from Presbyters pag. 21. arrogate unto themselves the sole power of Ordaining Ministers and to be the chief Conservators Cisterns and Conduits of Ecclesiastical authority and Ministerial power page 12. who have not only Precedency and Order but paternal authority page 18. and that not only over people but their Pastors who are by this antithesis fraternal with them and so fillial to the paternal power of the Bishops and make up the paternal fraternal and filial unity of Bishops Presbyters and people pa. 5. Nay in opposition to whom the ordinary Minister or Presbyter is divested of all power and degraded of all dignity among the people and the Bishop as dignified above him so distinguished from him by his Lawn sleeves which is plainly suggested when he tells us The people of England are not to be governed by their equals and inferiors because they are in black Coats page 17. All these expressions with many of the like nature do seem to set up and point out such an Episcopacy as is not Primitive and Regular And I say if this be the meaning of his Episcopacy as the word in the vulgar acceptation by the too long appropriation of it to such an unjust and Anti-christian frame of Government may be understood Truly Sir then I must be free to tell him the sence and very Letter of the Covenant is clear against it and binds the taker in terminis to the extirpation of Prelacy that is to say the Government by Arch-Bishops Bishops their Chancellors and Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-Deacons and all other Ecclesiastical Officers depending on that Hierarchy So that it is the thing not its abuse the subject not its adjuncts the Fabrick not its defects and excesses is covenanted against nor will the Covenant be accomplished or the conscience be satisfied by the removal of the pride presumption dulnesse covetousnesse and tyranny of Bishops whilst the preheminence prerogative paternal power and juridical authority assumed by them as distinct from and above all other Ministers of the Gospel as the only immediate Successours of the Apostles and enforced by their High Commission and starchamher with other imperial Courts Officers and proceedings are continued and established nor must he think by his Sophistical comparison to deceive and delude the conscience telling us page 17 18. That they that Covenanted against Popery cannot think they did abjure or must abhorre all those saving truths and duties of Christianity which are mixed with Popery for whatsoever is formal popery though it be an English Masse or Altar that all that though only that must be abhorred and I conceive it yet remains to be proved that the paternal authority of Episcopacy is a saving truth or Christian duty or not of the formality of prelacy and that government covenanted against It is no hard case of conscience to resolve whether a man may use the good and substantial materials of a destroyed Fabrick but I conceive it an high fallacy from thence to impose the very form resolved against You see Sir at what uncertainty we are left whilst the object of the obligation is propounded under a general term whose proper primitive and genuine signification suggests one thing and the vulgar and long-used acceptation suggests another and our resolution is darkned by the multitude of expressions concluding sometimes one and sometimes the other thing which of these shall a conscientious Covenanter embrace You cannot Sir but know the work of a Casuist is to be full and clear in the discovery of the Ratio formalis thing or matter concerning which the conscience conceiveth it self obliged and that it is a great unhappiness in an Interpreter and much greater in a Casuist to resolve obscura per obscuriora But Sir that I may testifie my willingness to understand him and cement what in me lieth the sad differences in the Church Shall I intreat you will please to provoke the Dr. and his Anti-covenant brethren such as seem to advance and promote an Episcopacy scrupled by Covenanters to speak out and clearly to declare whether they will admit the removal of the Government by Arch-Bishops and that late Hierarchy which he concludes page 18 is dead and must rise in another quality and according to what is suggested in the Reduction by him urged consent to the establishment of Congregational Classical Provincial and National Assembâ—ies oâ— Synods of Church-Officers Presbytarial Episcopacy admitted Communi concilio Presbyterorâ—m to debate and determine the affairs of the Church and exercise all Acts of discipline and Ecclesiastick power In each of which if there be Ignatius his Angel Tertullian his Summus sacerdos or Armagh's Bishop or Super-intendent for order-sake to call Assemblies propound questions gather suffrages require Order and composure in audience and debate pronounce sentence and sign Decrees and to be fixed in that place enjoying all the dignities thereto belonging and to be distinguished by some special denomination from his Chorepiscopi or Colleagues they shall not only enjoy my consent who I hope make conscience of the Covenant but also endeavour which I think will not much need that all the Covenanted Ministers may joyne with them in a Petition to His Majesty that by a Synod by His Majesties Authority called it may be speedily consulted and concluded on under which I doubt not but the Peace of the Church will be preserved and power truth and godliness promoted But if nothing will serve them but Bishops distinct in Office from Presbyters and exercising over them a paternal authority appropriating to themselves the power of ordaining Ministers Domineering Prelacy refused and the succession ro the Apostles and the Jurisdiction before noted we must intreat him to produce those clear pregnant and constant beams of right reason and true Religion which shineth in the brightness and stability of Divine and Humane Laws which may be the pillars of this truth firm supports of duty sure bounds of obedience and safe repose of conscience in this point greatly darkned by the many disputes of Bishops and Presbyters Papists and Protestants nay by the positive assertions of both Papists and Protestant Divines and determinations of Schoolmen who have concluded Bishops and Presbyters to be Ministers ejusdem ordinis equal in Office and authority and in this very case of government all which his very Reduction proposed doth not obscurely suggest Sir the conscience is by him confessed to be more tender than to be deluded with Sophistry or silenced by a pretence of Regulation and Moderation which intends no other save a Reduction of Episcopacy to its pristine and corrupt estate not unto Presbytery Thus Sir I have noted the first Rock and the Doctor 's unhappy dashing against it which must needs render ineffectual whatever he after writeth The inadvertency of his expressions will appear no less evident Inadvertency of expression than his ambiguous state of the Scruple and its resolution if we either observe its fierceness or falsehood The
it may not the very Ligue de Saint in France and Oath et caetera in England though sinful in their matter be good Spurres and Directions in Christian-policy May not the same means used to corroborate impiety be lawfully and prudentially used to strengthen true Religion and Reformation Why may not Popish policy teach Protestants to combine by Covenant as Protestant piety and prudence did dictate to them a Confirmation in Religion by Chatechising Courses common to men are not to be condemned because used by wicked men to wicked ends None Sir do deny the Covenant made in Baptisme to be the only new evangelical Covenant tò all Christians broken by wilful and presumptuous sins and renewed by repentance and the participation of the Lords Supper But it seems unto me a strange transport of so grave and serious a Divine to oppose it unto the Solemn League and Covenant that piece of policy rather than piety Baptismal Covenant no bar to the Solemne League and Covenant as he is pleased to term it The inconsistency of them I must confess is not to me visible sure I am Baptismal Vows are no bar but may be provocations to Solemn covenanting to and with God Let the matter of this Covenant be exactly scanned and if it be in any one Article found repugnant to or different from the Covenant made in Baptism we will renounce the whole I hope it will not be denyed that Baptized Nations and Churches may in their publique and politique capacities renew and amplifie that Covenant which was made in Baptisme And truly Sir the Solemn League and Covenant seems to me so little to differ from our Baptismal Covenant that it is no hard matter to resolve it into those three grand Heads we are instructed were promised in our names when we were Baptized and then all the difference will be in this the Baptismal Covenant was personal and private this publique and politique But I pray let us note his specification of the difference he suggesteth and the Reasons of this inconsistency he urgeth which he supposeth to be a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 crying out How vastly different from this Sacred covenant this late piece of policy more than piety is and how little the true Covenant of a Christian binds him by his Baptisme or Repentance or the Eucharist against all Episcopal government I leave all sober-minded Christians to judge Truly Sir his universal particle All may make something look like a vast difference if we could but understand the species he would pitch upon as excepted by his discretive term but the uncertainty of the object is that we cannot but stumble at in all the conclusions of his suggested answers Methinks such an out-cry of vast difference should have been warranted by a clear antithesis Opposites cannot appear but by their opposition and yet he specifies no one Article different from our Baptismal Covenant but sophistically evades with an How little do Baptismerepentance or the Eucharist bind against all Episcopal government These may Sir very little binde against it and yet the Covenant and they be at no vast difference for the question is not how little the true Covenant in them agitated binds against all Episcopal government but how much it binds to any He is the first Divine I have found to plead our Baptisme as the bond of Canonical obedience and defence of Episcopacy I never did imagine Discipline and order to be the express positive condition of Baptisme and the Christian-Covenant thereby made qua Christian the only new Evangelical Covenant but especially this species of it Episcopacy I hope his jus divinum will be made as clear as the Doctrine of the Trinity whil'st it is and must be owned as the absolute condition of Baptisme and nerve of union with the Church Yet Sir give me leave to tell the Doctor if the late Hierarchy or Episcopacy of England which he seems to advance as the late honour of the Ministry and encouragement of Learning and Religion be as on an easie discussion it may be found to be of the pomps and vanities of this wicked world we are not only a little but very much bound against it for our God-fathers and God-mothers did promise in our behalf That we should forsake them as the Devil and all his works and then he may well imagine all sober-minded Christians must judge there is a vast difference between Baptisme and such Episcopacy and that he is acted with a strong zeal that will by our Baptisme binde unto it who yet declared it to be but a tradition and universal observation But he addes a reason to enforce it and that is Since both the power of ordaining Ministers and by them to consecrate and celebrate both Sacraments Of the power of ordination by Bishops was ever derived from and by Bishops of the Church as the chief Conservaters Cisterns and Conduits of all Ecclesiastical authority and Ministerial power from the very Apostles the first Bishops of the Church Acts 1 c. But Sir is it determined and agreed on without controversie that the power of ordination was ever derived by and from Bishops in his sence paternal Bishops above and distinct from Presbyters that so it must be concluded No ordination by Bishops no Minister no consecration or celebration of either Sacrament and so where these Conservators Conduits Cisterns were never laid or have been any way cut off Ecclesiastical authority and Ministerial power never came or is removed and quite gone for without doubt this water must run in its own Pipes Were it not for that subordination and dependance of ordinary Ministers Shepherds and Rulers unto and upon the Angels Presidents and chief Fathers of his Episcopal authority he at after noteth I should by his adjunct Chief have conceived that he would grant Some small Pipes had run from the Apostles times in union with Christ our chief Bishop and drived Ecclesiastical authority and Ministerial power in the vacancy of his Bishops which if he deny the Church of Rome will triumph in his Episcopal union with her but the Reformed Churches can give him little thanks for this Church annihilating Notion Again is it cleare that Episcopal and Apostolical Ministry is idem ordo the same kinde distinct from that of Pastors and Teachers it must be imagined so to be whil'st Bishops only as Bishops lay so much claim to the immediate succession of the Apostles That the Apostles had an Episcopacy we cannot deny for we reade of it in Acts 1. 20. Nor I think can it be reasonably denyed that the feeding-Ruling Elders at Ephesus were Bishops for so Saint Paul called them as consecrated by the Holy Ghost Acts 20. 28. and immediate successors to the Apostles yet it is not evident that they were all Angels Presidents and chief Fathers and such as set Timothy over them as their Bishop must needs deny them so to have been and then Sir some that wanted this paternal authority
must be confessed Cisterns of Ministerial power and Ecclesiastical authority and immediate successors to the Apostles and so the Bond of Baptisme binds to Gospel-Ministers as the explicite and preceptive institution of Christ whil'st Episcopal order can claim no more but tradition and that very disputable the Prelatical Divines of our Nation would not be thus tyed to the observation of the Lords day nor I to the observation of Easter yet both these especially the first look as like an immediate institution of Christ preceptive and explicite or tacite and exemplary as any order or kinde of Episcopacy he suggesteth to be upheld by the bond of baptisme As to what the Doctor addeth concerning the signal and intolerable injuries offered to the persons of such excellent Bishops as England lately had and still may have and the abatement of the honour of this whole Church and its Ministry c. I wish it may be considered That the Covenant is not levelled against any Real Excellency in the Bishops but an unwarrantable greatness power and authority assumed by them or attributed to them which conferred an unfitting honour on the Church and then the exclusion of it is no injury and the mighty abatement thereof is a positive duty I cannot think but that learning and the due honour of the Church may and will be best encouraged by the vailing of that pompous worldly state and wicked superiority her Governours had obtained the Churches perspicuity seems not to me so necessary that it must needs shine in Lawn Sleeves and succession of Bishops of paternal authority over their brethren nor know I to what Churches save those of Rome who make the Succession of their Bishops the sole and singular Note of the true Church a Supersedeas of such Episcopal order how ancient or venerable soever it be deemed can be so scandalous as is suggested I am sure few of the Reformed Churches see cause so to judge it and then Sir we finde little force in this his complicated Answer Thus Sir I have made bold to consider the Doctors indirect answer and arguments wherein he endeavoureth to shake and subvert the whole fabrick of the Solemn League and Covenant and in them to my judgement there is so little strength of Reason or true Religion that it affords but a poor ground for his insulting and triumphant discharge in page 13. These things being thus premised are sufficient as I conceive to abate the Edge and Rigour of the Covenant and to ravel that cabel and bond of Religious obligation For Sir notwithstanding his supposal asserted in good earnest there is neither Law of God or man requiring imposing or comprobating any such Covenant The Boanergesses will finde cause to thunder out terrour against Covenant-breaking lest Rhetorical flourishes without strength of Reasons should release the consciences of the vulgar from the power of religious bonds It may be Sir we shall finde more strength in the Doctors down-right stroaks His direct answer than in his back-blows His batteries in his indirect answers attempted have bespoken his purpose to break in sunder the Sacred bond of the Covenant His power to effect it in point of Episcopacy must appear in his direct Answer wherein we thank him he looks on the Covenant in the softest sence that can be made as it is a voluntary vow or Religious bond which private men spontaneously took upon themselves c. But yet he suggesteth it was taken by very few not one fourth part of the Nation now living and those few made to take it by the terrors of prison plunder sequestration and the like wracks Unto which before we observe his particular reconciling Answers relating to the special point of Episcopacy I propound to consideration that The paucity of Covenantets will not discharge its obligation be there never so few I hope those few may be free in asserting and must be faithful in adhering to the Covenant in which their confidence may be the greater for that His most Sacred Majesty comes in to make up the number But if the Doctor saw with my eyes he would not suppose the number to be so small if all Tables were as legible as those of the Lords and Commons I believe their number would be found many more than the fourth part of the Nation But can any considerable observer take notice the Covenant was imposed on and submitted unto by all sorts and degrees of men in all Counties Cities and Towns tendred and since testified by their publique subscriptions by the most Ministers in the several Counties unto their individual Congregations and that under the success of War which usually extendeth a Covenant unto all who come under its influence and yet without the supposal of a very great mortality imagine not the fourth part of the Nation to have taken the Covenant The Doctor sure judgeth by such with whom he converseth and I easily believe they are not a fourth part of the Nation yet methinks he himself being to be reckoned into the number might well conjecture them to be more But again Sir the capacity of the Covenanters is more considerable than the number and will make it a question well worth consideration Whether it be not obligatory to the whole Nation When I consider the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled and under that notion and capacity swearing the Covenant as the collective body of the Nation though not near a fourth part in number I am apt to think it looks very like a National Obligation For I know not how they can take pardons if they may not make promises in our names especially when the assent of His Most Sacred Majesty is made so legible by His Royal Subjection to the same Solemn League and Covenant I am much mistaken if the Oath of Zedekiah and the Princes without popular delegates did not binde the people of Israel I hope the Doctor will be more warie than to plunge the whole Kingdome into perjury That there was any such Logick as Prisons Plunder and Sequestrations to enforce the Covenant I am not well-pleased I hope he had more fortitude than to suffer his Reason and Religion to be so captivated he knoweth the will cannot be compelled and I imagine he will not make extortion by force any more than fraude absolve the Obligation and warrant the recession or violation of an Oath he knows that Nature and Scripture do teach the contrary whatever was Cicero's affection to him he knows wherein he commends Pomponius the Tribune as to his extorted Oath nor will a Casuist deny Juramentum metu extorium to bind greater force can besiege none to the making of an Oath nor greater fury from God follow any for breaking the oath so forced than that which befell Zedekiah to the King of Babylon But let us see by what strength of Reason he worketh out release from this voluntary vow that we may be also free-men and it is produced by several suggestions where of The
first is a clear sophism or charm to vulgar conception Words in oaths do bind They are not saith he the bare words of the Covenant which as charmes can binde any mans conscience to or against any thing It is very true for they may be historically read or repeated by such who are not capable of or concerned in the obligation But Sir if as in our case the words be uttered as expressions of the mind and declarations of the purpose and resolve of the heart to engage God and men to expectation of performance I hope they then binde and that not only because the matter is just true and good but also because declared Is not engagement of expectation in others unto the Obligation of our selves the end of speech in Promises and Oaths whence else is that Caution of Casuists That the words of an oath be plaine and clear and commonly used and understood that the fallacy thereof may fall I wonder at the Doctors Antithesis of words unto the Reason Justice Truth Religion and Duty which we deny not morally and really to oblige men either by Gods generalor particular precepts but yet I cannot believe them to be as Iron or Adamantine bands to chuse good and do it to hate evil and eschew it long before the Wit hs and Cords of mans combining or tying are put upon them by themselves or others This sounds in my ears like new Divinity and morality too oh the folly of Nations who confide more in the Wit hs and Cords of words promises Covenants than in the Iron and Adamantine bonds of Truth Justice and Duty I must confess I was so foolish as to fancy my self bound to an Act because good iust true duty but much faster bound because promised or sworne and I have known many men boggle at an Oath or Promise and fear to break it who would make no bones of Reason Truth Justice Duty but snap them in sunder like a single tie and methinks the Scripture placeth a great deale of firength in the words of a Vow or Oath Deut. 23. 23. That which is gone out of thy lips thou shalt keep and performe as thou hast vowed it willingly unto the Lord thy God for thou hast spoken it with thy mouth And sure there was most Adamantine strength in the words of Jephtah which put him into that agony and constrained that Out-cry I have opened my mouth unto the Lord and cannot go back Judges 11. 35. If Oaths and Promises are but wit hs and cords I marvel at the course and customs of Nations to lay them each on other as the only grounds of confidence and I much more wonder mens faith should be more fixed in Gods promises than properties and God though under the Iron bonds of his own mercy justice truth yet for assurance-sake should bring himself under the wit hs and cords of Promise and Oath and then tell us by two immutable things wherein it is impossible Gods should ly we should have strong consolation Heb. 6. 18. His second suggestion is to me no less strange than the first Every mans oath binds by his own imagination viz. Nor can any such Covenant binde any man in any conscienti us bond meerely by the power of a mans own imagination I am sure it can never binde him by the power of another mans imagination Oaths ought to be in words significant whose sence may be obvious to every common capacity shuffling and shifting the sence and signification of an Oath is the snare and perplexity of conscience policy of Hell and Sophistry of the Devil Men must be careful to understand every Religious tie and bond and not list to conceive by prejudice and presumption yet if his own imagination be not that which must guide and binde him I am mistaken I expect men to see with their own eyes and be saved by their own faith and did ever conceive discourse interpretation instruction and argumentation to intend not a Magisterial imposition but information of the minde which might engender a right imagination for men to follow I know not Sir what your Casuist may make of an erroneous conscience but Dr. Ames hath taught us Conscientia quamvis errans semper ligat ille peccat qui aegit contra conscientiam an erroneous conscience doth alwayes bind so that he sins who acts contrary thereunto which cannot be unless the Covenant bind by the power of a mans own imagination His third Answer I do confess is drawn with some considerable strength Oaths bind not to the injury of another for no Covenant can binde us to the injurie of anothers right liberty power or lawful authority private or publique except such as are sui juris involved in himself and so per accidens are hindred and hurt in and by them which I believe he understands for Sir it loseth its strength in the assumption for it appears not that the xtirpation of Prelacy as it is expressed in the Covenant doth take away the liberty power and lawfull authority of King Bishops or Parliament himself tells us the Covenant was levelled against the despoticum tyrannicum Regimem and I have before noted that it is the unwarrantable pomp and power and unlawful authority and superiority of the Bishops above other Ministers which is excluded and to be extirpated by the Covenant untell the Object is agreed on the force of this Argument may well fall Yet give me leave to tell the Doctor it is worth his enquiry whether the power of the King for restitution and of the Bishops for execution and administration of Episcopacie lately acted in England and now endeavoured to be restored be not fully and actually by a just lawfull and compleat Authority abolished and taken away by the statute of 17 Caroli repealing that whole branch of the statute primo Elizabethae which authorized the jurisdiction of Episcopacy and barreth his most sacred Majesty from giving Commissions thereunto and forbidding all Ranks and Orders Ecclesiastical from acting upon any such Commission in any matter or thing whatsoever Sir most men think that this power was lawful and the Hierarchy of England was sui juris too and within the power of King Lords and Commons and this discharge of Episcopacy to have been no injury and to have been acted long before the Covenant did exist and so the Covenant was but an enforcement of this Law and then Sir if there be a Parliament which may look upon Bishops and Episcopacy with a more propitious eye than those who beheld it through the Presbyterian spectacles it will be worth enquiry whether the Covenant as is before noted be not a National Covenant and bindeth not the Parliament from propounding and praying and his most sacred Majesty from assenting unto the re-establishment thereof and so whether the present actings of some Bishops and Deans be not without Legal and just authority and the imposing or endeavouring to return that by Statute abolished and
not the very best 3. To pity the Bishops and Fathers of the Church who have been there too injurious or injuriously used and pull down all proud Prelates and paternal authoritie over Presbyters which abuse their brethren and debase their Ministry because in a black Coat 4. To encourage Ministers and endeavour the rescue of them from dividing factions and popular insolencies which have befaln them for want of the King and Ecclesiastical order but may be enjoyed without a Bishop advanced in power above his Brethren 5. Love to the Church in endeavouring its unity peace and prosperity in the ruine of Prelacy and establishment of an Episcopacy and over-sight duely constituted and carefully executed 6. Care to his own soul inward and eternal peace not to be couzened by glosses courted by Rhetorical flourishes nor cudgelled out of his Covenant by most bitter sufferings but to cleave unto it with care constancy and diligence and take heed of all sophistical solutions and subtle reconciliations which endeavour to baffle the Covenant and break in pieces the very power of all Religious bonds Sir Knowing how under and dclicate a thing Conscience is yet fearing it might be baftled and deluded by Sophistry and scovered I have presumed to surveigh your Doctors Solution of the Covenant and give an account of my apprehensions of it Covenant-breaking is so direful a God-provoking sin that I tremble to think of Englands least tendencie to it whatever men fancie to themselves of the Covenant being the Rock of his late Majesties shipwrark it is visible that the violation of it hath been the destruâ—â—ion of our late Ilsurpers who laid i aside that they might leap into their Chair oâ— State and it cannot be denied to have beene the chief and only means of his Majesties most just and honourable Restitution and an adherencie to it I doubt not will prove the establishment of his Royal Throne I cannot therefore but be grieved to finde contempt poured on the Covenant not only by the vulgar but such whose ranck and gravity should make them more sensible of the weight and worth of an Oath When Sir your Doctors Solution came first into my hands the Speech of Julian Cardinal of Saint Angelo concerning the League of uladislaus King of Hungary with Amurath the Turk came into my memory and one observation seems too much alike unto it I pray you pardon the comparison the pretended principle of the one was Zeale for the Church History of the Turks p. 290 291 292. and love of Religion and so of the other the scope of the one was to discharge the Oath and so of the other the method of the one was to absolve by colour and pretence of binding under the Oath so of the other the Arguments of the one were defect of authority from Gods Vicar on earth consent of Confederates contrariety to former Covenants exclusion of greater good exposal to reproach and scandal rashnesse and unadvisednesse in making and the like and such are the arguments of the other the one was by a man of eminencie and esteeme and engaged in the same Oath so is the other such is Sir the agreement in every point that it would much better have become a Jesuite or Popish Cardinal than a Protestant Doctor I cannot but pray they may not agree in their intended end the breach of the Covenant lest God make them agree in the miserable effect the losse of the Christian Cause ruine of King and people and their perpetual infamy I shall Sir trouble you no longer save to tell you this answer was dispatched in two days and had waited on you much sooner but that I hoped some more eminent and able pen would have pleaded the Cause of the Covenant and matched the Doctor suitably to himself such as it is you now have it I desire it may be weighed in the ballance of Reason and Religion without respect unto the person who by his meannesse and many calumnies which yet he weareth as his crown is obnoxious to no little prejudice but if he prove a Taylors Goose hot and heavie but blinde and dark will be contented to wear the Cap whilst resolved to approve himself no lesse zealous in the Religious than he hath appeared in the Political or Civil part of the Solemne League and Covenant and make it his care to give God the things that are Gods as Caesar the things that are Caesars July 8 th 1660 SIR Farewell be faithful
ΑÎΑΛΗΨΙΣ OR Saint PETERS BONDS abide FOR RHETORICK Worketh no RELEASE Is evidenced in A serious and sober consideration of Dr. John Gauden's sence and solution of the Solemn League and Covenant SO FAR As it relates to the Government of the Church by Episcopacy By ZECH. CROFTON Josh 9. 19. VVe have sworne unto them by the Lord God of Israel now therefore we may not touch them London Printed for Ralph Smith at the Bible in Cornhill near the Royal Exchange 1660. TO THE HONOURED Sir LAWRENCE BROMFEILD Knight and Colonel in LONDON Honoured Sir YOU have been pleased in order to composure of our unhappy differences to suggest unto a grave and learned Divine a considerable case of conscience Relating to Church-Discipline viz. The consistency of Episcopacy with the Solemn League and Covenant and you have thereby produced his Resolution unto the loosing of Saint Peters Bonds as he is pleased to Entitle it You may Sir remember it is Solomons experienced Rule It is a snare or stumbling stone to devoure holy things Pro. 20. 2â— and after vows to make enquiry How to keep or retract them saith Mercer for that indeed many times the Resolution proveth more entangling than the Obligation I wish that this were not found the unhappy fate of Dr. Gawden his sence and solution of the Covenant in point of Episcopacy Truly Sir according to that little skill that I have in things of this nature this Resolution to your enquiry is so sadly shipwrackt on the uncertainty of the object in advertency of expression and imbecillity of answer and Argument those three Rocks that lay-way conscience-satisfaction that it cannot arrive at its desired haven but notwithstanding its Angelical voice will leave Saint Peter as fast fettered as it found him If Sir I may do it without offence I would make bold to discover it that some other attempt for Saint Peters rescue may be undertaken First Uncertain proposal of the object Sir there is not a greater danger to be shunned by a Casuist than a mistake or uncertain proposal of the object or Ratio formalis of the obligation scrupled and to be discharged whereby the scrupulous conscience doth easily start from the most pinching Conclusions that are put upon it and herein Sir if I mistake not the Dr. is very unhappy for he propounds the object or Ratio formalis of the Covenant under the general term Episcopacy the which he well knoweth is owned as an appellation common to all and every the Governours of the Church Acts 20. 28. who are in Scripture denominated Bishops and by good demonstration Bishop and Presbyter have been asserted to be synominous titles of Church-Officers and are found to have been so used in the Primitive times of the Church and Writings of the Fathers The true sence of Episcopacy consistent with the Covenant and in this sence the Episcopacy which he supposeth to be the object of the Covenant intends only the Government of the Church by the Ministers and Officers thereof who may and must in their several Assemblies ordinis causâ have a President or Moderator to Regulate and dispose all things which belong to order as in all policy to the Chair belongeth and if this be it he means by his Episcopacy Primitive Regular Reformed and paternal Episcopacy which I could easily imagine when I observe the Emphasis of his universal discretive All Episcopacy page 9. and elsewhere oftenmentioned and that in an opposition to some Episcopacy abjured and fit to be extirpated and that it is explained by the adjuncts Reformed and Regulated as it ought to be as page 8. and opposed to an Episcopacy the confessed Subject of abusive excesses and defects not only in the execution of its authority through the faults and infirmities of some Bishops and their instruments who possibly were not so worthy and good or not so wise and discreet as became Christian Bishops and Ecclesiastical Governours of Christs Church but also in the very inconveniency of its constitution and Customs in England p. 10. In both which he confesseth page 21. there needeth an honest and ingenuous Reformation of Episcopacy beyond the former excessive or defective constitution or execution of it And more particularly by that Explication which is annexed in page 14. The efficacious conjunction of it with Presbyterie according to the Reduction of the most reverend Primate of Armagh and the considerations of the Lord Verulam offered to King James if I say this be the Episcopacy he means I humbly conceive in his Book he doth sudare de nugis labour to little purpose for so farre is any intelligent Covenanter from looking on their looking back to the Primitive Catholick and Universal government of this or any other ancient Churches to endanger the turning of them into Pillars of Apostacy as Lots wife was into a Pillar of Salt that they judge an arrival at it to be their Zoar in their escape from Sodom and hereof he might have assured himself by what page 22. he professeth himself to know to have been the sence of the Learned men in the late Assemby of Divines and by Mr. Marshal's Declaration that the Covenant was levelled at the Despoticum Tyrannicum Regimen there are no Covenanters that know any thing of the true nature of Presbytery but they will embrace this Episcopacy as not only consistent with but the very complement of the Covenant as to that point and Article and will confess this is not only the honest but literal and complexive meaning of it and with him will condemn them for rigid Bigots and virulent spirits to be slighted not striven with who conceive themselves bound against such a Primitive Reformed and Regular Episcopacy under such a reduction as I conceive would prove the formal corruption of the Episcopacy covenanted against and I hope he will finde few very few such Covenanters in England But if Sir by Episcopacy he mean as I must confess I am jealous he doth that frame and fabrick by which the man of sin was made manifest did advance himself in the Temple of God The vulgar and late acceptation of Episcopacy repugnant to the Covenant above not only all his fellow Ministers or Bishops but even Magistrates all that were called God which was by his appearance and exaltation innovated into and obtruded on the Churches of God in these Nations on the fall of the Monks of Bangor and was so exercised that Anselm whom Laude succeeded as in place so in property and almost power did appear papa alterius mundi wherein Bishops as a species or kind of Ministers different and distinct from Presbyters and so Superior to them not only in point of Order but Office and Authority together with all that Hierarchy by which it was executed all which his terms do too plainly suggest when he speaks of the Episcopacy which England sometimes had was lately desproyed the legal Episcopacy pa. 19 an Episcopacy wherein the Bishops are distinct
conscience made legible by the Lancashire and Cheshire plea for Non-subscribers and the testimonies of the Ministers in the several Counties of England published with their names subscribed and indeed Imprinted by the invasion and divastation of Scotland the Sequestrations and Sufferings even unto imprisonment and death of many in England pursuing His Majesties restitution on the account of the Covenant How can the Doctor confess Doubtlesse the sence of the Covenant hath lately quickned many mens consciences in their allegiance to the King so as to bring Him as David home with infinite joy and triumph page 25. and yet here complain that it was so easily vacated in point of its express Loyalty for the King's preservation If it were ever vacated when or how was it renewed and re-inforced If I may speak it without vanity had not the firm bond of the Covenant vigorously contended in the point of Loyalty against the violent powers which bare it down His late Majesties Martyrdom had not broken forth with such lustre not His now Majesty whom God long preserve been restored to that estate of Honour in which we now enjoy Him so that the Antecedent of this suggested Argument will be most positively denied But if we should admit it I cannot but wonder to hear a Divine say and inferre upon it If it were so easily vacated in point of Loyalty I do not see how it can be so binding against Episcopacy I think it to be no good Logick and worse Divinity from some mens evasion and violation to infer a vacation and non-obligation or from a vacation of it in one point to infer its non-obligation as to others sin indeed is apt but it must not be allowed to engender sin by Gods grace gradual violation shall not effect in me a total rejection of the Covenant His sixth suggestion seems indeed to be of more force than the former viz. 6th Suggestion in his indirect answer p. 8. The Covenant if so interpreted must needs grate sore upon and pierce to the quick those former lawful Oaths which had prepossessed the souls and consciences of most of us in England not only of Subjects as those of Allegiance and Supremacy besides that of Ministerial Canonical obedience to our lawful Superiours but even the conscience of the late King as bound by his Coronation-Oath c. From which Oaths as we know no absolution so neither can there be any superfetation of such a contradictory vow and Covenant without apparent perjury To all which I offer to consideration That the dissatisfaction of His late Majesty of Blessed Memory and in nothing more blessed than in the conscience He made of the Oath of God upon Him and the charge He hath left His now glorious Majesty That if God brought Him to His own Right on hard conditions He should be careful to performe what He should promise that is now beyond dispute and His Majesty that now is not only free from those Fetters which restrained His Royal Father but also is engaged in the same League and Covenant and this supposed contradiction cast out of doors and as to the contradiction of the Covenant to the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy non constat it appeares not nor would it ever as it hath done have quickned the hearts of some to suffer for and to struggle under their Loyalty untill His Majesties Honourable Restitution if it were so repugnant to them Let its contradiction in this point be noted and we shall speak to it and as to that of Canonical obedience to our lawful Superiors its contradiction is suggested with an If it be so interpreted Let the interpretation be cleared before the contradiction be concluded and argued for if that Oath did bind an obedience to Bishops as invested with paternal authority and as a distinct and superior order of Ministry and it s unexplained etcaetera included more a grating upon and piercing to the quick this Oath was no other but duty and then the Argument is of no more force save to speak the fretting of their spirits who foolishly sware they know not what and now desire to maintain it more for fancy than conscience for it is not yet proved that such are lawful superiors in Church or State His seventh Answer or Argument is ab incommodo the inconvenience which must be very great and visible if it discharge an Oath And here he tells us It must needs run us upon a great Rock of not only Novelty but Schisme c. unto which I desire Sir you will please to observe 1. The loss we are at by the uncertainty of the object he urgeth this Argument with his universal discretive all Episcopal order and government We must Sir have a clear Notion of Episcopal Order and Government before we can with care shun the Schism nor is it explained to us by the general terms of Practice and Judgement of the Catholick Church in all ages and places till of later dayes for we know that superiority and paternal power over other Bishops and Ministers did too soon appear and too universally spread after the Apostles days unto the advancement of the man of sin though it prevailed not without great reluctancy and its removal hath been aimed at and endeavored by the Reformation Again must we take it for granted that conformity is essential to communion with the Church and agreement in discipline unavoidally necessary to union Certaiâ—ly if so we must make the very form of Discipline an Article of our Creed And truly Sir the jus divinum or Apostolical institution of the form he seems to plead for lieth too much in the dark for such a conclusion and therefore the most himself tells us of it is That it looks like an immediate institution of Christ preceptive and explicite or tacite and exemplary pag. 13. but he knows not whether yet well knows simile non est idem and therefore he here calls it but an ancient tradition and universal observation and then the 34 th Article of the Church of England secureth us from this Rock of Schisme whilst it teacheth us 39 Articles of Religion in the Convocation held 1562. It is not necessary that traditions be in all places one and utterly alike c. In Politicks we well know different forms of Administration are consistent with union in the same Kingdome and Communion in the same Government It is no strange thing to see Corporations in England governed by their twelve Jurors without a Mayor and Court of Aldermen but it would be thought very strange from thence to charge them with sedition and it must be a jus divinum and immediate institution not Apostolical tradition or Universal observation must bar us from the priviledges any more than the dictated properties common to all policy Moreover Sir if this form of Discipline which he noteth some few Reformed Churches of later dayes want though they do not contemne but approve and venerate in others be so necessary a
Nerve that the abjuration and exclusion of it runs us on such a Rock of Schisme I see not how those Churches though their want be through necessity of times and distress of affairs put upon them can be owned in the union of the Catholique Church for essentials unto union must not only be reverenced in others but enjoyed by themselves It is Sir worth enquiry what he means by the Catholique Church for besides the vulgar appropriation of it to Rome and affection our late Prelates had to that term his Note That the abolishing of Episcopacy is no small wall of partition newly set up to keep all Papists from due Reformation makes me jealous the Cassandrian accommodation is yet in the Bishops intention and endeavour upon which they would not put that reproach scandal scruple or affront as to be without Bishops of paternal authority but if so happy is that Church whose Reformation carrieth them furthest off Romes Superstition in discipline and worship as well as doctrine His eighth Answer or Suggestion is a Rhetorical swada and insinuating plea which hath wholly lost its force by the uncertainty of the object If conscience be erroneous we shall easily grant that it is equal and ingenuous Loyal and Religious to redâ—ce and confine it Erroneous conscience must be rectified which yet must not and will not be straiter than the proper and genuine sence of the Covenant will admit but as for that extravagant disloyal unlawful enormous and Schismatical sence against which he declaimes in which it could neither be lawfully taken nor honestly kept it must be determined by an Explication of his All Episcopacy and full demonstration of a sence so qualified before there can be any more strength in his Rhetorick than in his Reasons I must Sir be free to tell him the Covenant doth expressely binde against the Fabrick and very form of the late Hierarchy in England not its abuses exccesses or defects only though not against the use of any thing which was good and fit to be used in the succeeding form to be established nor do I understand it to be such an unreasonable and irreligious Ametrie transport for men to Covenant against all the right use of things that are good but not necessary because of the abuse incident to them as he doth suggest though the Covenant is not guilty of such obligation But more of this in his direct Answer Having assaulted the Covenant with his fierce battery and alarummed it with his frightful Ecchoes The Covenant authority proved not only pretended by examples in the old Testament he proceeds to level to the ground all those faire but fallacious pretences as he deems them drawn to fortifie the Covenant from Scriptures examples wherein the Jewes sometimes solemnly renewed Covenant with God c. And the main and only Morterpiece he lets flie is That it was that express Covenant which God himself had first made with them in Horeb and Mount Sinai punctually prescribed by God to Moses and by Moses as their Supream Governour or King imposed upon them this they sometime renewed after they had broken it by their Apostacy to false and strange gods Unto the enforcement whereof we must desire the Doctor to demonstrate That the Law of Moses or Covenant in Horeb was not only the Rule and Dictate of what matter they should Covenant but the express Covenant which was or did consist in the exact recital and Repetition of that Law of the ten Commandements as the very form thereof so as that they never varied or altered it according to their special defections in the particular points of their lâ—ves and that this was the formal Covenant between God and the people in the times of Joshuah and before Israels defection on from God or that this was the Covenant between God the people and King and between the people and their King in the dayes of Jehoiadah Or that this was the express Covenant made in the point of the Sabbath and the putting away strange wives in the times of Nehemiah These several occasions and special obligations do bespeak them to have been Covenants conformed as to the matter of them to some part of the ten Commandements but as to their forme and manner of expression to have been squared by themselves But whatever was the matter or forme of their Covenanting I imagine it will not be denied that the taking or renewal thereof was their own political Act done by their own will and power at the time and on the occasion their own condition did require and dictate and so our Covenant warranred for matter by the Word of God is by their example justified to have been a pious and prudent action within our own power to performe though for the form of it it be not any Divine dictate or Soveraign prescription yet better to be esteemed than the petty composition of a few politick men Nor is there any strength in that we were not Apostatized to false and strange gods unless he will affirm no defection short of Apostacy from the true to false gods is a sufficient ground or occasion on which to renew Covenant which I think neither right reason or Religion will allow shall not gradual defections be restrained and total Apostacy be superseded by a seasonable Solemne League and Covenant Surely then Joshuah was too preposterous in working Israel into Covenant with God on a jealousie or rational conjecture of their future Apostacy and had England no need to Covenant when they were posting in doctrine especially in worship and discipline to Romes Superstition and Tyrannie Can any man consider the corruptions continued in England since the Reformation and so defended that nothing but a soveraign Remedy could remove them nay the very Retrogradations of the Reformation by a return of many expelled Rites and Prelatical power and say because she yet owned the true God she had no need to Covenant If covenanting be an Act within mans own power and choice and defection from God and his wayes inchoated or suspected be a just ground and occasion Englands covenanting is fully fortified by Scripture and Reason and the pretences thereof no way found fallacious His last Suggestion in his indirect Answer is of no force for admit that there is no precept or pattern for such a Covenant in all the New Testament which directs us as Christians and leaveth us to the Dâ—ctates of Nature and discoveries of the Old Testament in more publique and political Acts which concern us as a Kingdome or Church National or in the succeeding ages of the Church Will it therefore follow that such covenanting is sinful the Primitive Churches never were of such extent in the enjoyment of such power under such publique defections and in such capacitie of covenanting as we have been Must we enquire what hath been done in the Christian Churches to do that and no more without regard to what may be done the condition of the Church requiring
before it will puzzle me to charge him with iniquity for so doing Thirdly No man can in conscience be bound by any such Covenant against that which may upon second thoughts and after-view He that sweareth to his own hurt is bound and better information appear to be good and useful to him he is here bound not to keep his Coveuant in the latitude of his mistakes and presumptions nor to act according to his prejudices and former supposals but rather to retract his rashnesse and unadvisednesse in taking it at first and to act according to his present evidence of what is true just good lawful and useful even in Episcopacy c. Truly Sir this is to me such strange divinity that I cannot but wonder D. D. should be attendant on the assertor of it I am sure if it be admitted one reason produced by no mean Casuist to defend the Obligation of an Oath extorted by fear Sander de Juram Lect. 4. Sect 15. must fall to the ground Elegit id quod tunc visum est sibi melius he chose that which he then conceived to be the best but according to our Casuist he might on an after-view discern hurtful and so retract How happy and cheering would such a resolution as this have been unto Jephtah in his anguish and out-cry I have opened my mouth unto the Lord and cannot go back Why man can you not on second thoughts and an afterview see the goodness and usefulness of your daughter Retract the rashnesse and unadvisednesse of thy vow and act according to thy present evidence Nay how advantagious had this resolution been to Israel when Joshuah and the Princes preserved the Gibeonites to be pricks in the eyes and thornes in the side of Israel To what end do they plead We have sworne unto them by the Lord now therefore we may not touch them Why must they needs act to the latitude of their presumptions and mistakes could they not on second thoughts and an after-view discover their craft and discern them to be of the people commanded by God to be destroyed dangerous to disturb their peace and divert them from their Religion How sad was the fate of the sons of Saul in the want of such a solution as this which might have saved them all from hanging for the Scripture witnesseth That Saul slew the Gibeonites in his zeale to the children of Israel and Judah 2 Sam. 21. 2. Without doubt on second thoughts and an after-view of the good which might ensue on the violation of that Covenant caught by fraude I hope our Prelates will take care in the next Impression of the Common-Prayer-Book to make the words in Psalm 15. ver 5. conform to Psalm 105. vers 28. it is but the expunction of a Negative particle and for disobedient we reade obedient and for repenteth not we reade repenteth and so the Character of a man for heaven shall be conform to our Casuists resolution and Scripture-Text He that sweareth to his own hurt and repenteth I cannot but commend the correction of this verse to the Drs. care for as it is now read it is not only different from the Original but also dissonant to his doctrine whilst it is read in the Old Common-Prayer-Book He that sweareth to his neighbour and disappointeth him not though it were to his own hindrance Thus Sir I have tryed the strength of the Drs. Arguments and find in them very little force to rectifie conscience release St. Peter and reconcile the Covenant with Episcopacy Truly Sir were Episcopacy in it self never so good yet it must appear necessary before it break through the bond of the Covenant It is now indeed high time to learn righteousness and wisdom the which works not more in any thing than a conscientious cleaving to the Covenant and paying the vows made to God in the day of affliction I freely consent with him that the cautious and conscientious covenanter take a calmer view and exacter measure than perhaps he did at the first But methinks he should not leave them to rules of so great latitude that will not only discharge the Covenant but all Sacred Religiousties What Oaths can bind if words are of no force or but wit hs and cords his own imagination of no influence no good may be excluded or involved and second thoughts discovering usefulness will discharge it where shall be the certainty of humane contracts or force of Religious bonds if these principles be admitted who shall ever scruple to make or care to keep a Covenant if other mens interpretations must direct it and our own retraction on sence of rashness may discharge it If Sir these propositions be the Doctors props for Episcopacy it will appear too prophane for pious men to meddle with Sir I doubt not but he and all men shall find every conscientious Covenanter enjoy the comfort of his accomplished oath when in his place he hath seasonably advised humbly petitioned and lawfully endeavoured to remove Englands old Hierarchy and to restore such an Episcopacy to be exercised by the Officers of the Church in Common and good order as is neâ—â—st the Scripture primitive practice and perswasion of sober grave pious and learnâ—â— men such as was the late Primate of Armagh but if either His Most Sacred Majesty or any other in authority fail in the exercise of their capacity as he seems to hope to effect the ends of the Covenant I hope it shall be no offence to mourn for their iniquity and the iniquity of the Land nor will it be inconsistent to that humble submission active or passive I confess we all owe unto His Most Sacred Majesty whatever shall be the establishment in the Church though never so corrupt yet whilst consistent with salvation though it may occasion to me suffering and a suspence of my Ministry by Gods grace it shall not effect in me or such on whom I have an influence Schism from the Church or Resistance of His Majesties just Right and Authority for whom as I have not suffered the least so if God should so far leave Him which God forbid I am ready by Him to suffer the utmost in adherence to the Solemn League and Covenant untill it be discovered a band of iniquity a snare and gin for schisme and sedition to act by to the dishonour of God and reproach of Reformed Religion Yet I cannot but most heartily pray for the honest and ingenuous Reformation of Episcopacy beyond the former defective or excessive Constitution or execution of it which I doubt not will effect the corruption and extirpation covenanted I confess every conscientious Covenanter oweth this Justice and duty 1. To God to approve love desire and use what is good not being within his own power and excluded by his oath or covenant may and must are things very different 2. To obey the King as chief Governour of Church and State enjoyning things lawful and honest so not covenanted against though