been inlightned since and changed their mind they must know too that that power which gives men in publick place leave to act may upon publick inconvenience suspend their acting and if then they do act 't is an unjustifiable disobedience Nor is it with them as it was with Saint Paul Wo be unto me if I preach not the Gospel he had another kind of Call but for these there 's a Wo belongs to them if they do 'T is otherwise too now the Church is setled under Christian Magistrates and govern'd by Christian Laws then at that time when it was to be planted under the Government of Heathen Emperours The Church now with all her subordinations and dependencies in all her jurisdictions and powers owns the King her Supreme She challenges nothing to her self but what the favour of her Prince and the Laws of the land have allow'd her Thus Bishops as to the execution of their Office are sent by the King as Supreme and act in their Courts by the Kings power as Civil Courts do the King deputing Arch-Bishops and Bishops to be Judges under him in causes Spiritual and in his name to govern the Ecclesiastical State as he makes Lord Keepers Chief Iustices and other Iudges of the Land For had the Church any power in it self in Civil affairs besides what the Laws give her I dare say there 's ne're a Bishop in England but would speedily redress those scandals and grievances possibly brought into their Courts by Lay-Officers which people so much clamour against But now what can they do they are ty'd up by Law All of us that are of the Clergy own the Civil Power pay the same obedience to the Laws as any of you do and in First-fruits Tenths and Subsidies make as chargable acknowledgments as any of the populacy I know 't is said though what need of such a pompous costly Religion of a Church with so great an allowance of means This ample Revenue exhausts and weakens the State smaller stipends would serve turn very well But can any one with any shew of ingenuity fairly reason against the encouragements of Learning and the rewards of desert Let it be consider'd that several of this Order had they gone another way might with submission I speak it have sate in your Seats and been clad with your Purple After all our pains and time and strength and charges too spent in studies do not think that what the Law allows us we have by doing nothing for it These things are propos'd publickly as the Acquists of Industry and may be got and injoy'd as legally as any of your Estates And is it not fit do you think a National Church wherein the honour and reputation of Religion is to be kept up should be secur'd from poverty and that contempt which always accompanies meanness It were to be wish'd that as Kings are to be the Nursing Fathers of the Church so Princes and the Sons of Nobles would fit themselves for her dignities that they might bear up the honour of Religion with their personal attendence It has been so heretofore when the two great Offices were united in the same person Melchisedek King of Salem and Priest of the living God and they were kept pretty near in the persons of Moses and Aaron brethren and the Priest elder brother to the Prince And hence the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Kohen whence we have King signifies indifferently Prince and Priest whereupon the Apostle Rom. 13. calls the King in Ecclesiastical terms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gods Minister say we for both 't is Gods Liturgie-maker and Gods Deacon to shew too that a Christian Magistrate as such has power to order religious affairs in the Service of God This I say has been and 't were well if it could be so with us however must the Church alone be held up by a precarious dependence Is it not this that makes Religion a Prostitute to the humors of the people when men of mean spirits and parts shall out of fear comply for a paltry livelihood to preach things that may please and others of ambitious minds and voluble tongues to serve an interest shall lead the people to their own hurt But some will say what would you have men do that are not otherwise considered since there is that unequal distribution of Church-favours that some go away with all and others get little or nothing Judge in your own case whether this be a reasonable ground of quarrel Shall the inequality of Estates amongst you make the meaner Citizens quarrel the Government of the City because they have not all the wealth of Aldermen Shall I or any of my brethren and companions because we have not that place and esteem in the Church as we out of the pride of our own hearts may think we deserve go in a sullen arrogance and set up for our selves in a distinct interest from the Church and flye in the face of our Mother and put undutiful affronts upon her for not being so kind as we would have her No. Gen. 49. 6. O my soul come not thou into such mens secret unto their private assemblies mine honour be not thou united Let them for me be divided in Iacob and scattered in Israel that in their anger and self-will practise such things To go on I know it has been seriously discoursed and pâ—inted too that the largeness of the Church-revenue in any Nation impoverishes the State sets the people behind-hand and puts them out of a thriving condition and no less then demonstration offered that if it were retrenched Trade would flourish Manufactures and growths receive wonderful improvements and the people generally grow rich apace But to Answer that Author those Common-wealths he speaks of and ours are not alike in the constitution and nature of the Government and God forbid they ever should But it may be ones wonder why our people cannot now with much more case make those improvements since the Church keeps little in her own hands and for the most part lets easie penny-worths nor can it be any reason that the Church drains the peoples money since if the Church had not what she has some body else would in the Churches right nor would the people be much the better How our Neighbour-States order their Church affairs I suppose ought to be no precedent of Policy to us though they to keep up a National Religion by which those they admit into publick trust are brought to test and for the securing publick peace amidst the differences of Religion maintain a standing Army Further why our dissenters should not upon their own bottoms be comprehended within the legal settlement of the Church they themselves give a very just occasion for the very best Party amongst them have such Principles of Policy and Government as are utterly inconsistent and incompatible not only with any other Form but with Monarchy it self as hath been clearly evidenced
and opportunity hence it comes to pass that odia religionum acerbissima those heats and animosities which are grounded upon the cause of Religion are the most dangerous and irreconcileable by reason Conscience is ingaged in the quarrel whose tenderness of apprehension is worse then the jealousies of love or power which will admit of no rival cannot indure any competitor Thus it was betwixt the Iews and Samaritans that did upon the score of their Religions so abominate one the other that they would not so much as eat and drink together or buy and sell or converse in the ordinary civilities of Good morrow or Good even So nice and squeamish distasted conscience is out of fear of partaking with others sins and fancying it can never be at distance enough from what it conceives a dislike to Nor is that a sufficient Salvo to keep up Vnity amongst us that we agree in Fundamentals I wish we all did that and that we differ only in some things of smaller allay the more to blame they that fall out about such things and to the hazard of publick Peace make endless differences and quarrels about things indifferent I must commend the generous Charity of some that profess to love all that have faith in Christ Iesus whatever their Form be and I am of their mind that our Charity is not to be confin'd to a Party but to be extended to the whole Community the Body of the Church But then 't is a gross mistake to think the Church it self in its establishments a Party in these our divisions who is to be lookt on what S. Paul says of Ierusalem here as the common Mother of us all and herein lies the main of our Charity to seek and secure the Churches peace in endeavouring to appease divisions and to reconcile her disobedient Children This I say is right Catholick Charity As to those persons who are seduced and live in errour the greatest Charity can be shewed to them is to reclaim them or at least if that may not be for our brethren and companions sakes to keep them quiet For to see the humor of Schism after it has once broke off from the Church how restless a thing it is and how quarrel is apt to beget quarrel till it have brought all into confusion The Sects we have amongst us do no more disagree from the Church then they do from one another 't is Ephraim against Manasses and Manasses against Ephraim as well as both against Iudah And though they all agreed time was too well against the Church as a common Enemy and whilst her ruine was contriving held together yet no sooner had they obtained that which was the common design of them all but they fell out among themselves about their particular ends and when they had pulled down that which they maliciously termed Babylon the English Ierusalem their language was so divided that they could none of them build up a Babel of their own For the same Arguments which the Presbyterian Party had fiercely used against the Bishops were by the Independents unanswerably managed against themselves and then there succeeded more subdivisions the Baptized Churches got up and bore sway the Fift-Monarchy-men made a bustle for the Rule then at last arose the Quakers a spreading Party and feared by all the rest What should I speak for Free-willers Ranters Bedel's Followers and Naylor's crew it shames me thus to discover the nakedness of my Country but it grieves me more to think these pretences are still on foot and most of the Parties still owning themselves in their distinctions who though in the general as Sects and equally obnoxious to the Laws do by a kind of Syncretism unite yet had any one of them power in their hand would be far enough from looking on the rest that dissent from them as Brethren and Companions or shewing that savour to any of them all as the Church of England does now to them all together And so the case stood with their Fore-fathers at Frankfort Amsterdam c. where in opposition to our Liturgie and Discipline setting up purer Forms of their own they could not agree but were so zealous in their divisions though it highly concern'd them for credit of their new-found way and comfort of their exile to have held together till at last the Son excommunicated the Father and one Brother the other So giddy and lost a thing Conscience is when 't is once stept aside and gone out of its way I could wish the moderate and sober men amongst them would consider this that if God should in his just Judgment to the Nation give them an opportunity of another tryal they may easily if not blinded with self-conceit fore-see the event and in publick ruines read afore-hand their own disappointments But they say they have no such designs they are quiet and peaceable men desire only to seek and to serve God but that some of unquiet fierce Spirits amongst us will not let them alone they intend no disturbance to the Government but the Government disturbs them in their religious Exercises and Meetings The same Plea will serve for the worst of Malefactors that if the Law would let them alone they anâ— very quiet men but pray who breaks the peace he that looks after the execution of the Laws or he that disobeys them he that disobeys certainly is the Aggressor I cannot say but Ishmael and his Mother were hardly dealt with and did suffer a kind of persecution and yet the Apostle tells us that Ishmaels self was the Persecutor for but mocking of Isaac but this were it sport or contempt reflecting on the Heir of the Family the Son of a Princess who in the Allegory is Ierusalem here is interpreted Persecution while the turning out of Ishmael is own'd as just punishment And in like manner 't is the Sects persecute the Church by derisions and contempts not the Church that persecutes them But if they are so well inclin'd to Peace why then do they not do what they acknowledge may lawfully be done and submit in those things where their Conscience may give them leave i.e. in such things as God in his Word has not forbidden The Magistrate has bid them come to their Parish-Church bid men of my Order renounce the Covenant God hath no where commanded to the contrary Why should not they come why should not we renounce There can be no scruple in the case for in things where God himself has given no order we are to obey the Magistrate not only for Fear but for Conscience sake We read that our Saviour himself kept the Feast of the Dedication though no where appointed by God himself no where mention'd in the Old Testament an Apochryphal Feast and taught daily in the Temple and in their Synagogues and that some of his Apostles after the Ceremonies were dead and buried came up to the Temple still at the hour of Prayer to set us an example that in such things
Exercise of Religion Then the Church shews like an army with banners For the Church triumphant no body doubts but 't is so but this is spoken of the Church militant it should be so a well ordered and disciplined body of men Without discipline and good order and uniformity of Exercise it may be a tumult a mutiny a crowd or throng of men but not an Army or if an Army 't is but a broken routed one and needs rally and recruit And such an Army must I call our Church with her broken Ranks when so many flye daily from her Banners and repair to other Standards when some are so hardy to make themselves Commission-officers and appoint Rendez-vous and make Musters in private corners indeed in publick Assemblies to the defiance of the Church and Civil Authority at once Truth is Our divisions have made Religion a ridiculous thing whilst every Party priding it self in the glare of its own spiritual knowledge looks upon the rest with contempt The Sects wonder at us that we stick where we do and not come up after them we as much wonder at their unkindness in leaving us and their confidence in going so far And the wonder goes round for they all admire and pity one anothers ignorance All of them see a great light in the way they walk in and conclude they are got into Goshen when all the rest of the world as they fancy are still sitting in Egyptian darkness Thus we censure one another and when we have hoodwinkt our selves with our own form think our selves the only seeing people and all else that are not as we are blind-fold to the merriment of by-standers but withal to some peril lest from these giddy reflections we make upon one another they conclude we have no light at all amongst us in the English Church but that we are now in Egypt more then ever we were What pastime and advantage our divisions give Atheists and Papists I shewed before I am now speaking of us amongst our selves Nor do these differences only stir the spleen but the choler too and fill all Parties as with spiritual disdain of one anothers ways so with zealous passion too against one anothers persons The Sectaries are scandalized at Church-musick and look upon our decent Rites and Ceremonies as trumpery and reckon our Solemnities of Worship contemptible things The Orthodox on the other hand are justly offended at their slovenly familiarities with sacred things and indeed with God himself So that 't is clear by dividing from one another Religion has lost all its awe amongst us every sort of it being lookt on as mean and despicable by all those that are of any other sort Nor must the National Religion think to find better treatment then the rest but rather worse as lying under this peculiar disadvantage that those who adhere to that though never so conscientiously lay themselves open to a general censure of all dissenters that they in that they side with the Government are pleasers of men and time-servers Besides this is that they all in strict judgment account to be to them Antichrist that which holds back and hinders that no one of them can get up in to absolute power And certainly they must be so good-natur'd as to pity the Governour himself if his conscience be not of their model I and should he be but half so severe in the maintenance of his way as they are zealous in theirs perhaps hate him too at least have but little kindness for him who as they fancy keeps Christ out of his Throne Thus we see if Religion be not tyed up to rules if it grow lawless it will quickly become awless too loose all its respects and not be able to assist the Government in the protection of our brethren and companions whose concerns lie bound up in the Churches peace Nor Secondly Will Religion avail in its second property which is to Vnite unless God's worship amongst us be uniformly exercised Religio à religando Religion has its name from binding up men not only in themselves binding up their spirits so as to restrain them from publick disorders but as to one another too binding their hearts together in mutual offices of love and kindness And thus when we can walk together as brethren and companions to the house of God and there take sweet counsel together this is a kindly Vnion when all the members of the civil society are guided and governed by the same spirit of the mystical body and hold the faith in unity of spirit in the bond of peace and in righteousness of life This is the true cement which conjoins neighbours and friends closer then any legal priviledges and obligations can do Without this you build your City with untemper'd mortar nor will it well bear the weather when the flouds shall beat unless it be thus compacted together and be at unity in it self And how can it rationally be expected that Religion should bind us together if it self be left loose and tyed to no rules and orders I confess the Vnity of the Catholick Church may consist without the uniformity of particular Churches among themselves and thus notwithstanding some differences they have in ordering their own affairs prudently to their best convenience and accommodating themselves to the necessities of time and place still holding to the Analogy of Faith and sound Doctrine and the rule of God's Word I say notwithstanding these differences in externals we do own the communion of Saints as an Article of our Faith But to say that every particular person or party in the same Church has by vertue of his Christianity a liberty to disobey the publick orders of that Church whereof he is a member and to serve God as shall notwithstanding those orders seem good to that party or person for as the party breaks it will come to persons at last to take liberty in this notion is to make it but another name for confusion Wherefore what they say is not true being applyed to fellow-members of the same particular Church that according to our Christian liberty and that latitude God has left things in if the Church would leave them so too and not bind where he has not bound this would prove the best expedient of peace and unity for the way would be wide enough for every one to walk in we should not need justle one another but though we used not all one form in our serving of God we might be all of one mind as to our civil concerns at least It were well if dissents in judgment could be so managed as not to beget distances of affection but this is a thing rather to be wished then hoped for For whilest every party thinks it self obliged in conscience to advance it self even to the prejudice and ruine of the rest Conscience being a principle of that violence that right or wrong it acts like nature ad extremum virium to the utmost of its strength