men that thus make you agents for a Pope 3. Doth this Political description of Parochial Diocesane Provincial Patriarchal Churches also bring in Popery 4. Then either our Archbishops have no power or they have it from no superiour or else they infer a Pope 5. I again tell the Doctor as I did Mr. Cheny It is disingenious to say this to me when I have written so much against Johnson the Priest in my first and specially my second answer which none replyeth to without any confutation or notice of it I have fully proved that Christ's Catholick Church hath himself for an Essential Head sometime visible on earth leaving visible Laws and now visible to the Courtiers in Heaven and coming visibly to judge all and there is no other Indeed if the doctrine of Mr. Dodwell and many such hold who deny that the power floweth immediately from Christs Law or Charter to the Church and not from the Ordainers or Electors who do but determine of the Receiver and Invest him then all the Doctors in England cannot answer the Digression Cap. 14. of the Book called The Catholick Hierarchy proving that such a Prelatical subordination of Churches inferreth a Pope But I have fully shewed the vanity of that inference as to us But remember that the Doctor and I are agreed that A Nation consenting in an Association of particular Churches may be called a National Church equivocally Though it can make no Laws unless its consent also set up a Supreme Church-Government Meet Agreements are not Laws § 16. He next would make the unwary Reader think that he answereth my Question 1. What is the same Rule that all must walk by viz. that the Scriptures are the Foundation of our Faith 2. But our Church requireth Conformity to the Rules appointed by it agreable to the word of God Answ But it seems the Scripture then is not the whole rule but part the fundamental part 2. Which did Paul mean Was your Churches Rule then made 3. Doth your Church require this ad esse or but ad melius esse If the first all Canon-breakers are dismembred And is that according to God's word If the later why am not I of your Church 4. But how comes that Church to command and bind which hath no such Ruling power CHAP. IX Of the Peoples Consent to the Pastoral and Church-Relation § 1. PAge 307. Saith the Dean The next thing to be considered is the interest and power of the People as to the choice of their Pastors for want of which great complaints are made Mr. Baxter is very tragical on this Argument and keepeth not within tolerable bounds of discretion in pleading the Peoples Cause against Magistrates and Patrons and Laws Answ 1. That is tolerable to some men which others cannot bear Silken ears must have soft words The Land cannot bear all his words was an old Complaint And Speak pleasing things Prophecy deceit was an old Mandate It 's no wonder if that sort of men that must judg whether our Preaching and Worshipping God be tolerable and must write us down the words which we must say to God in Prayer or not be tolerated do also think themselves the meet judges whether our indiscretion be intollerable 2. But let us try whether he state this Controversie any more Logically or truly than the rest and whether he intimate not hurtful though tollerable untruth 1. It 's a crooked insinuation to put the word Power instead of Right and Liberty as if Power of Consenting in the People and Power of Rulers were univocal and not equivocal terms But this is tolerable For experience hath convinced me how little Logical strictness is from this Doctor to be expected I doubt lest next as some men instead of Learning maintain their reputation by deriding it we may expect some such defence of the Doctor◠Logick to prove that he is none of the Disputers of this World who deceive men by vain Philosophy 2. And the word choice instead of consent is somewhat more crooked For choice usually includeth the first nominating Vote And he knoweth that I pleaded for the necessity of no more than the Churches consent though it were subsequent to the choice of Magistrates or Patrons 3. But the next is worse that I plead the Peoples Cause against Magistrates Patrons and Laws when I do but desire their Conjunction § 2. His repetitions call me tediously to repeat the state of the Controversie a business quite below him I. I Have oft said that God hath not made either Magistrates or People the Judges who is fit to be and shall be a Minister of Christ in general but the ORDAINERS and the PERSON himself conjunct This is evident 1. From Scripture Instances of all that were Ordained 2. From the nature of the thing 1. Who is supposed so fit to judge as men and Seniors of the same Office Who but Physicians are fit to judge who is meet to be a Licensed Physician And who but Philosophers judge of Graduates and Professours in Philosophy 2. And no man can make me a Minister against my will nor know me to be fit if I know my self to be unfit § 3. II. I have oft said that the Supreme Civil Governour is the Judge whom he must countenance maintain and tolerate The proof is easie 1. Because to do it is his work and every man must be a discerning judge of his own work 2. Because it is a publick act of Government and he is the chief publick Judge therein § 4. III. I have oft said that the Disposal of the Tythes and Temples is in the power of the Prince and Patron by his grant But with these bounds 1. His power is not Absolute but Under Christ and limited by him and therefore he hath no power against him nor to cross his Laws or to contradict his ends 2. If the Tythes and Temples were given only for publick Teachers of Catechumens or for meer Lecturers the Magistrate must dispose of them to such as are capable of that Office 3. If the Tythes and Temples were given for the Pastors of the Churches the Magistrate is bound to give them to such as are lawfully called to be such Pastors and not by the advantage of his Trust overthrow the way of entrance instituted by Christ 4. However if they were devoted to God it is God who is the proprietor and it's sacrilege to alienate them And an intolerable ill disposal is alienation § 5. IV. I have oft said that it being supposed that their Ancestors gift of Tythes or Glebe and Temples is the reason of our common Patronage and presenting power the will of the dead Donors is to be observed and their gifts given to none but on the termes by them determined But their gifts are supposed to be for the Churches good and not against it Nor had they any power on pretense of beneficence to destroy or to take away more than they give But the Trusting of our Souls Conduct
that is an Heretick avoid Bid them not good speed Let no man deceive you Those that cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine ye have learned avoid from such turn away Is here no more than judging their lives § 18. Here he cometh to prove this even by Cyprian's Epistle against Martial and Basilides I must not name his dealing with it lest he say Irail But I may note 1. that he saith the force of what Cyprian saith comes at last only to this giving Testimony Answ Only here is more than Main before And though it was a matter of scandal that was before them and therefore it is no wonder if nothing else be particularly spoken of yet sure these words signifie more than Testimony By publick judgment and Testimony be approved worthy and meet And to be sound in the faith and apt to teach is some part of meetness And because they chiefly have power either to chuse Priests that are worthy or refuse the unworthy A chief chusing power of the worthy is more than a meer testimony of fact Again that by the suffrage of the whole fraternity the Episcopacy be delivered to him Suffrage is more than testimony of fact And All they do sin who are defiled by the sacrifice of a prophane and unjust Priest signifieth a dissenting power or else separation were no duty But he saith This is the strongest testimony in antiquity for the peoples power Answ A strange saying of so good an Historian who may easily know that the concurrent judgment of all the Churches their practice and their Canons making the Peoples consent and usually Election necessary was a far stronger testimony than one Epistle But to weaken this he saith 1. It was in a case where a Bishop had voluntarily resigned Answ 1. What 's that to the general rule here asserted 2. Was it voluntarily which they were adjudged to do But I find no mention of Martial's voluntary resigning but only Basilides 2. He saith Another Bishop was put in his place not by the power of the people c. Answ 1. This was before said that the people might give them power No. As if he would have the Reader think that we hold the people give the power which I have so oft disproved But it 's his advantage to talk to many men at once that he may say some of you said it But if distinction were not a crime I would distinguish between giving the power and concurring with other Causes to give a Receptivity to the person that must have it The peoples consent is a causa partialis of capacity and receptivity 2. But what signifie these words The Ordination of our Collegue Sabinus by the suffrage of the whole fraternity and by the judgment of the Bishops c. Is not this as much power as we plead for 3. Are not you the Author of the Defence of B. Laud and say That Christ gave the Keys to Peter as the representative of the whole Church And have you now said more against me or your self I am not of that mind 3. He saith They had the judgment of a whole Council for deserting him Answ Yes for deserting them both And that Council told them God had fore-determined in his word what men must or must not be Bishops and it was God rather than they that judged it and bound them to obey and that the power was chiefly in the people to chuse and refuse c. Did you think you had helpt your cause by saying It was a whole Council that was for what we say 4. He saith It was for Idolatry and blasphemy by his own confession Answ Which mean you by his when they were two neither of them were otherwise Idolaters than as Libellaticks who to save their lives suffered other men to subscribe their names thinking it was not their own deed like some that I have heard of that thought Conformity Perjury c. but let a Friend bribe an Officer to subscribe their names and give them a Certificate And Baslides blasphemy was in his sickness in terrour of Conscience and perhaps phrensie 5. He saith all St. Cyprian's proof is that the people were most concerned to give testimony of life c. This is answered already § 10. His next is The people on this assuming the power of Elections caused great disturbance and disorders in the Church where he goeth over some few of the many instances which I have at large recited at Antioch Rome Alexandria c. Answ 1. And yet for all these disorders the Church deprived not the People of their priviledge 2. But how fallaciously is this urged I have fully elsewhere opened to the Reader how the aspiring Prelates seeking Patriarchates and Bishopricks became as so many Captains at War and gathered Monks Clergy and People to strive and fight for them And now he layeth this on the People As if the common Souldiers and not the Generals were the cause of the War But of this I have said enough § 20. He saith To prevent this many Bishops were made without the choice of the People and Canons made to regulate Elections Answ Crastily said He saith not without the consent of the People but the Election And he saith not that the Canons took away either consenting or electing suffrages but that they regulated them Yes they over and over confirmed them § 21. He saith A◠Alexandria the Election belonged to the twelve Presbyters Answ They are hard put to it when they are put to fly to that testimony which maketh Presbyters the makers of Bishops Hierome and Eutychius Alexand. tell you that the Presbyters chose and made the Bishops as the Army doth a General which made Arch-Bishop Usher tell King Charles the First That the Presbyters at Alexandria did more than Ordain Presbyters for they made Bishops as he told me himself But 1. We never denied that the Com-provincial Bishops ordinarily afterwards Ordained them 2. Nor that the Presbyters chose them Did the Doctor think this was to the purpose But 1. Doth he think that the Presbyters choice excludeth the Peoples when it is a known thing that the Canons and Custom constantly conjoyned them 2. Will he conclude that when ever History nameth not the Peoples choice they are left out 3. Will he perswade us when the People are not the chusers that they are not necessarily the consenters or refusers I will add one more proof to all before-mentioned It is impossible ex naturâ rei that the Pastoral Office should be exercised on dissenters Therefore their consent is necessary A Patient may be drencht like a Horse and cram'd like fatted Fowl and so may have a Physician against his will But a Soul cannot use Pastoral help unwillingly 1. He cannot unwillingly be baptized 2. Nor unwillingly joyn in publick prayer and praise with the Church 3. Nor unwillingly confess sin 4. Nor unwillingly crave or receive Ministerial counsel 5. Nor unwillingly receive the Lords Supper 6.
would have all walk by he will not do it but instead of that with unusual gentleness tells me he will not differ about it if I do but grant that it is a Rule that binds us all to do all that lawfully we can for peace which I cheerfully grant And if it be not lawful for peace and concord to forbear silencing us imprisoning us accusing us as odious for not wilful sinning and urging Magistrates to execute the Laws against us and making us seem Schismaticks for not forbearing to Preach the Gospel to which we were vowed and consecrated by Ordination I know not lawful from unlawful I cannot yet get him to tell us what he would have the many score thousands do on the Lords Days that have no room in the Parish-Churches with many such which our case is concerned in § 14. I thought his Book had been an Answer to mine and other mens Prefaces but I find that I was mistaken Indeed he nameth five Books written against his Accusation what he saith to Dr. Owen and Mr. Alsop I leave to themselves to consider of The Countrey Gentlemans Case in sense was this Whether all they that think Parish Communion under the present impositions to be sin are bound till they can change their judgment to forbear all Church-worship and live like Atheists and so be damned And who can find any Answer to this Mr. Barret's Queries out of his Books he saith next nothing to but a dark retracting his Irenicon And far be it from me to blame him for growing wiser But why took he no notice of his own words cited in the Epistle out of his late Book against Idolatry threatning us all with no less than damnation if me prefer not the purest Church And as to my Defence his Book is nothing like an Answer unless his naming me and citing out of that and other Books a few broken scraps which he thought he could make some advantage of may be called an Answer § 15. I confess he hath made some attempt to tell me what the National Church of England is but so Independently as I doubt his party will disown it with great offence In short he holds that there is no such thing as a Church of England in the usual Political sense having any Constitutive Ecclesiastical Supreme Power Monarchical or Aristocratical or Democratical but it 's only the many Churches in England associated by the common consent in Parliament c. Remember that he and I are so far agreed As I was writing this I saw a Book against him of a friend too much for me and somewhat freely handling the Dr. which in this point would help them by saying that the Convocation having the Legislative Church-Power may be the Constitutive Regent part But he confesseth to me that he spake not what is but what he counts should be or wisheth for the Dr. himself had before told us that the Convocations of Canterbury and York are two and not united to make one National supreme power so that this proveth no one political Church of England at all but only 2 Provincial Churches in England § 16. The Dr. hath so judiciously and honestly pleaded our Cause in his defence of A. Bishop Laud and his Book against Idolatry that I have made his words the first Chap. of this Book which if he candidly stand to I see not but our principles are the same § 17. His book is made up of 3 parts I. Untrue Accusations II. Untrue Historical Citations abundance III. Fallacious Reasonings Would you have an undeniable Confutation ad hominem in few words I. As to his Principles he saith himself as aforesaid Of Idolat p. 7. We are sure that wilful ignorance or choosing a worse Church before a better is a damnable sin II. As to his History of the old Nonconformists read A. Bishop Bancrofts dangerous Positions and Heylins History of Presbytery charging them odiously with the clean contrary and the Canons made against them on that supposition III. As to his History and Doctrine against the Election of Bp s which I pleaded as I have fully proved his abuse of History in it I repeat Mr. Thorndikes words Forbear of Penalty It is to no purpose to talk of Reformation of the Churchtoregular Government without restoring the liberty of choosing Bishops and priviledg of enjoying them to the Synods Clergy and people in the making of those of whom they consist and by whom they are to be governed that I need make no other reason of the neglect of Episcopacy than the neglect of it O pray hard to God to provide greater store of skilful holy and peaceable Labourers for his Harvest that by the sound belief of a better world have overcome the deluding love of the honours prosperity and pleasures of the flesh and wholly live to God and Heaven POSTSCRIPT DR Edward Stillingfleet Irenic P. 114. saith The Episcopal men will hardly find any evidence in Scripture or in the practice of the Apostles for Churches consisting of many fixed Congregations for worship under the charge of one Pastor nor in the Primitive Church for the Ordination of a Bishop without the preceding Election of the Clergy and at least consent and approbation of the people and neither in Scripture nor Antiquity the least foot-step of the delegation of Church-power so that upon the matter all of them at last make use of those things in Church-Government which have no other foundation but the principles of humane prudence guided by Scripture and it were well if that were observed still P. 370. Surely then their Diocesses we re not very large if all the several Parishes could communicate on the same day with what was sent from the Cathedral Church P. 361. I doubt not but to make it appear that Philippi was not the Metropolis of Macedonia and therefore the Bishops there mentioned could not be the Bishops of the several Cities under the jurisdiction of Philippi but must be understood of the Bishops resident in that City P. 157. There must be a form of Ecclesiastical Government over a Nation as a Church as well as of Civil Government over it as a Society governed by the same Laws For every Society must have its Government belonging to it as such a Society And the same reason that makes Government necessary in any particular Congregation will make it necessary for all the particular Congregations joyning together in one visible Society as a particular National Church For the Unity and Peace of that Church ought much more to be lookt after than of any one Congregation P. 131. The Churches power as to Divine Law being only directive and declarative but as confirmed by a Civil Sanction is juridical and obligatory P. 113. Where any Church is guilty of corruptions both in Doctrine and in practice which it avoweth and professeth and requireth the owning them as necessary conditions of Communion with her there a Noncommunion with that Church is necessary and a
their several fixed Provinces which I never saw proved I will not contend whether those Provinces may be called Churches If we agree about the thing use the name as you see cause Sect. 9. And to your talk of our Bishops being of the same sort I ask you whether any of the Bishops for 300 years or for long after save Cyril Alexand. by violence did ever use or claim any power over any Ministers or Christians besides meer fatherly Teaching Perswading urging Gods Word on them and applying it to the consciences of particular Persons by Admonitions verbal Censures and Absolutions Did they meddle by Force with Body or Purse Let your Bishops use no other force or way of constraint than the Apostles did if they be their Successors and not lay the excommunicate in Prisons and ruine their Bodies and Estates valeat quantum valere potest But Mr. Glanvile and many of you tell us how little you care for it without the Sword Sect. 10. If any man will but consider what I cited out of Greg. Nazianzen that saith Men unfit were so ambitious to be of the Clergy that the Clergy was in many Churches almost as many as the Laity And that Presbyters then were much like the Presbyterians Elders save that they had the power of Word and Sacraments though they seldom exercised Preaching in Cities but left that to the Bishop and that the number of their Acoluthi Exorcistae Ostiarii Lectores Subdiaconi Diaconi c. made up the great body of them And the very Boys and Schollars that were bred up under them yea or but for Church-singing are sometimes joyned to make up the number see Isidor de Offic. Eccl. L. 2. even all the Monks are often numbred with them And Victor cited by him seemeth to number twice the Infantuli so bred up with the great number of Readers to the Carthage Clergy I say he that considers all this will not judge of the number of people or Churches by the number of the Clergy as he would do now with us where the great Parishes have but two or three Priests Sect. 11. And as to the cause that I plead for it is enough that I have proved that even when the name of Bishop was confined to the Episcopi Pastorum yet the Presbyters had the power of the Keys and were Episcopi Gregis and exercised this power in their distant Countrey assemblies though under the Bishop and the Bishop was to exercise his with them as Assistants so that the particular Churches were not really unchurched Sect. 12. p. 265. He cometh nearer our controversie but first falsly stateth the question supposing that I say that the whole power of the Presbyters is swallowed up by the Bishops And is the disputing of a question falsly stated of any profit I only said that the office of a Church-Pastor or Presbyter hath three essential parts viz. the power of Teaching the Church of conducting them in Worship and Governing the people by the use of the Keys And that he that destroyeth one part that is essential though he swallow not up all the power altereth the essence of the Office and that so the English Diocesan Form doth I have largely proved in my Treat of Episcopacy which he doth not answer Sect. 13. 1. He tells us that the Presbyters are the lower house in the Convocation and so have their Votes in passing all the Rules of Discipline Articles of Doctrine and Forms of divine Service Ans 1. According to his description the Church of England hath no one Ecclesiastical Government either Monarchical or Aristocratical or Democratical And therefore the Acts of the Convocation are no Acts of governing the Church of England but meer Agreements Therefore this proveth not the Presbyters power of governing it 2. If this be a part of Government it is the Legislative Part or the Executive The later it is not The former the Lawyers say it is not King and Parliament only being Legislators But if this be Legislation we deny it to be any of the power of the Keys in question which is but to judge who is fit or unfit for Church-communion to Admonish Absolve or Excommunicate according to Christs Law and is the execution of Christs Law and not the making of new Laws 3. It is lis sub judice whether the things here named be any part of true lawful Church-Government Rules of Discipline Christ hath made enough except about meer mutable Accidents Articles of Doctrine man must not otherwise make than to declare what he believeth Christ hath made Forms of Divine Service commanded to all others the Apostles never made nor that we find appointed any others to make them If these be lawful by way of agreement of many Churches this is none of the Power we speak of Yet he calls this one of the greatest Rights of Government viz. making Rules for the whole body which he denyeth to have any constitutive Government Sect. 14. He saith In this main part of Government our Church falls behind none of the ancient Churches only there they were taken singly in every City c. Ans That is 1. When the Ministers of a Diocess choose four out of whom the Bishops take two And 2. This only to make agreements without any governing power over the Church of England 3. And this only about general Regulation 4. In either unlawful or doubtful Impositions on others about meer Accidents or Circumstances of Order This is the same or as good as when every true Church hath present Pastors personally to exercise the executive Church-Government called the Keys by the Laws of Christ already made in judging the case of each particular Person as to his Title to Church-communion and the Kingdom of Heaven For that is the thing which by us is pleaded for Sect. 15. Next he tells us of four that are to joyn in Ordinatiom and Examination when 1. It is not the making or governing of Pastors which I am speaking of but the Government of the Flocks 2. He knoweth that it is no strange thing for our Bishops to say that both in Convocations and Ordination the Presbyters act only as the Bishops Council and the Bishops only act by governing authority 3. I never disputed for Presbyters Power to ordain as essential to them nor did I ever meddle in any Ordination 4. If four Presbyters have such power that proveth not that four hundred have it that never exercise it in the same Diocess 5. If by all this you mean that really Presbyters have the governing Power of the Keys it condemneth those the more that give it to four and deny it to four hundred or one thousand 6. When I was ordained none examined us but the Bishops Chaplain and two or three City Ministers called by the Bishop that never saw us before meerly pro formâ laid hands on us with him But it 's well that you give such a power to ordain Sect. 16. Next p. 267. he
Nor unwillingly desire the Pastors visitation and prayers in his sickness 7. Nor unwillingly seek and receive absolution c. I mean he can do none of this that doth not consent And is he a Pastor to such men that refuse all this It 's a shame to think that learned men should bend their wits to prove that the Sun is not light Did the Church at Alexandria ever after chuse their Bishops and not before All the Alexandrian Church-History tells us that the people there indeed exercised too great power after this no place on earth more tumultuous and unruly And yet no place where the Bishops were more secular and more assumed the power of the Sword But the people chose them 4. And if it had been true that the choice lay only and absolutely on the Presbyters how came they to have so long two Bishops and two Churches besides the Arians 5. And he wisely overlooketh the Question who chose those Pres byters that were the chusers of the Bishop § 22. He next instanceth ex Euseb l. 6. c. 10. in Germanion and Gordius Ordained by the Bishops in Narcissus place at Hierusalem Answ 1. His argument if any must be this Eusebius saith the Bishops Ordained them not mentioning the peoples consent or choice Ergo their consent or choice was not used How easily might he have known that we would deny the consequence Doth any of us deny that the Bishops were the Ordainers of Bishops 2. And even the words of Eusebius confute him saying That when Narcissus shewed himself again the brethren no doubt the Laity intreated him to enjoy his Bishoprick again § 23. His next instance is Severus Bishop of Milevis in his life time appointed his successour acquainting only the Clergy with it And Augustine prevented the peoples disturbance and got them to receive him Answ Thus it is some mens work to confute themselves It 's a known thing that the peoples right was so universally and unquestionably acknowledged that the Canons forbad any Bishop to nominate and chuse his Successour lest it should forestall them and prejudice their choice And why else was the peoples resistance feared And what did Austin but perswade them to consent And why doth he mention that the People consented and received him if they had no consenting Vote or right on just cause to dissent It would be an odd argument to prove that a woman had no power of choice in Marriage because one was put to perswade her to consent which proveth the necessity of her consenting § 24. He next tells us of Austin's own nomination of his Successour Eradius Answ More and more against himself All that men do is in danger of miscarrying by their faultiness Wise men would do their best to prevent this and the peoples consent being of necessity they sometimes will pre-engage them so Austin's predecessour thought it the craftiest way in his life-time to take in Austin for his Coadjutor or fellow Bishop two in a City lest the people should miss of so excellent a man But this being against the Canons Austin confesseth that he did it ignorantly and disowneth it Yet lest the people who grew more and more faulty should mischuse he in his life time commendeth to them Eradius that their love to him might procure their acceptance Doth not this prove that their choice or consent was necessary Reader if the Doctor can perswade thee that the Country have not the choice of Parliament men because some are commended or named to them thy yielding is too easie § 25. The next is the story of Paul the Novatian out of Socrat. l. 8. who hath but seven Paulus was advising his Clergy to chuse his Successour They told him their fear of their own disagreement and to prevent it intreated him to nominate one He made them promise to stand to it and named Mercianus in a sealed paper Doth not this instance prove that the Bishop had not power to chuse one of himself And was not his fear of the disagreement of the Clergy And doth any of this disprove the peoples consenting right And would the Doctor perswade us that even the Novatians excluded them § 26. He tells us that the Greek Canonists think that the Council of Nice took away all the power of election of Bishops from the people and gave it to the Bishops of the Province Answ 1. In all reason he should have cited those Canonists for it 's strange that yet their following Customs and Canons should say the contrary 2. There is not a word in the Canon cited about election but only ordination that all the Bishops in the Province should Ordain a Bishop But when that cannot be there shall be at least three present and three more consenting by writing And what 's this to the Case the Peoples election or consent § 27. Yet he bringeth more against himself viz. Can. 18. Concil Antioch which is That if one be Ordained Bishop and go not to the Parish because the people refuse him he shall have the honour and Office of a Bishop not troubling the peace of the Church which plainly saith what I have oft said That the people have no power to hinder any from being Ministers or Bishops indefinitely in the Church Universal but only to judge whether he shall be theirs whereas the Ordainers have power in both cases and usually were the first chusers though the people had a refusing or accepting power as there appeared cause § 28. Next he addeth more for what I plead that Basil Ordaining one first perswades the Senate and People to accept him Adding Their way then was if the people did agree on a person to be Bishop to petition the Metropolitan and Synod who had the full power to allow or refuse him Answ Is not this a strong proof that the people had no such agreeing or chusing power because the Metropolitan and Synod also had their vote what need Basil perswade them to accept him when they had no power to refuse Did Basil or any Synod say all people are bound to accept those whom we chuse be they what they will and not to try them and judge themselves § 29. And here I desire the Reader to remember 1. That we take the chief trust to be by Christ committed to the Ordainers for taking in fit men and keeping out the unfit They being the only Judges with the person himself who shall be a Minister of Christ in the Church Universal And neither Magistrate or People have a power to chuse or refuse them 2. That the Universal Church being one body of Christ though Ministers have not such a charge of each others flocks as the particular Bishops of them have yet are they bound to give them all the help they can as neighbour families to help each other And therefore to offer to vacant Churches the best they know and perswade them to accept them when they are at a loss or need advice 3. The
people are bound to reverence the judgment of neighbour Pastors herein and not causlesly to oppose 4. When the People have chosen or they and the Clergy if the person were not before Ordained the Ordainers still are judges for their own act 5. It was not usual to Ordain sine titulo and the Ordainers did two things at once 1. Judge absolutely who shall be a Minister of Christ 2. Judge with the Church to which he was Ordained Elders and People who was fit for that Church and should be theirs And a threefold lock was safe 6. By all this it appears that all the Doctors talk against the peoples unfitness to discern who are sound or Heretick fit or unfit is to no purpose And that if unmeet men are Ministers or Bishops the fault is ten times more in the Ordainers than in the People seeing it is not the People but the Ordainers that are trusted to take into the Ministry indefinitely but only among many to judg who shall be theirs supposing them either before Ministers or next to be made such by the Ordainers And doth the Doctor think that the judgment of all parties is not as sure as of one alone or that my refusing a Physician is any wrong to his Licensers or him § 30. The Laodicean Canon cited by him speaketh for me as the rest Did he think I wanted his help to cite more for my self Who doubteth that the People being not the sole judges if they took in an un-Ordained or un-approved man without the Synods consent it was void By the way do either Synods or People the old chusers chuse our Bishops or Priests § 31. Yet more for me he citeth the Chalced. Council turning out Bassianus and Stephanus from Ephesus two men that strove and sought for the Bishoprick unto blood in the Church and both pleaded they were lawfully called by Clergy and People And yet had the People no right But they were both proved to be violent Intruders and another chosen And who doubts but a great General Council had the greatest power then § 32. Next he tells us of a Law of Justinian that made the Clergy and better sort of Citizens chusers And indeed Nazianzene once wisht the more religious sort were chusers but doth not this prove still the peoples power though so long after by an Emperour the poorer were so restrained I will not stay to search the Book but take it as he citeth it § 33. But his next seemeth to be downright against us Can. 13. Conc. Laodic But it is not so Crab hath two translations The first saith Quod non sit permittendum turbis electiones eorum facere qui sunt ad sacerdotium provehendi It is not sufferable to chuse by tumults ergo not for the people to chuse at all no nor dissent I deny the consequence To forbid disorder is not to forbid choice or free consent § 34. His next proof is Nic. Conc. 2. c. 3. which he saith restrained the election only to Bishops Answ Such dealing tells us that Protestant Doctors are not to be taken for infallible no more than Papists I cited the Canon before The doubt is whether it drive us not to more separation than we are willing of by nullifying our Bishops and Priests calling It is every election of a Bishop Priest or Deacon which is made by Magistrates shall remain void by the Canon which saith If any Bishop use the secular Magistrates to obtain by them a Church let him be deposed and separated and all that communicate with him Doth not the Doctor unhappily chuse his testimonies Had it not been better to have past over this Council Where now is all the Church of England by this Canon if Bishops coming in by the King and Parsons by the Patrons be all void and null and the people separated that communicate with them Such events are the fate of an ill cause And the next Canon doth not amend their matter which calleth it madness for gain or any affection of his own to drive any from the Ministry or segregate one of his Clergy he shall have Lextalionis and his work shall fall on his own head § 35. He adds Which was confirmed by following Councils in the Greek Church as Can. 28. Const against Photius and the people are there excluded with an Anathema so far were popular elections grown out of request in the Eastern Empire Answ 1. Had this been true it would not much move me that these two Councils that set up Image-worship and shewed much wickedness should contradict the Apostolical and Catholick constitutions and practice But 1. I thank the Bishops I am not able to buy the French Volumes of the Councils and therefore what is there I know not and my own Library is ruined to avoid their Agents distraining it for my Preaching And Doctor James and others have taught me to prefer the oldest Editions of the Councils and to take heed how I trust the later and the Jesuits pretended Manuscripts I have now none but Crab who medleth not with this and Binnius And in Binnius there are but 14 Canons in the last Action and 27 in the antecedent Fragmenta and no such thing as a 28th Canon to be found Nor is there in the 27th any such thing as the Doctor citeth 2. But if there were if it were but the confirmation of the 2. Nicene Canon it were much against the Doctor 's cause and nothing for him 3. But unhappily here also he sends us to find out much against him For besides that the 8th Can. in Fragm condemneth requiring subscriptions to stick to the Patriarch though they were not yet oaths of obedience the 12th Canon is indeed the same with those forecited viz. That the Apostolical and Synodical Canons flatly forbidding promotions and consecrations of Bishops by the power and command of Princes we concordantly define and sentence that if any Bishop receive the consecration of such a dignity by the craft and tyranny of Princes he shall be altogether deposed as one that desired and consented to have the gift of God by the will of carnal sense and from men and by men I suppose this is the Doctor 's Canon which deposeth all the English Bishops unhappily cited And the Can. 14. requiring Princes to honour Bishops and condemning the Bishops that debase themselves to go far from their Church to meet a Prince and that will alight to them from their Horses and that will basely kneel to them or will come to their tables unless with purpose freely to reprove them expoundeth both these Bishops hearts and words And so doth Can. 17. which condemneth such as come not to Synods because the Prince forbiddeth them and saith That Princes have no right so much as to be spectators of the matters which at Synods fall out among Priests And here indeed an Anathema is pronounced against the obstinately disobedient Bishops that will not obey their Patriarch before the forbidding Prince And
Uniformity came out of about 9000 Ministers that kept in and had laid by the Liturgy before about 7000 Conformed to the altered Liturgy before any of them ever saw it save a few by declaring their Assent and Consent the Act being known before the Book could be Printed and about 2000 were silenced by that Act. How they behaved themselves since then is so well known and I have here and oft declared and how the Plague first and the burning of the Churches next and the Kings Licenses next did give them the opportunities and calls which made more publick Preaching seem to them a duty that I shall not make recital of it § 5. All this while abundance of invectiues were poured out against them by many of the Conforming Clergy in Press and Pulpits and especially in the ears of great men to whom we had no access but seemed what such men described us to be The new Laws against Conventicles and the Oxford Act of Consinement had been added to the first Many were hunted up and down their Goods and Libraries distrained many were imprisoned some there died The Informers and Prosecutors grew weary They saw the severity came most from the Prelates and the Parliament the King being not for severity therein The Justices grew unwilling of Execution the Preachers reprove them and call on them to put the Laws in Execution they are greatly offended at the Kings Licenses they continue to accuse us for Schism at least and some of Sedition though we invaded none of their Temples nor askt them for any part of their maintenance And the Parliament and Prelates were so sharp against us that we durst not tell the world what we refused in Conformity and why lest we put them upon more severity nor indeed could we do it the Press was lockt up by so great penalties But while we were forced to silence we were lowdly called to to say what we stuck at and what it was that we would have And after 17 years such calls I ventured to name the things and hence is the storm of the present indignation § 6. I had before proved the wilful desertion of our Ministry especially when the King Licensed us to be odious Sacriledg To this I am told of mens power to silence such as they think deserve it I grant it if they truly think so so may they on just cause alienate Churches and Church-lands and hang Malefactors but not when no such cause is given nor at their pleasure § 7. When in the fitst Plea for Peace I had stated the case of our Nonconformity I intended to bring the Proofs of each particular supposed sinful as I after found occasion And meeting with abundance that accused us of disloyal rebellious Principles I largly delivered my own and many others judgment of Civil and Eccesiastical Authority the power of Princes and the duty of Subjects and therein also wrote some Answer to Four Accusations brought against us 1. That we pretend Grace against Morality 2. That we hold that things Indifferent became unlawful if commanded 3. I largly confuted Bishop Morley's false Accusation of my Doctrine of the Magistrates power to command things unlawful by accident and Dr. Parker's Doctrine of Scandal 4. I confuted them that extend our Non-conformity to things which we refuse not All this in the second Plea for Peace which none yet that I know of have answered § 8. And lest any should think that we are all for Negatives I wrote a Treatise of the only Terms of Universal Christian concord which I value above all the rest being assured that the Churches will never otherwise be healed than by that impartial sure and easie Catholick way which some have reviled but none since that I know of confuted One Learned Bishop that had a chief hand in our present Impositions and ejection I desired to tell me which is the way of Christian concord if this be not And he maintaineth That the only way is to obey the Colledg of Pastors who are to govern the Catholick Church through all the world per Literas formatas Where this Colledg as one governing power do meet or how they signifie their Majority of Votes and in what cases and who must gather the Votes from Abassia to Moscovie and in how long time and how they shall come to all men with certainty and whether the ejected silenced and excommunicated c. may appeal to them c. I could not learn § 9. In the same Book I sufficientiy confuted Mr. Dodwell's great Book which denyeth not only the Churches and Ministry which are not by uninterrupted Episcopal Ordination but also the ordinary salvation of all such Churches as having no covenant promise by valid Sacraments delivered them He hath pretended some defence in a late Book of Letters to which if they can be Printed I hope to give easily a satisfactory reply § 10. In the same book he Publisheth some old Letters of his to me for the Diocesan frame of Government the notice of which beforehand given me caused me to Publish a full Treatise of Diocesan Episcopacy containing the Reasons why we cannot swear to it or approve it or swear never to endeavour any reforming alteration of the frame here setled and exercised And whatever Mr. Dodwell pretendeth to the contrary if this Treatise do not fully answer his Letter and justifie us in this part of Nonconformity I am unable to judg of the Cause but am willing to recieve any better information § 11. And because I find false History not the least cause of ordinary mistakes and men cry up Diocesan Prelacy as the ancient and chief cure of Schism I gathered an Abstract of the history of Bishops and their Councils that the true matter of fact might not be so commonly mistaken as it is § 12. At the same time came out against me First a book of Mr. John Cheyneys the mistakes of which I manifested in an Answer And afterward old Letters of Mr. Hinkleys to which I had an old Answer which I cast by and now Published and another Accuser abounding with untruths called the Impleder and another called Reflections or Speculum c. And another Book of Mr. Cheneys full of most pitiful mistakes All which with Justice L'Estrange's Dialogue and someothers I answered together in a Book called the Third Defence ef the Nonconformists c. § 13. But the Accusations of Dean Stillingfleet in his Sermon made the loudest noise In the Answer to which I chiefly desired to have come to some understanding agreement with him about the true state of our Case and Controversie and to that end craved his answer to several necessary questions but was not able to procure it And now in his large Book where I hoped to have found an Answer to them I look for it in vain Yea though Mr. Hikeringhill roughly provoked him but to expound his own Text and tell us intelligibly what the same Rule is which the Apostle
p. 73. He acquits them from Schisme that separate if the Church be Schismatical 74. I desire the Reader then to Read my few Sheets called A search for the English Schismatick More mistakes p. 74 75. Chap. 6. Whether he be no Christian that is not a fixed Member of a particular Church The Doctors Schismatical Error Confuted p. 76. He by this condemneth Apostles and Evangelists that were Itinerant and unfixed such as Bucer de Regno Dei would have sent abroad my exceptions about Churches and Ministers justified and his Calumny detected p 80. Whether I give too much to the People or am against the Rights of Patrons or Magistrates p. 82. Many more Calumnies to p. 89. He accuseth me as accusing them for naming the sins that I dare not commit p. 89. More of his vain Accusations to p. 92. Whether he be for silencing us p. 92. More of his Calumny p. 99. Considerable Quere to him p. 94. How he would drive men to Separation p. 95 96. He is come to Self-condemning Gentleness in expounding his Rule and Text Phil. 3. 16. p. 97. His sad Ennumeration of the causes of just Separation p. 98. Chap. 7. He begins his Third Part with more false Accusations p. 99. His History for Diocesan Churches against Parochial found fallacious p. 100 c. His vain Plea for the English Frame p. 106 c. He saith It s probable while the Apostles lived there were no fixed Bishops or but few p. 108. And Dr. Hammond saith No Subject Presbyters whether John Fox were the Publisher or Prefacer of the Reformatio Legum c. p. 109. Discipline hard but not unnecessary p. 111. Chap. 8. What the National Church of England is fully discussed and the Doctors Self-contradictions detected He denyeth any true Political Church of England He and we more agreed than he and other high Church-men that are for a Constitutive Political Government p. 112 113 c. He maketh it an introduction of Popery to hold that a Church must have a Constutive Regent Church-power and so fasteneth Popery on the Masters of his cause Chap. 9. That the mutual Consent of Pastors and flock is necessary to the very being of their Relation About Thirty Proofs from Antiquity that the Universal Church was for about 1000 years of that mind and decreed it p. 128 c. The necessity of consent proved from the Nature of the work where the reasons of it are all plainly opened p. 133. c. The Doctors contrary surmises and false Histories fully confuted p. 136 c. Chap. 10. Of the imposed Use of the Cross in Baptisme and denying Baptisme to the refusers p. 153. His vaine excuses confuted Whether the Cross be used as a Sacrament His disingenuous falsifying my words of the use of Crucifixes and other Images p. 156 c. What the Papists ascribe to Sacraments p. 168. Chap. 11. Whether the Excommunicating Church or the Excommunicate Nonconformists for not Communicating when ipso facto Excommunicate be guilty of Schisme p. 163. Chap. 12. Of the English sort of Sponsors and the Exclusion of the Parents Duty p. 167. see more in the Postscript Chap. 13. Of the three French Letters which he subjoyneth p. 171. Chap. 14. Epistles and Testimonies Compar'd with the Doctors And notes on Mr. Jo. Glanviles Book called The Zealous Impartial Protestant With a Letter of his to the Author and a Digression about Dr. Lewis du Moulin his Published Picture and Death-bed Repentance A Postscript of five notices viz. 1. Of a new Observation of the Trade of taking mony to be Godfathers to Poor mens Children and missing Baptisme for want of mony 2. A Letter of Mr. W. Rathbands of his Fathers judgment and Practice 3. An Excellent Confutation of Dr. Stillingfleets History of the extent of Dioceses and Choice of Bishops fully proving that the old Bishops were Parochial or Congregational and always chosen by the People or not made theirs without their free Consent By a Learned and faithful Minister 4. An Excellent Vindication of the silenced Ministers by a Conformist c. 5. My Apologie for the Nonformists Preaching Written by me and Comming out with this ERRATA IN the Preface Sect. 17. line 13. read pleaded for l. 17. after Clergie and People add of â—â—â—â—â—iâ—â—â—sâ— So Evident is the right of Synods Clergie and People AN ANSWER TO Dean STILINGFLEETS c. CHAP. I. The Concord of Dr. Stillengfleet and the Nonconformists especially with the Principles of my Book of Church Concord about the true Nature of Schism and who is the Schismatick written by him at age in his most owned books and not in youth in his Irenicon I stand to all my words against Schism which he hath cited and so I doubt not but he stands to these following of his DIscourse of Idolatry of Rome p. 7. Though we know not what allowances God will make for invincible ignorance we are sure that willful Ignorance or CHOOSING A WORSE CHURCH BEFORE A BETTER IS A DAMNABLE SIN and unrepented of destroys Salvation The Papists consent p. 43. I agree so far with him that every Christian is bound to choose the Communion of the purest Church but which that Church is must be seen by the grounds it brings to prove the Doctrines it teaches to have been delivered by Christ and his Apostles That Church is to be judged purest that hath the best groundâ— and consequently it is of necessity to Salvation to embrace the Communion of it Pag. 194. 195. 1. The Churches power is only to Edification and not to distruction For this was as much as the Apostles challenged to themselves and I hope none dare challenge more But this is a principle of Natural reason that no power in a society ought to be extended 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 of it or to contradict the end and designe of it 2. The Apostles were the most competent Judges of what made for the Edification of the Church Pag. 216. 217. 1. It is agreed on both sides that the Scriptures do contâ—ine in them the unquestionable will of that God whom we are bound to serve and it being the end of devotion as it ought to be of our lives to serve him what is there the mind of any one who sincerely desires to do it can be more inquisitive after or satisfyed in than the rules God himself hath given for his own service Because it is so easly a matter for men to mistake in the waies they choose to serve him in I see the world divided more scarce about any thing than this Pag. 218. Can any man imagine a better way if it could be hoped for than that God himself should enterpose and declare his own mind according to what way they ought to serve him And this is acknowledged to be done already by all Christians in the Scriptures and after all this must not all persons concerned be allowed to enquire into that which is owned to be the will of God or do they think
that ordinary people that understand not Latine and Greek ought not to be concerned what becomes of their Souls If they be and do in good earnest desire to know how to please God and serve him what directions will they give him They must do as they are bidden true say they if we were to worship you for Gods we would do as you bid us for we think it fitting to serve God in his own way But we would know whether that God whom we serve hath given us any Rules for his worship or no. How shall we know whether we keep them or not or will you take upon you the guilt of our sins in disobeying his will This seems to be a very just and reasonable request and I fear it will one day fall heavy on those who conceale that which they confess to be the will of God from the knowledge of the people Pag. 548. I agree with him in the way of proof of a Churches purity viz. by agreement with the doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and that the Church is to be judged purest which shews the greatest Evidence of that consent and that every one is bound to enquire which Church hath the strongest motives for it and to embrace the Communion of it Pag. 565. 14. To suppose the books so written to be imperfect i. e. that any thing necessary to be believed or PRACTISED are not conteined in them is either to charge the first Author of them with fraud and not delivering his whole mind or the writers with insincerity in not setting it down and the whole Christian Church of the first ages with folly in believing the fulness and perfection of the Scriptures in order to Salvation Read the rest of those excellent Rules to the end In his excellent Vindication of Arch Bishop Laâ—d called A Rational account of the Protestants Religion he hath the same termes of Communion and the same description of Schism with mine and I know not how better to express my thoughts nor plead my Vindication viz. Pag. 289. In his defence of Arch Bishop Land not yet disowned since so great and considerable parts of the Christian Churches have in these last ages been divided in Communion from each other the great contest and enquiry hath been which party stands guilty of the cause of the present distance and separation For both sides retain still so much of their common Christianity as to acknowledge that no Religion doth so strictly oblige the owners of it to peace and unity as the Christian Religion doth and yet notwithstanding this we find these breaches so far from closing that supposing the same grounds to continue a reconciliation seems to humane reason impossible an Evidence of which is that those persons who either out of a generous desire of seeing the wounds of the Christian world healed or out of some private interest or designe have made it their business to propound terms of reconciliation between the divided parties have been equally rejected by those parties they have professed themselves the members of Page 290. The distance then being so great as it is it is a very necessary enquiry what the Cause of it is and where the main fault lies and it being acknowledged that there is a possibility that corruptions may get into a Christian Church and it being impossible to prove that Christianity obligeth men to Communicate with a Church in all those corruptions its communion may be tainted with it seems evident to reason that the cause of the breach must lie there where the corruptions are owned and imposed as conditions of communion For can any one imagine it should be a fault in any to keep off from communion where they are so far from being obliged to it that they have an obligation to the contrary from the principles of their common Christianity And where men are bound not to communicate it is impossible to prove their not communicating to be Schism For there can be no Schism but where there is an obligation to communion Schism being nothing else but a willful violation of the bonds Christian communion And therefore whenever you would prove the Protestants guilty of Schism you must do it by proving they were bound to communicate with your Church in those things which they are Protestants for disowning of or that there is so absolute and unlimited an obligation to continue in the society of your Church that no conditions can be so hard but we are bound rather to submit to them then not joyn in Communion with you This being a matter of so vast consequence in order to the setling mens minds in the present disputes of the Christian world before I come to particulars I shall lay down those general principles which may manifest how free Protestants are from all imputation of Schism Schism then importing a violation of that communion which we are obliged to the most natural way for understanding what Schism is is to enquire what the foundations are of Christian communion and how far the bounds of it do extend Now the Foundations of Christian communion in general depend upon the acknowledgment of the truth of Christian Religion For that Religion which Christ came to deliver to the world being supposed true is the reason why any look on themselves as obliged to profess it which obligation extending to all persons who have the same grounds to beleive the truth of it thence ariseth the ground of society in this profession which is a common obligation on several persons joyning together in some acts of common concernment to them The truth then of Christian Religion being acknowledged by several persons they find in this Religion some actions which are to be performed by several persons in society with each other From whence ariseth that more immediate obligation to Christian society in all those who profess themselves Christians and the whole number of these who own that truth of Christian Religion and are thereby obliged to joyn in society with each other is that which we call the Catholick Church But although there be such a relation to each other in all Christians as to make them one common society yet for the performance of particular acts of communion there must be lesser societies wherein persons may joyn together in the actions belonging to them But still the obligation to communion in these lesser is the same with that which constitutes the great body of Christians which is the owning Christianity as the only true Religion and way to eternal happiness And therefore those lesser societies cannot in Justice make the necessary conditions of Communion narrower than those which belong to the Catholick Curch i. e. those things which declare men Christians ought to capacitate them for communion with Christians But here we are to consider that as to be a Christian supposeth mens owning the Christian Religion to be true so the conveyance of that Religion being now to us in those books we call
the Scriptures there must be an acknowledgment of them as the indispensable rule of faith and manners which is that these books are the great Charter of the Christian society according to which it must be governed These things being premised as the foundation in general of Christian society we shall the better understand how far the obligation to communion in it doth extend For which it must be considered that the grounds of continuance in communion must be suitable and proportionable to the first reason of entring into it No man being obliged by virtue of his being in a society to agree in any thing that tends to the apparent ruin of that society But he is obliged to the contrary from the general grounds of his first admission into it His primary obligation being to preserve the honour and interest of it and to joyn in acts of it so far as they tend to it Now the main end of the Christian society being the promotion of Gods honour and Salvation of mens Souls the primary obligation of men entring into it is the advancement of these ends to joyn in all acts of it so far as they tend to these ends but if any thing come to be required directly repugnant to these ends those men of whom such things are required are bound not to communicate in those lesser societies where such things are imposed but to preserve their communion with the Catholick societie of Christians Pag. 291. Setting then aside the Catholick society of Christians we come to enquire how far men are bound to communicate with any less society how extensive soever it may pretend it's communion to be 1. There is no society of Christians of any one communion but may impose some things to be beleived or practised which may be repugnant to the general Foundation of Christian society Pag. 292. 2. There being a possibility acknowledged that particular Churches may require unreasonable conditions of communion the obligation to communion cannot be absolute and indispensable but only so far as nothing is required destructive to the ends of Christian Society Otherwise men would be bound to destroy that which they beleive and to do the most unjust and unreasonable things But the greater difficulty lies in knowing when such things are required and who must be the Judge in that case to which I answer 3. Nothing can be more unreasonable than that the society imposing such conditions of communion should be judge whether those conditions be just and equitable or no. If the question were only in matters of peace conveniency and order the judgment of the society ought to over-rule the judgments of particular persons but in such cases where great bodies of Christians judge such things required to be unlawful conditions of communion what Justice or reason is there that the party accused should fit Judge in her own cause 4. Where there is sufficient evidence from Scripture reason and tradition that such things which are imposed are unreasonable conditions of Christian Communion the not communicating with that Society which requires these things cannot incur the guilt of Schism which necessarily follows from the precedent grounds because none can be obliged to Communion in such cases and therefore the not communicating is no culpable separation Pag. 324. His Lordship delivers his sense clearly and fully in these Words 'T is too true indeed that there is a miserable rent in the Church and I make no question but the best men do most bemoan it nor is he a Christian that would not have Unity might he have it with Truth But I never said or thought that the Protestants made this rent The Cause of the Schism is yours for you thrust us from you because we call'd for truth and redress of abuses For a Schism must needs be theirs whose the cause of it is The Wo runs full out of the mouth of Christ ever against him that gives the offence not against him that takes it ever Page 325. I do say it now and most true it is That it was ill done of those who e're they were who first made the Separation But then A. C. must not understand me of actual only but of causal Separation For as I said before the Schism is theirs whose the cause of it is and he makes the Separation that gives the first just cause of it not he that makes an actual Separation upon a just Cause preceding And this is so evident a Truth that A. C. cannot deny it for he says it is most true That the Reader may clearly understand the full State of this Controversie concerning Schism the upshot of which is that it is agreed between both parties that all Separation from Communion with a Church doth not involve in it the guilt of Schism but only such a Separation as hath no sufficient cause or ground for it Page 131. There can be no Separation from the whole Church but in such things wherein the unity of the whole Church lies for Separation is a violation of some Union Now when men separate from the errors of all particular Churches they do not separate from the whose because those things which one separates from those particular Churches for are not such as make all them put together to be the whole or Catholick Church This must be somewhat further explained There are two things considerable in all particular Churches those things which belong to it as a Church and those things which belong to it as a particular Church Those things which belong to it as a Church are the common ligaments or grounds of Union between all particular Churches which taken together make up the Catholick Church Those things which belong to it as a particular Church are such as it may retain the essence of a Church without Now I say whosoever separates from any particular Church much more from all for such things without which that can be no Church separates from the Communion of the Catholick Church but he that separates only from particular Churches as to such things which concern not their being is onely separated from the Communion of those Churches and not the Catholick And therefore supposing that all perticular Churches have some errors and corruptions in them though I should separate from them all I do not separate from the Communion of the whole Church unless it be for something without which those could be no Churches An evidence of which is that by my declaring the grounds of my separation to be such Errours and corruptions which are crept into the Communion of such Churches and imposed on me in order to it I withal declare my readiness to joyn with them again if those errours and corruptions be left out And where there is this readiness of Communion there is no absolute separation from the Church as such but only suspending Communion till such abuses be reformed which is therefore more properly a separation from the errors than the Communion of such a
Church wherefore if we suppose that there is no one visible Church whose Communion is not tainted with some corruptions though if these corruptions be injoyned as conditions of communion I cannot communicate with any of those Churches yet it followes not that I am separated from the external Communion of the Catholick Church but that I only suspend Communion with those particular Churches 'till I may safely joyn with them As suppose all the particular men I can converse with were infected with Leprosie my not associating with them doth not imply that I am separated from the Communion of all Mankind but that I am loath to be infected as they are and therefore withdraw my self till I can meet with such healthful persons with whom I may safely associate again And if several other persons be of the same mind with me and we therefore joyn together do we therefore divide our selves from the whole World by only taking care of our own safety And especially if any company of such leprous persons should resolve that none should live among them but such as would eat of those meats which brought that distemper upon them our withdrawing our selves and associating without them will still appear more reasonable and commendable Therefore we say we do not necessarily separate from all Churches that have errors or corruptions in them supposing those errors and corruptions be not imposed on us as conditions of communion and thence though we should grant no one visible Church free from taint or corruption yet it is not necessary we should separate from them all for we may lawfully joyne in communion with Churches having error and corruptions if our joyning be not an approbation of them Thus though the Greeks Armenians Albigenses Abyssins may have some errors or corruptions yet if they be not fundamental and be not joyned as necessary to be approved in order to their communion notwithstanding them we may lawfully communicate with them it doth not then at all follow that if there may be no one visible Church free from error and corruption it would be necessary to separate from the communion of the Catholick Church Because 1. All those particular Churches may not make those errors conditions of communion 2. Though they did we separate not from them as Catholick but as corrupt and erroneous particular Churches Pag. 336. To rectifie such gross mistakes as these are for the future you would do well to understand that Schism formally taken alwaies imports something criminal in it and there can be no just cause for a sin But besides that there is that which if you understand it you would call the materiality of it which is the separation of one part of the Church from another Now this according to the different grounds and reasons of it becomes lawful or unlawfull that is as the reasons do make it necessary or unnecessary for separation is not lawfull but when it is necessary Now this being capable of such a different nature that it may be good or evil according to its circumstances there can be no absolute judgment passed upon it till all those reasons and circumstances be duely examined and if there be no sufficient grounds for it then it is formally Schism i. e. a culpable separation If there be sufficient cause then there may be a separation but it can be no Schism And because the union of the Catholick Church lies in fundamental and necessary truths therefore there can be no separation absolutely from the Catholick Church but what involves in it the formal guilt of Schism it being impossible any person should have just cause to disown the Churches communion for any thing whose beleif is necessary to Salvation And whosoever doth so thereby makes himself no member of the Church because the Church subsists on the beleif of fundamental truths But in all such cases wherein a division may be made and yet the several persons divided retain the essentials of a Christian Church the separation which may be among any such must be determined according to the causes of it For it being possible of one side that men out of capricious humours and fancies renounce the communion of a Church which requires nothing But what is just and reasonable And it being possible on the other side that a Church calling her self Catholick may so far degenerate in Faith and Practice as not only to be guilty of great Errors and corruptions but to impose them as conditions of Communion with her it is necessary where there is a manifest separation to inquire into the reasons and grounds of it and to determine the nature of it according to the Justice of the cause which is pleaded for it Page 357. The Catholick Church therefore lies open and free like a Common field to all inhabitants Now if any particular number of these Inhabitants should agree together to enclose part of it without consent of the rest and not to admit any others to that right of Common without consenting to it which of these two parties those who deny to yeild their consent or such who deny their rights if they will not are guilty of the violation of the publick and common rights of the place Page 358. Although nothing separates a Church properly from the Catholick but what is contrary to the being of it yet a Church may separate her self from the Communion of the Catholick by taking upon her to make such things the necessary conditions of her Communion which never were the conditions of Communion with the Catholick Church Page 359. Since it appears that the Communion of the Catholick Church was free for many hundred years without approving or using these things that Church which shall not only publickly use but enjoyn such things upon pain of Excommunication from the Church doth as much as in her lies draw the bounds of Catholick Communion within herself and so divides her self from the true Catholick Church For whatever confines must likewise divide the Church for by that confinement a separation is made between the part confined and the other which separation must be made by the Party so limiting Communion As it was in the Case of the Donatists who were therefore charged with Schisme because they confined the Catholick Church within their own bounds And if any other Church doth the same which they did it must be liable to the same charge that they were The sum of this discourse is that the being of the Catholick Church lies in Essentials that for a particular Church to disagree from all other particular Churches in some extrinsical and accidental things is not to separate from the Catholick Church so as to cease to be a Church But still what ever Church makes such extrinsical things the necessary conditions of Communion so as to cast men out of the Church who yeild not to them is Schismatical in so doing For it thereby divides it self from the Catholick Church And the saparation from it is so
all the Anabaptists Independants Presbyterians c. Who never were of their Church to be none of the Separatists here meant But if by withdrawing he mean not joyning in Communion either he meaneth in the whole Communion or but in part If the whole then the many thousands that live in the Parishes and Communicate not in the Sacrament are no members of the Parish Church And who knoweth then who are of their Church And how few in many Parishes are of it that yet pass for Members of the Church of England And yet I that joyn with them am none of it in their account And. 3. What meaneth he by Constant Communion I go to the Parish Church when sickness hindreth not once a day I go to the Sacrament and am none of their Church Thousands go but rarely and thousands scarce at all at least to the Sacrament and these are of their Church and no separatists 4. But perhaps the conjunction is explicative and joyn with separate Congregations for greater purity and Edification If so then he that never joyneth with them nor any other is none of the intended separatists 2. Nor he that goeth to other Churches on other accounts than for purity of Worship and Edification As Papists that go as to the only true Church for the Authority § 3. But the utter ambiguity is in the word separate And that you may understand it he explaineth it by repeating it By separation he means withdrawing to separate Congregations But the doubt is which are the separate Congregations I named many sorts of Lawful and unlawful separations but he will not tell us which he meaneth by any intreaâ—y § 4. I would my self yet that I may be understood tell the reader what sorts of separation I renounce and what I own But I have done it so oft and largely that I am ashamed to repeat it as oft as mens confusion calls me to it The reader who thinks it worth his labour may see it done in my first Plea for Peace and in the Preface to my Cath. Theol. and specially in the beginning of the third Part of my Treat of Concord and in Christ Direct And he calls me here afterward to the same Certainly it is only sinful separation that is in the question and as certainly there are many sorts not sinful I am locally separate from all Churches save that where I am I morally separate from the Roman Church as an unlawful Policy and all other which are in specie against Gods word I separate from some for Heresie as being not capable matter of a Church while they own not all the Essence of Christianity I separate from some as Imposing sin and refusing my Communion without it I separate from some as having no lawful Pastors some being uncapable matter and some being usurpers that have no true call I separate from some only so far as to prefer a better rebus sic stantibus sometime a better as to the Doctrine sometime as to the Worship sometime as to the Discipline sometime and mostly as to the Pastors worth and work some go from their own Parish because the Minister is very ignorant in comparison of another to whom they go some that hear the Minister preach against preciseness and for Ceremonies had rather hear another that calleth them to holiness some that have tollerable Preachers go to Doctor Stilling sleet and Doctor Tillotson as better some go for neerness to another Church Some go from their own Parish because the Minister cuts the Common-prayer too short and Preacheth too long some because they would have it so go to such some because the Parson is an Arminian others because he is contrary Some go to the Minister that is strict in keeping the scandalous from the Sacrament some therefore go from him some remove their Dwellings or Lodgings for these ends and some do not some go from their own Parish for the benefit of the Organs in another And of old when Nonconformists had Parish Churches and used some part of the Liturgy many went to them from their own Parishes Some of these are lawful some are unlawful Most certainly they that go from their own Parishes yea or to Nonconformists Assemblies in London go not all on the same account Nor doth the Doctor and such other separate from me as I am said to do from them but otherwise and much more § 5. If he would first have told us what Separation is sinful secondly and then have proved us guilty of it instead of the confused talk of Separation and a begging the question by suposing that to be sinful which he will neither discribe nor prove such it had been of some usefulness to our conviction But I confess I never liked those Physitians who give their Patients the Medicines that they are best stored with or they can best spare be the disease whatsoever Nor the disputer that poureth out what he is best furnished to say how useless soever to the reader or to the Cause Disputeing should not be like boys playing at Dust point who cover their Points in a great heap of Dust and then throw Stones or Cudgels at it and he that first uncovereth them wins them Dusty heaps of ambiguous words confusedly poured out befriend not Truth that should be Naked nor the reader § 6. Some thought it was the Place called Conventicle houses which made the Conformists call us Separatists and they got oft into Parish Churches and Chappell 's But these were made the worst of separatists and punished the more And doubletss it is not meeting at any of the new Tabernacles nor at the Spittle nor at Sturbridge Fair where Preaching hath long been used nor in a Prison nor at the Gallows to Prisoners and People which are faulty Separation § 7. Some thought that they meant that its want of the Common-prayer that maketh us Separatists and they have tryed and read the Common-prayer in their Assemblys But these have been accused and suffered the more And even Mr. Cheny was forced to fly his Country for reading it and Preaching in an unlicensed meeting And some reading more and some less by this it will not be known who are the Separatists The old Nonconformists in their Parish Churches read some more some less and now some Conformists vary They say a Conformist at Greenwich keepeth up a Common-prayer Conventicle some Conformists are accused for overpassing much One lately suspended for wearing the Surplice too seldom and refusing to pray for our gratious Queen and James Duke of York How much of this goeth to make a Separatist § 8. Some thought it was want of the Magistrates leave that made them call us separatists But when the King Licensed us the accusation was the same yea Mr. Hinkley and many others tell you that they took this for worst of all § 9. Some say it is want of the Bishops Licence But as Mr. Tho. Gouge hath his University Licence and I have Bishop Sheldon's Licence
is not my case the same We had more than connivence when we had the Kings Licenses and ever since experience tells you that his Clemency hath occasioned a restraint of the Bishops and some connivence from them 2. And if it were the Temples that make the difference let them allow us to preach there and see whether we will refuse it And sure the Conformists that preach in Tabernacles are not Separatists the Parish Teacher of St. Martins now preacheth in the same place which I built to have preached in and for so doing was by a warrant judged to prison They had no more Law on their side than I have they usually read no more of the Liturgy but the Confession and the Scriptures and many not the first at all and some more so that its a full proof that if breaking the Law had been all their stop they would have still preached Sect. 29. Dr. Ames tells us that he had preached without the Bishops consent by this Story fresh Suit p. 409. describing an English Bishops Pastoral work he saith It would be ridiculous for a mean man to desire him to visit him his Wife or Children in sickness he must have a Chaplain not only to do other duties of Religion for him but even to give thanks at his Table I will not here speak of draw up an Excommunication for him take him Pursuivant Jaylor see to your Prisoner but note one example of mine own experience which many others can parallel I was once and but once I thank God before a Bishop and being presented to him by the chief Magistrates of a Corporation to be Preacher in their Town the lowly man first asked them how they durst choose a Preacher without his consent You said he are to receive a Preacher that I appoint you for I am your Pastor though he never fed them And then turning to me How durst you said he Preach in my Diocess without my leave So that without any other reason but meer Lordship the whole Corporation and I were dismissed to wait his leisure which I have done now twenty years and more Much like the usage of holy Paul Bayne Successor to Perkins who being commanded to preach a Visitation Sermon and being sickly and in a sweat with preaching was fain to refresh himself instead of going presently to attend the Bishop and when he was sent for having small Cuffs edged with a little blew thred saith the Bishop How dare you appear before me with those and he suspended him And good Mr. Bayne would never more have to do with a Bishop but said They are an earthly Generation and savour not the things of God When Dr. Fulke a half Conformist went out of St. Johns Colledge in Cambridge with his Pupils hiring Chambers for himself and them in the Town it was as great a separation from the Colledge to avoid the Surplice which he after submitted to as we make from the Church See Ames fresh suit p. 473. And that it was no conscience of obeying the Bishop that Beza would have the Ministers moved by from assembling Judge by these words De notis Eccles Ego pontificiis I willingly leave to the Papists the whole degree of Episcopacy of which I openly say the Holy Ghost was not the Author but humane prudence which if we observe not that God hath cursed certainly we even yet see nothing and we nourish a viper in our bosoms which will again kill the Mother Sect. 30. I will conclude with the recital of the Letter sent to the Bishops by Dr. Humphrey Regius Professor in Oxford who yet constrained used the Surplice after that Our Dr. may note what sence they had then of these things premising only the words of John Fox speaking of Blumfield a wicked Persecutor who threatned a godly man Simon Harelson for not wearing the Surplice Its pity saith he such baits of Popery are left to the enemies to take Christians in God take them away from us or us from them for God knoweth they be the cause of much blindness and strife among men Dr. HUMPHREY'S Letter to the BISHOPS YOur Lordships Letter directed unto us by our Vice-Chancellor although written in general words yet hath so hearted our Adversaries that we are now no more counted Brethren and Friends but Enemies and â—ith the old Mass attires be so straitly commanded the Mass it self is shortly looked for A Sword now is put into the enemies hands of these that under Q Mary have drawn it for Popery and under pretence of good order are ready without cause to bewreck their Popish anger upon us who in this will use extremity in other laws of more importance partiality I would have wished my Lords rather privy admonition than open expulsion yea I had rather have received wounds of my Brother than kisses of mine Enemy if we had privily in a convenient day resigned then neither should the punisher have been noted of cruelty neither the offender of temerity neither should the Papists have accused in their seditious Book Protestants of contention Religion requireth naked Christ to be preached professed glorified that graviora legis by the faithful Ministry of feeding Pastors should be furthered and after that orders tending to edification and not to destruction advanced and finally the Spouses friends should by all means be cherished favoured and defended and not by counterfeit and false intruders condemned and overborn and defaced But alas a man qualified with inward gifts for lack of outward shews is punished and a man only outwardly conformable and inwardly clean unfurnished is let alone yea exalted The painful Preacher for his labour is beaten the unpreaching Prelate offending in the greater is shotfree the learned man without his cap is afflicted the capped man without learning is not touched Is not this directly to break Gods laws Is not this the Pharises vae Is not this to waâ—â— the outside of the Cup and leave the inner part uncleansed Is not this to prefer Mint and Annis to faith aud judgment and mercy Mans tradition before the ordinance of God Is not this in the School of Christ and in the method of the Gospel a plain disorder hath not this preposterous order a woe That the Catechism should be read is the word of God it is the order of the Church to preach is a necessary point of a Priest to make quarterly Sermons is law to see poor men of the poor mens box relieved Vagabonds punished Parishes communicate Rood lofts pull'd down Monuments of Superstition defaced Service done and heard is Scripture is Statute that the Oath to the Q Majesty should be offered and taken is required as well by ordinance of God as of man These are plain matters necessary Christian and profitable To wear a Surplice a Coap or a corner'd Cap is as you take it an accidental thing a device only of man and as we say a doubt or question in divinity Sith now these substantial points
are in all places of this Realm almost neglected the offender either nothing or little rebuked and sith the transgressors have no colour of conscience it is sin and shame to proceed against us first having also reasonable defence of our doings Charity my Lords would first have taught us Equity would first have spared us brotherliness would have warned us pity would have pardoned us if we had been found trespassers God is my witness who is the beholder of all faith I think of your Lordships honourably esteeming you as brethren reverencing you as Lords and Masters of the Congregation alas why have not you some good opinion of us why do you trust known Adversaries and mistrust your Brethren We confess one faith of Jesus we preach one doctrine we acknowledg one Ruler upon earth in all things saving in this we are of your judgment shall we be used thus for a Surplice shall brethren persecute brethren for a forked Cap devised singularity of him that is our enemy Now shall we fight for the Popes coat his head and body being banished shall the controversie so fall out in conclusion that for lack of necessary furniture as it is esteemed labourers shall lack wages Churches preaching shall we not teach shall we not exercise our Talents as God hath commanded us because we will not wear that which our enemies have desired and that by the appointment of Friends Oh that ever I saw this day that our Adversaries should laugh to see brethren fall together by the ears Oh that Ephraim should thus eat up Manasses Manasses Ephraim My Lords before this take place consider the cause of the Church the Crests and triumphs of Antichrist the laughter of Satan the sorrow and sighs of a number the misery and sequel of the Tragedy I write with zeal without proof of my matter at this time present but not without knowledge of it nor without grief of mind God move your Spirit at this present to fight against Carnem Circumcisionem immo Concisionem against Literam Legem which principally is now regarded and rewarded Speak I humbly beseech you to the Queens Majesty to the Chancellor and to Mr. Secretary and the rest that those proceedings may sleep that England may understand your zealous mind toward the worship of God your love toward the poor welwillers your hate toward the professed enemies your unity in true conformity the other neither be needful now neither exacted in any good age So shall the little Flock be bound to you so shall the great Shepherd be good to you An ANSWER to the false ACCUSATIONS and REASONINGS of the Dr.'s SECOND PART HEre the Dr. begins with the description of their principles whom he accuseth I am one of them And the first sort are those that hold partial and occasional Communion with our Churches to be lawful but not total and constant viz. at some times to be present and in some part of our worship and on particular occasion to partake of some acts of Communion with us but they apprehend greater purity and edification in separate Congregations and when they are to choose they think themselves bound to choose these though at certain seasons they may think it lawful to submit to occasional Communion with our Church The second sort are `` Such as hold any Communion with our Church unlawful And he pretends to proceed with all possible clearness Answ I am sorry if more clearness and truth is become impossible to him He taketh not me to be one of the second sort and therefore describeth me as of the first It s no presumption to say that I know my own mind and practice better than he doth though he would seem to know the old Nonconformists minds better than they did themselves Sect. 2. The matter of fact must first be notified 1. I ever distinguished the National Diocesan Parochial and Segregate Churches And the National as supposed organized or an Ecclesiastically political Society from the National as a Christian Kingdom and as an agreeing Association of Churches without any Governor of the whole Single or Aristocratical And I distinguished Diocesans that are as Arch-Bishops over lower Bishops and those that are like ours infimae speciei and I distinguished Parish Churches that have true Pastors from those that have none but uncapable men through insufficiency heresie malignity or as usurpers are not truly called 2. Accordingly I concluded 1. That the Parish Churches in England that have true Pastors are true political governed Churches 2. That though some would make them none by denying to the Pastors an essential part of their office and make the Bishop the sole Pastor and the rest but his Curates and the Parishes no Churches as having no Bishop but to be only as Chappels part of the lowest governed Church Diocesan and so give up the cause to the Brownists called Separatists yet truly such Parishes are true political Churches because the ordainer being but the investing Minister the office is not essentiated as he willeth or saith but as God the Instituter willeth and saith As the power of the Husband over the Wife is not what please the Priest that marryeth them but what pleaseth God who giveth it by his Law and as the Lord Mayor's power is not what please the Recorder or he that giveth him his Oath or Insignia but what the Kings Charter giveth and the Kings power is not what he will that Crowneth him and giveth him his Oath but what he hath right to by the constitution of the Kingdom so that the truth of the Parish Churches is soundly maintained by the Nonconformists and overthrown by many of the Diocesans But if the Parish Minister himself consent not to the essentials of his own office his Ministry may be valid to others while he is in the place but he is himself no true Pastor 3. All Parishes are no true governed Churches whose Ministers want any thing essential to a Pastor nor must be owned as such if known 4. But for the peoples sake they are true Churches secundum quid or equivocally as a company of Christians may be so called that have no Pastor and as such may be so far communicated with 5. I never spake against a Diocesan or Arch-Bishop that hath Parish Churches and true Pastors or Bishops under him and taketh on him no more than the Apostles did excepting their work properly Apostolical viz. by the Word and not the Sword to oversee and instruct inferior Pastors 6. When the Diocesans put down all lower Churches and true Pastors I own not that doing nor them in that form but I separate from them no further than they do from Christ 7. When they are but as good Arch-Bishops taking care of many Churches whether their Diocess shall be called a Church as such is but lis de nomine I find not that any Apostle as such was the constitutive Head of a Diocesan or Provincial Church or made any such above particular Churches
Nor do I find in the New Testament any political Church form but the Universal headed by Christ and particular ones governed by Pastors The General is the constitutive Head of his Army and the Colonel of his Regiment and the Captain of his Troop as distinct subordinate Bodies but the Major General General of the Ordnance Quartermaster General c. may be only under Officers to the whole and the noblest integral parts but as such no constitutive Head of any Body of Men whatever So that General Pastors prove no superior proper Church But because it was lawful in prudence for the Apostles to have taken several Provinces limited severally to each so may men now and if any call such Churches I strive not so the matter be agreed on 8. I ever owned a Christian Kingdom and the agreeing Association of as many Churches as can for mutual help and concord and the King to be their Governor by the Sword And if any will call a Kingdom a Church or an Association that hath no constitutive Government a Church as if he called a Diet or Assembly of many Kings or Princes a Kingdom or Republick let him enjoy his Equivocation so we understand each other 9. According to these Principles I own my self a Member of the universal Church of the Church of England and of the Parish or particular Church where for the time I am called to be that is as they are But I think I may remove from Parish to Parish as I have cause as a dweller or a lodger may and I take not all the Parish to be the Church and take Parish bounds to be no Divine Institution but a humane mutable point of order convenient when by accident it crosseth not the end nor doth more harm than good 10. I think if any Nobleman in London confine his ordinary communion to a just assembly in his happel or any that have a Minister utterly unsuitable to their needs do usually hold communion in the next Parish Church for better he is thereby neither Separatist nor Sinner 11. According to all this when I was silenced I ordinarily heard Dr. Wilkins and Dr. Tillotson and communicated in several places as I had best opportunity and quickly going to Acton I there constantly morning and evening joyned at Common prayer and Sermon communicating in the Sacrament where I had best opportunity being loth for the Parson and Curates sâ—ke to tell you why it was not there once with Dr. Horton and often with Nonconformists The Plague driving me to Hambden I constantly there joyned in all the publick Worship and Sacrament Returning to Acton I did as before and sometime repeated Dean Rieve's Sermon till he got me sent to Gaol for teaching some willing ignorant people between the Church meetings in my house Thence going to Totteridge I many years constantly twice a day joyned in the publick worship and took the Sacrament when administred as Mr. Parre will testifie Thence removing to London and licensed by the King to preach I forbare some time and after chose only the Market house at St. James's openly declaring that we met not as separating from the publick Churches but for the need of multitudes that went to no Church for want of room Since then I have many years joyned in all the publick worship Word Prayer and Sacraments with the Parish Church when able since that I also sometime joyn with Nonconformists and preach my self Afternoons and on Thursdays in the Nonconformists Chappels being not allowed to do it otherwise In the Country in Summer I have far off got into some Parish Churches for a day and tryed neer London but could not have consent though I have Bishop Sheldon's License for that Diocess I think not yet invalidated This is the matter of fact Now Reader Qu. 1. Doth the tenth part of those counted of this Parish Church hear and communicate so oft as I do Q. 2. If not what makes them and not me to be of that Church Q. 3. What is the constancy that this Dr. maketh necessary to a member Q. 4. What are the parts of their worship which he saith I joyn not in Hath he named any Q. 5. Is this only occasional joyning Sect. 3. I do maintain that 1. When consideratis considerandis we may choose the purest Churches and most edifying Ministry it is a duty so to do And one of his answers the Rector c. hath in the Epistle cited his own words not out of the retracted Irenicon but his late Book against Popery expresly threatning us with damnation if we do not To which I find no excuse made by him yea the Papist adversary grants the same 2. I do maintain against those that separate from all Churches which they dare not be stated members of that its lawful to communicate occasionally where we may not do it statedly But is this to deny all save occasional communion with all their Churches 3. I often say that there is so great difference of Parish Ministers and of Persons cases and opportunities and Relations as Wives Children Servants under Parents c. of divers commands c. that to be constant Communicants in their Parish Church is to some a duty to some a sin and so is occasional communion Sect. 4. As to the second sort that hold all communion with them unlawful 1. I leave them to plead their own cause and I meddle only with my own part 2. But I must say that if they mistake those that wilfully give them the occasion are unfit reprovers of them And if men for worldly ends or by error will corrupt and defile a Church to the utmost that is consistent with lawful Communion or neer it they may make the question whether their Communion be lawful too hard for understandings Every one cannot tell whether one in a swoon be alive or dead and some may bury him too hastily Stretch not my similitude beyond my meaning If a Gentleman of the game should by wilful sin get the Lues Venerâ—â— and the case be disputed whether his wife may separate from him or if he beat her once a week if she will not daily eat that which makes her grievous sick and he doth it to exercise his Authority another may better plead against her departure than he If it be a fault in her so to save her self what is it in him to destroy or abuse her If we be forbidden to take poyson and one will causelesly command us to take a doubtful thing as Nightshade Hemlock Aâ—ripigmentum c. and then condemn us as disobedient for refusing he is the unfittest person to condemn us If it be lawful to avoid a house that hath the Plague a man is excusable that mistakes the spotted Fever for it Were your Congregations but full of persons that had the scabs of the small Pox not dryed away and one went to a sounder Congregation for fear of infection not at all condemning you he might be born with
If in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign when abundance of Papist Priests staid in the Churches for their Benefices a man had quietly gone from them to the Nonconformists I could not blame him though he had not been sure that they were not changed And I still say that if such erre by too much care to avoid sin and save their souls 1. It is a far greater error to give them the occasion 2. And in such as you to say that therefore they must be so far forsaken as that none may preach to them If I may preach to no erring people 1. I must preach to none 2. Or be no Physician to any that are sick And I must say that though I found no call to gather any together as a Church and give them the Sacrament I cannot say that no other had such unless I had heard them all speak for themselves yea I see such notorious need in many places that I dare not blame them Sect. 5. And now Reader Qu. whether the Dr. hath truly stated the case between him and me and whether you can expect truth and edification in his handling of a false-stated case These are the questions which as my accuser in his Book he should have handled had truth been his design 1. Whether for one that holdeth so much Communion with their Churches as I have done and here describe it be sinful separation to Preach in and Communicate with the Assemblies of Nonconformists or mixt ones as I have done 2. Whether to deny this to be sinful Separation or Separation as commonly taken for Schism be disingenious and worse than theirs that openly renounce their Communion Sect. 6. Three things he saith p. 94. we cannot deny 1. That there is no reason of Separation because of thâ— Doctrine of their Church Answ 1. We distinguish of Separation There is no reason to separate from you as no Church or further than we do there is reason to deny our consent 1. To your foresaid Doctrine of all baptized dying Infants undoubted salvation not excepting those of Atheists and Infidels 2. To your included Doctrine implyed in your Impositions viz. That if a man have unlawfully made a Vow and Oath to endeavour in his Place and Calling to reform some corruptions in Church-Government yea or to repent of his sin and oppose Popery Prophaneness and Schism there is no obligation on him from that Oath and Vow to do it These and such other Doctrines we separate from so far as to reject them Sect. 7. His second supposed Concession is That there is no other reason of Separation because of the terms of our Communion than what was from the beginning of the Reformation Answ 1. There are in my judgment no common reasons for going further from you than we do nor to justifie that which is commonly known by the name of Separation But there are many and great reasons to justifie our measure of dissent and ministration and to say that we grant there are no more reasons now than were then is too bold an untruth There is more reason 1. From the quality of the things imposed 2. From the designs and drift of the Imposition 3. From the effects 4. From the aggravation of Conformity as in the Church that we must communicate with 5. From the things which give us a fuller cause for our Preaching and Assemblies viz. 1. The late general contrary Church State and Engagement to it 2. The Plague 3. The burning of the Churches 4. The Kings License and Clemency 5. The number and quality of them that seek our helps Of these briefly in order 1. As to the things imposed now which were not then 1. The Vestry Act was not then made by which so considerable a part of your Parish Churches as the Vestries are to renounce all obligations to endeavour any alteration of the Government of the Church from the Oath and Vow called the Covenant So that all Reformation of Church Government as so sworn was thus renounced by them who in a sort represent the Parish Church 2. The Act of Uniformity had not then imposed the same declarative Renunciation of all such obligation on all the Ministers and Schoolmasters in England as it now doth 3. The Corporation Act was not then in being which constituteth all the Officers in power in all Cities and Corporations of such only as declare that there is no obligation from the said Oath at all not excepting so much as the sworn duties of opposing Popery Prophaneness and Schism to repent of sin and amend our lives And if swearing and vowing against Schism no whit bind men if the Oath were but unlawfully imposed why should the Dr. make so great a matter of it and think that his reasonings should make men afraid of Gods service if he will but call it Schism 4. None of these Acts then required men to profess and subscribe that there is from that Vow or Oath no such Obligation on any other person and so to become Vouchers for the Souls and Consciences of many hundred thousands whom we never saw even those Parliament men that were not forced to it but imposed it on others when we know not in what sense they took it 5. The Re-ordination of Ministers ordained by Presbyteries was not then required and made a necessary condition of their Ministration and Church Relation even by them that confess Re-ordination unlawful and therefore plainly intimate the nullity of the first 6. The Act of Uniformity was not then made which requireth all Ministers publickly to declare their Assent and Consent to all things contained in and prescribed by the Liturgy Book of Ordination though part of this was in a Canon 7. The false Rule for finding Easter-day was not then to be assented and consented to as a condition of the Ministry 8. Nor the new Doctrine or Article of Faith of the undoubted certainty by Gods word that baptized dying Infants are saved without any exception of the children of Atheists c. For the old words at Confirmation as many Drs. of the Church have shewed only meant that nothing else was necessary on the Churches part that is not Confirmation 9. The word Pastor as applyed to Parish Ministers distinct from Curates was not then blotted out of most places in the Liturgy nor the twentieth of Acts as applied to Presbyters left out Take heed to your selves and the Flock c. in plain design to alter the Office and Parish Churches 10. The Oxford Oath was not then imposed to banish Ministers above five miles from all Cities and Corporations and Places where they had of late years preached so that their old Flock or Friends yea Wives and Children that could not follow them might not so much as see or hear such Ministers in their Families or familiar converse that would have come to the publick Churches And all Nonconformist Ministers that took not the Oath were thereby forbidden to come to the Parish Churches
in all Cities Corporations or Places aforesaid though their example might have drawn many as mine did where I was 11. Ministers and Corporations and Vestries were not then bound to swear or subscribe that it is unlawful on any pretence whatsoever to resist any commissioned by the King when the Keeper of his Seal may sign Commissions to seize on the Kings Forts Garrisons Navies and Treasuries to deliver up the Kingdoms to Foreigners to destroy Parliaments Cities and Laws I am sure Hooker Bilson or Arch-Bishop Abbot subscribed not this nor were such Conformists Are all these no difference of case Sect. 8. There is 2. a great difference in the drift and tendency of the Impositions They were at first to quiet a Popish Nation while the true Doctrine took possession and rooting and to avoid the cavils of those Papists that charged the Reformers with forsaking all the Church But what they have been used for these last forty or fifty years I leave the Reader to judge 1. By the Complaints of all the Parliaments since then save one 2. By the History of Arch-Bishop Laud's Tryal 3. By Dr. Heylin's History of his Life 4. By the writings of Divines such as Mr. Thorndike Dr. Parker Dr. Pierce Arch-Bishop Bromhall and many more such and by the Papists historical collection out of such See Dr. Heylin's description of the Reconciling Plot Anno 1639. Arch Bishop Bromhal saith Vindicat. p. 19. c. Whereas Mr. Baxter doth accuse Grotius as a Papist I think he doth him wrong nay I am confident he doth him wrong And I have read all that he alledgeth to prove it but without any conviction or alteration in my judgment I will endeavour to give some further light what was the Religion of Grotius He was in affection a friend and in desire a true Son of the Church of England And on his Deathbed recommended that Church as it was legally established to his Wife and such other of his Family as were then about him obliging them by his Authority to adhere firmly to it The said Bishop though no Papist saith pag. 81. I know no members of the Greek Church who give them the Papists either more or less than I do Compare this with the Council at Florence and the Patriarch Jeremiah's Writings and the present sence of the Greek Church and we may know his mind But my ground is not the authority of the Greek Church but the authority of the Primitive Fathers and General Councils which are the representative Body of the Universal Church P. 82. To wave their last four hundred years determinations is implicitly to renounce all the necessary causes of this great Schism And to rest satisfied with their old Patriarchal power and dignity and Primacy of Order which is another part of my Proposition is to quit the modern Papacy name and thing Pag. 84 85. That Christians may joyn together in the same publick devotions and service of Christ 1. If the Bishop of Rome were reduced from the Universality of Soveraign Jurisdiction jure divino to his principium unitatis and his Court regulated by the Canons of the Fathers which was the sence of the Councils of Constance and Basil and is desired by many Roman Catholicks as well as we 2. If the Creed were reduced to what they were in the time of the four first General Councils with only necessary explications and those made by the Authority of a General Council 3. And some things whence offences have been given or taken be put out of the Divine Offices Whether Christians ought not to live in holy Communion and come to the same publick worship of God free from all schismatical separations Pag. 93. 1. That St. Peter had a fixed Chair at Antioch and after at Rome is a truth 2. That St. Peter had a Primacy of Order among the Apostles is the unanimous voice of the Primitive Church 3. Some Fathers and Schoolmen who were no sworn Vassals to the Roman Bishop do affirm that this Primacy of Order is fixed to the Chair of St. Peter P. 97. Though the Bishop of Rome had such a Primacy of Order by Divine Right or Humane it would not prejudice us at all nor is worth the contending about But 1. It is not by Divine Right in foro exteriore 2. Nor elsewhere interiore but executive according to the Canons Whereas I said that Protestants that consent not to the Popes Patriarchal Power over us in the West will fall under the reproach of Schism he saith p. 104. c. Must a man quit his just right because some dislike it Their dislike is but scandal taken but the quitting of that which is right for their satisfaction should be scandal given If they be forced to fall under the reproach of Schismaticks it is by their own wilful humors or erroneous Conscience other force there is none 2. Whether is the worse and more dangerous condition to fall under the reproach of Schism or to fall into Schism it self Whosoever shall oppose the just power of a lawful Patriarch lawfully proceeding is a material Schismatick at least P. 107. It 's unsound arguing to deny a man his just right for fear lest he may abuse it as a Patriarchal Power was the Bishop of Rome's just right They who made the Bishop of Rome a Patriarch were the Primitive Fathers not excluding the Apostles and Christian Emperors and Oecumenical Councils what Laws they made in this case we are bound to obey for Conscience sake till lawfully repealed by vertue of the Law of Christ Much more he hath to this purpose and p. 112. for uniting the Church Catholick on humane terms and p. 117. against the peoples liberty of reading and interpreting Scripture and after at large that concord must be on humane terms p. 122. Grotius judgment was and mine is moderate but had not this man been so owned by many now I had not cited so much of his And for Grotius I have over and over cited his own words and shall not now repeat them And was this the drift of Conformity of old 3. Sect. 9. Another difference is in the effects for with us things not universally or absolutely determined by God are to be used or refused as they do more good or hurt 1. Then open Preaching and gathering Assemblies by Nonconformists would have greatly offended the Prince but our King at Breda and in his three first Declarations and by his Licenses and connivence shewed such wisdom and clemency as intimated less displeasure at our liberty 2. It would have deprived most of the Nonconformists of their hopes of publick liberty in the Parish Churches which most of them enjoyed but we had neither possession nor expectation of such a thing 3. It would have hindred and hazarded the progress of the Reformation but our preaching hath done more to stop the progress of the Syncretism or of Popery Others know this whatever you frivolously
say against it 4. Few of the most ignorant that needed them would then have left the Parish Churches to hear Nonconformists in private but now many will come to us that cannot get in to the Parish Churches Other different effects may be named Sect. 10. 4. And though I accuse you not you that unjustly said before that I made you seem a company of perjured Villains seems to think your self that the fore alledged causes make many of the people think little better of some and a Church thought to consist of such Pastors and Vestries c. essential parts differ from those that do not 2. And the multitude of Atheists and filthy livers and the thousands of Noncommunicants who are still taken for real members of your Churches have now stood out against so long means and patience that the reasons of longer waiting for Reformation much differs from theirs in the beginning 3. The Canon at first did not ipso facto excommunicate all that do but profess themselves Nonconformists as since it did 4. The Bishops and their Canoneers had not then cast out 2000 nor neer so many Preachers as now and so did not so much tempt the people to flee from them as persecutors thorns thistles or wolves 5. When one Bishop cast any out some other usually would endure them but now it was not so 6. The people saw daily that you bore with those as no Schismaticks that never communicated nor used to hear you even the greater half of many Parishes and took them for Church members as is said and therefore they had reason to hope that they that communicated somewhere with Protestants especially that communicated also with your own Churches were as good Members and by good Pastors would be as well endured Sect. 11. 5. Lastly The forenamed causes of our preaching much differ 1. We saw the Kingdom though under usurpers engaged by Vow Practice and about sixteen years possession and custom to another way and who could expect that a Law should presently change them all and assure them of absolution 2. They that conformed were the more averse to see about six thousand Ministers that had gone the other way so suddenly change as to declare assent and consent to a Book which they never saw 3. The case of the Plague the burning of the Churches the Kings Licenses c. I named before which verily made a great difference 4. And the numbers that call to us for help makes a great difference when then they that needed them most did not desire it These are some differences Sect. 12. p. 95. He saith There is no reason of separation because of the doctrine of our Church Answ But now you have corrupted it in the Article of Infants undoubted salvation before described and before by the doctrines about Prelacy Godfathers power and duty Impositions c. implyed in your practical Canons there is great cause of Nonconformity P. 96. Repeateth that great mistake that there are no alterations in our own judgment which make the terms of Communion harder than before Answ What hope then of being understood how far is this from truth The terms are sar harder to Ministers and to the people they are easier in some things as amending some translations c. but it is not to them a small matter to make such a change of their Pastors as in too many Parishes is made The Bishop promised them at Kiderminster when he forbad me to preach that they should be no losers by the change They said and I had great reason to believe them that the Successor knew so little of the sence of the Creed and preach'd so rarely four times a year I am loth to tell you how that they durst not be guilty of encouraging him in undertaking the charge of Souls nor durst take him for their Pastor And the great increase of buildings in London shuts thousands now out of such Parish Churches who could have got in heretofore and some more differences are before implyed p. 97. As other Churches own your Churches so do we though not your imposed sins Sect. 13. p. I was in hope to have met with some answer to my importunate Question What would you have the many score thousands do that cannot come within your Churches to hear But no importunity will prevail for so small a matter with inexorable men But he saith 1. that this is but a pretence 2. And that no man denyeth that more places are desirable c. Ans 1. It is me that he is now accusing why doth he barely say and not prove that it 's but a pretence I never set up a Meeting place but in St. Martins Parish where are said to be forty thousand more than can come within the Church And when they would not suffer me to use it I gladly left it to the use of the Parish Minister I preach now twice a week elsewhere but both the places are in Neighbourhoods where many thousands cannot hear in the Parish Churches What if other men have other sufficient reasons as the utter incapacity of some Ministers or the like doth it follow that my own case and prosessed reason is a meer pretence why then did I use no publick preaching while I lived in such Villages where the people might go to Church and why did I constantly twice a day lead them thither though some disliked it 2. The question is not whether more Churches are desirable But where they are not whether many thousands must live like Atheists without all publick teaching or Divine Worship for fear of being called Schismaticks Is not this plainly to chuse damnation If the Gospel be needless why do we wish the Heathens had it Why subscribe you against mens hopes of being saved in all their several Religions If Church worship be needless why is a Clergy to be so honoured and maintained at so dear a rate Aud why do you make such a stir with Separatists to bring them to your Churches Can men not blinded by interest chuse but wonder that so many thousands in a Parish should be taken for Church Members and live quietly that come not to any Church or never communicate with any and yet that godly persons who hear and communicate with their old tryed Pastors yea with such as communicate with you should be preach'd and written against as Schismaticks and judged to that which some endure Did this Dr. think that to drop in the case of other men when he was at a loss would make good his charge against me and such as I Mr. Tombes and Mr. Williams preached other doctrine do I do so and have you proved it But seeing he will needs bring the case to Kiderminster whether I would suffer Mr. Tombes to gather a Congregation I must not balk it but advise him hereafter to keep himself at a greater distance and not to put his own followers who are willing enough to believe him upon utter impossibilities He sped better
is it his own â—…act or is he therefore not obliged by it Had it not been requisite that you should have justified all that we stick at as unlawful before you charge us with crossing this Rule Sect. 56. p. 204 c. My words in many Books against Schism are cited and praised Reader he tells men the measure of their Charity and Church Communion viz. That men that do as much as I do that forbore so long Sacramental Administration that gathered no Church that held constant Communion with divers Parish Churches that have wrote so much and earnestly against Schism shall yet be ejected silenced pay 40 â— a Sermon and lie in Jails unless I will do more While Bishop Lauds design for widening the Church doors to the Papists is magnified by Heylin and others as a good work Sect. 13. First he finds but two justifiable Causes of Separation but p. 213 214. he hath found three and no more 1. Idolatrous Worship 2. False Doctrine imposed instead of true 3. Making and imposing things indifferent as necessary to Salvation Ans 1. Readers do you remember how even now he exposed to odium the peoples judging whether the Pastors be Hereticks And now they may separate for false Doctrine 2. I intreat him to think again of these Cases following 1. What if the Worship be not Idolatrous but Blasphemous or utterly Ridiculous tending to contempt of God 2. What if it be in an unknown Tongue 3. What if the Church have no true Minister I am glad you are not for separating for want of Episcopacy or Episcopal Ordination 4. What if the Church want half the Church-Worship as to have Preaching and Prayer without Sacraments or Sacraments without Preaching or Prayer or Preaching without Prayer c. 5. What if the Church be but schismatical Have you written all this Book to draw men to you from the Independant Churches and do you now tell us that the people may not separate from them on the account of Schism 6. What if a Church require me to tell or subscribe to one known Lie or to say that I believe what I do not or to justifie thousands that I think obliged by a Vow if they break it What if they impose any one sin on me without which they will not receive me to Communion 7. What if I remove for my Edification from a drunkess ignorant Priest to the Church of a wise and holy Pastor 8. Are we looser than Pope Nicholas that forbad men to hear Mass from a Fornicating Pricst 9. I would you had spoken to Edification and told men what false Doctrine it is that will allow Separation and whether it 's false Doctrine preached or only imposed on the person to be owned If the former is it all false Doctrine or but some and what Verily if all you are tenfold more a Seperatist than I For I look to hear sometimes some words of false Doctrine in most Pulpits even of Conformists If it must be heresie it self I will not separate for once hearing it if the Church profess it not If it be imposed Error that you mean take heed lest you justifie Separation from your Church by the new Article of Infants certain Salvation And when both Arminians and Anti-Arminians subscribe the 39 Articles tell us whether those Articles are true in both their senses or whether the sence be not the thing subscribed or whether one half of them should separate You are too unmerciful to your self but what kind of Churches should there be upon your terms I find no more in his second part which I am much concerned in CHAP. VII The Reply to his Third Part The beginning Sect. 1. IN his third Part I first find my self accused p. 242 c. And that is not only by insisting on a false accusation of my words but adding a confutation of himself as if he discerned not that he did it In Treat of Concord I say If it holdeth that God instituted only Congregational or Parochial Churches as for present Communion then none of the rest instituted by man may deprive them of their priviledges granted by Christ I put it but with an If it be so because I told them my own doubt of it After I say To devise new species of Churches without Gods Authority and impose them on the World yea in his name and call all Dissenters Schismaticks is worse Usurpation than to make and impose new Ceremonies and Liturgies And can any Christian deny either of these But he saith This supposeth Congregational Churches to be so much the institution of Christ that any constitution above these is unlawful and unsupportable which is more than the Independant Brethren do assert And is any word of all this true 1. The Independants much insist on this I refer him now but to Amesii Medul de Eccl. Minist 2. Do the words suppose that which is plainly excepted in them If it were granted 1. That the Congregational only are so instituted 2. And that others are not set over them by God 3. And yet are obtruded in his name without his authority 4. And all Dissenters called Schismaticks then I say they are unlawful 5. To coufute himself plainly he confesseth that I say The question is not whether the Archbishops should be over the particular Churches as Successors to the Apostolical and General Overseers of the first Age in the ordinary continued parts of their Office Nor whether Patriarks Diocesans Lay-Chancellors as Officers of the King exercising Magistracy be lawful And yet he saith that I suppose the contrary He next pretends to give my Reasons And the chief is because it overthroweth the species of Gods making when I only say That which overthroweth it is unlawful which is not the Archbishops that are over the lower Bishops but those that put them all down and governed the Carkasses of the mortified particular Churches as the lowest Bishops of many score or hundred such as themselves And he saith I am for the full exercise of Discipline within the particular Church while he confest I spake not against Archbishops And yet he saith This is a fair representation of my opinion Sect. 2. Coming to prove our Episcopacy the same with the Primitive he pretendeth to confute me That which I asserted was 1. That by the first Institution and Constitution every Church no bigger for number of Souls than one of our great Parishes had a Bishop of their own one or more I disputed not 2. Yea that for the first two hundred years if not more no one Bishop had a Church so big as some of our Parishes at least except Alexandria and Rome and even of them it is not certain that they had more Souls 3. That after by degrees the case was altered But yet after there were many Meetings like Chappels a while there was but one Altar 4. After that those Chappels had Altars but so as that at certain times of the year the people of the Cities
and next parts were all to communicate with the Bishop and were no more than could meet to choose the Bishops and to be present as to the main body of them and disciplinary debates to give consent 5. In Cyprian's time at Carthage a place of greatness and great numbers of Christians the Church was grown very great but not beyond the exercise of such personal Communion as I described And the Bishops there and round about being worthy men kept up the life of the former Discipline And as great as their Church was we would be glad of such an Episcopacy Order and Communion For I oft told you that by present Communion I meant not that all must meet in one place at once For the tenth part of some Parishes cannot But that as Neighbours and Citizens may have personal Converse and Meetings per vices of some at one time and some at another as different from meer mental Communion or by Synods or Persons delegate or as their Governours or Representatives and this for mutual Edification in holy Doctrine Worship and Conversation And that the footsteps of this remained long when worldly Reasons had made a change And all this I have proved so fully in my Treatise of Episcopacy besides what 's said in my Abstract of the Episcopal History that till some man shall confute the full Evidence of Antiquity there brought I have no more in Reason to do upon that subject And though the Doctors History of this be the most considerable part of all his Book yet so far doth he leave what I say uncontradicted that I find not one word that he saith against any of my Testimonies nor any for his own cause for the first two hundred years But when he should have proved the extent of the Churches at two hundred years he begins his historical Proofs at two hundred and fifty for three or four great Cities in the World and so proceeds to Augustine at above four hundred and Victor Uticensis about four hundred and ninety Theodoret four hundred and thirty where he supposeth me to say that of his City which I said of the Diocess of that City And to confute all Impertinencies and groundless Suppositions while my full proofs are unanswered is but loss of time Sect. 3. His chief argument is that no City how great soever was to have more Bishops than one Ans 1. He can prove no such Rule in the first two hundred years 2. See how well the defenders of Prelacy agree Gratious de Imperio in Anotat and Dr. Hammond I cited who say that Cities at first had two Bishops in each Rome Antioch c. one of Jewish Christians and one of Gentile Christians and saith D. H. Peter at Rome was Bishop of the Jews and Paul of the Gentiles and they had two Successors and saith Gretius The Churches were formed to the manner of the Synagogues and there were divers Churches with divers Bishops in the same City in 1 Tim. 5. 17. de Imp. p. 355 356 357. 3. In the fourth Century a Council at Capua decreed that the two Bishops with their several Churches at Antioch Flavian's and Evagrins should live together in Love and Peace 4. This was a good custom while there were in the Cities no more than one Bishop might take care of And the custom held when times altered the case and reason of it And Possession and the Desire to avoid division made it held up by good men 5. I have at large in my Treatise of Episcopacy confuted the opinion of appropriating Bishops to Cities and so did the old Churches that set up Chorepiscopos Sect. 4. p. 259. He saith In Cities and Dioceses under one Bishop were several distinct Congregations and Altars Ans 1. Yes no doubt after the second Century and perhaps in two Cities a little before but in few in the World till towards the fourth Century 2. This is the same man who in the very Sermon which he defendeth said p. 27. Though when the Churches increased the occasional Meetings were frequent in several places yet still there was but one Church and one Altar and one Baptism and one Bishop with many Presbyters assisting him And this is so very plain in Antiquity as to the Churches planted by the Apostles themselves in several parts that none but a stranger to the history of the Church can ever call it in question But when I told him how this would agree us and hurt his cause he will quickly fall under his own censure and became a stranger to the history of the Church asserting many Altars in one Church of one Bishop This Sermon was written since his Irenicon And now he feigneth a distinction between An Altar taken with particular respect to a Bishop and for the place at which Christians did communicare But what was the Altar that was taken with particular respect to the Bishop Was it not the material place of Communicn And so the members of the distinction are co-incident Saith Optatus lib. 6. Quid est Altare nisi sedes corporis sanguimis Christi Each Church had long but one of these The best Altars that were made after the chief Church Altars were not for ordinary communion but honorary of some Martyrs The truth is the phrase of unum Altare was taken up when each Church had but one but to set up Altare contra Altare continued after to signifie Anti-Churches But I have fully answered this in my Treatise of Episcopacy His conjectures from the numbers of Officers c. he may see there also sufficiently confuted and in Ch. Hist And the odd instance of Theodoret he doth not at all make credible by his willing belief of Metius and other Popish Feigners And were that Epistle genuine a Cypher is easily dropt in by Corrupters It hath need of better authority that shall be so singular from the case of all other Churches And I suppose he knoweth that Cyrus was not a simple Bishoprick but a Metropolitane Seat and might have 800 Parish Bishops Yea whereas there were under Antioch seven Dioceses and fifteen Provinces or as others say thirteen that yet had many Bishops under them as Seleucia twenty four c. that were more dependant on Antioch Cyrus was one of the eight Provinces or Metropolis that were per se subsistentes And therefore when Theodoret said how many Churches were under hands it 's like he meant Bishops Churches and not meer Presbyters and either a Cypher dropt in corrupted the account or else the Bishops had but single Congregations But for my part as the case so late concerneth me not so I see nothing to perswade me that that Epistle is genuine and uncorrupt But I would not have a Diocess which then had many Provinces or a Province which had many Bishops Churches be taken for a single Church Sect. 5. The same I say of Carthage which was the Metropolis of Africa and the first of six Provinces before
Justinian and of seven after and Proconsular and the Church called Africae Caput as August ep 162. The sixth and seventh Carthage Councils tell us of the distribution of the Provinces decreeing three Judges to be sent out of each Province viz. Carthage Numidia Byzacena Mauritania c. Yea Leo 9. P. in Epist ad Thom. c. saith that the Bishop of Carthage was post Pont. Rom. primus Archiepiscopus totius Africae maximus Metropolitanus Though yet Binnius truly say that in Cyprian's time he was not an Archbishop that is no proper Governor of Bishops because they concluded in Council nemo nostrum dicitur Episcopus Episcoporum but he was the chief of that great Province And the Dr. himself out of Victor mentioneth one Cresseus that had one hundred and twenty Bishops under him He was Metropolitane of Aquitana and a Diocess then having many Provinces how many be in a Diocess Victor there 〈◊〉 you that the Bishop of Carthage in his own Eugitane Province had one hundred sixty four Bishops And how great were their Churches then and L. 2. when he lamenteth the great number of their banished Bishops Presbyters aud the Church-members were 4976. And one Parish here hath 40000 if not more He that considereth that Cyrus was at most but 60 miles from Antioch the Patriarchal Seat and that a Carthage Council had sometimes 600 Bishops and the Donatists perhaps had as many and that as he saith Cresceus had one hundred and twenty Bishops under him and that Cyprian so often tells us how Bishops were chosen by all the People and how he managed his Discipline in the presence of all his Plebs Laity and by their consent and how he telleth that it was the peoples duty to separate from the communion of a sinning Bishop which implieth communion before and how the Bishops in Council put the question When a Church wanted a Bishop whether one of them that was a Bishop and had perhaps but one or two or three Presbyters was bound to part with one to that wanting Church to make a Bishop of and considereth the circuit and distance of their Cities and much more which I have elsewhere named may well believe large Provinces and larger Diocesses but will think of their Bishops Churches as we must do of theirs in Ireland when a late converted Countrey had six hundred Bishops Make but Christs true discipline practicable and tie us not to swear or assent to your uncertain forms and we should no further trouble you in this Sect. 6. As for the credit he giveth to Syrmondu's copy of Theodoret's Epistle or to the later Editions of his Works I am not bound to be as credulous nor to take the last Editions for the best when they come out of the Jesuits hands And can prove the Epistle to Joh. Antioch which Bellarmine would disprove to be more credible than this And it 's one blot that he saith Theodoret's Epist 6. mentioneth the Metropolitane he was under when he was under none but was himself an Independant Metropolitane For so the Notitiae Episc tells us was Berytus Heliopolis Laodicea Samasata Cyros Pompriopolis Mopsuestia and Adama If his Province was as the Epistle cited saith fourty Miles square and the Christians so numerous as is said and he name none of the Bishops under him but number the Churches it 's like they were Episcopal Churches and very small And that Villages had Churches it 's no wonder when there were many Chorepiscopi not only under the Metropolitanes but the City Bishops And why I must reject his long received Work if I question his late found Epistles I know not But again I say this is nothing to our cause being so long after the ages I mentioned my contrary evidence being not at all confuted His confidence p. 260 261. about some citations out of Theodoret runs upon false Insinuations 1. That the question is not of the number of Churches but about the extent of the Episcopal Power whether it was limited to one Parochial Church or extended over many when he knoweth that I had no such question but whether those whose power was over many Churches in the first two Centuries at least had not as many Bishops under them over those Churches if such there were Or if the Bishops were of the lowest rank whether those under were not then denyed to be Churches for want of Bishops and were not only parts of a Church 2. And he feigneth me to bring Theodorets Testimonies to prove that even then in Alex. and Antioch a Church was but one Congregation when I brought it only to prove that even in that age they were so small that the footsteps of the ancient shape of them still appeared Such Fictions may deceive them that will not try what is said but only read the answerer But by this citation I see he read my Treatise of Episc before his Book came out And therefore I will pass by these niblings till he answer it Sect. 7. p. 262. He accuseth me of Rage and Bitterness for saying that if he will plead for so much Presumption Profanation of Gods name Usurpation Uncharitableness and Schism as to own their Churches to be new and devised without Gods Authority and yet may in his name be imposed on the World and all Dissenters called Schismaticks I leave him And first he feigneth that I charge him with this which is untrue unless he will charge himself with it But why do I put in If you will so plead Ans Because he accused me for saying the contrary viz. that so to divise and so to impose is worse c. But because I know not why he accused so plain a truth I said If you do so But he now tells me that he quoted it to shew that I looked on all Churches beyond Parochial as Churches meerly of mans devising which is another untruth confessed by himself who before had this up and cited my own words to the contrary viz. that I believe the Catholick Church and deny not National associated Churches nor Archbishops that put not down the particular Churches Pastors and Discipline one mistake is his excuse for another Had he meant as aforesaid had my words been Rage or necessary confutation Sect. 8. Yea it is his business in the very next page 263 to confute his own accusation of me by citing my own concessions And p. 264. he giveth me leave to call our Bishops Archbishops Ans But 1. Archbishops have Churches with their proper Bishops under them But our Bishops say that there are no such under them 2. I told you before that as the Major General Quartermaster General c. of an Army constituteth not a distinct body from the Army and the particular Regiments and Troops so I am not certain that Apostles or Evangelists or any general Preachers as such did constitute any Church Form distinct from the Catholick and the particular Bishops Churches But if they are supposed to have taken
Presbyterian National Church is one as headed by the General Assembly 10. An Episcopal National Church is one either as headed by one National Bishop or else by a Synod of Bishops Aristocratically or else by a Synod of Bishops and Presbyters Aristocratically All these that are constituted of One Regent and a subdite Part are called Churches in a Political proper sense and not only equivocally Now the Question is Of which sort is the National Church of England And the Doctor saith page 287. 1. That the Society of all Christians is counted a true Catholick Church from their Union and Consent in some common things and so is ours c. Answ But in what common things Not in one Bible for so may Hereticks much less in one Liturgy If it be not a consent in one Governing Head it makes no proper Church 2. He supposeth an agreement in the same Faith and under the same Government and Discipline Answ That 's right But what Government is it Civil or Ecclesiastical The first is no essential part of a proper Church If it be the later is it one in specie or in individuâ— politico Not the former for a 100 Episcopal Churches in several Nations may have one species of Government as many Kingdoms may have It is therefore the later that is all my Question which is the Church-Head He saith As several Families make one Kingdom so several lesser Churches make one National Answ True if that National Church have one Constitutive Head as a Family hath It 's no Family without a Pater or Mater Familias And no Governed proper Church without Governours and there is no Governour where there is no supreme in his place and kind For inferiours have all their power from the supreme There is no Universal supreme but God but the King is subordinately the supreme in his Kingdom in respect to inferiours and so it is in other Governed Societies He addeth The name of a Church comprehended the Ecclesiastical Governours and People of whole Cities and so may be extended to many Cities united under one Civil Government and the same rules of Religion Answ 1. If the question were only de nomine we grant that Civil Courts even of Heathens are usually by Writers called Ecclesia and so is any Assembly If this be all you mean speak out 2. Many Nations may agree in the same Rules of Religion yea so all Christians do Doth this constitute National Churches 3. One Civil Government is of another species and not essential but accidental to a Church and therefore doth not constitute or individuate it One justice of Peace or Mayor in a Christian Corporation doth not make it one Parish Church But if this be all your meaning speak out we grant de re a Christian Kingdom and contend not de nomine if you call it a Church § 3. page 297. â— As to the difference of a National Church and Kingdom he granteth what we desire confessing the difference But asketh whence cometh all this zeal now against a National Church Answ An untrue insinuation 1. To desire to know what it is is untruly called zeal against it 2. And agreeing with you in the description is no zeal against it He adds The Presbyterians and Mr. Hudson write for it Answ Mr. Hudson is a Conformist And the Presbyterians tell you what they mean a Christian Nation of particular Churches Governed by One General Assembly as the Supreme Ecclesiastical Government Whether this be just or unjust is now none of our question I have oft told what I think of it Do you also tell us which is your National Church-power and I have done Are you loth to be understood § 4. But page 299. He cometh to his plain Answer viz. 1. The National Church of England diffusive is the whole Body of Christians in this Nation consisting of Pastors and People agreeing in that Faith Government and worship which are established by the Laws of this Realm And now he continues his wonder at those who so confidently say they cannot tell what we mean by the Church of England Answ Yea your wonder may increase that I less and less understand it if you did not after tell us better â—â—an in this unhappy definition 1. Is this called the Church diffusive one Governed body Politick If not it is no Church in the sense in question and I 'le not stick with you for an equivocal name 2. Do you mean by Government agreed in 1. The Civil Government 2. Or the Ecclesiastical Government of the particular Churches severally 3. Or one Government of all the National Church 1. The first makes it no Church in the sense in question 2. The second makes it no Church but an Association of many Churches such as a thousand Independent Churches may make or the Churches of many Kingdoms Many Families Associated are no City or one ruled Society if they agree in no Common Governours but only their several Family Governours Many Cities associated are no Commonwealth if they agree not in one supreme power It 's no political body without one common Governour Natural or Collective Monarchical Aristocratical or Democratical And what is it of Worship established by Law that individuates your Church If all thâ—â— the Law hath established 1. Your Church hath oft changed its very being and may do at every Parliament 2. And the Church is small and unknown if all that differ in any point established are no parts of it But if it be not all established who knoweth by this definition what it is and what is the very matter of your Church So that here is a definition which neither notifieth matter or form § 5. Next he answereth the Question How all the Congregations in England make up this one Church and answereth By Unity of Consent as all particular Churches make one Catholick Answ Consent to what 1. If it be not to one common Government it is no Governed Church as one 2. Doth he think that the Catholick Church consenteth not to one Governing Head Christ And doth any thing else make them formally One Politick body or Church This were ill Doctrine § 6. Question How comes it to be One National Church Saith he I say because it was received by the common consent of the whole Nation in Parliament as other Laws of the Nation are Answ Whether How comes it Speak of the efficient cause or the formal or what it 's hard to know so singular are his Logical notions But the first is most likely And then 1. The question is still unanswered What is the One common Governing power in the Church which this Parliament consent hath â—â—t up He knows this is the question 2. And if it be by Parliament consent how old is your Church What Parliament first made it It 's not so old as Luther Is it no older than the Liturgy or Canons 3. Doth it die and live again as oft as Parliaments change it If the corruption of
is a matter of more weight than Tythes and Temples If Tythes be proved not to be of Divine Right all that can be expected is that if the flock cannot trust him whom the Patron chuseth they let him give his Tythes and Temple to whom he please and they will trust their souls with such as they dare and safely may But if he will chuse and offer them one whom they can safely and comfortably accept so as Tythes and Temples shall preponderate in case of small difference in the men prudence obligeth them to accept of the advantage The same I say of the Magistrates countenance and approbation But if the difference be very great it 's better stretch our purses to build new Temples and pay our Pastors than trust our souls on the Pastoral Conduct of ignorant malignant unfaithful or heretical men § 6. V. I have oft said that mutual consent is necessary to the being of the relation of Pastor and Flock And though sometimes the Rulers imposition and the Patrons choice may make it the Peoples duty in prudence to consent when the good preponderates the hurt not else yet till they consent the Relation is not existent As if Children were bound to take Wives and Husbands by the Command and fore choice of Parents yet it 's no Marriage till they consent § 7. The common objection is from the inconvenience if the several parties agree not To which I answer 1. The mischief of the contrary way is worse than that inconvenience 2. There is nothing in this World without inconveniences where all things and persons and actions are imperfect 3. If Parents and Children agree not about their Marriage it hath great inconveniences And yet neither Parents Government nor Childrens consenting Liberty must be denyed 4. In so weighty a Case divers Locks and Keys keep the Churches treasure safe Prince Patron People and Ordainers will not so often agree on a vile person as any one of them alone may do § 8. And now judge how Logically how honestly the Doctor hath stated the Case and made me Intolerably indiscreet and tragical against Magistrates Patrons and Laws And try if you can understand what it is instead of this that he would have I tell him again that if he deny the necessity of the flocks consent to the mutual relation he notoriously opposeth the judgment and practice of Antiquity and the Universal Church of Princes Patriarchs Prelates Councils and People and fights against the full stream of Historical evidence for a new crooked way that would make as many modes of Religion as there are different Princes And here he wonders what he said that occasioned such undecent passion It seems he felt some passion in reading it and thought he must have the like that wrote it And so let any man obtrude any pernicious thing on the Church and he can easily prove the detector to have undecent passion for giving a bad Cause its proper name § 9. But he cannot find out the reason of my inference that then Princes may impose what Religion they please Answ Not understanding with some men goes for confuting To put Religion for the mode of Religion is too little a slip of his to be insisted on But is not my inference necessary I urged him to tell me in what Countries and under what sort of Princes the Rule holds that the People must not judge whether the offered Pastors be Hereticks nor refuse them if Prince and Patron present them He will not be entreated to tell me I tell him that if the Rule be universal when a Papist Socinian Anabaptist Antiepiscopal c. Prince and Patron present men of their own mind and they are instituted the People must take and trust them as their Pastors And is not this to set up in all the Churches what modish Religion Prince and Patron please Is this hard to be understood Yet he calls this Railing on him for suppositions of my own making And here he steps over to another man § 10. Before I come to his undertakings I will repeat anothers railing and undecent passion against his Cause And I desire the Reader to note how well the Doctors of the Church of England agree and to learn which of them it is that we must believe both as to History and Right It is Mr. Herbert Thorndike in his Treatise of Forbearance of Penal It is to no purpose to talk of Reformation in the Church to regular Government without restoring the Liberty of chusing Bishops and the priviledge of enjoying them to the Synods Clergy and People of each Diocess So evident is the right of Synods Clergy and People in the making of those of whom they consist and by whom they are to be Governed that I need make no other reason of the neglect of Episcopacy than the neglect of it Yet these two are Doctors of one Church but we are no Members of it § 11. I again say that either the Reader hath read the Church History and Canons or not If not how can he tell who to believe that report them the Doctor or me But if he have I will no more dispute this Case with him than I would do whether English Parliaments used to make Laws He is past my conviction if he be not convinced § 12. And I will again say that I will yet suppose the Doctor so humble as to acknowledge himself much inferiour to Paulus sarpi servita venerunt in point of Church History At least I say to the Reader peruse what he hath said of this Controversie and of the alteration of Church Government in his History of the Council of Trent and his Book of Church Benefices lately translated by Dr. Denton and doubt if you can § 13. And in general I add I. I suppose no man of such reading maketh any doubt of the first 300 years whether any Bishops were made over any Church without the free Election or Consent of the Flocks and the whole Clergy and the approbation of the Ordainers I will not for shame stay to prove this having said so much of it in my first Plea for Peace and Episcopal Church History which are unanswered II. And since the first 300 years it 's so notorious in History that it 's a shame to need proof of it that the Christian Emperours confirmed the Churches in this right and use and for many hundred years after permitted and ordered that Bishops should be chosen by the People Clergy and Synods and when the Peoples Election was infringed the necessity of their consent long continued And it was only in the choice of the five Patriarchs that the Emperours used to meddle and that not always nor at all chusing them alone but commending some one to the People and Clergy to chuse or confirming some one that they had nominated And this held on till Popery sprung up III. And even then the Popes long continued it But 1. They strove specially in Hildebrand's days and
and my Conscience might have been bolder and less fearful of sin And though I love not to displease them I must say this great truth that I had never been like to have lived in so convincing sensible experience of the great difference of the main body of the Conformists from the most of the Nonconformists as to the seriousness of their Christian Faith and hope and practice their victory over the flesh and world c. I mean both in the Clergy and Laity of mine acquaintance O how great a difference have I found from my youth to this day Though I doubt not but very many of the Passive Conformable Ministers to say nothing of the Imposers have been and are worthy pious men and such as would not perswade their hearers that the Jesuits first brought in spiritual prayer And I had the great blessing of my Education near some such in three or four neighbour Parishes § 4. It grieved me to hear of Mr. Glanvile's death for he was a man of more than ordinary ingeny and he was about a Collection of Histories of Apparitions which is a work of great use against our Sadducees and to stablish doubters and the best mans faith hath need of all the helps from sense that we can get And I feared lest that work had perished with him But I gladly hear that by the care of Dr. H. More that worthy faithful man of peace who never studied preferment it is both preserved and augmented And as for his Origenisme as I like it not so I confess in matters of that nature I can better bear with the venturousness of dissenters than hereticators can do But when I saw this Rag called a Letter left behind him my grief for him was doubled And I saw what cause we have all to fear the snares of a flattering world and what cause to pray for Divine preservation and for an unbyassed mind and a humble sense of our own frailty that we may neither over-value prosperity nor our own understandings I did not think that he that had wrote the Vanity of Dogmatizing could so soon have come to perswade men in power that dissenting from our Churches dogmatizing and imposed words formes and ceremonies was worthy of so severe a prosecution of us as he describeth and that all their danger is from the forbearing such prosecution of us and that though for their own ends he could abate us some little matters the only way to settled peace is vigorously to execute the Laws against us He that can think the silencing and imprisoning of about 2000 such Ministers is the way to bring this Land to Concord hath sure very hard thoughts of them in comparison of Conformists And that you may see how little his judgment against such should weigh with others who is so lately changed from himself I will give you here one of several Letters which I had from him and leave you to judge whether he have proved that he was much wiser at last than when he wrote this or whether his character of me agree with his motion to silence and ruine all such I am so far from owning his monstrous praises that I fear I offended him with sharply rebuking him for them But lest his wit and virulence here do harm I give it you to shew the unconstancy of his judgment or if he would have excepted me from his severities I must profess that I believe the most of the Nonconformable Ministers of my acquaintance are better men than my self and therefore his excessive praise of me is the condemnation and shame of his persecuting counsel § 5. As to his praise of the Bishops Writings against Popery I had rather magnifie than obscure their deserts But I am not able to believe that the old ones who write to prove the Pope Antichrist c. and the new ones who would bring us to obey him as Patriarch of the West and principium unitatis Catholicae were of one mind because both are called Protestants and that such as Bishop Bramhall and the rest of the defenders of Grotius were of the same judgment with Bishop Usher Bishop Morton Bishop Downame c. nor that Grotius who describeth a Papist to be one that flattereth Popes as if all were right which they said and did did disclaim Popery in the same sense as the old Church of England did Two men may cry down Popery while one of them is a Papist or near one in the others sense As to the folly of calling that Popery which is not I have said more against it in my Cath. Theologie than he hath done And as to his excuse of an ignorant vicious sort of Ministers because no better will take small Livings It is not true The silenced Nonconformists would have been glad of them or to have preached there for nothing The tolerating of ignorant scandalous men were more excusable if better were not shut out that would have taken such places But it 's notorious that for the interest of their faction and prosperity they had rather have the ignorant and vicious than the ablest and most laborious Nonconformist Bishop Morley told me when he forbad me to preach that It was better for a place to have none than to have me when I askt him Whether I might not be suffered in some place which no one else will take Most of the old Nonconformists were suffered by connivance in small obscure places which was the chief reason why they set not up other meetings which Dr. Stillingfleet thought they avoided as unlawful because forbidden § 6. And as to his excuse by blaming ill Patrons I would know then by what true obligation all men in England are bound to commit the Pastoral conduct of their Souls to such men only as our English Patrons chuse § 7. And when he so blameth the tepidity and irreligiousness of the Members of their own Church I would know 1. Whether all men that are more seriously religious must be forsaken by us and ruined by them if they be not of their mind and form 2. And whether the numbers of the irreligious that are for their way and the numbers of the religious that are against it should not rather breed some suspicion in them than engage them to ruine so many such men § 8. And when page 3. he confesseth that the sword is their Churches strength and Government and how contemptible words paper Arguments and excommunications are without force doth he not shame their whole cause and shew that it is not the same Government which the Church used for many hundred years which they desire and that their whole power of the Keys which they talk so much for seems to themselves a dead and uneffectual thing while we Nonconformists desire no coercive power but to guide Consenters § 9. As to his project to save religion under a Papist King if the Dean and Chapter may but chuse the Bishop I leave it to other mâ—â—â— consideration But
Power in Erastus sense and went rather further than Dr. Stilling fleet in his Irenicum And as I was before against him so after this about 12 years ago I wrote that Book against him about the Magistrates Power in Church-matters in which I called him My sincere friend thinking sincere friendship consistent with such a difference and an open Confutation And if the contrary must be repented of I hope such charity is no crime This third Book against him also he took patiently and without breach of Love And when I laboured to perswade him to retract his Writings against Excommunication though he held still to his Conclusion and thought that the great work that God called him to in the World was to discover the Papal and Prelatical Usurpation of the Magistrates power under the name of Ecclesiastical yet I made him confess all the matter that I pleaded for and he made me see that his errour lay most in meer ambiguous words which he had not â—…ateness enough to explicate All this patience signified not uncharitableness rage or fury And I obliged him not by praise but 〈…〉 him for his eagerness for his own indigested conceptions nor gave him any thanks for his indiscreet and excessive praises afterwards given me in his Patronus bonae fidei Upon all this I would put some questions to the sober thoughts of the Author of his Picture 1. Whether there be not as great signs of sincerity humility and patience in such a behaviour and in that great love which he had to all that he thought Godly men though he too hardly judged of others for that which he thought great errour and sin as in those that cannot bear a just defence of dissenters against their unjust accusations nor endure men to tell why they rather suffer than Conform 2. Whether he that maketh him so very bad a man and incredible a lyar for too rash censoriousness of dissenters and some untruths vented in rash zeal do not tempt men to give as odious titles to those Reverend persons who go very far beyond him in untruths and uncharitable censures And whether they that were for the silencing and utter ruining of about 2000 Ministers and call'd to Magistrates to execute the Laws against them and that unchurch all the Reformed Churches which have not a continued succession of Diocesan Bishops shew not as much uncharitableness as he did that described some too hardly And whether most of the Books written against me by Conformists such as the Bishop of Worcester's Letter the Impleader Mr. Hinkley and many more be not much fuller of untruths in matter of fact than the Drs But yet I think it a sin to give them such a Character as this and render the persons as incredible lyars because errour interest and faction made some so unadvised 3. If it deserve such a Character to censure Arminians as dangerously erroneous and befriending Popery whether you do not consequently so stigmatize the old Church of England before Bishop Laud's time Even Arch-bishop Whitgift Bishop Fletcher and the rest who drew up the Lambeth Articles Arch-bishop Abbot and the Church in his time except six Bishops c. King James and the whole Church as consenting by six Delegates to the Synod of Dort And also that Synod and all the Forein Reformed Churches that consented to it And is not this more than Dr. Moulin did 4. And are they not then to be accordingly stigmatized who on the other side make the Calvinists as odious accusing them of Blasphemy Turcisme and doing as much against them as Dr. Heylin in the Life of Arch-bishop Laud tells us was done in England on that account 5. And if such hard thoughts of Arminians as furthering Popery deserve your Character whether by consequence you so brand not all those Parliaments who voted against it accordingly and made it one of the dangerous grievances of the Land And is not that as faulty as for Dr. Moulin too much to blame you 6. Yea I doubt you stigmatize thus so great a part of Christians in all the World as I am loth to mention so rare is it to hear of any Country where they are not so much guilty of sects and factions as by education and interest to run in a stream of uncharitable censures of one another speaking evil of more than they understand as I have proved in my Cathol Theolog. about this subject 7. Seeing it is above 20 years since I wrote that against Dr. Moulin which you cite and he never found fault with it nor justified his mistakes may I not think that he was convinced and repented And you that praise his death-bed repentance should not Characterize him by failings twenty years repented of 8. How do you know that the Dr. repented not of his too hard words of you till his death-bed You are mistaken In his health I more than once blamed him 1. For his censure of Dr. Stillingfleet and the other particular persons whose worth was known and had deserved well of the Protestant Churches 2. For his extending those censures to the Conformists and Church which belong to some particular persons and the most are not guilty of And 3. For his Book of the fewness of the saved as presumptuous And as far as I could then discern he repented of them all but laid the ill Title-page of the last on the Book-seller And he still thought of Causes and Parties as very different he owned not his harsh words or censures aforesaid I found him not raging nor impenitent 9. Doth not your own description of his great readiness to beg forgiveness and lothness to own any thing uncharitable shew a better spirit than your picture doth describe 10. Is not he as like to be a sincere man who asketh forgiveness of his faults rash censures and words as he that repenteth of his former duties his Pacificatory principles and Writings Surely to repent of evil is a better sign than to repent of good 11. Because you call us to acquit our selves by disowning Dr. Moulin may we not disown both his faults and our own without disowning God's grace and mens piety and worth would you be so disowned for your own faults 2. And how should I disown his rashness better than to write what I wrote against him and say what I said to him would you have a Synod called to reprove every rash word 12. Because you justly value mens repentance I will be thankful to you to further mine and give me leave to further yours Only I foretell you that your words shall not offend me by their hardness if they have but truth and you call me to repent of my sin and not of serving God I do not repent of defending Truth and Duty nor of seeking to save the Reader from the infection of false accusation and arguings which would destroy his charity and innocency by the fullest manifesting the falshood and evil of the words and deeds which are the Instruments
some excess of kindness to me V. With this Defence against Doctor Stillingfleet I at once pubblish in another Volume An Apology for the Nonconfirmists Preaching with an Answer to a multitude of their Accusers and Reasons to prove that it is the Bishops and Conformists great Duty and Interest to seek their Restoration Which is the most material part of the Confutation of Doctor Stillingfleet who would persuade us that our Preaching is a sin and make us guilty of silencing our selves FINIS Books lately Printed for Nevil Simmons â—â— the Three Cocks at the West and of St. Pauls 1. CHurch-History of the Government of Bishops and their Councils abbreviated Including the Chief part of the Government of Christian Princes and Popes and a true account of the most troubling Controversies and Heresies till the Reformation Written for the use especially of them 1. Who are ignorant or misinformed of the state of the Ancient Churches 2. Who cannot read many and great Volumes 3. Who think that the Universal Church must have one visible Soveraign Personal or Collective Pope or General Councils 4. Who would know whether Patriarchs Diocesans and their Councils have been or must be the Cure of Heresies and Schisms 5. Who would know the truth about the great Heresies which have divided the Christian World especially the Donatists Novatians Arians Macedonians Nestorians Eutychians Monothelites c. 2. A Treatise of Episcopacy Confuting by Scripture Reason and the Churches Testimony that sort of Diocesan Churches Prelacy and Government which casteth out the Primitive Church Species Episcopacy Ministry and Discipline and confoundeth the Christian World by Corruption Usurpation Schism and Persecution Meditated in the Year 1640 when the Et-câ—tera Oath was imposed Written 1671. and cast by Published 1680. by the importunity of our Superiours who demand the Reasons of our Nonconformity 3. A Moral Prognostication 1. What shall befall the Church on Earth till their Concord by the Restitution of their Primitive purity simplicity and Charity 2. How that Restitution is like to be made if ever and what shall befall them thenceforth unto the End in that Golden Age of Love All three by Rich. Baxter 4. Memorabilia or The most Remarkable Passages and Counsels Collected out of the several Declarations and Speeches that have been made by the King his Lord-Chancellors and Keepers and the Speeches of the Honourable House of Commons in Parliament since his Majesties happy Restauration Anno 1660. till the end of the last Parliament 1680. Reduced under four Heads 1. Of the Protestant Religion 2. Of Popery 3. Of Liberty and Property c. 4. Of â—â—rliaments By Edward Cooks of the Middle Temple Esq READER I Must take this opportunity for the avoiding of mistakes to give thee notice that whereas against them that plead for the necessity of an uninterrupted Succession of Episcopal ordination I have in the Preface to my Book for Universal Concord and in the beginning of my Breviate of Church-History said that our Northern English Episcopacy was derived from such as were no Bishops but Scottish Monks and Presbyters and that Aidan and Finan Tromhere Coleman were such lest I be misunderstood I must further explain my meaning viz. 1. The Culdees that were no Bishops first guided the Affairs of Religion in Scotland long before the coming of Palladius 2. These Culdees chose themselves for order sake some few to be as Guides and Governorus to the rest whom Writers called Scotorum Episcopos but were no Bishops in our controverted sense but as an Abbot among Monks and as the Presidents or Principals of Colledges rule those that are of the same office or order with them Nor had they any limited fixed Diocesses 3. And if any will call these Bishops and the question be but de nomine let them call them so and spare not I contend not against them 4. Afterwards Palladius sent from Rome began a higher sort of Bishops But the Culdees still kept up the greater part against him 5. Columbanus his Monastery in the Isle of Hy restored the Culdees strength And the Monks out of that Island were the most prevailing Clergy of Scotland who had no proper Episcopal ordination Or if you will call their ordainers Bishops they were not only ejusdem ordinis with the Presbyters but also not ordained by Bishops themselves but made such by mission from the Monastery and bare election and ordination of Presbyters 6. Out of this famous holy Monastery was Aidan first and Finan after and Tromhere c. and Coleman after sent into Northumberland where they aresaid to be made Bishops And they were the first Bishops that came thither and so had no ordination in England from any Bishops that were there before Nor is there any probability that the Palladian Bishops did ordain them Bishops But that their own order of Senior Monks and Presbyters only ordained them 7. Beda was such a votary to the Church of Rome that his testimony runs more for the Romish interest than most of the Scottish or English Historians of those times yet lib. 3. c. 5. saith of Aidan but that his approbation was in Conventu Seniorum and sic illum ordinantes ad praedicandum miserunt And c. 25. that Finan pro illo gradum Episcopatus a Scottis ordinatus missus acceperat qui in insula Lindisfarnensi secit Ecclesiam Episcopali sedi congruam Quam tamen more Scottorum uno de lapide sed de robore secto totam composuit arundine â—exit Et defuncto Finano qui post ipsum fuerit cum Colmannus in Episcopain sucâ—ederet ipse missus a Scotia c. And the King Oswi himself was taught by the Scots and was of their Language and for their way And Cedda was ordained by the Scots And at a Synod three or four of these kind of Bishops with the King and his Son and Hilda a woman Abbesse were the Company that made it c. 25. And c. 26. Tuda also was ordained by the Scots And c. 4. The Bishops themselves were under the Government of the Abbot juxta exemplum primi Doctoris qui non Episcopus sed Presbyter extitit et Monachus 8. Li. 3. c. 28. he saith that non erat tune ullus excepto Wini in totâ Britania Canoniee ordinatus Episcopus 9. And as there is no word of proof that it was the Palladian Roman Bishops that ordained these Northumbrian Bishops so there is enough to the contrary in that all these foresaid Bishops continued the stiffe enemies of the Roman Power and order which Palladius came to introduce Insomuch that Beda oft mentioneth their utter aversion to the Roman party and that the Brittons and Scots were all of a mind and Daganus and the rest would not so much as eate with the Romanists no nor so much as eat in the same house or Inn with them lib. 2. c. 4. 10. And lastly even that sort of Episcopacy which they took in Northumberland was but Equivocally so called as to that which we dispute about and not Ejusdem Speciei For. 1. They never pretended to a distinct order from the Presbyters 2. They had but one poor Church made of Wood and thatcht with Reeds and no possessions else And from theâ—â—e they went from village to village to instruct convert and pray with the people And that our English Episcopacyâ—eriâ—eth â—eriâ—eth its succession from these Scots and the Brittaineâ— and not frome Rome by Augustine and Palladius I refer the Reader to Mr. Jones and to the Preface before Knox his Church-History Thus much I thought needfull to prevent being misunderstood about the Episcopacy of Aidan 〈◊〉 c. Such an Episcopacy as the Bishop of Hereford pleade th for in his Naked Truth I meet with few that are against any more than that the Colledge of Physicians or Philosophers or Divines have â— President FINIS a The new Church since Bishop Laud's change b Note that the Bishops Book as against me runs upon a mere fiction p. 76. that I traduce him as a Factor for Popery when I had not a word to that purpose yea expresly excepted him by name though I argued against his too neer approach c No such thing but of the Churches within the Empire then d was there no necessary cause till after An. 1200 e So then these Protestant Bishops give the Pope Patriarchal Power and Primacy of Order and as much as the Greeks But 1. They had by Councils of old no Patriarchal Power over other Kingdoms out of the Empire 2. Obedience to the Pope as a Patriarch is against the Oath of Supremacy and on the matter little differeth our case from obeâ—ing him as Pope f So that this Arch-Bishop also was set on the pious design of joyning with the Papists on these terms and may not we have leave to worship God on better terms g That is 1. The Pope is not to govern us arbitrarily but by Canons Which what they are is hardly known 2. And all will be Schismaticks that so obey him not h 1. Thus for union with Rome all Protestants must pass for self made Schismaticks that cannot obey the Pope as Patriarch And doth this tend indeed to Concord It would open Protestants eyes did I but tell you all that is in the Canons which the Pope as our Patriarch must rule us by as these Doctors do desire i 1. If this Doctrine be true no wonder that Mr. Thorndike thought we could not justifie our Reformation till we alter the Oath of Supremacy then we are bound in conscience to a Foreign Jurisdiction 2. I have fully proved many great errors and sins to be decreed by many of the Councils by which the Pope as Patriarch must rule us all 3. Is it any easier to do evil In obedience to a Patriarch than a Pope 4. In my last Book against W. Johnson alias Tenet I have fully confuted all that he saith of the universality of Councils and the Patriarchs power over the Abassines and others without the Empire and shewed they were then all but in one Empire as the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury is in England ☜ Page 22. A vain Writer and malicious if not mad and distracted p. 11. he will magnifie the very worst of men if they be of his mind and vilifie the best if they be of another p. 27. He hath full liberty to vie with the Devil himself in his Calumnies with more such