charge these things upon the Bishops for clayming the same power over the inferiour Clergie and people which himselfe as a Priest hath over the people committed to him is more than wonderfull Well but for all that here is a strange piece of Poperie which hee addes uttered by the Chiefest Prelate of England in the High Commission p. 152. viz. That in matters of Divinitie wee are not tyed to the Scriptures but to the Vniversall Catholicke Church in all ages for how said hee so Master Burton affirmes shall wee know the Scriptures but by the Church But that this man hath set his faith to sale for popular breath so that his testimony is of no value I should here runne aground and miscarry in my undertakings How not tyed in matters of Divinity to the Scriptures surely His Grace did much forget himselfe and what himselfe hath both subscribed and publickly maintayned against the Romanists Or rather Master Burtons zeale hath farre over-reached in imputing so grosse an error so insulsly expressed to so learned and every way accomplisht a Divine Yet somewhat perhaps there was said which might minister occasion to malevolence thus to traduce him Perhaps if occasion were offered Hee might make the consentient testimonie of the Catholicke Church in all ages the best interpreter the best rule to follow for the setling of the understanding in the true meaning of holy Scripture Yea he might perhaps say in all matters in Divinity taking it to include Doctor Field of the Church l. 4. c. 20. matters of ceremony and other things in which consist not the substance of faith or manners necessarily required to salvation we are not tyed Perkins refor Cath. to the Scriptures It is no innovation to admit traditions which was ever granted in our Church and never denyed by any learned Protestant We baptise infants Chemnit exam Concil Trid Sess 1. 4. receive the Apostles Creed acknowledge the number names and authors of the Bookes of Canonicall Scripture that I mention not for feare of displeasing Master B. the observation of the Lords day all which besides a number of rites ceremonies and observations whereof we have neither irrefragable precept nor example in the Scriptures onely wee doe not admit any traditions contrary to the Scriptures nor doe wee as the Councell of Trent receive them with the same reverence and pious affection or advance them to an equality of authority with Scriptures but as subservient unto them Further though Master B. startle at it it is no innovation neither to make the Churches testimonie to bee the meanes of our knowledge the Scripture to bee the Scripture which is no more than our Articles allow calling Artic. 20. the Church a witnesse and a keeper of holy writ I wish Master B. would have given us his answer to the question and have told us how hee came to know the Scriptures seeing he will not seeme to bee beholding to the Church for that peece of learning surely hee had it by revelation or received that booke as Saint Iohn did from the hand of some Angel for I will not bee perswaded hee brought that knowledge into the world with him Revel 10. 9. But whatsoever hee shall perswade himselfe and others it is an undoubted truth that we come to know the Scriptures by the Testimony of the Church and that secluding that wee cannot ordinarily bee perswaded that they are the word of God But withall we must know that it is one thing to suspend the authority of the Scriptures upon the Church and to make the Churches testimonie the foundation of our beliefe of those things which are conteyned in the Scripture and another to make the Churches proposall and testimony a necessary meanes and condition without which ordinarily men cannot know them to be those divine oracles whereon our faith is to be builded And because Master B. may thinke the better of this tenet if it be delivered by others he shall heare the same from the late learned Deane of Glocester whom I know he will not count any D. Field Appendix l. 2. sect 8 Popish Innovator who answering a Popish Treatisor that would needs fasten a Popish absurd doctrine upon this assertion writes thus If Protestants receive the number names of the Authors and integrity of the parts of bookes divine and Canonicall as delivered by Tradition as I say they doe and if without tradition we cannot know such divine bookes he The Popish Treatisor thinketh it consequent that tradition is the ground of our faith But indeed there is no such consequence as he imagineth For it is one thing to require the Tradition of the Church as a necessary meanes whereby the Scriptures may be delivered unto us and made knowne and another to make the same Tradition the ground of our faith c. Thus that judicious Doctor with much more to that purpose evidently proveth his assertion Briefely the authority of the holy Scriptures depends onely upon the author God himselfe the Church receiving them as delivered by God and so approving publishing preaching interpreting and discerning them from other writings doth not adde any thing to the authority of them which by her meanes beeing made knowne of themselves they are able to perswade and to yeeld sufficient satisfaction to all men of their divine truth And this authority thus made knowne is that into which as into their highest and utmost cause and end our faith and obedience is resolved And this may serve for answere to this false and groundlesse crimination CHAP. XIX Of the jurisdiction of Bishops how farre of Divine right given by Christ to his Apostles and from them derived by succession The power given to the Apostles divided into severall orders What power Ecclesiasticall belongs to the King and the intent of the Statutes which annex all Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction to the Crowne Of Master Burtons Quotation of the Iesuites Direction to be observed by N. N. Master B. and the Iesuite confederates in detraction and ignorance BVt there are two things here which I am unwilling to passe over The first is that here he saith that the words which he ascribes to the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury were by him spoken at the censure of Doctor Bastwick for oppugning the jurisdiction of Bishops Iure Divino as being no where found in the Scripture c. This is one thing which though here brought in upon the by I cannot passe because I finde him else where much harping upon the same string Hee will not have the Bishops derive their succession from the Apostles cryes out upon Dr. Pocklington for delivering pag. 41. Ips Newes pag. 4. Appeal p. 7. 1. that doctrine affirmes their authority and jurisdiction to be onely from the King that not to derive it thence is against the law of the Land and I know not what danger besides and that Doctor Bastwick is imprisoned for defending his Majesties Ips N. p. vult See pag. 67
should be interpreted a confession of guilt and inability to wipe off such desperate and malicious slanders And herein I have for my warrant the authority of the same Father who having upon the grounds before mentioned long held his peace and with patience overcome the rage of his adversaries at length hee thus breaks forth Seeing thou Demetrianus Sed enim cum dicas plurimos conqueri quod bella crebriùs surgant quod lues quod fames saeviont quodque imbres pluvias serena longa suspendant nobis imputari tacere ultranon oportet ne jam non verecundiae sed diffidentiae esse incipiat quod tacemus dum criminationes falsas contemnimus refutare videamur crimen agnoscere Respondeo igitur c. Cypr. loc suprà citat saist many complaine that it is to be imputed to us Christians that warres so often rise that plague and famine doe rage and that wee have such long droughts We must no longer be silent lest now it bee not modesty but diffidence that we hold our peace and while we scorne to refute your criminations we should seeme to acknowledge the crime Upon these considerations and in imitation of that holy Father and Martyr I have set upon this worke in a calme and compendious way to endeavour the stopping of the mouth of detraction and to shew the groundlesnesse and vanity of those suspicious jealousies and clamors which of late have beene raysed in many parts of this Kingdome and which Mr. B. having first vented in the Pulpit did after send abroad gathered into one bundle in his book intituled An Apology of an Appeale c. And though I know it to be most true that among the ruder sort and common people the lowdest cry takes the most eares and that audacious errours and bold calumnies finde more free entertainment and welcome with light and weak judgments than peaceable and modest truth And that there seeme so great an indisposition and disaffection in the minds and hearts of some in these dayes either to the present Authority or to the things by it either commended or enjoyned that important truths and wholesome orders becomming once countenanced or pressed by authority in stead of credit and obedience receive nothing but clamor and detraction and that such as according but as duty bindeth them doe undertake to plead in their just cause or speake in their defence shall from many in stead of thankes gaine nothing but odious and opprobrious names and contumelies Yet withall I know and am perswaded that the iniquity of the times is not such but that truth and a good cause may yet finde equall judges who following the precept of our blessed Saviour Iudge not according to appearance Iohn 7. 14. but judge righteous judgment not taking their information of a cause from the cry of the crowde or rumor of the people which for the most part conveighs not the truth of the cause but the affections of the reporters but from right and solid grounds weighing things in the ballance not of profit or particular interest but of sound reason and abstracting the cause from the parties and from malevolent aspersions wherewith truth many times is obscured and defaced doe imbrace truth in the love of it And others there are no doubt who though led away for the present with the example of the multiutde and ensnared by the opinion they have unwarily drunk in of the worth of the broachers of error yet will notwithstanding be patient of better information and upon due consideration be ready to expresse their love to truth and peace To these sorts of men principally I addresse my selfe in this discourse whom I shall desire not to expect that verbosity much lesse that virulency opprobrious language which Mr. B. useth I leave that contention and victory to base mindes and shall study rather what is fit for me to speake than what he and such as he deserve to heare Neither doe I reckon upon their censure who judge of bookes not by the weight but by the words For as S. Austine saith well what is more talkative than vanity which yet cannot therefore Quid loquacius vanitate Quae non ideo potest quod veritas quia si voluerit etiam plus potest clamare quam veritas Sed considerent omnia diligenter et si forte sine studio partium judicantes talia essè perspexerint quae potius exagitari quâ—m convelli possint garrulitate impudent issima et quasi satyrica velmimica levitate cohibeant suas nugas et potius â— prudentibus emendari quam laudari ab imprudentibus eligant Aug. de civ l. 5. c. 27. doe that which truth can because it can cry lowder And I would to God that Mr. B. and if there bee any other of his minde and temper would as the same Father addes in that place consider all things diligently and if haply judging without partiality they shall perceive the things against which they have rayled such bitter invectives by their impudent pratings and Satyre-like or mimical lightnesse to be such as may rather be exagitated than confuted they would represse their scandalous trifles and choose rather to be rectified by the judicious than to be applauded by the unskilfull As for those who are the abettors and applauders of those contumelies and criminations cast upon the government and governors of the Church and State and so fautors and propagators of the suspitions and discontents received against them whether they bee in the same gall of bitternesse and bond of iniquity or only seduced by their leaders I shall only desire one boone from them namely that they would cease to have mens persons in admiration for profit sake or any other by-respect and endure with patience the examination of their complaints by the word of God and sound reason the only infallible rules of sound judgement That they would not as they are wont think those whom their popular breath hath swollen great to be the only oracles of truth and patrons of religion and godlinesse and in comparison of them contemne and vilifie all others even those of highest eminency and authority in the Church and State and reject whatsoever though never so reasonable shall proceed from them as if their doctrine were deadly and their persons Anathema Maranatha This request if they shall grant me I doubt not but the unnaturall heat of their distemper will in some measure be abated and they brought to entertaine a more reverent and dutifull esteeme of their superiours and begin to study to maintaine the peace of the Church which the proposterous zeale of boisterous spirits hath of late so much disturbed CHAP. II. A short Relation or Description of Mr. H. Burton his course and manner of life Of the occasion of his discontent his dismission from the Court The ground of his dislike and hatred against the Bishops and betaking himselfe to the People The course hee hath since taken in his
Bs. words either that the Bishops have these ends or that for these ends they do teach this doctrine But it is enough There is no Parliament and that they wish hoping if some such spirits as Mr. Burtons disciples get voyces in it and can prevaile they may do somewhat for their cause and ruine the Hierarchy and that there is none it must needs be the Bishops doings who as hee perswades credulous auditors will not bee able to purge themselves to a committee of the Lower-house for Religion and then if this be granted it cannot be thought a thing unlikely for them to broach such doctrine as this which cannot but be very usefull for their purpose But M. Burton will have much adoe to prove and words must not carry it that the Bishops are not Parliament-proofe and as much that they therefore are the meanes to hinder the King from having a Parliament I would to God that men of his straine and humour and poysoned with such principles of Popularity as hee labours to instill into the people had beene no greater meanes to cause heart-burning between the King and his subjects and so to keep them from meeting in Parliament than the Bishops are It is not the Bishops but the disobedient and seditious carriage of those ill-affected persons of the house of Commons in the last Parliament who raised so much heat and distemper upon causelesse jealousies That His Procla before the Declar. for the dissolut of the Parliament Majesty to use his owne words His Regall authority and commandement were so highly contemned as his Kingly office could not beare nor any former age parallel This is the meanes that severed King and people being met and this humor still fomented by turbulent and malevolent spirits such as Mr. Burton is the true and sole cause that yet hinders their re-assembling in Parliament And if thereupon any damage have or doe ensue the blame must light upon those entrenchers not upon those whom hee falsely makes the over-enlargers of the Royall prerogative Yet necessity may make them doe much and feare of danger may make them willing by any meanes whatsoever to make the King sure that they may have shelter and though God be praised they have not justly no not incurred the hatred of the whole land yet perhaps he knowes some intended mischiefe towards them or hopes well that his Sermons and the Ipswich Libell will worke so with some bloudy Assassines that they may be brought as his brother Leighton speaks Sions plea pag. 166. to strike that Hazael the Bishops in the fift rib to strike that Basilike vein as the onely cure for the plurisie of this State However it were but a poor device for their security to flatter the King into a conceit of his boundlesse authority which beside that it would be a vaine attempt upon so wise and just a Prince and such as cannot without derogation from his Majesties wisdome and gracious disposition be once imagined as faisible would but increase the subjects hatred and in the end cause his Majesty to forsake them and justly to expose them to the fury of their malice Their best security and that which they onely rely upon is their integrity and just proceedings wherein they assure themselves the just God and King whom they serve will never forsake them or deny them protection Neither doe they need to borrow a lawlesse and abused Regall power nor can it be accounted tyranny to punish those that deny obedience to his Majesties commands which whatsoever he untruely and seditiously suggests shall be proved both to be his Majesties and beseeming his Royall justice and goodnesse As for their ayming by this meanes to bring the State and King under their girdle and to make Princes subject to the Bishops If malice had not made him as blind as Impudent he would have wanted a forehead to have vented for if they meant any such thing their way had beene to advance their owne and not the Kings power and prerogative which if they make boundlesse will be sure to hold themselves as well as others under the yoke of subjection To conclude this point then The Bishops teach no other doctrine of obedience to Superiours than hath beene ever taught in the Church of God They give the King that onely prerogative which we see hath been given alwaies to all godly Artic. of Relig. p. 37. Princes in holy Scriptures by God himselfe that is that they should rule all estates and degrees committed to their charge by God whether they be Ecclesiasticall or Temporall and restraine with the civill sword the stubborn and evill doers This is the doctrine of our Church To this they have ex animo subscribed and to this they exact subscription of all that are under their severall Jurisdictions And this is not to give him any unlimited power they give to God and Caesar both their dues They make God the first the King the second and onely lesse than God as Tertullian speaks They make no Idol of their King nor Ad Scapulam Hominem à Deo secundum solo Deo minorem place his throne above but immediately under Gods That 's all Under God they grant acknowledging his power to be from God and that hee ought to use his power for God and not against him and our obedience to the King not sufficient to warrant disobedience to God yet immediately and above all others in his Dominions So as They beleeve and teach that his actions are not liable to the scanning much lesse to the controule no not of his greatest subjects This The King to speak with all humble reverence cannot give c. p. 72. They doe not know They dare not practice Neither will or dare They no not with humble reverence premised tell the people that the King hath not and therefore cannot give power to others to do those things which crosse their fancies as namely to punish those that refuse to conforme to his commands and the orders of the Church which he miscalls the altering of the state of Religion and to suppresse the faithfull Ministers of the Gospel this They judge no humble reverence but outragious and desperate impudency and boldnesse Yea and that it savours of unchristian disloyalty to insinuate to the people that the King is carelesse of his reiterated solemne protestations and oathes That he is forgetfull of the law of God and regardles of the laws of the Land That he useth his power or suffers it to be used to alter the state of Religion to oppresse and suppresse the faithfull Ministers of the Gospell against both law and conscience All pag 56. pag. 73. which Mr. Burton hath done ad nauseam usque even to his readers surfet and loathing Neither will his usuall scheme help him off or excuse him to say he doth not nor will not beleeve such actions as hee is pleased so deeply and desperately to censure to be the Kings
Burtons endeavour to excuse Ap-Evans Mr. Burtons opposites not censorious What they thinke of those whom he calls Professors and the profession it selfe True Piety approved and honoured in all professions The answere to this crimination summed up The censured partiall Iudges of their own censures How offences are to be rated in their censures THe next is Innovation in Discipline which saith he in a word is this That whereas of old the censures of the Church were to be inflicted upon disordered and vitious persons notorious livers as drunkards adulterers c. Now the sharpe edge thereof is mainly turned against Gods people and Ministers even for their vertue pag. 127. and piety c. A man that reads this charge and were ignorant of the language that is spoken among those of M. Burtons tribe would verily beleeve if it were but halfe true that the State of our Church were metamorphosed into a very Babel of disorder and confusion and sinck of profanenesse and iniquity But the comfort still is we may fitly answere him as Nehemiah did Sanballat There are Nehem. 6. 8. no such things done as thou sayest but thou fainest them out of thine owne heart For first let the records of Ecclesiasticall Courts and as that hee most aimes at of the High Commission bee searched and compared with the now highlymagnified times of the raigne of Queene Elizabeth of famous memory and it will appeare that there is not now the least Innovation either in the manner of their proceedings or in the crimes and persons censured but that it continues in the old and troden steps of religious justice and useth the same severity against vitious persons and inordinate livers in all kindes as ever it was wont to doe And that if there bee any change at all it is that the edge of their censures is not now so sharp or so mainly turned against Gods people and Ministers for their vertue and piety as it was in those happy times For had it beene now as it was then perhaps Mr. Burton had beene prevented for ever comming to this height and his vertue and Piety had beene nipt in the bud which now hath enlarged her branches loaden with goodly fruits suitable to the stocke on which they grow And many of his vertuous friends and Candidates of Martyrdom in the Sabbatarian cause would not have thus long have waited for their sentence of condemnation for their godly and right Christian resistance of his Majesties unquoth commands But I must not goe farther with this vizor and therefore before I proceed I le pull it off and expound the termes and then reade this part of his charge in plaine English Here then by Gods people and Ministers understand People and Ministers of Mr. Burtons party Their vertue and piety their disobedience to their Soveraigne their repining and murmuring at his government their inconformity to the Orders of the Church their contempt of Ecclesiasticall power and authority and other strange insolencies whereof M. Burton hath given us a full patterne in this booke and his long practices The summe and plaine truth is That some people and Ministers that have a better conceit of themselves than they have cause for have beene lately censured for their not conforming to his Majesties commands and the Churches orders This is all and when was it otherwise in this Church nay in any Church since the beginning of Christianity was it ever knowne that any Church or any civill government did or could subsist without inflicting censures upon the wilfull violators of their orders and constitutions Hath not ever the edge of discipline been justly sharpned against those that shall to their disobedience adde contempt of the authority and that with contumelious reproaches and slanders against the persons invested with it If men for the maintenance of their selfe will'd humours and for exalting of their private fancies against the publick Orders of the Church and the authority Ecclesiasticall shall presume so farre Sipro errore homines tanta prasumunt quanto magis aequ◠est et oportet eos qui pacis et unitatis Christianae asserunt veritatem omnibus etiā dissimulantibus et cobibentibus manifestam satagere instanter atque impigrè non solùm pro eorum munimine qui jam Catholici sunt verū etiam pro corum correctione qui nondū sunt Nam si pertina cia insuperabilis vires habere conatur quantas debet habere constātia quae in eo bono quod perseveranter atque infatigabiliter agit et Deo placere se novit et proculdubio non potest hominibus prudentibus displicere Aug. Ep. 167. How much more is it fit and behoves those who stand for the truth of peace and Christian unity which is manifest even to those that dissemble and oppose it to endevour with all earnestnesse and diligence not onely for the securing of those which are Catholicks but also for the correction of those that are not For if stubbornnesse seeke to get such strength what ought constancy to have which in that good which uncessantly and unweariedly it doth both knowes that it pleaseth God and without doubt cannot displease wise men So Saint Augustine once Apologized for the Church in his dayes proceeding against the Donatists and a fitter I cannot use for our Church at this day nor need I adde more in this case But this will not haply be contradicted by any that thus viewes things in their true notions and if any should be so void of reason and grace as to declaime against it every man would cry shame of him But the cunning maske that is put upon it makes it passe current and to be entertained as a just and a great grievance when it shal be presented under the names of persecution and unjust censures inflicted upon Gods people and Ministers and that for their vertue and piety who then can but pitty and commiserate the sufferers and condemne their persecutors of notorious injustice and horrible impiety It is an old and a cunning stratagem used by some expert Captaines to march disguised and to beare the Colours of those against whom they fight that they may finde the more easie passage And this practice hath beene long in use with the disturbers of the Churches peace to usurp the name and priviledges of the true Church and to appropriate that to themselves which of right belongs to those whom they oppugne But never any Vos enim dicitis remansisse Ecclesiam Christi in sola Africa partis Donati Aug. Ep. 166. were better Artists in this kinde than the Donatists in S. Augustines time who were wont to circumscribe the Church within the bounds of their party and to account all other Christians as Pagan and to call the repression of their turbulencies persecution and boast of Martyrdome as appeares out of S. Augustine and Optatus Milevitanus Optat. Milevit l. 3. prope finem And these Donatists were never better parallel'd than in these
no where doth to the Priests or Deacons but more clearely by the ancient Canons and writings of the Fathers in the primitive B. Andrewes Resp ad Epist Moâ—inaei 1. 3. Tortur Terti p. 151. Church That which results from all this is That to affirme the Episcopall order or authority as it is meerely spirituall to bee received not from the King but from God and Christ and derived by continuall succession from the Apostles is no false or arrogant assertion nor prejudicall to the Kings prerogative royall and so not dangerous to those that shall so affirme or that challenge and exercise their jurisdiction in that name For the further demonstration hereof I will also briefly set downe what power in causes Ecclesiasticall is due and challenged by the King and other Soveraigne Civill Magistrates what Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction is annexed to the Crowne of this Realme which the Bishops must acknowledg thence to be received and exercised in that right My first conclusion shall be in the words of Conclu 1 our thirty seventh Article where the power of Artic. 37. Kings in causes Ecclesiasticall is described to bee only That they should rule all estates and degrees committed to their charge by God whether they be Ecclesiasticall or Temporall and restraine with the Civill Sword the stubborne and evill doers other authority than this as Queene Elizabeth in her Injunctions His Majesty neither doth ne ever will Qu. Eliz. Injunct challenge nor indeed is due to the Imperiall Crowne either of this or any other Realme Where I observe two things wherein the Soveraigne authority of Princes in causes Ecclesiasticall doth consist First in ruling Ecclesiasticall persons under which are comprised 1 their power to command and provide that spirituall persons do rightly and duly execute the spirituall duties belonging to their functions 2 to make and ordaine Lawes to that end and for the advancement and establishing of piety and true Religion and the due and decent performance of Divine worship and for the hinderance and extirpation of all things contrary thereunto Secondly in punishing them as well as others when they offend with the Civill Sword Spirituall or Ecclesiasticall persons being offenders are not exempt from the coercive power of the King but that he may punish them as well as others but it is with the Gladium spiritualem stringere est Episcoporum non Regum quan quam hic licet Episcoporum manu piorum tamen Regum sancto monitu et evaginari in vaginam recondi solet Mason de Minist Ang. l. 4. c. 1. Civill Sword as that only which he beareth not with the Ecclesiasticall or by the sentence of Excommunication It belongs to Bishops and not to Kings to draw the Spirituall Sword yet that is also wont to be unsheathed and sheathed at the godly command and motion of religious Kings And they may as pious Princes use second yea and prevent the spirituall Sword and with the Civill as namely with bodily and pecuniary punishment compell his subjects as well Ecclesiasticall as Temporall to the performance of the duties of both Tables My second conclusion or as I may rather Conclu 2 terme it my inference upon the former is That the Bishops having any civill power annexed to their places and exercising the same either in judging any civill causes or inflicting temporall punishments whether bodily or pecuniary have and use that power wholly from the King and by his grace and favour in his right That the Episcopall jurisdiction even as it is Conclu 3 truly Episcopall and meerely spirituall though in it selfe it be received only from God yet in asmuch it is exercised in his Majesties Dominions and upon his subjects by his Majesties consent command and royall Protection according to the Canons and Statutes confirmed by his Authority nothing hinders but that thus-farre all Ecclesiasticall Authority and jurisdiction may bee truly said to be annexed to the Crowne and derived from thence And this onely is the intent of those Statutes which annex the Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction to the Crowne Which notwithstanding it may truly bee affirmed that the Bishops have their function and jurisdiction for the substance of it as it is meerely spirituall and so properly Ecclesiasticall by Divine right and only from Christ and that it is derived by a continuall and uninterrupted succession from the Apostles But if Master Burton conceive that the Bishops affirme that they have power to exercise this their spirituall jurisdiction within His Majesties Dominions and over His Subjects of themselves and without licence and authoritie from His Majestie Or that their temporalities their revenewes their Dignities to bee Barons of the Parliament c. or the authority that they have and use either to judge in Causes temporall or to inflict temporall punishments belong to them by Divine right or otherwise than by the favour of his Majesty and his predecessors hee makes them as absurdly ignorant and presumptuous as himselfe The other thing which I cannot let passe is that which he here cites out of the Iesuites pamphlet intituled A direction to be observed by N. N. c. wherein the Iesuit it seemes applauds the present state of our Church as comming on towards Vnion with Rome The temper and moderation of the Arch Bishop and some other learned prelates and the allowance of some things in these dayes which in former times were counted superstitious as the names of Priests and altars and the acknowledging the visible beeing of the Protestant Church for many ages to have beene in the Church of Rome c. My purpose is not here to enter the lists with the Iesuite who I doubt not ere long will bee more sufficiently answered than I have either leisure or ability to doe All that I shall say for the present is First that Master B. is willing it seemes to take dirt from any Dunghill to cast in the face of his Mother the Church of England and that though hee professe such mortall hate to Rome that the last affinity with her though many times but imaginary makes him breake forth into strange expressions of his abomination Yet hee can bee content to joyne hands with the worst of the Romanists the Iesuites and use their aide to slander and make odious the Church in which hee was bred But it is no Innovation this it hath beene a long practise of the Faction whereof he is now ambitious to become a captaine both to joyne with them in their principles and to make use of their weapons to fight against the Church wherein they live Secondly It is manifest from hence that the Iesuite and he are confederates in detraction and ignorance of the Doctrine of our Church which both of them judge of not by the authorised Doctrine publikely subscribed or the regular steps of those that have continued in the use of her ancient and laudable customes rites and ceremonies but by their owne humours and uncertaine reports of some
them too but I spare them yet surely I have knowne strange effects of this doctrine and what consequences naturally doe flow from it I leave to the judicious and indifferent consideration of any understanding man Thirdly it produces a strange kind of justification whereby at once all their sinnes past present Ames p. 121. Calvin Inst. l. 3. c. 4. §. 3. and to come are remitted and they without more adoe as sure of heaven as if they were in it already and that without any repentance which with them is no cause of the remission of sinnes neither indeed can bee as comming too late and when that worke is done already by faith or rather before all faith which apprehends the free and full remission of their sinnes ready sealed before all repentance which as they teach ever comes after faith though to say the truth it seldome either precedes or followes after as it ought and indeed I wonder how it should when they hold that neither it nor good workes are of any efficacie in procuring mans salvation Yea so farre have some gone in opposition to repentance and good workes that they blush not to teach that impenitencie it selfe doth not exclude from grace or salvation for they say that impenitencie is but a sinne and the impenitent but a sinner and so the proper object of justification and salvation inasmuch as the Apostle saith This is 1 Tim. 1. 15. a faithfull saying and worthy of all acceptation that Iesus Christ came into the world to save sinners so ignorantly and against the maine grounds of Christian faith and piety doe they wrest that most sweet and comfortable place to serve their owne fancies So for good workes though all agree to exclude them from being any meanes of not only of justification but of salvation yet some do admit them as it were spectators and witnesses of the worke done and in that respect require their presence as necessary though they contribute nothing to the worke But others are of a more sublime straine and they think them no way necessary but rather hinderers of salvation and whereas vulgar Christians and the under-forme or ranke of Professors doe make use of them as signes and evidences of their faith and justification these teach as the most new and more refined way that men should try their workes by their faith and that this is the onely way to have constant and untottering comfort which the commission of no sinne can ecclypse or diminish for they beleeving that God loves hath accepted their persons and that once for all must beleeve also that hee will take them altogether with all faults that they are or shall bee gulty of and being his favorits they may be assured that he will give them more liberty and winke at more and grocer faults in them than in unbeleevers and reprobates who may haply be condemned to hell fire for but looking upon a woman to lust after her when these scape with actuall adultery and many other grosse and grievous sins lived dyed in without repentance those being but infirmities in them which in others are scandalous and crying sinnes In which regard they enjoy two notable priviledges First that whereas to others death to them life is the wages of sinne for they so farre extend that of the Apostle Saint Paul Rom. 8. 28. to include sinne and all which together with all things else workes together for their good and salvation Secondly they are by this means exempted from all punishment as well in this world as in the next that all the afflictions which befall them and death it selfe are not punishments for their sins or signes of his displeasure against them whom hee once and ever loved so dearely but onely fatherly corrections and exercises of their graces As their faith is new so are many acts of Gods worship new too I le begin with the principall of them all their Prayers which are farre different from the Prayers of the Church of England for first our Church appointeth publick Prayers after a set and solemne forme Prayers received from the ancient Church of Christ and venerable for their antiquity Prayers wherein the meanest in the Congregation by reason of the continuall use may joyne in and helpe to set upon God with an armie of Prayers Prayers composed with that gravity with such pious and soule-ravishing straines with those full and powerfull expressions of heavenly affection that I suppose the world setting them aside hath not the like volumne of holy Orisons But these are by them slighted and vilified in whose mouthes the short and pithy prayers of the Church are but shreads and pieces and not worthy the name of Prayers and the Letany accounted conjuring And in stead of these regular devotions they have brought in a long prayer freshly-conceived and brought forth by the Minister and that God knowes many times in bald and homely language such as wise men would bee ashamed to tell a tale in even to their equals with many gasping and unseemely pauses and multitudes of irksome Tautologies and which is none of the least defects of it in which none of the Congregation is able to joyne with him or to follow him as not knowing no nor the speaker himselfe sometimes what he is about to say Againe the Church of England hath consecrated certaine places to be houses of publick prayer which places so consecrated and appropriated to that holy Service they judge fit that publick prayer be there made as in the places where God is in a more speciall manner present but these places are by them contemned and every place a parlour barne or play-house accounted as holy and fit as they for publick prayer or any other act of Gods worship Thirdly prayers in the Church of England have ever been conceived not only as duties to bee performed but as meanes also sanctified by God for the obtayning of his blessings whereby he is moved to grant our desires but with them they are accounted only duties which must bee done in doing whereof men do not so much move God or dispose him to grant their desires as themselves to receive them Fourthly when we according as our Saviour hath taught us in that holy pattern of prayer which he left with his Disciples do pray that God would forgive us our trespasses wee meane simply and unfeignedly to obtayn fogivenesse and that by this meanes but they praying for forgivenesse of sinnes intend only continuation of that grace of remission of sinnes which they have already received which grace being immutable prayer for that purpose is by them judged altogether superfluous the mayne end therefore that they ayme at in their prayers is that they may grow more and more in sense and assurance of the remission of their sinnes If we passe from prayer to the Sacraments which as our Church teaches are morall instruments to conveigh those graces unto the receivers which the outward signes visibly represent and