dissent And what hinders me from doing so at Common-Prayer He saith I must joyn in that form or none at all True And so must I when the Minister either prayeth freely or in a stinted form of his own You must joyn in that or none at all for that time I told him of old Mr. Fen a zealous Non-conformist at Coventry that would say Amen loud to every Prayer of the Liturgy save that for the Bishops Did he not use as much liberty here as he could have done at free prayer 2. And for fore knowledge he passeth by all the answer I oft gave to that objection and singeth over the same song again Fore-knowing what will be said doth more enable me to know what clause to forbear my consent to than in sudden Prayer not foreknown And what if by his constant custome I foreknow that Iohn Simpson Randal Iohn Goodwin Saltmarsh Dr. Crisp Canne Iohnson Blackwood or any other tolerable Opinionist will put his opinion into his Prayers Doth not that make them in this all one with an imposed prayer as to fore-knowledge And when I fore-know that the Matter of the Liturgy used on the Lords dayes by the Minister and people is sound this fore-knowledge maketh it not evil in the use Sect. 28. When I gave him no less than twenty Queries containing plain evictions of the falseness of his Doctrine about the Scriptures his answer is that he will answer them when I have satisfied him that I sinned not greatly in raising such mists and doubts and when I give him security that I will not ask him as many more Reader Is not this man an easie disputant Did you ever know any that answered all with less ado than so silly a reason Why he should not answer it Sect. 29. He concludeth by telling us that he is to say no more your best your equal I know what he meaneth though not what he saith And really it was but need that he should tell the world how good or worthy a man he is or else a sober person that had but read one of his three Libels would hardly have believed it Sect. 30. Having ended the second time he begins again with a Postscript to tell us his reasons for his refusing the Oath of Allegiance which he is imprisoned for But I have no mind to meddle with him where I have no call And shall only say that had it been more even the Oath of Supremacy it self if he will regard either Non-conformist Independents or Anabaptist Mr. Bradshaw Mr. Nie and Mr. Tombes have each written enough to teach him better to understand that English CHAP. IV. An Admonition to that part of the Church which is inclined to Mr. Bagshaw's Errours Sect. 1. VVEre it not my present Duty to Tell the Church I should take it to be as inconvenient as unpleasing to open Mr. Bagshaw's sins But as Christ did it by the Pharisees yea and Peter himself and as Paul in his Epistles did it by many so I think it is now become my duty though he and his believers be displeased by it I shall but desire the impartial sober Readers that have perused his Writings and mine to judge 1. Whether so great Ignorance as he discovereth in himself be not scandalous in a Preacher of the Gospel 2. Whether such dangerous errours in Doctrine against the very foundations of our faith with many other proved against him make him not an unsafe Guid for souls And give not incomparably greater occasion for renouncing him as an Heretick to such as are apt to take such occasion than most called Hereticks in the ancient Churches gave 3. Whether it be not rare among the worst of men to meet with so many evidences of Insolent Pride above the common measure of Proud men as his three Libels do contain 4. Whether it be not a hard matter to find among the worst of men on earth two Libels so small containing above fourscore visible Vntruths in matter of fact And a third to follow them substantially constituted of the like Vntruths scarce now to be numbred any more than drops that are aggregate in a Pond 5. Whether it be not rare to meet with more malicious contrived snares to make up his ends upon the person instead of defending of his Cause 6. Whether ever you saw a controversie so managed by any sort of men of what heresie soever that said so little for their Cause as he hath done for his Love-killing Principles I confess I remember not one no not excepting the very Quakers Read over several debates and see whether ever a cause so hotly contended for had so little said for it 7. Whether ever you saw Books so answered as mine are by him In all his three Libels not medling at all with any considerable part of my Books as to any answer But silently passing them over as if he had never read them And yet going on to repeat the same things which I had confuted 8. Whether his Calumny or false accusations of me and of Calvin Perkins Hildersham Preston c. be not an unchristian act 9. Whether it be not rare among the worst to find such footsteps of great Impenitence as he giveth in so silent a passing over his guilt of the fore-mentioned fourscore Vntruths without any considerable Vindication and after Admonition adding so many worse 10. Whether it be not rare to meet with so much audacious impudence in sinning 11. Whether the slandring of so many millions yea almost all Christs Churches on Earth as differ from him in point of Forms c. as guilty of Idolatry be not a most heinous sin against Christ and them as representing them as odious in the world 12. And is it not a sin to draw so many poor souls as will beieve him so far towards the hatred of Christs Churches and â—om Communion with them and to confine all their Communion 〈◊〉 so narrow a compass 13. Whether Fathering all this on God and Religion make â—â—t the sin to be yet greater 14. Whether according to his power he shew not as Cruâ—â— and bloudy and silencing a disposition as any of those that 〈◊〉 he accused of it 15. Whether he do not injuriously to labour by his insiâ—tions to bring many honest well-meaning Christians 〈◊〉 into the same guilt with himself or into the shameâ—â— reputation of it Insomuch that â—lready the common 〈◊〉 dishonoureth many of the Semi-separatists saying that they 〈◊〉 rejoyce at his Writings and so hate my Treatise against Church-dividing Principles as that for the sake of it they will read no other of my Books And if that hurt them no more than me the matter is but small Sect. 2. And when you have well considered of these things I shall next desire you to consider Whether this man hath not brought you as great a Care or Caution against unlawful Separations and Divisions as most men ever did in the world For 1. Here you see how much you
10. Ib. But he professeth that he dealeth thus in Zeal to the Glory of God Love to the Cause of Christ and Non-conformity which I have deserted Where 1. It is a repeated falshood that I have deserted the Cause of Non-conformity I challenge him openly to name even one point of it in which I have changed my judgment these 31 yeares which I speak not as my praise who in those things have grown no wiser except in knowing the same things better to this day 2. What sin will you call it to father all these falshoods on the Glory of God and the Cause of Christ Doth his Cause and Glory need mens Lies How many hundreds thus in a few more Libels may you publish if Satan bless them as hitherto he hath done with an Increase and Multiply Sect. 11. pag. 5. He reciteth many words of my Disputations of Church Government and laboureth whether by gross Ignorance or malice I know not to perswade the Reader that I retract or contradict them and saith We stand amazed you should so soon and so much forget all that you have said This is not a single falshood but maketh up no small part of his Book Reader do but hear and judge whether any thing except his Amareduci can excuse such horrid deliberate untruths 1. I never retracted any of that book setting aside the Dedication 2. I do still profess that I am of the same judgment which that book expresseth 3. I have in the greatest audience told the Bishops that I stand to it and provoked them to answer it 4. There is not a word of contradiction to that Book in my Cure of Church-Divisions which he writes against And am I not as like to understand my own writings as this man is 5. That very Book pleadeth as much and much more for a moderate Episcopacy the lawfulness of a Liturgy and those circumstances or ceremonies which I judge lawful as kneeling at the Sacrament than my later Books have done 6. It was to me a considerable Providence which drew me when the Sectaries were at the very highest to write that Book which had I written since the King returned they would have imputed to temporizing or a change 7. The very same men that now rail so loud against me said nothing that ever I could hear of against that book that contained more than Now I have written for But then it passed uncontradicted by them that now rail at half as much So Is it not a strange fate which that poor Book incurreth that the men of both sides plead it as for them and commend it whilst they condemn the Author as if he were himself against it The Reverend Bishop whom Mr. Bagshaw wrote against alledged it in the greatest audience before his Majesty Dukes Lords and Bishops with no less commendation than these words No man hath spoken better of this than Mr. Baxter And now Mr. Bagshaw citeth it with applause Reader who is in such a case as I The Bishop is for my Book Mr. Bagshaw is for it And I am the man that am against my self whilst I openly tell them both that I still stand to it as my judgment only not owning any words that any party shall justly find to be too sharp Surely they labour to bring me to that reputation among these contenders as Plato was among the Philosophers whom every Sect took to be the second or next the best Sect. 12. But pag. 6. he thinks that he talketh like a man of brains when he inferreth that if they be such kind of persons as I have represented them they ought immediately to be forsaken and forborn as to any acts of Church-communion Answ. But 1. I never said of them that they printed besides false Doctrines fourscore untruths in two small Libels as you have done and give the world neither vindication nor repentance And yet you or your disciples will not inferr thus against your self 2. Deceitful man Did I ever lay the charge you mention against all the honest conformable Pastors of the Parish Churches in the Land who have no hand in any thing that you can call an imposition or a persecution Nay that own not as they think the Diocesan Prelacy as such but only Episcopacy in general and Diocesans as the Kings Officers Did I ever lay that charge against all the Christians in the Parish Churches No nor against all the Bishops neither 3. And must all the Churches in a Kingdome be excommunicated or forsaken for the cause of a few men whom few of them ever knew or saw This is like the Popes interdicting Kingdomes 4. And if you separated but from the individual offenders should it not be done in a regular way Why go you about to blind the ignorant with such palpable fallacies as these Is it truth that men must be thus cheated into with errours Sect. 13. pag. 6. From what I said the Episcopal Churches would then have been if they had but had a meer toleration in the times that openly discountenanced them when the countenanced parties should set up by themselves he inferreth as if I had called them such now when no other are tolerated and that in all those Parishes where are good Ministers and no other Churches Thus palpable falshood is the very life of all his Libel Sect. 14. Ib. The self-contradicting man professeth to follow the Light which I once had in this and yet that my present Light is nothing else but confusion of darkness when I said the same then in that very Book that now I do and now own that book which I wrote then And all to carry on a cheating falshood as if in this I had changed my judgment Sect. 15. I had almost pass'd over a shameless falshood pag. 4. And that you may know I do not speak at randome particularly when at Gloucester you preached upon Curse ye Meroz and now you say you do repent do you expect ever to be believed again which is a mere composition of Vntruths 1. I never preached on Curse ye Meroz in my life if he mean that text or those words I never was at Gloucester but about one month before the Wars in which I preached thrice or four times of which one on a Fast had respect to the times which was on Ezek. 37. 3. Son of man Can these bones live And my business was to shew the Difficulty of the reparation and reformation of a sinful lapsed Church In which I mentioned many things and sorts of people that would hinder it but neither my Notes which I yet have by me or memory have any thing at all that tended unto War or resistance of Authority Yet if any other Sermon there did touch the times which I remember not I am sure it was not on that Text which I never preached on 2. And he as falsly insinuateth that I say I repent of what I preached at Gloucester so hard is it to him to speak that which is not
left us and yet will be one that shall mourn for the reproach of the solemn assemblies 26. Moreover it is one of Satans plots upon you to prepare for the reproach of the Non conformists when greater necessity shall drive them to the Parish assemblies and Communion Do not you make any doubt of it but that if the wrath or rigour of superiours should bring them to the same condition as the old Non-conformists were the most of the present Non-conformists would come to the Parish Churches even in Common Prayer and Sacraments as they did And you are preparing reproach for them that they may then be called Changelings who forsake their former principles and cause 27. And verily you will keep up the Papists hope that by an universal Toleration they may at last come in on equal terms with you or by connivance be endured as much as you And if they be equal in England with you their transmarine advantages will make them more than equal notwithstanding their disadvantages in their Cause and in their contrariety to Kingly interest which Henry Fowlis hath in folio most fully and unanswerably laid open 28. And though God in mercy hath at present given us a King that owneth the Protestant Cause so resolvedly as to make a Law against any that shall report him inclined to Popery England hath no promise that it shall be so for ever And if we should ever have a King more indifferent in his Religion do you know what a temptation it would be to him to pull down the Protestant Religion if he found it but in corners under a connivance and found it under the reproach of such crimes as Bâ—gshaw's books contain It were the next way to procure the fatal word Down with them even to the ground Though I know we have the greater security against this because Popery is so much against Princes interest and is the delâ—vering up the Kingdome in part to a foreign power 29. In a word Satan is playing by Mr. Bagshaw no lower a game than by turning all the people from the Parish assemblies while there are not in England had they liberty 〈◊〉 Ministers enow to supply the tenth part of the Churchâ—â— to 〈◊〉 the generality of them to live like open Atheists that give God no publick worship at all and so to extinguish knowledge Christianity and all Religion in most of the Land These things I see and because I see them I do as I have done 30. There is another reason that sticks much with me as knowing what silly peevish souls are employed in against themselves but I will add no more Brethren I have discharged my conscience Some will hear I will bear the censures and obloquy of the rest Your sins are no more lovely to me than the sins of other men nor no more merciful to England We all suffer by and for such sins as I have reproved I am one of the sufferers and therefore should have leave to speak I am long ago engaged in the cause of Concord Love and Peace and will not betray it for the shadow of Purity nor for the pleasing of any party whatsoever Though no duty when such is to be omitted nor any sin committed for Peace And to prevent the Calumny of Papists and the mis-information of Posterity I add that besides one hot-headed honest young man Mr. Brown I hear of no Non-conformable Minister in England that openly owneth Mr. Bagshaw's 〈◊〉 or secondeth him in his defence of the Love killing Principles of unlawful Separation Which with the other evidences of quietness and patience in the private assemblies of these times I take to be a marvellous thing considering mens great and manifold temptations which in time I hope God will abate FINIS