and intelligible Our great difference is in making a just Comment and in finding out the true sense and meaning of the words of the first Declaration Here by the way there is just matter of complaint that the said words should need any Comment for I look upon this Declaration thus openly to be made before the face of God and the whole Congregation of the same nature and congenerous with an Oath wherein things ought to be expressed perspicuously and evidently the sense of them easie and fixedly the same to every understanding and this if possible beyond all scruple or hesitation and not like Delph Oracles with their meaning doubtful intricate and involved and as occasion shall serve 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quickly to be turned from what at the first hearing they seemingly imported and intended You say Assent and Consent intend no more than Vse and Submission and that this is all in effect which is required of the Conforming Clergy I wish it had been so worded in the Declaration and instead of saying I A.B. do declare my unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained and prescribed in and by the Book entituled the Book of Common Prayer we might have said I A.B. will submit to the use of all and everything contained in c. Because for peace sake I can submit where I do not like and chuse and in this sense notwithstanding your scorn of a very wise and grave observation I do yet take the words Assent and Consent and am not removed from my first apprehension and explanation of them In the words of the Declaration there is an Agent an act the object The Agent is the Person or Minister declaring and this unfeignedly and sincerely from his heart the Act is this person his assenting and consenting Now this act of assenting as to the Party declaring relates to his understanding and as to the thing assented to relates to the truth and rightfulness of it So likewise again the act of consenting relates to his will and as to the thing consented to to the goodness expediency and behooffulness of it This is what you deride and hold that the intervention of truth and goodness need not be supposed as a necessary ingredient to what we declare we assent and consent unto but in so declaring we mean and intend only this that we will submit to the use of all and every thing contained and prescribed c. whether they be in their own nature if strictly examin'd most eligible and behoofful to be observed and practised yea or not Now this your Exposition of assent and consent I look upon as weak and faulty no more coming up to the full purport of the words considered in themselves than to the purpose of the Law-makers who framed and injoyned them to be declared For I take it for granted that this Declaration was thus worded by the most Reverend Clergy Archbishops Bishops Deans and such other Divines and this too for Divines and Ministers of the Gospel to be declared by them as the test of their worthiness and meetness for the Ministerial Function accordingly therefore such persons may rationally and well be supposed to use the words in sensu Theologico in a Divine or Scriptural sense and not otherwise Now in the Scripture phrase we find assent and consent fully and altogether according to the exposition which I have given of them As for example sake we have found this man a pestilent fellow and a mover of Sedition among the Jews and the Jews assented saying These things were so Assented that is they avouched what Tertullâ—s had witnessed against Paul was the very truth Shall not their Cattel and their substance and every beast of theirs be ours Let us consent unto them and they will dwell with us Let us consent unto them that is let us willingly and readily chuse and imbrace their terms since the end obtained by them will be so good and gainful so beneficial and profitable for us Thus S. Paul saith I consent unto the Law that it is good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eo quod or therefore because it is good Thus generally these words are taken in the description of Faith among Divines who tell and teach us that Faith is made up of these three parts Assent Consent and Affiance Faith as it is assent acknowledgeth and avoweth the truth and certainty of Gospel-Revelation especially concerning the Messiah and the promise of life by and through him Faith as it is consent imbraceth and receiveth the blessing and goodness of this promise as most behoofful and advantagious unto us And from hence is excited readily chearfully and thankfully to close in with Christ upon his own Conditions and Proposals as the only way to happiness Faith as it is affiance resteth and relieth upon the veracity of the Speaker and stability of the Covenant to felicitate our state and save us from all the evil and misery sin hath brought upon us By what I have spoken we may the better perceive the genuine force and meaning of assent and consent the Object of these acts now therefore offers it self to our consideration which I say according to the Declaration is all and every thing contained and prescribed in and by the Book intituled the Book of Common Prayer whereas you as a general Salvo suppose the word Use to be the next object or matter of those acts on which they terminate as thus I assent and consent to the use ordoing of all those things contained in and prescribed by c. But now is this seemly or tolerable in a most solemn Protestation oran Oath to have the main matter of it brought in only by the blind Wicket and back-door of a supposition why was not this word openly mentioned and expressed why was it not enjoyned us thus to declare I assent and consent to the use and doing of all and every thing contained c How can we know the Law-makers intended or will admit of any such a Subaudi What you mention as their Preface to the Declaration is somewhat but not sufficient my Reason is this because in the Book of common-Common-Prayer there are Credenda as well as Agenda things of Faith as well as of Practice yea some things only of Faith and not of Practice Now I cannot but think our Law-mâ—kers in commanding this Declaration did as zealously and carefully design the conformity of our Faith even as of our practice to the Frame and Model of Theology contained in the Liturgy I am sure in right reason the first ought to be aimed at by them before the last and the last only as the result of the first unless they thought all Conformists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bruit Animals rather than rational Creatures surely they would not thus reproach them of their own Coat who bear themselves high upon their own understanding above others and think it but Justice to
thing contained in and commanded by the Book of common-Common-Prayer Should I be required to give my approbation of this fault or else could not be admitted into Society with them I would rather bear their Excommunication and like an Hermit serve God in the Wilderness by my self alone than joyn myself to them So vast a difference there is between being in Communion where faults are for what Church is free from them and owning those faults yea making such an owning and approbation the Lydius lapis whether we are fit for Communion yea or not Now this is the very case of poor Non-Conformists with those who have outed them But to return Recrimination is no Self-justification besides in most of our Meetings there is on Lords-days at least constant reading of the Scripture besides the Exposition and giving of the sense of it with much care and pains to the edification of the Hearers I cannot approve of the Order appointed for the Ministration of Baptism because of the strict requiring of Godfathers and Godmothers to stand as bounden Sureties and Undertakers for the Child viz. that he shall renounce the Devil and all his Works c. You say Godfathers and Godmothers are not so strictly required as to make it essential to the nature of Baptism as is evident in private Baptism which is declared valid without it I never objected any such essential strictness this therefore is meer impertinency Yet reading over the Ministration of private Baptism as it is appointed to be further and fully compleated by the Minister there I find Godfathers and Godmothers interrogated and fully ingaging on the Childs behalf as well as in publick But suppose Godfathers and Godmothers are not called upon in private Baptism to make such a promise this is only in a rare extraordinary case of extremity and out of the general usual road we know some others in the like exigency will grant a greater liberty so much do they attribute to the Opus Operatum that they will give leave to the Midwife to baptize rather than fail One Swallow makes no Summer Herein also you run from the matter in hand I say Godfathers and Godmothers are usually brought to the Font to avouch a great untruth for though they make such a solemn promise on the Childs behalf they seldome perform it This you fully acknowledge past contradiction but charge it as a fault upon the Godfathers and Godmothers and not at all upon the Constitution yea you highly applaud the prudence and piety of the Church in taking such a care for the vertuous education of the Children baptized But quo warranto who hath authorized the Church to lay such a charge upon any besides the Parents upon whom God has laid it and if upon any why upon those who are called Godfathers and Godmothers rather than upon others of the Congregation who are all eye-witnesses of the baptizing of the Child as well as they As we may not make more sins than God has made sins so neither more duties than God has made duties why therefore in particular should we impose the duty on Godfathers and Godmothers to look to the well education of the Child baptized when God has not imposed it especially we may not do it where the fulfilling this duty is an utter impossibility as sometimes it falls out in the matter before us Sometimes persons are Sureties for Children by their Proxies themselves living in another Country how can these see the said Children vertuously brought up when they never see them Sometimes Boys and Girls stand as Godfathers and Godmothers for the Infant at the Font these are very likely to make good their promise when they are scarce in a capacity to understand what they say so far are they from a right apprehension of the matter they ingage in Whereby it appears that the great care of the Church for the health and safety of those she receives into her Bosom which is so much spoken of and magnified is no more than a meer pretence and dwindles into a sorry shadow of words and names For if there was such a true and real care as is given out and vaunted why will ye the Ministers admit of any such as I have now mentioned to be Godfathers and Godmothers ye except against none that I hear of And why will you lay a charge upon these of doing what in reason ye cannot but be convinced they are not in a condition to perform Verily if a man should judge according to your Quotidian practice I should be prone to believe ye your selves scarce think it an absolute necessity for Godfathers and Godmothers to perform their Font-promises for setting aside only what is there barely read before them I never met with any Book Sermon or Discourse wherein the duty of Godfathers and Godmothers is pressed upon them with reference to their God-children not any thing to mind them of their Obligation or move them to the fulfilling of it Who therefore can imagine ye think it much material further than the Pomp and Ceremony of their appearing whether such Godfathers and Godmothers look to the good manners of the Children baptized yea or not If men and women were throughly convinced by the Word of God what great Bonds they lye under by being Godfathers and Godmothers according to their own oral protestation and form of speech there dictated to their hands notwithstanding what you speak of the easiness of the performance of the promise it would be hard to find out such voluntary Stipulators or collateral security in the case but the Minister and his Clerk should be necessitated to undertake that Province from time to time Again I approve not of the Order appointed for the Ministration of Baptism because the Father of the Child is left out not mentioned and taken notice of at all in the publick Stipulation as if he had no concern in it though it is his proper place to undertake this charge for his own Child according to the Law of God and Nature With the highest scorn you justifie this way by the similitude of a Debtor and Sureties bound with him for an hundred pounds But I never yet saw such a Bond where the Principal and indeed the sole Debtor is not expresly and in the first place named for if he be not expresly named how can any notice at all be taken that the Money was lent unto him which is as you know your own concession yea if he be not expresly named as a Debtor in point of Law he has nothing to do with the Bond or the Bond with him which yet is the thing you would expose me for Your comparison affects me not nor makes against me but rather on my side For let the Father be the chief Debtor to bring up his own Child in the nurture and admonition of the Lord and some of his Friends I mean Godfathers and Godmothers be Sureties with him that this Debt shall
yet it is not prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer that is it is never to be used and we assent and consent only to the use of those things which are both contained in and prescribed by that Book This word both thrust in by your self as you imagine gives you your quietus est Hitherto I have taken you for a Divine but now one would think you some cunning subtil Lawyer with your Tricks and Quirks you have found out an unexpected Loop-hole to escape and baffle your Bond which hath lost all force and vertue of Obligation in sensu diviso because it only binds in sensu composito Yet pardon me Sir for I must assume the liberty to keep this Yoke still upon your Neck shake it off how you can But how Thus You dare not but acknowledge that the great and learned Sages of the Church who composed and worded this Declaration were compotes mentis and understood what they did better than your self or any such Expositor and therefore had as it hath been shewn already when they put in these words assent and consent into the said Declaration credenda as well as agenda in their thoughts and intentions they had equally an eye to both these in the time of the composing it Besides what is there spoken for the clearing of this truth I am now further confirmed in my Opinion by the two following Participles contained in and prescribed by which very naturally and almost necessarily answer the foregoing Substantives Assent and Consent to such an end and purpose as thus I declare my unfeigned assent to all and every thing as truth and right to be believed which is contained in the Book of common-Common-Prayer and I declare my unfeigned consent to all and every thing as good and eligible to be practised and observed which is prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer Here is Grammar and sense and I suppose the very sense intended by the Law-makers Surely they well weighed every several and distinct word in such a set and solemn Protestation and therefore every several distinct word in it hath its several distinct weight and purpose for far be it from me to charge such considerate Composers as guilty of any Tautology much less of Battology unto which you will cause them to approach too near if assent and consent unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained and prescribed in and by the Book c. do refer to and terminate upon use and practice only without any further aim then it had been fully enough to say I declare my unfeigned consent to all and every thing prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer and no need at all either of the word assent or of the word contained in to be once mentioned or thought upon You therefore deserve a rebuke from your Superiours for your presumptuous intrusion who made you of their counsel why should you leave out or put in any thing without their Commission why should you insert the word use which they never inserted But then you go further for having inserted the word use you say confidently enough that assent and consent to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by centre wholly upon the word use and have no other matter to respect and then again from hence you think you have gained another point concesso uno absurdo c. of freeing your self from the difficulty and pressing force of the Exception against Christned Infants their certain and undoubted Salvation dying without actual sin by saying You are not bound to give assent and consent to this Rubrick because though it be contained in yet it is not prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer that is it is never to be used and we assent and consent only to the use of those things which are both contained in and prescribed by that Book But this is a deep fetch and a fine subtilty of your own never to be allowed What think you of the Church Catechism wherein we have a Compendium of the Churches Faith what does not the Declaration bind you to believe it your self as well as to teach it the Children what think you of the Creed does the Declaration only bind you to rehearse the Articles of it before the Congregation and not believe them your self Surely to the latter as well as the former Every Collect every Prayer has in it a Credendum as well as an Orandum and without the first the last cannot be performed since Faith is of the very essence of Prayer properly so called But what do you imagine the Declaration binds the Minister only to say over those Prayers and not to pray them or pray in them that is not to believe what he prays for to be right and according to Gods holy will and pleasure This seems to me highly Paradox and of a most dangerous consequence Grant you this Postulate and you spoil the whole Declaration as to the great intents and purposes of it for who may not declare in these words I assent and consent to all and every thing c. if nothing of belief but only use and submission be intended by them I have heard of some Jews continuing such without any change of their Religion officiating as Priests among the Papists and Celebrating Mass now why may not such Jews yea Turks also thrust in among our Clergy if by declaring their unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained and prescribed in and by the Book of Common Prayer they signifie no more than that they will read over those Prayers perform those Offices and Ceremonies and submit to the use and doing of every thing enjoyned but in the interim without being obliged at all to believe the things so contained in and prescribed by the Book and so said and done by them to be right good and justifiable They may act as upon a Stage for a livelihood and have no concern about the thing acted or whom they personate Therefore Sir I tell you again you cannot wave the dispute but are bound to believe as well as to do all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer and to believe this in particular concerning the undoubted Salvation of Children baptized and dying before actual sin and this too as a truth asserted plainly and evidently out of Gods Word past all cavil or gain saying Wherefore I humbly and earnestly entreat you as a most learned Textuary to quote the place and satisfie my scruple for until then I dare not declare my unfeigned assent and consent unto such a doubtful and questioned Proposition contained in the Book But you would know of me whether nothing be undoubtedly certain by Scripture but what we have an express Text for Yes many things are undoubtedly certain by Scripture not only in terminis expressâ—s but also by an undeniable consequence wherefore let what is asserted concerning the undoubted Salvation of such Infants be confirmed and
be reputed the most sapient and judicious amongst men It appears by the woful event that more than a thousand Non-conforming Ministers could not thus construe the words of the Declaration when it was first put unto them and required of them which with some other things commanded made them to turn out and lose all rather than lose their Souls in doing what was clearly against their Consciences So that it is not perverseness and folly what-ever you say or think to stick at the words assent and consent but rather from the dictates of a sound mind influenced and awed by the fear of the Lord. Sir Far beyond my desert by the good Providence of God I have had the favour and countenance of several great Persons of Quality who have received me very lovingly and familiarly This I speak my Witness is in Heaven neither to vaunt my self with the glory of it nor yet to put you under any disarray again by the vanity of my pretension but to acquaint you with something to our purpose in the matter before us A little before the black Bartholomew one of the foresaid in discourse enquired of me what mine intentions were and whither I would conform yea or not I answered his Lordship such things were required and enjoyned as I could not swallow and therefore should be necessitated to march off and sound a Retreat His Lordship seemed to be much concerned for me using many Arguments as good as ever I have heard or read from any to reconcile me to a compliance but perceiving me not to be overcome by them while I urged some of these things now mentioned as a just cause of my refusing at last he said with a sigh I wish it had been otherwise but they were resolved either to reproach you or undo you Of which wise and weighty Apothegm I leave you to be the Interpreter Was not Conformity contrived in such a way and manner on purpose either to expose us to common Infamy as Persons who would say and swear and do any thing rather than lose our Livings or else to ruine and undo us by turning us out a grazing in the woful wild of extreme poverty and want About a year after another great Peer ordered me to wait on his Lordship and proposed something to be done by me with reference to the Liturgy which as I thought in my then present circumstances having neither call nor necessity to do I humbly craved leave of his Lordship to be excused therein and speaking yet further about the strict and hard terms of Conformity his Lordship replied I confess I should scarcely do so much for the Bible as they require for the Common-Prayer Both these I assure you are great and learned Noble-men and as far from being Presbyterians as your self yet you may see their Resentments as to what was commanded how little they were pleased with such high and rigorous proceedings and how in the bottom of their hearts they were rather the Advocates than the Accusers of the Non-consenters Yea I perswade my self that many among your selves had scruples more than a few or easie and would then with all their hearts have declined the Test of assent and consent if by any other means they could have escaped the danger it is well for them if they tentured not their Consciences while they tendered their worldly interests and necessities but to chuse to do it from any free act of their own option and will as what was desired and delighted in by them setting aside some high Prelatical Church-men who returned in anger and meditated retaliation was not to be found in the Bosom of many yet even these are called forth to declare their unfeigned assent and consent c. than which words I know none more significant of heart and good will of love and choice as to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer For I pray Sir were you to express your judgment and affection in any matter and how your whole soul and mind is fully pleased satisfied and gratified therein and this beyond all demur and exception how could you more clearly discover your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 than by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of an unfeigned assent and consent unto it for mine own part I profess I know not Therefore it is well remarked by you that assent and consent and approve are words synonymous But you say Cannot we approve of the use of a Book or approve of a Book as lawful to be used as well as assent and consent to the use of it Yes surely But you mistake me for I neither can assent nor consent nor approve of the Book or the use of the Book so as hereby to witness mine own will or desire for the same yet I can use it in submission to Command if I shall judge it not simply unlawful and sinful to do it I can as I have said silently and patiently swallow down some Gnats if my Superiours will have it so but if I shall be required to say I assent and consent and approve of swallowing down Gnats this alters the case and now I can no more swallow them down than if they were Camels Wherefore eo nomine upon the very same account as you ingenuously confess you would be a Non-conformist to any Church in the World I am at this present to the Church of England And upon the same score I think present Conformity harder than formerly the now Declaration being much more comprehensive in its own nature and taking in much more of our mind will and approbation as to all and every thing recounted and specified therein than any foregoing subscription especially than that mentioned by your self in the time of Queen Elizabeth wherein the Clergy were only required to subscribe this promise I shall read the Service appointed plainly distinctly and audibly that all people may hear and understand As for the Articles published by the Authority of King Edward the VI. and particularly that concerning the Book of common-Common-Prayer with subscription thereunto I have not seen them except in your Quotation and therefore can say nothing in the case one way or other but I have two Books of common-Common-Prayer printed in his days the first about the middle the second in the last year of his Reign in neither of which is to be found any Rubrick asserting the certainty of Childrens undoubted Salvation out of Gods Word though they are baptized and die before actual sins there is not I say one syllable to the said purpose in either of them Even this very particular would have rendred Subscription more facile and passable to me had I lived in those days As for the subscription of the three Articles in the time of King James I acknowledge this was one Quod Liber Publicae Liturgiae c. That the Book of common-Common-Prayer contains in it nothing contrary to the Word of God c. Unto
which I had rather and should much sooner subscribe than declare my unfeigned assent and consent supposing the same Book of common-Common-Prayer to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by it For though I cannot prove such and such things to be absolutely contrary to or against Gods Word yet I cannot therefore presently affirm them to be according to Gods Word either as expresly revealed or positively commanded by the Sacred Canon which yet I must be able to do before I can declare my unfeigned assent and consent to the said particulars else I should strangely violate my Conscience and blindly rush forward at all adventures without all reason or judgment As for example though I cannot say concerning Children baptized and dying before actual sin that their undoubted Salvation is absolutely contrary to the Word of God yet never the more can I affirm that their undoubted Salvation is certain and express by the same Therefore though perhaps I might subscribe to the former yet I could not declare my unfeigned assent and consent to the latter One thing I take notice of in these Subscriptions and I wish you would also for your better information viz. That assent and consent relate unto the acknowledgment or avouching the truth and goodness of the things assented and consented to as well as to the use The Great Ends generally mentioned for these Declarations and Subscriptions are Unity and Uniformity in the matters of Religion and Worship whereas the contrary effects of animosity and difference have wofully followed hereupon time after time as we have seen by long and sad experience in continual breaches and dissentions There is and will be a judicium discretionis in every person who will be a Judge in his own concern contra Gentes his own mind and apprehension shall and will dictate to him what is right and what is wrong what is good and what evil both to be believed and practised by him the greatest Authority of his Superiours and the wisest Models of their devised forms for his devotion in any wise notwithstanding nothing shall be able further to subjugate his thoughts to any Idea or System of Service than to what may be truly said to be his own I mean according to his own understanding and therefore much less to an oneness and sameness of opinion and judgment of it with those that are above him though commending and commanding it to be received and observed meerly because they are so Wherefore as it is the wisdome of the Church to chuse such a Creed as all who stile themselves Christians do universally agree in so likewise it would be the highest prudence to pitch upon such a Declaration which all Ministers might securely and freely assent and consent unto without all scruple or hesitation as the Test of their Conformity I will not presume to mention the nature and quality of such an one but shall leave it wholly to my Superiours and Betters And let these in Gods Name enjoyn all Ministers both to declare and do whatsoever the Word of God requires of them to capacitate them for Church-work and no more then should I expect Unity and Uniformity in all things of moment with peaceable toleration and forbearance in the rest to the glory of God and the greatest edification of the Church and never before Then also I would be among the first who would humbly offer my self as a Candidate to that high and holy Function though in the meanest and poorest place of preferment But it is high time to come to particulars I cannot approve of the Order appointed for the reading of the Scriptures my reason was because many Books of Apocrypha are commanded to be read for the Lessons of the day as the fabulous Legends of Tobit and his Dog Bell and the Dragon c. while some Books of the Sacred Canon are wholly left out c. This I perceive touches you to the quick this is confidence and impudence this is matter of exclamation against our invenomed tongues and pens and against our persons as Pharisaical Schismaticks and what not I see your zeal for Apocrypha will cause you presently to fly on the faces of those who shall dare to speak a word in any diminution or derogation of it and this only too as it Rivals the Holy Canon Yet say what you can in the justification of Apocrypha how the stories therein were received by many of the Ancient Fathers for truth and reality and how supposing them fiction and fancy profitable they are for instruction comfort reproof as the Parables of Christ himself so many say they can profit as much at a Play as at a Sermon yet Apocrypha is Apocrypha still and those very Books appointed ro be read full of absurdities and impossibilities as I could easily demonstrate in several notorious circumstances but this would be actum agere since it hath been sufficiently manifested by many Protestant Pens against the Papists here therefore I shall leave you to be censured and chastised of all who are not of the red Letter or looking that way As for mine own part I ran over the Kalender and saw there one whole Month together viz. October filled with Apocryphal Books Forenoon and Afternoon appointed for the Lessons of the day the same likewise in November unto the twenty fourth day of it besides what went before in September of the same kind while some Books Canonical are wholly left out which I did not approve of neither can I find any thing of better information from your self to change my mind and the rather because I am fully perswaded some parts of Scripture are omitted and shut out which contain in them more to the profit and edification of the Hearers than all the Books of Apocrypha put together yea it were little less than a Blasphemy to say and think otherwise Let us not presume to be wiser than God But you say Nothing of Apocrypha is appointed for Sundays whoever laid this to your charge Yet if you speak truth then some of your Ministers are not well skill'd in the order of reading who as I am told by Ear-witnesses do sometimes on Sundays read out of Apocrypha whether they then read according to the common Monthly Kalender and not according to the proper Lessons appointed for Sundays or whether they so read when an Holy-day whose proper Lesson is out of Apocrypha falls to be on a Sunday when there is proper against proper and the Minister left at discretion which of the propers he will chuse I shall not trouble my self about it but leave it in medio to the wise and learned in the case You say in our Conventicles we read little of Scripture indeed too little Pudet haec opprobria nobis and wish it were otherwise with all mine heart for I am as far from assenting and consenting to any such omission and neglect as I would be to all and every
of every wicked and profligate Wretch buried by the Liturgy Truth saith concerning such persons 2 Tim. 2.16 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that while they were alive as the word imports they were taken captive by the Devil Who therefore can believe that they made an escape from him and got out of his Clutches by death and not rather then fell under his power in a more fearful manner The Devil had and has still the power of Death in respect of all impenitent sinners as the Carnifex or Executioner has power over those who are condemned to die and accordingly put into his hands that the Sentence may be actually fulfilled But now are the Condemned ever known to escape from the Hangman after he has Noosed them in the Halter and actually trussed them up I think not So again who can believe that abominable wicked workers against whom I make the objection go immediately after death into the hands of the great God to be disposed of by him according to the promises of the Gospel-Covenant when the said persons had never the least qualification of Grace and Holiness to entitle them to the Covenant of Grace or the promise of the Gospel but utterly the contrary What therefore is this Harangue and flourish of words were they not only uttered by Mr. Falkner but also by an Angel to satisfie my scruple or give me a Licence when I am to bury the worst and most vile amongst men to say Forasmuch as it hath pleased God of his great mercy to take unto himself the Soul of our dear Brother Neither is there then place or season to mention any thing of a sure and certain hope of the Resurrection unto eternal life unless to imbolden wicked livers to continue stilâ— in their sins much less to use any such expression in prayer That when we shall depart this life we may rest in him Christ as our hope is this our Brother doth Alas what well-grounded hopes can either Minister or people have and hâ—rbour of Drunkards Whoremongers Adulterers cursed Swearers and the like their resting in Christ who every day are brought unto the ground and buried by the Liturgy You say There are various degrees of hopes and some of them so little that we can hardly deny them to any person though never so wicked I confess in this particular your Charity and Hope is much beyond mine and yet I think mine is regulated according to the Gospel But your fullest justification of your Church in this matter is by supposing this Office of Burial to be performed only to persons dying in Communion with the Church I look upon it as the best Apology and I have heard it again and again yet it is not equal nor satisfactory because it supposeth if not an impossibility yet the greatest improbability For it is known upon matter of fact that Excommunication was never duly exercised nor Church-Discipline ever duly administred nor indeed likely to be for the future while in the interim multitudes multitudes of ungodly men are brought to the ground and there the last Office done unto them as if they were the most Godly and approved by the Church The Church supposeth or maketh a Foundation which is not and then buildeth her practice upon it against all right and seemliness It is as if I certainly knowing such and such persons to be really mad and out of their wits by a long Quotidian experience and yet from time to time would treat and converse with them as persons most sober and discreet because being men it must be supposed that they have exercise of reason and understanding But rather than not justifie the Office for the Dead and not to help out the defect of due Excommunication you say I doubt not but whosoever shall leave out that sentence as our hope is this our Brother doth at the burial of some notorious profligate sinners complies with the intention of the Church and may justifie himself to his Superiours for doing so I answer Antiquum obtines you are semper idem beginning and ending with the same mind and in the same way You can put in and leave out to serve a turn according to your pleasure and yet not be a Transgressor but comply with the intention of the Church Surely there is no such matter for the Church hath expresly ordered concerning the last prayers for the Office whereof these words as our hope is this our Brother doth are a part in this manner Then the Priest shall say shall say that is he must and ought to say them and never omit them Here the Minister is expresly commanded and much more than to baptize without the Sign of the Cross as you could urge in the case of private Baptism though most illogically and most remotely from true reason as far as a privative is from a positive and a Non-entity from a Being To conclude if you do not when you bury the dead though known beyond all peradventure to die in their sins use these very words as our hope is this our Brother doth you are a Transgressor against the Church inasmuch as you directly disobey her express order and rule and you contradict your own Declaration and little less than give the Lye to your own solemn Oath and Asseveration for then and there you declared your unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained and prescribed in and by the Book entituled the Book of common-Common-Prayer and therefore to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the said Book for the Burial of the Dead which yet you like not nor approve in such and such cases that too often occur as to such and such persons which are every day upon the Biere but rather you think it right and meet to omit and skip them over as not proper to be applied not good to be mentioned On the other side if you use these words as our hope is this our Brother doth viz. rest in Christ at the Sepultures of the Sons of Belial while you obey the Churches order you are a transgressor against your own Conscience in uttering what you believe not and a transgressor against God in mentioning this your hope before him in your prayers as if you had good ground and authority for it out of his holy Word concerning the persons deceased when as in reality there is nothing in the Scriptures of Truth to intimate or countenance such an hope but altogether on the contrary to strike a fear in our hearts of their most miserable restless state under eternal death and damnation Sir What in your Conclusion you are pleased to stile the only piece of ingenuity in me is still my mind and judgment and I do not retract from it in the least let it displease whom it shall displease as I believe it will do many And what you say I acknowledge to be a great truth whether properly and directly inferred from my Concession yea or not
viz. That there is a real difference between that conformity which is requir'd of a Clergy man and that which is required of a Lay-man You add further The use I would make of this acknowlodgment is this that whatever objections there may be against conforming as a Minister there are none against conforming as a private Christian and therefore that nothing he hath said ought to disswade private Christians from conforming to the Church of England by his own confession I answer Let the persons concerned judge and do according as God and a good Conscience shall dictate unto them but as for mine own part were I one of them I should not cordially chuse and approve of him to be my Shepherd nor easily assent and consent to sit under his Pastoral charge if good Pasture might be found and had elsewhere who entreth not by the door into the Sheepfold but climbeth up some other way especially if this other way appeared to me to be too too like the way which David most devoutly prayed against Psal 119.29 Remove from me the way of lying Amen The Second Part. AFter a Confutation in Quarto another is brought to my hands in Folio I have kill'd him for a Villain said he on the Stage and made him an Example What have you kill'd him kill him again I was kill'd sufficiently as one would think by my first Antagonist notwithstanding to make sure work another comes in with his deadly stab and will needs kill me the second time and yet I find and feel a quite contrary effect and even return into life by this renewed death while the first of these as it were with a strong puff of wind blows out my Candle and the second with a sharper blows it in again and my Candle burns still as bright as ever For comparing one Confutation with another I am the better informed to answer them both and continue more stedfastly the same what I was in my first opinion inasmuch as in several things mine Opponents are not more contrary to me than contrary to themselves in what they write against me though yet in their spirit and temper they are one full of wrath censure and bitterness a man that shall touch them must be fenced with Iron and the Staff of a Spear else they will pierce and gore intollerably I have scuffled with the first as well as I could and am now come to encounter the last Sir Your Introduction is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the common place called Reviâ—ing and Reproaching and though it be particularly calculated for a Preface against me yet it may indifferently serve as a general Exordium to any Philippick against the whole Tribe of the Non conformists in all Controversies whatsoever I have heard of one beholding a great pair of Gates to a very little City said facetiously to the Citizens Pray shut your Gates lest the City run out and be lost such me thinks is your large beginning above the proportion of the following matter it being more than a sixth of the whole O how copious and fluent are you in this kind of Rhetorick how is your Pen as the tongue of a ready Speaker None I dare say about the Bridge can out-do you or put you down but I check my self for I have a better answer prepared to my hand in which I shall acquiesce not rendring evil for evil or raiâ—ing for railing but contrariwise blessing I bless the Lord Jesus that I am accounted worthy among my Brethren to suffer shame for his Name and I pray God to bless you in turning your heart from your causless prejudice and wrathful indignation against us This is all I have to reply to your Premises and now come to the work before us I could not declare my assent and consent mine unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer This you say may be one of my chief scruples that I could not prevaricate with Authority had there been allowed a lâ—ttle Equivocation and might I have been permitted to give an assent and consent which were not unfeigned the task had not been so intollerable but to require such an assent and consent searches men to the bottom and beats the Hypocrite out of all his Subterfugies who can bear it I answer The declaring of my unfeigned assent and consent is a great scruple to me though not hereby to be kept from a little Equivocation with man but from a down-right lying before God and against mine own Conscience and the rather as you truly observe because such an unfeigned assent and consent search me to the bottom yet not because I am an Hypocrite according to your supposition but because I am none my tongue and my heart being as they ought to be perfect Unisons and going together For if I were an Hypocrite indeed I could easily find my several Subterfugies and no such Declaration should be ever able to bear me out of them Herein therefore you are out But in the interim upon the whole matter you plainly infer what was denied by your Fore-man that Conformity is now much stricter than in former days and this also designedly You say Because of some possible Errata or faults that may escape in the printing of the Book of common-Common-Prayer or otherwise I scruple to give my unfeigned assent and consent unto all and every thing contained in it but this is a weak foundation and the Cavil trivial and therefore you leave me to be noted in my folly I answer It is you and not I who make such Errata properly so called which may be found in the Common-Prayer Book as well as in any other Book wholly besides the intention of the Composers of them to be the true proper and main ground of my bogling at the Declaration for I plainly by name except against the Order appointed for reading the holy Scriptures against the Order appointed for the administration of Baptism and so against the Order appointed for the burying of the Dead Now the things wherein I except against these in my apprehension are not Errata but Errors not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 however I am sure they are not escapes by accident and besides the intention of the Law-makers but are both contained in and prescribed by the Book as some of the substance and chief matter of it and this too confirmed by the Rubrick By what I have now spoken I clearly free my self from the absurdity of calling Errata the Contents of any Book or Writing as you would fasten upon me against all apparent truth and reason And whereas you say My scruple cannot affect you here because though such Errata may be contained in yet they are not prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer I have evidenced the contrary in the instances forementioned wherefore the Coat you would put upon me is more proper for another who lets the true
Enemy alone and fights against his own shadow as if it were an armed man and then triumphs like a Thraso in his wonderful Manhood for vanquishing such an Appearance But say you Do we not think we may safely assent and consent to the Contents of any Writings that pass an Estate for fear of Errata which by frequent copying out and transcribing the enrolled Deeds may happen to be there I answer I never yet heard of any such Writings of Conveyance or Charters of Liberties and Properties where the Parties concerned were called to declare their unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in them or else should be punished with the loss of their Temporal Rights which yet is the penalty of all those who will not assent and consent to all and every thing contained in the Book of common-Common-Prayer I have sometimes seen the Accounts of Merchants adjusted and subscribed by their names but with this Proviso saving all errours in them unknown to our selves Now upon this condition you and I will quickly compromise the difference let me insert these words Saving all errours which may be found therein as your Fore-man was good at inserting and I will readily declare my unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the Book of common-Common-Prayer But I charge my Governours at least by insinuation with a pretending to an Infallibility in their requiring an unfeigned assent and consent to all things devised and prescribed by them but this is an odious Inference I answer How odious soever yet if the Charge be true the odiousness is not at all to be imputed to the Insinuation but wholly to the Injunction But say you This is destructive to the reason of all Laws and by this Argument every Law-giver must be supposed to be Infallible the end of all whose Injunctions are to be assented and consented to I answer This is nothing destructive to other Laws because Law-makers in making those Laws never require of the people any such unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by their Institutes but only submission and obedience Secular Laws reach only to compliance of the outward man and not meddle with our thoughts and Conscience whereas this Declaration requires the inward approbation of the mind will and heart as well as the outward observation in matter of practise which is one great ground of our Quarrel against it But say you If it be necessary there should be a Rule of Uniformity 't is necessary that men subscribe to it not as an absolute Rule of Conscience but as a Rule of Peace and Ordor and this is all the Church requires that they so far submit their wills and understandings to their Governours as for these ends to conform to what they have prescribed I answer We must and ought to submit our will and understanding to the prescription of our Governours both in Conformity and in every case so far forth as Conscience will allow us and no further Conscience will intermeddle and be inquisitive into all our actions whether we will or no and if Truth and Right be not at the bottom Peace and Order which otherwise in general should prevail much with us will never be able to free and justifie us from the inward severe censure and condemnation of it The Composers of this Book of common-Common-Prayer thought all things therein right and good in every particular but unto this I replied Though this was their perswasion yet it might not be every mans perswasion and therefore I said I thought it not equal to compel all others jurare in verba Magistri to declare themselves to be fully of the same mind and judgment with them my reason was Hast thou Faith have it to thy self force it not upon others compel them not to think as thou thinkest and to declare as thou declarest Now you would know of the scrupulous Non-conformist whether this rule be given to the publick Officers of the Church or to the private Christian I answer This Rule is given to all Christians whether publick or private according to the several occurences which may befal them You should have rather queried About what this rule is given I would have told you that it was given concerning things which are not evidently and certainly true and good in their own nature beyond all doubtful disputation now such are many things contained in the Liturgy as the reading of Apocrypha signing with the sign of the Cross c. these things are not of an infallible truth nor are we sure of the goodness of them in their own nature by the Word of God wherefore here the forementioned rule is most apposite and necessary Hast thou Faith have it to thy self in these uncertain doubtful matters compel not others to judge as thou judgest nor to affirm what thou affirmest But say you Why or how then can there be any publick Sanctions in the world I answer There should be no publick Sanctions especially in the matters of God and his Worship unto which every private Professor shall be called and necessitated to give his unfeigned assent and consent as we are bound to do in all things with reference to the Liturgy but the truth and goodness of them in their own nature should instantly and apparently be seen by every eye beyond all scruple or doubtful hesitation for otherwise whosoever shall so declare his unfeigned assent and consent will either do it blindly at all adventures or else unfaithfully with a wavering uncertain judgment or else wickedly against his own mind and thoughts Wherefore the highest of publick Magistrates may not abuse their Power into any oppressive compulsion but are bound for Peace sake and for Conscience sake not to bind the Consciences of the people to believe and imbrace their private particular Sentiments as if they were Oracular and beyond all questioning but leave them to their own liberty to judge as they please until such time as they are better informed and more fully convinced But say you A publick Church-Officer may reject an Heretick I answer What is this to the matter before us Because he may reject an Heretick that is one who denies the Fundamentals of Religion and Godliness therefore he is above this rule Hast thou Faith have it to thy self and may compel those under him to believe what he believes and say what he saith From such a kind of wild reasoning libera nos I profess I am at my wits end here as in several other places to find what you drive at how then shall I fence my self against you I wished as to the Liturgy our Law-givers had required no more than use and submission as preceding Governours hâ—d done before them You say And what is more required I answer Very much for when I declare my unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing c.
I speak as much as can be spoken in words to express my love approbation and choice concerning all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the Book as most true and unquestionable to be believed as most eligible and desirable to be observed in every Office Service Rite Ceremony and Circumstance thereof but when I only submit to the use of the Liturgy I yield for peace and order's sake to my Superiours in things not simply sinful and unlawful though in themselves far from perfection and far from my desire in my own free choice and election And what I have now asserted with little less than a contradiction to your self you have acknowledged already in your foregoing discourse Paragraph 4. And in this very Paragraph you do it again when you say 'T is our Zeal too they are offended at that beyond what our preceding Governours did with reference to this Book of common-Common-Prayer we thus strictly enjoyn that Ministers do declare their unfeigned assent and consent but are not the men we have to deal with those that are gone off from all obedience to Church and State and is it not reason we take some pledge of them for their future integrity Is any man found guilty of a much less hainous Indictment and yet discharged without giving Sureties for his behaviour Shall men who have broken through Oaths of Allegiance shall such men be displeased if we cannot take the Viper into our Breast without pulling out the Sting That we dare not admit men of these Principles and Practices to come into the Church without giving such Caution of their being in good earnest as may justifie those in admitting them who have the care of the Publick Now what is the purport and meaning of all these words and many more of the same nature but plainly to tell us that an harder Yoke is now put upon our Necks than upon Ministers in former days and that our Governours had all reason to make our Bonds stronger as for the punishment of by-past miscarriages so for the prevention of future relapses Here therefore you forget your self But you say It is not necessary to the assent and consent here required that every particular person should take upon him expresly to determine in all these points 't is sufficient that nothing is sinful much less doth it become his humility to oppose the Opinion he hath of a thing 's being good and expedient to the sense and reason of his Governours 't is matter of obedience belongs unto him c. I answer Though this be your mind and judgment I am clearly of another Opinion I must determine in all points whether the things be right and good yea or not before I can assent and consent unto them I must be well ascertained what I affirm for a truth to be a truth indeed else I may be guilty of some degree of lying in speaking the very truth It is not contrary to humility but the just and due exercise of reason to search into the goodness and expediency of whatsoever I am called to assent and consent unto by whomsoever commanded yea and to oppose my private Opinion to the sense and reason of my Governours if what they stile sense and reason shall evidently appear to be without sense and reason and at the widest distance in a contrary way Every man is bound to see with his own eyes and to judge from his own understandings if he will act like a rational Creature it is not the part of Gospel-humility but of Sheepish stupidity to follow our Leaders not at all considering or judging of the way but by a blind Implicit Faith and submission yielding to be turned into every path meerly because it is their pleasure and appointment Thus far in general now in particular I excepted against the order and appointment for the reading of the holy Scriptures because many Books of Apocrypha are commanded to be read for the Lessons of the day as the Book of Tobit Bell and the Dragon c. while some of the Sacred Canon are wholly left out c. Now for the removing this Exception you say We desire that our Governours be not blamed if according to their best discretion they have chosen out such parts of Scripture to be read in the Congregation which are most intelligible and if they have omitted others which they thought would not be for the edification of a vulgar Auditory and if they have mixed some of Apocrypha as may be of wholesome instruction I answer Though you would not have your Governours blamed for this mixture yet some others will question their zeal and discretion herein and think they have just reason so to do For who shall presume to be wiser than Christ for the good nurture of his Church who shall take on them to determine which is most intelligible and most edifying to the people either the holy Scripture or any other writings I am sure he that knows it hath said All Scripture and therefore that part of Scripture also which is left out of the Kalendar is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for Doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be perfect throughly furnished to all good works There is no such testimony left on Record concerning any of the best parts of Apocrypha though some of those appointed to be read in the Congregation are far from the best to say no more Therefore this appointment by our Governours may well be scrupled but then the other appointment upon this appointment is most highly to be blamed I mean in their requiring all Ministers to declare an unfeigned assent and consent to this their appointment though in their own hearts at least many of them do not approve of this order but wish it were otherwise But is this a reason say you to break Communion with a Church let any man judge To this I have answered already for though I would read some Books of Apocrypha rather than break Communion with the Church as possibly not being in it self sinful and unlawful yet I would rather break Communion a thousand times over with the best Church in the world than be a wilful transgressor and such should I be in a notorious manner if a Lye be a transgression and I should lye most egregiously to declare my unfeigned assent and consent that is my will and desire to read the Apocrypha rather than Scripture in the hearing of the people for in the bottom of my Soul and in the truth of my Reins I am utterly against it I excepted against the order appointed for the Ministration of Baptism because of the strict requiring of Godfathers and Godmothers to stand as Sureties and Undertakers for the Child brought to his Christendom and this upon several accounts as First Because it is unscriptural Unto this you say It cannot be supposed that this order of Godfathers
that score deny his Babe Christendom He saith in such a Case the answer is plain that he ought not Though here he speaks without Book I mean the common-Common-prayer Book and against the Order of it in the Baptizing of Infants Whereas you say on the contrary in these words That odium he meaning me would load the Minister with that shall deny to Administer Baptism to them who come not according to the Rule of the Church are surely it should be is referring to odium besides our Argument 't is sufficient he the Minister hath no Title I think you mean hath no right for I am often at a loss to unriddle you so to do it that he is more serious in his function than to be knowingly unjust either to the trust the Church or God himself as I may say hath reposed in him If a Father come to have his Child Baptized but not according to the Rules of the Church The Minister has no Title so to do it and therefore in such Circumstances will be more just to the trust reposed in him than to Baptize the said Child If this be not the purport and intention of your words you speak unintelligibly but if they be you fight against your fellow Souldier yea and against Truth it self Shall we obey God or Man Christ hath said Go and disciple all Naions Baptizing them in the name of the Father c. and among others the Children of believing professing Parents simply because they are so This is the True Gospel trust put into the hands of Gospel Ministers well but the Church or man commands to Baptize them with God-Fathers and God Mothers and the sign of the Cross meer accidents and accessories forreign from the Nature and Essence of Baptism but only invented and imposed from Humane Tradition which therefore some weak and Scrupelous believers question and fear as a profanation of that Holy Ordinance and accordingly dare not so address themselves with their Children unto Baptism But now shall their Babes upon this account be denyed their birth-right Shall they be denyed a priviledge so excellent and so desirable Shall a pitiful order of the Church in Comparison over-rule and obtain Shall it be heeded and observed by the Minister more than the Regia placita of heaven it self God forbid I Objected against the order for the burial of the dead because what is there spoken to God and man though often at the interment of the worst of sinners is spoken of them as if they had been Saints and most devout Holy persons and their Souls then in a safe and happy State For first the Congregation by the mouth of the Minister speaks as it were to themselves one to another concerning the party deceased Forasmuch as it hath pleased God of his great mercy to take unto himself the Soul of our dear brother He is a Brother a dear Brother his Soul is now taken by God taken in mercy in great mercy and it is taken to himself And then when Corps is put into the Grave he continues his speech in these words we therefore commit his body to the ground in a sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to Eternal life Then Secondly the Congregation in the close of the Office by the mouth of the Minister speaks unanimously to God we meekly beseech the O Father to raise us from the death of sin to the life of righteousness that when we shall depart this life we may rest in him Christ Jesus as our hope is this our Brother doth What can be said more if the most Holy Martyr or confessour if Stephen again were carried to his Burial Let him be a Nabal a Cain a Judas yet here is if I might use the Word his Apotheosis his enthronization among the Crowned in Celestial glory You say I have only this to say That it is in the judgment of Charity we prenounce this of all I answer Charity with judgment is a gracious Excellency but without judgment it is the greatest absurdity and nothing else but the vain opinion of an over-pittiful simplicity But if Charity be with judgment then it must have some Rule of judging and if the right Golden Rule then this Rule is the Word for I know no other Now if Charity hath this Golden Rule of the Word to judge by then Charity can have no hope for some many flagitious abominable sinners so living and so dying when they are brought to be buried as suppose two Hectors falling out and fighting for a Miss and both killing one another in the place or let it be one of them which happens too too often suppose some High-way Gentlemen in the very Act of Robbery shot down stark dead the same moment by the Honest Traveller and thus I might instance in many like Cases Here if we will speak soberly and according to Truth we can have no hope nothing being written in the whole Bible from end to end to ground the least of any such hope upon Here to mention what happened to the Thief upon the Cross and what may be the dealings of God with the most profane wretch at the last Minute as you do and what may befall the most profligate persons inter pontem fontem as some others is a vain execuse and cannot afford the least shew or shadow of a just Apology As for the Thief upon the Cross a wonderful Act of mercy was extended to him at the last by an extraordinary priviledge at an extraordinary occasion but withal we know what a wonderful extraordinary Testimony he gave of his Faith and of the Change of his heart before expiration The order for the burial of the dead might have been proper enough at his interment but would it also have been as proper at the interment of the other his Copartner in sin Had he suffered in England supposing all things then as now he might have then been buried according to Liturgy For I see none else excluded but the unbaptized Excommunicate and laying violent hands upon themselves and yet even these also upon your grounds may equally be admitted to Christian burial I am sure the first of them the unbaptized may upon far better and as for the worst of the other who knows how gracious God may be in his dealings with them in the last Minute Who knows None can know and because none can know therefore none can hope for hope without knowledge is a meer Nullity As for what we know concerning such abominable wicked workers if we believe the Holy Scripture which saith Neither Fornicators nor Idolaters nor Adulterers nor Thieves nor Covetous nor Drunkards nor revilers nor Extortioners shall ever inherit the Kingdome of God which saith without regeneration and holiness no man shall see the Lord and every where to the like purpose it speaks their condition desperate and damned and therefore with silence but without hope we must leave them wholly to the disposition and
determination of God their judge And this also you seem to to acknowledge and concede for in making good those words since it hath pleased God of his great mercy to take unto himself you say That it is not necessary the Words in great mercy should refer to the Persons taken away for it may be mercy and a great mercy to them who suffered by their injury or ill Examples supposing them to be such in whom no shew of goodness did appear I answer I thank you heartily for this new Notion which never before came upon the imagination of my thoughts nor perhaps of any other so that you may say in a boast as Zabbarel if I hit right upon his name Ego primus hoc inveni Verily the Gens Togata I mean all of the Clergy are much your Debtors and I hope in gratitude will highly extoll the acumen of your wit and the pregnancy of your invention For a recompence I think my self bound to tell you a story which this rare piece of Fancy of yours brought fresh into my remembrance In those days when the Book of sports and pastimes as Lawful and expedient to be indulged to youth and fit to be exercised on the Lords day was commanded to be published and accordingly was read in most Congregations Deus bone What are the best of men the Tribe of Levi the Sons of the Church themselves when they come to be Tryed Yet there were some of them Non-conformists to the rest who neither could nor would do what was then required what ever they suffered One of them a most worthy Preacher was desired by some of his Chief Parishoners to visit his friends in another County and to absent himself from them three weeks or a month together and in the interim they procured an Old certain Saint John a very obscure person who neglected his dress but cherished the Hair of his face and beard at a strange rate to do this good turn for him who by the like Crotchet of an extraordinary fancy was ready at their service and made no bones of it He comes therefore and appears in the Desk after the manner of some Wild Satyr out of a Wood and for the better grace of the matter what he spake was with a Twanging Tone out of his Nose Well he sets upon the performance of the work and reads over the Book of Sports distinctly and audibly but when he had done he added as followeth Beloved Brethren Here the King gives you liberty to play on Sundays and to exercise youth in vain sports and pastimes which to do is aprofanation of the Sabbath and a breach of Gods Holy commandment but now brethren do you understand the Kings mind and his true intent and meaning herein Why I will tell you my brethren a Father has a stubborn rebellious Child and he sees his Temper and spirit from time to time aukward and cross to do any thing he is bidden but rather more resolved and forward to do the contrary wherefore the Father when he would have anything done by this perverse and froward boy forbids him the doing of it but what indeed he would not have done he charges him to do it Thus in like manner my brethren Our good and gracious King has commanded us to observe the Sabbath in coming to Church and in a Religious serving and Worshipping of God by many good preceeding Laws and Orders for that end and purpose but still such is our contumacy and wickedness that we drink and play and have our Dances and Revels on that blessed day in a shameful manner wherefore he seeing our perverse Rebellious carriage against his former good Precepts he speaks unto us by contraries He bids now play on Sundays but his true meaning is that we should no longer play as formerly we have done but keep God's Sabbath better and more Religiously this is all our good and gracious King judging of us according to our wonted crosseness intended in publishing this book of liberty and I hope will follow upon the reading of it Here was a strange unexpected and unlooked for enucleation of the mind of the King as now yours is of the words of the Liturgy When I heard this relation first I was hugely pleased with it and said it was pity some Courtier had not not acquainted the King with it who certainly would have rewarded this rare interpreter with a Dean's or Prebend's place for his eminent understanding and service herein I wish you the same success in your parallel Atchievement But in the interim we must consider whether those words in great mercy can admit of any such avulsion from the words following which relate unto the dead to be an Apostrophe to them that are living Let us read them and weigh them For as much as it hath pleased God of his great mercy to take to himself the Soul of our dear brother here departed c. Therefore the person here spoken of cannot be as you would suppose him a man of an ill example an injurious person and in whom no shew of goodness did ever appear for he is a brother a dear brother and his Soul now taken to God and accordingly these words in great mercy must refer unto himself the person taken away and not unto others unto whom this his being taken away was rather in judgment and for Correction by the loss of such a dear brother Notwithstanding procure a Rubrick to confirm your interpretation for until then according to your own look I may not believe it but when I shall see that once affixed let the turning of these words in great mercy from the dead to the living be proper or improper it shall be all one in the Case for your sense of them shall be most authentick with me You have yet another Salve for the sore place to justifieth is last Office for the dead in these words Nor have I ever thought the person Officiating obliged to use this form of burials intirely in all Cases something I conceive may be left to the discretion of the Priest especially with the advice of his Ordinary c. Your meaning plainly is this that you may leave out some part of what is appointed to be read for the burial of the dead if the persons buried be not subjects proper for it but utterly the contrary As for Example if the person to be buried has been a notorious flagitious offender from first to last then after your own discretion especially with the advice of your Ordinanry you may leave out the words in great mercy and to himself dear and the like and read only thus For asmuch as it hath pleased God to take the Soul of our brother we therefore commit his body c. Thus likewise in the close you may omit those words as our hope is this our brother doth and read it thus That when we shall depart this life we may rest in him and at the general
Resurrection be found acceptable in his sight c. I Answer It would be well if the Minister might thus be left to his own discretion supposing all parties agreed and that there would be no scandal in the Case which I look upon as an impossibility For put the Case after you have declared your unfeigned Assent and Consent to all and every thing contained in the book of common-Common-prayers before the face of God and the Congregation one of them should immediately step forth and say Sir do you like and approve of all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the order for the burial of the dead E're long your Office will call you to bury as cursed Reprobate wretches as ever breathed for too too many such are among us Do you think it lawful and expedient to stile every one of that sort dear brother can you then with a good Conscience say God in great mercy hath taken his Soul to himself Or can you express your hope before God even sure and certain hope of his resting in Christ and eternal happiness What now will you answer to his Questions will you bring in your last mentioned plea and think to help and justifie your self by it Will you replie thus Friend I have indeed in your hearing as in the hearing of the whole Congregation declared my unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the book of common-Common-prayer and by consequence as you justly infer to all and every thing appointed for the burial of the dead but yet you must know I have a mental reservation according to my own discretion and besides my Ordinary though I have avouched I will do this and that has given me a secret Licence to leave it undone insuch and such Cases and in this very Case in particular about burying the dead and therefore when I shall judge it meet and necessary I will omit several Expressions when they shall not be proper nor applicable to the persons to be buried or at least I will take the words in a contrary sense according to what they are usally taken should this be your answer but with what forehead could you utter it How quickly might the said person reply upon you to your shame and confusion in this or the like manner Belike Sir though you have declared your unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in and prescribed by the book of common-Common-prayer you have but jugled in all you have declared you have your private reservations and exceptions and your Ordinary has given you a Licence to profess one thing and do another I see your heart and mouth have not gone together but you speak and think two several ways I took you for a good Protestant Minister but I perceive you are a meer Jesuite an Ireland a Gavan can do no more What way you could devise to free your self from this impeachment is altogether beyond my thoughts Sir You well observed a certain sort of Ministers among your selves pitied in their Non conformity as doing good men what they would not do if they were not forced to it and therefore they huddle up and curtail the prayers and shew industriously by the manner of performance how little they like and approve of what they do This what you say I have heard my self spoken in their praise and themselves much commended for it but I have always thought them so far from being worthy of praise that I have esteem'd them most worthy of censure and condemnation and my heart has risen against them beyond all others This is wretched simulation and a base pitiful disguise Surely after I had declared my unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing contained in the Liturgy before the whole Congregation I would be faithful to mine own word and justifie my profession by a consonant practice I would not curtail the prayers but have the Courage before all the world to read them distinctly and reverently and do all in a most ample manner as the matter did require scorning aucupare famam to get the good opinion of any by shewing my self an Hypocrite And thus Sir it should be with you in your own concern after your declaration it behoves you to be True unto it in every Iota and Tittle frankly roundly and entirely coming up to the full performance of it and of all and every thing required by it yea even in the order for the burial of the dead any word phrase expression or passage therein in any wise notwithstanding Moreover besides this Scandal arising from your last contrivance of â—â—earing your self a worse yet might follow in the event and issue even sometimes to the peril and danger of your life should you indeed do as you say you have liberty that is should you leave out those words phrases and expressions wherein the piety and felicity of the party deceased is signified and declared it would never be endured Suppose the person interred some Lord Knight or Gentleman a Person of worth I cannot say but of wealth and quality though in the time of his life he was never so wicked and ungodly yet now that he is dead he must be reputed a worthy good man in all kinds and nothing thought or said amiss of him a pompous Funeral is prepared for him and his friends with much solemnity follow the Bier expecting for him the due and accustomed Honour of Christian burial and that every word be there spoken over him by the Minister in the very form and manner as it is prescribed if therefore you shall presume to take your liberty and use your discretion to skip over any thing in the Sepulture of him which of others you do not it will be taken as an affront and an unpardonable Trespass by his then present Relations and so perhaps some Son brother or fellow Hector shall be ready to tumble you into the Grave after him or offer some other abuse to your great mischief and evil Yea the meanest will not endure such a Reproachful Reflection upon their Relations but will hate you for it in their hearts You see therefore this stratagem of leaving out at discretion will Challenge your discretion but never do your work And consequently as things are now ordered in the Liturgy and as you have unfeignedly assented and consented to them in the declaration you must be again and again a Transgressour either to God or man in the burials of the dead But You say The Church must frame her Offices to suit those who are her real Members I answer Here is the wisdom of the Church to frame all her Offices and Services in such a manner as may be furthest from all Scandal in one kind or other and count that most sutable that is most conducible to such an end To speak therefore about the Office for the burial of the dead It is known upon matter of fact that all men have