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A49110 The character of a separatist, or, Sensuality the ground of separation to which is added The pharisees lesson, on Matth. IX, XIII, and an examination of Mr. Hales Treatise of schisme / by Thomas Long ... Long, Thomas, 1621-1707. 1677 (1677) Wing L2962; ESTC R33489 102,111 240

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then that there were just and necessary causes of making severe Laws against such practices and by an Act of Parliament for restraining the Queen's Majesties Subjects in obedience it was forbidden under the Penalty of Banishment that any Person should be present at or perswade others to those unlawful Meetings or Conventicles The Primitive Church did the like as in the Canons of the Apostles it was ordained Can. 30. That if any Presbyter contemning his own Bishop shall make a separate Congregation and erect another Altar his own Bishop not being condemned of any irreligion or injustice let him be deposed as one that is an ambitious and a tyrannical Person and in like manner all that adhere to him and let the lay People be excommunicated after the Bishop's third Admonition When Eusebius Bishop of Sebastia cast off the Discipline of the Church and contemned the Presbyters because they were married and under pretence of greater strictness of life fasted on the Lord days and kept private Meetings drawing away Women from their Husbands and both Men and Women to greater impurities the Bishops met in the Council of Gangra Anno 325. and there agreed That if any one should teach that the House of God is to be despised and the Assemblies that are held in it Let him be accursed If any shall take upon him to teach privately at home and making light of the Church shall do those things which belong only to the Church without the presence of the Priest and approbation of the Bishop let him be accursed And as all good Men cannot but bewail those great mischiefs and desolations which by the practices of such outragious and disorderly Persons have in all Ages invaded the Church of God so they ought highly to commend and submit unto such wholesome Laws as have been made by their pious and prudent Governors to stop the beginnings of such evils seeing as the Scripture and experience do teach us Wicked Men and Seducers do wax worse and worse And thus I have in some measure proved my Position That Sensuality is the Ground of Separation And now that you know the Men and their communication I shall apply all in the words of St. Peter Ye therefore beloved seeing ye know these things before 1 Pet. 3.17 beware lest ye also being led away with the error of the wicked fall from your own stedfastness But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ In which words you have first a Caution then a Direction The Caution to beware of being seduced by the Errors of wicked Men. And your knowledge of the sin and danger of such Errors will certainly be a preservative against them for as Solomon says in vain is a snare laid in the sight of any Bird and you will easily baffle all the arguments and expectations of such Sophisters if you consider what conclusions must necessarily follow upon their premises They tempt you to Division and Separation that is without any just or warrantable cause to leave a Church of Christ rightly established in all Points of Faith and a Holy Life wherein you have all and only that allowed for Doctrine which the Scripture approveth and for Government and Worship nothing but what in the judgment and by the practice of the Church of God in all Ages hath been determined to be agreeable to the Scripture I demand therefore First What real evil shall you avoid by leaving the Church and adhering to Conventicles Is there less pride and contention less hypocrisie and dissimulation less censuring and slandering less lying and defrauding amongst them than amongst us Or Secondly What real grace or vertue is practised by them more than by the Conformists if at least they conform in heart and life as well as in profession to the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church under which we may be as piously devout towards God as just and righteous to Men as sober and temperate in respect of our selves as liberal in works of Charity as our Humane infirmities will permit and in a word Whatsoever things are true honest just pure lovely and of good report Phil. 4.8 whatever is vertuous and praise worthy these things you may both learn and receive and hear and see in all the Doctrines Constitutions and Offices of the Church If you respect the means of saving knowledge where are the Scriptures more frequently read more plainly and solidly expounded more rationally and affectionately applyed than by the Ministers of the Church whose works praise them in all the Churches of God Now as there is no real good to be obtained or evil to be avoided by deserting the Church So in the next place consider the many real evils that will necessarily follow upon Separation First The great scandal we bring upon our Religion 2ly The great advantages we give to the enemes of it 3ly The hard censures and evil thoughts of the whole Church which we desert 4ly Our own great sin for in the words of Irenaeus l. 4. c. 62. It is to rent and wound the Great and Glorious Body of Christ and as much as in us lyeth to destroy it and while we pretend Peace to maintain War to strain at a Gnat and swallow Camels Nor can any Reformation that may be hoped for expiate the sin Mr. Edwards reckoneth 180. Errors or out-weigh the mischief of Schism The experience which the Assembly noted on Philippians 1.1 in the Preface to their Annotations 1645. should perswade us And Mr. Case tells the Parliament That the Errors in the Bishops Days were but trifles but now the Nation is filled with the Doctrine of Devils for when Religion is by choice or force propagated in corners then say they Many Heretical Doctrines are hatched and preached and printed too which had not been conceived or published if the Authors had continued in the Publick Assemblies And every one knows it to be a truth which Master Cawdrey observes Cawdrey contra Owen p. 14. that Toleration had done more hurt in Seven Years than was done under Conformity in Seventy Years before The Rule which the Spirit of God gives us for finding out a false Prophet will be of very good use to discover a Separatist If there arise among you a Prophet or a Dreamer of Dreams and giveth thee a sign Deutr. 13. 1 2 3. or a wonder and the sign or the wonder come to pass whereof he spake unto thee saying let us go after other Gods which thou hast not known and let us serve them Thou shalt not hearken to the words of that Prophet or that Dreamer of Dreams for the Lord your God proveth you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your Heart and with all your Soul If the end be Idolatry or any certain impiety to which false Prophets do intice you although they appear as Angels of Light Men of wonderful knowledge and holiness yet are they but