as a profession of Christianity And as to the Act it must be first A signification of the mind by word or writing or some intelligible sign Secondly it must seem to be understood For no man consenteth to that which he understandeth not But herein any intelligible sign of a tollerable understanding must be accepted though we find that the persons conceptions are raw and not so distinct and clear as they ought nor the expressions ready orderly or compt Thirdly it must seem to be serious For that which is apparently dissembled or Iudicrous is null Fourthly It must be de presenti a present giving up our selves to Christ and not only a promise de futuro that we will hereafter take him for our Saviour and Lord and not at present Fifthly it must seem to be voluntary and not constrained for then it is not serious Sixthly it must seem to be deliberate and resolute and setled and not only the effect of a mutable passion This goeth to make it a real Profession in the common sense of all mankind Obj. But how few among us do so much as seem be understanding serious and resolved in covenanting with Christ Answ. In the Degree of these we all fall short of that which is our duty But if you accuse any of the want of so much as is necessary to an acceptable Profession First you must be sure that you speak not by uncharitable surmise and hear-say but upon certain proof or knowledge Secondly and that therefore you speak it not at a venture of whole Parishes or families but only of those persons by name whom you know to be guilty Thirdly and that you remember that it is the Pastors office to judge and that you expect not that every one must give an account of their knowledge to you And if there be a mis-judging it is the fault of the Pastor and not yours of which more anon Fourthly that persons Baptized are already admitted into the Church and therefore if they make profession of Christianity they must not be put to bring any other proof of their title but it lies on you to disprove it if you will have it questioned And to reject them from communion without a proved accusation is Tyranny and Lording it over the Church of God These are Gods terms of Church-communion And if you will needs have stricter you must have none of his making but your own Obj. But all visible Christians and Churches are visible Saints and Regenerate and so are not ours Answ. To be a Visible Saint is to profess to be a Saint And whosoever doth profess the Baptismal Covenant professeth to be a Saint Conversion Regeneration Faith and Repentance are all contained into taking God the Father Son and Holy Ghost for our Father Saviour and Sanctifier Obj. But you may teach a Parrot to speak those words Answ. It s true And perhaps to speak any words which you use your selves But if you will thence conclude that words must not be taken as a Profession you grosly err or abusively wrangle or if you infer thence that your neighbour understandeth himself no more than a Parrot doth you must prove what you say to the Pastor of the Church For God hath not allowed him to excommunicate baptized persons because you say that they are ignorant And if they are willing to learn it is fitter to teach them than to excommunicate them And here I must lament it that I have met with many censorious Professors who would not communicate with the Parish Churches because the people are ignorant who when I have examined themselves have proved ignorant of the very substance of Christianity so that I have been much in doubt whether I ought to admit them to the Lords Table or not They knew not whether Christ was Eternal or whether he was God when he was on earth or whether he be Man now he is in heaven nor what Faith is or what Iustification or Sanctification is nor what the Covenant of grace is nor what Baptism or the Lords Super are nor could prove the Scripture to be the word of God or prove mans soul to be immortal but gave false or impertinent answers about all these And yet could not joyn with the ignorant Churches And next I desire you here to observe the different Priviledges as well as the different Conditions of Visible and Invisible Churchmembership The members of the Church mystical or Regenerate have the pardon of all sin and acceptance with God and communion with him and with his Church in the spirit and are the adopted children of God and heirs of everlasting life and shall live in heaven with Christ for ever The meer Visible Members of the Church that are not regenerate by the spirit as well as sacramentally by water have only an outward Communion with the Saints and have only the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament and only a name to live when they are dead And are these such great matters that we should envy them to poor sinners that must have no more Have we the Kernel and do we envy them the Shell Have we the Spirit and do we envy them the flesh or outward signes alone Yea consider farther that it is more for the sake of the truly faithful than for their own that all Hypocrites have their station and priviledges in the Church God maketh use of their Gifts and Profession for his elect to many great services of the Church And is it not then a foolish ingratitude in us to murmur at their presence Understand well the conditions and Reasons of this visible state of membership and how far it is below the state of the Regenerate and it will turn your separating murmuring into a thankful acknowledgment of the wisdom of God DIRECT VII Get right and deep aprehensions of the Necessity and Reasons of Christian Unity and Concord and of the sin and misery of Divisions and Discord WHen we have but slight apprehensions of a duty we easily neglect it and scarce reprove our selves for it or repent of our omission And when we have but slight apprehensions of the evil of any sin a little temptation draweth us to it we are hardly brought to through-repentance for it And there is in many Christians a strange inequality and partiality in their apprehensions of good and evil Some duties they dare not omit and they judge all ungodly who omit them when some others as great are past by as if they were no part of religion And some sins they fear with very great tenderness when we can scarce make their consciences take any notice of others as great And usually they let out all their zeal on one sâ—de only while they over-look the other The Papist seemeth so sensible of the good of Unity and the evil of Divisions that he thinketh usurpation of an Universal Church-Monarchy and Tyranny and horrid bloud-shed to be not only lawful but necessary for the prevention and the cure
of that censorious zeal which unchurches Persons or Parishes without just tryal and proof upon rumours of fame or their own surmises DIRECT XI Understand well what is the power of the Keys and what the Pastoral offiae is as they are the Governours of the Church entrusted by Christ with the power of admission and rejection that so you may know how far you are to rest in the judgement of the Pastors and may not attempt to take any part of their office to your selves THe power of the Keyes is the power of taking into the Church and of Governing it and of casting out Both in respect to present Order and in respect to future happiness by a Ministerial declaration of the sense of the Gospel concerning the state of such as they The power of Baptizing is the power of the Keyes for reception into the Church The private members have not the power of baptizing nor were the Pastors ever appointed to do it by their advise consent or vote Therefore the private members have not the power of the Keyes for admission And it is most apparent in the Gospel that the Keyes for admission and for exclusion are given into the same hands and not one to the Ministers and another to the Flock Therefore the people that have not the first have not the later For full proof of this observe the meaning of these Texts Isa. 22. 22. And the Key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder so he shall open and none shall shut and he shall shut and none shall open Isa. 9. 6. The Government shall be upon his shoulder Mat. 16. 19. I will give thee the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven c. Mat. 18. 18. Verily I say unto you whatsoever ye bind on earth shall be bound c. Joh. 20. 23. Whose soever sins ye do remit they are remitted to them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained Math. 28. 19. Go and teach all Nations baptizing them c. Joh. 20. 21. As my Father hath sent me euen so send I you Acts 1. 16 17. Judas was numbred with us and had obtained part of this Ministry Acts 20. 28. Take heed to your selves and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Overseers to feed the Church of God Rom. 1. 1. Paul a Minister of Iesus Christ called an Apostle separated to the Gospel of God 1 Cor. 4. 1. Let a man so esteem of us as of the Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the mysteries of God Acts 14. 23. They ordained them Elders in every Church Tit. 1. 3. Ordain Elders in every City as I appointed thee V. 7. A Bishop must be blameless as the Steward of God 1 Tim. 3. 5. For if a man know not how to rule his own house how shall he take care of the Church of God 1 Tim. 5. 17. Let the Elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honour 1 Pet. 5. 2. Feed the flock of God which is among you taking the oversight thereof Heb. 13. 7 17 24. Remember them which have the rule over you who have spoken to you the word of God Obey them that have the rule over you and submit your selves for they watch for your souls salute them that have the rule over you 1 Thes. 5. 12 13. We beseech you brethren to know them that is acknowledge their power and labours that labour among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their works sake and to be at peace among your selves Read these with judgement and then believe if you can that the power of the Keys or Government is in the People Shew us what text doth give them that power and where the Scripture calleth them to exercise it by Votes Or where God requireth ability in them for Church-government or where he calleth them to leave their Callings and attend this work When those that must perform it he separateth to it as by office and calleth them to give themselves wholly thereunto 1 Tim. 4. 15 16. Tell us when the people were authorized to baptize or to rule the Church that is themselves Obj. Mat. 18. 15. Tell the Church if he hear not the Church c. Answ. Many Expositors think that by the Church there is meant the Ministers only by this reason The Church that mâ—st teach mâ—st be heard the Church that must be heard must be told But that is only the Pastors and not the People Ergo But I easily grant you that the word Church there signifieth the whole Congregation as Dr. Taylor in his Second Disswasive hath well shewed But it is as an Organized body only And so the Office is to be performed only by the Organical part and not by any of the rest When I say to a man Hear me I do not mean that he should hear me with his eyes but only with his ears And when I bid him See or Read I bid him not do it with his ears but with his eyes Nor do the eyes receive this power from the feet or hands but immediately from the Head Though if they were separated from the body they could not retain it So if another Kingdome send to England to desire an Army of Men to help them they mean the King only as the Commander of them and the people as the executors of his Command So when you are bid to tell the Church it is quâ—tâ—nus aurita that it must be told And when you are bid to hear it it is as Teaching that it must be heard So that this talketh not of any Government in the people either to use or to give Obj. 1 Cor. 5. Paul biddeth all the Church to put from among them that wicked person Answ. Note that Paul passeth the sentence first himself I have judged as if I were present not that you deliver but to deliver such an one to Satan And therefore he doth this in himself in the name of the Lord Iesus and supposeth himself among them in spirit and power when they do it and my spirit with the power of our Lord Iesus Christ. 2. And I have said He speaketh to an organized Church which had two parts and accordingly two works to do The Ruling part was to put away the Offender by Iudgement or Sentence And the people were all to put him away by actual shunning his Communion which is but the obeying of that sentence If the King send to a Corporation to execute any Law he meaneth not that all persons must do it in the like manner but the Magistrates by Command and the people by obeying them and executing their Commands If I desire a man to transcribe me a Book and bring it me I mean not that every part of him shall herein have the same office But that he read it only with his eyes and
which Christ intended was a Vnity in himself and â— Concord in holy Obedience to his Lawes But it is a Vnity in the will of man and a Concord in obeying the Dictates of the proud which Treacherous Pastors do require It is a Peaceable progress of the Gospel and unanimous endeavor to convert and sanctifie and save the world which Christ requireth us to promote But it is a Peaceable enjoyment of their own prosperity wealth and honour and a peaceable forbearance of a holy life which Wolvish Pastors do desire It is an Orderly management of holy doctrine worship and conversation for the edification of the flock and the increase of godliness which Christ commandeth But it is an absolute obedience to their wills and an exact observance of their new-made Religions and needless scandalous inventions and an adoring of their titles and robes of honour covering their ignorance pride and sensuality which Church-yrants call the Order of the Church All Christâ— indulgent tenderness and Discipline are but to further his Holy designe of killing sin and sanctifying souls But the Images of Piety Government Unity Peace and Order which Hypocrites and Pharisees set up are devised engines to destroy the Life and serious practice of the things themselves and are set up in enmity against spirituality and holiness that there might be no other Piety Government Unity Peace or Order in the Church but these lifeless Images It is far from the mind of Christ that no difference should be made between the Holy and the profans the precious and the vile Oâ— that serious piety should be suppressed or discouraged or faithful preachers hindered from promoting it on ignorant graceless Ministers countenanced under pretence of Peace or Order The design of Christ was not like Mahomet's to get himself an earthly Kingdom and numerous followers meerly to cry up his name And therefore he will not indulge men in their sinâ— nor abate oâ— alter the conditions of his Covenant to win disciples He will have his Ministers deal plainly with all to whom they preach and let them know that without self-denial and forsaking all in estimation and resolution and a willing exchange of earth for heaven they cannot be his true Disciples Nor without a Profest consent to thus much they cannot be his visible profest Disciples But all that will not repent must perish And therefore in their Baptism they must profess a renunciation of all competitors His Ministers also must impartially exercise the Keyes which he hath committed to their trust and must not fear the faces of men who at most are able but to kill the body Luk. 12. 4. They must discern between the righteous and the wicked and draw all scandalous sinners to repentance or else exclude them from the communion of Saints that the world may see that Christ is no friend to prophane persons or sensual â—leshly bruits As Chrysostome commandeth the Presbyters not to give the body and blood of Christ to the unworthy though he were the greatest Commander or wore a Diadem and professeth that he would suffer his own blood to be shed before he would give the blood of Christ to the unworthy And as blessed Paul would become all things to all men to win them and commandeth us not to please our selves but to please our neighbours for their good to edification And yet when it came to the flattering of men in their sins he saith that if he should so please men he should be no longer the servant of Christ. And as to his own interest in mans esteem he saith With me it is a small thing to be judged of you or of mans judgment Rom. 15. 1 2 3. 1 Cor. 10. 33. Gal. 1. 10. 2 Tim. 2. 4. 1 Cor. 4. 3. Take heed therefore of pretending Unity order peace or charity against the strictest obedience of Godâ—laws or against the faithful preaching of the Gospel and exercise of true Church-discipline or against the necessity of the ancient profession of saving faith and true-repentance in all that will be admitted to the communion of the Church It is not an ungodly unity peace or order that we plead for DIRECT XIV Though your Governours and not you must judge what persons shall be of your publike Church-communion yet it is you that must judge who are fit or unfit for your private company and familiarity Here therefore exercise your strictness in your own part AS it is not you but the King that must judge who shall be of the same Kingdome with you nor the servant but the Master that must choose who shal be in the family with him Nor the scholler but the Schoolmaster that must choose who shal be of the same School with him So it is not you but your Pastor that must judg who shall be of the same Church with you As to the Universal visible Church this is confest by all And there is no reason why it should be denied of particular Churches as is proved But who shall be your Pastors or your Masters your husbands or your wives if you are yet free you your selves must be the choosers And who shall be your intimate companions or your bosome friends Here therefore make as strict a choice as you can If you meet a prophane person at the Lords Table it is his own fault or the Pastors But if you keep company needlesly with such or marry such it is your own fault If the Pastor do not excommunicate them you may choose not to be familiar with them Though you must meet them at the Church and pray with them you need not meet them at the Ale-house and drink with them Though you may not with a few of the most godly separate from the publike communion of all the rest yet may you keep a more intimate familiarity with those few than with all the rest And if you will consider this is all that is necessary to your own duty and that which is best for your own edification Keep thus to a strictness within the bounds of your own place and calling and God will bless you in such a strictness DIRECT XV. Understand well how much it hath pleased God to lay all mens good or evil happiness or misery upon their own choice And observe the reasons of it that you may not oppose this order of God THough God by his grace must change the perverse disposition of mens wills before they will make a gracious choice yet it is most certain that the teachings commands exhortations and reproofs of God are directed to the Will of man And that the promises and threatnings mercies and judgements are used to move and change the will And that in the tenor of his Laws and Covenants Christ hath set Life and Death before men and put their Happiness in their own choice and that no man shall have better or worse than he made choice of that is none shall be either happy or miserable but as they did choose or refuse
must we not separate from them then as Idolaters Yea and every man from himself that is He must give over praying because its all Idolatry But perhaps they will say This sin is but in the manner and not in the matter Answ. Very good It seems then that sin in the manner of worship is not Idolatry And how prove you that the faults of the Liturgy are not as far from the Matter of the worship as your own are Will you find some words which you can call false in the matter Suppose it were so When an Antinomian an Anabaptist a Separatist or any one that erreth doth drop some of his errours in his prayers as I think none will deny that they use to do must we needs believe that his prayer is Idolatry therefore as being false worship And is it unlawful to joyn with such Then we shall have more separation than you yet plead for or practise your selves No two men in the world must joyn together if all sinful worship or worship false sometime in the very matter doth necessitate a separation At least where no one knoweth before hand what another will say with his tongue when I know that every man hath some false opinion in his mind But where did these men learn to call their brethrens worship false any more than their own upon the account that God hath not commanded the manner of it when he hath neither commanded us to use a form nor to forbear it but by general precepts of doing all to edification If one man preach in one method and another in another One by written Notes to help his memory and another without one by his own gifts only and another by the help of others which of these is the false prophet the false worshipper or Idolater Hath God said you shall use Notes in preaching No more hath he said you shall preach without Notes yet hath he commanded both to severall persons where edification variously requireth itâ— Is he an Idolater that useth Meeters Tunes Versions Translations Directories Pâ—lpits Cups Table Cloaths Fonts Basins c. which God commandeth not O Lord pity thy poor Church whose Pastors themselves are so peevish in their ignorance and tempt other men by their follies to â—â—stifie all their severities against them and others But what Text of Scripture is it that ever told these men that all false worship is Idolatry what text do they name but such as if they did it on purpose to shew their boldness in adding to Gods Word The second Commandment is the chief which they insist on But what ever Expositions they may forge there is no such word nor sense in the Commandment We all hold that as the gross direct Idolatry is the worshipping of a false God against the first Commandment so to make any such false representation of the true God by words or deeds as maketh him like an Idol and contradicteth his nature and so to worship him this is also a secondary kind of Idolatry Because God is none such as they represent him and therefore it is not God indeed but an Idol which they worship And because God is not like to any thing corporeal in heaven or earth therefore he that maketh an image of any thing in Heaven or earth as like to God or to represent him he maketh an idol of God by blasphemy To what will you liken me that â— should be like unto it saith the Holy one This is the idolatry forbidden in the Second Commandment It is not all false worship but one sort of false worship which is idolatry what else that Commandment forbiddeth is neither called Idolatry nor can so be proved It is an odious sound to hear an ignorant rash self-conceited person especially a Preacher to cry out Idolatry Idolatry against his brethrens prayers to God because they have something in them to be amended while perhaps his own prayers have so much false doctrine in them or false fire of carnal passions and uncharitableness as maketh it a much harder question whether it be lawful to joyn with such as he is while he abhorreth so much to joyn with others All that know me know that it is not my own case and interest that I fit this reprehension to It is twenty times harder to me to remember a Form of words than to express what is in my mind without them But we must not fit our opinions of all our brethrens prayers to our own temperament DIRECT XXXIV Think not that all is unlawful to be obeyed which is unlawfully commanded MAny a Ruler sinneth in his Commands when it is no sin but a duty of the inferior to obey them He that hath but a bad end or bad circumstances may sin in commanding As if a Magistrate command Religious Duties in meer Policy for his own Advantage or if he enforce a lawful Command with unlawful Penalties And yet it will be the Subjects Duty to obey Yea as to the matter it self it may be unlawful for a Ruler to command a thing that will do no good because it is a vain Command and maketh men spend that time in vain and yet it may be the Subjects Duty to do it If the Magistrate choose an inconvenient place for publike worship or an unfit hour or if the Pastor choose a less fit translation meeter or tune or other circumstances of worship it may be their sin to do so and yet the peoples duty to obey them If a Father bid his Child but carry a straw from one place to another it is his fault so to imploy his time in vain but the Child is not faulty in obeying Indeed if the thing commanded be such as is simply evil and forbidden us by God in all cases whatsoever than no ones commands can make it lawful But if it be a thing that is only inconvenient or unlawful by some lesser accident then the command of authority may preponderate as a more weighty accident If it be lawful to give a Thief my purse to save my life which is not lawful for him to demand or take Then sure it is lawful to obey a King a Parent a Master oâ— a Pastor in things not evil in themselves though they unlawfully command them I say not that we must do so in all things which are evil but by accident For some accidents may make it so great an evil as no mans command can preponderate and make it lawful But in some cases it is so though not in all Therefore remember that you do not prove it sinful in you to do such things by proving it a sin in the imposer unless you have some better reason and can shew a Law of God forbidding you DIRECT XXXV Think not that you are guilty of all the Faults of other mens worship with whom you joyn no not of the Ministers or Congregations Nor that you are bound to separate from them in worship because of all the faults in their performance THis
the Ministery but a trade for their benefice and honour And therefore for fear left the people should encroach upon their advantages they drive them as far off as they can and care not how ignorant they are so that thereby they may but lock up the mystery of their trade securely for themselves and keep the people in a blindfold reverence dependance and obedience How ordinarily the Roman Clergy practise this iniquity the nations that are kept in darkness by them are doleful testimonies Like the great dog that will not endure the little one to come near his carrion or his bone And some are so excessively fearful of schism that they dare not endure the people to pray together or repeat a sermon or search the scripture and exhort one another daily in that manner which God requireth private men to do for fear lest they should go further and grow proud of their own gifts and doings and despise their Pastors and set up for themselves When as this very inordinate jealousie is the likely and the commoâ— way to bring them to the evil that is so much feared While peoples care of their salvation is cherished and stirred up and the Pastors do provoke them to pray and search the scriptures and help each other in the way to heaven they are honoured and loved by the faithful of their flocks as men that indeed are true to their great trust and have a love and care for the peoples souls And then those Pastors who further the people in such religious exercises may usually as fathers rule them in it and keep them from usurping any thing that is proper to the officers of Christ and from errours and factions and divisions and may easily suppress any arrogancie when it appeareth And that honest desire which religious persons have to do good to others is thus satisfied by such sober exercises as belong to them And so Pastor and people do peaceably lovingly and successfully concur to carry on the work of Christ whilest each one moveth in his proper place I speak this through the great meâ—cy of God from very great and long experience having still kept up such lawful meetings and sober exercises as are not unfit for private Christians and thereby kept out all heresies factions schisms and arrogancies from the flock with the great increase of their knowledge humility piety and just observance of their guides Whereas when the foresaid inordinate jealousie doth restrain people or discourage them from any of that which is their proper work First they grow into distaste of such Pastors and take them for enemies to godliness and to their souls Secondly they grow next as jealous of all the Pastors doctrine as he is of them and think it no fault to draw oft further from him themselves and then to disaffect others to him Thirdly their appetite to religious exercises when it is restrained groweth inordinate and affecteth that which belongeth not to them Fourthly they conceit that there is some necessity of their turning teachers to do that which the Teachers will not do Fifthly they next keep their meetings by themselves from under the eye and inspection of their Teachers Sixthly then they take liberty to vent what cometh in their minds whilest there is none to regulate and contradict them Seventhly and at last they set up for themselves and the chief speakers among them become Pastors to the rest and so too often speak perverse things to draw away disciples after them Act. 20. 30. Wisdome and Love may prevent all this Envy not the gifts or graces of your people Is it not the end of all your studies and labours to to promote them Are they not the fruits of Gods mercies and your own endeavours Will you grudge at your own successes In stead of restraining them let none so earnestly drive them â—n to such religious exercises that belong to them as your selves and help them and overâ—â—e them in the performance And then you shall have advantage to restrain them from that which belongeth not to them And you shall have them the great assisters of your Ministery who will more uphold your honours than all the prophane and ignorant will do yea they will be your glory crown and joy at the appearing of Jesus Christ. 1 Thes. 2. 19 20. DIRECT XVI Be not wanting in abilities watchfulness or diligence to resist seducers by the evidence of truth that there may be no need of other weapons And quench such sparks among your people before they break out into flames THe clamours and wayes of violence used by many Pastors are oft but an unhappy means to supply the defect of their own abilities and duties And those who are conscions of an insufficiency in themselves to do their parts do most intemperately call out to the Magistrates to help them and do most unmannerly censure them if they answer not their expectations And indeed if the sword of the Magistrate be such an universal remedy and may serve instead of the ability and labour of the Minister let it also serve to cure the sick instead of the skill and labour of the Physician and let all other callings as needless be put down and let us have none but Magistrates alone First Some Ministers are so ignorant that if one of their people do but turn Antinomian Anabaptist or Separatist they are not able to confute them Much less if one that is learned and well-studied introduce these errours If the Sectary challenge them to dispute it s two to one but errour will triumph through the insufficiency of him that should defend the truth And then this insufficient Minister will turn to railing or call out to the Magistrate for his help to declare to all that he is too weak which will harden and encrease the seduced party and make them think that it is the weakness of his cause Secondly And too many Ministers who seem more able are Lordly and lazy and carry themselves strangely and at a distance from the people and are seldome familiar with them in private And so they give advantage to such seducers as creep into houses to sow their tares and for the weaker sort to vend their errours when there is none to contradict them These Pastors take their proper work to which they are called for a slavery or a toil They are so proud and idle that for them to watch over all the â—lock and to teach them publickly and from house to house night and day with tears as Paul did and to watch where any spark appeareth and presently to quench it doth seem to them such a drudgery and burden that God were unmerciful if he should impose it on them That is They think God unmerciful if he will not rather let the patient die than put the Chyrurgeon to the trouble of dressing his sores If he will not let the people be damned rather than put Ministers to so much labour to instruct and save them If it
were but to take their tythes and honour and to be reverenced by the people and to preach once or twice a week a sermon which tendeth to their applause they could submit to this much But Paul's exhortation Act. 20. seemeth intollerable preciseness But souls will not be informed or reformed at so cheap a rate Sin hath corrupted them more than so If we will sleep the envious man will not sleep but when we awake we shall find that he hath sowed his tares Sometimes grievous Wolves will enter not sparing the flock and sometimes of our own selves will men arise speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them Therefore watch Study hard and meditate on these things and give your selves wholly to them that your profiting may be known to all that you may be able to stop the mouths of gainsayers and to edifie and stablish all the flock that they be not as children tossed to and fro and carried up and down by every wind of doctrine by the câ—nning slight and subtilty of men by which they lie in wait to deceive For to this end did Christ give offices and gifts Study therefore to shew your selves workmen that need not be ashamed rightly dividing methodizing opening and so defending the word of truth Act. 20. 20 28 29 30. Eph. 3. 12 14. 1 Tim. 4. 15 16. 2 Tim. 2. â— 15. DIRECT XVII Be not strange to the poor ones of your flock but impartial to all and the servants of all mind not high things but condescend to men of low estate Rom. 12. 16. ALL souls are equally precious unto Christ whether rich or poor O set the strange example of Christs condescension still before your eyes Was it the high or the low that were his familiars Did he live in fulness and ride in poâ—p and associate only with the rich and great O see him washing his disciples feet And hear him teaching them by that example what they ought to do for one another He came not to be ministred unto but to minister How sharply did he rebuke his disciples when they strove who should be greatest And setting a little child before them hath taught us what must be our ambition And that he that will be the greatest must be the servant of all Our greatness lieth in the greatest of our humility and usefulness Math. 18. 1 2 3 4. 23. 11. Luk. 22. 24 25 26. Math. 20. 28. It is lawful and meet that men in power should be honoured by us and also that the people be taught to honour them and that you keep such interest in them as is needful to the publick good and therfore all converse with them is not unlawfull But when Ministers only attend on the rich and are strange and seldome among the poor it makes them accounted carnal worldly men and is unsuitable to their Lords example and to the work of their calling The poor are far more numerous than the rich and therefore our work is more among them And death will quickly level all And when we have all done we shall find that the poor receive the glad fidings of the Gospel and the poor of the world may be rich in faith and heirs of the Kingdome which God hath prepared for them that love him Mat. 11. 5. Iam. 2. 5 6. And that the rich do hardly enter into the Kingdome of heaven Iam. 2. 6 7. But ye have despised the poor Do not the rich men oppress you and draw you before the judgement seats It is the poor that must be the chief crown and comfort of your labours Therefore be not strangers to them if you would not have them account you lordly worldly and self-seeking men If you will leave them to themselves and think your selves too good to be their companions or to come into their smoaky Cottages and then think that a lordly command or rebuke should serve the turn to keep them from errour and schism and disorder you may find your errour to the Churches cost when it is too late And it will be but a pitiful excuse for your pride or laziness to cry out of seducers for creeping into such houses which you disdained to come into your selves what do you by avoiding them but invite any others thither that will come and leave them as it were swept and garnished for such evil spirits DIRECT XVIII Spend and be spent for your peoples good and do all the good that possibly you can for their bodies as well as for their souls and think nothing that you have too dear to win them that they may see that you are truly Fathers to them and that their well-fare is your chiefest care and business ALl men love themselvs and naturally and necessarily love those that they know do greatly love them And all men are sensible of their bodily concernments and consequently of that good that is done to their bodies He that setteth himself to relieve the poor and to put on others to relieve them to visit the sick and help those that are in trouble and to comfort the afflicted to do what good he can to all and hurt to none shall find that their ears will be open to his doctrine and that they will follow him towards heaven with much less resistance than otherwise he must expect Few such Ministers do ever want success of their labours And the covetoâ—s close handed self-seeking and cruel are alwayes hated And let his mony perish with him who thinketh it better than the souls of men and the work of God DIRECT XIX Keep up the Reverence of the ancient and experienced sort of Christians and teach the younger what honour they owe to those that are their elders in age and grace For whilest the elder who are usually sober and peacaable are duly reverenced the heat of rash and giddy youth will be kept in order USually where the elder bear the sway the Church hath peace Though I know some deceive is grow worse and worse And it is where the young and rash are become the predominant most esteemed party that schism and disorders do prevail And though some tell the people what honour they owe their Elders by office yet few acquaint them what honour youths owe both to the Elder in age and in experience and grace It will therefore be much of the prudence of the Pastors to keep up the honour of the Elders of the people and to preserve in the younger a due esteem and reverence towards them DIRECT XX. The Pastors who will preserve the Churches Peace must neither neglect to preserve their interest in the Religious persons of their charge nor yet be so tender of it as to depart from sober principles or wayes to please them nor to make them their rulers nor follow them into any exorbitancies to avoid their censures BOth these extreams will tend to confusion First They that care not at all what men think of them do but despise their advantages to do
forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved to fill up their sin alway for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost ☞ Luk. 9. 54 55. Lord wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven and consume them even as Elias did But he turned and rebuked them and said ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of for the son of man is not come to destroy mens lives but to save them I conclude as I began that the consciousness of our own ordinary and lamentable infirmities and the greatness of the Churches sufferings thereby in all fore-going ages and in this will condemn us of impudent self-ignorance if Ministers be not compassionate and tender towards the weaknesses of the people who cannot be expected to equal them in knowledg Alas Brethren what are we even after so many years study preparation that we should be supercilious and cruel to the infirm what difficulties puzzle us what a loss are we at in our ordinary studies How weakly do we preach and pray and write How easily do we see this in one another as our mutual censures and severities shew Who troubled Paul and the first Churches but erroneous Teachers Who prated malitiously against Iohn and cast out the brethren but a Diotrephes Who brought in the errours of the Millenaries the corporeity of Angels the errours of the Arrians Eunomians Nestorians Eutychians Macedonians and almost all the rable ine Epiphanius Augustine and Philastrius but Bishops or Presbyters Who have caused and kept open the wounds of the Churches of the East and West so long Who introduced all the errours about praying for to the dead c. that are in most of the Liturgies of the Churches in East and West And all the errours that are found in so many Councils and Confessions of Churches and in so many Volumes of Controversie as are extant Who set up the Roman Usurpation and Tyranny Who set up the Papal power above Princes and determined in the Laterane Council for their power to depose them and alienate their dominions Who set up Usurpers and raised wars against Emperors and Kings upon these grounds Who brought in Transubstantiation with the rest of the Roman absurdities Who have been the Masters of the bloody Inquisitions And who hindereth the preaching of the pure doctrine of the Gospel in all the Romanists dominions Is it not an erroneous Clergy You 'l say Those are Papists and so are not we Ans. No God forbid we should But they are a mistaken Clergy which sheweth us that the Clergy are as liable to be dividers and troublers of the Church as the Laity are and have done much more If any hence would infer that the Pastors must be vilified or deprived of their just liberties and power I would more largely tell such a one that it is also the Clergy that have opposed all these Heresies and sins and that have maintained obedience to Princes and that have preserved the Scriptures and the Christian saith and that have been the salt and lights of the world without whom Christianity never long continued in any nation And that have been the chief instruments of bringing all the souls to Heaven that have passed thither from the militant Church But I have done this in two sheets for the Ministery long ago So that our faults consist with the honour of our function and of our necessary labours and with the praise of the more blameless And even so though the peoples weakness and inclinableness to unwarrantable separations and schisms be blameworthy as a fruit of their infirmity and injudiciousness Yet must we remember that they are the members of Christ and we must â—ot deny his interest in them nor judge or use them hardlier than Christ himself hath done or alloweth us to do But study his Love and tenderness and forbearance that we may follow him in serving him and not follow our uncharitable passions and call it a serving of him who liketh no such hurtful service He that loveth Christ in none of his Infants or weaker members but in the strong and more prudent sort alone doth love him in so few that he may question whether he loveth him indeed at all And whether ever he shall hear In as much as ye did it to the least of these my brethren ye did it unto me April 14. 1668. The way of Division by Violence I. Depart from the Apostolical primitive simplicity and make things un-necessary seem necessary in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Conversation II. Endure no man that is not of your mind and way But force all tâ— concord upoâ— these terms of yours what ever it cost III. â—rand all Dâ—â— â—ters with the 〈…〉 maticks â—â—ereticks or â—â—ditious Reâ—els that the◠〈◊〉 become â—teful to high â—nd low IV. When this â—ath greatly â—ncreased their â—isaffection to â—ou accusâ—â—heir Religioâ— of all the expressions of that disaffection to make iâ— odious also V. Take thosâ— for your enemies that arâ— their friends â— those for your friends which are their enemies And cherish those be thâ—y never so bad that will be against them and help you to rooâ— them out But remember that for all this you must come to judgement And read these following words of Mr. R Hookers which he useth of some part of the History which out of Sulpitius I before mentioned Eccles. Pâ—l Epist. Dedic The way of Peace by Love and Humility I. Adhere to the ancient simple Christianity and make nothing necessary to your Concord and Communion which is not necessary II. Love your neighbors as your selves Receive those that Christ receiveth and that hold the necessaries of Communion be they Episcopal Presbyterian Independants Anabaptists Arminians Calvinists c. so they be not proved Heretical or wicked III. Speak evil of no man and especiaâ—ly of Dignities Ruâ—lers Revile not when you are reviled speak moâ—â— of the good that is in Dislenters and do them all the Good you can IV. If any wrong you be the more watchful over your passions opinions and tongues lest Passion carry you into extreams Love your enemies â—less them that curse you do good to themâ—hat â—hat hate you and â—ray for them that despâ—ghtfully use you and persecute you And do noâ— evil â—hat good may come by it V. Impartially judg of men by Gods inâ—erest in them and â—ot your own or your parties Reprove the wayes of Love-killers and Backbiters and let not the fear of their Wrath or Censures carry you into a compliance with them or cause you by silence to encourage them But rejoyce if you should be Martyrs for Love and Peace For Blessed are the â—eek for they shall inherit the earth Blessed are the Peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God Blessed are they which are persecuted for Righteousness sake for theirs is the Kingdome of heaven The way of Division by Separation I. Depart from the Apostolical Primitive simplicity on pretence