shame do know to be true and visible but to my comfort do know to be an Objection of no weight for our question is concerning Communion with not the Constitution of a Church That such matter should not at first Constitution have been taken in and having grown up ought to have been cut off and cast out I can and do yield and consent but that the disorder defection and prophaneness of the members or what is more the Angels and Ministers hath resolved the Church into a non-entity and necessitated non-communion save in a new Constitution and Church gathering I cannot believe because I finde nothing more plainer in Nature then for a degenerate Vine to retain the name and nature of a Vine when it bringeth forth little save sowre Grapes Mat. 3.9 nor is any thing more clearer in Scripture then for the children of the Devil Matth 3 9. John 8.44 to have Abrahaem to their father and be the children of God and Covenant of Graco by visible administration or for disorderly Christians in Corinth to be called and owned as Saints and Believers a man covetous a fornicator and adulterer an idolater 1 Cor. 5.11 Rev. 3.1 a drunkard to be called a brother Sardis having a name to live but being dead is declared one of the golden Candlesticks among which Christ walketh and when Paul wrote to Titus the Christians in Crete were abominable disobedient and to every good work reprobate Titus 1 13 16. yet was Titus charged to rebuke them sharply not to disown them or decline communion with them or to gather the fit matter and orderly Christians among them into a new Church form nor are any among them advised or directed so to do a Ram and a Goat cannot be denied to be of Christs flock on earth though they may be turned on his left hand at the day of judgment Correction and casting out is the priviledge of a Church member and supposeth its capacity in their object though an incestuous person the prophanenesse of the members of this Church may and must provoke my brotherly admonition ministerial reprehension and the Churches Censures against them but will never warrant my non-communion with them or voluntary absence from Gods solemn publick worship celebrated among them because it doth not ipso facto by any due order or divine direction discharge their relation to Christs Catholick visible body so long as God knoweth them as his Spouse and people though deserving having not received from him a Bill of Divorce I may be burdened to see their lewdnesse and lightnesse but must not forsake the Bride-chamber nor his worship therein celebrated without all doubt the capacity of those within the Church though disorderly and as such to be judged is vastly different from Turks Jews and Pagans and those without the Church who refuse to professe the true God and Christ or obedience to them the one being subjected to Gods special pastoral paternal care in the case of their very disorder and aberrations whilest the other only enjoy Gods common providence as do other creatures the works of his hands What hath been urged to nullifie this Church from what this kind of men will needs suppose to be the form thereof Parochial distribution convenient and good viz. that they are by Parochial constitution and Christ never ordained Parishes hath been often and abundantly answered by many and among others I have already fully spoken to it in my Bethshemish clouded and shall therefore now only say Parochial distribution is no constitution nor any essential form of the Church so as that bare simple habitation within such bounds should ipso facto without further capacity or qualification make men Church members or their removal or non-residence within this or that Parish as do Merchants and Mariners should discharge their relation to the Church but it is a Political order and convenient distribution of the Church Catholick visible to particular Assemblies for the due and more easie Celebration of Gods publick worship the Lord Jesus founded his Church Catholick and universal into which Baptism is the Ordinance of Catholick incision and imitation and excommunication is the Ordinance of Catholick excision and discharge but nature and the necessity of order doth divide it into particular Assemblies according to humane discretion and no order can more conveniently circumscribe particular societies of the Church than vicinity and cohabitation This the holy Ghost doth plainly digitate by denominating the first plants of Christianity Rome Corinth Galatia Ephesus and the like by the places where they were planted not by the first planters or after Pastors blaming it as a Schism in the Church to say I am of Paul I of Apollo and I of Cephas and indeed this distribution doth much facilitate the inspection of the Pastor or brethren beyond what the Covenant constitution of Congregationalists is capable of whereby some living in York are members of a Church in London Parochial Division then being the benefit of the Church and members thereof in Christian Cities Countries and Nations it is so far from blame and avoidance that it is to be commended and approved by men of prudence and order and can never necessitate or warrant any mans non-communion with the Christian Assemblies thus distributed and conveniently assembled Unto such as stumble themselves and would have others so to do at Communion with the Church of England because they do not know that it was rightly gathered Englands Church was rightly constituted at the first and constituted at the first I shall briefly say History the best evidence of an ancient Act doth assure us that the Gospel was first preached and Christianity was first planted in our Islands by the Apostles or Apostolical men which no doubt did with all care rightly lay here the right foundation of Gods Church and if we may as in cases of this nature we must judge a posterior the certainty of the root by the extent and quality of the branches the foundation by the Dimensions and duration of the Fabrick can any man reading the English Stories of the eminent Martyrs of Christianity found in this Church in all ages since the times of the Apostles unto this day and not conclude the Church was at first rightly planted and founded these men shall do well to resolve the old question ever put by the Non-conformists to the Brownists these mens progenitors if they be begotten to God in what Church and by what Ordinances were they converted was it not the Church of England we whom they to serve their designe will own as Saints and declare fit matter for a Church must professe our selves sprouts from this plant their Charity is not sure so irrational as to believe men may gather Grâ—pes of Thorns or Figgs of Thistles for if so their gathering Churches will be found needlesse whilest Saints grow in Infidel soils and Gods house existeth without the laying any foundation These men shall do well to
Why is my now attendance on solemn publick worship branded to be renewed communion with you know not whom if you mean this of persons individual truly as to the most I know not whom nor can I think you judge it necessary I cannot in my first communion know it in any Congregation is Church gathering become a Presbyterial principle is it the work of every age is seven not seventy years an age is non knowledge of Members a cause of non communion would not common charity make me know them to be a society of Christians worshippers of the true God in Jesus Christ and are they not hereby members of the Church Catholick visible particularly divided by local circumscription or have we renounced this principle is not the Liberty of the Tower a particular Church in a Presbyterial sence as well as Christ Church or Alhallows Breads street If I communicate in these must I not communicate with I know not whom may I not hear the Gospel preached and in calling on God in the name of Christ for things agreeable to his will communicate with I know not whom But why is my communion râ—newed I never denied I never ceased from I never was cut off from communion with the English Reformed Church and its particular Assemblies must Independents be verified in the false reproach viz. Presbyterial Churches wâ—re gathered Churches Presbytery interrupted was the Church dissolved and Communion abandoned Cave We have disowned denied determined sin and danger in these Notions I have more charity than to think my self out of Communion because violently debarred from Convention with the particular Assemblies of the Reformed English Church God having at length opened me a door of liberty to attend his solemn publick worship in this place with this Assembâ—y why is my acceptance and use thereof clamorously condemned as an act not only impoliti k but impious do not you know this is the execution of a resolution neither new nor rash not new for I thus determined and thus practised in my youth when piety was reproached by profane men as Puritanism and by the Brownists as corrupt Communion I thus determined and declared in my publick Ministery and preaching for Reformation I thus determined in all my late disputes and writings whilest I was at liberty I thus practised on accidental occasions I herein convinced and hereof perswaded prayed the liberty I now enjoy the first day I was committed prisoner to this place and have ever since petitioned to enjoy it this act you know is not rash but the result of mature and deliberate thoughts besides what hath passed between God and mine own soul I have heard and weighed the objections of separating as well as reforming brethren and after many expostulations I have you know it stated my Case of Conscience drawn up my reasons communicated them to Brethren and Christian Friends craved a Confutation from more than one prayed fraternal Correption by solid and serious Argumentation and professed a readiness to hear and obey Conviction I wonder after all this and Nine Months time to have corrected convinced my Judgment I shall be censured for bringing it to Act and you should now call for an Apology Dear Brother How long shall I complain when shall I be known and dealt with as a Brother Is it fair Play to revile and not reprove To condemn and not confute Will you neither convince my Conscience nor be content without Censures to see me obey it Are you angry to be imposed on and yet expect I should live by an implicite Faith and forbear what is to me a positive Duty on this bare Reason The Brethren will be displeased Let me say it without Prophaneness or Levity Be not wise overmuch The Offence of Brethren hath its place and weight in my Soul but must be well grounded before it counterpoize Conscience of positive indispensable Duty I well understand not the Epithites which vilifie my present Act because they are general and without Reason That it is Impolitick I may not deny I have ever been estranged to and at enmity with the Brethrens Policies and Fancy If they had in some things been as foolish as silly I God might have had more Glory Truth more Strength the Church more Purity and Order my self more Liberty their Comforts I know not nor will adventure to judge What Policies this Act must relate unto I know not unless it be the strengthning and so justifying those Schisms which supplanted subverted our Reformation by those Seditions Rebellions Treasons which have made it Odious and scandalized the endeavours thereof that the most Upright and Innocent among us are pressed under it If Brethren were sensible That my Zeal for Reformation is reproached repelled and my self thus oppressed by these Schisms they would not sure think it Policy to strike hands with them or Impolitick to appear really as well as verbally against them God knoweth I may not long speak let me speak freely Truly Brother foolish I think it aque and aequaliter politick for serious sober Reformers to unite with Non-communicating Separating Congregational Brethren in the Church-confounding nullifying principles and practises As for our late King-Killers to cry up the COVENANT and confound the Quarrel of the Parliament with the Good Old Cause Confound 62. with 52. and you may reconcile 48. to 43. and soon return to 48. again Agree these in Ecclesiasticks and divide them in Civils if you can I wish I could not scent some Brethren offended at my Act as tainted already in their Civils But I am a Fool be it so yet a Fools Bolt is soon shot If Presbyters will wisely serve Gods providence and do his Church proper Service Now it is their Time and Business to witness Corruptions circa cultum publicum will not warrant Non-communion with secession or separation from a true Church and such I yet deem England Correct this folly and I may become wise till then I will through Grace joy in my folly I have observed indeed Gods and the Kings Fools were never many But truly foolish I could never judge it good Policy That Non-communion Separation and the Sectarian Spawn should shroud themselves and be sheltered by Non-conformity and Reformation Hath not our dear-bought Experience taught us That the Repute of being the Parent of these hath been the Remora and Retroversion of that Can we forget how these when in Power did divide divert and destroy Reformation Paganize all England and plant One hundred and twenty gathered Churches and thereby proclaim Entity not Purity of the Churches was their Quarrel And shall we not now be so wise as to disown and deny them as a Bastard brood Now they are taken as Vagrants and whip't up to Non-conformists as their reputed Parents Can we ever witness Relation more than by these affectionate embraces in this day of Discrimination O! that my Brethrens Policy were so wise as to consider the Duty and Necessity of differing Reformation and
consider Knowledge of a Church it first constitution not necessary whether the knowledge of the mode and order of first planting and gathering the Church be necessary to every member related to it In England we finde societies professing the true God and Christ baptized into his name worshipping him by his own Ordinances this is the forme of a Church and doth suppose and imply a Root and Foundation by which it is animated and preserved But must we needs know how it was at the first laid or planted though by length of time it is worn out of sight and over-grown with earth and weeds are we bound to renounce the Vine and run out of the house unlesse we pluck up the root and raze the foundation to satisfie our selves herein if so God help the illiterate souls and weak capacities not capable to conceive or well understand the same is Christs Church planted for an age only that every succeeding generation must transplant gathering of Churches did indeed begin the Acts of the Apostles must it needs be continued to the end of the Revelation to the coming of the Lord to judgment I finde not Paul in his joyning himself to the Church nor Priscilla and Aquila in their travels and communion with different Churches make any demurre on this enquiry and I dare not think the holy Ghost would have concealed from us a point of so great importance My good friend upon the whole of this Objection I must let you know that my serious and deliberate thoughts do dissent from the Conclusions concerning the matter and form of a Church stated by the self-consecrated Officers of the hundred and twenty self-constituted gathered Churches which of late years met at the Savoy but assent unto the determination of Mr. Cotton in his advice to the brethren of old England at the close of his way of the Churches in New-England viz. The work is not to make them Churches which were none before for the Gospel having been preached in England by Apostles or Apostolical men they were without doubt rightly planted but to reduce them to the Primitive purity they had in their first constitution And here my friend I must desire the Independents will not be offended that I propose them as the present prime promoters of the nonentity of the Church of England by way of barre to Communion with her and a principle of separation from her for that notwithstanding their contrary professions of what they cannot soberly charitably and rationally deny their common suggestion in England is fit matter but not the form which is the esse of the Church their Savoy conclusions and paganizing Church-gathering practice do loudly proclaim them the off-spring of the Brownists and posterity of the rigid Separatists ever withstood by the sober and serious Non-Conformists since Englands Reformation and in this point the summum genus of those several specifical self-constituted Sects which have confounded our Church the odium of whose Schism from it defended by Rebellion Schism and horrid Treason is at this day most sadly though falsly reflected on the most loyal sober serious reforming non-conforming Presbyterians to the weakning their hands and retarding yea diverting their progresse in an humble argumentative and patient pursuit of Christs Ordinances and due authority of Christs Officers to be restored and exercised in the Church of England by me ever owned and now lamented but not to be deserted Such as fancie the Church of England was lost in the deluge of Popery and Antichristianism Englands Church lost not its being in Popery may by their own observation correct the same and be constrained to confesse there is in this respect no more cause of stumble as to the entity of this Church then was as to the being of the Jews when overspread with Idolatry in their many defections from God for in Englands worst times they may finde a persecuted Elias a John Wickliffe with many other most eminent branches bringing forth the Clusters of Gospel Grapes to the bleeding out their very lives besides Obadiah's fifties hidden in Caves by the violence of persecution certainly the Root must abide or how or whence could these branches spring Yea the winter storms of Popery passing away and the floods of Antichristianism asswaging though not dryed up and the chief weeds of superstition being plucked up though some remain how hath this Church revived flourished and sent out many most eminent and pious branches without any new plantation Yea conveyed unto themselves who question her being the truth of Grace and Faith in Christ Jesus if ever they receiv'd it I blesse God I have learned to discern between the subject and its separable adjuncts though never so vile and do believe the Church to be Christs Church though vitiated and defiled with Idolatrous administrations all nor indeed any defection is an actual divorce if adulterous Judah Jet 3. on a summons to repentance do return and put away her abominations she loseth not her relation to God nor doth the high places continued under his reformation make God or his people to forsake her the Temple of God abides his when given to be trodden under the feet of the Gentiles yea when the Antichrist the man of sin sitteth therein this notion may possibly sound better to some eares from New-England than from the Tower of London let it therefore be thence receiv'd If Antichrist must sit in the Temple of God and the Courts of the Temple be given to the Antichristiaen Gentiles for a certain time to tread under foot then there was a true Church state where he sate and whilest he sate there and it was the true measured Temple whose Courts he did tread under fo t nor can there be Antichrist unlesse there be the Temple of God and Courts thereof where he is and if ever Antichrist sate in England then there was the Temple of God there before he sate in it and whilest he sate in it as was also in other reformed Churches the Temple or Church is the subject wherein he must sit the Antichristian seat is not the subject nor constituteth it but is an accident vitiating the subject and separable from it the removing therefore of Antichristianity doth not destroy the subject or make it cease to be but changeth it into the better state in which it was before thus accidentally vitiated this is the assertion of Mr. Phillips of Water-town in New England England was Christs Church before the Antichristian deluge under the power of Popery and since it was purged out and so she at this day notwithstanding her backsliding doth abide God provoked hath not yet removed his Candlestick or given her a bill of divorce as he justly may and I fear yet will if I then deny Communion with such of her assemblies I have a liberty to attend and frequent and make my appeal to God on the account of her non-entity with a Lord she was not or I know her not to
never be denied to be the indispensable duty of every Christian It is true these are to be expressed and acted by all lawâ—ul and only lawful means 1 Chro. 13.9.10 11. according to every mans place and capacity the most dreadful shakings of Gods Arke will not warrant Uzza to step out of his place to stay it nor will the greatest sanctity in Israel Numb 16. authorize Chora to usurp the Priesthood It is not a more poor apology than base for the rebellion of Dathan and Abyram that all the Lords people are holy the God of holinesse needs not nor will he endure the help of our iniquities these Cautions observed endeavours for reformation can be by none omitted or faintly pursued without an inevitable contracting upon themselves the guilt of those corruptions which remain upon Gods Church and service for no rule in reference to humane society is in Morality or Divinity more true than this error cui non resistitur approbatur veritas non quae non defenditur opprimitur negligere quippe cum possis deturbare perversos nihil aliud est quam fovere nec caret scrupulo societatis occultae qui manifesto sacinori cum potest desinit obviare Erâ—…r not resisted is allowed for silence gives consent Truth not defended is oppressed for Cowardize giveth falshood the Conquest to neglect when we can do it to disturb the wicked is to cherish them for concealment and indulgence is the guard of their designe nor can he want a suspition of secret conspiracy who can but will not hinder iniquity for such Connivance is an act and argument of affection â— Sam. 2. let it be remembred old Elies sin by which he fell under the severity of Gods wrath was his not reforming the abominations of his sons The Reforming Government of many pious Kings of Judah are blotted with a but the high places which the Temple restoted and frequented seemed not worth the heeding were not taken away Israel is charged with the prophanenesse of Gods Sanctuary Ezek. 44.7.8 by reason of the uncorrected neglect of the Keepers thereof and the non-resistance of false Prophets is aggravated with a the Prophets propâ—…cy lies in my name Jer. 5.31 and the people love to have it so It is a matter of admiration to a God of jealousie that his Church and â—â—…ship should be overspread with corruption without the â—â—…king and expostulations of an Advocate for him Isa 59.16 the 〈◊〉 saâ— it and it displeased him that there was no judgment and he saw that there was no man and he wondred that there was no Intercessor 1 Cor 5. the guilt of the incestuous person is by the neglect of discipline charged on the Church of Corinth and the suffering the woman Jezabel Rev. 2.20 is the evil imputed to the Church of Thyatira the light of nature and Scripture leadeth every one in his place and capacity to reform corruption and chargeth it on their conscience as a positive duty To damp zeal or barre endeavours for reformation and to blame and violently silence Ministerial rebukes and argumentation or popular petitions supplications mournings and murmurations under and against the corruptions of Gods Church and worship is irrational and irreligious and the defence thereof by this plea viz. these corruptions are confessedly consistent with salvation and such which notwithstanding the most serious and zealous reprovers do not and professe they dare not separate from or deny communion with the Church is no other than hellish divinity and Bedlam Reason best confuted by their wives rebukes of the Queene of S uts preparing her mistriss sack possets in the common wâ—shbowles not to mention a vessel of more base imployment or presenting to the table his dainty Cates in a disâ— licked by the dog and wiped with her dish-clout the which though it be unhandsome and unwholsome is not poysonous and so directly destructive as to drive them the house or table so as to begge or starve rather than to eate or keep good fellowship such as shall thus do must needs proclaim themselves ignorant of the reproving invective Ministery of the Prophets and Apostles yea of the Lord himself when and whilst they lived in Communion with the Church of the Jewes the last of whom whipt the money-changers out of the Temple when and because he acknowledged it his Fathers house of Prayer Joh. 2.16 insensible of the sad and severe judgments of God on Eli and his sons for their uncorrected disorder which made Gods people loath the sacrifices of the Lord when they did not nor durst leave his Sanctuary and on Solomon for building high places 1 Kings 11.31 though consistent with the Temple of the Lord Ezek. 43.8 and on Israel for building their posts besides his posts their Altars besides his Altars and setting up the Image of jealousie in the House of the Lord which yet was not forsaken by him or his people and unaffected with the nature and holiness of God who will have holinesse written on all the vessels of the Sanctuary and the very bridles of the horses Zack 14.20 and will have all things in his service done decently and in order 1 Cor. 14.33.40 because he is a God of order and not of confusion when Corruption in Gods Church and worship can be denied to be sin I will allow and advise Gods Ministers to be silent and when they grow substantiall and vitiate their subject I will allow and advise the Members of the Church to separate but till then I dare not give my consent or Countenance unto the one or the other Reformation and Seperation whereof voluntary non Communion is the privative part Seperation no act of Reformation but obstructive thereto and the first formal act though by the groundless Calumny of the enemies to the one occasioned by the rash inconsiderate zeal of the other they are confounded are in themselves vastly different and indeed inconsistent and destructive each to other as much as is the Cleansing and casting away a vessel purging and parting from an house this is duty but that is horrid iniquity schismes in the Church are dangerous and disgraceful but schismes from the Church is thereunto destructive and damnable to the subjects thereof the purity of Gods Worship must be pursued in unity with the Church and Communion is implied in all endeavours for Reformation desertion doth declare destruction not repair of the house is desired and designed which of us leave our houses because not so convenient handsome or healthful as is desired or forsake our food because of a slovenly Cook or Carver the Scripture doth detect much corruption in Gods Church and the zeal of many unto the Reformation thereof provoking and pursuing it unto death or very deep distresse without the least direction unto or allowance of separation or non-communion but with a most plain and clear charge and direction to the contrary Christs Apostles as
most zealous Reformers did often and openly and with much authority rebuke and resist the disorder of the Churches and corrupt administration of Gods worship yet were so farre from approving or advising separation that they have branded the subjects thereof with these and the like odious epithites they were not of us John 2.19 Jude 19. Heb 10.25 and therefore went out from us these are they who separate themselves sensual having not the spirit and taxeth the voluntary non-communicants with a defect forsake not the assembling of your selves as the manner of some is I cannot without trembling consider the circumcised Sects in the Church of Colosse are charged to have left the head Coll 2.19 by leaving the body in which all the joynts are knit together to the nourishment of the whole I cannot but assent to that maxim as most true ex Ecclesia nulla salus the Church is Gods Arke of salvation out of which none but mad men will leap or leave it on pretence of purging it or putting out of it unclean birds and beasts in this case of contest for Reformation and communion with the Church under many and great corruptions I must say as our Saviour of the lesser and more weighty matters of the Law Luke 11.42 these things ye ought to have done and not leave the other undone for Superstition and Separation are extreams equally odious and ominous to Reformation is it not obvious to every wise observer that the Devil and wicked men do make the one the advantage of the other and cast the odium and direct the force of each as the turn cometh and opportunity serveth against such who steering by Scripture Compasse desire according to their capacity to guide Gods Church and themselves in her between these two dangerous Rocks into the Haven of rest and holinesse Whilest poor despicable I in our late years in my place and Calling withstood our Church-wasting separation many professing piety and pursuing purity in Gods House and Ordinances were prejudiced unto an high and open persecution of me by their own fancy that I asserted and advanced the superstitions and disorders of our Church by the return whereof God hath convinced them of their rashnesse and constrained them to correct their mistake of his unworthy reproached servant and now God blessed be his name having animated me with zeal for perfect and compleat Reformation and acted me in my place and sphere as a Minister of the Gospel to debate the obligations thereunto beyond my mean abilities or the logical reply of the adversaries thereof who bear away the victory by a thou liest Bellarmine and have confuted me argumento baculino enforced by the severe moderation of authority incensed by the suggestion of Treason and Sedition secretly whispered and generally charged against me whose loyalty is most legible by both active and passive characters and who have in all the writings which bear my name declared my abhorrency of Sedition and popular tumults and having blessed me with an heart and opportunity to withstand and witnesse against the deluge of Superstition and Corruptions which breaking over and bearing down sacred banks doth to our sâ—… and shame again overflow our Church and Nation how many do now dream I will indulge and embrace Separation or at least by my voluntary non-communion the first act thereof give some countenance unto it as if between these there were no medium but that the corruption of the one must necessarily generate the other give me therefore leave to tell you and by you to tell others in me concerned I cannot but withstand the one with abhorrency of the other and keep my distance from separation whilst I desire and endeavour to stave off Superstition lest I Shipwrack my self or others on either rock Superstition and separation strengthen each other I have observed and our Church hath experienced the same that as Superstition Corruptions and disorder in Gods house and worship do and therefore call for the zeal and rebukes of Gods Ministers and carefull Remedy by his Majesties Prelates by him entrusted with the Ecclesiasticall good of his Subjects very much harden men of strong affections and weak Judgements to separate furnishing them with a clamourous accusation who discerne not the proper and genuine cause of their sinfull Shisme but readily father 1 Cor. 3.3 4. Gal. 5.19.20.21 what the Apostle hath determined to be the brat of their own lust on any thing which beareth relation thereunto though but a remote and accidentall occasion thereof so non communion and separation is the grand Removal and most Plain ruin to reformation that ever could be devised Subverting the house on pretence and instead of sweeping it as if an house forsaken and pulled asunder one running away with a post another with a beam to patch up their own self-founded fabricks were ever like to be purged and preserved from uncleaness and disorder my good friend take notice of this God determined and his people deserved the destruction of the ten tribes of Israel before those who feared God fled from among them or forsooke them Babylon is fallen she is fallen was the voice uttered by the Angel before Come ye out of her my people was sounded to the Saints which follow the Lamb Conservation is the end of burdensome Communion Ier. 13.2.7 and carefull Reformation but dissolution is the most certain sequell of desertion It is Gods and mush be his peoples last work to depart from and forsake his Sanctuary he stayes long with a grieved striving Spirit and stands on the very threshold with a wooing expostulation Be thou instructed O Jerusalem Ier. 6.8 least my Soul depart from thee and I make thee desolate the very issue of departure let it be seriously resolved did not Corah in his separating from the Camp of Israel gathering a Congregation out of the Congregation and the Circumcised Sectaries among the primitive Christians strike at the foundations and seek to subvert the very societies from whence they separated and do not the practices and some principles of the semi-separating as they would be deemed selfe constituting Independents of our age determine a non-entity by the non-formality of a Church in England and raâ—e the very foundation thereof and so condemn the very generation of the just who have lived and dyed members thereof yea Martyrs to the truths of â—esus Christ against Papall as well as Pagan power and errors The Anabaptists in Germany have not been more odious and obstructive to Luthers reformation then the Church gathering separatists of all Sects have been retarding unto a retrogradation of that in England in that the odium of their schisms seconded with seditien and centred in Rebellion un o Regicide with the confusion and subversion of our Church and Kingdom is most sadly and shamefully though unjustly imputed to all who with humble and peaceable spirits desâ—e and endeavour the casting out corruption and disorder from Gods house
and ordinances and reflectes on the work of reformation it selfe as if their proper genuine and natural parent The reformation of the Church is a duty incumbent on every man and member thereof Reformation must be by lawfull means onely it must be pursued in their places and capacities by just and lawful means without schism from or if possible in the Church or sedition in the Common-wealth both which my soul ever did abhor as disgraceful to Religion dishonourable to God and destructive to Reformation I never did nor yet can allow or advise other means of reformation then Ministerial admonition to the Church Logical dispute and Theological argumentation and redaurgtion among equals humble proposal petition and supplication to superiors with a patient and submisse attendance on their pleasure and on God acting the same such as receive Kings as nursing Fathers to the Church will rejoyce in them as Christians much more as professedly reformed and with all peaceable submission embrace such degrees of Reformation of the extrinsecall order and ministerial method of Gods worship enjoying the substance in the essential form thereof as they will allow untill God encline their hearts to allow what himselfe expecteth and his people desire soberly pursuing the bene esse with joy in the esse of Religion and in communion with the Church waiting on the truth of Gods ordinances quietly attending their Superiors for purity and regularity of dispensation I find not that the men fearing God in Iudah did tumultuously tumble down the high places nor turn away from Gods Temple because of them yet their standing was the stain of Government to their reforming Kings to flye out of Gods house or in the face of Gods Vicegerents because his own appointments are administred by instruments in order to his service unsuitable and to us offensive is a frowardness which God cannot nor will not admit or indulge in any of his children Ministerial reproofs and admonitions and vulgar mournings and murmurations are loud alarums to God and the consciences of men and strong enforcements of Reformation preces Iacrymae ever were and still are the onely weapons of the truly Godly Our state and time calleth for an higher degree of Reformation under and against the oppositions of just authority and lawful Princes such as God hath in his mercy and by his miraculous providence restored to our Church and Nation I am afflicted by and ashamed of the slow progress and shameful retrogradation of Englands Reformation under and against publike national solemn sacred bonds whose obligation will abide before God and conscience though the affirmations thereof may be interdicted by men If Calvini in his days could say If Godly Religion had flourished in England till that day the time of Queen Mary her Raign there ought to have been an order of service better corrected Epistle to the Ch. at Frankford and many things quitte taken away Can we without grief consider our Church hath enjoyed true Religion more then eighty years since that time and yet we ignorantly continue and violently contend for that order of service as if ashamed to give place unto better things yet I dare not deny her to be a reformed Church or as such decline Communion with her in and for whom the Lord hath emminently appeared and out of whom he hath gratiously purged all things venentous and destructive though some things nauseous and distastfull were continued and are returned into her having defended her against the Spanish Ariâ—ado and Popish Conspiracy by Gunpowder and other agitations and attempts of Papall power and Antichristian rage with an Almighty hand and outstretched Arme. I do beleive the infancy of Reformation might rejoice in and grow up under that order of divine service which the adult estate thereof ought to cast off as puerile and unsutable First degrees were matter of Comfort though not of Content to such who seek the simplicity of the Gospell remaining dreggs ought to be discharged and I doubt not God will notwithstanding mens aversness and opposition in due time effect it In the mean time i see no reason to refuse to drink because my waters are pudled or presented in an unclean Vessel and I can come by no purer remaining degrees of Reformation must be so purified that those obtained may not appear to be disowned or despised though our order of Divine Service be a Roman dregge of some dangerous distastfull influence yet it is not Popery shall we not blesse God and rejoyce in England as brought out of Babylon though some Babylonish Vestures Rites and Orders which ought to be abandoned are yet retained I conceive them ingratefull for the purity obtained who run out of Gods house for the Corruptions continued and obtruded I cannot but repute them over forward who shall refuse the Substantials of true Religion and Christs Institutions because of some rude Rough Appendants shall we not acknowledge Gods mercy in affording us and humbly use the truth of Gods word because transmitted unto us with some humane traditions and the substance of his own worship celebrated in a disorderly way and method with some foolish Appendants of mens inventions My good friend my zeal care and contests for Reformation of this poor Church have cost me dear yet if God suffer the Charge to rise as hâ—gâ— as did that of my namesake by the unkindness of King Joash not one mite too dear I blesse God however my passions worke I see no cause to repent my bargain I pray God glorifie himself and edifie his people by my bonds onely I must professe to all that fear God I see no sufficient cause to satisfie my Conscience or to plead before my God on which to refuse Communion with her and attendance on Gods solemn publique worship under her rude Ministerial method for that duty is not warantably superseded by the iniquity of another man my sufferings nor other mens sin under which I mourn because I cannot mend it must not turn me out of Gods way to the right or left hand superstition and separation must be shunned as Rocks equally dangerous to Gods Church and worship the prophanesse of this and its Subjects must not drive me nor the pretended purity and piety of the other and its Subjects allure or draw me unto the positive evil of separation or privative evil of voluntary non-Communion I pray and hope God will keep me upright under and against all temptations from falling into the extreams of our unhappy age and Church and yet give me to see the purity of his worship in Union and Communion with his Church here on earth or possesse me with his undefiled unstained glory in Heaven for from the one I dare not depart untill I arrive at the other least by shipwarck I should be deprived of both Fourthly Let it be considered Consi 4th Scandall is an argument of no strength when pleaded to supersede or condemn a positive duty Jobs friends
the people who sate under my Ministry will say I now undo the good Testimony I gave and give away the Cause for which I appeared Do I now practice otherwise than I have preached Who hath read the Books for which I suffer and will say I by this Act Give away the Cause and undo my good Testimony Read my Bonds pag. 35. Whatever shall be the establishment in the Church though never so corrupt yet whil'st consistent with Salvation though it may occasion to me Suffering and Suspention of my Ministry by Gods Grace it shall not effect in me Schism from the Church Read my Fetters pag. 49 50. This Reformation cannot justifie the Separation for that the Corruptions established were never made a sufficient ground for Separation sober serious Non-conformists who groaned under the burden of thâ—se Corruptions and for this Reformation were grieved by and greatly contended against this Separation as that which wanted sufficient ground Read again mine Epistle to Mr. Firmins Lyturgical Considerator in pag. 3. I can keep Communion under that Form of Worship whereby I cannot Administer and I can heartily say Amen to the Matter of those Petitions which are put up in an Order so confused preposterous and indigested that it seemeth to me to be so much below the Gravity of the Church whose mouth I must be the Seriousness of the Office whereby I administer the Sanctity of the Duty I am to perform and the Sacred Nature of the Object to whom they are presented that I dare not stand between God and his people with the same This last is part of my Testimony concerning and against the Lyturgy it self Now Sir What is my good Testimony Wherein is it undone Am I not practising the Cause in the express state in which I stated it It was ever far from mine intentions to be an Advocate much less a Martyr for Non-communion and Separation Non-conformity and Reformation is my Cause hath made my Testimony if I undo or give away this Inculca me tanquam salem insipidum Good Brother read me right and charge me not with Apostacy who drive with all my main my good Testimony against the one as well as the other extream of Reformation You wound your selves and engage Enemies by your Censures to Clamour and call me Apostate But you cannot convince me nor any that know me and my Testimony that I am started one hairs breadth from my Cause this condemned practice is the formal pursuit of my Contest I must therefore see very good grounds before I give back Having answered your Charge of Impolicy and Impiety I must consider your suggested Arguments against mine attendance on Gods Solemn Publick Worship in this place and order And truly Brother these are few and obscure I understand them not You speak of Ordinances which the Brethren think to be materially corrupt I can say no more to this but only to request they will speak out their thoughts and specifie the seeming corrupt matter and then I will judge concerning it And when they come to do this I think they will find Secundae Cogitationes sunt meliores they will find it is the Mode not Matter that is corrupt You say The Matter of Doctrine and Worship of Prayer seemeth not only to be the objectum ad quem I think quod more proper but pro quibus whether things or persons wherein they take it for granted the Common-Prayer is corrupt This I profess I understand not What do you mean by the Matter of Doctrine and Worship of Prayer Are these terms Synonimous Intend you by them Doctrine suggested in and by Prayer Or the Credentials of the Common-Prayer-Book distinct from the Worship of Praye I pray you explain yourself and then know Think so Seemeth so and take for granted may be supposed grounds for your Censures but signifie nothing to my Conviction which must be on certainty if it supersede what I conclude indispensable Duty Indeed your annexed instance maketh me think you mean the Matter of Doctrine suggested by Prayer for you specifie Arch-Bishops and Bishops as a superiour Degree of Ministry and if so you will give me leave to tell you you have antidated your Objection for our Books pray for none but Bishops and Curates or Pastors and Curates so that till the time of change come I may notwithstanding this Exception continue my Communion when the new Book cometh I may consider the weight of this Plea in the mean time I pray you resolve me Will single Errours preached much less suggested in Prayer warrant Non-communion with a true Church Non-attendance on Gospel-Ministry and Gods Solemn Publick Worship What meaneth when bindeth that Rule of our Redeemer Beware of the Leaven of the Pharisees I cannot understand by take heed what you heâ—r hear not them who teach for Doctrines the Traditions of men May not a personal Dissent be entered to a Petition for a mistaken Object and suggesting an Errour as its Basis Or must the whole Prayer for Matter generally good therefore be disowned This will necessitate and was the first cause of S t-forms of Prayer and require that they composed be not only communicated fratrâ—bus doctioribus but also to every indivâ—dual Member of the Church who must join in Prayer and so Sir we fight well to flie upon by flying from a Common-Prayer Book You add The Brethren think mine attendance on it is aequâ— if not aqualiter As if I should read or administer by this Form and that there can be no Obligation of Duty or Edification warranting the one which may not also justifie the other To this I say Thâ—nk so will not convince but of such who thus think I would enquire Is the common state of a Christian different from the special state of a Minister And so the Capacities Duties and Obligations of each different so that the one may be continued while the other doth cease The one may and must be acted when the other is arrested superseded or violently barred if men of power in the Church will discapacitate me for the one doth it ipso facto discharge me from the other Do our discapacitated Common Councel-men cease to be Citizens Or be they not bound to retain their Relation and participate or communicate in the common good of the City under what they judge to be the rude and disordered Government thereof I do not believe the Obligation of my Ministâ—y to be aeque or aequaliter necessitous and extensive with that of Christianity I must be and act as a Christian when those conditions are required from me which I cannot yield and without which I may not be permitted to act as a Minister and those conditions will not discharge the Duties of the one nor bar the Exercise of them which do bar the other I a Minister stand in a general and special Relation to the Church and am charged with Duties proper and peculiar to each of these I may be sinfully imposed on and restrained
John 20.19 26. 1 Cor. 16.2 held solemn Assemblies on the Lords day the first day of the Week and charged the Saints of their age and in them all others not to forsake the Assembling of themselves together Heb. 10.25 taxing the defect of some therein as the manner of some is As Solitary Sabbaths are in themselves so God knoweth they have been and are to me the sting of an imprisoned condition I hope I can say without vanity as David in his exile Psa 42.1 2 3. As the Hart panteth for the water Brooks so panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for the living God When shall I come and appear before God when I remember these things I pour out my soul in me for I have gone with the multitude I went with them to the House of God with the voyce of joy and gladness with the multitude that kept the holy day I deny not God to be served and enjoyed in Solitary Worship Psal 84.7 but must needs observe in Zion the Saints pass from strenth to strength every one appearing before God Solemn publique Worship is Gods chief Ordinance for the support of his peoples faith this is denominated the Beauty of Gods Holiness Psal 27.4 96.9 and 110.3 To this his presence and power is promised and in it chiefly predicated attendance on this is charged as his peoples duty and discharged as their joy The want of this is the Sacra fames Spiritual famine Amos 8 11. under want of which Davids faith was ready to faint had it not been prevented by a speedy and seasonable supply When I sought to know this it was too painful for me until I went into the Sanctuary then understood I their end Psal 73.16 17. This therefore is not to be slighted or neglected or superficially desired or used but most highly prized earnestly desired and joyfully imbraced and not voluntarily declined on every light occasion and trivial exception or friendly perswasion but the grounds must be plain clear certain and weighty such as I may with confidence plead unto my God as the apology of my absence of choice not constraint in which I expect God should have mercy on me because and for that he cannot have Sacrifice from me which can be nothing but the restraining necessity of my condition or my running into sin to possess it My good Friend you see my case is hard and what now is my case may ere long be yours and others of Gods people You yet enjoy a liberty of worshipping God in due and right order and may drink the Waters of the Sanctuary in clean Vessels long may you enjoy it and if God take pleasure in me he will in due time restore me to it but if not let him do what seemeth him good At the present I have no choice if I will attend Gods publique Solemn Worship I must do it in this place and order or not at all whilest I dread to give the least occasion of insultation to the wicked or offence to the weak my conscience is under the apprehension and aw of a positive indispensible duty which I dare not decline unless on reasons constituting a clear and unavoidable necessity my present restraint doth indeed acquit me and carry the guilt of my absence from Gods House from off me to others I duly endeavouring by all just means to have the same removed which once effected what moral bar will lie upon my minde and in my way as a formal sin which I cannot without guilt break thorow that is the question I have desired seriously to consult and by Scripture to resolve And on mature thoughts I must profess I finde not any which will bear weight in the ballance of the Sanctuary as that which I shall dare to produce before the Lord when demanded a reason of my voluntary absence on which he may not pronounce He was bidden to the feast but would not come and therefore is not worthy and hereafter shall not For I must profess First I never did could or yet can deny 1. The Church of England a true Church and I a member the being of the Churâ—h of England that is the community of Christians in this Nation incorporated by Baptism professing the true God and Jesus Christ and subjected to the Word and Sacraments in the Ministery of Christs lawful Ministers for I never believed any National Priviledge such as was peculiar to the Jews or the Hierarchical Order and collective Constitution which cannot be denied to be a meer humane and separable adjunct and is neither an equal nor regular Representation could or did give that appellation nor disown my own relation to it and must therefore see some good ground for my non-communion with it and for my choice of Solitary Worship of God rather then fellowship in its Solemn publique Worship where and whilest God affords his presence though with a grieved striving spirit I dare not be absent though thereby I might avoid some burthen It is well known I am not unacquainted with the Church renouncing rending ruining principles of the Anabaptists and old separating Brownists nor with the Paganizing practice of the seemingly more sober and serious Independent or Congregationalist who sometimes indeed pretend to own the being of this Church but by their Church-gathering Self-Constitution dispencing Ordinances by their self-consecration professed principle that in England there is much matter for but not the form of a Church and so no Church at all for forma dat essentiam and with the height of confidence to say no more of it proclaiming themselves the gathered Churches contradistinct to the Nation and all Christians in it as if they onely were the first fruits of Achaia I mean England an infidel Nation who had never received the Gospel or Christ had not been preached among them and professed by them nor any of her Inhabitants had been incorporated by Baptism into Christs Catholique Body but were to this day aliens and strangers to the Houshold of Faith and Commonwealth of Israel do plainly declare so to all rational men able and willing to discern that the being of a Church in England is by them disputed yea denied But these I never did nor could approve and therefore I must presume none that ever knew me and my constant contests by preaching writing and suffering under and against them can conceive this to be now any scruple to my conscience doubt to my soul demur to my duty or diversion to my Communion with them whose being a Church of Christ I have ever and openly asserted and defended and to whom I have ever professed my own relation Prophane members destroy not the Church That these men urge That many members in the Church of England are rude and prophane in their Conversation with their mouthes confessing but in works denying God and are not therefore fit matter for a Church I do well know and to my grief and
offer according to the Law of Moses confined his Ministry and Apostles to them till after the vaile of the Temple was rent in token of the expiration of their worship and departure of God accounting them children and all others dogs and charged the Disciples to hear them who sate in Moses seat under all their God-provoking Church annihilating corruptions he neither practised or prescribed a non-communion or separation 1 John 2.6 And in all extreams I desire to make him my pattern and walk as he walked who never went astray Do any stumble at the prophanenesse of the members and the neglect of corrective discipline rudenesse and irreverence in the use of Gods Ordinances Prophadess of members and disorder in Ministration confused method and the disorder of popular acclamations in publick prayer and other acts of worship I wish I could say these stones lay not in their way or that they were in my power to remove them but I think they run on a much greater Rock who run out of Gods Church or from solemn publick worship because thereof for the Church at Corinth was greatly corrupt and provoked the severity of Apostolical reprehension and that once and again 1 Cor. 5.1 2.10.21.11.20.21.14.26 2 Cos. 12.20 21 there being amongst them incest not to be named among the Gentiles and an heaven-daring ostentation in it instead of correction of it a participation with the table of Divels by their attendance on the Idol-feasts of the Infidels a rude and deboist drunken Communion at the Lords Supper intermingled and confounded with the Love-feasts intollerable disorder in their publick Assemblie all speaking at one and the same moment their very women not keeping silence and that in different matters and tongues every one had his Psalm his Prayer his Revelation his Prophesie his gift of Tongues in all which respects they were more confused than our popular acclamations and constrained the Apostles to check them by the nature of God as a God of order and not of confusion in all these the Apostle advised and endeavoured with all authority a Reformation but not separation or non-communion nor transplantation into a new gathered Church I cannot imagine he would make Schism from the Church 1 Cor. 3.4 a signe of a spiritual who judged Schism in the Church an evidence of a carnal mind Do men complain as they have cause that some Roman Rites and order was retained Rom. Rites when this Church was reformed let them consider many pious Kings of Judah have their reforming governments stained with a but the high places were not taken away but the people went thither to worship yet I finde not that any God-fearing Israelite who loathed those Reliques of Idolatry ever barred themselves because thereof from Gods Altar and worship My very soul is grieved to consider Englands back-sliding Backsliding Lukewarmness Indulgence of erronious Doctors and doctrines formality and lukewarmnesse in Religion yet when I observe that Ephesus who lost her first love Pergamus indulging the doctrine of Balaam and the Nicolaitans Thyatira suffering the woman Jezabel who called her self a prophetesse to teach and to deceive Gods people Sardis having a name to live but being dead and Laodicea Englands Counterpart so lukewarm that no good is spoken of her by all which these Asian Churches were rusted and therefore reproved by the Lord yet not rejected but represented to the world as the Starres he held in his right hand and golden Candlesticks among which he walked I dare not disown her relation to God disclaim mine own relation to her nor voluntarily decline communion with her Corruptions are not all alike My good friend all corruptions in Gods Church and worship are displeasing to God and distastful to his people imbracing the simplicity of the Gospel but all corruptions are not alike in operation quality and extent nor of a like influence on Gods Church and worship consider therefore some corruptions are substantial and intrinsecal vitiating the very subject and so universally spread through the worship of God that it cannot be used without sin others are circumstantial and extrinsecal to the same vain needlesse appendants superadded by mans will but which notwithstanding Gods Ordinances remain entire and exactly his and may be used without participation in the affixed corruption Some corruptions incident to Gods Church and worship I say are substantial and intrinsecal not arising out of Gods Ordinance as the genuine product and effect thereof but entring into the very body of the Church and substance of Gods worship Corruptions substantial and intrinsecal as a Spider into wine or venemous Worme into an Apple so as to vitiate the subject that it cannot be used with safety and nullisie the very Ordinances of God that it altereth their very nature to the losse of their efficacie and transmit certain destruction to such as sit under the same yea which is done either by changing the matter and retaining the essential constitutive form as by a solemne regular cutting off a Dogs head or offering swines blood instead of a Lamb or a Kid a baptizing as some have done by fire iâ—stead of water or retaining the matter but changing the essential forme as did Jeroboam and the Samaritans worshipping the true God by the very Sacrifices and in the very order himself appointed but before self-devised Symbols Calves to the one and the Dove to the other in a self-appointed place Dan and Bersheba to the one Mount Gerizim to the other and by self-consecrated Priests the lowest of the people and so departing from the Temple in Jerusalem Gods Ark in it and the Tribe of Levi all which were essentiall to the form of divine worship and thus did the Corinthians eating and drinking at the Idol Sacrifices which the Apostle severely corrected with a ye cannot parâ—ake of the Table of the Lord and the table of Devils ye cannot drink of the Cup of the Lord and the cup of Devils and by pointing them unto the essential form of the Sacrament the Cup of blessing which we blesse is it not the Communion of the blood of Christ and the Bread which we break is it not the Communion of the body of Christ Of this nature is Baptism 1 Cor. 10.16 by a Midwife or any other private hand though with water and in the name of the Father Son and holy Ghost or by water and a lawful Minister but in the name of God the Father of all things and Truth the Mother of all things as I have read some have done Corruptions extrinsecal Corruptions extrinsecal and circumstantial and c'rcumstantial are Ordinances superadded unto and so concomitant with or conversant about Gods Ordinances but enter not into nor do vitiate their subject the which these notwithstanding doth exist in matter and essential form perfect and entire capable of due operation in their own course and nature as stinking fish doth nourish or water pudled or in an unclean
vessel doth quench the thirst and these are either some matter superadded not intermingled with or destructive to Gods Ordinances such as were the high places posts by Gods posts thresholds by his thresholds Altar by his Altar in Israel unto the very Image of Jealousie set up in Gods house which yet remained his and as such was continued preserved and acknowledged The Lord Jesus found the Temple his Fathers house of Prayer though made a Den of theeves and such is our Crosse in Baptism though seemingly sacramental yet distinct from Gods imitating Seal of the Covenant and such is a Roman linnen vesture in ministration of Gods worship by a lawfull Minister or some corrupt rude and unsutable ministerial method and order which is the vessel and only instrument of conveiance though unclean of administration such was the violent and unfitting snatching of the Priests part of the Sacrifice by the sons of Eli the confused acclamations of the Church of Corinth speaking all at once different matters in different tongues and our imposed method disorderly method of publick Prayer by Versicles Responds abruptions abreviations and popular acclamations with artificial singing by boyes and base fellows thereunto appointed under all which Gods Ordinances abide a subject compleat truly and formerly existent and distinct from these superadded corruptions operative unto salvation and therefore may not be declined or disowned Corruptions intrinsecal are indeed such as do not only warrant but necessitate non-communion yea separation of the highest nature as a duty indispensable In sence hereof all those in Israel who feared God and set their hearts to seek the Lord prayed for and according to divine directions departed from Dan and Bersheba forsook the solemn Assemblies Jeroboam had constituted and followed the Tribe of Levi Gods only Ministers unto Jerusalem Gods only place of publick solemn worship and our Saviour resolved the woman of Samaria her enquiry concerning the place of worship with a ye know not what ye worship for salvation is of the Jews This is the very ground of the Reformed Churches departure and non-communion with Rome who though she be by original constitution the Temple of God is become the very seat of Antichrist and by the same so vitiated that her Ministrations are the cup of abomination by which she hath made the Nations drunk having by her intercessions of and to Saints the Popes infallibility divine power and properties and by her expiatory Sacrifices disowned and nullified as much as in her lieth Christs mediatory offices and by dividing the elements destroying the outward signe essential to a Sacrament and on a fancied transubstanciation turning it into a Sacrifice for quick and dead nullified Christs Ordinances and by many other intrinsecal evils poysoned Gods whole worship and rendred it directly destructive to salvation and is therefore presented to us under the Appellation Babylon in the very abstract spiritual Sodom and Egypt and so the object of our departure advised with a lest ye partake of her sins which were and are so universally diffused and hath so farre vitiated the subject that a guilt will be contracted by meer Communion Corruptions extrinsecal may Extrinsecal corruptions warrant no separation and must grieve the spirits of Gods people occasion their loud complaints his Ministers most zealous reproofs and the studâ—ous endeavours of all to prevent and remove them because scandals to the Church prejudicial though not directly destructive to salvation dishonourable to Religion and the God whose prerogative it is to prescribe every pin and the very snuffers to be used in his House 1 King 11 3â— and is therefore highly displeasing to God provoking him to rend a Kingdom from the house of David to loath and at least to leave his holy place and remove his Candlestick from such as will not fear him in the simplicity of his own institutions without the vain and needlesse Appendants of their own inventions But yet these cannot warrant separation or voluntary non-communion because the Church abideth related to God as his Spouse his worship and Ordinances remain for matter and essential form entire and exactly his own notwithstanding the concomitancy of some super-added matter or the unfit ministerial method and order by which they are dispensed and Gods presence is to them continued though with a grieved striving spirit threatning his departure and thereby we are under a possibility of salvation though engaged to more care and industry this was the case of the Prophets our Saviour and his Disciples the Church of the Jews and Primitive Christians under the many parallel yea transcending to ours corruptions before mentioned without any prescript or practice of Separation or Non-Communion Christian Friend it is too evident That many and great Corruptions are to our sin and shame retained The Case of England under corruption and to the aggravation thereof with an high hand and defiance of the God of Jealousie returned after a Solemn and Sacred Expulsion into our Church but yet they are extrinsecal and not of the substance of Gods Worship which for Matter and essential Form remaineth entire and properly his own though not so acceptable under as well as without them and will not therefore warrant my Separation or Non-Communion so far as to lie at Home or loyter in the Church-yard until the Common-Prayer whereby God is truly though not orderly invocated and worshipped wherein I as a Member of that Church am interested and unto which as it is Publick Solemn Prayer though in an unsutable Method my Amen is an indispensable Duty being ended The Administrations of Gods Worship among us are indeed nauseous and unhealthful but not void or venemous our waters are bitter and pudled but not poysonous our Pastures are trodden down and the proud of the Flock do push us with Horn Ezek. 34.18 19 20 21. and with Hoof but we are not yet driven out of Christs Fold not dare not we say our Pasture is quite taken from us To be plain Under all our Corruptions we must not we cannot we dare not deny the Matter and essential Form of Gods Ordinances and Worship is continued to us though some superstitious Rites are unto them annexed which are apparent Appendants redundant to and separable from and not vitiating destructive or annihilating to their Subject and are therefore pretended and professed by the Canons appropriated to this Church to be Acts of Order and Ornament rather than of Worship and Adoration to God and they are such wherein the people are generally passive not active Baptism is fully and formally Gods Ordinance though the Cross be needlesly and superstitiously added thereunto and the Parent by virtue of whose interest in Gods Covenant the Child receiveth the Seal is unjustly excluded and a deputation of Godfathers and Godmothers is groundlesly imposed The Word of God is not excluded though now and then a piece of Apocripha is unwarrantably read in the publick Assembly nor doth it cease to be
the Word of God because it is unfitly mangled into parts and parcels urduly fixed unto places unreasonably appropriated unto dayes and times Surplices and canting quiering singing boys and men and published in unseemly vestures and voyces I confess their Common-Prayer is my burden by reason of its defects and disorder and the rudeness of the Ministerial Method I stand convinced it ought to be altered yea ab lished See the Epistle to the Liturgical consideratoâ— considered by reason of its Symetry to the Romish Mass superstitious Order and unsutableness to Solemn Publick Prayer yet I must confess I find in it no Matter to which on a charitable interpretation a sober serious Christian may not say nay can deny his Amen And though I distaste the Ministeriâ—l Mâ—thod I cannot disown in it the essential Form of Prayer viz. A calling upon God in the Name of Christ That Set-Forms of Prayer are used is an Act and Argument of weakness that they are imposed on Gods Church and Ministers is an Act I cannot acquit of wickedness And that this defective disorderly Form is retained yea by forcâ— returned into the Church of England I fear will be found an Act and Argument of wilfulness against Gods mind yet neither the one nor the other maketh it cease to be Publick Solemn Pray r nor do I see on what ground I can deny or refuse my Amen to what is prayed for because I know there are many things wanting to the Church which are not not indeed can be by this Form expressed or not joining desires to God with and as a Member of his Church because they are rudely and unfittingly expressed whil'st the irregularity of that common Order is no Bar to Gods acceptance of my more regular Amen thereunto given Departure from Babylon is the indispensable Duty and will be the property of all whose names are written in the Lambs Book of Life but the Object must be Babylon in the very abstract Setting the mark of the Beast on them who partake with her Rev. 13.8 17 4 13 8. bearing in her hand the Cup of Abomination and so appearing to be formal spiritual Aegypt anâ— Sodom I cannot believe every or any Society retaining some Bâ—â—â—… 〈◊〉 â—…stures and Orders with a protested and apparent recession from Babylon can be the Object thereof and the last of these is the capacity of Englands Church Certainly the Temple of the Lord is not to be disowned or renounced because it hath been sometime trodden down by the Antichristian Gentiles and vitiated by the seat of the Beast when these are expelled though the dirt of their tramplings and stink of their session remain behind them My good friend let it be seriously resolved is there no difference between Israel and Judah Rome and a reformed Church a professed sacrifising Priest and a Minister of the Gospel fondly affecting and retaining that Appellation between a calling on the only true God in the name of Christ though in a defective rude confused and unfitting order and praying unto Saints and dumb Idols between the disorderly administration of the worship for matter and form Gods own appointment and the Ordinance nullifying administration in an unknown tongue to which the hearers cannot say Amen and abstraction or alteration of the Elements beyond yea contrary to Gods prescription or what the possibility of nature and entity of the ordinance will admit between Sacraments with some unwarrantable superstitious Appendants and a Sacrifice expiatory for the quick and dead must we depart from Israel returned from Egypt and Babylon though retaining the savour some of the Manners and Customs and an hankering mind to go back unto those accursed places I pray God keep England in her now retrograde motion from going back to Rome then through his Grace I shall not dare to renounce her Communion though my soul mourn for her corruption for so long as we enjoy in her the very matter and essential form of Gods worship and Ordinances though in an humane unfit corrupt ministerial method and order with some vaine and needlesse appendants of humane invention we are not without confidence of Gods presence and a possibility of salvation and we therefore are without a sufficient ground for separation or non-communion Consid 3d. Communion is no bar but a help to reformation Thirdly let it be considered Communion with the Church under many and great corruptions is not inconsistent with zeal care and contest for reformation thereof the designs of Hell may agree in the end but disagree in the means but it is not so with the determinations of Heaven the Devil may suggest and provoke the correction of sin by sin or make zeal to purity a spurre to separation and the shiprack of vertue to and in the Church 1 Cor. 11.13 14.15 he can make the white Witch heale what the black doth hurt by him one Conjurer doth blesse what another doth curse the Angel of light doth often expel and lay the Angel of darknesse but yet they be both evil Angels he sticks not at nor stirreth against Piety or Religion provided it be but sinful he is content men go in a via lactea sacra to the place of woe and steere by Conscience if erronious to their own condemnation but it is not thus with God and the dictates of his holy Spirit all his commands are competible his Graces concatenated 2 Pet. 1.5 c. 7. All the duties of a Christian are to be discharged without interfering interruption or destruction by one another he alloweth not one sinful step in the way of salvation though paved with never so fair a pretence of sanctity if therefore his people stumble thereinto they must return and go back if they will go to heaven no one duty at any time damps zeal unto another they may be desparata but never are opposita different but not contrariant one to another the discords in true Religion do ever constitute the clearest harmony all extreams are equally odious unto the God of order excesses finde no more acceptance with him than defects in Religion be not righteous overmuch is a divine dictate though many times unduly Eccl. 7.16 17. and unjustly pleaded by men as well as be not over-much wicked Gods Israel may not turn to the right or left hand Deut. 5.32.17.20.18.14 departing from the way of his Statutes the true Christian must walk in all well-pleasing in every good word and work and hate every evil way Col. 1.10 It hath been a scandalous Blasphemy from its very first being of Christianity to say or suppose it doth direct its subjects to do evil that good may come thereby sincere Saints are ever acted by the Spirit of peace and love to seeke and zealously pursue the purity of Gods worship in union with his Church Rom. 3.8 Reformation a duty zeal care and contests for Reformation of Gods Church and worship subjected to the least corruption can
offence no argument in this case like miserable Comforters were no little Scandalized that he would not from his Crosse condemne himself as wicked nor brand himself with Hippocrisy in his past piety to which they laboured to compell him by a right Theological rather then Logical argument though not fully asserted they that plow iniquity so we wickedness reap the same Iob. 27.4.5.26.19.42.7 sorrow is the fruit of sin yet Job well knowing the Prosperity of the wicked and that God trieth the righteous would not let go his integrity Nor to justifie them would he let his lips condemn himself but made his appeal to God his witness on high and record which is above who interposing to moderate the Question Mark 2.23 ad finâ—m discovered their fallacy and determined they had not Spoken of him the thing which was right as did his servant Job The Jewes were offended that the Disciples plucked the ears of Corn on the Sabbath day appointed of God for rest and that our Saviour on that day healed yet our Saviour mattered not their offence as of any weight but justified the facts by the positive duty of preserving mans natural life Luke 13.15.16.17 If the Circumstantials of the first Table must give way to the Substantials of the Second table of the Law and if obedience to humane must give place to Divine command and authority much more must the offence of a brother Act. 5 29. vail to obedience to the will of God In pleasing men God must not be displeased every man must therefore please his neighbour for his good to edification but to please a brother by omission of positive duty which is formal Rom. 15.2 fearfull iniquity is by sinfull strengthning his prophaness Scandal is not to be slighted or Error aedificare in Gehennam to edifie both to Hell from which the Lord deliver me Scandal is indeed an argument of more weight when duly and fitly pleaded then to be slighted or supersicialy evaded not to offend a weak brother Rom. 15.1 is charged as a duty we who are strong ought to bear with the infirmities of the weak and not to please our selves It s good not to eate or drink nor do any thing whereby thy brother is stumbled Rom. 14.21 offended or made weak are Divine directions and Gospell rules fearfull is the sin of a Willfull Scandal for that it is nor onely a snare by which a Brother is entangled and laid on the rack of a Scrupulous conscience and tortured betwen his own doubts and the contrary practice of the pious professing obedience to Gods will But also a stumbling-stone occasioning to him certain sin by either acting under his own doubts and against his own apprehensions induced by the bare ensample of another or by uncharitable censureing his brother in what is to him lawfull and without his own liberty and power to do or not to do it this is therefore represented to be the destruction of the work of God Rom 4.20 against this sign our Saviour hath denounced a most sad doom Whosoever shall offend one of these litle ones it were better for him a milstone were hanged about his neck and he were drowned in tthe depth of the Sea the dread hereof hath seized on my spirit in my present state and Case that though it become lawfull Mat. 18.8 could I without sin withdraw from publique solemn worship in an unfitting order I would on sence of Scandal do it Scandall is of force and fitly pleaded to supersede or condemn an action in it self indifferent and so within a mans own power to do or not to do it scandal is of force in things indiffrent for or against which the conscience may be awed by a seemingly religious reason such was the observing or not observing a day the eating or not eating of some kind of meates or meates offered unto Idols and the like things which in the Primitive Churches and times of Christianity the Apostles during the honourable obsequies of the expired law which hâ—d sometimes and yet seemed to charge them as duty or forbid them as iniquity determined indifferent and directed Scandall of the weak as the casting graine in the aequilibrious minde of a man satisfyed in conscience as to the doing or not doing the same thereby guiding us in all things and cases of the like nature for the indifinite Universal Eat drink Rom. 14. or any thing that may Scandalize offend or weaken a brother advised in Rom. 14.21 must be restrained to this species and things of this kind For what is positively forbidden or commanded must not at any mans pleasure be done or left undone simple scandal hath no strength To plead we are offended and not produce a reason at least seemingly religious is a most simple plea 1 Pet. â—… Jesus Christ is a stone of stumbling and a Rock of offence to many and yet he must be preached and professed unto bonds and death it self Such as in my case pretend scandal and offence I must advise and intreat to reflect their thoughts and take heed they do not mistake the case and mistake the question and thereby take offence where none is given I confess the ministerial order and method of publique worship and prayer is purely humane within the power of the Ministers thereof and so indifferent and ought not to be prescribed or imposed when it is as in our common divine service rude confused and disorderly it s no less Scandalous to the serious Godly then was the administration of the Sons of Eli or confused acclamations of the Church at Cerinth and such on which if I out of choice at liberty to enjoy a more serious and regular order according to the Kings gracious Indulgence granted in his Royal declaration concerning Ecclesiastical affairs should attend I could not but give offence to such as seek the Simplicity of the Gospell and seem to them to allow what I have concluded ought to be abolished and to build again what I have endeavoured to destroy for extirpation of every thing which is evil though but extrinsecall and in the ministerial method of Gods ordinances being the extent of zeale and duty of every member of the Church to be endeavoured in his place and calling though however not under a special solemn sacred obligation thereunto non-attendance on that order unto and by embracing of more regular administration of the same ordinances in Communion with the same Church is the least Act I could do to the enforecing that end I cannot beleive the pious Israelites would have brought their Sacrifices unto the Sons of Eli whose order made them loath the offerings of the Lord which they durst not with-hold if they had enjoyed other Priests who would have offered more conformly to divine appointment But my friend this is not my case or Question but whether solemn publique Worship which is my positive duty unto the
sanctification of the Lords day and as I am a member of Christs Catholick visible Church and cannot by reason of my confinement be enjoyed without my attendance on that Irregular unsuitable method and confused order may be warrantably supersedâ—d and omitted on this ground and reason my presence at such administrations is offensive to some weake Brethren zealously affected to the simplicity of the Gospell were these corruptions abstracted from or opposed unto Gods worship there were to me no case of Conscience but they are confounded with it as the unclean vessel or ill favoured carving with my food whereby I live and therein I must profess it satisfieth not my conscience nor seemeth to me to be of weight that I must offer my sacrifice though by the loathsom order of Elies sons or go to the Temple though my way lye by the high places or assemble and send up my prayer in Gods Sanctuary though the Image of jealousie be set up in it cannot be soberly denied nor ought any to be thereat offended and I must needs resolve in the affirmative for the superadded vanities do not void Gods ordinance nor will defect and disorder with which my private capacity is not charged discharge my positive duty I am not insensible that some will be ready to read my allowance of the same in my attendance on it unto the hardning of themselves in sin or hindring themselves in duty concluding Communion in the ordinances is a consent unto the order to such I must say at their peril be it this scandall is taken not given this inference is more than the promises allow the Communion of the Prophets our Lord Iesus Christ and his Apostles with the Churches in their time under their many and great corruptions was not nor logically could be interpreted to be an argument of countenance and approbation of them or abatement of the zeale against them nor did they thereby contraction themselves the guilt thereof the spider which diffused in wine doth vitiate its subject and make it destructive by the very act of Communion doth spread his dirty webbs all over the Vine and we ear the grapes thereof without the least of doubt or danger the Cities that suffer by all unfit matter in their publike ministrations attend the good instructions and assent unto the due proposals petitions or demands rudely uttered by their Recorder nor think they themselves concerned in the broken blunt abrupt style or confused indigested method of his discourse the extrinsecal adjuncts and ministerial method of Gods ordinances is charged on the Ministers not members of Gods Church it may indeed add grief or pleasure to the people but voyds not the matter of Gods worship or leaveth any guilt on them who thereby receive and celebrate it but do not approve the same the spider may indeed suck poyson of the grape and wicked men may make my duty an occasion of their iniquity but neither the one nor the other giveth thereto any proper casualty events accidentalls are no arguments against my duty these are not more damnable to them who infer them then they would be to me if I by reasons thereof decline my duty my own sorrow nor other mens sin must never stave me off from positive duty these stumbling stones and scandalous inferences do and will ever lye in my way to Heaven yea to my natural life Christs sheep must drink and may be hurt by pudled waters withoâ—t participation in the polluting pudling guilt only chargeable on the Pastors and proud of the flock none can be offended that I worship God Ezek. 44. in the solemn publike worship of his people nor can without wounding their own soul be offended that I do it in this order to me distastful not to Gods worship destructive untill my liberty doth manifest it to be an act of choice not of chance if any hence infer and enforce a persecuting constraint and say these men may be compelled to that form of service they will not choose I shall grant it but advise such to sit down and consider how this will sound in Gods cares or how themselves will like it to be confined to unclean vessels and order because they can but will not chuse in such to eat their meat The offence of any who are Godly will be my trouble and their sin but the omission of duty though but for a day will be my transgression as I dare not admit that as a reason of this and must advise it be not pleaded Fifthly Let it be considered in steering this course Consid 5. This practice is not wâ—…hout president using this liberty and holding Communion with this very Church under these very corruptions and by attendance on this very order of service and solemn publike worship I am not without the caution and conduct of the sober godly learned promoters and pursuers of a perfect and compleat reformation the reformed Churches beyond the Seas and in Scotland obtained higher degrees of reformation and more purity of ordinances then did England for power and dominion the chiefest reformed Church yet these never did disown or decline Communion with her nor advise any her Members thereunto yet they did often rebuke and complain of her luke-warm haesitation in the degrees of reformation obtained and retention of those corruptions which ought to have been expelled among our selves Tindall Hooper Ridley Latimer Farrar Whitaker Cartwright Baines Sibbs Preston Rogers Geree Mr. Iohn Ball Langley Hind Nicholls with many others the non-conformists of Lincoln Devon and Cornwall besides those of our present age and yet contemporary with us all eminent Divines and Holy men groaning under these retained corruptions praying for perswading and pressing after unto many and great sufferings a progress in reformation unto the pure primitive plaines and simplicity of Christs own institution yet lived unto their last breath in constant Communion with our Church attending Gods ordinances under these very disorders and irregularities and did in many things administer according to the form then now imposed and did disâ—ast the non-communion of such who loytered out the time of publike prayer because prescribed and confused and by press and pulpit pleaded against the separations of Brown Barrow Iohnson Canne and their separating followers and adherents or non-communicating abettors as inferring that from the English Liturgy which it would not allow these good men with zeal reproved the many Superstitions continued but still denied them to be any sufficient ground for Separation from which they ever kept the greater distance as subverting the very foundation of the Church and have plainly trodden this tract in which we must travel pursuing the purity of worship in Union and Communion with the Church I shall not fear to professe these good men are the patterns to me proposed next to the prophets our Lord Jesus and the Apostles and cautionary boighâ— for the guidance of my zeal for the perfection of Reformation against and past the dangerous
extreams of Supâ—…stitions disorderly administrations of Gods ordinances and Church-rendring religion subverting separation nor am I herein sensible that our case because our capacity is so is different from theirs onely I wish it to be observed the difference is graduall not Real it lieth on the measure and mode not in matter and Substance they were bound to endeavour an extirpation of the same evil but not by so strong an obligation They were in the infancy we are in the adult estate of Reformation and must therefore esteem the puerilia which were their pleasure our shame The nature and quality of the Corruptions with the necessity of their expulsion were by them under dispute it has been determined and that by an Authority sometime reputed just and whatever it will do in politiques will in point of conscience yet abide a dispute as to its lawfulness they were entangled in the snares of education and under the insensible yoakes of unseasonable subscriptions of approbation of and promise to administration by this rude order and confused method whereby the conscience was awed and the credit of Religion engaged them by a burdensome groaning spirit to bear what they did not see how they could regularly be released from from all which we are free and most strictly tyed by contrary obligations but neither they nor we might out of our places and Capacities attempt a Reformation by any sedition in the Republique or sinfull Schisme from the Church Non-communion is no more warantable to us under the strongest bonds to reformation then it was unto them without them because it is an evil in it self The nature of the retained returned corruptions were the same to them they are to us but to neither a justifiable reason for Non-communion The administration of these good men in and by this corrupt order I can better excuse then justifie or intimate I beleive extirpation to have been their duty as it is mine and I see not how I may act though I as a private member may and must attend assent and give my Amen unto right matter in that order and method with those corrupt Appendants I am bound to extripate Abstinence from action being the least and first act of extirpation in which the private Christian is passive purely passive necessarily passive because he cannot enjoy or attend Gods worship in this indispenceable duty of holy convocation without it I beleive the ministerial method of publique worship to have been subject to their Judgement and within their power as Ministers of the Gospell and Stewards of the misteries of God himselfe full and formall Judges of the mâ—de and order of dispensation not belonging to or charged on the private members and objects thereof as to me In both which respects besides that special capacity in which I conclude all the Ministers of our Church now stand by that special obligation which the transactions of providence in our unhappy times brought u on us and our posterities and successors I have else where professed and must still profess it as the result of my most serious and deliberate thoughts I can keep Communion under that form of worship Epistle to Considerator coâ—…dâ—res whereby I cannot administer and heartily say Amen to the Master of those petitions which are put up in an order so confused preposterous and indigested that it seems to me to be so much below the gravity of the Church whose mouth I must be the seniousness of the office whereby I minister the sanctity of the duty I am to perform and the sacred nature of the object to whom they are presented that I dare not stand between God and his people with the same I presume no man will or can deny my capacity as a Minister to differ from the capacity of a private Member and barr me against or bind me unto what the capacity of a private member of the Church doth not barr against or bind unto non-administration may subject me to a suspence of my Ministry when non communion cannot be warranted nor excused the restraint of that must not run me upon the sin of this I must with the pious Israelite leave my sacrifice before the Lord though with my souls abhorrency of the prophane preposterous order of administration when I dare not with violence snatch the fat of the sacrifice and act according to the method of the sons of Eli I must not leap out of Christs fold nor leave his pastures when trodden down by others because I dare not present his sheep with puddled waters in the one I am passive by other mens sin in the other my action maketh the sin mine own Gods substantial worship must not be slighted or refused because the sinful order of men attend it Strait is the gate narrow is the way which leadeth to life whilst I flie from the sin of my Ministry I may be and must take heed I be not split by flying into the sin of a Member of the Church that guilt may be charged on me in the collective body which I must be innocent of in my personal capacity where the Constitutions of men include the righteous judgement of God will distinguish and discriminate Ezek. 9.4 all particulars are included in an universal defection but do not perish by it God will not forget to mark his mourners under Israels abominations in his worship Numb 14 which they could not mend nor avoid his Joshua's and Caleb's who follow him fully shall nonfall short of the land of promise Confid 6. though all Israel fall in the wilderness Sixtly Let it be considered my communion with this Church under these corruptions is not more consonant unto the example of these good men of our Church Communion under corrup is consonant to my own professions and the carriage of other reformed Churches then unto my self who am and I hope through divine Grace shall be semper idem ever since I knew any thing of Religion and in any measure discovered the wayes of God and his people I have grieved for and contested against the corruptions of his Church but avoided abhorred and opposed separation from yea a non communion with it as the much greater evil though palliated with professions of piety and pretences of purity to the seduction of the simple such as have sate under my ministery now clouded by a righteous God reveiwing their notes and reflecting their thoughts on what I preached will find a series of rebukes and admonitions against separation and non-communion though enticed by men seemingly the most holy and pretences unto the greatest purity and sanctity In the last Sermons that I preached from John 4.22 from our Saviours practise and pleading for the Church of the Jews opposed to the Samaritans I affirmed Communion with Gods Church under many and great corruptions is not only lawful but an indispensable duty the which I amplified by shewing the different nature of corruptions as nouseous and venomous prejudicial
to health and growth or directly destructive as intrinsecal and vitiating to the subject or extrinsecal and conversant about the same notwithstanding which the subject remains the same participation in which contracts guilt as in offering sacrifice to an Idol or contracts no guilt to the Communicant eating in an amicable friendship what is offered to an Idol such as put us out of a possibility of salvation the only ground of separation or are therewith consistent imposed by others and so their sin not sufficient to bâ—r our duty all which were applyed to the Popish administrations nullifying Christs Offices and Ordinances and so necessitating separation polluting by participation and Englands corruptions grieving God and his people some 8. some 7. some 4. years now past but preserving Gods worship in the substantial matter and essential form thereof and so not sufficient to supersede communion If you look into the writings which bear my name in the world you will find separation because of corruption condemned by reasons beyond what the most serious Church-gathering Separatists ever undertook to answer otherwise then by rage and reproach the dialect of restrained lust in that as well as in this revolution Read at your leisure my Bethshemesh clouded Saints zeal against sinful Altars Virtue and value of Baptisme written many years since and you will see Mr. Crofâ—ons communion with the Church of England is not repugnant to his judgement more then seven years since declared and in those very writings lately published before and for which men have by Gods permission brought my light under a bushel you shall find my zeal for Reformation consistent to union and communion with the Church nor did the force of opposing corruption drive me as I might probably have done to let fall any expressions in favour of separation My logical casuistical Contests for Reformation do very plainly condemn and protest against schisme and sedition as thereunto destructive particularly in my Analâ—psis to Doctor Gaudens Analysis my Argument and Answer is thus concluded Whatsoever shall be the establishment in the Church though never so corrupt yet whilst consistent with salvation though it may occasion to me suffering and a suspence of my Ministry by Gods Grace it shall not effect on me or such on whome I have influence Schisme from the Church or a resistance of his Majesties just Authority And in my Epistle to the Lyturgicall Considerator considered in which I urge my apprehended grounds for the alteration and abolition of the Ministerial method of solemn publique prayer used in our Church with a proâ—est for Communion under it though against administration by it I am so much affected to the peace of the Church that I have of late preached what God assisting I am resolved for to practise viz. that many and graet corruptions in Gods worship are to be grieved for and patiently groaned under before Schisme be consented to or separation be consulted Provided neverthelesse I be passive not active in them I can keep Communion under that form of worship whereby I cannot administer and heartily say Amen to the matter of those petitions which are put up in an order so preposterous and indigested that I dare not stand between God and his people with the same The liberty that I now pursue when obtained and used is no more than a practice commensing on these professions whereby they are made more legible not more censurable than they were before My good friend These things considered I must professe when ever God shall mollifie the hearts of men into whose hands he hath given my present liberty I see not any reason that I dare plead before the Lord or reflect as a barre on my Conscience whereupon my solitary Sabbaths may be sweetned and spent with comfort my passage to the publique assemblie and worship though in this order and with these appendants which are burdensome to my spirit standing open and so my absence being a voluntary act within my own power If any man professing the fear of God can produce any I should be glad for I fear to be charged with the omission of Gods publique worship celebrated in Christ his Church though with extrinsecal corruption and in a rude Ministeriall order which ought to be reformed but will not excuse me though unforced by the offence of some weak brethren zealously affected to the purity of Gods House and Worship I am not insensible that the Committee of discretion will be no lesse ready to call me fool for steering this course than they were for my entering the Lists in defence and â—â—…oâ—cement of Reformation wherein I am deserted by my more prudent brethren for that I hereby strike ost from that party on whom my former contests did seem to 〈◊〉 me But to them I must breifly answer I am willing to be wise as a serpent and resolved to keep my innoâ—…nâ—… as a dove so long as these do correspond and agree I have an heart to lodge them but if prudence once obâ—…ate or obstruct duty or guide into oâ— guard sin I fear the serpent begins to wind too farre and getting in the head will wind in the body and devour the doâ—… that some who have been objects of my opposition because subjects of separation have in my present sufferings embraced me and shewed kindnesse to me and mine beyond some more specially charged with it as their more particular duty I am very sensible and thankfully acknowledge to God and them and hope they did not thereby designe to charme my zeal against what I ever cenceived to be sin I confess it hath been a check to my comforts to consider some triumph in me and my sufferings because opposed to the superstitions and prophanesse which they dislike who agree not with me in those positive truths which I have asserted and will be turned in their hearts against me when the same two-edged-sword in my weak hand shall be constrained to strike their more civil seemingly sacred lusts The Usurer huggs and hath the Preacher home to dinner when he preacheth against the prodigal profusal spending drunkard who will hunt and hurry him out of the Parish when he shall preach against usury I cannot but tell you a passage which here befell me In my close confinement three persons full of seeming zeal to piety and purity stumbled into my chamber and saluted me with this salutation we are strangers to you but in conscience of our duty are come to visit you as a sufferer for Jesus Christ to which kind and Christian salutation I returned a short admonition that we might endeavour to understand the truths of the Lord Jesus and labour to agree in positives for I feared many rejoyced in my sufferings as negative and against what is grossely evil who would not embrace the truths I did contend for on which these persons zeal boiled over into this angry Taunt what I warrant you you are yet for the Church of England and your
from my special by those things which will not bar the Duties of my general Relation and Capacity I conceive Administration of Gods Worship is much different from Attendance on Gods Worship and I stand bound to the last when I am justly or unjustly barred from the first Abiathar and the Idolatrous Priests were not barred from serving God with the Church when thrust from serving in the Priests Office In my general Relation as a Member of the Church I stand charged and am capacitated to judge the Matter and essential Form of Gods Worship assent to which is mine only Act But in my special Relation as a Minister I stand also charged and am capacitated to judge the Ministerial Mode and humane Order by which Gods Worship is celebrated and if herein I be imposed on and that by an Order rude irreverend and unsutable to God his Church or Worship which right Reason much less true Religion will not allow me to receive I am interrupted in my Ministerial Office the Formality of which is As a man to Modifie Gods Institutions whereby an intercourse is maintained between God and men such imposition I judge to be a subversion of Ministerial Office and Authority not to be offered by others or admitted by my self without great iniquity and if it therefore be enforced by violence that I must be restrained from my Ministerial Modification of Gods Ordinances according to mine Office and Ministerial Gifts received or I may not be permitted to Minister I yet stand in my Relation as a Member of the Church bound to communicate The Ministerial Mode imposed and sinfully received by such as subjugate their Ministry not vitiating the Subject or nullifying the Ordinances of God will not warrant my Non-attendance on them It is not equally necessitous and obliging that I a Speaker pronounce a wild indigested Speech full of Incongruities Non-sense and Solecisms from which a sound mind doth bar me as that I join and concur in the Substantials thereof with the Assemblies so asking common and certain good things I may not cast off my general Relation wherein I am purely passive because those things are to be personally acted in my special Relation and Capacity which I cannot without sin consent to do and therefore must stand still I cannot beat it into my Brains that it is aeque or aequaliter to attend and give an Assent unto the Matter prayed as to utter pronounce and express the raw rude and disorderly Speech of the Speaker Or that the Necessity or Obligation of the whole House in this general Order to present it self before his Majesty which will and doth warrant the one may justifie the other the Speakers Speech is often censured when the Commons concerned in it are commended and justified But Sir Rather than not enforce this Fancy you will knock me on the Head with a Chamber-pot you urge my necessity to Communion to be the same to Ministration and tell me I judge the Nurse is bound in Duty and Necessity to give the Child his bread his milk had been more proper out of a Chamber-pot as she her self or the Child it self out of it An homely Simile but in a starving Necessity I do judge so but I judge Similes do not currere quatuor pedibus there is no aptitude in this to my Case that Necessity will constrain me to take my Meat in an unclean Vessel which will not constrain me to give it in that Vessel to another I suppose your Nurse is poor who hath no other Vessel but a Chamber-pot yet I must suppose her a good Huswife capacitated to make it clean But if her Superiours have stripped her of all other and will bar her from her cleansing this I suppose she is not bound to play the Nurse and feed others though she must thus feed her self if filthy Parents will have such Nurses or none I hope it is in my power to be none of them I am not bound to it I am by Nature bound to deny it and yet I must maintain mine own being as well as I can If the being of Christianity depend upon my personal Ministry as my being or appearing a Christian doth on my Communion with the Church visible your Inference might be of some force but this it doth not That therefore you may understand the difference keep to similitudes more apt The King hath Decreed All the Citizens shall each Month present their Petitions by a joint Assent to the Expressions of a Speaker the Governours of this City direct a course by which to design different Speakers they consult Matter to be spoken and the Mode of speaking the first is good and allowed the second is rude and disordered the Speakers can better express the desired Matter but shall not be permitted are they aeque or aequaliter obâ—iged to speak in this Mode as to attend this Assembly and give Assent to this common good Matter rudely expressed by others Not speaking in this Mode they lose the Honour and Advantages of the Speakers but not attending or assenting to the Matter they lose the benefit and being of Citizens are these equally to be embraced and pursued They are bound in the one personally to Act and denying to subjugate their Judicium rationale to the rude Prescriptions of others they are barred from it but resolved into the common state in which assent to the Matter is their only Act being wholly and purely passive in the prescribed and imposed Form and Mode of expression in your Chamber-pot Case you suppose Christianity to depend on my personal Ministry which my Relation as a Nurse doth renounce and then indeed your Inference may be cogent for then your Chamber-pot will square with du Moulins Fools Coat but in my more sutable and sociable Case I am bound to attendance when and where I am not bound to administer The Necessity of City-Interest and Relation doth bind me to attendance and assent to City-Petitions but not to the Duty and Dignity of a Speaker between the King and the City from which I am barred by the irrational imposition of an irregular undue Mode of expression in which I must personally act by a suspense of my Judicium rationale which I am bound to act in this more and beyond what I must judge in my more common Capacity Now Sir I must tell you I know not whom you intend by the Brethren who are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the rest sure I am they are not Congregationallists who have no little blasphemed the COVENANT by their late Professions for it and by their Martyrs pretences to it as the Bond of their most barbarous pernitious Treasons and Impieties which was by themselves slighted as an Almanack out of Date and prophanely blasphemously violated before they could or did consult and perpetrate the same I cannot suppose them to be the Brethren for the late specifical Difference whose Policy propounded an interpretation of the COVENANT contrary to the literal