the name of the Lord e. g. to avoid a notorious obstinate offender and so to obey the command of God that is though we may charge them in the name of the Lord to consent and obey and do their duty yet if their Iudgements remain unconvinced in a case which is to them obscure we have no more to do but satisfie our selves that we have done our duty So that when we have quarrelled never so long what is it but the Peoples consent that the moderate men on one side do require and consent the other side requireth also Call it what else you will whether a Government or an Authority or a Liberty Consent is the thing which both require And are we not then in the matter agreed Peruse for this Mr. Lyfords words before cited See also what the leading men for Presbyterian Government do not only acknowledge but maintain as effectually as others as Dav. Blondellus de Jure plebis in Regim Eccles Calvin Institut l. 4. c. 12. sect 4. Ne quis tale judicium spernat aut parvi aestimet se Fidelium suffragiis damnatum testatus est Dominus c. Ita Zanchius ubi sup and many more Indeed this Consent of the people is not sine qua non to the Pastors performance of his own part viz. Charging the Church in Christs name to avoid the Communion of such a notorious obstinate offender and suspending his own acts towards him and so charging them to receive the innocent or penitent For if the people consent not to avoid such and so would exclude all Discipline yet the Pastor must charge it on them and do his part But it is sine qua non to their actual rejecting and avoiding that offender In a word we must Teach them their duty and require it and they and we must obey and do it and neither they nor we may oblige any to sin Obj. But we are not agreed about the matter of the Church that must be Governed Answ Peruse the qualifications required in Church-members in the writings of the moderate on both sides and see what difference you can find Are not both agreed that Professors of true faith and holiness cohabiting and consenting are a true Church and when they contradict that Profession by wicked actions Doctrine or life they are to be dealt with by Discipline Though I confess in our practise we very much differ most that I know running into one of the extreams of loosness or rigor 3. MY third and last Request is that all the faithful Ministers of Christ would without any more delay Unite and Associate for the furtherance of each other in the work of the Lord and the maintaining of Unity and Concord in his Churches And that they would not neglect their Brotherly meetings to those ends nor yet spend them unprofitably but improve them to their edification and the effectual carrying on the work Read that excellent Letter of Edmond Grindal Arch-Bishop of Canterbury to Q. Elizabeth for Ministerial meetings and exercises such Bishops would have prevented our contentions and wars You may see it in Fullers new History of the Church of England And let none draw back that accord in the substantials of faith and godliness Yea if some should think themselves necessitated I will not say to Schism least I offend them but to separate in publike worship from the rest me thinks if they be indeed Christians they should be willing to hold so much Communion with them as they can and to consult how to manage their differences to the least disadvantage to the common truths and Christian cause which they all profess to own and prefer And here I may not silently pass by an uncharitable slander which some Brethren of the Prelatical Iudgement have divulged of me far and near viz. That while I perswade men to Accommodation it was long of me that the late Proclamation or Ordinance was procured for silencing all Sequestred Ministers viz. by the late Worcestershire Petition which they say was the occasion of it and they falsly report that I altered it after the subscription To which I say 1. It was the Petition of many Iustices and the grand Iury and thousands of the County as well as me 2. There is not a word in it nor ever was against any godly man but only that the notoriously insufficient and scandalous should not be permitted to meddle with the mysteries of Christ specially the Sacraments which we desired should have impartially extended to all parties alike And so much of this as was granted we cannot but be thankful for whoever grudge at it and wish it had been fully granted 3. I desire nothing more then that all able godly faithful Ministers of what side soever in our late State differences may not only have liberty but encouragement For the Church hath not any such to spare were they ten times more In a word I would have those of what party soever to have Liberty to preach the Gospel whose errours or miscarriages are not so great as that probably they will do as much hurt as good Brethren I crave your pardon for the infirmities of this address and earnestly longing for the success of your Labours I shall daily beg of God that he would perswade you to those duties which I have here requested you to perform and would preserve and prosper you therein against all the Serpentine subtilty and rage that is now engaged to oppose and hinder you April 15. 1656. Your unworthy fellow-servant Rich. Baxter TO The Lay-Reader THE reason why I have called this volumn the first Part of the book is because I intend if God enable me and give me time a Second Part containing the duty of the people in relation to their Pastors and therein to shew 1. The Right and Necessity of a Ministry 2. The way to know which is the true Church and Ministry and how we justifie our own calling to this office and how false Prophets and Teachers must be discerned 3. How far the people must assist the Pastors in the work of the Cospel and the Pastors put them on and make use of them to that end And 4. How far the people must submit to their Pastors and what other Duty they must perform in that Relation But because my time and strength is so uncertain that I know not whether I may live to publish my yet-imperfect preparations on this subject I dare not let this first Part come into your hands without a word of caution and advice lest you should misunderstand or misapply it 1. The caution that I must give you is in two parts 1. Entertain not any unworthy thoughts of your Pastors because we here confess our own sins and aggravate them in order to our humiliation and reformation You know it is men and not Angels that are put by God in the office of Church-guides And you know that we are imperfect men Let Papists and Quakers pretend to a sinless perfection we
them and rejoyced when he can see the desired issue When a man doth only study what to say and how with commendation to spend the hour and looks no more after it unless it be to know what people think of his own abilities and thus holds on from year to year I must needs think that this man doth preach for himself and drive on a private trade of his own and doth not preach for Christ even when he preacheth Christ how excellently soever he may seem to do it No wise or charitable Physitian is content to be still giving Physick and see no amendment among his Patients but have them all to die upon his hands nor will any wise and honest Schoolmaster be content to be still teaching though his Scholars profit not but either of them would rather be weary of the employment I know that a faithful Minister may have comfort when he wants success and though Israel be not gathered our reward is with the Lord and our acceptance is not according to the fruit but according to our labour and as Greg. M. saith Et Aethiops etsi balneum niger intrat niger egreditur tamen balneat or nummos accipit If God set us to wash Blackamores and cure those that will not be cured we shall not lose our labour though we perform not the cure But then 1. He that longeth not for the success of his labours can have none of this comfort because he was not a faithful labourer This is only for them that I speak of that are set upon the end and grieved if they miss it 2. And this is not the full comfort that we must desire but only such a part as may quiet us though we miss the rest What if God will accept a Physitian though the Patient dye He must work in compassion and long for a better issue and be sorry if he miss of it for all that For it is not only our own Reward that we labour for but other mens salvation I confess for my part I marvel at some antient Reverend men that have lived 20. or 40. or 50 years with an unprofitable people where they have seen so little fruit of their labours that it was scarce discernable how they can with so much patience there go on Were it my case though I durst not leave the Vineyard nor quit my calling yet I should suspect that it was Gods will I should go some whether else and another come thither that might be fitter for them and I should not be easily satisfied to spend my daies in such a sort SECT IX 5. Do well as well as say well be zealous of good works Spare not for any cost if it may promote your masters work 1. Maintain your innocency and walk without offence Let your lives condemn sin and perswade men to duty Would you have your people be more careful of their souls then you will be of yours If you would have them redeem their time do not you misspend yours If you would not have them vain in their conference see that you speak your selves the things which may edifie and tend to minister grace to the hearers Order your own families well if you would have them do so by theirs Be not Proud and Lordly if you would have them to be lowly There is no vertue wherein your example will do more at least to abate mens prejudice then humility and meekness and self-denyal Forgive injuries and be not overcome of evil but overcome evil with good Do as our Lord who when he was reviled reviled not again If sinners be stubborn and stout and contemptous flesh and blood will perswade you to take up their weapons and to master them by their carnal means but that 's not the way further then necessary self-preservation or publike good requireth it but overcome them with kindness and patience and gentleness The former may shew that you have more worldly power then they wherein yet they are ordinarily too hard for the faithful but it s the later only that will tell them that you overtop them in spiritual excellency and in the true qualifications of a Saint If you believe that Christ was more imitable then Caesar or Alexander and that it s more glory to be a Christian then to be a Conqueror yea to be a man then a beast who oft exceed us in strength contend then with charity and not with violence and set Meekness and Love and Patience against force and not force against force Remember you are obliged to be the servants of all Condescend to men of low estate be not strange to the poor ones of your Flock They are apt to take your strangeness for contempt Familiarity improved to holy ends is exceeding necessary and may do abundance of good Speak not stoutly or disrespectively to any one but be courteous to the meanest as your equal in Christ A kind and winning carriage is a cheap way of advantage to do men good 2. Remember what I said before of works of Bounty and Charity Go to the poor and see what they want and shew at once your compassion to soul and body Buy them a Catechism and some small Books that are likest to do them good and bestow them on your neighbours and make them promise you to read them and specially to spend that part of the Lords day therein which they can spare from greater duties Stretch your purse to the utmost and do all the good you can Think not of being rich seek not great things for your selves or posterity What if you do impoverish your selves to do a greater good will it be loss or gain If you believe that God is your safest purse-bearer and that to expend in his service is the greatest usury and the most thriving trade shew them that you do believe it I know that flesh and blood will cavil before it will loose its prey and will never want somewhat to say against that duty that is against its interest But mark what I say and the Lord set it home upon your hearts That man that hath any thing in the world so dear to him that he cannot spare it for Christ if he call for it is no true Christian And because a carnal heart will not believe that Christ calls for it when he cannot spare it and therefore makes that his self deceiving shift I say furthermore that That man that will not be perswaded that duty is duty because he cannot spare that for Christ which is therein to be expended is no true Christian For a false heart corrupteth the understanding and that again increaseth the delusions of the heart Do not take it therefore as an undoing to make you friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness and to lay up a treasure in heaven though you leave your selves but little on earth Nemo tam pauper potest esse quam natus est Aves sine patrimonio vivunt in diem pecua pascuntur haec nobis
alwaies approved in the end And the time is at hand when you shall confess that those were your truest friends He that will deal plainly against your sins in uprightness and honesty will deal as plainly for you against the sins of any that would injure you For he speaks not against sin because it is yours but because it is sin It is an observable passage that is reported by many and Printed by one how the late King Charls who by the Bishops instigation had kept Mr. Prin so long in prison and twice cropt his ears for writing against their Masks and Plaies and the high and hard proceedings of the Prelates when he read his notable voluminous speech for an acceptance of the Kings Concessions and an agreement with him thereupon did not long before his death deliver the Book to a friend that stood by him saying Take this Book I give it thee as a Legacy and believe it this Gentleman is the Cato of the Age. The time will come when plain dealing will have a better Construction then it hath while prejudice doth turn the heart against it I shall stand no longer on the Apologetical part I think the foregoing Objections being answered there is no great need of more of this The Title of the Book it self is Apologetical which if I tell you not I may well expect that some of my old ingenuous Interpreter should put another sense upon it I pretend not to the Sapience of Gildas nor to the Sanctity of Salvian as to the degree but by their names I offer you an excuse for plain dealing If it was used in a much greater measure by men so wise and holy as these why should it in a lower measure be dis-allowed in another At least from hence I have this encouragement that the plain dealing of Gildas and Salvian being so much approved by us now they are dead how much soever they might be despised or hated while they were living by them whom they did reprove at the worst I may expect some such success in times to come But my principal business is yet behind I must now take the boldness Brethren to become your Monitor concerning some of the necessary duties of which I have spoken in the ensuing discourse If any of you should charge me with arrogancy or immodesty for this attempt as if hereby I accused you of negligence or judged my self sufficient to admonish you I crave your candid interpretation of my boldness assuring you that I obey not the counsel of my flesh herein but displease my self as much as some of you and had rather have the ease and peace of silence if it would stand with duty and the Churches good But it is the meer necessity of the souls of men and my desire of their salvation and the prosperity of the Church which forceth me to this Arrogancy and Immodesty if so it must be called For who that hath a tongue can be silent when it is for the honour of God the welfare of his Church and the everlasting happiness of so many persons 1. And the first and main matter which I have to propound to you is Whether it be not the unquestionable duty of the generality of Ministers in these three Nations to set themselves presently to the work of Catechizing and Personal Instructing all that are to be taught by them who will be perswaded to submit thereunto I need not here stand to prove it having sufficiently done it in the following discourse Can you think that holy wisdom will gain-say it Will zeal for God will delight in his service or love to the souls of men gain-say it 1. That people must be taught the Principles of Religion and matters of greatest necessity to salvation is past doubt among us 2. And that they must be taught it in the most edifying advantagious way I hope we are agreed 3. And that personal Conference and Examination and Instruction hath many excellent advantages for their good is beyond dispute and afterward manifested 4. As also that personal Instruction is commended to us by Scripture and the practices of the servants of Christ and approved by the godly of all ages so far as I can find without contradiction 5. It is past doubt that we should perform this great duty to all the people or as many as we can For our love and care of their souls must extend to all If there be a 1000. or 500. ignorant people in your Parish it is a poor discharge of your duty now and then occasionally to speak to some few of them and let the rest alone in their ignorance if you are able to afford them help 6. And it is as certain that so great a work as this is should take up a considerable part of our time 7. And as certain is it that all duties should be done in order as far as may be and therefore should have their appointed times And if we are agreed to practise according to these commonly acknowledged truths we need not differ upon any doubtful circumstances Obj. We teach them in publike and how then are we bound to teach them man by man besides Answ You pray for them in Publike Must you not also pray for them in private Paul taught every man and exhorted every man and that both publikely and from house to house night and day with tears The necessity and benefits afterward mentioned prove it to be your duty But what need we add more when experience speaks so loud I am daily forced to admire how lamentably ignorant many of our people are that have seemed diligent hearers of me this ten or twelve years while I spoke as plainly as I was able to speak Some know not that each person in the Trinity is God Nor that Christ is God and man Nor that he took his humane nature into heaven Nor many the like necessary principles of our faith Yea some that come constantly to private meetings are found grosly ignorant Whereas in one hours familiar instruction of them in private they seem to understand more and better entertain it then they did in all their lives before Obj. But what obligation lyeth on us to tye our selves to certain daies for the performance of this work Answ This is like the Libertines plea against family prayer They ask where are we bound to pray morning and evening Doth not the nature and end of the duty plainly tell you that an appointed time conduceth to the orderly successful performance of it How can people tell when to come if the time be not made known You will have a fixed day for a Lecture because people cannot else tell when to come without a particular notice for each day And it is as necessary here because this must be a constant duty as well as that Obj. But we have many other businesses that sometimes may interrupt the course Answ Weightyer business may put by our preaching even on the Lords day but we must
not therefore neglect our constant observance ordinarily of that day And so it is here If you have so much greater business that you cannot ordinarily have time to do the Ministerial work you should not undertake the office For Ministers are men separated to the Gospel of Christ and must give themselves wholly to these things Obj. All the Parish are not the Church nor do I take the Pastoral charge of them and therefore I am not satisfied that I am bound to take this pains with them Answ I will pass by the question Whether all the Parish be to be taken for your Church because in some places it is so and in others not But let the negative be supposed Yet 1. The common maintenance which most receive is for Teaching the whole Parish though you be not obliged to take them all for a Church 2. What need we look for a stronger obligation then the common bond that lyeth on all Christians to further the work of mens salvation and the good of the Church and the honour of God to the utmost of their power together with the common bond that is on all Ministers to further these ends by Ministerial teaching to the utmost of their power Is it a work so good and apparently conducing to so great benefits to the souls of men and yet can you perceive no obligation to the doing of it Obj. But why may not occasional Conference and Instructions serve the turn Answ I partly know what occasional conferences are compared to this duty having tryed both Will it satisfie you to deal with one person of 20. or 40. or an hundred and to pass by all the rest Occasional conferences fall out seldom and but with few and which is worst of all are seldom managed so throughly as these must be When I speak to a man that cometh to me purposely on that business he will better give me leave to examine him and deal closely with him then when it falls in on the by And most occasional conferences fall out before others where plain dealing will not be taken so well But so much is said afterward to these and several other Objections that I shall add no more I do now in the behalf of Christ and for the sake of his Church and the immortal souls of men beseech all the faithful Ministers of Christ that they will presently and effectually fall upon this work Combine for an unanimous performance of it that it may more easily procure the submission of your people But if there should be found any so blind or vile as to oppose it or dissent God forbid that other Ministers should because of that forbear their duties I am far from presuming to prescribe you Rules or Forms or so much as to motion to you to tread in our steps in any circumstances where a difference is tolerable or to use the same Catechism or Exhortation as we do Only fall presently and closely to the work If there should be any of so proud or malicious a mind as to withdraw from so great a duty because they would not seem to be our followers or drawn to it by us when as they would have approved it if it had risen from themselves I advise such as they love their everlasting peace to make out to Christ for a cure of such cankered minds and let them know that this duty hath its rise neither from them nor us but from the Lord and is generally approved by his Church And for my part let them and spare not tread me in the dirt and let me be as vile in their eyes as they please so they will but harken to God and reason and fall upon the work that our hopes of a more common salvation of men and of a true Reformation of the Church may be revived I must confess I find by some experience that this is the work that must Reform indeed that must expell our common prevailing ignorance that must bow the stubborn hearts of men that must answer their vain objections and take off their prejudice that must reconcile their hearts to faithful Ministers and help on the success of our publike preaching and must make true godliness a commoner thing through the Grace of God which worketh by means I find that we never took the rightest course to demolish the Kingdom of Darkness till now I do admire at my self how I was kept off from so clear and excellent a duty so long But I doubt not but other mens case is as mine was I was long convinced of it but my apprehensions of the difficulties were too great and my apprehensions of the duty too small and so I was hindred long from the performance I thought that the people would but have scorned it and none but a few that had least need would have submitted to it and the thing seemed strange and I stayed till the people were better prepared and I thought my strength would never go through with it having so great burdens on me before and thus I was long detained in delayes which I beseech the Lord of mercy to forgive Whereas upon tryal I find the difficulties almost nothing save only through my extraordinary bodily weakness to that which I imagined and I find the benefits and comforts of the work to be such as that I profess I would not wish that I had forborn it for all the Riches in the world as for my self We spend Munday and Tuesday from morning to almost night in the work besides a Chappelrie catechized by another assistant taking about 15. or 16. families in a week that we may go through the Parish which hath above 800. families in a year and I cannot say yet that one family hath refused to come to me nor but few persons excused and shifted it off And I find more outward signs of success with most that come then of all my publike preaching to them If you say It is not so in most places I answer 1. I wish that be not much long of our selves 2. If some refuse your help that will not excuse you for not affording it to them that would accept it If you ask me what course I take for order and expedition I have after told you In a word at the delivery of the Catechisms I take a Catalogue of all the persons of understanding in the Parish and the Clark goeth a week before to every family to tell them when to come and at what hour one family at 8. a Clock the next at 9. and the next at ten c. And I am forced by the number to deal with a whole family at once but admit not any of another to be present ordinarily Brethren do I now invite you to this work without God without the consent of all antiquity without the consent of the Reformed Divines or without the conviction of your own consciences See what our late Assembly speak occasionally in the Directory about the visitation of the
sick It is the duty of the Minister not only to teach the people committed to his charge in publike but Privately and Particularly to admonish exhort reprove and comfort them upon all seasonable occasions so far as his time strength and personal safety will permit He is to admonish them in time of health to prepare for death And for that purpose they are often to confer with their Minister about the estate of their souls c. Read this over again and consider it Harken to God if you would have peace with God Harken to conscience if you would have peace of conscience I am resolved to deal plainly with you if I displease you It is an unlikely thing that there should be a heart that is sincerely devoted to God in the breast of that man that after advertisements and exhortations will not resolve on so clear and great a duty as this is As it is with our people in hearing the word so it is with us in teaching An upright heart is an effectual perswader of them to attend on God in the use of his Ordinances and an upright heart will as effectually perswade a Minister to his duty As a good stomach needs no arguments to draw it to a feast nor will easily by any arguments be taken off And as a child will love and obey his parents though he could not answer a Sophister that would perswade him to hate them so I cannot conceive that he that hath one spark of saving Grace and so hath that love to God and delight to do his will which is in all the sanctified should possibly be drawn to contradict or refuse such a work as this except under the power of such a temptation as Peter was when he denyed Christ or when he disswaded him from suffering and heard an half excommunication Get thee behind me Satan thou art an offence unto me for thou favourest not the things that be of God but those that be of men Mat. 16. 22 23. You have put your hand to the plough of God You are doubly sanctified or devoted to him as Christians and as Pastors and dare you after this draw back and refuse his work You see the work of Reformation at a stand and you are engaged by many obligations to promote it and dare you now neglect that means by which it must be done Will you shew your faces in a Christian Congregation as Ministers of the Gospel and there pray for a Reformation and pray for the Conversion and Salvation of your hearers and the prosperity of the Church and when you have done refuse to use the means by which it must be done I know carnal wit will never want words and shews of reason to gain-say that truth and duty which it abhors It is easier now to cavil against duty then perform it but stay the end before you pass your final judgement Can you possibly make your selves believe that you shall have a comfortable review of these neglects or make a comfortable account of them unto God I dare prognosticate from the knowledge of the nature of Grace that all the Godly Ministers in England will make conscience of this duty and address themselves to it except those that by some extraordinary accident are disabled or those that are under such temptations as aforesaid I do not hopelesly perswade you to it but take it for granted that it will be done And if any lazy or jealous or malicious hypocrites do cavil against it or hold off the rest will not do so but they will take the opportunity and not resist the warnings of the Lord. And God will uncase the hypocrites ere long and make them know to their sorrow what it was to play fast and loose with God Wo to them when they must be accountable for the blood of souls The Reasons which satisfied them here against duty will then be manifested to be the effects of their folly and to have proceeded radically from their corrupted wills and carnal interest And unless they be desperately blinded and scared to the death their consciences will not own those Reasons at a dying hour which now they seem to own Then they shall feel to their sorrow that there is not that comfort to be had for a departing soul in the reviews of such neglected duty as there is to them that have wholly devoted themselves to the service of the Lord. I am sure my arguments for this duty will appear strongest at the last whatever they do now And again I say I hope the time is even at hand when it shall be as great a shame to a Minister to neglect the private Instructing and oversight of the Flock as it hath been to be a seldom Preacher for which men are now justly sequestred and ejected And if God have not so great a quarrel with us as tendeth to a removal of the Gospel or at least to the blasting of its prosperity and success in the desired reformation I am confident that this will shortly be And if these lazy worldly hypocrites were but quickened to their duty by a Sequestring Committee you should see them stir more zealously then all arguments fetcht from God and Scripture from the Reward or Punishment or from the Necessity and Benefits of the work can perswade them to do For even now these wretched men while they pretend themselves the servants of Christ and are asking What Authority we have for his work and if we could but shew them a command from the Lord Protector or Council it would answer all their scruples and put the business beyond dispute as if they had a design to confirm the accusation of the Papists that their Ministry only is Divine and ours dependeth on the will of men Well! for those godly zealous Ministers of Christ that labour in sincerity and denying their worldly interest and ease do wholly devote themselves to God I am confident there needs not much perswasion There is somewhat within that will presently carry them to the work And for the rest let them censure this warning as subtilly as they can they shall not hinder it from rising up against them in judgement unless it be by true Repentance and Reformation And let me speak one word of this to you that are my dear fellow-labourers in this County who have engaged your selves to be faithful in this work It is your henour to lead in sacred Resolutions and Agreements but if you should any of you be unfaithful in the performance it will be your double dishonour Review your subscribed Agreement and see that you perform it with diligence and constancy You have begun a happy work such as will do more to the welfare of the Church then many that the world doth make a greater stir about God forbid now that imprudence or negligence should frustrate all For the generality of you I do not much fear it having so much experience of your fidelity in the other parts of your
office And if there should be any found among you that will shuffle over the work and deal unfaithfully in this and other parts of your office I take it for no just cause of reproach to us that we accept of your subscription when you offer to joyn with us For Catechizing is a work not proper only to a Minister and we cannot forbid any to engage themselves to their unquestionable duty But in our Association for Discipline we must be somewhat more scrupulous with whom we joyn I earnestly beseech you all in the name of God and for the sake of your peoples souls that you will not slightly slubber over this work but do it vigorously and with all your might and make it your great and serious business Much judgement is required for the managing of it Study therefore how to do it beforehand as you study for your Sermons I remember how earnest I was with some of the last Parliament to have had them settle Catechists in our Assemblies But truly I am not sorry that it took not effect unless for a few of the larger Congregations For I perceive that all the life of the work under God doth lie in the prudent effectual management in searching mens hearts and setting home the saving truths and the ablest Minister is weak enough for this and few of inferiour place or parts would be found competent for I fear nothing more then that many Ministers that preach well will be found too unmeet for this work especially to manage it with old ignorant dead-hearted sinners And indeed if the Ministers be not reverenced by the people they will rather slight them and contest with them then humbly learn and submit how much more would they do so by inferiour men Seeing then the work is cast upon us and it is we that must do it or else it must be undone let us be up and doing with all our might and the Lord will be with us I can tell you one thing for your encouragement It is a work that the enemies of the Church and Ministry do exceedingly vex at and hate and fear more then any thing that yet we have undertaken I perceive the signs of the Papists indignation against it And me thinks it hath the most not able character of a work extraordinarily and unquestionably good For they storm at it and yet have nothing to say against it They cannot blame it and yet they hate and fear it and would fain undermine it if they knew how You know how many false rumours have been spread abroad this Country to deter the people from it as that the Lord Protector and Council were against it That the subscribers were to be ejected That the Agreement was to be publikely burnt c. And when we have searcht after the authors we can drive it no higher then the Quakers the Papists Emissaries from whom we may easily know their minds And yet when a Papist speaks openly as a Papist some of them have said that it is a good work but that it wants authority and is done by those that are not called to it Forsooth because we have not the Authority of their Pope or Prelates And some that should be more sober have used the same language as if they would rather have thousands and millions of souls neglected then have them so much as Catechized and Instructed without Commission from a Prelate Yea and some that differ from us about Infant Baptism I understand repine at it and say that we will hereby insinuate our selves into the people and hinder them from the receiving of the truth A sad case that any that seem to have the fear of God should have so true a Character of a partial dividing and siding mind as to grudge at the propagation of Christianity it self and the common truths which we are all agreed in for fear least it should hinder the propagation of their opinions The common cause of Christianity must give place to the cause of these lower controverted points and they grudge us our very labour and suffering for the common work though there be nothing in it which medleth with them or which they are able with any shew of reason to gainsay I beseech you Brethren let all this and the many motives that I have after given you perswade you to the greater diligence herein When you are speaking to your people do it with the greatest prudence and seriousness and be as earnest with them as for life or death and follow it as close as you do your publike exhortations in the Pulpit I profess again it is to me the most comfortable work except publike preaching for there I speak to more though yet with less advantage to each one that ever I yet did set my hand to And I doubt not but you will find it so to you if you faithfully perform it 2. MY second request to the Reverend Ministers in these Nations is that at last they would without any more delay unanimously set themselves to the practice of those parts of Christian Discipline which are unquestionably necessary and part of their work It is a sad case that good men under so much liberty should settle themselves so long in the constant neglect of so great a duty The common cry is Our people be not ready for it they will not bear it But is not the meaning that you will not bear the trouble and hatred which it will occasion If indeed you proclaim our Churches uncapable of the Order and Government of Christ What do you but give up the cause to them that withdraw from them and encourage men to look out for better societties where that Discipline may be had For though preaching and Sacraments may be omitted in some cases till a fitter season and accordingly so may Discipline be yet it is a hard case to settle in a constant neglect for so many years together as we have done unless there were a flat impossibility of the work And if it were so because of our uncapable materials it would plainly call us to alter our constitution that the matter may be capable I have spoke plainly afterward to you of this which I hope you will bear and conscionably consider of I now only beseech you that would make a comfortable account to the chief Shepherd and would not be found unfaithful in the house of God that you do not wilfully or negligently delay it as if it were a needless thing nor shrink not from duty because of trouble to the flesh that doth attend it For as that 's too sad a sign of hypoorisie so the costlyest duties are usually the most comfortable and be sure that Christ will bear the cost I could here produce a heap of testimonies of Fathers and Reformed Divines that charge this duty with great importunity I shall only now give you the words of two of the most godly laborious judicious Divines that most ever the Church of Christ had since
people to go to the Priest whose lips must preserve knowledge and at whose mouth they must ask the Law because he is the Messenger of the Lord of hosts And because the people are grown unacquainted with the office of the Ministery and their own necessity and duty herein it belongeth to us to acquaint them herewith and to press them publikely to come to us for advice in such cases of great concernment to their souls We must not only be willing of the trouble but draw it upon our selves by inviting them hereto What abundance of good might we do could we but bring our people to this And doubtless much might be done in it if we did our duties How few have I ever heard that heartily prest their people to their duty in this A sad case that peoples souls should be so injured and hazarded by the total neglect of so great a duty and Ministers scarce ever tell them of it and awaken them to it were they but duly sensible of the need and weight of this you should have them more frequently knocking at your doors and open their cases to you and making their sad complaints and begging your advice I beseech you put them more on this for the future and perform it carefully when they seek your help To this end it s very necessary that we be acquainted with Practical Cases and specially that we be acquainted with the nature of true Grace and able to assist them in trying their states and resolve the main question that concerns their everlasting life or death One word of seasonable prudent advice given by a Minister to persons in necessity hath done that good that many Sermons would not have done 4. We must also have a special eye upon families to see that they be well ordered and the duties of each relation performed The life of Religion and the welfare and glory of Church and State dependeth much on family Government and duty If we suffer the neglect of this we undo all What are we like to do our selves to the Reforming of a Congregation if all the work be cast on us alone and Masters of families will let fall that necessary duty of their own by which they are bound to help us If any good be begun by the Ministery in any soul in a family a careless prayerless worldly family is like to stiffle it or very much hinder it Whereas if you could but get the Rulers of families to do their part and take up the work where you left it and help it on what abundance of good might be done by it as I have elsewhere shewed more at large I beseech you therefore do all that you can to promote this business as ever you desire the true Reformation and welfare of your Parishes To which end let these things following be performed 1. Get certain information how each family is ordered and how God is worshippped in them that you may know how to proceed in your carefulness for their further good 2. Go now and then among them when they are like to be most at leisure and ask the master of the family Whether he pray with them or read the Scripture or what he doth And labour to convince the neglecters of their sin And if you can have opportunity pray with them before you go and give them an example What you would have them do and how And get a promise of them that they will be more conscionable therein for the future 3. If you find any unable to pray in tolerable expressions through ignorance and disuse perswade them to study their own wants and get their hearts affected with them and so go oft to those neighbours who use to pray that they may learn and in the mean time perswade them to use a form of prayer rather then none Only tell them that it is their sin and shame that they have lived so negligently as to be now so unacquainted with their own necessities as not to know how to speak to God in prayer when every beggar can find words to ask an alms and therefore tell them that this form iâ— but for necessity as a crutch to a Cripple while they cannot do as well without it but they must not resolve to take up there but to learn to do better as soon as they can seeing prayer should come from the feeling of the heart and be varied both according to our necessities and observations Yet is it necessary to most unaccustomed ill-bred people that have not been brought up where prayer hath been used that they begin at first with the use of a form because they will else be able to do nothing at all and in sense of their disability will wholly neglect the duty though they desire to perform it For many disused persons can mutter out some honest requests in secret that be not able before others to speak tolerable sense And I will not be one of them that had rather the duty were wholly neglected or else prophaned and made contemptible then encourage them to the use of a sorm either recited by memory or read 4. See that they have some profitable moving book besides the Bible in each family If they have not perswade them to buy some of small price and great use such as Mr. Whateleys New Birth and Dod on the Commandments or some smaller moving Sermons If they be not able to buy them give them some if you can if you cannot get some Gentlemen or other rich persons that are willing to good works to do it And engage them to read on it at nights when they have leisure and especially on the Lords day 5. By all means perswade them to procure all their children to learn to read English 6 Direct them how to spend the Lords day how to dispatch their worldly businesses so as to prevent encombrances and distractions and when they have been at the Assemblie how to spend the time in their families The life of Religion lieth much on this because poor people have no other free considerable time and therefore if they lose this they lose all and will remain ignorant and brutish Specially perswade them to these two things 1. If they cannot repeate the Sermon or otherwise spend the time profitably at home that they take their family with them and go to some godly neighbour that spends iâ— better that by joyning with them they may have the better help 2. That the Master of the family will every Lords day at night cause all his family to repeat the Catechism to him and give him some account of what they have learn't in publike that day 7. If there be any in the family that are known to be unruly give the Ruler a special charge concerning them and make them understand what a sin it is to connive at them and tolerate them Neglect not therefore this necessary part of your work Get masters of families to their duties and they will spare you
attestante veritate primas salutationes in foro primos recubitus in coenis primas cathedras in conventibus quaerunt qui susceptum curae pastoralis officium ministrare digne tanto magis nequeunt quanto ad hujus humilitatis magisterium ex sola elatione pervenernat ipsa quippe in Magisterio lingua confunditur quando aliud discitur aliud docetur Hactenus Gregorius ipse nimis magnus But I have stood longer upon this sin then is proportionable to the rest of my work I shall be the shorter in the confession of some of the rest SECT III. 2. ANother sin the Ministers of England and much more of many other Churches are sadly guilty of is An undervaluing the Unity and Peace of the whole Church Though I scarce ever met with any that will not speak for Unity and Peace or at least that will expresly speak against it yet is it not common to meet with those that are addicted to promote it but too commonly do we find men averse to it and jealous of it if not themselves the instruments of division The Papists have so long abused the name of the Catholike Church that in opposition to them many do either put it out of their Creeds or only fill up a room with the name while they understand not or consider not the nature of the thing or think it enough to believe that there is such a Body though they behave not themselves as sensible members of it If the Papists will Idolize the Church shall we therefore deny it disregard it or divide it It is a great and common sin through the Christian world to take up Religion in a way of faction and instead of a love and tender care of the Universal Church to confine that love and respect to a party Not but that we must prefer in our estimation and Communion the purer parts before the impure and refuse to participate with any in their sins but the most infirm and diseased part should be compassionated and assisted to our utmost power and communion must be held as far as is lawful and nowhere avoided but upon the urgency of necessity As we must love those of our neighbourhood that have the plague or leprosie and afford them all the relief we can and acknowledge all our just relations to them and communicate to them though we may not have local Communion with them and in other diseases which are not so infectious we may be the more with them for their help by how much the more they need it Of the multitude that say they are of the Catholike Church it is too rare to meet with men of a Catholike Spirit Men have not an Universal consideration of and respect to the whole Church but look upon their own party as if it were the whole If there be some called Lutherans some Calvinists some among these of subordinate divisions and so of other parties among us most of them will pray hard for the prosperity of their party and rejoyce and give thanks accordingly when it goes well with them but if any other party suffer they little regard it as if it were no loss at all to the Church If it be the smallest parcel that possesseth not many Nations no nor Cities on earth they are ready to carry it as if they were the whole Church and as if it went well with the Church when it gots well with them We cry down the Pope as Antichrist for including the Church in the Romish pale and no doubt but it is an abominable schism But alas how many do imitate them too far while we reprove them And as they foist the word Roman into their Creed and turn the Catholike Church into the Roman Catholike Church as if there were no other Catholikes and the Church were of no larger extent so is it with many others as to their several parties Some will have it to be the Lutheran Catholike Church and some the Reformed Catholike Church as if it were all reformed some the Anabaptist Catholike Church and so of some others And if they differ not among themselves they are little troubled at differing from others though it be from almost all the Christian world The Peace of their party they take for the Peace of the Church No wonder therefore if they carry it no further How rare is it to meet with a man that smarteth or bleedeth with the Churches wounds or sensibly taketh them to heart as his own or that ever had solicitous thoughts of a cure No but almost every Party thinks that the happiness of the rest consisteth only in turning to them and because they be not of their mind they cry Down with them and are glad to hear of their fall as thinking that is the way to the Churches rising that is their own How few be there that understand the true state of Controversies between the several parties or that ever well discerned how many of them are but Verbal and how many are Real And if those that understand it do in order to right information and accommodation disclose it to others it s taken as an extenuation of their error and a carnal complyance with them in their sin Few men grow zealous of Peace till they grow old or have much experience of mens spirits and principles and see better the true state of the Church and the several differences then they did before And then they begin to write their Irenicon's and many such are extant at this day Pareus Iunius and many more have done their parts as our Davenant Morton Hall whose excellent Treatise called the Peace-maker and his Pax terris deserve to be transcribed upon all our hearts Hattonus Amyraldus also have done But recipiuntur ad modum recipientis As a young man in his heat of lust and passion was judged to be no fit auditor of Moral Philosophy so we find that those same young men who may be zealous for Peace and Unity when they are grown more experienced are zealous for their factions against these in their youthful heat And therefore such as these before mentioned and Duraeus who hath made it the business of his life do seldom do much greater good then to quiet their own consciences in the discharge of so great a duty and to moderate some few and save them from further guilt and to leave behind them when they are dead a witness against a wilful self-conceited and unpeaceable world Nay commonly it bringeth a man under suspition either of favouring some heresie or abating his zeal if he do but attempt a pacificatory work As if there were no zeal necessary for the great fundamental verities for the Churches Unity and Peace but only for parties and some particular truths And a great advantage the Devil hath got this way by imploying his own Agents the unhappy Socinians in writing so many Treatises for Catholike and Arch-catholike Unity and Peace which they did for their own ends and
contempt of all Religions by our divisions and poor carnal wretches begin to think themselves in the better case of the two because they hold to their old formalities when we hold to nothing Yea and these Pious contenders do more effectually plead the Devils cause against one another then any of the ignorant people can do They can prove one another Deceivers and Blasphemers and what not and this by secret slanders among all that they can handsomly vent them to and perhaps also by publike disputations and Printed slanderous books So that when the obstinate drunkards are at a loss and have nothing to say of their own against a man that would drive them from their sin they are prompted by the raling books or reports of factious zealous malice Then they can say I regard him not nor his Doctrine such a man hath proved him a Deceiver and a Blasphemer Let him answer him if he can And thus the lyes and slanders of some for that is no news and the bitter opprobriou speeches of others have more effectually done the Devils service under the name of Orthodoxness and Zeal for Truth then the malignant scorners of Godliness could have done it So that the matter is come to that pass that there are few men of note of any party but the reproaches of the other parties are so publikly upon them that the ignorant and wicked rabble that should be converted by them have learnt to be Orthodox and to vilifie and scorn them Mistake me not I do not slight Orthodoxness nor jeer at the name but disclose the pretences of Devilish Zeal in Pious or seemingly Pious men If you are offended with me for my harsh language because I can tell you that I learnt it of God I dare be bold therefore to tell you further that you have far more cause to be offended at your Satanical Practices The thing it self is sure odious if the name be so odious as to turn your stomacks How should the presence and guilt of it terrifie you if the name make you start I know that many of these Reverend Calumniators do think that they shew that soundness in the fairh and love to truth which others want But I will resolve the case in the words of the Holy-Ghost Iam. 3. Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you Let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom But if you have bitter envying or zealousness and strife in your hearts glory not and lye not against the Truth This wisdom descendeth not from above but is earthly sensual devilish For where envying or zeal and strife is there is confusion and every evil work But the wisdom that is from above is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be entreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality without hypocrisie And the fruit of Righteousness is sown in peace of them that make Peace I pray you read these words again and again and study them O doleful case to think of that a while ago we were afraid of nothing but least Papists and Deboist persons should have swallowed up the Gospel and our liberty and destroyed us together And now when the work hath been put into the hands of those men that were joyned in these fears and are joyned in the strictest profession of Piety and are of one judgement in all the Articles of the faith they cannot or will not unanimously joyn in carrying on the work but they either fall upon one another or live at a distance and cast their work upon a hundred disadvantages by the bitter disagreements that are among themselves O what a Nation might England have been ere now if it had not been for the proud and obstinate contentions of godly Ministers What abundance of good might we have done Nay what might we not have done if our perversness had not marr'd our work Did we but agree among our selves our words would have some Authority with the people But when they see us some of one mind and some of another and snarling and reviling at each other they think they may well enough do so too Why may not we call them Sectaries or Deceivers say they when they call one another so Nay if we were not all of a mind in some smaller matters yet if we did but hold Communion and Correspondency and joyn together in the main and do as much of Gods work as we can in concurrent unanimity the people would far more regard us and we might be in a greater capacity to do them good But when we are single they sleight us and when we disagree and divide they despise us and who can marvel at it when we despise one another What say they when a Minister doth his duty alone Must we he ruled by every singular man Are you wiser then all the Ministers in the Countrey Are not such and such as learned as you But when we go hand in hand it stops their mouths They think either themselves may be wiser then one or two Ministers or at least other Ministers may be wiser then they but common modesty will not suffer them to think that they are wiser then all the Ministers in the Country or in the world I know that matters of faith are not to be received upon our credit alone but yet our credit may do much to remove prejudice and to unblock the entrance into mens minds and procure the truth a more equal hearing and therefore is necessary to our peoples good Nay more then all this I know it I see and hear it that there are some Ministers that are gâ—â—d when they perceive the people despise their Brethren that differ from them in some lesser things 〈…〉 would have it so and they foment it as 〈…〉 can for shame and they secretly rejoyce 〈◊〉 they hear the news of it This is next to Prelatâ—â—â—â—â—lencing them and casting them out of the Church And I confess I cannot but suspect that such men would go neer to silence them if they had their will and way For he that would have a Minister under disgrace would have him useless which is next to silencing him and tendeth to the same end You will say we do not desire that he should be disabled to do good but to do hurt I answer but the question is Whether his error be so great that the holding or propagating it doth more hurt then all his Preaching and the labours of that whole party which you would disgrace is like to do good If so then I think it is a desirable work to disgrace him and silence him in a just measure and by just means and I would concurr therein but if it be otherwise we are bound to keep up that reputation of others which is necessary ordinarily to the success of their labours I may not here without wrong to my conscience pass over the late practises of some of our Brethren of the New Prelatical way
marry should take such as can maintain themselves and their children or maintain them at the rate as their temporal means will afford and devote as much of the Church means to the Churches service as they can I would put no man upon extreams But in this case flesh and blood doth make even good men so partial that they take their duties and duties of very great worth and weight to be extreams If worldly vanities did not blind us we might see when a publike or other greater good did call us to deny our selves and our families Why should we not live neerlyer and poorer in the world rather then leave those works undone which may be of greater use then our plentiful provision But we consult in matter of duty with flesh and blood and what counsel it will give us we may easily know It will tell us we must have a competency and many pious mens competency is but little below the Rich mans rates Luke 16. If they be not cloathed with the best and fare not deliciously every day they have not a competency A man that preacheth an Immortal Crown of glory must not seek much after transitory vanity And he that preacheth the contempt of Riches must himself contemn them and shew it by his life And he that preacheth self-denyal and mortification must practise these in the eyes of them that he preacheth to if ever he would have his Doctrine prosper All Christians are sanctified and therefore themselves and all that they have are consecrated and dedicated to their masters use But Ministers are doubly sanctified They are devoted to God both as Christians and as Ministers and therefore they are doubly obliged to honour him with what they have O Brethren what abundance of good works are before us and how few of them do we put our hands to I know the world expecteth more from us then we have but if we cannot answer the expectations of the unreasonable let us do what we can to answer the expectations of God and conscience and all just men It is the will of God that with well doing we should put to silence the ignorance of foolish men Especially those Ministers that have larger maintenance must be larger in doing good I will give but one instance at this time which I mentioned before There are some Ministers that have 150. or 200. or 300. per an of Church means and have so great Parishes that they are not able to do a quarter of the Ministerial work nor once in a year to deal personally with half their people for their instruction and yet they will content themselves with publike preaching as if that were all that were necessary and leave almost all the rest undone to the everlasting danger or damnation of multitudes rather then they will maintain one or two diligent men to assist them Or if they have an assistant it is but some young man to ease them about baptizings or burials or such work and not one that will faithfully and diligently watch over the Flock and afford them that personal instruction which is so necessary If this be not a serving our selves of God and not a serving God and a selling mens souls for our fuller maintenance in the world what is Me thinks such men should fear least while they are accounted excellent Preachers and godly Ministers by men they should be accounted cruel soul murderers by Christ and least the cryes of those souls whom they have betrayed to damnation should ring in their ears for ever Will preaching a good Sermon serve the turn while you never look more after them but deny them that closer help that you find to be necessary and alienate that maintenance to your own flesh which should provide relief for so many souls How can you open your mouthes against oppressors when your selves are so great oppressors not only of mens bodies but their souls How can you Preach against unmercifulness while you are so unmerciful And how can you talk against unfaithful Ministers while you are so unfaithful your selves The sin is not therefore small because it is unobserved and not become odious in the eyes of men nor because the charity which you withhold is such as the people blame you not for withholding Satan himself their greatest enemy hath their consent all along in the work of their perdition It is no extenuation therefore of your sin that you have their consents For that you may sooner have for their hurt then for their good I Shall proceed no further in these confessions and discoveries but beseech you to take what is said into Cōnsideration and see whether this be not the great and lamentable sin of the Ministers of the Gospel that they be not fully devoted to God and give not up themselves and all that they have to the carrying on of the blessed work which they have undertaken and whether flesh-pleasing and self-seeking and an interest distinct from that of Christ do not make us neglect much of our duty and walk too unfaithfully in so great a trust and reservedly serve God in the cheapest and most applauded part of his work and withdraw from that which would put us upon cost and sufferings And whether this do not shew that too many are earthly that seem to be heavenly and mind the things below while they preach for the things above and Idolize the world while they call men to contemn it And as Salvian saith li. 4. ad Eccles Cath. pag. 454. Nullus salutem plus neglig it quam qui Deo aliquid anteponit Despisers of God will prove despisers of their own salvation SECT IX AND now Brethren what remaineth but that we all cry guilty of too much of these forementioned sins and humble our souls in the lamentation of our miscarriages before the Lord Is this Taking heed to our selves and to all the Flock Is this like the pattern that is given us here in the Text If we should prove now stout-hearted and unhumbled men and snuff at these Confessions as tending to our disgrace how sad a symptom would it be to our selves and to the Church The Ministery hath been oft threatned here and is still maligned by many sorts of adversaries Though all this may shew their impious malice yet may it also intimate to us Gods just indignation Believe it Brethren the Ministery of England is not the least or last in the sin of the Land It is they that have encouraged the common prophaness It is they that have led the people into divisions and are now so backward to bring them out And as sin hath been found in them so Judgements have been found and laid upon them It s time therefore for us to take our part of that Humiliation which we have been calling ou◠people to so long If we have our wits about us we may perceive that God hath been offended with us and that the voice that called this Nation to Repentance did speak
to do that which no man can contradict and to practice that which all are agreed in I hope we may have their good leave or silent patience at least to deny the ease and pleasure of our flesh and to set our selves in good earnest to help men to heaven and to propagate the knowledge of Christ with our people And I take it for a sign of a great and necessary work which hath such universal approbation the commonly acknowledged truths and duties being for the most part of greatest necessity and moment A more noble work it is to practise faithfully the truths and duties that all men will confess then to make new ones or discover somewhat more then others have discovered I know not why we should be ambitious of finding out new waies to heaven To make plain and to walk in the old way is our work and our greatest honour And because the work in hand is so pregnant of great advantages to the Church I will come down to the particular benefits which we may hope for that when you see the excellency of it you may be the more set upon it and the lother by any negligence or failing to destroy or frustrate it For certainly he that hath the true intentions of a Minister will rejoyce in the appearances of any further Hopes of the attaining of his ends and nothing can be more welcome to him then that which will further the very business of his life And that our present work is such I shall shew you more particularly I. AND first It will be the most hopeful advantage for the conversion of many souls that we can expect For it hath a concurrence of those great things which must further such a work 1. For the matter of it it is about the most needful things the Principles or Essentials of the Christian faith 2. For the manner of exercise It will be by private conference where we may have opportunity to set all home to the heart 3. The common concord of Ministers will do much to bow their hearts to a consent Were it but a meeting to resolv som controverted questions it would not have so direct a tendency to conversion Were it but occasional we could not handsomly fall on them so closely but when we make it the appointed business it will be expected and not so strangely taken And if most Ministers had singly set upon this work perhaps but few of the people would have submitted and then you might have lost your chiefest opportunities and those that had most needed your help would have had least of it Whereas now we may hope that when it is a general thing few will refuse it and when they see that other neighbours do it they will be ashamed to be so singular or openly ungodly as to deny The work of conversion consisteth of two parts 1. The well informing of the judgement in the necessary points 2. The change of the will by the efficacy of this truth Now in this work we have the most excellent advantage for both For the informing of their understandings it must needs be an excellent help to have the summe of all Christianity still in memory And though bare words not understood will make no change yet when the words are plain English he that hath the words is far liker to know the meaning and matter then another For what have we to make known things by that themselves are invisible but words and other subservient signs Those therefore that will deride all Catechisms and Professions as unprofitable forms may better deride themselves for talking and using the form of their own words to make known their minds to others And they may deride all Gods word on the same account which is a standing Form for the guiding of preachers and teaching all others the doctrine of eternal life Why may not written words that are still before their eyes and in their memories instruct them as well as the transient words of a Preacher These Forms therefore of wholsom words are so far from being unprofitable as some phantastical persons do imagine that they are of admirable use to all And then we shal have the opportunity by personal conference to try them how far they understand it and how far not and so to explain it to them as we go and to chose out and insist on those particulars which the persons that we spèak to have most need to hear So that these two conjunct A form of words with a plain Explication may do more then either of them could do alone Moreover we have the best opportunity to imprint the same Truths upon their hearts When we can speak to each ones particular necessity and say to the sinner Thou art the man and plainly mention his particular case and set home the truth with familiar importunity if any thing in the world is likely to do them good it is this They will understand a familiar speech that hear a Sermon as if it were non-sence And they have far greater help for the Application of it to themselves And withal you shall hear their Objections and know where it is that Satan hath most advantage on them and what it is that stands up against the truth and so may be able to shew them their errors and confute their objections and more effectually to convince them we can better drive them to a stand and urge them to discover their resolutions for the future and to promise the use of means and reformation then otherwise we could do What need we more for this then our experience I seldom deal with men purposely on this great business in private serious conference but they go away with some seeming convictions and promises of new obedience if not some deeper remorse and sense of their condition And I hope your own experiences are the samè O Brethren what a blow may we give the Kingdom of darkness by the faithful and skilful managing of this work If then the saving of souls of your neighbours souls of many souls from everlasting misery be worth your labour Up and be doing If the increase of the true Church of Christ be desirable this work is Excellent which is so likely to promote it If you would be the Fathers of many that shall be new born to God and would see the travail of your souls with comfort and would be able to say at last Here am I and the children that thou hast given me Up then and ply this blessed work If it will do you good to see your holy converts among the Saints in glory and praising the Lamb before his Throne if you will be glad to present them blameless and spotless to Christ be glad then of this singular opportunity that is offered you If you are Ministers of Christ indeed you will long for the perfecting of his body and the gathering in of his Elect and your hearts will be set upon it and you will travail as in
could but improve my time according to my convictions of the necessity of improving it He that hath lookt death in the face as oft as I have done I will not thank him to value his time I profess I admire at those Ministers that have time to spare that that can hunt or shoot or bowl or use the like recreations two or three hours yea whole daies almost together That can sit an hour together in vain discourses and spend whole daies in complemental visitations and journeys to such ends Good Lord what do these men think on when so many souls about them cry for their help and death gives no respite and they know not how short a time their people and they may be together When the smallest Parish hath so much work that may imploy all their diligence night and day Brethren I hope you are content to be plainly dealt with If you have no sense of the worth of souls and of the preciousness of that blood that was shed for them and of the glory that they are going to and of the misery that they are in danger of then are you no Christians and therefore very unfit to be Ministers And if you have how can you find time for needless recreations visitations or discourses Dare you like idle Gossips chat and trifle away your time when you have such works as these to do and so many of them O precious time How swiftly doth it pass away How soon will it be gone What are the 40 years of my life that are past Were every day as long as a moneth me thinks it were too short for the work of a day Have we not lost enough already in the daies of our vanity Never do I come to a dying man that is not utterly stupid but he better sees the worth of time O then if they could call time back again how loud would they call If they could but buy it what would they give for it And yet can we afford to trifle it away Yea and to allow our selves in this and willfully cast off the greatest works of God! O what a befooling thing is sin that can thus distract men that seem so wise Is it possible that a man of any true compassion and honesty or any care of his Ministerial duty or any sense of the strictness of his account should have time to spare for idleness and vanity And I must tell you further Brethren that if another might take some time for meer delight which were not necessary yet so cannot you for your undertaking binds you to stricter attendance then other men are bound to May a Physitian in the plague-time take any more relaxation or reereation then is necessary for his life when so many are expecting his help in a case of life and death As his pleasure is not worth mens lives so neither is yours worth mens souls Suppose your Cities were besieged and the enemy on one side watching all advantages to surprize it and on the other seeking to fire it with granadoes which are cast in continually I pray you tell me now if certain men undertake it as their office to watch the ports and others to quench the fire that shall be kindled in the houses what time will you allow these men for their recreation or relaxation When the City is in danger or the fire will burn on and prevail if they intermit their diligence Or would you excuse one of these men if he come off his work and say I am but flesh and blood I must have some pleasure or relaxation At the utmost sure you would allow him none but of necessity Do not grudge at this now and say This is a hard saying who can bear it For it is your mercy and you are well if you know when you are well as I shall shew you in answering this next Objection Object 3. I do not think that it is required of Ministers that they make drudges of themselves If they preach diligently and visit the sick and do other Ministerial duties and occasionally do good to those they converse with I do not think that God doth moreover require that we should thus tie our selves to Instruct every person distinctly and to make our lives a burden and a slavery Answ 1. Of what use and weight the duty is I have shewed before land how plainly it is commanded And do you think God doth not require you to do all the good you can Will you stand by and see sinners gasping under the pangs of death and say God doth not require me to make my self a drudge to save them Is this the voice of Ministerial or Christian Compassion or rather of sensual Lazarus and diabolical cruelty I Doth God set you work to do and will you not believe that he would have you do it Is that the voice of obedience or of rebellion It is all one whether your flesh do prevail with you to deny obedience to acknowledge duty and say plainly I wil obey no further then it pleaseth me Or whether it may make you wilfully reject the evidence that should convince you that it is a duty and say I will not believe it to be my duty unless it please me It s the true Character of an hypocrite to make a Religion to himself of the cheapest part of Gods service which will stand with his fleshly ends and felicity and to reject the rest which is inconsistent therewith And to the words of Hypocrisie this objection superaddeth the words of gross impiety For what a wretched Calumny is this against the most high God to call his service a slavery and drudgery what thoughts have these men of their Master their work and their wages the thoughts of a believer or of an Infidel Are these men like to honour God and promote his service that have such base thoughts of it themseves Do these men delight in Holiness that account it a slavish work Do the believe indeed the Misery of sinners that account it such a slavery to be diligent for to save them Christ saith that he that denieth not himself and forsaketh not all and taketh not up his cross and followeth him cannot be his Disciple And these men count it a slavery to labour hard in his vineyard and deny their ease in a time when they have all accomodations and Encouragements How far is this from forsaking all and how can these men be fit for the Ministry that are such enemies to self-denyal and so to true Christianity Still therefore I am forced to say that all these Objections are so prevalent and all these carnal reasonings hinder the Reformation and in a word hence is the chief misery of the Church that so many are made Ministers before they are Christians If these men had seen the diligence of Christ in doing good when he neglected his meat to talk with one woman Joh. 4. and when they had no time to eat bread Mark 3. 22. would not
Anglicanus was called stupor mundi before all those Ignorant and Scandalous ones were cast out what may we now call it Brethren let me deal freely with you The ungrateful contempt of a faithful Ministry is the shame of the faces of thousands in this Land and if through-Repentance prevent it not they shall better know in hell whether such Ministers were their friends or foes and what they would have done for them if their counsel had been heard When the Messengers of God were mocked and his words despised and his Prophets abused the wrath of the Lord arose on the Israelites themselves and there was no remedy 2 Chro. 36. 16. Shall Ministers study and preach and pray for you and shall they be despised When they have the God of Heaven and their own consciences to witness that they desire not yours but you and are willing to spend and be spent for your sakes and that all the wealth in the world would not be regarded by them in comparison of your salvation and that all their labours and sufferings is for your sakes if yet they shall be requited with your contempt or scorn or dicourageing unteachableness see who will prove the losers in the end When God himself shall Justifie and Condemn them with a Well done good and faithful servant let those that reproached despised and condemned them defend their faces from shame and their consciences from the accusations of their horrid ingratitude as well as they can Read the Scripture and see whether they that obeyed Gods Messengers or they that despised and disobeyed them sped best And if any of the Seducers will tell you that we are not the Ministers of Christ leave them not till they tell you which is his true Church and Ministry and where they are and by that time they have well answered you you may know more of their minds 3. My last advice to you is this See that you Obey your faithful Teachers and improve their help for your salvation while you have it and take heed that you refuse not to learn when they would teach you And in particular see that you refuse not to submit to them in this duty of Private Instruction which is mentioned in this Treatise Go to them when they desire you and be thankful for their help Yea and at other times when you need their advice go to them of your own accord and ask it Their office is to be your guides in the way to life If you seek not their Direction it seems you either despise salvation it self or else you are so Proud as to think your selves sufficient to be your own Directors Shall God in mercy send you Leaders to Teach you and Conduct you in the way to Glory and will you stoutly send them back or refuse their assistance and say We have no need of their Direction Is it for their own case or gain that they trouble you or is it for your own everlasting gain Remember that Christ hath said to his Messengers He that despiseth you despiseth me If your obstinate refusal of their Instruction do put them to bear witness against you in Judgement and to say Lord I would have taught these ignorant sinners and admonished these worldly impenitent wretches but they would not so much as come to me nor speak with me look you to it and answer it as you can For my part I would not be then in your case for all the world But I shall say no more to you on this point but only desire you to read and consider the exhortation which is published in our Agreement it self which speaks to you more fully And if you read this book remember that the Duty which you find to belong to the Ministers doth shew also what belongs to your selves For it cannot be our duty to Teach Catechize Advise c. if it be not yours to Hear and Learn and seek Advice If you have any temptation to question our office read the London Ministers Ius Divinum Minister Evang. and Mr. Tho. Balls book for the Ministry If you doubt of the duty of learning the Principles and being Catechized read the London Ministers late Exhortation to Catechizing and Mr. Zach. Croftons book for Catechizing now newly published April 16. 1656. Rich. Baxter Dr. H. Hammond of the Power of the Keyes cap. 4. sect 104. pag. 113. NAY thirdly there will be little matter of doubt or controversie but that private frequent spiritual conference betwixt fellow-Christians but especially and in matters of high concernment and difficulty between the Presbyter and those of his charge even in the time of health and peculiarly that part of it which is spent in the discussion of every mans special sins and infirmities and inclinations may prove very useful and advantagious in order to spiritual directions reproof and comfort to the making the man of God perfect And to tell truth if the Pride and self conceit of some the wretchlesness of others the bashfulness of a third sort the nauseating and instant satiety of any good in a fourth the follies of men and artifices of Satan had not put this practice quite out of fashion among us there is no doubt but more good might be done by Ministers this way then is now done by any other means separated from the use of this particularly then by that of Publike Preaching which yet need not be neglected the more when this is used which hath now the fate to be cryed up and almost solely depended on it being the likelyer way as Quintilian saith comparing Publike and private teaching of youth to fill narrow mouth'd bottles and such are the most of us by taking them single in the hand and pouring in water into each then by setting them altogether and throwing never so many bottles of water on them Mr. William Gurnal in his excellent Book called The Christian in compleat Armour pag. 2 5. THE ignorant soul feels no such smart If the Minister stay till he sends for him to instruct him he may sooner hear the bell go for him than any Messenger come for him You must seek them out and not expect that they will come to you These are a sort of people that are afraid more of their Remedy than their disease and study more to hide their ignorance then how to have it cured which should make us pitty them the more because they can pitty themselves so little I confess it is no small unhappiness to some of us who have to do with a multitude that we have neither time nor strength to make our addresses to every particular person in our Congregations and attend on them as their needs require and yet cannot well satisfie our consciences otherwise But let us look to it that though we cannot do to the height of what we would we be not found wanting in what we may Let not the difficulty of our Province make us like some who when they see they have more work
upon their hands than they can well dispatch grow sick of it and sit down out of a lazy despondency and do just nothing O if once our hearts were but filled with Zeal for God and compassion to our peoples souls we would up and be doing though we could but lay a brick a day and God would be with us May be you who find a people rude and sottishly ignorant like stones in the quarry and trees unfell'd shall not bring the work to such perfection in your daies as you desire Yet as David did for Solomon thou mayst by thy pains in teaching and instructing them prepare materials for another who shall rear the Temple Read the rest THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. Sect. 1. THE brief explication of the Text. Sect. 2. What sort of Elders they were that Paul spoke to Sect. 3. The Doctrine and Method Sect. 4. The terms opened Sect. 5 6 7 and 8. Wherein we must take heed to ourselves Sect. 9. to 16. The moving Reasons to Take heed to ourselves CHAP. II. Sect. 1. WHat it is to Take heed to all the Flock It s implyed that every Flock have their own Pastor and that regularly the Flock be no greater then the Pastors may over-see taking heed to all Sect. 2. The ends of this Oversight Sect. 3. Of the subject of this work Sect. 4. Of the Object of it 1. The unconverted 2. The converted 1. The young and weaker 2. Those that labour under some special distempers 3. Decliners 4. That are fallen under some great Temptation 5. The disconsolate 6. The strong Sect. 5. Of the action it self 1. Publike Preaching 2. Sacraments 3. Publike prayer and praise and benediction 4. Oversight of the members distinctly 1. Knowing them 2. Instructing the ignorant 3. Advising them that seek advice 4. Looking to particular Families How 5. Resisting seduction 6. Encourageing the obedient 7. Visiting the sick 8. Comforting 9. Private admonishing offenders 10. More publike Discipline 1. Publike admonition How 2. Publike exhortation to open discovery of Repentance 3. Publike praying for the offender 4. To assist the penitent confirming absolving c. 5. Rejecting the obstinately impenitent from our Communion 6. Reception of the penitent The manner and necessity of these acts Making Laws for the Church is not our work CHAP. III. OF the manner and concomitants of our work It must be done 1. Purely for God and not for self 2. Laboriously and diligently 3. Prudently orderly 4. Insisting most on the Greatest and most Necessary things 5. With Plainness and Evidence 6. In a sense of our insufficiency and dependance on Christ 7. In Humility and Condescention 8. A mixture of severity and mildness 9. With Affectionate seriousness 10. Reverently and spiritually 11. In tender love to our people 12. Patiently And we must be studious of Union and Communion among our selves and of the Unity and peace of the Church CHAP. IV. Sect. 1. THE first Use for our humiliation Confessing the sins of the Ministry especially of this Nation heretofore Sect. 2. A confession of our present sins Specially 1. Pride Sect. 3. 2. An undervaluing the Unity and Peace of the Catholike Church Sect. 4. 3. Want of serious industrious unreserved laying out our selves in the work of God Discovered 1. By negligent studies Sect. 5. 2. By dull drowsic preaching Sect. 6. 3. By not helping them that want abroad Sect. 7. 4. By neglect of acknowledged Duties E. G. Church Discipline The pretences confuted that would justifie it Sect. 8. 5. By the Power of worldly carnal interests Manifested 1. By temporizing 2. Worldly business 3. Barrenness in works of Charity Sect. 9. Applyed for Humiliation CHAP. V. Sect. 1. VSE of Exhortation Motives in the text 1. From our office and Relation to all the Flock with some subservient considerations Sect. 2. 2. From the efficient cause the Holy-Ghost Sect. 3. 3. From the Dignity of the Object Sect. 4. 4. From the price paid for the Church Sect. 5. A more particular exhortation 1. To see that the saving work of grace be wrought on our own hearts A word to Tutours and Schoolmasters Sect. 6. 2. Keep Grace in vigour and activity and preach to your own hearts first for your work sake Sect. 7. 3. Stir up your selves to the work and do it with all your might Sect. 8. 4. Keep up earnest desires and expectations of success Sect. 9. 5. Be zealous of good works Spare no cost Sect. 10. 6. Maintain Union and Communion The way thereto Sect. 11. 7. Practise so much of Discipline as is certainly your duty Sect. 12. 8. Faithfully discharge this duty of personal Catechizing and Instruction of all the Flock CHAP. VI. Sect. 1. REasons for this Duty 1. From the Benefits The great Hopes we have of a blessed success of this work if faithfully managed Shewed in 20. particulars Sect. 2. 2. From the Difficulty of this work Sect. 3. 3. From the Necessity of it which is manifold Sect. 4. Use What great cause of Humiliation we have for neglecting this so long Sect. 5. An Exhortation to the faithful performance of this work Twenty aggravations of our sin and witnesses which will condemn the wilful refusers of so great duties as this Private Instruction and Discipline are Sect. 6. The Objections of lazy unfaithful Ministers against Personal Instruction and Catechizing answered CHAP. VII Sect. 1. DIrections to the less experienced for the right managing of this work 1. For bringing our People to submit to it Sect. 2. 2. To do it so as is likest to succeed 1. For the Conversion of the ungodly and awaking of the secure In twelve Directions CHAP. VIII DIrections how to deal with self-conceited Opinionists and to prevent or cure Errour and Schism in our People And how to deal with those of whose condition we are between hope and fear Readers you will right me and ease your selves if you will mend these mis-Printings with your pen before you read the book PAg. 46. li. 14. for conscience read conference 3 p. 90. l. 9. r. moâ—iendo p. 105. l. 4. blot out that p. 106. l. 29. blot out us p. 113. l. 23. r. art p. 115. l. 19. after token r. it p. 135. l. 25. r. speaking for p. 142. l. penult r. desertion p. 144. l. 26. r. histrionical p. 145. l. 13. r. useful p. 146. l. 18. r. better p. 150. l. 16. r. contrive p. 168. l. antipen r. sit p. 180. l. antipen r. that p. 186. l. 3. r. Hoâ—tonus p. 188. l. 25. and p. 189. l. 8. r. sit still p. 209. l. 16. for shineth r. thriveth p. 211. l. 8. after and r. then p. 213. l. 17. blot out for p. 217. l. 17. after call r. them p. 222. l. 18. r. the p. 286. l. 11. r. going to Church p. 289. l. 9 10. r. continued and l. 20. r. see p. 290. l. 15. r. compose and l. 17. r. will never and l. 24. r. serve and l. 28. r. confessions p. 248. l. 14. r.
intumescat ne proximos juvando se deserâ—t ne alios erigens cadat saith Gregor M. de cur past l. 4. Yea left all his labours come to nought because his heart and life is nought that doth perform them Nonnulli enim sunt qui solerti curâ spiritualia praecepta prescrutantur sed quae intelligendo penetrant vivendo conculcant repente decent quae non opere sed meditatione didicerunt quod verbis praedicant moribus impugnant unde fit ut cum pastor per abrupta graditur ad praecipitium grex sequatur Idem ib. li. 1. cap. 2. When we have led them to the living waters if we muddy it by our filthy lives we may lose our labour yet they be never the better Aquam pedibus perturbare est sancta meditationis studia male vivendo corrumpere inquit Idem ibid. Before we speak of the work it self we must begin with somewhat that is implyed and presupposed And 1. It is here implyed that Every Flock should have their own Pastor one or more and every Pastor his own Flock As every Troop or Company in a Regiment of souldiers must have their own Captain and other officers and every souldier know his own Commanders and Colours so is it the will of God that every Church have their own Pastors and that all Christs Disciples do know their Teachers that are over them in the Lord 1 Thes 5. 12 13. The Universal Church of Christ must consist of particular Churches guided by their own Over-seers and every Christian must be a member of one of these Churches except those that upon Embassages travels or other like cases of necessity are deprived of this advantage Acts 14. 23. They ordained them Elders in every Church so Tit. 1. 5. and in many places this is clear Though a Minister be an Officer in the Universal Church yet is he in a special manner the Overseer of that particular Church which is committed to his charge As he that is a Physitian in the Common-wealth may yet be the Medicus vel Archiater cujusdam Civitatis and be obliged to take care of that City and not so of any other so that though he may and ought occasionally to do any good he can else where that may consist with his fidelity to his special charge when an unlicenced person may not yet is he first obliged to that City and must allow no help to others that must occasion a neglect of them except in great extraordinary cases where the publike good requireth it So is it betwixt a Pastor and his special Flock When we are Ordained Ministers without a special charge we are licenced and commanded to do our best for all as we shall have a call for the particular exercise but when we have undertaken a particular charge we have restrained the exercise of our gifts and guidance so specially to that that we may allow others no more then they can spare of our time and help except where the publike good requireth it which must be first regarded From this Relation of Pastor and Flock arise all the duties which mutually we owe. As we must be true to our trust so must our people be faithful to us and obey the just Directions that we give them from the word of God 2. When we are commanded to Take heed to all the Flock it is plainly implyed that the Flocks must be no greater regularly and ordinarily then we are capable of Over-seeing or taking heed of That particular Churches should be no greater or Ministers no fewer then may consist with a Taking heed to all For God will not lay upon us natural impossibilities He will not bind men on so strict account as we are bound to leap up to the Moon to touch the Stars to number the sands of the Sea If it be the Pastoral work to Over-see and Take heed to all the Flock then sure there must be such a proportion of Pastors assigned to each Flock or such a number of souls in the care of each Pastor as he is able to take such heed to as is here required Will God require of one Bishop to take the charge of a whole County or of so many Parishes or thousands of souls as he is not able to know or to over-see Yea and to take the sole Government of them while the particular Teachers of them are free from that undertaking Will God require the blood of so many Parishes at one mans hands if he do not that which ten or twenty or an hundred or three hundred men can no more do then I can move a Mountain Then wo to poor Prelates This were to impose on them a natural or unavoidable necessity of being damned Is it not therefore a most doleful case that learned sober men should plead for this as a desirable priviledge or draw such a burden wilfully on themselves and that they tremble not rather at the thoughts of so great an undertaking O happy had it been for the Church and happy for the Bishops themselves if this measure that is intimated by the Apstole here had been still observed and the Diocess had been no greater then the Elders or Bishops could Over-see and Rule so that they might have Taken heed to all the Flock Or that Pastors had been multiplyed as Churches multiplyed and the number of Over-seers proportioned so far to the number of souls that they might not have let the work be undone while they assumed the empty titles and undertook impossibilities And that they had rather prayed the Lord of the harvest to send forth more Labourers even so many as had been proportioned to the work and not to have undertaken all themselves I should scarce commend the prudence or humility of that Labourer let his parts in all other respects be never so great that would not only undertake to gather in all the harvest in this County himself and that upon pain of death yea of damnation but would also earnestly contend for this prerogative Obj. But there are others to Teach though one only have had the Rule Answ Blessed be God it was so and no thanks to some of them But is not Government of great concernment to the good of souls as well as Preaching If not then what matter is it for Church-Governors If it be then they that nullifie it by undertaking impossibilities do go about to ruâ—ne the Churche and themselves If only preaching be necessary let us have none but meer Preachers what needs there then such a stir about Government But if Discipline in its place be necessary too what is it but enmity to mens salvation to exclude it and it is unavoidably excluded when it is made to be his work that is naturally uncapable of performing it He that wâ—ll command an Army alone may as well say It shall be destroyed for want of command And the School-master that will Over-see or Govern all the Schools in the County alone may as well say plainly they
Luke he telleth us that he is as the Shepherd that leaveth the ninety and nine sheep in the Wilderness to seek after one that was lost or as the woman that lighteth a Candle and sweepeth the house and searcheth diligently to find the one groat that was lost and having found it doth rejoyce and call her friends and neighbours to rejoyce And Christ telleth us that even in heaven there is Ioy over one sinner that repenteth The Prophets are oft sent to single men Ezekiel is made a watch man over individuals and must say to the wicked Thou shalt surely dye Ezek. 3. 18 19. and 18 And Paul taught them publikely and from house to house which was meant of his teaching particular families for even the publike teaching was then in houses and publikely and from house to house signifie not the same thing The same Paul warned every man and taught every man in all wisdom that he might present every man perfect in Christ Iesus Col. 1. 18. Christ expounded his publike parables to the twelve a part Mark 4. 34. Every man must seek the Law at the mouth of the Priest Mâ—l 2 7. We must give an account of our watching for the souls of all that are bound to obey us Heb. 13. 7. Many more passages in Scripture assure us that it is our duty to Take heed to every individual person in our Flock And many passages in the antient Councils do plainly tell us it was the practice of those times till Churches began to be crowded and to swell so big that they could not be guided as Churches should be when they should rather have been multiplyed as the Converts did increase But I will pass over all these and mention only one passage in Ignatius or whoever it was I matter not much seeing it is but to prove what was then the custom of the Church ad Polycarp 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Let Assemblies be often gathered seek after or enquire of all by name despise not servant-men or maids You see it was then taken for a duty to look after every member of the flock by name though it were the meanest servant-man or maid The Reasons of the necessity of this I shall pass over now because some of them will fall in when we come to the duty of Catechizing and personal instruction in the end Obj. But the Congregation that I am set over is so great that it is not possible for me to know them all much less to take heed of all individuals Answ 1. Is it necessity or not that hath cast you upon such a charge If it be not you excuse one sin with another How durst you undertake that which you knew your self unable to perform when you were not forced to it It seems then you had some other ends in your undertaking and never intended to make it good and be faithful to your trust But if you think that you were necessitated to it I must ask you 1. Might not you possibly have procured assistance for so great a charge Have you done all that you could with your friends and neighbours to get maintenance for another to help you 2. Have you not so much maintenance yourself as might serve your self and another What though it will not serve to maintain you in fulness Is it not more reason that you should pinch your flesh and family then undertake a work that you cannot do and neglect the souls of so many men I know it will seem hard to some that I say But to me it seems an unquestionable thing That if you have but an hundred pounds a year it is your duty to live upon part of it and allow the rest to a competent assistant rather then the Flock that you are over should be neglected If you say That this is hard measure your wife and children cannot so live I answer 1. Do not many families in your Parish live on less 2. Have not many able Ministers in the Prelates daies been glad of less with liberty to preach the Gospel There are some yet living as I have heard that have offered the Bishops to enter into bond to preach for nothing so they might but have had liberty to preach 3. If still you say that you cannot live so neerly as poor people do I further ask Can your Parishoners better endure damnation then you can endure want and poverty What do you call your selves Ministers of the Gospel and yet are the souls of men so base in your eyes that you had rather they did eternally perish then your selves and family should live in a low and poor condition Nay should you not rather beg your bread then put such a thing as mens salvation upon a hazard or disadvantage Yea or hazard the damnation but of one soul O Sirs it is a miserable thing when men study and talk of Heaven and Hell and the fewness of the saved and the difficulty of salvation and be not all this while in good sadness If you were you could never sure stick at such matters as these and let your people go to damnation that you might live at higher rates in the world Remember this the next time you are preaching to them that they cannot be saved without knowledge and hearken whether conscience do not conclude It s likely they might be brought to knowledge if they had but diligent instruction and exhortation privately man by man and then were there another minister to assist me this might be done and then if I would live neerly and deny my flesh I might have an assistant and then it must conclude Dare I let my people live in that Ignorance which I my self have told them is damning rather then put my self and family to a little want And I must further say that indeed this poverty is not so sad dangerous a business as it is pretended to be So you have but food and rayment must you not therewith be content and what would you have more then that which may enable you for the work of God And it is not purple and fine linnen and faring deliciously every day that you must expect as that which must content you A mans life consisteth not in the abundance of the things that he possesseth So your cloathing be warm and your food be wholsom you may as well be supported by it to do God service as if you had the fullest satisfaction to your flesh A patcht coat may be warm and bread and drink is wholsom food He that wanteth not these hath but a cold excuse to make for hazarding mens souls that he may live on a fuller dyet in the world Obj. If this Doctrine be received then it will discourage men from medling with great places and so all Cities Market-Towns and other great Parishes will be left desolate Answ It will discourage none but the carnal and self-seeking and not those that thirst after the winning of souls are wholly devoted to the
to let them alone either in publike or private whatever other work we have to do I confess I am forced frequently to neglect that which should tend to the further encrease of knowledge in the godly and may be called stronger meat because of the lamentable necessity of the unconverted Who is able to talk of Controversies or nice unnecessary points yea or truths of a lower degree of necessity how excellent soever while he seeth a company of ignorant carnal miserable sinners before his face that must be chang'd or damn'd Me thinks I even see them entring upon their final woe Me thinks I even hear them crying out for help and speedyest help Their misery speaks the lowder because they have not hearts to seek or ask for help themselves Many a time have I known that I had some hearers of higher fancies that lookt for rarities and were addicted to despise the Ministery if he told them not somewhat more then ordinary and yet I could not find in my heart to turn from the observation of the necessities of the impenitent for the humouring of these nor to leave speaking to the apparently miserable for their salvation to speak to such novelists for the clawing of their ears no nor so much as otherwise should be done to the weak for their confirmation and increase in grace Me thinks as Pauls Spirit was stir'd within him when he saw the Athenians so addicted to Idolatry Acts 17. 16. so it should cast us into one of his paroxisms to see so many men in great probabilitie of being everlastingly undone and if by faith we did indeed look upon them as within a step of hell it should more effectually untye our tongues then they tell us that Croesus danger did his sons He that will let a sinner go to hell for want of speaking to him doth set less by souls then the Redeemer of souls did and less by his neighbour then rational Charity will allow him to do by his greatest enemy O therefore Brethren whomsoever you neglect neglect not the most miserable Whatever you pass over forget not poor souls that are under the condemnation and curse of the Law and may look every hour for the infernal execution if a speedy change do not prevent it O call after the impenitent and ply this great work of converting souls whatever else you leave undone 2. The next part of the Ministerial work is for the building up of those that are already truly converted And according to the various states of these the work is various in general as the persons are either such as are young and weak or such as are in danger of growing worse or such as are already declining so our work is all reducible to these three Confirmation and Progress Preservation and Restauration 1. We have many of our flock that are young and weak though of long standing yet of small proficiency or strength Heb. 5. 11 12. And indeed it is the most common condition of the godly Most of them â—â—ick in weak and low degrees of grace And it is no easie matter to get them higher To bring them to higher and stricter opinions is very easie that is to bring them from the truth into error on the right hand as well as on the left but to encrease their knowledge and gifts is not easie but to encrease their graces is the hardest of all It is a very troublesom thing to be weak It keepeth under dangers it abateth consolation and delight in God and taketh off the sweetness of his waies and maketh us go to work with too much backwardness and come off with little peace or profit It maketh us less serviceable to God and man to bring less honour to our Master and profession and do less good to all about us We find small benefit by the means we use we too easily play with the Serpents baits and are insnared by his wiles A Seducer will easily make us shake and evil may be made appear to us as Good truth as falshood sin as a duty and so on the contrary we are less able to resist and stand in an encounter we sooner fall we hardlier rise and are apter to prove a scandal and reproach to our profession We less know our selves and are more apt to be mistaken in our own estate not observing corruptions when they have got advantage we are dshonourable to the Gospel by our very weakness and little useful to any about us and in a word though we live to less profit to our selves or others yet are we unwilling and too unready to dye And seeing the case of weakliness is comparatively so sad how diligent should we be to cherish and encrease their grace The strength of Christians is the honour of the Church When men are inflamed with the Love of God and live by a lively working saith and set light by the profits and honours of the world and love one another with a pure heart fervently and can bear and heartily forgive a wrong and suffer joyfully for the cause of Christ and study to do good and walk in offensively and harmlesly in the world as ready to be servants of all men for their good becoming all things to all men to win them and yet abstaining from the appearances of evil and seasoning all their actions with a sweet mixture of Prudence Humility Zeal and Heavenly spirituality O what an honour are such to their professions What ornaments to the Church and how excellently serviceable to God and man Men would sooner believe that the Gospel is indeed a word of truth and power if they could see more such effects of it upon the hearts and lives of men The world is better able to read the nature of Religion in a mans life then in the Bible They that obey not the word may be won by the conversations of such as these 1 Pet. 3. 1. It is therefore a necessary part of our work to labour more in the polishing and perfecting of the Saints that they may be strong in the Lord and fitted for their masters use 2. Another sort of Converts that need our special help are those that labour under some particular distemper that keeps under their graces and maketh them temptations and troubles to others and a burden to themselves For alas too many such there are Some that are specially addicted to Pride and some to worldliness and some to this or that sensual desire and many to frowardness and disturbing passions It is our duty to set in for the assistance of all these and partly by disswasions and clear discoveries of the odiousness of the sin and partly by suitable directions about the way of remedy to help them to a fuller conquest of their corruptions We are leaders of Christs Army against the powers of darkness and must resist all the works of darkness wherever we find them though it be in the children of light We must be no more tender of the sins of
a thing as satisfactory when true Repentance is absent hath discovered more of the accusers error then of theirs For no doubt it is true Repentance that they exhort men to and it is true Repentance which offendors do profess and whether they truly profess it who can tell but God It is not nothing that sin is brought to so much disgrace and the Church doth so far acquit themselves of it But of this next 2. Next To the duty of Publike Reproof must be joyned an exhortation of the person to Repentance and to the Publike Profession of it for the satisfaction of the Church For as the Church is bound to avoid Communion with impenitent scandalous sinners so when they have had the Evidence of their sin they must see some Evidence of their Repentance for we cannot know them to be penitent without Evidence And what Evidence is the Church capable of but their Profession of Repentance first and their actual reformation afterwards both which must be expected 3. To these may most fitly be adjoyned the publike prayers of the Church and that both for the Reproved before they are Rejected and for the Rejected some of them at least that they may repent and be restored but we are now upon the former Though this is not expresly affixed to Discipline yet we have sufficient discovery of Gods will concerning it in the general precepts We are commanded to pray alway and in all things and for all men and in all places and all things are said to be sanctified by it It is plain therefore that so great a business as this should not be done without it And who can have any just reason to be offended with us if we pray to God for the changing of their hearts and the pardon of their sins It is therefore in my Judgement a very laudable course of those Churches that use for the three next daies together to desire the Congregation to joyn in earnest prayer to God for the opening of the sinners eyes and softning of his heart and saving him from impenitency and eternal death And though we have no express direction in Scripture just how long we shall stay to try whether the sinner be so impenitent as to be necessarily excluded yet we must follow the general directions with such diversity as the case and quality of the person and former proceeding shall require it being left to the discretion of the Church who are in general to stay so long till the person manifest himself obstinate in his sin not but that a temporal exclusion called suspension may oft be inflicted in the mean time but before we proceeded to an exclusion à statu it is very meet ordinarily that three daies prayer for him and patience towards him should antecede And indeed I see no reason but this course should be much more frequent then it is and that not only upon those that are members of our special charge and do consent to Discipline but even to those that deny our Pastoral oversight and Discipline and yet are our ordinary hearers For so far as men have Christian Communion or familiarity with us so far are they capable of being excluded from Communion Though the members of our special charge have fuller and more special Communion and so are more capable of a fuller and more special exclusion yet all those that dwell among us and are our ordinary hearers have some Communion For as they converse with us so they hear the word not as heathens but as Christians and members of the universal Church into which they are baptized And they joyn with us in publike prayers and praises in the celebration of the Lords day From this therefore they are capable of being excluded or from part of this at least Morally if not Locally For the precept of avoiding and withdrawing from and not eating with such is not restrained to the members of a Governed Church but extended to all Christians that are capable of Communion When these ungodly persons are sick we have daily bills from them to request the prayers of the Congregation And if we must pray for them against sickness and temporal death I know no reason but we should much more earnestly pray for them against sin and eternal death That we have not their consent is no disswasive For that is their disease and the very venom and malignity of it and we do not take it to be sober arguing to say I may not pray for such a man against his sickness because he is sick Or if he were not sick I would pray against his sickness No more is it to say If he were not impenitent so as to refuse our prayers I would pray that he might be saved from his impenitency I confess I do not take my self to have so strict a charge over this sort of men that renounce my oversight as I do over the rest that own it and that 's the reason why I have called no more of them to publike Repentance because it requireth most commonly more time to examine the matter of fact or to deal with the person first more privately that his impenitenc may be discerned then I can possibly spare from the duties which I owe to my special charge to whom I am more indebted and therefore may ordinarily expend no more on the rest who are to me but as strangers or men of another Parish and of no governed particular Church then I can spare when I have done my main duty to my own Flock But yet though I cannot use any such discipline on all that sort nor am so much obliged to do it yet some of them that are most notoriously and openly wicked where less proof and shorter debates are requisite I intend to deal thus with hereafter having found some success in that kind already But specially to all those whom we take for Members of that particular Church which we are Pastors of there is no question but this is our duty And therefore where the whole Parish are members Discipline must be exercised on the whole I confess much prudence is to be exercised in such proceedings least we do more hurt then good but it must be such Christian prudence as ordereth duties and suteth them to their ends and not such carnal prudence as shall enervate or exclude them It may be fit therefore for younger Ministers to consult with others for the more cautelous proceeding in such works And in the performance of it we should deal humbly even when we deal most sharply and make it appear that it is not from any contending or Lordly disposition nor an act of revenge for any injury but a necessary duty which we cannot conscionably avoid And therefore it will be meet that we disclaim all such animosities and shew the people the commands of God obliging us to what we do E. G. Neighbours and Brethren sin is so hateful an evil in the eyes of the most holy God how light
only much more then they have taken for that think it consisteth in making of new Laws or Canons to bind the Church As if God had not made us Laws sufficient and as if he had committed the proper Legislative power over his Church to Ministers or Bishops whose office is but to expound and apply and execute in their places the Laws of Christ Obj. But will you deny to Bishops the power of making Canons What are all those Articles that you have here agreed on among your selves about Catechizing and Discipline but such things Answ 1. I know Pastors may teach and expound Scripture and deliver that in writing to the people and apply the Scripture Generals to their own and the peoples particular cases if you wil cal this making Canons 2. And they may and ought to Agree among themselves for an unanimous performance of their duties when they have discovered it that so they may excite one another and be more strong and successful in their work 3. And they must determine of the Circumstances of worship in special which God hath only determined in General as what time and place they shall meet in what Chapter read what Text preacht on what shape the Table Cups c. shall be where the Pulpit when each person shall come to be catechized or instructed and whither c. But these are actions that are fitter to be ordered by them that are in the place then by distant Canon-makers And to Agree for unity in a necessary duty as we have done is not to make Laws or arrogate Authority over our Brethren Of this I refer you to Luther de Conciliis at large and to Grotius de Imper. sum pot That Canons are not properly Laws CHAP. III. SECT I. HAving spoken of the matter of our work we are next to speak a little of the manner not of each part distinctly least we be too tedious but of the whole in general But specially refering to the principal part 1. The Ministerial work must be managed Purely for God and the salvation of the people and not for any private ends of our own This is our sincerity in it A wrong end makes all the work bad as from us how good soever in it self It s not a serving God but our selves if we do it not for God but for our selves They that set upon this as a common work to make a trade of it for their worldly livelyhood will find that they have chosen a bad trade though a good imployment Self-denyal is of Absolute necessity in every Christian but of a double necessity in a Minister as he hath a double Sanctification or Dedication to God And without self-denyal he cannot do God an hours faithful service Hard studies much knowledge and excellent preaching is but a more glorious hypocritical sinning if the ends be not right The saying of Bernard Serm. in Cant. 26. is commonly known Sunt qui scire volunt co sine tantum ut sciant turpis curiositas est sunt qui scire volunt ut scientiam suam vendant turpis quaest us est sunt qui scire volunt ut sciantur ipsi turpis vanitas est Sed sunt quoque qui scire volunt ut adificent Charitas est sunt qui scire volunt ut aedificentur prudentia est 2. This work must be managed Laboriously and Diligently as being of such unspeakable consequence to others and our selves We are seeking to uphold the world to save it from the curse of God to perfect the Creation to attain the ends of Christs Redemption to save our selves and others from Damnation to overcome the Devil and demolish his Kingdom and to set up the Kingdom of Christ and attain and help others to the Kingdom of Glory And are these works to be done with a careless mind or a lazy hand O see then that this work be done with all your might Study hard for the well is deep and our brains are shallow and as Cassiod Decorum hic est terminum non habere hic honesta probatur ambitio Omne fi quidem scientificum quanto profundius quaeritur tanto gloriosius invenitur But especially be laborious in Practice and exercise of your knowledge Let Pauls words ring in your ears continually Necessity is laid upon me and woe unto me if I preach not the Gospel Still think with your selves what lyeth upon your hands If I do not bestir me Satan may prevail and the people everlastingly perish and their blood be required at my hand And by avoiding Labour and Suffering I shall draw on me a thousand times more then I avoid for as Bernard saith Qui in labore hominum non sunt in labore profecto Daemonum erunt Whereas by present Diligence you prepare for future blessedness For as Gregor in Mor. saith Quot labores veritati nunc exhibes tot etiam remunerationis pignora intra spei tuae cubiculum clausum tenes No man was ever a loser by God 3. This work must be carried on Prudent'y Orderly and by Degrees Milk must go before strong meat The foundation must be first laid before we build upon it Children must not be dealt with as men at age Men must be brought into a state of Grace before we can expect from them the works of Grace The work of Conversion and Repentance from dead works and faith in Christ must be first and frequently and throughly taught The Stewards of Gods houshold must give to each their portion in due season We must not go beyond the capacities of our people ordinarily nor teach them the perfection that have not learned the principles As August saith li. 12. de Civit. Si pro viribus suis alatur infans fiet ut crescendo plus capiat si modum suae capacitatis excedat desicit antequam crescat And as Gregor Nysen saith Orat de Pauper amand As we teach not insants the deep precepts of science but first letters and then syllables c. So also the Guides of the Church do first propound to their hearers certain documents which are as the elements and so by degrees do open to them the more perfect and mysterious matters Therefore did the Church take so much pains with their Catechumeni before they baptized them and would not lay unpolished stones into the building as Chrysost saith Hom. 40. Imperfect operis or who ever else it be p. mihi 318. Aedificatores sunt Sacerdotes qui domum Dei compon unt sicut enim adificatores nodosos lapides habentes torturas ferro dolant postea vero ponunt eos in aedificio alioqui non dolati lapides lapidibus non cohaerent Sic Ecclesiae doctores vitia hominum quasi nodos acutis increpationibus primum circumcidere debent sic in Ecclesiae aedificatione collocare alioquin vitiis manentibus Christiani Christianis concordare non possunt 4. Through the whole course of our Ministery we must insist most upon the Greatest
out their voice and stir up themselves to an earnest utterance But if they do speak loud and earnestly how few do answer it with earnestness of matter and the voice doth little good the people will take it but as meer bauling when the matter doth not correspond It would grieve one to hear what excellent Doctrines some Ministers have in hand and let it die in their hands for want of close and lively application What fit matter they have for convincing sinners and how little they make of it and what a deal of good it might do if it were set home and yet they cannot or will not do it O sirs how plain how close and earnestly should we deliver a message of such a nature as ours is when the everlasting life or death of men is concerned in it Me thinks we are nowhere so wanting as in this seriousness There is nothing more unsuitable to such a business then to be slight and dull What! speak coldly for God! and for mens salvation Can we believe that our people must be converted or condemned and yet can we speak in a drowsie tone In the name of God Brethren labour to awaken your hearts before you come and when you are in the work that you may be fit to waken the hearts of sinners Remember that they must be wakened or damned and a sleepy Preacher will hardly wake them If you give the holy things of God the highest praises in words and yet do it coldly you will seem in the manner to unsay what you said in the matter It is a kind of contempt of great things especially so great to speak of them without great affection and fervency The manner as well as the words must set them forth If we are commanded what ever our hand findeth to do to do it with all our might then certainly such a work as preaching for mens salvation should be done with all our might But alas how few how thin are such men here one and there one even among good Ministers that have an earnest perswading working way or that the people can feel him preach when they hear him SECT VI. 3. IF we are all heartily Devoted to the work of God why do we not compassionate the poor unprovided Congregations about us and take care to help them to able Ministers and in the mean time step out now and then to their assistance when the business of our own particular charge will give us any leave A Lecture in the more ignorant places purposely for the work of conversion performed by the most lively working-preachers might be a great help where constant means is wanting SECT VII 4. THE negligent execution of acknowledged duties doth shew that we be not so wholly Devoted to the work as we should be If there be any work of Reformation to be set a foot how many are there that will go no further then they are drawn And it were well if all would do but that much If any business for the Church be on foot how many neglect it for their own private business when we should meet and consult together for the unanimous and successful performance of our work one hath this business of his own and another that business which must be preferred before Gods business And when a work is like to prove difficult and costly how backward are we to it and make excuses and will not come on For instance What hath been for more talked of and prayed for and contended about in England for many years past then the business of Discipline And there are but few men the Erastians but they seem zealous in disputing for one side or other some for the Prelatical way and some for the Presbyterian and some for the Congregational And yet when we come to the practice of it for ought I see we are most of us for no way It hath made me admire sometimes to look on the face of England and see how few Congregations in the Land have any considerable execution of Discipline and to think withall what volumns they have written for it and how almost all the Ministery of the Nation is engaged for it how zealously they have contended for it and made many a just exclamation against the opposers of it and yet for all this will do little or nothing in the exercise of it I have marvelled what should make them so zealous in siding for that which their practice shews that their hearts are against But I see a disputing zeal is more natural then a holy obedient practizing zeal How many Ministers in England be there that know not their own charge that plead for the truth of their particular Churches and know not which they be or who be members of them and that never cast out one obstinate sinner no nor brought one to publike Confession and expression of Repentance and promise of reformation No nor admonished one publikely to call him to such Repentance But they think they do their duties if they give them not the Sacrament of the Lords Supper when it is perhaps avoided voluntarily by themselves and thousands will keep away themselves without our prohibiting them and in the mean time we leave them stated members of our Churches and grant them all other Communion with the Church and call them not to personal Repentance for their sin Read Albaspinaens a sober Papist in his Observat 1. and 2. and 3. after his Annot on O tatus and see whether Church-Communion in former times was taken to consist only â—n co-partaking of the Lords Supper Either these hundreds that we communicate not with in the Supper are members of our Churches or not If not then we are Separatists while we so much disclaim it for we have not cast them out nor have we called them to any profession whether they own or disown their membership but only whether they will be examined in order to a Sacrament nor do we use to let them know that we take their refusal of Examination for a refusal of Church membership and exclusion of themselves It follows therefore that we have gathered Churches out of Churches before they were unchurched or before we took Gods way to cast any of them much less all of them out But if they are taken for members how can we satisfie our consciences to forbear all execution of Discipline upon them It is not Gods Ordinance that they should be personally rebuked and admonished and then publikely called to Repentance and be cast out if they remain impenitent If these be no duties why have we made such a noise and stir about them in the world as we have done If they be duties why do we not practise them If none of all these persons be scandalous why do we not admit them to the Lords Supper If they keep away themselves is not that a sin which a brother should not be permitted to remain in Is it not a scandal for them to avoid the
have his Peace but not the worlds for he hath foretold us that they will hate us Might not Mr. Bradford or Hooper or any that were burnt in Queen Maries daies have alledged more then this against duty They might have said It will make us hated if we own the Reformation and it will expose our lives to the flames How is he concluded by Christ to be no Christian who hateth not all that he hath and his own life for him and yet we can take the hazard of our life as a reason against his work What is it but hypocrisie to shrink from sufferings and take up none but safe and easie works and make our selves believe that the rest are no duties Indeed this is the common way of escaping suffering to neglect the duty that would expose us thereunto If we did our duty faithfully Ministers should find the same lot among professed Christians as their predecessors have done among the Infidels But if you could not suffer for Christ why did you put your hand to his plough and did not first set down and count your costs This makes the Ministerial work so unfaithfully done because it is so carnally undertaken and men enter upon it as a life of ease and honour and respect from men and therefore resolve to attain their ends and have what they expected by right or wrong They looked not for hatred and suffering and they will avoid it though by the avoiding of their work 2. And as for the making your selves uncapable to do them good I answer That reason is as valid against plain preaching reproof or any other duty which wicked men will hate us for God will bless his own Ordinances to do good or else he would not have appointed them If you admonish and publikely rebuke the scandalous and call men to repentance and cast out the obstinate you may do good to many that you reprove and possibly to the excommunicate I am sure it is Gods means And it is his last means when Reproofs will do no good It is therefore perverse to neglect the last means lest we frustrate the foregoing means when as the last is not to be used but upon supposition that the former were all frustrate before However those within and those without may receive good by it if the offendor do receive none and God will have the honour when his Church is manifestly differenced from the world and the heirs of heaven and hell are not totally confounded nor the world made to think that Christ and Satan do but contend for superiority and that they have the like inclination to holiness or to sin 3. And I would know whether on the grounds of this objection before mentioned all Discipline should not be cast out of the Church atleast ordinarily And so is not this against the Thing it self rather then against the present season of it For this reason is not drawn from any thing proper to our times but common to all times and places Wicked men will alwaies storm against the means of their publike shame and the use of Church censures is purposely to shame them that sin may be shamed and disowned by the Church What age can you name since the daies of the Apostles wherein you would have executed the Discipline that you now refuse if you go on these grounds supposing that it had not been by Magisterial compulsion If therefore it be Discipline it self that hath such intolerable inconveniences why have you so prayed for it and perhaps fought for it and disputed for it as you have done What must all dissenters bear your frowns and censures and all for a work which your selves judge intolerable and dare not touch with one of your fingers When do you look to see all these difficulties over that you may set upon that which you now avoid Will it be in your daies Or will you wait till you are dead and leave it as a part of your Epitaph to posterity that you so deeply engaged and contended for that which you so abhord to the death that you would never be brought to the practice of it And doth not this Objection of yours plainly give up your cause to the Separatists and even tell them that your contending is not for your way of Discipline but that there may be none because it will do more harm then good Certainly if this be true it would have been better to speak it out at first before all our wars and tears and prayers and contentions then now in the conclusion to tell the world that we did all this but for a name or word and that the thing is so far from being worth our cost that it is not tolerable much less desirable 4. But yet let me tell you that there is not such a Lyon in the way as you do imagine nor is Discipline such a useless thing I bless God upon the small and too late tryal that I have made my self of it I can speak by experience it is not vain nor are the hazards of it such as may excuse our neglect But I know that pinching reason is behind They say that When we pleaded for Discipline we meant a Discipline that should be established and imposed by the secular power and without them what good can we do when every man hath leave to despise our censures and set us at nought and therefore we will not meddle with it say they without authority To which I answer 1. I thought it once a scornful indignity that some fellows attempted to put upon the Ministery that denyed them to be the Ministers of Christ and would have had them called the Ministers of the State and dealt with accordingly But it seems they did not much cross the judgements of some of the Ministery themselves who are ready to put the same scorn upon their own calling We are sent as Christs Embassadors to speak in his name and not in the Princes and by his Authority we do our work as from him we have our Commission And shall any of his Messengers question the Authority of his commands The same Power that you have to preach without or against the Magistrates command the same have you to exercise Pastoral Guidance and Discipline without it And should all Ministers refuse preaching if the Magistrate bid them not yea or if he forbid them 2. What mean you when you say you will not do it without Authority Do you mean the Leave or the Countenance and approbation or the Command upon your selves or do you mean a Force or Penalty on the People to obey you The Magistrates Leave we have who hindereth or forbiddeth you to set up Discipline and exercise it faithfully Doth the secular Power forbid you to do it or threaten or trouble you for not doing it No they do not To the shame of the far greatest part of the Ministers of England it must be spoken for we have so opened our own shame that it cannot be
tamen nata sunt quae omnia si non concupiscimus possidemus inquit Minutins Felix p. mihi 397. You lose no great advantage for heaven by becoming poor Qui viam terit eo faelicior quo levior incedit Id. I know where the heart is carnal and covetous words will not wring their money out of their hands They can say all this and more to others but saying is one thing and believing is another But with those that are true believers me thinks such considerations should prevail O what abundance of good might Ministers do if they would but live in a contempt of the world and the riches and glory of it and expend all they have for the best of their Masters use and pinch their flesh that they might have wherewith to do good This would unlock more hearts to the reception of their Doctrine then all their oratory will do and without this singularity in religiousness will seem but hypocrisie and its likely that it is so Qui innocentiam colit Domino supplicat qui hominem periculo surripit opimam victimam caedit Haec nostra sacrificia haec Dei sacra sunt sic apud nos Religiosior est ille qui justior inquit idem Minutius Felix ib. Though we need not do as the Papists that will betake them to Monasteries and cast away Propriety yet we must have nothing but what we have for God SECT X. 6. THE next branch of my Exhortation is that you would maintain your Christian and brotherly Unity and Communion and do as much of Gods work as you can in unanimity and holy concord Blessed be the Lord that it is so well with us in this County in this regard as it is We lose our Authority with our people when we divide They will yield to us when we go together who would resist and contemn the best of us alone Two things in order to this I beseech you to observe The first is that you still maintain your meetings for communion Incorporate and hold all Christian correspondency Grow not strange to one another Do not say that you have business of your own to do when you should be at any such meeting or other work for God It is not only the mutual edification that we may receive by Lectures disputations or conferences though that 's not nothing but it is specially for consultations for the common good and the maintaining of our Communion that we must thus assemble Though your own person might be without the benefit of such meetings yet the Church and our common work requireth them Do not then shew your selves contemners or neglecters of such a necessary work Distance breedeth strangeness and somenteth dividing flames and jealousies which Communion wil prevent or cure It wil be our enemies chiefest plot to divide us that they may weaken us conspire not with the enemies and take not their course And indeed Ministers have need of one another and must improve the gifts of God in one another and the self-sufficient are the most deficient and commonly proud and empty men Some there be that come not among their brethren to do or receive good nor afford them any of their assistance in consultations for the common good and their excuse is only we love to live privately To whom I say why do you not on the same grounds forbear going to Christ and say You love to live privately Is not Ministerial Commnnion a duty as well as common-Christian Communion and hath not the Church always thought so and practised accordingly If you mean that you love your own ease or commodity better then Gods service say so and speak your minds But I suppose there are few of them so silly as to think that is any just excuse though they will give us no better Somewhat else sure lieth at the bottom Indeed some of them are empty men and afraid their weakness should be known when as they cannot conceal it by their folitariness and might do much to heal it by Communion some of them are careless or scandalous men for them we have no desire of their Communion not shall admit it but upon publike Repentance and Reformation Some of them are so in love with their parties and opinions that they will not hold communion with us because we are not of their parties and opinions whereas by Communication they might give or receive better information or at least carry on so much of Gods work in unity as we are agreed in But the mischief of schism is to make men censorious and proud and take others to be unmeet for their communion and themselves to be the only Church or pure Church of Christ The Papists will have no Catholick Church but the Romans and unchurch all beside themselves The Separatists and many Anabaptists say the like of their parties The new prelatical party will have no Catholick Church but Prelatical and unchurch all except their party and so avoid Communion with others and thus turning Separatists and Schismaticks they imitate the Papists and make an opposition to schism their pretence First All must be accounted schismaticks that he not of their opinion and party when yet we find not that opinion in the Creed and they must be avoided because they are Schismaticks But were solve by the grace of God to adhere to more Catholick principles and practices and to have Communion with all Godly Christians that will have Communion with us so far as they force us not to actual sin And for the separating Brethren as by distance they are like to therish misinformations of us so if by their wilful estrangedness and distance any among us do entertain injurious reports of them and think worse of them and deal worse by some of them then there is cause they may partly thank themselves Sure I am by such means as these we are many of us grown so hardened in sin that men make no great matter what they say one against another but stand out of hearing and sight and vent their spleen against each other behind their backs How many jeers and scorns have they among their Companions for those that are against their party and they easily venture be'the matter never so false A bad report of such is easily taken to be true and that which is true is easily made worse when as Seneca saith Multos absolvemus si coeperimus ante judicare quam irasci nunc autem primum impetum sequimur It is passion that tels the tale and that receiveth it The second thing therefore that I intreat of you is that you would be very tender of the Unity and Peace of the Catholick Church not only of your own parties but of the whole And to this end these things will prove necessary 1. Do not too easily introduce any Novelties into the Church either in faith or practice I mean not that which seems a novelty to men that look no further then yesterday for so the restoring
me thinks a little humility should make men ashamed of that common conceit of unquiet spirits viz. That the welfare of the Church doth so lye upon their opinions that they must needs vent and propagate them whatever come of it If they are indeed a living part of the body the hurt of the whole will be so much their own that they cannot desire it for the sake of any party or opinion Were men but impartial to consider in every such case of difference how far their promoting their own judgement may help or hurt the whole they might escape many dangerous waies that are now trod If you can see no where else look in the face of the Churches enemies how they rejoyce and deride us And as Seneca saith to demulce the angry Vide ne inimiciâ— iracundia tua voluptati sit When we have all done I know not what party of us will prove a gayner so true are the old proverbs Dissensio ducum hostium succum And Gaudent praedones dum discordant regiones And is it not a wonder that godly Ministers that know all this how the common adversary derideth us all and what a scandal our divisions are through the world and how much the Church doth lose by it should yet go on and after all the loudest calls and invitations to peace go on still and few if any sound a retreat and seriously call to their Brethren for a retreat Can an honest heart be insensisile of the sad distractions and sadder Apostacies that our divisions have occasioned Saepâ—rixam conclamatum in vicino incendium solvit saith Seneca What scolds so furious that will not give over when the house is on fire over their heads Well if the Lord hath given that evil spirit whose name is Legion such power over the hearts of any that yet they will sit still yea and quarrel at the pacificatory endeavours of others who hunger after the healing of the Church and rather carp and reproach and hinder such works then to help them on I shall say but this to them How diligently soever such men may preach and how pious soever they may seem to be if this way tend to their everlasting peace and if they be not preparing sorrow for themselves then I am a stranger to the way of peace SECT XI 7. THE next branch of my Exhortation is that You would no longer neglect the execution of so much Discipline in your Congregations as it of confessed necessity and right I desire not to sour on any one to an unseasonable performance of the greatest duty But will it never be a fit season Would you forbear Sermons and Sacraments so many years on pretence of unseasonableness Will you have better season for it when you are dead How many are dead already before they ever did any thing in this work that were long preparing for it It is now near three years since many of us here did engage our selves to this duty And have we been faithful in performance of that engagement I know some have more discouragements and hinderances then others But what discouragements can excuse us from such a duty Besides the Reasons that we then considered of let these few be further laid to heart 1. How sad a sign do we make it to be in our preaching to our people to live in the willful continued omission of any known duty And shall we do so even year after year and all our daies If excuses will take off the danger of this sign what man will not find them as well as you Read Amesius medul cap. 37. de Disciplin Eccles Gelespi's Aarons rod with Rutherford and many more that are written to prove the Need and Dueness of Discipline saith Ames ib. sect 5. Immo peccat in Christum authorem ac institutorem quisquis non facit quod in se est ad hanc Disciplinam in Ecclesiis Dei constituendam promovendam And do you think it safe to live and dye in such a known sin 2. You gratifie the present designs of dividers whose business is to unchurch us and unchristen us to prove our Parishes no true Churches and our selves no baptized Christians For if you take them for people uncapable of Discipline they must be uncapable of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper and other Church-Communion and then they are no Church And so you will plainly seem to preach meerly as they do to gather Churches where there were none before And indeed if that be your case that your people are not Christians and you have no particular Churches and so are no Pastors tell us so and manifest it and we shall not blame you 3. We do manifest plain laziness and sloath if not unfaithfulness in the work of Christ I speak from experience It was laziness that kept me off so long and pleaded hard against this duty It is indeed a troublesom and painful work and such as calls for some self-denyal because it will cast us upon the displeasure of the wicked But dare we preferr our carnal ease and quietness and the love or peace of wicked men before our service to Christ our Master Can sloathful servants look for a good reward Remember Brethren that we of this County have thus Promised before God in the second Article of our Agreement We agree and resolve by Gods help that so far as God doth make known our duty to us we will faithfully endeavour to discharge it and will not desist through any fears or losses in our estates or the frowns and displeasure of men or any the like carnal inducements whatsoever I pray you study this promise and compare your performance with it And do not think that you were ensnared by thus engaging for Gods Law hath laid an obligation on you to all the same duty before your engagement did it Here is nothing but what others are bound to as well as you 4. The Ministery that are for the Presbyterian Government have already by their common neglect of the execution made those of the separating way believe that they do it in a meer carnal compliance with the unruly part of the people that while we exasperate them not with our Discipline we might have them on our side And we should do nothing needless that hath so great an appearance of evil and is so scandalous to others It was the sin and ruine of many of the Clergy of the last times to please and comply with them that they should have reproved and corrected by unfaithfulness in preaching and neglect of Discipline 5. The neglect of Discipline hath a strong tendency to the deluding of souls by making them think they are Christians that are not while they are permitted to live in the reputation of such and be not separated from the rest by Gods Ordinance and it may make the scandalous to think their sin a tolerable thing which is so tolerated by the Pastors of the Church 6. We do corrupt Christianity if self in
yet because Ministers have laid the stress of that examination upon the meer necessity of fitness for that Ordinance and not upon their common duty to see the state and proficiency of each member of their Flock at all fit seasons and upon the peoples duty to submit to the guidance and instruction of the Pastors at all times they have therefore occasioned people ignorantly to quarrel against their examinations and call for the proof Whereas it is an easie thing to prove that any Schollar in Christs School is bound at any time to be accountable to his Teachers and to obey them in all lawful things in order to their own edification and salvation though it may be more difficult to prove a necessity that a Minister must so examine them in order to the Lords Supper any more then in order to a day of Thanksgiving or a Lords day or the Baptizing of their children Now by this course we shall discern their fitness in an unquestionable way 7. ANother Benefit will be this We shall by this means be the better enabled to help our people against their particular temptations and we shall much better prevent their entertainment of any particular errors or heresies or their falling into Schism to the hazard of themselves and the Church For men will freelyer open their thoughts and scruples to us and if they are infected already or inclined to any errour or schism they will be ready to discover it and so may receive satisfaction before they are past cure And familiarity with their Teachers will the more encourage them to open their doubts to them at any other time The common cause of our peoples infections and heresies is the familiarity of Seducers with them and the strangeness of their own Pastors When they hear us only in publike and hear Seducers frequently in private unsaying all that we say and we never know it or help them against it this fettleth them in heresies before we are aware of it Alas our people are most of them so weak that whoever hath 1. Most interest in their estimations and affections and 2. Most opportunity in private frequent conferences to instill his opinions into them of that mans religion will they ordinarily be It is pity then that we should let deceivers take such opportunities to undo them and we should not be as industrious and use our advantages to their good We have much advantage against Seducers in many respects if our negligence and their diligence did not frustrate them 8. ANother and one of the greatest Benefits of our work will be this It will better inform men of the true nature of the Ministerial office or awaken them to better consideration of it then is now usual It is now too common for men to think that the work of the Ministery is nothing but to preach well and to Baptize and administer the Lords Supper and visit the sick and by this means the people will submit to no more and too many Ministers are negligently or wilfully such strangers to their own calling that they will do no more It hath oft grieved my heart to observe some eminent able Preachers how little they do for the saving of souls save only in the Pulpit and to how little purpose much of their labour is by this neglect They have hundreds of people that they never spoke a word to personally for their salvation and if we may judge by their practice they take it not for their duty and the principal thing that hardeneth men in this oversight is the common neglect of the private part of the work by others There are so few that do much in it and the omission is grown so common among pious able men that they have abated the disgrace of it by their parts and a man may now be guilty of it without any common observance or dishonour Never doth sin so reign in a Church or State as when it hath gained reputation or at least is no disgrace to the sinner nor a matter of any offence to beholders But I make no doubt through the mercy of God but the restored practice of personal oversight will convince many Ministers that this is as truly their work as that which they now do and may awaken them to see that the Ministery is another kind of business then too many excellent Preachers do take it to be Brethren do but set your selves closely to this work and follow on diligently and though you do it silently without any words to them that are negligent I am in hope that most of you here may live to see the day that the neglect of private personal Oversight of all the Flock shall be taken for a scandalous and adious omission and shall be as disgraceful to them that are guilty of it as preaching but once a day was heretofore A School master must not only read a common Lecture but take a personal account of his Scholars or else he is like to do little good If Physicians should only read a publike Lecture of Physick their patients would not be much the better for them Nor would a Lawyer secure your estate by reading a Lecture of Law The charge of a Pastor requireth personal dealing as well as any of these Let us shew the world this by our practise for most men are grown regardless of bare words The truth is we have been occasioned exceedingly to wrong the Church in this by the contrary extream of the Papists who bring all their people to Auricular confession For in the overthrowing of this error of theirs we have run into the contrary extream and led our people much further into it then we are gone our selves It troubled me to read in an Orthodox Historian that licentiousness and a desire to be from under the strict enquiries of the Priests in Confession did much further the entertainment of the Reformed Religion in Germany And yet its like enough to be true that they that were against Reformation in other respects yet partly for the change and partly on that licentious account might joyn with better men in crying down the Romish Clergy But by this means lest we should seem to favour the said Auricular Confession we have too commonly neglected all personal instruction except when we occasionally fall into mens company few make it a stated part of their work I am past doubt that the Popish Auricular Confession is a sinful novelty which the antient Church was unacquainted with But perhaps some will think strange that I should say that our common neglect of personal Instruction is much worse if we consider their Confessions in themselves and not as they respect their connexed Doctrines of satisfaction and purgatory Many of the Southern and Eastern Churches do use a Confession of sin to the Priest And how far Mr. Tho. Hocker in his Souls Preparat and other Divines do ordinarily require it as necessary or useful is well known If any among us should be
guilty of this gross mistake as to think when he hath preached he hath done all his work let us shew him to his face by our practice of the rest that there is much more to be done and that taking heed to all the Flock is another business then careless lazy Ministers do consider of If a man have the least apprehension that duty and the chiefest duty is no duty he is like to neglect it and be impenitent in the neglect 9. ANother singular Benefit which we may hope for from the faithful performance of this work is that It will help our people better to understand the nature of their duty towards their Overseers and consequently to discharge it better Which were no matter if it were only for our sakes but their own salvation is very much concerned in it I am confident by sad experience that it is none of the least impediments to their happiness and to a true Reformation of the Church that the people understand not what the work and power of a Minister is and what their own duty towards them is They commonly think that a Minister hath no more to do with them but to preach to them and visit them in sickness and administer Sacraments and that if they hear him and receive the Sacrament from him they owe no further obedience nor can he require any more at their hands Little do they know that the Minister is in the Church as the Schoolmaster in his School to teach and take an account of every one in particular and that all Christians ordinarily must be Disciples or Scholars in some such School They think not that a Minister is in the Church as a Physician in a Town for all people to resort to for personal advice for the curing of all those diseases that are fit to be brought to a Physician and that the Priests lips must preserve knowledge and the people must ask the Law at their mouths because he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts And that every soul in the Congregation is bound for their own safety to have personal recourse to him for the resolving of their doubts and for help against their sins and for direction in duty and for increase of knowledge and all saving grace and that Ministers are purposely settled in Congregations to this end to be still ready to advise and help the Flock If our people did but know their duty they would readily come to us when they are desired to be instructed and to give an account of their knowledge faith and lives and they would come themselves without sending for and knock oftner at our doors and call for advice and help for their souls and ask What shall we do to be saved Whereas now the matter is come to that sad pass that they think a Minister hath nothing to do with them and if he admonish them they will bid him look to himself he shall not answer for them and if he call them to be Catechized or instructed or to be prepared for the Lords Supper or other holy Ordinance or would take an account of their faith and profiting they will ask him By what authority he doth these things and think that he is a busie pragmatical fellow that loves to be medling where he hath nothing to do or a proud fellow that would bear rule over their consciences When they may as well ask him By what authority he preacheth or prayeth for them or giveth them the Sacrament or they may as well ask a School-master By what authority he cals his Scholars to learn or say their lesson Or a Physitian By what authority he enjoyment them to take his Medicine people consider not that all our authority is but for our work even a Power to do our duty and our work is for them so that it is but an authority to do them good And the silly wretches do talk no wiselyer then if they should thus quarrel with a man that would held to quench the fire in their thatch and ask him By what authority he doth it Or that would give his money to relieve the poor and they should ask him By what authority do you require us to take this money Or as if I offered my hand to one that is fallen to help him up or to one that is in the water to save him from drowning and he should ask me By what authority I do it Truly we have no wiser nor thankfuller dealing from these men Nay it is worse in that we are doubly obliged both by Christian Charity and the Ministerial office to do them good I know not of any Simile that doth more aptly express the Ministerial power and duty and the peoples duty then these two conjunct viz. even such as a Physician is in an Hospital that hath taken the charge of it and such as a School-master is in his School especially such as the Philosophers or teachers of any science or art whose Schools have the aged and voluntary members as well as children Christs hath all ages even such is a Minister in the Church and such is their work and their authority to do it and the duty of the people to submit thereto allowing such differences as the subject requireth And what is it that hath brought people to this ignorance of their duty but custom It s long of us Brethren to speak truly and plainly its long of us that have not used them nor our selves to any more then the common publike work We see how much custom doth with the people Where it is the custom they stick not among the Papists at the confessing of all their sins to the Priest And because it is not the custom among us they disdain to be questioned catechized or instructed They wonder at it as a strange thing and say such things were never done before And if we can but prevail to make this duty become as usual as other duties they will much more easily submit to it then now What a happy thing would it be if you might live to see the day that it should be as ordinary for people of all ages to come in course to their Teachers for personal advice and help for their salvation as it is now usual for them to come to Church or as it is for them to send their children thither to be Catechized Our diligence in this work is the way to do this 10. MOreover our practice will give the Governors of the Nation some better information about the nature and burden of the Ministery and so may procure their further assistance It is a lamentable impediment to the Reformation of the Church and the saving of souls that in most populous Congregations there is but one or two men to over-see many thousand souls and so there are not labourers in any measure answerable to the work but it becomes an impossible thing to them to do any considerable measure of that personal duty which should be done
Reformation And this Covenant we made as in the presence of God the searcher of all hearts with a true intention to perform the same as we shall answer at the great day when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed O dreadful case then that we have put our selves into if infinite mercy help us not out May we not say after the reading of this as Iosiâ—h after the reading oâ— the Law a Kings 22. 13. 2 Chron. 34. 21. Great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us because we have not done according to this Covenant Could a people have devised a readrer way to thrust themselves under the curse of God by such a solemn dreadful Covenant and when they have done so long so wilfully so openly to violate it Doth not this plainly bind us to the private as well as the publike part of our duty and to a Real Reformation of Discipline in our practice Again therefore I must needs say what a bottomless depth of deceit is the heart of man O what heavy charges have we brought against many others of these times for breaking this solemn Vow and Covenant from which I am far from undertaking to acquit them when yet we that led the way and drew on others and daily preach't up Reformation and Discipline have so horribly violated this Covenant our selves that in a whole Countrey it is rare to find a Minister that hath set up Discipline or private Instruction And he that can see much done towards it in England hath more acquaintance or better eyes then I have 2. Also in our frequent solemn Humiliation days in the time of our deep distress and fear how publikely and earnestly did we beg deliverances not as for our sakes but for the Church and Gospel sake as if we had not cared what had become of us so that the Reformation of the Church might go on and we promised if God would hear and deliver us what we would do towards it But O how unfaithful have we been to those Promises as if we were not the same men that ever spoke such words to God! I confess it filleth my own soul with shame to consider the unanswerableness of my affections and Endeavours to the many fervent prayers rare deliverances and confident Promises of those years of advesity And such experiences of the almost incredible unfaithfulness of our hearts is almost enough to make a man never trust his heart again and Consequently to shake his Certainty of sincerity Have we now or are we like to have any higher Resolutions then those were which we have broken And it tends also to make us question in the next extremity even at the hour of death whether God will hear and help us any more who have forfeited our Credit with him by proving so unfaithful If so many years publike humiliations spurred on by such calamities as neither we nor our fathers for many Generations had ever seen had no more in them then now appears and if this be the issue of all how can we tell how to believe our selves hereafter It may makes us fear lest our case be like the Israelites Psal 78. 34 35 36 37 43 42 57. Who when he slew them then they sought him and they returned and enquired early after God and they remembred that God was their Rock and the high God their Redeemer Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth and they lyed unto him with their tongues For their heart was not right with God neither were they stedfast in his Covenant They remembred not his hand nor the day when he delivered them from the Enemy But turned back and dealt unfaithfully like their fathers they were turned aside like a deceitful bow 3. Moreover if we will not be faithful in duties that we are engaged to our own Agreements and Engagements which remain subscribed by our hands and are published to the view of the world will rise up in judgement against us and condemn us We have engaged our selves under our hands near three years ago that we will set up the exercise of Discipline and yet how many have neglected it to this day without giving any just and reasonable excuse We have now subscribed another Agreement and Engagement for Catechizing and Instructing all that will submit We have done well so far But if now we should flag and prove remiss and superficial in the performance Our subscriptions will condemn us this days humiliation will condemn us Be not deceived God is not mocked it is not your Names only but your hearts and hands also that he requireth There is no dallying with God by feigned Promises He will expect that you be as good as your words He will not hold him guiltless that by false Oaths or Vows or Covenants with him doth take his holy Name in vain When thou vowest a vow unto God defer not to pay it for he hath no pleasure in fools pay that which thou hast vowed Better it is that thou shouldst not vow then that thou shouldst vow and not pay suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin neither say thou before the Angel that it was an Error wherefore should God be angry at thy voice and destroy the work of thy hands Eccless 5 4 5 6. And thus I have shewed you what will come on it if you shall not set your selves faithfully to this work to which you have so many obligations and engagements and what an unexcusable thing our neglect would be and how great and manifold a condemnation it would expose us to Truly Brethen if I did not apprehend the work to be of exceeding great moment to your selves to the people and to the honour of God I would not have troubled you with so many words about it nor have presumed to have spoken so sharply as I have done But when it is for life and death men are apt to forget their reverence and courtefie and complements commonly called Good manners For my part I apprehend this as one of the best and greatest works that ever I put mine hand to in my life And I verily think that your thoughts of it are as mine and then you will not think my words too many or too keen I can well remember the time when I was earnest for the Reformation of matters of Ceremony and if I should be cold in such a substantial matter as this how disorderly and disproportionable would my Zeal appear Alas can we think that the Reformation is wrought when we cast out a few Ceremonies and changed some vestures and gestures and forms O no Sirs it is the converting and saving of souls that is our business That 's the chiefest part of the Reformation that doth most good and tendeth most to the salvation of the people Let others take it how they will I will so far speak my conscience for your just encouragement as to say again that I am verily perswaded that as you are happily
agreed and combined for this work so if you will but faithfully execute this Agreement together with your former Agreement for Discipline you will do much more for a true Reformation and that peaceably without meddling with controverted points then I have heard of any part of England to have done before you and yet no more than is unquestionably your Duty SECT VI. I Am next to answer some of those Objections which backward minds may cast in our way And 1. some may object that this course will take up so much time that a man shall have no time to follow his studies Most of us are young and raw and have need of much time to improve our own abilities which this course will prohibit us To which I answer 1. We suppose them whom we perswade to this work to understand the substance of the Christian Religion and to be able to teach it others And the addition of lower and less necessary things is not to be preferr'd before this needful communication of the fundamentals I highly value common knowledge and would not encourage any to set light by it But I value the saving of souls before it That work which is next the end must be done whatever be undone It s a very desirable thing for a Physician to be throughly studied in his art and to be able to see the reason of his experiments and to resolve such difficult controversies as are before him But if he had the charge of an Hospital or lived in a City that had the raging Pestilence if he would be studying de fermentaticaâ— de circulatione sanguinis de vesicule chyli de instrumentis sanguificationis and such like excellent useful points when he should be looking to his patients and saving mens lives and should turn them away and let them perish and tell them that he cannot have while to give them advice because he must follow his own studies I should take that man for a preposterous student that preferr'd the remote means before the end it self of his studies and indeed I should think him but a civil kind of Murderer Mens souls may be saved without knowing whether God did predetermine the creature in all its acts whether the understanding necessarily determines the wil whether God works Grace in a Physical or Moral way of causation What free-will is Whether God have scientiam mediam Or positive decrees de malo culpae with a hundred such like which are the things that you would be studying when you should be saving souls Get well to heaven and help your people thither and you shall know all these things in a moment and a thousand more which now by all your studies you can never know and is not this the most expeditious certain way to knowledg 2. If you grow not extensively in knowlege you will by this way of diligent practice obtain the intensive more excellent growth If you know not so many things as others you will know the great things better then they For this serious dealing with sinners for their salvation will help you to far deeper apprehensions of their saving principles then will be got by any other means And a little more of the knowledge of these is worth all the other knowledge in the world O when I am looking heaven-ward and gazing towards the inaccessible light and aspiring after the knowledge of God and find my soul so dark and distant that I am ready to say I know not God he is above me quite out of my reach this is the most killing and grievous Ignorance One thinks I could willingly exchange all other knowledge that I have for one glimpse more of the knowledge of God and the life to come O that I had never known a word in Logick Metaphysicks c. Nor known what ever School-men said so I had but one spark more of that light that would shew me the things that I must shortly see For my part I conceive that by serious talking of everlasting things and teaching the Creed and shortest Catechism you may grow more in knowledge though not in the knowledge of more things and prove much wiser men then if you spent that time in common or curious less necessary things 3. Yet let me add that though I count this the chief I would have you to have more because those subservient sciences are very useful and therefore I say that you may have competent time for both Lose none upon vain recreations and employn ents Trifle not away a minute Consume it not in needless sleep Do that you do with all your might and then see whether you have not a competent time If you set apart but two daies in a week in this great work that we are Agreed on you may find some for common studies out of all the other five 4. Duties are to be taken together the greatest to be preferr'd but none to be neglected that can be performed not one to be pleaded against another but each to know its profession but if there were such a case of Necessity that we could not read for our selves in the course of our further studies and Instruct the Ignorant both I would throw by all the Libraries in the world rather then be guilty of the perdition of one soul or at least I know that this is my duty Obj. 2. But this course will destroy the health of our bodies by continual spending the spirits allowing us no time for necessary recreations and it will woolly lock us up from any civil friendly visitations so that we must never stir from home nor take our delight at home one day with our friends for the relaxation of our minds but as we shall seem discourteous and morose to others so we shall tire our selves and the bow that is still bent will be in danger of breaking at last Answ 1. This is the meer plea of the flesh for its own interest The sluggard saith there is a Lyon in the way He will not plough because of the cold There is no duty of moment and self-denyal but if you consult with flesh and blood it will give you as wise reasons as these against it Who would ever have been burnt at a stake for Christ if this reasoning had been good Yea or who would ever have been a Christian 2. We may take time for necessary Recreation for all this An hour or half an hours walk before meat is as much Recreation as is of necessity for the health of most of the weaker sort of students I have reason to know somewhat of this by long experience Though I have a body that hath languished under great weaknesses many years and my diseases have been such as require as much exercise as almost any in the world and I have found exercise the principal means of my preservation till now and therefore have as great reason to plead for it as any man that I know alive yet I have found that the
of our work There is nothing therefore from God from the spirit from right reason to cause us to make any question of our work or to be unwilling to it But from the world from the flesh and the Devil we shall have much and more perhaps then we yet expect But against temptations if we have recourse to God and look on his great Obligations on one side and the hopeful Effects and Reward on the other we shall see that we have little cause to draw back or to faint Let us set before us this pattern in the text and learn our duty thence and imitate it From Vers 19. To serve the Lord and not men or our selves with all humility of mind and not proudly and with many tears c. Vers 20. To keep back nothing that is profitable to the people and to Teach them publikely and from house to house Vers 21. That the matter of our preaching be Repentance towards God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ Vers 22 23 24. That though we go bound in the spirit not knowing particularly what shall befall us but knew that every where bonds and afflictions do abide us yet none of these things should move us neither should we count our Life dear to our selves so that we might finish our course with joy and the Ministry which we have received of the Lord Jesus to testifie the Gospel of the grace of God From Vers 28 To take heed to our selves and all the flock particularly against domestick Seducers and Schisms From Verse 31. Without ceasing to warn every one day and night with tears Vers 3. 3. To covet no mans silver or gold or apparrel as counting it more honourable to give then to receive O what a lesson is here before us But how ill is it learned by those that still question whether these be their duty I confess some of these words of Paul have so often been presented before mine eyes and stuck upon my conscience that I have been much convinced by them of my duty and neglect And I think this one speech better deserveth a twelve-moneths study then most things that young students do lay out their time in O Brethren write it on your study doors or set it as your Copy in Capital letters still before your eyes Could we but well learn two or three lines of it What preachers should we be 1. For our general business SERVING THE LORD WITH ALL HUMILITY OF MIND 2. Our special work TAKE HEED TO YOUR SELVES AND TO ALL THE FLOCK 3. Our Doctrine REPENTANCE TOWARDS GOD AND FAITH TOWARD OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST 4. The place and manner of Teaching I HAVE TAUGHT YOU PUBLIKELY AND FROM HOUSE TO HOUSE 5. The Object and internal manner I CEASED NOT TO WARN EVERY ONE NIGHT AND DAY WITH TEARS This is it that must win souls and preserve them 6. His innocency and self-denyal for the advantage of the Gospel I HAVE COVETED NO MANS SILVER OR GOLD 7. His patience NONE OF THESE THINGS MOVE ME NEITHER COUNT I MY LIFE DEAR 8. And among all our motives these have need to be in Capital letters before our eyes 1. We oversee and feed THE CHURCH OF GOD WHICH HE HATH PURCHASED WITH HIS OWN BLOOD 2. GRIEVOUS WOLVES SHALL ENTER IN AMONG YOU NOT SPARING THE FLOCK and OF YOUR OWN SELVES SHALL MEN ARISE SPEAKING PERVERSE THINGS TO DRAW AWAY DISCIPLES AFTER THEM Write all this upon your hearts and it will do your selves and the Church more good then twenty years study of those lower things which though they get you greater applause in the world yet separated from these will make you but sounding brass and tinkling Cymbals The great advantage of a sincere heart is that God and Glory and the saving of souls are their very end and where that end is truly intended no labour or suffering will stop them or turn them back For a man must have his end whatever it cost him He still retains this lesson whatever he forget ONE THING IS NECESSARY and Seek first the Kingdom of God and therefore saies Necessity is laid upon me and wo unto me if I preach not the Gospel And this is it that will most effectually make easie all our labours and make light all burdens and make our sufferings seem tollerable and cause us to venture on any hazards in the way That which I once made the Motto of my colours in another warfare I desire may be still before my eyes in this which yet according to my intentions is not altogether another On one side He that saveth his life shall lose it On the other Nic propter vitam vivendi perdere causas Which Doctor Io. Reignolds thought had reason enough in it to hold him to his labours though it cost him his life He that knoweth that he serveth a God that will never suffer any man to be a loser by him need not fear what hazards he runs in his cause And he that knows that he seeks a prize which if obtained will infinitely over-match his cost may boldly engage his whole estate on it and sell all to purchase so rich a Pearl Well Brethren I will spend no more words in exhorting wise Merchants to such a bargain nor telling Teachers themselves of such common Truths and If I have said more then needs already I am glad I hope now I may take it for granted that you are Resolved of the utmost diligence and fidelity in the work On which supposition I shall now proceed CHAP. VII SECT 1. Directions for the right managing this Work IT is so happy a work which we have before us that it is a thousand pities it should be destroyed in the birth and perish in our hands And though I know that we have a knotty generation to deal with and that its past the power of any of us all to change a carnal heart without the effectual grace of the Holy-Ghost yet it is so usual with God to work by means and to bless the right endeavors of his servants that I cannot fear but great things will be done and a wonderful blow will be given to the Kingdom of Darkness by our undertaken work if it do not miscarry through the fault of the Ministers themselves And the main danger is in these two defects 1. Of diligence 2. Of skill Against the former I have spoken much already As for the later I am so conscious of my own unskilfulness that I am far from imagining that I am fit to give directions to any but the younger and unexperienced of the Ministry and therefore must expect so much Justice in your interpretation as that you will suppose me now to speak to none but such But yet something I shall say and not pass over this part in silence because the number of such is so great and I am so apprehensive that the welfare of the Church and Nation doth much depend on the management of this work The points wherein you
have need to be solicitous are these two 1. To bring your people to submit to this course of private Catechizing or Instruction For if they will not come at you what good can they receive 2. To do the work so as may most tend to the success of it when they do come to you And for the first the best directions that I can give are these following 1. The chief means of all is for a Minister so to behave himself in the main course of his Ministry and life as may tend to convince his people of his ability sincerity and unfeigned Love to them For if they take him to be ignorant they will despise his Teaching and think themselves as wise as he And if they think him self-seeking or hypocritical and one that doth not mean as he saith they will suspect all that he saith and doth for them and will not be regardful of him And if they think he intendeth but to domineer over their consciences and to trouble and disgrace them or meerly to exercise their wits and memories they will flie away from him as an adversary and from his endeavours as noxious and ungrateful to them Whereas when they are convinced that he understandeth what he doth and have high thoughts of his abilities they will Reverence him and the easilyer stoop to his advice And when they are perswaded of his uprightness they will the less suspect his motions And when they perceive that he intendeth no private ends of his own but meerly their good they will the sooner be perswaded by him And because those that I write to are supposed to be none of the most able Ministers and therefore may despair of being reverenced for their parts I say to such 1. You have the more need to study and labour for their increase 2. You must necessarily have that which Amesius makes the lowest degree tollerable viz. to be supra vulgus fidelium and it will produce some reverence when they know you are wiser then themselves 3. And that which you want in ability must be made up in the other qualifications and then your advice may be as successful as others If Ministers were content to purchase an interest in their people at the dearest rates to their own flesh and would condescend to them and be familiar and loving and prudent in their carriage and abound according to their ability in good works they might do much more with their people then ordinarily they can do Not that we should much regard an interest in them for our own sakes but that we may be more capable of promoting the interest of Christ and of furthering their own salvation Were it not for their own sakes it were no great matter whether they love or hate us but what Commander can do any great service by an Army that hate him and how can we think that they will much regard our counsel while they abhor or dis-regard the persons that give it them Labour therefore for some competent interest in your peoples estimation and affection and then you may the better prevail with them Obj. But what should a Minister do that findeth he hath quite lost his interest in them An. If they be so vile a people that they hate him not for any weakness nor through mis-reports about particular things but meerly for endeavouring their good though in prudence as well as zeal and would hate any other that should do his duty then must he in patience and meekness continue to instruct these that oppose themselves if God peradventure will give them Repentance to the acknowledgement of the truth But if it be upon any weaknesses of his or difference in lesser opinions or prejudice meerly against his own person let him try first to remove the prejudice by all lawful means and if he cannot let him tell them It is not for my self but for you that I labour and therefore seeing that you will not obey the word from me I desire that you will agree to accept of some other that may do you that good which I cannot and so leave them and try whether another man may not be fitter for them and he fitter for another people For an ingenious man can hardly stay with a people against their wills and a sincere man can more hardly for any Commodity of his own remain in a place where he is like to be unprofitable to hinder the good which they might receive from another man who hath the advantage of a greater interest in their estimation and affection 2. Supposing then this general preparation the next thing to be done is To use the most effectual means to convince them of the Benefit and Necessity of this course to their own souls The way to win the consent of any man to any thing that you offer is to prove it to be good for him and to do this in Evidence that hath some fitness and proportion with his own understanding For if you cannot make him believe that it is Good or Necessary for him he will never let it down but spit it out with loathing or contempt You must therefore preach to them some effectual convincing Sermons to this purpose beforehand which shall fully shew them the Benefit and Necessity of Knowledge of Divine truths in General and of Knowing the Principles in special and that the Aged have the same duty and need as others and in some respects much more E. G. from Heb. 5. 12. which affordeth us many observations suitable to our present business As 1. That Gods Oracles must be a mans Lessons 2. Minsters must teach these and people must learn them of them 3. The Oracles of God have some Principle or fundamentals that all must know that will be saved 4. These Principles must be first learned that 's the right order 5. It may be well expected that people thrive in knowledge according to the means or teaching which they profess and if they do not it is their great sin 6. If any lived long in the Church under the means of knowledge and yet be ignorant of these Principles he hath need to be taught them yet how old soever he be All this is plain from the Text Whence we have fair opportunity by twenty clear convincing Reasons to shew them 1. The Necessity of knowing Gods Oracles 2. And more especially of the Principles And 3. especially for the aged that have sinfully lost so much time already that have so long promised to repent when they were old that should be teachers to the younger whose ignorance is a double sin and shame who have so little time to learn in and are so near their Judgement and who have souls to save or lose as well as others c. Convince them how impossible it is to go the way to heaven without knowing it when there are so many difficulties and enemies in our way and when men cannot do their worldly business without knowledge nor learn a trade without
then hazard it and that it is your daily principal business to seek it Can you truly say that though you have your failings and sins yet your main care and the bent of your whole life is to please God and enjoy him for ever and that you give the world Gods leavings as it were and not God the worlds leavings and that your worldly business is but as a travellers seeking for provision in his jorney and heaven is the place that you take for your home If he say yea to the first and third tell him how great a thing it is for a mans heart to abhor his sin and to lay up his happiness unfeignedly in another world and to live in this world for another that is out of sight And therefore desire him to see that it be so indeed If he say yea to the second question then turn to the ninth tenth eleventh or twelfth Articles of the Catechism and read over some of those Duties which you most suspect him to omit and ask him Whether he do perform such or such a duty Especially Prayer in a family or private and the holy spending of all the Lords day because these are of so great moment of which anon Direction 7. When you have either by former discovery of gross ignorance or by these later enquiries into his spiritual state discerned an apparent probability that the person is yet in an unconverted state your next business is to fall on with all your skill and power to bring his heart to the sense of his condition E. G. Truly neighbours I have no mind the Lord knows to make your condition worse then it is nor to put any causless fear or trouble into your mind but I suppose you would take me but for a flattering enemy and not a faith ful friend if I should daub with you and not tell you the truth If you sought to a Physitian in your sickness you would have him tell you the truth though it were the worst Much more here For there the knowledge of your disease may by fears increase it but here you must know it or else you can never be recovered from it I much fear that you are yet a stranger to the new life of all them that Christ will save For if you were a Christian indeed and truly converted your very heart would have been set on God and the life to come and you would have admired the riches of grace in Christ and you would have made it your business to prepare for Everlasting and you durst not you would not live in any wilful sin nor in the neglect of such duties Alas what have you done how have you spent your time till now Did you not know that you had a soul to save or lose and that you must live in heaven or hell for ever and that you had your life and time in this world for that purpose to prepare for another Alas what have you been doing all this while that you are so ignorant or so unprepared for death if it should now find you If you had but had as much mind of heaven as of earth you would have known more of it and done more of it and enquired more diligently after it then you have done You can learn how to do your business in the world and why could you not have learned more of the will of God if you had but minded it You have neighbours that could learn more that have had as much to do in the world as you and as little time Do you think that heaven is not worth your labour or that its like it can be had without any care or pains when you cannot have the trifles of this world without and when God hath bid you first seek his Kingdom and the righteousness thereof Alas Neighbour what if you had dyed before this hour in an unconverted state what had become of you and where had you now been why you did not know all this while that you should live a day to an end O that ever you would be so cruel to your selves as to venture your Everlasting state so desperately as you have done what did you think of Did you not all this while know that you must shortly dye and be judged as you were then found Had you any greater work to do or any greater business to mind then your salvation Do you think that all that you can get in this world will comfort you at a dying hour or purchase your salvation or ease the pains of Hell-fire Set these things home with a more earnest voice then the former part of your conference was managed with For if you get it not to heart you do little or nothing and that which affecteth not is soon forgotten Direct 8. Next this conclude the whole with a Practical Exhortation which must contain two parts First the duty of the heart in order to a closure with Christ and that which is contained in that closure and Secondly The use of external means for the time to come and the avoiding of former sins E. g. Neighbour I am heartily sorry to find you in so sad a case but I should be more sorry to leave you in it and therefore let me intreat you for the Lords sake and for your own sake to to regard what I shall say to you as to the time to come It is the Lords great mercy that he did not cut you off in your unconverted natural state and that you have yet life and time and that there is a sufficient Remedy provided for your soul in the blood of Christ and he is yet offered with Pardon and life to you as well as any others God hath not left sinful man to utter desperation for want of a Ransom by a Redeemer as he hath done the Devils nor hath he made any exception in the offer or promise of pardon and life against you any more then against any other If you had yet but a bleeding heart for sin and could come to Christ believingly for recovery and resign your selves to him as your Saviour and Lord and would be a new man for the time to come the Lord will have mercy on you in the pardon of your sins and the saving of your soul And I must tell you that as it must be the great work of Gods grace to give you such a heart so if ever he mean to pardon and save you he will make this change upon you that I have before mentioned he will make you feel your sin as the heaviest burden in the world as that which is most odious in it self and hath laid you open to the Curse of God he will make you see that you are a lost man and that there is no way but one with you even everlasting damnation unless you are pardoned by the blood of Christ and sanctified by his spirit he will you make you see the need you have of Christ and how much you are
the true Church How know you the Scripture to be the word of God What is Christs Priestly Prophetical Kingly office Be they three offices or but one and be they all with abundance the like And if it be Sacrament Controversies which he raiseth tell him it is necessary that you be first agreed what Baptism is what the Lords Supper is before you dispute who should be Baptized c. And its twenty to one he is not able truly to tell you what the Sacrament it self is A true Definition of Baptism or the Lords Supper is not so commonly given as pretended to be given 4. If he discover his Ignorance in the cases propounded endeavour to humble him in the sense of his pride and presumption And let him know what it is and what it signifieth to go about with a Teaching Contentious proud behaviour while he is indeed so ignorant in things of greater moment 5. But see that you are able to give him better information your selves in the points wherein you find him ignorant 6. But specially take care that you discern the spirit of the man And if he be a setled perverse Schismatick or Heretick so that you see him peremptory and resolved and quite transported with pride and have no great hopes of his recovery then do all this that I have before said openly before all that are present that he may be humbled or shamed before all and the rest may be confirmed But if you find him godly and temperate and that there is any hope of his reduction then see that you do all this privately between him and you only and let not fall any bitter words nor that tend to his disparagement And thus I advise both because we must be as tender of the reputation of all good men as fidelity to them and to the truth will permit we must bear one anothers burdens and not encrease them and we must restore those with a spirit of meekness that fall through infirmity remembring that we our selves also may be tempted and also because there is small hope that you should ever do them good if once you exasperate them and dis-affect them towards you And therefore 7. See that to such erring persons as you have any hopes of you carry your selves with as much tenderness and love as will consist with your duty to the Church of God For most of them when they are once tainted this way are so selfish and high-minded that they are much more impatient of reproof then many of the prophaner sort of people This way did Musculus take with the Anabaptists visiting them in Prison and relieving them even while they railed at him as Antichristian and so continued without disputing with them till they were convinced that he loved them and then they sought to him for advice themselves many of them were reclaimed by him 8 Either in the Conclusion of your meeting or at another appointed time when you come to debate their Controversie with them tell them That seeing they think you unable to teach them and think themselves able to teach you it is your desire to learn You suppose disputing as tending usually to exâ—sperate mens minds rather then to satisfie them is to be used as the last remedy Therefore you are here ready if they are able to Teach you to learn of them and desire them to speak their minds Which if they refuse tell them you think it the humblest and most Christian edifying way for him that hath most knowledge to Teach and the other to Learn and therefore your purpose is to be either a Learner or a Teacher and not be Disputant till they make it to be Necessary When they have declared their minds to you in a teaching way if it be nothing but the common pleas of the seduced as its like it will not till then that this is no new thing to you it is not the first time that you have heard it or Considered of it and if you had found a Divine Evidence in it you had received it long ago You are truly willing to receive all truth but you have received that which is contrarie to this doctrine with far better Evidence then they bring for it c. If they desire to hear what your Evidence is tell them if they will hear as learners you shall communicate your Evidence in the meetest way you can which if they promise to do let them know that this promise obligeth them to impartialitie and an humble free entertainment of the truth and that they do not turn back in cash carping and contention but take what shall be delivered into sober Consideration which if they promise 1. If you are so far vers't in the point in hand as to mannage it well ex tempore or the person be temperate and fit for such debates then come in with your evidence in a discoursive way first shewing your reasons against the grossest imperfections of his own discourse and then giving him your grounds from Scripture not many but rather a few of the clearest best improved And 2. When you have done or without verbal teaching if you find him unfit to learn that way give him some book that most effectually defendeth the questioned truth and tell him that it is a vain thing to say that over so oft which is so fully said alreadie and a man may better consider of what he hath before his eyes then of that which slideth through his ears and is mistaken or forgotten and therefore you desire him as an humble learner to peruse that Book with leisurely consideration because there are the same things that you would say to him and desire him to bring you in a sober and solid answer to the chief strength of it if after perusal he judge it to be unsound But if it may be fasten some one of the most sticking Evidences on him before you leave him If he refuse to read the book endeavour to convince him of his unfaithfulness to the Truth and his own soul Doth he think that Gods truth is not worth his study or will he venture his soul as the ungodly do and the Churches peace with it and all to save himself so small a labour Is it not just with God to give him over to delusion that will not be at a little pains to be informed nor afford the truth an equal hearing 9. But above all before you part yea or before you debate the Controversie see that you do sum up the precedent Truths wherein you are both agreed 1. Know whether he agree to all that is in the Catechism which you teach the people 2. Whether he suppose that you may attain salvation if you be true to so much as you are agreed in 3. Whether they that are so far agreed as you are should not live in Love and Peace as children of the same God and members of the same Christ and heirs of the same Kingdom 4. Whether you are not