than with your manly or rather unmanly pride envy uncharitableness roughness and presumption whereout it is that you so despise and offend the little ones withholding them from their due of Baprism rail and revilethe Churches of God and the Ministers of Jesus Christ These things I tell you grieve the good and mild Spirit of God and send it away sad from such hearts and at last if presevered in will quench its holy fervours And I wonder very much that any people should run after you as they do who leave their Infants and Children under no better a condition or denomination than of Infidels and unbelievers for so you tell them that their condition by nature and their seed is the same which Pagan-Gentiles and till they know God and believe in him open and professed enemies of God whereas upon their and our nature that is natural Generation or Procreation of Seed there is the Covenant of Grace established and set up which you see at large Ephes 2.3 and 4 c. That we were by Nature the Children of wrath as well as others when out of Covenant You profess much Scripture Learn to speak in that Holy Language and to call Children of Christians Christians by Nature and not sinners of the Gentiles or Pagans for so Saint Paul speaketh Gal. 2.15 We who are Jews by Nature and not sinners of the Gentiles How Jewer by Nature because they were the Children of the Prophets and of the Covenant born under it Act. 3.25 So are our Children Christians by Nature how not sinners of the Gentiles because born Jewes had not their sins imputed to them though born in original sin as the Gentiles the Covenant being a remedy appointed against it and a means to bring them into Gods favour again and so are our Children not sinners of the Gentiles You that are Parents and are carefull enough to keep sure your inheritances and joyntures of earthly things to you and your Children suffer not your Children to be wrangled out of their birth-right and joynt inheritance they have with your selves in the Covenant of Grace under the name and notion of unbelievers when as the Scriptures never calleth them so but a holy Seed and God hath made you and you Children joynt-partakers of the Covenant and the Seals thereof I have been the longer in this for that I would lay therein some ground-work for something to follow I will be very short in your next Quaere Section II. Of Baptism making Christians and how YOu ask whether Baptism maketh a man or woman a Christian without Faith and following of Christ in all his Commands and Steps left upon Record for our imitation This is a short Quaere and therefore shall be soon answered as not seeing to what purpose it is for you or against me I shall therefore briefly answer something to it out of Rom. 2.28 and 29. distinguishing of the sorts of Christians and the parts of Baprism as he doth of the sorts of Jews and parts of Circumcision As Circumcision which was outward in the flesh made though I do not here approve of this your word and therefore I will use another shewed or declared the Jew outwardly or the outward Jew so Baptism which is outward in the flesh sheweth or declareth the Christian outwardly or the outward Christian And both may be without Faith and following of Christ in all his Commands c. as in Esau and Simon Magus the one Circumcised the other Baptized Again As Circumcision which is of the heart in the Spirit not in the Letter made for here your word may go a Jew inwardly or the inward Jew So Baptism which is of the heart in the Spirit not in the water onely maketh a Christian inwardly or the inward Christian neither of these can be without Faith which parifieth the heart or the fruits of Faith in following of Christ c. Now as the Apostle saith surther He is not a Jew and that is not Circumcision so may I He is not a Christian and that is not Baptism namely approved of God and avaylable to Salvation which are outward onely and literal and therefore every true Jew or Christian must indevour after Faith and Following Christ to speak as you do and to find and get the inward and spiritual substance and nature of these Sacraments which is to worship God in Spirit to believe and rejoyce in Christ Jesus having no confidence in the flesh Phil. 3.3 to put off the sinsull body of the flesh Col. 2.11 That we may draw neer with a true heart in full affurance of Faith having our hearts sprinckled from an evill Conscience and our bodies washed in pure water Heb. 10.22 and may have the washing of Regeneration and the Sprinkling of the Blood of our Lord Jesus within us as Tit. 3.5 and 1 Pet. 1.2 Again There are Made Christians and there are Born Christians or a Proselytical or Parental Christianity As for such who are of the Pagan and Heathen world by Nature They can no otherwise be made Christians or Members of the Church but by a lawful Baptism upon their accession unto the Church and expression of their Faith so the Proselvtes of old were and did whom Baptism made Christians and outward members of the visible Church upon their Confession of Faith like as their Faith if true made them Saints and inward members of the Invisible Church But for them Infants who are in the Church and within the Covenant descended of Parents and in Covenant these are Born Christians and Church-members visible I mean not as born of Christian Parents but as born in and under the Christian Covenant so that their Baptism doth not so much make them to be Christians but only shew and declare them to be such as I said and seal them as Covenanters And howsoever a Positive expression of Faith explicitely be necessary unto a Heathen Born for his Admission unto his Christianity or Church-membership yet it is not so unto a Christian Born for their Christanity or Church-membership is their Birth-Privilege and Baptism is but their Instalment or inrolment and is but as the Inauguration or unction unto a Prince Born Faith I confess and I mean saving and justifying Faith and so must you seeing you joyn thereto the following of Christ in all his Commands and Steps left upon Record for our Imitation is absolutely requisite unto Born Christians as a Condition to their partaking and enjoyment of the Benefits and Fruits of Baptism but not absolutely required as the condition to their comming and engaging to the Covenant to the which they have a good Title and Right without present actual Faith unless you will affirm that all the Jewes who came to Circumcision had the like and all the whole Congregation of Israel man woman and child who Deut. 29. entred into Covenant with God had a saving and a justifying Faith In a word Baptism without Faith may declare a visible Christian but incompleatly
such were baptised and all their housholds such a one and All his by the Apostles is your imagination so strong and wide as to shut out the children first out of doors of those housholds that so next you may exclude them from the Apostles Baptism You must do so if there were any within doors or tell us that the Apostles passed by them in their baptisings or you must shew us that all the Women in those housholds were barren not a Mother of a Child or a young one amongst them all For though there should not have been in them Infants or Sucklings yet if but a youngling and a Child of some years all would have been but as one as to their Understanding and confessing Or you must thus divide the housholds as you are good at dividing houses and households setting the Husband against the Wife and alienating the Children from Father Mother which is a very bad practice and say that not all the Houshold was baptised whereas the Text saith expresly He and all his houshold were baptised but some major part or the most considerable part of the house and when it is said the house of Israel was circumcised its meant not of a part either major or most considerable but of the whole house as to the Parents and Children and Servants also or Proselytes under their education and instruction I do not wonder you cannot abide our University Arts and Sciences These cannot abide you and such reasonings and interpretations the Apostles baptised such and all their housholds that is the greater part the people of Growth for though sometimes such a word may be so taken where all are not capable of the thing done or spoken of you must prove it to be so here meant in all the places where the Apostles baptised such and all their housholds which you can never doe the express Letter which you are so for is expresly against you such and all their housholds of which many times also children are not onely some of all and a part of the whole but in your Tearms one of them at least the major part I say not the most considerable but I say a capable part too but if in all or any of these housholds there was but one infant or any one young stripling you are gone as to the Apostles practice who baptised the beleever and all his houshold and incapacity here is none to hinder either our interpretation or the Apostles ministration for if there had been any in the houshold uncapable The Apostle would not have baptised the whole houshold or the beleever and all his houshold and I have abundantly shewed before from the Apostle that Infants of Beleevers are capable of baptism Verse 32. Now if be said that the Apostle preached and spake the word to the Gaoler All that were in the Gaolers house so all might beleeve and be baptised it is true the Apostle did so speak the word to all capable of it but yet at the 31. Verse he speaks of the salvation of all the house upon the tearms of the Gaolers beleeving for that the promise and Covenant being so made at first held still to beleevers parents and their children and here also servants because it is said he and all his were baptised in the 33. verse So it appears to me that the Gaoler himself onely beleeved and had an inward work of Faith wrought in the heart upon some special evidence he received of Christ come in the flesh whereupon he and his of whom the other Pagans of his family there is nothing said as to their faith whether servants of growth or children under age the whole houshold were baptized immediately in relation to the Fathers and Masters undertaking and engaging for themselves and their housholds And indeed to keep to my particular if such in these or our housholds as did or do actually beleeve and professe were and are to be baptised onely why was the houshold as of the Gaoler before who onely there beleeved as I have shewed so the houshold of Lydia of whom onely it is said that the Lord opened her heart to beleeve in Christ baptised Surely the Apostles would not bring in a different Administration now in the housholds of beleeving Christians whether out of Jewes or Pagans from that which ever was in use and practice amongst the housholds of beleeving Jewes at first and therefore went here according the common custom formerly used in time of circumcision and where they baptised any beleeving Father of a Family there they did baptise or others for them the children of the same houshold or might have done Otherwise how could they the Apostes when they preached the Gospel to all Nations and so to their housholds how could they bring the blessing of Abraham into all Nations and their housholds according to the prophecy and promise thereof by God if they did not apply the Covenant and the Seal generally to them and theirs in the same manner as it was to him and his so that the children of beleevers might now be baptised as formerly they were circumcised And lastly I may add this That when men in those dayes were converted from Judaism or Pagainism they did probably at their admittance into the Church by baptism make an open and solemn League and Covenant with God before some people present to professe the Faith of Christ they and their housholds which Saint Paul may seem to put some of them in mind of Ephesians 6.4 Fathers bring up your Children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord And therefore when the Apostles did baptise housholds of beleevers they did it in relation on to the Parents or others in their stead undertaking and ingaging for themselves and the children therein And thus now at last and at length too as all other point I have asserted unto you this Point also of Apostolical Practice and Examples for the baptizing of the children and Infants of believing Parents I have answered all your Quaeres and I hope have informed and setled your judgement better by my answers than you could do it by our Quaeres for I cannot yet forget how that at the end of them you say these your Quaeres are your judgement I proceed now to what you have more in your Letter of two sheets but do not mean to proceed as I have begun either to transcribe all your words of the second sheet all have done your words of the first or to bestow twenty and five sheets closely written in answering of your second sheet but loosely written as I have done upon your first sheet for I have dispatched hitherto but the one first sheet of your Letter and there is good reason for it For the first sheet for the most part put Quaeres to me in your number twenty one and they contained in them some material and substantial things to be answered of a large extent and great depth and therefore I thought
in force and vigor and by a pious recordation thereof the Penitent may confirm his Faith as Peter did and by vertue of the same once established Covenant God receiveth such to mercy and grace otherwise the infidelity and impiety of man would frustrate the goodnesse and good will of God the matter testified in baptism which it cannot because it is constant and changeth not and therefore it is a horrible prophanation of it to reiterate baptism In a word Second baptism was ever abhorred in the Orthodox Church as a kind of incestuous Birth and if you iterate it and baptise your beleevers again upon their profession of faith you must be able to make their former baptism void and no baptism which you can never do as having all things therein which God requireth unto Infant baptism Though Faith a positive and actual Faith as you call for should not be there which is not required of God and therefore is denyed of us to be a necessary condition requisite to be found manifest in every one that is to be baptised indeed in an Aethiopian Eunuch an elder Gentile it is and therefore when he said see here is water what doth hinder me to be baptised Philip answered If thou beleevest with all thine heart thou maist who answering I beleeve that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and so Philip baptised him Acts 8 36 37. The onely Argument the Anabaptists triumph in I shall here give a short answer to Infants of Gentiles are not of Abrahams seed either according to the flesh because not Iowes or according to the promise because not beleevers therefore not to be baptised whilest Infants or if they be to be baptised again when beleevere But I answer First The consequent is denyed for Simon Magus and thousands more even of them that you baptise are neither 2. Nor is it true that onely Iewes are Abrahams seed according to the flesh for that part of the Gentile Galatians who pleaded for Justification by the works of the Law and thereby lay under the bondage and curse of the Law are called the children of Hagar and said to be born of the Bond-woman Sinai and Hierusalem upon earth as it is to be seen Gal. 3. 4. The Apostle applying that part of the distinction to them like as the other part the Children of Sarah to those Gentile Galathians who were justified by faith Nor 3. Is it true that onely beleevers actually beleevers as you speak are the Children of the promise for thus they do not onely at this one blow beat down all Christian infante from all interest in Christ and title to heaven and make them like as the Heathens and Pagans who yet are not wont to strike so hard yea and which is more all Jewish Infants Isaack Iacob and Ioseph these must not be with them nor were by this reason Children of the promise in their Childhood but only according to the flesh untill they did actually believe and so became Children of the promise And more absurdity yet doth follow hence that those Patriarks whom I named Abraham is to be here excepted by their infant-circumcision had no promise of grace sealed unto them but were under a Covenant of works and until the years of discretion and actual fiath were incapable of any interest in the Covenant of grace If onely true beleevers and the Elect persons be under the covenant of grace have right to the Sacraments why is the same Covenant of grace inthe outward administration thereof both in preaching the promises and applying the Seales of the Sacraments to be propounded by Gods appointment to all the outward visible members of the Church And why was Simon Magus baptised as I said 'T is true the inward saving grace of the Covenant in both Administrations is by the Holy Ghost conferred onely upon the invisible members of Christs mysticall body which are the true beleevers and elect But we not able to discern of these give the outward baptism to all those I mean all outward members of the visible Chruch You must do so for the Text before alleged out of the Acts sheweth that all they who have any degrees of Faith may and ought to be baptised But Sir will you stand to your own Tackling The baptising of beleevers hereby you think and intend to exclude Infants of Christians What then will you make of them Infidels or Beleevers can you shew any Text of Scripture old or new where any Infant of Iew or Gentile in Covenant with God is so stiled or can you give any reason of it That which makes an Unbeliever must be a positive habit of unbeleef to justifie this in an Infant will be a task too hard for you and to say that Infants do not beleeve in act or have not the habit of faith onely negatively will not in the Language of the Scripture denominate an Unbeleever Indeed those that are made Christians of heathens they must give some positive and actual expressions of their faith before they be baptised so Philip required of the Eunuch and not till then are they to be accounted beleevers but for such as are born Christians of Christians as our infants are being entred into and under a gratuitall Covenant with God we admit them unto the Initial Seal of that Covenant which is baptism without any such Testimonial Act of Fath as you require for they are not Infidels or Unbeleevers but beleevers and within the compasse of your words though not your sense the baptism of beleevers Seeing you can produce no scripture against their Faith I will see what I can do for their Faith Matth. 18.5 6. Turn to the Chapter and Verses and read them and look to your Neck in that Verse it is a Neck verse Whose shall offend one of these little ones which beleeve on me it were better for him that a Mistone were hanged about his neck and he were drowned in the depth of the Sea Lord what shall become of those that offend all thy little ones by dobarring and excluding them from their birth-privilege and their Right-baptism But that I aim at as to you Sir is that you would take notice that our Saviour Christ who best knew knowing the very secrets of the heart pronounceth of some little ones little Children such as he took out one of them set down in the midst of the Apostles for a pattern of Humility and Harmlesseness That they did beleeve in him its apparent that howsoever sometimes and elsewhere spirituall Children are meant by little Children such as are of a meek spirit little in their own eyes here and at this time very natural Children in age and little in growth or statute are spoken of as the very context and Antithesis do shew They who do so interpret this place do make this not the same story with that which followeth in Matth. 19.13 Where little Children are said tob e brought to Christ it may be in their
contemners and despisers of his Sacraments fall heavily upon you and some or other curse of God pursue you so also that such water may be loathsom and noysom to you afterwards Remember Esau again For ye know how that afterwards when he would have inherited the blessing Heb. 12.16 17 he was rejected for he found no place of repentance though he sought it with tears Are they not ritghtly called Jacob's Supplanters one of the first planters of them was called Jacob and that rightly for they that take away your Birth-right Baptism will also take away your Blessing the Blessing of God in Covenant with you as well as with your Parents Yea remember one of the Separation by name Hodsou of the City of Glecester and by an Epithite called Hodson-peevish who since he was new baptised grew as light in the head as before he was light in heart the which I finde recorded by Master Thomas Wynell in print a Minister of Cranham nigh unto that City Yea remember the sad and desatrous ends of those first Ringleaders of re-baptising Muncer Cnipperdoling c. And now thirdly Can they charm sweetly and delightfully to any of you who have the root of bitterness in them from which I dehorted you and whose mouths are full of cursing and bitterness like as they have bitter envying and sirife in their hearts against your Mother-Church and your Baptism especially wherein ye were if regenerate at all born again of water and the Spirit My Brethren these things ought not to be doth a Fountain send forth at the same place or hole of heart or mouth sweet water and bitter Hear now ye Benjamites ye left-handed Protestants will the Son of Jesse Muncer who I mentioned but now give every one of you the Field Benefits 1 Sam. 22 2 5 and Vine-eard Priviledges of Christ and his Church by their new dipping of you and make you Captains of thousands and Captains of hundreds against your sins that they shall not raign or have dominion over your mortall bodies or immortall Soules that all of you have conspired against your Mother-Church and brethren Ministers O foolish Galathians who hath bewitched you that you should not obey the truth before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth crucified amongst you even in your Baptism Gal. 3.1 as the word and other Sacrament wherein you were sprinkled with the blood of Christ unto the washing away of sin being also crucified in the old man with him and buried with him by Baptism that the body of sin might be destroyed that thenceforth ye should not serve sin I mervaile that you are so soon removed away from your Baptism and your calling into the Grace of Christ and his Covenant of Grace unto another Baptism which is not another but there be some that trouble you and would pervert the Baptism of Christ Gal. 1.6 7 But though they or an Angell from Heaven preach any other Baptism unto you then that which we have preached and reached unto you let him be accursed and as I said before so say I now again if any man preach or reach any other Baptism unto you than that ye have received of us let him be accursed or let him shew where ever the Lord Blessed for ever at any time blessed or consecrated instituted or appointed a Baptism of Baptized ones Parents or Children or any other Baptism then once of Believing Parents and their Children once They say if a man put away his wife and she go from him and become another mans shall be return again to her shall not that Land be greatly polluted But thou hast played the Harlot with many Baptisms and many Dippers yet return again to me saith the Lord I say return again to the Lord Jer. 3.1 and to the Lords Baptism if thou hast put it away from thee and renounced it if thou be gone from him and with the strange woman hast forsaken the guide of thy youth yea Child-hood and forgotten the Covenant of thy God Prov. 2.17 and the Seal thereof art become another mans and betaken thy self to another Baptism for which the Land is also defiled as thy self I say return again to the Lord and his and thy first Baptism The Lord look upon thee and remember thy first Baptism and the words of the Covenant of Christ and go out from amongst them who by their Quaeres and intricate questioning of thee caused thee to deny thy first Baptism and therein thy Lord and Master go out and weep bitterly for the same Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen and repent and do thy first works Rev. 2.5 and leave not thy first Love hold fast that which thou hast already even thy first Baptism till Christ come I say Repent and be still as you were in your Infancy baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ and you shall have the Remission of your sins even of this sin of being Baptized again if so you have committed it For the promise is made to you and to your Children with many other words I would have testified and exhorted you saying save your self from this untoward Generation But that I hasten and will tell you to the contrary Look often back to your first Baptism in your Infancy and think not upon any other Baptism afterwards as to a Store-house of comfort in all time of your need if you be tempted by the devill and assaulted about your sins in your youth or old age think not now of ny new or second Baptism but recall thy first and old Baptism oppose it against him say and know that therein God hath promised and sealed unto thee the pardon of thy sins and the purchase of everlasting life by Christ If thou beest troubled with doubtings and weakness of Faith Fetch from thy first Baptism such a strengthening consideration and meditation for the doing of which to introduce another Baptism is but a Fetch that God hath given thee there an earnest and pledge of his loving kindness to thee in the water sprinkled upon thee representing the blood of Christ applyed to thee and so as when Thomas saw the Holes in Christs-side and the print of the nailes he strengthened his Faith against doubtings be not thou faithless but faithfull when thou reflectest upon thy Baptism and remembrest the pouring out of the blood of Christ for thee and the earnest thereof the pouring out of water upon thee If thou liest under any kind of Crosse or Calamity whatsoever have recourse to thy Baptism in which God hath promised to be thy God of which promise he will not fail thee nor canst thou be miserable having this promise yea if God be with thee who shall be against thee Thou doest often look upon the wills and Testaments of thy Father and Grandfather when you are in a doubt of hour Estate or in some trouble about it or in want to be resolved in all
therefore the Jewish Infants were to have the initial Seal of Circumcision the old Ministration imprinted upon them in their infancy to seal up the Covenant unto them under which they were born though they had no such discerning as is now required of the Replier to be in the present act of our new Ministration so our Christian Infants are to have the initial Seal of Baptism the new Ministration sprinkled upon them In their infancy to seal up the same Covenant unto them under which they are born though they have no more discerning than was mentioned to be in the Jewish Infants then at the past act of their old Ministration And yet neither of these Ordinances vain or ineffectual to either of the Infant parties For the efficacy of Baptism as Circumcision depends not upon the act of the Creature discerning and working this is but a rank Romance or a Roman prank of the Replier but upon the free Grace and mercy of God conveighing and operating yea Baptism is not onely a transient act as to sprinkling of water and outward washing but a permanent and continued act of the same grace and mercy as to the inward washing and application of Chirsts merits unto all Gods children But Jewish infants discerned somewhat as who had a bodily seeling of the cutting of their the foreskin of their flesh and so have our Christian infants a bodily feeling of the water laid upon their forehead or faces but what 's either to the purpose of the spiritual discerning of either action or sign as Sacramental to them they discern somewhat and this somewhat is nothing nothing to the purpose being but a natural feeling of the coldness of the water or sharpness of the knife But there is mroe reason there should be demanded discerning of the sign when Baptism is ministred than there was when Circumcision was given for this left a mark or print of it self behinde it so that the Circumcised person bare in his body the mark of the Lord Jesus to use the Apostles phrase and he did daily discern that visible sign to assure him that he was sealed into Covenant with God but the water leaves no impression upon Baptized infants but is either presently wiped off with a Handkercheif by the Midwife or other woman though I think they should not do so and the Ministers ought to rebuke them for it or shortly after it is dried up of it self so that the body is as if it were not washed or wetted at all and and no mark to be seen outwardly to put the party in minde of his being sealed into God his peculiar Servant But what and if there be a mark and character of Baptism like as of Circumcision then there is no more reason of discerning in the one party than the other I do not mean that mark which Papists hold is formed in the soul of every Baptized infant and inscribed thereby the external action of Baptism Simply and barely in it self considered which they call an Indelible character For such is not to be found in Scriptures nor Orthodox writers such a character as may be imprinted and consist without grace in a soul damned and besides its absurd if not impious to ascribe to an external action of a creature that which is the proper act of God an internal characterising or indelible marking in the soul and they may as well say the bare and naked external preaching of the Gospel or remission of sins doth imprint eternal salvation upon the soul without perceiving any force or using any faith But I mean that mark and character which the Ancient Orthodox held to be imprinted in Baptism which was either that gracious act or gift never to he reiterated and therefore called an indelible character for a man rightly baptized becomming a Turk or Jew and afterwards returning to the faith and Church of Christ is in no case to be re-baptized the vertue of his former Baptism is not spunged out but still remainech a vailable of which matter I have spoke largely before or else the very grace and gife of the holy spirit of which the Apostle speaketh 2 Cor. 1.22 Who hath also sealed us and given the earnest of the spirit in our hearts and Eph. 1.13 In whom after ye believed ye were sealed with that holy spirit of promise which also may very truly be called an indelible seal and character wheresoever it is inscribed and imprinted as it is in the hearts and souls of many Baptized infants even all belonging to the eternal election and inheritance mentioned and spoken of in the Texts above alleged Or thirdly the character of Baptism is that passive power whereby the party Baptized is made fit and capable in due time and order to receive the other Sacrament the Lords Supper whereof without Baptism he were uncapable as without Circumcision the Jew was of the Passeover So then there is in both the initial seal marks or characters and as much mark left upon the face and forehead of the infant Baptized as there was upon your head and face when you were dopt or dipt over both in the Pond or River you wote off and though the outward mark were more permanent in Circumcision being done and engraven upon and into the flesh by incision yet there was an outward mark in Baptism though more transient done and laid upon the face and flesh by aspersion or infusion as anciently by immersion But neither was the one character or mark more discernable to the one the Circumcised infant then the other to the Baptized infant neither if it was was it more available to the participation of the Passeover then the other to the partaking of the Lords Supper or more acceptable to God who though he set sometimes an outward mark upon them that mourned Ezek. 9. and so and outward mark upon the houses of the Egyptians for good ends and purposes and so appointed the external elements and actions both of Circumcision and Baptism to be holy and profitable signes and seals yet are not the outward marks in the flesh or the sensitive discernings of the sings the excellencies of Circumsion or the eminencies of Baptism nor is God taken onely or chiefly delighted with beholding such external services and administrations who required these at your hands these onely or chiefly when therefore the Jewish infants came to years of discretion and discerning God looked for and called for not the Circumcision of the flesh but for the Circumcision of the heart this was the mark he looked for and upon in his sheep the Israelites and and so likewise when Christian infants shall attain to the age of discerning and understanding God will look for and upon not so much the water in or upon the face which was the mark of flesh as the blood of Christ in the heart which is the mark of the Spirit And this is that I conclude with As one of your Baptized and re-baptized adult proselytes may
14.15 For so I have put your three last Texts together into one as being all much as one that so I might bring your words the sooner to an end Neither here wanted you time to write out all the words even of three Texts together yet I see you are as far off from an end as when you began for you here fall back again upon your old matter you began withal to quaere me about Commandements of God and mens Traditions and Prescriptions say once more out of your former Text What will ye do in the end I must answer you from these Texts That I must now do in the end the same I did in the beginning discourse again of the Commands of God and Prescriptions of men But I am resolved otherwise having gotten up the stone to the top of the hill not to let it roul back or tumble down again this would make my labour endless and my pains infernal and Hellike which are supernal now and Heaven-like nor will I suffer you to begin the Sute again but will force you to joyn issue and to come to trial and so to an end In vain Sir you will tell me that we worship God in vain teaching for Doctrines the Commandements of men when as you do not here as not heretofore teach me and tell me what Commandement of man we make or teach for a part of Divine Doctrine or Worship We teach and embrace the Political and Ecclesiastical Commands of the Supreme Rulers over us as prescriptive Orders and directive Rules about the external carriage and outward celebration of the publick Divine Service and Worship to make it the more comely and in order and have not you the same Collinical and domestical Orders and Rules about your private Congregations and Administrations and so teach for Doctrincs the Commands of men and worship God in vain by your Text What a vanity is this in you to write thus in vain and in fine to shew nothing of ours in vain but onely words in vain of your own So likewise why do ye not name some one of those heavie burdens grievous to be born that we either lay upon the peoples shoulders or if lasd by others we our selves are not ready to move them with one of our fingers As for the old legal burdens and yokes of keeping the Law in all its Morals and Ceremonials as to justification and salvation thereby we were and are so far from laying them on mens shoulders no not with one of our fingers that with both our hands and not ours only but with the hands of the Apostlet Acts 15. we do pull them off knowing that neither our Fathers nor we for our shoulders yet are underlaid by them as well as others were able to bear them and to lay no greater burden upon men than things necessary as to salvation than the yoke and burden of Christ of which the one is casie and the other light as Christ himself said of it who also maketh it so unto all that undergo the same Matth. 11.29 30. This is no other than the Gospel the Doctrine and Commands of Christ the which as his yoke draweth in all and as his burden beareth out all Evangelical Graces and Duties which we Ministers in the Name of Christ impose upon our People or rather call upon them to take this yoke and burden of Christ upon them and to learn of him and to practise as he did things learnable practicable and imitable And these burdens and yokes we also as yoke-fellows and burden-fellows with our people we are even with both our hands and all our hearts ready to move stir and lift at and lift up as upon our own so their shoulders bearing our parts and helping them to bear their parts in repenting believing praying c. so bearing one anothers burthens as the Apostle adviseth Gal 62. yea with heart and mouth praying for them and preaching to them we strengthen the weak hands and confirm the feeble knees as the Prophet bids us Isa 35.6 by saying to them that are of a fearfull heart Be strong fear not if any faint under their burden or hold it not fast or stand not sure under it or grow weary of well-doing Coloss 6.9 and as the Apostle again exhorteth 1 Thessal 5.14 we are alwaies ready to comfort the feeble-minded and to support the weak and to be patient towards all men as active towards some for we that are strong or stronger than some others of our people I may say ought and some of us I say do or desire to do as we ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please our selves Rom. 15.1 nay we cannot please our selves if we be such as we ought to be better I think I am sure we cannot please God better than by bearing the infirmities of the weak and helping them to bear their burdens What would you Sir have more of us do you so much your selves are not you rather of those bad Scribes and Pharisees and in their coat and seat whom you quote and cite against us For a Scribe I think you are none or a very bad one who not only cannot write true English of your own without a Copie but even when you have a Copie before you and write out of the Bible cannot write the true English out of that Copie witness my Corrections of your Transscipts of these last Texts Nor are you a true Scribe for whereas at the beginning of your Letter and so all along when you had time enough before then you did not write out the many Texts you quote and cite about matters in question and proof but onely name the Chapter and Verse now at the end of your Letter when you have less time and are in more haste to make an end excusing the former for want of time you write out to the full length all the words of ten or eleven verses without any mention made of or excuse for want of time They were not the Pharisees onely but the Scribes also that were the Hypocrites in our Saviours time so the words run together Scribes Pharisees Hypocrites And was there not an Hypocrisie in your Scribism or the Scribe here shewed himself an Hypocrite I have said it and shewed it it was not want of time or leasure what then even want of truth and sincerity which you so much assume to your self or rather presume of in your self too much For Sir of fifty Texts of Scripture at least alleged by you in the former part of your Letter of which all had one verse many two and some three verses and some more To write out the words of few or none of them whereby the Reader and especially Popular sort might see how they accorded to the matter in hand for which they were cited when time enough was before you and at your own will and pleasure to take and then towards the end of your Letter to intreat me to look
them and seriously to weigh them excusing the matter that for want of time you had not written out all the words of all the Scriptures you might have added scarce of any at all when in the end and last clauses your Letter when time must needs therefore be more wanting to you by reason your Letter comming was noised abroad and long expected to take so much time as to stand and stay the writing out all the words to the full a thing different from your fashion when you had more time of six or seven Texts without the least intimation of want of time let the next honest Clerk or Scribe judge whether there were not some Legerdemain and Handicrast if not heart deceipt in such hand-writing and a piece of hypocritical Scribism as also Anabaptism or of scribbling and Anabaptizing hypocrisie in it And there was another piece of the same stuff in it besides for the former part of your Letter being of matters and points of Divinity in Question betwixt us it was your policy and hypocrisie to set down to your Tene's and Assertions Texts of Scripture named and figured by Chapter and Verse so to put a fair gloss and Iustre of Truth for the amusing of the vulgar people and deluding them with such shews and paints of proof you knowing they neither have skill nor will nor leasure nor pleasure to turn to the words themselves and weigh them of which you might have saved them the labour and me also but that you meant not but rather to put me to the pains wherein you lost your labour and purposes for that it is a pleasure to me to search the Scriptures if you had written out the words into your sheets and folded up them with your Arguments or Expositions together into the same But then there was another fear or Quakery in it for Hypocrites are ever a fraid of discovery and Quake for fear of it as the Devils believe but tremble for the same fear of being discovered in their false faith For you feared and might well enough that if you had written out the words of your Texts and set them down together or by your Opinions and Expositions people must needs see and reade both together and so comparing the one with the other the words of the Texts cited with the words of your Tenees asserted they might espy and discern as an ordinary understanding may do the impertinency of the one to the other yea the contrariety of the matters in them And truly this was and it a notable piece of Popery and Jesuitism to keep the people as much as may be from the words of the Scripture for the words of the Scripture are pure enlightning the eyes but peoples darkness best for their devotion they know and say Therefore indeed was I the willinger to look into every Text cited by you that so I might present unto the Reader whomsoever the Texts of Scriptures in words at length and not in figures as I said before if I remember well and so giving him a plain outsight of the words He may come to a clearer infight of the sense and better discern what it proveth or proveth not A good way to disfigure an onely Text scribe and to reverse and decapitate a verse and Chapter Hypocrite But there is more of the same cloath your Linsie Woolsie hypocrisie here at the end of your Letter for usually he that plaies the Hypocrite in the beginning works the Hypocrite in the end and turns to be of a merry a very one when you were engaged to prove and fortifie your Tenets as hitherto you onely set down Chapter and verse but not the words why so you could not stand about writing them down for want of time no no that was not the cause for being but newly begun it was free to you to have taken as much time as you would was it not rather for want of truch and out of abundance of subtlety and policy lest the Reader finding Gods words and your words in the same place together might the easier at one view see the distance and diffonancy of the one from the other and so perceive the weakness of proof in your allegation But now that you are resolved in the end for a friendly farewel to reprove yea to revile and reproach the true Church of England and the true Ministers thereof and now in the foot of your Letter without any foot or ground unless the foot of Pride like as you did the same in the front of your Letter without any front or brow but that of Brasse to trample under your unclean and stinking feet the sweet and precious Sons of Sion like as you dossed them before with your brasen and impudent forehead it seems now at the latter end of your Letter you can finde time enough though it be high time you should have done two hours and two sheets ago to write out fully the words of six or seven Texts spoken of some false and erroneous Prophets yea and of some corrupt Judges and Magistrates yea and some ignorant and sottish people some thousands of years fithence and to apply them to the learned pious and laborious Ministers of England very foolishly impertinently inconfiderately yea very wickedly maliciously devillishly Oh here you are very exact and diligent to write out all and the very words that your proselites reading here may learn the Scripture phrases and words and get them by heart and have them ready in their mouths as Shimei had the stones in his hand to cast them at David a man after Gods own heart and to asperse slander and bequaker the Ministers of God who are such according to Gods will as they passe by them or meet with them Remember Lord the reproach of thy servants how we do bear in our besoms the reproaches of the mighty people Wherewith thine enemies have reproached O Lord wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of thine Anointed Psal 89.56 Why did you not write out a thousand Texts more word for word even all in the Bible that mention any sin or vice of any Nation any erroneous or prophane person of any place there recorded and make application of them all to the Church of England and the Ministers there of This would have made the heap of your stones the bigger and so would have heaped up more wrath for you against the day of wrath for your speaking evil of Dignities and reviling Orders and especially for your teaching vulgar people errors confusions as to renounce their first Baptism and reproach their Preaching and Baptizing Ministers and that in Scripture Language and Phrases which they learn of you and such as you who writ out the Texts and the words too when you wrest Scripture to the vilifying of Ministers and you want no time nor malice for the doing of it to put such words into your peoples eyes and ears and mouth but when you are to wrest Scriptures for the justifying of
generally set down at the 3. verse and specified in two particulars the one of chastity along to the 6. verse in whcih verse is another particular of justice and at the 7 verse the reason of both is yielded For God hath not called us to uncleanness but holiness which if understood only of Matrimonial uncleannes which is Fornication and holiness which is chastity then the Argument must run thus let no man go beyond his brother in bargining for God hath not called us to fornication but to chastity and so you alone shall run with it for me and follow the consequence thereof which I hold to be of no consquence And fourthly Such another consequence is this uncleanness and holiness or sanctification is put by St. Paul to the Thessalonians for fornication and chastity suppose it so though I grant it not so and therefore the same is meant by St. Paul to the Corinthian when he saith the husband is sanctified by or in or to the wife else the children were unclean but now they are holy as if the same words may not bear divers senses in scveral Text of Scriptures according to the diversity of the matter and scope and how will you shew that chastity among the Heathens and unbelievers is ever called sanctification in Scripture the spirit only being the Spirit of sanctification and the bodies of Heathens and unbelievers being not the Temples of the Holy Spirit and yet you see the Heathen or unbelieving husband or wife is said to be sanctified in or by the believing wife or husband And Fiftly and lastly The Apostle speaketh to the Thessalonians grown persons converted to Christ and tells them for the present and time to come that it is the will of God they should abstain from uncleanness and fornication from fraud and injustice for the one of which you cite Heb. 13.4 also the only tâ—xt you ciâ—e according the sense of it and what 's all this to the unbelievers being sanctified by the believers or their childrens being holy Here was no such mixt conjugal societies of Christians and Gentiles or Heathens and children born of them as appears in that the Apostles saith Let every one of you possesse his vessel in sanctification and not in the lust of Concupisence even as the Gentiles which know not God I am sure the Apostle neither speaks nor means a natural holiness or cleanness that is not born of Fornication as you strangly and inconsiderately blurt out which words I leave to you to put into some Genitive Case for the birth of I know not whom the fathers or children of these Thessalonians for you make no Genuine sense here either of fathers or childrens Natural holiness or cleanness There is a parcel of your third Consideration clapt in by you not belonging to the matter in hand there which according to my custom of right ordering and methodising of your confused stuffe I reserve untill anon to come in its due and proper place I proceed now that I have answered your Allegation for a Natural you would say if you were acquainted with the best spoken of your Sect Matrimonial sanctification Holiness and cleanness to give you my Reasons to the contrary of your Opinion 1. When the Apostle saith the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife c. and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband this cannot be meant of Matrimonial sanctity and holiness that their Marriage was good and lawful and chaste for both parties knew that of themselves before nor needed they nor did they here propound any such Quaere unto the Apostle Whether they were at first or still rightly man and wife or were joyned in lawful way of Wedlock whilest they were Heathens And that case was also determined before by the Apostle as the 9 and 10. verses let not the wife depart from the husband and let not the husband put away his wife But the Quaere here was whether the believing party might depart and seperate from the unbelieving party a Brother or a Sister as its more explicated at the 12 and 13. verses so that it seems this Quaere arose from something in difference of Religion that troubled the Conscience of the believing party after his or her conversion as whether it would not be defiled in remaining joyned to Idolaters and Infidels Now suppose the Quaere had been sent to you for answer for I will see how good you are at answers who are so much in Quaeres what will you answer to these Corinthians why thus you do Be content Sirs you have a natural holiness cleanness or your Matrimony is lawful notwithstanding the difference in faith you may live together for all that you are no Adulterers and Adulteresses increase and multiply your children are no bastards but Legitimates But Sir do you think this would have answered their Quaere satisfied their scruple or pacified their Conscience would they not have replyed to you in the words of Job to his Friends We have heard many such things miseralbe Comforters are ye all Job 16.2 Tell us that we know not answer us to that we Quaere you speak that we have not heard we have heard many such things we know all this that we are lawfully man and wife and our children are no Bastards but Legitimater if this be all you can say as good hold your peace for you speak no peace to Conscience Miserable comforters of Conscience are ye all or as in the margent troublesome comforters of conscience are ye all and by this your resolution make our Consciences more troublesome and miserable than before they were Our doubts are whether we that are converts and believers may put away or go from our husbands or wives which are Infidels and unconverted and also his or her children as not belonging to God for part of his people or seed and being as a grief and vexation if not pollutionto us what do you tell us of lawfulness of our Marriages or Legitimacy of our children Can you shew us there is any sanctification betwixt us and our unbelieving consorts whereby we may be induced to live and dewell together any holinesse of our off-spring and children that we may own them as members of the Church of God do this and do somthing else it s nothing you say But I will take off these Corinthians from you Sir and from baiting of you for which you may thank me and will direct them to a more happy and peaceable Comforter ever their own Apostle St. Paul who here fully answereth their doubts and quiets their Consciences telling them that the unbelieving husband is sanctisied by or in the word in the Original beareth all the wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by or in the husband meaning though not expressed the believing husband and the believing wife I blamed you Sir before for expressing it in the text where the word believing is not for mentioning it as the fense and scope which my self
now do for the question is what the believing wife or husband is to do with the unbelieving husband and wife Now this goeth and speaketh to the heart as the Hebrews say of these Corinthians and bringeth a calme upon their troubled spirits now if the unbelieving husband bepleased to dwell with his believing wife she is well coutented for the unbelieving husband is sanctified by or in the wife and if the unbelieving wife be content to keep with her believing husband he is as well pleased for the unbelieving wife is sanctified in and by the husband and now also their children are not unclean but holy This of sanctification is such a privilege as is not common to all married folks but peculiar to believing persons so that these may reap such comfort and benefit hereby that their unbelieving consorts are sanctified to or by themselves and they may have not only a lawful enjoyment but also a holy use of their unbelieving yoke-fellows for that God esteems the seed of such to be a holy seed as truly as if both were believers Thus the Apostle his resolution removes that scruple of Conscience telling them the believing husband or wife they were not defiled by remaining joyned with the unbelieving consort but rather that the unbelieving consort was sanctified in or by the believing husband wife he which your sense of natural or Matrimonial chastity or sarctification if you will have the word also is nothing so satisfactory to or answerable for For again if so it should be meant and understood the Reason would have been as good The unbelieving wife or husband is sanctisied by or in the unbelieving husband and wife or the believing Consort is sanctified in and by an unbelieving Consort or the husband is sanctified by the wife and the wife by the husband Let them be what they will believers or unbelievers according to your sense as betwixt whom there is your matrimonial Chastity or lawful Marriage But then it would not have been so true every way as now it is according to my sense for to the pure all things are pure but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure but even their minde and conscience is defiled Titus 1.15 Nay more whereas the believing Consort sanctifieth the unbelieving Consort and not the other way the unbelieving Consort sanctifieth the believing one if matrimonial Chastity or your natural Sanctity were here understood both Consorts would here be sanctified yea both the believing one and also the unbelieving one would be and were hereby sanctified in themselves not by or in one the other for Marriage is honourable amongst all and the bed undefiled Heb. 13.4 And then you may alter the Text of Titus and say to the impure and unbelieving husband or wife also all things are pure 3. they are sanctified even in themselves by their matrimonial Sanctity and natural Chastity and even their minde and conscience is undefiled Besides what an incongruity and inconsistency is there in such a reddition and interpretation the unbelieving wife is sanctified by or in the believing husband that is chastified or matrimonially holy Said I not but even now That chastity amongst the Heathen or spoken of them as here you will have it of the unbelieving is never called Sanctification or Sanctity in Scripture Turn down to your self the one Text and then turn it over to me I gave you also reason for it because their bodies are not the Temples of the Spirit of God which is the Spirit of Sanctification and Sanctity But I pray shew me also that one Consort or yoke-fellow doth chastifie or make chaste the other like as the Apostle sheweth you that one doth sanctifie and make holy the other and if so be both Consorts be not chaste how are they made chaste or chastified each by or in other or if but one be unchaste how is he or she chastified or made chaste by or in the other chaste one be it he or she Truly Sir this opinion of yours and your sense here deserves a little to be chastised till it be more sensible yea and chastified too as which doth adulterate and corrupt the purity of the Word and the sanctification of this Text. It may something recreate the Reader if any come to reade these sheetâ— besides your self who do concreate iâ— to intersert what a great Champion of Infant-Baptism hath related of as great an opposer of it about the interpretation of this Text which he holding as you do it to be meant of matrimonial chastity and holiness bringeth forth as a parallel Text the 34 Verse of this Chapter I pray look the Verse it is too longton me to write out twice and he thus rendreth and meaneth it The unmarried cares for the things of God that she may be holy in body and Spirit i.e. That she may be chaste but she that is married cares for the things of the world that she may please her husband The Relator saith of it onely this That in truth it is a pretty odd sense thus invented and that which I onely shall adde is That if thus invented it is hardly in truth and though pretty it is not chaste but holy that the Apostle aimeth at That she being unmarried and free from worldly cares careth the more for the things of God that she may be godly and holy and whether the sense be even or odd I pass not it is odd indeed that the unmarried careth for the things of God that she may be chaste I will make it even and say with the Apostle The unmarried careth for the things of God how she may be holy If you ask me now for my sense and interpretation of S. Paul here to the Corinthians saying The unbelieving Consort is sanctified by or to the believing Consort I gave it you but a little before to be this plainly You believing Consorts may have and have if you dwell together not onely a lawfull enjoyment but a holy use of your unbelieving Consort This I shall elucidate by comparing it with 1 Tim. 4.5 where the creature is said to be sanctified by the word and prayer unto the pure and Believer You may as well limit and restrain the Sanctification here onely to a lawfull use of the Creatures to Believers and unbelievers as you do the other former sanctification onely to the lawfull marriage of the unbelievers and Believers But as I have shewed you the one so I shall now prove that the other holdeth out more to your eyes if you will open them and look on because the Heathens and unbelievers had a lawfull use of the Creatures but S. Paul here to Timothy speaks of such an use of the Creatures as they had not and is appliable onely to Believers and therefore is a holy and sanctified use also not lawfull onely as appears by that which followeth for it is sanctified by the Word and Prayer they have the Word to Warrant the use of