Moses in observing the abolished Rites The Apostle requires them to observe the Law of Love to bear one anothers Burdens and so fullfil the Law of Christ which should never be abolished In the words there are these two things 1. A very great Duty Bear ye one anothers Burdens 2. A very great and cogent Argument to the Performance of it And so fulfil the Law of Christ You may take these three Observations from them two are supposed and the other exprest 1. Every man hath his Burden The Apostle in the former verse saith If a man be overtaken in a Fault c. but he doth not say if a man hath a burden let him have help to bear it 'T is possible that a man may live so as to be inoffensive to others or at least so as not to be Obnoxious to Censure which I conceive is the meaning of the Apostle But it is not possible for men to live in this World and to be freed from burdens Every Man hath his burden 2. Every mans burden either is or may be too heavy for him This is supposed in that the Law of Christ requires that he should have help to bear it 3. It is the great Duty of every Christian to bear his Brothers Burden I intend that my discourse shall be from the last of these and I shall endeavour to do these four things 1. To shew what mens Burdens are 2. What is implied in the Duty of bearing one anothers Burdens 3. To consider the force of the Argument And so fulfil the Law of Christ 4. To make some inferences by way of Application I shall speak briefly of these especially of the two first which I have elsewhere enlarged upon I begin with the first namely What are mens Burdens You will say that I have undertaken a very hard task I may as well undertake to tell all the Thorns in a Wilderness or all the Waves upon a Tempestuous Ocean as to count the Evils of this Life which are Mens Burdens There is no State or Condition of man but hath burdens which belong to it and are inseparable from it From the King upon the Throne to the Beggar upon the Dunghil Every one hath his Burden The Evils of this Life are like Pharaohs Froggs that will be croaking in Kings Chambers When Moses was the Supream Magistrate over the People of Israel his Father-in-Law told him that his Burden was too great for him Exod. 18. v. 18. Thou wilt surely wear away this thing is too heavy for thee Thou art not able to perform it thy self alone And we find him groaning under this Burden of Government Numb 11.14 I am not able to bear this People it is too heavy for me If it were proper for me to enlarge upon this head from this Subject I would shew what a great Argument this should be to Subjects to obey their KING that they might not add to His Burden And how necessary it is that we should pray for Kings that God would enable them to bear their great Burdens and likewise shew the Folly as well as base Disloyalty of those who desire the Life of their Prince and yet load him with their disobedience to his Laws I might also shew in the next place that Ministers have their Burdens and that they are very great likewise and every one almost adds to the weight of them The Doubts and Scruples of those that are Good and the Debaucheries on one hand and the Errors and Divisions on the other hand of those that are Bad do make our Burdens to be very Heavy But this I must not enlarge upon for fear of a mis-application If Kings who are Gods-Vicegerents to whom God requires such a peculiar regard that they are called Gods in the Scripture And if Ministers for whom God hath declared a peculiar regard in the next place however contemn'd in the World Touch not mine Anointed and do my Prophets no harm If these must have Burdens others have no reason to expect that they should go free More particularly The Burdens of men in this life may come under these three Heads 1. Such as relate to Bad Men 2. Such as relate to Good men And 3. Such as relate to both Good and Bad. 1. Such as belong to Bad man The impenitent Sinner hath his Burden and it is such a Burden as he that is once rid of would not for all the world be loaded with it again The wicked man travelleth in pain all his dayes Job 15.20 If his Conscience be awakned he is allways loaded with Guilt and Fear His secret Complaints are very grievous and are somtimes a very great interruption to his Mirth In laughter his Heart is sorrowful and the end of his Mirth is Heaviness If any man shall ask the impenitent sinner the Apostles Question Rom. 6.21 What fruit had you He can give no answer But if it be asked What Burthen had you he must answer That it was a very heavy one That he had no rest or quiet in his mind by reason of it I know very well that this doth not appear whilst sinners are in Health but when they are bound in Cords of Affliction and God shewes them their Transgression they then acknowledg that they never enjoy'd so much pleasure as countervail'd the terrors of their Consciences which were the immediate consequence of them And if the sinner doth not feel the Burden of Guilt and Fear his condition is the worse because the less he feels his Burden the more he adds to the weight of it which he will certainly feel in another State There is another Burden likewise which belongs to impenitent sinners which I may call an accidental Burden and that is Religion The worship and service of God is a very great Burden to them They are such as the Prophet Amos speaks of c. 8. v. 5. who think long for the Sabbath to be gone that they may sell Corn and set forth Wheat They have ordered their business so for want of beginning right at first and by contracting evil Habits that they are as well burdened when they do that which they should as when they do that which they should not The service of God and the service of the Devil are both Burdens to them But I will not enlarge farther upon this head because I do not think it so proper from this Subject 2. The good man hath his Burdens too Many are the Afflictions of the Righteous and many are their failings and infirmities which are the occasion of their grief and trouble The Burdens of good men are either 1. Real Evils or 2. Such as I may call Imaginary 1. Such as are Real Burdens to them When a good man hath done that which is dishonourable to God a scandal to Religion or an occasion of Offence by which others are encouraged in that which is evil it is a very grievous burden to him This was Davids Burden that he had caused the Enemies of
or the King of Great Brittain Why thou hast Trimm'd it away here as if thou wert putting in for a Living of six or sevenscore pound a year Here 's first the Common Topique of All Trimmers Bearing of Burdens which Implys Oppression and Persecution The Dissenters lye under Those Burdens And the Government is to Ease them Love One Another is a Christian Lesson but are we to love Mens Iniquities or was it the Apostles Meaning we should bear the Burdens of One anothers Sins and Transgressions Are we to love Hypocrites in the very Hardness of their Impenitent Hearts Nay the Hypocrisy it self after so many Judgments Denounc'd against Them and It by our Blessed Saviour Are we to bear the Burdens of Men Swelling and Triumphing in the Sins of Schism Contumacy and Sedition Mercenary Wretches that to serve a Present Turn Cast themselves at the Feet and Lick-up the very Spittle of a Tony or an Oliver Will you call it a Slander to tell the Naked Fact of a Practical Vsurpation Or the Hiding of a Mans Self to do it in the Open Sight both of God and Man What would some body give now that I could Name for a Stand in some Parish-Pulpit to get a Shoot at the Observator In fine Every Son of the Charch is made a Child of the Devil and upon the Whole Matter here 's The Conformists Plea for the Non-Conformists The Law of Christ you say is above All Laws What 's That to say in this place but that the Law of the Land and the Law of Christ are at Odds But the Men of Forty One are the Best Expositors of the Duty of Bearing one Anothers Burdens according to the very Letter They bore the Kings and the Churches Burdens Poor Wretches Baggs Parchments Estates and Livings and the Devil of any Other way they Practic'd of Bearing one Anothers Burdens Thus you see what the Visit was which in his foregoing Paper he gave notice that he would return to Cripplegate You may take notice of the Passages which he cavels at in my Sermon by some of the Words being printed in Black Letters A REPLY TO THE OBSERVATOR SIR I Was informed by your Paper on Wednesday last that you were in haste to return a Visit as far as Cripplegate and perceiving the day following what the Visit was and how early you performed it that Morning I could not but think you to be one of that number of whom the wise Man observes that They sleep not except they have done Mischief The Visit was a most unaccountable Descant upon my Text and Sermon at St. Giles in the Fields the last Sunday which I here faithfully publish that the World may judg whether there were the least cause for such Opprobrious Reflections and pity the case of an antient Gentleman who makes it his Calling and Employment to reproach and villify whom he pleases The Sermon shall speak for it self and I doubt not but all sober Men will say that it is not more plain than honest You suggest Sir That I am a Mercenary Wretch who to serve the present Turn do cast my self at the feet and lick up the Spittle of a Tony or an Oliver But there is no Man living whom you might not with as much appearance of Truth have thus reproached 'T is very likely that I should pay such a mighty Reverence to the rotten Bones of the great Usurper under Tyburn who detested and despised him when in the height of his Glory Such was my Behaviour then that his Tryers would not permit me a Stand in a Parish-Pulpit of my own to get a Shoot at any body And when I had hid my self in a private place in the Essex-Hundreds I was routed thence by one of Oliver's Agents because my Name was then Malignant as it is now Trimmer and forc'd to make my escape after twenty weeks preaching there carrying no other Reward for my pains away with me but a Quartan Ague In such Circumstances was I at that time when SOMEBODY kept his Coach and six Horses So far was I from being a SPY or OBSEVATOR in those days And if you will play the Man and charge me point blank with being or having ever been an Admirer of your Tony or having a kindness for any Rebellious Factious or Associating Principles I will produce more Loyal Persons and better Protestants for my Compurgators than One that I know of was able to produce when he was accus'd for being a Papist I thank God I have been so far from acting any thing against the Government or Interest of our Church that I have been beyond Expectation successful in serving both The worst Enemy I have must acknowledg that by contending for Conformity both from the Pulpit and Press I have brought great numbers to the Sacrament and an exact Conformity to the Orders of the Church And I believe my Lord Bishop will be ready to attest that I have waited upon him about baptizing of converted Quakers and Anabaptists and their Children as often as any one of the Clergy hath done But if I had been of such a Spirit as I perceive would please You I had never brought any Dissenter into the Church nor convinced any one Person of his Errours I know Sir it is objected against me and it lately came to the Ear of his Majesty himself by the means of some spiteful People that I have been an Associate with Dissenters But the only Truth in that Suggestion is That I love all Men and according to my Power do good to all I do not think that Religion teaches Men to be ill natur'd nor can any prove me a greater Friend to Phanaticks than my great Master was to Publicans and Sinners The greatest Kindness I ever did for any Dissenters from our Church was for a Family of Papists Persons of Quality whose whole Estate was unjustly kept from them by a Protestant Dissenter and yet I think I could as soon be a Jew as a Popish Christian I have likewise suffered in my Reputation by being kind in the Distribution of other Mens Charity where I was not limited by the Donor to all that were in excessive want without respect to their Opinions but as the Church hath lost nothing by it so I cannot but see enough in all Men to provoke me to Kindness and Pity to the Persons even of those whose Principles and Practices I heartily abhor I may very well be content to suffer in my good Name in so notorious a manner since this hath been of late the lot of divers who are a thousand times more deserving than my self Some of the most eminent Divines of the Church of England have been most falsely accus'd And there is a certain Magistrate on whom some think you have been throwing your Dirt in the same Paper in which you Visit me who is a most devout Conformist to the Church and was so long before he was in Commission and a very vigorous Prosecutor of
Conventicles however he may have been represented by some whose Loyalty and Conformity to the Laws of God the King and the Church lye far more in their Talk than Practice And now Sir not to pay you in your own Coin I mean in returning reviling for reviling give me leave sedately to ask you a few Questions 1. If Mens calmly treating Protestant Dissenters speaks them Trimmers what doth your wonderful mildness and gentleness towards Popish Dissenters speak your self to be Or rather what does the mighty Kindness you are ever expressing towards them speak you to be whilst in the mean time you profess your self a Son of the Church of England Why should not your so vigorous pleading the Cause of the Papists make You as justly liable to the charge of Trimming And to speak to but one instance of your kindness to them If I had been at a quarter of that pains for the lessening of the Phanatique Plot See Observ Aug. 30. that you have taken to sham and redicule the Popish One I would not complain that you abus'd me in calling me Trimmer or by a worse Name if there be any worse May I not speak to you in your own Dialect and in most of your own Words to me as followeth Why this is right Trimming c. You do as good as say Look ye Gentlemen We are Christians and it is Our Duty to Help one Another and to bear one Anothers Burdens If the King gets the Better on 't Let Me alone to do Your Bus'ness And in case of a Turn to the Church of Rome You shall do as much for Me. What 's All This I say but a Tacit Composition with a Publique Enemy where a Man delivers-up his Honour and Conscience for the Saving of his Skin and Int'rest And the Devil Himself with his Cloven-Foot Attests the Contract Why This Man would have been Safe in the Arms of Sir Edmond Bury-Godfrey had the Papists kill'd him when three days after his Death he thrust himself through with his own Sword 2. I demand of you Whether you did more foolishly or spitefully in asking Whether by the Prince of this World I meant the King of Great Britain or the Prince of the Air Pray who ever call'd the King of Great Britain the Prince of this World 3. I ask you Whether you do like a Son of the Church of England or on the contrary vilely disparage her Cause in supposing as you often do that Men who have once imbibed Phanatique Principles can never become sincere Conformists Is not this to suggest that the Arguments to Conformity to our Church are of but little or no force or that the Clergy are too weak to justify it 4. I ask again Whether he that undertakes to pass publick Censures at the rate that You do upon the Divines of our Church and their Pulpit-Discourses assumes not to himself the Office of a Bishop And whether in so doing you do not plainly charge their Diocesans with not keeping a vigilant Eye upon the behaviour of their Clergy And whether it would not have become you much better to inform their Lordships of those Offences you can make good proof of than thus to blacken them to the World and that for the most part upon no other Evidence than the Tales of Gossipping Busy-bodies or Malitious People not to add that of your own Invention 5. I demand See Observ Numb 120. Whether you did not cast an unmannerly Reflection upon his Majesty himself for making your Tony his Lord Chancellor when you reproached some Doctors of our Church for then dedicating Books to him 6. I ask Who that Trimmer was who being judicially interrogated about somebodie 's receiving the Sacrament and answered Yes and being asked How replied very Decently And being asked again was it Sitting or Standing or How replied again It was Sitting but very Decently If this strikes at me as some think it does it is either a Fiction of your own Brain or a base Calumny brought to you by one of your Factors 7. Since no good Man will think that Rebels or Disturbers of the Government can be lash'd by your Pen too severely were it not more advisable that for the future you should suffer those to live in quiet who are no less Loyal but far more peaceable than your self I will conclude with serious advice to you although 't is too probable that you will burlesque it as you did my Sermon That since you have been so exceedingly obnoxious by reason of certain foul Misdemeanours which you have been publiquely accused of and from some of which you have not yet vindicated your Reputation you would no longer blemish the Church by pretending to be her Advocate by which the Mouths of Phanatiques are opened against her And that since you have lived so long in Contention and gratifying a very exasperated Spirit you would now think it high time to betake your self to the great concern of another State that you may die in Peace and in the favour of Almighty God which is heartily prayed for by him who desires the Eternal Happiness of his worst Enemies and who is Cripplegate Aug. 30 1684. Your Well-wishing Friend and Servant W. S. Gal. 6. Ver. 2. Bear ye one anothers Burdens and so fulfil the Law of Christ THE great Design of the Apostle in this Epistle is to rectify the Errors and Mistakes which were amongst the Galatians and to allay those Unchristian heats which are the certain consequent of them There was such a contest amongst them about Christian Liberty that some were ready to take a Liberty which to be sure is most Unchristian A Liberty to bite and devour one another Chap. 5.15 That Christian Liberty which they contended about was a Liberty from observing any longer the positive Institutions of Moses i. e. Those Institutions which were no part of the Moral Law but only performed in obedience to Divine Authority The Galatians had been told by false Teachers that they must observe the one as well as the other The Apostle determines the Controversie by telling them plainly That if they did any longer observe those legal Institutions they should lose the Benefit of the Gospel-Dispensation I Paul say unto you If ye be Circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing But though the Apostle had done this yet it was no easy matter for him to perswade them to maintain Christian Love and Unity amongst them and therefore in this Chapter he prescribes some Rules which Christians ought to observe in order to it The first is in case of Offences v. 1. If a man be overtaken in a Fault ye that are Spiritual restore such an one in the Spirit of Meekness The second is more general in the words of my Text because it relates to all the grievances and unhappinesses that attend men in this Life Bear ye one anothers Burthens and so fullfil the Law of Christ The Galatians were greatly concern'd about fulfilling the Law of