Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n
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A27060
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Two papers of proposals concerning the discipline and ceremonies of the Church of England humbly presented to His Majesty by the Reverend ministers of the Presbyterian perswasion.
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Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.
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1661
(1661)
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Wing B1440; ESTC R201112
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17,144
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24
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conceived they might reasonably be entreated to let them go for the saving of their Brethrens consciences and the Churches peace We are sure that a Christians conscience should be tender of adding to or diminishing from the matter of Gods Worship in the smallest point The Laws of God being herein the only perfect Rule Deut. 12.32 And that Synod infallibly guided by the Holy Ghost would lay upon the Churches no other burden but necessary things Act. 15.28 And that for things indifferent Christians should not despise or judge each other Rom. 14. Much less by silencing the able and faithful Ministers of the Gospel to punish the Flock even in their Souls for the tollerable differences and supposed mistakes of Ministers We doubt not but Peter and Paul went to Heaven without the Ceremonies in question And seeing your Majesty well expresseth it That the Universal Church cannot introduce one Ceremony in the worship of God that is contrary to Gods Word expressed in the Scriptures And multitudes of the Protestants at home and abroad do think that all Mystical Sacramental Rites of human◠Institution are contrary to the very perfection of Gods Law and to Deut. 12.32 c. though the determination of meer circumstances necessary in 〈◊〉 be not so and therefore dare not use them for fear of the displeasure◠of God the Universal Sovereign It must needs be an expression of your Majesties wisdome and tenderness of Gods honour and the safety of your peoples souls to refuse in things unnecessary to drive men upon apprehended sin and upon the wrath of God and the terrors of a condemned conscience 2. We beseech your Majesty to understand that it is not our meaning by the word Abolishing to crave a prohibition against your own and other mens liberty in the things in question But it is a full liberty we desire such as should be in unnecessary things and such as will tend to the concord of your people Viz. That there be no Law nor Canon for or against them commanding recommending or prohibiting them as now there is none for any particular gesture in singing of Psalms where liberty preserveth an uninterrupted Unity For the particular Ceremonies I. We humbly crave as to Kneeling in the Act of receiving the Lords Supper that your Majesty will declare a Liberty therein that none shall be troubled for receiving it standing or sitting And your Majesties Expressions upon Reasons best if not only known to our selves commands us to render some of our Reasons 1. We are sure Christ and his Apostles sinned not by not receiving it kneeling and many are sure that by kneeling they should not sin And therefore for the better security though not for absolute necessity we crave leave to take the safest side 2. We are sure that Kneeling in any Adoration at all in any Worship on any Lords day in the year or any Week day between Easter and Penticost was not only dis-used but forbidden by General Councils as Concil Nicen. 1 〈◊〉 20. Concil Trull c. and disclaimed by Ancient Writer◠and this as a general uncontrolled Tradition and therefore that Kneeling in the Act of Receiving is a Novelty contrary to the Decrees and practice of the Church for many hundred years after the Apostles And if we part with the venerable Examples of all Antiquity where it agrees with Scripture and that for nothing we shall depart from the Terms which most Moderators think necessary for the reconciling of the Churches and Novelty is a Dishonor to any part of Religion And if Antiquity be honorable the most ancient and nearest the Legislation and Fountain must be most honorable and it is not safe to intimate a Charge of Unreverence upon all the Apostles and primitive Christians and the universal Church for so many hundred years together of its purest time 3. Though our meaning be good it is not good to shew a needless countenance of the practice of Adoring the Bread as God when it is used by Papists round about us Sayth Bishop Hall in his Life p. 20. I had a dangerous Conflict with a Sorbonist who took occasion by our kneeling at the receit of the Eucharist to perswade all the company of our Acknowledgment of a Transubstantiation 4. Some of us that could rather kneel than be deprived of the Communion should yet suffer much before we durst put all others from the Communion that durst not take it kneeling which therefore we crave that we may not be put upon II. We humbly crave also that the Religious observation of Holy daies of humane Institution may be declared to be left indifferent that none be troubled for not observing them III. We humbly tender your Majesty our thanks for your gracious Concession of liberty as to the Cross and Surplice and bowing at the Name Jesus rather than Christ or God But we further humbly beseech your Majesty 1. That this liberty in forbearing the Surplice may extend to Colledges and Cathedrals also that it drive not thence all those that scruple it and make those places receptive only for a party And that the Youth of the Nation may have just liberty as well as the Elder If they be ingaged in the Universities and their Liberties there cut off in their beginning they cannot afterwards be free and many hopeful persons will be else diverted from the Service of the Church 2. That your Majestie will endeavour the repealing of all Laws and Canons by which these Ceremonies are imposed that they may be left at full Liberty We also tender our thanks to your Majestie for your gracious Concession of the forbearance of the Subscription required by the Canon But 1. We humbly acquaint your Majestie that we do not dissent from the Doctrine of the Church of England expressed in the Articles and Homilies but it is the controverted passages about Government Liturgie and Ceremonies and some by-passages and phrases in the Doctrinal part which are scrupled by those whose liberty is desired Not that we are against subscribing the proper Rule of our Religion or any meet Confession of Faith Nor do we scruple the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy Nor would we have the door left open for Papists and Hereticks to come in 2. We take the boldness to say that since we have had the promises of your gracious indulgence herein and upon divers Addresses to your Majestie and the Lord Chancellor had comfortable encouragement to expect our Liberty yet cannot Ministers procure Institution without renouncing their Ordination by Presbyters or being re-ordained nor without Subscription and the Oath of Canonical Obedience 3. We must observe with fear and grief that your Majesties Indulgence and Concession of Liberty in this Declaration extendeth not either to the abatement of Re-ordination or of Subscription at Ordination or the Oath of Obedience to the Bishops We therefore humbly and earnestly crave that your Majesty will declare your pleasure 1. That Ordination and Institution and Induction may be conferred without the said Subscription or Oath 2. That none be urged to be re-ordained or denied Institution for want of Ordination by Prelates that was ordained by Presbyters 3. That none be judged to have forfeited his Presentation or Benefice or be deprived of it for not reading those Articles of the 39. that contain the controverted points of Government and Ceremonies Lastly We humbly crave that your Majestie would not onely grant us this liberty till the next Synod but will endeavour that the Synod be impartially chosen and that your Majestie will be pleased to endavour the procurement of such Laws as shall be necessary for our security till the Synod and for the ratification of moderate healing Conclusions afterward And that nothing by meer Canon be imposed on us without such Statute-Laws of Parliament These favours which will be injurious to none if your people may obtain of your Majestie it will revive their hearts to daily and earnest Prayer for your prosperity and to rejoyce in the thankfull acknowledgement of that gracious providence of Heaven that hath blessed us in your Restauration and put it into your heart to heal our breaches and to have compassion on the faithful people in your Dominions who do not petition you for liberty to be Schismatical Factious Seditious or abusive to any but onely for leave to obey the Lord that Created and Redeemed them according to that Law by which they must all be shortly judged to everlasting Joy or Misery and it will excite them to and unite them in the cheerful service of your Majesty with their Estates and lives and to transmit your deserved Praise to Posterity FINIS
which the Holy Ghost hath made you Overseers to feed or rule the Congregation of God which he hath purchased with his blood And it is apparent in this Acts 20.17 18 28. Act. 14.23 Act. 15. 1 Thes 5.12 13. 1 Tim. 3 4 5. 1 Tim. 5.17 Heb. 13.7 17 24. and other places that it is the Office of a Presbyter to over-see rule and guide the Flock with that Ministerial Rule which consisteth in the exercise of the Keys or management or personal application of Gods Word to the consciences and cases of particular persons for their salvation and order of the Church the Coercive power belonging to the Magistrate And this was the practice of the ancient Church as appeareth undeniably in Ignatius Tertullian Cyprian Jerome Chrysostome c. Concil Carthag 4 Can. 22 23 29 32 34 35 36 37. And is confessed by the chiefest Defenders of Episcopacy II. If all Presentments and Appeals be made to the Bishop and his consistory alone it will take from us the Parish-Discipline which is granted us and cast almost all Discipline out of the Church as is most apparent to them that by experience are acquainted with the quality of our Flocks and the true nature of the Pastoral work considering 1. How many hundred Churches are in a Diocess 2. How many thousand persons are in many Parishes and of those what a number are obstinate in wilful gross ignorance or scandal refusing to be instructed or admonished by their Pastors 3. How long and earnestly and tenderly sinners must be dealt with before they are cut off by Solemn Excommunication 4. How unsatisfactory it must be to the conscience of a Bishop or Synod to cut off a man as impenitent upon the bare report of a Minister before they have upon full admonition proved him impenitent themselves especially when too many Ministers are to say nothing of a passion that may cause partial accusation unable so to manage a reproof and exhortation as is necessary to work on the consciences of the People and to convict Resisters of flat Impentiencie 5. What abundance of work the Bishop will have besides constant preaching which will require time for preparation visiting the several Churches confirming all the souls in so many hundred Parishes which alone is more than any one man can do aright if he had nothing else to do Ordaining Instituting and Examining the persons so far as to satisfie a tender conscience that takes not all on trust from others and is but the executor of others Judgments These and much more with a care of Church-building Lands and his own Affairs and Family and sicknesses and necessary absence sometimes will make this great additional work which must be constantly performed for so many hundred Parishes to be impossible 6. Reproofs and suspension will so exasperate the scandalous that they will vex the Pastors with numerous Appeals 7. The Pastors will be undone by travelling and waiting and maintaining such multitude of witnesses as is necessary for the prosecuting of Presentments and answering the Many Appeals 8. The business will be so odious chargeable and troublesome that witnesses will not come in 9. The Minister by these prosecutions and attendances will be taken off the rest of his ministerial work 10. Bishops being but men will be tempted by this intolerable burthen to be weary of the work and slubber it over and cast it upon others and to discountenance the most conscionable Ministers that most trouble them with presentments which when the people perceive they wil the more insult and vex us with Appeals So that the discouragements of the Ministers and the utter incapacity of the Bishops to perform a quarter of this work will nullifie Discipline as leaving it impossible Experience hath told us this too long And then when our Communion is thus polluted with all that are most incapable through ignorance Scandal and contempt of Piety 1. Ministers will be deterred from their Administrations to subjects so uncapable 2. Bishops that are tender-conscienced will be deterred from undertaking so impossible a work and of so ill success 3. And men that have least tenderness of conscience and care of souls and fear of Gods displeasure will seek for and intrude into both places 4. And the tender-conscienced people will be tempted to speak hardly of such undisciplin'd Churches and of the Officers and to withdraw from them 5. And hereby they will fall under the displeasure of Superiors and the scorn of the Vulgar that have no religion but what is subservient to their flesh 6. And so whilest the most pious are brought under discountenance and reproach and the most impious get the reputation of being most regular and obedient to their Rulers Piety it self will grow into disesteem and impiety escape its due disgrace And this hath been the cause of our Calamities II. As to Liturgie It is matter of very great joy and thankfulness to us that we have heard your Majestie more than once so resolutely promising that none should suffer for not using the Common-prayer and Ceremonies but you would secure them from the penalties in the Act for Uniformity as that which your Declaration at Breda intended And to find here so much of your Majesties Clemencie in your gracious concession for a future Emendation But we humbly crave leave to acquaint your Majestie 1. That it greives us after all to hear that it is given in charge by the Judges at the Assizes to indite men upon that Act for not using the Common-prayer 2. That it is not onely some obsolete words and other expressions that are offensive 3. That many scruple using some part of the Book as it is lest they be guilty of countenancing the whole yet would use it when reformed Therefore we humbly crave that your Majesty would here declare that it is your Majeâ—â—â—es pleasure that none be punished or troubled for not using the Book of Common-prayer til it be effectually reformed by Divines of both perswasions equally deputed therunto And that your Majesty will procure that moderation in the imposition hereafter which we before desired III. Concerning Ceremonies Returning our humble thanks for your Majesties gracious Concessions of which we are assured you will never have cause to repent We further crave 1. That your Majesty will leave out those words in your Declaration concerning us That we do not in our Judgments believe the practise of those particular Ceremonies which we accept against to be in it self unlawful for we have not so declared our Judgments Indeed we have sayd That treating in order to an happy uniting of our Brethren through the Land our work is not to say what is our own opinion or what will satisfie us but what will satisfie so many as may procure the sayd Union And we have sayd that some think them flatly unlawful some but inconvenient some think some of them unlawful in themselves and others but inconvenient and while thâ— Imposer thinks them but indifferent we