all that obey the twentieth Canon of the Nicene Council And from all that obey the Councils that forbid communicating with a Fornicating Priest And from all that obey the Councils which nullifie the Episcopacy of such as are obtruded by Magistrates or not consented to by the Clergy and People And many more such Abundance more instances of their Separation and Damnation I might adde In a word I think their Principles are as I first said for damning and separating from all men living for all men living are gulity of some sort and degree of Schism that is of Errours Principles or Practices in which they culpably Violate that Union and Concord that should be among Christians and Churches Every defect of Christian Love and every sinful Errour is some degree of such a violation All Christians differ in as great matters as things indifferent And no man living knoweth all things Indifferent to be such And these men distinguish not of Schism nor will take notice of the necessary distinctions given in the third Part of the Treatise of Church Concord And solutio continui causeth pain nor do they at all make us understand what sort of Separation it is that they fasten on but talk of Separation in general as aforesaid LXXXVII They seem to be themselves deceived by the Papists in exposition of Cyprians words de Vnit. Eccles. Vnus est Episcopatus c. But they themselves seem to separate from Cyprian as a Schismatick and consequently from all the Church that hath profest Communion with him and with all the Councils and Churches that joyned with him For Cyprian and his Council erred by going too far from the Schism and Heresie of others nullifying all their Baptisms Ordinations and Communions And for this errour they declared against the Judgment of the Bishop of Rome and other Churches and they were for it condemned as Schismaticks by the said Bishop And here is a far wider Separation than we can be charged with 2. And Cyprians words came from the Mind that was possest with these opinions and are expressive of his Inclination 3. Yet they are true and good understood as he himself oft expounds them the Bishop of Oxford citeth some instances many more are obvious in which he opposeth the Bishop of Rome saying that none of them pretendeth to be a Bishop of Bishops and limiting every man to his own Province and saying that they were to give account to none but God with much the like But in what sence is Episcopacie one 1. Undoubtedly not as numerically in the personal Subjectum Relationis One Bishop is not another if you should say Paternity is One none believe that one mans Relation of Paternity is anothers The Relation is an accident of its own Subject as well as Quantity Quality c. 2. Nor doth any man believe that many Bishops go to make up one Bishop in Naturals 3. Nor did ever Cyprian hold or say that all Bishops go to make up one Politick Governing Aristocracie as many go to make one Senate or Parliament that hath a power of Legislation and Judgment by Vote as one Persona politica He never owned such a humane Soveraignty But Episcopatus unus est 1. In specie all Bishops have one Office 2. Objectivè As the Catholick Church is one whose welfare all Bishops ought to seek 3. And so finaliter as to the remote End and are bound to endeavour Concord 4. And as effects all are from one efficient institutor As it may be said that all official Magistracy in England is one 1. As from one King or summa potestas 2. As described by one Law and as Justices of one Species 3. As all their Cities and Counties and Hundreds are but part of one Kingdom whose welfare all are for 4. And as they are all bound to keep as much common Concord as they can if any mean more they should tell us what If any mean that all Bishops make one numerical Universal Government they are heinous Schismaticks and the Kingdom is Sworn against their Judgment And these Men damn them in damning Schismaticks The truth is Cyprian de Vnitate Ecclesiae leaving out the Papists additions is a good Book and worthy to be read of all and take Cyprian's Description of the Episcopacy of the Church which we must unite with and the nature of that Union and we would rejoyce in such But if Cyprian had lived to see either Arians or Donatists the greater number or any Sect after call themselves the Church because that Princes set them up and had seen them depose Chrysostome and such other doubtless he would never have pleaded the Unity of Episcopacy for this but have judged as he did in the Case of Martial and Basilides nor did he ever plead for an universal humane Soveraignty LXXXVIII If we are damned Schismaticks I can imagine no pretended manner of Separation in which our Schism consists but first either Local as such 2. Or Mental as such 3. Or Local caused by Mental If Local as such be it All Christians are Schismaticks for being locally separated from others and absent from all Churches and places save one If Mental Separation be it either all Mental Division is such or but some only if all then all mortal men are Schismaticks as differing in a multitude of things from others If it be not all what is it is it all difference in the Essentials of Christianity we grant it and we are charg'd with no such thing Is it all difference in the Integrals or Accidents so do all differ that are not perfect Is it all want of Love or all Vncharitableness to one another all on earth have some degree of it and those are likest to have most that do as the Bishops did against the Priscillianists bring godly people under reproach on pretence of opposing Heresie or that seek the Silencing Imprisonment Banishment or Ruine of men as faithful as themselves For our parts we profess it our great Duty to love all men as men all Christians as Christians all godly men as godly all Magistrates as Magistrates c. Is it for our separating in mind from any Principles in specie necessary to Communion in the Church Universal or single Churches let it be opened what those Principles be We own all Christianity and all Ministry of Gods Institution and all his Church Ordinances We own Bishops over their Flocks let them be never so large so they be capable of the Work and End and alter not the true species and we submit to any that shall by the Word admonish Pastors of many Churches of their Duty or Sin or seek their good Nor do we refuse Obedience to any humane Officers set up by Princes to do nothing against Christs Laws nor nothing but what is in Princes power in the Accidents circa Sacra Is it because we disown any Numerical Rulers we own the King and his Magistrates we own all that we can understand to be true
Worshipping him amounts to besides the Union of the Creature with the Creator in whom he liveth c. And no unregenerate ungodly Christian is united to him savingly 5. They are united among themselves 6. This is by a Covenant 7. And by a Covenant Divine as to command approbation and object It is God that they Covenant to own and obey The common Profession of the Mahometans is There is one God and Mahomet is his Prophet It is Divine in tantum as commanded For God Commandeth all men to Own him to believe that God is and that he is the Rewarder of them that diligently seek him And God so far approveth it St. Iames saith Thou dost well to him that believeth there is a God much more that is professedly devoted to him Let us by this examine the Jewish Church Iews now may be 1. A Body 2. Of Men 3. Separated from the rest of the World even in Religion and Church pretensions 4. United to God as Creatures as Men as the corporal seed of Abraham and as professing Belief Love and Obedience to God as their God 5. Strictly united among themselves 6. By a Covenant 7. Which God once commanded and still approveth so far as they own God Let us consider whether this description take not in those in every Nation that fear God and work Righteousness that never heard of Christ being thus combined And whether the Kingdom of God be not larger than his Church Joyn the Head and Tail of this mans book together and by the Head the description for ought I see Iews Mahometans if not almost all Heathens are the Church But at the End I think none on Earth is the Church At least none that separate from a pair of Organs or an ignorant Curate Nor can any man know who Page 2. § 2. He explaineth his Word Body as opposed to a confused Multitude A. But a Community of Equals that have no Governours may have order and â—e no confused Multitude And he himself after pleads over much for a necessity of Rulers P. 3. § 3. And in many places his Confusion and grand errour is repeated that the Christian Church is but one p. 7. We know no Church but what all Christians are members of by Baptsme which is the Vniversal Church p. 8. There is but one Church of which all Christians are members as there is but one Covenant p. 19. If there be but one Church and one Communion of which all true Christians are members c. p. 23. I am no otherwise a member of any particular Church than I am of the Vniversal p. 40. It 's a schismatical Notion of membership that divides the Christian Church into distinct memberships and therefore into the distinct Bodyes And p. 19. and often he saith those Churches which are not members of each other are separate Churches and Schismaticks A. I had hoped that no man but Mr. Cheny had talkt at this rate I. It 's agreed on that there is but one Universal Church The contrary is a Contradiction 2. It is agreed that there is no lawful particular Church which is not a part of the Universal 3. That whoever hath just Union and Communion with a true particular Church hath Union and Communion with the Universal 4. That all men in their Worship of God should accordingly perform it and do all that they do as Men in that Relation to the Universal Church None of this is controverted II. But I had hoped never to have heard any but Seekers say that there are not many lawful particular Churches distinct from the whole and from one another though not disjunct in the Common Essentials For the proof of the contrary 1. I begin with that which I expect should be most powerful The mans own after-Confessions to which he is oft brought Pag. 8. Distance of Place and the necessities and conveniences of Worship and Discipline has divided the Church into several parts and members and Particular Churches c. So pag. 14. pag. 19. All Christian Churches ought to be members of one More fully p. 20 21. This is ad hominem Yea and Nay is his Resolution 2. But I 'le bring other Arguments that prevail more with me The Sacred Scriptures oft tell us of many Churches therefore there are many Act. 9.31 The Churches had rest and 15.4 Confirming the Churches 16.5 So were the Churches established in the Faith Rom. 16.4 All the Churches of the Gentiles So ver 16. 1 Cor. 7.17 So ordain I in all Churches 11.16 Neither the Churches of God have such Custom 14.33 As in all the Churches of the Saints 34. Let your Women keep silence in the Churches So 16.1.19 2 Cor. 8.1 The Grace of God bestowed on the Churches of Macedonia 18. Whose Praise is in the Gospel through all the Churches So 19.23 24. and 11.8.28 The care of all the Churches 12.13 Inferior to the other Churches Gal. 1.2 22. 1 Thes. 2.14 2 Thes. 1.4 Rev. 1.4 To the seven Churches ver 11.20 Angels and Candlesticks of the seven Churches And 2.7 11 17 29. and 3.6 13 22 23. and 22.16 His Concordance might have shew'd him all these in order Phil. 4.15 No Church communicated with me concerning giving and receiving but ye only The dispute now must be whether the Apostles or this Resolver be to be believed They say there are many Churches parts of One he saith There is but one and it 's Schismatical to divide it into distinct memberships or Bodyes c. It 's no Schisme here to say I am for Paul and the Holy Scripture Let who will believe the contradictor 3. My next Argument is this Where there are many Political Societies consisting of Christian Pastors and People professedly associated for the ordinary Exercise of those Relations as such in holy Communion in Christian Doctrine Worship Order and Conversation for Edification in true Faith Hope Love and Obedience and the Glorifying of God therein There are many distinct true Churches parts of the Church Universal But on Earth there are many such Societyes c. Ergo c. Either the controversie is De re or de nomine for we called Separatists use to separate these 1. If de re Let the existence of the thing defined be tryed by Scripture Reason and common Experience 2. If de nomine Forma quae dat esse dat Nomen Here is the true specifick form which is found in many single Churches ergo the Name of such single or individual Churches is due to them 4. Again ad hominem from the consequences 1. If there be not many single Churches in the Universal then there are not many Patriarchal National Provincial Metropolitical Diocesan or Parochial Churches For non entium non datur numerus Many nothings is a contradiction Multae sunt ergo sunt Abest tertij adjecti ad est secundi valet argumentum But if there be not many then 1. All the Parish Churches in England being but one and not many
a Foot parts similar and dissimilar in man are all compounded of lesser Parts If many Students may make one Colledge why may not many Colledges make one University It 's strange if a Doctor deny this 3. But let us consider of his Reason and enquire 1. Whether the Church have all things Common 2. Whether the very Essence of it consist in this I. It is granted that the whole Essence of the Genus and Species is found in every individual of that Species Natural or Politick but did we ever hear till Mr. Cheny and this Doctor said it that Politick Bodies differ not numero as well as Natural The Kingdom of England and of France are two the Church of Rome and Constantinople long strove which should be uppermost but who ever said that they were not two II. Have they all things common Dissenters would have excepted Wives and Husbands th◠the Canons called Apostolical do not Why should the Essence of a Church lie in this and not the Essence of a City or Kingdom Tories in Ireland would have all common Merchants and Tradesmen Knights Lords and Princes here would not But it 's no Schism here also to distinguish simpliciter secundum quid Propriety and the use of Propriety There is no Community without Propriety Men have first a Propriety in themselves their members their food the acquests of their Labours their Wives and Children and Goods And they consent to Community to preserve this Propriety because every man loveth himself And yet they must use their Propriety even of Life for common good because all are better than one But if they had no Propriety they could not so use it for the Common-wealth And I never conformed to the Doctrine that denyeth Propriety in Church Members and Particular Churches and thought all simply common I 'le tell you what Particular Churches have to individuate them not common to all 1. They consist of individual natural Persons many of which as much differ from many other Persons those in England from those in Spain as one man doth from another 2. Their Graces and gifts are numerically distinct Faith Hope Love c. from those of other Churches thó ejusdem speciei 3. England and France London and Oxford have Churches of different place and Scituation 4. But the formal individuating difference is their nearest Relation to their several Pastors as several Kingdoms Cities Schools are numerically distinct by their distinct Kings Maiors School-masters so are several Churches ejusdem speciei 1. Thess. 5.12 13 Know those that are among you and over you in the Lord and esteem them highly in love for their Works sake As every mans Wife Children and Servants must be used for the common good and yet are not common one mans Wife and Children are not anothers So the Bishop of London of Oxford c. must govern his Church for the good of the Universal but he is not the Bishop of Gloucester Norwich Paris Rome These are differences enow to constitute a numerical difference of Churches Paul distinguisheth the Bishops of Philippi Ephesus c. from others Do you yet see no Priviledges that one hath Proper and not common to all none that make a difference in specie but both numerical and gradual 1. All Churches have not Bishop Iewel Bishop Andrews Doctor Stillingfleet Doctor Sherlock to be their Teachers All Churches be not taught all that 's in this Resolver 2. All Churches have not men of the same soundness nor excellency of Parts It was once taken for lawful to account them specially worthy of double honour who laboured in the Word and Doctrine and to esteem men for their works sake Paul saith of Timothy I have no man like minded If those that heard not a Sermon in many years differed not from your Congregation why do you preach I am reproached in Print for telling the world this notorious truth That I lived till ten years old where four men four years hired successively were Readers and School-masters two Preached as it was called once a Month the other two never Two drank themselves to beggery After I lived where many Parishes about us had no Preachers The Parish that I lived in had a Church with a Vicar that never preached and a Chappel with a Parson eighty years old that had two Livings twenty Miles distant and never preacht His Son a Reader and Stage-player was sometime his Curate His Grand-son my School-master his Curate next that never preacht in his life but drunk himself to beggery One year a Taylor read the Scripture and the old man the best of them all said the Commmon-Prayer without book for want of sight The next year a poor Thresher read the Scripture After that a Neighbours Son my Master was Curate who never preacht but once and that when he was drunk in my hearing on Mat. 25. Come ye Blessed and go ye Cursed the saddest Sermon that ever I heard These things were no rarities Now my assertion is That the Church that had such as Austin Chrysostome Iewel Andrews and such worthy men as London now hath many had Priviledges distinct from these and many the like that I was in If you say that every Bishop and Preacher is as much the Bishop and Preacher to all other single Churches as to that which is his Title then 1. He must be condemned for not teaching them all 2. Then he may claim maintenance from them all 3. Then he may intrude into any mans Charge 4. Then no Church is unchurcht for want of a Bishop for any one Bishop is Bishop to every Church in the World and so ubi Episcopus ibi Ecclesia signifieth but that Church and Bishop are on the same Earth and Ecclesia est Plebs Episcopo adunata may be verified if there be but one in the World 5. And so Mr. Dodwell and such are self-confuted before you are aware Geneva Holland and all Presbyterians are true Churches for they have all Bishops e. g. The Bishop of London is Bishop to them all For if one man be no more a Member of one single Church than of another and so no more a Subject to one Bishop than to another then one Bishop is no more Pastor of one Church than of another 7. And how can you magnifie the Church of England for a Wise Learned Pious Clergy above other Churches if all Priviledges be common and they have no proper Pastors of their own 8. Do you think that the Church e. g. Of Hippo that was in Austins dayes was the same numerical single Church with that which is there now were there any or with the Diocesan Church of London if not then at least distance of time and change of Persons maketh divers Particular Churches and it 's no more against the unity of the Church Universal to have divers particular Churches in it in the same Age than in divers Ages In short Diversity of matter and form maketh a numerical Diversity as of Natural
humane Covenant for Christ hath made but one Covenant with Mankind which is contained in the Vow of Baptism if it be then no man is a Christian but an Independent Ans. Alas for the Church that is taught at this rate 1. I never saw what Independents do in this case but I think none of them that are Sober own any other sort of Church but the universal and single Churches as members of it and therefore require no Contract but 1. To the Covenant of Baptism or Christianity 2. To the Duties of their particular Church-relation 2. And nothing is here of necessity but manifested Consent which is a real Contract but a clearer or a darker an explicite or implicite consent differ only ad meliús esse 3. Is not God the Author of Magistracy Marriage c. And is it any violation of Gods part if Rulers and People Husband and Wife be Covenanters by his command 4. Is it any renuntiation of Baptism to promise at Ordination to obey the Arch-Bishop and Bishop and to take the Oath of Canonical Obedience Is it not still exacted Are not the Takers of it obliged are not Covenants imposed on all that will be Ministers in the act of Uniformity are not multitudes kept out and cast out for not making these Covenants Quo teneam nodo c. How should one deal with such slippery men Good Mr. Zachary Cawdry that wrote to have all men to covenant Submission to Bishops and Parish Ministers did not dream that it was any violation of Baptism 5. Do not men owe duty to their Pastors which they owe to no others If not put them not on it Why are you angry with them for going from you Why doth the Canon suspend those that receive them to Communion from another Parish that hath no Preacher Why are we ruined for not covenanting as aforesaid if yea then is it against Baptism to promise to do our duty 6. But hath God commanded or instituted no Covenant but Baptism Yes sure the Matrimonial at least and I think Ordination is covenanting for the Ministry Did not the Apostle Acts 14.23 ordain Elders in every Church if you would have by Suffrage left out of the Translation no sober man can doubt but it was by the Peoples consent and was it without their consent that Titus was to ordain Elders in every City Could any then come otherwise in Did not all Churches hold and practise this after and was it none of Gods Institution If so God requireth us not to take any of you for our Bishops or Pastors Who then requireth it What meaneth Paul when he saith they gave up themselves to the Lord and to us by the Will of God 7. Can the wit of man imagine how it is possible without consent for a man to be made the Pastor of any Flock Who ever ordained a man against his will or for any man to have Title against his will to the proper over-sight and pastoral care of any one Pastor or the priviledges of any Church If any think they may be cramm'd and drencht with the Sacrament or that an unwilling man may have a sealed pardon and gift of Salvation delivered him he will make a new Gospel And how any particular Pastor is bound to give that man the Sacrament ordinarily that consents not ordinarily to receive it of him I know not No man is a member of any City or any Company of Free-men in the City but by mutual consent and the Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy to the King maketh not the Oath of a Citizen as such or of a Member of a Company as such unlawful 8. Doth this Doctor think that he ever yet proved to sober men that the Covenant aforesaid of Godfathers and Godmothers to make Christians and members of the universal Church is more or so much of Gods Institution than the Contract or Consent between Bishops or Pastors and People to make a single Political Church 9. If it follow not that no man is the Kings Subject that sweareth not to the City It will not follow that none is a Christian but an Independent or Church-consenter 10. How are your Parish or Diocesan Church members known to your selves or any others Are all that dwell in the Parish or Diocess your Church members Then Atheists Sadducees Hobbists and all vicious men and thousands that never communicate are such Yea those that you call Separatists If it be every transient Communicant have you a proper Pastoral care of every Travellers Soul that so communicates with you You after plead that his very ordinary Communion maketh him not a member if he be unwilling to be one And is not his consent then necessary Or if ordinary Communion be the test how few then of great Parishes are of the Church yet that is because such Communion signifieth their Consent to your over-sight of them § 9. But it 's much to be approved which p. 5. and oft he saith that to be taken into Covenant with God and to be received into the Church is the very same thing as to the Universal Church By which all his gross Schismatical Accusations afterwards are confuted No man then is out of the Church that is not out of the Baptismal Covenant either by not taking it or by renouncing some Essential part of it And when will he prove that to take him rather than Dr. Bates that was cast out to be a Teacher or Pastor at Dunstans or to take this man and not another to be the Lawful Bishop or Priest and to obey him in every Oath and Ceremony is an Essential part of the Baptismal Covenant or of Christianity But such a rope of Sand as Mr. Dodwell and this man tye together to bind men to their Sect will serve turn with some that know not who speaks Truth by any surer way than prejudice § 10. His Doctrine of Separation and gathering Churches out of Churches is anon to be considered But whereas he addes p. 7. These men convert Christians from common Christianity and the Communion of the Vniversal Church to Independency Ans. My acquaintance with them is small save by reading their Books And there are few Men of any Common Denomination Episcopal or other that are not in many things disagreed But I must in Charity to them say that as far as I can judge by their Writings or Speech he palpably slandereth them and that none that are grave and sober among them do separate their Churches from the common Christianity or the Universal Church any more than the Company of Stationers Ironmongers c. are separated from the City of London or London from England or Trinity Colledge from the University of Cambridge or Oxford I never met with man and I am confident never shall do that doth not take his Independent Church to be part of the Universal and Dependent as a part on the whole If belying others stopt at words the wrong were small But when it 's made but the
is to hold that some Church is perfect in Understanding Faith Hope and Practice without Ignorance Errour or Sin that is not to know what a man or a Christian on Earth is XXIII Much less do all Churches agree in unnecessary indifferent accidents nor ever did nor ever will or can do XXIV The measuring out Churches by limits of Ground Parochial or Diocesan is a meer humane ordering of a mutable accident and no Divine Determination And if all were taken for Church members-because they dwell in those precincts it were wicked But if it be but all in those precincts that are qualified Consenters it is usually a convenient measure But such as in many Cases must be broken XXV If a Church with Faithful Pastors be well setled in a place first where there are not more than should make up that one Church it is not meet for any there to gather a distinct Church thô of the same Faith without such weighty reason as will prove it necessary or like to do more good than hurt 1. Because Love inclineth to the greatest Union 2. Because a Great Church is more strong and honourable than a small if the number be not so great as to hinder the Ends. 3. And the Ancient Churches kept this Union XXVI If Magistrates make such Laws about Church Accidents as tend to further the Churches wellfare or are so pretended and not against it we must obey them But if they will either invade Christs Authority or cross it by making Laws against his or such as are proper to his Prerogative to make or invade the Pastors Office and the Churches proper right given by Christ or determine Accidents to the Destruction of the Substance the Church Doctrine Worship or Ends these bind the Consciences of none to Obedience but Christ must be obeyed and we must patiently suffer XXVII Self-interest Self-Government and Family-Government are all antecedent to Publick Government which Ruleth them for the Common good but hath no Authority to destroy them No King or Prelate can bind a man to do that which would damn his Soul nor to omit that which is needful to his Salvation All power is for Edification They are Gods Ministers for Good XXVIII As it belongs to self-government to choose our own Dyet and Cloaths and Wives and Physicians thô we may be restrained from doing publick hurt on such pretences And it belongs to Family Government to educate our own Children and choose their Tutors Callings Wives c. so it more nearly belongs to self-government to choose the most safe and profitable means of our own Salvation which no man may forbid us and to avoid that which is pernicious or hurtful and to Family-Government to do the like for our Children XXIX It is false Doctrine of those late Writers who tell us that only Sacraments sanctifie or give right to Salvation The whole Tenor of the Gospel tells us that men are brought to Faith and Repentance and to be Christians and Godly men and by Faith to be justified by the Preaching of the Gospel and that Gods word is his appointed means of Salvation which his Ministers must preach skilfully instantly in season and out of season to that End And if the Gospel be hid it is hid to them that are lost XXX The Gospel saveth not like a Charm by the bare sound or saying of the words nor the Sacrament like an Amulet But as a Moral means specially blest by him that instituted it to work on man as Mâ—n by informing his Mind perswading his Will and exciting his Affections as Men are wrought on in other Cases which methinks those called Arminians should least deny who are said to lay more of the Spirits operation on Moral suasion than their Adversaries yea and those that account it Fanaticism to expect any other gift of Prayer from the Spirit but what is given morally by use And the contrary Doctrine feigneth God to Work even constantly by Miracle And as the Papists make every Mass-Priest a Miracle Worker in Transubstantiation so do they that make the bare saying over the Words and doing the outward Acts in the Sacrament to save us ex opere operato and the Pastoral teaching and oversight of an ignorant drunken Lad or Reader to be near as great a help to Salvation as the Ministry of a wise skilful Holy and exemplary Pastor and the clear affectionate Preaching of Gods word And that tell us as Mr. Dodwell how sufficient a man is to administer the Sacramental Covenant that understands what a Covenant is in matters of Common Conversation XXXI If a Wise and Skilful and Conscionable Ministry be as needless to Edification and Salvation as some Men pretend it is as needless that they should study to be such and vain to Glory that they are such and that the Church of England hath such a Ministry and vain to expect that men should pay them any more respect than I owed my Master that never preacht but once and that drunken and divers very like him Or that they should use this as an argument to draw men to hear them XXXII If the King or Law should settle a Physician of his or a Patrons choice in every Parish it were well done if it be but to have help at hand for Volunteers But if he command all to use them and to use no other before them or against them where unskilful or untrusty men are placed no man is bound to obey this command No mens Law can dissolve the Law of Nature nor disoblige a man from a due care of his Life nor bind him to cast it away upon Obedience to ignorant or bad and treacherous Men. And a mans Soul is more precious than his Health or Life and he is bound to greater care of it and is no more to trust it on the will of his Superiours How vast is the difference between an ignorant rash Physician or Pastor and one that is wise experienced and trusty They that scorn Men for going for greater edification from one to another do not so if a man prefer a skilful Physician to one that kills more than he cures or a skilful and careful Tutor for his Son yea or a Farrier for his Horse XXXIII If one Preacher be not for Edification to be greatâ—â— preferred before another then One Book is not And so it 's no matter what Book they read or value and what a Student will this make And what a Trade for the Booksellers And why then should their own Books be so valued And why then do they silence hundreds or thousands and forbid them to preach on pain of ruine thô no false Doctrine be proved against them if they think not that the difference is very great XXXIV When Councils hereticated and condemned Thousands or Hundreds of Priests and Bishops whom Christian Emperours and Princes owned as Orthodox they did not then think every Patron Prince or Prelate a competent Judge with what Pastor Men should
should not only hold any errour or practise sin but require men to subscribe and approve it and say it is no sin no man ought to do this nor yet to live like an Atheist and forsake all Worship because men forbid him if it were but to subscribe one untruth But alas this is no rare Case In one Emperours Reign all were Anathematized that subscribed not to the Council of Chalcedon and quickly after all that did or that would not renounce it The same division and changes were made by the Councils against and for the Monothelites de tribus Capitulis Images c. And when all Men living have many Errours and the Church of England disclaimeth her Infallibility and yet will receive no Minister that will not subscribe that there is nothing in her Books contrary to the word of God the Case is hard But when all the things mentioned in the Plea for Peace are proved lawful we shall be more yielding in this Case XLV 9. If true and sound Christians mistakingly think one or many things to be heinous sins as Perjury Lying Renouncing Obedience to God and Repentance c. which are things indifferent but of so great difficulty that most Learned and Godly and Willing Men cannot discern the Lawfulness and agree and yet are not necessary nor just conditions of Ministry or Communion and so it is the Imposer that entangleth them by difficulty in their dissent it is not lawful for these men therefore to forbear all Church Worship but must use it as they can XLVI 10. If any Church unjustly excommunicate such men or others they must not forbear all Church order and worship because men so excommunicate them No man must Sin to escape Excommunication and every man in the World is a sinner And therefore all the World must be excommunicated if all Sinners must be so As I before said the times oft were when almost all the Bishops in the Empire were excommunicated by one another Councils and Popes have oft excommunicated some for trifles and some for Truth end Duty And such must not therefore renounce all Church Worship and Communion The Church of England do by their standing Law ipso facto excommunicate all as aforesaid that affirm any thing to be repugnant to Gods Word or sinful in their whole Church Government Articles Liturgy and Ceremonies and so to stand till they Publickly revoke this as a wicked Errour Now many Lords and Commoners in Parliaments have spoken against some of these particulars and some out of Parliament Many Ministers have done the like when the King Commissioned them to treat for Alterations And many when the Accusations or demands of others have called them to give a Reason of their Actions Some have maintained that it is repugnant to Gods word that Lay Civilians should have the decretive Power of the Keyes and that the Parish Minister must cast out of Communnion all that the Lay Doctors or Chancellors excommunicate and all that dare not receive kneeling and that they should deny Christendom to all that scruple the English sort of God-Fathers Covenants and the transient Symbolical Image of the Cross with abundance such things Now all these are ipso sacto excommunicate And thô they be not bound to avoid the Church till this be applicatorily declared yet actually excommunicate they are and that by a higher authority thâ—n the Bishops and they know the Churches decree and the Priests are sworn to Canonical Obedience And he that will not tempt them to be forsworn nor come into a Church that hath excommunicated him seems therein excuseable But must he therefore renounce the Church of God XLVII 11. If the People are so set against one Bishop for another as that half being for one and half for the other and both Orthodox they cannot be perswaded to unite in one A Council at Rome determined in the Case of Paulinus and Flavian at Antioch that both of them should hold their distinct Churches and so live in love and peace And though one or both parties in this were mistaken Sinners so are all morral men who yet must not live like Atheists XLVIII 12. An undetermined accident must be so determined as most serveth to do the greatest good and avoid the greatest Evil But whether divers Churches shall promiscuously live in the same City or Diocess or Parish is an Accident not determined by God and either way may be for the greatest good as circumstances vary e. g. When in a Church half cannot consent to condemn the words of Theodoret Theodore Mopsuest and Ibas and half will condemn them with the Council if these can serve God quietly in Love and Peace in different Congregations but cannot endure one another in the same it is most for the Churches Peace that they be permitted to joyn with those of their own Mind When one Pope declared that it 's sound Doctrine to say One of the Trinity was Crucified when another had declared that it is not sound Doctrine they that held with one Pope and they that held with the other might both be true Churches in different Assemblies When Iustinian raised the bloody controversie between the Corrupticolae and the Phantasiastae wise men thought both sides were true Churches Yea and so did many wise men think of the Orthodox and Nestorians and many Eutychians XLIX 13. It 's a common case under Turks and Heathens that they give liberty of Conscience for Christians of all parties Now suppose that in Aâ—â—ppo in Constantinople or elsewhere there be partly for Countrey sake and partly for Language but most for different Judgments one Church of Armenians one of Greeks one of English-men c. what Law of God makes only one of these to be a true Church and which is it L. 14. Suppose that the setled Church e. g. in Holland Sweden Saxony is for Presbytery or for an Episcopacy that arose from Presbyters ordination or that had none or a short Liturgy and the Prince would tolerate English men as Frankford did to set up a Church of the English Form and Liturgy I think few Prelatists would deny it to be lawful LI. I omit other instances and come to the matter of Separation which word serveth this man and such other in so general and undistinguished a sence as would make one think he were of Mr. Dodwell's mind That words in dispute have but one signification which all are bound to know that use them Even a Bell by the same sound sometime signifieth a call to Church and sometime a Funeral and sometime Joy but Separate Separate is rung over and over with these men as if it signified but one thing 1. He that heareth half the Sermon and Service and goeth out of Church doth Separate at that time from the rest When a Protestant Heretick was doing Penitence with his Faggot at St. Maries in Oxford and the Fryer was Preaching a mistaken Voice in the street made them think the Hereticks had set the
they cannot change their mindes 1. Whether they will be damned as Excommunicate and practical Atheists that give over all Church Worship 2. Or as damnable Schismaticks for worshipping God in Churches when they are excommunicate 3. Or as perfidious Lyars that will make false Confessions Profession and promises to get off an Excommunication When Mr. Dodwel numbers those with Schismaticks that suffer themselves to be excommunicate if they have no other means in their Power to hinder it it seems these great Enemies to absolute reprobation do think all Christians being unavoidably born to imperfection of Knowledg are as unavoidably born to damnation whenever Prelates or Priests please thus to precipitate them LXXXVI 2. Particularly 1. The first and second Canons ipso facto excommunicate all that say that any manner of Obedience and Subjection within his Majesties Realms and Dominions is due to any usurped and foreign Power By this all Papists and all pretended Protestants such as Dr. Barrow confuteth who hold any manner of Obedience and Subjection due to Pope or Foreign Councils are Excommunicate 2. Those that say that the Book of Common Prayer containeth any thing in it repugnant to the Scriptures are ipso facto excommunicate Which now by the new Laws are interpreted of the present Books 3. In this all are excommunicate who say the Mis-translations in Psalms Epistles or Gospels of which many instances have been given to be any thing repugnant in the Scripture 4. And all that say It is against the Scripture to deny Christendom to all Infants that have not such Vowers in their Names and for their Education as we call Godfathers and Godmothers thô the Parent who is forbidden it offer his Child by Sponsion 5. And all that say it is against Scripture to deny Christendom to all that refuse the Covenanting transient Images of a Cross. 6. And all that say that it is against Scripture for all Ministers to profess that it 's certain by Gods Word that baptized Infants without exception so dying are undoubtedly saved when no word of God is cited that saith it and adding to Gods word is dreadfully threatned and when it 's certain that all Ministers are not certain of any such thing and I think no one 7. All are ipso facto excommunicate that say It is against Gods Word to deny Church Communion in the Sacrament to all that dare not take it kneeling for fear thô mistaken of breaking the second Commandment by Symbolizing with Idolaters that are seeking to reduce the Nation to their Sin and that live round about us 8. All are excommunicate that say it is against Scripture to pronounce all saved that are buryed except the unbaptized self-murderers and the excommunicate while thousands of Sadducees Hobbists Infidels Papists Perjured Adulterers Drunkards c. dwell among us 9. By the fifth Canon all are ipso facto excommunicate that say Any of the Articles are in any part erroneous or such as they perhaps as doubters may not with a good Conscience subscribe to and consequently all the aforesaid Conformists that think the sence erroneous while they subscribe those words and shall affirm e. g. that Canons are made necessary to Salvation thô the matter cannot be proved by Scripture contrary to Art 6. Those that contrary to Art 8. say any thing in Athanasius Creed may not be subscribed Such as Bishop Taylour that against Art 9. deny Original Sin Those that say contrary to Art 10. that the Word no Power excludeth Common natural Power or maketh Nature to be Grace Those that write against our being accounted righteous only for Christs merits and say that another subordinate Righteousness is named many hundred times in Scripture contrary to Art 11. Those that contrary to Art 13. say that works done before the Inspiration of the Spirit may make men meet to receive Grace Those that with Dr. Hammond write for works that are not commanded but counselled and Free-will-offerings contrary to Art 14. All they that take Infants and new baptized Persons to have no sin contrary to Art 15. All that say that after we have received the H. Ghost we cannot depart from Grace given contrary to Art 16. Those that deny the Doctrine of Election in Art 17. Those that say any on Earth may be saved by diligent living according to the light of Nature without knowing the name of Christ contrary to Art 18. Those that contrary to Art 19. reject that Description of a visible Church which reacheth to such as our Resolver damneth All that contrary to Art 20. say that the Church may not enforce any thing to be believed for necessity to Salvation besides the Scripture even those that say it 's necessary to Salvation by avoiding Schism to believe that all imposed Tyths Covenants Practices and Ceremonies are not sin All that contrary to Art 21. say that General or other Councils may be gathered without the command and will of Princes and deny they may erre and things ordained by them as necessary to Salvation have neither Strength nor Authority unless it may be declared that they are taken out of Holy Scripture Those that deny Art 23. that those are lawfully called and sent into the Ministry who have publick Authority given them in the Congregation to call and send Ministers into the Lords Vineyard are chosen and called hereto for want of Canonical Succession Those that contrary to Art 24. would have Gods Worship performed to them that understand not the language to avoid the Schism of having many Churches in a City Those that take Confirmation or Penance or the other three for Sacraments of the Gospel contrary to Art 25. Those that contrary to Art 26. would not have it believed to be the Peoples duty who know the Offences of Bad Ministers to accuse them All that contrary to Art 27. are against Infant Baptism as agreeable to Christs Institution All that contrary to Art 28. say the Body of Christ is given and taken and eaten in the Sacrament otherwise than in a Spiritual manner by Faith All that say that in some wise the wicked are Partakers of Christ in the Sacrament contrary to Art 29. All that contrary to Art 30. say There is other satisfaction for Sin besides Christs Blood All that say that Men justly Excommunicate may be reconciled and received by the multitude without open penance which is ordinary contrary to Art 33. All that contrary to Art 34. think that a General Council may ordain such Traditions or Ceremonies as shall in all places be one or the like and that every Particular or National Church may not abolish those Ceremonies or Rites which the General Council or Colledge ordained Many things in the Book of Homilies especially against peril of Idolatry are blamed by many Conformists contrary to Art 35. All that contrary to Art 36. say that the Book of Ordination wants some things necessary All that contrary to Art 37. think that Pope or foreign Bishops have any
there being somewhat opposite in all men and Churches on Earth you damn your selves for Communicating with them 9. That a man may have more Communion with the Church which he Locally separateth from even for sin than with that which he is present with E. g. A Congregation or Nation of men of eminent Sanctity and Order â—ound Doctrine and Worship may by humane frailty take some one falsehood or uncertain thing to be necessary to Ministry or Communion as they say some Churches unhappily of late reject all that own not the Antiquity of the Hebrew Points I cannot have local Communion with that Church for they will not receive me unless I subscribe either a falshood or that which I judge false but yet I highly honour and love them and have mental Catholick Communion with them when perhaps necessity may make me Locally join with a Church of far worse men and Order that will impose no sin on me 10. And I would advise these men did they not despise my advice for the Church of Englands sake and their own to retract their Errours and not lay such a Snare before the People Should you say in the Pulpit If the Church be guilty of any Schism by her Impositions oft-named Excommunications and silencing of Christs Ministers and afflicting good people without just Cause then I and all that communicate with it and me communicate in the guilt of Schism and are all in as much danger of Damnation by it as Adulterers and Murderers tell not your hearers this for if you do some will think you bid them separate or be damned and only make a doubt whether most men have Noses or not XCII Qu. But is not the Inference true Ans. No it 's false There are twenty cases in which 1. One may be guilty of Schism and not be a Schismatick as denominated from what predominateth 2. And as many in which he is not at all guilty that communicateth with the guilty And let the world that is sober and awake judge now whether these men or we be the greater Schismaticks and which more condemneth or separateth from the Church of England We say that all Churches have some degree of Schism and so hath the Church of England as it hath imperfection Errour and Sin but that it is not therefore no Church nor is it unlawful to communicate with it All Christians and Churches must not be separated from that are guilty of some degree of Schism If any will turn these Serious matters into Jest and say as Dr. Sayâ—â—ll that they will receive Greeks Lutherans c. that come to their Communion his Serious Readers will tell him that so will most Sects receive those that approve of their Communion and come to them Joyning with you signifyeth that they are of your way therein But will you go to their Churches and Communicate with them You will receive the damned Schismaticks if they come to you when yet you make it damnable to joyn in their meetings with them This quibbling beseems not grave men in great matters To conclude Reader God having allowed more Legislative Power to men in things Secular than in Religion I may say this case is like ours in debate I. Some Judges and Lawyers say that the Oath of Allegiance makes a Subject in this Kingdom that the Renouncing or Violating it by Treason or Rebellion or deserting the Kingdom overthrows the Relation But that other particular faults or quarrels against Neighbours Justices Judges yea the King himself are punishable according to the Laws but are not all Rebellion nor dissolve Subjection nor oblige the Subjects to renounce civil converse with each other though some contempt and obstinacy may outlaw them Such is our Judgment of Church Relation and Communion which I need not rehearse II. Suppose a sect of Lawyers and Judges arise that say no men are the Kings Subjects but are Rebels that break any of his Laws that Shoot not in long Bows that Bury not their dead in Woollen that swear prophanely that eat flesh in Lent unlicensed that have any unjust Law-Suit that wrong any Neighbour that oppress any Poor man all these are Rebels yea all that plead opposite Causes at the Bar and all Judges that judge contrary to one another and all that misunderstand any point of Law and Practice accordingly and all that besides the Oath of Allegiance do constitute Marriages Families Schools Societyes by any other Covenants of their own and all that are of different Cities and Companies parts of the Kingdom or all whose Justices Mayors Sheriffs c. differ from one another in any point of Law and practice Or all that obey not every Constable and Justice or that go to divers Justices in the same Precincts or that go from one Justice to another to avoid unrighteous Judgment or that go from the Physician of the Place for Health and from the Schoolmaster of the Town for greater edification or that Travel beyond Sea for Knowledge yea all that understand not every word in the Law that may concern them If any say none of these are the Kings Subjects but Rebels opposite to him and one another and deserve to be all hang'd as Murderers and so are all that have Communion with them Quaere 1. Whether these men are for the Unity of England 2. And are Friends to the King that deprive him of all his Subjects as much as those that would have him have no Subjects that be not of the same Age Stature Complexion and Wit 3. And whether they are Friends to Mankind 4. And whether they condemn not themselves if they live not as Anchorets out of humane Society 5. And whether that Nation be not by infatuation prepared for Destruction that would believe them and would hate scorn and ruine them that are of the first mentioned opinion according to the saying Quos perdere vult Iupiter hos dementat As to the more dangerous Doctrine now threatning this Land that would subject England to a Foreign Jurisdiction on pretence of a Necessity of either an Universal Church Monarch or Church-Parliament Senate or Council or of all the Church on Earth represented by Patriarchs or Metropolitans or that plead for Subjection to them under the Name of Communion they require a distinct Answer But Dr. Is. Barrow and Mr. Beverley's Catholick Catechism have effectually done it FINIS THE SECOND PART AGAINST SCHISM BEING ANIMADVERSIONS On a Book famed to be Mr. Raphson's LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside near Mercers-Chappel 1684. TO THE READER Reader WHEN I had Written the first of these Discourses I came after to know more of the Authors Iudgment by another Book against me which I also Answered but it lyeth by unprinted I also wrote for the use of some private Friends my Reasons for Communion with those parish-Parish-Churches who have Capable Ministers which many Importuned me to Print but that also is yet undone But a Book famed to
be Mr. Raphsons coming out I thought it my duty to Animadvert on that and to bear my Testimony against Schism on both Extreams lest I be guilty of Partiality and of the Sin and suffering of many that may be deceived by them If these Two be not overmuch discouraged the other Two against both the Extreams may come hereafter THE SECOND PART AGAINST SCHISM c. The Reasons of Mr. Raphson and such others against going to the parish-Parish-Churches considered THE Matter of his Book as against Persecution is very considerable the Stile is very close and pungent His Doctrine against Communion with the Churches that use the Liturgy is that which I examine The sum of it is 1. That kneeling at the reception of the Sacrament and the use of the Liturgy are unlawful 2. That they are false Worship and Idolatry 3. That the places where they are used are Idol-Temples 4. That to joyn there in them is to partake in Idolatry 5. The proof of all this is by this Argument Worship not institute is not lawful but kneeling in receipt of Bread and Wine is Worship not instituted by Christ therefore not lawful therefore not pleasing p. 160 161. To which by way of Motive he addeth p. 275. How many once in the separation are returned back to the Vomit they once cast up and wallow in the mire of a worldly worship c. Is compliance in Idol-Temples going to Dan and Bethel bowing to Baal sitting or drinking with the supersâ—itious in acts of religious adoration a witness for or against defection Are you turned as silly sheep that once were called shepherds to bleat after other shepherds that Christ never sent nor bid you go after them c. Looks it not like a declining of the Camp of Christ the work of the Gospel and setting your face towards Babel c. Is scandal of no weight with you c. How dare you venture your souls to sit under Means that he says shall not profit you and which is worse lies under his curse Ier. 23.32 Mal. 1.14 with more such Either this Writer knoweth how ill he dealeth with his Reader or not If he do it 's a double fault if not which I think it 's a doleful case that every well-meaning man that can but be confident in his ignorance and error and father it on God should become such a snare to them that cannot see through his Pretences and should himself suffer for sinning and call it the Cause of God and condemn all that sin not as confidently as he and hereby harden his afflicters by shewing them his weakness and impenitently justifying his sin If he would not have ensnared his Reader he should first have opened the meaning of the words of his Question that they might know how much of the Dispute is material and how much only about words 2. And then he should have so proved his assertion and accusation as might satisfie a good Conscience in a matter wherein God the Church and Souls are so much concerned and not have poured out Accusations by way of Motives upon unproved and false suppositions I find but one Argument which I shall now answer plainly His Major is Worship not instituted is not lawful Ans. 1. The word Worship in general signifieth 1. Any thing done in honour to another and so all our obedience to God is Worship It is to his glory that we must do all I suppose that this he meaneth not 2. Any immediate act or expression of the honour and reverence of the heart If this be not it that he meaneth by Worship I know not what he meaneth This Worship as within is the secret act of the soul as exprest it is the act of the body Of such Worship there are two sorts One sort is made necessary statedly by God's commanding it in particular To this no man must add the like or from it diminish any thing so commanded either pretending God's authority or his own The other sort is but the subordinate ordering of the former and is but the manner of doing it This God doth not institute in particular but only give man a general Rule how to choose it himself which is That all be done in love and to edification decently and in order Either this latter sort is to be called Worship or not If it be then it falls under his opposition If not then 1. He must give us a definition of Worship which shall exclude it and so Worship must be somewhat else than the direct or immediate acting or expressing honour to God And then who knows what he meaneth by it 2. And then when we plead for mens making none but this he should to avoid deceit confess that the Controversie is only of the Name whether Modes and Circumstances of God's instituted Worship may be called Worship and not at all of the Thing whether it be lawful or not This had been like a Christian Teacher Now I answer 1. to his first Proposition 1. Worship which is neither instituted particularly nor in the general appointing man how to choose it is unlawful 2. And to invent worship without God's allowance contrary or of the same kind as if he had not done his part is unlawful 3. But for man to choose and use such worship as is but the right ordering of God's Institutions is commanded by him and a Duty and therefore not unlawful 2. As to his Minor or Second Proposition I answer Kneeling at the Sacrament and communicating with Parish Churches that have tollerable Ministers are not instituted of God in particular but the Genus of them is instituted and we commanded to choose our selves according to God's general Rules to the best of our understanding and so they are our Duty and not unlawful I give the Instances of these two sorts of worship First God hath Instituted that our Minds Worship him in believing and receiving all his Gospel Revelations and trusting them and in desiring all things Petitioned in the Lords Prayer and in consenting to all commanded in the Scriptures and in Dedicating our selves to him cordially in Baptism and renewing it in the Lords Supper in commemoration of Christ's Death till he comes He hath Instituted the Corporal Expresions of all these That we confess Christ in all the necessary Articles of Faith That we ask the Petitions of the Lords Prayer That we perform the Commands of the Decalogue towards God and all others in the Scripture These are the Instituted Worship which none must alter Secondly The Manner and Ordering which is the Second sort which I leave every one to call Worship or not when they have defined Worship which man may and must chuse himself without any Particular Institution of God contain such Acts as these 1. Undetermined gestures of Reverence and Honour in time of Publick Worship As to be uncovered or put off the Hat at Prayer or the Lord's Supper This we do directly in honour and reverence to God whom
the Catholick Church is Ans. He maketh me think of the Man's Answer to the Pharisee John 9. I have told you and you heard not Would you hear it again If you would know what Unity is in uno which is affectio entis I must again send you to Schibler or Suarez or some such Tutor for I am not meet to tutor you If you would know in what this Unity consisteth I have told you before and oft § 16. But tho this Doctor use it not we use first to enquire whether the Controversie be de nomine or de re And 1. If I satisfie him what maketh the Church to be One will he grant that if we agree in that Union we are in Catholick Communion If he will we shall soon be Friends and no Schismaticks at least with any that knows what Unity is If he will not doth he not all this while abuse his Reader when he so hotly damneth us for want of Catholick Communion and tells us that he meaneth Unity and chargeth me with wilfulness or nonsense if I think that he meaneth any transient act But 1. De nomine I will once more tell him why I distinguish Unity and Communion and think he should have done so too Words in Dispute are to be used in the sense that Men of the Profession which the Subject most belongs to use them unless otherwise explained But Men that write of Logick Metaphysicks Physicks and Politicks use to distinguish Unity from Communion so far as that usually Communion presâ—pposeth Unity secundum quid and ever includeth some transient Acts when Unity is but the denomination of Eus qua Uâ—um I hope I may take the Language of our Creed to be so tollerable as that it is not necessary to salvation to condemn it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is by the Church of England which I hope is no damned Schismatical Sect translated the Communion of Saints That by Communion they mean some tâ—anâ—ient Acts and not meer Union all Expositors that ever I read among them shew as do all the Fathers and all Forreign Interpreters that I have read At least methinks he should not disdain to learn his Grammar again of Dr. Hammond and Dr. Heylin I remember not that ever I read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 translated Communion Indeed Eph. 4.3 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 expresseth Communion in transient acts but bare Unity doth not But Communion must maintain it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in the bond of peace King Iames so liked Bishop Usher's Sermon on that Text that a Knight then near him told me that when by his winking posture the Courtiers thought he had been asleep at the end of the Sermon he spake aloud This is the Religion that I will live and die in or to that sense The regardful reading of consenting learned Commentators on Eph. 3.4 5 6 7. Verses might have quenched this fire-â—rand Indeed I believe with Beza that they who translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by meer participation say too little For it is not all participation which is the Communion which many Texts express but such a participation as connoteth an Union in quibusdam For Union absolute and simple is uncapable of Communion except with some other thing having no parts 1 Iohn 1.6 7. we are said to have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with God and with Christ or one another I find no Expositor that taketh this for meer Union Some call it Partnership some Society some Friendship others Communion but all take it to include transient acts Dr. Hammond goeth so far from this Doctor that he will have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 almost every where in the New Testament to signifie Communication by transient acts Yea he goeth so far from his Friend Grotius who placeth it in the exercise of Friendship that he saith It is appliable to Friendship or Society no otherwise than to knowledg or anything else So he expoundeth Rom. 15.26 2 Cor. 8.4 2 Cor. 9.13 Phil. 1.5 Heb. 13.16 Phil. 6. and the Creed Tho for my part I doubt not but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 1.9 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Phil. 2.1 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 10.16 c. do signifie such a participation of that which is common to them all as implieth and connoteth that Unity which is the thing signified in this Communion tho it includes transient acts II. I should now again answer his question de re What makes all these Churches one But he stops me with a profession that he will not be to me intelligible and complaineth that I am unintelligible to him So that we seem Barbarians or Men of strange Languages in disputing with one another And it would be no edifying work for any to hear e. g. a Dutch-man and a Spaniard dispute in their several Tongues not understanding one another When I distinguisht of unifying the Church and uniting a single Member to it he tells me That he supposeth the particular Churches formed and particular Christians united to them and only enquireth how they are one Church and saith my distinction is to prevent understanding which his confusion promoteth And when I distinguish between Union in essential parts and in integral parts and in accidents without which distinction no true satisfaction can be given to the Querist he saith He perceiveth that we shall never come to the business for he did not enquire wherein the Essence of a Church consists or what degrees of Communion are more or less necessary to its being but how a thousand Churches become one Church Ans. Which words are to me as unintelligible as any Nonsence Doth any thing make it One Church but that which maketh it A Church Doth not that which maketh it eus existens make it Unum Doth not the word Church name its Essence If he ask me how the parts of Man come to make One Man Who would think but he meant either One Man essential or else improperly One entire Man And what Answer would any give but this If your how mean what was the efficient cause it 's God and the Generators If you mean what are the constitutive causes They are Soul and Body united that make a Man in Essence and the integrating parts united that make him an entire Man O! but saith our Doctor I ask not wherein the Essence of the Church consists Ans. Then you ask not what maketh it One in constitution What then do you mean unless it be the efficient cause which no Man would think you meant that read the rest of your Book For my part I despair of knowing what you mean till you have better learned to speak But this seemeth to imply that we are agreed of the constitutive Causes of the One Catholick Church and our disagreement were of the Efficient If that be it I 'le tell you what maketh the Church One efficiently 1. God maketh Man to be Man and so capable
matter 2. God gave Christ to be the Mediator and Head 3. God made by Christ the Covenant of Grace by which as by a Law and Gift he determineth of the Conditions of Church-Relation and Benefits and commandeth Man's belief and consent and professeth his own acceptance of such consenters 4. His Ministers and Word perswade Men to believe and consent 5. His Spirit efficiently causeth Men to believe and consent 6. At that time God's conditional grant becometh actual and giveth them actually a right and relation to Christ and his Benefits 7. Thereupon Christ's Ministers solemnize this Covenant declaring God's acceptance and by Baptism investing the person in the visible possession of his relation to Christ and all his Members the person professing his believing which maketh it a mutual Covenant the Parent doing it for Infants These Seven Acts go to make up the total efficient Cause of the Churches Essence and Unity and each Members Union therein And if you exclude any one of them you will be a false Teacher Is there any room here for a Controversie among Christians The Father the Son the Holy Ghost the Covenant and Law the Consenter the Minister and Baptism all make up the efficient Cause of the Churches Essence And that which maketh it a Church maketh it One Church As that which maketh it an House a Ship a Family a School a Kingdom maketh it thereby One House One Ship One Family c. for eus unun convertuntur § 17. But tho his Question How that ambiguous Syllable enquire not of the Churches Essence and of what who knows yet p. 43. he ventures to enquire of it upon my words it is only essential to the Church that there be an organized Body of Pastors and People united to Christ the Head saith he Here I agree with Mr. B. if he would add One Body for that is the thing in dispute Whether Christ have one or a thousand bodies Ans. I pray you remember this happy agreement that we agree of the Churches Essence But is not A Body the Singular Number If I say that a man is corpus organicum and a rational soul united do I need to put in One Body or One Soul while unum is entis inseparabilis affectio Good Doctor why must not Verum and Bonum be named with every eus in a definition as well as Unum Can it be a Body and not One Body O! what a Jest will School-boys make of us for such disputing 3. But the pretended disagreement is much worse asserted Is that the Controversie Whether Christ have One Body or a Thousand Would you make men believe that we deny the Unity of the Universal Church If you would prove it or blush 2. Do you your self deny the being of Thousands of particular Churches which are parts of the Universal When you have seemed long to do it you come again and confess such Churches and condemn us as separating from them 3. Is the Controversie whether these single Churches de nomine may be called so many Bodies of Christ 1. Name the men that so call them and prove it or confess your self a false Accuser 2. If they did an unfit Name is not an error de re I never heard man so speak We say that the word Church used for the Universal and the Particular is not univocally used but analogically expenuriâ nominum As oft the whole and part have one Name We say that as an hundred Cities and Counties may make one Kingdom and were they all equivocally called Republicks or Kingdoms it would be no change in the Doctrine All the Christian World call the universal and the particulars by the name of Church And yet if to help us out of the Equivocation you will invent a better Name and get men to consent to it not reprehending the Scripture-use we will hearken to you But as One Kingdom is individuate by One King and yet subordinate Societies may have subordinate individuating Heads so is it here And it 's grosly unfit to say Christ hath many Bodies tho he have many Churches in one as the King hath many Cities but one Kingdom here But he adds If but One how do all the Christians in the World make up that one Body How must not be explained If by how he meant by what efficiency I have told you If it mean by what constitutive Causes it is by Form and Matter united If it be any Mode that you mean vouchsafe to tell us what § 18. P. 43. he goes on thus reciting some of my words In this definition Christ only is the supreme constitutive summa potestas or regent part The organized body of Pastors and People is the pars subdita and the Union of Christ and that body maketh it a Church And saith he This is very well But the main doubt still remains untouched What is it that makes all the Christian Pastors and People in the World to be but One Church Ans. Contra negantem principia non est disputandum This intimateth that eus unum non convertuntur And that besides that which maketh it a Church somewhat else must go to make it one Whether your obstinate equivocation in the word make shall be by you expounded of the efficient or constitutive causes in this it 's all one That which maketh it a Church doth thereby without any more causality make it one Church This is as if he said We are agreed what maketh a Man an House a City a Book c. but we agree not what maketh him One Man and so of the rest Nothing but that which maketh him a Man and causeth the existing Essence Matter and Form united constitutively And efficiently all that which causeth Matter and its Disposition which Aristotle calls Privationâ— and Form and their Union But Reader it 's so hard to understand such a Speaker that we must â—ift every doubtful word lest he come again and say we wilfully mistake him Who knows but the Doctor hath a Câ—tâ—urnus in the word but and the question be What maketh this the only Church or that God hath no other but one As if the question were What made Adam at first the only man in the World or the Israelites the only peculiar Nation I answer Nothing in Adam nothing in Israel and so nothing in the Church can be the cause of Nothing No Man no Nation no Church speak Nothing Not to make another is nothing but the words are a meer Negation And Nothing hath no Cause What is the Cause that there is not another Sun Why Nothing hath no Cause But if we must give any other Answer it must be only by calling the Negation of a Cause by the Name of a Cause and saying that the Cause why there is but one Sun that we know of and one Church Universal is because God made no more § 19. The Doctor proceeds Nor does his similitude help him out which is so admirable in its Philosophy and
Col. 1.18 19. He is the head of the body the Church In him all fullness dwells 2.3 In whom are hid the treasures of wisdom and knowledg 9. In him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily 17.19 The body is of Christ the head from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministred knit together increaseth with the increase of God 3.3 4. Your Life is hid with Christ in God when Christ our Life shall appear 11. Christ is all and in all 1 John 1.2 The Life was manifested and we have seen it 4.9 We live through him 5.11 12. This is the record that God hath given to us eternal life and this Life is in his Son He that hath the Son hath Life and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life We are in him that is true in his Son Iesus Christ. These and many other signifie that Christ is fitly likened both to a Head and to a Soul to his Church and is not a dead Head but a living and that the word Head includeth the Soul operating in the Head for the Sense Reason and Guidance and increase of the body And that he doth operate by the Holy Ghost who is one God with the Father and Himself confirmeth it Even as Christ is said to be quickned by the Spirit and by the Spirit to offer himself to God and to justifie us c. which is far from proving that he did it not himself Chrysostome and Basil and Ambrose need not to have been at so great care to prove that it is Christ himself that is called The Spirit and the Lord the Spirit 2 Cor. 3.17 18. against the Arians It will prove him God that as he the word in making the World moved on the Waters by the Spirit which is one with him so he doth by his Spirit which is one with his own Godhead sanctifie Souls I hope you are not against the Filioque Briefly He that giveth to his Church and every true Member of it Spiritual Life Light and Love illumination Sanctification Strength increase and Consolation as appointed by the Father to do all this by himself and by his Spirit is the form Essentiating the Church as much and more than the Soul is to the Man But such is Christ Ergo If I were of their mind that anathematized the Nestorians Eutychians Monothelites as damn'd Hereticks for their unskilful words I should much more Hereticate a Doctor in our Age that will say That if Christ be the Head of the Church he cannot be to it as a Soul a forma informans denominans But I am not of that mind 3. But when this Doctor added If Christ be not the Head of the Body the Church must be without a Head or have some other Head than Christ which I suppose is the Reason why he talks so much of a constitutive Regent Head of the Church Reader Can you tell what he means by which is the Reason Which of the two meaneth he that I suppose the Church without a Head When I so oft and largely prove Christ to be the Head Or is it that I hold some other Head When my Book is to disprove it Which ever it be I do not think refusing such a Pastor as makes no more of the Ninth Commandment is a damning Schism The Sin of Church tyranny goes not alone § 20. P. 45 He proceeds But the organized Body is the constitutive matter of the man though other Philosophers used to call the Body a constitutive part but to let that pass Ans. You had not the Wit to let it pass Durst I have accused you of what you bewray and accuse your self Reader Is not the Matter a Part And is not the Form a Part of the man And doth that man speak plainer that barely calleth either of them a Part and tells you not which Part it is Matter or Form If one of his Pupils should say Sir you should not call the Soul the Form but a Part nor the Body the Matter but a Part what would the Boys say to him § 21. He goes on Thus an Organical Church is the constitutive Matter Of what Of Christ or of his Church or of some third compoundâ—d Ans. 1. Did I say An Organical Church or an Organical Body When Aristotle saith the soul is entelechia corporis physici organici doth he say Hominis physici Organici But you are an enemy to vain Philosophy and distinction 2. What if I had said an Organical Church as I sometimes do an Organized who knows not that ex penuria nominum the words Church Kingdom City Family School c. are ordinarily used equivocally sometimes properly for the whole Church Kingdom City c. as a Governed Society including Matter and form united And sometimes improperly for the Material part alone the Kingdom as distinguisht from the King the Church as distinct from Christ and from the Bishops and so of all the rest And when I so oft told you that the Organical Body of Christians is the Matter of the Church and Christ the foâ—m as far as these terms fit Bodies Politick could you not find in such words Of what it is the Matter of the Church of Christ. § 22. He adds But that these parts be duly placed and united is forma Corporis non Hominis which what it means I cannot tell unless that a man would be a man though the several parts of his Body did not stand in their right places nor were united to one another so they were all united to the Soul Ans. Do you not understand what it means What if I had so accused you Whether it be long of your Tutor or You I know not But 1. If you know not the difference between forma Corporis and forma Hominis some body is too blame Forma dat esse nomen The Soul giveth Being and Name to a Man He is no Man without it Do you think it gives Being and Name to the Body What if Lazarus his Body in the Grave were without its Soul is it not Corpus a Body What if such a Body as Mâ—ns had only the Soul of a Brute were it no Body What if Drâ—â—elius made his Engines move constantly by the Sun or Fire Is it not an Engine materially organized before the Sun or Fire move it Hath not a Wind â—â—ll or Water mill its mechanical form which is but the Organization oâ— dâ—e matter when Wind or Water move it not But to what purpose is it to talk to one that tells us he cannot understand it 2. But the addition is shameful misunderstanding Doth he that saith Organization is forma Corporis say that one may be a mâ—n without it This is below puerility Did I not maintain that as Aristotle haâ—h his three principles Matter Privation and Form and by Privation meaneth the Dispositio receptiva of the matter so Politick Bodies by similitude to natural have And that Organization is
thingt in their three Books that would not prove the Church of England no part of the Catholick Church If a Lay-man could prove it unlawful to trust other men with his Child in Baptismal Covenanting as far as the Church here doth or sinful to joyn in avoiding the Communion of all such gâ—dly men as the Canons or a Lay-Civilian may Excommunicate This will not prove the Church of England no part of the Catholick Church If any Church will deny men Communion unless they subscribe to some one small Untruth as the Liturgies false Rule to find out Easter-day or a mis-translation or the denial that Christ died for all c. this doth not unchurch them all But men have made so many snares by their numerous invented sinful forms of Communion that by such schsmatical Censures as this one scarce knows what Church on Earth is â—ot unchurched § 54. He saith Where there is 〈◊〉 bâ—â—ach of Communion no declared 〈…〉 act of communiâ—n between 〈…〉 be in communion with each 〈…〉 You may say of them what you will But all these Negatives speak no positive Act And is Communion nothing but Negations All this I may say of those that never heard of each others being 2. There may be an express disowning of each as the Romans did the Asians about Easter and the Africans about rebaptizing and the Britains disowned Augustine and as some disown a Pair of Organs or neglect of Discipline c. And yet both be parts of the Catholick Church § 55. P. 326. He is so Catholick in Doctrinals as to say that We may safely communicate with any Church how different soever our Opinion in other Matters may be when we agree in all the Fundamentals of Christian Faith and Essentials of Worship Answ. What could one wish more Is this the same Man May you not then admit those that so far agree with you Are all your humane Associations and Confedearcies and all the Laws for Church-Discipline and Government made by men that have no Legislative Power Essentials of Worship or Fundamental Doctrines of Faith Are all that your foresaid Canons Excommunicate Men for such Essentials If this much be enough in the Church notwithstanding all other Sins and Errors why not in those that you should receive But it seems by this that Matters of Divine Faith and Worship besides bare Essentials are small things to him in comparison of Bishops Rules and Canons § 56. Pag. 395. He saith To separate causelesly from any true and sound part of the Catholick Church cuts such Separatists off from the Church If they will justifie their Separation they must prove that what is Enjoyned is Sinful Answ. 1. Have you answered what they have said and said again towards a Proof Remember that you call them to it and justifie their Separation if they prove it 2. But your Conclusion is false and odious leaving it doubtful what part of the Christian World you damn not If I could prove that you separate causelesly from the Nonconformists doth that certainly cut you from all the Church I doubt there are too few Christians on earth who do not in some degree separate causelesly from others Grotius joyned with no Church locally in Worship long before he died Most of the Church in East West South and North is damned falsly by this Rule He that doth but causelesly separate pro tempore from a Preacher by Passion or Mistake as Mr. Martin aforesaid from Mr. Lapthâ—rne separate causelesly from a true and sound part of the Christian Church His words make me think so sadly of the Case of the Church that must be tempted and distracted by such men as puts me far from a sporting frame But as Dr. Twisse and some of the Gravest Writers sometime divert their Readers with a sad Story that hath somewhat in it ridiculous why may I not put him another such Case At Bridgenoth before 1639. One Parson Crosse a thorough Conformist Preacht a Sermon In which inveighing against Marriage he said If you marry a Widow She will be like a Banbury Cheese when all the Paring is cut off there 's little left So when all Portions and Legacies are paid â— Whoever Maid or Widow if you will hope for a Wife and virtuâ—us Woman you must be like a Man that will find out one Ele in a Barrel of Snakes It 's a hundred to one you miss her But if you light on her you have but a wet Snig by the Tail a slippery handful Now the Women were angry with the Preacher he was an Orthodox Licens'd Man They separate from him Quere Whether they separated from the Catholick Church Reader I am tired with following this Writer and Mr. Crosse's Sermon makes me think of his Book By that time all the wordy mistakes are pared off the good matter is like his pared Banbury Cheese And if you fish for them at a venture it 's great odds but you meet with some scurvy words or matter instead of them Or if you light of that which is better his Sence is so uncertain in undistinguisht words that you have but Mr. Crosse's wet Snig by the Tail But not to seem more incredulous and indifferent from him than I am I subscribe to his words to Mr. Humphrey pag. 226. Ignorance and Insensibility is as great a security to some Men against Shame as Impudence is to others And to his words to Mr. Lobb pag. 388. What a blessed thing is Ignorance which helps Men to confute Books without Fear or Wit And I do acknowledge That this â—r hath helpt me more sensibly to understand St. Paul 1 Tim. 3.6 Not a Novice lest being lifted up with Pride he fall into the condemnation of the Devil FINIS UNNECESSARY SEPARATING disowned in the Reasons of the Authors Censured Practice § 1. WHEN I see 1. How many suffer for refusing Communion with the Parish Churches 2. And how many are offended with Me and such others for Communicating with them censuring Us as mistaking compliers with Sin The Cause and some good Peoples request invite me to answer these following Questions I. Whether Men should be compelled to Communicate with any Church by Corporal Penalties II. Whether they who consent to Communicate with some Church may chuse their own Pastor and Company or may by force be confined to their Parish Priest and Church III. For what Reasons I and such others Hear in and Communicate with the Parish Churches And whether so to do be a Sin or a Duty or a thing Indifferent § 2. I. To the first case I answer 1. It were happy if the Sword could compel Unbelievers to Believe but it cannot nor is a way which Nature or Scripture ever allowed Man to use for such an end 2. To force an Unbeliever to Lie by saying he Believeth is a Sin 3. An Infidel must not be Baptized till he profess with seeming Seriousness and Willingness that he Believeth in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost and will Vow
by mistake XIII I know that the main Cause of Church-Divisions is seeking a Union on false and sinful terms And I know that the opinion That Parish-Communion is unlawful is an Error and therefore unfit to be the Condition of our Union And I see many would make it such a Condition And false terms of Concord are the great and certain means of Discord for the wisest Christians will refuse them And some Impose them by Doctrine and Censures as others do by Laws and Sword And I will not countenance dividing terms Obj. That is the chief fault of your Doctrine and Practice That it will cause Divisions among us when some will do as you do and others cannot and so our Congrâ—gations are divided Ans. 1. Can I cause that which is caused already is not so much Division known still to be among us 2. As I said Do not some write against the Lawfulness of Parish-Communion And some against Infant Baptism and the Lords Day And do not they divide by Writing against them And did Mr. Tombes and Mr. Nye forbear as aforesaid for fear of Division If we are already divided in Judgment and Practice sure giving each other an account of our reasons is rather the way to heal us 3. But I confess this Objection seemeth so sad and ugly to me that it hâ—th no small hand in urging me to what they object against Alas what are such come to They that separate because of the Liturgy Ministry or People do virtually separate as I said from almost all the â—hurch on Earth For it is on a cause common to almost all Yea not only all the Churches in the Eastern Southern and Northern parts and all in the West save themselves have Liturgies or separate not from them But even of the Non-conformists in England those that of old or of late have pleaded their Cause have taken the Liturgy for no sufficient cause of separation Nay even the old Separatists called Brownists denied not the lawfulness of forms of Prayer nor refused to join with the Parish-Churches in our Liturgy sometimes only they thought that when Crossing or such Ceremonies were used they were bound to disown them And shall men that separate from the Communion of almost all the Churches on Earth as unlawful pretend that their way is the way of Unity and that the contrary doth divide Is our shunning Division from the Christian World a dividing Practice In Holland Mr. Smith thought no man capable of Baptizing him and so Baptized himself and some others have done so since thinking none fit for Communion but the few that are their Flocks Yet these that divided from all the World cryed down Dividing from themselves But were all dividers that were against them This is the saddest of all Objections XIV Yea I am loth to do that which condemneth groundlesly the Reformers the Martyrs the Godly Conformists the old Non-Conformists the later and the Brownists themselves as being all for unlawful Communion 1. If it be simply unlawful to have Communion in the Liturgy and Parish-Churches then it was unlawful to have Communicated in their way of Worship with Luther Zuinglius Melanchton Bucer Pet. Martyr and the like Reformers And also with the English Martyrs in Queen Marâ—â—s daies or in King Edward 6. And also with such Holy and Excellent Conformists as Grindall Pilkington Downame Bâ—â—ton Sibbs Preston 〈◊〉 and abundance more such 2. And it 's well known that the old Non-Conformists wrote and practised against the Brownists in this case The Books of Hildersham Brightman Bradshaw Ball Paget Gifford c. are yet visible Mr. Hildersham in his Lectures chides them that will not come to the beginning of the Common-Prayer The old Non-Conformists begin the reasons of their Non-Conformity in refusing Subscription in these Words We protest before Almighty God that we acknowledge the Churches of England as they be established by publick Authority to be 〈◊〉 visible Churches of Christ That we desire the continuance of our Ministry to them above all Earthly things as that without which our Lives will he bitter and wearisome to us That we dislike not a set-form of Prayer to be used in the Churches And finally that whatsoever followeth here is not set down of any evil Mind or of purpose to deprave the Books of Common-Prayer Ordination or â—â—milies but only to shew some reasons why we cannot subscribe to all things in the same contained 3. I before told you Mr. Tombes the Anabaptist hath written at large for the Lawfulness of Parish-Church Communion And Mr. Nye for hearing the Parish-Ministers 4. The late Non-conformists that treated with the Bishops in 1660 and 1667. have left their Judgments fully on Record many of them being yet alive 5. The old Separating Brownists have these Words Confession and Protestation of Faith Touching the true visible Political Churches which we acknowledge are in England we profess and declare that each company of true visible Christians associated together in one place viz. a Parish and Professing to serve God according to his Will in Faith and Order so far as they know such as there are many in England the same is a true visible political Church in some respects And therefore we communicate also with them on occasion while in such communicating we countenance no evil thing in them which in many places and many times we need not do Lastly it being no evil nor any appearance of evil in us to join to the Parish Congregation and Ministry in such respect and so far forth only as aforesaid we ought as we believe sometimes on weighty occasion so to join and we sin if we do not Luke 17.32 Heb. 10.25 1 Cor. 10.32 We believe concerning Prayer That though every form of prayer prescribed by Men be not absolutely and simply a Sin neither as we judge are Idols nor an Invention of Man nor a trangression of the second Commandment yet a prescribed Liturgy or Book of Common Prayer by Commandment forced on a whole Church rightly constituted to be used still in the same Words whenever they assemble in comparison of other praying is not so profitable and we judge that it is best and most agreeable to the last Apostolick practice that even where many Pastors in one Church are yet that One have during Life a precedency and priority in order and place not in power before the rest I will not be more for separation than the Separatists themselves XV. If joining with the Parish Ministry be simply unlawful most or almost all England comparatively must cease all publick Worship of God The Nonconformists were but about two thousand 1662. Most of them I think by this time are Dead and not so many sprung up in their stead Those that are remaining for the most part are either in a few places quieter than the rest or hindered from any numerous Assemblies In 1636. I do not think there were many more than we have Counties and those few in
which they used in Catechising and in Baptism which were a great means to keep out Heresie and Church-Tyranny and Heresie were the Introducers of all their Alterations 10. The Lay-Christians of the first Aages were so full of Zeal that they would have taken it ill to have been forbâ—dden to speak their Answering and Consenting parts in the Church as the Iews before did and as now we would take it ill for the Minister to Sing alone and forbid the People And tho the scantness of History in the first two Ages tell us not what words were then used as a Liturgy and no doubt but praying by Habit was used chiefly yet some few Sentences that are recorded tell us that they used some Forms 11. Constantine himself made Prayers for his Soldiers and every Bishop then used what Prayers he thought best in his own Church and composed himself the Forms which he used constantly till Heresie and weakness of Ministers caused a Council to decree That every one should first shew his Form of Prayer to the Synods to be examined and approved before he used it 12. I do not read or hear of many Churches on earth at this dâ—y that used not a Liturgie except Nâ—w England and some Non confâ—rmists here Nor did I ever read that any one Church 〈…〉 for a 〈◊〉 Years after Christs time did ever scruple it or speak 〈…〉 remembrance so that it was for many Ages the 〈…〉 Church on earth At this day the Greeks Armâ—â—ians 〈…〉 Circassians Mâ—ngreliâ—ns Indian and Persian 〈◊〉 s the 〈…〉 Egyptians all the Countreys that have 〈…〉 Mâ—ronites beside the Papists have a Liturgie very 〈◊〉 more 〈…〉 Even those ascribed to Iames Mark 〈◊〉 The 〈◊〉 have one or divers in divers Countreys And thâ—se called 〈◊〉 Reâ—â—â—med have one tho a shorter and more simple 〈◊〉 France 〈◊〉 Hâ—lland the Palatinate Helvetia c. 13. The Nonconformists in England were generally for the Lawfulness of a Form or Liturgie and for Communion of the Parish Churches therein in the days of King Edward the Sixth Queen Elizabeth King Iames and King Charles the First And wrote more against Separation by far than the Bishops did as is yet visible in their Books specially Cartwright Hildersham Bradshaw Paget Gifford Brighâ—man Bayne Rathband Iohn Ball c. 14. Those then counted the Fathers of Independency were of the same mind for Parish Communion and against Separation Mr. Iacob Bradshaw Ames see his First and Second Manuduction 15. Yea those call'd Brownists or Separatists were for Communion in the Liturgie in the usual parts and for the truth of those Parish Churches that had good Ministers I have cited their own words before tho all of them were not of the same mind 16. The Martyrs in Queen Marys days had a chief hand in composing our Liturgie and rejoyced in it and worshipped God according to it And none that I read of separated for this from the rest as false Worshippers 17. When before 1639. there were but about one or two Nonconformable Ministers for each County if it had been unlawful to Communicate in the publick Churches with the Liturgy all England must have lived like Atheists without any Church Worship for want of Ministers except about thirty or fourty Yea those few kept up no usual Church Worship except those of them that by connivence had small Chappels or peculiars And of them most used much of the Liturgy 18. All the Congregations of the Nonconformists in England that I have heard save one now broken not counting such as Quakers c. have used and do use stinted imposed forms of Worship to this day and therefore judg it not unlawful meerly as forms or as imposed 1. Parents teach their Children a form of words in Catechisms in Prayers in giving Thanks for their Meat and impose these on them 2 Ministers impose on the Assemblies their own method and words in Prayer which are a form to the people yea and a form which they know not till they hear it and have no time to examine it while it floweth from the Speaker And their Sermons are imposed forms of Doctrine sometimes written also and read 3. Few men that retain any Sobriety in Religion are against the Creed to be used as a form of Confession of Faith 4. The Independents drew up at the Savor about 1658 or 1659. a form of Confession of their Faith and Discipline 5. They attempted Dr. Owen Mr. Nye Dr. Goodwin Mr. Sid. Sampson Dr. Cheynell and others by appontment of a Committee of Parliament to have drawn up a Catalogue of Fundamentals to have been imposed for consent on all that should be tolerated in the Land in Church-Worship they are yet to be seen in Print But Arch-bishop Usher being chosen for one and refusing and I being by his consent substituted in his room broke that attempt finding that their Fundamentals were lamentably composed and that Christianity was not an unknown thing and that Baptism the Creed Lords Prayer and Decalogue were a far better Catalogue of Fundamentals than theirs 6. We all constantly use an English form of Translation of the Scripture where all the English words the division of Chapters and Verses are mans invention imposed on all 7. We all use constantly forms of Confession Prayer Thanksgiving and Praise in the singing of Psalms where when Davids and the Iews Psalms are used the Translation or rather Paraphrase the rhime or meters and the tune are humane and imposed And the Separatists themselves make no question but other Psalms such as that of Ambrose c. more suted to the State of the Gospel Church may be fitly used as Paul requireth which must be composed by man and imposed on the Churches or never unanimously used Our common use of singing Psalms and Hymns is the use of stinted imposed forms 8. He that doth not celebrate Baptism and the Lords Supper often in words of the same signification shall corrupt those Sacraments by his affectation of variety of words the matter being the same 9. No man knoweth before-hand whether a Minister hath studied and sore compsed his Prayer or Sermon and yet all joyn with him 10. Many affect to compose all their Prayer in Scrpture Sentences which do but make up one form of many 19. When the King came in the Ministers of London were invited to attempt a Concord with the Bishops and they offered to joyn in the use of the Litugy if it were corrected And they offered Additional Forms or a Reformed Liturgy which they would have used I know it will be objected That I plead in this but for my own works But I answer 1. The Exceptions and Emendations of the old Liturgy offered was none of my work 2. And the new one which I drew up by their appoinment had their common review and consent It will be said That these were not all the then Nonconformists I answer It was the main Body of the London Ministers and it was as many as
and all Ministers belong to his Worship and yet Christ hath not in Scripture named you but left the Choice of you to Man So of all Accidents undetermined It is another Error That the Prescription of Forms and Modes of things in Worship XXXV Error not commanded by Christ can arise from nothing but from Supposition of a defect in the Wisdom care and faithfulness of Christ. I confute it 1. You know not the hearts of all the World and therefore cannot say That this can arise from nothing else Did you know Ambrose that made the Te Deum and all that made and prescribed Psalms Hymns and Prayers and Calvin that made a Liturgy and Bucer and the Martyrs here and all that prescribed Translations and Metres c. so well as to know that all these and almost all the Churches on Earth do suppose Christ to be unfaithful 2. Is it only such a charge or Supposition against Christ which made you your self prescribe your form of Church-Covenant your Savoy Articles your Catalogue of Fundamentals your Lay-Elders your time and place of Meeting your Utensils and Ornaments at the Sacraments c 3. I tell you another possible end They did it because they thought that these Modes are mutable according to Persons Place Time Occasion c. And therfore that it belonged not to Christs faithfulness to detemine them and that they should deny his faithfulness if they did deny that it hath left them to humane Determination under general Rules and bid the people obey them that have the rule over you c. D. O. 5. Argument That which is a means humanely invented for the attaining of an end in Divine Worship which Christ hath ordained a means for unto the exclusion of that means so appointed by Christ is false Worship and not to be complied withal The end intended is the Edification of the Church in the Administration of all its holy Ordinances this the service-Service-book is ordained and appointed by men for or it hath no end or use at all but the Lord Christ hath appointed other means for the attaining this end as is expresly declared He has given gifts unto men for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the Body Ephes. 4.7 8 11 12. that is in all Gospel Administrations But this means ordained by Christ namely the exercise of spiritual gifts in Gospel Administrations unto the Edification of the Church is excluded yea expresly prohibited in the Prescription of this Liturgical Worship § 19. TO the Major of your 5 th Argument I answer As to the former No man is to comply by Approbation with any thing that excludeth any of Gods means for instance not with you that exclude the great duty of Catholick Communion But we may so far comply with you and others as to joyn with you in Gods Worship tho you mix some evil Mr. Faldo at Barnet was fain many years to Preach to a people that excluded singing Psalms He did what they would bear when he could not do what he would He complied not by Approbation with exclusion for he spake against it Are you sure that all your ways have tended to the Edification of the Church Every weak Minister that preacheth or prayeth when an abler might be had hindereth the Edification of the Church Is it a Sin therefore to hear any but the ablest 2. That which hindereth the Churches Edification by the Rulers fault it may be the Peoples duty to obey for a greater good For instance â—t is less edifying to use our old singing Psalms than a better Version And yet for Concord if the Ruler appoint them the People must use them because Concord with that imperfection is better than to sing every one a several better Version or divers at once so a faulty Translation of Scripture a weak Sermon an inconvenient hour and place when Concord is necessary and cannot be had in the more edifying circumstances it must be had in the best way we can If the Sheriff appoint an unfit time and place to meet to chuse Parliament-men it 's a duty to comply rather than not to meet at all every evil so far excludeth good And yet we must not renounce Communion in all good where men mix any evil left we also give over all good our selves 3. Christ giveth gifts to men now in the due use of means and not by miracle Therefore he giveth them in great diversity and by hard Study and long Time Heb. 5. For the time they ought to have been teachers c. Therefore a Novice must not be a Bishop but an Elder whence the Office had its name All your pupils people or Ministers that had the Spirits gifts had not your redundancy of Expression And many can talk more fluently for falshood than good men can for truth I was never much troubled my self for want of words to express what I know but I have ten thousand times more beg'd hard for more Knowledg Faith Love and Hope than ever I did for the gift of utterance a full heart is earnest fervent and ready It is another mistake That the exercise of Spiritual gifts is expresly forbidden XXXVI Error unless you had meant that just at the use of the Litutgy extemporate utterance is forbidden but it is not so in the Pulpit And you should not confound things so different as is the use of the Liturgy and the forbidding of other prayers Nor yet the act of the Commander and of the People If Rulers should command Preaching Prayer c. to exclude the singing Psalms that is their Sin and not the Peoples who must not like peevish Children at meat refuse all because they cannot have what they would D. O. The pretence of mens liberty to use their Gifts in Prayer before Sermons and in Preaching is ridiculous they are excluded in all the solemn Worship of the Church § 20. THis answer is not only a mistake but of an ill aspect on your selves XXXVII Error It 's not true That the use of Gifts is excludeded in all the solemn Worship of the Church As if Prayer Praise Thanksgiving Confession Explication of the Scripture Reproof Exhortation Comfort Direction Benediction were no part of the solemn Worship of the Church Indeed some Superconformists have said so but I had hoped you would not 2. I said It 's of an ill aspect For 1. If Preaching and Pulpit-Prayer before and after be none of the solemn Worship of the Churches then all those Churches which seldom use any other saving a Psalm which is a Liturgick form have no solemn Worship at all 2. But if it be otherwise as it is then the Parish Churches so far excel most of you that they have all that you have Pulpit Prayer and Sermon and sometimes a Chapter and all the Common Prayer more And is not that better than your nothing except at Sacraments I know that the Nonconformists that I have converst with are in judgment for more
and godly Ministers in the Parish-Churches and some have such as I would never own or encourage in the Ministry by seeming to own them Some can remove their Dwelling and some cannot Some had Liberty the last year that cannot have it this year without more hurt than their benefit will compensate In these Cases where God hath not at all tied us to a Book or no Book to this Church or to that he that can truly tell which way he shall do and get most good or hurt may by that better know his Duty than by these Arguments or Mens Censures But verily my chief Reason for Communion in publick is the very same which you bring against it Even the avoiding of hainous Scandal I have told the World 1. That Scandal is not displeasing men but laying before them a temptation to sin 2. That if the Separatists be the best Christians they are farthest out of the danger of Scandal It is the worst that are easiliest tempted to Sin and so whom we should be most fearful to scandalize 3. And it 's a greater Sin to scandalize many than few 4. And worse by scandal to tempt men to the mortal Sins of persecuting or scorning godly men than merely to tempt them to some small mistakes or to grieve them 5. And to scandalize our Rulers is worse than to scandalize Inferiors Caeteris paribus And now I tell you I the rather joyn in Publick 1. Lest I should harden thousands in the Opinion That we take that to be unlawful which is not and that we are for sinful Separation and that we separate from and unchurch almost all Christs Church and that we are Enemies to Order and Peace and Concord and that we are unruly enemies to Government and giddy ignorant self-conceited people 2. And so lest we breed throughout the Land such a contempt of Conscience in Gods service as they have of Quakers and thousands by this should be alienated from the Reverence of serious Religion and Youth should be educated to the like contempt under these temptations 3. And lest if any in Church-matters be guilty of sinful Extreams on the other side in Oaths Professions Ceremonies or Practices we should harden them therein by tempting them to think that we have no worse against their way than the Use of a Liturgy 4. Lest the Conceit that we are but a company of giddy Fanaticks encourage any contentious Preachers to render us odious and rail at us in the Pulpits to their own shame and the widening of our Breaches 5. And lest the same Error should tempt any Bishops or Magistrates to think they do God and their Church and Countrey service in silencing imprisoning reproaching and ruining Gods faithful Servants without cause and bring the Land under Gods wrath by persecution Are these no Scandals or not greater than offending or displeasing the dissenting Separators to say nothing of ocsioning our Reproach in all the Foreign Churches which have a Liturgy If against all this the displeasing your mistaken Flocks should prevail then their weakness and error would constitute them our chief Governours D. O. Argument 9. That Worship which is unsuited to the spiritual relish of the New Creature which is inconsistent with the conduct of the Spirit of God in Prayer is unlawful For the Nature Use and Benefit of Prayer is overthrown hereby in a great measure Now let any one consider what are the Prâ—mises Aids of the Holy Spirit with respect to the Prayers of the Church whether as to the Matter of them or as unto Ability for their performance or as unto the Manner of it and he shall find that they are all rejected and excluded by this Form of Worship as is pretended comprizing the whâ—le Matter limiting the whole Manner and giving all the Abilities of Prayer that are needful or required This hath been proved at large § 25. TO your Ninth Argument I answer 1. O! confine not the New Creature to those of your Opinion Do you think none of the Old Nonconformists or Conformists none of the Reformed Churhes and no Church on Earth for a Thousand years had any of the New Creature When you have affrighted People with telling them it is heinous sin and returning to Babylon and also by long disuse made a Liturgy uncouth to them do not ascribe all their averseness to the New Creature which is from prejudice and disuse For my part when God taught me first to pray I had no averseness to a Form When I heard it charg'd with sin I began to be averse to it When I had studied the case I was cured of that aversness but never reconciled to the forbidding of all other Prayer nor to the faults of any Forms And who knoweth not that Man 's culpable Nature loveth Novelties and are hardly kept in lively Affections under any thing that is very often said A Book or Sermon tho never so good affecteth us not so much after many times reading and hearing as at the first We must not lay this weakness on the New Creature tho it should teach Imposers to suit the Remedy to the Disease and give children such food as is not too displeasing to their Appetites And yet I find not the generality of Appetites even in your Flocks is against the Forms of Psalms being not prejudiced against them It is not true that Liturgies are inconsistent with the conduct of the Spirit in Prayer It is a Mistake also XL. Error That this Form of Worship rejecteth and excludeth the matter of Prayer whenas the Visible Book tells all the contrary Do all those words express none of the Matter of Prayer It is untrue That it rejecteth and excludeth the Manner as to the chief part For the Lord's Prayer is a perfect Form for Matter Order and Method And the Psalms read and sung are for Matter and Manner neither evil nor excluded And sure there is much of the rest laudable If all Matter and Manner be rejected and excluded then the Martyrs that used it and all the Churches on Earth almost have no Church-Prayers But again I tell The use of Forms and the forbidding all other Prayers are Two different things which you ill confound D. O. Argument 10. That which overthrows and dissolves our Church-Covenant as unto the principal end of it is as to us unlawful This end is the professed joynt subjection of our souls and consciences unto the Authority of Christ in the observasion of whatever he commands and nothing else in the Worship of God But by this practice this end of the Church-Covenant is destroyed and thereby the Church-Covenant it self broken For we do and observe that which Christ hath not commanded And while some stand unto the Terms of the Covenant which others relinquish it will fill the Church with confusion and disorder § 26. TO your Tenth Argument I answer 1. What your Church-Covenant is I know not But if it profess subjection to nothing in Worship but what
Christ commandeth XLI Error it is your Church-Error For then you are in Covenant not to obey the Pastor even your self if he set a Psalm a Tune a Translation of Scripture nor if he appoint Time Place and Utensils for Worship For these are in the Worship Then you are covenanted to disobey the Magistrate if he command any of these or command men not to put on their Hats or sit at Prayer or for concord tâ—e all the Land to one Translation of Scripture or any such undetermined Mode 2. It is a greater disgrace to your Churches than ever I knew of before not only to covenant against God's Word Heb. 13.7 17. 1 Thes. 5.12 13. c. and against the Fifth Commandment but also to make this necessary to Concord That your Churches must break if the Members agree not all herein This is a plain demand of Conformity to an Humane unsound imposition No wonder if they are Dividers who set up by Church-Covenants false Terms of Unity D. O. Argument 11. That which contains a virtual renunciation of our Church-state and of the lawfulness of our Ministry and Ordinances therein is not to be admitted or allowed But this also is done in the practice enquired into For it is a professed conjunction with them in Church-Communion and Worship by whom our Church-state and Ordinances are condemned as null And this Iudgment they make of what we do affirming that we are gross Dissemblers if after such a conjunction with them we return any more unto our own Assemblies In this condemnation we do outwardly and visibly joyn § 27. IF your Church-state be essentiated by a Covenant to be subject to nothing else in Worship even the Accidents which God bids men determine by his general Rules of Edification Order Decency Love Peace Church-Custom c. then I commend the generality of Nonconforming Ministers that they set up no such Church-state And they do well to renounce all that you do ill to invent and impose while you talk against Imposition and adding to God's Word such Humane Forms But yet it 's an Error to hold That if any unjustly condemn other Churches XLII Error it is a renunciation of that condemned Church-state to have Communion with them that condemn Who would have thought the Two separating Extreams had so agreed in their Principles This is just the very Core of the evil of the Book of the contrary party which I here answer Alas how few Churches on Earth have not peevishly condemned one another it may be for Easter-day for the choice of a Bishop as the Donatists striving whose Bishop was the right The case of the Novatians Audians Luciferians and even of most in East and West are sad Instances And will such censoriousness unchurch them and forbid us Communion with them This is plain revenge and to curse them that curse us and abuse them that abuse us I lâ—ke Calvin's Spirit better than this who said Tho Luther should call me a Devil I would call him the Excellent Servant of God Too many Lutherans now renounce Communion with the Calvinists who yet renounce not Communion with them D. O. 12. Argument That which deprives us of the principal Plea for the Iustification of our Separation from the Church of England in iâ—s present state ought not justly to be received or admitted But this is certainly done by a Supposition of the lawfulness of this Worship and a practice suitable thereunto as is known to all who are exercised in this Cause Many other heads of Arguments might be added to the same purpose if there were occasion § 28. TO your 12 th Argument I answer 1. That which discovereth the unsoundness of any ones Plea for Separation is to be received There are several Cases in which Separation from the Church of England is sinful As 1. If any separate as the Papists do because they are against sound Doctrine or any good that is in the Church 2. If any renounce Communion with all the Parish Churches under the name of the Church of England 3. If any renounce Communion with the Church of England as it is a Christian Kingdom headed by one Christian Protestant King 4. If they renounce Communion with the Church of England as it is called one from the Association or Concord of its Pastors or Church Governours 5. If any renounce Communion with faulty Bishops or Worship or Discipline simply and absolutely and not only secundum quid and so forsake the good that is in them for the sake of the evil In a word 1. All that Separate for a wrong cause 2. Or further than they Separate from Christ or than Christ would have them separate do sin 2. But they that renounce any corruption as such and the Church no further than secundum quid as it is faulty do well For we must so renounce the faults of all Churches and Christians in the World and our own first But not the Churches and Christians for any tolerable faults so we commit no Sin our selves which they impose as the condition of their Communion Reader I displease my own disposition as well as others in the answering of these Arguments But when I had read them my Conscience would not suffer me to see many thousand good People so misguided who have not skill themselves to discern the Fallacies and by Silence to betray them Let it be noted That it is not all nor the greatest Objections I confess which I here deal with having done it oft elsewhere but these Twelve militate so much against all the Liturgies in the World as well as ours that I durst not pass them by in Silence 1. Some object against the faults which they supposed very great in divers By-offices Baptizing Confirmation the Lords-Supper-Impositions Burial Circumstances and Forms But these are nothing to the common Worship of the Church on the Lords days 2. Some object against the Ministers as Usurpers being chosen by Patrons and not consented to by the Flocks But this is nothing against them that are consented to by Acceptance tho not by Election 3. Some Object the heniousness of the Sins of Ministers Conformity as being deliberate Covenanting to I am loath to name them and so the command from such turn away with such not to eat And the case of Martiall and Basilides in Cyprian and that of Miracle-working Martin which on another occasion I have mentioned But were these Sins never so surely proved as great as alledged 1. Every Minister cannot be proved guilty of the worst part 2. And the Matter of a Sin may be heinous and yet ignorance take off much of the guilt as it did of Paul's Persecution An unlawful War in which thousands were murdered and Countries ruined is Materially one of the greatest Sins in the World And yet wo to abundance of Princes and People if Ignorance excuse it not and if we must renounce Communion with all Countries and Persons that are guilty of it 3. And when
professed that they are his I thought on Pauls case Gal. 2. who openly opposed Peter because he was to be blamed lest his great Name should make the Separation the most prevalent when Baâ—â—abas and others were carried away to Dissimulation and seeming to approve it It grieved me I think as much as any that blame me for it to seem to confute so worthy a man when he is dead and cannot answer for himself But I durst not let the writing of a dead man be so dangerous a trap for Souls and silently see the mischief prosper for fear of displeasing the mistakers But let the Reader know That it is so far from my design to wrong the Name of Dr. Owen by this Defence that I do openly declare That except in this point of his Mistake and who mistaketh not in more than one I doubt not but he was a Man of rare Parts and Worth And tho in the Tryals of the late Distractions of this Land I mention some of his Confessions it is to tell you that I had reason to hope that he repented for doing no more in his publick opportunities against the Spirit of Division which dissolved us And which of us need not repentance for our faults in those days of Tryal Yeâ— in his Doctrinal writings in his later Years he is much clearer than heretofore And even that Book of Communion with the Trinity which he writeth against whom I here deal with in the beginning is an excellent Treatise And his great Volumes on the Hâ—brews do all shew his great and eminent Parts it was his strange Error if he thought that freedom from a Liturgy would have made most or many Ministers like himself as free and fluent and copious of Expression In the late time he had never been so long Dean of Christ-Church so oft Vice chancellor of 〈◊〉 so highly esteemed in the Army and with the Persons then in Power if his extraordinary Parts had not been known But Reader if this excellent man had one mistake against all Liturgies and for Separation from them when yet he was of late years of more complying mildness and sweetness and peaceableness than ever before or than many others and if you will use his Name and Authority for this one Error Let me tell you I am confident you will wrong Dr. O. by ignorant defending him I doubt not but his Soul is now with Christ and that tho Heaven have no Sorrow it hath great Repentance and that Dr. O. is â—ow more against the receiving of this his mistake than I am and by deâ—ending it you far more displease him than me There is there no Darkness no Mistakes no Separation of Christs Members from one another no excommunicating or renouncing of Communion They all repent that ever they did any thing against Christian Love and Unity and received not one another as Christ receiveth us and did not own Communion in all that was good while they avoided the wilful consent to evil Were D. O. now to speak to you I am fully confident it would be to this purpose Tho all believers must be holy and avoid all known wilful Sin they must not avoid one another or their Communion in good because of adherent faults or imperfections for Christ who is most holy receiveth Persons and Worship that is faulty and false if all faultiness be falsness else none of us should be received There is greatest goodness where theâ—â— is greatest Love and Unity of Spirit maintained in the bond of Peace O call not to God to deny you Mercy by being unmerciful nor to cast you all out by casting off one another O Separate not from all Christs Church on Earth lest you separate from him or displease him God hath bid you pray but not told you whether it shall be oft in the same Words or in other with a Book or without a Book Make not superstitiously a Religion by pretending that God hath determined sâ—ch Circumstances O do not Preach and Write down Love and Commuâ—iâ—n â—f Saintâ— on pretence that your little Modes and Ways are only goâ—d and theirs Idolatrous or Intollerable and do not slander and excommunicate all or almâ—st all Christs Body and then wrong Gâ—d by faâ—hering this upon him You pray Thy will be done on Earth as it is done in Heaven Why here is no Sâ—â—ife 〈…〉 Animosity Sâ—cts or Factions nâ—r Separating from or Excomâ—â—nicating on another Learn of Christ and know what Spirit ye are of and separate from none further than they separate from Christ and receive all hat◠〈◊〉 receiveth While â—ou blame canonical Dividers and unjust 〈…〉 do not you renoâ—nce Communion wiâ—h 〈◊〉 mâ—re than they 〈…〉 of too naâ—râ—w 〈◊〉 â—rincipleâ— and in the time of Temptation I did nâ—t foresee to what 〈…〉 Conâ—usion and Dissolution and Hatred and Ruin dividing 〈…〉 did tend but the 〈…〉 in 〈◊〉 perfection of Love to God and one anothâ—r bids me beseech you to avoid all that is against it and to make use of no mistakes of mine to cherish any such offences or to oppose the motions of Love Unity and Peace No doubt but now this is D. O's mind If any one think that my Answers to him favour of too much disrespect which I fitted meerly to the Words I answered confessing my imprudence and liableness to such faultiness I desire that none will approve my failings blame me for them but do not therefore justifie true Schism and blame the cause of Love and Catholick Communion As to the mention of former miscarriages which arose from the Spirit and Principles of Division the Drs. Argument led me to mention them so necessarily that I must else have wronged the Cause and Truth Defended And I had great reasons I thought both for that and for this Defence which I shall next enumerate IV. I am not so blind as not to see inconveniences that abusers will raise from all that I have said But while I put those into one end of the Ballance I have so much to put into the other as with my Conscience quite weigheth down I know that men have already made tenfold worse use of our Silence in this Case and the Opinion 1. That we were all for the old Seditions and Convulsions And 2. that we are now oâ—â—he Dividers mind than ever they did of our writing against them And I have said so much against the active violent Dividers that should I say nothing against the Passive I should be partial and seem a Sectary my self Ovid taught me when I was a Child That Omnia perversas possunt corrumpere mentes Stant tamen illa suis omnia tuta locis 1. Truth and Love and Peace will be good when men have said and done their worst against them And I owe much more than this to their honour and defence Buy the Truth and sell it not is an old Precept These three are the very sum of all Religion and must not be forsaken or betrayed 2.
breach of their Covenant But they professed their gratitude without subscribing Divers of them are yet living but most by far are dead Were it not lest the Papists take advantage by it to undermine and ruin Peace-makers under the Name of Trimmers I would name you many places up and down in England where all the people live in love and quietness as if there were no Convulsive Cruelty or Schisms in the Land and this through the wise and conscionable behaviour of the Ministers the publick Ministers with the ejected Nonconformists living in so great and open amity as uniteth all the people Those that desire Reformation won by the good preaching and living of the publick Minister and by his kindness go all to hear him and when at other hours they meet to edifie one another by praying singing Psalms repeating a Sermon or reading a good Book he is far from hindring them Let any man that hath the Spirit of Christ judg whether this be not a better state of the Church than for some to be railing men from Communion with the charge of Idolatry and making the rest odious and for others to prophane the Pulpits by preaching up slanders and scorns and serving Satan in Christ's Name by making Religion seem Hypocrisie and conscionable men pass for odious Rebels for fearing lest some points of Conformity be sin and stirring up Rulers to use them accordingly if they were so bad and miserable as to be perswaded by such to persecution Which of these think you is the better and more desirable case Obj. But what would you do your self if you were in Spain or any other Land where there is no Church-worship but the Mass Would you not forbear all And will not the Papists use against you the same Arguments which you use against us and say That you separate from all the Church on Earth for 1000. years and so from Christ Ans. 1. What the Papists will say maketh not all true which they say The Question is Whether they say it truly 2. It 's the trick of deceivers in dispute to prove ab obscuriore and carry the Controversie into a darker Room and to fish in troubled Waters What if it were an hard Controversie whether I must separate from Papists from Bonner Gardiner c. doth it follow that it is as hard whether I must separate from Bradford Ridley Hooper and all those Martyrs and all the Protestant Churches With whom then shall I communicate 3. I 'le tell you what I would say and do to such Papists 1. I will prove their Objection false And 1. that at this day all Papists in the World are but as Bishop Brâ—mhall estimates about a fourth part of the Christian World 2. And that it was not till the days of our King Iohn and their Innocent the 3 d that a General Council decreed the Idolatry of Transubstantiation 3. That a great part of their own never consented to this and that few of the people understood or believed it 4. That even this Canon was made against great numbers of Godly men called Albigenses and Waldenses who opposed them in this Idolatry 4. Therefore I would resolve I will have no Local Communion with any Church in the use of this or any Idolatry but will Worship God in private if I can have no better but if I can I will And I separate not by this from the most of the Church but from a Tyrannical corrupt Sect or Schism Yea as to them I hold mental Communion with them in Christianity and in all that is good and sound and renounce Communion with them in all that I know to be evil Obj. But what if a Protestant Church make any Sin a condition of their Communion will you not separate Ans. 1. I have said so much of this in this Book against the Resolver and Unreasonable Defender as that I am ashamed that mens Objections make me guilty of so much repetition 2. None such can make any Sin the Condition of my mental Communion For if they joyn good and bad and bid me do so God forbids me and requireth me to own the good and disown the bad If they use the bad themselves and put not me to subscribe or own it I will joyn with them notwithstanding in that which is good and in due time and place disown the evils e. g. I have oft heard well-meaning men Preach falshoods against Calvanists and others against Arminians some against Presbytery some against Independency some against Infant-Baptism and alas how ordinarily do men drop their Errors and put them into their Prayers I will not for this separate from a Church that professeth to to take the Scripture for their rule Let them answer for their own misdoings 2. But if they bid me Subscribe or Approve any one Falshood or Sin I will deny it If they forbid me Communion I will continue it till they put me away by force And then it is not I that separate from them but it 's they by unjust casting me out that are Schismatical I 'le still have mental Communion with them in Faith and Love and not perswade any to separate from them as Idolaters or make them worse than they are but if I can I will go to another Church tho worse that will receive me without imposing actual sin but not draw others from them who are not cast out for refusing sin as I have been And tho I will not justifie many Protestant Writers who say That we separated not from the Church of Rome but they cast us out for not sinning yet I doubt not but this must be our case with sound Churches that would impose any Sin upon us But still To prefer the best and all things considered most profitable before the more faulty or imperfect without renouncing Communion with them or perswading all others from it as Idolaters or unlawful is that which I never called Schism nor wrote against To the unknown Author of a LETTER lately sent me SIR YOUR Letter contained 1. Your friendly reprehensions of me not only for my purpose to write against a MS. which you say was Dr. Owen's but for many other things and your enumeration of those faults of mine 2. With a friendly motion That I suspend my writing till we fairly debate the Cause upon some larger Papers of the Doctor 's on that Subject which you offered to send me I wrote you presently an Answer but your Messenger never more called for it by which I supposed that you changed your purpose If yet you will send for it I will send it you The Breviate of it is this 1. I do not feignedly but from my heart accept your manner of Reproof It is honest and friendly and I am truly thankful to you for it Tho I am thought to be too plain and sharp I can bear twice as much as I use It 's foolish pride that maketh us grudg at a friendly tho sharp reprehension But your mis-information
tells me the pitiful Case of most in the World Your honest Reproofs are founded on abundance of untrue Conceits There are about Twenty Untruths through mistake in matter of Fact in your Letter And how gross are many of them As that I write not against Persecution which I scarce over write a book that hath not much against it and this book it self doth fully confute you And that I oppose not but encourage divers things which I know not the man that hath said half so much against And you carry it all along as if I were your Accuser for not going to the publick Churches when I am a meer Defendent against your Accusations and plead the Cause of the Universal Church as not deserving an Excommunication and of many poor weak women and young people that would be drawn to renounce all Church-Worship in England for fear of Idolatry or a Curse from God If you that have his offered MS's and say This which I answer is Dr. O's were the man that made this MS. which I answer so common I think you did him a great deal of wrong Tho in his Printed Books especially that of Prayer and for Peace c. he owns the ill Principle which I now confute against all publick Worship by Liturgy and against man's power to command any more than Christ hath done in the order and manner of Worship and Church-Government which also is to be seen in his Preface c. of his Original of Churches and his Vindicatian of the Nonconformists c Yet these Printed Books of his especially his Original of Churches c. have so much sound and excellent matter and so many healing peaceable passages in them as did hide this one great Mistake so that I long purposely forbore all contradiction of him in it tho I plainly answered his Arguments in my Cure of Church-divisions for fear lest I should occasion a more common offensive or hurtful notice of them But when that one Error which was thus buried in abundance of sound matter was by some of you not only culled out and made common in MS. by it self but even in a writing in which he goeth yet further towards Non-Communion with all the Churches almost on Earth than ever he did in his Printed Books and this to affright all others into the same Non-Communion you could not sure imagine that no Christian had so much love to the Church to Souls to Catholick Communion to Love and Concord as not to let such a Writing do its worst without any Antidâ—te and Answer You could scarce have wrong'd the Doctor or his Memory mâ—re All his Enemies could not have done half so much against him having no such matter to accuse him of as you have unadvisedly given them And if 〈◊〉 also you will lay your own Fault on others that love the Truth and Church and Souls and Peace better than this Manuscript or its Reputation you will but run further into Error And can you possibly be ignorant how like you are to the other Extream 1. While you excommunicate far more than they do even almost all the Body of Christ as to External Communion 2. And are for silencing us as well as they Why else may not I have leave to render a Reason of my Iudgment and Practice to those that are offended at it 3. And as they would deprive Congregations of sound Doctrine Instruction and Worship for the Cause of the Opinions of their Faction would not you discharge almost whole Counties from all Church-worship where Forms are used and your way is not tolerated Had not the MS. been against all Forms of Liturgy but only against the real or supposed faults of the English one and had it been only against owning the faults and not against Communion in necessary Duty I had not troubled you by my Defence II. I did much approve of your brotherly motion to debate the Case friendly on the perusal of his larger Writings And tho your Letter came to me a week after the Book was printed the Bookseller said he had sold but two and I purposed thankfully to accept your offer and tho to my cost to have done my best to stop the rest and recall those two But not knowing you nor how to send to you I must suppose that you retract your Motions your Messenger not calling for my answer as we appointed Remember I beseech you that the Dr. writeth for mental Communion in Faith and Love with all true Churches tho he write against outward Local Communion with almost all And I crave your perusal of the first and third parts of this Book against the Resolver of three Cases c. And if you find that all the Cases in which I vindicate Local Separation to be no Schism be not enough bethink you what the Scripture meaneth by reprehended Heresie Schism and Division and whether there be any such Sins and whether they that are so much for Scripture-sufficiency as not to communicate with a Mode Order or Form of Words which it prescribeth not should set so light by it as not to fear its many sharp Condemnations of the foresaid sins and its frequent and vehement Exhortations to Unity and Communion of Saints and to receive one another as Christ received us to the Glory of God Lord pardon the faulty imperfections of our Services which we must rather venture on than a total Omission and teach us to pardon one another April 7. 1684. REader I have not time to gather the Errata of the Press or Copy only I intreat you to insert an omitted line page 29. line 35. because the sence is altered by the omission After them add than those of the Opinion which he pleads for Books Sold by Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside near Mercers-Chappel 1. MR. Baxter's Christian Directory or Sum of Practical Divinity and Cases of Conscience 2 Catholick Theology Plain Pure and Peaceable 3 Which is the True Church in Three Parts 4 Life of Faith in Three Parts 5 Answer to Mr. Dodwell and Dr. Sherlock 6 History of Councels Enlarged and Defended 7 Catechising of Families A Teacher of Housholders how to Teach their Housholds wherein the Creed Ten Commandments Lords Prayer and Sacraments are Expounded 8 Two Disputations of Original Sin Dr. Horton's 100. Select Sermons Sermons on the 4 th 42 d 51 st 63 d. Psalms Dr. Anthony Burges Sermons on 2 Cor. 3. Chap. Dr. Donn's Sermons Vol. 3. A Discourse of Gods Providence by Dr. Iohn Collings Morning Exercise against Popery Sermons on the Epistle to the Colossians by Iohn Daille Author of the Use of the Fathers A Discourse of the Covenant of Redemption