Diocesan or Patriarchal Churches as well as Rome yet even this would justifie our Separation because it was our duty to reunite our selves to the Catholick Church all several Churches being but partes simulares homogeneal parts of the whole Whereupon it followeth that that Church which keeps closest to the primitive Catholick Pattern and holds the nearest alliance with it is the purest and that several Churches having such a relation to and dependence upon it neither particular persons nor particular Churches are to act as divided Bodies by themselves which is the ground of all Schism but are to teach and to be taught and to doe all other Christian duties as parts conjoyned to the whole and as Members of the same indeterminable Society Sect. 4. Suppose we should yield to another project of Reformation the issue will be confusion and desolation for if we may conclude their intentions from their former practices and present principles the design is to over-rule or abolish all their way was to strike at all root and branch and now they are for removing the Laws Their course of regulation is to rase the Walls of the City if they can if not to undermine them Down with the Church of England is the Popish Plot and the direct way to this is to divide it All the Papist Pot Cannons and Sophisms could never batter or shake our Jerusalem till some of the Citizens thereof made breaches in it Nay the Romanists never made an approach upon it till the Puritans had made an assault these gave the other both the opportunity and encouragement to attack it Tush say the Popelings let us levell this the Mushrome Sectaries will either fall in the ruines of it or else into our hands they have been very serviceable Tools to us in all our attempts and no doubt will be so on to the end if ever we effect it and then we know how to engage their tender Consciences let it but appear to them which we will not fail to doe they can gain by the barter they forsooth have a new light a new dispensation of Providence and they must wait on Providence and follow that light Sect. 5. What will the consequence of this work be if it go on Is it to remove what is established before we resolve where to fix This were certainly mad work to demolish old Structures before we have advised of the fashion of the new Perhaps a model is fansied but are all the Dissenters agreed about it When they had power too much and time too long to resolve on a settled way even then they neither would or could unite nor ever will or can This we are sure of none of the schismatical Parties can have their own ends unless all be taken away which crosseth their humours or interests and if this be done by violence or by Law not one of ten shall have his own ends which because they cannot obtain their feuds will be high till one party get the full mastery and then the Plot of Union is marred But who shall be taken into this motion to have the benefit of it If all nothing can follow but confusion without remedy and scandal beyond an Apology If one onely Party which yet is unknown what it is then the others if they dare will stand out and oppose it if not they will murmur and repine and thus expostulate Why should they be secluded Members debarred of the privilege of Comprehension This say they we can say for our selves we were drawn into the Lines of Communication by the persuasions and solicitations of their gratified Partizans and Comrades and though they say it have as much promoted the good Old Cause In this indeed we are all agreed we shall never enjoy Liberty of Conscience till we have power to kill and take possession neither likely to have Free Trade till without any respect to Law we can plunder and sequester Malignants and shall we who are fully accorded with them be laid aside If it be pretended the favoured will give good security for their good behaviour for the future whereof there is yet no evidence we are as free as they not doubting to affirm we are the more sober and peaceable in whom there is a more sweet and gratious spirit of love and zeal and have been more constant to their principles than they For we can prove many of them were active Conformists soon after proved persecuting Presbyterians then dough-baked Independents and now again have tacked about and are Cologueing Compliers However if some be received into favour and others rejected there is plain partiality in the case if all must be entertained a downright unaccountable Schism follows But to wave the Persons to be comprehended what Things must be granted them for an Union If onely a few unsatisfactory alterations be tendered the project is baffled we should be as far from Unity as now we are for then the clamour would be our burthens are a little mitigated but not removed our grievances are abated but not fully satisfied we must not leave an hoof behind us when we go out of Egypt If many and great alterations be submitted to then they triumph in their Conquests they had not onely Providence on their side but reason also and argument and then we shall hear of nothing in Pulpits Clubbs and Coffee-houses but stories of their mighty Acts that their Enemies are now under great convictions that they are the Godly conscientious Gods secret Ones and the good Old Cause must needs be God's Cause Having premised these Considerations let us next reflect upon the matters on which this motion of Reformation must proceed and first of that which is most opposed the Government CHAP. II. COncerning it the most proper method will be to discuss these following Propositions 1. That Church Government is necessary 2. That necessary Church Government ought to be one and the same throughout the Christian world at all times 3. That one Church Government is Episcopacy which hath prevailed ever since the first plantation of Christianity Sect. 1. Church Government is necessary for these reasons The Church is a Society which cannot subsist without it It is a Body whose parts are compacted each whereof hath its proper Office and Service it is that Body whereof Christ is the Head who therefore will provide for its preservation and peace by placing Governours over it which de facto he hath done 1 Cor. 12. 28. It is the House of God whereof Christ is the Lord who hath reserved this prerogative to himself to nominate and constitute the Stewards of his Houshold and Family as he did Luk. 12. 42. hence those commissionated by him are called the Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the Mysteries of God Therefore for any to exercise a power in his House who is not authorized by him or to reject those powers which he hath entrusted to provide for his Family and rule his House is a most sacrilegious invasion and
interests are concerned are free to it If they can and doe why may not the same authority determine the circumstantials of the Second and Fourth Commandment as well as of the Third Are they not equally Precepts of Divine Worship And why may not the same require our conformity to their Constitutions in the adjuncts of religious Worship as well as command and enforce submission to their Acts for the modifying limiting and enlarging the duties of the Second Table Is not holy Text as much a rule of perfection for the Offices of Justice and Charity as for religious Duties Is not Christ the Lawgiver to both And can there be a fairer acknowledgment of the plenitude of his power than that by Commission he hath settled and delegated his Officers here on earth to make rules for the honest and honorary performance of what he hath indispensably commanded What therefore they by their Legantine power duly executed do order is ordered by him Quod quis per alium c. he that heareth you heareth me SECT 2. Ceremonies thus stated are in some degree necessary as we usually call ornamentals in an House necessaries because such is the exigence of all external actions that without them they cannot be solemnly performed which in all religious affairs as well as civil transactions ought to be respected All Societies have their ceremonial Observations as well as fundamental Constitutions to which they have so great respect that they suspect these to be sore shaken when the other are removed and the Catholick Church hath ever thought Ceremonies so subservient to the decent regular and reverend performance of Christian Institutions that without them the Service could not receive nor retain its due value and esteem In the Christian Community Unity and Uniformity are commanded duties and all Christians have hitherto believed Ceremonies are the best fences and securities for them and such as add much lustre and honour to exercises of Religion How great a part of the judicial Law was Ceremonial not onely by types and figures of good things to come which as carnal Ordinances were to expire when the fulness of time came but appendants and attendants of those good duties then enjoyned which are not abrogated by Christ That Text Matt. 5. 17. respects not one division of the Law but every part so that the whole remains in force to receive its perfection by the Gospel The moral Law though nulled in its presumed ability to justification which the grace of Jesus Christ supplieth yet liveth as a rule of obedience The judicial stands still in its full strength in matters of common equity though as to those Laws which peculiarly respected the Jewish State its rigour is abated to supply which God hath given to supreme Powers authority to enact such Decrees as are conducible to the great ends of Government The Ceremonial as it consisted of weak and beggarly rudiments is determined yet it holds as a directory to the Church for signification For one great end thereof was to teach us to serve God regularly and reverently Amesius Med. Theol. l. 2. c. 15. n. 16. confesses Institutions merely Ceremonial do yet contain in them a general equity and do yet teach us that certain fitting days therefore fitting Rites by parity of reason be assigned for God's publick Worship Substantia Legis Ceremonialis est perpetua Zanch. de Relig. Observ c. 15. Aphor. 4. J. Frig. p. 9. of his Ref. Pol. thus expresseth it in reference to the whole There is no abrogation well there may be some derogation which he hath borrowed from the Canonists and Casuists who thus distinguish Derogatur Legi cùm pars detrahitur abrogatur cùm prorsus tollïtur Barth Fum. Tit. Abrog and he thus explains it A derogation doth but expound an Edict as we see the Gospel derogateth from the Law by taking away the Letter and requiring it be taken after the Spirit now the spirit of the Law is the equity thereof but the letter is the rigour of the words We have a Saying the reason of the Law is its soul and every sense affixed contrary to the reason of its enacting is unreasonable Now as in several Statutes of Repeal some useless or prejudicial things are nulled but what conduceth to good ends is by cautious proviso's strengthened so the Mosaical Law in those things which were burthensome and inconvenient is quite out of all but those that are no way derogatory to the Discipline of Christ and his easie yoke and which are very agreeable with the Constitution of Christian Society and community have their full virtue It was the observation of Melancthon that the fourth Commandment was Morale praeceptum de Ceremoniali which if I understand him aright the ultimost reason of the Law is moral but what is specially commanded is Ceremonial and if so then plainly it is moral that some things should be Ceremonial And because Ceremonies have been by all almost adjudged serviceable to the common interchangeable good of Religion therefore they are not to be esteemed trivial or superfluous for nothing is so which is a concurring good mean to a good end or hath a social good end in good resolutions SECT 3. If the quarrel be at their significancy certainly the more significant they are the more expedient also they are and the Church hath good authority to expedients for what is both lawfull and laudable is in that degree necessary and if S. Paul thought it incumbent on every single Christian to provide things honest in the sight of all men Phil. 4. 8. then much more is the Church bound to take care in that respect for her self and her members Now these honest things which are to be provided are such as in the approbation of all wise men whether good or bad are grave venerable attractive and obliging and such are our Ceremonies which are experimented to be wholsome preservatives of the golden mean betwixt nakedness and vanity veneration and superstition gaudiness and rudeness and therefore of the kind of those honest things But S. Paul is yet more particular seeming to put significant Ceremonies sub Praecepto 1 Tim. 2. 8. I will therefore I appoint it by Apostolical authority saith Diod. that men lift up holy hands by this Ceremony saith he to express the devotion of the heart Pisc seconds him the lifting up the hands says he is a sign of the elevation of the heart with this proviso not that this gesture is so necessary that we are indispensably tyed to it For we find the Publican used it not but smote upon his Breast yet therein he was a true Conformist who observed an uncommanded significant rite according to the then received custome if Dr. Lightfoot's warranty be good that in Christ's time they prayed with their hands laid on their breasts the right hand being placed on the left Prostration was no commanded Rite yet approved 2 Chron. 7. 3. All these had their proper significations that of lifting up the
to enterprise any thing which might infringe or abate the tenour of the Law The Presbyters and Deacons of Rome writing to S. Cypr. l. 2. Ep. 7. are very positive Quid magis c. What can be more necessary either in times of peace or persecution than to exercise due severity according to Divine order S. Augustine fully Tract 11. in Joh. Admirantur Donatistae c. The Donatists wonder that Christian Princes should bestir themselves against the detestable dividers of the Church but to abate their wonderment he subjoyns this reason Si verò c. If they did not labour to suppress them how could they give an account to God of their power which they had received from him because it is the duty of Christian Kings that they in their times preserve their Mother the Church in peace That smart saying of his Ep. 73. Possid is not to be forgotten Magis quid agas c. Think rather what course you are to take with those who will not obey Laws and how to handle them than to trouble your self to make it appear that their disobedience to Laws is sinfull This also shews that the Christian Emperours did make severe Laws against the Schismaticks of those times so did Constantine and his Sons Aug. Ep. 166. Ed. Bas To. 2. so did Valentian Gratian Theodosius Arcadius but Justinian took the safest course for the Hereticks being great traders he came even with them none should trade 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. but the Orthodox the rest had six months given them to consider whether they would conform or no. Evident it is that as the Emperours handled them sometimes more severely sometimes more remissly as the exigence of their affairs and state of the Empire would permit the Church and State did accordingly enjoy their peace and quiet or else were pestered with intestine broils and mischiefs The Governours of the Church were not behind hand to doe their part for the Laodicean Council forbids them admission into the Church c. 6. prohibits any Orthodox man to give his Sons or Daughters in marriage unto them c. 31. yea not to pray with them c. 33. and though it be true S. Aug. and Optat. called the Donatists Brethren yet at last they would not that was after that they had rejected or laid aside the use of the Lord's Prayer as many of our Fanaticks have done But above all Solomon prohibits the removal of what had been long settled by paternal power Prov. 22. 28. which the Ephesine Fathers with many other Ancients have applied to Church Customs and Constitutions Hereupon all wise men have dreaded the dissolution and abolition which is the Puritans work of Reformation of what hath been firmly established by good authority finding the provoking and irritating of humours by medicines in order to a cure have oft proved mortal and have oft resolved a tolerable sore is much better than an hazardous application for a remedy The Lawyers have a saying Better a mischief than an inconvenience which can signifie onely this that a remedy by admitting onely an inconvenience hath oft proved more mischievous in the event than the mischief they endeavoured to avoid because every notable change of State is apt to produce a world of unavoidable mischiefs it being morally impossible upon the exchange of a mischief for an inconvenience to prevent a new set of mischiefs which are not ordinarily found till they be felt It is notorious that even preposterous and unseasonable pressures of present remedies against either some present conceited mischiefs or fansied inconveniences hath choked the heart of all the main and principal concerns which ought first to have been respected and frustrated all those great ends whose advancement hath been pretended and whilst the greatest care of our Patriot Reformers should have been neither to tempt God nor to weary and harden his Vicegerent they have most impudently imprudently and wickedly provoked both by their rebellious actings and preposterous courses Heu probatum est witness not to go farther back our late Exclusioners and No-money-men Num. 3. Admitting a change be submitted to this will not gain nor secure those that are given to change For upon every such change they are ready ever and anon to change their principles and practices The Donatists the great Grandsires of our Sectaries did so at first they yelped Quid Imperatori c. What had the Emperour to doe in Church affairs but S. Augustine tells us with the change of the times they changed their note for taking their time they petitioned Julian the Apostate supplicantibus Rogatiano Pontio saith Opt. for liberty of Conscience which he readily granted them upon an hellish design ut per sacrilegas dissensiones as S. Aug. that by their sacrilegious dissensions he might destroy Christianity hip and thigh root and branch if possible Thus it fared with our Boutefeus they sadly complained and heavily declaimed against those Laws and do yet which our most Christian Kings had enacted for the keeping their Subjects in obedience with penalties upon the seditious disturbers of the peace and transgressours of Law upon the same Donatistical principle yet upon the lamentable change of the times they procured from the Junto's Keepers and Noll cruel Edicts against the regular Sons of the Church which were executed as Bishop Sanderson truly noted without justice or mercy that they had reason to complain as S. Augustine did of the Donatists they were so mischievous ut Barbarorum facta c. That the actings of Barbarians were more mild than theirs Aug. Ep. 122. Num. 4. All the forementioned Petitioners did earnestly solicite for the Religion established by Law avouching a change thereof was unjust most impious and uncharitable They had reason so to doe for that above-cited Text Prov. 22. 28. doth at least insinuate that it is contrary to all Religion equity and prudence upon every motion or singular humour of absurd and unreasonable Male-contents or Phantasticks to discompose or unhinge what our prudent and fatherly Governours have industriously set for the publick peace and tranquillity and have been long received with the approbation and full satisfaction of all good and peaceable Subjects But there is another Text Prov. 24. 21 22 which probably wrought on them to be so zealous for the established Religion My son fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with them that are given to change for their calamity shall rise suddenly and who knoweth the ruine of them both A sad caveat this destruction is awarded not onely on the changelings but on the moderate medlers who are agitatours mediatours and apologizers for them who though they will not justifie them yet dare plead for them speak a good word for them and as much as they can with safety to themselves palliate and smother their crimes These though stylo novo they be called or miscalled the moderate sober party yet they answer not the name For they are either crafty designing
an ambulatory or menstruous Creed nor with an arbitrary monstrous superintendency voted and unvoted and revoted backward and forward according to the sense and interests of the Chairman and his crew in S. Stephen's Chapel Neither will we be satisfied or own a civil or common Law hotch-potch Church according to the device of the Counter-plot as the three Inventors gave it a Name one whereof is an outlawed Traitour the second a Church Trepanner the third a giddy Changeling For I demand Was the Church of England when Popish a true constituted Church according to its first settlement by Christ and his Apostles and subsequent example of the Primitive Church because it was so established by Law or not If it were we have done the Papists business they need not prove us we have proclaimed our selves Schismaticks in separating from a true constituted Church by Christ's and the Apostles order antecedently such before any humane Sanction if not then a legal settlement may be Antichristian which in that very respect stands in great need of a Reformation For as to attempt a Reformation of that which is founded on Divine Authority and stands by Divine Law is a contradiction to the indispensable and irrevocable will of the Founder so to reform what hath been introduced by mere humane authority without any warranty either general or special from a grant of our Law-giver is a pious Christian duty provided that in the management thereof nothing be done repugnant to any other Divine Law and our duty But let what can be suggested for the promotion of this new project it will be baffled by the two notorious Ringleaders of the Faction For if Mr. Baxter's onely true way of concord will not pass he and his Comrades will be as clamorous and stirring if they dare as ever J. O. is positive All lawfull things are not to be done for the Churches peace which quite undoes it Confessed it must be that several of the Partisans conceive a full union cannot be expected yet to comprehend and condescend to those who will occasionally and partially conform may go far towards a peace In good time can this be a way to true Christian peace when Mr. Baxter hath given us fair warning not to trust them plainly telling us Apol. for Nonconf p. 90. they are onely Instruments to undermine us and will turn against us as soon as they have opportunity Neither will their coming to Church as they delusorily and hypocritically call it clear them from the guilt of Schism because this Church being both founded and settled upon Divine Right in all its Superstructures there arises an obligation constantly and throughly to communicate with it and observe its Rules and Orders which not to doe is sinfull Separation and to abett or countenance those who doe not is to partake of their sin For it is not love devotion or duty which draws them but cunning interest and fear which drives them to this outward auckward conformity The best any can make of it it s an act of compliance cannot be an act of Christian allegiance and obedience to lawfull Superiours which is a work of Faith incorporate with the other good works of Faith issuing from the supernatural power of God's Word Spirit and Grace Certain it is that the men for whom this favour is moved do publickly and honestly declare which is next to a moral impossibility that they ever will that Kingly power is originally and immediately from God that Prelatical Episcopacy is a Divine Apostolical Institution that some circumstances and adjuncts in the external ministeries of Divine Worship not expresly prescribed by God may and ought to be adhibited therein for decency order and edification they are not to be trusted and if frequent experiences will not make us so wise as to neglect them and all such motions for them we are fit to be begged and once more undone We are yet again efforted with a troop of tantum nons who are still bleating for connivence forbearance and moderation which in effect is to solicite the Laws be outlawed though herein they would give better evidence of their moderation and modesty if they left that solely to the resolution of the Government Take these we must as we find them and we shall find them vary as the wind does they can blow hot and cold with one breath that trimming Proverb is their Rule There is no living at Rome and fighting with the Pope and let the Government sink or swim they will keep themselves out of harms-way If possible to make sure of this world they will have friends of all parties for which end they can at present swallow the Oath of Allegiance take the Test and upon another occasion vomit a fulsome Remonstrance Address or Association but by all means they will make infallible provisions for heaven in order whereto if they be in health they are for the Church and if in safe policy they may for a Conventicle too yea from the Church to a Conventicle and back again if sick they will not refuse the Offices of the Church but will admit them de bene esse yet for their transire and viaticum they must have a voluntary conceived prayer by a moderate Sneak who can play fast and loose with the Church Offices and to make sure work the Sacrament must be re-administred by one of the same batch or a zealous Holder-forth In my judgment these of all other Sects are the most dangerous because the more close and reserved we cannot say they are either flesh or fish nor discover whether they be Hawk or Buzzard they are animalia imperfectè mixta but this we know much mischief hath hapned by this false disguised and miscalled moderation to evidence which it will be requisite to exemplifie this in some all are too numerous and would be too bulky instances and to give in the opinion of two who in their times were reputed moderate learned men and excellent preachers 1. It hath been mischievous to the Church The Samosatenian Heresie was brought in under a mistaken charitable pretence to reconcile the Jewish and Christian Religion The Heresie of the Monothelites was set up on a design to moderate the Heresie of Eutyches The Eusebians propagated the Arian Heresie by their moderate endeavours to compose the difference betwixt them and the Catholicks Some Novatian Bishops to satisfie the scruple of a convert Jew thought fit to leave it though the matter of it was an approved practice as a thing indifferent which soon raised a Schism and this Schism in a short time begot another Theoph. Alex. favoured the Originists in hope to recover some at least from that Sect but S. Hier. told him roundly his moderation therein was very offensive to holy men because thereby he emboldned and strengthned the already over insolent and peevish Faction What Greg. Naz. got or rather lost by his easiness of temper is too large to relate and so it is of many more