points that no controversies or opinions will shake his faith or destroy his love to God or man Thirdly He will honour God by upright practise and shew forth the power and excellency of religion in the true success upon the heart and life His Religion which begins in solid faith will grow up into sincere Love and good works Fourthly He will be without partiality a Lover of all the servants of Christ and therefore escape temptations to faction and division because his Religion consisteth in those common truths and duties which all profess Fifthly he will not only safely receive all further truths from these principles but all his knowledge and disputes will be sanctified as being all subservient to faith and love and holiness Whereas he that taketh the contrary course and presently falleth to the study of by-opinions and layeth too much upon them will prove too like a superficial hypocrite and a deceiver of himself by thinking that he is something when he is nothing Gal. 6. 5 6. And he will make a pudder in the world for nothing as children do in the house about their babies and their bawbles He will make but an engine of his by-opinions to destroy true Piety and Christian Love in himself first and then in all that will believe him He will first make himself and then many others believe that Religion is nothing but proud self-conceit and faction And he will be the shame of his profession and the hardener of the wicked in their sin and misery by perswading them that the Religious are bnt a few ignorant whimsical fanaticks These are too sad experienced truths DIRECT XXXII Lay not a greater stress upon your different words or manner of prayer than God hath laid And take heed either of scorning reproaching or slighting the words and manner of other mens worship when it is such as God accepteth from the sincere IT is an easie thing to turn the native heat of Religion into a feaverish out-side zeal about words or circumstances or ceremonies whether it be for them or against them O what a wonder is it that by so palpable a trick as thâ—s the Devil should deceive so many and make such a stir and disturbance in the Church I know that one party will cry up Order the other will cry up Spirituality and both will say that God maketh not light of the smallest matters in religion nor no more must we And in this general position there is some truth But if nothing could be said for both their errours they would then be no deceits nor be capable of doing any mischief Some things that you contend about God hath left wholly undetermined and indifferent And some things in which your brother erreth his errour is so small a fault as not at all to hinder his acceptance with God nor with any man that judgeth as God doth Had you ever understood Rom. 14 15. you would have understood all this It would make a knowing Christian weep between indignation and compassion to see in these times what censures and worse are used on both sides about the wording of our prayers to God! How vile and unsufferable some account them that will pray in any words which are not written down for them And how unlawful others account it to pray in their imposed forms some because they are forms and some because they are such forms and some because that Papists have used them and some because they are imposed when God hath given them no command but to pray in faith and fervency according to the state of themselves and others and in such order as is agreeable to the matter and in such method as he hath given them a Rule and Pattern of But of all quarrels about forms and words he hath never made any of their particular determinations no more than whether I shall preach by the help of Notes or study the words or speak those which another studied for me It is a wonder how they that believe the Scriptures came first to make themselves believe that God maketh such a matter as they do of their several words and forms of prayer That he loveth only extemporary prayer as some think and hateth all prescribed forms Or that he loveth only prescribed Forms as others think and hateth all extemporary prayers by habit Certainly in Christs time both Liturgies by forms and also prayers by habit were used And yet Christ never interposed in the Controversie so as to condemn the one or the other He condemneth the Pharisees for making long prayers to cover their devouring widdows houses and for their praying to be seen of men But whether their prayers were a Liturgy and set forme or whether they were extemporary he taketh no notice as telling us that he condemned neither And it s like the Pharisees long Liturgy was in many things worse than ours though the Psalms were a great part of it And yet Christ and his Apostles oft joyned with them and never condemned them Nay as far as I can find the Pharisees and other Jews were not in this so blind and quarrelsome as we nor never made a controversie of it nor ever presumed to condemn either Liturgies or Prayers by habit I shall now pass by their errour who are utterly against publike prayers from a habit as having spoken of it at large elsewhere when I had opportunity I shall now only answer the contrary extreme Obj. Where hath God given any men power to prescribe and impose forms for others or commanded others to obey them Answ. First where ever he hath given any power to teach their inferiours to pray who cannot do it in a better way He hath given Parents this power where he hath bid them Bring up their Children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord Is it not by the Law of nature the Parents duty to teach their children to pray And is not the learning of the words first profitable to their learning of the sense May they not teach their Children the Lords Prayer or a Psalm though it be a Form And why not then other words which are agreeable to their State And he that taught his own Disciples a Form and Rule of Prayer and telleth us that so Iohn taught his Disciples and saith to his Apostles As my Father sent me so send I you by making them Teachers to his Church did allow them to teach either by forms or without as the cause required All the Scripture is now to Preachers a form of Teaching And when we read a Chapter we read a prescribed form of Doctrine And it haâ—h many forms of prayer and praise and forms of Baptizing administring the Lords Supper If you say that the Apostles had an infallible spirit I answer True And that proveth that that their Doctrine was more infallible than other mens but not that they only and not other men may teach by the way of forms All the Books of Sermons now written are
and tyranny if men shall be called Ignorant Scandalous and Hypocrites without proof And therefore to exclude baptized professors by whole Parishes or Multitudes without bringing proof against each person one by one is quite to over-turn Christs rules and order and Church Constitutions and all Church justice I confess it is the thing which I have long lamented and often written of especially in my Treatise of Confirmation that those who are baptized in Infancy are not called to a more explicite understanding profession of the Covenant then made and have not a more solemn transition into the number of adult Communicants And we are not out of hope that this may at last be brought to pass But in the mean time the same persons though less regularly do make profession of the same thing both at the Lords Table and in their publick worship and in their common claim to the faith and honour of Christianity so that all such must be rejected as hypocrites upon accâ—sation and proof of Impenitency in some gross sin and not in the lamp as if they were no professors For professors certainly they are And though I abhor their malignity who would vilisie Religion by over-hasty accusing of higher Professors and would flatter the wicked and ignorant by making an indifferency and tepidity seem sufficient in the things of God yet God would have me bear witness to this truth to cure some mens contrary extream that as this age as is said doth need no proof how heinously high professors may miscarry so in the place where I exercised my Ministry I found some give me a satisfying evidence in their last sickness that they had long lived a truly godly life who were never noted by their Neighbours for any extraordinary zeal at all If you ask me How can it stand with grace to be so much hid I answer They made the common profession of Christianity they usually attended the publick worship they lived blamelesly in their places but they were of silent retired dispositions and were inferiours who by their superiours were restrained from private meetings and some converse with more zealous persons which they desired And for ought you know there may be very many such who must not be rejected as no professors nor without a particular accusation and proof unless you would be used in the like kind your selves DIRECT IV. Affect not to be made eminent and Conspicuous in Holiness by standing at a further distance from these lower Professors than God would have you IT is the loathsome scab of the Romish Church that they who will be taken for Religious must go into a Monastery of Fryars and Nans and separate themselves from the rest of Christians as worldly secular people that so their Religion may be a noted thing they may be set up in their singularity as publike spectacles for the world to admire Though perhaps they come thither but under the gripes of Conscience to expiate the guilt of whoredome murder or some notorious sins which the contemned seculars never committed And it is somewhat easie to proud corrupted nature to enter into a life of greater self-denial than most Monasticks are put upon when by it they shall be thus separated from the rest of mankind as a people of more admired holiness To set our selves up in a separated society as persons whom the world must account more Religious than the common sort of Christians hath so much oftentation in it as is a great allurement to Pride For many a one who perceiveth how childish a thing it is to set out ones self to be observed for fine cloathes or for bodily comeliness or for high entertainments curiosities houses lands or such vanities doth yet think that it is an excellent thing to be honoured by men especially by the wisest and the best as a person of Wisdome and Piety and Goodness And indeed it is the truest and the highest Honour to be Wise and Good And it is exceeding natural to man to desire honour And it is lawful to have a due and moderate sense and regard to our honour And all this being so how easie is it for Pride to take this advantage and to go a little farther while we think that we go but this far and keep within our bounds And the root of the errour lyeth in Atheism Self-fishness and Carnality By the first we neglect the Honouring of God which should be our utmost aim and to which all our own Honour should be purely referred as a means By the second we Idolize our selves and are sunk into and centered in our selves and seek that honour to our selves which we should wholly refer to God alone And by the third we over-value Man and his esteem and live upon the thoughts and breath of mortals and seek the honour which is given by one to another more than the honour which is of God Whereas we should make it our grand care and study to be pleasing to our Maker which is the highest honour and lawful and necessary to be sought and should be more indifferent as to the esteem and thoughts of man as being no further regardable than it conduceth to our divine and ultimate end And when Pride hath thus turned the eye of the soul from God to our selves and to the Creature it is a working sin and will be alwayes seeking to fetch in fewel for its self to feed on and to find out wayes to make our selves conspicuous and observed in the world And to separate our selves into distinct societies that the world may see we are above Communion with the colder duller sort of Christians is one of the most notable means to this self-exalting end And many Christians that are more humble do yet so much mis-understand the Scripture principles of Communion that they think they should corrupt the Church and sin against God if they stood not in a separated state from those of the colder sort And this is caused much by taking those Scriptutes to speak of all cold and carnal Christians which speak only of the Heathen and Infidel world And this cometh to pass by the happiness of their birth and breeding because they are born and bred where there are almost none but professed Christians and they see not the swarms of Heathens that worship idols and creatures or of the Infidels who scorn and persecute the Christian name therefore they live as if there were no such persons They know that the world and the Church comprehend all mankind and that the Church is gathered out of the World And because they see the Church but see not the world out of which it is gathered therefore they are looking for the world in the Church and think that the commoner sort of Christians are the World and the better and more zealous sort only are the Church which therefore must be gathered out of the World And so they gather the Church out of the Church while they think that
Mystical and as Visible is but One however the Members and their Gifts and degrees of grace are many Sixthly It is One way of Faith and Holiness which all must walk in Seventhly And it is One end and happiness which we all expect and in One Heaven that we must meet and live for ever so many as are sincere in the faith which we profess And in Heaven we shall have one Mind and Heart and One employment in the Love and praise of our Creator and Redeemer and one felicitating fruition of his Glory for evermore Therefore he that seeth not the necessity of Unity knoweth not the Nature of the Church or Faith or true Religion The Honours and Benefits of Unity and the shame and mischiefs of Divisions may appear to him that further considereth the instances which follow First Our Union with the Church is a sign of our proportionable union with Christ And our separation from the Church doth signifie that we are separated from Christ. He that is United but to the Visible Church is but visibly by Baptism and Profession united to Christ such a union is spoken of in Ioh. 15. 2. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away He that is united to the mystical Church of the Regenerate and spiritual is united to Christ by faith and by the spirit For his union to Christ is at the same instant of time with his union with the Church but in order of nature goeth before it He that is divided from this mystical Church cannot possibly at that time be a Member of Christ in the spiritual sense As the member which is cut off from the body is also separated from the Head And he that himself forsaketh the Visible Church as such sorsaketh the mystical Church and Christ himself For to forsake the Visible Church as such is to cease to be a Professor of Christianity One may be a Member of the Visible Church and not of the spiritual but you cannot be a Member of the spiritual Church if you forsake and refuse the visible Church as such For though a man may be regenerate by the Spirit before he make an open profession or be baptized and without baptism in some few cases yet so he cannot be if he refuse to be a Professor It s possible indeed to be a member of the Universal Church both as Mystical and as Visible as spiritual and as professing while we have not opportunity to joyn with any one particular Church or to separate from some particular Church without separating from the Universal But to separate from the Universal Church is to separate from Christ. But then you must understand that the Universal Visible Church is nothing else but all professing Christians in the world as visibly subjected to Christ as their Head And that there is no such thing in being as the Papists call the Catholick or Universal Church that is the universality of Christians subjected to one Vicar of Christ as their Head either Constitutive or Governing Such a pretended Head is an Usurper and no true authorized Vicar of Christ And therefore such a Church as such is nothing but a company of seduced Christians following such a traiterous Usurper And to separate from the Pope is not to separate from Christ or from his Church Secondly Consider also that Union is not only an Accident of the Church but is part of its very essence without which it can be no Church and without which we can be no members of it It is no Kingdome no City no family and so no Church which doth not consist of United members As it is no house which consisteth not of united parts And he is no Member which is not united to the whole It is the great course of mens boldness in dividing ways that they take union to be but some laudable accident while it may be had which yet in some cases we may be without and think that separations are tollerable faults even when they are forced to confess them faults But they do not consider that Vnity is necessary to the being of the Church and to the being of oâ—r own Christianity Read 1 Cor. 12. Ephes. 4. Thirdly Remember also that our Vnion is necessary to our Communion with Christ and with his Church and to all the blessings and benefits of such communion Ioh. 15. 4. Abide in me and I in you As the branch cannot bear fruit of it self except it abide in the Vine no more can ye except ye abide in me for without me ye can do nothing If a man abide not in me he is cast forth as a branch and is withered and men gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned And Col. 2. 19. From the Head all the body by joynts and bonds having nourishment ministred and knit together increaseth with the increase of God The member that is cut off from the body hath no life or nourishment from the head or from the body but is dead He that is out of the Church is without the Teaching the holy worship the prayers and the discipline of the Church and is out of the way where the spirit doth come and out of the Society which Christ is specially related to For he is the Saviour of his body And if we leave his hospital we cannot expect the presence and help of the Physician Nor will he be a Pilot to them who forsake his Ship Nor a Captain to them who separate from his Army Out of this Ark there is nothing but a deluge and no place of rest or safety for a soul. Fourthly The Unity of Christians is their secondary strength Their primary strength is Christ and the Spirit of grace which quickeneth them And their secondary strength is their Vnion among themselves Separation from Christ depriveth men of the first and separation from one another depriveth them of the second An Army is stronger than a man And a Kingdom than a single person A flame will burn more strongly than a spark And the waves of the Ocean are more forcible than a single drop A threefold Cord is not easily broken Therefore it is that weak Commonwealths do seek to strengthen themselves by confederacies with other States The Church is likened to an Army with Banners both for their Numbers their Concord and their Order And therefore Christ saith that a Kingdom divided cannot stand Union is the Churches strength And what good soever they may pretend Dividers are certainly the weakeners and destroyers of the Church And as those means which best corroborate the body and fortifie the spirits do best cure many particular diseases which no means would câ—re whilst nature is debilitated So are the Churches diseases best cured by uniting fortifying remedies which will be increased by a dividing way of Reformation Dividing is wounding and uniting is the closing of the wound There is no good work but Satan is a pretender to it when he purposeth to destroy
THE CURE OF Church-divisions OR Directions for weak Christians to keep them from being Dividers or Troublers of the Church With some Directions to the Pastors how to deal with such Christians By Richard Baxter Joh. 17. 21. That they all may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us that the World may believe that thou hast sent me 22. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be One even as we are One 23. I in them and thou in me that they may be made Perfect in One and that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast Loved them as thou hast loved me 1 Cor. 1. 10. Now I beseech you brethren by the name of our Lord Iesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment 1 Cor. 3. 3. For ye are yet carnal for whereas there is among you envying and strife and divisions are ye not carnal and walk as men London Printed for Nevil Symmons at the three Crowns over against Holborn-Conduit 1670. The Authors I. Purpose II. Reasons and III. Prognosticks of this Book I. IT is none of the business of this Book to single out any one Party in the world to tell you by Application how far they are under the guilt of Schism I meddle with the Cause and leave each person to make application to himself It is SIMPLE CATHOLICK CHRISTIANITY which I plead for and the Love and Unity and Concord which are its Ligaments and Essential parts And it is a SECT as a SECT and a FACTION as a faction and not this or that Sect or Faction which I detect and blame Yet I doubt not but as in the same City there are the wise and the foolish the sound and the sick and in the same Army there are valiant men and Cowards so in the same Churches there are Christians of various degrees of Wisdom Integrity and strength And all men should earnestly desire to be of the wisest the Holiest and the most fruitful sort and not of the more erroneous impure or scandalous and unprofitable And if the sick will make themselves a Party and call the sound the Aâ—verse Party I will endeavour to be one of a Party in that sense and to obey God as exactly as I am able and to worship him as spiritually and holily as I can and to Love him with all my Mind and Heart and Strength and lament that I can reach no higher and do no more And if any will call this by the name of Heresie or Schism they shall see that I can avoid Heresie and Schism at as dear a rate as enduring the Name and Imputation of that which I avoid It is not the Name of a Schismatick that I am writing against but the Thing by whatever Name it is called It is UNITY LOVE and PEACE which I am pleading for And it is DIVISIONS HATRED and CONTENTION which I plead against And it is the Hypocrisie of men which I detect who betray Love Unity and Peace by a Iudas kiss and will nor or dare not openly renounce them and defie them but kill them with dissembling kindness who cry them up while they tread them down and follow peace with all men that are not of their party as the Dog followeth the Hare to tear it in pieces and destroy it Who fight for LOVE by making others seem odious and unlovely By evil surmisings proud under valuing the worth of others busie and groundless censuring of men whose case they know not aggravating frailties stigmatizing the persons the actions the worship and religious performances of dissenters with such odious terrible names and Characters as their pride and faction do suggest And all this to strengthen the interest of their side and party and to make themselves and their consenters to seem Wise and Good by making others seem foolish and bad Though they thereby proclaim themselves to be so much the worst by how much they are most void of Love They are all for Concord but it is only on their narrow factions terms They are for Peace but it is not of the whole street but of their house alone or not of the whole City but of their street alone or not of the whole Kingdom but of their City alone O what a blessed thing were peace if all would derive it from their Wills and terminate it in their interest and they might be the Center of Unity to the world that is that they might be Gods or Christs such excellent Architects are they that they can build Christs house by pulling it in pieces and such excellent Chirurgeons that they will heal Christs body by separating the members and can make as many Bodies as there are separated parts 2. Nor is it any or much of the business of this book to speak to those that I think are deepliest guilty of the Schisms of the Christian world For they are out of hearing and will not read or regard my writings It is the Roman Head and Center of Unity which hath done most to divide the Church And it is the contending of Rome and Constantinople for the Supremacy which hath made the greatest Schisms that the Christian world hath known And the Regiment of such Lords must be answerable to their Power and Greatness and the simple terms of Christian Unity left us by Christ and his Apostles must be turned into a Religion large as the Decrees of all the Councels and say half of them and the Popes Decretals also And that there may be no way out of this wilderness but the Confessors present will you must not in all these so much as distinguish fundamentals from the rest but so much material belief is necessary to Salvation as each mans opportunities and helps obliged him to receive that is The faith which is necessary to Salvation materially or objectively is as various as the number of persons in the world To one more is necessary to another less to some none at all of the Christian faith And you must suppose that the Priest is well acquainted with the internal capacity of every mans Soul and with all the instructions opportunities and suggestions of his whole life and can tell what measure of belief he hath and whether it be proportionable to his helps and so can tell him whether he be capable of Salvation though neither Pope nor Councel have given any Standard by which to judge And though no man can be assured of his own Salvation and though another man could not be saved by the faith that saveth him So much are we mistaken to think that it is the Pope that hath the Keys of Heaven when it is every Priest who is the onely judge of the measures of the persons faith These new made multiplyed Articles of Religion
Church but Christ himself 58. Take heed of superstition indiserâ—â—t â—â—al â—â—th been the usual beginner of superstition Mâ—lignity in that age the sharpest opposer for the Aâ—thorâ—s sake Formality in the next age hath made a Religion of it And then the zealous who first invented it have turned most against it for the sake of the last owners And thus the world hath turned round Instances lay'd down of the superstition of Religions people in this age 59. If through the fault of either side or both you cannot meet together in the same assemblies yet keep that Unity in faith love and practice which all neighbour Churches should maintain And use not your different assemblies to revâ—ling and destroying Love and Peace 60. When the Love-killing spirit either cruel or dividing is abroad among Christians be not idle nor discouraged Spectators nor betray the Churches peace by lazy wishes But make it a great part of your labour and Religion to revive Love and Peace and to destroy their contraries And let no censures or contempt of any party take you off But account it as comfortable to be a Martyr for Love Peace by blind Zealots or proud Usurpers as for the saith by Infidels or Heathens And take the pleasing of God whoever is displeased for your full reward The Additional Directions to the Pastors 1. Let it be our first care to know and do our own duty And when we see the peoples weakness and divisions let us first examine and judge our selves and lament and reform our own neglects Ministers are the Cause of most divisions 2. It is needful to the peoples Edification and Concord that their Pastors much excel them in knowledge and utterance and also in prudence holiness and heavenly mindedness that the reverence of their callings and persons may be preserved and the people taught by their Examples 3. Inculcate still the necessary conjunction of Holiness and Peace and of the Love of God and Man And that Love is their Holiness it self and the sum of their Religion the End of faith and the fulfilling of the Law And that as Love to God uniteth us to Him so Love to man must unite us to each other And that all doctrine and practices which are against Love and Unity are against God against Christ against the Spirit against the Church and against Mankind 4. If others shew their weakness by unwarrantable singularities or divisions shew not your greater weakness by impatience and uncharitable censures or usage of them especially when self-interest provoketh you 5. Distinguish between them that separate from the Universal Church or from all the Orthodox and Reformed parts of it and those who only turn from the Ministery of some one person or sort of persons without refusing Communion with the rest 6. Distinguish between them who deny the Being of the Ministry and Church from which they separate and those who remove only for their own Edification as from a worse or weaker Ministry a Church less pure 7. Distinguish between those who hold it simply unlawful to have Communion with you and those who only hold it unlawful to prefer your assemblies before such as they think to be more pure 8. Remember Christs interest in the weakest of his Servants and do nothing against them which Christ will not take well 9. Distinguish between weakness of Gifts and of Graces and remember that many who are weaker in the understanding of Church-orders may yet be stronger in grace than you 10. Think on the Common Calamity of mankind what strange disparity there is in mens understandings and will be And how the Church here is a Hospital of diseased souls of whom none are perfectly healed in this life 11. Distinguish still between those truths and duties which are or are not of necessity and between the tolerable and the intolerable errors And never think of a Common Unity and Concord but upon the terms of necessary points and of the primitive simplicity and the forbearance of dissenters in tolerable differences 12. Remember that the Pestoral Government is a work of Light and Love And what these cannot do we cannot do Our great study therefore must be first to know more and to Love more than the people and then to convince them by cogent evidence of truth and to cause the warmth of our Love to be felt by them in all the parts of our ministration and converse As the warmth of the Mothers milk is needful to the good nutrition of the Child The History of Martin 13. When you see many evils which Love and evidence will leave uncured yet do not reject this way till you have found one that will better do the work and with fewer inconveniences 14. When you reprove those weak Christians who are subject to errors disorders and divisions reflect noâ— any disgrace upon piety it self but be the more careful to proclaim the honour of Godliness and true Conscientious strictness lest the ungodly take occasion to despise it by hearing of the faults of such as are accounted the zealousest professors of it 15. Discourage not the people from so much of Religions exercises in their families and with one another as is meet for them in their private stâ—tions 16. Be not wanting in abilities watchfulness and diligence to resist Seducers by the evidence of truth that there may be no need of other weapons And quench the sparks among the people before they break out into flames 17. Be not strange to the poet ones of your flocks but impartial to all and the servants of all Mind not high things but condescend to men of low estate 18. Spend and be spent for your peoples good Do all the good that you are able for their bodies as well as for their souls And think nothing that you have too dear to win them that they may see that you are truely fathers to them and that their welfare is your chiefest care 19. Keep up the reverence of the ancient and experienced sort of Christians and teach the younger what honour they owe to them that are their Elders in age and grace For whilest the Elder who are usually sober and peaceable are duly reverenced the heat of rash and giddy youth will be the better kept in order 20. Neither neglect your interest in the Religious persons of your charge lest you lose your power to do them good Nor yet be so tender of it as to depart from sober principles or wayes to please them Make them not your Rulers nor follow them into any exorbitancies to get their love or to escape any of their censures 21. Let not the Pastors contend among themselves especially through envy against any whom the people most esteem A reproof of ignorant pievish backbiting quarrelsome Ministers 22. Study our great pattern of Love and tenderness meekness and patience and all those texts which commend these virtues till they are digested into a nature in you that healing virtue may go from you
about our Godliness or Goodness 1 Pride of our understandings worketh thus First a man that was formerly in darkness is much affected with the new-come light and perceiveth that he knoweth much more than he did before And then he groweth to a carnal and corrupt estimation of it valuing it more as Nature is pleased with it than as it is sanctified by it Delighting in knowledge for it self more than for the purity Love and heavenliness which it should effect Then he looketh about him on the ignorant sort of people who know not what he knoweth and seeth how far they are below him And he thinketh with himself what a difference hath God made between Me and Them And because Thankfulness is a duty he observeth not how Pride doth twist it self with it and creep in under the protection of its name And how Thankfulness and Pride have the same expressions and both of them say I thank thee O Father that thou hâ—st hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them to babes I thank thee O God that I am not as other men are extortioners unjust adulterers or even as this Publican Luk. 18. 11. And then he is so taken up with the things which he knoweth that he perceiveth not what knowledge yet he wanteth And the deep affection which his knowledge worketh in him or the tickling pleasure which he hath in knowing joyned with this ignorance of his ignorance in other things doth make him over-confident of all his apprehensions as if every thing which he imagineth were an absolute certainty And so he wanteth that humble suspicion of his own understanding which a true acquaintance with his ignorance would have caused in him And thus he groweth to over-value all his own conceivings and to under-value all the opinions and reasonings of others which are contrary to his own And thence he proceeds to corrupt his Religion with such mis-apprehensions and his rash unsuspected understanding entertains one errour first and then that lets in many more till he have espoused a self-chosen frame of doctrine instead of the sacred truths of God and method of the Gospel And from hence he proceedeth to choose his Religious exercises also according to these mis-apprehensions These make him Duties which are no Duties and sins which are no sins And thus he calleth evil good and good evil and putteth darkness for light and light for darkness bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter And having made him a Religion of his own he confidently thinketh that it is of God And next he valueth all men that he hath to do with according as they are nearer or farther off from this which he accounteth the way of God He chooseth his Church or party whom he will joyn with by the test of this Religion which his pride hath chosen He zealously declaimeth against the opposers of his way as against the adversaries of truth and Godliness and consequently of God himself He prayeth up his opinions and preacheth them up and contendeth for them and prayeth and preacheth and dispâ—teth down all that â—s against them He laboureth to strengthen the party that is for them and to weaken that which is against them And thus he divideth the kingdom and family of Christ He destroyeth first the Love of his brother and neighbour in himself and then laboureth to destroy it in all others by speaking against those that are not of his way with contempt and obloquy to represent them as an â—â—lovely sort of men And if the interest of his cause and party do require it perhaps he will next destroy their persons And yet all this is done in zeal of God and as an acceptable service to him And they think all are Neâ—ters and Lukewarm who prosecute not the Schism as fervently as they and fight not against Love with as much vehemency Yea and in all this they are still conâ—ident that they Lâ—ve the Brethren with a special Love and make it the mark that they are Christs disciples and that they are passed from deâ—th to life because they love the party and persons who are of their own opinion and way And thus PRIDE insensibly while they perceive it not at all doth choke their Opinions their Religions their Parties and make their Duties and their sins and rule their judgments affections and their actions which is all but the same thing which the Scripture in one word calleth HERESY And all that I have said you may find said in other words in the third Chapter of Iames. And there are two things which greatly promote this sin The one is a conceit that all their apprehensions are the Spirits dictatâ—s or the effect of its illumination And the works and teachings of the spirit are not to be contradicted or suspected but to be honoured Therefore they think that it is a resisting of the spirit to resist their judgment And they are perswaded that their apprehensions are caused by the spirit partly because they had no such thing whilest they lived in wickedness but it came in either with their change or shortly after And therefore they think that the same light which shewed them their sinful state doth shew them also all these principles And partly because they find themselves as deeply â—ffected with these misapprehensions as with other which are sound and right therefore they are confident that they come from the same spirit And specially when these thoughts come in upon the reading of the Scripture or in meditation or after earnest prayer to God to teach them by his spirit and lead them into the truth and not to suffer them to err and when they find that they have good ends and meanings and a desire to know the truth all thâ—s perswadeth them that it is the spirit from whom their thoughts proceed when yet it may be no such thing And another much greater and commoner cause of this self-conceitedness is this All mens understandings are naturally imperfect Our knowledge about Natural things is small and dark much more about things supernatural The wisest must say We know but in part And the variety of mens degrees of knowledge joyned with the difference of their educations and advantages and fore-going thoughts doth make as great a diversity of understandings as of complexions And yet it is very hard to any man to have a sufficient diffidence and suspicion of his mistaking mind For what a man knoweth he knoweth that he knoweth But no man that erreth doth know that he erreth For that is a contradiction If I knew that I erred in judgment I must know that the thing is otherwise than I judged it to be which is impossible to the same understanding at the same time For then judging were no judging as being contrary to knowledge When I see such a difficulty about a point as to pass no judgment at all but remain in meer suspence then I can easily perceive that I am ignorant of it But
when I pass any judgment I cannot perceive that my judgment is false except it be in the cure of it and by the same light which changeth it when I err I can never know that I err but in sensu diviso when I cease my error when I know that I erred I so err no longer And because every thing which appeareth to us doth appear in some kind of light or other and appeareth in some form and as clothed with some qualities the understanding therefore presently hath some thought or other of it If we take any notice of it we shall have some kind of conception and opinion of it And few things in the world do appear to us in such equal diverse shapes as to leave the understanding wholly dubious whether it be this or that Though of that which hath no appearance at all I am wholly ignorant and have no conception And when one part of a thing is seen and many other parts of it are unseen we are all apt to conceive of the whole according to the part which we see and not allow a just suspension or suspicion for all the parts which are unseen That which I see affecteth me as a thing seen But that which I see not is nothing to me and therefore affecteth me not at all That part which I know I know that it is so far what it is It is in my mind memory But that part which I know not I know not that it is or know not what it is so that seeing one part of things and not seeing another yea perhaps many others doth not only cause our error in judging of them but also maketh it very hard to question or distrust our judgments For we must not be Scepticks and doubt of all things Nor must we deny belief to so much as is revealed to us And therefore however at the present we apprehend things just such we are usually confident that they are And in this difficulty all error and the lamentable consequences of it do come in But what shall a man do in so hard a streight Why this every humble man must do He must tread safely and proceed warily and try the spirits and try the doctrines offered him throughly and this by all the means which God hath appointed him for that use He must not strive against the light but he must take heed of taking darkness for light or hearkening to the deceiver when he transformeth himself into an angel of light which is not unusual what cometh with evidence of truth must be received as truth and held fast and not again let go however sometimes it may have a second and third tryal And when you see any truth remember that it is still with a defective sight and that you see but in part And therefore allow a freedome in your understandings to receive the rest You are certain that you see not all that is to be seen of any Doctrine or Science any more than of any creature And you are uncertain what influence the unknown parts would have upon that part which you know or what alteration it would make upon your apprehension if you saw them altogether in their connexion Therefore be sure that in your most confident apprehensions you never forget that there is still much more unknown to you than you yet know And this will preserve a humility and modesty in your understandings and a capacity and fitness to receive more knowledge When the forgetting of this will make you proud and arrogant and presumptuous and like the fool that rageth and is confident even in your ignorance and shame and will shut up your minds against that knowledg which you want But especially if you know that your advantages for knowledge have been less than other mens that you are young or that it is but a few years since you entred upon the study of the Scriptures or that you have not any stronger natural parts than other men or that you have not had that measure of Learning which might further your knowledge of the holy Scriptures but that others that differ from you have had much more of all these helps and means than you common reason here commandeth you to be modest and not over-confident in your own opinion nor too much to slight the judgements of such others Especially if those that differ from you be not only more Learned but as truly conscionable as you and as like to be unfeigned lovers of truth and have prayed more and meditated more and have had more religious experiences than your selves And yet more if they are the greater number of the godly that differ from you and you are singular in your conceits in this case rash confidence in your own opinions is too palpable a sign of a religious pride Obj. But the Learnedst men are not always the wisest in the matters of Religion Answ. Many men are Learned in the Languages and Sciences who are not Learned in the Scriptures because they applyed not their studâ—es that way And many men are Learned in the Scriptures and the Sacred tongues who yet live in sin though they are able to teach the truth for others But those that well understand the Scriptures without Learning the Languages which they are written in and the Customs of those times and Countreys or without much reading and long study both of the Scriptures themselves and the writings of them that better understand them are so few so very few if any at all that if you will pretend to be one of them you had need of some miracle or something like a miracle to make your selves or others be-believe that you are not deceived See what I have said of this at large in my Unreasonableness of Infidelity Obj. The greater number are not always in the right therefore why should my singularity discourage me Answ. The greater number through the world are not in the right about Christiany for they are not Christians And the greater number of vulgar Christians be not in the right perhaps in many points of Learning and Scholastick controversies because they are not Learned in such controversies But all Godly men and Christians are in the right in all points essential to Godliness and Christianity And therefore they are in the certain way of life And if in any integral or accidental point you think that you are wiser than the greater part of men as Learned and as Godly as your self you must give very good proof of it to your self and others before it is to be believed I know that in all ages God giveth some few men more excellent natural parts than others and he engageth some in deeper and more laborious studies than others and he blesseth some mens studies more than others and therefore there are still some few who know more than the rest of the Countrey or of mankind and it were well for the rest if they knew these and would learn of them But
bound to be more afraid of giving scandal to them than unto you Are not men most afraid of overthrowing the children and the weak rather than those that are stronger than themselves If you are apter to sin and turn from Christ than the people of the Parish Churches we should rather separaâ—e from you than from them If not we must more take heed of scandalizing them than you Obj. But Christ pronounceth a â—o to them that offend his little ones Answ. If by offending them be meant only persecuting and hurting them as many think then it is nothing to the question in hand For I hope communicating with others is not a persecuting you And bare displeasing them it is certain that the text doth not mean at all But if by offending them be meant scandalizing them that is laying snares before them whether by fraud or persecution to turn them from Christ and draw them to sins then it confirmeth all that I say And the term little ones conteineth the reason of the words Because as little children are easily overthrown easilier deceived so the young weak believers of little faith are most in danger of being turned away from Christ or ensnared in any sin or errour And therefore if you think the Parish Churches to consist of weaker persons than your selves the woe is to you or us if we offend them The truth is offending and giving scandal is commonly taken in the Gospel for any action which is not our necessary duty by which either Heathens and Inâ—idels and enemies to Christ are like to be drawn to harder thoughts of the Christian faith or any wicked man is like to be kept from a godly life or else by which the young ungrounded and unsetled sort of Christians may be tempted to turn back and forsake the faith which they have professed or fall into any dangerous sin And therefore seeing the separatists profess to be setled in the faith already and many in the Parish Churches are weak and many averse to some duties of Religion and more in danger of being turned away we are bound to be much more afraid of giving scandal to the Parishes than to the separatists Obj. But Christ cared not for offending such perverse ones as Herod or the Pharisees Answ. Christ feared not to displease the greatest when it would be done by doing good No more must you or they be pleased by our neglect of any duty But Christ was against laying any trap before either Herod or the Pharisees to make them sin And it is not your censure of others that will warrant us to use them as Reprobates forsaken of God If every man that can be uncharitable enough to call his neighbours Pharisees or enemies of Christ without proof shall keep us from communion with them then the worse any man is the more he shall be Lord of all other mens consciences DIRECT XXV Be not over-tender of your reputation with any sort of men on earth nor too impatient of their censures displeasure or contempt THe fangs of the censorious are a common scandal and as strong a snare or temptation to some men as worldly preferments are to others When we come among men whom we take for the most Religious and hear them keenly censure all for hypocrites or formalists profane or schismaticks who are contrary to them in opinion or practise at the first we are in danger of being carried away as Barnabas in dissimulation and to say as they say or at least comply with them by our silence and practise lest we should be censured by them as others are Especially Ministers are greatly in danger of this snare For the prophane hate them for their doctrine and their holy lives And it is the godly that are the fruit of their labours and the satisfaction which they have for all their sufferings and the comfort of their lives And if these forsake them and despise them with whom shall they find any comfort in the world Therefore they are very much in danger of complying too far with their errours and weaknesses to keep their interest in them And they think it is that they may do them good And perhaps this was the case of Peter and Barnabas with the weak Judaizing Christians For Paul telleth us Rom. the 14. that it was the use of the weak who thought those things to be duties and sins which were not so to judge the strong who knew their liberty And it was the custome of the strong to despise the weak Just as at this day the mistaken superstitious Christian saith They are prophane that are not against all that he is against And those that see his errour say what giddy whimsical fanaticks are these So was it then and so it is like to be till God give the world a better mind Many a faithful Minister I have known who have freely confessed to me that the censures of peevish self-conceited Christians enclined to separation was a far stronger temptation to them to forsake or overrun their own understandings than all the offers of honours or riches could be on the other side It is a hard thing when we have spent our labour and lives to bring men to Christ and have got them into a state of hope and forwardness to be shortly after cast off by them as formalists oâ— temporizers or any thing that their sick fancies will call us But for all this it is but one of those trials which God will have his servants undergo And both Ministers and private persons must be above the praise and the dispraise even of self-conceited Religious persons before they can be sit to follow Christ as tried and firmly setled men Stand your ground if you are in the right Truth will bear all your charges at the last and will defend it self and you If you please men whoever they be contrary to God and conscience you are servants of men and verily you have your reward Math. 6. But you are no longer the servants of Christ. Gal. 1. 10. And you will never be setled but change as the Moon as the parties or opinions of the censurers change But if you stick to the words of truth and soberness at last the sober part of the Religious will be your encouragers and many of the giddy will come to you by Repentance when experience hath shewed them that which they would not learn of you That which is vertiginous will at last settle its rest on that which is permanent and firm As boys when they have made themselves wheel-sick with turning round will lay hold on the next post to keep them from falling Therefore bear the censures of the ignorant Please them in all things lawful for their good and edification and become all things to all men in a lawful way But depart not from the principles or practise of Christian-union Communion Charity or Sobriety to please a dividing hot-brain'd party nor to escape their sharpest censures He is
oppression be made mad nor driven from your innocency DIRECT LV. When you complain of violence and persecution in others take heed lest you shew the same inward sin by Church-persecution and cruelty against them or any others BUt because I know that guilt causeth impatience and passion disposeth men to mistakes and false reports before I proceed I must here foretell you 1. That I mean not by Separatists all that are so called by interessed injudicious persons But those 1. that account true Churches of Christ to be no Churches 2. or that account it unlawful to hold Communion with those Churches whose communion is not unlawful because they are faulty or because they differ from them in some opinions or circumstances of worship 3. especially if they practise and perswade others to practise according to these two opinions of which the first is the higher sort of separation and the second the lover And secondly That by Church-dividers I mean both these and all such whose principles and practises are against that love of a Christian as a Christian and that forbearance of dissenters which should be exercised to all the members of Christ and who fly from the ancient simplicity and primitive terms of Church-communion and adde as the Papists do their own little novelties as necessary things And those that do causlesly separate from their own lawfully called Pastors For ubi Episcopus ibi Ecclesia where the true Pastor is there the Church is what ever place it be that they assemble in as Cyprien once said And lastly those that are of uncharitable humerous peevish contentious and fiery spirits and will stir up mâ—tinies and â—idings and causeless diviâ—ions in any Church where they come And truly they that think of the present state of Hartford and some other Churcheses in New England which I will not here make a Narrative of me thinks should fear Separations Schismes or Divisions from oâ— in the Churches called Independent as much as those of a different Discipline do as to theirs if not somewhat more on several accounts Thirdly And remember that I am not here speaking of any mens former faults by way of uncharitable bitterness insulting or reproach but verily brethren if we are not impartially willing to know the truth of eveâ—y side and of our own selves as well as otheâ—s we choose deceit and resist the light and provoke God to forsake our understandings Do we not yet know where Iudgment hath begun after such plagues and flames and Church convulsions And do we not yet know where Repentance must begin Enquire for good news whence you will I vvill enquire whether we are awakened to a true Repentance and by that I will fetch my prognosticks of our fâ—ture state Not whether you cry out against other mens sins but against your own and that particularly with all their aggravations and whether Professoâ—rs of Religiousness do as heartily lament their own notorious publick scandals as they expect that drunkards and fornicators and the friends of loosness should lament theirs Till we see this what promise have we of the pardon of our dreadful temporal penalties to say nothing of the greater Woe to the Land and People that can multiply sin and cannot Repent And wo to them that pretend Repentance and love to be flattered in their sin and cannot endure to be admonished but take all the discoveries of their sin to be injurious reproach among the prophane we take this to be a deadly sign of impenitency And is it so bad in them and good in us It is part of my office to cry with holy Bradford REPENT O ENGLAND and to say after Christ Except ye Repent ye shall all Perish And can I call men to Repent when I must not dare to tell them of what Nor to mention the sin which is most to be repented of I use all this preface because I know that Guilt and Impenitency are touchy and tender and galled and querulous and such will bestow the time in backbiting their Monitor which they should bestow in lamenting their sin But shall I therefore forbear and betray their souls and betray the Land through cowardly silence Must I shew that I haâ—e Professours by not admonishing them Lev. 19. 17. when I must shew that I love the looser sort by my sharp reproofs Must I not fear them that can kill the body and must I fear to displease a professed Christian by calling him to Repentance in a time of Judgments Lord hide not my own miscarriages from my â—ight and suffer me not to take any sin that I have committed to have been my innocency or duty lest I should dare to father sin on God and lest I should live and die without Repentance and lest I should be one that continueth judgments and danger to the Land stir up some faithful friend to tell me with convincing evidence where it is that I have miscarried that Contrition may prepare me for the peace of remission O save me from the plague of an impenitent heart that cannot endure to be told of sin from that ungodly folly which taketh the shame that Repentance casteth upon sin to be cast upon God and Religion which bind us to Repentance and Confession Nay in this place I am not mentioning things past so much to humble you as necessarily to inform you of the groundlesness of your present arguings that you may see the truth Fourthly Note also that I lay not any miscarriages on any whole parties Anabaptists or others For I have found that all parties of Christians indeed have some good experienced sober charitable persons and some self-conceited and contentious novices 1 Tim. 3. 6. But I speak only of the persons that were guilty and no more Fifthly Lastly remember that while I seem to compare the faults of one sort of persons with anothers it is none of my intent to equal them much less to equal the state of the several sorts of Offenders as to the rest of their lives But only to mention so much of the similitude as is nenessary to represent things truly and impartially to your view Read on now with these Memento's in your eye And if after so plain a premonition you will venture to charge me with that which I disclaim do it at your own peril I stand or fall to the judgment of God and look for a better reward than the hypocrites which is to have the good opinion of men be they professours of piety or profane And with me by Gods grace it shall hereafter be accounted a small thing to the hindering of my fidelity to Christ and mens souls to be judged of men 1 Cor. 4. 3. And if there should be any Pastors of the Churches who instead of concurring to heal the flocks of these dividing principles shall rather joyn with backbiters and encourage them in their misreports and slanders because it tendeth to the supposed interest of their party or themselves Let them prepare to
1 Cor. 3. 1 2 3 4. II. On the other side if any withdraw from our Communion let us not too hastily accuse them of schism And when we do let us well distinguish of schism and not go further from them than they have gone from us and to be our selves the Schismaticks while we oppose it There are many cases in which local separation may be lawful First As if our callings justly remove us to another place or Country Secondly If our spiritual advantage bind us to remove to a better Minister and more suitable society when we are free Thirdly if our lawful Pastors be turned out of the place and we follow them and turn away but from Usurpers Fourthly If the Pastors turn Hereticks or Wolves Fifthly If the publick good of the Churches require my removal Sixthly If any sin be imposed on me and I be refused by the Church unless I will commit it In these and some other such cases a remove is lawful And when it is not lawful yet it may be but such a blemish in the departers as the departerâ— find in the Church which they depart from which will on neither side dis-oblige them from Christian Love and such Communion as is due with neighbour Churches There is a schism from the Church and a schism in the Church There is a schism from almost all the Churches in the world and a schism from some one or few particular Churches There is a separation upon desperate intollerable principles and reasons and a separation upon some weak but tollerable ones These must not be conâ—ounded The Novatians were tolerated and loved by the sober Catholicks Emperours and others when many others were otherwise dealt with If any good Christians in zeal against sin do erroneously think that an undisciplin'd Church should be forsaken that they may exercise the discipline among themselves which Christ hath appointed It is the duty of that Church to take this warning to repent of her neglect of discipline and then to love and honour those thâ—t have though upon mistake perhaps withdrawn But if when they have occasioned the withdrawing by their corruption they will prosecute the persons with hatred revising slanders contempt or persecution and continue impenitent in their own corruption they will be the far greater Schismaticks and err a more pernicious errour DIRECT LX. When the Love-killing spirit either cruel or Dividing is abroad among Christians be not idle nor discouraged spectators nor betray the Churches Peace by a few lazy wishes but make it a great part of your labour and Religion to revive Love and peace and to destroy their contraries And let nâ— censures or contempt of any Sect or party take you off But account it an honour to be a Martyr for Love and Peace as well as for the Faith OF all parts of Religion I know not how unhappily it comes to pass men think that Negatives are sufficient for the service of Peace If a man live not unpeaceably and do no man wrong nor provoke any to wrath this is thought a sufficient friend to peace And therefore it is no wonder that Love and Peace so little prosper When Satan and his instruments do all that they can by fraud and force against it and we think it enough to stand by and do no harm It is the Peace-makers that Christ pronounceth blessed for theirs is the kingdome of heaven Math. 5. 9. Here he that is not with Christ and the Church is against it Why should we think that so much actual diligence in hearing reading praying c. is necessary to the promoting of other parts of holiness and nothing necessary to Love and Peace but to do no hurt but be quiet patients Is it not worthy of our labour And is not our labour as needful here as any where Judge by the multitude and quality of the adversaries and by their power and success Is it a mark of hypocrisie to go no further in duties of Godliness than the safety of our reputation will give us leave And is it not so in the duties of Love and Peace If the Kingdome of God be in Righteousness and Peace then what we would do to promote Gods Kingdome we must do for them Rom. 14. 17. And if dividing Christs Kingdome is the way to destroy it and Satan himself is wiser than to divide his own Kingdome Math. 12. then what ever we would do to save the Kingdom of Christ all that we must do to preserve and restore the peace of it and to heal its wounds I know if you set your selves in good earnest to this work both parties who are guilty will fall upon you with their censures at least One side will say of you that you are a favorer of the Schismaticks and Sectaries because you oppose them not with their unhappy weapons love them not as little as they As they say of Socrates and Sozomen the Historians that they were Novatians because they spake truth of them called them honest men And as they said of Martyn and Sulpitius Severâ—s that they were favourers of unlearned Fanaticks and of the Priscilian Gnosticks because they were not as hot against them as Ithacius and Idacius but refused to be of their Councels or communicate with them for inviting the Emperour to the way of blood and corporal violence And the other side will say that you are a temporizer and a man of too large principles because you separate not as they do And perhaps that you are wise in your own eyes because you fall in with neither Sect of the extreams But these are small things to be undergone for so great a duty And he that will not be a peace-maker upon harder terms than these I fear will scarce be meet for the reward I again repeat Iam. 3. 17. The wisdome from above is first pure and then Peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality without hypocrisie and the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace Rom. 12. 18. If it be possible as much as in you lyeth live peaceably with all men Heb. 12. 14. Follow peace with all men and holiness Obj. But is it not as good sit still as labour to no purpose What good have ever any peace-makers done among differing Divines Answ. A grievous charge upon Divines and Christians Are they the only Bedlams or drunken men in the world If Princes fall out or if neighbours fall out arbitrators and peace-makers labour not alwayes in vain But I answer you It is not in vain Peace-breakers would have yet prevailed more and made the Church unhappier than it is if some Peace-makers had not hindered them The minds of thousands are seasoned with the Love of Peace and kept from cruelties and Schisms by the wholesome instructions and examples of Peace-makers And it is worth our labour to honour so holy and sweet a thing as Love and Peace and to bear our
sin which caused it and remember that you have aggravated your own transgression If you are children in parts and goodness your selves you are unfit either to upbraid the people with their childish weaknesses or to cure them DIRECT III. In all your publick Doctrine and private Conference inculcate still the necessary conjunction of Holiness and Peace and of the Love of God and Man And make them understand that Love is their very Holiness and the sum of their Religion the end of Faith the heart of Sanctification and the fulfilling of the Law And that as Love to God uniteth us to Him so Love to man must unite us to one another And that all Doctrine or practice is against God and against Christ and against the great work of the Spirit and is enmity to the Church and to mankind which is against Love aâ—d Unity Press these things on them all the year that your hearers may be bred up and nourished with these principles from their youth IF ever the Church be recovered of its wounds it must be by the peaceable Disposiâ—ions of the Pastors and people And if ever men come to a peaceable Disposition it must be by peaceable Doctrine and principles And if ever men come to peaceable Principles it must be by the full and frequent explication of the nature pre-eminence necessity and power of Love That they may heat of it so much and so long till Love be made their Religion and become as the very Natural Heat and Constitution of their souls And if ever men be generally brought to this it must be by daily sucking it from those breasts which nourish them in the infancy and youth of their Religion and by learning it betimes as the sum of Godliness and Christianity And if ever they come to this the Aged experienced ripe and mellow sort of Ministers and private Christians must instil it into Schollars and into the younger sort of Ministers that they may have nothing so common in their ears and in their studies as Uniting-Love That they may be taught to know that God is Love and thaâ— he that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God and God in him 1 Ioh. 4. 16. And that the Love of God doth ever work towards his image in man 1 Ioh. 4. 7 11 12 20. And that all men as men have some of his Image in their Nature as they are Intellectual Free Agents exalted above the bruits Gen. 9 6. And therefore we must Love men as men and Love Saints as Saints That it is Love to God and man which is the true state of Holiness and the New creature and which Christ came to recover lapsed man to and which the Holy Ghost is sent to work and all the means of grace are intended and fitted for and must be used for or they are misused In a word that FAITH WORKING BY LOVE or LOVE and THE WORKS OF LOVE KINDLED BY THE SPIRIT BY FAITH IN CHRIST is the sum of all the Christian Religion Gal. 5. 6 13 22. 1 Tim. 1. 5. He that crieth up Holiness and Zeal without a â—ue commemoration of Love and Peace doth first deceive the hearers about that very Holiness and Zeal which he commendeth whilest he lamely and so falsly representeth and describeth it and doth not make them know how much of Holiness consisteth in Love nor that true zeal is Love it self in its fervâ—ur and intense degree And so people are enticed to think that Holiness is nothing but the passions of fear and grief and earnest expressions in preaching and praying or scrupulousness and singularity about some controverted things or some other thing than indeed it is And they are tempted to think that Christian zeal is rather the violence of partial passions and the fervor of wrath and the making things sinful which God forbiddeth not than the fervors of Love to God and man And when the mind is thus mocked with a false Image of Holiness and Zeal it is cast into a sinful mold and engaged in the pursuit of an erroneous dangerous course of life And at last it cometh to an enmity and contempt of that which is Holiness and Zeal indeed For it accounteth Love but a Moral-vertue which they ignorantly take for a diminutive title of the great and primitive duties required by the light and law of nature it self And zealous Love is accounted by them but a carnal and selfish compliance and temporizing and a pleasing of men instead of God And â— zealous promoting of Unity and Peace is taken but for a cowardly neutrality and betraying of some truth which should be earnestly contended for And on the other side they that preach up Love to man and Peace and Concora without putting first the Love of God and a Holy and Heavenly mind and life they will cheat the poor ignorant carnal people by making them believe that God and Heaven may be forgotten and good neighbourhood to each other is all that is needful to make them happy And they will tempt the more religious sort to sin more against Love and Peace than before Because they will think that it is but a confederacy for Satan against Christ and a submission to the wills of proud usurpers to strengthen their worldly interest against godliness which these preachers mean when they plead for peace And thus as I have known ungodly Preachers by crying down Schism bring Schism into request while it was no such thing as real schism which they meant in theâ—r exclamations till at last the true eruption of schism with its monstrous effects made good people see that such an odious sin there is Even so I have known that a carnal Preacher contemning Holiness and crying up Love and Peace hath tempted the people to have too light thoughts of Love and Peace because it was but a confederacy in sin with a neglect of godliness which the preacher seemed to cry up Till riper knowledge better taught good people to perceive that Love and Peace are more Divine and excellent things than carnal preachers or hearers can imagine The wisedome from above is first pure then peaceable Let it therefore be a true conjunction of Holiness and Peace which you commend DIRECT IV. If others shew their weakness by any unwarrantable singularities or divisions shew not your greater weakness by passions impatiency or uncharitable censures or usage of them especially when any self-interest doth provoke you NOne usually are so spleenishly impatient at the weakness of Dissenters or Separatists as the Pastors are And what is the cause Is it because they abound most in Love to the souls of those who offend or them who are endangered by them If so I have no more to say to such But when we see that the Honour and Interest of the Pastors is most deeply concerned in the business and that they are carried by their impatiency into more want of Charity than the other express by their separations and when we see that they
their controversies when they are weary of contending and will give you the honour of healing the wounds which their rash injudicious zeal hath made DIRECT XXI The Pastors who will preserve the peace of the people must not contend among themselves Especially they must take heed that they engage not in any needless enmity against any of those Divines who for their learning or piety are most highly reverenced in the Church FIrst When Pastors fall into parties they alwayes draw the people with them some will take one part and some another If the Officers divide the souldiers will certainly be divided And though one of the dividing parties may get the advantage of the sword and suppress the other they are nevertheless in the way to increase the schism while the people will think never the worse of the party which is afflicted and trodden down Schismes are most commonly begun or at least formed among the Pastors And among them the cure must be begun and principally performed And when the wound is made it must not be despised but the threatned issues must be foreseen and the necessity of a cure apprehended and scarce any pains or cost must be thought too great to quench the fire The proud and carnal person who thinks all is well if he can but secure his interest and by spurning at dissenters make them seem contemptible doth cast oil upon the flames and may himself feel the greatest heat at last And he that can stand by as unconcerned and deny his service to Love and Peace and to the wounded Church lest it cost him too dear may soon find that he hath lost even that which he hath thought to save O that the Peace-makers would cry aloud and sound the retreat to contending Pastors and O that God would rebuke that pride and carnality self-conceitedness and love of worldly things which will not suffer them yet to hear Secondly And especially when those that are most reverenced and valued by the zealousest Christians are envied or afflicted by the rest it ever tendeth to divisions in the Church For the sufferings of such will never abate their esteem with those who honour them And if fear should stop their mouths for a time the fire will still burn within and be too ready to break out into more open schisms when opportunity serveth them Yea the Churches of old have found great cause to be very tender how they used such reverenced valued Pastors though they should fall into any errour and sometimes to connive or bear with much lest they should occasion a far worse disease by the imprudent curing of a lesser And I dare be bold to proclaim to the contentious Pastors of all the Churches wheresoever that True Piety Love Humility and Prudence can happily heal a great many of dissentions which to the carnal uncharitable proud and imprudent seem uncurable and by their malignant-medicines are still exasperated aâ—d made worse But alas this quarrelsome distemper in Ministers hath had such pernicious effects upon the Church and is still going on to more confusion that it deserveth and calleth for our common lamentation And if we must lament it with despair as an uncurable disease I fear we must with equal despair lament the Churches ruines and the consumption of Religion For how can we expect that the people should hear if the Pastors be obdurate and remediless And who shall cure them if their Physicians themselves be they that do infect them I speak not against the necessary defence of Truth so be it that it be truth indeed which we defend and that the defence be indeed necessary and that the manner be suited to the end and to the nature and rule of Christianity But the itch which caused the Churches scab is of a different description For fiâ—st it proceedeth from a salt acrimoniâ—us humour in the blood Not that there is no blood in our veins which hath better principles and qualities But alas it is tainted with this câ—rroding salt which hath bred our leprosie As if Christ had made us the salt of the earth not to preserve the world from putresaction but to bite and fret all that we have any thing to do with yea and those that we have nothing to do with and by the salt Caâ—aâ—â—hs of our back-bitings and peevish censures and reproaches to bring the Church of Christ into a consumption There is in many of us a love and zeal for Truth in the general and no wonder if we are but men But when we meet it we know it not but â—evile it and scratch it by the face As the Jews did long for the coming of the Messiah but when he came they knew him not but crucified him as a deceiver and blasphemer their prejudice fixing them in the dungeon of unbelief Mal. 3. 1 2 3. The Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his Temple â—ven the Messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in But who may abide the day of his coming and who shall stand when he appeareth For he is like a refiners fire and like fullers sope and he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver and he shall purifie the sons of Levi What abundance of the zealous â—â—nourers of Tristh are daily employed in revising and contradicting it As they do by Peace even prosecute it to the death by the most perverse oppositions and unpeaceable principles and practises while they cry up nothing more than Peace And do they deal any better by Holiness it self He that is for a Holiness which consisteth not in Love to God and man to God for himself and to Man for his sake is like the Heathens who are zealous for a God but he must be made of something unlikest to him that is God indeed Or like the Mahometans who are zealous Musselmans or believers but it is in the most gross deceiver And he that will promote Love by snaâ—ling and barking at all that are strangers to him and not of his own house shall at last partake of the fruits of such Love as he promoted And he may as wisely hope at last to bring the Church to Peace also by werrying it by splenetick censures and divisions in despight of the experience of our present age and of all the world What ever is done against LOVE is done against Holiness and against God and against the Life of the Church And therefore if any Love-killer do call himself a servant of Christ and a friend to Holiness or to the Church he must first prove that murdering it is an act of friendship and a service acceptable to Christ One would think by their practise that some men took Abrahams trial for their Law and accounted it the work of justifying faith to kill the Church and offer it up in sacrifice to Christ But before they bring us to believe that such a sacrifice is acceptable to him who offered himself a sacrifice for the Church and who calleth for a
living acceptable sacrifice Rom. 12. 1. They have need to make a better proof of their authority than Kelley did of his Revelation when he brought Doctor Dee to consent to adultery by the same pretended warrant God who is Love accepteth not such a sacrifice at the hands of Love-killers and Church-destroyers But especially when besides this acrimony of mind there shall other more pernicious diseases be contracted and foment these censures reproaches of their brethren the malignity of the disease is a sad prognostick Two such causes of it Paul layeth open one Act. 20. 30. the other Rom. 16. 17 18. One is the devilish sin of pride and a desire to have many disciples to be our applauders They shal speak perverse things to draw awaydisciples after them The other selfishness carnality and coveteousness They serve not the Lord Iesus but their own bellies And so 2 Pet. 2. 3. Through Coveteousness they shall with feigned words make Merchandise of you They buy and sell mens souls for gain These are Gainsayers in a double sense Their craft bringeth them in no small gain and lest it should be set at nought for gain they do gain-say the truth and raise up tumults against the best of the servants of Christ as Act. 19. 24 27. It is for gain and worldly glory that they say what they say against those that are wiser and sincerer than themselves The sum of all this and most that followeth is in 1 Tim. 6. 3 4 5. If any man teach otherwise and consent not to the wholesome words the words of our Lord Iesus Christ mark it is not to the words of any new faith-makers devâ—sing and to the doctrine which is according to Godliness he is proud though he may cry down pride knowing nothing though he may cry down ignorance but doting about questions though he may seem to be wise and of high attainments and strifes of words while he seemeth to plead for the life of Religion whereof cometh envy strife railings evil surmisings while they pretend to no less necessary a work than the saving of Truth and the peoples souls Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds the impatient scratchings of those whose corrupt blood must needs have vent and therefore causeth this itch of quarrelling and destitute of the truth whilest they think they are saving the life of truth supposing that gain is godliness being so blinded by the love of gain that they make themselves believe that is the cause of truth and Godliness which maketh for their gain and that the raising of them is the raising of the Church and that all tendeth to the interest of religion which tendeth to make them great and rich From such turn away that is own them not in hypocritical wranglings but turn your backs upon them as men unworthy to be disputed with in their way Answer not the fool according to his folly i. e. word it not with him in his foolish way lest you make him think himself worthy to be disputed with Talk not with him at his rates And yet answer him according to his folly by such conviction and rebukes as is meet for fooles and as may make him understand his folly lest he be wise in his own eyes and think that none can stand before him Secondly And it is commonly the most ignorant sort of Ministers who are the liberallest of their supercilious contempt of those whose understandings and worth are above their censures If a controversie be started which they either never studied or have only turned over the pages of a few books to number the sheets and never spent one year in the deep and serious search of the truth which is in question Or if they have clumsie wits that cannot feel so fine a thred nor are capable of mastering the difficulties None then are usually so ready to shoot their bolt and pass a Magisterial sentence and gravely and ignorantly tell the ignorant what eâ—rours such or such a one maintaineth as these that talk of that which they never understood For as I have known many unlearned sots that had no artifice to keep up the reputation of their learning than in all companies to cry down such and such who were wiser than themselves for no schollars but unlearned men so many that are or should be conscious of the dulness and ignorance of their fumbling and unfurnished brains have no way to keep up the reputation of their wisedome with their simple followers but to tell them O such a one hath dangerous errours and such a book is a dangerous book and they hold this and they hold that and so to make odious the opinions or practises of others which they understand not And this doth their business with these silly soals who hear not what can be said against them as well as if they were the words of truth and soberness As for the younger and emptier sort of Ministers it is no wonder if they understand not that which they had never opportunity to study or have taken but a superficial taste of But it were to be wished that they were so humble as to confess that they are yet but beardless and that time and long study is needful to make them as wise as those who with equal wit and grace have had many more years of serious study and greater opportunities to know the truth and that they have not their wisdome by special inspiration or revelation nor so far excel the rest of mankind in a miraculous wit as to know that by a few years lazy study which others know not by the laborious humble fearâ—hâ—s of a far longer time One would think that a little humility 〈…〉 the turn for thus much But it ignorance get possâ—ssion of the ancient and 〈◊〉 headed it triumpheth then and desiâ—◠〈…〉 and saith Give me a man that 〈…〉 with him Or rather Away with 〈…〉 is not worthy to be disputed 〈…〉 groweth not with years 〈…〉 wit may be poaring forty or fifty 〈…〉 that which another may sooner understand Much time and study is necessary to great wisedome But much time and study may consist with very mean attainments and doth not alwayes reach the wisedome which is sought And in such a case the ancient and grey-headed think that veneration is their due and that if they gravely sentence such or such to be erroneous they are injured if they are not believed They have not wisdome enough to make their age honourable and therefore they expect that their age should make their wisdome honourable Thirdly and because they are not able to endure the light nor to stand before the power of open truth they find it necessary to do almost all their work by back-biting When they are out of the hearing of those whom they back-bite among such as are as little sensible of this hateful sin as they then they have this man and that man this party and that party to reproach Fourthly And as Mr. Robert
of England defended c. in quarto 31. His Holy Commonâ—wealth or Political Aphorisms opening the true principles of Government 〈…〉 32. His Conâ—ession of Faith c. in quarto 33. His humble Advice or the heads of those things which were offered to many honourable Members of Parliament in quarto 34. The Quakers Catechism or the Quakers questioned in quarto 35. An account of his present Thoughts concerning the Controversies about the perseverance of the Saints in quarto 36. His Letter to Mr. Drury for Pacification in quarto 37. The safe Religion or three Disputations for the Reformed Catholick Religion against Popery c. in octavo 38. Catholick Unity or the only way to bring us all to be of one Religion c. in twelves 39. The true Catholick and Catholick Church described in twelves c. 40. The successive visibility of the Church of which Protestants are the soundest members c. in octav 41. The Sermon of Repentance 42. Of Right Rejoycing 43. Sermon of Faith before the King 44. Treatise of Death 45. The Vain Religion of the Formal Hypocrite c. in several Sermons preached at the Abbey in Westminster in iâ—â—lves 46. Two sheets for Poor Families c. 47. Short instructions for the sick a sheet 48. A Saint or a Bâ—â—it c. in quarto 49. The mischief of Self-ignorance and benefit of Self-acquaintance in octavo 50. Universal Concord c. in octavo 51. The last work of a Believer c. in 〈◊〉 52. The Divine Life in three Treatises The first of the Knowledge of God The second of Walking with God The third of Conversing with God in Solitude in quarto 53. The Reasons of the Christian Religion c. 54. Directions for weak distempered Christians to grow up into a confirmed state of grace c. 〈◊〉 The Characters of a sound confirmed Christian written to imprint on mens minds the true Idea or Conception of Godliness and Christianity in octavo 55. Now or never in twelves 56. The Life of Faith in 3 parts in quarto These Books following are also printed for Nevil Simmons at the three Crowns near Holborn Conduit THE Novelty of Popery opposed to the Antiquity of true Christianity By Peter Dismoulin D. D. in folio A Commentary or Exposition upon the five Books of Moses together with the following Books Ioshua Iudges Ruth first and second of Samuel first and second of Kings and first and second of Chronicles in folis The Beauty of Magistracy in an Exposition on Psal. 82. By Thomas Hall B. D. The Souls Looking glass wherein a man may discern what estate his soul stands in towards God and what evidences he hath for Heaven c. By Edward Bury â—â—ate Minister of great Bolâ—s in Shropshire in octavo The Profit of Godliness set forth in 5 Sermons on 1 Tim. 4. 8. The unprofitableness of worldly Gain in four Sermons on Mark 8. 36 37. The Parable of the barren Fig-tree in seven Sermons on Luk. 13. 6 7 8 9. Victorious Violence in two Sermons on Mat. 11. 12. By Tho. Brindal late Minister of Walshal in Staffordshire in octavo The Girdle of Holy Resolution in two Sermons on 1 Pet. 1. 13. By William Gearing Minister of the Gospel in quarto The Love-sick Spouse in 4 Sermons on Caâ—t 2. 5. By Wil. Gearing Minister of the Gospel in quart A Discourse on Prodigeous Abstinence occasioned by the twelve months fasting of Martha Tayler By Iohn Reynolds in quarto The Dead Pastor yet speaking in two Sermons preached on Bartholomeâ— day Aug. 24. 1662. in Bewdly Chappel By Henry Osland then Minister there in octavo The Christians daily Walk a sheet By the same Author A Sinners Justification on the Lord Jesus Christ the Lord our Righteousness in several Sermons By Obadiah Grew D. D. late Minister in Coventry in octavo The Repenting Sinner pardoned being a brief Relation of the wicked life and penitent death of Iames Wilson of Wolverhampton in Stâ—ffordsh in 8. The English School or the readiest way to teach children or elder persons to read spell and rightly pronounce English fitted to the use of common English Schools illustrated with five brasâ— Cuts By Tobias Ellis in octavo Dâ— Bryan's eight Sermons in octavo FINIS