discouraged they divert their studies another way I know your Grace heareth not of these matters and I hope God will work in your gracious heart some remedies against them for otherwise the Schools will be forsaken the Church desolate the People wild and dismayed the Gospel discredited and this noble Realm which ever was famous for the name of Learning likely to come to such ignorance and barbary as hath not been heard of many memory before our time Poor souls are destitute without a Guide the afflicted in conscience have none to quiet them they grow wild and savage as a people that hath no God they are commanded to change their Religion and for lack of instruction they know not whither to turn them Oh if the Kingdom of God be not worthy to be promoted yet the Kingdom of Satan is worthy to be overthrown Oh our Posterity shall rue that ever such Fathers went before them and Chronicles will report this miscarriage they shall leave it written in whose time and in whose reign this was done Or if we grow so barbarous that we consider not this or be not able to draw it into Chronicle yet forreign Nations will not spare to write this and publish it to our everlasting reproach and shame By these means forreign power which by Gods mercy this Realm is delivered from shall be brought upon us the truth of God shall be taken away the holy Scripture burnt and consumed in fire a marvellous darkness and calamity must néeds ensue Oh that your Grace might behold the miserable disorder of Gods Church or that you might see the calamities that will ensue It is a part of your Kingdom and such a part as is a prop and stay to the rest I will say to your Majesty as Cyrillus sometimes said to the godly Emperours Theodorus and Valentinian Ab ea quae erg◠Deum est pietate reip vestrae status pendet You are our Governour you are the Nurse of Gods Church We must open this grief before you and God knoweth whether it may be redressed it is let grown so long it is gone so far but if it may be redressed there is no other but your Highness that can redress it The Definition of Simonie SYmonie is an intentive desire or purpose to buy or sell a spiritual Living or any Corporal thing annexed to the Church Grat. dist 1. p. 2. 91. Zanch. de inter cultu Concil compl Sect. 43. dec cont Nic. can 8. 96. CHAP. V. The Church of Englands Complaint against Encroaching Pluralities IS your portion oh my Sons in this life or is it in another Is the satisfaction your immortal souls look for in the emptie vain low and perishing contents of this world or in the full high and everlasting enjoyments of the other world If in this life you have hope only you are of all men the most miserable the most contemptible and most deceitful if in another why so many Imperial Laws so many Ecclesiastical Canons so many Decrees of Councils so mans severe Reproofs from Fathers and Casuists so many Complaints and Reproaches so many Laws and Injunctions so many Attempts and Endeavours in Parliament these sixtie years against your Monopolie of Livings and Pluralities of Benefices Why do you heap upon your selves this envie why do you provoke these Reproaches I provided for you liberally I checked those that opposed your maintenance seasonablie I encouraged your Industrie and Merit carefully beyond any reformed Church in the world I restored you to your Rights handsomly I secured your Rights legallie will not this satisfie you will not this content you 1. It 's but lately that you were thought uncapable of one Living and now three four five cannot suffice you It 's not long since you wanted necessaries and do you now heap up superfluities Lately you could not provide for your Families Wants and do you now provide for their Excess and Pride have you forgot how lately you grasped all and you lost all Alas Alas 2. And will you eat bread out of your Brethrens mouths and will you starve your fellow-servants Are you Ministers so are they Are you Orthodox so are they Are you Loyal so are they Have you been constant so have they Are you serviceable to the Church they more in labours more abundant Oh how many excellent men who out-lived the late miseries Articles Committees Sequestrations Protestations Covenants Engagements lingring out their lives laden and almost oppressed worn out and quite tired with the burthen of years cares fears labours necessities and afflictions are now fain to die in obscurity want and contempt as if the Sons of the Church of England wanted only this to make up the measure of their sufferings That they should be undone when the Church is restored How many hundreds sober and able men are laid aside and contemned by some as Orthodox and despised by others as poor whom the people would relieve but that they are faithful to me whom I would relieve but that I am swallowed up by you When you look big with your abundance and superfluity and glory in your preferments how many hundred able and sober men are ashamed of their Order and Function are wrapped up in poverty and discontent and lost in poor employments whose faithful labours I want whose sober conversations might honour me whose diligence and care might restore me whose reason and learning might uphold me whose powerful preaching might establish me whose self-denial and devotedness to publick good might save me Alas Sirs let none of you think of himself more highly then he ought to think but to think soberly according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith for as you have many members in one body and all members have not the same Office so I being made of many am one body in Christ and every one in me is a member one of another You my Sons having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given you whether Prophesie c. why shall not they that prophesie be encouraged according to the proportion of Faith or Ministrie why should not all be encouraged that wait on the Ministrie or they that teach on teaching or they that exhort on exhortation The body is not one member but many now hath God set the members in the bodie as it pleaseth him and if they were all one member where were the bodie the eye cannot say to the head I have no need of thee nor again the head to the feet I have no need of you Nay much more those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessarie and those less honourable upon these we ought to bestow more abundant honour And our uncomely parts have a more abundant comeliness for our comely parts have no need but God hath tempered the body together having given more abundant honour to that part which lacked that there should be no schism in the body but that the members should have the
same care one for another Now ye my Sons are the body of Christ and members in particular and God hath set some in the Church first Apostles secondarily Prophets thirdly Teachers Are all Apostles are all Prophets are all Teachers are all provided for Oh covet earnestly the best Gifts not the best Livings And yet I could shew you a more excellent way Why is that Preferment engrossed by one which might maintain Twenty Why are those Revenues lost upon the folly vanity and superfluitie of one family which might provide for the honest occasions of five Oh Justice the equal Distributer of Affairs whither art thou fled Oh Equity whither art thou retired 3. If you consider not the sin do you consider the consequences of these miscarriages the envie that you already sink under the occasion given unto them that seek occasion which hath already disgraced you the great discontent that alreadie endangereth you Have not you enemies to your Order Calling and Judgement and must you incense your friends Must you provoke that God that hath hitherto upheld your Order and Function by abusing the maintenance he allows for his service and servants to your own advantage Must you displease his sacred Majesty by appropriating to a few ill beloved persons for whose sake his Majesty is thought the worse of that encouragement which might be equally bestowed upon well-deserving and well-beloved who might in each Parish teach his subjects their duty faithfully perswade them to obedience successfully and settle them in the Doctrine of Government according to the great Principles of Christianity most happily Must you provoke your Brethren of the Clergy to discontent by taking up all the encouragements of their Studies all their employments and hopes How many hopeful young men in City and Country are forced either to want or which is worse to live upon your small Pensions and scant allowance and what is natural for parts and ingenuity in want to dispair their fortunes and envy yours How readily do they now hopeless of any regular favour apply themselves to popular applause that their compliance may gain that among the people which their merit could not among you Do not you see how the people forsake you as Self-Seekers how the Gentry censure you as Unconscionable how the Clergy abhor you as invaders of their places and preferments Do you not see that the Law can hardly secure you that authority can scarcely defend you from all the affronts and baffles that Malice do suggest to an incensed people the adversaries triumph the many friends I have weep the Sober and Serious are amazed to see fourscore or an hundred odious men filling up a whole Church Do you imagine those many active men will rest in a dispirited poor mendicant decayed dejected and vexatious condition Do not you fear their melancholy thought their retired contrivance their forlorn meetings You know there are none so dangerous as the Discontented Scholars Monopolie is the Ruine of the State Pluralities are the ruine of the Church the one necessitates the indigent Subject to dangerous courses and practises the other the poor Scholar to as dangerous discourses and thoughts Is it not enough that mens late malice and insolencie against the Ministry reduced them to want and contempt but that to my shame who am blessed of God with abundance and honour one small part of the Ministry should reduce the other to smal Contributions poor Dependencies so uncertain and so base that men of ingenious spirits and learning must detest them who cannot endure when they do their work to beg for their wages not without forbid compliances and flatteries with vile men in their vilest humours Oh look upon the poor Curates and their Families what is their portion of the prosperity we now enjoy Alas they live by Gods mercy and mens charity How despicable is their Calling How little their Authority how inconsiderable their Instructions How successless their Doctrine how uncreditable their Lives Do not you see that your fellow-Ministers under these necessities will not long be able to assert the honour of their Calling and that no after-Generation will succeed to inherit their poverty and pains unless such as will further debase the Dignity of the Function What must all the ingenious Ministers be Stipendaries The Faction threatned no more Must they have only their allowances Anarchie could have done no more Are you restored to reduce your fellow-servants to that penurie by Law which Fanaticks would have brought them to without Law they wanted only this misery to be undone by their Brethren and perish by them of their own profession Obsect These poor men you will say are provided for answerable to their Parts Answ Have they Parts for the Calling of Ministers and have they not Parts for the Maintenance of Ministers Can they preach the Gospel and can they not live by the Gospel Are they worthy to discharge your Cures and are they not worthy to enjoy them 5. Do you desire the advantage of so many Benefices or do you desire the charge if the advantage then the poor Separatist was in the right when he called you Hirelings then indeed you make merchandise of Souls then you are the greatest Juglers and Deceivers in the world and you laugh among your selves as the Tuscan Sooth-sayers and confer Notes as that Pope with his Cardinal saying How much gain doth this fable of Christ bring us and poor souls should avoid you as the shadow of death What shall I hear him whose godliness is gain whose God is his belly whose faith is his advantage whose hope is only in this world His watchmen are blind they are ignorant they are all dumb dogs they cannot bark sleeping lying down loving to slumber yea they are greedy dogs which can Never have enough and they are shepherds that cannot understand they all look for their own way every one for his gain from his quarter Come ye say they I will fetch wine and we will fill our selves with strong drink and to morrow shall be as this day and much more abundantly Fsai 56. 9 10 11 12. If the Charge do you know what you do do you know that you must watch over the Congregation as they that must give an account so many Benefices so many more hundreds of souls that you must answer for Do you know what it is to answer the great God for an immortal soul do you know what it is to give an account of the purchase of Christs bloud do you know what is the work what is the charge of a Minister Oh poor souls you consider not whether some have not accused you to God whom you never saw whether souls under your charge are not daily going to another world with doleful complaints against you whom you never knew whether any in Hell do not cry out against you whom you never saw thousands have appeared before the Judgement-seat of God excusing themselves with your faults though you lay it not
people an inward worship of soul in spirit and in truth before God but withal I enjoyn outward worship of the body which is but a reasonable service to God that made the body exemplary and significant before men in such habits and gestures as may most conduce by the advice of the whole Church for the private spirit of the prophets in those things ought to be subject to the publick spirit of the Prophets to reverence devotion and edification in knowing humble meek and quiet spirits rightly discerning the innocent nature of such things not prohibited and so indifferent and the Christian liberty allowed to them to use those things indifferent when commanded and to lay them aside when not commanded However let the many Obligations to unity by the true Faith you joyntly professe give you more satisfaction then the occasions of dividing the Ceremonies in which you differ give you offence so that you may not upon so small occasions in such small matters sacrifice to your private passion and perswasion the publick Peace and Prosperity of the Church especially since I never heard of any sober Christian or truly godly Minister who being in other things prudent unblameable and sincere did ever suffer any check of conscience meerly upon the account of having been conformable to and keeping communion with me nor did they ever complain of Ceremonies Liturgy and Episcopacy as any damps to their real graces or to their holy communion with Gods blessed spirit but admired them as the united influence the joynt consent the combined devotion of all good Christians in this Nation who publickly agreed with one mind and in one manner to serve the Lord in a way allowed by the most pious of Princes practised by the best Nobility owned by the wisest Gentry maintained by the most learned Clergy and embraced by the best sort of Commons I allow only such Ceremonies as make religious Duties not more pious but more conspicuous not more sacred but more solemn not more spiritual and holy but more visible imitable and exemplary to quicken my children to allure others to instruct and edifie all 5. Are ye offended with my Canons and Injunctions Is it fit that a few men whom order and Policy hath made inferiour to others as the Rulers and Representatives of the whole society should prefer their own private Opinions and Judgements before the well-advised Results the learned Connsels the pious Endeavours and solemn Sanctions of so many eminent for piety prudence integrity publick influence and just Authority 6. Are my solemn Fasts and Feasts your grievances those solemn remembrances of Gods Mercy to men in Christ celebrated with prayer praises preaching and communicating to Gods glory and all sober Christians improvement according to the known president of the Jews and the general practice of the Christian Church What harm is there if some good men observing a day observe it to the Lord and others not observing a day observe it not to the Lord 7. Do you resent my Endeavours for Unity and uniformity Alas I desire only that men sincerely worship one true God and profess the Faith of our Lord Jesus Christ that they may be partakers of the gifts and graces of the blessed Spirit and may have an holy communion with that adorable Trinity and with one another in love and charity as Christians enjoying the noblest life the sweetest society and most heavenly fraternity imitating God emulating Angels Children and expectants of happiness Partakers of grace and daily preparing for eternal Glory that all men who have been called baptized and instructed by lawful Ministers here in the mysteries and duties of the Gospel may make a joynt and publick profession of the Christian Faith and Reformed Religion in the name and as the sense of the whole Nation grounded upon the holy Scripture guided also and administred by that uniforme order due authority and holy Ministry for Worship and Government which according to the mind of Christ the pattern of the Apostles and the practice of all primitive Churches hath been lawfully established by the wisdom and consent of all Estates in this Kingdom for Gods honour the Churches safety the publick peace and the common good of souls 8. Do I not allow you a just liberty to do such things constantly and chearfully which are most proper and advantagious to the nature and excellency of men to think what is true to do what is fit and enjoy what is just in reference to God others and your selves I have taken from you no liberty but that of doing evil you are at liberty to enjoy all the comforts priviledges and Ordinances which Christ hath instituted in an holy order and regular way for private or publick good and to hope for that reward and crown which God the righteous judge hath promised those that persevere in well doing My highest aim is that you may have liberty to exercise a good conscience void of offence towards God and towards man that they may willingly in all things live honestly 9. Are ye displeased with my Members Alas innocent men they pursue after the knowledge of and communion with God in order to a rational religious spiritual gracious perfect and unchangeable life enjoying themselves in the blessed enjoyment of God the enjoyment of whom satisfieth all their desires rewards all their duties requites all their sufferings compleats all their happiness crowns and perfects true Religion They endeavour that on earth which they hope for in heaven viz. a right knowledge and a willing performance which as reasonable they owe for ever to God their Maker Preserver and Redeemer in Christ With this religious frame and temper of which themselves only are conscientious they prepare for a glorious and blessed immortality with a sincerity of heart and uprightness of conversation which hath no other Rule but Gods Word no other End but Gods Glory no other Comfort but the Constancy of this Disposition to their Lives end Innocent men they look for one common Salvation they use one common Sacrament they professe one Faith and Rule of Holiness they have one Gracious Temper the same inward sense of Duty and Devotion they walk in the same order with the Catholick Church over the face of the earth 10. Do you envy me my Patrimony and Maintenance what the Law of God allows me what the Gospel hath provided me what the Piety of Elder times hath bestowed upon me what good Kings Peers and people of their own endowed me with freely honouring the Lord with their substance that they that served the Altar might live by the Altar O why may not my children who attend the Gospel live by the Gospel since they attend a Ministry as venerable in its Mysteries as clear in its Doctrine as glorious in its chief Minister Jesus as painful to it's Ministers and as comfortable to pious and devout souls as the Ministry of the Law Why are you offended that they of my children that are taught should