eminent degree of Learning But when they come there they shall save a Servants Wages They took therefore heretofore a very good method to prevent Sizars over-heating their brains Bed-making Chamber-sweeping and Water-fetching were doubtless great preservatives against too much vain Philosophy Now certainly such pretended savours and kindnesses as these are the most right down discourtesies in the World For it is ten times more happy both for a Lad and the Church to be a Corn-cutter or Tooth-drawer to make or mend Shooes or to be of any inferiour Profession than to be invited to and promised the Conveniencies of a learned Education and to have his name only stand airing upon the College Tables and his chief business shall be to buy Eggs and Butter Neither ought Lads parts before they be determined to the University be only considered and likelihood of being disappointed in their Studies but also Abilities or hopes of being maintain'd until they be Masters of Arts. For whereas two hundred for the most part yearly Commence scarce the fifth part of these continue after their taking the first degree As for the rest having exactly learned Quid est Logica and Quot sunt Virtutes Morales down they go by the first Carrier upon the top of the Pack into the West or North or elsewhere according as their Estates lye with Burgersdicius Eustachius and such great helps of Divinity and then for Propagation of the Gospel By that time they can say the Predicaments and Creed they have their Choice of Preaching or Starving Now what a Champion for Truth is such a thing likely to be What an huge blaze he makes in the Church What a Raiser of Doctrines what a Confounder of Heresies what an able Interpreter of hard Places what a Resolver of Cases of Conscience and what a prudent Guide must he needs be to all his Parish You may possibly think Sir that this so early preaching might be easily avoided by with-holding Holy Orders the Church having very prudently constituted in Her Canons that none under Twenty three Years of Age which is the usual Age after seven Years being at the University should be admitted that great Employment This indeed might seem to do some service were it carefully observed and were there not a thing to be got called a Dispensation which will presently make you as old as you please But if you will Sir we 'll suppose that Orders were strictly denyed to all unless qualified according to Canon I cannot foresee any other Remedy but that most of those University Youngsters must fall to the Parish and become a Town Charge until they be of Spiritual Age. For Philosophy is a very idle thing when one is cold And a small System of Divinity though it be Wollebius himself is not sufficient when one is hungry What then shall we do with them and where shall we dispose of them until they come to a holy Ripeness May we venture them into the Desk to read Service That cannot be because not capable Besides the tempting Pulpit usually stands too near Or shall we trust them in some good Gentlemens houses there to perform holy things With all my heart so that they may not be called down from their Studies to say Grace to every health That they may have a little better Wages than the Cook or Butler As also that there be a Groom in the House besides the Chaplain For sometimes to the Ten pounds a year they crowd the looking after a couple of Geldings And that he may not be sent from Table picking his Teeth and sighing with his Hat under his Arm whilest the Knight and my Lady eat up the Tarts and Chickens It may be also convenient if he were suffered to speak now and then in the Parlour besides at Grace and Prayer time And that my Cousin Abigail and he sit not too near one another at Meals Nor be presented together to the little Vicarage All this Sir must be thought of For in good earnest a Person at all thoughtful of himself and Conscience had much better chuse to live with nothing but Beans and Pease-pottage so that he may have the command of his thoughts and time than to have his second and third Courses and to obey the unreasonable humours of some Families And as some think two or three years continuance in the University to be time sufficient for being very great Instruments in the Church so others we have so moderate as to count that a solemn admission and a formal paying of College Detriments without the trouble of Philosophical Discourses Disputations and the like are Virtues that will influence as far as Newcastle and improve though at never such a distance So strangely possessed are People in general with the easiness and small Preparations that are requisite to the Undertaking of the Ministry that whereas in other Professions they plainly see what considerable time is spent before they have any hopes of arriving to skill enough to practise with any confidence what they have design'd yet to preach to ordinary People and govern a Country-parish is usually judg'd such an easie performance that any body counts himself fit for the Employment We find very few so unreasonably confident of their parts as to profess either Law or Physick without either a considerable continuance in some of the Inns of Courts or an industrious search in Herbs Anatomy Chymistry and the like unless it be only to make a Bond or give a Glyster But as for the knack of Preaching as they call it that is such a very easie attainment that he is counted dull to purpose that is not able at a very small warning to fasten upon any Text of Scripture and to tear and tumble it till the Glass be out Many I know very well are forced to discontinue having neither stock of their own nor Friends to maintain them in the University But whereas a Man's Profession and Employment in this World is very much in his own or in the Choice of such who are most nearly concern'd for him He therefore that foresees that he is not likely to have the advantage of a continued Education he had much better commit himself to an approved-of Cobler or Tinker wherein he may be duly respected according to his Office and condition of Life than to be only a disesteemed Pettifogger or Empirick in Divinity By this time Sir I hope you begin to consider what a great disadvantage it has been to the Church and Religion the meer venturous and inconsiderate determining of Youths to the Profession of Learning There is still one thing by a very few at all minded that ought also not to be overlooked and that is a good Constitution and Health of Body And therefore discreet and wise Physicians ought also to be consulted before an absolute Resolve be made to live the life of the Learned For he that has strength enough to buy and bargain may be of a very unfit habit
presence of some Clergy man to sanctifie the Ordinance Who if he sticks at his Glass bless him and call him but Doctor and it slides presently I take no delight I must confess to insist upon this but only I could very much wish that such of our Governors as go amongst our small preferr'd Clergy to take a view of the Condition of the Church and Chancel that they would make but enquiry whether the Minister himself be not much out of repair I have now done Sir with the Grounds of that disesteem that many of the Clergy lie under both by the Ignorance of some and the extream Poverty of others And I should have troubled you no farther but that I thought it convenient not to omit the particular occasions that do concur to the making up of many of our Clergy so pitifully poor and contemptible The first thing that contributes much to the Poverty of the Clergy is the great scarcity of Livings Churches and Chappels we have enough it is to be confessed if compared with the bigness of our Nation But in respect of that infinite number that are in Holy Orders it is a very plain case that there is a very great want And I am confident that in a very little time I could procure hundreds that should ride both Sun and Moon down and be everlastingly yours if you could help them but to a Living of Twenty five or Thirty pounds a year And this I suppose to be chiefly occasioned upon these two accounts either from the Eagerness and Ambition that some People have of going into Orders or from the refuge of others into the Church who being otherwise disappointed of a Livelihood hope to make sure of one by that means First I say that which encreases the unprovided for number of the Clergy is people posting into Orders before they know their Message or Business only out of a certain kind of Pride and Ambition Thus some are hugely in love with the meer Title of Priest or Deacon never considering how they shall live or what good they are likely to do in their Office But only they have a phansie that a Cassock if it be made long is a very handsom Garment though it be never paid for And that the Desk is clearly the best and the Pulpit the highest Seat in all the Parish That they shall take place of most but Esquires and Right-Worshipfuls That they shall have the honour of being Spiritual Guides and Counsellors And they shall be supposed to understand more of the Mind of God than ordinary though perhaps they scarce know the old Law from the new nor the Canon from the Apocrypha Many I say such as these there be who know not where to get two groats nor what they have to say to the People but only because they have heard that the office of a Minister is the most Noble and honourable Employment in the World therefore they not knowing in the least what the meaning of that is Orders by all means must have though it be to the disparagement of that Holy Function Others also there be who are not so highly possess'd with the mere dignity of the Office and honourableness of the Employment but think had they but a Licence and Authority to Preach Oh how they could pay it away And that they can tell the People such strange things as they never heard before in all their lives That they have got such a commanding Voice such heart-breaking Expressions such a peculiar Method of Text-dividing and such notable Helps for the interpreting all difficulties in Scripture that they can shew the People a much shorter way to Heaven than has been as yet made known by any Such a forwardness as this of going into Holy Orders either meerly out of an ambitious humour of being called a Priest or of thinking they could do such feats and wonders if they might be but free of the Pulpit has filled the Nation with many more Divines than there is any competent Maintenance for in the Church Another great crowd that is made in the Church is by those that take in there only as a place of shelter and refuge Thus we have many turn Priests and Deacons either for want of Employment in their Profession of Law Physick or the like or having been unfortunate in their Trade or having broken a Leg or an Arm so disabled from following their former Calling or having had the pleasure of spending their Estate or being perhaps deservedly disappointed of their Inheritance The Church is a very large and good Sanctuary and one spiritual shilling is as good as three Temporality shillings Let the hardest come to the hardest if they can get by heart Quid est Fides quid est Ecclesia quot sunt Concilia Generalia and gain Orders they may prove Readers or Preachers according as their Gifts and Opportunities shall lie Now many such as these the Church being not able to provide for as there is no great reason that She should be solicitous about it must needs prove a very great disparagement to Her They coming hither just as the old Heathens use to go to Prayers When nothing would stop the anger of the Gods then for a touch of Devotion And if there be no way to get Victuals rather than starve let us Read or Preach In short Sir We are perfectly over-stock'd with Professors of Divinity There being scarce employment for half of those who undertake that Office And unless we had some of the Romish tricks to ramble up and down and cry Pardons and Indulgencies Or for want of a Living have good store of Clients in the business of Purgatory or the like and so make such unrighteous gains of Religion it were certainly much better if many of them were otherwise determined Or unless we had some vent for our learned ones beyond the Sea and could transport so many Tun of Divines yearly as we do other Commodities with which the Nation is over-stocked we do certainly very unadvisedly to breed up so many to that Holy Calling or to suffer so many to steal into Orders seeing there is not sufficient Work and Employment for them The next thing that does much heighten the Misery of our Church as to the Poverty of it is the Gentries designing not only the weak the lame and usually the most ill-favour'd of their children for the office of the Ministry but also such as they intend to settle nothing upon for their subsistence leaving them wholly to the bare hopes of Church-preferment For as they think let the thing look how it will it is good enough for the Church and that if it had but Limbs enough to climb the Pulpit and Eyes enough to find the day of the Month it will serve well enough to preach and read Service So likewise they think they have obliged the Clergy very much if they please to bestow two or three years Education upon a younger Son at the Vniversity
THE GROUNDS OCCASIONS OF THE CONTEMPT OF THE CLERGY AND RELIGION Enquired into In a LETTER written to R. L. The Eighth Edition LONDON Printed by E. Tyler and R. Holt for Nathaniel Brooke at the Sign of the Angel in Cornhil near the Royal Exchange 1672. THE PREFACE TO THE READER I Can very easily phansie that many upon the very first sight of the Title will presently imagine that the Authour does either want the great Tithes lying under the pressure of some pitiful Vicaridge or that he is much out of humour and dissatisfied with the present condition of Affairs or lastly that he writes to no purpose at all there having been an abundance of unprofitable Advisers in this kind As to my being under some low Church Dispensation you may know I write not out of a pinching necessity or out of any rising Design and you may please to believe that although I have a most solemn reverence for the Clergy in general and especially for that of England yet for my own part I must confess to you I am not of that Holy Employment and have as little thoughts of being Dean or Bishop as they that think so have hopes of being all Lord Keepers Nor less mistaken will they be that shall judge me in the least discontented or any ways disposed to disturb the peace of the present settled Church For in good truth I have neither lost Kings nor Bishops Lands that should incline me to a surly and quarrelsome complaining As many be who would have been glad enough to see His Majesty restored and would have endured Bishops daintily well had they lost no Money by their coming in I am not I 'll assure you any of those occasional Writers that missing preferment in the Vniversity can presently write you their new ways of Education or being a little tormented with an ill chosen Wife set forth the Doctrine of Divorce to be truly Evangelical The cause of these few sheets was honest and innocent and as free from all passion as any design As for the last thing which I supposed objected viz. That this Book is altogether needless there having been an infinite number of Church and Clergy-Menders that have made many tedious and unsuccessful offers I must needs confess that it were very unreasonable for me to expect a better reward Only thus much I think with Modesty may be said that I cannot at present call to mind any thing that is propounded but what is very hopeful and easily accomplished For indeed should I go about to tell you that a Child can never prove a profitable instructor of the people unless born when the Sun is in Aries or brought up in a School that stands full South that he can never be able to govern a parish unless he can ride the great Horse or that he can never go through the great Work of the Ministry unless for three hundred years backward it can be proved that none of his Family ever had Cough Ague or gray Hair then I should very patiently endure to be reckoned amongst the vainest that ever made attempt But believe me Reader I am not as you will easily see any contriver of an incorruptible and pure Crystalline Church or any expecter of a Reign of nothing but Saints and Worthies But only an honest and hearty wisher that the best of our Clergy might forever continue as they are rich and learned and that the rest might be very useful and well esteemed of in their Profession THE GROUNDS OCCASIONS OF THE CONTEMPT OF THE CLERGY RELIGION Enquired into SIR THat short Discourse which we lately had concerning the Clergy continues so fresh in your mind that I perceive by your last you are more than a little troubled to observe that disesteem that lies upon several of those holy Men. Your good wishes for the Church I know are very strong and unfeigned and your hopes of the World receiving much more advantage and better advice from some of the Clergy than usually it is found by Experience to do are neither needless nor impossible And as I have always been a devout admirer as well as strict observer of your actions so I have constantly taken a great delight to concur with you in your very thoughts Whereupon it is Sir that I have spent some few hours upon that which was the occasion of your last Letter and the Subject of our late Discourse And before Sir I enter upon telling you what are my apprehensions I must most heartily profess that for my own part I did never think since at all I understood the excellency and perfection of a Church but that Ours now lately Restored as formerly Established does far out-go as to all Christian ends and purposes either the pomp and bravery of Rome her self or the best of Free Spiritual States But if so be it be allowable where we have so undoubtedly learned and honorable a Clergy to suppose that some of that sacred Profession might possibly have attain'd to a greater degree of esteem and usefulness to the World then I hope what has thus long hindred so great and desirable a Blessing to this Nation may be modestly ghess'd at either without giving any wilful offence to the present Church or any great trouble dear Sir to your self And if I be not very much mistaken whatever has heretofore or does at present lessen the value of our Clergy or render it in any degree less serviceable to the World than might be reasonably hoped may be easily referred to two very plain things the Ignorance of some and the Poverty of others of the Clergy And first as to the Ignorance of some of our Clergy if we would make a search to purpose we must go as deep as the very beginnings of Education and doubtless may lay a great part of our misfortunes to the old fashioned Methods and Discipline of Schooling it self Upon the well ordering of which although much of the improvement of our Clergy cannot be denied mainly to depend yet by reason this is so well known to your self as also that there has been many of undoubted Learning and Experience that have set out their several Models for this purpose I shall therefore only mention such loss of time and abuse of youth as is most remarkable and mischievous and as could not be conveniently omitted in a Discourse of this nature though never so short And first of all it were certainly worth the considering whether it be unavoidably necessary to keep Lads to sixteen or seventeen years of Age in pure slavery to a few Latin and Greek words Or whether it may not be more convenient especially if we call to mind their natural inclinations to ease and idleness and how hardly they are perswaded of the excellency of the liberal Arts and Sciences any further than the smart of the last piece of Discipline is fresh in their memories whether I say it be not more proper and beneficial to mix
of body to sit still so much as in general is requisite to a competent degree of Learning For although reading and thinking breaks neither Legs nor Arms yet certainly there is nothing that so flags the Spirits disorders the Blood and enfeebles the whole Body of Man as intense Studies As for him that rives Blocks or carries Packs there is no great expence of parts no Anxiety of Mind no great Intellectual Pensiveness Let him but wipe his Forehead and he is perfectly recovered But he that has many Languages to remember the Nature almost of the whole World to consult many Histories Fathers and Councils to search into if the Fabrick of his body be not strong and healthful you will soon find him as thin as Metaphysicks and look as piercing as School subtlety This Sir could not be conveniently omitted not only because many are very careless in this point and at a venture determine their young Relations to Learning but because for the most part if amongst many there be but one of all the Family that is weak and sickly that is languishing and consumptive this of all the rest as counted not fit for any course Employment shall be pick'd out as a choice Vessel for the Church Whereas most evidently he is much more able to dig daily in the Mines than to sit cross-legg'd musing upon his Book I am very sensible how obvious it might be here to hint that this so curious and severe inquiry would much hinder the practice and abate the flourishing of the Universities As also there has been several and are still many living Creatures in the World who whilst young were of a very slow and meek apprehension have yet afterward cheared up into a great briskness and became Masters of much Reason And others there have been who although forced to a short continuance in the University and that oft-times interrupted by unavoidable services have yet by singular care and industry proved very famous in their Generation And lastly some also of very feeble and crasie Constitutions in their Childhood have out-studied their distempers and have become very healthful and serviceable in the Church As for the flourishing Sir of the Universities what has been before said aims not in the least at Gentlemen whose coming thither is chiefly for the hopes of single improvement and whose Estates do free them from the necessity of making a gain of Arts and Sciences but only at such as intend to make Learning their Profession as well as Accomplishment So that our Schools may be still as full of Flourishings of fine Cloaths rich Gowns and future Benefactors as ever And suppose we do imagine as it is not necessary we should that the number should be a little lessen'd this surely will not abate the true splendour of an University in any Man's opinion but his who reckons the flourishing thereof rather from the multitude of meer Gowns than from the Ingenuity and Learning of those that wear them no more than we have reason to count the flourishing of the Church from that vast number of People that crowd into Holy Orders rather than from those Learned and useful Persons that defend her Truths and manifest her Ways But I say I do not see any perfect necessity that our Schools should hereupon be thinn'd and less frequented having said nothing against the Multitude but the indiscreet Choice If therefore instead of such either of inferiour parts or a feeble Constitution or of unable Friends there were pick'd out those that were of a tolerable Ingenuity of a study-bearing Body and had good hopes of being continued as hence there is nothing to hinder our Universities from being full so likewise from being of great Credit and Learning Not to deny then but that now and then there has been a Lad of very submissive parts and perhaps no great share of time allow'd him for his Studies who have proved beyond all expectation brave and glorious Yet surely we are not to over-reckon this so rare a hit as to think that one such proving Lad should make recompense and satisfaction for those many weak ones as the common people love to phrase them that are in the Church And that no care ought to be taken no choice made no Maintenance provided or considered because now and then in an Age one miraculously beyond all hopes proves learned and useful is a practice whereby never greater Mischiefs and disesteem has been brought upon the Clergy I have in short Sir run over what seemed to me the first Occasions of that small learning that is to be found amongst some of the Clergy I shall now pass from Schooling to the Universities I am not so unmindful of that Devotion which I owe to those places nor of that great esteem I profess to have of the Guides and Governours thereof as to go about to prescribe new Forms and Schemes of Education where Wisdom has laid her Top-stone Neither shall I here examine which Philosophy the old or new makes the best Sermons it is hard to say that Exhortations can be to no purpose if the Preacher believes that the Earth turns round Or that his Reproofs can take no effect unless he will suppose a Vacuum There has been good Sermons no question made in the days of Materia Prima and Occult Qualities And there is doubtless still good Discourses now under the Reign of Atoms There is but two things wherein I count the Clergy chiefly concerned as to University Improvements that at present I shall venture to make Inquiry into And the first is this Whether or no it were not highly useful especially for the Clergy who are supposed to speak English to the People that English Exercises were imposed upon Lads if not in publick Schools yet at least privately Not but that I am abundantly satisfied that Latin O Latin 't is the all in all and the very cream of the Jest As also that Oratory is the same in all Languages The same Rules being observed the same Method the same Arguments and Arts of perswasion But yet it seems somewhat beyond the reach of ordinary Youth so to apprehend those general Laws as to make a just and allowable use of them in all Languages unless exercised particularly in them Now we know the Language that the very learned part of this Nation must trust to live by unless it be to make a Bond or prescribe a Purge which possibly may not oblige or work so well in any other Language as Latin is the English And after a Lad has taken his leave of Madam University God bless him he is not likely to deal afterward with much Latin unless it be to checker a Sermon or to say Salveto to some travelling Dominatio Vestra Neither is it enough to say that the English is the Language with which we are swaddled and rock'd asleep and therefore there needs none of this artificial and superadded care For there be those that speak very well plainly
And one told Jacob and said Behold thy Son Joseph cometh unto thee presently perceived and made it out to the People that his Text was a spiritual Dial. For says he here be in my Text twelve words which do plainly represent the twelve hours Twelve words And one told Jacob and said Thy Son Joseph cometh unto thee And here is besides Behold which is the Hand of the Dyal that turns and points at every word in the Text. And one told Jacob and said Behold thy son Joseph cometh unto thee For it is not said Behold Iacob or Behold Ioseph But it is And one told Jacob and said Behold thy son Joseph cometh unto thee That is to say Behold And. Behold one Behold told Behold Iacob Again Behold and. Behold said And also Behold Behold c. Which is the reason that the word Behold is placed in the middle of the other twelve words indifferently pointing at each word Now as it needs must be one of the Clock before it can be Two or Three so I shall handle this word And the first word in the Text before I meddle with the following And one told Jacob This word And is but a Particle and a small one but small things are not to be despised S. Mat. 18.10 Take heed that you despise not one of these little ones For this And is as the Tacks and Loops amongst the Curtains of the Tabernacle The Tacks put into the Loops did couple the Curtains of the Tent and sew the Tent together So this Particle And being put into the Loops of the words immediately before the Text does couple the Text to the foregoing Verse and sews them close together I shall not trouble you Sir with the rest being much after this witty rate and to as much purpose But we 'll go on if you please Sir to the cunning Observations Doctrines and Inferences that are commonly made and rais'd from places of Scripture One he takes that for his Text Psal. 68.3 But let the righteous be glad From whence he raiseth this Doctrine That there is a spirit of Singularity in the Saints of God But let the righteous A Doctrine I 'll warrant him of his own raising it being not very easie for any body to prevent him Another he takes that of Isai. 41.14 15. Fear not thou Worm Jacob c. thou shalt thresh the Mountains Whence he observes That the Worm Iacob was a threshing Worm Another that of Gen. 44.1 And he commanded the Steward of the House saying Fill the mens sacks with food as much as they can carry And makes his Note from the words that great Sacks and many Sacks will hold more than few Sacks and little ones For look says he how they came prepared with Sacks and Beasts so they were sent back with Corn The greater and the more Sacks they had prepared the more Corn they carry away if they prepared but small Sacks and a few they had carried away the less Verily and extraordinarily true Another he falls upon that of Isa. 58.5 Is it such a Fast that I have chosen A day for a man to afflict his soul Is it to bow down his head like a Bulrush The observation is that Repentance for an hour or a day is not worth a Bulrush And there I think he hit the business But of these Sir I can shew you a whole Book full in a treatise called Flames and Discoveries consisting of very notable and extraordinary things which the inquisitive Author had privately observed and discovered upon reading the Evangelists As for example Upon reading that of S. Iohn chap. 2. vers 15. And when he had made a scourge of small Cords he drove them all out of the Temple This prying Divine makes these Discoveries I discover says he in the first place that in the Church or Temple a scourge may be made And when he had made a scourge Secondly that it may be made use on He drove them all out of the Temple And it was a great chance that he had not discovered a third thing and that is that the scourge was made before it was made use of Upon Mat. 4.25 And there followed him great Multitudes of People from Galilee I discover says he when Jesus prevails with us we shall soon leave our Galilees I discover also says he a great Miracle viz. that the way after Jesus being straight that such a multitude should follow him Matth. 5.1 And seeing the Multitude he went up into a Mountain Upon this he discovers several very remarkable things First he discovers that Christ went from the Multitude Secondly That it is safe taking warning at our eyes for seeing the Multitude he went up Thirdly It is not fit to be always upon the plains and flats with the Multitude but if we be risen with Christ to seek those things that are above He discovers also very strange things from the latter part of the forementioned Verse And when he was set his Disciples came unto him 1. Christ is not always in motion And when he was set 2. He walks not on the Mountain but sits And when he was set From whence also in the third place he advises People That when they are Teaching they should not move too much for that is to be carried to and fro with every wind of Doctrine Now certainly never was this place of Scripture more seasonably brought in Now Sir if you be for a very short and witty Discovery let it be upon that of S. Mat. 6.27 which of you by taking thought can add one Cubit unto his stature The Discovery is this That whilst the Disciples were taking thought for a Cubit Christ takes them down a Cubit lower Notable also are two Discoveries made upon S. Mat. 8.1 When he came down from the Mountain great Multitudes followed him 1. That Christ went down as well as went up when he came down from the Mountain 2. That the Multitude did not go hail fellow well met with him nor before him For great Multitudes followed him I love with all my heart when People can prove what they say For there be many that will talk of their Discoveries and spiritual observations and when all comes to all they are nothing but pitiful ghesses and slender conjectures In like manner that was no contemptible Discovery that was made upon S. Mat. 8.19 And a certain Scribe came and said Master I will follow thee wheresoever thou goest A thou shall be followed more than a that I will follow thee wheresoever thou goest And in my opinion that was not altogether amiss upon S. Mat. 11.2 Now when John had heard in the Prison the works of Christ he sent two of his Disciples Some also possibly may not dislike that upon S. Luke 12.35 Let your Lions be girded I discover says he there must be a holy girding and trussing up for Heaven But I shall end all with that very politick one that he makes upon S. Mat. 12.47 Then
and then commend him to the Grace of God and the favour of the Church without one penny of Money or inch of Land You must not think that he will spoil his eldest Son's Estate or hazard the lessening the Credit of the Family to do that which may tend any way to the reputation and honour of the Clergy And thus it comes to pass that you may commonly ride ten miles and scarce meet with a Divine that is worth above two Spoons and a Pepper-box besides his Living or Spiritual Preferments For as for the Land that goes sweeping away with the eldest Son for the immortality of the Family and as for the Money that is usually employed for to bind out and set up other children And thus you shall have them make no doubt of giving five hundred or a thousand pounds for a stock to them But for the poor Divinity-Son if he gets but enough to buy a broad Hat at second hand and a small System or two of Faith that 's counted stock sufficient for him to set up withal And possibly he might make some kind of shift in this world if any body will ingage that he shall have neither Wife nor Children but if it so falls out that he leaves the world and behind him either the one or the others in what a dismal condition are these likely to be and how will their sad Calamities reflect upon the Clergy So dismal a thing is this commonly judged that those that at their departure out of this Life are piously and vertuously disposed do usually reckon the taking care for the relief of the poor Ministers Widows to be an opportunity of as necessary Charity as the mending the High-wayes and the erecting of Hospitals But neither are spiritual Preferments only scarce by reason of that great number that lie hovering over them and that they that are thus upon the wing are usually destitute of any other Estate and Livelihood but also when they come into possession of them they finding for the most part nothing but a little Sauce and second Course Pigs Geese and Apples must needs be put upon great perplexities for the standing necessaries of a Family So that if it be enquired by any one how comes it to pass that we have so many in Holy Orders that understand so little and that are able to do so little Service in the Church If we would answer plainly and truly we may say Because they are good for nothing else For shall we think that any man that is not curs'd to uselesness poverty and misery will be content with Twenty or Thirty pounds a year For though in the bulk it looks at first like a bountiful Estate yet if we think of it a little better we shall find that an ordinary Bricklayer or Carpenter I mean not your great Undertakers and Master-workmen that earns constantly but his two shillings a day has clearly a better Revenue and has certainly the command of more Money For that the one has no dilapidations and the like to consume a great part of his weekly Wages which you know how much the other is subject unto So that as long as we have so many small and contemptible Livings belonging to our Church let the world do what it can we must expect that they should be supplyed by very lamentable and unserviceable things For that no body else will meddle with them Unless one in an Age abounding with Money Charity and Goodness will preach for nothing For if men of Knowledge Prudence and Wealth have a phansie against a Living of twenty or thirty pounds a year There is no way to get them into such an undertaking but by sending out a spiritual Press For that very few Volunteers that are of worth unless better encouraged will go into that Holy Warfare But it will be left to those who cannot devise how otherwise to live Neither must people say that besides Bishopricks Prebends and the like we have several brave Benefices sufficient to invite those of the best Parts Education and Discretion For imagine one Living in forty is worth a Hundred pounds a year And supplied by a Man of Skill and wholsome Counsel What are the other thirty nine the better for that What are the People about Carlisle better'd by his Instructions and advice who lives at Dover It was certainly our Saviour's Mind not only that the Gospel should be preached to all Nations at first but that the meaning and Power of it should be preserved and constantly declared to all People by such as had judgment to do it Neither again must they say that Cities Corporations and the great Trading Towns of this Nation which are the strength and glory of it and that contain the useful People of the World are usually instructed by very learned and judicious Persons For I suppose that our Saviour's Design was not that Majors Aldermen and Merchants should be only saved but also that all plain Countrey People should partake of the same means Who though they read not so many Gazetts as a Citizen nor concern themselves where the Turk or King of France sets on next yet the true knowledge of God is now so plainly delivered in Scripture that there wants nothing but sober and prudent Offerers of the same to make it saving to those of the meanest understandings And therefore in all parishes if possible there ought to be such a fixt and settled Provision as might reasonably invite some careful and prudent Person for the Peoples Guide and Instruction in Holy Matters And furthermore It might be added that the Revenue belonging to most of Corporation-Livings is no such mighty business For were it not for the uncertain and humorsome contribution of the well-pleased Parishioners the Parson and his Family might be easily starved for all the Lands or Income that belongs to his Church Besides the great mischief that such kind of hired Preachers have done in the World which I shall not stay here to insist upon And as we have not Churches enough in respect of the great multitude that are qualified for a Living so considering the smallness of the revenue and the number of People that are to be the Hearers it is very plain that we have too many And we shall many times find too Churches in the same Yard whenas one would hold double the People of both the Parishes And if they were united for the encouragement of some deserving Person he might easily make shift to spend very honestly and temperately the Revenue of both And what though Churches stand at a little further distance People may please to walk a mile without distempering themselves when as they shall go three or four to a Market to sell two pennie-worth of Eggs. But suppose they resolve to pretend that they shall catch cold the Clouds being more than ordinary thick upon the Sunday as they usually are if there be Religion in the case and that they are absolutely bent upon
having instruction brought to their own Town Why might not one Sermon a day or rather than fail one in a fortnight from a prudent and well esteem'd-of Preacher do as well as two a day from him that talks all the year long nothing to the purpose and thereupon is laught at and despised I know what people will presently say to this viz. That if upon Sunday the Church doors be shut the Ale-houses will be open And therefore there must be some body though never so weak and lamentable to pass away the time in the Church that the people may be kept sober and peaceable Truly if Religion and the Worship of God consisted only in Negatives and that the observation of the Sabbath was only not to be drunk then they speak much to the purpose but if it be otherwise very little It being not much unlike as it is the fashion in many places to the sending of little children of two or three years old to a School-Dame without any design of learning one Letter but only to keep them out of the fire and water Last of all People must not say that there needs no great store of Learning in a Minister and therefore a small Living may answer his deserts for that there be Homilies made on purpose by the Church for young Beginners and slow Inventers Whereupon it is that such difference is made between giving Orders and License to preach the last being granted only to such as the Bishop shall judge able to make Sermons But this does not seem to do the business For though it be not necessary for every Guide of a Parish to understand all the Oriental Languages or to make exactly elegant or profound Discourses for the Pulpit yet most certainly it is very requisite that he should be so far learned and judicious as prudently to advise direct inform and satisfie the people in holy matters when they demand it or beg it from him Which to peform readily and judiciously requires much more discretion and skill than upon long deliberation to make a continued talk of an hour without any great discernible failings So that were a Minister tyed up never to speak one sentence of his own invention out of the Pulpit in his whole Life-time yet doubtless many other occasions there be for which neither Wisdom nor Reputation should be wanting in him that has the Care and Government of a Parish I shall not here go about to please my self with the imagination of all the great Tithes being restored to the Church having little reason to hope to see such dayes of vertue Nor shall I here question the Almightiness of former Kings and Parliaments nor dispute whether all the King Henries in the world with never such a powerful Parliament were able to determine to any other use what was once solemnly dedicated to God and his Service But yet when we look over the Prefaces to those Acts of Parliament whereby some Church-revenues were granted to Henry the eight one cannot but be much taken with the ingenuity of that Paliament That when the King wanted a supply of Money and an Augmentation to his Revenue how handsomely out of the Church they made provision for him without doing themselves any injury at all For say they seeing His Majesty is Our joy and life seeing that He is so couragious and wise seeing that he is so tender of and well-affected to all his Subjects and that He has been at such large Expences for five and twenty whole years to defend and protect this his Realm therefore in all Duty and Gratitude and as a manifest token of our unfeigned Thankfulness We do grant unto the King and his Heirs for ever c. If follows as closely as can be That because the King had been a good and deserving King and had been at much trouble and expence for the safety and honour of the Nation that thererefore all his wants shall be supplyed out of the Church As if all the Charges that he had been at was upon the account only of his Ecclesiastical Subjects and not in relation to the rest It is not Sir for you and I to ghess which way the whole Clergy in general might be better provided for But sure it is and must not be denyed that so long as many Livings continue as they now are thus impoverished and that there be so few encouragements for men of Sobriety Wisdom and Learning we have no reason to expect much better Instructors and Governours of Parishes than at present we commonly find There is a way I know that some people love marvellously to talk of and that is a just and equal levelling of Ecclesiastical-preferments What a delicate refreshment say they would it be if twenty or thirty thousand pounds a year were taken from the Bishops and discreetly sprinkled amongst the poorer and meaner sort of the Clergy how would it rejoice their hearts and encourage them in their Office What need those great and sumptuous Palaces their City and their Country-houses their Parks and spacious Waters their costly Dishes and fashionable Sauces May not he that lives in a small thatch'd house that can scarce walk four strides in his own ground that has only read well concerning Venison Fish and Fowl may not he I say preach as loud and to as much purpose as one of those high and mighty Spiritualists Go to then seeing it hath pleased God to make such a bountiful provision for his Church in general what need we be sollicitous about the amending the low condition of many of the Clergy when as there is such a plain remedy at hand had we but grace to apply it This invention pleases some mainly well But for all the great care they pretend to have of the distressed part of the Clergy I am confident one might easily ghess what would please them much better If instead of augmenting small Benefices the Bishops would be pleased to return to them those Lands that they purchased in their absence And then as for the relieving of the Clergy they would try if they could find out another way But art thou in good earnest my excellent Contriver Dost thou think that if the greatest of our Church-Preferments were wisely parcell'd out amongst those that are in want it would do much feats and courtesies And dost thou not likewise think that if ten or twenty of the lustiest Noble-mens Estates of England were cleaverly sliced among the Indigent would it not strangely refresh some of the poor Laity that cry Small-coal or grind Scissars I do suppose that if God should afterwards incline thy mind for I phansie it will not be as yet a good while to be a Benefactor to the Church thy wisdom may possibly direct thee to disperse thy goodness in smaller parcels rather than to flow in upon two or three with full happiness But if it be my inclination to settle upon one Ecclesiastical person and his successors for ever a thousand