Selfishness and the like But some or other nay most of these are all wicked men servants to and over-powered by If Tully could say of the Lustful man An ille mihi liber videtur cui mulier imperat Shall I think him a freeman who is at the command of a woman And if Arrian could say What miserable wretch dost thou fancy thy self free who art 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Slave of a Wench and a vile sorry Wench too well may I say what a wretched Slave art thou then who art under the dominion of so many base vile opprobrious shameful and hateful things To be subject to any one of these is vile Servitude what is it then to be at the command of so many such Masters to serve divers Lusts as the Apostles expression is Titus 3. 3. and all most vile base and brutish Thirdly The wicked man is also inslaved by the most Tyrannical and Cruel Masters Indeed 't is rare that the Base prove other than Cruel whensoever they happen to get into power Having understood who are this mans Masters we must needs be satisfied that they are not more vile than they are Tyrannical And their Tyranny is shewed in requiring the most Vnreasonable services and the most Vneasie Their Commands must necessarily be most unreasonable in that they themselves are so The forementioned vile Affections and the like are therefore Vile because perfect contradictions to the Reason of mens Minds and degradations of the Humane and Intellectual Nature Because they Brutifie mens Souls yea and make them more Vile than the Beasts which perish In short he who obeys these Masters preferreth the Creature before the Creator God blessed for ever He forsakes the fountain of living waters and heweth out to himself broken Cisterns which can hold no water His Body is far more dear to him than his Soul and he esteems slight and momentany satisfactions and pleasures above the most Substantial and Eternal He fears the displeasure of a poor Creature and some very tolerable and small evil more than the wrath of the Omnipotent God and than Hell it self He is ever doing that which the sence of his own Mind upbraids him with and what he knows before hand he shall wish undone as soon as done In a word he is always contradicting the Great Design of his Creation and coming into Being Such things as these as I need not stand to shew do the Lusts of wicked men put them upon doing such services as these are they perpetually imploying them in And what we said of the Vnreasonableness of their commands speaks them also Vneasie Grievous and Troublesome It is impossible for a Creature to act contrary to its Nature and Essential principles but it must needs feel much Pain in so doing the more Unnatural any thing is the more Disquieting and Tormenting must it necessarily be The very presence of evil Affections in the Soul must needs make it as uneasie as evil Humours do the Body what then will the gratifying the Nourishing and Cherishing them do I appeal to the Covetous and Ambitious to the immoderate Lovers of Riches and Honours to such Lovers of Wine and such Lovers of Women to the Revengeful and Malicious and the like whether they do not feel excessive disturbance and perturbation of Mind from the several passions that denominate them such and whether the Pain they cause to their Souls be not incomparably greater and more lasting than the pleasure which their Flesh or Sensitive part receiveth from them Add hereunto the grievous Disquiet and Torment that is occasioned by Reflecting upon the past pleasing and gratifying a Lust. Tully hath an excellent observation to this purpose When a Lust hath ceased to exercise its dominion for a while or to employ its vassal in new drudgery he is not for that time at ease but another Lord immediately tyrannizeth over him viz. the Dread that ariseth from consciousness of Guilt oh what a miserable slavery and bondage is this And by the way methinks it should much affect us to find a Heathen expressing such a sense of the intolerable Slavery men are brought into by satisfying their Lusts. I might add further that mens Lusts have no moderation with them neither though as that Philosopher supposeth they may after their commands are obeyed for a while cease to command again yet it is but for a very little while before the sinner hath recovered his spent spirits they lay new burdens on his weary shoulders What the Apostle saith of those who have eyes full of Adultery that they cannot cease from sin is as true of those who are under the dominion of any lust whatsoever And what Horace observes of the Tyranny of sensual Love may as well be applied to every other corrupt Affection namely Vrget enim mentem dominus non lenis acres Subjectat lasso stimulos This cruel Lord th' unhappy Creature rides And when be-jaded claps sharp spurs to 's sides I might moreover shew were it needful that the service which mens Lusts exact from them is such as ordinarily is of fatal consequence to their Estates and Bodies as well as Souls but there is nothing to which universal observation in all Ages and Sinners Experience gives clearer evidence I might also in the last place shew that mens Lusts do deliver up their Servants to the power of the Devil such being said to be in his snare and to be taken captive by him at his will 2 Tim. 2. 26. And no man I hope shall need to be informed what a Tyrant and Tormenter the Devil is But enough hath been said of the service of Sin to make us cry out with the Philosopher in the forementioned words Quà m illa misera quà m dura Servitus What miserable and cruel Slavery is that Service Enough I say hath been said to assure us that no Slavery is comparable to this and consequently that the careful observance of the Laws of Righteousness is the true and most Glorious Liberty in that Freedom from such Bondage is implied therein as is not to be found in any other sort of Liberty CHAP. III. That the Liberty which resulteth from the Observance of the Laws of Righteousness is the Liberty of the Soul and how it is so is shewed in four Particulars SEcondly The Liberty which resulteth from the Observance of the Laws of Righteousness and Goodness is the truest and most excellent of Liberties in that it is the Liberty and Freedom of the Soul As this is apparent by what hath been already discoursed so we may further take notice that by the Observance of these Laws the Soul comes to be enlarged to have Self-enjoyment and to be as it would be in that it is by this means delivered from those Passions which straiten confine and pend it up and put it into a Slavish state Those Passions are chiefly Fear Shame Trouble and Dejection of Mind and an immoderate love to our own Bodily
next follow those words If the Son therefore shall make you free ye shall be free indeed So that the Freedom which our Lord speaks of ver 32. being deliverance from the power of Sin as appears by his explaining himself ver 34. It is manifest that he meaneth the same thing in these words and consequently does in them give testimony to what we are now designing to prove that to be rescued from under the dominion of our Lusts is Freedom and Liberty indeed the true and most excellent Liberty And of this the holy David was very sensible when he uttered those words Psal. 119. 45. I will walk at liberty for I seek thy precepts Whereby he signified that the ways of Gods Commandments though they seem to the fleshly and sensual strait and narrow and though such look upon those that walk in them as too much confined and abridged of Liberty yet the spirit of a Regenerate and Good man finds no where such Freedom and Enlargement as in those ways And therefore when he lapsed into those two hainous and provoking sins he felt himself exceedingly straitned and his Spirit was miserably pent up and contracted As appears by that prayer in his Penitential Psalm Psal. 51. 12. Restore to me the joy of thy salvation and uphold or establish me with thy free Spirit Or rather with a free Spirit In 2 Pet. 2. 19. the Apostle speaking of a sort of wicked people who were industrious to make others as vile as themselves saith that While they promise them liberty they themselves are the servants of corruption for of whom a man is overcome of the same is he brought in bondage They inticed others to all manner of carnality and filthiness and tempted those that were clean escaped from the pollutions of the world to relapse into them and this they did by the plausible pretence of giving them Liberty but alas saith the Apostle they themselves are the most wretched and miserable of Slaves having yielded themselves up to their vile affections and being under the power and command of Tyrannical Lusts. And Heathens have divers of them discoursed this excellently and were great Masters of this Notion That he who is gotten from under the dominion of his Sensitive part and lives agreeably to the Dictates of Right Reason and the Will of God is the only Free Man Arrian in his third Book upon Epictetus spends some time in shewing that the true Liberty consisteth in the obedience of our Appetites to the Divine Will And in his first Book that there is no true bondage but that which ariseth from the Prevalence of Evil Affections and that a Good man can never be in real Slavery though he be in his Enemies hands that then his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his Carkass only is taken Captive but he himself is as Free still as ever And he gives Diogenes for an instance who having been set free from his corrupt Appetites by his Master Antisthenes would deny that it was possible for any one to make a Slave of him and being taken by Pirates behaved himself in their hands like one that was more their Lord than their Vassal And this is one of the Stoical Paradoxes which Tully discourseth very bravely upon That all wise men whereby they meant good men are free men but all fools whereby they meant bad men are slaves And under this head Tully shewing who deserves the Title of Emperor hath this saying Let him bridle his lusts despise pleasures suppress anger subdue a covetous humour and other vicious affections Then may be begin to take upon him the government of others when he shall have ceased to be under the government of those most cruel Lords shame and Turpitude but whilest he yields obedience to these as he ought not to be accounted an Emperor so neither so much as a Free-man Again he saith a little after If Slavery be the Obedience of a broken abject and base mind and of a man that hath no power over himself as it is then who can deny that allwanton all covetous and lastly all bad people whatsoever are very Slaves CHAP. II. That the most excellent Freedom and Liberty consists in the Observance of the Laws of Righteousness and Goodness more distinctly and particularly demonstrated by three Arguments Of which the First is that this is Freedom from the worst and vilest of Slaveries Where it is shewed in three particulars that the Transgressors of those Laws are the most Slavish Creatures IT may moreover be more distinctly and particularly proved that the most excellent Freedom and Liberty consisteth in the Observance of the Laws of Righteousness and Goodness by these following Arguments First This is Freedom from the worst and vilest of Slaveries Secondly This is the Liberty of the Soul Thirdly This is the Divine Liberty the Liberty of God himself First This is Freedom from the worst and vilest of Slaveries And that there is no such Slavish Creature as he who lives in the transgression of these Laws as the wicked man doth plainly appear in that First His whole man both Soul and Body is inslaved Those who are Slaves in the vulgar sence that are taken captive by the Turk or such like merciless and inhumane Masters are necessarily inslaved only as to their Viler part their Bodies It lieth not in the power of any man on Earth to inslave a Soul The Mind and Will of him who as to his Outward man is the most absolute Vassal to the Lusts of others may retain their Liberty still in spight of them No Tyrant can make me either think or chuse or love or desire what he pleaseth Where all the members of the Body are under constraint the Soul may continue free in all its powers no external Force is able to inthral that But he who lives in disobedience to the Laws of Righteousness is perfectly inslaved his whole man hath lost its Liberty As his Body is at the command and dispose of his Lusts as each of its members are Ministers of Unrighteousness and made to fulfil the will of the flesh so his Soul is subjected to their power and dominion and his Slavery begins there His Mind Will and Affections are first subdued and brought into bondage by fleshly and impure Lusts and then his Body is ingaged in the filthy drudgery of making provision for them of gratifying them and giving satisfaction to them That is the meaning of those words of S. Iames Then when lust hath conceived it bringeth forth sin Chap. 1. 15. Secondly The wicked man is thus subject to the Vilest and Basest of Masters Such a one to repeat those words of Tully doth parere dedecori turpitudini is at the command of vile shame and filthiness it self What is Sordid Covetousness Swinish Lust Beastly Intemperance Devilish Rage and Malice what I say are all these less than so To which I may add those other hateful Qualities of Fraud Dissimulation Envy Pride
and grave Whatsoever things are just or exactly agreeable to the Rule of doing as we would be done unto Whatsoever things are pure or far from all shew and appearance of unchastity Whatsoever things are lovely or which tend to secure to us love among men such as all works of benignity mercy and Charity Whatsoever things are of good report or which are apt to procure a good name and therefore to prevent all the causes of shame and to give us the greatest freedom and confidence as before God so before Men too If there be any virtue if there be any thing that is by Good men reckoned in the number of Virtues And if there be any praise or any thing laudable and praise-worthy All these things as the Apostle in the general here enjoyneth us to think upon them so they are very particularly and as clearly and perspicuously recommended to us to be carefully observed by us in the New Testament There is nothing which it becometh us to Do or Forbear whether in reference to God our Great Creator Governour and Benefactor or to our Fellow-creatures or to our own Souls and Bodies but here we find it Again we may observe all these in our Saviour's Life also wherein He set us an Example that we should follow his steps And it is a most admirable Example of Piety towards God of Love to him Trust in him and Submission to his Will of Charity to all men even his greatest Enemies and of Humility Meekness Temperance Purity Contempt of the World and Heavenly-mindedness He that shall observe how our Blessed Saviour Lived cannot be ignorant of any of those Laws of Righteousness and Goodness which before his coming the World was so lamentably in not a few instances to seek in the knowledge of through that blindness which by the customary gratifying their vile Affections men had generally contracted I say he that is acquainted with the Life of our Saviour cannot easily be ignorant of any of those Laws although he never understood what particular Commands or Prohibitions his Precepts consist of So that this is the First thing Christ Iesus hath done for us in order to our being made Free He hath given us fully to understand what it is to be Free what are those several Rules of Righteousness and Goodness in compliance with which consists our Liberty Secondly Our Saviour hath also prescribed most Effectual Means by making use of which we shall most certainly obtain and maintain this Liberty that is obey those Laws of Liberty which he hath given us These Means are especially Believing himself to be the Son of God and consequently the Truth and Divinity of his Doctrine Hearing his Word and Receiving it into honest hearts or Pondering it in our minds and Meditating upon it with the Design of conforming our selves to it Prayer to God in his Name together with Faith in his Bloud for the Remission of our Sins and in his Power and Goodness for the Subduing our Lusts and the making us Obedient to his Precepts That is for the blessing our Endeavours to that End Setting his Example before our Eyes which is an Excellent Means to beget in us a likeness to him and to our partaking of his Spirit and Temper Watching over our own Hearts and against Temptations Denying our selves and not indulging our Sensitive Part. Advising in all Cases of doubt and difficulty with our Pastors and Spiritual Guides whom Christ hath given to his Church For the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the Edifying of the Body of Christ Ephes. 4. 12. And obeying them which have the Rule over us in the Lord they watching for our Souls as those that must give an Account Heb. 13. 17. Which Duties were never more neglected than in this Age to the great scandal of our Reformed Religion Keeping in the Communion of the Church And not forsaking the Assembling our selves together or our publick Assemblies as the manner of some is Heb. 10. 25. And now is the manner of vast numbers of us though no Terms of Communion are required that contradict any one Text of Scripture which Separation we are too like ere long to pay dear for The Religious observation of the Lords Day both in Publick and Private is another singular Help and Advantage Though few Professors of Christianity seem now to have any great sense of it to the great prejudice of their own Souls and the Souls of those who are under their charge And to these add in the last place because 't is most convenient to place them here The Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper By Baptism we are admitted into the Church of Christ and brought into a New State We are baptized into the name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost or devoted to their service And the Father in this Sacrament takes us into his special care and into the Relation of his Children whereas before we were only the Children of Adam The Son receives us as members of his Body the Church We are baptized into one Body as the Apostle speaks 1 Cor. 12. 13. that Body whereof Christ is the Head And the Holy Ghost who is the Author of Grace and Spiritual Life taketh us for his Temples We are said to Receive the Holy Ghost in Baptism to receive that power and strength from him which will enable us to Mortifie the deeds of the Body and to acquire the Divine Graces and Virtues which we shall certainly do if we refuse not to Exert and Improve it when we come to years of Discretion and our Faculties are ripe enough for that purpose In Baptism the Holy Spirit communicates to us the Beginnings of a new life which may afterwards be improved to large measures of Virtue and Goodness if we be not wilfully wanting to our selves in the other Means And in the Lords Supper as we renew the Covenant we made in Baptism to renounce the Devil and all his works c. So all worthy Receivers of that Sacrament receive great additions of Grace and Spiritual Strength are fed with the spiritual food of the most Precious Body and Bloud of Christ. And of all the Means prescribed for the Subduing our Lusts and Growing in Grace the Frequent Receiving the Lord's Supper is very deservedly accounted the Principal Certainly there is not any Ordinance wherein sincere Souls do so experiment the Communications of the Holy Spirit by which they are so Strengthened with strength in their Souls Nor are there any such Strong and Spriteful Christians any so confirmed and rooted in Goodness in the love of God and their Neighbour and all the Christian Virtues as those who take all occasions to attend upon it with a thankful sense of the infinite love of God and Christ to them and sincerely design in so doing a fuller participation of the Divine nature But this intimation that these two Sacraments are conveyances of Grace and Strength leads me to shew that
Thirdly Our Saviour hath moreover purchased for us a rich supply of Grace to enable us to use the forementioned Means with happy success He hath obtained from his Father by his Perfect Obedience both Active and Passive Authority to send the Holy Ghost powerfully to assist us and hath assured us that those who ask him shall have him in those most excellent and most comfortable words Luke 11. 11 12 13. If a Son shall ask bread of any that is a Father will he give him a stone Or if he ask a fish will he for a fish give him a Serpent Or if he shall ask an Egge will he offer him a Scorpion If ye then being evil know how to give good gifts unto your Children how much more shall your Heavenly Father give his holy Spirit unto them that ask him And if any of us want the Holy Spirit 's Assistance it is certainly because we either pray not at all for it or not with a sincere and earnest desire that he should root up and destroy every Evil Affection in our Souls Because we are secretly unwilling to let go some beloved lust or other And because we are false to God and our own Souls in those things which he hath put into our Power For 't is certain that not to put forth the power we have already received and yet complain for want of strength is to play the Hypocrities and no wonder if the Holy Spirit of God doth estrange himself and withhold or withdraw his blessed Influences from such persons But as for those who are faithful so far as those Talents reach which they are at present intrusted with our Lord hath promised them that more shall be given them That is the meaning of those words Mark 4. 25. He that hath to him shall be given That is that useth what he hath for no man properly hath or possesseth what he makes no use of 't would be the same thing to him to be without it Nay our Lord doth not only promise to him that hath that more shall be given him but also that he shall have abundantly more Matth. 13. 12. For whosoever hath to him shall be given and he shall have more abundance And he repeats this Chap. 25. 29. And if we were not through wilfulness and carelesness wanting to our selves in putting forth that measure of strength we have as sure as Iesus is the Christ we should fully experiment the truth of this promise We should then feel the Divine Spirit working in us mightily as the Apostle S. Paul saith he did Col. 1. 29. The great things that are spoken concerning the Spirit and of what he shall do in the hearts of men would be then punctually fulfilled in us and we should be satisfied by happy experience that they are not mere words the Holy Ghost would not fail to do all that for us he was sent by our Lord to do It is to be acknowledged with great sadness that both Fleshly and Spiritual Lusts are exceedingly strong and vigorous even in the generality of those that profess Christianity as well as in others and no less than in others that are Strangers to our Religion But this never to be enough lamented Evil doth not proceed from hence that grace is denied to the generality but 't is wholly to be imputed to their Receiving the grace of God in vain and wilfully refusing to comply therewith It is not at all to be ascribed to the Spirits refusing to perform his Office in them or to do in their behalf what doth belong to him but to their refusing to do their part This we are as fully assured of from abundance of Texts of Scripture as we can desire to be The same is to be said of mens so ordinarily falling again and again into those sins which they frequently Pray and Resolve and Vow against This is far from being the account of it that God is not willing to hear their prayers For as S. Iohn speaks 1 Epist. 5. 14. This is the confidence that we have in him that if we ask any thing according to his will he heareth us and to ask victory over our Lusts is of all Petitions most agreeable to his will This cannot be the reason of it that the Holy Spirit refuseth to inforce his Preventing or Prevenient with his Assisting Grace that he will not assist some persons in the performance of those good Resolutions which his Preventing Grace hath excited in their Souls But this is the true account hereof viz. Such Persons are undoubtedly wanting in the use of some Necessary Means or other for the subduing their Lusts they do not use all the means our Lord hath appointed and are especially faulty in neglecting particularly the great duty of Consideration They pray it may be very frequently and earnestly too that God would give them strength against this or that Corruption and they add Vows to their Prayers but they add not Consideration to their Prayers and Vows they watch not over themselves disregard the first motions of their Wills and inclinations of their Souls towards the sins or sin they so Pray Resolve and Vow against and are not careful to avoid Temptations And as inconsideration is the chiefest cause of unsuccessfulness in the use of means for the subduing of Corrupt Affections so the gross neglect of that grand Means the Lords Supper but now discoursed of which I hope in no Age nor among any people professing Christianity was ever so common as to our great shame it is in this Age and this Nation this gross neglect I say is questionless a very great cause of so much Non-proficiency in attendance on other Ordinances as is complained of Which Nonproficiency may well be notwithstanding the Promises of the plentiful Effusion of the Spirit and our Saviour's purchasing so rich a supply of Grace for us For our Saviour is no such Friend to Negligence and Carelesness as to dispense his Grace in such a way and manner as that it must necessarily be a motive and encouragement to do nothing or but little our selves But on the contrary he so communicates his Grace and Strength as to make it a great Exciter and Quickner of Endeavours Of this S. Paul assures us in making God's working in us to will and to do or his readiness so to do an argument to perswade us to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling Phil. 2. 12. Lastly As our Saviour hath purchased for us a rich supply of Grace for the Enabling us to use the Means of our Deliverance with happy success so he hath given us the most powerful Motives and Arguments that can be imagined to prevail upon our Wills to comply and cooperate with this Grace And these Arguments are not only proposed outwardly to us in his Gospel but they are also inforced inwardly upon our hearts as appears by what hath been now said by his Holy Spirit That is they are inforced upon the
which purpose I will add this passage of Clemens Alexandrinus To submit and give place to evil Affections is extreme Slavery as to overcome them is the only Liberty Nor can the best place in the World not Heaven it self or the most Glorious outward circumstances make that person Happy or not Miserable within whom all is amiss and out of order and who is indued with no good Habit or Temper of Mind A diseased Body will be uneasie do what you can to it and so will diseased Souls These things considered 't is the most Amazing thing that any who call themselves Christians can entertain such a Notion as this of Christian Liberty the directly contrary being the whole Design and Business of Christianity And yet for all that we find it as Ancient as the Apostles days there were those so early that did not only Teach it but Practised upon it that used their Liberty for a cloak of Maliciousness and turned the Grace of God into lasciviousness But 't is no over-bold saying that if this could be really proved to be a Liberty of Christ's bringing into the World there is no Good man but would abhor the Christian Religion But the Antinomians not to make worse of them than they are tell us that they do not deny the Obligation of Christians to the performance of the Duties required by the Moral Law but 't is only Love Gratitude and ingenuity that can oblige them Which is as much as to say that they are not obliged to them in strict Justice or as they are the Matter of a Law But alas they very little mend the matter by this Salvo nay their Doctrine is of the same dangerous consequence with it that it is without it For First It destroys all the Gospel Precepts makes them insignificant and idle things They being all Moral either in themselves or in their Design Secondly It takes off all Obligation to Love Ingenuity and Gratitude You say you are not bound to be Righteous Charitable Temperate c. by any other Law than that of Love and Gratitude But by what Law are you obliged to the Love of God and Christ to be Grateful to them and to have an Ingenuous Thankful Sense of the Great things they have done for you You must say by no Law at all seeing you make these the only Law of Christians And if you are obliged to these things by no Law how are they Duties And perswade a man once that they are not Duties and 't will be very strange if he make any Conscience of Love and Gratitude And then there is nothing left to hold him in from committing all manner of wickedness with greediness whensoever the Tempter or his Lusts solicite him and opportunities are offered to him But besides they have another Doctrine and 't is that upon which this strange wild Notion is founded which takes away all necessity of being Grateful and Ingenuous viz. That the Righteousness of Christ is Formally and not only in its Fruits and Effects a Believers so that He hath done all that the Law requires in the Believers stead or as Personating him This is their Sence of those words lately cited I came not to destroy the Law but to fulfil it so that Christ having fulfilled the Law as the Believers Representative he hath fulfilled it himself in Christ. And Christs Active and Passive Obedience is his both as to Matter and Principle and therefore Christs Love and Gratitude are his Love and Gratitude and all those Graces which so shined forth in Christ are the Believers in their very Formality and Essential nature Now what should ail those that can down with this strange stuff to boggle at believing that they have no need at all of any other Love Ingenuity or Gratitude than what is thus imputed to them And therefore you see that their talking of the Law of Love and Gratitude is but a pitiful shift and will do nothing towards the deliverance of their Doctrine of Freedom from the Moral Law from the necessary tendency it is charged with to the letting the Reins loose and opening the Flood-gates to all Ungodliness I exceedingly wonder how it is possible for People that have not first lost their Wits to embrace an Opinion so apparently Destructive of Christianity and of all Religion and all this while profess themselves Christians and the onely Christians too But I have bestowed too much time in the Confutation of this Hateful Notion of Christian Liberty it being as ridiculously silly as it is wicked And it being as evident to him that knows any thing of the Gospel that it is Antichristian Licentiousness as that there is any such thing as Christian Liberty Poor Souls They little understand what Liberty meaneth who are able to talk or think at this rate In short He that believes that true Christians are delivered by the Sufferings of Christ from the Curse due to the Transgressors of this Law believes most truly but whosoever believes they are delivered from the Power it had to oblige to the Duties thereof or that any man can be so delivered thinks most wickedly and thinks most madly CHAP. XIII A Second False Notion of Christian Liberty viz. That which makes it to consist in Freedom from the Obligation of those Laws of Men which enjoyn or forbid indifferent things This Notion differently managed by the Defenders of it First Some extend it so far as to make it to reach to all Humane Laws the matter of which are things indifferent Secondly Others limit it to those which relate to Religion and the Worship of God The 23. Vers. of the 7. Chap. of the 1 Epist. to the Corinthians cleared from giving any Countenance to either of these Opinions The Former of them Confuted by three Arguments And the Latter by four Vnder the Second of which several Texts of Scripture which are much insisted upon in the defence thereof are taken into Consideration An unjust Reflection upon the Church of England briefly replied to And this Principle that the imposing of things indifferent in Divine Worship is no Violation of Christian Liberty proved to be no ways Serviceable to Popery by considering what the Popish Impositions are in Three Particulars SEcondly We are next to speak to that Notion of Christian Liberty which makes it to consist in Freedom from those Laws of Men that command or forbid Indifferent things i. e. Things neither good nor evil in their own nature nor required or prohibited by any Law of God This Notion is differently managed by the Defenders of it First Some extend it to all Humane laws the Matter of which are things Indifferent Secondly Others limit it to those which relate to Religion onely and the Worship of God But what proof is there of Christ's having purchased such a Liberty as this Or that Christians are made Free from such Laws in either of these Sences There is one Text insisted on by both of these Parties for each
of God the Powers that be are ordained of God whosoever therefore Resisteth the Power Resisteth the Ordinance of God c. So that all we assert is this that we are bound to obey our lawful Governours for God's sake who hath invested them with the Authority they have over us and commanded us to obey those Laws of theirs which are not contradictory to any of His. Nor do we say that Humane Authority can make more Duties or Sins than God hath made or to speak properly and strictly can make any thing to be a Duty or Sin for it can only Command or Forbid and what it Commands if lawful the Divine Authority makes it a Duty and what it Forbids if not a Duty the Divine Authority makes it a Sin Or to speak in the words of the Learned Bishop Taylor Humane Authority doth not make the action of disobedience to be a Sin It makes that the not compliance of the Subject is Disobedience but it is the Authority of God which makes Disobedience to be a Sin And what immediately follows deserves also to be transcribed in this place viz. And though no Humane Power can give or take Grace away yet we may remember that we our selves throw away God's Grace or abuse it or neglect it when we will not make use of it to the purposes of Humility Charity and Obedience all which are concerned in our Subordination to the Laws There is also this difference between the Obligations of Divine and Humane Laws viz. The Divine Laws bind our Thoughts and the Sense of our Minds they bind us not onely to obey them but to think them also Wise and Good Laws But so do not Humane Laws they oblige onely to Obedience but not to the thinking them such as ought or are fit to be imposed A man may think a Humane Law imprudent or unreasonable and be guilty of no Transgression if notwithstanding he complies with it I mean provided he keeps his thoughts to himself or does not make them publick The forementioned Worthy Prelate layeth down no sewer than Ten or Eleven differences of Divine and Humane Laws in their obligation in his Ductor Dubitantium Whether they will all hold or no or may not be reduced to a smaller number I will not take upon me to say but thither I refer the Reader And thus much may serve to be spoken to the First thing premised viz. That Conscience is not so Sacred a thing as to be uncapable of being bound by Humane Laws Secondly I premise also that no man can be deprived properly of the true Liberty of his Conscience by any Power on Earth I mean without his own consent no Mortal nor any Creature is able to invade it This will appear by considering what that is which is called Conscience Conscience is The Mind of a man considered as possessed with certain practical principles and comparing his own actions with those principles doth according as he finds them agreeing or disagreeing with them judge of himself either absolve or condemn himself So that there are three Offices of Conscience The first is That of assenting to and embracing certain practical principles as Laws for the governing a man's self The second is That of comparing ones self or actions with those Rules or Principles The third That of passing judgment of ones self accordingly Now that is properly Liberty of Conscience and that onely which relates to the execution of these three Offices But the Acts of Conscience in executing these Offices being all Internal and within a mans Soul how can its Liberty in exerting those Acts be infringed by any Humane Power What Earthly Power can make me Assent to or believe what it pleaseth Can so give Laws to my Conscience as to necessitate me to receive them for such and to think them good Laws and safe to steer my Actions by Again how can any such Power deprive me of my Liberty to compare my Actions with such Rules as I think I am obliged to be governed by And having reflected upon my self and actions and made this comparison how can any such Power abridge me of Liberty to Absolve my self if I find my actions agreeing with those Rules or to Condemn my self if I find the contrary Can make me Condemn when I ought to Acquit my self or Acquit when I see reason to Condemn my self So that the Liberty which is with so much heat contended for by some and inveighed against by others under the name of Liberty of Conscience is truly and properly Liberty of Practice not of Conscience And the great thing in contest is Whether a Liberty of doing what a man's Conscience tells him he ought to do and of forbearing what it tells him he ought to forbear be an inviolable Right and not to be invaded by Humane Authority This being the true state of the Question I shall endeavour an Answer thereunto in these following Propositions Prop. 1. That there are two Extremes about this matter to be carefully avoided First That of Asserting an unlimited Liberty of practising according to a mans Conscience Secondly That of over-great severity in Restraining this Liberty First As to the Extreme of Asserting an unlimited Liberty of practising according to a man's Conscience This will appear to be an Extreme indeed and a very wild and mad one if we consider that there is scarcely any thing so extravagant or wicked but the Consciences of some or other may urge them to it Nay it is certain that men have pretended Conscience for some of the most impious and most villanous actions in the World So the Papists have done among our selves we all know And another sort of People too whose principles though very bad were better than theirs And it is not possible for us to know that their pretences of Conscience were mâ—re pretences Nor is it hard for us to perswade our selves that through the just judgment of God for past provocations the Spirit of delusion may be permitted to have such power over some mens Consciences as that they shall call evil good and good evil put darkness for light and light for darkness and bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter for we find a Woe pronounced against such as do so Esay 5. 20. which there would not have been if there were no such men nor could be And it is said of some 2 Thess. 2. 10 11 12. that Because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved God shall send them or permit to be sent them strong delusions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strength of delusion that they should believe a lie That they all might be damned who believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness Our Saviour foretold his Disciples Iohn 16. 2. that The time cometh that whosoever killeth you will think that he doth God service That is the time is coming when men shall kill you out of Conscience As no doubt the Papists have done