in order to particular Absolution from the Priest 7. As also a more particular Confession if voluntary 8. The Self-ends of this Church in exacting so punctual a Confession from men 9 10. The slavery and Mischief of such kind of Confessions 11. The infinite vexation to the consciencious and ingenuous from the obtruding upon them incredible and impossible Opinions 1. ABsolution puts me in mind of the pretence of necessity of Confessing once a year at least and that to the Priest of the Parish all a mans sins not onely actually committed but the very purposes desires or propensions to the committing of them Which might rightly be called Carnificina conscientiarum indeed and is as base a piece of servitude and to as ill purpose as if that all the modest Maids and grave Matrons in the Parish should strip themselves stark naked and in that manner humble themselves before their Priest once a year Which would look like a piece of unsupportable Tyranny And yet this extorted Confession upon pain of Damnation not to conceal any thing is not the stripping of a man to his naked body but the stripping him of his body that they may see his naked Heart and so by the force of this Superstition break into those secrets which it is the onely due privilege of God Almighty to be acquainted with who is the onely rightful 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and can neither receive any hurt by seeing the most inward motions of his own handy-work nor will knowing whereof we are made doe us any but will judge with equity in all things nor will despise the work of his own hands 2. The pretence for this Confession is the necessity of Absolution by the Priest which if a man through his own neglect have not he must be undoubtedly damned But that any such Absolution is necessary unless upon the case of just Excommunication cannot be made out by either Scripture or Reason For when it is said to Peter to the Church or to the Apostles Whatsoever ye bind in earth shall be bound in heaven or Matth. 18. 18. Whatsoever ye loose in earth shall be loosed in heaven and Whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain Joh. 20. 23. they are retained It is impossible the meaning should be Remit or Retain Bind or Loose whether right or wrong I will ratifie all above whatever the Successors of my Apostles shall doe nor shall any remission of sins be ratified without them though they succeed onely in the external profession and partake not of the same Spirit with their Predecessors Wherefore so large and accurate a Commission cannot belong to any but either to the Apostles themselves or to men of a true Apostolical spirit who are entirely of one mind with God and therefore can doe onely what is right It being so rare therefore and so difficult a thing to find such a Confessor it is an argument such an Absolution is not necessary For neither God nor Nature are wanting in necessaries But the Binding by Excommunication and the Loosing answering thereto is of another consideration and concerns the external Oeconomy of the Church 3. But to speak truly That phrase of Binding and Loosing above cited out of Scripture seems not so much to respect Persons as Things For it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whatsoever not whomsoever and reflects upon the known phrases of the Jews who called that which was declared unlawful 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ligatum but that which was allowed as lawful they called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 solutum And therefore that passage does not respect Absolution from sin but the making of Laws and Institutes for the Church by the Apostles which Christ says he would ratifie in Heaven But that other place Joh. 20. of remitting and retaining mens sins does undoubtedly respect Absolution from sin But mark to what manner of men this power is committed As my Father sent me so send I you now Christ was sent full of grace and of the power of the Holy Ghost and therefore he breathing upon them says Receive the Holy Ghost and did most certainly impart it to them And thereupon is derived upon them that authority Whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained 4. Whence Erasmus excellently upon the place Qui ex his posterioribus cristas erigunt Tyrannidem quandam sibi vendicant cur non meminerunt eorum quae mox praecesserunt Toti turgemus mundano Spiritu tamen placemus nobis authoritate commissâ remittendi aut retinendi peccata Tuere authoritatem sed cura ut adsit Spiritus per quem Christus tribuit authoritatem Which implies that where this Spirit is not the Authority is not and that a man cannot rationally be either comforted by the remission or dismay'd by the retaining of sin when it is from such Ghostly Fathers as are devoid of the Spirit of Christ. 5. Moreover Hugo Grotius does soberly and with judgment I conceive interpret this place of Remission of sins by Baptism or Reception again into the Communion of the Church if any be lapsed after Baptism but the Retaining of sins to be Non-admittance of these into the Church who are not yet penitent Believers or the Excommunicating them out of it upon a lapse worthy so great a Censure But what is this to an Anniversary Absolution which must necessitate and squeeze out such an unnecessary and unreasonable Confession St. James saith Confess your sins one to another whose style was ill directed if it had been such an indispensable duty to confess unto the Priest and in such a manner as has been described so frequent so punctual This Anniversary Provolution therefore of a Penitent upon the floor at the feet of a formal Confessor with eyes and hands devoutly lifted up toward him sitting in his majesty is no part of true Christian Discipline but as Erasmus has well intimated a piece of Antichristian Tyranny it being a thing very loathsome and burthensome to be bound to unbosome a mans self to him of whose judgment friendship or fidelity we can have no assurance and very intolerable to be forced to speak of such things as we do not allow our selves to think of and that before such as we may probably â—…spect will conceive some sinful pleasure by the discourse of them 6. The Injunction therefore of such a punctual Confession has no ground at all in either Scripture or Reason For neither did the Apostles nor Christ himself require any such particular and complete enumeration of mens sins nor left in charge with their Successors to doe so And it is sufficient more generally to confess them with a serious profession of detesting and resolution of leaving them wherein if the Penitent will dissemble he may as well dissemble
the devout what pangs of conscience may there arise for our not cordially committing our Lips to the meaner and more unlovely sort of them How can a man sleep quietly being stung with the sense of so irreligious a piece of incivility suppose it were but to an holy foul Handkerchief or some other old yellow linen There being so mighty power also in an exorcized Cross for conservation of health both of Soul and Body and for the driving away every evil Phantasm and the like reason there is of Reliques what conflicts of mind must this cause in the seriously Religious who having been able has not all this time purchased such a safeguard to himself and his house or being pinched betwixt the sense of poverty and quick urgencies of Devotion cannot resolve whether he had best purchase it or no or when he has is at a loss how many times a day he should crouch and creep to it to draw that secret virtue from it which was lodged therein by an holy Enchantment or Exorcization of the Priest The same reason there is of Holy-water how often to be sprinkled and of Exorcized Boughs and the like And for the Communion of Merit by being incorporated into this or that holy Sodality or Fraternity how anxious would it make a man of his choice that he may be best supplied and how ambitious of entring into as many as he can 3. And for the Entanglement of Vows how easie were it for men to be caught in them as a Woodcock in a Net What an harsh and slavish thing is it to be under the Vow of unlimited Obedience to one that I am not sure but may command me under the pretence of an allowance from an infallible Power to act what in my own conscience is against the Law of God of Humanity and of Nature What various occasions also there may be of making sundry rash Vows according to several Passions Exigences and Importunities in a Church where they are so much in fashion and the performance tends to the enriching thereof as also the being absolved from the Vow made by special dispensation I will not here insist upon for these things are infinite 4. There might arise great incumbrances of thought also from a Superstitious trust in the virtue of the Eucharist abused for such ends as it was never intended for It is ordinarily called Mass. And if it had such virtue and efficacy as this Church would pretend as of the delivering of Souls from punishment in the other state and for prosperous success in this for safe journeying by Sea or by Land on horse-back or on foot for Women that are barren big or bringing forth for Fevers and Tooth-aches for Hogs and Hens for recovery of lost goods and the like what multifarious misgivings of mind and anxieties of conscience would issue from thence in those who more carefully considered these virtues and privileges Wherefore where it is believed that by the power of those Five words of Consecration Christ does condescend to give himself into the hands of the Priest bodily and personally to be lifted up and offered to his Father for the succour and safety of the Good mans Sheep or Poultry or other meaner concerns how can the said honest man be quiet in his thoughts believing the irresistible importunity of so stupendious a Sacrifice and the sure effect thereof which will be more certain in matters of more consequence Are you not Matth. 10. 31. of more value then Sparrows if he have not his recourse to the Priest as far as his purse-strings will stretch and his conscience will be often racked and stretched to save his purse-strings upon every occasion of the sickness of his cattel the delay of his wife's belly in the danger of child-breeding or child-bearing in his or any of his family 's travelling and the like for fear he be accessory to any of those misfortunes that may befall them for want of timely applying himself to so certain means of prevention and if the miscarriages prove Tragical fansy his neglect the sin of Murther Nay how can men with a good conscience abstain from spending themselves to their very skin in laying out money for Masses for all their friends and kindred and then make strict inquiry amongst the poor that may be neglected in that point Or at least how can they shun being miserably distracted betwixt the fear of impoverishing themselves and the compassion they bear to them that they fansy may be tormented in the other world for want of some such relief Such superstitious surmizes as these will indeed bring grist to the mill in plenty for them that infuse them into the heads of the people but will grind and grate so hard against the believers of such principles that they must live very ill at ease under this load of a false and adulterate Religion 5. Which will again be hugely increased by another superadvenient Incertainty and will cause a greater dissettlement and wavering in all such deliberations where their propensions would otherwise carry them with more confidence to the succours of Religion and the Assistence of her Sacraments For supposing their Effect depended on the Intention of the Priest our own both cost and devotion were utterly lost if he out of malice or remissness should have his Intention diverted from the work Which though it tend immensely to make the Priest great and formidable and a little God upon Earth as having the power if not of damning at least of making the Salvation doubtful of as many as depend upon the sincere exercise of his function in Baptizing administring the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper and in absolving them from their sins which that he may discharge faithfully men will be obliged not onely to give him his dues or wages but to honour him by all manner of observance lest he should doe them or theirs some everlasting remediless mischief yet it were a plague and fret of mind beyond all expression to the poor credulous Laiety that were made to believe that God had put the power out of his own hand and unless his Substitute would and intended it should be so that the Almighty himself could not implant one into the body of the Church nor the party implanted partake of the grace signifi'd by the Lord's Supper nor receive express Absolution for his sins though all things upon his own pious desire were externally administred by one professedly in holy Orders Which must needs perplex the Religionist with a perpetual uncertainty of his own and others Salvations CHAP. XXI 1. Of the necessity of Anniversary Confession 2. Of Sacerdotal Absolution 3. What is meant by Binding and Loosing and to what manner of persons Remission of sins is committed 4. Erasmus his gloss upon that Text of St. John 5. As also Hugo Grotius his whence Auricular Confession and Absolution prove groundless 6. A voluntary Confession and in general useful in the Church in some circumstances and
the number and circumstances of his sins So little pretence can there be from hence of this Injunction But if he profess his sorrow and resolution of amendment and by reason of some weakness or melancholy cannot lay such fast hold upon the Promise of remission upon unfeigned Repentance without this visible and palpable seal set thereto of Sacerdotal Absolution I do not see but a Priest anointed with the Spirit of Christ and full of holy compassion to a penitent member of his Church may rightfully and profitably by that Authority which was derived upon the Apostles and their Successours and by that divine power that assists the sincere exercise of his Ministery seal to him the Remission of his sins by pronouncing his Absolution and so restore to peace his disquieted Mind his sins being as certainly pardoned as if Christ himself in person had absolved him he in such a case as this assuredly ratifying in Heaven whatever is here transacted upon Earth Which I suppose Grotius himself will not deny nor conceive at all clashing with his interpretation of S. John he not pretending those he mentions the only occasions of remitting or retaining of sins but the most notable 7. And as this Voluntary Confession in general to the Priest in order to the Penitent's Absolution is usefull and commendable so likewise a Voluntary unbosoming a mans self in a more particular way to such an one as he could trust and can presume fit and able for his office to the end that he may have a more perfect understanding of the state of his Soul and thereby administer more sutable and effectual counsel is a thing questionless of very good consequence 8. But to extort from every Believer every year or oftener a punctuall enumeration of all his transgressions in thought word and deed with all their circumstances were but a vile and disingenuous pretence of insinuating into all mens bosoms for the getting out their secrets of which the Priest may make his private advantage or communicate to the Churchpoliticians such matters as will tend to the strengthening of their distinct Interest which is The conserving or promoting that Honour Wealth and Power which they affect in the World And truely by this means the secrets not of this man or that woman but of whole Families and Cities nay of whole Provinces and Kingdoms and of all Christendom may flow together into that common Cistern or if you will Sea of Ecclesiastick Intelligence which is the very Eye of Action and the Soul of Conduct in all affairs 9. But though this would be a sweet morsel to this Pseudo-Clergy we are now describing it would be sour sauce to the Laiety not only in that it is a foul badge of an inevitable bondage upon them to be constrained upon pain of Damnation at least once by the year to cast themselves down upon the ground before them that are so many fathom sunk into the Earth themselves and to reproach themselves by ripping up their own faults accurately and punctually before such as they have no assurance of either their Candour Judgment or Friendship and for a man to balk his own Priest in this case would be to brand him and so make one of his chiefest neighbours his greatest enemy I say besides the external slavery of the business and the doing of a Ceremonie which may goe so much against the hair even with good and ingenuous spirits a man may be obnoxious to very great dangers and mischiefs For he that has the office of hearing men thus accurately and necessarily accusing themselves once a year at least has a greater opportunity of injustly defaming them by some tacit insinuations or somewhat expresser notices then is fit to be put into the hand of any man that is not a Saint upon Earth of which sort we suppose in this Polity we speak of extremely few 10. Interrogatories also from such Confessours may in greatest likelihood prove to young men and women Lessons of sin and lust and the knowing of the secrets of Families the seeds of infinite contentions betwixt Neighbours and also betwixt those of the same Families For it will be a hard thing for those that by this Shriving of persons know much of their Interest or disinterest to hold their itching fingers from acting or intermedling in their affairs or their other prurient parts from the soliciting the Chastity of such parties as they find hopefull and coming or not to be officious Intelligencers or Game-finders for such as pursue the pleasures of Venus Besides that the vainness of their Penances which yet must needs look like the right value of the Sin may harden men into a conceit that there is no great hurt in sinning and teach them to esteem the transgressing of the Law of God as a thing slight cheap and trivial Whereas if the only Penance of sin were the pain of forsaking it urged upon them from the certain expectation of that most direfull Judgment to come though no other condition but that were annexed to Absolution it would make men more sensibly feel the weight of sin and make them make the greater speed to get from under the burthen of it But to draw to an end 11. That also will pinch very hard especially upon the more Intellectual or Rational complexions namely To be bound in their Conscience upon pain of Damnation to hold whatsoever the Church professes to be true while she in the mean time obtrudes such things upon mens belief as have no ground neither in Reason nor Scripture For even in things that are disputable either way it is the fate of some men notwithstanding to be in a manner invincibly inclined to conceive this part to be true rather then the other What struggling and conflicting therefore must he undergoe to hold to the Authority of the Church against such strong and fatal sentiments of his own Mind But if the Church should be thus Dogmatical not only in things that may according to the sense of the generality of men be either way but conclude and require the belief of such things as are point-blank against either Scripture or Reason and are impossible according to the Faculties of all men who are unprejudiced to be true as That one and the same Body may be wholy and entirely in a thousand places at once and at a thousand miles distance betwixt all those places That we may worship a graven Image and the like how unevenly must these conditions of Salvation sit upon the spirit of him that is not a mere sot What reciprocations of belief and misbelief of hope and despair of Salvation must such an one be tortured with that holds that his share in eternall bliss depends upon the hearty belief of the truth of the Church in all things when what she propounds according to all his Faculties is not only unlikely but impossible to be true CHAP. XXII 1. The dreadfull Figment of Purgatory 2. That by this affrightfull Fable
years 17. Wherefore assuredly as the Outward Court troden down by the Gentiles is Synchronal to the first six Trumpets in the seventh Seal so the Inward Court is Synchronal to the first six Seals which was the thing to be demonstrated and which is a Conclusion of excellent use and weighty consideration as may appear in its due place 18. Finally as our Middle Synchronals have thus necessarily detected those that precede so they will with like facility and certainty discover them that succeed For the Thousand years wherein the Saints reign Satan is bound the Palmiferous Company triumphs and the Heavenly Jerusalem is seen upon Earth all these must in some sense plainly Synchronize with the seventh Trumpet And the seventh Angel sounded and Apoc. 11. 15. there were great voices in Heaven saying The Kingdoms of this world are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign for ever and ever So that it is plain that the Millennial Empire of Christ and of his Saints is under the seventh Trumpet The Palmiferous Company Apoc. 7. 9. also immediately succeed the 144 Virgin Regiments which are Synchronal to the first six Trumpets whence necessarily this company of Palm-bearers are under the seventh The Fall of Babylon also conterminates with the sixth Trumpet and therefore the New Jerusalem which succeeds it must needs be found in the seventh And lastly Satan who fought with Michael all along the first six Seals and bore such sway in the Kingdom of Antichrist in the first six Trumpets cannot be said to be bound cast into the bottomless Pit and sealed up there for a thousand years till the Millennial Empire of Christ till the glory and brightness of the Heavenly Jerusalem upon Earth till the Victory and Triumph of the Palm-bearing Company that is till the sounding of the last Trumpet not onely the Series of the Synchronals but the very nature of the things themselves forcing the Ligation of Satan into this last Period of times This is very easie and plain But if any one be unsatisfi'd he may reade Mr. Mede Part 2. Synchronism 4 5 6 7. where he shall have a more full and copious demonstration of these Synchronals contemporizing with the seventh Trumpet But how this contemporizing is to be understood will better appear out of this following Chapter CHAP. VII 1. Mr. Mede's Account of placing the first six Vials within the sixth Trumpet 2. That the truth of this Account depends upon an unlikely sense of the Expiration of the Reign of the Beast as if immediately after 42 months it should entirely and universally expire 3. A caution touching the Interpreting of the Prophetick style 4. That the Expiration of the Reign of the Beast upon the Exit of the sixth Trumpet is but partial or speciminal argued from the seventh Trumpet 's being also called a Woe-Trumpet 5. As likewise from the seven Thunders 6. Two more Arguments to the same purpose 7. Lastly from the fixed Epocha's of the Middle Synchronals compared with the affairs of Europe 8. That it follows hence that all the seven Vials are naturally to take their places in the seventh Trumpet as being the seven last Plagues 9. The same further proved from the Song of the Harpers upon their victory over the Beast 10. And from the order of the Vision of the Vials as also from the appearing of the Temple out of which the Angels come after the sixth Trumpet and before any of the Vials be poured out 11. In what sense the Middle Synchronals are to be fulfilled at the Exit of the sixth Trumpet 12. A larger Declaration how all the Middle Synchronals expire together in what sense or degree soever they do expire 13. Of the commencing of the last Synchronals and what the time of the Millennium more eminently so styled 14. The serviceableness of the premising these orderly Synchronisms for his further search into the Prophecies that foretell the Lapse of the Church into Antichristianism 1. I Had almost omitted the placing of the Vials the first six whereof Mr. Mede ranges within the sixth Trumpet briefly upon this account Because they being the seven last Plagues of the Beast they are to begin with the inclining of the Beast to ruine But it was proved above that the 42 months of the Beast's domineering over the Saints and overcoming them expired with the last breath of the sixth Trumpet as all those middle Synchronals do And it is as true that the Throne of the Beast does not wax dark before the fifth Vial. Wherefore he concludes that at the least five Vials if not six precede the seventh Trumpet 2. Which Ratiocination of Mr. Mede's were very firm if we could be sure that the meaning of the Continuance of the Beast for 42 months were such as he supposes it namely That this Duration or Reign of his is to be understood absolutely That he shall reign so long and no longer and not comparatively That after 42 months he shall not reign with that full power and victory over the Saints so keeping them under that they cannot appear a distinct Polity able to defend themselves from his Tyrannies and Cruelties Which latter may be a warrantable meaning of the Prophecie as well as the other namely That as soon as there appears a Kingdom or Polity of truly Evangelical or Apostolical Christians not Superstitious nor Idolatrous nor Persecutive and Bloudy but such as joyn heartily with one another in the plain Points of Christian Religion and make no other Fundamentals then the undoubted meaning of the Word of God requires and leave men free in the rest That as soon I say as such a Polity as this is in being the 42 months of the Beast may be said to expire as to the entireness of his Reign and also for that there is that set on foot which will certainly be his ruine and therefore in the Prophetick style he is accounted as ruined already According to which tenour Mr. Mede has interpreted that of Esay * Chap. 21. 9. Babylon is fallen is fallen whenas in the time of Esay there was onely the first Ground-work laid for her ruine by the Medes who casting off the Assyrian yoke and rescuing themselves into liberty and building Ecbatana under their new King Deioces laid the foundations of a Kingdom fatal to the City of Babylon Nor can we well understand that in the Apocalyps upon the sounding of the seventh Trumpet to that height it seems to be spoken The Kingdoms of the world are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ. Chap. 11. 15. Of which I must confess I cannot but surmise the most sober meaning to be something parallel to that saying of our Saviour Now is the judgment of this world now shall the Prince of this world be cast out and yet he kept Joh. 12. 31. possession till Constantine's time But in such a sense as the Kingdoms of the world at the beginning of