Congregations that are so corrupt and therefore they are neither Donatists nor Schismaticks I answer 1. Might not the Donatists have put in the same Plea Altingius probl Tom. 2. part 2. problem 17. p. 329. Junius in contro 4. Bellar p. 1165. Ames de cas Consc l. 5. c. 12. p. 288. who when they divided themselves from the Catholiques had a Communion with the many Churches of their fraternity Adhuc ista verba communiter dici possunt potest enim alius dicere as Augustine this is the common defence of all Schismaticks that when they leave one Church they go into another but as Altingius will give them one venny Quibuscum coenam sumere detrectamus eorum fraternitati tacitè renunciamus So secondly let them take a blow from the famous Junius to beat down this interposition Schismatici comperiuntur multi qui non à spiritu aut capite aut à corpore discindi volunt sed ab hac illave ecclesia i.e. membro particulari corporis ex infirmitate particulari especially if as Ames addeth the separation be propter causam omnium ecclesiarum communem as we suppose it is being causâ morum corruptorum scandali aut singularium offensionum Tryal grounds Separat c. 10. p. 197. Sacramentorum Communione sociamur Contra Donatist post Collat c. 28. Tom. 7. p. 127. Sacramentorum participandorum communione cohaerere Ibid. c. 21. p. 126. In una congregatione paria Sacramenta tractantes Contra Parmen l. 3. c. 2. p. 13. Malus frater propter communia Sacramenta Collat. cum Donatist prima die Si in communione Sacramentorum mali maculant bonos si propter ipsam tantam Communionem Sacramentorum mali perdunt bonos Contra Crescon l. 2. c. 35 36. p. 5. Tom. 7. Commixtos bonis malos intrà retia suorum Sacramentorum Brevicul collat cum Donatist 3. die p. 118. Bonos malis in communione Sacramentorum misceri Fulgentius l. de fide ad Petrum wherein all Churches may be alike concerned If they shall think to evade by telling us that they hold communion in other Ordinances not onely Mr. Ball gives sentence against them That to use one Ordinance and not another is to make a Schisme in the Church but St. Augustine hath fore-stalled their Plea who as he makes external unity and communion to consist mainly in the participation of Sacraments so he constitutes much of the Schisme of the Donatists in their refusing to have communion in Sacraments with the Catholikes And though I deny not that they renounced and protested against all other communion with the Orthodox as well as in the Sacraments to which heighth and wideness of separation the Independents have not risen or removed yet do they symbolize with them in the kinde though not degrees of their Schisme for there may be several stories of building one higher than another yet all upon the same foundation And these Duties notwithstanding wherein they communicate with others they account no acts of Church-fellowship or Ecclesiastical Communion but such as they can dispense unto Pagans also And themselves also seem to constitute the root of Church-fellowship in the Communion of Sacraments owning none to be of their Churches but such as communicate with them of the Supper of the Lord. As therefore they applaud the fighting Cock which having lost one eye for the battel turns away his blind side lest he be stricken where he can least ward the blow so I cannot blame the Apologists to seek to sequester from the question their gathering into their Church such as separate from and renounce communion of Sacraments with their own Congregations which is the grand heteroclyte and chief anomalon of their way which as Calvin saith of the point of Justification controverted between us and the Papists would they retract it would almost quit the cost to grant them all the rest But the lawfulness of this they undertake to assert hereafter But Aut deme verbis aut adde viribus for the words require more than a City In the interim they abstract the state of the question and deliver it in this form Whether in the reforming of a long corrupted Church it be necessary that all the members thereof do submit to some examination or tryal of their knowledge before they be admitted unto the Lords Table This question they fear not to maintain in the affirmative Et cùm magna malae superest audacia causae Creditur à multis fiducia They suppose corruption in their Churches and he hath no fire of divine love in his heart that hath not Water limbeck'd out of his eyes to see it Men well satisfied with the present frame and temper not looking on them under any such disorder they can expect little of reason or truth from Vox tua facta mea est If we could as easily accord in other things as this Et duo concordes animo moriemur in uno Onely I cannot tell neither should I concur with them in a desire nor much to dispute with such for the more they are sick they the more need the Physician and though Cain be not his brothers keeper yet Jacob holds him by the heel detinet gressus suos as Bernard allegorically interprets it and though they seem never so incurable yet he that lay 38. years diseased might perchance have bin sooner cured had he not wanted one to put him into the healing pool however si non liberabo animam suam liberavi meam for Qui non corrigit resecanda committit facientis culpam in se habet qui quod potest corrigere negligit emendare saith Gregory But yet notwithstanding all this it would be the great question whether they found or made more of this corruption and whether the Cure may not be as mischievous as the Malady as it fared with Cn. Pompeius of whom the Historian tells us Gravior remediis quà m delicta erant and whether since they undertook the Cure the Diseases have not grown more desperate and incurable ut antea flagitiis ità nunc legibus laboratur or perchance among wise and moderate men this would be beyond question Hae manus Trojam erigent Parvas habet spes Troja si tales habet When men of their way and principles declaim against the corruptions of the Church Clodius accusat moechos And when they cry up Reformation Clodius de pudicitia And it will be farther no less questionable why this way of examining and proscribing from the Sacrament should be unto reformation as quick-silver to other metals that without which they could have no constitution and that this Cure could be wrought by no medicine whereof this is not the Basis so as all the Psalms of reformation end in this Gloria whereas I rather think si non falsis â—ludor imaginibus that scarce any thing hath more obstructed the work of reformation than this inclosing of the Sacrament and censorious driving of so many from it as nothing more
that offence may come to all whereof the penalty hath fallen upon one and as it fares in the Church so it falls out alike in a Christian Common-wealth if the Laws be not duely executed in the punishment of Malefactors good men are scandalized and evil are encouraged by impunity and not onely the Justice of the Nation but the honour of Religion also is left obnoxious to obloquy yet however no man contradicts the moderating of civil punishments by clemency or approves the excess of Justice which is cruelty such as the Poet reproved in Sylla Ille quod exiguum restabat sanguinis urbi Hausit dúmque nimis jam putrida membra rescidit Excessit medicina modum nimiúmque secuta est Quà morbi duxere manus He must be more than a Cherubin that deignes not to looke to the mercy-seat Nec quisquam est cui tam valdè innocentia sua placeat Seneca de Clem. lib. 1. ut non stare in conspectu clementiam paratam humanis erroribus gaudeat It may fall out also in many cases what Livy tells us to have happened in that of Q. Maximus Nec minùs firma est disciplina militaris Q. Fabii periculo quam Titi Manlii miserabili supplicio and it is as consentient to prudence as the practice of States where there is a multitude of Delinquents to chuse out the fattest for Sacrifices to justice and with Tarquin to lop off the heads onely and where by a partial or negligent execution of Laws and administration of Justice offenders suffer condigne punishment it cannot yet warrant or excuse a denying of subjection or a raysing of sedition or an erecting and constituting new Common-wealths in the Commonwealth as if men could not live with a good and undefiled Conscience where were any bluntnes in the Sword or inequality in the Scales of Justice and why those considerations may not have some place and the reasons thereof be in some measure applicable to Ecclesiastical censures I confess I cannot apprehend but am yet to be instructed When the Church had no Civil Magistrate and very many sinnes there were which the Lawes took no cognisance of nor prescribed punishments for the Ecclesiastick Censures recompenced that defect Now when Municipall Lawes under Christian Magistrates are multiplied and extended to the correction of most offences the execution thereof might in some degree supply the neglect of Ecclesiastical censures and comply with the greatest part of the ends thereof as to humble and by shame to reclaime offenders to inhibit the contagious spreading of the example and to remove the scandall which Religion might contract by permitting offences to passe unpunished for as for pollution of others without society in sinne false testimony and sealing of blanks and the like I think the prevention thereof to be no proper end of censures 1 Cor. 5. nor finde any such thing intimated by the Apostle where he argueth and reasoneth for the putting away of that wicked person from among the Corinthians nor suppose them to be any more effectual meanes to that end than anciently in Eclipses the resounding of those aera auxiliaria mentioned in the Poets were to ease the ignorantly fained solis lunaeque labores Or the torches that were then held up were to reflect light on these great Luminaries I say the Laws of the Common-wealth might in some degree supply the neglect of Church censures which are to be exercised in palà m facinorosos maximè si circa hos magistratus officium non faciat saith Paraeus so farre In 1 Cor. 5. p. 14. 67. as to restrain and withhold men from separation or which is the moderne Periphrasis and new notion to blanch and palliate separation from gathering new Churches And this is that which to me seemes cardo negotii and that which I must insist on that though Excommunication be obstructed or laid asleep or culpably exercised and so there be a mixture of good evil in one Communion yet there must be no separation into the new gathered Churches The contrary opinion and practice was the very spirit and extract of the heresy of the Donatists Calvin tells us Instit. l. 4. c. 12. sect 12. that because the Bishops onely reproved some evils which they thought not profitable for the Church to punish with Excommunication therefore they made invectives against the Bishops and raised a schisme against the Churches of Christ Morton grand impost cap. 15. sect 25. Martyr loc com part 4. c. 5. p. 61. Parae in 1 Cor. 5. p. 467. Augustin contra Parmen l. 3. c. 1. 2. p. 12. 13. tom 7. And Dr. Morton shewes us that they separated from the other constituted Churches in Africa especially because of the mixture of Godly and wicked professors in one Communion and Peter Martyr and Paraeus both tell us out of Augustine that the Donatists objected to the Catholiques that they had no Church because they wanted Excommunication but St. Augustine answers them Dicant ergo si possunt meliorem se atque purgatiorem habere nunc ecclesiam quà m erat ipsa unitas beatissimi Cypriani temporibus who yet held communion of Sacraments with men notoriously culpable in una congregatione paria Sacramenta tractantes and though saith he siat hoc scil excommunicatio ubi periculum schismatis nullum est salvâ dilectionis synceritate custoditâ pacis unitate adhibitâ prudentiâ obedientiâ in eo quod praecipit Dominus ne frumenta laedantur yet as he instances in the case of Cyprian Quia non poterant ab iis corporaliter separari ne simul eradicent triticum sufficiebat iis talibus corde sejungi vitâ moribusque distingui propter compensationem custodiendae pacis unitatis propter salutem infirmorum veluti lactentium frumentorum ne membra corporis Christi per sacrilega schismata laniarent and to this truth his whole books are but one continued testimony and for this we have better even infallible and authenticke witness for when the incestuous Corinthian was not censured yet neither did any how much soever they might pretend to purity 1 Cor. 5. separate themselves into a gathered Church nor had any check from the Apostle for not doing so or command to doe it no not if in case as he had judged already that wicked person should not have been put away from among themselves And when the Angel of the Church of Thiatyra suffered that woman Jezabel to teach and to seduce Revel 2.20 and 24. to commit fornication to eat things sacrificed to Idols those which had not that Doctrine nor known the depth of Sathan were onely commanded to hold fast what they had and had no other burden put upon them because they had not separated Jezabel from the Church either of command to separate or of calamities and threatnings for not separating and for being defiled with such communion To conclude this discourse the thred whereof I have spun into some
an eclipse as the glimmering of that Popish gloworme may be a comfort in so great darkness and such an ignis fatuus followed as a guide when there is no better and upon this score perchance these cunning juglers like Boris of Muscovy clandestinely cause and help to set our houses on fire that they may get honor and power by rebuilding them Wisemen will finde these no idle feares nor groundless jealousies but as in that famous automaton the spheare of Cornelius Bezael there was an igneous spirit inclosed in the center thereof which caused the motion so time may discover that though some others are the maine spokes yet the fiery spirit of the Jesuits lying hidden in the center have wrought in this sphear these rotations and circumvolutions and it may too late appear that unadvisedly all this while we have plowed with Popish heyfers and after all our turning up and harrowing of the Church they may reape the harvest of all those sowings The paper recording the discipline of the ancient Church asserted That from the Communion as customarily and indeed antonomastically we speake though properly the Communion and the Eucharist were farre differing things it excluded onely the Catechumeni Energumeni persons excommunicate penitents c. and thereupon inferred That seeing they eject very many which fall not under any of those notions their practice is not conformable unto but disagrees from that of the ancient Church Hereunto instead of giving an answer they onely say that A smatterer in antiquity and whether they be of that lower forme or no the reader will by and by have trial may know the ancients rejected and suspended divers sorts of men under sundry considerations and were exceeding cautelous about admission to this ordinance no print whereof is to be seen in the common practice of our assemblies that is as true indeed of their assemblies as of any others where such orders and distinctions of men as are named may be fonud And then next they make us their catechumeni in describing to us what they were but whether themselves may not in some respect be penitents for such descriptions the reader shall judge and the care of the ancients to keep off ignorant and unfit shames the ordinary administrations in our Parishes where no such things are thought upon but All to the Sacrament is the plea and practice and then they take the boldness Nimium ne crede colori to say thus farre antiquity is for us rather than against us There is no good soule but is anhelant for the restitution and erecting of collapsed discipline and when other petitions may be frustrate yet as Philo comforted his countrymen that God would heare them when they could not be heard at Rome so we must take the better way to it by petitions preferred to Heaven Coelo restat iter coelo tentabimus ire But I must tell the Apologists that I doubt they are parcel-guilty of the obstructing of this work and they will finde somewhat thereof upon their proper score who have laid aside the right reynes and caught hold of the false and neglecting that discipline which is rooted in Scripture hath flourished in the purer times and brought forth sweet fruits where ever it was cultivated have bestowed and engaged themselves in the grafting and dressing of an exoticke plant which they have no warrant to set nor hope it should beare much or good fruit since it is too close and contracted not spreading its arms and braunches abroad and like the Clove tree ingrossing all moysture to it self makes all other to wither about it To graspe too much is the way to hold lesse and in this sense perchance the half may be more than the whole and to draw the wires too high is the way to crack the strings not to tune the instrument Est modus in rebus And as Cyneas told Pyrrhus he might have been more happy had he been content with Epirus and not attempted the conquest of Italy and Sicily so had the hedge of ancient Discipline been onely repayred and kept up and not raysed higher and set farther out beyond the old line and landmarks the seeds of peace and Godliness might have been more happily sowne and more prosperously flourished in the field of the Church which now lies lesse manured and more full of tares and noysome weeds Moribus antiquis res stat And a famous man saith Sir F. B. That women are sometimes more fortunate in their cures than learned Doctors because the one keep the old receipts punctually which the others magisterially take liberty to vary from and to alter the simples so the Physick of ancient Discipline in all probability might have cured our Distempers citò tutò jucundè whereas these new recipe's like the Paracelstan prescripts of Mercury sublimated and calcinate and such violent remedies in stead of proving Medicines grow to be maladies and to cure the disease kill the Patient Ut anteà vitiis ità nunc remediis laboramus I shall not press or insist upon that of Bullinger Potest in Ecclesia justa constitui disciplina Epist ad Beza ut interim coena Domini libera maneat omnibus illis qui se juxta Pauli doctrinam probarunt but with hands and feet asserting my self and joyning with and drawing others embracing and also propugning it I shall descend into that opinion that persons notoriously wicked and scandalous should be cast out And whereas in the close of the Section they say They wish they could see this done in the Assemblies about them which would beget better thoughts in them of some mens spirits than now they have but thereof they know the contrary I shall tell them that I wish they would consent that none but such as easily as I shall grant that all such ought to be ejected If some would have done it and want power to do it it is their affliction if any have the power and do not exercise it it is their fault but yet to hold Communion with those Assemblies where it is not done St. Augustine warrants them it shal be much to their praise and nothing to their prejudice and they have almost as much to plead for themselves as he had to justifie the Catholick Church against the Donatists And for my part I profess I had rather All to the Sacrament than any to Schisme and Separation And for their thoughts of others they are no mans Tribunal They that know their Witness is in Heaven with such it will be a small thing to be judged of them neither are they such Cato's as that it should be punishment enough to be condemned by them their teeth are not like the Tygers Claws wherewith whosoever is wounded can never be healed nor doth afterward prosper nor I hope are the Images or Conceptions which they form of others in their Thoughts and Intellects subject to the like fate which they say those Images are which are made by Witches where the
those Churches wherein is a free admission to the Sacrament of all those that are not duly cast out and they will not admit any of those Churches to have communion with them in the Eucharist untill they be new model'd and entred into their Churches But that Church-fellowship consists especially in communion of Sacraments and is principally defined by it Sect. 9. De unit Eccles c. 13. Schismaticos facit communionis dirupta unitas Aug. quaest ex Matth. tom 4 p 78. Camero oper Field of the Church l. 3. c. 5 p. 80 and that the commixtion of evill and good is intra eandem sacramentorum communionem connexionem and that to desert and to deny such a communion with those that are Churches of God is the dregs and sediment of schisme we have formerly shewed out of Augustine that to detrect to receive the Lords Supper with any is tacitly to renounce their fraternity was instanced out of Altingius and that to separate from this or that particular Church that is a particular member of the body of the Catholick Church is schisme we have instanced out of Junius as it is also to make a separation from that congregation Ubi Deus colligit Ecclesiam as may be added out of Camero Schisme saith a sound Writer is a breach of the unity of the Church which unity of the Church consists in three things First the subjection of the people unto their lawfull Pastors Secondly the connexion and communion which many particular Churches and the Pastors of them have among themselves Thirdly in holding the same rule of faith But they rent and infringe this unity in the first respect by gathering those into their Church that have other lawfull Pastors Qui schismata faciunt saith Cyprian Epist 76. p. 247. relicto Episcopo alium sibi foras Episcopum quaerunt And in the second by denying to have a communion with other Pastors and their Churches in this Sacrament of the Lords Supper and it cannot sow up this rent nor make up this fraction to say they communicate in other ordinances with them for not onely Church communion is chiefly communion of Sacraments but as was cited formerly out of Mr. Ball to use one ordinance and not another is to make a schisme in the Church Frustra sibi blandiuntur qui panem cum sacerdotibus Dei non habentes obrepunt latenter apud quosdam communicare se credunt as was alleaged out of Cyprian It is schisme saith Valentia and truly 22. Disp 3. q. 15. punct 1. p. 690. if he misapplied it not Nolle se gerere ut membrum hujus corporis in aliquo vel aliquibus spiritualibus actionibus ad hoc Ecclesiae corpus pertinentibus atque adeò nolle subesse visibili hujus corporis capiti neque aliis ejus membris communicant ut illi capiti subjecta sunt sed velle agere scorsim ab hoc corpore independenter ab ejus capite And since anciently a Bishop and an Altar were made Correlatives and a schismaticall Bishop was sayd constituere aut collocare aliud Altare Mead ubi supra saith a learned man therefore they that erect other Altars for them to partake of which have lawfull proper Pastors and they that participate at other Altars than those of their own Pastors tread too near upon Schisme Nay also they that separate from a true Church to partake of an Altar in a Church apart do not participate of the Table of the Lord for in una domo saith Rivet In Exod. c. 12 tom 1 p. 916. quae est Ecclesia Dei viventis commedi debet agnus carnes ejus quatenus cibus noster sunt extra illam domum non efferuntur And then as the Act of separation so the Reason thereof denominates schismaticall while they affirm the separation to be occasioned by the grossnesse of administrations elsewhere where no separation is made by exercise of Discipline which very thing viz. that any corruption of manners or want of Discipline which is among corrupt manners to expurge those that were corrupt was a sufficient ground of separation brought forth and gave rise to the schisme of the Donatists and was that which rendred them schismaticks that which S. Augustine impressed himselfe especially to fight against as is liquid through the whole torrent of his writings against them some drops whereof our former discourse hath been sprinkled with Cited by Mr. Baxters Saints everlasting rest part 4. p. 105. marg I shall here only say as learned Davenant professeth speaking of the Divines of Germany Haud dubitem affirmare illos qui falluntur tamen communionem fraternam cum aliis retincre parati sunt esse schismate coram Deo magìs excusatos quà m qui veras opiniones in hisce controversiis tuentur mutuam communionem eum aliis Ecclesiis etiam desiderantibus aspernantur so I think those Churches more excusable which have not the exercise of discipline in casting out offenders yet lack not a desire of a fraternall connexion and mutuall communion with other Churches than those that set up discipline and lay down communion and unity To say That they separate nor from true Churches First as it can no more palliate their guilt than it could cloak that of the Donatists who made the same defence and indeed this is the Catholicon the common place and plea of all Schismaticks that if they forsake one Church they go into another so secondly they do make a separation from true Churches seeing they separate as was said from all Churches that give a free admission to all that are not duly cast out and if those are no true Churches then they are not in the state of salvation for all that shall be saved are added to the Church and all that may grow capable of admission into their Churches out of the other it may seem requisite to baptize before they are admitted baptisme being a note of the true Church and therefore agreeing thereunto as proprium quarto modo They were such Churches wherein many of them received ordination to the Ministery who are not yet reordained and by the Ministery whereof faith was wrought in them wherein I hope they were built up before they laid the foundation of their new Churches and to believe is to be added to the Church which is Synonymous with the houshold of faith and wherein if they had suffered death for the profession of that faith they would have thought themselves intitled unto martyrdome and yet out of the Church are no martyrs neither can they pretend to reform the Church if they acknowledge not those from whom they separate to be true Churches for then they rather form a new Church and it is not an alteration which is Motus à qualitate in contrariam qualitatem but a generation motus à non esse ad esse and is not mutatio statûs sed essentiae But this is that root bearing gall
COENA quasi ΚΟΙÎΗ The New-INCLOSVRES broken down AND THE LORDS SUPPER Laid forth in common for all Church-members having a Dogmatical Faith and not being Scandalous In a Diatribe and Defence thereof AGAINST The Apology of some Ministers and Godly People as their owne Mouth praiseth them asserting the lawfulness of their administring the LORDS SUPPER in a select Company Lately set forth by their Prolocutor Mr. HUMPHREY SAUNDERS Written by WILLIAM MORICE of Werrington in DEVON Esq LONDON Printed by W. Godbid for Richard Thrale and are to be sold at the Cross-Keyes at Paul's gate entring into Cheap-side M. DC LVII Augustin in Psal 48. Concio 1. Tom. 8. Pag. 93. EXigitur a manducante quod manducat non prohibeatur à dispensatore sed moveatur timere exactorem Chrysostom in 1. ad Cor. 11. Hom. 27. Tom. 4. Pag. 110. Quoniam Dominica coena hoc est Domini debet esse communis quaeenim Domini sunt non sunt hujus servi aut alterius sed omnibus communia quod enim Dominicum est idem commune nam si Domini tui est quemadmodum est non debes tanquam propria tibi assumere sed tanquam res Domini communiter omnibus proponere siquidem hoc est Dominicum nunc autem non sinis esse Dominicum cum non sinis esse commune sed tibi comedis Bullinger adversus Anabaptist l. 6. c. 9. p. 229. 232. Probationem Ministri aut Ecclesiae judicio non relinquimus ut tum demum aliquis ad coenam Domini accedat cum Ministri vel Ecclesia satis dignum fidelem sanctum judicaverit Probet homo seipsum non debet ab alio probari Musculus in 1 Cor. 11.28 Pag. 438 439. Apparet necessarium utile esse eorum studium qui neminem ad coenam Domini admittant quem ipsi antea non probaverunt si modus discretio adhibeatur nec velut universali lege indiscriminatim omnes etiam qui inculpate se gerunt in Ecclesia ad hujusmodi examen constringantur verum juxta timendum est ne institutum hoc quà m nunc magni aestimatur tam olim in priscam servitutem Ecclesiam Christi reducat noxium reddatur Sane Apostolica institutio nihil hujus requirit sed hortatur unumquemque ut seipsum probet sed quid si Minister Ecclesiae hac Apostoli sententia nolit esse contentus nec admittat nisiquos ipse explorat item quid si fidelis ad panis tantum non poculi Dominici communicationem admittatur sicut in Papatu fieri videmus Respondeo ubi nec Domini ea institutio nec Apostolica Doctrina servatur ibi non est ut communicet fidelis sinat Magistratus illos regnare in Ecclesia donec visum fuerit Domino modum imponere illorum Dominio Chamier Panstrat Tom. 4. l. 7. c. 19. S. 17. Pag. 196. Non sunt digne praeparati Scelus hominis cur indignos Sacramento dicis quos indignos negas pace Ecclesiae Itane tibi videatur qui censeantur in corpore Christi ut indignos pronuncies qui vescantur Christo at Chrysostomus negabat dignos esse qui vel precibus interessent quodnam quaeso ingenium tuum est Chrysostomi certe Catholicum vide ne tuum non Christianum Casaubon exercit ad annal Baron exercit 16. S. 31. Pag. 366. Coena Domini privatae epulae non sunt natura sua sed publica fidelium omnium invitatio The Summe of the Dissertation DIATRIBE SECT I. OF Antiquity and Innovation the Character of their Discipline the state of the question p. 29. DEFENCE SECT I. What Authority the Diatribe ascribed to the Fathers and ancient Church Why the Apologists derogate from them p. 32. SECT II. Of Antiquity Custome sad consequences of Independency the novelty thereof the Fathers not without errors yet not to be sleighted What may be called the Primitive Church Protestants alwayes honoured their Fathers and never declined their Testimony p. 33. SECT III. How the Apologists have suited their Discipline to comply with several-Parties and Interests the odious Blots of their Pen. p. 42. SECT IV. Whether the Diatribe were guilty of Petitio Principii 44. SECT V. Whether their Discipline advance Godlinesse The Sacraments are Seales of the Conditionall Covenant which Doctrine hath no affinity with semi-Pelagianisme Whether the exhibiting the Sacrament make men Saints Whether the giving thereof without discrimination upon tryal blind men in their sins or be the setting of the Seal to Blanks Whether the Sacraments are privileges of the Godly 1 Cor. 10. argumentative for a free Communion 46. SECT VI. Independent Bookes and Arguments Of Rhetorique what Builders the Apologists are 62. SECT VII The Apologists causlesly irritated by an Allegory 67. SECT VIII In whom the School vesteth the Power of Church-Censures Whether the Apologists may de jure or do de facto censure alone How they have restored the Sacrament 68. SECT IX The state of the Question the model of their Church Whether their way smack of Donatus his schisme Ecclesiastical Communion consists principally in Communion of Sacraments Of Examination precedent to the partaking of the Eucharist Whether and how necessary What knowledge may be competent What profession of Faith the antient Church required before admission to Sacraments Of Excommunication Suspension Presbytery the Apologists no friends thereunto 71. DIATRIBE SECT II. The Lord Jesus examined not his Disciples antecedently to his Supper He admitted Judas to the participation as the Fathers consentiently assert and the Scripture evinceth Luke 22.21 Joh. 13.2.26 27 30. discussed 96. DEFENCE SECT X. How we know Christ examined not the Apostles The force of Arguments from the Authority negative of Scripture Of the washing of the Apostles feet VVhether any did partake the last Supper save the 12. Apostles The Apologists conceit of the 70. Disciples Of Confession of Faith how and when necessary Examination is a virtual and interpretative diffamation VVhether it be a small thing they require VVhether Examination if it be necessary ought to be made but once 111. SECT XI Judas did communicate at the Lords Supper What is thereby inferred The Attestation of the Fathers in that matter the consent of later Divines The weight of the testimonies on either side the Apologists confess there was no visible cause to exclude him VVhether Christ in admitting him acted onely as a man His not condemning the adulterous woman 122. DIATRIBE SECT III. The sufficiency of Scripture whereupon Negative Arguments are grounded the Argument deduced from 1 Cor. 11.28 it is difficult and unsafe to judge of other mens estate Of temerarious judgment Of judging men to be wicked or irregenerate With what difficulty and what a Pedegree of consequences their proofs are derived from Scripture Generall Rules for satisfaction of doubting Consciences perswade the contrary to their way Of Christs admitting onely Disciples Heb. 13.17 Mat. 18.16 Rev. 2.2 1 Pet. 3.15 1 Cor. 5.11 explained and vindicated 134. DEFENCE SECT 12. 1
Cor 11.28 Reinforced and vindicated Negative Arguments whether this be such Whether all revealed in Scripture be necessary Christs not examining his Disciples The sense of antient and modern Interpreters upon that of 1 Cor. 11.28 the testimony of Paraeus vindicated Examination but an after-reckoning to Auricular Confession and built upon the same Foundations the Consequences thereof alike to be feared 149. DIATRIBE SECT IV. No pre-examination in the antient Church save of Catechumeni Sending the Eucharist to persons absent and strangers The institution and abolishment of Confession Liberty to approach the Lords Table upon self-examination Whom the antient Church excluded from the Eucharist The Judgment of the Fathers Casuists and School-men concerning those that are to be admitted and to be debarred To partake was antiently commanded as a common Duty The omission reprehended the common right asserted 181. DEFENCE SECT XIII The honour and interest of the Ministery Confession of sins as necessary as Examination Whether their principles have any affinity with the Roman or may be subservient and manuductive to Popery The antient Discipline most like to advance Reformation What were the Catechumeni Energumeni Penitents The several degrees of the latter The Church-way of the Apologists hath no conformity with the antient Church How the Heathens proscribed profane persons from their Holies VVhether the Antients went too farre in Censures A testimony of Albaspinus falsified by them cleared Another of Chrysostomes vindicated 185. SECT XIV Sending the Eucharist to strangers and persons absent whether a corruption VVhether the Fathers were prodigal of Christs blood Of admitting to the Eucharist presently after Baptisme Of the Literae formatae and communicatoriae 182. post 185. SECT XV. Of daily communicating of receiving at Easter all the People anciently communicated No man to be repelled upon the private knowledge of the Minister or other Whether all did partake the Lords Supper that heard the Word What sinnes may exclude from the Sacrament Whether the ancient Church knew or practised any such Censure as Suspension The Negative proved the Arguments for the Affirmative profligated Penitents were first excommunicated What Communion anciently did signifie What Abstinency denoted What was the Lay-Communion What was meant by removing from the Altar What Suspension anciently signified and in what sense that notion was used What the School determines of giving the Eucharist to manifest and occult sinners Suarez imposterously alleaged by them What Suspicion may warrant an Exclusion Whether their way of Separation be conformable to the Ancient Of their care to keep men off from the Sacrament The Application of a passage in Chrysostome redeemed from their Exceptions Whether there be reason to examine dispositively to hearing the Word aswell as to receiving the Sacrament and danger to the Unworthy in the one aswell as in the other The casting of Pearl before Swine and giving holy things unto Dogs what it intends The difference between the Word and Sacraments All not anciently admitted to all the Word The Sacrament multifariously proved to be a converting Ordinance and this to be the common judgment of Protestants What effects may be hoped onely by seeing the Administration without partaking The Sophisme discussed He that partakes worthily is converted already he that eates unworthily eates damnation VVhether men are prohibited those Duties which they cannot well and duly discharge The moral works of natural men 186. DIATRIBE SECT V. By a free Communion there is no damnum emergens by pollution of the Ordinances Minister or Communicants the visible Church is aggregated of good and evil It is Schisme to renounce Communion of Sacraments with evil men not duly censured the administration not to be intermitted because all are not sufficiently prepared or those that are unworthy may partake The similitudes defeated of giving a cup of poysoned wine onely with admonition Of giving a Legacy to Schollars of such a capacity and parts which the Trustees cannot otherwise distribute Of being guilty of the sins we hinder not The weak to be encouraged and promoved by admission As much danger by mix'd Communion in the Word and Prayers as in the Sacrament The Reasons pretended to debar from the one as argumentative to exclude from the other Matth. 7 6. examined VVhether the receiving the Sacrament be a Duty injoyned to all and a good work in all VVhether it be a converting Ordinance VVhat the Sacraments seal and how VVhether they confer grace The same evil effects ensue by male administration of discipline as by a free communion and the same reasons which forbid separation in the one do also in the other case 235. DEFENCE SECT XVI The removing the scandalous by the power of the Keys no ingredient of our question nor any part of the Discipline which they practise What scandals may deprive of the Sacrament Whether formal Professors if they could be known were to be admitted How holy things may be polluted As the Sacrament so in like manner other holy things may be defiled By a free admission the Sacrament is not polluted by or to the Minister nor others that communicate worthily and it is no more dangerous for the unworthy to come than to keep off Whether mix'd Communion be a burden of sinne or pain In what cases it is lawful to have Communion of Sacraments with evil men The godly were alwayes commix'd with the wicked in Communion of Sacraments proved through the History of the Scripture Sacrifices were of like nature with Sacraments and for offering or eating thereof no signs or tryals of real Holiness were required Whether there be an equal necessity of profession of Faith at the receiving of the Eucharist and of Baptisme The Church of Corinth was corrupt yet in reforming thereof the Apostle prescribed no such tryal When and how far admonition and reproof may be sufficient Of Ambrose his proceeding against Theodosius What are the effects of the society of evil men with good The errors of Audius Novatus and Donatus Whether the Apologists symbolize with them Church-fellowship consists chiefly in Communion of Sacraments they make the Church of the Called to be no larger than that of the Elect. The state of the Church according to the Parables of the Floor Field and Net Matth. 13. Our Thesis asserted in the express words of the Antients The Pastor of Corinth not reproved for permitting mix'd Communions 1 Cor. 4.21 considered The Parable of the Marriage-Feast Of sealing men Their too free Pulpits no free Tables of Preaching without Ordination A recapitulation of much of the Discourse 255. DIATRIBE SECT VI. Whether this Discipline suit with Rom. 14.1 10. or check not with Charity relish not of the Pharisee Whether it sort with the qualifications of the High-Priest Heb. 5.2 Or the example of Hezekias Whether it smell not of Diotrephes Of examining persons set beyond suspicion Whether their way were cast in a like Mould with Popery Of their Elders their way is independent A complaint of our Schismes
whereas they tell us that all that are desirous and worthy with little pains might partake thereof As for many of those that are rejected their desire will be sufficiently witnessed and their worthiness is not to be tryed by unsealed weights and uneven ballances and for the pains which they must take which I imagine they intend of their travell to a remoter place Ad Paulin. Ep. 13. Tom. 1. although frustrà fit per plura and one place is as neer heaven as another as St. Hierom said Et de Hierosolymis de Britannia aequaliter patet aula coelestis so they that call them ten or twelve miles may with as much reason command them twenty or thirty farther Yet it is not so much the place as the way that is questioned and the reason and authority that enforceth it But of the place we shall suspend farther consideration having destined a special Section to that Topography and desire onely it may be here perpended whether the thrusting out of such a multitude from the Sacrament do not check with that caution which Augustine so often inculcates of not eradicating the Wheat while they rashly would separate the Tares SECT IX The state of the question the model of their Church Whether their way smack of Donatus his Schisme Ecclesiastical Communion consists principally in Communion of Sacraments Of Examination precedent to the partaking of the Eucharist Whether and how necessary What knowledge may be competent What profession of Faith the ancient Church required before admission to Sacraments Of Excommunication Suspension Presbytery the Apologists no friends thereunto IT is no unprofitable way saith an eminent Divine Dr. Jo. Whites Defence way p. 143. when one cannot defend his question to pick a quarrel to the state thereof Which trick saith he Dr. Stapleton in his time made good use of The Apologists it seems have learn'd this trick and here question the Paper for mistaking the question but it being their practice directly which was questioned the state of the question will be best determined by calling under our prospect their way and their practice At Holisworthy divers assembling at the Publick Lecture the Prolocutor of the Apologists who was married to that Church and now by a new kinde of Polygamy sought to contract a new and fairer Spouse of such as were most mallable to his impressions and facil to be lick'd into that shape whereunto he would form them drew some few for he retained his interest in his old Church when he gathered a new and being more provident than Aesops Dog kept the substance when he catch'd after the shadow and held the Bird in hand when he sought more in the Wood into a more private Conventicle where after the Lecture they had a kind of prophecying and one or other was by turn selected to be Moderator of their Exercises where Jacob not rolling away the stone from the Well for the sheep but the sheep for Jacob to drink while the Ministers sate by in silence silere eos turpe est Xenocratem loqui Others who though like those Animals whose eyes serve them well enough in the dark for their private obscurer condition yet have no perspicacy for a greater light so their parts either infused by nature or acquisite by study being too angust to reach that heighth or comprehend those Dimensions Yet Currus petit ille paternos They presuming as I think to understand above what was meet for them to understand Epist ad Paul in Tom. 3. p. 8. which the Apostle forbids and when quod Medicorum Promittunt Medici tractant fabrilia Fabri Sola Scripturarum ars est quam sibi omnes vindicant hanc universi praesumunt lacerant docent antequà m discant which St. Hierom derides and not contenting themselves with the judgment of discretion Hieron ubi supra but usurping that of direction and cancelling the natural Law of Relatives were all Pastors without Flocks and the Sheep all turn'd Shepherds they undertook Quae non viribus istis Munera conveniunt To expound and apply difficult Texts of Scripture and resolve doubtfull Cases and Questions in Theology and with the Child as it is in the Story of St. Augustine to lade out the Ocean with their Cockle-shell and as they arrogated to be Gods mouth in publick teaching of the rest so to be the mouth of the rest to God in publick praying for a blessing upon others Nay some of their Women impatient of that Gagge which the Apostle had set in their mouthes as if not fitted for this age wherein he did not fore see that Sex should become such able Speakers had their frequent interpositions even to the modelling of their Meetings and Exercises Discunt proh pudor à feminis quod viros doceant so as their Congregation had somewhat of Analogy with the State of Athens where Themistocles ruled the City and some other governed him And now when in conformity to the Independent Archetypon where when seven or more persons by frequent society are satisfied of the holiness of each other they agree to constitute a Church of themselves so when they had drawn forth stones enough hewn and formed them to their fashion that there might be no noyse of Hammers at Pyworthy thither the Prolocut or carryed them without ever appointing of a Communion at home where such as were fit might come to be admitted or examining who in his Parish else were fit or endevouring to fit them in any other way save by preaching That to come under their discipline was the onely door to let in to the Sacrament he there erects of these Stones his altare contra altare whereof all they which did at first partake and were received into Communion of the Sacrament had their tesseras hospitales Ad annal Baron Exer. 16. Sect. 43. p. 393. or mensales or somewhat analogically to what Cafaubon speaks of the Heathens in their sacred mysteries Habuerunt Symbola quae pro tessera erant thyasotis corundem sacrorum per quae se invicem agnoscerent bringing their Leaden Tokens with them as Badges to distinguish them or Passports to warrant their admission Others afterward led by their proper affections or drawn by their importunity entred into society and communion with them after they had rendred some satisfaction of their worthiness most of any one Parish out of the Parish of Pyworthy from whence their Elders were selected many out of divers some adjacent some distant Parishes very few out of the Prolocutors own Parish who yet upon some emergencies would have owned the Church and appropriated the gathering thereof to himself so as however he else-where speaks of finding a Church setled at Pyworthy to colour his ad journing thither from his proper charge yet it was of his settlement onely upon this occasion and though that Parish Church had then a Minister yet he that hath since ordinarily officiated there was long onely a candidate of the
sine causis sciendi nor sets up a mark for blinde men to shoot at but the Directory for admission is that which we may well reade and make easie judgment thereby viz. Church-membership with a dogmatical faith and therefore we may perceive that any other voyage will be with hurt and much damage when neither Sun nor Stars do appear from above nor can we frame to keep any compass below whereby to steer our course and being exceedingly tossed with such a tempest the onely way is to lighten the ship of this load DIATRIBE SECT V. By a free communion there is no Damnum emergens by pollution of the Ordinances Minister or Communicants the visible Church is aggregated of good and evil It is Schism to renounce communion of Sacraments with evil men not duly censured the Administration not to be intermitted because all are not sufficiently prepared or those that are unworthy may partake The Similitudes defeated of giving a Cup of poysoned Wine onely with admonition of giving a Legacy to scholars of such a capacity and parts which the Trustees cannot otherwise distribute of being guilty of the sins we hinder not the weak to be encouraged and promoved by admission As much danger by mixt communion in the Word and Prayer as in the Sacrament The Reasons pretended to debarre from the one as argumentative to exclude from the other Matth. 7.6 examined whether the receiving the Sacrament be a duty enjoyned to all and a good work in all Whether it be a converting Ordinance What the Sacraments seat and how Whether they conferre grace The same evil effects ensue by male-administration of Discipline as by a free communion and the same Reason which forbid separation in the one doth also in the other case CLemens Alexandrinus magnifies it in Socrates that he hearkened unto none but Reason and Plutarch tells us Idem est deum rationem sequi suitable to that Stoical Principle well illustrated by Perseus Ni tibi concessii ratio digitum exere peccas which is very true being understood of reason rectified by and subordinate to holy Scripture Having therefore pondered the authorities of Sacred Writ and propended the testimonies of the ancient Church let us try on which side the weight of reason will incline the Beam in this controversie There is no Damnum emergens in admitting to and there is Lucrum cessans in rejecting from the Sacrament any that profess the faith of Christ though but formally and are not openly wicked and scandalous to the manifest belying of their profession what then should rationally impede and obstruct their admission or promove and imperate the rejecting of them whom it obligeth in duty to come and in no mans duty is it written down to repell them or separate from them There is no emergent mischief or inconvenience by their receiving either in respect of the Sacrament quod others cum quibus the Minister à quo or themselves qui the Sacrament is not defiled by their partaking no more is it by being preach'd unto faithless people and that is no more than our Lord Christ was by the kiss of Judas or an Angel by descending upon earth into some unclean place Those that communicate with them are not polluted more than the sons of God were by Satans coming among them to present himself before the Lord nor thereby defrauded of the fruit and efficacy of the Sacrament more than the rest of the Guests were deprived of the Feast by the sitting down of one that had no wedding garment God doth not binde us to set up an Inquisition into other mens consciences Contra literas Petil. tom 7. p. 26. Nemo curiosus qui non malevolus nor can their hypocrisie or cold formal profession hurt any beside themselves Tale cuique sacrificium fieri saith Augustine qualis accedit ut offerat qualis accedit ut sumat ità si offerat deo malus accipiat inde bonus tale cuique esse qualis ipse fuerit quia illud scriptum est omnia munda mundis To God saith a learned man they seem such as they are Hooker Eccles Polit. l. 5. sect â—8 p. 370. but of us they must be taken for such as they seem in the eye of God they are against Christ that are not truly and sincerely with him in our eyes they must be received as with Christ that are not in outward shew against him Multi corriguntur ut Petrus multi tolerantur ut Judas multi nesciuntur donec c. Many are amended as Peter many are tolerated as Judas many are not known untill the Lord come who shall enlighten the hidden things of darkness and manifest the counsels of all hearts De poenitent medicina tom 9. p. 210. homil 50. tom 18. p 115. Ad mysteriorum divinorum signacula celebranda multi mali c. To the celebrating of the Seals of divine mysteries many wicked men also may have access for God in this life commendeth his patience that in the next he may shew forth his severity saith St. Augustine Christ would be baptized with the promiscuous multitude and with the same Baptism wherewith the Scribes and Pharises were baptized to confute saith acute Spanheym those Dub. Evang. part 3. p. 153. who in imitation of the Catharists and Anabaptists come not to the Lords Supper if it be administred to such as are in their opinion flagitious what prejudice or pollution or reproof from the Apostle reflected upon the Corinthians that were worthy receivers for the concurrence and communion of those that came unworthily who onely did eat and drink damnation to themselves not to others but when he said He eateth judgment to himself he sufficiently sheweth saith Augustine that he eateth not judgment to another but to himself because the fellowship with evil men defileth not in the participation of the Sacraments but in the communion of works The Master of the Feast said to him that had no wedding garment Friend how comest thou in hither Not Friends why come you in which such a guest Neither were they for his sake commanded or permitted to forsake the Wedding our teeth shall not be set on edg with the sowre grapes that others eat every one lives by his proper righteousness In Ezek. 18. not anothers and dies for his own sins not another mans saith Origen Quibus mali placeant in unitate ipse communicant malis quibus autem c. Those to whom evil men are pleasing in unity they communicate with evil men but those whom they displease who cannot amend them nor before the time of Harvest dare to root up the Tares lest the Corn be also eradicated they communicate not with their actions but with the altar of Christ so that not onely they are not polluted by them but by the Word of God they deserve to be commended and magnified because lest the Name of Christ be blasphemed through horrible Schisms Contra Donat.
and Heresies Perswasions to mildness and moderation 307. DEFENCE SECT XVII They misrepresent their Church-way Whether the Queries of the Diatribe were doubts of Friends or Enemies What are properly scruples 318. SECT XVIII Rom. 14.1 10. discussed Whether they judge or despise their Brethren Psal 15.4 vindicated No other Qualifications required in order to communicating in a Church-member having a dogmatical Faith but to be without scandal whether they reject onely the wicked whether their way render them not guilty of temerarious judgment of judging the heart of bearing infirmities of moral men 320 SECT XIX 1 Cor. 13.7 considered whether they suspect not much evil believe or hope little good of their people of examining the knowing to be exemplar to the ignorant or to nanifest their humility whether it be their duty to submit to such a passive examination whether to call them to it be not directly to detract from them or interpretatively to diffame them small matters are often great in the consequence 2 Cor. 11.2 examined the properties of charity in hoping and believing all the ignorance charged is not to know it to be duty to submtt to their commands whether conversion may be sudden whether the Church have loss or gain by these ways of pretended Reformation 332 SECT XX. Whether the Apologists are charitably suspected or can be justly charged with Pharisaism whether their actings proceed out of tenderness of conscience A paralel between the Apologists and Pharisees in some things 369 169 SECT XXI What was Diotrephes what his ambition whether the Apologists exceed not the bounds of Ministerial power by bringing all under triall excluding and not for scandal and that so many and by common continual practice whether this check not with 1 Peter 5.3 whether those they reject are scandalous themselves separated and left the Church behinde them Of Ecclesiastical power what it is and how far extensive The duty of Stewards It is Christ's honour to have an universal Church Their actings 1. Not commanded or warranted by Gods VVord 2. They act solely Of their Elders of ruling Elders in general not by divine right yet a prudent constitution requisite to be continued in some way the interest of the whole Church in censures the Elders Representatives of the Church whether the ancient Church knew any such 3. They act arbitrarily of the former Bishops the Flowers of the Apologists Canina facundia which they cast on the Opposites of their way the aspersions wiped off and some of them reflected of small things and whether their Injunctions are such what may be the consequences thereof viz. their own power and greatness in the intention which yet in effect may be thereby lessened whether their promiscuous examination be to prevent respect of persons of examining persons known to be knowing of the Shekel of the Sanctuary of their aviling of their people and thereby giving advantage to the Papists to upbraid us of the former Bishops the lack of light in some places through want of some to hold it forth whether the Diatribe aspersed Presbytery to be modelled like Popery the Apologists no friends to Presbytery their way hath some analogy with Popery and accidental tendency thereunto 378 178 SECT XXII Of Independents their godliness their Schism the confessed imperfection of the way of the Apologists their desire of an union with the Independents an admonition to the Presbyterians the confounding of Churches and Parishes by the Apologists their gathering of Churches whether they are guilty of disorder against Law whether Magick were laid to their charge whether they are culpable of Schism and Sedition or injury to other Ministers of the hatching others Eggs like the Partridge 414 214 SECT XXIII VVhy they have not the Sacrament in their own Churches why onely at Pyworthy whether it be no great matter to be called or drawn thither Of their return to their own Churches How they stigmatize the People and judge their hearts Of serving the times they confess the Word and Sacraments to be the same thing what thereupon followes 426. 226 SECT XXIV VVhether they are Butchers or Surgeons VVhether guilty of Schisme Of negative and positive Schisme VVhat are just causes of separation VVhether our Saviour separated from the Jewish Church for instance in eating the Passover They condemn what they practise by confounding Churches and by separation They grant Professors to be visible Saints which destroys their Platform Their Reasons why all sorts are to be admitted to the Word and Prayer VVhether there are not better Reasons to warrant a like admission to the Sacrament VVhether the same conclude it not VVhether the Churches of England are all true Churches Sacraments Notes of the Church and therefore communicable to all Church-Members they grant Discipline enters not the definition of a Church yet they separate for want thereof VVhether they may not aswell deny Baptisme to the Children as the Eucharist to the Parents 434. 234. SECT XXV Their great abuse and distortion of Scripture with what a train of Consequences their Arguments are far-fetch'd they are borrowed from the Donatists Papists Brownists Independents none of them conclude the question as themselves have stated it the Argument raised from 1 Cor. 14.40 examined Whether it be a glorious and comfortable practice that none approach the Lords Table save holy persons Whether their way be warranted by the Laws The moderating of Censures Whether their way have like ground with the antient Discipline in receiving in Penitents Whether there be order and decency in mix'd Communions The lesser good to be omitted to acquire the greater the confusion and disorder of their wayes 250. 450. SECT XXVI Jeremy 15.19 Discussed and vindicated 264. 464. SECT XXVII 2 Thes 3.2 6. Opened and redeemed from their misapplications Whether antiently the Commerce with any not excommunicate were avoided VVhat society Excommunication cuts off from How Suspension might be used and is abused 267. 467. SECT XXVIII 1 Cor. 5.11 Ventilated and the Chaff of their Interpretation dispersed Whether we may have communion in sacred things with such as we may not have society with in civil 274. 474. SECT XXIX Matth. 7.6 The sense thereof enucleated and shewed not to be subservient to their purpose but odiously abused VVhether Ministers may act in Censures alone and upon their own knowledge 281. 481. SECT XXX 1 Cor. 11.27 sequent Discussed of eating and drinking unworthily VVhether there be a necessity of examining all because some cannot examine themselves Whether any irregenerate man can examine himself VVhether this tends not to introduce Auricular Confession Jude 3. opened 288. 488. SECT XXXI 1 Tim. 5.22 Interpreted and answered Of Principals and Accessories 1 Tim. 3.10 considered Not like Reasons to examine those that are to communicate and those that are to be ordained 293. 493. SECT XXXII 1 Pet. 3.15 Heb. 13.17 Discussed VVhat obedience is due to Ministers and what power they have 497. 297. SECT XXXIII Levit. 13.5 2 Chron. 23.19
insert out of the English Plato that to reverence old times is to be a scorn to the new is meant of the arts and civil customes thereof which are lickt into better shape by time and daily improved and refined into more perfections Pervarios casus artem experientia trudit Exemplo monstrante viam but Theology and the Doctrine of Faith being inspired not acquisite was substantially perfect at the first tradition thereof and those which were neerest to those Secretaries of the Holy Ghost had the advantage and opportunity to receive a cleer explication and right understanding thereof and though too much reverence to those antient Times may peccantly verge from mediocrity wherein the matter of virtue consists yet he that shall scorn any for reverencing those old Times which we dispute of may put for to be Doctor of the chair of Scorners and hath been new dip'd in their principles who have learnt to say in effect with that Pope Hoc verum erit si ipse volo non aliter And whatever the Apologists may insinuate or glance at the Protestant Divines did never absolutely disclaim or renounce the tryal by the Fathers neither do they suffer any such Thrasonical vaunts as that of Campian Field of the Church l. 4. c. 5. p. 349. appendix Part. 1. Sect. 2. p. 750. to go unchecked and unshamed Patres admiserit captus est excluserit nullus est in altero fugam adornant in altero suffocantur Luther and the rest at the beginning seem to decline such tryal saith a learned Divine because the corruptions of their writings were so many as could not easily be discovered conformable to the advice of Vincentius Lyrinensis who saith If Heresies be inveterate and so have times and means to corrupt the Monuments of Antiquity we must flee to the Scriptures onely but now having found out by the help of so many learned men both of our adversaries and amongst our selves that have travelled in that kind which are their undoubted Works and which doubtful or undoubtedly forged we willingly admit the tryal by the Fathers and we now onely decry and condemn the Papists for their servile enthralling themselves to the judgment of the Fathers as to a Law as Canus speaks and ad ultimum iota as the gloss on the Canon Law delivers and for fettering themselves with an oath never to expound Scripture contrary to their consent and for advancing them to the disparagement and obsoleting of the Scriptures as among other examples did the Sorbonist Reynolds de Idololat Rom. Eccles l. 1. c. 8. p. 515. p. 301. Whitaker tom 1. p. 13. Marta de Jurisdict citat Dr. J. White 's Defence way true Church c. 20. p. 105. whom Stephanus asking where he read such a thing in the New Testament he answered Se illud apud Hieronymum aut in Decretis legisse quid vero Novum Testamentum esset ignorare but never deserted a tryal by the Fathers as by the Jury though not as by the Law which is the Scripture nor as by a Judge which is the Holy Ghost Ad hanc canitiem tanquam in Areopagum provocamus saith Whitaker to Campian and I could cite many others to the same purpose they are the Papists themselves that with notable hypocrisie depress and avile their authority when it interferes with their Interests speaking out plainly what the Apologists more covertly insinuate That the common opinion of the Doctors is not to be regarded when another contrary opinion favours the Keys or the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction or a pious case Those that wash'd off the water of their former Baptisme by new immersions were the first that sought to bring under water also the authority and reverence of the antient Church and it is very observable that from the same Fountain have sprung the foul and bitter waters of Schisme and Heresie that have defiled and envenomed the modern age as if it were therein legible that had due honour been given unto the Fathers our days of peace and truth had been prolonged in the Land What the Psalmist says of Children I think of the Fathers Happy are they that have their Quiver full of them they shall not be ashamed but they shall speak with the Enemies in the Gate The Philosophers that writ of the contempt of glory yet bewrayed their â—â—nbitious itch after it by affixing their names to the books So even those that seem to decry and sleight the witness of the Fathers yet think themselves more gay Birds when deck'd with their Plumes and that they make higher flights if they can impe their Wings with any of their Feathers The Apologists themselves in their 35. and 37. Section and else-where seek to borrow some colours from them to paint the face of their Discipline more seemingly fair And it is still true what Erasmus was wont to say When Hierom is for our purpose his authority weigheth much when against us it is worth nothing Yet as Agesilaus sent Tissaphernes his thanks that by fraction of the sworn League he had set the gods on his side so I thankfully accept this implicite and interpretative yeelding me the Fathers on my part while to my sense no other corollary can be deducted from all their discourse hereof but this Let them say what they list we neither value them nor will beleeve them SECT III. How the Apologists have suited their Discipline to comply with severall Parties and Interests the odious blots of their Pen. PRimus felicitatis gradus est non delinquere Secundus delicta cognoscere saith Cyprian They now condemn not all that differ from them and must acknowledge that some godly men eminent in parts and places close not with them and this I shall gladly take and put among their retractations for heretofore it hath been their course resulting as much out of subtilty as censoriousnesse to brand such as are adverse from them as enemies to godlinesse and so to sentence them I think is to condemn them yea they condemn them while they renounce Communion of Sacraments with them there being no way to communicate with them but to tread that path which they have lined and beaten out and if they grant them to be godly persons how can they without Schisme desert communion with them But indeed if their model of discipline be the onely path to Reformation and be that point alone wherein peace and holinesse meet and close together I think they could not but condemn all that walk not with them therein though in truth rather this renders it evident that it is no such right way because so many godly and eminent men are found in another Road. But as some censure them for going too far so do others for not going far enough in their seperation And it is like enough that this befals them which is the common fate of men that compound and medly themselves to comply with several Interests and bear up with divers parties who modelling themselves like
pertinac tom 2. p. 142. contra lit Petil. tom 9. p. 26. contra Crescon l. 3. c. 36. they suffer that for the good of truth which they hate for the good of equity saith Augustine And again Quaerendum est quis habeat charitatem invenies non esse nisi c. It is to be inquired who have charity and you shall finde none but those that love unity some likewise shall say In thy Name we have eaten and drunk and shall hear I know you not which eat his Body and drink his Bloud in the Sacrament and acknowledg not in the Gospel his members diffused through the whole world with whom therefore they shall not be reckoned in the day of judgment And in another place the Apostle saying Be not partaker of other mens sins Keep thy self chaste to shew saith he in what sort a man might communicate with other mens sins he adds Keep thy self chaste for he that keeps himself chaste communicates not with other mens fins although he communicate not their sins but the Sacraments of Christ which they receive to their judgment with them from whom he hath severed himself by keeping himself chaste There may be a common concourse to the material part of an act without concurrence in the formal neither can a Physical concurrence make partakers in a moral act there can be no such transite from one kinde of action to another both People and Minister concurre to the receiving not the unworthy receiving if thereof they are no causes to the act not to the ataxy or sinfulness thereof they cooperate not in the evil but permit it Contra epist Parmen tom 7. p. 11. as that which morally they cannot remedy Quod non placet non nocet qui seipsum custodit non communicat alienis peccatis saith St. Augustine for if in evil actions any man consents not to them the evil doer bears his own cause and his person saith he prejudiceth not another whom in consenting to an evil deed he had not his partner in the crime What is said of him that is born of God Non facit peccatum quia patitur potiùs is in some sort appliable to this purpose the People and the same may be said of the Pastor are physically active morally passive and neither give nor partake of the Sacrament to and with one unworthy but one that is undivided from the visible Church the notes whereof must agree to it as Proprium quarto modo omni soli semper whence if the Word and Sacraments are those notes as our Divines assert though Non quoad essentiam ejus internam certò necessariò declarandam tamem ad visibilem aliquem coetum designandum qui est Ecclesia particularis ex instituto Christi formata as learned Ames All then that are actually of the visible Church may challenge a right unto a free enjoyment of these Sacraments to the one by being born of Christian Parents to the other by being baptized and having a dogmatical faith which every intelligent person is presumed to have else there may be a part of the visible Church not authoritatively or judicially sequestred from the communion thereof which are not in a capacity of obtaining that which denotes the Church At no time can the Church pretend to or hope for perfection of degrees rarely to that of parts Jacob's Ladder had several degrees in it and all were not of one height or rising perplexed and complicated are those two Cities saith St. Augustine in this world and mix'd one with the other untill they are separated in the last judgment Exhortatio ad conc Eul. ep tom 2. p. 147. the Church being no homogeneous body constituted of singular parts The Floor hath in it Wheat and Chaff the Field Corn and Tares the Net good fish and bad and it is observable that at the Nuptial Banquet was one found without a Wedding-garment With those and other similitudes saith Augustine the Lord confirmeth the forbearance of his servants lest while good men may think themselves blamed for commixture with evil by humane and rash dissensions they destroy the little ones Contra Crescon l. 3. c. 35. or the little ones perish I keep the Church saith the same Father full both of wheat and Chaff I amend whom I can I tolerate whom I cannot I fly the Chaff lest I become the same thing but not the Floor lest I be nothing Let no man therefore saith he desert the Floor before his time Contra ep Parmen tom 1. p. 11. let him tolerate the Chaff in threshing suffer it in the Floor for he shall not have any thing to bear within the Barn he will come that hath his Fan and divide the good from the bad To forsake the assemblies because of the mixture and communion of hypocrites and evil men seems to be a kinde of negative Schism or Separation and a positive to gather and constitute a new Church and I would willingly know if it be not the renewing of the old Heresies and Schisms of Donatus Lucifer Contra Faust Manich. tom 6. p. 60. Novatus and Audim Whether it make not the Church of the called to be of no greater latitude than that of the Elect whereas many are called but few are chosen Cum paucis haereditatem Dei cum multis signacula ejus participanda saith Augustine and whether in time by degrees this singularity may not antiquate the Sacrament and make the use thereof wholly obsolete and bring men to be Seekers and like the Phenix In 1 ad Cor. c. 11. v. 26. p. 430. one alone in the kinde of their devotions and to that humour of the Swenckfeldian in Musculus that would never communicate because he could not in his judgment finde any Church sufficiently adorned to make a fit Spouse for Christ And as the better qualified people may not withdraw themselves from the Communion upon pretence of mixt Congregations and fear of prejudice by them so neither upon the like score may the Minister withhold the Sacrament from them or intermit the Administration thereof for can it be thought rational that the holy desire of a competent number should be unsatisfied because the greater part are not equally prepared and so well disposed to joyn with them Is not this to eradicate the Corn for the Tares sake whereas rather both should be suffered to grow together untill Harvest It was a Principle of wise Cato's It is better many receive Silver than a few Gold and can it be held just that none should have Silver because all cannot receive Gold or because the Leven cannot be throughly purged that therefore the Children must eat no Bread or because the Hedg of Discipline cannot be effecutally planted that the Field of the Church must ly altogether unmanured and must the Wheat receive no nourishment because the Tares stand in the same Field Shall a certain essential duty be neglected for an uncertain accidental evil
And surely there is no more obliging way or more apt or expedient to excite or quicken men to the acquiring of any ability than to account and commend them as having in some degree made acquist thereof for as Qui monet ut facias quod jam faeis ille monendo Laudet so convertibly Quilandat quasi secisti te sic monet ut quod jam laudat facias And Bernard sweetly tells us Si non est itasicut dicitur fit ita quia dicitur most men are like the herb Basil as the Genoans told Sforza's Ambassadour that themselves were which stroke it gently it yeelds sweet hardly an unsavoury smell or like the Colossus at Tarentum which you may move with your finger but not wag it if you you put all your strength to it gentle instruction is more effectual than rigid censure Moses was blamed for striking the rock which might have produced fire when he should have spoken to it to bring forth water Some Chymicks think the mild warmth of a Lamp is fitter to improve and transmute other metals into gold than the violent heat of fire the same arrow dipt in Median oyle shot from a strong Bow loseth its force if from a gentler is more efficacious Ne excedat medicina modum lest as he said in Tacitus Non medicina sed clades est moderation and clemency are vertues more proper to our times and indeed at all times more subservient to edification than rigor and austerity It is sometimes true that molesta sarâ—ina vir bonus quaedam virtutes odio sunt severitas obstinatio invictus adversus gratiam animus discretion tolle hanc virtus vitium erit perpends not onely what is good but what is fit It was said by Tully to be Cato's fault that he was too strist and severe as if belived in Plato's common-wealth not in the dregges of Romulus Nocuit faith the Historian antiquus rigor nimia severitas cui jam pares non sumus If they think there be a general unfitness in men for this ordinance which we concede not yet not to produce that of Tiberius Praestat omittere praevalida adulta vitia quam id assequi ut palam fiat quibus vitiis impares sumus let them only reminde the wise counsell of Bodin Though it be wholsom if one member be putrid to burn or cut it off for the safety of the whole body yet we mâ—st not therefore use cauteries or cutting off if all the members be putrified and infected with a Gangerne or rather let them take cognizance of the advice of the judicious and meek-spirited Augustine who tells us Siex separationc vel schisma metuendum Contra Parmen l. 3. c. 2. p. 13. tom 7. vel contagio peccandi c. If through separation a schisme be to be fearad or the contagion of sinning have invaded a multitude the severe mercy of divine discipline is necessary because the thoughts or counsels of separation are then vain and pernicious and sacrilegious because they are impious and proud and do more porturb infirm good men than correct stubborn evill And a little afterward Let a man with mercy rebuke what he can what he cannot let him patiently suffer and with love grieve and lament untill he from above dee amend and correct or deferre untill harvest to root up the tares or winnow the chaffe and yet as Christians of good hope secure of their own salvation among desperate ones whom they cannot rebuke let them continuc imunity let them put away the evill from themselves if they cannot put away evill men from the midst of them And in conformity to in the pursuance of the same principle writing to Aurelius Bishop of Carthage with complaint of the rifenesse and impunity of drunkennesse in Africa he adviseth that some remedy be applied by a Councell of Bishops to be convened but addeth Non ergo aspere quantum existimo non duriter c. Not sharply as I think not with rigor not in any imperious way let these things be taken away but more by teaching then commanding by admonishing than threatning monendo quam minando for so it ought to be done with the multitude of offenders but severity is to be exercised toward the sins of a few There is much dispute whether the Martyrs shall be raised up before the last and generall resurrection Epist 64. but we have lived to see the old heretickes to have a kind of resurrection in the reviving and now raising up of their abominable heresies so that what Prosper Aquitanious wrote in reflection upon Pelagius Pestifero vomuit coluber sermone Britannus might now be amplified and extended to the plurall number we having whole nests of those Adders spawning through the whole land the venome of their damnable heresies destructive to the very fundamentâ—lls of Faith and all this while we are quartelling about trimming up the house while the foundations are shaken It was St. Augustines advice that in the time of an heresie every one should write yet how few uncase and impresse their pens against the enemies of our common faith or are valiant for the truth and contend earnestly for the faith once given to the Saints Vix totidem quot The barum portae vel divitis ostia Nili But many and perhaps too many that Ante leves volucres censebis in acre are disputing of Church government with that acrimony as if Fortunae Graeciae in hocsitae and we had no other arae foci to contend for Sylla could say Ante frangendus hostis quam ulciscendus civis but we engage our forces against our brethren and let the enemies of Gods truth enlarge their conquests through our distractions and diversions every man is erecting a Kingdome for Christ that himself with his model may sit therein at his right hand and we hear of this mans Church and that mans Church as if by the revolution of a Platonick year we were come again to those old Emblems and Idioms of Schisme I am of Paul and I of Apollo but every one claims to be of Christ but it is an acute observation Christus noluit ficri judex ad divisionem and with what hearts others do resent it I know not but I look on it with sadness and astonishment that this and that form of discipline is cryed up in a manner antonomastically for the Kingdome of Christ as if he had new made his Scepter of late which we have been formerly catechised to be his word discipline may be subservient and adjumental to the Kingdome of Christ but how it should be a part thereof properly either integral subjective or potential I confess I am yet to learn And yet howsoever notwithstanding he that shall declare against or be not satis fied with or complies not with their waies is forthwith blasted with the airs of being an enemy to Godliness as if as the Gracchi said apud se esse rempublicam and
to excuse the intention if they could not the work rather than to accuse the intention when the work they cannot and rather to hope the best untill worse be evidenced Perchance those which the paper intimated were not such and without perchance ought to be believed certainly to have been such But they are sure some were once in a neernesse to act in that way who were unmeet for the work It is possible that some might indeed not be fit for every logge though it be sound timber is not fit to make a Mercury But they have more certain knowledge of their own hearts and might be sure of their proper unmeetness and perchance as well as they may they speak this first of themselves by the light of a reflex beam they had no heart to that work quod cor non facit non fit they had no love to it did not set about it con amore as the Italians say it was not for their turn some other way was aimed at like fierce Racers in the impetuousness of their course they did over-run and go beyond their Goal and like the Tyger which Pimenta speaks of that pursued his prey with such violence that he over-leapt it and fell into the mouth of a Crocodile it being no new thing to fall from one extream to another as an eager opposition to the heresie of Manes occasioned the rise of that of Pelagius Errant homines non servantes modum De fide operib c. 3. cum in unam partem procliviter ire caeperint non respiciunt divinae authoritatis aliae testimonia quibus possint ab illa intentione revocari in ea quae ex utrÃsque temperata est veritate modera ione consistere as Augustine Or secondly they say it of those that were of their choyce and recommendation whose Icarian wings being not naturall but set on soon would melt with their shamefull fall when they soar high or come into much light or like Barschocab the pretended Messias who saith Hierom had gotten a trick to kindle straw in his mouth and breath it forth as if he had spit fire so they for small matters talk with a fervent zeal but are as incompetent to carry on the work of reformation and settlement as he was to accomplish the deliverance of the Jewes Or thirdly perchance that sum which they cast up to be unfit were indeed not fit for their spurious and suppositious Presbytery and unfit for their ends and interest who would approve of or like none that were not like those in Tacitus Qui veri copiam non faciunt sed suspensa quo ducuntur inclinantia respondent and none to act as Church Governors which would not in acting be governed by them as the prime agents and were unwilling to set up any Oracles that would not Philippize and sought to have no planets in the Spheares that will not move concentrick with them as the Sun and receive all their light from them and if not like Mercury that shewes himselfe but once in thirty yeares yet like the other planets when they are in a Diametrall line with the Sun to seem retrograde and give place and way to him for those whom they assume to assist in the work they called with the same intent with which Xerxes convened the Lords of Asia when he designed the invasion of Greece to give more luster and countenance alone as he said to the expedition and onely to obey and not to advise him SECT XXII Of Independents their godlinesse their schisme The confessed imperfection of the way of the Apologists the desire of an union with the Independents An admonition to the Presbyterians The confounding of Churches and Parishes by the Apologists Their gathering of Churches Whether they are guilty of disorder against Lawes Whether Magick were laid to their charge Whether they are culpable of schisme or sedition or injury to other Ministers Of their hatching others Eggs like like Partridge AS Arminius thought it a good Quaere why Semipelagianisme might not be accounted true Christianisme because if that were false and counterfet coin Arminianisme could not be currant both being of like metall though of different stamp so the Apologists having generally been willing to passe under the vizard of Presbytery yet being researched like to be detected for Independents when they can no longer keep on the mask they seem to own the face at least suppose it need not be disowned and tell us That Independents are no such formidable creatures to them First and to them indeed they need not seem fearfull Cognatis maculis parcit fera And Junius tells us out of Pliny Animantia in suo genere probe degunt congregari videmus starc contra dissimilia Eiren. part 1. Leonum feritas inter se non dimicat serpentum morsus non petit serpentes nec maris quidem belluae pisces nisi in diversa genera non saeviunt Secondly they are not so formidable indeed to any as the Spaniards were to the Indians that they could not think it an happinesse to go to heaven in their company nor to consort with them in any good way that leads thither Thirdly neither are they so terrible at any Scholastick encounter as that if Crispinus minimo me provocat none should dare with them tentare peri ula belli Or that their names like Warwicks at the battell of Banbury should strike terror enough to win a victory but I doubt when the light of truth shall hereafter ascend neerer to her meridian and dispell these mists which now hinder men to see clearly they will seem Nomina quae ipso sunt pene tremenda sono Many godly men say they lye under that distinction of judgement and I wish it were onely a distinction without a difference But first I doubt the Independents will account this opprobrii loco because it is frigida tenuis laudatio for all of that denomination must needs be very godly who usurp that definition for their way which the Chymists arrogate to their Art puri ab impuro separatio As all that fire which is spheared on high and separate from commixture is a pure element so their Churches are questionlesse pure and clear like Egypts sky and have not a black cloud in them and Adam in them seems not to have sinned But secondly if we take Independencie in the lump not in some parcels that may be extracted and take the denomination from the major part the notion of Godly and Independent are not onely at distance but Diametral opposition for as in tempering medicines there is somwhat which they call the Basis whereunto they add other ingredients that have their several qualities and operations so Independency is the Basis of most modern heresies and the fertill Africa of these Monsters And as ubi definit Philosophus incipit medicus so where Independency ends there other heresies begin who are generally Independents aliquid amplius and as after
the battell of Salamis in honor of the victory every man gave the second place to Themistocles though he named himself first so if one be an Antinomian another a Socinian another an Antiscripturist yet every one is an Independent that as Pacianus said Christianus mihi nomen Catholicus cognomen illud me nuncupat istud ostendit so Independent is the praenomen what ever be the agnomen of hereticks Thirdly but I cannot truly deny nor shall unwillingly grant that there are some godly men of that notion yet though I shall not say as Vopiscus relates it was said of good Princes In uno annulo posse praescribi depingi at contrà quae series malorum nor altogether with Eubulus the Comicall Poet that checkt himselfe for declaiming against womâ—n for if this were naught yet that was not good but soon found himself at a stand not being able to find more of the good but multitudes of the evill yet I believe those godly men are Rari nantes in gurgite vasto Like the Israelites as two little flocks of Kids but the contrary kind like the Syririans fill the Countrey And then 4ly it was no great honor to Sodom that one Lot was their Citizen there are some white men among the Negroes yet is that the land of Blackmoores Even Mercury a desperate poyson hath some parts which being separated from the whole are Antidote Fiftly Those purely meer Independents which have no mixture of other heresies or prophaness and are godly men yet their light doth not shine so bright that as in the Sun those lesser starrs that move about him do seem as spots so their holiness should be defiled by a communion with others less holy neither are they like the Sun which by his matchless light perstringeth and eclipseth all other starrs and attracts all eyes upon his pearless beauty Their godliness may onely be an apology for their station and immunity as Photius tells us that those which made Synesius a Bishop before he believed the resurrection made this defence for so doing that they found many excellent graces in him and that they could not but think them useful to the Church of God and hope that God would not let them all perish Lastly as some of them are purged from filthiness of the flesh so I wish they were also as much from that of the spirit and were holy as well in spirit as in body yet as heresie so schisme is ranked also among the works of the flesh Gal. 5.20 where if it stand not under the notion of heresie as indeed Tremelius out of the Syrivck reads Schismes where we do Heresies and betwixt these two there is such an affinity and complicition as betwixt the Midiauites and Ishmaelites that one is taken for another or each intermixt with other and Schisme saith St. Augustine is sometime called Heresie not that it is Heresie but because it disposeth to it yet it falls under this comprehension of variance emulations wrath strife c. and as Schisme springs from pride and an overweening conceit of themselves as the efficient whereof the signum pathognomonicum is a fastidious contempt of others so the impulsive thereof Gerson tells us what it is propter quaestum propter vanam gloriam sutably to that whereby Augustine defines an Heretick qui alicujus commodi temporalis maximè gloriae principaâ—ùsque gratiâ falsas novas opiniones vel gignit vel sequitur and I wish Independents could acquit themselves of these Imputations and should be glad if they would set off themselves clear from those exceptions who in one respect like the clove tree drink up all the moisture of the Land and aswell pretend to ingrosse the very dewes and showers of heaven to themselves as they really intercept the fat streames of earth and in another respect are like the tree in Ferro one of the Canaries from whence must drop all the water and from thence onely to be conveyed to the whole Island And therefore what ever may be said of the godliness of Independents yet since they cannot well traverse or plead not guilty to an indictment of Schisme I think as the Greek proverb saith That a good Goat a good Cat c. are bad beasts so the best Independent is in this respect evill Contra Donat. post Coll. tom 7. p. 122. if in no other for as St. Augustine Quantumlibet laudabiliter se vivere existimet yet being separate from the Church hoc solo scelere quod a Christi unitate disjunctus est non habebit vitam Schisme in his judgement being a sin of deeper grain than idolatry for Qui fecerunt idolum usitata gladii morte perempti sunt Epist 162. ions 2. p. 142. qui vero schisma facore voluerunt hiatu terr principes devorati turba consentiens igne consumpta diversitate paenarum diversitas agnoscitur meritorum But dissentiunt inter se contra unitatem omnes consentiunt as Augustine of his Donatists they see some imperfection in the Independant way and they see very little that discerne not much imperfection therein and they know not their own to be altogether free and how can the stream be clear when the spring is corrupt the one and the other are paralel wayes trodden out by the same line and leading down the same precipice and diffet but as iter actus via in the Law the one is a little larger and more extensive than the other there may be some little dist inction but no materiall difference between them save in this onely that the one Baptize the Infants of those that are not of their Churches which the others deny to do They here acknowledge they agree in the greater and differ but in the lesse things which I think may be restrained and limitted to discipline especially and they confesse both parties to have the self same interest or rather it should be the same self interest and therefore when they accuse the Independent way of Imperfection In tabulam Syllaejam dicunt discipuli tres and as we see it truth which Tully saith ut oculus sic animus Je non videns alia cernit so it is as true that they are dimme and decaying eyes which can better discerne things at some distance than nearer hand and apprehend other mens imperfections more clearly than their own And if they know not their own way to be altogether free from imperfections why can they not patiently abide to hear that which may make them know it to be imperfect how do they so confidently assert that way in malis suis defensionis fomitem quaerunt as Gregory speaks Non semper corrupta est mens male operantis sed emper corrupta male desendentis wherefore so violently enforce it unless as the Pope said he would write Fiatur in despight of Grammer so they will have a Fiat for their imperfect modell in defiance of truth and usupre a like power to that which Stapleton
a greater number of persons at Pyworthy fit and willing to receave the Sacrament than might have been found at Holsworthie and it will seem strange to us that where there hath been a succession of topicall Starrs of greater magnitude that there should be still less light and less effects of a quickning and fructifying influence neither can it but eclipse the dignity of those Starrs seeing causes are best judged by their effects But perchance they were only not so fit or willing to come to the Sacrament in their way and to leave their liberty behind them surrendring up that right which they had to the Sacrament by the character of Baptisme and being Church members with a Dogmatical faith to take a new grant thereof by the copy of their countenance and a tenancy at their wills and when the Statute Quia emptores terrarum forbids the creating of new civill tenures to suffer them to erect new holdings in Spirituals Their pulpit discourses were directed onely to dispose them for this way of subjection and for their ends not for the right end the Sacrament But secondly If they at Pyworthie were more malleable free stones and easier to be wrought yet seeing the stones whereof this Church was to be built and constituted were drawn forth out of several places and were brought first to be formed and fashioned at Holsworthie and some of them hewed out of that rock why should they be carried thence to be laid in Pyworthie Quod petis hic est Ut U lubris animus si te non deficit aequus As St. Hierom said Heaven was as neer Britain as Jerusalem so they had been as neer to Christ in the Sacrament in the one place as in the other He was the master Architect of the frame at Pyworthie who first prepared for the edifice at Holsworthie Ubi Imperiator ibi Roma Vejas habitante Camillo Illic Roma fuit that was the more signal place why should Pyworthie be the Patriarchal or Metropolitan Church and as I may say the Rome from which Church all must be denominated of what place soever they were and Catholique must be joyned to Roman or else it is not right so they must be named of the Church of Pyworthie of whatsoever Congregation else they be and why should this be so especially seeing the Pontisex maximus that hath the greatest influence upon the members of the Church was the proper Pastor of another place unless also that be here applicable in the resemblance which Bellarmine tell us that the Apostolical seate may be separated from the Bishoprick of Rome and what Cameracensis saith that the Papacy and Bishoprick of Rome are two distinct things and not so necessary conjoyned but that they may be separated There might be some reasons of thrift in the conduct thereof which is a principle that hath more influence upon those of the Independent principles than on the more hospitable Presbyterians or of Policy that their own peculiar Churches might be kept for a reserve and to be modelled according to the mode of the time and exigence of emergencies for whereas they talk of their being a Church formed at Pyworthie in the choice of a Pastor c. as they were the efficients by whom and the matter of which it was formed so though at their first sitting down there was a Pastor duly I think ordained yet when he removed his quarters the phrase is not improper he that next assumed that charge was not for divers years after in Orders and all that while sure they had no Church formed there according to the rules of Gods Word in the choice of an appropriate Pastor c. and therefore then not to have reverted to their proper Congregations and rechurched them is without excuse Thirdly Since there are some of every of their own peculiar Congregations aggregated into their catholick Church at Pyworthie had it not been not onely more orderly and decent but more just and necessary to have modelled them into special and proper Churches at home where their proper work lay and which was the spheare wherein they ought to move and the Sparta which they should adorne and though by a figurative polygamy â—hey have taken another wife and the later is beloved and the former hated yet since the first borne sonne was hers that was hated he should not have been disinherited but have had his double portion and If these Churches would perchance at first have been diminutive yet should they have been augmentatives of their honor and peace which as they complaine doe suffer for neglect hereof I fuge sed poteris tutior esse domi and those little Churches have been likelier to grow by apposition of parts contiguous the corporeal contact facilitating the agents in assimilating and the sticks lying in the same pile easily kindling one the other which they cannot do being separated As opportunity sometime tempts to evill so also often doth it prompt to good and though Bellarmine have falsely thought That the only efficacy of discriminating grace consists in the annexed congruity or as Fonseca the due application thereof yet it is a truth that the external means of grace are more effectual by the congruous and fit application thereof and the circumstances of convenient place and facility of resort have some conducency to that congruity and fitness for wise men have been taught by experience to conclude that what is little in the cause may be great in the effect and consequent and the day of small things is not to be despised They deny that they had a competent number for the work but they leave us to divine what they judge to be a competency Suarez 3 q. 8. art 6. disp 67. sect 5. Item Vasquez Junius Eccles l. 1 c. 4. tom 1. p. 1936. Maimonides saith Where ten men of Israel were there ought to be built a Synanagogue for they determine it not The Schoole tells that ten suffice to make up a Parochial Church and this is also the judgement of the Canonists the Independents contract it to seven and think so few may constitute a Church Ecclesia saith Junius Grammaticis quoque testibus vox est sylleptica quae non unum aliquem spectat sed plùres complectitur divinitus in unum Caetum in privatis quoque domibus Ecclesia ita vocat Apostolus Rom. 16.5 1 Cor 16.19 sed ea constat ex familia justa in qua non minùs tribus animis esse oportere omnes noverunt Oeconomi ac omnes Philosophi Jurisconsulti docuerunt Correspondently Tertullian Vbi tres sunt ibi est Ecclesia neither of them unsuitably to what the Lord Christ hath promised Where two or three are gathered together in his name that he will be in the midst of them There was a Church in Paradise where there were but two persons and they had Sacraments there for such was the Tree of Life and I suppose that to help forward the
the cup the blood may be some way administred but they must not drink it SECT XXIV Whether they are Butchers or Surgeons Whether guilty of Schism Of negative and positive Schisme What are just causes of separation Whether our Saviour separated from the Jewish Church for instance in eating the Passover They condemne what they practise by confounding Churches and by separation They grant Professors to be visible Saints which destroyes their Platforme Their reasons why all sorts are to be admitted to the word and prayer Whether there are not better reasons to warrant a like admission to the Sacrament whether the same conclude it not Whether the Churches of England are all true Churches Sacraments notes of the Church and therefore communicable to all Church members They grant discipline enters not the definition of a Church yet they separate for want thereof Whether they may not aswell deny Baptisme to the Children as the Eucharist to the Parents VVHy they separate not in all Ordinances is an head that looks not directly toward us but respects their brethren of the separation who have outrun and gone beyond them and stand at a distance as much further from them as they from us For as when Apolles had drawn a fine small line Protogenes cut that in 〈…〉 another and the former halfed that again so when one sort have cut 〈…〉 from communion with the rest of the Church they divide themselves again and some of them think themselves not refined enough and as the Chymists say of sublimation sapius repetenda est operatio neque enim prima sublimotione res mox satis depuratur so one separation grows out of another like the tunal which Nieremberge speaks of mira frondium facunditas solium supernasâ—itur solio si decidâ—t aliquod radices rursus agit surgitque altera arbos And so though as sand conteined in a vessel hath one general figure in the whole Masse conformable to the continent yet every grain is inechaerent with other so though they all come under one common notion of Separatists yet they are as much separate from 〈◊〉 other as from us and as little agree among themselves as with us though when they come against us like Themistocles and Aristides going on Embassie they lay down their enmities to be afterward reassumed And as Aristides said It will never be well with Athens till both the one and the other be shut up in the dungeon so they intimate in the close of this Section that in such a condition they were most likely to close in a mutual agreement but their present quarrels with the other occasion here the diverting of their armes which offers us a little truce who might now stand a loofe and behold the fight among themselves whom that happily may befall which Tacitus relates of Apronjus souldiers dum singuli pugnant universi vincuntur and when they fall out good men may come by the truth Discordia in malis tam bona quà m concordia in bonis onely we shall gather up some of those arrowes which they let fly at others to shoot back upon themselves and if any of those shot at randome seem to fall neer us we shall endeavour to repell or avoid such as we have not already broken They separate not in other Ordinances because they are for Surgery not Butchery It seems then they now somewhat odiously set their brethren in the rank of cut-throats who will shrewdly resent to be degraded into the company of Butchers Secondly How little conformity or resemblance their practise hath with the rules of Chirurgery hath been frequently instanced Thirdly Chirurgeons neither use nor are able to cut off any one member from an union with the rest in the influence and benefit of one vitall faculty onely but exscind altogether from the whole body whereas they make exscision of men onely from a Communion in one Ordinance alone not all Fourthly Let this reason have the most favourable passe yet it onely can argue absolutely why they should separate not in all Ordinances but in some alone not comparatively why in this Sacrament rather than in other Fiftly It is a strange method of Physick or Chirurgery to seek to preserve life by witholding the means of life and the medicine of life and immortality as the Fathers call the Sacrament and if all meanes must be sought to cure before they cut down a Church we think they have deserted their own Aphorismes for they have not sought to cure it by this medicine yet they have cut down their Church not onely by gathering another but by a practical judging of them to have no present interest in the body and blood of Christ nor worthy to have the truth of Gods promises in him to be sealed unto them The learned and they quote Camero distinguish of a twofold separation positive and negative the first they condemne unlesse upon just and weighty grounds the second they are acting in making a separation in their Congregations not separating from their Churches but some corruptions in them in order to reformation De Eccles p. 325. Camero in that place disputes of Schisme whereof secession or separation may be the genus and Schisme he distinguisheth into negative and positive the first Schisma quod non exit in coetum societatem aliquam religiosam quae simpliciter secessio subductio cùm non instituitur ecclesia facto Schismate Schisma positivum tum fit cum instituitur ecclesia hoc est cum fit consociatio quaedam quae legibus ecclesiasticis Dei verbo atque sacramentorum administratione utitur separatim quod quadam formula desumpta ex Scriptura dicitur strâ—ere altare contra altare But as the men of Bengala are so afraid of a Tiger that they dare not name him through fear if they should do so they should be torn in pieces by him so it seems the Apologists are so conscious of Schisme or fearfull to be blasted with it that they decline the mention of this and passing over the description he makes of Schisme they only barely and without any distinct explication tell us of a negative and positive separation Abstine epistolis quae sunt instar Edicti saith Symmachus facessat omne studium ex quo nascitur cura compendii Me thinks they should have been able to have understood Camero had they looked into him themselves but whencesoever it results there is an ignorant and wilfull mistake in alleaging him for they seem to quote him as if he determined that a negative separation were absolutely and universally lawfull whereas he affirming that a positive Schisme is that which Antonomasticè and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is called Schisme he renders this reason because often he saith not alwayes a negative secession is lawfull that justly and piously it may be free to depart from some Churches but it will not be so if it grow into a positive As for example some may be cast out by the fault of
the Church-Governors and yet without the Churches fault If they then gather a Church apart they shal be guilty of Schism He speaks here of a secession where a man is passive and cast out not where he goes off when there is Anathematismus excommunicatio injusta iniqua certè qui excoetu aliquo ejecti secedunt se subducunt secesserunt quidem illi attamen non fecerunt schisma as he speaks in the former page but a negative secession wherein a man is active he saith is Schisme being not onely a Decession but a Discission if the cause be either temerarious or unjust and it is temerarious if it be upon a light occasion and the occasion is light unlesse there happen first an intolerable persecution for if it be tolerable the secession is unjust Or secondly Communion is not to be broken but for Fundamentals Mead. p. 622. tom 3. that congregation be infected with heresie for if it be a tolerable error if the rite though superstitious be sufferable there ought to be no separation Or thirdly be addicted to idolatry Now then seeing they confess they make a negative separation as Camero defines it if they can prove and convict their Congregations to be guilty of such persecution heresie or idolatry they may acquit themselves but if they cannot as they doe not attempt or pretend to accuse them thereof they are then culpable of schisme in the judgement of Camero to whom they referre and their separation is not onely temerarious but also unjust separatio injusta veluti extrema schismatis linea Camero ibid. à pag. 322. ad 327. saith he having not so much as a light occasion by any tolerable persecution or error or separation and the scandals being few or none which were they more or greater might perchance make the separation more just but could not excuse it from being temerarious Besides also their separation is rather positive then negative having gathered and constituted a new Church whereof there can be no just cause saith Camero but malum insanabile lethale contagiosum reigning in that Congregation which they desert or res gravis momentosa quae si negligatur tanta est ut de salute gloria Dei actum sit néque enim quicquid verum est id ipsum continuò necessarium est ut qui salubres cibi sunt non sunt continuò necessarii And it is also a separatiâ—n from their Churches though in them not of notorious evill members from the body of the Church but of a Church in and yet from a remaining Church which separation in a Church from those who remain Church-members and of the Church is a principle onely of independent Divinity and hath no dependance upon Scripture Reason or Camero's or any good authority And theirs is likewise a separation not onely by secession in place but from persons who were never duly cast out by any judiciall processe for notorious crimes and therefore is not heterogeniarum partium discessio sed homogeniarum and therefore a Schisme as Camero sentenceth and they are besides very few that separate so as though the cause had some weight L. 3. contra Crescon c. 36. Idem contra Parmen l. 3. c. 21. tom 7. p 11. yet si pauci sunt videtur nihil esse moliendum sed expectandum patienter tempus Domini saith he And whereas they say they separate not from their Churches but from some corruptions First they might separate from their corruptions by keeping themselves pure Non enim qui se castam servat communicat peccatis alienis saith Augustine and elsewhere Mixtus reis obnoxiis nisi per conscientiae maculatam consensionem nullus recte dici potest They may and must separate from the corruptions but they do which they ought not farther separate from the Assemblies with whom they will have no communion in the Sacraments which are Gods Ordinances and not corruptions And corruption of manners also is no just cause of separation for saith Camero wheresoever purity of doctrine flourisheth God in that assembly must needs have a Church though overwhelmed with multitude of scandals and therfore they that separate from such a Congregation doubtlesse depart from thence where God gathereth a Church and therefore saith Augustine Vbi mihi licet in melius commutari Contra Crescon l. 3. c. 36. Eiren. part 1. p. 706. tom 1. non mihi opus est indeseparari And Junius resolveth Non posso quenquam Christianum bona fide renunciare communioni alterius quem Christus aut adjunxit sibi aut se adjuncturum spem facit nam qui fratrem suum servum Dei membrum Christi protervè abdicat is eo ipso facto Christum authorem communionis salutaris nestrae abdicat And with these or like arguments have their Pulpits sounded a retreat to those of their Town which have separated from them to associate with such as have gone farther in their separation as if their sight were in this respect also extra mittendo that they can see the faults of others not their own nor discern how the same weapons wherewith they fight against others may be turned back upon themselves And if they shall say that the very communion in Sacraments with such congregations is a corruption besides that this is petitio principii a begging of the question it is Donatisme without question And whereas Augustine after the precedent words Non enim qui se castum ser vat communicat peccatis alienis adds quamvis non eorum peccata sed illa quibus ad judicium sibi sumunt Dei sacrament acommunicet cum iis à quibus se castum servando fecit alienum might not Cresconius with as much truth and reason as they doe have replied That the very communicating with such was the contracting of their corruption and sin Our Saviour say they lived in unity with the Jewish Church in necessary ordinances yet separated in regard of cerruptions Let them then be followers of Christ and we shall no farther pursue them for the sacrament is a necessary ordinance and not a corruption and there may be a non-conformity in a corruption unto them with whom there may yet be a communion in worship The Lord Jesus lived and died in communion with that corrupt Church saith Mr. Ball and was so indulgent and graciously applicable to sinners that the Pharisees called him a companion of sinners Ipse Dominus Jesus Aug. contra Epist Parmen l. 1. c. 17 Dub. Evang. part 3. Dub. 41. p. 153. nullâ cogitatione malignitatis in Judaeorum gente pollutus est neque cùm illa prima sacramenta secundum perfectam humilitatis viam factus sub lege susâ—epit néque cùm postea discipulis electis cum suo traditoâ—e usque ad extremum osculum vixit And it hath been elswhere mentioned that one reason why Christ would be baptized among the common sort is rendred by Spanheïm to be this Sic etiam
jugulatus confutatus error eorum qui Catherorum Anabaptistarum recentium imitatione ad S. Domini coenam accedere detrectant si eandem flagitiosis sua opinione peccatoribus administrari videant But whereas in the score of these corruptions wherein Christ separated they set down washings and misobservation of the Passover First they cannot but know though perchance they could be content that others were ignorant that there is a vast disparity and unsuitableness between superstitions or humane traditions and divine Ordinances Secondly when those that keep themselves pure doe partake of that sacrament whereof they also participate that in some thing are corrupt they do not communicate with the evill men but with the Altar and Sacraments of God as Augustine speaks Thirdly that there may be a communion without uniformity and Church-fellowship without a social compliance in accidentall Rites and Circumstances Fourthly that to differ in things speculative or practicall is not to separate as there may be variety in a garment yet no rent In illa veste varietas sit scissura non sit Then secondly for Christ his not washing among other reasons rendred by Interpreters why he declined and omitted those lotions these also are recounted 1. To shew that things though decent yet ought not to be imposed as necessary or holinesse be constituted therein And 2. That no pollution could be contracted by a necessary converse with those whom they supposed sinners if there were no consortship in sin the contrary superstitious conceit whereof was that which occasioned the Pharisees often washing And as the former reason may excuse us for non-complying with their institutions which some of them may perhaps be conformed to without sin yet none of them ought to be injoyned of necessity so the later may convince them that no communion with such as they are not convinced to be righteous can defile them unless it be a society in unrighteousness 3. But whereas they Magisterially and Dictator-like affirm that Christ observed not the Passover at the same time with the Jewâ—s I see Qui ad pauca respiciunt de facili pronunciant When the Churches of Christendom as the Greek and Latine for from this difference about the time it comes to passe that the Greek Church celebrates in leavened and the Roman in unleavened bread and the best learned men in the Churches both ancient and modern for there were indeed some of the Fathers that supposed Christ and the Jewes did eat the Passover at different times though not upon that reason whereupon the later Writers do assert it viz. the translation of Feasts Exer. 16. Sect. 13. p. 335. whereof Paulus Burgensis was the first authour as Casaubon opineth and he flourished so lately as 1430. but upon this account that it was defer'd by the Jewes through their solicitude and incumbrance about the crucifying of our Lord When I say the Senate of the learned have divided themselves and stand at difference about it and Casaubon though himself be of the contrary judgment yet confesseth it is the common opinion of the Roman Church that Christ and the Jewes did keep the Passover the same day and houre and three Evangelists seem to minister arguments in favour of that opinion and but one that checks therewith and that Enantiophany or seeming opposition between them is very plausibly to be reconciled without receding from this opinion and the arguments whereby it is supported which on that and the other side whereunto he propends are very hand somly drest and trickt up by Maldonat are so considerable for weight and number Hammond annot in Mark 14.12 And Resolut of â— Quaries p. 223. that even those learned men who settle in the other scale do it not without some vacillation And besides all this some very learned meâ— as Grotius Hammond supposing that Christ kept not at all the Passover by eating of the Lamb which was to be slain as they suppose by the Levites 2 Chron. 35.6 and sacrificed in the Temple Deut. 16.2 6. but onely a commemorative Passover which they that were not able to come up to Jerusalem to sacrifice were wont to eat at home as a memoriall of the afflictions and deliverance out of Egypt such as was eaten in the time of the captivity of Babylon being onely unleavened bread and bitter herbs and nothing else and eaten alwaies at the beginning of the Paschal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and which the other was to follow and to be eaten the next evening therefore I suppose it might have been a greater honor to their modesty than disparagement to their learning to have less confidently shot their bolt Verum nihil securius est malo poeta But Ludovicus Vives relates of a Jew that going over a dangerous bridge in the dark next day fell dead when he had light to see the hazard he was in so when they have better considered the knots and intricateness of the question they will have some resentment of their praecipitous determining it and holding this forth as a principle that needed no proofe Omnes in admonendo sapimus said Euripides sed cum ipsimet aberramus haud advertimus The Apologists are like men in the dark they can see nothing about themselves but discerne what others do in the light they have here good principles and they can apply them to conclude against others but they are not aware that in some measure they are applicable to condemne themselves Sciunt vera esse sed furor cogit sequi Pejora vadit animus in praeceps sciens Remeatque They declaime against renouncing Congregations destreying and confusion of Churches scattering flocks forsaking Assemblies which God hath not forsaken and they decry and protest against Schisme and rigid separation and say they tremble at the destruction and confusion of tree Churches But are they not like that Hannonian faction at Carthage which still complained of those miseries which their onely Counsells had brought upon the State If they can see a beame in the eyes of others they should not be so blind as not to see a rafter in their own and though they are but little theeves upon the Bench to invert that proverb yet they cannot with a just confidence condemne the greater at the barre They maintain the same principles of Schisme from whence all the particular conclusions are deduced though some extract them in a gresser threed and spin it out farther they think mixt communions unlawful and make separations in the Church from those that are not cast out from it And whereas in their preface they tell us that they are deceived if ever Church reformation and constitution prove comfortable and successful unless holding communion with other Churches come to be a matter of more weight nevertheless they deny to hold communion with their own Churches yea they have renounced their Congregations interpretatively while they have gathered another which by appropriation they call their Church and in part have directly forsaken
nisi fact â collatione inte multa ut eligatur quod utilius excâ—teris malum quà malum voluntas velle non potest at minus bonum cum majore collatum habet mali speciem rationem And we see that not onely in rationall creatures inferior reason which presenteth to the mind of man some circumstances may incline him to that which superior reason that looks into things with all circumstances diverts him from and yet there is onely a diversity no contrariety between the one and other because they are not in respect of the same circumstances and onely a subordination no repugnancy because the one yeelds to the oâ—her so even in naturall things we find that particular natures deny themselves in obedience to the universall and parts renounce their proper interest for conservation of the whole as we see ayer to descend and water to have an ascent to avoid a vacuum so lest the Church should suffer a vacuity by rooting up the wheat among such a multitude as are pretended to be puld up for tares August cont ep Parmen l. 1. c. 11. tom 6 p. 9. and to prevent Schisme which may arise from the animosity of one part and the faction and singularities of the other inferior order in things of lesser concernment must strike and vail to superior order in things of greater consequence But apparet facile non esse quicquam graviùs sacrilegio schismatis quia praecidendae unitatis nulla est justa necessitas cum sibi nequicquam spiritualiter nocituros malos ideo tolerant boni ne spiritualiter sejungantur à bonis cum disciplinae se veritatem consideratio custodiendae pacis refraenat aut differt And whose device it is under pretence of severity of Discipline to introduce and foment divisions Ibid l. 3. c. 1. St. Augustine tells by occasion of that 2 Cor. 2.11 ut non possideamur à Sathana c. saith he Ipse est qui per imaginem quasi justae severitatis crudelem saevitiam perfundit nihil aliud appetens venenosissimâ versutiâ suâ nisi ut corrumpat atque dirumpat vinculum pacis charitatis quo conservato inter Christianos vires ejus omnes invalidae fiunt ad nocendum c. But that we may not be left as Cicero saith of himself in the quarrell betwixt Caesar and Pompey Nosse se quem fugere ignorare quem sequi debeat as they have shewed us the wrong way so now they hold forth the right and that is their way That course which doth naturally and directly set up order and holinesse in the Church is warrantable by this text but their way doth so tend Ergo. And the Minor is proved Where onely such are admitted and all such are admitted as can chalenge right to the Sacrament by the word of Christ there due order and decenâ—y are observed But so it is with them Not to bring them under shrift for the Peccadilloes of their Logick as in the Major of the first Syllogisme where they say That which tends to set up order and holinesse they should have properly said Decency to have suited it with the conclusion and in the Major of the second Syllogisme when they tell us There due order is observed if they would have concluded aright it should have been That course naturally and directly tends to set up order c. But because the least prayer for pardon will expiate such veniall sinnes I answer First the Minor of the last Syllogisme though they have too much faith to believe it will shift for its self and carry its own passe yet we think they have somewhat of the Infidel that provide no better for their own but leave it to go a begging for the question Secondly if we concede there is order and decency in their way the Major of their Syllogisme pretends onely to prove that it is thereby warrantable but not that it is necessary and obliging to the exclusion of all others another may be as warrantable as that because different fashions may be orderly and decent one as well as another Thirdly a course may be orderly and decent in some respects and so be regular relatively to order and decency and yet not simply and absolutely good order may may sometime be in things that are evill and Physicians tell us That order in evill pulses are worse then disorder in good for bonum ex integra causa the argument may perchance hold negatively not affirmatively Fourthly it appears not to us no nor to them that all those whom they admit are really holy and it is too apparent that all which are relative holy they admit not howsoever seeming to themselves so pure Contra Lit. Petiliani l. 3. s. 81. they justly fall under that Sarcasme of Augustine to his Donatists Novum genus arcae vos fecisse gloriamini aut quae solum triticum habeat autin qua solum triticum appareat cui non fit necessarius ventilator sed perscrutator and yet notwithstanding it is also as true of these what the same Father said of the other Contra 2. Epist Gaudentii l. 2. c. 27. Habetis res magnas quas inter justitias vestras ventiletis divisionem Christi rescissionem sacramentorum Christi desertionem pacis Christi bellum contra membra Christi criminationes in conjugem Christi negationem promissionum Christi Fifthly But how intollerably and how many wayes doth their way via devia check with order and decency to gather a Church out of a Church and to admit into the Church those who were added to the Church already to set up a Church beyond a Church like a little England beyond Wales as was said of part of Pembrookshire and a Church more then a Church as if were like the fire at Leige which they say is hotter than fire that some should be members in their Church and yet not be members of their Church or if of their Church yet not of their Chancel that they own themselves to be their Pastors and yet they are not their own particular flock so destroying the nature of relatives to bring in a confusion of parishes and their Churches to have extension into and penetration with other Churches first pulling down the limits and hedge to make all common and then to set up a new inclosure and thereinto draw others flock and build their Churches by such a confusion doing by others what they would not have done by others to them and as the limits of Sparta were said to be as far as their spears could reach so the bounds of their Churches to be as wide as their tongues can extend and to make no lesse confusion of Ordinances while some have one ordinary Pastor for the Word another for the Sacrament others have a Pastor for the Word and none for the Sacraments and they to take the whole Fleece that minister not the whole food contrary to the equity of the Statute which proportions Tythes
deserve those censures But 2. Though all those crimes might render obnoxious to such censure meritoriously yet the persons might not be effectively censured the Church might have no publick and notorious knowledge thereof yet many might have private notice and if the Church had such evidence yet some obstacles from the number of the offenders or the danger of schisme and the like might send a prohibition to proceedings and yet in such cases the avoiding of voluntary familiar commerce with such may be necessary or expedient And whatever censure the offences might merit it doth not follow that in this place the Apostle must needs lay down his command for censuring the offenders neither is it likely that incest which the Ecclesiastical Canons have censured with excommunication without hope of absolution was only sentenced by the Apostle unto suspension from the Lords Table 5. He had spoken of keeping company before This last Argument is like the top-stone which children set on the Castles they build too high whose weight casts down all the pile and it self falls with them for if the Apostle spoke of keeping company before then the whole chapter doth not concern Church censures This defeats the 1. Reason drawn from the context 2 He then also writes not only of what is to be done by the Church but by particular persons in a private way this nuâ—lifies the second reason extracted from the text And yet as this Sampson pulls down the house upon the Philistims above so it self fals under the ruines also and this Argument cannot stand For 1. If the Apostle had formerly spoken of keeping company may he not again second and reenforce that exhortation 2. Doth he not in this very chapter prescribe the taking away from among them the incestuous person vers 2. and 4. and in their judgement also verse 7 and yet ingeminates that command vers 13. put away from you that wicked person and might he not vary his phrase and deliver the same matter under sundry forms or explane what kind of company he meant even contubernium aut interiorem convictum as Bullinger whereof eating together was a symbol as was shewed before SECT XXIX Matth. 7.26 The sense thereof enucleated and shewed not to be subservient to their purpose but odiously abused Whether Ministers may act in Censures alone and upon their own knowledge VVE have elswhere taken off the sting of the Argument raised upon Matth. Sect 15 7.6 so as though it hisse here it cannot hurt and in truth they cast us no pearles here they dive not deep enough to fetch them but onely gather us a few Cockle-shels which not onely bordure but fill up the current of their Discourse throughout which we cannot like the filly Indians take for fine things such is that of their keeping pure the Ordinance and not prostituting it and of exclading the scandalous c. Which fallacies of petitio princi ii fallacia consequentis ignorantia clenchi they cannot part with nor live asunder from but are bewitcht to dote upon as much as Charles the Great was upon his old Hagge We looked they should have demonstrated that the holy things and pearles here spoken of were meant of the Lords Supper and that all those whom they admit not to partake thereof are dogges and swine but here vox faâ—cibus haesit we expected Rachel and behold it is Leah according to the Hebrew Proverb The Divines of our part disputing against the Papists argue that the eating of the flesh of Christ John 6. cannot be understood of Sacramentall eating because the Sacrament was not then instituted and by congruity of like reason the holy things and pearles here mentioned cannot be meant of the Sacrament because it was not yet ordained nor were the Disciples likely to be cautioned to whom they should administer that which was not yet in actuall being non entis nulla sunt accidentia neither had they yeâ— been disciplined what was the nature or end of the administration There is a Diapason among Interpreters striking harmoniously together in one sound that the doctrine of the Gospel is properly signified by these holy things and pearles the mysteries of the holy or Christian saith or truth so Dionysius Chrysostome Euthymius Eucherius of Lyons the Author of the imperfect work on Matthew De adult conjun c. 27. Estius in 4. Sentent d. 9. sect 4. p. 123. Aug. de serm Dom in monte l. 2. tem 4. p. 259 all cited by Barradius so Aquinas and Estius also so Hierom expounds it of the pearles of the Gospel and Paraus of the treasures of heavenly wisdome and because the Sacraments are also among such mysteries and usually so denominated therefore Augustine contracts and limits it to the doctrine of the Gospel Euthymius specifies them to be pretiosa dogmatae Estius and Janscuius define it to be onely the doctrine of the Gospel exclusively to the Sacraments The holy and pretious truth saith Diodate the excellent unsearchable riches of Christ opened in the Gospel and those spoken as the English Annotations And Augustines reason of the Metaphor manifests it that he onely understood the word by these mysteries Margaritae saith he quia in abdito lateut tanquam de profundo eruuntur allegoriarum integumentis quasi apertis conchis inveniuntur Annot. in locum The learned Grotius informs us Quod autemin universum de omnibus sapientiae praeceptis dici solebat apud Hebraos id Christus suae sapientiae praeceptis praesertim interioribus applicavit docens qua cautione ea aliis sine impertienda And since Interpreters explain the sum of the command to be thus hoc loco vult ne prodige effundantur etiam infidelibus abstrusissima mysteria sed pedetentim instillentur ne mysteriorum sublimitate deterreantur Quistorp annot in locum Doctrinam divinam non evulgantes as Augustine de mysteriis sidei non propalandis and ne pandite ut occultentur as Barradius out of the Fathers if the Sacraments be the holy things and pearls intended here then neither they comply with the command onely by excluding men from partaking for by admittting them to see and hear at the administration they publish and reveale the mysteries which clasheth with non evulgantes non propalandis ne pandite That this place appertains not to the administration of the Sacrament but onely or chiefly at least to doctrine and the dispensation of the word of God Jansenius saith is apparent by that which precedes Quoniam mox superius docuit qui non debent alios judicare corripere docere hîc etiam docet qui non debent â—orripi doceri and also by what follows for there is subjoyned ne fortè conversi disrumpant vos but saith he non est periculum ne si petentibus peccatoribus dentur sacramenta converst disrumpant largitorem sed contra potius periculum ne disrumpant negantem It cannot be denied nevertheless that many learned men have
truth which are the proper passions of those Dogges and Swine that are here described but from being convicted of any such notorious crimes whereby the Church might be scandalized For secondly though we should surrender what they cannot win by force That the Sacrament not onely falls within the notion of those holy things and pearls but was properly and primarily understood thereby yet it is farther questionable who those Dogges and Swine are and what constitutes and denominates them such The main current of Interpreters runs strongly this way and not to be withstood that hereby are intended such as blaspheme the truth which is set forth by trampling it under feet and those that persecute it signified by renting them that propound it Chamier tom 1 l. 10. c. 8. caetcri in locum p. 187. Bullinger advers Anabapt l. 6. c. 9 p. 229. Let Paraeus be as Plato in hearing whom you hear all the rest he speaketh saith he of the professed obstinate enemies of the Gospel who being convinced of the truth therof yet cease not either to blaspheme or violently persecute the same and the same way run Augustine Chamier Bullinger Perkins Diodate Grotius the English Annotations Jansenius Maldonate Barradius Estius who adds in his Annotations Huic praecepto obtemperavit Paulus Apostolus quando Judaeos videns insua perfidia obstinatos reliquit eos transivit ad genies Art 13. Such obstinate professed and impure enemies of the Gospel and the Ministers thereof persecuting them for their message as the late English Annotations decipher them we cannot but consent Idem omnes simul ardor babet should be kept not onely from the the Sacrament but out of the Church at least if they would yet be willing to enter and we suppose it imports them in duty to have no Doggs or Swine among their Flock as well as it concerns them to have none at the Lords Table and that therefore and if it were possible there could be any such within it which Vixisset cauis immundus vel amica luto sus that they ought to be cast out of the Church which like the aire of Arakia is too sweet to nourish any such swine and which can give no admission to Dogges which were not suffered to enter heathen Temples as Minerva's at Athens and Diana's at Delos nor to be toucht by the Flamen Dialis at Rome But as Junius applies the text to those that voluntariè certáque malitiâ sunt inimici veritatis Eirenic part 1. p. 727. tom 1 so he gives us two cautions Nè tomere judicium feramus de ullo homine quòd certâ maltâ—iâ deliberatâ oppugnet Deum verit tem Ecclesiam ejus alâ—â—era est si judieandum est ne ex frustu uno aut altero putemus arbores illas malas cegnoscere sed potius ex fructibus plurimis gravissimi diseamus cognoscere quod satis est ad cautionem nostram non autem ad istorum condemnationem But then next 1. Are those whom they admit not to the Sacrament to be stigmatized with those odious attributes as being culpable of those desperate affections and actions Do they reproachfully despise and revile the Sacrament or not rather reverently prize it and humbly desire it as pretious and the worst of them hath some devotion toward it qui possunt aliquam devotionem hujus sacramenti habere non est iis denegandum in the judgment of Aquinas Part 3. q. 80. art 9. Is there any danger of their doing mischief to those that should exhibit it would they not rather thank and honour them for it and is it not the rise of the quarrel because they cannot have it and the rent is made for not distributing thereof and they that should give they turn away and rent those that would gladly receave we may therfore assume what Whitaker saith to the Papists who allege this text to justifie their with-drawing the Scriptures from the people Controver 1. q. 2. c. 17. p. 308. as the Apologists do for withholding the Sacrament Certè populus parum illis se debere putet de quo tam abjectè parum honorificè sentiunt ut eos canum porcorum loco habeant Secondly is not this as odious a dishonour to the Churches of God as a disparagement to particular persons that they should be made as kennels or hogsties by having about ninety nine doggs or swine to one holy Christian How great a blasphemie is this saith the great Chamier to the Papists ubi supra upon the same occasion with Whitaker that whom God calls his sons any one should name doggs and swine to what end therefore do we believe the holy Catholick Church if the far greatest part thereof be doggs and swine We confess notwithstanding among Christians not a few there are which lead a life too much depraved but we deny any of them that are to be reckoned of the Church to be in the number of those that are here signified by doggs and swine although they live wickedly So he This will be indeed musick in Gath and a pleasant song in Askelon and if the Apologists and their brethren will not with some animals cover their excrements the Papists will find it out by the strong scent and cast it back in the face of our Church and of the dung that such black birds do drop they will make birdlime to catch and ensnare other birds But they plead that sin and contempt of Gods waies make them deggs the Scripture interpreting this expression to signifie men of a prophane life 2 Pet. 2.18 19 20 22. Prov â—6 â—1 The very inspection into the text may check their assertion for in that of Proverbs it is said that as a dogg returneth to his vomit so a fool returneth to his folly but may a man be denominated from every thing whereunto he may in any respect be assimilated or can a likeness secundum quid warrant an appellation simpliciter If so then as the Chymists fancy that there is nothing in the great world which is not represented in the little and there is really nothing within the clasp of the universe but man doth in some regard resemble it then as Adam once gave names to the creatures so now they might denominate man and man is all things and you may call him what you will That of Peter is but a rehearsal of that Proverb with an enlargement concerning the sow and if I should concede that here wicked men were called Doggs and Swine yet let them recognize what those wicked men were viz. Simon Magus and his Gnosticks the dreggs and fink of mankind Christians onely in name So Estius Justinian Hammond c. and baptized Pagans who had the name of Borborites from dung and durt saith Augustine they were so filthy and contaminate with impurities beyond all that ever the Sun discovered or darkness hid which are like a dead carcass fitter to be
sic Elephantia sis omnium morborum maximus and so infectious that qui bibit in eodem vitro cum Elephantiaco inquinabitur And therefore though the judging of and exterminating the Leper may perhaps in a more tolerable Allegory bear some proportion to the consuring and excommunicating nefarious and notorious sinners obstinately persisting in impenitence who do give scandall and may spread infection yet what conformity carries it to the suspending of those who have not satisfied them of their fitnesse or worthinesse and who are innocent of such great transgressions The Priest was to take curions view and to make severall inspections not arbitrarily and precipitously as is their use to pronounce men Lepers and he was to distinguish between a Scab a Leprosie verse 8. for a scab did not shut out of the Camp neither must small faults from the Church or Sacrament Si quis suspect◠sit infirmitatis saith Ambrose indulge aliquantulum medendi periti cum vident notas aegritudines non primò medicinam adhibent Willot in locum Doct. 2. 5. sed tempus expectant And again Diu tractatur putrida pars si sanari potest medicamentis si non potest à bono medico abscinditur sie Episcopi affectus boni est ut optet sanari infirmos serpentia auferre ulcera adducere aliqua non abseindere postrumò quod sanari non potest cum dolore abscindere But while they use a contrary method sure the plague of leprosie is among the Priests who have the signes thereof not in the rent of their clothes but in the rent of the Church The next Scripture is 2 Chron. 23.19 another Allegory and therefore no Argument as Hierom saith of Origen Praefat. 10. Isai ad Amabil Episcop while he wanders in his free course of Allegories he makes his wit the Churches Sacraments so they make their Allegories the rule of their distribution of the Sacraments in the Church But if a clear and impartial judgement had been the Porter this Argument drawn from Jehosaphats Porters c. had not been suffered to enter not only because to reduce their practice of Discipline to a resemblance and conformity to what was done to those that were unclean under the law they should not only debar those whom they think impure from coming to the Sacrament but from entring the Church yea from civil commerce Instit Moral tom 3. l. 10. p. 679. for polluti praescripto legis arcebantur ab ingressu in templum ab aliorum convictu consortio saith Azorius comfortmably to Scripture neither were either of the legal Sacraments made or given in the Temple for if the Paschal Lamb were there killed and sacrificed yet it was eaten at home so that the keeping out of the temple was not the keeping off from the Passover however that which did prohibit the entry at the one might forbid the eating of the other and though Jehosophats Porters suffered none that were unclean in any thing to enter the house of the Lord yet this must be understood of evident and apparant uncleanness and of such as were notoriously known to be defiled for we do not find nor can imagine that they searched any men or women or made tryal of them by denuding them and some kinds of uncleannesse contracted by contact were not discernible by any re-search But chiefly because neither the Porters can rationally be supposed to Type the Church Officers nor the Temple only to signifie the Lords Table nor indeed is there any colour or proportion for it so as there can be no beauty in the Allegory that legal uncleanesse should be a figure of or bear resemblance with moral filthynesse contracted by sinful actions Philo makes the Temple to be an image of the world some more probably a Type of Christs natural body others of his mystical body the Church But if of the Church yet whether of the true Catholick or the Visible Church or of the Militant or triumphant Church which or whether of these is not clear and liquid Mr. Ball. answ to Canne part 2. pag. 67. August contra 2 Epist Gaudentii l. 2. c. 25 without some divine light for as it is only appertaining to God to design a Type so it is peculiar to him alone to expound and make known the signification thereof Homo vobis dixit an Deus si Deus legite hoc nobis ex lege Prophetis Psalmis Apostolicis Euangelicis literis so autem homines dixerunt ecce figmentum humanum c. But certainly it is evident that the Temple did not Type the Table of the Lord no man ever fell upon that fancy Tam vana nullum decepit imagine somnus And therefore however this Argument might seem subservient to prove the casting out of the Church by Excemmunication or might reflect a little superficial glosse on the Independent way of admitting none into the Church but manifest Saints yet it bears no colour to paint over their practice who permit them to be Members of the Church and partakers of other Ordinances whom they exclude from the Lords Supper And if hereby the Church had been figured and also that no wicked person should enter therein yet either the Church was thereby described as women were by Sophocles only what they ought to be not what they were or as they shall be in Heaven that new Jerusalem where no unclean person shall enter for otherwise it can be no true Church whereof any wicked persons are Members So likewise legal uncleannesse is clean wide from figuring or obumbrating either scandalous sins which may merit casting out or irregeneration for which pretendedly they let not in For 1. There might be legal uncleannesse without any sin as in some diseases of men and women and in some necessary or casual contacts and there might be odious sins without any legal uncleanesse sins did not make legally upclean nor legal uncleannesse alwayes sinful unlesse a man did wilfully neglect his cleansing A holy man might be unclean and a wicked man clean 2. All sin was forbidden by God and no sin was necessary but all uncleannesse was not prohibited and some was of necessity to be contracted as that which grew from Burial of the dead Numb 19.11 or removing dead Carcasses Levit. 11.39 and making of the water of separation Numb 19. vers 7. 3. No man could sin unwillingly every sin is in some respect voluntary but a man might be unclean against his will Leviticus 15.8 Numbers 19. vers 14. 4. The least uncleannesse shut out from the Tabernacle and Temple but the least sin excludes not from the Church or Sacrament even our enemies being judges 5. Things as well as persons were lyable to uncleannesse but only rational creatures are capable of sinning 6. He was clean that was most defiled as he whose leprosie covered all his skin from head to foot Levit. 13.13 14. but the Analogie holdeth not in the most leprous sinners 7. He that