it seem'd just and reasonable The Pope took his reason rightly from the above cited place 1 Cor. 9. 11. But falsly suppos'd every one to be instructed by his Parish-Priest Whether this were then first so decreed or rather long before as may seem by the Laws of Edgar and Canute that Tithes where to be paid not to whom he would that paid them but to the Cathedral Church or the Parish Priest It imports not since the reason which they themselves bring built on a false Supposition becomes infirm and absurd that he should reap from me who sows not to me be the cause either his defect or my free choise But here it will be readily objected what if they who are to be instructed be not able to maintain a Minister as in many Villages I answer that the Scriptures shew in many places what ought to be done herein First I offer it to the Reason of any Man whether he think the Knowledg of Christian Religion harder than any other Art or Science to attain I suppose he will grant that it is far easier both of it self and in regard of Gods assisting Spirit not particularly promis'd us to the attainment of any other Knowledg but of this only since it was preached as well to the Shepherds of Bethleem by Angels as to the Eastern Wife Men by that Star and our Saviour declares himself anointed to preach the Gospel to the Poor Luke 4. 18. then surely to their capacitie They who after him first taught it were otherwise unlearned Men. They who before Hus and Luther first reformed it were for the meaness of their condition called the poor men of Lions and in Flanders at this day les gueus which is to say Beggars Therefore are the Scriptures translated into every vulgar Tongue as being held in main matters of Belief and Salvation plain and easie to the poorest and such no less than their Teachers have the Spirit to guide them in all Truth Ioh. 14. 26. and 16. 13. Hence we may conclude if Men be not all their Life time under a Teacher to learn Logic Natural Philosophy Ethics or Mathematics which are more difficult that certainly it is not necessary to the attainment of Christian Knowledg that Men should sit all their Life long at the feet of a Pulpited Divine while he a Lollard indeed over his Elbow-Cushion in almost the seaventh part of 40. or 50. years teaches them scarce half the Principles of Religion and his Sheep oft-times sit the while to as little purpose of Benefitting as the Sheep in their Pues at Smithfield and for the most part by some Simonie or other bought aâ—d sold like them or if this comparison be too low like these women 1 Tim. 3. 7 ever learning and never attaining yet not so much through their won fault as through the unskilful and immethodical Teaching of their Pastor teaching here and there at random out of this or that Text as his ease or fansie and oft-times as his stealth guides him Seeing that Christian Religion may be so easily attain'd and by meanest capacitles it cannot be much difficult to find waies both how the Poor yea all men may be soon taught what is to be known of Christianity and they who teach them recompenc'd First if Ministers of their own accord who pretend that they are call'd and sent to preach the Gospel those especially who have no particular flock would imitate our Saviour and his Disciples who went preaching through the Villages not only through the Cities Mat. 9. 35. Mark 6. 6. Luke â—3 22. Acts 8. 25. and there preached to the Poor as well as to the Rich looking for no recompence but in Heaven Iohn 4. 35 36. Look on the Fields for they are white already to Harvest and he that reapeth receiveth wages and gathereth Fruit unto Life Eternal This was their wages But they will soon reply we our selves have net wherewithall who shall bear the charges of our journey To whom it may as soon be answered that in likelihood they are not poorer than they who did thus and if they have not the same faith which those Disciples had to trust in God and the promise of Christ for their maintenance as they did and yet intrude into the Ministery without any livelihood of their own they cast themselves into a miserable hazard or temptation and oft-times into a miserable necessity either to starve or please their Master rather than God and give men just cause to suspect that they came neither call'd nor sent from above to preach the word but from below by the instinct of their own hunger to feed upon the Church Yet grant it needful to allow them both the charges of their journey and the hires of their labour it belong next unto the charity of richer Congregations where most commonly they abound with Teachers to sâ—nd some of their number to the Villages round as the Apostle from Ierusalem sent Peter and Iohn to the City and Villages of Samaria Acts. 8. 14 25. or as the Church at Ierusalem sent Barnabas to Antioch chap. 11. 22. and other Churches jonyning sent Luke to travel with Paul â— Cor. 8. 19. though whether they had their charges born by the Church or no it be not recorded If it be objected that this Itinerary Preaching will not serve to plant the Gospel in those places unless they who are sent abide there â—â—me competent time I answer that if they stay there a year or two which was the longest time usually staid by the Apostles in one place it may 〈◊〉 to teach them who will attend and learn all the points of Religion necessary to Salvation then sorting them into several Congregations of a moderate number out of the ablest and zealousest among them to create Elders who exercising and requiring from themselves what they have learned for no learning is retaind without constant exercise and methodical repetition may teach and govern the rest and so exhorted to continue faithful and stedfast they may securely be committed to the providence of God and the guidance of his Holy Spirit till God may offer some opportunity to them again and to confirm them which when they have done they have done as much as the Apostles were wont to do in propogating the Gospel Acts 14 v. 3. And when they had ordained them Elders in every Church and praied with fasting they commended them to the Lord on whom they believed And in the same chapter ver 21. 22. When they had preached the Gospel to that City and had taught many they returned again to Lystra and to Iâ—onium and Antioch confirming the Souls of the Disciples and exhorting them to continue in the Faith and Chap. 15. 36. Let us go again and visit our Brethren And ver 41. He went through Syria and Cilicia confirming the Churches To these I might add other helps which we enjoy now to make more easie the attainment of Christian Religion by the meanest the Entire
A SUPPLEMENT TO D R. DU MOULIN TREATING Of the likeliest Means to Remove HIRELINGS OUT OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND With a brief VINDICATION of M R RICH. BAXTER By I. M. LONDON Printed in the Year MDCLXXX A SUPPLEMENT TO D R DU MOULIN TREATING Of the likeliest means to remove Hirelings out of the CHURCH TWo things has ever wrought much mischief to the Church of God and the advancement of Truth Force on the one side restraining and Hire on the other side corrupting the Teachers thereof The latter of these is by much the more dangerous for under force though no thank to the Forcers True Religion oft-times best thrives and flowrishes but the corruptions of Teachers most commonly the effect or hire is the very bean of truth in them who are so corrupted Of force not to be used in matters of Religion I have already spoken and so stated matters of Conscience and Religion in Faith and Divine Worship and so severed them from Blasphemie and Heresie the one being properly as is dispiteful the other such as stands not to the Rule of Scripture and so both of them not matters of Religion but rather against it that to them who willyet use force this only choise can be left whether they will force them to believe to whom it is not given from above being not forc'd thereto by any Principle of the Gospel which now is the only Dispensation of God to all men or whether being Protestants they will punish in those things wherein the Protestant Religion denies them to be Judges either in themselves infallible or to the Consciences of other Men or whether lastly they think fit to punish Error supposing they can be inâ—allible that it is so being not wilful but conscientious and according to the best light of him who errs grounded on Scripture which kind of error all Men religious or but only reasonable have thought worthier of pardon and take growth thereof to be prevented by spiritual means and Church Discipline not by civil laws and outward force since it is God only who gives as well to believe aright as to believe at all and by those means which he ordained sufficiently in his Church to the full execution of his divine purpose in the Gospel It remains now to speak of Hire the other evil so mischievous in Religion whereof I promised then to speak further when I should find God disposing me and opportunity inviting Opportunity I find now inviting and apprehend therein the concurrence of God disposing since the maintainance of Church-Ministers a thing not properly belonging to the Magistrate and yet with such importunity call'd for and expected from him is at present under publick debate Wherein least any thing may happen to be determined and established prejudicial to the right and freedom of Church or advantageous to such as may be found hirelings therein it will be now most seasonable and in these matters wherein every Christian hath his free suffrage no way misbecoming Christian Meekness to offer freely without disparagement to the wisest such advice as God shall incline him to propound Since heretofore in Commonwealths of most Fame for Government Civil Laws were not established till they had been first for certain days published to the view of all Men that who so pleas'd might spake freely his opinion thereof and give his exceptions ere the Law could pass to a full Establishment And where ought this Equity to have more place than in the liberty which is unseparable from Christain Religion This I am not ignorant will be a work unpleasing to some But what truth is not hateful to some or other as this in likelihood will be to none but Hirelings And if there be among them who hold it their Duty to speak Impartial Truth as the work of their Ministry though not performed without mony let them not envy others who think the same no less their Duty by the general office of Christianity to speak truth as in all reason may be thought more impartially and unsuspectedly without mony Hire of it self is neither a thing unlawful nor a word of any evil Note signifying no more than a due recompenee or reward as when our Saviour saith The Labourer is worthy of his hire That which makes it so dangerous in the Church and properly makes the Hireling a word always of evil signification is either the excess thereof or the undue manner of giving and taking it What harm the excess thereof brought to the Church perhaps was not found by experience till the days of Constantine who out of his zeal thinking he could be never too liberally a nursing Father of the Church might be not unfitly said to have either overlaid it or choaked it in the nursing Which was foretold as is Recorded in Ecclesiastical Tradition by a Voice heard from Heaven on the very day that those great Donations and Church Revenues were given crying aloud This day is poison pour'd into the Church Which the event soon after verifi'd as appears by another no less ancient observation That Religion brought forth Wealth and the Daughter devoured the Mother But long ere wealth came into the Church so soon as any gain appeared in Religion Hirelings were apparent drawn in long before by the very sent thereof Iudas therefore the first Hireling for want of present hire answerable to his covering from the small number of the meanness of such as then were the Religious sold the Religion it self with the Founder thereof his Master Simon Magus the next in hope only that Preaching and the Gifts of the Holy Ghost would prove gainful offered before-hand a sum of mony to obtain them Not long after as the Apostle foretold Hirelings like Wolves came in by Herds Acts 20. 29. For I know this that after my departing shall grievous Wolves enter in among you not sparing the Flock Tit. 1. 11. Teaching things which they ought not for Lucres sake 2. Pet. 2. 3. And through covetousness make merchandize of you Yet they taught not false Doctrine only but seeming Piety 1 Tim. 6. 5. supposing that gain is Godliness Neither came they in of themselves only but invite oft-times by a great audience 2 Tim 4. 3. For the time will come when they will not endure sound Doctrine but after their own Lusts they will heap to themselves Teachers having itching ears And they on the other side as fast heaping to themselves Disciples Acts. 20. 30. doubtless had as itching palmsâ— 2 Pet. 2. 15. Following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor who loved the wages of unrighteousness Jude 11. They ran greedily after the Error of Balaam for reward Thus we see that not only the excess of Hire in welthiest times but also the undue and vicious taking or giving it though but small or mean as in the primitive times gave to Hirelings occasion though not intended yet sufficient to creep at first into the Church Which argues also the difficulty or rather the
Scripture translated into English with plenty of Notes and some where or other I trust may be found some wholsome Body of Divinity as they call it without School-Terms and Metaphysical Notions which have obscur'd rather than explain'd our Religion and made it seem difficult without cause Thus taught once for all and thus now and then visited and confirmed in the most destitute and poorest places of the Land under the Government of their own Elders performing all Ministerial offices among them they may be trusted to meet and edifie one nother whether in Church or Chappel or to save them the trudging of many Miles thither nearer home though in a Houseor Baâ—r For notwithstanding the gaudy superstition of some devoted still ignorantly to Temple we may be well assur'd that he who disdain'd not to be laid in a Maâ—ger disdains not to be preached in a Barn and that by such Meetings as these being indeed most Apostolical and Primitive they will in a short time advance more in Christian-Knowledge and Reformation of Life than by the many years preaching of such an Incumbent I may say such an Incubus oft-times as will be meanly hired to abide long in those places They have this left perhaps to object further that to send thus and to maintain though but for a year or two Ministers and Teachers in several places would prove chargeable to the Churches though in Towns and Cities round about To whom again I answer that it was not thought so by them who first thus propagated the Gospel though but few in number to us and much less able to sustain the expence Yet this expence would be much less then to hire Incumbents or rather Incumbrances for a Life-time and a great means which is the Subject of this Discourse to diminish Hirelings But be the expence less or more if it be found burdensome to the Churches they have in this Land an easie remedie in their Recourse to the Civil Magistrate who hath in his hands the disposal of no small Revenues left perhaps anciently to Superstitious but meant undoubtedly to good and best uses and therefore once made publick appliable by the present Magistrate to such uses as the Church or solid Reason from whomsoever shall convince him to think best And those uses may be no doubt much rather than as Glebes and Augmentations are now bestowed to grant such requests as these of the Churches or to erect in greater number all over the Land Schools and competent Libraries to those Schools where Languages and Arts may be taught free together without the needless unprofitable and inconvenient removing to another place So all the Land would soon be better civili'zd and they who are taught freely at the publick cost might have their education given them on this condition that therewith content they should not gad for Preferment out of their own Country but continue there thankful for what they have received freely bestowing it as freely on their Country without soaring above the meanness wherein they were born But how they shall live when they are thus bred and dismis'd will be still the sluggish objection To which is answered that those Publick Foundations may be so instituted as therein may be at once brought up to a competence of Learning and to an honest Trade and the Hours of Teaching so ordered as their Studie may be no hindrance to their Labour or other Calling this was the Breeding of St. Paul though born of no mean Parents a Free Citizen of the Roman Empire so little did his Trade debase him that it rather enabled him to use that Magnanimitie of preaching the Gospel through Asia and Europe at his own charges Thus those Preachers among the Poor WALDENSES the Ancient Stock of our Reformation without these helps which I speak of bred up themselves in Trades and especially in Physick and Surgery as well as in the Study of Scripture which is the only True Theology that they might be no burden to the Church and by the Example of Christ might cure both Soul and Bodie through Industry joining that to their Ministry which he joyned to his by Gift of the Spirit Thus relates Peter Giles in his History of the WALDENSES in Piedmont But our Ministers think scorn to use a Trade and count it the Reproach of this Age that Trades-men preach the Gospel It were to be wished they were all Trades-men they could not then so many of them for want of another Trade make a Trade of their Preaching and yet they clamor that Trades-men Preach and yet they Preach while they themselves are the worst Trades-men of all As for Church-Endowments and Possessions I meet with none considerable before Constantine but the Houses and Gardens where they met and their places of Burial and I perswade me that from them the Ancient WALDENSES whom deservedly I cite so often held that to endow Churches is an evil thing and that the Church then fell off and turned Whore sitting on that Beast in the Revelation when under Pope Sylvester she received those Temporal Donations So the forecited Tractate of their Doctrine testifies This also their own Traditions of that Heavenly Voice witnes'd and some of the Ancient Fathers then Living foresaw and deplor'd And indeed how could these Endowments thrive better with the Church being unjustly taken by those Emperors without Suffrage of the People out of the Tributes and Publick Lands of each City whereby the People became liable to be oppressed with other Taxes Being therefore given for the most part by Kings and other publick Persons and so likeliest out of the Publick and if without the Peoples consent unjustly however to publick ends of much concernment to the good or evil of a Commonwealth and in that regard made publick though given by private Persons or which is worse given as the Clergy then perswaded Men for their Soul's health a pious Gift but as the truth was oft-times a Bribe to God or Christ for Absolution as they were then taught from Murders Adulteries and other hainous Crimes what shall be found heretofore given by Kings or Princes out of the publick may justly by the Magistrate be recall'd and reappropriated to the Civil Revenue what by private or publick Persons out of their own the Price for Blood or Lust or to such Purgatorious and Superstitious Uses not only may but ought to be taken off from Christ as a foul dishonour laid upon him or not impiously given nor in particular to any one but in general to the Churches good may be converted to that use which shall be judged tending more to that end Thus did the Princes and Cities of Germany in the first Reformation and defended their so doing by many Reasons which are set down at large in Sleidan l. 6. an 1526 and l. 11. an 1537. and l. 13. an 1540. But that the Magistrate either out of that Church-Revenue which remains yet in his hand or establishing any other Maintenance instead of
Tithe should take into his own power the Stipendiary Maintenance instead of Church Ministers or compel it by Law can stand neither with the People Right nor with Christian Liberty but would suspend the Church wholly upon the State and turn her Ministers into State Pentioners And for the Magistrate in Person of a Nursing Father to make the Church his meer Ward as alwaies in Minority the Church to whom he ought as Magistrate Esa. 49. 23. To bow down his face toward the Earth and lick up the dust of her feet her to subject to his Political Drifts or conceived Opinions by mastering her Revenue and so by his Examinant Committees as send her free Election of Ministers is neither just nor pious no honour done to the Church but a plain dishonour and upon her whose only head is in Heaven yea upon him who is her only Head sets another in effect and which is most monstrous a Human on Heavenly a Carnal on a Spiritual a Political Head on an Ecclesiastical Body which at last by such Heterogeneal such Incestuous Conjunction transforms her oft-times into a Beast of many Heads and many Horns For if the Church be of all Societies the Honest on earth and so to be reveng'd by the Magistrate not to trust her with her own belief and integrity and therefore not with the keeping a least with the disposing of what Revenue shall be found justly and lawfully her own is to count the Church not a holy Congregation but a Pack of giddy or dishonest Persons to be ruled by civil Power in sacred Affairs But to proceed further in the truth yet more freely seeing the Christian Church is not National but consisting of many particular Congregations subject to many changes as well through civil Accidents as through Schism and various Opinions not to be decided by any outward Judge being matters of Conscience whereby these pretended Church-Revenues as they have been ever so are like to continue endless matter of disâ—ention both between the Church and Magistrate and the Churches among themselves There will be found no better remedy to these evils otherwise incurable than by the incorruptest Council of those Waldenses our first Reformers to remove them as a Pest an Apple of Discord in the Church for what else can be the effect of Riches and the snare of mony in Religion and to convert them to those more profitable uses above expressed or other such as shall be judged most necessary considering that the Church of Christ was founded in poverty rather than in revenues stood purest and prospered best without them received them unlawfully from them who both erroneously and unjustly sometimes impiously gave them and so justly was ensuared and corrupted by them And least it be thought that these revenues withdrawn and better imployed the Magistrate ought instead to settle by statute some maintenance of Ministers let this be considered first that it concerns every mans Conscience to what Religion he contributes and that the Civil Magistrate is intrusted with Civil Rights only not with Conscience which can have no Deputy or Representer of it self but one of the same mind next that what each man gives to the Minister he gives either as to God or as to his Teacher if as to God no Civil Power can justly consecrate to religious uses any part either of Civil revenue which is the Peoples and must save them from other Taxes or of any mans Propriety but God by special Command as he did by Moses or the owner himself by voluntary Intention and the perswasion of his giving it to God Forced Consecrations out of another mans Estate are no better than forc'd vowes fâ—ateful to God who loves a chearful Giver but more hateful wrung out o mens purses to maintain a disapproved Ministery against their Conscience however unholy infamous and dishonourable to his Ministers and the free Gospel maintained in such unworthy manner as by violence and extortion if he give it as to his Teacher what justice or equity compels him to pay for learning that Religion which leaves freely to his choise whether he will learn it or no whether of this Teacher or another and especially to pay for what he never learned or approves not whereby besides the wound of his conscience he becomes the less able to recompence his true Teacher Thus far hath been enquired by whom Church-Ministers ought to be maintained and hath been proved most natural most equal and agreeable with Scripture to be by them who receive their teaching and by whom if they be unable Which waies well observ'd can discourage none but Hirelings and will much lessen their number in the Church It remains lastly to consider in what manner God hath ordained that recompence be given to Ministers of the Gospel And by all Scripture it will appear that he hath given it them not by Civil Law and Freehold as they claim but by the benevolence and free gratitude of such as receive them Luke 10. 7 8. Eating and drinking such things as they give you If they receive you eat such things as are set before you Mat. 10â— 7 8. As ye go preach saying The Kingdom of God is at hand c. Freely ye have received freely give If God have ordained Ministers to preach freely whether they receive recompence or not then certainly he hath forbid both them to compel it for them But freely given to himself Phil. 4. 16 17 18. Ye sent once and again to my necessity Not because I desire a gift but I desire fruit that may abound to your Account Having received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you an odour of sweet smell a sacrifice acceptable well pleasing to God Which cannot be from force or unwillingness The same is said of Alms Heb. 13. 16. To do good and to communicate forget not for with such sacrifices God is well pleased Whence the primitive Church thought it no shame to receive all their Maintenance as the Alms of their Auditors Which they who defend Tithes as if it made for their Cause when as it utterly confutes them omit not to set down at large proving to our hands out of Origen Tertullian Cyprian and others that the Clergy lived at first upon the meer benevolence of their hearers who gave what they gave not to the Clergy but to the Church out of which the Clergy had their portions given them in baskets and were thence called Sportularii Basket-Clerks that their portion was a very mean allowance only for a bare livelihood according to those precepts of our Saviour Mat. 10. 7 c. the rest was distributed to the poor They cite also out of Prosper the Disciple of St. Austin that such of the Clergy as had means of their own might not without sin partake of Church-maintenance not receiving thereby food which they abound with but feeding on the sins of other men that the holy Ghost saith of such Clergy-men they eat the sins of my
the People but rather leaven pure Doctrine with Scholastical Trash than enable a Minister to the Preaching of the Gospel Whence we may also compute since they come to recknings the charges of his needful Library which though some shame not to value at 600â— may be competently furnished for 60. If any man for his own curiosity or delight be in Books further expensive that is not to be reckon'd as necessary to his Ministerial either Breeding or Function But Papists and other Adversaries cannot be confuted without Fathers and Councels immense Volumes and of vast charges I will shew them therefore a shorter and a better way of confutation Tit. 1. 9. Holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught that he may be able by sound Doctrine both to exhort and to convince Gain-sayers who are confuted as soon as heard bringing that which is either not in Scripture or against it To pursue them further through the obscure and intangled Word of Antiquity Fathers and Councels fighting one against another is needless endless not requisite in a Minister and refus'd by the first Reformers of our Religion And yet we may be confident if these things are thought needful let the State but erect in publick good Store of Libraries and there will not want Men in the Church who of their own inclinations will become able in this kind against Papist or any other Adversarie I have thus at large examined the usual pretences of Hirelings coloured over most commonly with the cause of Learning and Universities as if with Divines Learning stood and fell wherein for the most part their pittance is so small and to speak freely it were much better there were not one Divine in the Universitie no School-Divinitie known the Idle Sophastry of Monks the Canker of Religion and that they who intended to be Ministers were trained up in the Church only by the Scripture and in the Original Languages thereof at School without fetching the compass of other Arts and Sciences more than what they can well learn at Secondary Leasure and at home Neither speak I this in contempt of Learning or the Ministry but hating the common cheats of both hating that they who have preached out Bishops Prelates and Canonists should in what serves their own ends retain their false Opinions their Pharasaical Leaven their Avarice and closely their Ambition their Pluralities their Nonresidences their odious Fees and use their Legal and Popish Arguments for Tithes that Independents should take that Name as they may justly from the true Freedom of Christian Doctrine and Church Discipline subject to no Superior Judge but God only and seek to be Dependents on the Magistrate for their maintenance which two things Independence and State-Hire in Religion can never consist long or certainly together For Magistrates at one time or other not like these at present our Patrons of Christian Liberty will pay none but such whom by their Committees of Examination they find conformable to their Interest and Opinions and Hirelings will soon frame themselves to that Interest and those Opinions which they see best pleasing to their Pay-masters and to seem right themselves will force others as to the truth But most of all they are to be revil'd and sham'd who cry out with a distinct voice of Notorious Hirelings that if ye settle not our maintenance by Law farewell the Gospel then which nothing can be uttered more false more ignominious and I may say more blasphemous against our Saviour who hath promised without this condition both his holy Spirit and his own presence with his Church to the worlds end nothing more false unless with their own mouths they condemn themselves for the unworthiest and most mercenary of all other Ministers by the experience of 300 years after Christ and the Churches at this day in France Austria Polonia and other places witnessing the contrary under an adverse Magistrate not a favourable nothing more ignominious levelling or rather undervaluing Christ beneath Mahomet For if it be thus how can any Christian object it to a Turk that his Religion stands by force only and not justly fear from him this reply yours both by force and mony in the judgment of your own Preachers This is that which make Atheists sin in the Land whom they so much complain of not the want of maintenance or Preachers as they alleage but the many Hirelings and Cheaters that have the Gospel in their hands hands that still crave and are never satisfied Likely Ministers indeed to proclaim the Faith or to exhort our trust in God when they themselves will not trust him to provide for them in the message whereon they say he sent them but threaâ—en for want of temporal means to desert it calling that want of means which is nothing else but the want of their own faith and would force us to pay the hire of building our faith to their covetuous incredulity Doubtless if God only be he who gives Ministers to his Church till the worlds end and through the whole Gospel never sent us for Ministers to the Schools of Philosophy but rather bids us beware of such vain deceit Col. 2. 8. which the Primitive Church after two or three Ages not remembring brought her self quickly to confusion if all the Faithful be now 4 Holy and Royal Priesthood 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. not excluded from the Dispensation of things Holiest after free Election of the Church and imposition of hands there will not want Ministers elected out of all sorts and orders of men for the Gospel makes no difference from the Magistrate himself to the meanest Artificer if God evidently favour him with Spiritual Gifts as he can easily and oft hath done while those Batchelor Divines and Doctors of the Tippet have been pass'd by Heretofore in the first Evangelick times it were happy for Christendom if it were so again Ministers of the Gospel were by nothing else distinguished fâ—om other Christians but by their Knowledge and Sanctitie of Life for which the Church elected them to be her Teachers and Overseers though not thereby to seperate them from what ever calling she then found them following besides as the example of St. Paul declares and the first time of Christianity When once they affected to be called a Clergy and became as it were a peculiar Tribe of Levites a Party a dictinct order in the Common-wealth bred up for Divines in babling Schools and fed at the publick cost good for nothing else but what was good for nothing they soon grew idle that Idleness with fulness of Bread begat pride and perpetual contention with their Feeders the despis'd Laitie through all Ages ever since to the perverting of Religion and the disturbance of all Christendom And we may considently conclude it never will be otherwise while they are thus upheld undepending on the Church on which alone they anciently depended and are by they Magistrate publickly maintain'd a numerous Faction of indigent Persons crept for the most part out of extream want and bad nature claiming by divine Right and Freehold the tenth of our Estates to monopolize the Ministry as their peculiar which is free and open to all able Christians elected by any Church Under this pretence exempt from all other imployment and enriching themselves from the publick they last of all prove common Incendiaries and exalt their horns against the Magistrate himself that maintains them as the Priest or Rome did soon after against his Benefactor the Emperor and the late Presbyters in Scotland Of which Hireling Crew together with all the Mischiefs Dissentions Troubles Wars meerly of their kindling Christendom might soon rid her self and be happy if Christians would but know their own Dignitie their Libertie their Adoption and let it not be wondred if I say their Spiritual Priesthood whereby they have all equally access to any Ministerial Function whenever call'd by their own abilities and the Church though they never came near Commencement or Universitie But while Protestants to avoid the due Labour of undertaking their own Religion are oâ—tent to lodge it in the Breast or rather in the Books of a Clergy-man and to take it thence by Scraps and Mammocks as he dispences it in his Sundays â—dole they will be always learning and never knowing always Infants always either his Vassals as Lay-Papists are to their Priests or at odds with him Reformed Principles give them some light to be not wholly conformable whence infinite disturbances in the State as they do must needs follow Thus much I had to say and I suppose what may be enough to them who are not avaâ—â—ciously beâ—t otherwise touching the likeliest means to remove Hirelings out of the Church than which nothing can more conduce to truth to peace and all happiness both in Church and State If I be not heard nor believed the event will bear me witness to have spoken truth and I in the mean while have born my witness not out of season to the Church and to my Country FINIS