VINDICIAE REVINDICATAE BEING AN ANSWER TO Mr. Baxters Book INTITULED Catholick Communion doubly Defended by Dr. Owen 's Vindicator and Richard Baxter AND Mr. Baxter's Notions OF THE Saints Repentance AND Displeasure in Heaven Considered By a Lover of Truth and Peace in Sincerity Sicut noxium est si unitas desit bonis ita Perniciosum est si sit in malis Greg. mor. Lib. 33. Non tam Authoritas in Disputando quam rationis momenta querenda sunt Cicero LONDON Printed by George Larkin at the lower End of Broad-street next to London-Wall 1684. AN EPISTLE TO THE READER Reader IT is none of the business of this Epistle to beg thy favourable and indulgent Respects for the Author and his Work which is almost as beggarly as beging the Question But least of all to crave that thou wouldest not be so suspicious and severe as not to take all Citations by which I represent my Author upon my own word without giving thy self the Trouble and me the sad Apprehensions of a diligent Scrutineer that will see with his own Eyes I am not much in love with Apologies in Epistles to the Reader But if I must in civility treat thee a little that way it shall be only to tell thee that if I could have found any particular faults in the following Tract deserving thy Censure before their Printing off thou shouldest not have found them there And that I suppose thou wilt read me as a man liable to Mistakes and Passions of which thy self art not altogether uncapable and yet neither nthee nor me to be justified As to the Reverend and Learned Author with whom I have here to do and for whom I have a Veneration for his real worth and many of his Works sake I doubt not but he knows how to put a difference betwixt the Liberty of the Pulpit and the Press and the Countenance of a Complement and a Controversy If this have somewhat in the manner that is almost necessary to ease my weariness in writing and thine in reading it and I do a little indulgere genio pardon me this wrong I intended to have joyned with this Tract my thoughts of Mr. Baxters Notions of a Parochial Assembly being a particular Church organical of Divine Institution independant on the Diocesan and as such to be Communicated with But this I have reserved for a Tract by it self and ' til I have seen Mr. Baxters Answer which I hear is in the Press to a Book intituled Mr. Baxters Judgment and Reasons c. which hath matter in it worthy perusal relating to the same Argument ERRATA Page 9. l. 25. read in the Pew p. 9. l. 36. read may go to p. 17. l. 8. read may not be said p. 31 32. for 5th dispute read 5 Disputations AN ANSVVER TO Mr. Baxters Book INTITULED Catholick Communion doubly Defended by Dr. Owens Vindicator and Richard Baxter SECT I. No Consent of Dr. Owens Vindicator to the Catholick Communion defended by Mr. Baxter Reverend Sir I Having read your answer to a Book Intituled A VINDICATION of the late Dr. Owen c. though I am not over strongly addicted to the Scribling Humour yet Considering all Circumstances according to my small Prudentials I was determined after some Hesitations to a publick reply And some Passages in your Answer look as if you expected it The Title of your book in the Frontispiece Scil. CATHOLICK COMMVNION DOVBLY DEFENDED BY DR OWENS VINDICATOR AND RICHARD BAXTER has so much of Riddle in it that I confess I am not the Oedipus who can reconcile it Nor did that manner of â—ign at the door direct me to look for an Answer much less a â—ontroversial Answer to my Vindication as the Entertainment â—â—thin But however Singular you have been in mis-matching the â—â—â—le and the Book Mr. Baxter and Dr. Owens Vindicator as â—o-authors I shall digest them as they come to hand as well as I can And in the mean time You might hold me excused if I should in my Title have followed so great an Example only that it be with somewhat more of Congruity But I am not disposed to make my Reader gaze at such an unusual Spectacle I have Sir no light Quibling Design in this Reply nor to put Tricks upon a Person I so much Reverence and in a cause so serious Nor did I expect from the Gravity and Sincerity of Mr. Baxter such a stumble at the Threshold CATHOLICK COMMVNION are two great words and in plâ—in downright Construction are the epitomy of two Articles of our Christian Creed the Holy Catholick Church and the Communion of Saints And were you as plainly to be understood I must acknowledge that in Intituling me to the defence of it you put an honour upon me which I am more ambitious than capable of deserving But 't is a hard Case that while we agree herein and applaud the terms Catholick Communion when you explain your sence I think at least that it goes beyond Catholick Communion tho' that seem a contradiction in adjecto by excess as Roman Catholick by defect For the genuine sence of Communion I leave to you and Dr. Sherlock to beat out after such a dust raised wherein 't is vanished out of sight I wish you had treated him more calmly it would have been never the less Christian or promotive of Catholick Communion But the Catholicism of our Communion you will needs have extending to an actual pressential joyning with the Parochial Assemblies in their Worship by the Lyturgy the Office of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper included yet not according to the National Diocesan Constitution established by Law but as with a particular divnely instituted and compleat Church independant on the Diocesan I am sure Sir that the defence of such a Catholick Communion was none of my intention and I am as sure that you find no such sence in my expressions But if I must be for a while a felâ— de se and represented as one who under the pretence of vindicating Dr. Owen have betrayed the cause I pretended to defend by siding with his opposite in the very Case Controverted a little patience will discover another scene wherein Mr. Baxter and the Vindicator will appear as if Mr. Baxter had forgotten his Title and had a priviledge to dispose of me according to his present fancy Having gotten over your general Title I have the prospect of another which seems to be restrained to your first section And it is The Consent of Dr. Owens Vindicator to the Catholick Communion defended by Richard Baxter Here Sir you make a very hopeful abatement of what you stood upon in your general Title there you will have me defend here you come down to Consent This is at least half a retractation at the next word yet when I have examined what you have to shew for the latter it will appear to be a meer ungrounded Chimaera You are pleased to distribute the matter of my Book under four
sort of Wisdom I am little acquainted with I am too open and fair for such Politicks I told you the cause page 3 page 23. and page 39. You might have given your self sufficient reasons for it without asking them of others much more being told them If you could not see them there it may be to as little purpose to repeat them here I hope you do not think that Laws Penal Laws are not to be feared What were they else made for You have indeed written concerning the Diocesan established Constitution and the manner of imposing as a man that feared not the Laws But you have made such a Compensation for that by your Zeal expressed for the Lyturgy and Lay-Conformity as may plead your pardon for that wrong I believe and not I alone that by your Writings Examples and valued name serving flesh and blood with a Wind which is no friend to Losses and Crosses you have served the interest of the present Constitution beyond all that hath been said for it by those whose Station may promise the service of their utmost Abilities But for the Cause you oppose and oppose with so much heat I have not found you always of the same mind Change of Weather hath great influence on some and not only the most infirm Constitions I beg your pardon if I make a little Retrospect to your Sentiments by-past and sometime since I might begin with your Savoy-Dispute or Conference wherein 't is offered against a Lyturgy that Cold Prayers are like to have a cold Return But that being viva voce in transient breath I shall not so much insist on it but remember you of what you said elsewhere for Example But we think it was not the Jesuites that first said Out of the Abundance of the Heart the Mouth speaketh 'T is natural for the Heart to lead the Tongue And men are more affected by words which come from Affection than by those that do not And reading words written by another when we speak to God is not so natural a Signification of Desire or other Affection as speaking them from the present Dictate of the Heart for any Child can do the one and it is not the usual Signification of Seriousness in other Actions Ministers should be better acquainted than the People how to speak to God and man. It is their Office and therefore it belongeth to them to chuse the Words which are fittest and to set up a Ministry that can do neither is to befriend the Prince of Darkness against the Kingdom of Light and to be a deadly Enemy to the Church and Souls and to sit up a Ministry that need not do it is the way to set up a Ministry that cannot Let the Ministers be bound to no more than to read and a few years will transform them to such as can do no more than read Baxters second Defence of the meer Nonconformists page 15. I doubt not but there are some pious Persons among you I Censure not farther than Experience constraineth me But I know that the Common Sence of most that are serious in practical Christianity is against your formal wayes of Worship and against the Course that you have taken in this Land. And the Spirit of Prophaness Complyeth with you and doteth on you in all places that ever I was acquainted in Bear with plain Truth It is in a Cause of Everlasting Consequence There is somewhat in a graciou Soul like Health in the Body that disposeth it to Relish wholsom food and perceive more difference between it and meer Air or toyish Kick-shaws than it can easily express Baxters fifth Dispute of Church-Government Pref. page 17. Compare this with Mr. Baxters Answer to Dr. Owens twelve Arguments Page 42. And if it be the disuse of your Common-prayer that you separate from us for I would know of you Whether you would have denyed Communion with all that lived before it had a Being If this be your Religion I may ask you Where was your Religion before Luther before King Edwards day If you say in the Mass-book And what else can you say I ask you then where was it before the Mass-book had a Being Baxters fifth Dispute c. Pref. page 30. Could men have been content to have made Gods Laws the Centre and Touch-stone of the Churches Unity all had been well But when they must make Cannons for this Vesture and that Gesture and the other Ceremony and determine in what Words all men shall pray and how many words he shall say or how long he shall be and so make standing Laws upon mutable Circumstances and this without any Necessity at all but only to Domineer c. Baxters fifth Dispute page 9. They the Pharisees used long Prayers as a Cloak for their Oppression Query Whether they were a Lyturgy or not If yea so let it pass in their Character If not Then it is scarce like that there was any other Lyturgy than the Scripture in those times else it is most likely that the Pharisees would have used it Apology for Nonconformists page 95. But to set up a new sort of Jurisdiction in the Church by Legislation to make Forms and Ceremonies Obligatory and by Executions to punish Pastors that will not practice them is Lastly By this means you will harden the Papists that by their inventions and impositions have divided the Church and been guilty of so much imposition and Tyranny For how can we condemn that in them that is practiced by our selves And though in number of inventions they exceed yet it is not well to concur with them in the kind of unnecessary Impositions and so far to justifie them in their injury to the Church If none of these or other reasons will allay the imperious Distemper of the proud but they must needs by an usurped Legislation be making indifferent things become necessary to others and domineer over mens Consciences and the Church of God We must leave them to him that being Lord and Lawgiver of the Church is jealous of His Prerogative and abhorreth IDOLS and will not give His Glory to another and that delighteth to pull down the proud and humble them that Exalt themselves Baxters 5th Dispute of Church-Government page 378. That to that very Question Whether they know of any thing in the Lyturgy with which they could not comply without Sin we after gave in a Paper of eight particulars in the Lyturgy which we undertook to prove flat sin Apology for meer Nonconformists page 155. Moreover the same reasons that prevail with us will prevail with others when we are dead They will be as fearful of Lying and Perjury and of swearing Allegiance to Church-Vsurpers as we have been There will still be a People seriously Religious that are Christians in good sadness and really believe a Life to come There is no hindering it God will have it so and who can gainsay Him And these men will be as loath in point of Order and Decency
sufficient Conviction you direct me by Quotations to fifteen I thank you for this great Charity and necessary pains But what is all this to the Purpose Dare you say that proprie dictum God repents or deny that spoken of him it is a denomination from the Changes he makes ad extra as the Effects of his eternal and immutable Will without any change in himself You tell me at next word that 't is not spoken of God as if he had any Mutability as man hath And yet you add as mighty unwilling to acknowledge your Scripture instances impertinent here But God being infinitely more perfect the Phrase is farther fetched and less proper of God than of man Therefore it is not the name that he blameth seeing he owneth the word of God. Reverend Sir I observe you go here all by Comparatives Mutability as man hath infinitely more perfect than man further fetch'd All which I should have taken no notice of but because of the following words that the phrase of God repenting is less proper of God than of Man. This plainly renders it your opinion that Repentance is proper to God as contradistinguisht from figurative though in a less degree and farther fetcht than when spoken of man which opinion whether it be not utterly untrue and unspeakably dangerous I refer to the Judicious Reader I would you had told us how much less proper and how much farther fetcht when spoken of God. To what you conclude It is not therefore the name c. I say I blame not the word repentance 't is true but your at least indiscreet if not impertinent use and misapplication of it You acknowledg that I had prevented your labour in transcribing other Authors that use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 usually for a meer change of the mind purpose and practice without any signification of sorrow And I also told you that if you had said the Saints in heaven were grown wiser had a better understanding and did disapprove of what they in this life thought good and true This might if nothing else have stopped your torrent of dismal consequences for they who do so are far from justifying or being Neuters as you express it as to Murder Rebellion Persecution and all sin as a small matter c. But yet you say page 23. But let us willingly take the Scripture use which speaketh of Repentance in heaven and on Earth Answ We have nothing to do in this Controversy with repentance of any on earth but of the Saints in heaven And you tell us at the bottom of the same page that we find no talk in Scripture of any in heaven repenting but God. Can I wish a fairer adversary That shall more willingly and expresly yield the Cause But by the next Paragraph you repent all this again and say All those acts of Repentance Souls have in heaven which rise to the number of five So that you can talk of what Souls do in Heaven that by your own confession within five lines before the Scripture is utterly silent in Have you any Revelation peculiar to your self of those things I must also Reverend Sir enter my dissent to some other passages upon the subject of Repentance in this life to which you are pleased to direct me page 24. in that you say But usually we have cause of sorrow as well as of Repentance and must joyn them together But where the Gospel frequently promiseth Repentance Pardon and Life together and Preacheth both Repenting and Believing in order to present joy there is little mention of sorrow in the Converts save for the murdering of Christ or some great 〈◊〉 Answ Is this a safe limitation to say usually which excludes sorrow from our Repentance even in this life very often if not mostly â—s no duty Your after-instances restrain it to the murdering of Christ or some great sin Then it seems we ought to repent That is Change our mind and will and wish we had not done what we did which you call the prime and common sence of Repentance within a few lines of all sin but be sorry in repenting only for some great sin But how great you tell us not except the murdering of Christ must be taken for its measure Yet here you argue from the negative a non dicto ad non factum There might be great sorrow where we have it not expressed and where we find the Gospel Preached affecting with present joy there might be room enough for sorrow afterward But you go on to fortifie this notion from 2 Cor. 7. 9 10. I rejoyce not that ye were made sorry but that ye sorrowed to Repentance for godly sorrow worketh Repentance to Salvation not to be repented of You then demand Is the sence godly sorrow worketh godly sorrow I answer no and yet you are never the nearer your end for one part of Repentance may very well contribute to another And this other part Emendation being the more excellent part may very well take the denomination of the whole Conviction is not Conversion yet Conversion includes Conviction not only as an inseparable adjunct but also as an essential part And if it should be said Conviction worketh Conversion to life this would not conclude that Conversion doth not include Conviction This is spoken of Repentance in this life to which you have led me by going out of the way But to tell you my thoughts of Repentance of Souls in heaven I am of opinion that there is none there I take Repentance and so do you to consist in its primary principal parts in the change of the Understanding and Will and this differs so little from the sence of the word Conversion as is hardly if at all distinguishable It may be said of the Saints in heaven that they are Converted but not that there is any Conversion there The like of Repentance Because the acts of Conversion and Repentance are in via and may properly be called the transitus or passage of the Soul from all the corruptions of nature to Consummate grace which is not attained in this life But when Grace is Consummate the work of Repentance and Conversion is over because there is no more sin to Convert or Repent from And you allow all that 〈◊〉 to fortifie this sence in your saying p. 24. to prove that 〈…〉 for sin is not alway a necessary adjunct of Repentance Heb. 6 1. It is not called Repentance for dead works but from dead works if this will serve your turn to shut out sorrow from Repentance here it will serve mine much more to shut Repentance out of heaven for there can be no repenting from dead works so as to make any change after they are lodged in that perfect state and have no dead works to repent from I conclude with a few passages of your own which makes you seem so generous as to give freely though you will hardly yield to have the same things forced from you But we find no talk in Scripture of any in heaven repenting but God No wonder how little hath God told us of the particular state and action of separated Souls before the Resurrection When it pleaseth God so sparingly to mention their present state yea and their Immortality in the Old Testament shall we feign that he must tell us of all their thoughts Page 25. But your last and best words on this argument are I only hence conclude that we must not take on us to know more than we do of separate Souls nor to make a measure or manner of blessedness for them of our own heads nor to apply every Text to them that is spoken of the state after the Resurrection There is enough besides to feast our joyful hopes Answ Cur in Theatrum Cato severe yenisti An ideo tantum veneras ut exires You seem to have faln out that we might shake hands at Reconciliation You have here if we may take your sence by your words repented of your undoubted repentance and displeasure to the Saints in heaven for to say there is such things there is to feign to our selves and of our own heads for of these the Scripture no where speaks I thought we should meet at Hedge or Style It 's better parting in san Weather then in a Storm And therefore FINIS