A Second Admonition TO Mr. EDWARD BAGSHAW Written to call him to Repentance for many false Doctrines Crimes and specially fourscore palpable untruths in matter of fact deliberately published by him in two small Libels In which he exemplieth the Love-killing and depraving Principles of Church-dividers and telleth the World to what men are hasting when they sinfully avoid Communion with true Churches and Christians for tolerable faults With a Confutation of his Reasons for Separation Written to preserve the weak to resist the Dividing Temptations of the Imperious unskilful Clergy to revive our dying hopes of Concord and to vindicate the Non-conformable Ministers from the unjust imputation of Schismatical Principles By Richard Baxter a long-maligned and reâ—sted Endeavourer of the Churches Unity and Peace LONDON Printed for Nevill Simmons at the Three Crowns near Holborn-Conduit 1671. THE Contents A Preface to those that are inclined to Principles of Church Division and Separation containing twenty causes of that sin and some Notices of Mr. Bagshaw's two Libells To Mr. E. B. the grounds on which I go in dealing with him Why I answer him contrary to my former purpose Sect. 1. Of calling him Brother of a middle way Sect. 2. Whether every untruth be a lye Sect. 3. Of Scripture perfection Sect. 4. Of the design of my Book Sect. 6 7. Whether calling Dividers to Repent c. be to make them odious Sect. 8. Whether all they whose sin brings Judgements must be hated of all and killed Sect. 9 10. Whether I disclaimed any Activeness in the first War Sect. 15. Whether I approved of setting up Cromwell to be Protector and such like Sect. 20. My Repentance published at Mr. E. B. his invitation in four parts Of Mr. E. B. his former defence of me against the then Bishop of Worcester Sect. 21 22. Of Christs Temporal Reign and my judgement of it Sect. 24. Whether I meant it because I dare not own any persecuted truth Sect. 25. Whether I inveigh against sufferings Of sufferers temptations Sect. 26 c. His sinful excuse of Vavasor Powells three publick false Prophecies Sect. 29 c. His wholsome accusation of me as proud 1. For saying that I publickly communicated 2. For saying that many have written against me that expect clean contraries from me 3. For writing many Books Sect. 31. Of his accusation in general about Justification Sect. 33. Of the stating of the Question about separating principles Sect. 34 c. Many of his misreports about my stating it Sect. 38. His first Reason for separation examined viz. because every Parish Church is part of a Diocesane Church How far that is true or not Sect. 39. His second Reason that a Parish Minister is but a servant to the Diocesan Sect. 40. His third Reason Because Parish Ministers consent to silencing and persecution by open consent or pernicious silence Whether there be little difference between persecuting and not sharply reproving it Sect. 41. His fourth Reason that Parish Ministers enter sinfully and by a solemn Oath renounce their Christian liberty All sinners or sinful enterers not to be separated from Sect. 42. May not a true Church be called Defective and faulty Sect. 43. His further Reasons 1. That we know not how else to preserve our Christian liberty Whether all Christian liberty must be maintained and how Sect. 44. 2. Whether to be present where things are used in Gods Worship which he commanded not be a sin Sect. 45. 3. Whether if we separate not we sell the truth about Christs Soveraignty Sect. 46. His reason from Acts 15. retorted Sect. 47. He taketh not Corruption and Error as such without Imposition to be a sufficient ground of separation How he is himself an Imposer Sect. 48. The charge of Hypocrisie for joyning in what we approve not Sect. 49. That Christ called and designed not his Church to be impure and mixt considered Sect. 50. How far a Church is to be separated from for abetting sin Sect. 51. His grand answer to the example of Church-pollutions in Scripture that they were setled as to Officers and Ordinances rightly and so had a power to keep themselves clean c. considered What Power Ministers have now Whether the Ages following the first did fall into an Vniversal Innovation and degeneration in the Essentials of Order and Doctrine and Antichristianism and so Christ had no Church and was no Christ Whether Mr. E. B. be a Seeker and separate from all Churches as well as from all Parochial Sect. 52. Whether the necessity of separation because of the said Vniversal degeneration in Essentials continue still because we are reformed from Antichristianism but in some points Sect. 53. He granteth that neither Corruption barely nor Imposition barely is a ground for just separation But Imposing Error with a strong hand c. Sect. 54. His vain answer intimating that he is wiser herein than the Old Non-conformists Sect. 55. Of Arminianisme whether so pernicious as to exclude from communion Sect. 56. Of Free will and its power to receive Sect. 57. His ignorant calumny against me about Scripture perfection Sect. 58. Twenty Questions to him about various Readings and Copies c. Sect. 59. Of the Possibility of salvation for some called Papist Sect. 61. His former untruth that by Flesh I affirmed was only meant the sensitive Appetite defended by him by reciting my words which expresly confute his calumny Sect. 62. The Reason rendred by Mr. E. B. why he cast away my Book of Rest and refused to read it and yet is the Judge of it And my account of my dissent long ago from his Latin slender Discourse against Monarchy Sect. 63. His report of Mr. Herles and Mr. Cawdrys words against my Saints Rest Sect. 67 c. Many more of his Vntruths Sect. 74. More of his ignorant Calumny about Scripture perfection Sect. 75 76 c. More of the Nature of his Defences and Accusations Sect. 80. Five Vntruths delivered by the Letter published by him as written by a woman of Worcester with my sense of her case Sect. 81 c. Seven Vntruths published by him in his Brother Brownes Letter and the Confutation of their Calumnies Sect. 94. Mr. E. B. his new sort of Dishonesty charged on me because he saith I have access to the Licensers and Press Sect. 95. Whether it be culpable Vanity to write on the Sabbath after Dr. Owen as he thought Sect. 97. His calumny of my Atheistical arguing against the Divine and self-evidencing authority of the Scriptures and as one of the worst sort of Hereticks that under the notion of being a Christian and a Protestant do with my utmost industry and cunning labour to overthrow the Foundation and therefore am to be Rejected of all The case opened and the weak warned to take heed of them that would ignorantly draw them to be Infidels by subverting Christianity while they think themselves the chief or true defenders of it To those Readers who are most enclined to the
regard it when he himself beginneth with this Confession that I scarce leave any thing to be disputed or denyed What honesty then is there in his denyals and disputes Sect. 34. E. B. 1. You grant that we are not to have Communion with a Diocesane Church as such and that we are not to own Diocesane Bishops R. B. Here are two more Untruths I only said that these are no part of our Question they are things that I assert not and that I meddled not with And you feign me to grant the Negative when I only say I meddle not with it I only say that I hold no Communion my self with a Diocesane Church as such in that form c. and that I perswade no others to it Sect 35. E. B. 2. You allow that we are not to have Communion with Persecutors nor with such as have consented to our silencing R. B. I never wrote such a word but only told you it was none of our question and that I did not affirm it and that it is none of the thing that I am perswading men to And yet with this intimation pag. 9. that neither your selves nor I do avoid Communion with all persecutors seeing most Parties have been guilty of it The Common-wealths men persecuted me and others so far as to make Orders to Sequester us for not taking the Engagement and for not keeping their Fasts and Thanksgivings for the Warrs against Scotland And yet I am not so rigid as to refuse communion with all that did it or consented to it My old special friend did persecute Mr. Sam. Fisher and Mr. Blake when he turned them both out of Shrewsbury from their Churches labour dwellings and maintenance even when the Plague was begun and the people doubly sensible of their loss And yet I refused not all Communion with such as did it It s like you know who persecuted Mr. Caughton Dr. Drake Mr. Nalton Mr. Arthur Jackson Mr. Watson Mr. Jenkins c. and Mr. Love and Gibbons And yet who scrupleth Communion with them Again I tell you I mention not these for reproach but only to set us in the impartial sense of the question Sect. 36. E. B. p. 11. All this and more being granted I scarce see what it is that you contend for R. B. What eyes then have you that cannot see that which I copiously and expresly speak Sect. 37. E. B. From these grounds separation at this day may be easily justified R. B. This is the undertaking by which you have drawn me to renew this debate and therefore I shall try your proof Sect. 38. E. B. Every Parish Church is part of the Diocesane And if a Diocesane Church as such is not to be Communicated with then a Parish Church as such is to be separated from since there is the same reason of the parts as of the whole And you must find out a new Logick before you can prove that if the whole be corrupt any of the parts are clean and fit for our Communion R. B. The name of Logick is incongruously used in such an Argument as is so palpably fallacious A Parish Church stands before us in three respects 1. As it is a true Church of Christians having all things Essential in Pastours and People 2. As these Christians live in the bounds of a Parish 3. As this Parish Church by the Laws of the Land is subject to the Diocesane and so a part of his Diocess Both the latter are meerly Accidental and it hath all that is essential to a Church without them As Mr. Jacob instanceth in Ordination and so in Marriage He that is marryed truly is truly a Husband though a Priest or Ring or some unnecessary accident was adjoyned Your reason is 1. Ridiculously fallacious 2. And if all were granted reacheth not the Case 1. It is Ridiculous to argue If a Diocesane Church as such is not to be communicated with then a Parish Church as such is to be separated from For the as such in the Antecedent and Consequent denoteth two several things You should only have inferred Then a Parish Church as part of a Diocesane is not to be Communicated with Which is nothing to the question And when you say that there is the same reason of the Parts and whole I answer that must be only as they are parts but not in all other alien respects If a Parish Church be to be disclaimed or not owned only as it is a part of a Diocesane Church yet it may be owned 1. As a true Church of Christians in its constitution 2. And as a Parish Church limited by those bounds without respect to the Diocesane 2. And if it were to be disowned as a Parish Church that also is nothing to the Question For it may yet be owned for its Constitutive parts as a Christian Church I will shew you your Argument in another case Suppose that Usurpers should alter the form of Kingly Government and set up themselves in another form and should allow all the Independent Churches in the Land but set over them Civil officers in every County of their own and should make a Law that none shall be a member of a Church that liveth not within five miles of the Meeting place In this case the Church is a Church in its own Constitution and that it is confirmed to a Parochial circuit or that it is under usurping Magistrates is an accidental thing which doth not nullifie it And if you argue If the Vsurpers Commonwealth as such be not to be communicated with or owned then the Church which is part of it is not to be owned Yes as a Church but not as a part of the Common-wealth If Independent Churches were under the Turks Government they may be parts of an Infidel and perhaps usurped Kingdom and yet be true Churches and to be owned If Presbyterian Classical Churches be supposed sinful and the Law said that all the Independent or particular Churches shall be under the several Classes and be part of those Churches the Churches will be true Churches nevertheless For 1. Perhaps most of them consent not to the Laws determination but only forbear an open contradiction 2. And in others of them the people may not consent though the Pastor do 3. And if they do consent and it be their sin it will not nullifie the particular Church being but an unwarrantable Accident If Vniversities were as unlawful as many Separatists judge them yet Dr. Goodwins Church e. g. in Oxford might have been part of the University and yet a true Church and to be disowned as part of the University and yet not as a Church If you were a member of an unlawful Society Army Church c. You may be disowned as a member of that Society and yet not as a Christian or as a Man Now would not the Boyes laugh at you if you should reason thus An usurped Heathenish Kingdom or Common-wealth as such is
unlawful and not to be communicated with A Classical Church as such is not to be communicated with An University as such is not to be communicated with Therefore such or such a particular Church as such is not to be communicated with which is a part of that Kingdom that Classis that University E. B. a Christian is a member of a Society which is not to be owned Ergo E. B. a Christian as such is not to be owned What more apparent than that the consequent should be but this Therefore such a Church should not be owned as it is a Part of such a Kingdom Classis Vniversity c. which is all accidental to the Church So that here is a double Equivocation and more than four terms 1. As such speaketh as I said one essence in the Antecedent and another in the Consequent 2. The word Communicating speaketh several things in the Antecedent and in the Consequent For to Communicate with a Diocesane Church is not to Assemble with it in publick Worship For a Diocess in our sense cannot so assemble but it is to own the Diocesane Relation and Prelats But to Communicate with a particular Church in a Parish is to have personal Communion in the Worship of the Assembly So that this is your Argument if put in plain words If it be unlawful to Communicate with a Diocesane Church as such by owning the Diocesanes and the relation to them then it is unlawful to communicate with a true particular Church in a Parish or bounded Parochially in the Assembly Worship as it is such a particular Church which is part of that Diocesane Church But c. Answ Yes It may be unlawful to communicate with it as a Part and that by Diocesane Communion but not as a true Church of Christians by assembly communion Or thus It is unlawful e. g. to have communion with the Army of Maximus Cromwel c. as such But many Christians are parts of the Army of Maximus Cromwel c. Therefore it is unlawful to have communion with those Christians Because there is the same reason of the parts as of the whole Ans 1. Christians are not parts of the Army as Christians but as those Souldiers 2. It is unlawful to have Military Communion with them as parts of that Army but not to have Christian Communion with them as Christians May not even the simple now easily see if you will not by what ignorant erroneous reasons you zealously labour to deceive the people of God to divide the Churches Sect. 39. E. B. 2. A Parish Minister is in that station and office but a servant of the Diocesane Bishop and therefore rightly called a Curate and if we may not own as you grant the Bishop I think it will necessarily follow that his substitute and curate hath no reason to expect any respect from us R. B. The same fallacy is so palpable that a small measure of reason may discern it 1. It is false that he is in that Office But a Servant The truth is the Law maketh him not a servant at all but only an Ecclesiastical Subject But if you had said He is but a subject it had not been true if But be exclusive of his other Pastoral Relation For he is by the Law the Priest the Teacher the Rector of that Parish Church in subordination to the Bishop 2. But whatever he be by the Law of the Land or by the Bishops will the faithful Ministers in Parish Churches are by Christs own Commission the true Pastors of the flocks having all things essential to that Relation 3. But deceive not your Reader by intimating that I speak of a Parochial Minister as Parochial not quâ but qui For Parish Bounds are but Accidents of the Churches It is Christian Churches as such though Parochial or so bounded that I speak of A Christian Pastor with his Christian flock e. g. Mr. Gataker Mr. Marshall Dr. Stoughtion Dr. Seaman Mr. Sedgwicke Dr. Gouge and such like do constitute a true Christian Church though in Parish bounds And as such Pastours they are the Ministers of Christ and not servants to Diocesanes And their subordination to Diocesans by the Law is but accidental to their Pastoral office How many volumes of the old Non-conformists give you this Answer And if you have read them why would you dissemble it and give no Reply to it If you never read them is it modesty to despise them Sect. 40. E. B. p. 11. If Persecutors are not to be communicated with nor such as have consented to our silencing which you also allow though I could wish you had proved it better than by the obscure disputable example of Martin then I think very few if any of the Parish-Ministers but must even upon that account also be separated from since either by open consent or else by an Vndoing and Pernicious silence they have all made themselves guilty of that grievous sin There being but little difference in the sight of God between the persecuting Brethren our selves and by not sharply reproving it seeming to approve of it in others R. B. 1. Your repeated mistake of my allowing that which I only meddle not with but exclude from the question or oppose not I pass by 2. Every one that is by remote consequence guilty of our silencing doth not consent to it Otherwise You and I and all the silenced Ministers in England do consent to it For he is blindly impenitent that will deny that we are any way guilty of it 3. You do but cover one open sin with another even separation with uncharitable slander of many hundred godly Conformable Ministers whom you accuse of this consent I know scarce any one of my acquaintance whom I take for a faithful diligent Pastor and whom I perswade men to hear but they are grieved at the heart for the silencing of so many and such I hear some complain of it privately and some lament it publickly and earnestly pray that God would restore them But I never heard one of them own it 4. I plead not for Vndoing Pernicious silence I think too many are deeply guilty by it My testimony in this case is visible among the Writings whose number you prove me proud by But if you make this a proof of the duty of separation you will make mad work of it For 1. You know not mens opportunities to speak And where there is no opportunity there it s no duty 2. You know not who hath spoken their dissent plainly and who not It may he some have done it in the Convocation It may be some have done it privately and some publickly already in due season And we are not to expect an account from them of all that they say 3. To whom is it that you would have all the Countrey Ministers speak against our silencing To those that did it they have no access and they are out of hearing And must they
that keepeth you from seeing how strongly you confute your self Is there a word in Acts 15. to forbid all Church communion with those that taught even this subverting false doctrine How many Texts be there that intimate that the Churches long without a prohibition held communion with the erronious judaizing Christians Till they grew obstinate and grew up to a Heresie and were the Separaters themselves and did subvert the Gospel and faith of Christ But yet prove that such doctrine is held by our Parish Churches and I will leave them Do not the Independents offer to subscribe the Doctrine of the Church of England Sure then they think its Doctrinals to be sound Sect. 47. E. B. By two Arguments you labour to defend your irregular way of Communion 1. That in the Primitive Churches there were many corruptions which the Apostle writes against but doth not advise any because of them to separate But I answer It is not corruption or error barely considered as such that we account to be a sufficient ground of separation But the Imposing of that error with on high hand and making a submission to it at least in our practice and outward observance the very condition of Communion This we say is a thing which necessitates us to make a separation R. B. Mark that you distinguish not of Corruption or Error nor except any but what is Imposed And when I had answered all this so fully why will you deign to confute a Book while you disdain to take notice what it saith 1. Who would have thought that you are so much looser in your communion than we are I will separate from that Church which in the essential matter Pastor or all the flock after admonition retaineth such Corruption and Error as is directly contrary to any essential point of Christianity though they impose it not on others But by these words it seems as scrupulous as you are you would not separate from Hereticks or Ungodly ones if they do not Impose their Heresie and Impiety 2. How oft have I urged you to prove that our publick Parish Ministers whom I advise men to hear do Impose any more than you your self do By choosing what Chapter to read you impose on the people to hear that Chapter then or none By choosing what Place Hour Method Words yeâ— Matter and Metre Tune c. you impose upon the people to joyn in all these or not to have communion with you therein And so our Teacher doth by reading Common-Prayer and wearing the Surplice impose on us to hear him so reading or to stay away But he maketh no Laws he commandeth us no Ceremony They are commanded by others and not by him And it is not in your own practice of any thing forbidden of God that I advise men to have communion with such but only in Gods true Worship though in the circumstances or manner the Minister himself say or do something that is forbidden as every Teacher in the world doth though not in the same degree It is one thing to submit to be present at the Worship which the Pastor performeth in some faulty manner And another thing wilfully to do evil your self or to approve of his failings or your own Sect. 48. E. B. To which I add only this that however the presenting our bodies at a Worship which we do not inwardly approve of may render us excusable and justiste us among men yet we are sure it will not in the sight of God who hates hypocrisie R. B. Though you confound I must distinguish the essentials of the Worship from the circumstances and outward imperfections in the manner I do inwardly approve of the matter or substance of the Worship which I joyn in in the main and labour to pray with my heart when I joyn in the Common-prayer though I consent not to the whole Method nor to the defects And when I hear a man in free prayer use confusion disorder unseemly words and when I hear one man drop the error of an Arminian or a Lutheran another of an Antinomian another of an Anabaptist another of a Separatist c. in his prayer I do not inwardly approve of that error or disorder any more than of the defects of forms And yet if it were hypocrisie to be present I would joyn with no man living Can all your hearers inwardly approve of all that you say if you preach and pray but as you write If they can its time to pitty them And are they Hypocrites else for joyning with you Sect. 49 E. B. p. 14. 1. This is clear in Scripture that our Lord Christ who was himself holy and separated from sinners did never call or design his Church to be an impure mixt body of holy and unholy without any distinction blended and hudled up together but to be an holy separate people and to depart from unrighteousness R. B. 1. Remember Reader for he will not remember that but even now he told us that it is not Corruption and Error barely as such that is a sufficient ground of separation without Imposition And now here is nothing but Mixture of Holy and Vnholy Reconcile these if you can 2. Christ that was perfectly separated from sinners had yet ordinary communion with sinners in a sinful or culpable manner of performance unless the Jews were all perfect Therefore our separation must be such as Christs was in our measure 3. Impurity and unholiness and sin is not the Matter of Gods Call or designment either in the Church or out but of his Permission But Communion with those Churches which by permission have sin and impurity in them is a commanded thing And they that must depart from iniquity must not alwayes depart from the worshipping Assembly where some unrighteous persons are Your argument if it be any must run this Christ did never call or design his Church to be an impure mixt body of holy and unholy The Parish Churches which you perswade us to communion with are impure mixt bodies Therefore the Parish Churches are such as Christ never called or designed them to be Suppose we grant you the Conclusion Whoever is a sinner is such as Christ never called or designed him to be But your Question intimateth that you would argue thus Whatever Church is such as Christ did not call it or design it to be is not to be communicated with But all the Parish Churches are such as Christ did not call or design them to be Ergo The Minor you prove Whatever Church is an impure mixt body of holy and unholy c. is such as Christ did not call or design them to be But the Parish Churches are such But I answer you 1. A Church is no Church that wants the Essentials required by Christ But he that will not communicate with Church or person that wants the Perfection which Christ calleth them to shall communicate with no Church or person on Earth 2.
Principles of Church-division and censorious unwarrantable Separation I Know there is in Holiness a contrariety to sin and Heaven and Hell must finally shew the difference for ever And to reconcile them is as unpossible as to reconcile Light and Darkness I know that it is the endeavour of every faithful Minister of Christ to make this difference plainly known and in Doctrine and Discipline to separate the precious from the vile and to make ungodly men know that they are ungodly and to give to each their proper portion and to keep the Churches as clean as they can by lawful means I know that the ruine of this purging and differencing Discipline is a great part of the lamentable ruine of the Churches and occasioneth that scandal to the Mahometans and Heathens because of the wicked lives of Christians which is one of the greatest hinderances of their conversion And that all Christians should use their utmost skill and power to recover Religion to its primitive Purity and Splendour and Discipline to the most effectual regular exercise And I know that in mens private converse there must be a great care what company we converse with and especially whom we make our familiars And that to be indifferent and to intimate an equality or likeness of the godly and the wicked in doctrine communion and familiarity is a notable sign of an ungodly person And upon these accounts I know that when persons are newly recovered from ungodliness themselves they are very much inclined to fly from the company of such as far as their safety doth require And by this inclination and their ignorance they are frequently tempted to go further from them in Church communion than God alloweth them to do and instead of separating from them in their sin to separate from them in their duty and to separate from the Churches of Christ in his true worship because of the mixture and presence of the bad And this they are drawn to 1. By forgetting the Scripture pattern and state of the Churches even in the purest age and thinking only what they desire rather than what is to be expected or done 2. By forgetting the difference between the Church visible which is alwayes mixt with Hypocrites and offenders and the Church invisible which shall all be saved 3. By forgetting the difference between their private familiarity where they are choosers of their company themselves and their Church communion where the Pastors are the Rulers and Judges of the fitness of the members Or else not understanding that this use of the Keyes and judging of the fitness of the members is indeed the Pastors Office and not theirs 4. By not considering that nothing must be done by Discipline upon Offenders but in a course of Church-Justice upon due Accusations Summons Audience Proof and patient Admonition And not by casting out any irregularly upon the expectation of every one that will say that they are ungodly and scandalous 5. By forgetting the great difference between joyning with men in sinful actions and joyning with them in their duty in which they should be encouraged 6. By forgetting the great difference of keeping in our own place and duty though bad men are present and going out of our place and duty to joyn with them in sin 7. By forgetting that God will have all mens own wills by Choosing or Refusing to have more hand in their Welfare or Misery than other mens And if they mischoose the sin will be their own 8. By forgetting that God hath not left the Church at arbitrary liberty to judge any Godly or Ungodly at their pleasure But hath given us a set Test or Rule to judge them by which is their sober Profession of Consent to the Baptismal Covenant upon which the Adult and their Infants have right to Baptism And being Baptized have Right to Church Communion in all the Acts which their Age and Understanding makes them capable of And it is Church-tyranny to refuse such as shew this Title till they are openly proved to forfeit it by Impenitency in gross sin after publick admonition and due means This is the truth and the method of Christs discipline and the Rule of our Communion 9. By superstitious placing their Religion in indifferent and undertermined things and laying a greater stress on the words of prayer than there is cause Overvaluing their several outward forms expressions and orders in the worshipping of God when instead of provoking each other to faith and fervency to Love and to good works they place more of Godliness in words and circumstances which God hath certainly left free to every mans conscience than God doth place in them And one thinks that he is irregular that prayeth without a set form and another that he is ungodly that prayeth not by the Spirit who useth a set form when both do but speak their own superstition and make Laws and Rules which God never made Superstition and our own additions in Religion even in those that cry out much against it is the occasion of most of our Church-divisions One side supposeth every disorder or unfit expression in free prayer to be a greater fault than indeed it is And that its unlawful therefore to joyn with a Church that hath no set forms Another party supposeth the forms in the Church Lyturgy to be worse than they are and that it is unlawful to joyn in them or to receive the Lords Supper when they are used When as God hath neither tyed us to set forms nor from them save only as unsuitableness to any particular persons may make one less edifying than the other And both free prayers and set forms studied prayers and sudden prayers are all the work of man as to mans part and therefore they must needs be imperfect and faulty as man is And yet in both we may pray by the Spirit even with the holy and fervent desires which the Spirit exciteth in us And the Spirit may ordinarily be a Spirit of supplication in us and help our infirmities in the one way and in the other And therefore though I will not equall them For I prefer some mens free praying before any forms and I prefer the Common prayers before some mens free prayers yet I may say that I will neither Assent and Consent to every word in the one nor in the other no not of any man that ever I heard And yet I will not take it for unlawful to joyn with Church or Family or person in the one or in the other yea upon long experience if I had fully my own choice and liberty I would use free prayer one part of the day or one day and a well composed form another part because I see commodities by both and such inconveniences of either way alone as are if possible to be avoided But when the Mind hath received a prejudice against either way by Education Custom or former distastes no reason how clear soever will overcome it till age and
exempt a man from the malignant calumnies of this Judge of the Churches When in one sentence he telleth you how much I have written against the Bishops and in another that I am in the same condemnation with him and yet in another that I dare look no truth in the face that bringeth suffering when he talks of one point that all Christians are agreed in and directly bringeth none And when he chargeth me with Atheistical arguing against the divine and self-evidencing authority of the Scripture and therefore to be Rejected of all as one of the worst sort of Hereticks that under the notion of being a Christian and a Protestant doth with his utmost industry and cunning labour to overthrow our foundation When I know of no one man living in this Age that hath written so much I say not so well for the things in question Scripture and Christianity as I have done May not this man as modestly charge Bishop Downame to be a Papist that hath written so much to prove the Pope to be Antichrist or say any thing else that he hath list to say 12. Doth he not fix upon you by such Libells as these an odious reproach As if he would perswade the world that you that he writeth to are so partial so blind so false to truth and to your own souls and such pernicious enemies to peace as that you will receive that which is thus falsly said to you without ever reading what is said on the other side or against all the evidence that contradicteth it and will believe all these visible untruths of his without any proof upon the bare report of so rash a man 13. Whether following such men and wayes as this is not the likeliest way in the world not only to increase the reproach of the Non-conformists and make them all thought of as we do of the Quakers and so to continue severities against them as a company of furious unsociable persons but also to harden men into a contempt of Religion it self 14. Doth not God permit such a Champion of the Cause of Division thus criminally to miscarry that you may see that you are not better than those you separate from You blame them for subscribing erroneously or falsly And which of them hath put thirty three and forty eight visible untruths deliberatly in print and Impenitently stands in them as your Champion hath done Doth not this shew you that you are not so good but that the Churches of godly Pastors are as worthy of your Communion as you are of theirs If one should admonish one of your Church-members of one single deliberate avowed lye would you not call him to Repentance And will you believe this man and follow him upon his bare word who hath published eighty such falshoods Yet I am not one that think he loveth a lye because it is a lye but one that is thus guilty through proud overvaluing his own unfurnished understanding and through an extraordinary Rashness and want of tenderness of Conscience You have heretofore had better Guides and you have better still I never met with two Ministers that approve his Libell nor any but Mr. Browne alone you have a more peaceable Rule And if you are Christians indeed you have a Peaceable Spirit and a Saviour who is the Prince of peace who hath prayed that all his Disciples may be one John 17. 21. and a God who is the God of peace Follow therefore the Wisdom that is both Pure and Peaceable and not that from beneath which is earthly sensual and devilish and worketh by envious zeal and strife unto confusion and every evil work Jam. 3. 14 15 16 17. To Mr. EDWARD BAGSHAW BROTHER it is not a little troublesome to me and will be troublesome to many peaceable Readers both that these Writings should pass between us and that I should mention your faults so plainly as I do But as I began not with you so I know not how to let you talk on without betraying the peace of the Church the credit of the Non-conformists who are by your self obliged to disown you and the souls of the weak brethren for whom Christ dyed And I am constrained plainly to name your faults 1. Because truth consisteth in speaking of things as they are 2. And because my business is now to summon you to Repentance to which end the opening of your sin is necessary 3. And because these following Scriptures are my ground and your own word seem to me to charge it on me as my necessary duty upon dreadful penalties The Scriptures that I set before me are Lev. 19. 17. after mentioned Rom. 16 17. Mark them which cause Divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which you have learned and avoid them Jam. 3. 14 15 16 17. But if ye have bitter envying or zeal and strife in your hearts glory not and lye not against the truth This wisdom descendeth not from above but is earthly sensual devilish For where envying zeal and strife is there is confusion and every evil work c. 1 Cor. 1. 10 11 12 13. 3. 1 2 3 4. John 17. 21 22. Rom. 14. 15. John 8. 44. When he speaketh a lye he speaketh of his own for he is a lyer and the Father of it Rev. 21. 8. All lyers shall have their part c. 22. 15. Whosoever loveth and maketh a lye Psal 15. 2 3. That speaketh the truth in his heart backbiteth not with his tongue nor doth evil to his neighbour nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour 3 John 9 10. I wrote unto the Church but Diotrephes who loveth to have the preheminence among them receiveth us not wherefore if I come I will remember his deeds which he doth prating against us with malicious words And not content therewith neither doth he himself receive the brethren and forbiddeth them that would and casteth them out of the Church Gal. 2. 11 12 13 14. I withstood him to the face because he was to be blamed For he withdrew and separated himself fearing them which were of the circumcision and the other Jews dissembled likewise with him insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation But when I saw that they walked not uprightly c. Tit. 3. 10 11. A man that is an Heretick after the first and second admonition reject Your own doctrine is as followeth pag. 1. It will be a favour if you look upon me as one that neither desires nor if you believe what your self have writ deserves such expressions of your familiarity Pag. 2. I hope you are not to learn that every untruth is a lye Pag. 11 12. There being little difference in the sight of God between the persecuting of brethren our selves and by not sharply reproving it seeming to approve of it in others And I hope you will say as much against approveing your own sin as other mens Pag. 14. All are commanded to turn aside from them A Church which
to a member of the Church to be subject to the Pope Reader Is not this man uncharitable that will neither give us his leave to use our old words nor teach us better but intimate that we speak nonsense and he can speak better if he would We have hitherto been used to call a Governed Church a Political Society as distinct from a meer concourse or community of Christians And why not if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 come from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And if God hath prepared for them a City whose God he is not ashamed to be called Heb. 11. 16. And if it be well said Phil. 1. 27. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And if our Political conversations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be in Heaven why may not a Church at least such a one as the Pope doth claim be called a Political body or society Or at least why may not the Pope be said to lay such a claim We have been used to call that Government Spiritual which is done by the Word and Church Keyes and consequently the Governours Spiritual And why must this be non-sense now We have been used to call that Governour a Constitutive Head without whom the society is not essentiated in specie as a King in a Kingdom O unkind Teacher that will leave us all in this ignorance and not vouchsafe one word to help us out Sect. 72. E. B. And do not think to excuse your self from writing Non-sense by saying you meant a thing objectively and not subjectively R. B. Nay then I despair of scaping non-sense If the Object and the Subject must needs be all one and if sense in the Book or argument and sense or reason in the Reader be all one I am not the first that was deceived No nor if it be all one to say You understand not the sense or reason of my argument and you have no sense or reason But new Lords new Laws Sect. 73. E. B. And do not make Philosophy ridiculous as you do when you tell us That our acts of knowing exterior things are as Philosophers affirm objectively organicall though not efficiently and formally Sir I am sure no wise man talks thus and if Philosophers do its time we left them c. R. B. When you once begin to say you are sure and no wise man is against you I begin to think you talk more ignorantly than when you seem to doubt I will not prophane a point so little understood by you and so much scorned as to dispute it with you Enjoy your ignorance and scorn Sect. 74. E. B. Lastly When truth is to be examined and the nature of a thing strictly to be considered do not argue against it from some ill consequence as what you desperately urge against the Scriptures being a perfect Rule which foundation of faith and practice you labour to overthrow by tragically infisting on the consequences that will follow Sir this in the end will be found perfect folly and madness therefore leave it in time lest the Lord reprove you and you be found a lyar R. B. 1. Alas That your Pen could write the last word without the more prevalent rebuke of your Conscience After so many Untruths yea and when in the same paragraph you are renewing the same sin in saying I deny the Scripture to be a perfect Rule when I still say It is a perfect Rule so far as it is a Rule 2. If you intend sense and truth your argument must run thus He that saith the Scripture is not a particular Rule commanding the thing in particular but only a General Rule for the Metre and Tunes of Psalms for the dividing of it self into Chapters and Verses for the hour and place of meetings for the choice of a Text to preach on and words and method of Sermon and Prayer for the naming or determining the Person that shall be a Pastor for the form of Pulpits Tables Cups c. yea for the making of a Clock or Watch or Hour-glass to measure the time by or for building the House to preach in c. He that saith these are not determined of particularly in Scripture but only under the General Rule of doing all things to Gods Glory to Edification decently and in order c. this man doth deny Scripture to be a perfect Rule and laboureth to overthrow the foundation of faith and practice and proveing what he saith by the ill consequences that else will follow will in the end be found in perfect folly and madness reproved by God and found a lyar But such a one is R. B. Therefore c. Reader if this be sound doctrine if after all Gods warnings of the danger of Levity and Ignorant pride thou canst yet receive such errors and revilings as a defence of the foundation thy case also is to be lamented 3. When Def. par 1. pag. 98 c. I had fully described the opinion which I rejected and had given in fifteen reasons against it what doth this easie confident Disputer but instead of offering an answer to any one of them calls it perfect folly and madness so to confute it by ill consequences Doth this disputing satisfie any sober enquirer after truth Doth he not reproach his followers in the eye of the world about him while he thus openly seemeth to expect that they will rest in such reasonings or replyes as these And really if we prove against the Papists that though they directly deny not Christ and his Office yet that such Consequents will follow upon divers of their errors will this man that talketh so much of Antichristianism say that it is perfect folly and madness to charge such consequents upon them If I prove that any opinion doth consequentially deny God or the souls immortality or subvert all our faith do I deserve no better an answer than that this is my perfect folly and madness and I shall be proved a lyar What need is there of learning reason sobriety or modesty to enable any man to dispute and seem Orthodox at this rate Sect. 75. E. B. You may see by this brief taste how easie it is for me to defend my self R. B. O wonderful blinding power of self-conceit Sect. 76. E. B. p. 21. It is not a lessening of your Reputation that I mainly aim at much less at the advancing of my own upon the ruine of yours But I thought the truth of Christ worth my vindicating And when I saw that your name did stand in the way of it The whole design of this Letter is as to others to perswade all to look upon you not only as a fallible but a mistaken man R. B. I have long ago done wondering that such men as you can deliberately choose and use such means when once they have dared to intitle God and his Glory to their false doctrines For what is it that they will not think lawful to do for God and Truth If some serve him by killing his servants no