joyful Remembrance of the Nativity of our Blessed Lord on the Anniversary thereof which in the time of Dioclesian proved a dismal Solemnity to some in Bithynia and of his Resurrection every Lord's Day especially on Easter which is Caput institutionis they on the Contrary as if they had not been unvaluable Mercies but rather great Plagues to the World must needs Fast on these Dayes and alwayes on that Sunday which did immediately preceed the Lord's Day on which the Holy Communion was to be celebrated though the Anniversary of our Saviour's Passion was judged by the Ancients the much fitter season for solemn Humiliation and Preparation in order to the due Reception of that Commemorative Sacrifice of Christ's Body and Blood on Easter Day for when Persecution ceased by the Haloyonian-dayes of the Great Constantine too much of the Christian Fervour abated therewith So that in the later Centuries of the Primitive Church The Holy Eucharist was not received every day no not every Lord's day but appointed to be celebrated thrice a year viz. On the Anniversary of the Nativity and Resurrection of our Blessed Lord and of the Descent of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost which Canons did at last terminate in Easter Day But these Antipodes are at the Expence of a Kalendar only to shun those dayes as a Sâ—ylla and Charybdis or the greater and lesser Syrtes And that they might give a Demonstration to the World that they are not sworn Enemies to their own Flesh and Blood and that it was not the Mortification of their own sensual Natures they designed by such Abstinence but rather that they fasted for Strife and Debate and to smite with the Fist of Wickedness under such a Religions Palliation It was usually observed that their most solemn Fasts did usher in the greatest Villanies they intended to act so that all honest-hearted men looked upon these Intimations as prodigious Meteors portending some bad Omen either to Church or State and too frequently to both But that they might make a sufficient amends to the animal Life for these few Politick Substractions they gratified the same with Feasting when they could come at it all the dayes of the Week though Epiphanius hath told us that in his time Fasting was practised throughout all the World every Wednesday and Friday unless the Anniversary of our Saviour's Nativity did happen upon one of these dayes As for Saturday's Fast though Pope Innocent pretended the Apostles Fasted that Day because Christ lay in the Grave all that time It did not so early nor universally obtain For it was not practised at Millan in the Time of S. Ambrose Yea more than so they were most willing to Feast all the time of Lent the Passionwee kwhich was deservedly termed by the Ancients Hebdomada magna Sancta Not that it hath sayes Chrysostom either more dayes or hours than other Weeks but because this is the Week in which truly great and ineffable good things were purchased for us not being excepted and were more ready to gormandize than on the Anniversary of our Saviours Passion all the Sympathy they discovered with his imparallel'd Sufferings on that Day being meerly Symbolical and that in a Physical sense too For as the Flesh of our Blessed Lord was inhumanely torne on that Day so they were ready with too greedy Appetites to tear the Flesh of Brutes hateing so much to be reputed Pythagoreans or Manicheans on that Day that they would have chosen rather to be accounted Canibals and ever since that time the Flesh-Market on that day is the greatest of all the year and though the Change of it to some other Day hath been frequently desired by some sober Persons in this Church for the avoiding of Scandal Yet such is the Prevalency of Fanaticisme in some Royal Burghs that the Bishop with his Clergy could not obtain that most reasonable Request This being one of the Cimelia è Scrinio Polonico eruta which they fail not to bring home with them per Hellespontum Danicum Whereas the Emperours Theodosius the first Valentinian the second and Gratian as we find in the Theodosian Code commanded all Suits and Processes at Law to cease and all Prisoners to be set free in this Holy week Whence it may appear these Carnivorous Animals have never seriously pondered that Typical Expostulation of our dying Redeemer which we find in the Lamentations of Ieremie Chap. 1. ver 12. interpreted by all the Ancients of Christ himself and which concerns them as much as any But that they might shew themselves Prefect in that Art of Opposition to the Primitive Church they still presumed to approach to that Holy Table absque Virgine Saliva though it was also condemned by the Ancient Canons and I wish some of them had rested satisfied with their Ordinary Repast in that great Morning of the Feast But there is good reason to fear That the Generality of Plebeian Christians shall rise in Judgment and condemn those Epicurean Fanaticks For these will not upon any account usher in that Spiritual and Incorruptible Food with any Temporal and perishing Harbinger Now if any shall say That they are afraid of Fainting I must confess Necessity hath no Law But I wish some have not contracted that Necessity by Intemperance For Nature is content with little and Grace with less I have also heard some object That Christ himself Condemned Fasting in the Pharisees But take St. Chrysostom's Answer to this ignorant Scruple who tells us That Christ did not simply Condemn the Pharisees their Fasting twice a Week or their exact payment of Tithes but their Hypocrisie and Ostentation But if we shall judge by the Practice of too many of those we have good reason to Conclude That they have perswaded themselves that Christ Condemned both these Matters in Thesi and that there is no necessity of any Hypothesis to expound the Text. But in the Last place Some of the more knowing of them are ready to adduce the Authority of Thorndyke and Ieremy Taylor both which were very far from Phanaticism that they have sufficiently evinced the Lent-Fast not to be an Apostolick Tradition as it is now Calculated by a Quadragesima dierum But that the proper Lent of the Infant Christian Church was only a Quadragesima horarum For Answer I cannot but reverence the Judgment of those great Clerks and do indeed look upon the Quadragesima horarum as the only Apostolick Tradition though the strict Observation of the whole Passion-week did begin very early in the Church But I think it a very strange Parologism to infer from thence That Feasting on Good Friday is Lawful seeing it must needs be inclusively the 〈◊〉 of that most absolute Fast of Fourty Hours But in these dayes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Animosities and Epicurisme have made the Usage of Fasts by Papists a Command to us not to use them And to conclude the Abating any thing of our Gluttony
Episcopis servire non cogantur quia scriptum est Nâ—que ut dominantes in Clero Vid. Hieronym Epist. 2. ad Nepotian where he sayes Sâ—a subjectus Pontifici tuo quasi Animae Parentem suscipe which Counsel savours very little of Fanaticism se Sacerdotes non Dominos esse noverint Honorent Clericos quasi Clericos ut ipsis à Clericâ—s quasi Episcopis honor deseratur sâ—itum est illud Oratoris Domitii Cur ego te inquit habeam ut Principem cum tu me non habeas ut Senatorem Augustin Epist. 48. Nonomnis qui parcit amicus est nec omnis qui verberat iâ—micus c. Ambros. Serm. 14. Leon. 1. Epist. 82. Greg. 1. De Cura Past. par 3. Admonendi sunt Subditi ne plus quà m expedit sint subjecti ne cum student plus quà m necesse est hominibus subjici compellantur Vitra eorum venerari Article XIV Psal. 95. 6. Mat. 18. 20. Rom. 15. 6 16 17. 1 Cor. 1. 10. 5. 8. 6. 20. 11. 2 4 7 22 34. 14. 33 40. Col. 2. 5. Tit. 1. 5. Heb. 10. 25. SEING we have so frequently mentioned the ancient Canons of the Church it being as indecent if not as dangerous for a Church to be without Canons as for a State to be without Edicts these serving not only as a Directory to the reciprocal Duties of Bishops Presbyters and People but being also Boundaries to all I wish we had some thing that looked like them and served in Lieu of them till they be imposed by Authority For the Tender of the Canonical Oath unto the Candidates of that Sacred Function doth necessarily presuppose some Canons according to which their Obedience should be squared and by which also the Injunctions of their Superiours ought to be regulated For I hope none of them are so simple as to imagine that this Oath doth imply an absolute implicit Obedience unto the Beneplacita of Ecclesiastick Governours as if Sic volo sic jubeo slat pro ratione Voluntas were the adequate Law of our Church The Angelical Dâ—ctor hath better deâ—in'd it who tells us that to speak properly Lex est Sententia praecipiens honesta c. and that it must be enacted with the general Consent of the Clergy otherwise it cannot be a binding Law to the Church and if those Qualifications be wanting though that Precept may be â—ermed An Ecclesiastical Law yet it is not truly such but Violentia Yea more than so as the Swearing of a Souldier to the Colours of his General doth not only import that he knows them from the Standard of the Common Enemy but also that this Sacramentum Militare is with a due Subordination unto him who gave that General his Commission unless any have a mind to imitate the Treachery of that famous Wolsâ—ein of whom it is reported by some that before his fatal Retreat to Fgra he took an independent Oath of the Imperial Army For the Precepts of the Superiour must not interfere with the Commands of the Supreme which if they be found to do they ought not to be obeyed And if it be concluded that this Canonical Oath in the privation of Canons is but a meer Non-ens Certainly these Fanatical Preachers are most obliged to some Bishops who have permitted them still to Officiate in this Church and yet were never so impertinent as to require from them any Subscription to this Chimerical Fiction Therefore I would humbly entreat the Reverend Fathers of our Church to meet privately amongst themselves accompanied with one or two of their respective Presbyters 〈◊〉 they judge most Judicious and knoâ— to be of unquestionable Principles and let them unanimously resolve upon an Uniformity of Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government to be practised in this Church It is certainly a matter of Lamentation that our National Church should resemble America in its first Discovery for as Peter Martyr and Ioseph Acosta report a good Horseman in one Summer's day's Travel might meet with variety of Languages Habits and Religion amongst that Barbarous People Sure I am not to speak of Confirmation which is already pressed they might easily introduce a Platform of Administrating the Blessed Sacraments of the Gospel For when one varies from the precise words of the Institution which is but too frequently done he shall hardly perswade me that he hath Consecrated those Holy Symbols or Elements as they are usually termed at that time the words of the Divine Institution being the Essential Form of a Sacrament And let not the Lord's Prayer be any more neglected in the Consecration of the Eucharist which as St. Cyprian testifies was the constant Epiphonema of that Solemn Benediction in all the Churches of Christ in his time The same is also attested by St. Hilary and St. Augustin As for the Gesture at the Holy Table I humbly suppose Standing will be found the best Expedient to introduce Uniformity into this Church not only because it staves off the serupulous Fears of an Arto-latria but also in regard we find direct Evidence for the Practice thereof in the Primitive Church I shall only produce one Private and another Publick Authority for it though many more might be adduc'd to this purpose Dionysius Alexandrinus who lived about the middle of the third Century and Wrote Anno Dom. 260. testifies in a Letter to Pope Xystus That it was the Custom of the Church in his time to stand at the Lord's Table As for the Publick Authority The 20th Canon of the Great and First General Councel at Nice is sufficient where we find Kneeling on the Lord's Day and on the day of Pentecost expresly prohibited and the practice of Standing at their Devotions explicitly enjoyn'd And that because the Lord's Day is the ordinary Christian Festival and the whole time of Pentecost which comprehends the fifty dayes betwixt Easter and Whitsunday inclusively the constant Festivity of the Church Tertullian and Epiphanius looking upon it as an Apostolical universal Tradition not to kneel all that time Whence we may infer That if some men speak Consequenter ad Principia one whereof is That this Blessed Sacrament is the most solemn part of Christian Devotion they must either grant that the Eucharist was received on those dayes in a standing Posture or that the People of God did not at all communicate at these times which were a very absurd Notion seeing they are acknowledged by all who are not wildly â—aâ—atick to be the fittest Seasons for the Participation of that great Mystery whereas that of Kneeling is but consequentially inferr'd because the Fathers usually term the Holy Eucharist The most sublime the most solemn and most useful part of Christian Devotion and that it is Tremendum adorabâ—le Mysterium though under Favour we must expound it and so the Context usually imports of internal Adoration unless we intend to joyn Issue with the Popish Idolatry As for that irreverent and lazy Posture of Sitting we
the Flock So it should fare with those defenceless Creatures if an Hostile Army should invade a peaceable People living securely without any Fear or Apprehension of such a sudden Deluge Friends and Foes Heterodox and Orthodox Conformist and Non-Conformist would be all overflowed alike the insolent Souldier having no other Eyes to discern but what Nature hath given to all living Creatures betwixt the Faith of an Heretick and the Orthodox save only by their Paleness and Garb. So that they who are accustomed to Rapine almost from their Infancies if they found rich Moveables and easily transportable to their own Countries whether the Owners were rich in the Faith or not they would not concern themselves with that nice Distinction But as it was said of the dayes of Caligula That it was then Crime enough to be rich so all should be Fish that should come in their Net so impartial would these rude Souldiers be And the Emperour would be so far from attaining his End that it would rather harden these deluded People to persist in their Non-Conformity they looking upon themselves as Martyrs at least Confessors for their imaginary Faith the most ignorant among them being at least so intelligent as to understand that this is not the peaceable Method of the Gospel to proselyte any to the Christian Faith but point blank contrary thereunto By which truly zealous Intercession this Devout man at last diverted the Tyrant from that most cruel Design But in fine I shall remit them to the serious Consideration of the State and Practice of the Primitive Church when the Civil Magistrate was no Christian but a Persecuter of that way whose Concurrence they could not expect to their Discipline but rather a violent Opposition thereunto And if any of them seemed to put to their helping hand it was not any Love to the Discipline of the Church but Ragione del ' Stato as the Italians phrase it Thus the Emperour Aurelianus did drive away Paulus Samosatenus that Arch-heretick and Bishop from Antioch but it was out of no Principle of Respect to the Church that he did so for he was accounted one of the Persecuting Emperours but from Reason of State because that proud Heretick was a great Incendiary in that City Let therefore the present Church imitate that excellent Pattern of the Primitive before the Halcyonian day of the great Constantine But if in ordine ad Spiritualia they will needs make their Address to the Secular Magistrate for the Coercion of Delinquents I wish it were rather in the matter of gross Scandal contumaciously persever'd in notwithstanding of the highest Censures of the Church inflicted upon them than of the Sentiments of the Judgment which proceed not the length of unwarrantable Practices For they who are incorrigibly profane are more overawed by the Terror of man than by the Fear of God and much more by the Temporal Sword of the Criminal Judge than by the Spiritual Sword of the Church for habitual Practical Atheists may without breach of Charity be presum'd to be such in Speculation I shall only instance the Profanation of the Lord's Day by Salmon-Fishing there being a vile Pack of brain-sick Hereticks in this Land who allow the Practice of it I am indeed far from pleading for a Judaical Sabbath in this Church But for any who are called Christians to be so employed in the time of God's Solemn Worship must needs be very odious in the Sight of Heaven and exceedingly scandalous in the Eyes of all those who are devoted to a Religious Service Neither find we any such Irregularities tolerated in any Christian Church which passeth not under the name of Barbarous no not in Geneva or Amsterdam I know certainly that this Insolency hath been represented both privately and publickly to the chiefest Governours of this Church and they obtested to implore the Assistance of his Majesties Secret Councel in order to the effectual Suppression of that Scandal as being so reflective upon the present Government but I fear it hath not yet been done for there is neither Bruit nor Fruit of that Address But if the Governours of our Church desire to avoid those bitter Sarcasmes Medice cura teipsum Turpe est Doctori c. De ingratis etiam ingrati queruntur qui non ardet non accendit Si vis me flere c. Which in plain English import that we should wash our own Mouths before we apply Gargarisms to others Or to use our Saviour's Phrase pull out the Beam before thou espy the Mote then let them have a special Care not to be found Profaners of the Lord's Day themselves Which Scandal ' they ought to shun the more solicitously because it was one of the Rocks on which their Predecessours did split if we may believe the verbal Assertion of many living Witnesses and that which a late learned Writer hath consign'd in print Which Reflection should serve at least as a Pharos to prevent all Shipwracks of that nature for the future But how this Beacon hath been observed may be perceived from the ensuing little Story A Bedal of a Country-Church being questioned not long agoe before a Country-Session for bringing home a Burden of Flax on the Lord's Day made this Apology for himself That not many Days before there had been a Bishop in that Village who in his Return from the North where he had been visiting his aged Father of the same Order with himself lodged all Night in the Minister's House though the Incumbent was not at home and not staying to supply that Vacancy travelled many Miles that Day of his Removal which was the Lord's Day with a great Baggage-Horse in his Train whose Burden was far above the Proportion of Flax he had brought home Whence he inferr'd That he thought the Bishops had brought such Carriages in Fashion on the Lord's Day and that he might lawfully imitate them who were the Fathers and Lights of the Church From which blunt but true Story for the poor door-keeper was censured in Publick for all his imaginary Authentick Apology I shall also deduce this Inference That all Church-men should be as vigilant as Dragons over their Conversation in the World that they give not the least Offence unto any that Stumbling-block occasioning the most dangerous Fall which is laid by the imprudent deportment of an Ecclesiastick The Plurality of men being more enclined to live by Examples than by Rules the former being much more obvious to Plebeian heads than the latter besides it hath a secret Magnetical Virtue like the Loadstone it attracts by a Power of which we can give no Account Yea such is the perverseness of humane Nature since that woful Lapse of our first Parents that the generality of men are more prone to follow Evil than to imitate that which is Good But that we may shut up this Point I shall add no more to the Prosecution of Delinquents in Foro Ecclesiastico but only this Wish That the Governours
non potest fieri ut qui Deum cognovit magnificè verè â—is quae adversantur serâ—iat voluptatibus and that Description of a self-denyed man found in the third Book of Theophilus Antioch Ad Autolycum Qui omnes Affectiones Animae Perturbationes debellacit faciâ—â— Mundum â—espicere potest But they that are Christ's have crucifyed the Flesh with all the Affections and Lusts thereof and consequently they not only endeavour to subdue the Irascible Faculty that Furor brevis being most unsuitable in a Church-man and that which usually deforms his Countenance worse than that of Thersites unless that Passion be transformed by Grace into a well-ordered Zeal But this general Mortification is also extended to all the Appetites of the Concupiscible Faculty So that a Church-man who makes this his Study and Delight will never be ranked by the World with the most brutish of the Epicurean Sect Who did not eat that they might live but lived that they might eat such as Sardanapalus Apicius Lucullus Heliogabalus the Emperour Maximinus whose Gigantine Appetite was above the Proportion of his vast bulk and that Usurper Boâ—osus of whom it was said That he was born not to lead a Life but to lift a Pot But on the Contrary all just mâ—n wâ—ll be so ready to reckon them with the ancient Fabricii the Bruti and Caâ—ones who were so much renowned for Temperance Yea more than so they shall be reputed the true Disciples of that great Doctor of the Gentiles who 1 Cor. 9. 24 25. c. recommends Sâ—briety to all Ministers of the Gospel from his own Example and by an Argument drawn ab incommoâ—â— all which Inconveniences of 〈…〉 in Church-men are expressed at 〈◊〉 by Clemens Alex. In his Paedagogus Who 〈◊〉 us there that the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Bacchus will never thrive together and that he cannot be a Spiritual Minister of the Gospel who is a sensual Man and immersed in Voluptuousness and that Gluttony and Drukenness are brutish Vices in all sorts of People But odious in Great men very detestable in Women but most abominable in the Clergy who ought to be Paterns of Temperance Abstinence and Fasting to all the World It being a great point of Christian Prudence in a Church-man to habituate himself by abstaining now and then from things lawful that with the greater Facility he 〈…〉 to things unlawful 〈…〉 still trenching nigh to a Precipice may sometimes stumble and fall into it It is very observable what the Judgment of Am. Marcellinus though a Heathen man was concerning the Splendour and Luxury of the Roman Bishops which he liked not but said That there was another way for them to be truly happy si Magnitudine urbis despectâ ad imitationem quorundam Provincialium viverent quos lemulas eâ—â—ndi potandique parcissimè ut puros Numim Commendant I say not that Fasting is a formal part of God's Worship though we read in Scripture of one that served God with Fasting and Prayer But as it is said of the Knowledge of Languages that it is not properly Learning yet a good help thereunto so it may be deemed of Fasting that it is not properly the Worship of God but a good Adminicle thereunto For a grosse Belly makes not only a gross Understanding but also a stupid Devotion I wish this were well observed on the Day of the Consecration of Bishops For it is but too much noticed that though the ancient Ceremony of reading the 13 Chapter of the Acts of the Apostles be still in Use yet the Duty therein recommended which is Fasting not to speak of that Moral one of Prayer hath fallen into such a desuetude that in lieu thereof too sumptuous and excessive Feasting hath succeeded so that the Solemnity of such a Day doth rather resemble the Pagan Cerealia Floralia the Saturnalia and Bacchanalia than the ancient Agapae of the Christian Church of which Tertullian in his Apologetick tells us That they were so far from supping prodigally as if they meant to dye to morrow as Diogenes said of the People of Megara that what cost was laid out upon those Love-Feasts was not expended for Vain-glory and to nourish Parasites but upon the account of Piety and Religion and to refresh the Poor And that they fed sparingly at them as remembring they were to rise at night to worship God So that they appeared not so much to have Feasted at Supper as to have fed upon Discipline and Order Sure it were much more commendable and fitter too to vouchsafe these hundreds of Crowns misimployed that way by way of Charitable Largess on the Poor that the Consecrated Person may have many Supplicants at the Throne of Grace to pray for the health of his Soul and for the Divine Blessing on the future Exercise of his Office that as Charlemain used to say by these Hounds he may hunt after the Kingdom of Heaven We find indeed that St. Cyprian the three Asian Gregories Basil Chrysostom and Augustine did prepare themselves for that most eminent Ecclesiastical Degree by various Acts of Mortification as is evident from the respective Histories of their Lives but none of them 〈◊〉 in Apollo the night of their Consecration But as the Wise man hath told us There is a time for all things So that even Fasting it self may be sometimes unseasonable not only upon a Physical but also upon a Moral account which is never more untimely than upon the Lord's Day I shall not be so uncharitable to such Fasters as is the Author of that Epistle to the Philippians Fathered on St. Ignatius though none of his who says That they are no better than murderers of Christ who fast on that day yet one thing is most certain That the Antient Church prohibited Fasting both privately and publickly on the Lords Day I mean all Religious Fasts and never permitted them no not in the Time of Lent because that Day was the most ordinary and constant Festival of the Church It being a weekly Solemnity Instituted for the Resurrection of our Saviour And though these detestable Hereticks the Manicheans and Priscillianists made it their Practice in Opposition to the Catholick Church to Fast on Sunday yet even the Montanists who pretended much to that kind of Mortification abstained from fasting on the Lord's Day as is evident from Tertullian's Treatise De Iejuniis which he wrote after his unhappy Montanizing But this Fasting in our Church on the Lord's Day is a part of that old Presbyterian Leaven not yet half well purged out of this Land For when that Tyrannical Usurpation was culminating in the Cuspe of the tenth House such was their Meridian Line that they thought it their Glory though it was indeed their Shame to run counter to all the Practice of the Primitive Church therefore the Pilots of the Leman Lake steered such a Course as they might at last become perfect Antipodes thereunto For whereas the Primitive Church solemnized a
find neither direct nor indirect Testimony for it Those Canons which command Standing every Lord's Day do consequently exclude Sitting if we look upon that Solemn Action as an Act of Devotion and Optatus hath told us Lib. 4. That the People may not sit in the Church and Tertullian gives the reason Lib. de Oratione cap. 12. That it was an Heathen Custom and therefore ought to be reprehended Let all those who plead so much for that irreverent and lazy Posture remember that they comply in their Gesture not only with these detestable Arrian Hereticks who design'd thereby to vilifie the Son of God but also with those who are worse the damnable Socinians as is evident from Socinus his Tract De Coena Domiâ—i And I wish all Sober Christians would seriously advert to this That it is not a Corporal Repast but a Spiritual Refreshment they are call'd unto when they come to that Holy Table and let the consideration of the Great King who invites them and of the unparallel'd Mystery they are to receive the Feast-Maker being the Feast it self perswade all Christians to present themselves at this Gospel-Altar with much more reverence than they are obliged to practise at an ordinary Banquet or a Penny-Bridale Yet Let not any imagine that we intend by these Lines to reflect upon some Canons of our Church Truly I had no such Design but on the contrary de regret that these Articles are fallen too much in desâ—etude But it is a Principle of Love to Uniformity that did prompt me to tender this Overture yet with all due submission to the Governours of our Church It being a most desireable thing to see all those who desire to fear God's Name blessed with one mind one heart and one way As for mine own judgment I can easily subscribe to those words of R. Mr. Baxter If it be lawful to take a Pardon from the King upon our knees I know not what can make it unlawful to take a sealed Pardon from Christ and his Ambassadours upon our knees Likewise a set Form of Excommunication to be used by all whether it be the Lesser call'd properly Abstentio ab Eucharistia the practice of the Primitive Church which was so copious in this matter being too much neglected in this Age or the greater Anathema with their respective Relaxations may be easily resolved upon with a form of Ecclesiastick Testiâ—icates in Conformity to the 〈◊〉 formatae of the Ancients And let all Bishops wherever they are if they be in health preach on the Anniversaries of the Nativity Passion and Resurrection of our Blessed Lord and on the Anniversary of the Descent of the holy Ghost as also on that of the Nativity and Restauration of our gracious Sovereign upon Earth And let it be recommended to all their Presbyters to do so as also to celebrate the Holy Communion on Easter and Pentâ—cost at least on every Easter-day which as hath been said already is Caput institutionis of the Christian Sabbath for though these things be not authoritatively enjoyn'd yet the Governours of the Church may easily thereby find the Pulse of their Clergy and by this Tessera Discover if there remain as yet any amongst them who are fermented with some of that foure leaven of Presbytery It were no difficult Province if I did not study Brevity to answer all the Paralogisms and most foolish Cavils of the Fanaticks against these Festivals of the Church But I shall remit them for their Doom to S. Augustine who makes it a Character of a true Son of the Church to solemnize the Festivals thereof Serm. 253. De Temp. in which number he places that of the Nativity in the Front and to Epiphanius who in his 75th Heresie tells us That Aërius was condemned as an Heretick as for other things so for opposing and condemning the Festivals of the Church But the ingenuous Reader may find the Lawfulness and Usefulness of these Festivals fully asserted by that admirable Hooker in his Ecclesiastical Policy and the no less wonderful D. Hammond in his Treatise on that Subject and in particular whosoever desires to see the Feast of the Nativity vindicated from the Imputation of Novelty let them peruse Origen lib. 8. contra Celsum and his Hom. 3. in Math. the Treatise of Cyprian on that day and the Homily of Chrysostom to the same Purpose and they will find each of them deducing it from the Practice of the first Antiquity yea that the 25th of December is the Anniversary of our Saviour's Birth in my humble judgment is notably demonstrated by Baronius in his Apparatus and the Learned Mountague in his Answer to him But most of all by M. I. Gregory Oxon of whom it may be truly said That he hath dived into the very bottom of Antiquity If these things and such as these were Universally practis'd a Liturgy might be stollen in pedetentim upon this Church And I wish we had a well-reformed one purified from the Dregs of Popery and Superstition and framed after the pattern of the most Authentick Liturgies of the Primitive Church of which the Learned G. Cassander hath collected no small variety that we may again resume the Face and Garb of a National Church which hath been too long as a Body without the Natural Ornament of Skin and Muscles or as a flat Picture not duely heightened with its Shadows a Liturgy being found by the Experience of all ancient Times as a necessary Hedge and Mound to preserve any Profession of Religion and Worship of God in a National Church from Irreverence Confusion and Contempt without which Boundary it is impossible that a tolerable Uniformity should be long retained in any great Incorporation of Christians And it 's observable That M. Calvin himself when from Frankfort he had received an odious malicious account of many Particulars in the English Liturgy as any will acknowledge who shall compare the Report then made with what he finds though he were so transported as to call them Ineptias tolerabiles yet in a more sober mood he gave positive Approbation of the same as is evident from his Epistle to the Protector of that Kingdom in these words As for Form of Prayers and Ecclesiastical Rites I very much approve that it be set or certain from which it may not be lawful for the Pastors in their Function to depart that so there may be Provision made for the Simplicity and Vnskillfulness of some and that the Consent of all the Churches among themselves may more certainly appear And Lastly also that the extravagant Levity of some who affect Novelties or at the best vent a Rhapsody of pious Non-sence may be prevented c. Whence we rationally infer that they who endeavoured the total Abolition of a Liturgy in that Church had a design to Reform or to say better Deform Geneva as well as England and to chastise Calvin's Estimation of it as well as that of the English Prelates Not to speak of that
act his part within his own Precinct sure there would be less trouble given to a General Assembly whenever Providence shall give the occasion thereof Therefore let them use all Means possible which are purely Ecclesiastick to reduce all Schismaticks to the path of Unity and all Hereticks to the path of Verity But if after much patient waiting for the fruit of their Labours there be no hope of their Conversion then let them proceed to a Judicial Conviction of these obstinate Sinners who are found to be Irreclamable and let the Church-Censures alwayes prevent the Castigations of the Civil Magistrate it being a most invidious thing for the Governours of the Church to clamour upon the Criminal Judge to Fine and Confine those Delinquents whom they have scarce ever noted as such in their Ecclesiastick Courts This preposterous Method looks not only like the Duo gladii of Boniface the 8th but doth also resemble Pope Iulius the second his throwing S. Peter's Keys into Tyber that he might betake himself unto S. Paul's Sword But this was not the Method of the Primitive Church which permitted none of it's Organical Members to meddle either directly or indirectly in the Matters of Blood or bodily Coercions as is evident from the ancient Canons the passive Effusion of the precious Blood of Holy Iesus and of his Blessed Martyrs being a rich Compost to the Soil of the Church but not the active Shedding of the Blood of others under a Pretext of Religious Zeal for the Enlargement thereof Which looks liker Mahumet's way of Propagation than the Tranquill Methods of the Gospel of Peace Primitive Christianity which did almost infinitely transcend this Age in the Glowings of Divine Zeal knew no such Calentures of Passion Bellona was not then looked upon as a Nursing-Mother to the Church Nor Mars as a God of Reformation Neither were the Laws of Christ like those of Draco or Mahumet written with the Blood of his Enemies though he sealed them with his own and sprinkled them with the Blood of Martyrs as Tertullian saith It being very observable that the Temple of Ianus was then shut when the Prince of Peace was born For the Church is sufficiently furnished with Means of saving Souls though she never draw a Temporal Sword The Diseases of the Mind not being cureable like those of the Body for Asperitie is no proper Remedy for them but only Reason and Lenity of Words Those good Emperours Constantine Valentinian the two Theodosii and Martianus proceeded unto no greater Extremity against the most to no greater Extremity against the most damnable and incorrigible Hereticks of their Times than the Sentence of Banishment Which Christian Lenity was consonant to the Judgment of Tertullian cap. 24. 28. Apologet. And in his Book to Scapula we have this excellent Expression Sed nec Religionis est cogere Religionem quae sponte suscipi debet non vicum hostiae ab animo libente expostulentur With whom S. Cyprian joyns Issue Epist. 62. and Athanasius Epist. ad solitar Vit. agen Orat. 1. cont Arrian Hilar. con Auxent lib. 1. ad Constan. Ambr. Epist. 32. lib. 2. Epist. 27. Hierom. Epist. 62. ad Theoph. August lib. 3. con Crescon Grammatic c. 50. Nullis bonis in Ecclesia Catholica placet si usque ad mortem in quemquam licèt Haereticum saeviatur Whence we may perceive that the Apology of some Ecclesiasticks for imbruing their hands in the blood of that detestable Heretick Servetus is point blank contrary unto the unanimous Doctrine of the Primitive Fathers And if we shall alter the Scene from Geneva to Rome it will be found no less tragical and bloody For as East and West meet together at last by going asunder so the Iesuit and Fanatick trust most unhappily in that Anti-Christian Conjuncture of Treachery and Cruelty in those damnable Arts of Rebellion and King-killing to which execrable Assasinations and perverse Intendments Britain hath been too long the fatal Theatre And though these pretend to be Christians yet I suppose they have no other Apology for their Perfidiousness than that of a barbarous King who said That his Tongue was not made of Bone For it is impossible that Christian Religion should afford them any it being very observable That in all those famous Persecutions of the Primitive Church whereby many Millions were absorpted in the gulfe of Death not one was found who thought it lawful to make use of defensive Arms though in a just cause against the supream Authority then in being but did conquer their Victors and Tormentors with Constancy and Patience it being most false what Bellarmin asserts that it was not a Moral but a Physical incapacity which restrained them For Tertullian in his Apologetick doth clearly evince the contrary Whence we may easily conclude in what Shop those Offensive Arms were framed wherewith Hildebrand assaulted the German Emperour Henry the fourth and by what hellish Councel his Successor Paschal the second was influenced to excite Henry the fifth against his Father and Sovereign not to speak of those Storms which disquieted Frederick the first and second all their Dayes the Clouds that ingendered them being exhaled at Rome But we had need to transcribe the Annals of Germany to enumerate the Hostilities of the Roman Bishops against the Emperours their Lords eight of which they excommunicated and when that was done then they made the Temporal Sword cut off those whom the Spiritual had struck at Which Anti-Christian Methods became so formidable to the languishing Emperours that Rodulph of Habspurg the Founder of the Austrian Greatness would not go into Italy to receive the Crown of Gold at Rome after he was chosen Emperour calling that bloody City The Lyon's Den And unto those who urged him to go thither to receive that third Ceremonial Crown he frequently uttered that of the Poet Olim quod Vulpes aegroto cauta Leoni Respondit reseram c. But Germany was not the sole Theatre of the unchristian Plots and Practices of these Anti-Primitive Prelates For no little Trouble was given to Philip the Fair of France by P. Boniface the eighth of whom it was truly said intravit ut Vulpes regnavit ut Leo mortuus est ut Canis Likewise Lewis the 12th had his share of Disquiet from that Martial Prelate Iulius the second by whose Fulminations the poor King of Navarr was Thunder-struck without Remedy Ferdinand of Arragon having indeed a most Catholick Appetite after the Dominions of his Neighbours not to speak of the barbarous Assasination of Henry the third and fourth of France by two desperate Villains who had been carefully instructed by their Ghostly Fathers in that meritorious Art of King-killing Sixtus Quintus having the forehead in a publick Consistory at Rome to celebrate that Iacobin Friar as a notable Martyr upon that account But we need not cross the Seas for Instances of this Nature For if Innocent the third the Hatcher of that most seditious and
perfidious XXX Canon of the Councel of Lateran with his Legate Pandolphus were now alive they would be found to talk of that inauspicious King of England named Iohn his constrained Resignation and it is no small wonder after so many Centuries of years to hear again in this Age any noise of that vain and illegal Pretence which all sober Persons imagined had been blown up long agoe by that Subterranean Powder-Plot but it seems they intend to give a Demonstration to the World that no Prescription of time can render a common Whore honest And if a grain-weight of Christian Ingenuity or Humanity can be found in that late prodigious Conspiracy against our Church and State let the Universality of that infernal Design with those base Appendages of diuturnal plotting vile Ingratitude Treachery and Cruelty be the sole Judges thereof And in fine it is my humble Judgment that till these Coals of Iuniper be quenched which have too long inflamed all the Vitals of the Christian Church I mean the Puritanical Papist and Jesuited Puritan our unchristian Animosities and Feuds many whereof are meer Logomachies and groundless shall never be throughly extinguished till the devouring Fire of Hell consume these lesser Flames Neither will I ever forget that notable Instance of this Concordantia Discordantiarum which that excellent Historian I. A. Thuan. affords unto us in his 56th Book where he tells us that the Daemagogues of Paris and Pulpiteers of Rochel centered in that point of treacherous inhumanity viz. to put to Death all Prisoners of War even after the publick Faith had been given unto them But Tractent fabrilia Fabri Therefore the Antisignani of the Arrians Macedonians Nestorians and Eutychians not to speak of many other Hereticks were not only conven'd before the respective General Councels which are accounted the most famous of them all but were also judicially convicted and Sentenc'd with the highest Censures of the Church before the Civil Magistrate took any other notice of them as Delinquents than to compell those erroneous Schismaticks to appear personally before the Ecclesiastical Court to which they had been legally summoned The Church in these Dayes laying down this as an inviolable Conclusion that they would not fail to do their own Duty and if the Civil Magistrate afterwards neglected his let him answer to God for it who punisheth Potentes potenter and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as saith Herodot in Chione and Seneca omne sub regno graviâ—ri regnum est And in that great Audit every man must stand and fall to his own Master The Brachium Seculare being indeed fit enough to restrain exorbitant Practices but it hath no direct Influence upon irregular Judgments and I fear it makes more Hypocrites than sincere Converts Fire and Faggot the beloved Argument of the Roman Church having a more natural Tendency to a preternatural Consumption than to a Spiritual Conversion Therefore the Arrians whose Courses were generally very violent and bloody are deservedly look'd upon as the genuine Parents of these Coercive Motives and disingenuous Arts which were judged very heterogeneal to the Nature and Constitution of the Church which as it transacts only in Spiritual Matters so it could inflict no other than Spiritual Censures and Chastisements But when the fiery Dominicans arose the Dream of Dominicus his Mother being a sad Prognostick of the Violence of that Order they might justly have been termed in this Regard Arriani Redivivi so merciless was that Persecution of the poor Waldenses to which they carried both Lanterns and Faggots Which bloody Method continues to this day in the Spanish Inquisition these violent Spirits being usually the cruel Lords of that infamous Judicatory whose inhumane Machins resemble the wild and Barbarous Fancies of Mezentius and Procrustes the unnatural Bellowings of Phalaris his Bull the Turkish Gaunching and Impaleing upon Stakes much rather than the harmless Engines of the Gospel And if a Pythagorean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were possible I would imagine that there had been a transmigration of the Souls of these Dominicans into the Bodies of some late Presbyterians one egg or Fish not being found liker to another than is the Resemblance of some of these Incendiaries on which account one of their abortive Issue hath in one of his Pamphlets not unfitly termed their Covenant Taht great Instrument of Blood whereby he verifies that common Observation Omnis Apostata persequitur suum Ordinem But seeing the Dominicans were nothing else but the Emissaries of those Masters who pretend to be S. Peter's Successors and in their fierce Anger and cruel Rage have cut off more than the Ears of many who were much more innocent than that Servant of the high Priest Therefore I cannot forget to take notice in this Place of another great Abuse committed by some Popes For the Croysade which was at first design'd to rescue the Holy Sepulchre from the Possession of Infidels to which great Undertaking many Myriads of Christians were animated by the preaching and Miracles of S. Bernard was so perverted from that Primary pious Institution that it was employed to the utter Extirpation of many thousands of the simple and harmless Inhabitants of the Mountains of Languedoc and Provence Such is the Affectation of the Roman Bishops to wear the Livery of that Scarlet-coloured Beast But the bright Olybian Flames of the Primitive Church which were not Ignes comburentes sed lambentes hated with a perfect Hatred those Sanguinary Spirits as may appear from the Deportment of S. Martin of Tours who as Sulpitius Sev. reports refused to communicate with Ithasius and Idacius two Spanish Bishops because they did prosecute unto Death some of the Priscillianists and that before the Tyrant Maximus though it cannot be denyed but that they were detestable Hereticks even Manichaei Redivivi and consequently but half Christians So great was the Aversion of these truly Evangelical Spirits from Shedding of Blood even in the Cause of God Yea more than so so great was the Antipathy that S. Martin had conceived against such violent Courses that when he was informed the Tyrant had impower'd some Military Tribunes to go into Spain there to depopulate the Country pillage the goods of all those who would not conform he immediately went to that Emperour and freely told him That this pretended Zeal was not kindled by a Coal from the Altar of God but rather an infernal Fire bred in the Breasts of some furious Bishops and fomented by the Venome of that old Red Dragon the natural Feuel thereof the Event whereof could be no other than that of a furious Tempest or overflowing Inundation which bears down all before it and puts no Difference betwixt the Good and the Bad Old or Young Male or Female but sweeps away all promiscuously or like unto a number of ravenous Wolves let loose upon a Multitude of harmless and naked Animals which have not the Faculty to discriminate betwixt the mangy Sheep and those which are sound in