Company of Bigots at Jerusalem appear'd there as a Nazarite with all the Formalities the Law required in that Case Ch. 21.24 This he could do occasionally according to the Liberty he had in Christ which he was careful to preserve and not to be brought under the Power of these Things which is contrary to the Nature and free State of the Gospel And having this apostolical Precedent our Consciences are at ease in this Matter Yet IV. If there be any that have made these external Compliances renuente Conscientia or but with a doubting Conscience let them look to it and repent of their Sin for whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin But to pass this Censure on any without clear Evidence is far from that Charity which thinketh no Evil. Your first Section it but Preliminary to what you pretend to be more Argumentative Sect. 1. wherein you tell us that the Church of Christ being but One and that in the highest and strictest manner of Vnion that is possible for a Society of Men all the Question will be wherein this Vnion does consist or in what things it ought to be maintain'd To this you answer That all Christians ought to be united 1. In Faith 2. in Love 3. in outward Worship and Communion On the Two former you touch lightly because you perceive that the stress of the Question lies on the Third So that tho' We Dissenters be One with you in Faith and Love which whatever you think we have alwaies taken to be the main fundamental Principles of our Christianity and the strongest Nerves of our Christian Union and all that is as absolutely necessary requir'd of us 2 Tim. 1.13 Gal. 5.6 Philem. ver 5. Yet we must by the Rules of your Charity be all Damn'd if we dare to dissent from you in any of your outward Acts and Modes of Worship and Communion Here you run on a large and learned Harangue on the excellency and necessity of Church-Concord in the external Forms of Worship and Discipline as if a few variable unscriptural and confessedly indifferent Ceremonies were the only true Cement and Badge of Christian Union and without which 't is impossible as a visible Society to appear in the Eye of the World as One. And for this you think you very pertinently quote both Scriptures and the Fathers Now as to what you say as to the necessity of Union in Essentials we are ready to say with you and take Communion on in Externalls and Circumstantialls where it may be had without Sin to be on several Accounts as desirable as you can represent it to be But when you say that Faith and Love being invisible Principles are not capable of being a publick Badge of the Christian Profession And Argue from thence that 't is only Vniformity in the external Rites and Ceremonies of Worship that evidences the Oneness of Faith and Affection as if Faith and Love had no other way to express their Efficacy and Sincerity but this you do not only traduce those Divine Principles but shamefully expose the Church of which you are so very tender For should it be said that no one would ever believe the Members of the Church of England to be any of Christ's Disciples did they not see them so Zealous for the Ceremonies of their Church how little would this be for the Credit of their Christianity And indeed this is lamentably too true of very many not only of the common Members but of the Teachers and Leaders of the Church that have little else to distinguish them from Heathens or to perswade a belief of their Christianity but an empty Name and a blind Zeal for what they call the Church That the Church Universal is One and in some respects may be said to be one visible Society and Political Body we readily grant so that the Unity be made to consist only in what is Essential to it else we must inevitably cut the Catholick Church in Pieces according to the variety and differences of the external Rites and Communions of the many particular Churches of which the whole is constituted And when we have done so where shall we find that Oracle that shall infallibly determine and assure us which of all these Parts is that which we ought to own and to Communicate with as the Church of Christ in which alone Salvation is to be had Must you be the Oracle May not others claim it as well as you Or will you send us to Rome to be determin'd Yet this is that you so charitably direct us to and are so strenuously contending for If then the Rending of the Church be Schism let all the unprejudiced part of the World judge who are the Schismaticks You or We. We are ready to Communicate with you in all that is Essential to the Church of Christ and profess our selves to be so far One with you but because we dissent from you in some Circumstantials of your own devising which God hath no where requir'd of us and which are justly Offensive to the Consciences of very many of the Faithful yet which you make the indispensable Conditions of Communion with you therefore we must be cut off and cast out as no parts of the Catholick Church of Christ Is not this to cut the Church in Pieces and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a Schismatical Church The Catholick Church of Christ indeed is One therefore he that is duly admitted as a Member in any one true part or particular Congregation of this Church has a right of Communicating in all and he that is justly Excommunicated out of one is cut off from all because all are but the integrating Parts of one and the same Body But then they can be one only in those things which are essentially common to all and not in those peculiar Forms or accidental Differences which are one way or other become proper to 'em as particular Parts Will you cut off the Foot as no part of the Body because it differs in Form from the Hand Are you offended with your Nose because it is not in Figure like your Ear When you have dismember'd all the Dissimilar Parts what a comely useful uniform Trunk will you have left Yet this is what you are Pleading for Where then is your Charity Or your Policy You say You see not what just Cause there can be that they should be divided in Worship who are united in Faith And we say so too But why then have you thus divided us from you Whose Fault is it that we do not Worship God together but yours that will not suffer it but on such Terms as we cannot without Sin submit to and which you have devis'd and impos'd with a design to keep so many of us out of your Communion That the Church is a Regular Society we grant A Body fitly joyn'd together consisting of many Members of which all have not the same Office as you quote it from the Apostle Neither
Service of your Hypothesis and on the Judgment and Practice of the Faithful in the purest Ages alias the most Popish Ages so that you presume your Inference is clear That all those who have separated without just Cause from the outward Communion of that Church with which they ought or with which you will say they ought to hold Communion and so persisting in that Separation tho' otherwise never so Orthodox or Holy have hereby so cut themselves off from the Body of the Vniversal Church that they can do nothing that can qualify themselves or others for Communion with it So that by this your Rule of Catholick Vnity in outward Communion all those Persons and Churches that herein agree not with you are not of the Body nor united to the Head and then must necessarily be in a state of Damnation Woe be then to all those poor Churches that are to your Constitution and way of Government and Worship Strangers But by the way give us leave to ask you How it comes to pass that Baptism and Ordination received in the Church of Rome are accounted valid in your Church of England and yet Ordination in any Protestant Church that 's not of your Constitution accounted Null Or for what politick Reason is their Baptism allowed and their Ordination only Condemn'd Is it because the Church of Rome never separated from you nor you from it as all the other Protestant Churches have done Who must therefore be all abandon'd by you as Harlots that deserve to be ston'd while Rome is own'd for your Sister or your Mother and of the same Catholick Body with you Either own the Relation or renounce the Title of Protestant Will you say that these Churches were never in Communion with you and therefore did not go out from you Suppose this were true of the main Body of them that they were never in particular outward Communion with the Church of England tho' before the Reformation they were in the same Church with you and many of those and of their Children who were once actually in particular Communion with you went out from you on the same Account as we do yet supposing it otherwise How little will this help Them more than Vs as to the Oneness of the outward Communion of the universal Church in the Sense that you take it and urge it on Vs And now that we are upon Enquiries with you Pray be not offended if we ask you once more What think you of our first Protestant Reformers Before they actually separated from the Church of Rome were they not Members of that Church and in outward Communion with it If not how could they be said to separate from it But if they were let us ask you again was that Church of which they were then Members a true Church of Christ or not If not then that Church and all the Members of it was not united to the Head and consequently was no Church nor by your Rule of Catholick Vnity could do any thing to qualify themselves or others for Communion with any part of the Catholick Church and from whom then did your Church of England or any of the Reformed derive their Succession and Authority from the Apostles But if it was a true Church how could they according to your Notion of Catholick Vnity separate from it without involving themselves in the guilt of Schism with which you now charge us May we not hence conclude that to separate from a true Church of Christ that retains the Essentials of a Church is not always Schismatical nor a Solution of Catholick Vnity Will you tell us that these had a Warrant by a Call from Heaven to justify their Separation Rev. 18.4 2 Cor. 6.17 But on what Reason was this Call grounded Come out of her my People that ye be not Partakers of her Sins And doth not the same Call reach Vs as far as the Reason is the same Tho' the Sins of the Church of Rome were greater than those of the present Church of England yet what is Sin is Sin still and will by your own Concessions so far justify our Separation and on no other Account do we desire or pretend to justify it The Separatists condemn'd in Scripture and with whom you would sort Vs and so represent us to the World were Men of very ill Character as to their Morals Persons given up to Sensuality walking after their own ungodly Lusts tho' veild under a Form of Religion yet by their corrupt Lives they were visibly to be discern'd Now let the impartial part of the World judge whether this be so much our Character as the Character of those by whom we are thus Censur'd That the Fathers and Bishops of the first Ages were very jealous of the Union of their Churches and an intire Obedience to their Ecclesiastical Rulers very Passionately and sometimes Hyperbolically declaiming against Separation or setting up Pastors without the Approbation of their own Bishops is not to be denyed and for which they had some prudential Reasons The Christian Church was then in its Infancy and therefore requir'd a stricter Hand of Government over it for the preservation of its Unity in Communion the Faithful were not so well settl'd and experienced in their Way their Dangers were many ways extraordinary not only from the Heathen Persecutors but from the Jewish Bigots which were in so many Places dispers'd among them and had so troublesome and ensnaring an Influence on the young Gentile Converts Besides the many false and seditious Teachers which the Devil had Sown as his Tares almost every where among them the Orthodox Presbyters too few and generally too weak to deal with so many so potent and so subtil Enemies or to be entrusted with the Conduct of the Church without the Counsel and Direction of its prime Guides and Governours Besides the Honour and Satisfaction of Sovereign Rule and Dictatorship is what was ever very pleasing to Nature So that all these things consider'd we have no reason to wonder at the Heat of their Spirits in this Case And indeed the Church had then very great Reason to bless God for this their Zeal and most religiously to observe them in it especially while they had no cause to dissent or divide themselves on the account of any Heresies they Taught them or any disputable unscriptural Impositions that were required as the Conditions of their Communion with them There were no such Things exacted of Them as have been of Vs and our Teachers which made their Obedience easy and indisputable And you may observe that the great Reason of their Care to preserve the Unity of the Churches outward Communion was not to uphold a few unnecessary Ceremonies but to preserve the Purity of its spiritual Worship and Doctrin which was infinitely more valuable and consequential a circumstantial variety of the external Forms of Church-Administrations would have done the Church no more harm than the variety which we see in every Species
if a Company withdraw themselves from it and shake off all Dependance on it and Communion with it all Communion if you speak this to us you must mean all outward Communion in those Ceremonious Acts of Worship and Matters of Discipline that lie in Controvesie betwixt us they cannot be of the same Body that they deserted And then it must needs follow That Your Church being Politically in Communion with the CATHOLICK and Ours out of Communion with you we are but as so many dead Branches that have lost their Union with the Body and all the Influxes of Life from the Head How gladly then would you see us in the Fire that you may warm your selves by us Sure 't is well for those of us you are so angry with that the Act De Haroticis comburendis is repeal'd But this Inference of yours you pretend to illustrate by several pat Instances The Empire of Persia you say was one Body under Darius but was not so when divided into several Kingdoms under the Successors of Alexander Very critically observ'd when thus divided they were not One particular Political Body as before yet were they true parts of One and the same Universal World still tho' divided into particular National Polities yet united still in all the common Interests of Human Nature and Society So a City is one Body but the Colonies that issue out from it and are form'd into other Cities under their own proper Laws and Jurisdiction cannot be Numerically and perhaps are not Specificially one Political Body yet they are one Kingdom and govern'd by the same common Laws and Statutes of the Kingdom And what the Kingdom is the worse for this Variety or Diversification of particlar Political Forms no Man can tell Nay suppose this Separation be made by a Revolt or Dislike of the Constitution of the Government of the City or of their Manners and Formalities and without the Publick Consent we hope this will not Out-law them nor Disfranchize them of any of their National Privileges and Rights as long as they behave themselves with due Loyalty to their Sovereign and peaceably to their Fellow-Subjects Now you say a Church hath this Communion with a City and with all Corporations Very true so the Church at Jerusalem was once the Vniversal Church and Gospel Metropolis But if all those particular Churches that have been separated from it into Political Bodies not only Numerically but Specifically distinct under their own Laws and Forms of Government Worship and Discipline and different from that of the first Mother-Church from which they issued be no more Churches because of these different outward Communions wherein they are not one with the first Church nor with one another then it must needs follow that You are no more a Church of Christ than We and so you have thus far set us on even Ground with your selves nor hath any one need to renounce the use of the Words or affront the common Sense of Mankind to draw this Conclusion from your Premises 2. You plead from a supposed Inconsistency it hath with Church Government and its Destructiveness of the Church it self and a vain excuse you say 't will be for Men to say that they are at an Agreement with the Church in Doctrin while by their Divisions they are tearing the Church in Pieces And this you are at the Pains to Illustrate by Comparisons Military Civil and Domestick as if it were an hard Matter to beat this Notion into Mens Heads But when all is done you won't imagine how little We think our selves concern'd in it for you have granted us and we cannot forget it that it must be a Causeless Separation or else it is not what you are declaiming on therefore till it appear that our Separation from the Church of England is Causeless we are not the Persons that are like to be hurt by your Arrows And as for our Officers by whose Conduct we are guided in the Matters of God and of our Souls they are neither Mutinous nor Seditious nor Self-Intruders as by your Comparisons you would Insinuate but generally as well qualify'd and altogether as lawfully call'd and commission'd and as fully invested with the ministerial Office according to the Rules of the Holy Scriptures as any of your Selves as we have already prov'd so that this Argument you may now lay aside among your broken Weapons till you find a proper Occasion for it 3. You argue from its Inconsistency with the Notion of Schism as it is express'd in the Holy Scripture i. e. If the Scripture Notion of Schism were the same with Yours And for this your only Instance is the Schism that was once in the Church of Corinth where every one said I am of Paul or I of Apollas or I of Cephas But this Faction among the Disciples at Corinth you told us in your second Section was but a Schism within the Church not from it and therefore will not give us the full Notion of Schism according to your own apprehension of it But we will let this pass for an Impertinence having already granted you more than this Instance can pretend to prove viz. that Oneness in Doctrin is not always enough to justify a Separation from outward Communion 'T is in your misapplying it to us that your great Mistake lies supposing that our Separation from you is as Causeless as were the Factious Divisions of those in the Church of Corinth which is the Thing that 's yet to be prov'd But it seems to us by the Tenour of your Discourse from top to bottom that let a Church be what it will either as to its Constitution or its individual Members ever so Corrupt in Doctrin Superstitious in Worship or Filthy in Conversation and degenerated from Scripture Rules and Institution yet while they hold together in outward Communion as the Church of Rome hath done both before and since the Protestant Reformation there is nothing in it that deserves the Name of Schism or that will justifie a Seperation from it Pray tell us plainly whose Cause it is you are pleading under the Name of the Church of England Have you never consider'd the Differences that there were in the Apostle's Days between the Churches of the Christian Jewes and those of the Gentiles in respect of Rites and Ceremonies and outward Communion and don 't you know to what a height these Differences were kept up by the Churches that were still so fond of their old Way that there was no Uniting them in this Point That Paul for his Non-Conformity to 'em could not shew his Face among 'em at Jerusalem without danger of his Life Have you not read what a feud there was once between Him and Peter on this Account Gal. 2.11 12 13 14. And how much ado the Apostle Paul had to preserve the Churches of the Gentiles from being bigotted to their Superstitions Now pray tell us whether the Church at Jerusalem or that at Antioch were the
mighty stress of eternal Salvation on these little Things but notwithstanding these Differences which could not be cur'd but by Time they should receive and embrace one another as fellow-Fellow-Members of one and the same universal mystical Body And now I will tell you in few words how far You and We are concerned in this your Dispute with the Dr. Either there were Independent and Separate Churches planted by the Apostles in the same City or there were not Utrum horum c. If there were then 1. Your Dr. was in the right and you under a mistake in opposing him 2. What was done by the Apostles rules the case under the like circumstances to Us and to all other Churches to the World's end 3. If there were such a Division of Outward Communion among the Churches of the Apostle's own planting and by their Allowance and Order then the Differences of Outward Communion destroy not the Catholick Union But the Church is truly One by some surer and more adequate Bond than that of Uniformity of Outward Communion On the other side if all the Churches of the Apostles planting were always One in Outward Communion then were not the Ceremonies in Controversie between the Jews and Gentiles ever made the necessary Terms of their Communion but every one had his Liberty according the Sentiments of his own Conscience and private Judgment of using or not using them Because otherwise Outward Communion had been utterly impracticable Now whether of these two you will chuse is very indifferent to Us because either of them will answer well enough for Us in what you here Object against us And what now is become of your Notion of Catholick Unity let any one judge that hath but the command of one sober Thought III. The next thing that you are pleas'd to produce in our Names and call one of our Arguments is this That Jesus Christ hath declar'd that where two or three are gathered together in his Name he is in the midst of them And that we Assemble in this manner and are therefore assur'd of his favourable Presence Here also Justice would have quoted us its Author and Art would have lick'd it into Form for us that so we might have seen the proper Dimensions and Strength of it as an Argument Now in Logical Form we humbly conceive it will look after this fashion and speak to this effect Those that are gathered together with Christ in the midst of them are no Schismatical Assembly But we are gathered together with Christ in the midst of us Erg. But because the stuff you have here laid together for Us will not regularly be comprehended within the compass of one ordinary Syllogism it will be needful to support the Minor which seems to to be most in danger with another to this purpose Those that are gathered together in the Name of Christ have Christ in the midst of ' em But we are gathered together in the Name of Christ Erg. SIR Though we own the Scripture out of which you quote us these Words Matth. 18.20 in the true sense and meaning of them and bless God for the Gracious Promise contain'd in them yet as we never offered them as a Reason of our Separation from your Communion so neither do we own them as an Argument to justifie our so doing You herein trifle with us Had you durst to have engaged our Arguments you would not have made your self sport with these little Things which are justly enough liable to so many exceptions But this it seems is a Reed which you have borrowed from the Old Novations to smite Us with and with these you should have left it or some others of that Character and not in imitation of the Old Woman at Endor have raised up the Ghost of St. Cyprian to read us a Doom till you had first substantially proved that we are the Persons of whom St. Cyprian spake But this indeed is an Argument that you make light of and so do we IV. Your Fourth It hath been said is of the same Complexion and Value with the former The Postulatum that lies in quest between us is Whether our Separating from the Church of England in outward Communion be Schism And to prove our Innocency herein you pretend that we produce the words of the Apostle Paul Phil. 1.15 and 18. That Paul rejoiced that Christ was Preached even by those Men that did it out of Envy and Strife and if the Case of our Preachers were as bad as this as long as they Preach Christ We have no reason to be sollicitous about their Call nor You to be offended at their Work This we suppose you put in to make up the Half Dozen But if you would represent it as one of our Arguments you should have squeezed it into such a Syllogism as this that we might have known what to make on 't If the Preaching of Christ though out of Envy and Strife were matter of rejoicing to Paul then the Preaching of Christ though out of Envy and without a Call which you force into the Argument is not Schismatical But our Ministers do Preach Christ whatever their Principles or their Call to the Office be Erg. We wish you would do us the right to tell us from whom of Us you got this Argument Possibly some good Body or other that was not so well-pleas'd with your Rigours in stopping the Mouths of so many Hundreds of our Ministers at once may have said That if Paul did rejoice that Christ was faithfully Preached though by such as envied his Fame and Liberty in the Gospel then you of the Church of England have done very unlike to the Blessed Paul in silencing so many of the Able and Faithful Ministers of Christ who would have Preached him Sincerely and Peaceably and from a Principle of Love to the Souls of Men and that had as much a Call to Preach as You And if you will as you ought take it thus and call it an Argument We will own it as a sober Reasonning of the Case with you whoever were the first Author of it But when you mock us with the Man of Straw of your own stuffing you deal with Us as they dealt of old with the Christians whom they put into Bears Skins and Fools Coats to be laught at by the Mob and worried by the Beasts And so you deal with our Ministers 1. By representing them to be such as take on them the Work of the Ministry without a Call to that Office the contrary whereof we have already proved 2. In saying that Paul's Enviers Preached to none but the Infidels which is more than you pretend to prove intimating that if you could but get our Ministers banished into America or any other Infidel part of the World to Preach the Gospel to them that never yet heard of it then you will rejoice too as Paul did 3. In accusing them of Envy and Strife as the main Principle that sets them on work
Yoke and prostitute our Consciences to your Authority and adventure our All to Eternity on the safe Conduct of your Direction and Benediction let us be ever so ignorant of the Articles or Nature of the Faith we profess or ever so Scandalous in our Lives yet if we Live and Die in your Communion you will on our Death-Beds bring us the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of our Saviour which you will pretend to Consecrate to us and so Absolve us and tell us we are safe for the other World May we not tell a Popish Priest now Mutato nomine de te Fabula Narratur And now Sir having taken this brief View of your first Section wherein had we followed you Line by Line in every thing that might have offer'd us a just Remark it would have carried us too far beyond the due Bounds of a Letter Wherefore for brevity sake we will now summ up the Argument of it in this categorical Form The Universal Church of Christ is One Body But the Church of England and those of the Dissenters are Two Erg. Dissenters are not of the Church of Christ Or which may be concluded altogether as Logically Erg. Either the Church of England or the Dissenters are not the Church of Christ Both of these are alike true In what University learn'd you this Logick Or by what Pretence can you hope to hide the shame of so staring a Fallacy That we have not wrong'd you in the Syllogism Sect. 2. we have drawn upon your first Section appears by your own Inferences in your Second where you conclude That a Breach of Vnion in any of these Things viz. Not only in Faith and Love but in External Communion and particularly with the Church of England in its present State and in all its Rites and Ceremonies which is the main thing in dispute betwixt us where-ever the Fault is as you express it with very good caution must needs be Sinful i. e. so Sinful as according to your Hypothesis cuts a Person off from all saving Communion with the Church of Christ Now this Inference so generally yet cautiously stated you begin very Orthodoxly to defend in your next Paragraphs where you say I. That if there be but one Faith deliver'd to the Saints for which they must earnestly contend they grievously offend who add new Articles to it or take away from it such as are already reveal'd or otherwise deprave it by a mixthre of Falshood And so far as they do so we ought to depart from them and not betray or deny the Truth in complyance with them Sir We sincerely thank you for this and wish that we may always sind you sixt on this good Principle This is all that We and our Teachers have been so long wrestling and waiting on the Church of England for Grant us but this and then there will need but one thing more besides the Grace of God to reconcile and unite us If we unite with you in all that the Word of God requires us to unite in the Fault will not be Ours if we depart and separate from you in those Articles which are not of the Faith that was once delivered to the Saints or in those Acts of Worship and outward Communion which we have no Warrant in the Scriptures for but general Cautions against then our Separation will not by this Principle of Yours be damn'd by you as Schismatical but must be acknowledged as we verily believe it to be a part of our bounden Duty And when you speak with so much keenness against our Division and Separation from you do Us and the Cause but so much right as to prefix the Word Causeless and you will find us ready to say as to the Theory of your Doctrin much the same as you do All that you quote out of the Scriptures or out of your Saints or any other more modern Authors of your own or of our Persuasion against Schism is nothing at all to us unless you first prove our Separation to be Causeless and consequently Schismatical Now in order to this you undertake 1. To shew us what the Nature of Schism is 2. What Grounds you have to apprehend that we are deeply concern'd in it 3. You examine the Arguments that have been offer'd on our part to excuse us from the guilt of it 4. You represent to us the sad Consequence of it According to this Method we shall now endeavour to follow you I. You say That Schism in the Notion of it that we are now upon is a causeless Breach of outward Ecclesiastical Communion By this Limitation of your Desinition whereby you warily explain your self you give us to understand that what your Discourse is so hotly affected with is not the Whole but only a Branch of Schism and indeed one of the least and remotest Branches of it yet which if Causeless we will grant it to your Desinition to be Schismatical And we again thank your Ingenuity in inserting the Word Causeless by which Specifick Difference of your Genius you leave us to conclude that there is a Breach of outward Ecclesiastical Communion which is not Causeless but Necessary and if we can prove this to be our Case then are you bound by your own Definition to Absolve us of that Guilt with which we stand charg'd by you This Schism you say is sometimes within a Church sometimes from a Church sometimes sets up opposite Churches and Officers All which if the Separation be Causeless must needs carry the Schism to higher degrees of Guilt And much more when it constitutes Pastors without any lawful Authority or Ordination So that in all this we are like to agree in Notion till it comes to be try'd whether the Separation with which we are charg'd be Causeless or no and whether our Pastors be constituted without any lawful Authority or Ordination But before we come to the Examination of this part of the Question wherein the main stress of all lies we are diverted by what you say you need not enter upon viz. The Debate Whether Episcopal Ordination and Baptism conferr'd in Schism be valid And yet you so far enter upon it whether you had need to do it or no as to resolve it in the Negative Now we hope that you would have us to understand Schism here in the same Notion of it as you give it us in your Desinition viz. A causeless Breach of outward Ecclesiastical Communion tho' in all other respects wherein the Essentials of the Christian Faith and Profession do consist there be no Schism but a good Agreement both with the Holy Scriptures and with the Catholick Church and that all Ordinances administer'd by such as are under the guilt of this piece of Schism are null you conclude from the Notion you have conceiv'd of Catholick Vnity which new-found Notion of yours you strongly fancy is grounded on the Scriptures you have before quoted i. e. as you understand and apply them to the
of the Creation doth do them as long as that wherein the vital Substance of Religion consists is preserv'd You having prov'd that a causeless Separation from the Church is highly Schismatical wherein we do not oppose you in the Theorie but in the Application of your Doctrin in which you all along beg the Question you tell us That for Separatists to set up opposite Churches and Officers is a degree of Sin much worse than Separation it self And we will say as you do when once you have prov'd the Separation to be Causeless But till then we hope your Christian Charity will allow us to provide for our own Souls that we may not be as Sheep without a Shepherd when we are either unjustly cast out by you or most justly separated from you And if you will not allow us this we will bless God and thank our more merciful Governours that do allow us without your Leave so to do Lastly You proceed to a yet higher Degree of Schism viz. When they that are engag'd in it constitute Officers without Authority or take to themselves Pastors that have no lawful Mission or real Ordination This is another of your orthodox Hypotheses which it is a thousand Pities that it should be dishonour'd by a Miss-application Sir We are as little for Uncommissionated Preachers and Self-intruders into the ministerial Office as You. Tho' bare Mission without Ministerial Qualification make but an Idol-Shepherd and wherein the Church of England is more deeply concern'd than perhaps you are willing to own yet Qualification without a rightly deriv'd Comission makes but a Thief or a Robber So that herein You and We agree in Thesi But when on this Head you apply to Us and to our Ministers that tragical Story of Korah and his Complices we cannot take it so kindly of you tho' you are not the first Man that in great Wrath hath thrown this heavy Stone at our Heads however we have not been hitherto hurt by it The History of the Case we need not repeat the Principles by which they were acted notwithstanding their popular Pretensions were Seditious and sacrilegiously Rebellious and the Judgment of God on them and their Followers as Just as it was Dreadful But before your Charity had apply'd this dismal Story and Guilt to Us and to our Teachers you ought to have drawn a true Parallel of the Case and have pro'd that our Ministers have no more Call nor Right to the Gospel-Ministry than Korah and his Company had to the Priesthood and that God hath set as strict Bounds about your English Episcopacy as it is now Established exclusively of all others as he then had done about Moses and the Aaronical Priesthood And till this be done there is no Man of sober Thought but must suspend his Judgment on us Out of this Preamble you lead us to your third Section where you tell us You are now come to our Case for indeed we think you have hitherto been far enough from it here then we hope for a fair Trial may we but be determin'd by what is written in that Book out of which both You and We must shortly be judged And in Order to our Conviction you are pleas'd to mind us how nearly it concerns us to enquire I. Whether we have not contracted the guilt of Schism in our Separation from the Church of England II. Whether we have not increased this Guilt by setting up opposite Churches and Officers or joyning with them III. Whether our Pastors have any just Title to the Ministry Sir Had we not to the best of our Power and Skill with the greatest Diligence and Sincerity enquir'd into all these Things long before this Day we had acted very precipitantly and dangerously but yet such an Admonition as this however design'd shall never be out of Season with us But seeing you offer your Interrogatories not in the form of an Enquiry but of an Indictment we are ready to answer to each Article in our just Defence 1. The first Article of our Indictments runs thus That we have contracted the Guilt of Schism by our Separation from the Church of England that is to wave all Disputes about the Ambiguity of the Word what you are pleas'd to call the Church of England Tho' we have varied your Form of Speech we have done you no wrong it being a known Rule in Rhetorick that a Negative Interrogation is but a more vehement Affirmation And to convict us of the Schism you charge us with you plead thus Was your Communion with it lately Lawful and have any new Terms been added to make it cease to be so Or was Conformity then a Duty and is it now become a Sin This you take to be a Dead Blow which must needs convince us and make us cry Guilty or stop our Mouths for ever But be not too Consident before you have heard our Defence 1. By way of Concession you shall have all that you here suppose that you may see we are not froward 1. That we once thought our Communion with your Church of England Lawful we grant for had we not been so perswaded we had been self-condemn'd by our own Practice Yet whatever our private Thoughts were once of it that was not it that could make the thing to be in it self either Lawful or Unlawful our private Judgment being only a Rule to our selves And if we were therein mistaken thro' our Weakness or any Prejudices of our Education we hope you will allow us the Liberty of rectifying our Judgments upon better Information of which if you think us uncapable what do all your Arguings with us signify But 2. We will grant you yet a little more that we are still of the same Opinion that it is Lawful to Communicate with the Church of England i. e. that it is not absolutely and in it self Sinful so to do But then we hope that if your Charity will not your Logick must grant us that what is to be consider'd but as simply Lawful is Matter of Liberty and not of Necessity We say Liberty granted us by the Nature of the Thing without any Relation to what the Government hath pleas'd so much to your regret to grant us But where we are thus at Liberty to Censure us for using it is Inhumanity 3. If this be not yet enough to please you we will grant a little more we once thought the Conformity you contend for i. e. our Lay-Conformity to be our Duty nor have we repented of these our Thoughts to this Day nor acted any thing that is inconsistent with them We hope the Ingenuity of your cultivated Reason will allow at least in Thesi that what is a Duty at one Time and under some Circumstances is not always so at another Time and under other Circumstances This you must grant or you know with what a Crowd of senseless Absurdities you will be pester'd and of which you will not be able to rid your self Now having
to Preach Christ here so near to your Noses wherein you make your self a Judge of evil Thoughts 4. By your implicit complaint how much they exercise your Patience and Self-denial as those of old did Paul's Yet would you but lay aside your own Envy and Prejudices you might on much more comfortable Grounds conclude as the Apostle there doth that this their Preaching would be to your Advantage and Beneficial both to the Church and to your selves too V. The next Argument that you can afford us is this That we are only returned to those whom we had forsaken before and that we might do this since we had the Indulgence or the Liberty granted to us by the Law Before we meddle with this Argument let us turn it into Form after its Fellows and see how it will look then and who they are that will own it But in Syllogism it makes this Figure For a People to return to those Ministers whom they had forsaken before when they have Liberty granted them by the Law so to do is no Schism But we have now Liberty granted us to return to those Ministers whom we had forsaken before Erg. Sir It would look very ingeniously if you would now at last please to tell us from what Author of Ours you took this Topping Argugument which perhaps you think and would have others to think is one of the best we have to defend our selves with The truth is were it not for the Law that protects Us we should be badly able to defend our selves against Church-violence and doubtless there are Summer-flies enough among Us whose Devotion depends on this Liberty which the Law hath given us But had we not better Reasons to justifie our Cause against your Argumentations we should think our selves in an ill Case 'T is hardly worth our labour to follow you in all that you harrangue on this Head You say If our Separation was Sinful before we Conform'd our return to it must be Sinful And we think so too For the Law hath not alter'd the Case as to the Nature of the thing Wherefore your first Enquiry upon it is very pertinent viz. Whether our Separation before we Conformed were Sinful But instead of Enquiring you take it for granted that it was so and say 't is clear from what went before i. e. from your notion of Catholick Unity which we have examin'd and think that by this time you have little Reason to Glory in it But if this prove to be no clear evidence against us then it is not yet clear that our Separation from you is Causeless and therefore Sinful and Schismatical And we hope we have already said enough to destroy that Infant-notion of Catholick Unity in your Sense if we may but obtain an unbyassed Judgment upon it Neither do we need that Objection you here make for us That many of us were never Members of the Church of England and therefore no Deserters of it We commend you that you will be careful to raise no Objections but what you think you can Answer But you must first better prove that our Separation is Causeless and then we shall think our selves concerned to take notice of what you say Sir We are ashamed to hear a Protestant pleading so like a Papist for a Priestly Succession concluding that the Office of the Gospel-Ministry is utterly extinct without your Episcopal Ordination Had not this Antiscriptural Uncharitable Church destroying Pretension been so long ago baffled and therefore deserted by the Wisest and most Learned of your own Communion as well as by the Judgment of all Foreign Protestant Divines we should not have wondered so much at you Wherefore we shall not now Rem toties actam agere but leave you first to answer what hath been by so many and with so convincing Evidence written on this subject whose Names we need not mention to one that is so well acquainted with Books as you are In the mâ—an time we cannot but make a very particular Observation on the Ebullition of your Gall against the Liberty we now enjoy by the Benefit of the Law 't is well for us that this was not granted us as once by a Dispencing Power to which the late Reigns pretended but by a Better-design'd and Well advised Act of King and Parliament For to give us here a Taste of the Volatility of your Spirit of Charity you are bold to suggest that We are not the Persons that come within the intent of that Act and therefore can justly expect no savour from it because you say that Act was only design'd to give ease to Tender Consciences but ours are not of that number because not of the same Latitude with yours Oh how do your Fingers itch to be at your old Work with us again What a grief of Heart is the Indulgence which our Governours have so Graciously and so Necessarily granted us How fain would you cut us off from the Protection of the Laws under which we live as Loyally and Obediently as any of your selves And all because we have forsaken your Ceremonies and desire to Worship God in a way more agreeable to the Scripture Simplicity of the Gospel and more experimentally conducive to the Spiritual Good and Eternal Happiness of our own Souls We see by this that Paul was never in greater danger at Jerusalem on the account of his Nonconformity than We should be of You should the Government but once more let you loose upon Us. But that We are none of the Tender Consciences that come within the intent of the Act you pretend to prove by our former Conforming to you and Communion with you wherein you presume that we were then satisfied and thought it lawful Ay Sir we once thought it lawful i. e. not absolutely or in it self Sinful when we either knew no better or could get no better and we are of the same Mind still as we have once already told you and to which to avoid repetition we would referr you having for illustration of the Case first given you this Familiar Similitude 2 Kings 6.25 There was a time in Samaria when an Asse's Head was sold for Fourscore Pieces of Silver and the fourth part of a Cab of Dove's Dung for Five Pieces of Silver There was nothing so Ceremonially or Naturally unclean but was Hungrily fed upon and not one questioned the Lawfulness of it so that there were no Murder in the Case To the Hungry Soul every bitter thing was sweet But when the Siege was broken up and the Gates were opened and a Plenty of all Good Food was come should the Princes have Monopoliz'd it and by a severe Edict interdicted the free use of it and confin'd the People to the use of such things for kind and measure as they had found in their extremity would pass down with them and was just enough to keep Soul and Body together and condemn all such to Fines or Prisons or Banishment that should dare
though never so peaceably and temperately to make use of the Plenty that God had given them would not your Charity think this to be a little hard And truly while we think our Souls so much better and nearer to us than our Bodies we cannot take it very kindly to be so dealt with by You. Lastly To take your fair leave of this Argument you tell us that you are far from derogating from the Authority of Secular Princes But we must tell you that you are not so far as would better become you from reflecting on the Wisdom and Justice of those that are in Supream Authority over you and by whose distinguishing Favour it is that you enjoy your Ecclesiastical Preferments and We our Christian Liberty of Conscience and Immunity from the rigour of Penal Laws VI. You have now brought us to what you Call our Sixth Argument and that you may shew how bountiful you can be and how willing to make the most of what we have to say for our selves you have subtilly divided this One for us into Three The Bulk of the Argument we perceive lies thus That the way of the Separation is preferable to that of the Church i. e. Of the Church of England Erg. We Answer that to chuse that which is the more excellent and having now Liberty given us so to do we hope is no Schism at least in our Case And to suffult our Major you have found out for us Three other Subservient Arguments which yet you say are cut off by the Sinfulness of our Separation So that it seems your Goodness never intended they should do us any real Service And thus you could have found it in your Heart to have dismised them without farther Consideration But because you apprehend there is some stress laid upon 'em and to make your Triumph the greater You thought fit to bring them under a distinct Examination wherein we shall follow you with a very obsequious diligence 1. It hath been said that in the way of Separation we enjoy purer Ordinances Ordinances that are freer from Ceremony and the addition of things not commanded that set us at a greater distance from Popery c. But to rid your self of this way of Arguing you endeavour to smother it under a Heap of Absurdities which they fall into who would exclude from Religion all things not commanded and who make the greatest distance from the Church of Rome from which you seem Jealous of being drawn too far the Standard of the best Reformation And then you make us a long Quotation of the gross Absurdities of those Men whom you call the more Rigid Separatists out of Baylie's Disswasive and Paget's Arrow against Separation wherein we are not concerned unless it be as you well advise to caution us against the like wild Extravagancies This we take kindly enough from you and that we may not lye long in your Debt in this kind we think it as seasonable to desire you to consider by what Means and Degrees the Church of Rome arriv'd to its 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Superstition and Idolatry Whether some such few uncommanded Ceremonies which you so zealously retain and unwarrantably impose were not the first Nest-Eggs to which all the rest were laid Whether they are not now as productive of more as ever they were when an occasion shall offer and whether there are not enough now in England that do expect it and have prepared their Nests for it Whether your few Ceremonies have not the same relation and subservient tendency to the grosser Superstition and Idolatries of Rome as the High Places of the Jews which some of their Reforming Kings through the instigation of their Priests were so loth to let go were of the grosser Idolatries of the Heathen And whether you are not as much concerned to beware of leading your selves and others into the Gulph of the foulest Superstition by an abuse of your Power as we have to beware that others run not out into Extreams by our doing but our Duty You seem to grant us with the generality of your Conformists That there is nothing to be admitted as an Essential part of God's Worship that is not the subject of a Divine Precept But would you not then by an innuendo have us to believe that some Integral Parts may be admitted without any such Precept Which you had need to prove before we can be very forward to believe But then you say indefinitely That External Rites and Circumstances of Worship whether English or Romish Jewish Greek or Barbarian are of another Nature and indeed we think so too but being not forbidden of God expresly or by consequence are not Sinful And herein we should agree too could it but be once agreed what is by consequence forbidden For our parts we are apt to think that the consequence of those first words of the Second Commandment and all those Scriptures of the Old Testament that condemn the using of any thing in God's Worship which He hath not commanded or required That that of Matth. 15.9 and that of the Apostle Colos 2.20 21 22. will go far to condemn all those Rites and Ceremonies us'd in Divine Worship which are of Men's Invention and not necessary ex natura rei whatever their pretended usefulness on the account of their significancy be Besides for the aggravation of our Guilt and our fuller Conviction you would have us to consider how few of these are required of us as Private Men. To which we reply that this brings to our Minds how Lot on a better Principle and to better Purpose once pleaded for Zoar Is it not a little one But whether there be few or many we know no Power you have to require nor any warrant we have to admit of any for he that may require one may on your Principles require ad libitum as many as he will But that it should be impossible to preserve Peace and Order in the Church without a Conformity to these things is owing only to the disorder of your own Spleens and your pertinacious Zeal for them Would you but give every one his Liberty in these things which your selves call indifferent according to the Apostle's Rule Rom. 14. alibi we know not who would disturb the Churches Peace about them You say That in the Primitive Church as many Ceremonies were used as now are required by the Church of England and what if we grant that there were as many and more will you argue from the Primitive Churches using to your Churches requiring and imposing Or do you know which way to prove that their Effects of Charity or Kiss of Peace or the Woman's Vail were of the Apostles Appointment or Institution 'T is true the Apostle argues the Decency of the Woman's being cover'd and of the Man's being uncover'd in the Place and Time of God's solemn Worship 1 Cor. 11. But as for the Matter or Mode of the Covering he hath left this to every
be built by others and this House you say as the word is here to be taken is the Church for which you quote us two pertinent Scriptures in which the Apostle speaks of Edifying of the Church But can you inform us why it is not as proper and as necessary for Temples to be Edified as Churches and whether every individual believer be not call'd the Temple of the Holy Ghost 1 Cor. 6.19 Nay do you not grant us in other words as much as we crave when you say that the Polishing and Perfecting those Living Stones of which the Church is Built is the Edifying of it yea and thus the Church is said to Edifie it self Eph. 4.16 Well then if Edifying be the Word that doth offend you pray strike it out of our Argument and put in Polishing and Perfecting and it will please us all as well And thus we will conclude with you That if we bring new Proselites into the Church i. e. by sound conversion to God and not to a Party to the Church of Christ and not meerly to the Ceremonies and Peculiar External Rites or Forms of this or that Particular Church and confirm those that are in it in advancing any in Knowledge and Piety in Faith and Practice we shall be reckon'd amongst the Builder or Edifiers of the Church And farther to explain what you mean by Edification you tell us there are these two things requir'd in it viz. Unity and Order 1. Unity And here you descant on the Benefits of Union and the Mischiefs of Schism in the words of Clemens Romanus and Mr. Baxter wherein we would not contradict you would you but once better prove that this Union must consist in those controverted things which you impose on us as the indispensible Condition of our Communion with you We are as desirous of Church-Union as You and are sensible how much it would conduce both to the Ornament Establishment and Enlargement of the Church but if it be your Tyrannical Impositions and your delivering up the Care of our Souls to such as have no Care of Ours nor of their Own that hath made and doth keep open the Breach between us let the World Judge who are the Schismaticks 2. As for Order you tell us not what you mean more than what we can pick out of Eph. 2.21 and Ch. 4.16 which Scriptures we own but can't learn from any thing that is Written there that our Dissent from such Impositions as yours and refusing to do what you would have us to do is a breach of Order If we stand not in those Ranks and Files of Military Order as once we stood if you see our Seats forsaken in your Churches and at your Communion-Tables you must blame your selves as the only Causes of this Disorder II. You next Enquire What we understand by Edification and whether we rightly judge how it is best promoted And here we are also concern'd to Enquire how rightly we are judg'd by you when you say That we take that to be Edifying that raises in us some Sensible Devotions that excites in us some Religious Affections such as Love Joy Fear or the like And these you suppose we have chiefly in view when we preferr the Service in our Meetimgs before that of the Churches The truth is that which is not proper to raise our Devotion in Religious Duties and to excite Holy Affections in us we cannot think to be very Edifying We know not how in this our compound state to exercise the Spiritual Graces of Faith Repentance Love Fear Humility Joy Delight in God c. but by the help of those Rational and Intellectual Faculties of Understanding Will and Affections which God hath given us If you understand the more Raptural Mysteries of Quietism a more Stoical or Seraphick way of contemplation without concerning those Grosser Spirits in so Divine an Exercise we will not envy your Attainment but for our parts we can't be satisfied that our Hearts are concern'd in Religious Duties as they ought to be unless we are sensible that they are so But to come to Particulars you instance in the two great ordinances of Praying and Preaching 1. You begin with the way of Praying us'd in our Meetings and here again you make your self a Judge of Evil Thoughts and that in such a Case wherein you are in Danger of Blaspheming the Holy Spirit of God For if it be by the Spirit of Supplication which makeh Intercession in the Saints that we are taught both what and how to Pray it concerns you to take heed how you approbiously oppose your Cant against our Common Experience of its assistance herein The Old and Often-repeated Harrangue by which you and others of your Way endeavour to exalt your prescribed Forms of Prayer and which hath been so often answered to silence doth but bewray your Inexperience of that way of Praying which the Holy Scriptures direct to and in which all the Saints in all Ages have found their greatest Reliefs How impertinently do you tell us That we are not to think that God is at all wrought upon by the variation of Phrases or the modulation of them No Sir we don't imagine that God is mov'd with Words or Tones or the most Eloquent or Artificial Composures of Matter or Expression whether Prescrib'dor or Unpremeditated Words are for our own sakes not for His yet we have great reason to think that the better the Affections are exercised and the Graces of the Spirit of God in the Heart the better is the Heart prepared and the better grounds it hath to hope to obtain Mercy from him And certainly that way of Praying which we find most conducible to this end we have reason to preferr Nor can any thing that we have ever yet heard incline us to your contrary Opinion That the Gift of Prayer which is in it self but a Common Gift as that of Preaching c. is may be and too often hath been abused by ill Men is what we grant But to censure all for ill Men that use it is unbecoming a Christian and to argue from the Abuse against the Use is too Weak and Absurd for a Man of your Figure and Learning And may we not easily retort as many and as great Abuses of your Way of Praying by Limited and Prescribed Forms had we a Mind to retaliate Those Motions and Efforts of Devotion which without due Caution or Distinction you impute to Natural Causes as you say a little Philosophy would teach us in such as use the Gift of Prayer are censured by you but one degree short of what the Spirit of God in our Saviour Christ was censured by those that attributed the Power by which he wrought his Miracles to a Diabolical Cause Matth. 12.24 c. which you will do well to read and spend some Second Thoughts upon But to moderare the matter you are pleased to grant that the Gift of Elocution which you seem to take for the whole of the
have all the same External Form or manner of Operation in the Service of the Body Order is to be preserv'd in the Church but how shall we agree what and whose Order it shall be Let us ask you soberly Is there no true Church in the World but yours If there be may not every one of these Churches which differ from you and from one another as much as we magnify their own Order as a Law to all the Rest as you now do And then tell us whether it be Order or Confusion that these Positions lead to or whether this be not the way to set all the Christian World by the Ears Here you complain that Men are generally averse from enduring any thing of Subjection to which we may add and altogether as prone to Domineering and Imposing Now the Obedience which is prescrib'd in the Texts of Scripture which you have cited you say is to be paid by the Faithful to those that are over them in the Lord But by the whole tenour of your Discourse you plainly insinuate that the Wisdom which is in effect the same with the Will of those that have obtain'd the Government of the Church must be the Rule to all their Inferiours And by their being over them in the Lord you give us to understand nothing else but their Power de facto in the Church where they sit in Moses's Chair as the Representatives of Christ in Government so that they must be obey'd without asking any Question for Conscience sake But for our parts we understand not how we can be secur'd against the danger of Church-Tyranny and Superstition if those Words of the Apostle 1 Thes 5.12 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Lord do not import the Bounds of our Obedience as well as the general Matter of it and Motive to it Church-Rulers may be forward to Labour and to Admonish too but if it be not in the Lord and according to the Lord woe be to them that are guided and influenc'd by ' em But let the Apostle's Exhortation be taken in the true intent and meaning of it and we will be as forward to obey as you There 's nothing in the World that we covet more than to see such Bishops and Pastors in the Church of England as the Apostle exhorts us to obey in the Lord that is without any personal Reflection such as require nothing of us but what the Lord requires that the World might see how much we would disdain to be out-done by any but Flatterers and Sycophants in our Love and Obedience to ' em What you say of the Oneness of Church-Government and of the People that are under it we agree to if you will but stand to your own Distinctions That what you say of both is to be understood of them so far as they agree to Christ's Institution And if Christ be not divided neither are they They are not divided I mean so far as they act according to his Will and the Rules of their Order If by these Rules you mean the Sacred Rules which Christ hath given them and not the Arbritary Rules which they give us We mean so too That the faithful People under their lawful Pastors we hope you mean Lawful by the Law of Christ and not only by the Law of Man make up one Body This you say is evident from their Duty and from their Rights From their Duty you plead 1. They are oblig'd to Honour and Obey their Spiritual Rulers Ay Sir In the Lord and according to the Lord. 2. It is their Duty to joyn together in publick Acts of Worship with that Company of Christians which they sind Established and in some Cases tho' only tollerated yea tho' Persecuted under a lawful Pastor where they reside This we acknowledge is their Duty where they may do it without Sin From their Rights which are the same every where you Argue That this Vnion is founded on a Divine Institution and the Baptismal Covenant in which they are all alike engag'd and not on a formal positive League amongst themselves No Sir nor on any thing that is merely Humane or of an Indifferent much less a doubtful Nature wherein the Substance or Essentials of Christianity do not consist What you object against the Independent Congregational way or any others of the same Practice and Persuasion in this Point we take not our selves to be concern'd in unless you mistake us all for such who have not that Dependance on and Communion with you which you are Quarrelling with us for Having been at great Labour to prove what none of Us nor perhaps any one else that is call'd Christian ever deny'd viz. That the universal Church is One Body you make your Application of this profound Doctrin by way of Encouragement to your selves and draw a most delightful Contemplation from it That it is now the same Body that it was from the beginning The same indeed is every true Church of Christ as it was from the beginning that is in all things that are absolutely necessary to Salvation but we would gladly understand where that pure Church is now to be found which hath not at all deviated or degenerated from what the Church of Christ was in the beginning 'T is true every true Church of Christ now in the World is deriv'd by Succession from Christ and his Apostles but dares the Church of England say that it is now the very same in all it's Circumstantials and external Modes and Forms of Worship Discipline and Ceremonies with those of the Apostles own Planting Where do you read your apostolical Rules or Precedents for any of those Things which you so zealously Practise and so arbitrarily impose on us as the Terms of our Communion with you and which are the only Matters in debate between us Yet you would have the World believe that without our full Conformity to these Things and our Communion with you in 'em we cannot be one Body with the Vniversal Church nor in Communion with the Apostles Nor is this all but that consequently we are out of Communion with the Father and the Son and so are in a state of Infidelity and Damnation Have we not herein a special Instance and Evidence of your Catholick Charity just like theirs of the Church of Rome who call those only Christians that are of their own Communion Let us be ever so Orthodox in all the Articles of the Christian Faith ever so right as to the Object of our Religious Worship or Reverent and Devout in the Acts of it ever so Sober Just and Righteous in our Conversation or ever so wiling to walk in Communion with you as far as we may do it without Sinning against God and our own Souls Yet for want of Conformity to you in all those unnecessary Things which you would impose on us we must be cut off from Christ and left to Perish with the Heathen World But if we will tamely put our Necks under your