Four Discourses Delivered to the CLERGY OF THE Diocess of Sarum CONCERNING I. The Truth of the Christian Religion II. The Divinity and Death of Christ. III. The Infallibility and Authority of the Church IV. The Obligations to continue in the Communion of the Church By the Right Reverend Father in God GILBERT Lord Bishop of SARVM LONDON Printed for Richard Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-yard MDCXCIV Imprimatur JO. CANT Ian. 22. 1693 4. TO THE CLERGY OF THE Diocess of Sarum My Reverend and dear Brethren THESE Discourses were at first prepared for you and were delivered to you among a great many more on other Subjects on several occasions they were so well received by you that many of you desired that you might have them copied out for a more lasting use This has set me on publishing these that follow they relating to Four different sort of men with whom you may be engaged The first is against Atheists and Libertines who grow to be so bold and insolent that it is of the last importance that you should be well furnish'd with Answers to those Objections with which they make the greatest noise This is the Pest of the Age we live in the most dangerous as well as the most contagious of all others It strikes at all and corrupts the whole Man as well as it dissolves all the bounds of Nature and Society This promises such an Indemnity and gives so entire a liberty that depraved Inclinations and Affections will be always of its side and it has some specious things to alledge the Novelty and Boldness of which makes them pass for Wit and Good Humour which will be always taking to those who want and desire supports and excuses for sins Upon all these accounts and chiefly upon the fatal progress which this Blasphemous Spirit of Infidelity has made among us it becomes us to consider these matters well that we may be throughly acquainted with all those depths of Satan and know what to answer to all those false shews of Wit or Reason as wall as to the more petulant demands by which that prophane Crew study to undermine and beat down all Religion One of their common Topicks is the decrying all Mysteries and in this they fall in to the same opposition with the Socinians tho upon very different designs For the Socinians run down all Mysteries and think they can make it appear That those passages of Scripture by which they are commonly proved have another meaning whereas Libertines do it being persuaded that they are indeed contained in the Scriptures and therefore they hope that they will gain their main end of decrying all Revealed Religion if strong prejudices are once formed against Mysteries and yet they are at the same time consider'd as parts of the Christian Religion and are believed to be contain'd in the Scriptures I must also do this right to the Socinians as to own that their Rules and Morality are exact and severe that they are generally men of Probity Iustice and Charity and seem to be very much in earnest in pressing the obligations to very high degrees of Virtue Yet their denying all secret Assistances must cut off the Exercises of many Devotions that give a softness and tenderness to the mind which if once extinguish'd it must of necessity draw after it a dry flatness over all a man's thoughts and powers their denying the certainty of God's foreseeing all future events that depend upon the freedom of a man's Will must very much weaken our Confidence in God our patience under all misfortunes and our expectations of a deliverance in due time Their Notions of another state do also take off much of the terror under which Bad men ought to be kept and lessen the Ioys of Good men On all these accounts their Opinions seem to have a great Influence upon practice but with â—â—lation to the great Article of Christianity concerning the Person and sufferings of Iesus Christ their Doctrine gives so different a view of this Religion in its most important Head that either we have been guilty of a most Irreligious prophanation in esteeming one to be God and giving him all the Acknowledgments and Adorations that belong to the Great and Eternal God who yet is a meer Creature or they must be no less guilty who if he be the Great and the True God do look on him only as a Creature and yet offer him all divine Honour and Worship and if his Death was only a pattern or any thing else than a true propitiatory Sacrifice then we who look on it as our Propitiation and Redemption who claim and trust to it as our Ransom and Atonement do very impiously raise its value beyond the Truth and fix our Confidence with relation to our Peace with God upon a false foundation Whereas on the other hand If God has set forth his death as a Propitiation for the forgiveness of sin then they are guilty of black Ingratitude and of defeating the chief design of the Gospel who so far detract from its value as to reckon it only a patern of dying a confirmation of the Gospel and necessary preliminary to a Resurrection Upon all these accounts it is that I could never understand the Pacificatory Doctrines of those who think that these are questions in which a diversity of Opinions may well be endured without disturbing the Peace of the Church or breaking Communion about thâ—m They seem to be the Fundamentals of Christianity and therefore I thought it was very necessary for me to give you a ful and clear Instruction in this matter The 3d. Discourse relates to that upon which the whole Cause of Popery turns for if they are Infallibâ—e it is to no purpose to dispute about any thing else and if they are fallible their pretending to Infallibility is of it self a just prejudice against their whole Church and against all their other Doctrines when they claim to so high an authority without good grounds Since therefore this is the most Important part of all our Controversies with that Church and since it is that to which they always turn themselves by which they gain Prosclites and estâ—blish their own Votaries and set them out of the reach of all Convistion the understanding of this matter in its full extent seems to be a very necessary piece of study We are apt upon a little Interval of quiet to forget the practices of that Church and because we do not think of them we may be apt to fancy that they think as little of us but they do still pursue their point with an unwearied diligence They never give over but when one design fails they either study to retrieve it or to set another on foot with an Industry that ought to awaken us and keep us always on our guard The Numbers of their Emisâ—aries are great and their Zeal is ever warm and active therefore we must never lose sight of them and
by their Princes as the fittest to serve their ends Now if the Divine Grant be to the whole Body it will not be easy to shew that even the most numerous of those Meetings that pass for General Councils were truly such Or if it is said that those few of remote Provinces come in the name of the rest and so represent them it must first appear whether such a thing as Infallibility can be deputed indeed where a Controversy is already known Churches may send men fully instructed in their Doctrine who may be thereby well impower'd to declare how the Doctrine and Tradition has been setled among them But if a Judgment is to be made upon the hearing of Parties and the discussing their Reasons on both sides which must be the case otherwise here is no Infallible Judge then in that case men at a distance who never heard the matter but very generally and partially cannot do this therefore such as come to a Council must have the full power of Judging We know that in Fact such Powers or Instructions are seldom given and in these latter Ages they will not at all be allow'd for the Bishops so instructed must be consider'd as the Proxies of their Principals and vote in their name which is contrary to the practice of all Councils exept that of Basile and can never be endured at Rome where every Italian Bishop tho his See is in some places but a small Parish is reckon'd in the Vote equal with any of those few that come from great Provinces Now these are all Difficulties of such weight that it will not be easy to settle them with any Divine Warrants the Scripture being silent as to all such matters Nor is it clear whether the whole Council must agree in the same Sentence or if a major number tho exceeding by one single voice is sufficient If the Council at Ierusalem is insisted on as the Precedent to other Councils we see that All agreed there And if this Infallibility is a power that Christ has left in his Church as necessary for her Peace and Preservation it may be reasonable enough to suppose that for giving their decisions the more Authority he should so order this matter by his Providence that they should all agree in their Judgments For after all when a thing is carri'd but by One vote tho according to the Rules of all Human Courts it must be good in Law yet it is not easy to think that God would lodge such an Authority and suffer it to turn upon so small and so despicable an Inequality In conclusion It does not appear from the Scriptures whether in such decisions the Bishops should expect a Divine Inspiration such as that which setled the Judgment in the Council of Ierusalem or not The meaning of those words It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to Vs seems to be this That as they of themselves were resolv'd on making that decision so an immediate Inspiration which was own'd by them all did finally determine them in their Resolution Or it may be suppos'd to relate to that Effusion of the Holy Ghost upon Cornelius and his Friends that being a solemn Declaration that men might be accepted of God while they were yet uncircumcised and that by consequence the Gentiles were not bound to the observance of those Precepts which did not oblige any but such as were circumcised So that what they then decreed was only a general Inference which they drew from that particular case And so they made a decision in favour of all the Gentiles from that which had happened to Cornelius This is the clearest account that can be given of these words which understood otherwise look as if they had added their decision as the giving a further weight to that made by the Holy Ghost or as a Vehicle to convey it which is too absurd to suppose Now if any build upon that Council they must make the parallel just and shew that the Holy Ghost interposes in their Conclusions To all these Considerations we must add this That the first Councils are to be supposed to have understood their own Authority or at least the sense of the Church at that time concerning it They considered the several Passages of Scripture and framed their Decisions out of them which were afterwards defended by some who had been of their Body not as if their Authority or Decision had put an end to the Controversy They urge indeed the great numbers of the Bishops that made those Decisions but use that rather as a strong Inducement to beget a prejudice in their favour than as an Authority that could not be contradicted In this strain does Athanasius defend the Council of Nice For indeed even that of Numbers was to be sparingly urged after the Council at Arimini where Numbers were on the other side The chief Writers of those times make their Appeals to the Scriptures they bring many Passages out of them and are very short and defective in making out the Doctrine of the Church from Tradition or Fathers Athanasius names not above four and these had lived very near that time two of them Origen and Dionysius were claimed by the other Side There are but few and very late Authorities alledged in the Council of Ephesus and those at Chalcedon made their definition chiefly upon the Authority and reguard to Pope Leo's Letter in which there are indeed very many Allegations from Scripture but not so much as one from any Father Thus it is plain both from the Practice of those Councils and the Disputes of those who writ in defence of their Decisions that it was not then believed that they had any Infallible Authority since that is never so much as once claimed by any of that time that I know of a great deal being said to the contrary by many of them It is true there are some high Expressions both in some of the Councils and in some of the Fathers of that time which import that they believed they were directed by God But this is no other than what may be said concerning any Body of Good and Learned men who use a great deal of pious caution in forming their Decisions Therefore great difference is to be made between a plain assuming an Infallible Authority and Rhetorical Hints of their being guided by the Holy Ghost the former does not appear and the latter shews that such as used those ways of speaking did not think them infallible but they believing that they had made good Decisions did upon that presume that they were guided by the Holy Ghost And thus it appears in a great variety of Considerations that we have no reason to believe that there is an Infallibility in a General Council and that we do not so much as know what is necessary to make one And to sum up all that belongs to this Head The Decisions of those Councils must have an Infallible Expounder as well as it
is urged that the Books of the Scriptures cannot be of use to us if there is not in the Church a living speaking Iudge to declare their true sense Now this is rather more necessary with relation to the Decrees of Councils which as they are Writings as well as the Scriptures so they being much more Voluminous and more artificially contrived and couched need a Commentary much more than a few plain and simple Writings which make up the New Testament If then the Councils must be expounded there must be according to their main reasoning an Infallibility lodged somewere else to give their sense And the necessity of this has appeared evidently since the time of the Council of Trent for both upon the Article of Divine Grace and upon their Sacrament of Penance there have been and still are great debates among them concerning the meaning of the Decrees of that Council both Parties pretending that they are of their side Who then shall decide these Controversies and expound those Decrees This must not be laid over to the next General Council for then the Infallibility will be in an Abeyance and lost during that Interval So this Inference leads me to the last Hypothesis That the Infallibility is in the Pope and in him only And it must be confessed that this is the only Opinion that is consistent to it self in all its parts Here is a living and speaking Iudge and if he is not Infallible it is plain that they have no Infallibility at all among them And yet his Infallibility as it is a thing of which no man ever dreamt for the first nine or ten Ages so it has such violent presumptions against it that without very express proof it will not be reasonable to expect that any should believe it The Ignorance of most Popes the Secular Maxims by which they are governed the Political Methods in which they are elected the Forgeries chiefly of their Decretal Epistles by which their Authority was principally asserted and which are now as universally rejected as spurious as they were once owned to be genuine their aspiring to the same Authority in Temporals for many Ages which they have gained in Spirituals their having dissolved the whole Authority of the Primitive Constitutions and Ancient Canons of the Church and all that practice of Corruption that is in all their Courts by which the whole order of the Church is totally reversed All these are such lawful and violent Prejudices against them that they must needs fortify a man in opposition to any such Pretensions till it is very plainly proved These Characters agree so very ill with Infallibility that it is not easy to believe they can be together Since for above 800 years together the Papacy as it is represented by their own Writers was perhaps the worst Succession of men that can be found in any History And it will seem strange if God has lodged such wonderful Power with such a sort of men and yet has taken so little care of them to make them look like the proper Subjects of that Authority We do plainly see that the Primitive Church even when they enlarged their Papal Authority as to Government did it what out of a respect to St. Peter and St. Paul who they believed founded that Church and suffered Martyrdom in it and what or most chiefly out of their regard to the dignity of that City it being the Head of the Empire under which they lived and this appeared by their giving the same Priviledges to Constantinople when it became the Imperial City which was made second to the other and equal to it except only in order and rank But as for the Doctrine of the Church tho still the regard to St. Peter went far yet when Liberius subscribed to Semiarianism it was never pretended that his Authority had in any thing altered the case which must have been urged if he had been believed Infallible The Case of Honorius does fully discover the sense of the Church in the Sixth Century concerning their Infallibility He was condemned as a Monothelite by a General Council which was confirmed by several Popes who did by name condemn him Now we are not a whit concerned in his Cause and Condemnation whether it was just or not and whether it was upon a due examination or not It is enough for us that a General Council as well as several Popes in that Age had never dreamt of Infallibility otherwise they could not have condemned him or believe him capable of Heresy This might be brought down to many later Instances in which several Popes have been charged with Heresy one shall suffice They have pretended to an Authority from Christ to depose Kings and to transfer their Dominions to others This they have not only done by force and violence but by many solemn Decisions in which this Authority has been claimed as founded on several Passages of Scripture not forgetting those In the beginning not In the beginnings did God create and the great light that rules the day these with many more they have urged both from the Old and New Testament This they did with the utmost pomp of solemn Declarations and upon this Head they filled the World with Wars Some few writ against these Pretensions but the Popes stood to them and carried them on in a course of five or six Centuries with all possible vigour And during those Ages this Doctrine grew to be universally received by the Learned and Unlearned by all the Universities all the Divines Canonists and Casuists not one single Person daring to oppose so strong a Current So that Cardinal Perron was in the right when he affirmed that this was the Doctrine universally received in the Church for the last six Centuries without contradiction before Calvin's days and those few that seemed to write against it durst only oppose the Pope's direct Power in Temporals as the Superior Lord to whom Kings were but Vassals but durst not contradict his Authority over them in case of Heresy This then being so publick and uncontested a Point as it shakes the Authority of Oral Tradition and shews how Doctrines even in points in which mens Interests did strongly oppose them could get into the Church though not derived down from the Apostles so it totally destroys the Pope's Pretensions to Infallibility in the Opinion of all such as think this to be simply unlawful and that it subverts the Order which God has setled in the World For there is not any one Fact in History that can be less contested than that the Popes have assumed this Authority and that they have vouched Divine Warrants for it To this also we may well add another train of Difficulties about the Right to chuse this Pope in whom it is vested what number is necessary for a Canonical Election and how far Simony voids it and who is the Competent Judge of the Simony or in the case of different Elections who shall judge which of
the two pretending Popes was truly chosen It must also be cleared in what form he is to proceed when Infallibility accompanies his Decisions whether he may proceed upon his own sense or with the advice of others and who these must be and what Solemnities in the Publication are necessary to make him speak ex Cathedra Here a great variety of Difficulties arise which ought to be well cleared to us before we can be bound to acquiesce in so great a Point as his Infallibility And we ought to have these things made out by a Divine Authority for if Christ has made a special grant of Infallibility to the Bishops of Rome no Forms nor Rules invented by men can limit that These may be Rules agreed on as fit to be observed but after all if a Pope is Infallible by a Commission from Jesus Christ he must be believed Infallible tho he should break through all those Forms that men have only invented It remains then that we consider those Proofs that are brought to confirm this since without very good ones it is extream unreasonable to urge such a Point or to expect that it should be submitted to Here all that was said formerly against proving this matter from Scripture is to be remembred But waving that in this place the Passages that seem to be formal for the Church in general are brought to support the Papal Authority For if great Powers are given to the Church and if it does not appear that they are any where else then they must be found in him he being the Church-Representative But this is an absurd Imagination unless they can shew us that God has lodged that Representation in that See As for that of 18. St. Matthew 17. for telling the Church and that such as do not hear it shall be to us as Heathens and Publicans it must be confess'd that these words barely in themselves and as separated from all that went before seem to speak out all that they plead for but when the occasion of them and the manner that governs them is consider'd nothing is plainer that our Saviour is here speaking only of such quarrellings and differences as may happen to fall out among Christians who are by these words oblig'd to try all amicable ways of setling them First by private endeavours then by the interposition of Friends and finally by the Authority of that Body or Church to which they belong'd and such as could not be prevail'd on by those methods were to be esteem'd no true Christians but to be look'd on as Heathens or as very bad men They might upon that be excommunicated and prosecuted afterwards in Civil Courts since they had no right any more to the Tenderness and Charity that ought to be among the Members of the Church This Exposition has a fair appearance and looks like being true to say no more at present for that is enough according to what was formerly laid down since the proofs of such a matter as this is ought to be full and home This seems to look more favourable towards the way of the Congregational Churches in which the whole Assembly of the Brotherhood govern all their Concerns but does not so much as by a hint seem to favour the pretensions either of Popes or Councils That Character of the Church given by St. Paul that it is the Pillar and Ground of Truth is a figurative form of Speech upon which it is never safe to build much less to lay so much weight upon it It is a Description that the Iews gave to their Synagogues and is by St. Paul appli'd to the Church of Ephesus for it is visible that it has no relation to the Catholick Church it being only an enforcing consideration to oblige Timothy to a greater caution in his Behaviour there It has visibly a relation to Inscriptions that were made on Pillars but what ever be the strict Importance of the Phrase it is clear that it is but a Phrase and therefore it cannot bear that which is raised upon it Some Reflections have been already made on those Promises of Christ to his Apostles that the Spirit should lead them into all Truth which plainly related to the infallible Conduct under which they were to be put but from these words themselves there is no reason to infer that the Promises were to descend to any after them they relate to an immediate Inspiration so if they prove any thing they prove too much That the Church must still have in it a successive Inspiration It is urg'd that a parity of Reason leads us to conclude That this Promise was still to continue tho not in the same manner in the Church But all such Arguments are only conjectural Inferences and are at best but probabilities so that there is no arguing from them and therefore this can signify nothing Those words of our Saviour's with which St. Matthew concludes his Gospel Lo I am with you always even to the end of the world infer no Infallibility but import only a promise of Assistance and Protection which was a necessary encouragement to the Apostles who were sent out upon so hard and laborious as well as dangerous Commission In both Testaments by God's being with any by his walking with them his being in the midst of them his never leaving them nor forsaking them no more is meant but that he watches over them that he directs assists and protects them and there being a vast difference between all this and Infallibility it can prove noting of that kind So that in conclusion the whole matter must turn upon the words of Christ to St. Peter for these do not relate to the Church in general but seem to belong particularly to him yet there is not so much as a hint given to lead us to apply them to his Successors nor does he give any himself when he was writing his Second Epistle not long before his death since he mentions a Revelation that he had of its being near him yet he does not in those last Warnings against the Corrupters of this Holy Religion give so much as a remote Intimation of any Authority that he was to leave behind him for the Government of the Church and preserving it pure both from Error and Immorality Nor were these words of Christ's so much as pretended for many Ages to import any Authority or Infallibility lodg'd with St. Peter's Successors I do not now question his being at Rome tho that matter is really so doubtful that even there we are far from any degree so much as of human Certainty But to go on with those words of our Saviour's to St. Peter there is one great presumption that lies against any pecular Authority given to him by them since we see not the least appearance either in the Acts of the Apostles or Epistles of any peculiar Appeals or References made to him On the contrary he seems to be call'd to an account for his
World in which they should be authoris'd to dissolve the Obligation of the Mosaical Laws and to confirm such parts of them as were Moral and perpetually binding which the Apostles should do with such visible Characters of a Divine Authority empowering and conducting them in it that it should be very evident that what they did on Earth was ratified in Heaven These words thus understood carry in them a plain sense which agrees well with the whole design of the Gospel but whatsoever may be their sense it is plain that there was nothing here peculiarly given to St. Peter As for our Saviour's praying for St. Peter that his faith might not fail and his restoring him to his Apostolate by a threefold charge feed my sheep or lambs it has such a visible relation to his fall and threefold denial that it is not worth the while to enlarge on or to shew that it is capable of no other signification and cannot be carried further And thus I have gone through all that is brought from the Scriptures for asserting the Infallibility of the Church and in particular of the Pope's and have I hope fully shew'd that they cannot bear that sense but that they must genuinely bear a plainly different sense which does no way differ from our Doctrine It was necessary to clear all this for tho as was before made out it is no proper way for them to resolve their Faith by passages out of Scripture yet these are very good objections to us who upon other Reasons do submit to their Authority There remains but one thing now to be clear'd which is this If the Church is not Infallible it does not easily appear what certainty we can have concerning the Scriptures since we believe them upon the Testimony of the Church and we have no other knowledge concerning them but what has been handed down to us by Tradition If therefore this is fallible we may be deceiv'd in our persuasion even concerning them But here a great difference is to be made between the carrying down a Book to us and the Oral Delivering of a Doctrine it being almost as hard to suppose how the one could sail as how the other should not fail The Books being in many hands spread over the whole Churches and read in all their Assemblies makes this to be a very different thing from discourses that are in the Air and to which every man that reports them is apt to give his own Cue A great difference is also to be made between the Testimony of a Witness and the Authority of a Judge If in any Age of the Church Councils had examin'd controverted Writings and had upon that past Sentence this had been in deed a judging the matter but no such thing ever was The Codex of the Scriptures was setled some Ages before any Provincial Council gave out a Catalogue of the Books which they held as Canonical For no ancient General Council ever did it and tho the Canonical Epistles of which there not being such a certain Standard they not being addrest to any particular Body that had preserv'd the Originals were not so early nor so universally receiv'd as the others were yet the matter was setled without any Authoritative Judgment only by examining Originals and such other Methods by which all things of that nature can only be made out But this matter having been so fully consider'd and stated in another Discourse I shall dwell no longer on it in this As for the Authorities which are brought from some of the Ancients in favour of the Authority of the Church and of Tradition it is to be considered that though the word Tradition as it is now used in Books of Controversy imports a sense opposite to that which is written in the Scripture yet Tradition is of its own signification a general word that imports every thing which is delivered And in this sense the whole Christian Religion as well as the Books in which it is contained was naturally called the Tradition of the Apostles So that a great many things said by Ancients to magnify the Tradition of the Apostles and by way of Appeal to it have no relation to this matter Besides when men were so near the Apostolical Age that they could name the Persons from whom they had such or such hints who had received them from the Apostles or from Apostolical men Tradition was of another sort of Authority and might have been much more safely appealed to than at the distance of so many Ages Therefore if any thing is brought either from Irenaeus or Tertullian that sounds this way here is a plain difference to be observed between their Age and ours which does totally diversify it But to convince the World how early Tradition might either vary or misrepresent matters let the Tradition not only in but before St. Irenaeus's time concerning the observation of Easter be considered which goes up as high as St. Polycarps's time We find that as the several Churches adhered to the practices of those Apostles that founded them so they had quite forgot the grounds on which it seems these various Observations were founded Since though it is very probable that those who kept Easter on the Iewish day did it that by their condescendence to the Iews in that matter they might gain upon them and soften their Prejudices against Christianity yet it does not appear that their Successors thought of that at all for they vouched their Custome and resolved to adhere to it nor is there any thing mentioned on either side that give us the account of those early but different Observations If then Tradition failed so near its Fountain we may easily judge what account we ought to make of it at so great a distance Many things are brought with great pomp out of St. Austin's Writings magnifying the Authority of the Church in terms which after all the allowances that are to be made for his diffuse and African Eloquence can hardly be justified Yet when it is considered that he writ against the Donatists who had broke the Vnity of the Church upon the pretence of a matter of fact concerning the Ordainers of Cecilian which had been as to the point of fact often judged against them And yet as they had distracted the whole African Churches so they were men of fierce and implacable Tempers that broke out daily into acts of great fury and violence and had set up a principle that must for ever break the Peace and Union of the Church which was that the vertue of all the publick Acts of Worship of Sacraments and Ordinances depended upon the personal worth of him that officiated so that his Errors or Vices did make void all that past through his hands Now when so warm a man as St. Austin had so bad a Principle and so ill a disposition of mind in view it is no wonder if he brought out all that he could think on upon the subject so
being Typical it was much more reasonable to have expected an Oral Tradition of its signification Their Prophets express'd themselves in a very dark and figurative way full of strange Allusions and lofty Phrases and since these were to lead them to the Messias and yet seem capable of very different Senses all this required an Infallible Expounder They were one Nation so that Unity was in many respects most necessary to their Preservation they were for many Ages strongly set on Idolatry so that a solemn publick and Infallible Authority was the more necessary There were also provisions in their Law much more express than any can be pretended in the New Testament requiring them when they had any Controversies within their Gates to come up to the Temple to the Priest that stood there to minister before the Lord as well as to the Judge and they were upon pain of death to submit to their Determinations This matter is set out in such a variety of large and positive Expressions that tho perhaps that passage belongs to their Law Suits But by the way that of tell the Church seems to be limited to the same sort of matters yet if a parity of Reason or if the Letter of the Law is consider'd this will go much further towards an absolute Submission which seems to suppose an Infallible Authority than any thing that can be alledged for the like out of the New Testament not to mention other Expressions of asking the Law at the Priest's mouth and that his Lips should preserve knowledge for he was the Minister of the Lord of Hosts These things I say seem to make out a very fair Title to Infallibility under the Mosaical Dispensation and they continu'd to be not only the True but indeed the Only Church that God had on Earth till the Dispensation of the Gospel was opened They had still among them the Federal Means of Salvation which is all that is necessary to the Being of a Church Our Saviour join'd both in Temple and Synagogue-Worship which alone is enough to prove them to have been a true Church In this we plainly see the Sophistry of one Argument which perhaps makes some Impression on weak minds That a True Church must be true in its Doctrine it must indeed have those things that are necessary to keep up its Federal Relation to God so the Iews had their Circumcision and Sacrifices together with the rest of the Temple-Service But yet that Church had fallen under two great Errors that had a vast Extent as well as a very fatal Consequence They understood all the Prophecies of the Messias in a literal sense of a Temporal Prince and a Glorious Conqueror Here Oral Tradition fail'd in that which of all other things was the most important for them to understand aright since their mistakes in this occasion'd their rejecting the True Messias which drew on their final Ruin The other Error was also very fatal for it brought them under a vast Corruption of their Morals They thought the ritual part of their Religion was of such high Value in the sight of God that this alone together with many invented Rites that had been handed down to them by Tradition were of such Value in the sight of God that they did compensate for the grossest Immoralities and excuse from the most important Obligations of the Moral Law These things had pass'd down among them by Tradition from their Fathers and had corrupted all their Notions about Religion so that here we see all the arguings from a seeming necessity of things for an Infallible Authority are only vain Imaginations which do not hold in Instances in which we have all the plausible Reasons of looking for them Nor does it appear that it is any greater Imputation on the Goodness of God that he has not provided an Infallible Remedy against Error than that he has not provided an Infallible Remedy against Sin Sin is that which of its own nature bears the greatest opposition to the Attributes of God and to his Dominion and that does defile and corrupt our Souls the most We can much more easily apprehend that God can bear with a man that lives in Error than with one that lives in Sin The one can consist with good Intentions and a Probity and Integrity of heart for he who is in Error may think that he is serving God in it and so it can dwell in the same breast with the Love of God and of our Neigbhour which are driven out by Sin The true design of Religion is to give us such degrees of Light and Knowledge as may preserve us from Sin and purify our Hearts and Lives Holiness is a much more certain Character of a man's being in the favour of God than all the degrees of Knowledge possible Upon all these grounds we may conclude that there is no reason to think that God should have made a more certain Provision against Error than he has made against Sin Now what are the Provisions against Sin God offers the free pardon of all past sins to encourage us to forsake them he gives us secret Assistances to fortify our Endeavours against sin he sets before us unspeakably vast Rewards and Punishments and he accepts of a sincere tho imperfect Obedience so here a great deal is left to the freedom of our Wills God will not work in us as in necessary Agents but having made us capable of Liberty he leaves us to the use of it and if we perish our perdition is of our selves And therefore if we will not apply our Faculties and use our best Endeavours to become truly Holy the blame must lie upon our selves for God will not convey into us by his Power such Principles and Dispositions as shall force us to be good and unless we do what lies in us at the same time that we pray to him for inward Aid from him we have no reason to hope that he will hear us In like manner He has call'd us to a Religion that lies in a very little compass he has order'd it to be deliver'd to us in Books writ in a great simplicity of Style he has given us Understandings capable of knowledge and of great Industry in the pursuit of it and we feel this difference in our natures in seeking after Truth from following after Holiness that there is no natural disposition in us to Error or against Truth whereas there are born in us Propensities that we feel to be deeply rooted in us against Holiness and in favour of sin Among men some are naturally inquisitive made and fitted to dive deep into profound Searches these men do in Religion as well as in all other Arts and Sciences so open and clear the way to slower and lazier minds that they render things easy to them And as we have no reason to imagine that God should have laid insuperable Difficulties in the way to Divine Knowledge so those few that are in it have
consent of the Metropolitan yet whatever may be done in subâ—ltern Bodies where things that are done amiss may be rectifi'd by Appeals the Supream and last Resort must be left to the full freedom in which Christ has constituted his Church It must be further consider'd That Infallibility is not like ordinary Jurisdiction or Legislation which may be moulded according to the conveniences of Society it is a Priviledge which if the Church has it at all she has it by an immediate Grant from Heaven and so she must enjoy and apply it according to the Ten or of that Grant and she cannot expect to have it continu'd to her but as she observes the nature of the Grant Indeed if it were given her at large to be modell'd and lodg'd as she pleases there might be a power in her to limit the use of it to such forms as should be least liable to Exception or Abuse But either it is granted to a single person or to the body in general If it is granted to a single person then he and he only has it He may indeed if he pleases in order to his being better inform'd or obey'd call a General Council but their proceedings are only preparatory to his using the Infallibility which is singly in himself Nor can the Divine Grant be limited as to the exercise or use of it all such Rules must still be at the Pope's discretion On the other hand If the Grant is given to the Community of the Pastors then the Infallibility must be in them and cannot be limited or supposed to stay for the Consent of any one Bishop for whatsoever regard may he had to any one man by reason of the Dignity of his See or his other Circumstances yet still this must be but a point or form of human Prudence for the Infallibility must be where Christ has placed it and cannot be transferr'd from thence or be put any where else So unless it is said that Christ has put this Infallibility between Pope and Council in so express a manner as all Constitutions do which are under a mixed Legislation which is not pretended then it must be lodged either in a General Council or in the Pope and cannot be in both This then is to be examin'd in the next place I begin therefore to examine the Plea for the Infallibility of Councils It is at first no small prejudice against this Opinion that the Church was Constituted and had continu'd 300. years before any thing that has the shadow of a General Council was call'd so if an infallible Judge of Controversies be necessary to the Church here we see she subsisted in her hardest times in which she was the most distrest both by Heresies and Persecutions without one We also see that she has been these last 130. years without one tho there are warm Disputes among them both in Speculative and Practical Doctrines both sides reproaching one another with Heresy and as there is little prospect of a Council neither the Court of Rome nor the Courts of other Princes who have among them taken away all the Primitive and Canonical Rights of the Church which an honest Council must desire to regain being concern'd ever to have one So if a Council were necessary it is not very easy to see how it should be brought together During the Greatness of the Roman Empire it was in the Emperor's power to have brought the Bishops together at his pleasure but now this depends upon the Pope who summons them having obtain'd the consent of the Princes of Christendom which is subdivided into many different Soveraignties This Matter depending then so entirely upon the See of Rome there is no reason to look for one from them for they pretending to have the Infallibility in themselves should very much derogate from that if they summon'd a Council for a decision in Doctrinal Matters they being in possession of judging these at Rome And as for Matters of Discipline except we can imagine that they will be content to part with that Authority which they have assum'd over all Sees and Churches and over all the Canons of the Church we cannot see reason to fancy that they will ever call one If they should the consent of all Soveraigns must likewise be obtain'd for it being a part of the Civil Authority to keep Subjects within the Princes Dominions they cannot be oblig'd to send their Bishops and Divines to a Council unless they please This is a power which seems to belong to them it is certain they claim it and very probably would put it in execution if that matter came to be contested So here are very great Contingencies to be conquer'd before a General Council can be brought together Now it is not very likely that Christ should have left so great and so necessary a power to his Church by which all Controversies must be judged which yet must be at the mercy of so many Accidents before it can be brought to work and that the bringuing together of those Councils should depend so entirely upon them against whose Pretensions or Usurpations it seems to be most necessary But to go more closely to this Opinion If the Infallibility lies in a General Council it is first necessary that we know who are the Members that must constitute this Council whether the Laity have a right to be in it and to Judge or not We find the Brethren as well as the Elders join'd with the Apostles in that first Council to which all subsequent Councils pretend they have succeeded and whose Style It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us is one of the Foundations of this Authority Why then are the Brethren or the whole Church that is Lay Christians whom even the Apostles tho Inspir'd took to consult and judge with them Why I say are they now excluded It is also probable that by Elders or Presbyters are to be meant those to whom that name was afterwards appropriated why then are they shut out In a word If by a Divine Grant Infallibility belongs to a General Council we have a just Right to ask for a Definition of the Council by the same Authority otherwise we may ascribe Infallibility to those to whom God never meant to give it Must this Council consist of all the Bishops of the Christian Church For tho this is both unreasonable and scarce possible yet if the Infallibility is given in common to the Pastors and Bishops of the Church then it will be hard to shut out any from it if because of their distance their Age or their Poverty they cannot come to it and if tho a general Summons is pretended to give all men a right to come yet it is certain that only a few of those who have lived at a distance have come even in the best Ages those few will either be men of a greater degree of Wealth of Heat or of Health and will be probably men pickt out
Churches By another he designed to expose them to Scandal and Scorn He forbade Men and Women to meet together to worship God or Bishops to visit Women or Women to come to be instructed in their Schools and appointed that Women only should instruct Women He also forbade their holding Assemblies within Cities and ordered them to meet in the open Fields Some Churches were pulled down by his Orders and others were shut up and his first Successes made him resolve on a general Persecution For not only Eusebius but both Socrates Sozemen and several other Writers do all affirm That there was no general Persecution begun but that there were visible steps made towards it When all this was represented to Constantine he was much affected with it and resolved to help the oppressed and thought it was a pious and holy Action to save a mulitude by the destroying of one Person For he saw no other way was left to relieve the Oppressed and his engaging in a War with Licinius was by the Bishops of the East that is Licinius's own Subjects ascribed to an immediate Conduct and Providence of God It is true Eutropius puts this upon Constantine's Ambition and his aspiring to be the single Monarch of the World This is also insinuated by Aurelius Victor and more fully set out by Zosimus whose hatred both of Constantine and of the Christian Religion breaks out into so many Partialities unbecoming an Historian and engages him into so many Stories that are evidently false that little regard is due to any thing he says I will not enlarge upon the War that followed only I must observe that tho Constantine as the Senior Emperour had the precedence of Licinius yet he had no sort of Authority over him So here two Princes both equally Sovereigns of the Roman Empire Colleagues and Brothers-in-Law for Licinius had maried Constantine's Sister were engaged in a War the quarrel was not a general persecution but such steps made as did plainly discover there was one intended A Peace soon after followed The Cement of it was The declaring Licinius's Son Licinian Caesar who was then 21 years of Age this put him in the Succession But a second Rupture followed quickly after that Licinius's hatred to the Christians being rather encreased than abated since he observed that they all loved Constantine This proved fatal to Licinius for he was totally defeated at Andrianople the 3d of July 324. and after some fruitless Attempts he was forced to put himself in Constantines hand on the 18th of September following Whereupon he was sent to live a private man at Thessalonica but Constantine understanding that he could not rest ordered him to be put to death in the beginning of the Year 325. Now we are in the next place to see what was the sense of the whole Church of this Transaction I confess we ought not to take it singly from Eusebius for he is rather a perpetual Encomiast of Constantine than his Historian but we have a much more certain and Authentical Authority for this Constantine in the same year in which he had put Licinius to death and had taken no notice of Lucinian tho but a year before made Caesar by his own Act called the first General Council to meet at Nice For in his Speech to them he tells them that he had given Orders to call them together as soon as he had overcome the Tyranny The Council made no Exceptions to Constantine as an Invader they did neither enquire after Lucinian nor complain of Licinius's Fate On the contrary When Constantine came in and harangned them Eustathius of Antioch did entertain him with a Panegyrick full of high Commendations and another seems to have been made by Eusebius blessing Almighty God upon his account which Speeches pronounced in full Council are at least a strong Presumption that they all approved of the War and rejoiced in iâ— the deliverance This is yet more evident from the 11th Canon of the Council in which they reflect upon the late Tyranny of Licinius which shews that tho his death and the ruin of his Family must have naturally given some Compassion for one that was then scarce cold and that had so lately been their Prince for almost that whole Council consisted of those who had been the Bishops in his share of the Empire yet they considered the danger they and their Religion had been in under him and their deliverance by Constantine as vastly superiour to their Ties to him so that there was an Universal Ioy over the whole East upon the Successes of Constantine The having adhered to Licinius and taking part with him in the War tho he was then actually their Prince was a matter of such Scandal and Infamy that Constantine in a Letter which he writ to the Nicomedians against Ensebius their Bishop reproaches him with this That he had been always in Licinius's Councils and Secrets that he had all along stuck to him and had treated himself with Reproach that he had imployed Spies to procure Intelligence to Licinius and that he had given him all sort of Assistance except the bearing of Armes for him all which Constantine affirms he is ready to prove by some Priest and Deacons who had adher'd to Eusebius and whom he had taken Prisoners And thus we see what the sense of the whole Church in one of its best Ages and of the first General Council was of a Deliverance procured by one Sovereign Prince's attacking dethroning and possessing himself of the Empire of another who had not yet set on foot a General Persecution but had only violated the Laws which the Christians had for the security of their Religion had committed many Acts of Injustice and violence against them and had declared his Intentions so visibly that there was all possible reason to conclude that a General Persecution was coming on Not a Bishop nor a Priest stood out against Constantine not so much as a private Christian was of Licinius's Party All went into the Revolution and rejoiced in their Deliverance I will not go on to shâ—w how parallel that Case was to ours the attempt were as needless as it might seem invidious Only I may well conclude That it is not easy to imagine how we can be better assured of the sense of the whole Church in any point then we are of the sense of the Christians of that Age in this particular I have not said any thing to justify my putting Constantine's prevailâ—ing over Licinius in the Year immediately before the Council of Nice tho Baronius puts it six before it But it is visible that he has disordered the whole History of Constantine on design to maintain his being baptized at Rome with other unjustifiable things besides that Eusebius's Chronology in this particular as it is of authority of it self without any other support so it is fully confirmed by the dates of some Laws in the Code and several
particular that he who had been on other occasions the forwardest of them all and who had been warned by our Saviour of his danger and so was by consequence on his guard and less likely to fall had yet upon a remote apprehension of danger with repeated Oaths denied that he knew him Now he who through fear will deny a truth is much more like upon the same or a greater danger to discover a falshood This being the state of that matter let us now see how we can possibly imagine the Apostles who knew what effects fear had so lately upon themselves and who had also seen to what a degree one of them might he corrupted could so far trust either themselves or one another in such a matter in which they had reason to believe that the Iews who had gone so far with their Master would spare neither arts nor violenee to fetch out the Secret Besides that to venture on an Imposture which goes so much against Human Nature and which naturally strikes Men with fears and jealousies Men must be long practised to boldness and must have made such essays upon themselves and upon one another as to think they are secure of all that are in the Confidence But let us pass over all this and then see how the matter when resolved on could have been managed Either they were to steal away the Body of Christ or to leave it in the Sepulchre If they had left it all must have broke out immediately the bare exposing the Body must have confuted all that they could have said so it must be supposed that they carried it away Now how this could be done when a Watch was set when the Moon shone bright and such numbers of Men were wandring about in every corner is not easie to be imagined Some persons to a considerable number must be imployed if it had been to be carried to any distance and they could not think themselves safe if it had been laid near the place of the Sepulchre Some trace or print must have remained if they had broke ground which they must have expected would have been looked for and being found out would have discovered all not to mention the natural horror that all Men have at the handling dead Bodies even in what is necessary for their burial but most of all Iews who by their Law became defiled to a high degree by it But suppose the dead Body so disposed of that they apprehended to hear no more news of it how is it to be imagined that those frequent Apparitions of our Saviour's particularly that in Galilee to Five hundred at once which is appealed to while many of them were yet alive could have been manageed Here then we have first twelve Witnesses against whom no just exception lies even to feed suspicion who affirm a matter of fact and call in many others as their Vouchers to support their Testimony They stand to it to the last tho' they suffered much for it and could not possibly gain any thing by it and yet are supposed by Infidels to contrive and stick to a Forgery meerly to perswade the World to Vertue and Purity and to Sincerity and Truth which they begin with a train of falshood and deceit without any other visible Bait but their love to their dead Master that they might magnifie him and give him a lasting Name and wipe off the reproach of his infamous Death by this bold Contrivance of theirs A Man that can suppose all this to be possible will suppose any thing and shews that he has no regards so much as to the colours of Truth but will advance any thing rather than be beaten out of his Infidelity But to follow this matter more home a part and a great one of the History of the Gospel is That ten days after our Saviour ascended up into Heaven in the sight of his Apostles which with Infidels will pass for a part of the contrivance they received such extraordinary Illapses and Powers from Heaven in consequence to the Promises that our Saviour had made them that they were enabled to work Miracles and to speak with divers Tongues and the first essay of this appeared at the next Festival of the Iews in which Ierusalem was again filled not only with all the Iews of Iudea but also with those of the dispersion who from all Quarters were come up at Pentecost from the East as far as from Persia and Media from the West as far as from Rome and Libia from the South as far as from Arabia and from the North as far as from Parthia and many Provinces of Asia the Less and from several Islands as well as from the Continent Here was an astonishing thing to see unlettered men all of the sudden break out in speaking of Languages in which they had no sort of Education or Practice Fevers or Enthusiastical Heats may inflame men so far as to make them speak those Languages which they understand tho' they are not otherwise ready at them for the Prints being already in their Brains a strong exaltation of their Spirits may fetch those out much better than they themselves in a cooler and more sedate state could have done but where there are no previous Impressions no heat whatsoever can fetch out that which is not within Now as this was the most necessary of all other things to qualifie men to execute their Commission of going to teach all Nations in which they must have made a very slow progress if they must have learned the Language of every Countrey to which they were to go so it was the most signal of all others and as was formerly hinted at was that which must have been presently discover'd if it had not been notoriously and unquestionably true With these Powers and those Languages the Apostles went every where and promised to confer the like gifts on those that should receive and believe their Gospel And in the Epistles which they writ afterwards to those Churches even when their Authority was called in question they appealed to the gifts of the Holy Ghost conferred by their means so that either these things were notoriously true or they must have been despised as the most assuming and impudent of all Impostors These were their Credentials that procured them a hearing and as men were disposed to eternal Life so they received and entertained their Message Thus we have seen by a great variety of Considerations which this matter presents to us that not only there is no colour of Reason to incline a man to think that the Apostles designed to impose upon the World but that there is all possible Reason to the contrary to persuade us that they were in no respect capable of projecting any such thing nor of effecting it if they had intended it The 2 d. Supposition of Infidelity is That they themselves might have been deceived by two or three designing persons who might have imposed upon them
then all Companies of men that lodge themselves in any Authority and more particularly those who manage mens Consciences and the Concerns of Religion have been too often observ'd to enlarge their powers and to make the most of them they could and that by their means Religion has been often and much corrupted the World has from hence a Right to exact very full proofs before they can be bound to believe any such body of men to be exempted from Error This will yet appear the more evident if that very Body in which this Infallibility is suppos'd to dwell has manifestly corrupted the Morals and the order or discipline of this Religion if they have fill'd the world with Fables if they have fallen under gross Ignorance and have been over-run with Vice and Disorder these must afford great occasion of suspecting them in all other things If Impostures have been set up and promoted with great Zeal in some Ages which have in other Ages of more Light and Knowledge been thrown out and disclaim'd and if we find that the same Methods of Craft and Violence which have been practised in all other Societies have been more notoriously and scandalously practis'd by the men of Infallibility then we have from all these things just prejudices given us against this pretension Now a just prejudice amounts to this That we have no reason to believe a thing unless we see very good grounds to believe it and it gives us all reason to suspect those grounds and to examine them well before we are concluded by them Further This being so great a Matter and that which must settle all other things we have just reason to believe That if God has left such Authorities in the World that he has also made it plain where they lie and with whom they are to be found for it is not imaginable that God should have concluded Mankind under such an Authority and yet not have explain'd so necessary a Point as Who are the Depositaries of it but to have left men to their shifts to find that out the best way they can since till this is clear'd the other is of no use There is a dormant Infallibility they say in the Church but no body knows where for it is no Article of Faith in whom it is vested We are where we were only with this disadvantage that if we think we are sure there is an Infallibility in the Church but are not sure to whom it is trusted we may be resisting this Infallibility by opposing those who indeed have it while we adress our selves for it to others who have it not tho we fancy it belongs to them In all Constitutions among men the most evident thing is this Where rests the Supreme Authority of that Constitution And if this is necessary for the order and policy of the World it is much more necessary that if God has devolv'd so main a part of his own Authority and indeed the dispensing of one of his own Attributes this should be so described and circumstantiated that there should be no danger of mistaking and that there should have been such Characters given by which all the World should have been as infallibly directed to this Authority as it was to be infallible in its Decisions When God consign'd such a Character to the Jewish Nation that the Symbol of his presence was to appear and that Answers were to be given out as he was consulted it was expresly declar'd with whom it was lodged and in what Method the High-Priest was to appear before the Lord with the Vrim in the Breast-plate that so there might be no room left for Imposture or even for suspicion Upon all these reasons we have a very just right to demand of those who call us to submit to their Infallibility to give us such plain express and determinate proofs for it as are proportion'd to the Importance and Unusualness of that which they impose upon us It is a vain thing to prove that this must be in the Church because otherwise a great many Absurdities must needs follow if it were not in it When it is once prov'd that God has given it to his Church we shall very willingly yield that he had very good reasons for it since so extraordinary a Power which might be easily imploy'd to very bad purposes certainly was not to be given but for very good ones but it is a very preposterous way to argue That God must have done such a thing because we fancy that it is necessary to prevent some great Evil or to procure some very great Good For this is only to pretend to prove that God ought to have done somewhat that he has not done unless they can at the same time prove that God has done it this is to conclude That his Ways must be as ours are and that his Thoughts must be as our Thoughts We may at this rate prove as well that the Messias should have appear'd much sooner than he did have shew'd his Miracles and even his Body after his Resurrection more publickly than he did This will prove that the Gospel should have been preach'd to many Nations yet in Paganism and this will rather with an advantage in the Argument prove that there should be no sin left in the world and that no man should be left to perish in his sins and so be damn'd for them It will require no great Art to make it appear that these are much more dreadful things and seem to be much more contrary to God's Nature to his Love to Mankind and to his Church but indeed if we will give our selves scope upon this Argument to fancy that God must do every thing which we imagine would be very convenient we should soon frame an Idea both of his Creation and his Providence that is wholly different from what we perceive it to be We are not capable of so vast a Thought as to take in a Scheme of those great Designs that lie in the Eternal Mind and that are scatter'd in a seeming Confusion through his Works and Ways but are beautiful and orderly as they are gathered together in his Ideas We cannot say what is good or evil with relation to the whole nor what are the properest Methods of bringing about the one or of diverting the other so to conclude the arguing that Christ had dealt ill with his Church if he had not made her Infallible unless it is made out that he has done it is only a reproaching him with this That he has not done that which he ought to have done and that he has not been faithful in discharging the Trust committed to him of his Father Therefore all these are false ways of arguing which cannot work on any but such as measure God by themselves The Argument if true is Infinite and has no bounds It does seem to agree much better with the Jewish Oeconomy that an Infallibility should have been lodg'd among them Their
been so overcome by the men of Labour and Learning that even the Church that boasts of Infallibility would have made a small progress without their Endeavours And why should we imagine that a Religion which we feel to be so hard in practice should be made so easy in the speculative part that we should be in no danger and need no Industry to understand it A Promise of the Spirit is indeed pretended that the Church should be thereby guided into all Truth But it is to be consider'd that this Promise was made personally to the Apostles who were Inspir'd and so were infallibly guided which appears more plainly from the following words and he shall shew you things to come that is clearly a promise of the Spirit of Prophesy to which since no Body of men can now pretend they cannot claim the other neither for both must go together according to the force of those works Nor is there any reason from those words to conclude that this any more than the Inspiration of the Apostles was to descend to others after them or if any will through a parity of Reason think that this was to continue in the Church why should it not belong to every Christian and not be confin'd to any Body or Succession of men especially since those who think that the same parity will hold as to the other effects of the Spirit promis'd there of its dwelling in them of bringing things to their remembrance of giving them Confort Peace Ioy and Victory over the World and that these do descend to others after the Apostles do believe that they belong to all Christians and are not to be contracted to a small number Now if all the other promises were to descend thus why not this of being led into all Truth as well as the rest For all promises even tho express'd in positive words do carry a condition naturally in them so that when this promise is believ'd to belong to all Christians yet it is not absolute but supposes men's using their utmost Endeavours with an honest and good Mind in which case no man can deny but that whether that promise was specially meant to them or not yet it shall be so far accomplish'd in them that they shall be left in no Error that shall be fatal to them but that either they shall be deliver'd from it or that it shall be forgiven them since it is inconsistent with the Notion of infinite Goodness that any man should perish who is doing all he can in order to his Salvation If it be said That Error does disturb the Peace and Order of the Church beyond what is to be apprehended from Sin Error runs men into parties and out of those Factions do arise which break not only the Peace of the Church but the whole order of the World and the Quiet of Civil Society whereas Sin does only harm to those who are guilty of it or to a few who may be corrupted by their ill example But to this it is to be answer'd That Sin does naturally much more mischief to Mankind than Error he that errs if he is not Immoral with it is quiet and peaceable in his Error therefore still the greatest mischief is from Sin which corrupts men's Natures through its own Influence And the mischief that Error does procure arises chiefly from the pretensions to Infallibility or something that is near a-kin to it for if men were suffer'd to go on in their Errors with the same undisturbed quiet that they have for most of their sins they would probably be much quieter in them since Sin of its nature is a much fiercer thing than a point of Speculation can be suppos'd to be but if men apprehend Inquisitions or other Miseries upon the account of their Opinions then they stand together and combine for their own Defence and Preservation so that it is not from the Errors themselves but from the methods of treating them that all those Convulsions have arisen which have so violently shaken Churches and Kingdoms But the last and Main thing that is urg'd on this Head is That no private Understanding is strong enough to find out Truth in all the points of Religion that it is an indecent and an insolent thing for private men for Tradesmen perhaps or for Women to pretend to expound Scripture or to judge in points of Religion This feeds Pride and self-conceit beyond any thing that can be imagin'd whereas a Spirit of Submission and Humility of thinking others particularly Superiours wiser than our selves has so great a resemblance to the Spirit of the Gospel and seems to agree so well with the design of this Religion that we must believe it to be a part of it This is indeed specious but after all it is to be consider'd that God has made us of such a nature that our apprehensions of things must determine us whether we will or not and it is not likely that God would make us as he has done and yet at the same time so limit our Faculties that they should not be imploy'd in the Matters of Religion We naturally love Freedom and we believe things the more firmly the more profoundly we have inquir'd into them when we come to be once fully satisfi'd about them when we find our selves oft call'd on in the Scriptures to search them to prove all things to try the Spirits when we see a great part of the New Testament was directed to whole Churches to all the Saints that is to the whole Body of the Christians when so much of it is writ in the Style of one that argues that descends from that Apostolical Authority by which he might have commanded those he writes to to receive and rest in his Decisions and that lays things in their natural Connexions and Consequences before those he writes to we see in that such an appeal to their Reasons and that even in the Age of Miracles in which there was another sort of Characters of the Divine Commission that render'd the Apostles Infallible when I say this Appeal was made to their Reasons and Understandings at that time it seems much more reasonable that in the succeeding Ages men should have a right to imploy their Faculties in finding out the Sense and examining the Books of the New Testament Here let us consider the state of every Iew at that time and see if this reasoning for Authority and Infallibility was not then as strong to keep him in Judaism There was a Controversy between the Apostles and the Sanhedrim whether Iesus was the Messias or not A decision of this was in a great measure to be made from the Prophecies in the Old Testament concerning the Messias which were urg'd by the Apostles but the Rabbies the Scribes and Pharisees put other senses on these Now what was a private Iew to do Must he take upon him to judge so intricate a Controversy Must he pretend to be wiser than all the Doctors
of their Law or the Conveyers of their Traditions to them Must he set up his Skill and Reason above theirs Thus we see that if this Reasoning is true it being founded on Maxims that are equally true at all times then it was as true at that time as it is now It is of no force to say that the Miracles which our Saviour and his Apostles wrought gave them such Powers that the people were upon that account bound to believe them rather than their Teachers For one part of the Debate was both the truth of the Miracles and the Consequences that arose from them So the Appeal according to this way of Reasoning did still lie to their Sanhedrim In a word In such Matters every man must judge for himself and every man must answer to God for the Judgment that he has made he judges for no body else but for himself He and He only can be the Judge and if he uses a due degree of Industry and frees himself from every corrupt Biass from Pride Vain-glory and affectation of Singularity or the pursuing any ill ends under those appearances of searching for Truth and the adhering to it he is doing the best thing which according to that nature of which God has made him he can do and so he may reasenably believe that he shall succeed in it Nor is there any pride in this for a man to think according to his own Understanding no more than to see with his own Eyes His Humility ought to make him slow and cautious modest and fearful but no humility can oblige him to think otherwise than he feels he must needs think Among the Works of the flesh Heresies or Sects are reckon'd as one sort and species Now by Works of the flesh are to be understood the appetites of a vicious and depraved nature the meaning therefore of reckoning Heresies among these is this That when a man out of a bad disposition of mind and on ill designs chuses to to be of a party he then is a Heretick but he that in sincerity of Heart goes into persuasions from an overcoming sense of their Truth cannot be one because he does not chuse his persuasion out of a previous ill design but is of it not out of choice but necessity since his Understanding in which those matters may be variously represented offers them so to him that he must believe them to be true in the same manner in which he apprehends them If upon this Principle there happen to be many Sects and Divisions in the Church this is a part of that Wo that Christ left upon the World by reason of Offences and Scandals for he forsaw that they must needs come God has made this present Scene of Life to be neither regular nor secure The strange Follies and Corruptions of Mankind must have their Influence on Religion as well as they have on all other things God has reserv'd a fulness of Light and of unerring Knowledge to another State Here we are in the dark but have light enough if we have honest Minds to use and improve it aright to guide us thither and that is the utmost share that God seems to have design'd for us in this Life we must therefore be contented and make the most of it that we can I go next to shew That the same Difficulties if not greater ones he upon those who build on Infallibility for before they can arrive at the use of it they must have well examin'd and be fully assur'd of two things either of which has greater Difficulties in it than all those put together with which they press us First They must be convinced that there is an Infallibility in the Church and next they must know to which of those many Churches into which Christendom is divided this Infallibility is fastned Unless the design is to make all men take their Religion implicitely from their Forefathers these things must be well consider'd If men are oblig'd to adhere blindly to the Religion in which they were bred then Iews Heathans and Mahometans must continue still where they are If this had been the Maxim of all times Christianity had never got into the World If then men are allow'd to examine things they must have very good reason given them for it before they can believe that there is an Infallibility among men Their own Reason and Observation offers so much against it that without very clear grounds they ought not to receive it Now the reasons to persuade it must be drawn either from Scripture or from outward visible Characters that evidence it The Scriptures cannot be urg'd by these men because the Scriptures as they teach have their Authority from the Testimony of the Church Therefore the Authority of the Church must be first prov'd for the Church cannot give an Authority to a Book and then prove its own Authority by that Book This is plainly to prove the Church by her own Testimony which is manifestly absurd it being all one whether she affirms it immediately or if she affirms it by affirming a Book in which it is contain'd here a Circle is made to run for ever round in Why do you believe the Church because the Scriptures affirm it and why do you believe the Scriptures because the Church affirms them I do not deny but they may urge the Scriptures for this very pertinently against us who acknowledge their Authority but I am now considering upon what grounds a man is to be instructed in the stating the grounds of his own Faith and resolving it into Principles In this an Order must be fix'd and in the progress of it every step that is made must be prov'd without any relation to that which is afterwards to be proved out of that and therefore either the Church or the Scriptures must be first prov'd and then other things must be prov'd out of that which is once fix'd and made good But in the next place if we should suffer them to bring Proofs from Scripture how shall it he prov'd that the true sense of them is that which makes for infallibility Other senses may be given to them which may both agree to the Grammatical Construction of the words to the contexture of the Discourse and to the Phraseology of the Scriptures who shall then decide this Matter It were very unreasonable to prove what is their true Sense by the Exposition that any Church puts on those passages in her own favour that were to make her both Judge and Party in too gross a manner Therefore at least thâ—se passages and all that relates to them must fall under the private Judgment and in these Instances every man must be suffer'd to expound the Scriptures for himself for he cannot be bound to submit to any exposition of them but that which satisfies his own Reason and if this step is once admitted then it will appear as reasonable to leave a man all over to the use of his
Sacrament to Salvation and all Parents having naturally a very tender Concern for their Children nothing but an absolute Authority against which no man durst so much as whisper could have brought the world to have parted with this It were easy to carry this to many other Instances and to shew that not only Ritual Traditions but Doctrinal ones such as were found on Explanations of passages of Scripture have varied It were perhaps too invidious to send men to Petavius to find in him how much the Tradition of the several Ages has vari'd in the greatest Articles of the Christian Doctrine It is no less certain that Origen laid down a Scheme with relation to the Liberty of man's Will and the Providence of God that came to be so universally receiv'd by the Greek Church that both Nazianzen and Basil drew a sort of System out of his Doctrine in which those Opinions were asserted and large Quotations were gather'd out of him explaining them with most of the Difficulties that do arise out of them and as this Book had not only Origen's own Authority to support it but likewise that of those two great Men who compil'd it so it passed down and was the uncontested Doctrine of the Greek Church But St. Austin being engag'd into Disputes with Pelagius fram'd a new System that had never been thought of before him and yet the Worth and Labours of that Father gave it so a vast Reputation that this was look'd on in several Ages as the Doctrine of the Church and Learning vanishing at that time the Roman Empire being then over-run by Barbarians his Book came to be so much read and so universally receiv'd that it gave no small suspicion if any one oppos'd his Tenets yet Cassian who was a Greek and was form'd in their Notions writ a Book of Conferences which contain'd the Precepts of a Monastick State of life that were digested in so good a method and writ with so true an Elevation that it is perhaps one of the best Books that the Ancients have left us This came to be held in such Esteem that all the Monks read it with a particular Attention and Regard In it the Doctrine of Origen and the Greek Church was so fully set forth that this and perhaps this alone kept up a secret opposition to St. Austin's Doctrine tho that came to receive a vast strengthening from Aquinas and the Schoolmen that follow'd him and yet at the time that Luther and Calvin in opposition to the Church of Rome built much upon St. Austin's Authority almost all all that writ against them argu'd according to the Sentiments of the Greek Church but those of Louvain and the Orders of the Dominicans and Augustinians did so maintain St. Austins and Aquinas's Doctrine that tho it was not liked because it seem'd to be too near theirs who were to be condemn'd as Hereticks yet the Council of Trent seem'd still to stick to St. Austin Since that time the Iesuits Order who tho they at first set up for St. Austin's Doctrine yet since have chang'd their minds and taken themselves to the other side have by their Influence both at Rome and in other Courts so chang'd the Sense of the greater part of that Church that it is plain tho St. Austin's Name is too great to be openly disparaged yet they are now generally in the contrary Hypothesis This I only instance to shew that in Speculative Points it is no hard matter to make multitudes go from one Opinion to another and to alter the Tradition of the Church that is to bring one Age of the Church to think otherwise than another did But after all Oral Tradition cannot be set up as the Judge of Controversies much less as the living and speaking Judge it is no real being nor do we know where to find it The Tradition of one Body among them differs from another as in the point of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin in which an Opinion has been lately started which is now receiv'd into all their Rituals and has given occasion to many Acts of Worship and publick Devotions which is most expresly contrary to all Ancient Tradition and yet is become now so Sacred that the whole Dominican Order feels no small Inconvenience by their being oblig'd as the Followers of Aquinas to maintain the contrary The Traditions of one Nation are question'd by another particularly in this important Point of the Subject of this Infallibility It is also impossible for any man to find this out must he suspend his Opinion till he has gone round the Church to ask every man what he was bred to This as it could not be suffer'd so it could not be so fully found out as to put a man in the way to end all Controversies in this a private Judgment must again come in For tho it were granted that Oral Tradition is a Rule to judge Controversies by it can never be pretended that it is the living and speaking Iudge that must determine them I come now to the two more receiv'd Opinions in this matter the one puts it in a General Council and the other puts it in the Pope and both the one and the other pretend that the Church Representative is in them As for the pretence of some who seem to make a Third party and believe it to be in a Council confirm'd by the Pope this is only a plausible way of putting it wholly in the Pope for if the Definitions of a Council have no Infallibility in them till the Pope's Consent and Approbation is given then it is plain that all the Infallibility is in him and that he only chuses to exert it in that solemn way For either Christ gave it to St. Peter and his Successors or he gave it not if he gave it not that pretension is out of doors if he gave it to them we plainly see no Limitations in the grant and whatsoever Rules or Methods may have become authoris'd by Practice and Custom they are only Ecclesiastical Constitutions but can never be suppos'd to limit Christ's Grant or to give any share of it to others It will be to no purpose to object here That as some Constitutions our own in particular are so fram'd that the Legislative Authority tho it flows only from the King yet is limited to such a Method that it cannot be exerted but with the Concurrence of Lords and Commons so it may be also in the Church and thus the Pope can only use his Infallibility in Concurrence with a General Council or at least that both together are Infallible But tho human Societies may model themselves as to their Legislation which way they will this will only prove that as to the Government and Administration of the Church she may put her self into such a method as may be thought most regular and expedient and thus the Council of Nice limited the Bishops of a Province to do nothing without the
no wonder if he raises the Authority and the Priviledges of the Church to a vast height Yet after all these were not his setled thoughts for he goes off from them whensoever he has an eye on his Disputes against the Pelagians for the System which he had framed in those Points could not bear with any other Notion of the Church but that of the persons predestinated to whom all the Promises belonged And thus whatever he himself asserts in his zeal against the Donatists comes to be thrown down when the Pelagians are in his view so we see from hence how much deference is due to his Authority in this Point The last head relating to this whole matter is to explain in what the Authority of the Church does consist what it is both in matters of Faith and Discipline As to matters of Faith it is certain that every Body of men is bound to study to maintain its own Order and Quiet and must be authoris'd to preserve it otherwise it cannot long continue to be one Body This binds the Body of Christians yet much more who are strictly charged to love one another to worship God with one heart and mouth to be of the same mind and judgment to assemble themselves together and to withdraw from all such as cause divisions or corrupt the great Trust of the Faith committed to their keeping It must be therefore a great part of the duty of those that are bound to feed the flock to observe when any begin to broach new Opinions that they may confirm the weak and stop the mouths of gainsayers which as the Apostles themselves did during their own lives so by the charges that they gave to the Churches in their Epistles and more fully by those given to Timothy and Titus it appears that a main part of their Care and Authority was to be employ'd that way When therefore any new Doctrines are started or when there arise Disputes about any part of Religion the Pastors of the Church ought to consider whether or not it is in a matter of any great consequence in which the Faith or Lives of men may be concerned If the point is not of a great importance it is a piece of wisdom to connive at lesser matters and to leave men to a just freedom in things where that freedom is not like to do hurt only even there care is to be taken to keep men in temper that they become not too keen in the management of their Opinions and that they neither disturb the Peace of the Church nor State upon that account If the matters appear to be great either in themselves or in the consequences that are like to follow upon them then the Pastors of the Church ought to consider them with an equal and impartial mind they ought to here Parties fully and weigh their Arguments carefully they ought to examine the sense of the Scriptures and of the best times of the Church upon those Heads and finally to give Sentence In which two things are to be considered the one is That great regard is due to a Decision made by a Body of men who seem to have acted without prejudice or interest For I confess it will be very hard to maintain such a respect for a Company in which matters are carried with so much Artifice and Intrigue as even Cardinal Palavicini represents in the management of the Council of Trent where Bishops were caressed or threatned well paid or ill used as they gave their Voices Such a proceeding as this will rather inflame than allay the opposition but a fair and equitable a just and calm way of examining matters of dispute will naturally beget a respect even in such as cannot yield a submission to their Decrees After all it must be confessed That no Man can be bound to a blind Submission unless we suppose an Infallibility to be in the Church yet Private Men owe to Publick Decisions when decently made a due respect they ought to distrust their own judgments and examine the matter more accurately But if they are still convinc'd that the Decision is wrong they are bound to persist in their own thoughts only they ought to oppose modestly to consider well the Importance of Order and Peace and whether their Opinion even suppose it true is worth the Noise that may be made about it or the Disorders that may follow upon it After all If they are still convinced that their Opinions are true and that they relate to the indispensible Duties of Religion or the necessary Articles of Christianity they must go on as they will answer it to God upon the sincerity of their Hearts and the fulness of their Convictions So that the Definitions of the Church may have very good Effects even when it is not pretended that they are Infallible Another thing to be consider'd in those Decisions is That though they are not Infallible yet they may have Authority in this respect That they are the established Doctrine of such a Body of Christians who will have no other to be taught among them and will admit none to be of their Body or at least to be a Teacher among them who is not of the same mind In this it is certain great Tenderness and Prudence is to be used and the natural liberty of Mankind is not to be too much limited But yet as any Man may fix and declare his own Opinion so certainly by a much greater parity of reason any Society or Body of Men may declare their Opinions and so far fix them as to exclude all other Doctrines and the Favourers of them from being of their Body or from bearing any Office in it So that though such Decisions do not enter into Mens Consciences nor bind them further than as they are convinced by the Reasons and Authorities upon which they are founded yet they may have a vast influence on the Order and Peace of Churches and States As to Rituals it is certain that there are many little Circumstances and Decencies that belong to the Worship of God the Order of Religious Assemblies and their Administrations and that in these the Pastors of a Church by the Natural Right that all Societies have to keep themselves in order must have a Power to determine all things of this nature This becomes yet clearer in the Christian Societies from the Rules that the Apostles gave to the Churches To do all things in Order and for the ends of Edification and Peace There is not one of the Rules laid down in Scripture concerning the Sacraments or the Officers of the Church to which many Circumstances do not belong now either these must be all left to every Man's liberty which must needs create a jarring disagreement in the several parts of this Body that would both breed confusion and look very ridiculous and absurd or there must be an Authority in the Pastors of the Church to meet together and to settle these by mutual consent
All the greater Bodies of those who divide from our Constitutions have some Rituals of their own so the Dispute in this must only be concerning the degrees and extent of this Power For if any Authority is allowed it will not be easy to fix any other Bounds to it but this that it must not invade the Divine Authority nor do any thing beyond the Rules and Limits set in the Scriptures for if there is the least degree of Authority in the Church the grounds upon which it is founded must carry it to every thing that cannot be proved to be unlawful Bare unfitness though it ought to be a Consideration of great weight when such things are deliberated about yet when they are once concluded can be no reason for disobeying them since the fitness of Order and the decency of Unity and Obedience is certainly of much more value than any special unfitness that can be supposed to be in any particular Instance So that one of these two must be admitted either that the Pastors of the Church have no sort of Authority even in the smallest Circumstances but are limited by the Rules of the Scripture and can only execute them strictly and not go beyond them in a title or this Authority must go to every thing that is lawful On that I will dwell no longer here the fuller discussion of this matter belonging to another Discourse It is a natural Consequence of the Authority given to the Pastors of the Church That they having declared and fixed their Doctrine and having setled Rules for their Rituals may excommunicate such as either do not live according to the Rules of their Religion which are a main part of their Doctrine or do not obey the Constitutions of their Society Excommunication in the Strictness of things is only the Churches refusing to receive a person into her Communion now as every Private man is the Master of his own Actions it is clear that every Body of Men must also be the Masters of theirs And thus though Excommunication in some respects is declaratory it being a solemn denunciation of the Judgments of God according to the tenor of the Gospel against persons who live in an open violation of some one or more of its Laws so it is also an authoritative Act by which a Church refuses to communicate with such a Person In this it is true Churches ought to make the terms of Communion with them as large and extensive as may consist with the Rules of Religion and of Order but after all they having a Power over themselves and their own Actions must be supposed to be likewise cloathed with a Power to communicate with other Persons or not to do it as they shall see cause in which great difference is to be made between this Power in it self and the use and management of it for any Abuses whether true or only pretended though they may well be urged to procure a proper Reformation of them yet cannot be alledged against the Power it self which is both just and necessary It is not so very clear to state the Subordination in which the Church is to be put under the Civil Power and how far all Acts of Church Power are subject to the Laws and Policies of those States to which the several Churches do belong It is certain that the Magistrate's being a Christian or not does not at all alter the Case that has only a relation to his own salvation for his Authority is the same whatever his Belief may be in matters of Religion His design to protect or to destroy Religion alters the Case more sensibly for the regards to that Protection and to the Peace and Order that follow upon it together with the Breaches and Disorders that might follow upon an ill understanding between Church and State are matters of Such Consequence that it is not only meer Prudence which may give perhaps too strong a Bias to carnal Fears and Policies but the Rules of Religion which oblige the Church to study to preserve that Order and Protection which is one of the chief Blessings of the Society and a main Instrument of doing much good Great difference is to be made between an Authority that acts with a visible design to destroy Religion and another that intends to protect it but that errs in its conduct and does often restrain the Rules of Order and impose hard and uneasy things Certainly in the latter much is to be born with that may be otherwise uneasy because the main is stil safe and private slips when endured and submitted to can never be compared to those publick disorders that a rigid maintaining of that which is perhaps in it self good must occasion But when the design is plain and that the Conduct of the Civil Powers goes against the Truth of Religion either in whole or in any main Article of it then the Body of the Christians of that State ought to fortify themselves by maintaining their Order and their other Rules in so far as they are necessary to their preservation Upon the whole matter it does not appear that the Church has any Authority to act in opposition to the State but meerly in those things in which the Religion that she professes is plain and positive so that the Question comes to be really this Whether is it better to obey God than Man There the Rule is clear and the Decision is soon made So when the Church acts meerly in obedience to Rules and Laws laid down in Scripture such as in declaring the Doctrine in administring the Sacraments and maintaining the setled Officers of the Church she is upon a sure Bottom and must cast her self upon the Providence of God whatever may happen and still obey God but in all things that have arisen out of ancient Customs and Canons in every thing where she has not a Law of God to support her I do not see any Power she has to act in opposition to Law and to the Supreme Civil Authority In this the constant practice of the Iews is no small Argument whos 's Sanhedrin that was a Civil Court and the Head of their State did give Rules and Orders which their Priests were bound to obey when not contrary to the Law of God We are sure this was the Rule in our Saviour's time and it was never censured nor reproved by him nor by the Apostles The Argument is also strong that is drawn from the constant practice of the Church from the time that she first had the protection of the Civil Authority till the times of the Papal Domination in which we find the Emperours all along making Laws concerning all the Administrations of the Church we find them receiving Appeals in all Church matters which they appointed such Bishops as hapned to be about their Courts to examine This was like our Court of Delegates for the Bishops who judged those matters did not act according to Canon or by the Ecclesiastical
Authority which had put the Church in a stated line of Subordination according to the division of the Provinces of the Empire They acted only by an Imperial Authority so that though they were Bishops they acted by the Emperor's Commission Such Authorities as these drawn from the practices of the Iewish and the Primitive Church are at least strong Inducements to believe this to be true But the Argument that seems to determine it is That Men cannot be obliged to obey two different Authorities that may happen to contradict one another this were a strange distraction in Mens Thoughts and Consciences and therefore it cannot be supposed that God has put them under such a divided Authority for all Temporals will easily be fetched within an in ordine ad spiritualia Since then every Soul is bound under the hazard of damnation to obey the Supreme Powers we must be bound to obey their Laws in every thing that is not contrary to the Law of God which seems to be the only Limitation that this can admit of That settles this whole matter which otherwise must be ravelled out into vast Intricacies and yet it must be supposed for certain that the Rule for Mens obedience must be distinct and fixed To conclude this whole matter The best and surest way for preserving the Order and Authority of the Church as well as its Peace and Prosperity is for the Clergy to live and labour so to be so humble and modest so self-denied and heavenly-minded that from thence the Laity may be brought to see that whatsoever Power they have will be employed for the Publick good of the whole This will make them to be less jealous and more submissive and this will secure to them most commonly the protection and encouragement which they may expect from the Civil Powers who will be apt to have regard to their Clergy according to the esteem which they observe their other Subjects have for them DISCOURSE IV. Concerning the OBLIGATIONS To continue in the COMMUNION of the CHURCH THERE is nothing that concerns the Peace and Order of Churches and indeed the quiet and good Government of Mankind more than rightly to understand our Obligations to continue in the Communion of that Church in which we were born or which is the main Body of that Society of Christians among whom we live The extreams in this matter are dangerous on both hands A lazy Compliance with every thing that is uppermost because of the Law and Advantages that may be on its side and an implicite believing and receiving of every thing that happens to be proposed to us does on the one hand depress our Faculties render us so easy to every Form in Religion that we become at last indifferent to all and concerned in none it makes way for tyranny in those that govern and sinks those that are governed into a sottish stupidity On the other hand a wanton cavilling at every thing thebreaking of an Established Order the making Divisions and the drawing of Parties the quarrelling about nicer points of speculation or some lesser matters in Rituals do occasion much passion and animosity they take men much off from the great ends of Religion they divide Christians from one another and sharpen them against one another all which are Evils of so high a nature in themselves and in their Consequences that it will be of great advantage to find so true a mean in this matter that in it we may avoid the mischiefs of both extreams The foundation then to be laid here is first to consider the natural obligation that all men who are united by any common Bond come under to maintain a cordial affection and a mutual good understanding among themselves both as it is an instrument to preserve and strengthen their Body and as it makes such a Body of men easy and happy But this that is a consideration common to all joint Bodies of men becomes much stronger in the Christian Religion one of its main designs being to knit mens hearts to one another by a tenderness of brotherly kindness and charity our Saviour having made this the distinction by which all the world might know who were his disciples and who were not so And all his Apostles have in every one of their Epistles not excepting the shortest prest this in such a variety of copious and most earnest Directions that whosoever reads the New Testament carefully must see that this is enlarged on beyond all the other Duties of our Religion and prest in the most comprehensive words and with the most enforcing considerations possible the chief of all being the love which our Saviour himself bare to us in imitation of which he has required us to love one another to love enemies to pass by and to forgive injuries doing good for evil to relieve the necessitous and have bowels of compassion for all men This is a main part of the glory as well as of the duties of our Religon To advance this and to endear us to one another we are obliged to pray with and for one another we are bound to assemble our selves together that by our seeing of one another and meeting in the same Acts and Duties of Religion our love and union may become stronger and more firmly cemented Sacraments are sacred Rites instituted not only to maintain our Devotion towards God as Acts of Homage and Solemn Vows made to him but likewise as Bonds to knit us together as well as to unite us to our Head And it is no small confirmation of all this that our Saviour in his last and longest Prayer to the Father when he was interceding for his Church has repeated this Prayer so often no less than five times in no very long Prayer that they might be one and be kept and made perfect in one and the Unity prayed for is so sublime that it is compared to that unconceivable Unity or Union that was between the Father and the Son and by this the world was to be convinced of the truth of his Religion That the world might believe that the Father had sent him More needs not be said upon this Head to make it evident that it is of the greatest importance to the Christian Religion to maintain an entire union among its Members and that the chief mean of doing this is their uniting themselves in the same Acts of Worship Now the only Question that will remain will be How far must this go and the only Answer that can be made to it is That it must go till the Body in which we happen to be engaged imposes unlawful terms of Communion on its Members In that case we must remember that it is better to obey God than man and that we must seek peace and truth since an Union on unlawful terms is a combination against God and his Truth and is no piece of Christian Charity This will be agreed to on all hands in the general So I will go
Deceency and Beauty as may carry on the Order and Edification of the Church and since some Actions seem to have a very natural tendency to give good Impressions and to raise a seriousness and awe for Divine Performances these may be also appointed by those who are to feed teach and guide their people We see the Iews tho their Religion seems to have in it a sufficient share of Rituals did add a great many Ceremonies to those which Moses gave them They had in their Pascal-Supper a thick sawce of Dates Almonds and Figs pounded together and wrought up into the form of Clay to remember them of the Clay of which their Fathers had made Bricks in the Land of AEgypt and yet our Saviour observ'd this Paschal-Supper with the same addition for this was probably the sawce into which Iudas dipt the Sop. They had likewise a form of Initiating Proselytes into their Religion by Baptism not mention'd in the Old Testament and after this Paschal-Supper the Table was spread a second time and nothing but Bread and Wine was set on it yet tho these two last mention'd were Rites added by them to the Divine Institution our Saviour was so far from condemning them for those additions that he took these and hallow'd them to be the two Foederal Rites of his own Religion Nor does he so much blame the Pharisees for the observation of those Rites which Tradition had handed down to them as because they set that value on them as to make the Laws of God of no effect upon their account when those voluntary assum'd Ceremonies were preferr'd by them to the Moral Law it self so that the over-valuing of Rituals and the imagining that by them Compensation can be made to God for the weghtier Matters of the Law Faith Justice and the Love of God is indeed severely reprimanded by our Saviour but the bare observance of them is no where censur'd by him On the contrary The whole service of the Synagogues was only a human Institution no print of any Divine Precept appearing for it in the whole Old Testament yet our Saviour came to their Synagogues and bore a share in the Acts of Worship that were perform'd there A Feast was Instituted by the Maccabees in commemoration of their having purg'd the Temple from Idolatry which was observ'd by our Saviour and the whole New Testament is full of allusions to some Forms and Rites which were their practised by the Iews in their Worship tho no where instituted in the Old Testament There are also some Precepts given in the New Testament about Ritual Matters which are now taken away only by disuse that is by the Authority of the Church that has discontinu'd the practice of them such is the Decree that the Apostles with the rest at Ierusalem made against the eating of meats strangled or offered to Idols or of blood which as they are join'd with Fornication so the prohibition of them is reckon'd among necessary things yet these are now no more consider'd as forbidden that prohibition being lookt on either as a compliance with the Iews in those precepts which they believe were given to the Sons of Noah or as a direction to keep the Christians at a due distance from all compliances with the Gentiles in their Idolatrous practises And now that all regards to the Iews have ceased with God's rejecting them from being his people at the destruction of Ierusalem and all danger of coming too near the practices of the Gentiles is likewise at an end we living no more among Heathenish Idolaters the nature of the things prohibited by that Decree not being evil in themselves when the ground of the Prohibition ceases all men reckon that the Prohibition must be at an end Here then the Authority and Practice of the Church seems to be strong even in bar to an Apostolical Decree and none of those Bodies that are offended at our Rituals have revived this So at least this Argument is of force against those who do it not for certainly a greater degree of Authority is necessary to take away a practice that has the face of a plain Commandment in Scripture enjoining it than for adding such Rites as are recommended by new Emergencies To this may be added the Practice and Rules given by the Apostles concerning Deaconesses Phoebe and others are mention'd that serv'd in that Function St. Paul also in the Rules that he gives concerning the Age the Qualifications and the Functions of the Widows seems plainly to mean them and we do certainly know that they were in the first Ages of Christianity and were imploy'd in the Instruction and about the Baptism of such women as were converted to the Faith But when afterwards some Scandals rose upon them as the Council of Nice prohibited the Clergy to keep any women that were not very nearly related to them in their houses so in the Fifth Century upon some publick Scandals given by them we find that as they were put down in the Western Church by several Provincial Synods so they insensibly wore out of the Greek Church and yet none in our days have endeavour'd to revive this Institution The kiss of peace was likewise us'd in the Apostles times and is mention'd in their Epistles yet that Rite being perhaps made use of by prophane Scoffers to represent the Assemblies of the Christians as too licentious for the black and unjust Imputations cast on their Meetings seem to have no other Foundation but this it wore out of practice and I do not hear that any in our days have endeavour'd to bring it again in use We see likewise that they had Love-feasts before the Eucharist which was taken from the Iews and tho St. Paul complains of some abuses in this practice he does not condemn it nor order it to be let fall yet it wore out and is not now offer'd to be reviv'd by any among us Thus we see that as to Matters that are expresly mention'd in Scripture with warrants that seem to impose them as standing Rules upon succeeding Ages the abuses or unfitness which afterwards appear'd in them were thought sufficient Reasons for departing from them To these Instances another may be added that must needs press all that differ from us one Body only excepted very much We know that the first Ritual of Baptism was by going into the Waters and being laid as dead backwards all-along in them and then the persons baptized were rais'd up again and so they came out of them This is not only mention'd by St. Paul but in two different places he gives a Mystical Signification of this Rite that it signified our being buried with Christ in Baptism and our being raised up with him to a new life so that the Phrases of rising with Christ and so putting on Christ as oft as they occur do plainly relate to this and yet partly out of modesty partly in regard to the tenderness of
Infants and the coldness of these Climates since such a manner might endanger their lives and we know that God loves mercy better than sacrifice this form of baptizing is as little used by those who separate from us as by our selves If we consider only the words of the Scripture without regarding the subsequent practice of the Church we see reason enough to imagine that the washing of feet should be kept up in the Church We have our Saviour's practice for it and words that seem to import an obligation on us to wash one anothers feet together with the moral use and signification of it that it ought to teach us Humility From all these things this Inference seems just That according to the practices of those who divide from us the Church must be suppos'd to have an Authority to adjust the Forms of our Religion in those parts of them that are meerly Ritual to the Taste to the Exigencies and Conveniencies of the several Ages and Climates I say in things that are meerly Ritual for I do not think that these Instances can justify a Church that should alter any main part of a Foederal Rite instituted by Christ such as the giving the Chalice in the Sacrament since this Institution is deliver'd with so particular a Solemnity and in express words is appointed to be continu'd till Christ's second coming and the Cup is given as a Seal of the New Covenant in his blood for the remission of sins which therefore all are requir'd to drink We are to consider that in matters that are meerly Ritual unless we suppose that Charms are ti'd to particular Rites there could be no other design in them but to secure some good purpose or to keep off some bad practice by those outworks If then the state of Mankind does so alter that what is good in one Age is liable to abuse mistake or superstition in another there must be suppos'd to be a power in the Pastors of the Church to alter or add as they see real occasions or good warrants for it Outward appearances work much on Mankind things that look light must dissipate men's Thoughts as much as graver methods do recollect them Dancing in the praises of God would look very wild now but in other Ages it had a better effect Since therefore the Christian Religion was to last to the end of the World and to be spread to very different Climates and since there is no special Rubrick of Forms digested in it since there is also no Limitation put upon the Church in this point but rules are given that sound very much to the contrary of doing all things that tend to Order Edification and Peace this great prejudice seems to be fully taken off and answer'd Nor do such Institutions lead to Superstition but rather to the contrary Superstition in its strict Notion is a baseness of mind that makes us fear without cause and over-value things too much imagining that there is more in them than really there is If things that are ritual were unalterable there might be from thence more occasion given to Superstition according to the conceit of the Iews who thinking that their Rites were unalterable came to fancy from thence that there was a real value in them which upon their own account render'd men the more acceptable to God Superstition is more effectually beat down by the opinion of the alterableness of all external forms according to the different Exigencies of times and places since this shews that Rites are only matters of Order and Decency which have no real value in them because they are alterable If any grow superstitious in the observance of them this is an abuse to which all things even the most Sacred the Sacraments themselves are liable It can as little be said That these Rules in Ritual Matters are Impositions on our Christian Liberty they are rather the exercise of a main part of it which is our not being tied up so strictly by a Law of Commandments as the Iews were The Notion of Liberty as it is stated by St. Paul is the Exemption under which Christians were brought from the Precepts of the Mosaical Law for those who asserted the standing Obligations of that Law were bringing Christians under a heavy Yoke in opposition to which the Apostles asserted their Liberty But it is likewise a true piece of Liberty and a very necessary one for the Societies of Christians to have among them a power of of using or forbearing to use such external things as do either advance or obstruct the main ends of Religion That some Churches may abuse and that others have abused this Authority by carrying it too far and imposing too great a load of external performances is not to be denied The number of them may become a vast burden and a distraction rather than a help towards the main Design of Religion Ludicrous Rites begetâ— prophaneness and Pompous ones and undue gaity But the apprehension of an abuse in the extent of an Authority cannot justify the quarrelling at a few Rites when it is visible there is no disposition to swell or encrease them If every year were producing some new Rite or other there might be good ground to fear that there would be no end of such Impositions but this cannot be appli'd to our Circumstances It is also a question whether in case that there were indeed too many Rites enjoin'd every one of which were innocent in it self so that no special Objection lay against any one but against them all as too many whether I say in such a case private persons were not oblig'd rather to bear their burden than by shaking it off to rend the Body and disturb the Peace and Order of the Church It seems they ought rather to bear it The Rulers of a Church have indeed much to answer for who press her too hard with burdens that are both useless and heavy to be born but the obligations to Peace seem to conter-ballance this inexpediency For tho private persons must judge for themselves whether things requir'd of them are lawful or unlawful and must act accordingly yet Expediency or Inexpediency is only to take place in cases in which they are entirely at their own disposal and where the rules of Prudence or Charity can only determine them But where the quiet and order of the Body is concern'd Publick orders and determinations being interpos'd they are not to depart from those upon their conceiving them inexpedient for it is certainly more inexpedient and mischievous to break Publick Order than it can possibly be to practice any Rite which perhaps if left free to us might seem not expedient and were better let alone The expediency of Forms and Rites is a very proper Subject of publick Consultations and those who are concern'd in them will have much to answer for to God if they do not weigh this together with all that counterbalances it very critically but
one another in such cases The one is not to set a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in another man's way that is not to use our liberty in such instances or on such occasions as may draw other men to act in imitation of us against their own Consciences This is the true notion of giving scandal or the laying a trap in the way of another by which he may fall or be catched And this every man is to avoid when it is free for him to act or not as he pleases for in that case only he is under this obligation and caution since otherwise if he is determined by any Law Divine or Humane he must go on and do his duty without considering what consequences may happen upon it for which he is not accountable since he is not at liberty to dispose of himself but is concluded by a higher Authority The other Rule is That we ought as much as may be to avoid doing any thing that may grieve other Christians which is said to be walking uncharitably since we ought to have such regard even to the tenderness and weakness of our Brethren as not to do such things as may wound or trouble them still under the former supposition that we are fully at our own liberty and under no law nor obligation to the contrary These are the Rules laid down by St. Paul which when well considered and rightly understood will give a great light into this whole Controversy By these it will appear that even the Apostles themselves who might have assumed a higher strain of Authority yet had great regards to the frailties of those they governed And although most of these Positions and Rules do suppose men to be in a state of an unrestrained liberty so that they do not belong to our case in which Laws and Constitutions have already determined us yet they ought still to have great weight with those that are not concluded by Laws and all such as may have the making or reviewing of Laws under their care and deliberation But I have opened this matter more fully than was perhaps necessary to my present purpose which only required that I should clear some Passages in St. Paul's Epistles that are applied to the Points now under examination though they do not at all belong to them since all that is in St. Paul relates only to such things as were entirely left to mens own liberty and in which it was free to them to act which way soever they pleased which are not at all applicable to established rules setled by Law and recommended by Ancient practice It is true that no Age of the Church since the Apostles days can make Laws for succeeding Ages since the Pastors of every Age have the same Authority that the Pastors of any precedent Age had after the times of Inspiration Whatever was done in a former Age may be altered in a subsequent one And therefore all those Rules of the subordination of Churches one to another being taken from the disposition of the Roman Empire Europe being now totally moulded into another frame are now at the discretion of Princes to cotinue or change them at their pleasure And all the Rituals of the Church are in the power of every Age to alter or continue them as they shall see cause but till they are altered they bind not by reason of any Authority that former Ages had over the present but because the present Age by not repealing former Rules and Canons does tacitly and interpretatively confirm and renew them For if the Pastors of the present Age in concurrence with and a due subordination to the Civil Powers have an Authority to make Laws or Canons in such matters they have likewise a power to continue such as were made in any former Age and they are presumed and in Law taken to do that till they repeal them I have now gone through the general Plea that is brought against our Constitutions from general Topicks and have I hope shewed that there is no force in any part of it I come next to consider such things as are objected more specially to several particulars in our Constitution They except to the Government of the Church because of the different Ranks of Bishop Priest and Deacon whereas the Scriptures use Bishop and Priest so promiscuously that from thence it seems reasonable to infer that they are one and the same Function and that there ought to be but two Ranks Bishop and Diacon in the Church But those who object this have really among them but one Function and Order since they have no Diacons in the sense of St. Paul's Epistles who are a Degree of Men dedicated to the Service of God out of which as any served well in it they were advanced to a superior Degree and were ever esteemed a Sacred Order of Men. There are none such among those who urge this Matter against us The Promiscuous use of Names does not prove the Offices the same The Apostles are called sometimes Deacons or Ministers and so are their Companions in Labour for the term Diacon signifying any one that Ministred It was not then appropriated to the lowest Order no more than Presbyter was to the second for the Apostles call themselves sometimes Deacons so that from hence an Argument might be drawn as well to prove that Deacons are equal in Rank to the highest Order of Bishops We plainly see That God setled three Orders of Officers in the Iewish Temple We see also in their Synagogues that there were three different Ranks taken probably from the Model of the Temple We see our Saviour chose twelve Apostles and afterwards Seventy Disciples having in that no doubt a regard both to the numbers of their Tribes and of their Sanhedrin We plainly see that during the Apostles lives the governing and ordering of the Church was in them yet they constituted some in their Name to govern a large extent of Churches and by their Epistles to these it is plain That the Power of governing those Churches and of ordaining new Officers in them belonged to them they being the Persons to whom that trust was committed with solemn Charges given them for it by the Apostles We plainly see two distinct Orders of Bishop and Deacon as two Sacred Functions that were to labour in the work of the Gospel and we find by the short Epistles in the beginnings of the Revelation that there was one Man who had the Immediate Charge of those Churches to whom every thing relating to them is addressed as to a Person that was accountable for the rest and that by consequence must be suppos'd to have an Authority over them We see immediately after the days of the Apostles that all the Churches were cast into one Mould of Bishop Priest and Diacon This taking place every where and that at a time when no Meetings of the Clergy could be held to establish any such Form and that no
Laws of Princes were made to Enact it and no Men of Authority could so early and so universally have brought such a change into the Order of the Church when there was nothing to tempt any to affect Preheminence Labour and Sufferings being all that then follow'd this Superiour Rank and yet within less than one Century after the days of the Apostles we do plainly see that this was the Constitution even of those Churches that had been gathered and setled by the Apostles themselves Among whom so visible a thing as the Order in which they had put the Church could not possibly be soon forgotten and this was not complain'd of by the Sects of those days particularly the Montanists that had so fair an appearance by their praying and fasting so much that not only Tertullian was drawn away by it but even the Church seems to have taken a Tincture from some of their Methods whether in imitation of them or on design to out-do them is not so easy to determine yet nothing of this kind was ever objected as if the Church had by the Authority given to Bishops departed from the Apostolical Customs Now I will acknowledge that a bare practice tho very Ancient such as the giving the Eucharist to Infants without a colour for it in Scripture ought not to conclude us but when there is a great deal in Scripture that looks favourably to a thing tho the proof from the words alone should not seem full and positive and when the first Writings and clearest Practices of the Ages that immediately follow'd confirms such an Exposition then we have all that is possible for us to pretend to for giving a fixed and determinate sense to such passages From all this then it is clear that we are now upon the same Constitution as to the main on which the Apostles setled the Churches and that we have all the reason that a thing of this nature is capable of to conclude That the distinction of Bishop Priest and Deacon was setled by the Apostles themselves and is related to by many places in the New Testament The division of the World into Diocesses larger or narrower as well as of Parishes some being excessively large and others as unreasonably small does not a whit alter the nature of the thing in it self since tho' it were to be desir'd that Parishes were nearer an equality in point of Labour and Cure yet this is an Inconvenience that we must bear and not disturb the Church by seeking undue Remedies for it So such Disorders as a length of time a corruption of Manners a change of Governments and Civil Policies has brought into a Constitution may put it out of our Power to procure the Redress of many things that yet will as little warrant a renting the Body or dividing the Church upon any such account as it would justify the lazy Sloth of such as may bring things to a better State and yet do not set about it nor do heartily endeavour it Another head of Objections is to set-forms of Prayer in general as a stinting of the Spirit of Prayer of which mention is often made in the New Testament and which ought to have scope given to it since it is a mean to rouze up and quicken heavy minds which become flat when accustom'd to a constant form of Words that render both the Clergy lazy and the People Dead But when it is consider'd that every Man's words become a form to which all the rest of the Assembly is limited the question then lies naturally between the sudden conceptions of one Man who is often young rash without Judgment and who always speaks on the sudden and between a form well digested and prepared by a Body of wise and good Men Since then the People must be under a Form it may seem much more reasonable that they should be under such a form than under the other and that the rather since we see Moses David and the Prophets of old gave the Jewish Church so many forms both for Prayers and Praises We know that in our Saviour's time the Iews had a stated Liturgy of their own which our Saviour was so far from blaming that he himself prescribed his Disciples a Form and compos'd it out of theirs laying together so many Petitions drawn out of their Prayers as answer'd his end in appointing his own And Praises seeming to be the sublimest Acts of Worship in which the Soul ought to arise to its highest Elevation it is not easily accountable why so much excitation should be required in Prayer while Men are left to be still flat and formal in their Praises It is not to be deni'd but that among the extraordinary Gifts that follow'd the wonderful Effusion of the Holy Ghost one was That Men were Inspir'd to offer up such Prayers to God as comprehended the necessities of whole Congregations it appearing in those Prayers that the Spirit in him that pray'd searched all their Hearts and so did prompt him with groanings that were unutterable and it thus appearing that the Spirit or Inspiration which moved any to pray in this sort searched all things every Man finding the sense of his own Heart thus open'd together with suitable Intercessions it was from thence evident that this was the Spirit of God making Intercession for the Saints in the mouth and words of the Inspir'd Person This being a plain account of those words of Praying in or by the Spirit and well agreeing with every thing said concerning it in the New Testament it is a great mistake if we in these days should expect any such Assistances from God So that now a readiness of new or tender Expressions in Prayer is an effect of a quickness of Thought a liveliness of Imagination together with a good Memory much conversant in Scripture-Phrases and long practised in that way All things by a long use grow flat to minds that are not seriously awaken'd but extemporary Prayers do rather kill than feed true Devotion since they must be hearkened to as Discourses which is a distraction to him that Prays after them whereas those accustom'd to set-forms have only the things themselves that their Devotion relate to in their view so they are certainly less tempted to distraction than they must be who follow the other way Those sudden starts that are given to the mind by soft Words and melting Images of things may be according to the different Compositions of Men more or less useful to them in their secret Exercises but they ought not to be let in upon publick Assemblies which being made up of a great variety of Tempers must be entertain'd only with such Devotions that suit with all their Conditions and do equally quadrate to all their necessities and thus it is not only natural but necessary for all Men who will maintain Order in their Worship and will frame it in so diffus'd an extent as to take all equally within it that they have
Christians to adore as they received it Now in a course of many Ages this difference of several degrees in Prayer and the postures proper to them is quite worn out so that kneeling is become the common posture of all Prayer whatsoever Therefore we receiving in a posture of Prayer do in that follow the constant practice of all Christians in all the best Ages Kneeling is a matter merely ritual and being now grown the common Rite expressing our humility in Prayer we do not depart from the Spirit and Intentions of the Primitive Church since we receive the Eucharist in our posture of prayer as they did in theirs The plausible Exception to all this is That since our Saviour did institute this Sacrament at a Table after Supper it is a needless departing from his Practice and the Pattern that he hath left us to receive it in any other posture If this Objection had any force it should oblige us to receive leaning along according to the posture of sitting at table in those days and if we must adhere to the Circumstances of the Institution the time after Supper and the place an upper room will be as obligatory upon us as the Posture since all these things are of the same order and value But to go to the bottom of this Objection and to shew by a clear parity the just reason of departing from our Saviour's practice in this particular It is to be remembred That when Moses gave out the Institution of the Paschal Festivity he limited that people by express words to a posture They were to eat it with their loins girt and their shoos on their feet with staves in ther hands thus ready to march There is nothing in the Institution that gives the least hint as if this was not meant to be a lasting Precept So here is much more than a bare Example a Precept given in very plain words without any limitation of time And yet when the Israelites were setled in the Land of Canaan at rest and no more obliged to march this change of their Circumstances did from the natural suitableness of things bring on a change in this part of that Festivity They sate about their Tables or rather leaned and so they did eat the Lamb in that lazy posture that expressed the Rest which God had given them And we are sure that in this they committed no error since our Saviour himself justified their practice by conforming to it So here more than a bare practice an express Institution in a ritual matter is changed by a Church that in all such things seems to have been much more tied up to the letter of their Law than the Christian Church is yet a great alteration in their Circumstances made them conclude that this ought to be altered and in that they did right Now if we will apply this to the Christian Passover Christ being in a state of Humiliation and in the form of a Servant institutes it and does it in a familiar posture of Equality with his Disciples at Table but gives no rule how as to that particular it ought to be observed for the future as Moses had done Afterwards a vast change happens in his visible Condition he is raised from the dead and exalted up into Heaven Upon this change therefore with relation to his Human nature that was vastly more important than that which had happenened to the Iews when they were brought into the Land of Promise it seems to have been highly congruous to that practice of the Iews with which the first Christians could not be unacquainted for them to have changed the posture from the appearance of Familiarity to that of Respect and to have brought it to the Posture which they use in Prayer and their other Devotions And this I think is a full answer to every thing that can be objected to our Posture in Receiving Another exception some have to our Administration of this Sacrament That there is no previous examination of those who are admitted to it that a promiscuous multitude comes without any notice given or enquiry made after them tho we are commanded to note such as walk disorderly and to have no fellowship with them that they may be ashamed nay with Brethren that is Christians who live scandalously not so much as to eat To this it is to be answer'd That a great difference is to be made between a Church that lies yet under some defects which she laments and cannot get them to be effectually supplied and a Church that is viciously faulty and blamable in any thing she does If the acts of Church-Communion are in themselves lawful and good so that particular persons are obliged to nothing that can be made appear to be unlawful it can be no reason for them to separate from it because other things are not done which perhaps are fitting and may seem necessary But a further distinction is to be made between things commanded by a Divine Precept and such things as are only recommended by the Practice and Rules of the Church St. Paul does only prescribe this That every man examine himself but does not impose it upon any to examine others and the true Importance of the word render'd Examine is Approve that is Let a man so consider himself as to see whether he is approved of by his own Conscience but this gives no other person an Authority to search into examine or approve such us come to the Sacrament There is therefore no Rule given in the New Testament for any such previous enquiry it was indeed a very Ancient and is upon very many accounts a good and useful practice so to do But how criminal soever a defect in obeying a Divine Law may be it can be no such matter not to observe even the ancientest Rules of the Church that after all do rest only upon a human Authority Those rules concerning scandalous persons belong to the Body in general and if there should be Errors and male-Administrations the Body or rather its Pastors when in a Body are accountable for that and not the the Individuals of the Society who cannot be further concern'd in them than to lament such defects and to use their best endeavours to help them to be redressed so this can never justify a separation because there may be erroneous or scandalous men in a Society who are too much connived at St. Paul finds great fault with many Errors some bad Practices and Scandals among the Corinthians yet tho in one case he thunders a severe Sentence upon a more eminently scandalous man he never so much as insinuates that the rest of the body should separate themselves from those erroneous or irregular men On the contrary he presses the Obligations to Unity most vehemently on the Corinthians tho that was the Church which he charged the most severely of all others both with Errors Disorders in Worship and scandalous Practices It was no wonder If after