Church to have rejected those Ceremonies which had been made venerable by ancient use when they would equally or better serve those ends we designe than any new ones This is the very account our Church gives of it Having given the reason why she retained some Ceremonies still as I have already observed she answers that Objection why she has retained some old Ceremonies If they think much that any of the old remain and would rather have all devised new then such men granting some Ceremonies convenient to be had surely where the old may be well used there they cannot reasonably reprove the old onely for their age without bewraying of their own folly For in such a case they ought rather to have reverence to them for their antiquity if they will declare themselves to be more studious of Unity and Concord than of Innovations and new Fangleness which as much as may be with true setting forth of Christ's Religion is always to be eschewed Let our Reconciler consider whether this be Hypocrisie or true and sober reasoning 2. The Dean's second reason is To manifest the justice and equity of the Reformation by letting their Enemies see that they did not break Communion with them for meer indifferent things Or as our Reconciler adds That they left the Church of Rome no farther than she left the ancient Church Which the Dean does not say under that Head nor any thing like it But yet here he takes advantage and says It is manifest that we have left off praying for departed Saints the Vnction of the sick the mixing water with the Sacramental Wine c. with many other things which were retained in the ancient Church and in the Liturgie of Edward the Sixth he should have said the first Liturgy and which are things indifferent retained in the Roman Church But is our Reconciler in good earnest I fear the next Book we shall have from him will be the Roman Catholick Reconciler Are all these things as used in the Roman Church indifferent Is praying for the dead as it is joyned with the Doctrine of Purgatory and Merit in the Church of Rome a thing indifferent Is the Sacrament of Extream Unction an indifferent thing Are their Grossings and Exorcisms and such-like Ceremonies abused by the Church of Rome to the absurdest Superstitions indifferent things Our Reformers at first in veneration to the Primitive Church in which some of these Ceremonies were used did retain the use of them in the first Liturgy of Edward the Sixth but upon more mature deliberation finding how impossible it was to restore them to their primitive use and to purge them from the superstitious abuses of the Church of Rome to which their people were still addicted laid them all aside and for this they are reproached by our Reconciler Some men would have been called Papists in Masquerade for half so much as this But what is this to the Dean's reason That we do not break Communion with them for meer indifferent things For certainly to retain three indifferent Ceremonies though we should reject five hundred more equally indifferent is a sufficient proof that we do not quarrel nor break Communion for indifferent things considered as indifferent which is all that the Dean meant by it But he has a fling at some others besides the Dean though whom he means I cannot well tell but he says Some of our Church senselesly pretend we cannot change these Ceremonies because they have been once received and owned by the Church I suppose he means the Catholick Church and though I think it is too much to say we cannot change what has been once received for the Church of this Age has as much Authority as the Church of former Ages had yet I think what has been received by the Catholick Church ought not but upon very great reasons to be rejected by any particular Church But now had our Reconciler been honest he might have made a great many useful Remarks upon this History of ancient Ceremonies for the conviction of Dissenters He might have observed that even in the Apostles days there were several Ceremonies used of Apostolical institution which yet had not a divine but humane Authority and therefore were afterwards disused or altered by the Church That in all Ages of the Christian Church there have been greater numbers of Ceremonies used and those much more liable to exception than are now retained in the Church of England That the Church has always challenged and exercised this Authority in the Externals of Religion and therefore there has not been any Age of the Church since the Apostles with which our Dissenters could have communicated upon their Principles This had been done like an honest man and a true Reconciler but it is wonderful to me that he who can find so many good words for the Church of Rome can find none for the Church of England 3. It may so happen that some things must be determined by publick Authority which are matter of doubt and scruple to some professed Christians When I say Authority must determine such things I mean if they will do their duty and take care of the publick Decency and Uniformity of Worship without which there can be no Decency This is evident in such an Age as this wherein some men scruple every thing which relates to publick Worship but what they like and fancy themselves To be uncovered at Prayers is as considerable a scruple to some Quakers as to kneel at the Sacrament is to other Dissenters This it seems was a Dispute in the Church of Corinth in St. Paul's days but the Apostle made no scruple of determining that question notwithstanding that and yet praying covered or uncovered are but circumstances of Worship as kneeling or sitting at the â—acrament are and if I had a mind to argue this point with our Reconciler I think I could prove them as indifferent circumstances as the other For the reason the Apostle assigns for the mens praying uncovered and the women covered that one was an Emblem of Authority the other of Subjection which makes it a symbolical Ceremony as our Dissenters speak is quite contrary among us though it were so in the Apostles days and is so still in some Eastern Countries To be uncovered among us is a signe of Subjection and to be covered a signe of Authority and therefore Princes Parents and Masters are covered or have their Hats on while Subjects Children and Servants are uncovered in their presence And therefore in compliance with the Apostles reason men should now pray covered because that is a signe of civil Dignity and Superiority whereas we now pray uncovered in token of a religious Reverence and Subjection to God Now I would ask our Reconciler whether our Church may determine that all men shall pray with their Hats off notwithstanding the scruples of some Quakers for if the Church must have respect to mens scruples why not to the scruples of Quakers
which are upon all accounts indifferent and have neither any good nor hurt in them are by no means fit to be commanded in religious Worship for this is to trifle in sacred things which is contrary to the Decency and Gravity of Worship but those Ceremonies which serve the ends of Order and Decency are not indifferent things but necessary considered as decent There must upon some account or other be an antecedent Decency in things before they are fit to be commanded Church-Governours must take care to maintain the Decency of Worship but they must find things decent for by their meer command they cannot make them so All decent Rites and Ceremonies are by the Apostolical Rule to do all things decently and in order fitted and qualified to be made the Ceremonies of Religion which nothing purely indifferent is and all the Authority of Church-Governours in this matter is onely to determine what particular decent Rites of Worship shall be used in their Church that is to apply the Apostles general Rule to particular instances I know very well how jealous and fearful most men are of owning any other necessity or obligation to observe the external Rites and Ceremonies of Religion but what is derived from the Authority of Ecclesiastical or Civil Governours and therefore no wonder if in an Age wherein the Authority of the Church is so much despised and the Authority of the Prince in matters of Religion is absolutely denied they fall under such a general Contempt But I confess I see no reason why any man should be afraid to own some kind of necessity antecedent to all humane Authority For as I have already proved 1. The external Decency of Worship is absolutely necessary by an Apostolical Precept antecedent to all humane Authority 2. This makes it necessary that some decent Rites and Ceremonies should be used in religious Worship 3. This makes it necessary that nothing but what is decent should be used And therefore 4. All particular decent Ceremonies have this necessity antecedent to all humane Authority that some of them must be used in religious Worship and no other must And therefore 5. When the Governours of the Church have determined which particular decent Ceremonies shall be used in religious Worship these particular Ceremonies become necessary not meerly by Ecclesiastical Authority but by vertue of the Apostolical Command and their own natural Decency which brings them within the compass of that general Rule Church-Governours have Authority to apply that general Rule to particular Ceremonies which have such Order and Decency as comprehends them within that general Rule But these Rites and Ceremonies when they are fixt and determined do not derive their obligation meerly from the Authority of the Church but from the Apostolical Canon we must observe them not meerly because the Church has commanded them but because they are in themselves decent and so comprehended within the Apostolical Canon and therefore the proper Object of Church-Authority The Authority of the Church consists onely in applying the Apostolical Authority to such particular Rites and Ceremonies as by their own Decency are fit and qualified to be used in religious Worship but it is the Apostolical Authority as applied by the Church to such particular Ceremonies which gives them their necessity and obligation Hence Mr. Calvin observes that those Ecclesiastical Laws which relate to Discipline and Order must not be accounted humane Traditions because they are founded in this general Precept of doing all things decently and in order and so receive their approbation as it were from the mouth of Christ himself This I think is sufficient to shew that the decent Rites and Ceremonies of Religion have such goodness and necessity that they ought to be commanded for they have the goodness and necessity of Decency which is enjoyned by an Apostolical Canon But still the Controversie remains what this external Decency of Worship is and by what Rules we must judge of it for one man may account that decent which another may think has no positive Decency at all as it is in our present case The Church of England retains the use of some Ceremonies for the sake of Decency our modest Reconciler who is very sensible of his own proneness to mistake yet ventures to contradict the judgment of the Church and affirms that there is no positive Order or Decency in the Ceremonies of the Church of England wherefore they ought to be commanded And therefore it will be necessary Secondly To consider what the general notion of Decency in religious Worship is and by what Rules we must judge of it Now in general the external Decency of religious Worship consists in performing the Duties of Religion in such a manner as is expressive of Honour Reverence and Devotion This I suppose will not be denied by any man who acknowledges any such thing as external Worship but the difficulty is by what Rules we must judge of external Honour and Reverence and yet most men understand this very well also when they speak of civil Honour They know what Postures what Actions what Habit what Behaviour what Language what Address becomes them when they approach their Prince and their Parents or any other Persons whom they ought to honour or respect And this suggests to us two general Rules to direct us in religious Worship 1. That whatever would be deservedly thought a breach of good manners in common Conversation or a violation of that civil Respect and Honour which is due to Princes and all Superiours can never become the Worship of God What God tells the Israelites who offered the blind and the lame and the sick in Sacrifice holds good in all other cases Offer it now to thy Governour will he be pleased with thee or accept thy person saith the Lord of Hosts 1 Mal. 8. Such words and actions and behaviour as would be an affront to the Majesty of a Prince do much more unbecome religious Worship because God is much greater than the greatest Prince 2. That whatever is a necessary expression of our Honour and Reverence to men as far as it is agreeable with the nature of religious Worship is in a peculiar and eminent degreâ— due to Almighty God Many of the external expressions and signs of Honour both to God and man must of necessity be alike and if not the very same yet of the same kind and nature For whether we intend to honour God or men it must be done by some visible signs of Honour which are not necessarily determined either to religious or civil Worship but applicable to both If it be a signe of Honour to our Prince to be uncovered in his presence to deliver our Petitions upon the knee to come in a decent apparel to put on a grave and modest countenance to keep our distance c. that is if we must express our Reverence for our Prince in our words and gestures in our looks and habit and deportment of our
another sort of Ceremonies which are not the necessary circumstances of action but yet may be very decently used and do contribute to the Gravity and Solemnity of religious actions Of this nature is the signe of the Cross in Baptism which is no necessary circumstance for Baptism may be very decently and reverently administred without it but it is a thing very fitting and decent to be done at the time of Baptism and which adds to the external Solemnity of it Our Church has enjoyned no other Ceremony of this nature but onely the signe of the Cross but yet it will be necessary to discourse something briefly about the nature the decency and lawfulness of such Ceremonies as these and in particular about the Cross in Baptism First As to the nature of these Ceremonies I shall observe three things which I presume will contain all that is necessary to be known about them 1. That though they are symbolical and significant Ceremonies they are not meerly for signification that is they are not meer Images and Pictures of things which would transform Religion into an external piece of Pageantry A great many such things indeed have been used and are still in use in the Church of Rome as dressing up a Baby and rocking it in a Cradle as a Figure and Emblem of Christs birth about the time of his Nativity and such-like childish and ludicrous shows which unbecome the Gravity and Simplicity of the Christian Religion Such mean Representations as these are onely for the entertainment of Children but do mightily debase the Spirits of men and detain them by earthly Figures and Similitudes from contemplating those sublime Mysteries God never instituted such a Religion as this nor did Christ and his Apostles give any countenance or authority to it The Law of Moses indeed consisted of a great many significant Rites and Ceremonies such as Circumcision Washings Purifications Sacrifices c. many of which were instituted purely for their signification but then the designe of it was to teach them by such external Rites those things which at that time he did not think fit to give any express Laws about nor to make a plain and clear revelation of The Rites and Ceremonies of their Law were either typical of Christ and the state of the Gospel or had a moral signification to instruct them in those Evangelical Graces and Vertues which God did not think fit then expresly to command Now in such a dispensation as this it did highly become the divine Wisdom by such external Signs and Figures to give some hints and intimations of diviner Mysteries and a more excellent Philosophy to devout and inquisitive minds The designe of these legal Ceremonies was to teach them that by Hieroglyphicks which it was not yet time to teach them by plain Precepts and express Revelations But to transform the plain Precepts and Revelations of the Gospel into earthly Figures is to teach men backward to draw them off from the immediate contemplation of pure and naked Truth to court a Picture and a Shadow and to dote upon earthly Figures and Images of it And therefore it is a reproach to the wisdom of the Mosaical Dispensation to call such fooleries as these Jewish Rites and Superstitions There was a great deal of hidden and secret Wisdom contained in and taught by those Rites which at that time they had no other way to learn but such significant Ceremonies as are meerly for signification in the Christian Religion do onely obscure and debase divine Mysteries are wholly useless when we are instructed in those things by plain and express Revelations which these Ceremonies teach or rather darken by earthly Figures and they corrupt a Spiritual Worship which hereby degenerates into external pomp and show 2. These Ceremonies therefore though they are significant must not be meer teaching Signs which are out of date under the Gospel and a reproach to the clear Revelations and perfect light of it but are visible signs and expressions of some Grace or Vertue or Duty which we at that time exercise or profess the exercise of As to give you some instances of such Ceremonies as were both allowed and practised by Christ and his Apostles Christ washed his Disciples feet as an Example of Humility as well as Kindness which he recommended to their imitation and this seems to be literally practised by them after his death and was continued in some Churches to after-Ages But now we must not look upon this Ceremony onely as a signe of Humility but as a real exercise of it In those Countries to wash the feet of any man was a servile work and as mean an Office as they could do for one another and therefore it was a visible exercise of Humility in our Saviour to do it and so it was in them too who imitated him in it but did withal signifie all other acts of Kindness Humility and Condescension which by that act of washing the feet they did profess to each other And should men wash each others feet still without the exercise of that Humility with which our Saviour did it it would not be a religious Ceremony but a ludicrous piece of Superstition Thus the Kiss of Charity or the holy Kiss which was used in the Apostles days was not a meer significant Signe but a real exercise and expression of that Brotherly love which they had and which they expressed to each other and those who kissed without this divine Charity profaned the Ceremony Thus the Love-Feast which was in use also in the Apostles days where all Christians the rich and the poor eat together at a common Table was not onely a significant Signe of mutual Love but an Exercise and a visible Profession of it and therefore the Apostle severely reproves them for such disorders at that holy Feast as were inconsistent with that Brotherly Love and Charity which they profess'd in it Thus the signe of the Cross as it is used in our Church at Baptism is not meerly for signification but is a visible Profession of our Faith in a crucified Saviour and a Promise and Engagement of our selves to take up his Cross and to suffer as he did rather than to deny him In token that we shall not hereafter be ashamed to confess the Faith of Christ crucified and manfully to fight under his Banner against the World the Flesh and the Devil and to continue Christs faithful Servants and Souldiers unto our lives end But yet we must observe farther that though these Ceremonies may be called religious Actions or Ceremonies yet they are not properly acts of Religion in a strict sence as that signifies acts of Worship They are religious actions as being done upon a religious account as being the Exercise or Profession of some Vertue but we do not properly worship God in them no more than we do by being meek and humble and charitable and professing the Faith of Christ before men To kiss each other and
imposing the Ceremonies now used in the Church of England because it hath been proved already that they have nothing of this nature in them that is nothing of positive Order or Decency But what he says has been proved already I have made appear is not proved by him yet and I hope I have proved the contrary But if the Ceremonies of our Church which are nothing else but the decent circumstances of action or contribute to the Gravity and Solemnity of religious actions have no positive Decency and therefore cannot be prescribed by the Church I desire to know what that positive Decency is which the Church has authority to command for if it does not extend to the determination of the necessary circumstances of action I cannot see that the Church has any authority in matters of Decency And if as the Bishop says the Rulers of the Church are the perpetual Iudges and Dictators in such matters which he seems to assent to how does it become the great modesty of our Reconciler to assert That there is no positive Decency and Order in those Ceremonies which the Church has appointed for the sake of Decency and Order If the Rulers of the Church be the proper Judges of this how does our Reconciler come by this authority to judge his Judges II. Our Reconciler adds a limitation of this Rule That all things be done decently and in order in the words of the same Reverend Bishop That it is not to be extended to such Decencies as are onely ornament but is to be limited to such as onely rescue from confusion The reason is because the Prelates and spiritual Guides cannot do their duty unless things be so orderly that there is no confusion But if it can go beyond this limit then it can have no natural limit but may extend to Sumptuousness to Ornaments of Churches to rich Vtensits to Splendour and Majesty for all that is decent enough and in some circumstances very fit But because this is too subject to abuse and gives a secular power into the hands of Bishops and an authority over mens estates and fortunes and is not necessary for Souls nor any part of spiritual Government it is more than Christ gave to his Ministers How much our Reconciler has injured this learned Prelate by his numerous citations of his words to a quite different sence from what he intended shall be made appear before I leave this Argument though he has dealt no worse by him than he has by Christ and his Apostles whose words â—e has as grosly abused That this excellent Bishop had no designe in this or any thing else which our Reconciler transcribes from him to reflect on the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church of England I have more than one reason to believe as will appear presently and therefore though I could not give an account of every particular expression yet none but such a Protestant Reconciler would expound any of his words in contradiction to his declared sence of things I am sure what he here says if it be applied to the Ceremonies of the Church of England has no reason in it and that is a sufficient Argument to me that he never meant it so For 1. Supposing this to be true That this Rule is not to be extended to such Decencies as are onely ornament this does not concern the Church of England which has no such Ceremonies as are meerly for ornament And therefore the Church has authority enough to prescribe the decent Rites and Modes of Worship though she have not authority to make her Worship gay and theatrical which indeed is not decent and therefore not contained within this Rule The Bishop never thought of the Church of England when he gave this Rule but had his eye upon the fantastick Ceremonies and Amusements of the Romish Worship 2. But yet when he says That this Rule is not to be extended to such Decencies as are onely ornament it is evident that he does not exclude all Ornaments neither if they serve any ends of Religion beside For if they be really such Decencies and Ornaments as become Religion and Christian Worship I cannot imagine any reason why they should not be included in the Rule of Decency and Order Such Decency and Order as is opposed to confusion and disorder is always necessary and may always be had what state soever the Church is in while there is any publick face of a Church Ornamental Decencies cannot always be had and therefore do not always oblige as in the case of Persecutions But why any man should say that the Authority of the Church does not extend to Ornaments when it is in her power to adorn the Worship of God I cannot guess Must there be no difference between the afflicted and prosperous state of the Church When God has made in all other things a distinction between Necessaries Conveniences and Ornaments does he allow nothing but what is barely neâ—essary to his own Worship It is possible indeed that men may mistake in what they call the Ornaments of Religion as the Church of Rome evidently does but if they do not mistake and have it in their power to give an external beauty and lustre to Religion do they exceed their Commission in this too The Bishop acknowledges that Sumptuousness Ornaments of Churches rich Vtensils Splendour and Majesty is decent enough and in some circumstances very fit and I should much have wondered had he denied it Now when these things are decent and fit does it exceed the Authority of the Church to appoint them Can any thing be decent and fit to be done in any circumstances which the Church has no Authority to do And therefore when he says that meer Ornaments are not comprehended within the Rule of Decency and Order he means no more by it than that the Governours of the Church are not so strictly obliged to take care of the external Ornaments of Religion which cannot be had at all times as they are of the Decency and Order of Worship Ornaments are very fitting when they can be had but the Bishop has not authority to oblige the People to the charges and expences of such Ornaments unless they freely and willingly consent And that this is his meaning appears from the Reasons he gives of it That this is too subject to abuse and that it gives a secular power into the hands of Bishops and an authority over mens Estates and Fortunes Which are good Arguments onely upon this supposition that the Bishop had such authority as to oblige his People to such expences as he should think fit for the Ornaments of Religion but suppose devout people liberally contribute to such pious uses if his Authority and Commission does not extend to Ornaments he must not receive their money nor adorn the Church with it if he may then his Authority extends to Ornaments though he has no Authority over mens Estates for he must not do any thing in
him without his consent for I doubt Church-authority does not extend to such matters which are purely civil and secular and though when such things are highly expedient for the Worship of God the Bishop has authority to exhort and perswade and that man sins who disobeys yet this is not properly the object of Church-censures and Ecclesiastical authority no more than when men refuse to do some pious or charitable act at the Bishops request Philemon's obligations to St. Paul who was his spiritual Father who had converted him to the Christian Faith gave him a peculiar authority over him but the bare Apostolical authority did not extend to the disposal of mens Fortunes and Servants which in those days were part of their Estates 3. In those things where God had interposed no command though the Rule they gave contained in it that which was fit and decent yet if men would resist they gently did admonish reprove them let them alone So S. Paul in case of the Corinthian men wearing long hair If any man list to be contentious we have no such custom nor the Churches of God that is let him chuse it is not well done we leave him to his own liberty but let him look to it But this does not reach the case neither for wearing long hair did not concern the Rites and Ceremonies and Uniformity of religious Worship which is our onely Dispute but was an Indecency in common conversation and a great many such things the Apostles indulged both to Jews and Heathens till they could be reformed by Reason and better Instructions though at the same time they did more severely correct the Disorders and Indecencies of Worship And yet I confess it seems a very odd Comment upon the Apostles words We have no such custom nor the Churches of God viz. let him chuse it is not well done we leave him to himself Whereas in these words the Apostle is so far from leaving them to do as they please that he determines the Controversie against them by the highest Authority to a Christian next to an express Law of God viz. the Customs and Usages of the Christian Church The Apostle indeed does not here threaten Church-censures against them but first tries what Reason and Argument will do which is a very proper method for Bishops to use but a very ill Argument to prove that the Church must not censure those who refuse Obedience to her Laws and Constitutions 4. If the Bishops power were extended farther it might extend to Tyranny and there could be no limits beyond this to keep him within the measures and sweetness of the Government Evangelical but if he pretend to go farther he may be absolute and supreme in the things of this life which do not concern the Spirit and so fall into Dynasty as one anciently complained of the Bishop of Rome and change the Father into a Prince and the Church into an Empire This is a plain Argument that the Bishop does not speak here of the decent Rites and Circumstances of Worship for how the Authority of the Church to prescribe the decent Rites and Ceremonies of Religion should degenerate into Tyranny and secular Power is unintelligible to me The Usurpations of the Church of Rome we know came in at another door and the Presbyter who has little regard to the external Order and Decency of Worship can find other pretences to get some secular power into his hands But what limit can be set to Ecclesiastical Authority if the Church exceed what is barely necessary to prevent confusion in religious Worship I answer Decency is the bound of it and there needs no other What is decent and orderly in religious Worship belongs to Church-authority what is more is an irregular abuse and there is no great danger that such a Power as this should make Bishops secular Princes This makes it evident to me that this learned Prelate intended not one word of all this against the Ceremonies of the Church of England or the imposition of them and it is certain he could not unless we will say that he contradicts himself and then his authority is good on neither side And I shall make this appear once for all and thereby answer the Citations out of the Writings of this excellent Bishop to countenance this Reconciling Designe all together I observe then that the Bishop himself does expresly justifie the Ceremonies of the Church of England as not offending against any of those Rules he had prescribed for Ecclesiastical Laws When he speaks of Rituals and significant Ceremonies and censures such Ceremonies which are meerly for signification which seems to come nearest to our Case there he designedly not onely vindicates the Practice but applauds the Wisdom of the Church of England in reference to her Ceremonies There is reason to celebrate and honour the Wisdom of the Church of England which hath in all her Offices retained but one Ritual or Ceremony that is not of divine Ordinance or Apostolical Practice and that is the Cross in Baptism which though it be a significant Ceremony and of no other use though in this I cannot agree with the Bishop and have given my reasons for it above so it is very innocent in it self and being one and alone is in no regard troublesome or afflective to those who understand her power her liberty and reason I say she hath one onely Ceremony of her own appointment for the Ring in Marriage is the Symbol of a â—ivil and religious Contract it is a Pledge and Custom of the Nation not of the Religion And those other Circumstances of her Worship are but determinations of time and place and manner of a Duty they serve to other purposes besides signification they were not made for that but for Order and Decency for which there is an Apostolical Precept and a natural reason and an evident necessity or a great convenience Now if besides these uses they can be construed to any good signification or instruction that is so far from being a prejudice to them that it is their advantage their principal end being different and warranted and not destroyed by their superinduc'd and accidental use In other things we are to remember that Figures and Shadows were for the Old Testament but Light and Manifestation is in the New This is the judgment of this excellent Bishop about the Ceremonies of the Church of England which I think makes little for our Reconcilers purpose and therefore when he had transcribed that large Discourse about Rituals and Ceremonies meerly for signification out of the Bishops Writings he stops when he comes to this as being convinc'd in his Conscience that the Bishop did not intend one word of this against the Ceremonies of the Church of England which he expresly excepted and justified Well but though the Bishop out of civility to the Church made such an exception yet there was no reason for it his Arguments were as strong against the
great Sacrifice of the Cross. A great many such things our Reconciler himself has collected in his eighth Chapter which may properly be called the Rituals or Ceremonies or Religion most of which are now out of use in most Churches which formerly used them and none of them are in uâ—e among us But what we call the Ceremonies of the Church of England are not in this sence Rituals or Ceremonies but the decent circumstances of Worship as the Bishop acknowledges excepting the Cross in Baptism which yet is not a meer significant but a professing Signe as I have already discours'd and for such Ceremonies as these which serve for Order and Decency the Bishop tells us There is an Apostolical Precept and a natural Reason and an evident Necessity or a great Convenience In a word when the Bishop speaks of Rituals and Ceremonies he understands by them exterior actions or things something which is like the ceremonial observances of the Jewish Law which were not meer circumstances of action but religious Rites Such were their Sacrifices Washings and Purifications their Phylacteries their Fasts and Festivals new Moons and Sabbaths not considered meerly as circumstances of time but as having such a Sacredness and Religion stamped on them that the very observing them was an act of Religion that the religious Duties observed on them were appointed for the sake of the day not the day meerly for the sake of the Religion Such were the numerous Traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees about making broad their Phylacteries washing their Cups and Platters and their hands before dinner and an infinite number of other superstitious observances Now though some external actions and things wisely chosen and prudently used may be for the service of Religion at least are not unlawful to be used unless we will condemn the whole Christian Church for several Ages which used a great many external Rites yet every one sees what a vast difference there is between such Rites as these and the decent Circumstances of religious Worship And therefore those men mistake the case of the Church of England who lay the Controversie upon Rituals and Ceremonies for there is no such thing in the Church of England according to the true and proper signification of these words Our Fasts and Festivals look most like such Rituals and Ceremonies but are not so for with us they are not religious days but days appointed for the solemn Exercises of Religion which differ as much as a circumstance of time does from an act of Religion as making a day religious which none but God can do differs from appointing a day for the publick Solemnities of Religion which the Governours of the Church and State may do as the Religion of observing a day differs from those acts of Religion which are performed on such a day Now this very observation of the difference between Rituals and Ceremonies and the decent circumstances of Worship will answer most of his Citations which he has impertinently alleadged out of the Bishops Writings and a multitude of Objections which for want of observing this have been very injudiciously made against those which we call the Ceremonies of the Church of England Thus he observes from the Bishop That Ecclesiastical Laws which are meerly such cannot be universal and perpetual But then he should have told us what the Bishop meant by Ecclesiastical Laws meerly such That is saith he those which do not involve a divine Law within their matter And therefore this cannot relate to the decent circumstances of Worship for they all involve a divine Law in the matter of them they are onely the specification of the Law of Decency and include those very acts of Worship to which they belong To kneel at the Lords Supper is a command to receive the Lords Supper kneeling and when the Minister is enjoyn'd to wear theSurplice it signifies that he must perform divine Offices in a Surplice These are but the decent circumstances of necessary Duties and they founded on the Apostolical Rule of Decency Well but the Bishop adds When Christ had made us free from the Law of Ceremonies which God appointed to the Iewish Nation and to which all other Nations were bound if they came into that Communion it would be intolerable that the Churches who rejoyced in their freedom from that Yoke which God had imposed should submit themselves to a Yoke of Ordinances which men should make For though before they could not yet now they may exercise Communion and use the same Religion without communicating in Rites and Ordinances Now does not this make it plain that the Bishop does not speak of the decent circumstances of Worship such as our English Ceremonies are but of such Rituals and Ceremonies as answer to the Jewish Rites and Ordinances which he calls exterior things and actions which are of a different consideration and must be governed by different Rules and Measures And yet our Reconciler is so unfortunate that if the Bishop had meant this of the Ceremonies of our Church it had been nothing to his purpose for he adds in the very next words This does no way concern the Subjects of any Government what Liberty they are to retain and use I shall discourse in the following numbers but it concerns distinct Churches under distinct Governments and it means as it appears plainly by the Context and the whole Analogie of the thing that the Christian Churches must suffer no man to put a Law upon them who is not their Governour For when he says that Ecclesiastical Laws that are meerly such must not be universal he means that they must not be intended to oblige all Christendom except they will be obliged that is do consent That no Church or company of Christians have such authority as to oblige the whole Christian World and all the Churches in it to conform to their Rituals and Ceremonies which he says is contrary to Christian liberty and such an Usurpation as must not be endured which is directly levelled against the Usurpations of the Church of Rome But though one Church cannot impose upon another yet every Church has power over her own Members and they are bound to obey that Authority which is over them And by the way this answers all his Testimonies from Bishop Davenant and Bishop Hall in their Letters to Duraeus about his Pacificatory designe of uniting all the Reformed Churches into one Communion and several others cited in his Preface to the same purpose They discourse upon what terms distinct Churches which have no authority over each other ought to maintain Christian Communion and this he applies to particular Churches with reference to their own Members as if because particular Churches must not usurp authority and dominion over each other nor deny Communion upon every difference of Opinion or different Customs and Usages of Modes of Worship therefore no Church must govern her own Communion nor give Laws to her own Members as if because
the King of England must not impose the Laws of England on Italy or Spain therefore he must not make Laws for England neither This our Reconciler was aware of and therefore in his Preface to strengthen these Authorities he asks this Question Why that agreement in Fundamentals which is sufficient to preserve Communion betwixt Churches disagreeing in Rites and Ceremonies and Doctrines of inferior moment may not be sufficient also to preserve Communion among those Members of the same Church though disagreeing in like matters For if the reason why Christian Churches which do thus differ should be received and owned as Christians and Brethren of the same Communion with us is because these differences do not hinder their being real Members of Christs Body and therefore Fellow-members of the same Church and Body with us since the same reason proves the Members of any Church whatsoever who differ onely in non-fundamentals capable of being real Christians and so of the same Church and Body with us why should it not oblige us to receive them as Christian Brethren i. e. persons of the same Communion with us if we can do it without sin Now the Answer to this is so obvious that I wonder our Reconciler should miss it For 1. The reason of Communion between distinct Churches can be nothing else but the common Principles of Christianity one Lord one Faith one Hope one Baptism c. that is whatever is essential to Christian Faith and Worship for what is more than this as the particular Rules and Orders of Discipline and Government and Modes of Worship are the Object of Ecclesiastical Authority and since no Church has authority over another they ought not to impose their own Rules of Discipline or Worship upon each other But now no private Christian can live in the Communion of any particular Church without submitting to its Government and Discipline and conforming to its Rules of Worship Though one Church must not usurp Authority over another yet every Church must govern her own Members and direct her own Worship and there can be no Order nor Decency of Worship where there are no Rules of Worship no Uniformity but every man is left to do as he pleases And yet 2. Though the Communion of distinct Churches with each other does not require that they should all observe the same Usages and Rites of Worship in their own Churches yet it requires that the Members of these distinct Churches should communicate with each other and conform to each others Customs where they happen to be present It is a ridiculous thing to talk of two Churches being in Communion with each other who will not as occasion serves communicate together upon the terms of each others Communion For Calvinists to call the Lutherans or Lutherans the Calvinists Brethren but to refuse to joyn in Communion when they happen to be in each others Churches this is not to live in Communion with each other or for a Calvinist to communicate in the Lutheran Church or a Lutheran in the Calvinists but according to the Rites of their own Churches not of the Church in which they communicate this is not to communicate with but publickly to affront each other The onely Principle of Catholick Communion between distinct Churches in such matters as these is so far to allow of each others Rules and Modes of Worship as to conform when occasion serves to such indifferent Customs and Usages though very different from their own rather than divide the Communion of the Church and if this be necessary to the Communion of distinct Churches with each other then certainly it is necessary for the Members of every particular Church to submit to its Authority and conform to its Rules and Orders of Worship For 3. It is ridiculous to imagine that nothing more is necessary to a Christian in Church-Communion than what is absolutely necessary to the State of a Christian out of the visible Communion of any Church as if nothing more were necessary to make a man a Member of the Commonwealth than what is necessary to make him a man The belief of the fundamental Doctrines of Christianity and Obedience to those Laws of Righteousness which have an eternal and immutable goodness in them will make a man a good Christian in a private and single capacity but obedience to Government and conformity to the Rules of Discipline and Worship are as necessary to make a man a good Christian in Church-society as they are essential to the being and constitution of a Church and it is impossible to form a Church-Society onely of the Essentials of Christianity considered as a Systeme of Doctrines and Laws which every private Christian ought to observe for there are the Essentials of Christian-Communion as well as of Christian Religion Christ did not onely publish the Gospel but instituted a Church and the Government and Discipline of the Church is of a distinct consideration from the belief of the Gospel No man can be a Member of the Church without believing the Gospel but Church-Society lays some new obligations upon us beyond what is necessary in a single state out of Church-Society But to return Though this learned Bishop did not urge the abrogation of the Mosaical Law against the imposition of the Ceremonies of the Church of England nor against any other Rituals or Ceremonies neither but only against such usurpt Authority as challenge a power to make Laws for the whole Christian World yet this Argument is frequently alleadged by others and more than once repeated by our Reconciler to this purpose but how trifling it is appears from this distinction between Rituals and Ceremonies and the decent Circumstances of Worship They tell us that Christ removed those burdens which were on the Church and therefore would not impose new ones But does the Church of England lay any new burdens upon men Does she require any thing more than what is necessary Christ requires that we should celebrate his last Supper in remembrance of him that the Minister should perform all the publick Offices of Religion and that this should be done in a decent and reverent manner and does the Church of England require any more Does she institute any Ceremonies excepting the Cross in Baptism which is a professing Signe and relates to no act of Worship though it be thought decent to be done at the time of Baptism but what are decent circumstances of action And is Decency then a new burden which Christ hath not imposed on his Disciples Is Decency an unnecessary or unreasonable thing Did Christ leave it at liberty then whether his Disciples should worship God decently or not Christ hath taken away the Yoke of Jewish Ceremonies and has the Church of England put another Jewish Yoke on the Disciples necks Are there any such Rituals and Ceremonies in the Church of England as have the least affinity with the Jewish Yoke Did Christ when he abrogated the Jewish Law abrogate all Decency
Authority and ought to take care of the decent circumstances of Worship then the Schism can be charged onely upon the disobeying Schismatick But this I have largely discoursed in the place before cited And now I come to those shrewd Questions which our Reconciler says he has met with in the Books of the Dissenters to which he finds no answer in the Replys of any of their Adversaries and which he entreats the Champions for the Church of England as they respect the credit of our Church-Governours the reputation of the Church and of her Discipline not to pass by without the least notice taken of them as hitherto they have done Now though I do not pretend to the honour and character of a Champion yet I have such a hearty love and reverence for my dear Mother the Church of England that I cannot deny so easie a Request as this the most troublesome task being to transcribe all these Questions Quest. 1. The first Question is Whether they do well that unnecessarily bring Subjects into such a straight by needless Laws for additions in Religion that the Consciences of men fearing God must unavoidably be perplexed between a fear of treason and disobedience against Christ and disobedience to their Prince and Pastors Ans. I answer Such men do certainly very ill in it but then this is not the case of the Church of England for she has made no needless Laws for Laws to direct and determine the external circumstances of Worship according to the Rules of Order and Decency are not needless but necessary as I have already proved Our Reconciler grants that the Church has this Authority and if the exercise of it be needless the Authority is so too and then Christ has given his Church a needless Authority for I suppose he will not own that the Church has any Authority but what she has from Christ. Nor does the Church make any additions in Religion for the decent circumstances of Worship are no additions to external Worship but as necessary to it as Decency is unless our Reconciler thinks that it is an addition to the Law of God which commands us to reverence our Prince and Parents and Superiours to command Children Servants or Subjects to stand bare before them Nor need the Consciences of men fearing God be unavoidably perplexed between a fear of treason and disobedience against Christ and of disobedience to their Prince and Pastors for a great many men who fear God are not thus perplexed and therefore it is not unavoidable I will instance onely in the Reconciler himself if he will give me leave to reckon him among those men who either fear God or reverence their Prince and Pastors And there is another good reason why this is not unavoidable because there is no competition in this case between obedience to Christ and obedience to our Prince and Pastors and therefore no man need to be perplexed about it and if there were a plain competition there were no need of being thus perplexed neither because all men who fear God do or ought to understand that where Christ commands one thing and our Prince another inconsistent with the command of Christ we must obey God rather than men Quest. 2. Whether Rulers may command any indifferent and unnecessary thing which will notably do more harm than good or make an unnecessary necessary thing a means or occasion of excluding the necessary Worship of God or preaching of the Gospel Ans. If by indifferent and unnecessary things he means things wholly useless and by their notably doing more harm than good that they are in their own nature hurtful as well as useless it is certain Governours ought not to command such things but what is this to the Church of England The Ceremonies of our Church though upon some accounts they may be called indifferent yet are very useful as contributing to the Decency of Worship which is as necessary as publick Worship is and are not apt to do any hurt at all and therefore are the proper Object of Ecclesiastical Authority And with what face can our Reconciler pretend that they exclude the necessary Worship of God or preaching of the Gospel when God is still worshipped and the Gospel preached in all the Parish-churches of England unless he thinks that God is not worshipped nor the Gospel preached any where but at a Conventicle Quest. 3. Whether is it more to common good and the interest of Honesty and Conscience that all the Parsons in a Nation be imprisoned banished or silenced that dare not swear say and practise all that is imposed on them than that unnecessary impositions be altered or forborn Now I think I may have the liberty to ask our Reconciler a Question now and then I ask therefore Whether is most for the common good that there should be any setled Order and Government in the Church or that there should be none Whether it is possible to maintain any Order or Government without rejecting and censuring those who will not conform to it Whether is most for the publick good to maintain and encourage a loyal and conformable Clergy when there is no scarcity of such men or to nourish Shism and Schismaticks to say no worse Quest. 4. Had Images been lawfully used in places or exercise of Gods Worship yet whether was it not inhumane and unchristian in those Bishops and Councils who anathematized all that were of a contrary mind and ejected and silenced the Dissenters Ans. The bare lawfulness of any thing does not make it a fit matter for a Law but whatever is both lawful and useful if it be enjoyned by a just Authority ought to be obeyed by the Members of that Church where it is enjoyned and Dissenters ought to be censured according to the nature of the offence for without this there can be no government in the Church But why he particularly instances in Images I cannot tell unless it be to insinuate that the Ceremonies of our Church are of the same nature with them but our Church which retains Ceremonies removed Images as just matters of scandal and offence Quest. 5. Whether Christ who made the Baptismal Covenant the test and standing terms of entrance did set up Pastors over his Church to make new and stricter terms and Laws or to preserve Concord on the terms that he had founded it and to see that men lived in Vnity and Piety according to those terms and when they as Christs Ministers have received men on Christs terms whether they may excommunicate and turn them out of the Church again for want of more or onely for violating these Ans. The Baptismal Covenant is sufficient for our admission into the Church but Church-communion requires our submission to Church-authority as I have already shewn and to say that nothing more is required of us in a Society than what is necessary to our admission into it is contrary to the nature of all Societies in the World wherein the
terms of admission are very different from the Rules of Government That a man has served an Apprentiship to a Trade and is made free by his Master is sufficient to make him a Member of such a Corporation but though he understand his Trade very well and behaves himself honestly in it yet if he prove a disobedient and refractory Member to the government of the Society he may be cast out again and I wonder what the Master and Wardens of such a Company would say to the Reconciler should he come and plead in the behalf of such a disobedient Member that they ought not to make any thing necessary to his continuance in and communion with the Society but what was necessary to his first admission The Charter whereon the Society is founded is very different from the particular Laws of the Society whereby it is governed as it must be where there is any power of making Laws committed to the Governours of it and therefore if Christ has committed such a power of making Laws to his Church as our Reconciler himself acknowledges it is a ridiculous thing to say that they must not excommunicate or cast any man out of the Church who believes the Christian Religion and lives a vertuous life which is the sum of the Baptismal Covenant how disobedient soever he be to the Laws and Government of the Church Which is a sufficient Answer to Quest. 6. His sixth Query Whether anathematizing men for doubtful actions or for such faults as consist with true Christianity and continued subjection to Iesus Christ be not a sinful Church-dividing means Onely I shall observe farther that as he has stated this Query it does not concern the Church of England She anathematizes no man for doubtful actions for she commands nothing that is doubtful though some men are pleased to pretend some doubts and scruples about it But I have already shewn that there is a great difference between a doubtful action and an action which some men doubt of the first ought not to be commanded the second may And then our Church excommunicates no man who lives in a continued subjection to Iesus Christ which no Schismatick does whatever pretences he makes to holiness of life for subjection to Christ requires subjection to that Authority which Christ has set in his Church as well as obedience to his other Laws Quest. 7. As for his next Question about imposing heavy burdens and intolerable yokes when Christ came to take them away it has been at large answered already Quest. 8. Whether Christ hath not made Laws sufficient to be the Bond of Vnity to his Church and whether any man should be cut off from it who breaketh no Law of God necessary to Church-unity and communion Ans. Christ has made Laws sufficient to be the Bond of Unity to his Church for he has commanded all Christians to submit to the Authority which he has placed in his Church which is the onely Bond of Union in a particular Church and therefore those who are cut off from the Church for their disobedience to Ecclesiastical Authority while nothing is enjoyned which contradicts the other Laws of our Saviour cannot be said to break no Law of God necessary to Church-unity or communion for they break that Law which is the very Bond of Union and deserve to be cut off though they should be supposed to break no other Law of Christ. Quest. 9. Whether if many of the children of the Church were injudiciously scrupulous when fear of sin and Hell was the cause a tender Pastor would not abate them a Ceremony in such a case when his abating it hath no such danger Ans. A tender Pastor in such cases ought to instruct such children but not to suffer such childish fancies to impose upon Church-authority For to disturb the Peace and Order of the Church and to countenance mens injudicious scruples by such indulgence is a much greater mischief and more unpardonable in a Governour than the severest censures on private persons If a private connivance for a time in some hard cases would do any good it might be thought reasonable and charitable but to alter publick Laws and Constitutions for the sake of such injudicious people is for ever to sacrifice the Peace and Order and good Government of the Church to the humours of children which would not be thought either prudent or charitable in any other Government Quest. 10. If diversity in Religion be such an evil whether should men cause it by their unnecessary Laws and Canons and making Engines to tear the Church in pieces which by the ancient simplicity and commanded mutual forbearance would live in such a measure of Love and Peace as may be here expected Ans. Whoever cause a diversity of Religions by their Laws and Canons or make Engines to tear the Church in pieces are certainly very great Schismaticks but Laws for Unity and Uniformity can never make a diversity of Religions nor occasion it neither unless every thing produces its contrary heat produce cold peace war and love hatred Men may quarrel indeed about Laws of Unity and Uniformity but it is the diversity of Religions or Opinions which men have already espoused not the Laws of Unity which makes the quarrel The plain case then is this Whether when men are divided in their opinions and judgments of things and if they be left to themselves will worship God in different ways according to their own humours and perswasions it be unlawful for Church-Governours to make Laws for Unity and Uniformity because whatever they be some men will quarrel at them Or whether the Church may justly be charged with making a diversity of Religions by making Laws to cure and restrain that diversity of Religions which men have already made to themselves It is certain were men all of a mind the Laws of Unity could not make a difference and therefore these Laws and Canons are not the Engines which tear the Church in pieces but that diversity of opinions which men have wantonly taken up and for the sake of which they tear and divide the Church into a thousand Conventicles But had it not been for these Canons by the ancient simplicity and mutual forbearance they would live in such a measure of love and peace as may be here expected But what ancient simplicity does he mean The Church of England is the best Pattern this day in the World of the Primitive and Apostolick simplicity for a Phanatick simplicity was never known till of late days there never was a Church from the Apostles days without all Rites and Ceremonies of Worship till of late when men pretended to reform Religion by destroying all external Order and Decency of Worship and therefore he is fain to take in a commanded mutual forbearance to patch up Church-unity that is if men be permitted to worship God as they please and are commanded not to quarrel with one another and are not permitted to cut
for denying this liberty and indulgence is known to all men and it is hard to think then that he was a Reconciler for never any Reconciler was a Martyr for the Church And methinks the Act of Uniformity and the prosecution of Dissenters upon that and former Acts might convince any reasonable man that our present Soveraign is none of his Protestant Reconcilers But if notwithstanding all this he can prove against plain matter of fact and the evidence of sense and the experience and complaints of Dissenters all these to be Reconciling Kings I am resolved I will be a Protestant Reconciler too and I hope I may pass for as good a Reconciler as any of these renowned Kings without recanting this Book Let us hear then how he proves these great Princes to be Reconcilers As for King Iames he proves him to be a Reconciler from Casaubon's Epistle to Cardinal Perroon Now how faithfully Casaubon represented the Kings Judgment is more than our Reconciler can tell onely I am certain he did misrepresent him if he made a Reconciler of him But there is no reason to take Sanctuary in this for whoever considers the occasion of those words may put a very sober construction on them without giving any countenance to our Reconciler for the Dispute did not concern the Rules of Order and Decency in Religious Worship but the unscriptural Innovations of Popery which they imposed upon all Churches as terms of Catholick Communion Now in this Controversie any man may safely say what Casaubon says for the King without being a Protestant Reconciler For there is no nearer way of concord than to separate things necessary from unnecessary to call nothing simply necessary but what the Word of God commandeth to be believed or done or which the ancient Church did gather from the Word of God by necessary consequence that other humane Constitutions whatever antiquity or authority is pretended for them might be changed mollified antiquated and that this may in the general be said of most Ecclesiastical observations introduced without the Word of God Now this does not refer to the decent Circumstances and Ceremonies of Religion but to such Ecclesiastical observations as are in dispute between us and the Church of Rome as the Celibacy of the Clergy Prayers for the Dead Pilgrimages Monastick Vows the Worship of Saints and Angels and Images and the like for which the Church of Rome pretends the Authority of ancient Councils or the ancient practice and usage of the Church Now in these cases I am perfectly of the Kings mind and yet do not take my self to be a Protestant Reconciler in our Authors way Our Royal Martyr when he saw what danger Church and State and his own Royal Person was in from the outrageous zeal of dissenting Protestants who did not now humbly beg for Indulgence and Toleration but contended for Rule and Empire was willing if it were possible to allay these Heats and divert the Storm by yiâ—lding somewhat to their boisterous and threatning importunities and if he had yielded a great deal more at that time than he did I think it had been no argument of his own setled judgment of things The Reconciler might hence prove that the King thought it much better to yield a little at that time than to ruine Church and State by too much stiffness not that he thought it unlawful to impose any thing on his Subjects in matters of Religion which they were pleased to scruple And yet what is it that the King yielded under these necessities For that our Reconciler produces these words As for differences among our selves for matters indifferent in their own nature concerning Religion we shall in tenderness to any number of our loving Subjects very willingly comply with the advice of our Parliament that some Law may be made for the exemption of tender Consciences from punishment or prosecution for such Ceremonies and in such cases which by the judgment of most men are held to be matters indifferent and of some to be absolutely unlawful Does the King in these words promise to alter the Constitutions of the Church to abolish all Ceremonies c By no means he onely says that he will comply with the advice of his Parliament to exempt such tender Consciences from punishment And how can our Reconciler hence conclude that the King believed it unlawful to impose these Ceremonies because at such a critical time he was contented there should be some provision made to secure Dissenters from the execution of the penal Laws And yet that ill usage which so excellent a Prince met with from these dissenting Protestants after such a condescension as this gives no great encouragement to Princes to try this Experiment again Thus he proves our present Soveraign to be of his mind by his Declaration from Breda which he prints at large I suppose for fear People should forget that there had been such a Declaration or what were the contents of it How the present circumstances of affairs at that time might incline his Majesty to such a condescension is not my business to inquire it is sufficient for us to know that the House of Commons presented their Reasons to the King against that Declaration which so far satisfied him that he gave his assent to the Act of Uniformity and therefore I suppose is not of our Reconciler's mind now and indeed never was notwithstanding that Declaration for he never asserted it unlawful to impose scrupled Ceremonies upon Dissenters but thought it expedient at that time to indulge their weakness And while matters were under debate for the re-establishment of the Church of England no wonder that the King and his great Ministers should make Proposals of Accommodation and offer their Reasons and Arguments for it but I always thought that what is said by any person on one side or other while the matter is under debate is not so good an Argument what his judgment and opinion is as what he agrees and consents to when the Reasons on both sides have been heard and scann'd Thus our Kings are our own again and of all men in the world have the least reason to countenance such a designe as this which serves onely to encourage a busie and restless Party among us who first strike at the Church but will never be quiet till they have usurp'd the Throne What the sence of our Church is in this matter is evident from her Articles Canons and Constitutions and this signifies a great deal more to me than the opinion of any private Doctors of what note and eminency soever It is unreasonable to oppose the authority of any particular Doctors to the Judgment of the Church and it would be an endless work to number the Votes and Suffrages of private Doctors on both sides indeed their authority is no greater than their reason is and if any of them be of our Reconciler's mind I am sure they speak without book unless they have something more
against her uncharitable Impositions And when he has published a Book against the Constitutions of our Church agreed on by the wisdom of the Convocation and establisht by Act of Parliament when he has already the most mature and deliberate judgment of Church and State it looks like a very hypocritical piece of modesty a downright Challenge to the whole Clergy to cry out as he does Teach me my Reverend Brethren and I will hold my peace cause me to understand wherein I have erred and I will thankfully yea I will publickly retract it Any body I think but a Protestant Reconciler would call this libelling the Church and hectoring and out-braving all his Mothers Children How the rest of my Brethren will digest this outragious Contempt of Church-Authority I cannot tell for my part I cannot bear it but am resolved to do my weak endeavours to vindicate my dear Mother from the rudeness and insolence of her undutiful Son And in order to this I shall consider what it is he contends for wherein we agree and where we part and fairly debate on which side the truth lies The Proposition which he undertakes to prove is contained in these words That things indifferent which may be changed and altered without sin or violation of Gods Laws ought not especially under our present circumstances to be imposed by Superiours as the Conditions of Communion or as Conditions without which none shall minister in sacred things though called to that work and none shall be partakers of the publick Ordinances which Christ hath left to be the ordinary means of Grace and of Salvation to mankind bâ—t shall upon refusal to submit unto them for ever be excluded from the Church and from the Priviledges belonging to the Members of it Where by indifferent things which may be changed and altered without sin or violation of Gods Laws it is plain he means whatever is not expresly commanded by God and so must include all the Externals of Worship Government and Discipline which are not enjoyned by a divine Law That these ought not to be imposed signifies that it is sinful and mischievous to impose them as he expresly asserted before and which all his Arguments are designed to prove viz. that Governours sin in it To impose signifies onely to command and to impose as Conditions of Communion signifies no more than to impose though it sounds bigger For the Church makes such indifferent things the Conditions of Communion in no other sence than as she commands those of her Communion to worship God in such a manner and rejects those which will not which is nothing more than to command as to command is opposed to leaving every one at liberty to worship God as he pleases So that if the Church have not Authority to make these indifferent things the terms of Communion in this sence so as to reject those who will not worship God according to such Prescriptions i. e. who will not obey the Governours of the Church wherein they live then she has no power at all to command And when he adds especially in our present circumstances he refers to those Divisions and Schisms which he says are occasioned by such Impositions Whenever such Ceremonies are doubted and scrupled and made an occasion of Schism then especially it is a sin to impose them but when he says especially he plainly insinuates that it is at all times sinful and unlawful to impose such uncommanded Rites and Modes of Worship though it is a greater sin to do it when there are any who scruple the lawfulness of such Impositions This is the Doctrine of our Protestant Reconciler which I should rather have expected from a profess'd Enemy than from a pretended Advocate of the Church of England He has at once very modestly rejected all Ecclesiastical Authority in indifferent things He has condemned all the Canons and Constitutions of the Church for the orderly performance of Religious Worship from the Apostle days until this time which concern the external Circumstances and Ceremonies of Worship He has plainly renounced one of thoâ—e Articles of Religion to which he has subscribed and declared his Assent if he be a Member of our Church For Art 20. asserts That the Church hath power to decree Rites or Ceremonies And if the Church has power to do this I suppose she may do it without sin and without asking leave of her Inferiours But though our Reconciler has stated this matter so generally as to condemn all Ecclesiastical Authority in indifferent things and has said many things which look that way in several parts of his Book yet his open and avowed designe is onely to prove the sinfulness of such Impositions when they are scrupled and made the occasion of Schisms and Divisions in the Church as he says it is at this day among us And here I shall joyn issue with him and give a particular Answer to every thing which has the least appearance of an Argument which though it will make this Answer larger than I could wish yet is necessary to stop the mouths of such pragmatical Reconcilers who are as troublesome and dangerous to the Government as Dissenters themselves CHAP. 1. Concerning the external Order and Decency of Worship and the Authority of the Church in such matters THat I may give a fair Answer to our Protestant Reconciler I shall first examine some of his Mistakes which run through his whole Book and whereon the whole Argument of his Book is founded the removing of which to men of any competent understanding would supersede the necessity of any farther Answer And they either concern 1. The usefulness of some Rites and Ceremonies of Religious Worship and the Authority of the Church in such matters Or 2. The obligations of charity to the Souls of men with the due measures and extent of it Or 3. That regard which ought to be had to an erroneous or scrupulous Conscience From these Topicks he all-along argues to prove that Church-Governours ought to alter the external Ceremonies of Worship because they are of no value in themselves and therefore charity to the Souls of men requires them in such things to condescend to the errours or scruples or weakness of their Brethren I shall begin with the first which is the fundamental Mistake on which all the rest depend and therefore must stand or fall with it and that concerns the external Order and Decency of Worship or the Authority of the Church in prescribing Rites and Ceremonies for the more decent and orderly performance of Religious Worship Now concerning this matter our Reconciler thinks that the external Ceremonies of Religion are of no account at all for publick Worship may be performed as decently and reverently without the use of those Ceremonies which are in dispute as with them For thus he expresly and dogmatically asserts That the Ceremonies which are imposed by our Church as they have nothing sinful in their nature for which Inferiours
Postures or Gestures in the Worship of God much more to institute any significant and symbolical Rites and Ceremonies that such things have no real and positive goodness in them and therefore are not worth contending for I shall discourse this matter more particularly and shall 1. shew how necessary some decent Rites and Ceremonies are to the external Decency of Worship which will justifie the Governours of the Church in such Impositions 2. Wherein the Decency of religious Worship consists which will justifie the Ceremonies in use among us as having a positive Order Decency and Reverence 3. I shall consider how our Reconciler states this matter First How necessary some decent Rites and Ceremonies are to the external Decency of Worship For though any one particular Habit or Posture or Gesture in religious Worship is so far indifferent as it is no-where expresly commanded yet a decent Habit and Posture c. is not indifferent but as necessary as external Worship is and expresly commanded by this Apostolical Rule That all things be done decently and in order If men will acknowledge that God requires publick external and visible Worship as well as the Worship of the Mind and Spirit which I have largely discoursed elsewhere it is certain there can be no visible Worship but by external and visible signs of honour for the internal Devotion of the mind cannot be seen by men though it be seen by God and therefore is not external and visible Worship Can that man be said to pay any visible Honour or Worship to God whose words and actions postures and behaviour signifie nothing of Honour or Reverence We know of what mighty consequence the Ceremonies of State are and how punctual Princes are in exacting them and when we remember that no Prince can be so jealous of his Honour as God is of his Worship we cannot think that the publick Solemnities and external Decenâ—y of Worship are such inconsiderable things when the glory of God is so nearly concerned in them For the external and visible glory of God consists in external and visible Worship and external Worship is nothing else but external significations of Reverence and Devotion And therefore though the particular modes and circumstances of Worship are not particularly prescribed by God yet some particular Rites of Worship for external Decency and Order are necessary and ought to be prescribed by those who have the care of publick Worship For if the external Decency of Worship be necessary by an Apostolical Precept and yet this external Decency cannot be secured without some particular Rules of Decency and Order then some such particular Rules are as necessary as Decency and Order is and whatever external Rites do contribute to the Decency and Order of Worship have all that real goodness in them which therâ— is in Decency and Order and no man can truly say that any such Rites and Ceremonies have no real goodness in them wherefore they ought to be commanded without asserting at the same time that there is no real goodness in Decency and Order for if they are decent and orderly they must have all that real goodness which is in Decency and Order For it is a manifest Fallacy to argue that such or such Rites or Ceremonies are in their own nature indifferent and not commanded by any positive Law of God and therefore have no real or necessary goodness in them when the end for which they serve is not indifferent but necessary and expresly commanded by God For I cannot see but that these men if they pleased might as well prove that those Rites and Ceremonies which serve the ends of Decency and Order are not indifferent but necessary by vertue of that Law which enjoyns the external Decency of Worship as that they are not necessary but indifferent because they are not in particular commanded by God For the same Law which makes the external Decency of Worship necessary makes the use of decent Rites necessary because the end cannot be attained without the means but the natural indifferency of things does not make them indifferent in their use when they are to serve a necessary end But the fallacy of this consists in the equivocal use of these terms real goodness necessity indifferency which therefore I shall briefly explain and apply to the present Controversie Real goodness may respect the intrinsick nature or the use of things In the first sence we call all moral Vertues good which have an intrinsick and eternal reason such as Prudence Tâ—mperance Fortitude Justice and all those natural acts of Homage and Worship which we owe to God and in this sence no Habits Postures or Gestures have any real goodness in them for they are no acts nor parts of Worship This turns all these external observances into superstition which our Saviour charged the Pharisees with of old and which we very justly charge the Church of Rome with at this day when we place such Vertue and Sanctity in these things as to advance them into proper Acts and Ministries of Religion the very doing of which is as acceptable or more acceptable to God than the most real and natural acts of Homage and Worship But then there are other things which have no natural nor intrinsick goodness in them which yet may be properly enough called and are really good with respect to their use and the end they serve if the end be good and such are those external Rites and Ceremonies which conduce to the decent and orderly performance of religious Worship For if the external Decency of Worship be good then those Ceremonies wherein the external Decency of Worship consists must be so far good also and fit to be commanded The like may be said about the different kinds of necessity as far as it concerns this matter For some things are necessary in their own nature as all those things are which have an internal and immutable goodness and being founded on eternal reasons other things which are not necessary in their own nature yet may be necessary by a divine and positive Institution as the Levitical Sacrifices and Ceremonies were under the Mosaical Law and as the Christian Sacraments are under the Gospel other things are neither necessary in their own nature nor by a positive Law which yet may be necessary as means in order to a necessary end And here are two degrees of necessity 1. When the means is so absolutely necessary to the end that the end cannot be obtained without it as it is in all those cases where there is but one way of doing a thing which makes that one way as absolutely necessary as the thing it self is as if there were but one Road from London to York it would be as necessary to travel that Road as it is to go to York but there are very few such cases as these in matters of Morality But 2. There is another kind of necessity when there are various means equally fitted and
to eat together at a common Table is a civil action and a testimony of civil kindnesses and respects but when this is done upon a religious account as a testimony and expression of Christian Charity it becomes a holy Kiss and a religious Feast These Ceremonies are as acceptable to God as those Duties and Graces are which we exercise and profess in them if we be sincere but they are no parts nor acts of Worship though performed in the time of Worship This short account of the nature of these Ceremonies shews us what a ridiculous pretence it is to charge them with being Sacraments of humane Institution Some tell us that the definition our Church gives of a Sacrament belongs to such Ceremonies as these that it is an outward visible signe of an inward spiritual Grace and here they stop as if this were the full definition of a Sacrament but our Church adds given unto us and ordained by Christ himself as a means whereby we receive the same and as a pledge to assure us thereof So that there can be no such thing as a humane Sacrament because there can be no Sacrament but what is ordained by Christ. True say they but that is the fault of it that when upon other accounts it has the nature of a Sacrament it has not that authority which should make it a divine and therefore it is onely a humane Sacrament These Ceremonies then it seems would be Sacraments if they had the authority of Christ then there is one Sacrament more than they think of viz. washing the Disciples feet which was instituted by Christ himself and is as much an outward visible signe of an inward spiritual Grace as the Cross in Baptism or any other significant Ceremony can be but it wants what our Church adds to make up the nature of a Sacrament that it is ordained as a means whereby we receive this spiritual Grace and as a pledge to assure us thereof Which shews that no Ceremony how symbolical soever it be can be a Sacrament which is not the Seal of a Covenant and Promise and an instituted means for the conveyance of Grace But to let that pass the nature of these Ceremonies does not consist in this That they are outward visible signs of an inward spiritual Grace but that they are the visible Exercise or Profession of some Grace or Duty Their nature does not consist in being signifying signs to teach a Duty but in signifying the actual Exercise or Profession of some Duty and this I suppose does not make them Sacraments Secondly Let us now consider the Decency of such Ceremonies and I cannot imagine what dispute there can be about it For if the Exercise or Profession of such Vertues be decent then the external Rite and Ceremony whereby such a Profession is made if it be used in a grave manner and upon a solemn occasion and be a proper and natural signe of such a Profession must be decent too If it be a decent thing for Christians to express their mutual love and charity to each other when they come together to worship God and to offer up their united Prayers to their common Father or to feast at the Table of their common Lord and Saviour then to kiss one another and to feast at a common Table which are proper and significant expressions of mutual Charity must be decent also at such times And thus they were used by the Primitive Christians they used to kiss each other after Prayers upon which account it is called Signaculum orationis or the Seal of Prayer Thus they kissed each other before their receiving the Lords Supper and began this mysterious Supper with a Love-Feast which was a common Table for the poor and the rich And if it were decent at such times to express their servent charity to each other the external Rite and Ceremony of this must be decent also for inward Charity cannot be expressed but either by words or signs and visible signs which are also the external acts and exercise of Charity are to be preferred before words Thus if it be decent upon some solemn occasions to make a publick profession of our Faith in a crucified Christ and our resolution to follow him even to the Cross and rather to die with him than deny him there cannot be a more solemn occasion for this than at our Baptism when we are received into the Communion of his Church this being an express Condition of our Discipleship to take up our Cross and follow him and therefore also there cannot be a more proper signe and emblem of this Profession than to receive the signe of the Cross in our foreheads for to receive the signe of the Cross is a natural profession of our crucified Lord and a suffering Religion and to receive this signe in our foreheads which are the seat of Modesty and Bashfulness is a visible Profession that we are not and will not be ashamed of the Cross. And as this is decent in it self so it contributes to the Gravity and Solemnity of that religious Administration as all awful grave and solemn Ceremonies do If we consider this as the profession of the Person baptised nothing can be more decent at such a time than to confess a crucified Christ under whose command we then lift our selves and our resolution to fight under the Banner of the Cross. If we consider it as the Profession of the Church who by her publick Ministers solemnly owns the Doctrine of the Cross and declares it as the Condition of our Discipleship when she receives any persons into the Communion of the Church is there any thing unbecoming in this Nay can any thing be more comely and decent than upon such solemn occasions to make such a solemn Profession of the Religion of the Cross Thirdly As for the lawfulness of these Ceremonies I think there is no need to prove that after what I have now discoursed for they being nothing else but the visible Exercise or Profession of some Grace or Duty upon fit and solemn occasions they cannot be unlawful unless the external Acts and visible Profession of a known Duty can be unlawful If it is our duty to make a publick Profession of our Faith in a crucified Saviour no time can be more proper for such a Profession than the time of our Baptism no signe can more naturally signifie this Profession than the signe of the Cross. Now I would gladly hear a wise reason why it should be unlawful to make such a Profession as this at our Baptism or unlawful to do it by signs as well as words I would desire to know why we may not profess our Faith in a crucified Saviour by the signe of the Cross as innocently and decently as make our Appeals to God in an Oath by laying our hand upon the Bible and kissing it Nay I would desire to know why the Church may not as well receive men into her Communion with the signe
of the Cross as a solemn Profession of a crucified Saviour and a suffering Religion as Constantine make the Cross his Banner and Royal Standard and yet would any Christian refuse to fight under a General who bore the Cross in his Banner If you say that this is onely a civil Signe and Ceremony I deny it and affirm that it was as much a religious Ceremony as the signe of the Cross in Baptism unless any man think that there can be no Religion in the Field but onely in the Church That which makes it a religious Ceremony either upon a mans forehead or in the Emperours Standard is that it is done upon a religious account as a publick and visible profession of our Faith in a crucified Saviour and I think the Cross in the Emperours Standard displayed in the open Field in the sight of Pagans is a more publick and visible Profession of the Cross than what is privately transacted in the Church and leaves no visible signe behind it And I cannot imagine why any man should not as much scruple to fight under such a visible Banner of the Cross as to receive an invisible signe of it upon his forehead since the Profession the Ceremony and the Religion of it is the same It is true such Ceremonies as these ought not to be numerous nor too familiarly used nor upon slight occasions for this burdens Religion and makes them degenerate into Superstition or Formality But our Church has retained but one such Ceremony and that used but once in a mans life upon the most solemn occasion in the world at our admission to Baptism and it argues very little understanding in our Reconciler to reproach the Church for this and scornfully to ask Why she rejects crossing of the breast and retains crossing in the forehead why she rejects crossing at the consecration of the Eucharist and the Baptismal Water and retains it at the baptizing of the Infant why she rejects Exorcism Chrysom Vnction Dipping trine Immersion and retains the Cross in Baptism It does not become me to censure the Practice of the ancient Church in any of these Ceremonies but I think if the ancient Church cannot be condemned for these things our Church cannot One Ceremony is more easily justified than twenty and the using of it once upon a very solemn occasion than a too familiar use especially where it cannot so properly be called a professing Signe which is all I undertake for The onely Objection I can think of against the signe of the Cross in Baptism as a professing Signe is this That there is no need of such a Profession as this because we make the very same Profession at our Baptism which represents and signifies our conformity to the Death and Resurrection of Christ and therefore this is a vain and superfluous addition to the Sacrament of Baptism and does tacitly charge that divine Institution with defect I answer The same Objection for the very same reason might have been made against the Love-Feast which was celebrated at the very same time with the Lords Supper to signifie that Brotherly love and charity which was and ought to be among the Disciples of Christ and yet that heavenly Feast of the Lords Supper does not onely signifie our Union to Christ our Head but our Union to each other as Members of the same Body and therefore required the actual exercise of Brotherly love in receiving And yet this is acknowledged on all hands to be an Apostolical Institution observed by the Apostles themselves and all the Apostolical Churches of those days The same Answer then will serve for both That Christian Love and Unity is included in the Supper of our Lord and a patient suffering for the Name of Christ in the Sacrament of Baptism but neither of these Sacraments were instituted to signifie these Duties nor do they signifie them otherwise than collaterally and consequentially The proper use of these Sacraments is not to signifie and represent a Duty but to convey divine Blessings and Vertues to us The Pardon of our sins and the Gift of the holy Spirit in Baptism which incorporates us into the Body of Christ and the continual supplies of Grace and renewals of Pardon in the Lords Supper where we feast on the Sacrifice of Christ and partake in the Merits of it But then as we all feast on the same Sacrifice of Christ eat of the same Bread and drink of the same Cup this consequentially signifies that we are Members of the same Body and that we ought to love one another with the most tender and natural affections But the mutual love and charity of Christians being so great a Duty of the Christian Religion and so proper to be exercised at this time for which reason they used also to kiss each other before receiving and yet not directly and primarily represented in this holy Feast the Apostles did not think it any derogation from the Lords Supper to appoint a common Table for all Christians to eat at as a Testimony and Exercise of mutual love and charity with each other When we feast with any person it is a direct signification that we are in a state of Friendship and Reconciliation with him at whose Table we eat but it does not so immediately signifie that all the Guests who eat at the same Table are Friends to each other It is reasonable indeed that it should be so and God expects and requires that it should be so and none are welcome at Gods Table who do not come in perfect love and charity But I say the Lords Supper considered as a symbolical Rite does not primarily and directly signifie it and therefore the Apostles thought fit to signifie and profess this by a common Table where Christians first eat and drank together as Friends and having thus testified their mutual kindness to each other they were the better prepared to eat together at the Table of their common Lord and Saviour and receive the Tokens and Pledges of his love to them all So that this Love-Feast did not at all intrench upon the Lords Supper it being instituted for a different end though in subserviency to it And thus it is in Baptism It is the Sacrament of our Initiation whereby we are made Members of the Body of Christ and intituled to all the Blessings of the New Covenant but the external Ceremony of Baptism whereby we are said to be implanted into the likeness of Christs death does not primarily signifie our laying down our lives for Christ though that be a necessary Condition of our Discipleship but it signifies our new Birth our spiritual conformity to the death of Christ by dying to sin and walking in newness of life as St. Paul discourses in the 6 Rom. And therefore taking up the Cross being by Christ himself made such an express Condition of our Discipleship the Primitive Christians thought it very fitting to make a visible Profession of this by receiving the signe
of the Cross on their foreheads at the same time that they were received into the Church by Baptism which does no more derogate from the perfection of Baptism than their forms of renouncing the Devil with their faces towards the West and spitting at him Those constant Persecutions which in those days attended Christianity made this a very useful and necessary Ceremony And it may be observed that no Christians in any Age of the Church ever scrupled to receive the signe of the Cross on their foreheads but those who think the Doctrine of the Cross now out of date and can as profanely scoff at a suffering Religion as the Heathens did at a crucified Christ None but those who profess Treasons and Rebellions for Christ and never think it their duty to suffer but when they want â—trength and power to fight for him which â—ives little encouragement to Christian Prinâ—es to part with this symbolical Signe and Ceâ—â—mony of a suffering Religion But there is one Objection which our Reconciler makes against the positive Order and Dcency of these Ceremonies which aâ—e used in the Church of England which is fit to be considered in this place and that is That Christ and his Apostles did not use them and therefore they either worshipt God indecently or the use of them is not necessary to the Decency of Worship Now this is sufficiently answered by what I have already discours'd That though the Decency of publick Worship be a necessary Duty and some decent Rites and Ceremonies be necessary to the external Decency of Worship yet where there is choice of such Ceremonies which are very decent we cannot say that such or such particular Ceremonies are absolutely necessary because the Decency of Worship may be preserved by the use of other decent Rites and therefore Christ and his Apostles might worship very decently without the use of these Ceremonies and the Church of England may worship very decently with them But yet to shew the folly of this Argument we may consider 1. That all the time Christ was upon Earth he never set up any publick Worship distinct from the Jewish Worship He lived in Communion with the Jewish Church anâ— worshipped God with them at the Temple oâ— in their Synagogues And it is as pleasant 〈◊〉 Argument to prove that there is no reason 〈◊〉 using such Ceremonies now because 〈◊〉 did not use them as it would be to proveth tht we must not use such Ceremonies as are proâ—er to the Christian Worship because they wre not used in the Temple or Jewish Synagogâ—es in our Saviours days for he never performed any act of publick Worship any-where else But you will say Christ instituted the Sacrament of his own Body and Bloud but he neither received kneeling himself nor commanded his Apostles to do so Now in answer to this it is not evident to me that Christ received at all himself much less does it appear in what posture he received It is said in St. Matthew and St. Mark that after the institution of this holy Supper when he had blessed the Bread and brake it and divided it among his Disciples and commanded them all to eat of it and had likewise took the Cup and having given thanks commanded them all to drink of it that he added But I say unto you I will not henceforth drink of this fruit of the vine until that day that I drink it new with you â—n my Fathers kingdom From whence some â—ay conclude that he did at that time drink 〈◊〉 the Cup though he tells them it was the 〈◊〉 time he would drink of it But St. Luke 〈◊〉 us that these words were spoke at eating 〈◊〉 Passover before the institution of his last Super and then they are a plain demonstratiâ—â— that he did not drink of the Sacramental Wâ—e and it is not likely that he should feaâ— on the symbols of his own Body and Bloâ— But suppose he had it had been as imprper for him to have received kneeling as it â—s decent in us to do so for this had been â—n act of Worship to himself And though we do not read in what posture the Apostle received yet I am pretty confident they did receive in their ordinary eating posture For it is very improbable that our Saviour would require them to kneel for he exacted no act of Worship from them while he was on Earth they never prayed to him as their great High-Priest and we may as well argue that we must not pray to him now he is in Heaven because he did not command his Apostles to pray to him while he was on Earth as that we must not worship him when we approach his Table nor receive that mysterious Bread and Wine with all humility of Soul and Body now he is in Heaven because at the first institution of this holy Supper while he was still visibly present witâ— them he did not command his Apostles tâ— receive kneeling Nor is it likely the Apostles would do 〈◊〉 of themselves any more than that they 〈◊〉 any other act of religious Worship to Chst on Earth for though they heard the wrds of institution yet at that time they understod nothing of the mystery of it as it is impoâ—ble they should who understood so little oâ— his Death and Passion much less of the merorious Vertue and Expiation of his Bloud 2. As for the Apostles who founed a Christian Church and set up Christian Worship after the Death and Resurrection of our Saviour what particular Rites and Ceremonies of Worship they used we are no certain though that they were careful of the Decency of Worship is evident from this Apostolical Precept That all things be done decotly and in ordâ—r And their Love-Feasts anâ— the holy Kiss are a plain proof that they were not without their religious Rites also And if we may judge of the Apostolical Churches by the succeeding Ages of the Church even while they were under Sufferings and Persecutions there was no Age of the Church till the Reformation so free from Rituals and Ceremonies as the Church of England is at this day Thirdly Let us now consider how our Reconciler states this matter and here I shall once for all examine whatever I can find in his Book pertinent to this Argument I. Now in the first place I observe that our Reconciler agrees with Bishop Taylor That it is for ever necessary that things should be done in the Church decently and in order and that the Rulers of the Church who have the same power as the Apostles had in this must be the perpetual Iudges of it And he adds It cannot therefore rationally be denied that the Rulers of the Church have power to command things which belong unto the positive Order and Decency of the Service of God This is so fair a Concession that methinks we might agree upon it but he immediately undoes all again and says That this Command affords no ground for the
significant Ceremonies of the Church of England as of any other Church But it seems the Bishop did not think so and when the Reconciler alledges the Bishops Authority as well as Arguments against us he ought to have urged his Arguments no farther than he himself did or to have told his Readers what exceptions the Bishop made and left it to him to judge whether the exception was good and reasonable or not And I am apt to think that every ordinary Reader would have made some little difference as the Bishop did between such significant Ceremonies as are withall the necessary circumstances of religious actions and receive their Decency from their signification and such Ceremonies as contribute nothing to the decent performance of religious actions but onely entertain a childish fancy with some Theatrical Shews and arbitrary Images and Figures of things of which the Bishop there speaks And indeed all his other Citations out of the Writings of this excellent Bishop are as little to his purpose because none of them concern the decent circumstances of religious Worship which is our present Dispute and therefore we cannot from thence learn what the Bishop's judgment was in these matters as to take a brief survey of these Arguments as he calls them taken out of Bishop Taylor 's Ductor Dubitantium His first Argument is patcht up of two Sayings at the distance of fifteen pages from each other and yet they are much nearer to each other in the book than they are in their designe and signification He says The Bishop truly saith That 't is not reasonable to think that God would give the Church-Rulers his Authority for trifling and needless purposes This is said in one place and to make up his Argument he tacks another Saying to it Now Rituals saith he and Externals are nothing of the substance of Religion but onely appendages and manner and circumstances a wise man will observe them not that they are pleasing to God but because they are commanded by Laws The first of these Sayings is under the third Rule That the Church hath power to make Laws in all things of necessary Duty by a direct Power and divine Authority So that this does not relate to the circumstances of religious actions but to some necessary Duties The instance the Bishop gives in that place is this That the Bishop hath power to command his Subject or Parishioner to put away his Concubine and if he does not he not onely sins by uncleanness but by disobedience too This sure is remote enough from the Dispute of Ceremonies But then he proves that such men sin by disobeying the Bishop in such cases by this Argument among others That it is not reasonable to think that God would give the Church-Rulers his Authority for trifling and needless purposes For it is a trifling thing to have Authority to command if that Authority have no effect if men may disobey such commands without sin So that these words whereby the Bishop proves the Authority of the Church to command and that those sin who disobey our Reconciler produces to prove that the Church has no Authority to command the decent Ceremonies of Religion because in his opinion they are trifling and needless things The latter part of his Argument is taken from the Bishops sixth Rule which is this Kings and Princes are by the ties of Religion not of Power obliged to keep the Laws of the Church His resolution of which in short is this That such Ecclesiastical Laws which are the Exercises of internal Religion cannot be neglected by Princes without some straining of their duty to God which is by the wisdom and choice of men determined in such an instance to such a specification but in Externals and Rituals they have a greater liberty so that every omission is not a sin in them though it may be in Subjects and his reason is That they are nothing of the substance of Religion but onely appendages and manner and circumstances and therefore a wise man will observe Rituals because they are commanded by Laws not that they are pleasing to God Since therefore these are wholly matter of obedience Kings are free save onely when they become bound collaterally and accidentally So that the Bishop does not here speak one word of Externals and Rituals as such trifling and needless things that the Church has no Authority to command them to which purpose our Reconciler applies it but as such things which being bound on us onely by humane Authority a Soveraign Prince who owns no higher humane Authority than his own is not so strictly obliged by them as his Subjects are but may dispense with himself when he sees fit These are excellent premises for such a conclusion as our Reconciler draws from them But yet it is worth the while to consider what the Bishop means by the Externals or Rituals of Religion Whatever our Reconciler finds said about Ecclesiastical Laws or the Externals and Rituals of Religion he presently applies to the Ceremonies of the Church of England which excepting the Cross are onely decent circumstances without which or such-like the Worship of God cannot be decently or reverently performed that is without which there can be no external Worship which consists in the external expressions of Honour and Devotion It is sufficiently evident what a vast difference the Bishop makes between these two Thus he expresly does in these words To the ceremonial Law of the Iews nothing was to be added and from it nothing was to be substracted and in Christianity we have less reason to adde any thing of Ceremony excepting N. B. the circumstances and advantages of the very Ministry as time and place and vessels and ornaments and necessary appendages But when we speak of Rituals and Ceremonies that is exterior actions or things besides the institution and command of Christ c. Where he expresly distinguishes between the circumstances and advantages of the very Ministry what is necessary or convenient for the decent and orderly performance of the publick acts of Worship from Rituals or Ceremonies whereby he understands exterior actions or things that is such Ceremonies as are not the circumstances of religious actions but are distinct acts themselves either instituted as parts of Worship and then he says they are intolerable or meerly for signification and that is a very little thing and of very inconsiderable use in the fulness and charity of the Revelations Evangelical Such he reckons giving Milk and Honey or a little Wine to persons to be baptized and to present Milk together with Bread and Wine at the Lords Table to signifie nutrition by the Body and Bloud of Christ to let a Pidgeon flie to signifie the coming of the Holy Spirit to light up Candles to represent the Epiphany to dress a Bed to express the secret and ineffable Generation of the Saviour of the World to prepare the figure of the Cross and to bury an Image to describe the
of Worship too or is the bare Decency of Worship a Jewish Yoke What correspondence is there between the Ceremonies of the Jewish Law and the decent circumstances of Worship between new and distinct acts and the decent Modes of actions But our Reconciler proceeds Ecclesiastical Laws must not be perpetual that is when they are made they are relative to time and place to persons and occasions subject to all changes c. Now besides that the Bishop stills speaks of such Laws as concern Rituals and external Observances not the decent circumstances of Worship and therefore it is impertinently alleadged in our present Controversie yet suppose it did relate to our Ceremonies what advantage could he make of it They must not be perpetual that is they are alterable when the wisdom of Governours sees fit and who denies it But must every one who believes these Ceremonies alterable presently grant that they must be altered right or wrong This is much like another mangled Testimony which he cites from Rule 12. n. 9. I shall transcribe the whole because our Reconciler has concealed the sence by transcribing onely part of it Excepting those things which the Apostles received from Christ in which they were Ministers to all Ages once for all conveying the mind of Christ to Generations to come in all other things they were but ordinary Ministers to govern the Churches in their own times and left all that ordinary power to their Successors with a power to rule their Churches such as they had and therefore whatever they conveyed as from Christ a part of his Doctrine or any thing of his appointment this was to bind for ever All this our Reconciler leaves out which is a Key to what follows For Christ is our onely Lawgiver and what he said was to bind for ever In all things which he said not the Apostles could not be Lawgivers they had no such authority and therefore whatsoever they ordered by their own wisdom was to abide as long as the reason did abide but still with the same liberty with which they appointed it for of all men in the world they would least put a Snare upon the Disciples or tye Fetters upon Christian liberty To what purpose he cites this he does not say but I suppose it was to insinuate that there is no Authority in the Church to make any Laws which Christ has not made because he is our onely Lawgiver and that to make such Laws is to put a Snare upon the Disciples and to tye Fetters upon Christian Liberty which the Apostles of all men would not do but this is directly contrary to the designe of the Bishop All that he says is no more than this That the Apostles had not authority to make such Laws as should perpetually oblige the Church in all Ages for Christ onely is so our Lawgiver that his Laws are perpetual and unalterable and therefore what they taught as from Christ that was to bind for ever but what Laws they made as ordinary Ministers to govern the Churches in their own times they might be altered when the reason of them ceas'd by the Bishops and Ministers of following Ages who have as much ordinary authority for the government of the Church as the Apostles themselves had So that the Governours of the Church have authority to make Laws though not unalterable ones and therefore it is not making Laws but making perpetual Laws which he calls putting a Snare upon the Disciples and tying Fetters on Christian Liberty for the more unalterable Laws there are the less Liberty the Church enjoys and those Laws which were of excellent use when they were first made yet when their reason and use ceases might prove Snares to Christians if there were no power in the Church to repeal them All his Citations from this excellent Bishop about Ecclesiastical Laws are of the same nature they do not concern the decent circumstances of Worship but Rituals and external Ministeries of Religion and I suppose I need not tell any man how impertinent his Testimonies about Fasts and Evangelical Councils and Subscriptions to Articles c. are to this Controversie This is sufficient to prove that this excellent Bishop is ours and to satisfie all men that this Protestant Reconciler is either a very ignorant and careless Reader of Books or a shameless Impostor in suborning mens words to give testimony against their own protest and avowed Principles and Doctrines There are several other little Arguments which are frequently repeated by our Reconciler and confirmed with great Names and great Authorities though it is probable enough that he has as much abused other great men as he has done the Bishop and I have not leisure nor opportunity to examine all and it is no great matter when the Argument is weak and trifling whose Argument it is They tell us that to impose such Ceremonies and Rites of Worship is to come after Christ and to mend and correct his Laws and to require new terms of Communion which Christ hath not required This is a great fault if the charge be good and just but is the Church of England guilty of any such thing Does she require any new acts of Worship which Christ has not required Has not Christ required that we should worship God decently Has he not made Obedience to our Rulers and Governours a necessary condition of Communion And does the Church of England require any more Has the Church of England imposed any thing upon her People but the Rules of Order and Decency and has not Christ enjoyned this Are the Ceremonies of our Church decent circumstances of Worship or are they not If they be then here are no new terms of Communion here is no mending nor correcting the Laws of Christ but onely a determination of some necessary circumstances which Christ left undetermined and gave authority to his Church to determine But why should Church-Communion be suspended upon such terms as are not necessary to Salvation Why is not that sufficient to make a man a Member of a Church which is sufficient to carry him to Heaven No doubt but it is and the Church of England requires no more The Decency of Worship is as necessary to eternal Salvation as publick Worship is which is not Worship if it be not decent Decency is necessary and though such or such particular Modes of Decency be not necessary yet some decent Mode of Worship is and therefore that Church which requires no more than the Decency of Worship requires nothing but what is necessary to Salvation That which confounds and blunders these men and makes them dream of new terms of Communion is this That they distinguish the act of Worship from the manner of performing it and because Christ hath onely instituted and commanded the act but the Church directs and prescribes the manner therefore they say the Church mends Christs Laws and makes new terms of Communion by requiring something more than Christ has
Church-Authority that without it the wisdom of Christ is obscured and exposed to censure the Peace and Unity of Christians rendered impracticable Protestants left destitute of any means of Union and occasion given to Papists to cry up the necessity of an infallible Judge that which draws so many fatal consequents after it does not seem to me to be any great act of charity and yet thus it would be should the Governours of the Church in compliance with the frowardness and scruples of Schismaticks give up their authority in the Externals of Worship and leave every man to do as he pleased While the Church maintains her Authority a little Discipline and Government and a few good Arguments may in time cure the Schism and if it will not let Schismaticks answer for it at the last day but if Schismaticks once gain this point and wheedle the Church for peace sake out of her Authority then we must bid an eternal farewel to Peace and Order and Uniformity in Religion for men will never agree in these matters without the determination of Authority There is no other means left in the Church to decide these differences when the Church has parted with her Authority and thus the Wisdom of Christ will be reproached and censured and the Protestant Name and Religion exposed to contempt and this is our Reconciler's Protestant Charity Well but suppose this compliance with Dissenters did not infer a renuntiation of their Power and Authority but onely a suspension of the exercise of it the case is much the same for this forbearance must be for ever unless we could suppose that these men will return to the obedience of the Church when the Church leaves off to command Now it is the same thing for the Church to renounce her Power and to renounce the exercise of it I suppose Christ gave this Power to the Church that she should exercise it and if the Power be necessary to the welfare and unity and edification of the Church to be sure the exercise of it is For Authority is a meer empty name and good for nothing when it doth nothing This I think is sufficient to prove that the charity of Governours does not require them to renounce their Government neither in the authority nor exercise of it And therefore II. The Charity of Governours must consist in the acts and exercise of Government that is as far as it concerns our present Dispute in making and repealing Laws And I dare joyn issue here with our Reconciler and challenge him and all his dissenting Clients to fix the least imputation of uncharitableness upon the Church of England on this account as to discourse this matter a little more particularly to confound all such unjust Defamers of Authority and Government 1. I shall begin with repealing Laws and altering such Rituals and Ceremonies as were either sinful superstitious or inconvenient because here our Reformation began And what Rules our Church ' observed in this we learn from the Preface to the Common-Prayer where the reasons are assigned why some Ceremonies were abolish'd As 1. Becauâ—e some of them which were at first well intended did in time degenerate into vanity and superstition 2. Others were from the beginning the effects of an indiscreet Devotion and such a Zeal as was without knowledge and dayly grew to more and more abuses and they were rejected because they were unprofitable blinded the people hindred them from a right understanding of the true nature of Christian Religion and obscured the glory of God 3. Some were put away because their very numbers were an intolerable burden and made the estate of Christian people in worse case concerning this matter than were the Jews as St. Austin complained in his days when the number of Ceremonies was much less than it was in this Church at the time of Reformation which was a great injury to the Gospel of Christ which is not a Ceremonial Law as much of Moses Law was but a Religion to serve God not in the bondage of the figure or shadow but in the freedom of the Spirit And lastly the most weighty cause of the abolishment of certain Ceremonies was that they were so far abused partly by the superstitious blindness of the ignorant and unlearned and partly by the unsatiable avarice of such as sought more their own lucre than the glory of God that the abuses could not well be taken away the thing remaining still With what grave and mature consideration our Church proceeded in this affair is evident from this account which contains all the wise reasons that can be thought of for the alteration of any publick Constitutions Here is charity to the Souls of men in delivering them from ignorance and superstition to which they were betrayed by the Rituals and Ceremonies of Religion a tender regard to the case and liberty of Christians which was oppressed by such a multitude as were hard to know and to remember and very troublesom to observe and almost impossible to understand which made them wholly useless and unprofitable Here is a great regard to the glory of God which was obscured by these Ceremonies to the purity of the Christian Religion which was transformed by a multitude of Ceremonies into a meer external and figurative Worship And here are the true reasons why any Ceremonies which have been long used in a Church and confirmed by Ecclesiastical Canons or Civil Laws ought notwithstanding that to be removed when either their numbers are excessive or the abuses of them such as cannot be taken away without abolishing the Ceremony it self Several instances of this may be given as to name onely Images in Churches which could not be safely retained at that time without the danger of idolatrous Worship For the generality of people in those days were so superstitiously addicted to the worship of Images that had they been left in Churches though the worship of them had been expresly forbid yet infinite numbers of people would have worshipped them notwithstanding This very reason our Church gives in her Homily against the peril of Idolatry part 3. of the necessity of removing Images out of Churches That as well by the origine and nature of Idols and Images themselves as by the proneness and inclination of mans corrupt nature to Idolatry it is evident that neither Images if they be publickly set up can be separated nor men if they see Images in Temples and Churches can be stayed and kept from Idolatry Wherefore they which thus reason though it be not expedient yet it is lawful to have Images publickly and do prove that lawfulness by a few picked and chosen men if they object that indifferently to all men which a very few can have without hurt and offence they seem to take the multitude for vile Souls of whose loss and safeguard no reputation is to be had for whom Christ yet paid as dearly as for the mightiest Prince or the wisest and best learned of the Earth
And they that would have it generally to be taken for indifferent that a very few take no hurt of it though infinite multitudes besides perish thereby shew that they put little difference between the multitudes of Christians and bruit Beasts whose danger they do so little esteem Thus in another place of the same Homily What shall I say of them who lay stumbling-blocks where before there were none and set snares for the feet nay for the souls of weak and simple ones and work the danger of everlasting destruction for whom our Saviour shed his most pretious Bloud where better it were that the Arts of painting plaistering carving or graving never had been found out or used than one of them whose Souls in the sight of God are so precious should by occasion of Images or Pictures perish and be lost This makes it very evident that our Church in her Reformation had a peculiar regard to the care of mens Souls and therefore removed whatever might prove a snare and temptation to them and so hazard their eternal salvation Our Reconciler transcribes these Passages out of that Homily and endeavours from thence to prove that the Church by a parity of Reason and out of care of mens Souls ought to part with all other Ceremonies since the imposition of them tempts men to Schism which is a damning sin But is there no difference between these two cases The Church must not retain that which though it may possibly be innocently used by some men yet is apt in its own nature to tempt the generality of men to sin as Images in Churches are to tempt men to Idolatry and the Church must not retain such Ceremonies which serve to very good purposes in Religion and are not apt in their own natures to serve any bad one because there are some men who will not submit to such Impositions but will separate from the Church and involve themselves in the guilt of a damning Schism if such Ceremonies be imposed Let us put a like case and see how this Argument will look then A Father out of charity to the Soul of his Son must not carry him to nor indulge him in going familiarly to the Tavern or the Stews because though it is possible to go to those places without being drunk or unchast yet very few young men can resist such temptations and therefore he apparently hazards his Son by it Now suppose from hence our Reconciler should argue that by a parity of Reason he ought not to command his Son to go to School nor to do any thing which he strongly suspects he will not obey him in though it be otherwise very innocent and useful and fit to be commanded because this involves his Son in the guilt of disobedience to his Father which is a damning sin and will destroy his Soul as well as Adultery or Drunkenness What would all Parents think of such a Casuist as this At this rate a disobedient Son must give Laws to his Father as well as a Schismatick give Laws to the Church Superiours must not in charity command any thing but what Inferiours please to obey for if they disobey and be damned for their disobedience those Superiours who commanded what their Inferiours would not obey are guilty of their damnation But the plain Answer to it is this The obligations of Charity extend no farther than our own part and duty does for we cannot shew our charity in that which is not our duty nor in our power to help or hinder Whatever evil happens to others upon the neglect of our duty or the uncharitable performance of it is imputable to us but if other men by the neglect of their own duty accidentally suffer by what we have wisely and charitably done the sin and guilt as well as misery is their own Otherwise it were a dangerous thing for us to do our duty unless we were sure that other men would do theirs For the wise and charitable discharge of our duty may in most cases aggravate the sin and condemnation of those who will not do theirs It may at this rate prove the most uncharitable thing in the world to reprove an obstinate and incorrigible sinner or to attempt to convince an obdurate and inflexible Schismatick because such reproofs and such means of conviction if they do not reclaim them make their sin more inexcusable Thus it is between Governours and Subjects It is the duty of Governours to govern and they must do it wisely and charitably and it is the duty of Subjects to obey If the Subjects suffer by the ill government of their Superiours it is their fault if they suffer by their own disobedience the fault also is their own If the Governours of the Church set up Images in Churches which is a great temptation to people to worship them especially if they have been educated in such an idolatrous Worship this is very uncharitably done and argues little care of mens Souls but if they give wise and charitable Rules of Worship and people will not obey them but divide themselves from the Church and unite in a Schism if they be damned for their Disobedience and their Schism the fault is their own 2. Let us now consider what Rules our Church observed in retaining Ceremonies and if she have acted as charitably there too I know not where our Reconciler will fix the charge of uncharitableness upon the Church Now she has retained but very few and therefore they are not burdensom by their numbers nor do they obscure or adulterate the simplicity of the Christian Worship She has retained onely those which are for decent Order and Edification since without some Ceremonies it is not possible to keep any Order or quiet Discipline in the Church She has retained such as are venerable for their antiquity and age and have a plain and easie signification are neither dark nor dumb Ceremonies but so set forth that every man may understand what they do mean and to what use they do serve For though meer signification without any other use is a very little thing in Christian Religion yet when the decent circumstances of Worship which are necessary to the orderly performance of it have an additional signification also suitable to the nature of the Worship we are engaged in it is an additional ornament and advantage to the Ministry as I have already discours'd Nay the Church has taken care as she says to appoint such Ceremonies as are least capable of being abused to superstition That it is not like that they in time should be abused as others have been In which case she has left a liberty to alter them if they should be so abused which is the onely reasonable occasion there can be for such an alteration Now how any Church can be more easie and charitable in her Impositions I confess I cannot tell and if that be a charitable Church whose Impositions are easie and charitable which are innocent and
useful themselves and not apt to tempt men to any sin then the Church of England is very charitable though Dissenters should be damned for their wilful and causeless Schism But besides this as far as it is possible to prevent the Cavils of evil-minded men our Church has taken care to explain the meaning of the signe of the Cross in Baptism and kneeling at receiving the Lords Supper to remove all suspicions of any superstitious opinions about them which is an Argument of great charity and great care of the Souls of men But you will say Had it not been greater charity to the Souls of men not to have retained such Ceremonies as needed explication than to explain the meaning of them which may not give satisfaction to all men of the lawfulness of their use This were something to the purpose indeed were there any thing doubtful in their signification but it is not the obscureness of these Ceremonies but the perverseness of men who endeavour to find out some superstition in them which makes such Declarations of the Church more charitable still as being a condescension not to the ignorance but to the frowardness of her Children Though to worship the Cross be Idolatry to use it as a Charm and Spell savour of Superstition yet to use it as a venerable Badge of our Christian Profession is neither and no man can reasonably suspect that it is used otherwise in Baptism To kneel at the Sacrament is a decent posture of receiving and can never be suspected as an act of Worship to the Bread in those who believe that after consecration it is Bread still and not the natural Body of Christ for to worship Bread which we believe to be nothing but Bread would be a more absurd Idolatry than the Papists are guilty of who believe it not to be Bread but the Body of Christ. This reason the Church assigns for it in the second Common-Prayer-Book of Edward the Sixth Although no Order can be so perfectly devised but it may by some either for their ignorance and infirmity or else for malice and obstinacy be misconstrued depraved and interpreted in a wrong part yet because brotherly charity willeth that so much as conveniently may be offences should be taken away therefore we willing to do the same declare that in kneeling at the Sacrament no adoration of the Elements is intended Thus our Reconciler cites this passages and I must trust him at present because I have not the Book by me but this sufficiently proves what I alleadge it for that our Church did not adde this explication as apprehending any necessity of it but to prevent the absurd interpretations of ignorant or malicious Cavillers But what our Reconciler adds Who can tell why this whole Preface in our present Common-Prayer-Book is left out is only a spightful insinuation of I know not what since the same Declaration is as large and full in our Common-Prayer-Book as words can make it But he proceeds and Why that Charity which willeth that as much as conveniently may be offences should be taken away should not will also the taking away or the abatement of unnecessary Ceremonies or alteration of scrupled expressions in our Liturgie I am not bound to answer these trifling Cavils as often as he repeats them but I think every man of sense will see some little difference between making the Rules and Orders of the Church as inoffensive as may be and destroying all decent and orderly Constitutions the first is such a Charity as becomes Governours the second is nothing better than the dissolution of Government But of Scruples more presently Thus our Reconciler observes that the Convocation held An. 1640. speaking of the laudable custom of bowing with the body in token of our reverence of God when we come into the place of publick Worship saith thus In the practice or admission of this Rite we desire the Rule of Charity prescribed by the Apostle may be observed which is That they who use this Rite despise not them who use it not and they who use it not condemn not them who use it Now saith the Author of the mischief of Impositions I would gladly hear a fair reason given why the Apostle should prescribe the Rule of Charity to be observed in this one Rite or Ceremony more than another And our Reconciler very modestly adds The Apostle prescribes a Rule and they will make use of it when and where and in what cases they please and in others where it is as useful lay it by like one of their vacated Canons This is wonderful deference to Authority But however this is another instance of the Churches Charity and moderation at least in this one Rite and methinks it deserved a little more civility than to be turned into an Argument of Reproach But cannot our Reconciler guess at any reason for this difference why she should grant that liberty in this one Rite which she denies in other cases Why then I 'll tell him one Because it is more capable of such an indulgence than other Ceremonies are for it is an act of private Worship though performed in the publick Church and therefore different usages in such matters do not disturb the Order and Decency of publick Worship When we offer up our common Worship to God which is the act of the whole Congregation it is fitting that there should be one Rule and Order observed for Uniformity is necessary to the Decency of Worship and to the Unity of it but there is no necessity that all mens private Devotions should be alike And it is possible to think of another reason too That this bowing the body in reverence to God when we enter into his house is properly a Ritual or Ceremony that is an exteriour action or thing not meerly a circumstance of Worship it is it self an external Rite of Worship not the circumstance of any other act It may be very decent to bow our body in reverence to God when we enter his house but it is not a decent circumstance of religious Worship and therefore there is not the same necessity that the Church should determine it as there is that she should determine the necessary circumstances of action without which the Worship of God cannot be decently performed and it seems to me to be an Argument of great wisdom in the Church that she has not made an uniformity in this Rite as necessary as in the other Ceremonies of Religion since there is not an equal necessity for it And I further adde that the Apostles Rule of Charity not to judge and censure one another upon such different usages does not relate to those Ceremonies which are also the decent circumstances of religious actions and so are necessary to the uniformity of publick Worship which must not be neglected out of a pretence of Charity but it may extend to such Rites as these which shews the great judgment of our Church in applying this Rule
to one case and not to the other and argues great ignorance as well as impudence in our Reconciler to censure it which I shall largely prove when I come to answer his fourth Chapter And because our Reconciler so often mentions not onely the abatement of the Ceremonies but the alteration of some scrupled expressions in the Liturgy without mentioning what those are I can give no other answer to it but to represent that account which is given us of those late alterations which were made in our Liturgy as we find it in the Preface to the Common-Prayer-Book Our general aim therefore in this undertaking was not to gratisie this or that Party in any of their unreasonable demands but to do that which to our best understanding we conceived might most tend to the preservation of peace and unity in the Church the procuring of Reverence and exciting of Piety and Devotion in the publick Worship of God and the cutting off occasion from them that seek occasion of cavil or quarrel against the Liturgie of our Church Most of the alterations were made for the more proper expressing of some words or phrases of ancient usage in terms more suitable to the Language of the present times and the clearer explanation of some other words or phrases which were either of doubtful signification or otherwise liable to misconstruction And what other Rule our Reconciler would have the Church observe in altering scrupled phrases I cannot tell for if she muâ—t alter while some people cease to scruple she must alter it all or rather take it quite away 3. But you will say It is at least a breach of Charity to impose such Rites and Ceremonies as are scrupled by great numbers of Christians and the imposition of which occasions a formidable Schism in the Church As for the Schisms and Divisions which are said to be occasioned by the imposition of these Ceremonies I shall consider that in the next Chapter My designe at present leads me to consider the Mistakes and Scruples of Christians and how far Governours ought to have any regard to them and for the explication of this there are several things to be observed 1. I readily grant that the Church ought not to command any thing which is of a doubtful or suspicious nature for where the thing is doubtful her Authority to command is doubtful too Or rather it is certain that the Church has no Authority in doubtful matters for her Authority can be no larger than her Commission and it is no part of her Commission to teach or command things which are doubtful Thus it may well be doubted whether it be lawful to set up Images in Churches to pray before a Crucifix to excite and quicken our Devotions though we have no intention to pay any religious homage to them For the same reason the Church cannot by her Authority adopt doubtful Propositions into Articles of Faith and require all Christians to believe them as the necessary terms of Communion To this purpose our Reconciler at his usual impertinent rate of Citations alleadges several passages out of Mr. Chillingworth to prove that no doubtful Propositions ought to be made Articles of Faith or necessary terms of Communion in which I perfectly agree with Mr. Chillingworth but can by no means see how it follows from hence that because the Church must not make new Articles of Faith therefore she must not prescribe the necessary Rules of Worship that because she must not impose things which are of a doubtful nature therefore she must not command any thing which some people raise doubts and scruples about But our Reconciler thinks that it is a sufficient evidence that a thing is doubtful and that the peace and unity of the Church ought not to be suspended upon the determination of it when there are a great number of men doubt of it and the thing is disputed and controverted and Arguments produced on both sides and if this be so there is not any Article of our Faith but what is doubtful it is very doubtful whether there be a God and whether Christ were the true Messias or an Importer for we know there are a great many Atheists Jews Turks and Infidels in the world And if it be an Argument against the Ceremonies of the Church of England that Dissenters dispute against them if this prove That the peace and unity of the Church ought not to be suspended upon submission to them and that the decision of the Controversie concerning them was not intended as a necessary means for the peace and unity of the Church of God in these Kingdoms farewell to all certainty in Religion But he proves this by an Argument transcribed from Dr. Stillingfleet's Irenicum a book which certainly did such great service at the time when it was written to draw men on to a calm consideration of things and whose Reverend Author has done such excellent service since to the Church of England by his incomparable Writings both against Papists and Fanaticks that whatever fault there may be in it both the Book and the Author have merited something more than a pardon especially since that Book stands now upon its own legs and can derive no authority from that great Name he having sufficiently declared his dislike and I think sufficiently answered some principal parts of it himself And though I cannot assent to every Proposition in the Irenicum as I am pretty sure the Author himself does not yet I can by no means think that it deserves all that clamour which some men have raised against it I am sure it never can make any man a Dissenter and I think it much more desirable and more for the interest of the Church that men should conform upon the Principles of the Irenicum than that they should continue Dissenters I could not forbear saying this once for all out of that sincere honour I have for that excellent person who has met with very ill usage from some men who either envy his deserved praises or hope to make themselves considerable by being his Rivals But let us hear what the Argument is Where probable Arguments are brought for the maintaining one part of an Opinion as well as another though the Arguments brought be not convincing for the necessary entertaining either part to an unbyassed understanding yet the difference of their Opinions is Argument sufficient that the thing contended for is not so clear as both Parties would make it to be on their own sides and if it be not a thing of necessity to salvation it gives men ground to think that the final decision of the matter in controversie was never intended as a necessary means for the peace and unity of the Church of God Now I confess I see no reason why I may not assent to all this for if the Arguments be onely probable on both sides and such as are not convincing either way to an unbyassed judgment it is a signe the
hard case as such cases will happen under all Governments God who is our supreme Governour will take care to rectifie it when the Governours of Church or State cannot do it without loosening the Sinews of Government As for instance The Governours of the Church must take care to prescribe Rules for the decent performance of religious Worship and in such an Age of mistakes and scruples as this it is possible some very honest but weak Christians may take offence at the best and most prudent Constitutions and separate from the Church and involve themselves in the guilt of Schism what must the Church do in this case Must she alter her Laws as often as any Christians pretend to scruple them or must she make no Laws about such matters but suffer every Christian to worship God as he pleases This is to renounce their Government because some Christians will not obey or to make Government contemptible and ridiculous when it must yield to mens private fancies and scruples And yet it is very hard that the Government of the Church which is instituted for the care of mens Souls should prove a snare and temptation to them and occasion their eternal ruine and misery But I hope that there is no necessity for either of these Governours must do their duty must take care to make such Laws as are for the advantage of Religion and the edification of the Church and are least liable to any just offence and if after all their care some very honest men may take offence and fall into Schism we must leave them to the mercy of God who will make allowances for all favourable cases The Church can give no relief in such cases without destroying her Authority and Government and giving advantage to Knaves and designing Hypocrites to disturb the best constitutions of things but God can distinguish between honest men and Hypocrites and if men be sincerely honest and do fall into Schism through an innocent mistake God will be merciful to them which secures the final happiness of good men and yet maintains the sacredness and reverence of Authority For when men know that nothing can justifie a Schism and nothing can plead their pardon with God but great honesty and some invincible mistake it will make all honest men careful how they separate from the Church and diligent in the use of all means for their satisfaction without which no man can pass with Almighty God for an honest Separatist and I doubt not but were men convinced of this it would sooner cure our Schisms than the removal of all scrupled Ceremonies But in is so far from being the duty of Church-Governours to take any notice of mens scruples when there is no just occasion for them that they ought not to allow any man to scruple their authority in such matters which weakens Government and opens a gap for eternal Schisms to enter It is very true as our Reconciler has proved at large in a whole Chapter to that purpose that the Church in several Ages has made great alterations in the Externals and Rituals of Religion but how this serves his Cause I cannot tell No body questions but the Church has done this and that she had authority to do it and that she has so still when she sees just occasion to do it but the Question is Whether she must do this as often as every little Reconciler or every scrupulous Christian demands such an alteration The Question is Whether unreasonable scruples and prejudices be a necessary reason for the Church to make such alterations And if he can give any one example in all Antiquity that the Church altered her Constitutions for no other reason but to comply with the scruples of private Christians he will say something to the purpose No in those days private Christians did not use to scruple any Ceremonies which the Governours of the Church thought fit to appoint but Bishops made or repealed Laws about such matters as they thought most expedient for the good government of the Church The Question is Whether they repealed all Laws for the Order and Decency of Worship or renounced their Authority to make such Laws in compliance with those who denied any such Authority to the Church Again the Question is Whether in the same Church they allowed all private Christians to worship God after what manner they pleased according to their own private perswasions and apprehensions of these things that those who are for a May-pole may have a May-pole as our Reconciler very reverently expresses it If he can say any thing to these points I confess it will be to his purpose and therefore I would desire him to consider of it now he knows what he is to prove But though his History of those alterations which the Church in several Ages has made in the Rituals and Ceremonies of Religion would not serve his main designe yet it highly gratified his pride and insolence to trample upon a great man whom he thought he had taken at some advantage The Reverend Dean of St. Pauls assigns some reasons why the Church of England still retains the use of some Ceremonies His first reason is out of a due reverence to Antiquity They would hereby convince the Papists they did put a difference between the gross and intolerable Superstitions of Popery and the innocent Rites and Practices which were observed in the Church before This says our Reconciler is very like Hypocrisie to pretend to retain three Ceremonies of humane institution out of respect to their supposed antiquity whilst we reject as many which were unquestionably of a divine original and therefore sure of an antiquity which more deserveth to be reverenced Truly if our Church has parted with any thing of a divine original I think she has reformed too far but will our Reconciler say that every thing that was an Apostolical Practice is of divine original Bishop Taylor to whom he so often appeals would have taught him otherwise as I have already observed who says that the Apostles in ordering religious Assemblies and in prescribing such Rules of Worship as they did not immediately receive from Christ acted but as ordinary Ministers of the Church and what they prescribed obliged no longer than the reason and expediency of the things and the Governours of the Church in after-Ages had as full and ample Authority as the Apostles themselves in such matters But does the Dean say that these Ceremonies were retained onely for their antiquity then indeed the Reconciler's Objection had been strong that other Ceremonies which are as ancient as they should have been retained also But is it not a just reverence to Antiquity that when our Church had for other reasons determined what number of Ceremonies to retain and for what ends and purposes she chuses to use such Ceremonies as were anciently used in the Christian Church rather than to invent any new ones for it had been an affront to the ancient
the Church ought in charity to the people to shew them the blindness of their Guides and therefore not to comply with them in their superstitious scruples III. But the men who were offended at it were onely Hypocrites whose hearts were hardened against the truth What were they all Hypocrites was there not one honest man among them Some Hypocrites there were then and so there are still Hypocrites in another sence than these men were Hypocrites For the Jews did generally believe the unlawfulness of any kind of work on the Sabbath-day and therefore were really scandalized and offended but we have a company of Hypocrites among us who do not really scruple what they pretend to do but onely make a pretence of scruples an occasion to abuse the People to stir up Schisms in the Church and Factions in the State men who can conform when they please and be offended and scandalized when they please But our Lord did all that could be reasonable to prevent their scandal No he did not abstain from working Miracles on the Sabbath-day which he might have done if he had pleased but he was so far from avoiding giving offence to them that he did it on purpose because they were offended at it and to deliver men from such Superstitions as made them take offence But he first satisfies them from their own practice on a less occasion and from the nature of the action and that with so much evidence and conviction that they were ashamed and could not answer him one word And has our Church been wanting in this to give satisfaction to Dissenters How many unanswerable Books have been written in justification of the Constitutions and Worship of our Church And that our Dissenters are not ashamed but will talk on when they have not one wise word to say is onely an Argument that they have less wit and more impudence than the Pharisees had Our Church indeed cannot work Miracles as Christ did to convince them though where plain and convincing Reasons will not do I doubt Miracles will not do neither for though the Pharisees were silenced by Christ yet they were neither convinc'd by his Reasons nor his Miracles Thus I have considered what obligation Charity to the Souls of men lays upon the Governours of the Church to abate those Ceremonies which some men scruple and take offence at But I must here briefly consider one Principle more of our Reconcilers which he no-where pretends to prove but takes for granted That the Charity of Governours requires the abatement of every thing which is not absolutely necessary in Religion if it prove an occasion of scruple and offence For why must the Church be tyed up to what is necessary Her Power and Authority extends to things which are useful and expedient though not absolutely necessary and therefore she may exercise this Power according to the measures of Prudence and Charity notwithstanding the unreasonable superstitious scruples of men which ought to lay no restraint upon the prudent Exercise of Government as I think I have already sufficiently proved and yet our Reconciler thinks it a sufficient reason why the Church should alter any scrupled Ceremonies how decent or expedient soever they are if we cannot prove them to be absolutely necessary Thus I have considered the main Principles of his Book and shall not think my self any further concerned to take notice of them as often as I meet with them If these Principles which I have now laid down hold good his Book is answered and the Governours of the Church may exercise their just Authority and he that is offended let him be offended And yet for the more ample satisfaction of all men what a trifler our Reconciler is I shall particularly examine his Arguments from Scripture and shew how impertinent they are to our present Dispute CHAP. III. Concerning a more particular Answer to our Reconciler's Objections against the imposition of indifferent things when they are an occasion of Discords Divisians and Schisms THough what I have already discours'd bâ— sufficient to satisfie every impartial Reader that all our Reconciler's Arguments are meer Fallacies as proceeding upon false and mistaken Principles yet for the more abundant satisfaction of all who are willing to be informed I shall proceed to a more particular examination of his Reasons why Church-Governours ought to alter or abate such scrupled Ceremonies I. And first he declaims very copiously about the great evil and mischief of Divisions and truly I believe Discord and Division especially among Christian Brethren to be as bad a thing as he can possibly describe it to be But what then what then the consequence is very plain For if Conformists do not conceive it better at least that we should run the hazard of all these dreadful evils than that we should consent to lay aside the imposition of a few indifferent Ceremonies or to the altering of a few scrupled expressions in our Liturgie then must they yield up these few Ceremonies and alter these expressions to prevent all the aforesaid evils 1. I answer Does our Reconciler then think that every thing that is the occasion of Discords and Divisions must be removed Is the cause of Divisions in the nature of things or in the minds of men And is it not most proper to apply the remedy to the disease to instruct people that they ought not to quarrel about such matters that they ought to pay such deference to their Superiours as chearfully to obey them in all things which God has not expresly forbid Till this be done the Church may aâ—ter her Constitutions every year and be as far off from Peace as now for while men are ignorant scrupulous and quarrelsome it is impossible for the Governours of Church and State by the most wise and prudent Constitutions to prevent Divisions 2. Is not the contempt of Ecclesiastical Authority and the rude and unmannerly performance of religious Worship as great a mischief as Divisions and yet it is impossible to indulge every scrupulous person without destroying the Authority of the Church and the Decency of Worship as I have already proved Now I must confess bonâ fide to our Reconciler that I think all our Divisions about Ceremonies a less scandal to the Christian Religion than this would be for it is better to have a well constituted Church with Division than to have none without it 3. Will our parting with some few Ceremonies cure these Divisions which he so much complains of This our Reconciler cannot undertake for and it is demonstrable it will not Is this the onely Controversie that Presbyterians Independents Quakers and other Sectaries have with the Church of England Has our Reconciler never read Mr. Baxter's Pleas for Peace and those other venomous Pamphlets of late date When the Church of England was pull'd down and these Ceremonies and Episcopacy it self removed out of the way did it cure Divisions or increase them When the Reverend Dean
of St. Pauls made some Proposals for the ease of scrupulous persons with reference to these Ceremonies what thanks had he for it How many bitter Invectives were written against him And can we flatter our selves then that the removal of these Ceremonies would cure our Divisions And if it will not why does he urge the evil and mischief of Divisions to perswade the Church to part with these Ceremonies Whatever other reasons there may be to part with these Ceremonies the cure of Divisions can be no reason when we certainly know before-hand that this will not cure them unless he thinks the Church bound to act upon such reasons as he himself and every body else knows to be no reason for nothing can be a reason for doing a thing which cannot be obtained by doing it But because our Reconciler attempts to say something to this in his tenth Chapter I shall follow him thither His first Objection is That the Church will gain little by such an Indulgence and this I verily believe to be true Let us hear then what he has to say to it And 1. he takes it for granted that he has already proved it the duty of Superiours to condescend in matters of this nature rather than to debar men from Communion with the Church of Christ for things unnecessary and which they nowhere are commanded to impose and if so let us do our duty and commit the event to God Now I answer 1. I can by no means grant that he has proved this and have in part already and doubt not to make it appear before I have done that he has not proved it But 2. Suppose he had proved that it is the duty of Superiours to condescend in such matters when they can do any good by their condescension has he proved also that it is their duty to condescend when they know they can do no good by it When these Divisions will not be cured by such condescension which is the present case The gaining of some very few Proselytes would not countervail the mischief of altering publick Constitutions though we should suppose it reasonable to condescend to such alterations when we can propose any great and publick good by doing it II. Our Reconciler answers Suppose that we by yielding in these matters should not reduce one of the Tribe of our dissenting Brethren yet should we take off their most plausible pretences and leave them nothing which could be rationally offered as a ground of Separation or accusation of our proceedings against them I doubt not but our Dissenters despise this Reconciler in their hearts for thinking that they have no plausible pretences nor rational grounds of Separation but the Dispute about Ceremonies What pretences then have the Dissenters in Scotland where none of these things are imposed And are they more quiet and peaceable or less clamorous in their Complaints than our Dissenters in England For whose sake shall the Church make this Experiment with the loss of their own Orders and Constitutions for the sake of Dissenters And what charity is it to them to discover their obstinacy and hypocrisie and render them more inexcusable to God and men Is it to satisfie our selves that the Dissenters are a sort of peevish and obstinate Schismaticks who will make Divisions without any just pretence or reason for it We know this already we know they have no rational grounds for their Separation though these Ceremonies be not removed Or do we think to stop their mouths and escape their reproaches and censures As if any man could stop the mouth of a Schismatick or make him blush Those who are resolved to continue Schismaticks will always find something to say for it and let them talk on the true Sons of the Church will defend her Constitutions with more reason than Dissenters reproach them III. However he says This will intirely stop the mouths of the Layety and if they be gained their Preachers must follow But who told him this I am sure Mr. Baxter often complains that their Layety is so headstrong and stubborn that they cannot govern them and in all my observation I find that they are as fond of Schism as zealous against Liturgies and Bishops as obstinately addicted to the peculiar Opinions and Practices of their Party as their Preachers are though I am of our Reconciler's mind that their Preachers will sooner follow their People to Church than the People their Preachers But with what face can our Reconciler say That these Ceremonies chiefly debar the Layety from full Communion with us when every one knows the contrary They can communicate with us notwithstanding these Ceremonies when they please and when they can serve any interest by it and their Preachers can give them leave to do so and is it not an admirable reason for altering the establish'd Constitutions of a Church to gratifie such humoursome Schismaticks who can conform when they please IV. He adds They who at first dissented from the Constitution of our Church declared they did it purely upon the account of these things i. e. the Ceremonies still used among us This now is a mistake in History for the first dislike that was taken against our Church was for the square Cap and Tippet and some Episcopal habitâ— which are not talked of in our days and some of which were used in the Universities without scruple in the late blessed times of Reformation But the use of these Ceremonies was never scrupled till Queen Elizabeth's days which was the fruit of the former Heats at Francford during the Marian Persecution and these men indeed did dissent as our Reconciler expresses it that is they expressed their dislike of these things but they did not separate upon it The first that made any steps to Separation set up other pretences complained for want of a right Ministry a right Government in the Church according to the Scriptures without which there can be no right Religion which are the pretences of our Separatists at this day Well but suppose what he says to be true what reason is this for altering our Ceremonies at this day Will our Separatists conform now if these Ceremonies are taken away That he dares not say but we shall gain this by it That it will appear that they are not the genuine Off-spring of the old dissenting Protestants As if any man but a Reconciler were to learn that now when it has been so often proved upon them and they themselves scorn and huff at the Argument and will not have the old Puritans made a President for them V. In the Treaty at the Savoy the abatement of the Ceremonies and the alteration of some disputable passages in the Liturgie was all that was contended for That is he means the Dispute went no farther but if they had gained these points we should then have heard more of them I am sure whoever reads their Petition for Peace will find all the Principles of Mr. Baxter's
â—udge when it is fit to stop and every wise man will think it fit to stop when she has cast every thing out of her Worship which is a just cause of scandal and offence and if she goes further to satisfie unreasonable and clamorous demands she can never have a reason to stop till she has satisfied all Clamours 2. Yes says our Reconciler she may remove things indifferent and unnecessary which is all at present desired No say I she cannot part with all things which are in their own nature indifferent for some such things are necessary to the Order and Decency of Worship which must not be parted with and the Church never owned the contrary She says indeed that her particular Ceremonies are indifferent and alterable that we may exchange one decent Ceremony for another when there is reason for it but the Church ought to alter no Ceremony without reason nor part with all indifferent Ceremonies for the external Decency of Worship for any reason And now we are beholden to him that 3. He grants with some reconciling salvo's that we must not part with our Church-government under the pretence of parting with indifferent things But if we must not part with that we may as well keep all the rest for our Divisions will be the same No party ever separated from the Church for the sake of Ceremonies who did not quarrel with the Order and Authority of Bishops The rest of his Arguments in that Chapter do not concern this business but whatever he would prove by them there are two general Answers will serve for them all 1. That indifferent things which serve the ends of Order Decency are not such unnecessary trifles as to be parted with for no reason which I think I have sufficiently proved above And 2. Tâ—at parting with them will not heal our Divisions and therefore at least upon that account there is no reason to part with them What I have now discours'd about Divisions and Discords is a sufficient Answer to his next long Harangue about the evil of Schism in which I heartily concur with him as believing that Schism it self will shut men out of the Kingdom of Heaven which is as bad a thing as can be said of it and therefore out of love to my Brother's Soul I would not upon any account be guilty of his Schism But how does this prove that Church-Governours must part with the Rites and Ceremonies of Religion Oh! because Dissenters take offence at these things and run into Schism and consequently must be damned for it and therefore Charity obliges to part with such indifferent things to prevent the eternal damnation of so many Souls But now 1. Suppose the imposition of these Ceremonies be neither the cause of the Schism nor the removal of them the cure of it what then Why must the Church part with these Ceremonies which are of good use in Religion to no purpose And yet this is the truth of the case as appears from what I have already discours'd The several Sects of Religion were Schismaticks to each other when there were no Ceremonies to trouble them and would be so again if the Church of England were once more laid in the dust No man separates from the Church of England who has not espoused some Principles of Faith or Government besides the Controversie about Ceremonies contrary to the Faith and Government of the Church and will the removal of Ceremonies make them Orthodox in all other points or are they of such squeamish Consciences that they can submit to an Antichristian Hierarchy and an Antichristian Liturgy but not to Ceremonies 2. The Argument of Schism is the very worst Argument our Reconciler could have used as being directly contrary to the end and designe of it All the Authority the Church has depends on the danger of Schism and the necessity of Christian Communion The onely punishment she can inflict on refractory and disobedient Members is to cast them out of the Church and that is a very terrible punishment too if there be no ordinary means of salvation out of the Communion of the Church and therefore the danger of Schism is a very good Argument to perswade Dissenters to consider well what they do and not to engage themselves in a wilful and unnecessary Schism But it is a pretty odde way to perswade the Governours of the Church out of the exercise of their just Authority for fear some men should turn Schismaticks and be damned for it The reason why the Gospel has threatned such severe punishments against Schism is to make the Authority of the Church sacred and venerable that no man should dare to divide the Communion of the Church or to separate from their Bishops and Pastors without great and necessary reason and our Reconciler would fright the Church out of the exercise of her just Authority for fear men should prove Schismaticks and be damned for it Christ has made Schism a damning sin to give Authority to the Church and our Reconciler would perswade the Church not to exercise her Authority for fear men should be damned for their Schism Now whether our Saviour who thought it better that Schismaticks should be damned than that there should be no Authority in the Church or our Reconciler who thinks it better that there should be no Authority in the Church than that Schismaticks should be damned are persons of the greatest Charity I leave others to judge Indeed the odium of this whole business which is so tragically exaggerated by the Reconciler must at last fall upon our Saviour himself either for instituting such an Authority in his Church or for confirming this Authority by such a severe Sanction as eternal damnation If Christ will at the last day condemn those who separate from the Church for some external Rites and Ceremonies as our Reconciler's Argument supposes he will then it is a signe that Christ approves of what the Church does in taking care of the Decency of Worship and that he thinks it very just that such Schismaticks should be damned and then let our Reconciler if he think fit charge the Saviour of the World with want of Charity to the Souls of men The Church damns no man but does what she believes to be her duty and leaves Schismaticks to the judgment of Christ if he damns them at the last day let our Reconciler plead their Cause then before the proper Tribunal and if Christ can justifie himself in pronouncing the Sentence I suppose he will justifie his Church too in the exercise of her Authority This is certain that if the imposition of these Ceremonies be a just cause of Separation our Dissenters are not Schismaticks and therefore in no danger of damnation upon that score and if it be not a just cause of Separation then the Church does not exceed her Authority in it and therefore is not to be blamed notwithstanding that danger of Schism which men wilfully run themselves into
the Lord and bow my self before the high God shall I come before him with burnt-offerings with calves of a year old Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams or with ten thousand rivers of oyl shall I give my first-born for my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what doth the Lord require of thee but to do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God Now because God prefers true and real goodness before the externals of Religion does it hence follow that there must be no external Worship or that the Church must make no Laws for the decent or orderly performance of it or must repeal these Laws when any ignorant people refuse to submit to them Just as much as that God did not require them to offer Sacrifice because he preferred Mercy before it Our Reconciler obsâ—rves two Cases to which our Saviour applies this saying 1. To justifie his Disciples who pulled the ears of Corn as they walked through the fields and rubbed them in their hands and eat them on the Sabbath-day which the Pharisees expounded to be a breach of the Sabbatick rest as being a servile work and our Saviour does not dispute with them upon that point but justifies what they did by their present necessity and by this Rule I will have mercy and not sacrifice That God who prefers acts of Kindness and Mercy before Sacrifice when they come in competition with each other is not such a rigorous exacter of obedience to any positive Institutions as to allow no Indulgence to necessity it self and it becomes Church-Governours to imitate the goodness of God in this and our Church does so as I have already observed but how this proves that the Church must make no Laws about Ceremonies or repeal them if men won't obey them I do not understand The next instance is our Saviour's justifying himself against the accusations of the Pharisees for his eating and drinking with Publicans and Sinners which he tells them was onely in order to reform them as a Physician converses with the sick and certainly it was lawful to converse with them upon so charitable a designe since God preferred Mercy before Sacrifice and therefore certainly God will be better pleased with our conversing with Sinners in order to make them good men than with our abstaining from their company though a familiar conversation with them upon other accounts be scandalous And how this proves what our Reconciler would conclude from it I cannot see Well but this is a general Rule which may be applied to more cases than one or two Right But if we will argue from our Saviour's authority and application we must apply it onely to such cases as are parallel to those cases to which our Saviour applies it otherwise we must not pretend the authority of our Saviour but the reason of the thing and let him set aside our Saviour's authority and we shall deal well enough with his Reason All that can be made of this Rule is this That where there happens any such case that there is a temporary competition between two Duties which are both acknowledged to be our duty there the greatest and most necessary duty must take place and particularly that all Rituals must give place to Mercy So that to make this a parallel case our Reconciler must grant that it is the duty of Church-Governours to prescribe Rules for the external Decency and solemnity of Worship what is the other Duty then to which this must give way To the care of mens Souls says our Reconciler No say I there is no inconsistency between the care of mens Souls and the care of publick Worship which is the best way of taking care of mens Souls and therefore there can never be a competition between these two O but some men are ignorant and scrupulous and wilful and if you prescribe any Rules of Worship they will dissent from them and turn Schismaticks and be damned and thus accidentally it affords occasion to these great and fatal evils Let him prove then if he can from these words of our Saviour that the Governours of the Church must never do their duty for fear those men should be damned who will not do theirs Such cases as these if they be truly pitiable must be left to the mercy of God but the Church can take no cognizance of them especially when this cannot be done without destroying the publick Decency and Solemnities of Worship and renouncing her own just Authority the maintaining of which is more for the general good of Souls than her compliance with some scrupulous persons would be I shall onely farther observe his great civility to theChurch and Kingdom of which he is a Member For his third Observation from these words is That they were used by the Prophet upon the occasion of the strictness of the Israelites in the observance and the requiring these Rituals whilst charity and mercy to their Brother was vanished from their hearts there being no truth no mercy nor knowledge of God in the land but killing committing adultery stealing lying and swearing falsly c. Now certainly it was no fault in the Jews at that time to be zealous for the external Worship instituted by the Law of Moses though our Reconciler seems to insinuate that it was for he matters not how he reproaches the Institutions of God himself so he can but reflect some odium on the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church yet they betrayed their Hypocrisie by their Zeal for the Externals of Religion while they neglected the weightier matters of the Law And left any man should be so dull as not to understand the meaning of this Observation he thetorically introduces it with a God forbid Now God forbid that I should say that it is thus in England but he is pleased to put men in mind of it if they please to think so This is true Fanatick Cant and Charity There must be no Rules prescribed for the Worship of God the Church must not take care to reclaim or restrain Schismaticks because our Reconciler thinks the State does not take sufficient care to punish other Vices Certainly there never was any Age of the Church wherein the publick Ministers of Religion took more care to decry this Pharisaical Hypocrisie of an external Religion and to teach men that nothing will recommend them to God without the practice of an universal Righteousness than at this day who will not flatter the greatest men in their Vices nor think any man a Saint because he expresses a great Zeal for the Church when his life and actions proclaim him to be a Devil We leave this good Reconciler to your beloved tender-conscienced Dissenters who can strain at a Gnat and swallow a Camel who cannot see a Surplice without horror but can dispence with Lying and Perjury with Slanders and Revilings and speaking
are which Magistrates can never know Hypocrites may pretend conscience as well as the sincere and Government could never be secure if Justice must be administred not by known and standing Laws but in compliance with every mans Conscience which is or may be no body knows what 3. The onely doubt then is about the Governours of the Church whether they in making Laws and in the exercise of Discipline ought not to have great regard to the Consciences of men Now I would fain know a reason why they are more bound than either God or civil Magistrates to suffer men to do what they please according to their various and different pretensions of Conscience If there be any equity in it that every man should enjoy the liberty of his own Conscience it holds in other matters as well as these I suppose our Reconciler will not say that the Governours of the Church are bound to suffer every man to be of what Religion he pleases to believe what he will to deny the Divinity and Satisfaction of our Saviour to worship an Image or the Host or the Virgin Mary c. and therefore the most considerable things in Religion are not left at liberty and yet of the greater moment any thing is the greater imposition it is upon Conscience I had rather submit to twenty Ceremonies than to be required to subscribe to one new Article of Faith But our Reconciler pretends onely to this Indulgence in inferiour matters Let us then consider his reason for that for certainly the less the things are the less need there is and the less reason to humour mens Consciences about them The onely reason he assigns for it is this That those who do observe or do refuse observance of the Constitutions of our Church in these inferiour matters do really observe them or not observe them out of Conscience towards God And if this be a good reason why every man should be left to the government of his own Conscience it is good in all other cases as well as in such inferiour matters for why should we impose upon men in any thing which they observe or not observe in conscience towards God But you 'll say this is St. Paul's Argument not the Reconciler's No say I it is the Reconciler's Argument not St. Paul's But does not St. Paul say He that regardeth a day regardeth it to the Lord and he that regardeth not a day to the Lord he doth not regard it He that eateth eateth to the Lord for he giveth God thanks and he that eateth not to the Lord he eateth not and giveth God thanks Yes I grant that these are St. Paul's words And does not this signifie that they who did eat and they who did not eat acted out of conscience towards God Yes I grant that too The converted Gentiles did eat indifferently of all sorts of meats and thanked God for that liberty he had granted them the converted Jews abstained from all meats forbidden by their Law and thanked God for their Law which preserved them from all legal pollutions but this is peculiar to this case and cannot be applied to our Dissenters that they refuse to observe our Ceremonies out of conscience towards God God had given a positive Law to the Jews by the hands of Moses which enjoyned the observation of new Moons and Sabbaths and other Festivals and made a distinction between clean and unclean meats and though this Law was now out of date yet it was not repealed in as publick a manner as it was given and God had no way declared that they should observe this Law no longer and therefore those Jews who embraced the Faith of Christ durst not renounce the Law of Moses out of reverence to the Authority of God who gave it and therefore these believing Jews might well be said to observe days and not to eat to the Lord that is out of reverence to the authority of God who gave that Law The believing Gentiles were never under the obligation of the Law of Moses and therefore were more easily instructed in their Christian liberty which God declared by sending his holy Spirit on them in their uncircumcision and by the Decrees of the Apostolical Synod at Ierusalem and they were very well assured by these divine Testimonies that God had delivered them from the Jewish observation of days and meats and therefore they did eat and they did not observe days to the Lord out of reverence to the divine authority which had delivered them from the Mosaical Law But where there is no positive Law nor any publick Declaration of Gods Will whatever our particular Perswasions and Opinions may be we do not act out of conscience towards God For no man can be said to do any thing to the Lord or out of conscience towards God in such cases wherein God has not interposed his authority And therefore unless our Reconciler can shew any positive Law either against Ecclesiastical Ceremonies in general or against the Cross in Baptism the Surplice or Kneeling at the Sacrament in particular how much soever his beloved Dissenters pretend to Conscience it is absurd to say that they do not observe these things out of conscience towards God nor do Conformists observe them out of conscience towards God any otherwise than as they obey that Authority which God hath set in his Church For there can be no other foundation for Conscience but either the express Laws of God or obedience to that Authority which God hath set over us But you 'll say may not that man also be said to act out of conscience toward God who does or forbears doing any thing out of a perswasion that God has commanded or forbid it though he should be mistaken in it and he can produce no Law of God to that purpose While men designe to please God in what they do surely they may be said to act out of conscience towards God I answer I will not contend about words and phrases with any man but let them call things by what names they please All that I say is this That St. Paul does not use it in this sence nor is any man in Scripture said to do any thing to the Lord who cannot produce a plain Law for what he does Other men may intend Gods glory in what they do but they may miss of their aim when they have no Rule and incur the divine displeasure instead of pleasing God and neither God nor men can grant any Indulgence to such a Conscience as this But when both contending Parties can produce a divine authority for doing or not doing the same thing which never did and never can happen but in this case concerning the obligation of the Law of Moses there is great reason for them to receive one another because they both act out of reverence to the divine Authority In a word two contrary Parties as the Jews and Gentiles were in this Controversie can never both of them
be said to do what they do to the Lord but onely in such cases where there is a divine positive Law or a divine Indulgence permission or liberty on both sides which was the case between the Jews and Gentiles but has no parallel that I know of Our Dissenters indeed pretend the authority of Scripture to justifie their non-observance of Ecclesiastical Rites and Ceremonies and so did the Jews for putting our Saviour to death so do all Hereticks and Schismaticks and even Rebels themselves and if the Government must take notice of every foolish Reasoner who pretends Scripture it is in as ill a case as if every unscriptural Dream and Fancy must pass for an Oracle This will make no difference before God whether men pervert the Scripture to their own destruction or follow the wild Enthusiasms of their own brains and I see no reason that Governours have to make a difference neither By these Arguments St. Paul perswades the believing Jews and Gentiles at Rome notwithstanding their Disputes about the observation of the Law of Moses to maintain Christian communion with each other and they are very proper to this purpose but can by no parity of Reason be applied to the case of our Dissenters as I hope abundantly appears from what I have already discours'd Secondly The Apostle by these Arguments having perswaded them to receive one another to Christian communion proceeds to perswade the Gentile Converts or those strong Jewish Christians who understood their Christian liberty not to give any needless offence and scandal to the weak by an uncharitable use of their liberty from v. 13. to the end of the Chapter These two to receive into communion and not to give offence and scandal are of a very different consideration though our Reconciler makes no distinction between them and therefore I shall briefly state this matter also and shew how remote it is from the case to which our Reconciler applies it The scandal which he supposes the Church gives to the Dissenters is this That by enjoyning the use of some indifferent Ceremonies in Religion which are scrupled by them or condemned as unlawful she tempts them to separate from her Communion and rather to involve themselves in the guilt of Schism than to submit to such unscriptural Impositions Let us then consider what that Scandal is of which St. Paul speaks and by what Arguments he disswades them from it and how â—ar it is applicable to our case 1. Then I shall consider what this Scandal was 2. By what Arguments he disswades them from giving Offence and Scandal First What this Scandal was Now the persons who were scandalized were the weak that which gave this scandal to them was as they apprehended an open contempt and violation of the Law of God in eating such meats as were on all hands agreed to be forbidden by the Law the danger of this scandal was lest it should tempt them to renounce Christianity Let us then compare this with the case of our Dissenters 1. The weak Jew was scandalized and offended So far you 'll say the Parallel holds good for whatever the Dissenters think of themselves I suppose the Church looks upon them as a sort of weak Christians and it is not what they think but what they are which is to be considered in this case for these Jews did not think themselves weak no more than our Dissenters do and yet the Apostle declares them to be weak and requires the strong to treat them as weak Brethren So far I agree but then we must consider what this weakness was for all weakness is not alike nor equally the object of our charity Some men are weak because they are ignorant and because they will not be instructed others are weak out of prejudice and some vicious inclinations some weakness is to be chastised and corrected not indulged and therefore because St. Paul requires them not to offend the weak Jew it does not follow that the Church must use the same Indulgence to the weak Dissenters unless their weakness be alike pityable Now the weakness of the Jew consisted in this that though they had embraced the Faith of Christ yet they were not convinced that the Law of Moses was out of date and therefore durst not do any thing which was forbidden by that Law nor omit doing what the Law commanded nor could they endure to see others do so so that their weakness consisted in a profound reverence for an express positive Law which all men agâ—eed was given by God but which was not yet repealed in so visible a manner as to satiâ—fie the believing Jews that it was repealed Now this was a very favourable case so favourable that God himself still indulged the Jews in the observation of their Law and therefore there was great reason why the strong Christian should avoid giving offence to the weak by the use of his Christian liberty But now this is such a case as never was before and never can be again Our Dissenters may be weak but not weak as the believing Jews were out of reverence to an express positive Law because there is no such Law which ever did forbid the use of those Ceremonies which they condemn and certainly there cannot be the same pretence to indulge those who foolishly reason themselves into mistakes and scruples as there was to indulge those who could produce a plain positive Law to justifie their dissent The case is so vastly different that I doubt not but St. Paul who pleaded for such Charity and Indulgence to the Jews would himself have censured our Dissenters For both the Governours of the Church and private Christians are in an ill state if they are bound to humour those mistakes and scruples which are owing to mens ignorance folly interest prejudice or unteachable and refractory dispositions 2. These weak Jews took offence at the open violation of an express Law of God For the Gentile Christians did not observe the Law of Moses but acted in direct opposition to it Now this was a just matter of offence to the Jew while he retained such a great veneration for the Law of Moses which at least he had some fair appearance of reason to do It is true the strong Christian in eating those things which were forbidden by the Law of Moses did nothing but what was lawful for him to do but it does not hence follow as our Reconciler infers that the scandal the weak Christian took at the freedom of the strong who used his Christian liberty in eating these things was scandalum acceptum non datum scandal received but not given the action being such as the weak Christian could not justly be offended at For the weak Christian had as much reason to be offended at this as he had to believe that the Law of Moses was still in force and this was the true reason of his offence No man can be justly charged with giving offence or scandal who does
of every mans private liberty The Gentile Christians who knew that they were not under the obligation of the Mosaical Law which made a distinction between clean and unclean meats were perfectly at liberty whether they would eat or not eat such meats as were forbid by that Law and this was an instance of their own private liberty wherein no body was directly concerned but themselves neither any other particular man excepting the case of scandal nor the publick state of the Church For what is it to any man what is it to the Church whether I eat such meat or not when I may lawfully do either And therefore this is a proper Sphere for the exercise of a private Charity for Charity of what nature soever it be can be exercised onely in such matters as are perfectly in our power and therefore no private Christian can lawfully extend his charity any farther than his own private liberty extends whatever others are concerned in as well as himself especially whatever the Church of God and the publick state of Religion is concerned in is the object neither of private liberty nor of private charity And yet the Apostle here exhorts them to nothing but what was in the power of every private Christian. And whether we say that this Exhortation concerns onely particular Christians or Church-Governours also yet it is evident it concerns onely the exercise of their own private liberty Now if any such case should happen again which I think cannot possibly be that in the use of our private liberty in our Diet or Clothes or way of living we should give such offence to weak Christians as should make them suspect the truth of Christianity and endanger their final Apostacy this 14th Chap. to the Romans would be an admirable Text to preach on to correct such uncharitable abuses of our liberty but what is this to the use of decent but indifferent Rites and Ceremonies in the Worship of God for the decent Rites of Worship concern the publick exercise of Religion not every Christians private liberty every instance of our private liberty may indeed in some sence be called an indifferent thing as that signifies what we may do or may not do as we please but it is not indifferent as the decent Rites of Worship are indifferent for the Decency of Worship is the matter of an express positive Law and the particular Rites of Worship the Object of Ecclesiastical Prudence and Authority And what a vast difference this makes in the case of Scandal will appear from my second Observation on St. Paul's discourse which is this 2. That this compliance and condescension to a weak Brother must be in such matters wherein Religion and Religious Worship is not concerned For by this Argument St. Paul perswades them to this forbearance because Christian Religion is not at all concerned in it The Kingdom of God is not meat nor drink Their eating or not eating in it self considered was no act nor so much as a circumstance in Religion and it did not become the charity and goodness of the Christian temper to give such great scandal to a weak Brother for things in which Religion is not at all concerned Those who expound meat and drink in this place to signifie all the Externals of Religious Worship especially all such Rites and Circumstances as have not a divine institution and command as our Reconciler plainly does do mightily mistake the Apostles meaning and affix such Doctrines to him as are very absurd and unaccountable When the Apostle says The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink it plainly signifies that the Christian Religion does not consist in eating or not eating such or such meats that no man is the better Christian for eating Swines flesh or other prohibited meats nor the worse Christian meerly for not eating them No man questions whether the Kingdom of God signifies the Christian Religion or the state of the Christian Church and therefore when he says that meat and drink is not the Kingdom of God he must mean not that it is not the whole of Religion which no man ever dreamt of but that it is no part of it no act of Religious Worship as I think I need not prove to the Reconciler himself that though the Gospel gives us leave to eat Swines flesh yet it is no act of Religion to do it And therefore the Externals of Religion the decent Rites and Ceremonies of Worship how mean and indifferent soever they may be thought cannot be comprehended under those general terms of meats and drinks because this meat and drink was no act nor part nor circumstance of Religious Worship nor any thing relating to it but the decent circumstances of Religious Worship are necessary to publick Worship Now when the Apostle exhorts them to exercise forbearance and condescension to a weak Brother in such matters by this very Argument because Religion is not concerned in it our Reconciler will be a very wonderful man if he can prove that we must exercise the same indulgence in such matters as do concern Religious Worship if he can prove that the Governours of the Church must indulge private Christians in the different Rites and Modes of Religious Worship because private Christians must indulge each other in such different practices as do not at all relate to Religion I am resolved never to dispute more with him for I doubt not but he is at the same rate able to make good the greatest Paradoxes in Religion or Philosophy There is very great reason for Christians not to quarrel with each other nor to divide the Unity or disturb the Peace of the Church for such Disputes as do not properly belong to Religion for where it is purely matter of our own liberty there is room for the exercise of Charity and mutual Forbearance And this is the Apostles Argument that the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink But where Religion and the Worship of God is concerned it is of another nature for it is not in our power to do what we please in such matters nor to allow others the liberâ—y of doing what they please and therefore this is not the Object of Indulgence and Forbearance nor is there any one word in all the Scripture to countenance any such liberty which would effectually undermine all Order Decency and Uniformity of publick Worship And therefore when the Apostle adds that the Kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost this does not signifie neither that this is the whole of Religion or the onely thing that we are to be concerned about as the Reconciler understands it for the external and visible Worship of God is as essential a part of Religion as these but these are plain and acknowledged Duties of Religion and we ought not to violate a plain and necessary Duty for the sake of that which is no Duty at all Which is the sum of the Apostle's Argument as
I observed before The necessary consequence of which is that in all such cases wherein not Religion but our own liberty is concerned the great Rule we are to observe is to promote the Peace of the Church and the mutual Edification of each other to follow after the things which make for peace and things wherewith one may edifie another Now this is a plain Rule which all men at first hearing will acknowledge to be reasonable not to violate the plain Duties of Religion in contending about such liberties the use and exercise of which are of no account in Religion not to scandalize a weak Brother nor destroy the Peace of the Church and the mutual edification of Christians in love by eating such meats as we may indeed in other cases lawfully eat but the eating of which is at no time and in no case in it self considered an act of Worship or acceptable to God But if we understand these words in our Reconciler's way that the Externals of Religion are of no account and therefore must be sacrificed to the dearer interests of Peace and Charity and mutual Edification I confess the Argument is plain enough but it is neither to the Apostle's purpose nor is it true And yet this is the fundamental Principle of all Reconcilers and of those men who affect the name and character of Moderation that the Externals of Religion are little worth and of small account with God But the great business which Christians ought to mind is Love and Charity and the practice of those moral Vertues wherein they place the life and substance of Religion and therefore it does not become them to quarrel about the external Modes of Worship but an indulgence in such matters becomes the good and benign temper of the Gospel Now how these men come to know that God is so indifferent about his own Worship I cannot guess nor how the Worship of God comes to be a less essential part of Religion than justice and charity to men I am sure under the Law God appeared very jealous of his Honour and Worship and though he rejected all the Worship of bad men and despised those external acts of Worship which were separated from Justice and Charity yet this was no Argument that he undervalued his own Worship because he was not pleased with an empty shew and appearance of it As for his preferring Mercy before Sacrifice I have given some account of it already and may do more in what follows but certainly Religion is properly the Worship of God and therefore that is the greatest thing in it And publick Worship which is the most visible Honour of God consists in external and visible Signs and therefore the Order Decency and Solemnity of Worship is so essential to the notion of publick Worship that there can be no Worship without it for to worship God visibly without publick and visible signs of Honour is a contradiction and therefore it does not seem to me to be so indifferent a thing after what manner God is worshipped and therefore not to be left indifferently to every mans humour upon every slight pretence of Charity and Moderation However it is plain that the Apostle does not speak one word of this here which had been nothing to his purpose and I cannot find any thing to this purpose in all the Scripture 3. This Apostolical Exhortation to avoid scandal concerns onely such cases wherein we are not bound to make a publick profession of our Faith nor to do that in publick in the view of all men which we believe we may very lawfully innocently do Hast thou faith have it to thy self before God that is keep thy Faith to thy self and enjoy thy liberty privately when thou may'st do it without offence Now I suppose our Reconciler will not think this a good Rule in all cases to dissemble our Faith and to keep our Religion to our selves which would effectually undermine the publick profession and practice of Religion in the World For if this were once granted men would find a great many other as good reasons to keep their Faith to themselves as avoiding scandal Indeed this Rule can hold onely in matters of a private nature such as I before observed this case to be for matters of a publick nature require a publick profession and practice For let us consider wherein the force of this Argument consists to perswade the Gentile Christians to exercise this forbearance towards their weak Jewish Brethren not to offend or scandalize them with their meat Hast thou faith have it to thy self before God which includes these two Arguments 1. That they are under no obligation to a publick profession or exercise of their Christian liberty in these matters 2. That though it be some restraint yet it is no injury to their liberty not to do those things publickly which give such offence For their liberty in such matters is maintained as well by a private as by a publick exercise of it For if they may do it at any time their liberty is secure though the exercise of it may be sometimes restrained But now if we apply this to the Rites and Ceremonies of publick Worship what sence is there in this Argument for publick Worship must be publickly profess'd and publickly practised or else it is not publick and therefore there is no place here to avoid publick scandal by keeping our Faith to our selves for then we must not worship God publickly as we think we may and that we ought to worship him for fear of giving offence So that this does not onely restrain but it destroys the Authority of Governours and the Liberty and Obedience of private Christians for what relates to publick Worship cannot be done at all if it must not be done publickly and that is no Authority and no Liberty which cannot be exercised without sin that is without a criminal offence and scandal As for what our Reconciler frequently urges and I have already observed and answered that it is not desired that the Church should renounce her Authority and Worship but onely give liberty to Dissenters to worship God in their own way this plainly shews how vastly different the case of the Jews and of our Dissenters is and how little they are concerned in that forbearance of which the Apostle speaks The Jews were offended not at the restraint of their own liberty for they were indulged in the observation of the Law of Moses but at that liberty which the Gentile believers used in breaking of the Law of Moses our Dissenters it seems are scandalized not so much at what we do as because they cannot do what they would The Apostle exhorts private Christians not to do such things publickly as offended their weak Brethren This great Reconciling Apostle exhorts or rather commands the Church to suffer Dissenters to worship God according to their own way and to do what is right in their own eyes and this would remove the
scandal Now these two do so widely differ that the one is true and proper scandal and the other is not To offend a weak Brother by an uncharitable use of our liberty by doing such things as prove a stumbling-block and occasion of falling to him is scandal in the Apostle's notion of the word and the onely scandal of which he treats in this 14th Chapter to the Romans but thus it seems we do not scandalize the Dissenters who are not concerned not offended in the Apostle's sence at what we do so they might enjoy their own liberty and therefore neither the Church nor Dissenters are concerned in what the Apostle discourses about Scandal in this Chapter And as for that offence and scandal they take at the exercise of Discipline and Government which restrains their wild and fanatick pretences to liberty it is no other offence than what all Criminals take at Laws and publick Government which is so far from being such a scandal as the Governours of the Church ought to avoid that there is not a greater scandal to Religion than the neglect of it But I shall think nothing impossible if our Reconciler can prove out of this Chapter that the Governours of the Church should prescribe no Rules of Worship nor lay any Restraint upon the giddy and enthusiastick fancies of men for fear of giving offence to them 4. The last Argument the Apostle uses to represent the reasonableness of this forbearance is this that though the Gentile Christians without sin or without any injury to their own liberty might comply with their weak Jewish Brethren yet these Jewish Christians who believed it unlawful to eat any meats forbidden by the Law of Moses could not comply with the believing Gentiles without sinning against their own Consciences which brings judgment and condemnation upon them And he that doubteth which does not signifie what we commonly call a scrupulous Conscience for that was not the case of the Jews who did not doubt but certainly believe that it was unlawful for them to eat such meats but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as I observed before signifies him who makes a distinction between meats and so believes it unlawful to eat any meats which were forbidden by the Law of Moses he who thus doubteth is damned if he eat because he eateth not of faith for whatever is not of faith is sin Now here our Reconciler thinks he has us fast for if this were a good Argument in the case of the Jewish Christians it must be also in the case of the Dissenters If the Gentile believers were not by any means to compel the believing Jews to eat those meats which they believed unlawful because how lawful soever it was in it self yet it was unlawful for them to do it while they believed it unlawful to be done by the same reason the Governours of the Church must not compel Dissenters to Conformity which they believe unlawful or at least greatly doubt of the lawfulness of it For he that doubteth is damned if he conforms as well as if he eats This looks most like a parallel case of any thing yet and if this fails him I doubt his Cause is desperate and yet I am pretty confident that this will do him no service 1. For first this is not a good Argument in all cases to grant such an indulgence and forbearance that men act according to their Consciences as I have already proved at large for this would subvert all Order and Government in Church and State and supersede the Authority and Obligation of all other Laws but every mans private judgment and opinion of things 2. Let us then consider in what cases this Argument is good for certainly it is good in the case to which the Apostle applies it Now I know of but one general case to which this Argument can be reasonably applied and that is where every man 's own Conscience is his onely Rule not where Conscience it self has a Rule The Laws of God and the Laws of our Superiours when they do not contradict the Laws of God are the Rule of Conscience that Rule whereby all men ought to act and it is a senseless thing to say that when men are under the government of Laws they must have liberty to act according to their own Consciences that is according to their own judgment and opinions of things which is to say that though men are under Laws yet they must be governed by none that Magistrates may make Laws but they must not execute them but must suffer every man when his Conscience serves him to break both the Laws of God and of the Church or Kingdom wherein he lives But where we are under no obligation of divine or humane Laws in such cases every mans own Conscience is his onely Rule and in these cases it is fit to leave every man to the direction and government of his own mind because they concern onely every mans private liberty and have no influence at all upon the Publick And if in such cases any man should fancy himself to be under the obligation of a divine Law when indeed he is not it would be barbarously uncharitable by Censures and Reproaches and such kind of rude and ungentile Arts to force him to a compliance contrary to the sense and judgment of his own mind for when there is no other Rule of our Actions every mans Conscience is his onely Rule and if he does that which he believes to be forbidden by the Law of God though indeed it is not yet he sins in it and if we force him to such a compliance we are very uncharitable in it and are guilty of offending a weak Brother This was the very case of which the Apostle speaks The Law which made a distinction between clean and unclean meats was now out of date and did no longer oblige them and therefore it was lawful both for Jews and Gentiles to eat what meat they pleased but the Jews still thought that Law to be in force and therefore though the Law did not oblige them to abstain from such meats yet their own Consciences which is always a Law when there is no other did still oblige them to abstain and therefore it was very uncharitable in the Gentile Christians to judge and censure and reproach them for this for though they who understood their liberty might use it yet a believing Jew could not do this without sin And there may be a great many cases in â—ome degree parallel to this As suppose a man scruples the use of Lots and consequently all Games which depend upon Lots or thinks it unlawful to drink a Health or to see a Play or apprehends himself obliged to a stricter observation of the Lords day than the Christian Church has in former Ages thought necessary though we should suppose that there were no Law of God about these matters yet this mans Conscience is a Law to him and whiles he thinks any
of these things unlawful they are unlawful to him and it would be very uncharitable by any Arts to force him to do such things as are contrary to the dictates of his own Conscience This is onely a restraint of their own private liberty and therefore they ought to be indulged in it especially while they are so modest as not to censure those who use their innocent liberty innocently In such cases as these there is no other Rule to guide us but what the Apostle gives Let every man be fully perswaded in his own mind which is a safe and a sure Rule when there is no other Law to govern us for this must not be extended to all cases as St. Chrysostom observes upon the place for if in all cases we must suffer every man to act according as he is perswaded in his own mind this would subvert all Laws and Government but this is reasonable in such cases as onely concern mens private liberty and are under the restraint and government of no Laws but what men make or fancy to themselves It is true all men who act upon any Principles will in all cases do as they are fully perswaded in their own minds yet this is not a Rule to be given in all cases It can be a Rule onely in such cases wherein let a mans judgment and opinion be what it will he acts safely while he acts according to his own judgment which can never be where there is any other Law to govern us besides our own judgment of things for though we act with never so full a perswasion of our own minds if we break the divine Laws we sin in it and shall be judged for it And that this is the true sence of the Apostle's Argument appears in this that he urges the danger a weak Brother is in of sin if he should be perswaded or forc'd to act contrary to the judgment of his own mind which supposes that he is in no danger of sin if he follow his own judgment for if there were an equal danger of sin both ways this Argument has no force at all to prove the reasonableness of such an indulgence and forbearance For if this weak Brother will be guilty of as great a sin by following his judgment if we do forbear him as he will by acting contrary to his own judgment if we do not the danger being equal on both sides can be no reason to determine us either way and therefore this must be confined to such cases wherein there is no danger of sinning but onely in acting contrary to our own judgment and perswasions that is onely to such cases where there is no other Law to govern us but onely our own private Consciences And therefore this danger of scandal cannot affect Governours who have authority to command nor extend to such cases which are determined by divine or humane Laws and therefore not to the Rites and Ceremonies of publick Worship for whatever our own Perswasions are if we break the Laws of God or the just Laws of men by following a misguided and erroneous Conscience we sin in it And the same thing appears from this consideration that the Apostle perswades them to exercise this forbearance out of charity to their weak Brother but what charity is it to suffer our Brother to sin in following a misguided Conscience If our Brother sin as much in following a misguided Conscience as in acting contrary to his Conscience he is as uncharitable a man who patiently suffers his Brother to sin in following his Conscience as he who compels him to sin by acting contrary to his Conscience or rather by not suffering him to act according to his Conscience Nay since external force and restraint may and very often does make men consider better of things and help to rectifie their mistates it is a greater act of charity to give check to men than to suffer them to go quietly on in sin And here I shall take occasion to speak my mind very freely and plainly about that perplext Dispute of liberty of Conscience It seems very contrary to the nature of Religion to be matter of force for Religion is a voluntary Worship and Service of God and no man is religious who is religious against his will and therefore no man ought to be compelled to profess himself of any Religion which was plainly the sence of the Primitive Christians when they suffered under Heathen Persecutions as is to be seen in most of their Apologies And yet on the other hand it is monstrously unreasonable that there should be no restraint laid upon the wild fancies of men that every one who pleases may have liberty to corrupt Religion with Enthusiastick Conceits and new-fangled Heresies and to divide the Church with infinite Schisms and Factions The Patrons of Liberty and Indulgence declaim largely on the first of these heads those who are for preserving Order and Government in the Church on the second and if I may speak my mind freely I think they are both in the right and have divided the truth between them No man ought to be forc'd to be of any Religion whether Turk or Jew or Christian though Idolatry was punishable by the Law and that with very good reason for though men may not be forc'd to worship God yet they may and ought to be forc'd not to worship the Devil nor to blaspheme or do any publick dishonour to the true God And this was all the restraint that Christian Emperours laid upon the Pagan Idolaters they demolished their Temples and forbad the publick exercise of their Idolatrous Worship But though no man must be compelled to be a Christian yet if they voluntarily profess themselves Christians they become subject to the Authority and Government of the Christian Church The Bishops and Pastors of the Church have authority from Christ and are bound by vertue of their Office to preserve the Purity of the Faith and the Decency and Uniformity of Christian Worship and if any Member of the Church either corrupt the Faith or Worship of it or prove refractory and disobedient to Ecclesiastical Authority they ought to be censured and cast out of the Communion of the Church which is as reasonable as it is to thrust a Member out of any Society who will not be subject to the Orders and Constitutions of it This distinction St. Paul himself makes between judging those who are without and those who were within the Church They had no authority to force men to be Christians but they had authority over professed Christians to judge and censure them as their actions deserved and this is properly Ecclesiastical Authority to condemn Heresies and Schism and to cast Hereticks and Schismaticks and all disorderly Christians out of the Communion of the Church and no governed Society can subsist without so much authority as this comes to As for temporal restraints and punishments they belong to the Civil Magistrate and if we
will allow that Christian Princes ought to take any care of the Christian Church we must grant them so much authority as is necessary to suppress Heresie and Schism and to punish those who are disobedient to the Censures and Authority of the Church How far this may extend is another Question I think all Protestants with great reason reject sanguinary Laws in this case but whoever grants any authority in these matters to Christian Princes must grant what may reasonably be thought sufficient to attain the end Thus I have as plainly as I could given an account of the Apostle's discourse in this Chapter about Scandal and Offence and proved that it cannot be applied to the case of indifferent things in the Worship of God by any parity of reason I grant St. Chrysostom and some other ancient Writers do accommodate this Doctrine of Scandal to other cases some of which passages our Reconciler has transcribed from them that if we must not scandalize our weak Brother by using our innocent liberty much less by our wicked examples by doing things evil in themselves which aggravates the guilt of the offence And I grant such accommodations as these are very allowable in popular Harangues but I hope our Reconciler does not take them for Arguments and yet if he did he could no more apply them to the case of the Church and Dissenters than he can the case of which St. Paul speaks But because this Discourse has been somewhat long though as plain and methodical as I could contrive it I shall reduce some of the most material things in it into a narrower compass and compare the Apostle's Arguments with the Reasonings of our Reconciler which will enable every ordinary Reader to judge how unlike they are The Case of the believing Iews 14 Rom. THe Dispute between the believing Jews Gentiles was concerning the observation of the Law of Moses not about things acknowledged to be indifferent The weakness of the Jews which occasioned their scruples was the effect of a great reverence for an express Law which was universally acknowledged to be given by God but was not at that time as visibly repealed as it was given The offence the Jews took against the Gentiles was at the breach of a divine Law which they still believed to be in force and so had as much reason to be offended as they had to believe the obligation of their Law which was so much as to render forbearance reasonable That weakness which pleaded for the indulgence of the Jews was their weakness in the Faith that they were not well confirm'd in the truth of Christianity and therefore ought to be tenderly used and indulged as being neither capable at present of better instruction nor severer government For the danger which the believing Jews were in and which St. Paul endeavoured to prevent was lest they should reject Christianity if Christianity rejected the Law of Moses which they certainly knew to be given by God and therefore it was reasonable to expect a while till they were confirmed in the Faith before they gave them any disturbance about such matters as would endanger their Apostacy while they more firmly believed the obligation of the Law of Moses than they did the Faith of Christ. And indeed God himself had by visible signs instructed both believing Jews and Gentiles not to judge and censure each other nor to break Christian Communion upon theâ—e Disputes because he had received the believing Jews and Gentiles into the visible Communion of the same one Catholick Church by the visible effusion of the Holy Spirit on them both though one observed the Law of Moses and the other did not and therefore it became both Jews and Gentiles to receive one another as Christian Brethren and to worship God together in the Communion of the same holy Offices And whoever after this visible determination made by God himself undertake to judge and censure and deprive each other of Communion for such matters usurp an Authority to judge over Gods judgment to reject those whom God receives which is like judging another mans servant over whom we have no authority for we have no authority to judge one another in such cases which God allows who is the supreme Lord and Judge of us all Besides this both Jews and Gentiles in observing and not observing the Law of Moses did it to the Lord acted out of reverence to the divine Authority The Jews observed the Law because God gave them this Law by Moses and had not so visibly repealed it as to remove all just scruples about it The Gentiles never were under the Law of Moses and God had received them into his Church without imposing that burden on them and therefore they did not observe the Law out of reverence and thankfulness to God for that liberty he had granted them And therefore Jews and Gentiles had reason to receive each other since it was not Humour Peevishness or Faction which made them differ but a regard to God and a reverence for his Authority which they both pretended and which at that time they both had And therefore St. Paul exhorts the believing Gentiles not to use their Christian liberty to the scandal and offence of their weak Brethren For this was such a case wherein they might be very kind to their weak Brethren if they pleased it being onely a restraint of their own private liberty wherein no body was concerned but themselves for though the Gospel had taken away the distinction of clean and unclean meats and made it lawful to eat indifferently of every thing yet it had not made it our duty to eat such things as the Law had forbidden but we might abstain if we pleased and therefore this was a proper Sphere for the exercise of a private charity not to destroy him with our meat for whom Christ died Especially considering that the Christian Religion is not at all concerned in our eating or not eating for the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink and therefore they ought not to transgress the Laws of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost of Brotherly love and charity and the peace and unity of the Christian Church which are great and essential Duties of Religion for the sake of eating or not eating such meats which in it self considered is no act of Religion at all Especially the case being such that men may keep their Faith to themselves and enjoy the private exercise of their liberty without offence Whereas the believing Jew who believes it unlawful to eat meats forbidden by the Law could not comply with the Gentile Christians without sin because it is against the judgment and perswasion of his own mind which makes it very reasonable as well as charitable to leave men to the direction of their own minds in the use of their own liberty where they are under the government and restraint of no other Law neither of God nor men for in this
case if they follow the direction of their own minds they do no injury to any body but themselves in an unnecessary restraint of their own liberty but neither offend God by it nor hurt men but if they act contrary to what they believe to be their Duty in compliance with others they sin in it for every mans private Conscience is his onely Rule where there is no other Law to govern him The Case of the Dissenters THe Dispute between Dissenters and the Church of England is concerning the use of indifferent Rites and Ceremonies in Religious Worship The scruples of Dissenters are not grounded on any express Law acknowledged by all Parties to be a divine Law but are occasioned by their ignorance and perverting of the holy Scriptures and obstinacy against better instruction The Dissenters cannot produce any plain positive Law which is oâ— ever was in force against the Ceremonies of our Church and so have no reasonable pretence to be offended The weakness of Dissenters is not a weakness in the Faith for they firmly believe the Christian Religion but at best a weakness of understanding which is not to be indulged but to be rectified by wise Instructions and prudent Restraints unless we think that every ignorant Christian must give Laws to the Church and impose his own ignorant and childish prejudices Whatever offence the Dissenters take at our Ceremonies it is not pretended that the imposition of them tempts them to renounce Christianity but onely is an occasion of their Schism and makes them forsake the Church for a Conventicle But this is no reason at all in it self for any indulgence and forbearance to be sure is vastly different from the case of the Jews for by the same reaâ—on there must be no Authority and Government in the Church or no exercise of it lest those who will not obey should turn Schismaticks But now besides that it is absolutely impossible for those to receive one another to Communion without mutual offence and scandal who observe such different Rites and Modes of Worship of which more anon God has never by any such visible signs declared that Dissenters should be received to Communion notwithstanding their disobedience to the Authority and non-conformity to the Worship of the Church For as for our Reconciler's invisible communion with God which he grants to his beloved Dissenters who refuse the Communion of the Church St. Paul never thought of it and no body can tell how our Reconciler should know it especially if Schism as he asserts be a damning sin for no man in a state of damnation which it seems is the case of Schismaticks can be in Communion with God But when the Church judges and censures and excommunicates those who refuse to conform to her Worship she does nothing but what she has authority to do for all private Christians are subject to the Authority of the Church in such matters as God has not determined by his own Authority But though our Dissenters pretend Conscience as the reason of their non-conformity yet these pretences are vain and not to be allowed of because there is no plain positive Law of God against it and neither Governours nor private Christians are concerned to take notice of or to make any allowance for every mans private Fancies and Opinions especially in matters of publick Worship which would bring eternal confusions and diâ—orders into the Church There is a great difference between mens doing any thing to the Lord and following their own Consciences or private Opinions the first requires a plain and express Law for our Rule which will justifie or excuse what we do both to God and men but mens private Consciences if they misguide them may deserve our pity but cannot challenge our indulgence Our Reconciler exhorts the Governours of the Church not to exercise their Authority in prescribing the Rules of Order and Decency for publick Worship for fear of offending Dissenters But the Dispute between the Church and Dissenters is of a different consideration it does not concern the exercise of a private liberty wherein all Christians ought to be very prudent and charitable but the exercise of publick Government and the publick administration of Religious Offices which must be governed by other measures than a private charity It is not in the power of private Christians to dispense in such matters as these nor absolutely in the power of Church-Governours who are obliged to take care of the Order and Decency of publick Worship whoever takes offence at it And therefore this cannot relate to indulgence and forbearance in the external Rites and Ceremonies of Religion wherein Religion is nearly concerned for though they be not Acts yet they are the Circumstances of Worship wherein the external Decency of Worship consists which is as necessary as external Worship is And therefore cannot refer to the publick Ceremonies of Religion which if they be practised at all must be practised publickly because they concern the publick acts of Worship There is no avoiding offence in this case by dissembling our Faith or by a private exercise of our liberty but Governours must part with their authority and private Christians with their liberty in such matters which the Apostle nowhere requires any man to do no not to avoid offence Now though our Dissenters pretend that it is against their Consciences to conform to the Ceremonies of the Church and our Reconciler pleads this in their behalf as a sufficient reason why they ought to be indulged yet this is not a good Argument in the case of Dissenters though it was in the case of the Jews because their mistakes do not meerly concern the exercise of their private liberty but publick Worship which is not left to the conduct of every mans private Conscience but to the direction and government of the Laws of God and men And though it be reasonable to leave men to the government of their own Consciences where there is no other Law yet there is no reason for it where there is for if they sin in acting contrary to their Consciences which no man can force them to do so they sin also in following an erroneous Conscience which Governours ought to hinder if they can This I take to be a sufficient Answer to all our Reconciler's Arguments from that condescension and forbearance which St. Paul exhorts the believing Jews and Gentiles to exercise towards each other because the case is vastly different from the case of our Dissenters The Dispute between the Jew and Gentile was not concerning the use of indifferent Rites and Ceremonies in the Worship of God but about the observation of the Law of Moses and those Arguments which the Apostle uses and which were very proper Arguments in that case can by no parity of reason be applied to the Dispute about indifferent things But there are several other considerations which I have already hinted at which plainly shew how vastly different the case of the Jews
and Unity in the Christian Church for they may entertain and multiply such Disputes for ever with the same reason that they do now And therefore there is always reason to suppress those Scruples which câ—nnot be cured or outworn by time when Indulgence will not cure the Disease nor time remove it it must be stifled and suppressed by Ecclesiastical Authority Whether our Reconciler will think this a sufficient Answer to his fourth Chapter I cannot tell I am sure I do CHAP. VI. Containing an Answer to the fifth Chapter of the Protestant Reconciler or his Arguments taken from St. Paul's Epistles to the Corinthians HAving in the former Chapter so particularly answered our Reconciler's Arguments taken as he pretends from that condescension and forbearance which St. Paul exhorts the believing Jews and Gentiles to exercise towards each other in that great Dispute about the observation of the Law of Moses there seems little occasion to answer the rest of his Arguments from Scripture which every ordinary Reader may do from the Principles already laid down But that our Reconciler may not complain that he is not answered I am willing to undergo the trouble of a needless Answer if my Readers will be pleased to pardon it His first Argument is from St. Paul's discourse 1 Cor. 6. Where he condemneth the Corinthians because they went to law before the heathens which was a blemish to the Christian Faith and ministred scandal to the heathens and made them apt to think that Christians were covetous contentious and prone to injure one another c. Since therefore our Contentions about these lesser matters do minister far greater Scandal to the Atheist the Sceptick c. our Governours should rather suffer themselves to be restrained a little and even injured in the exercise of their just Power about things unnecessary than by their stiffness to assert and to exert it to continue to give occasion to so great a Scandal to the Christian Faith This is an admirable Argument if it be well considered The Christians must not go to law before Heathen Judges therefore the Governours of the Church must not prescribe the decent Rites and Ceremonies of Worship Yes you will say the Argument is good because the reason is the same to avoid Scandal Let us then suppose this was the reason if we will make these two cases parallel it must be thus To go to law with our Christian Brethren is scandalous and therefore must be avoided to prescribe the decent Rites and Ceremonies of Religion is scandalous and therefore Church-Governours must not exercise this Authority Will our Reconciler now stand to this Proposition No that he durst not affirm that the exercise of a just Authority in these matters is scandalous but the contentions about such Rites and Ceremonies are scandalous and therefore Governours must not insist on their Authority to prescribe them But now this way of stating it does not make the case parallel and therefore he cannot argue by any parity of Reason from one to the other St. Paul exhorts the Christians not to go to law before Heathen Judges because it was scandalous to the Christian Profession to do so and therefore if our Reconciler will make a parallel case he must instance onely in something which is scandalous and then by a parity of reason he may prove that to be forbidden also But neither the Authority to prescribe the decent Rites of Worship nor the prudent exercise of it is scandalous and therefore he cannot prove this to be forbid by any parity of Reason But contentions indeed in the Christian Church whatever be the cause of them are very scandalous and therefore all scandalous contentions are forbid as all scandalous going to law is For we must observe that though the Apostle in the seventh verse tells them There is utterly a fault among you because ye go to law one with another yet he does not absolutely forbid going to law as that signifies using some fair and lawful means of righting our selves when we suffer wrong even from our Christian Brethren but onely as it signifies going to law before the Vnbelievers or Heathen Magistrates for he requires and exhorts them to have their Causes heard and tryed before the Saints that is either the Governours of the Church or any other Christians whom by joynt consent they shall make Judges and Arbitrators among them But to go to law in those days did properly signifie to implead one another before the Heathen Tribunals because there were no other Magistrates at that time who had any legal authority and this going to law was scandalous Thus by a parity of Reason it is onely that contention which is scandalous that can be forbid and therefore for the Governours of the Church to assert their own Authority in ordering the Externals of Religion and for private Christians to defend the Authority of the Church though with some vehemence and earnestness is not scandalous for it is what they ought to do but to contend against the Authority of the Church is a very scandalous contention because it is against the Duty which private Christians owe to their Superiours and therefore whatever Scandal is given by such contentions is wholly owing to the scandalous Contenders that is to the Dissenters who scandalously oppose the Authority and Constitutions of the Church And therefore our Reconciler ought to have reproved the Dissenters and exhorted them to leave off their scandalous contentions not to lay a necessity on the Governors of the Church not to exercise their Authority which these men so scandalously oppose as we find the Apostle in this very place turns the edge of his reproof against those who did the wrong and gave occasion to these scandalous contentions Ye do wrong and defraud and that your brethren Contentions either about the Doctrine Discipline or Worship of the Christian Church are very scandalous but is this a good reason not to contend for the Faith not to oppose Heresies and Schisms because these Disputes represent Christianity as a very uncertain thing and give scandal and offence to Atheists and Infidels then the Orthodox Christians did very ill to meet in such frequent Councils to condemn Arianism and other pestilent Heresies Where there is a Scandal onely on one side and Contention is the onely Scandal this is a good reason against such contentious Disputes but when it is more scandalous to suffer Heresies in the Church to see Ecclesiastical Authority despised to permit any indecencies and disorders different customs and practices in Christian Worship than it is to contend for the Truth and for the Order and Uniformity of publick Worship we must not be afraid to contend for these things the onely scandalous contention being to contend against them His second Argument which he draws out to a great length is taken from 1 Cor. 7. where he tells us that the Apostle grants it is good for a man not to touch a wife
the Idols Temple and then the sound Christian was to forbear for fear of encouraging such weak Christians in their Idolatry for they might apprehend it as lawful to sacrifice to an Idol as to eat of the Sacrifice and as lawful to eat of the Sacrifice in the Idols Temple as in a private house And thus the use of their innocent liberty in eating what is set before them without scruple might confirm such men in their Idolatrous practices and for that reason they were to forbear And it is probable enough that St. Paul might have respect to all these from what he adds v. 32. Give none offence neither to the Iew nor to the Gentile nor to the Church of God Not to the Jew who had a great abhorrence of Idolatry by doing any thing which should make them suspect you of the least approach to Idolatry which would confirm them in their aversion to Christianity not to the Gentile by confirming them in their Idolatry not to the Church of God by scandalizing either weak or scrupulous Christians much less by scandalizing the Christian Profession as the Gnosticks did by eating in the Idols Temple But how any thing of all this makes to our Reconciler's purpose I cannot see that which comes nearest the business is if we suppose that the Apostle commands them to abstain for the sake of those who scrupled the lawfulness of such meats but then this forbearance was only in the exercise of their private liberty in eating or not eating wherein Religion is not immediately concerned for though it were lawful to eat of such meats yet it was not their duty to do it their eating in it self considered did not please God though they eat without scandal much less when their eating was an offence to weak Christians Meat commendeth us not to God for neither if we eat are we the better neither if we eat not are we the worse as he had before told the Romans The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink and therefore in such cases it became them to exercise great charity in the use of their liberty But how little this makes to our Reconciler's purpose I have already shewn at large in the fifth Chapter and our Reconciler has offered nothing new here to deserve a new Answer All that remains to be considered in this Chapter is the Example of St. Paul himself which may be answered in a very few words He exercised great charity and forbearance both towards Jews and Gentiles and therefore being so great an Apostle ought to be an Example of the like forbearance to all succeeding Bishops and Pastors of the Church Now if our Reconciler can prove from the Example of St. Paul that the Governours of the Church ought not to prescribe the decent Rites and Ceremonies of Religion or ought to alter and abolish them in charity and condescension to Dissenters I will yield the Cause Let us then consider what St. Paul's condescension was and I observe in general that he was an Example of the same condescension and forbearance which he perswaded other private Christians to exercise and therefore if that charity and forbearance which he exhorts the Christians to exercise towards each other does not overthrow Ecclesiastical Authority nor plead for the Indulgence and Toleration of Dissenters then St. Paul's Example cannot do this neither This will appear from considering particulars In this Epistle to the Corinthians he perswades them not to eat meats offered to Idols especially in an Idols Temple for fear of offending and scandalizing weak Christians and this he tells them he would observe himself Wherefore if meat make my brother to offend I will eat no flesh while the world standeth lest I make my brother to offend In the Epistle to the Romans he perswades believing Jews and Gentiles to receive each other and not to judge and censure and scandalize one another about the observation or non-observation of the Law of Moses and this condescension both â—o Jews and Gentiles he exercised himself Vnto the Iew I became as a Iew that I might gain the Iews to them that are under the Law as under the Law that I might gain them that are under the Law to them that are withouâ— the Law as without Law that I might gain them that are without Law That is when he was among the Jews he lived as a Jew observed the Law of Moses as they did when he was among the Gentiles who had no regard to the Law of Moses he did not observe it neither he complied with the weakness and mistakes both of Jews and Gentiles he became all things to all men that he might by all means gain some that is he practised that condescension and forbearance which he taught others to practise And if that did not concern the case of our Dissenters nor plead for the like Indulgence and Toleration for them as I have already proved at large it does not neither can the Apostle's Example prove any such thing All this condescension of the Apostle was not in the exercise of his Apostolical Authority but in the use of his private liberty which he was very willing to restrain to make his Ministry the more effectual but he never parted with his Authority to govern the Church and to prescribe the Rules and Orders of Worship for the sake of any Dissenters as I have already proved But there is one instance more of St. Paul's condescension which our Reconciler takes notice of and indeed it is a very notable one viz. that though St. Paul asserts his right to live upon the Churches stock as well as other Ministers yet he maintained himself by his own labour that he might preach the Gospel to the Corinthians without charge for it is plain that he did receive Contributions from other Churches and this he did lest he should hinder the Gospel of Christ and to cut off occasion from them that desire occasion From whence our Reconciler thus argues Wherefore although the Rulers of the Church have certainly a right to impose things indifferent yet with submission to them I conceive they should not exercise that power in like circumstances viz. when by the exercise thereof they give occasion to them that desire occasion to traduce them as men who more regard a Ceremony than an immortal Soul the exercise of their commanding power than the preserving poor Souls from damning Schisms and the Church from sad Divisions when it hinders the preaching of the Gospel to their Flock as this imposing seems to do Ad Populum phalerae Now I shall briefly consider the Case and then I will consider our Reconciler's Application The Case is this St. Paul had a right to live on the Gospel by Gods own appointment and ordination as the Priests under the Law who ministred in holy things lived of the things of the Temple and they which wait at the Altar are partakers of the Altar have their portion
duty but the power of imposing indifferent things as he calls it or the power of prescribing the Rules and Orders and Circumstances of Worship if there be any such power as he grants there is is the power and authority of an Office is a Trust and a Duty the prudent and faithful discharge of which they must give an account of and therefore must not when they please either part with the power or the exercise of it St. Paul was contented to part with the temporal rewards of his Ministry that he might the more successfully discharge the Ministry it self therefore Church-Governours must not exercise their Authority in the discharge of their Ministry to humour Dissenters St. Paul did more than his strict duty required that he might have something to glory in therefore the Governours of the Church must neglect their duty and lose their reward Indeed our Reconciler talks as if the Churches Authority in indifferent things were onely a personal right a Complement to Church-Governours an ornamental power which they may use or may let alone as they please and if this were so I should presently be of our Reconciler's mind but I believe they have no such kind of useless Authority as this Christ has not complemented his Ministers with any power which is not for the use and service of the Church and therefore if they have power in indifferent things this is a useful power and that which they ought to use when there is reason for it whoever be offended at it Another reason why St. Paul preached the Gospsl freely at Corinth he gives us in the 2 Cor. 11. 12 13. What I do that I will do that I may cut off occasion from them that desire occasion that wherein they glory they may be found even as we for such are false Apostles deceitful workers transforming themselves into the Apostles of Christ. The meaning of which is this There were several false Teachers who crept in among them and used all manner of arts to recommend themselves to the Corinthians and among others this seems to be one that they preached the Gospel freely to them onely as they pretended out of love of their Souls which was a very popular art especially to that People and therefore St. Paul resolved to persist in preaching the Gospel freely to them to cut off occasion from them that desire occasion that is to disappoint those arts of deceit whereby these false Teachers endeavoured to recommend themselves that wherein they glory they may be found even as we that whereas they glory in preaching the Gospel freely this may give them no advantage since it is no more than what I my self have all along done and still continue to do Our Reconciler paraphraseth these words thus To cut off occasion from them that desire occasion that is lest his enemies should take occasion from the exercise of this his liberty to charge or to traduce him as one who more consulted his own profit than the glory of God and the propagation of the Gospel But what occasion had there been for this though he had taken Wages of them as he says he did of other Churches to supply his necessities it was sufficiently evident notwithstanding that he did exact nothing from them to serve the ends of covetousness and ambition for certainly a man may desire the supply of his wants without being charged with covetousness but the Apostle would not suffer these false Prophets by a pretended and hypocritical Zeal to outdo him in any thing Now the Apostle's care to give no advantage to false Teachers is a good Example to the Governours of our Church not to do so neither and I am sure they cannot give them greater advantage than to sacrifice all Order and Decency to their pretended Scruples Well but says our Reconciler the Rulers of the Church by the exercise of this power in indifferent things do give occasion to them that desire occasion to traduce them as men who more regard a Ceremony than an immortal Soul the exercise of their commanding Power than the preserving of poor Souls from damning Schisms and the Church from sad Divisions c. These are very spightful but very foolish Insinuations As for Schisms and Divisions we have already considered where that charge must rest and then how do Ceremonies come in competition with the Souls of men Does the appointment of some Ceremonies for the decent and orderly performance of Religious Worship hinder the salvation of mens Souls Cannot men be saved who observe the Ceremonies of our Church Then indeed our Reconciler might well complain that those who impose such damning Ceremonies have more regard to a Ceremony than to an immortal Soul otherwise there is no competition between Ceremonies and the Souls of men and those who will be Schismaticks for a Ceremony will be Schismaticks without it and will be damned for their Schism whether there be any Ceremonies or not All that remains in this Chapter are his Answers to Meisner's Arguments which I have already considered as much as is necessary to my purpose CHAP. VII Containing an Answer to the Motives to Mutual Condescension urged in the sixth Chapter of the Protestant Reconciler I Find nothing in this Chapter besides some Harangues and Popular Declamations but what has been sufficiently answered already The whole proceeds upon those general Topicks of the smalness of these things the danger mens Souls are in by these Impositions the obligations to Love and Charity which have been particularly discoursed above in the first and second Chapters where the reasons of these things are particularly examined But however I will briefly try whether I cannot give an Answer to all this which may be as popular as his Objections are I. His first Argument or Motive is from considering how small the things are which cause our Discords and Divisions when they are set in competition with the more weighty duties and concerns of Love Peace and the Churches Vnion and Edification and the avoiding the offence and scandal of Iew Gentile and the Church of God which he very pompously proves to be great Gospel-duties Now suppose the things in dispute be never so small if they are of any use in Religion and the Object of Ecclesiastical Authority as our Reconciler owns they are what will he conclude from hence that the observation of such little things must not be enjoyned What not when Christ has given authority to enjoyn them Does Christ then give any authority to his Church which she must not use Must nothing be enjoyned which is little in comparison of Love and Peace and Unity or must they be enjoyned and left indifferent at the same time Must the Church appoint them to be observed but command no body to observe them but those who please In all well-governed Societiâ—s there must be Laws about little as well as about great things and if there be no Authority to determine the least matters both in
Church and State it will necessarily occasion very great inconveniences Well but we must not set these little things in competition with the more weighty duties and concerns of Love and Peace No God forbid we should But does our Reconciler know what a competition between two Laws means I know but of two ways that this can happen either when they contradict each each other or are so contrary in their natures that they can never be both observed or when there is a competition of time that it so happens that we cannot observe both at the same time as when we cannot at the same time go to Church to serve God and stay at home to attend a sick Father or Friend in which cases our Saviour has laid down a general Rule That God prefers Mercy bâ—foâ—e Sacrifice But now upon neither of these accounts can there be any competition pretended between the Rites and Ceremonies of Religion and the great duties of Love and Peace and Unity and Edification For cannot men observe the Orders and Constitutions of the Church as to the external Rites of Worship and love one another and preserve the Peace and Unity of the Church at the same time Indeed can there be a better means to preserve Love and Peace and Unity among Christians and to promote mutual Edification than an Uniformity in Religious Worship since it is evident that nothing breeds greater Dissentions and Emulations and Envyings among Christians than different and contrary Modes of Worship And if this be so then there is no competition between the Ceremonies of Religion and the Love and Peace of Christians and consequently no reason why the Governours of the Church may not command both though the particular Ceremonies of Religion be acknowledged to be small things in comparison with the great duties of Love and Peace Yes you 'll say the imposition of these Ceremonies does come in competition with these great duties of Love and Peace and Unity because there are a great many who quarrel at them and divide the Church upon that account and if these controverted Ceremonies were removed Love and Unity would be restored among us Now supposing this to be true which I have already proved not to be true what is this to the Governours of the Church If they impose nothing which is inconsistent with Love and Peace and Unity then the imposition of these things in it self considered cannot be inconsistent with these great Gospel-duties for if what we command be consistent with Love and Unity then the Command otherwise called the Imposition must be so too It is not the command or imposition of these things which is inconsistent with Love and Unity but refusal of obedience to such lawful Commands which is not the fault of the Governours but of the Subjects not of those who command but of those who will not obey and therefore these are Arguments proper to be urged against Dissenters but not against the Governours of the Church As to give you a familiar instance of this A Master commands his Servant to put on a clean Band to wait at Table the Servant refuses to do it upon this the whole Family is divided some take part with the Master others with the Servant in steps a Reconciler and tells the Master he did very ill to cause such Divisions in his Family that Love and Peace and Unity were more considerable duties than a Servants wearing a clean Band which therefore ought not to come in competition with them Pray Sir says the Master preach this Doctrine to my Servants and not to me I have commanded nothing but what was fit to be done and I will have it done or he and all his Partners shall turn out oâ— my Family Now let one who is a Master judge whether the Master or the Reconciler be in the right The breach of Love and Peace and Unity is not the effect though it be the consequent which our Reconciler I perceive cannot distinguish of the Command or Imposition but of the disobedience and therefore when the Command is fit and reasonable cannot be charged upon him who commands but upon him who disobeys But besides this I observe that Christian Love and Unity and Peace in the Writings of the New Testament signifie the Communion of the Church and how kind soever they may be to each other upon other accounts men do not love like Christians who do not worship God together in the Communion of the same Church wherein they live and there can be no Edification out of the Church Now if there be no way of uniting men in one Communion but by an uniformity of Worship then to prescribe the Rules and Orders and Ceremonies of Worship is as necessary as Christian Love and Peace and Unity is Men who worship God after a different manner must and will worship in different places too and in distinct Communions and those who will not submit to the Injunctions of a just Authority will never consent in any form of Worship and therefore this may multiply Schisms but cannot cure them This is all perfect demonstration from the experience of our late Confusions when the pulling down the Church of England did not lessen our Divisions but increase them But our Reconciler confirms this Argument that the Governours of the Church ought not to insist on such little things when they come in competition with Love and Peace and Unity c. from the example of God himself who was not so much concerned for the ceremonial part of his Worship but that he would permit the violation of what he had prescribed about it upon accounts of lesser moment than these are He instances in the Law of Circumcision which was not observed in the Wilderness because this would hinder the motion of the Camp In the Law of the Passover which was to be observed on the first month and the 14th day of the month but God expresly provided that if any man were unclean or in a journey far off at that time they should observe it on the 14th of the second month in the Sabbatick rest which admitted of works of necessity and mercy which were never forbidden by God in that Law nor intended to be Now are not these admirable proofs That God is not so much concerned for the ceremonial part of his Law but that upon some accounts he would permit the violation of what he had prescribed when it does not appear that he ever did so As for the neglect of Circumcision in the Wilderness I doubt not but God had given express order about it otherwise Moses who was faithful in all his house and a punctual observer of all the divine Laws and Statutes would never have neglected it and this I may say with as much reason as our Reconciler can produce for Gods permission of it without an express Order and somewhat more As for the Passover let our Reconciler consider again whether the observation of
them from Communion whom God will receive So that the poor Church of England must receive Papists into her Communion as well as the Phanaticks where we must observe the Charity is Bishop Sanderson's the Inference and Application the Reconciler's III. His next Argument is from one great purpose of Christ's Advent and the effusion of his precious bloud to make both Iew and Gentile one by breaking down the middle wall of partition that was between them and abolishing the Law of Commandments contained in Ordinances Now the conceit of it is this He supposes the Ceremonies of the Church of England to be such a Partition-wall between Conformists and Nonconformists as the Mosaical Law was between Jews and Gentiles and therefore as Christ has broken down one Partition-wall and made Jew and Gentile one Church so our Governours ought to break down the other Partition-wall to make Conformists and Nonconformists one Body and Church which is such a dull conceit and argues such stupid ignorance in the Mysteries of Christianity that I do not wonder he is so zealous an Advocate for Ignorance and Errour The Partition-wall is an Allusion to that Partition in the Temple which divided the Court where the Jews worshipped from the Court of the Gentiles and that which made this Partition was Gods Covenant with Abraham when he chose his carnal Seed and Posterity for his peculiar People and separated them from the rest of the World and the more effectually to separate them from other Nations gave them a peculiar Law which was to last as long as this distinction did For God did not intend for ever to confine his Church to one Nation but when the promised Messias came to enlarge the borders of his Church to all mankind And therefore this Law was so contrived as to typifie the Messias and to receive its full completion in the perfect Sacrifice and Expiation of his Death which put an end to the former Dispensation and sealed a Covenant of Grace and Mercy with all mankind Thus Christ by his death broke down the Partition-wall because he put an end to the Mosaical Covenant which was made onely with the Jews and to that external and â—ypical Religion which was peculiar to the Mosaical Dispensation and made a distinction and separation between Jew and Gentile that is as Christ made a Covenant now with all mankind so he put an end to all marks of distinction between Jew and Gentile and to that typical and ceremonial Worship which was peculiar to the Jews as a distinct and separate People Now indeed any such Partition-wall as this which confines the Covenant and Promises of God to any particular People or Nation and excludes all others is directly contrary to the end and designe of Christs death and ought immediately to be pulled down but must there therefore be no Partion to distinguish between the Church of Christ and Infidels and Hereticks and Schismaticks Must there be no Walls and Fences about the Church this Vineyard and Fold of Christ Must there be no Laws made for the government of Religious Assemblies and the Decency and Order of Christian Worship for fear of keeping those out of the Church who will not be orderly in it How come the Ceremonies of our Church to be a Wall of partition the Church never made them so for she onely designed them for Rules and decent Circumstances of Worship which it is her duty to take care of Let those then who set up this Wall of partition pull it down again that is let those who separate from the Church and make these Ceremonies a Wall of partition return to the Communion of the Church which no body keeps them from but themselves As for his modest insinuations that our Ceremonies are carnal Ordinances weak and beggarly Elements and therefore ought to be removed for their weakness and unprofitableness as the Mosaick Ceremonies were I have already largely shewn the difference between a Ritual and Ceremonial Religion and those Ceremonies which are for the Decency of Religious Worship which are as necessary and must continue as long as External Worship which requires external Signs of Decency and Honour does IV. His next Motive to Condescension is from the Example of Christ and his Apostles in preaching the Gospel which in short is this That when Christ was on Earth he did not instruct his Disciples in such Doctrines as they were not capable of understanding till after his Resurrection and therefore left the revelation of such matters to the Ministry of his Holy Spirit whom after his Ascension into Heaven he sent to them And the Apostles when they converted Jews and Gentiles to the Faith of Christ did not immediately tell them all that was to be known and believed but instructed them in the plainest matters first and allowed some time to wear off their Jewish and Pagan prejudices therefore the Governours of the Church should forbear imposing of some practices at which our Flocks by reason of their prejudice and weakness will be apt to stumble and take offence But how this follows I confess I cannot understand if it proves any thing it proves that the Governours of the Church must not instruct their People in any thing which they are not willing to learn that our Reconciler should never have published his second part to convince Dissenters that they may lawfully and therefore in duty ought to conform to the Ceremonies of the Church when they are imposed for if notwithstanding the Example of our Saviour and his Apostles we may instruct our People in such things we may require their obedience too otherwise we had as good never instruct them But did Christ and his Apostles then intend that Christians should be always children Did not St. Paul testifie that he had declared the whole Will of God to them And when the Gospel has been fully published to the World for above sixteen hundred years must the Church return again to her state of infancy and childhood to humour Dissâ—nters But indeed is the duty of obedience to Governours in all things which Christ has not forbid such a sublime and mysterious Doctrine that it ought to be concealed as too difficult to be understood Is it not a pretty way of reasoning that Euclid's Elements is too difficult a book for a young child to learn therefore his Master must not teach him to obâ—y his Parents neither I am sure this was one of the first Lessons which the Apostles taught their Disciples whatever else they concealed from them for there can be no Church founded without Government and there can be no Government where Subjects must not be taught Obedience But however there is a great difference between the first publication of any Doctrine and the preaching of it after it is published The first requires great prudence in the choice of a fit time to do it in and of fit persons to communicate it to which was the case of Christ and his
Reverend Bishops once have condescended to these terms of Vnion would they not have rejoyced to have seen the Church restored and themselves readmitted to the execution of their sacred Function upon such terms as the abatement of such trivial things Ans. I judge it very likely they might as a banished Prince would be glad to be restored to his Crown again though he parted with some Jewels out of it But when the providence of God restores them to the exercise of their Function without any such restraints and limitation of their power it is their duty to use their whole power as prudently and charitably as they can The restoring of Episcopacy restored the face of a Church again which was nothing but a Schism without it and no doubt but all good men would be very glad of this though upon hard and disadvantageous terms but surely to restore the Church to its ancient beauty and lustre in a regular and decent administration of all holy Offices is more desirable than nothing but the meer being of a Church still deformed with the marks and ruines of an old Schism and therefore when this can be had it ought to be had and it is a ridiculous thing to imagine that Bishops must use no other authority in the government of the Church when they are in a full possession of their power than barely so much as they would have been contented to have bargained for with Schismaticks when they were thrust out of all power Though whether St. Cyprian would have made any such bargain with Schismaticks as inferred a diminution of the Episcopal Authority I much question Had the Wisdom of the Nation at the happy return of his Majesty to his Throne thought fit to have made any tryal and experiment what some condescensions and abatements would have done the Reverend Bishops no doubt would have acquiesced in it not out of any opinion they had of such methods but to satisfie those who do not see the events of things at a distance by making the experiment But that factious and restless Spirit of Phanaticism which began immediately to work convinced our Prince and Parliament how dangerous such an experiment would be and prevented the tryal of it and now we have such fresh and repeated experiments how dangerous these Factions are both to Church and State our Reconciler would perswade our Governours out of their senses to cherish those men who if they be not suppressed will most infallibly involve this unhappy Church and Kingdom in Bloud and Confusion As for what our Reconciler adds concerning the Rubrick about kneeling at the Sacrament and the Canon about bowing of the body in token of our reverence of God when we come into the place of publick Worship have been sufficiently answered already CHAP. VIII Containing some brief Animadversions on the Authorities produced by our Reconciler in his Preface and the Conclusion of the whole with an Address to the Dissenters THus I have with all plainness and sincerity examined the whole reason of this book for as for the remaining Chapters whatever is of any moment in them I have answered before in the first and second Chapters of this Vindication whether the Answer I have given be satisfactory or not I must leave to others to judge but I can honestly say I have used no tricks and evasions nor have I used any Argument but what is satisfactory to my self All that remains now is a brief examination of those Authorities our Reconciler has produced in his Preface to prove that our own Kings and many famous Doctors of our own Church besides many foreign Divines have pleaded for that condescension for which he pleads in this Book Now I thought it the best way in the first place to examine his Reasons for this condescension for if there be no reason to do this it is no great matter who pleads for it without reason and yet I should be very unwilling to leave such a reproach upon so many great men that they declare their opinions and judgment for a Cause which has no reason to support it And therefore to give a fair account of this also I reviewed his Preface and found there were two ways of answering it either by examining his particular Testimonies we having no reason to believe any thing upon his credit or by taking the Testimonies for granted and shewing that this does not prove that they were of his mind The first of these I had no great stomach to as being a tedious and troublesome work which would swell this Vindication to a great bulk which is grown too big already and the onely end it could serve is to prove that the Protestant Reconciler does not quote his Authors faithfully but I have already given such evidence of this in my Vindication of Bishop Taylor as will spoil his credit with all wary men And therefore I resolved upon the other way of answering him to shew that the Testimonies produced by him as he produces them do not prove what he intended them for But I called to mind that I had a Book written upon this very subject entituled Remarks upon the Preface to the Protestant Reconciler in a Letter to a Friend which I read over and to my great comfort found my work done to my hand for that Author has with great judgment said whatever I can think proper to be said in this Cause and therefore I shall onely give some little hints of what I intended more largely to discourse and refer my Readers to those Remarks for further satisfaction The intention of this Preface our Reconciler tells us p. 3. was to strengthen the designe of his Book by the concurrent suffrages of many worthy Persons both of our own and other Churches who have declared themselves to be of the same judgment and have pursued the same designe which he has done in his Book Now the designe of his Book as I have shewn from his own words in my Introduction p. 13 14. is to prove that it is utterly unlawful for the Governours of the Church to impose the observation of indifferent Rites and Ceremonies in Religion especially when these Ceremonies are scrupled and many professed Christians rather chuse to separate from the Church than submit to them Now to prove this he first alleadges the Authority of three Kings King Iames King Charles the first the Royal Martyr and best of Kings and men as he is pleased to stile him and our present Soveraign and I know not where he could have named three other Kings more averse to his Reconciling designe What King Iames his Judgment was is evident from the Conference at Hampton-court where he so severely determined against Dissenters and kept his word all his reign without granting any liberty to these pretended scruples which is very strange had he been of our Reconciler's mind that it is unlawful to impose these Ceremonies upon a scrupulous Conscience How much King Charles the first suffered