sufficient cause for it And in the same Book they tell us of a Two-fold Schism Negative and Positive Negative when Men do peaceably and quietly withdraw from Communion with a Church not making a Head against that Church from which they are departed the other is when Persons so withdrawing do consociate and withdraw themselves into a distinct and opposite Body setting up a Church against a Church which say they Camero calls a Schism by way of Eminency and further tells us There are Four Causes that make a Separation from a Church lawful 1. When they that Separate are grievously and intollerably Persecuted 2. When the Church they Separate from is Heretical 3. When it is Idolatrous 4. When it is the Seat of Antichrist And where none of these Four are found there the Separation is insufficient and Schism Now we are fully assured that none of these Four Causes can be justly charg'd upon our Congregations therefore you must not be displeased with us but with your selves if we blame you as guilty of positive Schism All which is as true now as it was then and as applicable to us and them as it was to them and their Dissenters Admit then there were some things in our Constitution that might be contrived to better purposes and that needed amendment and alteration yet I hope every Defect or supposed Corruption in a Church is not a sufficient ground for Separation or warrant enough to rend and tear the Church in peices Let Mr. Calvin judg between us in this matter who says That wherever the Word of God is duly Preached and Reverently attended to and the true use of the Sacraments kept up there is the plain appearance of a true Church whose Authority no Man may safely despise or reject its Admonitions or resist its Counsels or set at nought its Discipline much less Separate from it and Violate its Unity for that our Lord has so great regard to the Communion of his Church that he accounts him an Apostate from his Religion who obstinately Separates from any Christian Society which keeps up the true Ministry of the Word and Sacraments that such a Separation is a denial of God and Christ and that it is a dangerous and pernicious Temptation so much as to think of Separating from such a Church the Communion whereof is never to be rejected so long as it continues in the true use of the VVord and Sacraments though otherwise it be over-run with many Blemishes and Corruptions VVhich is as plain and full a determination of the Case as if he had particularly designed it against the Doctrine and Practice of the Modern Dissenters from our Church IV. Fourthly We entreat them to Consider whether it be pure Conscience and meer Zeal for the Honour of Religion and not very often Discontent or Trade and Interest that has the main stroke in keeping them from Communion with our Church Far be it from me to judg the Secrets of Mens Hearts or to fasten such a Charge on the whole Body of Dissenters yea I accuse not any particular Person but only desire they would lay their Hand upon their Hearts and deal impartially with themselves and say whether they stand clear before God in this matter And there is the more reason to put Men upon this Enquiry not only because Secular Ends are very apt to mix with and shelter themselves under the shadow of Religion but because this has been an old Artifice made use of to promote Separation Thus the Donatists in the Primitive Times upheld their Separation from the Catholick Church and kept their Party fast together by Trading only within themselves by imploying none to Till their Grounds or be their Stewards but those that would be of their side nay and sometimes hiring Persons by large Sums of Mony to be Baptiz'd into their Party as Crispin did the People of Mappalia And how evident the same Policy is among our Modern Quakers is too notorious to need either Proof or Observation Time was when it was made an Argument to prove Independency to be a Faction and not matter of Conscience because Needy broken decayed Men who knew not how to live and hoped to get something turned Independents and became sticklers for it that some who had Businesses Causes and Matters depending struck in with them and pleaded for them that so they might find Friends be sooner dispatched and fare better in their Causes that Ambitious Proud Covetous Men who had a mind to Offices places of profit about the Army Excise c. turned about to the Independents and were great Zealots for them Thus it was then and whether the same Leaven do not still spread and ferment and perhaps as much as ever there is just cause to suspect VVhoever looks into the Trading part of this City and indeed of the whole Nation must needs be a very heedless and indiligent Observer if he do not take notice how Interests are formed and by what Methods Parties and Factions are kept up how many Thousands of the Poorer sort of Dissenters depend on this or that Man for their VVork and consequently for their Livelihood and Subsistence how many depend upon others for their Trade and Custom whom accordingly these Men can readily Command and do produce to give Votes and increase Parties on all Publick Occasions and what little Encouragement any Man finds from them that once deserts them and comes over to the Church of England There is another thing that contributes not a little to this Jealousie and Suspicion that many of the Chifest and most Stiff and Zealous of the Dissenting Party are they at least the immediate Descendants of those who in the late Evil-Times by Rapine and Violence shared among themselves the Revenues of the Church and the Patrimony of the Crown and are said still privately to keep on foot their Titles to them And if so what wonder if such Men look on themselves as obliged in point of Interest to widen Breaches foment Differences increase Factions and all this to Subvert and over-turn the Church of England being well assured they can never hope but over the Ruins of this Church to make way to their once sweet Possessions Let Men therefore impartially examine themselves and search whether a Worldly Spirit be not at the bottom of their Zeal and Stiffness These I confess are Designs too Base and Sordid to be owned above Board but be not Deceived God is not Mocked Man looks to the outward Appearance but God looks to the Heart V. Fifthly We desire them to-Consider Whether it be not a Just Prejudice to their Cause and that which ought to prevail with Men Modest and Peaceable that in those things wherein they differ from us they are Condemned by the Practice of the whole Catholick Church for Fifteen Hundred Years together This were I minded might afford a large Field for Discourse but I shall instance only and that very briefly in a few Particulars
this time how many excellent Discourses have been Published for the satisfaction of Dissenters written with the greatest Temper and Moderation with the utmost plainness and perspicuity with all imaginable evidence and strength of Reasoning so short as not to require any considerable portion either of Time or Cost so suited to present Circumstances as to obviate every material Objection that is made against Communion with us and yet there is just cause to fear that the far greatest part of our Dissenters are meer strangers to them and are not so just to themselves or us as to give them the reading And that those few that do look into them do it rather out of a design to pick quarrels against them and to expose them in scurrilous or cavilling Pamphlets then to receive satisfaction by them I do heartily and from my Soul wish an end of these Contentions and that there were no further occasion for them but if our Dissenting Brethren will still proceed in this way we desire and hope 't is but what is reasonable that the things in difference may be debated in the most quiet peaceable and amicable manner that they may be gravely and substatially Managed and only the Merits of the Cause attended to and that the Controversie may not be turned off to mean and trifling Persons whose highest attainment perhaps it is to write an idle and senceless Pamphlet and which can serve no other use but only that the People may be born in hand that such and such Books are Answered Which is so unmanly and disingenuous a way and so like the shifting Artifices of them of the Church of Rome that I am apt to persuade my self the wiser Heads of the Dissenting Party cannot but be ashamed of it If they be not 't is plain to all the World they are willing to serve an ill Design by the most unwarrantable Means But however that be we think we have great reason to expect from them that they should hear our Church before they condemn Her and consider what has been said for the removing of their Doubts before they tell us any more of Scruples Tender-Consciences and the hard Measure that they meet withal I confess could I meet with a Person that had brought himself to some kind of unbyasdness and indifferency of Temper and that design'd nothing more then to seek and find the right way of Serving God without respect to the Intrigues and Interests of this or that particular Party and in order thereunto had with a sincere and honest Mind read whatever might probably conduce to his satisfaction fairly proposed his Scruples and modestly consulted with those that were most proper to advise him and humbly begged the guidance and direction of the Divine Grace and Blessing and yet after all should still labour under his old Dissatisfactions I should heartily pity and pray for such a Man and think my self obliged to improve all my Interest for Favour and Forbearance towards him But such Persons as these I am afraid are but thin Sowed and without breach of Charity it may be supposed there is not One of a Thousand III. Thirdly We desire that before they go on to accuse our Church with driving them into Seperation they would directly charge her with imposing sinful terms of Communion And unless they do this and when they have done it make it good for barely to accuse I hope is not sufficient I see not which way they can possibly justifie their Separation from us 'T is upon this account that the whole Protestant Reformation defends their departure from the Church of Rome They found the Doctrine of that Church infinitely corrupt in several of the main Principles of Religion New Articles of Faith introduced and bound upon the Consciences of Men under pain of Damnation its Worship overgrown with very gross Idolatry and Superstition Its Rites and Ceremonies not only over-numerous but many of them advanced into proper and direct acts of Worship and the use of them made necessary to Salvation and besides it's Members required to joyn and communicate in these corruptions and depravations nay and all proposals and attempts toward a Reformation obstinately rejected and thrown out in which case they did with great Reason and Justice depart from her which we may be confident they would not have done had no more been required of them than instead of Worshipping Images to use the Sign of the Cross in Baptisme or instead of the Adoration of the Host to kneel at the Receiving of the Sacrament A learned Protestant Divine of great Name and Note has expresly told us That had there been no other faults in the Church of Rome besides their useless Ceremonies in Baptisme and some other things that are beyong the measure and genius of the Christian Religion they had still continued in the Communion of that Church Indeed did the Church of England command any thing which Christ has prohibited or prohibite any thing which Christ has commanded then come ye out from among them and be ye seperate saith the Lord were good Warrant and Authority But where do we meet with these prohibitions not in the word of God not in the nature and reason of the things themselves nor indeed do we find our Dissenting Brethren of late very forward to fasten this charge and much less to prove it whatever unwary sayings may fall from any of them in the heat and warmth of Disputation or be suggested by indirect consequences and artificial insinuations And if our Church commands nothing that renders her Communion sinful then certainly Seperation from her must be unlawful because the Peace and Unity of the Church and obedience to the commands of lawful Authority are express and indispensable duties and a few private suspicions of the unlawfulness of the thing are not sufficient to sway against plain publick and necessary Duties nor can it be safe to reject Communicating with those with whom Christ himself does not refuse Communion This I am sure was once thought good Doctrine by the cheifest of our Dissenters who when time was reasoned thus against those that subdivided from them If we be a Church of Christ and Christ hold Communion with us why do you Seperate from us If we be the Body of Christ do not they that Seperate from the Body Seperate from the Head also we are loath to speak any thing that may offend you yet we entreat you to consider that if the Apostle call those Divisions of the Church of Corinth wherein Christians did not separate into divers formed Congregations in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper Schisms 1 Cor. 1. 10. may not your Secession from us and professing you cannot join with us as Members and setting up Congregations of another Communion be more properly called Schism You gather Churches out of our Churches and set up Churches in an opposite way to our Churches and all this you do voluntarily and unwarrantably not having any
And First We desire them to produce any settled part of the Christian Church that ever was without Episcopal Covernment till the time of Calvin it being then as hard to find any part of the Christian World without a Church as to find a Church without a Bishop This is so evident in the most early Antiquities of the Church that I believe our Dissenters begin to grow sick of the Controversie And if Blondell Salmasius and Daille whose great Parts Learning and indefatigable Industry could if any thing have made out the contrary have been forced to grant That Episcopacy obtained in the Church within a few Years after the Apostolick Age We are sure we can carry it higher even up to the Apostles themselves There are but Two passages that I know of in all Antiquity of any Note and both of them not till the latter end of the Fourth Century that may seem to question Episcopal Authority The One That famous and well known passage of St. Jerom which yet when improved to the utmost that it is capable of only intimates Episcopacy not to be of Apostolical Institution And very clear it is to those that are acquainted with St. Jeroms Writings that he often Wrote in hast and did not always weigh things at the Beam and forgot at one time what he had said at another that many expressions fell from him in the heat of Disputation according to the warmth and the eagerness of his Temper that he was particularly chafed into this Assertion by the fierce opposition of the Deacons at Rome who began to Usurp upon and over-top the Presbyters which tempted him to Magnifie and Extol their Place and Dignity as anciently equal to the Episcopal Office and as containing in it the common Rights and Privileges of Priesthood For at other times when he Wrote with cooler Thoughts about him he does plainly and frequently enough assert the Authority of Bishops over Presbyters and did himself constantly live in Communion with and Subjection to Bishops The other passage is that of Aerius who held indeed that a Bishop and a Presbyter differed nothing in Order Dignity or Power But he was lead into this Error meerly through Envy and Emulation being vext to see that his Companion Eustathius had gotten the Bishoprick of Sebastia which himself had aimed at This made him start aside and talk extravagantly but the Church immediately branded him for an Heretick and drave him and his followers out of all Churches and from all Cities and Villages And Epiphanius who was his Contemporary represents him as very little better then a Madman and adds that all Heresies that ever were from the beginning of the World had been hatched either by Pride or Vain Glory or Covetousness or Emulation or some such Evil Inclination But his Heresie it seems was not long-liv'd for we hear no more concerning this matter till the Reformation at Geneva Secondly We desire them to shew any Christian Church that did not constantly use Liturgies and Forms of Prayer in their Publick Offices and Administrations of Divine Worship I take it for granted that there were Forms of Publick Prayer in the Jewish Church and I make no doubt but that the use of such Forms was together with many other Synagogue-rites and Usages transferred into the Practice of the Christian Church and did actually obtain in the most early Ages in all Churches where there were not Miraculous Gifts and every where as soon as those Miraculous Gifts ceased it being very fit and proper and agreeable to Order and Decency that the Peoples Devotions should be thus Conducted and Governed in their Publick Ministrations Not to insist upon the Carmen or Hymn which even the Proconsul Pliny says the Christians upon a set Day were wont one among another to say to Christ as to their God Apparent footsteps of some Passages of their Ancient Liturgies are yet extant in the Writings of Origen and St. Cyprian And when Eusebius gives us an account how Religiously Constantine the Great ordered his Court That he was wont to take the Holy Bible into his Hands and carefully to Meditate upon it and afterwards to offer up Set or Composed Prayers together with his whole Royal Family he adds He did this after the manner or in imitation of the Church of God Nazianzen tells us of St. Basil That he composed Orders and Forms of Prayer and appointed decent Ornaments for the Altar And St. Basil himself reciting the manner of the Publick Service that was used in the Monastical Oratories of his Institution says That nothing was done therein but what was Consonant and Agreeable to all the Churches of God And the Council of Laodicea holden much about the Year 365 expresly provides that the same Liturgy or Form of Prayers should be always used both Morning and Evening That so it might not be lawful for every one that would to compose Prayers of his own Head and to repeat them in the Publick Assemblies as both Zonaras and Balsamon give the reason of that Canon Further then this we need not go the Case being henceforward evident beyond all Contradiction Thirdly Let them shew us any Church that did not always set a part and observe Festival Commemorations of the Saints besides the more solemn times for Celebrating the great Blessings of our Redeemer his Birth Day and Epiphany Easter in Memory of his Resurrection Pentecost or VVitsuntide for the Mission of the Holy Ghost they had Annual days for solemnizing the Memories of the Blessed Apostles they had their Memoriae and Natalitia Martyrum whereon they assembled every Year to offer up to God their Praises and Common Devotions and by Publick Panegyricks to do honour to the memory of those Saints and Martyrs who had suffered for or Sealed Religion with their Bloud Not to mention their Lent Fast and their Stationary Fasts on VVednesdays and Fridays which Epiphanius more then once expresly says were a Constitution of the Apostles But the less need be said on this head because few that have any Reverence for Antiquity will have the hardiness to oppose it Fourthly We desire them to produce any Church since the Apostles Times that had not its Rites and Ceremonies as many if not more in number and as liable to exception as those that are used in our Church at this Day nay there are few things if any at all required by our Constitution which were not in use in the best Ages of Christianity This were it my design I might demonstrate by an Induction of particulars but it is fully done by other Hands I shall therefore only as a Specimen instance in One and the rather because 't is so much boggled at viz. The Sign of the Cross in Baptism which we are sure was a Common and Customary Rite in the time of Tertullian and St. Cyprian the latter whereof says oft enough that being Regenerated that is Baptized they were Signed with the Sign