Selected quad for the lemma: evil_n
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A64560
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An apology for the Church of England in point of separation from it by ... William Lord Bishop of St. Davids.
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Thomas, William, 1613-1689.
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1679
(1679)
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Wing T975; ESTC R33829
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87,104
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244
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unto them that call evil good and good evil that put darkness for light and light for darkness that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter I pray God be merciful to any of either party Tros Rutulusve fuit who is justly liable to this Commination When ever your separation is demonstrated to be good when your Doctrine is manifested to be light I shall not presume to misname nor disesteem it But if the blaze of Comets be accounted the splendor of Stars if a new Light that diverts to Schism extinguish the old Orthodox if division distraction confusion in Religion be gilded with the title the varnish of Reformation if Sects that are to be bewailed lamented for be applauded gloried in as some Ladies imagine their little black spots to be grand beauties then this Caution affords a retortion and may be weighed by your selves You enforce this Caveat of Isaiah with Solomons Aphorism Prov. 17. 15. He that justifieth the wicked and he that condemneth the just they both are abominable to the Lord. Whether this is to be interpreted of publick judicature or private censure I shall not discuss If you appropriate the Epithet Just as you do Saints to your selves we honor whatever hath the true savour of Sanctity in you we are ready to embrace you in our Bowels in our Church Upon your aversness we condemn not the Separatist but the Separation because erected upon an unwarrantable foundation upon a Pharisaical presumption If you apply the wicked mentioned Solomon to a Parochial Assembly formerly asperst by you to be a company of Drunkards Swearers Sabbath-breakers I am no Advocate to plead for any crimes or scandals I resent bewail and detest them and upon all fit opportunities shall present the guilt and horror of them to the consciences of the Offenders in the sharpest accents Though when ever acted they are sufficient grounds for the Ministers general reprehension in the Pulpit yet not of your particular Separation from the Lords Table till they are declared sentenced by the Church You proceed They profess Christ 1 Cor. 6. 15 17. Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of a harlot God forbid verse 15. But he that is joyned to the Lord is one Spirit vers 17. The Apostle doth here by the elegant charm of Sacred Rhetorick disswade deter the Christian Corinthians from lasciviousness being the darling sin of Corinth where a thousand beautiful Damosels were the votaries of Venus as Herodotus and Strabo testifie so that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 became proverbial to be wanton The spreading contagion of uncleanness there occasioned the Apostles piercing Expostulation for a searching healing at least a preventing Physick You may hence argue that fornication severs a profest Christian inwardly from Christ when ever committed and not repented of but not outwardly from the Church without conviction and promulgation You object such make not the Communion because a mixt Communion is not fit for Christ his Members must be homogeneal or else a monster This Argument is fallacious Ab ignoratione Elenchi Wicked men so far as they are Christs Members are homogeneal to wit in profession though heterogeneal in conversation wherein they are not Christ's Members Your Objection is not ejusdem secundum idem Real actual Believers are Members homogeneal inwardly sincerely verbal professional Believers are Members homogeneal outwardly formally If this Professional consideration will not serve how do you confess Hypocrites to be Members of the Church since they are no otherwise homogeneal than a glass eye or a wooden leg is to a true body than a painted face is to a genuine complexion than the fucus the Paint of Art is to the Beauty of Nature Lastly you conclude the Church if not homogeneal a Monster whereas impiety in Church Members is not monstrosity till emproved to impenitenoy such Monsters are to be cut off to be excommunicated Your Citation in the close 2 Cor. 6. 14. hath been already discuss'd The Apostle there forbids the Corinthians to be yoked with Pagan Unbelievers because of the profest Idolatry Therefore you will be separate from Christian Believers for their practick iniquity The LETTER A mixt Communion may do no hurt what is it to me what others are Ans. Yes it will be hurt to him that commucates with scandalous brethren 1 Cor. 5. 7. It is not meant there the sin but the incestuous person The danger is in vers 6. so Gal. 5. 9. which is it may become sin to me in neglecting my duty if I have not endeavoured the casting out of a scandalous person as far as it lyeth in me and in following the rule Matth. 18. 15 16 17. The ANSWER You plead it noxious to communicate with scandalous Brethren from 1 Cor. 5. 7. compared with vers 6. I have already vindicated this Text from your gloss being to be understood of Excommunication not separation without it You add Gal. 5. 9. A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump It is a recital of the same maxime but not with the same scope or drift In the fifth Chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians it is applied to the incestuous person but in the fifth to the Galatians to the infection of Circumcision a contagious Doctrine It is our Saviours Lecture Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees Their singularity their hypocrisie like leaven had a double influence to swell and sower Arrogance and Virulence If this leaven be entirely purged out the question of separation will be completely stated absolutely determined If we will separate from the Pharisee in the secret mortification of our own bosoms we cannot separate from the Publican in the publick pious devotion of the Temple This primary duty being conscientiously observed of purging the corruption of our own hearts the secondary duty will much more dextrously he discharged to endeavour so far as in us lyeth within the compass of our own Sphere our calling to cleanse the Congregation of its corruption a scandalous person The Rule proposed Matth. 18. 15 16 17. hath been copiously examined though by your selves scantily observed The LETTER If I have gone so far by professing and witnessing against it I discharged my duty or else I sin and if the Church will not do it after long patience and waiting I know no warrant to continue in such a diseased body that will not nor cannot purge out its infectious humours that wants such a precious Ordinance of Jesus Christ of separating the precious from the vile Hag. 2. 12 13 14. That the unholy do defile and unhallow the holy in such a way as I said before so that to communicate in such a way is sin The ANSWER It ought to be our prime care in this exigency not to partake of the sins of other men when they are vitious and scandalous not to be engaged in them by Precept or Precedent by advice or example
Primitive Institution The ANSWER Such unnecessary Queries have discarded necessary Duties which are become pastimes and triumphs to our Romish Adversaries Wounds and scandals to our Reformed Brethren I shall not cavil at the terms of the Question though justly lyable to exception as a Nation being a civil consideration as a Church a spiritual but I affirm the National Church of England to be constituted according to the Word of God and Primitive Institution I shall not act the Samaritan who would be reputed a Jew when Judaism was resplendent flourished but in its Umbrage and Captivity had no portion no interest in Israel Having owned and reverenced the Church of England as a chaste Matron as a venerable Mother in her lustre I shall not desert nor brand her as an impure Harlot in her Eclipse I imagine her pathetically expostulating with you in this Assault as Coriolanus's Mother in Livy did with her hostile Son The LETTER If it was whether it be not so degenerated and defaced from a true Gospel Institution that a man cannot safely walk therein and partake of the Holy Things of God without sin The ANSWER Your twisted Query is a Fallacy Fallacia plurium interrogationum a compound of variety of contrariety at least in consequence of ingredients A Church is not degenerated without a charge of the corruption the stain of depravation A Church may be defaced by the freckles of affliction by the scars of persecutions The Beauty of the Piety of the Church of England is clouded the Feature disfigur'd by the Obstructions of the times In this consideration of solemnity Seges est ubi Troja fuit But an afflicted eclipsed is not a degenerated depraved Church If your self be degenerated from her profession your question resembles the fond imaginations of Harpaste who being deprived of her sight would not be perswaded her self was blind but that the room was dark There may be in Tertullians Judgement a confidence of two sorts of blindness intellectual to discern a depravation which is not and not to see that perfection which is The Calamities of the Church of England are not to be imputed to her for crimes Is the less Christian because she owns Christs Badge and wears his Livery the Cross. The participation of her holy things is not unholy It is no sin to communicate with her in these but to separate from her To prevent an imaginary guilt of Pollution by others beware lest you incur a real guilt of Schism by separation in your self It is the wily artifice of Satan though probably you neither ken nor dread it Sic notus Ulysses In this nicety of severity you supererogate exceeding the Apostolical prescription Have no fellowship with the fruitless works of darkness The works not the workers unless you intend to quit universally all society with the World The Sacred Charge nay Charm of a Sacred Life is cast in the same mould Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from evil From the quality the action not the agent the sin not the sinner Unless as Constantinus reproved Acesius you will erect a ladder for your separation to mount Heaven alone The LETTER Touching the first Query I have this to say First Primitive Institution the first Apostolical Church Acts 2. 42. from the verses before I gather the matter of it to be Converts and no ordinary Work on their hearts neither 37 38 39 verses joyning all together it holds forth that they were and so all to whom the promise belongs which is a Church Legacy ought to be called Converts The ANSWER That first Apostolical Institution doth not justifie your separation your Argument may be retorted Some have hence proved the lawful constitution of those Churches you separate from By an outward profession which is the result of their Communication you alledge that they were Converts Were they reall Converts or Professional If real this ingrafts them in the invisible Church as professional they were interested in the visible Church This Profession claimed the Appellation to be called Converts But you argue that they were real Converts because no ordinary work wrought on their hearts It is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They were pricked in their hearts They had some sting of conscience some gripings of remorse at St. Peters Sermon Reprobates are not always destitute of these corrosive Anxieties Compunction of heart doth not amount to conversion unless you will confound the critical differences of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 warranted by the Evangelists It is a preparative to it it is not an accomplishment of it In this instance it is expressed generally of all the Auditors without any limitation in 37 verse Now when they had heard this they were pricked in their hearts But it is qualified restrained They that gladly received his word were baptized in the 41. verse If both qualifications of a bitter compunction and a chearful attention be linked yet they will not compleat them to be true Converts Ananias and Saphira are computed Members of this Congregation you will not grant a true Conversion where there is a Recidivation Their first Profession is censured Dissimulation The LETTER 2. How they were gathered into order by withdrawing themselves yea and that from a Church not from Heathens but from a froward Generation such as many professing are as great enemies to Christ as ever they were though not in the same manner For those who will not have Christ to be their King to rule over them are as great enemies to Christ as those that will not have him their Jesus to save them Matth. 19. 14 27. Phil. 3. 18 19. The ANSWER I grant they were gathered into order though your Medium doth not infer it The Text sets it out Parainetically St. Peters admonition not Historically the execution the practice of it in the 40 verse However they withdrew themselves not from a Church if you intend by a Church a Christian Assembly but from a Synagogue If from a Church in this Notion you contradict your self this was not then the first Primitive Institution I suppose in your construction first Apostolical Before this numerous shole caught in the Fisher of Souls Net the Church after our Saviours Passion is summed up comprehending one hundred and twenty Members To collect three thousand out of a Church of an hundred and twenty were as prodigious Logick as Arithmetick I pray weigh the importance of the inference touching this Primitive Institution They withdrew from a Synagogue from Jews therefore Christians must withdraw from Christians They gathered to the Church therefore a Church must be gathered from a Church Such deductions are ropes of Sand arena sine calce as Domitian censured Senecas concise uncemented expressions an incoherence more laudable in sentences than proofs but not to digress That froward Generation mentioned were especially the Scribes and Pharisees our Saviours profest embittered