bound to be more afraid of giving scandal to them than unto you Are not men most afraid of overthrowing the children and the weak rather than those that are stronger than themselves If you are apter to sin and turn from Christ than the people of the Parish Churches we should rather separaâ—e from you than from them If not we must more take heed of scandalizing them than you Obj. But Christ pronounceth a â—o to them that offend his little ones Answ. If by offending them be meant only persecuting and hurting them as many think then it is nothing to the question in hand For I hope communicating with others is not a persecuting you And bare displeasing them it is certain that the text doth not mean at all But if by offending them be meant scandalizing them that is laying snares before them whether by fraud or persecution to turn them from Christ and draw them to sins then it confirmeth all that I say And the term little ones conteineth the reason of the words Because as little children are easily overthrown easilier deceived so the young weak believers of little faith are most in danger of being turned away from Christ or ensnared in any sin or errour And therefore if you think the Parish Churches to consist of weaker persons than your selves the woe is to you or us if we offend them The truth is offending and giving scandal is commonly taken in the Gospel for any action which is not our necessary duty by which either Heathens and Inâ—idels and enemies to Christ are like to be drawn to harder thoughts of the Christian faith or any wicked man is like to be kept from a godly life or else by which the young ungrounded and unsetled sort of Christians may be tempted to turn back and forsake the faith which they have professed or fall into any dangerous sin And therefore seeing the separatists profess to be setled in the faith already and many in the Parish Churches are weak and many averse to some duties of Religion and more in danger of being turned away we are bound to be much more afraid of giving scandal to the Parishes than to the separatists Obj. But Christ cared not for offending such perverse ones as Herod or the Pharisees Answ. Christ feared not to displease the greatest when it would be done by doing good No more must you or they be pleased by our neglect of any duty But Christ was against laying any trap before either Herod or the Pharisees to make them sin And it is not your censure of others that will warrant us to use them as Reprobates forsaken of God If every man that can be uncharitable enough to call his neighbours Pharisees or enemies of Christ without proof shall keep us from communion with them then the worse any man is the more he shall be Lord of all other mens consciences DIRECT XXV Be not over-tender of your reputation with any sort of men on earth nor too impatient of their censures displeasure or contempt THe fangs of the censorious are a common scandal and as strong a snare or temptation to some men as worldly preferments are to others When we come among men whom we take for the most Religious and hear them keenly censure all for hypocrites or formalists profane or schismaticks who are contrary to them in opinion or practise at the first we are in danger of being carried away as Barnabas in dissimulation and to say as they say or at least comply with them by our silence and practise lest we should be censured by them as others are Especially Ministers are greatly in danger of this snare For the prophane hate them for their doctrine and their holy lives And it is the godly that are the fruit of their labours and the satisfaction which they have for all their sufferings and the comfort of their lives And if these forsake them and despise them with whom shall they find any comfort in the world Therefore they are very much in danger of complying too far with their errours and weaknesses to keep their interest in them And they think it is that they may do them good And perhaps this was the case of Peter and Barnabas with the weak Judaizing Christians For Paul telleth us Rom. the 14. that it was the use of the weak who thought those things to be duties and sins which were not so to judge the strong who knew their liberty And it was the custome of the strong to despise the weak Just as at this day the mistaken superstitious Christian saith They are prophane that are not against all that he is against And those that see his errour say what giddy whimsical fanaticks are these So was it then and so it is like to be till God give the world a better mind Many a faithful Minister I have known who have freely confessed to me that the censures of peevish self-conceited Christians enclined to separation was a far stronger temptation to them to forsake or overrun their own understandings than all the offers of honours or riches could be on the other side It is a hard thing when we have spent our labour and lives to bring men to Christ and have got them into a state of hope and forwardness to be shortly after cast off by them as formalists oâ— temporizers or any thing that their sick fancies will call us But for all this it is but one of those trials which God will have his servants undergo And both Ministers and private persons must be above the praise and the dispraise even of self-conceited Religious persons before they can be sit to follow Christ as tried and firmly setled men Stand your ground if you are in the right Truth will bear all your charges at the last and will defend it self and you If you please men whoever they be contrary to God and conscience you are servants of men and verily you have your reward Math. 6. But you are no longer the servants of Christ. Gal. 1. 10. And you will never be setled but change as the Moon as the parties or opinions of the censurers change But if you stick to the words of truth and soberness at last the sober part of the Religious will be your encouragers and many of the giddy will come to you by Repentance when experience hath shewed them that which they would not learn of you That which is vertiginous will at last settle its rest on that which is permanent and firm As boys when they have made themselves wheel-sick with turning round will lay hold on the next post to keep them from falling Therefore bear the censures of the ignorant Please them in all things lawful for their good and edification and become all things to all men in a lawful way But depart not from the principles or practise of Christian-union Communion Charity or Sobriety to please a dividing hot-brain'd party nor to escape their sharpest censures He is
are but the effects of your prejudice passion or weakness of understanding 28. Do not too much reverence the revelations impulses or most confident opinions of any others upon the account of their sincerity or holiness but try all judiciously and soberly by the word of God 29. Take heed least the trouble of your own disquieted doubting minds do become a snare to draw you to some unâ—outh way of Cure and so make the fancy of some new opinion sect or practice to seem your remedy and give you ease and soperswade you that it is the certain truth 30 Keep in the rank of a humble disciple or Learner in Christs Church till you are fit and called to be Teachers your selves 31. Grow up in the great substantial practical truths and duties and grow downwards in the roots of a clearer belief of the Word of God and the life to come And neither begin too soon with doubtful opinions nor ever lay too much upon them 32. Lay not a greater stress upon your different words and manner of prayer than God hath laid And take heed of scorning reproaching or slighting the words and manner of other mens worship when it is such as God accepteth from the sincere Where the Case about forms of prayer is handled 33. When you are sure that other mens way of worship is sinful yet make it not any other or greater sin than indeed it is and speak not evil of so much in it as is good And slander not God as a hater or rejecter of all mens Services which are mixt with infirmities or as a partial hater of the infirmities of others and not yours 34. Think not that all is unlawfully obeyed which is unlawfully commanded 35. Think not that you are guilty of all the faults of other mens worship with whom you joyn no not of the Ministers or Congregations Nor that you are bound to seperate from all the worship which is faultily performed For then there must be no Church-Communion upon Earth Where is more about extemporary prayer and imposed forms 36. Yet know what Pastors and Church-Communion you may joyn with and what not And think not that I am perswading you to make no difference 37. In your judging of Discipline reformation and any means of the Churches good be sure your eye be upon the true End and upon the particular Rule and not on either of them alone Take not that for a means which is either contrary to the Word of God or is in â—ts nature destructive of the end 38. Neglect not any truth of God much less renounce it or deny it But yet do not take it for your duty to publish all which you judge to be truth nor a sin to silence many lesser truths when the Churches peace and welfare doth require it 39. Know which are the Great duties of a Christian life and wherein the nature of true Religion doth consist And then pretend not any lesser duty against these greater though the least when it is indeed a duty is not to be denyed or neglected 40. Labour for a sound judgement to know good from evil least you trouble your selves and others by mistakes Forsake not the guidance of a judicious Teacher nor the Company of the agreeing generality of the Godly 41. Let not the bare fervour of a Preacher or the loudness of his voice or affectionate utterance draw you too far to admire or follow him without a proportion of solid understanding and judiciousness 43. Your belief of the necessary Articles of faith must be made your own and not taken meerly on the Authority of any And in all points of belief or practice which are necessary to Salvation you must ever keep company with the Universal Church For it were not the Church if it erred in those And in matters of Peace and Concord the major vote must be your guide In matters of humane obedience your Governours must be your guides And in matters of high and difficult speculation the judgment of one man of extraordinary understanding is to be preferred before the Rulers and the major Vote 43. Reject not a good cause because it is owned by some bad men And own not a bad cause for the goodness of the Patrons of it Iudge not of the Cause by the persons when you should judg of the persons by the Cause 44. Yea take the bad examples of religious men to be one of your most perillous temptations And therefore labour to discover what are the special sins of professours in the age you live in that you may be specially fortified against them 45. Desire the highest degree of holiness and to be free from the Corruptions of the times But affect not to be odd and singular from ordinary Christians in lawful things 46. When you have to do only with stigmatized scandalous ones to vindicate the honour of Christianity from their Scandal go as far from them as lawfully you can But with the Common sort of Sinners whose Conversion you are bound to seek go not as far from them as you can but purposely study to come as near them as lawfully you may that you may have the better advantage to win them to the truth 47. Whenever you are avoiding any error forget not that there is a contrary extream to be avoided of which you are not our of danger 48. Think more and talk more of your faults and failings against others especially against Princes Magistrates and Pastors than of their faults and failings against you 49. Take notice of all the good in others which appeareth and talk rather of that behind their backs than of their faults 50. Study the duty of instructing and exhorting more than of reproof and finding fault 51. The more you suffer by Rulers or any mâ—n the more be watchful lest you be tempted to dishonour them or to withdraw or abate the Love which is their due 52. Make Conscience of heart-revenge and tongue-revenge as well as of hand-revenge 53. When you are exasperated by the hurt which you feel from Magistrates remember also the Good which the Church receiveth by them 54. Learn to suffer by good people and by Ministers and not only by ungodly people or by Magistrates 55. When you complain of violence and persecution in others take heed lest the same inward vice work in you by Church cruelties and dimning censures against them or others Persecution and separation often have the same Cause 56. Keep still in your eye the State of all Christs Churches upon earth that you may know what a people they are through the world whom Christ hath Communion with and may not ignorantly separate from almost all the Church of Christ while you think that you separate but from those about you Queres about separation 57. Yet ler not any here cheat you by the bare namees and titles of Unity to the papal usurping head of the Church nor must you dream of any Head and Center of Unity to the universal
to purchase them DIRECT XXXVII In your judging of Discipline Reformation and any means of the Churches good be sure your Eye be both upon the true End and upon the particular Rule and not on either of them alone Take not that for a means which is either contrary to the word of God or is in its nature destructive of the End THere are great miscarriages come for want of the true observation of this rule First If a thing seem to you very needful to a good end and yet the word be against it avoid it For God knoweth better than we what means is fittest and what he will bless As for instance some think that many self-devised ways of worship contrary to Col. 2. 21 23. would be very profitable to the Church And some think that striking with the sword as Peter did is the way to rescue Christ or the Gospel But both are bad because the Scripture is against them Secondly and if you think that the Scripture commandeth you this or that positive means if Nature and true Reason assure you that it is against the End and is like to do much more harm than good be assured that you mistake that Scripture For first God telleth us in general that the means as such are for the End and therefore are no means when they are against it The Ministery is for edification and not for destruction The Sabbath is for man and not man for the Sabbath Secondly God hath told us that no positive duty is a duty at all times To pray when I should be saving my neighbours life is a sin and not a duty though we are commanded to pray continually So is it to be preaching or hearing on the Lords day when I should be quenching a fire in the town or doing necessary works of mercy Wherefore the Disciples Sabbath-breaking was justified by Christ and he giveth us all a charge to learn what this meaneth I will have mercy and not sacrifice which must needs import I prefer mercy before sacrifice and would have no sacrifice which hindereth mercy Therefore if a Sermon were to be preached so unseasonably or in such unsuitable circumstances as that according to Gods ordinary way of working it were like to do more hurt than good it were no duty at that time Discipline is an Ordinance of Christ But if sound reason tell me that if I publickly call this man to Repentance or excommunicate him it is like to do much hurt to the Church and no good to him it would be at that time no duty but a sin As Physick must be forborn where the Disease will but be exasperated by it Therefore Christ boundeth our very preaching and reproof with a Shake off the dust off your feet as a testimony against them And give not that which is holy to dogs c. When treading under foot and turning again and rending us is lâ—kest to be the success the wisdome of Christ and not that of the flesh only requireth us to take it for no duty This is to be observed by them that think that Admonitions and excommunications and exclusion from the Sacrament must be used in all places and at all times alike without respect to the End come of it what will Or that will tempt God by presuming that he will certainly either bless or at least justifie their unseasonable and imprudent actions as if they were a duty at all times To be either against the Scripture or against the End is a certain proof that an action is no duty because no means DIRECT XXXVIII Neglect not any truth of God much less renounce it or deny it For lying and contempt of Sacred truth is always sinful But yet do not take it for your duty to publish all which you judge to be truth nor a sin to silence many lesser truths when the Churches peace and welfare doth require it TO speak or subscribe against any truth is not to be done on any pretense whatsoever For lying is a sin at all times But it is the opinion of injudicious furious spirits that no truth is to be silenced for peace Truth is not to be sold for carnal prosperity but it is to be forborn for spiritual advantage and true necessity First if the publishing of all truths were at all times a duty then all men live every moment in ten thousand sins of omission because there are more than so many truths which I am not publishing Nay which I never shall publish whilest I live Secondly Positives bind not always and to all times Thirdly while you are preaching that opinion which your zeal is so much for you are omitting far greater and more necessary Truths And is it not as great a sin to omit them as the lesser Fourthly Mercy is to be preferred before sacrifice What if the present uttering some truth would cost many thousand mens lives Were not that an untimely and unmerciful word And is it not as bad if but accidentally it tend to the ruine of the Church and the hurt of souls It were easie to instance in unseasonable and imprudent words of truth spoken to Princes which have raised persecutions of long continuance and ruined Churches silenced Ministers and caused the death of multitudes of men Fifthly And where is there any word of God which commandeth us to speak all that we know and which forbiddeth us to forbear the utterance of any one truth Sixthly And for the most part those men who are most pregnant and impatient of holding in their opinions on the pretense of the pretiousness of truth do but proudly esteem their own understandings precious and do vend some raw undigested notions vain janglings or errors under the name of that truth which must by no means be concealed though the vending of it tend to envy and strife and to confusion and every evil work When those that have the Truth indeed have more wisdome and goodness to know how to use it It is not Truth but Goodness which is the ultimate object of the soul. And God who is infinite Goodness it self hath revealed his Truths to the world to do men Good and not to hurt them And the Devil who is the Destroyer so he may but do men hurt will be content to make use even of Truth to do it Though usually he only pretendeth Truth to cover his lies And this angel of Light hath his ministers of Light and Righteousness who are known by their fruits whilest the pretenses of Light and Righteousness are used to Satans ends and not to Christs to hurt and destroy and to hinder Christs Kingdome and not to save and to do good As the Wolf is known by his bloody jaws even in his sheeps cloathing DIRECT XXXIX Know which are the great duties of a Christian life and wherein the nature of true Religion doth consist And then pretend not any lesser duty against those greater though the least when it is indeed a duty is not to
be denied or neglected HEaven-work and Heart-work are the chiefest parts of Christian duty Christ often giveth us his summaries of the Law and inculeateth his great Command Iob. 13. 35. Matth. 22. 37 38 39. Luk. 10. 27. And so doth the Apostle Rom. 13. 10. 1 Pet. 1. 22. 1 Iohn 3. 11 14 23. 4 7 11 12 20. 2 Ioh. 5. And the fruits of the spirit are manifest Gal. 5. 22 23. Iames saith that pure Religion and undefiled before God even the father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in adversity and to keep our selves unspotted of the world Jam. 1. 27. Paul saith 1 Tim. 1. 5. The end of the Commandement is Charity out of a pure heart and of a good conscience and of faith unfeigned And then addeth From which some having swarved have turned aside to vain janglings In a word The effectual belief of pardon and eternal Glory given through Christ and the Love of God and man with the denial of our selves and fleshly desires and contempt of all things in the world which are competitors with God and our salvation with a humble patient enduring of all which must be suffered for these ends is the nature and sum of the Christian Religion Do nothing therefore as a duty which is a hinderance to any of this Contentious preachings and factious sidings which weaken Love are not of God The servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle to all men 2 Tim. 2. 24. When you come into a family and find that their Religion consisteth in promoting some odd opinion and pleading for a party and vilifying others be sure that this is a Religious way of serving the devil being contrary to the great and certain duties of a godly liâ—e When you fall into company which stiâ—leth all talk of Heaven and all Heart-searching and Heart-humbling conference by pleading 〈◊〉 this or that opinion be sure that it is but one way of enmity to Holiness though not so gross as scorning and persecuting it That which I said before of Truth is applyable to this of Duty It is one of the most important things in the world for the resolving of a thousand cases of conscience and the directing of a Christian life to know which Duties are the Greater and which are the lesser and so which is to be preferred in competition For that which is a duty at another time is a sin when it is done instead of a greater as Christ hath resolved in the case of the Sabbath If Good must be loved as Good then the Greatest Good must be most loved and sought Sacrifice instead of mercy is a sin Our gift must be left at the altar while we go to be reconciled to our brother Math. â— Never hearken to those men who would set up their controverted duties or any positives and lesser things against the duties of nature it self or the great substantial parts of godliness DIRECT XL. Labour for a sound judgement to know good from evil left you trouble your selves and others by mistakes And till you grâ—w so judicious forsake not the guidance of a judicious Teacher nor the company of the agreeing generality of the Godly ALmost all our contentions and divisions are caused by the ignorance and injudiciousness of Christians especially the most self-conceited They are for the most as children that yet need to be taught the very principles of the divine Oracles and to be fed with milk when they think themselves fit to be teachers of others Heb. 5. 11 12. And therefore as children they are tossed to and fro and caried about with every wind of doctrine Eph. 4. 14. And when they have many years together been crying up an opinion and vilifying dissenters at last they turn to some other opinion and confess that they did all this upon mistake And was it not a pitiful life that they lived that while and a pitiful zeal which did set them on and a pitiful kind of worship which they thus offered to God Alas to hear a man pray and preach up Antinomianism one year and Arminianism the next and Socinianism the next To hear a man make Separation and Anabaptistry a great part of his business to men in preaching and to God in prayer for seven and seven years together and at last confess that all this was his errour and his sin Or if he confess it not it is so much the worse Is it not sad that ignorance and hasty rashness should so much injure the Church and mens souls that so many well meaning people should put evil for good and good for evil darkness for light and light for darkness Isa. 5. 20. But because there is no hope that most should be judicious there is no other remedy for such but this of Christs prescript which I have here set down First Happy is he that chooseth a judicious faithful Guide and learneth of him till his own understanding be better illuminated And that escapeth the conduct of ignorant erroneous self-seeking proud dividing Teachers Secondly Continue in the Communion of the generality of agreeing Christians The generality of the godly are more unlikely to be forsaken of Christ than a few odd self-conceited singular professours This is the way of peace to your selves and to the Church of Christ. DIRECT XLI Let not the bare Fervour of a Preacher or the Lowdness of his voice or affectionate manner of utterance draw you too far to admire or follow him without a proportionable degree of solid understanding and judiciousness IT is pity that any wise and judicious Minister should want that fervour and seriousness of speech which the weight of so great a business doth require And it is greater pity that any serious affectionate Minister should be ignorant and injudicious And it is yet greater pity that in any good men too much of their fervour should be meerly affected and seem to be what it is not or at least be raised by a selfish desire to advance our selves in the hearers thoughts and to exercise our parts upon their affections But it is most pitiful that the Church hath any hypocrites who have no other but such affected dissembled fervency And it is not the least pity that so many good people especially youths and women should be so weak as to value an affectionate tone of speech above a judicious opening of the Gospel I confess there is something in an affectionate expression which will move the wisest And as light and judgement tend to generate judgement so heat of affection tendeth to beget affection And I never loved a senseless delivery of matters of eternal consequence As if we were asleep our selves or would make the hearers to be so Or would have them think by our cold expressions that we believe not our selves when we set forth the great inestimable things of the life to come But yet it grieveth my very soul to think what pitiful raw and ignorant kind of preaching is crowded
quench it and hath these fifteen hundred years but especially these thirteen hundred been the wolvish Scatterer of the flocks of Christ And must that be now the way to build it which hath so long been the way to pull it down It is Love that must be our Union and Love that must cause it or we shall never have the Union of a Christian Church By this shall all men know that you are Christs Disciples if you have Love one to another If you believe not this pretend not to believe in Jesus Christ who doth affirm it I confess I am so far guilty of superstition my self that if I had been one of the Changers of our ancient Government I should have been somewhat the more backward for his Name sake to the beheading of Christopher Love lest it should be an ill Omen both to Church and State but especially to the Actors of it 8. Another of the Motives of this Discourse is because I know that times of most temptation are times of greatest danger and commonly of greatest sin And all faithful Pastors must know what are the special Temptations of the Time and Place which they live in When had we ever greater Temptations to Love-killing principles and practices than now except in the times of the miserable Wars I need not name them to you The harder it is for men to Love them that hate them that censure them unjustly that revile them and reproach them and make them odious or that hurt them the more cause have Ministers and all Christians to set a double watch upon their Love Lest before they are aware a flaming and consuming zeal do tell others that they know not what manner of Spirit they are of Luk. 9. 55. 9. Yea it is not only a time of great Temptation to this sin but of common guilt They are multitudes that are overtaken already with this sin Is not the Land in a continual heart war Are there not parties against parties and cause against cause and heart-risings and passions and censurings of Dissenters to say no worse And is it not time to bring water when we see the flames 10. And I perceive few know so heinous a sin to be any sin at all But all factions and parties are still justifying their Love-killing wayes and reproaching those whom they have wronged As if when they have sinfully withdrawn their Love from them it were no crime to take away next their good names and all that they have but power to take away And when they have cast their brethren out of their estimation and affection they think it a piece of commendable zeal or justice to cast them ouâ— of Christian communion and if they could out of the Land and of the world And shall Ministers stand by and see men take such sin for duty and serve God by abusing his Servants and look for a reward for dividing and pulling down his Church and never tell them what they are doing 11. And the old Non-conformists who wrote so much against separation were neither blind nor temporizers They saw the danger on that side Even Brightman on Rev. that writeth against the Prelacy and Ceremonies severely reprehendeth the separatists Read but the writings of Mr. Iohn Paget Mr. Iohn Ball Mr. Hildersham Mr. Bradshaw Mr. Baine Mr. Rathband and many such others against the separatists of those times and you may learn that our Light is not greater but less than theirs and that we see not further into that cause than they did and that change of times doth not change the truth nor will warrant us to change our Religion unless we will make our Religion subject to the wills and interests of men and change it as oft as the times shall change 12. Lastly if your friends tell you not of your faults and errours in Love those whom you account your enemies will do it in wrath And though all sober Christians should learn by the keenest rebukes of their Adversaries yet passion and prejudice maketh it so difficult that it usually hardeneth men more in their sin And this is another thing which causeth me the more to abhor division and to long for the reconciling of the minds of all dissenting Christians Because while they take each other for adversaries nothing that is written or said by any is like to do the Adversaries any good Nay I must confess when I see an adversary tell men of their sin especially with furious spleen and wrath mixing together words and swords I am greatly afraid lest by that temptation Satan will draw the reproved to impenitency and greatly harden them in their sin and make them glory in that as a virtue which such a person doth so reprove But if you will neither hear of your sin nor duty by adversaries nor friends by fair speeches nor by foul you fasten the guilt upon your selves Remember I pray you that I am not kindling fires nor drawing Swords against you nor stirring up any to do you hurt but only perswading all dissenters to love one another and to forbear but all that is contrary to love And if such an exhortation and advice seem injurious or intollerable to you the Lord have mercy on your Souls III. And now without a spirit of Prophecy I will foretel what entertainment this Paper must expect 1. Some on the one side will say It is sharper and rounder dealing than all this that must cure the Schismes in the Church And if you would heal our Divisions why do you not conform you self but stand out as one of the party that divideth 2. Some on the other side will say that it is an unseasonable time when so much anger is breaking forth against those that we account Dividers to mention their faults and so to stir up more I will give these men no other answer than to bid them read the last part of this Book or else do not talk till they know of what 3. And some will say that I am doing that which will prove a hurt to my self and others For if I should draw the People to Communion with the Conformists there would little compassion be shewed to the Ministers that cannot conform But selfish wisdome must be shut out of the Council when we are consulting about the healing of the Churches and the good of Souls And indeed there is little danger of this consequence as long as the people are far more averse to Communion or Concord with the Parish-Churches than the Non-conforming Ministers are But suppose it prove true should we not do good to Souls and save men from sin and heal divisions at the dearest rate What though it cost us more than is here mentioned The reviving of decayed Love and the closure of any of the Churches wounds is a recompence worth our liberties and lives 4. And those that are most guilty of the Love-killing principles here detected and are most eminent in self-conceited ignorance will do by me and by
as a profession of Christianity And as to the Act it must be first A signification of the mind by word or writing or some intelligible sign Secondly it must seem to be understood For no man consenteth to that which he understandeth not But herein any intelligible sign of a tollerable understanding must be accepted though we find that the persons conceptions are raw and not so distinct and clear as they ought nor the expressions ready orderly or compt Thirdly it must seem to be serious For that which is apparently dissembled or Iudicrous is null Fourthly It must be de presenti a present giving up our selves to Christ and not only a promise de futuro that we will hereafter take him for our Saviour and Lord and not at present Fifthly it must seem to be voluntary and not constrained for then it is not serious Sixthly it must seem to be deliberate and resolute and setled and not only the effect of a mutable passion This goeth to make it a real Profession in the common sense of all mankind Obj. But how few among us do so much as seem be understanding serious and resolved in covenanting with Christ Answ. In the Degree of these we all fall short of that which is our duty But if you accuse any of the want of so much as is necessary to an acceptable Profession First you must be sure that you speak not by uncharitable surmise and hear-say but upon certain proof or knowledge Secondly and that therefore you speak it not at a venture of whole Parishes or families but only of those persons by name whom you know to be guilty Thirdly and that you remember that it is the Pastors office to judge and that you expect not that every one must give an account of their knowledge to you And if there be a mis-judging it is the fault of the Pastor and not yours of which more anon Fourthly that persons Baptized are already admitted into the Church and therefore if they make profession of Christianity they must not be put to bring any other proof of their title but it lies on you to disprove it if you will have it questioned And to reject them from communion without a proved accusation is Tyranny and Lording it over the Church of God These are Gods terms of Church-communion And if you will needs have stricter you must have none of his making but your own Obj. But all visible Christians and Churches are visible Saints and Regenerate and so are not ours Answ. To be a Visible Saint is to profess to be a Saint And whosoever doth profess the Baptismal Covenant professeth to be a Saint Conversion Regeneration Faith and Repentance are all contained into taking God the Father Son and Holy Ghost for our Father Saviour and Sanctifier Obj. But you may teach a Parrot to speak those words Answ. It s true And perhaps to speak any words which you use your selves But if you will thence conclude that words must not be taken as a Profession you grosly err or abusively wrangle or if you infer thence that your neighbour understandeth himself no more than a Parrot doth you must prove what you say to the Pastor of the Church For God hath not allowed him to excommunicate baptized persons because you say that they are ignorant And if they are willing to learn it is fitter to teach them than to excommunicate them And here I must lament it that I have met with many censorious Professors who would not communicate with the Parish Churches because the people are ignorant who when I have examined themselves have proved ignorant of the very substance of Christianity so that I have been much in doubt whether I ought to admit them to the Lords Table or not They knew not whether Christ was Eternal or whether he was God when he was on earth or whether he be Man now he is in heaven nor what Faith is or what Iustification or Sanctification is nor what the Covenant of grace is nor what Baptism or the Lords Super are nor could prove the Scripture to be the word of God or prove mans soul to be immortal but gave false or impertinent answers about all these And yet could not joyn with the ignorant Churches And next I desire you here to observe the different Priviledges as well as the different Conditions of Visible and Invisible Churchmembership The members of the Church mystical or Regenerate have the pardon of all sin and acceptance with God and communion with him and with his Church in the spirit and are the adopted children of God and heirs of everlasting life and shall live in heaven with Christ for ever The meer Visible Members of the Church that are not regenerate by the spirit as well as sacramentally by water have only an outward Communion with the Saints and have only the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament and only a name to live when they are dead And are these such great matters that we should envy them to poor sinners that must have no more Have we the Kernel and do we envy them the Shell Have we the Spirit and do we envy them the flesh or outward signes alone Yea consider farther that it is more for the sake of the truly faithful than for their own that all Hypocrites have their station and priviledges in the Church God maketh use of their Gifts and Profession for his elect to many great services of the Church And is it not then a foolish ingratitude in us to murmur at their presence Understand well the conditions and Reasons of this visible state of membership and how far it is below the state of the Regenerate and it will turn your separating murmuring into a thankful acknowledgment of the wisdom of God DIRECT VII Get right and deep aprehensions of the Necessity and Reasons of Christian Unity and Concord and of the sin and misery of Divisions and Discord WHen we have but slight apprehensions of a duty we easily neglect it and scarce reprove our selves for it or repent of our omission And when we have but slight apprehensions of the evil of any sin a little temptation draweth us to it we are hardly brought to through-repentance for it And there is in many Christians a strange inequality and partiality in their apprehensions of good and evil Some duties they dare not omit and they judge all ungodly who omit them when some others as great are past by as if they were no part of religion And some sins they fear with very great tenderness when we can scarce make their consciences take any notice of others as great And usually they let out all their zeal on one sâ—de only while they over-look the other The Papist seemeth so sensible of the good of Unity and the evil of Divisions that he thinketh usurpation of an Universal Church-Monarchy and Tyranny and horrid bloud-shed to be not only lawful but necessary for the prevention and the cure
But to make him as sensible of the wickedness of these unlawful means and of the good of a serious spiritual Religiousness and of Christian Love and tenderness and forbearance here is the great difficulty And on the other side many are very sensible of the need of spirituality and seriousness in Religion and of the evil of hypocritical formality and imagery and of usurpation of the prerogatives of Christ and of the plague of persecuting Pride and cruelty who yet have little sense at all of the good of Unity and of the mischiefs of divisions in the Church Yea many are so careful to be found exact in their obedience to God that they build very much for duties and against sins upon dark and very far-fetcht consequences and upon a few obscure and doubtful passages in Scripture when there is no express words or clear text at all to bear them out And doubtless the darkest intimations of the will of God must not be disregarded But on the other side we cannot bring them to lay to heart some duties and sins which are over and over an hundred times and that with vehemency exprest and urged in the plainest words And because all Christians pretend to sâ—bmit to the word of God I will try whether it be not thus with you in the present case and will cite many plain expressions of Scripture for Christian Vnity and Concord that you may either better perceive you duty or plainly shew your great partiality Zech. 14. 9. In that day there shall be One Lord and his name One. Ezek. 34. 23. And I will set up One Shepherd over them Ezek. 37. 22. I will make thâ—m One Nation and One King shall be King to them all and they shall be no more two Nations nor divided into two Kingdomes any more 24. And David my servant shall be King over them and they shall have One shepherd Jer. 32. 39. I will give them one heart and one way So Ezek. 11. 19. Joh. 21 22. That they all may be One as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be One in us that the world may believe that thou hast sent me And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be one even as we are one I in them and Thou in me that they may be made perfect in one and that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as thou hast loved me Joh. 11. 52. That he should gather together in One the children of God that are scattered abroad Act. 1. 14. These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication And chap. 2. 1. They were all with one accord in one place Act. 4. 24 32. They lift up their voice to God with one accord and said Lord thou art God And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul. Act. 5. 12. They were all with one accord in Solomons Porch Act. 15. 25. It seemed good to us being assembled with one accord 2 Cor. 11. 2. I have espoused you to one husband Eph. 4. 1 c. I the prisoner of the Lord beseech you that ye walk worthy of your vocation wherewith ye are called with all lowliness and meekness with long-suffering forbearing one another in love endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace There is One body and One Spirit Even as ye are called in One hope of your calling One Lord One Faith One Baptism One God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in you all v. 12 13. For the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ. Till we all come in the Unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect Man that we henceforth be no more childrâ—n tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunâ—ing craftiness whereby they lye in wait to deceive But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things who is the Head Christ From whom the whole body fitly joyned together and compacted by that which every joynt supplyeth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part maketh increase of the body to the edifying of it self in love 1 Cor. 12. 3 12 13. No man can say that Iesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost As the Body is One and hath many Members and all the members of that One body being many are One â—ody so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we are all baptized into One body v. 22 23. Nay much more those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary And those members of the body which we think to be less honourable upon these we bestow more abundant honour and our uncâ—mely parts have more abundant comeliness For our comely parts have no need but God hath tempered the body together hâ—ving given more abundant honour to that part that lâ—â—ked that there should be no Schisme in the body 〈◊〉 that the members should have the same care one for another And whether one member suffer all suffer with it and if one be honoured all rejoyce v. 15. If the foot say Because I am not the hand I am not of the bâ—dy is it therefore not of the body By all this you may see that even the lowest dishonoured 〈◊〉 an◠〈◊〉 memâ—ers must not be denied to be of the Church or body of Christ. 1 Cor. 13. 4 5. Charity suffereth long is not easily provoked thinketh no evil The greatest is charity v. 13. 1 Cor. 1. 10. Now I beseech you brethren by the name of our Lord Iesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgement v. 12 13. Every one saith I am of Paul and I of Apollo Is Christ divided was Paul crucified for you or were ye baptized into the name of Paul Ch. 3. 15. If any mans work be burnt he shall sâ—ffer loss yet he himself shall be saved yet so as by fire Ch. 3. 3 4. For yâ— are yet carnal For whereas there is among you envying and strife and divisions are ye not carnal and walk as men while one saith I am of Paul c. Rom. 14. 1. Him that is weak in the faith receive but not to doubtful disputations v. 3. Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not and let not him which eateth not judge him which eateth for God hath received him who art thâ—u that judgest another mans servant to his own Master he standeth or falleth One man esteemeth one day above another Another esteemeth every day alike Let every man be fully perswaded in his own mind He that regardeth a day regardeth it to the Lord v. â—0 But why dost
furtherance of the right and successful use of gifts For ordinarily he that speaketh from the heart speaketh to the heart when an unexperienced hypocrite speaketh without life But sometimes a dulness and want of utterance in the sincere and a natural and affected servency in the hypocrite with a voluble tongue do obscure this difference and make the hypocrite the more profitable to the Church DIRECT XVIII Understand well the necessity of your Communion with all the Universal Church and wherein it consisteth and how far to be preferred before your Communion with any particular Church WIth the Vniversal Church mystical you must have communion by the same spirit the same regeneration the same Faith and Love and the same Laws of God and obedience thereto With the Universal Church visible you must have communion in the same Profession of faith and repentance and the same baptism and the same sort of ministry and publike worship so far as they are universally determined of by Christ. And though you are absent in body you must be as present in spirit by consent with all the Churches of Christ on earth You must have spiritual communion with the whole spiritual Church and visible communion in kind in the same Rule of faith and kind of workship with all the visible Church and Lâ—cal-presential communion with that particular Church where you are present and with any other where your presence afterwards may be needful unless they hinder you by unlawful terms So that it is not the same kind nor measure of Communion which you are obliged to hold with all But you must have Communion with all men as a man and with neighbours as a neighbour and with relations according to the relations civil or domestical and with all true Christians as a true Christian and with all professed Christians as a professed Christian and with the particular Church of which you are a part as a part of that Church And with your bosome Friends and intimate Companions as a Friend and Companion And yet in all this you must communicate with no Church or person in their sin it self and yet not refuse their Communion in good though mixt with sin You must own all the prayers of all the Churches in the world so far as they are good and joyn in spirit by consent as if you concurred with them in presence and made all their prayers to be your own As you do by the prayers of the Church where you are present If there be disorders or imperfections or sinful blemishes in their prayers you must disown all those faults but not therefore disown any part of all their prayers which are good but desire to have a part in them and desire the pardon of their failings And here you may perceive what a mischief pievish separation is on both sides It hindereth you from prâ—ying aright for others as the members should do for all the body And it hindereth you from partaking in the benefit of the prayers of most of the Church of God on earth Indeed God may hear those prayers for you which you your selves disown But whether this may be expected according to the ordinary course of his dealing is much to be doubted seeing he hath made every mans will or choice the ordinary condition of his participation of such benefits it is hard to conceive that he that abhorreth the prayers of other men or taketh them for such as God abhorreth or will not accept and in his mind disowneth all participation and communion in them should yet have a part against his will But of this more anon As your Baptism maketh you Members of the Universal Church in order of nature before you are members of a particular Church so your relation to the Universal Church is more noble more necessary and more durable than your relation to any particular Church It is more noble because the Society is more noble The whole is more excellent than a little part It is more necssary because you cannot be saved and be Christians without being members of the Universal Church But you may be Christians and be saved without being a member of any stated particular Church It is more durable because you can never separate from the Univeâ—sal Church or cease to be a member of it without being separated from Christ But divers occasions may warrant your removeall from a particular Church Live not therefore in those narrow and dangerous principles as if your Congregation or your party were all the Church of Christ or as if you had no Christian relation to any other Ministers or People nor owed any duty to them as Members of the same Body But remember that all Christians Persons and Congregations are but the Members of the Kingdom of Christ. DIRECT XIX Take heed of engaging your selves too far in any divided Sect or of espousing the interest of any party of Christians to the neglect or injury of the common interest of the Universal Church or cause of Christianity I Doubt not but among several ranks of Christians the soundest and most upright are to be best esteemed and caeteris paribus their Communion to be preferred before theirs that are more unsound and scandalous But it s one thing to prefer the eye or hand before the foot a noble member before a more ignoble and another thing to own a Sect as such or a party as they either divide from others or take up a dividing opposite interest You are sure that the Universal Church of Christ can never erre against the essentials of Christianity nor against any truth or duty necessary to their salvation For then the Church were no Church and then Christ were not its Head And then the body of Christ might perish And then Christ were not the Saviour of his body But you cannot say of any one part that you are sure that part shall never fall away and perish There may fall out a necessity which may warrant the Body to cut off a hand or leg to save the rest But no corporal necessity can warrant you to destroy the whole nor any one member to forsake the Body before it is forcibly cut off He that seeth not how the espousing of parties and divided interests doth corrupt most Christians in the world and lacerate and deface the Church of Christ doth not understand or not observe the condition of mankind It is somewhat rare to meet with any serious Christians who are not so deeply engaged into some Sect or Side or party as to darken their judgements and pervert their affections as to all the rest and to corrupt their converse in the world How blindly do such look on all that is good in those that differ from them How partially do they judge of the judgements and practises of others How small a thing will serve the turn to excuse the faults of any of their party And how small and common a good seemeth excellent in them And how perversly do they
fetch true grounded satisfaction from the Scriptures and from the solid truth in the use of Gods appointed means they hearken to any one that will promise them comfort and salvation by what means soever Like ignorant people is their sickness some of them know not an able Physician and some of them will not be at the cost and some of them will not take such unpleasing Medicines and most of them have not patience to stay for a Cure unless the Medicine at twice or thrice taking do give them ease they will not believe that it will do them any good And so in their foolish ignorance and the weariness of their pain they will go to any ignorant woman or unskilful fellow who will take cheapest of them and be boldest in his undertakings And those that die by it are out of sight and forgotten by the living And those that by the strength of nature do recover do magnifie their ignorant Physician as if there were none such and so entice others to their Graves Thus many troubled unquiet souls either notâ—ound â—ound Doctrine and Teachers from deceit or else will not be at the pains or patience to wait on God in the use of the right means or most commonly spoil the Remedy offered them by their own misapplications and then for ease they hearken to any ignorant Sectary that will fiercely cry out against â—ound Teachers and revile all that are wiser than himself as if he knew more than all the Ministers in the Country O saith the deceiving Papist you will never have setled comfort while you follow these Ministers and till you come to us who are the true Church Saith the Anabaptist you will never be well setled while you follow these Preachers They have not the Spirit but speak only by the book Come to us and be baptized and you will have peace And thus saith the Quaker the Familist and other Sects I have known some that have lived long in doubts and fears of damnation who have turned Anabaptists and suddenly had comfort And yet in a short time they forsook that Sect and turned to another I have known those also that have lived many years in timerous complaints and fears of Hell and they have turned to the Antinomians and suddenly been comforted And others have turned Arminians which is clean contrary and been comforted And others have but heard of the Doctrine of perfection in this life and suddenly been past their fears as if hearing of perfection had made them perfect And from thence they have turned Familists and at last shew'd their perfection by fornication and licentiousness and meer Apostasie who yet liv'd very conscionably and blamelesly as long as they lived in their fears and troubles The reason of all this is plain to any judicious Observer 1. The persons are ignorant and never had the right knowledge and skilful improvement of the sound doctrine which at first they seemed to embrace And 2. the power of conceit and fancy brought them comfort or quietness in their change For they thought before that if they had not somewhat extraordinary they could have no assurance of salvation And while they held that sound Doctrine which all about them held as well as they and found no extraordinary power of it on their hearts they perceived no difference between themselves and others But when they had entertained new opinions and entered into a new Sect which confidently told them that they only were in the right they had then something extraordinary to trust their souls on And the novelty of the matter and greatness of the change with the conceited excellency of the opinions and party did make them think that they were now grown very acceptable to God To this may be added that as a life of holiness hath far more opposition from the Devil the world and the flesh than the changing of an opinion or joyning with a party hath so it must be harder to get and keep that comfort which is got and kept by faith and holiness than that which is got by such an easie change We see among us what abundance of persons can live like beasts in most odious whoredomes drunkenness and rage or like devils in bloody cruelty against the good and yet be comforted because they are of the Church of Rome which they think is the true Church As if God saved men for being of such a side or party And why may not Separatists Anabaptists and others easily take such kind of comfort O therefore labour for well-grounded faith and solid knowledge that you may attain the true Evangelical comforts and your ignorance may not prepare you for deceit and you may not be like children toss'd to and fro and carried up and down with every wind of doctrine by deceived and deceitful men Nor may not have need to go to the devil to be your comforter nor to steal a little unlawful peace from parties and opinions as if there were not enough to be had in Christ and holiness and eternal life DIRECT XXX Keep in the rank of a humble Disciple or learner in the Church of Christ till you are fit and called to be your self a Teacher CHrist owneth no Disciples which are not in one of these two ranks either Teachers by office upon a lawful call or Learners who submit to be taught by others When his Ministers have made men his Disciples they must afterward Teach them to observe all things whatsoever he hath commanded them Matth. 28. 19 20. And a Learner must hear and read and discourse in a learning way by humble asking the resolution of his doubts acknowledging the weakness of his own understanding and the superiority of his Teachers This is the common ruine of raw professours that they presently grow proud of a poor ignorant head as if it were full of knowledge and spirituality and while they continue Hearers they continue not Disciples or Learners but come with a proud and carping humour to quarrel with their Teachers as poor ignorant men in comparison of them And therefore choose them a heap of Teachers according to their own opinions And all this while they have such list to be some body and to vent their seeming wisdome that they can hardly stay from being Teachers themselves till they have any thing like a lawful call Whereas if they would have kept in the rank of humble Learners till they had grown wiser they might have preserved the Churches peace and their own DIRECT XXXI Grow up in the great substantial practical truths and duties and grow downwards in the roots of a clearer belief of the word of God and the life to come And neither begin too soon with doubtful opinions nor ever lay too much upon them HE that taketh this course will have all these advantages First He will be himself a solid Christian and will make sure of the man which is his own salvation Secondly He will have so fast hold of the necessary
I think I should have done it And who can prove that this had been his sin And yet this was a using of another mans gifts instead of his own And I have heard men that are much against Parish Churches and Liturgies wish that some unlearned men of good utterance might read some excellent Sermonâ—books to the people in ignorant places that can get no better And who can prove the reading of a Homily unlawful Moreover Christ hath given to all his members such gifts as are suitable to their places as well as to Ministers such gifts as are suitable to theirs And the place of a Master of a family requireth the gift of Catechising and instructing the family And they are as truly obliged to use their gifts as Ministers are theirs And yet who doubteth but it is lawful for Parents to teach and catechize their children by such books and forms of Catechisms as are composed by the gifts of abler men Moreover Prayer is the duty of every one and specially of the heads of families And therefore every true Christian hath gifts procured by Christ for so much as is his duty And he is bound to use his gifts And yet those gifts are so low in many that I fear not to call that man effectively an enemy to families souls and prayer who forbiddeth all such to use such forms of prayer as are composed by the gifts of others The famousest Divines in the Church of God even Luther Zwinglius Melancthon Calvin Perkins Sibbs and abundance of Nonconformists of greatest name in England did ordinarily use a form of prayer of their own before their Sermons in the Pulpit and some of them in their families too Now these men did it not through idleness or through temporizing but because some of them found it best for the people to have oft the same words and some of them found such a weakness of memory that they judged it the best improvement of their own gifts Now besides the first composure of these prayers which perhaps was done 20 years before none of these men did use their own gifts any moâ—e than if they had used a form composed by another For the memory utterance is the same of both These all were famous worthy men whom no wise man judgeth to be insufficient for the Ministry for want of gifts But if such as these may so many years forbear the exercise of their gift of extemporary prayer much more may far weaker Ministers do it Abundance of young Ministers are trained up under aged experienced Divines what if one of these should sometimes make use of the same words of prayer which the aged Minister used the day before as finding them fitter than any that he could devise himself Must he forbear to do better because he cannot do so well by the use of his own gifts alone And in some Ordinances as Baptism and the Lords supper c. the same things must be daily prayed for And he that thinketh he must not frequently speak the same things will quite corrupt the Ordinance of Christ. And he that will imâ—gine that he must have always new words will at last have new things or worse than nothing If then it be meet to use often the same words why may not a weak Minister use the better words of others when he hath none meerly of his own that are so fit Nay is it not the Duty of such to do it Every man is bound to do Gods service in the best manner that he can Cursed be the deceiver that hath a better in his flock and bringeth that which is corrupt But to utter prayers and praise to God in a full methodicall and congruous manner and in words suitable to the Majesty of the worship of God is better to the people and to the honour of Religion then to do it in a more confused disorderâ—y broken manner with barrenness and incongruity of speech But this lâ—st is the best that many honest Ministers can do by their own giâ—ts when they may do it in the former better manner by making use of the words and gifts of otherâ— Therefore it is a duty for such men so far to use others gifâ—s of inventing words before their own And among us there is no man forbidden in the Pulptt to use his own gifts to the utmost and pray without any set form of his own or other mens And I would at last desire any of the Objectors but to name that text of Scripture which directly or indirectly commandeth every Minister to use his gift of inventing words and method or his gift of extemporary prayer every time that he prayeth to God Or which forbiddeth to use the gifts of others though better than his own Obj. But what if the forms imposed be worse than the exercise of our own gifts Answ. First That may be below one mans own invention which is above-anothers Secondly And that may be more defective than your own invention could reach to which yet may be more desirable for other advantages As if all the Churches for some good ends should agree to to use one mode or method or form as now we do in singing Psalms the benefit of that concord might do more to the Churches service than my singular better form or words could do And if the lawful Rulers commanded me that which perhaps I could somewhat exceed my self I should do much in obedience to their command Or if the people had a greater averseness or unfitness for my more congruous words than for others more fective I should take that for the best food or physick which is most agreeable to the stomack and disease But especially if I am restrained from the publick preaching of the Gospel or exercise of any of my Ministry unless I will use a more disordered or defective form I shall take it for my duty then to use it Because it is more to the Churches edification In a word God hath bound all his Ministers to use all their gifts to the Churches greatest edification But to use a more defective form with liberty to use my best gifts also and to exercise my Ministry publickly to all is more to the Churches edification than to use my own gifts only a few days in a corner and then to lie in prison and use them no more Though no man must of choise prefer the less congruous before the more congruous when he is free which I confess is a sin yet it is a duty to prefer a less congruous order before none or before a better for a day with a restraint of that and all our Ministery hereafter For my part I have often truly professed that I look at many Liturgies which I have read as I do at the prayers of some honest men who use little method nor very meet words and often toss Gods name through weakness who put that last which should be first that first which should be last but yet the
their wit or learning or if they can take an advantage by it against better men who erre in that one point It is no wonder in all these Cases if the worser sort of men defend the truth For instance If any Sect should rise in England who should deny Christ or the Scripture or the Resurrection or the Life to come or the Lords day for all that they cannot keep it holy yet the worser sort of the people would all rise up against such errours Shall we therefore think that the people are in the wrong So if any better persons deny Infant Baptisme or the use of the Lords Prayer c. the worser sort of people would be all against them and yet be in the right And yet how many do take a form of prayer or Liturgy to be unlawful meerly because the most of the worser sort are for it As a Pharisee can gratifie his hypocrisie by long Prayers which yet are good in themselves so can an ungodly person gratifie his hypocrisie and sloth by Forms and Liturgies which yet doth not prove them to be unlawful DIRECT XLIV Ye take the bad example of religious men to be one of your most peâ—ilous temptations And therefore labour to discover especially what are the sins of Professours in the age that you live in that you may especially watch and sortifie your souls against them SOmetimes the strictest sort run in a gang after one opinion and sometimes after another sometimes to overvalue free will with the Pelagians sometimes to abuse the name and notion of free grace sometimes they are drawn with Peter to lay about them with a private unwarranted Sworâ— or by Politicians tempted into unlawful tumults sometimes they run together into unlawful Compliances and Conformities to escape some censure or danger to the flesh And most commonly they are hurried by Passion to follow some erroneous Leader into Schisme and Divisions which are contrary to Unity Love and Peace Study well what is the common errour of the religious party in the times and places where you live that you may take a special care to escape them For some such or others it is too probable they have Like not their fault for their Religions sake But specially take heed lest the Devil draw you to dislike their Religion for their faults Joyn with them heartily in the one but not in the other DIRECT XLV Desire the highest degree of Holiness and to be free from the corruptions of the times But affect not to be odd and singular from ordinary Christians in lawful things AN affectation of singularity in indifferent things doth either come from such ignonorance as those were guilty of in Rom. 14. or most commonly from Pride though you perceive it not your selves If it be to go in a meaner garb than others and as the Quakers not to put off the hat or with the Fryars to go bâ—refoot or in a distinguishing habit that all men may see and say This is a singular person in Religion it is easie to see how this gratifieth pride Humility desireth not to be specially taken notice of And therefore in all things lawful to do as others do doth gratifie humility very much It 's strange to observe how much stress some persons lay upon their singular habits gestures expressions and actions when they have once taken them up and how sharp they are against all that are contrary For as the Masters of every Sect of Monks among the Papists had their several Rules of singularity in things indifferent and yet presently desired to get disciples to take their names and follow their rules so is it with most that begin in singularity They would have all follow them that it might grow common DIRECT XLVI When you have to do only with stigmatized scandalous ones to vindicate the honour of of Christianity from their scandal go as far from them as lawfully you can But with the common sort of sinners whose conversion you are bound to seek go not as far from them as you can but purposely study to come as near them as lawfully you may that you may have the better advautage to win them to the truth WHen it is our work to avoid persons that they may be ashamed or that we may shew our detestation of their wickedness then going from them is our duty and we must do it To the excommunicate in-publick and to the notoriously wicked and impenitent after admonition in our private way of life But with most men our duty is to labour their conversion and in hope to seek the saving of their souls till they prove as dogs and swine to their exhorters It is a common question whether we should go as far as we may from wicked-men or come as 〈◊〉 them as we may And it is very great ignorance to say either the one of the other without distinguishing of wicked men Seeing our duty lyeth the clean contrary way towards one sort of them and towards another And there is much difference also to be made of the matter in which our joyning with them or going from them doth consist For there are some things which though they are no sin yet are so like sin that our doing them is most like to be a snare and to hinder mens repentance and not to further it And in this we must not come too near them But there are other things in which our going too far from them is like to hinder their repentance The injudicious zeal of many young Christians doth often carry them into this extream Any fashion of apparel which the common people use they will avoid as far as modesty will permit them And any lawfull recreation which they use they will fly the further from because they use it And they think it a scandal to shoot or bowl or use any such game which bad men use And any form or manner of speech which is lawful in it self they think they must avoid because such use it But especially any way of worshipping God or any controvertible opinion in Religion which is owned by bad men they flye as far from as they can By which means all this evil is committed First Their own faith and practise is corrupted For many an errour is taken up by going too far from other mens faults Many a one turneth Pelagian by flying indiscreetly from Antinomianism And many a one turneth Antinomian by avoiding Pelagianism Many a one turneth Papist to shew his detestation of multitudes of sects And many a one turneth to the giddiest sects to avoid the things which are held and practised by the Papists and are so zealous in avoiding the Papists ceremonies and forms and holidays too far that at last they renounce their Ordination and their Baptism and some at last deny the Scriptures the Creed and the Christ which the Papists own Many a one turneth Separatist and Anabaptist and Quaker to get far enough from Bishops and Liturgies And many a one
found 3. You would shew a humble sense of your own frailty who dare not proudly contemn your brethren 4. You would shew more love to God himself when you love all of God whensoever you discern it and cannot abide to hear his gifts and mercies undervalued 5. You would increase the grace of love to others in your selves by the daily exercise of it when backbiting and detraction will increase the malignity from which they spring 6. You would increase Love also in the hearers which is the fulfilling of the Law when detraction will breed or increase malice 7. You will do much to the winning and conversion of them whom you commend if they be unconverted For when they are told that you speak lovingly of them behind their backs it will much reconcile them to your persons and consequently prepare them to hearken to the counsel which they need But when they are told that you did backbite them it will fill them with hatred of you and violent prejudice against your counsel and profession Yet mistake me not It is none of my meaning all this while that you should speak any falsehood in commendation of others nor make people believe that a careless carnal sort of persons are as good as those that are careful of their souls or that their way is sufficient for salvation Nor to commend ungodly men in such a manner as tendeth to keep either them or their hearers from repentance Nor to call evil good or put darkness for light nor honour the works of the devil But to shew Love and impartiality to all and to be much more in speaking of all the good which is in them than of the evil Especially if they be your enemies or differ from you in opinions of Religion Tit. 3. 1. Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers to obey Magistrates to be ready to every good work to speak evil of no man to be no brawlers but gentle shewing all meekness to all men For we our selves were sometime foolish c. Grace is clean contrary to this detracting vice DIRECT L Study the Duty of instructing and exhorting more than Reproof and finding fault I Deny not but that it is duty to tell a brother of his fault and to reprove and that with plainness too Math. 18. 15. Lev. 19. 17. And it is but few that do this rightly of many that will backbite and censure But yet I have long observed that many Christians are enquiring How they must manage the duty of Reproof who ne-never enquire how to perform the duty of Christian exhortation or instructing of the ignorant When as this later is much more usually a duty than the former And you are bound to exhort a multitude whom you are not bound to reprove And exhortation to good is a duty which the hearer is usually less offended at It doth not so much gall and exasperate his mind It shameth him not so much and yet is the greater part of our duty to him as the positives of Religion are before the negatives Exhortation rightly used is the plain direct expression of Love and an earnest desire of anothers good When Reproof doth savour of a mixture of Love and displeasure and the wrath doth often cloud the love And I must say that I find many surly proud Professors much proner to Reproof than to Exhortation Their pride and self-conceitedness makes them too forward to reprove their Governours and the ignorant people are ready enough to reprove their Teachers and the servant to reprove the Master or the Mistris but not to be reproved by them Ministers must be wise and cautelous how they set such people on reproving and finding fault with others when their own pride and passion and fond self-opinion is ready to put them on too far DIRECT LI. The more you suffer by your Rulers or any men the more be watchful lest your sufferings tempt you to dishonour them And the more you are wronged by your equals the more be afraid lest you should be tempted to withdraw the Love which is their due THe Honouring of our superiours is a Moral or Natural duty of the fifth Commandement which sufferings will not excuse us from And so is the Love of all men even of our enemies And selfishness and Passion are things so powerful that it is wonderful hard to escape their deceit They will blind the mind and change the judgement and corrupt the affections before you are aware or believe that you are at all perverted Every man must watch most where his temptation is strongest Do you not think that you have a far stronger temptation to dishonour a persecuting Magistrate than a good one And to hate an enemy than a friend Therefore arm your selves and one another against this snare And when others are aggravating the fault and injury do you in company remember each other in what danger you are now of losing your innocency and of doing your selves more hurt by that than any powers or enemies can do you It is an easie thing to Love one that loveth you and to honour a Magistrate that doth good to you and all But as the Apostle saith of servants 1 Pet. 2. 18 19 20. Be subject Not only to the good and gentle but also to the froward For this is thank-worthy if a man for conscience toward God endure grief suffering wrongfully For what glory is it if when ye be buffeted for your faults you take it patiently But if when ye do well and suffer for it ye take it patiently this is acceptable with God DIRECT LII Make conscience of heart-revenge and tongue-revenge as well as of hand-revenge IT is so notorious that Revenge is a usurpation of Gods prerogative a heinour sin that Professors could not so frequently easily commit it if they did not first deceive themselves and take that to be no revenge which is To do any open hurt to another they take notice of as sinful revenge But is there no secret wish in your heart that some evil may befal another Nor no secret gladness that some evil hath befaln him You will say It is not in revenge but in hope he may repent But take heed what is in your heart It s one thing to Repent of his injury to you as such and to make you amends and repair your honour And it s another thing to repent of it as a sin against God to the saving of his own soul. Is it not the former that you more desire than the later And are not your Tongues employed too often in revenge What are all your secret reflections and endeavours to dishonour those that have wronged you but revengeful speeches Railing and backbiting and nibling at anothers honour and good name may be acts of revenge as truly as the actions of the hand DIRECT LIII When you are exasperated at the hurt which you feel from Magistrates remember the good which the Church receiveth by them
oppression be made mad nor driven from your innocency DIRECT LV. When you complain of violence and persecution in others take heed lest you shew the same inward sin by Church-persecution and cruelty against them or any others BUt because I know that guilt causeth impatience and passion disposeth men to mistakes and false reports before I proceed I must here foretell you 1. That I mean not by Separatists all that are so called by interessed injudicious persons But those 1. that account true Churches of Christ to be no Churches 2. or that account it unlawful to hold Communion with those Churches whose communion is not unlawful because they are faulty or because they differ from them in some opinions or circumstances of worship 3. especially if they practise and perswade others to practise according to these two opinions of which the first is the higher sort of separation and the second the lover And secondly That by Church-dividers I mean both these and all such whose principles and practises are against that love of a Christian as a Christian and that forbearance of dissenters which should be exercised to all the members of Christ and who fly from the ancient simplicity and primitive terms of Church-communion and adde as the Papists do their own little novelties as necessary things And those that do causlesly separate from their own lawfully called Pastors For ubi Episcopus ibi Ecclesia where the true Pastor is there the Church is what ever place it be that they assemble in as Cyprien once said And lastly those that are of uncharitable humerous peevish contentious and fiery spirits and will stir up mâ—tinies and â—idings and causeless diviâ—ions in any Church where they come And truly they that think of the present state of Hartford and some other Churcheses in New England which I will not here make a Narrative of me thinks should fear Separations Schismes or Divisions from oâ— in the Churches called Independent as much as those of a different Discipline do as to theirs if not somewhat more on several accounts Thirdly And remember that I am not here speaking of any mens former faults by way of uncharitable bitterness insulting or reproach but verily brethren if we are not impartially willing to know the truth of eveâ—y side and of our own selves as well as otheâ—s we choose deceit and resist the light and provoke God to forsake our understandings Do we not yet know where Iudgment hath begun after such plagues and flames and Church convulsions And do we not yet know where Repentance must begin Enquire for good news whence you will I vvill enquire whether we are awakened to a true Repentance and by that I will fetch my prognosticks of our fâ—ture state Not whether you cry out against other mens sins but against your own and that particularly with all their aggravations and whether Professoâ—rs of Religiousness do as heartily lament their own notorious publick scandals as they expect that drunkards and fornicators and the friends of loosness should lament theirs Till we see this what promise have we of the pardon of our dreadful temporal penalties to say nothing of the greater Woe to the Land and People that can multiply sin and cannot Repent And wo to them that pretend Repentance and love to be flattered in their sin and cannot endure to be admonished but take all the discoveries of their sin to be injurious reproach among the prophane we take this to be a deadly sign of impenitency And is it so bad in them and good in us It is part of my office to cry with holy Bradford REPENT O ENGLAND and to say after Christ Except ye Repent ye shall all Perish And can I call men to Repent when I must not dare to tell them of what Nor to mention the sin which is most to be repented of I use all this preface because I know that Guilt and Impenitency are touchy and tender and galled and querulous and such will bestow the time in backbiting their Monitor which they should bestow in lamenting their sin But shall I therefore forbear and betray their souls and betray the Land through cowardly silence Must I shew that I haâ—e Professours by not admonishing them Lev. 19. 17. when I must shew that I love the looser sort by my sharp reproofs Must I not fear them that can kill the body and must I fear to displease a professed Christian by calling him to Repentance in a time of Judgments Lord hide not my own miscarriages from my â—ight and suffer me not to take any sin that I have committed to have been my innocency or duty lest I should dare to father sin on God and lest I should live and die without Repentance and lest I should be one that continueth judgments and danger to the Land stir up some faithful friend to tell me with convincing evidence where it is that I have miscarried that Contrition may prepare me for the peace of remission O save me from the plague of an impenitent heart that cannot endure to be told of sin from that ungodly folly which taketh the shame that Repentance casteth upon sin to be cast upon God and Religion which bind us to Repentance and Confession Nay in this place I am not mentioning things past so much to humble you as necessarily to inform you of the groundlesness of your present arguings that you may see the truth Fourthly Note also that I lay not any miscarriages on any whole parties Anabaptists or others For I have found that all parties of Christians indeed have some good experienced sober charitable persons and some self-conceited and contentious novices 1 Tim. 3. 6. But I speak only of the persons that were guilty and no more Fifthly Lastly remember that while I seem to compare the faults of one sort of persons with anothers it is none of my intent to equal them much less to equal the state of the several sorts of Offenders as to the rest of their lives But only to mention so much of the similitude as is nenessary to represent things truly and impartially to your view Read on now with these Memento's in your eye And if after so plain a premonition you will venture to charge me with that which I disclaim do it at your own peril I stand or fall to the judgment of God and look for a better reward than the hypocrites which is to have the good opinion of men be they professours of piety or profane And with me by Gods grace it shall hereafter be accounted a small thing to the hindering of my fidelity to Christ and mens souls to be judged of men 1 Cor. 4. 3. And if there should be any Pastors of the Churches who instead of concurring to heal the flocks of these dividing principles shall rather joyn with backbiters and encourage them in their misreports and slanders because it tendeth to the supposed interest of their party or themselves Let them prepare to
old can do And if you extend the case to all other parts of the Ministery where the reason is the same they will say what reverence is due to such or why should we maintain and honour men for doing no more than our children can do And the Popish devise to make a disparity by keeping the people in ignorance is the basest and most pernicious plot of all When the Pastors instead of excelling the people would keep down the people from increasing in their knowledge and expression this is so notorious a discovery of envy pride and malignity conjunct that the people presently flye from such Pastors as supposing them to be ministers of the Devil because they see them bear his image What do we teach them for if we would not have them learn and profit What greater honour can a Teacher have than to make his Schollars as wise and able as himself Every one who is a child of Light and believeth in him who is the Light of the world will suspect that man to be a Minister of the Prince of darkness who is a malicious adverstry of Light This is that brand of the Roman iniquity the hindering men from the reading of the Scriptures and magnifying ignorance which maketh men so commonly think them to be the Ecclesia malignantium and the Antichristian brood Thus Cardinal Wolsey declaimed against the Art of Printing as that which would take down the honour and profit of the Priesthood by making the people as wise as they It is not by keeping them down or envying their abilities that we must keep our distance from the people but by rising higher our selves and excelling them in all ministerial gifts Else why should we be thought any fitter to be their Teachers and Guides than they to be ours Yea though we excel them in all these abilities it will not serve turn to the ends of our Ministery unless we also excel them in holiness and every Christian vertue The Devil knoweth more than Ministers And if he have a tongue to speak he wanteth not utterance He is the most excellent and honourable who is likest to God and hath most of his image And God hath more proposed himself to mans imitation in Goodness than in Greatness He hath not said Be Great for the Lord your God is Great but walk in the Light as he is in the Light 1 Iob. 1. 7. and Be holy for the Lord your God is holy 1 Pet. 1. 16. Lev. 20. 7. 19. 2. 21. 8. To be Great and Bad is to be able to do mischief To be Learned ingenious and Bad is to be wise to do evil and a crafty and subtle instrument of the devil Ier. 4. 22. It was no laudable description of Elymas Act. 13. 8 10. O full of subtlety and all mischiefs thou child of the devil and enemy of all righteousness wilt thou not cease to pervert the right wayes of the Lord Satan would never transform himself into an Angel of Light nor his ministers into the Ministers of Righteousness nor would Pharisees and hypocrites cover oppression by long prayers if Light Righteousness and long prayers were not laudable in themselves and necessary in the preachers of the word of God and had not a goodness in them capable of being a cloak to their iniquity 2 Cor. 11. 14 15. Mat. 23. 14. God is Light 1 Iob. 1. 5. And God is Holy If therefore Satan or any hypocrite would credit their falshood and wickedness they must pretend to Light and Holiness And he that will keep up the true honour of his Ministery and be accepted with God and reverenced by good men mâ—st do it by real Light and Holiness An ungodly Minister hath a radicated enmity to the holy doctrine which he preacheth and to the holy duties and life which he exhorteth the people to And how well how sincerely how readily how faithfully they are like to do the work which they are enemies to you may easily judge The carnal mind is enmity to God for it is not subject to his law nor indeed can be Rom. 8. 6 7 8. I knoâ— that they are not enemies to the honour nor to the maintenance and therefore may force themselves to do much of the outside of the work But where there is an inward enmity to the life and ends of it we can expect but a formal unwilling and unconstant discharge of such unpleasing duty Truth is for Goodness The Knowledge which maketh you not Good is lost and hath mist its end If therefore your Love to God and man your mortification and unblameableness of life your heavenly mindedness be no greater than the peoples or perhaps much less do not wonder if you lose your honour with them and if you grow contemptible in their eyes Mal. 1. 10. 14. I have no pleasure in you saith the Lord Cursed be the deceiver which hath in his flock a male and voweth and sacrificeth to the Lord a corrupt thing Mal. 2. And now O ye Priests this commandement is for you If ye will not hear and if ye will not lay it to heart to give glory to my name I will send a curse upon you The Law of truth was in Levi's mouth and iniquity was not found in his lips He walked with me in peace and equity and did turn away many from iniquity For the Priests lips should keep knowledge and they should seek the law at his mouth for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts But ye are departed out of the way ye have caused many to stumble at the Law ye have corrupted the Covenant of Levi saith the Lord of hosts Therefore also have I made you contemptible and base before all the people according as ye have not kept my wayes but have been partial in the Law 1 Sam. 2. 17. 24 30. The sin of the young men was very great before the Lord for men abhorred the offering of the Lord Ye make the Lords people to transgress Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and at my offering which I have commanded I said indeed that thy house should walk before me for ever But now the Lord saith Be it far from me for them that honour me I will honour and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed If as Moses you stand nearer to God than the people do you must be so much holier than they and your faces must shine with the beames of God in the peoples eyes They that with open face behold in Christ as in a glass the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory as by the spirit of the Lord. 2 Cor. 3. 7. 17 18. If therefore by your low and common parts and carnal lives you make your selves contemptible instead of exclaiming against the people cry out against your selves and lament your sins and the more you have aggravated the crimes of Schism and other errors in your flocks the more penitently bewail your
and what errours are intoâ—erable Yet as long as it is certaâ—n that such a difference there is and that accordingly men must do doth it not rather concern both parties to search after it and practise as far as they can discern than to cast away Reason because there is a difficulty in using it aright Just thus the Papists do with us about the like notion of fundamentals or essentials of Christianity They call to us for a just enumeration of the fundamentals and because they find so much difficulty there as may find words and work for a perverse wrangler they insult as if they might therefore take either all things or nothing to be essentials and of necessity As if Christianity had no constitutive essentiall parts and so were nothing And when they have all done they are forced themselves in their writings to distinguish the fundamentals essentials and universally necessary points from the rest as Daveâ—pâ—rt Costerus Bellarmine Holden c. do And doth it not then concern them as much as us to know which they be What if it be a hard thing to enumerate just how many bits a man may eat and not be a glutton or how many drops a man may drink and be no drunkard or just what meats and drinks must be used to avoid exceâ—s in quality or just what sort of stuffes or silks or cloth or fashions may be used without excess in apparel will you thence infer that men may eat and drink any thing in quantity and quality or else nothing or that he may wear any thing or must go naked What if you cannot justly enumerate what herbs or roots or drugs are wholsome and what are unwholsome which purge too much and which too little Must therefore all be used indifferently or none If I am not able to enumerate just how many faults or weaknesses may be tollerable in my servants Must I therefore have none till I have those that are faultless or else must I allow them to do any thing that they list Though just at the verge of evil even that which is good may be matter of doubt yet God in Nature and Scripture hath given us sufficient light for an upright safe peaceable life Thirdly And if ever Baptism had been well understood by these objectors the essentials of Christianity had been understood Hath not Christ himself determined who they be that shall be admitted into the Church and numbered with Christians in the very tenor of the Baptismal Covenant And did not the Church take the Creed to be sufficient for its proper use which was to be the matter of the Christian profession as to the Articles of faith to be believed And yet are we now to seek in the end of the world what Christianity is and what are the essentials of our faith and who is to be received as a professor of Christianâ—ty But this is a subject more largely to be handled if Rulers will permit it And in the mean time because it is not the Magistrates but the Pastors that I am now speaking to I shall pretermit the most which is to be said and only acquaint you in the conclusion that one of these following wayes must be chosen I. Either to tollerate all men to do what they wil which they will make a matter of conscience or religion And then some may offer their children in sacrifice to the devil and some may think they do God service in killing his servants â—nd some may think it their duty to perswade people that there is no God nor life to come nor duty nor sin but all things are left to our own wills as lawless Secondly Or else you must tollerate no errour or fault in religion And then you must advise what measure of penalty you will inflict If but a little then you tollerate the errour still For they that err will err still and they that conscienciously pray as Daniel did Dan. 6. or forbear to obey the King as the three Confessours did Dan. 3. will do so still for all your penalty And so there is no cure but a tolleration still But if you inflict upon them banishment or death you must resolve that the King shall dwel alone and have no subjects and so be no King nor have any servant and so be no Masters nor endure so much as a wife and so be no husband and if he have children must use them as K. Philip of Spain did his eldest son Prince Charles and so be no Father It can be no less than this at last Or if you will imprison them every subject must be in prison and then who shall be the Jaylor and who shall find them food Thirdly Or else you must deal partially and unjustly and condemn one while you acquit another for the same fault or condemn one sort of errours while you allow to tollerate others as great As if all were to be punished who believe not Christs descent into Hell while all are tollerated who deny the rest of the Articles of the Creed Fourthly Or else you must make sure that all the Kings subjects shall be born under the same Planets and of the same parents and have the same temperament and complexion and the same teachers and company and all hear the same words and all see the same objects and all have the same callings employments interests passions temptations advantages and the same degree of natural capacity and of grace That so there may be no difference or defect in their apprehensions Fifthly or else you must â—istinguish and say that some are tollerable and shall be tollerated and some errours arâ— intollerable and shall not be tollerated in the tongue I mean for you must tollerate them in the mind whether you will or not And then you will find a necessity of discerning as well as you can the tollerable from the intollerable And if so for Christs sake and his Churches sake and your own sake bethink you whether Christ be not the King of his Church and whether he hath given his Church no Laws for its Constitution and Administration By which we must try who are to be the members of himself and his Church and to have Communion with himself and one another and who are to be rejected and avoided And whether the Holy Ghost iâ— not the Author of the Church-establishment in the Scriptures And whether we can expect more infallible deciders of such cases than Christ and his Spirit and Apostles And whether the Church be not the same thing now as then and and its universal constitution and necessary administration the same And whether the primitive Church or ours be the purer and more exemplary And whether it would do Kings and Kingdomes and the souls of men any dangerous hurt to have all Christians hold their Union and Communion just on the same terms as they did under Peter and Paul and all the Apostles Or at least whether it be worthy all the calamitous divisions