will call that Solitude which you call Concord Vniformity Peace c. I am weary of transcribing such Language and sorry to find men who would take it very ill not to be thought Conscientious against their Consciences to impute that to their Brethren which themselves do not believe they would ever attempt nay which they abhor in the least to desire Good Lord forgive 4. I must needs look upon his aggravating his own and the Dissenters sufferings beyond truth I am sure beyond Probabilities to have proceeded from the same want of temper Pag. 142. He tells us Some of the ejected Ministers are so reduced and find so little succour that they live upon brown bread and water I will only in Answer hereunto make and I do hereby make a solemn and serious Invitation of all those Protestant Ministers in my Diocese nay of all of them in the whole Province who are thus low I invite them I say hereby to my Table every day in the year They shall freely eat as I do and Wellcome in God's Name But it is yet an higher strain which we have pag. 153. Some have died through the effects of want I have heard so indeed of divers of our own Churches Clergy ejected in the days of Vsurpation and I have reason from some I knew to believe it But Mr. Baxter must pardon me if I tell him I am very sure there is more Liberality and Charity amongst the Brethren than that any such things could come to pass except men were resolved wilfully to conceal their own Conditions and throw themselves away in some discontented Humour But this I take only for a Figure which he uses beyond the Rule in Oratory usque ad nauseam We have it again pag. 210. Having told us after his use of the Two thousand silenced Ministers of late he adds to that Sum and the many that have died in and by Imprisonment which we are told of again pag. 180. as if besides that vast number silenced there were many others that fared much worse We must profess all these things are new to us never heard of before and as Mr. Baxter says well upon a like indefinite Accusation pag. 145. All proof in such cases must be of individuals so till such proof be brought he must excuse our Faith as we are content herein to excuse his Charity Again pag. 194. We will be thankful to be under no severer usage than Colliers and Bargemen and Seamen than begging Rogues and Vagabonds have Ficta voluptatis causâ sint proxima veris. 5. Of the same nature are his Altitudes touching the Conformity by Law required Pag. 189. Subscribe That we have not mistaken a word in all theâ—e three Books c. We will suppose by the three Books he means the Liturgy Canons and Homilies but what by the c. in which we pretend to be infallible as he insinuates we know not unless it be a littâ—â— Art to make ignorant People furmise more than he durst affirm Or else you shall not preach the Gospeâ— of Salvation nor labour to save Peoples Souls nâ—â— perswade them to think on another life Yes in pravate as much of this as you please or not to above five at a time that are not of the Family The same in sense we have again pag. 219. We cannot subscribe that your three Books are infâ—llible to a word c. I doubt not but Mr. Baxer knows a man may subscribe with good Conscience to that which he does not know infallibly to be true There are many things which both he and I verily believe yet we are not infallibly sure we are not mistaken If I have a fair and clear perswasion or satisfaction grounded hereon That though there be Arguments on the contrary side yet they are such which I judge honestly answered but on the side I take the Arguments are far the stronger and not satisfactorily answerable as I see I say I may subscribe with very good Conscience that I receive such Doctrine Lubens ex animo for I do so though perhaps I receive it not as of strictness necessary to Salvation or as an Article of Faith But neither is that assent required in the Subscription We subscribe only with a design of Peace and Union The very Articles are intitled Articles agreed upon for the avoiding of diversities of Opinions I could tell Mr. Baxter that somewhere in this his Book if my memory mistake not he says he durst not reject such an one who should not subscribe he believed every Book of the Old Testament as perhaps a Chapter of Ecclesiastes or the Book of Canticles or some other like piece to be infallibly Canonical yet I doubt not but he subscribed and can in Conscience subcribe the sixth amongst the 39 Articles Nay pag. 167. The Nonconformists offer to subscribe I fear with some exception the same Doctrine of the Church of England as the Conformists do in the 39 Articles and the Book of Homilies Yet neither do the Conformists nor Nonconformists believe every word in those Books to be infallible but they judge them a wholsome mean of Peace and by their subscription are bound not to teach contrary What needed then those terms subscribe we have not mistaken a word Did any one ever say so that these three Books are infallible to a word c. These heights serve only to conciliate hatred and the reputation of cruelty to us and so to blast Peace 6. I will only ask Mr. Baxter himself whether he thinks that imputing to men gross ignorance of their Office unbelief of Religion obdurateness beyond Examples and the like are apt terms to gain mens hearts and unite us and them Yet all these and worse than these as far as worse can be we have abundantly from his hand Pag. 2. He accuses the Clergy at the Savoy that is those Bishops Doctors and diverse the Learnedest men in the three Kingdoms perhaps in Europe with whom he there treated of having spoiled the work at that season for want of skill But this is Modesty in Mr. Baxter yet Pag. 89. Alas that England must suffer so much while the Bishops are learning to rule and do their Office yea learning what weaker persons i. e. himself lin 15. easily perceive Alas that so many thousand souls must pay so dear for a few mens experience Pag. 195. I shall give you reasons that will make you know it if you have but the understanding of ordinary men This as to the ignorance and sottishness yea even of those of our Party who are ablest such I say as were those at the Savoy Poor Dr. Sanderson Dr. Morley Dr. Gunning Dr. Pierson c. that had not the understanding of Ordinary men Then as to our Atheistical Irreligious Temper pag. 190. O! what a plague it is to the Church and World to have Ministers that when they read of the necessity of Knowledge Holiness and Salvation do neither believe Christ nor themselve Lastly
Office of the Visitation of the Sick that much in that Particular is referred to the discretion of the Minister Then shall the Minister exhort the sick person after this form or other like says the Rubrick He is not then tied up but may vary and I scarce ever knew but in ordinary practice we do so Again Then shall the Minister examine whether he repent him truly of his sins and be in Charity with all the World exhorting him c. viz. to forgiveness satisfaction to men for wrongs done disposal of his goods Charity to the Poor all which says the Rubrick may be done before the Minister begin his Prayer as he shall sée cause And for all this there is no form at all prescribed consequently then it being left to the Ministers prudence he he may put what Interrogatories and make as narrow a search as he shall think fir and he is required plainly to judge because to exhort and admonish as there appears cause Now it is to be considered these Exhortations and Admonitions may and most frequently do take up divers Visits However all this being supposed to be done Then and not till then Here shall the sick person be moved to make a special Confession of his sins if he féel his Conscience burdened with any weighty matter After which Confession the Priest shall absolve him if he humbly and heartily desire it after this sort Rubr. Where to be short I only desire two things may be noted 1. That after all this the Minister is not commanded to absolve him They must be absolved in Mr. Baxter is then false but if he see fit to absolve him he is to absove him after this sort It is very well known divers of us have refused and daily do to absolve such persons touching whose Penitence we are not satiâ—fied 2. Those words if he humbly and heartily desire it do import the discovery of such a sense of sin to to the Confessour at least suppose him in Conscâ—ence judge as may well be conceived to bear him out in giving Absolution certainly they do exclude Cursing and Swearing and railing at an holy Life at that time Which things being so apparently thus it would almost tempt a man in charity to think Mr. Baxter writes against the Laturgy without having duly read or considered it otherwise he would not so falsly accuse it or traduce our Church for it His last imputation is but little better than this which we have now dispatched Namely that the Discipline of the Church is managed by one Lay Chancellâ—r and his Court with some small Assistance The Archdeacons of which in most Dioceses there are divers in that of Exon from whence I came four throughout England generally have their Courts and neither are they Lay-men nor for the most part do they Act mainly by Lay-Officials and their Courts in many places are weekly Besides these in Every Deauery i. e. ten Parishes or thereabouts there are Archypresbyters or Deans Rural whose Duty and Oath binds them to enquire into the Conversation as well of the Clergy as of the People within their Precincts So that if Ministers and Church-wardens will but do their Duty the Provision of Discipline is sufficient in Mr. Baxter's language for the keeping clean the Church I will be still so charitable to him as to believe he is not verst in our Exercise of Discipline but I could also have wish't that he had no more censured it Only I will conclude this Particular by appealing to his own Sense and the sense of Mankind if such undue and prevaricant Charges as these be the way to peace 9. And now I am speaking of Prevarication his reckoning Hooper Latimer and Cranmer pag. 228. amongst the Nonconformists to conciliate thence credit to their Cause and detract from us is a kind of Art which Ingenuity and much more Christian Veracity would blush to own I will allude in this regard to the words of the great Apostle I wish not only Mr. Baxter but all the Dissenters were altogether such as they excepting their Bonds and Sufferings 10ly and Lastly For I will not run the number up to Mr. Baxter's beloved number of 20 or upwards though I might There appears to me in him a great Inconstancy to himself and that not only in smaller points and lapses of memory or attention as may seem that pag. 10. I never came near them that is the People of Kidderminster nor except very rarely sent them one line yet within five lines after I sent them says he all the Books which I wrote but even in his Resolutions and Matters of great moment is there with him Yea and Nay Sometimes he seems against all Subscribing as pag. 60 113 c. At another time he is for Subscribing to the Doctrine of the Church in the 39 Articles and Books of Homilies pag. 12 167 c. and other terms of Peaceableness Again pag. 128. The 39 Articles are a wholsome Doctrine yet pag. 122. They are not intelligible they have contrary meanings to fit the use of every Subscriber they are hot to one and cold to the other By the way sometimes it is no fault in the Books to be subscribed that they are so worded as to allow men to abound in their own sense And we are sure our Articles are in this no more guilty than most Confessions which have been penn'd for Concord as the Augustan it self witness therein the Article and Clause touching the Presence of Christ's Body in the Sacrament In sum when a Proposition evidently admits of two or three senses and each of them is known famous and held by divers Doctors of the same Church and that Church framing a Rule or Mean of Concord for her Sons shall in that Rule set a Proposition which takes in the several Opinions of these Doctors in such sort as to tye them up as far as is necessary and to leave them otherwise at their liberty is this Proposition justly to be called unintelligible or have Mr. Baxter and the Dissenters any cause if they will be constant to themselves to say 't is Unreasonable For my own part I wish sincerely for their sakes some more of the Articles and perhaps Rubricks too were penned with ampler Latitude But to the Point again That is a very unkind inconstancy unkind not only to us but to the Design of Peace that so often in pag. 16 17 18 c. he says They take it to be their Duty in the Exercise of their Ministry to take heed of any thing that tendeth to the Division of the peoples minds or the hinderance of the lawful publick Ministry or to their just Discouragement Again to take heed lest any dishonour or murmuring against their Rulers arise or be cherished by reason of their sufferings or to subvert or perplex the hearers by aggravating the faults of others or other mens worshipping of God or breeding in them distast of the Publick Worship for all which Expressions
I cannot say whether That a man may with less danger of exposing himself preach many Sermons than print one Those Defects and Crudities which the speed and with some more happy persons the Grace of Pronunciation covers are easily perceived by the mature attention of the Peruser That this will be the Fate of divers Passages in these foregoing Discourses I am sensible enough and perhaps see the Particulars But the Design I pursue in them is so necessary to be promoted by more Advocates than it has in good earnest that I could not prevail with my self through any fear of Censures to suppress my poor however cordial endeavours therein Nor did I think it fit in the Copy for the Press to make any such Supplies or Changes as in themselves I might think but requisite lest it should be objected by any I preached not what I print Wherefore I am content that all pass in the form it is I will only admonish that the same Arguments which I have used in the Second Sermon to prove our present Divisions destructive to Holiness will also prove that other part which I have too lightly touch't That the Union we perswade would certainly produce more Holiness or Reformation of the Publick Manners than any other Expedient we can easily imagine Only I had not time to apply them distinctly to both parts and to those who will read this 't is amply enough to have suggested thus much There may possibly occur divers Passages in both Sermons which same may say want Truth nay the Contradictions to which I have read in print not many days ago I can only say I spoke them not with a design of contradiction and I both did and still do judge them real Truths For instance Serm. 1. pag. 22. I say We Conformists doubt not but in this our obedience we please God and are not unserviceable unto men Mr. Baxter on the contrary in his Apology for the Non-conformists Ministry which Book I shall much cite in what follows applies to us more than once as I remember that passage of the Apostle touching the unbelieving Jews 1 Thessal II. 15. That we please not God and are contrary to all Pag 235. c. men I believe in my Conscience he is mistaken and that what I said is true Nay further I will tell him and all the World and God is my Witness herein I at first obeyed with a design to serve God and I bless my God I do both serve him with a pure Conscience in the way of Conformity and have the comfort and joy thereof in my own brest daily nor do I trouble my self or can I help it if prejudicate men are of another mind Again pag. 30. of the same Sermon I said Presbyterians and Independents could not agree among themselves no not when they had an Assembly packt mostly of themselves Yet many have lately magnified their Agreement and some have told us that Assembly was almost all of Episcopal conformable Mr. Baxt. Apol. N. C. p. 90 204. c. men Were it worth the labour I could prove the truth of what I said nay I could prove much more First as to their great concord I say they were so far from agreeing then that they are not agreed yet For whereas some could come in to our Church upon such terms as they are pleased to insinuate under the name of a Comprehension namely the Moderate Presbyterians They of the Congregational way cannot according to their Judgments allow of our Parochial Bill for Accommodation pag. penult Churches nor a Book of Liturgy but do choose to worship God in the way of their Gathered or Separate Congregations and so need an Indulgence Then as to Mr. Baxter's demand Were not almost all the Westminster-Assembly Episcopal Conformable men when they came thither I could say No not in their hearts as appear'd by their fruits Those four of five that were had no comfort to be amongst them Hear part of the Preamble of that Ordinance by which this conformable Assembly was called Whereas it has been declared and resolved by Jun. 12. 1643. Scob. Coll p. 42. the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament that the present Church Government by Archbishops Bishops their Chancellors Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Archdeacons and other Ecclesiastical Officers depending upon the Hierarchy is justly offensive and burthensome to the Kingdom a great impediment to Reformation and growth of Religion and very prejudicial to the State and Government of this Kingdom and that therefore they are resolved that the same shall be taken away and that such a Government shall be settled in the Church as may be agreeable to God's Holy Word Episcopacy then in these mens judgments was not and most apt to procure and preserve the peace of the Church at home and nearer agreement with the Church of Scotland c. What Episcopal men would have answered this call or these ends any otherwise than by protesting against them Did these things tend to peace I could and would give a further answer I could tell him too who it is that through habitual prejudice self-flattery and unhappy errour is a falsifier of History and that in the very memory of them in whose times these things were acted and particularly in fixing the war upon an Erastian party in Parliament when all the World knows a People ever known to be of more bloody Principles and whom I will not name for peace-sake both scattered and blew the Coals whence arose those Combustions but that I say I conceive my Answer would no more conduce to peace than his reminding the Nation of those things which at other times he would have forgotten I would have set forth all this In short he and all his Abettors must know the Catalogues of that Parliament of that Assembly are in our hands the Copies of their Speeches the Journals of their Votes Transactions c. are all to be produced and to say nothing of the Covenanters the Commissioners both of Ministry and Laiety named in the Form of Church Government which the Assembly had been so long a hammering to be used in the Church of England and Ireland all these mens names qualities principles and procedure are notorious in print Such publick and as I may justly call them Authentick Records as these must and will be credited when private persons whose interest and unhappiness it is to tax others with their own faults will scarce find belief But I forget my self however I followed another and sad it is when one who pretends for peace in his very pleas for it leads us out of the way to it I have done with this kind of Discourse when I have besought my Reader not to account any thing said in my Sermons false because some have been pleased to contradict and hector the Truth I did not at first intend even thus much of Reflexion for I proposed not to my self in this Postscript to Apologize for my Sermons nor to answer
Materials in my poor judgment are very defective and without very considerable advances never like to take I no whit at all doubt but Mr. Baxter was the main Authour of the Petition for Peace and the Reformation of the Liturgy said to have been tender'd about the same time and publisht A. D. 1661. The style and whole tenor of them abundantly bespeaks so much to me Now if out of these and his later Pieces we view what he offers or proposes towards Union it will appear to be such as might tempt men to think he treats like those who never intend to come nearer to an agreement 1. A Liturgy indeed he would possess us he is for but when he comes to particularize Not one Office no not one Prayer of the Old Liturgy except the Lords Prayer nor so much as the Ancient Face Order and Structure thereof must be left And it is observeable what the Petition for Peace styles Alterations and Additions to the Liturgy when it comes to be presented is intitled A Reformation of the Liturgy and indeed bears proportion perfectly to the Reformation they made of the Church which destroy'd its identity and visibility and is clearly and intirely a new Frame and even that so proposed or designed that it would have been little more than a Direction this being generally the style of the Rubricks if without offence I may so call them Prayer to be performed in these or the like words pag. 25. Then shall the Minister use this or the like Prayer pag. 51. In the very Office of Consecration of the Elements in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper Let the Minister bless them in these or the like words pag. 52. Let the Minister pray thus or to this sense pag. 56. and conclude with this or the like blessing pag. 58. In the Burial of the Dead pag. 72. His power shall be suited to the occasion No Form of Prayer being there so much as directed So too upon Days of Publick Humiliation Thanksgiving Anniversary Festivals No form at all pag. 73. Besides so great variety of practice in the Order of Consecrating and Distributing the Elements is permitted in this Draught to the Discretion of the Minister as must necessarily have bred great dâ—sorder and discontent In a word so universal innovation and such unlimited liberty they could never expect would be admitted This had been to confess the old Liturgy obnoxious beyond all reason and conscience and our selves guilty of all the Mâ—schiefs which arose by the opposing it and by the methods used for the abolishing it I no whit doubt but divers parts of it as elsewhere I conceive my self to have manifestly proved were in use even in the Apostles days I mean taken up from their mouths as having been frequently and in ordinary course used by them and that they have been continued in the Church ever since Now Prayers of such Antiquity such Primitive simplicity and fervour I may add of such Purity too were it not for no other reason but some mens perhaps unreasonable dislikes to be thrown out I could speak much here touching their intrinsick real excellency and perfection not only as to particulars but as to the main body And I find something as to this Point confest ingenuously by Mr. Baxter himself Third Part of Plea pag. 9. Having saith he perused all the Forreign and Ancient Liturgies extant in the Bibliotheca Patrum I doubt not but our own is incomparably better than any that is there Yet pag. 219. he complains of such failings in it that it is a Worship which we i. e. he and his Nonconforming Brethren cannot in Faith be assured God accepteth That there was never any thing purely of Humane Composure but had some failing or defects in it we readily acknowledge neither did our Church ever require whatsoever he in the Page last cited and other of his Party scrupulously pretend such a Subscription to any of her Books no not to the Correctest Translation of the Bible it self which was to be taken in any other sense This is a common Temper understood in all such Subscriptions But that our Liturgy has more failings or faults in it than either their Extemporary Conceptions or the stated Forms which they presented I must crave their pardon if I peremptorily deny I have not undiligently compared those Forms of theirs with our own and whether it be the daily use of our own for many years according to that wholsome Rubrick to all in Holy Orders which has naturalized them to my spirit or whether by so frequent reading hearing and minding them I see more intimately into their Sense and Emphases than I do into those which I have read but twice or thrice or for some such reason I know not but this I profess God bearing we witness that it is the sense of my soul I can find nothing in theirs which comes so naturally near unto my heart as our own Prayers do What have they so humble easie comprehensive and emphatical in every part as our General Confession Almighty and most merciful Father So Pathetical as well as comprehensive also as our Litany And to pass over other parts the Communion Service is in my poor sense of Devotions most incomparable What could the Wit of Men or Angels devise fitrer to introduce the Celebration of that Holy Ordinance than the distinct Rehearsal of the Commandments each Communicant in the hearing of every Commandment having occasion given him to examine or reflect upon his examinations of Conscience touching his sins against that Commandment and betwixt God and his own heart in his thoughts to confess them and in conclusion after every one with his own mouth to beg distinct pardon for the sins which occur to his mind against that Commandment and for Grace as distinctly against such and such sins for the future And all this usher'd in too with a Prayer which would raise any Soul that were not sensless as well to a strict enquiry into his Conscience Almighty God to whom all hearts be open c. 't is in vain therefore to flatter our selves with an half-scrutiny or Confession as to the impartial cleansing his Soul from all reserves of sin And waving other parts to proceed to the Prayer for the State of Christs Church Militant and the Commemoration of and praising God for the Triumphant or those who are departed this life in his faith and fear without which commemoration it appears not that the Ancient Church did ever Communicate To proceed I say to the General Confession in behalf of all the Communicants and that most comfortable Absolution annext and then to the Sursum Corda the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Gloria in Excelsis which three last will certainly reach home for Antiquity to the Apostles days what more Seraphick than these And how mean is what they would have substituted in the room hereof at least comparatively Again besides the Materials of our Prayers the very Form and
disturb the Union and Peace of our Church I will therefore freely publish my thoughts to be That whether we consider the nature of the thing it self or with regard to the Apostles Rule Rom. 15. 1 2. Not to please our selves but every one of us to please his Neighbour for his good to Edification In either regard I say there are some Collects and perhaps Rubricks too which with all duty and submission I humbly conceive might be altered for the better And further That in some seasons and in some private places where Ceremonies want that Augustness which the advantage of Publick and great Congregations gives them and in which kind of Assemblies they are chiefly requisite if the Obligation to a Ceremony or two were taken off the Benefit which might hence redound to the Church would be very considerable both in respect of Proselytes and strength thereby as also perhaps in other Points And I seem to my self herein to follow the sense and guidance of our Church for even at present the Injunction of the Ceremonies does not appear to me to extend it self to all places and seasons As for instance A Minister baptizes a Child in case of real Necessity in private and he neither habits himself in his Surplice c. nor signs the Child with the sign of the Cross and the Baptism is by the Rubrick declared Lawful and Sufficient nor did the Minister offend in the Omission of those Ceremonies because no Law required them In this particular then the Sense and Spirit of our Church touching the Places and Occasions which require Ceremonies is sufficiently apparent There are also divers other Points which when once the Design of a fair and complaint Accommodation shall be on foot will be fit to be mentioned and indeed will both of course offer themselves and be I judge as easily granted such are the Liberty which the Preface to the Second Book of Homilies allows of exchanging Apocryphal Lessons for Canonical ones any Amendment of such defects as can be proved for all that is said cannot be proved in the Calendar The use of the most correct Translation of the Psalms A better Metrical Version also and perhaps some like matters which though we may account small some Dissenters do not Without doubt some such Mitigations proportionable might have been obtained when that Way tending to a fair and amicable composure spoken of by the Right Reverend Bishop Morley was not yet precluded But now as to the Dissenters who perhaps expected another Game than they have found it may be truly lamented to use Caesars words in a like case Accidisse his quod plerumque hominibus De Bell. Civil Com. 1. nimiâ pertinaciâ atque arrogantiâ accidere solet uti eò recurrant id cupidissimè petant quod paulò ante contempserint nor is it at present though possibly they think as they daily complain it is in the Bishops power to help them Id possumus quod jure possumus They who know any thing of our Constitution know the Bishops are as much tyed by the Laws to the Observation of the Laws as any Order of men whatsoever And though some may say the Penalties upon us in this regard are small or rarely inflicted yet what Penalties operate in others Conscience ought to do in us And I see not how in Conscience we can dispense when the Law allows no such thing for we know not the Mischiefs which may arise from such our Laxness and it would be a very unjustifiable presumption and besides inconsistence with that mans self who pretends to obedience and submission to the Wisdom of the Constitution for him upon his single judgment to over-rule the Dictates of that Wisdom that is the Laws of the Nation In plain English when every one bears his own burthen the hardship or rigour of the Laws if any there be is to be laid first at their doors who by their Combinations had made it necessary for the Government in its own defence to break the knot and then at theirs who through refractoriness when they were asked what would satisfie them replied and stood to it All or Nothing some men may understand this Language if they please Nor are the Law-makers to be charged with severity Such aggrieved persons as I speak to can only thank themselves they have one Member of their fore-mentioned choice though perhaps many of them whom they take for their Enemies are sorry for it besides themselves and yet I say again not able to help them For Laws neither can nor may be altered and Liturgies varied as oft as men could wish then perchance Government as well as Laws would be of very short life Being then such Alterations cannot be made in the Liturgy for the present as might effect the design of Vnion we must turn our selves in the next place to think what can be done And here first it offers it self that one main Branch of the Subscription and Declaration prescribed in the Statue for Uniformity which stuck much with divers relating to the Covenant by the very Letter oâ— the Statute ceases within half a year I trust this may give ease and pâ—rhaps open the door to some And whether the same inducements which swayed the Wisdom of the Nation to prefix such term for the expiration of that Clause might not be as forcible towards the taking off another clause or two which are scrupled by some Possibly it is as necessary other things should be forgotten as the Covenant whether also the Old Oath of Allegiance might not be so worded or explained as to serve in the room not only of this Declaration but of another new Oath too I shall not adventure to propose But this I will say that the Clause touching the Covenant ceasing of it self as beforesaid I do not see what is left in this Declaration or Subscription call it as you please which he who is resolved faithfully to keep the Oath of Allegiance according to its true intent need at all to scruple except only that Branch of Conforming to the Liturgy as it is now by Law establisht Yet this Observation though it remove a suggestion which might afterwards have been objected leaves us nevertheless where we were sticking as some may account it upon the Rock of Plenary Conformity to the Liturgy This would seem now the only stop For relief then herein we must consider whether there be no Mitigations or Lenitives to be found without Repeal or too dishonourable Change of Laws which we cannot expect And I know no fitter Clue in the Entrance of this Labyrinth than the examining what has been offer'd hereto by any of the Dissenters themselves for from them only under God we can tell what will please them Amongst all that have writ upon the Design of Accommodation there is only one come to my Hand that seems to me to offer any thing of Reason more there may be whose Books reach not me here I mean the
but I thought it for the Publick Good to say what I have to which Publick Good we are all of us in duty bound to contribute all we can whatever diminution we suffer in some mens esteem I know it will be demanded of me What need of letting these men in Are there not Ministers enow already and more than are Honourably provided for I answer We shall have never the more for this Relaxation These men in behalf of whom I have spoken are in being already and will preach some where or other and 't is better we had them in Publick than in Corners that so the Church either had security for their peaceable doctrine which I verily believe we may have as to most of them or opportunities to convict them of their Sedition But I have other-guess Arguments than these that move me 1. To those who ask What need of more Union I return What need of Holiness What need of Godliness Charity Justice Are these Christian Duties and is not Union and Peace as much so 2. I am and must be in the mind that the strength of the Protestant Cause both here at home and throughout Christendom lies in the Union of Protestants and the Glory Purity and Power of Christianity in this World stand or falls with Protestantism 3. I must be so ingenuous as to acknowledge That though perhaps the City and divers particular Places flourish with such Preachers as never they had before yet the way of Preaching in many parts of the Countrey and in some no obscure places too might be much improved and needs supply And it can never be made out to the World but it were better we had too many good Preachers than too few I could tell some men in their ear They also have strangely multiplied Curacies which are too often vacant The Lord forgive them and redress this great Evil in his Church If I thought not these Arguments sufficient I would add more which occur plentifully but my Postscript is too much swoâ—n already I am not unsensible how difficult it will be to gain even this Point which I have pleaded for as small as it seems to some That it neither can nor ought to be attempted without the Legislative Power I have said often enough And I conceive the Dissenters would do well by performing so much Obedience to the Laws as they can to encourage and invite Authority to savour them by a Relaxation in what they cannot I will therefore by way of Conclusion make one Proposal which above all yet done or said is the likeliest means in my opinion to bring on an Accommodation Mr. Baxter says Part. 3. p. 8. Where he lived he came to the beginning of the Churches Prayers when he could and staid to the end And that peaceable worthy man above-commended whom I know not but whose name I found out by comparing one Book with another Mr. John Humphrey the Author of both Pieces touching Reordination of the Healing Paper and of the Peaceable Resolution c. seems to offer for himself and divers of his Brethren not only to use but to subscribe to the use of the Liturgy as to the Ordinary Lords-day Service It is plain then that several of the Nonconformist Preachers can in Conscience use thus much of the Liturgy yet I never heard either that Mr. Baxter when he preached publickly Occasional Sermons as he calls them and to which if I mistake him not he conceives his old Licence might authorise him still I say I never heard either he or any other of his Brethren did read any part of the Liturgy before any of their Preachings That they still frequently preach I no whit question Now my Proposal is That before all such Sermons at least before their more Solemn Ones on the Lord's days they would respectively use the Morning and the Evening Prayer which they thus acknowledge they could use and subscribe to the use of and by their practice thus teach the People the lawfulness of so much Conformity I should not doubt but such frequent reverent and serious use of it would soon recommend it to their Consciences and to the Consciences of all sober persons among them and this practice would not only be an Argument that they talk about Accommodation in good earnest but certainly prevail with the Bishops to use their interest and address to his Majesty in Parliament for some such Relaxation or Explanatory Act as is desired This would be something of a coming nearer to us and is but reasonable in them for that they expect we should be moving towards them But if they will still totally hold off and only tell us They can do thus and thus much towards Peace yet really do nothing it is a very shrew'd sing either that there is not in them that Cordial desire of Union they pretend to or that their Non-conformity is more the Act and Resolution of their Will than of their Conscience which if it shall appear they will for the future find less belief and fewer Favourers The End