is but another word for the same thing and yet I suppose they had as little need of them as you or any body else We find the Disciples of Christ confessing their own Impotence and saying They knew not how or what to Pray for as they ought And Christ gave them a Form of found Words with which he would have them go to their Heavenly Father He doth not say Use this Form till you have better Gifts and your Legs be grown stronger but absolutely and indefinitely When you Pray say Our Father c. Luke 11.2 And the Christian Church hath observ'd and done so ever since Will you say or think that all before you have gone upon Crutches and that you only have arrived to that sure-footing as to be able to lay them aside and go without them This farther shews what a fine Conceit you have of yourself But I think you had better rely upon those Crutches which Christ made and his Apostles used than stand too much upon your own Legs And now I think you may easily see that these fine Fetches of yours have more of Pride than Argument in them But there is one thing more which must be considered in this place and that is you say That God must be served with the best you have And you say true but 't was not so wisely done to contradict it again and say That God is better serv'd with the Incongruities and Barbarisms of Conceived Prayer than the more Elegant and Exact Composure of well-digested Forms I hope Sir you will not say that Nonsense and Incongruities are better or more acceptable to God than proper and well-order'd Sense But this is another of your Incongruities And yet you quote St. Austin for it That where the Heart is sound God accepts a few Solecisms and Barbarisms in Prayer c. Indeed where these are the best that we have or can get God accepts according to what a Man hath and not according to what a Man hath not But where the Church hath made better provision for us 1 Cor. 8.12 he will not away with such blind and lame Sacrifices Mal. 1.13 And having in our Flock a Male will not be put off with a Corrupt thing In short Sir you may easily perceive that you have as much need of these Spectacles as other Men to help the Weakness of your Sight in these matters And the Lameness of your Arguments as well as Prayers may call upon you to make use of these Crutches With which therefore you may do well to furnish your self with all speed Your loud and frequent Out-cries about silencing so many brave Men for not using Forms of Prayer shall be heard and considered in my next In the mean time I am SIR Your affectionate Friend and Servant M. H. LETTER XII To J. M. SIR WE are yet upon the Injunction of Forms of Prayer for publick Worship against which you have Two farther Exceptions the one that it hath silenced many hundred of able and painful Ministers and deprived the Church of their Labours the other that it hath set up and encouraged a lazy Ministry in their room A heavy Charge indeed But let us see how it 's made out First then you say that the Enjoyning of Forms hath stopt the Mouth of many able and painful Ministers and struck many Hundreds of them Dumb at one clap Well! But how was this done I hope here was no violence used in stopping their Mouths and forcing them to perpetual Silence no 't was their own voluntary Refusal of those publick Prayers which many of them had used themselves and most of them judged lawful to be used and all of them might have used if they pleas'd Why then it seems they Silenced themselves and made it their own Choice and what reason have they to complain of their own Act But 't was the Enjoyning these Prayers that made them unlawful and hindred their Compliance with them How so What could the Enjoyning a lawful thing alter its Nature and make it Sinful Is there such a Malignity in the Power of Superiours as to Poyson a good Action and turn it into Evil meerly by Commanding it I hope Sir you have better thoughts of the higher Powers than so To state this Matter aright Was this Injunction made by good and sufficient Authority and was there wise and good Reason for the making of it Yes it was done by our lawful Superiours both in Church and State And that too to preserve Order and Unity and to put a stop to those Swarms of Sects and Schisms which the Liberty of free Prayer had brought in Why it seems then they were Silenced by Law and such a one too as they might and ought to have obey'd Where is the Fault then of stopping the Mouths of Gainsayers and putting to Silence the Ignorance of foolish Men Besides is it not the Will of God that Men shall pay a due Reverence and Obedience to all lawful Commands of our Superiours who have the rule over us in the Lord Did not God cause the Earth to open its Mouth and Silence those that spake against Moses and Aaron Numb 16.32 who all perished in the gainsaying of Korah Do we not read of some whose Mouths must be kept with Bit and Bridle Psal 32.9 lest they shall fall upon thee And have not many fallen upon their Governours this way speaking Evil of the Rulers of the People and Slandering the Footsteps of Gods Anointed And does not the Apostle speak of some unruly and vain Talkers and Deceivers Tit. 1.10 whose Mouths must be stopt And is not this the case of all such as speak and act against good Orders So then for ought I can find These Men are silenced by the Law of God as well as Man for Christ himself hath commanded that if any neglect to hear the Church Mat. 18.17 that is to obey the good Orders of it he must be thrust out of it and be esteemed but as a Heathen Man and a Publican Where then is the Hardship in the Case Why you say Governours are to Rule not by Constraint but Willingly But what if some are unwilling to be ruled If the sense of Duty will not constrain them must there be no restraint laid upon their Disobedience What then will become of Government Will not this leave every one to do what is right in their own Eyes Sit down Sir and consider this But you will have me consider the hard Terms that were put upon these Men in order to their Conformity I shall Sir Why then First They were required to give their unfeigned Assent and Consent to all that is used in the Publick Prayers of the Church or else they must hold their Tongues And is not this very fit think you that Men should assent to the Truth and consent to the use of what is duly established Would you have them say one thing in the Service of God and think
another and play the Hypocrites in Publick Worship I hope not But there were Subscriptions Oaths Declarations and the like required which is a Burthen upon Mens Consciences Why so Do not all Societies require quire some Oaths of Fidelity from all that are admitted into them Do not all the Reformed Churches abroad exact an Acknowledgment and Subscription to their Confessions and Publick Worship and may not the Church of England expect the same Security that all other Societies require from their Members These Sir are some of those crude indigested Notions of Mr. Baxter of which I told you in the beginning and which have been largely answered and refuted by many learned Men particularly by Dr. Morrice in his Treatise of Episcopacy Dr. Falkner in his Libertas Ecclesiastica and Dr. Saywel in his Evangelical and Catholick Vnity which I therefore recommend to your serious and impartial perusal not doubting if you please to read them you may soon see the Vanity of these Cavils and come to a better Light than you have at present in these Matters But those Godly Men that were thus silenced had another and better way of Praying than by Forms and could perform that Duty in a more Spiritual and Edifying manner by their own Gift Pray Sir Who is to judge of that Hath not God appointed Rulers in his Church that all things may be done decently and in order And are not we required to obey them for the Lords sake And how can this be if every one may take the liberty of Praying in Publick after what manner and way he please Our Superiours think fit to settle an uniform and regular way of Publick Worship that according to our Saviour's Advise Men may agree in what they ask and speak the same things in their Prayers And must Men instead of observing such wise and wholesome Laws bring a Babel and Confusion of Tongues into the Church and Pray one against another I hope Sir you would not have this done But if we must have a Liturgy you say then let us have the Reformed Liturgy made at the Savoy which is much more correct than the other It seems you would have the ancient Liturgy compos'd by our Pious and Learned Reformers laid aside like an old Almanack out of date and nothing can please you but a new and reformed Liturgy 'T is not to be doubted Sir when that is grown old you will grow weary of that too And if we must reform our Prayers as oft as some new fangled Persons will find Flaws in them we must have a new Liturgy as well as a new Almanack every Year Have you never heard what ill things have been done under a pretence of Reformation And do not all wise Men know the Danger and Mischief of Innovation But the Reformed Liturgy is more correct than the other Are you Sir Or your Superiours to judge of that Have not they the Care and Government of the Church put into their Hands And must they lay aside the Antient well compos'd Prayers of the Church meerly to gratify your Reforming and new fangled Humour To what will this Pride of yours bring you You already set your self above the High Powers and 't is to be feared your next Step will be that of Lucifers to be like the Most High But while you make such loud outcries against silencing so many brave Men you have forgotten the silencing of all the Learned Bishops and Regular Clergy of the Church of England in the Days of the great Rebellion And that too by an Usurp'd Power that took away the Life of one of the best Princes and pull'd down the Discipline of one of the best Established Churches in the Christian World Whereas the silencing of your brave Men was only stopping the Mouths of those that had open'd them to do all this Mischief For is it not well known how they reviled that good King and aspers'd his Government and by the Venom of an evil Tongue corrupted the Loyalty of a great part of the Kingdom And certainly if the Mouth of Wickedness must be stopt never any Persons in any Age were more justly silenced But would you be served so Put your self in their Case Sir If you put your self in the Case of any Offender there is no doubt but you would willingly escape unpunished how just and necessary soever it were to to be inflicted For Punishment is against the Grain of Nature and all Men are so tender and sond of Themselves as to desire to escape it You mistake Sir that Golden Rule of Doing as we would be done by which must be understood of those Regular and Lawful Desires we may reasonably have for our selves not of those inordinate Wishes which Partiality and Self-Love may create in us For the Magistrate is to deal with Offenders not as they could wish nor as himself in their Case would be apt to desire For there is none how guilty soever but would avoid Punishment but as Law and Justice do require and direct him If these Men then were so justly silenced by the Law of God and Man how came they to speak again and in Conventicles too which they themselves had spoken so much against Sure they had no Warrant to open there Nor can they yet speak as Men having Authority For tho' the Penalty be suspended their Obligation to silence still continues What then have they a Commission from Heaven to speak without or against Lawful Authority No The People strike them upon the Back and encourage them to speak and promise to hear them let what will come of it And this is all the Warrant and Authority they have yet to break this silence But is it not pity the Church should be deprived of the Labours of so many Godly Men Sir it had been much better for the Church if it had never known the Labours of most of them For they laboured hard to bring Confusion into the Church and Anarchy into the State and both of them groan to this day under the sad Effects of their Labours But Thanks be to God the Church has no need or reason to desire any more of their Labours For they have only made work for other and better Labourers sc To root out those Seeds of Discord and Division which they have sown among us And if it be possible to plant Peace and Unity and Order in their Room But how can this be expected from such a lazy Ministry as you say Forms of Prayer have set up This Sir is your next Plea against the Injunction of them concerning which all that I shall say at present is that 't is another just reason for silencing your brave Men for the Mouth of Calumny ought to be stopt and 't is but necessary to strike Detractors dumb And whether this be any more than a down-right Calumny must be examined in my next I am Your hearty Friend and Wellwisher M. H. May 12. 1697. LETTER XIII To J. M. SIR YOur
them I cannot doubt your acceptance and shall therefore rest SIR Your assured Friend and Well-wisher M. H. June 10. 1697. LETTER XVIII To J. M. SIR I Come now to what you have often called for and that is to prove Extempore or Free Prayer to be a late Invention brought into these Kingdoms by the subtlety of Popish Emissaries which you say is asserted in my Sermon and I doubt not but with very good Reason and Truth That 't is a late Invention hath been proved in some measure already because Antiquity makes mention only of two Ways of Praying sc by the Immediate Inspirations of the Holy Ghost and by the use of Publick Forms When our Saviour called his Disciples and Apostles he indowed them with extraordinary Gifts of the Holy Ghost by which they were enabled to Pray by the immediate Assistance and Inspirations of the Holy Spirit and this continued a while for the Confirmation and Probation of the Gospel but when the Gospel obtaining every where this extraordinary Gift of Praying was withdrawn then the Ordinary way of Praying by Publick Forms took place and this hath continued and is derived down through the several Ages of the Church to this day Whereas Praying Extempore without the help of Inspiration and in opposition to Established Forms is a thing that was never heard of or practised for above a Thousand years after Christ and his Apostles and hath plainly appeared to be a late Artifice made use of by cunning Men to serve their own Ends and Purposes When the Church of England had by the Blessing of God happily Reformed and cast off the Errors and Corruptions of Rome and that Church had thereby lost a very great part of its Power Patrimony and Preferments great Art was used to reduce it back again and by undermining the Reformation to regain their lost Prize And because they found no Tool more effectual to work by than this of Extempore Prayer as being most apt to catch and deceive the People they did not fail to make use of it and this we shall find to be the Rise and Original of this way of Praying For the clearing and confirming whereof you must consider First the nature of the thing to be proved And Next The proper Evidence or way of proving it for to expect the same kind of Proof for every thing and to look for Demonstrations in matters that are not capable of it hath been ever esteemed a piece of great Ignorance and Folly Now the thing before us being a matter of Fact is only to be proved by Testimonies and such Authentick Records as no wise or impartial Man hath any just reason to deny and if it hath this Evidence for the Truth of it 't is as much as any reasonable Person can desire and that it hath this I doubt not to make apparent to any that hath no wrong Byass to draw him away from the belief of it To this end you must know Sir That there is in Rome a Society called Congregatio de propagandâ fide whose chief business it is to choose out and send abroad Emissaries into all Parts of the World to propagate the Romish which they call the Catholick Faith and to reduce Hereticks that are gone off from it Now the persons they make choice of for this Imployment are the fittest they can pick out of all Orders and Fraternities but more especially of the Order of the Jesuits who being bred up to all the Arts of Insinuation and likewise to some skill in many ordinary and mechanical Arts are known to be the ablest Instruments for the carrying on of this Work and These are found under sundry Masks and Disguises in most parts of the reformed Countries Moreover you must note That one of the principal Wiles and Methods made use of to compass this end is to create Differences and Divisions where they come that by unsetling the Minds of Protestants they may the better shake the Principles of the reformed Religion and by running the Round of various Sects and Heresies they may at last be brought to wheel about and to settle in what they stile the Catholick Faith Bella Haereticorum Pax Ecclesia 'T is the known Maxim of their great Politicians that the Discord of Hereticks is the Security of the Church and Bishop Whitgift in the days of Queen Elizabeth shews that the opposing of Uniformity was the great Artifice of the Papists to subvert the Protestant Religion and which way their Endeavours still tend may be seen with half an Eye all their Hopes being founded upon our Dissentions Of this you may read more at large in Dr. Falkener's Libertas Ecclesiastica Pag. 6. Sect. 2. Now there is no one thing which they have found more effectual to cause and ferment Divisions than this of Extempore Prayer whereby under the notion of a more spiritual way of Praying they have brought the People out of love with all Antient and Godly Forms and set them a madding after vain and new Inventions and having found this so well to answer their Expectations you may be assured such cunning Polititians will not be wanting to promote and practise it And that this was the first Rise and is still their main reason of encouraging this way of Praying I come now more directly to prove Though there are many known and well attested Stories of Romish Priests and Jesuits being found in various Disguises wheedling and seducing the People by this Artifice yet because some among our selves have fallen into the same way for their own Ends 't will be hard to remove their Prejudices by any private though never so well attested Relations of this kind I shall therefore give you two very remarkable Instances hereof confirmed by such Publick Authentick Testimony as no unbyass'd person can have any just Exception against and they are Faithful Cummin and Thomas Heath the one a Dominican Fryar and the other a Jesuit The Examination of the first was taken before Queen Elizabeth and the Lords of the Council by Matthew Parker then Arch Bishop of Canterbury an Extract of which was found in the Memorials of my Lord Cecil an eminent Statesman in the Reign of that Queen from whence it was transmitted to the most Reverend Arch Bishop Vsher and coming into the hands of Sir James Ware was by that means communicated to the Publick The Examination of the other was taken by the Bishop of Rochester in the presence of the Dean and Chapter of that Church the Narrative whereof was taken out of the Registry of that See So that no matter of Fact can be proved by better Evidence Having seen the Evidence let us hear the Fact which in short was thus Faithful Cummin under the Disguise of a more refined Protestant made frequent use of this more Spiritual way of Praying on purpose as it plainly appeared to bring the People into a hatred and contempt of the Publick Prayers of the Church which he reviled