may always be had in it this seems abundantly sufficient for establishing an absolute obedience unto it in all its Decisions Because in submitting to all these for which submission we have good reason so long as we ought to think these our Superiors more wise learned and holy than our selves we are secured not to err in necessaries nor to be such blind followers of the blind as that both shall fall into the ditch But in our non-submission we may err in necessaries so long as our selves can make no certain distinction between things that are or are not so And again in such non-submission where Submission is due tho we happen to retain all truths still necessary to salvation yet here in dissenting and departing from the Church or such Superiors we shall stand guilty of Schisme and Breach of her Vnity or Communion and so on this account miscarry in our Salvation 10. That if the Church succeeding the Apostles had any Authority as to stating matters of Controversy it hath in all times an equal and which lays an equal Obligation on its Subjects And that several Controversies also are such as must be decided not by the former but the present Church As this Controversy What former Counsels are to be accounted General Legal Obligatory Or What is in any point debated the Sense of Antiquity c. 11. That all the Church's new Determinations or Injunctions in what ever time passed are never done but for some seeming to-her-cogent Reason or necessity thereof Viz. Upon some error and opposition to Doctrines or Practices formerly received or to some by-her-deemed necessary consequents thereof which error permitted against the latter must by the Sequel ruine the former And thus came justly the Athanasian Creed to be larger than the Apostles And the same authority hath the Church of later Ages to add more Articles to this Creed as the Church of that age had to add these to the Apostles Creed And here note concerning such necessary Consequents That if any Article of Faith is contained in Scripture so are all the necessary Consequents thereof And then that these also when known by us to be such are all necessary to be believed tho it is not necessary that also we know them to be such Nor necessary in assenting to all things which we know the Church hath determined or decreed that we know all her Decrees or that we may not inculpably hold something otherwise than the Church doth till we know what she holds therein 12. That our Obedience to our spiritual Superiors for any decisive authority in Controversies of Religion committed and delegated to them by our Lord is not duly performed so long as done with these limitations viz. Obeying and assenting to them so far as we think or judge their Decisions agreeing with God's Word Or so far as agreeing with right i.e. with our own Reason for only what seems to us right Reason we call so For indeed he that will first judge concerning these where they judge aright and only obey for so much submits not at all to theirs but his own judgment Qui obediunt propter judicium proprium sibi non aliis obediunt Nor herein do we more observe or conform to theirs than we would do to the advice of a Friend or Servant viz. Where we think these say right Some of these precedent Propositions well digested may stand you in some stead For fixing your obedience to Spiritual Superiors and in it practising Christian Humility and a Denial in what is most your self and preventing Disputation and Scepticism in things established and lastly for enjoying much quietness of mind §. 58. 5. Industry and a Vocation 5. Industry in some Vocation i. e. 1. Serving God and being instrumental to his providence in some Imployment for supplying those necessities Spiritual Civil or Natural which God hath ordained to be conveyed to men only by the ministry of men 2. Following it without digressions into other curious or needless imployments or desire to be aliquis in omnibus And if it may be having a design of some particular good accrewing to your self or your neighbor in your labour by it to sanctify your work and excite your diligence 3. Entertaining no imployment that excludes a sufficient vacancy for your Devotions 4. Ordering still before-hand and where it is much setting down in writing your business which strengthens the performance and prevents divertisements 5. Keeping a certain and constant order in your dayly imployments as far as they are capable thereof Qui bene ordinat diem bene ordinat vitam life being only a collection and total summe of so many days 6. Taking special care of the beginning of your imployments in the morning and after meals which then begun well are easily continued but ill and vainly are not so easily changed 7. Using your recreations not before but after your imployments because you will experience that to get most of your time which is taken in hand first 8. Not doing business hastily or passionately or many at once for all these much hinder the acts of reason and judgment in the managing of them but dispatching things allway successively rather and in a certain order with a reposed Spirit and without excessive thought 9. Avoiding in all things taedium mentis for 't is some delight that keeps a man in his work nor will he persevere without it the chief remedy whereof is an admixture of some variety variety both of our imployments and in the same imployment of the postures of the body as sitting walking lying c. and of the accidental and by-entertainments of the senses as several roomes prospects being in the House in the Field in a Church c. by which the intention of the mind is much recreated and better thus to afford some content to nature than which is worse quite to desist from an holy or otherwise profitable exercise out of irksomeness 10. Keeping a strict account of your expence of two things your Time being that in which you are now to purchase Salvation in eternity And your Money or Goods all the spare thereof being the Portion of the poor and this in order to your Salvation also see Luk. 16.9 those eternal houses in this sense being also to be bought with money Often accounts for what is past helps much to prevent mis-expence for the future Edicat quid absumpserit ita fiet ut non absumat quod pudeat dicere 11. Doing all your temporal business in the name of Christ Col. 3.17.23 to the glory of God 1. Cor. 10.31 whereby all your secular actions may become as it were consecrated religious and holy duties 12. Never neglecting your vocation and duty to cover an infirmity or avoid obloquy c. But glorifying and so increasing your reward with God in serving him in your appointed station through the impotency of your nature dishonor and infamy from men Digr Neglect of publick duty not excused and made amends
2. A right ordering of our Judgment concerning Truth and Error 1. Judging of the truth of Doctrines as you see they tend to godliness 1. Tim. 6.3 Tit. 1.1 and as they are more fitted for bringing forth in us the fruits of good works For by their fruits are true and false doctrines certainly known Matt. 7.16.20 holiness and truth vice and error being consectaries one of another §. 46. 2. Taking heed of those doctrines which weaken the practice of Piety c. To name you some of them such as these seem to be If any Should teach you That to abstain from any thing which it is lawful by God's word to enjoy is fruitless will-worship Superstition Should assure you of an equal facility of attaining heaven in all conditions of life not noting to you the great lets and temptations that are in some beyond others as in honors riches marriage c. to excite your choice of the Better or your vigilance in the other Should disallow or discourage Vows and other prefortifications against those things which have been former occasions of sinning and the abstaining where-from is in our Power Should speak against frequent hours of prayer in the day frequent days of solemn worship in the year frequent celebrations of the Eucharist frequent Confession and Communion frequent fasting days and macerations of the Body c. Should remit unto you the reins of your obedience to the authority of the Church requiring it only to her when she commands that which you in your own judgment weighing her reasons do think just and right to be believed or practised Should disallow confession of your sins to the Priest Should affirm that confession to God or the Priest is sufficient for remission of Sin without reformation of life and quitting Sin Or that an internal sorrow of the Soul for them is only required and any further external and corporal penances humiliations or punishing your self for them useless Or teach that these penances and mortifications are necessary only when they are imposed to satisfy the scandal given the Church but no way to appease the wrath of God Or that your sins are remitted by mony alms Ecclesiastical indulgences or Absolutions when these are not preceded by a true Contrition Should teach you that all sins without any distinction amongst them are equally effecting your damnation and either that All or that None put you out of the Grace and favour of God and that several degrees of Penitence are not necessary according to the quality of your offence Should teach you that good works are not necessary to Salvation and that the promises of reward are made only to faith or necessary not from a strict obligation of every regenerate man to do them having time for it but only out of gratitude or as fruits that necessarily spring out of a true faith Should so extol Faith in our Saviour's merits i.e. in his good works as to make supervacuous inherent Righteousness Or faith in our Saviour's satisfaction i.e. in his sufferings as to void all our self-afflictions mortifications and conformity unto his death Should teach your inability though in the state of Grace to observe all God's Commandments and to please him in your works and to fulfil his law as to the forbearance of all greater sins and offences against any part thereof Should hold no degrees of perfection in our obedience nor any latitude of goodness above that of not being in fault making none better than him that only keeps from sinning or him whoever is not the most good to be amongst offenders and one falling short of the highest degree of any virtue as of Prayer Charity c. in this to be guilty of sin to the taking away of all confidence in God for any good or acceptable work done by us and emulation of being perfect and pre-eminence of those who are Saints Should teach the heavenly reward to be to all persons equal so that who is more holy than the rest that enter-in thither Suppose St. Paul than the Publican doth in the overplus of his mortifications c serve God for nought Should extol Predestination Election Grace certainty of Salvation c. i. e. the mercies of God so far as to remit and discourage all Man's endeavours Should deny the continuance of God's miraculous works now as they have been in former times to Holy mens Prayers to the great weakning of Prayer and Faith and of the making use of the intercessions of Saints and of holy men for us Should labour more to instruct you in what sense and quatenus such and such Christian virtues are not to be practised than in what they are whereby you become more inclined to the omission than inflamed to the practice of them As That Confession of sins to the Priest is not to be used if not necessary jure divino or because all our sins cannot be recounted or remembred Not almes not penances that is as self-sufficient satisfactions to God's justice for your sins Not good works that is as thinking to merit heaven by them abstracting from our Lord's Not set times of Prayer of Fasting that is as of divine command or essential parts of God's Worship No Addresses to Saints or Holy-men of God for their Prayers and Intercessions to God for us lawful i. e. with such a belief and intention as if the Divine Majesty did not immediately hear or receive our own Prayers or as if our Lord's Intercessions and Mediation for us were defective or unsufficient without them Should teach you that voluntary poverty or selling our Goods to give them to the Poor Celibacy preaching without charges remitting just Law-suits and not requiring by constraint satisfaction for damages not wearing of gold costly apparel c. 1. Pet. 3.3 are no general Advices and Counsels to all save only in preparatione animi to do them in some time of great exigence as in persecution c. but are particular precepts and so obligatory to some only we know not whom in some particular cases we know not when I say Taking heed and having great jealousy of the truth of such doctrines which you experimentally find do weaken the practice of Piety as several of these doctrines fore-mentioned seem to do §. 47. 3. Considering Doctors Religions Sects according to the less or more liberty or severity of their doctrines remissness or strictness of their discipline the more or less practice of mortifications and devotions in them for the severest Religion is the best and the most Spiritual consolations and the surest way of Salvation are in it According to their erring more in speculative points or more in practicals for the Error in practicals is much more dangerous Since a small measure of knowledge is exacted of Christians but much of duty Again According to the more works and Monuments of Piety and Charity which you find to abound in either For there surely is the greatest love of God and love is never without light
thy Saints we may also imitate their faith and patience We sinners beseech Thee to hear us That we may keep inviolably the Catholick Faith so stoutly maintained by them that like as thine Elect in heaven so we may readily do thy will on earth that we may hate our own Souls in this world that we may preserve them to eternal life that thou wouldst vouchsafe to admit us into the inheritance of thy chosen in light We sinners beseech Thee to hear us That we may continually praise thee in thy Saints that we may laud thee with thy Saints in Heaven and magnify thee for ever We sinners beseech Thee to hear us O Lamb of God that takest away the sins of the world Our Father which art in Heaven c. PRaise the Name of our Lord praise him ye Servants of our Lord. Who stand in the house of our Lord in the courts of the house of our God Praise our Lord for he is good sing unto his Name for it is sweet Sing unto our Lord a new Song his Praise in the congregation of his Saints For our Lord taketh pleasure in his people he will magnify the meek with Salvation Let the Saints be joyful in glory let them sing aloud upon their beds Let the high Praises of God be in their mouth and a two-edged Sword in their hand To execute vengeance upon the Nations and punishment upon the people To bind their Kings with chains and their Nobles with fetters of Iron To execute upon them the Judgment written This Honor have all his Saints Hallelujah Let us pray WE give thee thanks O Lord with all our hearts for that thou hast chosen thy Saints and justified them by thy infinite grace for that thou hast prevented them with the blessings of thy sweetness and preserved them in their way thro all the impediments of their Salvation We give thee infinite thanks O God for all the Graces and Benefits which thou hast bestowed upon them in time and reserved for them to Eternity O ye blessed Servants and Friends of God who confirmed in all Grace and now have received the Crown of heavenly Glory and with joy behold the Sacred Trinity face to face praising him with unspeakable gladness everlastingly obtain for us your Supplicants free pardon of our sins and a perfect denial of our selves that we may follow your steps thro the narrow way as also an intimate and sincere love of God wherewith you being enflamed have valiantly and gloriously overcome the world the flesh and the devil with all the crosses of this present life pray for us now and at the hour of our death that when we are to pass hence and to appear before the fearful Tribunal of the great Judge he would not enter into judgment with us but judge us according to his infinite mercy that so at length we may be admitted into the blessed Fellowship in that supernal Jerusalem where we altogether may praise extol and magnify our Lord God for ever and ever Amen O Lord God multiply upon us thy Grace and grant us to follow in a holy profession the joy of thy Saints whose memories we celebrate through Jesus Christ thy only Son our Lord. Amen MOst gracious God the Author of all Sanctity and lover of Unity whose wisdome hath established an admirable communion between thy Church triumphant in heaven and militant on earth as members of the same mystical Body whereof thy Son Christ Jesus is the Head mercifully grant that as thy Blessed without ceasing pray to thee for us we may continually praise thee for them and in correspondence to their perfect Charity with pious observance celebrate their memories till we all meet before thy glorious Throne and with one heart adore the Saviour of us all who with Thee and the Holy Ghost liveth and reigneth one God world without end Amen O All ye blessed Saints of heaven and Spirits Angelical whom God with the brightness of his presence makes everlastingly joyful pray for us We salute and honour you we give praise and thanks to our Lord who hath chosen you and made you eternally happy with his benedictions obtain from him for us forgiveness obtain for us grace that at the end of this frail life we may be admitted to the fruition of your heavenly Society thro Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen ALmighty God and most merciful Father favourably regard the imperfect Prayers of thy servants here on earth which we present unto thee by the most efficacious intercession of our fellow members the Saints in heaven and grant that as their Sanctity is exalted by thee to a supreme degree of glory so their Charity may obtain for us the especial assistance of thy Grace thro Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen GRant O Almighty God that we who celebrate the Memories and reverence the Holiness of all thy Saints may be assisted with Thee by their intercession and rejoyce in their protection thro Jesus Christ Amen O Almighty and Eternal God who vouchsafest us the Grace to reverence the Holiness of all thy Saints Grant us we beseech Thee the desired plenty of thy mercy by their multiplied intercessions thro our Lord Jesus Christ Amen The LITANY of Penitents O God the Father of heaven our Creator Have mercy on us O God the Son our Redeemer Have mercy on us O God the Holy Ghost our Sanctifier Have mercy c. O strong just and jealous God taking revenge upon all sin and iniquity who sparedst not the Angels that sinned but castedst them down into hell to be tormented From thy great wrath good Lord deliver us Who hast appointed death the stipend of Sin who didst shut Adam after he had sinned out of Paradise and subjectedst him to many Curses From thy great wrath good Lord deliver us Who sparedst not the old world but punishedst it overwhelmed in sin by the flood From thy great wrath c. Who utterly consumedst Sodom and Gomorrah burnt to ashes and miraculously punishedst Pharoah and the Aegyptians hardening their hearts against thee From thy great wrath good Lord deliver us Who sparedst not thine ancient people the Jews rebelling against thee but deliveredst them up into the hands of their enemies and into the Babylonish Captivity From thy great wrath good Lord deliver us Who at last scatteredst them throughout all the world whilst persevering in their sins and gavest thy beloved City and thy Sanctuary to be trodden under foot of the Enemy From thy great wrath good Lord deliver us O God to the relenting and penitent gracious and merciful long-suffering and abundant in mercy and repenting thee of evil who lovest every thing and hatest nothing that thou hast made From thy great wrath c. Who pitiest all and winkest at the sins of men for their amendment of life who wouldst have none to perish but all be converted and in whose presence there is joy over one sinner that doth penance From all thy great wrath c. Who calledst