the young Clergy that can talk thus shew us by any good evidence that in other things they are so much Wiser Learneder than the Dissenters Are they all of greater Learning than Iohn Reignolds or better Hebricians than Hugh Broughton or better Logicians than Sadeel or Ramus or Sohnius or of greater Reading than Blondel c. 3. Do they know us better than we our selves We offer our Oaths that we hold what we do by the Cogency of appearing Evidence and are willing to know the truth 4. Have I here and elsewhere given no Reasons for our Dissent Have they answered my Treatise of Episcopacy my First and Second Plea for Peace my Apology my Treatise of the Terms of Church-Concord or any one thing that I have written for our Cause save two or three by disputes which when I have vindicated they have let fall the Disceptation What front have these men then that say we Dissent without giving Reason for it But you know how long the Press was shut against our Writings and yet then they that would not endure us to Speak accused us for being Silent L. Obj. IV. They say you are Non-Conformists meerly to make good your former Errours because you will not confess that you did amiss but will make the People justify you M. 1. What are those Errours If it be our dislike of any of the things before described I confess it is because we will not renounce them If it be an errour to be against their Church-corruptions and cruel Excommunications and denying Christendom to the Seed of the Faithful and Communion to faithful Christians I confess we will not recant these errours till they have better proved them such The Papists that swarm with Errours as a Beggar doth with Lice yet burn the Protestants as for Errour 2. I pray you wish those infallible men that in the ditch of dirt are delivered from all the uncleanness of errour to send only those those that are without errour to cast the first stone at us or those that have no worse errour than ours to silence excommunicate and destroy us 3. Have we given them no reasons of our dissent 4. Do they not know that the argument that hath brought us all into the case that we are in was thus given us 1664. and oft since in Print If we abate them any thing they will say that our Church was faulty and needed that Reformation who then is it that hath divided us to avoid confession of any former faultiness Tho' good Bishop Hall pronounceth a heavy Sentence on them that will justify the miscarriages of the Prelates L. Obj. V. They say that you took part with the Parliament against the King and involved the Land in Blood and have still the same rebellious principles M. 1. I confess there were some among us that were of the mind of Hooker Bilson Grotius Barclay and the common sort of Casuists Politicks c. and that thought that as in a doubt about Physick the College of Physicians were most to be trusted so in a doubt about Law the Parliament had been most credible And when the Irish had murdered two hundred thousand Protestants falsly pretending that they had the Kings Commission and threatning to finish their works in England there were many formerly tempted to fly in fear to the Parliament for safety being ignorant that the Kings bare word notwithstanding the Papists strength and interest was more to be trusted with our Laws Lives and Religion than all the Lawyers Courts and Pariament and that if all the Protestants in England had been used as those in Ireland they ought to have died patiently unless the killers would have given them time to send to the King to know whether he would have them live or die They were ignorant that a Lord Proprietor may do with his own as he list Who accuseth the owner for killing his own Sheep But the times of this ignorance are past The Long Parliament that made the Act of Vniformity cured it And shall not the Act of Oblivion be permitted to reconcile us and continue our peace 2. But Sir Who be they that were thus deceived I told you 1. That of near ten thousand that had Churches under the Parliament and Cromwel there was but two thousand that refused to Conform And is not seven thousand Conformists more than two thousand Dissenters 2. Many that were in the Parliament's Army Conformed and some that were for the Kings Death when the generality of those called Presbyterians abhorred it and the Engagement and brought in the King on reasons of meer Conscience 3. I have told you that we will take it thankfully if only those were silenced that had any hand in that War believing that it will not now be twenty Ministers in England And why are the rest that were Boys at School accused for other Mens opinions or actions For the time to come you need not fear them I heard some tell the Members of the Long Parliament that called them Rebels for saying that a Parliament may use defensive Arms against the Kings Commissioned Souldiers that if that would serve they would promise that if the King would but send a dozen Irish-men to kill them all in the house they would never be guilty of taking Arms to defend them nor perswading any else to do it L. Obj. VI. But they say that these Non-Conformists tho' they had no hand in the late War yet have the same Principles that caused it and that is Non-Conformity M. This is an argument a baculo ad angulum A man is against the Cross in Baptism or a Lay-Chancellor's excommunicating Men for a Ceremony c. ergo he is against the King and for Rebellion The other side say that the Irish Principles and the Popish were the cause and must we therefore conclude all Irish or Papists to be against the King They were Papists that raised the Wars on both sides in the aforesaid days of King William K. Stephen H. 1. and H. 3. and Ed. 2. and Rich. 2. and H. 6. and Rich. 3. and Ed. 4. c. Doth it follow that all rapists are rebels 2. But I have elsewhere fully proved that the Parliament when that War began were of the Church of England and Conformists and it 's strange that any should have the face to deny it while so many are yet living that know them Whitlocke tells us in his Memorials that they voted that every County should have a Bishop and his Presbytery And were those then against Episcopacy One would think that a County should be big enough to keep Episcopacy from dwindling to nothing every Bishop of old had but one City Many Counties have ten or near twenty Towns that were then called Cities But when Papists dare say that all are against Kings that are against the Pope who is the ruler and deposer of Kings it 's no wonder if every Bishop or Chancellor or Official c. will say If
Government L. The Presbyterians call their Discipline the Kingdom of Christ and feign their Government to be Christs M. I speak for nothing proper to Presbyterians For no Lay-Elders nor Synods that by Vote govern all the Churches of the Land but only for that substance of Parish Discipline which all acknowledge not resisting Appeals from abusive Ministers to Bishops or Magistrates Bucer was no Adversary to moderate Episcopacy Yet if you will read him de Regno Dei de Confirmat c. to King Edward 6. for Parish Discipline I shall need to say no more to you this subject Chap. XLVIII Point V. The discountenancing the fear of sin and the practice of serious godliness M. V. I will add next this aggravation which comprehendeth many parts of Conformity No true Christian doubteth but seriousness and diligence in serving God and making our Calling and Election sure and Obedience to Gods Law and fear of sinning are of absolute necessity to Salvation And how greatly the Laity is discouraged and frightned from all this by the course of Conformity is notorious L. Who doth discourage them Do not all our Ministers Preach for Obedience and Godliness Doth not our Liturgy pray that the rest of our lives hereafter may be pure and holy that we may attain Eternal Life M. Yes and more than so you read the Scripture which is all for holiness The deeper is the guilt of Hypocrisie and Malignity in them that seek to root it out Out of their own mouths will they be judged and beaten with many stripes Judge by these instances 1. How Children are Baptized with God-fathers and how Confirmed after and Admitted to Communion and forced to it I shewed before 2. So many humane Institutions are imposed on Men as necessary to Communion that he must be a Man of more Learning and Understanding than I have or with all the study of my Life could obtain who can discern them all to be Lawful And he that calls any of them sinful is Excommunicate ipso jure 3. It is certain that a great part of the Laity understand not the Creed and those few that set themselves to seek for saving knowledge attain so little in their secular course of Life as that we must be glad if they understand all the Catechism the Creed Lords Prayer and Ten Commandments and take such for extraordinarily wife And yet if one of these think a Form a Ceremony a Lay Chancellors Discipline c. to be repugnant to the Word of God and say it he is Excommunicate 4. By this it is absolutely necessary that the generality of men even all England that know not more than I do must blindly believe as the Canon and Priest bids them barely on their Word or else they must falsly pretend to believe them or be all liable to Excommunication And so an implicite Faith in the Canon-Makers and Bishops is become the necessary Religion of the Land. And then if the Bishops turn we must all turn with them 5. By this means wilful ignorance is made necessary For it is a dangerous thing as I have found it to study for knowledge in Gods Word lest it should lead us to differ from something in the Canons Liturgy or Bishops and then we are liable to ruin And so they that will be Church Members must take heed of studying Gods Word or searching after Truth 5. If for thinking and saying any of the Impositions are amiss they be once Excommunicated or but noted as Dissenters they are rendered odious to the Church-Courts and Priests and by them to the credulous Obsequious Herd and it 's likely that in the Pulpit they will be proclaimed Hypocrites Schismaticks unquiet Spirits Phanaticks and in as much danger of Damnation as Murderers or Adulterers who are as safe as they 6. By this means fear of sinning and the danger of dissenting being so usually conjunct the avoiding of sin is made Puritanism and a suspicious sign if not a common scorn 7. By this means ignorant Youth is quite discouraged from serious piety and fear of sin lest they fall under common scorn and it 's well if they follow not the multitude and be scorners of Obedience to God themselves And the very plea of Conscience which is but obeying God is made a disgrace or mockery and a tender Conscience made equivalent with a self-conceited Schismatick 8. It is no danger to meet by hundreds at a Play-house or by great numbers at Taverns Ale-houses Coffee-houses Horse-races c. But if a few Neighbours meet to Pray or Excite each other in the Love of God and Heaven you know what the danger is 9. If any Minister will but leave Preaching the Gospel of Christ and turn Physician he may be quiet tho' hebe of the same judgment that he was before the forbearing of his Ministry may preserve his peace There are now in this City ejected Ministers who have forsaken their Function and are Doctors of Physick and they live in great wealth and acceptance There are Physicians and Ministers of the same judgment and perhaps dwell together in the same House it was the case of Dr. Micklethwait and me The Physician is honoured and the Minister call'd and used as a Rogue though they were of the same mind There are some Nonconforming Ministers that tho' they are Doctors of Physick yet dare not cease their Ministry but practice both These are welcomed to the Sick but the Healthful banish them or hunt them away notwithstanding their acceptance as Physicians the hatred of their Preaching being more prevalent L. Sure they Preach some dangerous Doctrine M. Not a word of such is charged on them tho' malicious Persons come to hear them and inform against them Their writings tell the World their Doctrine Dr. Clifford was one of them who hath written of the Covenants Dr. Gilpin is one of them who hath written of Temptations driven from Newcastle Some ejected Ministers Educate their Sons to Physick and tho' they be of their Fathers mind the Sons are highly esteemed and honoured and the Aged Fathers laid in Jayl This last Week old Dr. Grew that is about 80 or 79 years of Age and almost Blind and hath lived there 36 years and more known by some writings a Man of a calm quiet sober peaceable Temper was sent to the common Jayl at Coventry for dwelling there and sometimes exhorting his old Hearers to fear God and he hath here a Son and a Son-in-Law Doctors of Physick deservedly honoured who if they did but Preach the Gospel might speed as ill as he 10. If an ejected Minister would but teach the Children of the Laity tho' it were but to read and tho' there be no other School-master near the people must rather have their Children untaught and must not be suffered to have so needful a help 11. If a Minister would give over Preaching yet if his old Hearers desire his Neighbour-hood that they may have the benefit of his Conference they must
wickedness that wicked men destroy the just and as for sinning that they persecute them that will not sin It is for Religion that Religion is impugned and for the Church that the true Children of the Church are Persecuted And is it for the Gospel that the Preachers of it are silenced and destroyed Without the Church a false Religion is set up against Christianity But within it an Image of Christ and of the Church and of Concord and Religion is set up against Christ Church Concord and Religion and men in the Garb of Magistrates and Pastors do prosecute the War as by Christ's Commission and in his Name And sin is defended and propagated by false pretended opposition If the Iews had known him they would not have Crucified the Lord of Glory Heathens would not for Idols fight against God nor Mahometans for a Deceiver against Christ if they knew what it is that they are doing Christ who was Crucified as a Blasphemer and Rebel foretold his Disciples that they should be kill'd as an act of service to God. Where the Gospel is believed it is a crime so horrid to silence and destroy Christ's faithful Ministers and forbid his publick Worship and render his most conscionable Servants odious and plot their extirpation and ruine that none dare do it but those that know not what they do When Christians as a Sect were every where spoken against Paul was exceeding mad against them and persecuted them to strange Cities and verily thought that he ought to do many things against the Name of Jesus Act. 26. But when he heard from Heaven Why persecutest thou me it stopt his rage and changed his judgment But alas How slender a means will serve to deceive the wicked A meer nick-name or malicious slander yea the avoiding of a sin which they think to be no sin is enough with them to make the best men seem the worst while Perjuries Adulteries Blasphemies Prophaneness Cruelty and Persecution are tolerable motes in the eyes of their Companions All the Holiness Wisdom and Miracles of Christ and his Apostles would not serve to make them pass for good yea or tolerable men while Sadducees who denied Spirits the Resurrection Ceremonious hypocritical blood-thirty Pharisees went for meet Rulers of the Flock And how can it be expected that he who thinks not Holiness desireable to himself should think it any excellency in others Or that he that thinks his own sin but a tolerable frailty should much abhor it in the World Satan then hath his Army not only among Infidels but nominal Christians And it is commanded by Honourable and Venerable Names and he pretends a good and righteous Cause whereever he fighteth against Christ and Holiness But by the fruits he may be known in the greatest pretenders whatever names he call them by It is the most profitable Preaching which he laboureth to suppress and the most faithful Pastors that he would silence the most conscionable Christians whom he striveth to make hateful and the more Spiritual Worship of God which he would hinders And therefore even among Christians we have great cause to warn men to fear least they be enticed into Satan's service against Christ and their own Profession and Salvation And especially in an age 1. Where worldly and cross Interests are set up against the Interest of Christ and Conscience 2. Where these worldly and cross Interests have already wasted Christian Love and Contentions have begun a Mental War. 3. When these have prevailed by scorns and slanders to make Conscionable Christians pass for some contemptible criminal or erroneous Sect and this Reproach is fortified by Honourable and Reverend Names Lest therefore such Causes too visible in the World should draw the ignorant and rash into the dreadful Sin of fighting against the Interest of Christ and Souls by hindering Christ's Ministers from their necessary Work and faithful Christians from worshipping God I will humbly beseech all that are in danger of such Temptations but seriously to exercise their own Reasons in the present Consideration of these following Questions and to take up with no other Answer to them which will not bear weight at Death and Judgment when worldly Pomp and Pleasures leave them and not worldly Interest Wit or Grandeur but the Righteous Lord the Lover of Holiness and Holy Souls will be the dreadful and final Judge The Questions to be well Considered Quest. 1. ARe we not on all sides agreed that we are Mortals posting to the Grave Doth any Man think he shall not die And is striving or mutual Love and Quietness a fitter Passage to the dust Do not all Men constrained by natural Conscience at a dying Hour repent of hurting others and ask Forgiveness of all the World Yea if you are not worse than most Heathens Are we not agreed That Man's Soul is immortal and that we shall all be shortly in another World and that it shall be with us there as we live on Earth If any doubt of this should not the least probability of such an everlasting Life of Joy or Misery prevail against the certain Vanity of such a shadow as this World Or if yet they believe not another Life Why should they not let those live in quietness that do believe it and dare not hazard their everlasting Hopes for nothing as long as they do no hurt to others Q. 2. Do not all Christians believe That the Knowledge of God our Creator and Redeemer and a holy Heart and Life are of necessity to our Salvation Do we not see That Children are not born with Knowledge nor free from fleshly and worldly Inclinations Doth not the World's Experience tell us how hard and how long a Work it is to make the Ignorant understand the very Articles of Faith and necessary Duty to God and man and as hard to perswade their Carnal Minds to the hearty Love and Practice of them and to save them from the damning Love of sinful Lust and worldly Vanities and how wofully the best Teaching is frustrate with the most Q. 3. Are we not all Vowed to God in our Baptism renouncing the Seduction of the World the Flesh and the Devil And do all understand and keep this Vow And is not the perfidious Violation of it a most damning Sin And when Thousands of full Age are yet to learn what Baptism is and what they Vowed Have they not great need to be plainly taught it Q. 4. Is a Baptized Infidel or ungodly Person any better or safer than the Turks or the Salvages in America Will the Name of Christians save perfidious Hypocrites Or Will it not be easier for Sodom than for such Q. 5. If Christian Knowledge and Practice be not necessary Why pray we for Conversion of Heathens and Infidels And Why doth the Article of the Church of England condemn those that hold That all may be saved in their several Religions And what are we better than Turks and Heathens Q. 6. Are not all Men
make us wish all the Sermons unpreach'd which we have preach'd and all the Books unwritten which we have written and all the Souls unconverted who have repented Q. 42. VVhen Ionas over-ran an unpleasing Ministery did not God overtake him with his Judgment And if we prove Ionasses may we not expect to meet with Storms more terrible than Jails Q. 43. Can all this said and done against such in the world ever make the sober that knew them believe that such a man as Anthony Burges Mr. Porter Mr. Hildersham the Son Mr. Hughes Mr. Richard Allen and hundreds much like them were worthy Silencing Imprisonment and Shame while such as fill some thousand Churches are worthy of maintenance and honour Or will sober Posterity who read the Lives and VVritings of such men as Iohn Corbet Ioseph Allen Iames and Iohn Ianeway and abundance such others believe that they were as bad as their accusers make them There is but one way to bring them under the Infamy and Odium of Posterity and that is the Papists way to kill all that are of another mind and to drive Truth and Conscience out of the world and then who would stay behind Q. 44. VVho did Christ mean by the Hypocrite that seeth a mote in his brothers eye and could not see the beam in his own VVas it not the Pharisee that blamed Christ's Disciples for crossing their Ceremonies and Traditions and saw not all the crimes in themselves recited Mat. 23. And is not the scrupling of a thing called by others Indifferent a mote in the eye of many truly godly persons I will not offend you by describing the beams Q. 45. Have we not often offered that as soon as any true reason can tell us that our Labours are here needless by the sufficient number and quality and labours of others we will joy fully be silent and seek for work where there is need Till then to starve souls is to be guilty of their damnation And if Meeting-Chapels be wanting why do not the great and rich Conformists build them Q. 46. Is it not a pleasing advantage to Papists if they can see two thousand of those Minister who are most against them silenced and driven from Cities and Corporations and made a hunting game and scorn and the Kingdom crackt by general divisions as turned into Guelphs and Gibelines weekly reviling and deriding each other as Whiggs and Tories Is it not their design to banish Conscience and absolute Obedience to God And you know who ruleth where God and Conscience doth not rule And what is it that the unconscionable will not do for worldly interest And did not the Papists always know that our Love and Concord would be our strength and their terrour Q. 47. Who is it that was or is able to cure all these our divisions It never was in our power nor yet is unless damning our souls by willful sin must be the cure For we have oft offered our Oaths that nothing but fear of sin shall hinder us from conforming If our fear come from ignorance do the Churches suffer none more ignorant than we But how easy were it with others without sin or cost to cure all Q. 48. Is it not God's great Mercy to our Land that we have had twenty years peace while other Lands have been miserable by Wars And if it be the Preachers of the Gospel that yet will give the Land no peace but cry out execute prosecute suffer not strike home and their judgment be the executioners encouragment who say The Clergy tells us it is our duty I had rather answer them with tears than words Q. 49. Should not the long and universal experience of the Christian VVorld be some warning to us which these thousand years hath been broken into shreds by the contentions of the Clergy and their Magisterial needless impositions and by forsaking the Primitive purity and simplicity Q. 50. Are not these words in the Liturgy before the Sacrament very terrible If any of you be a hinderer or slanderer of God's Word or be in malice or envy Repent of your sin and come not to this Holy Table lest after the taking of the Sacrament the Devil enter into you as he did into Iudas and fill you full of iniquities and bring you to destruction of Body and Soul And are not the Words of our Judge more terrible Mat. 25. Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels For I was hungry thirsty a stranger naked in prison c. In as much as ye did it not to one of the least of these ye did it not to me And these shall go away into everlasting punishment but the Righteous into Life eternal O let me never be one of those who for nothing shall run on such a doom Q. 50. If yet objections or the mis-understanding of our cause do frustrate all these reasons I have answered so many objections and so far opened the cause already as here is not to be repeated viz. In the First and Second Pleas for Peace In the Apology for our Preaching and in the Treatise of Episcopacy And against the judgment of those Reverend Fathers who still cry Abate nothing and suffer them not do Execution I set the judgment I. Of the King 1. In his Declaration from Breda 2. His healing Gracious Declaration about Ecclesiastical Affairs 1660. 3. And that of 1662. II. The Judgment of the late House of Commons Ian. 10. 1680. Resolved that it is the Opinion of this House that the prosecution of protâ—stant Dissenters upon the Penal-Laws is at this time grievous to the Subjects a weakning the Protestant Interest and dangerous to the Peace of the Kingdom III. Christ's Canon-Law 1 Iohn 4. 8 16. He that Loveth not knoweth not God for God is Love God is love and he that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God and God in him Joh. 13. 35. By this shall all men know that ye are my Disciples if ye have Love one to another Rom. 14. 17 18. The Kingdom of God is not Meat and Drink but Righteousness and Peace and Ioy in the Holy Ghost For he that in these serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of Men. vers 1. Him that is weak in the Faith Receive we but not to doubtful disputations c. 1 Thes. 5. 12 13. We beseech you Brethren to know them which LABOVR AMONG you and are over you in the Lord and to esteem them very highly in Love for their WORK sake and be at Peace among your selves 1 Sam. 2. 30. Them that honour me I will honour and they that despise-me shall be lightly esteemed ENGLANDS SLAVERY Q. 1. IS not Silencing taking all we have and lying in Jaile among Rogues from six Months to six Months till we die greater Slavery than the Turks inflict on Christians Q. 2. What is this for And on what sort of Men Q. 3. Who be they that have caused and continued it after 27 Years Experience of the effects Q. 4. What is Diabolism if this be not Q. 5. Why is not publick Repentance of it proclaimed * And Bucer thought so too when â—e so earnestly wrote for another sort of Disciplâ—ne to King Edw. 6. The Story of the King of Cappadocia and his Brotâ—â— that conspired with some Nobles to depose him and take his Kingdom and how the Senate of Rome detected the Plot and defeated it by the help of Cicero then Proconsul there is worth the reading in Cicero's Epistles Read the Lord St. Alban's Considerations of Reconciling and Edification of the Church of England and his Advertisement on the present Church-Controversies and see whether he thought there was no need of Reformation And Judge Hales Papers of Religion See the Lord Bacon about Subscription in his foresaid Considerations Dedicated to King Iames. This was written 1683. This was â—ritten when â—he Duke of Monmouth's Treason was most noised and the Dissenters cryed down