not put this past Controversie with most judicious Christians I should stand to prove all this by parts But on the other side it is hence manifest 1. That the Pastours of the Church must refuse no man that hath the least degree of Grace or makes a credible Profession of the least 2. And that we must nor require as a matter of Necessity such â—ipe or clear and judicious expressions from the ignorant bashful or such as for want of use and good breeding are unable to express their minds as we may from others If a man or woman be unable in good sence to express their Faith in the very Essentials or to reveale the Grace of God within them yet if upon our Interrogations and helping them they can do it in any intelligible manner so that we do but perceive that it is a sound Profession in the Essentials which they Meane though they cannot handsomly utter it we may not reject any such as these 3. Note also that defects in Knowledg must be indeed exceeding gross where the person is willing to be taught and Ruled by Christ and use his means and thus seems to Love God and Holiness before they will warrant us to reject them Should the Judgments of such persons seem unacquainted with some fundamentals about the Trinity and the like mysteries I should search them better and I should plainly tell them presently of the truth and if they received Information I should not reject a willing Soul The very Apostles of Christ had the Sacrament administred to them by himself when they did not understand and believe the Death and Resurrection of Christ I know that this will not warrant us to give such persons the Eucharist now because that those great Truths were not then of such great Necessity as after Christs Death and Resurrection they did become as being not so fully revealed nor the Actual belief of them so peremptorily imposed But yet it shews us this much that even in persons admitted to the Lords Supper if there be but a Belief in God the Father Sonne and Holy Ghost and the Points of Absolute Necessity though in rude and unperfect conception and a Love to Christ and a willingness to Learn of him and obey him a great deale of lamentable ignorance may be born with in those that have wanted either Means of knowledg and clear discoveries of the Truth or natural ripeness of understanding to receive it You see then that Pastours are not Arbitrary nor meerly left to their own wills Prop. 9. It is most evident that Ministers People and Magistrates have each a Power of Judging but different as they have different works 2. VVHen the Question is To whom the Sacraments and other Ordinances and Church-Relations and Priviledges are to be Ministerially deliverd as from Christ and to whom not Here the Ministers of Christ are the Judges And so are they when the Question is Whom must we teach direct and perswade and in Christs Name command the people to avoid or to hold Communion with For those two are our own work in the Execution And if either Magistrate people or any other must be Judge where Ministers must Execute and work Then 1. We have not that common Judicium Discretionis to guide our own actions which is allowed and Necessary to every Christian 2. Then the Rulers of the Church are not only degraded and made no Rulers but are put into that slavery and subjection to them that are commanded to obey them which no Pastour must desire the People or any one of them to be in For we must not deny them a Judgment of Discretion about their own actions 3. And by this course Ministers that are the Eies of the Body must not only be guided by other parts but they must execute against their own Knowledg and Conscience when other men miss-judge 4. And if so either God commandeth us to sinne when ever people or Magistrates bid us which none dare say or else it is no sinne when it doth but get their Vote and so we may warrantably do what the Magistrate bids us as Hobbs thinks or what the people bids us as others as unreasonably think As if it would be a sufficient excuse for me to say Lord I did what the Magistrate or the Major Vote of the people bid me though it was that which thou forbidest 5. If the people have no such Power over one another then they have none over their Rulers or Guides But they have none such over one another Indeed in order to Unity a Major Vote may not effectually oblige but occasion an obligation But as to Government let them shew us if they can from Scripture where the Major Vote of a Church hath the Government of the Lesser part or that the Lesser may go against their own Judgment and Conscience meerly because the greater part requireth it This Governing Vote is as strange a thing to the Scripture as a Pope is 6. Pastours or General uâ—fixed Ministers may receive persons into the Vniversal Church sometime without receiving them into any particular Church And what have any people there to do with the tryal or Approbation of their Profession or Qualifications One can lay no more claim to it then another And sure all the world must not have the tryal of them 7. What people did Philip advise with before he Baptized the Eunuch Or who but Philip alone was judge of his Profession What Vote approved of the 3000 Converts Acts 2 or of Paul Acts 9. or of Lydia or the Gaoler Acts 16. or any other that ever were admitted by the Ministers of Christ in Scripture times And what Magistrates were the Approvers for 300 years after Christ No nor after 8. If in this part of our Office we must obey men against God whether Magistrate or People then in other parts And so if the Vote of the Church or Magistrate forbid me to pray or preach against Pride Covetousness or Drunkenness I must obey them that is I must obey men before God and please men and be no longer the Minister of Christ 9. What can be more plainly contrary to Scripture then for the people by a Major Vote to Rule those whom God commandeth to obey as their Rulers Heb. 13. 7. 17. 24. 1. Tim. 5. 17. 1 Thes 5. 12. Acts 20 c. Object Pastours have but a Ministerial Ruling Power Answ Who doubts of that But is a Ministerial Rule no Rule No man on earth hath more then a Ministerial Power For all are under God and the Redeemer All Judges Justices and other Officers in the Commonwealth have but a Ministerial Rule as Officers But is that no Rule Or shall the People therefore Rule these Rulers We are Christs Ministers for the people we are their 's finally but have our Power from Christ only Efficiently If the People are the Rulers who are the Ruled It 's a strange society when the Ruling and Ruled part is the same
prentice after this If the University give a man the Degree of Doctor of Divinity or Master of Arts that never took Degree of Batchelour of Divinity or of Arts they cannot afterwards call him back to take his Batchelours Degree If you have irregularly admitted the untryed unapproved unconfirmed to the Lord Supper you have Eminenter though not Formaliter Confirmed and Approved him though irregularly Of this more anon Prop. 19. So exceeding great and many are the mischiefs that have befallen us by the neglect of a solemn meet Transition from an Infant into the Adult Church state and which undoubtedly will continue till this be remedyed that all Magistrates Ministers and People that dissemble not in professing themselves to be Christians should with speed and diligence attempt the Cure LEt us here take a view of the case of our Nation and Congregations and then consider of the effects and consequents All the people of our Parishes except Anabaptists do bring their Children to be Baptized which if it were faithfully done were a happy means of an early engagement unto Christ and a happy enterance upon further mercy Multitudes of those know not what Baptism is nor to what use and end it is appointed nor what benefit their Children may receive by it I speak upon too sure and large experience nor do they know what Christianity is nor who Jesus Christ is nor what it is that they are to do in Baptism But there they make a promise customarily as they are bid in words not understood that they will acquaint their children at age with the Covenant there made which they never understood themselves and that they will educate them in Godliness when they hate Godliness at the heart And when they come home they performe their promise accordingly They teach them nothing of the Doctrine of Christianity and the life to come but they give them up to the flesh and the world which there in words they did renounce and they teach them by their daily examples to curse and swear and raile and to be proud and covetuous and voluptuous serving their bellies in stead of God and hateful reproaching a godly life instead of teaching it their Children These Children are customarily brought to the Assemblies where they heare the plainest teaching without understanding or regarding it and grow hardened under daily reproofs and exhortations living as their Parents taught them some in gross ignorance and worldlyness without any signes of Godlyness further then to come to Church some in Drunkenness some in Whoredom abundance in a malignant hatred of a holy life making them that use it the common scorne and taking them for the hatefullest persons in the Parish or Country where they live For custome sake and to quiet their Conscience in their sinne they will come to the Lords Table if they be admitted by the Pastour and may have it in their mode and way And if a Minister shall desire them to come to him first that he may understand their knowledg and Profession they scorn it and ask him by what Authority he would examine them and what proof he hath that men must be examined before they be admitted to the Lords Supper And some self-conceited half-witted Writers have taught them this lesson and made Ministerial tryal and Approbationâ—odious to them But because they were once Baptized and have since come to hear and joyne with us in the Assembly therefore they think that they have right to all Ordinances and are true Christians and Adult members of the Church and also exempt from the Government of the Pastours that require them to submit to the means of their own good In the Bishops daies some few of them were Confirmed in the Country where I lived about one of ten or twenty and what that was and how it was done I can tell you but what I once made tryall of When I was a Schoole-boy about 15 years of age the Bishop coming into the Country many went in to him to be Confirmed we that were boies runne out to see the Bishop among the rest not knowing any thing of the meaning of the business when we came thither we met about thirty or fourty in all of our own stature and temper that had come for to be Bishopt as then it was called The Bishop examined us not at all in one Article of the Faith but in a Church-yard in hast we were set in a rank and he past hastily over us laying his hands on our head and saying a few words which neither I nor any that I spoke with understood so hastily were they uttered and a very short prayer recited and there was an end But whethey we were Christians or Infidels or knew so much as that there was a God the Bishop little knew nor enquired And yet he was one of the best Bishops esteemed in England And though the Canons require that the Curate or Minister send a Certificate that children have learnt the Catechism yet there was no such thing done but we runne of our own accord to see the Bishop only and almost all the rest of the County had not this much This was the old careless practice of this Excellent Duty of Confirmation Some few perhaps halfe a Parish in the best places will send their children to Church to be catechized yet but even those few that learn the words for the most part understand not what they say and are as ignorant of the matters as if they never learnt the words This is the common way by which our Parishes come to be Churches and our people to be Christians supposing some to be mixt among them that are more Faithfully devoted to God in Baptism and better educated in the feare of God 2. Now let us see what are the real visible undenyable fruits of this defective sinful course Because men build upon this Fundamental falshood that infant Baptism upon the Parents Profession doth give them right to the Church-state and Priviledges of the Adult without any personal Profession and Covenanting with God when they come to the use of reason which the Church must have cognisance of and so they that entred somewhat more Regularly into an Infant Church state do become Adult-members secretly unobservedly and no body well knows how Hereupon it followeth 1. That our Churches are lamentably corrupted and diseased though they are true Churches and have Life in them while they are made so like the unbelieving and ungodly world and the Garden of Christ is made too like the common wilderness For Heathens and Impious persons and all sorts of the unclean almost are the members of them where Parishes or Parish-meetings are made convertible with Churches I would make the case neither worse nor better then it is Till within these few years I knew but very imperfectly how it is and I thought the case had been better with some and worse with others then I have found it upon tryall And had I not set
are to rest in Obedience to their Pastours for that 's undoubtedly their duty the work being the Pastours and not theirs 2. But if the case be plainly contrary to the Scripture as if he would admit an Impenitent Drunkard Fornicatour c. they must disown his sinne that it lie not upon them and refuse private familiarity with that person but not withdraw from publick Ordinances because of his presence For when they have done their duty and rid themselves of the guilt by a dissent the person is to them as Morrally absent though Locally and Physically present and the Ordinance is not defiled to them by his Corporal presence but the guilt will lie on the Rulers of the Church otherwise all Churches should be broken in pieces if the people must seperate when every one that they are confident is unworthy is Introduced and the Governed will become the Governours 3. But if it be not a few that the Pastours thus introduce against the certain Word of God but so many and such as will corrupt the substance of the Church and make it an uncapable matter for the form and so to become another thing and destroy the very Ends of Church-association so that it is no longer a Communion of Saints then the people fearing God are bound to stop this before it have quite corrupted the Church by admonishing the Pastours and advising with neighbour Churches to admonish them and if that prevail not by rejecting them and if they cannot do so by reason of a Major Vote of uncapable persons they ought to withdraw themselves and worship God in such a Church as is truly capable of the Name and Ends And this is a Lawfull and Necessary separation of which as it is a duty God is the Cause and as it is a forsaking of the rest the culpable cause is only in themselves I can easily prove all this but that I think it needless tediousness 4. And indeed it would be very hard measure if at the corrupt administration of a carnal or carless or erroneous Pastour all the Church must be under an Obligation to give their estates by way of relief to every one that he will put the name of a Christian and Church member upon unworthily Then may he force them to maintaine all the beggars and rogues about them though they were Infidels and impious men I speak not of the common relief of the needy for that I know they owe to an Infidel but of the special Community which Charity must make among the Disciples of Christ It 's against all Reason that an erring or careless Pastour shall thus Command all the Peoples estates by introducing such without their consent whom they are bound thus to maintaine 5. Yea indeed the Spirit of God is in the Saints a Spirit of discerning so that it is not Possible that all the Church should in their Affections obey such a corrupt Administratour by Loving all the notorious ungodly men as Saints with the special Love of brethren whom he will carelesly or erroneously put in the place of Saints I cannot possibly Love that man as a Saint or Disciple of Christ that I am certain is his enemy and none such I conclude therefore that though the people be not Church-governours by a Vote that 's a great errour yet they have a Judgment of Discerning according to which they must obey or reject their Pastours administrations And he that denyeth this and would have them yield an Absolute obedience without trying choosing and refusing would not only make the Pastours to be of a Papal streine but would give them a Jesuitical Obedience above what the moderate Papists give the Pope And therefore seeing that ad finem there is a Necessity that the People consent or else they cannot Obey nor hold communion with the person therefore there is also the same Necesity ad finem that they have satisfaction offered them and have either the cognisance of the Profession and admission of the person or that they be satisfied in the fidelity of their Pastours in Administration and that he seek their consent or which is best that some chosen persons do Represent them and be present at such Professions with the Pastours and the Pastours and their own Delegates together do acquaint the Congregation of all that are Admitted and of their Satisfactory Prfession that they may hold Communion with them This I speak of those which are very many that are fit for Church-communion and yet through bashfullness or want of utterance are unable to make a Publike Profession before all The choisest Christians that I have known have been such But those that are able should rather in Publike make their own Profession Object But what if one part of the Congregation approve of the Person and Profession and the other disallow it Answ 1. They are to be governed by the Pastours 2. And consult with the Pastours of Neighbour Churchâ—â— in rules of great weight aed danger 3. And the lesser part of the Church in doubtfull cases and tollerable differences is to yield to the greater part Not as if a Major Vote had the Government of the rest much less of their Governours but in Order to Vnity the fewer must submit Quest But what if the people would have the Pastour Baptize Confirm or introduce an open hereticke or wicked person in his impenitency Answ The Pastour must obey God and refuse to obey them Quest And what if the People think a man unfit whom the Pastour would Approve and Introduce Answ 1. He may admit him into the Universal Church notwithstanding their unjust refusall 2. He hath power to Admit him into that particular Church against their unjust dissent as he is the Ruler of the Church and the Administratour of the Ordinances 3. He hath Authority to perswade and command them from Christ to hold communion with the person and do their duty to him which if they do not they commit a double sinne one of unjustice and uncharitableness in a causless rejecting of a member of Christ and another of disobedience against the fifth Commandement 4. But yet the Pastours cannot force the people to obey their advice and command nor effectually procure it perhaps 5. And therefore their forementioned Power is not alwaies to be exercised For it is in vaine to use a means that will rather hinder the End then attain to it and so is at that time no means Sometimes the Pastour may see just cause to exercise all this Power and execute his part of Church communion with the person in administring the Ordinances to him and leave the people answerable to God for refusing their part But this is not an usual case Usually if he see the People resolve against Communion with that person how fit soever he is publickly to cleare himself by disallowing them in their sinne and reproving them for it and leaving the blame on them and then in Prudence to forbear the Intruding
do manifest whom they esteem good Christians and this the people very much look at 2. The Reputation of all the Pastours of the Church which is to be manifested in their Agreements Confessions or Declarations and Practices 3. The common consent of Christian people which is to be manifested by their actions according to the Laws of Christ and the Direction of their Guides If Magistrates Ministers and people do concurre to repute all the Infidels and utterly Ignorant wicked men among us to be Christians how many thousand Souls may this deceive and undo for ever Whereas If Magistrates Ministers and People that feare God would all agree accordng to the Laws of Christ to esteem none Adult-Christians but those that by a Credible Profession of Christianity do seem to be such it would abundantly help to convince them of their misery and the need of Christ and Grace and the absolute necessity of a change We see even among good men in the case of a particular sinne how much common Reputation doth help to hinder the work upon their Consciences Among the Reformed Churches beyond the Sea what Conscience is troubled for these actions or omissions on the Lords Day which in England would much trouble men of the same temper in other things Among several Sects it troubleth them not freely to revile the Servants of Christ that are against them because they finde it rather go for commendable then much condemnable by those whom they most esteem Among the Papists the believing in a Vice-Christ and the worshiping of his Image and Cross with Divine Worship and also the consecrated Host and the condemning all the Churches of Christ that do it not do goe for Virtues and Christian Practices though they are most haynous odious sinnes and what is it but common Reputation of Prince and Priests and multitudes of people that could make so many yea and such persons as some of them are to continue in such sinnes as if they were a part yea an essential part of holiness and one generation to succeed another in them Were these sinnes but commonly reputed to be as odious as indeed they are what a change would it make on millions of Souls So that it 's strange to see the power of Reputation 3. Moreover this course would be an excellent help to the Labours of the Ministers of Christ for mens Salvation They would better understand and apply our Sermons whereas now they lose the benefit by misapplying them Now we must labour all our lives and with most in vaine to make unbelievers and ungodly persons understand what they are and no means will serve to convince many people that they are not truly Christians that know not what it is to be a Christian or that hate it and fight against it When they all go together under the name of Christians what ever comforts they hear offered to Believers they take them to themselves or mistake them as offered to them and all the threatnings that are uttered against unbelievers they put by and think it is not they that they are spoken against But if once we could but get men to stand in their own places and to know themselves how easily then would our message work Me thinks the Devil should not be able to keep one man of an hundred in his power if they knew themselves to be in his power nor one of an hundred in a state of ungodliness and condemnation if they knew that they are in such a state At least I am sure men will not so numerously nor easily runne into Hell when they know they are going into it as when they are confident that they are good Christians and in the way to Heaven 4. If this foredescribed Confirmation be practised it will more powerfully oblige our people to Christ then a secret sliding into the number of Adult-Christians will do And doubtless solemn engagements and obligations have some force upon Conscience to hold men to Christ and restraine them from sinne or else Baptism it self would be much frustrate and the Jews should not have been so often called by Moses Joshua Asa and other Princes to renew their Covenant with God But with us men feel no such bonds upon them And many question whether they are bound at all by their Parents promises for them in Baptism 5. The profiting of our people will be much greater in their own place when those that are not yet fit for Adult-membership and Priviledges are kept in the place of Catechumens or Expectants Every thing doth thrive and prosper best in its own place If you teare them not out of the Churches wombe till they are ready for the birth they will prosper there that else may perish Your Corne will best prosper in the cold earth where it seems to be dead and buried till the Springing time shall come And you should not violently unhose the eares till Nature put them forth The first digestion must be wrought before the second and Nature must have time allowed it and the stomack must not too hastily let go the food if you would have good sanguification and nutrition follow Men think they do a great kindness to grosly ignorant or impious men to take them into the Church before they are capable of such a station and the work or Priviledges thereto belonging but alas they do but hurry them to perdition by thrusting them out of the state where they might have thriven in preparation to a Church-state into a state which will set them abundance of work which they are utterly unfit for and under the pretence of benefits and Priviledges will occasion abundance of aggravations of their sinnes A boy in his A B C. will learne better in his own place among his fellows then in a higher form where he hath work set him which he is uncapable of doing 6. By this means also Church-Discipline will attain its Ends It will awe and preserve the Church and terrifie and reduce offendours and help them to Repentance and preserve the order of the Church and Gospel when it is exercised upon such as are capable of it that know the nature of it and either are habitually diposed to profit by it or at least understand what it was that they were engaged to and understandingly consent to live under such a Discipline and when it is exercised upon few and we have not such multitudes to sweep out of the Church 7. By this means both Church-associations and Ordinances may attaine their Ends and people will be capable of doing the duty of Christians to one another when others are capable of receiving it Church members are bound to exhort one another daily while it is called to day lest any be hardened by the deceitfullness of sinne Heb. 3. 13. and to teach and admonish one another Col. 3. 16. But before swine we must not cast such pearls nor give that which is holy to dogs Matth. 7. 6. Therefore it necessarily followeth that dogs and
Opinion right let it not so farre dispossess you of Charity and Reason as to unchurch all the Churches of Christ that thinke otherwise or to cast off Communion with the Godly that are not of your Opinion as long as we come so near you as to take none into the Number of Adult Church-members but those that are Confirmed or Approved by Christs Ministers upon their personal credible Profession of Faith and Holiness Lay all this together and we may well conclude that this Practice of Ministerial Approbation and Confirmation or Restoration of all that are admitted into the Number of Adult-Christians or visible Church-members and to their Priviledges is so necessary and so admirably fitted both for Reformation and Reconciliation of the Episcopal Presbyterian Independants Erastian and moderate Anabaptists and to stop the mouths of the Intemperate and of the Papists that all Magistraâ—es Ministers and People that love the Churches Purity and Peace and long to see it clensed and healed should gladly embrace it and vigorously promote it it I Have two things yet more to do upon this Subject 1. To answer some Objections and 2 To give some Directions to all sorts for the effectual putting it in execution The Objections are these Object 1. You will tempt the Anabaptists to say that this is but a shift of our own devising instead of Baptism lest we should yield to them when we are convinced of the Necesity of a personal Covenanting by the Adult Answ There is no Ordinance or Truth of God that will not be spoken against by mistaking men and yet we must not therefore cast them away Nor is it the way to vindicate a Truth or Ordinance from reproach to disclame it and so to reproach it actually our selves Nor is it the way to get advantage of an adversary to fly fom him too far into the contrary extreame but rather to come as neare him as the truth will give us leave And to the Anabaptists Objection we shall give them our reasons against their way in a fitter place and have already done it We are most certain that the Servants of God of old both with Circumsion and without it Deut. 29. did enter their children into Covenant with God as well as themselves And if it be the express Word of God that both Infants and Aged should be entered and engaged to him in Covenant we will obey his Word and do both though the Anabaptists will do but the one He must have a hard face that will deny that it was once the duty of Parents to offer their children to God and enter them into Covenant with him and when they have proved that this Duty or Power is recalled which I never yet saw done no not in Mr. Tombes his last Voluminous Review then we will forbeare it but till then it is not mens talk and confident words that must make a tender Conscience yield to omit so great and plain a duty or give up so great a Mercy as this is I am sure that Infants were then no more able to believe themselves nor enter themselves in Covenant with God then now and I am sure the Parents by Gods appointment did it for them offering and engageing them to God and that God hereupon is called their God and they his people and that usually the signe of the Covenant was annexed And I am sure that Parents have as much Natural Interest in their children now as then And I never yet saw where God had acquit us of this duty or withdrawn this Mercy from us and our seed Object 2. The proof which you bring for this Confirmation is so obscure that it is not like to be generally received Answ It was generally received in almost all the Churches on earth till lately And as far as I plead for it it is yet Doctrinally at least owned and maintained even by those Churches that practically have disused it Of all the Christians on Earth I suppose there is a thousand if not ten thousand for it doctrinally or dogmatically for one that is against it if we judge by the Laws Confessions and writings of their guides Though the Greeks I know do not own the Popish Confirmation nor have it not so formally as they should and the Papists have corrupted it by their abuse yet the thing in substance is owned dogmatically by almost all the Christian world And they must be very singular persons that disowne it 2. And I think the proofe that hath been given you is clearer then you have for the Morality of the Lords day for constant family Prayer for Infant Baptism and many a holy Duty which yet we have sufficient proof for What would you have plainer Is there the least doubt of it whether a Presonal Profession and Covenanting with God be necessary to him that will be taken into the Number of Adult Christians and possess their Priviledges and Communion Or whether this Profession must be approved by the Pastour of the Church and known to them that must hold Communion with him Prove if you can that ever one man was admitted among Adult-Christians to enjoy Communion with them without such a personal Profession You cannot prove it If Infant-Covenanting were enough for the Adult then Infidels are Believers 3. Object But this will make Ministers to be Lords of the Church when no man can be taken into the Church or possess the Priviledges of a Christian till he be Approved by them This will put a Tyrannical Power into their hands Answ 1. Such a Tyranical Power as every Physician hath who may choose or refuse his patients or every School-master hath that may choose or refuse his Schollars if he engage not himself to the contrary as Plato Zeno and every Philosopher did in his Schoole 2. It is such a Tyranny as Christ hath unquestionably set up and to accuse him of setting up Tyranny is an unkind part of them that look to be saved by him 3. It is a Power that hath Constantly been exercised by the Officers of Christ and did not men smel out the Tyranny of it till now What Prince did govern the Church doores and judge who should be admitted from the daies of Christ till Constantines daies when the Church was at the purest yea or ever after for many a hundred yeares Did not all the Apostles and every Preacher of the Gospel Baptize those that they convetred and judge of them whether they were Baptizable And did not the Bishops Confirm the Baptized without consulting another Power Half that were admitted into the Church by Baptism and more for some hundred yeares after Christ were the Adult and of these the Pastour required a personal Covenant and Profession The other half were their Infants and for them they required the Parents Profession and entering them into Covenant But still the Pastours were the Judges who were the administers 4. If you think it too much Power for us I beseech you think it too much work for
ejus salubriter percipit And saith the Synod of Dort Artic. 1. 8. 17. Quandoquidem de voluntate Dei ex verbo ipsius nobis est judicandum quod testatur liberos fidelium esse sanctos non quidem natura sed beneficiâ— faederis gratuiti in quo illi cum parentibus comprehenduntur pij parentes de electione salute suorum liberorum quos Deus in Infantia ex hac vita evocat dubitare non debeâ—t And if there be such certainty of the Election and Salvation of all such Infants of the godly as ought to exclude all doubting surely the visible Church-state of the Adult also hath some respect to saving grace so farre as that its credible fide humanâ that such have saving Faith And saith Mr Fullwood Append. p. 6. I conceive that such an ones personall profession in his generall owâ—ing the true Faith and usuall attending Gods publick worship doth superadde a kinde of new right and mingle it with such a persons former right had by his Birth priviledge And if the new Right be not a necessary Right I think it will prove no right I will contend with no man whether the approved profession which I have pleaded for in this book be the very same thing with the Ancients confirmation I have given you my thoughts of it and I am sure the thing in question is our duty and the name not unfit and that its the same with the Confirmation owned by the Divines of the reformed Churches and particularly with that established and recommended in the Book of Common-Prayer here in England for the substance I shall conclude with this serious request to my Brethren seconded with weighty reasons Even that they would take heed of both extreams in their judging of Church-members and managing the Discipline and Ordinances of Christ 1. Should we be so loose as to cast out Discipline or settle the Churches either with such materials for quality or quantity as that it shall be uncapable of Discipline we shall never be able to answer it to Christ And should we make a new qualification of Adult Church-members even their Infant-Title-condition alone or the profession of a Faith that is not saving we should come too neere the making of a new Baptism and Church And truly if we do but slubber over the business and to avoid offence or trouble to our selves should take up with a profession utterly incredible especially in these times when we have so much liberty and countenance from the Magistrate for a fuller Reformation we shall be guilty of so much injury to the Church and the Christian name and our people souls as is little considered by many that have their eye only on the contrary extreame as if there were no danger but on one side 2. On the other side if we go so rigidly and unrighteously to work as some men are bent to do we may accomplish those ends that we are endeavouring to overthrow and frustrate our own which we think to attain If we will reject the Scripture-ancient-Character or Evidence of Title to Church-priviledges even a credible profession of Christianity we shall confound our selves and trouble the Church and be at a losse for a certain Evidence and never know what ground to rest upon And we shall injure the souls of multitudes of true Believers and keep out those that Christ will entertain For there are no other terms besides taking mens profession by a humane Faith on which we can admit persons without excluding multitudes that should not be excluded I doubt many Ministers that have had a more ingenuous education themselves are not sufficiently sensible of the great disadvantage that Countrey People are under by their want of such Education Many that are bred where holy discourse is strange and never were used to any thing of that nature no nor to common Urbanity of speech or behaviour may be brought to hearty sorrow for sinne and desires after Christ and Grace long before they can expresse their knowledg or desires in any such manner as some men do expect Many gracious souls as farre as I can discerne I have met with that never were noted for any thing extraordinary in Religion though they lived among such I had rather let in many that are unregenerate into the Church then keep out one that 's a true Believer if there be no other remedy The Lord Jesus that died for them and sent the Ministery for them and will at last admit them into Heaven will give us little thanks for excluding his weakest Members from the Church and from the use of the Sacrament and Communion of Saints who have most need of them of any that have right to them For my part I desire not nor dare be guilty of that way of Government in the Church as shall grieve those that Christ would not have grieved and exclude the weak and turne or keep out the Infants in Grace from the Family of the Lord. A compassionate Minister is likest to Christ that will not break the bruised reed How dealt he with the woman taken in adultery How tenderly excuseth he the sluggishnesse of his Disciples that could not watch and pray with him one houre in his last extreamity with the Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak when many now that think well of themselves would almost excommunicate men for as small a fault We know not in such cases what Spirit we are of But this is not all I must confesse Brethren which I beseech you patiently to hear these three things very much stick upon my thoughts 1. I cannot but observe how many eminent Professors of Piety have miscarried and grievously miscarried of late when some of lower Professions have stood fast And I think God suffers the falls of many of his own to let them know the frailty of our natures and cause them to be compassionate to others And some censorious mens hearts might smite them if they had heard from their Master Let him that is faultless cast the first stone 2. And it sticks very much upon my thoughts how small a handfull the censorious way would reduce the Catholike Church of Christ to When it is but about the sixth part of the world that are at all Baptized Christians and scarce the sixth part of them that are Protestants and of the Protestants so few except in England that are so qualified for holiness as in your admissions you exspect and in England how small is the number that you would admit I am deeply afraid lest you hainously injure the Cause of Christ by your excessive rigor and lest confining even the visible Church into so exceeding small a compass should tempt men to infidelity For he that to day can believe that Christ died not for one of a hundred thousand in the world may to morrow believe that he died for none at all I hope the little flock of the Elect is not so little as some would have
washt with Christ's Blood how can they deny to wash them with that water that is appointed to signifie and invest Moreover Infants are capable of many other Priveledges and of being the Adopted Sonnes of God the Members of Christ the Heirs of Heaven as having Right thereto and being the members of the Church and being under the Special Protection and Provision of God and in a special sort partakers of the Prayers of the Church with divers more As in the Commonwealth an Infant is capable of having Honour and Inheritance in Right though not Actally to use them and of the protection of the Laws for Life Reputation and estate and of being Tenant and obliged to pay a certain Rent and Homage when he comes to age and in the mean time to have Provisions from the Estate that he hath Title to But all this I have fuller exprest elsewhere And I have altely read Mr Tombes's last and large Reply to part of my Book and many others and must needs say that it leaves me still perswaded that it is the will of Christ that the Infants of his Servants should be Dedicated to him in Baptism and members of his visible Church and though upon the review of my Arguments I find that I have used too many provoaking words for which I am heartily sorry and desire pardon of God and him yet I must say that I am left more confident then before that the cause is Gods which Mr Tombes opposeth Of which if God will I intend yet to give some further account In the mean time I deal with this but as a Supposition that is already sufficiently proved though all men yea all good men see not the sufficiency of the proofe Prop. 2. There are many Priveledges belonging to the Adult Members of the Church which Infant members are not capable of THis is true both of Natural and Moral Capacities The Priviledges which I mean are the pardon of many actual sinnes committed since they are Adult the exercise of all Holy Graces Knowing God Loving him Trusting him Serving him the Communion that we have with God herein as particularly in Prayer in holy Praises and Thanksgivings in Heavenly Meditations The Peace and Joy that followeth Believing and the Hopes of Everlasting Life the Communion which we have with the Church of Christ in hearing praying Praises the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ in distribution by giving and receiving and an endearing holy Love within These and many more Priveledges are proper to the Adult That Infants are not Naturally capable of these is as needless to prove as that they are Infants And then that they are not Morally capable is an inseparable consequent For though Natural Capacity may be without Moral yet Moral cannot be without Natural In point of Duty Infants are not bound to the work as to Hear Pray Prayse c. beyond the Natural Capacity of their Intellects and bodies And so in point of Benefit we must have more sobriety then to suppose God to make over any Benefit to them which they are not capable of All this is plain Prop. 3. The Continuation of Priveledges received in Infancy is part of the Priveledges of the Adult or the Restoration of them if they be lost IF the cause discontinue the effect will cease Adult Priveledges comprehend the Infant Priviledges partly as that which is Perfect comprehendeth the Imperfect and partly as the whole comprehendeth the parts and partly as the thing Continued is the same with the thing Begun Infant Priviledges would all cease with Infancy if the Causes or Conditions cease and there be no other Cause for their continuance God never took Infants into his Church and Covenant with a purpose so to continue them without any other Condition then that upon which they were admitted This is past denyal and will be more cleared in the next Prop. 4. The Title-Condition of Infant Church-membership and Priviledges is not the same with the Title-Condition of the Church-membership and Priviledges of the Adult so that if this new Condition be not performed when men come to Age their former Title ceaseth and there is no other that ariseth in his stead 1. WE are agreed I think that our Title which is Fundamentum Juris is Gods Covenant Graunt or Guift As it is his Precept that constituteth our Duty so it is his Promise or Deed of Gift which is our title to the Benefit 2. And we are agreed I hope that this Promise or Grant from God is Conditional For if Church-membership and Priviledges he Absolutly Given then it is to All or but to Some Not to All for then the Church and the world are all one and then it is not Ecclesia caetus evocatus and then Heathens and Infidels have right which are things that no Christian I think will grant If it be but Some that have Title then there must be some Note to know them by or else the some will be equal to All or to None And if they be Marked out then it must be by Name or by Description Not by Name for we find the contrary Scripture doth not Name all that have Title to Church Priviledges If it be by Description it is either by meer Physical or by Moral Qualifications that they are described The former none doth imagine that I hear of If they are Moral Qualifications then either they are such as are prerequisite to our Right and Priviledges or not That they are prerequisite all must confess that read the Promise and all do confess that they are prerequisite to all the following Priviledges And if Prerequisite then either as Means or no Means The later none can affirm without going against so much light as ordinary Christians have still ready at hand to confute them with And if they are required as Means then either as Causes or Conditions And I think you will sooner yield them to be Conditions then Causes though either Concession sufficeth to the end that is before us But of this we need to say no more both because it is commonly confessed and because that the words of the Promises are so plaine and undenyable being uttered in Conditional terms Nor is this either inconsistent with or any way unsuitable to an Absolute Decree For as a Threatning so the Conditionality of a Promise are Instruments admirably suited to the accomplishment of an Absolute Purpose or Decree He that is fully Resolved to save us or to give us the Priviledges of his Church will deal with us as men in bringing us to the possession of the intended benefits and therefore will by Threats and Conditional promises excite us to a careful performance of the Condition and that Grace which is resolved to effect the very Condition in us is also resolved to make a Conditional Promise yea and a Threatening the Instrument of effecting it 3. Note that the great Question whether all the Infants of true Believers are certainly Justified or
whether some of them have but lower Priviledges is not here to be determined but in a fitter place And therefore I determine not what Priviledges they are that will cease if our Infant Title cease But that according to the tenour of the Promise the Continuance of them with the Addition of the Priviledges proper to the Adult are all laid upon a New Condition 4. Note also that when I call it another or different Condition I mean not that it is different in the Nature of the Act but in the Agent or Subject It is the same kind of Faith which at first is required in the Parent for the Childs behoof and that afterward is required in our selves But the Condition of the Infants Title is but this that he be the Child of a Believer Dedicated to God But the Condition of the Title of persons at Age is that they be themselves Believers that have Dedicated themselves to God The Faith of the Parent is the Condition of Infant Title and the Faith of the person himself is the Condition of the Title of one at Age. That their own Faith is not the Condition of an Infants Title I think I need not prove For 1. They are uncapable of Believing without a Miracle 2. If they were not as some Lutherans fondly think yet it 's certain that we are uncapable of discerning by such a sign I think no Minister that I know will judge what Infants do themselves believe that he may baptise them 3. And I think no man that looks on the Command or Promise and the Person of an Infant will judge that he is either Commanded then to believe or that his Believing is made the Condition of his Infant Title But that a Personal Believing is the Condition of the Title of them at Age is as farre past doubt and it 's proved thus Arg. 1. The Promise it self doth expresly require a Faith of our own of all the Adult that will have part in the Priviledges therefore it is a Faith of our Own that is the Condition of our Title Mark 16 16. He that Believeth and is Baptized shall be saved and he that Believeth not shall be damned Act. 8. 36 37. And the Eunuch said See here is water what doth hinder me to be baptized And Philip said If thou believest with all thy heart thou maist Act. 2. 38 41. Repent and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the Remission of sinnes c. Then they that gladly received his word were baptized Act. 10. 44 47 48. Act. 16. 14 15. 30. 32 33. Rom. 10. 12 13 14. With many other Texts do put this out of doubt Argument 2. We were engaged in our Infant baptismal Covenant to Believe and Repent when we came to Age as a means to our reception of the Benefits of the Covenant proper to the Adult therefore we must perform our Covenant and use this means if we will have the benefits Arg. 3. If another Condition were not of Necessity to the Aged beside the Condition that was necessary to them in Infancy then Turks Jews and Heathens should have right to Church-membership and Priviledges of the Adult But the Consequent is notoriously false therefore so is the Antecedent The Reason of the Consequent is evident Because a man that hath believing Parents may turn Turk as is known in thousands of Janizaries or Jew or Pagan and therefore if it were enough that he was the Child of a Believer his Title to Church Priviledges would still continue And so among professed Christians the Child of a Believer may turn Heretick or notoriously prophane and scandalous and yet have Title to Church Priviledges if his first Title still hold and a personal Faith be not a necessary Condition of his Right Adde to these the many Arguments tending to confirm the point in hand which I have laid down on another occasion in my Dâ—sputations of Right to Sacraments But I think I need not spend more words to perswade any Christians that our Parents Faith will not serve to give us Title to the Church Priviledges of the Adult but we lose our Right even to Church-membership it self if when we come to Age we adde not a personal Faith or profession at least of our own I only adde that this is a truth so farre past doubt that even the Papists and the Greekshave put it into their Canons For the former you may find it in the Decrees Part. 3. dist 3. pag. mihi 1241 cited out of Augustinin these words Parvulus qui baptizatur fiâ—ad anneâ—s rationales veniens non crediderit nec ab illicitis abstinuerit nihil ei prodest quod parvulus accepit That is An Infant that is baptized if comming to years of discretion he do not believe nor abstain from things unlawfull that which he received in Infancy doth profit him nothing And for the Greeks that this is according to their mind you may see in Zonaras in Comment in Epist Canon Can. 45. cited ex Basilii Mag. Epist 2. ad Amphiloch thus Siquis accâ—pto nomine Christianismi Christum contumeliâ afficit nulla est illi appellationis utilitas that is If any one having received the Name of Christianity shall repreach Christ he hath no profit by the Name On which Zonaras addeth Qui Christo credidit Christianus appellatus est cum ex Divinis praecept is vitam instituere oportet ut hac ratione Deus per ipsum glorificetur quemadmodum illis verbis praecipitur sic luceat Lux vestra coram hominibus c. Siquis autem nominatur quidem Christianus Deâ— vero praecepta transgreditur contumeliam irregat Christo cujus de nomine appellatur nec quicquam ex eâ appellatione utilitatis trahit That is Seeing he believed in Christ and is called a Christian ought to order his life by the Commandements of God that so God may be glorified by him according to that Let your light so shine before men c. If any one that is called a Christian shall transgress Gods Commands he brings a reproach on Christ by whose name he is called and he shall not receive the least profit by that Title or Name This is somewhat higher then the point needs that I bring it for And indeed it were a strange thing if all other Infidels should be shut out of the Priviledges of the Church except only the treacherous Covenant-breaking Infidel for such are all that being baptized in Infancy prove no Christians when they come to Age. As if persidiousness would give him right Prop. 5. As a Personal Faith is the Condition before God of Title to the Priviledges of the Adult so the Profession of this Faith is the Condition of his Right before the Church and without this Profession he is not to be taken as an Adult member nor admitted to the Priviledges of such THis Proposition also as the Sunne revealeth its self by its own light and therefore commandeth
me to say but little for the Confirmation of it Arg. 1. The Church cannot judge of things unknown Non entium non apparentium eadem est ratio Not to appear and not to be is all one as to the judgment of the Church We are not searchers of the heart and therefore we must judge by the discoveries of the heart by outward signes Arg. 2. If Profession of Faith were not necessary Coram Ecclesiâ to mens Church-membership and Priviledges then Infidels and Heathens would have Right as was said in the former case and also the Church and the world would be confounded and the Church would be no Church But these are consequents that I hope no Christians will have a favourable thought of and therefore they should reject the Antecedent Arg. 3. It is a granted case among all Christians that Profession is thus necessary the Apostles and Ancient Churches admitted none without it nor no more must we Though all require not the same manner of Profession yet that Profession it self is the least that can be required of any man that layeth claim to Church Priviledges and Ordinances proper to Adult members this we are all agreed in and therefore I need not adde more proof where I find no Controversie But yet as commonly as we are agreed on this yet because it is the very point which most of the stress of our present Disputation lieth on it may not be amiss to foresee what may possibly be Objected by any new comers hereafter Object Perhaps some may say 1. That we find no mention of Professions required in Scripture 2. It is not probable that Peter received a Profession from those thousands whom he so suddenly Baptized 3 Our Churches have been true Churches without such a Profession personally and distinctly made therefore it may be so still To these briefly yet satisfactorily 1. The Scripture gives us abundant proof that a plain Profession was made in those times by such as were baptized at Age and so admitted by reason of their ripeness and capacity into the Church and to the speciall Communion and Priviledges of the Adult at once To say much of the times of the old Testament or before Christ would be but to interrupt you with less pertinent things Yet there it is apparent that all the people were solemnly engaged in Covenant with God by Moses more then once and that this was renewed by Joshua and other godly Princes and that Asa made the people not only enter into a Covenant to seek the Lord God of their fathers with all their hearts and with all their Soul But that whosoever would not seek him should be put to death whether smal or great man or woman And they sware to the Lord with a loud voice and with shoutings and with trumpets and with cornets 2 Chron. 15. 12 13 14. So following Princes called the people to this open Covenanting But this is not all To take the Lord only to be their God with the rest of the Law was the very essence of an Isarelites Religion which they did not only openly Profess but excessively sometimes glory in As Circumcision sealed the Covenant and therefore supposed the Covenant to Infants and aged whoever were circumcised so had they many sorts of Sacrifice and other worship in which they all were openly to profess the same Religion and Covenant Many Purifications also and Sanctifyings of the people they had and many figures of the Covenant I am the Lord thy God c. Thou shalt have no other Gods before me c. was the tenour of the Covenant which every Israelite expressly and by frequent acts professed to consent to The Law is called a Covenant which all were to own and avouch the Lord to be their God and themselves his people See Deut. 26. 17 18. chap. 29. 10 11 14 c. 2 King 23. 3. 2 Chron. 23. 3 16. chap. 29. 10. Ezr. 10. 3. Neh. 9. 38. Psal 50. 5. Ezek. 20. 37. Jer. 50. 5. Isa 56. 4 5. Exod. 34. 27. Psal 103. 18. 25. 10. 18. 10 c. And yet I hope no Chhistian would wish that we should deal no more openly and clearly with God the Church and our selves in daies of Gospel Light and worship then the Jews were to do in their darker state under obscure Types and shadows We find that when John Baptist set up his Ministry he caused the people to Cenfess their sinnes Matth. 3. 6. And if we confess our sinnes God is faithfull and just to forgive us our sinnes 1 Joh. 1. 19. And whereas some say that John Baptized them that he calleth a Generation of Vipers I Answer 1. We will believe that when they prove it It seems rather that he put them back 2. If he did Baptize them it was not till they Confessed their sinnes before that all did and it seems by his charge till they promised to bring forth fruits meet for Repentance Matth. 3. 8. Christ would not have so instructed Nicodemus in the Nature and necessity of Regeneration before he was a Disciple if a Professed or Apparent preparation had not been necessary Nor would he ordinarily have taught men the Necessity of denying themselves and forsaking all for a treasure in Heaven with such like if they would be his Disciples if the Profession of so doing had not been Necessary to their visible Discipleship I grant that so full a Profession was not made before Christs Resurrection as after For many Articles of our Belief were afterward made Necessary And the Apostles themselves were unacquainted with what the weakest Christian did afterwards believe But still the Essentials of Faith then Necessary in existence to mens Justification were Necessary in Profession â—â— mens visible Christianity or Church-membership As to those Acts. 2. 37. c. It is plain that they made an open Profession if you Consider 1. That they were openly told the Doctrine which they must be baptized into if they did consent 2. It is said They that gladly received that word were baptized 3. It is certain therefore that they first testified their glad reception of the Word 4. We may not imagine that Peter was God or knew the hearts of all those thousands and therefore he must know it by their Profession that they gladly received the Word 5. Their own mouths cry out for advice in order to their Salvation 6. It had been absurd for the Apostles to attempt to baptize men that had not first professed their Consent 7. The Scripture gives us not the full historical Narration of all that was said and done in such Cases but of so much as was Necessary 8. The Institution and Nature of the Ordinance tells us that Baptism could not be administred without a Profession to the Adult For they were to be Baptzed into the Name of Father Sonne and Holy Ghost and therefore were to profess that they believed in Father Sonne and Holy Ghost Yea the very receiving of
an Infidel or one that Professeth not to be a Christian Baptism is said to save us 1 Pet. 3. 21. And therefore they that will be Baptized must profess the qualifications necessary to the Saved The Key 's of the Kingdom of Heaven are put into the Churches hands and they that are loosed on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven if the Key do not erre And therefore Pastours of the Church must absolve none by Baptism that do not by Profession seem to be Absolvable in Heaven They must Profess to have the old man Crucified with Christ that the Body of sinne might be destroyed that henceforth they might not serve sinne Rom. 6. 5 6 7 8. As many as have been Baptized into Christ have put on Christ and are all one in Christ Jesus and are Abrahams Seed and Heirs according to promise Gal. 3. 27 28 29. This speaks the Apostle of the Probability grounded on a credible Profession And thereforeit is clear that the Profession was presupposed that might support this charitable judgment Our Baptism is the Solemnizing of our Marriage with Christ And it s a new and strang kind of Marriage where there is no Profession of Consent The Baptized are in Scripture called men Washed Sanctified Justified c. 1 Cor. 6. 11. 1 Cor. 14. 33. They are all called Saints and Churches of Saints 1 Cor. 1. 2. All Christians are called Sanctified ones or Saints therefore it s certaine that they professed themselves such But why should I go any further in this when the main substance of my Dispute of Right to the Sacraments proves it I intreat the Reader that would have more to prove not only the Necessity of a Profession but also of the Profession of a Saving Faith to peruse that Book or at least the second Disputation where are Twenty Arguments for it and the sence of all the Ancient Churches there cited out of Mr Gatakers Collections See also Dr Hammonds many testimonies to prove the use of the Abrenuntiation Paraenes pag. 18 19 20. I love not needlesly to recite whath others have already cited But he that knows not that the Universal Church from the daies of the Apostles hath baptized the Adult upon a personal Profession of Faith and Repentance and Vow or Promise or Covenant for obedience knows little of what the Church hath Practised And I hope few sober men will be found that will be so singular and self-conceited as to contradict the Practise of the Universal Church in such a case as this and set up their own private judgment against it and go about to perswade us to a new way of Church enterance and admission now in the end of the world Blame me not to be confident with you where I have so good ground as Scripture and so good company as the Primitive Universal Church To this let me adde that most or too many that we are to receive to the Priviledges of Adult members have violated their Baptism-Covenant and proved ungodly after Baptism and that by open notorious Scandals Now Scripture and the Practice of the Universal Ancient Church direct us to require of these an open Confession of sinne For they need an Absolution and not a meer Confirmation It is past all controversie that such have both an open Confession and Profession to make Yea how scrupulous the Ancient Church was of Receiving and Absolving such violators of the Baptismal Covenant and on how severe terms they did it is known to all that know any thing of those times I pray amongst others see what Grotius Discus Apol. Rivet pag. 221 222. citeth from Irenaeus Tertullian Pacimus Hierom c. ad pag. 235. n. And as to the last Objection that our Churches were true Churches when we made no particular Professions I Answer 1. Without some Profession of true Christianity our Churches could not have been true Churches And therefore against those that would prove them no Churches we plead and justly that a Profession was made by them 2. But I pray you mark that that will prove a Church to be a true Church which will not prove every person in the Parish to be a true Member of that Church 3. And he that thinks it enough that our Churches have a meer Metaphysical Verity such as Bishop Hall and multitudes of Learned Protestants allow the Church of Rome it self is as good a friend to it as he is to his wife or child that will let them go naked yea and be contented that they catch the plague or leaprosie yea and plead for it too and all because they have still the Truth of Humane Nature I know that any thing that may truly be called a Profession will in that point seem to prove the Being of the Church But as it will not seem to prove the well-being so an obscure Profession doth but obscurely prove the Being of it which an open plain Profession doth more clearly prove Let us not befriend either the Kingdom of darkness or the Seperatists so much as to leave our Churches so open to their exceptions and so apt to cherish and befriend their ignorance and infidelity of the world If coming to Church and sitting there be somewhat a probable argument that men do implicitly believe as that Church believes yet it 's a very dark proof that they understand what the Church believes especially when experience hath acquainted us with the Contray of many of them But now I have said this much for a personal and plain Profession I would faine know what any man hath against it The Church through the great mercy of God hath yet liberty to use it And we see how many thousands make a blind kind of shew of Christianity going from one publike duty to another and knowing not what they do And is there not need that they should be brought out into the open light and see their way If Covenanting with God the Father Son and Holy Ghost be the Essence of our Christianity in the Name of God I desire you to consider whether it be a thing to be hudled up in the dark Unless it be mens design to hide the Nature of Christianity and keep people in destructive ignorance and delude their Souls with a name and shew of a Religion which they understand not they will surely be willing that men should know the Covenant that they make and understand what they do before they enter into a Marriage bond with Christ if at Age or own it if they have been entered in infancy Why should we choose Darkness rather then Light Why should an Implicit Covenant and Profession be pleaded for when the being of a Profession is palam fateri openly to make known and when we know by sad experience that when we have all done the best we can to make our ignorant people understand we shall find enough ado to accomplish it Ignorance hath no need of frendship especially from Ministers it deserveth none especially in so great
approving of it belongeth to the Office of the Pastours of the Church The first is grounded by almost all Christians that I know of and therefore need not may words 1. If every man should be the sole Judge of the soundness and validity of his own Profession then Hereticks and Heathens and Infidels may all croud into the Church for when there is any outward advantage or other common motive to induce them to it they would all joyn with the Church as if they were Christians And we see that it is the custom of Hereticks to intrude And who shall say to any of them why do you so if themselves are the only Judges We meet daily among our own neighbours with abundance that know not whether Christ be God or man nor who he is nor what he hath done for us nor why he came into the world and are ignorant of almost all the Essentials of the Christian Faith and with abundance more that live in common drunkenness scorning at holy duties and at a Godly life and hating those that use it and giving up themselves wholly to the flesh and the world And yet all these men are so confident of the soundness and validity of their own Profession that they will hate that Minister that shall make any question of their Right to the Priviledges of the Church I speak not by hearsay or conjecture but by sad experience And if they be their own judges all these will be approved and admitted and indeed what man would not be admitted where Christianity is in credit or hath any worldly advantages so that it 's certain that this would pluck up the hedg and lay open the Vineyard of Christ unto the wilderness For self-love is such a powerfull blinding thing that it will make every man almost especially of the worser sort approve of that which is their Own 2. If every man should be the sole Judge of his own Profession and fitness for Church Priviledges then there could be no Communion of Saints For all the most ignorant and impious persons would intrude into our Communion and it would be a Communion not only of actual but of professed impious men But the consequent is intollerable as being contrary to an Article of our Belief and a principal part of Christian practice 3. If each man were the only Judge of his own Profession then there could be no exercise of Church Discipline nor keeping or casting out the wicked But the consequent is unsufferable Therefore 4. If each man be the only Judge of his own Profession then the Church is an unguided ungoverned Society but the Consequent is false therefore so is the Antecedent 2. And now I prove that it belongeth to the Office of the Ministers to judge of and approve the Profession of such as expect admission or the Priveledges of the Church 1. If persons are not the sole Judges themselves then it must belong to the Minister to judge But the Antecedent is before proved The Consequence is proved thus It must belong either to the Pastours or the Magistrate only or the people only or to all or some of these conjunctly Not to the Magistrate only for 1. No man that I know of affirmeth it 2. It is another mans office Not to the people only for 1. None that I know of affirmeth this They all include the Pastours 2. As I said it is made part of the Pastours office If you say that it belongs to Magistrates People and Pastours jointly then you include the Pastours And I grant that in some sort it belongs to them but in a different sort as I shall tell you under the next Proposition 2 It is to Ministers as such that the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven are committed but to approve of the Profession of such as are to be admitted into the Church or to its Priviledges is part of the exercise of the Key 's of the Kingdom therefore it is Ministers to whom it belongeth thus to judge and approve I have proved in another place and so have many others more at large that the Key 's were not given to Peter or to the Apostles as to private men for so they were not nor as to a Church of private Christians for so they were not nor the representatives of any such nor yet as to Apostles only for then they should have belonged to none but themselves the contrary whereof is certain nor as to fixed Diocesan Bishops for such they were not and it 's generally granted that the Key 's belong also to Presbyters either wholly or the chief of them and particularly that in question Nor yet were the Key 's given them only as a Synod or Presbyterie for Peter was not such and this in question hath ever been exercised by such Ministers Arg. 3. The Rulers of the Church are the lawful Judges or Approvers of the Profession of those that come into the Church or demand the Priviledges of it But it is the Ministers of Christ that are the Rulers of the Church as is exprest 1 Thes 12. Acts 2. 28. Heb. 13. 7. 17. 24. 1 Tim. 5. 17. Therefore Arg. 4. Those that are by Office the Stewards of the Mysteries of God and Rulers over his houshould to give them meat in due season which they must do as faithfull and wise servants till their Lord cometh are the men that must judge of and approve the qualifications of those that come under their Stewardship Government and Administration of these Mysteries But such are the Ministers of Christ 1 Cor. 4. 1. Matth. 24. 45 46 47. Therefore Arg. 5. To whom it belongeth to receive men at age into the Church to restore by Absolution them that fell off and to Administer Christ's Ordinances to those that are within to them doth it belong to try judge and approve of them that are to be thus received absolved or that expect the Priviledges of the Church But it belongeth to Christ's Ministers to receive men absolve them and administer the Ordinances to them Therefore The Antecedent is commonly granted and plain in Scripture The Consequence hath Reason so evident as needs no confirmation Arg. 6. If all that enter into the Church or that are restored by Asolution or are stated in a Right to Church Priviledges of the Adult are therewithall engaged into a mutual voluntary Relation to Christs Ministers then must their Profession be judged of approved by Christs Ministers but the Antecedent is certain Therefore so is the Consequent The Antecedent is cleare because 1. All that enter into the Universal Church do enter under the hand of the Ministerie and thereby acknowledg their Relation to them and Authority to admit them 2. Because all such do engage themselves to be Christs Disciples and learn of him as their Master not as coming down from Heaven to teach them personally but as teaching them by his Word Spirit and Ministers conjunctly saying Luke 10 16 He that heareth you heareth me
fidei plane instructi id est de Dei magnitudine potestate rebusque quae in Evangeliis continentur uno excepto Eucharistiae mysterio neque baptizabantur nisi post quam ea omnia se credere jurassent quorum fides a fide poenitentiae incipiebat c. Et in sequ Jucabant in Baptismo solennibus verbis se nunquam peccaturos deinde renunciabant Diabolo pompis ejus Denique Censurâ si peccarent post baptismum coercebantur So that men that are engaged in covenant with God must keep Covenant or manifest themselves Penitent for the violation of it before they are admitted to further Priviledges There is a long time in which they grow up from an Infant-state to an Adult and how they live in that time must be enquired after 2. Otherwise the Apostate would have equal Acceptance and Priviledges with the Faithfull 3. And so Penitence and Absolution would be excluded and confounded with meer Confirmation 4. Moreover the Baptized are obliged to be responsible for their lives being under the Government of Christs Ministers and among his Saints 5. For the sake of their own Souls and of the Church and Ordinances we must endeavour to preserve them from Corruption which lying Professions would introduce and therefore must not overlook or neglect such Evidence as is within our reach 6. Else Ministers that are by office to judg of their Profession would be unfaithfull Judges and forfeit their trust if they shall wilfully neglect any Evidence within their cognisance by which they may be enabled to judge But yet it is not the certainty of inward saving Grace that we must find out by mens lives for no man can have such certainty of another but only that their lives be not such as Null and Invalidate and confute their Profession and they live not in the perfidious violation of their Baptismal Covenant Prop. 15. It is not of flat Necessity that the Profession of the Expectant be made in the open Congregation or before many in order to his Confirmation and Admittance PRoved 1. It is not of Necessity that Converted Infidels be admitted by Baptism into the state of Adult-members upon a Publique Profession in a Congregation therefore it is not of Necessity that others be so admitted in Confirmation The Antecedent is proved by the instance of the Eunuch Acts 8. whom Philip Baptized in their way and the Jaylour and his houshold Acts 16. Baptzed in the night at home The Consequence is proved by the propriety of reason and case 2. If a man may by Confirmation be admitted into the Number of Adult Christians in the Church Universal without being admitted into a particular Church then his Profession and Admission need not in that case to be before the Congregation But the Antecedent is true as I prove thus A man may by Adult Baptism be admitted first into the Universal Church only As was the Eunuch the Jaylour Lydia Sergius Paulus and every first Convert in any City where the Apostles came Therefore a man may by Confirmation be admitted into the Number of the Adult in the Catholick Church only For the reason is the same and the former admitteth them into the same number The Consequence of the Major is plain For no one Congregation more then another can claim the cognisance of the Admission of a member into the Universal Church or Confirming them in it 3. Scripture hath no where made such Publique Admission to be of constant Necessity therefore it is not so 4. Else none could be Admitted or Confirmed when persecution hindereth Church Assemblies 5. The Church is to believe and trust the Pastours to whom it doth by office belong to try and admit them 6. General unfixed Ministers may thus try approve and confirm who are not Pastours of any particular Church such as Apostles Evangelists and others were therefore they are not alwaies to do it before a particular Church Nor indeed did they alway do so Prop. 16. When a Person is admitted among the Adult-members af a Particular Church as well as the Vniversal his Profession and Admission must be either before the Church or Satisfactorily made Known to the Church at least who must Approve of it by a Judgment of Discretion in order to their Communion with him and this among us is the ordinary case because it is the duty of all that have opportunity to joyn themselves to some particular Church and it is in such Churches that Communion in publique Worship and Order must be had either statedly or transiently and temporarily 1. THe solemnity it self of our Transition into the number of Adult-members and their Communion is of very great advantage as I shall manifest more anon 2. We that are commonly against the private Admission of Infants at least except in some urgent case have less reason to be for the private Transition and Admission of men among the Adult and that into a particular Governed Church 3. The whole Society among whom such a person is entered do owe him much duty and brotherly assistance They must Love him with a special Love They must live though not in a Levelling yet in a Charitable Community with him not shutting up the bowels of Compassion from him when they see him in want but relieving him as if they sufferd with him They are not only to Love him and Relieve him as a man but as one of Christ's little ones or friends yea as his brethren yea as loving and relieving Christ in them Matth. 25. 35. to the end They must receive and relieve a Disciple in the name of a Disciple Besides this they must have Church-Union and Communion with him as one Body and must pray for him and rejoice with him in Gods Praises and the Lords Supper and watch over him and admonish and reprove him in sinne for his recovery and avoid him if he walk disorderly and be impenitent in scandalous sinne c. Now 1. No man can perform all this duty to a man that he knoweth not to be thus related to him If he know not that he owes him this duty any more then to any one else in the world how shall he pay it him To say that we are bound to take all men that converse with us to be such is to say that Christians must renounce their witts and turn the Church into Bedlam 2. And as this proves that the Church-members must be made known to one another so it proves that they must have a Judgment of Discretion in receiving them though the Pastours have the Judgment of Governing Direction For 1. God hath not left the Pastours at liberty to take in whom they Please but hath described what Profession they shall accept or what persons they shall admit and whom they shall reject If therefore the Pastours go against the Word of God then this following is the peoples duty 1. If they know not the errour or the case be doubtfull they
any from whence they may fetch matter of reproach against the Pastours and Ordinances among us 10. Another sort there are that are deeply possest with a conceit that God having determined before we are borne whether we shall be saved or not it is in vaine to strive for if we be predestinated we shall be saved what ever we do and if we be not we shall not what ever we do and that we can do nothing of our selves nor have a good thought but by the Grace of God and if God will give it us we shall have it and the Devil cannot prevaile against him but if he will not give it us it 's in vaine to seek it for it is not in him that willeth nor in him that runneth but in God that sheweth Mercy and therefore they give up themselves to security and ungodliness because they cannot do nothing of themselves And thus by misunderstanding some Texts of Scripture and abusing some Truths of God they are hardened in ungodliness thinking that all is long of God and they will not so much as promise Reformation nor promise to use the means because they say they cannot tell whether God will put it into their hearts and it is all as he will 11. Besides these there is one or two honest ignorant Professours that are turned Anabaptists and joyne with the Church of them in the next Parish 12. And some Papists are among us and whether only those that stay from the Assemblies I cannot say Of these twelve sorts of People this Parish is composed which I therefore mention that the state of our Parishes may be truly known while others are compared with this For every one hath not had the opportunities which I have had to know all their people or the most And now if all these are fit to go for Christians then must we make a new kind of Christianity and a new Gospel and a new Christ And if all these are fit to be Church-members then we must make a new kind of Churches And why then may not those be Christians and Church-members that never heard of the Name of Christ as well as many of these 2. By this untried Entrance of all sorts into our Churches we bring a dishonour on the very Christian Name and so on the Lord Jesus himself and on his Gospel and holy waies Christianity is not a matter of meer Opinion Christ came not into the world only to perswade men to have high thoughts of him but to save his people from their sinnes and to destroy the works of the Devil And when the Church of Christ shall be turned into a den of thieves or a sty of swine what a great dishonour is it to the Lord As if we would perswade the world that his servants are no holier then others and differ but in an Opinion from the world Christ needeth not Disciples and therefore will not take in all that refuse to come upon his terms but hath fixed his terms and will have only those that will yield to them Though I abhorre the rigor of the contrary extreame that would make the Church narrower then it is and pinne it up in so small a number as would tempt men to doubt of Christianity it self and teacheth men to exclude their bretheren meerly because they are themselves uncharitable Judges when they are not able to disprove their Profession yet must I also detest this horrible dishonouring of the Lord as if his Body were no better than the army of the Devil 3. And by this means the Heathens Jews Mahometans and all Infidels are exceedingly hindred from believing in Christ when they can say as the Turks when men question their fidelity what dost thou think I am a Christian He that knows any thing of Religious affaires knoweth that commonly the first thing that draweth men to any party is the liking of the Persons and their Practices from whence they grow to enquire with inclination into their doctrines The Ancient Christians that lived before the daies of Constantine did bring Christianity into reputation by their Holiness and God was then more eminently seen among them But when the countenance of the Emperour and worldly advantages had drawn in all men to the Church and the Bishops did set the door too wide open Christianity lookt like another thing and that inundation of wickedness overspread the Church which Salvian and so many more complaine of Our likeliest way to win the Jews and all Infidels to the Church is by shewing them the true Nature of Christianity in the Church-members 4. Hereby also we confound the ancient Order of Catechumens or Expectants with the true members of the Church and lay the Church and the porch yea and the Church-yard if not the commons all together By which also our Preaching and Administrations are confounded so that whereas the Ancient Churches had their Common Sermons and some Prayers which were fitted to the unconverted or Expectants and had also both Doctrine Praiers Praises and other worship proper to the Church especially on the Lords Daies we must now speak to all and joyn with all and the Church and the Enemies of the Church must sing the same Praises as if they were one body And God is not the God of confusion but of order in the Churches He that put two sorts of Preaching and Doctrine into the Apostles Commission Matth. 28. 19 20. One for making Disciples and another for the edifying and guidance of Disciples did never intend that these should be confounded 5. And then by this means the Souls of millions of poore people are deprived of the great benefits of the Ordinances and Administrations suitable to their state The begetting Word goeth before the feeding strengthning Word even before the milk for babes The laying of the foundation must go before our building thereon Every one will thrive best in his Own Element and place A fish will not prosper on dry land nor a man under water The womb is the only place for the Embrio and unborn child though not for those that have seen the Sun If you will break the shell before the Chicken be hatcht that you may hasten its production or honour it with a premature association with the rest that see the Sunne your foolish charity will be the death of it And so deale abundance of mistaken Zealots with the Souls of men who cry out against the wisest and most conscionable Ministers as if they were unchristning the People and undoing the world because they would feed them with food convenient for them and will not be such hasty midwives as to cast the mother into her throws if not rip her up that shee may have the child at her breasts which should yet be many daies or moneths in the womb Moreover they thus cause our people to lose all that benefit of preparations and solemn Engagement to Christ of which more anon among the Benefits 6. By this means also
is Excommunication to be deferred as long as there is any Hope by other meanes but only till we have used other means in vaine for such a season as is meet that the ends of Discipline be not frustrate For else there should never man be Excommunicated For there is some Hope that preaching against his sinne may do him good at last though he come drunk to the Lords Table twenty years together you cannot say that his Conversion is Impossible And yet we must not hereupon deferre the casting out of such a member But in his Expectant state or among the Catechumens we may beare with him lawfully in his wickedness without excluding him from among our hearers and if he heare us seaven years and seaven in vaine there is yet some Hope of his Conversion while he waiteth in his own place and way And yet I yield this much to the Objectours freely that when fit persons are taken into the Church yea or unfit by negligence we must wait with all patience that is consistent with the ends of Government and cutting off must be the last remedie and that when it is necessary it must be used though we see that it 's ten to one it will plunge the person occasionally into a worse condition For the Publike Ends of Discipline the credit of Christianity the preservation of the Church and abundance more are to be preferred before the good of that mans Soul and as paena debetur Reipublicae and we cut not off malefactours for their own good so much as the Common-wealths which by their hurt must be promoted so is it as to the Church But this must be done but upon a few for example and therefore but few that will need this severity are supposed to be in our Communion And I cannot believe that way to be of God that would bring such multitudes into this miserable state Object Your very keeping them from the Communion of the Church and not Approving or Confirming them would as much exasperate them Answ It 's no such matter Much it may but not neare so much as I certainly know by experience Those not Admitted heare with Hope but to the rejected I speak as almost hopeless except such as were fit to live under Discipline on whom it may have its due effect 9. And by this admitting all men without tryal and Confirmation to come unobservedly into the state of Adult-Christians we breed and feed continual heart burnings against the Ministers of Christ while we are necessitated to do our work upon such unprepared Souls And how much the hatred and contempt of Ministers doth conduce to the destruction of the people Satan is not ignorant that is the diligent promoter of it 10. By this means also we frustrate our own studies and Ministerial Labours to abundance of our people Partly by deluding them actually in the Reception of them among Christians that really are no Christians and partly by this provocation of their hatred 11. By this means also we breed and feed abundance of Controversies in the Church For when once we displace any parts of the frame we shall find almost all in pieces and one errour draweth on so many that Controversies grow numerous and will never be reconciled by meere words and writings till we actually set the Church in joynt againe 12. By this course also we lay open the Ordinances of God to a continual prophanation while abundance that know not who Christ is nor what Christianity is are admitted as Christians to our Christian Communion and so themselves are involved in more sinne and Gods own Worship turned into Provocation so that we may feare lest God should frown upon our Assemblies and withdraw the tokens of his Presence and deny his blessing to those prophaned Ordinances Though the innocent may still have their share in the blessing yet may the Pastours and the guilty majority deeply suffer by this great abuse of holy things 13. By this means also it is that so many Scruples are cast in our way about Administrations and reception of Ordinances and the comfort of Ministers and people in them is much abated 14. And I doubt it is a hinderance to the Conversion of many sects about us and of many ungodly ones among us who if they saw the primitive holiness of Churches might be drawn in 15. And it much corrupteth the Communion of Saints and turneth it to another thing when this Holy Communion is so much of our duty and our comfort and such a Representation of Heaven it self 16. And if it be not a practical denial of some of the Articles of our Faith it 's well We say there that we Believe the Catholike Church to be Holy and that it is a Communion of Saints that is by the parts of it to be exercised And shall we deny this in our works which in words we profess 17. By this means also we dishonour the work of Reformation when we hinder the fruits of it that should be visible to the world and make men believe that it lieth but in a change of bare opinions They that see no great difference between the Reformed and the Romanists in their lives will think it is no great matter which side they are joyned to It 's noted by some Protestant Writers that when Luther opposed Popery in Germany abundance of the common licentious people that were weary of Popish Confessions and Penances did joyne with those that were truly conscientious and dishonoured the Reformation by their lives though they increased the number and did the service as Erasmus his Gospeller that used to carry a bottle of wine and Erasmus New Testament with great brass bosses and when he disputed with a Papist knockt him about the pate with the Bible and so confuted him 18. And by this means we give the Papists more roome then they should have to reproach our Churches and glory comparatively of the Holiness of theirs Though I know that their glory is exceeding unreasonable and that our Impurities are no more to theirs then a few boiles to a Leprosie yet we do ill to give them so much occasion as we do who are ready to make the worst of all 19. By this means also we leave all Sects to quarrel with us and dispute against us even whether we be true Churches of Christ or not because our Adult-profession and Covenant is no more express and discernable then it is And though we have enough to prove our selves a Church yet do we leave them under their temptations and our selves under the obloquy And indeed we perversly maintain our own dishonour while we think it a condition to be rested in if we can but prove our selves true Churches when our Learned Divines do give as much to the Romanists themselves though not as Papal yet as Christian A Leper is a true man and yet his cure is a thing to be desired 20. Lastly By this means also we tempt many well meaning people among
us to a dangerour separation from us and to fly from our Churches as if they would fall on their heads and we too much harden those that are already separated and all because we will not yield to the healing of our own diseases or will do little or nothing to procure it I know these men have no just ground for their hard conclusions and censures of us but we have little reason to give them this occasion and cast a stumbling-block in the way of so many precious Souls To what is here briefly thrust together if the Reader will adde the twelve Reasons in my Christian Concord pag. 11 12 13 14. and what 's said in my book of Right to Sacraments where these matters or those that sustaine them are handled more at large I suppose he may easily be convinced that the former Church-Governours in England have been lamentably negligent and our Churches by their means are much disordered and that the present Ministers should be more forward and diligent and unanimous for the cure and that the Magistrate if he love the Church of Christ and the Souls of men should speedily afford his help and all too little to remedy these great and many evils which we have let in by suffering such a loose unobserved transition from the state of Infant Church members or from Apostacy into the number of Adult-members without Approved Profession and Confirmation Prop. 20. So many and great are the Benefits that would follow the general practice of this duty of Trying Approving and Confirming or Absolving all those that enter into the number of Adult Christians that it should mightily provoke all Christian Magistrates Ministers and People to joyne in a speedy and vigorous execution of it 1. ONe excellent fruit of this Practice will be the great increase of Knowledge and godliness and the destruction of ignorance and notorious impiety This is an effect most apparent in the Causes When men are made to understand that by the Law of God seconded by the common consent of the Church and the most Learned Godly Pastours and if it may be by the Law of the Land no man is to be accounted or numbered with Adult-Christians but those that make a sober serious understanding Profession of Christianity renouncing the flesh the world and the Devil and not contradicting and nullifying this Profession by a wicked life this will engage Parents to teach their Children and Children themselves to learn what Christianity is when they cannot have the Name or the honour and the Priviledges of Christians without some Credible Appearance of the thing For doubtles while Christianity is in credit the same motives that now prevaile with the multitude to seeme Christians and to desire the Baptism of their Children will continue then to make them desire to be numbred with Christians when they are at age and so will provoke them to do that without which they know they connot be esteemed Christians And as it 's now a common thing to be baptized in Infancy so will it be then a common thing for our young people to learn the Principles of Christianity yea and to reform their lives I hope with the most when they understand that else they must be taken to be no Christians And if it were but the making of the understanding Profession and outside of Christianity to be commoner among us it would be a most precious fruit of our endeavours But much more when true Christianity it selfe in the life and power of it would also be more common As no doubt but it would For the Knowledg of the Letter is the way to the receiving of the Spirit among multitudes that have the outside of true Religion there will be far more that have the life and soule of it then among those that have not so much as the outside Any man in reason may foresee that if we be openly agreed and it be publikely enacted or declared that none be taken into the number of Adult Christians nor admitted to their Priviledges till they have made an Approved Profession of Christianity and so be received by Jesus Christ himself acting by his Ministers it will set all that care for the Name or hopes or Privilidges of Christians to learn and be and do that which they know will be so required of them Whereas as things go now in most places they may bring their Children to Baptism without understanding what Baptism is and those Children may slide into the state of the Adult-Christians and possess the Name and place and outward Communion and other honours and Priviledges of such without knowing whether Christ were a man or a woman or who he is or what business he came about into the world And when no outward Necessity is laid upon them by the Church to know more or to seem better no wonder if so many Heathens do sit among Christians and if the multitude looke not much after knowledg or Godliness 2. And moreover it will be a very great helpe to their Consciences in order to the convincing them of their sinne and misery and of the insufficiency of that Condition which multitudes do now rest in and so to waken them to look after a safer state and to be what they must seem to be if they will be taken to be Christians It is a great help to the deceiving of the multitude of the ungodly to be currantly esteemed Christians when they are not And self-love is such a blinding thing that a little help will go farre with it in the promoting of such deceits Naturally men are very easily brought to think well of them selves and hardly brought to confess their misery Every man almost will easily confess himself a sinner and a very great sinner so you will but allow him to be a Christian and a pardoned sinner For this is a common confession and brings no very terrible Conclusion and message to the Soul But when a man must confess himself no true Christian but unsanctified unpardoned and a slave of Satan this is as much as to confess himself in a state of damnation in which if he die he is lost for ever and men are hardly drawn to believe so terrible a Conclusion when yet it is so necessary where it is true that we can scarce imagine how a man can be saved without it He that knoweth not himselfe to be out of his way will hardly be perswaded to turne back And he that knows not himself to be unpardoned will hardly value or seek a pardon And he that thinks he is sanctified and a true Christian already will seek to be made what he takes himself already to be And how much Reputation doth to help or hinder men even in self-judging is easily perceived Now here is a threefold Reputation of very great moment to concurre either for mens Deception or Conversion 1. The Reputation of Prince and Parliament and so of Law-givers and Rulers of the Nation who by their Laws
swine should be kept out of the Church and cast out if they be crept in Nothing hath more destroyed that Charitable Community which should be among the members of the Church and that loving and relieving Christ in Church-members then the crowding of such into the place as indeed are Satans members and appeare not capable of that special Love nor are capable of returning it to others 8. This will make easy the Ministers work and free him from abundance of hatred trouble and disadvantage when like a workmans tooles in his shop that all are in their place and so at hand when he should use them so his Hearers are in order and each one lookes but for his portion and none are snatching at our fingers for the Childrens bread that belongs not to them and men be not drawn to hate and raile at Ministers for not fullfiling their desires 9. By this means also the Ordinances will be more purely administred agreeably to their Nature and the Institution And so God will bless them more to his Church and own his people with the fuller discoveries of his presence and take pleasure in the Assemblies and services of his Saints 10. By this means also the Communion of the Saints and the holy Ordinances of God will be abundantly more sweet to his Servants when we have it in the appointed way and it is not imbittered to us by the pollutions of Infidels and notorious ungodly men Though yet I know that in a negligent polluted Church Gods Servants may have their share of comfort in his Ordinances when they have done their own duty for Reformation without success 11. By this means the Church and the Christian Religion will be more honorable in the eyes of the world who judge by the members and professours lives before they can judge of the thing as in it self And as Christ will be thus honoured and the mouths of adversaries of all sorts stopped so it will do much to further their Conversion when they have such a help to see the beauty of the Church and Christian Faith Many more such benefits I would name but that you may gather some of them from what was said of the contrary incommodities Only I adde 13. Lastly it is a way that is admirably suited both to Reformation and Reconciliation to Unity as well as Purity which removeth many of the Impediments that else would trouble us in the way For as all wicked men will agree against it as they will against any holy practice so all parties considerable among us do in their doctrine and professions owne it and it will suit the Principles or the Ends of all that fear God either wholly of very farre I shall here distinctly shew you 1. That the Episcopal 2. Presbyterians 3. Independants 4. Anabaptists 5. Yea and I may put in the Papists themselves have no reason to be against this practice but all of them have great reason to promote it supposing them to be what they are 1. That it is so far agreeable with the Doctrine of the Church of England that our Episcopal party have reason to be for it appeareth 1. By the Rubricke for Confirmation in the Common-Prayer Book which saith as followeth The Curate of every Parish or some other at his appointment shall diligently upon Sundaies and Holydaies halfe an houre before Evening Prayer openly in the Church instruct and examine so many Children of his Parish sent unto him as the time will serve and as he shall think convenient in some part of this Catechism And all Fathers Mothers Masters and Dames shall cause their Children Servants and Prentices which have not learned their Catechism come to the Church at the time appointed and obediently to hear and be ordered by the Curate until such time as they have learned all that is appointed here for them to learn And whensoever the Bishop shall give knowledg for Children to be brought before him to any convenient place for their Confirmation then shall the Curate of every Parish either bring or send in writing the names of all those Children of his Parish which can say the Articles of the Faith the Lords Prayer and the ten Commandements and also how many of them can answer to the other Questions contained in this Catechism And there shall none be admitted to the Holy Communion till such time as he can say the Catechism and be Confirmed So that you see we must not admit any but the Confirmed to the Sacrament And I suppose in common reason they will extend this to the Aged as well as unto Children seing ignorance in them is more intollerable And indeed the words themselves exclude the unconfirmed and that cannot say the Catechism from the Sacrament of what age soever 2. And I may take it for granted that it is not bare saying the Catechism that they expect but also a Profession that they owne their Baptismal Covenant to God the Father Sonne and Holy Ghost And also that it be a Profession somewhat understood and not barely to say the words which they understand not as a Parot doth And this I prove to be their meaning yea and also that they live a Christian life from the Prayer in Confirmation adjoyned which is this Almighty and Everlasting God who hast vouchsafed to regenerate these thy Servants by water and the Holy Ghost and hast given unto them forgiveness of all their sinnes strengthen them we beseech thee O Lord with the Holy Ghost the Comforter and daily increase in them the mani old gifts of Grace the Spirit of Wisdom and Vnderstanding the Spirit of Counsell and Ghostly strength the Spirit of Knowledg and true Godliness So that here you see that the Church of England supposeth all those that are to be Confirmed to have already the Holy Ghost and the Spirit of Wisdom Understanding Counsell Knowledg and true Godliness which they beg of God as to an increase only for the Confirmed And sure they do not think that every notorious ungodly man hath the Spirit of true Godliness if he can but say the Catechism or that every ignorant person or Infidel hath the Spirit of Knowledg Wisdom c. as soon as he can speak the words which he understands not And in the following Prayer they say We have laid our hands on them to certifie them by this signe of thy favour and gracious goodness towards them And sure they will not think to Certifie men that know not what Christianity is or that live not Christian lives for this favour of God towards them meerly because they say the words which they do not understand So that if they will but let men understand what they do and make good what is here expressed we are agreed with them that stand for Common-Prayer that such as are unconfirmed be not admitted to the Holy Communion And as for the person Confirming I shall speak to that anon 2. I will next speake of the Papists
us and dreame not that we have a work and not Power to do it or discern what we do Set others to do it that you can better trust 5. Who would you have trusted with this Power Some body must have it I have proved to you fully that every man must not be the sole Judge of his own fitness for Baptism or Church Priviledges and that the people or Magistrates are not the sole or chief Judges and who should it be but they to whom it is committed by Christ in their call to the office of the Ministry 6. Ministers as I before shewed have no Tyrannical or Arbitrary Power For Christ hath tied them by a Law who to admit and whom to reject And if they disobey this Law the Magistrate may correct them So that in the exercise of this Tyrannical Power every Minister is under the lash of the Magistrates violence if he grosly offend whereas none of the people are under any violence or force from us to obey us but if all of them disobey us and rebel it is their own loss and we have no remedy This is the Tyranny 7. Lastly If you think it as it is so great a Power for us to judge of mens Profession and fitness for Church Priviledges let it awaken you the more to get the wisest ablest men you can for the Ministry that are fit for so a great trust If the best that are to be got are not in the Office beshrew our Governours and the choosers And if you do not cast us all out if you can put fitter men into the place that are meeter for the trust beshrew you for your negligence we give you no thanks for it But if you have no fitter for this work and trust will you cast it upon unfitter or on none It is a great trust for a Physician to be trusted with your lives and a School-master and Tutour with your Children But what of that Will you therefore trust the good women or common neighbours about you with them yea or the Magistrate himself Or will you have no Tutours or Physicians Or rather will you not be the more careful to keep our Empiricks and unworthy persons and get the ablest and faithfulest that you can O unthankfull men that grudge us the Power of labouring and spending our selves for their Salvation and judging where we must act 4. Object Is it not the use of the Lords Supper to Confirm us and do not men there renew their Covenant and Profession What need is there then of any more Answ 1. You would think much if at the Lords Supper we should openly call each man to a personal explicite Profession of his Faith and Covenanting with God And indeed it would be a tedious as well as unseasonable work It is but a general or joynt Profession of all together that is there renewed and notwithstanding that there may for ought we know be many a one there that is an Infidel and knoweth not what Christianity is 2. The Lords Supper is the food of the Soul confirming by way of nutrition and augmentation and therefore you must shew that you are alive before you may partake of it It is a feasting upon Christ and with him in his family and at his Table It is a work of Communion with Christ and with his Saints It is one of the highest priviledges of the Church And therefore you must produce your little before you can lay claim to it If a man must be admitted to the Lords Supper without any precedent personal Profession or Covenanting with God upon supposition that by the act of Receiving he doth all this then men that know not whether there be a Christ or what he is may be admitted For multitudes of such there are that in Infancy were baptized And I know not by seeing him receive whether he know or believe any thing of Christianity If a man converted at Age from Heathenism may not be admitted to the Lords Table without a personal profession in Baptism then neither may such as are baptized in Infancy be admitted without a personal Profession in Confirmation or such as is without any other Baptism Our Parents Profession will not serve our turn in stead of our own when we come to age And therefore this Objection is vaine unless Infidels may be admitted to Communion and all be common But I need not speak much of this because I shall have few such Objectours to deale with Even the Papists themselves are many of them against promiscuous communion though the Jesuites of late have fitted almost all their work to their man pleasing designe See Joh. Thauleri flores cap. 23 24 pag. 257 c. An old Puritane among the Papists And they make confession also prerequisite Object 5. According to our arguing Confirmation is not necessary to those that were Baptized at full Age and therefore it is not necessary to any if not to all Answ I have given some Reasons why it should be used with all that have opportunity after Baptism but I have proved it more Necessary to those that were baptized in Infancy And if it were Necessary to no other it would not follow that it is not Necessary at all because not to all 6. Object Is it not better take up with an Implicit Profession and Covenanting then make so great a trouble to our selves and disturbance among the people as this will make Answ 1. Me thinks not only the face of the Roman Church but of our own might by this time have afforded us satisfying experience what Implicit Faith and Implicit Professions are and to what they tend Peruse the forementioned Evils of this course and look upon the state of our people where you may see them in existence and then judge whether this Objection be answered 2. An Implicit Profession is the lowest and least that in any case of extremity or necessity can be thought tolerable and accepted by God and consistent with the life and being of a Church And shall we deliberately choose to offer God the worst the least the lowest that 's possible to find acceptance Nay he will have the best as he deserves the best or he will not accept it when we have it to give Shall we think that in a case of freedom the same will be accepted which Necessity only can excuse Or shall we be content that our Churches have as many diseases as will consist with life and being 3. An Implicit Profession makes or proves men but Implicitâ—ly Christians Such dumbe uncertaine signes do leave us in So great uncertainty of the thing signified that it seems but a very mocking of God that will not be mocked when we have opportunity for an open Intelligible Profession and will not use it or require it 4. It is against Nature for a man that hath a Tongue in his head to refuse to utter his mind any other wise then by dumb shews and yet expect to be understood and
accepted What is the Tongue made for but to express the mind Indeed if a man be dumb and can neither speak not write it is more tollerable to take an uncertaine signe from such a man then from another that hath the use of Tongue or pen. 5. It is a very Implicite denying of Christ which many call an Implicite Profession If a man that hath a Tongue in his mouth shall refuse to Profess the Christian Faith and quarrel with the Minister that calls him to it and say we shall have no other Profession from him then to come to Church and put the bread and wine into his mouth and not to deny Christ expresly I leave it to any reasonable man whether there be not so much of an Implicite denying Christ in this refusing to confess him when they are called to it by their Pastours whom God hath commanded them to obey and that in a case and season when all the Church hath required it or taught it to be due 6. It is contrary to the honour of Christ and the very Nature of Christianity for men to take up with Implicite uncertaine Professions when we have opportunity of more open free Professions He is not a Master to be ashamed of And he will have no servants that will not confess him before men even in the hazzard of life much more in daies of the freedom of the Gospel As with the heart men must believe to Righteousness so with the mouth Confession is made unto Salvation Rom. 10. 10. What reason have we to whisper or draw back in a cause of such a nature and weight as this 7. Shall we thus teach our people to esteem Christianity as an unobservable thing by no more observing it The Solemnity of mens Transition into the Adult-state of actual Believers doth make it more Observable in the eyes of men and they will see that there is more in it then commonly is now esteemed I find by experience that our people hate no preaching more then Differencing Preaching which leaves or shuts them out from the number of the Sanctified and sets them as one the left-hand in the face of the Congregation and judgeth them before the time but faine they would have Ministry confound and jumble all together And then you may make them as great sinners as you will so you will make them no worse then the Justified that are forgiven and shall be saved And so in Practice they love no differencing waies But shall we so far gratifie the Devil and the flesh No we must labour to make the difference between Christs Servants and the world as conspicuous as we can that the Consciences of poor sinners may rather be wakened then cheated by us And therefore we should choose the most solemn Transition and Record the names of the Confirmed and let the people be brought to a publike Observation of the Necessity of Faith and Holiness while the Covenant and Profession of it is made so Necessary 8. That is the best means that is fittest to attain the End The End of a Covenant is to Oblige and the End of a Profession to declare the mind And I pray you which is fittest for these Ends An Express Profession and Covenant or a dumbe uncertain signe by coming to Church paying Tithes c. 9. Such dumb Professions are less tolerable now because we have many in our Assemblies that we know to be no Christians I know of many that will heare that believe no life to come and secretly make a scorne of Christ and Scripture and many more that know not what Christianity is as is aforesaid Now shall we take up with such signes of Christianity as we see and know are commonly used by Infidels when we may have better 10. It is essential to a Profession to be in some measure explicit for Profiteri is but palà m vel publicè fateri It is no Profession if it be not or pretend not to be an Expression of the mind And therefore to be Implicite and not Express is so far to be against the very Nature of the Profession in that measure as your Profession is Implicite as it 's called and not Express in that measure it is no Profession at all Object 7. But when you have the most express Covenant or Profession you are not sure that it is true and that the man is a believer at the heart Answ 1. I am sure that it 's Truly a Profession that is a Pretended signe of the mind thoâ—gh I am not sure that it 's True Profession that is a True infallible signe of the mind I can know the metaphysical though not the Morall Truth of it And then I can be sure that I do my duty and take up according to the Directions of Christ It is his work to judge the heart immediatly as being his prerogative to know it but it 's my work to judge of the Credibility of the Profession 2. And what if I have no infallible Certainty Must I therefore throw up all and make the Pastoral Church-government to be void and cast open the Vineyard of Christ to the wilderness and not so much as require a Credibility because we cannot have an Infallibility This may not be Object 8. But this will encourage tbe Anabaptists and Congregational in their Express Covenantings by our coming so neer them Answ 1. I may better say you will make men Anabaptists and drive them too far by your loosness and willfully shunning plaine duty How can weake professours be drawn to think well of that party which they see do shun so needfull a Work of God 2. Love and Peace will teach all Christians to say that it 's the best for Unity and healing of our breaches to come as neare dissenting Brethren as we may and noâ— to fly the further from them At least we may not run from truth and duty that we may be unlike our dissenting Brethren 3. And I take it to be my duty to tell this alowd to the Christian world that after long contest with the Anabaptists and opposition of their waies I am grown as I confidently think to this discovery of the mind of God in suffering them among us that he had this great truth and duty to which he saw it necessary to awake us the Church having been so lamentably defiled Discipline made an impossible thing and mens Salvation grievously hindred by the common secret unobserved transition of all people into the name and number and Priviledges of Adult-Christians therefore did God permit these men to step too far on the other side that the noise might be the greater and his call the more observable so that they are his messengers calling aloud to England and all other Christian Churches in Europe to keep the doore and repaire the hedge and no more to take an Infant-baptism and Profession of our Parents as a sufficient Evidence of the Title of the Adult to the Name or Place or Priveledges of
Christians but to give them Infant Priviledges upon the Parents Profession but to require of them a sober serious Profession and Covenanting by themselves in owning their Baptismal Covenant before we number them with Adult-Christians And that God hath suffered the Anabaptists to make such a stirre among us will prove a mercy to us in the End if we have the wit and grace to learn this upon this troublesome occasion and then the Reformation will do us more good then ever the Anabaptists did us harm But if we will not learne nor obey Gods call we must yet looke to be molested by them more or else to do and suffer worse Object 9. But if you will not take a non-renouncing of Christ and Infant Baptism as sufficient without a Personal Covenant and Profession you may on the same grounds call men every week to such a Profession because that the former Profession shews not what they afterwards are but what then they are Answ 1. The case is quite another In your instance it is but the continuance of the same Profession and Condition that is requisite And I am bound to take it as continued while I have no Evidence to question it and see the performance of it as far as belongeth to my cognisance But in my case the Conditions and the Professions are not the same A new Condition of Right is necessary to the Adult which they had not at all in their Infant Baptism Then they entered upon their Parents Faith or Profession but at age they must necessarily have a Faith or Profession of their own or else they actually cease to be Christians 2. And yet let me adde that frequent Professions of Faith and renewing Covenant with God have ever been used in the Church both before Christs Incarnation and since and indeed the Lords Supper doth import it And for my part I thinke it a very convenient edifying course to have the Articles of our Faith every day repeated as the Belief of that Church and the people to stand up at it to signifie their consent so be it you will not take up with this silent Profession alone and exclude a more explicite one when it is requisite But this fitly signifieth our standing to the first Object 10. But this will cast you upon the same difficulties which you Object to the Anabaptists you will not know at what Age to take men for Adult-Christians Answ 1. We shall not accept them for their Age but for their Profession And we can easily tell when they offer themselves to tryal and Profession and desire the Communion of the Church As the Ancient Churches could tell when their Catechumens were to be baptized 2. And for the time when we must judge their Infant Church-state to cease if they own not the Covenant personally we cannot set a certaine yeare nor is it necessary but when their Infancy ceaseth then their Infant-state ceaseth That is when they come to the full or competent use of Reason But then observe 1. That if they be called at such a time to profess their Faith and own their Covenant and refuse it then we must judge them refusers of Christianity unless the Reasons of the Refusal allows another judgment 2. Or if they will fully neglect for a considerable space to own their Baptismal Covenant and to seeke a standing among the Adult-Christians it 's a strong presumption that they are Backsliders 3. If they only suspend their personal Profession at age we must only suspend our Judgment till we have some light to discern the cause and cannot be sure that there are Deserters or Apostates 4. But we are sure that they are nor to be numbred by the Church among Adult Christians till they have produced the Evidence of their Title which is no other then A Credible Personal Profession So that it 's easy to know when any such person is to be admitted and publikely owned as an Actual Believer though it be not so easy to discern of all before that time whether they are to be reckoned as Desertours or not He that wilfully neglecteth to come among the Adult Christians long after he hath the full use of Reason which is not with all at the same age is to be much suspected at least And commonly about 16 or 17 or 18 years of age is the time when we have reason to expect that they should seek the Communion and Privilidges of the Adult For about that age they have a competent use of Reason Object 11. But if you admit them into the Church in Infancy say the Anabaptists you will be obliged to excommunicate them all that prove ungodly when they come to age and not to let them silently pass out of the Church again Answ Excommunication is either an excluding them from all Relation of members to the Catholike Church or from the actual Communion of the Church or from both The former we can do but Declaratively In the latter we also adjoyne the charge of God for the execution of the sentence But those that were never personal Professours of Faith nor admitted into the Communion of Adult-Christians are not fit to be cast out of it And this is the common use of Excommunication to remove those as unfit from the Communion of the Adult that once were in it and forfeit that Communion which cannot belong to them that never were in it And for our Declaring them Desertours or Apostates we may do it upon just occasion but we are not bound to do it publikely by all that are guilty this being not the Excommunication that is so enjoyned in the Scriptures Where do you find that the Church in Scripture-times or after was wont to Excommunicate Apostates And yet Apostates were formerly of the Church It is those that hang on and pretend still to be of the Church and intrude into the Actual Communion of it that we must cast out when they deserve it Object 12. But if they cease to be Christians you must Baptize them againe if you will receive them Answ No such matter The Anabaptists themselves will not Rebaptize an Apostate when he returneth to the Church He is to be received by Confession and Absolution and not by Baptism If a Christian turn Turk and afterward Return he is not to be Rebaptized Object 13. But by this means you will unchristen the people and then they will be exasperated and turn Heathens or hearken to any seducers that will mislead them Answ 1. No we will unchristen no man but do that honour to Christianity and that right to the Church and the Soules of men as to make a difference between Christians and Infidels and that somewhat wider then the bare Names He that is a Christian shall be more encouraged by this course and he that is not cannot be unchristened by us If men will not unchristen themselves they need not fear lest the just trying and approving of their Christianity should unchristen them 2. How little
penalties they will beare it at their hands and take it the better when we deale with them as the Word of God requireth I heare it with my eares to the grief of my heart how some of my neighbour Ministers are spoken against with bitterness by their people because they give not the Lords Supper to all even to the most ignorant and ungodly that refuse to be instructed or so much as to take themselves for any members of the Ministers charge And that which they say is that though Bishops and Common Prayer be taken down yet the giving of the Sacrament to all the Parish is not taken down And they that now submit so quietly to the disusing of many other things because Ministers are punishable if they use them would also do the like in this case And yet if you are jealous that Ministers will go as far on the other hand in refusing the people that are not to be refused though with one of an hundred there 's little feare of that we are contented that you looke to us also in this To which end these two things will be sufficient 1. Let the Magistrate joyne with the Pastours and Delegates of the Church in their meetings where Church-affaires are transacted that he may see what we do If there be no Justice of Peace in the Parish let every Church have a Church-Magistrate purposely chosen by the chief Magistrate or some Agent on his behalf deputed hereunto 2. And let the Magistrates Agent acquaint the Commissioners how things are transacted in cases of Complaint and let them by the advise of the Assistant Ministers correct us as we deserve if you should imagine this to be necessary Direct 4. The Magistrate should promote encourage countenance yea command the Pastours to Associations and Brotherly correspondencies for the more cautelous and vigorous and effectual management of these works and for the concatenation and Communion of Churches and the right understanding of each others affaires that he that hath Communion in one Church may by Communicatory Letters have Communion in any of the rest and he that is cast or kept out of one may not be received by the rest till it be proved that he is excluded unjustly And those that joyne not so fully as the rest may yet be provoked to owne one another as farre as they can that so we may maintaine brotherly Love with all that differ from us by tollerable defferences and may own them as Churches though we cannot own their different opinions or waies and may have such Communion with them as we may and upon their Letters may admit their members to our Communion This the Magistrate should at least openly provoke and encourage the Churches and Pastours to seeing no man can doubt whether it be for the edification of the Church Direct 5. For the better promoting of this Necessary work I conceive it would be a very ready and unquestionable way for the Magistrate to appoint an able Godly moderate Minister to be a Visiter in each County or rather in each half or quarter of a County to see the Churches thus Reformed and prvoke the several Pastours to their duty and assist them in it where there is need But not to have any Episcopal power to punish or cast out any Minister or excommunicate them suspend them or the like But let every Visitor have an Agent of the Magistrate joyned with him armed with authority to convent the Ministers and examine witnesses and do what more the chief Magistrate shall see meet so that still these two Visitors go together but have not the same Authority or work but let the Minister only enquire direct exhort and give account and advice to the civil Visiter and let the civil Visiter have all the Coercive Power And let both of them transmit such causes as are exempt from their determination to the Commissioners for ejecting scandalous Mininisters who by the advise of the Assistant Ministers may determin them These Visiters did very much to the first and great Reformation of Scotland when Popery had overrun all Nor did they Scruple the using of them for all that they were against Prelacy Direct 6. It is one of the chief and unquestionable parts of the Magistrats duty in order to the Reformation and Peace of the Churches and the saving of mens Souls to see that dangerous Seducers be restrained from infecting and carrying away the ignorant ungodly discontented people that are kept under Ministerial Teaching as Expectants I do not move to have men driven into our Churches Nor do I move to have an unnecessary restraint laid upon mens tongues or pens in case of tollerable differences among the Servants of Christ In this case I only desire now that the Dissenting Godly Brethren would agree together to meddle with their differences no more then needs and to manage their Disagreements with such Cautions and in such manner and season and measure as may least hinder their success in the common work viz. the promoting of the common Fundamental Verities and the converting and saving of the Ignorant and ungodly and getting down the reigning sinnes of the world And then they will find 1. That if there by any truth in the private Opinions which they would propagate it will farre easier be received when the minds of their brethren are sedate and peaceable then when they are allarmed to the conflict by unseasonable preaching for the said Opinions 2. And that the Errours of this lower nature among Brethren which some feare a tolleration of will sooner die of themselves for want of fewel in such Peaceable deportment then when the bellowes of opposition contradiction reproach and violence are blowing them up and putting life continually into them For most Dividers are proud and selfish and must needs be noted for somewhat extraordinary And you take the principal way to animate them when you make so much ado with them Whereas a few yeares neglect and not observing them as if there were no such men in the world unless when they impose a Necessity on us would more happily extinguish them I speak but what I have seen and tryed This therefore is not the matter of my present request that Magistrates would use rigor and violence with godly men about tollerable differences which the Power of greater Light and Love in the contrary minded is the principal means to reconcile But the thing requested now of Magistrates is that they would keep out the Wolves while we are feeding the Sheep or help us in it That they suffer not damnable deceivers or any that plainly go about to subvert mens Souls or the state of the Church to fall in with our Ignorant ungodly people in the time of their Learning and Expectancy And as I shall be ready against any Libertine Infidel or Papist in the world to prove this to be in the Magistrates Power and his flat duty of which I hope no sober Christian doubteth so I shall
man is out of it and you may next question whether the Devill be not a Member that believeth much more then he But when I say that Infidelity Impiety Heresie do cut off or cast out I meane it but Meritoriously Either these crimes are private and unknown or provable If not provable then they merit this and more Coram Deo but not Ecclesiâ judice that is though there be guilt or demerits yet we are no capable judges of it But if the crime be provable then it is either such as needs a judgment or not If it need a judgement the person is only de jurâ— cast out before the sentence which is terminus diminuens and is noâ— actuall casting out and he is actually cast out by the sentence and the execution so that his sin cast him out Meritoriously the Law Obligatorily the Paflors of the Church Sententially and the whole Church Pastors and People Executively in avoiding him But if there need no judgement then he is excommunicate actually ipso jure by the Law alone without a Judge which may be in many a casâ—â— Aâ— if he be a notorious Infidell Atheist Blaspheamer or notoriously beyond all doubt and controversie one of those that the Law commands us to avoid we must execute this Law though there be no sentence pronounced The want of a mans sentence will not excuse us from obeying Gods Laws And where there is no controversie through the notoriousness of the case there needs no Judge 6. If Birth-priviledge will serve alone for the Adult to prove their Title to the Church-state and priviledges of the Adult then no man that is born of Christian Parenâ—s can be obnoxious to excommunication or justly excommunicate For he is still a Child of Believing Parents and no sin will make them otherwise And therefore if that were enough he hath a good Title still Nay it would follow that he cannot Apostatize for he cannot fall away from this But the consequence is absurd therefore so is the Antecedent 7. If Infant Title only be sufficient to the Adult then no Parent is necessarily oblieged to professe himself a Christâ—aâ— or actuall believer in order to prove the interest of his Child to Baptism nor any that offer him in the Parents stead For it is sufficient if the Parents or susceptors say We were Infant-members and Baptized and therefore our Child must be so but whether we are actuall Believers now it is not necessary that we tell you But the Consequent is so absurd that whoever should have offered a Child to Baptism on these terms in the Aâ—cient Church or any Church that I know of till very lately would have been rejected The acceptance and Baptism of our Infants is one of the priviledges of Believers But no one hath right to this priviledg that his children be thus accepted into the Church upon a bare Infant-Title without the profession of a personall actuall â—aith Therefore c. 8. If the opposed Doctrine should hold good then all the world hath right to Church-Communion or Mâ—llions of Infidels at least But the consequent is false therefore so is the Antecedent The reason of the Consequence is plain because Noah was a Church-member and all the world came out of his Loynes And the men of Thracia Bithynia and most of Asia where Mahomet is worshipped may say Our Ancestors were Christians Therefore the Birth-priviledges still going down from generation to generation even to the Thousandth generation it must follow that the present generation of Mahometans and other Infidels are Church-memberâ— still For they lost not their naturall Relation to their Parents 9. It will not prove a Society of Adult persons to be a Christian Church if they have no more but their Infant-Condition therefore it will not prove a single person to be a Member of the Church That which is necessary to make a society a Christian society is necessary to make a person a Christian person But I hope none will deny but that some kind of Profession is necessary to make or prove a company of men to be a Christian Church therefore some profession is necessary to make or prove a man to be a Church-member 10. If Infant-conditions will suffice to the Adult for Church-membership and common priviledges then will they serve for Justification and Salvation that are speciall priviledges But the Consequent is false therefore so is the Antecedent The reason of the consequence is because though the benefits be various yet the Covenant and Conditions are the same by which we have right to one and to the other It is the Appearance of the same Faith by profession before men that give Title Coram ecclesiâ whose inward sincerity giveth right Coram Deo as was aforesaid And God giveth Title to all the blessings of the Covenant Coram Deo on the same conditions And there is also a parity of reason For if it be enough to prove our right to Adult Communion to praise God and have all his Ordinances and helps in the Church c. that we had Christian Parents then must it be enough to prove our Title in all the rest of our benefits The ancient Fathers and Churches thought that Baptism did as certainly give the Infant rightly Baptized a right to pardon of Originall sin and eternall life aâ— to outward Church-priviledges And if the same Covenant give both on the same condition then he that hath the condition of one hath of both I have proved in another Disputation that God hath not two Covenants of grace on his part one of spirituall or inward mercies and another of outward Ordinances and that he giveth not these inward benefits and the outward signes of them upon various conditions but on the same 11. Faith or the profession of it in the Adult is either necessary to Church-communion or unnecessary if unnecessary then Christians have no more to do in the Church then Heathens if necessary then either as a meer duty or as a condition or other means Not as a meer dutyâ— for then still the Infidels should be equally received though not applauded It must be therefore necessary as a meanes And the very words of the promise tells us what sort of meanes it is that makes Faith to be its condition 12. I would know of my adversary what he would do with the Son of a Believer that were unbaptized at 40. or 50. years of age would be Baptize him without a profession of actuall Faith of his own or not if he would then he would make new fashioned Christians and Churches and might Baptize all the posterity of the Apostates or the ancient Christians in the world that would consent Yea he could not indeed Baptize them for Baptism essentially containeth a profession of consent unto the Covenant which therefore others make for Infants that have the dispose of them But if he would not Baptize such without profession then it seems he takes not their Birth-priviledges to be a
sufficient condition of their Title thereunto 13. A Covenant breaker can claim no right to the benefits of the Covenant supposing him to violate the main conditions on which the benefits are suspended But all those at capable age that have nothing but their Infant condition to shew are Covenant breakers therefore they have no right to the benefits of the Covenant They therefore were engaged personally to beâ—ieve in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost when they came to the use of reason we have cause therefore to see whether they have broke or kept this Covenant and if they have broke it they can at present claim no Title to the benefits 14. He that cometh to God must believe that God is and that he is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek him Therefore those that profess not this belief cannot come to God and consequently not have Communion with the Church Without Faith it is impossible to please God Heb. 11. 5 6. Therefore without a profession of Faith it is impossible to have right to just Communion which is purposely for the pleasing of God Object But its said Infants have Faith that is a Relative Faith and a Faderall Faith as well as a Relative Faederall Holiness Their right is not only in their Parents but in themselves and therefore their Faith is in themselves and this continueth with the aged till Heresie and Schisme cut it off Answ Call any thing under Heaven by the name of Faith so you will but explain your meaning and we will quarrell as little as may be with you about words But little know we what you mean by Relative or Faederall Faith unless it be plainly to be semen fidelium the seed of believers that there is a Relative and Faederall Holiness is Scripture Doctrine and good sense For the formall nature of the thing is a relation which commonly is expressed by the name of Holiness and which in that phrase is implyed But I remember not that Scripture ever speaks of a Relative or Faederall Faith For I believe not that it was Infants that Christ calls the little oâ—es that believe in him And Faith being an act or habit you must mean some other species of Faith which consisteth in relation I know it not nor will I use your Language though I think it more tolerable to call the Infant Relatively a Believer then to say he hath Relative Faith for in so saying no more is meant but that he is a Disciple of Christ or belongs to him as he is the Seed of a Believer in Covenant But let this word of Faederall Relative Faith be used by you as you please If the thing signified by it be any more then I have expressed you should tell us what you mean If it be no more but to be the Seed of a Believer then we doubt not but thiâ— continueth when they come to age but it doth them no good at age as to the continuing of their Title to Church-membership before God without a Faith of their own nor before the Church without a profession of it That the Infant himself is the Subject of hâ—s own Right is a thing that no man that I know makes doubt of that believeth him to have any Right But the active main condition of that right is not to be performed by himself but by the Parent and only the Passive Condition is to be found in himself that he be the Seed of that Parent If he must be a Believers Seed it s the Parent that must Believe But that will not serve his turne at age if he do not also believe himself 15. It is granted by the Dissenters that the ignorant for all their Infant Title have no Immediate right to the Communion of the Church And we will not contend about names this satisfieth us in the maine It is not Actuall right if it be not immediate plenary right that which they call a remote right is properly no actuall right but a term of Diminution as to it when right hath two Conditions you may call it right when the first and greatest is performed but actually it is none till all be performed For it is still but Conditionall while any part of the Condition is unperformed saith Learned Mr Fullwood page 274. The rule to give all their due is of indispensable Obligation but seeing ignorant persons have no such immediate right in the Supper what injury or wrong is there done them Object But ignorance doth not wholly cut a man off from the Church For such a knowledge goeth not to the â—ssence of the Church for â—â—s foâ—m is society or Community Answer 1. It s sufficient to our present purpose that it excludeth men meritoriously from immediate right to the Communion of the Adult 2. Ignorance qua talis materially is no sin as in Ideots Paralyticks c. and therfore cuts not off But ignorance in a Subject where knowledg should be found is culpable and complicate alwaies with Infidelity or not believing and therefore doth declare the person to be matter uncapable If you choose to say it cuts not off I easily can prove that it manifesteth that he is not in the Invisible and ought not to be esteemed of the visible Church by reason of his incapacity his former Title ceasing for want of the condition of its continuation 3. Knowledge in the capable Adult is an essentiall to the Church as a society A Church is a society of Christians As it is a society Christianity is not essentiall to it and so not Knowledge For there are societies of Heathens and Infidels enow But as it is a Christian Society Knowledge is essentiall to it and therefore as it is a Church It 's essentiall to a field of wheat that there be wheat in it Or to a heape of wheat that it be of wheat And yet not as a field or as a heap for there are heaps of dirt also The aggregation of a number of individuals makes it a Community and the form of the body aggregated as to the mutuall relation of the parts makes it a Body politick or society But the essentiall qualification of the Individuals viz Christianity is essentiall to that society in specie as a Christian Church And Faith in the Adult is essentiall to Christianity and Knowledge is essentiall to Faith or inseparable from it Object Then one should not take another to be a Church-member till he is satisfied of his Knowledge which were a stranger thing Answ Not so strange as true supposing him an Adult Person capable of Knowledg For he cannot be satisfied of his Faith without being satisfied of Knowledg nor of his Christianity without his Faith For we are yet unacquainted with the Christian Infidels But then Consider what must be satisfactory to other men concerning their Brothers knowledg It must satisfie them that he is by the Pastours of the Church who are to judge approved and annumerated with Believers and that he
if wilfully contrary they are a lie And God doth not make a lie to be the Condition of Church-membership or Priviledges nor doth he bind his Ministers or Church to believe a known lie Nothing but Real or seeming truth is to be believed 2. More particularly the Profession which we speak of must have these Qualifications 1. It must be or seem to be Vnderstanding Ignorant is non est Consensus If a Parrat could say the Creed it were not a Credible Profession of Faith Therefore the Ancient Church was wont by Catechists to prepare them to understand the Doctrine which they were to believe and profess This is past Controversie I think no Minister would take that mans Profession that seemeth not to Understand what he saith 2. No Profession is Credible but that which is or seems to be serious He that speaks in scorn or jest is not to be believed as one that speaks his mind nor is it to pass for a Profession 3. No Profession is credible or sufficient but that which is or seems to be Free and Voluntary Though some force or outward urgencies in some cases may help to incline the will yet willing it must be or it is not a Credible Profession He that Professeth himself a Christian when a sword or Pistol is at his brest is not to be Credited if he continue it not when he is free And also that which is done in a meer Passion without Deliberation is not to be taken as the act of the Man and a true expression of the bent of his mind unless he afterwards stand to it upon Deliberation 4. It must be a Profession not nullified by a contradiction in word or deed Though their may an obscure contradiction not understood consist with it or a contradiction only in Degree as Lord I believe help thou my unbelief yet there must be no contradiction of the Essentials of our Profession that nullifieth it by shewing that we lie or speak against the bent of our hearts If a Minister can by contrary words or deeds disprove the Profession of the party he is not to believe it or accept it For we are not to believe without Evidence of Credibility much less against it I have given instances of this in the foresaid Disputation of Sacracrament pag. 10. 5. When by Covenant-breaking and Perfidiousness or often Lying a man is become come Incredible having forfeited the Credit of his word with wise and charitable men this man must give us a Practical as well as Verbal Profession before we can again admit him to the Priviledges of the Church For though we are not to be so strict as some old Fathers seem to have been and the Novations were that would not admit such Penitents again into the Church at all but leave them to Gods own Judgment yet must we not go against Reason and Scripture and the Nature of the thing in believing that which is not to be believed nor to cast by all Order and Discipline and prostitute Gods Ordinances to the lusts of men and make them a scorn or level the Church of Christ with the world The Testimonies cited by me on another occasion in the foresaid Disputations shew the Judgment of Protestants in these Points and somewhat of the Judgment of Antiquity I shall recite but those on the Title page of the third Disputation Tertullian Apologet. cap. 16. Sed dices etiam de nâ—stris excedere quosdam à Regulis disciplinae Desiâ—unt tum Christiani haberi penes res Philosophi verò illi cum talibus factis in Nomine honore Sapientiae perseverant that is But you 'l say that even of ours some swarve from or forsake the Rules of Discipline Answ They cease then to be counted Christians with us But your Philosophers with such deeds do keep the Name and honour of Wisdom The Judgment of the French Professours at Saumours you have in these words Thes Salmuriens vol. 3. pag. 39. Thes 39. Sacramenta non conferuntur nisi iis qui vel findem habent vel saltâ—m eam praese ferant adeò ut nullis certis argumentis compertum esse possit eam esse â—mentitam that is Sacraments are conferred on none but these that either have Faith or at least pretend or Profess to have it so that it cannot by any certain Arguments be proved to be feigned The Judgment of the Scottish Divines may be much discovered in these two Testimonies following Gillespie Aaron's Rod Blossoming pag. 514. I believe no consciencious Minister would adventure to Baptise one who hath manifest and infallible signs of unregeneration Sure We cannot be answerable to God if we should minister Baptism to a man whose works and words do manifestly declare him to be an unregenerated unconverted Person And if we may not initiate such a one how shall we bring him to the Lords Table Rutherford Due Right of Presbyteries pag. 231. n. 2. But saith Robinson most of England are ignorant of the first Rudiments and Foundations of Religion and therefore cannot be a Church Answ Such are materially not the Visible Church and have not a Profession and are to be taught and if they will fully remain in that darkness are to be cast out If you would have the Testimonies of Protestants you may read above threescore of them expressly maintaining that it is a Profession of Saving Faith that is prerequisite to to our Right of Sacraments cited in my forementioned Disputation second To which I adde 33. more cited to a like purpose in my fift Disputation of Sacraments And to these adde the large testimony of Davenant with his many Arguments on Colos 1. vers 18. too large to recite And for the later sort of Episcopal Divines that they also agree in the same I will satisfie you from an Eminent man among them Mr Herbert Thorndike in his Discourse of the Right of the Church pag. 31 32. where he saith And hereby we see how binding and loosing sinnes is attributed to the Keyes of the Church Which being made a Visible Society by the power of holding Assemblies to which no man is to be admitted till there be just presumption that he is of the Heavenly Jerusalem that is above I shall adde more from him anon Somewhat I have elswhere cited of the Fathers Judgments in this Point and more anon I shall have occasion to produce But in a Point that we are agreed on that is not Every Profession but only a Credible Profession of true Christianity even of Faith and Repentance that must be taken as Satisfactory by the Church I hope I may spare any further proof Prop. 7. The Profession of those that expect the Church-sttate and Priviledges of the Adult is to be tried judged and Approved by the Pastours of the Church to whose Office it is that this belongeth THis Proposition hath two parts 1. That it is not a Profession untryed and unapproved that must serve the turn 2. That the trying and