places And if the order which Christ hath left in his Church be so vyle in Mr B. eyes in comparison of his vnorderly preaching what can he say for his Lords the Bishops which for the orders devised by themselves by their forefathers of Rome thrust out of so many Churches the ordinance of preaching A man would think Mr B. zeal should find room enough at home and in his owne Church and not thus pursue beyond the â—â—as a poore company of despised and dispersed people But to the very poynt which Mr B. drives at There is not one scripture alledged by him which iustifyes the preaching of the gospell out of a true much lesse in a false constitution They do all and every one of them necessarily presuppose the same howsoever he would separate the things which God hath ioyned together Take one for example and that such a one as he makes a pillar in his building It is written and so by him alledged Psa. 147. 19. 20. He shewed his word vnto Iacob his statutes and his iudgments vnto Israell He hath not so dealt with every nation c. Here sayth Mr B. the Lord preferrs his word before a constitution as a testimony of his speciall love But vntruly For in this very place the Lord prefers a constitution before his word statutes and iudgments as the cause why he gave them For wherefore did the Lord shew his word vnto Iaakob his statutes iudgments vnto Israel but because of their constitution that is because Israel was the Lords peculiar people separated from all other nations and received by the Lord into covenant as no other nation was Lev. 26. â—4 14. Exod. 19. 5. 6. Deut. 19. 10. 11. 12. c. with RoÌ„ 3. 2. 9. 4. Act. 2. 39. 3. 23. how profanely soever this man doth debase and vilify the true constitution of the Church which he is like never to enioy as Esau did the byâ—thright wherewith the Lord never meant to honour him Gen. 2â— 32. 33. And amongst other debasements of the constitution of the Church he affirmeth pag 55. that though an orderly proceeding ought to be had yet that at no hand for want therof preaching ought to be left of to this end pag. 53. and 54. he violently haleth into the same guilt with himselfe the brethren of the dispersion Act. 8. 1. 4. 12. whom he chargeth in preaching the word not to have stood vpâ—n every speciall poynt in entering so orderly vnto the work But as theyr enterance was most orderly for that being of a true constituted Church at Ierusalem dispersed by persequution they published the gospel in every place where they came as any member of the Church may do as grace is ministred and occasion offered so is it on the otherside a Babylonish presumption for any man vnder any praetence whatsoever to enterprise the preaching of the gospell or any other work disorderly The Apostle speaking especially of prophecying expresly commaunds that all things be done according to order how then dare any petty Pope or proctor of Babylon dispence with or plead for disorder in this or any other ministration in the Church The last and highest degree of our vncharitablenes he reckons this that we are sorry and envious that the good things of God do prosper with them that the more religious men be in their way the more are we greived and to this end he pretends Mr Barrowes abusing and scoffing at the graces of God and holy exercises in such persons As we hold our selves bound to acknowledge all good things in all men and to honour them accordingly 1 Pet. 2. 17. So must I here demaund of Mr B. as another hath done before me what those good things are which so prosper Onely the Prelates prosper in the kingdome who with theyr ceremonious hornes canons beat batter down all that stands in their way Of their prosperity against the truth we are sory but not envious being taught not to envy the works of iniquity considering what suddayn and certayne desolation shall fall vpon them Psal. 37. 9. 10. And by the way where Mr B. takes it for graunted that the reformists are the most religious in the way of the Church of England it is cleane otherwise The most absolute Formalists most strict vrgers of conformity are the most religious in the way of the Church of England And as for the reformists theyr zeale to speak as the truth is and as shall hereafter more fully be manifested is not in nor for the way of the Church of England but a by path from it which the Church of England considered in the formall constitution of it accounteth schism and rebellion but rather the same way in effect which we walk if they were true to theyr own grounds and durst practise what they have professed in theyr supplications and admonitions to the Prince and Parliament other their vnder hand passages wherein they do playnly condemn the Prelacy for Antichristian the service book as superstitious the mixture of all sortes of people as confused and so of the rest And this Mr B. iustifyeth the obiections which you would so gladly prevent pag. 57. made by your brethreÌ„ in the faith for so are the worst of them the prophane and secure worldlings and Athiests that men paynfull and conscionable in their Ministery and lives do breed and further as you speak Brownistes and Brownisme For proof hereof I will here insert a few things written published both in former and latter tymes by such men as I dare say Mr B. reckens amongst the painefull conscionable Ministers Their words are these We have an Antichristian Popish ordering of Ministers strange froÌ„ the word of God never heard of in the primitive Church but taken out of the Popes shop to the destruction of Gods kingdome 2. Adm. to the Parl. The names and offices of Archbishops Archdeacons Lordbishops c. are together with their goverment drawen out of the Popes shop Antichristian divelish and contrary to the scriptures Parsons Uicars Parish Preists Stipendaryes c. be byrds of the same fether 2. Admo to the Parliament The callings of Archbishops Bishops with all such be raâ—â—er members and parts of the whore and strumpet of Rome then of the pure Uirgin and spouse of the immaculate Lamb. Mr Ch. Serm. vpon Rom. 12. The calling of Bishops and Archbishops do onely belong vnto the Kingdome of Antichrist Discovery of D. Ban. slaunders pag. â—0 Our Diocesan and Provinciall Churches vsing Diocesan and Provinciall goverment and officers are contrary to Gods word and simply vnlawfull Mr Iakob for reformation Ass 1. There is no true visible Church of Christ but a particular congregation onely Christian Offer Prop. 4. Every true visible Church of Christ or ordinary assembly of the faithfull hath by Christs ordinance power in it selfe imediately vnder Christ to elect to ordayne deprive and depose theyr Ministers and to
〈…〉 and it haâ—h the being from them The 2. I gather from Mr B. own graunt where treating of the causes and properties of the Church he makes the true matter such as professe Christ Iesus their onely saviour and the form to be the vniting of men to God and one to another visibly Now except he will say which God forbid that none may make profession of faith and be vnited to Christ without officers he cannot deny but there may be and so be called a Church without them For all vnited vnto Christ the head are members of the body which is the Ch and so the whol assembly ioyntly considered is an whole and entyre body and Church So that to deny an ordinary assembly or communion of Christians to be a Christian Church is an vnchristian opinion And here I entreat the indifferent reader to consider whether these mens wayes be equall or no. When we deny their assemblies to be true visible Churches though they consist for the most part of prophane and vngodly persons vnder the government of a Provinciall or Diocesan Bishop and the Ministery of a dumb or prophane Preist as the most do to which also the best is subiect within one moneth they complayn of vs as most injurious detracters and yet will not they acknowledge any assembly of faithful holy people onely if vnfurnished for a time of officers to be a true Church or capable of that denomination But let not the harts of Gods servants be discouraged he is no accepter of mens persons he hath not tyed his power and presence to any order or office in the world but accepted of them that feare him and work righteousnes hating the assemblyes of the wicked and all their sacrifices Vpon this point I haue insisted the longer partly because it is the ground of the other truthes to be handled in their places and partly in detestation of the vnsufferable pryde of this Prelacy and Preisthood which will have the very life of all Churches to hang on the breath of their nostrels yea I may safely say on their lusts if they dy yea or forsake their charges in never so fleshly respects their Churches are dissolved at least during the vacancy and so the brethren dismembred from being of the visible body of Christ. But so far are the officers from being the formall cause of the Church as is intended as they are in truth no absolutely necessary appurtenance vnto it The power indeed to enioy them is an essentiall property seated in the body which may braunch out it self as God gives fit means into officers accordingly which if they prove unfruitful it may also accordingly lop or break off And so farr is the Holy Ghost from giving countenance to this opinion that the Officers make the Church as when he speakes distinctly of the body and officers and considers them severally he calls the body the Church excluding the Elders as appeares in these amongst many oâ—her scriptures Act. 14. 23. 15. 4. and 20. 17. 28. 1 Tim. 3. 5. 15. And the reason is because the Church is essentially in the saincts as the matter subject formed by the coverâ—ant unto which the officers are but adjuncts not making for the being but for the welbeing of the Church and furtherance of her fayth by their service The second poynt now comes to be manifested which is that two or three faythful persons joyned unto the Lord in the fellowship of the Gospel have immediate interest to Christ in all his ordinances Now least any should stumble at these words two or three ioyned or gathered together as it seems Mr. B. would hereby take advantage to discountenance so small a number it must be coÌ„sidered that two or three thus gathered together have the same right with two or three hundred Neyther the smallnes of the number nor meannes of the persons can prejudice their right When the Lord did chose one nation from all other nations he chose the smallest amongst them fewest in number And though now Christ have opened a way for all nations yet is it a narrow way and which few finde especially in the first planting or replanting of Churches of which Christ speaks most properly in which regard also he likens the the kingdome of heaven or Church to a grain of mustard-feed which is the least of all seeds but yet hath vertue in it to bring forth a tree in whose boughes the birds of heaven may build their nests And against this exception of discouragement Christ himself hath provided a coÌ„fortable remedie in speaking expresly of two or three to whom he hath given his power and promised his presence Now for the poynt it self the truth whereof is sufficiently manifested by that which hath been â—ormerly layed down If a company of faythfull people though without officers be the true Ch. and body of Christ and Israel of God then to that company apperteynes the covenants of promise the oracles of God are committed untothem and to them are given his word statutes and iudgments so they may freely enjoy them amongst themselves in the order by Christ prescribed without any forreyn Ministers for Mediators II. They that have received Christ have received the power of Christ and his whole power for Christ and his power are not devided nor one part of his power from another But every company or communion of faythful people have received Christ. Ioh. 1 12. Rom. 8. 32. Isa. 9. 6. and with him power and right to enjoy him though all the world be against it in al the meanes by which he doth communicate himself unto hiâ— Church III. When the Scriptures would give us to understand the near union betwixt Christ and his Church and the free and full title which he hath given her in himself and all his most rich and pretious benefits they do teach the same by resemblances of most streight and immediate conjunction as of that between the vine and the branches the head and the body the husband and the wise and so as the branches do receive and draw the sap and juice immediately from the vine and as the body receiveth sense and motion from the head immediately and as the wife hath immediate right to and interest in her husbands both person and goods for her use though she may and ought to use the service of her husbands and own servants as they can be had for convenient purposes so hath every true visible Church of Christ direct â—nd immediate interest in and title to Christ himselfe and the whole new Testament every ordinance of it without any vnnaturall monstrous and adulterous interposition by any person whatsoever betwixt the vyne and the branches the head and the body the husband the wife which are Christ and his Church though but two or three gathered together in his name as hath formerly been manifested If all things be the Churches even the ministers
Church though cast out for notorious wickednes for many of them hold these mayn truthes and many more yea more then Mr B. himself doth Then is the true matter of the world and lims of the Divell for such are all wicked persons whatsoever truth they professe Ioh. 8. 44. and 15. 19. Rom. 6. 16 2 Tim. 2. 26. 1 Ioh. 3. 8. 12. true matter and members of the Church They that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts of â—â— Gal. 5. 24. therfore persons visibly wicked are not visibly Christs and so not visibly or in respect of men true matter of the Church or members of his body That which destroyes the Church makes it become eyther a false Church or no Church at all cannot make a true Church or be the true matter whereof it is made for these things are contrary But wicked men whatsoever they professe in word make the Church a Synagogue of Sathan and very Babylon which is an habitation of Divils and hold of all foul spirits Rev. 18. 2. provokes God to remove the candle-stick that is to dischurch a people and to spew them out of his mouth Rev. 2. 5. and 3. 16. Mr B. had need be a skilful workman which can make a true Ch of Christ of that matter which makes the true Churches planted by the Apostles themselves eyther false or no Churches at all They which are true visible matter of the Church or true visible christians have Christ for their King visibly or in outward appearance and so far as men can judge for by visible we mean that which may be seen of men opposed to invisible which onely God seeth for Christ is not devided but look to whom he is a Preist to save them a Prophet to teach theÌ„ to the same persons he is also a K. to reign rule over them but he is not a King to any ungodly ones neyther doth he but Satan and their lusts reign over them If profession in word with a wicked conversation make true matter of the Church then an apparantly a flat contradiction a known sinne that which makes men more abhominable makes them true matter of the Church For he that sayth he hath fellowship with God or beleeves in Christ and yet walkes in darknes doth ly and doth not truely 1 Ioh. 1. 6. He that professeth Christ to be his saviour and doth wickednes contradicts himself for Christ is not a saviour of the wicked sinns against the 4. coÌ„mandement in taking Gods name in vayn Other reasons might be brought for the â—â—iction of this soul prophane errour for truth vnanswerable for nuÌ„ber sufficieÌ„t to make a volume but these may suffice for the present some other I will intermingle as occasion shal be offered in the examination of that which Mr B. brings for the confirmation of his assertion For which end he sets down 4. Reasons The sum of the three first is thus much viz that Christ his Apostles preaching the gospell such as beleeved the same and made profession of it and of their faith were without stay or let received into the Church as true matter We are as farr from denying this order of gathering Churches as you are from enjoying it Mr B you needed not to have made three distinct proofs of this which no man denyes nor to have brought so many scriptures as you do for the confirmation of that which wee graunt with you and practise without you But herein you deceive the simple reader in that you separate and disioyn those things which then were and alwayes should be ioyned together and they are faith and repentance These two ioyntly did Christ himself preach and Iohn Baptist before him and the Apostles after him and these two were preached to and required of every one both man and woman which was admitted into the Church Mat. 3. 2. 6. Mark 1. 15. Act. 19. 4. Luke 13. 3. 5. 24. 47. Act. 2. 28. 8. 37. 19. 18. But now bycause faith repentance are inward graces resydeing in the hart and known to God alone which knoweth the hart and that the profession and confession of them are the ordinary meanes by which these hidden and invisible graces are manifested made visible vnto men there was no cause but they which made this profession to men in sincerity so far as men could judge should by men be deemed and acknowledged for true members of Christ and fit matter for the Lords house And so if by any other means men manifested themselves to have fayth and holynes wrought in them though they made neyther profession of faith nor confession of sinnes yet were they and so ought to be intitled and admitted to the liberties of the Church as appeareth Act. 10. 44. 46. 47. And vppon this very ground also it is that the children of the faithfull are of the Church and baptised though they make no profession of faith at all bycause the scriptures declare them to be within the gratious covenant of Gods mercy and love and vnder the promises of the gospel and so by vs to be reputed holy Gen. 6. â— 17. 7. 8. 9. 10. Deut. 29. 10. 11. 12. 13. Act. 2. 39. Rom. 11. 16. 1 Cor. 7. 14. so that it is not for the profession of faith ex opere operate or bycause the party professing vtters so many words that he is to be admitted into the Church but bycause the Church by this his profession and other outward appearances doth probably in the judgement of charity which is not causlesly suspitious deem him faithfull and holy in deed as in shew he pretendeth But that a man of a known lewd conversation appearing still to remain in his sinne whatsoever in word he professeth should be received into the Church out of which he ought to be cast though he were one of it or should have baptism administred vnto him which is as Mr B. rightly confirms from the scriptures the seale of the forgivenes of sinns of new birth of salvation being judged not to have the forgivenes of sinns nor to be born a new nor to be in the estate of salvation were a most desperate and prophane practise then which I know not whither the Divel hath brought any other into the Church more derogatory to Gods glory or prejudiciall to mans salvation This were to make the way of the kingdome of heaven broad enough by which al the Atheists in the world might enter into the Church and certaynly would every one of them if the Magistrate should vse his compulsive power as it is in Engl at this day yea a parrat might be taught to say over so many words yea the Divel himself though he were known so to be would not stick for his advantage to vtter them and so might be true matter for Mr Ber Church The material templi was to be built onely of
so many times been driven to so grosse absurdities by a consequence or two about this cause as he vtterly abhorrs the very memory of all coÌ„sequences it seems would have it enacted that never consequence should be more vrged To conclude whatsoever it pleaseth this man to suggest the mayne grounds for which we stand touching the coÌ„munion government ministery and worship of the visible Church are expresly conteyned in the scriptures and that as we are perswaded so plainly that as like Habbakuks vision he that runnes may read them The 4. guesse against vs is That we have not the approbation of any of the reformed Churches for ouâ— course and that where our Confession of faith is without allowance by them they give on the contrary the right hand of fellowship to the Church of England This is the same in substance with the first instance of probability and that which foloweth in the next place the same with them both And Mr Bern. by his so ordinary pressing vs with humane testimonies shewes himself to be very barren of divine authority as hath bene truely noted by another Nature teacheth every creature in all daunger to fly first and oftenest to the chief instruments eyther of offence or defence wherin it trusteth as the But to his horne the Bore to his tusk and the byrd vnto her wing right so this man shewes wherein his strength lies and wherein he trusts most by his so frequent and vsuall shaking the horne and whetting the tusk of mortall mans authority against vs. But for the reformed Churches the truth â—s they neyther do imagine no nor wil easily be brought to beleeve that the frame of the Church of England stands as it doth neyther have they any mind to take knowledge of those things or to enter into examination of them The approbation which they give of you as Mr A. hath observed as indeed it is of speciall observation is in respect of such generall truthes of doctrine as wherein we also for the most part acknowledge you which notwithstanding you deny in a great measure in the particulars and practise But touching the gathering governing of the Church which are the mayn heads coÌ„troverted betwixt you vs they give you not so much as the left haÌ„d of fellowship but do on the contrary turne their backs vpon you The difference betwixt you and them in the gathering and constituting of Churches is as great as betwixt copulsive conformity vnto the service book and ceremonyes which is your estate and voluntary submission vnto the gospell by which all every member of them is ioyned to the Church and as is betwixt the reigne of one Lord Bishop over many Churches and the government of a Presbytery or company of Elders over one And if you would take viewe of this difference nearer home do but cast your eyes to your next neyghbours of Scotland there you shall see the most zealous Christians chusing rather to loose liberty country and life then to stoop to a far more easy yoke then you bear Yea what need I send you out of your owne horizon The implacable mortall hatred the Prelates bear vnto the Ministers and people wishing the government and Ministery receaved in the reformed Churches proclaymes aloud the vtter emnity betwixt them your vnreformed Church of England of which I pray you hear with patience what some of your own have testified Those that will needs be our Pastors and spirituall fathers are become beasts as the Prophet Ieremy sayth And if we should open our mouthes to sue for the true shepheards and overseers indeed vnto whose direction we ought to be committed the rage of these wolves is such as this endeavour would almost be the price of our lives And do these Churches like sisters go hand in hand together as is pretended Now for vs where Mr B. affirmeth that wee published our confession but without allowance if I saw not his frowardnes in the things he knowes I should marvayl at his bouldnes in the things whereof he is ignorant we published the confessioÌ„ of our fayth to the Christian Vniversityes in the low countryes and els where entreating them in the Lord eyther to convince our errours by the word of God if so any might be found or if our testimony in theyr iudgments agreed with the same word to approve it eyther by wryting or silence as they thought good Now what Vniversity Church or person amongst them hath once enterprized our conviction which without doubt some would have done as with such haeretiques or schismatiques as arise amongst them had they found cause Thus much of the learned abroad in the next place Mr B. drawes vs to the learned at home from whose dislike of vs he takes his fifth Likelyhood which he thus frameth The condemnation of this way by our divinâ—s both living and dead against whom either for godlynes of life or truth of doctrine otherwise theâ— for being theyr opposites they can take no exception No mervayl we may not admit of partyes for iudges how is it possible we should be approved of them in the things wherein we witnes against them And if this Argument be good or likely then is it likely that neyther the reformists have the truth in the Church of England nor the Prelates for there are many and those both godly and learned which in their differences do oppose and that very vehemently the one the other Now as for myne owne part I do willingly acknowledge the learning godlynes of most of the persons named by Mr B. do honour the very memory of some of them so do I neyther think theÌ„ so learned but they might erre nor so godly but in their error they might reproch the truth they saw not I do indeed confesse to the glory of God and myne owne shame that a long tyme before I entered this way I took some tast of the truth in it by some treatises published in iustificatioÌ„ of it which the L. knoweth were sweet as hony vnto my mouth and the very principall thing which for the tyme quenched all further appetite in me was the over-valuation which I made of the learning and holynes of these and the like persons blushing in my selfe to have a thought of pressing one hayr bredth before them in this thing behynde whom I knew my selfe to come so many miles in all other things yea and even of late tymes when I had entered into a more serious consideration of these things and according to the measure of grace received serched the scriptures whether they were so or no and by searching found much light of truth yet was the same so dimmed and overclouded with the contradictions of these men and others of â—he like note that had not the truth been in my heart as a burning fyre shut vp in my bones Ier. 20. 9. had never broken those bonds of â—lesh and blood wherein I was so
of it out of Antichristianism or Paganisme out of Babylon Egypt Sodome spiritually or civily so called or out of any other society or Synagogue which is not the true visible body of Christ must be is constituted and compact of good onely not of good evill The Lords field is sowen onely with good seed vers 24. 27. 38. his vyne noble and all the seed true his Church saynts and beloved of God all and every one of them though by the mallice of Satan and negligence of such as should keep this field vineyard house of God adulterate seed and abominable persons may be foysted in yea and suffred also which the scriptures affirm and we deny not But our exceptioÌ„ in this case is first that the Church of England was never truely gathered the Church of England I say that that is the National Church consisting of the Provinciall Churches and those of the Diocesan Churches and the Diocesans of the Parochyall Churches according to their parish precincts with their governours government correspondent That there were true visible Churches in the land gathered out of Paganism at the first I will not deny but that ever the whole Land in the body of it was a Church is an affirmatioÌ„ of them which consider not what is eyther the matter whereof or the manner how the Church of the new Testament is to â—e gathered 2. Graunt that the way of the kingdom of Christ the Church were now so wyde that a whol nation might walk a brest in it and that England had been some times that Canaan the holy land wherein none vncircumcised person dwelt yet in the apostasy of Antichrist it could not be so accounted but was in the body of it divorced froÌ„ Christ with Rome whereof it was a member except you Mr B. will affirm as many do that Rome remaines still a true visible Church and that antichristianism is true Christianism Antichristians true Christians the body which hath the Pope the head the true body of Christ so except the Church of Engl. had been sowen with good seed without tares since that general apostasie it cannot be the L. field The Iewes were forbidden by God vnder the law to sow their field with divers seeds and will he sow his own feyld with divers yea with coÌ„trary seeds wheat tares What husbandman is eyther so foolish or carles as to sow his field with tares wheat together And yet this fair field of Engl of whose beauty all the Christian world is enamoured is so sowen this pleasant orchyard so plaÌ„ted this â—lourishing Ch so gathered A few kernels of wheat scattered amoÌ„gst the tares here there a few good plants amoÌ„gst the wilde branches a smal strinkling of good meÌ„ amoÌ„gst the great retchles rowt of wicked graceles persons And was this field sowen this orchard planted this Church gathered by the Lords hand And as was the root so are the branches as were the first fruits so is the whole lump To conclude this point thus I reason The Lords field is sowen with good seed onely though tares may in time be conveyed into it by the Divels mallice and mans negligence But the Engl nationall Ch was not so sowen but with tares wheat together Therefore it is not the Lords field And thus I hope the indifferent reader wil easily see what succour Mr B. findes amoÌ„gst those tares under whose shadow he would so fayne shrowd all the Atheists Papists other flagitious persons in the Church Now for the Parable of the draw net Mat. 13. I confesse the bad fishes may be wicked persons in the Church but undiscerned as fishes vnder the water between which the good no difference is seen If the fishers and they that drew the netts did know of the bad fishes in them and had meanes of voyding them they would never burden themselves and the nett with them except you will have as foolish fishermen here as you had husbandmen before but till they do discern them to be as they are they must take theÌ„ as they hope they are though with you all be fish that come to the net yea good fish too till the CoÌ„missaries court judge otherwise And lastly to your saying wel it were that all were saints but that is to look for a heaven vpon earth I answer that the Church is heaven vpon earth and if you were not a straunger to the true Church and to such scriptures as speaks of it you should find as in many other places so espetially in the Revelation the Church visible oft dignifyed with the name of heaven and with no name oftener Yea to seek no further then these two parables brought in by you to speak against heaven that is against the true natural coÌ„stitutioÌ„ conservatioÌ„ of the visible Church Christ himself that with his own mouth gives the Church no worse name then heaven and the kingdom of heaveÌ„ the onely ordinary beaten way which Christ hath left to heaven in heaven is heaven on earth which way soever you please to guide men The sixth insimulation against vs is that we hold That the power of Christ that is authority to preach to administer the sacraments and to exercise the Censures of the Church belongeth to the whole Church yea to every one of them and not to the principall mâ—bers thereof If Mr B. were but as able to confute vs by just reason as he is willing to bring vs into hatred by unjust and odious accusations we should then have as much cause to feare his skill as now we have to complayn of his mallice Onely herein his skill is to be commended that where he findes not our opinions such as he thinks wil be disliked by the simple multitude he makes theÌ„ such and so deales against them Here come in many things of great weight to be discussed and although it were in it self the readyest way to reduce things to some heads and so to prosequute them in order yet since I have taken this task vpon me to trace Mr B. in the particulars therfore I purpose to follow him step by step notwithstanding all his vnorderly wandrings and excursions And first Mr B. charging vs with errour for giving authority to preach minister the sacraments excercise the censures to the whole Church and not to the principall members thereof playnely insinuates that the authority to do all these things amongst them is in the principall members of the Church But the truth is otherwise in the parish Church of Worksop and in all other the parish Churches in the land You have one onely member that hath power and that vnder the ordinary to any of these things and that your self the parrish Priest though perhaps the parish clerk may by speciall indulgence be licensed to bury the dead Church women read service on light holy dayes and do some such like drudgery in your absence But
for the exercising of the censures that belongs not to the whole body or to any member thereof principall or lesse principall but to the Bishops and his substitute which are forreyners and strangers as in theyr office from the true Church so even in theyr persons from yours All your portion in the censures Mr B. is to do the exequutioners office when the Officiall hath played the iudge which if you should be so bold as to refuse besydes the punishment of your contumacy the Church doore would do your office for the bull of excommunication hanged vp there by the sumner byndes the offenders both in heaven earth And for the position it self howsoever we do indeed maynteyne the most of the particulars against which Mr B. intends his refutation yet as he sets it down we do vtterly disclayme it with all the errors in it First for teaching in the Church we do not vse it promiscuously nor suffer it to be vsed but according to the order as we are perswaded which Christ and his Apostles have prescribed And for the sacraments the contrary to that which you affirme is to be seene of all men in our confession of fayth wherein it is held that no sacraments are to be administred vntill Pastors or Teachers be ordayned in theyr office neyther have we practised otherwise And this Mr B. knew when he writ this book as well as our selves Thirdly touching the censures we do expresly confesse that the power as to receive in so to cut of any member is given to the whole body together of every christian congregation and not to any one member a pâ—â—t or to more members sequestâ—ed from the whole vsing the mâ—etest member for the pronouncing the censures And answerable to our profession is our practise with what conscience then or credit Mr B can father vpon vs those bastardly runnagaâ—es let God men iudge These things being thus the vntruthes which he sayth we build vpon this opinion are his and not ours as the groundwork is his so is the whol building raysed from it But touching interpretation of scripture by private brethren and pollution by sinn vnreformed in the Church separation from it for the same we shall speak in their places Onely I desyre it may be observed that rather then Mr B. will forbeare to accuse vs that we hold it lawfull for one person to excommunicate the whole Church he will back this most odious calumniation with as fond and false an assertion and that is that separating from a Church and excommunicating of it is all one in substance though called lesse odiously But the contrary is manifested by these two reasons First excommunication is a sentence judiciall presupposing ever a solemn and superiour power over the party sentenced but no such thing is inferred vpon separation 2. Excommunication is onely of them which are within and of the Church but separation may be from them without And I would know of Mr B. whither a person though never so meane might not separate from the assemblies of Pagans Turkes Iewes Papists other haeretiques and Idolaters I hope he would not draw such a man within his separatists schism yet for the same person to excoÌ„municate such an assembly were a sinful prophanation of Gods ordinance And though we held as we do nothing lesse that one man might excommunicate the whole Church yet were it not more as you affirm then your Church allowes to any Bp. in Engl. no nor so much by a thousaÌ„d parts for one Bishop with you may excommunicate a thousand Churches every Diocesan Bishop all the Churches in his Dioces the two Provincial Bishops theyr two Provinces so livelyly do the reverend fathers the Bishops resemble the holy father the Pope which may judge all men but be judged by none The next collection made agaynst us is that we hould that two or three gathered together must be a Church which hath the whole power of Christ and may preseÌ„tly make them officers vse the discipline of Christ. No such hast Mr B. of making officers presently we make no dumb Ministers neyther dare we admit of any man eyther for a teaching or governing Elder of whose ability in prayer prophecying debating of Church matters we have not had good experience before he be so much as nominated to the office of an Elder amoÌ„gst vs remeÌ„bring alwayes the deep charge of the Apostle to lay hands suddeynly on man nor to be partakers of other mens sums But this we hold and affirm that a company consisting though but of two or three separated from the world whither vnchristian or antichristian and gathered into the name of Christ by a covenant made to walk in all the wayes of God knowen vnto them is a Church and so hath the whole power of Christ. And for the clearing of this truth I will propound and so prove by the scriptures these two heads 1. First that a company of faithfull people thus covenanting together are a Church though they be without any officers amoÌ„g them coÌ„ntrary to that your Popish opinioÌ„ here insinuated els where expressed that a company is no where in all the new testament called a Church Christian familyes excepted but when they have theyr officers and that otherwise they are called beleevers Disciples but not a Church but onely by anticipation as heaven and earth are so called before they were Gen. â— 1. that the officers give theÌ„ the denominatioÌ„ of a Church 2. That this company being a Church hath interest in all the holy things of Christ within amongst theÌ„selves immediately vnder him the head without any forreyn ayd assistance Of which holy things in particular we shall consider as they come in our way These two grounds by the grace of God I will prove in order and for the confirmation of the former take these reasons The first is gathered from the authours owne words that a coÌ„pany of holy persons without officers are called beleevers disciples but not a Church which is all one as if he sayd that a Church is not called a Church for the word Church is no more then a coÌ„pany or assembly howsoever gathered together and so a set company of visible beleevers must needs be a constituted visible Church and to manifest the vanity of that distinction that one place shall serue Act. 11. 26. where in the same verse the same persons are called the Church Disciples and Christians Two or three or more people making Peters confession Math. 16. are the Church But two or three or more may make this confession without officers Therefore such a company is a Ch The former proposition is evident by that promise Christ made to build his Church vpon the rock of Peters confession The second namely that men without officers may professe their faith is without question except we will hold that without officers no men can
tvvo former orders vvhich are Apostles and Prophets are ceased as being temporary how can there be superioritie in the third which is but one Your third and fourth Argument you draw from the superioritie ordayned by God in the old testament amongst ecclesiasticall persons and the consequence of this Argument you prove two wayes first bycause this order is not forbidden in the new testament 2. bycause the ground of superiority is alike in the new testament as in the old which is to preserve order But do you not consider Mr Bernard that the old testament or law is abrogated and disanulled as having the shadow of good things to come and so every order and ordinance in it which is not plainly renued by Christ in the new And where you seem to make the Chief Priests besides the high Preist a superiour order to the other formally differing it is more if I be not deceived then can be proved by the word of God I know no diversity of administrations amongst them but that any of the Priests might in their course and order offer sacrifice performe other the most solemne duties of preisthood But where you further adde that onely the high Priest did type out Christ and not the other Preists so you are much mistaken The whole preisthood of Aaron vnder which the law was established was a type of Christs Preisthood though the high Preists in a speciall manner and their sacrifices of his and being a part of the law which was a shadow or first draught whereof the gospel is the lively portrature it must needs be ceremoniall and so a type to affirm otherwise is a grosse Iewish errour Lastly as I graunt one end of the subordination of Ministeries to have been the preserving of order so I deny that same order is to be preserved in the nevv testament and in the old The order of the old testament was the order of a nationall Church but the order of the new testament is the order of a particular Church wherein there needs no such subordination of Ministeries as in the other which was nationall the ey of common sense sees this difference The law of nature whether written in the hart of man or to be seen in the workmanship of the world from which you draw your fift Argument doth not prove superioritie amongst officers in a particular assembly but onely that there must be government in all societies which may well be though the governours be of one order and rank Lastly they against whom you deale doe mainteyne as you say an inequality in their government in making the Pastor superiour to the Teacher c. and if they do so why deal you against them and why do you labour so carefully to prove against them their own practise to be lawful though if they had not better warrāt then you bring they were ill bestead But this is the point Mr B. which you never touch do they which hold two kindes of officers teaching and governing Elders or they which hold three orders Pastors Teachers and governing Elders eyther of them both hold such a superioritie as gives the superiour jurisdiction over the inferiour Ministers do they make a Bishop of Bishops or a sheepheard over a flock of sheepheards or do they set vp any such ravenous creature as devours the liberty and power both of the people and other officers as your Bishops do even as the leane and evill favoured kyne which Ioseph saw in his dreame ate vp the fat kyne and welfavoured And for the erroneous exposition of Luke Luk. 22. 25. 26. by D. Downame and D. Dove of which you boast it hath been confuted both before and since they gave it Now howsoever I purpose not the refutation of every particular in Mr B. second volume which he might have drawen into as few lynes well nigh as he hath done leaves had he not rather desired to have vttered many words then many things yet seing how he labours even till sweating to trouble the mindes of his young students and seely countrymen especially about the government discipline of the Church not caring how absurd expositions of scriptures he admits of nor how contrary one vnto an other so he may weaken the faith of any that way I will not therefore altogether hold off myne hand but will open as I goe his vnsound dealing in this case especially about Mat. 18. 15. 16. 17. which he will no way have meant of the piscipline or censures of the Church the order of proceeding therein but that Christs meaning there is to direct the Iewes how to prosecute their suits in matter of injury before the heathenish Magistrates And this he labours p. 218. 219. and so on to prove by many obiections answers yet as borrowed from other mens books so put out as other mens sayings that by this meanes he himself may avoyd some part of that iust hatred by the better sort of people which he knowes will ly vpon this odious and vngodly glosse First then Mr Bernard graunts pag. 212. that Christ hath left a government in his Church and so consequently an order for the censuring of offenders and he accounts the contrary opinion but a familisticall conceipt and yet this truth he cannot let passe without some vntruth at the end of it and therefore he addes that to this familisticall conceipt the seely Brownists are drawn by force of their own grounds which are because they will have all in the Church to be voluntary professours where voluntarynes is taken away by being vnder any government to be subiect ruled is an estate far frō freedome Christians loose thereby Christian liberty c. And say in good sooth Mr B. would you haue men vnvoluntary professours against their wills their profession must eyther be voluntary with their wills or vnvoluntary and against them Noah prophesying the calling of the Gentiles of Iaphets line foretells that God will allure or perswade them to dwell in Shems tents And the scriptures do expressely affirme that the Churches were gathered by perswasion voluntary submission vnto the gospel And it is a strange thing even above wonder that any man should have preached so many yeares and written so many books about religion and yet not know that the nature of religion is not to be constreyned but perswaded And tell me Mr B. did you subscribe the last tyme vnto your Bishops government sponte ex animo according to the Canon yea or no Of if you think that to curious a quaestion answer me whether you be vnder the Kings goverment voluntarily or against your will If against your will it is a treacherous disposition in you if voluntarily or willingly how seelely then do you which are thus rife in imputing seelines vnto others argue that voluntarines is taken away by being vnder any government as though all government were tyranny and all obedience slaverie but reason why Mr
B. should thus speak know I none except it be bycause in the Church of England the Ecclesiasticall government of canonicall obedience vnto the Praelates is such as he speakes of by which Christians indeed loose Christian liberty but in the easy yoke of Christ it is not so And if Christians must be subiect to Princes in civil affaires for conscience sake then which nothing is more voluntary how much more is the subiection of the saints vnto the government of Christ most free and voluntary yea by how much more full and entyre Christs government is over the Saincts whether within or without by so much more voluntary and free is their obedience both wayes And so passe on to the thing I cheâ—â—ly intend and that is to shew that if there be a government left for the Ch and order set for the punishment of offenders by Christ the King thereof that then this 18. of Mat. is the place where that order is to be found Let Mr B that I may vse his own words Pag. 224. 225. declare where els is not a more perfect rule but any rule for it left by Christ or not any supply but any mention made els where c. The reasons now follow in the next place by which Mr B. would prove that Christ Iesus Mat. 18. 15. 16. 17. speakes not of Church admonitions and censures but of private injuries and the civil menaging of them His first reason is taken from the cohaerence of these verses with that which goes before in the Chapter where Christ admonisheth his disciples to take heed both of the offences that should be given as also of offending others True Mr B. for the meaning of Christ was not onely to prepare them against the manisold scandals and stumbling stones of offence especially in the new kingdom to which he prepared theÌ„ which Satan would cast before them every step they took eyther to turne them out of the way of life or to stop them in it but also to lay strayt charge vpon them that they for their parts cast no stumbling blocks before others admonishing them very severely neyther easily to take nor to give offence And because through pride in our selves and contempt of others we are imboldened to give offence especially to them in whom we behold any great infirmities our saviour Christ proceeds to shew what great care the Lord takes for the meanest of his and what account he makes of them teaching them all moderation and compassion towards them in their infirmities But least any should then say if it be so the best way is to let men alone in their sinnes Christ prescribes a remedy for this evill even that golden mean v. 15. 16. 17. that we should neyther be bitter or rigorous towards them to cause them to scandalize nor yet so remisse as by connivency to flatter them in their sinnes For the occasion of the words the Argument taken from it bycause the authour puts it downe not as he proves it to be but as it is thought I passe it by as one of the thoughts spoken of by the wise man in the Prov. and with it the scope which he tells vs is held to be a moderating of the Iewes passion for private iniuries offred as being both together with them the exposition also in the 4. place as being onely so many beggings of the quaestion in hand The sum of which exposition is for to relate all Mr Bernards words were too tedious that if one Iew offred an other iniury and would not satisfy him when he required it eyther privately or with a witnes or two the party iniured was to complayne to the Iewish Synedrion and if that would not serve the turne he might if he would proceed with him and bring him before the Romayn power and sue him at Caesars â—arr as if he were a publican or heathen The reasons novv to prove this interpretation follovv And the first is because Christ spake according no the tyme as Mat. 5. 23. 26. It followes not that because Christ so spake that one tyme and in that one place that therefore he so speaks here What is lesse forceable 2. As Christ in that place spake both ecclesiastically and civily as you expresly affirm so if you graunt in proportion that he speakes here both civily for injuries and ecclesiastically for sinnes you speak truth enough at the least to overthrow your self Your second and third proofs taken from Peters vnderstanding of Christ and Christs answer againe in the parable though it were no straunge thing for Peter to vnderstand that civily which Christ spake spiritually nor for Christ to reply according to the present vnderstanding do not shew that Christs speach is to be restreyned to personall iniuries the contrary shall appeare by and by And the same answer may serve to the 4. and 6. Argument The fifth Argument is taken from the propriety of speach in the text as first because Christ sayth against thee which say you shewes the offence to be private c. I graunt it and that Christ there fetches his beginning from private or rather from secret offences and sinnes which being knowen vnto one onely may by one be remitted Your second Argument is drawne from this terme brother which shewes say you that Christ meant the Iewes whom alone both the Iewes and disciples of Christ did account brethren If Christ meant onely Iewes what makes it matter if the Iewes onely were brethren that is of the Church but it is not true you say that onely Iewes were accounted brethren by the disciples of Christ at that time Christ shewes that they which beleeve and obey his words are his and so his disciples brethren as did amongst others many of the Samaritans which were no Iewes long before this time That these words thou hast gayned or wonne thy brother shew an alienation of mind in the party that doth the iniurie is idle as the former For the alienation of mind will rather be in him that hath received the injurie which a man may do of ignorance self love covetousnes or other by regards without any change of his affection towards the person injured the words in truth shew that the lost sheep is found the sinner converted The next words are let him be to thee which you tell vs shewes such a Church as the offender might not regard and so the plantiffe vnremyed might seek further If you meane by these words might not regard that he might lawfully not regard it you erre if that he might be so wicked as not to regard it is no new thing for wicked persons to disregard the Church of Christ. Your addition of dismissing to further proceeding is your owne and so I leave it to you And the reason why Christ sayth let him be to thee is bycause the brother spoken to was the first and principall in the accusation as vnder the law the accuser of the false
by the people and so vnder their excommunication is their deprivation comprehended If the Pastour and so of the rest of the Officers be a brother in the Church as all Gods children are the saynts brethren then must the Church not suffer sin to rest upon him but must admonish him and if he remaine obstinate cast him out For the Lord Iesus subjects every brother indefinitely and without respect of persons to this censure Mat. 18. 17. 1 Cor. 5. 11 12. 13. From which last scripture another Argument of the same nature may be drawn which is that if the Pastour and so of the other officers be within and not without and vnder the Lords judgement then are they under the judgement of the Church gathered together in the name of our Lord Iesus which you confesse to be the multitude yea I see not how the Pastour or officers may be admonished by the Church if they may not be cast out or how the Collossians may say to Archippus take heed to thy Ministery if they may not censure him if he be heedlesse for he that wil not heare the Church must be excommunicated or which is a description of excommunication by an effect must be accounted an heathen or publican They that are without vnder the Lords iudgement are exempted from the Churches judgments but they which are within the Church must iudge and therefore if the Ministers be within and not without and under Gods iudgements they must vndergoe the iudgements of the Church If the Pastour and the like reason is of the rest may not be excommunicated for sin by the Church then he and they want a meanes of salvation which the brethren have yâ—â— the onely folenin meanes of salvation in the case of obstinacy â—o which they are as subâ—ect as any other being frayl men as the rest And the reason is for that as the preaching of the gospell which is the one key of the kingdome is the power of God to salvation vnto them that beleeve so excommunication being the other key is the power of our Lord Iesus for the destruction of the flesh or humbling of the offender that his foule might be saved Now what a miserable priveledge this were all men truely fearing God will easily observâ—â— And for mine own part knowing mine owne infirmities and that I am subiect to sinne yea to frowardnes in sin as much as the brethren are if by mine office I should be deprived of the romedy which they enioy that blessed ordinance of the Churches conâ—ures I should think mine office accursed and my self by it as frustrating and dissappointing me of that mayn end for which the servants of Christ ought to ioyn theÌ„selves vnto the Church of Christ furnished wiâ—h his power for their reformatioÌ„ And sinâ—e the cheif thing which after the glory of God the saynts are to regard is their salvation and that their salvation is no way indangâ—red but by obstinate impenitency and that obstinate impenitency hath none other solemn ordinance for remedy but excommunication what cause of sorrow had I for the want of this soveraigne remedy and meanes of salvation by mine office which without it I might enioy As on the contrary God is my record how in the very writing of these things mâ— soul is filled with spirituall ioy that I am vnder this easy yoak of Christ the censures of the Church whereof I am and how much I am comforted in this very consideration against my vile and corrupt nature which notwithstanding I am perswaded the Lord wâ—ll never so farre suffer to rebell as that iâ— shall not be taymed subduâ—d by this strong hand of God with out which it might every day and hower so hazard my salvation That doctrine which advanceth an inferiour and meaner estate in the Church above that which is superiour the cheif that is vnsound and in deed serving in a degree for the exaltation of thâ—â— man of sinne a 〈◊〉 all that is called God But this doctrine of Mnâ—stâ— setting the Elders without and above the iudgements and censures of the Church doth advance an inferiour above a suporiour Ergo. The point then to be proved is that the order of saints or sayâ—tship in the Church is an order superiour vnto and above the order of officers or of Bishoptick or Eldership which I thus manifest 1. The order of servants is inferiour to the order of them whose servants they are But the order of Church Officers is an order of servants and they by their officâ— to 〈◊〉 the people Ergo. 2. The order of Kings is the highest order oâ—â—staâ—â— in the Church But the order of saynts is the order of Kings wee are Kings as we are saynts not as wee are officers Ergo 3. As the Apostle proves the woman to be inferiour vnto and lesse excellent then the man 1. bycause 〈◊〉 is not of thâ— woman but the woman of the manâ— and 2 bycause the man was not created for the womuns sake but the woman for the mans sake â—o by necessary consequence and iust proportion it followeth that the Elders are inferiour and lesse excellent then the Church as being both of and for the Church and not the Church of nor for them 4. As the Lord Iesus did prove against the Scribes Pharisees that the temple was greater then the gold bycause it sanctified the gold and that the altar was greater then the offering bycause it sanctifyed the offoring so by proportion the condition of a saynt which sanctifieth the condition of an officer as our generall calling doth our speciall calling is more excellent and greater then it is To our saynt-ship and as wee have fayth is promised the forgivenes of sinnes the favour of God and life eternall but not to our office or in respect of it The estate of a saynt is most happy blessed though the person never so much as come neare an office but on the contrary an officer if he be not also and first a sainct is a most wretched and accursed creature Infinite others are the reasons to disprove the pretended charter by which this popish Clergy would exempt it self from the coÌ„mon condition of Christians in the coÌ„mon Christian ordinances of the Church as though their office ate vp their brotherhood their speciall calling of officers their generall calling of Christians And I cannot more fitly resemble this exemption of one or more officers from the ecclesiasticall censures vnto which one or so many brethren are subiect being in the same sinne then to the like exemption or priveledge springing as it seemes from the same root in civill judgements coÌ„monly called The benefit of clergy For as by it a malefactour if he can read vt clericus as they speak shall escape death which others do so he should without that benefit vndergoe so by the benefit of clergy here the person
delinquent is freed froÌ„ the dint of the spirituall sword the ceÌ„sure of the Church which others do and so he should without that priveledge vndergoe as well as they Where me thinks it were more meet as that he which can read and so hath or may have greater knowledge should be the more severely punished civily so that the officers in the Church should vndergoe if it were to be found an heavier ceÌ„sure for their sinne as being both more scandalous and lesse excusable And so the Lord by Moses expresly manifests his will to be in enioyning the Preist a greater sacrifice a bullock for his sin where a goat which was lesse might serve in the like case for the suâ— of one of the people And this may well serve for a seventh reason to prove that the officers are by the law of God lyable to as deep censures for sin as the people and so the Pastour as any one of the brethren Yet for the further more full opening of the iniquity of those proud and popish exemptions and exaltations of Church officers whereof from these scriptures alledged by Mr B. and the like they boast so much and by which they affright and abuse the simple people in all places I will breifly as I can lay down certayn such different respects and relations vnder which the officers of the Church do come as being rightly vnderstood iustly applyed will give good light to the discovering of this mystery First then the officers of the Church are to be considered in respect of the thing which they minister and that is the word and revealed will of God in which regard they are infinitely above superiour vnto all men and angels and in the very stead of Christ and of God himself And in for and according to this message or ambassage of God and of Christ they are absolutely and simply to be obeyed as is the meanest officer about the King carrying with him his warrant and authority by the greatest Pere in the kingdome In the 2. place they must be considered of vs in respect of their office by vertue whereof they do administer And in this regard they are inferiour vnto the Church as being by it called to a place of ministery to serve the Church and not of Lordship to reign over it The 3. consideration they vndergoe is in regard of their persons and as they are brethren saynts christians for they cease not to be Christians bycause they are Ministers but must manifest their generall calling in their speciall partakers of the same coÌ„mon graces and subiect to the same common infirmities with the rest and in this respect they are equall with the brethren standing in need of the same meanes both for their edification and reformation and so particularly of the censures for their humiliation if they be so farre left of God as they may be and oft times are as they will not otherwise be reclaymed And I had as leiv you should tell me that bycause the Deacons are to distribute the Churches almes therfore the Church is not to releiv them though they be in daunger to starve bodily as that bycause the Elders are to minister the Churches judgmeÌ„ts none must iudge them though they be thorough impenitency in daunger to perish spiritually Now for the particulars which Mr B. obiecteth it is true the people are sheep but not the Ministers but the Lords sheep Ezech. 34. 6. 8 31. neyther are these sheep for the Ministers as the naturall sheep for their sheepheards but for the Lord and the sheepheards for them The people are indeed an house but not the officers house but the Lords house for him to dwell in Ephe. 2. 20. 21. 1 Tim. 3. 15. Secondly the people are sheep yet not vnreasonable beasts but men Ezech. 34. 31. so to be looked to by the sheepheards as they are also to look to themselves Act. 20. 28. Luk. 17. 3. They are so a house as they consist not of dead but of living stones 1 Pet. 2. 5. so built vp by the Officers as they are also to build vp themselves Iud. 20. And which is especially to be minded for the purpose in hand the officers are so sheepheards as they are also themselves sheep if they be not goates Math. 25. 37. Luk. 12. 32. Rom. 8. 36. They are so fathers as they are also brethren Mat. 23. 8. Act. 1. 16. 2 Cor. 8. â—â— yea as they are sonnes also in a sence as the Levite was in sundry respects both Michaes father and his sonne Iudg. 17. 1. 11. They are so workmen or builders as they are also part of the house Ephe. 2. 22. 2 Tim. 2. 20. so seeds-men as themselves are also seed and a part of the harvest Math. 13. 38. These distinctions rightly observed will both teach the officers how to govern and the people how to obey and both officers people how to preserve themselves and one another vnder the power of Christ given to his Church And where you demaund in this place by way of digression how a few of vs become a Church we answer in a word by coÌ„ming out of Babylon thorough the mercies of God and building our selves into a new and holy temple vnto the Lord. But where you affirm the Ministery that is the office of Ministery or the word so ministred to be the Lords onely ordinary meanes to plant Churches or to vrge men to ioyn vnto them you streyten the Lords hand and wrong his people When the woman of Samarta spake to her neighbours of Christ and called them vnto him they both beleeved and came but had you been amongst them it seemes you would have done neyther the one nor the other except a Minister had called you I confesse indeed the Churches in England were very manneâ—ly this way would not so much as forsake the Pope of Rome till their masse-priests went before them who being continued in their office did by the attractive power of King Edwards proclamation at the first and Queen Elizabeths afterward and by their statute lawes gather heir Parish Churches vnto them vnder their service book as 〈…〉 doth her chicken to be brooded vnder her wing But the â—â—formed Churches were otherwise gathered then by Popish preists continued over them the people first separating themselves from idolatry and foâ—oâ—â—ing together in the fellowship of the gospell were afterwards when they had sit men to call them into the office of Ministery and so they practised as appears in the Epistle of Melanctbon to the Teachers in Bohemia in D. Tileâ—us his answer to the Earle of Lavall and in Peter Martyr vpon the 4. of Iudges It is true indeed that the Lord Iesus sent forth his Apostles into the world for the first planting of Churches though even in their times Ch were planted men turned to the Lord by the preaching of private brethreÌ„ Act. 8. 1. 4. 11. 19. 20. 21. therefore
1 Cor. 10. 16. 17. 12. 12. 13. Thirdly if separation be lawfull from persons not receiving Christ but rayling against him then is communion vnlawfull with any assembly in the land wherein there are many which remayn in vnbeleif as their works declare Iam. 2. 20. and so receive not Christ. Ioh. 1. 12. but do on the contrary both revile and persequute him in his graces servants and ordinances howsoever for fear or fashion they be content to be accounted Christians Now for separation from Gentiles without Christ from Antichrist vnder a shew of Christ persecuting Christians as the scriptures do account of antichristianism as of haethenism in this respect calling it Babylon Sodom Aegypt spiritually and so warning the Lords people to come out of it so for the second point I do not yet beleive whatsoever you write but you Mr Bernard are as verily perswaded as my self that the Church of Engl. formally considered in her lawes canons ecclesiasticall contrived exequuted by the prelates their substitutes doth persecute Christians vnder a shew for Christ. That the Bishops make a shew for Christ all graunt and that they persequute true Christians let your prisons be searched and there will want no records and if you yet will passe by the poor brethren of the separation as the Preist and Levite did the wounded man which had fallen among theeves Luk. 10. and will take no knovvledge of vs ask your ovvn brethren the godly Ministers vvith vvhose supply against vs you back your book and I doubt not but the suspensions and deprivations of the most of them for refusing the Prelates badges and liveries the surplice typpet and the like vvill testify vvith vs the persequutions of the Antichristian Praelacy against Christians The separation you admit of in the last place is from familiar accompanying in private conversation with men excommunicate or of levvd life worthy to be excommunicate when neyther religion commaundeth c. What Mr B. ought men to avoyd familiarity with excommunicates onely in private conversation and not both in the private and publique worship of God Is there any religious familiarity or communion save in the Church out of which excommunicates are cast The Iewes had no religious communion at all with heathens or persons vncircumcised which therefore might not enter into the sanctuary of the Lord though you be driven in answer to Act. 21. 28. 29. to affirm they might 2 book pag 175. and as such must wee account them that refuse to hear the Church Mat. 18. 17. And as no religious communion eyther private or publick may be held with persons iustly excōmunicated by the Church so neyther with such lewd persons as deserve excommunication and are thereof clearly convinced though the Church want grace to cast them out The Churches vngodly cōnivency vpboulstring them in their scandalous sinns makes them nothing the better but it self in truth like vnto them as he that brought a thing abominable into his house was accursed like it how much more if he eyther bring it into or keep it in Gods house And how we are to avoyd persons incorrigibly wicked whether Idolatours Haeretiques or prophane livers the common bonds of naturall and civill society ever kept inviolated which as they are to the Lord so ought they to be vnto vs abominable see these scriptures Act. 2. 40. 47. 19. 19. Rom. 16. 17. 1 Cor. 5. 11. 2 Cor. 6. 14. 15. 16. 17. Gal. 1. 8 9 1 Tim. 6. 3. 4. 5. 2 Tim. 3. 2. 3. 4. 5. Tit. 3. 10. which places do not onely forbid private and voluntary familiarity as you speak and affirm but religious also to which you vnskilfully oppose voluntary where no society is so voluntary as that which is religious and that both private and publique Neyther is there any reason whither we respect the glorie of God or our own safety or the avoyding of offence in others or the shaming of the partyes why we should avoyd civil communion with any and yet hold religious communion with them To conclude since the Lord wil be glorified by his people not onely severally and in their persons but ioyntly in their holy cōmunion and hath given them in charge to exhort comfort admonish reprove one an other as there is cause and in the order he hath prescribed as also according to the same order to sequester censure reiect and avoyd persons incorrigible and infectious the brother or brethren fayling in these duties are steyned and polluted not by other mens sinns which can no way hurt them or the holy things they vse save to themselves but by their own swarving and neglect from and of such duties as wherein they are to acquite themselves in their most streyt and sacred bond of communion Onely before I end I must touch one point of deep divinity set down by Mr B. for the purpose in hand which is that the Lord takes a people to be his before he commaund them and that commaundements are for his people to rule them not to make them his people But how agrees this to let passe his former book with that which he not onely writes but substantially proves pag. 277. of his second that when the L. sets vp a people to be his people first he gives them his word which is his ordinance to make them his people his power to subdue thē the meanes of reconciling thē that by which he extols a people above other people Well Mr B. to let passe your inconsiderate lightnes in those weighty matters wherein you exceed Mr Smyth for that where he confutes one book by an other you confute yours by it self in an other place howsoever your nationall Church were not made the Lords people by his commaundements but by the commaundements precepts and proclamations of men yet would the L. Iesus haue his Churches gathered and men made his people by the publishing preaching of his commaundements wherewith he furnished his Apostles for the making of disciples by the knowledge faith and obedience of them Mat. 28. 19. 20. The ◠errour layd to our charge is our holding That every one of their assemblies are false Churches If one of them be then are they all for they are all and every one of them cast in the same mould We professe we put a great difference betwixt person and person amongst you and do not doubt God forbid wee should but there are hundreds and thowsands amongest you having assurance of saving grace and being partakers of the life of God in respect of your persons but considering you in your Church-communion ordinances we cannot so difference you but must testify against your apostasie as wee do And let it not be greevous vnto you Mr B. or vnto any other that in this regard we speak thus generally and alike of you all without exception for even your own Church intendeth you all and every one of you alike without exception
person is Mr Nichols who in his Plea of the innocent expresly affirms that conferring with the particular persons in his parish after he had preached some good space amongst them about the meanes of salvation of 400 coÌ„municants he scarce found one but that thought and professed a man might be saved by his own wâ—ll doing and thaâ— he trusted he did so love that by Gods grace he should obteyn everlasting lâ—se by serving God and good prayers Now how do these agree together Mr B sayth that all professe salvation by Christ onely and alone Mr Nichols on the coÌ„trary affirms out of his own experience that not one of 400 so thinks and professes And if he and all the ministers in England should deny it we out selves by our own experience know what the fayth and perswasion of the multitude in most places is Now for your further reasoning that bycause a Bishop or two published this and some other mayn truthes vnto the world with the approbation of the Parliament and Convocation house and that some preachers here there do so teach therefore all the land so professeth where many thowsands do not so much as vnderstaÌ„d it what can be imagined more vayn Can men professe the truth they know noâ— What is this but the Papists implicit faith when men beleiv as the Church beleiveth though they know not what it is yea and worse then it also for as we see and know infinite multitudes beleive and vpon occasion professe the contrary But most vayn of all is it to affirm that bycause a few godly martyrs have sealed vp this the like truthes with their blood that therefore they that murdered them professe the same truth are true ChristiaÌ„s without any other change wrought in them for the most part then by the Magistrates sword and authority You affirm by way of answer pag. 249. of your second book that the Magistrates compulsion vnto goodnes is no hurt vnto it neyther makes men vnholy or lesse good if they have goodnes in them As it is not simply true you affirm that the compulsion of men to the faith doth not hurt it for if the causing the truth to be blasphemed be to hurt it then the coÌ„pelling of apparant wicked persoÌ„s to professe the same hurts it as it doth both them and the Church whereof they are so if the body of the land in the beginning of the Queens reign were good and holy at all the magistrates compulsion wrought it in men made them of persequuting Idolaters true Christians for other meanâ—â— intervening or coÌ„ming betwixt their professioÌ„ of the masse of the gospell had they none saving the Magistrates authority But here I am by necessity and in respect of the present matter in hand drawn into Mr B. 2. book and a great benefit were it to me if there I might find him though in both vnfound yet one and the same But a great trouble it is to walk with a drunken man and to be bound to follow him in all his vagaâ—ies so is it to deal with an adversary light headed dizzy with wrath vanity and errour whom a man must follow in all his staggerings and reelings to and fro and in all the forwards and backwards that he makes oft times going and vngoing again the same by-pathes There is no one thing wherevpon Mr B labours more in his former book and for which he brings more reasons and scriptures and those often repeated then to prove the Church of EnglaÌ„d or rather such particular Churches as have the word preached in them to be truely gathered after the suppressing of Popery and by the order of the Apostolick Churches both in respect of separation from Idolatours and Antichristian Papists pag. 108 as also by profession of the mayn truth and sum of the Gospell wherein they differed from Iewes Turks and Pagans as no matter and also from Papists as false matter of the Church pag 111. 112. 113. 116. And therefore having proved by a multitude of scriptures that the Apostolick Churches were gathered by free profession of fayth he concludes thus of them and of his own Church such as make this profession are true matter and so are wee for we all professe this fayth c. But now as though he had eyther forgotten what he wrote before or cared not how he crossed himselfe so he might oppose vs against whom he hath vowed such vtter emnity he suckes in his former breath and eats the words he had formerly vttered peremptorily affirming in his 2. book that in the reformation of a Church after Popery there is not required any such profession nor yet the word of God to go before their reformation but that the feare of the Magistrates sword is sufficient to recover them and to setle the people in order to the worship of God The ground vpon which he builds this his new and crosse opinion is the practise of Asa Ezechias Iosias and Nehemiah godly Kings and Princes of Iudah in the reformation of that Church after her Apostacy in the dayes of vngodly Idolatrous Kings therevpon taking it for graunted that the catholique visible Ch of Rome as it is called now is and that the national Church of England in Queen Maries dayes and before when Popery reigned was in the same estate with Iudah in her apostacy he concludes thence that as the Magistrates then without any voluntary profession did by force bring the people of the Iewes back from Idolatry to the true service of God so might King Edward and Queen Elizabeth by force bring back the people of England into covenant with God to be his true Church without any such profession of fayth as in the first planting of Churches is required We will then consider of this poynt at large as being both weighty in it self and having many others depending vpon it That Iudah was at the first and so continued by vertue of the Lords Covenant with her forefathers on his part faythfully remembred and kept though by her oft tymes broken the true Church of God and holy in the root till she was broken of for vnbeleif after the death resurrection and ascension of Christ fully published and confirmed by the Apostles I graunt with him but the same or the like things of the Church of Rome or of England in the respects layd down may I not acknowledg That there was at Rome a true Church beloved of God called saynts by giving obedience vnto the fayth is apparant but that eyther the city or Church of Rome consisting of many cities and countryes was ever within the Lords covenant and holy in the root as Iudah was may I neyther acknowledg neyther can he possibly prove So for England I wil not deny but there were at the first true Churches planted in it by the preaching of the gospell and obedience of fayth and these as the other Churches in every nation though in
and so espeiaâ—lly the Church of Rome because he sits surest there And it is very like this is one reason why Mr B. is so much perswaded of the Church of England as of a true Church because he thinks Antichrist sitts there in a measure and it is not impossible but this may have been some part of the cause why in former tymes he was so loath to leav that Church and to ioyn to vs when he thought we had the truth because he perceived we wanted that prerogative of Antichrists seat which England enioyes But though this shew the absurdity of the opinion yet doth it not answer the obiections I do then answer the same in effect which Mr B. makes his fourth ArgumeÌ„t namely that Popery or Antichristianism begun not out of Christianity but in the Church of God where it did also by steppes advance it selfe into the very throne of God of Christ there did in tyme and by degrees so vniversally corrupt and confound both persons and things as that God could no longer be sayd to dwel there by his visible presence and promises but Antichrist in his stead having destroyed the temple of the Lord the Church and caryed captive his people with the holy vessels into Babylon spirituall as did the civil BabyloniaÌ„s the material temple carying captive with them into Babylon civil the holy vessels and other appurtenances thereof together with a remnant of the Lords people of which more hereafter Onely I doe in the mean whyle except against two particulars in this second Argument The former is that Antichrist sitting in the temple of God viz so remayning is that head with his body 2 Th. 2. Antichrist was not in the Apostles tyme nor in a long tyme after a perfit man consisting of the head the Pope and the body the Hierarchy ecclesiastical but was in the seed onely or as an embrie in the wombe not perfectly framed much lesse visibly brought forth least of all grown to that height as to iustle with Christ for his throne yea to dispossesse him of it as now he doth and hath done a long season Secondly it is not truely affirmed that because there are some fundamental truthes of God in doctrine and truthes in ordinances of Christ as you Mr B. speak held there that therefore Rome is the true Church How should Antichrist and the Divil in him so effectually deceive with the delusion of vanity and errour if he did not countenance the same with some truthes And do you not think it possible Mr B. that any malignant and falâ—e Churches should vsurp some truthes and ordinances of Christ which apperteyn not vnto them If your argument be good the Greek Churches the Arians Anabaptists Vbiquitaries yea and all the assemblyes of haeretiques and schismatiques in the world are true Churches of Christ for they all reteyn many mayn truthes and ordinances of Christ. The third Argument is that as the children or infants of the ten tribes in IeroboaÌ„s Apostacy were called the children of God by circumcisioÌ„ the visible seale of Gods covenant so may the litle ones in the Romish Church be called Christs for that they have received true baptism And so that Rome hath a true constitution by true baptism in the children who are Christs thereby as the children of the Israelites were the Lords by circumcision til by education they be made Antichristian and by that offered vp to Antichrist as the Israelitish children became Molechs by their fathers offering them to him You do here Mr B. in the first place alter the state of the question in both the termes The question is whether the Church of Rome be the true vsible Church of Christ or no. You for the Romish Church put the lâ—tle ones in the Romish Church and in stead of their being the visible Church you tel vs they may be called Christs Whereas 1. those litle ones or infants are not the Church but the least part of it and secondly they are not necessarily eyther the true visible Church or of it because they are Christs â—â— so they were in a respect for God hath his in Babylon whicâ— are visible Citizens of that visible City of fornication though the Lords in respect of election and the beginnings of personal sanctification whom he therefore calls out of the coÌ„m 〈…〉 of it the aboâ—â—â—ations therein vnder a severe penalty Secondly whâ—â— you say 〈…〉 the children in the Romish Church have a tâ—ue 〈…〉 by 〈…〉 are Christs till by education they be made An t 〈…〉 â—â—d by it 〈◊〉 vp to Antichrist you seem to make the Church of Rome to be or to comprehend in it two distinct yea two 〈◊〉 visible Churches a Christian Church of infants before they be capable of education and an Antichristian Church of those that are of ripâ— yeares And yet further where you say that iâ— for so your words are hath a tâ—â—e constituâ—s â—â— by true baptism in their children there it seems you will have the parents to have one constitutioÌ„ that is to be one Church with their children and that true by their true baptism and to the parents which by their education are Antichristian must by the baptism of their children be made christian and yet the children by their parents when they are capable of their education be made antichristian offred vp to Antichrist The scriptures every where teach that parents by their fayth bring their children into the covenant of the Church and entitle them to the promises but that children by their circumcision or baptism should constitute their parents in the Church read â— not but in this mâ—ns scripture Yoâ— most manifest it is every where that wicked parents by their 〈…〉 lity or other sinns depriving themselves of the Lords presence and covenant have enwrapped their children â—â—th 〈…〉 and visibly secret things ever reserved vnto God So C 〈…〉 the presence of the Lord caried his posterity with him so â—iâ— Ismaell and Iâ—saâ— theirs the Ismaelites and Edoâ—â—es And â—â—th Lord disâ—laym the mother for a harlot not reputing her his wife he accounts the children no better then bastards on whom he wil have no pity And if the children of the Iewes be not broken of with their parents for their vnbelief they are successively within the covenant and of the true Church every one of them to this day Neyther doth this at all crosse that which els where you obiect out of the Prophet that the soul that sinneth shall dy that the sonne shal not bear the iniquity of the father c. For first the Prophet there speaks of such a sonne as forsakes his fathers evil practiseth the contrary Otherwise the Lord threatneth that he wil visit the sinns of the fathers vpon the children yet not so as the children are without fault for infants new-born by Adams transgression and their natural and original corruption are children of wrath and lyable
to all Gods curses but the Lord takes occasion by the sinns of the parents to execute his iustice vpon the children in whose punishments he also punisheth the parents themselves after a sort The next thing I observe in this argument is that you affirm the children of the Apostate Israelites to be the children of God by circumcision and infants now to be Christs by baptism which you say also constitutes the Church against which Popish and anabaptistical errour I do iustly except Popish I call it for that the papists imagine that by baptism their children are made Christian soules and in signe of that they have the font ever standing at the Church dore so do the Anabaptists make baptism the form of the Church which you call the constitution as indeed the form of a thing constituteth it and giveth being vnto it Wherof if I my self were perswaded I could not defend the baptism received eyther in Rome or England but I must withall iustify both the one the other for the true Church of Christ. But against this vnsound opinion both theirs and yours I will lay down certayn arguments playnly proving the contrary And first it is the covenant of God which makes the Church as you your selfe both affirm prove pag. 277. of your 2 book of which covenant you also graunt in this place baptism to be the visible seal as was also circumcision in those tymes and therefore it is not the covenant it selfe but is after it in the order both of nature and tyme. Secondly the Lord had his Church before eyther circumcision or baptism were appoynted which is also one and the same in essence from the beginning to the end of the world which it couldnot be if eyther circumcision or baptism were parts constitutive or essentiall of it Thirdly the Lord made his covenant and so admitted them into the Church wâ—â—h Abraham and his seed to be his and their God in their ages and generations so that he children of Abraham and of the Iewes were not without the Lord covenant and him to be their God til the tyme of their circumcision which was the eighth day but were born yea begot in the covenant and an holy seed and therfore the manchilde not circumcised the eight day is sayd to have broken the Lords covenant wherof circumcision was asigne To this also add that the Lord did admit into 〈◊〉 with himself accepting them to be his people all and every one of 〈◊〉 Israelites in the wildernes where notwithstanding all of them in comparison were vncircumcised Ios. 5. 2. 3. 4. 5. Fourthly if baptism were the constitution of the Church as Mr B. speaks then were all heretiques and schismatiques baptised with water into the name of the Father Son and H. Ghost true christians and their assemblyes true Churches of Christ so had the â— Sâ—â—ceâ—â—tes been a true Church by circumcision and so of the Isâ—â—â—elites or Agarians which have retayned circumcision to this day the same may be sayd of the Eâ—â—â—ites and Edomites which were notwithstanding as far from being true Churches as Mr B. is from the truth of God in writing aâ— he doth A fourth consideration is to be had of an affirmation by you peremptorily and absolutely made as though it were without all contradiction or limitation in the third argument and that is that the baptism in the Romish Church is true baptism Touching which I do commend vnto the godly reader this distinction Baptism is to be considred of vs in a twofold respect first nakedly and â—â— the essential causes the matter water and the form the washing with water into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the H. Ghost and in this respect I confesse true baptism both in England and Rome Secondly it is to be considered of vs 〈…〉 as they speak clothed with such appurtenances as wherewith the Lord hath appoynted it to be administred as for example a lawfull person by whom a right subiect vpon which a true communion wherein it is to be ministred dispensed in which regards neyther I can approve it nor Mr B. manifest it to be true eyther in Rome or England When the house of the Lord at Ierusalem was destroyed by the Câ—aldees and the vessels therof together with the people caryed into Babylon they remayned still both in nature and right the vessels of the Lords house though in respect of their vse or rather abuse they became Belshazzars quaâ—fing bowles So is it in the destruction of the spirituall house of the Lord the Church by the spirituall Babylonians and in the vsurpation and abuse of the holy vessels and in special of this holy vessel of baptism Yet is there in this poynt a further consideration to be had of vs vnto which both the scriptures and our own experience do lead vs namely that as the Lord hath his people in Babylon his I mean both in respect of election and of personal sanctification so hath he for their sakes there preserved notwithstanding all the apostacy and confusion which is found in it sundry his holy truthes and ordinances amongst which baptism is one But as this his people being commingled with the Babylonians in one visible communion cannot be called the true visible Church of God so neyther can these ordinances in the administration of them be called the true visible ordinances of Christ and of his Church but as the Lords people are commaunded to goe out of her and to separate themselves and so to build the Lords house a new in Ierusalem or rather themselves into a new spiritual house for him to dwel in so are they to bring with them out of Babylon these ordinances and in particular this ordinance of baptism and to enioy the same being sanctifyed in the right vse and order All which was livelily shadowed out in the materiall temple and ordinances as appeareth Ezra 1. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. and 5. 13. 14. 15. And this also may serv for answer to that you bring in your second reason for the iustification of Rome in respect of the truthes of doctrine and ordinances there In your fourth argument there is litle but the answer of which I formerly spake vnto the second to wit that antichristianism begun in Christianity which is true as sowernes begins in wine til by degrees it turn it into vineger and as other haeresies begun in the Eastern Churches which have notwithstanding long since eaten out the hearts of them that they cannot nor could not of long tyme be called the true Churches of Christ. True also is it which you say that antichristianism doth not wholy disanul christianity for if it did it were not possible it should deceive so effectually as it doth How should the Divil be beleeved in so many lyes if he should not in some things speak the truth But where you further adde that Poperie is nothing
lawes of men but Pauls word even the preaching or publishing of the gospel is the proper means which the Lord hath sanctifyed for that purpose though I doubt not but there both hath been and is great vse of the Magistâ—â—â—â—â— authority for the furtherance of the gospel that way When the Lord Iesus purposed to advance the scepter of his king â—â—me he sent out his Apostles not furnished with sword and â—pâ—â—â— noâ— yet backed with humayn lawes or authority but with châ—â—ge and commission to publish and declare his holy commâ—â—ndâ—ments and the things which he had taught them and thâ—reby to 〈◊〉 Disciples or gayn subiects vnto his kingdom Math. 2â— 19. 2â— which they also practised admitting and initiaâ—ing mâ—n into â—â—â— Church vpon their voluntary submission vnto and 〈◊〉 of the â—ayth of Christ. Nâ—â—â—â— vnto â—â—â— be added a second consideration namely where and to â—â—â— a the Apostles were first to preach and to 〈◊〉 th◠〈◊〉 commission received from Christ it wil both gâ—ve lighâ— to the â—oâ—nt in hand and discover the vanity of a distinctâ—â—n in Mr B. â— book to which he trusteth much and therefore â—â—th oâ—t â—â—r the gathering and establishing of Churches after the P 〈…〉 by fyâ—â— and sword without any further respect then the magistrates authority the summe whereof as also of that he infeâ—reth upon it is that to a Church in the fâ—â—â—t 〈◊〉 that iâ— as â—â— eâ—poundâ— himselfe gathered of inâ—iâ—els and of such a people â—â—â—re no Church 〈…〉 there is required preaching and 〈◊〉 going bâ—fore with the word and profession of the name of Christ but for a people that are not infidels but Christians hâ—â— corrupt soever aâ—â— a Church â—â— suâ—h preachiâ—â— on the one side nâ—◠〈◊〉 of â—â—yth on the other is râ—qâ—ired 〈…〉 compel with the feare of the swâ—â—â— the Magistrate authority is sufficient in such a case Let the Reader behold this bold mans grosse ignorance and contradiâ—tions and if he wil not open his eyes to see them he mâ—y feel them with his hand so palpable are they I wil lay them down in these particulars â—â—â—st he affirmeth pag. 176 that the Lord taâ—â—s a peâ—ple to be 〈…〉 and that commâ—â—â—dements are for his people to â—â—â—â—â—â—â—m and nâ—t to make them 〈…〉 maâ—s commaâ—ndemeâ—t makâ—s not a servent but declâ—â—es such a one to be â—is â—â—â—vant already and so he gives God not more power to commaund the wicked and vnbeleevers then a man hath to commaund another mans servant and yet here he tells vs that before a people can become a Church Paul must goe with the word and expresly pag. 277. that the Lord to make mâ—n his people gives tâ—em his word and quoâ—es Math. 28. 19. to prove it Secondly by this his distinction and his inferences vpon it he makes all the Iewes to whom Iohn Baptist Christ and the Apostles preached and which were baptised by them or any of them to have been Infidels before and nâ— Church no Christianâ— And â—â— he affirms directly pag. 262. though I suppose he considerâ—t not where in answer to a proposition of Mr Aynsworthes that the Churches of Christ were established of saynts onely men visibly 〈◊〉 confirmed amongst other scriptures by Math. 3. 6. he pâ—â—emptorily avouches and so builds vpon it that that pâ—oposition scripture amongst the rest is to be vnderstood of a people which is no Church no Christians so the Church of the Iewes at that tyme must be no Church and they no Christians with this man for of them that scripture speaks whatsoever Peter and Paul say to the contrary Thirdly since the Apostles being sent by Christ to teach and make Disciples were to begin their ministration amongst the Iewes in Ierusalem Iudea and else where which is the consideration I formerly mentioned and so by the publishing of the gospel of fayth on their part and by the profession of fayth and confession of sinns on the peoples part to gather and establish particular Churches and that the Church of the Iewes was at that tyme the Church of God in respect of which the establishing of these particular Churches was no new plantation but a continuation of their former ingraâ—â—ing in the same root wherein they formerly were planted not differing from it essentially but being onely reformed perfited and otherwise ordered then before it appeareth most vntrue which Mr B. affirmâ—th that the preaching of the gospel is onely necessarily required for the planting of Churches of such people as were formerly infidels and no people of God Fourthly and lastly even that which he most freely graunts in one pag. namely that at the first the word must be preached and by that means men brought to a voluntary 〈◊〉 without compulsion that he vtterly reverses and denyes in the very next pag where pleading the proclamation of Hezechiah and compulsion of Iosiah he annexeth to the same purpose as cunningly as his wit wil serve an insinuation that Mordecai for feare of whom he sayth many of the heathen for such the people were became Iewes procured of the King proclamations and other statutes for the compelling of his subiects to the Iewish religion wherein he both perverâ—s the words as the reader may see and the meaning also of thâ— scripture which is that the heathen observing the myghty and mervelous hand of God for his people and against his and their enemyes many of them became Iewes and separated themselves vnto them from the 〈◊〉 of the heathen of the land to seek the Lord God of Israel as also in alleadging to the same purpose Luke 14. 23. as he doth in another place borrowing as it seems the corrupt exposition of that scripture from the Ministers whom â—e drawes in with him in his former book of which more in due place But that I may not be caryed too far in this my digression I do first deny that the reformation by Queen Elizabeth though great in it selfe and she for it of blessed memory did in any measure equalize the reformation made by Hezechiah Iosiah and Nâ—heâ—yah in whom you most insist Mr Bernard For whereas all reformation respects eyther persons or things that which was wrought by these godly Kings and governours receives testimony from the H. Ghost himselfe to have been most full and intyre both wayes And to let passe for brevityes sake the things themselves with referring the reader to these and the like scriptures which handle that part I wil insist a litle vpon the persons about whom the question here is between Mr B. and me in whom the other parte of reformation is to be considered which wil better appear if we compare together officers with officers and people with people And first it is evident in the scriptures that those Kings Princes of Iudah did not apoint any other Preists eyther for the purging of the temple or for any other Preistly work whither of reformation or administration
men It is an outward pledge or symbole of the coÌ„munion which the faithful haue with Christ for of that the Apostle speaketh 1 Cor. 10. 16. 17. directly and so by coÌ„sequence one with another bycause it vnites Christ the head with his own members one of them with another doth it therefore vnite Christ or his true members with the true apparant visible lims of the Divil which all vngodly men and women are This is the force of Mr Br. arguments Bycause the L. supper is of this or that vse unto them to whoÌ„ by the word of God it apperteyns therefore it hath or must be judged to haue the same vse amongst them which are apparant vsurpers of it and to whom by the word of God it apperteyns not There is nothing more coÌ„mon in both his books then this kind of deceiptfull arguing Here is yet an Arg of coÌ„parisoÌ„ to be taken knowledg coÌ„sidred of the rather because the author both wills the reader to note it in the margent and repeats it himself over over in the text The Argument is that aâ— continual siâ—nes corruptions of the hartâ— of the elect do not make theÌ„ false Christians before God or no true invisible meÌ„bers of Christ so neyther do outward offences or corruptions mâ—k open professors of the saith false Christians before men or no true visible members of Christ. True no more due proportion observed namely thaâ— those outward offences do not reign in the mortall bodyes of men â—â— the inward corruptions do not reign in the hearts of the elect But let the reader here remember the subiect of the quaestion which is men of lewd conversation and deserving to be excommunicated and then the noting of Mr B. Arg wil be like Davidâ— noting the Amalâ—kites tydings of the death of Sâ—ul and Ionathan to the destruction of him that brought them For by the same rule of proportion I argue thus As they in whose hearts sinns and corruptions reign inwardly are no true Christians before God nor actuall members of Christ invisibly so they in whose lives and conversations sinnes and corruptions reign outwardly are no true Christians before men nor members of Christ visibly And here comes to my mind an other argument much what like this in Mr B. 2. book where he will have a mixt company of godly and wicked persons to be called holy or a company of saynts as well as a person holy in whom there is a mixture of the spirit and flesh But the difference is playn In this mixt body of godly wicked sin reigns in some of the members but in no part of body or faculty of soul of a person in whom the spirit is though never so much flesh be mingled with it doth sinne reign He might as well say the whole Church so mixt shal be saved for the whol man shal be saved by faith in Christ notwithstanding all mixture in him Now the conclusion Mr B. makes that their congregations professe Christ as is before sayd that God hath given them his holy word and sacraments moved the harts of all of them outwardly to receive both the one and the other is vnproved and vntrue For first there is no one congregation in the Land whose particular members made that holy profession in any measure by according to which the Apostles did constitute and vnite visible congregations Secondly I deny that the Lord hath given his sacraments to any congregation in the Land there are very many in the best ordered parishes which take them without the Lords gift as being wicked vsurpers of them vnto which by the revealed will of God they have no right But here I must needs discover Mr Bernards haunt and the turning by which in his second book he vsually declines both Mr Ainsworths Mr Smyths Arguments of this nature and that is by telling them that all are not wicked amongst them that some or many haue the true knowledge of Gods word and that the fear of God possesseth the hearts of many as in this place that God hath moved the hearts of many of the people effectually and the like and that therefore we do them wrong in condemning all for some and in denying the good their right for others default To this I answer first that those that can be truely judged to fear God are thin strewed in the best places and not many in comparison of the rest as is pretended but a very small handfull and besides it is but casuall and accidentall to the congregation and nothing to the constitution of it that there is one man truely fearing God in it The parish must be a true vivisible constituted Church as well one as another and so receive the sacraments together whether the Lord have had any such work as is here spoken of in the hearts of any or no. And 2. it must be considered I pray the teader well to observe it that the quaestion here betwixt Mr B. and me and so ordinarily betwixt him and them is about the congregation which consists of all the members ioyntly and not about some particulars coÌ„sidered severally from the rest of whom the congregation consists not I am verily perswaded there are in many congregations many that truely feare God and the Lord encrease their number and graces and if they were separated from the rest into visible communion I should not doubt to account them such coÌ„gregations as vnto which God had given his sacraments but take them as they are even one with the rest in one ioynt communion as members of one body making all together one Church congregation so joyned at the first and so still remayning I deny that this Church or congregation is the Lords people in covenaunt with him or that he hath given vnto it his sacraments yea or that those which truely fear God are accepted of him in their persons have in that communion the right and lawfull vse of them in many particulars They cannot take them for pawnes and pledges of Gods love and the forgivenes of sinns to that congregatioÌ„ wherewith they ioyn in the vse of them nor as testimonies of true spirituall love amongst the persons communicating in them nor as notes badges of dâ—stinction of that assembly from all profane vnhallowed assemblies in the world And yet are all these common ends and vses of the sacrament as it is a communion or coÌ„mon vnion of the members with the head and one with another mutually Since therefore your congregations or parish assemblies are alwayes have been so constituted as that neyther the greatest part of them being prophane have any interest in the sacraments or can have any right vse of them in their persons nor yet the rest in their communion it must needs follow except the Lord have given his sacraments to them which can haue no right vse of them and to whom they apperteyn not that the Lord
no Papists in your kingdom I may say in your Parish or are Papists become no idolaters with you as Rome was right now no false Church nor Iesuites false subiects The face of your charity Mr B. is so full set towards Rome and Papists as no marvayl though you be so vnequall towards vs as you are The truth is you are in the most streyt bond of civil society with Popish idolaters that may be Ther is nothing more common amongst them of your Church then to ioyn in mariage with them neyther is there to my knowledge amongst all your canons any one against this prophane commixture Neyther is it any thing you speak of living vnder a Christian King or with a people professing Christ for idolaters may live vnder a Christian King and professe Christ too in a measure as both many others and all antichristiaÌ„ idolaters do Yea I have formerly manifested that you live not onely in civill but even in religious society with Papists and you your self graunt as much of Atheists in the beginning of your book and will you say that visible Atheists are true visible matter of the Church and capable by the word of God of true visible fellowship and communion with Christ and the true members of his body The scope of â—e scripture followeth which say you iâ— that the beleeving Corintâ—ians may have no fellowship with the infidels and vnbeleevers to their evill works but that they reprove condemn hate and avoyd them Belike then they might haue had fellowship with them in any good work and so if any of the heathen or infidell Corinthians would haue communicated with the Christian Corinthians in the sacraments or prayer they might not haue refused their fellowship or communion herein For by your exposition the Apostle onely forbids partaking with them in evill works the works of darknes Of which more hereafter And here in our names you frame an obiection the sum whereof is that if all the godly would separate from all the wicked then there should be no wicked of the Church Vnto which you answer sundry things but how sufficiently will appear in the particulars First you say God commaunds not his to separate wholly from all the wicked but from Infidels Gentiles Idolaters Iewes Turks Papists whose very societies are to be left as no people of God Well then I perceive all religious fellowship with Papists is vnlawfull and that their societies are no people of God And how agrees this with your other affirmations that Rome is a true Church Papists true Christians though under corruptions as it was true Iob though vnder soars baptism there a true sacrament and seal of the covenaunt yet here the societies of Papists are no people of God that is in no covenant with him Or how doth this separatioÌ„ thus wholly to be made from Papists agree with that you write pag. 91. of ioyning in prayer with such Papists as though they be of the Church of Rome yet sorrow for the abhominations and as are come out from it in their soules the best part though not so in their bodyes The distinction you put between Infidels and idolaters and men of prophane life wee shall consider of in due place for your speach of all the Church falling into the estate of infidelity and so â—â—dged of the Church eyther it is without sense or I which vnderstand it not Now to that you adde of separating from the private familiarity of the wicked living in the society of the godly and that if they will not be reformed other courses are to be taken with them as their sin of obstinacy deserves I answer these things First that as there is a case wherein private withdrawing from a brother is warrantable namely when his offence is private and he privately obstinate that his sinne eyther cannot be or is not yet made publick publiquely â—vinâ—â—d so to separate from men privately and that onely for publick offences is a course without ground either of scripture or rea son You say pag. 144. that alvin so expounds 1 Cor. 5. 11. and therevpoÌ„ do take an occasion to accuse our practise as Brownisticall vs of Luciferian schisme Pharisaicall pride As I leave your raylings to be iudged by the Lord so do I give the reader to vnderstand how you grossely abuse Calvins authority who expounds that scripture as all men know it is meant of excommunicates and of mens private cariage towards them with which publick separation is also to be joyned I suppose you your self will not deny it And where you speak of an other course to be taken with wicked men that wil not be reformed you should also shew what that course is and what is to be done if that course be not taken but you have thought it a point of your wisdome to be silent in these things least by opening them too particularly you should discover your own shame The course to be taken is the censuring of such incorrigible offenders by the particular congregation whereof they are being gathered together in the name of Christ by the power of Christ with which power divine and heavenly priviledge he hath furnished his Churches every one of them as well as that one of Corinth neyther doth any true Church of Christ want this power or neglect the vse of it without sinne And if any Church of Christ would neglect to vse this power against scandalous sin manifestly proved and coÌ„vinced would obstinately continue notwithstanding all good meanes vsed to the contrary this sower leaven vnpurged out the whole lump were levened and with leven might not the Passeover be eaten And as the Church if sin do arise is first to endeavour the casting out of the sinne by the sinners repentance and if that will not be in the last place to cast out the sinne and sinner together so if the Church do wickedly bear out and boulster iniquity amongst themselves such as are faithfull are first to quit themselves of that Church-sin by testifying against it and reproving it and in the last place to quit themselves of the Church if it remayn incurable Now here you bring in certayn differences distinctions of separation but without application The first I omit as being before handled so much as concerns the present purpose The 2. difference is between the wicked remayning amoÌ„g the godly the godly being of the felowship of the wicked this differece I acknowledg withall affirm that the latter part of it notes out the estate of your nationall Church wherein a few godly mynded in comparison live in the fellowship of a wicked and sinfull nation And if persons excommunicate by the Church be not of her fellowship then certaynly the number of the godly in your fellowship is very small since your nationall Church representative the convocatioÌ„ house whose Act also pag 147. you avouch to be the Act of all the Church so to be
lyeth To conclude what reason hath Mr B. thus to obiect that all which are amongst them live not in darknes and that all are not in league with the Divel considring that by his own exposition of this place the very societies of Papists are to be left as no people of God and yet all Papists live not in darknes as here he vnderstands it nor are in league with the divell neyther in deed had they need considering what league of spirituall coÌ„munion he professeth els where he will have with many of them Mr B. 2. obiection is which he also makes the 4. head of his division that there is no proportion betwixt the persons here mentioned to be separated from being infidels and such as were no members of the Church and Gentiles that had enterteyned no profession of Christ on the one side and the members of the Church on the other side and that the consequence followes not from infidels Heathens Pagans Idolaters led by the Divell to Christians professing Christ though in life not answerable to their profession Even now you justified separation from Papists by this scripture and here you restreyn it vnto Infidels and Gentiles that had not enterteyned any profession of Christ as though Papists were infidels or without all profession of Christ which is contrary both to truth and to your own expresse affirmation every where But my answer is that howsoever infidelity and Idolatry be two greivous sinnes and which do principally separate those which continue in them from God his Church yet not they alone but any other transgressions as well as they obstinately stood in do rayse this vvall of separation as is manifest in the scriptures And first the Apostle in this very place disioynes righteousnes vnrighteousnes light darknes as farre a sunder as beleevers vnbeleevers as the temple of God Idols in which former also the vnion betwixt Christ Belial is as monstrous as in the latter Vnto which I do also adde that Mr B. in this very place debarring infidels and idolaters from being matter of the true Church layes this down as a cause or reason that they are led by the Divel wherevpon it followeth that since none other wicked men are led by Christ but all by the Divell aswell as they that none other can be matter of the true Church more then they And that some persons led by the Divel should be matter of the Church and some not is a distinction not found in the scriptures but devised for a remedy against the iniquities of the tymes and for the avoyding of trouble and dissipation Secondly as the scriptures do every where denounce the same judgements vpon other wicked men and vpon idolaters and infidels for example that as well he that deâ—ileth his neighbours wife or oppresseth the poore or gives forth vpon vsury shall dy the death as he that eates vpon the mountaynes or lifts vp his eyes vnto the Idols and that aswell whoremongers unâ—rtherers and such as love or make lyes as Idolaters shal be without the heavenly Ierusalem so do they also both warrant direct vs the same course of walking towards the one and other The Lord Iesus Mat. 18. 17. enjoyns the Church to account every obstinate offender as an Heathen And the Apostle Paul gives the Corinthians in charge as much to avoyd formâ—atours covetous persons raylers drunkers and â—xtortioners as Idolaters And no marvayl for covetous persons are Idolaters and so are carnall men Idolaters making their belly their God Vnto these adde that the same Apostle vnto Tâ—tus calles vnholy and profane persons what profession of God soever they make unbeleevers or Infidels which are the same Which scripture I wish the Reader to observe in respect of Mr B. bould châ—lendge of all the Brownists in the world to shâ—w the term or name of vnbeleevers to be given to such as are not become absolute Apostates from Christ. Lastly unto that vvhich Mr B. obâ—â—â—teth in the fifth and last place against our exposition of this scripture to the Corinth for our separatioÌ„ namely that at this very tyme when the Apostles thus writ there were of them which did partake with the heatheÌ„ that they were a mixt company among whom were dissentions envying open incest drunkennes at the Lords supper fornication wantonnes men denying the resurrection I do give this answer As there was this mixture in the Church at this tyme so doth the Apostle most severely reprove the same For the incestuous man suffred vncensured he pronounceth the whole lump levened 1. Epist. 5. chapt For thâ— abuse of the Lords supper that they came together not with profit but with hurt chap. 11. 17. where I entreat the reader also to take knowledge of the counsayl which vpon that occasion Beza gives in his Annotations vpon ver 31. which is that we try and examine our selves by faith and repentance separating our selves froÌ„ the wickâ—d For this very sin here spoken of namely their partaking with Idols in the Idolothytes that they could not partake of the Lords supper You cannot drink the cup of the Lord the cup of Divels You cannot be partakers of the Lords table of the table of Divels And in this very place about which we now coÌ„tend that except they separated theÌ„selves left this their vngodly mixture they could not haue the promise of the Lord that he would dwel among them and walk there that he would be their God and haue them his people ver 16. And doth the holy Ghost in leaving these things recorded give any countenance to a mixt company or can you from hence eyther take unto your self or give unto others any comfort in your or their confused walking Will you make your self a medicine of their poyson or a playster of their vlcers You are a physition of no valâ—w Besides it must be considered that all the evils mentioned amongst the Corinthians were contrary to their constitution and so many aberrations and defections from that estate and condition wherein the the Ch was gathered It is evident that Paul planted the Ch at Corinth he being Gods labourer and it Gods husbandry Now who dare open so prophane a mouth as to affirm that this faithfull labourer would plant the Lords vineyard with such imps or gather vnto him a Church of any such slagitious persons as fornicators drunkers incestuous men or such as denyed the resurrection But what is this to your nationall Church which was constituted and gathered for the greatest part of fornicatours drunkerds blasphemers and the like with such wild branches was your vineyard planted Thus much of our interpretation application of 2 Cor. 6. I will here onely adde one argument more to prove your nationall Church vncapable of the new covenant or testament by which you your self do graunt and truely the Church of Christ to be formed
and combyne together as they did may cease to be the true Church of Christ and may eyther become no Church by forsaking all profession of Christianity or a false Church by holding and professing themselves stil Christians in fellowship with God through Christ when being considered by the revealed will of God and testament of Christ they are in truth in deed neyther the one nor the other And considering what Iohn sayth that he which loveth not his brother and so consequently cares not for his welfare which issueth from the former as the stream from the spring is not of God nor of his children but of the children of the Divel and withall that you your self right now did place the form covenant of the Church in a great measure in the manifestation and testimony of love in the members each to other and so consequently of care ech for the welfare of other I see not how that Church can be accounted the houshould of God consisting of his children by the word of God or the body of Christ vnited coupled together of his members by your owne doctrine where this love of and care for each other is visibly and outwardly wanting But to passe over all other things the point vpon which Mr B. insists and which he would most gladly fasten vpon the reader is that the power of the censures and of excommunication termed by the name of discipline howsoever it be a thing necessary for the wel being of the Church yet is it no essentiall property nor of such necessity but that a true Church may be without it And this wanting scriptures or reasons to confirm it he affirms again and again and in the end illustrates by a similtude taken from a man who is not therefore a false man though he can neyther see nor gâ—e nor speak It is recorded of one THEODOTIVS that having denied Christ in persequution to lessen his sin he went about to lessen Christ and taught that he was mere man and not God so many in the case of Christs government that their own and other mens sinne may seem lesser in not vsing or submitting vnto it do labour to extenuate and make it lesse excellent or vsefull then it is and therevpon one telles vs it is not a part of Gods worship nor of religion another that it is a thing indifferent arbytrary changeable a third that it is not simply necessary for the true Church as Mr B in this place The vnsoundnes of whose affirmation illustration I will by and by manifest the Lord assisting me in the mean while I do desire the reader to observe with me these two things in his writings about this point The former is that in labouring thus earnestly to perswade as here he doth that the power of excommunication is not of simple necessity he in effect graunts that which all men know to be true namely that the Churches in England do want this power Now if here he answer as he doth in his 2. book that though the power of excommunication â—e not in every parish yet it is in the Church of England in which is comprehended all paâ—rishes and all superiour power over these Parishes in which is the power of Christ I reply these particulars First that he might thus answer though one Bishop alone had engrossed into his hands all this power yea a Papist might answer thus for the Popes sole authority over all the Churches in the world yea though he should communicate the same with no other person or persons 2. Let this mans shifting be well noted When both in this and the other book he pleads for the Ministery in the Church he passes by the Nationall Provinciall and Diocesan Ministery and speaks onely of the Ministery in some parishes where some honest zealous preachers are but now comming to plead for the power of Christ in the Church he takes the contrary course and passing by the parishes takes his flight to the Nationall Provinciall and Diocesan Ministery there to find comfort 3. the quaestion here as he himself puts it pag. 125. of this book is about particular congregations which he sayth there are with them having true matter true form and true properties whereof excommunication is one To this also adde that in the end of his book he aâ—oucheth the Ministers affirmation that this power is given to the particular congregations in the land 4. lastly I haue formerly manifested from Mat. 18. 1 Cor. 5. that this power and praerogative is given to a particular congregation besides which the new testament acknowledgeth none other visible Church and if that one particular Church or congregation aâ— Corinth gathered together into the name of the Lord Iesus Christ had the promise of his presence and that he would be in the mâ—ddest of them and were by this power of the Lord Iesus Christ to deliver to Satâ—n purge out iudge and put away wicked men from among them for fayling in which duety they were reproved by the Apostle then why not every other particular Church or congregation of Gods people as well as that one espetially since that as all other scriptures was written for our learning and that there is but one Church or body as there is but one Lord one that is in matter form and essentiall properties The 2. thing I desire may be noted is that Mr B doth if not deceiptfully yet vnfitly comprehend the power of the censures vnder the care for the welfare of the Church since this power may be full and intire where the care is eyther very little or not at all as it came to passe in the Church of Corinth which had this power alwayes amongst them but neglected the vse of it and therein the care for the welfare of the Church which they should have had for which neglect they were reproved by the Apostle Now for the similitude I do except against it in a double respect first for that God doth oft times deprive a man of the naturall power of seing going and speaking by naturall infirmities within or bodily violence from without but Christ never deprives his Church of this spirituall power of excommunication neyther can it be impeached by any outward violence onely Antichrist exalting himself against all that is called God and intruding himself into the throne of Christ doth deprive the Church of God and of Christ of this liberty and power and so all those Churches or congregations over whom he thus vsurpeth receive his mark are in that respect subject to his judgement 2. Mr B as I have formerly observed doth most vnaptly coÌ„pare the power of casting out offenders to the faculty of seing speaking and the like it is more fitly resembled to the want of power to void and purge excrements which is prodigious in nature so neyther the naturall nor spirituall body so constituted can possibly consist or
more then tyme I come to the mayn controversie about succession which might be layd down summarily in these words whether the reformed Churches were bound to submit notwithstanding their separation from Rome vnto such ministers onely as were ordeyned by the Pope and his Bishops but for the better clearing of things I will enlarge my speach to these three distinct considerations First whether the Ministery be before the Church or no. 2. Whether the delegated power of Christ for the vse of the holy things of God be given primarily and immediately to the Church or to the Ministers 3. Whether the Lord haue so linked the Ministery in the chayn of succession that no Minister can be truely called and ordeyned or appointed without a praecedent Minister Touching the first of these Mr Ber affirmeth as in his former book that the Officers make the Church and give denomination vnto it so expresly in his 2. book that the Ministery is before the Church And noting in the same place a two fold raysing vp of the Ministery the first to beget a Church the second when the Church is gathered he puts the Ministers in both before the Ch in the former absolutely in the latter in respect of their Office and ordination by succession from the first In which discourse he intermingleth sundry things frivolous vnsound and contradictory Now for the first entery I desire the reader to observe with me that the quaestion betwixt Mr Bernard and me is about ordinary Ministers or officers of the Church such as were the first Ministers of the reformed Churches and as Mr B and I pretend our selves to be and not about extraordinary Ministers extraordinarily miraculously or immediately raysed vp as were Adam and the Apostles by God and Christ whom he produceth for examples Admit the one sort being called immediately and miraculously may be before the Church yet cannot the other which must be called by men and those eyther the Church or members of the Church at the least Besides the word Minister extends it self not onely vnto Officers ordinary and extraordinary but even to any outward means whether person or thing by which the revealed will of God is manifested and made known vnto men for their instruction and conversion Yea it reacheth even to God himself so far Mr B. stretcheth it where he makes God the first preacher Gen. 2. 3. As though there were a controversy between him and me whither God or the Church were first I see not but by the same reason he might avouch that the Ministers of the Church could not all dy or be deceived bycause God is free from these infirmityes It is true which Mr B. sayth that the word is before the Church as the seed which begetteth it and so is that which brings it yea whither it be person or thing which may also be called a Minister and be sayd to be sent of God as it is an instrument to convey and means to minister the knowledg of the same word will of God vnto any So if any private man or woman should be a means to publish or make known the word of God to a company of Turkes Iewes or other Idolaters he or she might truely be sayd to be their Minister and the Lords Ambassadour vnto thē as you speak Yea if they came to this knowledg by reading the Bible or other godly book that book or bible as it served to minister the knowledg of Gods wil in his word might truely in a generall sense be accoūted as a Minister vnto thē But what were all this to a Church-officer about whō our quaestiō is These things Mr B. shuffles together but the wise reader must distinguish them so doing he shall easily discover his trisling The particulars follow And first he affirmeth that God made Adam a Minister to whom he gave a wife to begin the Church and as Adam was before his wife so is the Ministery at the first before the Church If Adams wife began the Church then is your mayn foundation overthrown namely that the ministers make and denominate the Church except you will say that Eve was a Minister Secondly it is not true you say that God made Adam a Minister before Eve was created In the same place you make and truely a Minister and Ambassadour which brings the word all one vnto whom could Adam eyther minister the word or be an Ambassadour to bring it before Eve was formed There was nothing but bruit beasts and senceles trees and to them I suppose he brought it not The truth is Adam and Eve were the Ch. not by his but by her creatiō which made a company or society thus we are in the first place to consider of them and of Adam as a teacher in the second place the speciall calling here and ever following after and vpon the generall Of the same force with your first proof is your 2. which you take from Ephes. 4. 11. 12. where it is sayd God gave some not onely to confirm the Church but to gather the Saynts to make a Church To let passe your boldnes with the words I except against your exposition application of them The word gathering vpon which you insist is in some bookes turned repayring and is the same in the Greek with that which is restoring Gal. 6. 1. of which I have spoken formerly Againe Paul in that place speaks not onely of Apostles other Ministers of the first raysing vp for the begetting of Churches but of Pastours and Teachers which were taken out of the Church and of the 2. raysing for the feeding of the flock You will not deny but the Apostles and brethren at Ierusalem were a Church of God Act. 1. 15. 16. when as yet no Pastours or Teachers were appointed in it and how then can your doctrine stand that the Ministers spoken of Ephe. 4. 11. 12. amongst which were Pastours and Teachers were before the Church out of which they were taken and raysed vp of God to beget a Church Yea it is evident that the very office of Pastour vvas not then heard of in the Church whereby the falsity of your other affirmation is discovered to wit that the Office of such Ministers as are of the second raysing which are taken out of the Church is before the Church Thirdly the Apostles themselves howsoever extraordinary officers immediately called and sent forth to beget other Churches both of Iewes and Gentiles were Christians before they were Apostles and members of the Church before they were Officers And the scriptures do expresly testify that God ordeyned or set in the Church Apostles amongst other Officers and this their setting in the Church doth necessarily praesuppose a Church wherein they were set as the setting of a candle in a candlestick praesupposeth a candlestick as in deed the Church is the Candlestick the officers the candles lights and starres which are set in it
Lastly it is a senceles affirmation you make that a man sent to win people is a minister to the hidden number not yet called out which are also his flock potentially though not actually The scriptures and you accordingly in another place make it a property of a good Minister to call his own sheep by name that is as you expound it to take notice of his people of their growth in religion c. now here you wil haue a minister of the hidden number whereof he can take no notice at all nor can tell whether or no he shall find one sheep amongst them Besides you coÌ„mit a Logicall errour in raysing an actuall Minister from the relation he hath vnto a flock potentially you may as truely affirm that a single man towards mariage is an housband and a father bycause he may have wife and children Any man that vpon a just calling or occasion opens and makes known the Gospel of salvation vnto a company of Turks or Pagans may in that generall sense be called the Lords Minister sent vnto them but a Church Officer of whoÌ„ our quaestion is till he have by his Ministery called and separated them vnto the Lord and be by their election called and separated to his office can he neyther be nor be called One thing more you adde which is that Ministers may be the Church as they are Christians and that they are Ministers in respect of an office bestowed upon them in their state of Christianity wherein you speak and that truely sufficient to overthrow not onely your particular errour in this place but well nigh your whole writing For therevpon it followeth First that the Church is before the Ministery bycause men are a Church as they are Christians Christians before they be Ministers 2. That Ministers make not the Church but become such by an office bestowed vpon them in their state of Christianity that is in their Church state Thirdly that the Christian brethren though not in office are part of the Church Math. 18. since even the officers themselves are acknowledged the Church or of the Church as they are Christians I come now vnto the 2. consideration and do affirm against Mr Ber. that the delegated and communicated power of Christ is given primarily and immediately to the Church and not to the officers This point I haue formerly handled at large vnder two generall heads opened in the former part of my book vnto which I do entreat the reader to look back yet will I for further satisfaction breifly annex a few things First bycause vnto the Iewes were of credit committed the Oracles of God vnto whom also did the covenants apperteyn and all the priviledges of them as to the common wealth of Israel 2. Bycause the Ministers themselves are given to the Church the Churches immediately as the Church is Christs Christ Gods And if this holy thing the Ministery be the Churches immediately then other things also as well as it in respect of right and possession though she vse the service of the Ministers ordinarily for the dispensation exequution of them It is not denyed but that the officers in such works as they perform vnto the Châ—in the name of the Lord as ofdoctrine exhortatioÌ„ admonitioÌ„ the like stand in a more imediate relatioÌ„ vnto the Lord then the Church doth but it must also be remembred that this no more advanceth the order of their Office above the order of the body then it doth one private bother performing the same work orderly in the exercise of prophesying or otherwise 3. The Officers are to dispense and exequute the holy things of God as the servants Ministers of Christ his Church and whatsoever they do in their office they do it as the servants and ministers both of Christ and of the Church Now common sense teacheth men that what power or authority soever the servants or Ministers of others haue or vse in their places that authority and power they haue first whose servants and ministers they are and that therefore the holy things of God are primarily and immediately the Churches vnder Christ and in the last place the Officers as the servants of Christ and his Church for execution in the order which Christ hath left The last greatest quaestion now comes into handling namely whether Ministers may be made by such as are no Ministers For this phrase of making Ministers Mr B. affects much belike with refereÌ„ce speciall to the Ministers of England and Rome who are fitly sayd to be made by the Bishops to be the workmanship of their haÌ„ds Mr Ber. vehemently vâ—geth the negative part namely that no Minister may be made but by a minister tying as he doth the Ch to the Ministery the Ministery to successioÌ„ ther is cause he should For if the chayr of succession should break both the Ch Ministery of England must fall to the ground The onely Argument he brings for his purpose is an historicall narration as he speaks from time to time without any one instance to the contrary the constant practise of the Church of God from the dayes of Adam hitherto I desire the Reader in the first place to take knovvledge from me that I deny not but confesse that the Churches of God more particularly and the Churches of the new testament continuing and abyding in that state â—ayth order wherein they were set established by the Lord in the hands of his servants the Apostles Eâ—angelists were to receive their ministers constantly by successioÌ„ after a sort namely so far as that all succeeding Ministers were to be ordeyned by Ministers and no otherwise But would any man save eyther a marked servant of the Pope or one that cared not what he wrote for some praesent seeming-advantage argue as this man doth from the estate of the Churches of Christ and in particular of the Church at Rome in Peter and Pauls time to the estate wherein now it is or was an hundred years since in which estate we are to consider of it But of this more hereafter The historicall narration before spoken of Mr B. divides into 4. tymes or ages the first wherof is from the beginning of the world till the giving of the law the 2. from the law till Christs coÌ„ming the 3. from Christ till the end of the history of the new testament the 4 and last from that tyme hitherto Let vs consider of his instances And first sayth he God at the worlds beginning ordeyned Adam in his place and till the law did rayse up extraordinary Teachers whom he also nameth in his 2. book as Henoh Noah Abraham Isaak Iakob Ioseph Levâ— and the rest As it is true that all Ministers are both to be called and ordeyned of God and ordinary Ministers to be called by the Church and ordeyned by the Church-officers
it be not actually seen or open to the ey of all as you speak as colours are alwayes visible and souÌ„ds audible in themselves though for the present they be neyther seen nor heard But what do I striving with this man which needs none other adversary but himself As he crosses his first book with his second so doth he both crosse and confute his second by his third In his first he will haue the word truely taught and the sacraments rightly administred to be the marks of the true Church in his 2. the true word preached though not truly the true sacrameÌ„ts administred though not rightly are inâ—allible tokens and reciprocally converted with the Church in the 3. last book the Church may be a Ch without the vse of the sacrameÌ„ts for a long tyme as the Ch of Israel was in the wildernes so it be not done of contempt and such as are eyther no Church of God at all or an antichristian assembly may haue and vsurp the seales put to a blank as Ismael Esau out of the Church had circumcision and the Papists now have baptism And that which he sayth of Baptism may as truely be sayd in cases of the word and the publication of it by reading and interpretation As the true Church may for a time want the vse of both so may a false Ch vsurp and abuse both as well the wryting as the seal ' He that held the seven starres in his right hand and walked in the middest of the seven golden candlesticks threatned the Church of Ephesus that he would shortly remove her candlestickout of his place for leaving her fâ—rst love except she repented though she still held and vsed the word and sacraments and if a company of schismatiques leaving a Church without cause or of excommunicates justly cast out of the Church should vnite themselves together vsurping and assuming the word and sacraments and professing the covenant outwardly and in the letter did this their â—old vsurpation make them a true visible Church of Christ The matter is the true Church may want vpon occasion the vse or administration of the word and sacraments but never the right power and interest in and vnto them so may a false assembly vsurp oâ— assume them but never have right or power from Christ unto them And this spirituall power and liberty arising from the Lords visible covenaunt to communicate and partake in the visible promises ordinances of it is the true essentiall propertie of the visible Church as is the faculty of reasoning the property of a reasonable man and the faculty of seing hearing tasting and the like the property of a sensible creature though neyther the one haue the actuall vse of reason for the present nor the other of sense The third and last property of the Church Mr B makes the care for the welfare of all and every one for the whole and each for other this eyther corporall for the maintenance of the body as in almes deeds Act. 2. 42. or spirituall touching the sowle which standeth in admonition and exhortation and so â—orth as 1 Thes. 5. 11. which also he sayth they and their congregations have It is noted of some persons beside themselves that all the ships they see in the haven and fayr houses in the country they think and say are theirs where if they were in their right witts they would both know and acknowledge that they were poore and beggarly and had nothing So is it with this man bycause he reads in the scriptures that the Apostolicall Churches consisted of saynts and were gathered by voluntary profession into the covenant of God that they had given them and did enjoy by the Lords gift and donation his word sacraments other ordinances and did in that holy communion whereunto they were called exercise themseves mutually for the welfare one of another both bodily and spiritually therevpon he concludes peremptorily that the Church of England whereof he is and for which he pleads hath all these things and that they haue all these properties where if he had a sound mind and an honest heart in the things of God he would both see confesse that things were nothing lesse with them then as he sayth and that in stead of this great and vniversall aboundance whereof he boasteth there were generally nothing but spirituall beggary and want Thou sayest I am rich and increased with goods have need of nothing knowest not how thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked More particularly as you want the office of Deaconship which Christ hath left by his Apostles for the collection and distribution of the Churches almes and haue enterteyned under the true name a false and forged office of half preisthood perverting and misapplying to the iustification of it such holy scriptures as are left for the calling and ministration of true and lawfull Deacons in the Church of Christ so is there not that care for the bodily welfare one of another amongst you in any measure whereof you boast The needlesse and endlesse suits and quarrels amongst you filling all your courts and judgement seats your dayly thefts and murthers amongst the members of your Church the continuall cousenings and circumventions one of another the vsuryes oppressions extortions which overflow both country and city as did the waters in the time of Noah both the valleys hilles do too manifestly shew how farre you are from this care of the welfare ech of other bodily whereof you thus vainly boast But though this care of ech for other both bodily and spiritually be almost wholly wanting yet say you the Church is not to be iudged a false Church no more then the houshould is to be iudged a false houshould bycause there is not that care that ought to be amongst them of the family or a man a false man if through folly madnes or wilfulnes he neglects the welfare of his body Surely it had not need considering how not onely this is wanting but how the contrary aboundeth in all places And to let passe all other matters no man is ignorant what care the two great factions in the Church that of the Prelates and the other of the Reformists do take each for other namely how ech may subvert and root out the other And for your similitudes borrowed from an houshold and a body as wee deny your Church to be that houshold of God or body of Christ wherein every member hath his effectuall working in his measure as the Apostle speaketh so is there no way the like reason of them and of the Church in the respect wherein you compare them A man doth not nor cannot cease to be a true man naturally by any meanes if his person survive neyther can a family cease to be a true family civily if it be not dissipated and dissolved but a Church though the same persons survive still