repugnant to any Institution of Christ. But that is the case as to our Episcopacy We intend no quarrel about names If it be Mr. B. ' s pleasure to call our Bishops Archbishops let him enjoy his own fancy It already appears from Saint Cyprian and might much more be made plain from many others if it were needfull that the Bishops of the several Churches were looked on as Successours to the Apostles in the care and Government of Churches Now the Office of Mr. B. ' s Parochial Bishops was onely to attend to one particular Congregation but the Apostolical Office was above this while the Apostles held it in their own hands and did not make a new species of Churches nor overthrow the Constitution of Parochial Churches It seems then a strange thing to me that the continuance of the same kind of Office in the Church should be called the devising a new species of Churches But Mr. B. runs upon this perpetual mistake that our English Episcopacy is not a succession to the Ordinary part of the Apostolical Power in Governing Churches but a new sort of Episcopacy not heard of in the ancient Church which swallows up the whole Power of Presbyters and leaves them onely a bare name of Curates and destroyes the being of Parochial Churches But if I can make the contrary to appear from the Frame and Constitution of this Church I hope Mr. B. will be reconciled to our Episcopal Government and endeavour to remove the prejudices he hath caused in Peoples minds against it Sect. 12. Now to examin this let us consider two things 1. What Power is left to Presbyters in our Church 2. What Authority the Bishops of our Church have over them I. What Power is left to presbyters in our Church and that may be considered two ways 1. With respect to the whole Body of this Church 2. With respect to their particular Congregations or Cures 1. With respect to the whole Body of this Church and so 1. There are no Rules of Discipline no Articles of Doctrine no Form of Divine Service are to be allowed or received in this Nation but by the Constitution of this Church the Presbyters of it have their Votes in passing them either in Person or by Proxy For all things of that Nature are to pass both Houses of Convocation and the lower House consists wholly of Presbyters who represent the whole Presbytery of the Nation either appearing by their own Right as many do or as being chosen by the rest from whom by Indentures they either do or ought to receive Power to transact things in their names And the Custom of this Church hath sometimes been for the Clergy of the Dioceses to give limited Proxies in particular Cases to their Procuratours Now I appeal to any man of understanding whether the Clergy of this Church have their whole Power swallowed up by the Bishops when yet the Bishops have no power to oblige them to any Rules or Canons but by their own consent and they do freely vote in all things of common concernment to the Church and therefore the Presbyters are not by the Constitution deprived of their share in one of the greatest Rights of Government viz. in making Rules for the whole Body And in this main part of Government the Bishops do nothing without the Counsel of their Presbyters and in this respect our Church falls behind none of the ancient Churches which had their Councils of Presbyters together with their Bishops onely there they were taken singly in every City and here they are combined together in Provincial Synods model'd according to the Laws of the Nation And when the whole Body of Doctrine Discipline and Worship are thus agreed upon by a general consent there seems to be far less need of the particular Councils of Presbyters to every Bishop since both Bishops and Presbyters are now under fixed Rules and are accountable for the breach of them 2. In giving Orders by the Rules of this Church four Presbyters are to assist the Bishops and to examin the Persons to be Ordained or the Bishop in their presence and afterwards to joyn in the laying on of hands upon the Persons ordained And is all this nothing but to be the Bishop's Curates and to officiate in some of his Chapels 2. As to their particular charges one would think those who make this objection had never read over the Office of Ordination for therein 1. For the Epistle is read the charge given by Saint Paul to the Elders at Miletus Act. 20. or the third Chapter of the first Epistle to Timothy concerning the Office of a Bishop What a great impertinency had both these been if the Presbyters Power had been quite swallowed up by the Bishops But it hence appears that our Church looked on the Elders at Ephesus and the Bishop in Timothy to be Presbyters as yet under the care and Government of the Apostles or such as they deputed for that Office such as Timothy and Titus were Which I suppose is the true meaning of Saint Ierome and many other doubtfull passages of Antiquity which relate to the community of the names of Bishop and Presbyter while the Apostles governed the Church themselves And at this time Timothy being appointed to this part of the Apostolical Office of Government the Bishops mentioned in the Epistle to him may well enough be the same with the Presbyters in the Epistle to Titus who was appointed to ordain Elders in every City Titus 1. 5. 2. In the Bishop's Exhortation to them that are to be ordained he saith Now we exhort you in the name of the Lord Iesus Christ to have in remembrance into how high a dignity and to how chargeable an Office ye be called that is to say the Messengers and Watchmen the Pastours and Stewards of the Lord to teach to premonish to feed and provide for the Lord's Family c. have always therefore printed in your remembrance how great a treasure is committed to your charge for they be the Sheep of Christ which he bought with his death and for whom he shed his bloud The Church and Congregation whom you must serve is his Spouse and Body And if it shall chance the same Church or any member thereof to take any hurt or hinderance by reason of your negligence you know the greatness of the fault and of the horrible punishment which will ensue c. Is this the language of a Church which deprives Presbyters of the due care of their flocks and makes Parochial Congregations to be no Churches 3. The person to be ordained doth solemnly promise to give faithfull diligence to minister the Doctrine and Sacraments and the Discipline of Christ as the Lord hath commanded and as this Realm hath received the same according to the Commandments of God so that he may teach the People committed to his Cure and charge with all diligence to keep and observe the same Here we see a Cure and charge
committed to the Presbyters Preaching and Administration of Sacraments required of them and the exercise of Discipline as far as belongs to them of which afterwards but now in the Consecration of a Bishop this part is left out and instead of that it is said That he is called to the Government of the Church and he is required to correct and punish such as be unquiet disobedient and criminous in his Diocese So that the more particular charge of Souls is committed to every Pastour over his own Flock and the general care of Government and Discipline is committed to the Bishop as that which especially belongs to his Office as distinct from the other Sect. 13. II. Which is the next thing to be considered viz. What Authority the Bishop hath by virtue of his Consecration in this Church And that I say is what Mr. B. calls the ordinary parts of the Apostolical Authority which lies in three things Government Ordination and Censures And that our Church did believe our Bishops to succeed the Apostles in those parts of their Office I shall make appear by these things 1. In the Preface before the Book of Ordination it is said That it is evident unto all men diligently reading holy Scripture and ancient Authours that from the Apostles time there have been these Orders of Ministers in Christ's Church Bishops Priests and Deacons What is the reason that they express it thus from the Apostles time rather than in the Apostles times but that they believed while the Apostles lived they managed the affairs of Government themselves but as they withdrew they did in some Churches sooner and in some later as their own continuance the condition of the Churches and the qualification of Persons were commit the care and Government of Churches to such Persons whom they appointed thereto Of which we have an uncontroulable evidence in the Instances of Timothy and Titus for the care of Government was a distinct thing from the Office of an Evangelist and all their removes do not invalidate this because while the Apostles lived it is probable there were no fixed Bishops or but few But as they went off so they came to be settled in their several Churches And as this is most agreeable to the sense of our Church so it is the fairest Hypothesis for reconciling the different Testimonies of Antiquity For hereby the succession of Bishops is secured from the Apostles times for which the Testimonies of Irenaeus Tertullian Saint Cyprian and others are so plain hereby room is left to make good all that Saint Ierom hath said and what Epiphanius delivers concerning the differing settlements of Churches at first So that we may allow for the Community of names between Bishop and Presbyter for a while in the Church i. e. while the Apostles governed the Churches themselves but afterwards that which was then part of the Apostolical Office became the Episcopal which hath continued from that time to this by a constant succession in the Church 2. Archbishop Whitgift several times declares that these parts of the Apostolical Office still remained in the Bishops of our Church As for this part of the Apostles function saith he to visit such Churches as were before planted and to provide that such were placed in them as were vertuous and godly Pastours I know it remaineth still and is one of the chief parts of the Bishops function And again there is now no planting of Churches nor going through the whole world there is no writing of new Gospels no prophesying of things to come but there is Governing of Churches visiting of them reforming of Pastours and directing of them which is a portion of the Apostolical function Again Although that this part of the Apostolical Office which did consist in planting and founding of Churches through the whole world is ceased yet the manner of Government by placing Bishops in every City by moderating and Governing them by visiting the Churches by cutting off schisms and contentions by ordering Ministers remaineth still and shall continue and is in this Church in the Archbishops and Bishops as most meet men to execute the same Bishop Bilson fully agrees as to these particulars 1. That the Apostles did not at first commit the Churches to the Government of Bishops but reserved the chief power of Government in their own hands 2. That upon experience of the confusion and disorder which did arise through equality of Pastours did appoint at their departures certain approved men to be Bishops 3. That these Bishops did succeed the Apostles in the care and Government of Churches as he proves at large and therefore he calls their function Apostolick Instead of many others which it were easie to produce I shall onely add the Testimony of King Charles I. in his debates about Episcopacy who understood the Constitution of our Church as well as any Bishop in it and defended it with as clear and as strong a Reason In his third Paper to Henderson he hath these words Where you find a Bishop and Presbyter in Scripture to be one and the same which I deny to be always so it is in the Apostles times now I think to prove the Order of Bishops succeeded that of the Apostles and that the name was chiefly altered in reverence to those who were immediately chosen by our Saviour In his first Paper at the Treaty at Newport he thus states the case about Episcopal Government I conceive that Episcopal Government is most consonant to the word of God and of an Apostolical Institution as it appears by the Scriptures to have been practised by the Apostles themselves and by them committed and derived to particular persons as their substitutes or successours therein as for ordaining Presbyters and Deacons giving Rules concerning Christian Discipline and exercising Censures over Presbyters and others and hath ever since to these last times been exercised by Bishops in all the Churches of Christ and therefore I cannot in conscience consent to abolish the said Government In his Reply to the first Answer of the Divines he saith that meer Presbyters are Episcopi Gregis onely they have the oversight of the Flock in the duties of Preaching Administration of Sacraments publick Prayer Exhorting Rebuking c. but Bishops are Episcopi Gregis Pastorum too having the oversight of Flock and Pastours within their several precincts in the Acts of external Government And that although the Apostles had no Successours in eundem gradum as to those things that were extraordinary in them as namely the Measure of their Gifts the extent of their charge the infallibility of their Doctrine and the having seen Christ in the flesh but in those things that were not extraordinary and such those things are to be judged which are necessary for the service of the Church in all times as the Office of Teaching and the Power of Governing are they were to have and had Successours and therefore the learned and godly Fathers
then there was no deviation from the unalterable Rules of Christ. Let us therefore impartially consider what the Government of the Church of Carthage then was concerning which these things may be observed 1. That there was a great number of Presbyters belonging to the Church of Carthage and therefore not probable to be one single Congregation This appears from Saint Cyprian's Epistles to them in his retirement In one he gives them advice how to visit the Confessours in Prison which he would have them to doe by turns every one taking a Deacon with him because the change of Persons would be less invidious and considering the number of Confessours and the frequent attendance upon them the number of Presbyters and Deacons must be considerable When he sent Numidicus to be placed among the Presbyters at Carthage he gives this reason of it that he might adorn the plenty of his Presbyters with such worthy men it being now impaired by the fall of some during the persecution In the case of Philumanus Fortunatus and Favorinus he declares he would give no judgment cùm multi adhuc de Clero absentes sint when many of his Clergy were absent And in another Epistle he complains that a great number of his Clergy were absent and the few that were remaining were hardly sufficient for their work At one time Felicissimus and five Presbyters more did break Communion with the Church at Carthage and then he mentions Britius Rogatianus and Numidicus as the chief Presbyters remaining with them besides Deacons and inferiour Ministers About the same time Cornelius Bishop of Rome mentions 46 Presbyters he had with him in that City And in Constantinople of old saith Iustinian in his Novels were 60 Presbyters for in one he saith The custom was to determin the number and in another that 60 was to be the number at Constantinople Let any one now consider whether these Churches that had so many Presbyters were single Congregations and at Carthage we have this evidence of the great numbers of Christians that in the time of Persecution although very many stood firm yet the number of the lapsed was so great that Saint Cyprian saith Every day thousands of Tickets were granted by the Martyrs and Confessours in their behalf for reconciliation to the Church and in one of those Tickets sometimes might be comprehended twenty or thirty persons the form being Communicet ille cum suis. Is it then probable this Church at Carthage should consist of one single Congregation 2. These Presbyters and the whole Church were under the particular care and Government of Saint Cyprian as their Bishop Some of the Presbyters at Carthage took upon them to meddle in the affairs of Discipline without consulting their Bishop then in his retirement Saint Cyprian tells them they neither considered Christ's Command nor their own Place nor the future Iudgment of God nor the Bishop who was set over them and had done that which was never done in foregoing times to challenge those things to themselves with the contempt and reproach of their Bishop which was to receive Penitents to Communion without imposition of hands by the Bishop and his Clergy Wherein he vindicates the Martyrs and Confessours in his following Epistle saying that such an affront to their Bishop was against their will for they sent their Petitions to the Bishop that their Causes might be heard when the Persecution was over In another Epistle to the People of Carthage on the same occasion he complains of these Presbyters that they did not Episcopo honorem Sacerdotii sui Cathedrae reservare reserve to the Bishop the honour which belonged to his Place and therefore charges that nothing further be done in this matter till his return when he might consult with his fellow-Bishops Celerinus sends to Lucian a Confessour to beg him for a Letter of Grace for their Sisters Numeria and Candida who had fallen Lucian returns him answer that Paulus before his Martyrdom had given him Authority to grant such in his Name and that all the Martyrs had agreed to such kindness to be shewed to the lapsed but with this condition that the Cause was to be heard before the Bishop and upon such Discipline as he should impose they were to be received to Communion So that though Lucian was extreamly blamed for relaxing the Discipline of the Church yet neither he nor the other Martyrs would pretend to doe any thing without the Bishop Cyprian gives an account of all that had passed in this matter to Moses and Maximus two Roman Presbyters and Confessours they return him answer that they were very glad he had not been wanting to his Office especially in his severe reproving those who had obtained from Presbyters the Communion of the Church in his absence In his Epistle to the Clergy of Carthage he mightily blames those who communicated with those persons who were reconciled to the Church meerly by Presbyters without him and threatens excommunication to any Presbyters or Deacons who should presume to doe it The Roman Clergy in the vacancy of the See take notice of the discretion of the Martyrs in remitting the lapsed to the Bishop as an argument of their great modesty and that they did not think the Discipline of the Church belonged to them and they declare their resolution to doe nothing in this matter till they had a new Bishop By which we see the Power of Discipline was not then supposed to be in the Congregation or that they were the first subject of the Power of the Keys but that it was in the Bishop as superiour to the Presbyters And that they were then far from thinking it in the Power of the People to appoint and ordain their own Officers Saint Cyprian sends word to the Church of Carthage that he had taken one Aurelius into the Clergy although his general custom was in Ordinations to consult them before and to weigh together the manners and deserts of every one which is quite another thing from an inherent Right to appoint and constitute their own Church-officers the same he doth soon after concerning Celerinus and Numidicus When he could not go among them himself by reason of the persecution he appoints Caldonius and Fortunatus two Bishops and Rogatianus and Numidicus two Presbyters to visit in his name and to take care of the poor and of the persons fit to be promoted to the Clergy Who give an account in the next Epistle that they had excommunicated Felicissimus and his Brethren for their separation 3. That Saint Cyprian did believe that this Authority which he had for governing the Church was not from the Power of the People but from the Institution of Christ. So upon the occasion of the Martyrs invading the Discipline of the Church he produceth that saying of Christ to Saint Peter Thou art Peter c. And
14. 22. which is again an argument on our side for if we compare Act. 14. 22. with Titus 1. 5. we shall find that ordaining Elders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath the same importance with ordaining them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so that by the Church is understood the Body of Christians inhabiting in one City as the ' 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at Athens was the whole Corporation here and particular Congregations are but like the several Companies all which together make up but one City Sect. 6. 3. Dr. O. saith that the Christians of one City might not exceed the bounds of a particular Church or Congregation although they had a multiplication of Bishops or Elders in them and occasional distinct Assemblies for some Acts of Divine Worship Then say I the notion of a Church is not limited in Scripture to a single Congregation For if occasional Assemblies be allowed for some Acts of Worship why not for others if the number of Elders be unlimitted then every one of these may attend the occasional distinct Assemblies for Worship and yet all together make up the Body of one Church to which if he had but allowed a single Bishop over these he had made up that representation of a Church which we have from the best and purest Antiquity And so Origen compares the Churches of Athens Corinth and Alexandria with the Corporations in those Cities the number of Presbyters with the Senates of the Cities and at last the Bishop with the Magistrate But Dr. O. adds that when they did begin to exceed in number beyond a just proportion for Edification they did immediately erect other Churches among them or near them Name any one new Church erected in the same City and I yield And what need a new Church when himself allows occasional distinct Assemblies for greater Edification But he names the Church at Cenchrea which was a Port to the City of Corinth because of the mighty increase of Believers at Corinth Act. 18. 10. with Rom. 16. 1. I answer 1. It seems then there was such an increase at Corinth as made them plant a distinct Church and yet at Ephesus where Saint Paul used extraordinary diligence and had great success there was no need of any new and distinct Church And at Corinth he staid but a year and six months but at Ephesus three years as the time is set down in the Acts. Doth not this look very improbably 2. Stephanus Byzant reckons Cenchrea as a City distinct from Corinth and so doth Strabo who placeth it in the way from Tegea to Argos through the Parthenian Mountain and it is several times mentioned by Thucydides as distinct from Corinth and so it is most likely was a Church originally planted there and not formed from the too great fulness of the Church of Corinth As to the Church of Ierusalem he saith that the 5000 Converts were so disposed of or so dispersed that some years after there was such a Church there as did meet together in one place as occasion did require even the whole multitude of the Brethren nor was their number greater when they went unto Pella To which I answer 1. the force of the Argument lies in the 5000 being said to be added to the Church before any dispersion or persecution In which time we must suppose a true Church to be formed and the Christians at that time performing the Acts of Church-communion the Question then is whether it be in the least probable that 5000 persons should at that time make one stated and fixed Congregation for Divine Worship and all the Acts of Church-communion What place was there large enough to receive them when they met for Prayer and Sacraments Dr. O. was sensible of this inconvenience and therefore onely speaks of the Church of Ierusalem when these were dispersed but my question was about them while they were together Were they not a Church then Did they not continue in the apostles Doctrine and Fellowship and breaking of Bread and Prayers But how could 5000 then doe all this together Therefore a Church according to its first Institution is not limited to a single Congregation 2. A Church consisting of many Congregations may upon extraordinary occasions assemble together as the several Companies in a Common-Hall for matters of general concernment which yet manage their particular interests apart so for Acts of Worship and Christian Communion particular Congregations may meet by themselves but when any thing happens of great concernment they may occasionally assemble together as in the two debates mentioned Act. 15. 4. and 21. 22. so the several Tribes in Athens did at their general Assemblies which Strabo and Eustathius say were 174. 3. There is no number mentioned of the Christians that went to Pella neither by Eusebius nor Epiphanius who relate the story so that nothing can thence be concluded but if the force lies in his calling Pella a Village I am sure Eusebius calls it a City of Peraea beyond Iordan and Epiphanius adds that they spread themselves from thence to Coelesyria and Decapolis and Basanitis So that all this put together makes no proof at all that the Christian Churches by their first Institution were limited to single Congregations Sect. 7. 4. He answers that he cannot discern the least necessity of any positive Rule or Direction in this matter since the nature of the thing and the duty of men doth indispensably require it But is it not Dr. O. that saith that the Institution of Churches and the Rules for their disposal and Government throughout the world are the same stable and unalterable Are all these Rules now come to nothing but what follows from the nature of the thing Is it not Dr. O. that saith that no religious Vnion or Order among Christians is of spiritual use and advantage to them but what is appointed and designed for them by Iesus Christ Doth not this overthrow any other Order or Vnion among Christians but what Christ hath instituted and appointed for them The Question is not about such a Constitution of Churches as is necessary for performing the duties of religious Worship for all Parties are agreed therein but whether Church-power be limited to these exclusively to all other Vnions of Christians whether every single Congregation hath all Church-power wholly in it self and unaccountably as to subordination to any other How doth this appear from the nature of the thing and the necessary duties of Christians I grant the Institution of Churches was for Edification And I think a great deal of that Edification lies in the orderly disposal of things Whatever tends to Peace and Vnity among Christians in my judgment tends to Edification Now I cannot apprehend how a sole Power of Government in every Congregation tends to the preserving this Peace and Vnity among Christians much less how it follows so clearly from the nature of the thing as to take away
the need of any positive Rule or Direction in this matter And here the main Controversie lies between us and the Congregational Churches Is there no positive Rule or Direction in this matter then it follows as much from the nature of the thing that since Peace and Order is to be kept up among Churches as well as Persons every single Congregation ought not to engross Church-power to it self but to stand accountable for the management of it to those who are intrusted with the immediate care of the Churches Peace And I cannot yet see by all that hath been said how those that break the established Order in a Church wherein all the substantials of Religion are acknowledged to be sound and set up particular Independent Churches in opposition to it can acquit themselves from the Guilt of Schism how great and intolerable soever it be thought As to what concerns the Churches in the Houses of Priscilla and Aquila and Nymphas and Philemon I say that this is to be understood not of a Church meeting in their Houses but of their own Families was pleaded by the dissenting Brethren who say most of our Divines are of that Opinion and therefore the Argument holds against them And from Dr. O.'s Discourse I less understand than I did before what obligation of Conscience can be upon any when they may serve God in their Families in opposition to Laws to keep up such publick Congregations as are forbidden by them For 1. he grants that a Church may be in a Family although a Family as such be not a Church Then the members of a Family submitting to the Government of the Master as their Pastour are a true Church for a Church he saith may consist onely of the Persons that belong to a Family Then there is no necessity of going out of a Family for the Acts of Church-communion especially when the addition of four more may provide sufficiently for all the Officers they believe necessary to the making up a Church 2. All that he saith is that there is no such example given of Churches in private Families in Scriptures as should restrain the extent of Churches from Congregations of many Families And what then the Question is not now whether they be lawfull but whether they be necessary for nothing less than a Divine Command can justifie the breach of a plain Law but where is that Command Doth not Dr. O. appeal to the nature of the thing and the indispensable duties of men with respect to the end of Churches as his great Rule in these cases But which of all these necessary duties may not be performed within the terms of the Law so that no obligation can arise from thence to have Congregations of many Families All that he saith further as to this matter is that if through non-compliance any disturbance happen the blame will be found lying upon those who would force others to forego their Primitive Constitution Then it seems at last the Primitive Constitution is come to be the ground of non-compliance which in this case amounts to separation But this primitive Constitution had need be far better proved before it can be thought a good ground for breaking the Peace of the Church and the Laws of the Land and much more before it can carry off the blame from the persons who break Orders and Laws to the Makers of them All men no doubt that ever broke Laws if this Plea would be admitted would transfer the blame upon those that made them And so much for the Plea of the Congregational Party Sect. 8. 2. I now come to consider the Plea of those who hold our Diocesan Episcopacy to be unlawfull In my Sermon as it is printed I set down this saying of Mr. Baxter That to devise new species of Churches beyond Parochial or Congregational without God's Authority and to impose them on the world yea in his name and to call all Dissenters Schismaticks is a far worse usurpation than to make or impose new Ceremonies or Liturgies Which I said doth suppose Congregational Churches to be so much the Institution of Christ that any other Constitution above these is both unlawfull and insupportable which is more than the Independent Brethren themselves do assert Now for our better understanding Mr. B. 's meaning we must consider his design in that place from whence those words are quoted 1. He saith Christ hath instituted onely Congregational or Parochial Churches 2. That Diocesan Episcopacy is a new species of Churches devised by men without God's Authority and imposed in such a manner that those are called Schismaticks who dissent from it 3. That such an imposition is worse than that of Ceremonies and Liturgies and consequently affords a better plea for Separation But to prevent any misunderstanding of his meaning I will set down his own Cautions 1. That the Question is not whether every particular Church should have a Bishop with his Presbyters and Deacons i.e. whether every Rectour of a Parish be not a Bishop if he hath Curates under him This he calls Parochial Episcopacy 2. Nor whether these should have Archbishops over them as Successours to the Apostolical and general Overseers of the first Age in the ordinary continued parts of their Office 3. Nor whether Partriarchs Diocesans and Lay-chancellours be lawfull as Officers of the King exercising under him such Government of the Church as belongeth to Kings to which in such exercise all Subjects must for conscience sake submit 4. Nor if Diocesans become the sole Bishops over many hundred Parishes all the Parochial Bishops and Parish Churches being put down and turned into Curates and Chappels whether a Minister ought yet to live quietly and peaceably under them You will ask then where lies this horrible imposition and intolerable usurpation It is in requiring the owning the lawfulness of this Diocesan Episcopacy and joyning with Parochial Churches as parts of it But wherein lies the unsufferable malignity of that 1. It is making a new species of Churches without God's Authority 2. It is overthrowing the species of God's making which according to Mr. B. requires two things 1. Local and presential Communion as he calls it i.e. That it consists onely of so many as can well meet together for Church Society 2. The full exercise of Discipline within it self by the Pastours which being taken away they are onely Curates and their Meetings Oratories and no Churches This I think is a true and fair representation of Mr B. 's opinion in this matter Which tending so apparently to overthrow our present Constitution as insupportable and to justifie separation from our Parochial Churches as members of a Diocesan Church Therefore to vindicate the Constitution of our Church I shall undertake these three things 1. To shew that our Diocesan Episcopacy is the same for substance which was in the Primitive Church 2. That it is not repugnant to any Institution of Christ nor devising a new
species of Churches without God's Authority 3. That the accidental alterations in Discipline do not overthrow the being of our Parochial Churches 1. That our Diocesan Episcopacy is the same for substance which was in the Primitive Church This I begin with because Mr. B. so very often makes his Appeal to Antiquity in this matter And my first inquiry shall be into the Episcopacy practised in the African Churches because Mr. B. expresseth an esteem of them above others for in Saint Cyprian 's time he saith they were the best ordered Churches in the world and that the Bishops there were the most godly faithfull peaceable company of Bishops since the Apostles times And of the following times he thus speaks Most of the African Councils saith he were the best in all the world Many good Canons for Church order were made by this and most of the African Councils no Bishops being faithfuller than they Therefore concerning the Episcopacy there practised I shall lay down these two Observations Obs. 1. That it was an inviolable Rule among them That there was to be but one Bishop in a City though the City were never so large or the Christians never so many This one Observation made good quite overthrows Mr. B.'s Hypothesis For upon his principles where ever the Congregation of Christians became so great that they could not conveniently assemble at one place so as to have personal Communion in presence as he speaks there either they must alter the instituted species of Government or they must have more Bishops than one in a City For he saith the Church must be no bigger than that the same Bishop may perform the Pastoral Office to them in present Communion and for this he quotes 1 Thess. 5. 12 13. Heb. 13. 7 17. i.e. their Bishops must be such as they must hear preach and have Conversation with But that this was not so understood in the African Churches appears by their strict observance of this Rule of having but one Bishop in a City how large soever it was And how punctually they thought themselves bound to observe it will appear by this one Instance That one of the greatest and most pernicious Schisms that ever happened might have been prevented if they had yielded to more Bishops than one in a City and that was the Schism of the Donatists upon the competition between Majorinus and Coecilian as the Novatian Schism began at Rome upon a like occasion between Cornelius and Novatian Now was there not all the Reason imaginable upon so important an occasion to have made more Bishops in the same City unless they had thought some Divine Rule prohibited them When there were 46 Presbyters at Rome had it not been fair to have divided them or upon Mr. B.'s principles made so many Bishops that every one might have had three or four for his share But instead of this how doth Saint Cyprian even the holy and meek Saint Cyprian as Saint Augustin calls him aggravate the Schism of Novatian for being chosen a Bishop in the same City where there was one chosen before His words are so considerable to our purpose that I shall set them down Et cum post primum secundus esse non possit quisquis post unum qui solus esse debeat factus est non jam secundus ille sed nullus est Since there cannot be a second after the first whosoever is made Bishop when one is made already who ought to be alone he is not another Bishop but none at all Let Mr. B. reconcile these words to his Hypothesis if he can What! in such a City of Christians as Rome then was where were 46 Presbyters to pronounce it a meer nullity to have a second Bishop chosen Mr. B. would rather have thought there had been need of 46 Bishops but Saint Cyprian who lived somewhat nearer the Apostles times and I am apt to think knew as well the Constitution of Churches then thought it overthrew that Constitution to have more Bishops than one in a City At Carthage it seems some turbulent Presbyters that were not satisfied with Saint Cyprian's Government or it may be looking on the charge as too big for one chose one Fortunatus to be Bishop there with this Saint Cyprian acquaints Cornelius and there tells him how far they had proceeded and what mischief this would be to the Church since the having one Bishop was the best means to prevent Schisms After the election of Cornelius some of the Confessours who had sided with Novatian deserted his Party and were received back again at a solemn Assembly where they confessed their fault and declared That they were not ignorant that as there was but one God and one Christ and one Holy Ghost so there ought to be but one Bishop in the Catholick Church Not according to the senseless interpretation of Pamelius who would have it understood of one Pope but that according to the ancient and regular Discipline and Order of the Church there ought to be but one Bishop in a City After the Martyrdom of Cornelius at Rome Saint Cyprian sends to Rome to know who that one Bishop was that was chosen in his place And the necessity of this Vnity he insists on elsewhere and saith Our Saviour so appointed it unam Cathedram constituit unitatis ejusdem originem ab uno incipientem sua auctoritate disposuit Which the Papists foolishly interpret of Saint Peter's Chair for in his following words he utterly overthrows the supremacy saying all the Apostles were equal and a little after Episcopatus unus est cujus à singulis in solidum pars tenetur But this is sufficient to my purpose to shew that these holy men these Martyrs and Confessors men that were indeed dying daily and that for Christ too were all agreed that a Bishop there must be and that but one in a City though never so large and full of Christians Saint Augustin in his excellent Epistle to the Donatists gives an account of the proceedings about Caecilian after the election of Majorinus and that Melchiades managing that matter with admirable temper offer'd for the healing of the Schism to receive those who had been ordained by Majorinus with this Proviso that where by reason of the Schism there had been two Bishops in a City he that was first consecrated was to remain Bishop and the other to have another People provided for him For which Saint Augustin commends him as an excellent man a true Son of Peace and Father of Christian People By which we see the best the wisest the most moderate Persons of that time never once thought that there could be more Bishops than one in a City In the famous Conference at Carthage between the Catholick and Donatist Bishops the Rule on both sides was but one Bishop to be allowed of either side of a City and Diocese and if there had been any new made to increase
their number as it was objected on both sides if it were proved they were not to be allowed for generally then every Diocese had two Bishops of the different Parties but in some places they had but one where the People were of one mind and nothing but this notorious Schism gave occasion to such a multiplication of Bishops in Africa both Parties striving to increase their Numbers Sect. 9. Obs. 2. In Cities and Dioceses which were under the care of one Bishop there were several Congregations and Altars and distant places Carthage was a very large City and had great numbers of Christians even in S. Cyprians time as I have already shewed And there besides the Cathedral called Basilica Major Restituta in which the Bishops always sate as Victor Vitensis saith there were several other considerable Churches in which S. Augustine often preached when he went to Carthage as the Basilica Fausti the Basilica Leontiana the Basilica Celerinae mentioned by Victor likewise who saith it was otherwise called Scillitanorum The Basilica Novarum The Basilica Petri. The Basilica Pauli And I do not question there were many others which I have not observed for Victor saith that when Geisericus enter'd Carthage he found there Quodvultdeus the Bishop maximam turbam Clericorum a very great multitude of Clergy all which he immediately banished And without the City there were two great Churches saith Victor one where S. Cyprian suffered Martyrdom and the other where his body was buried at a place called Mappalia In all he reckons about 500 of the Clergy belonging to the Church of Carthage taking in those who were trained up to it And doth Mr. B. imagine all these were intended to serve one Congregation or that all the Christians then in Carthage could have local and presential Communion as he calls it in one Church and at one Altar Sometimes an Altar is taken with a particular respect to a Bishop and so setting up one Altar against another was setting up one Bishop against another as that Phrase is commonly used in Saint Cyprian and Saint Augustin sometimes for the place at which the Christians did communicate and so there were as many Altars as Churches So Fortunatus a Catholick Bishop objected to Petilian the Donatist that in the City where he was Bishop the Hereticks had broken down all the Altars which is the thing Optatus objects so much against them And that there were Altars in all their Churches appears from hence that not onely the Oblations were made there and the Communion received but all the Prayers of the Church were made at them as not onely appears from the African Code and Saint Augustin which I have mentioned elsewhere but from Optatus who upbraiding the Donatists for breaking down the Altars of Churches he tells them that hereby they did what they could to hinder the Churches Prayers for saith he illà c ad aures Dei ascendere solebat populi oratio The Peoples Prayers went up to Heaven that way And that distant places from the City were in the Bishops Diocese and under his care I thus prove In the African Code there is a Canon that no Bishop should leave his Cathedral Church and go to any other Church in his Diocese there to reside which evidently proves that there were not onely more places but more Churches in a Bishops Diocese And where the Donatists had erected new Bishopricks as they often did the African Council decrees that after the decease of such a Bishop if the People had no mind to have another in his room they might be in the Diocese of another Bishop Which shews that they thought the Dioceses might be so large as to hold the People that were under two Bishops And there were many Canons made about the People of the Donatist Bishops In one it was determined that they should belong to the Bishop that converted them without limitation of distance after that that they should belong to the same Diocese they were in before but if the Donatist Bishop were converted then the Diocese was to be divided between them If any Bishop neglected the converting the People of the places belonging to his Diocese he that did take the pains in it was to have those places laid to his Diocese unless sufficient cause were shewed by the Bishop that he was not to blame Let Mr. Baxter now judge whether their Bishopricks were like our Parishes as he confidently affirms Saint Augustin mentions the Municipium Tullense not far from Hippo where there was Presbyter and Clerks under his care and government and he tells this particular story of it that a certain poor man who lived there fell into a trance in which he fancied he saw the Clergy thereabout and among the rest the Presbyter of that place who bade him go to Hippo to be baptized of Augustin who was Bishop there the man did accordingly and the next Easter put in his name among the Competentes and was baptized and after told Saint Augustin the foregoing passages It seems the Donatists were very troublesome in some of the remoter parts of the Diocese of Hippo whereupon Saint Augustin sent one of his Presbyters to Caecilian the Roman President to complain of their insolence and to crave his assistance which he saith he did lest he should be blamed for his negligence who was the Bishop of that Diocese And can we think all these persons had praesential and local Communion with Saint Augustin in his Church at Hippo While he was yet but a Presbyter at Hippo in the absence of the Bishop he writes to Maximinus a Donatist Bishop a sharp Letter for offering to rebaptize a Deacon of their Church who was placed at Mutagena and he saith he went from Hippo to the place himself to be satisfied of the truth of it At the same place lived one Donatus a Presbyter of the Donatists whom Saint Augustin would have had brought to him against his Will to be better instructed as being under his care but the obstinate man rather endeavour'd to make away himself upon which he writes a long Epistle to him In another Epistle he gives an account that there was a place called Fussala which with the Country about it belonged to the Diocese of Hippo where there was abundance of People but almost all Donatists but by his great care in sending Presbyters among them those places were all reduced but because Fussala was 40 miles distant from Hippo he took care to have a Bishop placed among them but as appears by the event he had better have kept it under his own Care For upon the complaints made against their new Bishop he was fain to resume it as appears by a Presbyter of Fussala which he mentions afterwards However it appears that a place 40 miles distance was then under the care of so great a Saint
and so excellent a Bishop as Saint Augustin was And could Mr. B. have found it in his heart to have told him that he did not understand the right constitution of Churches How many Quaere's would Mr. B. have made about the numbers of Souls at Fussala and how he could take upon him the care of a place so far distant from him And it is no hard matter to guess what answer Saint Augustin would have given him But besides this plain evidence of the extent of Dioceses we have as clear proof of Metropolitan Provinces in the African Churches Quidam de Episcopis in Provinciâ nostrâ saith Saint Cyprian and yet he speaks of his Predecessours times which shews the very ancient extent of that Province In provinciâ nostrâ per aliquot Civitates saith he again which shews that more Cities than Carthage were under his care Quoniam latius fusa est provincia nostra in his Epistle to Cornelius In the African Code it appears the Bishop of Carthage had the Primacy by his place in the other Provinces by Seniority of Consecration Victor mentions one Crescens who had 120 Bishops under him as Metropolitan And I hope at least for the sake of the African Bishops Mr. B. will entertain the better opinion of the English Episcopacy Sect. 10. But that he may not think this sort of Episcopacy was onely in these parts of Africa let us enquire into the Episcopacy of the Church of Alexandria And we may suppose Athanasius did not spend all his zeal upon doctrinal points but had some for the right Constitution of Churches and yet it is most certain the Churches under his care could not have personal Communion with him It is observed by Epiphanius that Athanasius did frequently visit the neighbour Churches especially those in Maraeotis of which Athanasius himself gives the best account Maraeotis saith he is a Region belonging to Alexandria which never had either Bishop or Suffragan in it but all the Churches there are immediately subject to the Bishop of Alexandria but every Presbyter is fixed in his particular Village and here they had Churches erected in which these Presbyters did officiate All this we have expressly from Athanasius himself whence we observe 1. That here were true Parochial Churches for so Athanasius calls them Churches and not bare Oratories 2. That these had Presbyters fixed among them who performed divine Offices there 3. That these were under the immediate inspection of the Bishop of Alexandria so that the whole Government belonged to him 4. That these were at that distance that they could not have local Communion with their Bishop in his Church at Alexandria Which is directly contrary to Mr. Baxter's Episcopacy So in Alexandria it self there were many distant Churches with fixed Presbyters in them as Epiphanius several times observes and it would be a very strange thing indeed if so many Presbyters should have fixed Churches in Alexandria and yet the whole Church of Alexandria be no bigger than to make one Congregation for personal Communion with the Bishop But Mr. Baxter's great argument is from the meeting of the whole multitude with Athanasius in the great Church at Alexandria to keep the Easter Solemnity whence he concludes that the Christians in Alexandria were no more than that the main body of them could meet and hear in one Assembly Whereas all that Athanasius saith amounts to no more than this that the multitude was too great to meet in one of the lesser Churches and therefore a great clamour was raised among them that they might go into the New Church Athanasius pressed them to bear with the inconveniency and disperse themselves into the lesser Churches the People grew impatient and so at last he yielded to them But what is there in all this to prove that all the Christians in the whole City were then present and that this Church would hold them all If a great Assembly should meet at one of the lesser Churches in London upon some Solemn Occasion and finding themselves too big for that place should press the Bishop to open Saint Paul's for that day before it were quite finished because of the greater capacity of the Church for receiving such a number would this prove that Saint Paul's held all the Christians in London Athanasius saith not a word more than that it was Easter and there appeared a great number of People such a one as Christian Princes would wish in a Christian City Doth he say or intimate that all the Christians of the City were present that none of them went to the lesser Churches or were absent though the Croud was so great Doth he not say the multitudes were so great in the smaller Churches in the Lent Assemblies that not a few were stifled and carried home for dead And therefore it was necessary to consider the multitude at such a time In my mind Mr. Baxter might as well prove that the whole Nation of the Iews made but one Congregation because at the dedication of Solomon's Temple there was so great a multitude present that one of the lesser Synagogues could not hold them But the argument is of greater force in this respect that God himself appointed but one Temple for the whole Nation of the Iews and therefore he intended no more than a single Congregational Church But to serve this hypothesis Alexandria it self must be shrunk into a less compass although Dionysius Alexandrinus who was Bishop there saith it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a very great City and the Geographer published by Gothofred saith it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an exceeding great City so great that it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 past mens comprehension and Ammianus Marcellinus saith it was the top of all Cities And for the number of Christians there long before the time of Athanasius Dionysius Alexandrinus saith in a time of great persecution when he was banished he kept up the Assemblies in the City and at Cephro he had a large Church partly of the Christians of Alexandria which followed him and partly from other places and when he was removed thence to Colluthion which was nearer the City such numbers of Christians flocked out of the City to him that they were forced to have distinct Congregations so the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie and so Athanasius useth them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the Christians meeting in several Congregations If there were such a number of Christians at Alexandria so long before under the sharpest persecution is it possible to imagin in so great a City after Christianity had so long been the Religion of the Empire that the number of Christians there should be no greater than to make one large Congregation There is no hopes of convincing men that can build Theories upon such strange improbabilities I shall onely add one Instance more from Antiquity which is plain enough of it self to shew the
great extent of Diocesan Power then and that is of Theodoret a great and learned Bishop and although his Bishoprick was none of the largest yet in his Epistle to Leo he saith he had the Pastoral charge of 800 Churches for so many Parishes saith he are in my Diocese which he had then enjoyed twenty six years Doth Mr. B. believe that all the Christians in these 800 Churches had personal Communion with Theodoret And yet these Parishes did not change their species for he saith they were Churches still This Testimony of Theodoret is so full and peremptory that Mr. Baxter hath no other way to avoid the force of it but to call in question the Authority of the Epistle But without any considerable ground unless it be that it contradicts his Hypothesis For what if Theodoret ' s Epistles came out of the Vatican Copy Is that a sufficient argument to reject them unless some inconsistency be proved in those Epistles with the History of those times or with his other Writings Which are the Rules Rivet gives for judging the sincerity of them That Epistle which Bellarmin and others reject as spurious is contradicted by other Epistles of his still extant which shew a full reconciliation between Cyril of Alexandria and him before his death And it is supposed that Iohn of Antioch was dead some considerable time before Cyril which manifestly overthrows the Authority of it But what is there like that in this Epistle to Leo when the matter of fact is proved by other Epistles As to the unreasonable proceedings of Dioscorus against him which was the occasion of writing it his other Epistles are so full of it that Mr. B. never read the rest if he calls this into question upon that account That Hypatius Abramius and Alypius were sent into the West upon Theodoret's account appears by the Epistles to Renatus and Florentius which follow that to Leo. What if several Epistles of his are lost which Nicephorus saw doth that prove all that are remaining to be counterfeit But he is much mistaken if he thinks there was no other Copy but the Vatican translated by Metius for Sirmondus tells us he met with another Copy at Naples which he compared with the Vatican and published the various Readings of the Epistles from it What if Leontius saith that Hereticks feigned Epistles in Theodoret ' s name Doth that prove an Epistle wherein he vindicates himself from the imputation of Heresie to be spurious What Mr. B. means by the printing this Epistle alone after Theodoret ' s Works I do not well understand unless he never saw any other than the Latin Edition of Theodoret. But it is a very bold thing to pronounce concerning the Authority of a man's Writings without so much as looking into the latest and best Editions of them But there are two things he objects which seem more material 1. That it seems incredible that a Town within two days journey of Antioch should have 800 Churches in it at that time 2. That he proves from other places in Theodoret that it is very improbable that Dioceses had then so many Churches 1. As to the first certainly no man in his wits ever undertook to prove that one such City as Cyrus then was had 800 Churches in it But by Cyrus Theodoret means the Diocese of Cyrus as will afterwards appear If Cyrus were taken for the Regio Cyrrhestica with the bounds given it by Ptolemy Strabo and Pliny then there would not appear the least improbability in it since many considerable Cities were within it as Beroea now Aleppo and Hierapolis and extended as far as Euphrates Zeugma being comprehended under it The Ecclesiastical Province was likewise very large and by the ancient Notitiae it is sometimes called Euphratensis which in Ammianus his time took in Comagena and extended to Samosata but the Regio Cyrrhestica before was distinct from Comagena as appears by Strabo and others in that Province there was a Metropolitan who was called the Metropolitan of Hagiopolis which by the same Notitiae appears to have been then one of the names of Cyrus or Cyrrhus But notwithstanding I do not think the words of Theodoret are to be understood of the Province but of his own peculiar Diocese for Theodoret mentions the Metropolitan he was under By Cyrus therefore we understand the Region about the City which was under Theodoret's care within which he was confined by the Emperour's Order as he complains in several Epistles and there it is called by him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Regio Cyrrhestica and Theodoret himself sets down the extent of it in his Epistle to Constantius where he saith it was forty miles in length and forty in breadth And he saith in another Epistle that Christianity was then so much spread among them that not onely the Cities but the Villages the Fields and utmost bounds were filled with Divine Grace And that these Villages had Churches and Priests settled in them under the care of the Bishop appears expresly from a passage in the Life of Symeon where he speaks of Bassus visiting the Parochial Churches 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If there were then Parochial Churches settled with Presbyters in them and these under the care of the Diocesan Bishop then Mr. B.'s Hypothesis is utterly overthrown In his Epistle to Nomus he mentions eight Villages in his Diocese that were overrun with the Heresie of Marcion another with the Eunomian another with the Arian Heresie which were all converted by his care and in another place he saith he had brought ten thousand Marcionists to Baptism In another he mentions the spreading of Marcion ' s Doctrine in his Diocese and the great pains he took to root it out and the success he had therein And we find the names of many of the Villages in his Lives as Tillima Targala Nimuza Teleda Telanissus which are sufficient to shew that Theodoret had properly a Diocesan Church and that his Episcopal care and Authority did extend to many Parochial Churches his Diocese being forty miles in length and as many in breadth So that Mr. B. must reject not onley that Epistle to Leo but the rest too and his other Works if he hopes to make good his Parochial Episcopacy which is too hard a task to be undertaken without better evidence than he hath hitherto brought 2. But he offers to produce other Testimonies out of Theodoret to shew the improbability that Dioceses had so many Churches The question is not about the bare number of Churches in Dioceses which all men know to have been very different but about the extent of Episcopal Power whether it were limited to one Parochial Church or was extended over many And what is there in Theodoret which contradicts this I extreamly failed of my expectation as to the other places of Theodoret which he promised to produce For I find five or six places
and Councils of old times did usually stile Bishops the Successours of the Apostles without ever scrupling thereat Many other passages might be produced out of those excellent Papers to the same purpose but these are sufficient to discover that our Bishops are looked on as Successours to the Apostles and therefore Mr. Baxter hath no reason to call our Episcopacy a new devised species of Churches and such as destroys the being of Parochial Churches Sect. 14. 3. It now remains that we consider whether the restraint of Discipline in our Parochial Churches doth overthrow their Constitution To make this clear we must understand that the Discipline of the Church either respects the admission of Church-members to the Holy Communion or the casting of them out for Scandal afterwards 1. As to that part of Discipline which respects the admission of Church-members The Rubrick after Confirmation saith That none shall be admitted to the holy Communion untill such time as he be confirmed or be ready and desirous to be confirmed Now to capacitate a person for Confirmation it is necessary that he be able to give an account of the necessary points of the Christian Faith and Practice as they are contained in the Creed the Lord's Prayer the Ten Commandments and the Church Catechism and of his sufficiency herein the Parochial Minister is the Iudge For he is either to bring or send in writing with his hand subscribed thereunto the names of all such persons within his Parish as he shall think fit to be presented to the Bishop to be confirmed Now if this were strictly observed and the Church is not responsible for mens neglect were it not sufficient for the satisfaction of men as to the admission of Church-members to the Lord's Supper And I do not see but the Objections made against the Discipline of this Church might be removed if the things allowed and required by the Rules of it were duly practised and might attain to as great purity as is ever pretended to by the Separate Congregations who now find so much fault for our want of Discipline For even the Churches of New-England do grant that the Infant seed of Confederate visible Believers are members of the same Church with their Parents and when grown up are personally under the Watch Discipline and Government of that Church And that Infants baptized have a right to further privileges if they appear qualified for them And the main of these qualifications are understanding the Doctrine of Faith and publickly professing their assent thereto not scandalous in life and solemnly owning the Covenant before the Church Taking this for the Baptismal Covenant and not their Church Covenant our Church owns the same thing onely it is to be done before the Bishop instead of their Congregation But the Minister is to be judge of the qualifications which Mr. Baxter himself allows in this case Who grants the Profession of Faith to be a Condition of Right before the Church and then adds that such profession is to be tried judged and approved by the Pastours of the Church to whose Office it belongs because to Ministers as such the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven are committed and they are the Stewards of God's House c. which he there proves at large by many Arguments But he complains of the old careless practice of this excellent duty of Confirmation This is a thing indeed to be lamented that it is too hastily and cursorily performed but let the fault then be laid where it ought to be laid not upon the Church whose Rules are very good but upon those persons in it who slubber over so important a Duty But is it not more becoming Christians in a peaceable and orderly manner to endeavour to retrieve so excellent a means for the Reformation of our Parochial Churches than peevishly to complain of the want of Discipline and to reject Communion with our Church on that account And I shall desire Mr. Baxter to consider his own words That the practice of so much Discipline as we are agreed in is a likelier way to bring us to agreement in the rest than all our disputings will do without it Yea Mr. Baxter grants That the Presbyters of our Church have by the Rubrick the Trial and Approbation of those that are sent to the Bishop for Confirmation and that the Doctrine and Practice of the Church of England is for the Power of Presbyters herein as far as they could desire This is a very fair confession and sufficient to make it appear that our Diocesan Episcopacy doth not overthrow the Power of Presbyters as to this part of Discipline which concerns admission of Church-members to the Communion Sect. 15. 2. As to that part of Church Discipline which respects the rejecting those for Scandal who have been Church-members In case of open and publick Scandal our Church doth allow if not require the Parochial Minister to call and advertise such a one that is guilty of it in any wise not to come to the Lord's Table until he hath openly declared himself to have truly repented and amended his former naughty life that the Congregation may thereby be satisfied which before was offended And in case the offender continue obstinate he may repel him from the Communion but so that after such repelling he give an account to the Ordinary within 14 days and the Ordinary is then to proceed according to the Canon Here is plainly a Power granted to put back any Scandalous Offender from the Sacrament whose faults are so notorious as to give offence to the Congregation but it is not an absolute and unaccountable Power but the Minister is obliged to give account thereof within a limited time to the Ordinary Now wherein is it that our Diocesan Episcopacy destroys the being of Parochial Churches for want of the Power of Discipline Is it that they have not Power to exclude men whether their faults be Scandalous to the Congregation or not Or is it that they are bound to justify what they doe and to prosecute the Person for those faults for which they put him back from the Communion Or is it that they have not Power to proceed to the greater Excommunication that being reserved served to the Bishop upon full hearing of all parties concerned But as long as by the Constitution of our Church every Minister in his Parish hath power to keep back notorious Offenders it will be impossible to prove from other circumstances that the being of our Churches is destroyed by our Diocesan Episcopacy Mr. B. saith that if it could be proved that the lesser excommunication out of our particular Congregations were allowed to the Parish Ministers it would half reconcile him to the English sort of Prelacy but if it be so he hath been in a sleep these 50 years that could never hear or read of any such thing It is strange in all this time he should never reade or consider the
large as the exercise thereof at some times appeareth to have been the exercise thereof being variable according to the various conditions of the Church in different times And therefore his Majesty doth not believe that the Bishops under Christian Princes do challenge such an amplitude of Iurisdiction to belong unto them in respect of their Episcopal Office precisely as was exercised in the Primitive times by Bishops before the days of Constantine The reason of the difference being evident that in those former times under Pagan Princes the Church was a distinct Body of it self divided from the Common-wealth and so was to be governed by its own Rules and Rulers the Bishops therefore of those times though they had no outward coercive power over mens Persons or Estates yet in as much as every Christian man when he became a Member of the Church did ipso facto and by that his own voluntary Act put himself under their Government they exercised a very large Power of Jurisdiction in spiritualibus in making Ecclesiastical Canons receiving accusations converting the accused examining Witnesses judging of Crimes excluding such as they found guilty of Scandalous offences from the Lord's Supper enjoyning Penances upon them casting them out of the Church receiving them again upon their Repentance c. And all this they exercised as well over Presbyters as others But after that the Church under Christian Princes began to be incorporated into the Common-wealth whereupon there must of necessity follow a complication of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power the Iurisdiction of Bishops in the outward exercise of it was subordinate unto and limitable by the Supreme Civil Power and hath been and is at this day so acknowledged by the Bishops of this Realm 4. The due exercise of Discipline is a work of so much prudence and difficulty that the greatest Zealots for it have not thought it fit to be trusted in the hands of every Parochial Minister and his particular Congregation Calvin declares that he never thought it convenient that every Minister should have the power of Excommunication not onely because of the invidiousness of the thing and the danger of the example but because of the great abuses and Tyranny it may soon fall into and because it was contrary to the Apostolical Practice And to the same purpose Beza delivers his judgment who likewise gives this account of the Discipline of Geneva that the Parochial Ministers and Elders proceed no farther than Admonition but in case of Contumacy they certify the Presbytery of the City which sits at certain times and hears all Causes relating to Discipline and as they judge fit either give admonition or proceed to suspension from the Lord's Supper or which is a rare case and when no other remedy can prevail they go on to publick Excommunication Where we see every Parochial Church is no more trusted with the Power of Discipline than among us nay the Minister here hath no power to repel but all that he can doe there is to admonish and how come then their Parochial Churches to be true and not ours Besides why may not our Ministers be obliged to certify the Bishop as well as theirs to certify the Presbytery since in the African Churches the matter of Discipline was so much reserved to the Bishop that a Presbyter had no power to receive a Penitent into the Communion of the Church without the advice and direction of the Bishop and Saint Augustin proposed it that whosoever received one that declined the judgment of his own Bishop should undergoe the same censure which that person deserved and it was allowed by the Council Alipius Saint Augustins great Friend and Legat of the Province of Numidia proposed the case of a Presbyter under the censure of his Bishop who out of pride and vain-glory sets up a separate Congregation in opposition to the Order of the Church and he desired to know the judgment of the Council about it and they unanimously determined that he was guilty of Schism and ought to be anathematized and to lose his place And this was the Iudgment even of the African Bishops for whom Mr. Baxter professeth greater reverence than for any others and saith their Councils were the best in the world and commends their Canons for very good about Discipline But he pretends that a Bishop's Diocese there was but like one of our Parishes which I have already refuted at large by shewing that there were places at a considerable distance under the care of the Bishops So that the bringing the full power of Discipline into every Parochial Church is contrary to the practice of Antiquity as well as of the Reformed Churches abroad which plead most for Discipline and would unavoidably be the occasion of great and scandalous disorders by the ill management of the Power of Excommunication as was most evident by the Separatists when they took this Sword into their hands and by their foolish and passionate and indiscreet use of it brought more dishonour upon their Churches than if they had never meddled with it at all And in such a matter where the honour of the Christian Society is the chief thing concerned it becomes wise men to consider what tends most to the promoting of that and whether the good men promise themselves by Discipline will countervail the Schisms and Contentions the heart-burnings and animosities which would follow the Parochial exercise of it The dissenting Brethren in their Apologetical Narration do say That they had the fatal miscarriages and shipwrecks of the separation as Land-marks to forewarn them of the rocks and shelves they ran upon and therefore they say they never exercised the Power of Excommunication For they saw plainly they could never hold their People together if they did since the excommunicated party would be sure to make friends enough at least to make breaches among them and they holding together by mutual consent such ruptures would soon break their Churches to pieces Besides this would be thought no less than setting up an Arbitrary Court of Iudicature in every Parish because there are no certain Rules to proceed by no standing determination what those sins and faults are which should deserve excommunication no method of trials agreed upon no security against false Witnesses no limitation of Causes no liberty of Appeals if Parochial Churches be the onely instituted Churches as Mr. Baxter affirms besides multitudes of other inconveniencies which may be easily foreseen so that I do not question but if Mr. Baxter had the management of this Parochial Discipline in any one Parish in London and proceeded by his own Rules his Court of Discipline would be cried out upon in a short time as more arbitrary and tyrannical than any Bishop's Court this day in England Let any one therefore judge how reasonable it is for him to overthrow the being of our Parochial Churches for want of that which being set up according to his own principles
than mutual forbearance towards each other Let now any rational man judge whether it appear probable that so loose and shatter'd a Government as this is should answer the obligation among Christians to use the best and most effectual means to preserve the Faith once delivered to the Saints and to uphold Peace and Vnity among Christians But supposing all these several Congregations united together under such common bonds that the Preacher is accountable to superiours that none be admitted but such as own the true Faith and promise obedience that publick legal Censures take hold upon the disturbers of the Churches Peace here we have a far more effectual means according to Reason for upholding true Religion among us And that this is no meer theory appears by the sad experience of this Nation when upon the breaking the bonds of our National Church-Government there came such an overpowring inundation of Errours and Schisms among us that this Age is like to smart under the sad effects of it And in New-England two or three men as Williams Gorton and Clark discovered the apparent weakness of the Independent Government which being very material to this business I shall give a brief account of it as to one of them Mr. Roger Williams was the Teacher of a Congregational Church at Salem and a man in very good esteem as appears by Mr. Cotton's Letter to him he was a great admirer of the purity of the New-England Churches but being a thinking man he pursued the principles of that way farther than they thought fit for he thought it unlawfull to joyn with unregenerate men in prayer or taking an Oath and that there ought to be an unlimited toleration of Opinions c. These Doctrines and some others of his not taking he proceeded to Separation from them and gathered a New Church in opposition to theirs this gave such a disturbance to them that the Magistrates sent for him and the Ministers reasoned the case with him He told them he went upon their own grounds and therefore they had no reason to blame him Mr. Cotton told him they deserved to be punished who made Separation among them Mr. Williams replied this would return upon themselves for had not they done the same as to the Churches of Old-England In short after their debates and Mr. Williams continuing in his principles of Separation from their Churches a sentence of banishment is decreed against him by the Magistrates and this sentence approved and justified by their Churches For these are Mr. Cotton's words That the increase of concourse of People to him on the Lord's days in private to a neglect or deserting of publick Ordinances and to the spreading of the leaven of his corrupt imaginations provoked the Magistrates rather than to breed a Winters spiritual plague in the Country to put upon him a Winters journey out of the Country This Mr. Williams told them was falling into the National Church way which they disowned or else saith he why must he that is banished from the one be banished from the other also And he charges them that they have suppressed Churches set up after the Parochial way and although the Persons were otherwise allowed to be godly to live in the same air with them if they set up any other Church or Worship than what themselves practised Which appears by the Laws of New England mentioned before and Mr. Cobbet one of the Teachers of their Churches confesseth that by the Laws of the Country none are to be free men but such as are members of Churches I now appeal to any man whether these proceedings and these Laws do not manifestly discover the apparent weakness and insufficiency of the Congregational way for preventing those disorders which they apprehend to be destructive to their Churches why had not Mr. Williams his liberty of Separation as well as they why are no Anabaptists or Quakers permitted among them Because these ways would disturb their Peace and distract their People and in time overthrow their Churches Very well but where is the entireness of the power of every single Congregation the mean while Why might not the People at Salem have the same liberty as those at Boston or Plymouth The plain truth is they found by experience this Congregational way would not do alone without civil Sanctions and the interposing of the Pastours of other Churches For when Williams and Gorton and Clark had begun to make some impressions on their People they bestiâ—red themselves as much as possible to have their mouths stopt and their persons banished This I do onely mention to shew that where this way hath prevailed most they have found it very insufficient to carry on those ends which themselves judged necessary for the preservation of their Religion and of Peace and Vnity among themselves And in their Synod at Boston 1662 the New-England Churches are come to apprehend the necessity of Conâ—eciation of Churches in case of divisions and contentions and for the rectifying of male-administrations and healing of errours and scandals that are unhealed among themselves For Christ's care say they is for whole Churches as well as for particular persons Of which Consociation they tell us that Mr. Cotton drew a platform before his death Is such a Consociation of Churches a Duty or not in such cases If not why do they doe any thing relating to Church Government for which they have no Command in Scripture If there be a Command in Scripture then there is an Institution of a Power above Congregational Churches It is but a slender evasion which they use when they call these onely voluntary Combinations for what are all Churches else Onely the antecedent obligation on men to joyn for the Worship of God makes entring into other Churches a Duty and so the obligation lying upon Church-Officers to use the best means to prevent or heal divisions will make such Consociations a Duty too And therefore in such cases the Nature of the thing requires an union and conjunction superiour to that of Congregational Churches which is then most agreeable to Scripture and Antiquity when the Bishops and Presbyters joyn together Who agreeing together upon Articles of Doctrine and Rules of Worship and Discipline are the National Church representative and these being owned and established by the civil Power and received by the Body of the Nation and all persons obliged to observe the same in the several Congregations for Worship these Congregations so united in these common bonds of Religion make up the compleat National Church Sect. 20. And now I hope I may have leave to consider Mr. Baxter's subtilties about this matter which being spred abroad in abundance of words to the same purpose I shall reduce to these following heads wherein the main difficulties lie 1. Concerning the difference between a National Church and a Christian Kingdom 2. Concerning the Governing Power of this National Church which he calls the Constitutive regent part 3.
Concerning the common ties or Rules which make this National Church 1. Concerning the difference between a Christian Kingdom and a National Church A Christian Kingdom he saith they all own but this is onely equivocally called a Church but he saith the Christian Bishops for 1300 years were far from believing that a Prince or Civil Power was essential to a Christian Church or that the Church in the common sense was not constituted of another sort of regent part that had the Power of the Keys If there be any such Christians in the world that hold a Prince an essential part of a Christian Church let Mr. Baxter confute them but I am none of them for I do believe there were Christian Churches before Christian Princes that there are Christian Churches under Christian Princes and will be such if there were none left I do believe the Power of the Keys to be a distinct thing from the Office of the Civil Magistrate and if he had a mind to write against such an opinion he should have rather sent it to his learned sincere and worthy Friend Lewis du Moulin if he had been still living But if I onely mean a Christian Kingdom who denies it saith he If all this confused stir be about a Christian Kingdom be it known to you that we take such to be of divine Command Nay farther if we mean all the Churches of a Kingdom associated for Concord as equals we deny it not What is it then that is so denied and disputed against and such a flood of words is poured out about It seems at last it is this that the Nation must be one Church as united in one Saccrdotal head personal or collective Monarchical or Aristocratical Before I answer this Question I hope I may ask another whence comes this zeal now against a National Church For when the Presbyterians were in power they were then for National Churches and thought they proved them out of Scriptures and none of these subtilties about the Constitutive Regent part did ever perplex or trouble them Thus the Presbyterian London Ministers 1654. made no difficulty of owning National Churches and particularly the Church of England in these words And if all the Churches in the world are called one Church let no man be offended if all the Congregations in England be called the Church of England But this you will say is by association of equal Churches No they say it is when the particular Congregations of one Nation living under one Civil Government agreeing in Doctrine and Worship are governed by their greater and lesser Assemblies and in this sense say they we assert a National Church Two things saith Mr. Hudson are required to make a National Church 1. National agreement in the same Faith and Worship 2. National union in one Ecclesiastical body in the same Community of Ecclesiastical Government The old Non-conformists had no scruple about owning the Church of England and thought they understood what was meant by it Whence come all these difficulties now to be raised about this matter Is the thing grown so much darker than formerly But some mens Understandings are confounded with nice distinctions and their Consciences ensnared by needless Scruples To give therefore a plain answer to the Question what we mean by the National Church of England By that is understood either 1 the Church of England diffusive Or 2 The Church of England representative 1. The National Church of England diffusive is the whole Body of Christians in this Nation consisting of Pastours and People agreeing in that Faith Government and Worship which are established by the Laws of this Realm And by this description any one may see how easily the Church of England is distinguished from the Papists on one side and the Dissenters on the other Which makes me continue my wonder at those who so confidently say they cannot tell what we mean by the Church of England For was there not a Church here settled upon the Reformation in the time of Edward 6. and Queen Elizabeth Hath not the same Doctrine the same Government the same manner of Worship continued in this Church bating onely the interruption given by its Enemies How comes it then so hard for men to understand so easy so plain so intelligible a thing If all the Question be how all the Congregations in England make up this one Church I say by unity of consent as all particular Churches make one Catholick Church If they ask how it comes to be one National Church I say because it was received by the common consent of the whole Nation in Parlament as other Laws of the Nation are and is universally received by all that obey those Laws And tâ—is I think is sufficient to scatter those mists which some pretend to have before their eyes that they cannot clearly see what we mean by the Church of England 2. The representative Church of England is the Bishops and Presbyters of this Church meeting together according to the Laws of this Realm to consult and advise about matters of Religion And this is determin'd by the allowed Canons of this Church We do not say that the Convocation at Westminster is the representative Church of England as the Church of England is a National Church for that is onely representative of this Province there being another Convocation in the other Province but the Consent of both Convocations is the representative National Church of England Sect. 21. And now to answer Mr. Baxter's grand difficulty concerning the Constitutive Regent part of this National Church I say 1. It proceeds upon a false supposition 2. It is capable of a plain resolution 1. That it proceeds upon a false supposition which is that whereever there is the true Notion of a Church there must be a Constitutive Regent part i. e. there must be a standing Governing Power which is an essential part of it Which I shall prove to be false from Mr. Baxter himself He asserts that there is one Catholick visible Church and that all particular Churches which are headed by their particular Bishops or Pastours are parts of this Vniversal Church as a Troop is of an Army or a City of a Kingdom If this Doctrine be true and withall it be necessary that every Church must have a Constitutive Regent part as essential to it then it unavoidably follows that there must be a Catholick visible Head to a Catholick visible Church And so Mr. Baxter ' s Constitutive Regent part of a Church hath done the Pope a wonderfull kindness and made a very plausible Plea for his Vniversal Pastourship But there are some men in the world who do not attend to the advantages they give to Popery so they may vent their spleen against the Church of England But doth not Mr. Baxter say that the universal Church is headed by Christ himself I grant he doth but this doth not remove the difficulty for the Question is
about that visible Church whereof particular Churches are parts and they being visible parts do require a visible Constitutive Regent part as essential to them therefore the whole visible Church must have likewise a visible Constitutive Regent part i. e. a visible Head of the Church as if a Troop hath an inferiour Officer an Army must have a General if a City hath a Mayor a Kingdom must have a King that is equally present and visible as the other is This is indeed to make a Key for Catholicks by the help of which they may enter and take possession 2. The plain resolution is that we deny any necessity of any such Constitutive Regent part or one formal Ecclesiastical Head as essential to a National Church For a National Consent is as sufficient to make a National Church as an Vniversal Consent to make a Catholick Church But if the Question be by what way this National Consent is to be declared then we answer farther that by the Constitution of this Church the Archbishops Bishops and Presbyters being summoned by the King 's Writ are to advise and declare their Iudgments in matters of Religion which being received allowed and enacted by the King and three Estates of the Kingdom there is as great a National Consent as is required to any Law And all Bishops Ministers and People taken together who prâ—fess the Faith so established and worship God according to the Rules so appointed make up this National Church of England which notion of a National Church being thus explained I see no manner of difficulty remaining in all Mr. Baxter ' s Quaeries and Objections about this matter Sect. 22. 3. That which looks most like a difficulty is 3. concerning the common ties or Rules which make this National Church For Mr. B. would know whether by the common Rules I mean a Divine Rule or a meer humane Rule If it be a Divine Rule they are of the National Church as well as we if it be a humane Rule how comes consent in this to make a National Church how come they not to be of it for not consenting how can such a consent appear when there are differences among our selves This is the substance of what he objects To which I answer 1. Our Church is founded upon a Divine Rule viz. the Holy Scriptures which we own as the Basis and Foundation of our Faith and according to which all other Rules of Order and Worship are to be agreeable 2. Our Church requires a Conformity to those Rules which are appointed by it as agreeable to the word of God And so the Churches of New-England doe to the orders of Church Government among themselves by all that are members of their Churches and annex civil Privileges to them and their Magistrates impose civil Punishments on the breakers and disturbers of them And although they profess agreement in other things yet because they do not submit to the Orders of their Churches they do not own them as members of their Churches Why should it then be thought unreasonable with us not to account those members of the Church of England who contemn and disobey the Orders of it 3. There is no difference among our selves concerning the lawfulness of the Orders of our Church or the duty of submission to them If there be any other differences they are not material as to this business and I believe are no other than in the manner of explaining some things which may happen in the best Society in the world without breaking the Peace of it As about the difference of Orders the sense of some passages in the Athanasian Creed the true explication of one or two Articles which are the things he mentions A multitude of such differences will never overthrow such a Consent among us as to make us not to be members of the same National Church Sect. 23. Having thus cleared the main difficulties which are objected by my more weighty Adversaries the weaker assaults of the rest in what they differ from these will admit of a quicker dispatch Mr. A. objects 1. That if National Churches have Power to reform themselves then so have Congregational and therefore I do amiss to charge them with Separation I grant it if he proves that no Congregational Church hath any more Power over it than a National Church hath i. e. that there is as much evidence against both Episcopal and Presbyterial Government as there is against the Pope's Vsurpations When he doth prove that he may have a farther answer 2. That National Churches destroy the being of other Churches under them this I utterly deny and there wants nothing but Proof as Erasmus said one Andrelinus was a good Poet onely his Verses wanted one Syllable and that was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. By my description the Parlament may be a National Church for they are a Society of men united together for their Order and Government according to the Rules of the Christian Religion But did I not immediately before say that National Churches are National Societies of Christians under the same Laws of Government and Rules of Worship from whence it is plain that in the next words when I went about to prove National Churches to be true Churches I used such a general description as was common to any kind of Church and not proper to a National Church 4. He gives this reason why consent should not make National Churches as well as Congregational because it must be such an agreement as the Gospel warrants and that is onely for Worship and not to destroy their own being This is the reasoning of a horse in a mill still round about the same thing And therefore the same answer may serve 5. Out come Mr. B.'s Objections against a visible Head of this National Church and the manner of union and the differences among our selves as though Mr. B. could not manage his own Arguments and therefore he takes them and strips them of their heavy and rusty Armour and makes them appear again in the field in another dress and if they could not stand the field in the former habit they can much less doe it in this The Authour of the Letter saith I onely prove a National Church a possible thing He clearly mistakes my design which was to shew that if there be such a thing as a National Church then no single Congregations have such a power in themselves to separate from others in matters of order and decency where there is a consent in the same Faith To prove that there was such a thing I shewed that if the true Notion of a Church doth agree to it then upon the same reason that we own particular Churches and the Catholick Church we are to own a National Church so that the design of that discourse was not barely to prove the possibility of the thing but the truth and reality of it But saith he Can it be proved
preach notwithstanding the Laws can excuse them from Separation for this lies at the bottom of all 1. As to the Original inherent Right and Power of the People Dr. O. supposeth all Church-Power to be originally in the People for to manifest how favourable wise men have been to the Congregational way he quotes a saying of F. Paul out of a Book of his lately translated into English that in the beginning the Government of the Church had altogether a Democratical Form which is an opinion so absurd and unreasonable that I could not easily believe such a saying to have come from so learned and judicious a Person For was there not a Church to be formed in the beginning Did not Christ appoint Apostles and give them Commission and Authority for that end Where was the Church power then lodged Was it not in the Apostles Did not they in all places as they planted Churches appoint Officers to teach and govern them And did they not give them Authority to doe what they had appointed Were not then the several Pastours and Teachers invested with a Power superiour to that of the People and independent upon them And if they had such Power and Authority over the People how came their Power to be derived from them as it must be if the Church Government then were Democratical Besides Is it reasonable to suppose the People should assemble to choose their Officers and convey the Power of the Keys to them which never were in their hands And how could they make choice of men for their fitness and abilities when their abilities depended so much on the Apostles laying on of their hands For then the Holy Ghost was given unto them But in all the Churches planted by the Apostles in all the directions given about the choice of Bishops and Deacons no more is required as to the People than barely their Testimony therefore it is said they must be blameless and men of good report But where is it said or intimated that the Congregation being the first subject of the Power of the Keys must meet together and choose their Pastour and then convey the Ministerial Power over themselves to them If it were true that the Church Government at first was Democratical the Apostles have done the People a mighty injury for they have said no more of their Power in the Church than they have done of the Pope's It is true the Brethren were present at the nomination of a new Apostle but were not the Women so too And is the Power of the Keys in their hands too Suppose not doth this prove that the Churches Power was then Democratical then the People made an Apostle and gave him his Power which I do not think any man would say much less F. Paul As to the election of Deacons it was no properly Church Power which they had but they were Stewards of the common Stock and was there not then all the reason in the world the Community should be satisfied in the choice of the men When Saint Peter received Cornelius to the Faith he gave an account of it to all the Church And what then Must he therefore derive his power from it Do not Princes and Governours give an account of their proceedings for the satisfaction of their Subjects minds But here is not all the Church mentioned onely those of the Circumcision at Ierusalem had a mind to understand the reason of his receiving a Gentile Convert And what is this to the power of the Church But in the Council of Jerusalem the People did intervene and the Letters were written in the names of all the three Orders Apostles Priests and faithfull Brethren I grant it but is it not expresly said that the Question was sent up from the Churches to the Apostles and Presbyters Is it not said that the Apostles and Presbyters met to debate it and that the multitude was silent Is it not said that the Decrees were passed by the Apostles and Presbyters without any mention of the People And here was the proper occasion to have declared their Power but in the other place it signifies no more than their general consent to the Decrees that were then made In success of time it is added when the Church increased in number the faithfull retiring themselves to the affairs of their Families and having left those of the Congregation the Government was retained onely in the Ministers and so became Aristocratical saving the election which was Popular Which account is neither agreeable to Reason nor to Antiquity For was not the Government of the Church Aristocratical in the Apostles times How came it to be changed from that to a Democratical Form Did not the Apostles appoint Rulers in the several Churches and charged the People to obey them And was this an argument the Power was then in the People It was not then the People's withdrawing of which there can be no evidence if there be so much evidence still left for the People's Power in Antiquity but the Constitution of the Church was Aristocratical by the appointment of the Apostles Sect. 25. We therefore come now to consider the Popular Elections as to which there is so fair a pretence from Antiquity but yet not such as to fix any inherent or unalterable Right in the People As I shall make appear by these following observations 1. That the main ground of the People's Interest was founded upon the Apostles Canon That a Bishop must be blameless and of good report 2. That the People upon this assuming the Power of Elections caused great disturbances and disorders in the Church 3. That to prevent these many Bishops were appointed without their choice and Canons made for the better regulating of them 4. That when there were Christian Magistrates they did interpose as they thought fit notwithstanding the popular claim in a matter of so great consequence to the Peace of Church and State 5. That upon the alteration of the Government of Christendom the Interest of the People was secured by their consent in Parlaments and that by such consent the Nomination of Bishops was reserved to Princes and the Patronage of Livings to particular Persons 6. That things being thus settled by established Laws there is no reasonable Ground for the Peoples resuming the Power of electing their own Bishops and Ministers in opposition to these Laws If I can make good these Observations I shall give a full answer to all the Questions propounded concerning the Right and Power of the People which my Adversaries build so much upon 1. That the main ground of the Peoples interest was founded upon the Apostles Canon that a Bishop must be blameless and of good report For so the Greek Scholiast argues from that place in Timothy If a Bishop ought to have a good report of them that are without 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 How much rather of the Brethren 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith
had the judgment of a whole Council of African Bishops for their deserting him 4. For a notorious matter of fact viz. Idolatry and Blasphemy by his own confession 5. All the proof which Saint Cyprian brings for this doth amount to no more than that the People were most concerned to give Testimony as to the good or bad lives of their Bishops This further appears by the words in Lampridius concerning Alexander Severus who proposed the names of his civil Officers to the People to hear what they had to object against them and said it was a hard case when the Christians and Iews did so about their Priests the same should not be done about Governours of Provinces who had mens lives and fortunes in their hands But no man could ever from hence imagin that the People had the Power to make or unmake the Governours of Roman Provinces Origen saith The Peoples presence was necessary at the Consecration of a Bishop that they might all know the worth of him who was made their Bishop it must be astante Populo the People standing by and this is that Saint Paul meant when he said A Bishop ought to have a good Testimony from those that are without 2. That the People upon this assuming the Power of Elections caused great disturbances and disorders in the Church Eusebius represents the disorders of Antioch to have been so great in the City upon the choice of a new Bishop by the Divisions of the People that they were like to have shaken the Emperour's Kindness to the Christians For such a flame was kindled by it that he saith it was near destroying both the Church and the City and they had certainly drawn Swords if the Providence of God and fear of the Emperour had not restrained them Who was forced to send Officers and Messages to keep them quiet and after much trouble to the Emperour and many meetings of Bishops at last Eustathius was chosen Greg. Nazianzen sets forth the mighty unruliness of the People of Caesarea in the choice of their Bishop saying it came to a dangerous sedition and not easy to be suppressed and he saith the City was very prone to it on such occasions And although there was one Person of incomparable worth above the rest yet through the Parties and Factions that were made it was a hard matter to carry it for him He complains so much of the inconveniencies of popular Elections that he wishes them alter'd and the Elections brought to the Clergy and he thinks no Common-wealth so disorderly as this method of Election was Evagrius saith the sedition at Alexandria was intolerable upon the division of the People between Dioscorus and Proterius the People rising against the Magistrates and Souldiers who endeavoured to keep them in order and at last they murthered Proterius Such dangerous Seditions are described at Constantinople upon the Election of Paulus and Macedonius by Sozomen and in the same place after the death of Eudoxius and after the death of Atticus by Socrates and after the deprivation of Nestorius And again at Antioch upon the removal of Eudoxius and about the Election of Flavianus at Ephesus by Saint Chrysostom at Verselles by Saint Ambrose at Milan by Socrates and many other places I shall onely adde a remarkable one at Rome on the choice of Damasus which came to bloodshed for several days and is particularly related by Ammianus Marcellinus and the Preface to Faustinus his Libellus Precum Mr. Baxter grants there are inconveniencies in the Peoples consenting Power and so there are in all humane affairs But are these tolerable inconveniencies Is this Power still to be pleaded for in opposition to Laws as though Religion lay at stake and onely Magistrates were bad men and the People always good and wise and vertuous A man must have great spite against Men in Power and unreasonable fondness of the Common People that can represent great Men as wicked debauched and enemies to Piety and at the same time dissemble and take no notice of the Vices of the Common People besides their Ignorance and incapacity of judging in such matters and their great proneness to fall into sidings and parties and unreasonable contentions on such occasions But Saint Chrysostom complains much of the unfitness of the People to judge in such cases Saint Hierom saith they are apt to choose men like themselves and saith elsewhere they are much to be feared whom the People choose Origen saith the People are often moved either for favour or reward 3. That to prevent these inconveniencies many Bishops were appointed without the choice of the People and Canons were made for the regulation of Elections In the Church of Alexandria the Election of the Bishop belonged to the 12 Presbyters as Saint Ierom and others shew For by the Constitution of that Church before the alteration made by Alexander the Bishop of Alexandria was not onely to be chosen out of the 12 Presbyters but by them So Severus in the life of the Alexandrian Patriarchs saith that after the death of their Patriarch the Presbyters met together and prayed and proceeded to election and the first Presbyter declared it belonged to them to choose their Bishop and to the other Bishops to consecrate him To which the Bishops assented onely saying if he were worthy they would consecrate whom they chose but not otherwise Elmacinus makes this a Constitution of Saint Mark in the first foundation of that Church and saith it continued to the time of the Nicene Council and then as Hilarius the Deacon saith the custom was alter'd by a Council among themselves which determin'd that they might choose the most deserving person whether of that Body or not And there could be no room for popular elections whereever that Custom obtained which the Counterfeit Ambrose speaks of ut recedente uno sequens ei succederet speaking of the Bishop dying and the next in course succeeding But if this be onely a particular conceit of that Authour yet we find the Bishops consecrating others in several Churches without any mention of choice made by the People So when Narcissus retired from Ierusalem Eusebius saith the neighbour Bishops assembled and consecrated one Dius in his room and after him followed Germanio and then Gordius in whose time Narcissus returned but being grown very old Alexander was brought in to assist him by Revelation and a Voice from Heaven to some of the Brethren Severus Bishop of Milevis in his life-time appointed his Successour and acquainted the Clergy with it but not the People great disturbance was feared hereupon the Clergy sent to Saint Augustin to come among them and to settle their new Bishop who went and the People received the Bishop so appointed very quietly S. Augustin himself declares the sad effects he had often seen of the Churches Election of Bishops through the ambition of some
Ages and at last among us the royal Power overthrowing the other reserved the Power of Nomination of Bishops as part of the Prerogative which being allowed in frequent Parlaments the Consent of the People is swallowed up therein since their Acts do oblige the whole Nation For not onely the Statute of 1 Edw. 6. declares The Right of appointing Bishops to be in the King but 25 Edw. 3. it is likewise declared That the Right of disposing Bishopricks was in the King by Right of Patronage derived from his Ancestours before the freedom of elections was granted Which shews not onely the great Antiquity of this Right but the consent of the whole Nation to it And the same is fully related in the Epistle of Edw. 3. to Clement 5. where it is said That the King did dispose of them jure suo Regio by his Royal Prerogative as his Ancestours had done from the first founding of a Christian Church here This is likewise owned in the famous Statute of Carlisle 25 Edw. 1. so that there is no Kingdom where this Right hath been more fully acknowledged by the general consent of the People than here in England and that from the Original planting of a Christian Church here As to the inferiour Right of Patronage it is justly thought to bear equal date with the first settlements of Christianity in peace and quietness For when it began to spread into remoter Villages and places distant from the Cathedral Churches where the Bishop resided with his Presbyters as in a College together a necessity was soon apprehended of having Presbyters fixed among them For the Council of Neocaesarea mentions the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Country Presbyters c. 13. whom the Greek Canonists interpret to be such as then were fixed in Country-Cures and this Council was held ten years before the Council of Nice In the time of the first Council of Orange A. D. 441. express mention is made of the Right of Patronage reserved to the first Founders of Churches c. 10. viz. If a Bishop built a Church on his own Land in another Bishop's Diocese yet the right of presenting the Clerk was reserved to him And this was confirmed by the second Council of Arles c. 36. A. D. 452. By the Constitution of the Emperour Zeno. A. D. 479. the Rights of Patronage are established upon the agreements at first made in the endowments of Churches This Constitution was confirmed by Iustinian A. D. 541. and he allows the nomination and presentation of a fit Clerk And the same were settled in the Western Church as appears by the ninth Council of Toledo about A. D. 650. and many Canons were made in several Councils about regulating the Rights of Patronage and the endowments of Churches till at last it obtained by general consent that the Patron might transmit the right of presentation to his heirs and the Bishops were to approve of the Persons presented and to give institution to the Benefice The Barons of England in the Epistle to Gregory IX plead That their Ancestours had the Right of Patronage from the first planting of Christianity here For those upon whose Lands the Churches were built and at whose cost and charges they were erected and by whom the Parochial Churches were endowed thought they had great Reason to reserve the Nomination of the Clerks to themselves And this Ioh. Sarisburiensis saith was received by a general custom of this whole Kingdom So that the Right of Patronage was at first built upon a very reasonable consideration and hath been ever since received by as universal a Consent as any Law or Custom among us And the onely Questions now remaining are whether such a Consent can be made void by the Dissent of some few Persons who plead it to be their inherent Right to choose their own Pastours and supposing that it might be done whether it be reasonable so to doe And I conclude that 6. Things being thus settled by general consent and established Laws there is no ground for the People to resume the liberty of Elections 1. because it was no unalterable Right but might be passed away and hath been by consent of the People upon good considerations and 2. because no such inconveniencies can be alleged against the settled way of disposal of Livings but may be remedied by Laws far easier than those which will follow upon the Peoples taking this Power to themselves which cannot be done in a divided Nation without throwing all into remediless confusion 3. Because other Reformed Churches have thought this an unreasonable pretence Beza declaims against it as a thing without any ground in Scripture or any right in Antiquity and subject to infinite disorders In Sweden the Archbishop and Bishops are appointed by the King and so are the Bishops in Denmark In other Lutheran Churches the Superintendents are appointed by the several Princes and Magistrates and in these the Patrons present before Ordination The Synod of Dort hath a Salvo for the Right of Patronage Can. Eccles. 5. In France the Ministers are chosen by Ministers at Geneva by the Council of State which hath Power to depose them And it would be very strange if this inherent and unalterable right of the People should onely be discovered here where it is as unfit to be practised as in any part of the Christian world But Mr. B. is unsatisfied with any Laws that are made in this matter for when the objection is put by him That the People chose the Parlament who make the Laws which give the Patrons Power and therefore they now consent he saith this seemeth a Iest for he saith 1. It cannot be proved that all the Churches or People gave the Patrons that Power 2. They never consented that Parlaments should do what they list and dispose of their Souls or what is necessary to the saving of their Souls 3. They may as well say that they consent to be baptized and to receive the Sacraments because the Parlament consented to it 4. Their forefathers had no power to represent them by such consenting 5. The obligation on the People was Personal and they have not God's consent for the transmutation So that one would think by Mr. B.'s Doctrine all Laws about Patronage are void in themselves and all Rights of Advowson in the King or Noblemen and Gentlemen or Vniversities are meer Vsurpations and things utterly unlawfull among Christians since he makes such a personal obligation to choose their own Pastours to lie on the People that they cannot transfer it by their own Act. But upon second thoughts I suppose he will not deny that the freedom of Publick Churches and the endowments of them do lie within the Magistrates Power and so binding Laws may be made about them unless he can prove that the Magistrates Power doth not extend to those things which the Magistrate gives And if these may be justly settled by Laws then the
The Vnreasonableness of Separation OR An Impartial Account OF THE History Nature and Pleas OF THE Present Separation FROM THE Communion of the Church of ENGLAND To which Several late LETTERS are Annexed of Eminent Protestant Divines Abroad concerning the Nature of our Differences and the Way to Compose Them By EDWARD STILLINGFLEET D. D. Dean of St. Pauls and Chaplain in Ordinary to HIS MAJESTY LONDON Printed by T. N. for Henry Mortlock at the Phoenix in St. Paul ' s Church-yard MDCLXXXI THE PREFACE IT is reported by Persons of unquestionable credit that after all the Service B. Jewel had done against the Papists upon his Preaching a Sermon at St. Paul's Cross in Defence of the Orders of this Church and of Obedience to them he was so Ungratefully and Spitefully used by the Dissenters of that Time that for his own Vindication he made a Solemn Protestation on his Death-bed That what he then said was neither to please some nor to displease others but to Promote Peace and Unity among Brethren I am far from the vanity of thinking any thing I have been able to do in the same Cause fit to be compared with the Excellent Labors of that Great Light and Ornament of this Church whose Memory is preserved to this day with due Veneration in all the Protestant Churches but the hard Usage I have met with upon the like occasion hath made such an Example more observable to me especially when I can make the same Protestation with the same sincerity as he did For however it hath been Maliciously suggested by some and too easily believed by others that I was put upon that Work with a design to inflame our Differences and to raise a fresh persecution against Dissenting Protestants I was so far from any thought tending that way that the only Motive I had to undertake it was my just Apprehension that the Destruction of the Church of England under a Pretence of Zeal against Popery was one of the most likely ways to bring it in And I have hitherto seen no cause and I believe I shall not to alter my opinion in this matter which was not rashly taken up but formed in my Mind from many years Observation of the Proceedings of that Restless Party I mean the Papists among us which hath always Aimed at the Ruine of this Church as one of the Most Probable Means if others failed to compass their Ends. As to their Secret and more Compendious ways of doing Mischief they lie too far out of our View till the Providence of God at the same time discovers and disappoints them but this was more open and visible and although it seemed the farther way about yet they promised themselves no small success by it Many Instruments and Engines they made use of in this design many ways and times they set about it and although they met with several disappointments yet they never gave it over but Would it not be very strange that when they can appear no longer in it others out of meer Zeal against Popery should carry on the Work for them This seems to be a great Paradox to unthinking People who are carried away with meer Noise and Pretences and hope those will secure them most against the Fears of Popery who talk with most Passion and with least Understanding against it whereas no persons do really give them greater advantages than these do For where they meet only with intemperate Railings and gross Misunderstandings of the State of the Controversies between them and us which commonly go together the more subtle Priests let such alone to spend their Rage and Fury and when the heat is over they will calmly endevour to let them see how grosly they have been deceived in some things and so will more easily make them believe they are as much deceived in all the rest And thus the East and West may meet at last and the most furious Antagonists may become some of the easiest Converts This I do really fear will be the case of many Thousands among us who now pass for most zealous Protestants if ever which God forbid that Religion should come to be Vppermost in England It is therefore of mighty consequence for preventing the Return of Popery that Men rightly understand what it is For when they are as much afraid of an innocent Ceremony as of real Idolatry and think they can Worship Images and Adore the Host on the same grounds that they may use the Sign of the Cross or Kneel at the Communion when they are brought to see their mistake in one case they will suspect themselves deceived in the other also For they who took that to be Popery which is not will be apt to think Popery it self not so bad as it was represented and so from want of right understanding the Differences between us may be easily carried from one Extreme to the other For when they find the undoubted Practices of the Ancient Church condemned as Popish and Antichristian by their Teachers they must conclude Popery to be of much greater Antiquity than really it is and when they can Trace it so very near the Apostles times they will soon believe it setled by the Apostles themselves For it will be very hard to perswade any considering Men that the Christian Church should degenerate so soon so unanimously so universally as it must do if Episcopal Government and the use of some significant Ceremonies were any parts of that Apostacy Will it not seem strange to them that when some Human Polities have preserved their First Constitution so long without any considerable Alteration that the Government instituted by Christ and setled by his Apostles should so soon after be changed into another kind and that so easily so insensibly that all the Christian Churches believed they had still the very same Government which the Apostles left them Which is a matter so incredible that those who can believe such a part of Popery could prevail so soon in the Christian Church may be brought upon the like grounds to believe that many others did So mighty a prejudice doth the Principles of our Churches Enemies bring upon the Cause of the Reformation And those who foregoe the Testimony of Antiquity as all the Opposers of the Church of England must do must unavoidably run into insuperable difficulties in dealing with the Papists which the Principles of our Church do lead us through For we can justly charge Popery as an unreasonable Innovation when we allow the undoubted Practices and Government of the Ancient Church for many Ages after Christ. But it is observed by Bishop Sanderson That those who reject the Usages of our Church as Popish and Antichristian when Assaulted by Papists will be apt to conclude Popery to be the old Religion which in the purest and Primitive Times was Professed in all Christian Churches throughout the World Whereas the sober English Protestant is able by the Grace of God with much
Evidence of Truth and without forsaking his Old Principles to justifie the Church of England from all imputation of Heresie or Schism and the Religion thereof as it stood by Law established from the like imputation of Novelty Wherein he professes to lay open the inmost thoughts of his heart in this sad business before God and the World I might shew by particular Instances from my present Adversaries that to defend their own practices they are driven to maintain such Principles as by evident consequences from them do overthrow the Justice and Equity of the Reformation but I leave those things to be observed in their proper places Yet I do not question the Sincerity of many Mens Zeal against Popery who out of too eager a desire of upholding some particular Fancies of their own may give too great advantage to our Common Enemies Three ways Bishop Sanderson observes our Dissenting Brethren though not intentionally and purposely yet really and eventually have been the great Promoters of the Roman Interest among us 1. By putting to their helping hand to the pulling down of Episcopacy And saith he it is very well known to many what rejoycing that Vote brought to the Romish Party How even in Rome it self they Sung their Jo-â—aeans upon the Tidings thereof and said Triumphantly Now the day is ours Now is the Fatal-Blow given to the Protestant Religion in England 2 By opposing the Interest of Rome with more Violence than Reason 3 By frequent mistaking the Question but especially through the necessity of some false Principle or other which having once imbibed they think themselves bound to maintain whatever becomes of the Common Cause of our Reformation Which may at last suffer as much through some Mens folly and indiscretion who pretend to be the most Zealous Protestants as by all the Arts and Designs of our open Enemies For as the same Learned and Iudicious Bishop hath said in this case Many a Man when he thought most to make it sure hath quite marred a good business by over-doing it Thus when the Papists of late years have not been able to hinder the taking many things into consideration against their interest it hath been observed that their Instruments have been for the most violent Counsels knowing that either they would be wholly ineffectual or if they were pursued they might in the end bring more advantage than prejudice to their Cause And it is to be feared they may still hope to do their business as Divines observe the Devil doth who when he finds one extreme will not do he tries whether he can compass his end by the other And no doubt they will extremely rejoyce if they can make some Mens Fears of Popery prove at last an effectual means to bring it about As some of the Jews of old out of a rash and violent zeal for the preservation of the purity of their Religion as they pretended by opposing the Sacrifices offer'd by Strangers and denying the use of the lawful Customs of their Country brought the Roman Power upon them and so hasten'd the destruction both of their Religion and Countrey too I do not mention this as though we could take too great care by good and wholsom Laws to strengthen the Protestant Interest and by that means to keep out Popery but only to shew what mighty prejudice an indiscreet Zeal at this time may bring upon us if Men suffer themselves to be transported so far as to think that overthrowing the Constitution of this Church will be any means to secure the Protestant Religion among us For What is it which the Papists have more envied and maligned than the Church of England What is it they have more wished to see broken in pieces As the late Cardinal Barberini said in the hearing of a Gentleman who told it me He could be contented there were no Priests in England so there were no Bishops for then he supposed their Work would do it self What is it they have used more Arts and Instruments to destroy than the Constitution and Government of this Church Did not Cranmer and Ridley and Hooper and Farrar and Latimer all Bishops of this Church suffer Martyrdom by their Means Had not they the same kind of Episcopacy which is now among us and which some now are so busie in seeking to destroy by publishing one Book after another on purpose to represent it as unlawful and inconsistent with the Primitive Institution Is all this done for the honor of our Reformation Is this the way to preserve the Protestant Religion among us to fill Mens Minds with such Prejudices against the first settlement of it as to go about to make the World believe that the Church-Government then established was repugnant to the Institution of Christ and that our martyr-Martyr-Bishops exercised an unlawful Authority over Diocesan Churches But Whither will not Mens Indiscreet Zeal and love of their own Fancies carry them especially after 40 years prescription I do not say such Men are set on by the Jesuits but I say they do their Work as effectually in blasting the credit of the Reformation as if they were And yet after all these pains and Forty years Meditations I do not question but I shall make it appear that our present Episcopacy is agreeable to the Institution of Christ and the best and most flourishing Churches And Wherein doth our Church differ from its first Establishment Were not the same Ceremonies then appointed the same Liturgy in Substance then used concerning which Dr. Taylor who then suffered Martyrdom publickly declared That the whole Church-Service was set forth in King Edward ' s days with great deliberation by the Advice of the best Learned Men in the Realm and Authorised by the whole Parliament and Received and Published gladly through the whole Realm which Book was never Reformed but once and yet by that one Reformation it was so fully perfected according to the Rules of our Christian Religion in every behalf that no Christian Conscience could be offended with any thing therein contained I mean saith he of that Book Reformed Yet this is that Book whose constant use is now pleaded by some together with our Ceremonies as a ground for the necessity of Separation from our Churches Communion But if we trace the Footsteps of this Separation as far as we can we may find strong probabilities that the Jesuitical Party had a great influence on the very first beginnings of it For which we must consider that when the Church of England was restored in Queen Elizabeth's Reign there was no open Separation from the Communion of it for several years neither by Papists nor Non-conformists At last the more Zealous Party of the Foreign Priests and Jesuits finding this Compliance would in the end utterly destroy the Popish Interest in England they began to draw off the secret Papists from all Conformity with our Church which the old Queen Mary's Priests allowed them in this raised some heat among themselves
but at last the way of Separation prevailed as the more pure and perfect way But this was not thought sufficient by these busie Factors for the Church of Rome unless they could under the same pretence of purity and perfection draw off Protestants from the Communion of this Church too To this purpose Persons were imployed under the disguise of more Zealous Protestants to set up the way of more Spiritual Prayer and greater Purity of Worship than was observed in the Church of England that so the People under these Pretences might be drawn into Separate Meetings Of this we have a Considerable Evidence lately offer'd to the World in the Examination of a Priest so imploy'd at the Council-Table A. D. 1567. being the 9th of Q. Elizabeth which is published from the Lord Burleighs Papers which were in the hands of Arch-Bishop Usher and from him came to Sir James Ware whose Son brought them into England and lately caused them to be Printed Two years after one Heath a Jesuit was Summon'd before the Bishop of Rochester on a like account for disparaging the Prayers of the Church and setting up Spiritual Prayers above them and he declared to the Bishop That he had been six years in England and that he had laboured to refine the Protestants and to take off all smacks of Ceremonies and to make the Church purer When he was seized on a Letter was found about him from a Jesuit in Spain wherein he takes notice how he was admired by his Flock and tells him they looked on this way of dividing Protestants as the most effectual to bring them all back to the Church of Rome and in his Chamber they found a Bull from Pius V. to follow the Instructions of the Society for dividing the Protestants in England and the License from his Fraternity There is one thing in the Jesuits Letter deserves our farther consideration which the Publisher of it did not understand which is that Hallingham Coleman and Benson are there mentioned as Persons imploy'd to sow a Faction among the German Hereticks which he takes to be spoken of the Sects in Germany but by the German Hereticks the English Protestants are meant i.e. Lutherans and these very Men are mentioned by our Historians without knowing of this Letter as the most active and busie in the beginning of the Separation Of these saith Fuller Coleman Button Hallingham and Benson were the chief At which time saith Heylin Benson Button Hallingham and Coleman and others taking upon them to be of more ardent Zeal than others c. That time is 1568 which agrees exactly with the Date of that Letter at Madrid October 26. 1568. And both these had it from a much better Author than either of them Camden I mean who saith That while Harding Sanders and others attacked our Church on one side Coleman Button Hallingham Benson and others were as busie on the other who under pretence of a purer Reformation opposed the Discipline Liturgy and Calling of our Bishops as approaching too near to the Church of Rome And he makes these the Beginners of those Quarrels which afterwards brake out with great violence Now that there is no improbability in the thing will appear by the suitableness of these Pretences about Spiritual Prayer to the Doctrine and Practices of the Jesuits For they are professed despisers of the Cathedral Service and are excused from their attendance on it by the Constitutions of their Order and are as great admirers of Spiritual Prayer and an Enthusiastick way of Preaching as appears by the History of the first Institution of their Order by Orlandinus and Maffeius They who are acquainted with their Doctrine of Spiritual Prayer will find that which is admired and set up here as so much above Set-Forms to be one of the lowest of three sorts among them That Gift of Prayer which Men have but requires the Exercise of their own Gifts to stir it up they call Oratio acquisita acquired Prayer although they say the Principle of it is infused The Second is by a special immediate influence of the Holy Ghost upon the Mind with the concurrence of infused habits The Third is far above either of these which they call the Prayer of Contemplation and is never given by way of habit to any but lies in immediate and unexpressible unions All these I â—ould easily shew to be the Doctrine received and magnified in the Roman Church especially by those who pretend to greater Purity and Spirituality than others But this is sufficient to my purpose to prove that there is no improbability that they should be the first setters up of this way in England And it is observable that it was never known here or in any other Reformed Church before this time and therefore the beginning of it is unjustly father'd by some on T. C. But by whomsoever it was begun it met with such great success in the zeal and warmth of devotion which appeared in it that no Charm hath been more effectual to draw injudicious People into a contempt of our Liturgy and admiring the Way of Separation When by such Arts the People were possessed with an Opinion of a more pure and Spiritual Way of Worship than was used in our Church they were easily drawn into the admiration of those who found fault with the Liturgy and Ceremonies that were used among us and so the Divisions wonderfully increased in a very short time And the Papists could not but please themselves to see that other Men did their VVork so effectually for them For the Authors of the Admonition 14 Elizab. declared They would have neither Papists nor others constrained to Communicate which although as Arch-Bishop Whitgift saith they intended as a Plea for their own Separation from the Church yet saith he the Papists could not have met with better Proctors And elsewhere he tells them That they did the Pope very good service and that he would not miss them for any thing For what is his desire but to have this Church of England which he hath Accused utterly defaced and discredited to have it by any means overthrown if not by Forrein Enemies yet by Domestical Dissention And What fitter and apter Instruments could he have had for that purpose than you who under pretence of zeal overthrow that which other Men have builded under color of Purity seek to bring in Deformity and under the Cloke of Equality and Humility would usurp as great Tyranny and lofty Lordliness over your Parishes as ever the Pope did over the whole Church And in another place he saith They were made the Engines of the Roman Conclave whereby they intend to overthrow this Church by our own Folly which they cannot compass by all their Policy Arch-Bishop Grindal as I find a Letter of his expressed his great fear of two things Atheism and Popery and both arising out of our needless Divisions and Differences fomented he doubts not by
Satan the Enemy of Mankind and the Pope the Enemy of Christendom By these differences the Enemies of our Religion gain this That nothing can be established by Law in the Protestant Religion whose every part is opposed by one or other of her own Professors so that things continuing loose and confused the Papists have their opportunity to urge their way which is attended with Order and Government and our Religion continuing thus distracted and divided some vile wretches lay hold of the Arguments on one side to confute the other and so hope at last to destroy all Dr. Sutcliffe said long ago That Wise Men apprehended these unhappy Questions about Indifferent things to be managed by the subtle Jesuits thereby to disturb the Peace and Settlement of our Church until at last they enjoy their long expected opportunity to set up themselves and restore the exploded Tyranny and Idolatry of the Church of Rome Among Mr. Selden's MSS. there is mentionâ—d an odd Prophecy That Popery should decay about 1500 and be restored about 1700 which is there said to be most likely by means of our Divisions which threaten the Reformation upon the Interest of Religion and open advantages to the Enemies of it and nothing is there said to be so likely to prevent it as a firm establishment of sound Doctrine Discipline and Worship in this Church Among the Iesuit Contzens directions for reducing Popery into a Country the most considerable are 1. That it be done under a pretence of ease to tender Consciences which will gain a reputation to the Prince and not seem to be done from his own Inclination but out of kindness to his People 2. That when Liberty is granted then the Parties be forbid to contend with each other for that will make way the more easily for one side to prevail and the Prince will be commended for his love of Peace 3 That those who suspect the Design and Preach against it be traduced as Men that Preaâ—h very unseasonable Doctrine that theâ—â— are Proud Self-opiniators and Enemies to Peace and Union But the special Advice he gives to a Catholick Prince is 4. To make as much use of the Divisions of his Enemies as of the Agreement of his Friends How much the Popish Party here hath followed these Counsels will easily appear by reflection upon their behaviour these last Twenty years But that which more particularly reaches to our own case is the Letter of Advice given to F. Young by Seignior Ballarini concerning the best way of managing the Popish Interest in England upon His Majesties Restauration wherein are several very remarkable things This Letter was found in F. Young's Study after his death and was translated out of Italian and printed in the Collection before mention'd The First Advice is To make the Obstruction of Settlement their great design especially upon the Fundamental Constitutions of the Kingdom whereunto if things should fall they would be more firm than ever 2. The next thing is To remove the jealousies raised by Prin Baxter c. of their design upon the late Factions and to set up the prosperous way of Fears and Jealousies of the King and Bishops 3. To make it appear under-hand how near the Doctrine Worship and Discipline of the Church of England comes to us at how little distance their Common-Prayer is from our Mass and that the wisest and ablest Men of that way are so moderate that they would willingly come over to us or at least meet us half way hereby the more stayed Men will become more odious and others will run out of all Religion for fear of Popery 4. Let there be an Indulgence promoted by the Factious and seconded by you 5. That the Trade and Treasure of the Nation may be engrossed between themselves and other discontented Parties 6. That the Bishops and Ministers of the Church of England be Aspersed as either Worldly and Careless on the one hand or so Factious on the other that it were well they were removed These are some of those excellent Advices then given and how well they have been followed we all know For according to this Counsel when they could not hinder the Settlement then The great thing they aimed at for many years was the breaking in pieces the Constitution of this Church by a General Toleration This Coleman owned at his Trial and after Sentence Declared That possibly he might be of an Opinion that Popery might come in if Liberty of Conscience had been granted The Author of the Two Conferences between L'Chese and the Four Jesuits owns the Declaration of Indulgence 1671 2 to be of the Papists procuring but he saith the Presbyterians presently suspected the Kindness and like wise Men closed with the Conformists and refused the Bait however specious it seemed when they saw the Hook that lay under it It was so far from this that when one of the furious Dissenters suspected the kindness and made Queries upon the Declaration wherein he represented it as a Stratagem to introduce Popery and Arbitrary Government one of the more moderate Party among them Wrote a Publick Vindication of their accepting the Licences wherein he declared to the World in their Name That they were not concerned what the Secret Design might be so long as the thing was good And why saith he do you insinuate Jealousies Have not we Publick and the Papists only Private Allowance In fine we are thankful for the Honor put upon us to be Publick in our Meetings Was this the Suspicion they had of the Kindness and their Wisdom in joyning with the Conformists If such bold and notorious Vntruths are published now when every one that can remember but 8 years backward can disprove them What account may we expect will be given to Posterity of the Passages of these Times if others do not take care to set them right And I am so far from believing that they then closed with the Conformists that I date the Presbyterian Separation chiefly from that time For Did not they take out Indulgences Build Meeting Places and keep up Separate Congregations ever since And did not those who before seem'd most inclinable to hold Communion with our Churches then undertake in Print to defend the lawfulness of these Separate Meetings upon such Principles as will justifie any Separation Vpon this many of those who frequented our Churches before withdrew themselves and since they have formed and continued Separate Bodies and upon the death of one Minister have chosen another in his room And What is a Formal Separation if this be not Then the Ejected Ministers resorted to Cities and Corporations not to supply the necessities of those who wanted them but to gather Churches among them For a very credible Person informs us That in the City he lived in where there were not above 30 or 40 that ordinarily refused the Publick and met Privately before the Indulgence there were Ten Non-conformist Ministers that
whom they come Let now any impartial Reader Iudge who did most effectually serve the Papists Designs those who kept to the Communion of the Church of England or those who fell into the Course of Separation I will allow what Mr. Baxter saith That they might use their endeavors to exasperate the several Parties against each other and might sometimes press the more rigorous execution of Laws against them but then it was to set them at the greater distance from us and to make them more pliable to a General Toleration And they sometimes complained that those who were most adverse to this found themselves under the severity of the Law when more tractable Men escaped which they have weakly imputed to the implacable temper of the Bishops when they might easily understand the true Cause of such a discrimination But from the whole it appears that the grand Design of the Papists for many years was to break in pieces the Constitution of the Church of England which being done they flatter'd themselves with the hopes of great Accessions to their strength and Party and in order to this they inflamed the differences among us to the utmost height on purpose to make all the Dissenting Parties to joyn with them for a General Toleration which they did not question would destroy this Church and advance their Interest Whether they did judge truly in this I am not to determine it is sufficient that they went upon the greatest Probabilities But Is it possible to imagine such skilful Engineers should use so much Art and Industry to undermine and blow up a Bulwark unless they hoped to gain the place or at lest some very considerable advantage to themselves by it And it is a most unfortunate condition our Church is in if those who design to bring in Popery and those who design to keep it out should both conspire towards its destruction This which I have represented was the posture of our Church-Affairs when the late horrible Plot of the Papists for Destruction of the Kings Person and Subversion of our Religion came to be discover'd It seems they found the other methods tedious and uncertain and they met with many cross accidents many rubs and disappointments in their way and therefore they resolved upon a Summary way of Proceeding and to do their business by one blow VVhich in regard of the circumstances of our Affairs is so far from being incredible that if they had no such design it is rather a VVonder they had not especially considering the allowed Principles and Practices in the Church of Rome Upon the discovery of the Plot and the Means of Papists used confirm the Truth of it knowing our great proneness to Infidelity by the Murder of a worthy Gentleman who received the Depositions the Nation was extremely Alarm'd with the apprehensions of Popery and provoked to the utmost detestation of it Those who had been long apprehensive of their restless designs were glad to see others awaken'd but they seemed like Men roused out of a deep sleep being amazed and confounded fearful of every thing and apt to mistrust all persons who were not in such a Consternation as themselves During this heat some of us both in Private and Publick endeavor'd to bring the Dissenters to the sense of the necessity of Union among Protestants hoping the apprehension of present danger common to us all would have disposed them to a better inclination to the things which belong to our Peace But finding the Nation thus vehemently bent against Popery those who had formerly carried it so smoothly and fairly towards the common and innocent Papists as they then stiled them and thought them equally capable of Toleration with themselves now they fly out into the utmost rage against them and others were apt by sly insinuations to represent those of the Church of England some of whom had appeared with vigor and resolution against Popery when they were trucking underhand for Toleration with them as Papists in Masquerade But now they tack about and strike in with the violent Rage of the People and none so fierce against Popery as they VVhat influence it hath had upon others I know not but I confess it did not lessen my esteem of the Integrity of those of the Church of England that they were not so much transported by sudden heats beyond the just bounds of Prudence and Decency and Humanity towards their greatest Enemies having learnt from St. Paul That the wrath of Man worketh not the righteousness of God They expected as little favor from them as any if they had prevailed and I doubt not but some of them had been made the first Examples of their Cruelty However this was interpreted to be want of Zeal by those who think there is no Fire in the House unless it flame out at the VVindows and this advantage was taken by the inveterate Enemies of our Church to represent us all as secret friends to the Papists so improbable a Lie that the Devil himself would Blush at the Telling of it not for the Malice but the Folly and Ill Contrivance of it and those who were more moderate were content to allow 3 or 4 among the Bishops to be Protestants and about 4 or 5 among the Clergy of London To feed this humor which wonderfully spread among more of the People than we could have believed to have been so weak most of the Malicious Libels against the Church of England were Reprinted and dispersed and new ones added to them Among the rest one Translated out of French to prove the Advances of the Church of England towards Popery but so unhappily managed that those Persons are Chiefly Mention'd who had appeared with most zeal against Popery Yet so much had the Arts of some Men prevailed over the Iudgments of others that even this Discourse was greedily swallowed by them But I must do the Author of it that Right to declare that before his Death he was very sensible of the Injury he had done to some Worthy Divines of our Church therein and begged God and them Pardon for it Wherein as he followed the Example of some others who were great Enemies to our Church while they lived but repented of it when they came to die so I hope others upon better consideration will see reason to follow his But this was but an inconsiderable trifle in comparison of what follow We were still in hopes that Men so Wise so Self-denying as the Non-conformist Ministers represent themselves to the World would in so Critical a time have made some steps or advances towards an Union with us at lest to have let us known their Sense of the Present State of things and their Readiness to joyn with us as far as they could against the Assaults of a Common Enemy In stead of this those we Discoursed with seemed farther off than before and when we lest expected such a Blow under the Name of a Plea for Peace out comes a
the Alteration of Established Laws which concern the Preservation of our Church and Religion one of the Weightiest things that can be taken into Consideration And although the Arguments are very plausible one way yet the Objections are very strong another The Union of Protestants the Ease of Scrupulous Consciences the providing for so many poor Families of Ejected Ministers are great Motives on our side But 1. The Impossibility of satisfying all Dissenters 2. The Vncertainty of gaining any considerable number by Relaxations 3. The Difficulty of keeping Factions out of the Church considering the Vngovernableness of some Mens Tempers and Principles 4. The danger of breaking all in pieces by Toleration 5. The Exposing our selves to the Papists and others by Receding too far from the first Principles and Frame of our Reformation And 6. The Difficulty of keeping out Priests pretending to be allowed Dissenters are very weighty Considerations on the other side So that whatever Men talk of the easiness of taking away the present Impositions it is a sign they look no farther than their own case and do not consider the Strength and Union of a National Settlement and the necessity thereof to keep out Popery and How much easier it is to break things in pieces than to set them in order again for new Objections will still be raised against any Settlement and so the result may be nothing but Disorder and Confusion Of what moment these things may be thought to other persons I know not but they were great enough to me to make me think it very unseasonable to meddle with Establish'd Law 's but on the other hand I could not but think it seasonable to endeavor to remove such Scruples and Prejudices as hindered the People most from Communion with our Churches for as I said in the Epistle before the Sermon If the People be brought to Vnderstand and Practice their Duty as to Communion with our Churches other difficulties which obstruct our Union will more easily be removed This passage Mr A. tells me was the Sport and Entertainment of the Coffeâ—-Houses I confess I am a great Stranger to the Wisdom of those places but I see Mr. A. is able to give me an Account of the Sage Discourses upon Points of Divinity there But if those pleasant Gentlemen would have understood the difference between Lay-Communion and Ministerial Conformity they might have apprehended the meaning of that passage For I am of Opinion if the People once thought themselves bound to do what they may lawfully do towards Communion with us many of the Ministers who seem now most most forward to defend the Separation would think of putting a fairer Construction upon many things than now they do And therefore I thought it fittest to handle the Case of the People who are either over-violent in these matters without ever considering them or have met with ill-instructors who have not faithfully let them know what the terms of Communion as to themselves were For the Scruple of the Surplice seems to be worn out Kneeling at the Sacrament is generally allowed by the more Iudicious Non-conformists and the only Scruple as to them about the Sign of the Cross is not whether it be lawful for the Minister to use it but whether it be lawful for them to offer their Children to be Baptized where it is used and as Mr. Baxter resolves the case Baptism is Gods Ordinance and his priviledge and the Sin if it be one is the Ministers and not his Another Man 's sinful Mode will not justifie the neglect of our Duty else we might not joyn in any Prayer or Sacrament in which the Minister Modally sinneth that is with none As to the Use of the Liturgy Mr. Baxter saith He that Separateth from all Churches among us on the account of the Unlawfulness of our Liturgy doth Separate from them on a Reason Common to All or almost All Christian Churches upon Earth the thoughts of which he is not able to bear And although the New Impositions he saith makes their Ministerial Conformity harder than formerly yet the Peoples Conformity is the same if not easier by some Amendments of the Liturgy as when Separation was fully confuted by the Old Non-conformists And the most Learned and Worthy of them he saith Wrote more against Separation than the Conformists and the present Non-conformists have not more Wisdom Learning or Holiness than they But he saith they did not only urge the People against Separation but to come to the very beginning of the Publick Worship preferring it before their private Duties What ground was there now to make such a Hideous Out-Cry about a Sermon which perswaded Men to no more than the Old Pious and Peaceable Nonconformists would have done who talked more sharply against the Sin and Mischief of Separation than I have done as may be seen in the First Part of the following Treatise But as if they had been the Papists Instruments to execute the fury of their Wrath and Displeasure against me they Summon in the Power of their Party and resolve with their full might to fall upon me And as if it had not been enough to deal with me by open Force which is more Manly and Generous they made use of mean and base Arts by Scurrilous Rimes by Virulent and Malicious Libels sent to me without Names by Idle Stories and False Suggestions to rob me at once of my Reputation and the Tranquillity of my Mind But I thank God I despised such pittiful Artifices and such Vnmanly and Barbarous Usage which made no other Impression on my mind but to make me understand that other Men could use me as Bad or Worse than the Papists But this brought to my Mind a Passage of Arch-Bishop Whitgift concerning their Predecessors usage of Bishop Jewel after he had so stoutly defended this Church against the Papists But saith he it is their manner except you please their humor in all things though you otherwise deserve never so well all is nothing with them but they will Deprave you Rail on you Backbite you Invent Lies of you and spread False Rumors as though you were the Vilest Persons upon Earth I could hardly have believed so ill a Character of Men pretending to any kind of Religion had I not found so just a parallel abating only the due allowances that must be made as to my Case with respect to the far greater deserts of that incomparable Bishop But notwithstanding all their hard Censures of me I do assure them I am as firm a Protestant as ever I was and should be still as ready to Promote the Interest of the Protestant Religion yea and to do any Real Kindness to the Dissenters themselves that may be consistent with the National Settlement of our Church and the Honor of our Reformation After a while they thought fit to draw their Strength into open Field and the First who appeared against me was Dr. Owen who
up Scholars or to teach Gentlemens Sons University Learning because this may be justly looked on as a design to propagate Schism to Posterity and to lay a Foundation for the disturbance of future Generations II. As to the Case of the ejected Mininisters I have these things to offer 1. That bare subscription of the Thirty six Articles concerning doctrinal Points be not allowed as sufficient to qualifie any man for a Living or any Church-preferment for these Reasons First Any Lay-man upon these Terms may not only be capable of a Living but may take upon him to Administer the Sacraments which was never allowed in any well constituted Church in the Christian World And such an allowance among us in stead of setling and uniting us will immediately bring things into great confusion and give mighty advantage to the Papists against our Church And we have reason to fear a Design of this Nature under a pretence of Union of Protestants tends to the subversion of this Church and throwing all things into confusion which at last will end in Popery Secondly This will bring a Faction into the Church which will more endanger it than external opposition For such Men will come in triumphantly having beaten down three of the Thirty nine Articles and being in legal possession of their Places will be ready to dâ—fie and contemn those who submitted to the rest and to glory in their Conquests and draw Followers after them as the victorious Confessors against Prelacy and Ceremonies And can they imagin those of the Church of England will see the Reputation of the Church or their own to suffer so much and not appear in their own Vindication Things are not come to that pass nor will they suddenly be that the Friends of the Church of England will be either afraid or ashamed to own her Cause We do heartily and sincerely desire Union with our Brethren if it may be had on just and reasonable Terms but they must not think that we will give up the Cause of the Church for it so as to condemn its Constitution or make the Ceremonies unlawful which have been hitherto observed and practised in it If any Expedient can be found out for the ease of other Mens Consciences without reflecting on our own if they can be taken in without reproach or dishonour to the Reformation of the Church I hope no true Son of the Church of England will oppose it But if the Design be to bring them in as a Faction to bridle and controll the Episcopal Power by setting up forty Bishops in a Diocese against one if it be for them to trample upon the Church of England and not to submit to its Order and Government upon fair and moderate terms let them not call this a Design of Union but the giving Law to a Party to oppose the Church of England And what the success of this will be let wise Men judge Thirdly If a subcription to Thirty six Articles were sufficient by the Statute 13 El. c. 12. I do not understand how by virtue of that Statute a Man is bound publickly to read the Thirty nine Articles in the Church and the Testimonial of his Subscription on pain of being deprived ipso facto if he do not For the L. Ch. I. Coke faith That subscription to the 39 Articles is required by force of of the Act of Parliament 13 Eliz. c. 12. And he adds That the Delinquent is disabled and deprived ipso facto and that a conditional subscription to them was not sufficient was resolved by all the Judges in England But how a Man should be deprived ipso facto for not subscribing and Reading the 39 Articles as appears by the Cases mentioned in Coke and yet be required onely to subscribe to 36 by the same Statute is a thing too hard for me to conceive 2. But notwithstanding this if any temper can be found out as to the manner of Subscription that may give ease to the scruples of our Brethren and secure the Peace of the Church the desired Union may be attained without that apparent danger of increasing the Factions among us And this I suppose may be done by an absolute subscription to all those Articles which concern the Doctrine of the true Christian Faith and the Use of the Sacraments and a solemn Promise under their hand or Subscription of Peaceable submission as to the rest so as not to oppose or contradict them either in Preaching or Writing upon the same penalty as if they had not subscribed to the 36. Which may be a more probable means to keep the Church in quiet than forceing a more rigorous subscription upon them or leaving them at their full liberty 3. As to the other subscription required 1. Jac. to the 3 Articles The first is provided for by the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy The third is the same with the subscription to the 39 Articles And as to the second about the Book of Common Prayer c. It ought to be considered 1 Whether for the satisfaction of the scrupulous some more doubtful and obscure passages may not yet be explained or amended Whether the New Translation of the Psalms were not fitter to be used at least in Parochial Churches Whether portions of Canonical Scripture were not better put in stead of Apocrypha Lessons Whether the Rubrick about Salvation of Infants might not be restored to its former place in the Office of Confirmation and so the present exceptions against it be removed Whether those expressions which suppose the strict exercise of Discipline in Burying the Dead were not better left at liberty in our present Case Such a Review made by Wise and Peaceable Men not given to Wrath and Disputing may be so far from being a dishonour to this Church that it may add to the Glory of it 2 Upon such a Review whether it be not great Reason that all Persons who Officiate in the Church be not only tied to a constant Use of it in all Publick Offices as often as they administer them which they ought in Person frequently to do but to declare at their first entrance upon a Parochial Charge their approbation of the Use of it after their own Reading of it that so the People may not suspect them to carry on a factious Design under an outward pretence of Conformity to the Rules of the Church they live in 3 Whether such a solemn Using the Liturgy and approbation and promise of the Use of it may not be sufficient in stead of the late Form of declaring their Assent and Consent which hath been so much scrupled by our Brethren These are all the things which appear to me reasonable to be allowed in order to an Union and which I suppose may be granted without detriment or dishonour to our Church There are other things very desireable towards the happiness and flourishing of this Church as the exercise of Discipline in Parochial Churches in a due subordination to
the Bishop the Reforming the Ecclesiastical Courts as to Excommunication without prejudice to the excellent Profession of the Civil Law the Building of more Churches in great Parishes especially about the City of London the retrenching Pluralities the strictness and solemnity of Ordinations the making a Book of Canons suitable to this Age for the better Regulating the Conversations of the Clergy Such things as these might facilitate our Union and make our Church in spite of all its Enemies become a Praise in the whole Earth The Zeal I have for the true Protestant Religion for the Honour of this Church and for a firm Union among Brethren hath Transported me beyond the bounds of a Preface Which I do now conclude with my hearty Prayers to Almighty God that he who is the God of Peace and the Fountain of Wisdom would so direct the Counsels of those in Authority and incline the hearts of the People that we may neither run into a Wilderness of Confusion nor be driven into the Abysse of Popery but that the true Religion being preserved among us we may with one heart and mind serve the only true God through his only Son Jesus Christ the Prince of Peace and our alone Advocate and Mediator Amen The Contents PART I. An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of Separation § 1. No Separation in the beginning of the Reformation although there were then the same Reasons which are now pleaded The Terms of Communion being the same which were required by the Martyrs in Queen Maries days § 3. A true account of the Troubles of Francfurt Mr. B's mistake about them § 4. The first causes of the dislike of our Ceremonies § 5. The Reasons of retaining them at the time of Reformation § 6. The Tendencies to Separation checked by Beza and other Reformed Divines abroad § 7. The Heats of the Nonconformists gave occasion to Separation § 8. Their zele against it notwithstanding their representing the sinfulness and mischief of it § 9 10. The true state of the Controversie between the Separatists and Nonconformists § 11. Their Answers to the Separatists Reasons § 12. The progress of Separation The Schisms and Divisions among the Separatists the occasion of Independency That makes Separation more inexcusable by owning some of our Churches to be true Churches § 13. The mischiefs which followed Independency both abroad and § 14. hither into England § 15. The Controversie stated between the Divines of the Assembly and the Dissenting Brethren § 16. The cause of the Assembly given up by the present Dissenters § 17. The old Nonconformists Iudgment of the unlawfulness of mens preaching here when forbidden by Laws fully cleared from some late Objections PART II. Of the Nature of the present Separation § 1. The different Principles of Separation laid down The things agreed on with respect to our Church § 2. The largeness of Parishes a mere Colour and Pretence shewed from Mr. B's own words § 3. The Mystery of the Presbyterian Separation opened § 4. The Principles of it as to the People Of occasional Communion how far owned and of what force in this matter shewed from parallel cases § 5. The reasons for this occasional Communion examined § 6. Of the pretence of greater Edification in separate Meetings never allowed by the Separatists or Independents as a reason for Separation No reason for this pretence sheâ—ed from Mr. B's words § 7. The Principles of Separation as to the Ministry of our Churches Of joyning with our Churches as Oratories § 8. Of the Peoples judging of the worthiness and competency of their Ministers Mr. B's Character of the People The impertinency of this Plea as to the London Separation § 9. The absurdity of allowing this liberty to separate from Mr. B's own words § 10. The allowance be gives for Separation on the account of Conformity What publick Worship may be forbidden § 11. The Ministry of our Church charged with Usurpation in many cases and Separation allowed on that account § 12. Of Separation from Ithacian Prelatists § 13. That the Schism doth not always lie on the Imposers side where the terms of Communion are thought sinful § 14. The Principles of the Independent Separation or of those who hold all Communion with our Church unlawful § 15. The nature of Separation stated and explained § 16. The charge of Separation made good against those who hold Occasional Communion lawful § 17. The obligation to constant Communion where Occasional Communion is allowed to be lawful at large proved § 18. The Objection from our Saviours practice answered § 19. The text Phil. 3. 16. cleared from all Objections § 20. A new Exposition of that text shewed to be impertinent § 21. The charge of Separation proved against those who hold all Communion with us unlawful § 22 23. The mischief brought upon the Cause of the Reformation by it The testimonies of forein Protestant Divines to that purpose § 24. No possibility of Union among the Protestant Churches upon their grounds which hath been much wished for and desired by the best Protestants § 25. All the ancient Schisms justifiable on the same pretences § 26. There can be no end of Separation on the like grounds Mr. A's Plea for Schism at large considered § 27. The Obligation on Christians to preserve the Peace and Unity of the Church The Cases mentioned wherein Separation is allowed by the Scripture In all others it is proved to be a great sin PART III. Of the Pleas for the present Separation Sect. 1. The Plea for Separation from the Constitution of the Parochial Churches considered Sect. 2. Iustice Hobart's Testimony for Congregational Churches answered Sect. 3. No Evidence in Antiquity for Independent Congregations Sect. 4. The Church of Carthage governed by Episcopal Power and not Democratical in S. Cyprian's time Sect. 5 6. No evidence in Scripture of more Churches than one in a City though there be of more Congregations Sect. 7. No Rule in Scripture to commit Church-power to a single Congregation but the General Rules extend it further Sect. 8. Of Diocesan Episcopacy the Question about it stated But one Bishop in a City in the best Churches though many Assemblies Sect. 9. Diocesan Episcopacy clearly proved in the African Churches The extent of S. Austin's Diocess Sect. 10. Diocesan Episcopacy of Alexandria The largeness of Theodoret's Diocese the Testimony of his Epistle cleared from all Mr. B's late Objections Sect. 11. Diocese Episcopacy not repugnant to any Institution of Christ proved from Mr. B. himself Sect. 12. The Power of Presbyters in our Church Sect. 13. The Episcopal Power succeeds the Apostolical proved from many Testimonies Sect. 14. What Power of Discipline is left to Parochial Churches as to Admission Sect. 15. Whether the power of Suspension be no part of Church Discipline Sect. 16 17. Of the defect of Discipline and whether it overthrows the being of our Parochial Churches Sect. 18. Of National Churches and the grounds on which they
Reformation he declares That he did mightily approve a Certain Form from which Men ought not to vary both to prevent the inconveniencies which some Mens folly would betray them to in the free way of Praying and to manifest the General Consent of the Churches in their Prayers and to stop the vain affectation of some who love to be shewing some new things Let Mr. Br. now Judge Whether it were likely that the Controversie then at Frankford was as he saith between them that were for the English Liturgy and others that were for a free way of Praying when Calvin to whom the Dissenters appealed was so much in his Judgment against the latter And it appears by Calvin's Letter to Cox and his Brethren that the State of the Case at Frankford had not been truly represented to him which made him Write with greater sharpness than otherwise he would have done and he expresses his satisfaction that the matter was so composed among them when by Dr. Cox his means the English Liturgy was brought into use at Frankford And to excuse himself for his liberal censures before he mentions Lights as required by the Book which were not in the second Liturgy of Edward the Sixth So that either they deceived him who sent him the Abstract or he was put to this miserable shift to defend himself the matter being ended contrary to his expectation For although upon the receipt of Calvin's Letter the Order of Geneva had like to have been presently voted in yet there being still some Fast Friends to the English Service they were fain to compromise the matter and to make use of a Mixt Form for the present But Dr. Cox and others coming thither from England and misliking these Alterations declared That they were for having the Face of an English Church there and so they began the Letany next Sunday which put Knox into so great a Rage that in stead of pursuing his Text which was directly contrary he made it his business to lay open the nakedness of our Church as far as his Wit and Ill Will would carry him He charged the Service-Book with Superstition Impurity and Imperfection and the Governors of our Church with slackness in Reformation want of Discipline with the business of Hooper allowing Pluralities all the ill things he could think on When Cox and his Party with whom at this time was our excellent Iewel were admitted among them they presently forbad Knox having any thing farther to do in that Congregation who being complained of soon after for Treason against the Emperor in a Book by him Published he was forced to leave the City and to retire to Geneva whither most of his Party followed him And thus saith Grindal in his Letter to Bishop Ridley The Church at Frankford was well quieted by the Prudence of Mr. Cox and others which met there for that purpose Sect. 4. It is observed by the Author of the Life of Bishop Jewel before his Works that this Controversie was not carried with them out of England but they received New Impressions from the places whither they went For as those who were Exiles in Henry the Eighth's time as particularly Hooper who lived many years in Switzerland brought home with them a great liking of the Churches Model where they had lived which being such as their Country would bear they supposed to be nearer Apostolical Simplicity being far enough from any thing of Pomp or Ceremony which created in them an aversion to the Ornaments and Vestments here used So now upon this new Persecution those who had Friendship at Geneva as Knox and Whittingham or were otherwise much obliged by those of that way as the other English were who came first to Frankford were soon possessed with a greater liking of their Model of Divine Service than of our own And when Men are once engaged in Parties and several Interests it is a very hard matter to remove the Prejudices which they have taken in especially when they have great Abettors and such whose Authority goes beyond any Reason with them This is the True Foundation of those Unhappy Differences which have so long continued among us about the Orders and Ceremonies of our Church For when Calvin and some others found that their Counsel was not like to be followed in our Reformation our Bishops proceeding more out of Reverence to the Ancient Church than meer opposition to Popery which some other Reformers made their Rules they did not cease by Letters and other wayes to insinuate that our Reformation was imperfect as long as any of the Dregs of Popery remained So they called the Vse of those Ceremonies which they could not deny to have been far more Ancient than the great Apostasy of the Roman Church Calvin in his Letter to the Protector Avows this to be the best Rule of Reformation To go as far from Popery as they could and therefore what Habits and Ceremonies had been abused in the time of Popery were to be removed lest others were hardened in their Superstition thereby but at last he yields to this moderation in the case That such Ceremonies might be reteined as were easie and fitted to the Capacities of the People provided they were not such as had their beginning from the Devil or Antichrist i.e. were not first begun in the time of Popery Now by this Rule of Moderation our Church did proceed for it took away all those Ceremonies which were of late invention As in Baptism of all the multitude of Rites in the Roman Church it reserved in the Second Liturgy only the Cross after Baptism which was not so used in the Roman Church for there the Sign of the Cross is used in the Scrutinies before Baptism and the Anointing with the Chrysm in vertice after it in stead of these our Church made choice of the Sign of the Cross after Baptism being of Uncontroulable Antiquity and not used till the Child is Baptized In the Eucharist in stead of Fifteen Ceremonies required in the Church of Rome our Church hath only appointed Kneeling I say appointed for although Kneeling at the Elevation of the Host be strictly required by the Roman Church yet in the Act of Receiving it is not as manifestly appears by the Popes manner of Receiving which is not Kneeling but either Sitting as it was in Bonaventures time or after the fashion of Sitting or a little Leaning upon his Throne as he doth at this day therefore our Church taking away the Adoration at the Elevation lest it should seem to recede from the Practise of Antiquity which received the Eucharist in the Posture of Adoration then used hath appointed Kneeling to be observed of all Communicants In stead of the great number of Consecrated Vestments in the Roman Church it only retained a plain Linnen Garment which was unquestionably used in the times of St. Hierome and St. Augustin And lastly As to the Episcopal Habits they are retained only as
a Mark of Distinction of a certain Order of Men the Colour of the Chimere being changed from Scarlet to Black These are now the Ceremonies about which all the Noise and Stir hath been made in our Church and any sober considering Man free from Passion and Prejudice would stand amazed at the Clamour and Disturbance which hath been made in this Church and is at this day about the intolerable Mischief of these Impositions Sect. 5. But the most Material Question they ever Ask is Why were these few retained by our Reformers which were then distastful to some Protestants and were like to prove the occasion of future Contentions I will here give a Just and True Account of the Reasons which induced our Reformers either to Retain or to Apoint these Ceremonies and then proceed 1. Out of a due Reverence to Antiquity They would hereby convince the Papists they did put a difference between the Gross and Intolerable Superstitions of Popery and the Innocent Rites and Practises which were observed in the Church before And What could more harden the Papists then to see Men put no difference betwen these It is an unspeakable Advantage which those do give to the Papists who are for Reforming 1600 years backward and when they are pinch'd with a Testimony of Antiquity presently cry out of the Mystery of Iniquity working in the Apostles times as though every thing which they disliked were a part of it Next to the taking up Arms for Religion which made Men look on it as a Faction and Design there was scarce any thing gave so great a check to the Progress of the Reformation in France especially among Learned and Moderate Men as the putting no difference between the Corruptions of Popery and the innocent Customs of the Ancient Church For the time was when many Great Men there were very inclinable to a Reformation but when they saw the Reformers oppose the undoubted Practises of Antiquity equally with the Modern Corruptions they cast them off as Men guilty of an unreasonable humor of Innovation as may be seen in Thuanus and Fran. Baldwins Ecclesiastical Commentaries and his Answers to Calvin and Beza But our Reformers although they made the Scripture the only Rule of Faith and rejected all things repugnant thereto yet they designed not to make a Transformation of a Church but a Reformation of it by reducing it as near as they could to that state it was in under the first Christian Emperors that were sound in Religion and therefore they retained these few Ceremonies as Badges of the Respect they bore to the Ancient Church II. To manifest the Iustice and Equity of the Reformation by letting their Enemies see they did not Break Communion with them for meer indifferent things For some of the Popish Bishops of that time were subtle and learned Men as Gardiner Heath Tonstall c. and nothing would have rejoyced them more than to have seen our Reformers boggle at such Ceremonies as these and they would have made mighty advantage of it among the People Of which we have a clear instance in the case of Bishop Hoopers scrupling the Episcopal Vestments Peter Martyr tells him plainly That such needless scrupulosity would be a great hindrance to the Reformation For saith he since the People are with difficulty enough brought to things necessary if we once declare things indifferent to be unlawful they will have no patience to hear us any longer And withall hereby we condemn other Reformed Churches and those Ancient Churches which have hitherto to been in great esteem III. To shew their Consent with other Protestant Churches which did allow and practice the same or more Ceremonies as the Lutheran Churches generally did And even Calvin himself in his Epistle to Sadolet declared That he was for restoring the Face of the Antient Church and in his Book of the true way of Reformation he saith He would not contend about Ceremonies not only those which are for Decency but those that are Symbolical Oecolampadius looked on the Gesture at the Sacrament as indifferent Bucer thought the use of the Sign of the Cross after Baptism neither indecent nor unprofitable Since therefore so great a number of Protestant Churches used the same Ceremonies and the Chief Leaders of other Reformed Churches thought them not unlawful our first Reformers for this and the foregoing Reasons thought it fit to retain them as long as they were so few so easie both to be practised and understood Sect. 6. But the Impressions which had been made on some of our Divines abroad did not wear off at their Return home in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign For they reteined a secret dislike of many things in our Church but the Act of Vniformity being passed and the Vse of the Liturgy strictly enjoyned I do not find any Separation made then on the account of it no not by the Dissenting Brethren that withdrew from Frankford to Geneva Knox was forbidden to Preach here because of some Personal Reflections on the Queen but Whittingham Sampson Gilby and others accepted of Preferment and Imployment in the Church The Bishops at first shewed kindness to them on the account of their forward and zealous Preaching which at that time was very needful and therefore many of them were placed in London Where having gained the People by their zeal and diligence in Preaching they took occasion to let fall at first their dislike of the Ceremonies and a desire of farther Reformation of our Liturgy but finding that they had gained ground they never ceased till by inveighing against the Livery of Antichrist as they called the Vestments and Ceremonies they had inflamed the People to that degree that Gilby himself insinuates That if they had been let alone a little longer they would have shaken the Constitution of this Church This was the first occasion of pressing Vniformity with any rigor and therefore some examples were thought fit to be made for the warning of others But as kindness made them presumptuous so this severity made them clamorous and they sent bitter complaints to Geneva Beza after much importunity undertook to give an Answer to them which being of great consequence to our present business I shall here give a fuller account of it We are then to understand that about this time the Dissenting Party being Exasperated by the Silencing some of their most busie Preachers began to have Separate Meetings This Beza takes notice of in his Epistle to Grindal Bishop of London and it appears by an Examination taken before him 20th of Iune 1567. of certain persons who were accused not only for absenting themselves from their Parish Churches but for gathering together and making Assemblies using Prayers and Preachings and Ministring Sacraments among themselves and hiring a Hall in London under Pretence of a Wedding for that Purpose The Bishop of London first Rebuked them for their Lying Pretences and then told them That in this Severing
themselves from the Society of other Christians they not only Condemned them but also the whole State of the Church Reformed in King Edward's dayes which was well Reformed according to the word of God yea and many Good Men have shed their Blood for the same which your doings Condemn Have ye not saith he the Gospel truly Preached and the Sacraments Ministred accordingly and good order kept although we differ from other Churches in Ceremonies and in indifferent things which lie in the Princes Power to Command for Order sake To which one of them Answered That as long as they might have the Word freely Preached and the Sacraments Administred without the preferring of Idolatrous Gear about it they never assembled together in Houses but their Preachers being displaced by Law for their Non-conformity they be thought themselves what was best for them to do and calling to mind that there was a Congregation there in the dayes of Queen Mary which followed the Order of Geneva they took up that and this Book and Order saith he we hold Another Answered That they did not refuse Communion for Preaching the Word but because they had tied the Ceremonies of Antichrist to it and set them up before it so that no Man may Preach or Minister the Sacraments without them Things being come to this height and Separation beginnâ—ng to break out the Wiser Brethren thought not fit to proceed any farther till they had Consulted their Oracle at Geneva Beza being often solicited by them with doleful Complaints of their hard usage and the different Opinions among themselves what they were to do at last resolves to Answer but first he declares How unwilling he was to interpose in the Differences of another Church especially when but one Party was heard and he was afraid this was only the way to exasperate and provoke more rather than Cure this evil which he thought was not otherwise to be Cured but Precibus Patientiâ by Prayers and Patience After this General Advice Beza freely declares his own judgment as to the Reformation of several things he thought amiss in our Church but as to the case of the Silenced Preachers and the Peoples Separation he expresses his Mind in that manner that the Dissenters at this day would have published their Invectives against him one upon the back of another For 1. As to the Silenced Ministers he saith That if the Pressing Subscription continued he perswades them rather to live privately than to yield to it For they must either act against their Consciences or they must quit their Imployments for saith he the Third thing that may be supposed viz. That they should exercise their Function against the Will of the Queen and the Bishops we Tremble at the Thoughts of it for such reasons as may be easily understood though we say never a word of them What! Is Beza for Silencing and stopping the Mouths of such a number of Faithful and able Ministers and at such a time when the Church was in so great Necessity of Preaching and so many Souls like to be famished for the want of it when St. Antholins St. Peters St. Bartholomews at which Gilby saith their great Preaching then was were like to be left destitute of such Men Would Beza even Beza at such a time as that be for Silencing so many Preachers i. e. for their sitting quiet when the Law had done it And would not he suffer them to Preach when they ought to have done it though against the Will of the Queen and the Bishops It appears that Beza was not of the Mind of our Adversaries but that he was of the contrary it appears plainly by this That before he Perswades the Dissenting Ministers rather to live privately than to subscribe and that he expresses no such terrible apprehensions at their quitting their Places as he doth at their Preaching in Opposition to the Laws 2 As to the case of the People his Advice was As long as the Doctrine was sound that they should diligently attend upon it and receive the Sacraments devoutly and to joyn Amendment of Life with their Prayers that by those means they might obtain a through Reformation So that nothing can be more express against Sâ—paration than what is here said by Beza for even as to the Ministers he saith Though he did not approve the Ceremonies yet since they are not of the nature of things evil in themselves he doth not think them of that moment that they should leave their Functions for the sake of them or that the People should forsake the Ordinances rather than hear those who did Conform Than which words nothing can be plainer against Separation And it further appears by Beza ' s Resolution of a case concerning a Schism in the French Church then in London That he looked on it as a Sin for any one to Separate from a Church wherein Sound Doctrine and a Holy Life and the Right use of the Sacraments is kept up And by Separation he saith he means Not meerly going from one Church to another but the Discontinuing Communion with the Publick Assemblies as though one were no Member of them Beza's Authority being so great with the Dissenting Brethren at that time seems to have put an effectual Stop to the Course of Separation which they were many of them then inclined to But he was not alone among the Foreign Divines who about that time expressed themselves against Separation from the Communion of our Church notwithstanding the Rites and Ceremonies herein used For Gualter a Divine of good Reputation in the Helvetian Churches takes an occasion in an Epistle to several of our Bishops to talke of the Difference then about these things and he extremely blames the Morose humor of those who disturbed the Church for the sake of such things and gave an occasion thereby to endless Separations And in an Epistle to Cox Bishop of Ely 1572. he tells him How much they had disswaded them from making such a stir in the Church about Matters of no moment and he Complains grievously of the Lies and Prejudices against our Church which they had sent Men on purpose to possess them with both at Geneva and other places Zanchy upon great Sollicitation wrote an earnest Letter to the Queen to remove the Ceremonies but withal he sent another to Bishop Iewel to perswade the Non-conformists if the Queen could not be moved not to leave their Churches on such accounts which for his part he did not understand how any could lawfully do as long as they had otherwise liberty to Preach the Gospel and Administer the Sacraments although they were forced to do something therein which did not please them as long as the things were of that kind which in themselves were neither good nor evil And the same Reason will much more hold against the Peoples Sâ—paration Sect. 7. But about this time the dissenting party much increasing and most of the old and peaceable Non-conformists
being dead or unfit for business the management of their affairs fell into the hands of younger and fiercer Men. Who thought their Predecessors too cold in these matters insomuch that honest Iohn Fox complained of the Factious and Turbulent Spirit which had then possessed that Party although himself a Moderate Non-conformist and he saith They despised him because he could not Rail against Bishops and Archbishops as they did but if he could be as mad as they they would be kinder to him And therefore he soberly adviseth the Governors of the Church to look well after this sort of Men for saith he if they prevail it is not to be imagin'd what Mischief and Disturbance they will bring whose Hypocrisie is more subtle and pernicious then that of the old Monks for under a Pretence of Greater Purity they will never give over till they have brought Men under a Iewish Slavery These New Men full of bitter zeal despised the old trifling Controversie about Garments and Ceremonies they complained That all was out of order in the Church and nothing but a New and Thorough Reformation would please them For in the Admonition presented to the Parliament 14 Eliz. they complain for want of a Right Ministry a right Government in the Church according to the Scriptures without which they say there could be no right Religion The Liturgy they deride as câ—lled and picked out of the Popish Dunghill the Portuise and Mass-Book the Government of the Church by Arch-Bishops and Bishops they call Devillish and Antichristian and Condemn the Vocation of the Clergy as Popish and Vnlawful and add That the Sacraments are mangled and profaned that Baptism is full of Childish and Superstitious Toys All which and many more expressions of a like Nature are extant in the First and Second Admonitions Which Bold and Groundless Assertions being so Openly Avowed to the World by the Leaders of the Dissenting Party gave the true Occasion to the following practise of Separation For when these things were not only published in the name of the Party being the Pleas for Peace at that time but stifly maintained with greater Heat than Learning It is easie to imagine what Impressions such things would make on the common sort of People who have still a good Inclination to find fault with their Governors especially in the Church and to Admire those that Oppose them And these they Courted most having their Opinions so suited to Vulgar capacities that they apprehended their Interest carried on together with that of Purity of Reformation Hence they pleaded then as others do at this day for the Peoples right to choose their Bishops and Pastors against the Vsurpations as they accounted them of Princes and Patrons hence they railed against the Pomp and Greatness of the Clergy which is always a Popular Theme and so would the exposing the inequality of Mens Estates be if Men durst undertake it with as great hopes of impunity Besides it was not a Little Pleasant to the People to think what a share they should come to in the New Seigniory as they called it or Presbytery to be erected in every Parish and what Authority they should Exercise over their Neighbours and over their Minister too by their double Votes By such Arts as these they complied with the Natural Humors of the People and so gained a mighty Interest amongst them as the Anabaptists in Germany and Switzerland at first did upon the like Grounds Which made Bullinger in an Epistle to Robert Bishop of Winchester parallel the Proceedings of this Party here with that of the Anabaptists with them in those Countries For saith he we had a sort of People here to whom nothing seemed pure enough in our Reformation from whence they brake out into Separation and had their Conventicles among us upon which followed Sects and Schisms which made great entertainment to our Common Enemies the Papists Just thus it happened here these hot Reformers designed no Separation at present which they knew would unavoidably bring confusion along with it for that was laying the Reins on the Peoples neâ—ks and they would run whither they pleased without any possibility of being well managed by them but since these Men would Refine upon the present Constitution of our Church there soon arose another sort of Men who thought it as fit to Refine upon them They acknowledged they had good Principles among them but they did not practise according to them If our Church were so bad as they said that there was neither right Ministery nor right Government nor right Sacraments nor right Discipline What follows say they from hence but that we ought to separate from the Communion of so corrupt a Church and joyn together to make up new Churches for the pure administration of all Gospel Ordinances The Leaders of the Non-conformists finding this Party growing up under them were quickly apprehensive of the danger of them because the Consequence seemed so Natural from their own Principles and the People were so ready to believe that nothing but Worldly considerations of Interest and Safety kept them from practising according to them Which was a mighty prejudice against them in the Minds of the Separatists as appears by Robinsons Preface to his Book of Communion Sect. 8. II. The Separation being now begun the Non-conformists set themselves against it with the Greatest Vehemency Which is the second thing I am to make out As for those of the Separation saith Parker a Noted Non-conformist Who have Confuted them more than we or Who have Written more against them And in a Letter of his he expresseth the greatest Detestation of them Now it grieved me not a little at this time saith he that Satan should be so impudent as to fling the dung of that Sect into my Face which with all my Power I had so vehemently resisted during the whole course of my Ministery in England I think no other but that many of them love the Lord and fear his Name howbeit their Error being Enemy to that Breast of Charity wherewith Cyprian covered his Qui ab Ecclesiâ nunquam recessit as Augustin speaketh they cannot stand before his Tribunal but by the Intercession of our blessed Saviour Father forgive them for they know not what they do Think not these words are applyed to their Sect amiss for in effect What doth it less than even persecute the Lord Jesus in his Host which it revileth in his Ordinances which it dishonoreth and in his Servants last of all whose Graces it blasphemeth whose footsteps it slandereth and whose Persons it despiseth And Two Characters he gives of the Men of that way viz. That their Spirits were bitter above measure and their hearts puffed up with the Leaven of Pride How far these Characters still agree to the Defenders of the present Separation I leave others to Judge When Brown and Harrison openly declared for Separation T. C. himself undertook to Answer them in a Letter to
4. That it doth not belong to private persons to set up the Discipline of the Church against the Will and Consent of the Christian Magistrate and Governors of the Church Nay they declare that in so doing they should highly offend God Giffard saith That the Fetters and Chains can no faster bind the hands and feet of Brownists then the hands of private Men are bound with the bands of Conscience and the Fear of God from presuming to take upon them Publick Authority And if all the Brownists in the Land should come together and choose a Minister and Ordain him it would make him no more a Minister before God then if all the Apprentices in London taking upon them to choose a Lord Mayor and Minister an Oath unto him should make him a Lord Mayor But of this more afterwards V. That the Ministers of our Church stand under as they speak an Antichristian Hierarchy To which they Answer First They deny that our Bishops can be called Antichristian since they do and by the Laws of the Land ought to hold and teach all Doctrines that are Fundamental yea some of them have Learnedly and Soundly maintained the Truth against Hereticks that have gainsay'd it some have not only by their Doctrine and Ministry Converted many to the Truth but have suffered Persecution for the Gospel Secondly Suppose it were an Antichristian Yoke which they deny yet this doth not destroy the being of a True Church or Miâ—istry under it Since both the Jewish and Christian Churches have frequently born such a Yoke and yet have been the True Churches of God still Thirdly That there is nothing unlawful or Antichristian in the Office of Bishops if they consider them as the Kings Visitors and Commissioners to see that the Pastors do their Duties And that this cannot destroy the nature of a Visible Church to cast many particular Churches under one Provincial or Diocesan Government Yea Mr. Bradshaw undertakes to prove this not only lawful but expedient to that degree that he thinks the Magistrate cannot well discharge his Duty as to the Oversight and Government of the Churches within his Dominions without it as is implyed in the seven Quaeries he propounds to Fr. Iohnson about it But supposing them to be Pastors of the Churches under them this saith he doth not overthrow the Office of Pastors to particular Congregations so long as under them they perform the main and substantial Duties of True Pastors which all the Ministers of our Church-Assemblies do and by the Laws cought to do These Particulars I have laid together with all possible brevity and clearness from the Authors of best reputation on both sides that we might have a distinct view of the State of the Controversie about Separation between the Old Non-conformists and the Separatists of that time Sect. 12. But before we come to our present Times we must consider the Alteration that was made in the State of this Controversie by those who were called Independents and pretended to come off from the Principles of Brownism or rigid Separation And here I shall give an Account of the Progress of the Course of Separation or the Steps by which it was carried on and how it came at last to settle in the Congregational Way and what the True State of the Difference was between the Assembly of Divines and the Dissenting Brethren and how far the Reasons then used will hold against the present Separation When those who were called Brownists for the fâ—eer Exercise of their new Church way withdrew into the Low-Countreys they immediately fell into strange Factions and Divisions among themselves A. D. 1582. Robert Brown accompanied with Harrison a School-Master and about 50 or 60 Persons went over to Middleburgh and there they chose Harrison Pastor and Brown Teacher They had not been there Three Months but upon the falling out between Brown and Harriâ—on Brown forsakes them and returns for England and Subscribes promising to the Archbishop To live Obediently to his Commands Concerning whom Harrison Writes to a Friend in London in these words Indeed the Lord hath made a breach among us for our sins which hath made us unworthy to bear his great and worthy Cause Mr. Brown hath cast us off and that with open manifest and notable Treacheries and if I should declare them you could not believe me Only this I testifie unto you that I am well able to prove That Cain dealt not so ill with his Brother Abel as he hath dealt with me Some of the words of Browns Subscription were these I do humbly submit my self to be at my Lord of Canterbury's Commandment whose Authority under Her Majesty I wâ—ll never resist or deprave by the Grace of God c. But being a Man of a Restless and Factious Temper no Promises or Subscriptions could keep him within due bounds as one who lived at that time hath fully discovered For although he promised to frequent our Churches and to come to Prayers and Sacraments yet living School-Master at S. Olaves in Southwark for two years in all that time he never did it and when he was like to have been question'd for it he withdrew into another Parish Sometimes he would go to hear Sermons but that he accounted no act of Communion and declared to his Friends That he thought it not unlawful to hear our Sermons and therefore perswaded his Followers in London so to do Notwithstanding this he Preached in Private Meetings and that in the time of Publick Assemblies when he thought fit Which this Author though a Non-conformist and Friend of T. Cs calls a Cursed Conventicle who sets forth at large his Strange Iuglings and Iesuitical Aequivocations in his Subscription By the Bishops Authority he said he meant only his Civil Authority by declaring the Church of England to be the Church of God he understood the Church of his own setting up by frequenting our Assemblies according to Law he meant the Law of God and not of the Land he declared his Child was Baptized according to Law but then told his Followers it was done without his Consent Mr. Cotton of New England hath this passage concerning Brown The first Inventor of that way which is called Brownism from whom the Sect took its Name fell back from his own way to take a Parsonage called Iâ—ourcâ— God so in a strange yet wise Providence ordering it that he who had utterly renounced all the Churches in England as no Church should afterwards accept of one Parish Church among them and it called A Church But upon the Dissention at Middleborough between Brown and Harrison that Congregation soon broke to pieces Ainsworth cannot deny the early Dissentions between Brown and Harrison Brown and Barrow Barrow and Fr. Iohnson but he reckons up all the differences in Scripture from Cain and Abel downwards to justifie theirs notwithstanding as Dr. O. well observes We are to distinguish
Christian Magistrate was by any Prophet either commanded to deal otherwise than by perswasion in publick Reformation when the Magistrate neglected it or reproved for the contrary Fourthly To the Instance of the Apostles they Answer Two things I. That though they set up Church-Government without the Magistrates leave yet not contrary to his liking or when he opposed his Authority directly and inhibited it they never erected the Discipline when there was so direct an opposition made against it by the Civil Magistrates II. If it could be proved that the Apostles did so then yet would it not follow that we may do so now for neither was the Heathen Magistrate altogether so much to be respected by the Church as the Christian Magistrate is neither have our Ministers and People now so full and absolute a power to pull down and set up Orders in the Church as the Apostles those wise Master-builders had Fifthly As to their Ministers Preaching being Silenced they declare 1. So long as the Bishops Suspend and Deprive according to the Law of the Land we account of the Action herein as of the Act of the Church which we may and ought to reverence and yield unto if they do otherwise we have liberty given us by the Law to appeal from them If it be said the Church is not to be obey'd when it Suspends and deprives us for such causes as we in our Consciences know to be insufficient We Answer That it lieth on them to Depose who may Ordain and they may shut that may open And as he may with a good Conscience execute a Ministery by the Ordination and Calling of the Church who is privy to himself of some unfitness if the Church will press him to it so may he who is privy to himself of no fault that deserveth Deprivation cease from the execution of his Ministery when he is pressed thereunto by the Church And if a guiltless person put out of his Charge by the Churches Authority may yet continue in it What proceedings can there be against guilty persons who in their own conceit are alwayes guiltless or will at least pretend so to be seeing they will be ready alwayes to object against the Churches Iudgment That they are called of God and may not therefore give over the Execution of their Ministery at the will of Bishops 2. That the case of the Apostles was very different from theirs in Three respects First They that Inhibited the Apostles were known and professed enemies to the Gospel Secondly The Apostles were charged not to teach in the Name of Christ nor to publish any part of the Gospel which Commandment might more hardly be yielded unto than this of our Bishops who though they cannot endure them which teach that part of the Truth that concerneth the good Government and Reformation of the Church yet are they not only content that the Gospel should be Preached but are also Preachers of it themselves Thirdly The Apostles received not their Calling and Authority from Men nor by the hands of Men but immediately from God himself and therefore also might not be restrain'd or deposed by Men whereas we though we exercise a Function whereof God is the Author and we are also called of God to it yet are we called and ordained by the hands and Ministery of Men and may therefore by the Ministery of Men be also deposed and restrained from the Exercise of our Ministery To this which I had referred Mr. B. to he gives this Answer If Mr. Rathband hath denied this it had been no proof Did I ever mention Mr. Rathband's Testimony as a sufficient proof My words are That I was certain their Practice was contrary to the Doctrine of all the Non-conformists as you may see in the Book published in their name by Mr. Rathband Can any thing be plainer than that the Book was written by the Non-conformists and that Mr. Rathband was only the Publisher of it This way of Answering is just as if one should quote a passage out of Curcellaeus his Greek Testament and another should reply If Curcellaeus said so it had been no proof Can Mr. B. satisfie his Mind with such Answers When Fr. Iohnson said That our Ministers ought not to suffer themselves to be Silenced and Deposed from their Publick Ministery no not by Lawful Magistrates Mr. Bradshaw Answered This Assertion is false and seditious And when Iohnson saith That the Apostles did not make their immediate Calling from God the ground of their refusal but this that they ought to obey God rather than Man which is a Duty required of all Ministers and Christians Bradshaw a Person formerly in great esteem with Mr. Baxter and highly commended by the Author of the Vindication of his Dispute with Iohnson gives this Answer 1. Though the Apostles did not assign their immediate Calling from God as the Ground of their refusal in so many Letters and Syllables yet that which they do assign is by Implication and in effect the same with it For it is as much as if they had said God himself hath imposed this Calling upon us and not Man and therefore except we should rather obey Man than God we may not forbear this Office which he hath imposed upon us For opposing the Obedience of God to the obedience of Man they therein plead a Calling from God and not from Man otherwise if they had received a Calling from Man there had been incongruity in the Answer considering that in common sense and reason they ought so far forth to obey Men forbidding them to exercise a Calling as they exercise the same by vertue of that Calling Else by this reason a Minister should not cease to Preach upon the Commandment of the Church that hath chosen him but should be bound to give them also the same Answer which the Apostles gave which were absurd So that by this gross conceit of Mr. Johnson there should be no Power in any sort of Men whosoever to depose a Minister from his Ministery but that nowithstanding any Commandment of Church or State the Minister is to continue in his Ministery 2. For the further Answer of this his ignorant conceit plainly tending to Sedition we are to know that though the Apostles Prophets and Evangelists Preached Publickly where they were not hindred by open violence and did not nor might not leave their Ministery upon any Human Authority or Commandment whatsoever because they did not enter into or exercise the same upon the will and pleasure of any Man whatsoever yet they never erected and planted Publick Churches and Ministeries in the Face of the Magistrate whether they would or no or in despite of them but such in respect of the Eye of the Magistrate were as private and invisible as might be 3. Neither were some of the Apostles only forbidden so as others should be suffered to Preach the same Gospel in their places but the utter abolishing of Christian Religion was manifestly
II. Of the Nature of the Present Separation Sect. 1. HAving made it my business in the foregoing Discourse to shew How far the present Dissenters are gone off from the Principles of the old Non-conformists I come to consider What those Principles are which they now proceed upon And those are of Two sorts First Of such as hold partial and occasional Communion with our Churches to be lawful but not total and constant i. e. they judge it lawful at some times to be present in some part of our Worship and upon particular occasions to partake of some acts of Communion with us but yet they apprehend greater purity and edification in separate Congregations and when they are to choose they think themselves bound to choose these although at certain seasons they may think it lawful to submit to occasional Communion with our Church as it is now established Secondly Of such as hold any Communion with our Church to be unlawful because they believe the Terms of its Communion unlawful for which they instance in the constant use of the Liturgy the Aereal sign of the Cross kneeling at the Communion the observation of Holy-dayes renouncing other Assemblies want of Discipline in our Churches and depriving the People of their Right in choosing their own Pastors To proceed with all possible clearness in this matter we must consider these Three things 1. What things are to be taken for granted by the several parties with respect to our Church 2. Wherein they differ among themselves about the nature and degrees of Separation from it 3. What the true State of the present Controversie about Separation is I. In General they cannot deny these three things 1. That there is no reason of Separation because of the Doctrine of our Church 2. That there is no other reason of Separation because of the Terms of our Communion than what was from the beginning of the Reformation 3. That Communion with our Church hath been still allowed by the Reformed Churches abroad 1. That there is no Reason of Separation because of the Doctrine of our Church This was confessed by the Brownists and most rigid Separatists as is proved already and our present Adversaries agree herein Dr. Owen saith We agree with our Brethren in the Faith of the Gospel and we are firmly united with the main Body of Protestants in this Nation in Confession of the same Faith And again The Parties at difference do agree in all Substantial parts of Religion and in a Common Interest as unto the preservation and defence of the Protestant Religion Mr. Baxter saith That they agree with us in the Doctrine of the 39 Articles as distinct from the form of Government and imposed abuses And more fully elsewhere Is not the Non conformists Doctrine the same with that of the Church of England when they subscribe to it and offer so to do The Independents as well as Presbyterians offer to subscribe to the Doctrine of the 39 Articles as distinct from Prelacy and Ceremony We agree with them in the Doctrine of Faith and the Substance of God's Worship saith the Author of the last Answer And again We are one with the Church of England in all the necessary points of Faith and Christian Practice We are one with the Church of England as to the Substance and all necessary parts of God's Worship And even Mr. A. after many trifling cavils acknowledges That the Dissenters generally agree with that Book which is commonly called the 39 Articles which was compiled above a Hundred years ago and this Book some Men call the Church of England I know not who those Men are nor by what Figure they speak who call a Book a Church but this we all say That the Doctrine of the Church of England is contained therein and whatever the opinions of private persons may be this is the Standard by which the Sense of our Church is to be taken And that no objection ought to be made against Communion with our Church upon account of the Doctrine of it but what reaches to such Articles as are owned and received by this Church 2. That there are in effect no new termes of Communion with this Church but the same which our first Reformers owned and suffered Martyâ—dom for in Q. Maries days Not but that some alterations have been made since but not such as do in the Judgment of our Brethren make the terms of Communion harder than before Mr. Baxter grants that the terms of Lay Communion are rather made easier by such Alterations even since the additional Conformity with respect to the late Troubles The same Reasons then which would now make the terms of our Communion unlawful must have held against Cranmer Ridley c. who laid down their Lives for the Reformation of this Church And this the old Non-conformists thought a considerable Argument against Separating from the Communion of our Church because it reflected much on the honor of our Martyrs who not only lived and died in the Communion of this Church and in the practice of those things which some are now most offended at but were themselves the great Instruments in setling the Terms of our Communion 3. That Communion with our Church hath been still owned by the Protestant and Reformed Churches abroad Which they have not only manifested by receiving the Apology and Articles of our Church into the Harmony of Confessions but by the Testimony and Approbation which hath been given to it by the most Esteemed and Learned Writers of those Churches and by the discountenance which they have still given to Separation from the Communion of it This Argument was often objected against the Separatists by the Non-conformists and Ainsworth attempts to Answer it no less than Four times in one Book but the best Answer he gives is That if it prove any thing it proves more than they would have For saith he the Reformed Churches have discerned the National Church of England to be a true Church they have discerned the Diocesan Bishops of England as well as the Parish-Priests to be true Ministers and rejoyce as well for their Sees as for your Parishes having joyned these all alike in theâ—r Harmony As to the good opinion of the Reformed Church and Protestant Divines abroad concerning the Constitution and Orders of our Church so much hath been proved already by Dr. Durel and so little or nothing hath been said to disprove his Evidence that this ought to be taken as a thing granted but if occasion be given both he and oâ—hers are able to produce much more from the Testimony of foreign Divines in Justification of the Communion of our Church against all pretences of Separation from it Sect. 2. We now come to the several Hypotheses and Principles of Separation which are at this day among the Dissenters from our Church Some do seem to allow Separate Congregations only in such places where the Churches are not
and an ignorant zeal may perhaps be more edifying to some capacities and to some purposes than judicious and well studied Sermons This Argument must therefore be quitted and they who will defend the present Separation must return to the old Principles of the Separatists if they will justifie their own practices And so I find Mr. B. is forced to do for discerning that the pretence of greater Edification would not hold of it self he adds more weight to it and that comes home to the business viz. That the People doubt of the Calling of the obtruded Men. This is indeed an Argument for Separation and the very same which Barrow and Greenwood and Iohnson and Smith and Can used Now we are come to the old Point of defending the Calling of our Ministry but we are mistaken if we think they now manage it after the same manner We do not hear so much the old terms of a False and Antichristian Ministry but if they do substitute others in their Room as effectual to make a Separation but less fit to justifie it the difference will not appear to be at all to their advantage Sect. 7. 2. I come therefore to consider the Principles of our new Separatists as to the Ministry of our Church and to discover how little they differ from the old Separatists when this matter is throughly enquired into as to the Argument for Separation I. In General they declare That they only look on those as true Churches which have such Pastors whom they approve How oft have I told you saith Mr. B. that I distinguish and take those for true Churches that have true Pastors But I take those for no true Churches that have 1. Men uncapable of the Pastoral Office 2. Or not truly called to it 3. Or that deny themselves to have the power essential to a Pastor And one or other of these he thinks most if not all the Parochial Churches in England fall under You will say then Mr. B. is a Rigid Separatist and thinks it not lawful to joyn with any of our Parochial Congregations but this is contradicted by his own Practice There lies therefore a farther subtilty in this matter for he declares in the same place he can joyn with them notwithstanding But how as true Churches though he saith they are not No but as Chappels and Oratories although they be not Churches as wanting an essential part This will bring the matter to a very good pass the Parish Churches of England shall only be Chappels of Ease to those of the Non-conformists This I confess is a Subtilty beyond the reach of the old Brownists and Non-conformists for they both took it for granted that there was sufficient ground for Separation if our Churches were not true Churches and the Proof of that depended on the Truth of our Ministry Now saith Mr. B. Although our Parochial Congregations be not true Churches because they want an essential part viz. a true Ministry yet he can joyn with them occasionally as Chappels or Oratories From whence it appears that he accounts not our Parochial Churches as true Churches nor doth communicate with them as such but only looks on them as Publick places of Prayer to which a Man may resort upon occasion without owning any relation to the Minister or looking on the Congregation as a Church For where he speaks more fully he declares That he looks on none as true Churches but such as have the Power of the Keys within themselves and hath a Bishop or Pastor over them with that Power and any Parochial Church that hath such a one and ownes it self to be independent he allows to be a true Church and none else So that unless our Parochial Churches and Ministers assume to themselves Episcopal Power in opposition to the present Constitution of our Church as he apprehends he at once discards them all from being true Churches but I shall afterwards discover his mistake as to the nature of our Parochial Churches that which I only insist on now is That he looks on none of them as truly constituted Churches or as he calls it of the Political Organized Form as wanting an essential part viz. a true Pastor From hence it necessarily follows either that Mr. B. communicates with no true Church at all or it must be a Separate Church or if he thinks himself bound to be a Member of a true Church he must proceed to as a great Separation as the old Brownists did by setting up new Churches in opposition to ours It is no sufficient Answer in this case to say That Mr. B. doth it not for we are only to shew what he is obliged to do by vertue of his own Principles which tend to as much Separation as was practised in former times and hath been so often condemned by Mr. B. Sect. 8. II. Suppose they should allow our Parochial Churches in their Constitution to be true Churches yet the exceptions they make against the Ministers of our Churches are so many that they scarce allow any from whom they may not lawfully Separate 1. If the People judge their Ministers unworthy or incompetent they allow them liberty to withdraw and to Separate from them This I shall prove from many passages in several Books of Mr. B. and others First They 〈◊〉 it in the Peoples Power notwithstanding all Legaâ—â—stablishments to own or disown whom they judge sit Mr. B. speaks his Mind very freely against the Rights and â—etronage and the Power of Magistrates in these cases and pleads for the unalterable Rights of the People as the old Separatists did God saith Mr. B. in Nature and Scripture hath given the People that consenting Power antecedent to the Princes determination which none can take from them Mr. A. saith Every particular Church has an inherent right to choose its own Pastors Dr. O. makes the depriving the People of this right one of his grounds of Separation So that although our Ministers have been long in possession of their Places yet if the People have not owned them they are at liberty to choose whom they please How many hundred Congregations saith Mr. B. have Incumbents whom the People never consented to but take them for their hinderers and burden So many hundred Congregations it seems are in readiness for Separation Secondly The People are made Iudges of the worthiness and competency of their Ministers This follows from the former In case incompetent Pastors be set over the People saith Mr. B. though it be half the Parishes in a Kingdom or only the tenth part it is no Schism saith he but a Duty for those that are destitute to get the best supply they can i.e. to choose those whom they judge more competent and it is no Schism but a Duty for faithful Ministers though forbidden by Superiors to perform their Office to such people that desire it This is plain dealing But suppose the Magistrate should cast out
I do not understand For there is no more colour for the Peoples resuming their right especially a small part against the whole in one case then in the other Which makes me wonder at those who daâ—e call them Vsurpers who enjoy their places by the same Laws that any Men do enjoy their Estates And they who assert that the people are bound notwithstanding the Laws to adhere to their former Pastors as Mr. A. doth who saith They judge it their unquestionable duty to abide in that relation to their ejected Pastors do not only assert a power in a handful of people to act against established Laws passed by general consent in Parliament but overthrow the settlement of our Church upon the Reformation For the Papists then had the very same Plea that these Men have now vâ—z That the Magistrate could not dissolve the relation between their former Church Guides and them and thereforâ— notwithstanding Acts of Parliament they were still hound to adhere to them For the Magistrate had no power in such matters and the real Schism was to withdraw from those Guides just as Mr. A. speaks concerning the ejected Ministers So much do these Men in pursuing the interests of their Parties overthrow the principles of the Reformation For either the Magistrate hath a Power to Silence some Ministers and to put others in their places or he hath none if he hath none then What becomes of the Iustice of the Reformation when the Popish Bishops and Priests were ejected and others put into their places If they say He hath a just power in some cases but not in theirs Is not this a Plea common to all For whoever thought themselves justly ejected Or that they did any thing which deserved so severe a punishment What then is to be done in this case if Men think themselves unjustly cast out The old Non-conformists said They ought to sit down quietly with this satisfaction that there were others to Preach the Word of God soundly although they did not They might by joyning in their private capacities in Communion with our Churches and drawing the People to it by their example and encouragement have done more good both to the People and to this Church than I fear their publick preaching in opposition to the Laws hath done to either But if they go upon such principles â—s these That the Magistrate had no rightful power to eject them That others are Vsurpers who come in their places That the People are still bound to own them in their former relation notwithstanding the Laws And that 't is Schism to separate from them notwithstanding that they confess the True Religion is maintained and preached in our publick Assemblies I leave it to others to determine how consistent such Principles are with the submission Men owe to Government or that peaceable behaviour which becometh Christians This I the rather insist upon because I find not only Mr. B. and Mr. A. asserting it but that it is made the standing Plea for the necessity of the present Separation among those who do not hold all Communion with our Churches unlawful So the latest of my Answerers makes a Question Whether they can be said to erect new Churches or proceed to the forming of separate Congregations who were true Ministers and had their Congregations before others came into their places If they had done nothing worthy of ejection or exclusion from their Ministry whether they have not still a right to exercise their Function And consequently whether others may not as justly be said to draw away their People from them as they are charged with the same practice There is not one word in all this Plea but might have equally served the Papists in the beginning of the Reformation For the Law signifies nothing with them in any case where themselves are concerned if Ministers be ejected without or against Law they who come into their places are no Usurpers and if they are cast out by Law they that succeed them are Usurpers so that the Law is always the least thing in their consideration Secondly All those who come into any Pastoral charge whether Bishops by vertue of the Kings Nomination or others by the Presentation of Patrons are Vsurpers unless the People be pleased to give their free consent and if they do it not they may lawfully withdraw from them For saith Mr. B. the People have an antecedent Right to consent which none can take from them And he saith he hath proved it by many Canons that he was no Bishop that was not chosen by the Clergy and the People or came in without the Peoples consent Nay if they have the consent of some and not of the greater part those who did not consent may proceed to choose another Bishop if Mr. B. say true For these are his words If a Diocess have a Thousand or 600 or 300 Parish Pastors and a Hundred thousand or a Million of People or 50000 or 20000 as ye will suppose and if only a dozen or 20 Presbyters and a Thousand People or none chuse the Bishop this is not the Election or Consent of the Diocesan Church nor is it Schism for twenty thousand to go against the Votes of two thousand Therefore if they have so much the advantage in polling as Mr. A. suggests there is nothing hinders them but that in spite of Laws they may proceed to the choice of new Bishops and new Pastors of Churches wherever they think they can make the Majority For this is an inherent and unalterable right in the People say they to choose their own Pastors Again saith Mr. B. in the name of the Party in his Plea If Bishops that have no better a Foundation i.e. that come in by the Kings Nomination and not by the Majority of the People shall impose inferior Pastors or Presbyters on the Parish Churches and command the Peoples acceptance and obeâ—â—â—nce i.e. if they give them Institution upon a Patrons presentation the People are not bound to accept and obey them by any Authority that is in that command as such nor is it Schism to disobey it no more than it is Treason to reject the Vsurper of a Kingdom It is plain then all Bishops of the Kings Nomination all Ministers presented by Patrons are meer Vsurpers the People may give them a good Title if they please but they are not to blame if they do it not For in them Mr. B. saith the chief Power is and sometimes he tells them they are bound to Separate however while they do not consent they are no Churches which they are set over and it is no Schism so to pronounce them nor to deny them Communion proper to a Church Is not this an excellent Plea for Peace and the true and only way of Concord which lays the foundation for all imaginable Disorders and Confusions only that they might have some pretence for their present Separation Sect. 12. 3.
the Gospel Was not the same Authority the same charge as to both of them Was there not the same promise and engagement to give faithful diligence to Minister the Doctrine and Sacraments Is there an indispensable obligation to do one part of your duty and none at all to the other Is this possible to perswade impartial Men that for 18 years together you thought your self bound to Preach against the Laws and yet never thought your self bound to do that which you were as solemnly obliged to do as the other Mr. B. knows very well in Church-History that Presbyters were rarely allowed to Preach and not without leave from the Bishop and that in some of the Churches he most esteems too viz. the African but they were constantly bound to Administer the Sacraments so that if one obligation were stricter than the other that was so which Mr. B. dispensed with himself in for 18 years together and why he might not as well in the other is not easie to understand However Why all this while no Constant Communicant with any Church What no Church among us fit for him to be a Member of No Obligation upon a Christian to that equal to the necessity of Preaching These things must seem very strange to those who judge of Christian Obligations by the Scripture and the Vniversal Sense and practice of the Christian Church in the best and purest Ages To what purpose is it to dispute about the true notion of an Instituted Church for personal presential Communion if men can live for 18 years together without joyning in Communion with any such Church What was this Communion intended for The antient Churches at this rate might easily be capacious enough for their Members if some never joyned with them in so long a time But he hath communicated occasionally with us Yes to shew what defective and tolerable Churches he can communicate with but not as a Member as himself declares and this occasional Communion makes him none For Mr. A. saith Their occasional Communion with us is but like any of our occasional Communion with them or occasional hearing of a weak Preacher or occasional going to a Popish Chappel which no one imagines makes the Persons Members of such Congregations If therefore Men use this occasional Communion more than once or twice or ten or twenty times as long as they declare it is only occasional communion it makes them no Members of our Churches for that obliges them to fixed and constant Communion Secondly They that have fixed and constant communion in a Church gathered out of another are in a State of Separation from the Church out of which it is gathered although they may be occasionally present in it Now if Men who think our constant communion unlawful Do judge themselves bound to joyn together in another Society for purer administrations as Mr. A. speaks and to choose new Pastors this is gathering new Churches and consequently is a plain Separation from those Churches out of which they are gather'd The Author of the Letter out of the Country speaks plainly in this matter Such saith he of the dissenting Ministers as have most openly declared for communicating at some times with some of the Parochial Churches have also declared their judgment of the lawfulness and necessity of Preaching and Hearing and doing other Religious Duties in other Congregations also If this be true as no doubt that Gentleman well understands their Principles then we see plainly a Separation owned notwithstanding the occasional communion with our Churches For here is not only a lawfulness but a necessity asserted of joyning in Separate Congregations for Preaching Hearing and other Religious Duties And here are all the parts necessary for making New Churches Pastors People and joyning together for Religious Worship in a way separate from our Assemblies For although they allow the lawfulness of occasional communicating with some of them yet they are so far from allowing constant communion that they assert a necessity of separate Congregations for Divine Worship And what was there more then this which the old Separatists held For when they first published the Reasons of their Separation which Giffard Answered they laid down the grounds of their dissatisfaction with our Assemblies from whence they inferred the necessity of Separation and then declare that they only sought the Fellowship and Communion of Gods faithful servants and by the direction of his Holy Spirit to proceed to a choice of new Pastors with whom they might joyn in all the Ordinances of Christ. And what is there in this different from what must follow from the Principles of those who assert the necessity of joyning in other Congregations distinct and separate from our Assemblies for the performance of Religious Duties And if there be a necessity of Separation as this Gentleman tells us they generally hold that seem most moderate the holding the lawfulness of occasional Communion will not excuse them from the guilt of the other For as long as the necessity of Separation was maintained the other was alwayes accounted a less material dispute and some held one way and some another And for this occasional communion the same Author tells us that he looks upon it but as drinking a single glass of Wine or of Water against his own inclination to a person out of Civility when he is not for any Mans pleasure to destroy his health by tying himself to drink nothing else It seems then this occasional communion is a meer Complement to our Churches wherein they force themselves to a dangerous piece of civility much against their own inclinations but they account constant communion a thing pernicious to their Souls as the other is destructive to their health So that this Salvo cannot excuse them from the guilt of Separation Sect. 17. 2. That as far as occasional Communion is lawful constant Communion is a Duty This the former Gentleman wonders at me if I think a good consequence Mr. A. brings several instances to prove that we allow occasional Communion to be lawful where constant is no duty as with other Parish Churches upon a Iourney at a Lecture c. but who ever question'd the lawfulness of occasional Communion with Churches of the same constitution or thought a Man was bound to be always of that Church where he goes to hear a Lecture c. but the question is about the lawfulness of Separation where occasional Commuon is allowed to be lawful For a man is not said to separate from every Church where he forbears or ceases to have Communion but only from that Church with which he is obliged to hold Communion and yet withdraws from it And it is a wonder to me none of my Friends my Adversaries I am loth to call them could discern this It is lawful saith Mr. B. to have Communion with the French Dutch or Greek Church Must constant Communion therefore with them be a duty Yes if he were obliged
themselves when they saw no hopes of recovering the Churches Communion if they once fell from it Add to this that Novatus or Novatianus for the Greeks confounded their Names in his Epistle to Dionysius of Alexandria saith That he was forced to do what he did by the importunity of the Brethren who out of their zeal for the Purity of the Ecclesiastical Discipline would not comply with the looser part which joyned with Cornelius and therefore chose him to be their Bishop And so much appears by Pacianus that Novatus coming from Carthage to Rome makes a party there for Novatiaâ—us in opposition to Cornelius which consisted chiefly of those who had stood firmest in the Persecution in their Name he Writes to Novatianus declaring That he was chosen by the zealous Party at Rome whereas Cornelius had admitted the lapsed to Communion and consequently corrupted the Discipline of the Christian Church Here we have a concurrence of Dr. O's Pleas Zeal for Reformation of Discipline the greater Edification of the People and the asserting their Right in choosing such a Pastor as was not likely to promote their Edification But notwithstanding these fair pretences the making a Separation in the Church was every where condemned as a great Sin as appears by St. Cyprian Dionysius of Alexandria Theodoret Epiphanius and others Dionysius tells the Author of the Schism that he had better have suffer'd any thing than thus to have made a Rent in the Church and it was as glorious a Martyrdom to die to prevent a Schism as to avoid Idolatry and he thinks it a much greater thing the one being a Martyrdom for the Church the other only for ones own Soul St. Cyprian charges those who were guilty of this Schism with Pride and Arrogance and doing unspeakable mischief to the Church by breaking the Peace of it and will hardly allow those to be Christians who lived in such a Schism when as Epiphanius observes they still pleaded they had the same Faith with the Catholick Church and yet St. Cyprian will not allow that to be true Faith which hath not charity and saith That there can be no true charity where Men do thus break in pieces the Vnity of the Church The Meletians in Aegypt agreed with the Catholick Christians in the Substantials of Religion holding the same Faith with them as Epiphanius relates the Story and their Schism began too about preserving the Discipline of the Church and the best means for the Edification of the People They allowed a Restitution for the lapsed to the Communion of the Church but after a very severe Discipline and an utter incapacity of those in Orders as to any parts of their Functions But Peter Bishop of Alexandria thought the milder way the better whereupon a Separation followed and the Meletians had distinct Churches which they called The Churches of the Martyrs This Schism grew to that height that they would not pray together in Prison nor in the Quarries whither they were sent Meletius being a Bishop was deposed by Peter of Alexandria but he went on still to promote the course of Separation in Thebais and other parts of Egypt upon which the Council of Nice in their Synodical Epistle deprived him of all Episcopal Power and the People that adhered to him of the Power of choosing their own Pastors or rather of proposing the names of those who were to be ordained And so according to Dr. O. they had just cause to continue their Separation still although it were condemned by the Council of Nice Audaeus began his Schism out of a mighty zeal for the Discipline of the Church and a great freedom which he used in reproving the faults of the Bishops and Clergy but meeting with ill usage he withdrew from the Churches communion with his Disciples although he still retained the same Faith and agreed in the Substantials of Religion with the best Christians but forbore all communion with them which Epiphanius accounts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most dreadful thing in the World and yet upon Dr. O's Principles of Separation they did a very commendable thing as long as their design was to restore the Churches Discipline and to consult their own greater Edification The followers of Eustathius Sebastenus are on this account likewise excused who withdrew from the publick Congregations on a pretence of greater sanctity and purity in Paphlagonia and stand condemned in several Canons of the Council at Gangrae so are those mention'd and condemn'd in the Councils of Constantinople and Carthage and the Separation of Felicissimus and his Brethren from St. Cyprian all which are set down together in my Sermon but are gently passed over by Dr. O. and Mr. B. and the rest of their Adversaries Only one saith That the Errors of the followers of Eustathius Sebastenus both in Opinion and Practise were very gross which the Council takes notice of and condemns Yet as gross as they were there was a pretence of greater Sanctity and Purity in them For their abstaining from Marriage and peculiarity of Habits and Separate Meetings were all carried on with the same Pretence To proceed then On the same accounts the Donatists will be vindicated in the main grounds of their Schism although they were mistaken in the matter of fact concerning Coecilian for their great pretence was to preserve the purity of the Churches Discipline as may at large be seen in Optatus and St. Augustin and yet they frequently and deliberately call it a most Damnable and Sacrilegious Schism The Luciferians pretended such a zeal for the true Faith and the Discipline of the Church that the only pretence for their Schism was that they could not communicate with those who had subscribed to Arianism or received Ordination from Ariâ—n Bishops as may be seen at large in the Book of Marcellinus and Faustinus And they joyned with the party of Vrsinus at Rome against that of Damasus and complained they were deprived of the liberty of choosing their own Pastors So that upon these grounds there hath scarce been any considerable Schism in the Christian Church but may be justified upon Dr. Owens Reasons for Separation from our Church Sect. 26. 4. Another Argument against this course of Separation is That these grounds will make Separation endless Which is to suppose all the Exhortations of Scripture to Peace and Vnity among Christians to signifie nothing For nothing being more contrary to Vnity than Division and Separation if there be no bounds set but what the fancies of Men dictate to them be sufficient Grounds to justifie Division and Separation any People may break Communion with a Church and set up a new one when they think fit which will leave the Christian Church in a remediless condition against those who break its Peace and Communion It being a true saying of Mr. Cottons of New-England That they that separate from their Brethren farther than they have just Cause shall at length
whatsoever you shall bind c. From whence saith he by a constant succession of times such a course hath been always observed in the Church that the Church hath been still governed by Bishops and every Act of the Church hath been under their care and conduct Since this saith he is a Divine Institution I wonder at the boldness of those who have written at that rate to me concerning the lapsed since the Church consists in the Bishop the Clergy and the standing People In his Epistle to Antonianus he speaks of the Agreement of the Bishops throughout the whole world and in that to Cornelius that every Bishop hath a part of the flock committed to him which he is to govern and to give an account thereof to God and that a Bishop in the Church is in the place of Christ and that disobedience to him is the cause of schisms and disorders To the same purpose he speaks in his Epistle to Rogatianus and to Pupianus where he declares a Church to be a People united to a Bishop and to Stephanus that they have succeeded the Apostles in a constant course Let the Reader now judge whether these be the strokes and lineaments of the Congregational way and whether Dr. O. had any reason to appeal to Saint Cyprian for the Democratical Government of the Church But we have this advantage from this appeal that they do not suppose any deviation then from the Primitive Institution and what that was in Saint Cyprian's judgment any one may see when he speaks of nothing peculiar to his own Church but what was generally observed over the Christian world And now let Dr. O. give an account how a change so great so sudden so universal should happen in the Christian world in the Government of the Church that when Christ had placed the Power in the People the Bishops in so short a time should be every where settled and allowed to have the chief management in Church-affairs without any controul from the People which to me is as strong an argument as a matter of this nature will bear that the Power was at first lodged in them and not in the People For as Mr. Noys of New-England well argues It is not imaginable that Bishops should come by such Power as is recorded in Ecclesiastical History and that over all the world and in a way of ambition in such humbling times without all manner of opposition for 300 years together and immediately after the Apostles had it been usurpation or innovation When and where is innovation without opposition Would not Elders so many seeing and knowing men at least some of them have contended for Truth wherein their own Liberties and Rights were so much interessed Aërius his opposing of Bishops so long after their rise and standing is inconsiderable The force of which reasoning will sway more with an impartial and ingenuous mind than all the difficulties I ever yet saw on the other side So much for the account Dr. O. promises of the deviations of the Churches after the Apostles decease Sect. 5. 2. Dr. O. answers as to the matter of fact concerning the Institution of Congregational Churches that it seems to him evidently exemplified in the Scripture The matter of fact is that when Churches grew too big for one single Congregation in a City then a new Congregational Church was set up under new Officers with a separate Power of Government Let us now see Dr. O.'s proof of it For although it may be there is not express mention made that these or those particular Churches did divide themselves into more Congregations with new Officers i. e. Although the matter of fact be not evident in Scripture yet saith he there are Instances of the erection of new particular Congregations in the same Province But what is this to the proof of the Congregational way The thing I desired was that when the Christians in one City multiplied into more Congregations they would prove that they did make new and distinct Churches and to exemplifie this he mentions new Congregations in the same Province Who ever denied or disputed that On the contrary the proof of this is a great advantage to our Cause for since where the Scripture speaks of the Churches of a Province it speaks of them as of different Churches but when it mentions the Christians of one City it calls them the Church of that City as the Church of Ierusalem the Church of Ephesus but the Churches of Iudea Galilee and Samaria what can be more evident than that the Christians of one City though never so numerous made but one Church If one observe the language of the New Testament one may find this observation not once to fail that where Churches are spoken of in the plural number they are the Churches of a Province as the Churches of Iudea the Churches of Asia the Churches of Syria and Cilicia the Churches of Galatia the Churches of Macedonia but where all the Christians of one City are spoken of it is still câ—lled the Church of that City as the Church at Antioch the Church at Corinth and when the 7 Churches are spoken of together they are the 7 Churches but when spoken to single it is the Church of Ephesus the Church of Smyrna c. Which being spoken without any discrimination as to the difference of these places in greatness and capacity or the number of Believers in them doth evidently discover that what number soever they were they were all but the Church of that City For it is not to be supposed that the number of Christians was no greater in Ephesus Sardis Pergamus and Laodicea which were great and populous Cities than in Thyatira and Philadelphia which were much less especially considering the time Saint Paul staid at Ephesâ—s and the mighty success which he had in preaching there which will amount to no great matter if in three years time he converted no more than made up one single Congregation And thus men to serve an Hypothesis take off from the mighty Power and prevalency of the Gospel I cannot but wonder what Dr. O. means when after he hath produced the evidence of distinct Churches in the same Province as Galatia and Macedonia he calls this plain Scripture evidence and practice for the erecting particular distinct Congregations who denies that but I see nothing like a proof of distinct Churches in the same City which was the thing to be proved but because it could not be proved was prudently let alone whereas we have plain Scripture evidence that all the Christians of a City though never so great made but one Church and uncontroulable evidence from Antiquity that the neighbouring Christians were laid to the Church of the City All that he saith further to this matter is that such Churches had power to rule and govern themselves because in every one of them Elders were ordained Act.
cited out of his History but not one that comes near any proof of this matter The 1. proves that in a time of Persecution at Alexandria nineteen Presbyters and Deacons were banished to Heliopolis in Phoenicia where there were no Christians Therefore in Theodoret's time there was no Diocesan Episcopacy The 2. shews that in a small City of Thebais Whither Eulogius and Protogenes were banished and there were but a few Christians yet there was a Bishop Who ever denied this where there was a prospect of converting more as appears by the endeavours of Eulogius and Protogenes there But he ought to have proved that as the Christians increased new Bishops were made which this is very far from The 3. proves that Lucius of Alexandria was made Bishop by force without any Synod of Bishops or Choice of the Clergy or Request of the People I suppose by this time Mr. B. had forgotten what he promised to prove from Theodoret. But I wonder how it came into his mind to say the Church of Alexandria at that time was like a Presbyterian Church which I am sure he had not from Theodoret nor from the Epistle of Peter of Alexandria The 4. is intended to prove that in the time of Valens the Patriarchal Orthodox Church of Alexandria was but one Assembly which met onely in one place at once But it is very unhappy that Theodoret shews just the contrary in that place for he saith that Valens expelled the Orthodox Christians out of their Churches 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are his very words to whom he saith Iovianus had likewise given the new built Church Which Mr. B. thus translates Valens found the Orthodox even in the great Patriarchial City of Antioch in possession but of one Church which good Jovinian the Emperour had given them of which he dispossessed them I desire any one who relies on Mr. B.'s skill and fidelity in these matters but to compare this Translation with the Text in Theodoret and I dare say he will see cause to admire it But if any one can imagin that the Patriarchal Church of Antioch in the time of Valens could consist but of one Congregation for my part I must give him over as one uncapable of being convinced of any thing by me I do not speak what the Church in a time of great persecution might be driven to but of what it was in its settled state The 5. is from Terentius his begging One Church for the Orthodox of Valens which saith Mr. B. intimates their numbers I am ashamed to reade much more to confute such arguments as these For if the Papists should desire the liberty but of one Church in London doth that prove they are no more than can make one Congregation The 6. proves that Maris was made Bishop of Dolicha a small Town infected with Arianism It is true Theodoret saith Doliche was a little City and so he tells us Cyrus was no great one but he doth not set down the bounds of the Diocese which for any thing we see in Theodoret might be as large as we have evidently proved from him the Diocese of Cyrrhus was Let the Reader now judge whether Theodoret doth not plainly overthrow Mr. B.'s notion of Parochial Episcopacy But Mr. B. insists upon the Institution of Christ and if Christ hath appointed one sort of Churches viz. for personal Communion and men make another is not this a violation of Christ's Command and setting up Man against God I see no evidence produced for any such Institution of Christ which limits Episcopal Power to a single Congregation and therefore the extending it to more can be no violation of Christ's Command or setting up a new species of Churches as will appear from Mr. B. himself under the next particular Yet Mr. B. according to his wonted meekness towards his Adversaries charges me for speaking against this principle of his with pleading for presumption profanation usurpation uncharitableness schism what not What is the reason of all this rage and bitterness Why I set down a saying of his as going beyond the Independents in making the devising new species of Churches beyond Parochial or Congregational without God's Authority and to impose them on the world yea in his name and call all dissenters Schismaticks a far worse usurpation than to make or impose new Ceremonies or Liturgies But is not all this true supposing that such new species of Churches be so devised and so imposed That is not to the business for that which I quoted it for was to shew that Mr. B. looked upon all Churches beyond Parochial as Churches meerly of mens devising and that to charge men with Schism for opposing any such Constitution is unreasonable and that the imposing it as Divine is an intolerable usurpation and all this at the same time when he pretends to write for Peace and Concord My business is now to shew Sect. 11. 2. That such an Episcopacy as is practised here and was so in the Primitive Church is no devising a new species of Churches nor hath any thing repugnant to any Institution of Christ. And to prove this I need no more than one of Mr. B. ' s own Cautions in his Premonition viz. that he doth not dispute the lawfulness of Archbishops as he calls them over Parochial Bishops as Successours to the Apostolical and other general Overseers of the first Age in the ordinary continued parts of their Office And what he saith in his own name and others in his Plea for Peace There are some of us that much incline to think that Archbishops that is Bishops that have oversight of many Churches with their Pastours are lawfull Successours of the Apostles in the ordinary part of their Work But I cannot here omit Mr. Baxter ' s Arguments to prove that the Ordinary governing part of the Apostolical Office was settled for all following Ages 1. Because we reade of the settling of that form but we never reade of any abolition discharge or cessation of the Institution 〈…〉 affirm a cessation without proof we seem to accuse God of mutability as settling one form of Government for one Age onely and no longer 3. We leave room for audacious Wits accordingly to question other Gospel Institutions as Pastours Sacraments c. and to say they were but for an Age. 4. It was general Officers Christ promised to be with to the end of the world Matt. 28. 20. Which being joyned with the Consent of the Christian Church of the Ages succeeding the Apostles that the Apostles did leave Successours in the care and Government of Churches have a great deal of weight in them and overballance the difficulties on the other side As upon this occasion I think fit to declare From whence I argue thus That which is onely a Continuance of the same kind of Churches which were in being in the Apostolical times is no devising a new species of Churches nor hath any thing
26 Canon which saith that no Minister shall in any wise admit any one of his Flock or under his care to the Communion of the Lord's Supper who is notoriously known to live impenitently in any scandalous Sin This is not in the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum which he mentions as an abortive thing published by Iohn Fox which last any one that hath seen them knows to be a mistake nor in Dr. Mocket's Book which was burnt yet not so destroyed but with some diligence he might have seen it but it was for nothing of this kind that Book underwent so severe a censure as Mr. B. insinuates but for seeming to incroach too much on the King's Prerogative But I appeal to what Mr. B. calls the Authorized Church Canons which I think are plain in this case But Mr. B. saith this is not the lesser excommunication but a temporary suspension of the Ministers own Act in delivering the Sacrament to such persons Let Mr. B. call it by what name he pleaseth this is certain the Minister is impowred is required to doe this the question then is whether this be not such a Censure of the Church as to suspend notorious Offenders from the Sacrament and that within the Power of the Parochial Minister I grant this is not the lesser excommunication according to the Vse of this Church for that supposeth the sentence passed and is so called by way of distinction from the greater pronounced by the Bishop in Person upon extraordinary occasions But yet it is a Church-censure upon Offenders and was accounted a sort of excommunication by the Ancient Church for those who were in the state of Penitents were then said to be under a kind of excommunication as appears by several passages in S. Augustin produced by Spalatensis to this purpose viz. to prove that there was a penitential excommunication But Mr. B. quotes Albaspinaeus to shew that the old Excommunication did shut persons out from all other Church-communion as well as the Sacrament Which is very true of the greater Excommunication but besides this there were other Censures of the Church upon Offenders whereby they were suspended from full Communion but not debarred the hopes of it upon satisfaction given These were said to be in the state of Penitents It was a favour to the excommunicated to be brought into this state and others were never allowed to hope to be restored to Communion others onely on their death-beds others according to the nature and degrees of their Repentance of which those were left to be Iudges who were particularly intrusted with the care of the Penitents Albaspinaeus grants that as long as men remained Penitents they were actually deprived of the Priviledges of Church-communion but he saith the Penitents were in a middle state between the excommunicated and the faithfull being still Candidates as he calls them so that all that were Penitents were suspended from Communion but not wholly cast out of the Church because the Christians might as freely converse with these as with any but they were not allowed to participate in the Sacred Mysteries But there was no question wherever there was a Power to suspend any Persons from Communion there was a Power of Discipline because the Churches Discipline did not consist merely in the power of Excommunication no more than a Iudges power lies onely in condemning men to be hanged but in so governing the Members of the Church that Scandalous persons may be kept from the greatest Acts of Communion and by Admonition and Counsel be brought to a due preparation for it Since then our Church doth give power to Parochial Ministers to suspend notorious Offenders from the Communion it is thereby evident that it doth not deprive them of all the necessary and essential parts of Church-discipline But saith Mr. B. If a Minister doth publickly admonish another by name not censured by the Ordinary the Lawyers tell him he may have his action against him I answer 1. What need this publick Admonition by name Doth the nature of Church-discipline lie in that Suppose a man be privately and effectually dealt with to withdraw himself is not this sufficient I am sure Saint Augustin took this course with his People at Hippo he perswaded them to examine their own Consciences and if they found themselves guilty of such Crimes as rendred them unfit for the holy Communion he advised them to withdraw themselves from it till by Prayers and Fasting and Alms they had cleansed their Consciences and then they might come to it Here is no publick Admonition by name and in many cases Saint Augustin declares the Church may justly forbear the exercise of Discipline towards Offenders and yet the Church be a true Church and Christians obliged to communicate with it as appears by all his disputes with the Donatists 2. If a restraint be laid on Ministers by Law the question then comes to this whether the obligation to admonish publickly an Offender or to deny him the Sacrament if he will come to it be so great as to bear him out in the violation of a Law made by publick Authority with a design to preserve our Religion But my design is onely to speak to this case so far as the Church is concerned in it Sect. 16. If it be said that notwithstanding this the neglect and abuse of Discipline among us are too great to be justified and too notorious to be concealed I answer 1. That is not our question but whether our Parochial Churches have lost their being for want of the Power of Discipline and whether the Species of our Churches be changed by Diocesan Episcopacy which we have shewed sufficient Reason to deny And what other abuses have crept in ought in an orderly way to be reformed and no good man will deny his assistance in it 2. It is far easier to separate or complain for want of Discipline than to find out a due way to restore it No man hath more set out the almost insuperable difficulties which attend it than Mr. Baxter hath done especially in that it will provoke and exasperate those most who stand in need of it and be most likely to doe good on those who need it least 3. The case of our Churches now is very different from that of the Churches in the Primitive times For the great Reason of Discipline is not that for want of it the Consciences of Fellow-communicants would be defiled for to assert that were Donatism but that the honour of a Christian Society may be maintained If then the Christian Magistrates do take care to vindicate the Churches honour by due punishment of Scandalous Offenders there will appear so much less necessity of restoring the severity of the ancient Discipline To which purpose these words of the Royal Martyr King Charles I. are very considerable But his Majesty seeth no necessity that the Bishops challenge to the Power of Iurisdiction should be at all times as
and confusion will follow if every Congregation may have a several Rule of Worship and Doctrine of Faith without being liable to an account to any superiour Church Authority Which is all one as to suppose that every Family may govern it self because a Kingdom is made up of Families without any respect to the Laws and Constitution of a Kingdom No saith Dr. O. the case is not the same For God never appointed that there should be no other Government but that of Families And where hath he appointed that there should be no other Churches but particular Congregations But God by the Light and Law of Nature by the ends and use of the Creation of man by express Revelation in his Word hath by his own Authority appointed and approved other sorts of Civil Government So say I that God by the Light and Law of Reason by the ends and use of a Christian Society by express Institution of the Apostolical function in the care and Government of many Churches did declare that he did appoint and approve other sorts of Church Government besides that of particular Congregations For if God upon the dispersion of the Nations after the Floud had appointed twelve Princes to have ruled the People in their several dispersions it had been a plain demonstration he did not intend the several Families to have a distinct and independent Power within themselves but that they ought to be governed according to their appointment so in the case of Churches since Christ did appoint twelve Apostles to plant settle and govern Churches and set up Rulers in them but still under their Authority can any thing be plainer than that these particular Churches were not settled with an entire power of governing themselves But as in the former case if we suppose those twelve Princes to have led out their several Divisions and to have placed them in convenient Seats and given them general Rules for governing themselves in Peace and Order under such as they should appoint and as they found themselves decaying should nominate so many Successours as they thought fit for the ruling the several Colonies were they not then obliged to submit to such Governours Without breaking in pieces into so many Families every Master governing his family by himself which would certainly ruin and destroy them all because they could not have strength and union to defend themselves So it is again in the case of Churches The Apostles planted them and settled such Officers in them as were then fit to teach and govern them still reserving the main care of Government to themselves but giving excellent Rules of Charity Peace Obedience and Submission to Governours and as they withdrew from particular Churches within such a precinct as Crete was they appointed some whom they thought fit to take care of all those Churches and to constitute inferiour Officers to teach and rule them and therefore in this case here is no more independency in particular Congregations than in the other as to private Families which is as contrary to the general design of the Peace and Vnity of Christians and their mutual preservation and defence as in the former case In which we believe the civil Government to be from God although no Monarch can now derive his Title from such Princes at the first dispersion and would it not then seem unreasonable to question the succession of Bishops from the Apostles when the matter of fact is attested by the most early knowing honest and impartial Witnesses Lastly as in the former case several of those lesser Princes might unite themselves together by joynt-consent for their common interest and security and become one Kingdom so in the latter case several Bishops with the Churches under them might for promoting the common ends of Christianity and the Peace and establishment of their Churches joyn together under the same common bonds and become one National Church which being intended for the good of the whole so united and no ways repugnant to the design of the Institution and not usurping upon the Rights of others nor assuming more than can be managed as an universal Pastour must doe will appear to be no ways repugnant to any particular command or general Rules of the Gospel as the Pope's challenge of universal Dominion over the Church is Which I therefore mention that any one may see that the force of this Reasoning will never justifie the Papal Vsurpations But saith Dr. O. National Provincial Churches must first be proved of Christ's Institution before they can be allowed to have their power given them by Iesus Christ. And yet in the case of Congregational Churches he saith there is no need of any positive Rule or direction for the Nature of the thing it self and the duty of men with respect to the end of such Churches is sufficient for it And this is as much as we plead in behalf of National Churches viz. What the nature of a Christian Society and the duty of men with respect to the end of it doth require For whatever tends to the support of Religion to the preserving Peace and Vnity among Christians to the preventing dangerous Errours and endless confusions from the very nature of the thing and the end of a Christian Society becomes a Duty For the general Rules of Government lay an obligation upon men to use the best means for advancing the ends of it It being then taken for granted among all Christians 1. That Christ is the Authour or founder of this Society which we call the Church 2. That he designs the continuance and preservation of it 3. That the best way of its preservation is by an Vnion of the members of it provided the Union be such as doth not overthrow the ends of it We may reasonably infer that whatever tends to promote this Vnion and to prevent any notable inconveniencies or mischiefs which may happen to it is within the design of the first Institution although it be not contained in express words Sect. 19. We are now therefore to consider whether single Congregations dispersed and disunited over a Nation or a combination of them together under some common bonds as to Faith Government and Worship be the more likely way to promote Religion to secure the Peace and Tranquillity of a Church Let us then compare these two Hypotheses together in point of Reason as to these ends In the Congregational way there may be as many Religions as Churches I do not say there are but we are arguing now upon what may be from the nature of the thing Supposing then every Congregation to have an entire and unaccountable Power within it self what hinders but of ten Congregations one may be of Socinians another of Papists another of Arians another of Quakers another of Anabaptists c. and it may be no two of them of the same mind But if they be it is meer chance and good hap there being no obligation upon them to have any more
Theophylact. And both have it from Saint Chrysostom So it is said concerning Timothy himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who had a good Testimony from the Brethren in Lystra and Iconium And this is mentioned before Saint Paul's taking him into the Office of an Evangelist So in the choice of the Deacons the Apostles bid them find out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 men of good reputation among them And there is a very considerable Testimony in the Epistle of Clemens to this purpose where he gives an account how the Apostles preaching through Cities and Countries did appoint their First-fruits having made a spiritual trial of them to be Bishops and Deacons of those who were to believe Here it is plain that they were of the Apostles appointment and not of the Peoples choice and that their Authority could not be from them whom they were appointed first to convert and then to govern and although their number was but small at first yet as they increased though into many Congregations they were still to be under the Government of those whom the Apostles appointed over them And then he shews how those who had received this Power from God came to appoint others and he brings the Instance of Moses when there was an emulation among the Tribes what method he took for putting an end to it by the blossoming of Aarons Rod which saith he Moses did on purpose to prevent confusion in Israel and thereby to bring Glory to God now saith he the Apostles foresaw the contentions that would be about the name of Episcopacy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. about the choice of men into that Office of Ruling the Church which the sense shews to be his meaning therefore foreseeing these things perfectly they appointed the persons before mentioned and left the distribution of their Offices with this instruction that as some died other approved men should be chosen into their Office Those therefore who were appointed by them or other eminent Men the whole Church being therewith well-pleased discharging their Office with humility quietness readiness and unblameableness being men of a long time of good report we think such men cannot justly be cast out of their Office It seems some of the Church of Corinth were at that time factious against some Officers in their Church and endeavoured to throw them out for the sake of one or two more and made such a disturbance thereby as had brought a great scandal not onely on themselves but the Christian Church which made Clemens write this Epistle to them wherein he adviseth those busie men rather to leave the Church themselves than to continue making such a disturbance in it and if they were good Christians they would do so and bring more glory to God by it than by all their heat and contentions Now by this discourse of Clemens it is plain 1. That these Officers of the Church were not chosen by the People but appointed by the Apostles or other great Men according to their Order 2. That they took this course on purpose to prevent the contentions that might happen in the Church about those who should bear Office in it 3. That all that the People had to doe was to give Testimony or to express their approbation of those who were so appointed For he could not allow their power of choosing since he saith the Apostles appointed Officers on purpose to prevent the contentions that might happen about it And it seems very probable to me that this was one great reason of the faction among them viz. that those few Popular men in that Church who caused all the disturbance represented this as a great grievance to them that their Pastours and Officers were appointed by others and not chosen by themselves For they had no objection against the Presbyters themselves being allowed to be men of unblameable lives yet a contention there was and that about casting them out and such a contention as the Apostles designed to prevent by appointing a succession from such whom themselves ordainâ—d and therefore it is very â—ikely they challenged this power to themselves to cast out those whom they had not chosen But it seems the Apostles knowing what contentions would follow in the Church took 〈…〉 them leaving to the People their Testimony concerning those whom they ordained And this is plain even from Saint Cyprian where he discourseth of this matter in that very Epistle concerning Basilides and Martialis to which Mr. Baxter refers me For the force of what Saint Cyprian saith comes at last onely to this giving Testimony therefore saith he God appointed the Priest to be appointed before all the People thereby shewing that Ordinations in the Christian Church ought to be sub Populi Assistentis Conscientiâ in the Presence of the People for what reason that they might give them Power no that was never done under the Law nor then imagined when S. Cyprian wrote but he gives the account of it himself that by their presence either their faults might be published or their good acts commended that so it may appear to be a just and lawfull Ordination which hath been examined by the suffrage and judgment of all The People here had a share in the Election but it was in matter of Testimony concerning the good or ill behaviour of the Person And therefore he saith it was almost a general Custom among them and he thinks came down from Divine Tradition and Apostolical Practice that when any People wanted a Bishop the neighbour Bishops met together in that place and the new Bishop was chosen plebe praesente the People being present not by the Votes of the People quae singulorum vitam plenissimè novit which best understands every mans Conversation and this he saith was observed in the Consecration of their Fellow-bishop Sabinus who was put into the place of Basilides Where he doth express the Consent of the People but he requires the Iudgment of the Bishops which being thus performed he incourages the People to withdraw from Basilides and to adhere to Sabinus For Basilides having fallen foully into Idolatry and joyned blasphemy with it had of his own accord laid down his Bishoprick and desired onely to be received to Lay-Communion upon this Sabinus was consecrated Bishop in his room after which Basilides goes to Rome and there engages the Bishop to interpose in his behalf that he might be restored Sabinus finding this makes his application to Saint Cyprian and the African Bishops who write this Epistle to the People to withdraw from Basilides saying that it belonged chiefly to them to choose the good and to refuse the bad Which is the strongest Testimony in Antiquity for the Peoples Power and yet here we are to consider 1. It was in a case where a Bishop had voluntarily resigned 2. Another Bishop was put into his room not by the Power of the People but by the judgment and Ordination of the neighbour Bishops 3. They
and the contention of others and therefore he desired to prevent any such disturbance in his City when he was dead And for that reason he acquainted the People that he designed Eradius or as some Copies have it Eraclius for his Successour So Paulus the Novation Bishop at Constantinople appointed his Successour Marcianus to prevent the contentions that might happen after his death and got his Presbyters to consent to it The Greek Canonists are of opinion that the Council of Nice took away all power of election of Bishops from the People and gave it to the Bishops of the Province And it is apparent from the Council of Antioch that Bishops were sometimes consecrated in the East without the consent of the People for it doth suppose a Bishop after consecration may not be received by his People which were a vain supposition if their election necessarily went before it And withall it puts the case of a Bishop that refused to go to his People after consecration which shews that the consecration was not then performed in his own Church Gregory subscribed at Antioch as Bishop of Alexandria before ever he went thither So Saint Basil mentions his consecration of Euphronius to be Bishop of Nicopolis without any consent of the People before it being then performed by the Metropolitan in his own See but he perswades the Senate and People to accept of him If the People did agree upon a Person to be Bishop their way then was to petition the Metropolitan and his Synod who had the full Power either to allow or to refuse him And it is evident from the twelfth Canon of the Council of Laodicea that although all the People chose a Bishop if he intruded himself into the possession of his See without the consent of a Provincial Synod he was to be turned out or rejected by them Which shews how much the business of elections was brought into the Bishops Power in the Eastern parts And by virtue of this Canon Bassianus and Stephanus were rejected in the Council of Chalcedon By the Law of Iustinian the common People were excluded from elections of Bishops and the Clergy and better sort of Citizens were to nominate three to the Metropolitan out of which he was to choose one By the Canon of Laodicea the common People were excluded from the Power of choosing any into the Clergy For they were wont to raise tumults upon such occasions such as Saint Augustin describes in the case of Pinianus but some of the Greek and Latin Canonists inlarge the sense of the Laodicean Canon to the election of Bishops too The second Council of Nice restrained the election onely to Bishop which was confirmed by following Councils in the Greek Church as Can. 28. Concil Constantinopol against Photius and the People are there excluded with an Anathema So far were popular Elections grown out of request in the Eastern Church 4. That when there were Christian Magistrates they did interpose in this matter as they judged expedient So Constantine did in the Church of Antioch when there was great dissension there upon the deposition of Eustathius he recommended to the Synod Euphronius of Cappadocia and Georgius of Arethusa or whom they should judge fit without taking any notice of the interest of the People and they accordingly consecrated Euphronius After the death of Alexander Bishop of Constantinople the People fell into Parties some were for Paulus and others for Macedonius the Emperour Constantius coming thither puts them both by and appoints Eusebius of Nicomedia to be Bishop there Eusebius being dead the Orthodox Party again choose Paulus Constantius sends Hermogenes to drive him out by force and was very angry with Macedonius for being made Bishop without his leave although afterwards he placed him in his throne When Athanasius was restored Constantius declared it was by the decree of the Synod and by his consent And he by his Authority restored likewise Paulus and Marcellus Asclepas and Lucius to their several Sees When Gregory Nazianzen resigned the Bishoprick of Constantinople Theodosius commended to the Bishops the care of finding out a Person who recommending many to him the Emperour himself pitched upon Nectarius and would have him made Bishop though many of the Bishops opposed it When Chrysostom was chosen at Constantinople the royal assent was given by Arcadius the election being made saith Sozomen by the People and Clergy but Palladius gives a more particular account of it viz. That upon the death of Nectarius many Competitours appeared some making their application to the Court and othes to the People in so much that the People began to be tumultuous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Palladius upon which they importuned the Emperour to provide a fit man for them Eutropius being then chief Minister of State recommended Chrysostom to the Emperour and immediately an express was sent to the Comes Orientis that he should with all privacy for fear of a tumult at Antioch send him away to Constantinople whither being brought he was soon after consecrated Bishop So that here was no antecedent election of the People as Sozomen saith but whatever there was was subsequent to the Emperour's determination After the death of Sisinnius the Emperour declared That to prevent disturbance they would have none of the Clergy of Constantinople chosen Bishop there and so Nestorius was brought from Antioch Maximianus being dead he gave order that Proclus should be made Bishop before the others body was buried These instances are sufficient to shew that Christian Princes did from the first think fit when just occasion was given to make use of their Authority in this matter 5. Upon the alteration of the Government of Christendom there was greater reason for the Magistrates interposing than before For upon the endowment of Churches by the great liberality of the Northern Princes it was thought at first very reasonable that the Royal assent should be obtained though a Bishop was chosen by the Clergy and People which at first depended onely on tacit consent but after the solemn Assemblies of the People came to be much used these privileges of Princes came not onely to be confirmed by the Consent of the People but to be inlarged For the Princes obtained by degrees not onely the confirmation of the elected but the liberty of nomination with a shadow of election by the Clergy and others of the Court as appears by the Formulae of Marculphus This way was not always observed in France where frequently according to the Edict of Clotharius the Clergy and People chose the Metropolitan consecrated and the Prince gave his Royal assent but in doubtfull or difficult cases he made use of his Prerogative and nominated the Person and appointed the Consecration Afterwards there arose great contests between the Papal and Royal Power which continued for several
qui ne vouloient point de communion avec ceux qui avoient esté ordines par des Evéques laches qui s'imaginoient que leur societé étoit la veritable Eglise l'épouse bien aimée qui paissoit son troupeau vers le midi Entre eux ceux de la communion Romaine qui ont si bonne opinion de leur Eglise que hors d'elle ils ne s'imaginent pas qu'un puisse jamais acquerir le Salut Pour moy quelque enclin que je sois a la tolerance je ne pourois pourtant me persuader qu'il en faille avoir pour ceux qui en ont si peu pour les autres que s'ils étoient les maitres feroient assurement un mauvais quartiér a ceux qui dependroient d'eux Ie regarde ces gens lá comme de perturbateurs de l'Estat de l'Eglise qui sont infalliblement animés d'un esprit de sedition I'ay méme de la paine a croire qu'ils soient justement ce qu'ils disent estre je craindrois bien que sous ces Docteurs il n'y eust des ennemis tres dangereux qui fussent cachés Des Societés composées detelles personnes seroient extrement perilleuses on ne les pourroit soufrir sans ouvrir la porte au disordre travailler asa propre ruine Ily en a de composées de personnes plus raisonnables Mais j'y voudrois qu'elles le fussent assez pour ne se point separer de celles qui composent l' Eglise Anglicane particulierement au terme ou nous sommes elles devroient tout faire pour une bonne Reconciliation dans le conjuncture des affaires presentes ils devroient bien s'aperçevoir qu'il n'y a qu'une bonne reunion qui puisse prevenir les maux dont l'Angleterre est menacée Car pour dire la verité je ne voi pas que leue Meetings soient de fort grande utilité qu'on puisse s'y consoler davantage que dans les Eglises Episcopales Quand j'estois a Londres il y a bien tost cinq ans je me trouvay en plusieurs assemblées particulieres pour voir comme on l'y prenoit pour l'instruction du peuple la predication de la parole de Dieu Mais j'avoue que je â—'en receus aucune edification I'entendis un de plus fameux Non-conformistes Il pre-choit en vn lieu ou il y avoit trois hommes soissante ou quatre vingt â—emmes Il avoit choisi un texte touchant le restablissement des ruines de Ierusalem pour l'expliquer il cita cent fois Plinie Vitruve n'oublia pas de dire en Italien ce proverbe duro con duro non fa muro Tout cela me parut hors de propos fort peu a propos pour des femmelettes tres eloigné d'un esprit qui ne cherche que la consolation l'edification de ses auditeurs Se Cantonner faire un schisme pour avoir la liberté de debiter de telles vanitâ—s est une fort mâ—â—vaise conduite les peuples paroissent bien â—â—ibles de quitter leur mutuelles assemblées pour de choses qui mâ—ritent â—i peu leur estime leur preference Ie n'estime pas qu'on soit en obligation de souffrir ce dereglement Il est vray qu'autrefois on souffroit les Assemblées de Novatiens á Rome à Constantinople que le Donatistes a voient en la premiere place quelque sorte de liberté Mais c'estoit les Estrangers cela méme ne dura pas long temps comme il'y en avoit peu cela ne tiroit pas en consequence Mais c'est un autre fait en Angleterre comme le bien de l' Estat de l' Eglise depend absolument de l'union du peuple sur le poinct de la Religion on n'y pourroit trop presser une union universelle Mais il la faut procurer par les bonnes voyes comme Messieurs les Evéques sont de personnes d'une grande experience d'un Scavoir extraordinaire d'un zele d'une bonté envers leur peuples veritablement paternelle j'espere qu'ils s'employeront a câ—grand Oâ—rage avec toute la prudence la charitè qui sâ—nt necessâ—ires pour faire reüssir une si louable entreprise t'ous particulierement Monseigneur dont la moderation la capacité sont reconnües de tout le mâ—nde il semble que 〈◊〉 soit un dessein reservé pour votre grande Sagâ—sse 〈◊〉 vous n'y reuscistes pas apparemment que tous les autres ' y travailleront inutilement Pour mor je re 〈◊〉 â—â—â—tribuer d'icy que de voâ—us que de prâ—res 〈◊〉 bien protester que j'en fais tous les jours de fâ—â—r sinceres pour la prosperité de 〈…〉 qu'il plaise a Dieu faire en sorte que tous les Protestants d'Angleterre ne soyent a l'avenir qu'un coeur qu'une Ame. Ie prie Vostre Grandeur d'en estre bien persuadé de croire qu'il n'est pas possible d'estre avec plus de respect que je le suis A Leyden 3 Septemb 1680. Monseigneur Votre tres humble tres Obeissant Serviteur Le Moyne First Letter A Letter from Monsieur le Moyne Professor of Divinity at Leyden to my Lord Bishop of London concerning the nature of our present Differences and the unlawfulness of Separation from the Church of England My Lord TWo Journeys that I have been obliged to take have hindered me from answering the Letter with which your Lordship did me the favour to honour me so soon as I could have wished Just as I was about to excuse my self to you for it Monsieur de l' Angle came to this Town which made me defer it longer yet in hopes that he would charge himself with my answer and that by that means it might be brought unto you more safely It is true my Lord that if I should hearken to my own unwillingness I should put it off still to another time for I cannot write unto you without being extreamly grieved when I think upon the matter of which you command me to tell you my opinion I believe that you know it already and that you do not do me the honour to ask it of me as if you had any kind of doubt of it You do me more right than so and you do not account me of the number of those that have so ill an opinion of the Church of England For my part I had not so bad a one of any true English-man and I could not have perswaded my self that there had been so much as one which had believed that a man could not be of her communion without hazarding his own salvation For those that are engaged in
the party of the Church of Rome I judged quite otherwise of them they have particular Maxims and act by other interests But for those that have no tye to Rome it is a very strange thing to see them come to that extream as to believe that a man cannot be saved in the Church of England This is not to have much knowledge of that Confession of Faith which all the Protestant World has so highly approved and which does really deserve the praises of all good Christians that are For there cannot be any thing made more wise than that Confession and the Articles of Faith were never collected with a more just and reasonable discretion than in that excellent piece There is great reason to keep it with so much veneration in the Library of Oxford and the great Iewell deserves immortal praise for having so worthily defended it It was this that God made use of in the beginning of the Reformation of England And if it had not been as it were his work he had never blessed it in so advantageous a manner The success that it has had ought to stop the mouth of those that are the most passionate and it 's having triumphed over so many obstacles should make all the World acknowledge that God has declared himself in favour of it and that he has been visibly concerned in its establishment and that it has the truth and confirmation of his word to which in effect it owes its birth and original It is the same at present as it was when it was made and no one can reproach the Bishops for having made any change in it since that time And how then can it be imagined that it has changed its use And can there be any thing more unjust than to say that an instrument which God has heretofore employed for the instruction of so many people for the consolation of so many good men for the salvation of so many believers is now become a destructive and pernicious thing If your Confession of Faith be pure and innocent your Divine Service is so too for no one can discover any thing at all in it that tends to Idolatry You adore nothing but God alone in your Worship there is nothing that is terminated on the Creature And if there be some Ceremonies there which one shall not meet with in some other places this were to make profession of a terrible kind of Divinity to put off all Charity not to know much what souls are worth not to understand the nature of things indifferent to believe that they are able to destroy those eternally that are willing to submit themselves unto them It is to have the same hardness to believe that your Ecclesiastical Discipline can damn any For where has it been ever seen that the salvation of men was concerned for Articles of Discipline and things that regard but the out-side and order of the Church and are but as it were the bark and covering of the truth Can these things cause death and distill poyson into a soul Truly these are never accounted in the number of essential truths and as there is nothing but these that can save so there is nothing but these that can exclude men from salvation For the Episcopal Government what is there in it that is dangerous and may reasonably alarm mens consciences And if this be capable of depriving us of eternal glory and shutting the Gates of Heaven who was there that entered there for the space of fifteen hundred years since that for all that time all the Churches of the World had no other kind of Government If it were contrary to the truth and the attainment of eternal happiness is it credible that God had so highly approved it and permitted his Church to be tyrannized over by it for so many Ages For who was it that did govern it Who was it that did make up its Councils as well General as particular Who was it that combated the Heresies with which it has been at all times assaulted Was it not the Bishops And is it not to their wise conduct to which next under God his Word is beholden for its Victories and Triumphs And not to go back so far as the birth and infancy of the Church who was it that in the last Age delivered England from the error in which she was inveloped Who was it that made the truth to rise so miraculously there again Was it not the zeal and constancy of the Bishops and their Ministry that disengaged the English from that oppression under which they had groaned so long And did not their Example powerfully help forward the Reformation of all Europe In truth I think they might make the same use of this as Gregory Nazianzen did heretofore at Constantinople When he arrived there he found that Arrianism had made a very great progress in that place but then his courage his zeal his learning did so mightily weaken the party of the Hereticks that in a little time the truth appeared there again more beautiful than ever and the Church where he had so stoutly upheld it he would have to bear the name of Anastasia because he had brought the truth as it were out of the earth and cleared it from the error that lay upon it and by his continual cares had caused it as it were to come out of the Grave to a glorious Resurrection It is this too that the Bishops of England have done they saw not only one truth but almost all the fundamental truths buried under a formidable number of errors they saw the yoke of Rome heavier among them than it was any where else The difficulty that there was of succeeding in the Reformation was enough to discourage persons of an ordinary capacity and zeal Nevertheless nothing turns them from so generous a design the enemies without and those within as terrible as they seem do not fright them they undertake this great work and do not leave it till they had brought it about and raised up the truth and placed it again upon the Throne in such a manner that they might every where have monuments of this miracle and justly have called all their Churches by the name of Anastasia or Resurrection But if their Churches have not that title the thing it self belongs unto them and you shall hear nothing discoursed of in these but lectures and praises of the pure truth Which ought to oblige all good men not to separate from it but to look upon the Church of England as a very Orthodox Church Thus all the Protestants of France do those of Geneva those of Switzerland and German and those of Holland too for they did themselves a very great honour in having some Divines of England in their Synod of Dort and shewed plainly that they had a profound veneration for the Church of England And from whence does it then come that some Englishmen themselves have so ill an opinion of her at present and
divide rashly from her as they do Is not this to divide from all the antient Churches from all the Churches of the East from all the Protestant Churches which have alwayes had a very great respect for the purity of that of England Is it not horrible impudence to excommunicate her without mercy and to make themselves believe strangely of her for them to imagine that they are the only men in England nay in the Christian World that are predestinated to eternal happiness and to hold the truths necessary to salvation as they ought to be held Indeed one might make a very odious Parallel betwixt these Teachers and Pope Victor that would needs excommunicate the Churches of Asia because they did not celebrate the Feast of Easter the same day they did at Rome Betwixt them and the Audeans that divided from the Christians and would not endure rich Bishops Betwixt them and the Donatists that would have no communion with them that had been ordained by lapsed Bishops and imagined that their Society was the true Church and the well beloved Spouse that fed her flock in the South Betwixt them and those of the Roman Communion who have so good an opinion of their own Church that out of her they do not imagine that any one can ever be saved For my part as much inclined to Toleration as I am I cannot for all this perswade my self that it ought to be allowed to those that have so little of it for other men and who if they were Masters would certainly give but bad quarter to those that depended upon them I look upon these men as disturbers of the State and Church and who are doubtlesly animated by a Spirit of Sedition Nay I can scarce believe that they are just such as they say they are and I should be something afraid that very dangerous enemies might be hid under colour of these Teachers Societies composed of such persons would be extream dangerous and they could not be suffered without opening the Gate to disorder and advancing towards ones own ruine There are some of these that are composed of more reasonable men but I could wish they were reasonable enough not to separate from those of which the Church of England is composed Especially in the case we are in they should do all for a good agreement and in the present conjuncture of affairs they should understand that there is nothing but a good re-union that can prevent the evils with which England is threatned For to speak the truth I do not see that their Meetings are of any great use or that one may be more comforted there than in the Episcopal Churches When I was at London almost Five years ago I went to several of their private assemblies to see what way they took for the instruction of the people and the preaching of the Word of God But I profess I was not at all edified by it I heard one of the most famous Non-Conformists he preached in a place where there were three men and three or fourscore women he had chosen a Text about the building up the Ruines of Ierusalem and for the explication of it he cited Pliny and Vitruvius a hundred times and did not forget to mention a Proverb in Italian Duro con duro non fa muro All this seem'd to me nothing to the purpose and very improper for the poor women and very far from a Spirit that sought nothing but the comfort and edification of his hearers To cantonize themselves and make a Schism to have the liberty to vent such vanities is very ill conduct and the people seem very weak to quit their mutual Assemblies for things that so little deserve their esteem and preference I do not think that any one is obliged to suffer this irregularity It is true that the Assemblies of the Novatians were sometimes suffered at Rome and Constantinople and that even the Donatists had some kind of liberty in the first of these places But they were only strangers and that neither did not indure any long time and as there were but few of them that is not to be drawn into example But it is another case in England and seeing the good of the State and Church depends absolutely upon the union of the people in the point of Religion one cannot there press an universal union too much But it ought to be procured by good means and since the Bishops are persons of great experience of an extraordinary knowledge of a true fatherly zeal and goodness towards their people I hope that they will employ themselves in this great work with all the prudence and charity that are necessary to the succeeding of such a commendable undertaking You particularly My Lord whose moderation and capacity are acknowledged by all the World it looks as if it were a design reserved for your great Wisdom and if you do not succeed it is clear that all others will labour in it but in vain For my part I can contribute nothing to it where I am but Vowes and Prayers and of these I can protest that I make very sincere ones every day for the prosperity of the English Church and that it would please God to order things in such manner that all the Protestants of England for the future might be of one heart and of one soul. I beg your Lordship to be well assured of this and to believe that it is impossible to be with more respect than I am Leyden Sept. 3. 1680. My Lord Your most Humble and most Obedient servant Le Moyne A Paris l' 32. d'Octob Monseigneur RIen ne vous a deu paroistre si estrange ny si incivil que mon silence sur la lettre que vous me fîstes l'honneur de m'escrire il y a environ trois mois Il est pourtant vray que je n'ay rien a me reprocher sur cela a fin que vous le croyiez comme moy vous voulez bien me permettre de vous dire comment la chose s'est passée Quand on m'apporta vostre lettre j'estois retombé dans une grande violente fiebvre dont Dieu m'a affligé durant quatre ou cinq mois qui m'a mené jusqu'a deux doits de la mort Ie priay un de mes amis qui estoit alors dans ma chambre de l'ouvrir de me dire le nom de celuy qui me l'escrivoit mais il se trouva que vous aviez oublié de la signer sur quoy je me l'a fis apporter pour voir si je n'en connoistrois point le caractére Et ce fut encore inutilement par ce que jusqu'alors je n' avois rien veu de vostre main Cela me fit croire qu'elle avoit esté escrite par celuy lá mesme qui l'avoit apportée pour m'attrapper dix ou douze sous de port car ce petit stratageme est assez commun en
que Dieu vous presente vous ferez voir à toute la terre en convaincrez les plus incredulez que vous aves de la pietè du zele de la crainte de Dieu que vous estez de dignes ouvriers de dignes serviteurs de Iesus Christ. C'est deja le temoignage que vous rendent les gens de bien que nul quelque mal intentionnè qu'il soit n'ose contredire je ne doute pas que vous ne poussiez vostre vocation jusqu'an bout Mais outre cela Monseigneur j'espere que vous ne defaudrez point aux devoirs de la charitè de l'esprit de paix que quand il ne s'agria que de quelques temperamens ou de quelques Ceremonies qui servent d'achoppement qui en elles mesmes ne sont rien en comperaison d'une entiere reünion de vostre Eglise sous vostre saint Ministere vous ferez voir que vous aymez l'Epouse de vostre Maitre plus que vous mesmes que ce n'est pas tant de vostre grandeur de vostre dignitè Ecclesiastique que vous desirez tirer vostre gloire vostre joye que de vos vertus Pastorales des soins ardens que vous avez de vos troupeaux I'espere aussi que ceux que vous avez choisis appellez au S. Ministere ceux que desormais vous y appellerez avec un prudent discernement reglez non seulement par la donceur mais aussi par la severitè de la Discipline quand la severitè sera necessaire marcheront sur vos traces suiront heureusement l'exemple que vous leur donnerez pour estre eux-mesmes en exemple en edification aux Eglises qui leur sont commises Ie finis Monseigneur par des prieres tres-ardentes que je présente à Dieu de tout mon coeur afin qu'il luy plaise de vous conserver à jamais le flamebeau de son Evangile de repandre sur tout le corps de vostre Ministere une abondante mesure de son onction de sa benediction celeste dont celle de l'ancien Aaron n'estoit que l'ombre afin qu'elle soit non l'embleme l'image de la concorde fraternelle comme cette ancienne mais qu'elle en soit la cause le lien Ie le prie qu'il veuâ—lle de plus en plus ramener le coeur des enfans aux peres des peres aux enfans afin que vostre Eglise soit heuereuse agreable comme un Eden de Dieu Ie le prie enfin qu'il vous conserve vous Monseigneur en parfait longue santè pour sa gloire pour le bien l'avantage de cette grande considerable pertie de son champ qu'il vous a donnè cultiver que vous cultivez si heureusement Ie vous demande aussi le secours de vos saintes prieres la continuation de l'honneur de vostre affection en vous Protestant que je seray toute ma vie avec tout le respect que je vous dois Monseigneur Vostre tres-humble tres-obeissant Serviteur Fils en Jesus Christ CLAVDE Paris Novemb. 29. Stilo Novo My Lord MOnsieur de L' Angle having given me the Letter which you have been pleased to write me I was surprized to see by that that you had done me the honour to write me another which I have not received and to which I had not failed to make an answer You do me a great deal of honour to desire that I should tell you my thoughts of the difference that has troubled you so long betwixt those they call Episcopal and those they name Presbyterians Although I have already explained my self about this divers tims both by Letters which I have written upon this Subject to several persons and in my Book too of the Defence of the Reformation where speaking of the distinction betwixt the Bishop and the Priest I have said expresly That I do not blame those that observe it as a thing very ancient and that I would not that any one should make it an occasion of quarrel in those places where it is established pag. 366. And though I otherwaies know my self sufficiently not to believe that my opinion should be much considered I will not forbear to assure you upon this occasion as I shall always do upon any other of my Christian esteem my respect and my obedience This I shall do the rather because I shall not simply tell you my private thoughts but the opinion of the generality of our Churches First then my Lord we are so very far from believing that a man cannot live with a good Conscience under your Discipline and under your Episcopal Government that in our ordinary practice we make no difficulty neither to bestow our Chairs nor to commit the care of our Flocks to Ministers received and ordained by my Lords the Bishops as might be justified by a great number enought of Examples both old and new And a little while since Mr. Duplessis that was ordained by my Lord Bishop of Lincoln has been established and called in a Church of this Province And Monsieur Wicart whom you my Lord received to the Holy Ministery did us the honour but some months agoe to preach at Charenton to the general edification of our Flock So that they who in this respect do impute unto us any opinions distant from peace and Christian concord do certainly do us wrong I say Peace and Christian concord for my Lord we believe that the obligation to preserve this Peace and this Brotherly concord which make up the external unity of the Church is of a necessity so indispensable that St. Paul has made no difficulty to join it with the internal unity of the same Faith and the same Regeneration not onely as two things which ought never to be separated but likewise as two things depending the one upon the other because if the external unity be as it were the Daughter of the internal she is likewise the preserver of it Walk says he Ephes. 4. worthy of the calling wherewith ye are called with all lowliness and meekness with long-suffering forbearing one another in love Endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace On the one side he makes this brotherly love which joins us one with another to depend upon our common vocation and on the other side he teaches us that one of the principal means to preserve our common vocation intire which he calls the unity of the spirit is to keep peace among our selves According to the first of these maximes we cannot have peace or Ecclesiastical communion with those that have so degenerated from the Christian vocation that one cannot perceive in them a true and saving Faith especially when with mortal errours they
be happy and pleasant as the Paradise of God Lastly I pray that he would preserve you my Lord in perfect and long health for his glory and the good and advantage of that great and considerable part of his field which he has given you to cultivate and which you do cultivate so happily I desire too the help of your holy prayers and the continuance of the honour of your affection protesting to you that I will be all my life with all the respect that I owe you My Lord Your most humble and most obedient Servant and Son in Iesus Christ CLAUDE FINIS A Catalogue of some Books Printed for Henry Mortclock at the Phoenix in St. Paul's Church-Yard A Rational account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion being a Vindication of the Lord Archbishop of Canterburie's Relation of a Conference c. from the pretended answer of T. C. wherein the true grounds of Faith are cleared and the false discovered the Church of England Vindicated from the Imputation of Schism and the most Important particular Controversies between us and those of the Church of Rome throughly examined The Second Edition corrected by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. Folio Sermons preached upon several occasions with a Discourse annexed concerning the True Reason of the Sufferings of Christ wherein Crellius his Answer to Grotius is considered by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. Folio Irenicum A Weapon Salve for the Churches Wounds by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. Quarto A Discourse concering the Idolatry Practised in the Church of Rome and the hazard of Salvation in the communion of it in Answer to some Papers of a Revolted Protestant with a particular Account of the Fanaticism and Divisions of that Church by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. Octavo An Answer to several Late Treatises occasioned by a Book entituled a Discourse concerning the Idolatry practised in the Church of Rome and the hazard of Salvation in the Communion of it by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. the first part Octavo A second Discourse in vindication of the Protestant Grounds of Faith against the pretence of Infallibility in the Rom. Church in Answer to the Guide in Controversies by R. H. Protestancy without Principles and Reason and Religion or the certain Rule of Faith by E. W. with a particular enquiry into the Miracles of the Roman Church by Edw. Stillingflect D. D. Octavo A Defence of the Discourse concerning the Idolatry practised in the Church of Rome in Answer to a Book cutituled Catholicks no Idolaters by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. Dean of S. Paul's and Chaplain in Ordinary to His Majesty THE END Arch-Bishop Whitgift's Defence of the Answer to the Admonition p. 423. Life of Bishop Jewel before his Works n. 34. Vita Juelli per Humâ—red p. 255. Preface to 2d Vol. of Serm. Sect. 11. Preface to the First Volume Sect. 18. Acts and Monuments Tom. 3. p. 171. Foxes and Firebrands 1680. Church History l. 1. p. 81. History of Presbyter l. 6. p. 257. Annales Elizabethae A. D. 1568. V. Thom. à Iesu de natura divinae Orationis Defence of the Answer p. 605. Page 55. Fair warning second Part Printed by H. March 1663. Contzen Politic l. 2. c. 18 Sect. 6 Sect. 9. Coleman's Trâ—al p. 101 Vindiciae libertatis Evangelii Or a Iustification of our present Indulgence and acceptance of Licences 1672. p. 12. Sacrilegious desertion rebuked and Tolerated Preaching Vindicated 1672. Answer to Sacrileg desert p. 171. 1672. Page 71. Page 72. Page 32. Page 250. Preface to the Defence of the Cure p. 17. Defence of the Cure of Divisions introduction p. 52 c. Sacrilegious desertion p. 103 104. Defence of the Cure p. 53. Dr. O. Vindication p. 4. Letter out of the Country p. 7. Pagâ— 4. Mischief of Impos end of the Preface Preface p. 11 13. Page 15. Mischief of Imposition Preface towards the end Christian Direct Cases Eccles. p. 49. Defence of Cure of Divis Introd p. 55. Ib. p. 88. Arch-Bishop Whitgift ' s Defence c. p. 423. Several Conferences p. 258 c. Orig. Sucr l. 2. ch 8. p. 220. Orig. Sacr. p. 367 368. Papers for Accommodation p. 51. Answer to R. Williams p. 129. Irenic p. 123. Page 5. Page 6 7. Page 8. Co. Iast 4. Part. 323 324. Acts and Monuments Vol. 3. p. 131. Mischief of Impositions Preface Fresh suit against Ceremonies p. 467. Pet. Martyr Epist. Theolog Hoopero Buc. r. Script Anglic. p. 708. Acts and Mon. Vol. 3. p. 319. Ridiey's Articles of Visitation 1550. Vindicat. of Nonconf p. 13. P. 35. 37. Iacob's Answer to Iohnson p. 20 21. Iohnson's Defence of his ninth Reason Bradford's Confer with the Bâ— Acts and Mon. Vol. 3. p. 298. Iacob ' s Answer p. 82. Letters of the Martyrs p. 50. Plea for Peace p. 1â—0 Page 19. Page 21. Calvin Ep. 164. Ep. 55. Ep. 165. Tr. of Fr. p. 30. Page 31. Letters of the Martyrs p. 60. Bonavent 〈◊〉 Ps. 21. Angel Roecha de Sollâ—â—i Communione Summi Pontificis p. 33. 38. Calvin Epist. ad Sadolet De verâ Eccl. Reformatione c. 16. â—â—â—olamp Epist. f. 17. Bucer Scriâ—t â—â—gl p. 479. Dialogue between a Soldier of Barwick and a-English Chaplain p. 5 6. Beza Epist. 23. Part of a Register p. 23. Beza Epist. 24. p 148. Gualter Ep. ded ad Hom. in 1 Ep. ad Câ—rinth Zanchii Epist l. 2. p. 391. See his Letter in Fullers Church-History l. 9. p. â—06 Bullinger Ep. ad Robert Winton in the Appendix to Bishop Whitgifts first Book Parker on the Cross Part. 2. cap. 9. Sect. 2. Vide Profane Schism of the Brownists Ch. 12. Giffords first Treatise against the Donatists of England Preface Gifford's Second Treatise Preface Answer to Giffords Preface Dangerous Positions c. l. 3. c. 5. The Second Answer for Communicating p. 20. Printed by John Windet A. D. 1588. Page 46. Answer to Ainsworth p. 13. Page 57. Preface to the Readâ—r p. 17. Brownists Apology p. 7. A. D. 1604. A Defence of the Churches and Ministry of England Middleburgh p. 3. A. D. 1599. Barrow's Observations on Gifford's last Reply n. 4. p. 240. Brownists Apol. p. 92. Brownists Apology p 7. Barrow ib. Barrow's Refutation of Giffard Preface to the Reader Sum of the Causes of Separation Ibid. Brownists Apology p. 7 8 9. Ainsworth's Counter-poyson p. 3. Ib. p. 87. T. Cs. Letter to Harrison against Separation in Defence of the Admonition to the followers of Brown p. 98 99. Page 106. Page 107. Page 91. Counterpoyson p. 117. Ball against Can p. 77. Giffard's Answer to the Brownists p. 55. Grave Confutation c. p. 9 10 11. â—ravâ—conâ—utation c. â— 12 13 15. Ibid. Pall against Can. Part. 2. p. 8. Giffard's Plain Declaration c. Preface Answ. to the Brown p. 10 11. Mr. Arthur Hildershams Letter against Separation Sect. 2. highly commended by Mr. J. Cotton in his Preface before his Commentaries on 4 John Iâ— Sect. C 7 8. V. Bradshaw's Answer to Johnson Hildershams Letter Sect. 3. Grave Confutation
between what falls out through the passions of Men and what follows from the nature of the thing But one of their own Party at Amsterdam takes notice of a Third Cause of these Dissentions viz. The Iudgment of God upon them I do see saith he the hand of God is heavy upon them blinding their Minds and hardening their Hearts that they do not see his Truth so that they are at Wars among themselves and they are far from that true Peace of God which followeth Holiness There were two great Signs of this hand of God upon them First Their Invincible Obstinacy Secondly The Scandalous Breaches which followed still one upon the other as long as the course of Separation continued and were only sometimes hindred from shewing themselves by their not being let loose upon each other For then the Firebrands soon appear which at other times they endeavour to cover Their great Obstinacy appears by the Execution of Barrow and Greenwood who being Condemned for Seditious Books could no ways be reclaimed rather choosing to Dye than to Renounce the Principles of Separation But Penry who suffered on the same account about that time had more Relenting in him as to the business of Separation For Mr. I. Cotton of New-England relates this Story of him from the Mouth of Mr. Hildersham an eminent Non-conformist That he confessed He deserved Death at the Queens hand for that he had Seduced many of Her Loyal Subjects to a Separation from Hearing the Word of Life in the Parish Churches Which though himself had learned to discover the Evil of yet he could never prevail to recover divers of Her Subjects whom he had Seduced and therefore the Blood of their Souls was now justly required at his hands These are Mr. Cotton's own words Concerning Barrow he reports from Mr. Dod's Mouth that when he stood under the Gibbet he lift up his eyes and said Lord if I be deceived thou hast deceived me And so being stopt by the hand of God he was not able to proceed to speak any thing to purpose more either to the Glory of God or Edification of the People These Executions extremely startled the Party and away goes Francis Iohnson with his Company to Amsterdam Iohnson chargeth Ainsworth and his Party with Anabaptism and want of Humility and due Obedience to Government In short they fell to pieces separating from each others Communion some say They formally Excommunicated each other but Mr. Cotton will not allow that but he saith They only withdrew yet those who were Members of the Church do say That Mr. Johnson and his Company were Accursed and Avoided by Mr. Ainsworth and his Company and Mr. A. and his Company were rejected and avoided by Mr. Johnson and his And one Church received the Persons Excommunicated by the other and so became ridiculous to Spectators as some of themselves confessed Iohnson and his Party charged the other with Schism in Separating from them But as others said who returned to our Church Is it a greater Sin in them to leave the Communion of Mr. Johnson than for him to refuse and avoid the Communion of all True Churches beside But the Difference went so high that Iohnson would admit none of Ainsworth's Company without Re-baptizing them Ainsworth on the other side charged them with woful Apostasy And one of his own Company said That he lived and died in Contentions When Robinson went from Leyden on purpose to end these Differences he complained very much of the disorderly and tumultuous carriage of the People Which with Mr. Ainsworths Maintenance was an early discovery of the Great Excellency of Popular Church-Governmâ—nt Smith who set up another Separate congregation was Iohnson's Pupil and went over In hopes saith Mr. Cotton to have gained his Tutor from the Errors of his Rigid Separation but he was so far from that that he soon outwent him and he charges the other Separate Congregations with some of the very same Faults which they had found in the Church of England viz. 1. Idolatrous Worship for if they charged the Church of England with Idolatry in Reading of Prayers he thought them equâ—lly guilty in looking on their Bibles in Preaching and Singing 2. Antichristian Government in adding the Human Inventions of Doctors and Ruling Elders which was pulling down one Antichrist to set up another and if one was the Beast the other was the Image of the Beast Being therefore unsatisfied with all Churches he began one wholly new and therefore Baptized himself For he declared There was no one True Ordinance with the other Separatists But this New Church was of short continuance for upon his Death it dwindled away or was swallowed up in the Common Gulf of Anabaptism And now one would have thought here had been an end of Separation and so in all probability there had had not Mr. Robinson of Leyden abated much of the Rigor of it for he asserted The Lawfulness of Communicating with the Church of England in the Word and Prayer but not in Sacraments and Discipline The former he defended in a Discourse between Ainsworth and him So that the present Separatists who deny that are gone beyond him and are fallen back to the Principles of the Rigid Separation Robinson succeeded though not immediately Iacob in his Congregation at Leyden whom some make the Father of Independency But from part of Mr. Robinson's Church it spread into New England for Mr. Cotton saith They went over thither in their Church-State to Plymouth and that Model was followed by other Churches there at Salem Boston Watertown c. Yet Mr. Cotton professeth That Robinson 's Denyal of the Parishional Churches in England to be true Churches either by reason of their mixt corrupt matter or for defect in their Covenant or for excess in their Episcopal Government was never received into any heart from thence to infer a nullity of their Church State And in his Answer to Mr. Roger Williams he hath these words That upon due consideration he cannot find That the Principles and Grounds of Reformâ—tion do necessarily conclude a Separation from the English Churches as false Churches from their Ministery as a false Ministry from their Worship as a false Worship from all their Professors as no visible Saints Nor can I find that they do either necessarily or probably conclude a Separation from Hearing the Word Preached by godly Ministers in the Parish Churches in England Mr. R. Williams urged Mr. Cotton with an apparent inconsistency between these Principles and his own Practice for although he pretended to own the Parish Churches as true Churches yet by his Actual Separation from them he shewed that really he did not and he adds that Separation did naturally follow from the old Puritan Principles saying That Mr. Can hath unanswerably proved That the Grounds and Principles of the Puritans against Bishops and Ceremonies and profaneness of People professing Christ
and the necessity of Christ ' s Flock and Disciples must necessarily if truly followed lead on to and inforce a Separation Notwithstanding all this Mr. Cotton doth assert the Lawfulness of hearing English Preachers in our Parish Churches but then he saith There is no Church Communion in Hearing but only in giving the Seals Mr. Williams urgeth That there is Communion in Doctrine and Fellowship of the Gospel Upon which Mr. Cotton grants That though a Man may joyn in Hearing and Prayer before and after Sermon yet not as in a Church-state Yet after all he will not deny our Churches to be True Churches But if they remain true Churches it appears from the former Discourse they can never justifie Separation from them upon the Principles of either Party So that though those of the Congregational Way seem to be more moderate as to some of their Principles then the old rigid Separatists yet they do not consider that by this means they make their Separation more Inexcusable The Dissenting Brethren in their Apologetical Narration to avoid the imputation of Brownism deliver this as their Judgment concerning our Parochial Churches And for our own Congregations viz. of England we have this sincere Profession to make before God and all the World that all that Conscience of the Defilements we conceived to cleave to the true Worship of God in them or of the Vnwarranted Power in Church Governors exercised therein did never work in us any other thought much less opinion but that Multitudes of the Assemblies and Parochial Congregations thereof were the True Churches and Body of Christ and the Ministery thereof a True Ministery much less did it ever enter into our hearts to Iudge them Antichristian we saw and cannot but see that by the same reason the Churches abroad in Scotland Holland c. though more Reformed yet for their Mixture must be in like manner Iudged no Churches also which to imagine or conceive is and hath ever been an horror to our thoughts Yea we have always professed and that in those times when the Churches of England were the most either actually overspread with Defilements or in the greatest danger thereof and when our selves had least yea no hopes of ever so much as visiting our own Land again in peace and safety to our persons that we both did and would hold Communion with them as the Church of Christ. This is a very fair Confession from the Dissenting Brethren but then the difficulty returns with greater force How comes Separation from these Churches to be lawful If they had gone upon the Brownists Principles all the Dispute had been about the truth or falshood of them but their truth being supposed the necessity of Separation followed whereas now upon altering the State of the Controversie by the Independents though their Principles seem more Moderate yet their Practice is more Unreasonable It is therefore a vain pretence used at this day to justifie the Separation That they do not deny our Churches to be true Churches and that therein they differ from the old Separatists It is true in that Opinion they do but in Separation they agree which is the more unjustifiable in them since they yield so much to our Churches And yet herein whatever they preâ—end they do not exceed their Independent Brethren whose Separation themselves Condemned But the Presbyterians were then unsatisfied with this Declaration of the Dissenting Brethren and thought it did not sufficiently clear them from the Charge of Brownism because 1. They agreed with the old Separatists in the Main Principle of Popular Church Government Which they say is inconsistent with the Civil Peace as may be seen say they in the Quarrels both at Amsterdam and Rotterdam and the Law-Suites depending before the Magistrates there 2. They overthrow the Bounds of Parochial Churches as the Separatists did and think such a Confinement Unlawful 3. They make true Saintship the necessary Qualification of Church Members as the Separatists did Whereby say they they confound the Visible and Invisible Church and make the same essential form of both 4. They renounce the Ordination received in our Church but all the allowance they make of a true Ministry is by vertue of an explicit or implicit Call grounded on the Peoples explicit or implicit Covenant with such a Man as their Pastor For when they first began to set up a Congregational Church after the New Model at Rotterdam Ward was chosen Pastor and Bridges Teacher but they both Renounced their Ordination in England and some say They ordained one another others That they had no other Ordination than what the Congregation gave them Sect. 13. And now new Congregations began to be set up in Holland upon these Principles but they again fell into Divisions as great as the former Simpson renouncing his Ordination was admitted a private member of the Church at Rotterdam but he grew soon unsatisfied with the Orders of that Church and thought too great a Restraint was laid upon the private Members as to the exercise of Prophecying and so he and those who joyned with him complaining of the Mischief of Impositions were ready for a Separation if that restraint were not speedily removed Mr. Bridge yields to the thing but not as to the time viz. On the Lords Day after Sermon this gives no satisfaction for they must have their will in every thing or else they will never cease complaining of the Mischief of Impositions And so Mr. Simpson and his Party set up a New Church of their own Which I. Goodwin doth not deny for Mr. Simpson saith he upon dislike of some persons and things in that Church whereof Mr. Bridge was Pastor might seek and make a departure from it But were these Churches quiet after this Separation made So far from it that the contentions and slanders were no less grievous saith Baylie than those of Amsterdam betwixt Ainsworth and Johnsons followers But did not Mr. Bridges Church continue in great quietness No but in stead of that they were so full of Bitterness Reproaches and hard Censures that Mr. Brâ—dge often declared If he had known at first what he met with afterwards he would never have come amongst them nor being amongst them have given them such scope and liberty as he had It seems at last he came to apprehend the necessity of Impositions and the mischief of a Separating dividing humor But the People having the Power in their hands were resolved to shew that they held it not in vain for Mr. Ward had it seems given Offence to some of the Congregation by Preaching the same Sermons there which he had Preached before at Norwich this and some other frivolous things were thought Intolerable Impositions and therefore against the Will of Mr. Bridge they Depose Mr. Ward from his Ministery This being a fresh discovery of the great inconveniency of Popular Church Government gave a mighty alarm to the Brethren which occasion'd a