worst of all and I like the businesse the better that what he understands least that he likes worst it is that Christ hath given no direction for any duty of worship meerly and purely of soveraign institution but only to them and by them who are so joined Hereupon he askes 1. is Baptisme a a part of worship A yes and to be so performed by them that is a Minister in or of them I fear my expression in this place lead him to his whole mistake in this matter 2. prayer and reading of the word in private families are they no duty of worship An Not meerly and purely of soveraign institution 3. Is preaching to convert heathens a duty of worship not as described in all cases when it is it is to be performed by a minister and so he knowes my answer to his next invidious inquiry relating to my own person Against my fourth Reason taken from the Apostles care to leave none out of this order who were converted where it was possible he gives in the instance of the Eunuch and others converted where there were not enough to ingage in such societies that is in them with whom it was impossible my fift is from Christ's providing of officers for these Churches This also he saith is weak as the rest for first Christ provided officers at first for the Catholick Church that is the Apostles 2. all ordinary officers are set first in the Catholicke Church and every minister is first a minister to the Catholick Church and if saith he he deny this he knowes where to find a learned Antagonist A. But see what it is to have a mind to dispute will he deny that Christ appointed officers for particular Churches or if he should have a mind to do it will his arguments evince any such thing Christ appointed Apostles Catholick officers therefore he did not appoint officers for particular Churches though he commanded that elders should be ordained in every Church Pastors and teachers are set first in the Catholick church therefore Christ hath not ordained officers for particular Churches But this is the way with our Author if any word offers it selfe whence it is possible to draw out the mention of any thing that is or hath at any time been in difference between Presbiterians and Independents that presently is run away withall for my part I had not the least thought of the controversie which to no purpose at all he would here lead me to but yet I must tell him that my judgment is that ordinary officers are firstly to be ordained in particular churches and as I know where to find a learned Antagonist as to that particular so I do in respect of every thing that I affirme or deny in the businesse of Religion and yet I blesse the Lord I am not in the least disquieted or shaken in my adherence to the truth I professe My last reason he saith is fallacious and inconsequent and that because he hath put an inference upon it never intended in it Now the position that these reasons were produced to confirm being true and so acknowledged by himselfe because it is a truth that indeed I lay some more then ordinary weight upon it being of great use in the daies wherein we live I would humbly intreat this Reverend Author to send me his reasons whereby it may be confirmed and I shall promise him if they be found of more validity then those which according to my best skill I have allready used he shall obtain many thanks and much respect for his favour What he remarks upon or adds to my next discourse about instituted worship in generall I shall not need to insist on onely by the way I cannot but take notice of that which he calls a chiefe piece of Independencie and that is that those who are joined in church fellowship are so confined that they cannot or may not worship God in the same ordinances in other churches how this comes to be a cheife peice of Independency I know not It is contrary to the known practise of all the churches of England that I am acquainted with which he calls Independents For my part I know but one man of that mind and he is no child in these things For the ensuing discourse about the intercision of ordinances it being a matter of great importance and inquired into by me meerly in reference to the Roman Apostacy it needs a more serious disquisition then any thing at present administred by our Author will give occasion unto possibly in convenient time I may offer somewhat farther towards the investigation of the mind of God therein every thing in this present contest is so warped to the petty difference between Presbyterians and Independents that no faire progresse nor opportunity for it can be afforded If it may be in my next debate of it I shall wave al mentiō of those meaner differences as I remember I have not insisted on them in what I have allready proposed to this purpose so possibly the next time I may utterly escape For the present I do not doubt but the spirit of God in the Scripture is furnished with sufficient authority to erect new churches and set up the celebration of all ordinances on supposition that there was an intercision of them To declare the way of his exerting his Authority to this purpose with the obviating of all objections to the contrary is not a matter to be tossed up and down in this scambling chase and I am not a litle unhappy that this Reverend Person was in the dark to my designe and aime all along which hath intangled this dispute with so many impertinences But however I shall answer a question which he is pleased to put to me in particular he askes me then whither I do not think in my conscience that there were no true churches in England untill the Brownists our fathers the Anabaptists our elder brothers and our selves arose and gathered new Churches With thanks for the civility of the inquiry in the manner of its expression I answer no! I have no such thoughts and his pretence of my insinuation of any such thing is most vaine as also is his insultation thereupon truly if men will in all things take liberty to speak what they please they have no reason but to think that they may at one time or other heare that which will displease Having investigated the nature of a particular Church I proceed in my treatise of Schisme to inquire after the union of it wherein it doth consist and what is the breach thereof The summe is the joint consent of the members to walke together in celebration of the same numericall ordinances according to the mind of Jesus Christ is that wherein the union of such a Church doth consist This is variously excepted against and I know not what disputes about an implicit and explicit covenant of Specificating forms of the practise of new and old England of Admission
world of my thoughts herein in my book of Schisme I now informe him again that all thes surmises are fond untrue And truly for his own sake with that respect which is due to the reputation of Religion I here humbly intreate him not to entertain what is here affirm'd with un-Christian surmizes which the Apostle reckons amongst the works of the flesh as though I were of another mind but durst not declare it as more then onâ—â— in some particulars he insinuates the state of things with me to be But blessed be the God of my salvation and of all my deliverances I have yet liberty to declare the whole of my judgment in and about the things of his worship Blessed be God it is not as yet in the power of some men to bring in that their conceited happiness into England which would in their thoughts accrew unto it by my removall from my native soyle with all others of my judgment and perswasion We are yet at peace and we trust that the Lord will deliver us from the hands of men whose tender mercies are cruell However be it known unto them that if it be the will of the Lord upon our manifold provocations to give us up to their disposall who are pleased to compasse us with the ornaments of reproaches before mentioned that so we might fall as a sacrifice to rage or violence we shall through his assistance and presence with us dare to professe the whole of that truth and those waies of his which he hath been pleased to reveaâ— unto us And if on any other account this Reverend person suppose I may foster opinions and thoughts of mine owne and their waies which I dare not owne let him at any time give me a command to waite upon him and as I will freely and candidly answer to any enquiries he shall be pleased to make after my judgment and apprehensions of these things so he shall find that God assisting I dare owne and will be ready to maintaine what I shall so deliver to him It is a sufficient evidence that this reverend Author is an utter stranger to me or he would scarce entertaine such surmizes of me as he doth Shall I call in witnesses as to the particular under consideration one evidence by way of instance lies so neare at hand that I cannot omit the producing of it not above 14 daies before this treatise came to my hands a learned Gentleman whom I had prevailed withall to answer in the Vespers of our Act sent me his Questions by a Doctor of the Presbyterian judgment a friend of his and mine The first Question was as I remember to this purpose UtruÌ„ ministri Ecclesiae Anglicanae habeant validam ordinationem I told the Doctor that since the Questions were to passe under my approbation I must needs confesse my selfe scrupled at the limitation of the subject of the Question in that terme Ecclesia Anglicana which would be found ambiguous and aequivocall in the disputation and therefore desired that he would rather supply it with Ecclesiarum reformatarum or some other expression of like importance but as to the thing it selfe aimed at namely the assertion of the ministry of the Godly ministers in England I told him and so now do the Reverend Author of this treatise that I shall as willingly ingage in the defence of it with the lawfulnesse of their Churches as any man what ever I have only in my treatise questioned the institution of a nationall Church which this Author doth not undertake to maintaine nor indeed hath the least reason so to do for the asserting of true ministers and Churches in England I meane those of the Presbyterian way What satisfaction now this Reverend Author shall judge it necessary for him to give me for the publicke injury which voluntarily he hath done me in particular for his attempt to expose me to the censure and displeasure of so many godly ministers and Churches as I owne in England as a person denying their ministry and Church station I leave it to himselfe to consider And by the declaration of this mistake how great a part of his book is waved as to my concernments therein himsefe full well knows A second principle of like importance which he is pleased to make use of as a thing granted by me or at least which he assumes as that which ought so to be is that what ever the Presbyterian ministers and Churches be I have separated from them as have done all those whom he calls Independants This is another fountaine out of which much bitter water flows Hence we must needs be thought to condemne their ministry and Churches The Brownists were our fathers and the Anabaptists are our elder Brothers we make an harlot of our mother and are Schismaticks and Sectaries from one end of the book to the other Quod erat demonstrandum But doth not this Reverend Author know that this is wholly denyed by us Is it not disproved sufficiently in that very Treatise which he undertakes to answer He grants I suppose that the separation he blames must respect some union of Christs institution for any other we professe our selves unconcerned in its maintenance or dissolution as to the businesse in hand Now wherein have we separated from them as to the breach of any such union For an individuall person to change from the constant participation of ordinances in one congregation to do so in another barely considered in its selfe this Reverend Author holds to be no separation However for my part who am forced to beare all this wrath and storme what hath he to lay to my charge I condemne not their Churches in generall to be no Churches nor any one that I am acquainted withall in particular I never disturb'd that I know of the peace of any one of them nor separated from them but having already received my punishment I expect to heare my crime by the next returne 3. He supposeth throughout that I deny not only the necessity of a successive ordination but as farre as I can understand him the lawfulnesse of it also By ordination of Ministers many upon a mistake understand onely the imposition of hands that is used therein Ordination of Ministers is one thing and imposition of hands another differing as whole and part Ordination in Scripture compriseth the whole Authoritative translation of a man from among the number of his brethren into the state of an officer in the Church I suppose he doth not thinke that this is denied by mee though he tels me with the same Christian candor and tendernesse which he exerciseth in every passage almost of his booke of making my selfe a Minister and I know not what I am I blesse the Lord extreamly remote from returning him any of his own coyne in satisfaction for this Love For that part of it which consists in the imposition of hands by the Presbytery where it may be obtained according to the mind of Christ
I am also very remote from mannaging any opposition unto it I thinke it necessary by vertue of precept and that to be continued in a way of succession It is I say according to the mind of Christ that he who is to be ordained unto office in any Church receive imposition of hands from the Elders of that Church if there be any therein And this is to be done in a way of succession that so the Churches may be perpetuated That alone which I oppose is the denying of this successive ordination through the Authority of Antichrist Before the blessed and glorious Reformation begun â—nd carried on by Zuinglius Luther Calvin and others there were and had been two States of men in the world professing the name of Christ and the Gospell as to the outward profession thereof The one of them in glory splendor outward beauty and order calling themselves the Church the only Church in the world the Catholike Church being indeed and in truth in that state wherein they so prided themselves the mother of harlots the beast with his false Prophet The other party poore despised persecuted generally esteemed and called Hereticks Schismaticks or as occasion gave advantage for their farther reproach Waldenses Albigenses Lollards and the like As to the claime of a successive ordination down from the Apostles I made bold to affirme that I could not understand the validity of that successive ordination as successive which was derived downe unto us from and by the first partie of men in the world This Reverend Authors reply hereunto is like the rest of his discourse pag. 118. He tels me this casts dirt in the face of their Ministry as do all their good friends the Sectaries and that he hath much a doe to forbeare saying The Lord rebuke thee How he doth forbeare it having so expressed the frame of his heart towards me others will judge the searcher of all hearts knowes that I had no designe to cast dirt on him or any other godly man's ministry in England Might not another answer have been returned without this wrath This is so or it is not so in reference to the ministry of this Nation If it be not so and they plead not their successive ordination from Rome there is an end of this difference If it be so can Mr. C. hardly refraine from calling a man Sathan for speaking the truth It is well if we know of what spirit we are But let us a little farther consider his answer in that place He asketh first Why may not this be a sufficient foundation for their Ministry as well as for their Baptisme if it be so be so acknowledged whence is that great provocation that arose from my enquiry after it For my part I must tell him that I judge their Baptisme good and valid but to deale clearly with him not on that foundation I cannot believe that that Idolater murtherer man of sin had since the dayes of his open Idolatry persecution and enmity to Christ any authority more or lesse from the Lord Jesus committed to him in or over his Churches But he addes secondly That had they received their ordination from the woman flying into the wildernesse the two witnesses or Waldenses it had been all one to mee and my party for they had not their ordination from the people except some extraordinary cases but from a Presbytery according to the institution of Christ So then ordination by a Presbytery Is it seemes opposed by me and my party but I pray Sir who told you so when wherein by what meanes have I opposed it I acknowledge my selfe of no party I am sory so grave a Minister should suffer himselfe to be thus transported that every answer every reply must be a reflection and that without due observation of truth and love That-those first reformers had their Ordination from the people is acknowledged I have formerly evinced it by undeniable testimony So that the proper succession of a Ministry amongst the Churches that are their off-spring runs up no higher than that rise Now the good Lord blesse them in their Ministry and the successive ordination they enjoy to bring forth more fruit in the earth to the praise of his glorious grace But upon my disclaiming all thoughts of rejecting the ministry of all those who yet hold their ordination on the accompt of its successive derivation from Rome he cries out egregiam verò laudem and saies that yet I secretly derive their pedigree from Rome well then he doth not so why then what need these exclamations we are as to this matter wholly agreed nor shall I at present farther pursue his discourse in that place it is almost totally composed and made up of scornefull revilings reflections and such other ingredients of the whole He frequently very positively affirms without the least hesitation that I have renounced my own ordination adds hereunto that what ever else they pretend unlesse they renounce their ordination nothing will please me that I condemn all other Churches in the world as no Churches but who I pray told him these things did he enquire so far after my mind in them as without breach of charity to be able to make such positive and expresse assertions concerning them A good part of his book is taken up in the repetition of such things as these drawing inferences and conclusions from the suppositions of them and warming himselfe by them into a great contempt of my selfe and party as he calls them I am now necessitated to tell him that all these things are false and utterly in part and in whole untrue and that he is not able to prove any one of them And whether this kind of dealing becomes a minister of the Gospell a person professing Godlinesse I leave it to himselfe to judge For my owne part I must confesse that as yet I was never so dealt withall by any man of what party soever although it hath been my unhappinesse to provoke many of them I do not doubt but that he will be both troubled and ashamed when he shall review these things That whole Chapter which he entitles Independentisme is Donatisme as to his application of it unto me or any of my perswasion is of the same importance as I have sufficiently already evinced I might instance in sundry other particulars wherein he ventures without the least check or supposition to charge me with what he pleaseth that may serve the turn in hand so that it may serve to bring in he and his party are Schismaticks are Sectaries have separated from the church of God are the cause of all our evills and troubles with the like tearmes of reproach and hard censures lying in a faire subserviency to a designe of widening the difference between us and mutually exasperating the spirits of men professing the Gospell of Jesus Christ one against another nothing almost comes amisse His sticking upon by matters diverting from the maine
he will yet proceed and Sec. 13. informe his Reader that in that Treatise I aver that two things are required in a teacher as to formall ministeriall teaching 1. Gifts from God 2 Authority frō the Church well what then I am of the same mind still but now I cry down ordination by Presbytery what is not this a great alteration and signe of inconstancy Truly Sir there is more need of humiliation in your selfe then triumphing against me for the assertion is most untrue and your charge altogether groundlesse which I desire you would be satisfied in and not to be led any more by evill surmises to wrong mee and your owne soule He addes sect. 14. two cautions which in that treatise I give to private Christians in the exercise of their gifts and closeth the last of them with a Juvenile Epiphonema divinely spoken and like a true Presbyterian and yet there is not one word in either of these cautions that I do not still own and allow which confirmes the unhappinesse of the charge Of all that is substantiall in any thing that followes I affirme the same as to all that which is gone before Onely as to the liberty to be allowed unto them which meet in private who cannot in conscience joyne in the Celebration of publike ordinances as they are performed amongst us I confesse my selfe to be otherwise minded at present than the words there quoted by this Author do expresse But this is nothing to the difference between Presbytery and independency and he that can glory that in 14. yeares he hath not altered or improved in his conception of some things of no greater importance then that mentioned shall not have me for his rivall And this is the summe of M◠C. Appendix the discourse whereof being carried on with such a temper of spirit as it is and suited to the advantage aimed at by so many evill surmises false suggestions and uncharitable reflections I am perswaded the taking of that paines will one day be no joy of heart unto him CHAP. 3. A Review of the chargers Preface HIs first chapter consists for the most part in a repetition of my words or so much of the discourse of my first Chapter as he could wrest by cutting off one and another parcell of it from its coherence in the whole with the interposure of glosses of his own to serve him to make biting reflexions upōthem with whom he hath to deale How unbecoming such a course of procedure is for a person of his worth gravity and profession perhaps his {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} have by this time convinced him If men have a mind to perpetuate controversies unto an endlesse fruitlesse reciprocation of words and cavils if to provoke to easie and facile retorsions if to heighten and aggravate differences beyond any hope of reconciliation they may do wel to deale after this manner with the writings of one another Mr. C. knowes how easie it were to make his owne words dresse him up in all those ornaments wherein he labours to make me appeare in the world by such glosses inversions additions and interpositions as he is pleased to make use of but meliora speramus Some particulars that seem to be of any importance to our businesse in hand may be remarked as we passe through it pag. 1. He tels us the Donatists had two principles 1. that they were the onely Church of Christ in a corner of Africk and left no Church in the world but their owne 2. That none were truly baptized or entred members of the Church of Christ but by some Minister of their party These Principles he saies are againe improved by men of another party whom though yet he name not yet it is evident whom he intends and pag 3. he requires my judgement of those principles Because I would not willingly be wanting in any thing that may tend to his satisfaction though I have some reason to conjecture at my unhappinesse in respect of the event I shall with all integrity give him my thoughts of the principles expresséd above 1. Then if they were considered in reference to the Donatists who owned them I say they were wicked corrupt erroneous principles tending to the disturbance of the communion of Saints and everting all the rules of love that our Lord Jesus Christ hath given to his disciples and servants to observe if he intend my judgment of them in reference to the Churches of England which he calls independent I am sorry that he should thinke he hath any reason to make this inquiry I know not that man in the world who is lesse concerned in obteining Countenance to those principles then I am Let them who are so ready on all occasions or provocations to cast abroad the solemne formes of reproach Schismaticks Sectaries Hereticks and the like search their owne hearts as to a conformity of spirit unto these principles It is not what men say but what men doe that they shall be judged by As the Donatists were not the first who in story were charged with Schisme no more was their Schisme confined to Africk The agreement of multitudes in any principles makes it in its selfe not one whit better and in effect worse For my part I acknowledge the Churches in England Scotland and France Helvetia the netherlands Germany Greece Muscovia c. as far as I know of them to be true Churches such for ought I know may be in Italy or Spaine and what pretence or colour this Reverend person hath to fix a contrary perswasion upon me with so many odious imputations and reflections of being one of the Restorers of all lost Churches and the like I professe I know not These things will not be peace in the latter end shall the sword devour for ever I dare not suppose that he will aske why then do I separate from them he hath read my booke of Schisme wherein I have undeniably proved that I have separated from none of them and I am loath to say though I feare before the close of my discourse I shall be compelled to it that this Reverend Author hath answered a matter before he understood it confuted a book whose maine and chiefe designe he did not once apprehend The rest of this chapter is composed of reflections upon me from my owne words wrested at his pleasure and added to according to the purpose in hand and the taking for granted unto that end that they are in the right we in the wrong that their Churches are true churches and yet not esteemed so by me that we have separated from those churches with such like easie suppositions He is troubled that I thought the mutuall chargings of each other with Schisme between the Presbyterians and Independents was as to its heat abated and ready to vanish wherein he hath invincibly compelled me to acknowledge my mistake and I assure him I am heartily sorry that I was mistaken it will not be
on the account of separation from the Catholick church let him prove that that church is not made up of the universality of professors of the Gospell throughout the world under the limitations expressed that the union of it as such doth not consist in the profession of the truth and that the breach of that union whereby a man ceases to be a member of that Church is Schismes otherwise to tell me that I am a Sectary a Schismatick to fill up his pages with vaine surmizes and supposalls to talke of a difference and schsme among the members of the catholick church or the like impertinencies will never farther his discourse among men either rationall solid or judicious All that ensues to the end of this chapter is about the ordination of ministers wherein however he hath beē pleased to deal with me in much bitternesse of spirit with many clamours and false Accusations I am glad to find him p. 120. renouncing ordination from the Authority of the church of Rome as such for I am assured that by his so doing he can claime it no waie from by or through Rome for nothing came to us from thence but what came in and by the Authority of that Church CHAP. IX WE are now gathering towards what seems of most immediate concernment as to this Reverend Authors undertaking namely to treate of the nature of a particular church its union and the breach of that union the description I give of such a church is this It is a society of men called by the word to the obedience of the faith in Christ and joint performance of the worship of God in the same individuall ordinances according to the order by him prescribed This I professe to be a generall description of its nature waving all contests about accurate definitions which usually tend very little to the discovery or establishment of truth after some canvassing of this description our Author tells us that he grants it to be the definition of a particular church which is more then I intended it for only he adds that according to this description their churches are as true as ours which I presume by this time he knowes was not the thing in Question His ensuing discourse of the will of Christ that men should joine not all in the same individuall congregation but in this or that is by me wholly assented ūto and the matter of it contended for by me as I am able what he is pleased to adde about explicite covenanting and the like I am not at all for the present concerned in I purposely waved all expressions concerning it one way or other that I might not involve the businesse in hand with any unnecessary contests it is possible somewhat hereafter may be spoken to that subject in a tendency unto the reconciliation of the parties at variance His argument in the close of the Section for a Presbyterian church from Acts 20. 17. because there is mention of more elders then one in that Church and therefore it was not one single congregation I do not understand I think no one single congregation is wholly compleated according to the mind of Christ unlesse there be more elders then one it there should be elders in every Church and for my part so we could once agree practically in the matter of our churches I am under some apprehension that it were no impossible thing to reconcile the whole difference as to a Presbyterian church or a single congregation And though I be reproved a new for my pains I may offer ere long to the candid consideration of godly men something that may provoke others of better abilities and more leasure to endeavour the carrying on of so good a work Proceeding to the consideration of the unity of this church he takes notice of three things laid down by me previously to what I was farther to assert all which he grants to be true but yet will not let them passe without his animadversions The two first are that 1. a man may be a member of the Catholick invisible church and 2 of the visible Catholick church and yet not be joyned to a particular Church These as I said he ownes to be true but askes how I can reconcile this with what I said before namely that the members of the Catholick visible Church are initiated into the profession of the faith by Baptisme but where lies the difference why saith he Baptisme according to his principles is an ordinance of worship only to be enjoyed in a particular Church whilst he will grant what yet he doth denie but will be forced to grant that a minister is a minister to more then his owne church even to the Catholick Church and may administer Baptisme out of a particular church as Phillip did to the Eunuch A. How well this Author is acquainted with my principles hath been already manifested as to his present mistake I shall not complaine seeing that some occasion may be administred unto it from an expression of mine at least as it is printed of which I shall speak afterwards for the present he may be pleased to take notice that I am so far from confining Baptisme subjectively to a particular congregation that I do not believe that any member of a particular church was ever regularly baptized Baptisme precedes admission into Church membership as to a particular Church the subject of it is professing believers and their seed as such they have right unto it whither they be joined to any particular church or no suitable to this judgment hath been my constant and uninterrupted practise I desire also to know who told him that I deny a minister to be a minister to more then his own Church or averred that he may perform ministeriall duty only in and towards the members of his own congregation for so much as men are appointed the objects of the dispensation of the word I grant a man in the dispensation of it to act ministerially towards not only the members of the Catholick church but the visible members of the world also in contradistinction thereunto The third thing laid down by me whereunto also he assentes is that every believer is oblieged to join himselfe to some one of those Churches that there he may abide in Doctrine and fellowship and breaking of bread and prayer but my reasons whereby I prove this he saies he likes not so well and truly I cannot helpe it I have little hope he should like any thing well which is done by me Let him be pleased to furnish me with better and I shall make use of them but yet when he shall attempt so to doe it is odds but that one or other will find as many flawes in them as he pretends to do in mine But this he saith he shall make use of and that he shall make advantage of and I know not what as if he were playing a prize upon a stage The third reason is that which he likes