distinct Answer to Dr. Stilling fleets most Rational and Elaborate Irenicum than any yet extant And the naming of this last Book will be enough to manifest that an owning of the Jus Divinum of Episcopacy is not necessary to Conformity Some who insist very much on this Jus Divinum run their Notion a great deal too far and their keeping such a stir as they do about Succession whereas I cannot find that any of the first Fathers did insist on any other Succession than a Succession in Faith will suggest to some men unrecoverable doubts concerning all our Ministry and the validity of all our Administrations There has been a great dispute concerning the possibility of personal assurance of Salvation This Doctrine of Succession will go a great way to determine the Question in the Negative And indeed it offers too great occasion if we allow the Notion to question the validity of most Ministrations in the world For supposing that some were anciently made Bishops by Presbyters as the most learned Arch-Bishop Vsher durst have undertook to have proved and for a belief of which we have a great deal of ground from what St. Hierom saith of the Bishops at Alexandria For these not receiving their power in a Regular way viz. not from those who had Authority and Commission to Communicate and give it all the Ordinations they did afterwards Celebrate will prove null according to this Principle and of how vast and wide an extent this might be or how long a time this spurious Communication of Orders did continue is too difficult a point for the most curious and exact Critick to resolve Nay for ought any one can tell some of the Ordinations which now go for currant might appear if they could be run up to those Ages to derive from some of those impotent and unauthorized Bishops 'T is a very hard task for people to undertake to prove to themselves the Administrations they partake of are valid by proving the valid Ordination of him who Ministers For it is not enough that one who is called a Bishop and was consecrated according to the Rules of a particular Church did ordain him who officiates but you must prove that that Bishop's Ordainers and so upwards till you come to them who were ordained by the Apostles had every one of them a True Regular Episcopal Ordination And it will be a very unsafe tho it may appear to be an easie way to perswade people to be satisfied with a belief that the Providence of God is obliged to maintain this Succession unblemisht in the world For he may do that and yet the greatest part of those Ordinations which are called Episcopal be notwithstanding Invalid because of some Mixture either further distant or nearer at hand But tho this Notion obtains very much in these days our great Church-men and those who were high enough for Episcopacy formerly had other thoughts and abhorred to strain their Opinions to countenance such Uncharitableness as this Notion doth include For when some were to be ordained Bishops for Scotland An. Dom. 1609. Dr. Andrews then Bishop of Ely proposed a Question concerning the Consecration of those Bishops Whether they must not first be Ordained Presbyters because they had not received Ordination from a Bishop But Dr. Bancroft Arch-Bishop of Canterbury maintain'd there was no need of it for the Ordination given by Presbyters when Bishops could not be had must be owned lawful And then the Bishop of Ely did acquiesce the other Bishops being of that Judgment That which I design to take notice of as the matter in dispute between us and the Dissenters is the Ceremonies we use and they do scruple And I must needs say I apprehend it a very great unhappiness that such Divisions should be amongst us and continue so long whilst occasioned by such things as are but trifling and frivolous when compared with the great things in which we agree Tho I plead for Moderation towards those who cannot come up to us in these things and that busie intemperate People who lye under no obligation to interpose and make themselves Acceslary to the causing of Fines and Mulcts or heavier Censures to be inflicted on their sober honest pious but scrupupulous Neighbours may not have any incouragement in their doing thus but may meet with those Checks and Reprimands as shall prove effectual to restrain them from that course yet I do heartily wish all could be fairly satisfied concerning the lawfulness of the several things which are now appointed But I think much may be said by Them who are satisfied concerning these things to shew the great reasonableness of compassion and tenderness towards them who do at present dissent Besides I perceive that by the serious and diligent use of those methods which are universally acknowledged most agreeable with a Christian Church and Ministry many of those for whom I plead may be prevailed with to a considerable Compliance in a little time For I have known several who have been wholly proselyted to our Church by the practical Sermons exemplary Lives and the rational serious Discourses of some of our Clergy and by the calm and meek Endeavours they have used to satisfie their Judgments and remove their Scruples And I do not doubt but if these and the like courses were every where duly observed and incouraged it would evidently appear there is not the thousandth part of that need to use more severe Methods which some apprehend there is But it is a great unhappiness we have so many who pretend to the Church of England who are her greatest disgrace and who will not allow we make any Proselytes to the Church unless we do prevail with them to sit ordinarily ten times as long in a Tavern or Alehouse as the longest Service appointed for any day in the year and a Sermon of near an hour long at the end of it will oblige them to stay at Church It would undoubtedly be a great honour to our Church if all who pretend to her would lay out the chief of their zeal for Real Religion and then labour to win on and proselyte those who do dissent in these lesser things by condescending and yielding what they may and treating them with meekness and love The very appearances of a calm temper have a Charm in them but the Effects of them in concurrence with other prudent Methods are most irresistible In sum it is better to be over-run and ruined in the ways of meekness than to conquer all the world by cruelty In the one we bear the Cross and suffer for Righteousness sake in the other we Triumph in the Garments of Antichrist died red with the blood of those who tho in Errors yet may be good Men in the main for ought we know Thus speaks the learned Dr. Burnet who in all his Writings discovers an eminently primitive Christian healing Spirit I might mention many things now I am taking notice of
Rancour they have long cherished in their Breasts and which has quite Cankered their Spirits The pretences these men do make are but Colours under which they may more decorously vent their venom and malignity 2. It tends much to the utter extirpating of that Love and Charity and Meekness which are commended by Christ and his Apostles as the Vital Parts the Honor and Glory of the Christian Religion Satan has created the Church much trouble by causing Divisions amongst Christians Sometimes he has suggested Errors and False Doctrines to some who have professed Christianity and then has irritated them to make Parties and adhere resolutely to those Tenets against all the Demonstrations the Orthodox could give them both of the falseness of their Opinions and how pernicious they would be in their Consequences But I think he has done Religion more Disservice by hurrying men into undue and peevish Heats about Humane Devices than he has been able to do by instigating men to broach and publish such Doctrines as have had an immediate plain and direct tendency to overthrow Christianity For under a pretence of the Innocency of these former Instances and the great Benefit some pious men have concluded would follow from the use of them and the plausible Arguments they might easily urge for them he has first of all prevailed with men to lay out too much of their Zeal about these things and then by degrees has gone so far as to obtain those very Instances which were at first designed by good men to be used only as Decent and Comely Ceremonies to be taught and injoyned as Doctrines of Christianity We have too many Instances of this in the Church of Rome I will mention but one There is no great doubt to be made but that the primary design of those who first brought Pictures and Images into Churches was innocent but these had not been long there before Satan corrupted mens minds and drew them to pay them a Divine and Religious Worship Yea he prevailed with the Leading and Governing part of the Church to espouse that Cause so heartily the did contend and declare that Images not only ought to be set up but to be worshipped Every man who hath taken any tollerable notice of the History of former times must certainly know the Church of Christ has been often very miserably torn and rent and divided on the account of Indifferent Ceremonies Some have stubbornly refused to comply in the use of those Rites for which others have had an extraordinary kindness and these being impatient of that Denial have been too fierce and rigorous in imposing what they have said they did believe would be very useful And what has been just matter of complaint in former Ages is thorough the Craft of Satan and wicked Hypocrisie of carnal men a more than ordinary ground of Fear and Trouble to this present Generation We who profess our selves Protestants have stood a great while at some distance and of late our Difference has been exceedingly heightened nay it is to be feared many attempts have been made by some sort of People to render us wholly unreconcileable This is the more Deplorable and has a more Direful Aspect because we do on both sides lie under more then ordinary ingagements to unite as speedily and firmly as we can Besides the nature and tendency of our Religion and all that excellent provision Christianity doth make to keep its Professors from Jars and unseemly Quarrels making Meekness and Peace and Love and Condescention and mutual Forbearance some of its Vital Parts Besides this and all the ordinary inducements to Union we are now in a very audible and visible manner called on and importuned to do all we can on each side to unite We must either unite or we must perish It is high time to leave off insisting on little punctilio's of Honour we ought duly to weigh our circumstances and the nature of the things we Contend about and if our Dangers be unmeasurably great and the things we differ about such as will not bear so great a weight as the loss of our Religion and all our Rights we must yield something on either side and that side must be willing to part with most that can do it with greatest ease and most innocence Many eminent persons have imploy'd their thoughts to find out Expedients by which our Common Enemy the Papists may be hindred from getting so much advantage by our Differences as they expect No doubt the Papists have had a great influence in increasing our Divisions They have been Industrious in labouring to exasperate men and work their Passions beyond all Government and Moderation Nay tho some of our Make-bates who do wholly imploy their Talents to widen our Differences do pretend to the Church of England I am verily perswaded they are either Real Papists of very Mischievous Instruments in Popish hands to effect and bring about the common Ruine of Protestants The weakening of the Protestant Cause be it under what pretence soever is undoubtedly very serviceable to the Papists and whether this be done by keeping up mutual Animosities and Contentions amongst us to the weakening and impairing the strength of both sides or by irritating the superior and prevailing part to squeeze and subdue the other by their power and might is equally acceptable to them This latter cuts off that supply the stronger part would undoubtedly have from the other when assaulted by the Common Enemy It is Policy in the Papists to imploy some of their own Party to counterfeit and feign and pretend themselves of the Church of England and then ingage them and others under that pretence to endeavour the ruine of those they call Dissenters not only because they hate them but because they know that having done thus they shall be more successful in attempting the Church of England However they are certain if they can make us the Executioners of their Rage against our fellow Protestants they shall be better able to grapple with and execute their own wrath on the Church of England when single and by Her self He that incouraged the two Countrymen in their Quarrel and provoked them to fight with one another till they were both absolutely tired and when they were thus wearied did murder them both would no doubt have taken his Revenge on the Survivor if one of them had killed the other Amongst the many Methods and Expedients found out for effecting a firm and lasting Union amongst Protestants I think Dr. Stilling-fleet in his early years did hit on a very clear and infallible one if it might be universally attended to and countenanced by those in power Were we so happy but to take off things granted unnecessary by all and suspected by many and judged unlawful by some and to make nothing the bounds of our Communion but what Christ hath done viz. on Faith one Baptism c. allowing a liberty for matters of Indifferency and bearing for the weakness of
those who cannot bear things which others account lawful we might indeed be restored to a true primitive lustre far sooner than by furbishing up some antiquated Ceremonies which can derive their Pedigree no higher than from some ancient Custom and Tradition God will one day convince men that the Union of the Church lies more in the unity of Faith and Affection than in uniformity of doubtful Rites and Ceremonies It is a very great instance of the deplorable Degeneracy of this Age that there are so many professed Enemies to all Moderation towards them who have different Apprehensions concerning the Indifferent Appendages to our Publick Worship Nay their zeal against this Moderation transports them into such indecencies they will not only have it expunged the number of Christian Virtues but they dare decry all who own and plead for it as the worst of men Instead of Observing that Rule given by the Apostle Let your Moderation a virtue inclining us to such a kind of benign and equitable temper in our conversing with one another whereby we may endeavour to preserve concord and amity in our treating concerning those things about which we differ we known unto all men they seem to read it backward and do in their practice publish to the world they be resolved to let their Rage and Fury be known to all men But the Hurt would not be so great if they would only publish their wilde and untameable Temper under a Private name and not strive to injure and bespatter the Church of England by pretending her Patronage Moderation is not only a Christian Duty but a peculiar Ornament to any Church which doth espouse and practise it And therefore those who do labour to represent the Church of England under another Character by pretending to her in their fierce and outragious carriages do as much as they can to baptise her Antichristian and under a pretence of justifying themselves in their worst Demeanor do strip her of one of the greatest Excellencies and chiefest Ornaments the Christian Church doth enjoy and can glory in The ordinary matters in dispute between us and other Protestants are not of that Moment we should be so zealous and passionate about them Christian love and charity must not be lost and thrown away for such things Indeed where these are in any considerable Degree they will do very much to allay and quench those Heats into which passionate and inconsiderate people are too apt to be unduly hurried We have at this time greater things which call for our zeal and concern to be imployd about And the dangers we are in of losing them should mightily operate on us and make us cautious lest by any unsuitable carriage we should be any way instrumental to make that breach wider through which Popery is apparently labouring to thrust her self in amongst us The great and weighty matters of Religion the very Fundamentals of Christianity are now assaulted by the Papists And if they can get but a little more advantage we shall be in danger of having new Articles added to our Creed and new Sacraments administred in our Churches And therefore whilst in danger of having such Innovations obtruded on us we cannot have any time on leisure if heartily concerned for our Religion and our Souls to fall out and quarrel with one another about Old Rites and Ceremonies It is very sad to consider with what heat our present Differences are managed on every hand and that which doth very much Hurt is that debauch'd and lewd people are suffered to blow up our Divisions into much greater flames and distances than they would rise to if only learned and serious and pious men had the manageing of them What! is it not high time to agree amongst our selves now that Hannibal is at our Gates shall we give no hopes of an union amongst our selves till being Sacrifices to our Enemies Fury we meet on both sides in Popish Flames to witness to the same Religion Such blustering boisterous Tempers as are all for the great River Euphrates which runs with a torrent and a mighty noise and refuse the still waters of Shiloah which run soft and gently as the Prophet speaks Isa 8. 6. Such are no friends to peace because 't is the latter which is the River whose streams must make glad the City of God Psal 46. 4. that is must promote the quiet and flourishing state of the church as a Reverend Prelate hath elegantly exprest it It is true and pure Christianity we must mainly discover our Zeal for and for other matters we must reduce them to their proper Sphere and place and allow them no more of our affection and Zeal than in their own nature they deserve and the Exigence of the Church doth call for Our Saviour lays no stress on any thing but Real Practical Religion he does rather Caution us against too much Zeal about Mint and Cummin lest this should eat up the heart and life and spirit of our Devotion than oblige us to a particular and eminent discovery to great and extraordinary warmth about those things in which Real Religion is not immediately concerned We find the Apostles upon mature deliberation and when they had the immediate assistance and guidance of the Spirit would lay no more on the Disciples than what was then Necessary And it would be no difficult thing to shew that they were not Rigid towards those who did omit and even refuse afterwards to observe some of those Injunctions they concluded necessary to be observed in that Juncture of Affairs when they made that Determination I know some do insist very much on this Question Whether the Apostles had not power to determine Indifferent Ceremonies so as to oblige the Church in her several Administrations to the use of some and to forbear the use of all others and whether if any Professors of Christianity should obstinately have refused to comply with those Orders the Apostles might not innocently and justly have Excommunicated them for their Contempt Such kind of Questions as these are very unnecessary and I am affraid those who are so frequent in proposing these things in Company as some in the world are have a design to trepan and insnare the unwary I will say no more to this Point at present than 1st First of all That I believe the Apostles had as much Authority and Power as any of those have who pretend to be their Successors 2ly That they had so great a measure of Divine Grace communicated of them as did effectually restrain them from using their Authority arbitrarily or in an inordinate and hurtful way 3ly They never made use of their Power that we read of about these indifferent and unnecessary points And therefore whether they would have proceeded to such Censures as some talk of if they had appointed any number of Rites and had not been obeyed is not evident enough to convince and satisfie inquisitive men The Question lies mainly here
Whether if they had exerted this Power without Divine Direction they would have resented every thing Imperious and Haughty men have in after Ages called Contempts with the same passion they have done 'T is plain they thought it if not more Christian yet more prudent to forbear laying Snairs in peoples way and chose rather to suspend the exercise of their Authority about these things than to make any unseasonable use of it and than vindicate it by so severe a course as their delivering men unto Satan did amount to 4ly I think it will be very difficult for any man to make it appear that for some hundreds of years after the Apostles the Christian Orthodox Church did ever require any thing more than common Christianity as a Term of Church-Communion Or that any Ceremony was for so long a time imposed on the Church This is not designed in the least to reflect on the Church of England or to expect against any of Her Orders it is designed only to shew 1. That neither Christianity in the general nor the Being of a particular Church is concerned in our Dispute and that therefore considering our present Circumstances there is no need of discovering such immoderate heat in this business as some men do manifest and expect that all who pretend to the Church should approve 2. That some of those who do dissent from us may have more plausible pretences for what they do than some who are inconsiderately furious against them do imagin But allowing that there may somtimes happen such cases that the Church may and ought to proceed to great severity with some offenders we cannot reasonably conclude hence that every difference about outward Rites and Ceremonies especially if managed with meekness and other Christian Virtues by those who do dissent must be treated and prosecuted in that manner This would be to make the Church transcribe that Quack's folly who perceiving a skilful Chyrurgeon had saved a mans life and done him great service by cutting off his Legg when desperately gangreen'd did advise one who was troubled with the Head-ach to have his Head cut off The same Medecine will not cure every Disease nor may the same Remedy be applied to every part Moderation in these lesser things is certainly very desirable it may do the Church great service And whilst we are not obliged by any Law to prosecute and ruine those who are not of our Judgment in these things either unnecessarily to turn Informers our selves or to wheedle or threaten others into such Courses is very unbecoming any who profess they have a desire to befriend the Protestant Religion in this day The Church of England is undoubtedly a very strong and would be if it were not for these violent and headstrong Bigots who indanger the ruining the Protestant Religion under a glorious name and pretence an Impregnable Bulwark against Popery But she is not so by her injoyning any Ceremonies in which point she and other Protestants do difler but in her close and immovable adhering to those Doctrines and Practices which are common to us with the generality of our sober and only scrupulous Dissenters and which are directly contrary to and destructive of Popery I dare affirm That if the Rites and Ceremonies now in use in the Church of England should be altered some changed and some laid wholly aside by the same Authority which did at first injoyn them the Church of England would still be as Impregnable a Bulwark against Popery as now she is And I am fully satisfied there is no man will deny this unless he be either a Real Papist or an Ignorant Superstitious Fool. Nor is this all that may be alledged why we should be cautious of dealing harshly with those who differ from us in these things and against whom we have nothing else to except For the very Consideration of the Fruit and Effect the continued imposing of these things has had on many should both abate our vehemence against Dissenters and make us generally more inclinable to desire that some Abatements might be legally made in these things for the satisfying of those who still remain unsatisfied There are two dreadful Events which have followed these Impositions 1. Many worthy pious and otherwise every way qualified Persons have been hindred from either entering or continuing in the Lords Vineyard to labour and work publickly there 2. The constant imposed use of these things hath almost unavoidably begot in the minds of ignorant and vulgar people a belief that they are indispensably necessary and undoubted parts of those Ordinances to which they are annexed I have known several who would as willingly have had their Children and Relations not baptized at all as not to have the Sign of the Cross added And this not because it is required by Authority but because as they have professedly and openly owned they thought the Baptism not good and valid without it Nay I have known when many Arguments would not satisfie people that private Baptism without the Cross and I know not how any man can justifie the use of the Cross in that case was sound and true Baptism tho they have professed they did believe the Child could not live half an hour And in such cases the Sign of the Cross is I think at least Contradictio in Adjecto And some of these were such I should scarce have believed had been so ignorant or superstitious if I had not had a particular knowledge of it And however both these Effects might happen directly contrary to the primary design in appointing them yet when these Fruits do apparently spring from thence whether naturally or only by accident they may be enough to make those who have the greatest zeal for the power of godliness desire that no more stress may be laid on these things than their own Nature will bear For notwithstanding all the caution the Church hath used to prevent these ill Effects by declaring her own design and the true use and importance of these things that has not been universally effectual to answer her Design Neither her Rubricks her Canons no nor the Admonitions of her Clergy have been so effectual to prevent mistakes and false conceptions about these things as the constant uninterrupted and Injoined use and practice of them has been to ingender and create them in some mens minds Nor is it altogether improbable but more minds would have been leavened with such false Notions as those mentioned before if these things had been universally submitted to and the contests and differences about them had not awakened people to consider them more distinctly and get themselves acquainted with the proper design and true use of them Nor have I only observed that some do misunderstand the Church in injoyning the use of these Ceremonies by the particular knowledge I have had of their laying too much stress on these things and looking on them as assential parts of Ordinances but I am inclined to think
the great Matter in dispute between us which may incline sober and pious minds to dislike all unnecessary heat and Severity towards those who are not able to attain to so great a Latitude in Relation to these things as we are satisfied with But I will neither multiply instances to an irksom number nor insist on those I shall name so as to make them tedious I will name but seven things and they are such as will conduce something to abate that violent and unaccountable Peevishness some have allowed themselves in if considered with that candor and equanimity which becomes every Christian and every man who would judge fairly of things 1st It is unquestionably certain that the closer any Church doth keep or the nearer she approach to the first Churches in their simplicity and fredom from Humane Inventions the more justifiable she will be She will be the freer from those Contagions which are too apt to prevail when way is given to every thing that either a subtle man can represent as plausible or a pious affectionate man may apprehend useful I do not plead for reducing the Church to its ancient and primitive Poverty nor do I in the least incline to that opinion that there may not be some external difference in the Church when under Prosperous Circumstances from that she observed when persecuted and under storms But undoubtedly there is no absolute necessity of making new Terms of Communion because the outward face of Affairs is altered The less there is of Humane Inventions mixed with the Worship of God the more genuine and the liker it is to that which the Apostles and Primitive Christians did observe Nor do we find that outward Circumstances were very much insisted on by the Orthodox till very Considerable Corruptions were crept into the Church And tho this doth not argue or conclude against the lawfulness of any thing the Church of England doth injoyn for I do not urge it for that end yet it may induce us to have much Charity and Tenderness for them who have such a regard to what was only observed and injoyned in the first Churches they are almost afraid to deviate from them even in such particulars as are innocent and free The first Churches were so taken up with the great necessary and substantial Parts of Religion they had no time to fall out and quarrel about Indifferent Circumstantial Appendages Indeed we do not read of any contendings about these things till some either very ill or very weak men had a mind to lay an unnecessary and uneasie yoke on the rest of their Brethren There ought to be a great deal of care taken when ever any unnecessary Instances are admitted so much as to border on the Worship of God For God is very jealous of his Honour and we can scarce be too wary in giving way to Humane Inventions in Divine Service because our minds are too prone to adhere over-much to what is sensible Nay we too easily give more way and room to those particulars which are at first commended under very specious colourable and innocent pretences than we can afterwards justifie to be lawful However this is apt to lay us too open to the treacherous insinuations with which cunning and subtle men will labour to commend to us other Instances which be directly sinful But we must take heed not only that we yield not in things really evil but that we do not transgress due bounds in the use of those things which are Harmless A very ill use has been made of many things which were without doubt Originally well intended yea those very particulars which devout and Holy Men have found serviceable to them in the raising of their affections to the best things have been of ill Consequence when peremptorily injoyned on all There ought not any thing to be universally required of all men in the Service of God but what has either equal agreeableness to all mens tempers or a direct and certain tendency to advance the interest of Religion more or less in all men For some Instances which are proper to excite and quicken Devotion in some mens breasts have not the like tendency in reference unto others And the goodness of the End will not justifie an Universal Imposition till you can first of all make all men of one Complexion 2ly Teaching that Humane Authority has an unlimited Power to impose any thing on the Church which is not expresly forbid in Scripture may be of dangerous consequence It is generally acknowledged I think by most Parties that it doth pertain to Humane Authority to determine those Circumstances relating to the Worship of God which do belong to those Acts considered as they are Humane Acts. Some Circumstances must unavoidably accompany every external Religious Performance because it is impossible for man to act and his Acts be stript of all Circumstances and therefore it is generally allowed that those Circumstances without which the joint Celebration of Divine Ordinances cannot be observed should be determined by Humane Authority As to other Ceremonies which are not necessary to these Performances some do apprehend they are left free by Christ and therefore should not be constrained and compelled by men There have been great Disputes in the Church about this matter And some have declared their sense in very large words even so as to make way for the bringing of very strange Innovations into the Church For 1st It is not Demonstrably certain that Humane Authority has power any further than to restrain and punish disorders and indecencies in the Church And if so tho we our selves may be satisfied to serve God in the way appointed by Authority we cannot thence fairly conclude it lawful to ruine others who serve God without our Ceremonies but in a way that is grave and decent as well as ours For if it should at last happen notwithstanding all the Probabilities we have on our side that the extent of Humane Authority in these matters is only to keep men within Decent and Comly bounds and to punish them when they are disorderly irreverent and Rude and that it doth not reach to determine one way Decent and Orderly so as to make all other wayes which are in themselves equally Decent unlawful I say if it should thus fall out at last then all those who do unnecessarily engage themselves in the immoderate courses I am disswading from may wish when it is too late they had followed the safest Advice 2ly The Limitations usually prescribed to the Exercise of this Power by those who yield it in a great measure are such as will not secure us from all the dangerous Inconveniences which do attend this Power when unlimited Indeed if Humane Authority has such a Power belonging to it of Right as some do affirm there cannot be very much said on the point And therefore I will only propose two Questions for such to think upon Quest 1. Who has power to circumscribe and