seriousness in Religion made odious or banished from the earth and that themselves may be taken for the Center and Pillars and Law-givers of the Church and the Consciences of all men may be taught to cast off all scruples or fears of offending God in comparison of â—â—â—â—â—â—ing them and may absolutely submit to them and never stick at any feared disobedience to 〈…〉 t They are the scorners and persecutors of strict obedience to the Laws of God and take those that â—ear his judgements to be men affrighted out of their wits and that to obey him exactly which alas who can do when he hath done his best is but to be hypocritical or too precise but to question their domination or break their Laws imposed on the world even on Kings and States without any Authority this must be taken for Heresie Schism or a Rebellion like that of Corah and his company This Luciferian Spirit of the proud Autonomians hath filled the Christian world with bloodshed and been the greatest means of the miseries of the earth and especially of hindering and persecuting the Gospel and setting up a Pharisaical Religion in the world It hath fought against the Gospel and filled with blood the Countreys of France Savoy Rhaetia Bohemia Belgia Helvetia Polonia Hungary Germany and many more that it may appear how much of the Satanical nature they have and how punctually they fulfill his will § 3. And natural corruption containeth in it the seeds of all these damnable Heresies nothing more natural to lapsed man than to shake off the Government of God and to become a Law-giver to himself and as many others as he can and to turn the grace of God into wantonness Therefore the prophane that never heard it from any Hereticks but themselves do make themselves such a Creed as this that God is merciful and therefore we need not fear his threatnings for he will be better than his word It belongeth to him to save us and not to us and therefore we may cast our souls upon his care though we care not for them our selves If he hath predestinated us to salvation we shall be saved and if he have not we shall not what ever we do or how well soever we live Christ dyed for sinners and therefore though we are sinners he will save us God is stronger than the Devil and therefore the Devil shall not have the most That which pleaseth the flesh and doth God no harm can never be so great a matter or so much offend him as to procure our damnation What need of so much ado to be saved or so much haste to turn to God when any one that at last doth but repent and cry God mercy and believe that Christ dyed for him shall be saved Christ is the Saviour of the world and his grace is very great and free and therefore God forbid that none should be saved but those few that are of strict and holy lives and make so much ado for Heaven No man can know who shall be saved and who shall not and therefore it is the wisest way to do no body any harm and to live merrily and trust God with our souls and put our salvation upon the venture no body is saved for his own works or deservings and therefore our lives may serve the turn as well as if they were more strict and holy This is the Creed of the ungodly by which you may see how natural it is to them to abuse the Gospel and plead Gods grace to quiet and strengthen them in their sin and to embolden themselves on Christ to disobey him § 4. But this is but to set Christ against himself even his Merits and Mercy against his Government and Spirit and to set his Death against the Ends of his death and to set our Saviour against our salvation and to run from God and rebell against him because Christ dyed to recover us to God and to give us Repentance unto life and to sin because he dyed to save his people from their sins and to purifie a peculiar people to himself zealous of good works Matth. 1. 21. Tit. 2. 14. He that committeth sin is of the Devil for the Devil sinneth from the beginning For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil 1 John 3. 8. John 8. 44. Direct 18. WAtch diligently hath against the more discernable decayes of grace and against Direct 18. the degenerating of it into some carnal affections or something counterfeit and of another kind And so also of Religious duties § 1. We are no sooner warmed with the coelestial flames but natural corruption is enclining us to grow cold Like hot water which loseth its heat by degrees unless the fire be continually kept under it Who feeleth not that as soon as in a Sermon or Prayer or holy Meditation his heart hath got a little heat as soon as it is gone it is prone to its former earthly temper and by a little remisness in our duty or thoughts or business about the world we presently grow cold and dull again Be watchful therefore lest it decline too far Be frequent in the means that must preserve you from declining when faintness telleth you that your stomachs are emptied of the former meat supply it with another lest strength abate You are rowing against the stream of fleshly interest and inclinations and therefore intermit not too long lest you go faster down by your ease then you get up by labour § 2. The Degenerating of Grace is a way of backsliding very common and too little observed How Grace may degenerate It is when good affections do not directly cool but turn into some carnal affections somewhat like them but of another kind As if the body of a man instead of dying should receive the life or soul of a Beast instead of the reasonable humane soul. For instance 1. Have you Believed in God and in Iesus Christ and Loved him accordingly You shall seem to do so still as much as formerly when your corrupted minds have received some false representation of him and so it is indeed another thing that you thus corruptly Believe and Love 2. Have you been fervent in Prayer you shall be fervent still iâ— Satan can but corrupt your prayers by corrupting your judgement or affections and get you to think that to be the cause of God which is against him and that to be against him which he commandeth and those to be the troublers of the Church which are its best and faithfullest members Turn but your prayers against the cause and people of God by your mistake and you may pray as fervently against them as you will The same I may say of preaching and conference and zeal Corrupt them once and turn them against God and Satan will joyn with you for zealous and frequent preaching or conference or disputes 3. Have you a confidence in Christ and his promise for
of flesh and blood which maketh you pretend Moderation and Peace and that it is a sign that you are hypocrites that are so lukewarm and carnally comply with error and that the cause of God is to be followed with the greatest zeal and self denyal And all this is true if you be but sure that it is indeed the cause of God and that the greater works of God be not neglected on such pretences and that your Zeal be much greater for Faith and Charity and Unity than for your opinions But upon great experience I must tell you that of the zealous contenders in the world that cry up The Cause of Consuming 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 use at 〈◊〉 â—o 〈◊〉 up the owners of it Whatever tâ—â—y say oâ— do against others in theâ—â— inâ—â—mperaâ—e violâ—nce they teach otherâ— at last to say and do against them when they have opportunity How the Orâ—â—odox taught the Aâ—â—iaâ—s to use severity against them may be sâ—en in Victor utic p. 447 448 449. in the Edict of Hunneâ—yâ—hus â—â—gem quam dudum Christiani Imperatores nostri contra eos alios haereticos pro honorisicentia Ecclesiae Catholiâ—ae dedâ—runâ— adversus nos illi proponere non eâ—ubuerunt v. g. Rex Hun. c. Triumphalis Majestatis Regiae probatur esâ—e virtutis mâ—â—a in autores conâ—lia retorquere Quisquis enim pravitatis aliquid invenerit sibi imputet quod incurrit Nullâ—s 〈◊〉 homâ—usion Saceâ—doâ—es assumanâ— nec aliquid mysteriâ—â—um quae magis polluunt sibi vendicenâ— Nullam habeant oâ—dinandi licentiam Quod ipsaâ—um legum continentia demonstratur quas induxiâ—â—e Imperaâ—oâ—ibuâ— c. viz. Ut nulla exceptâ—s superstiti 〈…〉 s suae â—nâ—stibus Ecclesia pateret nuâ—lâ—s liceret aliis aut convictus agere aut exercere convâ—ntâ—s nec Ecclesias auâ— in uâ—â—iâ—â—â—â— aut in quibuâ—dam 〈◊〉 locis God and Truth there is not one of very many that understandeth what he talks of but some of them cry up the Cause of God when it is a brat of a proud and ignorant brain and such as a judicious person would be ashamed of And some of them are rashly zealous before they have parts or time to come to any judicious tryal and some of them are mis-guided by some person or party that captivateth their minds and some of them are hurried away by passion and discontent and many of the ambitious and worldly are blinded by their carnal interests and many of them in meer pride think highly of an Opinion in which they are somewhat singular and which they can with some glorying call their Own as either invented by them or that in which they think they know more than ordinary men do And abundance after longer experience confess that to have been their own erroneous cause which they before entitled the Cause of God Now when this is the case and one cryeth Here is Christ and another There is Christ one saith This is the cause of God and another saith That is it no man that hath any care of his Conscience or of the honour of God and his profession will leap before he looketh where he shall alight or run after every one that will whistle him with the name or pretence of truth or a good cause It is a sad thing to go on many years together in censuring opposing and abusing thâ—se that are against you and in seducing others and mis-imploying your zeal and parts and time and poysoning all your prayers and discourses and in the end to see what mischief you have done for want of knowledge and with Paul to confess that you were mad in opposing the truth and servants of God though you did it in a zeal of God through ignorance Were it not much better to stay till you have tryed the ground and prevent so many years grievous sin than to scape by a sad repentance and leave behind you stinking and venemous fruits of your mistake And worse if you never repent your selves Your own and your Brethrens souls are not so lightly to be ventured upon dangerous untryed wayes It will not make the Truth and Church amends to say at last I had thought I had done well Let those go to the Wars of disputing and 〈◊〉 and câ—nsuâ—ing and siding with a Sect that are riper and better understand the cause Wars are not for Children Do you suspend your judgement till you can solidly and certainly inform it and serve God in Charity quietness and peace And it s two to one but you will live to see the day that the contenders that would have led you into their Wars will come off with so much loss themselves as will teach them to approve your peaceable course or teach you to bless God that kept you in your place and duty § 3. In all this I deny not but every truth of God is to be valued at a very high rate and that he that shall carry himself in a neutrality when Faith or Godliness is the matter in controversie or shall do it meerly for his worldly ends to save his stake by temporizing is a false-hearted hypocrite and at the heart of no Religion But withal I tell you that all is not matter of Faith or Godliness that the Autonomian-Papist the Antinomian-Libertine or other passionate parties shall call so And that as we must avoid contempt of the smallest Truth so we must much more avoid the most heinous sins which we may commit for the defending of an error And that some Truths must be silenced for a time though not denyed when the contending for them is unseasonable and tendeth to the injury of the Church If you were Masters in the Church you must not teach your Scholars to their hurt though it be truth you teach them And if you were Physicions you must not cramm them or Medicate them to their hurt Your power and duty is not to Destruction but to Edification The good of the Patient is the end of your Physick All Truth is not to be spoken nor all Good to be done by all men nor at all times He that will do contrary and take this for a carnal principle doth but call folly and sin by the name of zeal and duty and set the house on fire to rost his Egg and with the Pharisees prefer the outward rest of their Sabbath before his Brothers life or health Take heed what you do when Gods honour and mens souls and the Churches peace are concerned in it § 4. And let me tell you my own observation As far as my judgement hath been able to reach the men that have stood for Pacification and Moderation have been the most judicious and those that have best understood themselves in most controversies that ever I heard under debate among good Christians And those that suriously censured them as lukewarm or corrupted have been men that had least judgement and most passion pride and foul mistakes in the points in question § 5. Nay I will tell you
our faith Help thou our unbelief But he that approveth of his Doubting and would have it so and thinks the revelation is uncertain and such as will warrant no firmer a belief I should scarcely say this man is a Christian. Christianity must be received as of Divine infallible revelation But controversies about less necessary things cannot be determined peremptorily by the ignorant or young beginners without hypocrisie or a humane faith going under the name of a Divine I am far from abating your Divine belief of all that you can understand in Scripture and implicitely of all the rest in general And I am far from diminishing the credit of any truth of God But the Reasons of this Direction are these § 2. 1. When it is certain that you have but a dark uncertain apprehension of any point to think it is clear and certain is but to deceive your selves by pride And to cry out against all uncertainty as sceptiâ—isme which yet you cannot lay aside is but to revile your own infirmity and the common infirmity of mankind and foolishly to suppose that every man can be as wise and certain when he list as he should be Now Reason and experience will tell you that a young unfurnished understanding is not like to see the evidence of difficult points as by nearer approach and better advantage it may do § 3. 2. If your conclusions be peremptory upon meer self-conceitedness you may be in an error for ought you know and so you are but confident in an error And then how far may you go in seducing others and censuring dissenters and come back when you have done and confess that you were all this while mistaken your selves § 4. 3. For a man to be confident that he knoweth what he knoweth not is but the way to keep him ignorant and shut the door against all means of further information When the Opinion is fixt by prejudice and conceit there is no ready entrance for the light § 5. 4 And to be ungroundedly confident so young is not only to take up with your Teachers word instead of a faith and knowledge of your own but also to forestall all diligence to know more and so you may lay by all your studies save only to know what those men hold whose judgements are your Religion Too Popish and easie a way to be safe § 6. 5. If you must never change your first opinions or apprehensions how will you grow in understanding Will you be no wiser at age than you were in childhood and after long study and experience than before Nature and Grace do tend to increase § 7. Indeed if you should be never so peremptory in your opinions you cannot resolve to hold them to the end For Light is powerful and may change you whether you will or no you cannot tell what that Light will do which you never saw But prejudice will make you resist the light and make it harder for you to understand § 8. I speak this upon much experience and observation Our first unripe apprehensions of things will certainly be greatly changed if we are studious and of improved understandings Study the Conâ—roveâ—â—â—â—s about Grace and Free-will or about other such points of difficulty when you are young and â—â—s two to one that ripeness will afterward make them quite another thing to you For my own â—â—â—â—t my judgement is altered from many of my youthful confident apprehensions And where it heldeth the same conclusion it rejecteth abundance of the arguments as vain which once it rested in And where I keep to the same Conclusions and Arguments my apprehension of them is not the saâ—â— â—ut I see more satisfying light in many things which I took but upon trust before And if I had resolved to hold to all my first Opinions I must have forborn most of my studies and lost much truth which I have discovered and not made that my own which I did hold and I must have resolved to live and dye a child § 9. The su 〈…〉 is Hold fast the substance of Religion and every clear and certain Truth which you see in its own evidence and also reverence your Teachers especially the Universal Church or the generality of wise and godly men and be not hasty to take up any private opinion And especially to contradict the Opinion of your Governours and Teachers in small and controverted things But yet in such matters receive their Opinions but with a humane faith till indeed you have more and therefore with a supposition that time and study is very like to alter your apprehensions and with a reserve impartially to study and entertain the truth and not to sit still just where you were bâ—rn Direct 12. IF Controversies â—ccasion any Divisions where you live be sure to look first to the interest of Common Truth and Good and to the exercise of Charity And become not passionate contenders for any party in the division or censurers of the peaceable or of your Teachers that will not â—ver 〈…〉 their own understandings to obtain with you the esteem of being Orthodox or zealous men But suspect your own unripe understandings and silence your Opinions till you are clear and certain and jâ—yn rather with the moderate and the peace-makers than with the Contenders and Dividers § 1. You may easily be sure that Division tendeth to the ruine of the Church and the hinderance of the Gospel and the injury of the common interest of Religion You know it is greatly condemned in the Scriptures You may know that it is usually the exercise and the increase of Pride uncharitableness and passion and that the Devil is best pleased with it as being the greatest gainer by it But on the other side you are not easily certain which party is in the right And if you were you are not sure that the matter will be worth the cost of the contention Or if it be it is to be considered whether the Truth is not like to get more advantage by managing it in a more peaceable way that hath no contention nor stirreth not up other men so much against it as the way of controversie doth And whatever it prove you may and should know that young Christians that want both parts and helps and time and experience to be throughly seen in controversies are very unfit to make themselves parties And that they are yet more unfit to be the hottest leaders of those parties and to spur on their Teachers that know more than they If the work be fit for another to do that knoweth on what ground he goeth and can foresee the end yet certainly it is not fit for you And therefore forbear it till you are more fit § 2. I know those that would draw you into such a contentious zeal will tell you that their cause is the cause of God and that you desert him and betray it if you be not zealous in it and that it is but the counsel
it We must not only contemn it as compared to the approbation and favour of God but we must value it but as other transitory things in it self considered estimating it â—s a means to some higher end the service of God and our own or other mens greater â—â—â—â—d And further than it conduceth to some of these it must be allmost indifferent to us what men â—â—â—â—â— or say of us And the displeasure of all men if unjust must be reckâ—ned with our light afâ—flâ—â—â—â—iâ—ns § 17. 6. One truth of God and the smallest duty must be preferred before the pleasing and favor of all the men in the world Though yet as a means to the promoting of a greater truth or duty the favor and plâ—â—sing of men must be preferred before the uttering of a lesser truth or doing a lessâ—r â—â—od at that â—â—â—â— because it is no duty then to do it § 18. 7. Our hearts are so â—â—lâ—â—sh and deceitful naturally that when we are very sollicitous about â—â—â—◠〈…〉 we must carefully watch them lest self be intended while God is pretended And w◠〈◊〉 take special care that we be sure it be the honour of God and Religion and the good of soulâ—â—◠〈◊〉 greater benefit than honour it self that we value our honour and reputation for § 19. 8. Mans nature is so prone to go too far in valuing our â—steem with men that we should more fâ—â—r â—â—â—â— we â—rr on that hand than on the other in undervaluing it And it is far safer to do too little than too much in the vindicating of our own reputation whether by the magistrates justice or by dâ—sâ—uting or any contentious means § 20. 9. Wâ— must not wholy rest on the judgement of any about the state of our souls nor take their judgement of us for inâ—â—llible but use their help that we may know our selves § 21. 10. If Ministers or Councils called General do err and contradict the word of God we must do our best to discern it and discerning it must desert their error rather than the truth of God As Calvin and after him Paraeus on 1 Cor. 4. 3. say We must give an account of our doctrine to all men that require it especially to Ministers and Councils But when a faithful Pastor perceiveth himself oppressed with unrighteous and perverse designs and factions and that there is no place for equity and truth he â—ught to be careless of mans esteem and to appeal to God and fly to his tribunal And if we see our selves condemned our cause being unpleaded and judgement passed our cause being unheard let us lift up our minds to this magnanimity as despising mens judgement to expect with boldness the judgement of God and say with Paul With me it is a smal matter to be judged of you or of mans judgement I have one that judgeth me even the Lord. § 22. 11. God must be enough for a gracious soul and we must know that in his favour is life Psalm 30 5. Psalm 63. 3. 2 Câ—â— â— 9. Rom. 8. 33 34. and his loving kindness is better than life it self and this must be our care and labour that whether living or dying we may be accepted of him and if we have his Approbation it must satisfie us though all the world condemn us Therefore having faithfully done our duty we must leave the matter of our reputation to God who if our waies please him can make our enemies to be at peace with us or be harmless to us as if they were no enemies As we must quietly leave it to him what measure of wealth we shall have so also what measure of honour we shall have It is our duty to Love and Honor but not to be beloved and honoured § 23. 12. The prophesie of our Saviour must be still believed that the world will hate us and his Mâ—â— 10. â—â—â—â—n 15. Maâ— 27. Hâ—b 12. 1 2 3. â— Pet. 2. 21 22. example must be still before our eyes who submitted to be spit upon and scorned and buffeted and slandered as a traytor or usurper of the Crown and made himself of no reputation and indured the Cross and despised the shame leaving us an example that we should fâ—llow his steps who did no sin neither was guile found in his mouth who when he was reviled reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but câ—mmitted all to him that judgeth righteously This is the usage that must be the Christians expectation and not to be well spoken of by all nor to have the applause and honor of the world § 24. 13. It is not only the approbation of the ignorant and ungodly that we must thus set light We must go further than Sâ—â—â—â—ca who said Maâ—e dâ— mâ— loqâ—â—â—â—â— â—ed mâ—lâ—â— mâ—â—eâ—er si de me Mâ—â— Caâ—e si â—â—â—â—s sapiens si duo Scipioâ—es ista loquerentur nunc malis disâ—â—â—â—ceâ—e â—audari est by but even of the most Learned and Godly themselves so as to bear their censures as an easie burden when God is pleased this way to try us and to be satisfied in God alone and the expectation of his final judgement § 25. Direct 2. Remember that the favour and pleasing of man is one of your snares that would Direct 2. prevail against your pleasing God Therefore watch against the danger of it as you must do against other earthly things § 26. Direct 3. Remember how silly a creature man is and that his favour can be no better than Direct 3. himself The thoughts or words of a mortal worm are matters of no considerable value to us § 27. Direct 4. Remember that it is the judgement of God alone that your life or death for ever Direct 4. doth depend upon and how little you are concerned in the judgement of man 1. An humbled soul that hath felt what it is to have displeased God and what it is to be under his curse and what it is to be reconciled to him by the death and intercession of Jesus Christ is so taken up in seeking the favour of God and is so troubled with every fear of his displeasure and is so delighted with the sense of his Love as that he can scarce have while to mind so small a matter as the favour or displeasure of a man Gods favour is enough for him and so precious to him that if he find that he hath this so small a matter as the favour of a man will scarce be mist by him § 28. 2. God only is our supream judge and our Governors as Officers limited by him But for others if they will be usurpers and set themselves in the throne of God and there let fly their censures upon things and persons which concern them not why should we seem much concerned in it If a beggar step up into a seat of judicature and there condemn one and fine another will you fear him or laugh at him Who art thou that judgest another mans servant To
Only by Rom 1â— 1â— Pride cometh contention Prov. 13. 10. He that is of a proud heart stirreth up strife Prov. 28. 25. What is their wrath their scorns their railing and endeavouring to vilifie those that have offended them but the foam and vomit of their pride Proud haughty scorner is his name that dealeth in proud wrath Prov. 21. 24. § 68. Sign 17. A proud man is either an open or a secret boaster If he be ashamed to shew his Sign 17. Pride by â—pon bâ—â—â—â—ing then he learneth the skill of setting out himself and making known his excellencies in a closer and more handsome way His own commendations shall not seem the design of his speech but to come in upon the by or before he was aware as if he thought of something else or it shall seem necessary to some other end and a thing that he is unavoidably put upon as against his will Or he will take on him to conceal it but by a transparent veil as some proud women hide their beauties Or he will conjoyn the mention of some of his infirmities but they shall be such as he thinks no matter of disgrace but like proud womens beauty-spots to set out the better part which they are proud of But one way or other either by ostentation or insinuation his work is to make known all that tendeth to his honour and to see that his goodness and wisdom and greatness be not unknown or unobserved And all because he must have mens approbation the hypocrites reward He is as buried if he be unknown Proud and boasters are joyned together Rom. 1. 30. 2 Tim. 3. 2. Theudas the deceiver boasted himself to be some body Acts 5. 36. Simon Magus gave out that himself was some great one and the people all gave heed to him from the least to the greatest saying This man is the great power of God Acts 8. 9 10. Such love the praise of men more than the praise of God John 12. 43. But the humble hath learned another kind of language not affectedly but from the feeling of their hearts to cry out I am vile I am unworthy to be called a child My sins are more than the hairs of my head And he hateth their vanity that by unseasonable or immoderate commendations endeavour to stir him up to pride and so to bring him to be vile indeed by proclaiming him to be excellent Much more doth he abhor to praise himself having learned Prov. 27. 2. Let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth a stranger and not thine own lips He praiseth himself by Works and not by Words Prov. 31. 31. § 69. Sign 18. A proud man loveth honourable Names and Titles as the Pharisees to be called Sign 18. Rabbi Matth. 23. And yet they may have so much wit as to pretend that it is but to promote their service for the common good and not that they are so weak to care for empty names or else that they were forced to it by some bodies kindness without their seeking and against their wills § 70. Sign 19. Pride doth tickle the heart of fools with content and pleasure to hear themselves applauded Sign 19. or see themselves admired by the people or to hear that they have got a great reputation in the world or to be flockt after and cryed up and have many followers Herod loveth to hear in commendation of his Oration It is the voice of a God and not of a man It is a feast to the proud Acts 12. 22. to hear that men abroad do magnifie him or see that those about him do reverence and love and honour and idolize him Hence hath the Church been filled with busie Sect-masters even of those that seemed forwardest in Religion which was sadly prophesied of by Paul to the Ephesians Acts 20. 29 30. Two sorts of troublers under the name of Pastors pride hath in all Ages thrust upon the Church Devouring Wolves and dividing Sect-masters For I know this that after my departure shall grievous Wolves enter in among you not sparing the flock Also of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them See also Rom. 16. 16 17. § 71. Sign 20. Pride maketh men censorious and uncharitable They extenuate other mens vertues Sign 20. and good works and suspect ungroundedly their sincerity A little thing serves to make them think or call a man an hypocrite Very few are honest or sincere or godly or humble or faithful or able or worthy in their eyes even among them that are so indeed or that they have cause to think so A slight conjecture or report seemeth enough to allow them to condemn or defame another They quickly see the Mote in a Brothers eye Their pride and fancy can create a thousand Hereticks or Schismaticks or hypocrites or ungodly ones that never were such but in the Court of their presumption Especially if they take men for their adversaries they can cast them into the most odious shape and make them any thing that the Devil will desire them But the humble are charitable to others as conscious of much infirmity in themselves which makes them need the tenderness of others They judge the best till they know the worst and censure not men until they have both evidence to prove it and a call to meddle with them having learned Matth. 7. 1 2 3 4. Iudge not that ye be not judged § 72. Sign 21. Pride causeth men to bate Reproof The proud are forward in finding faults in Sign 21. others but love not a plain Reprover of themselves Though it be a duty which God himself commandeth Lev. 19. 17. as an expression of love and contrary to hatred yet it will make a proud man to be your enemy Prov. 15. 12. A scorner loveth not one that reproveth him neither will he go unto the wise Prov. 9. 7 8. He that reproveth a scorner getteth himself shame and he that rebuketh a wicked man getteth himself a blot Reprove not a scorner lest be hate thee Rebuke a wise man and be will love thee It galleth their hearts and they take themselves to be injured and they will bear you a grudge for it as if you were their enemy If they valued or honoured you before you have lost them or angred them if you have told them of their faults If they love to hear a Preacher deal plainly with others they hate him when he dealeth so with them Herod will give away Iohns head when he hath first imprisoned him for telling him of his Sin though before he reverenced him and heard him gladly They can easily endure to be evil and do evil but not to hear of it As if a man that had the Leprosie loved the disease and yet hated him that telleth him that he hath it or would cure him of it This pride is the thing that hath made men so unprofitable to each other by
of soul and Body have special need of help and counsel As 1. The Doubting troubled Christian. 2. The Declining or Backsliding Christian 3. The See Tom. 1. Ch. 7. Tit. 10. Of despair Poor 4. The Aged 5. The Sick 6. And those that are about the sick and dying Though these might seem to belong rather to the first Tome yet because I would have those Directions lye here together which the several sorts of persons in Families most need I have chosen to reserve them rather to this place The special duties of the Strong the Rich and the Youthful and Healthful I omi◠because I find the Book grow big and you may gather them from what is said before on several such subjects And the Directions which I shall first give to doubting Christians shall be but a few brief memorials because I have done that work already in my Directions or Method for Peace of Conscience and spiritual comfort And much is here said before in the Directions against Melancholy ☞ and Despair § 2. Direct 1. Find out the special cause of your doubts and troubles and bend most of your endeavours Direct 1. to remove that cause The same Cure will not serve for every doubting soul no nor for every one that hath the very same doubts For the Causes may be various though the doubts should be the same and the doubts will be continued while the cause remaineth § 3. 1. In some persons the chief cause is a timerous weak and passionate temper of body and mind which in some especially of the weaker Sex is so Natural a disease that there is no hope of a total cure Though yet we must direct and support such as well as we are able These persons have so weak a Head and such powerful passions that Passion is their life and according to Passion they judge of themselves and of all their duties They are ordinarily very high or very low full of joy or sinking in despair But usually Fear is their predominant Passion And what an enemy to quietness and peace strong fears are is easily observed in all that have them Assuring evidence will not quiet such fearful minds nor any Reason satisfie them The Directions for these persons must be the same which I have before given against Melancholy and Despair Especially that the Preaching and Books and means which they make use of be rather such as tend to inform the judgement and settle the will and guide the Life than such as by the greatest servency tend to awaken them to such passions or affections which they are unable to manage § 4. 2. With others the Cause of their Troubles is Melancholy which I have long observed to be the commonest cause with those godly people that remain in long and grievous doubts Where this is the cause till it be removed other remedies do but little But o◠this I have spoken at large before § 5. 3. In others the Cause is a habit of discontent and pievishness and impatiency because of some wants or crosses in the world Because they have not what they would have their Minds grow ulcerated like a Body that is sick or sore that carryeth about with them the pain and smart And they are still complaining of the pain which they feel but not of that which maketh the sore and causeth the pain The cure of these is either in Pleasing them that they may have their will in all things as you rock children and give them that which they cry for to quiet them 〈…〉 or rather to help to cure their impatiency and settle their minds against their childish sinful discontents of which before § 6. 4. In others the Cause is errour or great ignorance about the tenour of the Covenant of Grace and the Redemption wrought by Jesus Christ and the work of Sanctification and evidences thereof They know not on what terms Christ dealeth with sinners in the pardoning of sin nor what are the infallible signes of Sanctification It is sound Teaching and diligent learning that must be the cure of these § 7. 5. In others the cause is a careless life or frequent sinning and keeping the wounds of Conscience still bleeding They are still fretting the sore and will not suffer it to skin either they live in railing and contention or malice or some secret lust or fraud or some way stretch and wrong their Consciences And God will not give his peace and comfort to them till they reform It is a mercy that they are disquieted and not given over to a seared Conscience which is past feeling § 8. 6. In others the Cause of their doubts is Placing their Religion too much in humiliation and in a continual poreing on their hearts and overlooking or neglecting the high and chiefest parts of Religion even the daily studies of the Love of God and the riches of Grace in Iesus Christ and hereby stirring up the soul to Love and Delight in God When they make this more of their Religion and business it will bring their souls into a sweeter relish § 9. 7. In others the Cause is such weakness of parts and confusion of thoughts and darkness of mind that they are not able to examine themselves nor to know what is in them When they ask themselves any question about their Repentance or Love to God or any grace they are fain to answer like strangers and say they cannot tell whether they do it or not These persons must make more use than others of the judgement of some able faithful guide § 10. 8. But of all others the commonest cause of uncertainty is the weakness or littleness of Grace When it is so little as to be next to none at all no wonder if it be hardly and seldome discerned Therefore § 11. Direct 2. Be not neglecters of self-examination but labour for skill to manage aright so Direct 2. great a work But yet let your care and diligence be much greater to get grace and use it and increase it than to try whether you have it already or not For in examination when you have once taken a right course to be resolved and yet are in doubt as much as before your over-much poreing upon these trying questions will do you but little good and make you but little the better but the time and labour may be almost lost whereas all the labour which you bestow in Getting and Using and Increasing grace is bestowed profitably to good purpose and tendeth first to your safety and salvation and next that to your easier certainty and comfort There is no such way in the world to be certain that you have grace as to get so much as is easily discerned and will shew it self and to exercise it much that it may come forth into observation When you have a strong Belief you will easily be sure that you believe When you have a fervent Love to Christ and Holiness and to the word and wayes and servants
is simple or mixt simple when we only intend Gods worship immediately in the action And this is found chiefly in Praises and Thanksgiving which therefore are the most pure and simple sort of expressive worship Mixt worship is that in which we joyn some other intention for our own benefit in the action As in Prayer where we worship God by seeking to him for mercy And in reverent hearing or reading his Word where we worship him by a holy attendance upon his instructions and Commands And in his Sacraments where we worship him by Receiving and acknowledging his benefits to our souls And in Oblations where we have respect also to the use of the thing offered And in holy Vows and Oaths in which we acknowledge him our Lord and Judge All these are acts of Divine Worship though mixt with other uses § 3. It is not only worshipping God when our acknowledgements by word or deed are directed immediately to himself but also when we direct our speech to others if his Praises be the subject of them and they are intended directly to his Honour Such are many of Davids Psalms of Praise But where Gods Honour is not the thing directly intended it is no direct worshipping of God though all the same words be spoken as by others § 4. Direct 2. Understand the true Ends and Reasons of our worshipping God lest you be deceived Direct 1. by the impious who take it to be all in vain When they have imagined some false Reasons to themselves they judge it vain to worship God because those Reasons of it are vain And he that understandeth not the true Reasons why he should worship God will not truly worship him but be prophane in neglecting it or hypocritical in dissembling and heartless in performing it The Reasons then are such as thâ—se § 5. 1. The first ariseth from the Use of all the world and the nature of the Rational Creature in special The whole world is made and upheld to be expressive and participative of the Image and Benefits of God God is most perfect and blessed in himself and needeth not the world to add to his felicity But he made it to please his blessed Will as a communicative Good by communication and appearance that he might have creatures to know him and to be happy in his Light and those creatures might have a fit representation or revelation of him that they might know him And Man is Read Mr. Herberts Poem called Providence specially endowed with Reason and Utterance that he might know his Creator appearing in his works and might communicate this knowledge and express that Glory of his Maker with his Tongue which the inferiour creatures express to him in their being So that if God were not to be worshipped the end of mans faculties and of all the Creation must be much frustrated Mans Reason is given him that he may know his Maker His will and affections and executive powers are given him that he may freely love him and obey him and his tongue is given him principally to acknowledge him and praise him Whom should Gods work be serviceable to but to him that made it § 6. 2. As it is the Natural Use so it is the highest honour of the creature to worship and honour his Creator Is there a nobler or more excellent object for our thoughts affections or expressions And nature which desireth its own perfection forbiddeth us to choose a sordid vile dishonourable work and to neglect the highest and most honourable § 7. 3. The right worshipping of God doth powerfully tend to make us in our measure like him and so to sanctifie and raise the soul and to heal it of its sinful distempers and imperfections What can make us Good so effectually as our Knowledge and Love and Communion with him that is the chiefest Good Nay what is Goodness it self in the creature if this be not As nearness to the Sun giveth Light and Heat so nearness to God is the way to make us Wise and Good For the contemplation of his perfections is the means to make us like him The worshippers of God do not exercise their bare understandings upon him in barren speculations but they exercise all their affections towards him and all the faculties of their souls in the most practical and serious manner and therefore are likest to have the liveliest impressions of God upon their hearts And hence it is that the true worshippers of God are really the wisest and the best of men when many that at a distance are employed in meer speculations about his works and him remain almost as vain and wicked as before and professing themselves wise are practically fools Rom. 1. 21 22. § 8. 4. The right worshipping of God by bringing the Heart into a cleansed holy and obedient frame doth prepare it to command the body and make us upright and regular in all the actions of our lives For the fruit will be like the Tree and as men are so will they do He that honoureth not his God is not like well to honour his Parents or his King He that is not moved to it by his regard to God is never like to be universally and constantly just and faithful unto men Experience telleth us that it is the truest worshippers of God that are truest and most conscionable in their dealings with their neighbours This windeth up the spring and ordereth and strengtheneth all the causes of a good conversation § 9. 5. The right worshipping of God is the the highest and most rational Delight of man Though to a sick corrupted soul it be unpleasant as food to a sick stomach yet to a wise and holy soul there is nothing so solidly and durably contentful As it is Gods damning sentence on the wicked to say Depart from me Matth. 25. 41. 7. 23. so holy souls would lose their joyes and take themselves to be undone if God should bid them Depart from me worship me and love me and praise me no more They would be weary of the world were it not for God in the world and weary of their lives if God were not their Life § 10. 6. The right worshipping of God prepareth us for Heaven where we are to behold him and Love and worship him for ever God bringeth not unprepared souls to Heaven This life is the time that 's purposely given us for our preparation as the Apprenticeship is the time to learn your trades Heaven is a place of action and fruition of perfect Knowledge Love and Praise And the souls that will enjoy and Praise God there must be Disposed to it here and therefore they must be much employed in his Worship § 11. 7. And as it is in all these respects necessary as a means so God hath made it necessary by Psal. 45. 11. Psal. 66. 4. Psal. 80. 9. Psal. 95. 6. Psal. 99. 5 9. his command He hath made it oâ—r duty to worship him constantly and he
faith or Religion while he pretendeth to hold all the rest he is an Heretick If he deny the whole Christian faith he is a flat Apostate and these are more than to be Schismaticks § 12. The word Heresie also is variously taken by Ecclesiastick writers Austin will have Heresie to be an inveterate schism Hierome maketh it to be some perverse opinion Some call every Schism which gathereth a separated party from the rest by the name of Heresie Some call it a Heresie if there be a perillous errour though without any Schism Some call it a Heresie only when Schism is made and a party separated upon the account of some perillous errour Some say this errour must be damnable that is in the essentials of Religion And some say it is enough if it be but dangerous Among all these the commonest sense of a Heretick is One that obstinately erreth in some essential point and divideth from the Communion of other Christians upon that account And so Paraeus and many Protestants take Heresie for the Species and Schism for the Genus All Schism is not Heresie but all Heresie say they is Schism Remember that all this is but a Controversie de nomine and therefore of small moment § 13. By this that I have said you may perceive who they be that are guilty of Church-divisions Who are true Schismaticks As 1. The sparks of it are kindled when Proud and self-conceited persons are brainsick in the fond estimation of their own opinions and heart-sick by a feaverish zeal for the propagating of them Ignorant souls think that every change of their opinions is made by such an accession of heavenly light that if they should not bestir them to make all of the same mind they should be betrayers of the truth and do the world unspeakable wrong When they measure and censure men as they receive or reject their peculiar discoveries or conceits schism is in the Egge § 14. 2 The fire is blown up when men are desirous to have a party follow them and cry them up and thereupon are busie in perswading others to be of their mind and do speak perverse things to Act. 20. 20. draw away disciples after them And when they would be counted the Masters of a party § 15. 3. The flames break forth when by this means the same Church or divers Churches do Jam. 3. 13 14 15 16 17. fall into several Parties burning in zeal against each other abating charity censuring and condemning one another backbiting and reviling each other through envy and strife when they look strangely at one another as being on several sides as if they were not Children of the same Father nor members of the same body or as if Christ were divided one being of Paul and another of Apollo and another of Cepha◠and every one of a faction letting out their thoughts in jealousies and evil surmises of each other perverting the words and actions of each to an ugly sense and snatching occasions to represent one another as fools or odious to the hearers as if you should plainly say I pray you hate or despise these people whom I hate and despise This is the core of the Plague sore It is schism in the bud § 16. 4. When people in the same Church do gather into private meetings not under the guidance of their Pastors to edifie one another in holy exercises in Love and peace but in opposition to their lawful Pastors or to one another to propagate their singular opinions and increase their parties and speak against those that are not on their side schism is then ready to bring forth and multiply and the swarm is ready to come forth and be gone § 17. 5. When these people actually depart and renounce or forsake the Communion of the Church and cast off their faithful Pastors and draw into a separated body by themselves and choose them Pastors and call themselves a Church and all without any just sufficient cause When thus Churches are gathered out of Churches before the old ones are dissolved or they have any warrant to depart when thus Pastor is set up against Pastor Church against Church and Altar against Altar this is schism ripe and fruitful The swarm is gone and hived in another place § 18. 6. If now the neighbour Churches by their Pastors in their Synods shall in compassion seek to reclaim these straglers and they justifie their unjust separation and contemn the counsel of the Churches and Ministers of Christ this is a confirmed obstinate schism § 19. 7. If they shall also judge that Church to be no Church from which they separated and so cut off a part of the body of Christ by an unrighteous censure and condemn the innocent and usurp authority over their Guides this is disobedience and uncharitableness with schism § 20. 8. If they shall also condemn and unchurch all the other Churches that are not of their mind and way and renounce communion with them all and so condemn unjustly a great part of the Body of Christ on Earth this is to add fury and rebellion to an uncharitable schism And if to cover their sin they shall unjustly charge these Churches which they reject with Heresie or wickedness they do but multiply their crimes by such extenuations § 21. 9. If the opinion that all this adoe is made for be a damning errour against some essential point of the true Religion then it is Heresie as well as Schism § 22. 10. If this separation from the Church be made in defense of an ungodly life against the Discipline of the Church If a wicked sort of men shall withdraw from the Church to avoid the disgrace of confession or excommunication and shall first cast off the Church lest the Church should proceed to cast out them and so they separate that they may have none to govern and trouble them but themselves this is a Prophane rebellious schism This is the common course of schism when it groweth towards the height § 23. 11. Besides all these there is yet a more pernicious way of Schism which the Church or Court of Rome is guilty of They make new articles of faith and new points of Religion and a new worship of God shall I say or of Bread as if it were a God And all these they put into a Law and impose them on all the other Churches yea they put them into an Oath and require men to swear that without any doubting they believe them to be true They pretend to have authority for all this as Rome is the Mistress of all other Churches They set up a new Universal Head as an Essential part of the Catholick Church and so found or fain a new kind of Catholick Church And he that will not obey them in all this they renounce Communion with him and to hide this horrid notorious schism they call all Schismaticks that are not thus subjected to them § 24. 12. And to advance
to a more edifying Church that useth all the publick Ordinances of God unless the publick good forbid or some great impediment or contrary duty be our excuse § 36. 11. If a true Church will not cast out any impenitent notorious scandalous sinner though 2 John 10. 11. 2 Tim. 3. 5. Rom. 16. 17. 1 Cor. 5. 11. I am not to separate from the Church yet I am bound to avoid private familiarity with such a person that he may be ashamed and that I partake not of his sin § 37. 12. As the Church hath diversity of members some more holy and some less and some of whole sincerity we have small hope some that are more honourable and some less some that walk Mat. 13. 41 30. Jer. 15. 19. 1 Cor. 12. 23 24. blamelesly and some that work iniquity So Ministers and private members are bound to difference between them accordingly and to honour and love some far above others whom yet we may not excommunicate And this is no sinful separation § 38. 13. If the Church that I live and communicate with do hold any tolerable error I may differ therein from the Church without a culpable separation Union with the Church may be continued with all the diversities before mentioned D. 3. § 10. § 39. 14. In case of persecution in one Church or City when the servants of Christ do flye to another having no special reason to forbid it this is no sinful separation Matth. 10. 23. § 40. 15. If the publick service of the Church require a Minister or a private Christian to remove to another Church if it be done deliberately and upon good advice it is no sinful separation § 41. 16. If a Lawful Prince or Magistrate command us to remove our habitation or command a Minister from one Church to another when it is not notoriously to the detriment of the common interest of Religion it is no sinful separation to obey the Magistrate § 42. 17. If a poor Christian that hath a due and tender care of his salvation do find that under one Minister his soul declineth and groweth dead and under another that is more sound and clear and lively he is much edified to a holy and heavenly frame and life and if hereupon preferring his salvation before all things he remove to that Church and Minister where he is most edified without unchurching the other by his censures this is no sinful separation but a preferring the One thing needful before all § 43. 18. If one part of the Church have leisure opportunity cause and earnest desires to meet ofter for the edifying of their souls and redeeming their time than the poorer labouring or careless and less zealous part will meet in any fit place under the oversight and conduct of their Pastors and not in opposition to the more publick full assemblies as they did Acts 12. 12. to pray for Peter at the house of Mary where many were gathered together praying and Acts 10. 1 c. this is no sinful separation § 44. 19. If a mans own outward affairs require him to remove his habitation from one City or Countrey to another and there be no greater matter to prohibite it he may lawfully remove his local communion from the Church that he before lived with to that which resideth in the place he goeth to For with distant Churches and Christians I can have none but Mental Communion or by distant means as writing messengers c. It is only with present Christians that I can have local personal communion § 45. 20. It is possible in some cases that a man may live long without local personal communion with any Christians or Church at all and yet not be guilty of sinful separation As the Kings Embassadour or Agent in a Land of Infidels or some Traveller Merchants Factors or such as go to convert the Infidels or those that are banished or imprisoned In all these twenty cases some kind of separation may be lawful § 46. 21. One more I may add which is when the Temples are so small and the Congregations so great that there is no room to hear and joyn in the publick Worship or when the Church is so excessively great as to be uncapable of the proper ends of the society in this case to divide or withdraw is no sinful separation When one Hive will not hold the Bees the swarm must seek themselves another without the injury of the rest By all this you may perceive that sinful separation is first in a censorious uncharitable mind condemning Churches Ministers and Worship causelesly as unfit for them to have communion with And Secondly it is in the personal separation which is made in pursuance of this censure But not in any local removal that is made on other lawful grounds § 47. Direct 4. Understand and consider well the Reasons why Christ so frequently and earnestly Direct 4. presseth Concord on his Church and why he so vehemently forbiddeth Divisions Observe how much the Scripture speaketh to this purpose and upon what weighty Reasons Here are four things distinctly to be represented to your serious consideration 1. How many plain and urgent are the Texts that speak for Unity and condemn Division 2. The great Benefits of Concord 3. And the mischiefs of Discord and Divisions in the Church 4. And the Aggravations of the sin § 48. I. A true Christian that hateth fornication drunkenness lying perjury because they are forbidden in the Word of God will hate Divisions also when he well observeth how frequently and vehemently they are forbidden and Concord highly commended and commanded John 17. 21 22 23. That they all may be One as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also See Rom. 14. throughout Rom. 15. 12. 5 6 7. may be one in us that the world may believe that thou hast sent me And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be One even as we are One I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in One and that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as Ephes. 4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. thou hast loved me Here you see that the Unity of the Saints must be a special means to convince the Infidel world of the truth of Christianity and to prove Gods special Love to his Church and 1 Pet. 3. 6. 1 Cor. 12. throughout Phil. 3. 15 16. Acts 2. 1 46. 4. 32. also to accomplish their own perfection 1 Cor. 1. 10. Now I beseech you brethren by the name of our Lord Iesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions or Schisms among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgement For it hath been declared to me of you my brethren that there are contentions among you Rom. 12. 4 5. Psalm 133. 1 Cor. 8. 1
hold their own mercies upon the condition of their own continued fidelity And let their Apostasie be on other reasons never so impossible or not future yet the promise of continuance and consummation of the personal felicity of the greatest Saint on earth is still conditional upon the condition of â—his persevering sidelity 6. Even before Children are capable of Instruction there are certain duties imposed by God on the Parents for their sanctification viz. 1. That the Parents pray earnestly and believingly for them Second Commandment Prov. 20. 7. 2. That they themselves so live towards God as may invite him still to bless their Children for their sakes as he did Abrahams and usually did to the faithful's seed 7. It is certain that the Church ever required Parents not only to enter their Children into the Covenant and so to leave them but to do their after duty for their good and to pray for them and educate them according to their Covenant 8. It is plain that if there were none to promise so to educate them the Church would not baptize them And God himself who allowed the Israelites and still alloweth us to bring our Children into his Covenant doth it on this supposition that we promise also to go on to do our duty for them and that we actually do it 9. All this set together maketh it plain 1. That God never promiseth the adult in Baptism though true believers that he will work in them all graces further by his sanctifying spirit let them never so much neglect or resist him or that he will absolutely see that they never shall resist him nor that the spirit shall still help them though they neglect all his means or that he will keep them from neglecting the means Election may secure this to the Elect as such but the Baptismal Covenant as such secureth it not to the baptized nor to believers as such 2. And consequently that Infants are in Covenant with the Holy Ghost still conditionally as their Parents are And that the meaning of it The Holy Ghost is promised in Baptism to give the Child grace in his Parents and his own faithful use of the appointed means is that the Holy Ghost as your sanctifier will afford you all necessary help in the use of those means which he hath appointed you to receive his help in Obj. Infants have no means to use Answ. While Infants stand on their Parents account or Wills the Parents have means to use for the continuance of their grace as well as for the beginning of it 10. Therefore I cannot see but that if a believer should apostatize whether any do so is not the question and his Infant not be made anothers Child he forfeiteth the benefits of the Covenant to his Infant But if the propriety in the Infant be transferred to another it may alter the case 11. And how dangerously Parents may make partial forfeitures of the spirits assistance to their Children and operations on them by their own sinful lives and neglect of prayer and of prudent and holy education even in particular acts I fear many believing Parents never well considered 12. Yet is not this forfeiture such as obligeth God to deny his spirit For he may do with his own as a free benefactor as he list And may have mercy freely beyond his promise though not against his word on whom he will have mercy But I say that he that considereth the woful unfaithfulness and neglect of most Parents even the Religious in the Great work of holy educating their Children may take the blame of their ungodliness on themselves and not lay it on Christ or the spirit who was in Covenant with them as their sanctifier seeing he promised but conditionally M. â—â—istoâ— pag. â—3 As Abraham as a single person in Covenant was to accept of and perform the conditions of the Covenant so as a Parent he had something of duty incumbent on him with reference to his immediate seed And as his faithful performance of that duty incumbent on him in his single capacity so his performing that duty incumbent on him as a Parent in reference to his seed was absolutely necessary in order to his enjoying the good promised with reference to himself and his seed Proved Gen. 17 1. 18. 19. He proveth that the promise is conditional and that as to the continuance of the Covenant state the conditions are 1. The Parents upright life 2. His duty to his Children well done 3. The Childrens own duty as they are capable to give them the sanctifying Heavenly influences of his Life Light and Love in their just use of his appointed means according to their abilities 13. Also as soon as Children come to a little use of Reason they stand conjunctly on their Parents Wills and on their own As their Parents are bound to teach and rule them so they are bound to learn of them and be ruled by them for their good And though every sin of a Parent or a Child be not a total forfeiture of grace yet both their notable actual sins may justly be punished with a denyal of some further help of the spirit which they grieve and quench 11. And now I may seasonably answer the former question whether Infants Baptismal saving grace may be lost of which I must for the most that is to be said referr the Reader to Davenant in Mr. Bedfords Book on this subject and to Dr. Sam. Ward joyned with it Though Mr. Gatakers answers are very Learned and considerable And to my small Book called My Iudgement of Perseverance Augustine who first rose up for the doctrine of perseverance against its Adversaries carried it no higher than to all the Elect as such and not at all to all the Sanctified but oft affirmeth that some that were justified sanctified and Love God and are in a state of salvation are not elect and fall away But since the Reformation great reasons have been brought to carry it further to all the truly sanctified of which cause Zanchius was one of the first Learned and zealous Patrons that with great diligence in long disputations maintained it All that I have now to say is that I had rather with Davenant believe that the fore-described Infant state of salvation which came by the Parents may be lost by the Parents and the Children though such a sanctified renewed nature in holy Habits of Love as the adult have be never lost than believe that no Infants are in the Covenant of Grace and to be baptized Obj. But the Child once in possession shall not be punished for the Parents sin Answ. 1. This point is not commonly well understood I have by me a large Disputation proving from the current of Scripture a secondary original sin besides that from Adam and a secondary punishment ordinarily inflicted on Children for their Parents sins besides the common punishment of the World for the first sin 2. But the thing in question is
and that all strict Religion is but hypocrisie or at least to refuse their help and counsels Even Plutark noted that It so comes to pass that we entertain not virtue nor are â—apt into a desire of imitating it unless we highly honour and love the person in whom it is discerned And if they see or think the Preacher to be himself of a loose and careless and licentious life they will think that the like is very excusable in themselves and that his doctrine is but a form of speech which his office bindeth him to say but is no more to be regarded by them than by himself Two wayes is mens damnation thus promoted 1. By the ill lives of hypocritical ungodly preachers who actually bring their own persons into disgrace and thereby also the persons of others and consequently their sacred work and function 2. By wicked Preachers and people who through a malignant hatred of those that are abler and better than themselves and an envy of their reputation do labour to make the most zealous and faithful Preachers of the Gospel to be thought to be the most hypocritical or erroneous or factious and schismatical § 5. 5. The neglect of Ministerial duties is a common cause of sin and of mens damnation When they that take the charge of souls are either unable or unwilling to do their office when they teach them too seldome or too unskilfully in an unsuitable manner not choosing that doctrine which they most need or not opening it plainly and methodically in a fitness to their capacities or not applying it with necessary seriousness and urgency to the hearers state When men preach to the ungodly who are neer to damnation in a formal pase like a School-boy saying his lesson or in a drowsie reading tone as if they came to preach them all asleep or were afraid of wakening them When they speak of sin and misery and Christ of Heaven and Hell as if by the manner they came to contradict the matter and to perswade men that there are no such things The same mischief followeth the neglect of private personal inspection When Ministers think that they have done all when they have said a Sermon and never make conscience of labouring personally to convince the ungodly and reclaim offenders and draw sinners to God and confirm the weak And the omission much more the perversion and abuse of sacred Discipline hath the like effects When the Keys of the Church are used to shut out the good or not used when they ought to rebuke or to shut out the impenitent wicked ones nor to difference between the precious and the vile it hardeneth multitudes in their ungodliness and perswadeth them that they are really of the same family of Christ as the Godly are and have their sins forgiven because they are partakers of the same Holy Sacraments Not knowing the difference between the Church mystical and visible nor between the judgement of ministers and of Christ himself § 6. 6. Parents neglect of instructing Children and other parts of holy education is one of the greatest causes of the perdition of mankind in all the World But of this elsewhere § 7. 7. Magistrates persecution or opposition to Religion or discountenancing those that preach it or most seriously practise it tendeth to deceive some who over-reverence the judgement of superiours and to affright others from the obedience of God § 8. 8. Yea the negligence of Magistrates Masters and other Superiours omitting the due rebuke of sinners and due correction of the offenders and the due encouragement of the good is a great cause of the wickedness and damnation of the World § 9. 9. But above all when they make Laws for sin or for the contempt or dishonour or suppression of Religion or the serious practice of it this buildeth up Satans Kingdom most effectually and turneth Gods Ordinance against himself Thousands under Infidel and ungodly Princes are conducted by Obedience to damnation and their Rulers damn them as honourably as the Physicion kill'd his Patients who boasted that he did it secundum artem according to the rules of art § 10. 10. The vulgar example of the multitude of the ungodly is a great cause of mens impiety and damnation They must be well resolved for God and holiness who will not yield to the major Vote nor be carryed down the common stream nor run with the rabble to excess of ryot When Christianity is a Sect which is every where spoken against it proveth so narrow a way that Act. 2. 8. few have a mind to walk in it Men think that they are at least excusable for not being wiser and better than the multitude Singularity in honour or riches or strength or health is accounted no crime but singularity in godliness is at least thought unnecessary What! will you be wiser than all the Town or than such and such superiours is thought a good reprehension of Godliness where it is rare Even by them who hereby conclude their superiours or all the Town to be wiser than God § 11. 11. Also the vulgars scorning and deriding Godliness is a common cause of Murdering souls Because the Devil knoweth that there cannot one Word of solid Reason be brought against the Reason of God and so against a Holy life he therefore teacheth men to use such weapons as they have A Dog hath teeth and an Adder hath a sting though they have not the Weapons of a man A fool can laugh and jeer and rail and there is no great wit or learning necessary to smile or grin or call a man a Puritan or precisian or Heretick or Schismatick or any name which the malice of the age shall newly coin Mr. Robert Bolton largely sheweth how much the malignity of his age did vent it self against Godliness by the reproachful use of the word Puritan When Reason can be bribed to take the Devils part either natural or literate reason he will hire it at any rate But when it cannot he will make use of such as he can get Barking or hissing may serve turn where talking and disputing cannot be procured Drum and Trumpets in an Army serve the turn instead of Oratory to animate cowards and drown the noise of dying mens complaints and groans Thousands have been mocked out of their Religion and salvation at once and jeered into Hell who now know whether a scorn or the fire of Hell be the greater suffering As Tyrants think that the Greatest and Ablest and wisest men must either be drawn over to their party or destroyed so the Tyrant of Hell who ruleth in the Children of disobedience doth think that if Reason Learning and wit cannot be hired to dispute for him against God they are to be suppressed silenced and disgraced which the noise of rude clamours and foolish jeers is fit enough to perform § 12. 12. Also idle sensless prating against Religion as a needless thing doth serve turn to deceive the simple Ignorant people
a man choose for a matter of trust Quest. 2. Answ. As the matter is One that hath wisdom skill and fidelity through conscience honesty friendship or his own apparent interest Quest. 3. In what cases may I commit a secret to another Quest. 3. Answ. When there is a necessity of his knowing it or a greater probability of good than hurt by it in the evidence which a prudent man may see Quest. 4. What if another commit a thing to me with charge of secresie and I say nothing to him and so Quest. 4. promise it not Am I bound to secresie in that case Answ. If you have cause to believe that he took your silence for consent and would not else have committed it to you you are obliged in point of fidelity as well as friendship except it be with robbers or such as we are not bound to deal openly with and on terms of equality Quest. 5. What if it be a secret but I am under no Command or Promise at all about it Quest. 5. Answ. You must then proceed according to the Laws of Charity and Friendship and not reveal that which is to the injury of another without a greater cause Quest. 6. What if it be against the King or State or common good Quest. 6. Answ. You are bound to reveal it so far as the safety of the King or State or common good requireth it Yea though you swear the contrary Quest. 7. What if it be only against the good of some third ordinary person Quest. 7. Answ. You must endeavour to prevent his wrong either by revealing the thing or disswading from it or by such means as prudence shall tell you is the meetest way by exercising your love to one without doing wrong to the other Quest. 8. What if a man secretly entrust his estate to me for himself or children when he is in debt Quest. 8. to defraud his Creditors Answ. You ought not to take such a trust And if you have done it you ought not to hold it but resign it to him that did entrust you Yea and to disclose the fraud for the righting of the Creditors except it be in such a case as that the Creditor is some such vicious or oppressing person as you are not obliged to exercise that act of charity for or when the consequents of revealing it will be a greater hurt than the righting of him will compensate especially when it is against the publick good Quest. 9. What if a delinquent entrust me with his estate or person to secure it from penalty Quest. 9. Answ. If it be one that is prosecuted by a due course of Justice cujus poena debetur reipublicae whose punishment the common good requireth the case must be decided as the former You must not take nor keep such a trust But if it be one whose Repentance giveth you reason to believe that his impunity will be more to the common good than his punishment and that if the Magistrate knew it he ought to spare or pardon him in this case you may conceal his person or estate so be it you do it not by a lye or any other sinful means or such as will do more hurt than good Quest. 10. What if a friend entrust me with his estate to secure it from some great taxes or tributes to Quest. 10. the King May I keep such a trust or not Answ. No if they be just and legal taxes for the maintenance of the Magistrate or preservation of the Common-wealth But if it were done by a Usurper that had no authority or done without or beyond authority to the oppressing of the subject you may conceal his estate or your own by lawful means Quest. 11. What if a man that suffereth for Religion commit his person or estate to my trust Quest. 11. Answ. You must be faithful to your trust 1. If it be true Religion and a good cause for which he suffereth 2. Or if he be falsly accused of abuses in Religion 3. Or if he be faulty but the penalty intended from which you secure him is incomparably beyond his fault and unjust Supposing still that you save him only by lawful means and that it be not like to tend to do more hurt than good to the cause of Religion or the Common-wealth Quest. 12. What if a Papist or other erroneous person entrust me being of the same mind to educate Quest. 12. his Children in that way when he is dead and afterwards I come to see the errour must I perform that trust or no Answ. No 1. Because no trust can oblige you to do hurt 2. Because it is contrary to the primary intent of your friend which was his Childrens good And you may well suppose that had he seen his errour he would have entrusted you to do accordingly You are bound therefore to answer his primary intention and truly to endeavour his Childrens good Quest. 13. But what if a man to whom another hath entrusted his Children turn Papist or Heretick Quest. 13. and so thinketh errour to be truth what must he do Answ. He is bound to turn back again to the truth and do accordingly Obj. But one saith this is the truth and another that And he thinketh he is right Answ. There is but one of the contraries true Mens thinking themselves to be in the right doth not make it so And God will not change his Laws because they misunderstand or break them Therefore still that which God bindeth them to is to return unto the truth And if they think that to be truth which is not they are bound to think otherwise If you say They cannot It is either not true or it is long of themselves that they cannot And they that cannot immediately yet mediately can do it in the due use of means Quest. 14. What if I foresee that the taking of a trust may hazard my estate or otherwise hurt me and Quest. 14. yet my dying or living friend desireth it Answ. How far the Law of Christianity or friendship oblige you to hurt your self for his good must be discerned by a prudent considering what your obligations â—â—e to the person and whether the good of your granting his desires or the hurt to your self is like to be the greater and of more publick consequence And whether you injure not your own Children or others by gratifying him And upon such comparison prudence must determine the case Quest. 15. But what if afterward the trust prove more to my hurt than I foresaw Quest. 15. Answ. If it was your own fault that you foresaw it not you must suffer proportionably for that fault But otherwise you must compare your own hurt with the Orphanes in case you do not perform the trust And consider whether they may not be relieved another way And whether you have reason to think that if the Parent were alive and knew your danger he would expect