silencing to lose our friends to gratifie them that thus abuse us and to take pains to exchange kindness for cruelty and to strive hard to leap out of the ashes into the fire But I will tell the truth to the world and you we do what you desire of us or reasonably can desire I constantly Preached till the Goal restrained me against Separation and much more against sedition and rebellion We do it openly and plainly I am the man that am reproached in Print for want of this And the same hand so far justified me as before the Kings Majesty and Lords and before the Right Reverend Bishops to say of me and my Disputes of Church-Government about the Ceremonies c. No man hath written better of these things And can we speak louder than by the Press Or can they prove that we preach not as we write O wonderful that ever the world can degenerate to so much unrighteousness as to condemn men upon such defamations as these Besides that Book many a year before and since I have still written to the same purpose I have Preached to the same purpose But thinking it more seasonable in private Conference I have an hundred and an hundred times more pleaded for the like in private And my Disputes before mentioned are accused by many offended persons as having made a hundred Ministers at least conformable And had they not been written in the very height of Usurpation before the Kings return I should have been taken for the vilest temporizer This is our course and yet if wrath and partiality and ill will do but dream that we do infect the people and cherish them in Separation and do not contradict but flatter them in their extreams against our own judgments the world must ring of all these dreams and they think it fit that we be used as if all were certain truth We have need to bless our selves against dreaming neighbours if we must be estimated and used and described to the world according to their dreams Nay I will tell the world here the certain truth of our success and usage I preach I write and I frequently and openly talk against Separation and for the lawfulness of joining with the Church in the use of the Liturgy and to rebuke mens extreams and censures of the Episcopal Clergy and for an impartial love of all true Christians I sharply reprove the weak reasonings of those that are otherwise minded and by this I occasion the true Sectarians every where to speak against me and yet even these Sectaries wish me well and would do me no harm and the generality of my hearers bear all this well and seem to be of the same mind And yet when I am loved by those that I plead against I am reviled and abused by those that I plead for Yea more I must profess it before the world that I plead your cause as far as conscionably I can and its you that hinder me and none like you You would have us do your work with the people and you would not let us do it You use us as I saw a man lately do by a Colt who tyed him fast to a great tree and lashed him most cruelly to make him draw You make our work difficult if not impossible and then think us worthy of your smarting wrath for not performing it Were it not for two things we could do much to reconcile the people to you 1. If you would not impose those Oaths Subscriptions and such like burdens which we are our selves unable without fraud and falshood to defend 2. If you would not silence their faithful Teachers but would encourage Godliness and good men impartially and would exercise LOVE as openly and largely as you exercise WRATH But we must tell the world and you that we are unable utterly unable to justifie the Corporation-Oath and Declaration and to bring the people to like those Bishops whom they think are the chief cause of depriving of them of their long tried painful faithful Pastors and setting over them such as in too many places are set When our people are in Goals for meeting as they have done these twenty yea thirty or forty years only to repeat their Teachers Sermon and pray and sing a Psalm together between the publick Exercises on the Lords-day where they have reverently attended It is a hard task that you put on them to like you but a harder that you put on us that we must Preach them to it even when we must not Preach at all That we must go to the Gaols to them or after they come out to their houses to teach them to like the Bishops and their Impositions They will tell us VVe love them with a love of Benevolence as we must our enemies we wish them no harm but the greatest good but we cannot love them as such complacentially nor think approvingly of their ways Whether you do well or ill in promoting their sufferings I am not now judging I only tell you that it is the greatest hinderance to our reconciling them to you and your ways that you could easily have devised I never saw that wooing speed well that said Love me or I will send thee to Gaol When I was a child I never thought any correction more unreasonable than whipping children to make them give over crying when whipping was an unresistible means to make them cry if they had not cried before While I am Voluminously reproached for not reproving the spirit of Separation or Nonconformty as afore limited when I did it last I was sent to Prison and when I would do it by Preaching I have not leave And if your meaning be Speak when we have shut thy mouth and teach men to like us when they suffer our wrath you increase our task when you have taken away our straw I conclude therefore with repeating it you will not suffer us to serve you as we can but are our greatest hinderers while you blame us And lastly as to their scrupling the Corporation Declaration and Oath I can speak best for my self The Bayliff Justice and all the twelve Capital Burgesses besides inferior Burgesses did refuse it and were every one displaced save one now dead that had been a Soldier in the Kings Army what men were put in their stead I am not now to tell you And they were so far from being perswaded to this by me at almost an hundred miles distance that I never once spake to them nor wrote to them one Letter or word about it And it being no part of the old Conformity how could this be put into their heads by me especially when they know that I had kept the Covenant from ever being put upon that Town and Country 4 Obj But the issue sheweth how little good your Teaching doth where are any more against Bishops and Conformity than your hearers You make men hypocrites and teach them to prate phrases and cut faces and rail at carnal
foreseeing the inconveniences of mens uncertain and venturous reports that nothing should be charged on either part as their assertions which was not by them given in in writing After this we received not one line of Answer from you either to our Reply or to our Additions wondering above all that when it had been said so usually by others that we could agree to find fault with the old but could never agree of any other in its stead we should never hear from men supposed not unwilling one charge against the Matter Phrase or Method to this day Our last three days being spent in hopeless disputation I have nothing to say to because of our forementioned agreement but this That when it had fallen to my lot to speak much and consequently to displease much I was since charged in Print with the unsoundness of some what there delivered about commanding things evil by accident which I never publickly answered to this day lest I should seem to blow the fire which all good men desire should be quenched But the very words of the Dispute it self were printed being not half a sheet of Paper than which I thought there needed no more to satisfie any living man of the truth that would but use sound eyes and reason And since that case is opened in a Discourse of Scandal in the second Plea for Peace I have recited this much principally to mind you of these few things 1. That we were not the last in seeking Reconciliation Unity and Peace 2. That we are the more excusable if we are not changed in our judgment because you never Answered our three last Writings given in We have since indeed seen two Volumes which are against two particular passages The one by a nameless Author who would have no Prayers in the Pulpit but the Liturgy or imposed forms but most of the Conformists practise the contrary to this day and therefore we need not write to confute him The other to prove that Lent should be kept not only on a Civil but Religious account and the antiquity thereof of which Dr. More in his Mystery of Iniquity Bishop Taylor and other Conformists have spoken so well that we need to say nothing especially in a case which we take to be of no great moment to us while each man hath the liberty of his secret thoughts and may observe it on what account he please But had it been of moment we had told the Author that he lost his labour in proving the antiquity of one or three or few days fast when the question was only of the antiquity of the forty days of which Daille hath given a full account 3. That our displeasing-importunity to have prevented the silencing of so many Ministers was not without cause and that we spake not falsly when we so ost foretold you on how many of the Clergy and Laity the storm would fall and that it would not asswage but much increase the divisions which all good men lamented 4. That we never yet had opportunity to give you or the world our Reasons against the New Conformity it being only the Old before the New was made which we were then allowed to debate So that as the Presbyterians on one side may say that their cause was never yet publickly pleaded by us so may those on the other side who could have yielded to the old Conformity but cannot to the new Since that time instead of Abatements and Approaches for Accommodation and concord Conformity is made very much more difficult to us than it was before which we speak not to accuse you much less the makers of the Law but to lament the unhappiness of this distracted and distressed Land and partly to excuse our selves Several men have several interests and apprehensions of things and the judgments which God will have executed upon a sinful people must come to pass though he will not be the author of any of the sin of them that execute them The Conformity of the Laity is made an hundred-fold more difficult by the Corporation Oath and Declaration and by the Vestry Act c. yet have we lately read the writings with pity and admiration who blush not to tell the world that the Laity or People are not put upon the renouncing of the Covenant But thus it will be where Love and Unity are oppugned and destroyed by those that praise them The Conformity of the Clergy is made much more difficult than before 1. By the new Subscription 2. By the new Declaration 3. By Reordination 4. By the new additions to the Liturgy especially the Doctrine of the Salvation of Baptized Infants without distinguishing of them that are Baptized jure vel injuria with right or without And the old Conformity is yet too hard for us in the Subscription and in the Oath of obedience to the Diocesans and in other points All which again we speak not to reflect on our Superiors whose Honour we desire to maintain but to make known our case and the reasons of our practice Now these seventeen years we have patiently waited on Gods Providence in silence as to the pleading of our cause so that I know not that ever there was so much as one Petition either for us or by us offered to the Parliament And when a multitude of Books have been written against us of such a nature and tendency as I will not denominate or describe it is the policy of some to do things so bad that no sufferer or dissenter can so much as name them without the imputation of railing or reviling by the use of such abominable words But the day is near that will set all strait it hath moved me many time to pity to read such Books as I have seen written for Conformity to think how easie it was to answer them and pro captu lectoris what lamentable reasonings go for current with some men We have been silent whilest Volume after Volume hath been published against us some disputing and some reproaching and if any impatient Nonconformists have been moved to dispute the Cause it hath been mostly such of the weaker sort who have done it without their brethrens knowledg and have done the Cause more wrong than right And who can expect that so many hundreds should be so many years silenced accused and writ against in such a manner and that none of them should be so weak and impatient as to speak for himself according to his ability and they that at such a time had not wisdom enough to hold their tongues could not be expected to have wisdom enough to speak For my own part I must profess that the principal reason that caused my silence as to such disputes was the fear of injuring the Church For as I have heard that old Mr. Dod was wont to thank God that no more conformed for the sake of truth and to thank God that so many conformed for the sake of the Gospel which they preached So
Churches of the people in their Communion and Worship but only from a prevailing company and Synod of the Bishops that were guilty of cruelty and of bringing reproach upon the serious practisers of Godliness in those times And as for the many Volumes which have been written against my self I thought it not necessary to confute them nor seasonable to stand upon a Personal Vindication when I knew it would exasperate the accusers to be accounted injurious and false and would increase the breach Yea when it was judged against me that my presence would be injurious to the people that I had long preached to and that my absence would more conduce to their Conformity and that they were none of my Charge I so far denied my self and them as that I never since came near them nor unless very rarely sent them one line Though I thought if I had been allowed so much it might have better answered the ends of those that were most for my removal Yet did I not take this for any perfidious forsaking them when upon many accounts I believed it to be for their good and I sent them all the Books which I wrote If any think that I should not say so much of my self in an Apology for others I answer 1. It is because that men will needs have it so whether I will or not I say not a word to them and yet what a multitude of Volumes have these seven years and more been tossing my Name as a football of reproach about the land And when the cause is pleaded they presently let fly at the persons and say what you can it 's there that they will stick and till they are answered there they think they are unanswered 2. And because I am best acquainted with my self and can speak with more certainty of my own case and reasons than of any others 3 But chiefly because as our late Tilenus hath stiled me Purus putus Puritanus so the late Episcopal Indignation published me the Antesignanus of the Presbyterians I deserve not so much honour But hence the world and posterity may know that whereas but a few years ago a Puritan was one that was against Bishops and Ceremonies and Liturgy and a Presbyterian was one that was for Lay-Elders and the power of Classes composed partly of such not only for concord but as Governours of all the particular Churches now in England a Puritan is one that is no more against and as much for Archbishops Bishops Liturgy and Ceremonies as in my Books I have long published my self to be And a Puritan as a Puritan is no worse a person than I am whose life and writings have had the happiness to have some share in their commendations And a Presbyterian now is one that is against Lay-Elders and in his judgment against the Regimental power of Classes and Synods as over the Pastors of the particular Churches and only for their consultation and their use to concord and one that is as aforesaid for Archbishops Bishops c. as far as in my dispute for Church-Government I have declared my self to be It is of some use to know the mutability of the world and what a purus putus Puritanus and a Presbyterian now is But having thus far related the History of our true endeavours for peace it must be my next task to Apologize for our supposed unpeaceableness And I cannot better know what is the matter of offence than by knowing what is charged on my self He that was one of the first restrained from Preaching and hath been laid in the Goal as I have been will be supposed to be one of the most guilty And therefore I may hope that they that have escaped better have deserved less and that my own defence will be also theirs And I owe the offended an account of the practise by which I have so much offended them When the Act of Uniformity was not yet made or talkt of I went to the now Archbishop of Canterbury then Bishop of London even whilest the Kings Declaration gave us liberty and I desired his License to preach in his Diocess which he was pleased to grant me upon my Voluntary subscription to the Doctrine of the Church and those terms of peaceableness which he accepted When the said Act of Uniformity was in fieri I ceased that seeming Lecture which I had before 1st of May 1662. When that Act came out it forbad all to hold any Benefice Cure Lecture c. who had possession of any Ecclesiastical Promotion the 1st of May 1662 and did not subscribe and declare as required of them in that Act and also forbad the reception of any into such Promotion or Cure for the future that should not so subscribe and declare Neither of these being my case for I was out of all before May 1st 1662 and I sought no new Cure or Benefice the Law did no more require me to subscribe and declare than it did the Bishops or any conformable man that for so long had Cure Promotion or stated employment So that I was no Nonconformist in the sense of the Law because I conformed as far as the Act required me to conform And that Act not forbidding occasional Sermons to any but those that were not Licensed my License enabled me to Preach occasionally as many that had no places did yet because I knew that the Bishop might revoke my License at his pleasure and that if I so far used it being reputed a Nonconformist it would give offence to my superiors I never since made use of it to this day nor ever Preached a publick Sermon And though the Act forbad me not publick Catechising or the Administration of the Sacraments I never did either to avoid offence And when about three years after the Oxford Act came forth for the restraining Nonconformists from coming within five miles of a Corporation or of any place where they had been Teachers or kept a Conventicle I found that I was not concerned in that Act because by Law I was no Nonconformist to whom the Act by the very title and matter was limited So that being neither a Nonconformist by Law nor my License to preach occasionally ever nulled nor yet concerned in this Oxford Act which imposeth the new Oath I supposed my peace not endangered by the Law which the Lawyers whom I consulted also did conclude Yet did I forbear to come within five miles of a Corporation except on the rode to avoid offence All this while I lived in a place where sew desired me to preach they being poor and worldly people that minded most their labours and necessities So that I contented my self to instruct my family with three or four more that sometimes desired to be present But the chief reason why I did no more was because as none called me to it so I was engaged in certain writings A Body of Practical Divinity the Reasons of the Christian Religion and others which I thought
other Nor did I ever hear man or woman blame him for any word or deed nor ever heard him ask what money he should have but took it as it came And was indeed as a willing and loving servant unto all and was beloved by all though we had many more affectionate taking Preachers 7. I gave to every family in Town and Parish being beside a great Borough about twenty Villages a Catechism and some of my lesser Books and of every Book I wrote usually as many as my Purse could well afford And to every Family a Bible which either for want of money or of willingness to buy had none where any one in the house could read 8. After the Lecture at evening as many as had leisure and will assembled at my Lodgings where one of them repeated the Sermon and any one that would did by word or writing put in such doubts about the things delivered the solution of which would tend to their further satisfaction which I then answered And if they had any other cases of Conscience they offered them to me in writing that I might see whether they were fit for publick mention and then we sung a Psalm and I or one of them did pray 9. All the Ministers of the County whose names are Printed in our Book of Concord did agree seeing the Rulers that then were did leave all Discipline to the Churches will and constrained none and seeing we were divided about Church-Government to the great damage of the Church That we would all practise so much of the spiritual discipline as all three parties Episcopal Presbyterian and Independents were agreed in which we thought enough for our union and reformation and leave the rest without the compass of our agreement that so the Episcopal party might not say that we break the Laws or shut them out nor the rest say that our narrow principles excluded them from our Communion 10. Accordingly once a mouth I had a meeting to hear and admonish them that after more private reproof had refused repentance for heinous and notable offences where were present three Justices of the Peace as at their monthly meeting to do that which belonged to the Magistrate and see that we did not usurp their power and above twenty of the Seniors of the Town and Parish not as Lay-Elders or Officers to vote but as those of the people that had best leisure and advantage to see that we did the Church no wrong and two or three Pastors and three or four elected Deacons Where our chief trouble was with drunkards exhorting them to repentance and praying with them and to keep peace among the neighbours and maintain their unity 11. The next day of every month the Neighbour-ministers met at the Lecture and afterward at an Ordinary in an honest neighbours private house where if any of our Parishes obstinately refused repentance for drunkenness or such open heinous sin he was gently admonished and exhorted before all the Ministers But our usual work was a Disputation on some useful point in Divinity to exercise and edifie the younger sort where were usually present about twenty and among them some of the most learned sober Episcopal Divines that were in these parts who were constant or frequent helpers of us Mr. Thomas Good Mr. Mar. Johnson c. 12. Those open great offenders who before these Ministers also refused to profess Repentance I did three Lords-days as gently and affectionately as I could admonish publickly before all the Church and after that some days publickly prayed for their Repentance which if they refused not they there consest their sin and desired the Churches prayers for their pardon and reformation But if they still refused I declared them unfit for the Communion of the Church according to the Laws of Christ and required the Church to avoid their Communion and we used no other Excommunication But this discipline we used on none but those that consented to it before and not over any that would rather forsake our Communion than submit to it lest they should think I did them wrong 13. The people of the place also did for ought I know as much as I for the promoting of their neighbours good 1. By their unity and concord 2. By their humility and blameless lives 3. They met in the houses of many of those that were ablest to help them on Saturday nights to call to mind the last Lords-days Exhortations and on the Lords-days twice to repeat the Sermons preacht that day and sing a Psalm and pray together and no more The Reasons of these meetings I refer not to the enemies of all things that favour of diligence for a mans soul but to all that know what a soul is worth and what is due from the Creature to his Creator and what is necessary to the information of an ignorant man 1. Many families had no one that could read and such were also the most ignorant so that they could not do any thing in a holy use of the Lords-day but what they did at Church unless they took their neighbours help And time on any day is precious and not to be cast away in vain 2. These persons and many more could remember but little of a Sermon by once hearing yea twice was too little with the most And we preach not only to be heard and admired but to edifie souls and how great a discouragement is it to a faithful Minister to bestow his time and labour in preparing and speaking that which so nearly concerneth his auditors and to cast it as seed by the high-way side and to have it all die in the hearing and carried no further than the Church-doors If I taught a School of boys or sent my servant but on certain businesses for my self I should not be willing that all my words should go no further And old ignorant men do hardlier learn than boys and heavenly Doctrine is more hardly remembered than common business in the world 3. If the Lords-day had been but a time of leave to use such helps and not of duty we should take it for a great mercy to have leave to spend that time in seeking God and life everlasting which else would be lost or spent in trifles 4. Our people were generally poor labourers that could spare so little time for such things on the week-days but what they did in their Shops at their work that it must be now or not at all 5. Common charity and many Scripture-precepts oblige all good Christians to help to edifie and save their neighbours by all just and lawful means 6. We found by great experience that it greatly increased knowledg and obedience and piety in the people 7. And so far was it from causing sects or heresies or contempt of Ministers or private mens Preaching that it was the chief of all means that ever I found successful against these exorbitancies so that when those Pastors that cried down such meetings as Conventicles and
heinous crime for any to vent any suspicions of his constancy which through so many temptations he hath approved And indeed it were a crime that deserved no small punishment as imputing that to our Sovereign which is scarce to be thought of a rational man even to give up most of his power and Kingdom to a foreign Usurper after his power is shaken off and that without any cause Princes that ever got loose from the Roman yoke do not use to come under it again at least except as King John resigned his Crown constrained by meer necessity But Godfrey Goodman a Papist was the last Bishop of Gloucester and I must profess that if I were a Papist and studied to help them to a Toleration I would by writings and by all my interest endeavour to bring as many more of you as I could into a necessity of seeking Liberty or Toleration that when the party that needed and sought it were considerable and the cry for it were great we might look for our part among the rest and say why not we as well as others And yet I would have the Papists and all conscientious persons used like men and not with any cruelty or inhumanity 19 Obj. There was indeed a necessity of much Preaching before the world was converted to Christianity but there is no such necessity now when we are all Christians Ans. This is fully answered before Do you think the bare name of a Christian and his Baptism will save those thousands that know not what Christianity is or those that live in enmity contempt or neglect of the Laws of Christ Is a wicked Christian that sinneth against the greatest means and his own Covenant vow and profession a happier man than the poor Infidels that never heard the Gospel If not these have need of teaching here at home as well as men in foreign parts But I will add no more to my former answer 20 Obj. But why do you not go preach among the Indians or in other lands where there is more need if liberty of Preaching be all that you desire Ans. 1. Some are sickly and weak and some aged unable to travel 2. Some have families which they are obliged to and must not desert and cannot carry with them If you say they should have kept themselves without I answer they were born in a land where good men were suffered to serve God quietly and therefore they thought they might fix themselves therein But if they could have foreseen that they should have been forbidden to Preach at home I believe that many would not only have forborn Marriage but also have set themselves to learn some foreign languages that they might have been able to Preach abroad But 3. our great impediment is that we have not the vulgar tongue of any other Country and therefore cannot preach to any of the vulgar there and if we could in a long time learn the Tartarian or Indian tongue c. a half learnt broken tongue doth but make the speaker ridiculous to the vulgar To say nothing of our want of maintenance to sustain us thither and there For my own part had I strength and any vulgar tongue which I might use in Preaching in other lands I think I should have left England long ago and not been an eye-sore to you so long 21 Object Have not the Friendly Debate and the Politician fully and unanswerably opened the folly and villany of your Religion and can you yet for shame desire leave to preach and propagate such a Religion as that Ans. Because so great prejudice is taken against us from those Books I intended in the end to have given a full answer to all that concerneth us not in their mode but in my own that is in certain Propositions containing our judgment and our reasons about those matters which I leave out now to avoid length having written Books enow to declare what my Religion is and so have others And therefore now only say this in general concerning the Authors and their dealing with us 1. As to the men I judg them to be of more than ordinary parts as to Ratiocination and expression and had they with humility patience and impartiality taken but a dozen or twenty years more time to have furnished their minds according to their capacity before they had permitted themselves with so great considence to say what they have said I believe they would have been as excellent persons as most ages have produced But they have put off the habit of little children too soon 2. I imagin by their writings that they have been unhappy in their converse and acquaintance and that they have had more to do with Sectaries and weak women and boys and the weaker sort of serious Christians among those called Puritans than with the sober understanding sort and so judg of the party by such as they have been acquainted with For most of the weak expressions and passages which they fill their Books with I have heard from some Sectaries or true Fanaticks and from some weak women and ignorant persons but never from the grave and sober sort of Nonconformists Nor have I used to converse with many of the Laity that talk at so low a rate as they feigned them to talk 3. I doubt also that their converse hath been more at the Universities and with Scholars and with the richer and well-bred sort of persons besides those Sectaries than with Plowmen and other of the lower rank and therefore that they are strangers to the condition of the vulgar which faithful Country Ministers know whose work hath been to Catechise them and personally instruct them 4. They cannot but know that most of those things which they blame in the people which are real weaknesses and faults we tell them of as loud as they do and as plainly as they though not so wrathfully or flamingly as they Mr. Pool's Vox calmentis hath told the si'enced Ministers even in Latin in the hearing of the world of more of their faults then both these Authors could remember and not only in my Directions for weak Christians but in divers other Books I have dealt as plainly with the people 5. Saving therefore the Debaters civility to my self I must ask him whether it savoured of common equity and justice to make the Nonconformist in the general the author or owner of all those weaknesses follies impudences falshoods c. which he could fasten only on Sectaries or on the ignoranter sort And especially when scarcely ever Books were written by any man as against Nonconformists that so little touch upon Nonconformity it self or any of the points in difference Is Gersom Bucer or Altare Damascenum or Amesius Fresh Suit or any other of the Nonconformists writings answered there except a late Nehushtan that few men own and he thought he could more easily say somewhat to 6. If he say that he told us that he spake it not of all I answer what if he
had put the word Christians instead of the word Nonconformist and said that Christians hold all those sottish and impudent opinions but yet said It is not all Christians had this been justice to Christianity and yet it is true for if Nonconformists be Christians then Christians hold what they hold He that heareth such a word Christians or Protestants or Nonconformists have a foolish Religion doth suppose it to be locutio formalis and that the meaning is As Christians or as Protestants or as Nonconformists their Religion is foolish And for the Author to say when he hath done I meant not All Christians All Protestants All Nonconformists is to say I speak not of them as such What then Why as Antinomians or as ignorant unlearned people But why then did you not charge your fooleries only on Antinomians Sectaries and ignorant people and make them as such only the actors in your scene and not as Christians Protestants c. I know the name Christians is more venerable than Protestant or Nonconformist But the injustice is as palpable in the one as in the other And the cause or the principle is bad that can engage men in such unrighteousness and make them so strange to themselves as not to see it yea to proceed impenitently in it even when Righteousness is one of the things which they write for as neglected by them whom they endeavour to disgrace It is an ill cause that produceth such effects though a quick and hasty wit can write another Volume to defend it till love it self shall sit in judgment and condemn all the issues of uncharitable wrath The cause of Nonconformity as of old and as owned now by us was punctually expressed to you in our many Papers given in when we vainly attempted unity and the new Conformity is known by the Acts which are lately made And what is the matter of the Debaters Dialogues to any of this Doth any Act of Parliament forbid men to say I am well through mercy Or is there any Nonconformity in that speech or any unfitness either And so of abundance of such other passages 6. And is it for the interest of Justice honesty and charity to perswade the world that the Nonconformists Religion is foolish senseless and unpeaceable when they profess to own no Religion at all but naked Christianity Is Christianity so vile a thing And indeed is not your Religion the same with ours I thought we had not been of different Religions but only of different opinions about Discipline and modes of worship in the same Religion But you know your selves better than we do But if really you are of another Religion from us why were there never any attempts to reconcile us in Doctrinals when the work of reconciliation was vainly on foot Why did you never charge us with errors in Doctrine Nay why did Dr. Cornelius Burgess his Reasons for Reformation in Doctrine Discipline c. so much offend as you may see even in the Kings Declaration about Ecclesiastical Affairs where he takes it ill that some pretend that we differ in Doctrinals But now the Religion of one must be wise and the other foolish The King there declareth our unity in Religion after his trial of both sides And this Author maketh our Religions as different as light and darkness that is as wisdom and folly Our Religion as to its containing Rule is the holy Canonical Scripture Is that foolish and seditious we profess to have no more The Explication of the Nonconformists sense of it you have much in the Assemblies Catechisms and Confession Why wrote you not to prove them to be another Religion Our Books also are abroad Mr. Hildershams Greenhams Hierons Dods Amesius Bains Bradshaws Cartwrights Mr. Gataker Mr. Vines Mr. Anth. Burgess Mr. Shaws Mr. How 's Mr. Allens and an hundred more What false Religion do they contain I have told you my Religion oft enough especially in my Reasons for the Christian Religion and in my Confession And if it be not false and foolish then it is not the Nonconformists as such that is so for a quatenus ad omne you may justly argue Yea the Author is pleased to favour me with some Vindication and to blame others for opposing me and is not that enough to prove that such opinions as he disliketh are no part of Nonconformity as now in Controversie But he will give me occasion to tell him how much I differ from his mind and ways when as there are near thirty or forty Books written against me in whole or in part by men of several Sects and parties and yet I fall out with none of them all nor charge them with such foolish Religions unless they be downright Apostates or Hereticks Nor would I silence any one of them that is a sincere Preacher of the Christian Faith My provocations its like have been more than this Authors ever were But must I forgive enemies and not friends Do we contend for our selves or for Truth and love and unity and peace It is some honour from those adversaries both to me and to my brethren that I am called their Antisignanus who have written such abundance of Books against me For it seems that we forgive and love each other If you say that it is because we now agree in Nonconformity I answer 1. It was so before 2. And you suppose us as little agreed in that and indeed many censure me more for differing from them there than in all the rest 7. And is it not as valid arguing to say Mr. Hildersham Dr. Reignolds Amesius Bradshaw Burgess c. have written soundly and learnedly Ergo the Religion of the Nonconformists is wise and sound as to say Mr. Bridge one of the five Dissenters from the Presbyterians hath some harsh expressions and Mr. T. W. hath some little sententious jingles such as Conformists most abound with Ergo the Nonconformists Religion is foolish 8. But it may be you will say that the Nonconformists must be judged of not by an odd person as your self is but by the major part Ans. 1. It never goeth right among Divines when they judge Causes by persons contrary to signed avowed professions Do they print and publish their professed Religion to the World and will you measure and denominate the Religion of the Nonconformists by two or three mens Writings against which also you have no more to say 2. And why did you not prove that it is the major part or one of an hundred that are guilty of the real weaknesses which you mention for all that you find fault with are not weaknesses Are the two or three that you named the major part of Eighteen hundred What of all this have you to charge on those forenamed or on Mr. John Ball Mr. John Paget Mr. Langley c. or on Dr. Twisse Dr. Arrowsmith and the rest of that Assembly or on Dr. Tuckney Dr. Langley Dr. Staunton Dr. Seaman Dr. Manton Dr. Bates Mr. Bull Mr.
say that they are certain of their own Salvation I know that many excellent Protestants have made it the sense of that article of the Creed I believe that my own sins are pardoned and say that this Proposition My sins are pardoned is de fide Divina And yet I know that in propriety and strictness of speech which should be used in Controversies it is not true I know that many of the School-mens assertions are commonly rejected as erroneous because they are not commonly understood I know that Luther maketh the Doctrine of Justification to be Articulus stantis vel cadentis Ecclesiae and yet I know that Ludovicus le Blank of Sedan in his Theses hath greatly narrowed the difference and understands it much better than Luther seemeth to have done Which I may say also of Bucer Conradus Bergius In Praxi Cathol Ludov. Crocius and many other such Conciliators And that Luther on the Galatians is so acceptable to the Antinomians that I conceive divers passages in it have need of as candid an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Doctrine of Scotus and many Papists on that point I am my self a Christian and that is my Religion and I own the name Protestant for no greater reason than because it is the Protestant Religion to be meer Christians and to protest against the Roman Superadditions and depravations of it And so to be a Protestant and to be a meer Christian adhering to Scripture sufficiency as the test and terms of Union and Communion are all one Yea if any one doubted of the Canonicalness of the Canticles Esther or some one or few Books and acknowledg the main body of the Scriptures and the ancient articles of faith I would not cast such a one from my Communion And these terms or none I have foretold it you oft must heal the Church if ever it be healed And till the Papists will see the equity of these terms it is our great advantage that the certain truth of all our Religion is so fully acknowledged But 2. as long as we let others alone with their additions why may they not live in peace with us and let us alone without them All men are united in the Essentials of Humanity though they are not all of one complection stature or degree of strength And if any be so peevish that he will associate with none that are not of his own complection the separation is the effect of his folly which may possibly be cured and till it be cured both the fault and the suffering is his own If a Law were made that none shall live in the Kings Dominions but men of a Sanguine complection and of a strait and comely person and of such a proportion of tallness and of strength and of flaxen hair this Law would necessitate a separation and diminution of the Kings subjects from generation to generation But if the Law be that all English men that will live after the rules of Reason Honesty and Society shall have the priviledges of subjects if an hundred thousand had got a conceit that they may not lawfully be of the same Kingdom with any but men of their own complection and stature as aforesaid this is a cureable folly and the Law-makers may say we have done our parts for universal society and it is not we that make it impossible or hinder it and men in time may come to reason We refuse not them but they refuse us If you make things necessary and of common agreement to be your terms of Union Greeks Abassines Armenians Romans may take their own way and every one without injury enjoy his own be it wisdom or folly upon these terms But if you unite upon any other terms you make Laws for schism even for the exclusion of all that are not of your mind For Hales his Doctrine is true in the judgment of all men save the guilty that the Imposer of unnecessary doubtful things is the Schismatick or cause of all the schism So that there is no true union to be expected with Rome or any others but on the terms of primitive simplicity or which all true Christians are agreed in And they are no good terms which induce the authors through the force of interest to say that none in the world are good Christians that are not of their cut and strain and wear not their livery and lace not their coats in the Imposers mode 4 And as long as we take nothing from the men of various modes and fashions by unity in the Essentials of Humanity and Christianity to imagine that it is the way to union to force all Dissenters to their modes is but to renounce union and to gratifie a distant party so far as to make them laugh at us as fools and hope ere long to get us at their mercy and thereby to lose disoblige and destroy those that are nearer to us and would indeed be our friends and strength and to become enemies to our own families rather than to displease the people of France by not wearing their fashions 5. And if you had attained a seeming union with the Papists you are not sure it will hold seven year For their Religion still thriveth and thereby changeth and is yet far short of its maturity in all likelihood For General Councils make their Religion and who knoweth how many General Councils of forty Bishops perhaps like that at Trent for a great part of the time there may yet be and what alterations of Religion they may make And are you sure you can go along with them in all as far as they will go If you must break at last unite not on such mutable terms at first But there 's no talking to men whose interest and passion and partiality is the maker of their Religion It is not my purpose to speak any of this either to one of Grotius's mind if Saraviad and the Book called Grotius Papirans be credible or if he be that man that wrote the Discussio Apolog. Rivet who would have us unite upon the acceptance of all the Councils even that of Trent nor to such as come as near them as Mr. Thorndike nor any of that degree of affinity For I suppose they are already gone out of the hearing of such a voice as mine Yet still remember that I am not setting a Law no not Christs Law to your selves for the rule of your own opinions or practices If you will please the Papists by coming yet nearer them even nearer than the learned Forbes Bishop of Edenburgh did if you will have more of their Doctrine Discipline and Worship take it if it will do you any good But why must all others needs be of your judgment or those be of your way that are not of your judgment And why cannot you unite with the Papists if you will without destroying the Protestants or renouncing them Unite in things necessary and hold and use the rest as matters of liberty and it will
or Covenant doth disoblige me from any of this aforesaid nor warranteth me to disobey any lawful Command of the King or any of my Governours nor to do any unlawful thing And I renounce all Doctrines and Practices contrary to this profession Especially of those Popes and Councils of Bishops who have decreed the Excommunicating and Deposing of Kings or other Temporal Lords and the Absolving their Subjects from their Oaths and Fidelity and the rest of the Papal Usurpations and Church-Tyranny against the Rights of Princes and Christian people though judged Hereticks by Pope Prelates or Priests If this be not enough see the 2d Plea for Peace and my form of professed Loyalty in my book called The true and only way of the Concord of all Christian Churches V. And because they still cant over the mention of the late miserable Wars as if they hated the Act of Oblivion and Peace I add that malice may have no more to say that hath the shew of reason Silence and cast out all that ever had any hand in those Wars except the Conformists and no more and we will give you a thousand thanks and acquiesce in it as unexpected justice And is not all this yet enough VI. As to the particular reasons that we have against Subscribing Universally and unlimitedly without any exposition given by the Law-makers that it is unlawful to take arms against any Commissioned by the King and as referring to on any pretence whatsoever it belongeth to another discourse to render them which giveth the reasons of our Nonconformity It would be here unseasonable and they are many and great 27 Obj. But good words must not satisfie while the remembrance of your Rebellious practises yet remaineth Ans. 1. I have elsewhere told the strangers and young men that know it not that it was between two Parties of Episcopal Conformists that the War began 2. Is it not Words that you require as satisfactions in your Subscriptions and Oaths What more than Words is it that you would have 3. Are not the Laws in Power and Judges to execute them against any that shall speak or do disloyally What would you have more than Words and that mens Estates and Lives be answerable for their offences Obj. But why will you not then subscribe and swear in the words of the Law but in your own Ans. To give here the reasons of that is the unseasonable digression before disclaimed You may as well here call us to dispute over all our differences Obj. But here I am charged as an impudent falsifier of History for saying that the War began between two Parties of Episcopal Conformity which maketh me pity the World in point of History when the publick affairs of a Kingdom so openly managed shall be in such a manner controverted in the very age when they were done Divers Lords are yet living who were interessed in these matters and it is unpleasing to give men the Catalogue of great mens Names in a matter which His Majesty hath committed to oblivion But a breviate of all the necessary proof I shall draw up in a History by it self The Accusation 28 being made publickly by my old friend Dr. Thomas Good in his book called Dubitantius Firmianus I will annex a Letter which I wrote in answer to it ACCUS 28. To my Reverend and Worthy Friend Dr. Thomas Good Master of Baliol-Colledge in Oxford Reverend and Worthy Sir IT is now about a Month since I received a Letter from you for the furthering of a good work which I sent to Mr. Foley by his Son Mr. Paul Foley not having opportunity my self to see him I have stayed so long for an answer not hearing yet from him that I think it not meet any longer to forbear to acquaint you with the reasons of the delay He liveth quite at the other end of London from me and my weakness and business keep me much within doors and it 's hard to find him within except at those hours when I am constrained to be in bed But I have reason to conjecture that his answer will be 1. That the rich men whose judgments are for Conformity are far more numerous than those who are of another mind and therefore fitter to promote that work And there are so very few that do any thing for the ejected Ministers that some of them live on brown bread and water c. which hindereth those Gentlemen from other kind of charitable work 2. And I must crave your patience being confident by your ancient kindness of your friendly interpretation which I tell you that this day I heard one say We can expect that Dr. Good do make his Scholars no better than himself And what reason have we to maintain and breed up men to use us as he hath done in his late Treatise I got the Book and was glad to find much good and several moderate passages in it and I knew you so well as that I could not but expect moderation but when I perused the passages referred to I could say no more for them but that I would write to you to hear your answer about them For I confess they surprized me though at the same time I received many new Books of a sanguine complection from other hands without any admiration I. The first passage referred to was pag. 104. Which are confessedly things indifferent This is spoken indefinitely of the Presbyterians Where have I lived I know not one Presbyterian living that divideth from you for any thing which he confesseth indifferent I crave your answer containg the proof of this at least to name some one of them that we may reprove him We take Conformity to be so far from indifferent that we forbear to tell the world the greatness of the sin which we think to be in it lest men cannot bear it and lest it should disaffect the people to the Ministry of the Conformists II. Your p. 156. I pass by The main matter is p. 160 161. that though All the Nonconformists were not in actual arms against the King nor did they all as natural agents cut off his Head but morally that is very sinfully and wickedly they had their hands stained with that royal blood for whosoever did abet these sons of Belial in their rebellions treasons murders of their King and fellow subjects either by consenting to their villanies praying for their prosperity praising God for their successes c. The Charge is high If it be not true 1. They are almost as deeply wrong'd as you can wrong them 2. Our Rulers are wronged by being so provoked to abhor them silence and destroy them 3. Posterity is wronged by a misinforming History I. You are too old to be ignorant that it was an Episcopal and Erastian Parliament of Conformists that first took up these arms in England against the King The Members yet living profess that at that time they knew but one Presbyterian in the House of Commons Interest forced or
Catalogue of Questions for our Disputations at those Meetings and never then talkt to us of what he here writeth in a Book called Dubitantius Firmianus 2. Mr. Thomas Foley a Nonconformist Gentleman eminent for Charity having built near Stourbridge a Hospital and endowed it with about 500 l. per annum being my friend Dr. Good wrote to me to move him to give maintenance for two Scholarships in Baliol-Colledge and I wrote this Letter in answer to that but the sending was delayed till he was dead Accus 29. Another to save the Nation from the labours of a Concordant Ministry and from the blessings of Unity Peace and Innocence hath written a book lately called The Modern Pleas for Comprehension Toleration c. considered who at his enterance saith I would fain have any of our dissenting brethren to answer directly Whether there be any one thing sinful in her Communion the Churches as by Law established or only some things as they conceive inexpedient And p. 11. he saith Suppose that the terms of the Communion of the Church are not only inexpedient but really sinful if so then I shall readily grant that the Church ought not to be communicated with while the terms of her Communion are such But I shall presume to say with some confidence that it is not easie to find a considerable man among them who will not be ashamed to own it publickly or who doth himself really believe it And p. 12. I have been credibly informed not to say that I am able to make it good that Mr. Calamy did before his Majesty and divers Lords of the Council profess that there was not any thing in the constitution of the Church to which he could not conform were it not for the scandalizing of others so that in his esteem the Constitutions of the Church were in themselves innocent and the whole objection against them lay in the mistakes of other men Yet saith he p. 11. That the separation from the Church is so avowed and pressed upon the people as if that it were highly necessary and that communion with the Church was highly criminal at least in the opinion of the teachers Ans. And now Reader what a shake doth this instance give to the credit of History at least such as is written by interessed factious men yea what a reproach to humane nature For what untruth can be imagined so gross and what thing so nakedly evil as may not be expected to be found in Man yea in professed Christians yea in Divines of such a character Either this man and such others believe what they say themselves or not If not what Preachers what Christians what Men are these If they do what matter of fact can ever be so notorious as that we can hope that such men can know it What History of such Writers can deserve any credit What regard can the people be encouraged to give to the Words and Writings of such Doctors that no better know such publick notorious matters of fact and so confidently and boldly deceive the world in cases where so many thousands yea the Churches Peace and Concord is so much concerned Reader judge by these notorious evidences of fact of these mens credibility and usage 1. The judgment of the ancient Nonconformists is declared to the world by abundance of Writings in which they thought that they proved much in the English Constitutions to be sinful and such as men must suffer deprivation and death rather than consent to And are all these Writings no evidence of their judgments nor their sufferings neither 2. Since his Majesties Restoration the present Nonconformists still distinguished 1. Between Diocesan or National Churches and Parish-Churches 2. Between the Communion and Conformity of private men and of Ministers And 3. Between Approbation of the Church-Constitutions Practising all imposed and peaceable behaviour and submission And though some exasperated persons have by the late sufferings of conscionable men been tempted to separate from the Prelates and their party as far as St. Martin did from the Bishops about him and their Synods yet the main body of the Nonconforming Ministers as far as ever we could learn did judge as followeth 1. That those Parish-Churches which had true Ministers not utterly uncapable persons were true Churches of Christ. 2 That the ordinary Liturgy appointed for the publick worship was such as a good Christian may lawfully joyn in not speaking of Baptizings Burials c. in which some things they thought more dubious 3. That though combined Churches whether you call them Diocesan or National are not any otherwise a Divine Institution than as Concord is commanded us in general and may not be set up to the detriment of the particular Churches which are of Divine Institution yet a good Christian may and must live peaceably and submissively where some such combined Churches are guilty of Usurpation and sinful abuse 4. That Conformity to all the Subscriptions Declarations Oaths Covenants and Practices now imposed on Ministers would be to us a very great and heinous sin modesty forbidding us to meddle uncalled with the Consciences of the Conformists 3. Their judgment of the sinfulness of Ministerial Conformity they declared to his Majesty and the Bishops in many Writings when they had encouragement to attempt once the healing of the divisions And when because they agreed to leave out all harsh provoking words in their accusations of the Church-Orders and Ceremonies the Lord Chancellor had put into the first draught of a Declaration That we do not in our judgments believe the practice of those particular Ceremonies which we except against to be in it self unlawful In our next Address we desired that those words might be expunged and so they were Yet this extended not to Subscriptions Oaths c. And afterward many particulars were mentioned which we thought sinful and the supposition vindicated in a Reply to which the Bishops never answered And in a long Petition for Peace p. 6. we make this Protestation following Who can pretend to be better acquainted with their hearts than they are themselves For what man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of a man which is in him And they are ready to appeal to the dreadful God the searcher of hearts and the hater of hypocrisie that if it were not for fear of sinning against him and wounding their consciences and hazarding and hindering their salvations they would readily obey you in all these things That it is their fear of sin and damnation that is their impediment they are ready to give you all the assurance that man can give by the solemnest professions or by Oath if justly called to it And one would think that a little charity might suffice to enable you to believe them when their non-compliance brings them under suffering and their compliance is the visible way to favour safety and prosperity in the world And if men that thus appeal to God concerning the intention of
refused them we should have thought it a sign of their humility What a case are we in with such men as these when we must needs be proud whether we accept or refufe 5 Would not the favour and honour of those that would have advanced us to Dignities have weighed down the displeasure of those that we should have offended Do you not think that they are more and more honourable persons whom our conformity would have pleased 6. What scorn or derision does Bishop Reignolds now undergo or many of your Doctors who some were and some reputed formerly of our mind 7. What scorn would it have been to Baxter who had written two years before the change for moderate Episcopacy and Liturgies and whose Books was pleaded and produced at the great meeting at Worcester-house before the King and Lords and Bishops and Nonconformists with these words of the now Bishop of Winchester No man hath written better of these things than Mr. Baxter Who answered That he stood to all that he had there written And why doth he now suffer so much obloquy and displeasure from the separating part of the Nonconformists if it be reputation that he stuck upon Why do your party tell him that he is more calumniated by the Nonconformists than by any others Why hath he lost the esteem of so many as he had once almost done of his own quondam flock for perswading them from going too far in heart and practice from the Bishops when it was their silencing Himself and such others that was the thing which turned his old hearers hearts against them 8. But judge all men of common Reason sobriety and honesty of these mens Accusations now by the matter of fact it self which I opened before as to a former Objection Again Let common reason and equity here be judge of the ingenuity and credit of both these Defences When of three men that were offered Bishopricks but one delayed his resolution and two that were offered Deaneries and when the notorious reason was to see whether the refused Conformity would stand or fall when no one of them ever talkt of accepting if that Conformity should stand and when these were but three men among Eighteen hundred Nonconformists that after were cast out and that Conformity was Actually dispensed with at the time when one refused one accepted and three delayed Whether this be a good proof that it was not Conscience but Interest that these men stuck upon and that consequently this is the chief reason that 1800 men subscribed not And will not posterity rather think that the change may prove sad to the Church of England when instead of so many men that are silenced for avoiding that which they fear to be Perjury Lying and Covenanting against the Commands of Christ such men are set up that dare talk at this rate and that in Print and with the mention of God and the day of judgment And whereas the Debate-maker saith That he heard some of them acknowledge that they scruple not what others do through Gods mercy they are all save Mr. Calamy yet living and solemnly profess that they never so thought or said to him or any other but have oft openly profess'd the contrary But if he means any others what proof is that of these accused persons thoughts His second proof runs thus If this excellent Author shall be condemned as Apocryphal and it is a very easie confutation to cry Fie upon him when they are not able to answer his Arguments Alas for the Church of England if her Doctors take such inhumane Calumnies for unanswerable Arguments I shall then give them an Authority formerly little less than Canonical How the case stands with him at present I am wholly ignorant However he is one that fullwell understands the Intrigues of his party Baxters Def. of the Princip of Love p. 92. And here he reciteth the Authors words against that pride and self-interest which we are accused of And here again we appeal to common ingenuity 1. Whether this man who professeth himself wholly ignorant of the Authors case and to him is utterly unknown be liker to know the secrets of his and other mens hearts it 's like as much unknown to him than he himself who he saith knoweth the intrigues of his party 2. Whether it be a good proof that Nonconformists are chiefly moved by Pride because they openly write against it and condemn those that are so moved with words which the Accuser himself highly approveth Obj. But it seemeth by your words that some such there are among you and it is not Baxter himself that he accuseth Ans. 1. Yes for his application followeth Ex ore tuo which properly should mean that he condemns himself 2. But suppose it otherwise Know Reader that the person against whom that Book was written was Mr. Edward Bagshaw an Anabaptist Fifth Monarchy man and a Separatist and a man of an extraordinary vehement spirit who had been exasperated by many years hard and grievous imprisonment and that it was such as he that were described and that the Nonconformists of England were so far from being of his mind and spirit that when Baxter had written three Books against him and such as he even as Separatists without medling with him as an Anabaptist or a Millenary no one Minister of England wrote in his Defence nor that ever his Confuter heard of pleaded for him And did we ever dream that no Sectary is moved by Pride to Nonconformity Do we justifie the secret thoughts of all Nonconformists whom we know not Or is it a proof that Pride chiefly moveth the Nonconformists because they call out to Sectaries to take heed lest it be so with them 3. But because this Doctor hath told the world that Baxter fullwell understands the intrigues of his party as he calls them Let the world judge whether his testimony then of that party be not more credible than his that so little knoweth them And he solemnly professeth to the world that though he hath reason to call the best of men to be very jealous of their hearts lest pride and self-interest should pervert them yet he verily believeth that there is not this day on earth that he heareth of a more conscionable godly faithful party of Ministers of the Gospel than those that are now ejected silenced Nonconformists in England though they are not all equal in judgment or Ministerial ability or self-denyal As far as his credit will go let posterity believe this And his testimony shall be believed when the Defamers and Calumniators shall not 2. He thus proceedeth A second reason why they conform not is their Interest If this be thought a Paradox it being a strange method to consult their interest by losing their Livings the dissatisfied person is desired to consider that the Ringleaders of the faction having possessed themselves of other mens preferments and foreseeing that they should be restored to the right owners thence made a virtue of
Those of their own Religion not charged with one doctrinal difference if they obey not their Wills in every Ceremony are the worst of all mankind Reader is this the Religion taught by St. Paul Rom. 14. 15. and Phil. 3. where mutual forbearances and Receiving dissenters is commanded against both Censurers and Despisers Will ever Church on Earth have Concord on these terms Are such mouths fit to call others Fire-brands Is not this a disgrace to the Christian Protestant Religion that all its fundamentals will not keep a man that differeth but in a Ceremony from being the worst of mankind 3. Look back but on the Instances of our Nonconformity before laid down and then tell thy self what to judge of such men and such pens as proclaim to the world that it is but an innocent Ceremony that we submit not to See the Nonconformists Plea for Peace 4. Bethink you what our Nonsubmission or Nonconformity doth to ruine Kingdoms in comparison of the course of such accusers If poor men desire to serve Christ though in poverty with diligence and peace and Lordbishops shall say Either subscribe say and swear all this or be silenced and cast out of all your Ministry and Maintenance Doth he now that patiently beareth all their penalties loseth all and goeth quietly to the Common Jayl among Rogues for Preaching Christs Gospel to more than four without Swearing and Conforming become hereby a Ruiner of Kingdoms while they are innocent that do all this against them Do they not toto nudato pectore taelum recipire tantum non with great Cameron unbutton them and cry Feri miser Is there any one word of Rebellious Doctrine proved by this man when he hath done his worst out of any one Church-Confession of those whom he revileth And if he can find any thing which is not found in the books of any particular men in the late Wars is that their fault that never owned it and were then scarce born Doth he or any of all the malicious tribe charge those whom they reproach with drunkenness gluttony luxury fornication ambition fraud lying or any such immorality 5. Are those that suffer and do so much for that which they think to be the truth of Christ well charged with hating Christ and is not the exception a prophane scorn of Christ but that he said he came not to bring peace It is easie to say with Tertullus of Paul that he is a Ring-leader of a Sect and a pestilent fellow and a mover of sedition among the people but where 's the proof 6. And mark why he professeth himself kinder to the Papists 1. Because they are more Learned Civil and Gentile 2. Because they differ in supposed fundamentals But 1. did he not know our advantage in Learning then was a great cause of the success of the Reformation in Luthers days And who that knoweth the pitiful Priests in France Spain and Italy and what a generation Erasmus Stephanus Vives Hutten and others describe and what men the Reformation found in the Priesthood in England and all other Countries will believe this man that the Papists are more learned And though we truly honour the later Leared men that have been bred among them their Suarez their Petavius and many more yet he might know that our John Reignolds our Chamier Sadcel Bochart Capellus Rivet with multitudes of their like were learned men as well as they and so were Rob. Parker Amesius Bradshaw Paget and many other Nonconformists here and Twisse Gataker and many more of the Westminster-Assembly And all the Learning of the Papists in the world is not enough to make them know Bread and Wine when they see and touch and taste it which without Learning may be easily known 2. But that differing in supposed fundamentals should prove the Papists so much better than us doth tell us with what sort of men we have to do By that rule the Mahometans are much better than the Papists and the Heathens yet better than the Mahometans for they differ from us and them in greater things I perceive why the Jews were crueller than the Heathens and the Papal than the Pagan Rome against the Ministers of Christ because they differed not from them in so many and weighty points Note Reader that this mans book of 20s Price is written to prove that Treason Rebellion and King-killing is the very Religion and the ancient and later practice of the Papists Their Councils are cited for it and their chiefest and most learned Writers cited as maintaining the excommunicating and deposing Kings to be in the power of the Pope and that in so great a number in their own words the very Pages accurately and fully cited that after a multitude that have written on that subject he hath quite over-done them all and brought whole loads of Testimonies to prove it to be the common doctrine of the Roman Church so that no man that ever wrote hath in this done so much to render them unreconcilably odious to all Kings and Magistrates as this man hath done and he hath given them the deepest wound in point of Policy and History that was ever given them with as bitter and odious terms of aggravation And yet we that agree with him in all fundamentals and refuse as he dreameth but a Ceremony are worse far worse than they Had he only done by us as he did by them recited the words of our Synoâ—s and Professors we would contentedly have left all to judge of our Confessions and of each particular Author as they deserve and those that are proved culpable to bear the blame But his sentence and inferences only tell us how desirable the coming of Christ is to his Servants and how earnestly we should pray to the Judg of the World to come and to come quickly Reasons why the Conformable Clergy should be desirous of their Brethrens Ministerial liberty that cannot Conform as is now required 1. YOU ought to be better acquainted with the Common state of peoples Souls and the great necessity of Teaching in the Land than Parliaments or Magistrates can be expected to be who converse not with the people about their everlasting hopes as your calling bndeth you to do And you are obliged also to a double zeal for the Kingdom of Christ and mens Salvation As you still profess a zeal for the Church when Revenues Power or Ceremonies are the things in question And men that have acquaintance with the Common state of Souls cannot chuse but know how insufficient they are of themselves without help for so great a work among such multitudes and what need most Parishes have of more than one much more of one If the Shepherds themselves should either be so ignorant as to think that their ignorant Parishes need no more help than one man is able to afford to many thousands or hundreds of Souls and that the labours of others may be spared because that which they do themselves is enough or
you are though it be an old device and of great success hath ever been hateful to sober men when the falshood hath appeared and will but make your blot the fouler There were two great Philosophers in France in the time of King Francis the first Castellanus and Bicot Bicot was a most profound interpreter of Aristotle and saith Hornius hath got the immortal fame of Scaligers testimony Hist. Phil. l. 6. p. 314. And indeed Scaligers words are very high in his praise Exercit. 307. n. 15. Pag. 904. and smart against his adversaries Haec quidem risui sunt atque contemptui nostris Lucianis atque Diagoris Culinariis sed non neglecta sunt a maximo Philosopho Guilielmo Bicotio qui quidem pene solus hoc summum jus hodie tuetur in reconciliâ Philosophiâ But Castellanus hated Bicot because he was a Peripatetick The King being a great lover of learned men heard Castellanus often and when some Courtiers extolled Bicot and desired the King to hear him Castellanus in wrath and cunning together saith VVhat do you praise an Aristotelian And that you may know O King what men these Aristotelians are they affirm that Aristocracy is better than Monarchy Which knockt the nail on the head and the King would not hear Bicot but Castellanus Melancthon hath recorded the whole Story and Hornius after him These devices may do the feat for a while and serve for a shift against not only Aristotles Philosophy but more necessary Truths but at the long running they will be out of breath and flattery and calumny will stink Postscript LET the Reader who hath read my Repetitions of Martins and Bicots Stories in other books know that this was written before them all and cast by till mens importunity have prevailed with me to publish it AND now we humbly lay these Petitions at your feet and beseech you not for our own ease or honour or wealth but for the Souls of many Hundred thousands of ignorant sensual impenitent sinners that you who call your selves their Pastors and the Fathers of the Church will not deny them the bread of life We beseech you for the Souls which are ready to appear before their Judg and to receive their final doom and are lost for ever if they be not presently recovered Their lives are going Time will not stay while you are waiting for advantages to attain your ends They are posting into another world O let them know whither they are going before they are there And feed not your anger envy or interests at so dear a rate as the damnation of so many If you believe that if the Gospel be hid it is hid to them that are lost and that men cannot love desire or seek what they know not deny not poor souls the means of knowledge If you yet believe that ignorance and sin is not so common as we think or that the silly dry and dead discourses or sayings over of some broken Notes which is the food of too many Churches is enough to cure them we beseech you come out of your Palaces a while and dwell in some Countrey-Village and be familiar with the people and confer with all the poor of the Parishes as we have done that you may not see many Hundred thousands damned by your means and have nothing to say when it is too late but a non putarem As ever you believe there is a Heaven to be obtained hinder not Souls from entering in if you will not help them Strive not for a title to the Keys that you may lock the doors and neither enter your selves nor suffer them that would to enter If you believe there is a Hell have some pity on Souls and tye not their hands who desire to save them If you believe not the Gospel confess it and deal plainly with the world If you do believe it forbid us not to preach it till you have made our labours needless by better supplies We beseech you remember the price that was paid the blood that was shed by Christ for Souls and sell them not now for a thing of nought and make not merchandize of them for your honour interest or passions Remember that you and we and they are ready to lye down in rottenness and dust and our Souls to appear before our Judg And where then will be your wealth and ease and greatness And how will these things appear in the review when you shall stand in that more clear convincing light Fall not on the corner-stone that you should build upon lest you be broken and strive not against it lest it fall on you and grind you to powder Who will set the bryars and thorns against him in battel Will he not go through them and burn them up together Remember that our God is a consuming fire Though as Paul once you have verily thought that you ought to do many things which are contrary to the Gospel and work of the Lord Jesus be warned in time and do so no more O that God would make them sensible by repentance who are truly guilty how many thousand persons damnation is like to be charged upon them for what they have already done in above seventeen years hindering so many faithful Ministers of Christ to labour the saving of their Souls Right Reverend Lords though we are your Petitioners for the sake of poor Souls and of the Church and Gospel and for the sake of Christian Love and Peace and for the sake of Christ who valueth these yet are we not your flatterers Had we not seen in history and experience especially in the numerous Roman Clergy how far interest and self-love can blind men and bring both Learning Reason and pretences of Religion into their service it would be a wonder to us that humane nature could be guilty of your course and that in the face of such dreadful judgments as have lately been upon us That when Gods displeasure had afflicted your selves or some of you for many years you should come out of the fire so unrefined as to use the Gospel and Ministers of Christ much worse than your Predecessors did before you and shew that you have learnt so little by all Gods judgments on you and on the land as to forget what God did and what your selves did while you remember only what the Instruments of his wrath did Nay under pretence of remembring your afflicters your wrath burneth implacably against the innocent that never hurt you nor had the hundredth part so great a hand in your afflictions as you had your selves Wonderful that in the very time while the Plague was devouring and souls crouding out of time into eternity and each man a terror to another and about a hundred thousand dead in one City you should be a terror to your surviving brethren and study how to stop the mouths of those that would but help to prepare poor souls for so great a change That when such dreadful flames have followed