THE PRINCIPLES OF PROTESTANT Truth and Peace IN FOUR TREATISES VIZ. The TRUE STATE of LIBERTY of CONSCIENCE In Freedom from Penal Laws and Church-Censures The OBLIGATIONS to NATIONAL TRUE RELIGION THE NATURE of SCANDAL Particularly as it relates to Indifferent Things A CATHOLICK CATECHISM Shewing the True Grounds upon which the Catholick Religion is ascertained Zech. 8. 19. Love the Truth and Peace By THO. BEVERLEY Rector of Lilley in Hertfordshire LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst and Will. Miller at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside and the Acorn in St. Paul's Church-yard 1683. To the Reader I Have very sadly observed the great distress of Humane Affairs through miscarriages every way in point of Religion For while the Powers of this world and Ecclesiastick Jurisdictions take it for their Right to impose by severe Penalties and dreadful Censures what they think fit under so great a name they yet neither can assure any one they are not or do not use to be mistaken in their recommendations or that all their Authority or Power shall excuse and acquit those that obey them when they appear before Gods Tribunal so that it is impossible the Judgment or Conscience should have any repose here On the other side some not only out of Recoyl for self-preservation or out of design but from Furious Wild Principles have broken out into publick disturbance to make room for what they have proclaim'd as the Kingdom of God and Christ to the great scandal of True Religion the imbrewing their hands very horridly in Blood and the seeming Justification of utmost Rigors against any pretences of Religion except according to Law Besides all this private Feuds and Animosities vehement and angry disputes are every where clamorous and people hereupon in great Amuse what they should believe or do Now since there is no doubt all these evils are foreseen by God there is as little doubt that there are sure Remedies provided against them I have then upon the whole this account to give the Reader That the observation of so many Counter-Cries of Opinion such great Exasperations in mens Affections such Complaints of oppression of Conscience by undue Laws such Recriminations of Faction Sedition Fanaticism not only among Christians but among Protestant Christians and of the same Common National Interest mov'd me to seek Retirement to some Rock of Certainty that I might be at perfect Peace upon in full satisfaction of Judgment and composure of Affection and having found Natural Religion as certain as our Faculties and Fundamental Christianity in most things of the same immediate certainty as Natural in all things after due exploration of the same final certainty I am so far at Peace in my Judgment as to have no doubt WHAT IS TRVTH in relation to Eternal Happiness if ten thousand more of Opinions encompassed me round about so far at Peace in my Affections as not to be in Commotion with any man that gives Testimony to Christian Charity that he is a strict observer of Natural Religion and Fundamental Christianity one Essential Rule of both which is Love Peace and Mercy to all that are centred in this Natural Christian Religion though they may adjoyn or refuse some Eccentrick Placits that do not harm the Foundation Lastly I am assur'd this very Natural Religion espoused by Christianity well considered and observed would disarm the world of those Instruments of Cruelty in the Cause of Religion so extreamly abhored by it whether used by angry supreme Powers or unjustly taken up by Seditious Ambitious or Fanatick Subjects Which Cruelty men are sain to borrow from wild Beasts no such being given by the Gracious Author of all things to so excellent a Nature as he made the Humane and therefore most certainly not by the Redeemer nor his Religion who came to fill the world with Innocency Goodness and Peace after so great an Invasion of Barbarity and Cruelty Now having found this satisfaction my self I make offer of it if it may be the same to others asking only Candid Interpretation in particular management the main Principle being above the need of pardon or the Fear of Indignation Although the Discourse being intended much shorter is not distinguished in the Body of it into Chapters or otherwise yet that the Reader may have a guidance into the main Designs of it I have prefixed this Summary of Heads of Discourse following each other The Contents THE Introduction Explaining the Text and shewing the merciful Design of Christianity against contrary appearances The always present way of determining Doubts in Religion 1. to 8. Of Natural Religion as sure as our Faculties and the Examination of Things by it 10. to 26. Of Natural-Religion united by Christian Religion to and with it self as the only Assurance and Test of Revealed Religion and of the little value of Ceremonies in Religion either Natural or Christian 27. to 45. Of Natural Religion the only standard of Humane Paenal Laws in Religion 45. to 79. Of the great use of Natural Religion in composing and deciding Differences in Christian Religion applied to some of the greatest Controversies in it 80 82. Of the first Principle of Peace in Christianity it self The important Honourable Business given as one Rule to walk by wherein it engages all its Disciples several ways producing peace 88 to 94. Of the grand Principles of the Vnion of Christians into one Body on which love and peace are infallibly to ensue 95 to 99. Of Heresie and the nature of it cutting off from that Vnion exemplified in Popery and whether the Roman Society be a True Church Of Schism and its nature as it cuts off from the Body of Christ 99 to 110. Of the Laws for Christians being imbodied in a Catholick Church in particular Congregations or Churches and the Order of Both to National Christian Constitutions Of the great value the word of God gives to Publick National Religion requiring our utmost attemperation of our selves to it consistently with conscience Of the Peace of Christianity in relation to the Ministerial presidency of it in relation to Magistracy to Vniversal Goodness 121 to 127. A Lamentation over the World's unhappiness in relation to so excellent a thing as Religion and Christian Religion 127. An Offerture for the Amicable Return of all Protestants one to another within our English Nation and the Methods of it 136. ERRATA PAGE 2 l. 28. r. action p. 7. l. 25. for thus r. that p. 17 l. 17. blot them p. 23 l. 1 for them r. that l. 5. for it self r. themselves p. 27. l. 32. r. appellation p. 91. l. 37. for they r. that p. 109. l. 7. blot why l. 10. blot who being p. 1220 Marg. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 141. l. 7. r. done ISA. XI 6 7 8 9. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb and the leopard shall lie down with the kid and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together and a little child shall lead them And
Testament the Apocalypse foretel the kingdoms of the world in the very state of Kingdoms becoming the Lords and his Christs All these things argue a great encouragement of Nations receiving and making a publique profession of the Gospel as Nations even as Families may and ought as Families And though it be undoubtedly the great Honour and Glory of Nations to come as near and as exact and close as may be to the Laws and Order of Christ in the Government as in the Constitution of their National Christianity yet because there will and generally falls out to be a mixture of National Customs in such publique Administrations a Comprimise of them to the Laws and Government of Nations hence it also comes to pass there may be a dissatisfaction in many of the subjects of such Nations to comply with their National Constitutions of Religion Hence there is apt to arise Discomposure and Disquiet if Princes or Powers exceed that exercise of Power allotted to them by God as we have before discours'd and also by the very essential constitution of Christianity seeing Christ hath made none Lords of his peoples Faith or Divine Worship and Princes are no more than Nursing-fathers The quiet therefore and peace of Nations is most advanced by setting up nothing in Christianity but what is absolutely necessary according to the Laws of Christ and yeilding the tenderest and opening the most bountiful hand to the professors and Ministers of essential Christianity Covering all the faulty divisions of Christians with their Royal and compassionate PVRPLE This is most Princely Generous and Great this is most exalting of Christianity it self But if this cannot be obtained the next Best and that which is indeed as I have already made out but Just is That no native Rights and Liberties be defaulked nor punitive oppressions inflicted but that the Honorary Rewards of Nations and Princes be adjudged to men who are of the Publique Sentiment in their Administrations in Christian Religion And this indeed cannot be excepted to it being the Right of National Powers to dispose of their own according to their own Reason and Judgment Yet is there still an obligation upon Christian subjects beyond these Considerations to examine all things with the greatest prejudice for and on the side of the National sense especially when they find the substantials of Religion secure and in safety and besides their private adjustments of Christian performances in particular Societies according to the exacter Rules of Christianity as they are Judges for themselves to encourage also promote and as far as possibly they can communicate with National Religion putting the fairest and kindest interpretation and Hope upon all things tolerating all that can without disobedience to God be tolerated observing Rites and Customs of Nations as far as they can with security from vain worshipping of God by the commandments of men both because of the Honour Christianity gives to Magistracy according to Natural sanctions and also and more especially because of the esteem Christianity hath of a Publique and National Religion Let me then resume upon the whole matter And it plainly appears Christianity notwithstanding the Freedom it allows to every man's conscientious sentiments is no Enemy but a Friend 1. To Society 2. To the Order and Peace that bind Society Yea and strictly commands them and hath given positive Institutions for them 1. For first It unites all its true disciples in that common ample universal center of Love Peace and Order God and Christ to whom the first dedication of a Christian is made and in whom it always rests 2. It unites them with that most publique wise rational and most holy Assembly under Heaven the Catholick Church even all that are that one Body acted by that one Spirit united in one Hope one Faith one Baptism In all which every Christian being one with the whole desires and rejoyces in the encrease of that one Body the advancement of that one Faith communicates in the prayers and praises of that one Body sorrows in its Afflictions ministers to its necessities and if opportunity be offer'd communicates in Spiritual Gifts and Services with any member of it and values not their particular Rites as any obstruction while they agree in Essentials And indeed every Christian should be suffer'd to drop that Mantle of Ceremonies as he pleases when he ascends in holy offerings of himself â—o God 3. 〈◊〉 to particular Societies or Churches of Christians in whiâ—â— the Essentials of Doctrine and Worship are preserved uncorrupted and so they must be or else such Societies deserve not the name of Churches and when they are in such a neighbourhood to the true Christian that he may freely enjoy his choice he considers these two both recommended by the Word of God 1. Private particular Congregations that cannot conform to publique settlement such must needs be the first Churches when Christianity had no publique allowance such may be still 2. The most publique Settlement of Christian Religion and wherein he may do it he uses both promiscuously wherein he must divide he considers upon the Ballance of his most humble and impartial judgment which tends most to the glory of God to publick edification as well as his own and so as not to do evil that good may come If he chuses that which is more particular as best according to his Sentiment he is yet careful to do all he does with the greatest vigor of Charity Inoffensiveness and desire of promoting of that publique worship as it contains the Essentials of Christianity If according to the sincere sense of his mind he prefer the publique Appointment either as publique and in that regard overweighing smaller doubts and so taking the best advantages afforded therein as to all the Duties particular Congregations seem most adapted to or that the whole composure of the publique is most agreeable to his Sentiment he considers the more private as being of the same body and cannot be severe to the Retirers thereto knowing every man hath the proper sense of his own mind and what Essentials Christianity consists in and therefore would not forcibly hale any into the publique but remonstrate to them as he sees reason with mild and Christian arguments the disadvantage of separating from it beyond plain necessity 4. In the differences of judgment of publique Societies and private in relation to one another or the differences of private among themselves the true Christian still keeps himself upon that Love Mercy and Peace Christianity teaches him and in the midst of those diversities considers the higher tyes worth and value of those Vnities wherein they all meet 5. If a Christian fall into such places where the Essentials are corrupted he esteems Religious solitude the best Communion yet refuses not to improve any thing of Truth he can extract from such Corruption or if there be any parts of publique worship not so adulterated but to admit a possible separation in the exigence of present service
Societies of Mankind it declared it self a Religion that loved them and as it were on purpose to testifie the Divine Approbation of and the near resemblance between those Civil and Political Unions one with another founded in the very nature of Humane Society and that Religious Union which by the very same Law of Nature follows them as so united Christianity kept to the very same Tenor of Union it found any where and twin'd as close about the Cities Neighbourhoods and Families made ready to its hand by civil Associations as it could not calling men out to Wildernesses Mountains or Woods to be the Churches of Christ or that they should abide in Desarts and Solitudes when persecution did not drive and force them out But the Churches of Christ are denominated from those Cities and Regions where they are planted as the Churches of Epheâ—â—â—â— 2 Cor 9 2. Coriâ—th Judaea Galatia Macedonia c. yea the Christiâ—â— of Achaia are called by the Apostle Achaia as if Christianity were there become the Religion of the Countrey and the seven Churches of Asia are called those very Cities where they were seated Rev. 1. 1â— Wherein it is observable the Churches of Cities are called the Church of or in each City as one though it is in a manner certain they must be distributed into more Congregations for their numerousness yet they are still called one because the City was one But the Regions not being so united in Government Neighbourhood or any kind of Civil Union the distribution of Churches easily follows the distinction easily supposable in their civil state In Regions therefore we suppose there was no Centre of Union not in the Churches which were at distances too great for Coagmentation into one nor in the Laws and Government at least with any respect of order towards Religion they are therefore called Churches and not one Church as they are without any exception in Cities even where the Apostle names particular Churches in the Houses within those Cities yet in regard of the Unity of the City it self they are comprehended under the one Church of that City Now all this speaks the care Christian Religion uses not to disturb but to conform to Civil Societies and therefore especially to National the chief of those Societies and so I close this third Argument for National Religion derived from the consideration of Christian Religion National Religion is of great moment and consideration in respect Argum. 4 to the Day of Judgment for the wrath and fury of God upon those Nations that know him not that call not on his Name is to be taken at the full extent and duration in this world in that which is to come and so the happiness of Nations who have the Lord for their God that have the everlasting Arms under and about them spreads it self not only upon Time but upon Eternity It is indeed generally taken for granted that Nations are only judged as Nations in this world yet if we closely examine we shall find both in Scripture and Reason very valuable grounds to believe the Day of Judgment shall not only pass upon persons single but in their Communities as they are lock'd in with their Associations and with respect to those very periods of Time and the Generations into which the Communities and Associations have been distributed so that not only the people of every Nation come into Judgment together but the people of every Generation of this or that Nation come distinctly into Judgment together Besides those peculiarities of Sin or Grace wherein every man is individual to himself and no Stranger intermeddles but he proves and enjoys his own work alone or bears his own burden There are also mens interwoven Actions either good or bad wherein the Communities knots of Society Neighbourhoods Concurrences with the Nation Conformities with the Age and Generation shall be exactly compared and weighed in the Eternal Judgment For there is nothing more frequent in the Scripture than thus to represent the carriage of the day of Judgment The Nations whole as Nations that forget God shall be turned into Hell and Aegypt and Ezek. 32. 18 c. Rom 2 12. all its company all its Hosts lye together the other Nations with their multitude every one in their proper sorts The Vncircumcision and those without Law are judged by themselves the Circumcision and those under the Law by themselves distinctly Our Saviour speaks oâ— Sodom and Gomorrah the men of Nineveh Tyre aend Sidon Chorazin Bethsaida and Capernaum coming into Judgment in that Union in that Community wherein they were imbodyed here in the world and the men of that Generation as they were that Generation I confess it is not so clear that the happiness and salvation of mankind is with any respect to the distinction of Nations because besides what other reasons may be given the union of all blessed persons to God and Christ and of happy Spirits one to another is so infinitely great as to swallow up all distinctions so that there is neither Jew nor Gentile Scythian nor Barbarian but God and Christ are all and in all And so far as there is any such National distinction Our Lord being of the Seed of Abraham in whom all the Families of the Earth are blessed the bosom of Abraham the Table of Everlasting Life at which Abraham Isaac and Jacob sit down the new Jerusalem the Israel of God are the Capital expressions of happiness But still there is reason to think the distinction of Nations is not so lost but that the Holy Seed is as the substance of every Nation in which it is for ever as it were by it self conserv'd A Seed serves God in every Age which is accounted to the Lord for a Generation at that time and when God writes down the people in the Book of Life he writes them as under the head of such a Nation this or that man was born there although they are all enrolled as Citizens of that common City of Zion the City of David from whom our Lord sprang And though all Christians are one holy Nation yet it is said of some very glorious and happy State of the Church of which I will not undertake to determine that after the distinct Sealing of so many thousands of each Tribe there was yet an innumerable company not in a confusion but in a distinction so as to be known to be of all Nations Kindreds People and Tongues All the Nations of them that are saved are also mentioned in the same Mystical Book as kept under that distinction The Apostle speaks to his Corinthians and Thessalonians as certain he should meet them under those very names at the appearance of Christ He prays for Israel as a Nation that they might be saved he discourses their falling away and recovery in a national way for many particular Israelites were then called and saved but not in a national way as he insists Besides all these fair
but with his Mouth must make confession of it to salvation 2. True Religion becoming National hath the desence and security of National Wisdom Force and Strength against false Religion and its force and endeavours to expel the true and become National it self For a Nation divided against it self in Religion how can its Religious Interest stand When though the main be agreed yet if differences of an under nature are managed with high exasperations it must needs endanger the staple Religion it self by weakning dispiriting and dividing the strength that should ingage for it while every one takes care for his private sentiments and is jealous of being undermined or oppressed in them the publick and common Religion cannot be environed and defended with that vigour and union A Nation united in Protestancy is the greatest Bulwark against Popery what can single Interests do in this case Even Experience teaches those that dissent from one another in many things even in National Reform'd Religion to acknowledge this Union the Fort-Royal against the hostile Invasions of Popery which should conciliate them as far as is possible among themselves 3. True Religion as it is National secures best against those undermining Enemies of Atheism Heresies Enthusiasm wild and monstrous Opinions Prophaneness neglect of all Religion Coldness Lukewarmness which take shelter and manage their defence from the divisions in the Religion of a Nation setled and confirmed into avowed Sects and several parties but National Union in a true Religion strikes them both with fear and shame 4. The benefits and blessings of publick Religion as before declared come down upon a Religious Nationa and all the truly Religious parts of it both in this world and in that which is to come according to the strength of the Union in National Religion And this is an interest far greater than that of Trade warlike Defence or the policy of Cities or Kingdoms Accursed therefore be that Irreligion or Disunion that enfeebles it He that lives without God in the world as to the worship of him and he that prodigally commits waste upon a Religious Principle is worse than they that by riotous living or idleness do their part to impoverish a Nation He that upon Division retires from the publick Religion without necessity takes his Interest out of the National Bank or bottom or sullenly lets it lye dead Such kind of partyings in Religion without necessity are like the Hetaeriae or Cabals in Civil Government Consultations without respect to the publick and so the great damage of it an injury of great guilt seeing we owe so much to the publick And so I have done what I intended in the arguing this point I shall now consider what may be objected to it as an occasion further to explain this whole Doctrine and the great Objections I can conceive in prejudice of what I have asserted concerning National Religion I reduce to these following Obj. 1. When God gave the great instance and pattern of National Religion especially as in a National Church how much otherwise did he found it than is possible to be derived from our Saviours Institution He begun it in a holy Root that sprouted out and grew and flourished into a Nation holy to God By his appointment they met together at Jerusalem in the solemn Feasts and Sacrifices as publique Ordinances The Priests and more especially the High-Priests were in most Authorirative Deputation from God between him and that peculiar people that they might unite all as in One. The Temple Altar and Holy of Holies were as the common Center of all the publique worship and a great sin it was to have multiplied any of these and so to have made a Division They had Prophets who were their extraordinary National Ministers their Office and Sermons closely relating to the general state Lastly their Civil Magistrates were under the strictest obligation to attemper their Government and Administrations to the Religious Laws given by God to that people Besides all this they had the Levites dispersed through their Cities and Villages to teach and instruct in the Synagogues the places wherein they assembled for constant exercises of Religion But now what a silence is there of all these things or any thing like them with relation to Nations in our Lords appointment His Apostles called men out of Judaism or Heathenism the then Religion of Nations into private and particular Assemblies called Churches under Pastors particular to them without any Rules for Christian Magistrates or expectation of service from them which argues he did not intend National Churches or if he did by the Prophets signifie any such it was not intended they should be in this dark and cloudy state wherein Antichristianism has so prevailed it is reserv'd for some more glorious State of the Church some more eminent appearance of Christ wherein such Prophecies are to be fulfilled 2. Hence it came to pass the only Instances we have in Scripture of Christian Societies the discourses of them the Rules in relation to them are all fitted to private and particular Congregations and where there are any such spoken of they are called Churches or Congregations so that there is no Association in Christian Religion mentioned but under the name of a Church to signifie Christian Religious Societies and Churches are all one so that there can be no National Christian Religion without a National Church But there is no rule either of a National Christian Religion in the New Testament or a National Church 3. A National Church or a National Religion must depend upon a National Magistracy the Church must be gathered in them the Religion established by them subject to their Laws and penal Statutes and beyond this those that cannot be every way compliant with the whole National Scheme are looked upon as enemies to or disturbers of the peace and Government of the Nation because the Government and the Religion are incorporate together whereas the Laws and Religion and Churches of Christ are all in him and depend upon him only how far is this from a National Church To give first an answer to these Objections together The Arguments already mentioned do mightily prevail with me that it is impossible Christianity should by any of its influences so much as suspend so absolute a Natural Duty upon mankind as this viz. to consecrate National Associations to God in National Religion but that it is always the duty of Christian Magistrates and people to unite in National Christian Religion Or that the Redeemer of mankind should cut off so great a priviledg of Nations as that to intitle themselves Nationally to God and his favour and blessing and to make profession of the wisest and only true Religion in the world or that the very proper and natural Glory of Christianity to make disciples of all Nations may not at all times be endeavoured by every particular Nation However the Prophecies may be more literally fulfilled hereafter in the purity and universality
and shifting for the gaining opportunities for the assembling themselves and preserving their relation one to another in the discharge of mutual duties much more easily than any greater associations could for our Saviour intended all for use not for Form he minded not Nominal Titular Bishops and Churches Thus far I have pleaded the appointment of Christ that the smallest numbers of Christians may agree and associate and be assured of his presence But now that this appointment is in bar of greater Societies of Christians is by no means to be granted for it is most apparent our Saviour design'd all things under the Gosplel should be restor'd to the Law of Nature and the true Reason of Things Now according to that the first End of all Society is the enjoyment of True Religion in more than solitude This desire of enjoying true Religion in Society extends it self from the least of Societies to the greatest that are not too great for the Ends of Society Our Saviour therefore as he gave no Frame of positive Laws or Worship no Pedagogy of Precepts so no Institution of Bounding Churches but that in case of straits and exigencies his true Religion may be administred in the very smallest of Societies with confidence of his Favour and Presence when it hath freedom it may enlarge it self further and further and if it have favour of Nations and Governments ascend to the greatest yet with this reserve That if in any time or place National Christianity varies from the true Original Christianity as often it hath been sound to do so that it cannot even in substantial things be consented in with a pure Conscience privater Congregations even to the most particular are always ready for Christians to retire into for so the Laws of Nature allow where the Publick is not safe and yet when the whole is not corrupted nor liberty of joyning without commixture with those Corruptions denied there may yet be there ought to be no Separation Thus the greatest Societies are not in bar of the least when True Religion requires them Thus the least are not in bar of the greatest when Christianity is at full freedom for it is closely allied with that Wisdom whereby Kings ought to Reign and Princes to decree Justice by which Princes Prov. 8. 15 16. ought to rule and Nobles yea all the Judges of the Earth with that Wisdom which rejoyces in the Habitable parts of the Earth and hath its delights with the sons of men I have therefore before observed That Christian Religion at the very first joyn'd it self as near as it could to all Humane Societies made ready to it as Families Villages Regions and so far as the Rage of Persecution would permit Christian Societies united themselves unto Distant and National Correspondencies among themselves Now it hath been so unhappy indeed with the World that in few Instances there hath been a Good State of National Religion to yield a full consciencious Compliance with Yet this will no more argue against the Thing it self than it does against any other of the wise and good Ordinations of God or against the Jewish Church so immediately govern'd by God and yet so often and so notoriously corrupted in Judah and more generally in the Ten Tribes and yet to shew how to the very utmost without following a multitude to do evil we ought to joyn with any that are good in a Nation and with any thing that is good in National Religion when Elijah had as it were deserted his place and the good influence his being in publick might have had and that God found him alone He did by way of Reproof ask him What he did alone in 1 Kings 19. 9. the Wilderness and inform'd him of a greater number that had not bowed to Baal than he knew of with whom he might joyn himself If Corruption would argue against any good Appointment or Ordination of God it would argue against Churches of the very first Form or Constitution those Churches in the Revelation whose Corruption is severely tax'd and threatned yet are without any Censure as to their Constitution and while Sâ—paration from those Churches is not so much as intimated yet a Separation from Impurities is highly commended and promised reward Those Names Rev. 3. 4. in Sardis that had not defiled their garments are assured they should walk with Christ in white for he judg'd them worthy From whence I conclude no Form of Churches can recommend things disagreeing from the word of God how truly form'd soever those Churches be for Churches are constituted for joyning in those things that are agreeable to the Will of Christ not in those that are not and yet Separation from Corruptions does not necessitate Separation from Churches while there are any Parts of Divine Truth and Worship preserv'd pure to unite in so great are the Obligations that lye upon all sincerely Religious to make true Religion as publick as they can in the several Societies that are found to ingraft it upon Now that every Society that is the feat of True Christian Religion is in the language of the New Testament A Church I allow and therefore will briefly inquire into the Scripture-notion of a Church And I find the Original word taken out of the Septuagint of the Old Testament which translates the Hebrew Kahal by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which our Translators in the Old Testament as generally render Congregation although in the New Testament what is in the quotations out of the Old Testament in the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they render Church so that from the whole it is very plain as the Vniversal or National Assembly of the people of Israel was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Church as by St. Stephen Acts 7. 38. where he speaks of the whole Body of the Israelites in the Wilderness so the Vniversal Assembly of Christians consider'd as in the Catholick Church is call'd by our Saviour and the Apostles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is The Congregation by way of Eminency as Holy Records are The Scripture or Writing and the Volume of Scripture The Bible or Book as the glad tidings of Christ are the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Evangil or Gospel so the Church is The Congregation And as lesser Congregations of that Church of the Jews that did not comprehend the whole Body are call'd The Congregation or Church even so lesser Societies of Christians are call'd the Congregation or Church in allusion to which our Saviour says If two or three are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word of like Importance gathered together in my name I will be in the midst of them So that the Universal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Christians seen only together by God and particular Assemblies of Christians that meet together under each others eye are in the phrase of the New Testament Churches Even as the whole Assembly of the Israelites in the Wilderness when they were all under
one view is by St. Stephen as I observ'd call'd the Church and the Congregations after they were become a Nation though they could not all then meet together are call'd the Church also because they were all under one Law and Institution all partakers of the same Rights and Priviledges and so indeed all particular Churches of Christians are but the Catholick Church in lesser Associations as the circumference of Heaven is the same though in so many different Horizons As light is the same though variously modell'd by its several Receptions as the Ocean is one by how many several Denominations soever it be distinguish'd from the shores it washes or the channels or other scituations it rests in so this Church is often spoken of as one Church and as several Churches as the Sea is one and several Seas they being so much every way the same as to differ only in the Universality But whether a Nation united in Christianity may be call'd a National Church having many dissents of opinion appertaining to it and not possible to be decided by express Scripture there being no Christian Nation under Heaven in those days of the New Testament wherein it was written I shall leave wholly in the middle and only observe two Things concerning this Controversie 1. That there can no great matter accrue to either side of it by deciding for or against a National Church For allow a National Church or if you will a Congregational Church agreeing in any thing not agreeing with the Laws of Christ or if either of them wants any thing necessary to our Obedience to all the Laws of Christ In the first of these Cases Christians may and ought to retire from the Irregularities of any such Church either National or Congregational that they may be pure from Corruption In the second Case Christians must find out the ways and opportunities so far as is possible whereby they may perform all the Duties commanded by Christ though they separate from either of those Churches no further than to those ends But if there be a Corruption in the Main or a Defect in the Vitals of the Doctrine or Worship of Christ in either Notion or Churches that will not be upon due Remonstrances reform'd then if according to the Institution of Christ Christians gather into Assemblies though lesser though but of Two or Three they are assur'd of the Presence of Christ and no inconvenience of Rending the Body of Christ or making Divisions in his Church shall condemn them for the Society deserted is not his Church but the Society that does desert is his Church supposing it retires sincerely in obedience to the Laws of Christ On the other side Suppose a National Church not of the Ordination of Christ in the Gospel as under that Name or Notion yet if that stand good which I have endeavoured to demonstrate that every Nation to which the Gospel is preach'd is bound by the Laws of God establish'd in Nature and by the Laws of God and Christ in his Word to plant true Christian Religion upon its National Union It will be still every Christians duty to joyn in unite himself with encourage and promote all that True National Christian Religion and not to separate from it any further than the Laws of Christ oblige him that he may yield Obedience to all those Laws For it is the absolute Duty of every member of a Nation to seek the Eternal Salvation of his Nation in his sphere as the Apostle Paul did of the Jews in so high an Orb when he profess'd his great heaviness and sorrow of heart even to the wishing himself accurs'd from Christ and prayed with his hearts desire they might be sav'd On account of which in so many things he became to the Jews as a Jew and wrote that Excellent Epistle to the Hebrews It being for that very Reason to me most probable it was his that he might make good all those great professions of Love to them for though it was peculiarly directed to the Christian Hebrews yet it had an aspect upon the whole Religion and people of the Jews as the scope of Adjusting all the Mosaick and Jewish Law to the Gospel-Mediation makes plain and so was in it self most proper for the Conversion of that Nation as a Nation seeing their own'd and gloried in National Religion truly understood led to the Christian Religion justly now to have been their National Religion if they had yielded obedience to their own Laws rightly interpreted Now if National Religion be an undoubted obligation upon Nations and the members of Nations so far as it is true Those Laws those Officers that are though not ordain'd by Christ yet not contradictory to his Ordination but necessary according to Rules of Right Reason to the Establishing True Religion as National must be submitted to also upon the account and for the sake of that True Religion as National But if National Religion wander from Truth that Fundamental Liberty establish'd by Scripture and Laws of Nature must be always preserv'd that I before asserted as giving Right to retire from all Societies not united in Truth according to the Degrees of their defection from it But for the further justifying National True Religion I will in the next place observe from Scripture the Uses and great Ends of Churches and see how far National Religion may be accommodated to them For Churches are not therefore appointed that men may Arbitrarily and Fancifully chuse which or what sort they will be of but that the true Reasons and Purposes of them may be observed and complied with and they are these Three 1. That there may be a Generation of men in the world in the same Faith and Worship of God in Jesus Christ according to the Scripture however dispers'd at whatever distance soever remote yet united in the same Doctrine Prayer Preaching Praising God in the Sacraments and if opportunity allows and invites it in the same actual Worship and at all times closely compacted in a virtual and mystical Communion with one another the same spirit running through all uniting all to Christ and God and one with another joyned in the same love and sympathy of joy in the prosperity and of sorrow in the afflâ—ctions and sufferings one of another and with all readiness in yielding the fruits of mutual Charity Mercy and Compassion from one end of the earth to the other every true Christian being the compassionate Samaritan to every other Christian and not Jewishly distinguishing his mercy to his own Sect Party or Church and in cases of corruption and defection from the Laws and Word of Christ there is to Christians a mutual power of remonstrating against those corruptions and that defection by arguing expostulating censuring the evil of them yea and Authoritative denouncing the Judgment of God and Christ upon them for that Charter of Christs to the true Preachers of the Gospel to the true Churches stands good as to Ages so to
all parts of the true Church Whose sins ye remit are remitted c. viz by solemn Declarations out of and according to the Laws of Christ even to the utmost distance wherein any rational possibility of extending such Remonstrances and Declarations with success and effect can be found there is not only power but an incumbent duty to do it This Union now is of uncontroulable Divine Right Thus much of National Religion a National Church can by no means be denied to a Christian Nation seeing to be thus of the Church is absolutely necessary to salvation Every man that shall be saved being certainly added to this Church the entrances into which in deed and in truth are by the saving Graces of the Spirit of God and in the judgment of Charity by a serious profession And this is that Catholick Church that compreheâ—ds all lesser Unions but excludes or denies none much less can be excluded by any As therefore every one must be of the Church Catholick and Nations ought to be Christian Nations and protect that profession So this very Catholick Church in every Nation where it is truly found carries with it the name of a Church and as a Nation is by it self and its own Civil Union denominated a Nation so the union of Christians must be the Church in that Nation for it is the Catholick Church in its universal diffusion running through this or that particular Nation and all the vertues and duties of the Catholick Church ought to be exercised in it and if any one denies this he denies the Catholick Church of greater moment than any particular Church can be 2. All the closest and most constant exercises of Christian Religion that Christians are to exercise one with another that cannot be exercised but in Society of this kind are all parts of the publick worship of God Prayer Preaching Sacraments which are indeed or ought to be the same for nature throughout the whole Christian Church but must be actually perform'd in particular Societies Now these Churches may be solemnly erected and constituted by agreement but they are also founded and even grow out of the very nature of the thing for the close Neighbourhood of Christians one with another they having continual knowledg of and acquaintance one with another and thereby daily opportunities of agreeing in that publick worship of God and their common profession all these ingage and also incline them to unite whether in greater Families as the Apostle speaks of Churches in the Families of Christians or in Villages or in greater Congregations of Cities one or more still the obligation is unavoidable The necessity of Duty that lyes upon Christians to perform these Acts of Worship in Society and the Law that is upon all Society and Societies must needs grow out of this frequent conversation to dedicate it self to God make it absolutely necessary that from the neighbourhood of Christians should arise particular Churches And who then can deny but that there may be an Union and further that there ought to be an Union of a Nation agreeing with it self as in the same Government Laws National Constitutions and commerce in a more frequent and free conversation one with another so in Religion when the parts of it profess the same true Religion and desire to worship God in the most publique way they can or who can deny that a Nation may give name to a Church seeing the very Cities give name to Churches where there was a number of Christians acting together according to the Laws of Christ given to his Church The obligation to true Râ—ligion to publique Religion is undeniable The opportunity of agreement is the same and may be transacted in the same mannner all other National agreements are And what is a Church but a Society agreeing in all Acts of true Religion according to the Laws allowed by Christ having no other Form but that of the Catholick Church distinguished by the particular Societies or places where they reside I acknowledg Two things are necessary to particular by the nature of particular Societies and the places where they resided Churches 1. Consciousness or mutual knowledg of persons and their worship 2. Consent This our Saviour teaches in that expression if Two of you shall agree Mat. 18. and indeed not only in particular Churches but even in the Catholick Church it self these things have their resemblance but with this difference In the Catholick Church the Divine Spirit running through all knows them all that truly belong to it and every one of them one for another and by their true Faith they all are united in closest consent in all things necessary to salvation one with another which Faith is kept from failing by the same spirit in them all that are truly of it But because there must be yet a more particular understanding that Christians have one with another that they may joyn in the same Religious Acts and mutually assist one another in them therefore the union of the Catholick Church upon Earth though it be the greatest the most Religious Society the most strongly banded and cemented yet is not sufficient because there is not that consciousness or mutual knowledge of and consent in one anothers Faith and Worship in distant parts of the World that is necessary to the Glorifying God and Christ in particular Churches This is one great reason too why the Church-Triumphant though inseparably united with the Church-Militant and every part of it though more acceptable and prevalent in all its Adorations yet cannot be communicated with actually and explicitly we may not sollicit such a communion with it here on Earth because we are not conscious or knowing of any such particularities in their State or Action as should ground it nor are we assur'd that they are conscious of any of our particularities Abraham the Prophets and Apostles are for ought we know wholly ignorant who we are when we pray or are exercis'd Religiously There is a thick and dark Vail drawn betwixt the Church in Heaven and Earth as to such particular Communion The Father the Son the Holy Spirit are only certainly and particularly known to us in that Higher Region of them we are only assur'd They know us and all our actions To ascribe the Honour to any other of the Invisible Church is to Idolize them as well as to thrust into things we have not seen or known Thus freely I acknowledg the closeness and easiness of Society of mutual understanding and consent with one another is the Foundation of particular Churches Those Duties of mutual Exhortation Assistances Counsels and when it is necessary Reproof one of another besides the constant meeting in publick worship That necessary severity of disowning in cases of great or incorrigible offence such persons as walk in practises contrary to the Rules of Christianity not being possible but in the nearest conjunction one with another that the State of mankind allows at the same time to be as
publick too as it may be The duties of Pastors and Teachers towards the people and of them towards those that are so over them in the Lord which consist in watchng for their souls as those that must give an account for them and those souls therefore yielding obediâ—nce to those Rules of the Word of God the Administring of which is stil'd a Ruling All these require a particular presence one with another and in such a proportion of number one to another that the principal Duties may not be defeated by the over-number but that the services of all one to another may extend to all may comprehend all may continually pass and re-pass between all and in which all may continually demonstrate their consent and agreement But yet all these things cannot be in bar of a National Religion seeing that a Nation as I have already said hath and undeniably must have a National Union and if True Religion be fixed there and carried along with that Union it may well be call'd a National Religion at least and without any injury a National Church the Agreement in the one carrying also an Agreement in the other makes it so And as in such a National Union though the standard of all things as of the whole state of Law Judicature Trade Business Militarystrength of a Nation be preserv'd in Capital Cities and Courts yet by the care of Government they are all in due proportions distributed as the Blood in the veins by fit Channels to every particular as it were in circuit so the publick agreement in Religion settles the Religious Interest of a Nation more eminently in those things that do most represent the consent of the whole in it yet with due care of every part and member of the Nation to bring it home particularly to them and making the mutual entercourse in it free and open to all persons in all places where they have occasion to pass up and down and maintain an entercourse one with another that wherever they are or have occasion to be they may enjoy the Freedom of publick Worship and National Religion to which at all times they give a knowing and even conscious Vote that agree in it the Assemblies being as it were in view under a sufficiency of Masters of the Assemblies of the Nation together and as National Union does not swallow up lesser or even Family Union no more does a National any lesser Church or Religious Society except by mens own fault And wherever men thus united come in the Nation they gladly lay hold of the opportunity of joyning with any other particular Assembly to which sameness of language and manners give them ready admission besides particular knowledge and that National Religion cannot be so very particular as congregational is no more reason to deny National and rest wholly in Congregational than it is to deny Congregational and rest in Family Religion or to deny Family and rest in Personal Religion because these are each closer than other 3. A third end of Churches comes to be considered that more particularly enforces National Religion and justifies its Nationality viz. That there may be a more illustrious famous and remarkable offer of Religion to notice and observation for the drawing in and congregating others to it Thus a Church is a Pillar and Ground or Seat of Truth and a magnificent House of the Living God And what more advantageous to this end than a Nation united in the True Religion which we know hath greatly the odds of particular Congregations in this Illustriousness and Magnificence nor does this run out yet to the building the Babel of Rome that would mount up as a Tower to Heaven or as too ambitious Pyramids that are often rebuked with Lightning from Heaven for coming too near it seeing as I have before shown such an Universality enforced is destructive to all the ends of publick Religion Humane Society being so bounded by Nations though all the Treaties of Nations of the same True Religion may be managed to give it the honour due to it that can be procurated in such Treaties So much then as National exceeds and extends it self beyond any narrower compass and yet rejoyns it self to and with it self after the manner of particular Congregations so much does it partake of the magnificencies of Scripture concerning the publickness of Christian Religion and the Catholick Church and yet returns into the closeness of particular Churches with themselves and is the just point betwixt the Tyranny Ambition and endlesness of Popish Vniversality and putting Christianity under a Bed or Bushel National Religion and National Union in it is as a city set upon an Hill that cannot be hid as a candle set upon so exalted a candlestick that gives light to all within it self and about it even as far as the Fame of that Nation reaches The Churches much more as rising up into a National State are the Glory of Christ As therefore though we may be in some regard more exact in the most private we go out of our Personal Religion into Family Religion out of our Family Religion into Congregational and as the Christians at first most probably according to the Laws of Humane Society went out of Congregations into Consociation of Churches in Religion so we out of all these where National Union in true Religion allows it go into that National State that we may build the honour of Religion to the highest in so sensible and understanding a Consent and Union in it so publick an acknowledgment of God and though hereby it be as a Net that draws in bad as well as good even visibly and apparently yet when we consider the possible care against it in particular Congregations though still National when we further consider the state of the Jewish Church of Corinth the state of the Apocalyptick Churches the doubt will not be so cogent as to move National Religion out of the Nature of things The only remaining Doubt is that thus National Magistracy becomes as the Head of such a Religion the National Religion is gathered and united in the Magistrate and his Laws and that which should only be united in and depend upon the Laws of Christ becomes subject to another Head on pretence of which Magistrates have been attempted on too with force to bring their power to true Religion The Answer I give to this shall be very brief in three Heads 1. I always own any pretence taken from exalting Christ and his Kingdom to enforce Civil Powers to ratifie truest Religion into National Constiâ—utions and Laws is most destructive of the Kingdom of Christ which is not of this world that is to use force for its own promotion and utterly subverts Government seeing private persons may under this shelter and disguise rise up and invade and disturb any Civil State or Government whatever When Religion is our Birthright by our Laws it may be by the same Laws defended when it is not Prayers
and Divine Reasons are the only way of introducing it into Nations Beyond this is nothing but Popish Antichristian Ambition or wild and cursed Enthusiasm with all their salvage effects 2. Where there is National Religion even the National Authority is first Christianiz'd so that there is no Headship no Foundation but Christ and his Laws taking place upon a National State in profession of him If the Christianity then be removed by falshood taking place instead of Truth the Nationalness stays but the Religion the Candlestick is removed the Church is departed from it and retires where it may be enjoyed in its own Truth The form of the Church is the very same with that of the Catholick Church and Congregations As it is National the Headship Organization is no other than National but no more than the City of Corinth or other Cities or Regions made a Church of Corinth or those other Churches no more do National Laws or Magistracy make the National Religion Christianity if received settles there if not received or afterwards expulsed leaves Laws Magistracy Cities to themselves and so it deals with Churches or Forms of them of what kind soever 3. All Union in True Religion is free rational voluntary It owns no compulsion of Laws or Magistracy except in things morally good or evil so that in this only is the difference from National Agreement in other things that of Religion is voluntary and by consent Princes and Governors may be nursing Fathers and Mothers by honorary Rewards and Encouragements they may give all freedom to the true Worship of God and protect it by Laws they may fâ—nce it in with the strict observation of all moral observances they may offer and take care for the perswasions of Religion to be addressed to all their Subjects Many such demonstrations of their Love to true Religion are allowed by God but despotically to command or compel is not of the nature of True Christian though National Religion Christs Kingdom not being of this world refuses even the Magistrates Sword much more that of private force for the propagation of its most proper Interests Our Saviours Religion hates all things of violence and cruelty it is not of its Spirit he does all by instruments of his own And if Nations have made their Religion yea the Religion of Christ an essential of their Government yet if it be not according to the rule of Christ Obedience to and the good opinioof that Government is a lower and lesser Interest than Truth and O bedience to Christ Christ never intended Christianity for a Politick Engine or Expedient yet for the conservation of Government in its full Rights there is not a more concernful point of Christian Religion than the whole Doctrine of Patient Suffering with its reasonableness though it is unhappy for those Rulers that put Christians upon the exercise of it unhappy is that Power that is sealed to with Martyrs Sufferings Yet every man owes to God a strict account why he is not of the National Religion what reasons counterballance to him the great reasons given for National Religion and therein shall receive his Sentence from Christ If any upon just reasons desert a Congregation though but of two or three as I have at large set out is a little Sanctuary reserved to them by Christ with a faithful promise of his presence where it cannot be enjoyed in greater which are else though with some disadvantages in all other regards to be preferred for their publickness and not without great reasons to be refrained from or deserted If the Reasons are not of weight they stand at the Judgment Seat of Christ who are guilty of a Schism against the Laws of Christianity the Laws of Natural Religion the Laws of Humane Society and that according to the malignancy of it To draw this Discourse now to a Conclusion let me subjoyn some Rules by way of Inference of certain good effect to the management of so great an Interest as I have represented National Religion Rule 1. That the Religion offered for National should in the substantials of it be all of clear and undoubted evidence from the Word of God and sound reason from it and in indifferents or necessarily adhering circumstances prepared by so publick a Spirit as to project least of doubt and scruple that as Articles of Faith should be so fram'd as to beget no dividing Controversie but leave room to the particular Judgments of Men where points absolutely necessary are secured so all things of external mode or form should be so freely and generously design'd that every mans particular apprehension may be most at liberty without which the probabilities of the National Religion are surpris'd Rule 2. That in Circumstantials of Religion what is prepared and setled so that it cannot be alter'd by any private dispose nor allowed to any private choice without scandal to the publick Every man should consider his Liberty of Conscience on one side as on the other to preserve himself from scruple as in the Apostles instance of eating There is liberty on one side to eat all things but this does not determine to a necessity of eating that were not liberty If therefore there be a good reason an expediency not to eat the liberty is more conserv'd in not eating than in eating So it is in the use or not use of all indifferent things Where then as to the case we are now upon the advantages for publique Religion incline this way or that way to the use or not use of Indifferent Things It is our greatest liberty to move our selves that way and not to be deterr'd with the suspition of the loss of it by so doing This seems to be the Prophet Zachariahs resolution concerning the Fasts wherein those that would have them laid down and others would keep them still a foot differ'd He first shews them of no value with God then bids them love the Truth and Peace Zach. 8. 10. For though outward Forms Uniformity or Variety in them are of no account in themselves with God but either way in the Uniformity or the Variety They that serve God in spirit and truth are accepted of him yet the angry dissents and disagreements that dis-joyn the minds of men and disable the Union of Divine Worship is like the covering the Altar with tears of complaint and makes the offering unacceptable That there may be the Unity God is delighted in without Uniformity is plain by the Harmony of the Evangelists in their History of our Saviour where there is perfect Unity yet without Uniformity it is plain too by a consideration of Gods smelling a savour of rest in the services of the Church Universal where there is great Variety yet Unity But the contentions and quarrels that often arise about these things are the great causes of Gods displeasure what may most cure them is then most to be desired and chosen but what that is I will not be so bold as to prescribe
which are marks of Segregation from false Churches or Members of the True Church falsly so called Here is the Catholick Church in a Nation according to the Institution and here is the Holy Nation according to both the Law of Nature and the Institution So again Where a Nation brings home Religion into the most particular National Districts or Divisions as near as may be according to the Institution of Christ for particular Churches Here is a Nation of Churches which in regard they all consent in one National Vnion are without any impropriety stiled A National Church and every such Society is both a Holy Society according to the Law of Nature devoted to God and a Church-Society according to the Institution directing and perfecting that Law of Nature Now the Institution of particular Churches by Christ I understand to be that where he says If Two or three agree and are gather'd or enchurch'd in my Name I will be in the midst of them Wherein he does not only encourage the smallest number in case of Exigency or Necessity but couches some Rules whereby much greater numbers whether of Christians in Separation from Civil Societies or united according to them are to be formed As first in all excepting the Universality that is Essential to the Catholick Church which is The Church of the nature of which each particular must therefore partake that it may be a Church 2. In a number proportionable to Edification in all the Duties and Ordinances of Christian Religion 3. In the Humility Modesty and unaspiringness of Christianity For he that instituted his Churches in such small numbers and those not forced but agreeing projected nothing by that Institution for Domination or Grandieur 4. In the simplicity and plainness Christian Religion professes For Churches instituted in such a paucity of Members were never design'd to be Courts of Forensick business nor capable of Subordinating themselves so as that their Members should be Fatigu'd with long and tedious Suits and Appeals removed from one part to another worse than going to Law before unbelievers as the Romish Tyranny hath contriv'd Whereas our Saviours methods for Complaint and Admonition in case of Scandal for Reconciliation in case of Repentance or severer Discipline in case of obstinacy are natural easie and speedy as is plain to any observer 5. Christian Churches allowed in Two or Three shews the care of Christ that there should be a proportion betwixt the strength and gifts of his ordinary Ministers since the Cessation of the Apostolick measures and their charge and trust For our Lord would not by his Institution give any Reason to Moses his complaint I am not able to bear this great people Thus was our Saviours Institution of particular Churches and though it does not lay any absolute Interdict upon the Truly prudential though Additional Constitutions either of Nations or other Humane Societies proceeding according to the general maxims upon which Societies strengthen themselves yet with this Caution that what is so done may not enact any thing by which the main and great Ends of this Institution shou'd be defeated However that the Institution should never be pleaded but stand free from the Errors men fall too often into in pursuit of the Maxims forenamed whereby they would aggrandize Society in Religious Things or make it comport with Civil State But that his Institution should be a standing Rule first to avoid them after to discover and reform them or if they grew extâ—eme and not to be reduced as in Popery to warrant a witâ—drawing from them But to apply all this to our purpose If the main Ends of the Catholick and particular Churches Instituted by our Lord and Saviour are obtain'd There is no Encounter but a most happy Agreement between the Natural Law of National Religion and the Institution of Churches which as I before asserted are not to be drawn into a Desert or Wilderness or shut up in Cells and Cloysters or confin'd to one point of the World as the Donatists would have had the True Church but are to be fix'd in the midst of the Universe of Nations and Cities as the very places of the Candlesticks or Churches from which in just indignation to those places when unworthy of them they are remov'd in the midst of the Business Trade and Conversation of the World as is apparent by the Churches we read of in the Scriptures Let then True Religion as Christianity contended and will at last in much higher Degrees overcome be as wide as the Universe Let the Kingdoms of the World become the Kingdoms of the Lord and his Christ and the Vniversal Church will be as wide Bring it into particular Societies and particular Churches will be as many as numerous as they A Church-State is indeed a State of Separation the Church-Catholick is a Separation from the Universe because there are Fallen Angels unholy and unhappy because there is a multitude of mankind in the same State But this is only for the sake of True Religion and the Happiness consequent upon it that there is such a Separation and this the very Law of Nature agrees in Thus particular Churches whenever they are a Separation from particular Societies It is for the sake of True Religion and its due Administration Restore that and the Law of Nature and the Institution become both one Then a Nation and a National Church coalesce into one then Civil Societies in particular and particular Churches grow into one and God is pleas'd to dwell in them and with greater delight because all his Institutions Natural and Reveal'd unite in one I have only one Caution to add That the state of Things hither to in the world is far from perfection that whethersoever we look we can't find it so that to be removing from one thing to another in hope of it is perpetually to give our selves to change except Things are no way tollerable but the very Substance Rules and Principles are corrupted and that there are no Arts of Retirement and withdrawing from them left we should consider how the pious Jews and Israelites how our Saviour and the Apostles how the undefiled names in Sardis mannag'd themselves in the midst of great Corruptions what retreats from the Evils and yet joyning in all that was good was visible in their practise what kind of Division the good and approved Corinthians made from the misdemeanors 1 Cor. 11. 19. of the bad without forsaking the Church that we may imitate their Examples and continue to do the greatest service to the Churches or Nations we are members of neither silencing our due Resentments of Evil in our place and station nor rending our selves from that Body we are of But that All our Things 1 Cor. 16. 14. may be done in Charity Rule 9. In the last place let us not think Nations and other Incorporations of mankind slide away with this world and are wholly lost in the future state of Things and that only
Adultery and Peters Denial of his Lord the one was plain Temptation the other Scandal arising from the to him uninterpretable Suffering of our Saviour though both were great and grievous Sins 3. Scandal is a Temptation to some great Sin or course of Sin For though the least Sin introduc'd upon the Counterfeit of Religion and Reason is truly Scandal and partakes in its Woe Yet those Scandals of daily almost unavoidable Incursion in this imperfect State are broken in their deadly effect by the daily and general Repentance and desire of Pardon and Faith in the Blood of Jesus all true Converts live in the Practice of Who can understand his Scandals Deliver thou me from secret ones may every good man pray But keep back thy Servant from Insolent Scandals that they may not have Dominion so that I be Innocent and free from the great Transgression The sins that Scandal precipitates upon may be either in the refusal disavowment rejection or despight to some of the prime manifestations of God in the World in Infidelity or Unbelief or some great Enormity of Practice and it may be absolv'd and finished in some Notorious Act of Sin or may run through the whole Course of a mans Life in an habitual State of sin or Transgression of the Rule that he acts in all a-long Lives and dies in this Snare of Satan in this Captivity under him It may be partial only there being a reserve of the Soul preserv'd by Grace by which the renewed Soul recovers it self as the Apostles were Offended or Scandalis'd in Christ on the Night of his Passion and Peter in a fouler manner and yet theirs even his Faith did not fail They and he most Eminently escap'd out of the broken Snare But men devoid of any Principle of true saving Grace are though in several degrees lock'd within the Scandal and cannot be rescued out of it but by a Renovation to Repentance the first Repentance Yea even the best men under the power of Scandal as we now discribe it are for the present inwrap'd and involv'd so that the whole man seems to fall and the whole strength for that time so far as is visible is taken Captive Now by all this that hath been spoken it is undeniable that a Man is never Scandalised but when he sins he is not Offended in this Scripture-sense but when he himself Offends To be justly displeas'd with other mens sins or defiling Religion with impure mixtures is not to be Offended but when a man himself displeases and offends God and against his Duty 4. Scandal in wraps in Sin and the dreadful consequents of it for in the mischief and deadly issue of Sin is the complemental nature and notion of Scandal It is in the way of Righteousness onely that there is Life and in the Path-way thereof that there is no Death none of the beginnings and first strokes of it of the avant Couriers of Death It is Wisdom alone that is Health to the Navel and Marrow to the Bones whose ways are ways of pleasantness and all its paths are Peace But the ways of Scandal so closely united with Sin though they seem right in a Man 's own Eyes yet are all along the ways of Death and most evidently so in their end Guilt Divine displeasure Perplexity Anguish of Mind Grief if the Sin be felt however a wound a stripe upon Conscience and a mark of that stroke of that wound and stripe whether felt or not that can never be worn off but by Repentance and Faith in the Blood of Christ Weakness Inability loss of Vigour to a Holy Life 〈◊〉 Action and often down right Apostacy are the Fruit◠〈◊〉 Scandal for every Sin is a prejudice a mortification 〈◊〉 dead works upon the Consciâ—nce dispiriting it to Holiâ—â—â—â— more and more It is the way of Righteousness that is strength to the upright and the joy of the Lord therein is his double strength Through Scandal Men stumble and fall are discouraged and lye down at length out of Choice and with resolution to continue where they are as most easie Qui jacet in terris non habet unde cadat Upon all this ensues at last Eternal Death if not prevented by Repentance 5. Scandal is covered under some plausible pretence or disguise of a principle of Reason or Doctrine of Religion For Reason being an efflux from God the Sovereign Reason and Light from the Father of Lights any true principle of true Reason and rightly applyed is undoubtedly a Divine Oracle and would justifie any pretension grounded upon it Now in all Cases wherein Divine Revelation is refused or avowedly forced from the genuine Sense because either the Revelation or all Natural Interpretation will not serve the turn of Scandal but detects and exposes it it then flyes under an umbrage of Reason as separated from such Revelation or sets it up to limit and control such Revelation But if it professes to own the Scripture it then serves it self of Divine Revelation but wrested and mis-applyed for the higher the Authority is that is vouched and pretended the deeper the Scandal as we may see in the Pharisees the greatest both Masters and Bondmen of Scandal that ever were in the World except the Galley Slaves of it in the Romans Antichristianisme and they were so because they were defended and flanked on all sides as they miserably deluded themselves with the Authority of the Old Testament the Law and the Prophets together with the to them equall or indeed superiour awful Traditions of the Elders by which they circumscribed and kept under the Authority and Sense of Scripture as the Papists do at this day by like Traditions and Faith of their Church Now all these as they would have it joyned in perpetuating the Ceremonial Law as irreversible by God himself and settling an indefeisible state of Inheritance in the true Religion upon the Jews alone without the calling of the Gentiles to be the People of God but as their meer Proselytes All these as they deemed represented a Messiah of quite another Figure another Character than our Saviour and therefore he as they concluded must needs be an Impostor and his Doctrine Blasphemy upon which Rock of offence the Vessel of their Church and even Nation it self besides their particular Souls was most dismally Shipwrack'd But not only things of so good a Title and Claim as the Jewish Religion are counter-scarf'd with a Doctrine but even such vile things as Balaam taught eating things Sacrificed to Idols in honour of the Idol and committing Fornication when contrived into Scandal must have a Doctrine for them For so the Spirit of God calls it the Doctrine of Balaam In Scandal even Jezabel puts on the Vail of a Prophetess and calls her self so and under it teaches and seduces which may abate to us the wonder of Romes calling it self a Church and its Adulteries Sorceries and Idolatries Catholick Christian Religion 6. Scandal by such a Principle of
Craftiness whereby they lye in Eccles 4. 14. wait to deceive But following the Truth in Love we may grow up into him in all things who is the Head even Christ From the whole Body fitly joyned together and compacted by that which every Joint supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part maketh increase of the Body to the edifying it self in Love Be not carried about Heb. 13 9. with divers and strange Doctrines For it is a good thing that the Heart be established with Grace not with Meats which have not profited them that have been exercised therein 2. That we have a true and sincere Love of the Divine Law and our Obedience to it the Blessedness of which and its great preservation from Scandal the Psalmist thus describes Blessed is the Man that walketh not in the Councel of the ungodly nor standeth in the way of Sinners nor Psal 1. 1. sitteth in the Seat of the Scornful But his delight is in the Law of the Lord and in that Law doth he meditate Day and Night And he shall be like the Tree planted by the Rivers of Water that bringeth forth his Fruit in due season his Leaf also shall not wither and whatsoever he doth shall prosper 3. That we order all things of Indifferency in Religion aright both as to the Sense of our own minds and the Edification of others To which purpose the Apostles Directions should be always before us The Kingdom of God is not Meat nor Drink but Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost Let every Man be fully perswaded in his own Mind Rom. 14. 5 17. 1 Cor. 10. 22. Give no Offence neither to the Jews nor Gentiles nor to the Church of God even as I please all men in all things not seeking my own profit but the profit of many that they may be saved Whoever thus serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of Men. FINIS ERRATA Several mis-pointings and litteral mistakes the Candid Reader is desired to observe and pardon and what is most injurious to the Sense thus to Correct PAge 6. line 32. for an read all p. 13. l. 22. for they r. the. p. 17. l. 12. dele not p. 18. l. 11. for at r. with p. 25. l. 30. for he r any one p. 27. l. 30. for purity r. party p. 38. l. 4 for Righteous r. weak p. 44. l. 24. dele them p. 48. l. 17. for rule r. rate p. 55. l. 22. after are r. not p. 61. l. 9. for Sacrifice r. Sacraments p. 76. l. 29. for Party r. Polity p. 79. l. 11. after justly r. may Printed for Tho. Parkhurst THE whole Duty of a Nation or National True Religion Argued and Perswaded upon greatest Motives of Scripture and Reason Conciliated to all moderate Apprehensions though differing in smaller things and to the strictest Notion of Churches II Book Liberty of Conscience in its order to Universal Peace Impartially Stated and proved to be the just Right and genuine effect of True Natural and Christian Religion in Immunity from penal-Penal-Laws Church Censures and private Animosities A CATHOLICK CATECHISM SHEWING THE IMPOSSIBILITY THE CATHOLICK RELIGION Should be varied to the Degree of a Thought from the Measures left Sealed by the Apostles WITHOUT THE LOSS of TRUTH And therefore The Impossibility POPERY or whatever else is not found in Scripture should be CATHOLICK Composed to the Capacity of the Meanest that will but Consider that they may know and be ready upon un-movable Reasons to give an Apologie or Defensive Answer for the Catholick Religion if they are indeed of it and be secured from Temptation in Times of Danger 2 Pet. I. 12 The Present Truth Prov. 22. 21. That I might make thee know the Certainty of the Words of Truth that thou mightest answer the Words of Truth to them that send unto thee LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst and Will Miller at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside and the Acorn in St. Paul's Church-yard 1683. THE PREFACE TO THE READER I Call this A Catechism because I design it a Familiar Instruction in Fundamental Truths Resounding the same Thing from Question to Answer the easiest way of Conveying Truth and Imprinting it upon the Minds of those that are even of the meanest Capacity But especially because the Principles of it are to be daily so Meditated upon Pondered and Applyed to use as to be a perpetual sound in our Ears and so to be properly stiled Catechism For Things of such great weight as Principles are must have as the most Advantageous Admâ—ssion as the most Deep and therefore Leisurely Insinuation as the most Resolved Adherence when found True and Right which is Buying the Truth and not Selling it so they must have the most Easy and Ready Application to all their Uses and Ends They must therefore be bound continually about our Neck that when we go they may lead us that when we sleep they may keep us that when we wake they may talk with us Prov. 6. 21 22. I know the Things I have written cannot be duely received without much Thinking and without that they will be in danger of a Censorious rejection from the most or of a superficial unintelligent Acceptance in the Kinder which is as bad as the other and therefore I present it as a Catechism to those that shall at all approve it that they may be throughly versed in it and the Sense of it grow Domestick to them I call it a Catholick Catechism only with Relation to the Great Subjects it Treats of the Catholick Religion and the Catholick Church in those things wherein they are Catholick or in which their Catholickness consist That is that they are of God and that the whole Society of Holy and Happy Spirits is by that Catholickness united and closely banded with it self Catholick as the Epistles called Catholick that is after some Doubt Asserted to be Divine of the Publick Spirit of God and giving that Publick Doctrine in which the General Assembly is one I have endeavoured to contrive the Questions and Answers so that the Answers may be an Apology or Defensive Answer of that Catholick Truth giving a Reason or a Rational Account to any Demand that can be made upon it And it is the Apology of that Truth it self the Apology it gives and furnishes us with for other can no Man give Truth can need no other than its Native Apology for it self no other will it accept To give this and to be always ready to give it to keep it within us and to have it fitted to our Lips is the proper Fruit of such a Catechetical Instruction and the Apostle assures us it is the great Duty of Christianity and the greatest Honour we can do to God First to Sanctifie him in our Hearts by a full acknowledgment of him in his Divine Truth by a Plerophory or full Assurance of Vnderstanding in the Mystery of God and of the Father and
of Christ For a Devotion to the True God without knowing him to be the True God cannot thus Sanctifie or Honour him There is nothing we should be more Rational in than in the True Religion the Account of which and of its whole Content ought to be so certain to us that nothing of a Diverse Spirit from it can be added to it nor any thing of its Integral or Essential Nature taken from it but we may plainly see it would change the Account and so we need not make a Traverse over all Falsehood to know Truth but by having a Right understanding in and Just Contemplation of Truth the most even thing in the whole World we come to know it self by it self and to be assured of it although there were no other False Religion in the World to compare it with and set it off by and withal to descry every false way offered to us and to hate it Yea we observe every thing that is but doubtfully Proposed and stay it its due time of Examination and so either accept or reject it or if we see full reason for neither still suspend It is not the Laws of our Country our Church our being Baptiz'd or Educated in it that will justifie our Religion to be the True It is not the High Reverence of it the Devotion we use in it our hating of those that speak Blasphemously of it will make good our Religion what Religion in the World may not be justified upon such Topicks It is not that we find many great Principles of Truth in a Religion that will justifie it There is no Religion that can be called Râ—ligion that does not espouse many True Principles And in Christian Religion Antichristianism vies with Christianity it self upon the Fundamental Creeds which it self Confesses with True Christanity but hath Built upon them New Creeds of its own and so Corrupted all For what is so pure and perfect as True Religion is must needs be Corrupted by any Addition All that is Pure and True is already its own who then can add to it and not be found a Lyar Nothing therefore as I have already intimated can be our security for True Religion but the Just Divine Measure the Common Faith the True Catholick Standard which in all things necessary to the main End is most evident and in entertaining nothing that is not so evident till it becomes so upon this Great Test this is our Security For it is very plain there is less danger when our Understandings are not yet extended to the breadth of Divine Truth if none of the Vital Principles are unknown to us unsensed by us which are so exceedingly plain that we cannot be except willfully ignorant of them for no Injury is done to Truth that we do not understand its whole Compass nor to our selves if we do not hate knowledge offering it self to our notices but in adding to Truth seeing we can have nothing to add but what is of no worth we must needs defile it in having only Truth though we have not all Truth we yet are under the Influence of Truth only but when we add we enslave our selves to Lying Vanities Now hereunto have I levelled the whole ensuing Catechism or Discourse against which I know many prejudices will lie except full Consideration be allowed I know too many things raise a Detestation at the first which being Examined and Weighed by their Reason gain not only the Discharge of these Angry Passions but much Acceptance and Assent And I must take the Confidence to say in relation to any such Doubt upon the ensuing Apology for Catholick Truth that it is settled upon such unmoveable Reason and Weigh'd out by such exact attendance to it that I may write upon it without Immodesty Loe this we have searched it so it is hear it and know thou it for thy good for good in the Quiet and most Peaceable Course of Christianity wherein to know the True Grounds upon which it rests alone makes the Soul both Wise and Good and determines it to the Square and Just Rules of that Holy Religion for Good in times of Temptation to a False Religion especially that which calls it self Catholick For the truly Instructed Christian in that which is indeed Catholick is even Impregnable against that Delusion of Catholick falsely so called Lastly for good in the midst of great Differences and Diversities of Opinion and Practice in relation to lesser things pertaining more Circumstantially or Doubtfully to True Religion wherein the Rational Christian carrying it as Inoffensively and Communicatively as he can with all centers in that which is Catholick as to his Faith Love Inward Esteem and Practice and unmoveably fixes there detesting all Animosity and much more rigour or severity towards others in Relation to such differences than which nothing can be more ungenerous more unchristian more irreligious more unworthy THE CONTENTS CAP. I. OF the Perfect and First State of Humane Nature with relation to Catholick or Publick Religion page 1 CAP. II. Of the Violation of this Catholick Order of Religion and the Means provided by God to restore it 7 CAP. III. Of the Vncontroversible Laws of Natural Religion 10 CAP. IV. Of Revelation and the Reasons of so great Miscarriages against both the Light of Nature and Revelation with the Means of Cure 14 CAP. V. Of the Publick or Divine Original of Sacred Writing or Scripture 23 CAP. VI. Of the Proof of Scripture That it is of God and that the Proof also is Publick and Divine 27 CAP. VII Of the Publick Interpretation of Scripture pag. 36 CAP. VIII Of Tradition and Antiquity â—â— CAP. IX Of the Church Catholick 65 CAP. X. Of the Officers appointed by Christ in his Church 8â— CAP. XI Of every Man's Obligation to be wise for himself to Salvation 89 CAP. XII Of Schism and Scandal 93 CAP. XIII Of the Anti-Church and its Opposition in every thing to the True Church 109 CAP. XIV Of the Power of Magistrates in Religion and of National Religion 128 A Catholick Catechism CAP. I. Of the Perfect and First State of Humane Nature with relation to Catholick or Publick Religion Quest WHAT is the most distinguishing Excellency and Perfection of Humane Nature Answ Catholick or truly Publick Religion for it is the All the Whole or Universal Man Whoever therefore hath vanquished the sense of that hath put off Man and degraded himself into worse than a Brute Quest What do you mean by Religion Answ By Religion I mean a close Binding or Uniting our selves to and with God the Supreme Being in the Worship of him according to his Excellent Nature and Attributes in keeping his Commandments and seeking his Grace and Favour according to all his Divine Manifestations of himself and in so doing we are joined and join our selves as far as we can with one another in the same Religious Services performed by all Quest Why do you call it Catholick or truly Publick Religion Answ
all but one great Lie of this Son of the Father of Lies the Image of the God of this World the Son of his falshood and perdition contrary to Christ the Son of the Father in Truth and Love But if any one receiving Christianity or the Scriptures from the Antichurch and measuring them in and by themselves separates True Christianity from the Antichristianism and retains it Pure it is but like the Service God received from the False Prophet Baalam when he Prophesied Truth into whose Place and Office Antichrist succeeds and is therefore styled the False Prophet Revel 16. 13. Quest What then can this pretended Catholick Church be in relation to the True Catholick Publick Religion Answ It can be no other upon strict account than the Synagogue of Satan the Pseudocatholick Antichurch in a Damnable Heresie from and hatred to the General Assembly and Church of the First Born written in Heaven united with the God of Truth and Love and the Son of the Father in Truth and Love in a Hellish Schism and Separation from the Apostolick Catholick Church of which God and Christ are the Head Quest How can it be believed that so great a Lie upon Christianity should be received by so large a proportion of the Christian World or that Persons of so vast Abilities and Comprehensions should so deceive others or be themselves deceived Answ Scripture has taken all the care possible to Arm us against this Objection which is indeed very great It calls this Apostacy a Mystery of Iniquity and to assure us the Apostle Paul and the Divine Person in the Revelation point to the same Thing upon the Forehead of this Adulterous Church is written Mystery Now a Mystery if it were presently understood and all easie and plain were no Mystery It hath the Energy of Delusion in causing Men to believe a Lie it is the whole Deceit of unrighteousness it sets up a great Stage of Counterfeit Miracles that it vaunts upon and that it might have that Reverend Face of Antiquity to deceive with and say it comes from a far-off Ages It was a Mystery that was then at work in the Apostles time Lastly It hath its effect upon them that may be Christians and receive Truth but not the chaste unprostitute Love of Truth alone Quest But it seems imposible that any parts of the Christian World that have been once disabused should return any more under so great a Delusion Answ There are very great hopes that God who hath Commanded his Light to shine out of this Darkness will interpose by the perpetual Brightness of his own appearance and by that Divine Breath of his Mouth in his Word against the return of so great a Darkness This set aside there are so many Reasons of fear and such possibilities of laying a Train of Causes reaching to such an Effect that there can be no place for Security but in the Almighty Providence and yet what Degrees of that deadly Scourge may fall on the Protestant World God only knows we know our Sins deserve very ill Quest What is the greatest Security under the Divine Grace and Providence against so great Desolation upon True Christian Religion Answ A perfect Acquiescency of the Protestant Nations upon the Foursquare of Divine Truth and Resolvedness not to move from thence For as a Foursquare never removes from its own Base because it is All Base so they that are Squar'd to it and settled upon it never move For it always bears them alike with it self and by its own Justness recalls them if they offer to wander meer angry prejudice against this or that False Religion is not enough without being thus grounded upon Truth Entertainment of Truth with any Addittaments will secure no Man for he that receives one Addition may receive another He that receives Truth lying Foursquare with it self is called back by that Even of Truth He that adds one to it and makes it Odd may go on indefinitely as Popery hath done because he hath forsakent he Just Even that should stay him He can no longer wait for the Voice of Truth that by it self always answers it self but to what is not like it self it will not answer but discover it to be off from this Square it will not on any respects hearken to any thing different because it will not be sollicited to move from it self So that upon the whole the Laws of Symetry and Commensuration are the great Security of True Religion and ascertain the True Church both to it self and all Beholders For Additions to Religion like Surds or Irrational Figures incommensurable to the Rational Square can never be reduc'd to this Foursquare of Truth but are like the Deaf Adder that will not hearken to the voice of Reason Charming never so Wisely Nor can they ever be reduced to a certainty or exactness with themselves but are one thing to day another to morrow But Divine Truth is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rational Certain Expresly it self Deaf indeed to any thing else but in it self it is Yesterday and to Day the same for ever He therefore that daily ponders meditates upon hath a just Measure of the Fundamentals of Divine Truth and does all things in a Regular Square with them shall know the Doctrine that is of God all the Fruits of the Tree of Life though they are various yet come all within the Apostolick Twelve and he that hath a Spiritual Gust exercis'd to discern betwixt Good and Evil by tasting any aright will taste all and find them Apostolical and know whatever pretends and is not and so reject it He will know all the Gates of Wisdom and Truth and the Angelical Guard attending at them and go in and out by them but the Disorderly Breaches and Gaps that Wild Beasts or Deceitful Foxes have made he avoids knowing they exceed the Apostolick Twelve and are therefore dangerous and pernicious and whatever Apparation of Angels may be at them he knows it is only Satan transformed into an Angel of Light and his Ministers transformed as the Apostles of Christ as the Ministers of Righteousness Thus the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles Numbred and Measured exactly by it self is the Security of the Twelve Tribes of Israel that is of the True Church CAP. XIV Of the Power of Magistrates in Religion and of National Religion Quest IT is I think very clear by all that hath been spoken that the settlement of Religion in the Word of God is most stable and certain and that by no Powers he hath given in his Church it can be changed nor receive any Arbitrary Additions that should be Obligatory But I am in great doubt how to reconcile those Commands of Scripture to be subject to Principalities and Powers with those strict Precepts to keep close to the Word of God and to turn neither to the Right hand nor to the Left where Rulers so often prescribe in Religion contrary to or different from the Word of
to have their effect there being many other in the event incurable evils upon men in despight of right Reason the cure of which yet any one may freely offer and discouse 2. Having thus far insisted upon the first Particular under this Head of Natural Religion I come to shew the agreeableness of Christian Religion with Natural in what it reveals above and beyond Natural Religion and the great Reasons of our Acceptance of Christian Religion thereupon which was the second Head propos'd And that I may make this the clearer let it be distributed into these three Branches 1. That it is hereby necessarily suppos'd Natural Religion is given to be a Test and Touch-stone of Truth in Religion 2. That Christian Religion hath such an evident agreement with Natural Religion as to be approved and recommended by it 3. That it being so excellent and so recommended it lays the true grounds of peace throughout the world in Religion 1. As to the first I thus argue If a man have no notes of distinction within if there be not a Religious Rational Understanding planted by God as a nature in man if there be not Principles ingrafted into that Understanding how shall a man know the goodness of anything propos'd to him the conformity of it with what it is pretended to be When our Saviour challenged the Phraisees requiring a sign from Heaven for the truth of his Doctrine thus Why even of or from within your selves judg ye not what is Luk. 12. 5 7. right He imply'd The very essence of a man as an Intellectual Rational Spirit must be also full of Religious and Moral Principles and so must have innate judgment of Religious Truth as many other Scriptures assure us Without this a man can have nothing but an Implicite faith for his Religion a strong belief it 's true Now seeing Turks Jews Papists every one that is throughly possess'd with his Religion hath the same this kind of Faith is no other than these several Religionists laying a wager one with another which is the true Religion and it greatly derogates from the Christian Religion to suppose there is no more but this confident adventure for it rather than for any other and no grand assurance within in Natural Religion Even matters of Divine Revelation however immediately from God must be hence known and discovered else every thing that calls it self Revelation must be taken for Divine Although the Prophets might be at some times under a strong supernatural hand that transported their minds as it did also in extraordinary cases their bodies yet they were generally under the still-voice speaking to their faculties enlightning their reason sanctifying their affections by which they had even at the time of their greatest raptures a sense of the excellency of Divine Truth an habitual acquaintance with the ways of Divine approach and presence a search into the things they had spoken even after they had spoken them So the Apostle Peter tells us They searched what or what manner of time the Spirit that was in them did signifie 1 Pet. 1. 11. They had a holy gust of Divine things a judgment discerning between any sort of private spirit and the universal Spirit of Grace and Truth else how did they differ from Balaam 2 Pet. 1. ult Abraham no doubt had a free debate with himself of the certainty that the voice was Divine that commanded him to Gen. 22. sacrifice his Son and argued within himself the reasonableness of returning his Son and especially his Son Isaac to the Author of all life and being and of Isaac's most particularly and so he resign'd him But Infinite Truth and Goodness always jealous over the sacredness of Nature's Laws would not permit the execution The great power of Miracles is not their astonishment of sense but summoning mens minds with great authority to Rational and Religious Considerations laid up in store within them The sum then of this Point is this Natural Religion always with us as intimate as our faculties as certain and true as they are in their frame and creation must be our Ordeal if I may so call it our Fiery our surest way of trial of all Proposals made to us in Religion that is after due awakening our minds and examination of things by them and the blessed assistances or highest infusions of the Divine Spirit are breath'd into our natural sentiments in things pertaining to God inlightned purified and guided into all truth 2. The second Branch follows viz. Christian Religion hath such an evident agreement with Natural Religion as to be approved and recommended by it even in what it reveals above and beyond Natural Religion Now if it be first evident there is not one good thing in that whole Religion as every thing in it is holy just and good but Christianity hath united it self with it self it hath so carefully gathered up all the fragments of it that no one thing is or can be lost And if it be made good in the second place that whatever Christian Religion reveals beyond natural Religion endures the touch of Natural Religion and is besides its own proper credentials recommended by it there cannot be any thing added to evince that Christian Religion is a foundation of Oecumenical peace in Religion seeing Natural Religion is the Oecumenick Religion the Religion of all mankind It must be so for every man hath it written in his heart and Christian Religion is in much of it one and the same Religion is all of it most agreeable with Natural Religion and recommended by it It then necessarily follows no man can be wisely Rationally Religious but he must be so far Christianly Religious and what Christian Religion offers beyond the wisdom and rationality of a man beyond the Law of the first creation is yet as agreeable with it as light with light greater light with lesser light how then can he that shews himself man be cruel outragious against or out of peace with it He that falls out with it falls out with Godliness Righteousness Soberness Humility Truth peace with God attonement to him with laying hold upon Eternal Life and flying from the wrath to come with Patience Meekness Mercy Compassion from God to men from men to one another He that persecutes Christianity must persecute righteousness peace and joy in the Holy Ghost in which whosoever Rom. 14 17 18. serveth Christ as every one must do that serves him is accepted of God and approved of men and therefore to despite Christianity is not only Belluine but Devilish So that the third Branch plainly results from the two former viz. if Natural Religion be the standard and touchstone given us to try all things in Religion by and that Christian Religion comes off from the tryal more precious than Gold It follows then of what value it ought to be to all the world To demonstrate then the second Branch that Christian Religion so agrees with Natural as to
Faith in Divine mercy and lastly of future rewards and punishments Now in all these as I premis'd Natural Religion is not to be measured by what is found in the dark and sullied state of the generality of Mankind at such vast distances from the days of Innocency or so much as in the colder liveless Climate of Philosophick Morality but by what discovers it self when these frozen benum'd Principles relent and are thaughn by the warmer beams of revealed truth by what men do and must acknowledg when they come to themselves then the Ministers of Natural Righteousness out of and according to Divine Revelation are 2 Cor. 5. 11. made manifest in mens consciences and they speak and write no other things than they do acknowledg and shall acknowledg to the utmost to the very end Even as the illiterate 2 Cor. 1. 13. mind does not at first perceive the wisdom of such a writer as Socrates Plato Plutarch of such Historians as Livy Taritus but when it comes to be cultivated it knows by a Test within it self the gravity and dignity of their sense and stile Thus at the first unexercised souls tast not the gratefulness of the Word of God to natural conscience which is afterwards most agreeable the senses being exercised to discern gâ—od and evil Heb. 5. 14. 2. In what of Christianity pure and perfect revelation alone must be acknowledg'd There is yet such a close affinity betwixt the holiness purity wisdom of the one thus reveal'd and the other implanted that they must be own'd all from the same fountain and accepted alike by every serious considerer that as it is observ'd of the Old and New Testament and the several Writers of each through all the variety of Times Manners and Customs of the world in the sâ—veral ages of it throughout the several periods of the Churches state and progression and throughout the different extractions educations employments temperatures of the Sacred Writers there is yet one Wisdom one Reverence of God one Holiness one Majesty of Discourse running through the whole arguing the supreme Author one and the same Even so in Natural and Revealed Christian Religion the Divine Commandment is perfectly one and the same nothing trivial nothing Romantick nothing Speculative only all is for greatest use of the glory of God and the salvation of mens souls so as not to be refused 3. The Revelations of Christianity are the highest Amplifications of natural light even to the utmost possibilities of conception but in nothing contradictious The Doctrine of the only true God is kept most pure even as silver tried in a furnace of earth purified seven times But this Divine Nature is explained to us in the Father Son and the Holy Spirit and in the infinite Graces and Bounties proceeding from the Deity so explain'd to us and this is so to the utmost that as we certainly know in Heaven it self it is impossible to know any more Gods than the one true God we have known here in the world so it is as impossible we should know any more in that Essence than the Father the Son and the Spirit in Eternity it self It is of everlasting inviolable Truth There is one God and it is reveal'd to us in Christianity There is one Mediator 1 Tim. 2. 5. 1 Cor. 8 6. between God and man the man Christ Jesus There is one God the Father of whom are all things and we in him and one Lord Jesus Christ by whom are all things and we by him And this is life eternal to know thee the only true God Joh. 17. 3. and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent Thus the Divine Unity is preserv'd And lest the obligation to a Mediator to a Redeemer should abate or interfere with the obligation to the one God and Father the Mediator is always made known to us as the Son of the Father the brightness of his Heb. 1. 3. Glory tho express image of his person the heir of all things So that the Glory of the one Mediator infinitely and incomprehensibly unites and circulates in one with the Glory of God the Father So far is the Revelation of Jesus Christ Phil. 2. 2â— from any the least contradictoriness to that fundamental natural principle of one God And as evident it is that it is to the utmost and above all we can think for in the highest Glory of Knowledg it is we know certainly impossible to know any higher Mediator any other Mediator than our one Mediator for as a man can rise no higher than God there can be no higher Beeing than God so there cannot be a greater Redeemer and Mediator than the Son of God There cannot be a greater acceptance of a sinner than upon the account of the most perfect obedience and the deepest sufferings of the only begotten of the Father the beloved Joh. 1. 14. â—at 3. ult Son in whom he is well pleased There cannot be a nearer union to the whole nature of of man than by this divine Person assuming not any humane Person which had been limited narrow and confined but humanity it self into one person with himself There cannot be a greater inspiration and internal operation than of which the Spirit of God is the Author and Fountain nor a closer uniting of Believers to Christ than by this Spirit to be so joined to the Lord as to be one 1 Cor. 6. 17. Spirit Thus to the great Justification of Christianity before Natural Religion all is from God and absorpt into him yet in such a distinction from him that every glorified Spirit enjoys its Happiness Glory Purity Perfection Acceptance with the Divine Majesty distinctly and in it self and yet so in God that the whole Glory is refunded into him which is the perfect Glory of the Divinity From the whole then though it is most true that these great points surmount Reason in the discovery and explication yet when it beholds these things in that full portraicture divine Revelation presents them it cannot but adore and admire and confess the manifold wisdom and knowledg of God the riches of his grace the praise of his Ephes 3. 10. 1. 6 11. glory working all things after the counsel of his own will As to the Christian Doctrine of the Resurrection and eternal Judgment they are but what is very agreeable to the very Principles of Natural Religion all men having an ingrafted sense both of it and a future state and as to the Resurriction it self I think it most manageable upon grounds of Reason That the Creator can as easily command the Principles of a dissolved body into one as at first create those very Principles out of nothing nor can I think those niceties of dispute brought into this Article of Faith of any moment it being enough there shall be a future state of Spirits in bodies as in sensible appearances of Glory or Misery and those bodies as much mens own as the nature
long mistaken I perceive that God is no respecter of persons but Acts 10. 34. in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh righteousness the two Comprehensive parts of this Religion is accepted of him Why then should mankind imbrue their hands and that upon the Account of Religion in the blood of those that are of the same Religion they themselves are or ought to be and hold to contradiction to it What excellent persons were Job his three Friends and Elihu though out of the Family of Abraham I mean out of that part of it where God had more eminently fix'd his Church and out of that line wherein all the Families of the Earth were to be blessed How excellent the Books of their Religion and Ratiocinations upon it though the Friends were mistaken in urging too far as if present Afflictions were a detection from Heaven of Insincerity and applying it to Job That most desirable Book of Holy Scripture was undoubtedly by the special Wisdom of God prepared as a Treatise of Natural Theology rais'd to its own height through the Assistances and Inspirations of the Holy Spirit and wherein most probably the sense of all the Pious Patriarchs kept fresh and pure from Corruption was maintain'd and improv'd upon the proper Reasons of Natural Religion for we meet with no intermixture of positive Precepts or Rites except the Historical Relation of Sacrifices in the beginning and end of the Book An Institution of God by which men were taught in the beginning of the World as soon as sin had entred it to look for Atonement witâ— God through that great Sacrifice of Christ to be offer'd in the end of the world to whom it is most probable Job makes somâ— very significant References though according to the Covertness of so great a mystery at that time But what point of Natural Religion even sense of Natural Corruption and the â—vil of sin of Faith in Divine Mercy and Repentance of Godliness Righteousness Soberness Fidelity Chastity Tempâ—rance Charity and Mercy to the poor is left untouched What point relating to the Worship of God against Atheism Idolatry an Iniquity own'd to deserve punishment from a Judg is not hâ—re stated Job 31. 28. Prayers Praises Holy Meditations Discourses and Attendances on the Word of God for the knowledg of his ways have here their frequent mentions What severe Reproofs Censures and Condemnations of all wickedness do we meet with And which is most remarkable through the whole All is Substantial nothing Ceremonial How lovely is such a Religion Our Saviour observing but some of the lines of it in the young man in the Gospel it is said He look'd upon him and lov'd him Mat. 10. 21. And the Scribe that had so much of the notion of it he commended as not far from the Kingdom of Heaven viz. from True Christianity here and Eternal Salvation hereafter In this Book of Job we have also the true natural way of propagating Religion and reconciling differences in it viz. by Discourse and Argument only heinous offences and plain violations of Duty in Natural Religion are cited to the Magistrates Tribunal I have insisted so long upon this because we have not such another Hypothesis in Scripture such a Body of Natural Religion such a form of sound words concerning it given out by such Masters of Assembly and yet not of that we may call the visible Church at that time else indeed the whole Scripture is full of Natural Religion from one end of it to the other and that which is least in the Kingdom of Christ concerning it is greater than all besides But no doubt there might be many others at that time and all along who were not of the Jewish Proselytism and yet great Instances of this same Natural Piety For if Elijah 1 King 19. 18. who had a less compass to observe in and more probable opportunities of Inquiry and even Inspection yet was ignorant of seven thousand in Israel that had not bowed their knees to Baal but thought himself left alone how much more may lye hid from our almost suspition True worshippers of God according to Natural Religion all along elder times inspired and conducted to it by Divine Illumination Nay who dares be so bold to define there are no such now For though it is most true There is no other name under the whole Heaven given to men whereby they can be saved but Acts 4. 12. the name of Christ yet we are not sure that Name must be expresly known but that the God of pardoning-mercies giving and accepting repentance unto life may by Divine Equity and Favour be interpreted God in Christ in the behalf of men so addressing God as he is truly so in himself Yet ah lass we cannot stretch our charitable hopes so as to think this the case of the generality of the Nations that know not Christ who lye in the valley of the shadow of death not only as ignorant of Christ but as without God the true God in the world Horrible Corrupters of what they naturally know that is of Natural Religion But as there were many Lepers and Widows in the days of those two Prophets Luk. 4. 25. but to one of each were they sent so we may hope there are some Instances of this Divine Bounty and Grace if we can hope so but of few but these secret things belong to the Lord our God and it 's safest not to presume too far on either Deut. 29. 29. side yet by the same Charity we allow Papists that the prevalency of truly Christian principles may Antidote the poyson of Popery so the pregnancy of some natural principles rise up above all the refuse in such Souls but oh Lord thou only knowest Yet some things I dare be bold to affirm 1. That if any man live uprightly as Job according to the Laws of Natural Religion at its full extent and hath the knowledg of Christ offer'd him he will receive it upon the advantageous Recommendations of it in Gods own time and way 2. That if any man so obeys the Precepts of Natural Religion and hath not the Revelation of Christ the want of that Revelation shall not be charged upon him so much as in the consequences of it 3. That whoever understands Natural Religion must needs understand that sin is in the world that man is born like the wild Asses Colt and drinks iniquity like water and Job 〈◊〉 16. 13 14. yet that God is patient speaks once and twice in order to mens Conversion and Repentance That therefore there is place for it in pardoning-mercy of which in God even Humane Nature it self hath a sense Natural Religion cannot be ignorant of this for without it all service of God or Application to him would be in vain and but like the service of Devils Yet I cannot but here take notice There is not such a learned World in Morals as was heretofore among the Graecians
Christianity have found it most to their advantage of Edification to unite with such a Congregation of Christians All these or any of these may create an obligation to such conjunctions But because the hottest disputes in relation to Christian Practise so as to conserve Peace and Order have risen in this very juncture of particular Societies of Christians I will endeavour to settle upon an indisputable state of things and leave out what is more intricate and controversal that we may see how far the Laws of Christ extend here to Love and Peace in these following Assertions 1. That Our Lord hath given Rules for such Holy Grave and Honourable Societies under the name of Churches as must needs invite all of the same excellent Christian Temper into their Communion according to the opportunities they have to joyn with them their Doctrine Worship and Practice so Pure and Heavenly so evidently for the good of mens souls so composed to all true Decency Prudence and a Discipline so Humble Natural Strict only to the truest benefit of those that are under it that it cannot look like a secular Dominion but for the service of Faith the help of Joy the safety of Souls and their eternal Interest This I am sure every one will yeild is the Frame and Constitution of a Christian Church let it be found whereever it can be found Let every Church see to it self whether it be so Tempered and Constituted or not How then does it seem possible that when there are such Societies Christians should not fly to them as the Doves to the windows seeing Christianity improves the sociableness of Humanity into the truest publickness of Spirit and desire to enjoy Good with more than in solitude 2. It is the express Command of Christ and his design in all his institutions that there should be such Assemblies of his people and servants for the Glory of his Father for his own Glory for the Salvation of his People for Divine worship for the discharge of the several Duties of Christians for the Communications of their Gifts and Graces so that the forsaking of the Assemblies of our selves together as Heb. 10. 25. the manner of some was is very little distant from Apostacy it self How can there then be but Churches where there are Christians seeing so much of the concerns of Christianity lye therein and who indeed possess'd with those concerns does not rejoice in them and bless God for his unspeakable Gift in the Constitution of them 3. Yet is there no Law of Christ that main force should be us'd upon men to bring them into any Assembly of Christians at all much less into one rather than another especially when the main Reasons or Motives of uniting with Assemblies according to the Laws of Christ present themselves to mens Apprehensions and Consciences more in some than others Indeed mens over-zealous Affectation of some and unworthy neglect of others as one for Paul another for Apollos another for Cephas another for 1 Cor. 1. 12. Christ as if these Ministers by whom they believed were to set up for themselves as Heads of Christianinty and to rival Christ himself as if but upon the same level with them was very justly and severely chastiz'd by the Apostle but a true value for all the Stewards of Divine Mysteries and 1 Cor. 4. 1. Churches and a particular value for those Pastors and Congregations wherein God hath vouchsafed especial Blessings for mens Souls or gives opportunity to receive such is very agreeable to the Gospel as the Apostle though he refus'd undue measures of Honour yet assumes that of being 1 Cor. 4. 15. 1 Cor. 9. 2. a Father as above thousands of Instructors Christianity and the Ministry of it being so Holy and Humble a state that no one acting according to it either Arrogates or Envies so he that hath much of the Honour of it hath nothing over or above the measure of a Steward and he that hath least should have nothing under that measure if he be found Faithful So the Congregations have the equal Glory of being of the Body of Christ and Churches to be little Representations of and imbodyed with his own Catholick Church in the grand Vnion of all Christians with the Head Here then is the ground of Christian Peace and Union in Churches 4. It is a Principle in Nature and much Confirm'd and Exalted by Christianity that the Worship of God and the Salvation of mens Souls should be made as Publick and Vniversal as may be Go Preach the Gospel to every creature and Baptize all Nations was the very Commission Christ gave to his Apostles and first Embassadors and is continued to all his Ministers to the end of the world not of Mat. 26. 19. the world of that Age only but to that end of the world which is till his second coming until which he hath promised his presence The Great Congregation is the most natural Receptacle of Divine Truth the state of Religion under the Gospel is rarely spoken of especially when declared Psal 100. 1. 117. 16. 1 c. in its Magnificence with a less Publick Character than All People All Nations All Lands the Round World in its whole Circle from the rising of the Sun to the going down of the same All the Earth True Religion aspir'd to it even under the narrow Dispensation of the Law and in this very sense it is most true that the Apostle said in his time The whole Creation groaneth and travelleth in pain until Rom. 8. 19 c. now and the earnest expectation of it waiteth for the Adoption the Manifestation of the Sons of God to be gathered together under the whole Heaven Nor will some of every Nation satisfie the full intention of this Magnificence but that Nations as Nations imbodyed and Kingdoms as Kingdoms shall become the Lords and his Christs is the plenary sense of the Divine Spirit when even as of Israel an indisputably National Church God shall say of Heathen Nations as of Egypt and Assyria known to Israel so well and known so well as Rankly Heathen and therefore chosen as Representatives of the whole Heathen world Yet of these God shall say Blessed be Egypt my people and Assyria the work of my hands and Israel Isa 19. ult my inheritance for in that day Israel shall be but a third with Egypt and Assyria and there shall be a High-way through them All and they shall serve together there shall be a free passage of Truth through All. A High way of the Gospel throughout and an Vnion of Worship So then if we find so much for a National Religion in the Prophecies of the times of the Gospel in the Old Testament which grasp more than those passages in the New Testament which relate to the then matter of fact only if our Saviours Commission for making disciples and preaching the Gospel extend to all Nations if the Prophetick book of the New
our Love in our Sympathy in our Bowels of Affection in our Care for the Body though we are not all of an Aspect of a Figure of a Size in our Membership yet still are we the Body of Christ and Members in particular and being so we are the Israel of God upon whom is Peace and Mercy both now and for ever Amen And if we ought as certainly we ought so to pray with what satisfaction of mind with what appearance of Christianity can we move against the Peace of our Fellow-Members or not contribute to their Ease to their self-Enjoyment to the Comfort of each others Condition so that if one member be honour'd all the members may rejoice with it if one member suffer all the members may suffer with it and send in to its Relief and Support Our Defects herein disturbing the Peace not Ministring to the Merciful support of one another will be found another sort of Schism but of far deeper Guilt than that so much cryed out of not Conforming to one anothers Indifferents But above all the Ravening of the Evening Wolf the Roar of the Lyon the Poison and Venome of the Asp and Cokatrice ' should be far from our Mountain if we would have it accounted the Holy Mountain of the Lord. And on all sides we should open the Doors and Sluces that the streams of Divine Knowledg might run every way till it covers our Land as the waters do the Sea THE END True Religion the Interest of Nations or National Religion Demonstrated to be the Duty of Nations c. Psal 79. 6. Jer. 10. 25. Pour out thy Wrath Fury upon the Heathen Nations that have not known thee and upon the Kingdoms Families that have not called on thy Name THIS Prayer doubled by the Spirit of God for the weight of it the safety to men it should be well known and the certainty of its effect contains a strong assertion of the great benefit of Phil. 3. 2. Gen. 41. 32. and obligation lying upon Nations to National true Religion For seeing according to a grand Rule in Gods Administration of the World Nations that have no National Religion and whose Nationalness therefore becomes Heathenism and is so branded by the Spirit of God for so Nations in Scripture very often signifies Heathen that is Nations without true Religion are lyable to the pouring out of the wrath and fury of God upon them It does not only follow by the rule of Contraries that National true Religion or Worship of the true God hath a strong order to and connexion with the favour of God but as the positive Proposition is the prime and original and gives ground to and contains within it self the privative so does this Proposition That Gods Anger and Fury is at all times ready against those that do not know him that do not call upon him as join'd in a National Body or Society being the privative owe it self to the other being the positive as shall be more fully made out in the arguing this Point At the present it will be enough to observe that these two Holy men the Composer of this Psalm and the Prophet Jeremy except as some think they were both one desiring the destruction of those Heathen enemies under whose oppression their own people which at that time comprehended the Church of God then groan'd and praying in spirit for it relye and rest the whole weight of their prayer upon this principle of great truth and consequence in Gods Government of the World that as Families as Nations as Kingdoms for so all Communities are comprehended they did not know nor call upon God that is they did not worship the true God and therefore were most justly subject to his fiercest displeasure And on the other side it is couched under this though indeed before it That the people that do know and call upon the true God have a title to his savour and vindication of them in all their distress while they are consider'd as so knowing and calling upon him and not contradicting it by their actions The Context therefore goes on arguing with God on this point They have devoured Jacob in whose quarrel and rescue God is so much concern'd And seeing the favour of God is Eternal Life and his wrath burns to the lowest Hell both his wrath and his favour are to be understood in their extent even to everlasting ages All which will ground the Proposition which I mainly intend in this Discourse That National true Religion is the greatest security strength and defence of a Nation against the Divine wrath and displeasure and gives the surest claim to his favour blessing and protection both in this world and in that which is to come Because it is an observation of the greatest duty and therefore to be most closely united in and pursued to the utmost by all wise Nations and by all the several parts and members of a Nation for it is their first and highest Psal 33. i2 144. 15. Interest Blessed is the Nâ—tion that is in such a case yea happy is the people whose God is the Lord who have Jehovah thus for their God And this very consideration should reconcile all differences in National Religion that can be composed without loss of that Truth and corruption of those parts of the Worship of God which give denomination to true National Religion This should incline those that are above to the greatest condescensions and those that are beneath to the most free compliances possible if they value Religion and love their Nation that at least there may be union in National Religion if there cannot be perfect Uniformity For I am fully perswaded that upon a strict examination of this Point it will be found that National Religion supposing it always the true is the happiest model of union in Religion of any upon earth and most pleasing to God except that of the Catholick Church whose union is in the Substantials of Truth worship and practise but comes under no other form or model properly taken but except this there is none so perfect to the ends and glory of Religion so adaequate to the expressions of Scripture concerning the publickness of Religion so encouraging and advantageous to the practise so reconcileable with the peace of Religion and Nations so preventive of the endless divisions and subdivisions Humane Nature is apt to fall into when it yields up it self to a scrupulosity and Disputatiousness about Externals and Forms in Religion I say again I am perswaded no man can serve God with greater acceptableness nor be Religious to greater ends and purposes of Religion than by joining with the Nation or Supream Civil Incorporation whereof he is a member so far as he can be permitted to do it consistent with the Truth of Religion and Divine Worship I say as far as he can upon these accounts if not throughout And of this I shall endeavour to give great and valuable proofs from
in Hell If we could suppose a Society designedly united without Religion it would be like the Plot for building of Babel an endeavour of such a part of mankind to set up for its self and its own security as it were in defyance of Heaven A Society united in Civils and crumbled into Sects and Divisions in Religion that is in the main substantials of Doctrine Worship and Practice is a Babel as it was under the curse of Confusion of divided Language A disparagement of Religion which can be as it is indeed Religion but one as if its Name were Legion or as if in fundamental points it could not sufficiently evidence it self so as to be known to be the true Lastly a disanulling the ancient Law of Society which is principally for the Union of Religion so that if men could agree in all things else and were yet divided here it were not true humane society but would want the very noblest part or Principle of it Religion which is as a soul or spirit to it Yet too rigorous and severe a constraint of Uniformity is both to forget humane infirmity that does not allow so perfect an union in this world if a rigid Uniformity be indeed perfection and to forget also that every man is a complete Being within himself and makes a perfect Figure as he is alone and therefore to grant nothing to this consideration is rather to crowd men into a Little ease in Religion than to unite them and so pressing them too strait makes them fly out of that uneasie state for more room and dissolves the union that might else have been But in all the principal points of True Religion Union is so necessary that it stands good Humane society is for the sake of Religion yet in this state of Gods patience to the world Commerce and civil Conversation are no more than Property founded in Grace for then we must go out of the world yet still the supreme and prime end of Society is Religion Society in Divine Adorations is the state of Angels and Saints in Heaven It was designed to be the State of Innocency in this world It is a Law that cannot be repealed It is the perpetual Duty of Man Fallen Nature hath a violent inclination to it so that all societyes consent to walk in the name of some God though mistaken in the right object But the word of God and Christianity as they most clearly reveal the True Religion so the necessity of Union in it The publickness of Religion therefore that it is most choosable for the glory of it to God for the good it does to the souls of men for the blessing and acceptance it receives from God I shall plainly make evident from the reason of Scripture 1. For the Glory publick Religion presents to God it is evident although God in his Son and Spirit is a sufficient Spectator and Witness of and infinitely rich in his own Glory in the understanding of and his own eternal praises of himself so that nothing can be added to him yet it is most evident God is pleased to delight in the publickness of his service and the nearest approach of all his Creatures to him and that not in solitary service but the most conjoyn'd as if infinity received Additions of Glory from the openness and publickness of his Worship which yet we know is impossible But it is the abyss of his goodness that he delights in loving all his creatures and being universally known loved and served by them and that in the greatest Union herein that as he himself is the prime Unity and Universality and this is the perfection of his Being so his Creatures sprung from him may return to him in the same Universality and Unity in resemblance of himself which is the highest and truest worship of him In Heaven there is an Innumerable company of Angels and blessed Spirits in one general Assembly to praise and worship God The Scripture excites the praise of all the Earth of all the world of all Lands of all People Tongues Languages Nations Kindred and Families even the Heaven and Earth and things under the Earth and the whole host of them are called in to concert the Glory of God and nothing left out but Death and Destruction which cannot praise him because never made by him And when the Glory of God as it rises from his Creatures is represented at its highest pitch it is thus set out And I beheld and I heard the voice of many Angels round about the Throne and the Beasts and the Elders and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands saying with a loud voice Worthy is the Lamb c. And every Creature which is in Heaven and on the Earth and under the Earth and such as are in the Sea and all that are in them I heard saying as it were in one Quire Blessing and Honour and Glory and power be unto him that sitteth upon the Throne and unto the Lamb for ever and ever Thus David also musters up the whole Creation to join in the praises of God not to fill up and adorn the Divine Poesie but to shew the indisputable right God hath to the services of all his Creatures and that in those which are not able to pay it immediately by themselves every wise and prudent holy man is to observe that tribute of praise that is as it were marked upon them by the wisdom that made them and to offer it up for them when the service of God is represented as most glorious in its being most publick Every thing therefore in Gods Ordination of Religion tends to publickness Our Saviour will not appear but in the fulness of his Body the Church which does as it were compleat him For it is in this sense his Complement or Fulness though he fills all in all The knowledg of God would cover the earth even as water does the Sea and is restless till it does so the Preaching of the Gospel is to be extended to all Nations to every creature In Prayer there is to be a coming of all flesh to God Praise is to rise up as one pillar of Incense from the whole world The Church especially is to publish the name of the Lord and to ascribe greatness to our God Now the sense of this is that since God hath been pleased to place his Glory in the publickness of Religion in this Universality of it all good men are zealous and earnest to draw in the publick Societies of the world as much as they can to love fear serve pray to God and praise him together God does not allow his servants that out of choice they should retire to the Religion of a Cloyster or a Wilderness or a private separated Assembly as the greatest honour to him but delights in the most publick Assemblies of his Saints servants and creatures for though the reasons here of lye deep in the Divine
of them that diligently seek him that Godliness hath the promises of this life and of that which is to come And this must be first because as Righteousness and Duty are before sin so Blessing and Favour are before Wrath and Displeasure Yet Wrath is a more certain Demonstration of absolute Duty violated than Favour is of absolute Duty observ'd because the Favour of God is more at liberty than his Wrath which always depends on strict Justice All which amounts to the full proof of the great Duty of National Religion from this prayer seeing National Irreligion is so near the Curse of Divine Fury and Revenge Having thus far considered National Religion as it is founded Argum. 2 in the very Laws of Nature and inviolable duty to God I come secondly to consider the Wisdom and unquestionable Rationality of the Divine Ordination among the Jews when by a Prerogative of Power and Goodness God would secure the True Religion after the Nations had so corrupted themselves and that he had now begun as the Apostle speaks to suffer them to walk after their own ways He founds his Worship as it were anew first in Abrahams Family and from thence commences it into a National State even as he did the Family wherein he had plac'd it and that for the very sake of his True Worship which Family and Nation had indeed many peculiars in its Religious Constitution such as are not to be found in any other as I shall after account for them yet in the general it is an Evidence of the Fitness and Agreeableness of that Model of Humane Society to the Ends of Religion and the Acceptableness to God it should be so devoted But because we may think this chusing of Abrahams Family and the Nation rising from it was an Interdict upon any other Family or Nation to institute a publique National Religion any other ways than as they Proselyted themselves to that one Nation and Family It is very observable there are elsewhere the footsteps of National and Family Religion though more rare in that very time as in Melchisedeck who was King of Salem of Peace and Righteousness and Priest of the most High God so incorporating Religion with his Government the same is to be found in Job and his Friends so that the Erecting a National Religion among the Jews did not supersede the obligation of any of the Nations to the National Worship of God though in Judgment past our finding out He so overlook'd them as to leave them to themselves for he never left himself without witness He ought to be so worshipped by giving them fruitful times and seasons and filling their hearts with food and gladness He was never far from them in that he gave them life and breath and all things and in him they lived moved and had their Beings so that they wâ—re without excuse when at any time his wrath was reveal'd from Heaven against them for not glorifying him as God and being thankful Belshazzar and his Nation were obnoxious to God for not Glorifying that God in whose hands was his life and breath and all his ways Besides those of the Nations that were near the Jews were allowed to unite themselves to the Jewish National Religion when the Laws of Nature were grown so dark and obsolete among themselves and though they were the sons of strangers yet God assur'd them a place in his sanctuary but because there was not provision enough for the multitude of the Nations within the Bounds of that Religion it was certainly at all times lawful and pleasing to God that they should have Nationally dedicated themselves to the true Jekovah though eminently known then to be the God of Israel and that they did not so gave reason always to his Wrath against them whenever he pleased to execute it But I hasten to the third Argument of nearer concernment to us The third Argument I derive from the Favour of Christian Religion Argum. 3 to National Religion of which I shall lay down several proofs 1. Christianity repeals none of the Laws of God that are founded in the very Nature of Things if therefore National Religion be according to the Rules of Essential Duty towards God if it be the Reasonable service of Nation It is certain Christianity does not remove it but restores and exalts it to the greatest perfection Christ came not to dissolve any of those Laws but to fulfil them that is to restore the Doctrine to its just Integrity where it was falsly gloss'd upon and if any thing was wanting in the former Revelation of it to superadd what might render it most complete 2. Of the same Nature is the second proof That if God not only for the sake of type and shadow which was useful for that State of the Church but for the sake of the real Goodness and Usefulness of the Thing it self pitch'd upon the National Form of Religion by his immediate Revelation to Abraham and Moses as I have already argued it cannot be suppos'd to be revers'd by Christ It remains therefore among those things that are written for our Admonition and Learning on whom the Ends of the world are come 3. Christianity vouches it self a Religion of the most publique spirit and intention and came into the world by the High Conduct of God to open all passages for Truth and Divine Knowledge among men as innumerable places in the Old and New Testament assure us so that the Gospel most evidently designs it self to be free and publique as the Heaven as the lights of it and the words of the Psalmist may well be apply'd to it The line of it is gone throughout all the Earth and its words to the ends of the world so far therefore as Naturalness and Publiqueness agree so far the thing is undeniable 4. Many expressions of the Prophets that went before of our Saviour and his Apostles that folâ—owed after have a particular Favour for National Religion To name some of a multitude Christ shall sprinkle many Nations He is the Desire of all Nations Go make Disciples of all Nations All the Kingdoms of the World shall become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ The Apostle magnifies himself as the Apostle of the Nations He compares himself with the Holy Priesthood while by Preaching the Gospel he was negotiating in the offering up the Nations a sacrifice consecrated and sanctified by the Holy Ghost the greatest sacrifice that was ever offer'd to God except that of the Son of God offering himself And this is the only instance of the Ministry of the New Testament resembled with the Priesthood of the Law or cloath'd with that Denomination of Priestliness use hath appropriated to it and that to no other office but of Preaching to Conversion Rom. 15. 16. But because I know the proofs from these Scriptures are lyable to be retrench'd by expounding them of the Diffusion of Christianity into the Catholick Church throughout the World and
of Christian Religion This being premised I come more particularly to give answer 1. Many of these things that are named as found in the Church of the Jews as a National Church were not yet the Essentials of a Church as National in general but of that particular National Church and typical of things under the Gospel as is plain in the exposition of them in the New Testament and more particularly that excellent Epistle to the Hebrews the Temple the High Priest the Holy of Holies the Altar the Sacrifices the solemn Feasts with such like serv'd only as shadows of things to come and the want of them argues nothing against National Religion 2. Those things that were not Typical or whose main and sole intention was not to adorn and compleat that whole Frame but rested upon Universal Principles of Reason Truth and Duty can never be abrogated but are for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures may have National hope in God and be obliged in our duty even as they were Thus the duty of Magistrates and people towards true Religion of publick instruction of publick Ministers of Religion of care for places of meeting for Divine Worship throughout a Nation continue still and need no new commands in the Gospel 3. As to the first planting of Churches by drawing Christians into particular private Societies it amounts but to thus much that Christ the Lord of tâ—e Church did not found his Church universal as necessarily diffusing it self into Nations nor could it in reason be so For seeing it was in Divine Providence for great and weighty Reasons of which it is not proper now to speak intended and ordered that hundreds of years should pass over Christianity ere it had the favour and protection of Supreme Christian Magistrates there must have been for that space no Religion or Church if there had been no other Form but National The Church of Christ therefore though it was in those days within Nations Cities Towns and Villages yet of low stature in comparison of National Religion till the Reign of Christian Emperors considerable indeed in it self and its diffusion through so much of the world but not acknowledged by Laws or Governments till long after its first entrance And at all times upon the change of a Christian Magistracy into a Pagan an Apostate an Heretical or Idolatrous Succession or the complex of all Antichristianism which early invaded the Church and even covered and obscured it in succession of time the Church of necessity must fall back into such a low state and subsist upon its obedience to the Law of Christ and its own prudential accommodations to the state of Times without the Magistrates care and protection Our Saviour therefore took care of the Catholick Church which is of absolute Divine Institution which is founded in that promise The gates of Hell shall not prevail against it To which belong primarily all the great and glorious expressions of Scripture to which are given originally Pastors and Teachers to propagate promote build up and strengthen it and shall by virtue of Christs ascension far above all heavens be certainly continued to it till we all come to the unity of the Faith of the Son of God to a perfect man to the full measure and stature of Christ in all his members All other Societies of Christians are but little images and representations of this in these its excellencies and the more they participate of it the more truly are they the Churches of Christ But because this is too diffus'd for one Model for one Frame to comprehend there is therefore allowance given by Christ for lesser Associations of this Catholick Church from the nature of the thing and because of the discountenance of Nations and worldly powers at first and since upon true Christianity Our Saviour therefore Matth. 15. 18 c. expresly fixes the promise of his Divine Presence in the smallest parts of this Church where but two or three are gathered together in his Name he hath assured he will be in the midst of them so that it is hence evident the whole neighbouring discourse centers in the least Assemblies agreeing in Christian Religion For though it supposes first a greater number the Church and two or three Witnesses being contradistinguished yet as it were in prospect of the great fewness upon some exigencies of Christians practising the duties of Christianity together it brings down the promises of Audience in their appeals to heaven and presence with their whole worship and services to the smallest numbers not by way of limitation to but encouragement of so small a number And it is very observable the very same declaration of Christ to the Apostles whose soever sins you remit or bind by the true Doctrine of the Gospel shall stand good in heaven the very same is said here to the smallest Societies of Christians as to their Judgment and determination upon their own members according to the Laws of Christ concerning the offences that fall out among themselves having the same Doctrine to proceed he committed to them even as to the Apostles themselves Churches are Pillars and Rocks of Truth even as the most Excellent Ministers and either or all being no more but Praecones each in their kind or Publishers of the Will of Christ and his Truth declar'd in his Word in the vertue of their being parts of the Catholick Church Now the Reason why our Saviour pitches upon so small a number of Christians agreeing is certainly this because he would appoint no other form to his Church than such as could live as could subsist under any Civil Government whatever whether friendly or unfriendly to it He gave it no other shape but what it might attain and keep under any state of Civil Laws under any enmity it met with in the world And this was most necessary because the Church of Christ was not confin'd to one Nation as the Jewish was whom God in a peculiar manner singled out and manag'd to the state of a Kingdom and Nation by a mighty power and out-stretched arm and conserv'd by the same ruling it with an immediate sensible presence after he had form'd it by precise Laws and setled the just bounds of all Officers in their Office and appointed them the place of the exercise of it whereas the Christian Doctrine being indifferent to every Nation under Heaven it did as it made its progress convert certain numbers to it self at first which had no priviledg of humane Laws or Powers but the edg of all turn'd against it so that the Form of Churches was composed to all the vicissitudes of Providence they were to undergo and that in all reason must be in case of necessity the very least of Societies of Christians Two or Two or Three as our Saviour significantly points upon small Societies for such are most fitted to the worst of conditions that could befall lesser and single bodies moving every way
whether a strict Conformity upon Reasons in Government best understood by Governours themselves or a compassionate Indulgence most acceptable to Christianity Rule 3. They that without the violation of the true and substantial Rules of Religion can most see and use their liberty in these things and thereby become instruments of the greatest publique good are most acceptable to God They that do not Tythe the Mint and Cummin of Indifferent Things in National Religion and Worship with great noise and zeal for that is the greatest injury can be done to it but take them so far as they are instruments of Peace and use them in their own Indifferency for the greatest service to the publique They that insisting with any stress upon main things only are most earnest in turning many to righteousness These are they that shall shine as Stars in the Nations Firmament if not now assuredly in Eternity They that take advantage of the National profession to call sinners to repentance cause greater joy in Heaven than they that only think to secure themselves with the purer Societies Sure in this case God chooses mercy in seeking and saving them that are lost rather than sacrificing alone by our selves without regard to such Christ chose rather to converse with Publicans and Sinners than what look'd lâ—ke purer Society because he came to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance For the case was much different between the scandalous of the Jewish National Church with which our Saviour conversed and so of every National Church from the Churches gathered newly from among the Heathen of whom the Apostle speaks though even among them we read of no Separation from Religious Duties but only from private converse among those that were scandalous till they were as publickly disowned as they ought to be by Church Censures But on the other side they are least in the Kingdom of Heaven and the National Religion whether Rulers or People that dispirit Religion by an immoderate heat for meer Forms that are so warmly concern'd for Indifferencies to give reason to suspect they are a principal part in their esteem of their own or the National Religion Whereas such things so far as they may be any way contributary to good are best observed with greatest silence and least cry being rather to be first so far prepared to acceptance and use that there may be no noise of Axes Hammers or Tools of force or compulsion about them Rule 4. In all Religious Duties and the management or administration of them there are different excellencies like the Psalms of Degrees or those parts of a Psalm honoured with the Notes of Elevation There will and may be different Keys of Affection according to the differing hands playing upon us The People hung upon Christ to hear the Word of God for he tauâ—ht them with Authority and not as the Scribes yet they were â—â—â—nd by Christ to hear the Scribes Even thus in the National 〈◊〉 and Administrations we may undoubtedly more warmly adhere to and pursue the things that are more excellent and with a lighter touch pass over things of less moment though in all we mind the glory of God and the peace of National Religion For Union in National Religion must be primarily and chiefly in things truly called Religion and in lesser things with a regard to peace only David was otherwise affected in praise than in sacrificing a Bullock with Horns and Hoofs seeing as he says it pleased God more yet in the fear of God he did both The Apostle was otherwise affected in the Preaching of Christ than when he became as a Jew to the Jews yet he did the latter Religiously too The higher and closer the Ministry of Divine Truth and Service is the greater and closer the adherence of the Soul ought to bee Some things we ought to do with our might and only not to leave others undone Rule 5. We ought to have a steady and certain Gage within our selves of what our Lord hath provided for the preserving the truth of Religion to us and what care he hath taken so far as is possible with the conservation of that Truth to give us all advantage for publickness in Religion As to the truth of Religion these three provisions will secure it 1. That no man is so much bound to any Church Communion Nation or Government as to the true Religion which is the first and absolute necessary nor shall his withdrawing from any of them in things impure and offensive to God be charged upon him as sin or Schism All the putting out of Synagogues casting out Names or Excommunications signifie not any thing where God and Christ are in communion and where those on whom they fall are of the general Assembly and Church of the First born of that truly Catholick Church which is the only necessary Church to be of that we may be saved 2. The privatest Assemblies yea even single Souls so retiring that they may worship God according to his word have the promise that God and Christ will make their abode with them come and sup with them and they with him and they shall be written in the writing of Gods people The Catholick Church is always provided for them that they may not be out of the best Society under Heaven The Apostle encouraged the Hebrew Christians that might think them selves divided from the Jews that had been the only Church of God by assuring them the Gospel brought them into a greater Church than that viz. the General Assembly and Church of the First-born written in Heaven This honour have all the Saints of Christ 3. All the evils that can be endured upon account of Christ and obedience to him will be abundantly recompenced by the saving of the soul and that better and truer life That Argument of our Saviour He that loses his life saves it and he that saves it loses it And what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and loses his own soul or what shall he give in exchange for his soul stands always impregnable that a man should buy the truth and not sell it at any rate whatever Thus for the Truth of Religion 2. As to the Publickness of Religion there are these great advantages for it 1. That Christian Religion professes Love endeavour of Good and Salvation to all men to every Creature and hath antiquated all that Judaism that neglects any for their profit to Salvation though but Gentiles 2. That a man may join his Religious Services to any thing truly good in Natural or Revealed Religion whether of Families Neighbourhoods Cities Nations or of voluntary Societies stopping there and keeping himself free from other mens sins so that the evil that other men adjoin to any thing true and good in Religion being protested against and divided from does not corrupt what is good or true but it may be enjoyed in the most publick way while we have nothing to do with the
evil nor find it so mixt with the good as to admit of no separation And what is wanting in the publick worship of that which Christ hath ordained and commanded does not necessitate the total departure from that publick Worship when the very Institution is not chang'd by that want for the true Christian may make up that want in privater Duties Thus they that feared the Lord spake often to Mal. 3. 16. one another without separation from the Church 3. There is a free use granted by Christ of all things indifferent or a freedom on each sides to do oâ— not to do where no moral evil adheres or disobedience to some express Command of Christs attends either part If then Religion be not drawn out of those necessary things wherein Divine Wisdom Goodness and Truth have plac'd it and Traditions thereupon become Doctrines which constantly carries alâ—ng a rejecting the Commands of God or a lower esteem of them for those Traditions sake if there be no moral evil or indecency nor that a too great cumber be drawn upon Religious Acts every thing is by the Laws of Christ left to its own indifferency as Reason invites or perswades on either side to the doing or not doing All which sets men free from a Jewish yoke in these cases and is the true Christian Liberty Eating or not eating keeping a day or not keeping it Buying in a market and going to a feast without asking any question for Conscience sake without fear of the danger of moral defilement in those things that other mens sins defile only to themselves if we keep our selves pure are plainly the Liberty Christ hath published to us every Creature of God is pure and not to be rejected but received with thanksgiving no sin of man can pollute it to any but himself And this consideration may state to us the whole matter that relates to order and decency That order which God hath establisht in nature it self that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are written with a Sun-beam upon things themselves are out of all dispute God is the Author of them and not of the contrary confusion or indecency That order which is the prudential contrivance of men though not the same in all places times and to all persons as the former yet ought to be chearfully complied with as what is necessary to a National union in and administration of publick Religion both as to Officers and Things seeing nothing can be setled without order Accordingly we find the wise and pious Governours among the Jews taking care and the people submitting to such Ordinations and all under Divine Approbation The Order that is meerly of Humane position and arbitration moves the greatest doubt standing in things that have only the thin pretexts of Antiquity to give them some venerableness or that they are usages already in being or that they add the Imaginary decency that Ceremonies set out Humane actions with Now as to this they that have the power of imposing are equally to weigh the value of Religion it self and what that may suffer for the sake of this order and a great account lyes upon them before God but for those that are under subjection I add further As to this sort of order I can only say this that supposing it no way turn'd into Doctrine as the Pharisees not eating with unwashen hands but declar'd against as such the consequences of observing or not observing are to be ballanc'd and so the practise of every conscientious man to be determined On one side stands the freedom of using this order as an advantage to do good the consideration of the peace of Nations the National defence made more unite against false Religion at the price of Conformity to those more Arbitrary Impositions On the other side stands a just fear for the purity of Religion being either obscured or the freedom of it incumbered or for the reputation of Religion which often suffers by those unnecessary adherencies as if they entered into the nature of Religion it self I must yet allow the preference in my own judgment to that side by which National Religion is most served but with the full perswasion that God receives both if over-bitter zeal on either side be not offensive to him and with the concession that National Religion were more happy if more free but if love adjust to each their due allowance the services of both will be found with great acceptance in the common National Religion as I doubt not their hands would be in the defence of it against the Invasion of a National false Religion But if any be over-rigid or severe on either part they may receive the full rewards of their own society or party but they lessen the higher recompences of doing the most publique good The strictest Laws either this way or that way in these things are of mens own making and exacting so from them only they have their reward who are zealous beyond their own knowledg and the goodness of the matter From all that hath now been said under this Rule I collect 1. That they that cannot agree to the publickly encouraged constitution of a Nation should yet point their worship as much as they can towards it They should comply with all that is good in it so far as they can be recieveâ— without launching beyond their judgments Thus Christianity was made as publique in all places by the Apostles as they could by adjoyning it to any principle of Truth or to the natural sense of Religion they found any where St. Paul gave solemn thanks to God in the midst of all that sailed with him though a bad sort of men Thus he Preached the true God and Christ at Atkens upon their Inscription To the unknown God upon the Fundamentals of National Theology upon the wise saying of a Poet of their own He thought it best to acknowledg all that was good in the most faulty state of Religion as an advantage to convince what was bad and disagreeing to that good and gaining men to unite with that whole element of Truth and Goodness with which any sparks kindled in them already were so closely allied as to gain them to the whole How much nearer then and closer may Christians and of the Reformed Christianity fall in one with another if we valued what we agree in at a higher rate as certainly we ought to do then what we differ about 2. The way to make National Religion most National is by comprehending all the differences that can be reconcil'd with true Religion while they that dissent in some things receive one another with a good peaceable holy and publick temper of mind as the great Argument and Inducement of which we should all pray for the acceptance of the holy services of all that call on the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Apostle distinguishes Christians but immediately unites them again both theirs and ours They and
we whatever smaller distinctions make the they and the we are both one in our Lord Jesus Christ We ought therefore to pray for the common benefit of all so united though not bound up in the same form with us for a gracious audience and reception of their and our Worship of God that so the Spirit of Love and Vnion in the main may convey all our services into one before God where indeed if they are as he requires they meet stripp'd of all their outward Circumstances Form and Ceremony Faith and Obedience being alone able to mount thither with them And services so raised can by no means be spar'd for small differences in a National Religious Interest for the Angels of all such behold the Face of our Father in Heaven If Darius though a Heathen Prince had such a sense of the virtue Ezr. 6. 10 of that true Religion he was not of as to engage those of so great difference from him in their sense of God to pray for the peace of the King and his Sons how much more should we who are all of the same true Faith and Worship and know the Force and Energy of it by great acts of Favour to one another in those things wherein we cannot be wholly one yet all joyn in praying for the acceptance of one anothers services and the services of the whole Nation whereof we are not only Civil but Religious Members And if we are truly Religious shall be so accounted with God yet with the abatement of our sinful differences and divisions How should we therefore unite that we may lose none of the things that we have wrought but may receive a full reward Rule 6. It is the happiness of our Nation that if any man truâ—y understands considers and pronounces of our National Religion It stands in the Scripture making us wise to Salvation In Faith in Jesus Christ Repentance Love of God Fear of the Divine Majesty all Acts of Justice Love Mercy Compassion true sincere Preaching the whole Word of God Prayer use of Sacraments the Lords-day Religious Discourses Conferences Catechetical Instructions and Education of Youth in the knowledg of Religion Restraint of Atheism Irreligion Intemperance and Sensuality generally and throughout the Nation Compulsion of the very worst of men to acknowledge a Deity and his Worship for what is hypocrisie in them may turn to the salvation of good men These are the things I say again that are truly our National Religion all things pertaining to Order Decency outward Form or Mode are but the Vehicle the conveyance of that True Religion if the main Ends of which be obtain'd viz. That these Religious Acts are perform'd but with that peace and freedom from confusion Confusion destructive of all publick Actions and with that Honourableness that is agreeable to the state of every Nation and this Nation particularly in the simplicity of Religious Worship It is enough and whatever on these accounts is commanded in our National Religion I freely own and acknowledge as reconcilable with these Characters forbearing such who though agreeing in all main things upon sincere endeavours to understand them so cannot acquiesce in them as so who deserve compassion These things ought to be no Partition-Wall in our National Worshipping of God one with another nor can they without great rigor and censor ousness very evil in the sight of God be condemned in those who for the sake of Substantial National Religion the publickness and more universal benefit of it wherein they are most truly zealous pay obedience to the Rules of them Rule 7. Let us all strive labour preach hear and pray and even suffer in the Reformation of our selves and endeavours to Reform all others according to the most excellent Rules of our most Holy Religion professed in this Kingdom as our National Religion that it may be found to Praise Honour and Glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ and be thought worthy to stand before the Son of Man at his coming before whom nothing but the Gold and precious Stones of Substantial Truth and Goodness can stand all else will be burnt off as Hay and Chaff by the fire of that day and they that have been hot and contentious for them be saved only as by Fire with difficulty and loss And in the mean time that our Vnion and Love in the True Religion may be to us an assurance of the Divine Favour and presence of his protection and blessing that neither our Candlestick may be removed nor our Nation the present place of it be taken away for generally both are removed one with the other or soon after one another Rule 8. Let no man be discouraged from the most zealous Affectionate joyning himself to and promoting National Religion because oâ— that veneration due to the Name of The Church and Churches according to the Scripture For a Nation united in True Christian Religion differs no more in the strictest notion from a Church than a Body of men united and consecrated to God according to the Law of Nature differs from a Society united and consecrated to God according to an Institution that is no more than an Institution planted in Nature differs from an Institution given by Revelation For one is the Appointment of God of old from the very Foundations of Humane Society The other after the Fall of Nature and the Inability of it to its end An Institution therefore does not repeal a Natural Law but takes care it should be fulfill'd and compleated in its chiefest End Israel was a Church to God being so devoted to him by his own Institution and it was a Holy Nation according to the Original Exod. 19. 6. Law being elevated by the Institution to its true perfection as a Nation The Christians to whom the Apostle Peter wrote As they were a Church according to the Institution of Christ so they were a Holy Nation as he stiles them succeeding into the place of that whole Jewish Nation Consecrated to God by the Law of Nature upon Nations though but strangers scattered abroad yet to show the 1 Pet. 1. 1â— great value God has of a Nation devoted to him they are stiled A Holy Nation The Institution of the Catholick Church as the seat 1 Pet. 2. 9. of the True Religion of Jesus Christ makes a Nation united in that True Religion both a Church as that Catholick Church hath thereby a Residence in it and much more than those fore-mentioned scatter'd Jews a Holy Nation as it is Nationally resign'd up to God in the True Religion according to the Law of Nature made perfect by the Institution Where then a Nation is united in the Truth of Christian Doctrine the Purity of Divine Worship the Holy Rules of Practise the Catholick Love of all Christians Baptized into the same Body made to drink into that one Spirit In Pastors and Teachers Ministring the same Gospel the Apostles infallibly deliver'd and seal'd with Miracles All
Reason or Doctrine of Religion edifies or emboldens Conscience For although Conscience was made for the Divine Truth and Law of God which is the Truth and not for Scandal it was made so even and true to it that they which love this Law have great peace and nothing can scandalise or offend them that is either seduce or hurt them yet in this very Seat in this very Throne of the Divine Law in this Temple of God in this place of the Holy this Tribunal of the Soul that ought to be the Sanctuary of Truth and Righteousness and as a Tabernacle of Testimony does Scandal exalt it self as if it were from God and from thence it gives its Oracles but Conscience thus debauched and prostituted bears no more proportion to true Conscience than Antichrist does to Christ and is therefore a pseudo-Conscience an Anti-Conscience Conscience falsly so called 7. Scandal always dashes its own Principles of deceived Reason and false Doctrine upon some true and grand Principle of Reason and Doctrine of Religion For though every Truth of God is great yet there are of the first magnitude on account of which oppos'd the Spirit of God brands it Scandal more remarkably and hereupon though the Sin derived from Scandal may in it self seem small yet in regard of some stable Law of Religion made void and thereby Sin introduced it is a very great Sin though in a matter of its own Nature sometimes indifferent Now it cannot be otherwise but Scandal must thus dash upon Truth because as I have said it herein differs from simple Temptation that its rest is upon some false Principle of Reason or Doctrine of Religion it frames mischief by a Law and it must needs be that every false Principle and Doctrine must rush against some true one and though no Truth of God be small or Sin little and Scandal is always proportionable yet the wisdom of Scripture hath appropriated the name of Scandal to the violation of some grand Principle As I shall now in the next place for the further explaining of Scandal observe those Pillars of the Divine Truth and Law against which it throws and bruises the Scandalised Soul as the Sacred Books shall instruct us 1. The Eternal Being and Holy Government of God in the World according to those Righteous Just and Good Laws he hath given and according to which he will Judge and make Retribution to all Men at that great day is the Fountain and most Fundamental Principle of Religion So then whatever upon pretence of Reason and just cause undermines the Faith abates the Aws or dispirits the Obedience agreeable to so supreame a standard of all these is the Original and final Scandal Here all Scandal begins in the decay of the Faith and Fear of God and hither it returns It ends in a further loss of God and this upon offence taken that too much is required without reason This is that Eternal Rock of Truth at which whoever stumbles must needs be hurt wounded and grieved Thus was I grieved in my Heart and pricked in my Reins Psal 73. 21. saith the Psalmist on this very occasion Whoever falls violently against it it breaks him whoever contests to remove it and burdens himself with it it falls upon him and grinds him to Powder And yet against this speculative and practical Atheism hath in all Ages hardened it self and by shews of Reason and high Spirit been heaving and pecking at it and casting Scandals in all Mens way Gods retirement as they fancy it into the thick covering of the Clouds and the pleasure of Jâ—b 21. 14. walking in the Circuit of Heaven and not coming down in visible shapes of Glory and Power have given to ungodly Men the Boldness and a counterfeit of Argument to dispute against his Being and Government I say a counterfeit of Argument for with an Apparition of Reason from hence and an Insolency of Wickedness they Conjure down they Moâ—mo of Religion and the Goblin of Conscience as they esteem them Atheism hath always spoken stout Words against God saying to God Depart from us we desire not the knowledge Mal 3. 13. of thy ways What is the Almighty that we should serve him Or what profit is it if we should pray unto him Job 21. 14. It hath of old lifted up Men against God and stretched out their hand against the Almighty so that they have run upon God even upon the thick Bosses of his Buckler to mischief themselves to the utmost In the very days of Job there was this Counsel of the Job 10. 3. and 21. 16. and 22. 18. wicked as if it was the result of debate and serious consideration in a Senate of Atheists as if they had made the Experiment and found upon proof there was no advantage in serving God and no Man came by the worse in despising him It is not the invention of one Age of this last Age as if it might pride it self in finding it out Scripture hath not thought it against its Interests to record the strength of the Cause as it was managed of old in those Elder days of Job in the last days of the Old Testament in the time of the Prophet Malachi But over-runs it with a Flood of Truth and Eloquence even as God does as he pleases with a Deluge of Wrath. Yet present Impunity and the seeming confusion of Providence in the prosperity of the ungodly and the afflicted State of good Men hath been always a stumbling Block to sudden and short consideration Job significantly calls it Gods shining on the Councel of the Wicked as if it Job 10. 3. gave it a Lustre and Countenance Even good Men till they went into the Sanctuary of God and looked to the end of things have found it a Scandal The Psalmist acknowledges His Feet were almost gone and his Feet well Psal 73. 2. nigh slipped when he saw the Prosperity of the Wicked and Waters of a full Cup of affliction wrung out to the Godly Yet upon full discussion of the case he confesses it his Folly Ver. 22. and Ignorance So Foolish was I and Ignorant I was as a Beast before thee The wise King observed the Hearts of Eccles 8. 11. the Sons of Men fully set them in to do Evil because Sentence on an Evil Work was not speedily Executed God by his Patience sustaining and making wicked Men stand Exod. 9. 16. even when they deny him is the occasion of their more dreadful fall for their Foot will slide in due time to their Eternal Ruine how slack soever God is misdeemed he will be a swift Witness of his own Being and Truth and the Avenger of his own Glory Now so far as any Man hath either in secret Suspicions or in the silent Murmurs of his Soul said There is no God or vanquished the prevailing Awes of God so that Conscience hath been emboldened or edified or so much as silenced or dumb
those who do vehemently and zealously fall in with Conformity to these Impositions in Indifferents yet they may be scandalised and that very deeply This Case does not I confess arise out of the Apostles Discourses except by the other Interpretation of the Scope of that to the Corinths which gives it not onely as if Compliance against the Sentiments of Conscience upon the Trust of Example were the Sin and Scandal but that the weaker Christians not having the Knowledge of the stronger doing as they did and not prepossess'd as they were that the Idol was nothing sunk into some Degrees at least of Idolatrous Reverence and Worship as if they knew no other Reason of eating in an Idols Temple but Devotion to him And this kind of Scandal though I believe the drift of the Apostle is chiefly as I have explained it yet too often falls out in these Cases Those Ceremonies that have been promoted into Divine Services or into the Ornament of Religion and the Places of it have been though dangerously enough yet not so ill design'd as afterwards abused by more Ignorant Persons who greedy and fond of a sensual and external Religion have been transported upon Superstition and sometimes downright Idolatry and this often noted in Scripture under the very Name of Scandal Thus I before observ'd in the Case of Gideons Ephod his House and all Israel were insnar'd beyond the first Intention Thus in the Brazen Serpent continued no doubt in memory of the Miracle yet afterwards prov'd so great a Snare that they burnt Incense to it And it is most likely Balaam cast his Snare at first in a less-guilty Feasting with the Midianites upon their Idols Sacrifices not known to be such poysonous Meat and by degrees toll'd them on into the midst of the Congregation and Assembly of Idolaters Thus the Apostles by Divine Direction condescending to the weakness of Convert-Jews among the Romans on consideration of the Divine Command in some of their Rites but just now expiring degenerated afterward into such a Judaism that the same Apostle was most severe against it and that very Strength of the Corinthian Christians or at least the Weakness of the Unknowing following their Example became afterwards into an infamous Doctrine the Doctrine of Balaam and the very inchanting Seduction of the Prophetess Jezebel who taught the People of Christ to commit Fornication and to eat things offered to Idols in honour to them The bringing in of Pictures into Places of Religious Worship suppose it as innocent as could be suppos'd at first yet was abus'd speedily into all imaginable Corruption and it is much to be fear'd all the Remonstrances concerning more Innocent Rites as they can't vindicate them from Scrupulosity on one side so can't preserve them from Mens placing too much of their Religion in them on the other whereby the true Conscience of it is weakned the Vertue and Vigour of Conscience in things truly Religious weakned and spent by having been laid out unnecessarily upon extern Observances and loosness of Life like Fornication with eating things offered to Idols breaking in upon the Commute of such Flatteries of Conscience for substantial Piety as the Jews would exchange New-Moons and Oblations for Justice and Mercy and walking humbly with God It must be indeed acknowledg'd not onely Humane Appointments but even Divine Commands are subject to the Injury of Scandal but with this difference One cannot be cut off though Scandal presses never so hard the other may and ought For in all things not ordained by God the Principle sinned against in Scandal is the exceeding Purity of Religion the substantial Piety and most Spiritual and Rational Worship of himself God requires and expects by his Word and that all things he has commanded be adjusted to those Ends even as he provided them and all he has not commanded should stand off or at least be presently superseded when become the Prey of Scandal Yet on the other side Scandal shelters it self under Order Decency or Edification of the Ignorant Obedience to Authority and presses on to the utmost under them 3. The third sort of Scandal arising from Indifferent Things upon those that will not be at all perswaded to a Compliance with them even they may be scandalised by unlawful and very sinful Censoriousness and Passion placing too much of their sense of Religion upon their dislike of such Additions to Divine Worship Divisions and Separations on both sides from the Publickest Worship of God and National Union in Religion beyond the Merit and Quality of the Cause or further than the Case at its utmost extent can require and if the Sin of Schism be such as the endeavour'd Notion of it would make it a Fall into the great Sin of Schism The Principle offended against in this sort of Scandal is That great Love of Christians and Union in Divine Worship in Truth and Peace made so Fundamental in Christianity by Christ and the Apostles The pretence of Scandal lies too both ways That for the sake of such Additionals we may desert those much higher Considerations and Reasons and Causes of Love and Union and our Obligations to them The Apostle represents this great Mischief not under the formal Account of Scandal in the Discourse to the Romans though I doubt not he after refers to it expresly as such when he joyns Scandals and Divisions together but Rom. 16. 17. in the Discourse it self he both sets out the Heat on both sides in judging and despising and argues on both sides with highest strength of Divine Reason against the Evil both ways And this is certain The more excellent our Religion the more desirable our Publick Worship and Communion for the Piety Rationality and Order of it the more pure our National Church and Association in Religion is and the greater the Sin of Separation the more does the Apostles Argument against scandalising for the sake of Indifferencies press and urge us Why should our Good be thought evil of or blasphem'd Why should our Publick Worship and National Religion be once thought to be Ceremony Why should our Communion be clogg'd with things of no greater avail than Meat and Drink Why should we lose those from our Communion who own The Kingdom of God is Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost and contend for those Divine things though they have not leisure and freedom for Ceremonies when they that serve God in them though they cannot joyn in lesser things yet as they are accepted of God so should be approved of Men Or if the Sin of Separation be so great and even Schism it self why for our Meat for our Indifferent things should they perish for whom Christ died or such a Work of God as appears in them be destroyed 4. The Severity Passion Transport beyond the Values of the things themselves and taking up the Instruments of Cruelty cannot be without Scandal upon the Imposers of Indifferency and those that will needs be
is wise He shall understand these things Prudent And he shall know them for the ways of the Lord are right in themselves and lye in streight Lines one to another the Just shall walk in them though Transgressors fall therein In fine Magistrates especially Christian Magistrates are as much oblig'd against pushing on Scandal as private Christians and more as they are the Custodes the Publick Guardians of Conscience But if they fail in their Duty Obedience to them cannot disannul the Charges against Scandal lying upon all Christians in Relation to one another nor can their Laws prescribe against Moderation Obj. 6. But when time is allowed to the Doubtful to satisfy themselves if they come not off from their Scruples it argues Humor and Faction are highest in the Case or a Superstition on the other side Answ The Apostle tells us it is a very happy a very rare thing when Christians surmount their Doubts Happy is he that Condemns not himself wherein he allows himself It is a very Priviledged Case to be well and wisely satisfied after Doubt and therefore it must not be hastily censured if those that have been unsatisfied cannot presently answer our Lure to the other side And the time is much larger that is necessary in some Cases than in others The Ceremonies of Moses it was reasonable should go off more quick as Shaddows of the Night by the brightness of the Gospel and could never return any more But the Reasons against eating at an Idols Feast being nearer Moral are much more durable and may last even while the World stands where or when-ever Idolatry has place In the first Reformation from Popery there was Reason to expect the Superstitious Rites and Customs that had gained upon Mens Minds with the Reputation of Religion should be daily wearing off but the Reasons of Doubt in Indifferents affixed to Divine Worship taken from that perpetual Obligation of preserving it pure setled upon the Base of truest soundest Reason and much more favoured by Scripture well arm'd with Experience of Events must always continue in force and so no Time may be large enough for getting off from those Scruples that spring from them but that wherein they are indeed taken away But if any thing of Turbulency Faction or Unruliness be supposed to lye deeper than the Scruples it is best to unmask it by taking away so just a Cause to mannage it self upon and by so great a kindness to Conscience that ought to be tendered to heap Coals of Fire upon the heads of such Persons either to reform them or condemn them beyond Apologie Or if Superstition and placing Religion on the other side in having a Zeal against Ceremonies be suspected even that does but increase the Scandal arising from these Indifferent Things and makes them more necessary to be remov'd as Stumbling-Blocks out of Mens way you cure the Superstition on the other side too by taking away the Cause Object 7. Order and Government in the Church or National Religion cannot be preserv'd without such Guards upon both Piety Order and Unity for besides that Publick Authority hath thought them fit there are many private Christians zealous of them and that would be scandalised if they were taken away as if the Precept of the Apostle were broken Let all things be done Decently and in Order and of them greatest care is to be had as owning the Publique Authority most Answ I have already asserted in answer to some parts of this Objection 1. That Religion and Piety are its own best Guards and Devotion to God preserv'd most awful as well as most pure in its own Spirituality and Truth 2. That all Natural and Necessary Order and Decency are always to be secured as much as may be as being above the Scale of meer Indifferents 3. That Unity is to be preserv'd in the Inviolate love of Christians to one another center'd in those principal Things Love of God and Christ and keeping his Commandments and not in one Face of Vniformity which is if plac'd upon Ceremonials in its own Nature as variable as the Phase of the Moon 4. I add The more Publick Societies in Religion are intended and desired to be the more Comprehensive the Forms of Union must be The Prudence and holy Caution of that first Council we read of in the Christian Church is always to be followed When the Jews and Gentiles were to come into the nearest Union and as great an Vniformity as was any way necessary either in the several Churches or the whole Church when Doubts and Disputes had arisen concerning the Terms of their Union was that prime Canon made happy had it been if that Pattern had been ever since kept to It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to lay upon you no other Burden than These necessary Things one necessary by a perpetual Morality one other in the fear and danger of Idolatry or Scandal The other two necessary at that time but by alteration of Time they dropp'd off as to any Religious Import except as general Nature may check at them 5. The Banding of Societies in unnecessary Rites is rather of Ecclesiastick Interest and Domination than of the Concerns of Christian Religion 6. If there are such Varieties that some cannot serve God without adorning their Worship with these Arbitrary Rites of Order and Decency they must stand or fall to their own Master If they have such a Faith seeing the Danger of Scandalising lies most on the side of Ceremonies they are those that should have it to themselves before God not they that doubt or because it is the Publickly Established Order they should carry the Happiness the Priviledge of their full Perswasion humbly and compassionately being not high minded but fearing lest in some parts of that wherein they seem so clear Causes of Condemning themselves lye hid at present and afterwards start out But all this cannot be a Standard for others they that are doubtful ought not to be screwed up by Engines and Pullies to this Happiness Seeing then there are some that dare not serve God in this way we must seek out other Terms of Union and they are very near us the vital Union of Christianity our National Reformed Religion which may subsist well enough if we would let it in these lesser Distinctions It did not make diverse Churches in Primitive Rome that some Christians distinguished Meats and Days and others did not Yet the asserting the Rights of the Gospel-Freedom from Judaick Bondage was of more concernment to the Christian Church at that time than all the Order and Decency of Despotick Ceremonies can be worth to it now Let us therefore as the Conclusion of this Head of Scandal always remember upon the point of Indifferency That All that it is hath been nam'd already and it is known to be Indifferency and it may not contend with Scandal that is mightier than it for Scandal is Scandal real Mischief and lays about it from
every Quarter with Mischiefs How much better then is it that indifferent things in Religion were taken away even while the World standeth than that they should be kept up as the Sconces of Scandal For Indifferent Things let not the Work of God be destroyed nor any for whom Christ dyed in danger to Perish the more we esteem our Church our Religion our Worship of God the better and purer they are the more it is pity any should be divided from it should be so far scandalised as to be Schismaticks from it either in our account or if it be that Sin in the real danger of it and of perishing in it The more excellent our Church is the more the Apostles Rules take hold of us Let not the good of our Church be evil spoken of as if it was Ceremonial Let us not lose any from our Church for Meat and Drink Increase not the Woe of Scandal any way for so mean Things as Indifferents Let us not indanger our selves into the Woe of him by whom Scandal comes for Elements But besides all these Considerations there is not so absolute a security in adding any thing under any Name whatever to the pure Worship of God any more than to his Word lest we be found Lyars to him mismatching with it what will not endure the Fire Greatest Peace have they that Prov. 30. 5 6. love thy Law O Lord and that only nothing shall offend them in nothing will they offend others Observing Rites that had been Divine was not so safe to the first Christians having to do with Rites that had been corrupted Idolatrously and Superstitiously proved very Fatal Ceremonies are but Shaddows Superstition easily pervades that little thin Essence they have They have not the Right of being Gods Creation to bring them off to lye lower than their Corruption and commend them There is no such Cause to be over-zealous of such things in regard of which a late * Father Simmons 's Critical History Romanist hath said The true Religion of the Church of England differs little from the Romish in outward appearance The Argument strikes all ways if our Constitution be so good and injur'd not at all by Ceremonies let us as Christ Seek and save that which is lost those we look upon as the least that believe in Christ let them not be lost for Ceremonies The Love and Compassion of a Saviour triumphs towards these least easily Offended narrow-soul'd morose suppose them Smoaking Flax bruised Reeds yet despise them not if Christians if Protestants Their Angels behold the Face of the Father of Christ in Heaven Let them not be Offended Scandalised from Union with our National Church for Ceremonies If on the other side our Ceremonies in Gods account should be blemishes of our Church and Imperfections or if they may be turned into such by an ignorant use of them or if they cause Divisions and Scandals if the Mischiefs of those Scandals fall upon Strangers to true Religion and keep them at distance All these considerations weigh heavy against a Zeal for them But if none of these can be laid to their Charge yet if Men doubt concerning them what must they do How shall they escape that of the Apostle He that doubteth is Damned if he Eats Whatever is not of Faith is Sin Why should this be hazzarded for Indifferents And when the Tyde of Advantages Preferments Publick Approbation are on one side Deprivation of all those Censures and Penalties on the other who dares answer for many Men that they do not offer Violence to their Principles much more venture over their Doubts And yet in those very Doubts has the Apostle laid his Doctrine Or Lastly Wo can reasonably suppose Men would stem this Tyde that is against them if they had not real Conscientious Doubts or higher than Doubts to contest with in prejudice of their Complyance Upon the whole then I cannot but conclude Imposing Indifferent Things in Religion by a violent Example much more by severe Ways is very contrary to the Apostles Doctrine in that Case and that upon Reasons that till I see them answered I must suppose unanswerable I have now thus far discoursed of Scandal in the more strict and particular Cases Scripture hath given us the notices of but in the remaining Heads to be treated of I shall consider it in that largest and most comprehensive Grasp of it Religion in general And there is nothing that requires greater Wisdom and the prepossessions of a more Religious Prudence than to sit and count the Charge of undertaking serious Piety as the Lord hath bidden us in relation to one Branch of Scandal Persecution so with respect to the whole Negotiation of Scandal in the World It is the great both Wisdom and Goodness of God in the Scripture that he hath given full and ample warning before hand of all the Disadvantages we are to encounter in our Faith Love and Obedience to him as when we are assured There shall be False Prophets There must be Heresies There shall be Persecution There shall be an Apostacy or general Defection from True Symmetral Christianity within Christianity it self And so in the present Case it must needs be that Scandals come For the Knowledge of these things is one greatest Defence against the Evil predicted as also against the staggering of our Minds concerning the Truth of Religion it self Let any man then enquire and search this thing out both in Scripture and close Reason and he will find Scandals must come though he may at first think Religion if it be so great and excellent as is given out of it should not be darkned and clouded with Scandal but stand clear from it and it be impossible it should be any way liable to it Now that it is in it self Just and Right even to Perfection it self is every where recorded and published of it Wisdom speaks excellent things and the opening its Lips are Prov. 8. 6. Right Things It speaketh Truth and Wickedness is an abomination to its Lips All its Words are in Righteousness and nothing froward or perverse in them They are all plain to him that understandeth and right to them that find Knowledge The Righteousness of thy Testimonies is everlasting give me Vnderstanding and I shall live Gods Precepts are right concerning All Things and secure from every False Way Psal 119. 104. c. His Law is the Truth By the Word of his Lips Men are kept from the Paths of the Destroyer Amidst all the scandalising Psal 17. 4. Hos 14. 11. and intangling Works of Men The Ways of the Lord are all right if Men have but right Feet right Intentions Affections and Motions And yet when all this is granted let any Man cast the thing in his severest Thoughts and he will find it impossible as things are Religion should be free from Scandal and that therefore as if any Man cannot deny himself he cannot be Christ's Disciple so if
Man's Heart Answ Whatever is indeed written in Man's Heart must certainly be from God seeing no Created Hand could write there The Hand that Made can alone Ingrave it Quest How then shall we make a Judgment what is written upon the Heart Answ That which is universally acknowledged and amidst all the Differences in Religion falls under no Variation assures us it was placed there by that Supreme Hand that alike fashioned all Mens Hearts and especially seeing to this universal Acknowledgment there is no Temptation from the sensual and worst Part of Man it being against its Interest but it springs from the wisest and best Parts most unconcerned in this World or any of the brutish Pleasures of it Quest What Principles do you account thus to be of Natural Religion Answ I account these following That there is a God the Greatest and Best of Beings that governs the World That God vouchsafes to be acknowledged ador'd and worshipped by Man and that he takes notice when he is so worshipped or neglected and that with Favour or Displeasure That there is a Distinction betwixt Good and Evil setled by the Unchangeable Laws of God That God being himself so Good is pleas'd in Men doing well and rewards it and displeas'd when Men do ill and punishes it That Men have a Conscience viz. a Knowledg of and Government of their own Actions with Approbation of them if Good and Dislike if Bad. That there are Rewards and Punishments beyond this Life That therefore the Notions of Virtue Righteousness Temperance Soberness Beneficence and the contrary Vices are of unchangeable Truth and the Actions flowing from them of the same Notion That God is both the Judge and Observer of them now and will be so in the Future State That in the time of God's Patience and Bounty to sinful Man there is Forgiveness with him that he may be feared and that he thereby leads Men to Repentance That upon all accounts Solemn Worship of him by Prayer Praises Honourable Discourses of him of all Obedience to him and Returns to him after our Falls are most due from Humane Nature and according to the sociable Nature of Man in Publick Associations Quest Do you believe these so close to and inseparable from the Reason of Man Answ I am fully assured so and that these and all the immediate genuine and natural Deductions from them are so nearly allied with Humane Nature and Reason that they are in no Parts of it wanting however overcome but where extreme Barbarity and Brutishness in all things else make it plain such People cannot weigh against the wiser Societies of Mankind in whom the more vigorous Efforts of Reason shew themselves Quest But would you have Men rest in Natural Principles without Revelation Answ No by no means For if Adam in Paradise had Revelation to make his State towards God Consummate how much more Man Fallen in whom all Natural Light is but glimmering and obscure Heavenly Objects at so great a remove by his being sunk down so low from them and the Mists and Fogs of this Earth so prevalent upon him in the great Deordination of Spirit into Body that whatever true Principles of Reason might effect if duely pursued he is without Revelation upon all Experiment no better than in the Valley of the Shadow of Death Quest But does there appear any Expectation of Revelation in the Motions of Natural Reason Answ Very great so that no Religion in the World hath been without the Pretence of it And it is both most hopeful according to the Laws of Natural Light that God will reveal himself and most just that his Revelations should be accepted with all Reverence when vouchsafed our very Reason being a Revelation from him and if any Revelation from him could be false even That might be so also But in all things Natural Light must needs bow to Divine Veracity Quest How happy might the World be if all the Religions of the World were but reformed to this Natural True Religion Answ Undoubtedly so for the State of it could not then be far from the Kingdom of God all True Religion whether Natural or Revealed being so closely allied to it self For though Revealed rises much higher yet in an inseparable connexion with and in a continuation undivided from Natural Quest But as the State of the World is and hath always been there seems to have been no Effect of True Natural Religion Answ Very great in many respects 1. To justifie God in his Dealings with Mankind that there have been such Possibilities of Return to True Religion laid up in them 2. To be as Sense in a Mans Soul upon which all Divine Applications might take either to Conviction or Conversion 3. To be at all times ready to be re-enlivened by Revealed Truth and to unite with it 4. To be an Universal Code of True Religion in which it is always reasonable for Mankind to agree or in any Parts of it on any Occasion as Jonah and the Mariners did in their Calamity or as St. Paul and the Seamen with him in giving Thanks to God 5. That it might be a Standard to punish Prophaneness and Irreligion by without entrenchment on Conscience which Revelation cannot be but in some peculiar Circumstances 6. That Men may on all Occasions treat with one another by it on Terms of Reason and Justice as the Apostle Paul with the Men of Athens with Felix and generally Men one with another in all their Commerce All Society good Laws and Government Restraint of excessive Evil depending upon it CAP. IV. Of Revelation and the Reasons of so great Miscarriages against both the Light of Nature and Revelation with the Means of Cure Quest SEeing there is by all that hath been spoken so great a weight resting upon Revelation let the Accounts of Gods Revealing himself to Mankind be more fully stated Answ Besides Gods Revealing himself to Adam even in Innocency in a Doctrine suitable to those two Sacramental Trees the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life and besides that Original Revelation of Christ after the Fall The Seed of the Woman shall break the Serpents Head he hath been pleased to guide that Holy Seed which is his Church by Revelation as by a Pillar of Fire throughout succeeding Ages till he compleated the whole he intended in a Kingdom of Truth that cannot be shaken which is to continue to the end of the World Quest How then did God deal with the rest of the World Answ Even they were for some considerable Spaces in the first Ages of the World within the Advantages of Revelation by mixture with or Neighbourhood to the Church by Tradition from the Holy Patriarchs which if they had faithfully observed together with the Improvement of Natures Light it would have secured them in True Religion Besides that they who were faithful in these were on all proper occasions provided for by the Faithful Creator though they were
not strictly of that Seed with immediate Revelations But when all these were corrupted as they were in the generality of Mankind God withdrew himself by degrees as the Glory did from the Temple in Ezekiel till there was nothing left but the Darkness of Tradition fearfully debauch'd false Deductions from Nature's Light and worse than that the Devils Oracles in the room of Gods so that there was in the generality of the Nations a second and more desperate Fall of Mankind from the true Religion the Jewish Church and a small Proselytisme to that only excepted Quest What Examples are there of Gods continuing Favour to any parts of Mankind out of Abrahams Family justifying him as not departing from men till they departed from him Answ Melchisedek no descendent from Abraham was King of Righteousness and King of Peace at the same time the Church was placed in Abrahams Seed Laban was not wholly revolted from true Religion But especially Job and his Friends of the Posterity of Esau were eminent Instances of the Favour of God that whole Book of Job testifying that being helped by Holy Tradition together with occasional Revelations they held the Light of Nature at its own Purity Quest How long did the Nations that deserted God continue under that dismal obscurity Answ Till that Blessed Seed in whom all the Families of the Earth were to be Blessed and who was the desire of all Nations came and shone as the Sun of Righteousness upon the whole World Quest How was the Light of Revelation conveyed to the People of God in Elder Times Answ In divers Ways and Manners in more immediate Appearances in Visions Dreams Prophesies in inward Illumination by a Voice In all which there were when ever they were truly from God such mighty Evidences of Divinity as over-ballanc'd all doubt Together with these were the ordinary and familiar Instructions of Patriarchs and Holy Men grounded upon Natural and Revealed Religion Quest How did God conclude his Manifestations of himself in the way of immediate Revelation Answ By speaking in the last Days by his Son and the Apostles immediately Commissioned by him sealing up Vision and Prophesie in the fullness and Complement of Truth Quest Did God take any care for the securing the Monuments of his Truth given out by Revelation Answ Yes very early how early we know not but beyond Controversie in the first forming the Jewish Church into a setled Body he began the more sure and certain way of committing his Word and Will to Writing and for the Honour of it set the Copy with his own Hand and continued it till the whole Revelation was compleat Passant Revelation or Oral Tradidition not being sure enough Quest Wherein is the Written Word more sure than the Word in passing Revelation or Tradition Answ The Word committed to Writing stands unalterable Divine Providence watching over what was Written to keep it the same All Covenants and Treaties all Monuments of Knowledge have been thus secured transmitted into all Parts and consigned to after Ages Appeals in Cases of doubt are more safely made to what is Written and every one concerned has a ready and open way to Examine and in all Cases to be resolved Quest Have all Nations since the Days of the Blessed Seed been Communicated with these Revelations Answ There hath been a Freedom given to Communicate them and a Right in all Nations to demand the benefit of them granted by God and Christ to them but there are many sad Accounts to be given why this Universal Grace to Mankind has not yet taken Effect 1. The unaccountableness of the Methods of Gods Government of the World in the Efficacies of his distinguishing Goodness even when things seem equally disposed to the advantage of one as of another 2. The Experiment made upon so great a part of Mankind that have the Gospel justifies God in not effectually conveying it to others who would make as ill an use of it The Idolatry Superstition of some the sottish Ignorance Sloath and neglect of others The Cruelty and Barbarity exercised by Christians upon one another and the unanswerable living to it in all Sects make plain the great perverseness of our degenerate Nature and how Nations that have not the Gospel would have abused it if they had had it 3. But especially the great Enmity to and Contempt of the Heavenly Doctrine great Nations are inviron'd with against the approaches of it so far as it has come within their notice as among Jews Turks and Pagans are a very obvious Reason why they receive not the benefit of the Gospels free promulgation Quest What then is the immediate Reason why so many Nations that have the Light of Nature to guide them and the Jews that have the Scriptures of the Old Testament have been the one great Enemies to all Scripture Revelations and the other to the new Testament Answ Because Nations that have the light of Nature stay not themselves upon that which is clear and evidently Divine and Publick in Natures Law but either by unnatural Collections and miserable wrestings of its Principles or flying to false and dark Revelations fortifie themselves in falshood or misapplyed Truth As to the Jews it is very plain they were bemisted with the private Interpretation they had affixed to the Old Testament so that they could not see the clear easie and certain Trains of the same Publick and Divine running betwixt the Old and the New but the Rudiments in the Old being more kind to the Cabal or Cypher of their self-interested Sense they venerated them and hated the Perfection and Life in the New that would not at all bear their privy Gloss although both Scriptures had the same Credentials from Heaven and carried the same Publick Sense So great is the Delusion of Private Quest But how comes it to pass that even among those that enjoy the Light of the Gospel the Scriptures and profess the same Christianity nay the most Refined and Reformed Christianity there are so great Differences and Divisions Answ All proceeds from the same unhappy Spring Men cannot endure to rest in the Clear and Certain Oracles of Truth but by forc'd Additions Misinterpretations violent Detorsions forsake that which is Publick and Divine for that which is Private and their own and are greatly offended and too often enraged that others do not concur with them Quest It seems then the best Method of keeping off from Errour is to rest upon the most undoubted Points of Truth before we remove from them to any thing further Answ It is undoubtedly so Religion in all the Branches of it having suffered much more by forreign and disagreeable Additions than by wary Suspensions For hereby a Man keeps himself from False Religion and stands ready and open to receive Truth Quest But how then should a Man make forward from Natural Religion to Revealed or from what he does not understand to what he may in time come to see very good Proof for
Answ By staying the due time upon the Uncontrovertible Doctrines and Commands of Natures Laws yielding full Obedience to God in them trembling to add any thing of baser Alloy to them A Man shall see Revealed Truth shining out upon Natural and joyning it self to it and with it Thus many of the Fathers came over to Christianity And so in all parts of Scripture by rising from the most Fundamental Truths lov'd and obey'd a Man shall ascend by due degrees to those more remote Thus Good Men in the Old Testament waited for the Kingdom of God and upon just Considerations moved upon the Line of Truth from the State of Religion in the Old Testament to that of the New except sometimes a Light shines suddenly round about Men as in extraordinary Conversions Quest You seem then to think False Religion and All Divisions in the True have most nearly sprung up from over-confidence of Things not of the Evidence of Publick and Divine Truth Answ I do so indeed although I know Mens not liking to retain Truth but being bewitched by false Imagination betrays them both to the Plague of Lost and Fallen Spirits warring under the Prince of our disordered Air the Ruler of the Darkness of this World and to the various Arts of Men who corrupt Religion for the Ends they have to serve themselves of by it I know Mens Faculties of Search Inquiry into and Comprehension of Truth are much shrivell'd and shrunk up I know Endless Doubts and Incertainties are brought upon Religion by Darkness and false Appearances to Souls that are so full of all the Reasons and Causes of Delusion within themselves and deserted by the just Judgment of God giving them over to believe a Lie I acknowledge all these Causes of Errour Yet I am assured the close Adherence to God in Truths evidently Divine and not removing farther into a Religious Esteem of Things till upon the same Evidence is the Means under the Conduct of the Holy Spirit to be secure from dangerous Errour or Schism from the true Publick And whatever is not so evidently Publick and Divine is liable to Private Interpretation and so to Errour And when Men are overweening upon Private Interpretation they easily fall into Errour and when they are surly and masterly upon it it moves Wrath Emulation Strife so that both Falshoood and Cruelty have entered in at this Door and rang'd over the World Quest But ought we to stupifie all Inquiry and benumb Judgment in every thing not evidently Divine Answ Not so but to behave our selves humbly and modestly to acknowledge there are vast Tracts of Truth and Knowledge beyond what we know but we must feel the Evidence of them before we can receive them yet to carry our selves with due concession to every Mans Sense that though their Sense cannot nor ought to master us no more ought we to expect ours should them which would exceedingly reconcile or abate Differences and retrench the mischievous Effects the World hath so long groan'd under by so many Religions of Nations Names of Churches and Persons propagating their Private that is not Divine Sense and that with Clamour and too often with rude Force Quest What are the Instances of the Mischief of making Defection from this Publick Catholik Divine Truth for Private Sense Answ The Angels Fall from Heaven was certainly upon Private Sense and Interest Adam's from Innocency and Paradise upon the same the Jews Fall from being the Church and People of God was upon the Idiotism of having Religion for their own All Idolatry and Superstitions of Heathens have risen from hence All the Heresies in the Church have come from an over-love to Private Opinion This is the most damnable Antichristianism of Rome to make its Private Catholick All Persecutions of Heathens Romes Inquisition and Massacres have been inflam'd in this Furnace the love of making Private Publick And in lesser and more unfundamental Points Private Interpretation enfore'd as if it were Publick hath discompos'd the Peace of the Purest and best reformed Churches and not only disturb'd their Peace but stain'd their Purity Quest I seem to my self in all this unhappy Babelism or Confusion of Religion to be very apprehensive for the Glory of God and Religion Answ It is most necessary to be zealous for Divine Glory and for the Honour of Religion that Rivers of Tears should run down our Eyes because of the Injuries done by Men to the Divine Law But yet to be so concern'd as to be scandalised is to forget that God is infinitely more the Publick than we are and therefore to be offended at his Disposes is to make our Private the Publick We must then consider that if God does not miraculously interpose it must needs be so it is no other than the Necessity of the Case Men moving with so great Disadvantages as the Active Soul of Man does in so great a Concern as Religion is in our highest Interest and as thereupon Men will make use of it in the present World it must needs be so There must be Heresies in Religion But that this Mormo or dreadful Apparition may vanish we must remember 1. That to the Soul humble and fearing God all that is of Grand Interest in Faith Worship and Practice is so Publick and evidently Divine that no Man need be ever learning and never come to the Knowledge of the Truth After this God hath given this Employment to those that through Office or Desire set themselves to seek and intermeddle with al Knowledge to travel with advantage to themselves and others in their Inquiries into the whole Compass of Divine Knowledge whatever Difficulty can be supposed to be in things of higher Advance to Salvation is resolv'd to them that do the Will of God as a Reward of their Obedience They shall know the Doctrines that are of God that rise higher towards Heaven than others The due and diligent Search after Wisdom is a Test upon the truly Sincere and well-resolv'd in Religion that have in them another Spirit as Caleb to follow God fully and do not as the Israelites bring up an ill Report on this good Land as if the Difficulties were unconquerable and the Entertainment Hungry and Barren through the many Disputes and Differences in Religion Hereby lastly the Conduct of the Free Spirit is seen leading into all Truth and the Unction of the Holy One by which the True Christian knows all things necessary to him to be known appears most desirable and necessary Thus the Wise and Holy Government of God who brings Light out of these Clouds and Darkness is made manifest and it is to be ascribed to the Infinite Perfection of Light with the Father of Lights who is without any variation or shadow of turning Quest What Rule is then to be observed in the great Diversities of Men in Religion that may most abound to the Honour of Catholick Religion Answ To own and embrace any thing we find in any Man or
highest elevation is but Created and Created is not firm and sure enough for a Foundation nor can it raise an Assent noble and generous enough for a Faith in that which is Divine All that can be summon'd may be an outward Fortification or Introduction but the Rock of Truth is the Son of God Divinity it self Upon this the Church is built that the Gates of Hell cannot prevail against it Quest But are there no Parts of Scripture that receive greater Service from Humane Testimony than others Answ There are some Parts of Scripture that are but Ministerial and almost Servile in comparison of others And that these are found in all Authentick Copies and have been delivered down from Age to Age with the Sacred Rolls may depend more upon Humane Testimony especially where the Connexion with the more Divine Parts is not evident For these being but as the Body and some of them of the more remote Parts from the Soul of Scripture cannot sparkle that Divine Light and Heat the Spirit of Scripture does and so may stand in need of borrowed Light from the Superiour Luminaries of Sacred Truth and in many Cases may like the Moon need Reflexions of Light from our very Earth but the Sun of Scripture receives the Highest Testimony by the strongest Reflexions of its own Original Beams Quest How comes it to pass that there are such different Degrees of Scripture-Excellency in the several Parts of it and that it is not one Even Form of Doctrine methodically laid together and of the same Tenour of Discourse Answ In this seeming Disorder appears the great Wisdom and Majesty of Divine Contrivance that without obliging it self to the low and even pedantick Laws of Humane Discourse it raises so great a Record of Truth upon variety of Occasions and by an Infinite Foresight predetermining to it self the several Measures and Ends of Scripture raises them out of a great variety of Accidents and in such an Order as seem'd best to it self for those Ends so as to give easie and ready Advantages to him that runs to read and gather Instructions of weightiest moment and also of quickest and suddenest sally upon his Mind of greatest aptness to fix upon the Memory without loading it and yet in the mean time to lay the Obligations of all Degrees of Search and Diligence to join one part of Scripture to another so as to comprehend the whole Complex of Divine Doctrine and extract the Order of History For by a most natural free and unaffected occasional way all Truths to make wise to Salvation and a complete Sum of all Goodness is to be found in Scripture with infinite Varieties of Address all the ways possible to the Understanding Will Affections Conscience Memory Imagination suited to all Capacities States Conditions full of plain and obvious of most retir'd secret and farthestreach'd Wisdom which no Mind can fully grasp nor Tongue express And with these Things of main Importance runs along such a Chronology of the Dealings of God with the World and especially with his Church as serves the main Design All Learning and Knowledge in the mean time attending with lowliest Submission and not with pompous Appearance Now from this Supreme Dispose of all things to the Ends of God in Scripture out of such a variety of Emergencies of all sorts arises such a diversity of several Excellencies in the Parts of Scripture that yet all meet in that Great Center of the Glory of God in a Communication of his Counsels concerning Man and that turn round those Two Globes that little one of the present World a Point like this Earth and the other that vast Circumference of Eternity Quest But is there not as great a difference arising from the various States and Conditions of the Writers of Scripture and the so different Periods of Time they were upon Answ That there is and must needs be a difference is undeniable yet to the great Glory of Scripture and assurance it is from God even those smallest and lowest things last spoken of are all treated with all the Purity Gravity becoming the Penmen of the Holy Spirit and with all the Usefulness their Nature can extend to Even so the Holy Men used by God in this Service how various and differing soever in their several Ages and Times of writing in their Circumstances of State and Condition in this World High Low Rich Poor Learned Unlearned how distant soever in their Times of Writing in the outward Forms and Modes of their Worship of God in the Things that fell under their Account and Relation before the Law under the Law in the Days of the Messiah after his Death yet there is the same Spirit Scope Chastness of Style Majesty and Authority in the Contexture one Aspect upon the Glory of God Obedience to him Desire of his Favour as the whole Happiness of Man the same Reflexions upon the great Evil of Sin and the consequent Misery and even of their own Sins So that where any Combination or Conference to concert things was impossible yet there is such an Union without a set Uniformity as assures the One Hand of the Divine Spirit and Guidance upon All. Quest Is not the Church of God the Trustee and Depository of Sacred Oracles Answ It is so in Divine Ordination and the general Course of Providence but yet it adds nothing to them but receives all from them The Church is known to be the Church by the Scriptures not the Scriptures by the Church except declaratorily only The Church is the Pillar and Rest of Scriptures where God is pleas'd to fix them that they may be exposed to Publick View but their Authority is of God evident in themselves Quest Do we then attribute nothing more to the Church in which we were Baptiz'd and received the Knowledge of Religion Answ A very great Favour it is of God that when he writes up the People he counts that we were born within his True Church where all the Springs of Salvation run but as to the Proof of Religion or the Records of it it can be no more than a Private Proof For till we make a true Judgment by what is Divine and Publick and of God in the true Church it does no more than equal other Societies walking with Confidence and Assurance with great Awes and Devotion in the Name of their God in the Profession of their Religion Till therefore there is a Trial of every Religion and the Records of it all such Societies are upon the same Level When the Religion and Oracles of every Religion come to be tried and duely examined the Church of God rises to Heaven and all else except so far as they joyn in any Parts of the same Truth sink down beneath Quest But how can we know that every Book of Scripture is Scripture but by the Testimony of the Church or that we have all the Books of it but by the same Testimony Answ That the Books we own
Interpreter is immediately assisted by the Holy Spirit to give such an Interpretation that else could not be found by any Created Sagacity or Industry in such particular Places of Scripture either from the Importance of the Words the strength of the Context or Scope or in the Analogie of Scripture comparing Spiritual things with Spiritual Quest What are to be understood to be Motives of Credibility in so great a Case Answ The Divine Sense of an Interpretation agreeable with all those so self-evident Notions of God and all Goodness the Weight and Gravity of the Matter The Authoritativeness of Scripture Language and Elocution Miracles Agreement with all former Scripture Awes upon the Conscience Inward Illumination of the Holy Spirit in its Sanctifying and Heavenly Influences breathing in it and with it These are a Divine and Publick Presence and absolutely constitute further Scripture even as they illustrate and put a greater Splendour upon former Scripture and compleat it Quest Who were such Interpreters of former Scripture Answ The Prophets were such Interpreters upon the Law in their Time even all that writ after Moses who either by Histories compiled by such Divine Inspiration gave Examples agreeable to the Scope of the Law or by Sermons stirr'd up to the Obedience of it and reproved the Disobedience or by Divine Meditations Discourses and Hymns display'd it or by Prophesies foretold the Government of God in his Church and in the World according to it but especially accommodated all things in it under Prophetick Veils to Christ and the State of True Religion under the New Testament All the Prophets from Samuel and all that followed after as many as have spoken foretold likewise of these days All which together fill up wholly the Spaces of Scripture in the Old Testament Quest How did the New Testament and the Writers of it succeed in this great Office of Expounding and Summing up Scripture in this Publick Divine Authority Answ They were above all that went before them For John the Baptist than whom a greater Prophet among them that were born of Women had not risen yet he that was least in the Kingdom of God in the more explained State of Christianity was greater than he Quest How is this Notion of Publick Interpretation contradistinguish'd to Private made good out of Scripture it self Answ From the Apostle Peter who expresly tells us Scripture is not of any Private Interpretation Whose Sense in that place is very necessary to be pursued both as it much clears the Nature of Private Interpretation and also strengthens the Foundations of the New Testament as laid in the Old Quest But you know the Original Word there used and translated Interpretation is by some understood for no more than the Prophetick Declaration or Interpreting the Mind of God revealed by Inspiration and by very many another Word signifying Inspiration it self oâ— the Illapse of the Divine Spirit in those Prophetick Revelations is preferred to the Word translated Interpretation as the more genuine Reading Answ I know the Current of Expositors both the ways you mention but against them both there is this great Reason No other but Interpretation and that strictly taken will fit the Apostles Purpose Quest What was the Apostles Purpose Answ To assure the Jewish Christians in the Truth of Christianity out of that more sure Word of Prophesie in the Old Testament Quest Was it not then to the purpose to assure the Divine Original of that Word of Prophesie and to assert its immediate Descent from the Publick Holy Spirit Answ That indeed was necessarily suppos'd and included or rather concluded on all hands but not the close Point in discourse For the Sacredness of the Old Testament being agreed both by Jews and Christians the Apostle commends the giving heed to it as to a Light that shone in a dark place a great Lamp shining when all was dark and deep Night about till the Day of the Gospel dawn'd and Christ the Day-star arose in their Hearts by Faith Quest What was the precise Mark the Apostle was to aim at Answ To vindicate the true way of Interpreting this sure Word of Prophefie Quest Why was this so much to his purpose Answ Because the whole Stream of Interpretation of the Old Testament among the Jews run against Christianity Quest Whence came this Current of False Interpretation Answ Even from whence Interpretation might seem least of all to deserve the name of Private from the Scribes and Pharisees Doctors of the Law Elders of the People who vogued themselves the Publick and so Proprietors of the Sense and Interpretation of the Scriptures but as our Saviour says they had indeed taken away this true Key of Knowledge neither entring in themselves nor suffering those that would Quest How does the Apostle vindicate this Point Answ By a vehement Caution on those to whom he writ to measure from the Publick and Divine Original of Scripture to the Interpretation as necessarily to be Publick and Divine also You do well saith he to take heed to the Word of Prophesie of the Old Testament as yet more sure to you than the New can be if you do but know and well consider this first and lay it in the Foundation That Scripture cannot be subject to a Private Intetpretation whose Original you your selves together with us acknowledge as Publick as the Holy Spirit For can that be subject to the Will and Dispose of Man in the Interpretation that came not by the Will of Man but by the Supreme Motion of the Holy Ghost in the Original Quest Wherein lies the Strength of this Argument Answ In this If the Interpretation of Scripture be not as high as the Original so high an Original is to no purpose For Sense being more Scripture than Words and Interpretation assigning the Sense if That be Private All is Private at the Rebound and not Divine else a Divine Original shall be mismatch'd controll'd and even made servile by and to a Private and often a False and Unworthy Interpretation Quest Into what Vse and Effect did this Argument issue Answ To a silent calling them to compare the Manner and Kind of Interpretation used by the Lord and his Apostles and that other of the Jewish Doctors and then to â—udge which appeared Divine and from God which not and they would easily give the Preference to our Lord and his Ministers as the only Divine Interpreters Quest How then did our Saviour and the Apostles justifie their Interpretation to be Publick and Divine Answ By one of the two fore-named ways either from the evident Importance of some very express Scriptures of the Old Testament applied in the New as David's calling Christ who was his Son Lord which muzled the very Adversaries or by the immediate Presence of the Divine Spirit discovering what it had treasured and sealed up in such Expressions which Eye could not see nor Heart conceive till in due time the Spirit it self revealed them The Spirit that knows
according to the undeniable Sense of Scripture Quest But the nearness of these Fathers to the Days of Christ and the Apostles must needs enable them either from what they themselves received warm from their Lips or from what they had from others not quite cold to know the Apostles Doctrine Discipline Manner of Life Purpose their Sense of the Scope and Meaning of those Things wherein they were Divinely Inspired and so to deliver it to After-ages Answ Whatever they have spoken or written giving us more light and advantage to understand and behold Scripture in its own Light ought from them or from any other to be accepted with great regard but if it do not thus it cannot be accepted even from the Writers of Scriptures themselves upon a single or divided Authority They were so bounded by the very Things and Words they themselves had once spoken and written by the Holy-Ghost that all the deference to their knowledge in Divine Things above others was to be made reasonable in the clearest Expounding what themselves and others had written by Divine Inspiration and to be discerned in the very Writings themselves and not to be drawn oracularly out of their Breasts when the Evidences of Divine Inspiration were not upon them For he that is Spiritual i. e. that God vouchsafes Inspiration to or pretends to it must acknowledge all that is either truly written or spoken by the same Inspiration to be the Commandments of the Lord 1 Cor. 14. 37. And as for the newness freshness and life of Truth given by Divine Revelation God graciously providing it should remain as Revelation left it and the Evidences it hath done so appearing with it it is the same in all Ages Divine never loses of its life nor abates of its vigor what it was so many Ages ago that it abides now what the Holy-Ghost spoke so many Ages ago that it speaks now as warmly as then All Divine Truth given is after the power of an endless life the Eternal Increated Spirit lives in it and gives Divine Quickness to it It is yesterday to day the same for ever and so breathes its own sense in Scripture by the ordinary Assistances it vouchsafes to Holy Humble and diligent Waiters upon him in this even as it did in the first Ages though the extraordinary Motions are withdrawn Quest But still the Gifts and Endowments of those Eminent Men with all the Light Truth Grace Learning and Reason they shine to us with ought to be esteemed and improved Answ Yes doubtless For whatsoever Things are true whatsoever things are pure are of Virtue and deserved praise they are Publick and of God wherever they are found And whatever there is in these Elders in their nearness to the First Times their Holiness their Sufferings their great Learning their Encounters of Paganism their Apologies for Christianity their Heavenliness their Contempt of this World all is a Donation and a Grace of God by them to his Church and Mankind in general Quest And does not there arise great Evidence to Christianity and the Doctrines and Practices of it from such eminent Witnesses Answ No doubt there does both to Christianity in particular and to all Religion Virtue and Goodness in general But yet neither their Writings nor Practices can in any wise become Scripture to us they all lead to Scripture and ought to do so they are all to be seen and reflected in Scripture Light and from thence they receive their lustre For though they are a Subordinate Testimony as hath been said yet Christian Religion hath greater Testimony and first enabled them to give a valuable Testimony to it self by Communicating so great knowledge and worth to them And besides all that hath been spoken the Writings of the Fathers are so Voluminous as not to be read over by the most so doubtful in their Genuiness that they cannot be Examined but with great Labour and well prepared Judgment so disputable in their sense that to attain a certainty in it would cut off Time from the greater Imployment of Meditation in the Word of God day and night where Men's Callings lie otherwise so that to receive our Religion from hence were of too remote an assurance to any one much more to those who have not Books and studie for their Profession But every Man whether learned or unlearned is concerned deeply to try his Religion with his own Eyes and not anothers for him and God hath therefore provided a Word nigh him even in his Mouth and in his Heart and hath also taken care by stirring up so many both of the Ancient and Modern Christians to separate themselves to intermeddle with all sacred knowledge that there is a worthy exercise of the learned World herein and great advantages arise thereby for universal knowledge even to the less learned and the very unlearned Quest But did the Fathers themselves distinguish thus their own and one anothers Writings from Scripture Answ It is most evident as hath been already affirmed they put a greatest difference betwixt the most excellent Monuments of Christianity that were but Humane whether their own or others and inspired Pages else Clement Ignatius and others might as well have been Canoniz'd by them as what is from them come down to us for Sacred Canon it self and even as they did we may see the great odds betwixt the one and the other and as we adore God the supreme Author so the Sovereign Preserver of Scripture who by Divine Evidences and by superintending Providence hath divided the bound of Scripture at so great a remove from all the Writings in the World whether Christian or Prophane the Apocryphal Books not excepted which though too adventurously joyn'd so generally in a Volume with Scripture yet are evidently disproportioned in the Majesty of Sense and Divine Eloquence Quest Is there no greater Authority of the First Councils Answ How many Humanes soever meet they cannot make up Divine where it was not before nor can a multitude of Privates constitute a Publick Divine and Publick may be declared but cannot be made so by such Contribution All Determinations of Councils are infinitely outweighed in Value and over-ruled in Authority by Scripture indeed Publick and Divine Quest But in such a number of his Servants may we not conclude God is certainly among them and does guide them Answ Give them all the advantages that can be given and either we must say they are Infallibly guided and then we must receive their Decrees as Scripture and they must be attested to us as Scripture is attested or they are not Infallibly guided and then their Decrees must be tryed as all Fallibles ought to be by a Rule surer than themselves If even Divine Revelation it self was at first tryed and found perfect nay if even all that God proposes to us as from himself comes laden with its own proper Evidences how much more must that which is confessedly humane be tryed by that which is confessedly
Divine The great use of Councils is therefore so to debate and bring things to a Result by a confluence of Wisdom and Learning that we may see Divine Truths in their own Light in Scripture-light to hold out which they are but ministerially imploy'd and not to impose upon any under the name of Publick for that alone is Publick that is Divine All Comparison of Privates among themselves must needs be lost in this Publick before which the greatest name of Publick is but as the drop of the Bucket and the small dust of the Ballance And the union with that true Publick makes the most Private a Publick and Separation from it the most seemingly Publick a most Idiottal Private And it were very happy if the Experiment hereof were not too evident in the Councils that have been how little Number of it self can Contribute to truly Publick or Divine yet the fitness of the Means is withall to be acknowledged as ordain'd by God CAP. IX Of the Church-Catholick Quest SCripture the Publick Record of Catholick Religion being thus far Established and Secured both by Internal Characters and External Care of Providence it still remains necessary there should be some stated Ordination of God for the Actuating this Record to its several Purposes and Ends. 1. Because Divine Revelation having now finished its measures there cannot be expected those immediate motions of Truth that were vouchsafed by God in his extraordinary Presences but all is to be deriv'd from and display'd in Scripture 2. Scripture yet being but of the nature of a Record it would lye still and unmoved and as it were dead if not produced and applyed even as other Laws and Records do that are not continually executed to their proper Vses be their Virtue never so great if so Executed What therefore is that Ordinance of God in the Cessation of Immediate Presence for the exposing this Record to its universal notice and for the applying it daily to its great purposes which is the Executing it as far as it is to be Executed in this World Answ God hath by his extraordinary Ministers whom he gave his Divine Revelation and Word first founded the Church and according to the Degrees of that Revelation exalted it to be serviceable to this great End and so to supply the place of Immediate Presence Quest What is to be understood by the Church Answ The Church is The Catholick Congregation of Mankind called to the Faith and Obedience of that Word it self and which being called it self is entrusted to call others to the same Faith and Obedience and so is Govern'd and Governs according to it by daily Exercises in and according to that Word Quest Why do you give the Church the stile of a Congregation are not the Parts of it so distant that they cannot be Congregated in the Worship of God Answ They are yet all so united in the Faith and Obedience of this Sacred Word and in the Worship of God according to it as to be most properly called a Congregation in that regard Quest But still how can the Church be called a Congregation seeing that speaks it always actually Congregated but those very Members that in regard of nearness one to another are at due seasons Congregated cannot yet be always Congregated Answ The Twelve Tribes of Israel that is the Church in its several Members always united always ready to the Instant serving God Day and Night are beheld and seen by him as in a perpetual actual Congregation Quest Why do you call the Church The Congregation Answ Even as Holy Writing is The Scripture and The Bible or Book so the Church is The Congregation by way of Eminency the only Excellent Assembly or Congregation in the World And indeed upon a true account there is no other Religious Congregation but either a rude Multitude or a Conspiracy and Faction against God Quest Why is the Church said to be a Congregation called by the Word Answ Because Humane Nature uncall'd lies in the Lapse of Separation from God in Private and False Religion and in those Assemblies justly branded as before till it be recalled by him into the Church united again to him So that a Church is not a Natural but a Supernatural Assembly yet it is ready to embrace all true Nature anâ— the Associations of it into it self Quest Why is the Church describ'd to be One Catholick Congregation when both Scripture and daily Observation assure us there have been and are so many Particular Congregations very Regular Churches and duely so styled Answ Because the Church is of the Nature of those Things that are distinguished only by the several Accidental Receptions they find and yet still remain One the Catholick Church and a Particular Church differ no otherwise than as a Beam of Light differs from the whole Globe of Light or a Stream of Water from the Ocean Even the most Particular Church is in this regard Catholick that it is united to God and Christ that indeed give both the Name and Nature of Catholick from themselves Particular Churches yea even Particular Persons truly of the Church have every one the whole Character Title Promise and Privilege of the Catholick Church so far as they can need or receive them even as Heaven is Entire Heaven to every single Glorified Soul Every Lively Member of the Church touches the Head and Corner-stone and so in him the whole General Assembly and Church of the First-born both in Heaven and Earth and is at last consummate with them to Eternity Quest How is this Church Congregated Answ It was begun and hath always increased by Particular Persons converted and brought home to God according to his Word in several Ages and Successions For the Church as it is a Church is not a Society formed by a common Consent of Men or by their Will but its several Parts are added by God so that it consists of all that are inwardly and truly of that Catholick Religion in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ by the Eternal Spirit all the World over and in which meet all that have been are or shall be thus converted by the Word of God as the Church is and shall be triumphant in Glory Quest The Call then that makes this Congregation is first to God and Christ and not to the Church it self Answ It is evidently so All true Converts first give themselves to God and Christ and by vertue of That to the Church The Apostles were not sollicitous of any other Conjoyning Men to the Church than what most necessarily followed upon their receiving the Gospel and were afraid of their fixing upon them that were but Ministers and Servants We preach Jesus to be the Lord and our selves Servants for Jesus sake The Corinthians heading themselves under Paul or Apollo or Cephas was very mischievous and therefore the Apostle knowing the Union ought to be only to Christ directs himself so vehemently against it as also against any
fanciful Distinction of themselves under Christ as an ordinary Chief of a Party and not as the Divine Head of the whole Body in the Catholick Truth Even as he erred that vulgarly called Christ Good not knowing him to be God the Supremely Solely Good Quest Are they all true Converts that are of the Church Answ All that are indeed the Church are so but all that may appertain to the Church are not so as all that were of Israel were not Israel There is a visible Profession that is too often not sincere yet this makes Men Of or belonging to the Church but not truly The Church Many are so called that are not chosen But all that are truly The Church are also truly called and truly Converts not only outwardly and visibly the Church but inwardly and invisibly so too whose praise is not of Men but of God In the mean time they that are onely of the Visible Church have the Means of Grace and are not thrown out of that Register of God's People till the Final Judgment cuts them off A very great Benefit in it self Quest Is not the Church then so Catholick or General as the Profession of the True Religion is Answ The Catholickness of the Church as hath been often inculcated is its Union to God and Christ and that in sincerity As to the general Profession though the number of it be as the Sand of the Sea a Remnant only shall be saved For God will finish the Account and cut it short in Righteousness for a short work will the Lord make in the Visible Church There shall be an often eating or brousing it off a retrenching of it again and again it shall cast the Leaves of its meer Professors as the Teyle-tree or Oak when yet their Substance is in them the Holy Seed are the Substance of it Isa 6. ult not losing them it loses nothing Quest In what sense is it then said The Gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church Answ It is undoubted none can fail while they are the Church while united to Truth to the God of Truth to Christ the Way the Truth and the Life It is also certain from this high Declaration there always shall be a Church in the World so united Hades or Mortality shall not prevail over it and how much farther it assures the Perseverance of those that are once truly the Church I leave the thing it self to speak It is said They that overcome ar Pillars that never go out of it and They that go out of it were not of it for if they had been indeed of it they would no doubt have continued with it And how the Church it self shall always continue if any True Member of it may perish is not easie to conceive Quest How is the Church ordained by God to actuate Scripture as it is the Record of Catholick Religion Answ The Apostle in his Noble Description of the Church hath laid the Foundations of our Instruction herein in those three Honourable Titles he hath given it 1. That it is the House of the Living God 2. That it is the Pillar of Truth 3. That it is the Ground of Truth Quest Before the Explanation of each of these Titles in the first place I desire it may be determined whether these things are spoken of the Catholick or of a Particular Church the Particular Church of Ephesus Answ Although I have already affirmed That the Catholick Church differs from a Particular True Church only in the Compass and Comprehensiveness of it yet I very willingly represent it over again in this Instance These things are truly applied to the Catholick Church to the Particular Church of Ephesus to every Particular Church nay it reaches down to every single living Member of the Church so far that God makes his abode with him dwells in him he is a Pillar in the House of God the Truth rests and dwells in him and shall be with him for ever so that he is a Ground of Truth and hath more of the Church in him than greater seeming Portions of it that erre from the Truth Quest If you please now to proceed in the Explanation of these Titles and first What is the Importance of the Churches being the House of God for the actuating the Scripture Answ God the most High Possessour and Owner of Heaven and Earth places his Court Family and particular Residence where he pleases and he hath chosen the Church to be this to him This is my Rest here will I dwell for ever for I have desired it Heaven is my Throne Earth is my Footstool where is the House you will build me To this Man will I look that trembles at my Word And where God dwells there he manifests himself As a Master of a Family makes known in his House and Family his Nature Will Laws and Government so God does in his Church In Judah is God known his Name is great in Israel In his Church he shews the Light of his Countenance expects and rewards Services as a Great Master and makes known his Dislikes and Displeasure This is brought to pass in the Church by those many Ways that God hath of bringing his Word to any Places or Persons giving it Reception among them and then stirring up his Children and Servants to hear his Voice to search his Mind and Will and to understand it so that it is as a Voice continually behind them In his Temple therefore in his House every one must needs speak of his Glory His Word cannot lie still for all are concerned to meditate ponder inquire and discourse of it and are by Supreme Management excited so to do and so much as this Exercise in his Word is by any means depressed so far God is withdrawn and the Excellency of the Church-state lost Now of the Church being the House of God there was this great Type God dwelt in the Temple at Jerusalem as in a Palace there was such a Diet of Shew-bread changed every day of Sacrifices of all sorts such Perfumes of Incense and Odours such Officers and Servants attending continually such Resorts of the whole Body of the People to the Court of this Great King and Princely Housholder Together with this State runs along in a mighty Stream Gods shewing his Word to Jacob his Statutes and Judgments to Israel In the New Testament the Pomp and Ceremonial Part is wholly transferred into Spirituality but Spirituality is not lower but higher in the Substance of all that could be figured by these things and the substantial part of that State the Communication of the Word of God is much exalted in the true Christian Church that the Light of One Day is now as much as the Light of Seven was before Thus the Church as the Family of God cannot but actuate his Word Quest What is the meaning of the Church being the Pillar of Truth Does the Church support Truth Answ Not so for it self is built upon the
find the Truth by it self and then the Church by that Truth and not the Church by it self and then the Truth by the Church Answ Very true For God hath so in his Infinite Wisdom establish'd the very Nature of Things Truth can give many Assurances of it self to us by it self so suited to our Faculties The Church can give us none but by its agreement with Truth revealed in the Word of God We could not have known such a Congregation as the Church at all to be much less which it is but by that Word manifesting it self in our Consciences and so distinguishing to us the True Church among the many Associations in the World each calling to us as having the best Religion among themselves Even the True Apostles themselves could be known to be so and False Apostles tried and found Liars no other way but by this Truth view'd and considered singly and distinctly by it self Quest But when we have found the Church by the Truth may we not then deliver up our selves wholly to the Church as so united to Truth Answ No by no means We can never so deliver up our selves nor will the True Church desire any such thing of us seeing its Office is not to hold out it self but the Word of Truth and in doing any thing else it acts not as a Church but as any other ordinary Society and on no other Terms can we have to do with it For the very Attempt to hold out as a Church any Laws of its own ought to enter us into a Jealousie whether it be the True Church which is as a Church the Pillar and Rest of Divine Truth only Quest What Reason is there of such a Jealousie when once we have found it a Church by the Truth it holds out Answ Because a Church that hath been a True Church may several ways decline from its State Quest How then can it he said The Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Answ That Prophetick Promise does not secure this or that Particular Church but that there shall be a Seed of the Church in the World with which the Covenant of God is Eternal My Word shall not depart out of thy Mouth nor out of the Mouth of thy Seed or thy Seed's Seed for ever But it is yet further true the True Seed the Holy Seed the Substance of the Church can never utterly and finally fail in any Particular Member of it for if it could it were too great a violation of our Saviour's Truth in that Declaration The Gates of Hell shall not prevail against his Church or force that Immortal retrograde into Mortality even that most dreadful one of the Second Death for which a Succession of others and in the same Danger is but a faint Salvo though it go on so to the End of the World Quest Who are this True Church in every Age and Place Answ They which are by True Saving Faith united to Christ the Son of God the Rock of Eternity and being so founded upon him are Pillars that never remove and a Rest of Truth for ever having been taught and learnt it as it is in Jesus Quest Who are the Professionary Church only Answ They that though they may as Artificial Pillars give some Ornament to the House of God and offer Truth yet not being indeed united to the Foundation are movable and may go out of the House They are such as have not received the Truth in the Love and Obedience of it within themselves and so may fall away from it It cannot be said of them as of the former The Truth shall be with them for ever having made its Edrâ—â—â—ma or Settlement in them Quest How does the Professionary Church fall away in the Bulk and Body of its Professors and Profession Answ The Office of the Church being to Actuate Truth and only Truth it may fail either in abating the Fervours due to Truth though nothing False or Forreign be admitted or in receiving Falshood or things of a baser Alloy for Truth and wasting those Fervours due only to Truth upon them The one may be called a departing from the true State of a Church the other from the State of a True Church and they usually meet one in another Quest How does this come to pass Answ From the Judgment of God upon the present sinful State permitting things so to themselves that in very few Instances it is but that the Imperfections of Good Men and the prevailing Corruptions of Professionary Christians change the Holy Lively Activities of the True State of a Church into Lukewarmness and Formality or by admitting Falshood and impure Mixtures into Doctrine Worship and Discipline corrupt the State of the Church so that it loses its Truth Quest What becomes of the Professionary Church when it loses the True State of a Church Answ It is as the Prophet expresses a Civil State or a City that hath lost its Splendour It becomes like a burnt Mountain or extinguish'd Globe of Light It retains the Form but loses the Life and Vigour of a Church like Ephesus that lost its First Love or Sardis that had a Name to live but was dead or Laodicea that was neither cold nor hot Quest What becomes of it when it is corrupted and loses in its Truth Answ It exchanges the Lively Oracles for Forms of Doctrine and Lifeless Discourse not of the High Spirit of Scripture It debases pure Worship into Ceremonialness Superstition or Idolatry and the Gospel Rule and Discipline it sells for a Worldly Politie and the true Graces of Christianity expressed in a Holy Conversation for what is much beneath or contrary Sometimes it forsakes Truth in some Fundamental Article that it swells out from the Foundation in a Breach ready to fall And there is one Instance of all these in the Anti-Church which will deserve a greater Consideration Quest How does God deal with such Churches Answ Sometimes sweeps them with the Beesom of Destruction taking away both the Candlestick and Place of it together Alienes Both to them and their Religion thrusting them out of their whole Possession Sometimes he suffers them to continue even for Ages yet so that their Candlestick is moved out of its due stately Positure hardly appearing like a Candlestick and that by the Indignation of God Quest In these Cases how does it fare with the True Holy Seed the Substantial Church Answ God chastens them to Repentance Self-purification and greater Zeal in that Case of the Churches losing its Brightness and Vigour that they may recover their first State and Work aad sets them on work to retrive Truth lost in that other Case of the Churches Defection Quest How is it with them when the very Place and Candlestick are taken away Answ They are either first removed into the higher State of the Church in Heaven or driven before into other Parts of the World by Persecution or the violence of the Judgment makes no distinction but carries
them Captive with the rest though in different Baskets as the Prophet Jeremy represents Quest How do they survive in the time of the displac'd and dejected Candlestick Answ They are either called out to a Zealous Appearance and Suffering for Truth or sometimes retired into Corners like the Seven thousand in Israel or the Church in the Wilderness that they cannot appear like a Church offering those Publick Notices of Divine Truth a Church is designed for Quest How is a Visible Profession lost from Particular Persons Answ It is too often thrown up by Apostasie or Profaneness or dwindled into a very Spiritless Form but very often a Profession without the Power being not inconsistent with the working of Iniquity it may pass out of this World like a Lamp burning but being found to burn only in a small Temporary Light without Oyl in the Vessel a Plenitude of Grace in the Heart shutting out every Lust it becomes a Lamp put out in utter Darkness Quest What is to be inferred from all this Answ That there is no Trust but in the Lord himself the Truth it self by which at all times the Church that is indeed the Pillar and Ground of Truth and wherein it is so will be known to us and in uniting to Truth we are united to That Quest There remains one thing yet to be understood in the Description of the Church which is its Power of Governing even as it is Governed by the Word of God Vnder what Notions I beseech you is that Government expressed in Scripture Answ That Power is by our Saviour represented under the Mataphor of Keys and the Use of those Keys in opening and shutting or in Binding and Losing Quest What is the meaning hereof Answ The meaning is plainly this When the Church of Christ hath by the Key of Knowledge inquir'd into all the Divine and Heavenly Doctrine of the Gospel and Word of God it hath in and according to that Word and only so a Power of Application of that Doctrine to Particular Cases binding Men under the Sense of Guilt and fear of Damnation in such or such Sins and an impenitent Continuance in them or of Absolving and assuring Men of the Divine Favour and Acceptance in a holy course of Life and Obedience to God and of Pardon upon Repentance after Falls into Sin and Disobedience and so of Declaring and Pronouncing upon Men as to their present State in the Church by Excommunication or Absolution all these are the Power of Binding and Loosing according to what our Saviour speaks in parallel Words Whose Sins you remit they are remitted whose Sins you retain they are retained meaning still according to his Word the Pole-Star by which they are to direct all their Motions who claim any such Power For only where it is declard according to the Word is it that what is bound on Earth is also bound in Heaven and what is loosed on Earth is loosed in Heaven there being an Invariable Agreement between what is Published from Heaven in the Word of God concerning the State and Actions of Men on Earth and the Transactions in Heaven in relation to them He then that pronounces agreeably with that word pronounces as Heaven does and will pronounce Heaven binds what he binds and looses what he looses because he speaks the Voice of Heaven in both Cases But that there should be any Binding or Loosing except in the Power of this Word and according to it in its Vertue in its Truth nothing can be more contrary to the Ends to the Glory to the Soveraignty of Christ To bind any single Christian by Excommunication and not according to this Word is as much a Brutum Fulmen a Thunder to no purpose a causeless Curse that shall not come as for the Pope to Excommunicate whole Protestant Churches Quest What is a Particular Church Answ It is the Catholick Church in a Neighbourhood or number of Christians Communicating one with another ordinarily even as the whole Cotholick Church would if it were possible Communicate with it self in the Ordinances and Worship of Christ exactly according the to Rules of his Word wherein this is the distinguishing Character of the True Church that its Communion is not with it self primarily but its Communion is so with it self as to be with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ principally as the Fountain-Head Center and Rule of the Communion and therein it holds out and invites to its Communion CAP. X. Of the Officers appointed by Christ in his Church Quest CAn there be either an Orderly or an Effectual Actuation of the Truth by the Church as a Congregation without distinct and separate Offices and Officers that may attend continually on this very thing Answ It is imposible for an Assembly without Order would cease to be an Assembly and fall into a Confusion or Rude Multitude All Wise and Prudent Assemblies have always had Elders to preside over them and our Lord hath ordained such to moderate throughout his Congregation or Church to conduct all the Publick Services of Religion For all things therein are actually administred by the Ministers of Christ the Noblest Organical Parts of the Church like those Senses that attend upon the Understanding most immediately Seeing Eyes and Hearing Ears so these upon the Word of Christ And that they may be most fitted ingaged and provoked hereunto they are even according to the very Laws of Nature separated to their Offices and unto all Preparations for them by Reading and Meditation as to their Proper Calling and Business of Life seeing they do not pretend to Immediate and Extraordinary Inablements or Excitations to their Service Quest What Titles or Characters does the New Testament place upon these Officers Answ Those that we have especial Respect to for in the Deacons if strictly taken we are less concerned receive Denominations either from their Work and Service or from that Honour and Estimation due to the Faithful Discharge of such a Service From their Work they are stiled Apostles Evangelists Pastors Teachers Ministers Servants of God and Christ and in a just sense of the Church also From the Estimation and Honour due to the Discharge of their Work and the Authority it ought to carry in the Hearts and Consciences of Christians they are styled Bishops Elders Rulers Guides and Ensamples as also Embassadours And the Work and the Honour do so enclose one another that they ought not to be separated and are in their Institution the Measure one of another extending both to Obedience and Support of them in their Work and the Titles are so prepared by the Wisdom of the Holy Ghost that they ought not to be changed for any other nor the Scripture Language herein to be altered for any Words not importing the same proper Sense Quest How shall the True Ministers of Christ be known that there may be that Obedience and Submission paid to them that is commanded Answ There can be no other Means to
discern them but by the Word of Righteousness of which all True Ministers are the Ministers on account of which alone Obedience and Submission to them is due Their bringing that Word in its own Life Evidence and Power is their best Commission Quest But how are they most orderly enstall'd into so high a Function Answ Christ as the Head of the Church hath ascended up on high and given gifts to Men and as the Lord of the Harvest takes it upon him as his Supreme Care to thrust forth Labourers into his Harvest The several Congregations of Christians observing Ministerial Abilities and Meetness to Teach call out to such to help them and herein in the Cessation of Extraordinary Gifts the Schools of Learning and Religious Education like the Schools of the Prophets do best prepare and the Judgment of those that have been Pastors and Teachers before them does most orderly recommend to Choice and Acceptance in the great Service such as are Scribes instructed to the Kingdom of Heaven and commits to them the Charge of Teaching others For in this as in all other Acts the Elders of the Church are to preside with due Respect to the Congregation Quest Is the Lord Christ pleased then to act generally by the Elders and Officers of the Church Answ Generally and ordinarily he does so the Officers are therefore more particularly entrusted by Christ with the Keys even as the Church in general is Thus eminently by the Ministry of the Apostles our Lord founded his Church and so edifies and builds it up in After-ages by Pastors and Teachers and when great Defections have prevailed upon it summons it to Reformation by some rais'd up among those Officers and whom he sends out as such to reform and recover his Church Yet still all this Power is in and according to his Word and no other and so that in all things as much as may be the Knowledge Judgment and Approbation of the Church is to be joyn'd in all the Officers do as having their Interest in the Keys also because they have their Interest in the Word of God in the Understanding Opening and Applying of which to Particular Cases the whole Power of the Keys rests The Apostles Elders and the Brethren or whole Church were together pleased and together joyn'd in that Famous Conciliary Epistle Acts 15. 22. Quest I desire your more full Explanation of the Publick Offices of the Christian Church and the Power accompanying it Answ I will very willingly do as you desire and begin with the Apostles Quest Wherein stood their Power Answ It stood in their Preaching Acting Directing Governing by that Immediate and Infallible Assistance of the Divine Spirit by which they writ and sealed Scripture and by which they were so guarded every way that they could turn neither to the Right Hand nor to the left in any thing wherein they exercised this Power Quest How was this Power Justified Answ By the Divineness substantial Goodness and Reasonableness of all their Prescriptions propos'd in all the Methods of Rational Discourse and manifestation of themselves in Mens Consciences witness'd to by the Holy Spirit and authorised by a Power of Miracles generally of Beneficence or doing good and in some but sparing Instances of infliction of Bodily Pains or Death Quest Did the Apostles never err in their Administration Answ Whenever that Infallible Guidance was not present to them they might err as was before observed in the Apostle Peter's Miscarriage which no doubt was recorded to shew their Power was not in themselves but in the Divine Spirit acting by them that none in After-ages might pretend to dictate as their Successors having not their Power and yet requiring Obedience as if they had it whereas even the Apostles themselves might err and so lose their Power if never so little deserted by the Holy Spirit And therefore what they consigned over to After-ages was winnowed from every thing Humane and Fallible that both Officers and People might know the one Common Rule by which one is to Govern the other in the Application of it is to be Governed Quest Who were next to the Apostles in this Office and Power Answ Evangelists such as were Timothy and Titus who having a Portion of the Apostolick Work to plant and settle Churches and Ordinary Officers in them had also a Portion of their Power to enable them to it it being absolutely necessary there should be such till the General Rule was fully settled and fixed Quest Were not the Apostles and Evangelists above Ordinary Pastors and Teachers Answ They were in this great Point of Difference that they had the Word of God by Immediate and Infallible Revelation committed to them to commit the same to others by direction from the same Spirit who gave them Discerning to whom to entrust it till all things relating to the Kingdom of God in the Church were sealed in the Canon of the New Testament else they owned themselves Compresbyters as the Apostle Peter stiles himself A Presbyter with Presbyters Quest From all that hath been spoken we are to conclude That the whole Power in the Church and in all things pertaining to Religion is retained in the Word of God Answ It is so For Christ in his Word is the only King and Lawgiver of his Church which Glory he will not give to another Whatever Power can be supposed resident in the whole Church together is no other than in that Word of Truth publickly offered by it The Apostles Power was only the presence of that Word to them by the Immediate Revelation and infallible Guidance of the Holy Spirit for the Preaching it throughout the World and thereby founding the Christian Church Such was the ordinary Power of any extraordinary Ministers under them The and constant Rulership of the Elders of the Church remains unmoveably in the Word which it is their Office to speak Quest Are not those we distinguishingly call Bishops Successours to the Apostles in that Preeminency they had over other Pastors and Elders Answ That Successors to the preeminency of the Apostles may be well established Three things are necessary 1. That there be found and produced Distinct Commands given in Scripture â—o the Inferior Ministers of the New Testament to obey Superior Ministers or Bishops Commands to Christians to obey Inferior Ministers or Ordinary Presbyters as Inferior Ministers with respect to Superior Ministers and those Superior Ministers as Superiors We must find the Apostle distinguishing ordinary Presbyters as Inferior Ministers with respect to Superior Ministers and those Superior Ministers as Superiors as we find him distinguishing Civil Magistrates into the King as Supreme and Governors as those that are sent by him 2. Seeing it is very clear and apparent there is nothing more distant from the Design of the Gospel than to Constitute any thing for the sake of making a great Figure without as great an Use or End and that Christ hath not given Power to his Rulers to Command
the very least thing but as Commanded by himself first for then they would be Lords which he plainly declares against and absolutely denies to them and that what they do as Commanded by him they should do so in Duty and Service to the Supreme Lord and Subordinately to his Church as not to be called or esteem'd Benefactors for their Services so that it must be evident what their Superior Service is it must be plainly expressed in the Word of God and there at least so determinately set down as to be deduced with greatest clearness to the Understanding and Conscience of Christians and distinguishingly from the Service of other Subordinate Rulers appointed by Christ that so it may be waited for and received according to his Ordinance with Faith and Obedience 3. Seeing Christ appoints none to an Eminency of Service without a suitable Eminency of Abilities as is plain in the Apostles and Evangelists it is therefore reasonable to expect some extraordinary promises of the presence of Christ to those Superior Ministers to assist them in the Conduct of their Superiority wherein they might above any other Ministers of the Gospel Visibly and Experimentally make some approaches to the Eminent Assistances the Apostles and Evangelists had in the time of their Ministry and that they have continued and succeeded in their High Function in the Church of Christ so that the History of the Real Substantial Services of Bishops to Christianity hath come near to the Acts of Apostles and as much excelled that of Common Presbyters as the Order it self is supposed to do Now without these three self evident concurrent marks of Superiority secret invisible Characters are of no signification Quest How then is such a Succession of Bishops in a Superiority over Presbyters so uncontrolably deduced from Antiquity Answ Besides all other Coincident Accounts there is this to be given After the Apostles there was but a Gradual Cessation of Apostolick Men Men of Eminent Graces and Extraordinary Gifts though not of the Infallible Guidance of the Divine Spirit for the Revelation of the Gospel or the writing of Scripture yet of more immediate Divine Assistances in resemblance of Timothy and Titus for the Confirmation of the Churches planted by the Apostles Supervisal over them and Care for them and also for the further propagation of Christianity which being but newly set out had not arrived many places where it was to come and so needed some more than ordinary Assistances Even as Miracles did not immediately Cease no more did these Personages extraordinary in their Endowments Such as these were worthily in a Degree of Superiority over those that had not the same miraculous Inablements nor Knowledge as yet in Christianity Afterwards such Manifestations of the Divine Presence by Degrees retiring and Christianity having fixed it self where it was then to go and the Churches settled the best accounts of the continuing Distinction between those that were upon the same level in regard of their Gifts and Graces were but Humane Prudence and Order which oblige no Man's Conscience beyond the valuableness of the Reasons of that Prudence and Order Except undeniable Holiness Industry and Improv'd Understanding recommend any Person to such Eminency For Eminency and being Taller than others in those Qualifications will make any Person a Bishop in the true sense of one whether so ordinated or not and cannot make him that is a Dwarf in these truly a Bishop however for Orders sake he may stand in the place of that Figure He that excels in his Knowledge of Obedience to Zeal for and Authority in the Word of God seeing that Word conveys all this kind of Power from it self must needs have more of that kind of Power so conveyed than others for the more purely this Word is understood and Preached the more Power goes out of it and along with those that display it and so they become Pastors of a higher Character whether of a higher Order or not CAP. XI Of every Man's Obligation to be wise for himself to Salvation Quest ACcording to all the precedent Accounts of the Church it seems not only reasonable but most necessary every Man should be wise for himself unto Salvation Answ It is certainly so for every Man is to be determin'd by the Word of God to the True Religion to which purpose he is to apply his Mind to search for true Wisdom as for Silver and to seek for it as for hidden Treasure Quest How should Men of so great Disadvantages to such High Things be inabled to Judge Answ Wisdom assumes most justly to it self to be of so high Value that every Man should think it worth his while to Labour and Travel herein and to them that do so it hath promised the most certain Success even the pouring out its Spirit to them and that they shall understand the Fear of the Lord and find the Knowledge of God The Things of greatest moment are not of such difficulty but that they are attainable in the use of Right Means under so great Promises Quest What are those Right Means Answ Bowing down our Ears to the Words of the Wise that is of those that by Inspiration from God have been Wise and written their Wisdom for Future Ages and by applying our Hearts to Divine Knowledge upon which they come to be inlay'd within us and to be fitted to our Lips to be agreeable and well matched to our Discourse and not like a Parable in a Fools Mouth Quest But are not these things spoken and written to the Learned and Elders of the â—hurch that they might know for the People and the People put their trust in them Answ No They are written to thee even to thee that is to every one that they might have their Trust only in God that is find the Rock of Divine Veracity and Infallibility and have no need to trust in Men â—ut to know the certainty of the Words of Truth and be able to answer the Words of Truth either to those that advise with them as Friends or challenge them as Enemies Quest If this was the sense of the Old Testament it is undoubtedly much more so of the New Answ It must needs be so as a higher and more Intellectual State of the Church as much freer and clearer in its Notions of Truth The Apostles Discourse Christians as no Christians if they are not able to Judge as Wise Men what they say If they are not Men in understanding if they attain not to the state of Teachers by skill in the Word of Righteousness and have senses exercised to discern by an Intellectual and Spiritual Gust Things Good and Evil if they cannot give an Apology or Defence of the Hope that is in them that is of their Christianity to every one that asks them a Rational Account of it Quest But in things of Perplexity and Doubt are not Christians bound to submit to the Judgments of their Teachers Answ If they can receive and
digest their Reason and take in the Light they judge by so as to make it their own else if they cannot find their Reasons nor acquit themselves from doubt they must suspend For a Christian is Commanded by his Lord to call no Man upon Earth Master or Father Quest What is the meaning of that Answ It is this very Thing that we should receive nothing as Doctrine or Indisputable Truth or Precept upon any Man's Word that does not offer such Reason and Authority from God and his Word that we our selves see Reason not to receive it as the Word of Man but of God Quest But is it not said that they that have the Rule over us watch for our Souls as they that must give an Account for the same If we are not to believe them and surrender our Judgment to theirs how can they give an Account Answ They that Rule over us watch for our Souls and must give an Account as Ezekiel's Prophets and Watchmen by giving Warning laying Truth before us offering the sincere Word of God in all Cases the success of which upon Souls Converted and Saved is their Crown and Glory and their unsuccess lookes like a sorrow to see those Souls lost for whom they laboured in vain and spent their strength upon them for nought yet so that if they have been faithful though without success their reward is with the Lord and their Work with God But notwithstanding this every Man is so to account for his own Soul that the very success is not a Blind Obedience to Rulers but as is said a Receiving the Word not as the Word of Men but as it is indeed the Word of God And if these Watchmen neglect their Duty or Seduce instead of Teaching Men are to apply to better Means afforded by God and if they do not they still die in their Iniquity and following their Blind Leaders fall into the Pit which is an unanswerable Argument that we may trust in no Man but in God only For if an implicit Faith could be a saving Faith it should save those that followed such Guides though they themselves were justly Condemned in not discharging their Trust Quest But were not the Apostles and Prophets to be Trusted at a higher rate than thus Answ No There were such evident Marks of Divine Doctrine always given by God to those that desired to Know Love and Obey him that even the very Prophets and Apostles were not to be received without them nor to be believed but according to them nay to be plainly Anathematiz'd if they varied from it Christians were therefore to judge to try the Spirits to search the Scriptures whether the things spoken were so to have recourse to undoubted Principles of Truth that were as standards to all that came after besides the Unction from the Holy One whereby they were inabled to know all things necessary to Salvation Quest But is not all Humane Teaching and Instruction hereby taken away and what becomes of the Ministry the Eldership of the Church and their Rule Answ They are all hereby Established for they are the Ordination of God to this very purpose to make Men see to bring them Light to clear things to them that by the awakening their Judgments the summoning and collecting their Principles they may see with their own Eyes the ways of God and Religion the Holy Spirit graciously adjoyning it self to their Ministry They have no Dominion over their Faith but are helpers of thier Joy that is they facilitate and make pleasant the knowledge and assurances of Religion and they Rule by Exhorting Admonishing Rebuking Comforting and even Commanding in the Evidences of Divine Authority on Account of which they are to be obey'd and highly esteemed for their Works sake Notwithstanding all this no Man is excluded from his own Office to himself for every particular Christian is in some Sense a Congregation and Preacher to himself as Solomon his Conscience hath the Keys binds and looses within it self nay Christians are not excluded from Rule in the Church when they have the Word of God on their side they may plead and reason with their Mother Hos 2. 2. When they have more understanding than their Teachers or the Rulers Rule not according to the Word of God they that speak according to the Law and the Testimony even Rule their Rulers and prove the more noble Organs of the Church when those that should Rule it are as the Idols Eyes that see not Ears that hear not or as the Idol Shepherd a Blast is upon their Right hand and Right-eye that their Arm is clean dried up and their Eye utterly darkened the most naked unfurnished Christian with outward Accomplishments that yet knows the Word of God is among the Prophets in such a time of necesity CAP. XII Of Schism and Scandal Quest FRom the precedent Discourse of the Church I conceive the truest Notion of Schism may be deduced I desire you therefore to Explain what the true Nature of Schism is Answ The Question concerning the Nature of Schism follows very pertinently upon the right settlement of the Nature of the Church now the whole Being of the Church consisting in its Union to God and Christ in Love according to the Truth of his Word and that it receives all its Members into Union with it self by their being first united as it self is Schism which is Division must needs in its strictest and most formal Notion be a Division from that Truth wherein the whole Church is one and so from the Love consequent upon such an Union Quest What is that Truth of the Word of God in which the Church is One Answ The Truth of the Doctrine of God or the Unity of the Faith of the Son of God in things to be believed and the Truth of his Law and Commands in things to be done Quest How is the Love of the Church Vnited in these Answ It is a Love in the Truth and hereby we know we Love the Brethren when we Love God and keep his Commandments John Epist 2. No Love how great soever is Christian-love nor Union how close soever Christian-union if it be not in the Truth and Commandments of God From whence it necessarily follows the Schism that is a Schism from the Church must be a Disunion from the Faith of the Scriptures and the Love springing from that Faith and there is no danger of any other Schism from the Church as it is a Church Quest How does Schism differ from Heresie Answ Heresie in the highest Sense and worst Sense of it is a Disunion from Truth in some Fundamental and Grand Concernment of Religion either in the Doctrine or Commands of God so that a Man is subverted and sinneth and must needs be Condemned of a Separation from the Assembly of Truth both by himself and the Thing it self and that both as to Faith and Christian-love he is so separated Schism is a Disunion in some less momentous parts
of this Truth under an apprehension of a greater moment than there is indeed in the Causes of such a Disunion and a proportionable abatement of Christian Love arising from it All Heresie therefore includes Schism but all Schism does not rise up to Heresie Quest Are these the Scripture Notions of Schism and Heresie according to its use of those Words Answ They are most agreeable with the Sense of it but the words were not so set solemn and formal in Scripture as afterwards in Ecclesiastick Writers for Dichostasyes or Division into two or more Parties and Contentions are by the Apostle used to the same Sense as Schism and Heresie sometimes signifies no more than a Sect or Division though that is remarkably used in its worst Sense by both the Apostles Paul and Peter Quest Is every different Apprehension and Practice ensuing upon it though distant from Truth immediately to be Condemned of Schism Answ By no means if it be a Modest and Humble Distrust and Suspension concerning the Truth and Command of God in some things of smaller moment and doubtful yea though it comes to a positive Determination so far as a Man's judgment and yet erroneous can at the present discern it cannot be branded as Schism if there be no stress laid upon the Thing beyond its desert if the Union in the greatest and clearest Truths and Commands remains firm and the Love due to such an Union with the Church of God be sincere and fervent yea even Dissent in greater points thus qualified and free from ill practice hath not been rigidly censur'd for Heresie Quest Is there no danger then of running into Schism if there be an Vnion with Truth Answ In this Sense only when the weakness or misapprehension of others are rated against them beyond their Merit and without regard to the greater Truths they agree in and the Love due to them upon Union in those greater Truths is withdrawn or the Spirit of meekness in endeavouring to restore the Erring Christian denied This may be justly esteem'd like Schism as it recedes from the just value of Great Truths and from the Charity of Christians upon Union in them but no Man is to espouse any Mans Errors or to receive even Truth by an implicit Faith for fear of Schism in things that carry not a broad Evidence of Divine Truth there is great scope for Modest Suspensions and even Dissents without Imputation of Schism for Truths of magnitude either in Doctrine Worship Practice or Discipline are too bright to be refused by sincere and honest Minds after due admonition Quest Wherein lies then the great Evil of Schism Answ That Schism and the Evil of it may better be understood I will set before you the several Instances of Schism in Scripture and the Evils noted by the Apostle in each of them 1. The first sort of Schism is the Disunion in the sincere Doctrine of the Gospel and bringing in upon it the necessity of the Judaique Rites to concur with it This the Apostle to the Romans Rom. 16. 17. calls making Divisions or Parties beside or contrary to the Doctrine received The great Evil of this adding to the Word of God is that it lays Scandals before Men and draws them into this great mischief that instead of the pure nourishment of Divine Truth all runs into this over-beloved Sentiment and so deprives the Soul of the true and vigorous Spirits of Truth and also the Service due to True Christianity is drain'd away and consumed upon this private Opinion which is indeed the mischief of all Falshood in Religion and Devotion in Things not appointed by God who only can prescribe what is truly fitted to our Good and bless it with suitable Effect Miscarriage from Divine Truth is always found in Schism with this mischievous Consequence that it deceives the Soul with a Cloud and Wind instead of Truth and solid Good 2. A Second kind of Schism the Apostle Notes 1 Cor. 11. 19 20. was the Disorder in Divine-Worship in that great Ordinance of the Lords Supper wherein they that were reprov'd were necessitated to withdraw and to stand apart for the manifesting themselves in the purity of that Worship and Service for the very honor of it The great Evil of this Schism is that it brings in a necessity of divided Parties in Publick Religion and the Duties of it seeing good Men must separate from such Corruptions and stand at a Distance from them on Account of which Religion it self is dishonoured as if it were a Jumble of Sects and gave an uncertain sound and further than that is charged as if it were but a Sect it self because it stands by it self Thus Christianity was called This Sect and the Sect of the Nazarenes Idolatry damns the True Worship of God as a Heresie from it self and the False Church charges the truly Publick-Assembly with Schism and a Private Religion 3. Another Degree of Schism the Apostle taxes in the Corinthians 1 Cor. 1. 11. c. 4. 3. was that this one intire Profession of Christianity in the one Universal Church of Christ they thought ought to be shred into little Fraternities under the Names of some prime Minister of Christianity or even under the Name of Christ himself as an ordinary Master of a Party except we will understand that Those Approved who stood firm in Christ alone were manifested and stood alone by being at a distance from the Schism of others and so appeared as was said before like a Schism themselves Thus vain Philosophy parcell'd out it self under its great Masters The great Evil of this is that it raises Feuds Contentions and Factions as if this one Integral Christianity could have distinct Interests and some ingross one Interest others another Whereas the Apostle thus reduces this Schism all Ministers saith he with all their Gifts Graces and Functions are the whole Churches without any cantoning other than that Order and Conveniency requires the more constant administration of Religion in certain Congregations with their Elders Cephas the Apostle of the Circumcision was the Corinthians though Gentiles as well as the Apostle of the Gentiles Paul himself and not only the Churches Ministers â—ut the whole World and the Cargo of Light and Truth in it are the Churches Every Truth every Ordinance every Minister whâ—ther of Truth Natural or Revealed Religion with all the happy Effects of them are all the Donation of Christ to the Catholick Church whose the Catholick Church is and no Ministers whatever and Christ is Gods who is the Foundation Center and Supream Head of this Unity and Union 4. The last Instance of Schism I find in Holy Scripture is intimated to us under that curious Parable 1 Cor. 12. 12. of the Wise and Excellent Temperament betwixt the several Members of the same Body set in different Degrees of Dignity the less comely parts have more abundant Comliness and those that we think to be less Honourable on these we bestow more abundant
every thing revealed in his Word But in things neither Commanded nor Forbidden if Conscience be apprehensive of danger any way this is the Honour and Dignity that God hath conferred upon Conscience as his immediate Vicegerent in the Soul and carrying his Authority by always presenting it in his Word and Command that a Man should suspend his Action wherein Conscience is not satisfied and at rest concerning the Goodness of the Action and this is the Honour which those that are above either in their Authority in the Church or the strength of their Understanding Gifts or Graces should bestow upon those that are below that they should not either by their Authority Influence or Example Scandalise the little ones or the weak that are so either in regard of their low Station or the weakness of their Gifts and Graces that is draw them into the Sin of doing any thing of which Conscience hath a mistrust of displeasing God in so doing in regard that it both weakens and disables Conscience in the discharge of that Trust reposed in it for the carrying on the Soul in a Christian Course its Authority being violated and prostrated in the reverence due to it and disturbs the Peace and Comfort it ought to Minister to the Soul in that Course For by this sort of Scandal the Apostle Witnesses the Weak Christian falls into Sin his Conscience is defiled is wounded is grieved is made weak All the mischief of which the value of indifferent things is not such as that it can answer and make recompense for and so to sin thus against the weak is to destroy them for whom Christ died and therefore to sin against Christ which is the reason of those weighty Discourses of our Saviour against Scandal Mark 18. and of the Apostle Rom. 4. and 1 Cor. c. 8. and cap. 10. which being compared give great light one to another Quest But it seems that a Conscience only in doubt might be setled by the Advice Example and Authority of those that are the Elders or Eminent Members of the Church for when Doubt supposes the Conscience inclining neither this way nor that way in it self but standing between both or sometimes moving to one side and then to the other the coming in of those Considerations taken from the Example and Authority forenamed should give an over-weight to that side on which they fall Answ Yet on purpose to shew the great Dignity of Conscience and its Government without which approving and directing accordingly even Obedience to the Divine Commands wants the just Complement of a Good Action and also to shew of how little moment in Christianity all things are not under a Divine Sanction the whole weight of the Apostles Discourse is hung upon a doubting Conscience a Conscience in doubt concerning things indifferent when urg'd either way Quest But are not all Sinnews of Government hereby cut and dissolv'd even of Civil Government for Conscience may be in relation to such Commands disatisfied Answ As Scripture every where supposes the whole Government in the Church of God to be confined within the Monarchy and Word of Christ and nothing to be Imposed or Forbidden but according to that so it doth every where disinterest the Church of Christ to judge or intermeddle in Civil Government or Things pertaining to it it supposes Civil Powers will oblige to and determine Indifferencies in Civil things this way or that way as they please and therein exercise a Lordship but Christ having declared it shall not be so among his Disciples does yet Command by himself and his Apostles all Obedience to these Principalities and Powers even thus Commanding if not against Gods Command directly so that in all such things the Doubting Conscience is only to be instructed in its Rule and Duty but can have no more Relief against Obedience to Civil Commands than it hath against Obedience to the Commands of God when it is mistaken about those Commands for such Obedience to Magistrates is Obedience to the Divine Command Quest There appears so near an Assinity in the Commands concerning Indifferent Things of those that have Rule in the Church with the Commands of those that have Civil Rule that the one may be a Measure for the other or wherein is the difference especially when they joyn in one in their Commands concerning these Indifferoncies Answ The Commands of Civil Authority concerning Indifferent Things in Religion deserves a particular consideration for which a proper place shall be reserv'd But that the Church is such a kind of Political Regiment that should set up for it self as one of the Polities of this World by Canons and Constitutions of its own not founded in the Word of God but introduced on other pretences and that if Christians do not Submit to them they should be accounted Schismaticks and Excommunicated as Heathens if they do not hear the Church that is thâ— Rulers of the Church thus Ordaining in their own Wisdom and all this by the Charter of the Keys or the Power of Binding or Loosing is as gross a Forgery as Popery hath any in this Point Indeed if there were such a state of things there were reason to believe the whole Church should by proper ways and means found out by Christ be modelled into one universal Uniformity of Government and Ceremony seeing the whole Church is but one and that the Romane supposing it had not so grossly contradicted the Laws of Christ might sooner pretend to be the Metropolis of it and the Bishop of Rome the Head of the Unity than any other it being the first Imperial City that was famous for Christianity But how little Uniformity is to Christ or his Kingdom in those things wherein he hath not interposed at all but left Christians free and intended they should be free appears in the Ununiform Unity of the History of the Evangelists concerning his Life Doctrine Death and Resurection To suppose therefore the Church to be in this manner Uniformed by the Prudence of its Governours is to turn it so far into a Civil State and the Bishops of it into Lay-Elders CAP. XIII Of the Anti-Church and its Opposition in every Thing to the True Church Quest IS there not an Anti-Church or Antichristian-Church that stands in Opposition to the True-Church Answ There is and hath been so for many Ages and that hath taken upon it in the most Publick way to be the Church of Christ the House of the Living God the Pillar and Ground of Truth Quest With what Advantages hath it been arm'd thus to take upon it self at all the Name of a Church Answ It having risen out of the True Ancient Apostolick Church that received the True Christianity from the Apostles at Rome and the Faith of which as the Apostle Paul witnesses Rom. 1. 8. was spoken of throughout the World it hath retain'd the Scriptures and the Fundamentals of Christianity the Writings of the First Christians and Apostolical Men and so hath continued
to do from that very time of the Apostles to this Day and hath also actuated the Truth of the Scripture and those Fundamentals of it according as its Interest hath led it in some Ages more in some less as shall be presently more discovered Quest Having then the Scriptures those Fundamentals of Christianity and the Discourses of the Ancient Fathers and Doctors upon them in such a length of time with what reason can it be looked upon as an Anti or Antichristian-Church Answ With very great reason because by a multitude of Additions fowlest Idolatrous and Superstitious Corruptions and false Interpretations upon the Scriptures the Fundamentals of Christianity and the Discourses of the Ancients shamefully interpolated and by Spurious Writings under their Names despited it hath turned whole Christianity into a very contrary thing to it self while therefore it holds those points of Christianity and the Records of it in veneration and yet supports all its Falshoods thereby it becomes perfectly an Antichurch or Antichristian It hath in regard of those Articles of Truth it holds and actuates so much as to have the Name of a Church and Christian and yet having them so falsified corrupted and changed from themselves it becomes a Mock-Church a Mock-Christianity that is an Antichurch and Anti-christian in despite of the True-Church and True-Christianity And as to its Actuation of Truth it hath so Actuated Truth as to Actuate by Truth its own Falshoods and Lies upon Truth Quest How then did it rise to such an Eminency and pretence of being Catholick and Publick Answ The many Concurrences of Divine Providence under his deep and unsearchable Judgments in the Government of the World in relation to that state he had appointed for his Church I leave to the History of the Church and Roman Empire in those times by which may be understood how the Papacy took the advantage to Exalt it self not only above the Episcopal Chairs then in an Ambitious Contest for Supremacy but above all that was called God that is the Imperial Power it self and so set its Foot upon the Necks of Christian Princes throughout the World till the great Cheat began to be detected and all this by and upon pretence of being the Vicar of Christ or the Head of the Catholick that is the Roman-Church Quest These things I confess not so convenient to my Inquiry I desire only to know how in the middle of so many horrible Corruptions this Antichurch could be so bold as to vaunt it self the Vniversal Church of Christ Answ Taking the utmost benefit of its Antiquity in the Christian-Faith and Fundamentals of it and especially of the Conspicuousness and Famousness of its State and in the mean time the Corruptions growing up by degrees and not so observably as at once for Papal Rome was not built in a Day It usurped the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven as its own the Key of Knowledge in its Infallibility the Keys of Power in opening and shutting Heaven Gates so as that in the Darkness then overspreading the World and the Church Ignorance the Mother of False-Devotion so bewitching the Minds of Men that they all wondered after the Roman-State as new modelled under the Beast Arm'd with two Horns like those of a Lamb counterfeiting Power from Christ the Lamb but that spake as a Dragon pursuing all its pretendedly Christian Decrees with the extreamest Salvageness of any of the greatest Earthly Tyrants but all under a Mask of the Catholick Apostolick Church by which Fascination of Zeal to the most excellent Religion though so Vitiated Princes and People Surrendred their Power to this great Sorceress using at once all the Frauds and Cheats of False-Prophesie and the Arts and Policy of the most Designing Universal Monarchy Thus while this Antichurch stole into Power by the best appearances of True-Religion and secured it by all the Blandishments of a Meretricious Religion it found it self so strong as to force its False-Religion by its Power and using both together raised the Grandeur of both a Secular and Spiritual Tyranny to such a height Quest But how did the True-Church in this time Actuate Truth or agree with those Characters of being the House of God the Pillar and Ground of Truth Answ It was by the might and prevalency of this Secular and Spiritual Tyranny so suppressed that it was in a manner known only to God who reserv'd a number to himself in the midst of so great a Defection wherein that promise was made Good the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against his Church Exposing and Actuating Truth pure from those Corruptions is hardly and very hardly to be found in History in any of the Lines and Motions of it in the most dark and dolesom period of that Defection Quest How was it with the True-Church recovering it self from this great Darkness Answ God raised up by extraordinary Measures of though but an ordinary presence such who by Indefatigable searches into his Truth and Word and those Records of Christianity that Antichurch was concerned to preserve because as was said it could not without so much of a Church be an Antichurch and by bold Publications of it shook so that Inchanted City that a tenth part of it fell And by the great contrivance of Providence even the chief of that Antichurch were forc'd by way of Repercussion to raise greater Light by endeavours to defend themselves from Scripture Antiquity and Reason by the Summons of all that Learning Wit and Industry could levy in their Defence so that they were necessitated to awaken out of that Barbarity and Ignorance in which they had been so long drown'd and to Actuate even Truth more fiercely that they might together with it make as potent and prevalent as they could and give countenance to those great Falshoods they had interwoven with it From all which broke out such a light in the World that Princes rowz'd themselves and no longer crouch'd down under such an intoxicated Servitude which had long gall'd and pinch'd them but that they knew not how to rid themselves from it till the Sorcery was laid bare which still gave greater scope for the display of Truth Quest Could the Scripture be inconscious or silent concerning so great Revolutions in the Church of God as these Answ It is in all True Reason most impossible and therefore it is a mighty Argument that those great places of Scripture that do so notoriously agree to such a purpose as the Discovery of this Antichristian State are justly apply'd to it by Protestant Interpreters Quest If you please point me to the chief of those places you refer to Answ I will do it very briefly as being too large for the present purpose to enumerate many or enlarge upon any of them But what more proper to delineate such a State than the Apostasie the Apostle describes 2 Thess 2. 3. and 1 Timoth. 1. 4. or than the Church in the Wilderness Revel 12. 14. the Witnesses Prophecying
in Sackcloth being slain and lying dead three Days and a half True Christianity being in all appearance extinct The measuring the Altar the Temple and those that Worship in it signifying the close Retirement of Pure Religion and the outward Court left to be trodden down by the Gentiles or Heathen Christians and their impure Rites and Worship and therefore excluded from those strict measures true undefiled Christianity is enclos'd within Revel 11. 1â— Now upon all these Representations of such a State of the Church so exquisitely shadowed and resembled and compared with that deep plunge and immersement of Christian Religion in the time of the Popish Midnight who can but believe these with many concurrent Delineations in all those forecited Scriptures were on purpose to give the Portraicture of that so Fatal Apostasie that believes it at all to be Prophesied in the Book of God and who that considers the weight of the thing can but believe it foretold if there be any thing prophetick of the State of Christianity to the end of the World As it most evidently appears there is But if any be so incredulous as to suppose such a State of Christianity beneath the Prefigurations of the Divine Spirit he cannot if he be indeed a Protestant but agree that nothing does with more Art and Divine Skill Pourtray and Draw to the Life such a Devastation of Christs True Religion as all History knows Popery hath made and as far as it can prevail does now and would do much farther and in its very Frame is constituted so to do Quest But seeing you suppose these Types of Popery may be applyed another way though it is I confess very hardly to be supposed yet I desire if any thing hath fallen under your Observation that can be less avoided to make plain how different a Religion Popish-Christianity is from the Scripture-Christianity you would give me leave to ask what it is Answ I must needs commend your Rational Enquiry for I know neither the Veneration given to any Religion by the Natives of it nor the ill Words against any Religion by those that are Strangers and Enemies to it should conclude against it The Professors of every Religion are startled at any reproach of their own Religion as at horrible Blasphemy but freely speak ill of a diverse from it Mahometans call themselves Believers and Christians Infidels Popish Religion calls it self Catholick and Protestancy a Grand Heresie and Schism Judaism charges whole Christianity with Cheat and Imposture It is therefore necessary we should have some Magnetick Needle to point us to the True Religion and to the True Christianity seeing its Name is not only distributed to many but so solemnly divided into the Popish and Protestant Profession of Christianity Quest What then can be our Invariable Northpole in Religion in such a Wide and Tumultuous Ocean Answ I hope you have not forgotten what was at first given in Instruction concerning Natural and Revealed Religion their exact Agreement with one another and with all our Faculties so that no Religion in the World can deserve the Name of a Religion but looks monstrous and horrid only so far as it borrows some or more of the Grand Principles of our True Religion nor can be at all Weighty and Considerable but is vain and ridiculous if it receive no Ballast from True-Religion That then which was accounted for in the beginning being remembred I shall especially apply my self to ascertain True-Christianity in contradiction to the false or Popish Christianity by that which will much ascertain all True Religion also in General and difference it from all False Religion Quest I much desire to have some such Test as you seem to intimate and promise Answ I cannot furnish you with a better surer and more lively than that Emblem of the Divine Spirit representing the New Jerusalem by a four-square City the Length and the Bredth and the Height of which are equal The Walls and the Gates and the City it self amounting to so many Square Solid Furlongs all exactly regulated by the Number Twelve all of Massy-Gold and most precious Pearl Rev. 21. Quest The very General view of so rich an Embleme much affects me but I desire you to lead me into the Application of it to each particular purpose and in the first place what am I to understand by the City Answ It is evidently told us it is the New Jerusalem that is coming down from Heaven the True Church Seated in the Christian Religion for so the Apostle Paul assures us the Christian Church so Spirited with True Christianity is Jerusalem which is above the Divine and Spiritual Jerusalem which is free and is the Mother of us all if True Christians Gal. 4. 26. Quest What do you understand by the Foundations the Wall the Gates the City it self Answ I am not bold or curious in pursuing Emblems too close but understand in general by the whole of all these the Doctrine the Worship the Rules of Life the Discipline of the True Church Quest What are we directed to by all being reduced to the Number Twelve Answ It is very evident the Twelve Apostles of the Lamb give the Honour to the Number Twelve for the Prophets and Apostles that is the Truth ministred insallibly by them is the Foundation upon which the True Christian Church is built Jesus Christ himself being the Corner-Stone and so to shew True Religion hath been always Substantially the same The Twelue Tribes of Israel and the Name of Jerusalem the People and City of God of old are Recorded with Honour as expressive of the True Church fixed in the True Religion in the Times before Christ Quest Why are all things in the Christian State describ'd to be of Pure Gold and Precious Pearl Answ To teach us by sensible things the transcendent Purity and Worth of Christian Religion and the equal Purity and Worth of all things in it of a most transparent clearness being all Spiritual Intellectual full of Light and Truth and so to be received and enjoy'd by Purity and Intellectuality or Clearest Understanding Wisdom and Prudence in the Knowledge of this Divine Revelation and by greatest Innocency Cleanness and Heavenliness of Heart Affections and Life Quest But can this be supposed to be the present State of the Church of God as it is here upon Earth Answ This is the certain and most unalterable Constitution and Designation of God concerning it and whoever plants it lower in any of the Things before Named viz. the Doctrine Worship Rules of Life or Discipline contradicts the very thing it self or degrades and embases it though it must be acknowledged its being thus prepared and adorned as a Bride must be from Heaven in some just season appointed by the Father This is yet always the Tryal of the True Church and the True Religion although the Church be not yet perfected to it Quest But you seem to have forgotten the City and all the Parts of
it lying Foursquare and being solid square measure for so it must be if the Length Bredth and Height are all equal Answ I did not at all forget it but suffered your Questions to lead through all I less design'd that they might come to the Principal Character of the True Religion and the True Church so exactly adequate to one another Quest Will you then more fully explain this Similitude Answ That I may the better do it I must repeat it from the very Ground and Bottom of it which is that God makes use as he pleases of all the Knowledge and Science that is in the World to Minister to Divine Knowledge in which he principally intends to Instruct as being most absolutely necessary for all of what condition soever As then Mathematicks is the most Demonstrative Science and some things in it are of most retired and fine Speculation so are others most known and necessary to all imployed in Mechanicks Thus God hath been pleased to deposite some Prophetick Truths in the most mystick parts of that Learning and some of the more general use in the most known and acquainted parts of it now those that are more secret and not so necessary I shall leave to those that are most fitted thereunto But what is most plain and imports what is most necessary for all I will insist upon As then Number and Measure are means Ordained for Humane Nature and principal Instruments of Reason to come to the most certain knowledge of things and to be secured they are and continue what they justly ought to be so True Religion is thereupon presented to us under exact Number and Measure falling in one with another the Number Twelve multiplied into a Square Cube of Twelve thousand Furlongs And as the Foursquare Figure does so bind and is so compact with it self that it cannot receive the least Addition but with the loss of its Square nor the least Diminution but under the same Forfeiture thus True Religion is so perfectly it self that it can neither be added to nor diminished from but with a proportionable loss of it self God was pleased upon this account to chuse this Figure for the Altar under the Law for the Breast-Plate of Judgment this was the Measure of Solomons Oracle how far the Measures in Ezekiel agree I leave The Heathen by Natural Wisdom had such a Sense of the so Just to it self Foursquare that they called a Good Man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a Foursquare Man And lastly as Solid Square Measure is in all parts of it and throughout every part exactly Square and gives the most certain account of the whole content of a Body so is True Religion in all its Parts exactly so it self and every Part of every Part is reduced to the same exactness for so the Length Bredth and Height of it are equal and so is the True Church exactly adequated to True Religion The Faith is therefore said to be at once delivered to the Saints because it can receive no New Measures and it is called the Common Salvation or Doctrine of it because the Universal Standard is one This then is the Measure of a Man and the Measure of the Angel For by that Wisdom that is natural to a Man in which Beasts have no share that is to Number and Measure is made plain to us Angelical Number and Measure that is the Number and Measure of True Religion as the Angel delineated it beginning in the Apostolical Twelve and Multiplied by it self to an exact Square Figure or Measure Square in the whole product Square in every particular part and of that just content And with this exact Number Twelve so Foursquare agreed the Altar Temple and they that worshipped therein when the outward Court was left out of Measure to be trodden under Foot by Heathenish Idolatry and Superstition disguis'd under Popish Christianity of which whenever it shall be perfectly freed it shall appear in that Glory here describ'd All richest Pearl pure Gold most transparent Jasper that is Brightest Clearest Truth and of the exact Apostolical Number and Measure Quest Is there no farther Improvement to be made of this Divine Symbole the Foursquare City Answ There is when I have first observed to you False-Religion is out of all Square just Measure and even Number it is a constant and perpetual Odd wandring from True Religion and the justness of it to it self and that both in Doctrine Worship Rules of Life and Discipline so that it is impossible in it to Measure one thing from and by another or any one point of any of these by it self uneven in the whole Product uneven in every part uneven in the Root The most significant Emblem of the Popish-Church which having the Fundamentals of Christianity hath yet lost the Apostolical Twelve by innumerable most irregular and wild Additions and deformed every Single Article of Truth by most disagreeable Corruptions of it and therefore as a Man most Learned in Numbers hath demonstrated the Number 666 a Number no way to be reduced to a Foursquare Figure is the most Fit and Significant Hieroglyphick of it and indeed of all False-Religion that must have something of Truth to make it a Religion but as it is false is an Odd from that Truth Quest Let me now desire the most plain and useful Application of this Parabolick Scheme Answ You shall have it and it consists in observing Four Prime Characters of the True Christian Religion that may be as Four Equal sides of this Foursquare and of the Church adjusted to it from each of which may be measured to each of the rest and the Equality or Inequality will discover the Truth or Falshood of all that is brought to the Tryal 1. The Transcendant Holiness Goodness and Purity of the Doctrine Precepts of Worship Rules of Life Discipline is one side of this Christian-square with which whatever does not Square is convicted not to be of that Doctrine and Religion whether it look towards God in all the Highest most Honourable Apprehensions of him suitable Discourse Worship Love and Obedience or whether it look towards Men in all Justice Righteousness Mercy Compassion Charity Benevolence Beneficence and these as they respect all the particular Offices of Life Publick of Magistrates Subjects or Private as of Parents Children Husband Wife Master or Servants The Peace and Welfare of Mankind are treasur'd up in the Law of Christ or lastly whether it look to a Man 's own Person in Soberness Purity Continency in the Thoughts the Words the Actions The Honour and best State of the Mind and Body are provided for by this Doctrine that is after Godliness not only in the World to come but in this Life Whatever now does not agree with these wholesom words is detected not to be Christian which is all Truth Virtue and Praise 2. There being nothing more intimate to Man in this fallen state than the Sense of Guilt and knowledg that he is a
Sinner the whole platform of Redemption by Jesus Christ is become like the Original Law of Righteousness by which Man was formed and Answers to it in all the Attributes of Perfection as therefore the Plot of Restoration by the Son of God infolds it within it self and answers every way exactly to it so that very Law and Doctrine of Holiness owns the Reconciliation and Attonement by that great Sacrifice as Equilateral to it self the Dimensions of one being found correspondent in the other and each to be Tryed one by the other so great a Sacrifice would be unnecessary if it had not so great a Law to answer so great a Law can be answered by so great a Sacrifice and only by that It must have that it can need it can acknowledge no other So then the one may be Measured by the other The Holiness Purity of such a Law violated requires such an Effectual Pacification and Purgation of Conscience such a Renovation as Christianity sets before us Such a Sacrifice such a Renovation or Sanctification by the Divine Spirit from it teaches us what an excellent Law was violated so often therefore is the Lamb made the Title of our Lord and Savour so oâ—ten it is Signally Recorded in the Revelation and the Names of the Apostles of the Lamb are said to be written in the Foundations of the New-Jerusalem to shew the weight of the Doctrine of the Christian Sacrifice in the Blood of Christ and the Holy Spirit breathing in and from it in Renovation and Sanctification 3. The Liberty that Jesus Christ hath brought in by his Gospel is another Equilateral Character of his True Religion to be Measured by each of the former and it also Measures them It is not a Liberty from Holiness it is not a Liberty from close application to the Redemption of Christ and not to need it on any pretence whatever but it is a Liberty from any Imposition that is Ceremonial and does not by its Intrinsique Worth and Goodness or by its Supreme Ordination from God center in the true Perfection of the Mind Conscience and whole Soul yea whatever God himself had Commanded the Jews is not only reversed but despised for the sake of Christian Liberty if it does not square with it so that no Yoak of Ceremonial Bondage is laid upon us by God himself that which had been is taken away and a Yoak of humane imposiing is under the Gospel-Anathema the Doctrine of Godliness of Redemption by Christ may be justly measured by the true perfection of Conscience To do well in things intrinsically good according to the Rule of Christianity and being inwardly purg'd and atton'd by the Christian Sacrifice do also truly measure this Liberty for on one side the Kingdom of God is not Meat and Drink but Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost He that in these things serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved of Men It is not applying to the Blood of Bulls and Goats that can never take away sin but to the Blood Offered by the Eternal Spirit which certainly makes the comers thereunto perfect On the other side this Liberty lays not open the Inclosures of a Holy Life nor removes the Barriers of Justice against Sin if not satisfied and attoned by Faith in the Blood of Christ 4. Lastly That which answers to each of these Characters of True Religion is that is hath no Secular Interest no Interest of this present World that it looks not upon the things that are seen that are but for a Moment but on the things that are not seen that are Eternal such is the Godliness such is the Sacrifice such the Christian Liberty that their Uses and Ends are too great and large to center in Earthly things and though themselves are the True Interest of the present state yet they no way make it or the Grandeur of it an Interest but seek a Heavenly Country and City even as the Lord of this Religion said My Kingdom is not of this World Now as this measures each of the other Characters so each of them measures it such a Transcendant Holiness and Purity can alone see God in Eternal Habitations such a Sacrifice alone can have its Blood enter into the Holy Place made without Hands having obtained an Eternal Inheritance such a Blood speaks alone in the Heavens better things than the Blood of Abel a Conscience so free so perfected hath boldness to enter into the Holiest and none else These are all fitted and Consecrated to Eternity and Eternity to them Light and trivial Holiness Insignificant Ceremonies and Rites of Purgation a cumber of External Observations invented by Men can never enter within the Vail nor endure for ever And on the other side by such Divine Things to grasp at this World and a Patrimony on Earth is as gross and out of Square so that these things exactly measure one another and square together Quest How is the Four-Square City or the True Church adjusted to these Dimensions Answ In all these things I before mentioned in having these and these only in its Doctrine its Worship its Practice and Obedience its Discipline or Government Quest How is the False Church out of Square to all these Answ In that retaining the Profession of the Christian Religion constituted according to these and pretending an Imitation of them and the Miracles attesting them it hath been most extravagant from them by its Traditional Additions and Counterfeits of them every of which are a Violation and Irregularity from one or all of these Characters or equal Sides of True Religion a great Lie upon them with which they can never be brought to agree being not only an endless Variation from but a flat Opposition to them and a despiting them with themselves so strangely so monstrously mis-shapen and that in so great numbers that as in mockage to the many excellent things our Saviour did and taught so many that if they were all written the World it self could not contain the Books that would be written even so if all the numerous and prodigious excursions of the Antichristian Church and Antichrist the Head of it from Christian Religion by its indeterminable swarm of New pieces of Antichristianism should be written the whole World it self would not be able to contain the Volumes that would be written Quest But does not the Profession of so much of the Christian Religion in such an Eminence like tbe City upon the Hill that cannot be hid give it the Reputation of a most Famous Church if not the Catholick as it calls it self Answ Christianity so abused as in the Popish Religion is infinitely the more dishonoured for the Eminence of the Antichurch that so exposes it and it is only the Eminence of Antichrist sitting in the Temple of God and the exalting himself above all that is indeed and truly God in his Church and shewing himself that he is God in his Oracles Wonders and Miracles but they are
Peace and Welfare and to punish Offenders and Transgressors according to the Degree of their Guilt and can no more be Impeached in that procedure than in any the most undoubted Functions or Rights of Government whatever Quest I must desire to be guided in my Thoughts concerning the Power of Governours in Revealed Religion Answ Besides the Legislative and Vindictive Power of Supreme Magistrates in Natural Religion there is that Divine stamp of Authority God hath Engraven upon them so that besides their Laws they recommend Religion by the very representation of God himself whose Presence they bear and have not only the more Remote Authority of a Prince but the nearest most Natural and kindly Authority of a Father On account of which Solomon as a King so often speaks Hear O ye Children the Instruction of a Father and as having all Parental Affection in himself forsake not saith he the Law of a Mother The Care of all means for Instruction and Propagation of Religion is most proper to Government And all these Administrations in Religion run not only through all points of Natural Religion in that ampleness before expressed but do most genuinely and freely stream through all points of Revealed Truth and the whole Counsel of God in the Scripture nothing being more Princely and Paternal than the utmost Providence and Influence of Princes and Soveraign States herein wherein they fulfill the Prophesie of Kings being Nursing Fathers and Queens Nursing Mothers to the Church of God But there is this difference between Natural and Revealed Religion Natural Religion is written in the Heart and may certainly be found there however it comes to be known clearly and truly only by Revelation and so may be absolutely Commanded But Revealed Religion is recorded by Faith and Faith cometh by Hearing and Hearing by the Word of God and therefore cannot be Commanded but must be expected by the Blessing of God upon Instruction But if any Man profess to believe Revealed Religion to have received it as the undoubted Truth of God it is then the Law of Nature he should deport himself in it and towards it as to the Truth of God Nebuchadnezzer Darius and the King of Nineveh their Laws were rightly grounded upon the Principles of Natural Religion concerning the True God The Laws of Moses and the Princes of Judah in Revealed Religion were upon the so unavoidable acknowledgement of the Divine Presence and Authority in and with those Laws the so many Repeated Covenants Indentures and Engagements of that People on the evident Appearances of God to be obedient to those Laws But in the Revelation oâ— Jesus Christ we find no tracks of Humane Power bâ—â—â—ll was done by Instruments fitted from Heaven naked of â—ll Humane Authority that the Excellency of th◠〈◊〉 might be of God and not of Men till Princes and 〈◊〉 agreed in the Faith of the Gospel not by Compulsion but by Evidences and inward Assurances of the Faith and so it is still to continue Quest Before you pass from this point that it may be made the clearer will you give the Distinction between Sovereign Powers and the Elders of the Church For they are both called Rulers they are both called the Ministers of God Answ This is indeed most necessary to be known as tending much to Illustrate this whole Matter 1. The Power of the Elders of the Church lies wholly and intirely in the Evidence of the Truth and the Word of God they Minister without which their Persons are Invested with no Power or Authority at all But there is a Sacred Character upon Soveraign Powers and their very Persons so that Reverence Prostration Obeysance Honourable Titles and Obedience in all Lawful Things are due to them even when their Commands in some things being unlawful cannot be obeyed as appears every where in Scripture 2. The Authority Power and Majesty of Sovereign Princes remains Inviolable and not to be invaded by any no not by those who have Commission to speak the Word of God There is no Temporal Power in order to Spirituals Conferred by Christ or Ordained to his Ministers to Create a Civil-Spiritual Power within a Civil and to rencounter it But Princes are in all Causes and over all Persons within their own Dominions under God and according to his appointment Supream Governours so contrary is Scripture to the Usurpation of the Anti-Church herein All Religious Princes guiding themselves by Gods Word have great Power and Authority not only by that Word but by Virtue of that Authority and Majesty God hath Cloathed them with as his Vicegerents to Direct and Govern according to Truth wherein the Divine Spirit is pleased often to be so immediately present with them that a Divine Sentence is in the Kings Lips that they may direct according to Truth and in all Truth they are to be Obey'd not only for the Truths sake but for that Authorities sake also God hath Invested them with 3. The Elders of the Church lose their Power by erring from Truth and the Word of God for of what Authority is the False Prophet or the False Teacher But Princes and Soveraign Powers have a Power though misapply'd to vindicate their Authority upon those that cannot Obey them except they should Disobey God to Obey Magistrates which none dare assert that acknowledge God in which Power Magistrates must not be resisted even while they cause Men to suffer for Righteousness sake 4. The Admonitions Excommunications Anathema's of Church Rulers have no Force when not grounded upon Divine Truth nor ought to make Impression upon Conscience but to be rejected with Disdain But the Penal Sentences and Vindictive Decrees of Sovereign Powers have their Effect so far even when they are unjust as to be received as an Ordination of Power appointed by God though us'd to a wrong purpose Where the Word of a King is there is Power and his Wrath is as the Roaring of a Lion and it is so appointed by God Against such a Supream Executive Power Arm'd with the Supream Legislative Power of a Nation there is no rising up no remedy but appeal to God by Prayers and Tears Quest This whole Account might be much Illustrated if it be declared on the other side what Obedience is due to the Ministers of the Word and Truth of God whether extraordinary as Prophets and Apostles or ordinary as the Elders of the Church and Ministers of the Gospel even when Supream Magistrates Command the contrary Answ The Word and Truth of God are of so Supream Authority that though the Ministers of it are of no Authority separated from that Word yet the Word and â—â—uth oâ— God of which they are Embassadours is much highâ—◠〈◊〉 â—he Kings and Princes of the Earth and there is no Compare between thâ— one and the other God therefore raised up extraordinarily what Messengers he pleased and sent them with what Messages he thought good to what Princes or Magistrates soever because immediately 〈◊〉 God the
For the sake of the True Religion we may be oblig'd to forsake not only our Country but our Fathers House and to unite to the Church of God founded in that True Religion yet in the mean time we must own all that is Divine Rational True weresoever we find it much more in our Native Country and if it be possible propagate True Religion upon it For we shall not only be judged in this World with our Nation but shall rise with it at the Day of Judgment in the same Station or Lott wherein we were placed in this World according to our doing good in it we shall receive our Reward with those of it that are saved who shall then survive in Glory and become as if they were the whole Nation the perishing part being lost as we therefore desire the prosperity of it in this World so ought we to endeavour by all means the Eternal Happiness of as many of it as we can by joyning with them and ingaging them in True Religion Quest I desire your Second Proposition Answ It is this That in a Political Sense National Religion is when Magistrates and the Body of the People joyn in the True Religion and Establish it by Law and devote to it the most Publick Advantages that the Largeness and Grandeur of such a Nation have in their Power fixing Characters of Civil Honour and ample Condition upon the Rulers of the Church and Communicating to them Magistratical Power in things pertaining to the External Defence Honour and Provision for the True Religion as it is National all which so far as it is Serviceable to the best Ends is acceptable to God our Saviour who is not the Author of Confusion but of Peace and ought to be Submitted to with Reverence both in Obedience to Government and also as it is done in Honour to the Name of God and True Religion The State of the Church in times of Persecution being not the Standard as to these things in the prosperous times of it Quest I now desire the Third Proposition Answ The Government of a Nation in Religion appointing and prescribing Liturgies Confessions of Faith Catechisms and Publick Forms of Instruction or Homilies they may be so far useful as when they are composed according to the Word of God to secure True Religion and the Publick Administration of it by so much publickly Ratified and requiring of all whom it Intrusts as Ministers of the Word of God under its Approbation and Maintenance to assent to the Truth of Religion so Compriz'd and Publickly to declare it by using them as is appointed But these are not to be understood to put Limits upon the Ministers of the Word first entrusted by Christ who are both in Prayer Preaching the Gospel and all means of Instruction to search into all the Scripture that is profitable for Doctrine Instruction Reproof and to Pray with all Prayer and Supplication according to the particular occasions and in that abundance and liberality of the Divine Oracles that they themselves may speak as the Oracles of God and Pray with the Vnderstanding and in the Holy Spirit and that all their Service may be matter of Bounty from their own Minds and not of Constraint and necessity as impos'd For how should they then as every Good Scribe Instructed to the Kingdom of Heaven bring out of their Treasure Things New and Old or like the good Housholder that hath made provision and laid up in store to that End In all these things Solomons Example is Great According to which the Preacher ought to be Wise and to teach the People Knowledge and give good heed and seek to find out acceptable Words that may be as Goades and Nailes not blunted with Common use Quest I now desire your Fourth Proposition Answ The Benefit of National Religion Established by Law is That every Subject of that Nation hath a Right to the True Religion so Established and may claim his Interest and Property in it as in all Things else legally due to him and is not oblig'd upon the account of Passive Obedience to desert or relinquish his Right in it any more than his Righteous Claim or Title to any thing else he enjoys by Laws and yet Trangresses no Rule of Christianity but hath the same Obligation to defend that his Right as any other Right whatever so far as the Laws of the Nation enable him nor can there be any Resistance to Government in so doing even as there can be none but it is the Duty and Trust of Subordinate Magistrates to adhere to the Laws in the point of True Religion as in all other Cases and of the Supreme Legislative Power of a Nation to foresee Dangers and prevent them by Additional Laws as necessity shall require And all this with the Prerogative due to Religion Quest I desire your Fifth Proposition Answ National Religion seeing it is design'd to Comprehend a multitude of Persons of most necessarily and unavoidably various Sentiments and Apprehensions must be so prepared as that with greatest Ease and Room to Consciences and Understandings of so many several Figures and Impressions there may be an Union in National Religion with least Scruple and therefore to give all the Liberty that Truth gives not imposing Arbitrarily because Religion as hath been said is Gods Peculiar and in that the Doubting Conscience cannot Obey farther than it sees the Divine Rule before it not in things Dark and Disputable because clear things are only necessary to Salvation not forcibly except when Natural Religion is Violated because patient Instruction Counsel and Ratiocination are the Divine Methods in giving and working Faith Quest I now expect the last Proposition Answ I shall give you the last and therein Conclude this whole Enquiry and Instruction and it is this The True Religion of the Word of God in a Nation or City does overtop all the False and Private Religions in it and become in the Sacred Register the National Religion In the Sacred Maps the Christians of Achaia were Achaia it self The Seven Churches of Asia were the Cities themselves And whatever Lesser Differences or Divisions this or that Name of Distinction may seem to make in National Religion yet the True Substantial Religion in all of them shall be one National Religion and become one Rod and Scepter in the Hand of Christ and the Nation be as one National Tribe and Church For let Men do what they can against it True Religion as it is the only Publick Religion and no Separation of Men from it however called Publick can make it Private so in what place soever it is it shall have the most Publick Character and the True Religion in all those that sincerely profess it shall be one True Publick Religion and those little Differences shall not cleave it into more than one Without the Change of True Religion it self there cannot be a Schism of a deeper Sense in it if Bitterness and Animosity Censoriousness and the Persecuting Spirit were away God will graciously Interpret Scruples on one side to a Jealousie for the Purity of Religion the freedom of the other to a desire to Propagate it under the favour of Laws and thereby to be capable of doing most Good In Heaven they now are all one and shall be one and the Envy Strife and Contention which the Good Lord Pardon shall be utterly Abolished This is the Honour of True Religion of Publick Divine Religion Now the God of Peace that brought again from the Dead our Lord Jesus that great Shepherd of the Sheep by the Blood of the everlasting Covenant make his Church and his Church in this Nation perfect in every Good Work to do his Will Working in it that which is well pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to whom be Glory for ever and ever Amen FINIS ERRATA Page 36. l. 20. for scale read seal p. 70. l. 9. r. Record
having not so immediate a Respect to him as Godliness or Religion are more under Humane Legislation in the particular adjustments to the General Ends. But both the inward Court of Religion or Divine Truth and Worship it self and the outward Court of Decency and Order are within such Limitations of the Word of God and the Laws of Nature that all indifferent things therein not prescrib'd by God are left to the freedom of every Man by God and no Power of Prescription ought to come there that a Man may not be either incumbered by unnecessary Observances or in danger to mistake them as having any influence into his Worship of God which ought not to have any and can indeed have none that is good Nor lastly be in doubt whether he do not displease God in adding to his Worship But if a Man can see his Freedom in all these it is serving out of Love and being made all things to all Men and going to the utmost he can in Obedience to Magistrates if a Man cannot see his Freedom but doubts of the lawfulness he is under as severe a prohibition of Compliance against his Doubt as in other Cases of Sin For the Sentence is Positive He that Doubteth is Condemned in doing the Indifferent thing he doubteth of and whatever is not of Faith or assurance it is pleasing to God or not displeasing to him is Sin Quest But this Doubt may extend to Civil Things and Indifferences there or to those Rights of Soveraignty and Grandeur of Supream Power God hath invested them with Answ When Obedience is enforc'd in such Things the Magistrate hath this to justifie him he is within his own Territories given him by God he requires the things that are Caesars upon Gods Donation But in Religious things â—e is within Gods Peculiar and so cannot be justified in that enforcement because the things are so peculiarly Gods Quest The great Question now remains what are Subjects to do when Authority stamps it self upon False Religion or enforces Indifferent things against the apprehensions of Conscience concerning their lawfulness so that they cannot Obey but with a doubting Conscience and the danger of that hath been already opened Answ There is one Rule in all these Cases even as it is impossible Laws of Injustice and Licentiousness when Soveraign Powers so Err in Government should change the True and Everlasting Notion of Righteousness or Soberness or those Eternal and Immutable Laws of them in themselves even so impossible it is the Laws of a False Religion should change those of True Natural or True Revealed Religion or the Laws imposing Indifferent things in Religion should take away the Liberty God hath given or the sinfulness of Obeying against Doubt of Conscience when a Man does not see that Liberty That therefore which is Eternal and Unchangeable must be adhered to and obeyed Quest How then is there a Subjection to Magistrates Answ The Subjection then is in this as in all other Errors of Magistracy in Cases of Justice or Soberness not to resist the Power vindicating its Commands by Sufferings and Penalties upon those that cannot actively Obey wherein Religion Justice or Soberness are contradicted which are Gods and must be rendred to him according to themselves who is able to make them recompense who suffer for Righteousness sake as he pleases in this World or most certainly in the Resurrection of the Just But if there were not such an absolute Legislative and Executive Power in every Community thus fixed and unmoveable and accountable only to God the Restless Love of Change would be always disturbing and calling to account Government and every Man take upon him to be a Lawgiver and a Justicier or indeed to be Licencious and Inordinate and as they could Consult and together Collect themselves into a Rebellion would enter into open Hostilities against it and so the ends of Government in the Peace and Order of Humane Societies be quite lost so that till any Principalities sitting on the Seats of Government are so bad as to retain less of the Uses and Ends of Government than they destroy and it can be made apparent endeavours of Change cannot introduce so great and general Mischiefs or that even Anarchy it self cannot introduce greater Mischiefs than that Government is the Author of which hath come to pass in few Instances till then I say we must fear the Lord and the King and not meddle with them who are given to Change For their Calamity shall rise suddenly and who knows the ruin of them both Quest But what are Christian Subjects to do when Titles of Soveraignty or Legislative or Executive Powers of Laws are Disputed either betwixt various Pretensions of Princes or where the bounds of Power and Rights of Soveraignty and the Liberties and Properties of People are in Controversie Answ I shall no more intermeddle in that than the Doctrine of Christianity does which leaves all those things to the Laws and Constitutions of Nature of Nations and of each Particular Country The Duty of Christians is to those Soveraign Powers whose Authority is Current whose Image and Superscription is upon all things Publick the Powers that are in being are to be Obey'd according to the Ends of Government already Discoursed that is for the Punishment of Offenders for the Executing Judgment betwixt Man and Man for the securing Common Peace in all Godliness and Honesty Our Lord and his Apostles intimate nothing either way to strengthen or weaken the Claim of the Powers then present but declare Obedience to them Prayers and Thanksgivings for them as they then were although they could not have the clearest of Titles Christianity as it is strictly the Religion of Jesus Christ doth not make it self a Divider over Men nor Decide such Controversies which are quite of another Cognisance yet it subverts no Rights it betrays no Liberties justly so called it reverses no Laws of Nature nor rescinds Constitutions and Compacts of Government but teaches Men to do all they can to preserve Common Good and Right determinable upon other Principles Only this the more clear ancient and indisputable the Titles of Princes are the more indisputable Boundaries betwixt Prince and People are kept the greater are the Obligations of Obedience of quiet and peaceable rest in that Obedience of the most vigorous Defence of the Power over us and the greater the Guilt of any of the Sins of Mutiny Faction Sedition Rebellion Quest The Discourse of the Power of Magistrates in Religion hath brought to my thoughts National Religion and a National Church wherein I desire your Instruction Answ I can but apply what I have said in general to this Particular Case which I shall endeavour to do to your satisfaction in these six Propositions Quest What is the first Proposition I am to be Instructed by Answ It is this That to join in True Religion with our Native Country or Nation is such a Law of Nature that cannot be reversed