determined to any one Province or Nation is very groundless and injurious to the whole design Christ had in propagating the Faith For the said commission of Christ given to his Apostles was not Lex but Jus a Right to Act not a Precept indispensably enjoyning the execution according to the full extent of the Letter Again It was not said to each singly Go and teach all nations but to all conjoyntly So that to all it was a direct Precept which was fulfilled if all Nations were by all the Apostles not all by each of them instructed in Christ But the interpretation which taks All nations to be rather understood negatively in opposition to the Jewish Church which enviously denyed the like Priviledges of salvation to the Gentiles which they claimed proper to themselves rather then positively as if by virtue of Christs injunction they were necessitated to pass all the world over which it is certain that neither any one nor all ever did the intention of Christ being to open a wide door of Grace to all Nations so far as humane ability could ordinarily promote the work quite disables that argument As it was lawful therefore for all the Apostles and every one of them to pass into any Part of the world so was it not unlawful to make choise of some one considerable portion wherein to move and officiate according to his Place For otherwise how should it be lawful for them to continue in some one City two three or seven years as 't is as certain as any thing in History can be that some of them did taking a peculiar and pastoral care thereof and its Appendages Now because as their Presence was finite in reference to place so their lives were to time therefore when in any one large Province they could not manage immediately themselves every City of note and command they assigned certain Substitutes to continue and promote what they had begun even during their lives in many Countries And departing this life left them to succeed in a perpetual line to all ages not by intrusion and spontaneous invasion possessing themselves of Rule and Authority over others but according to the same form that themselves were sent by Christ For Christ not only sent his Apostles but enabled them to send others in the like Pastoral charge And these Apostolical Pastours together with that personal Power given them to be exercised by them had also a real paternal Power to constitute others of the like or inferiour order as necessary emergencies required upon the increase of the Professours of Christian Religion as may in due place be more cleerly proved From hence a reason may be rendred of the Opinion of some very sober Bilson and learned Defenders of Episcopal Government who seeing neither the Apostles alone to govern the Church nor Bishops alone have said It is very hard to determine what was the Discipline of the Church in the very Primitive times of all For surely while the Apostles lived the Government of the Church was Apostolical and not properly Episcopal because those Elders otherwise called Bishops said in Scripture to be set over Cities were themselves wholly at the beck and disposal of the Apostles ordaining them and governed and taught under them no otherwise than a Priest may be under a Bishop in all subjection But the Apostles dying and their intire power also with them part of it devolved unto that Person who before in their Right presided over such a Church the Apostolicalness excepted which consisted in an immediate Ordination to that Office by Christ and illimitedness as to the exercise thereof with other signal gifâ—s and graces not here to be insisted on and was properly Episcopal which consisted in an Authority derived from the Apostles and consequently from Christ to govern the Church and not only present for their dayes but because it was to continue to all Ages which it could not without Governours and Teachers to ordain such who should ordain others without interruption for ever And these not only such who should succeed them in the like Pastoral care but who might together with them though under them by their counsel and labours as the common Fathers of the Church take part of his charge upon them in teaching and governing such a portion of that Church as was allotted them And these were called Priests or Presbyters And as the Bishop was constrained Christians multiplying to ordain an assistent Presbyter to him so when the People under that Presbyter increased so far that it was too difficult for him to discharge all Offices of publick and private ministration it was found expedient to ordain an inferiour Officer in the Church to him for his assistance called a Deacon or Minister Not that these two last Orders themselves were of humane or moderner Institution than the Apostles dayes but that they might be likewise undetermined in the place of their Function to any particular Person until the consummation of the Apostolical age But in truth it is hard to determine what the Scripture intends speaking of Deacons and therefore I offer this mean opinion as not inconsistent with theirs who hold them of Apostolical Institution nor with theirs who make them much later For the first may be true as to the Office which was a degree Ecclesiastical as St. Paul intimateth and the other as to the manner of exercise in reference to one place and one presiding there And the like seems most probable concerning the Evangelists who were persons commissioned by the Apostles to preach the Gospel under them without any determination to a certain place or people and saving this large Licence were in no higher degree than simple Presbyters the Apostles themselves presiding in all such places as Pastours But when they were by their farther Authority fixt to one City and Country with a power to create Successours or Co-adjutors in the Government of that Church then they became formal and proper Bishops For the allegation of them is most frivolous who would elude the express testimonies of Scripture affirming that Timothy and Titus were Bishops by saysaying they were Evangelists For by the same reason they may deny they were Presbyters because probably they were Evangelists and so make them of no order in the Church or of another which is yet unknown to the world which whatever it may please men to call it certainly it must be founded on Priestly Power or else they could not have regularly acted as they did Neither was it as some may phansie to degrade such Evangelists whose faculty extended to all places to be confined to one afterward as Bishop First because such power was more truly indetermined to one than extending actually to all For it depended on the pleasure of the Apostles to send them to what place they thought fit Secondly this fixing of them to one place was not without the accession of power of Government as well as preaching which is no where found to
virulent tongues cannot forget their wonted strains of dishonesty and extream spite and railings witness one for all the foresaid Ludovicus Molinaeus who as civilly and reverently as he carries himself towards Mr. Baxter for none of his vertues we may be sure as exorbitantly in the old Puritans language and on their Grounds flies in the face of the Greatest and Best of the Rulers of the Church and State too who have at any time resolutely opposed the designs and Schismatical devices of such unchristian Reformers as himself only I must confess he is favourable to his late Sacred Majesty whose invincible Piety and unparallel'd innocency of Life and Ignominious yet Glorious Death hath not only struck Sectaries dumb who once opened so loudly and perniciously against him but extorted cold commendations from them not much unlike that approbation given by that Parricide Antonius the Emperor who when he understood how the people of Rome magnified and even deâ—fied his virtuous Brother Geta whom he had wickedly murdered said Sit Divus modò non sit vivus i e. Let him be Divine so he be not living But whom doth he or his Fellows occasion serving spare Hath he not raked the stinking Canal of all â—ld lyes and feigned rumors invented to imbroyl the Church in Schism and Kingdome in Sedition and Bloud and indeavoured to put new life into them and Authentize them to other Countries as well as ours It was soberly and seasonably said by that excellent Arch-bishop Speech Delivered in the Star Chamber p. 2. whom he would traduce in basest manner were not his merits above the Calumnies of such wretched Fellows in his Speech in the Star-chamber at the Charge of Prin Burton and Bastwick viz. There were times when Persecutions were great in the Church even to exceed Barbarity it self Did any Martyr or Confessor in those times Libel their Governors Surely no not one of them to my best remembrance yet these complain of Persecution without all shew of cause and in the mean time libel and rail without all measure so little a kin are they to those who suffer for Christ or the least part of Christian Religion This witness is most true of these Cretians And it is my great glory not only to be named among such eminent persons as lately but at present are living in our Church whom this Molinaeus traduceth And why so because of my rude usage of Mr. Daillee whom I spit on if any will believe him Lud. Molin Antidure Epist p. 54. rather then dispute against That I spare not the memory of Diodate That I am no fairer to Mr. Bochartus And why doth be forget my railing too against his Brethren the Puritans This he might better say But neither he nor any man else can say that I imitate Puritans in railing against my Betters or Governors that 's their peculiar and inseparable virtue and hath been from the first founding of the Discipline by Penrie Whittingham Goodman and Cartwright with others to the confounding of the Church so far as lay in their power I ever was not only an approver but an admirer of the personal Gifts of Calvin and Beza of Monsieur Daillee and Monsieur Bochart c. but I owe them no more respect in the cause of Religion than they do me or any man else of our Church but I profess I owe more Reverence to the least of the Bishops and Fathers of the Church whom Puritans have so basely treated then to the greatest of them and so do Sectaries too as ill as they are galled to hear of it But what do I speak so irreverently after all against Mr. Daillee Not a word hath this Zelote found in my whole Book against him nor in that Action against our Schismaticks whom I confess to have severely treated in that I give them their own some mens dealings being so foul as theirs have been that the very bare recitation of them is lookt on as railing though never so faithfully done If any of them or their friends can tell me wherein I have done them wrong in misreporting their Facts I do here assure them I will make them all the satisfaction I am able in retracting and acknowledging my Error and that as publickly as I have injured them with the next opportunity Cyprian Optatus Hierom Austin Nazianzen and Chrysostom as holy and sober persons as they were in their Generations made no great scruple to paint Schismaticks out in their Colors with language which cuts where it goes and I am sure these upon no better grounds than they have or can possibly offer of departing from and dividing our Church are no better Nay in this hath the Puritan Sectary transcended all Hereticks and Schismaticks that ever went before them For though divers Factions were raised and fomented to a great height in the Church of God of old and Altar was erected against Altar and Chair against Chair i. e. Worship against Worship and Governor against Governor of the Church yet do we find none through all the Histories of the Church that ever became so presumptuous and desperate as to endeavour the total subversion of the Government of the Church in it self and to set up another in the room of it quite of another nature which we read not that Aerius himself ever attempted though he preacht up the equality of Bishops and Presbyters And so far am I from such a spirit of meekness I confess that I shall never smooth them or their cause over so civilly as to imply the contrary until they bethink themselves without their customary frauds and dissimulations of their duties and return to the Peace and Unitie of the Church which I shall not cease to pray for But one of the most material things charged on me is That I liked Dailee's Book the worse because it pleased the Puritans so much which says my Accuser is to be of the spirit of Maldonate the Jesuite But he is mistaken For Maldonate indeed rejected a sense of Scripture which otherwise he approved because it was Calvins If I disliked Dailees opinions only because they were Dailees or our Puritans he had been somewhat near the matter but no such thing hath fallen from me I disliked indeed his Book because it so far pleased the Puritans that they were thereby notably confirmed in their obstinate Opinions against the Authority of the Ancient and our Present Church Here were evil effects also to be disliked Next let us bear how I abuse Diodate of Geneva in that I rehearse this saying of him against King Charles the first viz. That Christ in the Gospel commands us to forgive our enemies but not our friends This he calls Crassum mendacium A gross lye in me whereas the lye if there be any must necessarily be in himself or his brother Puritan Cook the Sollicitor against King Charles the first at his Sentence in that monstrous Court. For I no where say of my self that Diodate said those words
only to signifie how Christ was lifted up on the Cross but as practised in the Roman Church to the intent direct and divine Worship be given it 7. Wicked men eat not the Body of Christ Sure enough in a proper sense not denominatively only as the consecrated Elements are called the Body of Christ very often and currently 8. That they who communicate not are to be put out of the Church This is such an Error as the Ancient Church was guilty of as well as we as your own Vicecomes sheweth at large Vicecomes Vol. 3. l. 1. c. 18. 9. The Keys of the Church consist only in opening the Word of God No such thing is held by us 10. Private Confession is to be taken away Not so much as Sectaries say this absolutely 11. The Ceremonies of the Church are to be abrogated Simply and falsly said and directly contrary to the Articles of our Artic. 20. Church 12. Prayers in the Latin Tongue are barbarous and against St. Pauls Precept Very true where they are at first so instituted and understood by very few or none and so are they in the English Tongue or any other 13. No man can fulfill the Law This is true or false as it may be taken 14. More Masses then one cannot be said in one day in one Church Here our Accuser saith he knows not what For neither doth our Church inhibit more then once to officiate Liturgically neither did the Ancient Church practise if permit it for above four hundred years after Christ as appears from Dioscorus Bishop of Alexandria consulting with Leo the first Bishop of Rome what he should Leo 1 Epist 79 or as some So. See also Grecian consecr Dist c. 51. do when Christians were so numerous that they could not all be received into the Church at once who answered In such cases he might safely reiterate the office And the Council of Antisiodorum or Auxere held about the Year 578 decreed that but one Mass should be said upon one Altar in one day which is as much observed by the Church of Rome now-a-days as other Canons of Councils which lye in their way thrown out And where in the Ancient Church do you read of above one Altar in one Church 15. Unity is no Note of the Church Discords and Divisions are certain signs of Errors but Unity is no certain sign of Truth nor so much as of a Church how then can it be of a true Church 16. Universal Councils may be repeal'd by Particular This See Petrus Gregorius Syntagm l. 15. c 3. is nothing he might have said by particular persons as the Popes who may according to that Church null Acts of Councils Oecumenical But we only hold that in things mutable according to the condition Article 34. of Time Place and other Circumstances rendring some Decrees prejudicial to some Churches contrary to the intention of the first Ordainers of them a Provincial Church may make alterations 17. The Church may erre in Faith And what of that meaning any one Individual single Church as the Roman hath according to our Articles 18. The Precepts of the Church concerning set Fasts are A Doctrine of Devils It is rather a Doctrine of Devils to teach so 19. Peter was not the Prince of the Apostles Peter was A or if you will The Principal Apostle but he was not the Prince of any one of them much less of all 20. The Bishop of Rome is Antichrist We are not so much agreed about this point as to give in a full verdict but we agree he is Antichristian 21. The difference concerning Leaven and Easter is inconsiderable Where no danger of Schisms or confusions may alter the case it is true 22. It is Heathenish to invoke Saints that reign with Christ Whether heathenish or no may be doubted they never worshipping any relating to Christ But for all that it may be and is superstitious and idolatrous in the sense very current in the Roman Church 23. The Reliques of Saints are not to be worshipped We hold so indeed though we hold they are to be respected relatively 24. The Saints in Heaven have no merits It is true taken strictly and properly 25. Indulgences of the Church are vain They are not only vain but wicked and generally blasphemous and ridiculous as mangâ—ed by the Church of Rome contrary or at least without all Precedents of the Christian Church for many hundred years viz. in remitting Sins or Punishments after this life and that divers times before they are committed Is not this fine and wonderful ancient and Catholick 26. Nothing is to be read in the Church besides Canonical Scripture This is rank Puritanism contradicted by themselves in their practise who read their Sermons as well as others and pray which is aequivalent to reading in this case out of their own heads rather than Scripture 27. In Oecumenical Councils and Private for the explaining of the Doctrine of Faith the consent of Lay-Princes is necessary It is necessary for the orderly assembling of such Councils It is necessary for the giving any Secular enforcement unto them 28. That it is lawful for Lay-men alone the Clergy opposing to introduce the Ancient Religion This is true no farther then that of Gerson which is alledged to this purpose A Lay-man with Scripture on his side is to be preferred before a Council without it Supposing a monstrous Proposition no wonder if a monstrous conclusion follows 29. He is no Bishop that teacheth not This is also a Puritan strain It being only true that he is no faithful conscientious Pastor but either proud or treacherous or sloathful or basely prudent who doth not in person discharge his Office so far as he is able without turning the care of his flock over to others using that for an argument of keeping close in his Cabin which is rather an argument of appearing in his charge viz. storms on the Church Opposition the Faith and Orders of the Church meet withal and difficulties obstructing the truth It being both shameful and ridiculous both in Bishop and Priest to censure others for enemies to the Church and for them so to wast it in all mens esteem in deserting it and delivering it up to the care of others themselves seeking little else then their temporal Harvest and case These men are over the Church indeed but 't is as the Extinguisher is over the Candle to put it out They pretend for themselves they have been sufferers for the Church and so it should seem indeed by their carriage to it in that through their scandalous negligence as to their charge they take a course to revenge themselves of it by making it suffer as much or more for them 30. Faith alone justifies How this is held we have even now as also we shall hereafter more fully explain 31. There are no Merits in Good works There are none properly so called 32. Priests and Monks may marry 'T is true where the
be in them before and which doth more than countervail such antecedent liberty of simply teaching as was then in some manner fixed Thirdly there was in such cases as this added a Power and Right of instituting others as occasion offered which is unknown to have been in them as Evangelists From it follows that of all the forementioned kinds of Government that of the Church approached neerest to that call'd Monarchical which was only absolute and universal in Christ the Soveraign Head thereof but Ministerially under him and over the Church under their circuit Politically as proper Heads and Rulers and whatever power after extraordinary Callings by Revelation from God ceased any one dispartake of in the Church was ctrtainly at first derived from such single Persons alone however to the solemnity of such ordination others of an inferiour Order concurred thereto And as the Government of the civil World was originally without exception so far as search can be made by the most curious Antiquaries Monarchical though it were not governed by one man alone but by Civil Supream Princes of several Dominions into which the earth was parcelled So though no one Father or Bishop ever presided over all the Christian world yet several single Persons in their respective Provinces governing the Church as Principal the Government of the Church may rightly be termed Monarchical in Particular but Aristocratical as to the whole For as the Apostles were all Monarchs compared with their Proselites Converts and Churches by them founded but were but Peers compared one with another So was it with the Bishops and Patriarchs of the Church succeeding them whereby the Prophesie of Christ in St. Matthew was verified spoken not so much as some mistake it of his Heavenly Kingdome but earthly his Church and its ensuing glory Verily I say unto you that ye which M … â—â— have followed me in the regeneration when the son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones judging the twelve Tribes of Israel That when the Church of Christ should flourish then there should be such as in lieu of the twelve Tribes of Israel should Rule as in Thrones the Church of God under the Gospel They who object against this the words of Christ in Saint Matthew Ye know that the Princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them and Mâ—tt 20 25. 26. they that are great exercise autority upon them But it shall not be so among you Do declare no less against Aristocratical then Monarchical Government yea all Government over the Church And their favourable gâ—osS in behalf of one will be as valid for that which they reject For as it was not at all the mind of Christ that there should be no Governours at all over his Church so doth it not at all appear that what was lawful for many to do was not lawful for one But here the old cheat again takes place to suppose that the Government of one is in it self tyrannical and of many free but neither Christ nor nature ever taught them how to prove this presumptuous imagination And to this may we add another such mistake from St. Peters words That men should not be Lords over Gods heritage And what then Must there be more 1 Pet. 5. 3. than one over a Church and not onely one May a company of Presbyters oblige Christians to do or believe such things and not Lord it but if by a principal Person bearing Rule this same thing be done then is the Precept violated Besides who sees not that hath not a mind to be blind That the Apostle speaks nothing at all in these words of the kind of Government but the exercise of it and abuse Surely if Episcopal Government could not choose but tyrannize and Presbyterial could do nothing but according to Scripture and equity this Objection were unanswerable otherwise not worth the mentioning much less answering as common as it is and as confidently urged And as to that Pretense intended to overthrow our prime ground of Christs institution taken from what was first actually found in the Church viz. That Imparity of Christs Ministers was not found in the Church till about an hundred and forty or fifty years after Christ when it is confessed by the Enemies of Ecclesiastical Hierarchies that it prevailed Let the Huggers of this Device First consider what a pitiful addition is made to their cause from hence seeing that it is undenyable there was a disparity all the Apostles dayes who in order excelled all Ecclesiastical Persons and that almost one hundred years were spent of the said tearm in their time So that about fifty or sixty years only this imaginary Government had its being and then was lost again for fourteen hundred and then was better lost then found and taken up again But a far worse inconvenience spoils this jest as being founded and raised only from conjecture and that conjecture upon the obscurity of those ages not so clearly known as afterwards CHAP. XXIX Of the necessity of holding visible Communion with Christs Church Knowledge of that visible Church necessary to that Communion Of the Notes to discern the true Church how far necessary Of the Nature or Condition of such Notes in General IT being so necessary as we have above shewed to be in communion with the visible Church of Christ and the Nature of things themselves being more intrinsick many times than to characterize sufficiently them to the Enquirer into them it hath been thought necessary to explain them farther by more apparent and observable notices given of them And in the Doctrine of the Church these seem to be of greatest consequence Visibility Universality or Catholickness Sanctity and Perpetuity Of all which we shall briefly speak in order yet first premising somewhat concerning Notes in General For seeing as we have said it is necessary to know the true Church from the false and the Natures of things are often-times so abstruse and hidden from us that we cannot discover them from their own Light therefore it hath been judged very reasonable to pitch upon certain outward Notes eading us unerringly to the knowledge of the thing it self And in truth I cannot wholly approve of that course chosen to certifie us and point out to us the-true Church taken from the very being of it such as are Faithful and sincere Doctrine taught therein Sacraments duly administred Worship purely performed and Discipline rightly constituted because these are rather of the very intrinsick nature and definition it self of the Church than notes and characters outward whereby the nature it self should be certainly known We all indeed without exception consent that that Church is the true Church which is thus qualified and affected believeth aright is governed aright administreth the Sacraments aright and worshippeth aright and in one word which followeth most exactly the Rules of Holy Scripture but in the Assumption and Application is all the doubt and infinite
and for ought appears the Schismatical may be in greater unity within it self than the Catholick how can any man discern from unity which is the Catholick or true Church The Unity therefore which may any wise describe or distinguish the sounder part of Christs Church from the heretical must not be taken from that which it holdeth within it self but with some other which is acknowledged for Catholick wherein comes the use of Antiquity again because the Ancient Churches of Christ were saved by the same Faith and Worship that all succeeding Churches must be therefore if it may appear that a Church doth not agree in all necessary or considerable points of Faith Worship and Government with them of former ages supposed to be truly Catholick it self cannot be Catholick or a true Christian Church But they who look no higher than one Age or two and no farther then one place or two and finding convenient agreement amongst themselves do characterise themselves for Christs Church fall into the censure of St. Paul to the Corinthians who measuring themselves by themselves and comparing 2 Cor. 10. 12. themselves among themselves are not wise And in the Revelation of St. John we read of some Nations into whose heart God hath put to fulfill Revel 17. 7. his will and to agree and give their Kingdom unto the Beast until the word of God should be fulfilled I hope this unity of consent will not be taken for any argument of the faithfulness of their consent or Catholickness But more we shall have occasion to speak of Unity in the treating of Schism In the mean time I see no force at all in the places alleadged out of the Old Testament to prove so much as may be well allowed to the unity of the Church as where it is said My Beloved is but one and to the Cantic like purpose For such places taken in relation to Fact and not to Precept and counsel rather that Gods Church should be so and endeavour to keep the Spirit of Unity in the bond of peace as the Apostle speaks can Ephes 4. 3. be understood strictly only of that single Nation of the Jews which was alone chosen so peculiarly to himself Or of the future Coalition of Jew and Gentile into one Body as the same Apostle in the same Epistle speaketh of Christs Passion That he might reconcile both unto God in one Chap. 2. 16. Body by the Cross having slain the enmity thereby i. e. between Jew and Gentile These difficulties and uncertainties in this Note of Unity have constrained the Patrons of the Roman Cause to find out such an Unity which indeed is more apparent and certain to him that commits his Faith to be guided by some outward sign but so much repugnant to all ancient Churches so wholly strange to them and unheard of that it may seem to do them much more mischief than advantage as that which excludes all Antiquity from having any suffrage in this cause And this their Note is Unity Bellarm. de Notis Eccles lib. 4. cap. 10. init with the Bishop of Rome as boldly said and as weakly proved as their enemies could wish St. Hierom indeed saith to Damasus he is resolved to hold as He and that See believed in one particular of the Trinity and used not simply and abstractly consider'd this as a probable argument of Orthodoxness and preserving the peace of the Church but with the concurrence of other Circumstances rendring his Opinion probable But doth he or any ancient Author deserving with themselves the name of a Father teach as they would perswade indefinitely That to hold communion with the Bishop of Rome is to be assured you are of the true Catholick Church Christs Charter much stood upon to St. Peter and the Rhetorical flourishes many times of the Holy Fathers extolling St. Peter and his Successors but never categorically affirming or soberly determining so will not amount to this Hence they proceed to Universality too as a sign of the true Church and an help to Unity it self For it profitteth nothing that there be some one Church and that in one Age and Place which is at unity with it self if it be not universal Christs Church is said to be universal but so many senses are given of Universality it self that it is hard to apply it positively to any pretending to it For nothing so plain as that the Christian Faith doth not and never did possess all Nations nor all the persons of those Nations where it hath flourished No man therefore can know the true Church by that which is not true of it And therefore I make no doubt but the most anciently genuine and proper sense of that expression in the Apostles Creed where it is said I believe the Catholick Church Vide Augustinum Epistolâ— 50. aimed at no more than to cause us to believe that Christs Church was from that time forward no longer to be of one Nation or one Denomination as it was before Christs Incarnation but Catholick that is Universal and indifferently to extend to all People For at that time when the Creed was composed the secondary sense wherein Catholick and sound Believer signified the same thing was scarce at all heard of no not before the Councel of Nice under Constantine Afterwards it was applyed to particular Sees as well Alexandrian Antiochian and some others as Roman In Theodosius the second his dayes which above 400 years after Christ a Sozomenus Ecclesiast Hist lib. 7. cap. 4. Law was made that none should call themselves Catholicks but such as believed aright concerning the Holy Trinity the rest should be termed Hereticks Afterward notwithstanding every Sect and Heresie usurped that name as may appear from that very place corruptly cited out of Austin August Epist ad Epistolam Fundamenti by some to prove the true Church from the Title of Catholick it self For saith he however all Hereticks desire to be called Catholicks yet if any enquired for a Catholick Church they were directed to the Orthodox and not Heretical Churches But if we take the word Catholick in a more restrained sense not for that which is all over the world actually but so far as it doth extend passeth generally through all and that not Places but Ages too where shall we find a Catholick Church Christians never for fourteen or fifteen hundred yeers not conspiring into one belief no not in things held very important to Faith and I mean not only single persons but Societies of Christians Therefore neither from hence can we conclude directly of the true Church in opposition to Heretical And therefore the Patrons of this opinion of the Universality finding themselves harder pursued with difficulties than they can evade being taken in their own snares are forced according to their very vain custom to leave off the tryal of the truth from matter of Fact which is most plain and ready and proceed to say It ought so
themselves For though infinite Instances may be given of Cities and Nations which have wrung the Civil Power out of the hands of their Princes and Magistrates and pretended they would be ruled by their own Counsels and power yet could they never effect this but were constrained after all devices used to no purpose to let go their hold if not Pretensions and suffer the assumed Power to return to a more capable subject Which incapacity of using such Power is no less then an unanswerable Demonstration to me that it was never there placed by any divine Will or Right but somewhere else Now though some eminent Reformers of the Late Age have been so superfluously and in truth superstitiously nice and as is pretended jealous for Christs honour and absolute Headship over his Church that would not so much as allow the name of Government to the Church or any in it least Christ should suffer loss but administration must be the Junius de Ecclesia name signifying power and Rule exercised in the Church yet in truth all this is no better then a Superstitious fear where there is no fear For they are not names but things that are so much to be heeded And if these men in their Charge had not acted the part of Governours as well as others we might have allowed this invention for tollerable but the truth is the honour pretended to Christ and the Gentle usage of the People have ended in the same thing which the other more openly and honestly professed to do the difference being only in the Hands so acting But 't is no new thing to beguile dissetled people with new words into new orders neither will it ever be left off as common a Stratagem as it is so long as the People are people and Craft and Ambition shall spurrmen of Fortune to currie and scratch that unruly beast to the end that when they find it convenient they may get up of them and ride them at their pleasure This incapacity of all Christians to rule themselves being the same with the other necessarily inferreth a more proper subject of that Power which not being assumed but delivered any more then the Faith it self founds a distinction of Christians and the Church as ancient as the Church it self not unknown to Civil Societies For as hath been said a Kingdom or Commonwealth is said to decree and act such a thing when not the thousand part thereof so much as know any thing of it till it be done so that clearly there is a Nation Real and Representative and Formal and proper This consisteth of all Persons in that Society and every member of that Political Bodie The other of such Principal Parts of that Bodie as are in Possession of autority and power to Rule the rest and whose Acts are interpreted to be the Acts of the whole State And that the Church consisting of infinite Persons uncapable of consulting or acting Decretorily must and alwayes had certain Select Persons representing the whole which it should conclude the thing it self together with Precedents of all Places and Ages do prove The greatest arguments and most colourable are taken from the Infancy of the Church to the contrary For both Hereticks and Schismaticks endeavour at contrary conclusions from the Scripture Patrons of the Popes absoluteness argue from a Superiority or Primacy of order in St. Peter when the Church consisted it may be of twenty persons to make good the Popes pretensions to supremacy over the universal Church when it consisteth of so many Nations But to this our answer is ready First that the like power was never in St. Peter over his fellow Apostles and the Rest that is claimed by the Present Bishop of Rome Secondly That if such a Power as is asserted to St. Peter for the Popes sakehad ever been in him really yet it could be no good ground of his Successors claiming the same over the Catholick Church And that First because there is no probability of the like Gifts and Graces requisite to such Autority in the Popes of Rome as were given by Christ to St. Peter yea there are more instances to be given of the Ignorance and horrible vitiousness of Persons possessing that Chaiâ— then in any other Patriarchal See in Christendom Secondly There is no Rule of Certainty setting aside the Personal incapacities and imperfections how far the Apostolical power was derived to their Successors but what may be taken from the end of such power which was to conserve the Church in due order of Government Devotion and Faith and this may as well and better be performed without one Persons engrossing to himself the Disposal of all things Primarily though not in the Execution Thirdly the difference is vast between the Church consisting of so few and contracted into so narrow a circuit as at the first founding of it when one man might have with great facility taken the whole management of the Church upon him and in following Ages when it was diffused into so many and far distant quarters of the Universe not to be inspected or managed by one man though an Apostle On the other side Persons of Democratical Principles and purposes finding in holy Writ that the whole Church without distinction of Persons were often assembled together and that during their such meeting matters concerning the due administration of the Church were treated of collect from thence that in right and not rather occasionally they concurred to Publick Acts of the Church but this likewise is a fallacy without any necessity of consequence as will appear from the original and orderly search made into the first Constitution and the gradual Progress of Ecclesiastical Persons and functions First then That Christ is the Head of the Church and under that General notion of Power life and motion doth communicate his influence unto his Body the Scripture is so manifest and it is so generally and willingly by all assented to that it were lost time to insist on it He is then by immediate consequence the fountain of all Power resting in that Body as doth appear from the several Appellations subordinate to that of Head attributed unto him in Scripture For Hebrews the third and first he is called The Apostle of our profession And in the Book of the Acts he is stiled that Prophet Heb. 3. 1. Acts. 3. 22. Deut. 18. 15. Luk. 4. 18. which was in Deuteronomie promised to the true Israel And an Evangelist he is made to us by his own words verifying the Prediction of Esaias upon himself Saying The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to preach the Gospel And St. Peter calleth him our 1 Pet. 2. 25. Mat. 23. 10. Bishop Doctour or Master he claims as proper to himself in St. Mathew And to the Hebrews as before he is called a Priest an High priest yea lastly a Deacon or Minister for the words properly used signify the same Rom. 15. 8. thing
such as were Christians without any autority in the Church and therefore we read often of the Apostles and their Party on the one side and Brethren on the other But the Officers and Rulers of the Acts. 11. 1 12 17 15 23 16. 2. Church are not found to have any general name distinguishing them from others but were by their particular charges and Offices known to men as Apostles Elders Bishops Evangelists Deacons But afterward compendiousness of speech general cemprehension of them so distinct requiring they received their several Names not as Socinus Salmasius and some such presumptuous traders for Anarchy in the Church would have it the things themselves or being For it is granted that at first all true believers Clerus dicimur quia sors Dei sumus Hieron Item Praefat. ad Enarrat August Psal 1 Pet. 5. 3. were called indifferently 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Gods Portion or Clergy as we now speak For it is very probable that St. Peter using that word which we render Clergy doth intend to comprehend thereby all Christian People as well as they who as St. Hierome saith are the Lords portion more peculiarly But with good advice afterward they who were more especially dedicated to Gods service and attended his Altar were signally called the Clergy and the other the Laity or people very agreeably to the phrase of the Old Testament where we find not only a distinction in the things themselves but in the names of such as served any ways in Gods house and those who were only Israelites at large For these were called simply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sons of the People or the Laity as we now adayes speak 2 Chron. 35 7 12. Vid. Vatab. in Locum in opposition to the Levites which discrimination in terms was thought to be introduced in Josiah's time Secondly From what is said we may conclude that even before and after this distinction all the administration of Church affairs passed through the hands of these Persons of the Clergy or Ecclesiastical Functions and that their Votes and Acts ever went under the name of the Church it may be that in the beginning of the Church when Christians had not so many advantages as after they had and their convenience of assembling was not so great but they were constrained to teach and pray and determine controversies and ordain Laws for the Church that the Laity as we now call them were present at all these but that this fortuitous presence should inferr a right nothing appears A third Conclusion may be That observing the orderly Rites used to invest any person with a Clerical Power it must necessarily follow that they who wanted them never attained the thing it self For the Author to the Hebrews asserts plainly the sacredness of Evangelical Ministring Heb. 5. 4. from the Prescriptions and practise of the Levitical saying No man takes this office upon him but he that was called of God as was Aaron and least it might be presumed that this strickness concerned the Old Law only he proceedeth to that greatest of Precedents Christ himself who though he needed not any Institution being absolutely free to all such purposes of himself yet was called of God in signal manner to shew that all that exercise such Sacred function should much more be thereunto orderly called Now to understand what this ordinary and orderly call is the better it is worth the observing how Aaron was called for so in proportionable manner ought all under the Gospel be ordained to the Ministry And here first we may note there is not the least intimation given of such a Call as is Internal upon which many vainly rest But Aaron was called not only internally by certain proper and sufficient Gifts to that Office but externally and that not of himself but of another He was called by God Now least it should be here suspected that a bare and bold presumption of being called of God without some outward evidence prooving the same might suffice to justify an Intruder of himself into the Ministry the Scripture tells us how Aaron was called of God and that is not only of God and immediately but mediately by man that is by Moses Nay farther because many content themselves with such an Ordination as comes from another not examining much what power or Right such persons have so to ordain others the Scriptures tell us that Aaron was called by another and him appointed specially by God so to do as we read Exodus the 28. 1. where Exod. 2. ◠God commandeth Moses saying And take thou unto thee Aaron thy Brother and his sons with him from among the children of Israel that they may minister unto me in the Priests Office Here is their Election or Vocation Their consecration or ordination followeth afterward described particularly according to its several Ceremonies in the next chapter So that we see the great Example or Figure of Evangelical ordination directeth to such a form as ought to be of God by the hands of some who are thereunto appointed And if any should here interpose that Moses himself was no Priest properly himself though he were of the Tribe of Levi and yet he consecrated Priests being himself rather a Civil Magistrate and from hence argue a power in Lay-men especially Magistrates to do the same now adayes I answer here indeed doth Calvins defence of himself and such as are in like condition take place of an Ordinary call and an Extraordinary For before God had setled a Rule and Order in his Church the extraordinary and immediate hand of God did appoint persons to minister before It was therefore first of all an Extraordinary Act in God to call Moses rather than any others to direct and Rule his Church it was next an Extraordinary Act in him to separate the whole Tribe of Levi to Minister before him but from that time forward there was no such thing heard of as an Extraordinary Call Secondly I answer that God prescribing to us Rules and Precedents doth not thereby so tie his own hands as he doth ours but when he pleaseth he may create Persons in Extraordinary manner to what ends he will And his Autority infallibly granted to those we call now Lay-men is altogether sufficient to make a Priest of what Order or dignity soever he shall be But until such infallible Proofs of either Gods immediate Calling which is Extraordinary indeed or his immediate enabling or empowring any other Person not having in the ordinary Course established in his Church received such a power be given all such Extraordinary assuming of the Ministery on a mans self is more then one way Extraordinary and to be rejected as void And with such no good and conscientious Christian ought to Communicate as with Priests that is as Offering the Spiritual Sacrifice of Prayer and Praise unto God as a Legitimate and Publick Minister of God or Mediatour of the People or that Mistical Sacrifice in the
may reconcile many otherwise contrary opinions found amongst the Ancient Fathers sometimes ascribing much of the Ecclesiastical Power to Christian Emperours and sometimes calling the same in question The Church of England so far as she hath declared herself herein seemeth to take the mean way and follow herein the Prescriptions of the Old Testament and the Precedents of Christian Emperors found in the Antient Church under the Gospel and doth profess to be the due of our Kings as much as ever any Kings upon earth to sway in Ecclesiastical matters In execution of which power as there was alwayes approbation moderated according to the customes of the Church so was there always Opposition when the bounds were exceeded And undoubtedly true is That we are taught by our Church to acknowledge That whatever in Church Constitutions and Canons Church of England Can. 2. matters was the Right of Jewish Kings or Christian Emperours of Old is so now the Right of our Kings But some not content herewith have out of the Title of Head given at the first attempts of Reformation to our King and made by acts of State Hereditary to his successors drawn an argument to prove all that power which rested in the Church to be devolved on the Kings of this Nation But this hath ever been disowned and disclaimed in such a large sense by themselves as appears by Queen Elizabeths Injunctions and an Act of Parliament in confirmation whereof I shall here only recite the opinion or testimony of Bishop Jewel in his view of Pius Quintus his seditious Bull Bishop Jewel against the Bull of Pius 5th against her in these his own word Where is the called Supream Head Peruse the Acts of Parliament the Records the Rolls and the Writs of Chancery or Exchequer which pass in her Graces name Where is she ever called Supream Head of the Church No No brethren she refuseth it she would not have it nor be so called Why then doth Christs Vicar blaze and spread abroad so gross an untruth c. This was her Judgement and modesty then when there was greatest cause to apprehend some such thing and what she thought of it I never could learn was ever otherwise interpreted by her Successors For notwithstanding that according to the most ancient and undoubted Rights of this Emperial Crown our Kings are supream Governors of the Church as well as State yet never was it expounded of the Church as they were Ecclesiastical but as they were of Civil capacity For herein differeth the Right of Kings according to our Reformation from that of Roman Perswasion That Clergy men becoming Sons of the Church in more especial manner than they of the Laity are not thereby exempted from the Civil Power either in matter of propertie or Criminalness But the Roman Church so far exalted and extended their Ecclesiastical Power as to withdraw such Persons and their Cases civil from Civil cognizance and judgement and assume it to themselves And this the Pope claiming very injuriously as Head of the Church To root up this usurpation Henry the eight null'd that his pretence and took the title to himself intending nothing more then to vindicate his Prerogative in that particular For though it cannot be denied that many and great Priviledges to this effect have been of Old granted by Christian Emperours to eminent Bishops to judge of their own Sons as they were called within themselves yet did they never claim this as a Native Right of the Church or Christianity but as an act of Grace from the Civil Power And though the Church following therein the Councel of St. Paul to go to Law rather before 1 Cor. 6. 1. the Just than unjust and that Christians should rather determine Causes of differences amongst themselves by arbitration than scandalously apply themselves to the Judgement Seat of Heathen did ever endeavour to determine business within it self and yet more especially the Clergy Yet they never denied a Right in Civil Autority to call them in question upon misdemeanours or to decide their Cases of Civil nature And for the other of Divine nature or purely Ecclesiastical Princes never expected or desired to intermeddle therewith This the Roman Deputy of Achaia Gallio understood not to concern his Juridical power when Act. 18. he refused to be a Judge of such matters as were esteemed Religious though in that violence was offered to the body of St. Paul before his face he might and ought to have shewn his Autority But when the Soveraign Power became Christian it was not thought unlawful at all nor scandalous to address themselves to it for decision of Controversies And this is it which is intended to be demanded now by our Kings in their Supremacy in Cases Ecclesiastical and Civil and acknowledged by the Clergy of this Church to be his due without that servile way of seeking leave from the Bishop of Rome or any under him Onely where it may be showed that Peculiar Grants of Exemptions from the common course of Justice have been made by Princes to the Clergy of the Church may it not seem equal that they should enjoy the benefit of them as well as others in other Cases But nothing is more unreasonable or intollerable then the impudence of those spitefully and malitiously bent against the Religion professed in our Church who argue from the Kings Supremacy over the Church such an absolute dominion there as they will by no means acknowledge due to him in the State If by Acts of Parliament a thing be confirmed to the Commonwealth it is lookt on as inviolable by the King and unalterable without the like solemn Revocation as was the Constitution But by vertue of the Ancient Right of the Crown they would have it believed the King may at his pleasure alter such solemn Acts made in behalf of the Church Without the concurrence of the Three Estates nothing is lookt upon as a standing Law to the Civil State but by vertue of this Supremacy Ecclesiastical they would have it believed that without any more ado without consent or counsel of the Church he may make what alteration of Religion he pleases which was never heard or dreamt of Yea and whereas not only his Civil but Ecclesiastical Power always acknowledged the Bounds of common benefit and extended not to destruction they would have it thought that he may when he pleaseth by vertue of such Headship destroy the Body of the Church and Religion and leave none at all so far at least as the withdrawing of all secular aid and advantage do hasten its ruine But they will not be of this opinion any longer than they have brought about their mischievous purposes Surely St. Paul who had 1 Cor. 5. 12. nothing to do at all with State matters and could not touch one that was without the Church by Ecclesiastical censure was as much the Head of the Church as ever any Prince in Christendom doth expressly declare that whatsoever
with Christians denying them all outward conversation as well as spiritual in matters of Religion Now this seems to be a branch of the Old Greater Excommunication and not in all places disusâ—d And sometimes is unlawful and otherwhile lawful according to the extent and application of them For to inflict the same to the dissolving of ties of nature is not agreeable to the simplicity of the Gospel And Natural Ties we call such as are between Subjects and Soveraign Parents and Children Husband and Wife which by no Ecclesiastical Excommunication can be broken or nulled The reason whereof besides the monstrous effects ensuing upon their evacuation not here to be treated of is this That Ecclesiastical Power can take away no more than it gave nor Christianity destroy what it never builded But Christianity did never simply confer such Rights on men but the Law of Nature only it regulated and directed the same therefore can it not null it It is therefore unchristian for any pretending Ecclesiastical Power to absolve subjects from obedience Civil or Children from natural and the like But every Christian in that he is adopted of God by baptism and admitted into the Society of Christians doth receive thereby certain Rights and power to communicate with it in all things which power may be forfeited and lost by breach of Covenant as well with the Body of the Church to live and believe according to the Received Faith and practice thereof as with the Head Christ And this being so judged by those who are over the Church in the Lord it is very consonant to Christian Religion to deny such of what order or rank soever they be the signs of outward communion Prayer and Communication of the Holy Sacraments of Christ The Church hath power to declare even soveraign Princes uncapable of such Communion and deny it them which we call the Lesser Excommunication Yet because as we said No natural Right can be extinguished upon unchristian misdemeanours If a Supream Prince of a Place should disdain to be denied or opposed in such cases and would make his entrance into the Church by vertue of his Civil Right to all places under his Dominion the most that the Church could do justly in such cases were to diswade him but by any force to resist his entrance into any Church were unlawful as it would be also to minister in a Christian manner in his presence for this cannot be commanded by him but in such cases suffering must be put in practice as for the Faith it self sought to be destroyed Some there are yet who call in question the peculiar and incommunicable Right of decreeing this Censure of Excommunication to those called the Clergy which is very strange seeing this Power is part of that of the Keys delivered by Christ himself to such only as he constituted Governors of the Church and that in Christs days their was a distinction between the Members of his Body as to Inferiority and Superiority Obedience and Command Teacher and Learner and much more in the Apostles days after Christs Assention and much more yet after their days according as the matter of the Church Christians encreasing and improving became more capable of a more convenient form and fashion For as it is in the production of natural things though the Form be certain and constant and the very same at the first production as in its perfection yet it doth not appear so fully and perfectly as afterward So was it with the Body of Christs Church It is certain therefore that from the beginning this Act of Excluding from the Communion was never executed but by the Rulers and Presidents of Congregations though the people might concurr thereto Now that these Rulers whom we may call Bishops or Presbyters were not created by the People nor by the Prince we have shewed already and therefore did nothing in their Right but in the Power of Christ whose Ministers alone they properly were And this being essential to right Administration of the Church how can it be supposed either to be separable from the Church in General or from those persons who are the proper Administrators of it For to say with some It is needless Selden de Jure Gentium apud Bibliander apud Erastum wholly where Christian Magistrates rule whose proper office it is to rebuke and punish vice and scandalous misdemeanors which say they can only be just cause of Excommunication is to destroy the subject of the question which supposes it needful and upon this enquires after the Persons which should Execute the same And spitefully to defeat the Church of all Authority from Christ doth indeed translate this Power to the Civil Magistrate And is not the absurdity the very same which endowes the Christian Governor with Civil Power and which endows the Civil Magistrate with Christian If it be not absurd for a King to be a Philosopher it is not absurd for a Philosopher to be a King If it be not absurd for a Civil Magistrate to have Priestly power it is not absurd for him that hath Priestly power to be a Magistrate There is certainly no inconsistency on either side For things of a far different nature and intention may easily meet in the same person though the things themselves can never be the same Here therefore the things differing so egregiously it is no more than nacessary that a different cause be acknowledged necessary which not appearing the Effect must be denied Now the Cause of all Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction as Ecclesiastical must needs come from him from whom the Church it self hath its Original and being And it is a certain Rule that a man is born to nothing that comes from Christ as Head of his Church but is made and instituted Which whoever is not cannot lay any just claim to any Office under him I know it is objected that Preaching being an Ecclesiastical Act hath without contradiction been practised by diverse and to this day may be no ordination preceeding To which I thus answer by distinguishing first between doing a thing Ex Charitate and Ex Officio out of Charity and out of duty Preaching was ever permittedin the Church especially taken in the larger sense wherein it signifies all declaration of the Gospel out of Charity But the office of Preaching was never suffered but upon antecedent qualifications And these two differ yet farther For he that doth a thing out of Office doth it so that it is not lawful for him absolutely to omit it but he that doth it out of Charity and only by connivance not by commission may cease at his pleasure and as he made may suspend himself when he will Again he that teaches without Autority upon bare permission nay be silenced without any other cause renderd but the will of him that hath the Jurisdiction or if a reason be given because He hath no autority is sufficient But he that is orderly instituted to that end cannot without
injustice and Tyranny be denied the exercise of that which pertains to him Now the Key of Knowledge and the Key of Jurisdiction of which the Power of the Keys delivered by Christ consists and into which it is commonly divided are very different For the first doth but open the door to the others and prepares and qualifies a person for the other but doth no more actually give power or autority than the great skill and experience of a Souldier makes him a Captain to command others or knowledge in the law makes a man a judge actually It is therefore the Key of Jurisdiction or a Right given by Christ to administer the Church and every member thereof that is principally to be acknowledged in this Case And which not being found to descend orderly from Christ no effect of that affected power can be acknowledged But as is said doth not descend naturally or by birth but Judicially from others In which manner who ever receives it not sacrilegiously murps what belongs not to him But they who would wring this power out of the hands of the Church Selden de Synedriis Lib 1. Cap. 9. do give us certain Presidents as well from the Jewish Church wherein there was it should seem a custom that one Person might excommunicate another when he pleased But the same Antiquaries tell us also that it was in use amongst them for a man to excommunicate himself And this I take to imply an answer to the former For it is in the power of any man to separate himself from the Church or any other Society materially and Really but Judicially and Formally he cannot neither can he separate another otherwise than by absenting himself from the Communion of the Church he may indeed as formally pronounce such a censure against himself or an other as the most Canonical Judge in the world but intrinsique power being wanting the outward Act turns to smoak as to others but as to himself has no other effect then he that is in a boat hath upon the earth against which he sets his oar and thrusts hard but puts himself off not the earth as our neighbouring Ministers did when with intollerable and incredible presumption they took upon them to Excommunicate their own Bishops and some of the transmarine Churches of the same Platform were so wise as to allow their Fact And to the Instances of some Princes whom Histories affirm to have Excommunicated Id. ibid. certain persons the Answer is That the word Excommunication hath deceived the reporters and appliers thereof to this Case For according to signification of that word both in the Latin and Greek language Excommunication or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the declaration by Publick Herauld Suidas in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Item 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of any guilty Person to be excluded or banished the Princes Court or Company or perhaps Dominions Thus many have been Excommunicated by Soveraign Princes But can any instances be given of such as without any further Act of the Church have been thereupon denied Communion with the Church And what we say of Excommunicating holds good likewise in the Power of Absolution which the same Persons allow to meer secular Powers and would prove from an Act of Constantine the Great his absolving Eusebius Bishop of Nicomedia Constantine we all know had but little knowledge in the Rites of the Church at that time and might attempt he knew not what as soon as any other man whose affection to Christianity far exceeded his Judgement But what is affirmed of Constantines Act That he Restored that Excommunicated person to the Communion of the Church which only is properly Absolution No surely but he might restore him to his See and that is all Or if more were done he might be said to do it who caused by the interposition of his Power some Bishop of the Church to free him from those Eonds But questionless that is none of the least corruptions which the Church of Rome stands guilty of and which our Church hath but too much connived at that the Power of Excommunication should be in the hands of Lay men To mend this a little they of the Roman Law distinguish that which by no means should be separated curing one absurdity by another Anastafius Germbnius de Sacrorum Immunitat For they distinguish Episcopal Order from Episcopal Jurisdiction and say a man that hath not Episcopal Order but Episcopal Jurisdiction may Excommunicate a vile and corrupt imagination brought in on purpose to serve the turns of ambitious secular and sacrilegious Drones who would drive two trades of secular advantage and Ecclesiastical Profits For there is nothing so Essential unto Episcopacy as Jurisdiction I mean an Habitude and Right to Preside and Rule and there can be no Episcopal power without that nor that without Episcopal Charactar Officers indeed there may be under him void of that Charactar or any Priestly because though the Court be properly Ecclesiastical yet all things are not so which are acted therein Judicial Acts and Acts of Notaries and of Executions are competible to unordain'd persons because Gifts of nature and Learning may capacitate a man to them but that of Jurisdiction properly so called is the intrinsique Right of the Pastour of the Church and this of Excommunication annext thereunto or rather a part of it And therefore he is not a Bishop that hath it not and he that hath it is a Bishop It is not indeed necessary that this should be denounced by a Bishop but that this power which is likewise inherent in a Priest as a Priest be committed to him after the decree made by the Bishop For the Priest having a Jurisdiction within himself by vertue of his place and office but restrained by the Superiour Power to him the Jurisdiction and Autority of the Bishop is seen sufficiently in this that it enables a Priest to do that which of himself he ought not to do and this is rather exciting an old power in the Priest then infusing a new giving right to it to exert it self which before it had not But Lay-men having no Ecclesiastical Charactar inherent in them cannot by any such general commission given them from the Bishop act effectually to that end for want of the due Principle this Licence of the Bishop being nothing else but removing of that Obstacle which hinders it to work where it was For to deliberate debate and Judge of causes and persons subject to Excommunication may possibly be better performed by such who have attained to that science without any order in the Clergy but the fact it self is quite of another nature CHAP. XXXIII Of the second branch of Ecclesiastical Power which is Mystical or Sacramental Hence of the Nature of Sacraments in General Of the Vertue of the Sacraments Of the sign and thing signified That they are alwayes necessarily distinct Intention how necessarie to a Sacrament Sacraments Effectual to Grace HAving
according to the judgment of many of the Ancients it was Christs intention we should have but two Sacraments when he shed from his Divine side water and blood insinuating thereby Baptism and the Sacrament of his Blood And another argument intimating 1 Cor. 10. 1 2 3 4. that Christ ordained but two Sacraments in the New Testament is taken from the due conformity between the Shadows and Types of the Law and the Substance of the Gospel The Law had but two Sacraments proper Circumcision and the Passover and therefore that these two should prefigure only two in the Gospel is most probable But not only the Fathers of old but Schoolmen did alwayes acknowledge a due proportion to be observed between these And it makes nothing against this That the Fathers do often call some at least of the other five Sacraments because then they spoke at large as we said before A second general Reason may be That as they have no precept so have they no promise from Christ of Grace or favour Spiritual For Ordination indeed hath an ordinary Gift of Ecclesiastical Power but no assurance of special Grace belonging to it Confirmation hath a good and laudable end but no special Promise to it Repentance hath a promise but hath no outward visible sign upon which the word is built to make it a Sacrament for this is a Third Reason of the equality of Sacraments Because all true and proper Sacraments must consist as well of outward signs to which the word and Grace are annext as of the Grace it self therein given But all these Sacraments have not these Signs and they which have an appearance of visible signs have them not by Gods institution Fourthly The Sacraments of the Gospel are of concernment to all true Christians according to their Capacities but all Christians are not by the confession of the Patrons of seven Sacraments bound to marry or to be in Holy Orders Nay some are absolutely interdicted the use of some of the reputed Sacraments as are women from Holy Orders therefore whatever may possibly be said concerning the not circumcising of Women under the Law under the Gospel there being neither Male nor Female as St. Paul affirmeth that cannot be a Sacrament equal in sacredness or necessity of which Women are not capable Fifthly The general Nature of Sacraments is such as renders the due Partakers of them more holy than they are who receive them not but no man saies that marriage faithfully observed doth make any person more holy then Virginity therefore it cannot be a Sacrament If they here say That Marriage is not a Sacrament absolutely but only as it is Christian and a representation of Christs conjunction with his Church and as it is blessed by the Priest I answer First to this latter That blessing doth not alter the kind of the thing but only sanctifies the thing it self and therefore Marriage in Heathens and Christians is the same in nature but not in the circumstances of Holiness And whenas St. Paul saith in his Epistle to the Ephesians having before treated of solemn Marriage This Eph. 5. 31 32 is a great mystery from whence commonly is drawn an argument of a Sacramentalness in Marriage of Christians the reply is easie which quite nulls the conclusion First Because it is as manifest as a thing need be that St. Paul doth speak rather of Heathens marriage than Christian as appears from his citation of the first institution of Marriage which comprehends all and therefore according to themselves could not intend to make a Sacrament of it seeing it is no Sacrament but as Christian Secondly The word being Mystery doth not properly signifie a Sacrament however the Vulgar Translation might be allowed to translate it so but not men upon that tearm given at large to draw it into the number of Sacraments St. Paul saith to the Corinthians Behold I show you a mystery 1 Cor. 15. we shall not all dye but we shall all be changed Is this a Sacrament also But many of the Fathers have so called it It may be so in the sense before spoken of in which many more things may so be called But lastly The Apostle in that Place to the Ephesians doth expresly remove that tearm Mystery from the natural or civil conjunction of Man and Woman Eph. 5. 27 29. in Matrimony and restrain it to Christ and his Church and doth not so much as say that Marriage is a mystery For having drawn an Argument for the due observation of Wedlock and its Rights that seeing Christ loved his Church man should love his Church he addeth afterward This is a great mystery but I speak of Christ and the Church which is as 32. if it had been said Here is a great Mystery but this Mystery I mean not So much of external Marriage but internal between Christ and his Church But after all this seeing we grant with many of the Ancients That the name Sacrament is communicable to more than two it is not much worth the contending whether we make more or fewer than seven while we reserve a peculiar sacredness to these two above others Let us rather touch upon them in their nature than name as best worthy to be rightly understood And first of Orders briefly as having spoken thereof in treating of the Political Power of the Church and there shown the necessity of them according to Christs intention and institution which was to make a discrimination between Persons and the several Members of that Body the Church of which he is the Head as is also sufficiently insinuated by St. Paul to the Corinthians saying But now hath Göd set the Members every one of 1 Cor. 12. 18. them in the Body as it hath pleased him where he doth not speak of moral but Political excellency and order of Inferiour and Superiour From whence the name of the Function is taken For as St. Augustine defines it Order is Civ Dei Lib. 19. 13. the disposing or ranking of equal and unequal things in their proper places And therefore sometimes the Church is divided by the Ancients into Clergy and Laity as two Orders Again The Clergy by the Ancienter into three only Bishop Priest and Deacon as Optatus Afterwards some made Isidorus Hispalens Orig. Lib. 7. c. 12. six some seven some nine as Hispalensis who likewise subdivideth the Bishop into four Orders Patriarch Metropolitane Arch-Bishop and simple Bishop So that it were not worth the labour to strive about words here and especially in distinguishing Order from Degree in the Church For though the distinction in nature be manifest between the first importing a diversity in kind and the other in condition of the same kind yet the Church cannot be though to speak so circumspectly at all times and so precisely as not to use them promiscuously divers times so that because she sometimes speaks of Degrees they should deny the Order of the same thing Neither
same in publick and clearly in the Church seeing we could not do this when we were baptized Mast How are ye confirmed Schol. By publick blessing intercession of the Church with imposition of hands Mast But how art thou assured of this Schol. We have Word of God when he sayes Let little Children come unto me c. Thus that Catechise Another reason may be the danger from the multitude of Hereticks which possibly might have corrupted such young beginners in the Faith therefore as well for the better securing such persons as for the satisfaction of the Church that they who were once enter'd into communion with it did so persevere inviolate in the same this excellent Rite was instituted And surely because it notably discriminates Schismaticks and Erroneous persons from sober and faithful Members of Christ and his Church it is by vain ignorant and ungodly persons scoffed at railed at and contemned A third Reason respecteth the time to come wherein a man foreseeing the many and great temptations of the World Flesh and Devil which he had renounced in Baptism to increase upon him as he converses more with the World doth thereby fortifie himself by a renewed profession of his Faith and Obedience to Christ Fourthly to this conduceth very much the Benediction of his Ghostly Father the Bishop and the joynt prayers of all the Congregation which ought devoutly to be put up to God for the descent of his Grace to preserve the persons so confirmed in that holy profession which should be most earnestly desired by every pious heart that likes his Religion and fears his own frailties And it is to me an infallible argument of desperate unchristian prophaneness or a new superstition instilled into men alienating them from the truth of that Religion in which they were educated who carp at this so godly Constitution their best ground being that which is to all their frivolous reasonings Because no express place of Scripture commands it directly and because it is possible to be saved without it It is possible that we may be saved without many things which we daily use in Religion and yet they contemptuously and wilfully omitted may be a just and certain cause of our condemnation the Scriptures having not limited God to those means of saving us which they have if we would be saved And yet again they have not so particularized our duties that there should be nothing accepted by God from us which they have not expressed I find it disputed on both sides whether this Rite be of Divine Institution or not and shall not determine it but in this both Ancient and Modern Eastern and Western Churches are agreed that it is of Divine use and therefore I may determine it to be pious and profitable and them who oppose it to speak evil 2 Pet. 2. of the things they understand not for which they may utterly perish in their own corruption But I suppose the proper Minister of this Solemnity who alwayes was the Bishop of the Church hath much turned the stomach of those who very unhappily have none or most wickedly endeavour to have none against it For considering how little is to be said against it how much for it the principle ground why they are bent against it must be to defend themselves from notorious defects To understand this as likewise the manner of performing this Sacramental Rite it is to be noted there was a threefold use of Unction called also Chrism in the ancient Church whereof one pertained to the Presbyter or Priest who in the time of Baptism was wont to anoint the party baptized on the crown of the Head The other two were properly belonging to the Bishop the one being done presently Hieremias Patr. Cap 7. Censure O. rieâ—tal after Baptism on the forehead after the Priest had anointed him on the crown of the Head which custom the Greek Church retain to this day as their Patriarch Hieremias witnesseth and when this was done I suppose there followed no other Confirmation but after the deferring of Baptism ceased and the appointed times of Easter and Pentecost for that Sacrament were laid aside and children and that at all times and in all places of Divine worship were admitted to Baptism and not alwayes as most anciently in the presence of the Bishop then it became necessary that a peculiar time and proper services should be appointed to this Solemnity wherein the Party to be confirmed was signed in the forehead by the Bishop only as before in substance but with variation of circumstances In Gregory Gregor M. Epist Lib 3. 9. the Great 's days it should seem the brest was anointed by the Priest What need we trouble ourselvs in such things aswere alterable in that unalterable solemnity our Churches moderation endeavouring to prevail upon the modesty of some dissatisfied persons in it have incurred the censurre of other Churches in paring that Ordinance to the Quick from unnecessary excrescencies without any effect upon her own undutiful children but pertinacy and petulancy in their private morosities which at length may teach us how vain such charms of Charity are used upon such deaf Adders and unnatural Vipers whom nothing will satisfie but the tearing to pieces the womb that conceived them And that they may do with it what they list they make the Church speak what they list many times And therefore though it hath wisely declared and plainly but for two Sacraments ordinarily necessary to salvation they are wont to exclaim against it thereby inferring contumeliously that she holds more though not so necessary which had been no slander if they at the same time had used that candour which became them in stating the mind of the Church as they might and ought but to do this here or in other cases were to do themselves or Cause wrong and to be just to us were to be cruel to themselves A fifth pretended Sacrament is that of Repentance sometimes also called Penance with us For so I read Mr. Bradford in his Sermon on the Fourth of Matthew and the seventeenth to speak saying Penance is a sorrowing or forethinking of our sins past an earnest purpose to amend or turning to God with a trust of pardon Which description may suffice us at present For the first thing in Repentance is a sound judgment of the evil of the Facts committed or omitted the next is a belief and sense of the evil of punishment incurred by such enormities A third degree or act of the mind is a change of the resolution for the time to come to act more reasonably and faithfully A fourth is an apprehension of the Grace and Mercy of God towards him upon his humiliation and return A fifth the real execution and putting in outward practise the good purposes of heart in effects proper to Repentance A sixth is not to repent of Repentance or return to the offenses for which he was so grieved and which he renounced A seventh is the
confession to the Priest or Minister Some indeed very ignorant and no less superstitious persons are offended at the word Auricular from the common use of it amongst them whose Doctrine and Practice have corrupted it But the ancient use thereof was quite otherwise than now adayes it is as it is thus expressed by Bishop Jewel It is learnedly noted by Bishop Rhenanus the Sinner when he began to mislike Jewell Defence p. 156. himself and to be penitent for his wicked life for that he had offended God and his Church came first unto the Bishop and Priest as unto the mouths of the Church and opened unto him the whole burden of his heart Afterward he was by them brought into the Congregation and there made the same confession openly before his brethren and farther was appointed to make satisfaction by open Penance which being duly and humbly done he was restored again openly unto the Church by laying on of the hands of Priests and Elders Perkins on the Galatians speaketh thus This must farther admonish Perkins on Gal. 5. 19 20. us never to hide or excuse our sins but freely to confess them before God and before men also when need requires Whether we confess them or not they are manifest and the ingenuous confession of them is the way to cover them Psal 32. 1 4. Luther in his Colloquies delivers his opinion of Confession in these words â—â—ther Coll. Com. p. 257. English The chiefest Cause why we hold the Confession is this that the Catechism may be rehearsed and heard particularly to the end they may learn and understand the same However I for my part will never advise Confession to be intermitted for it is not a man that absolveth me from my sins but God himself And see pag. 258. How sins are to be confessed Another of our Church speaketh thus No kind of Confession either publick Archbishop 〈◊〉 Ansâ—â—â— to the 〈◊〉 p. â—â— or private is disallowed by us that is any ways requisite for the due execution of that ancient power of the Keys which Christ bestowed on his Church the thing that we reject is that new Pick-lock of Sacramental Confession obtruded upon mens consciences as a matter necessary to salvation by the Canons of the late Council of Trent Sess 14. c. 6. The Canon here intended I suppose is the Fifth of the Fourth Session under Julius the Third Mr. Perkins again in another place saith In troubles of conscience it is Cases of Conscience lib. 1. cap. 1. meet and convenient that there should be always used private Consession For James saith ch 5. v. 16. Confess yoou faults one to another and pray one for another c. For in all reason the Physician must first know the Disease before he can apply the remedy and the grief of the heart will not be discerned unless it be manifested by the confession of the Party diseased In private Consessions these Caveats must be observed First It must not be urged as a thing absolutely necessary without which there can be no satisfaction Again It is not fit that Confession should be of all sins but only of the Scruple it self Here Perkins's assertion is meerly of his own pleasure and against his own rule which requireth that the Spiritual as well as Corporal Physician should understand all Diseases and are not all sins diseases and of all diseases that the greatest which we are not sensible of 3. Though yet it is specially to be made to the Prophets Ministers of the Gospel Lastly He must be a person of fidelity able to keep secret things that are revealed Many more suffrages for the usefulness of Confession might be alledged of men of unquestioned authority in such cases as this but now I shall come briefly to declare what is to be received and what rejected in this Confession 1. In speaking of the Original or Institution 2. The Necessity 3. The Tradition concerning it 4. The due Practise of it And the Church of Rome however the Council of Trent hath determined it of Divine institution to whose servile Canons we ascribe not so much as to the less servile judgment of some of the Learned Doctors of that Church being divided in its opinion concerning the institution of it the ancienter of them generally denying any such Divine Precept and they who come after the Council being obliged to hold up its Credit affirming we may without great danger or difficulty affirm that Christ hath not in particular and precisely required any such Sacramental Confession but by general Rules of Piety and Prudence inferring so much as a Council and holy direction to assure our Salvation which possibly may be obtained without and more possibly be lost for want of it For the Priest under the Gospel being the same to the uncleanness of the Soul as was the Levitical Priest to the uncleanness and leprosie of the Body it agreeth exactly with the Analogy between the Old and New Testament that the like power be allowed to him in his Sphere as was to the other in his and the like real though not formal and express command Yea I could shew were it a place Scholastically to handle this matter here how according to the opinion of the Learned ancient Jews the people under the Law did practise this Confession and that upon opinion of a Precept in their Law But I do not rest upon any other than what the Gospel affords either in Letter or Inclusively under those duties which it prescribes a Christian Yet what Solomon hath in the Proverbs I take not to be so much Legal as Evangelical He that covereth his sins shall not prosper Prov. 28. 13. but who so confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy And that of Job cleering himself from the concealing of his sins as a great crime commends the revealing them as a necessary act If I covered my transgression Job 31. 33. as Adam by hiding mine iniquity in my bosom seem to be counsel in common with the Gospeâ— as having nothing ceremonial in them And though that of Leviticus was truly Legal as concerning outward absolutions and Levit cap. 13. 14. pollutions yet I see not how they who allow any weight in the Type to infer the thing signified under the Gospel can deny the like obligation in spiritual matters upon us as was on the Jews in respect of matters carnal By that Law the polluted and diseased person was to appear before the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys in c. 1. ad Rom v. 26. Levit. 5. v. 6. Prâ—eâ—t he was to be examined by him judged and sentenced for clean or unclean whole or unsound Sin is certainly the Leprosie of the soul and 't is because men are led more by Sense than Faith or by a monstrous Faith rather than truly Evangelical which dispatches compendiously more than safely all duties of Religion in a word or single act that they apprehend not the like
be he no where affirms but saith expresly I do not therefore affirm because I oppose it not But the supream folly of cutting off scores hundreds and thousands of years of torments by Indulgences upon earth was such an imposture as could never enter into the head of any of the sober Ancients and not to be endured amongst Christians Many are the Suffrages of the Fathers to that of the word of God Blessed are the dead which dye in the Lord from henceforth yea saith the Spirit Rev. 14. 13. that they may rest from their Labours and their works do follow them Implying a direct and comfortable passage from this miserable to that happy life in heaven And whereas they say That they who go to Purgatory may be said to dye in Christ because they shall at length be delivered by Christ How can that stand with such excessive pains there suffered to which none on earth are equal either in degree or continuance How can these wretched souls be said to rest from their labours and sorrows Must they not make God a mocker of his servants in comforting them against their affections in this world by telling them they shall one day be delivered from them and go to greater in Purgatory Besides What grounds do they find in the Word of God or the word of the primitiye Fathers which makes a a twofold state in Christ One of them who by Saintly lives pass immediately to bliss Another of them who are in a middle state and are partly miserable and partly blessed But to their prime argument the Answer is easie We are not generally purged wholly from sin nor have we made full satisfaction of punishments for our sins in this Life unless by Martyrdom or some heroical and eminent Sanctity Both are false which are here supposed First That Martyrdom for Christ or the most holy and exemplary life lead here in this world do so perfectly purge us that we need not further cleansing Again it is denyed that true and sincere repentance acted in this life both in forsaking sin and in true conversion unto God sufficeth not to purge us from all our sins in this life as to the guilt and penalty of them and the odious stain rendring the soul unaccepted to God though men arive not to the perfection of Martyrdom or the eminencie of Sanctity attainable here as St. John witnesseth But if we walk in the light as he is in the light 1 John 1. 7. we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin He doth not here intend to speak of the supreamest sanctity only but of that general state of grace and holy life in which whoever is the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth him from all his sins and dying in that state needs no more cleansing to make him capable of entring immediately into everlasting bliss which is far from all torment though not so consummate as to be capable of no addition at the Resurrection when the Body shall be re-united to the Soul Nor doth this take away what of prerogatives is justly due to Martyrdom or eminent Holiness in this Life because there remains proper to them first a greater measure of comfortable assurance of Gods favour and bliss hereafter and a much greater and higher degree of glory when possessed than inferiour degrees of holiness here can lay claim to And this is sufficient encouragement next to the pure intention of holiness it self and Gods glory to any Christian to abound in good works knowing that his 1 Cor. 15. labour is not in vain in the Lord. And thus much of those we call Aequivocal Sacraments and improper For though all true Sacraments are ordinarily necessary to salvation yet all things ordinarily necessary to salvation are not Sacraments as Repentance which in its nature consisting of true Contrition of heart and conversion unto God and thereby putting us into capacity of mercy from God is not pretended to be a Sacrament until the Priest acteth his part towards the Penitent And if Contrition thus understood or Repentance be no Sacrament surely neither can Confession or Satisfactions which are said to be parts of Repentance be Sacraments nothing being in the parts which may not be in the whole But so moderate sound Consecration of arch-Arch-Bishops and Bishops a course hath our Church taken as to call them Sacramentals as being above the order of general acts and duties of Piety and not amounting to the dignity of the two proper ones Baptism and the Eucharist CHAP. XL Of Baptism The Author Form Matter and Manner of Administration of it The General necessity of it The Efficacy in five things Of Rebaptization that it is a prophanation but no evacuation of the former Of the Character in Baptism MANY Acceptations are found of the word Baptism in Holy Scripture which I leave to others who have collected them and betake my self to the thing it self commonly understood by it And thus Baptism is a Sacrament of the New Testament instituted by Christ consisting of the outward signs of Water and the Word and the inward Grace of Regeneration and remission of sins and outward Communion with the Church of Christ all which I conceive to be contained in our Church Catechism where it is first described by its outward Sign to be Water wherein the Party is baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost And by its inward Grace to be A death unto sin and a new birth unto righteousness for being by nature born in sin we are hereby made the Children of Grace This Sacrament then of baptism is said truly to succeed that of Circumcision and to have the same Spiritual effect upon the Spiritual and inward man which that had over the Outward The agreement and difference between which two will sufficiently appear from the comparing of this as we now shall explain it with that which we shall do by considering the Form the Matter The Subject The Efficacy and the Minister of Baptism The Form we have propounded to us by Christ when he first instituted the same and commanded his Disciples to go and teach all nations baptizing Mat. 28. 19. them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost teaching them to observe all things whatever I have commanded you From whence it doth appear that taking Baptism simply for the Act it consisteth in that form of words here prescribed by Christ and the outward Action of baptizing with Water But taken more Concretely and complexly for all things concurring to that Sacrament essentially It is a Covenant made between God and Man whereby is promised on Gods part remission of sins and salvation and on mans part Faith and Observation of the terms of the Gospel as St. Mark more expresly hath it He that believeth Mar. 16. 16. Eph. 2. 12. and is baptized shall be
a man never was inserted into that Stock is more properly called Atheism or Heathenism or Privative and then is called Apostasie which is a professed renunciation of the Faith once received Or this Division is Partial and so it takes the name of Heresie upon it Schism then must needs be an outward Separation from the Communion of the Church But when we say Schism is a Separation we do not mean so strictly as if it consisted in the Act of Separating so much as the State For we do not call any man a Schismatique who sometimes refuses to communicate with the Church in its outward worship though that done wilfully is a direct way to it as all frequented Actions do at length terminate in habits of the same Nature but it is rather a State of separation and of Dissolution of the continuitie of Church in a moral or divine sense not natural which we seek into at present This Separate State then being a Relation of Opposition as the other was of Conjunction the Term denominating and signallizing both is to be enquired unto And that is insinuated alreadie and must needs be the Church and that as that is united unto Christ or the true Church For there is no separation from that which really is not though it may seem to be It must therefore be a true Church from whence Schismatical separation is made So far do they confute and confound themselves who excuse their Schismaticalness from that which principally constitutes Schism and Schismaticks viz. an acknowledgement of that to be a true Church from which they divide themselves and separate Again We are to note that Separation is either of Persons and Churches in Co-ordination or subordination according to that excellent and ancient distinction of Optatus saying It is one thing for a Bishop to communicate Optatus Mileviâ—â—â— Cont. Parmen Lib. 3. Aldâ— with a Bishop and another for a Lay man or the Inferiour Clergy to communicate with the Bishop And this because what may perhaps justifie a Non-communion with Co-ordinate Persons or Churches which have no autority one over another wil not excuse Subordinate Persons or Churches owing obedience to their Superiours from Schism From whence it is manifest that though all Schism be a Separation yet all Separation is not a Schism And though there may be many and just causes for a Separation there can be no cause to justifie a Schism For Schism is in its nature A studious Separation or State Separate against Christian Charity upon no sufficient Cause or grounds It must be affected or Studious because if upon necessity or involuntary the Diâ—junction of Churches is rather a punishment than a sin and an Infelicity rather than Iniquity as in the dayes of Anastatius the Emperour as Evagrius relates it Who so violently persecuted the Catholick Church in behalfe of the Eutychian Evagrius Hist Eccl. L. C. 30. Heresie that it was crumbled as it were into several parcels And the Governours could not communicate one with another but the Eastern and Western and African Churches were broke asunder Which farther shews that all Criminal Separation which we make Synonimous with Schism must likewise be an Act proceeding from the persons to separated and not the Act of another For no man can make another a Schismatick any more than he can make him a Lyar or a drunkard without his consent For if the Governours of one Church expeâ— out of Communion another upon no just grounds the Church thus separated is not the Schismatick but the other as appears from the words of Firmilianus Bishop of Cappadocia in St Cyprian concerning Pope Stephen advising him he should noâ— be too busie or presumptious in separating others lest he thereby separated himself so that if the Schism had broke out upon no good grounds he who was the Architect of it Separated himself as all others do and it is impossible any man should make though he may declare another a Schismatique any more than he can make him erre without his consent or be uncharitable Yet do they err also that from hence conclude that the Formal reason of Schism consists in Separating a mans self for it is rather the material Cause than formal The formal Cause being as in all other things the very Constitution it self with unreasonableness and uncharitableness No man can make another involuntarily an Heretick And therefore no man can make another a Schismatick All the Guilt redounding to the Agent noâ— Patient in such cases So that it is scarce worth the Enquiring Who began the breach of unity as it outwardly appears but who is actually and Really First divided from Christs Church For they surely are the proper Schismaticks though the name may stick closer to others To understand this we may consider that there is a Vertual Schism and a Formal Schism A Vertual Schism I call real division from Christs Church though it comes not to an open opposition to it or Defiance of it so that where ever is any heresie or considerable Errour nourished or maintained in a Church there is to be found a Schismatick also in reality though not in formality the reason hereof is well expressed by and may best come from the hand of an Adversary to u thus judiciously enquiring It is demanded first saith he Whether Schismaticks be Hereticks Answer The Common opinion Azâ—rius Inst Moral Tom. 1. Lib. 3. C. 20. of the Interpreters of the Canon Law and of the Summists is that the Heretick differs from the Schismatick in that Every Heretick is a Schismatick but not on the contrary Which they prove because the term Shismatick signifies Division But every Heretick turns away separates divides himself from the Church This is very plain and reasonable and so is the consequence from hence That where the Body is so corrupt as to be really infected with notorious errors there it is really so far as it is erroneous separated from the true Church and where it is so far separated from the true Church so far it is Schismatical And when a Church is thus far really Schismatical little or no Scruple is to be made of an outward Separation neither can a guilt be affixed unto it And on the other side if no such real separation and antecedent Guilt can be found in a Church in vain do diverse betake themselves to that specious Shift and evasion that they were cast out and went not out willingly from a Church and that they are willing to return but are not suffered For undoubtedly the very supposition is insincere and faulty that they forsook not the Church before they were ejected And the expulsion followed separation and dissention from it and was not rather the Effect than Cause of them as are all excommunications rightly used For to those that pretend they were turned out do not the doors stand open to receive them and that with thanks if they please to re-enter and re-unite themselves What do they here
that communion which may detain any man of Christian modesty and Charity from pronouncing such an one to be infallibly damn'd or out of possibility to salvation And if it be hereupon demanded What difference we put between Infidels and such corrupt Christians seeing diverse have undertaken to assert a Possibility of salvation to them also living exactly to the Light and Rule of Nature in them I answer not absolutely at present dashing the argument a-pieces by denying the supposition and their colourable proofs thereof but demonstrating a vast discrimination between the one and other condition For commonly where Heresies which are so properly called and not Gentilism as they are which destroy the first Principles of Christianity are taught and maintained there are to be found all truths necessarie to salvation in a Christian sense For the Holy Scriptures we suppose are there received and submitted unto which are able to make a 2 Tim 3. 16 17. man wise unto salvation and thorowly to furnish him unto all good works And the Records of the Church and ancienter practise good guides against the rocks way-laying a man in his course to Heaven And the want of actual communion with a Church doth then only expose our souls to Perdition when it is wilfully and causelesly slighted and contemned And then only doth Separation visible 〈◊〉 less Visible alienation of mind and affection put on the nature of Schism And there are two general defects in a Church which justify Separation according to those two things we have shewed do constitute a Church Doctrine of Faith and Divine Regiment called commonly Discipline If a Church errs notoriously in the former no Separation can be called Schism oâ— if defective not in Government absolutely for without some Government it could not be so much as a Society but in the Government oâ—dained for it because then it should not be a Christian Society For the faith of Christians held do not make a Christian Society but the Christian Regiment Christian Regiment also I call that not whereby Christians are Governed for Civil Governments are common to Heathens and Christians but that which is Proper to Christians as Christians and was instituted by Christ for Christians and not invented out of mens wise brains and accommodated to the Church and perhaps called Divine to give it greater credit and place amongst Christians Of which we have alreadie spoken It being a common rule amongst the Ancients Clemens Alexand Stromal immutable with me There can be no true Flock without true Pastours And there can be no true Pastours where they are not set over the Flock according to Christs known and received will but some presumed tacit and extraordinary Vocation as they term it when there is an entrance by the Window and not by the Door From hence it doth appear how uncertain and confused their notion and position is who without any more adoe conclude all those to be Schismaticks and that upon their own Principles and Concessions who separate from a Christian Societie which they acknowledge to be a true Church For very great is the ambiguity both of Separation and True Church First Separation is as we have before noted either of Subordinates or Co-ordinates And of Subordinates either simply or with Restriction Simply subordinate I call them not comparitively with Christs Imperial Power but with all External power who by divine Right of Providence owe direct obedience to their Pastours in all things not inhibited by the Law of God to which all Spiritual Pastours are to be no â—ess subject than the sheep themselves And thus every Bishop is true Head and Governor of that Flock which under Christ is committed to his Care and Custodie But in like manner is not that Bishop subject to the Metropolitane and much less that Metropolitane to his Patriarch For these are but Ecclesiastical Constitutions and of no distinct Order though Degree According to which obligations of obeying the refusing to obey and dis-uniting ones self from the Governours of the Church doth aggravate or extenuate the Division and the guilt thereof And without all peradventure may one Church divide from another upon less grounds then the Members of one Church separate from the more immediate Head of the same How thick do instances stand in Ecclesiastical History of Churches who by vertue of their Respective Governours have been divided and yet both remain true Churches Again a True Church is said so to be more than one way viz. As to Being absolutely and Being perfectly We know that every Errour in Doctrine though great nay though heretical doth not presently destroy the nature of a Church absolutely though it takes away from the perfection of a Church How that opinion was delivered by the Fathers viz. That Heresie destroyes the Church we have Cyprianus Epistola 52. â— gat Novatianos eâ—â—e Christianosâ— shewed in part speaking of Heresie and now may add farther that the the same persons of old or their Co-equals denied an Heretique to be a Christian also and therefore they are to be understood of the such foul and unchristian Heresies which rased the foundation of faith it self as did the Valentinians the Gnosticks the Marcionites and such like For t is now agreed to That unless a man be a Christian he cannot be an Heretique Or if at any time they spake of more tolerable Heresies not wholly inconsistent with Christianity it self then they laid the burden of Damnation upon that accessorie but separable Aggravation Uncharitableness which alone and especially conjoined with such errours exposed to damnation But as it is with the Natural Man it is with the Spiritual There are some parts Essential and Vital which cannot be wanting or corrupted but the Whole must loose its nature and denomination and there are others not absolutely Essential which are called Integral without which the Body may possible subsist but not be perfect in its material Parts And so it is with the Body of Faith consisting of so many Articles or members as Parts some Vital and essential some necessarie to its perfections but not its Being absolutely And a Church may be called a true Church which is defective or Excessive in these though not in them And yet we need not betake our selves to that explication by some used of a True-man and a Thief to express how a Church may be a True Church and an erroneous one at the same time For the nature of this truth we ascribe unto the Church consisting only in Morality If the Church failes in that the Nature of it failes as it doth not in a man when he is corrupted with falsness and vice But this we say That although all Truths are equally true as to the nature of Truth it self they are not of equal importance and use to us or to a Church Therefore such a Latitude being in the notion of a True Church how can any man so confidently say that No Church can separate from the Church
not say to extenuate I know not what unkindness or perhaps incivility we were driven out from such communion and went not out of our selves but may declare Franckly We voluntarily chose to relinquish such communion so condition'd Now such errours we may well charge the Church of Rome with even while we hold it to be a true Church in the sense above expressed viz. Essentially true but not Integrally For so a Monstrous man may beget a truly natural son and out of the Loyns of the Corrupt Church of Rome may proceed a Perfect Church And he that holds that a man may even now when it is much more definitive and express in its errours then itwas about sevenscore years ago when it met first with that Opposition which it could never master as yet be saved in the Church of Rome may hold there are many damnable errours in it which in their nature do damn yet do not alwayes actually damn as is said And this doth altogether vindicate such Churches as directly leave them provided they leave such their errours only and not extravagantly hurry themselves into contrary errours out of detestation to theirs And this doth lay a necessity upon such as communicate with them to desert them and a much greater upon such as are at present alienated from them to preserve themselves from such imminent dangers though not infallibly destroying the soul Now if it be here demanded as I know necessarily it must and will be that to make this high charge probable we give some instances of such their errours and Schismaticalness though I might well decline that so great and Schismaticalness though I might well decline that so great and copious a subject in this transient and compendious discourse referring them to what hath been sufficiently written though some have I confess Est sâ—lus in Orle 〈◊〉 Chaâ—actâ—â—â—s Episcâ—â—us suique â—â—dimis pâ—incipium â—â—nis Anasiatius Germonius D Indultis Apesiolicis Praefat. §. Episeopus Vide etiam â—etrum Gregorium Syntagm L. 15. C. 3. quid tribuitur Popâ— supra Conciliis â—rincipilus weakely and inconsiderately over-acted to this purpose yet I shall not absolutely without this general touch leave the matter so reducing their Errours to these two Heads Schismatical Doctrines and Heretical And this alone I look on as a most Schismatical dogm next to heresie and which alone suffices to justifie the separation of all other Churches from that of Rome viz. That they maintain if not in express termes which somedo who perhaps will not be acknowledged when they are pinched hard to speak the sense of the Church in reallity That the Pope or See of Rome hath arbitrary power of himself to Judge and Censure all Churches and to institute or Cassate Lawes for the universal Church and that he cannot be a Schismatick There is nothing more fundamental in the Lawes and Traditions of the Catholick Church than that no one of the Patriarchs should presume to form or oblige the Catholick Church by their single and private Canons and Decrees without the consent and concurrence of his Brethren neither can any meeting deserve the name of a General Council wherein their sentence is not heard or received But there is nothing more notorious than the Bishop of Rome's invasion of a sole Right to Govern the whole Church of which he hath been often soundly charged by the eminentest of the Later of the Greek Bishops Nilus Thessalo nicensis though their complaint hath generally been received no otherwise than with a deafear or an insolent stomach and contempt of the Sacred Canons of the Church as might be made appear by several instances were this a proper opportunity so to do Neither do I know how they of Rome can exempt themselves from apparent Schisme upon the account which Balsome urgeth against them viz. That the Popes have separated and are divided Balsam Resp 1. Jurts Graeco Rom. L. 6. pag. 370. from the Four other Patriarchs Will they say they are Schismaticks and Hereticks It is no more then they will pay them with again And 't is no harder matter to prove one than the other But if Four of the Patriarchs of the Church may be Hereticks and Schismaticks and so continue for many hundered years together What becomes of that argument for the true Church taken from the Universality of its Profession For putting the Case that those of the Roman Communion were equal yea Superior in extent of Ground and number of professers which is hardly to be granted yet being apparently inferiour in the number of Patriarchs they cannot pretend universality unless they beg the question as too often and importunately they do that the Roman See is the only Standard to weigh and Conclude all Ecclesiastical controversies and quarrels This is as we said such a fundamental Errour in the outward Politie and Discipline of the Church that it alone might justifie a Separation from such a Monster I shall give but one instance and that of one Man expressing the sense of Vid. Aus Barbossam de Officio Potestate Episc Par. 3. Allegat 57. num 3 4 5 6 7. the Church of Rome though some will have it called The Court of Rome only concerning the Popes Power He the Pope is the Universal Bishop of the Church He hath the whole World for his Diocess He is the Bishop of Bishops The Ordinarie of Ordinaries In things concerning Benesices he hath free and absolute power All Benesices in respect of this Holy Prelate are manual and he may use absolute power in them But to this adding such to us manifest errours and corruptions in Faith and practise as have been introduced into that Church there can be no just Scruple made of Separating and to profess so much without mincing the matter by certain fine evasions which strictly enquired into will no more satisfie than down-right dealing which chargeth them with such heretical-Dogmes which contrary to Charity as well as Verity require Separation Of the many of which that of Transubstantiation may claim the first place together with its long Train of Gross abuses and Errours following upon and flowing from it For though I know diverse Learned men of our Church do look upon it as a very absurd falsity in matter of Fact rather then of Faith yet if it be considered as reduced to Propositions invented and strenuously asserted to maintain that Errour in fact it putteth on the nature of Heresie too To say that Christ had but one hand is not an Heresie of it self but a notorious non-truth in matter of Fact But so to defend this opinion as thereby to deny Christ to have been of the same nature with us amounts to Heresie Granting likewise that not only Christs Natural Body is in that Sacrament but it is that very thing which after Consecration appeares though not as it appears to our senses is but a fowl absurdity and errour in point of Fact Yet when it
by us For passing by that which we now believe they could wish themselves unsaid and are well content to lay aside Antichristianism Popery Baalism Idolatry and what not of most foul bitter and false slanders and reproaches unbecoming the mouth of any sober Christian with which notwithstanding they thriv'd so exceedingly at first into Power and estimation there remains nothing now but such starv'd allegations and pittiful exceptions as may call in question their discretion as well as conscience to urge them Will all the Prophecies and Prefigurations and descriptions of the Old Testament concerning the unity of Christs Church under the Gospel all the Predictions Injunctions Obtestations of Christ and his Apostles All the solemn and Sacred Acts and Endeavours of Apostolical Postours to keep up unity in the Church All the detestations of Discord and Disuniting All the Denunciations of the most severe Judgements of God against causeless breakers of the Churches peace be put off and made void upon such sorry grounds as are of late found out to countenance separation They are so well and generally known by frequent use that aiming at brevity here I hold it not necessary to enlarge upon them especially after so many who out of the Ancients have dissected this Monster to the horrour of any truly conscientious Yet one or two I shall instance in Dyonisius Bishop of Alexandria as Nicephorur Nicephor Calixt Lib. 6. Cap. 4. Calixtus relateth affirmeth it to be no less glory yea greater in his Judgement not to divide the Church than not to sacrâ—fice to Idols Which in plain terms is to say It is as great a sin to be a Schismatick as to be an Idolater or yet more home to our Case to be a Papist St. Augustine tells us that it is manifest that he who is not a member of Christ cannot have the DeVnitate Eccles C. 2. salvation of a Christian But the Members of Christ he goes on are conjoined together by the love or Charity of Unity and by the same do stick to their Head which Head is Christ Jesus Now if it be impossible that any man should be a member of Christ the Head who is not a member of his Body the Church also and that it is impossible a man should be a member of the Body from which he is divided and that Schism doth so divide a man from the Body How can a man that is a Schismatick be saved Will they say by being of the Mystical Body of Christ though not Visible In this excuse they fall into many dangerous absurdities First in conceiving of Christs Visible Church as not the Mystical Body of Christ For it is called Mystical not because it is internal and invisible but because it is not a Natural but a Spiritual Body It is not a Political as Political signifies Civil or Humane Society but a Divine Body It is not administerd so much by Lawes of humane and common Invention as Spiritual Secondly In that it is supposed here what we have before disproved that they are two distinct Bodies the Invisible and Mystical as they speak from the Visible So that a man may be of the one and not of the other which cannot be understood For though a man may not be Visibly of the outward Church yet he must be and may be of the Visible Church They are not Visibly of the Visible Church who by far distance of Place and time are involuntarily separated from the Communion of the Church but they who live within the communion of the Church and uncharitably divide from its communion are not of the Visible Church at all nor yet for ought can be made appear of that they call Invisible any more than an Heretick For as the same St Austin saith in another place Neither the Heretick pertains to the Lib. De side Symb. C. 3. Catholick Church because he loveth not God neither the Schismatick because he loveth not his neighbour And Luther in his Colloqules tells us that Colloquia Mensalia The Heathen sins against God the Father The Heretick against God the Son And the Schismatick against God the Holy Ghost Therefore if there be such notorious guilt on the part of him that sinneth against the Holy Ghost above that of him who sinneth against the Son what mercy can they expect who thus wilfully offend For who saith Austin sighteth with such evidence Aug. Exposit in Rom. inchâ—ata To. 4. against the Holy Ghost as he doth who rageth against the Church with such proud contentions Sectaries and Schismaticks have made way to their divisions and alienations of mens minds and affections from the Church by reproaching it with Antichristianism which if they could have many sober or tollerable manner have made good they needed nothing more to excuse them but alas they have the good Nature now to blush at such gross follies and give over such foul slanders though not the Grace to repent which they can never do without a recognition of their errour But now they have almost done with that wicked lye they must expect we should begin to tell them a manifest truth That the Antichristianism is on their sides upon many accounts of which this of Schismatizing is a principal proof as we and they both are taught by Cyril of Jerusalem thus Hatred of our Cyrril Hieron Catâ—c pa. 161. brethren doth open a Gap to Antichrist For the Devil doth preapre Schisms of the people or Laity that be who is to come may be more readily received These and such like intollerable if not unpardonable Evils of Schism made St. Hierome say plainly that Schism was worse than Heresie And so Hieron contra Luciferanos indeed it is in this respect that Heresie of itself and own nature ruineth only the person so infected but Schism sweepeth away many from the truth and Charity of the Church As therefore it is better for a City that one man in it should die of the plague than that through the infection of any one the whole City should be troubled with the Itch or some such disease which should make them all keep their beds though possibly they may at length recover so an Heretick in a Church not so divulging his errour as to infect the Church in general and thereby divide it from it self and others shall undoubtedly find an easier Judgement at Gods hands than the Schismatick who dissolves the members of it from the Head and one another and doth far less mischief And whereas two things are popularly alledged in their Vindication The one that they would have lived in peace might those things have been granted which might have been yielded them certain indifferent things acknowledged to be so And that they have done no otherwise than was done by the Church against the Church of Rome to reform against their consent The First of these is in part very ridiculous as we have shewed and in part very false Ridiculous it is because
purpose or to their advantage to say for instance sake as the more sober especially when they would gain upon the good opinion of men That Images may be worshipped relatively and as instruments to devotion and helps but when there are found and generally known to be such doctrines as teach a veneration of Images for their own sakes and directly and that with the same sort of worship that the things they represent are capable of though perhaps they upon a pinch can insert a distinction which neither can be understood nor profit such a doctrine as this known to be delivered by the Principal Doctors of their Churches and maintain'd not being condemned by that Church however not generally embraced may subject a Church to a censure of Heresie and Idolatry of both and so in other things whereof tolerable senses are given in the Church of Rome or else they could not be said so much as to be a Church at all but intolerable and Heretical are also uncondemned and so are no true Church and so may be separated from without Schism but not without peril of damnation united to And do not our brethren for such they were before they professed Schism and I hope may be after they have renounced it see now plainly enough the vaniâ—y and spitefulness of their Evasion Are not the Cases infinitely different and that in their own eyes Hear they what Perkins saith to our and their purpose So long as a Church Perkins on Gal. C. 5. V. 20. or people do not Separate from Christ we may not separate from them 2 Pro. 24. 21. Fear the King and meddle not with them that vary i. e make alterations against the Laws of God and the King Indeed Subjects may signifie what is good for the State and what is amiss but to make any alteration in the State either Civil or Ecclesiastical belongs to the Supream Magistrate And â—n another place the same Author hath these words Great therefore is the rashness Id. Galat 1. V. 2. and want of moderation in many that have been of us that condemn our Church for no Church without sufficient conviction going before If they say we have been admonished by books published I say again these be grosser faults in some of those books than any of the faults that they reprove in the Church of England and therefore the books are not â—it to convince especially a Church Thus we see how the cases in the matter difier And no less may we see the difference in the manner For 't is apparent that Schismaticks against the Church of England never had any Legal autority to warrant their vile and Scandalous practices but were forced to give names to things uncapable of them to excuse themselves or else by an unnatural course to entitle the People to a Power Supream who have none at all but what is given them from another fountain neither did the people concurr with such misdemeaners as was pretended they did But thirdly another difference is to be noted from the Rights of a Patriarchal Power over a Provincial Church not properly of its Diocess and that of a Metropolitan with his Suffragans over the members of the Church which they altogether make For according to the constitutions of the Church though a Patriarchs Power was Intensively equal to Episcopal over his proper and immediate Diocess and Extensively much greater than the Metropolitans or Bishops in relation to other Diocesses yet was it never so Intensive i. e. so particular and great in those Bishops Diocesses over which he had only an Order of Unity rather than Intrinsick power to dispose matters therein though in process of time this also was invaded much by him and might be recovered to the proper Bishop by the Laws of the Church But the Bishops of this Church had the sole and immediate disposing of the affairs of it and nothing could be concluded without obligation of obedience out of Conscience without their Concurrence as desparately as Schismaticks then did and still do rage at this truth But then as Hinderson saith with others They would never reform themselves It is very likely so meaning as they would have them but that not to the better Rule of the Ancient Churches and the Scriptures is more than they knew or would acknowledg when they saw because still they would have done otherwise and invented a new Rule of their own But seeing the grounds and Cause of separation are they upon which the Guilt of Schism is avoided or contracted according to the nature of them and obscure and difficult and tedious is the method leading to the tryal of the sufficiency of them to justifie a Separation therefore it were well contrived if as in the search of a true Church they may being very long and uncertain and grievous to most proceeding upon the points of Faith and Parts of worship themselves certain infaâ—lible obvious and plain Characters could be produced to convince the Schism and distinguish it from simple and innocent Separation A Fair attempt to which hath been made by Austin who dispuâ—ing against the Donatists denies that any man can separate from the Universal Church innocently So that although it should be doubtful as most things are managed by Learned Partisans whether considering the grounds of Separation in themselves the Separation be Schismatical or lawful and laudable yet by such an outward Characteristick it might be competently discerned And so farmust I needs comply with that Judicious and Holy Father and such as urge this out of him against us as to yield it a most probable outward Note of Schism for any man or number of men not a Church but in Fieri as they speak only and in breeding to divide from the Universal Church not only as comprehending all Ages but of any one Age the weight and evidence of which Concession will appear from the esteem of the Church Catholick and the wrath and extent of Christs promises to preserve it in All truth For this is certain That Christ directed his promises and restrained them to no one time or Age. And it is not probable there should be such an Intercession or intermission of Faith or Christianity that the universal Church should mortally err in any one thing necessary to salvation nay though we take it not in such a large sense as sometimes it is wont to be used for all individual persons in it as well as Churches of which the whole is constituted And therefore to desert the communion of all Churches not of persons for this is scarce to be supposed to happen at any time doth argue shrewdly That the separation hath much of Schism in it without examination of particular grounds which are pretended sufficient For it will be said That it ought not to be supposed that Christ should deliver over his whole Church to such heretical errours which only can exempt a Separation from Schism From such notorious suspicions as these we
may clear our selves thus First by putting a difference between the Church so united as is here supposed to rightly denominate it the Catholick or Universal Church and the Church disunited and divided long before any Reformation came to be so much as called for in these western Parts with attempts to put such desires into practice The division or Schism between the Western and Eastern Churches happened about the years 860 and 870 under Nicholas the first of Constantinople and Adrian the Second Bishop of Rome Where the guilt was is of another subject But the Schism rested not here but infested the Greek Church also subdividing the Armenian from the Constantinopolitan Now in such Case as this which is as much different from that of the Donatists who divided from all these entirely united together as may be who can conclude a Division from the Church so divided long before a Schism ipso facto because a Division was made from one Part of it calling itself indeed the Catholick Church Had therefore Reformers so divided from the Catholick Church united as did the Donatists it were more than probable that their division might from thence be known to be Schism without any more ado but it is certain it was quite otherwise And therefore some other Conviction must be expected besides that Characteristick And what must that be The Infallibility of any one Eminent Church which like a City on a Mountain a Beacon on a Hill a Pharus or Lighttower to such as are like to shipwrack their Faith may certainly direct them to a safe Station and Haven And all this to be the Church or See of Rome But alas though this were as desirable as admirable yet we have nothing to induce us to receive it for such but certain prudent inferences that such there is because such there ought to be for the ascertaining dubious minds in the truth and therefore so say they actually it is and lest humane reason should seem too malapert to teach what divine Autority ought to do therefore must the Scripture be canvas'd and brought against the best Presidents in Antiquity to the Contrary to Patronize such necessary Dogms The matter then returns to what we at first propounded viz. the Judging of Schism from the Causes and of the Causes from the Scriptures and the more Genuine and ancient Traditions of Christs Church before such Schism distracted the same These two things therefore we leave to be made Good by Romanists in which they are very defective First that there is any One Notorious infallible Judge actually constituted whereby we may certainly discern the Schismaticalness or Hereticalness of any one Church varying from the truth and this because It were to be wish'd a Judg were somewhere extant Secondly that what ever Security or Safety of Communion is to be found in the Visible Church properly and inseparably belongs to the Roman Church because some of the Ancients tell the time when it did not actually err But if our proofs be much more strong and apparent which declare that actually it doth err and wherein it doth err what an empty and bootless presumption must it needs be to invite to its communion upon her immunity from Erring or to condemn men of Schism for this only That they communicate not with it which is the bold method of Roman Champions THE Second BOOK OF THE FIRST PART CHAP. I. Of the Formal Object of Christian Faith Christ An Entrance to the treating of the Objects of Faith in Particular AND Thus far have we treated of Religion in General and specially of Christian Religion or Faith in its Rule the Scriptures Its Causes its Effects its Contraries its Subject the Church in its several Capacities Now we are briefly to treat of the Particular Object Christian Faith That as God is the true and proper Author of Christian Faith he is also the principal Object is most certain and apparent and is therefore by the Schools called the Formal Object that is either that which it immediately and most properly treats of or for whose sake other things spoken of besides God and Christ are there treated of For other Religions as well as Christian treat of God and the works of God but none treat of God or his works as consider'd in Christ his Son but the Christian For the two Greatest Acts which have any knowledge of of God being Creation and Redemption both these are described unto us in Holy Writ to be wrought by God through Christ Jesus as the Book of Proverbs and of Wisdom intimate to us when they shew how God in Wisdom made the Worlds Christ being the true Wisdom of the Father And more expresly in the entrance into the Gospel of St. John Joh. 1. 2 â— the Word of God being Christ is said to be in the beginning with God and All things were made by him and without him was not any thing made that was made And St. Paul to the Ephesians affirmeth All things to be created by God Eph. 3. 9. Col. 1. 15 16. by Jesus Christ And to the Colossians speaking of Christ the Image of the Invisible God addeth For by him were all things created that are in Heaven and that are in the Earth Visible and Invisible c. This therefore discriminates the treating of things natural in Christian Theologie from all other Sciences and Theologies that all is spoken of in relation to Christ Jesus Therefore having in the beginning of this Tract spoken of God in General as supposed rather than to be proved in Divinity viz. of his absolute Being his Unity being but one His Infiniteness being all things in Perfection and Power we are here to resume that matter and continue it by a more particular enquiry into the Nature Attributes Acts and Works of God here supposing what before we have spoken of the First notion of Gods Being and those immediately joined with them His Unity and Infiniteness which Infiniteness necessarily inferreth all other Attributes proper to him as of Power Prefence in all places and all times and Omniscience and therefore here we shall speak only of the Nature or Being of God in the more peculiar sense to Christians that is being distinct in Persons as well as One in Nature CHAP. II. Of the special consideration of God as the object of Christian Faith in the Vnity of the Divine Nature and Trinity of Person FROM the Unity or singularity of Gods nature as to number doth flow an Unity and Simplicity of that one Individual Nature in it self For as the Nature of God cannot be found in several and separate Persons subsisting by themselves as may the nature of man so neither ought we to imagin that there is multiplicity of natures constituting the same God For as there are not many Gods differing Generically as there are Bodies Celestial and Podies Terrestial and again of Terrestial some Bodies Elemental and uncompounded naturally Other Mixt and compounded and such are Fish Foul
in general concerned himself in the marriage of others And to declare how that state was not at all inconsistent with a state Clerical of twelve Disciples John 2. 1 2. which Christ chose to minister for him Eleven are supposed to be married persons or at least to have been married formerly To answer which by saying that after they were chosen they forsook their wives is to evade and not really to answer First because it had been as easie for Christ surely to have picked out a dozen persons free from the knowledge of women as to make choice of such as were wedded had he judged any incapacity in these to the Evangelical Ministery But secondly do we find any thing in special prescribed by Christ for such separation from wives more than for other Christians who were not Ministers of the Gospel For of all faithful Christians it is spoken in certain junctures that whoever forsaketh not Father and Mother and Brethren and Sisters and Wise and Children for Christs sake cannot be his Disciple And there is no rule but common necessity and prudence not Divine prescription which requires any man for the Gospels sake to forsake his Wife rather than his Father and Mother Yet that the Apostles did actually absent rather than separate themselves from their Wives and that others who enter'd into the ministration to the Church under the Apostles foreseeing what St. Paul expresseth the present distress of the Church as well in regard of the 1 Cor. 7. 26. persecutions of the Church as the paucity of Preachers the greatness of the Harvest and the small number of Labourers did decline the state of marriage is very probable because they were required by Christs Injunction to Go and teach all Nations which travelling life ill could consist with cohabitation with Wives And therefore it must be given them Gratis and not by the merits of any reason oâ— grounds they can show that that such relinquishing of their Wives was either total or upon conscience made of the thing it self Doth not St. Paul say expresly in the words before those now touched Concerning Virgins I have no commandment of the Lord If such as served at the Altar were to be excepted surely he 1 Cor. 7. 25. would not have left the Rule so general as we find speaking only according to humane prudence And though they search with their best eyes they shall not be able to find in any other writings of the Apostles one Text o Scripture obliging Bishops or Priests to singleness of life more than those of the Laity unless they argue from reason That Virginal Chastity is more severe more pure more spiritual than conjugal which is yielded and therefore more obliging the Clergy who should be more spiritual persons then others all which I deny not but say that this binds them no more from marriage than it doth from wine and strong drink which if none of the Clergy ever used they were the more to be commended unless in such cases as St. Paul advises Timothy For their stomachs sake and often infirmities And thus is Bellarmin's first proof laid Bellarm. de Clericis l. 1. c. 19. The sole grounds then of unmarried state of Priests must be fetch'd from Tradition and Reason of both which we shall presume to speak a word or two Apostolical Tradition is pretended but not trusting much to that recourse is had to the Old Testament from certain allegorical interpretations made of some Rites in Moses's Law which may do well in the Church where they used them to perswade but ill in the Schools to prove the same as a necessary duty The argument taken from the custom of the Priest abstaining from their Wives during the time of their ministration I do really 1 Chron. 24. believe to have had an influence upon Primitive Christians Judaizing in many other things of like nature to restrain them from the use of their Wives upon solemn ministrations But this was without Law or Canon freely undertaken and embraced as was Celebacie it self at first until about the year 385. Siricius Bishop of Rome made a constitution that it should and ought to be and that on that ground And that the inferiour Orders such as Ostiaries Readers Exorcists and Acolythites should only be permitted to marry But Alexander the third about the year 1160 proceeded according to the method of that Church to shut them also out the doors of Orders that should presume to marry But all that was done against those in greater or sacred Orders in the Church for more than three hundred years after Christ was to deny such as were married access to the Altar by way of ministration who from that time abstained not from their Wives as did the Council of Arles and some in Spain Only a custom prevailed very generally and anciently to suffer none who were in those called Sacred Orders such as were Bishops and Priests and Deacons to marry after they were so ordained for if they did they were dismissed of their Office or their Wives The Eastern Church ever accepted of married persons into the Clergy and at length understanding the Apostle Let the Bishops be the husbands of one wife as a Precept rather than a Caution that they should be husbands of no more then one which in all likelyhood the truest sense in the Sixth Council In Trullo decreed they only should be received into Priestly Orders who were married And therefore all antiquity for twelve hundred years together fails them in this that it was otherwise then voluntary that married Priests lived from their Wives who had before orders or that married Men might not be made Priests though 't is confessed they preferred unmarried Persons before them until that Sixth Council which for that reason amongst others Bellarmine calls a Profane Synod and Baronius impious such a great veneration have they for the Autority of the Church when it speaks not their sense Yet as we are far from giving an exact and full account of this long controversie here so are we so far as I can Divine at the judgment of our Church willing to accommodate the matter with others that can digest any thing but their own stout devises to acknowledge a Power in the Church to bind or loose her sons of the Clergy to an unmarried state or to leave them free For to aggravate matters to that height as to make it absolute tyranny or Antichristian and to be against the word of God which saith Marriage is honourable in all things and the like implyes more of the weakness of the Arguer than strength in the Argument more of spite and passion than ingenuity or soberness For 't is answered very sufficiently marriage is not condemned but virginity commended before it Marriage is not at all declared to be evil when Celebacie is said to be much better Marriage is not condemned when certain persons are condemned for marrying Doth a Father that should cast off
years since saith Austin in another Epistle there arose at Rome one Jovinian who is said to have perswaded certain holy Nuns even grown into years to marry not enticing them so far as to take any of them to wife but by arguing that Virgins devoted to holiness found no greater reward from God than faithful married persons For such his opinion Jovinian fared never the better amongst the primest Fathers of the Church and still we hold to this Rule not easily to lend an ear to modern Reformers how eminent soever against the torrent of more eminent Fathers of the Church There are three things specially to be observed in Monastick Life according to which we may judge of the reasonableness and piety of the same 1. The Original 2. The Form or Manner of Living 3. The End and Effects of it Surely the Original was very ancient though not to be fetched so far backward as Elias or John the Baptist though Sozomen Sozomenus Hist Eccles lib. 1. cap. 12. would from thence derive it And no wonder if others of laters years have been of that mind It is generally agreed amongst Writers that the Hermites or Anachorets of Aegypt first professed such separations from men partly out of pure Devotion and partly not wholly as some suppose upon the violent persecutions raised in those parts in those early dayes But afterward those dispersed persons began to gather together in companies and societies St. Chrysostome in a certain Homily assures us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys Serin 25 in Hebraeos Polyd. Virg de Invent. lib. 7. c. 2. Schafnaburg de Rebus Germ. Ann◠1025. that in St. Paul's dayes not the least foot-step of a Monk was to be found Before St. Basil's time saith Polydore Virgil Monks were left to their own liberty and so were Nuns too to continue in or relinquish that state as they pleased as appears from many instances might be given But such as had once professed or pretended such a state and after deserted it were judged by all most infamous and fear of shame had the force of a Vow upon them nevertheless St. Basil brought them into a Society propounded Rules unto them and brought them under that threefold Vow of Chastity Obedience and Poverty which hath continued unto this day Yet there are not wanting some as Lambertus Schafnaburgensis who complaining of the new Orders of Monks brought in by Dominick and Francis have thought it safer to be free from such bonds as have been cast upon men beyond their ability to endure But what should I add to what upon this subject hath been so largely and learnedly treated of by others Only the Popery of this state of Life is it which has brought an ill name upon the thing it self But the exception is too general trivial and trite to move knowing and sober Christians though it may go far with such as have nothing from their Lecturer with whom the Scripture it self is of no other use than such shall please to apply it unto Who can deny but Popish corruptions have tainted the purity and simplicity of former Ages in the regiment of Monks But those most of them which Perkins instances in are too light to bring the thing into disgrace and utter dislike And such are Copes and Cowles and other Monkish Habits as also Quire-singing Vowed Fasts and choice Meats Against which Mr. Perkins his pains had been better spar'd than spent For Perkins Denonstration of the Probiem p. 594 595. as it is necessary that all orders in the Common-wealth should be distinguished accordingly and their Habits are proper cognizances for that purpose and none but Artisans and such persons that are neither Gentlemen nor in any place of Honour or Power malign such a distinction So should the several orders and professions be preserved and appear distinct by their outward garb to advertise them of their duty and profession and a we them before the eyes of all men to a walking conformable to their profession others to be subject to just censures and reprehension of men and none but low and ignoble Christians do malign and oppose them And that it should be indecent or as they would fain but in vain quarrel with such outward Habits unlawful is ridiculous to affirm and a greater argument of more superstition lurking in the souls of these scandalized persons than can be found in the thing accused But to except against Quire-singing is not only frivolous but impious without limitation And choice of meats and especially Fastings vowed are as far out of their power to disprove soberly as it is out of their will to pretend to or imitate But there are some things here called fundamental differencing ancient Perkins ibid. Monks from the present First They lived solitarily of necessity to be safer from persecution This is not true in all Secondly They were not constrained to give all that they had to the poor But where lyes the accusation here In constraining or being constrained We now speak of the Monastick person and I hope it is no sin in him to suffer such or greater violence as to the Injurer let him look to it And in truth I do not determine any thing in this case To the Fourth that Monks were not then bound to any certain Rules it is answered in part already that while they lived separate and were not form'd into a Society it was not so requisite But St. Basil doth show how much better it is to live in caenobio in company with Basilius M. Regul Fus Disput 7. others than Hermite-like to skulk in holes or wander up and down in deserts And that first because there is an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he calls it a self-pleasingness in such free solitariness and Secondly such keep shut up without exercise that ability they have being ignorant as well of their own defects as of others proficiencie There are causes enough besides such pitiful exceptions above mentioned to condemn the most irregular constitutions of such Regulars as are thick sown in the Roman Church I might begin with the excessive number of them to the prejudice of such states where they are planted I might proceed to the nature of them and horrible loosness tolerated in them of which so many Authors have too justly complained and continue to declare the intolerable strictness of some either requiring a gross Dispensation to the voiding of the express will of their Founder or to the shortning the dayes of many persevering in the rigorous observation of them The very rules likewise themselves are many times most superstitious And above all the foul usurpation the Pope of Rome hath over them to the disobliging them from their proper Bishops and thereby making them Schismaticks and himself a Tyrant it being certain that of old both by course consequence custome and Canons of the Church all Monasteries and Religious Societies were and still ought to be subject to the Bishop of that
gifted as to speak in unknowntongues they should either be altogether silent or speak by one or two Interpreters and this is all they can make of these words as the words going before and after plainly demonstrate But to Ecclesiastical antiquity they have recourse next and from Justin Martyr they argue a Liberty to Priests to model the worship of God because he saith the place is known well enough that the President of the Assemblies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according as he is able prays But that this publick Officer was a Presbyter or Priest and not the Bishop himself is more than they can prove though it lyes upon them For I make no scruple to grant but it was free for the Bishop who is the highest power in the Church to alter several things in the form of worship and to make forms of Prayer according to the exigence of that Church he presided over but never was any such thing allowed to the Presbyter and no longer to the Bishop than a form of publick Worship was agreed to and received which we confess was not until the Gifts of Miracles were ceased and then not all at an instant but by degrees and by orderly consultation and good autority as occasion offered There might also be some Liberty even after such provision made for the solemn service of God by some presumptuous Priests taken to deviate from such Prescriptions but that ever it was left free to them to use or not to use the same or to add or detract from them no where appeareth The Council of Milevis in Affrica provideth by a Canon against such perhaps growing presumption but not then first made it absolutely unlawful as it is cited to that purpose by Sectaries And as for Tertullian who affirmeth it to have been the custom in Christian Apolog. ◠39. assemblies for certain persons to come forth and sing Hymns to God out of the Holy Scriptures or their own Wits I understand him rather of the Actions in the Agape or Love-Feasts which were wont to be distinct from and kept after the more solemn and proper Ecclesiastical service And in such cases spending the time religiously also it might be lawful for private men whether Ecclesiastical persons or otherwise for his words make no more for Priests than Laymen and upon that very ground can avail them but little that draw them to their Ministers only to show their Poetical Gifts whether extempore or premeditate no matter or mention is made in the praising God But finding in Philo Judaeus Philo Judaeus de Vita Contemplat a description of the Ascetical Jews which were mostly of the Sect of the Essens to have such practises amongst them also I make no doubt but such things might be first drawn from them as many ancient Ceremonies of the Christians were and that by the countenance of the Apostles themselves however simpler Zealots will scarce endure to hear so much and continued without prejudice to the more solemn and publick worship For scarce do the leading Sectaries pretend to such Gifts of the Spirit as should enable their wits to make Hymns extemporary or so much as bring in a new Psalm or Hymn into their Assemblies unknown or unheard of to the commoner sort Surely their modesty herein that they have not dared as yet to offer any new Sonnet though of praise and prayer to God to their people as they call them by vertue of this gift of the Spirit doth condemn their boldness in offering every day new prayers whereas there is the very same ground for the one as the other both in Antiquity and the Scriptures Tertullian speaks only of singing out of their own heads St. Paul speaks as expresly of singing as praying by the Spirit yet we hear nothing they have done to declare their spirituality in publick by way of singing or causing any thing of their own devising to be sung But surely singing is no less a duty then praying And if they find it difficult and inconvenient for the people to take the ditty so set by them from their mouths or hands and from thence infer that it is not necessary We reply That is as necessary and accordingly was ever practised in Churches that people should concur with the Priest in prayer too and therefore such ill-form'd forms as are made and used at the same time are not fit for solemn service because though they may be tacitly followed yet are they so ordered and invented that the common sort should have no more to do with them than they may with musical prayers and praises which in heart they may consent to but in act can only say Amen to as is permitted to the people in their extravagant prayers Would the one be scandalous to those of their Party so is the other actually offensive to us and therefore we desire to hear no more of such matters nor should they expect to find relaxation of Duties from those they are bound in Justice to obey before they remove such obstacles of communion with them to those that owe them nothing but charity and this principally in reducing them from such a fond admiration of themselves and gross infatuation of others by the colour of such false gifts It would be too long and tedious to take notice here of all their reasons against Set forms which are of two sorts the one General against All enjoyned forms the other against the English Liturgy in Particular Of this latter we shall speak least and not much of the former because we will take them at their word when they say they are not absolutely against Liturgies prescribed though we know they contradict themselves sufficiently Bishop Whitgift hath of old told them home of this their double dealing For in the Puritans Admonition they directly oppose all forms Cartwright Cartwrights Reply p. 105. Whitgifts Defens p 488 in his Reply to Whitgift endeavouring to bring them off says they explain themselves afterward But they are truly told that such their Explication is a meer retractation and contradiction all their arguments formerly being level'd directly against forms in General And to this day they are always at that game still until they be beaten off and then forsooth 't is only the Liturgies as ill-framed they complain of as Cartwright hath taught them to dissemble upon occasion and shuffle Nevertheless I hold it not amiss to transcribe here a Case of Conscience out of Mr. Perkins thus doubting Perkins Cases of Conscience l. 2. c. 6. Whether it be lawful when we pray to read a Set form of prayer Answer It is no sin This is better then nothing But a man may lawfully and with good conscience do it Reasons First the Psalms of David were delivered to the Church to be used and read in a Set form of words and yet the most of them are prayers Secondly To conceive a form of prayer requires gift of memory and knowledge utterance and the gifts
it may be noted that we make publick prayer of two sorts Publick in respect of manner and publick in respect of place The former when there is an unanimous and orderly concurrence of many members of Christs Body in one common service The other when one single person appears before God in his House and offers his bounden service and devotion alone Both these we hold to be better than domestick or private worship of the same nature and thus prove from reasons not easily to be distinguished but making for both generally First because the precepts of the Scripture much more often inculcate and more earnestly press this and more highly magnifie this office than the other O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness saith the Psalmist This beauty Psalm 96. 9. Psalm 27. 4. of holiness was undoubtedly the Temple And again One thing have I desired of the Lord that will I seek after that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to behold the beauty of the Lord and to enquire in his Temple And to what end was the Temple of God built and dedicated so solemnly but to receive the prayers of devout persons as well as sacrifices and the singers in order Is there any thing more frequently repeated in Solomons Oration than the use of prayer there especially And that they who 1 Kings 5. 8. could not enter into the Temple it self should direct and send their prayers thither The Jews it is well known turn'd to their Temple generally when they pray'd as Daniel Hezekiah when he was sick is said to turn his face Isaiah 38. 2. to the wall because his house standing with the Temple he thereby turned his face that way And I suppose upon this ground which will be censur'd I know as superstitious that they held opinion their prayers did not immediately ascend unto God but by entring first into the Temple which I gather from the prayer of Jonah who being in the belly of the Whale and the bottom of the Deep cryed unto the Lord thus I am cast out of thy sight Jonah 2. 4 7. yet I will look again towards thy holy Temple Again When my soul fainted within me I remembred the Lord and my prayer came unto thee into thy holy Temple So that wherever or in what condition soever they were they held themselves obliged to offer their prayers up there first as the properest place and means to have them ascend unto God and that Secondly because there were greater promises of audience of prayers made there than in any other place as it is well known from the prayer of Solomon and the promises of God thereupon in the Book of the Kings 1 Kings 8. Thirdly where there is a greater approbation and consent in the worship of God there is a greater confirmation of our Faith and Confidence that there we may offer up our prayers to God But in publick worship rather than private this is found Fourthly in publick Worship a greater increase of devotion towards God is ordinarily occasion'd at the consideration of the special place of Gods worship and the special presence God hath promised in that place in the hearing the prayer observing the postures and behaviours of all such as appear before him and in the dispensation of his graces there As likewise the eye and example of Men are of very great use and effect to the checking of light and vain actions which may fall from us and inviting us to a due veneration of God there and a decencie to prevent the just censure and offence of others which was the drift and force of St. Pauls argument to the Corinthians and the case of publick Assemblies of Christians and their behaviour there saying For this cause ought the woman to have 1 Cor. 11. 10. power over her head because of the Angels whether we understand it as doth Origen upon Luke Because the Angels are present in the Church which deserves Origâ—â— Hom 23. in Luc. so much to wit that only which is of Christ Therefore it is required that women should be covered because the Angels are there present assisting Photius Epist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. the Saints and rejoycing in the Church Or as Photius understands it That women have power over their head that is saith he have such who have power over them and that for the Angels they ought to be covered who are beholders and witnesses of the production of women out of man and proceeding from him Or lastly if we understand the words as some others who take the Angels here to be no other than the Bishop of the Church or President of the Assembly of such Christians for whose sake women ought to cover themselves because according to the most ancient form and custom of such Assemblies the Bishop having a higher seat than the rest of the Congregation might easily over-look the actions and gestures of all the rest And 't is no strange thing for the President or Bishop to be tearmed an Angel as what ever Origen playing many times with the Scripture rather than interpreting it might phansie in the Revelation and in other places of Scripture Rev. 2. 1. Lastly The glory of God which as hath been said is principally relative is much more declared and celebrated by the publick than by private worship even in the single act of one when occasion is not offered for more in the publick place of Worship But to conclude this I shall hear give the reasonings of St. Chrysostome to this our purpose upon the occasion of the effect of the joynt prayers of the Faithful in the delivery of St. Paul from death mentioned in his Epistle to 2 Cor. 1. 10. Chrys Serm. 64. p. 662. 663 Tom. 6. the Corinthians If St. Paul saith he being in danger was delivered by the prayer of the multitude why should not we also expect great benefit from such assistance For seeing when we pray singly by our selves we are weak but when we are gathered together we become strong we more prevail with God by multitude and auxiliaries For so a King who often gives one over to death and yields not to one when he intreats for one condemned but yields to the importunity of an whole City pleading for him and upon the importunity of a multitude respites him that is lead to the Dungeon from condemnation and brings him forth to Life Such is the force of the supplication of a multitude For this reason we are here gathered together all of us that we might more powerfully draw God to commiseration For seeing as is said when we pray by our selves we are weak by conjunction of Charity we prevail with God to give us those things we crave But I speak not these things for mine own sake but that ye may daily hasten to the Assemblies that ye say not What is there that I cannot pray for at
from an hearty and diligent answer and reply to the Minister and thank themselves if ever they be denied the understanding the publique worship of God For is there not much reason that the service should forsake them who forsake that And that they who will not concern themselves reverently and devoutly as they ought to do in it should be made uncapable of so doing by such an invention as this I know they of the Sectaries as their writings testifie can be content the Common people should say Amen at the last as if St. Paul had indeed intended no more than that one word whereas in all probability he intended not that word at all in terms but such a constant and general suffrage as might be implied in that word and yet that word very laudably used in the conclusion of several prayers It may I should think put them to the blush to consider how herein they vary from the whole practice of ancient Churches as I could particularly show and give us no reason why they presume so sacrilegiously to defraud the People I have I confess met in some of their writings such an one as can scarce be wondred at enough coming from them For they say it may give some occasion Account of the Conference at c. to the Laity to invade the Office of the Minister Priest they would have said if they dar'd to speak so in Publique And is not this wonderful and ridiculous both that they who have by their own Principles quite destroyed the ancient Hierarchy of the Church so far as power would enable them and by their practice opened a way for all comers into the Ministry by defending Extraordinariness of Vocation should be more zealous than any Hierarchical persons in either Ancient or Modern days for the Dues and Rights of the Ministry This surely can have no good meaning as it hath no good reason seeing all that the Laity doth in such cases is only to follow and not to lead as Pastours do and to answer the call of others and not to give any law or word to any Is there any fear that the common people should ascend to the throne when they give their approbation by shout and applause to the Oration of their King made from thence There ciprocation of the people was never looked upon otherwise than a suffrage and an â—â—â—â—ance and argument of the inward affection born by them to the worship of God performed by the Priest and a proof of their communion with him So that very early in the Church it was constituted that no such publick Service should be performed in the Church where Consecrat Dist 1. there were not two at least to make answer to the Priest And as there was never before these prevaricating Sectaries any fear that the Deacon should invade the Priests office because he made answer to him so neither that the people should usurp either because they replyed to both as innumerable instances may prove take this amongst many which I could add to them already collected by Vicecomes In the Aethiopian Mass which bears the name of Joseph Vicecom Observ Eccl. Tom. 3. l. 1. c. 14. the Universal Canon thus speaks the Deacon Bow the knee People Before thee O Lord we bow it and praise thee The Assistent to the Priest saith as followeth Lord Lord c. The People replyes the same Then the Assistent of the Priest or rather Bishop for so the word Sacerdos and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly used signifies follow the Prayer Lord c. The Deacon says Arise to Prayer The People Lord have mercy upon us c. Thus and much more anciently Now for the credit of the Roman Church and much more for the Puritan who agrees with it herein hear what follows in Vicecomes This custom is long since antiquitated in the Latin Church a custom being brought in that some one of the number of Clerks should answer to the Priest in the sacred ministration of the Mass Which when it first began may well be doubted by reason of the scarcity of Writers who treat of it But if I may use my conjecture it was but a little before Beroaldus his dayes which Beroaldus I take to be him who lived about the year 1480 because he is the first that I can find who makes mention thereof in a Manuscript of Ceremonies which is extant in the Library of the Canons of the great Church c. By which it may be seen which are most popish the Church of England in its publick Liturgy commending and prescribing this ancient custom and laudable or Sectaries who have conspired with Papists to abolish it and exclude it out of their Service CHAP. XI Of the Circumstances of Divine Worship and first of the proper Place of Divine Worship called the Church the manner of worshipping there Of the Dedication of Churches to God their Consecration and the Effects of the same That no man can convert any part of the Church to his private use without profanation of it and Sacriledge Against the abuse of Churches in the Burial of dead Bodies erecting Tombs and enclosing them in Churches or Chancels Rich men have no more right to any part of the Church than the Poor The Common Law can give no Right in such Cases THERE are two very considerable circumstances in most Moral and Divine Actions Place and Time which have great influence upon the goodness and evil of an action And we have already so far touched the former as to assert the Excellencie of a Place Publick above the Private Closet or Domestick Rooms Now it is requisite we should enquire into the condition of such publick places as we call Temples or Churches omitting here Sic ergo appellamus Ecclesiam Basilicam quâ continetur populus c. Aug. Ep. 157. the various names and significations and acceptations as more proper for larger and learneder Treatises And yet we must not omit the distinction of Church into Proper and Improper as Austin doth thus use it For so saith he we call the Temple Basilica the Church wherein is contained the people which are truly called the Church as that by the name Church that is The place is called Gods Temple or Church because the company and congregation of Gods people which is properly called the Church doth there assemble themselves on the days appointed Homil. Ch. of Engl. Of the place c. p. 126. the people contained in the Church we should signifie the place which contains c. And to prevent all mistakes we confess we here mean that opprobriously called The Steeple-house as no bodies house but as we believe the House of God by institution and designation however it proves many times by Hereticks and Schismaticks intrusion and usurpation the House of the Enemy to God But the Kings Palace is still the Kings though Rebels and Usurpers possess themselves by violence and injustice of the same And that
certain Houses may become the houses of God in a peculiar manner no less than Houses and Lands may be the rights of Man will appear from the very same grounds which are generally three Donation Purchase Occupation Donation is the Transferring of the Right of one Man to another under which we reduce Inheritance which though now custom of Law has made to descend to the next heir without any act of the predecessour yet originally it was constantly by gift and the Law supposes now a gift of the deceased where no formal donation is mentioned to him that is to succeed nor any other Purchase is the transferring of the Right or Dominion one hath of any thing to another upon civil contract and consideration whereas the other seemed rather to be natural Occupation is the possession of a thing free from any proprietary and retaining the same unto his own proper use All these ways both Houses and Lands may be transferred unto God upon this farther supposition that to the acquiring of a Right of Dominion the act of the person to whom it is transferred is not immediately necessary but another in his name and right may assume it So that if any entring into uninhabited and unpossessed Countries to which no man layeth a claim shall take up such a quantity of ground in Gods name and declare it devoted to the use of Religion and the Service of God it as undoubtedly becomes the possessions of God as it would have belonged to himself had he retained to himself the right of the first Occupant as they call it Again when out of the revenues of such sacred Estate commonly called Church-Lands or Means there is purchase made to the same end and in the same nature But most known is that of Free Donation either of one or more to the Service and Honour of God which we call Dedication Which Dedication is an outward act or ceremony signifying the Alienation of the right formerly posited in others and Translation thereof to Gods Service which because God conversing not with us Civilly as we do one with another it cannot be put immediately into the hands of God is taken up in Gods name for his use by his more immediate Servants and by consequence is not to be wrested from him nor alienated to any prophane I mean common humane uses any more than is that which in right belongs unto one man to be granted to or usurped by another without concession or consent in some manner implyed if not expressed This ancient Rite of Dedicating Churches was at first very agreeable to the simplicity of Christian Religion it self yet like all passing of Estates from one to another in the more natural and rude condition of Humane Society where there was alwayes a change of the Propriety where was any propriety at all but very simple and rude without any formalities as are now in use in those called civilized Countries but with no less validity And so it was at first in the alienation of Houses from humane Proprietaries and devoting them to God For as Baronius hath observed As the Kings Baron Ann. 112. num 45 46. or Emperours Exchequer was wont at first to lay claim to any thing by casting over it the Emperours Mantle or putting his Image or Name upon it even so the Bishops were wont to consecrate Churches to God no otherwise than by marking them with the Title of the Cross or with its Banner Whence it was that the Emperour Theodosius Leg. ult de Paganis Cod. Theod. commanded that the Temples of the Gentiles should serve for Christian Religion by placing upon them the sign of the Venerable Cross Hence is that of Perkins concerning this matter who saith The ancient Consecration of Perkins Demonst Problem Churches was with meer words and prayers not with crossings or such like rites And dedication of Churches began about the year 300 after Christ is partly found true and partly erroneous For Funcius yields much more confessing Funcius Comment l. 2. ad Ann. 141. that Hyginus Bishop of Rome ordained that Temples should be dedicated to God with solemn Rites and Ceremonies which was about the year 141. And yet it is true what Perkins saith that very simple was the first form But we do not so much here enquire into the Antiquity or Form of Consecration as the reasonableness and effect of such consecration And the reasonableness doth appear from the common grounds already laid and the necessity of some outward visible form to be used in such Dedications as well to manifest to the world the renunciation of propriety in any that may otherwise pretend to reserve their right to themselves anciently enjoyed as also to declare to what end and upon what conditions they so part with that right and to whom it thenceforward belongs all which if it must be traduced with the opprobrious name of Superstition so pass as invalid or sinful I would pray such enemies as he did those that desired Aristocratical Government to settle it first in their own Families and then as experience should prompt to them to commend it to the Publick First to take up estates upon such simple unceremonial acts themselves and as they find the event to offer that as the most simple and sober way for Gods House to pass from others hands into Gods I know the haters of Superstition to far greater superstition are wont to say It suffices that such is the consent of Christians that a place should be allotted in convenient manner to Gods Service and that it is sufficiently consecrated if they dare speak such a bold word by concomitancie that is when such acts of Divine worship as their prayers and specially preaching are there exercised But this will no ways be accepted both because they do the same duties in places which they hold no wayes thereby alienated from their common uses And this is no more than for a man to lend another his house to keep a Feast in it and not so much as if a man should let out his house for one to keep his Shevalry or Majoralty in But that we require is that a place should so be made over to Gods use that it should be out of all mens power justly to reduce it to humane propriety and uses And this can only be done and is done by such acts of publick Dedication as we plead for and never could hear half a note of sense reason or religion against it though we hear too great and unchristian clamours to the contrary with wonted revilings Supposing then this we pass to the effect of such Dedications unto Almighty God one of which is contained and expressed in the formal abrenunciation made of all Civil Right to such a place and by consequence for any man to convert any part of it to his own use is sacrilegiously to prophane the same A thing which I take this occasion to note against the gross abuse of Churches
the matter before such as they find startled and impatient at such plain derogation of Gods honor But they who openly profess to give Divine honor to Saints thus state the matter as doth Azorius Hoeretiques Azor. Instit Moral l. 9. c. 10. Quinto quaeritur c. saith he no wayes deny that Saints are to be honoured with that worship and honor which men eminent for vertue power wisedom nobility and Authority may be worshipped with for such honor as this is altogether civil and human but they tax Catholiques for worshipping them as God that is that they give divine honor to them But greatly are they mistaken For Catholiques worship them not as God but for Gods sake worship and honor them For as before Minime cols pro Deo sâ—d propter Deum c. we said Catholiques worship not the Image for God but for Gods sake So in like manner we honor not Saints only with that honor wherewith we honor vertuous wise and noble men but with divine honor and worship which is an Act of Religion But we give not divine honor to them for their own sakes but for Gods sake Thus he Against which we object sacriledg and Idolatry thus loosly delivered For as for the distinction it serves their turn nothing at all It implies with us a contradiction For to give Divine honor to any Creature is Idolatrous for what reason or for whose sake soever it be given Neither is it possible a man should give it to a Creature for Gods sake meaning as I suppose they do for the honor of God For divine worship being proper to God and incommunicable to any but him can no more be given for his sake to the Creature than supream honor to a Villain for the Kings sake And therefore as he goes on to erect Temples and Altars and offer Sacrifices in honor of Saints which is to tell us more plainly what they mean by Divine worship and this as they say for Gods sake is with us Idolatry who deny that any such things can be done really to Gods honor and much more that God would have them so honour'd or himself by them And whereas a little before he saith It was the Heresy of Eustathius as Socrates writeth in his History l. 2. c. 33. That Saints were not to be worshipped but God alone as being against the first Commandment There is no such thing to be found in that place but this we find which expresses the dealing of the Romanists in this and other controversies viz. how that Sccrat l. 2. c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eudoxius being in Julians dayes placed in the Episcopal Throne of Constantinople he uttered these words in publique God the Father is impious but God the Son is pious at the hearing whereof the minds of all present being much troubled and beginning to mutiny He added Let not this saying trouble you For 't is true thus God the Father is impious because he worshippeth none but God the Son is pious because he worshippeth the Father Which being heard the tumult was appeased and instead of it they all fell out into laughter and so was that saying ever after look'd on as ridiculous In like manner when these new Divines come with great swelling language of divine honor to be given to the Creature in their interpreting themselves they must be very heretical and prophane or very ridiculous Or rather it is both to say We must give divine honor to Saints for Gods sake yea an abomination yet greater to make God the author of his own injury and degradation as it were to set up a competitor to a King against his will or at least without his will for his sake But suppose what may not be granted that there is a favourable interpretation and tolerable practise in the Church of Rome of these things I am sure this is not tolerable that such sayings as these and many more should pass untouched or uncersur'd by them yea are kept and nourished and preferred much by the most Visible autority of their Church and the other softer inferior sense allowed and made use of chiefly to dispute with and to decline the force of a resolute accuser and to satisfie green proselytes with who are not able to digest the stronger and ranker Divinity they have for them in store when it shall be too late to see the truth and must have their mouths stopt and all objections and scruples answered with this The Church cannot err It is most apparent that God neither in Old nor New Testament hath given any such warrant as Ahasuerus did to Haman to exalt Mordecai or Pharaoh to honor Joseph for us to honor Saints in exhibiting any thing of divine worship to them I shall not need therefore trouble this place with their citations to that purpose which is not to the purpose when it was there manifest to all that such honor was the honor not of a King but a principal subject and Minister of state Neither do Scriptural reasons advance their cause Whereof some are so parabolical and forced that they fall to nothing before they come to us as that of Mat. 24. 26. and that of Saint Peter 2 Pet. 1. 14. 15. being plainly intended of the records he would leave with them he wrote to to bear in memory what he delivered to them as Cajetane hath noted And the Power promised Rev. 2. 26. to them that overcome is not as they violently give out a power to dispense blessings and therefore to be sought to by Invocation but a power to be victorious in the Faith against all persecutions And those reasons drawn from Apoc. 5. 8. and 6. 10. and 8. 3 4. Are all besides the vanity of the form of the argument it self upon a false foundation and supposition viz. as if those things there related were acted in Heaven and not upon earth True it is as hath been noted before that the Vision of the Apostle is implyed to have been in Heaven concerning things there revealed to him but it was of things only to be fulfilled on earth And though it is most easie fit and obvious to interpret the Angel offering incense as the servent prayers of the holy Saints upon earth to God the Father yet it is I conceive more literal and agreeable to the intent of the Revelations made to interpret them partly as descriptions of things doing then in the Church and partly as prophesies of the future condition of the Church in the publique Service of God where by the Angel we are to understand the Bishop who in the first dayes of the Church was wont in presence and behalf of the people to offer up the common prayers of the People at the golden Altar viz. The special place of his ministration which prayers and worship did like incense ascend unto the holy Throne of God And the fire which is said to be cast from the Censer and Altar unto the earth is
it was not here cannot be exercised but according to that Light and that Rule given them which is the will of God which perceiving so fully and in which being so absolutely satisfied they cannot be said to pray that it might be done so much as admire and continually adore the doing of it without interposing by way of particular intercession as we out of ignorance do here on earth for the inclining or averting of God from any thing they see in him future or rather present They have therefore indeed greater Charity as to the purity and intenseness of it which is Charity Triumphant but not Militant according to which last only they are said to assist us by their prayers And yet this I may add That as the intercession of Saints in Heaven for us is no wayes to be allowed to be vocal or proper as on earth nor by any special act direct to God on the behalf of their Friends and Fellow-members on earth for the reason now given so may they not be denyed all influence upon God in his dispensation of grace and benefits to us on earth as God doth please to consider their Labor of Love not only for themselves but fellow-members here below And whereas one of the best testimonies alledged to prove special offices of Angels done before God in behalf of the Militant Members of Christ here is taken out of the Revelation where S. John prayeth or saluteth Rev. 4. rather with a Pastoral and Apostolical benediction the seven Churches of Asia saying Grace be unto you and peace from him which is and which was and which is to come and from the seven spirits which are before Tobit 12. 15. his Throne It may sufficiently be answered with that of Tobit c. 12 15. where mention is made of Seven Angels before the Throne were this autority greater with us than it is That we doubt not but God doth make use of the Ministry of Angels to impart his blessings to men on Gen. 48. 16. earth For this implys the benediction of Jacob given to Joseph The Angel which redeemed me from all evil bless the Lads but this infers not either that Jacob did then or we should now address our selves to Angels but as he certainly there so ought we to seek of God only that he would by his servants the holy Angels preserve and bless us Nevertheless I according to my former Rule interpret the seven spirits in the Revelation to be none other than the seven Governors or Bishops of the seven Churches of which St. John speaks immediately before whom in a Vision St. John saw to stand before the golden Altar or proper place of worship and from thence blessing the people But no more of this Agreeable to this is the doctrine of making Images and Reliques of Azorius ubi sâ—p Saints objects of divine worship too and that though not for their own sakes yet for Gods sake to which I need say no more than is already spoken of so worshiping Saints But for their sakes who can be content with less honor done unto Cassan Consult them it may suffice to say in few words what Cassander hath observed before me It is certain that at the beginning of the preaching of the Gospel for a good time especially in Churches there was no use of Images at all as Clemens and Arnobius witness And this was above two hundred years after Christ Afterward Pictures were admitted into Churches with great simplicity and innocency yea benefit to the vulgar Christian whose book Gregory not unfitly called them as expressing the historical part of Christian Faith and no more worshipped then than Papists worship their Bibles now And that Images should be erected at all or being constituted that they should be worshipped at all or brought into Temples there was never any admirer or adorer of them could pretend to show out of Scripture But the second commandment against all Images in order to worship or reverence hath prov'd such a bone that it hath broke the teeth of all that would break it Erasmus in his Catechism stateth the cause thus Before the coming of Christ when the Israelites were very rude and dull all Imagery was prohibited them for fear of Idolatry But now since all Paganism is extinguished by the Light of the Gospel the danger is not the same and if any superstition should lurk still in the minds of Christians it may easily be driven thence by holy Doctrine Until the age of St. Hierom were certain men of sound Religion which would endure no Images at all in Churches either painted or graven or wrought no not of Christ I suppose by reason of the Anthropomorphites yet by little and little Where are they then that with so much importunity and little reason call for the very time precisely wherein corruptions entered into the Church or else will not be satisfied the use of Images entred into Churches And perhaps there would be no undecency if in such places as God is served in solemnly no images should be placed saving the Image of Christ crucified But Pictures if they were duly used besides the honest pleasure they bring conduce very much to memory and understanding of history Yea the learned many times see more in Pictures than Letters and are more vehemently affected And as the Ancient Church prohibited all books not canonical to be used in Churches so perhaps were it not amiss if all kinds of Pictures of things not contained in Holy Scripture were excluded To this effect and almost in these very words he To which we must so far assent as to yield a possible good effect of Information and Devotion arising from such outward occasions as Pictures yet considering God hath no where laid any obligation upon us to profit by such helps as he hath to advance our selves in knowledg and Christian vertues by consulting Holy Scriptures and how great and manifest peril of falling into Idolatry by them there is it were more pious and safe to interdict the falling down before as well as to them man being naturally as prone to Idolatry as to unlawful carnal copulation But whereas Erasmus proceedeth to defend Images because God in the Old Law commanded to make Cherubins and Seraphins about the Ark Tertullian answereth That so may we too when we have the like command For though God ties us up strictly to his Laws he doth not so tye himself but when he pleases he may give us a dispensation But besides Vid. Phil. Judaeum Legat. ad Caium p. 801. Gen. this such Images were altogether hid from the peoples eyes and much more use being in the Holiest of Holies and we speak now of such as are exposed to view and reverence And as common as this instance is amongst the great Doctors of Rome it makes little to their purpose Again Erasmus That which is before God meaning that Thou shalt have no other God before me is made equal to God
Place where their Site was And to this purpose is there express provision made by a Council of Ments in the middle age of the Church under Charles the Great in the ninth Chapter that the Monks of Religious Houses should be subject to their proper Bishop and do nothing without his approbation But it is one thing to plead in general for the lawfulness and expediencie of Monastick Life and that of both sexes and another to deliver laws and due prescriptions for the well disciplining of them which is the work of the wisest heads and sincerest hearts to Religion to be here passed over There may yet seem somewhat due to an objection against the said state taken from the vow exacted from such as enter themselves into it which no wonder that they who oppose so blindly the thing it self should much more oppose But they who approve of it can find little reason to quarrel at that bond And that first because such Monastick Life is not alwaies in Society which they call Convents but may be undertaken at a mans own pleasure both for time and place and other circumstances every Christian having power to dispose of himself not prejudicing the general right and inteâ—â—â—t of his Governours over him to what life he pleases and with what â—â—â—cumstances But if a man resolves to become a member of some special Society already formed by certain Rules and Laws to desire to be matriculated into that Body and not to be willing to conform to the constitutions of it is unjust and unreasonable And so Pikewise not to give that outword and common assurance of faithful submission unto the same by an Oath of Vow For do men think it reasonable that Prentises should be bound to be true faithful and keep their Masters secrets even before they know them and when they know them to be none of the justest or honestest or shall men that enter but into civil Companies be it but of Merchant-Taylers or Barber-Surgeons be constrained by Oath to be true and faithful to them but they who are admitted into Religious Societies be left to do and live as the please What were this but to seek an occasion under colour of friendliness and good affection to divide and destroy it as is apparent in the seemingly modest pretenses of dissenters and disaffected persons to our Church who upon condition that they may give and reverse certain orders and laws offer themselves to become one with it Thus the Vulgar take it but in truth it is for the Church to be one with them And is not this a notable piece of modesty condescension and complyance But here let that rest as also what we have to say of the second thing generally to be consider'd in the Worship of God viz. The state of serving God CHAP. VII Of Religious Worship the third thing considerable in it viz. The Exercise of it in the several kinds of it And first of Prayer the chiefest Act of Gods Worship contrary to Sectaries who are Enemies to it in three respects And first by their vain conceit of Preaching wherein consisteth not the proper Worship of God as in Prayer THE third thing wherein the worship of God may be said yet more properly to consist is the Kinds of Worship And these we shall reduce to three Prayer Preaching and Obedience in the due exercise of all Christian Graces and Vertues wherein the Life of Faith properly consisteth And first we shall begin with prayer as that wherein was ever thought the worship of God principally to consist be that Religion Christian or Unchristian unless we be forced to except some modern and immodest pretenders to Reformation For though they keep within such bounds as a grave and judicious defender of our Church says none ever exceeded not to deny prayer absolutely yet have they brought it to that pass so humbled and diluted it that there is little place found for it and less value And surely were they but true to their own principles and arguments no use at all would they acknowledge of prayer more then certain Heathens and Hereticks whose arguments must needs be accepted by them if they will believe conformable to themselves St. Hierome upon Matthew tells us There is sprung up here a certain Hieronymus in Matth. cap. 6. 8. Heresie and Dogme of Philosophers who say If God knows what we pray for and that we have need of such things as we desire before we ask in vain we speak to him who knows all before To whom saith he we answer That we do not so much tell God what we would have as begg of him Clemens Alexandrinus likewise tells us that one Prodius was Clemens Alexa Strom. 7 Authour of that Opinion Thus far profane Sectaries amongst us have not generally proceeded though we have been credibly informed that some have However they unanimously conspire to debase prayer and corrupt Christian worship it self in these three Respects First in advancing preaching much inferiour to it in a Church become Christian infinitely before it Secondly by opposing Set or Prescribed Forms of Prayer And thirdly in expunging the Lords Prayer out of their uncertain and wild Liturgies Which the Presbyterian Sect the Sire of all others was not a little guilty of and so seldome used it that being demanded why they left it out in their prayers thought good to give such a modest reason as this They feared they should be out in the recitation of it so had they accustomed their tongues to liberty and variety of words But they had other reasons which they were ashamed to utter but to their trusty friends But let us first see how preaching transcends prayer and hath insulted and trampled over it For such have been the extreams of late that whereas formerly the Proverb was No Penny no Pater Noster now No Preaching no Pater Noster No Sermon no Prayer in Gods House And whereas it was said by our Saviour Christ of old and by the Prophet before him My House shall be called which almost every ordinary man knows accord-to Matth. 21. 3. the Hebrew Idiom is the very same with shall be the House of Prayer unto all Nations and never was it called or accounted a preaching house but by them that called it a Steeple-house and little otherwise judged of it now have things been so reformed with a witness ot rather a vengeance that Sermoning carries all afore it bears all down to little or nothing But what if all this while preaching be not the worshipping of God at all Will they continue so obstinate as to make it almost the only thing in Gods house That they who with strange boldness profess and in constant practise declare they will have nothing to do with Gods house as Gods house but only as a Vestry-house when they are to take the Parish Accompts unless there be a Sermon do hold that Sermoning active and passive preach'd and heard is the main matter of Religion