for granted as I had reason that you went herein upon the Authority of the Church-Officers I ask'd Whether this would not put the Being of our Church upon an hazardous Issue and oblige your self to prove that 't was a true Church before the Reformation Which surely is no remote Consequence from the Supposition that the Church-Power was lodged with them of the Church of Rome before in opposition to which our Church was erected and out of which it was gathered But then you say to my second Query upon this That there was not the same Necessity for private Christians reforming from an Antichristian Church to usurp the Ministry as there is for a Lay-man in an Heathen Nation But you do not observe that the Force of this lies in the Supposition that the Power was lodg'd with the Popish Clergy upon which account the Acts of the Reformed Ministry in opposition to them would be but like the Acts of Lay-men And you know who has asserted That Recourse ought to be had to the Intention of the Church-Governors Ecclesiastical Power being their Gift And this does oblige all to a strict dependance on the supreme visible Power so as to leave no Place for Appeal concerning the Practice of such Government And they are the most certain as well as the most competent Judges of their own Intentions But should we have recourse to such Church-Governours pray do you think they would say you have Power of keeping up a Form of Church-Government in opposition to theirs or that your Officers are better than Lay-men To put this home to you I shall here subjoin a Passage of your own Should a Company of private Christians on their own choice separate themselves from their Bishops and unite into a church-Church-Society this were a Church-Faction and Schism and all they did were null and void Here you must admit that a Minister Episcopally ordained may possibly join with them in this Separation from the Bishop or else you will allow of what will overthrow your Assertion as to Separation even from the most sound Church Wherefore this being admitted and it being laid generally shew me if you can wherein this differs from Mr. D. at least how Separation from Papists or from whatever unlawful Terms of Communion can upon your Hypothesis be freed from Schism You assure us you do not charge our Dissenters with Schism from the Invalidity of their Orders but from their causless and sinful Separation And tho they have true Orders and are true Churches but yet divide Christian Communion by separating from any sound Part of the Christian Church they are Schismaticks nay if it were only in separating from each other Wherefore since Separation and ordinarily refusing to communicate where one never did but as you suppose ought come to the same thing you cannot blame me if I represent your Notion to be That where there are several Churches within a Nation which here you admit of whether one of these Churches has Authority over the Members of the other or no yet he who refuses to communicate with any one of these is a Schismatick And so you make it in relation to Churches in several Nations If this be your meaning as I take it to be then you have no reason to cry out of Mis-representation and blending together Things of a different Nature when I ask Query 4. Whether from the Supposition that there is to be but one Church-Covenant throughout the Catholick Church that there cannot be one true Church within another And that the Nature of Catholick Communion is such that one ought to be ready to communicate with any sound Church from which one is not hindred by reason of the Distance of Place It does not follow Here you stop me before you make an Answer as if I did not fairly to take every one of these Propositions for yours or in tacking together some Things not very consistent with each other Because you had in some place asserted that there could be but one Church in one Place therefore it seems not only our Dissenters but also Foreigners living here are without any Church Tho to avoid the Force of my Questions now you would admit that the Dissenters may have sufficient Church-Officers and Power but however that they are Schismaticks if it were only for dividing from each other You had said further that nothing can justify the Distinction of Christians into several Churches but only such a Distance of Place as makes it necessary and expedient to put them under the Conduct and Government of several Bishops What that Distance of Place is which makes this necessary and expedient you are not pleased to inform us But nothing it seems but Distance can with you justify a Distinction of Churches be the Terms never so unlawful which is but the same in effect with what you had said elsewhere as that 't is absurd to gather a Church out of a Church of baptized Christians Nay further here is more wholesom Doctrine which is That no Distinction of Churches is justifiable but under Bishops Yet alas you do not dispute against the Dissenters Form of Church-Government or deny their being rightly invested with Church-Power no not you But it lies not upon me to reconcile you to your self nor can you deny the having said a Thing in one place because of the contrary in another The only Proposition which you can seem to deny with any colour is That one ought to be ready to communicate with any sound Church from which one is not hindred by distance of Place But surely 't is full enough to this purpose that The Exercise of true Christian Communion in a particular Church is nothing else but the Exercise of Catholick Communion in a particular Church which the Necessity of Affairs requires since all the Christians in the World cannot meet together for Acts of Worship But there is nothing in all these Acts of Communion which does more peculiarly unite us to such a particular Church than to the whole Church Again To be in Communion with the Church signifies to be a Member of it and that not of any particular Church as distinguish'd from the whole Catholick Church but to be a Member of the one Body of Christ and of every sound Part of it Wherefore as a Man is a Member of every sound Church sure he may communicate with any sound Church if Distance do not hinder nay the refusing Communion in such Case is the very Schism which you all along declaim against Having thus fix'd upon you every one of these Propositions for the first of them I cannot believe that you will yet deny I shall consider with you what follows Wherefore I still assert Either that the French Protestants have no Church here but are Schismaticks in not communicating with ours Or that ours is guilty of Schism in making the Terms of Communion so streight that
who you say shall at the last day be judged not as Infidels but as wicked and Apostate Christians 7. The seventh Query which goes upon that Ground which you give and do not yet recede from for the Belief of your lodging Church-Power so with the Clergy that they who conform not to them or who incur their Displeasure would be in a woful Case you answer only with a Scoff but say not whether the Clergy are the Church Representative or whether what I urge would follow from that Supposition or no. These were the general Questions and whether most of them were impertinent or are now fairly answered 't is for others to determine From hence I am obliged to follow you to my three Sets of Queries as you call them relating to sveral Propositions and the parting-blow of four Queries relating to the Text. Because of my asking Questions concerning your Sense of our Saviour's Promise to his Apostles which you seem to suppose to go along with Church-Governours in Succession as distinguish'd from the Body of Christians and without allowing private Christians that share which the Words of the Promise import you intimate my designing to confute our Saviour and burlesque his Institution But to use mostly your own Expressions if my design of Charity and to deliver that blessed Institution from the Freaks of an Enthusiastick Fancy and to expound it to a plain and easy Sense such as is agreeable to the Vnderstanding of Men and worthy of the Spirit of God be to burlesque Scripture I acknowledg the Charge To my first Qustion Whether our Saviour's Promise of Divine Assistance did not extend to all the Members of the Church considering every Man in his respective Station and Capacity as well as to the Apostles as Church-Governours You answer That there are Promises which relate to the whole Church and Promises which belong to particular Christians as well as Promises which relate particularly to the Apostles and Governours of the Church Well for the comfort of us poor Lay-men there are some Promises which relate to us It being so then I may well ask 2. Whether it signifies any thing to say there is no Promise to particular Churches provided there be to particular Persons such as are in Charity with all Men and are ready to communicate with any Church which requires no more of them than what they conceive to be their Duty according to the Divine Covenant You think it hard to know what this Query means But surely 't is material to know whether or no such Men may be saved otherwise than under Church-Governors And truly you tell us pretty plainly I wish for your own sake it had been a little more covert that such have no Promises but as Members of the Church that is of the visible Church under Church-Officers if you answer to the purpose You add indeed When Communion may be had upon lawful Terms I hope this implies that 't is possible the Terms may be unlawful Which yields me my fourth Question upon this Matter But it likewise yields That if the Terms are unlawful private Christians are entitled to these Promises tho not visibly admitted into a Church-State which is contrary to what you all along drive at But it seems however your Charity to these Men who think the Terms such as they ought not to comply with is so great to believe them guilty of Schism as adhering to their own private Fancies in opposition to Church-Authority out of Pride and Opinionativeness which God alone can judg 3. The third Query is Whether if the Promise you mention be confined to the Apostles as Church-Governors it will not exclude the Civil Power To which you answer That the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power are very distinct but very consistent But such a Power in the Church-Officers as would make them the Church-Representative and prevent a National Reformation tho by the Civil Power is of another Nature Nor do you think fit yet to declare what the Power is which you would have lodged in Church-Officers But for fear you should go beyond your Warrant in this Matter I shall mind you of what our Church teaches us which is that We must not think that this Comforter was either promised or else given only to the Apostles but to the Vniversal Church of Christ dispersed through the whole World And speaking of Christ's Promise that the Spirit of Truth should abide with them for ever and that he would be always with them he meaneth saith our Church by Grace Vertue and Power and that it says was indifferently to all that should believe in him through their the Apostles Words that is to wit for his whole Church To my Inferences from the second Proposition which I consider apart You make such an Answer as if we had been at cross Purposes For my Questions were grounded upon your asserting without any limitation That 't is absurd to gather a Church out of a Church of Baptized Christians And indeed it is but a Golden Aphorism wherein you epitomize a great Part of your Discourses on this Subject And you answer That the Independents are out in their way of gathering Churches and that we separated not from the Papists upon their Principles Which is nothing to the purpose But you do confess indeed that we may separate from any Church of baptized Christians if their Communion be sinful But wherein the Difference lies I know not except by Separation you would only have a withdrawing from Communion but will not allow the setting up a distinct Church-Communion be the Cause of withdrawing never so just Which unless you mean I hope you will be so ingenuous to confess this was not so warily worded and so sound as might have been But if you have a Patent to make Words signify what you please besides their natural and presumable Intendment to make generals particular or vice versâ much good may it do you provided they afford you not a Loop-hole for the most uncharitable Censures Yet give me leave before I quit this to demonstrate that you have not answered fairly in restraining this as if spoke only of Independents These were your own Words When there is one Church within the Bowels of another a new Church gathered out of a Church already constituted and formed into a distinct and separate Society this divides Christian Communion and is a notorious Schism This is the plain case of the Presbyterian and Independent Churches and those other Conventicles of Sectaries which are among us They are Churches in a Church Churches formed out of the National Church by which means Christians who live together refuse to worship God in the same Assemblies Pray Sir would you have me fancy some general Scope and Design which no Man can understand from the Words you utter in any particular Place This I suppose may satisfy reasonable Men that all my Queries under this Head
Consent you hold to be necessary by a Divine Law And here indeed is Cardo rei Well then this Consent which is necessary by a Divine Law is either in Fundamentals only or in Fundamentals and Accidentals too Whatever Church differs from a sound Church in Fundamentals is certainly ipso facto cut off from Christ's Body without Excommunication But the Question is Whether if in Accidentals only the danger be the same Dr. Stillingfleet says it is not and you have not yet proved it is Indeed you talk very wisely of the Catholick Church which is the Root and Fountain of Vnity and was antecent to particular Churches But I would gladly know whether these Accidentals were antecedent too or whether it is not the Fountain of Unity only upon the account of the Fundamentals essential to it Speak home to this and shame all the Orthodox Writers before you and of this Age if you please Assure your self my concern was only to admonish your self and your unthinking Hearers of the Danger I conceiv'd to lie in your way If neither you will retract nor they distrust your Authority however I have discharg'd my self But it not being improper for me to make some Enquiry into the Political Constitution of a Church viz. as it is founded on Consent which as was before cited is all that is necessary to unite a Body or Society into one Communion Here 't is presumed that the Consent of the Minor Part is so included in the Major that every one is bound as he would avoid the damnable Sin of Schism to conform to that sound Church or particular Way of Worship which carries it by most Voices But suppose that according to Mr. Humphreys his Model several Ways should be left indifferent or that the Number of Voices should be equally divided or where there are three Negatives it could not be agreed by all three dividing by a National Act from a false Way of Worship which of the distinct Communions in the true Way should be the National Would not more than one Church in such case be consistent with one Civil Government And can it be made appear which of these is the Root and Fountain of Vnity according to your Cabalistical Terms to which the others ought to unite But suppose one of the Churches carries it by plurality of Votes and looking upon all others as Schismatical and therein as Heretical too should with the African Fathers deny these Schismaticks their Communion unless they should be re-baptized which you own to have been a Mistake in those Fathers Pray would they still continue Schismaticks who would refuse to come in upon those Terms Or would the prevailing Party which vigorously insisted on this be Schismatical But as you say that there ought to be but one Church and one Communion in one place and that Dissenters are Schismaticks in separating from each other as well as from the Church of England while they live in England I desire you to resolve me one Question which is this Whether the Christian Church at Rome gathered out of the Gentiles in the time of the Apostles or that distinct Church which was gathered out of Jews was the Church of the Place You will say No doubt that the Church gathered from among the Gentiles was the only sound Church But what think you then of those poor Jews who through the Mis-fortune of their Education were so wedded to the Jewish Rites that they thought them necessary to be retained along with Christianity which as you do probably they thought to be nothing else but mystical Judaism and would not communicate in those Christian Congregations which believed those Rites to be abolished by the Christian Religion Were these poor Men Schismaticks and as bad as Murderers and Adulterers If they were they might well argue that our Saviour introduced a very hard Law which not only obliged them to a severer Mortification of their Appetites and Desires but required of them upon pain of Damnation to act against their Consciences in those very things which they scrupled as they thought by Divine Warrant But as to their Case Dr. Stillingfleet tells us that It was agreed by all the Governours of the Christian Church that the Jewish Christians should be left to their own Liberty out of respect to the Law of Moses and out of regard to the Peace of the Christian Church which might have been extreamly hazarded if the Apostles had presently set themselves against the observing the Jewish Customs among the Jews themselves But if it had been absolutely necessary to Catholick-Communion that there should be but one Church in a place The Apostles who were the Governours would never have suffer'd this Which since they did I conceive it directly conclusive against your Notion Nor is it to be suppos'd that these Jews had no distinct Church-Officers For Timothy might have been over a Church of converted Jews being circumcis'd which for ought we know was for that very end Nay St. Peter himself withdrew and separated himself from the Gentiles And as St. Paul told him would compel to wit by his Example the Gentiles to live as do the Jews But will you say as you must if you are consistent with your self that St. Peter was a Schismatick by this You say There cannot be any competition betwixt two Churches because there must be but one in the same place How far this agrees with the fore-going Instance you would do well to consider If in this matter I have fastened many absurd Proposions upon you t is not I conceive for want of due regard of my own Reputation or the common Principles of Honesty you well know the old Observation uno dato absurdo sequuntur mille 5. As to my Query about virtual Baptism you say You speak only of the necessity of visible Communion in visible Members And these you suppose not capable of Communion with the visible Church not being made Members But the Question is Whether they be not made Members of the invisible And if they be your Notion of the absolutle necessity of being visibly received into Communion falls 6. As to that of a profest Athiest you here place both him and a Schismatick in the same state of Exclusion from the Catholick Church Yet it may be a Question Whether by our unwary wording things you do not suppose that the Atheist is intituled to Acts of Communion but the Schismatick is not The first you seem to suppose to be in a State of Covenant with God For a Church-State and a Covenant-State you make the same thing And if it be not or that Baptism does not give us this you argue that then a Man may be in Covenant with God through Christ and yet be no Member of Christ or he may be a Member of Christ viz. as baptiz'd and yet no Member of his Body which is the Church Nay in your glorious Vindication you number Schismaticks among them
it serves your purpose to have it believed that it cannot be sound and Orthodox unless it maintain Communion in Accidentals with every other sound Part. Upon the erecting this Scheme and observing the Rules of Art you have already given one may be able to resolve a great many nice horary Questions Yet some of them must stay for your own Solution or Elias's Quest If Baptism lets one into the Church and entitles one to all the Privileges of Church-Membership how comes it to pass that one who ordinarily dissents is an Intruder when he exercises an Act of Communion Answ You had your Answer already if you had Eyes to see it He who despises the Authority or destroys the Vnity of the Church renounces his Membership and Communion with it Quest What tho he does actually communicate Resp Yes thou Man of perverse Understanding Church-Communion does not consist in particular Acts of Communion but in Membership Quest Well then if neither Baptism nor particular Acts of Communion are enough to make or at least continue me a Member pray how many Acts of Communion will do the Business Resp Why I tell you it must be constant Communion Quest What do you mean by constant Communion Resp I mean ordinary Communion that is always sometimes Quest Well what is it that obliges me always sometimes to communicate with a particular Church Does Baptism do it Resp No we know no Church but all Christians are made Members of by Baptism Quest What then if I chuse ordinarily to communicate with another Church Resp If you divide your self from this Body and set up distinct and separate Societies which you call Churches but which are not Members nor live in Communion with the one Catholick Church you cannot carry your Right and Title to the Covenant out of the Church with you Quest But do you not tell us that our Communion with the Church consists in being Members of the Church which we are made by Baptism And they being baptized into the same Faith I should think they hold Communion with the Church Resp But let me tell you tho sometimes I maintain That Baptism makes us Members of the whole Church and gives us a Right to communicate with every sound part of it yet in spite of Contradiction I hold That Baptism at most gives Men only a Disposition to be Church-Members but does not make them Members of any Church Besides where there are two separte Churches one if not both must be Schismatical And the National Church having the Advantage of Authority you are bound to reject the Communion of all other Parties and Sects of Christians as Schismatical If you do not you renounce your Membership and by destroying the Unity of the Church forfeit your Interest in the Divine Charter and cannot carry your Right and Title to the Convenant out of the Church with you Quest Suppose I do not communicate with any other Church yet ordinarily withdraw from Communion with yours at the Times appointed for Worship or other Acts of Communion is it enough to own my self a Member Or if not how long Suspension will amount to a Forfeiture Resp 'T is not enough to own your self a Member for to withdraw from the visible Communion of the Church is Separation Now if Separation from Religious Assemblies be to break Cowmunion then to live in Communion with the Church requires our actual Communion Quest Well then thus far I have learnt my Catechism that there must be actual Communion and that actual Communion must be constant or ordinary otherwise a Man wilfully separates himself and forfeits his Interest in the Divine Charter So it seems tho Acts of Communion are but Effects and Applications of Church-membership yet the Non-user of them forfeits the Right one had by Baptism even tho one be not cast out of the Church by any Sentence and nothing but ordinary Communion amounts to owning a Membership How many Acts are necessary to avoid the Forfeiture we are yet to learn And further if we live where Communion may be had with another Church in communion with that which expects our constant Attendance we as well own our selves Members by a constant Communion with the other as with that For as you inform us there is nothing in Baptism nor in all the Acts of Communion which does more peculiarly unite us to such a particular Church than to the whole Christian Church And 't is no Interruption of Communion to communicate actually with any Church that is in Communion with another sound Part. But if it should fall out that notwithstanding the Division of Communions upon lesser Matters a divided Communion may continue a sound part of the Christian Church the Necessity of constant Communion with a Church where occasional is lawful will stand in need of some other Medium to support it Resp O but there is a differene between being a Member of the Vniversal Church and of all particular Churches which are Parts and Members of the sniversal Church Quest Why so may I not communicate with any sound Part which is in communion with this Church and professing no dislike of its Communion thereby own my self a Member especially since my communicating with the one does not interrupt the Communion with the other and neither Baptism nor all the Acts of Communion unite me more to one than another Resp I care not for that for constant Communion in a particular Church confines Church-Membership to that particular Church in which you communicate Quest If I may not offend I should say my Question is What obliges to constant Communion But you seem to say no more than that constant Communion obliges to constant Communion or in your own Phrase confines Church-Membership to that particular Church So it seems if constant Communion be omitted that Obligation or Confinement ceases I shall trouble you but with one Question more in this place and that is Whether the Necessity of re-baptizing those who were of a separate Communion does not follow upon your Grounds as well as upon Donatus's and that tho the Party had not been baptized in a Schism Certainly this is no remote consequence from the Supposition that Separation makes a forfeiture of all the Privileges acquired by Baptism For if they were forfeited how can they be restor'd without a new Grant Nay they are your own Words that the guilty Divider forfeits his Interest in the Covenant without a new Grant But a little to examine the Foundation of your charitable Positions You suppose that Christ's Body being but one whoever separates from any sound Part separates from the whole But is it not equally evident that whoever separates from any true Part separates from the whole Surely a true Member is a Member tho it be not sound Yet you say there may be a true Church tho no Catholick Church that is according to your Argument no
should be Schismaticks and cut off from his Body meerly for disobeying Additions the Authority of which they soberly dispute You say in one part of your Answer to me That whatever Variety and Difference in the Rules of Worship is consistent with one Communion may be granted when the Prudence of Governours sees it fit and expedient Where as you condemn such Indulgence as is inconsistent with one Communion it may be thought to be equally conclusive against the Imposition of any Thing inconsistent with one Communion or the great Law of Catholick Communion And when you confess that the Government of the Church since the Apostles Days was never so entirely in the Bishop's Breast that what he did should be thought the Act of the Church any further than he complied with those Laws by which the Church was to be governed You having likewise set aside the Civil Authority and admitted that Dissenters have sufficient Church-Power amongst them I again ask How they can be Schismaticks for dividing from the Bishops upon the account of suspected Rites and Ceremonies which they believe not to agree with those Laws by which the Charch was to be governed as being greatly prejudicial to if not inconsistent with one Communion And I would willingly be satisfied how you can bring within the foregoing Rules what you assert but within three Pages where having held that there was no Schism between the Latin and Asian Churches yet you will have it that private Christians at Rome could not receive the Asians into the Communion of the Church without the Bishop's Authority But to word this Matter according to your Hypothesis Tho Conformity to the Church of England that is Obedience to the Church-Governours the Bishops is not essential to the Vnity of the Catholick Church yet it is for all that live here I should have been contented to have the Controversy confin'd to Persons living here but that you tempt me further You say indeed That Christians who live under the Government and Jurisdiction of other Churches may and do preserve the Vnity of the Church without Conformity to the Church of England But pray can they preserve the Unity of the Church without Catholick Communion to which as you have told us a Compliance with the Order Government Discipline and Worship as well as the Doctrine of the Catholick Church is absolutely necessary And then All the Churches of the World are but one Church or one Society and have the same Right or Obligation of them to communicate with each other as Opportunity serves in all those Duties for the sake of which Christian Churches are instituted as the Members of a particular Church are There are some other Passages in my third Letter which perhaps might want to have something said to them but I shall only refer the Whole with what I have here wrote to your second and cooler Thoughts But I must confess I wonder how I escap'd unrebuk'd when I observ'd that you your self made a sufficient Excuse for some even causless Separation And if the Sinfulness of Separation lies in not observing your Terms of Catholick Communion the Dissenters would think themselves pretty sake under Mr. Chillingworth's Defence against the Papists not only when he affirms That the Gospel of Christ is the whole Covenant between God and Man nor when he blames the Papists for making Salvation depend on Things casual and in the Power of Man to confer or not to confer But if it were only because of the Obscurity and Doubtfulness if not Inconsistency of the Grounds whence the Obligation to constant Communion with the Church is inferr'd for he thought it Demonstration that nothing is necessary to be believed but what is plainly revealed Now Sir I take leave to tell you that I have faithfully followed you in all your subtil Windings I am sure I have nowhere perverted your Discourses how much soever I may have mistaken them And 't is no easy matter to take his Sence rightly who is inconsistent with himself It has not been the least nor perhaps the least pertinent part of my Task to fix your own Principles upon you some of which need no other Exposure but to be set in their proper Light where like the Cadmoean Issue they may be left to destroy each other If you forget in one place what serv'd your purpose in another or go to prove too little or too much for what possibly might be your general Scope and Design I hope you will for the future be more cautious of condemning Men for Dishonesty in arguing upon what they find By this time 't is likely I may in a double Sence have tir'd your Patience which you value your self upon I must confess the Substance of what lies in Dispute between us might be brought into a much narrower Compass But perhaps it was no more than requisite to put several Questions to you to prevent all colourable Evasion that one might take up what might be artfully slipt over upon another And certainly any one that observes what Skill you use in the management of this Controversy will think that many Things which might have seem'd superfluous were but necessary to oblige you to speak out Thus when I had ask'd Whether a Man has a Right to be of a particular Church as he is a Christian that is as I then thought and still do a true Member of the Catholick Church I should not have added Or becomes a Christian only as received into a particular Church were it not that I wrote to one who seems to think no Man can be a true Member of the Catholick Church before he has been actually receiv'd into some particular Church But you taking no notice of the last Branch of the Question wonder I should ask you Whether a Man has a Right to be of a particular Church as he is a Christian when you say The whole Design of your Tract is to prove that every Christian by being so is a Member of the Catholick Church and has a Right to communicate with all sound Parts of the Catholick Church and bound to communicate with that Part of it in which he lives Now 't is odds but it may be as evident upon this your whole Design that every particular Church is bound to receive every Christian as such into its Communion without imposing any Terms but meer Christianity as that a Christian must communicate with that sound Part where he lives even in other Terms Yet here you speak not one Word to the Question how a Man becomes a Christian whether it be only as received into a particular Church Indeed you had said in your Resolutions which I thought you might have either justified or retracted That no Man can be in Covenant with God or a Member of his Church who is not at least visibly admitted which must be by some particular Church and surely no Man can be
straggle into a Church which is not in Communion with our Bishops This Confinement to one Bishop you must say upon your grounds would be contrary to the Nature of Catholick Communion but we have your Authority for it that the other is not Yet it seems if Presbytery should have the Advantage of Authority they who refuse Communion with the National Church upon pretence of purer Ordinances and the Belief that Episcopacy is the Ordinance of God must be as bad as Murderers and Adulterers that is very Schismaticks And judg you whether 't would not be a barbarous Thing to make any Laws which shall ensnare Men in so great a Guilt But here you take notice of a Passage or two in my Preface The one That perhaps it is no Absurdity to suppose that Men may as well continue Members of the National Church notwithstanding their breaking many positive Laws made for the outward management and ordering of it tho not fundamental and necessary to its Being as he who incurs the Penalty of any Statute of the Realm about Civil Affairs may however be a sound Member of the State if he keep from Treason or other Capital Crimes This you answer by a begging and indeed mistaking the Question and will have it of a Schismatical Separation which you elswhere express by renouncing Communion And this you may compare to Treason and Rebellion in the State if you think fit But the Church is not much beholden to you for making that in which Conformity is expected fundamental and necessary to its Being And when you compare a Man that communicates sometimes with one true Church sometimes with another to a Man that joins sometimes with his Prince's Forces and sometimes with his Enemies the Comparison is either very impertinent or very uncharitable in supposing that a Church which differs from this in what is really accidental how essential soever you make it is Antichristian or an Enemy to Christ which surely no true Church is yet I must confess herein you agree with your self when you say There may be a true Church which is no Catholick Church that is no true part of the Catholick Church I add Nay possibly that there should be several Religious Assemblies living by different Customs and Rules and yet continuing Members of the National Church is not more inconsistent than that particular Places should have their particular Customs and By-Laws distinct from the Common-Law of the Land without making a distinct Government This you condemn without vouchsafing it a fair Hearing as nibling at that Healing Project for which you think you have sufficiently exposed Mr. Humphreys But I shall chuse the Protection of the great Protestant Champion Mr. Chillingworth and if you are resolved to wound him through my Side I will bear the Brunt of it as well as I can To reduce Christians to Unity there are but two Ways that may be conceived probable The one by taking away Diversity of Opinions touching Matters of Religion the other by shewing that the Diversity of Opinions which is among the several Sects of Christians ought to be no Hinderance to their Unity in Communion The first he looks on as not likely without a Miracle What then remains says he but that the other way must be taken and Christians must be taught to set an higher value upon those high Points of Faith and Obedience wherein they agree than upon Matters of less moment wherein they differ and understand that Agreement in those ought to be more effectual to join them in one Communion than their Difference in other Things of less moment to divide them When I say One Communion I mean in a common Profession of those Articles of Faith wherein all consent a joint Worship of God after such a way as all esteem lawful and a mutual Performance of all those Works of Charity which Christians owe one unto another And to such a Communion what better Inducement could be thought of than to demonstrate that what was universally believed of all Christians if it were joined with a Love of Truth and holy Obedience was sufficient to bring Men to Heaven For why should Men be more rigid than God Why should any Error exclude any Man from the Churches Communion which will not deprive him of eternal Salvation To the same Sence is the Passage I had in that Preface cited out of Dr. Tillotson's Sermon and you may as well ask him as me Is the Catholick Church then and Communion of Saints no part of our Creed Your Notion of Communion is a new Article But to re-assert what I had observed of your managing the Charge of Schism I had said People might not well understand what it is unless it be taken to lie wholly in want of Charity And in the Errata to avoid the Cavil of its being common such as we have for all Mankind I had added the Epithete of Christian I say further to my thinking as St. Paul speaks of it He supposes a continuance still of the same Body and ascribes it to Christians continuing such nay and communicating with each other And this you were not able to deny nay you well know that not only the Thing but the very Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 had by that Apostle been applied to such Hence you would argue That I will not allow causless Separation from a sound Part of the Catholick Church to be Schism but place Schism wholly in want of Charity But 't is obvious that I do it no more than the Apostle himself does But besides it induces the Belief that Schism is not such a Crime as you imagine For if the Corinthians were Schismaticks whilst they continued in Communion with each other and yet were particular Members of Christ's Body then Schism does not cut off from Christ's Body nor do you rightly apply the Addition of Apostate Christian Further by what Authority do you apply that to a refusing Communion with any sound Church whatever upon your supposed Notion of Catholick Communion from a Text which mentions no other Schism but what was between them who liv'd in the same Communion And still beyond all this it seems demonstrable from the Text that the Causa formalis or that which constitutes Schism is not Separation tho it be causless unless it be accompanied with want of Charity For since there may be Schism where there is no Separation of Communion then it must be something which consists with joint Communion and find out something besides Want of Charity if you can The Apostle's Notion of Schism we have seen but I wonder by what Authority you affirm'd That Schism is nothing else but a Breach of Christian Communion and that where the Vnity of the Church is broken by distinct and opposite Communions there is the full Nature of Schism and where this is not there is either no Schism or only a partial Schism which is like a great