choose Men to sit in Convocation c. The possibility of it if the King should be so ill advised as to give consent to it I shall not much dispute remembring that a Parliament in King Henry the Eighth's Reign surnamed the Almighty-Parliament and some since have de facto done such strange things in annulling transferring Titles Rights Claims Possessions and Inheritances c. without regard to Superiour Laws as argue Infallibility and Arbitrary Power except in the Persons of Popes and Kings to be neither absurd nor disallowable I shall only take leave to say that the Clergy are as competent Judges of the Parliament-men as the Knights and Burgesses of the Convocation-men that whatever alterations they may make de facto in our Liturgy or Ceremonies without the Clergy yet it is absolutely impossible to make an Union without them I need not add that such alterations would be a taking away that Liberty of Conscience from the establish'd Church which is given to all Dissenters for it is to be supposed that our Parliament-men if not infallible are yet wiser than at the suggestion of this Furioso to attempt the removing the ancient Land-marks and constitutions of the Nations Government such violent Convulsions of the Monarchy must needs both presage and produce a dissolution of it All the Art and Power in the World cannot make trifles in the Worship of God seem matters of importance to them that rellish heavenly things 〈…〉 6. The conformable Clergy and Laity of the Church of England knowing many things to be lawful and innocent and judged by our Superiours to tend to Order Decency and Devotion use them as such and cannot so properly be said to make them seem matters of importance as they who pretend Conscience for disobedience in the use of things no where prohibited and therefore indifferent and disturb all peace and Unity in the Church to introduce their own confusions and divisions 〈…〉 7. What Trumpery are Habits various Gestures and Postures to a Man that is swallowed up in the contemplation of the infinite Majesty of the Glorious God This Man is too wise as being wise above what is written A modest and well-bred Man would never have used such rude and vilifying terms of such things as the Almighty God was once pleased to appoint and command in his own Worship If any say those sacerdotal Habiliments and Levitical Impositions are not obligatory to us Christians I say no more are the Judicial Laws given by Moses and yet if any Man shall therefore say they are unjust absurd foolish or ridiculous I think God the Supreme Legislator is reflected on and concern'd in his Honour and the person so saying must be supposed immoral bold and prophane If our Author should be censured by this Paragraph he would be thought not only a Phanatique but an Enthusiast Would this contemplative Politico have the Priest officiating lose his Body as well as his Mind and Wits for otherwise he must of necessity use such Trumpery as Habits Gestures and Postures and if they in use are lawful as our Author saying nothing to the contrary must in all reason be supposed to allow why not those as well as others especially since they are few Grave Decent Ancient Naturalized and by Law established Innovations are always hurtful and sometimes dangerous always tend towards and sometimes precipitate dissolution 3. It is unreasonable to continue Ceremonies Ibid. After all the Wisdom and Power of Imposers can do the judgments of Men will differ And I can say with equal truth and reason After all that Abolishers can do Pag. 〈…〉 the judgments of Men will differ He proceeds It is as possible to make their Hair all of one colour their Bodies of the same proportion their Faces all alike as their Judgments to be the same in Rites and Ceremonies To which I may add or in any thing else Must nothing therefore be continued If every thing must be abolished concerning which Men have different Opinions not only Rites and Ceremonies but our Creeds and Sacraments nay our Houses and our Bibles which gave occasion to great diversities of Opinions and some Heresies must be abolished and burnt not only University Habits Notes of Degrees and Church Vestments but all manner of Clothes must be left off and if our Author's inference were pursued home it would abolish his own dear Corps As for that Rule Ibid. Nothing but what is necessary should be imposed as terms of Communion to understand it aright we must first enumerate those things which are enjoined the Members of the Church of England and they are That they should duly frequent their parish-Parish-Church be present at and join in the Publick Prayers and Offices of the Church with reverence and attention hear the Church Homilies or other Sermons read or preach'd and receive the Holy Communion at the least thrice in a Year That they should bring their Children to the Font to be baptized to the Church to be Catechized and to the Bishop to be Confirm'd I know nothing else required of any person as necessary to their holding Lay-communion with it and these I think to be both few and such as are generally necessary to Salvation What is meant by Imposition of things as Terms of Communion when spoken if properly it may be so of persons here born and bred is not so easily understood It is true the Church assumes as her part a maternal care to instruct and educate her Children in her Bosom Whereas that Expression Imposition of things as Terms of Communion seems to relate properly either to Foreiners or Converts presupposing them Professors of some other Religion and She treating with them and offering them conditions of admittance to her Communion and this if such Foreiners are already received into the Catholick Church by Baptism with us is done by vertue of the Communion of Saints upon their freely uniting themselves with the Congregation of that Parish where they inhabit joying therewith in its Publick Worship and other Churches Offices and if duly qualified their participating of the Sacraments But if a person yet unbaptized and consequently no Christian being made a Convert desires to to be received into the Communion of this Church it is requisite that he make profession of the Christian Faith contained in the Apostles Creed desire and receive Baptism What else can be understood by Imposing Terms of Communion The Prescriptions Rules and Constitutions of the Church of England are all directed to those already in her Communion and suppose all Persons born in this Kingdom to be by Baptism made so But if by it is meant that nothing may be prescribed in a Church to be observed by the Members of it which is not necessary to Salvation I cannot believe it to be in that sense true for some things may be not only lawfully but also laudably used and established in a constituted Church which are not absolutely necessary to Salvation A Man
Lords Day hath met with many and great Enemies among the Ritualists Pag. 〈…〉 I know of no Men in the Church of England that are Enemies to the Lord's Day and if any such there are they never learn'd it from their Mother It sufficeth to my purpose that nothing is constituted or used in our Church to hinder or discountenance the most pious and religious observation of it but so far on the contrary that our publick Worship is appointed to be every where observed on it Neither am I or any other in her Communion I suppose against the most strict and Christian observation of the whole day which is reconcileable to the necessities and infirmities of this life provided always that it be not accounted nor used as a Jewish Sabbath nor observed by way of obedience to the fourth Commandment of the Decalogue The Scripture hath its share of contempt from Ceremonialists Pag 〈…〉 of the truth hereof the Impositions of Rome are a full proof What are the Impositions of the Church of Rome to us Who is bound to justifie all things in use in that Church Let our Author if he be at leisure and so please try his hand with them and see what Defence they will make As to us either let Men write to the purpose or not trouble themselves abuse the ignorant and harden the prejudic'd or tell us particularly which are those Impositions which are Terms of Communion and which are Scriptural and unscriptural or otherwise he and such like who make precarious suppositions and from thence deduce Inferences as much inconsequent must expect to hear that their pretended preciseness is childish and the wresting alledged places of Scripture from their genuine senses to their own purposes is no other than impertinency which is no reflection on the sacred Scripture but on those superstitious and scrupulous Persons who desiring to seem more holy than others raise doubts under pretences of Conscience and to appear more wise and understanding in the Scriptures as if they could see those things there which no Man could ever do before quote them tho improper to prove what they design 2. 〈…〉 4. Mischiefs in promoting an increase of all kind of wickedness What our Author says upon this Head is of a piece with the rest of his Pamphlet magisterial assertions without Proof or Reason precarious suppositions and idle beggings of the Question intermix'd with scurrilous reflections is stuff'd with bitter Railings 〈…〉 These are part of his words The most immoral Men if they did pretend zeal for Ceremonies and were furious against Dissenters did pass for good Christians and true Sons of the Church I might as well viz. with no less truth and reason say that amongst the Dissenters The most immoral Men if they did pretend zeal against Ceremonies and were furious against Conformists did pass for good Christians in their own phrase true Professors and the seriously Godly and in the Dialect arriv'd here the last year sound Protestants and with at least equal pretence subjoin his words 〈…〉 This false measure hath hardened abundance in their evil ways mightily cherish'd and increas'd Vice in the Land If he is not satisfied with this way of answering let him alter his way of writing when he can make good his words I shall easily do mine He adds Conformity to Ceremonies hath been a Cloak that hath covered the most filthy Abominations Had this been true Dissenters would never have been so numerous The changing one word putting Opposition for Conformity and reading it thus Opposition to Ceremonies hath been a Cloak that hath covered the most filthy Abominations will make the Sentence much truer and this Assertion of mine needs no other proof than the allowance of what he insinuates plainly enough in these words A Ceremonial War hath been once fatal to Clergy men 〈…〉 7. 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 2 to be true They assure us That the Rebellion against King Charles the First was raised to oppose Ceremonies and elswhere to the same purpose the words are plain and admit of no other interpretation I therefore challenge him to give the like instance or proof of Conformity to Ceremonies being a Cloak to cover the most filthy Abominations 〈…〉 which if he doth he shall carry his Cause 6. Hindring a world of Good It cannot be proved that Ceremonies in Worship ever did any good 〈◊〉 25. We in the Church of England as I have said have no Ceremonies in use or enjoined in our publick Worship unless kneeling at Prayers and standing at the Creed and Gospel he called Ceremonies and if they be they may do so much good as to testifie our inward humility and devotion in the one our resolution to stand by maintain and defend the other and our Communion with the Primitive and divers Modern Christian Churches in both and this if Men were not contentious though short might be a satisfactory account of two ancient and Catholick and even in themselves decent Postures What good more would our Author have of them They hinder Reformation Love and Communion of Churches 1. They hinder Reformation In the Reformation of the Church of England from the Novelties and corruptions in Doctrines and Practices tending to Idolatry Superstition and Schism from the Primitive and Catholick Church of Christ great care was taken to prevent the Papists still continuing in the Communion of the Church of Rome from accusing us of injustice and perverseness in abolishing any thing which was innocent and decent in it self made venerable by Antiquity and Catholick by the use of the Universal Church or merely because they used it which prudent and Christian moderation as it was designed to justifie our Reformation from the imputation of Schism or unnecessary separation and prevent the giving a scandal to them or throwing a stumbling-block before them which might hinder their coming over to our Communion So it was attended with so good success that it became more generally and universally received through this Kingdom than in those places where it was brought in by force and accompany'd with Tumults and Rebellions as in Scotland Switzerland the Low-Countries c. Insomuch that had not that politick King of Spain Philip II. prevail'd with the Pope by his Bull to prohibit the Roman Catholicks here in Queen Elizabeth's time to frequent our Churches it is with great probability conjectur'd that her happy Reign would so far have out liv'd Popery as that it would no more have been openly professed in this Kingdom And agreeably hereunto I remember a Clergy-man of my Acquaintance who liv'd some years in Ireland affirmed in my hearing that if Kneeling at the Sacrament the use of Godfathers and the Sign of the Cross at Baptism were abolished in Ireland it would breed such a prejudice in the Irish a People very tenacious of their first Principles against the Protestant Religion that they would very hardly be brought over to it and that one of the
from them both And if all other pretences for the continuance of a Schism were removed perhaps this founded in the difference of Opinion would be made a new one by our Dissenters for many of them reproach as they imagine some eminent Divines of the Church of England by imposing on them the name of Arminians Their Doctrines of Solifidianism Imputative Righteousness the Instruments of Justification c. though founded in mistakes and wrong acceptations of words were by many of them imbib'd and receiv'd with that confidence and assurance that they had not patience to hear them explain'd much less doubted of and if there were no Schisms occasioned by them in those times of their Reformation for it would puzzle even a good Ramist to Analyze the several subdivided Sects and their Opinions which that great confusion produc'd Yet how they aspers'd revil'd and persecuted one another upon that account is well known if not Mr. B. can inform any Man who desires it more fully 4. Not only difference of Opinion in matters of Religion but also in the Civil Government is sufficient to make a separation and division in the Church especially if any Authority in Ecclesiastical Affairs be assigned to the supreme Magistrate for that neither the Papists nor Presbyterians will allow him It hath been often observed that Rebellion in the State is usually attended with a Schism in the Church Jeroboam of old introduc'd Idolatry to continue his Revolt lest Union in one Religion and Communion in one Church should restore Loyalty in the Kingdom The Feuds betwixt particular Families arising from the ambitious Emulation of the Prince's favour The Faction between the Covenanters and the Anti-Covenanters in Scotland The Attempts of the Anabaptists in Germany and the Fifth Monarchy-men here in England to omit the most famous Faction between the Guelphes and Gibellines both Parties of the same Religion and other ancient and forreign Instances I shall give you one Example sufficient alone to prove my Assertion The Mountain Conventiclers in Scotland who having under pretence of Conscience separated themselves from the establish'd Episcopal Church and also subdivided themselves from the Presbyterian Dissenters followed select Teachers of their own which being prosecuted according to the Laws of that Country King Charles the Merciful indulged some of them and licensed them to Preach which when he had done and they accepted they who before could by no Authority Laws and Penalties be restrained from flocking to them in multitudes quite deserted them and refused to hear them Preach Such was their pretense of Conscience but indeed Zeal for the Covenant aversion to the King 's Monarchical Authority and Supremacy c. So that if there were not one Rite Ceremony Vestment Gesture c. if it were possible retained or used in our Church nor even the Liturgy it self nor any Constitutions and Canons in force Yet the Old Kirk and Common-wealth Principles beginning to be revived again and the Question being not as some short-sighted Clergy-men imagine about Rites Ceremonies Liturgy Vestments Constitutions and such like small and inconsiderable things but whether a King or Common-wealth if a King from whence shall his Power be derived how limited c There needs no more than that Opinion of the King's Supremacy and that Adherence and Loyalty to Monarchy which the Church of England was formerly renowned for to cause the Dissenters all which are against the King's Supremacy and many of them Men of Common-wealth Principles whose Fingers itch after the Crown and Church-Revenues to separate and continue their Schism from the Church the Quarrel being really and truly more Political than Religious and of this the War against and Execution of King Charles the First the Fanatick-Plot against the Life of King Charles the Second which perhaps they will say was the Action of but some few particular Persons and the Carriage Conversation Writings and Actings of the N. Cs. in general in those times ever since especially this and the last year the transactions lately in Scotland and their precipitate abolishing of the King's Supremacy there are sufficient evidences to any Man who is in his right Senses 5. Different persuasions concerning Ecclesiastical Discipline See◠〈◊〉 Enâ—â—â—â— Noâ—â—â— forâ—â—â— undâ—â—â— K. Câ— c. The Advocate of the Non-conformists as a reason of their Recusancy objects against Lay-Civilian's decreeing Persons to be excommunicated which he calls the exercising the Power of the Keys though this objection is absurdly urged by any Man who asserts the Presbyterian Model by Lay-governing Elders but the removal of this would do little to their satisfaction Neither would what the Author of the Healing Attempt proposes viz. In 〈◊〉 A condescending to settle the Power of Orders and Jurisdiction on Presbyters as well as Bishops according to the Learned Archbishop Usher 's Model c. satisfie them so long as there remain any Persons in our Church superior to them in degree the Power of Ordination and the exercise of Jurisdiction for that is not only inconsistent with their affected Parity but irreconcileable with that Vice gerency which they pretend as well as the Pope to derive from and hold under Christ as the Supreme Head of the Church Thus the Author of the Survey of Discipline tells them pag. 440 441. See 〈◊〉 Doâ—â—ame'â—â— fenceâ— the Sâ—â—â— c. 〈◊〉 6. p. 〈◊〉 They had said that your Discipline is the Kingdom of Christ wherein your Presbyters hold as it were Christ's Sceptre That the Question between the Bishops and You is about no less matter than this whether Jesus Christ shall be King or no c. Or more truly and plainly whether they shall be his Vice-Roys and as Popes over several Parishes Lord it over their Flocks As for Lay-Chancellors tho it is some deviation from the Primitive Times when Bishops with the assistance of their Colleges of Presbyters managed all Affairs yet the Christian Magistrate afterwards committing many Causes to Episcopal Audience Silvanus the Famous Bishop of Troas delegated them with approbation Soc. 〈◊〉 cap. 〈◊〉 to the hearing of Lay-Men However I believe all the Clergy and Lay-Men living in the Communion of the Church of England would be glad the Reverend Fathers of it by a personal execution of the Episcopal Office with their Cathedral College in all cases of Conscience Heresie Schism Crime and Scandal for their own sakes if not for their Church's would remove that Objection As for the Learned Archbishop Usher's Model every body knows it was not his judgment but invented as an expedient to prevent things from coming to the utmost extremities that it doth not settle any Power of Orders as is insinuated upon Presbyters or of Jurisdiction but what they have already and may exercise as to the substance of it by vertue of their Order our Rubricks confirm'd by Statute and our Canon besides that Model excludes the lately invented Lay-Elders and is as little reconcileable to the Congregational way into which most
oppositions of the Civil Magistrate's Authority and exclaiming against his Government their industrious spreading of false and malicious reports to undermine it by possessing others with prejudice against it are all sufficient nay undeniable evidences that their actions are not directed to the preservation of a pure and undefiled Conscience as is pretended for that is void of offence towards God and Man but to the encreasing and upholding a Faction in the State to confront the Government I might add hereunto the practice of our Dissenting Brethren in new-New-England in their combinations conspiracies against and oppositions to their Governors and the Royal Authority their Penal Laws made against those of the Communion of the Church of England their Sanguinary ones against the Quakers c. their Persecutions of the former and Executions of the latter and their injurious and unchristian dealings with all Men not of their new Church fellowship are such plain instances that their Principles and Practices are such as for which no Conscience or Conviction of judgment can with any shew of reason be pretended or with any appearance of discretion be allowed 4. To alledge the Immorality of the Dissenters Lives in general as an Argument that their Schism was not caused by the conviction of their Consciences since he who lives in the wilful Commission of any one known sin hath forfeited his right to the Plea of Conscience in any other case though a probable Inference yet I am sensible would be to insist upon an harsh and unpleasing Topick to others as well as my self having therefore in the last Paragraph intimated it in relation to their carriage to their Governors in Church and State Here in Scotland and New-England from the beginning of the Rebellion against King Charles I. and often since observing only here that the Scripture Histories Reason and Experience have taught us sufficiently that no actions can be more immoral than the conspiring beginning and carrying on of Oppositions Insurrections and Rebellions and those things which precede accompany and follow them which when made under pretence of Religion are thereby yet aggravated by the dishonour done to the Profession of it the scandal given to others and the addition of their own Hypocrisie I shall pursue it no farther but only give you a Character which one who knew them very well by his own woful experience hath left us gathered by his personal observation and confirm'd with a solemn Protestation It is that of King James I. to his Son Prince Charles Take heed therefore My Son of such Puritanes very Pests in the Church and Common-wealth whom no deserts can oblige neither Oaths or Promises bind breathing nothing but sedition and calumnies aspiring without measure railing without reason and making their own imaginations without any warrant of the word the square of their Conscience I protest before the great God and since I am here as upon my Testament it is no place for me to lie in that ye shall never find with any High-land or Border-Thieves greater ingratitude and more lyes and vile perjuries than with these Fanatick Spirits c. Basil Dor. l. 2. p. 160. This is a Testimony too great to be disputed much more to be denyed it commands belief and needs no confirmation and is large and wants no addition Lastly This Schism themselves being judges is unnecessary for upon supposition that either the Presbyterian or Independent in the difference betwixt the Church of England and them is in the right tho the Institution of our Saviour the Writings and Practices of the Apostles the Universal Government of the whole Catholick Church being against them both it is scarcely to be supposed yet since neither of them can deny a true Christian Church wherein are all things necessary to Salvation to have subsisted under the Episcopal Government unless he will assert that there never was such a true Christian Church in the World till Mr. John Calvin erected one at Geneva Anno Dom. 1541. which I think neither of them will affirm what can be imagined should hinder but that they may both live in Communion with the Church of England which they cannot deny to be such an one It is evident enough by the Writings of the Presbyterians Printed between the Years 1640. and 1660. part of which time the Government was in their own or a Friends hand that they insisted upon this as a sufficient argument against the Independents Separation That they allowed their Churches to be true Christian Churches and therefore they condemned them and all others separating from them as guilty of Schism and declared against a Toleration of them as appearas by their Covenant Letter to the Assembly Testimony to the Truth of Jesus Christ and others too many to be named So that it is evident that they themselves since they cannot deny our Churches to be true Christian Churches are now such Persons as when they had power in their hands they judged to be inexcusable and not to be tolerated in their Schism because unnecessary and therefore unlawful being made from that which the Separatists themselves confess to be a true Christian Church and consequently that their then judgment condemns their present practice This might be a sufficient argument for us if we had no other to conclude that the prepossessions and prejudices education custom relation interest temporal advantage fear of being accompted fickle unstable c. if conforming and not any conviction of Judgment obligation of Conscience sense of Duty impartially considered or objection against our Liturgy Rites or Ceremonies rightly understood and duely pondered are the true though concealed causes of their renewing and continuing this which when time was at least by parity of reason they themselves judged unnecessary and unlawful Schism Whether it be no reflection on these pretended Teachers to act so contrary to their own Principles and former practises let their Consciences and the World judge In what guilt they involve themselves and their deluded Proselytes for their own temporal gain interest reputation and advantage deserves their most serious Examination In the mean time to all those who desire to hold the unity of the spirit in the bond of Peace it must needs be a very sad spectacle to see prejudic'd ignorant unstable and inadvertent Men not considering the relation they stand in to their own proper Pastors the hazards they run of their own Souls by the guilt of Schism they incur and the scandal they lay before others nor the invalid Ordination of these new intruding Teachers 〈◊〉 10.1 their want of Mission or their designing Schism nor the Obligations of their own Consciences to promote and preserve the Peace Order Unity and Communion of the Church or the many and great mischiefs attending an unnecessary and therefore a criminal separation should contemn those spiritual advantages of Church Ordinances celebrated in the most Decent Pious and Apostolick manner and needlesly make a childish and perverse Schism from the
of continuing Ceremonies in the Worship of God Humbly proposed to the Present Convocation c. THat An English-man never knows when he is well is a Proverb which we use at home and wherewith we are reproach'd abroad and that too justly to be denyed applicable both to single Persons and conjunct Societies the tendency of Affairs in this Nation since the Year 1640. beyond all possibility of contradiction doth evince The Subjects of this Kingdom through the Grants of former Kings and by virtue of the good Laws by them enacted and made were better secured in their Rights Properties and Persons than any other Nation of the Universe Nor were they less happy as Christians living in the bosom of a Church whose Faith was Catholick Government Apostolical whose Publick Liturgy Constitutions and Canons in perfection excell'd those of any of the Reformed or any other then Visible Church whose Clergy were esteem'd the wonder of the World Hence the envy of the Roman and the admiration of the Reformed Churches Such was then the condition of the English Church and State that it was hard to imagine what could be thought wanting to compleat their happiness unless perhaps you will say their being sensible of it But not knowing when they were well they by God's just permission actuated by the Romish Emissaries who took advantage of the ambition and covetous Inclinations of some and of the discontented and restless Spirits of others involv'd the Nation in a most odious and unnatural Rebellion the Violences Cruelties and Murthers which accompany'd and the Oppressions Usurpations Tyrannies Plunderings and Miseries which follow'd it are too many to be numbred too woful to be rehearsed and such as any Man in his right Wits would for ever be caution'd by to avoid as the worst of evils any actions means or methods whereby the like may again be brought upon us And yet as if Men were led by destiny or guided by those ludicrous Spirits which our Author supposes play little tricks in disturb'd houses and others learned in those matters think set Men together by the ears as they do Cocks and Dogs for their own diversion they seem industriously to lay the Foundations of future troubles to return to 1640. and to be willing to react the same Tragedy and that before the Epilogue is ended and the Actors all gone off the Stage Hither tend most of our new Scriblers and their Pamphlets some devesting the King of all Inherent Sovereign Authority Supremacy and Prerogative c. Others representing our Monarchs of the last Race as the most Monstrous and Wicked Villains that ever liv'd and under the pretence of Secrets relating things not only incredible in themselves but if supposed yet impossible to be known to any but Pimps and Persons if any such there be of a more odious Character thereby endeavouring to possess the People with an ill opinion of the Persons of Kings in order to prepare them for the dissolution of the Monarchy Essays tending to the same purpose have been also made against the Church designing Men having unjustly slander'd her Divines as inclined to Popery and popishly affected till in King James's time to their no less glory than hazard they appeared the greatest if not the only Champions in the Cause of our Religion and the Laws and thereby made all future calumnies of that sort appear too unjust and malicious to be used How is it to be wished that our Enemies malice could have had an end But alass though they thus were forc'd to change the Object yet they have retained the Vice Nothing will please them they will never be quiet now our Rites and Ceremonies must be illegitimated our Liturgy circumcised our Subscriptions Constitutions and Canons all abolished to gratifie those who if all these things were done would be as little satisfy'd as now they are Our Author their Adversary betrays too much Passion before the things themselves and their consequences are well considered he is all upon the fret and out of all patience to be pulling down the whole Ancient and therefore venerable the well compact and firm Fabrick of the Church of England which having been of full proof against all the assaults of our Foreign Roman Foes must now be undermined by her domestick Enemies and what is yet more intolerable her own pretended Friends by an easie surrender of her outworks make her main strength less tenable and precipitate her ruin Our Author like a Man full of design or big with some conceit of his own or News heard from others breaks out and with abundance of concern and passion thus vents himself It is the wonder and grief of all good English Protestants Pag◠〈…〉 that such an unaccountable frenzie should possess and hurry some hot Clergy Men amongst us with a blind zeal against the good proposals of Peace prepared by the Kings Commissioners in the Jerusalem Chamber If by all good English Protestants he means the Men of the Church of England as by Law Established to whom that Name borrowed from the Lutherans who at Spire in the Year 1529. protested against the Corruptions and Usurpations of the Church of Rome whose Communion they then forsook more properly than to any other People in England belongs both because they are an Establish'd and Visible Church and because all Sectaries whatsoever among us hold more in common with the Papists than they do then his assertion is too general to be true Many and perhaps the most and wisest admire what an unaccountable frenzie should hurry some hot Church-Men amongst us with a blind Zeal against that Pious Good and above all extant the most Perfect Liturgy to which and all things therein contained and prescribed they have all once at the least declared as they then pretended their unfeigned assent and consent or against that Government in Church which as far as we can understand by the Scriptures was Instituted by our Saviour which the Ancients assure us was propagated together with the Christian Faith by the Apostles and their Successors and which the continual Succession of the Catholick Church of Christ for now more than 1600 Years hath delivered to us and those wholsome Constitutions which the Wisdom and Experience of the Learned and Grave Fathers of our own Church relation being had to those of elder times also have produced and the Civil Laws of the Land confirmed unto us As for His Majesties design in giving a Commission to some of our Reverend Fathers and Divines to prepare things for Peace and calling of a Convocation c. Who ever blamed it though as to the Method it must be supposed that the unseasonable precipitancy and preposterous Zeal of some in the Late House of Commons to gratifie their dissenting Friends by an Act of Toleration hath prevented even those few good Fruits which they who are acquainted with that sort of People expected from it but of this afterwards I shall here only add that this would be too
To joyn in the Publick Worship of the Establish'd Church though it be supposed there are Ceremonies and what he hath no less maliciously than falsly insinuated vanities in it would not be to despise our Christian liberty but to make use of it Whereas he who scruples it either is weak and thinks he hath no liberty in that case or which is worse is sullen and will not use it But suppose Men despise their Christian Liberty though I understand not how the Members of the Church of England can be said to do so will they sell therefore their Civil Rights and Privileges at any Rate I wonder our Author is not ashamed of such gross non sequitur's As for any indirect means which may be supposed to have been used in Juries Elections Corporations c. I think the Dissenters both in modesty and justice ought to have held their tongues as having by far exceeded the Conformists for as far as I could ever see hear read observe or learn they were much more diligent and industrious used more indirect courses and underwent greater fatigues to uphold and carry on a Faction against the Government and Laws than these some whereof being not so designing they usually drew over to their Party were either to maintain the Right or countermine their attempts The best course which can be taken to recover God's blessing the Church's Union and the Kingdom 's Peace Riches Wealth Strength and Reputation is not the Parliaments or rather some few turbulent Spirits strugling as our Author says with the Prince nor the maintaining an unquiet and never to be satisfied Faction to confront the Government or extort Privileges or Liberties from the King by the diminution of his Prerogative the glorying in the Doctrin of Resistance under the pretence of Preservation of the Protestant Religion and the Laws or the encouraging of Dissenters to make the Schism greater for these do but make one Party jealous of another and neglect the Publick Good to oppose each other but a true practical Piety towards God a Loyalty and quiet Subjection to the Prince and a permission of him to manage his own Province a Charity and mutual Love and Unity without interessing our selves in much less hating and separating from one another for our respective private Opinions and an industrious following every one his own lawful Vocation and Employment 3. Mischief to Souls Pag. 1◠For trifles there hath been exercised a mad Tyranny over Mens faculties This is that which cannot be made good for all Men have and since the times of Popery every Man had liberty by the Laws of England to be of any Judgment or Opinion he should think most probable and freedom for his faculties and the exercise of them where they could claim any right to do so in their own Houses and Families nor if a Friend Stranger Traveller or a Neighbor or two happened to be present was there any danger or penalty thereby incurr'd But that every Man under pretence of Conscience should therefore have liberty for all his outward actions and be allowed for his own private advantage to make publick Harangues to disturb the Peace and seduce his Neighbors by the propagation of a Schism dangerous to both Church and State is that which doth not follow even the Dissenters themselves when they had power in their Hands being Judges as appears by their carriage to the Clergy of the Church of England in the late times That a pretence of Conscience where nothing evidently sinful in it self is positively enjoyned will not justifie a Man in Schism or exempt him from Penal Laws as having a Right by the Law of Nature to be tolerated therein I shall imagine my self to have proved till I see farther The little things imposed are a means of depriving the Church of the Service of many useful Ministers that are apt to teach 〈◊〉 16. and would be glad to give the Bread of Life to those Souls that are by the Drones left in the broad way to destruction The Church of England wants not Ministers that are apt to teach but in some places Persons that will be taught and in others maintenance for the Teachers No place where there is a competent visible subsistence needs to want a Preacher Our Universities can supply another Kigndom In the mean time this needs none of their assistance if the Usurping Ministers and Encroaching Pastors would return the straying Sheep home to their own rightful Pastors and proper Folds whence designedly they have drawn them for their own advantage they would thereby do better Service to God his Church the Kingdom their own and the seduced and deluded Mens Souls than possibly they can any other way If any are Drones let them be amended or removed they may well be spared Ibid. Christ commands his Ministers to Preach and qualifies them for that Service Christ commands none to Preach but those which he calls by his Church and he who intrudes into the Sacred Office without an Ordinary Mission unless he demonstrates by Miracles an extraordinary one can shew no tolerable reason why he should not be esteemed and used as either an Euthusiast or Impostor neither can any qualifications though exceeding those of other Men which yet never have been found in them be reasonably laid in the balance with the Peace Order and Unity of the Church and the Love and Charity of the Neighborhood Our Author says in Page 17th The Ruin of Souls may be for want of the Labours of those able Ministers whom we exclude for toys I know none are excluded but such who exclude themselves and the more shame for them if they will be so humoursome and pettish as to shut out themselves because they cannot in every thing have their Wills and the more trivial the things objected are the more evident it is that somewhat else besides and more than Conscience which is pretended is the true cause of their Non Conformity But yet I can see no such great danger of the ruin of Souls more than now there is if they were as silent as they are clamorous Salvation in another sense than that in which it is usually taken being the common end of at least a great part of that noise and disturbance which is made by that Party and I heartily wish that their Hearers laying aside that blind zeal out-side Piety and unreasonable opposition to the Government both of Church and State in which they please themselves and whereby they are distinguish'd from other Men they would by the regular Piety Loyalty Peace Humility Obedience and Charity of their Lives convince the World of the excellency and sincerity of their Teachers 〈◊〉 18. 4. Mischiefs to Piety The most Learned Divines and the Wisest States-men in the World are but bunglers when they take upon them to add unto Gods Worship what he hath not appointed If our Author either could or would tell us what Worship God hath particularly appointed
I who make no pretensions that way shall not though perhaps I might with a greater probability contradict him but rather wish that he and many others whose ambition it hath been to be thought wiser than more modest Men had been more sparing both in the interpretations of Prophecies in such a manner and in uttering their own Imaginations and Whimsies in such terms as have encouraged some unjudicious and credulous Persons by the like phanciful application of the fulfilling of them to themselves to attempt strange things to the disturbance of our Church's and the Kingdoms Peace the Emotions of the Anabaptists in Germany long since and the Fifth-Monarchy-men in England in the time of King Charles the Second are such evident instances hereof that I need name no more I could be heartily glad that that expression of his to them 〈◊〉 31. It depends much on your pious Counsels to calm the storms that rage in some Men's minds to heal our breaches c. were true tho for a far better more generous and Christian end than that which he adds To make us a terrour to our Enemies and wish that our Author to prove it would give us an instance of the Efficacy of their pious Counsels by the future calmness of the storm that so lately rages in his own Mind and in his Disciples 5. 〈◊〉 35. The danger that threatens us in the continuance of Ceremonies in the Worship of God We are threatened with a double danger present and future 1. Our present danger this may be set forth in three Particulars 1. The continuance of these things will bring upon us the contempt and hatred of the People It was well enough because plainly and honestly confess'd and the motive allow'd sufficient for the writing of a Play which the Comedian acknowledges in his Prologue Poeta cum primùm animum ad scribendum appulit Id sibi negotî credidit solùm dari Populo ut placerent quas fecisset fabulas But it ill becomes a Divine to plead for any alterations in the worship of God by arguments drawn from worldly Interests and Advantages even the favour of a Prince much less of a Populace one single Reason deduced from the Peace and Union of the Church were it to be this way attained as it never will after the greatest condescensions alterations and abolitions our Author or a more furious Phanatick if any such there be can propose in the balances of the Sanctuary which only are to be used by the Church would infinitely outweigh all such considerations And I may add that the continuance of these things is so far from the bringing upon us the hatred and contempt of the People that on the contrary the abolishing of them would most certainly and upon far juster grounds do it as being Persons of levity and inconstancy in our religious Worship and making it truckle to our worldly Interests and designs men that have not hitherto been in earnest with God or the World who prostitute their Consciences to the pleasure of others and are contented for advancement to make themselves ridiculous by giving the Lye to all their publick Professions Declarations Subscriptions Defences Vindications and use of our Church-Customs and Constitutions The Dissenters doubt of the lawfulness of our terms of Communion and therefore cannot yield to us 〈…〉 but we may with ease and innocence condescend to them in quitting Impositions not appointed by God What our Author means by terms of Communion and Impositions not appointed by God who can tell he having no where told us but while he intimates the former to be unlawful and the latter to be so innocently easily and advantageously parted with he doth but beg the Question If it were enough to say the Dissenters doubt of the lawfulness of our Church Customs and Constitutions and therefore cannot yield to us by equal reason it may be sufficient to return we doubt of the lawfulness of parting with them and therefore cannot yield to them However when our Author and his Clients the Dissenters shall shew unto us what and which are by us made terms of Communion and are unlawful as also which are the Impositions that are and are not appointed by God and when he and they are come to an agreement amongst themselves and give us security to be all concluded by it then I dare engage the Church of England will joyn with them and do what they would have done in the mean time it is not rational to talk of an Union since no Man knows what will please them The Bishop of Salisbury's Exhortation is very good but I think it should more properly have been directed to the Dissenters for it is in their Power only to heal the wounds and close the Schisms they have to say no worse unnecessarily made by their own voluntary separation from us but in ours it is not tho we should give away our Ceremonies our Liturgy our Churches our Consciences and our Lives Our Brethren have according to the Act of Indulgence subscribed our Doctrine 〈…〉 and are thereby incorporated into the Church of England Except I see the Subscriptions of our Author's Brethren or at the least receive it from far better Testimony than his Pamphlet I shall not believe that they have subscribed the Thirty Nine Articles of the Church of England for I never remember such an instance of their Obedience to Authority and it is difficult to leave an old ill custom but if it be true then they have thereby approved of our Ordinations Creeds and consequentially of our Ceremonies also yet are they not thereby incorporated into the Church of England for incorporation into a Church doth not depend upon believing or testifying that belief by subscription of some few Principles in Religion which perhaps may so be elected and composed that Papists Lutherans Calvinists Arminians Independents c. which hold not mutual communion amongst themselves may subscribe them but in being baptized in it as to Infants and in living in actual Communion in the Word Sacraments Prayers and other Publick Offices with it as to the adult and faithful Suppose they did all subscribe the whole 39 Articles and agree with us in the substantials of our Religion 1 〈◊〉 3 〈◊〉 which are only worth contending for is it not a plain Argument of their pride carnality and disobedience that they will make a Schism and separate from our Communion upon the account of order and decency and the use of such things as they themselves cannot say are unlawful Who and what Party used to obstruct Affairs in Parliament he needs no Information who can remember the Reign of King Charles II. But to charge some Clergy-men and Priest ridden Gentlemen with the obstructing the Affairs of Parliament hindering the Relief of Derry c. can be looked upon nothing less than a malicious slander till he names the Men and proves the thing if he can do either or both of them let him
he is welcome he will do good service he needs not fear the Law is on his Side Criminals ought to be brought to Justice and he may expect a Reward however he hath malice enough towards Clergy-men and perhaps for their sakes to the Priest ridden Gentlemen to discover them if he knew them and therefore unless he doth so what he says ought in all reason to be esteemed as a notorious Calumny and Libel and our Author to be dealt with accordingly Who brought Ireland and Scotland into their late and present condition is very well known 〈◊〉 6. All the pious sober and moderate Clergy-men are for a Union I believe they are so but all the Question is how we shall attain it an abundance of Men have undertaken to dictate to the Convocation many whereof have like the Cobler in the Proverb who went beyond his Last judged of things beyond the Verge of their knowledge and prescrib'd Methods both unreasonable and impracticable Our Author cannot be thought to have contributed to the cure but must be accounted amongst those unskilful Operators who instead of lessening and removing have only increas'd our Maladies and made them more incurable for in lieu of Wine and Oyl he hath brought Gall and Vinegar to pour into the Churches Wounds The account he gives of the rest of the Clergy is such as can be called no less than an heap of malicious false suggestions and slanderous railing accusations and deserves and admits of no particular answer If I should say of his magnify'd Clients the Dissenting Teachers some are whimsical Enthusiasts and not worthy our regard some are ignorant Dunces and incompetent Judges some are Proud and Hypocritical Pharisees and separate as their Predecessors amongst the Jews to be thought more holy than others that their Glory and Triumph consists in leading filly Women captive that instead of the Solid and Practical Doctrins taught in the Church of England they entertain their seduc'd and beguil'd Disciples with useless canting and unintelligible Phrases that their separation from our Communion was not so much out of Conscience as out of Pride Peevishness and Love of opposition to their Superiors in Church and State that they study more to avoid the scandal than the vice and differ from the most profane but as he who wears a Vizor from him who goes bare-fac'd that they all drive on a Carnal and Worldly Interest and do but maintain a Faction to be maintained by it I should do violence to my inclinations and intentions and write with almost as little civility and shew of good breeding but with far more truth and modesty than he hath done concerning the Clergy of the Established Church Our Author for fear his successive cajoling and railing should not prevail with the Church of England to part with those ancient Rites and laudable Customs wherein she holds Communion with the Primitive and Catholick Churches whereby she justifies her separation from the Roman and performs the solemn Worship of God with decency and uniformity in her own Publick Assemblies which her Pious and Prudent Reformers and Fathers recommending unto Authority are secured unto us by Laws and Constitutions and he in contempt calls Ceremonies proceeds now at length to threatnings to frighten her Members into a compliance and to this purpose he tells our Clergy-men that in the next Rebellion the People viz. the Dissenters will be severely reveng'd on them Pag. 〈◊〉 make sure work with them I suppose he means by cutting their Throats for that is as secure a way as any I know and totally extirpate them Whether our Author speaks these things experimentally from what some suffered in the late Rebellion or prophetically by vertue of his talent that way let the learned judge however we may see what manner of Spirit he and his Clients are of and how fit he is to be a Peace-maker and what manner of stuff he hath proposed to the Convocation he might well have called his Pamphlet the second part of the Healing Attempt As for those dreadful Comminations who can deny their being probable What passed between the Years 1635. and 1660. is sufficient to teach us that the usage of Presbyterians and Papists to those in their Power is much alike and that when they shall have the same or the like opportunities an indissolvible House of Commons to protect them and the Rabble to fight for them and their Brethren of Scotland to assist them they may expect the same or a worse Persecution for what fair Quarter can they look for when Kings are beheaded c. But in the mean time what would he have them to do to pull down their Churches themselves for fear the Dissenters should do it This is but for a Man to hang himself for fear of dying In the next National Deluge of Rebellion and Bloodshed which our Author Prophesies to be at hand and our Friends the Dissenters true Lovers of Peace desirers of Union and upholders of Monarchy in pursuance of their Solemn League and Covenant and for the establishment of their Godly Discipline shall bring upon us and therein overwhelm our Church and State they do not expect to escape nor are covetous to survive them and yet at present are not willing either to be the Authors of or to anticipate their own misery 2. Our danger of losing all our lately recovered Rights 〈…〉 if by our Divisions we should again let in the Common Enemy That our Church's parting with all her Liturgy Rites Ceremonies and what else our Author hath confidence enough to ask would not re-unite the Dissenters to the Establish'd Church I shall elsewhere endeavour to make apparent I shall therefore here only observe that in this time of danger all the Dissenters even the most Potent Interests as well as the lesser Sects would do well and wisely since better Motives will not prevail with them to re-unite themselves with the Church of England but to exhort the Church of England to go over to any of them is not so proper or decent The Agreement of the Church of England with Scripture and the Primitive and Catholick Church both in Doctrin and Government the moderation of her Reformation Her Apologies Defences and Vindications of her self and practices from the Calumnies of the Church of Rome and Separatists her Orthodoxness of Principles Regularity of Constitutions and Legal Establishments to which I might add the Personal obligations a great part of the Nation is under not to endeavour any alterations in the Government of either Church or State as by Law established all prohibit it and make it unequal and unreasonable And farther that if the Church of England will not for these and other reasons part with any Rite Ceremony laudable Custom or Constitutions till the Dissenters shall prove them unlawful or shew her better motives so to do yet there is therefore nothing the more danger of losing all our lately recovered Rights by letting in again the Common
Our future danger from the continuance of Ceremonies and that in respect of the account we must give to our Judge Our Author it seems would have the World believe that we have many or at least some very dangerous Ceremonies in the Church of England whereas except kneeling and standing are such as I have already observ'd and his tautologies have often forc'd me to repeat there are no Ceremonies enjoyned to be observed by the Congregation in our Publick Worship and all the Ceremonies the Clergy are appointed by our Church to use in all her Publick Offices joyntly taken if Ceremonies are taken in that sense in which they include not Baptism and the Holy Communion exceed not three and those three are so inoffensive in themselves and innocent in their signification that none of the Dissenters could ever yet prove them unlawful and our Author who hath shewn malice enough by his railing thought fit to pass over that Topick in silence retained for so good ends and purposes and tend so much and evidently to Devotion Decency Order and Uniformity the Piety and Wisdom of our Reformers in reserving them and only them out of such a Multitude deserve not only to be commended but admired neither is it to be supposed that those Holy Men most of which either dyed or suffered Banishment in the Cause would clog and burthen that Doctrin and Reformation with evil or unprofitable Ceremonies which they were forced to espouse with the utmost peril of their Lives and Fortunes How will you at that day lift up your Faces before your Master and your Judge when he shall demand of you what is become of those his Lambs 〈…〉 which you drove into the Wilderness by needless Impositions Instead of other answer to this Question I shall ask another How will you O ye dissenting and seducing Teachers at that day lift up your Faces before your Master and your Judge when he shall demand of you what is become of those his Lambs which you have enticed and enveigled away from their own proper Pastors and Folds into the Wilderness by your needless oppositions to things lawful and indifferent by your perverse separation from a decent Establish'd Order and by your scandalous Schism from my true Church and making mischievous divisions in it Româ— 17 â—â— upon the specious pretence of Conscience when the true inward Motives were pride sensuality and interest and the effects have been prejudices censures malice railings seditions rebellions c To conclude notwithstanding all those dreadful denunciations of vengeance that our Author useth to affright our Clergy or the Members of our Church I doubt not but that it will be far more tolerable both for our Reformers who continued our present Rites and Ceremonies and the Clergy who since did and yet do use them in the Day of Judgment than for those who out of Pride and Interest oppose them upon their account make an unnecessary Separation from the Church or like our Author seditiously and schismatically libel the Government and Church to encrease the Enemies and endanger the Peace of both Some Considerations on the Author 1. HAD not our Author by an ambiguous if not fictious Subscription obtruded himself upon the World for a Clergy-man of the Church of England I should as well as others for ever as I did a long time have let his Pamphlet lye neglected upon the Booksellers Shop windows as being what the Title Page shews it a fardle of malice and railing prejudice and passion for such usually are the Pamphlets of our Adversaries and therefore fitter to be answered by silence and contempt than any other way If we take liberty to wave the Subscription and judg of the Author by his work he seems to be really though disguised a Jesuit or at least a Regular of some other Order in the Romish Church Commissioned as an Emissary and sent hither to disturb our Peace and this we may the more readily believe if we remember That the Church of Rome esteeming the Church of England because so like the Primitive both in Doctrine and Discipline and the only Church able to convince her of her corruptions and novelties her greatest and most invincible Enemy which since her Champions could neither by their Pens confute 〈…〉 nor by their Swords destroy they made it their business to weaken by divisions pursuant to which proposed Method long since in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign they set patterns to the Dissenters to make long extemporary Prayers to decry set Forms rail against our Liturgy Ceremonies the pretended corruptions of our Church and Popery it self for which good service one Faithful Comyn 〈…〉 in particular was rewarded by the then Pope with 2000 Ducats On the same errand were many other Jesuits sent over into these Kingdoms in the Reign of King Charles I. which how well they succeeded is but too well known And our Author following the same labour it is but rational to suppose him set on work by the same Master carrying on the same design and expecting the same issue and hoping for the same or the like reward 2. Or since the Pamphlet contains weak or rather no Arguments but instead thereof strong calumnies its Style is Fanatick-cant intermixt with down-right scurrilous railing and is with no less impertinence than conceited confidence proposed to the Convocation we may suppose our Author to be some small retailer of the Geneva-Discipline and Government who having read a Systeme or two where that Model is laid down as Orthodox Divinity is therewith so captivated and possessed with it that all others must be censured condemn'd and abolish'd to make room for it and being fully persuaded of the truth of those notions he judges every thing lawful or unlawful as it suits or disagrees with them neither will the subscription though in unusual terms By P. M. a Minister of the Church of England make it much less probable for Presbyterians besides an envy to the Episcopal Order because it is superior to their own and Antimonarchical Principles may have learned of their elder Brethren the Jesuits the useful art of Equivocation by virtue whereof our Author if he believes his own words in pag. 36. Our Brethren meaning the Dissenting holders forth have according to the Act of Indulgence subscribed our Doctrine and thereby are incorporated into the Church of England perhaps may think it in some sense to be reconcilable to truth and to this conjecture the use of that affected word Minister which as in use formerly in the Jewish Synagogue 〈◊〉 20. signified him who kept the Book and prompted the Reader according to its derivation a Servant and in the Christian Church a Deacon or Alms Keeper adds a great probability 3. But if our Author be really such as he designs to be thought a Clergy-man in the Church of England though a Minister or Deacon in the lowest Station he hath degenerated yet lower and become guilty of the
enjoyned the Congregation in the ordinary Publick Worship prescribed in the Church of England Will the removal of them take away the Vizor with which Formalists Hypocrites Wicked and Prophane Men cover themselves Wicked and Prophane Men as the words themselves imply are bare-fac'd Sinners and wear no Vizor and as for Formality and Hypocrisie they were never since the Ancient Pharisees used by any more than by our Modern Sectarists nor ever so much in esteem and fashion as since the number of those who under that disguise decry Ceremonies made them bold and confident Had kneeling at Prayers and standing at the Creed and Gospel been such an excellent Vizor it would not be prudence in us to abolish them especially for nothing for many of the Dissenters who need a Vizor as well as others would either use them in their Conventicles or come over to us themselves merely for the benefit of them but suppose what it is almost ridiculous to suppose viz. that our Author had herein spoken Truth and Reason yet the removal of Ceremonies would effect little as to that for we find that the Dissenters who seldom kneel at Prayers or use the Creed and have no Gospel have yet under the Vizor of purity preciseness and tenderness of Conscience done abundantly beyond all that ever Ceremonies can or could pretend to neither need we to strip our Church Offices of these and run from the little remainders of decency remaining in use in our Churches into down-right rusticity and more than Corinthian rudeness in our Publick Worship in hopes that then Drunkards 〈…〉 Swearers Whoremongers and such like will be known to be what they are a mere Herd of Brutes It would be a foolish and too costly an experiment and an extravagant instance of our levity and indiscretion but no discovery unless of that which every body knows already or if any Man wants farther satisfaction herein let him repair to our Author who can tell him such wonderful things concerning Rites Ceremonies c. as all the World never dream'd on before nor any Man of but ordinary Sense and Judgment will believe now 5. Mischiefs in promoting a mighty increase of profaneness and all kind of wickedness Pag◠〈…〉 1. Profaneness in the outragious contempt of holy things The tautologies impertinencies improper inferences and untrue assertions of our Author's Pamphlet are too many to be consider'd or remark'd but a Man must either have a conceit of himself like to that of his own Infallibility or else he must presume wonderfully upon the simplicity dulness and ignorance of his Readers before he comes to put such down right contradictions upon them Him who all this while he hath bitterly inveigh'd against as a Bigot and Zealot he now makes a profane and outragious contemner of holy Things whereas Zeal when taken in ill part for Superstition and profaneness are and always were esteemed the two contrary extremes and vices on either side Religion There is scarce any thing in Religion that hath escaped the scorn and reproach of blind Zealots The Ordinance of Preaching the Lords Day the Scripture our Holy Religion and Jesus Christ himself all have been struck at To scorn and reproach Preaching Scripture the Lord's Day c. hath been always hitherto look'd upon as a Sign of a Profane and not of a Zealous Person and this Author hath shewn us no reason to change our Sentiments but suppose his words to be true hence we may observe 1st That a Schism caused by a difference in belief though erroneous can never be reunited by the abolition of Ceremonies for the cause remaining the effect would continue 2ly That the apprehensions of Men being so various and their judgments so discrepant a comprehension without a compliance in things indifferent and a forbearance with Men in their particular Opinions can never be effected but these being once supposed it may follow as things now are 3ly That there are divers others as extravagant Zealots as our Author whose Notions are altogether impracticable who encrease the Schism and widen the Separations in the Church under pretence of making propositions for a comprehension and should not be regarded till they learn more discretion and moderation than at once to ask the abolishing of all Ceremonies the exercise of jurisdiction 〈…〉 and power of Orders and the pulling down the whole Constitutions of our Church The Ordinance of Preaching 〈…〉 21. The constant serious diligent performing of this would spread knowledge amongst the People to the prejudice of humane impositions in Divine Worship They would see what light things they are in the Service of God 〈…〉 43. The Constitutions of the Church of England are so far from discouraging or obstructing constant serious diligent Preaching as our Author would insinuate that on the contrary she requires and enjoyns it so that in that sense even the Ordinance of Preaching may properly be called an Humane Imposition neither do we of her Communion if Passionate Malicious Schismatical Sinister-designing Railing go not as often it hath under that notion fear any prejudice thereby ensuing to any Impositions in use in our Divine Worship We wish all Men in our Communion and in theirs too were more knowing pious discreet honest and conscientious than all the Preaching of Dissenters and our Author with all others of his Opinion is ever like to make them We would be glad all Men did see what light things all our Impositions and Ceremonies both are in the Service of God hoping then they would be better satisfied both of the lawfulness and decency of them and if their prejudices and interests which with ignorance are the great causes of our Schisms and Separations should not hinder would approve of them and conform to the use of them for their lightness adds to their weight and value and their easiness and fewness to their Commendation for those Impositions and Ceremonies which were otherwise allowable as were the Jewish when their numbe like theirs makes them weighty Matt. 〈…〉 become a burthen too heavy to be born As for Preaching it must be confess'd to be far less necessary now at least in a converted Nation than when the World was Pagan And whereas the Papists have resolved all publick religious Duties into Prayers and the Dissenters have run into the other extreme and placed them in long Preachments the Church of England hath herein as in most other things retained the golden Meane and useth both and tho frequency is more necessary to the former yet the latter is not to be neglected but when it excludes Catechizing the change is made for the worse and indeed were that most useful way of instruction of both the young and ignorant much used in the Primitive Church and prescribed by our own revived throughly performed and duly frequented Can. 〈…〉 61. as it would be far more difficult to the Teacher so it would be far more beneficial to the People than Preaching The