does not oppose his own single and private Judgment to the Judgment of Many but the common Reason of Mankind and the Judgment of God plainly declared in his Word If the generality of men should turn Atheists and Infidels and should deny the Being of God or his Providence the Immortality of mens Souls and the Rewards and Punishments of another World Or should deny the Truth of the Gospel and of the Christian Religion it would not certainly be any breach of modesty for a man to appear single if no body else would stand by him in the resolute defence of these great Truths In like manner when a whole Church though never so large and numerous shall conspire together to corrupt the Christian Religion so far as to impose upon Mankind under the name of Christian Doctrines and Articles of Faith things plainly contrary to the Sense and Reason of Mankind and to the clear and express Word of God why must a Man needs be thought immodest if he oppose such gross Errors and Corruptions of the Christian Doctrine And what reason have the Church of Rome to talk of modesty in this Case when they themselves have the face to impose upon Mankind the belief of things contrary to what they and every man else sees As they do in their Doctrine of Transubstantiation And to require of them to do what God hath expresly forbidden as in the Worship of Images besides a great many other Idolatrous Practices of that Church To deny the People the free use of the H. Scriptures and the publick Service of God in a known Tongueâ— contrary to the very end and design of all Religion and in affront to the common Reason and Liberty of Mankind Obj. 2. Secondly It is pretended that it is more prudent for private Persons to err with the Church than to be so pertinacious in their own Opinions To which I answer that it may indeed be pardonable in some Cases to be led into mistake by the Authority of those to whose Judgment and Instruction we ought to pay a great deference and submission Provided always it be in things which are not plain and necessary but surely it can never be prudent to err with any number how great soever in matters of Religion which are of moment merely for Numbers sake But to comply with the known Errors and Corruptions of any Church whatsoever is certainly damnable Obj. 3. Thirdly It is pretended yet further that men shall sooner be excused in following the Church than any particular Man or Sect. To this I answer that it is very true if the matter be doubtful and especially if the Probabilities be equal or near equal on both Sides But if the Error be gross and palpable it will be no excuse to have followed any number of Men or any Church whatsoever For here the competition is not between Men and Men but between God and Men And in this Case we must forsake all Men to follow God and his Truth Thou shalt in no wise follow a Multitude in a known Error is a Rule which in Reason is of equal obligation with that Divine Law Thou shalt in no wise follow a Multitude to do evil or rather is comprehended in it because to comply with a known Error is certainly to do Evil. And this very Objection the Jews made against our B. Saviour and the Doctrine which He taught that the Guides and Governours of the Jewish Church did utterly differ from Him and were of a contrary mind Have any of the Rulers say they believed on him What will you be wiser than your Rulers and Governors What follow the Doctrine of one single Man against the unanimous Judgment and Sentence of the Great Sanhedrim to whom the Trial of Doctrines and pretended Prophets doth of right belong But as plausible as this Objection may seem to be it is to be considered that in a corrupt and degenerate Church the Guides and Rulers of it are commonly the worst and the most deeply engaged in the Errors and Corruptions of it They brought them in at first and their Successors who have been bred up in the belief and practice of them are concern'd to uphold and maintain them And so long a Prescription gives a kind of Sacred Stamp even to Error and an Authority not to be opposed and resisted And thus it was in the corrupt State of the Jewish Church in our Saviour's Time And so likewise in that great Degeneracy of the Christian Church in thâ— Times of Popery their Rulers made them to err Insomuch that when Martin Luther appeared in opposition to the Errors and Superstitions of that Church and was hard prest with this very Objection which the Pharisees urg'd against our Saviour he was forc'd to bolt out a kind of unmannerly Truth Religio nunquam magis periclitatur quà m inter Reverendissimos Religion says he is never in greater hazard and worse treated than amongst the most Reverend meaning the Pope and his Cardinals and all the Romish Hierarchy who had their dependance upon them Obj. 4. Fourthly it is Objected That as on the one hand there may be danger of Error in following blindly the Belief of the Church so on the other hand there is as great a danger of Schism in forsaking the communion of the Church upon pretence of Errors and Corruptions Very true but where great Errors and Corruptions are not only pretended but are real and evident and where our Compliance with those Errors and Corruptions is made a necessary Condition of our Communion with that Church In that Case the guilt of Schism how great a Crime soever it be doth notâ— fall upon those who forsake the Communion of that Church but upon those who drive them out of it by the sinful Conditions which they impose upon them And this is truly the Case between Us and the Church of Rome as we are ready to make good and have fully done it upon all Occasions and they have never yet been able to vindicate and clear themselves of those gross Errors and Corruptions which have been charged upon them and which they require of all their Members as necessary Conditions of Communion with them here and of eternal Salvation hereafter For we do not object to them doubtful matters but things as plain as any are contained in the Bible as every body would see if they durst but let every body read it The Worship of Images is there as plainly forbidden in the Decalogue as Murther and Adultery are The Communion in both Kinds is as express an Institution of our Saviour as any in all the New Testament and even as the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper it self only that Church pretends to a Dispensing Power as a Priviledge inherent in theâ—â— Church and inseparable from it And to add but one Instance more Publick Prayers and the Service of God in an unknown Tongue are as plainly and fully declared against by St. Paul in a long Chapter upon this
and to damnable Errors and Heresies And some good Men have upon the matter stood alone in the open Profession of the true Religion in the midst of this general Defection from it Elijah in that general Revolt of the People of Israel when they had forsaken the Covenant of the Lord and broken down his Altars and slain his Prophets and he only as he thought was left to stand alone I say in this Case when as he verily believed he had no body to stand by him he was very zealous for the Lord God of Hosts 1 Kings 18. 18. and with an undaunted courage stood up for the Worship of the true God and reproved Ahab to his face for his defection to the Worship of Idols And those three brave Youths in the Prophecy of Daniel chap. 3. did in the like resolute and undaunted manner refuse to obey the Command of the great King Nebuchadnezzar to worship the Image which he had set up when all others Submitted and paid Honour to it Telling him plainly If it be so our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery Furnance and He will deliver us out of thy hand If not be it known unto thee O King that we will not serve thy Gods nor worship the golden Image which thou hast set up v. 17 18. In like manner and with the same Spirit and courage Daniel withstood the Decree of Darius which forbad men to ask a Petition of any God or man for thirty days save of the King only Dan. 6. 7. and this under the pain of being cast into the Den of Lions and when all others gave obedience to it he set open the windows of his chamber towards Jerusalem and kneeled down upon his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks as he did afore time v. 10. In the prevalency of the Arian Heresy Athanasius almost stood alone in the profession and maintenance of the Truth And in the Reign of Antichrist the true Church of God is represented by a Woman flying into the Wilderness and living there in obscurity for a long time insomuch that the Professors of the Truth should hardly be found And yet during that Degeneracy of so great a Part of the Christian Church and the prevalency of Antichrist for so many Ages some few in every Age did appear who did resolutely own the Truth and bear Witness to it with their Blood But these did almost stand alone and by themselves like a few scattered Sheep wandring up and down in a wide Wilderness Thus in the heighth of Popery Wickliffe appear'd here in England and Hierome of Prague and John Huss in Germany and Bohemia And in the beginning of the Reformation when Popery had quite over-run these Western Parts of the World and subdued her Enemies on every side and Antichrist sate securely in the quiet possession of his Kingdom Luther arose a bold and rough Man but a fit Wedge to cleave in sunder so hard and knotty a Block and appeared stoutly against the gross Errors and Corruptions of the Church of Rome and for a long time stood alone and with a most invincible spirit and courage maintained his ground and resisted the united malice and force of Antichrist and his Adherents and gave him so terrible a Wound that he is not yet perfectly healed and recovered of it So that for a Man to stand alone or with a very few adhering to him and standing by him is not a mere imaginary Supposition but a Case that hath really and in fact happen'd in several Ages and Places of the World Let us then proceed to consider in the 2d place The due limits and bounds of this peremptory Resolution In all matters of Faith and Practice which are plain and evident either from Natural Reason or from Divine Revelation this Resolution seems to be very reasonable But in things doubtful a modest man and every man hath reason to be so would be very apt to be stagger'd by the judgment of a very Wise man and much more of many such and especially by the unanimous Judgment of the generality of Men the general Voice and Opinion of Mankind being next to the Voice of God himself For in matters of an indifferent nature which God hath neither commanded nor forbidden such as are many of the Circumstances and Ceremonies of God's Worship a man would not be singular much less stiff and immovable in his singularity but would be apt to yield and surrender himself to the general Vote and Opinion and to comply with the common Custom and Practice and much more with the Rules and Constitutions of Authority whether Civil or Ecclesiastical Because in things lawful and indifferent we are bound by the Rules of Decency and Civility not to thwart the general Practice and by the Commands of God we are certainly obliged to obey the lawful Commands of lawful Authority But in things plainly contrary to the evidence of Sense or Reason or to the Word of God a man would complement no Man or Number of Men nor would he pin his Faith upon any Church in the World much less upon any single Man no not the Pope no though there were never so many probable Arguments brought for the proof of his Infallibility In this Case a Man would be singular and stand alone against the whole World against the wrath and rage of a King and all the terrors of his fiery Furnace as in other matters a Man would not believe all the Learned Men in the World against the clear evidence of Sense and Reason If all the great Mathematicians of all Ages Archimedes and Euclide and Apollonius and Diophantus c. could be supposed to meet together in a General Council and should there declare in the most solemn manner and give it under their Hands and Seals that twice two did not make four but five this would not move me in the least to be of their mind nay I who am no Mathematician would maintain the contrary and would persist in it without being in the least startled by the positive Opinion of these great and learned men and should most certainly conclude that they were either all of them out of their Wits or that they were byassed by some Interest or other and swayed against the clear evidence of Truth and the full conviction of their own Reason to make such a determination as this They might indeed over-rule the Point by their Authority but in my inward judgment I should still be where I was before Just so in matters of Religion if any Church though with never so glorious and confident a pretence to Infallibility should declare for Transubstantiation that is that the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament by vertue of the Consecration of the Priest are substantially changed into the natural Body and Blood of Christ this is so notoriously contrary both to the Sense and Reason of Mankind that a Man should chuse to stand single in
the opposition of it and laugh at or rather pity the rest of the World that could be so servilely blind as seemingly to conspire in the belief of so monstrous an Absurdity And in like manner if any Church should declare that Images are to be worshipped or that the Worship of God is to be performed in an unknown Tongue and that the H. Scriptures which contain the Word and Will of God and teach men what they are to believe and do in order to their eternal Salvation are to be lock'd up and kept concealed from the People in a Language which they do not understand lest if they were permitted the free use of them in their Mother Tongue they should know more of the Mind and Will of God than is convenient for the common People to know whose Devotion and Obedience to the Church does mainly depend upon their Ignorance Or should declare that the Sacrifice of Christ was not offer'd once for all but is and ought to be repeated ten Millions of times every Day And that the People ought to receive the Communion in one kind only and the Cup by no means to be trusted with them for fear the Profane Beards of the Laity should drink of it And that the saving efficacy of the Sacraments doth depend upon the intention of the Priest without which the Receiver can have no benefit by them These are all of them so plainly contrary to Scripture and most of them in Reason so absurd that the Authority of no Church whatsoever can oblige a man to the belief of them Nay I go yet further that being evidently contrary to the Doctrine of the Gospel though an Apostle or an Angel from Heaven should declare them we ought to reject them And for this I have St. Paul's authority and warrant who speaking of some that perverted the Gospel of Christ by teaching things contrary to it Though we says he or an Angel from Heaven preach any other Gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you let him be accursed As we said before so say I now again though an Apostle though an Angel from Heaven preach any other Gospel unto you than that which ye have received let him be accursed Gal. 1. 7 8 9. You see he repeats it over again to express not only his own confident assurance but the certainty of the thing And here is an Anathema with a witness which we may confidently oppose to all the Anathema's which the Council of Trent hath so liberally denounced against all those who shall presume to gainsay these New Doctrines of their Church which are in truth another Gospel than that which our B. Saviour and his Apostles taught And yet on their Side there is neither an Apostle nor an Angel from Heaven in the Case To give but one Instance more If Bellarmin shall tell me as he expresly does That if the Pope should declare Virtue to be Vice and Vice to be Virtue I were bound to believe him unless I would sin against Conscience And if all the World should say the same that Bellarmin does namely that this Infallible Declarer of Virtue and Vice were to be believed and followed yet I could not possibly be of their mind for this plain and undeniable Reason because if Virtue and Vice be all one then Religion is nothing since the main Design of Religion is to teach men the difference between Virtue and Vice and to oblige them to practise the one and to refrain from the other And if Religion be nothing then Heaven and Hell are nothing And if Heaven be nothing then an infallible Guide thither is of no use and to no manner of purpose because he is a Guide no whither and so his great Office ceases and falls of it self And now lest any should think me singular in this Assertion and that thereby I give a great deal too much to the single Judgment of private Persons and too little to the Authority of a Church I will produce the deliberate Judgment of a very Learned Man and a great Assertor of the Church's Authority concerning the matter I am now speaking of I mean Mr. Hooker in his deservedly admired Book of Ecclesiastical Policy His words are these I grant says he that Proof derived from the Authority of Man's Judgment is not able to work that Assurance which doth grow by a stronger proof and therefore although ten thousand General Councils should set down one and the same Definitive Sentence concerning any Point of Religion whatsoever yet one Demonstrative Reason alledged or one Testimony cited from the Word of God himself to the contrary could not chuse but oversway them all In as much as for them to be deceived it is not so impossible as it is that Demonstrative Reason or Divine Testimony should deceive And again For men says he to be tyed and led by Authority as it were with a kind of Captivity of Judgment and though there be Reason to the contrary not to listen to it but follow like Beasts the first in the Herd this were Brutish Again That the Authority of Men should prevail with Men either against or above Reason is no part of OUR Belief Companies of Learned Men though they be never so great and Reverend are to yield unto Reason the weight whereof is no whit prejudiced by the simplicity of the Person which doth alledge it but being found to be sound and good the bare Opinion of men to the contrary must of necessity stoop and give place And this he delivers not only as his own particular Judgment but that which he apprehended to be the Judgment of the Church of England I have produced these clear and positive Testimonies of so learned and judicious a Person and of so great esteem in our Church on purpose to prevent any misapprehension as if by this Discourse I intended to derogate from the Authority of the Church and her just and reasonable Determinations in things no wise contrary to plain Reason or the Word of God And beyond this pitch no judicious Protestant that I know of ever strain'd the Authority of the Church I proceed now in the Second place to vindicate the Reasonableness of this Resolution from the Objections to which this singular and peremptory kind of Resolution may seem liable as Obj. 1. First it may very speciously be said that this does not seem modest for a man to set up his own private Judgment against the general Suffrage and Vote And it is very true as I said before that about things indifferent a man should not be stiff and singular and in things doubtful and obscure a man should not be over-confident of his own Judgment and insist peremptorily upon it against the general Opinion But in things that are plain and evident either from Scripture or Reason it is neither immodesty nor a culpable singularity for a man to stand alone in the defence of the Truth Because in such a Case a man
single Argument as any one thing in all his Epistles These things are plain and undeniable and being so are a full justification not only of the Church of England in the Reformation which She thought fit to make within her self from the gross Errors and Corruptions of the Church of Rome but likewise of particular Persons who have at any time for the same Reasons withdrawn themselves from Her Communion in any of the Popish Countries Yea though that single Person should happen to be in those Circumstances that he could not have the Opportunity of holding Communion with any other Church that was free from those Errors and Corruptions and which did not impose them as necessary Conditions of Communion For if any Church fall off to Idolatry every good Christian not only may but ought to forsake Her Communion and ought rather to stand single and alone in the Professâ—on of the pure and true Religion than to continue in the Communion of a corrupt and Idolatrous Church I know that some Men are so fond of the Name of a Church that they can very hardly believe that any thing which â—ears that glorious Title can miscarry or do any thing so much amiss as to give just occasion to any of her Members to break off from Hâ—r Communion What the Church err That is such an Absurdity as is by many thought sufficient to put any Objection out of countenance That the whole Church that is that all the Christians in the World should at any time fall off to Idolatry and into Errors and Practices directly contrary to the Christian Doctrine revealed in the H. Scriptures is on all hands I think denied But that any Particular Church may fall into such Errors and Practices is I think as universally granted Only in this Case they demand to have the Roman Catholick Church excepted And why I pray Because though the Roman Church is a Particular Church it is also the Universal Church If this can be and good sense can be made of a Particular-Universal Church then the Roman Church may demand this high Privilege of being exempted from the Fate of all other Churches but if the Roman-Catholick that is a Particular-Universal Church be a gross and palpable Contradiction then it is plain that the Church of Rome hath no more pretence to this Privilege than any other Particular Church whatsoever And which is yet more some men talk of these matters at that rate as if a man who thought himself obliged to quit the Communion of the Church of Rome should happen to be in those Circumstances that he had no Opportunity of joining himself to any other Communion he ought in that Case to give over all thoughts of Religion and not be so conceited and presumptuous as to think of going to Heaven alone by himself It is without doubt a very great Sin to despise the Communion of the Church or to break off from it so long as we can continue in it without Sin But if things should once come to that Pass that we must either disobey God for company or stand alone in our obedience to Him we ought most certainly to obey God whatever comes of it and to profess his Truth whether any body else will join with us in that Profession or not And they who speak otherwise condemn the whole Reformation and do in effect say that Martin Luther had done a very ill thing in breaking off from the Church of Rome if no body else would have joined with him in that honest Design And yet if it had been so I hope God would have given him the Grace and Courage to have stood alone in so good and glorious a Cause and to have laid down his Life for it And for any man to be of another Opinion is just as if a man upon great deliberation should chuse rather to be drowned than to be saved either by a Plank or a small Boat or to be carried into the Harbour any other way than in a Great Ship of so many hundred Tuns In short a good man must resolve to obey God and to profess his Truth though all the World should happen to do otherwise Christ hath promised to preserve his Church to the end of the World that is he hath engaged his Word that he will take care that there shall always be in some part of the World or other some persons that shall make a sincere Profession of his true Religion But He hath no where promised to preserve any one Part of his Church from such Errors and Corruptions as may oblige all good men to quit the Communion of that Part yea though when they have done so they may not know whither to resort for actual Communion with any other sound Part of the Christian Church As it happened to some particular Persons during the Reign and Rage of Popery in these Western Parts of the Christian Church The Result from all this Discourse is to confirm and establish us all in this Hour of Temptation and of the Powers of Darkness in the well-grounded Belief of the necessity and justice of our Reformation from the Errors and Corruptions of the Roman Church And to engage us to hold fast the Profession of our Faith without wavering And not only to profess and promise as Peter did to our Lord though all men forsake thee yet will not I But if there should be Occasion to perform and make good this Promise with the hazard of all that is dear to us and even of Life it self And whatever Trials God may permit any of us to fall into to take up the pious Resolution of Joshua here in the Text that whatever others do WE will serve the Lord. I will conclude my Discourse upon this First Particular in the Text with the Exhortation of St. Paul to the Philippians chap. 1. v. 27. Only let your conversation be as it becometh the Gospel of Christ Stand fast in one Spirit be of one Mind striving together for the Faith of the Gospel In nothing terrified by your Adversaries which to them is an evident token of Perdition but to you of Salvation and that of God And thus much may suffice to have spoken to the First thing in the Text namely the pious Resolution of Joshua that if there were Occasion and things were brought to that extremity he would stand alone in the Profession and Practice of God's true Religion Chuse you this Day whom ye will serve but as for ME I will serve the Lord. I should now have proceeded to the Second thing and which indeed I chiefly intended to speak to from this Text namely the pious Câ—re of a good Father and Mâ—ster of a Fâ—mily to train up those under his Charge in the Râ—ligion and Worship of the true God As for Me and MY HOUSE we will serve the Lord. But this I shall not now enter upon but defer it to some other Opportunity Consider what ye have heard and the Lord give