wills the reformation whereof is the absolute and adaequate end of all punishments and of the exercise of all Political Power but punishments were never ordained for the information of the understanding To return to satisfie the Objection It is not necessarily nor generally true of all Members of the Visible Church that they be called by the word if this be granted which cannot be denyed that as among the Jewes Men were incorporated into the Church by Circumcision so they are under the Gospel by Baptisme Col. 2. 11 12. and that as in those times many for by-ends and through fear joyned themselves to the Church Est 8. 17. so it may be and hath been under the Gospel Obj. But the greatest part of our people are ignorant and unsanctified yea prophane Persons Answ Ignorant and prophane Persons have alway been in the Church It was so in the Church's Infancy and so in her perpetual growth and so shall be to the end of the World at least till Christ come the second time but these are not of the Church which hath its denomination of the better part Obj. But open and prophane Persons are not cast out Answ The Law takes Order they shall be The fault is in the Governors We are not no Church or a false one because such are suffered 1 Cor. 5. Rev. 2. Obj. But we want the Form of a true Church Viz. a Covenant Answ It appeares not in the Apostles times any thing more was required to make Church-members of the Church-Universal than assenting to Evangelical truths embracing and professing Christian Religion and receiving Baptisme wherein all in our Church enter into a Solemn Covenant and confirm it when they come to years of understanding And moreover to settle them in particular Church-order the Apostle made Bishops or Elders over them in every Church Acts 14. 23. and required the People to obey them hear and honour them 1 Thes 5. 12 13. Heb. 13. 7. 17. 24. 1 Tim. 5. 17. And those that consented to this and did so were Members of that particular Church so that we confess as a Man cannot be a Member of the Universal Church if at age without his own consent so neither can he be of a particular Church however he may be antecedently obliged to consent But that this consent was wont to be signified by any express Covenant between the Pastors and the Flocks no Scripture mentioneth It is consent signified only which God requireth But whether this consent be signified 1. By the Peoples Election of the Pastors 2. Or by a Covenant 3. Or by lifting up the hands or any such sign 4. Or only by constant attendance with the Church on all God's Ordinances there God hath no where determined save only as circumstances may make one of these more fit than another and so oblige us to it in prudence And he which maketh Duties which God hath not made is a maker of superstition and a false Teacher or Speaker of God and his Lawes and addeth to them As to that you say you cannot joyn with our Congregations because they stand under a Devilish Anti-christian Government and the Worship in them by a number of Common-prayers is a devised Worship All that I desire of you is only this that laying aside passion you will but pause and ponder what is alledged to give satisfaction to this Objection which may cool at least the fierceness of your Spirits and abate that desperate prejudice you have conceived against the Government and Worship established in these Churches Touching the exercise of Ecclesiastical Government in general you know it is not of absolute necessity to the Constitution of a Church and as to the Government of the Churches by Bishops speaking of it only as they are Superiour to Presbyters without medling with the extent of their Diocesses c. when you finde so much written with so much confidence that Episcopacy is the true ancient Apostolical Government of the Christian Church That it was received in profession and practice in all Ages and is so far Divine that Bishops were in the very time of the Apostles that they were ordained and appointed by the Apostles themselves That there was an approved succession of them in the Apostolical Churches That in all the following Ages all the Churches in the World were governed by them for more than Fifteen Hundred Yeares without any opposition save by the Arrian Aerius who was therefore cryed down as an Heretick by the ancient Fathers That the first reformed Protestant Churches cast not off Episcopacy with any aversness to the Order as appeares by the History of the Augustane confession to which Calvin himself signed That some of those Churches are governed by Superintendents the same with Bishops That there was long since a challenge made to them that have aversness to the degree or order in these words We require you to finde out but one Church upon the Face of the Earth that hath not been ordered by Episcopal Regiment which to this Day as they say is not answered These allegations may me-thinks so far allay your heat as to restrain your thoughts and Tongues from passing so sore a censure upon the Government that it is Devilish and Antichristian till you can solidly absolve all these Arguments though notwithstanding all that hath been said you are perswaded that another Church Government may be better And that there is no cause why you should refuse communion with these Churches upon this account because Bishops are chief Rulers there Touching the devised Worship objected do but ruminate upon what you have frequently heard and read and you will see little reason to condemn stinted Prayers because invented and devised by Men. For how many inventions of Men are there of the same nature in God's worship which you approve of namely set-formes of Catechising studyed Sermons Interpretations of Scripture division of it into Chapters and Verses Contents of Chapters Marginal references putting Psalms into Meeter with a multitude more True it is invented or devised worship is unlawful yet it is lawful to serve God in a Form of words devised For the Form is not worship but the Prayer tendered in that Form And therefore they do not well that say a stinted Form of Prayer is a means of Divine Worship not ordained of God and that there is no warrant for it in the Word of God For God's Word warrants things not only by special Institution as all substantial means of Worship and by necessary consequence so the Translation of the Scripture is warranted because it must be read to edification and edifie it cannot unless it be understood but also by the Light of Nature and Reason according to the general Rules of Scripture And thus accidental means of Gods Worship which are only circumstances of the Celebration as time places order method phrase and sorme of words in the administration of holy things of God yea Pulpit to preach in and Bells to call
life long no good be done yet you may take that Comfort your Master did Though Israel be not gathered yet shall I be glorious in the Eyes of the Lord. And in the Verse before I have laboured in vain I have spent my strength in naught in vain Yet surely my Judgment is with the Lord and my work with my God God knoweth with what uprightness I have done his work and therefore I know he will Crown me with Glory though my labour hath been lost as to the most part of the People THE SIXTH SERMON THe next sort of Persons in reference to whom Duty lies upon you are Christian Societies Assemblies that profess the Christian Religion and joyn together in the worship of the true God These are called Churches and of these there are two sorts false and true and your duty is to separate from those and hold fellowship with these Three things are required to the constituting of true Churches 1. That the Word of God and Doctrine of Salvation be truly taught in them ye are of the houshold of God and are built upon the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets upon this Rock this truth confessed by thee I will build my Church the Church is God's Register that keeps his Records faithfully the Pillar and ground of Truth where the Doctrine of the Law and Gospel is truly taught God dwells with that People and Salvation may be there had 2. That there be Pastors and Ministers lawfully called How shall they preach except they be sent pray the Lord of the Harvest that he will send sorth Labourers into his Harvest Christ hath given his Ministry to his own Church 3. That the People receive and embrace the Doctrine and Religion of Christ and submit to and joyn together in the Worship of God Then they that gladly received the Word were Baptized and they continued stedfastly in the Apostles Doctrine and fellowship in breaking of Bread and Prayers Hereby may be discerned which are false Churches and which true The Roman Political Church as the Constitution of it is false and of Man's Invention Obj. They have the Apostles Creed the Books of Canonical Scripture and Baptisme Answ They acknowledge the Creed in profession and word but overthrow much of the sense by their superadded Articles and false expositions They retain the words of Scripture though in much not the sense of the Holy Ghost nor can Baptism though for substance according to the first Institution prove them a true Church more than Circumcision could Samaria to be so or a Seal pulled from the Writing and set to the bare paper A Thief may shew a true Man's Purse but that proves him not to be a true Man and they overthrow inward Baptisme the life of that Sacrament imputed righteousness and holiness which in Gods Church must go together with the outward Element 2dly As Papists they have no true Ministers the Romish Priest as such is no Minister of Christ not only because of the Anti-Christian Doctrines which he teacheth overthrowing the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles but also in that he offereth Christ a real Sacrifice for quick and dead wherein chiefly stands his Office and because as a Papist-Priest he receives his very Power from the Pope whose Office is not of Christ Qu. Why then should not one Baptized by a Mass Priest be Rebaptized Answ Because the action of a lawful Calling done by one that is not lawfully called is not a nullity the Ministry is lawful though as corrupted by them is bad 3dly Their People oppose God's true Worship and live in palpable Idolatry and profess themselves the Members of a usurping trayterous head the Pope Obj. Anti-Christ sitteth in the Temple of God therefore the Church of Rome is God's Church Answ In the Popish Church there is the hidden Church of God mingled as a little Wheat with much Chaff as a little Gold with much Dross So that though the Church of God be where Anti-Christ sitteth yet the Church whereof he is Head is no Church of God for there are no means there to beget or preserve spiritual life whether we regard Doctrine or Worship To speak plainly it is a part of the Universal Visible Church of Christians so far as they profess Christianity acknowledge Christ their Head but it is the Visible Society of Trayterous Usurpers so far as they profess the Pope to be their Head just as if a Traytor should make himself Deputy of Ireland against the King's will and all the People believe he is so and so profess themselves Subjects to the King as their Soveraign and to him as his Deputy Here it is a true Kingdome as it is still under the King and yet a Kingdom of Traytors or Rebels Secundum quid or so far as they adhere to the Usurping Deputy against the King's command From this Church therefore which is spiritual Babylon the Mother of Harlots and abominations of the Earth no Spouse of Christ but a Strumpet no House of God but an Habitation of Devils once indeed a famous Church but now dead and buryed and as is the Mother so is the Daughters God's People are bound to separate Come out of her my people and yet not from such therein who mean well in the general and secretly discent from her damnable Corruptions is this Obligation of Separation upon you Rom. 18. 4. Much less ought you to separate from Churches which have made separation from Rome as the reformed Protestant Churches in France Germany and other Countreys and these of Great Britain and Ireland have done in whose Congregations is found truth of Doctrine a lawful Ministry and a People professing the true Religion submitting to and joyning together in the true Worship of God I am not ignorant that many of you whose Habitation I question not but the Lord is who have your Habitations in all the several Countries of this Kingdom have drunkin a deep prejudice against all the Parochical Congregations whereof you are legal Members and where all you were baptized and thereby were made the Members of Christ the Children of God and Heires of his Kingdome I fear some of you will startle at these expressions found in the Common-Prayer-Book But if you consult the Holy Scripture you will finde them warranted in a Sacramental sense and your prejudice hath so far wrought upon you that you have forsaken the assembling of your selves together with your Neighbours in the publick Meeting Places I know with whom I am dealing Persons that have a comfortable assurance that they dwell in God and therefore are willing to hear any thing that may tend to the increase of their comfort and unwilling to retain any errour in their judgments or practice that may defile and dishonour their dwelling place or cause it to be evil spoken of by them that are without whose mouthes you know your absenting your selves from all the Solemn Assemblies open wide to cast a scandal upon your
Persons as prophane and upon that strict profession of walking precisely according to the Rule of the written Word which they think gives you no Warrant for your seperation from their Society in the service of God and my humble and earnest request to you is to lay aside your prejudice and examine by that good Word whether your separation be not sinful I shall presume you will freely grant both that it 's necessary to Salvation that a Man be a member of the true Visible Church because in the Word you finde the profession of the true Religion yea the very hope of Salvation and joyning to the true Chruch going together and that so long as God continueth the Doctrine of Salvation to a People and his Solemn Worship so long he dwells among that People and Salvation may be had there and that no utter separation may be made from those Assemblies where God dwelleth and where Men may be assured to finde Salvation though there may be many great corruptions both in Doctrine and Worship in those Assemblies There were so in the Church of the Jewes in Christ's time the Priests and Teachers were ignorant and wicked and had a corrupt and unlawful entrance into their Calling and the People were like to the Priest generally notoriously and obstinately ungodly and the Worship used in that Church was wofully corrupt many superstitious Ceremonies the Observation whereof were more strictly urged than the Commandments and Ordinances of God the Temples made a Den of Thieves the Discipline and censures shamefully abused the Doctrine was corrupt in many points and the great Sacrament of the Passover ill timed yet the Word tells you Christ whose example it binds you to follow and you profess your selves followers of him in all imitable things made no separation from this Church professed himself a Member of it was by Circumcision incorporated a Member of it received Baptisme in a Congregation of that People was a hearer of their common-service and their Teachers allowing and commanding his Disciples to hear them communicated in the Pass-over with the People and the Priest no more did his Apostles make separation from this Church after his Ascention till their Day had its period Peter and John went to their publick Prayer in their Temple So Paul and Barnabas in their Synagogue By their example it appeares that till God hath forsaken the Church no Man may forsake it and that it is no sufficient warrant to separate from a Church because it is guilty of such sins and corruptions as deserves God should forsake it and for which he hath threatned in his Word that he will forsake it till it appear that God hath put in Execution that which he justly threatned we ought to acknowledge and receive it as his House and not to refuse to dwell with him in it For shall Man be holier than God and hate corruption more than he And yet we may not communicate with it by consenting to any corruptions that are or shall be detected or proved to be in it wherein we have our Saviour's example to guide us All this I take for granted that you will surely grant because many Books largely asserting all this have been many Years in the hands of those who have led away many to separation a syllable whereof they have not gain said and they are in yours nor have I heard a word of your dissenting But this I hear you say that you question the constitution of the Church of England and that you cannot joyn with their Congregations in Divine Worship because they stand under an Antichristian Government and the worship in them is a devised worship Touching the constitution of the Church of England I have no more but this to commend to your consideration namely the answer that was long since given to the Brownists to which I never saw reply given Their Objection was this that the People of England were never rightly called for in the beginning of the Queen's Reign they were by her command and Proclamation compelled to embrace the Protestant Religion and to conform to God's worship whereas in the New Testament we have no Example of People compelled to the Service of God christ commanding Fishermen to convert souls by preaching not Princes to make Disciples by compulsion Therefore the church of Christ had no right constitution The Answer to the separation of old is this that if we speak of a Church first planted the people of such a Nation are first called by the word before they come to be a Church but it is not so of a Countrey where for a long time true Religion hath been professed which is our case And as to that part of the Object that there is no such example in the New Testament 1. The Magistrates were then Enemies to the Christian Religion 2. It sufficeth that we have examples in the Old Testament 2 Kings 23. 21. 2 Chr. 15. 13. 33. 16. 34. 33. Nor have Christian Princes less power in their Dominion to abolish Idolatry and by Law and penalties to compel their Subjects where there is a parity of reason 3. We finde that private Governours in the New-Testament have required and brought in their Families to embrace and profess the Christian Faith Joh. 4. 53. Acts 10. 21. 16. 34. 18. 8. 1 Cor. 1. 16. But that these did any more than teach and command them to learn consent and profess some question if they did so much And so much they did may and ought to do Gen. 8. 9. And whether a Christian Magistrate may do more For though it 's out of all doubt that not only all external duties of the Second Table but also all such of the First Table of the Moral Law are directly and properly of political cognizance yet they doubt much whether any Evangelical Ceremonies or Formes of Worship which relate to Christ be so because they are supernatural and Conscience is the only Rule whereby the Merit of those Duties is to be Judged which must be satisfied before any Papal Injunction can be imposed or obedience can be safely yielded and therefore they would have the ranged not among the essential but among the contingentials of Political Government But they earnestly deny that any internal duties and matters of Faith and Evangelical Doctrine fall within the spheer of that cognizance either directly or indirectly because no humane power extends to acts of the Soul and it is the duty of the Minister and not of the Magistrate to reform even in such matters and yet the Magistrate may and ought to exercise his power for restraining and punishing the fruits and effects of such Errours when the peace of the Common-wealth comes to be disturbed thereby but he has no warrant to punish the misbelief or incredulity concerning Articles of Chirstian Faith no nor Idolatrous Formes of Worship unless they proceed from the errour or obliquity of their Subjects
meat for those that are of full age profounder and more mysterious Doctrines The Stewards of the House appointed to dispense both to both as they are able to bear them As the head of the House taught them to do by his practice every part and particle of the Holy Scriptures Histories Precepts Prohibitions Promises threatnings are all of them choice Viands wherewith holy Souls are satisfied as with marrow and fatness Nor are they only meat but Medicinal also and therefore called wholsome words that have a healing property in them The Spirit of God accompanying his word is called by our Saviour the Water of Life Hadst thou asked of me said he to the Woman of Samaria that denyed to give him of her Water I would have given thee a better and far more excellent kind of Water than this is that I have desired of thee Whosoever drinketh of this Water shall thirst again but whoever shall drink of the Water that I shall give him shall never thirst Of this living Water they that dwell in God do drink continually whereby the thirst of their Souls after earthly things the lust of the flesh the lust of the eye and the pride of life is quenched And their consciences are satisfied and quieted against the sense and apprehension of Gods wrath due for their fins And the sense of his love affected by this Water is better than Wine whose property is to comfort the heart beget new Spirits purge warm refine and waken them Yea this House is a House of Wine And the graces and fruits of the Spirit are delightful to them as Wine with which they being spiritually drunk have inward spiritual joy bred in them testified in the private and publick praises of God by Psalmes Hymns and spiritual Songs Their hearts being merry and chearful They make a rejoyce as if they were set on fire with Wine But here is another food which every one of this House have for commons every Day The Body and Blood of Jesus Christ His flesh is meat indeed and his blood is drink indeed Note well that spiritual things have their truth and reality as much and beyond comparison in their kind as corporal ones have theirs This meat and drink surpasseth all other upon a manifold account 1. Of the place from whence it comes This is the Bread which cometh down from Heaven Not out of the middle Region of the Aire as Manna did but from the highest Heaven 2. The Variety of Viands in it for all things are in Christ who of God is made unto us Wisdome Righteousness and Sanctification and Redemption Let our wants be what they will let our wills be what they can to feed on this or that dish Nothing can be imagin'd nourishing or cheering which is not to be found in Christ Manna which was but a type of this true bread is said to have had all sorts of good tasts in it 3. Of the sufficiency of it for it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily The whole Mass and gathering together of all Divine and everlasting goods Whereof the parcels and streams do issue out upon the Church They are in him not in shaddows and figures as in the Old Testament but in reality and substance And of his fulness have we all received grace for grace Not a fulness of abundance only but a fulness of redundance also out of which a sufficient portion is distributed to every of his Members There can be no want in him where Riches are unsearchable As he is able to save them unto the uttermost that come unto God by him and so to satisfie them that feed upon him as it is said of those four thousand Men beside Women and Children They did all eat and were filled 4. Of the powerful efficacy that is in it I am the Bread of Life That is there remains in me received and applyed by a lively faith power to quicken the Soul that is dead in sin separated from God the true Spring of Life and to preserve it alive by a communicative and continual influence of Divine grace and to give it also the life of joy and comfort yea and to cure not only all the Maladies that molest the Life of Grace but of Nature also 5. Of the permanency of it this is not like other Food and Physick that perisheth it self and is not able to keep the body into which it is received from perishing Upon which account we are forbidden to labour for it Labour not for the Meat which perisheth but for that Meat which endureth to everlasting life which the Son of Man shall give unto you What is that The Bread that I will give is my Flesh If any Man eat of this Flesh he shall live for ever This Meat and Drink is every Day received by this whole Houshold not after a corporal and carnal manner as those Capernaites conceived Christs meaning How can this Man give us his Flesh to eat But by believing that it was given for them and is the Price of their sins to God He that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth on me shall never thirst As Meat is received into the stomack by eating so is Christ into the Soul by believing He that eateth my Flesh and drinketh my Blood dwelleth in me and I in him that is to say is inseparably united to me and I to him even as food is with him that eats it This and no other way is this meat and drink received in the Holy Supper wherein here is or ought to be a frequent communicating where and when every Communicant by eating and drinking the consecrated Bread and Wine being Sacramentally Christ's body and blood Signes to represent it Seals to confirm aud Instruments really to exhibit them doth acknowledge and preach the benefits of the Lord's Death and protesteth to take part thereof by a lively faith which is as the Eye and Hand to the Mouth and Stomack of the Soul taking Christ into and uniting him to them even as corporal Food is by eating and digesting united to the Body 6. This is that Feast of fat things of Wine on the Lees of fat things full of Marrow of Wines on the Lees well refined which the Lord of Hosts promised to all Nations gathered together in his Church to some of all veiling Heavenly things under Earthly condescending so low as to enter into the inward Man by the outward our apprehensions being so weak and narrow that we cannot otherwise be acquainted with them while our Souls are in our Bodies They are much guided by our fancy and then spiritual things are conveyed to them this way only we must remember that there is a far greater excellency in the things themselves than in their representations For what is