thereof 1. The groundlesnesse when there is no casting of persons out of the church by an unjust censure of excommunication no departure by unsufferable persecution no heresie nor idolatry in the church maintained no necessity if Communion be held with a Church of communicating in its sins and corruptions 2. The manner of separation makes it unlawfull when 't is made without due endeavour and waiting for reformation of the church from which the departure is and such a rash departure is against charity which suffers both much and long 1 Cor. 13.4 all tolerable things It is not presently distasted when the justest occasion is given it first useth all possible meanes of remedy The Surgeon reserves dismembring as the last remedy It looks upon a sudden breaking off from communion with a church which is a dismembring not as surgery Non medicina sed Laniena non Chirurgia sed Carnificina but but chery not as medicinal but cruel 2. For the second the sinfulnesse of this separation appears several wayes Not to the speak of the sinfulnesse of separation by heresies and prophanness I having in this and the former part of this Commentary shewn it at large before Error of Balaam ver 11. Sunt qui peccatum schismatis adaequent peccato heresis sunt qui illud adhuc prae isto exaggerent Musc loc Com. de schism Aug. Cont. Donat. lib. 2. cap. 6. but briefly to manifest the sinfulnesse of schismatical separation I shall not spend time to compare it with heresie though some have said that Schism is the greater sin of the two Augustin tels the Donatists that Schisme was a greater sin than that of the Traditores who in time of persecution through fear delivered up their bibles to the persecutors to be burnt A sin at which the Donatists took so much offence that it was the ground of their separation But to passe by these things by these three considerations especially the sinfulnesse of Schism shews it selfe In respect of 1. Christ 2. The parties separating 3. Those from whom they separate 1. In respect of Christ it is first an horrible indignity offered to his body it dividing Christ as the Apostle speaks 1 Cor. 1.15 and makes him to appear the head of two bodyes how monstrous and dishonourable is the very conceit hereof 2. It is rebellion against his Command his great command of love the grace of love is by some call'd the queen of graces and it 's greater then faith in respect of it's object not God only but man its duration which is eternal its manner of working not in a way of receiving Christ as faith but of giving out the soul to him Eph. 4.3 Phil. 2.2 Joh. 13.34 and the command of love is the greatest command in respect of it Comprehensivenesse it taking in all the commandements the end of them all being love and it being the fulfilling of them all 3. Joh. 12.52 It s opposite to one great end of Christs greatest undertaking his death which was that all his Saints should be one 4. It tends to frustrate his prayer for unity among Saints Joh. 17. and endeavours that Christ may not be heard by his father 5. It opposeth his example By this shall all men saith he know that ye are my disciples if ye love one another Love is the Livery and Cognizance which Christ gives to every Christian If there be no fellowship among Christians there 's no following of Christ Let this mind be â—n you that was in Christ Jesus Phil 2 5. 6. It s injurious to his service and worship How can men pray if in wrath and division how can Christians fight with heaven and prevail when they are in so many divided troops Nullum schisma non sibi aliquam confingit haeresim ut recte ab Ecclesiâ recessisse videatur Hierom in Tit. Schisma viam facit ad haeresim et separationem à Christo What worthinesse can be in those Communicants who celebrate a feast of love with hearts full of rancour and malice 2. In respect of the parties separating For 1. It causeth a decay of all grace By divisions among our selves we endeavour to divide our selves from him in and from whom is all our fulnesse All wickednesse follows contention Upon the stock of schism commonly heresie is grafted there is no schism saith Jerome but ordinarily it inventeth and produceth some heresie that so the separation may seem the more justifiable The Nonatians and Donatists from schism fell to heresies our own times sadly comment upon this truth they equally arising to both The farther lines are distanced one from another the greater is their distance from the Center and the more divided Christians are among themselves the more they divide themselves from Christ Branches divided from the tree Anima vivisicat membra cohaerentia non divulsâ— Peccatum schismatis non martyrii sanguine deletur Quo pacto qui animum pro Christo exponis Ecclesiam oppugnes pro quâ animum suam Christus tradidit receive no sap from the root The soul gives life to members which are joyn'd together not pluckt asunder 2. Schism is the greatest disgrace to the schismaticks A schismatick is a name much disowned because very dishonourable All posterity loads the name of sinfull Separatists with disgrace and abhorrency He spake truly who said the sin and misery of schism cannot be bloted out with the blood of martyrdom Hee cannot honorably give his life for Christ who makes divisions in his Church for which Christ gave his life 3. In respect of the Church from which this separation is made For 1. It s injurious to the honor of the Church whose greatest glory is union 3. Cant. 6.9 How can a body be rent and torn without the impairing of its beauty Besides how disgracefull an imputation is cast upon any Church when we professe it unworthy for any to abide in it that Christ will not and therefore that we cannot have communion with it 2 It s injurious to the peace and quietnesse of the Church Schismaticks more oppose the peace of the Church then do heathens If the natural body be divided and torn pain and smart must needs follow The tearing and rending of the mystical bodie goes to the heart of all sensible members They often cause the feaverish distempers of hatred wrath seditions envyings murders Schism in the Church puts the members out of joynt and disjointed bones are painful All my bones saith David are out of joint Church divisions cause sad thoughts of heart true members are sensible of these schisms though artificiall ones feel nothing None rejoyce but our enemies Oh impiety to make Satan musick and to make mourning for the Saints 3. It s opposite to the edification of the Church Division of tongues hindred the building of Babel and doubtlesse division in hearts tongues hands heads must needs hinder the building of Jerusalem while parties are contending Churches and
themselves from the Church were scorners and that these who were sensuall and void of the spirit did follow their ungodly lusts Or in the words Jude expresseth 1. The sin of these seducers in Separating themselves 2. The cause thereof which was 1. Their being sensuall and 2. their not having the spirit For the first their separation EXPLICATION Two things are here to be opened 1. What the Apostle here intends by separating themselves 2. Wherein the sinfulnesse thereof consists 1. segregantes separantes Disterminantes Exterminantes For the first The words in the Originall are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 severall wayes rendred by severall interpreters may signifie the unbounding of a thing and the removing of a thing from those bounds and limits wherein it was set and placed for the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie to terminate or circumscribe a thing within limits and bounds and the preposition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 added to it may import * Thus the Preposition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is frequently taken in Scripture the taking away or exempting a thing from those bounds and limits wherein it was contained and this interpretation of making themselves boundlesse as being a generation of Libertines that would be kept within no bounds or compasse of restraint by Scripture Magistrates Church-discipline c. doth both agree to the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and also the whole series of the Epistle and context in which the Apostle immediately before saith they walked after their own lusts and immediately after saith they were sensuall given over to sensuall pleasures These seducers were sons of Belial without a yoke like yokelesse heifers Scope and Liberty were their study They would needs make the way to heaven as he who went over a narrow bridge with spectacles before his eyes desired to make the bridg seeme broader then it was This interpreation I dare not reject I desire to present it to the learned but though upon my maturest thoughts I much incline to it yet seeing the streame of interpreters going another way I shall not refuse the second according to which the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports the parting and separating of one thing from another by bounds and limits put between them and the putting of bounds and limits for distinction and separation between severall things it being thus a resemblance taken from fields or Countries which are distinguisht and parted from each other by certain boundaryes and Land-marks set up to that end and thus it s commonly taken by interpreters in this place wherein these seducers may be said to separate themselves divide or bound themselves from others either first doctrinally or secondly practically 1. Doctrinally by false and hereticall doctrines whereby they divided themselves from the truth and faithfull who were guided by the truth of the Scripture and walked according to the rule of the word hence these seducers were deceiving and deceved and it s said that they brought in damnable heresies and many followed their pernitious wayes and that they spake perverse things to draw away Disciples after them 2 Pet. 2. And thus they separated themselves from the Church 1. By holding that the grace of God gave men liberty to live as they pleased and by maintaining of unchristian libertinisme because Christ had purchased Christian liberty for us Whereas the word teacheth the contrary namely because the grace of God hath appeared therefore that we should deny ungodlinesse and worldly lust 2. By teaching that among the people of God there ought to be no Civil Magistrate no superiority nor any to restraine and hinder people from their going on in what wayes they pleased whereas the word commands every soule to be subject 3. By denying the day of judgment at which they scoft as at a vaine scar-crow because it was deferred whereas the faithfull were 1 Pet. 4.4 to account the long suffering of the Lord salvation to labour to be made meet for the approach of Christ and to look for the mercy of the Lord to eternall life 2. Practically they might separate themselves as by bounds and limits 1. By prophaneness and living in a different way from the Saints namely in all loosenesse and uncleannesse for as the faithfull separate and difference themselves from the wicked by their holy and heavenly Conversation so the wicked divide themselves from the faithfull by prophaneness and falling from the profession of godlinesse into all manner of loosenesse and irregularity and thus the ungodly make such bounds between themselves and saints as saints dare not break over ungodlinesse being too high a wall for a godly man to scale or rather too deep a mote for him to swim over and wade through 2. Calv. in loc discessionem faciunt ab ecclefiâ quia disciplinae jugum ferre nequeunt By Shismaticalness and making of Separation from and divisions in the Church Because they proudly despised the doctrines or persons of the Christians as contemptible and unworthy or because they would not endure the holy severity of the Churches discipline they saith Calvin departed from it They might make rents and divisions in the Church by schismaticall withdrawing themselves from fellowship and Communion with it Their heresies were perverse and damnable opinions their schism was a perverse Separation from Church-Communion the former was in doctrinalls the latter in practicals Schismaticos facit non diversa fides sed communionis disrupta societas Aug. Coâ—tr Faust l. 20. c. 3. The former was opposite to faith this latter to charity By faith all the members are united to the head by charity one to another and as the breaking of the former is heresie so their breaking of the latter was schism And this schisme stands in the dissolving the spirituall band of love and union among Christans and appears in the withdrawing from the performance of those duties which are both the signes of and helps to Christian unity as prayer hearing receiving of Sacraments c. for because the dissolving of Christian union chiefly appears in the undue separation from church communion therfore this rending is rightly call'd schisme It is usually said to be twofold 1. Negative Camero de schismate 2. Positive The first the Negative is when there is onely simplex secessio when there is onely a bare secession a peaceable and quiet withdrawing from Communion with a Church without making an heâ—d against that church from which the departure is 2. The other the positive is when persons so withdrawing doe so consociate and draw themselves into a distinct and opposite body setting up a church against a church or as divines expresse it from Augustine an altar against an altar and this it is which in a peculiar manner and by way of eminency is called by the name of schisme and becomes sinful either in respect 1. of the groundlesnesse or 2. the manner
Common-wealths suffer In troublous times the walls and temple of Jerusalem went but slowly on Though Jesus Christ the head be the only fountaine of spiritual life yet the usual way of Christs strengthning it and perfecting thereof is the fellowship of the body that by what every joynt supplies the whole may be encreased when Church-members are put out of joint they are made unserviceable and unfit to perform their several offices They who were wont to join in prayer sacraments fasting and were ready to all mutuall offices of love are now fallen off from all 4. It s opposite to the future estate of the Church in glory In heaven the faithful shall be of one mind wee shall all meet saith the Apostle in the unity of the faith Eph. 4.13 when we are come to our manly age Wrangling is the work of child-hood and folly and a great peice of the folly of our child-hood Lutheâ— and Calvin are of one mind in heaven though their disciples wrangle here on earth OBSERVATIONS 1. Naturally men love to be boundlesse Obs 1. they will not be kept within any spiritual compasse nor endure to bee held in any bounds This according to one signification of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Apostle Jude aimes at in this place Wicked men are sons of Belial they cannot endure the yoke of Christ though it be sweet and easie They break his bonds asunder and cast away his cords from them Men love to have liberty to damn their own souls Psal 2 3. Hos 4 16. They back-slide like a back-sliding heifer Though men account it no unwelcome streightning to them to have a fence between them and their bodily enemyes yet they cannot endure those limits and bounds of Gods law or corrections which stop them from sin their fear of hurt makes them love preservation their love of pleasure makes them desirous of sinful liberty How good a sign of a gracious heart is it rather to desire to be in Christs inclosure then in Satans champain to account Christs service our liberty and Satans liberty our bondage How just also is God in suffering sinners to take their course and swinge in the wayes of sin and destruction They who wil not be kept within Gods compass are deservedly left to Satans disposall They who are back sliding heifers who will not endure the yoke are justly threatned to be suffered to be as a lamb in a large place without a keeper or preserver They shall have their fill of liberty but their liberty is like that of the Deer which though it were gotten out of the park-pale yet it was at the cruel curtesie of the hounds On the contrary God is very gracious in stopping up his churches way though with a thorny hedge Oh happy thorns that stop us in our waies to hell Such thorns are better then roses The setting up of the thorny hedge Hos 2.6 is a promise a branch of the Covenant Our separation from Rome cannot be charged with schism Obs 2. This will evidently appear if we consider either the ground or the manner of our separation 1. For the ground and cause thereof our separation from Rome was not for some slight and tolerable errours but damnable heresies and grosse idolatries The heresies fundamental and idolatries such as those who hold communion with her cannot but partake of In respect of both which the church of Rome was first Apostatiz'd before ever we separated nor was there any separation from it as it had any thing of Christ or as it was Christian but as it was Romane and Popish The Apostacy of the Roman church which was the ground of our separation appeared sundry ways 1. In that she did thrust the Lord Jesus the great and onely teacher of the church out of the chair and in it placed the Pope as the infallible Doctor of the church to whom she ties her beliefe and subjects her faith though he alwayes may and oft doth rise up against Christ himself 2. The Scriptures the alone rule of faith the Romanists slight and impiously despise and make them an insufficient rule of faith by joyning their over-fond and false traditions to it by preferring a vitious and barbarous interpretation before the sacred originals by making the holy Scriptures to have neither life nor soul nor voice till the interpretation of the church or rather the Pope be added 3. They have depraved the great and main article of faith concerning the justification of a sinner the nature whereof though the Scripture makes to stand in the remission of sinnes and the application of Christs righteousnesse by faith yet they ascribe it partly to Christs and partly to our own merits and righteousnesse in which respect that of the Apostle sutes with them Christ is become of no effect to you who are justified by the law 4. Though the worshipping of the immortal and invisible God under any visible image or representation or the likenesse of a mortal creature be frequently and expresly forbidden in Scripture Ecclesia Romanaeusus admittit basce trinitatis imagines caeque pinguntur non solum ut ostendantur sed ut adorenâ— tur In 3 Aq. 9.29 art 3. yet they set forth and teach the worshiping of the Father under the image of an old man the Son under the image of a Lamb and the holy Ghost of a Dove And Cajetan confesseth that they draw these images of the Trinity not only to shew but to adore and worship them To these I might add their maiming or rather marring the Sacrament of the Lords Supper their denying the cup to the laity Their ascribing of remission and expiation of sin to the sacrifice of the Mass their seven Sacraments their praying to Saints Auge piâ—s justitiam Reisque dona veniam Solve vinela reis Profer lumen Coecis Psalt Rom. and ascribing to the Virgin Mary the bestowing grace and glory pardon of sin c. Their dispensations with the most hideous and bellish abominations as murders incest Sodomy c. for mony c. 2. For the second the manner of our separation it was not uncharitable rash heady and unadvised nor before all means were used for the cure and reformation of the Romanists by the discovery of their errors that possibly could be thought of notwithstanding all which though some have been enforced to an acknowledgment of them they still obstinately persist in them Our famous godly and learned reformers would have healed Babylon but she is not healed many skilful Physicians have had her in hand but like the woman in the Gospel she grew so much the worse By praier preaching writing yea by sealing their doctrine with their bloods have sundry eminent instruments of Christ endeavoured to reclaim the Popish from their errors but in stead of being reclaimed they anathematized them with the dreadfullest curses excommunicated yea murdered and destroyed multitudes of those who endeavoured their reducement not permitting any to trade
buy or sell to have either religious or civil communion with them except they received the beasts mark in their hands and forheads All which considered we might safely forsake her nay could not safely do otherwise Since instead of our healing of Babylon we could not be preserved from her destroying of us we did deservedly depart from her and every one go into his own Country and unlesse we had so done Jer. 51.9 we could not have obeyed the cleare precept of the word Apoc. 18. Come out of her my people c. Apoc. 18.4 Timothy is commanded to withdraw himself from perverse and unsound teachers Though Paul went into the Synagogue 1 Tim. 6.3.5 disputing and perswading the things concerning the Kingdome of God yet when divers were hardned and beleeved not Acts 19.9 but spake evill of that way 1 Cor. 10.14 he departed from them and separated thâ— disciples And expressely is Communion with idolaters forbidden 2 Cor. 6.14.17 what fellowship hath righteousnesse with unrighteousnesse what Communion hath light with darknesse what concord hath Christ with Belial what agreement hath the temple of God with idols Come out from among them and be ye separate And Hos 4.11 Though thou Israel play the harlot yet let not Judah offend and Come ye not unto Gilgal neither goe ye up to Bethaven Though in name that place was Bethel the house of God yet because Jeroboams calf was set up there it was indeed Bethaven the house of vanity If Rome be a Bethaven for idolatry and corrupting of Gods worship our departure from it may be safely acknowledged and justified In vaine therefore do the Romanists Stapleton Nic. Sanderus de visib monar eccles praefat ad lect Staplet demonstrat Princ. fid l. 4. c. 10. Sanders others brand our separation from them with the odious imputation of Donatisme and schisme it being evident out of Augustine that the Donatists never objected any thing against nor could blame any thing in the Church from which they separated either for faith or worship whereas we have unanswerably proved the pseado-Catholick romane-Romane-Church to be notoriously guilty both of heresie and idolatry and our adversaries themselves grant in what ever Church either of those depravations are found Communion with it Schisma aliud malum aliud bonum Malum quo bona bonum quo mala scinditur unitas Musc de schism is to be broken off I shall conclude this discourse with that passage out of Musculus concerning schisme There is saith he a double schisme the one bad the other good the bad is that whereby a good union the good that whereby a bad union is broken asunder If ours be a schisme it is of the later sort 3. Obs 3. The voluntary and unnecessary dividing and separation from a true Church is schismaticall When we put bounds and partitions between it and our selves we sin say some as did these seducers here taxed by Jude If the Church be not hereticall or Idolatrous or do not by excommunication persecution c. thrust us out of its Communion If it be such an one as Christ the head hath communion with we the members ought not by separation to rend and divide the body To separate from Congregations where the word of truth and Gospel of salvation are held forth in an ordinary way 1 Tim. 3.15 as the Proclamations of Princes are held forth upon pillars to which they are affixed where the light of the truth is set up as upon a candlestick to guide passengers to heaven To separate from them to whom belong the Covenants and where the Sacraments the seals of the Covenant Rev. 1.13 and for substance rightly dispensed where Christ walketh in the midst of his golden Candlesticks and discovers his presence in his ordinances whereby they are made effectuall to the Conversion and edification of soules in an ordinary way where the members are saints by a professed subjection to Christ and his Gospell and haply have promised this explicitely and openly where there are sundry who in the judgement of charity may be conceived to have the work of grace really wrought in their hearts by walking in some measure answerable to their profession I say to separate from these as those with whom Church Communion is not to be held and maintaind is vnwarrantable and schismaticall Pretences for separation I am not ignorant are alledged Frequently and most plausibly that of mixt Communion and of admitting into Church-fellowship the vile with the pretious and those who are chaff and therefore ought not to lodge with the wheat Answ 1. Not to insist upon what some have urged viz. that this hath been the stone at which most Shismaticks have stumbled and the pretence which they have of old alledged as having ever had a spiritum excommunicatorium a spirit rather putting them upon dividing from those who they say are unholy then putting them upon any godly indeavours of making themselvs holy as is evident in the examples of the Audaeans Novatians Donatists Anabaptists Brownists c. 2. Let them consider whither the want of the exact purging and reforming of these abuses proceed not rather from some unhappy obstructions and politicall restrictions whether or no caused by those who make this objection God knowes in the exercise of discipline then from the allowance or neglect of the Church it selfe Nay 3. Let them consider whether when they separate for sinfull mixtures the Church be not at that very time purging out those sinfull mixtures and is that a time to make a separation from a Church by departing from it when the servants of Christ are making a separation in that Church by reforming of it But 4. Let it be seriously weighed that some sinfull mixtures are not a sufficient cause of separation from a Church Hath not God his Church even where corruption of manners hath crept into a Church if purity of doctrine be maintained and is separation from that Church lawful from which God doth not separate did the Apostle because of the sinful mixturess in the Church of Corinth direct the fuithful to separate Must not he who will forbeare communion with a Church till it be altogether freed from mixtures tarry till the day of judgment til when we have no promise that Christ will gather out of his Church whatsoever doth offend 5. Let them consider whether God hath made private Christians stewards in his house to determine whether those with whom they communicate are fit members of the Church or not or rather whether it be not their duty when they discover tares in the Church in stead of separating from it to labour that they may be found good corne that so when God shall come to gather his corn into his garner they may not be thrown out Church-officers are ministerially betrusted with the ordering of the Church and for the opening and shutting of the doors of the Churches Communion by the Keyes of doctrine
there were within them waves of unquietnesse and impatiency raised by the windes of their pride They were murmurers and complainers both against God and man Of this unquietness the Apostle speaks afterwards vers 16. 3. They were as the troublesome and raging waves of the sea in respect of others And this I conceive Jude principally intends in this place The Sea neither resteth it self nor doth it suffer any thing to rest which is upon it it tosseth the ships and tumbleth the Passengers therein from one side thereof to another who reel to and fro like a drunken man and in its rage and fury it often swallows up and devours both ship and men The lives of those who are upon the sea hang by a thred they themselves being neither reckon'd among the dead Moâ—tude quiesâ—nâ—â— nor among the living And thus these Seducers were so restlesse and turbulent that they found no rest but in their motions Like those of whom Solomon speaks Prov. 4.16 VVho sleep not unlesse they have done mischief and their sleep is taken away unlesse they cause someto fal Meritò hâ—retici fluctibus maris similes esse dicuntur quòd nuâ—quam quieti sâ—nt nusquam consistant nova semper moliantur surgia misceant seditionem excitent schismata pariant omnia denique perturbent ac pervertanâ— Justinian Vti fluctus fcri navim ita ipsi turbulenti seditiosi Ecclesiam concutiunt Lap. And troublesome they were 1. First to the bodily and outward welfare of others their names they tost up and down by slanders and reproaches they uttered many hard speeches against the Faithful Their tongue set on fire of hell did set on fire the whole course of nature VVhat bittter and uncharitable censures have such fomented in all times against those who did not joyn and hold with them They are wont to lowre brow beat disdainfully frown and look sourly upon them as Cain upon Abel with a discontented and faln countenance and what bitter enemies in all ages Hereticks especially Seducers have been to the lives and safeties of the Godly and Orthodox hath been before in part declared and of old manifested by the Donatists and Arians and more lately by the Papists and Anabaptists who all by their boysterous violence and cruelties shewed themselves raging waves of the sea They were troublesome enemies to all Publick Order They were fierce heady high-minded traitors enflaming and enraging mens spirits against all Government and Rule in Church and State putting all places into confusion and combustion by strifes seditions schismes They were not afraid to speak evill of dignities they set their mouth against the heaven and their tongue walked through the earth 2. But secondly Fluctus fert sunt perversi doctores qui in semet ipsis inquieti semper tumidi amari sunt pacem Ecclesiae firmitatemque obicum semper impugnare non cessant Beda Quem ad modum fluctus maris saevitiâ atque immanitate suâ integra navigia hauriunt aut ad scopulos allidunt it a Gnostici perversis suis dogmatibus plurimos ad interitum pertraehunt sempiternum Justinian in loc Ut fluctus maris intumescunt attolluntur ipsi quodam modo Câ—â—lo minantur non aliter isti in coelum ipsamque Divinam naturam maledicta congerunt Id. Ib. these raging waves troubled and disquieted the spirituall welfare and peace of those Christians into whose societies they had crept whom they tost to and fro by the violent urging of their errours and caus'd to fluctuate and waver in their judgments overturning their faith swallowing them up and drowning them in perdition by their erroneous and impious doctrines Through the tossing and fury of these waves many souls suffered shipwrack and lost the spirituall and precious Merchandize of Faith and holiness with these waves of false teachers and their doctrines were the Galatians disquieted when the Apostle saith There be some 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who trouble you or who muddy and stir you like water and cap. 5.12 I would they were even cut off which trouble you This for the opening of the first Branch of this Resemblance the second followes viz. What these raging waves of the sea are said to get and bring upon themselves by all their swelling and raging and that was nothing but shame and disgrace * Vulg. Bâ—z Despumantes Nonnullidispumantes Deseumare proprie valet spumam auferre Dispumare spumam ejicere Quandoque confundi videntur Syriacè qui in manu spumationis suae indicant ignominiam Arabicè sicut fluctus maris commoti ebulliunt in confusionibus seu delictis suis Spuâ—â—ea semifero subpectore murmurat unda Virg. Foming out their shame Gr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Apostle saith not shame but shames 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confusiones Vulg. Dedecora Bez. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to note how great that shame and disgrace was which they discovered And he saith they fomed out their shames that is that by all their forementioned raging and troublesomenesse they brought forth shame to themselves as the raging waves of the sea bring forth fome And most aptly and elegantly in the prosecution of the Metaphor of raging waves doth our Apostle say Instar tumentium undarum quanto altius se superbientes attollunt tanto amplius confusi quasi in spumas dissolvuntur percunt Bed Per dedecora intelliguntur peccata linguae ex immundo turbatoque corde manantia sed brevi in nihilum instar spumae resoluta Mera sonant tonitrua Nugas meras inanes voces effutiunt that by their raging and swelling they brought forth disgrace and shame to themselves as the raging waves of the Sea bring forth fome In these three respects did these raging Waves of whom the Apostle speaks bring forth shame to themselves as the waves of the Sea bring forth fome 1. Because that after all their troubling and disquieting of the Church by their erroneous turbulent and soul-destroying opinions and practises both were found to have as much vanity lightness and emptiness as the fome of the Sea though in their swelling and proud elevation of themselves and unquiet urging of their doctrines they seemed like the huge waves which threaten to touch and wash the very clouds to be raised far above others in knowledg and spiritualness and especially in enjoying of that liberty which they pretended went along with their practises and opinions and so to have climb'd as it were into the third heavens Non minus quis confunditur ob ignorantiam quam ob libidinem detectam Congeries perstrepentium vocum quibus nihil subest sententiae solidioris Vid. Epiph. haer 26. Nonnulli denotari volunt fornicationes veterum illorum baereticorum alii immunditiam gulae luxuriae quae veluti pâ—r spum ammanifestentue yet soon did all their glorious appearances as a highly rais'd billow of the sea falling either upon a rock or the shore end in meer froth
with the wicked though they may be cast among them Let us not censure the faithful in their most tossed estate There 's not a drop of wrath in a sea of a Saints sufferings Could you see how free his inside is and his end shall be from storms and tossings you would rather envy then censure him the waves which Satan raiseth shew that he hath a treasure which that enemie would fain have cast away but yet should he so far prevail t is a treasure which wil swim to shore with him To conclude let the faithful of all people most prepare for storms and waves as it is best for them to be among raging waves so it s too much for them both to have a haven in their passage and in the end of their passage too As long as the people of God are sayling to that port the divel wil tosse them and this he wil do though nay because he cannot destroy them Let them be sure that by faith they get Christ into the ship or rather into their souls that by obedience they undertake their voyage for him that their cause be good and that by repentance they cast out every Jonah and then let them fear no waves 4 The Church hath most trouble from those within her Obser 4. She hath sometime saith Bernard had peace from Heathens Pax à Pagauis nunquam à filiis never or but very rarely from her own children No adversaries were such raging waves as these who were domestical Of your selves saith Paul Acts 20.30 shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them Grievous wolves shall enter in among you not sparing the flock These Seducers were not Heathens without but Professours who had crept into the Church No evils are so great as those which come to the Church from within The inward intestine divisions ruptures heresies schisms have cost the Church more lamentations then ever did her persecution from without The heathen Emperors never were so vexatious to her as Arians Donatists Anabaptists Papists Outward enemies scratch the face they within stab the heart of the Church From the former she suffered by the latter she both sinned and suffered by the former she was under Persecution from men by the latter under Provocation against God by the former she was but sollicited to tell where her great strength lay by the latter she cut off her locks threw away her own weapons and betrayed her strength by her suffering from without the enemies laboured to beat her off from continuing Christian by her scandal within she beats them off from becoming Christians Wonder not then that the Divel hath alwayes used this home-bred engine of evil against the Church namely the ungodly carriage of those within her and the stirring up troubles in her own bowels He knows that there is no sword to this and that they will never adventure their lives for God and one another in war who will neither love God nor one another in peace Oh how should Christians labour to disappoint and countermine this the Divels most destructive policie Christians if we must die let us die like men by an unanimous holy contention against the common Enemie not like fools by giving him our sword and destroying one another by heresies schisms prophaneness in our own bowels 5 Sin is a persons greatest shame Observ 5 That which should most make him ashamed and confounded in himself and that which shall make him a spectacle of shame disgrace and infamie to others O my God said Ezra chap. 9.6 I am ashamed and blush to lift up my sace to thee for our iniquities are increased c. There is the shame that sin should make in us Thou hast consulted shame to thine own house Hab. 2.10 by cutting off many people and hast sinned against thine own soul Psal 40.14 Let them be brought to shame So Nah. 3.5 I will shew c. the Kingdoms thy shame there is the shame that sin brings upon us In the former respect sin should be shame in the latter it shall be shame It s sin only which deprives a man of true glorie and excellencie and is the degradation of his nature Men account that their shame which to do or suffer is much below their port and rank Oh how much goes that man below himself who was created Gods favourite and son having his love fixt and image stampt upon him the Viceroy of the creation a consort with Angels whose nature is taken into the union of the person of the son of God whose purchase was no less then the blood of God whose soul is a little heaven for the great God to dwell in whose bodie is the Temple of the holy Ghost whose habitation shall be the Empyrean heaven a Citie a Kingdome purer more glorious then a thousand Suns nay in comparison whereof a thousand Suns are but sack-cloth How much I say goes this excellent creature below himself in being a thorow-fare threshold foot-stool vassal to unclean spirits yea in having his heaven-born soul a very sink or common receptacle for that which is infinitely baser then all the dung off-scouring filth excrements upon earth or then any thing which hath a being How much lower is this descending then for a King to imbrace dung-hils or for Nebuchadnezzar to be a companion for beasts Rom. 6.21 Well might the Apostle say that of this condition the Romans were now ashamed Indeed there is nothing but sin which truly disgraceth a man Nothing but sin which disgraceth a man in Gods eye whose estimate is the true Standard of Honour nothing but sin makes us unfit for that habitation of glory nothing shameful unless sinning but befell the Lord of glory Nothing but sin which will make us unglorious at the last day when Christ shall appear with ten thousands of glorious Saints and Angels Oh how much are they mistaken who account sinne their glory who are asham'd of their glory holiness Pudor est medi. cina pudoris and glory in their shame their sin Are there not many who cannot blush in the doing of that Eph. 5.12 Jer. 8.12 at the hearing whereof t is our duty to blush They were not ashamed neither could they blush they have sin'd away shame in stead of being ashamed of sin and will not now suffer nature to draw her vail of blushing before their abominations When the Colours and Ensigns of a battle are lost we then give the battle for lost some have aptly called blushing the colour of vertue displaid by nature in the countenance When Satan hath taken away our colours and custome of sin hath banished even sense of sin and shame for sin our case seems to be desperate Other evils which sin bringeth are curable the anguish of conscience the wrath of God the breach of charity but the shame of sin can nay must never be got out the more holy we are now the more should we be
saint themselves and to say If such an one were commendable and voiced by our Minister for a good man I thank God t is much better with me I never was guilty of halfe his extravagancies and I see I may be a good man yea and commended when I am dead notwithstanding my failings so he calls his allowed wickednesses though I be not so pure as such and such are Oh how unsutable is it that by funerall Sermons men should be made more unfit for death to paint those in the pulpit who are punisht in hell and that a Minister should be strewing that dead body with flowers whose soule is bathing in flames For my part though I should not deny due commendation even at a funerall to some eminently exemplary saint or publiquely usefull instrument yet mostly I thinke his speech concerning the deceased may suffice who said If he were good he did not desire If bad he did not deserve praise 2. When we so admire the persons of some instructers as to neglect and despise others who haply deserve better then they the sin of the Corinthians when the Apostle tells them 1 Cor. 3.21 of their glorying in men some teachers being so gloried in peculiarly as if they were onely worth the hearing and none else to be regarded Some accounted Paul the only teacher some delighted onely in Apollo some magnified Peter as the alone worthy man thus they thought of men above what was meet and they were puffed up for one against another They gloryed in some disdaining all others as not to be named with them though teachers of the same truth because they had an high conceit of their learning wit cloquence holinesse or the like qualifications A great sin doubtlesse and I fear the common sin of this City How unthankfull for the bounty of Christ doe men make themselves hereby who gave all the Ministers of the Gospell to be theirs for their good all things saith the Apostle are yours whether Paul or Apollo or Cephas 1 Cor. 3.21 22. It s unthankfulnesse to a bountifull Prince when he bestowes many Lordships on his favourite if he should regard one of them onely and despise all the rest Yea how injuriously is the Spirit of Christ hereby reproached For the despising of those who are of small gifts is a reproaching of the Spirit of God as if he were defective in his gifts whereas their variety sets forth the fulnesse and freenesse of Gods spirit who divideth to every man severally as he will and worketh all these 1 Cor. 12.11 Besides this sin is oft the maine cause of schismes in the Church It makes people to divide themselves under different teachers whom they admire and it causeth teachers to take away those that affect them from other teachers whom they affect not so much Now this sin of schisme in it selfe very great as afterwards shall be shewn God willing on the 19. ver is made much the greater by being occasion'd by those very gifts of men which God bestowed upon them to this end that there might be no scisme in the body but that the members should have the same care one of another 1 Cor. 12.25 Nor is there any sin which doth more expose Christian Religion to so much contempt and obloquy then this kinde of admiring of persons for hereby severall Companies of Christians are made like the severall schools of Philosophers some whereof followed Plato some Aristotle some Epicurus and the doctrines of faith are but accounted as the proper opinions of severall teachers and all zeal for them is conceived to arise not from a certaine knowledge of heavenly truth but from peculiar humour and strength of fancy And how great a stumbling block must this needs be to those who are without how will it hinder them from embracing the truth and lay it open to derision yet further the sinfulness of this sort of man-admiration appears in that hereby both the despised person is so greived and discouraged that he is infeebled and disabled in his work and also he who is admired is not onely puffed up with pride and thereby occasion'd to adulterate the word invent and broach errors that stil he may be advanced above all others by going in a different way from them but also put upon the pleasing of men by sinfull flatteries in stead of profiting them by faithfull reprehensions To conclude this consideration nothing begets so great an aptness in men to receive errors as this sinfull admiration nor hath any seed of heresies and superstitions proved so fruitfull as this affection commonly makes men take down falsities and error is easily received from them whom we much admire and God doth often leave admired teachers to erre for tryal of the people and the punishing of their vanity in making Gods truth to stand at the devotion of the teacher for its acceptance and trampling upon the holy and perhaps learned labours of those who are more seeing and faithfull than the admired 3. When we so admire mens persons as to give all respect to men in outward greatnesse though perhaps wicked despifing the poor Saints because poor this James reproves my brethren have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ in respect of persons James 2. When wickedness in robes is magnified and holinesse in raggs contemned Oh how unworthy is it that the gold ring and costly apparell should be prefer'd before the robe of Christs righteousnesse and the jewel of grace that godliness and good examples should be rejected for their want of a gold ring that he who shall have a throne in heaven must here be a footstool upon earth 4. When Elections and offices are passed and bestowed partially for freindship favour money kinred a sin by much agravated when men have taken oaths to a Corporation to the contrary and it s ost a great tentation to the party who enters by money to sell justice dear 5. When we so admire the person of one as to do injustice in judgment whether Civil or Ecclesiastical which is when our affection doth so blind our judgment by some outward respect or appearance that we will not determine righteously the cause being over ballanced with such forreign considerations as have no affinity with it Thus men are in judicature sometime swayed with foolish pitty sometime with cowardly fear both these the Lord forbids Levit. 19.15 Thou shalt not respect the person of the poor Deut. 1.17 nor honour the person of the mighty This sin would make God a patron of iniquity the sentence being pronounced from God OSERVATIONS 1. Obs 1. The oondition of men in greatest out ward emiuency and dignity is oft very miserable None have so many flatterers and therefore none so few freinds as they flatterers as worms breed in the best fruit When a poor illiterate man is admonished for sin a rich a learned man is admired in nay haply for sin As the bodies so the sonls of Kings and great men
and discipline and herein if they shall either be hindred or negligent private Christians shall not be intangled in the guilt of their sin if they be humbled and use all lawful means for remedy though they do communicate 6. Let them search whether there be any Scripture warrant to break off communion with the Church in the ordinances when there is no defect in the ordinances themselves only upon this ground because some are admitted to them who because of their personal miscarriages ought to be debarred The Jewes of old though they separated when the worship it self was corrupted 2 Chron. 11.14 16. yet not because wicked men were suffered to be in outward communion with them Jerem. 7.9 10. nor do the precepts or patterns of the Christian Churches for casting out of offenders give any liberty to separation in case of failing to cast them out and though the suffering of scandalous persons be blamed yet not the communicating with them 1 Cor. 5.11 Rev. 2.14.15.20.24 The command not to eat with a brother who is a fornicator or covetous c. concerns not religious but civil communion by a voluntary familiar intimate Conversation either in being invited or in inviting as is clear by these two Arguments 1. That eating which is here forbidden with a brother is allowed to be with an heathen but it s the civil eating which is onely allowed to be with a heathen therefore it s the civil eating which is forbidden to be with a brother 2. The eating here forbidden is for the punishment of the nocent not for a punishment to the innocent but if religious eating at the Sacrament were forbidden the greatest punishment would fall upon the innocent the godly Now though such civil eating was to be forborne yet it follows not at all much lesse much more that religious eating is forbidden 1. Because civil eating is arbitrary and unnecessary not so religious which is enjoyned and a commanded duty 2. There is danger of being infected by the wicked in civil familiar and arbitrary eatings not so injoyning with them in an holy and commanded service and ordinance 3. Civill eating is done out of love either to the party inviting or invited but religious is done out of love to Jesus Christ were it not for whom we would neither eat at Sacrament with wicked men nor at all To conclude this separation from Churches from which Christ doth not separate is schismatical now it s clear in the Scripture that Christ owneth churches where faith is sound for the substance and their worship Gospel-worship though there be many defects and sinfull mixtures among them And what I have said concerning the schismaticalnesse of separation because of the sinfull mixtures of those who are wicked in practise is as true concerning separation from them who are erroneous in judgement if the errours of those from whom the separation is made be not fundamental and hinder Communion with Christ the head And much more clear if clearer can be is the schismaticalnesse of those who separate from and renounce all Communion with those churches which are not of their own manner of Constitution and modeld according to the platform of their own particular church-order To refrain fellowship and communion with such Churches who professe Christ their Lord whose faith is sound whose worship is Gospel-worship whose lives are holy because they come not into that particular way of church-order which we have pitcht upon is a schismaticall rending of the church of Christ to pieces Of this the church of Rome are most guilty who do most plainly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and circumscribe and bound the church of Christ within the limits and boundaries of the Romane jurisdiction even so as that they cast off all churches in the world yea and cut them off from all hope of salvation who subject not themselves to their way Herein likewise those separatists among our selves are heniously faulty who censure and condemn all other churches though their faith worship and conversation be never so scriptural meerly because they are not gathered into church order according to their own patterns In scripture churches are commended and dignified according as their fundamental faith was sound and their lives holy not according to the regularity of their first manner of gathering And notwithstanding the exactest regularity of their first gathering when churches have once apostatiz'd from faith and manners Christ hath withdrawn communion from them and most severely censured them And this making of the first gathering of people into church-fellowship to be the rule to direct us with whom we may hold communion wil make us refuse some churches upon whom are seen the Scripture characters of true churches and joyn with others onely upon an humane testimony because men onely tell us they were orderly gathered It should be our care to shun separation Obs ult To this end 1. Labour to bee progressive in the work of mortification the lesse carnal we are the lesse contention and dividing will be among us Are ye not carnal saith the Apostle and he proves it from their divisions separation is usually but very absurdly accounted a sign of an high grown christian we wrangle because we are children Jam. 4.1 and are men in malice because children in holinesse wars among our selves proceed from the lusts that war in our members 2. Admire no mans person the excessive regarding of some makes us despise others in respect of them when one man seems a gyant another will seem a dwarfe in comparison of him This caused the Corinthian schism Take heed of man-worship as well as image-worship let not idolatry be changed but abolish't Of this largely before upon Having mens persons in admiration 3. Labour for experimental benefit by the ordinances Men separate to those churches which they account better because they never found those where they were before to them good Call not Ministers good as the young man in the Gospel did Christ complementally only for if so you wil soon cal them bad Find the setting up of Christ in your hearts by the Ministry and then you will not dare to account it Antichristian If with Jacob we could say of our Bethels God is here wee would set up pillars nay bee such for our constancy in abiding in them 4. Neither give nor receive scandals give them not to occasion others to separate nor receive them to occasion thine own separation watch exactly construe doubtfull matters charitably Look not upon blemishes with multiplying glasses or old mens spectacles Hide them though not imitate them sport not your selves with others nakednesse Turn separation from into lamentation for the scandalous 5. Be not much taken with novelties New lights have set this church on fire for the most part they are taken out of the dark-lanthorns of old Hereticks They are false and fools fires to lead men into the precipice of separation Love truth in an old dresse let not antiquity be a