the right and have witnessed to the Truth then ought the Church of England to hang down her head c. And thus as he states the case himself if the Dissenters have not witnessed to the Truth the Church of England is not guilty and all their Outcries about Persecution must pass for nothing Here then lies the stress of the dispute Whether the Nonconformists have Truth on their side and were therefore really persecuted for Righteousness-sake I proceed therefore to examine Q. The Reasons and Objections which he pleads for his Non conformity His first Stumbling block is the Subscription in the Act of Vniformity with the Oath in the Oxford Act in which are these Words I. A. B. do declare That it is unlawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King Again I do swear That it is not lawful c. He adds we refused thus to declare and swear and he requires three Things to be observed First A man may believe a Proposition to be true but would not be willing to swear it and this Objection is a perfect Cavil He that asserts a Proposition to be true does mean only that he is convinced of its Truth and he that swears it is true does only call God to witness that he is convinced of it Nothing is more obvious than that in all assertory Oaths when we swear to the Truth of Things we are understood to declare no more than our own Belief and Knowledge concerning them and thus when I swear that it is unlawful to resist nothing more can be understood than that I am fully satisfied of it if I believe it unlawful I may subscribe and declare that it is so and if I cam do that I may also swear it since in this Case an Oath superadded to a Declaration must follow the nature of the Principal and can be nothing else but a Sacred Confirmation of my sincerity in declaring and I am morally certain that no Magistrate in England would have refused to administer the Oath with this Interpretation Secondly he objects that Barclay Grotius and others who have written in favour of Kings do yet allow some Cases in which it is lawful to resist them and if a King does govern by his Will and not by Law he doth excidere de jure that is he forfeits his Right to Govern I answer that an Arbitrary King does forfeit his Right is affirmed by neither of these Authors but is contradicted by them and though it be true that Barelay Grotius and others whether Republicans Jesuits or Presbyterians have allowed Exceptions for resisting yet I am sure the Holy Ghost has made none in Scripture they that resist shall receive Damnation is denounced without any Limitation and how shall we limit where GOD hath not limited or distinguish where He hath not distinguished So was the Rule understood and practiced by the first and best of Christians so was it taught by the first Reformers of our Church and some of them with their Blood bore witness to it The Popes were the first Christians that taught Resistance but though an Augel from Heaven had taught it we have received another Doctrine and could not have departed from it Thirdly he adds That all the Nobility and Gentry of England and Scotland and all the Protestant Princes beyond Sea in their Proceedings against King James have justified the Nonconformists in refusing the Oath Now I have no Correspondence with all these Princes Nobility and Gentry and therefore know not their minds about it but I am sure he cannot make good his all without taking Sanctuary in Hyperbole There be many that think those Proceedings may be justified without justifying Resistance but I believe there are no Princes that will allow it against themselves and if the Majority of the Nobility and Gentry do justifie what they once condemn'd their Authority can be urged on neither side and though there he a Revolution of Opinions as well as Governments yet the nature of Things is immutable and Truth the same yesterday to day and for ever His Second scruple is about Reordination as tho' Ordination by Presbyters were not sufficient without the laying on of the hands of those we now call Bishops But first since this Minister hath now undertaken to argue he should have prov'd that Reordination implys a Nullity of their former Orders But as no Declaration of their insufficiency is requir'd so neither is it imply'd in the nature of the thing nor understood to be so by Construction of the Fact as appears from the Reordination of many French Ministers whose Orders have never been condemned by our Church who never intended to renource them by that Action nor are supposed to do so Secondly tho' the Ordination of Presbyters be granted to be sufficient yet this will not justify the Nonconformists Ordinations There is all evidnet difference betwixt the Case of these Ministers and the Presbyters of some Foreign Churches 1. Those Foreign Divines tho' their Churches are not under Episcopal Government yet they do not separate from Episcopal Communion but have all own'd Commun on with the Church of England Blondel their best Advocate for Presbyterian Parity does yet condemn Separation from Bishop as Schismatical and expresly * Praef. ad Apol. p. 59. declares that Aerius was therefore an Heretick because he asserted That separation was to be made from those who admitted any difference between Bishops and Presbyters But their approving of Episcopal Government and coadmning Separation from it as Schismatical has been so often so irrefragably * Ibid p. 47 and Bramhall's Replication to affirm the Bishop of Chalcedon p. 164 of his Works proved that there can be no longer any Controversie about it But on the other side the present Nonconformists do make Episcopal Government the chief reason of their Separation and condemn it as unlawful and Antichristian which no Resormed Church or Divine that we know did ever before them and this is certainly a very material difference between them 2. The Ordination of Presbyters withou Bishops in those Foreign Churches has been generally defended by the plea of Necessity thus it has been defended by some of the Foreign †Bishop Hall's and Mortons Bcoks in defence of Eiscopacy Archbishop Bramhall in his Sup. Dr. Durell's Church Government Saywell's Evangelical and Catholick Unity and lately in the Judgment of Foreign reformed Divines Divines themselves and thus by many * As Downham Mason Field Andrews and leately by Dr. Sherlock in his Vindication of the defence of Dr. Still Divines of our own Church As their circumstances were it was impossible for them to have Bishops and therefore they wanted them out of invincible necessity whereas our Presbyterians are uncapal le of that Plea they reject the Authority of Bishops and Ordain in opposition to them and therefore it is evident they are under no necessity and consequently their Orders may be thought in ufficient without impeaching the
Canons and Separation for them is alike unlawful He observes further that there were several Liturgies allowed even in the Roman Communion and that this Branch of the Churches Liberty was taken away by the Council of Trent and here in England by the Reformation And what was that Liberty which was thus abridged Not an Arbitrary Liberty in every Pastor of a Parish to use what Form he pleased but the use of different Rules of Prayer that were before prescribed and practiced in different National Churches and Dioceses The different Offices in England as those for instance after the use of Sarum and York did agree in Substance they had the same Forms of Prayer and differed for the most part in Rubricks and Ritualities only and when our first Reformers established an uniform Order it was not esteemed an Encroachment upon Christian Liberty neither are Unity Order and Uniformity the less valuable because Councils and Popes were for them 5. His next Reason is an Invective against the Introducers of Liturgies and in the midst of it he defines ex Cathedrd That the Liturgies which bear the great Names of S. James Peter Mark Basil and Chrysostome are known Forgeries That they are ent rely genuine as they are now extant is affirmed by no one but that they are Forgeries quite throughout and especially the Liturgy ascribed to St. James is so far from being known that we may safely affirm that it is impossible to know it And the contrary opinion of so Learned men as See Falkners Vindication p. 149. Baronius Ddurantus Leo Allatius Sixtus Senensis Possevinus Pamelius and others among the Romanists Dr. Hammond Thorudike Falkner Casaubon Salmotius Durel and some other Protestants will bear me out in affirming it But behold the Modesty Charity and Humility of this Minister 'T was the Ignorance Carnality Sloth and Laziness of the Clergy together with their Pride which first brought in and imposed Service-Books on the Churches When the Church began to be an Harlot when Bishops were not Silver Trumpets but tinkling Cymbals c. when in Councils as of Ephesus and Chalcedon they profest they did literas ignorare and could not write their own Names to confirm their Canons then came in our Liturgies Thus far the Son of Thunder but I take heart again for find it is brutum fulmen and our Prayer-Books are in no danger from it The Falshood and weakness of this Raillery is Schol. Hist part 2d p. 276. sufficiently exposed already and it is impossible such stuff should impose upon any but the greatest Bigots of Fanaticism Ignorance Carnality Pride and Laziness brought in Liturgies he might as well have said that Burglary or Vsury did introduce them if Pride and Ignorance brought in Liturgies why are they not read in Conventicles for In his Cure of Divisions Mr. Baxter hath complained to all the World that the People who frequent them for their Ignorance Injudiciousness Pride and Self-conceitedness are their Grief and their Shaine and certainly we may believe him But if Pride and Ignorance brought in Litugies we remember well then Entbusiasm Sacriledge and Rebellion did eject them We have Preface to Dr. Still Vnreasonableness of Separation had convincing Proofs that the Jesuits first brought extempore Prayers into England those Missionaries of Antichristian were the first Teachers of them and when Presbyterian Ministers were Trumpets to Rebellion when their Sermons and their Arms brought the best of Kings to the Scaffold when the Church was rent in pieces with damnable Doctrines when Jeroroham's Priests profaned the Pulpits and the Altars when the Stalls and the Shambles were the chief Schools of the Prophets when all Religion was vanished into Cant and Blasphemy and Nonsense were entitled to the Holy Spirit then were Liturgies first abolished and extempore Prayers first universally practised in any Christian Nation in the World But Liturgies he says were brought in when the Church began to be an Harlot Smectymnius * Answer to Remonst p. 7. derived their Pedigree from Three Canons of the Laodicean Carthaginian and Milevitan Councils and thus they are allowed to be in use about 1300 years since and has the Church been a Whore for so many Ages has she forsaken her Spouse so long has she renounced Christ Jesus for 13 Centuries together Yes and much longer too when we dispute about Episcopacy for when we come to that Controversie the Mystery of iniquity was working even in the times of the Apostles and the Church did then begin to be an Harlot also so little do some men care how they wound our common Christianity and condemn the whole Catholick Church of Christ so they may but vent their Malice against Liturgies and Bishops But because he cannot deny that Liturgies were introduced in the 4th and 5th Centuries he particularly Rallies upon the Ignorance of the Bishops of those Ages And were those ever reputed ignorant Ages when was the Church better enlightned with Learning than when Chrysostome Basil Nyssene Nahianhen Epiphanius the two Cyrills Lactantius Ambrose Jerome Augustine Isidore Pelus Theodoret Vincentius Gennadius and many others were the Luminaries of it But among these Gnosticks even the Mechanicks and the Women have been thought more able Divines than the Fathers and indeed if Ability is to be measured by the Gift of Prayer as they call it they may vye Learning even with their own Teachers for their most ignorant Zealots do often pray with as much fluency of words with as much pretence to the Spirit and which is the main Gift with as much Confidence as the ablest Ministers among them But the Bishops of Ephesus and Chalcedon could not write their Names and Mr. Clarkson indeed produces the Subscriptions of Three or four to prove it And to * Schol. Hist pt 2. p. 300. this it is replied That those Subscriptions are of no credit as being suspected of Forgery but suppose there were four Bishops among 830 in those Councils who were so illiterate is it not a very impudent Calumny to say indefinitely as he does That the Bishops of Ephesus and Chalcedon could not write their Names to confirm their Canons might it not as well be said that the Assembly of Divines at Westminster were Independants because there were Five of that Sect among them or that the Nonconformists Ministers of this Age have generally died as Traitors because Two or three were executed for being in Monmouths Rebellion His last Reason concerns the imposing of Liturgies and here he denies not the Lawfulness of them but after he has begged the belief of his Followers That they were not used in the Primitive times for many Hundred of years he pretends to prove the unlawfulness of imposing them Now one would think it a very plain Case that things lawful in themselves may be lawfully enjoyned by lawful Authority but this Minister is of another opinion and the only Reason he gives for the unlawfulness of prescribing Forms is this
to the Word of God and the same in effect which had been for 1500 Years in the Church of Christ and let any one now consider whether our first Reformers were not fully satisfied with the Liturgy But he adds they ingenuously confess they came short of the Primitive Discipline and that the Reformation should have been carried on higher if the Times would have given leave They confess they could not revive the ancient Discipline of Lent and they desired a higher Conformity to the Primitive Church not in relation to the Hierarchy and Liturgy but in the strictness of Mens Lives and the impartial severity of publick Penance Yet says he they had then their Government by Bishops Archbishops Chancellors Archdeacons c. as we have at this day They had so and were fully satisfied with it and there were no Protestants in that Age that separated from it Archdeacon Philpot Archbishop Cranmer and several Bishops our first Reformers and Martyrs approved that Government and lived and died in the Administration of it they did not permit it only as Moses did Divorces to the Jews because of the hardness of their Hearts as this Minister does falsely insinuate but they never intimated the least Suspition of its unlawfulness and they plainly * Preface to the Book of Ordin 〈◊〉 declared Episcopacy to be evidently founded upon Scripture and Apostolical Institution But these Reformers and Martyrs were ignorant of those things which are now known unto Women and Artificers poor Men they were under a dispensation of Darkness and the Gospel-Light of Separation was totally hidden from them Secondly he observes That it is more than 1â—00 Years since these good Men recorded their Desires of Restoring the said Discipline and is it enough say he that the Church carries her good Wishes with her through all Generations Enough certainly while the Restoring that Discipline is impossible Our first Reformers could not revive it because the universal and incorrigible Wickedness of that Age could not endure the Yoke of Primitive Penance and are scandalous Offenders now less numerous or loss incorrigible If the Reformers are excusable much more our present Governors by how much the present Age is more untractable and more obstinate against the Bands of Discipline Is it possible now to reduce Offenders to the Primitive Humiliations the Fastings and Watchings the Sackcloth and Ashes the Prostration at the Church Doors and the other Austerities of Ancient Penance Will any of the Dissenter's submit to this Discipline as a satisfaction for their Schism If such an impracticable Discipline were imposed these Ministers would presently cry out Popery encourage all Offenders to oppose it and set open the Doors of their Conventicles to receive them such an Imposition would be vain and pernicious it would scandalize the weak and alienate the obstinate and serve only to empty our Churches and crowd the Conventicles and though for that reason they may desire it yet the Church is not obliged to prescribe a Remedy that will make the Physician contemptible and the Patient incurable The restoring of that Salutary Discipline as the reviving of Primitive Piety may be always wish'd for but perhaps will never be attained but the licentious Wickedness of the present Times the general Contempt of all the Censure of the Church and the manifold Schisms with which it is rent in pieces do make it now impossible and if it were established it is not to be hoped that the obstinacy of the Dissenters would be subdued nor their Aversion to the Church be reconciled by it I intend not to follow this Minister through his tedious Digression about Reformation and much less to ramble with him as far as the Temple at Jerusalem to which forsaking his Text and his Purpose he undertakes a Pilgrimage and returns with these wise Observations * P. 22 23. That the Temple was built upon Ornan 's Barn that this Ornan was of Princely descent because he had a Princely Mind and that Temple-Work is hard Work 't is Threshing Thus after a long Journey he brings back nothing but Apes and Peacocks as himself observes of some who ramble into the Indies These are the Saving Doctrines for which this Thresher is admitted by his Hearers and since a Barn is his Delight may he never Thresh in the Houses of GOD nor profane those Sanctuaries that are consecrated to his Worship But I return to Reformation and in Answer to his Harrangue about it I desire it may be remembred 1. That this Minister does not seek the same Reformation which was sought by Christ and his Apostles for Presbytery is not the Gospel neither is Extirpation of Bishops the Propagation of Christianity 2 Reformation is very good in it self and the Churchmen are for it much more than the Dissenters but they cannot be convinced that the removing Decency Order and an Apostolical Government is Reformation they know that this is the usual Vizard to disguise Sacrilege Avarice and Ambition and that the Sectaries endeavour not to reform the Church but to destroy it that they may seize on its Inheritance and withall they cannot but reflect upon the experience which we have had of Sectarian Reformation when Prelatical Government was reformed into no Government and a sober Liturgy into Enthusiasm and 39 Articles into infinite Heresies that could scarce be parallell'd in all the ancient Catalogues and in stead of the Power of Godliness there ensued such an Inundation of Wickedness as no Age could parallel This was observed by the * For instance by Edwards in his Gangraina Presbyterians themselves and an ingenious Foreigner who then resided at London made this Observation upon those Times * A Letter of a Noble Venetian to Ca. Barbarino Translated and Printed 1648. p. 19. one of the Fruits says he of this Blessed Parliament and of these two Sectaries Presbyterians and Independants is that they have made more Atheists than I think there are in all Europe besides and if we judge of the Tree by its Fruits and desire to see no more such Reformations have they reason to blame us for it 3. It should be considered that no pretence of Reformation can justifie Separation from a Church in which no sinful Terms of Communion are imposed There is no Church in the World which is free from all Corruptions in Doctrine Worship Discipline or Manners and if the want of some Reformation be a just reason for Renouncing Communion the Unity of the Church is nothing but a Notion and it will be lawful for every Man to separate from all the Churches in the World for it is only the Triumphant Church in Heaven which is perfectly without spot and blemish Defect of Discipline and purer Communion were the pretences of the Donatist and Novatian Schisms but they were condemn'd by the Catholick Church and * Aug. con Parmen Epis lib. 2 3. Tom. 7. S. Austin proves at large against the Donatists that Corruption in Discipline or Manners
cannot make the Communion of such a Church sinful nor justifie Separation and hence any one may discern how impertinent to this purpose are all this Ministers Clamours about Reformation for though the pursuit of it may be commeadable and the Church may need it yet it is evident his Nonconformity and Separation cannot be justified by it for there is no Church upon Earth which needs not Reformation and if Men may separate where they see any thing amiss this Principle will carry them to a Separation from all Christian-Society and that is a plain Demonstration of the Faishood of it I have now considered and weigh'd all his Pleas for Nonconformity and having found them light and deceitful in the Ballance having sufficiently prov'd them to be false and fallacious I conclude that the Nonconformists were not persecuted for Righteousness sake and that his * P. 24. virulent Reproaches of the Church of England in Prophetick Language are no better than Blasphemy and a contumelious Prophanation of Gods word by making it the Instrument of his Spite and Animosity And one Ressection more will make it yet more evident that they did not suffer for Righteousness it is this that tho his Pleas be allowed to have Truth and Reason in them yet they will not justifie the Dissenters Separation Every one knows that these Ministers were not punished for not conforming as Ministers but for setting up Conventicles tho they could not Act as publick Ministers yet they might have adher'd to the Communion of the Church and then they would have been in no danger of Persecution they suffered for their Separation and if all this Ministers Objections will not justifie it they will not justifie their Sufferings for it The Plea of Reformation I have shewn already to be insufficient and it is evident that Lay Dissenters are unconcerned in all the others they were neither ablig'd to renounce the Covenant nor the Lawfulness of Resistance nor the Ordination of Presbyters nor to declare their Assent and Consent to the Common-prayer and this Minister himself denies not the Lawfulness of their joyning in it Thus he hath left all his Congregation without any defence and it remains that they suffered not for Righteousness but for an unrighteous and indefensible Separation Let us see whether the same Objections will justifie his own Separation Suppose the Oath of Non-resistance to be unlawful was that a term of our Communion was it required of all that come to our Prayers or Sacraments and might he not have adhered to the Communion of our Church without swearing or declaring it be it granted next that Reordination is unlawful to be comply'd with was that likewise any term of Communion in Worship and Sacraments And if they could not Preach as Ministers could they not Communicate as Laymen and is the unlawful silencing of a Minister to be revenged with Schisin The next point is the use of the Liturgy and is there any thing unlawful in all our Prayers if he cannot Consent to some Passages in the Rubrick or in a Creed that is very Seldom recited yet there is nothing sinful in our ordinary Worship and the occasional Communion allow'd by the Presbyterians themselves is a clear Confession of it And Lastly as to the Covenant if it must not be renounced cannot they worship God in our Churches without renouncing it or does it at all oblige them to Separation Mr. * Defence of Cure p. 68. Baxter has prov'd that the Covenant binds them to Communion with our Church because it binds to Reformation according to the Example of the best reformed Churches but all reformed Churches in Christendom do commonly profess to hold Communion with the English Churches in the Liturgy if they come amongst us where it is used therefore says he it seems to me to be Perjury and Covenant breaking to refuse Communion with the Churches that use the Liturgy as a thing meerly on that Account unlawful Thus Mr. Baxter and these Concessions are very remarkable that Separation on the Account of our Liturgy is unlawful that it is a breach of their Covenant and is condemned by all Reformed Churches and what new Pleas can this Minister produce to defend his Separation Will he urge the Pretence of necessity to Preach the Gospel and that therefore he was forced to separate because he could not do it in our Churches But if he was under the same necessity the Apostle was then he has surely the Commission and Authority of an Apostle but if he hath no Commission from God let me use the words of an antient * Mr. Giffard cited in the Vnreasonableness of Separ p. 80. Nonconformist it is the Devil that hath sent him forward to Preach against the Authority of the Church and the Prohibition of the Christian Magistrate In short they have neither the same Commission as the Apostles neither is there the same necessity of their Preaching for the Gospel is now planted in this Kingdom it is Preached in our Churches and it would not be extinguished if this Minister and his Brethren to use his own Seraphical Expressions were all them Dumb Dogs or Breasts without Milk or Bells without Clappers And withal it is here to be observed that it is evidently proved * Ibid p. 1. sect 8 9 10 11 17. that according to the Doctrine of the most learned Nonconformists of former times both their Separating and their Preaching are absolutely unlawful The Sum of all is this the Laws against the Dissenters were made for the security of the Church and State the Execution of them was not so cruel as is pretended their persecuting of the Government did extort it the Presbyterians themselves have always condemned Toleration they do ever persecute whenever they have Power this Minister declaims only against Persecution for the Truth but all his Pretences to Truth appear to be false and groundless and if they were admitted would not justifie Separation and therefore the result is this That his Call to Humiliation is an unreasonable Clamour and that it ought to have been directed to the Presbyterians themselves and especially to their Ministers who have been the most grievous Persecutors who have crubified Christ Jesus by dividing hith have torn his Body into pieces have separated from the whole Catholick Church under pretence of Reforming the Reformed Religion have Reproached and weaken'd it have been always undermining that Church which is the Bulwark of it have bound themselves by impious Oaths and very lately ebtred into an Alliance with the Papists to destroy it And lastly have suffered obstinately for an Unrighteous Chuse condemned by Reason and Revelation by the Universal Church of all Ages and by all the Reformed Churches in the World Having now Answer'd the whole Design if this Pamphlet and all that looks like Argument in it it would be superfluous to examine the Remainder and to reflect particularly on his malicious Hints and Intimations his Cant and Shtyr his abuse of Scripture his Uses and his Prayers which he Recommends to his People and wherein he Feaches them that Vile and Divilish Practice of turning Prayers into Libels and instructs them to Pray much worse than the Pharisee to commend themselves to God †See p. 27. As followers of the Lamb and the Lords Anointed and to accuse the Church-men before him as Dumb Dogs and Wolves and bloudy Persecutors Thus do they fill up the measure of their Fathers who sin their Prayers taught the People to Speak evil of Dignities and to Curse the best of Kings as a Bloudy Persecuting obdurate Tyrant Yet I cannot but take notice of his insolent Triumph for the Establishment of Presbytery in Scotland Now says he is fulfilled that which was spoken by the Prophet The Land of Zebulun c. The People which sate in Darkness saw great Light and to them which sat in the Region and Shadow of Death Light is sprung up And was this Prophecy never fulfilled till now It Presbytery the Messias whose Light is there foretold Did Nailor himself ever utter more Abominable Blasphemy Has the Virgin Daughter of Scotland proclaim'd a new Gospel which was not Preach'd before Is it the Evangelium Armatum or the Gospel of Xaverius or of the Whore of Babylon Hither to I thought that Episcopal Churches might have the Light of the Gospel but a new Light hath now discovered that they are all in Darkness and that all Christian Churches for 1500 Years together have been in the Regions of Death without Christ without the Light of the Gospel and consequently without Salvation One thing more I must observe that the Sermons and Writings of these Ministers do make it as clear as the Sun that all the projects of Vnïon with that Party are absolutely impracticable The Presbyterians are the only Dissenters that are thought capable of Comprehension but to take them into our Church we must cast out our Liturgy and our Bishops we must submit our Necks to the Iron Yoke of Presbytery in short we must destroy our Church if we will have an Vnion with them no Alterations will content them they who have they who have not taken the Covenant do think themselves bound to extirpate Prelacy and to Reform according to the model of Scotland they desire no Vnion and despise it when Treaties of Peace are proposed they make themselves ready to Battel their Hostility is Irreconcileable and the total Destruction of our Church is the sum of all their Endeavours and Designs But Oh! That our Lives were as good as our Religion and our Manners pure and primitive as the Constitution of our Church for then would God cover is under his Wings and he that hath deliver'd and doth deliver would still deliver us Our Church we know is Founded on a Rock let us depart from Iniquity and her Foundation shall stand sure and the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it FINIS
so that they were ejected not for Conscience but Intrusion whether they were just 1600 is not worth enquiry but that they all suffer'd for Conscience cannot be so clear as he pretends for I suppose neither he nor we can know the Consciences of 1600 without something of Omniscience but that all the 1600 did suffer by long Imprisonment is an unconscionable overlashing and 't is as clear as the Sun that it is a notorious Falshood He adds That many of them have dyed for want of natural Bread and that both the Shepheards and the Flocks have been starved What! Have their Ministers died with Famine Have whole Congregations perished for want of Bread This is certainly all Fiction and Romance or if you will the Rhetorick of common beggars who with doleful Complaints of Starving cheat the People into Compassion I Grant That many Families of Dissenters have been distress'd by Penal Laws thô I think he can never make it out that they were many thousands But the conclusion of this Tragedy is beyond measure extravagant If says be the Sufferings of our Brethren were written at large as the Sufferings of the Saints at other times have been Mr. Fox his Book of Martyrs would be but an Enchiridion in comparison of it That Work is an account of the Sufferings of Christians from the Crucisixion of our Saviour to the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and as Voluminous as it is it has not bulk enough for the Dissenters Sufferings since the Restauration nay it is but a little Epitome in comparison They alas have suffered more in 30 years than the whole Church in 1600 and the Martyrologies of the whole Catholick Church may be infinitely exceeded by the Acts and Monuments of a few little Conventicles One would think that many Myriads of Dissenters had suffered Martyrdom That every individual Church of England-man had destroyed as many as Dioclesian and that all England had been a Sea of Blood for 30 years together when in the mean time not one of them suffered death for his Religion not many of them were ruined in their Estates and pecuniary punishments were the only persecution of almost all of them Yet he has the Confidence to say * P. 11. That the Church of England had taken into her hand the Bloody Club of Cain to Martyr the Dissenters that his Weapon was a Club is revealed to him by * P. 4. Bucheltzerus to whom the Cabala was deriv'd but that the Church of England has used it against the Dissenters is the revelation of Beelzebub for the Father of Lyes can be his only Author for it Let him name but one Dissenter that has been martyr'd by the Church and he shall have my Licence to revile her with all the odious Names from Coin to the Apocalyptick Whore in Scripture But if that be impossible he may still revile if he please but I think he will be no where believed but in his Conventicle and his Patmos so the place of his retreat is * Ep. Ded. called by the fifth Evangelist that he may be paralell'd to one of the former But this magnifying of Sufferings is an old Artifice of Dissenters so did their Ancestors the Donatists as may be seen in St. Austin and so did the Popish Priests their late Brethren and Allies in the time of Queen Elizabeth as may be seen in Creswell's Philopater and the Books of Parsons Behold how one of them exclaimeth Where are now the old Tyrants of the World Nero Decius Dioclesian Maxentius and the rest of the great Persecutors of the Christious Where is Genserick and Hunricus with their Arrian Hereticks Alluding to the Persecutions of the State here as infinitely beyond them This was just such another Outcry about Persecution as this Ministers And how did the States-men of those Times apologize for their Severity * See a Treatise of the Lord Burluigh Entitled The Execution of Justice in England for Maintenance of publick Peace The sum of thier defence was this That what they did was necessary to the Preservation of the State and that their Treasons and Seditions occasion'd the hard Laws against them And Will not the same defence serve to justifie the Laws against the Dissenters The severest * As the 1 Eliz. c. 2.23 Eliz. c. 1.35 Eliz. c. 1. Laws and the severest Proceedings against them were in the Time of Queen Elizabeth they were then suspended deprived imprison'd banish'd and some of them even * Barrow and Greenwood executed for their scandalous Writings and the ground of these Proceedings may be learnt from the Queen her self in the Speech of the Lord Keeper Puckering to the Parliament * Transeribed by Dr. Pierce from his own hand Writing and Published in his Discovery against Mr. Baxter an 1659. p. 109. which was delivered by her Command and Direction There he tells them That they were commanded by her Majesty to give no ear to the Sollicitations of the Puritans of whom he declares It may be doubted whether they or the Jesuits do offer more danger or be more speedily to be repressed and this Reason is there given for it because they publish in their Books and teach in all their Conventicles sundry Opinions not only dangerous to the Realm but also Derogatory to her sacred Majesty and her Crown and by Separation of themselves from the Vnity of their fellow Subjects and by abusing the sacred Authority of their Prince they do joyn with the Jesuits in opening the Door and preparing the Way to the Spanish Invasion that is threatned against the Realm Thus far the Queen her self by the Mouth of her Lord Keeper and so effectual was this Speech that the Parliament then passed the Act of the 35 Eliz. the severest against the Dissenters in the whole Body of our Laws But a larger account of the true Reasons of those hard Laws against the Papists and Dissenters may be seen in a * It is printed at large in Dr. Burnet's Hist of the Reform par 2 lib. 3. p. 420. Letter of Sir Francis Walsingham her Secretary to Monsieur Chiroy a Frenchman The Preservation of the State against their Seditious Practices is there assign'd as the true Cause of those Severities And as to the Puritans he concludes that after they had been a great while tolerated When they desended into that vile and base Means of Defacing the Government of the Church by ridiculous Pasquils when they began to make many Subjects in doubt to take Oaths which is one of the fundamental Points of Justice in all Places when they began both to vaunt of their Strength and Number of their Partizans and to use Comminations that their Cause would prevail through uproar and violence then it appeared to be no more Deal no more Canscience but meer Faction and Division and therefore though the State were compell'd to hold somewhat a harder hand to restrain them than before yet was it with as great a moderation as
must not only exterminate Homoonsios Procession and eternal Generation but we must burn all our Bibles except the Greek and Hebrew because they are not properly the Word of God but Words that signifie by the Agreement of Men and if the original Words of Scripture may be Translated by Words of humane Institution why may not a Doctrine of Scripture be so expressed also Secondly as many of the Roman Church have absolved the Greeks from damnable Error in this Point so it is notorious that the Writers of our Church have always vindicated them from it and therefore it cannot be imagined that our Church in this Creed should pronounce them damn'd and it must be manifest injustice to put such Interpretations upon the Creeds of a Church as have heen ever disclaimed by the chiefest Writers of it Thirdly These damnatory Clauses must be understood to refer only to the Belief of the Doctrines contained in the Creed and not to every particular Word and Expression in it The great Fundamental Doctrine which in this Creel is called the Catholick Faith is this That we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Vnity and of this Faith it is declared That they who keep it not shall perish everlastingly And they who believe this viz. That the Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three Persons and me God do believe all that follows in the Creed which contains nothing but what is Essential to the Unity and Distinction of the Three Persons and therefore however they who believe the Trinity may scruple some Words and Expressions in this Creed or understand nothing of them yet as long as they believe the Doctrines they are not included in the Sentence of perishing everlastingly Faith belongs not unto Words but Things and though no one shall be damn'd for a Word yet it is no uncharitableness to say after our Saviour that he who believeth not shall be damn'd neither is it any Popery to conclude that if the Belief of the Trinity be necessary to Baptism it is necessary to Salvation and if this Minister be of another mind let him answer the Arguments that have been * Dr. Sher. Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity lately urged for the necessity of that Belief and let him also satisfie the World if he can why the Athanasian Creed which the Presbyterians appointed to be read in Churches in their Directory drawn up at the Savoy an 1661 should be afterwards a Reason of their Nonconformity But he goes on with his Scruples about the Matter of Consent and declines to speak of the Ceremonies the Cross the Surplice and behold the Reason because all know they came from Rome and when Rome falls they will fall too This is an Art full of Venome to traduce by odious Insinuations that which cannot be opposed by just Objections It appears from * Orig. in Ps 38. Hom. 2. Origen and others that the Cross in Baptism and from †See Hooker lib. 5. rect 29. S. Chrysostome and S. Jerome that such a Garment as the Surplice were of Ancient Usage their Antiquity is far enough beyond Popery and they come no more from Rome than do our Creeds and our Bibles and if this Minister hath had a Revelation in his Patmos that they shall fall with Rome we are foretold that in the last Times false Prophets shall arise and must not take his Dream for Vision Next en passant he upbraids us with our praying for King James a profest Papist that he might persevere in the Faith but there is no such Prayer in our Liturgy and if there were seeing the Papists are Christians and believe all that is necessary to Salvation for I hope he will not leap into the Throne of Judgement and pronounce them damn'd why may we not pray for their Perseverance in the Faith not the Faith of a Papist but the Faith of a Christian that will suffice to save them And now after these little Skirmishes we enter into the Battel and must encounter the Reasons which he has mustered up against reading the imposed Form of Common Prayer And here pray judge between the Church of England and the Nonconformists First he affirms that during the Apostles Times and two or three Hundred Years after there was no Liturgy used nor imposed neither did they direct for the drawing up of any and inforcing it by Penal Laws Here are many things jumbled together which must be separated Penal Laws imposing set Forms Directions for them by the Apostles and the Primitive use of them As for Penal Laws the Presbyterians themselves allow them and their Directory is as accountable for them as our Liturgy imposing to be considered hereafter and as to Directions for composing Forms out of many that are urged I shall select these three Considerations 1. Seeing there is convincing * See Dr. Flammond's View of the Directory Selden on Eutichyus p. 83. Dr. Lightfoot Vol. 2. p. 158. and Dr. Comber's Scholastical History p. 3. the Examiner of Dr. Combet p. 4. does question the Solidity of their Proofs but yet declines to undertake them Evidence that the Jewish Church had a fixed Liturgy and therefore both our Saviour and his Apostles who frequented their Synagogues did certainly joyn in it and not one Iota is to be found in the Gospel that condemns it from this Silence and that Practice we may certainly conclude that the use of fixed Liturgies is lawful that the joyning in them is warranted by their Example and that separation from a Church upon that account is absolutely unlawful 2. Our Saviour himself composed a Form of Prayer for his Disciples and in so doing hath * See M. Mede on Matt. 6 9. commended a set Form of Prayer unto His Church He enjoyn'd them when they prayed to say Our Father c. which is as plain a Prescription of a Form as any Words can express It is †Clarkson 's Disc conc Liturgies p. 3. confessed that this Form was anciently used in the Church and this Primitive Use may be very reasonably ascribed to that Prescription especially when we have so plain a Testimony as that of * Tert. de Orat. ca. 1. Tertullian Novis Discipulis Christus novam Orationis Formam determinavit i. e. Christ hath prescribed a new Form of Prayer to his new Disciples And therefore from the Institution nay from the Use of that Prayer which is confessedly ancient we may certainly conclude that a Form of Prayer is lawful in it self that it is useful and edifying that a Prayor is not therefore unlawful or inexpedient because it is a Form and that the Prescription or Use of a Form in a Church will not justifie separation from it 3. All the Directions which our Saviour or His Apostles have given for the Performance of the Duty of Prayer may be apply'd to Forms of Prayer suppose a Prayer to be exactly composed according to those Directions may not such a Prayer
That it is a restraint upon the Gifts of such Ministers as have Ability to compose better Prayers themselves and this he illustrates by the trite instances of Trespass Offering and of a Law obliging those who are not Lame and Impotent to make use of Crutches But 1. All this is impertinent to the Dispute before us for the Ministers in our Church are not restrained from the Exercise of their own Abilities in publick Prayers they may use their own conceived Prayers in the Pulpit and the Fifty fifth Canon as explained by the general Practise is an allowance of it and therefore if the Exercise of Abilities be not excluded in our Church the pretence of restraint can never justifie a Separation from it Secondly The Objection is grounded on these false Suppositions that God is better served by conceived Prayers than by a publick Liturgy that the Church is less difyed by it that it is unlawful to lay a restraint upon private Gifts and that it is lawful to separate for better Edification and unless all these Propositions here precariously supposed to be true and I think he will find it impossible to prove them then his whole reasoning and the Crutches he has brought to prop it and the Pidgeons Lambs and Bullocks which attend it are plainly unserviceable to him His Pidgeons and Crutches are designed to intimate that a Form of Prayer is a cheap impotent unedifying way of Worship in Comparison of their extempore Effusions but this he should have proved for he knows we assert the contrary we think that Prayers are not more acceptable because they are inconsiderate or of private Composure that the Framers of our Liturgy were as well gifted as Dissenters that the Church may be better edifyed by the Spirit of the Church than by the Spirit of a Member and that those Prayers are fittest for the People which they are before acquainted with and wherein they are secured from Presumption and Impertinence Blasphemy and Nonsense He should have proved likewise that the Exercise of private Gifts cannot lawfully be restrained by publick Authority we know that even the miraculous Gifts of the Spirit were subject to restraint and we have an express Rule That the Spirit of the Prophets must be subject to the Prophets There is no Law no Reason nor Revelation against such a restraint on the contrary both Reason and Religion do require that the use of private Abilities be regulated by publick Order and that the vain Ostentation of them be restrained * Epist 87. ad Prot. Aug. Calvin has expresly declared for the necessity of prescribing Forms To remedy the simplicity and unskilfulness of some to testifie the Consent of all the Churches in the same Prayers and to prevent the desultory Lightness of those who affect Novelty In short all the Foreign reformed Churches do either use or approve of prescribed Liturgies the old Nonconformists always allowed them and even the Presbyterian Directory prescribed every thing but Words and if private Spirits may be restrained to Sense and Matter why not to Form and Language also Lastly Admitting that such restraint is unlawful and that conceived Prayers are more edifying than Forms he should then have proved that it is lawful to separate for better Edification The antient Puritans thought otherwise and so did the Presbyterian Assembly in their Controversie with the Independents See Vnreasonableness of Separation pt 1. and so both Reason Experience and Revelation do convince us that the restraint of private Gifts will not justifie the dividing of Christ that the silenceing an able Minister is not so mischievous as Schism that the Pretences of better Edification is the fruitful Parent of endless Separations and that the Church which is in the House of the living God cannot be built or edified by being torn in pieces and destroyed Thus have I considered at large his Discourse about Liturgies it is the principal Fort and Bulwark of his Cause and the slight defences which remain will be easily demolished 4. The Point that follows next is the abjuring of the solemn League and Covenant as in it self an unlawful Oath and imposed on the Subjects of the Realm against the known Laws and Liberties of this Kingdom And is it not extreamly modest in these Men to Quarrel at the State for requiring them to renounce an Impious and Rebellious Covenant was it reasonable to admit such men into the Offices of the Church as were sworn and obstinately resolved to extirpate the whole Government of it But let us consider the Reasons which he urges against the abjurating that Covenant 1. There are many learned Preachers that never redd a Law Rook they know nothing of Manna Charta Bracton Littleton Cook Common Law or Statute Law is it reasonable then to require them to declare the Covenant is contrary to known Laws and Liberties which they are utterly unacquainted with Indeed there is no necessity that a good Preacher should be an able Lawyer and much less is it necessary to read over a Lawyers Library to be convinced that the Covenant was illegal can none but profound Lawyers know that Felony and Burglary are against our Laws and Liberties Does not every sensible man know that the impofit on of an Oath without Law to warrant it is contrary to it and that nothing is Law which has not the concurrence of King Lords and Commons to enact it have these Ministers never heard of the * 3 Car. 1. c. 1. S. 2. Petition of Right which declares all others without Law to be against our Laws and Liberties Or can they tell us by what Law the Covenant was established was it not imposed without the Concurrence of the King and against his express Command had they never heard of the Oaths and Laws about the Kings Supremacy and is not the * Vid. indicium Acad Oxoniensis de solrum Freder p. 8. 14. Cotenant plainly Contradictory to it and Lastly do they not know that this Abjuration is required by an Act of Parliament and what need then of consulting Law Books about a Covenant for which there is no President in them when the Legislative Power it self has declared the unlawfulness of it it is manifest this Ignorance is affected time was when they were so well acquainted with Laws and Liberties that they preached the People into a Rebellion for them in the Covenant it self they swore expresly * Artic. 3. to preserve the Priviledges of Parliament and the Liberties of the Kingdom if then they knew those Liberties can they now be unacquainted with them or is it not as lawful to abjure as to swear without knowledge Article 1. They swore to preserve the Religion of the Church of Scotland in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government and was there one in a Thousand of the Covenanters that had a competent knowledge of these particulars How could it be imagined that he common People should know them and yet they never scrupled to exhort
signifies only fervency of Spirit when it is appled to the People but he thinks it a very plain Case that a Minister cannot properly be said to pray to the utmost of his Ability when he doth not pray to the utmost of his Ablity and may not the same thing be said of the People also If the Minister use a Form may he not likewise pray with all his might or as well as he is able and is not this a plain Equivocating upon the word Ability take it first for fervency and then for a faculty of composing and the Contradiction is solved and the Fallacy Transparent The other Proof is out of Tert. Apol. cap. 1. Tertullian sine Monitore quia de pectore oramus we pray without a Monitor because we pray out of the Heart But this can be no Proof against a Form of Prayer sor 1. They who joyn with a Minister that prays Extempore do pray as much with a Monitor and have a Prayer dictated to them as much as if they joyned in a prescribed Liturgy And 2. Praying out of the Heart Schol. Hist part 1. â—p 46. c. may signifie either saying a Prayer by Heart or secret mental Prayer without words or praying heartily sincerely and affectionately de anima innocenti de Spiritis Sancto as Tertullian a little after with a prayer proceeding from an innocent Soul and the Holy Spirit moving and exciting it These interpretations are probable and consistent with the use of Liturgies and consequently from this passage no Argument can be drawn against them Yet from thence this Minister takes occasion to vent his Malice against Liturgies and to reproach them as an heathenish way of Praying Now if our Saviour prescribed a Form to his Disciples and it is impossible for him to prove the the contray then this reproach is Blasphemy might not an Atheist say as well That Prayer it self is an Heathenish practice or a Quietest Comment in Entychium p. 55. taht vocal Prayer is a Heathenish way of praying Mr. Selden thought it probable that the Heathens learnt to use set Forms from the Example of the Jewish Church and he cites Authorities to prove it and View of the Directory Dr. Hammond produces out of Plato and Alexander ab Alex. these two Reasons of that practice which he thinks may pass Christian least evil things should be asked in stead of good and least any thing should be said Preposterously in their Prayers and therefore the practice of the Heathens is so far from being a prejudice to Liturgies that it is a solid Argument for them Whether either or both the Example of Gods Church or the Catholick reason of mankind were the Original of it the universal use of them among Jews and Christians and Heathens is an impregnable Proof of their expediency and can be ascribed to no other cause but the voice of God or Nature 3. He transcribes this Objection after Mr. Clarkson when the Christians were so numerous in Constantinople that it was thought necessaryto dispose of them in several Churche the Emperour Constantine Euseb de vita Const lib. 4. c. 35. 〈◊〉 to Eusebius for 50 Bibles for the use of those Churches but there is no mention of any one common Prayer Book Eusebius commends Constantine for observing in his Court the manner of the publick Service in the Church he first imoplyed his mind in the Meditation of the Scriptures and then with those who dwelt in his Palace he repeated Ibid cap. 17. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the authorized Prayers and it is known that he himself composed a Prayer which he Ibid cap. 19 20. prescribed to his Army And after such convincing Proofs can a Negative Argument be thought considerable enough to Ballance them Is it imaginable that Eusebius intended to give an exact Inventory of all that was provided for those Churches Constantine sends to Eusebius in Palastine for 50 Bibles probably because the best Copies might be there most easily procured does it therefore follow that no prayer Books were provided at Constantinople where it was easie to procure them and if we should send to Holland for Bibles when we want them would it not be as plain a Demonstration that we have no prayer Books in England Sue Schol. Hist part 2d p. 48. c. He pretends That when Forms of Prayer began to be used ever Church made use of what Forms they pleased and for this he cites Socrates Scholas lib. 5. the passage he intends is in Chap. 22. In which the Historian reflecting upon a division among the Novatians about the time of keeping Easter and shewing that antiently in different Churches it was observed at different times without breach of Communion does pass from thence to observe the diversity of other different usages in the Christan Chruches as the different Customs of keeping the Fasts before Easter the Marriages of the Clergy and the different Rites and times of Prayer and interpreting Scripture in many Provinces and Countreys The he tells us that the Novations in the Hollespont did not observe the same manner of praying with those of Constantinople and concludes that upon the whole every where and in all the Worships or Rites of Prayers you cannot find that they agree together two in the same thing and this is the passage they insist on But 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may signifie Ceremonies and Rites of Prayer for of different Ceremonies he was before Discoursing and then the Passage will be no proof of different Forms 2. Admitting that he speaks of different Prayers this diversity is not spoken of single Congregations but of several Nations and Dioceses such as for instance Jerusalem Cyprus Constantinople 3. A little after we have the reason fo this variety I judge says Socrates that the Bishops who presided in several Gages were the cause of it and how They transmitted their own Vsage as a Law to those who should come after them thus the cause of this diversity was not Liberty but Law and Prescription 4. Immediately after he vindicates the Nicene Council which had determined the Controversie about Easter and prescribed a certain time to keep it But diversity in praying and the different times of Easter are by this Historian proposed as things alike indifferent and if Church Authority may determine and prescribe in one case so it may also in the other Thus we have the great Example of the Nicene Fathers for prescribing and in stead of the Liberty they pretend to the Prescription of set Forms or Rights of Prayer to whole Dioceses and Nations In short the design of the Historian is to shew that there were divers Customs in the Church in Things indifferent and that the Communion of the Church ought not to be divided for them Now Custom is a Law introduced by Practice and Law is a restraint upon Liberty And if indifferent things may be prescribed by Custom they may be prescribed by