to all Communities of men and to the flourishing of Religion I do not find that in the Law of Moses there was any direction or command in particular that when that people should chuse them a King that he should use his authority in causing both Priests and people to do their Duty in the several parts of Gods Worship enjoined by Moses his Law any more than Kings now under the New Testament are in particular appointed and required to see that the Christians under them both Ministers and People do their duty in matters relating to Gods publick Worship And yet when Hezekiah for instance to restore Religion after a decay of it in his Dominions commanded the Priests and Levites to do the duty of their places according to the Law of Moses and with advice of the Princes summon'd the People of the Land to come and keep the Passover and the like in the Conclusion it is said thus of him Thus did Hezekiah throughout all Judah and wrought that which was right and good and true before the Lord his God and in every work which he began in the service of the house of God and in the Law and in the commandments to seek his God he did it with all his heart and prospered 2 Chro. 31.20 21. And if this and the like in other good Kings was highly acceptable to God as we see it was then we have little reason to think it should be displeasing to him when Kings now do any thing like it He is the minister of God to thee for good saith St. Paul Rom. 13.4 and so long as he promotes the publick good in things temporal or spiritual Civil or Ecclesiastical he is not out of his way If it were a thing so well pleasing to God for Abraham to command his Children and his great Houshold to keep the way of the Lord as that God himself applauded him for it Gen. 18.19 it cannot certainly be an offence to him for Kings to command their Subjects to do likewise It was no small blessing that God promised to the Church when he said that Kings should be their nursing Fathers and Queens their nursing mothers and it would be great ingratitude not to acknowledge it to be so when they use their power and authority not only to protect and incourage them in the profession of the Christian Religion but also in making provision as Nursing Fathers for their spiritual nourishment Isa 49. And the truth is the more the Higher Powers concern themselves in due ways to promote Religion in their Dominions the more usually it flourisheth as we see not only by examples in the Scriptures and other History but experience teacheth us that there is generally the least face of Religion in such places as have been most neglected in the publick provision I would advise those among you who are most tender in this point touching the Magistrates Power in matters of Religion to hear what is said in answer to a Question of this Nature by J. O. in some Sheets intituled Two Questions concerning the power of the supream Magistrate about Religion and the worship of God with one about Tythes proposed and resolved Whose words I know they will more regard than anothers The Question is Whether the Supream Magistrate in a Nation or Common-wealth of men professing the Religion of Jesus Christ may or ought to exert his power Legislative and Executive for the supportment preservation and furtherance of the profession of the faith and worship of God and whether he may and ought to forbid coerce or restrain such principles and practices as are contrary to them and destructive of them The Answer to which is managed under ten Heads of Arguments The affirmative saith he of both parts of this Question is proved 1. From the light and Law of Nature 2. From the Law of Nations 3. From Gods Institution in and by Laws positive upon Doctrines of faith and ways of worship of pure Revelation 4. From the example of all godly Magistrates accepted with God from the foundation of the World 5. From the promise of Gospel times 6. From the equity of Gospel rules 7. From the confession of all the Protestant Churches in the World 8. From the confession of those in particular who suffer in the World on account of the largeness of their Principles as to toleration and forbearance 9. From the spiritual sense of the generality of godly men in the World 10. From the pernicious consequences of the contrary assertion This was good Doctrine in 1659. And if upon apprehension and experience such Higher Powers do judge that all the Christian Ministers and People in their Dominions are never like to prove so wise and sober as not to abuse an absolute liberty by making different parties in the Church by chusing different ways of administration and if to prevent this and to preserve Peace and Unity in the Church as of great concernment for their edification and comfort and for the honour and reputation of the Christian Religion and for the better propagation of it they have thought it best to prescribe some method and form to be used by all it is to be seriously considered by you That if nothing in that method and form be enjoined you as a condition of Communion which is not sinful for you to submit to Then which is most eligible whether to separate or to submit to that method and form though it should not in your apprehension be so useful beneficial and grateful to you as a liberty for you and your Ministers would be to use what way you liked best If you say to separate is most eligible and fittest to be chosen in this case Then you must prove that which no man will ever I think be able to do to wit That it is lawful to break Churches to pieces upon the account only of some conveniencies you desire and inconveniencies which in your apprehension you suffer when otherwise you might lawfully and without defiling your selves with sin continue and maintain your Communion in those Churches to your own and their edification with whom you were united No doubt but the great differences that were on foot between the Judaising and Gentile Christians in the Apostles times did somewhat burden their Communion together in the same Church with some considerable inconvenience and so did the scandalous opinions and practices of many in the seven Churches of Asia and other Churches make the Communion which those had with them who had not defiled their garments the less pleasant and comfortable and in some respect burdensome to them But we hear nothing of separation and breaking of Churches in pieces upon that account nor of any encouragement given thereto by the Apostles but the quite contrary To bring this business down from above let us try it a little in your own Court Suppose the Higher Powers should not have concerned themselves in prescribing any Common form to be used in all particular
separations and multiplied more and more monstrous Sects than ever there were in the Nation before Notwithstanding the sad experience of all which and notwithstanding the means used by the Higher Powers to reduce them yet it seems these several divided parts have thought themselves concerned upon one account or other still to carry on their esteemed Reformation in their several different ways and rather to run the hazard of all the ill consequences of their division in common from the Church of England and of their several subdivisions among themselves than to return to our Parochial Communion Now then the endeavour of the following Address is to shew these two things especially The one is That both the Principles and practice in many things wherein this Reformation endeavoured by them doth consist are really corruptions and things which ought themselves to be Reformed The other is that if any Emendation in matters Ecclesiastical shall be found convenient for the peace unity and stability of the Church of England as I will not deny but there may the present genius and temper of many of this Nation considered for Moses for the hardness of the peoples hearts by Gods direction put that into the body of the Law which otherwise would not have been ncessary Yet to seek this by separation from our Parish Churches and by gathering Churches out of them and by keeping assemblies in opposition to them is no good method of proceeding therein but such as tends to hurt the Church of God much more than to do it good and to set people back and not to bring them forward in that wherein the heart and spirit of true Christianity lies And for my Justification in this undertaking I have the old Non-Conformists so far on my side as that as Mr. Baxter saith Such as Mr. Cartwright Egerton Hildersham Dod Amesius Parker Bains Brightman Ball Bradshaw Paget Langly Nicols Hering and many such wrote more against separation than the Conformists did And the former writings of the present Presbyterians abound also with invectives against the practice of gathering Churches out of our Parish Churches Yea those who have been chief in the Congregational way have in their Apologetical Narration told the World That all that Conscience of defilement they conceived cleaved to the worship of God in our Parish Churches or of the unwarrantable power of Church Governours exercised therein did never work in any of them any other thought much less opinion but that multitudes of the Parish Congregations were the true Churches and body of Christ and the Ministry thereof a true Ministry And again We have always profest say they and that in these times when the Churches of England were most either actually over-spread with defilements or in the greatest danger thereof that we both did and would hold a Communion with them as the Churches of Christ I shall not offend you by making that improvement of these Concessions by reflections which the matter is capable of Only I heartily wish That for the honour of our Religion we may all be careful to do that which is good and commendable not only in the sight of God but also in the sight of men and that nothing may be done but what we can give some competent account of unto men A thing wherein you have left even such as wish you very well much to seek as not knowing how to reconcile your principles and your practice What hath been offered by some in order to it from the consideration of the different circumstances of former and present times Doctrine of Schism opened and applyed to gathered Churches A stop to the course of separation I must needs say falls very short of it and hath met with such a return from other some as hath even left it without any strength at all especially in that which relates to Lay Communion Now the God of love and peace at last lead us out of all those distractions and confusions into which our own weakness and folly hath betrayed us into paths of purity peace and love and bestow upon us all a spirit of love and of a sound mind that so we may all come to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace A Serious and Friendly ADDRESS TO THE Non-Conformists Beginning with the Anabaptists SIRS NOW I am upon leaving the World by reason of Age some reasons have prevailed with me to leave behind me for you a few words not of bitter Contention but of Peace and to Edification and such only as are agreeable to a following the Truth in Love And in doing so methinks I might promise my self that what shall be thus offered will with a like mind be pondered and weighed by all such among you as in whom passion prejudice and partiality do not prevail more than that wisdom which is from above which is first pure then peaceable and easie to be intreated How unfit soever I may in other respects be thought for this undertaking yet my former experience in your way and the many serious and impartial considerations I have had about it may possibly have given me so much advantage for it as may excuse my present undertaking And besides if he that digged a pit Ex. 23.33 was to cover it no man need to wonder if I concern my self more than many others by endeavouring what in me lies to Cure the almost Epidemical Disease of Schism in some and to prevent it in others For however the general prevailing of it seems to have worn out that sense of the hainousness of it which the Church of God and all the famous Guides in it anciently had of it and to have changed its name and to be now adopted into the number of Virtues and to be esteemed an Ornament among too many yet I assure you it is not so with me who have seen and observed the dismal effects of it And doubtless it is not grown any whit the less hainous by prevailing so much as it hath done unless a thing becomes the less evil by how much the more mischief it does This evil took place presently after the Reformation from Popery and became a clog to it then as it hath been ever since And I know nothing so like to subvert the Reformation and at last to deliver us up again unto a Papal Power as this Sin of Schism Therefore blame me not if you find me endeavouring to awaken you into the same sense of it which I my self have If you will but take your measure of what it is like to produce among the whole Protestant party in the end if a stop be not put to it by what the divisions among your selves in the greatest part of your Congregations in this Nation hath brought forth especially in the West the prospect will be sad enough and such as one would think should create in you a great jealousy touching the practice of separating from other Protestant Congregations I should think it might well
him to worse than being drowned in the depth of the Sea And this sense of the word offend exactly agrees with the common use of it in the New Testament But yet notwithstanding all that I have said I do not at all deny the emblematical use here of the little Child which our Saviour set in the midst of the Apostles which was to cure them or some of them of ambition and to perswade them to become if possible as free from it as little Children are And therefore tells them first that except they were converted and became as little Children they should be so far from being greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven the thing they contended about as that they should not at all enter therein ver 3. And secondly he tells them that the way for them or any other to interess themselves so far in his favour as to be made greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven is by becoming like little Children by purging out such ill habits of pride and the like which made them unlike to little Children in whom such ill habits had not taken place For saith he Who so shall humble himself as this little Child the same is greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven ver 4. But then though all this is granted yet it must be considered how and after what manner our Saviour would cure this distemper in the Disciples by this emblem of a little Child And this he did first by intimating to them how free from pride and other ill habits little Children are till they have defiled themselves with actual sin And secondly by letting them know how very dear to him they are upon that account upon their not having actually defiled themselves with pride malice or opposition against him and his Gospel for which reason perhaps he numbers them with those that believe indeed so dear as that he takes what is done for or against them as done for or against himself And by thus discoursing to them of such little Children as that was which stood in the midst of them he instructed them touching the necessity of purging out ill habits and of becoming humble and innocent if ever they would endear themselves to him or become capable of entering into the Kingdom of Heaven or of being great therein By the way then by what hath been now said you may answer your own argument why you cannot think it probable that any little Children were said to be baptized when it 's said such and such were baptized and their Housholds Your reason you know is because it is said of some of them that all of those Housholds did believe Which yet is no reason to disbelieve little Children to be any of those all if the little Children of Believers are said by our Saviour to be Believers as you may see they are by what hath been now represented to you unless better reason can be offered against the sense argued for than what is offered for it THus far we have heard what our Saviour hath said touching the continuance of little Children in the visible Church under the Gospel Let us now hear what his Apostles say In the first Sermon they preached after they had received the Holy Ghost St. Peter used this as a motive to those Jews who had Crucified Christ to repent and be baptized for remission of sins for saith he the promise is to you and to your Children and to all that are afar off even as many as the Lord our God shall call Act. 2.38 39. This clause even as many as the Lord our God shall call shews that which I have been proving to wit that the promise of spiritual benefits or priviledges was not made to Abrahams seed meerly upon account of their relation to him according to the flesh but as they shall be his spiritual Children in deriving from him the profession of the same Faith or Religion which was in Abraham And so and upon these terms the promise was made to the Jews here spoken to as bad as they were and to all afar off whether Jews or Gentiles upon supposition of their being called and not to them only but to their Children also Now I have shewed before that the little Children in the Jewish Church could not have been of it no more than the Children of the Gentiles but by being some way or other called to it as they were whom God put under the nurture of believing Parents or Tutors and upon those terms the Gentiles Children might be of the Jewish Church too as the Children of the Strangers that were born in the House of him that was a Jew or bought with his money were By this part of St. Peters Sermon you may see that under the Gospel the promise continued to all such as were called both of Parents and Children just as it was before I mean as to spiritual priviledges The promise now is to as many both Parents and Children as God shall call and it was no otherwise before The Apostles words here run but according to the tenour of the promise of old and according to what was enjoyed in old Testament times both by Jews and Proselytes and their Children The Proselytes from among the Gentiles upon their being called were of old grafted into the stock of Israel and their Children with them and did partake of the root and fatness of the Olive Tree as the Apostles phrase is that is they were partakers of the same spiritual priviledges as Abrahams spiritual Seed were Thus the Proselytes were then and the believing Gentiles under the Gospel were no more they were but grafted into the same stock or Olive Tree i. e. into the same Church Rom. 11.17 I say into the same Church for that continued still though not all the same Laws and was constituted of Abrahams spiritual Seed as before it had been Which brings me to the next thing I would call you to the consideration of When St. Paul in Rom. 11.20 speaking of the unbelieving Jews saith because of unbelief they were broken off it doth appear thereby there was no discontinuance of the Church by any change made by the Gospel upon its first entrance This is implyed when it 's said of some Jews that they were broken off For it was the Church the same Church from which they were broken off of which they were branches or members until they were broken off But then the Church it self remained still in being at that time when they as branches were broken off and after also into which others were grafted The case was plainly this Before Christs appearance in the flesh the Jews generally both better and worse professed a belief in Gods promise of sending the Messias and that he should be of Abrahams Seed in which Seed all Nations were to be blessed By profession of which faith or this and the Religion of Abraham otherwise they were all externally Abraham's Spiritual Seed and as they were his Spiritual Seed they were the
Christians who contended with the believing Gentiles for not observing the Law of Moses in Circumcision meats and days never that we find quarrelled with them for not entering their Children into the Church as by the Law of Moses they were to do when they themselves were received as Proselytes nor for not baptizing them according to the custom of the Jews both in reference to their own Children and the Children of Proselytes Nor do we find that the unbelieving Jews ever contested with them for any such thing though otherwise they were forward enough to lay hold of any thing they could to object against them All which still renders it probable that there was no such thing wanting in the believing Gentiles as might give either the Judaizing Christians or unbelieving Jews any occasion for such a quarrel which otherwise we may well think would have risen among them But leaving these things suppose it were granted you which yet will not be that the Scripture were wholly silent as to matter of fact touching the baptizing of Infants in the Apostles days yet when we find in Scripture sufficient reason why they might and should have been then baptized it may well induce belief that they then were and now may We do not find as to matter of fact that any of six of the seven Churches of Asia were baptized nor of some other Churches of the Apostles planting but yet that 's no good argument that there was none so long as there is ground enough to conclude that they ought to have been baptized for that they were a part of that one universal Church that hath one baptism belonging to it for the solemn incorporation and initiation of all its members of all that are qualified for Church membership We do not read in Scripture that the Jews baptized the Proselytes both Fathers and Children when they received them into the Church and yet we are otherwise satisfied that they did So that you see it can be no good argument that Infants were not baptized in the Apostles days though it should be supposed and granted that we have no record in Scripture that they were I have told you before that if this way of arguing were good it would oppose and run down your own practice as much and more than Infant Baptism Because there is nothing at all recorded in Scripture as to matter of fact that gives the least hint that any were baptized at age whose Parents were Christian at their birth So that either the baptism of Children is recorded in the recording of the baptism of Housholds or else the baptism of none is recorded in Scripture but of such who immediately before their being baptized were converted from Judaism or Paganism I mean as to what was done after Christs Resurrection This argument from matter of fact I know hath taken much with people of weak minds who cannot see a far off as St. Peter speaks in another case and hath furnished your Congregations with Proselytes to your way but doth indeed wound your cause and gratifieth none but Socinians in their opinion that none ought to be baptized but such as are newly converted to Christianity from another Religion And it is not a thing to be slighted in reference to this matter of fact That Authors of good credit in the antient Church who lived in times not far distant from the age in which the Apostles or one of them lived did assert Infant Baptism to be an Apostolical Tradition and to have been received from them and practised in the Church from their times downwards as many Books before you have made it appear And that which yet adds the more credit to their testimony is in that they were never contradicted in this their report and testimony by any that lived in the same age with them or near to it no not by Tertullian himself though otherwise in reference to his opinion of all sin past being wash'd away by Baptism he would have had it deferred except in case of danger of death in Infants not only till persons were past Childhood but till after Marriage and the heat of youth was over if not till old age or towards the time of death Neither could ever any Advocate of your cause so far as I can learn give any account short of the Apostles times of the first rise of Infant Baptism But not example in matter of fact but the reason and ground on which they stand or do depend is our rule And therefore the reason and ground from Scripture why some Infants may be baptized I reckon is more to be attended to than the evidence of fact And these I have laid before you already and shewed That the reason of allowing the visible Church-membership of some Infants is the same now as it was in old Testament times such as is Gods chusing them to it sanctifying and setting them apart for it and calling them to it That Gods gift in granting this priviledge in the days of the Patriarchs and his calling them to it is without repentance and unrepealed That they are as much qualified for the Church initiating Ordinance now as ever heretofore and as capable of the ends thereof That our Saviour hath owned their special relation to him by appointing them to be received in his name That he hath acknowledged them to be of the number of those that believe in him And that our Saviour and his Apostle hath put them into the number of Disciples That they are in a sense in a regenerate state All which together plainly show them to be qualified for Baptism according to the very Letter of Christs Commission And if there be substance in these reasons as I doubt not but there is Then Infant Baptism is far from being a Nullity And whatever I have said heretofore in times long since contrary to the tenour of these reasons I hereby Revoke and do think I have given you sufficient reason for my so doing and for every one of you to do so likewise Considering then what lies in your way you will find it a difficult task to satisfie your selves or to give others any tolerable account that you can satisfie your selves that Infant Baptism is a Nullity And it is so much the more unreasonable for you to think that it is when yet those who have been baptized in their Infancy do agree with you in the doctrine of baptism touching the nature and necessity of it and the reasons and ends of it and hold themselves as much obliged by it as you do by yours and the sincere of them do as well and as much perform their obligation as those among you do who are sincere AND if these things be so as I have endeavoured to represent them from the Scriptures and if Infant Baptism be indeed no Nullity Then so many of you must needs be under a dangerous mistake and guilty of the odious sin of Schism who think it a sufficient ground to
of many Zech. 2.11 Many Nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day and shall be my people As the Nation of the Jews were Nationally Gods people and God was the God of Israel so here it 's foretold that many Nations nationally should be joined to him and be his people also and consequently he must be the God of those Nations in the same sense in which they are his people Thus far the matter is so evident that one would think that nothing but an inveterate prejudice and prepossession of a contrary opinion unduly taken up and an averseness to confess your selves to have been mistaken should hinder you from accepting of a conviction in this matter and of yielding up your judgments as conquered by the truth To proceed then yet farther If Nations professing the true Religion are in a more general sense Abrahams spiritual Seed and a people joined to the Lord so as to be his people Then it is as well the duty of the people of such Nations to associate and knit together in Christian Congregations for publick worship in the places where they reside as it was for the Primitive Christians who lived in Rome in Corinth in Cenchrea by Corinth c. to associate as they did in the same places for the same end and accordingly those Churches were called by the names of the places where they did reside And our Parochial distribution is no more a cause of quarrel than that was that the Church of Corinth and the Church at Cenchrea were distinct upon the only account that the members of each lived in distinct places And as the distribution of the whole Nation of Professors of Christianity into particular Parochial Assemblies best answers the Primitive pattern so it best answers the ends of Church association such as are the watching over conferring with admonishing exhorting and comforting one another and the assembling together for publick worship And when the Christians in a Nation are thus disposed of into Congregations in the places where they live weak and strong together it is no ways agreeable to primitive practice nor to the general ends of Church association nor to the common good of particular Churches or of the whole body of Christians in a Nation for the stronger the wiser the better the more spiritual in those Parish Churches to withdraw themselves from the more ignorant weak and carnal Christians residing in the same place with them into distinct and separate Communities so long as they can hold Communion with them without sinning in so doing This the Primitive Christians did not and if no such thing had been done in our Nation the Church of God amongst us would doubtless have been in no such bad circumstances as now it is As God hath placed in the natural body members some more necessary and useful than others to be helpful and serviceable to the meaner more helpless and less useful for the good of the whole body so it is in Ecclesiastical bodies God saith St. Paul hath tempered the body together having given more abundant honour to that part which lacked that there should be no Schism in the body 1 Cor. 12.24 25. That there should be no Schism in the body as to be sure there will and needs must when that part is most neglected which lacketh most care and pains and withdrawn from as if it were no part of the body This becomes a sore temptation to those who are despised to set against those who despise them and that again tempts them on the other side to oppose their opposers and so the breach grows wider and wider and spreads it self through the whole body of a Nation And as the withdrawing live coals from those that are but a little kindled is the way to put out the fire so is the withdrawing of the better Christians from the worse not in a way of Church Discipline but into distinct bodies the direct way to ruine the Church and to extinguish the life and heat of Religion in those places where this is practised I nothing doubt but that those who have taken this course let the provocation to it be what it will might have consulted the real and true interest of Religion in the main much better in another way This way savours too much of self-satisfaction and neglect of others to be of Christ who would have the strong to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please themselves after his own example Rom. 15. New ways many times take much for a while which do not end so well at last Enquire for the old way and stand in the good way that in which the primitive Christians walked if ye would find rest and satisfaction in your own minds rest to your Souls And if it be matter of duty in it self and according to primitive practice for all Christian Professors in a Nation thus to unite in particular Congregations in the places where they reside and not to make any Schism after by one part withdrawing from the other into separate Communities so long as they can continue their Communion without a necessity of sinning Then if the Higher Powers in such a Nation do exercise their authority in commanding them to do this which is of it self their duty though they had not commanded it and do likewise forbid and restrain their making of Schisms by separating when they have no sufficient or warrantable cause to do it this cannot make it less their duty than it was of it self before and still would be were there no such Command or restraint from the Higher Powers No man sure can imagine that if Nero had used his authority in commanding the Primitive Christian Churches to do the same things which they were obliged to do though he had not commanded it as he did not that Nero's Command in that Case would have made it any whit less their duty but the more It is not unbecoming but very laudable no doubt for the Higher Powers to concern themselves and their authority in promoting the Christian Religion in their Dominions by taking order that God be publickly and solemnly worshipped by the Christians in the use of Gospel Ordinances That places for publick worship be provided for that end That Officers competently qualified be appointed to administer those Ordinances That fitting maintenance be appointed and provided them that they may attend that work without distraction That the people be required and commanded to attend the publick worship and that care be taken that they may not be disturbed in it and finally that Discipline be duly exercised for the purging of the Churches and for the keeping them pure Supposing the Higher Powers and the people of a Nation to be Christian the very light of nature and their love to the Religion they profess will dictate such things as these in the one to Command and the other to obey and to use all due means to prevent divisions amongst them as being most destructive
our Liturgical Form of Administration or that it might be mended or a better way pitcht upon if the Higher Powers over us thought it fit if this should be granted yet this is no argument why you may lawfully separate It is not its being less useful or less desireable to you than it might be made that will bear you out in your separation so long as you should do nothing in it self sinful in worshipping God in the use of it The question is not at all whether this or another way were most eligible were you at liberty to chuse without danger of making any Schism But the great question to which you must bring your selves is Which is most eligible whether to do that which comparatively you think is inconvenient less profitable less useful but yet not unlawful or to make your selves guilty of a great and notorious Schism and therein of a great Sin and thereby also to make your selves accountable for the most dismal effects of our sad breaches and divisions the very thought or suspicion of which is enough to make the stoutest heart to tremble Do not flatter your selves with this and that apology and pretence for this seems to be clearly the State of your Case You talk of more purity of Communion for the sake whereof you separate but if you make your selves guilty of Schism to obtain a more pure Communion and such a Schism as hath already produced most lamentable effects in vain do you flatter your selves with a conceit of a more pure Communion For your Communion being founded in a great Schism must needs pollute it and make it far more impure than Parochial Communion can upon any reasonable account be suspected to be You cannot say Parochial Communion is at all impure because a man does not defile himself with sin in making his way to it or having his share in it as they do that make their way to yours through a sinful Schism So that upon the whole matter there is incomparably more cause to scruple Communion in your Assemblies under your circumstances than Communion in our Parish Congregations Nor does a defect in the exercise of Discipline by reason whereof some are admitted perhaps to Parochial Communion that should be debar'd it make the Communion impure to them who cannot help it A man is to examine himself and then he may eat of that bread and drink of that Cup his examining anothers Case is not made the condition of it There were but a few names in the Church of Sardis but what had defiled their garments and were dead having only a name to live and yet those few held Communion in the same Church without defiling their own Revel 3.4 You may if you please exercise that Discipline which the Scripture directs private persons to use towards scandalous Church-members that is not to keep Company with them or to eat or drink with them in a way of familiar voluntary and unnecessary Conversation 2 Thes 3.14 1 Cor. 5.11 But this is no bar against doing your duty in coming to Gods Ordinances and in Communicating with others there who have not so defiled themselves as was said before The want of due Discipline is indeed a great Calamity but Discipline is not of the essence of the Church no more than the rod is of the Family but is only necessary for the well being and good Government of it THere are two things I perceive which some of you make much of The one is that when any thing becomes a condition of Communion which is vehemently suspected to be unlawful it frees a man from the guilt of Schism although he break Communion upon it The other is that when that is imposed as a condition of Communion which ought not to be made a condition if Schism be occasioned thereby the guilt of it lies only on the imposers and not on them upon whom it is imposed It argues in my opinion that arguments run very low with you when you are fain to make shift with such as these For the first of these Mens opinions of things or suspicious concerning them does not alter the nature of the things themselves or make that no Schism which is so in it self It may make a difference in the nature of the offence to be greater or lesser before God according as men have been diligent or negligent in the use of means to understand their duty in order to practice but does by no means excuse them from all guilt in the Case for the reason aforesaid This Position therefore is doubtless false But is there indeed such a virtue in suspicion as to sanctifie Schism it self and to make it to be no Schism though otherwise it were Why then I pray you will not your suspicion do as much on the other hand Why does not your suspicion of making your selves guilty of a notorious Schism make that very lawful for you to do to avoid it which were it not for the danger of Schism and the evil of thwarting publick Laws might otherwise seem inconvenient for you to do Is there more danger in doing that in the doing whereof it is uncertain to you whether you do well or ill in reference to your personal concern than there is in doing that which it's certain tends to so publick a hurt and damage as Schism does When you alledge Rom. 14.23 where it 's said he that doubteth is damned if he eat because he eateth not of faith for whatsoever is not of faith is sin I say when you alledge this to justifie your Schism upon the account of your doubting of the lawfulness of some things in the administration of holy things you make things equal in your apprehension which are altogether unequal in themselves The Case there touched was about the eating or not eating of such meats the eating of which the Christians were not obliged to by any Law of God or Man in which Case a man might be sure he should not offend against either in forbearing to eat that about which the doubt was raised nor against the publick peace of the Church But you are at no such liberty in your Case it is not a matter of such indifferency whether you make a Schism in the Church and act contrary to publick Laws as it was for a man to forbear one sort of food by the forbearing of which he should do no hurt to the Church by disturbing the peace of it nor to Religion by causing it to be evil spoken of But yet that is not all but your case and that there spoken of is vastly different in another respect The doubting of some Christian Jews touching the lawfulness of eating some meats which the Christian Gentiles did eat without scruple did arise from a want of satisfaction in their own minds touching the abrogation of the Mosaical Law by which the eating of those meats was once expresly forbidden So that your case is no ways parallel with theirs there handled by the
see what the fruits and effects of their Schism were which made them socarnal in the Apostles account such as were their being puft up for one Teacher against another and their debates envyings wraths strifes backbitings whisperings swellings and tumults that were among them Just such as your Schism hath brought forth among us in this Nation only I fear the effects of our Schism hath as much exceeded theirs then as our Schism it self hath exceeded theirs And if these things have been are and will be the natural effects of Schism which are so directly contrary and destructive to the power of Religion Then you will do well calmly to consider whether you have not mistaken the right method of promoting the power of Religion when you made so wide a breach as you have done in the Church to effect it If instead of this each Christian of you had kept to Parochial Communion and each outed Minister had kept their residence among them and Communion with them as private Members in the Parish way and had also in a private capacity joined with those Ministers which have succeeded them in doing all the good they could in the Parish as by a private application and improvement of the publick labours of their Minister together with Catechising and other personal instruction and exhortation privately administred to the several Families in the Parish I say if such a thing as this had been done instead of gathering separate Congregations I nothing doubt but that by so doing you would have taken an unspeakably far better course to promote the power of Religion in the Nation than by what you have done and to have procured a removal also of your burdens long before now and to have been competently provided for in the mean time But separation hath always of old been counted an undue irregular and dangerous way of seeking what you desire even by the ancient Non Conformists themselves and was as much inveighed against by them in those times as it was by the Conformists themselves You know right well that when Sacrificing observation of Sabbaths and other instituted parts of Gods worship came in competition with mercy Charity and the like it by no means pleased him when these were thrust out that the other might take place Much less have you reason to think that he is in such love as you are with one external manner and form of administration of worship when another may be used as that he would have that contended for to the loss of Charity Peace and Unity when as he hath commanded us above all things to put on charity Col. 3.14 and above all things to have fervent charity among our selves 1 Pet. 4.8 and that peace should rule Col. 3.15 Certainly to think that God is in such love with one form above another under such circumstances cannot proceed but from a misapprehension of the nature of God and the nature of his worship If this then be true and I cannot see how it can be denied but that your separation as all unlawful separation in the Church is be of such ill abode to the power of Religion as I have shewed Then if you be in any measure convinced that it is so I hope it will not be grievous to any of you to whom the Commandments of God are not grievous to make a stand and bethink you how you may take your selves off this way And if the Higher Powers over us shall perceive any relenting in you for what hath been done I dare not suspect but that they will take your Case into compassionate consideration and be willing to do their part towards the making up the great breach that hath been made in the Church and in a healing way to hinder the growing mischiefs of it Which God of his infinite mercy grant before it be too late That which hath occasioned all this unhappiness under which the Church of God among us groans and Religion in the most spiritual and most concerning part of it extreamly suffers is a want of a right understanding and due use of our Christian liberty It was that which occasioned divisions and the unchristian effects of them in the Churches first planted by the Apostles And the same thing hath produced the same and perhaps much worse effects among us in this Nation Very many of the Jews who believed did not at the first understand their Christian liberty but thought themselves still under the obligation of the Ritual Law of Moses But others did especially the believing Gentiles And the want of a knowledge of it in the one and the want of a due use of it in the other begot an unchristian carriage in them one towards another Upon occasion of which St. Paul said Gal. 5.13 Brethren you have been called unto liberty only use not liberty as an occasion to the flesh but by love serve one another When he saith ye have been called unto liberty his meaning doubtless in special was that by the Christian Ecconomy the believers were set at liberty from being tyed to the observation of a great variety of external modes and forms of worship to which the Jews by the Law of Moses were obliged But though they were at liberty in these yet they were still as strictly obliged to the spirit and moral substance of the Law as ever one part whereof consisting in our love one to another according to the Apostles words in the next Verse where he saith for all the law is fulfilled in one word even in this Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Now his counsel therefore to them was that they would use this liberty of theirs so as that in the use of it they might serve one another in love that they would suffer Christian Charity to govern them in the use of their Christian liberty and not to do any thing to the prejudice of that And then cautions them that by no means they should use this liberty as an occasion to the flesh by gratifying any carnal selfish humour under colour of Christian liberty to the diminishing or quenching love or to the ingendering variance emulations wrath strife envying or the like which are part of the works of the flesh which he after reckons up Ver. 20. And intimates in the 14. ver that if they did thus abuse their Christian liberty what the consequence of it would be and that was their biting one another first and then their being consumed one of another Contrary to which counsel of the Apostle those Christians abused their Christian liberty when they put such a stress on it and on standing unmoveably in it without giving any ground to those Christians which did not understand it and in placing so much of Christianity in it as to despise slight and set at naught those Christians who did not understand and use it as they did and that to such a degree as to cause division strife and uncharitable censuring one another by means whereof their good
account of our divisions so as it never would have done if they never had been begun besides the hazard we run of exposing our posterities to lose the substance by our contending for circumstance and besides the temptation we have thereby put upon men to call the whole of Christianity into question and thereupon to give reins to their lusts more than ever before since the Reformation was first made I pray God so to bind the consideration of these things upon your minds that you may be awakened thereby out of I know not what dream into which a great many of the good people of this Nation have fallen There is nothing hardly in Christianity more evident than that matters of less moment are to give way to those of greater circumstance to substance conveniencies to necessaries a less convenience to a greater a greater inconveniency to a less duties only by Positive Institution to those which are morally or naturally such as might be shewed in many other Scriptures Hos 6.6 Mat. 12.4 5 6 7. besides those now touch'd on about Christian liberty And I think nothing gives a more direct contradiction to all this than the Schism that is made among us or the things by which it is made because by this you make matters of greater moment to truckle and yield to those that are less circumstance to substance matters necessary to those of conveniency a greater convenience to a less and so on For I appeal to the light of your own reason and to your Conscience whether the affairs of Religion in reference to the Church of God and to the World are so much concerned in having Gods worship and Ordinances administred in your way rather than in the way of the Church of England as they are in the peace and unity of the Church and in what depends upon them Whether the Souls of men in general both of those which adhere to you and of those which do not are advantaged by your way of administration above what they are and would be in the way of the Church of England more than they are hurt by the division and separation that is made about that difference Whether the Christian Religion be more honoured abroad in other Nations among Christians and Infidels by the one than hurt by the other Whether the Protestant Cause both at home and abroad gains more by the one than it is hurt by the other and whether more secured to posterity by the one than endangered by the other Whether error and heresie be more supprest by the one than propagated by the other and lastly whether Charity Humility and other Christian vertues or graces wherein the substance and power of Religion consists are farthered in your way above what they are and would be in the way of the Church of England more than they are hindered by Schism and separation Now if the affairs and concerns of Religion among men do in these and many other respects lose more by your Schism than they get by having the worship of God administred in your way rather than in the way of the Church of England as doubtless they do and the thing is too manifest to be denied Then you must needs be as certainly guilty of making matters of greater moment to stoop and submit to those of less as ever the Pharisees were of passing over the weightier matters of the Law and contenting themselves that they tithed Mint Anise and Cummin There is no such proportion of value in your way of external administration of holy things as different from that of the Church of England as makes it worthy to be put in competition with the peace and unity of the Church and what depends thereon For the Scripture no where lays any such injunction upon us to observe one way or manner of external administration of the right substance of worship supposing it to be done in common language as it does for the keeping of the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace nor gives any such caution against any external form of administration except that which is made in an unknown tongue as it does against the breach of the peace and unity of the Church and the many consequent ill effects thereof Nor is there any such utility in your way of administration as different from that of the Church of England as makes it worthy to be put in competition with the peace and unity of the Church I presume there is no sober serious Christian among you will say that your way of administration makes any such difference in the hearts and lives of Christians but that there were heretofore and are now Christians in Communion with the Church of England as sober righteous and godly as any among you I know nothing therein to hinder a man from being as holy and as good as he hath a mind to be It is the difference in mens more or less attendance to the substance of Christianity that makes them better or worse Christians and not their using different undetermined circumstances in the administration of worship And if it be so that your way of administration as different from that of the Church of England holds no such proportion of value or utility as makes it worthy to be brought in competition with the peace and unity of the Church Then for you to bring it into competition therewith nay to prefer it above the peace and unity of the Church and what depends thereon as it is apparent you do is a thing altogether unaccountable and a flat contradiction to that vein of Doctrine in the Scripture which I have mentioned above I know you will be ready enough to say that if it be so bad a thing in us to put undetermined circumstances in the administration of holy things into competition with the peace and unity of the Church as you say it is Then it cannot be good in them who by imposing such things upon us as conditions of Communion do put them into competition with the peace and unity of the Church also which is divided upon that account There is I grant little question but that the imposing of nothing as a condition of Communion but what is generally freest from exception is a very good way to preserve peace and unity in the Church But yet the using of some indifferent circumstances in the worship of God upon the first Reformation from Popery in this Nation was doubtless thought as convenient for the bringing people to Church then as ever a complying with the Jews in their usages not sinful in themselves was at the first Conversion of them to Christianity thought convenient to bring them to and to keep them in the Church then And though you think the case is so altered since the Reformation as that what was a reason of their use then to wit the bringing folk to Church is a reason of their dis-use and laying aside now as tending to the same end yet