the Conditional Covenant then men are not made Saints by being made partakers of them Indeed the use of them may help to make men Saints by their influence and efficacy but they do not imply or presuppose all those to be absolute Saints that partake them but onely Saints conditional if they seal back their counterpart to God and fulfill that Condition whereupon he makes his grants and conveyances or onely relative and notional not real Saints Saints by calling not by qualification as the Apostle writing to the entire Churches among which especially among the Corinthians many walked inordinately calleth them Saints that is such as are made partakers of Gods Covenant and Members of his Church not Saints actu sed vocatione professione debito as A Lapide called to be Saints taking the word called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and exegetically ut sint Sancti as Paraeus and Aretius and so called charitativè quia cha it as omnes habet pro verè conversis qui fidem et poenitentiam profitentur such Saints as according to the idiom of Scripture are Synonymous with Professours of the Christian Faith for it is not likely to be conceived by any and will be more difficult to be proved by the Apologists who else-where say Professours are visible Saints that all those Saints whose bowels Philemon refreshed and whose feet the Widows had washed and who had share of the Collections and Contributions and Ministrings had all given evidence of their real Sanctity or that Paul when he shut up the Saints in prison did tarry and forbear to do it till he was convinced they were really such but it was sufficient they were professors of Christianity and that was enough to denominate them Saints He that is a member of the Church is within the Covenant and is in Scripture-phrase a Saint though not living altogether conformably to his profession those priviledges which are given to the visible Church in respect of internal essence according to Tychonius his Rule de permixta Ecclesia being attributed to the visible in regard of external existence as to be Saints holy children of God Saints everlasting rest part 4. Sec. 3. p. 105. Gal. 3.26 Christs body 1 Cor. 2.13 branches of Christ Joh. 15.2 and there are many Saints or sanctified men saith Mr. Baxter that yet shall never come to heaven who are onely Saints by their separation from Paganisme into Fellowship with the visible Church but not Saints by separation from the ungodly into the Fellowship of the mystical body of Christ He is therefore as I said a relative though no real Saint and the entring into and the acceptation of the terms of the Covenant is common to very Reprobates and in that notion a grave and learned Divine saith Mr. Balls ans to Can part 2. p. 52. Tom 4. l. 1. c. 12. that Cain was in profession a Saint before he had discommon'd himself And we grant that such an external or as Suarez calls it a Legal Sanctification the Sacraments alwayes indeed do effect so saith the famous Chamier Sanctificationem illam quae pertinet ad externam vocationem in Ecclesiam quomodo Paulus dicebat ramos id est omnes sui temporis Judaeos esse sanctos quòd eorum truncus id est Abraham Sanctus fuisset Rom. 11. et filios fidelium sanctos 1 Cor. 7. Hanc sanctitatem concedimus semper conferri per Sacramenta nimirum quia utrinque in confesso est esse testes professionis Christianae unde sequitur quicunque Sacramentorum sit particeps hunc pertinere ad eum populum qui profiteatur Religionem veram and if they will have none to be made such Saints by profession but those that are Saints in verity I shall desire them to perpend that their Argument is more forcible to forbid the admission of such as are not manifest Saints and approvedly holy to be Church-members then to be partakers of the Sacraments for indeed the former are expresly and in terms called Saints and holy and therefore with more colour might they argue that there ought to be probation made whether they were such before they were admitted into Church-fellowship and what they shall answer to evade the force of the Argument against admitting none but upon tryal to be Church-members may perhaps be catcht up and returned to frustrate the Argument for non admission without tryal to the Sacrament vox tua facta mea 2. Not to question why the Sacraments or indeed this of the Lords Supper and not Baptisme also are made the priviledges of the godly and not other Ordinances also Or how external and sensible Ordinances can be priviledges of an invisible and indiscernable Society Irregenerate men admitted to the Sacraments enjoy no proper priviledges of the godly but as is their Faith such are their priviledges A common Dogmatical or Historical Faith externally professed gives them title to the common external seals of the Covenant External Ordinances are not onely priviledges of the godly in facto esse sed etiam in fieri and either the Apologists must say they are never deceived in these which they admit or else sometimes notwithstanding their caution themselves are not priviledged from communicating the Sacraments to the unregenerate and in so doing they set the seal to a blank and co-operate to their damnation and the act contracts more of guilt in them then it can do in us in whom it is for the impulsive cause onely an errour of charity and for the matter thereof if it should be evil yet is not so formally to us because we are not thereof convinced in our Consciences whereas they impose upon themselves a necessity of acting that which they can have no infallible assurance they shall not fail in doing of and yet are perswaded the failer thereof occasions that which cannot be lawfully done As it is no obvious thing or facile work for any man to obtain an evidence of his own regeneration so it is infinitely more perplext and intricate to acquire such assurance concerning another and therefore upon this principle that the Sacrament appertains to none but the truly regenerate as the doubting soul can never approach and so the sick be cast into an incapacity of a Physitian that most needs him and the weak in Faith be frustrate of that which was instituted for confirming thereof and the humble soul will be most afraid to come and the presumptuous be most forward since baser Mettals soonest run and are most volatile the richer are more fixt and the full ear hangs the head when the empty pricks up and as he that knows most discerns best that he knows little so where there is much grace there often the want thereof is most complained of whereas when the strong man armed keeps the house the things possessed are in peace so also no Minister can admit any man with comfort because not in Faith and therefore with sinne nor without a snare because not in allibly
so neither can we suppose the answer to be among such things quae decies repetita placebunt but if the unsealed may be called if they be not only actively but also passively called and come in why may they not have the seal of their calling and being called to believe partake of the Sacraments the seals of faith And though we think it not proper to say that men are sealed but the promises to them yet like Mercury to battologize with Battus and use their forms we are not so foolish to think whether or no they be so fond to imagine that any that are uncalled should be sealed for the Sacraments being the proper cognizances of Christianity are not communicable to any but Christians and the profession of the faith is as tessera hospitalis without which none must eat at the Lords table But if the uncalled may not be sealed doth it therefore follow that the called may not be sealed we rather think the contrary to be consequent It is not onely denoted by the Greek name of the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but warranted by the constant Idiom of Scripture that the Church and the Called are confignificant Rom. 1.6 7. and 9.24 1 Cor. 1.9 24. and 5.11 and 7.18 Col. 3.15 c. and therefore though none but of the Church and called yet all that are of the Church and called may be sealed but it seems still they will have none but the chosen to be called and so make the Church of the called to be of no more latitude than that of the elect which we observed before though they would take no notice therof like the Ostrich which when he hides his head and sees no body supposeth no body sees him But to speak properly men are not sealed but the promises to them and the Sacrament by sensible things and actions assures their faith that if they believe in the death of Christ they shall be saved by it which is to them onely a conditionall sealing also And then likewise as is their calling such will their sealing an externall calling takes onely the outward conditionall seal an inward hath the internall and absolute seale also And beside before any come to the Supper of the Lord he is not onely called but sealed too with one of the seals viz. Baptisme for that seale hitherto they impresse upon all them and their children as many as the Lord our God shall call so that many are sealed that have no inward call and though upon another account of other qualifications more requisite to the Eucharist then necessary to Baptisme all that are baptized do not communicate but only those who being intelligent are capable of a Dogmaticall faith yet formally as the Sacraments are seals why any one should be susceptible of the one that is not capable of the other my ignorance cannot apprehend and I doubt their learning cannot prompt me But whereas they say They like a free Pulpit but condemn a too free Table Sadly they and their friends have made their pulpits too free suffering others to intrude there as Ambassadors for Christ who had not his commission and of their Table have been too parcimonious and the Stewards have grudged the liberality abridged the allowance of their Master In 1 Cor. 11. for oportet communes mensas esse communes saith Oecumenius atque illam dominicam imitari quae omnibus aeque prostat in the former they have been carried away with an epidemicall stream occasioned by the common shower of folly falling in those times where preacher seem to be bred as the best Meteorologists tell us those frogs are which though some may vainly imagine to be rained down from heaven yet indeed are generated of the dust of the earth diluted and levened with a little humor and spirit of the rain that comes from cloudy meteors and yet crawle about and croke in every corner when they are not yet perfectly formed for what ever the inward parts may be of any of them they are but half made up without an externall calling but whether in the later of no free Tables they have some resemblance with Philoxenus who being a Musician and defining the soul to be the harmony was said to put his own affection into his Philosophy I will not determine To that serious caveat given them which might chalenge a more prolix and intentive consideration Not to hazard their own souls while they are scrupulous about others the paper had it legible thus while they fear accidentally to lose or hazard souls whether they do not more endanger them and their own souls too by withholding from them the Sacrament the likeliest means of full and perfect recovery of them they answer that unworthy comers do directly quoad corruptionem actus defile and destroy themselves nor is the Sacrament a proper or likely means to recover such as they keep back but rather likely by accident more to blind and harden them and to prevent mens sins and damnation cannot hazard their souls but will comfort their consciences under this buckler they fight The things which they here answer were alibi damnata priusquam hic nata and do but resemble vagrants which being whipt in one town will in another still be begging viz. the question Of this subject we have elswhere we hope said enough to satisfie discerning and equanimous men to those that are not such we have said too much the one we trust will be satisfied of the other we are satisfied why they will not be We have copiously shewed That if unworthy persons eat and drink damnation it is sâ—bi non aliis That it is one question who may come another who may be admitted and they are not warranted to proceed in doubtfull things who are not commissioned to be judges save only in things manifest That though another cannot comply with his duty in worthy receiving yet the Minister may not cancel his in not giving the Sacrament nor dispense with a certain duty for an uncertain danger nor hath any warrant much lesse precept to with-hold that which is good of it self upon fear or suspition that it may do evil by accident for upon this score may all good things in the world be inhibited That though indifferent things being abused may be denied or removed yet what is good in its proper nature and direct effects may not be laid aside or with-held for any accidentall abuses and that seeing he doth as much evill as he might do good which neglects to do it he kils that might help to save and omits it therfore there is equal danger in withholding this food of life from those that are or may be worthy as in exhibiting it to those that are or may not be such yea rather more danger because it is sarer to erre on the account of charity then on the score of unmercifulnesse and censoriousnesse and where is hope of doing good he cannot be excused of the omission to doe
applied without dis-joynting or dissecting the whole They plead for Ministeriall power which they have as governors of their Churches and we should check the thoughts if any could arise in us that should oppose or repine at it while it is regular and limited and while the head doth not drop acrimonious defluxions to emaciate and wast the body for then caput malum est caput mali and the head is the parent of all diseases as Physicians say Defer Deo in nobis deferemus Deo in te as Symmachus in Augustine But as Furfidius counselled Sylla Sinendos esse aliquos vivere ut essent quibus posset imperare so they should not unchurch so many that they might have some to govern and as he said in the patrocing of women though they could not live so contentedly with them as was desired yet without them they could not live at all so though their Church should be lesse pure by the communion of those they reject yet it will be scarce a Church without them and the spirits which they shall extract by separation will not quit the cost of the turning of so huge a substance to caput mortuum and if we should grant their separations could produce gold yet it must needs fare with them as Pliny tells us it did with Caligula Invitaverat spes Caium principem avidissimum auri quamobrem jussit excoqui magnum pondus planè fecit aurum excellens sed ita parvi ponderis ut detrimentum sentiret nec postea tentatum ab ullo est Secondly to whom are they scandalous Some four or five are scandalized by four or five hundred for about that proportion their Church bears to their Congregation and those hundreds are more scandalized by their separation then the units can be by their comportment or condition Quos projecerunt video quos unuerunt ipsi dicant saith Augustine to his Donatists These centuries were never judicially cast out but separated from and how could they regularly be cast forth when the rest are hardly members enough to constitute and organize the Body They were rather the Body of the Church from which the separation was made the denomination being taken from the major part and what Livy saith in another case is appliable to this In duas partes discessit civitas aliud integer populus fautor et cultor bonorum aliud forensis factio tenebat Contr. Ep. Parmen l. 1. c. 6. and as suitable is that which Augustine tells the Donatists The Nations are given to Christ for an inheritance you would appropriate it to your party Quasi propter vos Christus apud nos haereditatem perdidcrit suam Philosophers say Omnis motus est super immobili that was the Church rather which stirred not when they moved a way in their separation not that which removed and they were the whole the separatists but a part and though one member may be cut off to preserve the whole yet it is a wild and desperate way of cure to dissect the whole to conserve a part Ecclesiast l. 3. c. 5. tom 1 p. 1978. Cum Ambroâ—oâ—statuaut saith grave and learned Junius Non tanti esse homines pauculos ut propter cos dejiciantur ecclesiae dei pluris esse aedificationem omnium ecclesiarum quà m praesentem unius conservationem in officio deflectentis and the same may be said of persons in the Church Thirdly Wherein are they scandalous Non pejores erant Iudâ traditore cum quo Apostoli receperunt primum sacramentum coenae cùm tanti sceleris reum inter se jam scirent esse as Augustine Cont. part Donati Psal tom 7. p. 2. as their ignorance lay in not knowing it to be their duty to submit to tryall so in all likelyhood their scandall consists in their unwillingness to be subject and standing fast in their liberty Perchance pro parte Dorati tolerarent quos pro Christi unitate tolerare nolunt would they acknowledge their power and submit to their discipline by this relative without other reall thange the scandal were removed as the doggs in the Dictaean Temple at Crete and the birds of the Diomedes in the Adriaticke they are onely infestous to those they account Barbarians but gentle enough to their social Greeks the Livery of their Church like the name of Alexander with Caracalla would frustrate all accusation like the papal Chaire if it find not men good it makes them such Ex codem naturae utero continentia nata est Cato holiness and their discipline are twins and must according to their Hypothesis stand and fall together Cum hoc Aristide ipsa sanctitas emigrabit and it will be true of their partie compared with others what Bellarmine baith of his Catholiques in comparison of Hereticks Praefat. ad controvers Si catholicus quispiam labitur in peccatum nihilominus quoniam adhuc aliquis vitae sensus adhuc adificii sundamentum adhuc lumen aurorae multa et magua praesidia ad salutem habet non ambulat in tenebris nâ—vit medicum suum Neque deest illi maternus ecclefiae sinus et patent quoque officinae omnes spiritualium pharmacorum at homo haereticus nihil horum habet c. Fourthly What evidence is there of their crimes that should produce this scandal Nam quo eccidit sub crimine quisnam delator quibus indiciis quo teste probavit nil hotum Verbosa et grandis epistola venit August cont Ep. Parmen l. 1. c. 7. Idem Epist 162. tom 2. p. 142. I would have said Apologia sed tu syllaba contumax repugnas It seems sufficit accusasse and therfore quis erit innocens and they cast them out suspicionibus suis sicut semper damnando as Augustine of the Donatists and whereas Incerta crimina pro certa pace dimitterentur nisi magis falsa factio fingentium quà m ratio vera convincentium praevaleret We rather find that objiciuntur crimina malorum hominum et ipsa partim incognita Idem con Ep. Parmen ubi supra quae si etiam vera et praesentia videremus et Zizaniis propter frumenta parcentes pro unitate toleraremus non solum nullâ reprehensiene sed etiam non parva laude nos dignos diceret quicunque Scripturas sanctas non corde surdus audiret but they rather frumenta falsis criminationibus insectantur dum ipsi ab ecclesia potius tanquam levissima palea variis tumorum flatibus sepâ—rati sunt That which is usually termed the power of the keyes Polanus thinks ought properly to be called Ministery Polanus syntag l. 7. c. 18. p. 544. In Bell. de translat imperii tom 2. Sect. 27. p. 897. Ames cas consc l. 5. c. 24. p. 310. and Junius tells us Quae potestas propriè appellari potest aut Politica aut despotica est ut rectè in politicis distingunt Politici Ecclesiae non propriè potestas sed administratio vel ministerium
they must come at Pyworthy where he that tells them so is Pastor of no Church there those that are so told are not the flock of any Pastor there they might as justly call them to Exceter and would they come there they must notwithstanding come under this probation and wait upon their good pleasure and gracious opinion which is the thing questioned and sets the business in the same posture as before after all these palliations So that in the conclusion when they tell us elsewhere he that puts them to prove that persons knowing and not scandalous may be excluded shall hear of their refusal we must say to them we do indeed hear of their refusal but it is onely to prove this not to do it whiles they exclude these whom they dare not say and if they did we should knowingly gainsay that they are ignorant or scandalous To the second that my Concessions look one way my Arguments another as if like the Parthians I turn my face from that mark I shoot at or like Faustus that pretended to write against Pelagius yet half justified him it had been a just debt if not to me that I might see my error yet to themselves that we might see their truth and ingenuity to have instanced in any one argument of mine that pleads against the power and duty of Excommunication No when the Civil Magistrate is become both the Sonne and Father of the Church I doe not think that the opening of his Praetorium should shut up the Ecclesiastical forum exterius nor the exercising of his sword lay the keys aside to rust Let them not be tryed to open other Locks than they were made for that Moses may have no cause to say the Sons of Levi take too much upon them we shall no more repine at Aarons keys or rod than at Moses sword I am sensible these are different Administrations and have several reasons and ways and ends There are some Crimes which need Censure and sometime the Civil Laws take no hold thereof nor can the Civil Courts take cognizance of them and the Magistrate punisheth though the Offender repent and is satisfied when the pain is suffered or mulct is paid whether he be penitent or not The Church hath a contrary method in her punishments and which are not properly punishments but castigations the holy and prudential ends thereof I have elsewhere displayed I do not therefore hold it fit to excommunicate Excommunication though I judge the undue conduct and culpable exercise thereof to be suspended Let it not be 1. too frequently inflicted it being Medicine not Food and Physicians tell us that Medicines lose their efficacy by ordinary use and though Cacochymie give indication yet continual Purgings brings the habitude of the body to a cachexy and in the Timpany to let out all the water without stops and intermissions destroys the Patient 2. Nor too precipitate Nulla unquam de hac morte hominis cunctatio longa est And Avenzoar they say trembled three days before ever he administred a Purge 3. Nor ordinarily until after frequent admonitions afflatur omne priusquà m percutitur let all other good means be used Cuncta priùs tentanda Let it be as Physicians say of Antimony that it must be like a cowardly Captain to come up to the charge last of all and after all others let it be onely upon obstinate impenitence and when it is immedicabile vnlnus then quaecunque medicamenta non sanant ea sanat ferrum as saith Hypocrates 4. Let it not be for any thing but scelus or affine sceleri that which is interpretativa negatio fidei gross abominable iniquities whereby the Church may be defamed and the enemies have cause to blaspheme and such as may be stumbling blocks to other mens Consciences such sinnes as appear omnibus execrabilia as Augustine and are excessus peccatorum as Estius speaks let it be not inflicted for smaller faults which else would be as Parisiensis tells us as if to kill a Fly on the fore-head we should knock a man in the head with a beetle and let not such purity be required from men in order to their safeguard and immunity from this Censure as Anabaptists exact who as Marlorat tells us Marlorat in 1 Cor. 51. Ball tryal of the grounds of Separat c. 10. p. 187. Ante Communionem protestantur se tantam habere Charitatem quantam Christus in cruce pendens 5. Let it be for such Crimes as are notorious by publike notice not if one or other though perhaps the Minister be one of them do know thereof but let them be such as are scandalous in their course commonly defamed by evidence of fact or confession or proof of witnesses and if not by innumeris documentis testibusque as Augustine pleads yet by more than one for uni testi ne Catoni quidem credendum est even when the great cry of Sodom came up yet God went down to see whether they had done altogether according to the cry Si regnas jube si judicas cognosce 6. Let it be done humili charitate benignâ severitate sine typho elationis in hominem cum luctu deprecationis ad Deum Aug. cont Parmen l. 3. c. 2. Tom. 7. p. 13. and as it is said of Augustus Priùs suas lachrymas quà m alienum sanguinem effudit for otherwise hujus enim summi rarÃque voluptas Nulla boni quoties animo corrupta superbo Plus aloës quà m mellis habet Let it be thus regulated without humane wrong in hypothesi and let it in thesâ— pass as of divine right The greater Excommunication I mean for as concerning Suspension which they call the lesser Excommunication I am deceived if it may not be called the least in the Kingdome of Heaven the Tree from which that Wood was gathered was of a later rise and spring in the Paradise of God not of the first planting and hath no divine ground to fix its root in if there be any Characters in Scripture asserting expresly or by plain and easie consequence the divine right thereof See this amply discussed or any footsteps thereof in the tract and course of all the ancient Church so as that any were suspended from the Sacrament that were not separate from the body of the Church by Excommunication those characters and footsteps are too small to be discerned by my dimme eyes § 15 without the help of spectacles to be lent me or my Horizon too narrow to reach them unless their hand like that in a margin pointing to the places shall lead me neerer to them Tertullian I am sure defines Excommunication of what kind soever it be à Communicatione Orationis conventûs omnis sancti commercii relegatio I am not ignorant there is frequent mention in the Casuists and Schoolmen of excommunicatio minor but these bear no weight where these men hold the beam yet notwithstanding it may have place and be of
wholesome use when men strongly accused or violently suspected of offences in their nature scandalous are under tryal and as it were pendente lite in which respect it may pass as gradus excommunicationis as Ames calls it and if they will give that name to a deferring to administer to those that are manifestly ignorant while they are under catechising I shall not contest against it and besides I should be no eager Opposite thereunto because as Alcibiades acquired more esteem because Socrates loved him so I should be more indulgent to this act of discipline by reason it hath the favour of some godly learned men and seems also to march under the Colours of Prudence and pretends to wear the cognizance of Piety and clement moderation and onely under the notion of clemency and upon account thereof we may give a passport to that which is the main weapon wherewith the Casuists and School-men fight for the lesser Excommunication and from whose Armory the Divines of this judgment have borrowed it That he that can do the greater can do the less which having many other limitations must especially be limited to matters of the same kinde for otherwise for instance sake a Justice of peace that can send a man to the Goal for Felony which is the greater cannot commit him to the Prison for Debt nor likewise in matters of the same kind However it may go upon the account of clemency it cannot pass upon the score of justice for a Judge that may for a crime take a Malefactors life may not nevertheless deprive him of his eye for that offence yet so as suspension be exercised in such a regular way as excommunication ought to be and for such notorious scandals as merit excommunication for then the person suspended seems excommunicate jure licèt non juridicè in fieri si non in facto esse in actu signato si non actu exercito demeritorie etsi non effectivè and so our ground may still lye unshaken that every member of the visible Church not uncapable through natural disability hath a right to the Sacrament while these in such manner suspended though not fully and formally cut off from the body of the Church are yet having a virtual excision no compleat members thereof and being much loosned have loosed much of the privileges founded in and resulting from Church-membership I say with these qualifications though this Jephtha be the Son of a strange woman yet since he may fight for Israel against the Ammonites I shall not vote to cast him out and though like an Heteroclyte it be among those quae genus variant having not that kind of evidence and authority which excommunication hath yet if it do not flexum also and deflect to any inordinateness among those which novato ritu deficiunt superantque for my part I shall not proscribe it Even menial servants merit some respect onely for wearing the Cognizance of noble Families onely as they distinguish the Romane gods into those Majorum Gentium Semi-dei seu Indigites Semones so let there be a distinction among acts of discipline of those that are originally of a divine impression and necessary and such as are of later prudential Edition and expedient onely in some cases And to proceed farther 3. Disp. 7. q. 17. punct 1. p. 1387. I am not altogether of the judgment of the School and the Casuists that determine Abstinendum à sententia excommunicationis quando constaret non modò non profuturam peccatori sed etiam nocituram quia scilicet magìs indurabitur yet I approve it with the limitations of Valentia Tunc solùm verum esse quando circumstantiae non essent tales ut propter exemplum bonum Commune redundaturum ex tali Excommunicatione videretur meritò posse negligi privatum detrimentum illius And I do fully consent with Augustine Si contagio peccandi multitudinem invaserit Contra Par. men l. 3. c. 2. Tom. 7. p. 13. divinae disciplinae severa misericordia necessaria est tunc autem hoc sine labe pacis unitatis sine laesione frumentorum fieri potest cùm congregationis Ecclesiae multitudo ab eo crimine quo anathematizatur aliena est eum posse tali modo salubritèr corrigi qui inter dissimiles peccat idest inter eos quos peccatorum similiùm pestilentia non corrumpit neque enim potest esse salubris à multis correptio nisi cùm ille corripitur qui non habeat sociam multitudinem cùm verò idem morbus plurimos occupaverit nihil aliud bonis restat quà m dolor gemitus Plures numere tuti inter multos societate culpae tutior Tacitus And such a course is not onely suitable to civil prudence an example whereof we may finde in Sparta a City of the strictest and severest discipline of all Greece as the best men so the best City of Greece might pass for the best of the Heathen world where though he that fled out of the battel carryed afterward the perpetual Characters of Infamy yet when such a multitude were put to flight at the great battel of Leuctra Agesilaus thought fit to lay asleep suspend the Law for that time But 2. conformable also to Divine wisdome Annot. in Mat. 13.41 not onely in respect of what Grotius tells us Quod ad poenas generales attinet quales sunt diluvia incendia aliaeque id genus pestes cùm non possunt ita infligi ut solos improbos contingant proborum etiam paucorum causâ Deus iis abstinet aut certè eas temperat but in regard of what St. Augustine proves from the patterne of the Apostle who though he excommunicated one incestuous person at Corinth Ubi supra yet cùm jam multos comperisset immundâ luxuriâ fornicationibus inquinatos ad eosdem Corinthios in secunda Epistola scribens non itidem praecipit ut cum talibus nec cibum sumerent multi enim erant nec de his poterat dicere Si quis frater c. sed ait ne iterum cum venero ad vos humiliet me Deus lugeam multos c. per luctum suum potiùs eos divino flagello coorcendos innuens quà m per illam correptionem ut caeteri ab eorum conjunctione contineant And 3. the contrary course is altogether opposite to the ends of Excommunication either general as edification whereas this is vastare civitatem non sanare as Salust of Catiline clades non medicina as Germanicus in another case or special as making them ashamed whereas the multitude of offenders takes away all shame as among Negroes it is beauty to be black and they paint Angels of that colour The civil judgments and Ecclesiastick censures though otherwise different yet are both built upon these common grounds that punishments are inflicted not because a fault hath been committed but lest it should be that the fear of
to be the president to all future Administrations gave the Sacrament onely to his Disciples and therefore those which are not Disciples may not participate thereof and the Disciples of Christ must have such and such qualifications which no unregenerate men can have Ergo. But the frame must needs be weak that is raised upon such a foundation for Architects say a crack in the Foundation but as great as one digit makes a breach in the building of many foot For first Chamier Tom. 4. l. 8. c. 8. p. 202. that the Dâ—sciples which learned men thâ—nk not evident that they were no more than the twelve Apostles Gerhard loc Com. Tom. 5. p. 18. Ames Bell. enervat Tom. 3. c. 7. p. 159. and it is not improbable saith Gerhard that the Master of the house and some of his Family might also communicate did then represent the whole body of the visible Church as the same Author elsewhere confesseth and is nervously approved by Protestant Divines against the Papists who would justifie the substraction of the Cup from the Laity upon this very score because the Apostles to whom it was first given were onely Priests And that a Christian and a Disciple are Synonimous may appear by Act. 11.26 The Disciples were called Christians So Matth. 28.19 Go teach all Nations baptizing them c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word used is as much as to make Disciples and not onely signifying to teach for else it were a Tautology in the 20th verse following where it is added teaching them c. therefore to convert any to the Faith of Christ Spanheim dub Evang. Tom. 8. p. 93. though but externally is to make him a Disciple he that is baptized is a Disciple and in this notion we grant that none but Disciples may partake the Holy Supper that is none but Christians And as soon as any were discipled that is converted they were without any stop to be baptized and if Disciples are to be taken in that latitude and equivocal notion in order to the one Sacrament it shall be strange to think they ought to be construed in any stricter or more limited sense in reference to the other Secondly Judas was one of those Disciples one of those Twelve that sate down yet had not those graces though necessary to constitute and qualifie a Disciple Thirdly it appears by the first of the Cor. 11. that very many admitted there to the Communion had not these Qualifications essential to real Disciples Fourthly if Disciples quà tales and formally such are to communicate then since quatenus ipsum includes de omni all Disciples are susceptible of the Communion but that Infants are Disciples hath been sufficiently proved both formerly and also of late by excellent Divines against the Anabaptists yet we do not think fit to imitate the ancient Church and give the Eucharist to Infants The three favourite and palmary Texts which as most commonly so with most colour are produced in proof of this Discipline are that of Revel 2.2 Thou hast tryed them which say they are Apostles and are not and that of 1 Pet. 3.15 Be ready always to give an answer to every one that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you and 1 Cor. 5.11 If any man that is called a Brother be a Fornicator c. with such a one no not to eate c. whereof the second seems to prove the necessity of a verbal examination at least passively the third of a real and the first like Janus lookes both ways and toward the proof of either Concerning the first it can conclude nothing to this purpose unlesse by some new Art trochilike they could draw it to be consequent that every tryal must be by examination of the persons and that every one approaching to the Lords Table is likely to be a false Apostle and that false Apostles were onely or chiefly to be tryed antecedently to the Communion or that because Hereticks such as Ehion and Cerinthus which are thought to be here meant and the Nicholaitans which are expresly mentioned ought to be tryed by their lives and doctrine applyed to the Rule of Gods Word which is the sense of Interpreters upon this place that therefore every other person offering to communicate though never pretending to be Teachers Paraeus Piscator Aretius Menochius Tirinus c. much less holding forth new Doctrines needful to be tryed must be pre-examined before their admittance no man but will discern the fallacy of the consequent Touching that of Peter first the Answer here commanded to be given is not properly a profession of the Faith but a defence thereof or a Confession under the Cross as Aretius expounds it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Defence of Christian Religion consisting in Speech and Arguments saith Piscator Gagnaeus Menochius in locum and therefore saith he it is added with fear viz. of God lest for favour of men or fear of persecution dissembling the truth you offend God so the Syriack is rendred by Tremellius ad defensionem so Justinian understands it and Estius interprets it to be an Answer to the Objections of the Adversaries which Oecumenius admonisheth to have been after a sort necessary in the Apostles age when the Gentiles derided the Christian Religion and reproached Christians for worshipping a crucified God undergoing such persecutions and denying themselves the present complacencies and endeerments of life out of a vain and empty hope of future uncertain things not falling under the comprehension of Sense The Apostle therefore commands the faithful to have answers prepared and premeditated whereby they might refel the Objections of the Gentiles and assert their hope of eternal glory to be most rational and satisfie any that was desirous to learn the Reasons of such Hope this is the summe and exstract of the Commentaries of Calvin Paraeus Estius and Justinian upon the place The vulgar Translation reads In locum ad satisfactionem and the glosse expounds it to be satisfaction by words and deeds justifying their Faith both by defensive Arguments Constancy and a godly life which is in effect the Exposition of Aquinas also which seemes likewise to be understood by Diodate in his Annotations viz. he will have beleevers still ready to shew unto all men that they sincerely serve the onely true God Secondly if this giving an answer were properly meant of a profession of Faith when there is hope of him that asketh when the glory of God is to be asserted or the name of Christ to be confessed as Bullinger extends it yet what is all this to an answer upon examination antecedent to the Sacrament How is the necessity thereof more at that time than another evinced out of this Text If it be answered That if we must be ready to give answer at all times much more before the Communion truly I think he shall deserve thanks as for a largesse or for a charientisme that shall grant the
c. 18. sect 21. p. 194. Such as were under penance aswell as Catechumens for licuit discedere in missa catechumenorum sed qui intraverit Scripturas audiverit id est non fuerit egressus cum catechumenis hunc jubent canones excommunicari vel expectare missam fidelium ac proinde communicare such are still presupposed to be seposited from our discourse aswell as they were known to be sequestred from the Sacrament they know we onelyspeak of the rest and that of those all that hear the Word should participate of the Sacrament agrees well enough with the way of the ancient Church and the way of righteousness too but indeed agrees not with their course where an hundred of those that are neither Catechumens nor Penitents partake of the Word and but one of them of the Sacrament These then were dark times unless they were holier than ours that is they were dark unless they had more light they were holier doubtless because more humble and more meek and more charitable but some men are like the Hermit who thought the Sun shined onely into his Cell and resemble Seneca's Harpaste who thought the rooms to be dark when her self was become blinde They tell us a saying of a godly man That all to the Sacrament is the great Golias of those days with whom the little Davids of this age are encountring and I shall requite them with an Apothegm of a man that perchance can be no godly man because not of their judgment That none to the Sacrament but whom they please is the great Diana of the Ephesians for which all the Silver-smiths of the times are making Shrines as if the Image fell down from Jupiter when it was made by the Crafts-men The testimony that allows no cause of separation from the communion but such sins as deserve excommunication they say bears no weight yet it is alleged out of St. Augustine but Augustinus tecum erravit as Corvicius The truth is St. Ep. 118. c. 3. Augustine reciting and allowing therein the sense and judgment of some pious men in his age speaks this of an active separation of a mans self upon conscience of his sinfulness and not of a passive as it is commonly understood by Gratian and others but the argument holds with more nerves and energy against a passive separation since a greater cause is requisite to exclude those that do come than to deterr them from coming and many may not perchance lawfully approach which yet cannot but unlawfully be repelled as I have said before And if the ancient Church excluded none but such as were or had been excommunicate we may be indulged to think no sins a cause of separation from the Eucharist but such as merit excommunication I confess my Horizon is very narrow as men that are of no heighth have no large prospect and mine eyes are weak and do not discern all that I might and my memory as frail to retain all those species and notions which sometime perchance I have received but sure I did never meet with or have forgotten any clear evidence in antiquity that warranted the distinction between Excommunication and Suspension as now it is apprehended and practised or that any were excluded from the Communion antonomastically but such as had been first separate from all Communion or to speak properly from simple Communion The Apologist tells us indeed that Antiquity hath distinguished between Excommunication and Suspension but they verifie it by no evidence or testimony save their own and we should advise them rather to imitate Pythagoras his Scholars in their silence than to emulate their Master in his Ipse dixit Their Margin seems to quote Ames as asserting what they affirm but though that learned man distinguish in the place cited between the greater and the lesser Excommunication Cas consci l. 4. c. 29. sect 29. yet he produceth neither Scripture nor authority to back that distinction who elsewhere plainly confesseth that Suspension is not ex singulari Christi instituto They say the Paper it self makes the Excommunicate but one sort of the excluded True but doth it say or doth it follow from what it said that the suspended were another sort The others suffered exclusion for natural disabilities we are speaking now of those that were separate for sins which are moral defects and among those though the Paper distinguish Penitents from Excommunicate it was not because all those under penance had not also been excommunicated but because all excommunicate were not Penitents these later being as I said before communionis ecclesiasticae candidati it was conceded them as a favour to do penance in order to their redintegration which to the others was not as yet vouchsafed But however the Apologists like the Ostrich leave their Eggs in the dust that any foot may crush them and so have deserted all incubation upon suspension yet I am not ignorant that some others have engaged in a vindication of the practice and exercise thereof in the primitive times but however their sheets like that of Parrhasius may seem real to other Painters yet they are but painted They shew us 1. That divers sorts of men were not admitted to the Eucharist which were not under excommunication And we grant it but we ask if it necessarily follow that they must be persons suspended that is Ab excommunicatis solis poenitentia peti poterit Albaspinus not in c. 2. ep 3. Innocent ad Exup p. 143. Multi reperiebantur excommunicati qui circum fores ecclesiae poenitentiam flagitabant Idem de vet eccles ritib. l. 2. obser 4. p. 240. Per poenitentiam ab excommunicatione sive à peccato excommunicationis ut loquuntur antiqui canones liberabantur Ibid. obs 3. p. 227. Cum excommunâ—cato poenitentia concederetur ante poenitentiam meminerimus poenitentem excommunicatum fuisse poenitentiae benedictione eum ab excommunicatione liberatum fuisse Ib. p. 242. obs 4. Aug. ep 108. tom 2. p. 98. 3. concil Tolet. can 12. 6. concil Tolet. can 7 8. item Albas not in can p. 92 104 Idem de vet eccl rit l. 2. obs 4 p. 241. such as were onely debarred the Lords Table and that immediately without having been first excommunicated or cut off from the body of Christ his Church before they were kept off from his body in the Sacrament or without being first separated from a Communion in all Ordinances aswell as that of the Eucharist for this is that which they call Suspension and this is that which they must assert out of antiquity unless they will give us a Cloud in stead of Juno And this we deny and gainsay that there were any such persons or any such ecclesiastick censure Those censured persons that were kept off from the Lords Table and yet lay not under Excommunication were Penitents who indeed were not excommunicate but had been and were in the way of redintegration with the Church from whose Communion they had
pacem where by peace is meant fraternity absolution and reconciliation or admission into the company of the Church as Erasmus expoundeth and Albaspinus intimates which shews that he was before put from the Brother-hood and cut off from the body of the Church by Excommunication 8. Albaspinus tells us Abstenti nec poenitentiae compotes essent and farther Idololatras abstentos ad Ecclesiarum aditum ibi fletu gemitu elicere misericordiam studuisse Which renders it evident that the abstenti were the same with excommunicate and that these two notions were in his judgment Synonymous Arel can 3. as appears also by what he otherwhere delivers ab hac societate non solùm arcebantur haeretici schismatici abstenti sed etiam poenitentes Catechumeni where abstenti must stand for excommunicate or else they were omitted by him who were principally excluded from the Church 9. Whereas the first Councel of Arles decrees de his qui arma projiciunt in mare placuit eos abstinere à communione Albaspinus also himself gives the sense and effect of that Canon Ut qui in pace arma projiciunt excommunicentur and addes this note Pauco tempore à societate fidelium abstineant which is more than Suspension the suspended being not debarred from the society of the faithful as Abstention from the Communion is more than Separation from the Sacrament of the Lords Supper the former being of greater latitude than the latter Lastly we shall often finde that after abstention from the Communion penance was imposed in order to restitution and penance presupposeth a precedent Excommunication But if Abstention were Suspension and to be under Penance was also to be suspended only from the Eucharist then Suspension had been imposed to obtain a restoring from Suspension and when we reade in the Canons poenitentiam agere quaerunt it should seem they desired to be suspended but neither was penance like to have been desired by them unless to get out of a greater evil under which they lay before viz. Excommunication 4. They produce Testimonies to prove That some were rejected until death but were not excommunicate so long for some of those might have the Sacrament at their dying hour which persons excommunicate could not have But Ubi vincere apertè Non datur insidâ—â—s armaque tecta parant If they were rejected until death they were so long also excommunicate for in that second Canon of Neo-Caesarea which is referred to Mulier si duobus nupserit fratribus abjiciatur in diem mortis sed propter humanitatem in extremis suis Sacramentis reconciliari oportet ita tamen ut si forte sanitatem recuperaverit Matrimonio soluto ad poenitentiam admittatur It is rendred manifest by the first Canon that this Censure was Excommunication for there absiciatur is explained by an addition of Extra Ecclesiam and casting out of the Church is Excommunication neither doth it follow that she was not excommunicate so long because dying she might have the Sacrament for first as we cannot be convinced that reconciliari Sacramentis doth properly and onely signifie the admission to the Sacrament but thereby by a Synecdoche is understood perfecta communio maxima absolutissima reconciliatio wherein a right also to the Eucharist is involv'd Justellus instead of Sacramentis reconciliari oportet renders it poenitentiam habebit L. 2. obser 4. p. 239. Idololatrae maechi homicidae apostatae Concil Elib can 3. Arel 2. can 24. Cyprian l. 1. ep 38. Cartag can 76. Nicen. can 13. yet though it were in their sens to be understood nevertheless though no excommunicate person in sensu composito could partake of the Eucharist as neither could a person suspended without a contradiction yet he that stood excommunicate might in extremis in fine in necessitate infirmitatis as the Canons speak be admitted to penance to be assumed and undergone if he did recover into health and in the interim receive not onely the simple Communion but also the Sacrament which seems clear and demonstrable from this very Canon as also doth that other truth that men were first excommunicate before they were made Penitents Adducor ut credam saith Albaspinus facinorosis ex omni scelerum flagitiorum coliuvione concretis hominthus vel etiamsi in ea praecipites peccata abeant poenitentiam modò illa peteretur nunquam denegatam and he cites the words of Caelestine in an Epistle to the Bishops of France Poenitentiam morientibus denegari quid hoc rogo aliud est quam morienti mortem addere ejusque animam nè absolvi possit occidere And howsoever in some of the first Times and during the ardour of Persecution for some sinnes four sorts of which Albaspinus recounteth besides those which Tertullian calls non delicta sed monstra and offences a second time lapsed into where it was decreed in fiae Communionem non dandaem ne lusisse de Dominica communione videantur the Communion was denyed to be afforded in their dying condition which manifests the falseness of that over-bold assertion That none were excommunicate until death yet as this was decreed with a condition express'd nisi digna satisfactione poenituerint as the Canon speaks and as it appears by Gyprian and by the third Canon of the first Council of Arles that Communion was especially denyed to men at their death because they had not petitioned to do their penance while they lived in health So not onely the fourth Councel of Carthage held in the fourth Century expresly decreed That penance should be permitted to dying persons which supposeth them then under Excommunication and then that the Eucharist should be immediatly exhibited to them if they desired it with condition of performing their penance injoyned in case they survived But the great Council of Nice also determined Ut si quis vitâ excedat ultimo necessariv viatico minimè privetur si vero desperatus Communionem assecutus supervixerit sit inter eos qui Communionem orationis tantummodo consequuntur Generaliter autem omni cuilibet in exitu posito Eucharisitiae participaâ—â—onem petenti Episcopus cum examinatione oblationem impertiat where if Viaticum be not the Eucharist as Zonaras Balsamon and Casaubon suppose it to be but onely the simple Communion as Albaspinus and others conceive yet all none dissenting agree that the Lords Supper is spoken of in the latter part of the Canon and beside the Story of Serapion is Lippis Tonsoribus nota known to all those that have but half an eye in Ecclesiastical History and have top'd off the least haires thereof 5. But they were at a greater fault and ranne away with a falser sent that hunting after Testimonies for Suspension among the Records of Antiquity tell us that Penitents were persons only suspended the Lords Table not excommunicate because some adjudged to penance were admitted to the Laicke Communion for if Penance were Suspension then the privation of
come to demand it and those that have come to them to require it have been denied the participation though such as have not been patible of the definition of notorious sinners and though they suppose that it proves nothing that the Schoolmen and Casuists assert that secret sinners are not to be kept off yet it proves their course not paralel with the line drawn out by the School who deny it to those the far greatest part whereof can be but occult sinners and not within the definition of notorious and it is something sure that hereby the School and Casuists must consequently conclude that when a Minister doth as he ought distribute the Sacrament to him whom onely by his private notice he knows unworthy he doth no act simply unlawfull by partaking of the receivers sin or prostituting the privileges of the godly or giving false testimony nor that he is to suspend him untill he hath rendred upon triall demonstrative signs of his conversion They say Suarez tells us That a violent suspicion is enough to deny the Sacrament but as Pliny writes of the deceitfulness of the Panther they shew forth those parts which seem fair for them and hide the head which would seem stern and terrible so Suarez indeed saith this of a publick suspition not of any private and of such a violent suspition too quae probabili rationi deponi non potest for if it be onely probable suspicion Sect. 6. p. 863. that onely sufficeth ad generandum dubium non ad judicandum simpliciter de peccato alierius and in such a case saith he Melior est conditio possidentis Suspect's de aliquo crimine neganda est si suspicio publica vehemens seu violenta sive si laborat publica infamia non item si est suspicio solùm probabilis vel praesumptuosa Sylvius in 3. q. 80. art 4. p. 311. Dr. Twisse quando aliquis non sufficienter probatur malus praesumendus est bonus and a violent suspition is described to be such quae moraliter facit rem certam such a suspition Suarez thinks sufficient because in rebus moralibus non est quaerenda metaphysica evidentia sed sufficit moralis certitudo and therefore this violent suspition is in Suarez his sense equipollent to evidence of fact or little short thereof for otherwise that any less suspition is enough to deny the Sacrament is so far from being the common opinion of Divines that they commonly opine and directly resolve the contrary as I have elsewhere manifested and it would otherwise be contradictory to Suarez his own judgment otherwhere delivered viz. That the Sacrament is not to be denied but to him that is notorious by Law or fact and his fellow Vasquez whom a famous Schoolman hath weighed in his ballance and found to ponderate more than Suarez doth tell us that infamy which is I think somewhat more than suspition Licèt sit sufficiens principium inquirendi contra ipsum de delicto ad poenam non statim vldetur sufficiens ut statim puniatur tanquam manifestus peccator in conspectu ecclesiae denegando ei Eucharistiam cùm infamia illa non eâ— rei evidentia sed ex aliquibus judiciis ortum habet quae sufficere non debeat ut ità graviter quis puniatur And seeing the publick repulsion from the Sacrament is called the lesser Excommunication and that being defined to be an ecclesiastical consure Cas consc tract 13. c. 1. Sect. 9. p. 254. and Eiliucius telling us that ad ferendam censuram requiritur jurisdictâ—o fori contentiosi so that whereas Biel taught That whosoever sinned mortally incurred the lesser Excommunication because he that remains in any mortal sin deprives himself of the Sacrament Vasquez refutes this opinion as false upon this ground De excom dub 1. Sect. 7 8. because the lesser Excommunication is an ecclesiastical censure hence therefore it follows that regularly according to the Doctrine of the School neither should the Minister alone inflict it neither ought it to be inflicted upon suspition but according to the judicial process upon proof or confession of some crime or evidence of the fact Their testimony out of Gregory may serve to assert what we confess That for such manifest faults as seem to be inconsistent with grace and to exclude it a man may by authoritative sentence be put from the Communion but tends not to prove what we deny that he may arbitrarily be suspended till he demonstrate himself to be in the state of grace They have the conscience to appeal to the Readers judgment whether there be not more conformity between them and antiquity than their adversaries can pretend unto that make no separation But we approve and shall cooperate in a separation of others from us by juridical censure that are notoriously wicked for this suits with the ancient Discipline but not a separation as theirs is of our selves from them that are not manifestly godly no nor yet from that Church where that laudable Discipline though de jure approved is not defacto through some obstruction exercised for this sorts with the old Donatisme The Chymists boast much of their extractions and separations of the pure parts from the impure but Sennertus commends an answer of Queen Elizabeth to one glorying of such spirits If said she we were purely spirit we might be cured and nourished by such spirits so I shall say If we were onely and altogether spiritual we might have a Church universally holy and a pure use of the Ordinances but till we come to be so which will be onely when we shall be as those immortal spirits the Angels those violent separations are like to leave us scarce any body of a Church but because the ancient Church made some kinde of separation and they also separate therefore to infer that theirs must needs be the like kinde of separating and their way conformable to the ancient is such another argument as the Chymicks use that because Ezra weighed out two vessels of fine Copper precious as Gold therefore they must needs forsooth be of metall transmuted or improved by Chymical artifice Ezra 8.27 They know not who they be that are so carefull to repell and exclude men from the Sacrament indeed every man being his own grand flatterer he is the first that sees his perfections and the last that discerns his faults and there are some that misprise their faults to be their perfections as the Mexicans think that to be beauty and gallantry which is the vilest deformity to have their lips by the weight of jewels pendent in them drawn down over their chins to the imbearing of their teeth but if to suspend whole Congregations not because they are proved to be wicked but meerly because they are not approved to be Saints which is as if we should withhold a mans sood from him till he make proof of his good digestion to suspend the Sacrament it self in their proper
Churches that they may better suspend their people which hath some affinity with Caligula's wish That the whole City of Rome had but one neck that he might cut it off at once to take so much pains to justifie and defend their suspending of so many as unfit when as he said to his Son encountring with his Enemy Percute qua aratrum the same labour might have made the most of them fit and however they shall be fitted yet to give them no admission or entrance but onely by stepping over their threshold which they have set up by Gods threshold he that shall deny that this is to be carefull to exclude and keep men from the Sacrament and as Alcibiades perswaded Pericles to be studious rather not to give than to give an account so that this is to be more solicitous not to give than to give the Sacrament he hath been bred up in Anaxagoras his School where in defiance of sense it was denied that the Snow was white and if I should do it I should doubt that even for this I should come too near the danger of incurring some of Chrysostome's stigmatical Epithites Chrysostome was ere while as full as they could wish now he is fulsom and their stomaces cannot digest an argument collected from his words They very calmly and with silence let pass the greatest and most forcible part of the testimony and onely pick a quarrel to the application of one piece thereof Chrysostome had said that he that stands by and not communicates is wicked shameless and impudent And the Paper thence modestly as it could offered it to be considered by arguing à pari if not à fortiori where or upon whom that censure would fall or how it would be-reversed if those that stand by and would yet shall not be suffered to participate hereupon Ignescunt irae duris dolor ossibus haeret They take this shaft into their sides as if aimed at them and complain of the wound and indeed cùm vitia incessimus reum ira manifestat but I shall say with St. Hierom Neminem specialiter meus sermo pulsavit Tom. 1. ep 2. ad Nepol c. 26. qui mihi irasci voluerit priùs ipse de se quòd talis sit confitebitur As our Saviour told the Jews That not he but Moses accused them so it was not I but Chrysostome that laid the censure and leaves it not on them but ex Hypothesi upon supposition they do that which he censureth it was he that delivered the Law as the major if their conscience become the witness against them in the case and make up the minor for the conclusion let any man be judg I could not borrow a nail from that Master of the Assemblies as the words of the wise are called and not drive it to the head nor bring forth and onely shew the weapon and not strike with it nor make it like Thebes when Epaminondas was slain a spear that had no head or point If they shall prompt me how I might apply the words to make them argumentative in any more modest or candid manner I shall be very docible to write after their copy and excuse and expunge my former characters or Ut Lugdunensem dicturus Rhetor ad aram My tongue shall lick out and make amends for the blots of my Pen. But noise and outcries whatsoever some Nations imagine will not help an Eclipse As in Tophet they set up a loud sound and raised clamours to drown the cry of the dying childe so perchance they keep this ratling about thatwhich seems to pinch the credit of their persons onely to drown the sound of that blow which-mortally wounds their cause for what was transcribed out of Chrysostome That he which was unworthy of the Eucharist was also unworthy of the prayers this they take no notice of like weak souls that wink when they are put in fear and think the danger lessened which they see not And this though his words seem yet to be the sense of the whole Church which did conclude all her publick and solemn prayers with the receiving of the Sacrament so as Albaspinus tells us De vet eccles rit l. 1. obs 16. p. 124. Mede Christian Sacrif Sect. 1. p. 475. Vix repories quenquam eo i. solenniter usum esse nisi ad Eucharistiam significandam As we vocally conclude all our prayers through Jesus Christ our Lord so saith Mr. Mede the ancient Church in the solemn and publick service when she presented her self before God as one body did visibly by representing him in the Symboles of his Body and Bloud he being thereby commemorated and received by them and us to the same end for which he suffered that through him we receiving forgiveness of sins God might accept our persons and prayers The Stations which were but dimidiata jesunia Fasts extended to the ninth hour and not prolonged usque ad authoritatem demorantis stellae in Tertullian's Idiom and which he tells us had their name from the example of Souldiers whose standing to watch before the Palace being called Stations I. 1. obs 14. p. 101. gave the like appellation to the Christians coming together twice a week and continuing together in prayer for defence of the Church and to impetrate Gods favour those Stations being as Albaspinus describes them Nihil aliud quam coitio ac veluti conjuratio totius ecclesiae contra Deum and whereby as Tertullian speaks quasi manu facta eo Deum perpellebant adi gebántque ad id quod obnixè peterent concedendum But those Stations were always concluded with the Eucharist as the close and upshot thereof In the fifty days betwixt Easter and Whitsunday L. 1. obse 15. p. 106 108 a time of more solemn prayers and which Albaspinus affirms to equal the Lords day in Worship and Religion every particular Christian saith he most sweetly was compelled and enforced to receive the Eucharist Besides they had no other place where they offered the publick prayers but that whereon the memory of Christ's Body and Bloud was celebrated and even as in the Old Testament where they called on the Name of the Lord there they still built an Altar and their Sacrifices were Rites whereby to invocate God as may be collected from 1 Sam. 13.12 So in the swadling of the Christian Church Breaking of Bread or as the Syriack reades the breaking of the Eucharist and prayers are conjoyned and both referred to their Christian fellowship as the Exegesis thereof shewing wherein the Communion of the Church consisted so as therefore whosoever was of the body of the Church did both partake of the Prayers and of the Altar and who was divided from the one had no benefit of the other as Mr. Mede produceth Ignatius to witness Pag. 494. and it was morally impossible that those which were received as competent for a conjunction in the former could be rejected as incapable of Communion in the later
promises though with some more particular and appropriate application upon performance of the condition Chamier Tom. 4. l. 2. c. 9. S. 18 Easdem res confirmare quae prius erant solis verbis conceptae est enim ea signorum natura ut quae Diplomata in membranis sunt fiant efficaciora sortianturque effectum suum Sacraments having some analogy with an Oath wherewith God confirms the promise willing more abundantly to shew unto the Heirs thereof the immutability of his counsel non suam naturam spectans sed nostram infirmitatem and therefore Paraeus calls our Sacraments In Hebr. c. 6. v. 17. p. 888. God's visible Oaths as the very words saith he manifests for Lawyers call a solemn Oath a Sacrament and therefore they are Gods Oaths in confirmation of his Promises Si verbum meum non sufficit ecce signum do addes Chrysostome but then even in confirming Faith objectivè they consequently not onely strengthen but beget Faith subjectively as a Seal in confirming the Writing begets a beleef of the validity of the assurance and so are meanes of Conversion producing a firmer assent to the truth of those Promises which before were not effectually laid hold of Dico sacramenta saith Chamier esse notiora efficaciora fidei faciendae Ubi supra S. 24. p. 42. observe he saith faciendae non tantùm confirmandae ipsa promissione codem modò quo sigilla regia sunt notiora â—fficaciora ipso diplomate nimirum quia solent apud nos esse cognitiora certioraque quae in oculos cadunt quà m quae auribus admoventur As then he that is not satisfied with a bare single promise may credit an oath and then that oath is properly the means whereby he is perswaded into a beleef and as when a naked Writing is not held a good Conveyance until it become a Deed sealed and delivered that sealing and delivery makes good the assurance and is that which invests the right and interest so when the Word preached doth not profit being not mix'd with Faith in them that hear it the Sacrament that superadds to the Dogmatical or Historical Faith a fiducial assent doth not onely confirm but cause that Faith which justifieth and brings peace with God And to say it cannot properly be said to doe this because it doth it not without precognition of the word is as if they should say that because a Deed is a writing sealed and delivered that it doth not therefore become of force from the sealing and delivery but from the writing read or that an incorporal estate did alwayes pass when the grant alone was read and was onely confirmed by the sealing and delivery Though most of their cunning lye in such generalities yet I shall not insist on it that Christ hath promised to be with us in all his Ordinances unto the end of the world And that there are general promises that their hearts shall live that seek God Psal 6.9.32 Prov. 8.17 Matth. 7.7 Lam. 3.25 Psal 75.4 that the Lord will be found of them that seek him and is good to them that wait for him and to the soul that seeketh him and they that dwell in his Courts shall be satisfied with the goodness of his house and that this is extensible and accommodable to seeking and waiting on him in all his wayes and Ordinances and as a general rule extends to and comprehendeth all particulars not specially and expresly excepted so they must shew by direct and explicit proof that the grace of conversion is denyed to this particular ordinance or else it is included in the affirmation of such grace to be annexed to ordinances in general As the generative faculty for propagation of the species is still supported and enlivened by influence of Gods benediction Be fruitful and multiply semel quidem dicta est semper autem fit saith Chrysostome so the converting power in the Sacrament for continuance and dilatation of the Church is maintained and verified by the power of Christ's blessing of the Elements to the remembrance of him which commemoration is efficacious to the engaging of the heart to him The Sacramental Elements are the Body and Blood of Christ and the Blood of the New Testament shed for many for remission of sins as well by signification as by obsignation and the obsignation is but an higher kind of signification they are the communion of the Body and Blood of Christ In locum signifying and sealing them accompanied with their effect and spiritual reality saith Deodate by virtue of the Holy Ghost And why should not the signification be really effectual in production of reall grace as the sealing to the causing of relative or the signification have no such effect in the Sacrament which is so efficacious when made in the Word Beside every promise made to the Word Homil. 3. aâ—â— Ephes c. 1. is extended to the Sacraments which are but visible words And when Chrysostome in his Exhortations to frequent communicating affirms not onely by these things set before us viz. the Sacrament but by Hymnes also doth the Holy Ghost descend he implyes that by the Sacrament the Holy Ghost more evidently came into mens hearts than by the other means and whether that of 1 Cor. 12.13 of drinking into one spirit which the Syriack Ambrose Augustine and others render drinking of one spirit and which Calvin thus expounds Participationem calicis huc spectare ut unam Christi spiritum hauriamus and Piscator Etsi verbi auditionem sacramentor legitimam c. brationem spiritus consolans sanctificans sequitur remunerationis ergo potiores â—amen esse in eo sacramentorum partes neque sane leviter praetereundum est quod Paulus dixit nos spiriâ—â— potari eui nihil unquam simile protulit cum de verbi praedicatione locutus est Thes Salmur part 3. p. 40. Calvin in loc Piscator in loc Gerhard loc com tom 6. c. 20. p. 173. Chrys in homil moral 24. Ut regenerentur ab uno spiritu viz. Sancto and Gerhard Ex uno calice bibimus ut unum spiritum accipiamus refer not to the conferring of real grace as well as relative and so whether those Testimonies of Chrysostome and other Fathers which if I should muster up for my defence I might like that Romane Vestal be oppress'd with the multitude of such Bucklers concerning the Sacrament calling it Fundamentum salus lux vita medicamentum immortalitatis antidotum non moriendi the saying of Ignatius Renovationis regenerationis causa which is Nyssen's vivificatio spiritûs which is Cyril's Saint as mentis which is Cyprians c. relate onely to confirming not begetting of Faith let men more learned judge but truly I cannot beleeve Can they deny that the Sacrament by shewing forth and signifying the Lords death and putting us in remembrance of him and his Body broken and his Blood shed for the remission of sins is a part of the Gospel or good
pertinac tom 2. p. 142. contra lit Petil. tom 9. p. 26. contra Crescon l. 3. c. 36. they suffer that for the good of truth which they hate for the good of equity saith Augustine And again Quaerendum est quis habeat charitatem invenies non esse nisi c. It is to be inquired who have charity and you shall finde none but those that love unity some likewise shall say In thy Name we have eaten and drunk and shall hear I know you not which eat his Body and drink his Bloud in the Sacrament and acknowledg not in the Gospel his members diffused through the whole world with whom therefore they shall not be reckoned in the day of judgment And in another place the Apostle saying Be not partaker of other mens sins Keep thy self chaste to shew saith he in what sort a man might communicate with other mens sins he adds Keep thy self chaste for he that keeps himself chaste communicates not with other mens fins although he communicate not their sins but the Sacraments of Christ which they receive to their judgment with them from whom he hath severed himself by keeping himself chaste There may be a common concourse to the material part of an act without concurrence in the formal neither can a Physical concurrence make partakers in a moral act there can be no such transite from one kinde of action to another both People and Minister concurre to the receiving not the unworthy receiving if thereof they are no causes to the act not to the ataxy or sinfulness thereof they cooperate not in the evil but permit it Contra epist Parmen tom 7. p. 11. as that which morally they cannot remedy Quod non placet non nocet qui seipsum custodit non communicat alienis peccatis saith St. Augustine for if in evil actions any man consents not to them the evil doer bears his own cause and his person saith he prejudiceth not another whom in consenting to an evil deed he had not his partner in the crime What is said of him that is born of God Non facit peccatum quia patitur potiùs is in some sort appliable to this purpose the People and the same may be said of the Pastor are physically active morally passive and neither give nor partake of the Sacrament to and with one unworthy but one that is undivided from the visible Church the notes whereof must agree to it as Proprium quarto modo omni soli semper whence if the Word and Sacraments are those notes as our Divines assert though Non quoad essentiam ejus internam certò necessariò declarandam tamem ad visibilem aliquem coetum designandum qui est Ecclesia particularis ex instituto Christi formata as learned Ames All then that are actually of the visible Church may challenge a right unto a free enjoyment of these Sacraments to the one by being born of Christian Parents to the other by being baptized and having a dogmatical faith which every intelligent person is presumed to have else there may be a part of the visible Church not authoritatively or judicially sequestred from the communion thereof which are not in a capacity of obtaining that which denotes the Church At no time can the Church pretend to or hope for perfection of degrees rarely to that of parts Jacob's Ladder had several degrees in it and all were not of one height or rising perplexed and complicated are those two Cities saith St. Augustine in this world and mix'd one with the other untill they are separated in the last judgment Exhortatio ad conc Eul. ep tom 2. p. 147. the Church being no homogeneous body constituted of singular parts The Floor hath in it Wheat and Chaff the Field Corn and Tares the Net good fish and bad and it is observable that at the Nuptial Banquet was one found without a Wedding-garment With those and other similitudes saith Augustine the Lord confirmeth the forbearance of his servants lest while good men may think themselves blamed for commixture with evil by humane and rash dissensions they destroy the little ones Contra Crescon l. 3. c. 35. or the little ones perish I keep the Church saith the same Father full both of wheat and Chaff I amend whom I can I tolerate whom I cannot I fly the Chaff lest I become the same thing but not the Floor lest I be nothing Let no man therefore saith he desert the Floor before his time Contra ep Parmen tom 1. p. 11. let him tolerate the Chaff in threshing suffer it in the Floor for he shall not have any thing to bear within the Barn he will come that hath his Fan and divide the good from the bad To forsake the assemblies because of the mixture and communion of hypocrites and evil men seems to be a kinde of negative Schism or Separation and a positive to gather and constitute a new Church and I would willingly know if it be not the renewing of the old Heresies and Schisms of Donatus Lucifer Contra Faust Manich. tom 6. p. 60. Novatus and Audim Whether it make not the Church of the called to be of no greater latitude than that of the Elect whereas many are called but few are chosen Cum paucis haereditatem Dei cum multis signacula ejus participanda saith Augustine and whether in time by degrees this singularity may not antiquate the Sacrament and make the use thereof wholly obsolete and bring men to be Seekers and like the Phenix In 1 ad Cor. c. 11. v. 26. p. 430. one alone in the kinde of their devotions and to that humour of the Swenckfeldian in Musculus that would never communicate because he could not in his judgment finde any Church sufficiently adorned to make a fit Spouse for Christ And as the better qualified people may not withdraw themselves from the Communion upon pretence of mixt Congregations and fear of prejudice by them so neither upon the like score may the Minister withhold the Sacrament from them or intermit the Administration thereof for can it be thought rational that the holy desire of a competent number should be unsatisfied because the greater part are not equally prepared and so well disposed to joyn with them Is not this to eradicate the Corn for the Tares sake whereas rather both should be suffered to grow together untill Harvest It was a Principle of wise Cato's It is better many receive Silver than a few Gold and can it be held just that none should have Silver because all cannot receive Gold or because the Leven cannot be throughly purged that therefore the Children must eat no Bread or because the Hedg of Discipline cannot be effecutally planted that the Field of the Church must ly altogether unmanured and must the Wheat receive no nourishment because the Tares stand in the same Field Shall a certain essential duty be neglected for an uncertain accidental evil
from the Communion because of the admission of some in their opinion wicked or unworthy doth symbolize with the Anabaptist and hath a raste of their Leaven but whether those principles that it is of necessity to make probation of their fitness and worthiness that are to be admitted to the Holy Supper and that this Sacrament being a Seal of Faith ought not ordinately to be administred to those that have not Faith may not also be extensive and aswell applicable to the Sacrament of Baptism and so do tacitely advance and drive on also the interest of the Anabaptists who will have none to be baptized untill they have given sure evidence of their sound Faith and real Conversation and unawares militate in the Tents of and run Biass toward that faction I shall not make research into much less dare to determine but transferre and resign the consideration thereof to more comprehensive judgments it shall be enough for me with the Pismire in the Apologue To awaken the Lion and make him look about But I shall now bring it to the Scales and more importunately offer it to be weighed by judicious men whether those Reasons wherewith some men make so specious a Muster and whereof they make ostent with so many plausible amplifications if they were mutato nomine fitted and applied to the hearing of the Word and Prayer they might not serve aswell and have asmuch force and efficacy First to stave off and exclude unconverted men from those duties as from the Sacrament And secondly to introduce a necessity of probation antecedently to the ordinary partaking of the Word in those who are born within the Church and bred up in the profession of the Faith and of Prayer as to the participation of the Lords Supper And thirdly render it as piacular to joyn with Congregations wherein persons unconverted and unworthy are mixt in hearing the Word and Prayer as in the Communion of the Body of our Lord though the Reasons might be indifferent and the same or the like in all yet for method and perspicuity sake we will take our instance for the first in Prayer and make our experiment of the second in hearing the Word and take an assay of the third point in both To abridge and sum up the Reasons produced for debarring unconverted men that is such as satisfie them not with demonstrative signs of Godliness from the holy Table they may be reduced to this Compendium that they neither can perform the duties requisite to nor can be capable of the mercies of the Sacrament that by partaking unworthily they doe but multiply their sinne and aggravate their damnation whereto he also is accessary that either doth exhibit it or consents to it or suffers them or by partaking with them countenanceth their receiving according to those branches of this rule Consensus palpo participans nutans non obstans now turn those against an admission and conjunction with them in prayer have unconverted men those dispositions and affections and elevations suitable with and requisite to religious prayer the clean hands 1 Tim. 2.8 Faith without wavering James 1.6 Fervency of Spirit Rom. 12.11 Can they call on the name of the Lord Jesus that depart not from iniquity 2 Tim. 2.19 Are they susceptible of any holy communion with God or of the gracious effects of Prayer or capable of any share of the righteousness and intercession of the Lord Jesus which must be spread upon their persons and their prayers to make them acceptable Will not the multiplyed sins of distrust of Gods promises irreverence towards so glorious a majesty dulness of spirit deadness of affection and extravagances of thoughts increase their guilt and irritate their judgment shall so precious a duty be thus prophaned so high a privilege as this is to powre forth our wants into the bosome of God be prostituted and so great blessings as are held forth to faithful prayers be despised What dishonour results hence to the name of God What a grief is impress'd on the spirits of the godly What a profanation reflected on so sacred an Ordinance Were it not better for them to forbear prayer than onely to pray to the promoving of their condemnation Is there nay promise they shall be heard Are they not expresly told that God will not hear them whose prayers are abominable Psal 66.18 Isa 1.15 1 Joh. 3.22 Prov. 28.9 Are not they that admit them to a communion in prayers where they but flatter God with their mouth and lye unto him with their tongues in all that is said guilty of those sins because they hinder them not and doe onely concur to farther and accelerate their damnation and so deface the purity and defile the beauty of so divine an Exercise You may see what an Harvest he might make of this Stubble that were torrens suadaeque medulla and happy in sermonis divite vena and now consider I beseech you if the same apogogical or abductive reasons may not be as speciously and as plausibly urged and amplified to bring off unconverted men from prayer as to take them off from the Lords Table and have not as much energy and force in order to the one as to the other Secondly concerning hearing of the Word The conclusion that it is necessary to take examination of men previously to the Sacrament and to make tryal whether they are worthy or not to be admitted is deduced and extracted from that principle He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation to himself not discerning the Lords Body But now try and examine I beseech you since the Word is said to be the savour of death unto death and that the Word shall judge them in the last day that hear it and there is a caution Take heed how you hear and qualifications required in hearing 1 Pet. 2.1 2. Jam. 1.21 and men hating instruction are not to declare his Statutes or take his Covenant in their mouth Psal 50.16 and he that discerns not the Word of God from the Word of Man hears his damnation and lets it in at his ear as well as the other eates and drinks it and the Word and Sacraments represent but the same Christ and the same promises under divers notions and to several Senses the one to the Ear and the other to the Eye Hand and Mouth the one being an audible and the other a visible tactible gustable word and both are Divine Ordinances for the salvation of soules whether there should not be as great a necessity incumbent to examine men already incorporated into the Church of their fitness and dispositions and preparation in order to hearing of the Word as to the receiving of the Sacrament and upon the same score why should it be more perilous or hazard more pollution of our selves or the Ordinances to joyn in mixt Congregations in eating of the Sacrament than in hearing of the Word especially since that prohibition not to give that which is holy to Dogs
pietatem ejus in dubium vocant videtur defecisse à parentis pietate Rivet in Gen. 18. Exer. 91. p. 353. and in c. 21. Exer. 104. p. 403. Ita Paraeus expressè in Gen. 16.12 17.21 p. 249. 259. Though the Covenant were established with Isaac yet Ismael whom the Hebrew calls a Wilde Asse and the Chaldee paraphrase retaines the Original word Metaphoricè pro homine insociabili ferinis moribus praedito saith Rivet and whom he and Paraeus Cajetan Pererius and others judge to be a profane man and a Reprobate and Mr. Broughton thinkes to be the onely evil man whose name is fore-told in Scripture though he had then no Title to the Inheritance yet he had the Seal of Circumcision to shew for it which was also given him saith Paraeus very observably Ut ei non minus quà m aliis offerretur rata maneret federis gratia donec eum ab ipsa manifestâ apostasiâ excluderet ità redderetur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 deinde propter Disciplinam cuj omnes Abrahae domesticos subjectos esse voluit ut servaretur ordo vitarentur scandala And so also at the first Institution of this Seal all the Males of Abraham's Family were the Virgin Waxe as it were to receive the stampe thereof as well those bought with his Money as they that were borne in his house and it was impress'd on them the same day that the seal was ordained and they could then be put under no long tryal or great preparation and though it have better Evidence than that of Gen. 14.14 where his trained servants are according to that which some will have to be proper to the Hebrew rendred his catechized servants that Abraham had taught his servants the knowledge of God Gen. 18.19 Yet that they were by any former probation found all of them to have evident signes of holiness and that Abraham's Family had a Prerogative beyond Christs and was a Paradise without a Serpent it is very hardly imaginable or that it was as Scaliger of Virgil such a monstrum sine labe but their capacity of Circumcision was rooted in their being parts of Abraham's Family the Church and their admission to that Seal of the Covenant is made an Argument to prove that even the Children of Infidels Rivet in Gen. 17. exer 89. p. 343. taken or bought by and in the power of Christians may be baptized as hath been determined in a National Synod of the French Churches When the seal had been disused and for 40. years antiquated at the great sealing day when that great Body of the People was circumcised Josua 5. and that Body was not nor could be without some Excrements and therein as in Mines there was vile Earth as well as precious Metals and when that Ore was brought forth out of the dark Mine and was capable to have been sifted or put under a fiery Tryal or have been brought unto the Teste yet without any such separation of the precious from the vile we doe finde that all Israel was circumcised v. 8. and that without any examination or any profession save general and virtual that we can finde and then immediatly follows their keeping of the Passover v. 10. so it was ordained that every soul that was circumcised should eat the Passover every soul that was susceptible of a journey to the place which the Lord had chosen and was capable to eat such solid meat which Infants were not And upon this account the Rabbins also except the Blind Lame Deaf and Idiot yet was the Command for eating thereof an absolute and general Rule with no other exception but of being on a journey or under any legal uncleanness and even these were not to omit but to adjourn it one moneth In Lev. 9.13 else to be cut off from their People for that omission of duty say the late Annotators is dangerous as well as commission of sinne against God we doe not finde so much as that moral uncleanness was a barre to the keeping thereof by any that continued of the Congregation of Israel And not to conceal a truth there is no foot-steps of any cutting off or any Law or Precedent for such casting out from the Congregation by sentence of Excommunication for any notorious crimes or scandals in all the Old Testament I shall not gain-say there may be some Evidence found among the Rabbinical Writings for the practice thereof which may onely argue it to be then an Ecclesiastical but no Divine Institution But it cannot be imaginable how there should be any such examination antecedent to admission to partake of the Passover when the Lamb was neither brought to the Temple nor killed by the Priest In Exod 12.6 p. 890. In Gen. 17.11 Exer. 80. but slain and eaten privately at home as Rivet proves out of Philo Josephus Liranus and others and of the same opinion is Gerhard Rivet extracts the definition of a Sacrament out of Gen. 17.11 which he defines Signum federis inter Deum homines and the partaking of the Sacrament is a renewing of the Covenant with God and much upon this account it is pretended that a profession of Faith is exacted as previous to the participation the same inconveniencies then may seem to refult from an admission to a formal explicit covenanting with God as from being admitted to take the seal of the Covenant and consequently the like Reasons may seem to prohibite the one and the other Unless we shall think it less to be entred into a Gild or Company than to wear the Livery or suppose it not strange that he that is taken Tenant shall be denyed his Evidences but now long before this Nationall Circumcising there was a covenanting with God by the whole Nation of the Jews all the people in the whole heap or floor without winnowing away of the Chaff Exod. 24.7 Deut. 29.10 12. many of which notwithstanding the Psalmist sings a sad note of them They flattered him with their mouth and lyed unto him with their tongues for their heart was not right with him neither were they stedfast in his Govenant Psal 78.36 37. and Moses himself renders this Character of them that they were a stiff-necked and a foolish people and had not eyes to see nor ears to hear nor hearts to beleeve yet in respect of the Covenant and Promises he nevertheless calls them an Holy Nation and the peculiar People of God and therefore like as Aeneas Sylvâ—us said in the case of Priests Marriages howsoever there might be some Reasons for excluding of such as are not approved for Personal Sanctity yet there are more Reasons for admission of such as are not by judicial Censure cast out of the Church because of their federal Holiness and we may therefore say of their new Chymistry whereby they pretend to separate the pure from the impure as Gerson did of some constitutions Eorum sanctior esset omissio When as they say of the
naturalizing or rather unnaturalizing this being a translation from the state of nature to that state of grace but those that were children of the faithful Dicimus saith Calvin Ecclesiae filios nasci ab utero reputari in Christi membris and this may aswel supersede the necessity of profession of their faith at the partaking of the Eucharist as he concludes it to do at the receiving of their Baptism And it seems to me to have asmuch reason that the parents should give evidence of their faith when they bring their children to Baptisme the Childrens right being rooted in their faith as when they offer themselves to the Lords Table but their constant conversation and fellowship in the Church makes them Confessors and they need not be made Martyrs by farther trial until justice convict them to be evil charity must conclude them to be good sicut difficilè aliquem suspicatur malum qui bonus est sic difficilè aliquem suspicatur bonum qui ipse malus est saith Chrysostom it is the Character of a strait heart and close hand to examine a poor beggar of his whole life before they think him worthy of a morsel of bread whereas it is better to feed divers that are unworthy than suffer one to want that is worthy Semper habet unde det cui pectus est plenum charitatis saith Augustine habere omnia Sacramenta malus esse potest habere autem charitatem malus esse non potest adds the same Father and though that of the wise man may seem a paradox Melior est iniquitas viri quam mulier benefaciens And that be an hyperbole that the worst Grecian is better than the best Cretian yet it is a just truth that the errors of charity are better than the best pretences of rigor and censorious uncharitableness and it is neerer the partaking of the Divine Nature to spare many for the sake of a few good men than to dissolve or shatter a whole Church for a few evil The Church of Corinth was a very corrupt Body Morbus est partium viventium corporis humani ad actiones naturales exercendas impotentia seu ineptitudo ab earundem constitutione praeter naturam ortum habens Sennertus and needed purging as much as any there were not onely Cacochymical humors mixt with the blood but they were gathered and ripened into Spiritual diseases there being an impotency or unaptness in the parts of that body to exercise spiritual actions springing from their constitution beside grace there were diseases in their state and vigor diseases of all kinds morbi intemperiei they were too hot at strife and contention 1 Cor. 3.3 11.18 And too cold in their love and zeal to the reverence of the Sacrament 1 Cor. 11. To the honor of the Apostle 2 Cor. 10.10 And to their weak brethren whom they scandalized 1 Cor. 8.12 They were too moist with intemperate drinkings 1 Cor. 11.21 and their profane distempers in receiving the Sacramental food of their souls which had brought them to an Atrophy and Apepsy together with their uncleanness fornication and lasciviousness wherein they had sinned already and had not repented were a compounded intemperateness 2 Cor. 13.21 There were morbi totius substantiae though not arising from occult qualities yet otherwise not onely as they were carnal 1 Cor. 3.3 But through their denial of the resurrection of the dead which is the life of faith and substance of Christianity quae est singularis fides Christianorum saith Augustine there were morbi compositionis in figura the immodest and irreverent habit of their women 1 Cor. 11. In magnitudine they were puffed up 1 Cor. 4.18 5.2 There were swellings among them 2 Cor. 13.20 In numero there was one member continued and cherished in that wickedness which was execrable to the heathens which should have been cut off 1 Cor. 5.1 In situ there were tumults 2 Cor. 13.20 Eating and drinking in the Church which they should have done in their own houses 1 Cor. 11.22 Eating in the idol temples and partaking the cup and table of Devils 1 Cor. 8.10 10.21 And lastly diseases solutae continuitatis in their envyings strifes divisions 1 Cor. 3.3 11.18 And going to law one with another for trifles and that before Infidels Chap. 6.1 2. Yet notwithstanding all this Contr. Donat. post Collat. c. 20. Tom. 7. p. 125. there were many pure and precious souls among them tamen omnes ad unum altare accedebant eadem Sacramenta communicabant qui eadem vitia non communicabant saith Augustine What then doth the Spiritual Hippocrates to whom might more plausibly be applied what Macrobius attributed to the Coan Nec falli potest nec fallere he first acknowledgeth them to be the Churches of Christ and a society of Saints he doth not Unchurch or Anathematize them and although the same men that did partake of the Table of Divels were partakers also of the Table of the Lord and though they met together for the worse and in effect did not eat the Lords Supper but held a kind of Bacchanal rather yet he denies not this promiscuous Communion he doth not command nor permit such as found themselves precious Vbi supra p. 126. to separate from those they saw vile non corporaliter separat sed spiritualâ—ter separare non cessat Nolite seduci corrumpunt bonos more 's colloquia prava non eorum congressum sed consensum timet saith Augustine he increpates not the Church-governors for admitting such nor lays any injunction of excluding so many of them nor gives any advice to suffer none to pass to the Lords table but through the Strainer of Examination but he allows them to continue the use of the Lords Supper and onely corrects the abuses whereby they provoked the Lord and lost the fruits of their refection being not strengthned in Spirit but rather made weak and sick in body and soul too some of them who did eat and drink damnation onely to themselves and when he saith to themselves Vbi supra p. 125. quid aliud nisi istos vaniloquos cogitabat saith Augustine ut ei non sufficiat dicere judicium manducat bibit nisi adderet sibi nè hoc etiam ad illos pertineret qui pariter quidem sed non judicium manducabant he wills them not to resrain the Supper but their sins to amend their stomacks not to leave their meat to use some preparatives not to lay aside the main Physick he prescribes them to examin themselves not to subject them to the examination of another but so to eat not abstain In 1 Cor. 11. p. 438. and so to eat without any forain examination Nec dicit abstinete igitur à pane hoc c. saith Musculus hoc pacto malum quod reprehendit non emendasset si Medicus dicat aegroto quia comedis ac bibis secùs quà m valetudini tuae
cum ipsis qui ea faciunt donec areâ dominicâ sicut palea ventilabro ultimo separentur non eorum peccata sed Dei sacramenta communicent We shall howsoever endeavour that they may not onely recipere totum telum but also be sensible of the stroke and the wound First they grant what the Paper proposed that to forsake the Assemblies or to make a separation because of the mixture of evil men was the Heresie of Donatus Audius c. But what it tacitly assumed that they were guilty of a like separation upon like grounds that they think they may be confident to deny But although perhaps there be not such an exact agreement between them and those Hereticks as they say there was among the 72. Interpreters who though in several Cells yet punctually accorded in the same Translation yet that there is some conformity in judgment and affection between them as they write there is among those between whom there is a Synastry and who have the same common Stars and influences at their Nativities if themselves will not see we hope to make others to discern for first they separate from those which by no judicial process are separated from them so did those Hereticks 2. Their separation is carried on by the same motives for they confess that divers of their members have forsaken Communion with their proper Congregations Centur. Magd. cent 4. c. 5. p. 208. L. de unic bapt c. 14. S. 9. because they were offended with the grossness of the Administrations at home where no separation was made just as Theodoret tells of the Audians Recederéque à communione Ecclesiastica dicebant quòd in illa ferrentur faeneratores impuri and right as Augustine and others elsewhere alleaged shew us of the Donatists that they separated from other constituted Churches because of the mixture of godly and wicked persons in one Communion and because some whom they thought of right ought to have been so were not in Fact excommunicated 3. That Reason the Apologists have back'd with a second adding that the commixture of the Wicked with the Godly defileth and polluteth and therefore they refuse Communion with them in the Sacrament And these were the very Dictates and Arguings of the Novatians and Donatists Centur. Magd. cent 3. c. 3. p. 71. ubi supra as Cyprian and Augustine inform us In communione sacramentorum mali maculant bonos c. so as plainly the lives of the one and other are paralels though in a different Meridian If to excuse themselves from symbolizing with those Hereticks they shall alleage that they doe not suppose the Church either should or can be constituted of such as are free from all sinne but such as are cleer of Crimes not who are really but onely who are visibly worthy We shall re-minde them that those Heresiarchs were pure from so gross an errour as to think there were no Hypocrites in the Church or that all of their Societies were pure without mixture or perfect without defect neither did they pretend to have read the Book of Life to know who were Elect nor presume to know the hearts Gods peculiar and to discern who were Hypocrites but they would admit of communion with none whom they could distrust to be culpable in any sinne or that had not a visible worthiness as the Apologists would qualifie their members they would not communicate with those they judged to be impure as is mentioned of the Audians though they were not yet cast out nor thought fit to be so Mutato nomine de te Fabula narratur Secondly If to vindicate themselves they shall suggest that they admit such to Church-fellowship in other Ordinances and only deny it in the holy Supper besides that some men may build higher upon the like Foundation and runne farther in the same way we must remember them § 9 that it hath been elsewhere shewed that the Fathers have described Ecclesiastical Communion by Society in Sacraments and have asserted evil men with the good Sociari cohaerere fratres esse misceri in and by a Communion of Sacraments and St. Cont. Ep. Parmen l. 3. c. 2. tom 7. p. 12 13. Augustine tells us that Cyprian alia frumenta Dominica quòd in illa tunc unitatis Ecclesia cum avaris rapacibus cum his qui regnum Dei non possidebant panem Domini manducabant calicem Domini bibebant which frustrates any interposition that this Communion of Sacraments was onely in the one Sacrament and not in the other and that they were together not onely unam cum iis intrantes Ecclesiam but also in una Congregatione paria tractantes sacramenta for quia non poterant ab iis corporaliter separari ne similiter eradicarent triticum sufficiebat iis à talibus corde seâ—ungi vitâ moribusque distingui propter compensationem custodiendae pacis unitatis propter salutem infirmorum tanquam lactentium frumentorum ne membra corporis Christi per sacrilega schismata laniarent and as it is not Ecclesiastical Communion but Schisme rather in the judgment of Mr. Ball to use the one Ordinance and not the other Cited before and they are not to be reckoned of the body of Christ which are unworthy to eat the Body Christ in the Sentence of Chamier so Casaubon tells us farther Exercit. 6. S. 52. p. 145. Eos ' qui ad Christianismum adspirarent priusquam sacramentorum facti essent participes neque esse neque dici posse Christianos neque ad Ecclesiam pertinere aditum per baptismum sed neque satis hanc semel esse ingressum sed oportere conjungi Christo per sacramentalem ejus manducationem L. de Pastorib c. 13. p. 221. tom 9. They were not by Antiquity held or named Fideles that did not partake of the Eucharist the Celebration whereof was therefore called Missa fidelium Quaeris saith Augustine nè fortè Catechumenus irruat sacramentis Respondet fidelis which implyes that every of the faithful which was a member contradistinguish'd from the Catechumens and onely those that had the name of Faithful used to communicate neither were they esteemed Brethren that were not partakers of the Sacrament L. 1. obs 19. p. 141. for so Albaspinus tells us that the Penitents and Catechumens were not called Brethren by the Faithful so as the denomination being taken à fortiori it cannot be absolutely called Church-fellowship that is without Communion of Sacraments which is implyed and tacitly assented unto even by themselves who call those onely the Church whom they admit to the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ Thirdly if to defend themselves they shall interpose that they separate not from the Catholique Church but from corrupt Congregations I shall admonish them that seeing the publick Worship is not sinful but it is onely pretended that sinners are admitted to a Communion therein and those that are pure may joyn in
that Worship without concurring in any sinne save that which they suppose is contracted only by a Communion with such men though not in evil but rather in that which in it self is good and formally as it is a Communion onely with those that are evil That to separate on this account was both the root and pith of the Schisme of the Donatists who did not own any separation from the Catholique Church but impropriated that Church to themselves and held Communion with many Churches of their Model but separated from others and therefore might have put in the same Plea with this but seeing those Churches from which the Apologists separate are Members of the Catholique Church as till they be cut off juridicè aut jure they are so and in this consideration § 9 Eadem est ratio partium totius and all Members are conjoyned to the Body See more of this therefore if they separate from any such particular members they divide from the body of the Catholique Church as I have before proved by the authority of Junius § 24 that it is schismatical so to be torn off ab hac illáve Ecclesia i.e. membro particularis corporis ex infirmitate particulari Next that they remove the antient Land-mark of that distinction between the Church of the Called and that of the Elect may be discerned by any that passeth by their way There are many externally called who are onely relative and notional Saints Saints in the judgment of Charity because they have given their names to Christ entred into an outward Covenant with God and doe make profession of their Faith but such as are effectually called and are united to Christ in virtue as well as profession and in whom the Spirit of Christ is operative by influence of grace and salvation such onely are Elect Saints real Saints in verity Now if they will admit none to an entire Church-fellowship which is not as was said without Communion of Sacraments others that communicate not being not owned by themselves to be of the Church save such as give demonstrative signes that they are elected doe they not quantum ad hominem though it be impossible quoad rem contract the Church of the Called and make it no more extensive than that of the Elect and turn those many that are called into a few that are chosen sure I think this cannot but be visible to any unless to one Cui lumen ademptum And by this meanes also there may be multi hirci intus multae oves foras Hom. Deonibus tom 9. p. 224. Since as Augustine meekly scit praedestinatione praescientiâ oves hircos ille solus qui praedestinare potuit qui praescire si autem multas oves foras errare plangimus vae quorum humeris lateribus cornibus factum est non enim haec facerent nisi fortes oves quae sunt fortes de suis viribus praesumentes quae sunt fortes de sua justitia gloriantes humeris audaces ad impellendum quia non portant sacrinam Dei latera mala conspirantes amici societas pertinaciae cornua erecta elata superbia mitte foras quod non emisti certe ipsa tota causa est quia tu justus alii injusti indignum erat ut justus esset cum injustis indignum scilicet ut frumenta essent inter zizania indignum ut oves inter hircos pascerentur donec Pastor veniret qui in separando non errat ita tu angelus eradicans zizania non te agnoscerem angelum zizania eradicantem nec si jam messis venisset ante messem non tu sed quisquis fuerit non est verus qui designavit messem designavit tempus angeli tibi nomen potes impoere tempus messis non potes breviare ita falsum dicis qui sis quia nondum venit quando sis noli velle zizania eradicare quando tempus non est sed tu ipse intrò redi cum tempus est cornua sunt ista ventilantis non mansuetudo pascentis non expectas finem nesciens quando tibi sit finis unde hoc nisi quia ipsos tanquam hircos accusasti falsò accusasti nam si verè accusasses non te separasses tua separatio illorum est purgatio Lastly for the state of the Church Exponere similitudinem istam ne conati quidem sunt illam similitudinem omnino attingere nolucrant Brevic. collat cum Donatist tom 7. p. 117. Cont. Donat. post collat c. 7. p. 122. tom 7. which is a floor where chaff is heap'd with Wheat a Field where Tares grow intermix'd with Wheat a Net where bad Fish is involved with good c. most of those similitudes Quibus Dominus suorum servorum tolerantiam confirmavit as Augustine they like the Donatists of old whose Copy it seems they have chosen to write after will take no notice of as any way concerning them but I doubt it is onely nihil ad nos because supra nos and they doe not answer it because they cannot durum sed levius fit patientiâ quicquid corrigere est nesas for seeing Ecclesiasticall Communion is described by a Society in the Sacraments and therein principally is constituted and if there shall be a commixtion of evil men with good not onely in the Congregation but also in Una Congregatione paria Sacramenta tractantes as was even now alleaged out of Augustine and not onely in the Word but as idem verbum Dei simul audiunt so also simul Dei sacramenta percipiunt then whatever they suggest to the contrary thus much is gained hereby which will be on their part the loss of the question First that none ought to be so offended with the grossness of their Administrations at home where no separation is made as thereupon to remove S. 9 or desert to have a Communion of Sacraments with such Congregations August de verb. Dom. in Evang. Matth. Serm. 18. tom 10. p. 18. and separating from them to gather themselves into another Church which yet they confess to be the case of divers of them the Corn lay fast in the same Floor with the Chaff and that onely was volatile Non vos seducant perversi paleae nimis leves avolant ante adventum ventilatoris ex area and therefore he directeth elsewhere ex eo ubies disce quid es and consequently adviseth nemo ante tempus ventilationis deserat aream In Psal 25. tom 8. p. 26. Brevicul collat cum Donat. 3. die tom 7. p. 117. Cont. Donat. post collat c. 6. tom 7. p. 122. In Psal 149. tom 8. p. 360. quasi dum non vult pati peccatores nè praeter aream inventus priùs ab avibus colligatur quà m ingrediatur in horreum the good Fishes break not the Net to get out from the bad Commixtos bonis malos intra retia suorum sacramentorum And this commixture will continue while we are
those Tares to be Emblems of wicked and scandalous men Ad zizania reseruntur omnia scandala saith Hierom scandala tum doctrinae tum vitae as Piscator agreeing in sense with Beza the children of the wicked one that is Hereticks Schismaticks Hypocrites wicked and profane men living in the Church as the late Annotations out of Theophylact Euthymius Augustine when beyond all those we have better testimony from the Word and Truth Christ himselfe interpreting this parable who expoundeth the Tares to be the children of the wicked one and them which doe iniquity which is too comprehensive to be restrained onely to hypocrites and seeing that which the Angell-reapers shall gather at the last great harvest is the same that the servants discerned to be tares and would precipitously have pluckt up that being expressly said to be scandals in the originall and the same word is retained by the vulgar and Tremelius and Offendicula whereby others render it is the same in sense though not in sound those Tares must be concluded to be scandals and though they come near Christians bearing the name and owning the profession and therein indeed like believers yet they may be distinguished from sincere Christians otherwise they could not be scandals and though they may be denominated hypocrites in a large and generall notion because their actions give the lye unto their profession In Ecclesia Christi ficte intrantes promittentes non facientes voventes non reddentes renunciantes malo iterum idem facientes as Augustine yet the falsity of that profession and the difference thereof from their actions was as discernable as the Tares from the Wheat But it seemes the Apologists will allow none to be in the Church save such onely who appeare to be godly and will cast out all whom they dscern not to be sincere he that had imbibed the Philosophy of Pythagoras would suspect the souls of the Donatists had made a transmigration into their bodies for had they with Aethalides been dispenc'd with for drinking of Lethe they might have said with Pythageras remembring when he was first Aethalides and after Euphorbus Cognovi clypeum lâ—vae gestamina nostrae and have owned the Shield of this answer for the same with that of the Donatists Contra Donat. post Collat. c. 8 p. 123. tom 7. or very like it who being prest by the Catholicks with arguments drawn from those similitudes chose to answer to that of the net gathering of every kind malos in Ecclesia usque in finem seculi permixtos esse confessi sunt sed occultos cos esse dixerunt quoniam sic à sacerdotibus ignorantur quemadmodum pisces intra retia cum adhuc in mari sunt à piscatoribus non videntur to whom Augustine the then speaker of the Lords house his Church replies C. 10. Propterea ergo arcae comparata ost ut etiam manifesti malicum bonis in ea pronunciarentur futuri neque enim palea quae in area est permixta frumentis etiam ipsa sub fluctibus latet quae sic omnium oculis est conspicua ut potiùs occulta sint in ea frumenta cum sit ipsa manifesta As also in that Conference where were 306 orthodox Bishops Brevical Col. lat 3. die tom 7 p. 118. Quamvis debeat vigilare Ecclesiastica disciplina ad eos non solum verbis sed etiam excommunicationibus degradationibus corripiendos Contr. Donat. post Collat. c. 10. and no fewer than 296 of the Donatists it was asserted that iâ— was not destructive to discipline nor incompatible with the watchfulnesse therof for correption of evill men not onely by words but also by excommunications although mali non solum in ea latentes nesciantur sed plerunque propter pacem unitatis etia neogniti toleremur and therefore this glosse being in the judgment of the ancient Church so corruptive of the text Augustine tells them Quanto melius seipsos corrigant quam Euangelia sancta pervertunt ad vanum suae mentis errorem eloquia dominica detorquere conantur Though the beauty of holiness which like the Sun gilds those that look toward him though with squint eyes may give some specious advantages to those Declamations which are made against mixt communions as spots to that beauty yet this is rather paint or colour laid on than any true beauty and as they say the use of the artificiall fucus despoils the native candor so reall spots are contracted by those assayes to cleanse the imaginary and by those separations to make the Church more pure it becomes nimio candore deformis propter venustatem invenusta and the face of the Church more blemished by being made not onely lean and hollow and withered but also defective in many integrall parts and were they all onely parts superfluous yet is there more peril in their removall than their remaining as Chirurgions tell us that sometimes the cutting off of a Mole as an alloy to beauty hath occasioned the cutting off of life It is a grave censure given by Calvin that Augustinus redivious cum sub studio perfectionis imperfectionem nullâ—m tolerare possumus in corpore aut in membris Ecclesiae tunc diabolum nos tumefacere superbia hypocrisi seducere moneamur What was the judgement of the ancient Church in this case of mixt communion may be seen by the verdict of Augustine who in the Controversies with the Donatists as well as in the contests with the Pelagians was the Foreman to say for them and that judgment as it was never reverst in after Ages by any Writ of Error so it is as direct to our issue as can be conceived for we have heard expressly that evill men are to be permixt with good in the Church till the great day of judgement and in one congregation in una Congregatione and not onely in hearing the same word of God idem verbum Dei simul audiunt but also communione sacramentorum they receive the same sacraments paria sacramenta tractantes simul Dei sacramenta percipiunt not onely participating of the one Sacrament of Baptisme but also of the other of the Supper of the Lord De verb. apost serm 23. tom 7. p. 76. Cont. Donat. post coll c. 20 p. 125. tom 7 quid si communicares cum illo malo mensam Domini and omnes ad unum altare accedebant and they did eat panem Domini and drink calicem Domini and those evil men are not latent or undetected hypocrites but known to be evill etiam cogniti and manifest evil manifesti mali and this is as full and as express as can be wished or imagined so that as the Fathers in a Councill against the Pelagians formed their Canons out of the very words of Augustine so we in this controversie need say no more than he hath said before us for us and as he that to avoyd the shot of an enemy took up his son in his
how incompetent those Elders are ad hic nunc to be set up as Judges being of such parts and education I need not say who as little dare to undertake as they are unable to act any thing without the infusions and conduct of their Pastor and though I will not say as the Italians do of the Cardinals in the conclave in relation to the sense of the Pope That they do assentari non assentire yet others cannot but observe that the Elders of those Churches which be spoken without any odious extension to all of that Notion are but Cyphers serving onely to add the more of number and like Mercury in conjunction with the Sun lost in the light and having no influence but what is derived from him and as in the Consulship of Julius Caesar and Bibulus because the one carried all the sway and honour from the other they dated writings Julius and Caesar being Consuls no mention being made of Bibulus so notwithstanding the conjunction of the Elders the Ministers are virtually and in effect sole in the action and act arbitrarily too for any rule or Canon that ever I could take notice of to regulate their proceeding but in whomsoever the power be vested yet nec unquam satis fida potentia est ubi nimia est and whatsoever the men may be that exercise it yet Vespasianus moderatus sed imperator non libertas Lastly Whether this be not more than half way towards the Independents and symbolize not with the Congregational way for what subâ—â—antial difference is there between their gathering a Church and this collecting together of Communicants some out of one place some out of another What material disparity is there between this admitting none without profession made and satisfaction rendred of their sufficiency both in faith and manners and then entring into fellowship and the Independent Covenant As their way of gathering is the same so their way of governing the Church is very like the Independents admit any to the hearing of the Word not to the Communion of of the Body and Blood of Christ so do these they have further conformity in admitting and countenancing their gifted brethren to pray publickly and though not in their publick places of convention nor in the formality of preaching Bayly diswas c. p. 174. yet to teach in their private Assemblies and Meeting-houses according to the medious way excogitated by some Independents to reconcile the different opinions among themselves upon that matter and it is said that not the Elders onely but the whole Congregation doth occasionally make judgment Are not both they and the Independents equally guilty of an Allotrioepiscopacy of removing the ancient Land-marks and confounding of Churches and limits and taking in such of whose souls they have by no law nor consonancy to good order any proper or special care and of a resemblance with the Partrich Ier 17.11 which gathereth the young which she brought not forth as was the ancient and is still the marginal reading and of that magick which Furius Cresinus among the old was slandered with of charming and bringing other mens fruits into his field contrary to holy Scripture Acts 20.28 1 Pet. 5.2 Heb. 13.17 Can. 17. not in quosdam Canones Concil Gal. p. 160. Can. 20. Can. 6. apud Magdeburg 7. apud Caranz L. 1. Epist 5. Epist 6. contrary to that rule of righteousness what you would that men should do unto you even so do unto them Matt. 7.12 contrary to the ancient Canons of the first Council of Arles Ne quis Episcopus alium Episcopum conculcet hec est involare in vicini sui diaecesim saith Albaspinus and the third Council of Carthage Vtâ—a nullo Episcopo usurpentur plebes alienae and the first Council of Carthage nequis vel clericus vellaicus sine literis Episcopi in aliena Ecclesia communicet and contrary to the judgement of Cyprian singulis pastoribus portio gregis est adscri ta quam regat unusquisque gubernet rationem sui actus Deo reddat oportet eos quibus praesumus non circum-cursitare and again sine spe sunt perditionem maximam indignatione Dei adquirant qui schismata serunt rolicto Episcopo alium sibi foras pseudo-episcopum constituunt So as they must excuse me to think that they onely take magni nominis umbram when they sometimes assume the name of Presbyterial Churches at best they can be but blended and by mixture constituted of some of the principles of the one way and the other Amphibii Zoophytes Epicaenes like the Chymicall naile in the Duke of Florence his cabinet part Iron and part Gold like the Amphisbaena that hath two heads and moves two divers wales that have a Crow for Caesar and another for Anthony or as the Angel in the Revelation that flew between heaven and earth is by a learned man interpreted to be Gregory the Great who was the last of the good Popes and the first of the bad so they may passe for the worst kind of Presbyterians though the best sort of Independents But surely as Aristotle said of the Milesians That they were not fools but yet they did the very same things that fools doe so if these be not Independents yet they have the same actions and wayes There may be and are some differences perchance in opinion and practice between the one and the other but that impedeth not but that they may passe under one notion and denomination The Churches of France and Spain are in many points Antipodes each to other Azorius will tell us that what is the common opinion in the one kingdome is not so in the other as concerning the immaculate conception of the virgin Mary and the worshipping the Cross with Latria c. yet both are Papists and so are all they among whom Bellarmine himself by the account of Pappus reckons up above three hundred different opinions and perhaps we might find far more among those who properly and professedly passe for Independents and so many perchance as are not to be reduced to a fixt certain number except by a second Clavius who hath in one sum set down the number of the sands that would fill up all the concave space between the Earth and the eighth Spheare or peradventure so many as there are Indulgences in that one Church of Lateran which a Papist saith none but God can number and he Indeed at his great day of account will be sure to number both the one and the other And as these mens ARguments are most of them Arrows taken out of Independent Quivers and sharpned on their Anvils so let assay be made by some skilfuller hand more versed in these controversies whether the forces mustred against separation fight not most of them against this new modell which I know nor how to blanch or palliate with any other name than a Separation a separation of themselves as the purer part from the dregges of the
common sort as if common and unclean were still synonomous in relation to all subjects for though it may differ gradually from other separations yet magis minus non variant speciem especially surveigh that rich Armory which St. Augustine furnisht against the Donatists and try if most of his weapons may not be appositely and properly made use of in this present controversie against our Antagonists It were indeed a more humble zeale and better placed and more discreetly regulated for those Ministers to engage their endeavours to frame and constitute their several Towns and Parishes according to the way of Presbyterial Churches where they have a more warrantable call where their speciall work lies and where they receive their maintenance and to take heed to those Flocks whereof the holy Ghost hath made them over-seers rather than to be gathering and forming without obligation or warrant of new Churches out of Churches of such persons as by remoteness of place are not susceptible of any frequent communion together in the ministry of the word and have one pastor for the Word another for the Sacraments at least if any body can tell who is the Pasos of some of those Churches in which are so many Ministers that have severall pastorall charges elsewhere and some other of these in like manner gathered Churches who have stept farther and stand at greater distance in their separations have onely such Teachers as can be called Pastors no otherwise than the Idols of the Gentiles were called Godsn uncupatively or ironically or by antipbrasis so that by a Charientisme we may say of them as the Athenians did of Alexander If he will be a God let him passe for one And I would have those that are lawfully ordained Ministers abstracted from Selfe and Interest for pessimum veri affectus venenum sua cuique utilitas to consider with what right they can take tythes from them whom they will not own to be of their Church seeing officium beneficium sunt relata with what conscience they can exact the whole tyth as their due when they omit a great part of their duty And for such as are univocally and compleatly of the Independent way I would gladly know how it is coherent with their principles to receive tythes at all for to say they take them not immediatly while yet they doe by mediation of their Farmers and Agents is such a palpable imposture as the Capuchins gull the world with who may not touch with silver themselves but they have their boyes at hand to purse up all they can carch Lastly I shall hold it forth to the serious consideration of prudentiall and godly men whether this setting of the Sacraments in an elevation of purity and holinesse above the Word as a lower and higher story or sphear have not been the spring or source of those manifold schilmes and heresies which of late years have made the Church of God as an heap of sand without unity or communion and whether that opinion haue not been fomented by an ambition of pre-eminence of power in some men and singularity of holiness in others Episcopacy like a tree not bearing good fruit hath been howen down and cast into the fire but is it seasonable or â—uits it with prudence or is it of the Interest of religion in the ashes thereof to be like Archin edes drawing of lines and circles and figures of Church-government according to our severall models while the enemy is at the gates of our Syracuse or in a more proper Allegory like the factions of John and Simon and Eleazar to be at feude among our selves while the Romans have laid siege to and are like to surprize our Jerusalem to divide and break our Ranks when we should stand close and conjoyn our selves to withstand the impression and charges of our enemies To ravell more threads in the coat of Christ when it is more than time and need to stitch up the rents In these unstable and ensnaring and lapsing times to quench the smoaking Flax which being not tenderly cherished either will altogether expire or catch after strange fites and new lights to hazard the blasting of the blossoms of Aarous Rod with sharp and nipping censures at their first putting forth Hoc I thacus velit magno mercentur Atridae They are prudent principles and worthy of reflection Novum imperium inchoantibus utilis clementiae fama Potentiam cautis quam acrimoribus confiliis tutius haberi Remissius imperanti melius paretur Numa built a Temple for Faith and Peace under one roofe and Charity and Peace must have some Sacrifices if it be not with neglect of the Altars of indispensible truth lest we have daily more cause to exclaim passionatly with Nazianzen Loving Peace loving Peace loving Peace where didst thou leave us Some things also may be just in Ecelesia constituta which in constituenda are not fit It rendred a complacency to wise Solon to have given the Athenians Laws the best of those they would have received Excellentissima animdvertenti ne mediocria praestare quidem rubori oportet esse And he was a judicious Physician whose Maxim it was Frustra disputamus utrum satis tutuÌ„ sit remedium quod est unicuÌ„ The wisdom of God himselfe hath taught us That no man puts a piece of new Cloth into an old garment otherwise the rent is made worse nor puts new wine into old bottles else the bottles break and perish and the wine runneth out and no man having drunk old wine straight way desireth new for he saith the old is better Quid jugum vestrum super eos aggravatis quorum potius onera portare debetis saith Bernard and he was the greatest propagator of the faith and advancer of the truth that ever was who was made all things to all men that he might by all meanes save some Seraphins which have their name from love are an higher order in the Scholastick Hierarchy than Thrones Dominations Principalities Powers and Doves whose wings are anointed with sweet ointment the Emblem of love draw all others to the house as it is in St. Basil not onely Tacitus commends Agricola that rarissima moderatione maluit videri invenisse bonos quam fecisse but when St. Paul questioned Agrippa concerning his faith he anticipated his confession and answered for him And when the King acknowledged that he did but almost believe the Apostle by a Charientisme presumed to know that he believed That great Fither of men knew it was the best bait to catch soules to graâ—ulate our brethren in their weak beginnings and to pretend a considence they are such as we desire they should be to take hold of such as are coming forward and to draw them farther with signes of love and indulgence and to seem to hope well of them not to discourage or set them out of countenance or to distrust or disparage them ctiam fictilia vasa confringere domino soli concessum saith Cyprian
Euangelii deterreant as Piscator Ad conversationem vobis adjungite habete ut fratrem neque repellite tanquam aâ—ienum in Christo tolerandus est ne forte resiliat ah incapto as Estius Affectu cbaritatis vobis conjungite ad supportandum as Aquinas and therefore none may judicandae fratern â—conscientiae licentiam ad se trahere as Calvin de se potius quam do aliis solicitos esse oporteat as Paraeus the reason being rendred quod potestas julicandi de aliorum conscientiis propria sit Christi quod unusquisque illi ratiouem de scipso redditurus sâ—t as Piscator And then we assume that for them as if there were no other way to rectifie their Assemblies than as Candiot corrected Ficinus his translation of Plato with one common spung to put from the Communion whole Congregations which is not to improve the health or growth of the Church but to reduce it to an atrophy and consumpâ—ion by such continual violent purgings and tâ— do thus not for grosse and palpaâ—le ignorance or notorious offences and scandâ—ls but because they have not approved their knowledge or holiness to those Censors and like Procrustes to rack and draw them to the length and measure of their bed is not to support or animate but cast down and dishearten not to assure and evidence but to irritate and imbitter men not to bear with them but to bear them down or overbear them since most men carry some an logy to the leaves of the arbor tristis whereof Nieremberge tells us that being roughly handled they scarce smel but gently toucht do spire forth an excellent odour nor is this to hold or converse with them as brethren the ancient Church calling none brethren that communicated not but rather as aliâ—ns from Christ being not by the Apologists reckoned of the Church aliens because not of the faithful for the ancients named those onely fideles which did receive the Sacrament and aliens from Christ because not worthy to partake of his body and when men manifestly discover not themselves by scandals yet to reckon them unworthy of the Communion is First To judge their consciencies by determining of things occult whereof the Church never pretended to any judicatory for they have not manifested themselves by crimes that are notorious And is secondly to despise them not onely speculatively to esteem them evil 22. q. 60. art 4. in c. in 22. disp 5. q. 4. punct 5. p. 865. but practically also to deal with them as evil for qui habet malam opinionem de alio absque sufficienti causa injuriatur ei contemnit iâ—sum saith Aquinas and in dubio per malam opinionem de proximo indigne is contemnitur adds Valentia and there can be no sufficient cause nor indicia vehementia nor can their condition be otherwise than doubtful where the actions are not scandalous and if when they call them dead and bastards as here and account them Dogs and Swine for upon that score and in that notion they say elsewhere they administer not the holy things to them they shall yet deny that they despise them I think they shall despise our reason also to hope to make us believe so and they have as much reason to say this is not contempt as the Glosse in Gratian hath to deny any may be called a Whore till she have been culpable with 23000 men But whereas they insinuate that the 4 verse of the 15 Psalm will warrant and bear them out to contemn vile persons I shall say if they are not scandalous for notorious crimes they are not vile and if they be not vile they are not to be contemned Junius and Piscator tell us that according to the Hebrew it should be translated contemptus est spreius and they render â—â—reprobus as the vulgar doth malignus In locum and to contemn is not to flatter as Junius or voluntarily to honour vice and impiety for flattery or any worldly respects as Diodate to cover or excuse their vices by filthy adulation Quantumvis opibus potentia gloria florentes non veretur peccantes redarguere impedireubires occasio postulat Tirinus in locum and seek friendship and have commerce with the impious and slaves of Satan as Molle and it would seem prodigious if it should more check with this duty to admit into Communion those that are not notoriously flagitiâ—us then to reject them shall clash with that property in the former verse that taketh not up a reproach against his neighbour dictis aut factis as Junius non admisit ad aures suas vituperationes detractiones susurra iones calumnias contraproximum saith Bellarmine Omnem proximi contumeliam injuriam avertere conatus est as Ianseuius And we think we may therefore take up for a conclusion that Epiphonema of Paraeus upon this text stolidus fanaticorum error improbatur qui Ecclesiam veram non putant subsistere nisi ubi emnes sunt pariter firmi fide pariter sancti in vita nulla Zizania cum tritico in agro domini pullulare conspiciantur They say the Apostle speaks of not receiving the weak to doubtful disputations and he doth so but he doth not onely speak of that but first prescribes them to be received and afterward prohibites their reception to doubtful dispuâ—aâ—ions but as the Ganonists say that fictione Canonica Saturday and Sunday are all one so iâ— seenâ—s the Apologists would sain have receiving and not receiving to be the sâ—me they inferre therefore men are not to be called is such exercises as may be hurtful to them and we grant it of such as have a direct tendency unto and natural efficiency of hurt but not of such as may indirectly and by accident onely become hurtful for then they may not be convâ—cared to the hearing of the Word which by accident doth blind and harden and is the savour of deaâ—h unto deaâ—h In since the inhibition to receive them to doubtful disputations is bottomed on this apagogical reason lest they should be disquieted with troublesom questions as Diodate we suppose the reason to be as illative to forbid their examinations and trials whose questions do occasion and produce as much of trouble and disquiet as can ordinarily result from disputations but they unwittingly mistake or would willingly take others in a mist while they with as much solemnity as little pertinency discourse as if by weak in the faith were to be understood onely such as had a sound lively and saving faith though feeble in a remiss degree such as have a true Godly fear and some degree of graciousness whereas by the very light that naturally beams from the text and is reflected also by Interpreters it is meant of such as are not yet full in knowledge nor perswaded of Christian liberty as Diodate qui in doctrina Euangelii rudâ—or est nondum satis edoctus persuasus de libertate Christiana for here fides
every one be culpable and multis minatur qui uni fâ—cit injuriam and have obtained what Caligula wisht that all their people have but one neck which they cut off at once nor do they like Chirurgions onely launch tumors or cut off dead flesh but like Mountebanks do wound and flash the whole and sound flesh upon pretence to heal it again and to bring themselves and their salves into more request and practice and whereas the terror onely should come to all they make the punishment proper for a few to be universal not punishing onely those that are necent but like Theodosius at Thessalonica for which Ambrose thought he merited excommunication cut off all promiscously without discrimination the innocent as well as the guilty that when one man perhaps hath sinned they are wroth with the whole Congregation and then notwithstanding Irae suum stimulum Zelum vocant so as the generality and commonness of the punishment taking away the sense of shame and fear thereof frustrates the end of it as it is no odious deformity to be black among Negroes where all are of that colour a white man and some such they have born there is more monstrous to them and therefore as Physitian say that the disease which all or most men commonly have must spring from the same common cause and our Divines tell us that the corruption of the Masse cannot be the cause of reprobation negative because that is commen but that which makes to differ is peeuliar so it cannot be any crime or incapacity in the persons wherein their exclusion is rooted for all are not incapable or criminous but there is some cause that is common to all and that can be no other but that they may have a preheminent power over all whereinto this is their Inauguration Fourthly they exercise not this power onely occasionally and upon an exigent but make a common and continuall trade thereof and consequently making the Church such a meddow as Lewis 11. said France was which he mowed not onely when it was rank grown but as often as he pleased nor do proceed as Arnoldus saith a wise and a modest Physitian ought to doe which is never to use medicines but upon urgent necessity and that sparingly too but their constant practice is to keep men under this purging physick which were it cordial would ferfeit its virtue by too frequent use but being purgative medicines must not be used as familiar as meat when there is no purgative as â—hysitians confess but is contrary to nature and consumes the very substance of our bodies so as qui medicè vivit miscrè vivit and this is to make the Church as he said of the State of Thuscany under the Medices like a body exhausted with continual purgings the blood and spirits consumed and nothing left but weakness and melancholly and we may say of them as Seneca did of others Moverer si judicio hoe farerent nure morho faciunt faciunt non quod mercor sed quod solent and judge of their course as Demosthenes did of calumny Aliquantisper audientium opinionem confirmare progressu verò temporis nihil eá imbecillius Upon these considerations that which they call ministerial power is Tempestas non potestas as the Lawyers speak potentia ruinae et incendii as â—eneca Cornâ—a sunt ista ventilantis non mansuetudo pascentis as Augustine And if this do not border upon that of Ifidor which he saith of some that they bear themselves upon their Priesthood as if they had a tyranny yet whether it be not the second part of Diotrephes and the playing over again his ambition of preheminence and whether these probations and suspensions be not a kind of hunting of men thereby to make themselves mighty ones in the earth and instead of the old paternal government to introduce a Lording In 1 Pet. 5.3 which is the same thing which Diotrephes practised as Aretius alios vobis imperiose subjectos esse volentes as the Commentary asscribed to Aquinas to be imperious masterly persons ruling roughly and harshly as Hammomd by which prohibition the Apostle reprehends severity tanquam ab ecclefiastica mansuetudine alienam as Iustinian and lessoneth Parstors and Governours in the Church magis apparere humilitatem et mansuetudinem quà m potestatis ostentationem ac severitatem et amorem magis quà m terrorem as Estius and if their course clash not with this precept so interpreted yet whether it check not with that which he thereby prescribeth ut absit non solùm animus sed species dominandi in plebem subjectam as Estius the Apostle saying Neque ut deminantes non solùm non dominantes quia nihil debent exterius praetendere per quod possit de iis opinari ut videantur velle dominari as Aquinas Though they may be somewhat in passion to hear the quaere yet we shall not be much out of reason to make it and we are sure without question that this rejecting of all till they be proved and approved by them as Musculus ranks it with the with-holding of the cup from the Laity by the Popish Priests so it is that dominion which if otherwise it cannot be redressed â—he saith God will restrain And whereas they say To Lord it over Gods heritage is to infringe the liberties and priviledges of the Saints Whosoever is a Church-member I have formerly demonstrated to be in Scripture ideom and generall acceptation a Saint and to debarre any intelligent member of the Church of communion in the Sacrament is to infringe his liberties and his priviledges in the crown whereof that communion is a rich jewell but the learned â—unius tells them Vtriusque communionis cum Deo inquam Ecclesia ad sanctos omnes promiscue pertinentis I might setâ— an asterisck on that for the observation indici à Deo data certáque E. clesiae verae documentá eculis omnium exposita sunt ea quae communis usus Sacramenta nuncupavit atque haec quidem communionis genera quà sunt spiritualia semper ubique ab hominibus sanctis percipiuntur quà autem sunt â—orporalia coluntur in templo id est ad to um Ecclesiae corpus conjuâ—â—ctè pertinent neque ullus ex Ecclesia Dei esse putandus est qui se ab ullo istius communionis genere ultro subtraxeri a passage like the pillar of a cloud and fire which gives light to us and casts them under darkness To keep away ignorant and scandalous persons exceeds not Ministeriall power is no Lording imperious thing But first were they whom they keep away such delinquents yet the number of the guilty should manacle the hands of the Judge and periculum schismatis send an injunction from the Court of equity If the one member be gangrened the excision thereof may be just and necessary potiùs pereat unus quà m unitas as Bernard but if the body be infected with a scab other medicines may be
aut Aquila aut serpens Epidaurius should discern or be convinced thereof Secondly whereas they disclaim to act in a sole jutisdiction we know indeed that they have such as they call Elders also but we have as certain knowledge that they are not held so necessary to the conduct and management of their Church affairs as good works are determined to be to justification wherein they have their presence but no efficiency but these are not alwayes so much as present at their Counsels or of the Qaorum at trials and hereof we can render particular instances And however they may set off those Elders to those at distance Ignote reverentia major And as it is said of the Athenians That by the advantage of the feathers or quils of their countreymen they flew higher in fame than truth and however they being beheld with the advantage of the Basis they are set upon and conjectured to hold out the weight that some others carry of that like notion yet the truth is those Elders being so inconsiderable for number and weight too in respect of parts and influence are but as images which seem to bear up the roose of Churches but are onely for shew and serve not for support or like the Characters which Magicians and Charmers make use of that have no reall influence into effects but serve to amuse delude men and fortifie imagination and as Charles of Burgundy was said to carry all his Councill behind him on horse-back so all the powers sit in the same Chair with the Minister I am not so insensible or inconsiderate to strike at or move against the standing of ruling Elders in the Church rebus sic stantibus which are an excellent composition for the attempering and restraining the power of the Ministers which else might become arbitrary and unlimited and who may perchance serve them in like stead as Gracchus his servant did to his Master Cui orami à tergo adstabat fistuid concinnatâ tonúâ—que Plutarch de ira cohibenda suggerebat quo heri asperitatem iracundiam vocis delinitam auferebat Prudence will prompt us that it is not safe to entrust so great power in the hands of a single person and it not onley lessons us in the words of Plutarch Nimis periculosum est velle quae non decet eum qui quae vult facere potest but it also cautions us by the voyce of Cyprian Nemo diuautus est periculo proximus And divine wisdome hath prescribed in censures Tell the Church and if he hear not the Church Aug. de verbis Dom. serm 16. in locum And I hope the Minister will not assume to be as the Pope the Church virtually Augustine will check such presumption who tells us this correption is to be Coram omnibus and Paschasius Coram omni Ecclesia inspectante or Tota Ecclesia as Eucherius and the Glosse And Dic Ecclesiae being in the sense of Hierom multis dicendum est and Aquinas interpreting Dic Ecclesiae i. totae multudini Cypr. Ep 27 p. 62. and Cyprian stating the Church to be in Episcopo Clero in omnibus astantibus constituta And when the incestuous person at Corinth was to be cast out the Church was to be gathered together and they were to put him away they to whom he wrote which was not the Ministers onely but the Church collectively Chrysostom in 2 Cor. c. 2. hom 4. tom 4. p. 167. Universis in nomine Domini congregatis saith Theodoret and Chrysostome very sully assumpsit illos in ejus sententiae consortium dicens Congregatis vobis tradere illum duas res maximas accurans ut proferretur sententia ne ne id fieret absque illis ne videretur hoc illos facto laedere ac neque solus pronunciat ne videretur Apostolus esse praefractus ipsosque contemuere And certainly it appeares very liquidly that in Ecclefiasticall concernments and agitations the whole Church was consulted and consentient in the deliberations and resolutions for when Judas was gone home to his place whose demrits had made the place of damnation to be his and another to be chosen in his which he had unworthily occupied the election was carried on by common consent of the Church Idem in Act. c. 1. homil 3. p. 138. tom 3. Erat turba nominum saith Chrysostom simul ferè centum viginti Considera quà m Petrus agit omnia ex communi discipulorum sententia nihil authoritate suâ nihil cum imperio And when Deacons were to be châ—sen that serving of tables might not be a snare to the Apostles to tie them up from a better work in the institution and choice of them the Apostles proceede in the same method Acts 6.2 3 5. Non propriâ sententiâ faciunt saith the same Father sed priùs rationem reddunt multitudini sic nunc fieri oportebat whence the interlineary glosse took the hint consensum quaerunt multitudinis quod in exemplum debet â—ssumi so conformably it pleased the Apostses and Elders wiâ—h the whole Church to send chosen men Acts 15 22. who being come to Antioch when they had gathered the multitude together delivered the Epistle v. 30. from whence Calvin concludes Cum tota Ecclesia communicare debent ipsi doctores quod ex verbo Dei statuerint The like course may be traced down the succeeding Ages the footsteps whereof appeare not more conspicuously then in Cyprian who as it was his resolution Nihil sine consilio vestro sine consensu plebis meae privatâ sententiâ gerere Cyprian Epist. 6 p. 17 cp 14. p. 41. Ex editio le Preux secundum Pamel Goulart epist 12. pag. 37 epist 31. p. 70. out of the sense he had that Hoc verecundiae disciplinae vitâ— ipsi omnium nostrae convenit ut Episcopi plures in unum convenientes praesente stantium plebe quibus ipsis pro fide timore suo honor habendus est disponere omnia consilii communis religione possimus so it was his constant practice Examinabuntur singula praesentibus judicantibus vobis And correspondently pariter stantibus laicis lapsorum tractare rationem and he asserts and ratifies the course by this reason quoniam nec firmum decretum potest esse quod non plâ—rimorum videbitur habuisse consensum Yet nevertheless as the consent of the people is requisite to those laws whereby they are to be obliged yet that consent is usually as most expediently given by their Representatives so because the integrall Church now grown to a greater body cannot alwayes be so easily or fitly convened upon such occasions nor so well contained together 〈◊〉 Rondoletius his fish which being little could be comprehended in a small glasse but afterward waxed too great for iâ— and some considerations may perswade that they should not be all congregated and though the head were of goid and the whole primitive
that it is respect of persons and the same reason holds in distributing punishments also so at it here will follow that they rather accept persons who in examining those that may be ignorant except not those that are removed beyond all doubt of their knowledge They think it possible but not so usuall that the Pastor may be exceeded in learning by some of his congregation If it fall not out often yet if it sometime happen that supports the Hypotheâ—is and in such a contingence if Phormio were accounted so delirous to dispute of military discipline before Hannibal it were greater madness for a lesse knowing man to take an overly and suspitious examination of one of more knowledge and some would unhappily think sus fiâ—ly joyned with sacerdos if in such a way sus Minervam But doth learning they ask exempt from obedience No but from a Tyronical or rather a Tyrannical examination and from that obedience which is proper onely for the unlearned Ministers though less learned must be obeyed by more scientious auditors when they speak in his name and upon his embasly in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge but they are not to expect such obedience of any when they speak of themselves and seek their own glory Conscience is the onely forum divinum and in that Court they are not Praetors but publishers and interpreters we call no man Master In Matt. 23.8 Quasi penes quem esset scripturam pro suo arbitrio exponere intelligere as Calvin or ut verum putemus quicquid ille docuerit quia ab illo prosectum est as Estius It is the slavish superstition of the Papists that as Gratian tells us they rather desire to know the ancient institution of Christian Religion from the Popes mouth than from the holy Scripture and they onely inquire what is his pleasure and according to it they order their lives and it is the ambitious tyranny of their Prelates to teach That if the consent of divers Divines affirme such a doctrine to be the sense of the Church the people are bound to believe it though it be a lie as Valentia and they shall commit a meritorious act by believing such a falshood as Biel and Tolet but nobis non licet esse tam indiscrtis they might then justly account and deal with us as ignorants indeed They must be obeyed in what they derive from Gods Word not in what they teach as it were inspiredly and voluntary and in things within the spheare of their power to command and iâ— what is proper and proportioned to the subject whereon the command is imposed but it no less exceeds the limit of our obedience than the extent of our patience to suffer men to bring us into bondage we cannot with these Barbarians in Apâ—ian desire to be rid of liberty and spoile our selves potiore metallis Libertate and to permit them to devour us and take of us even our other patrimony our reputation by an interpretative rendring us simple ignorants and making us per gradum Simconis to commence catechumens when we have long been in the degree of the faithful and to exalt themselves to make us the Basis and to render us as Jacks in Virginals to fall down that their usurped keyes may go up Non bona patientia saith Bernard Cumpossis esse liber servum te permittere fieri nolo dissimules servitutem in quam certe indies dum nescis redigeris hebetatis cordis indicium est propriam non sentire continuam vexationem Vexatio dat intellectum audiâ—ui sed nimia non fuerit nam si sit non intellectum dat sed contemptum The most learned we grant must still be kept under teaching because we know in part but not be put under examination if he knowes in part Every Christian must be a disciple and in Christ Schoole his Ministers are the Ushers and those of the highest form that know most the more do know that they know but little the greatest part as one saith of what we know being the lest part of what we know not and all humane understanding being like the vial of Oyl which Xerxes found in Belus sepulchre which after continual infusions could not be filled up and besides he that is skill'd in the doctrine yet is too often to seek of the application and the use which is to set home by continual exhortation and thereby are the affections to be reconciled to reason and charmed into a compliant subserviency and those sailes for affectus sunt vela arimi to be spread and trim'd and filled with a continual breath to carry on the mind to the port designed but there is no such necessity of our being examined by them the Church must receave edifying and they are given for the edifying of the body of Christ but if they will be wise Master-builders they will not be still laying again the foundation in those that have gone on unto perfection nor level the walls after they have been built to some hight to try how the ground-work was setled for as it is said to be the madness of jealousie to seek that which it is loath to find so it is if not a madness yet a mockery to seek that which is found already A Wife may have more knowledge than her Husband some subjects more policy than their Governours yet this cannnot justifie disobedience nor null authority Neither do we dream that he that hath a richer stock of Knowledge than his Pastor may despicably extrude or renounce him or proudly detract his obedience to Gods Commands in his mouth or presumptuously usurp upon his office and be dealing with his stock and laying it forth in publick teaching but can onely claim his privilege to be exempt of such a derogatory examination and not be apprehended and stopt in his access to the Lords Table as a poor suspected person till he have gotten their Let-pass We do not imagine however it sometimes may be true in some respects Tu major tibi me est aequum parere Menalca and Cyrus was wont to say Neminem debere sâ—scipere principatum nisi melior his in quos susciperet that every superior must be higher by the head than all those subject to him and that it must be among men as it is they say amonst Angels of light that every one of an higher Order is more illuminate than any one of an inferior the title to superiority hath often another root than an absolute deturdigniori but yet an Husband if he will dwell like a man of knowledge must net deport himself toward his Wife as if she were a fool or interpretatively and implicitely make her such if she be a woman of knowledge nor a King that will be just deal with wise men as with idiots and practically make them such for justice partly consists in giving every man his own and to be so despicably examined is not proper to a knowing but an
the battell of Salamis in honor of the victory every man gave the second place to Themistocles though he named himself first so if one be an Antinomian another a Socinian another an Antiscripturist yet every one is an Independent that as Pacianus said Christianus mihi nomen Catholicus cognomen illud me nuncupat istud ostendit so Independent is the praenomen what ever be the agnomen of hereticks Thirdly but I cannot truly deny nor shall unwillingly grant that there are some godly men of that notion yet though I shall not say as Vopiscus relates it was said of good Princes In uno annulo posse praescribi depingi at contrà quae series malorum nor altogether with Eubulus the Comicall Poet that checkt himselfe for declaiming against womâ—n for if this were naught yet that was not good but soon found himself at a stand not being able to find more of the good but multitudes of the evill yet I believe those godly men are Rari nantes in gurgite vasto Like the Israelites as two little flocks of Kids but the contrary kind like the Syririans fill the Countrey And then 4ly it was no great honor to Sodom that one Lot was their Citizen there are some white men among the Negroes yet is that the land of Blackmoores Even Mercury a desperate poyson hath some parts which being separated from the whole are Antidote Fiftly Those purely meer Independents which have no mixture of other heresies or prophaness and are godly men yet their light doth not shine so bright that as in the Sun those lesser starrs that move about him do seem as spots so their holiness should be defiled by a communion with others less holy neither are they like the Sun which by his matchless light perstringeth and eclipseth all other starrs and attracts all eyes upon his pearless beauty Their godliness may onely be an apology for their station and immunity as Photius tells us that those which made Synesius a Bishop before he believed the resurrection made this defence for so doing that they found many excellent graces in him and that they could not but think them useful to the Church of God and hope that God would not let them all perish Lastly as some of them are purged from filthiness of the flesh so I wish they were also as much from that of the spirit and were holy as well in spirit as in body yet as heresie so schisme is ranked also among the works of the flesh Gal. 5.20 where if it stand not under the notion of heresie as indeed Tremelius out of the Syrivck reads Schismes where we do Heresies and betwixt these two there is such an affinity and complicition as betwixt the Midiauites and Ishmaelites that one is taken for another or each intermixt with other and Schisme saith St. Augustine is sometime called Heresie not that it is Heresie but because it disposeth to it yet it falls under this comprehension of variance emulations wrath strife c. and as Schisme springs from pride and an overweening conceit of themselves as the efficient whereof the signum pathognomonicum is a fastidious contempt of others so the impulsive thereof Gerson tells us what it is propter quaestum propter vanam gloriam sutably to that whereby Augustine defines an Heretick qui alicujus commodi temporalis maximè gloriae principaâ—ùsque gratiâ falsas novas opiniones vel gignit vel sequitur and I wish Independents could acquit themselves of these Imputations and should be glad if they would set off themselves clear from those exceptions who in one respect like the clove tree drink up all the moisture of the Land and aswell pretend to ingrosse the very dewes and showers of heaven to themselves as they really intercept the fat streames of earth and in another respect are like the tree in Ferro one of the Canaries from whence must drop all the water and from thence onely to be conveyed to the whole Island And therefore what ever may be said of the godliness of Independents yet since they cannot well traverse or plead not guilty to an indictment of Schisme I think as the Greek proverb saith That a good Goat a good Cat c. are bad beasts so the best Independent is in this respect evill Contra Donat. post Coll. tom 7. p. 122. if in no other for as St. Augustine Quantumlibet laudabiliter se vivere existimet yet being separate from the Church hoc solo scelere quod a Christi unitate disjunctus est non habebit vitam Schisme in his judgement being a sin of deeper grain than idolatry for Qui fecerunt idolum usitata gladii morte perempti sunt Epist 162. ions 2. p. 142. qui vero schisma facore voluerunt hiatu terr principes devorati turba consentiens igne consumpta diversitate paenarum diversitas agnoscitur meritorum But dissentiunt inter se contra unitatem omnes consentiunt as Augustine of his Donatists they see some imperfection in the Independant way and they see very little that discerne not much imperfection therein and they know not their own to be altogether free and how can the stream be clear when the spring is corrupt the one and the other are paralel wayes trodden out by the same line and leading down the same precipice and diffet but as iter actus via in the Law the one is a little larger and more extensive than the other there may be some little dist inction but no materiall difference between them save in this onely that the one Baptize the Infants of those that are not of their Churches which the others deny to do They here acknowledge they agree in the greater and differ but in the lesse things which I think may be restrained and limitted to discipline especially and they confesse both parties to have the self same interest or rather it should be the same self interest and therefore when they accuse the Independent way of Imperfection In tabulam Syllaejam dicunt discipuli tres and as we see it truth which Tully saith ut oculus sic animus Je non videns alia cernit so it is as true that they are dimme and decaying eyes which can better discerne things at some distance than nearer hand and apprehend other mens imperfections more clearly than their own And if they know not their own way to be altogether free from imperfections why can they not patiently abide to hear that which may make them know it to be imperfect how do they so confidently assert that way in malis suis defensionis fomitem quaerunt as Gregory speaks Non semper corrupta est mens male operantis sed emper corrupta male desendentis wherefore so violently enforce it unless as the Pope said he would write Fiatur in despight of Grammer so they will have a Fiat for their imperfect modell in defiance of truth and usupre a like power to that which Stapleton
those Churches wherein is a free admission to the Sacrament of all those that are not duly cast out and they will not admit any of those Churches to have communion with them in the Eucharist untill they be new model'd and entred into their Churches But that Church-fellowship consists especially in communion of Sacraments and is principally defined by it Sect. 9. De unit Eccles c. 13. Schismaticos facit communionis dirupta unitas Aug. quaest ex Matth. tom 4 p 78. Camero oper Field of the Church l. 3. c. 5 p. 80 and that the commixtion of evill and good is intra eandem sacramentorum communionem connexionem and that to desert and to deny such a communion with those that are Churches of God is the dregs and sediment of schisme we have formerly shewed out of Augustine that to detrect to receive the Lords Supper with any is tacitly to renounce their fraternity was instanced out of Altingius and that to separate from this or that particular Church that is a particular member of the body of the Catholick Church is schisme we have instanced out of Junius as it is also to make a separation from that congregation Ubi Deus colligit Ecclesiam as may be added out of Camero Schisme saith a sound Writer is a breach of the unity of the Church which unity of the Church consists in three things First the subjection of the people unto their lawfull Pastors Secondly the connexion and communion which many particular Churches and the Pastors of them have among themselves Thirdly in holding the same rule of faith But they rent and infringe this unity in the first respect by gathering those into their Church that have other lawfull Pastors Qui schismata faciunt saith Cyprian Epist 76. p. 247. relicto Episcopo alium sibi foras Episcopum quaerunt And in the second by denying to have a communion with other Pastors and their Churches in this Sacrament of the Lords Supper and it cannot sow up this rent nor make up this fraction to say they communicate in other ordinances with them for not onely Church communion is chiefly communion of Sacraments but as was cited formerly out of Mr. Ball to use one ordinance and not another is to make a schisme in the Church Frustra sibi blandiuntur qui panem cum sacerdotibus Dei non habentes obrepunt latenter apud quosdam communicare se credunt as was alleaged out of Cyprian It is schisme saith Valentia and truly 22. Disp 3. q. 15. punct 1. p. 690. if he misapplied it not Nolle se gerere ut membrum hujus corporis in aliquo vel aliquibus spiritualibus actionibus ad hoc Ecclesiae corpus pertinentibus atque adeò nolle subesse visibili hujus corporis capiti neque aliis ejus membris communicant ut illi capiti subjecta sunt sed velle agere scorsim ab hoc corpore independenter ab ejus capite And since anciently a Bishop and an Altar were made Correlatives and a schismaticall Bishop was sayd constituere aut collocare aliud Altare Mead ubi supra saith a learned man therefore they that erect other Altars for them to partake of which have lawfull proper Pastors and they that participate at other Altars than those of their own Pastors tread too near upon Schisme Nay also they that separate from a true Church to partake of an Altar in a Church apart do not participate of the Table of the Lord for in una domo saith Rivet In Exod. c. 12 tom 1 p. 916. quae est Ecclesia Dei viventis commedi debet agnus carnes ejus quatenus cibus noster sunt extra illam domum non efferuntur And then as the Act of separation so the Reason thereof denominates schismaticall while they affirm the separation to be occasioned by the grossnesse of administrations elsewhere where no separation is made by exercise of Discipline which very thing viz. that any corruption of manners or want of Discipline which is among corrupt manners to expurge those that were corrupt was a sufficient ground of separation brought forth and gave rise to the schisme of the Donatists and was that which rendred them schismaticks that which S. Augustine impressed himselfe especially to fight against as is liquid through the whole torrent of his writings against them some drops whereof our former discourse hath been sprinkled with Cited by Mr. Baxters Saints everlasting rest part 4. p. 105. marg I shall here only say as learned Davenant professeth speaking of the Divines of Germany Haud dubitem affirmare illos qui falluntur tamen communionem fraternam cum aliis retincre parati sunt esse schismate coram Deo magìs excusatos quà m qui veras opiniones in hisce controversiis tuentur mutuam communionem eum aliis Ecclesiis etiam desiderantibus aspernantur so I think those Churches more excusable which have not the exercise of discipline in casting out offenders yet lack not a desire of a fraternall connexion and mutuall communion with other Churches than those that set up discipline and lay down communion and unity To say That they separate nor from true Churches First as it can no more palliate their guilt than it could cloak that of the Donatists who made the same defence and indeed this is the Catholicon the common place and plea of all Schismaticks that if they forsake one Church they go into another so secondly they do make a separation from true Churches seeing they separate as was said from all Churches that give a free admission to all that are not duly cast out and if those are no true Churches then they are not in the state of salvation for all that shall be saved are added to the Church and all that may grow capable of admission into their Churches out of the other it may seem requisite to baptize before they are admitted baptisme being a note of the true Church and therefore agreeing thereunto as proprium quarto modo They were such Churches wherein many of them received ordination to the Ministery who are not yet reordained and by the Ministery whereof faith was wrought in them wherein I hope they were built up before they laid the foundation of their new Churches and to believe is to be added to the Church which is Synonymous with the houshold of faith and wherein if they had suffered death for the profession of that faith they would have thought themselves intitled unto martyrdome and yet out of the Church are no martyrs neither can they pretend to reform the Church if they acknowledge not those from whom they separate to be true Churches for then they rather form a new Church and it is not an alteration which is Motus à qualitate in contrariam qualitatem but a generation motus à non esse ad esse and is not mutatio statûs sed essentiae But this is that root bearing gall
the cup the blood may be some way administred but they must not drink it SECT XXIV Whether they are Butchers or Surgeons Whether guilty of Schism Of negative and positive Schisme What are just causes of separation Whether our Saviour separated from the Jewish Church for instance in eating the Passover They condemne what they practise by confounding Churches and by separation They grant Professors to be visible Saints which destroyes their Platforme Their reasons why all sorts are to be admitted to the word and prayer Whether there are not better reasons to warrant a like admission to the Sacrament whether the same conclude it not Whether the Churches of England are all true Churches Sacraments notes of the Church and therefore communicable to all Church members They grant discipline enters not the definition of a Church yet they separate for want thereof Whether they may not aswell deny Baptisme to the Children as the Eucharist to the Parents VVHy they separate not in all Ordinances is an head that looks not directly toward us but respects their brethren of the separation who have outrun and gone beyond them and stand at a distance as much further from them as they from us For as when Apolles had drawn a fine small line Protogenes cut that in 〈…〉 another and the former halfed that again so when one sort have cut 〈…〉 from communion with the rest of the Church they divide themselves again and some of them think themselves not refined enough and as the Chymists say of sublimation sapius repetenda est operatio neque enim prima sublimotione res mox satis depuratur so one separation grows out of another like the tunal which Nieremberge speaks of mira frondium facunditas solium supernasâ—itur solio si decidâ—t aliquod radices rursus agit surgitque altera arbos And so though as sand conteined in a vessel hath one general figure in the whole Masse conformable to the continent yet every grain is inechaerent with other so though they all come under one common notion of Separatists yet they are as much separate from 〈◊〉 other as from us and as little agree among themselves as with us though when they come against us like Themistocles and Aristides going on Embassie they lay down their enmities to be afterward reassumed And as Aristides said It will never be well with Athens till both the one and the other be shut up in the dungeon so they intimate in the close of this Section that in such a condition they were most likely to close in a mutual agreement but their present quarrels with the other occasion here the diverting of their armes which offers us a little truce who might now stand a loofe and behold the fight among themselves whom that happily may befall which Tacitus relates of Apronjus souldiers dum singuli pugnant universi vincuntur and when they fall out good men may come by the truth Discordia in malis tam bona quà m concordia in bonis onely we shall gather up some of those arrowes which they let fly at others to shoot back upon themselves and if any of those shot at randome seem to fall neer us we shall endeavour to repell or avoid such as we have not already broken They separate not in other Ordinances because they are for Surgery not Butchery It seems then they now somewhat odiously set their brethren in the rank of cut-throats who will shrewdly resent to be degraded into the company of Butchers Secondly How little conformity or resemblance their practise hath with the rules of Chirurgery hath been frequently instanced Thirdly Chirurgeons neither use nor are able to cut off any one member from an union with the rest in the influence and benefit of one vitall faculty onely but exscind altogether from the whole body whereas they make exscision of men onely from a Communion in one Ordinance alone not all Fourthly Let this reason have the most favourable passe yet it onely can argue absolutely why they should separate not in all Ordinances but in some alone not comparatively why in this Sacrament rather than in other Fiftly It is a strange method of Physick or Chirurgery to seek to preserve life by witholding the means of life and the medicine of life and immortality as the Fathers call the Sacrament and if all meanes must be sought to cure before they cut down a Church we think they have deserted their own Aphorismes for they have not sought to cure it by this medicine yet they have cut down their Church not onely by gathering another but by a practical judging of them to have no present interest in the body and blood of Christ nor worthy to have the truth of Gods promises in him to be sealed unto them The learned and they quote Camero distinguish of a twofold separation positive and negative the first they condemne unlesse upon just and weighty grounds the second they are acting in making a separation in their Congregations not separating from their Churches but some corruptions in them in order to reformation De Eccles p. 325. Camero in that place disputes of Schisme whereof secession or separation may be the genus and Schisme he distinguisheth into negative and positive the first Schisma quod non exit in coetum societatem aliquam religiosam quae simpliciter secessio subductio cùm non instituitur ecclesia facto Schismate Schisma positivum tum fit cum instituitur ecclesia hoc est cum fit consociatio quaedam quae legibus ecclesiasticis Dei verbo atque sacramentorum administratione utitur separatim quod quadam formula desumpta ex Scriptura dicitur strâ—ere altare contra altare But as the men of Bengala are so afraid of a Tiger that they dare not name him through fear if they should do so they should be torn in pieces by him so it seems the Apologists are so conscious of Schisme or fearfull to be blasted with it that they decline the mention of this and passing over the description he makes of Schisme they only barely and without any distinct explication tell us of a negative and positive separation Abstine epistolis quae sunt instar Edicti saith Symmachus facessat omne studium ex quo nascitur cura compendii Me thinks they should have been able to have understood Camero had they looked into him themselves but whencesoever it results there is an ignorant and wilfull mistake in alleaging him for they seem to quote him as if he determined that a negative separation were absolutely and universally lawfull whereas he affirming that a positive Schisme is that which Antonomasticè and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is called Schisme he renders this reason because often he saith not alwayes a negative secession is lawfull that justly and piously it may be free to depart from some Churches but it will not be so if it grow into a positive As for example some may be cast out by the fault of
the Church-Governors and yet without the Churches fault If they then gather a Church apart they shal be guilty of Schism He speaks here of a secession where a man is passive and cast out not where he goes off when there is Anathematismus excommunicatio injusta iniqua certè qui excoetu aliquo ejecti secedunt se subducunt secesserunt quidem illi attamen non fecerunt schisma as he speaks in the former page but a negative secession wherein a man is active he saith is Schisme being not onely a Decession but a Discission if the cause be either temerarious or unjust and it is temerarious if it be upon a light occasion and the occasion is light unlesse there happen first an intolerable persecution for if it be tolerable the secession is unjust Or secondly Communion is not to be broken but for Fundamentals Mead. p. 622. tom 3. that congregation be infected with heresie for if it be a tolerable error if the rite though superstitious be sufferable there ought to be no separation Or thirdly be addicted to idolatry Now then seeing they confess they make a negative separation as Camero defines it if they can prove and convict their Congregations to be guilty of such persecution heresie or idolatry they may acquit themselves but if they cannot as they doe not attempt or pretend to accuse them thereof they are then culpable of schisme in the judgement of Camero to whom they referre and their separation is not onely temerarious but also unjust separatio injusta veluti extrema schismatis linea Camero ibid. à pag. 322. ad 327. saith he having not so much as a light occasion by any tolerable persecution or error or separation and the scandals being few or none which were they more or greater might perchance make the separation more just but could not excuse it from being temerarious Besides also their separation is rather positive then negative having gathered and constituted a new Church whereof there can be no just cause saith Camero but malum insanabile lethale contagiosum reigning in that Congregation which they desert or res gravis momentosa quae si negligatur tanta est ut de salute gloria Dei actum sit néque enim quicquid verum est id ipsum continuò necessarium est ut qui salubres cibi sunt non sunt continuò necessarii And it is also a separatiâ—n from their Churches though in them not of notorious evill members from the body of the Church but of a Church in and yet from a remaining Church which separation in a Church from those who remain Church-members and of the Church is a principle onely of independent Divinity and hath no dependance upon Scripture Reason or Camero's or any good authority And theirs is likewise a separation not onely by secession in place but from persons who were never duly cast out by any judiciall processe for notorious crimes and therefore is not heterogeniarum partium discessio sed homogeniarum and therefore a Schisme as Camero sentenceth and they are besides very few that separate so as though the cause had some weight L. 3. contra Crescon c. 36. Idem contra Parmen l. 3. c. 21. tom 7. p 11. yet si pauci sunt videtur nihil esse moliendum sed expectandum patienter tempus Domini saith he And whereas they say they separate not from their Churches but from some corruptions First they might separate from their corruptions by keeping themselves pure Non enim qui se castam servat communicat peccatis alienis saith Augustine and elsewhere Mixtus reis obnoxiis nisi per conscientiae maculatam consensionem nullus recte dici potest They may and must separate from the corruptions but they do which they ought not farther separate from the Assemblies with whom they will have no communion in the Sacraments which are Gods Ordinances and not corruptions And corruption of manners also is no just cause of separation for saith Camero wheresoever purity of doctrine flourisheth God in that assembly must needs have a Church though overwhelmed with multitude of scandals and therfore they that separate from such a Congregation doubtlesse depart from thence where God gathereth a Church and therefore saith Augustine Vbi mihi licet in melius commutari Contra Crescon l. 3. c. 36. Eiren. part 1. p. 706. tom 1. non mihi opus est indeseparari And Junius resolveth Non posso quenquam Christianum bona fide renunciare communioni alterius quem Christus aut adjunxit sibi aut se adjuncturum spem facit nam qui fratrem suum servum Dei membrum Christi protervè abdicat is eo ipso facto Christum authorem communionis salutaris nestrae abdicat And with these or like arguments have their Pulpits sounded a retreat to those of their Town which have separated from them to associate with such as have gone farther in their separation as if their sight were in this respect also extra mittendo that they can see the faults of others not their own nor discern how the same weapons wherewith they fight against others may be turned back upon themselves And if they shall say that the very communion in Sacraments with such congregations is a corruption besides that this is petitio principii a begging of the question it is Donatisme without question And whereas Augustine after the precedent words Non enim qui se castum ser vat communicat peccatis alienis adds quamvis non eorum peccata sed illa quibus ad judicium sibi sumunt Dei sacrament acommunicet cum iis à quibus se castum servando fecit alienum might not Cresconius with as much truth and reason as they doe have replied That the very communicating with such was the contracting of their corruption and sin Our Saviour say they lived in unity with the Jewish Church in necessary ordinances yet separated in regard of cerruptions Let them then be followers of Christ and we shall no farther pursue them for the sacrament is a necessary ordinance and not a corruption and there may be a non-conformity in a corruption unto them with whom there may yet be a communion in worship The Lord Jesus lived and died in communion with that corrupt Church saith Mr. Ball and was so indulgent and graciously applicable to sinners that the Pharisees called him a companion of sinners Ipse Dominus Jesus Aug. contra Epist Parmen l. 1. c. 17 Dub. Evang. part 3. Dub. 41. p. 153. nullâ cogitatione malignitatis in Judaeorum gente pollutus est neque cùm illa prima sacramenta secundum perfectam humilitatis viam factus sub lege susâ—epit néque cùm postea discipulis electis cum suo traditoâ—e usque ad extremum osculum vixit And it hath been elswhere mentioned that one reason why Christ would be baptized among the common sort is rendred by Spanheïm to be this Sic etiam
and they lie unto God with their tongues when they pray Psal 76.36 aswell as others in their judgment seem to lie or give false testimony when they give them the Sacrament And why those reasons then should be of weight to exclude from the Sacrament but not to debarre from prayer A Lapide in Levit. 19.36 I know not where to lay the cause but upon the divers weights and divers measures which the Hebrewes say pollute the Land and prophane the name of God and that more truly than they can prove the free admission can pollute or prophane the Sacrament onely when they are resolved to assume a power to keep whom they please from some Ordinances that they may better keep them in awe and hold them in subjection To exclude from prayer is neither so specious to attempt since as among the Heathens to what Deity soever the sacrifice were intended yet there was an invocation of Janus and Vesta also so among the Christians whatsoever be the Ordinance attended upon it is seconded with that of prayer and invocation of God and this is the Salt that must season all other sacrifices disposing to and attending on them for improving their fruit and effect and therefore this species carries away the name of the genus from the rest and the Hebrew and Greek aswell as the English call this by the name of Service not without warrant sealed by God himself who calls his house an house of proyer denominating it from the chiefest service but also to withold them from prayer is lesse possible to effect for men may pray without concurrence of a Minister but not receive the Sacrament without it be consecrated by him But they have laid an obligation on the Church of England Perpetuúsque animae debitor hujus erit in undertaking to prove that some of the particular Congregations are true Churches Non tali auxilio nec defensoribus istis Tempus eget we cannot allow them to be auditors of that sum nor to cast it up with their new Counters who it seems suffering none to come to the Sacrament without their Let-passe would rise higher to permit none to passe for true Churches which have not their Communicatory letters Seminibus jactis se sustulit arbos Exiit in coelum ramis soelicibus but which are those that are true Churches and what is that which is constitutiv◠or destructive to either of them As Adrian Turnebus used to hit more right when he set down predictions of the weather clean contrary to the Prognosticators so perchance he may aim nearer to truh that denominates some of those not true Churches which they so call and some of them true whom they name not such but seeing they allow the Word and Sacraments for notes of a visible Church Field of the Church l. 2. c. 2. p. 51. whereunto some of our great Divines have appended another which admitted might also perchance disfranchise some of those that usurp and appropriate the name of Churches viz. an union and connexion of men in this profession and use of the Sacraments under lawfull Pastors and guides appointed authorised and sanctified to direct and lead them Contro 4. de Eccles l. 3. c. 2. in consonancy wherewith Bellarmine himself defines the Church to be Caetus hominum ejusdem Christianae fidei professione corundem Sacramentorum communione ligatorum sub regimine legitimorum pastorum But indeed the other two being as they grant the Inseparable absolutely proper peculiar and essentiall notes for scire est per causas scire and therefore being both the formall cause of a Church giving Being thereunto in constituting and conserving it while it is taught by the Word and by the Word and Sacraments is gathered together to God and being the effect of the Church constituted while it teacheth others they cannot but demonstrate the Church à priori à posteriori and therefore being adequate unto the Church Gerhard loc com tom 5. de Eccles c. 10. p. 306. 309. and inseparable from it it may firmly and immoveably be collected saith Gerhard that where the Word is preached and the Sacraments administred there is a Church and reciprocally where there is a Church there is the Word preached and the Sacraments administred upon this ground therefore as the Church of England was a true Church so were also all the particular congregations being similar parts of that nationall Church as that was of the Catholique and if in respect of that common nature found in them they were not Species of the Church in general yet they were members thereof as it is an integrall body for they had all of them the Word preached and professed purely without any error in the foundation which onely nulls a Church and the Sacraments legitimously administred for matter and form and had there been some corruption in the doctrine and administration yet as totas Ecclesias non esse aestimandas ex solis pastoribus Whitak Cont. 2. de Eccles q. 5. c. 17. p. 541. Iunius Eirenic part 1. tom 1. p. 715. 716. Animad in Contro 4. Bellarm. l. 4. c. 2. p. 1132. Ibid. p. 1131. nec ex qui busdam paucis as Whitaker and Gerhard so these corruptions had onely made a cease to be a pure Church not to be a Church so long as the foundation had stood it had been the house of God though hay and stubble were built thereupon saith Whitaker it had continued to be a Church untill Deus renunciaverat iis testificatione publicâ as Junius in the like case the Word and Sacraments simply and absolutely distinguished a Church from prophane Assemblies and the incorrupt preaching of the Word and legitimate administration of the Sacraments from hereticall congregations though properly as Iunius observes the preaching of the Word being actus hominum est Index illius notae non nota primaria jam enim ante habuit notam Ecclesia Dei veritatem verbum veritatis à Deo quà m praedicatio exstiterit so as sure our Congregations were lately all Churches Fuimus Troes fuit Ilium ingens Gloria Dardanidum But since their brethren in principles sought to undermine our Churches and having made the match and their zeal giving fire to the hidden mine by a new powder-plot have blown up these Churches and thereby not onely rent and dissipated them one from the other but scorched and mortally wounded them with fundamentall errors I think now it is not without due caution and circumspection that they say onely some of our Congregations are true Churches for as Diogenes sought a man with a Lanthorn at noon-day at Athens so amidst all the late new light we have more need then ever of that lamp unto our feet to find a Church and they do therefore ingenuously call themselves of the Congregational way for they are many of them out of the way of a true Church And though all that be of those principles are not vitiated with
such heresies yet they are culpable in causa as he that pulls down the Dam is guilty of all the inundations and breachâ—s made by the flood But then seeing the administration of the Sacraments is a note of the Church Oportuit esse signa aliqua sacra quibus distinguerentur cives Jerusalem à civitate Baby Cit. ab Ames Bell. Ener tom 2. c. 3. p. 63. louis saith Alexander Hales sicut videmus in aliis rebus oves enim unius gregis discernuntur ab ovibus alterius gregis proprio signo sacrae aedes à non sacris proprio signo discernuntur civitas nobilis aliquo signo donari consuevit ut civitas Romana penula dignitas militaris accinctione gladii officium traditione virgae vel clavium ex quibus omnibus colligitur quod sacramenta homini sunt necessaria post lapsum ad hoc ut discerneretur esse civis spiritualis Jerusalem deâ—g ege Domini de militia cius Vbi supra And although as Whitaker affirms Sacramentorum usum non esse semper simpliciter necessarium sed possead tempus intermitti sunt enim sigilla tantum eorum bonorum quae nobis in verbo proponuntur sigilli vero appositio ad rem nihil addit sed ad rei duntaxat modum si sigillum deperdatur res non continuo amittitur non enim nobis est negotium cum callido aliquo mercatore ut fraudem motuamus sed cum Deo qui sallere non potest non est ergo quod de salutis premissionibus nobis ab illo factis dubitemus eisi sigilla nâ—n hâ—bemus Yet notwithstanding as this seems onely to comfort those that cannot have them not to excuse those that will not give them and therefore he adds Sinâ—llum necessarium impedimentum fuerit nec esse ullo modo omittenda yet I say if the Sacraments be notes of the Church how can that be a Church to whom these notes are supposed not to belong How can these be Citizens of Ierusalem sheep of the Lords flock Souldiers of his Militia who not onely have not but are affirmed not be in capacity of having the proper signes of such Vbisupra p. 1131. And seeing as Iunius asserts those are notes of the Church Professione Dei nostrâ Deitradentis Scripturâ professione Sacramentis nostrâ profitentium recipere Scripturam professionem Sacramentáque ipsius qua Deus profitetur jam Ecclesia est quà homines jam Deum Ecclesiámque profitentur se Ecclesiae membra tota haec professio notâ— Ecclesiae est sed prima illa Ecclesiam constituit notam essentialem ipsius in se haec notam Ecclesiae in membris ejus particularibus ostendit how can they be yeelded to be membâ—rs that are not allowed this profession And how can these be notes by their profession in receiving whom they professe uncapable to receive and if as the same famous learned man delivereth P. 1133. the word Saltem vocatione communi facit divinae consortes naturae ut ita loquamur omnes quamvis non singulari internáque vocatione singu os how can they that are partakers of the divine nature be unworthy to participate of the signes of his body They fairly confess That discipline enters not into the definition of a Church but onely of a sound and healthy Church and to put all or most on this is unwarrantable In deed it is disliked by Whitaker in Beza and Danaeus that they make Discipline a note of the Church Si per disciplinam certam quandam perpetuam gubernationis Ecclesiae formam per Presbyteros excommunicationem intelligant Vbi supra falli cos existimo but we then assume if it may be a Church without discipline and all or most is not to be put on this Sect. 9. how can they excuse those fellows of theirs in the separation who secede from their proper congregations through offence at the want of Discipline as they confesse and thereupon renounce their brotherhood For as we alleaged out of Altingius to refuse to partake the Supper with them is a tacite renunciation of their fraternity or how can these justifie themselves that permit none to be of their Church that will not submit to their Discipline I doubt whether Divinity will not as little warrant that assertion as accurate That the form of a visible Church is the union of the body with Christ Polanus Syntag l. 7. c. 2. Bucan Instit loc 41. sect 15. Ames Medulla theol c. 31. Altingius l c. com part 1. loc 11. part 181. aliiq Epist ad Bezam which visibly is by living under Gospel Ordinances for this is not properly and immediâ—tly vocation and profession of faith which is generally determined to be the form of the Church and hence it is that the Word and Sacraments which are appendages thereunto being visible words are the essentiall notes of the Church as Philosophy will own that saying That the form of a man is the union of the soul and body for the soul is the form though the union thereof with the body as the matter make the man but that the union of the form with the matter should be the form checks as much with good sense as Philosophy As the Word and Prayer so Baptism also they think to be more communicable and plead for the free admission of Infants onely the Lords Supper which Christ instituted ad congregandam Ecclesiam ad communionem societatémque must be drawn as Bullinger complâ—â—ins ad Ecclesiam dispergendam excommunionem ut sic dicam soparationem but that most of the mediums which they use to entrench the one Sacrament will be subservient to reclude and restrain the other we have endeavoured for merly to lay open They ask Whether they can deny Baptisâ—â— to the child of any member how off ensive soever before the sentenceof cutting off poss upon him Sic tuâ—sic breviter positâ tibi Gorgone Pallas You cannot justly make such deniall but then we shall take leave to ask Whether they can deny the Lords Supper to any member before the sentence of cutting off passe upon him or some notorious crime done by him that may demerit that sentence And if they will cut off all partiall and prejudicious sentencing they must be sensible that the same reason will command them to give like answer as they receive viz. that in justice they cannot deny The children they say are not baptized in their own right but in the Churches but what interest in the Churches rights have those infants which is not rooted in their parents and their relation to them And the soederall holinesse which they speak of is by the virtue of the promise made to the seed of these parents that are in covenant with God I know they take not the Church Metonymically for the Town or Countrey that contains it for upon such an account the children of Infidels born within
circumstance but the action it self and which properly comes not within the list or rank of things of order decency unless perhaps in a general acception as whatsoever is agreeable to rule is orderly what is contrary thereunto is out of order Ordini contrariatur quicquid inordinatè agitur as Tully long since said Et quicquid peccatur perturbatione ordinis peccatur accordingly Quod decet honestum est et quod honestuÌ„ est decet justa omnja decora sunt injusta contra but taking order and decency in this notion the Church hath no power to make Lawes in things of such concernment but Order in this place of the Apostle comprehendeth the circumstances of season time and place and comliness includes that gravity and modesty in the performance of the works of Gods service which beseems actions of that nature Field Vbi supra and such Rites as may cause respect unto the things performed and thereby excite men to greater devotion or express such spiritual affections and motions as are or should be in them but the pretended order and course of the Apologists is of a far different kind and nature 3. The ancient church held not forth that manner and degrees of pennance as a Divine Institution nor necessarily implicating the conscience but as an act of Discipline of a medious and indifferent nature when abstracted from their positive Constitution and therefore it was transitory in respect of time and ambulatory in regard of place not alwayes nor every where observed But as their Discipline hath no Ecclesiastical Constitution like a great sum to obtain its freedom in the Church so they pretend it was free born and is of divine not humane Establishment and therefore they prevaricate and betray their Cause when they compare it to that Model of Discipline for the Paeniten's and do interpretatively and virtually acknowledge it hath only a like foundation with that which also they confess had no particular warrant from the Scripture save this general rule of doing things in order and decency which was no special or immediate command for the same but only a Praecept That the Church should do what seemed orderly and decent and in this very particular what seemed so in one age and place did not in another 4. There is yet a greater difference between their Discipline and that of the old Paenitents this being only in a thing not specially determined by Scripture and theirs is against what the Scripture hath determined as we conceave we have sufficiently evidenced They have now distilled the Spirits of this Argument into a Syllogisme and we must tast the strength thereof Where is no due order in Sacramental Administrations there Gods Will is not observed but where all are admitted there is no Order Ergo. If we grant the whole we part with nothing nor get they any thing we shall only make them a Magicians Feast which costs noâ—hing to prepare nor will any way strengthen them to take for where are all admitted de facto infants madmen excommunicate c. or who saith all are to be so de jurâ— It is only Church-members who have a Dogmatical Faith which have neither torn the Evidence of their Title by being cut off nor bloted it by any such scandal as merits cutting off whose admission we plead for The Minor and their Arguments are all minors they prove Where there is mixture and confusion of good and bad fit and unfit there is no Order but where all are admitted is this mixture They do not well see what can be denied here and least we should disparage their eye-sight we shall deny nothing thereof but they may put all their gain in their eyes according to the proverb but least as bad eyes infect one the other so some others also be like Tychonius of whom Augustine speaks Statim quippe amore sententiae suae contra veritatem oculum claufit and may seem to see this Argument to be unanswerable also as it looks with an opposite aspect and adverse influence upon our Thesis and that to admit all in that qualified and restrained sense is in consistent also with order and comliness therefore to undeceive them advertant ea quae oculos etiam caecos seriant intueantur â— Let them borrow the same Proposition and advance it to a Major Where there is mixture and confusion of good bad there is no order and then yoak it with a Minor where the subject onely is changed and render it thus Where all are admitted to Church-membership to the Word and Prayer there is such mixture c. And then see what a conclusion it wil draw after it and if they be not now as mute as a Fish but have any piece of answer found in their mouthes let them give it for me and them Let them remind what we have often mentioned out of Augustine Mixtus reis obnoxiis nifi per conscientiae maculatam consensionem nullus recte dici potest and that bonus malis nullo modo misceripotest so as then first here can be no mixture of good and bad Thirdly men may be said to be bad and unfit simply and absolutely or respectively according to their sense and construction if simply and absolutely such as are guilty of grosse palpable ignorance of the very principles of the faith or of notorious crimes scandals obstinately persisted in though we should grant them their conclusion we yeeld nothing of the cause but if they understand all those to be bad and unfit who though Church-members and Dogmaticall believers have not approved by tryall their sound knowledge and sincere holinesse unto them we shall deny what they have not proved and we have now had proof that they cannot prove hat such are bad or unfit or that where all in this accommodate sense are admitted there is no order all such are relatively though not really holy and fit and many of those to whom they give admission are not really worthy If they are worthy to partake of the prayers Quoted before they are not unworthy to communicate of the Sâ—crament in the judgment of Chrysostom And if they are not unworthy saith Chamier of the peace of the Church they are not unworthy of the Sacrament and if worthy to be reckoned to be of the body of Christ â—hat is members of his Church thâ—y are not unworthy to feed on him Besides although simply the casting out or non-admission of persons criminous may be consonant to order yet respâ—ctively to the procuring or conserving a greater good or avoiding a more mischievous evill it may not be orderly Although we may not doe evill that good may ensue yet we may and must passe over or omit a lâ—sser good to acquire a greater And since malus bonum vehementiùs excitat movet impellit voluntatem therefore regularly non potest voluntas inserius bonum eligere quia electio non est nisi ex consultatione rationis consultatio vero non fit
Persons rather then Things If thou shalt separate or draw out of the vile world the precious people of God converting them by the Preaching of the Word and into this Channel flow the Expositions of Hierom Chrysostom Gregory Theodoret Hugo Thomas Lyranus VVillet do Castro A Lapide Sa and Sanctius also Piscator and the English Annotations think this the more genuine Exposition which Diodate also mentions viz. If in thy teaching thou put a difference between the godly and the wicked by confirming and comforting the one and by sharply reproving convincing and menacing the other But this still is only a Doctrinal Separation and though of Persons yet of them alone in reference to the Word preached and however some men may happily apply this text in an accommodate and transumptive sense to a Separation from the Sacrament yet that this should be here properly ment or ought litterally so to be understood or especially that it should be so contracted and restrained to command only a Separation from the Sacrament and from no other Ordinance which though it might better suite with their Model for otherwise as it might countenance their Separating from one Ordinance so it should condemn their not separating from other yet sorts not with their marginal quotations out of Mr. Stock who speaks of excluding from Prayers also so that they can make no Mercury for themselves out of that Stock as for all or any of this they have produced neither reason nor the authority of any Interpreter and if they will have their interpretations imitate the Spiders Web spun only out of their own bowels nulli debeo they will also resemble it in this that they will be soon swept down and in the mean time serve only to catch flyes so as well Reason as Authority forbids this sense for Separation from the Sacrament of persons unfit is the separating the vile from the precious not the precious from the vile and to say they separate themselves from others is in effect to say they Excommunicate themselves not others Separate and Excommunicate being anciently the same and passing under one notion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unless perhaps they rather separate themselves as the Pharesees did who indeed had their name from Separation and were also called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And therefore also whereas telling us elsewhere of a Negative Separation in a Church not from it which we have formerly shewed is negatively separated from Reason and the Authority pretended they speak also here of a Church separating from scandalous Members of her own Body or separating such as are scandalous from her the latter we acknowledge may be rightly done but know it not to be that which they do but that this and the former expression should be consonant in sense or the former consonant with sense viz. That the Body should separate from the Members the whole from the parts will be very strange for any sensible man to opine but indeed it suits not altogether amiss with their way where they pretend to separate into a new Church from the other Members of the Church so as Hoc non secundum veram sed secundùm vestram seutentiam vobis rectissime dicitur as Augustine to Petilian If the text alleaged allows only a Doctrinal Separation in Preaching and denyes any other then Excommunication falls Quae nondum data sunt stulte negata putas Must the text needs deny what it doth not affirm If Excommunication be not here asserted can it no where else be ratified But surely if Excommunication expect no other support if it here find none it hangs by as frail a thread as Dionysius his Sword over Damocles his head It may be a Plant which the heavenly Father hath planted yet not grow out of this ground and it disparageth the strength thereof to suppose it hath no better root and they give it no firmer fastning when they tell us That Church Censures were under the Old Testament and ask Who knows it not But because we are so ignorant as not to know it out of Scripture they might have done consultly if it were so obvious to have brought forth their evidence and to have shamed our ignorance Non semis in conflictu in quo veritas quaeritur cùm probatio non sequitur quà m vana inepta fit narratio said Augustine to Petilian We hope we are not forgetful thereof through carnal liberty but rather think they haue forgotten themselves to use such carnal liberty to censure us but till they reflect some of their new light upon us we cannot see any Precept or Example of Excommunication in the Old Testament or of Suspersion in the New and we think it as likely that in this place Suspension which is their only way of processe was Prophesied of and a Canon made for regulating the administration of that one Sacrament when it was not then instituted nor any other Sacrament expressed or implyed in the context as that the Society of the Jesuits was as some dream foretold in that of 1 Cor. 1.9 God is faithful by whom ye were called into the fellowship of his Son Jesus 1. q. 32. art 1. q 46. art 2. And we shall commend to the Apologists a good rule of Aquinas Cùm quis ad probandam fidem Christianam adducit rationes quae non sunt cogentes cedit in irrisionem infidelium credunt enim quod hujusmodi rationibus iunitamur propter eas credimus so as whereas they suppose we limit and straiten the text for our own ends we think upon such account it had been more subservient to their ends to have forborn to insist upon such non-cogent Arguments for some might have been facil to believe that men so eager and confident in their way had better Arguments if they had not produced these and they might so also have redeemed themselves from that which Augustine calls Haereticorum cavend◠calliditas De unit Ec. l. c. 13. volentium convertere Dei verba à veritate propter quam dicta sunt ad perversitatem in qua ipsi sunt But lastly whereas they conclude That if some separation must be made then examination and such proper means must be also these are not only ten times sodden Coleworts but grown so faetid and rancid that the very stirring of them though but to remove them may offend and therefore we shall refer the Reader to what we said to correct them when they were brought forth fresh SECT XXVII 2 Thess 3.2 and 6. opened and redeemed from their misapplications Whether anciently the Commerce with any not Excommunicated were avoided What Soc ety Excommunication cuts off from How Suspension might be used and is abused AElian tells us of one Mizaldus that was so light that they were constrained to hang Lead at his heels least he should be blown away by every puffe of wind As light verily is that Argument which appears in this maniple drawn from 2
was greater than the lesser excommunication which onely removes from the Sacraments but not from the society of the faithfull and to this opinion inclines Dr. Sclater who is therefore here quoted by the Apologists Fide Independenti In locum p. 284 285. and to no other effect but to make us Independents upon their fidelity when they produce his authority to prove that this is meant of a withdrawing in sacris when he demands Quid boc ad sacra Epist 64. tom 4. p. 61. Whether there were anciently such a kind of censure in the Church and whether such thus censured were those with whom they might not eat bread yet might take the body of Christ with them as Augustine affirmeth of some I shall not dispute and though Estius tell us that Chrysostome complains this censure was antiquated in his time when the greater excomunication was in use yet let the learned advise if some such thing be not hinted at in Augustine to have been practised in his time when he saith Contra Donat epist allat c. 2. Quos acrius corripimus etiamsi in corum possessione sumus nihil ibi apud eos contingimus ut sentiant quan um peccata corum doleamus And whether it may not be confirmed by the first Councell of Toledo which if it were held An. Dom. 402. 1 Tolet. Can. 7 as Marianus affirmeth was six years before Chrysosâ—oms death for Nâ—uclerus tells us that be died An. Dom. 408. or if it were celebrated Anno 420. as Cassiodore and Prosper would have it was twelve years after his decease where it was decreed Vt si quorumeúmque Clericorum uxores peccaverint ne fortè licentiam peccandi plus habeant accipiant mariti corum hanc potestatem praeter necem custodiendi ac ligandi in domo suâ ad jejunia salutaria non mortifera eas cogentes cum uxoribus autem ipsis quae peccaverint nec cibos sumant nisi forte ad timorem Dei acta poenitantia revertantur And that this was not always done by the publick sentence of the Church but sometimes upon the pious discretion of private Christians as may seem to be insinuated by Augustine where speaking of the Apostles prohibition not to ear with a brother thaâ— is called a fornicator he saith Contra Epist Parmen l. 3. c. 2. Quod multi boni Christiani faciunt de iis de quibus familiarius curam gerunt ut a quorum confortio se potueriut separare and afterward Nam in domibus suis quique boni fideles ita disciplinam sâ—orum moderantur regunt I say therefore this could not be accompanied alwayes with suspension from the Sacrament which could not be inflicted but by publick judgment of the Church and which doth not debarre commerce in civill things and I do still professe my selfe to seek of all evidence in antiquity that any man was kept from the Sacrament that had not been cut off from the body of the Church for however they might withdraw themselves from men that were evill yet they did not withdraw the Ordinances whereby they might grow better but what ever be the sense of the Senate and people of learnings Common-wealth in this particular yet it shewes it to be the judgement of learned Estius That interdiction of all civill lociety and conversation is not a lesse punishment then suspension And whereas they say That because of mens relations their society can hardly be left in civill things by the same reason it will be as hard to proceed to the greater excommunication Baldwin Case Consc l. 4. c. 10 p. 1131. Davenant determinat q. 48. whereof the abrenunciation or desertion of civill commerce is a consequent But they might have understood that as neither excommunication makes any divorce of those whom God hath conjoyned but only a separation from some particular Church nor cancels or looseth from any bond of Divine Natuturall or Civill Law nor any Pollticall or Oeconomicall communnion founded upon either of them but prohibits onely undue and voluntary commerce and that also alone by positive Law and by generall consent allows a mutuall conversation in those cases which are sum'd up in that verse mentioned almost in every Schoolman and Canonist who I wish had had commerce with some bettsr Poets and not to have given us as Virgil said of Ennius their gold in dung Vtile lex humile res ignorata uccesse so though a contaglous person may be prudently eschewed by the generality of the faithfull so as to have no open voluntary and familiar converse with him yet this hinders not but that those which have speciall relations may be conversant with him and generally any one may be so in things profitable and necessary But are the Apologists as light as the leaves they write upon sententia vobis Versa retro non sic incerto flamine Syrtes Mutantur Just now they told us this withdrawing noting not companying was casting out by excommunication now presently they conclude it must be excommunication the greater or the lesser or have they more than an omnipotent power to make both parts of the contradiction true for omnipotence it self cannot do this but the greater indeed it may be the Apostle here useth the same word which he hâ—th 1 Cor. 5.9 viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And if there it be meant of excommunication it is probable it ought to be so understood here and if not so in the one then in neither but the lesser it cannot mean for that doth not exclude from the company of the faithful but onely à sacris and that is contracted too and it now deprives onely of the Lords Supper But if we should bestow this alms upon them in their necessity and concede that the lesser excommunication is here intended yet it will not suit with their intent nor contribute to their advantage for this censure is an act of justice and therefore must proceed in a judiciall way Proculdubio mens Apostoli est saith Estius speaking of this Text and that of 1 Cor. 5.11 Id quod hîe praecipit agendum ordine judiciario there must be some crime particularly charged Nominatim exprimendum saith Baldwin and sufficiently proved and the sentence must come forth ex foro contentioso as the Casuists speak a man must plea for himself as well as others against him and particular persons distinctly not multitudes confusedly and indiscriminately are to be thus censured and that after admonition after due knowledge is taken of them by the Church and they being admenished remain disobedient still say the late English Annotations on the text And then the Apologists will get as much advantage by this as he doth wealth when he awakes that dreams of golden mountains for their way and this method doe as much differ as a Bristoll stone and a perfect Diamond and are no more the same than the suppositions Reliques shewed forth among the Papists are really the same things which
sic Elephantia sis omnium morborum maximus and so infectious that qui bibit in eodem vitro cum Elephantiaco inquinabitur And therefore though the judging of and exterminating the Leper may perhaps in a more tolerable Allegory bear some proportion to the consuring and excommunicating nefarious and notorious sinners obstinately persisting in impenitence who do give scandall and may spread infection yet what conformity carries it to the suspending of those who have not satisfied them of their fitnesse or worthinesse and who are innocent of such great transgressions The Priest was to take curions view and to make severall inspections not arbitrarily and precipitously as is their use to pronounce men Lepers and he was to distinguish between a Scab a Leprosie verse 8. for a scab did not shut out of the Camp neither must small faults from the Church or Sacrament Si quis suspect◠sit infirmitatis saith Ambrose indulge aliquantulum medendi periti cum vident notas aegritudines non primò medicinam adhibent Willot in locum Doct. 2. 5. sed tempus expectant And again Diu tractatur putrida pars si sanari potest medicamentis si non potest à bono medico abscinditur sie Episcopi affectus boni est ut optet sanari infirmos serpentia auferre ulcera adducere aliqua non abseindere postrumò quod sanari non potest cum dolore abscindere But while they use a contrary method sure the plague of leprosie is among the Priests who have the signes thereof not in the rent of their clothes but in the rent of the Church The next Scripture is 2 Chron. 23.19 another Allegory and therefore no Argument as Hierom saith of Origen Praefat. 10. Isai ad Amabil Episcop while he wanders in his free course of Allegories he makes his wit the Churches Sacraments so they make their Allegories the rule of their distribution of the Sacraments in the Church But if a clear and impartial judgement had been the Porter this Argument drawn from Jehosaphats Porters c. had not been suffered to enter not only because to reduce their practice of Discipline to a resemblance and conformity to what was done to those that were unclean under the law they should not only debar those whom they think impure from coming to the Sacrament but from entring the Church yea from civil commerce Instit Moral tom 3. l. 10. p. 679. for polluti praescripto legis arcebantur ab ingressu in templum ab aliorum convictu consortio saith Azorius comfortmably to Scripture neither were either of the legal Sacraments made or given in the Temple for if the Paschal Lamb were there killed and sacrificed yet it was eaten at home so that the keeping out of the temple was not the keeping off from the Passover however that which did prohibit the entry at the one might forbid the eating of the other and though Jehosophats Porters suffered none that were unclean in any thing to enter the house of the Lord yet this must be understood of evident and apparant uncleanness and of such as were notoriously known to be defiled for we do not find nor can imagine that they searched any men or women or made tryal of them by denuding them and some kinds of uncleannesse contracted by contact were not discernible by any re-search But chiefly because neither the Porters can rationally be supposed to Type the Church Officers nor the Temple only to signifie the Lords Table nor indeed is there any colour or proportion for it so as there can be no beauty in the Allegory that legal uncleanesse should be a figure of or bear resemblance with moral filthynesse contracted by sinful actions Philo makes the Temple to be an image of the world some more probably a Type of Christs natural body others of his mystical body the Church But if of the Church yet whether of the true Catholick or the Visible Church or of the Militant or triumphant Church which or whether of these is not clear and liquid Mr. Ball. answ to Canne part 2. pag. 67. August contra 2 Epist Gaudentii l. 2. c. 25 without some divine light for as it is only appertaining to God to design a Type so it is peculiar to him alone to expound and make known the signification thereof Homo vobis dixit an Deus si Deus legite hoc nobis ex lege Prophetis Psalmis Apostolicis Euangelicis literis so autem homines dixerunt ecce figmentum humanum c. But certainly it is evident that the Temple did not Type the Table of the Lord no man ever fell upon that fancy Tam vana nullum decepit imagine somnus And therefore however this Argument might seem subservient to prove the casting out of the Church by Excemmunication or might reflect a little superficial glosse on the Independent way of admitting none into the Church but manifest Saints yet it bears no colour to paint over their practice who permit them to be Members of the Church and partakers of other Ordinances whom they exclude from the Lords Supper And if hereby the Church had been figured and also that no wicked person should enter therein yet either the Church was thereby described as women were by Sophocles only what they ought to be not what they were or as they shall be in Heaven that new Jerusalem where no unclean person shall enter for otherwise it can be no true Church whereof any wicked persons are Members So likewise legal uncleannesse is clean wide from figuring or obumbrating either scandalous sins which may merit casting out or irregeneration for which pretendedly they let not in For 1. There might be legal uncleannesse without any sin as in some diseases of men and women and in some necessary or casual contacts and there might be odious sins without any legal uncleanesse sins did not make legally upclean nor legal uncleannesse alwayes sinful unlesse a man did wilfully neglect his cleansing A holy man might be unclean and a wicked man clean 2. All sin was forbidden by God and no sin was necessary but all uncleannesse was not prohibited and some was of necessity to be contracted as that which grew from Burial of the dead Numb 19.11 or removing dead Carcasses Levit. 11.39 and making of the water of separation Numb 19. vers 7. 3. No man could sin unwillingly every sin is in some respect voluntary but a man might be unclean against his will Leviticus 15.8 Numbers 19. vers 14. 4. The least uncleannesse shut out from the Tabernacle and Temple but the least sin excludes not from the Church or Sacrament even our enemies being judges 5. Things as well as persons were lyable to uncleannesse but only rational creatures are capable of sinning 6. He was clean that was most defiled as he whose leprosie covered all his skin from head to foot Levit. 13.13 14. but the Analogie holdeth not in the most leprous sinners 7. He that
Church in the daies of Moses and the Prophets was one and the same with the Church in our daies saith a learned Divine the house of God the body of Christ the elect and redeemed people the holy Nation the peculiar treasure and spouse of the Lamb and from thence he argues what was not a sufficient cause to separate in that time is no sufficient cause of separation in our daies Thirdly In the old Testament prophane people were not distinctly in themselves called Gods people August de doct Christil 3. c. 32. but the Church and society wherein they were permix was so called quando Scriptura cum ad alios loquatur tanquam ad eospsâ—â— ad quos leque batâ—r videtur loqui vel de ipsis cum de aliis jam loquatur tanquam 〈…〉 propter temporalem commixtionem communionem sacramentorum and in the same respect and notion wicked men under the new Testament are also called the people of God as the Church of Corinth is called the Church of God they that were incorporate thereunto are said to be sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be Saints which are attributes equivalent to the people of God and yet that body had many rotten ulcers and odious excrements They with some complacency or confidence in their undertakings conclude who knows what all these lights will do being set up together But we must tell them that their arguments have no other light than such as putrified wood hath which only shines in darkness and being brought into a clear light nothing appears but rottenness but if any take them for lights and will be guided by them they are like to do but what was done by the lights which Nauplius hung out at Euboea for the Greeks in their return from Troy which served onely to draw them among the rocks thereby to suffer Shipwrak SECT XXXIV XXXV XXXVI XXXVII Their repeated Fallacies The complacency of their close which is destructive to their main discourse CRebrescunt optatae aurae portusque patescit Jam proprior I may now strike saile and cast anchor not onely because I may justly fear lest the Reader will no longer fill my sails with a favourable breath being like to have been tired with so tedious a voyage and even bonum longum minus bonum therefore much more longum malum duo mala but also because what occurres of concernment in the remaining Sections are but the same forces which we have proffigated in another field and here they rally them together again either like some politick captains who to set out the multitude of their Armies when they are to march through a City cause them to enter at one gate and go out at another and then to pass round and come in again at the first port or as Francis the first thought that the stile of King of France alone being often repeated would ballance all the numerous titles of Charles the Emperour so they think the same arguments reiterated may be instead of any other or more that might be expected and that if they pierce not by their force yet they may by their continual dropping non vi sed saepe cadendo or that if in one place or time they take not they may in another as Astrologers say some things work not their effects unless they be applied under such a constellation and in such a juncture of time and as the Iesuits tell us that the same moral perswasion that at sometimes is not yet anothers is efficacious in respect of â—â—s annext congrulty and due application but upon what account soever they bring the Arguments they have been elsewhere broken and come here as Gonsalvo said of a Captain shewing himself after the battel That it was St. Elmo that appeared after the storm was past But however the Apologists may suppose the things very fair that therefore by the allowance of Plato they may be twice or thrice repeated or to be as the works of Aristotle were to Alpharabius which he had read forty times and could as often read again without fastidiousness yet we rather suppose with Plutarch Ubique unius tenoris cantilena satietatem affert offendit and are very sensible sunt talis quoque taedia vitae Magna Voluptates commendat rarior usus In the 34. Section are their arguments which they call Convincing but sure if the convincing signes they require of holiness in men need to be no more forcible than their convincing arguments we shall not much complain of their rigor in trying or their strictness in admitting as that this Sacrament belongs onely to godly ones That they which partake it without true grace have the seal set to a blank The inference from Christs first administring onely to his peculiar disciples That an unregenerate person cannot examine himself The similitude of the Legacy bequeathed to the persons of such a condition That because the ignorant and scandalous are to be repelled therefore examination is requisite as a means in order to that end And in the 35. Section their motives drawn from the eating and drinking of their own damnation by the unworthy from the abuse of Christs blood by being too prodigal thereof from obstructing the reformation crossing the desires of the godly and the actings of the State from the degenerating from the primative times and all true antiquity And in the 36. Section what they answer to the objections of Schisme which constitutes and troubles that sollow their way And in the 37. Section among their Quaeries whether Ministers contradict not themselves in giving the seales of Salvation to those in the Sacrament whom hey have damned in the Word Whether ary other way than theirs or like it can be walked in to answer the holy courses of the ancients But if any like it may serve the turn it seems they have no such faith in their way but that another may be as good and therefore their 's not absolutely necessary and another in most things different may in somewhat be like theirs seeing as Synesius In omnibus iis quae in se differunt convenientia est similitudo and what Ministers should do while government is unsetled All this and much more of this sowr and swelling leaven is onely like the trunks which Cardinal Campeius his Mules carried being stufft with old clothes shooes and raggs for all hath been formerly worn out cast off and torn to pieces as we met with it heretofore very frequently in their discourse And if any rational and ingenious man shall prompt me to any thing among this frippery to which I cannot prompt him to find a sufficient answer in what I have delivered I shall soon hoyse those sails I have stricken and weight that anchor I have cast out and set to Sea again seeing it is like to be no difficult voyage nor to be imperilled by any acute solid rocks or very quick-sands most of it I think could be onely in their intention
prejudiced the Romane Church nor more helped forward the work of our Reformation than their with-holding of the cup from the Laity which hath made them lately somewhat wiser by their harms so as now in this Nation what is done elsewhere I know not the Laicks are permitted the Wine though not the Cup out of which it is powred into a Glass wherein they drink it for reason of State forbids they should have it in the same manner the Priests receive it that being reserved onely for Kings to be so far made equal with Priests and if they should perfectly reform this sacrilegious abuse they should confess a former error and consequently forfeit their Palladium the infallibility of their Church and since res aetas usus semper aliquid apportat novi aliquid moneat ut illa quae te scire credas nescias quae tibi putaris prima in experiundo repudies it is possible that at length piscator ictus sapiat and those Fishers of men too may change those Nets which drive away most Fish for those that may inclose more and not by alienating hearts forfeit their hands which might help to carry on the work they pretend to As Saracenus Moses to Lucius of Alexandria in Ruffinus Nunquam verior potest esse fides quae auribus capitur quà ne quae oculis pervideâ—ur so let them give us some sensible effects and demonstrations à posteriori of the aptness and energy of their way for reformation they cannot dispute us out of our senses and we see where they set up after eight or nine years among several hundreds they gain scarce so many units and their reformation is like the filings and washings of Gold by false Clippers onely to impair and embase it like Dioclesians deserting the Empire to attend a Garden or like Woolseys destroying forty religious houses as they were then accounted out of the ruins thereof to build two Colleges Nay they do not edifie after that proportion nor to that similitude As whom they admit have liberty given to beleeve what they list liberty in things of the minde being the great bait or philter of Independency so those whom they reject are like enough to take liberty to do what they list little or no care being taken of them and they being cast off without any great crimes may be careless what they do since they can speed no worse though their crimes become greater I know nothing can so much excuse the former frame and temper as the succeeding as Augustus adopted Tiberius to reflect more glory upon his own raign by comparison with his Successors comparatione deterrimâ sibi gloriam quaesivisse saith Tacitus nor any thing that can more endear the present frame and temper of the Church but the like fear which the old woman had that prayed for Dionysius of Sicily It is no new thing to transfer upon others our proper faults Me suo nomine exulem vocat as Nero set Rome on fire and charged it on the Christians and yet all the time of the burning too he sang some of Homers doleful verses but ori digitum for the fore-finger that used to stop the mouth had the attribute of salutaris from antiquity But to revert to the question as stated by the Apologists If there were no other Gulph between us but the necessity of Examination of our knowledge in order to our admission to the Sacraments we might sooner come together but yet first why this should be onely necessary in the reformation of a long corrupted Church and not be of a stable permanent necessity seeing knowledge is always needful in every Communicant and they will be satisfied that every one is knowing and that satisfaction cannot be had without examination as they pretend they have not favoured our ignorance so farre as to tell us and I doubt we shall need not onely some Delian diver but Elias himself to come to resolve us 2. In reformation of a long corrupted Church there may be an obviousness of reason to examine those that are corrupt or suspected to be so but all are not so we hope and why all should then passe under examination our dulness needs to be prompted to apprehend the reason 3. It had had more of rational congruity to examine in reforming an ignorant Church rather than a corrupt for there may be knowledg enough where there are corruptions too many 4. We are left in a mist also and need to have it cleared up to us how they understand the Church to be corrupt whether with the Brownists the comparative degree of this separation they suppose the reformed Churches to be corrupt in the first constitution and in Essentials which though directly they affirm not yet implicitely and by consequence they seem to say it why else do they gather new Churches and separate from the former Congregations Among Heathens they might finde a proper spheare for such activity not here if there be Churches already gathered to their hand and they cannot in my sense stand firm and unshaken upon this degree or stair unless they ascend to the superlative degree of separation and require a farther probation in order to the re-acception of the other Sacrament and so as the Papists upbraid us to have had no Church before Luther they will gratifie them farther confessing that till now gathered by them we had none since 5. If they suppose corruptions onely in Accidentals in doctrines not fundamental but that charge they have seemed to wave or in discipline and manners this indeed is the way to keep the power in perpetual exercise qui velit potestatem perpetuam velit for whatsoever the Donatists may talk of a Church in this world without spot or wrinkle yet as Beda tells us who according to his wont took the hint thereof from Augustine while the Apostle saith Retract l. 2. c. 18. That he viz. Christ might present to himself a Church not having spot or wrinkle he first said glorious sufficiently signifying when she should be without spot or wrinkle to wit when she should be glorious here she may be fair but among women onely by comparison and yet is black still habet aliquid Aethiopici decoris as Origen Since then Corruptions will still be and Reformation thereof ought always to be they need not have limited the necessity of examination in these terms in reformation of a long corrupt Church but have determined it always necessary 6. And of necessity we must cast dirt in the faces of the Churches of God that have preceded us as well in dignity as time if in reformation of a long corrupt Church this examination be necessary The godly Judges and Kings of Israel and Judah with the assistance of the Prophets and Priests oftentimes had a zeal like fire to consume the grown corruptions and purge and purifie the Church yet there is no light that there was any such fiery tryal of those that were to come to the
Sacrifices or Sacrament St. Paul begot the Corinthians to Christ and that body by many distempers soon grew corrupt and in purifying thereof the Apostle prescribes no such looking to the state of those that were to be admitted to the Sacrament he onely commands every man to examine himself none to examine another not to take our Prospect at too great a distance The Morning Star of the Reformation arose to dispel and clear the contagious Mist of Popish Errors Superstitions and Usurpations yet we cannot discern the least foot-step of any such way of examination but whosoever professed a desire of Communion with them was accepted and received into fellowship with them in the Sacraments unless by any notorious crime he forfeited it 7. And if the question thus stated be the mark the Apologists shoot at let us with a touch onely and in general here try how their arrows will fit or reach it They have mustered up in the 25. and following Sections sundry Arguments grounded on Texts of Scripture to verifie their judgment and defend their practice Doth any of them conclude the question thus stated I beseech you try in which of their Syllogismes is this Thesis the conclusion It is necessary in the reformation of a long corrupt Church that all members thereof submit to some examination of their knowledge Nay which of them mentions any examination onely one Text speaks of giving an answer but not to the purpose or which specifies the Sacrament as that in order whereunto the duty injoyned is to be performed one excepted where is a command for men to examine themselves none to submit themselves to be examined by another The withdrawing from noting not eating with not giving holy things or casting pearles shutting up keeping out c. is to be understood in their own sense of men of wicked lives nothing here intended of men defective in knowledge and neither can examination be concluded out of the Texts but by making petitio principii the medium viz. that what is there injoyned as duty cannot be complyed with but by such examination But then for the limiting and restraining of all to the time of Reformation of a long corrupt Church the Chymists that can extract oyl out of steel and flint volitant velut umbrae compared with these men whose omnipotence of Logick can create something out of nothing Who ever till now suspected that onely in the reformation of a corrupt Church things ought to be done in order and decency The precious to be separated from the vile that we should be delivered from unreasonable and evil men and withdraw our selves from every brother that walketh disorderly That we must not cast pearles before Swine and give holy things to Dogs nor be partakers of other mens sins that we ought to obey them that rule over us c. As if at other times when a long corrupt Church is not to be reformed we need not nor are obliged to do any of these things Diogenes seeing a roving Archer ran to stand at the mark as the safest place so surely all the Apologists shafts are shot so extremely wide that I may willingly chuse to keep my self at this mark which they set up for the state of their question and yet never fear to be hurt with any of their arrowes Concerning examination the paper did never absolutely oppose it as precedanous to this Ordinance as they suggest I might say to the Apologists as St. Augustine did to Cresconius Lege prius diligenter contra quod scribis aut intellige quae dicuntur aut noli quod intelligis vertere in aliud for the very first inspection into the paper will cleare it of that charge it is denyed to be necessary that all be examined but it is affirmed of some viz. such of whom there is a violent suspicion that they are ignorant that it is meet they should be examined and these propositions carry neither Diagonall nor interpretative contradiction Though they have not yet prompted us with the least Jota of Scripture that might enforce this examination preparatory and dispositive to the Sacrament nor helped us to the smallest colour of reason to evince it to be more requisite in order to the Sacrament than other Ordinances yet we shall here tell them First that wee doe not so much question the conveniency of examining as the necessity thereof Durum est quod necesse est said Quintilian As love is the sweetning of labour and ubi amor est non est labor sed sapor so necessity is the imbittering of all undertakings like the Salamander which if laid to the root of a tree it never flourisheth or prospers Quod cogitur altera mors est As the Colossus at Tarentum might be moved with a finger but not at all stirred if one set his whole force to it so many may be facil to goe that are impatient to be driven and lesse cheerfully chuse to doe that which they cannot chuse It is a memorable Story which Cardan tells us of him in Millaine who having in sixty yeers been never without the Walls yet when the Duke hearing thereof sent him peremptory command never to goe out of the Gates during life he that before had no inclination to doe so yet soone dyed with greefe to be denyed the liberty of doing it Because therefore we would not be brought under a yoke or into bondage of any thing we strive to stand fast in that liberty wherein we thinke God and the gifts which he hath given us have set us free 2. We doe not altogether dispute whether they may call men to examination as whether it be so necessary ratione medii so as that if they will not come under it they have power for that cause onely to keep them from the Sacrament Lo. Verulam We shall say of this matter as a learned Man doth of Alchimy which intends to improve baser Metalls into Gold and then with one drop of that Elixir to transmute a whole Sea of Quicksilver into Gold That the foundation is more facible than the superstructure the antecedent more rationall than the consequent the proposition more plausible than the inference So in the first part they may pretend colour but in the second are blanke A Land-lord may require his Tenant to bring forth his Lease and shew his title but if he thinke himselfe not obliged to produce it it follows not that he may be thrust from his Tenement When Bellarmine arguing for Auricular confession and agitating the History of Nectarius Bellarm. de poenitent lib. 3. cap. 14. pag. 304 305. tom 6. Denison de auricul confess cap. 14. p. 92. objects that Adversarii non admittunt homines ad Eucharistiam nisi exploratos and for proofe thereof besides Melancthon cites Calvin Interim quin sistunt se oves pastori quoties sacram coenam participare volunt adeò non reclamo ut maximè velim hoc ubique observari Dr. Denison answers Illam consuetudinem