and Ideots to suspect they have no sense of their duty or to reproach their Sanctions as Tyrannical Superstitious or Antichristian If I must put the best construction the case will bear upon the Actions of my Equal or Inferiour will it become me to make the harshest interpretation of publick Laws and the Actions of my Superiours It was an unhappy slip of a great and worthy person whose name I will conceal for the reverence I bear to his profession and worth when reflecting upon the Statute of the fifth year of Queen Elizabeth concering the Jejunium Cecilianum or the Wednesday-Fast he calls it a Law and no Law a meer contradiction a piece of nonsence That it must bind the Conscience if it be a Law but the Law-makers saith he declare it shall not bind the Conscience and so it is no Law with a great deal more to that purpose Now the words of the Statute are these it is declared penal if any man shall say That this Fast is injoyned upon any necessity for the saving of the Soul or the service of God otherwise than other political Laws be Had that excellent person read and considered these words they would have afforded him no colour for the aforesaid imputation for the Law-makers do not declare that this Law shall not bind the Conscience but the contrary that it shall as other Political Laws do but they take care that the end and reason of the Law may be understood which was not Religious but Political for the maintenance of the Wars I say that clause in the Statute had not the least intention of limiting or declaring the obligation of the Law but only of preventing rumours of superstitious designs in the end and intentions of the Law-makers Nor is there any other the least passage in the Law that gives countenance to the reflections he makes either upon the Law it self or the Law-makers And I note it only for this end that we may observe how much more prone men are to pass censures than to consider to the bottom the true state of the things we pass sentence upon But to let pass that as a meer over-sight it is intolerable to hear the immodest clamours that are raised upon meer mistakes and surmises Men it seems think to recommend themselves as persons both of more than ordinary Sagacity and also of singular purity of Conscience by finding faults of this kind Whereas did they indeed consider either the divine Image born by Magistrates or the great consequence of publick Peace and well weighed how much that depends upon publick reputation and reverence they would certainly choose some other subject to serve those little ends by The Scripture calls the Magistrates Masters of restraint Judges 18. 7. See the Hebrew and as such they must needs be an eye-sore and grievance to all loose and exorbitant persons and consequently it is mightily to their wish that Authority should lose its force and Laws their veneration and thereby the sinews of all Society be loosened that so their Extravagancies may be uncontrolled and their Vices indemnified Therefore by how much it is the interest of all evil men to have Magistracy and Laws in contempt by so much is it the wisdom and concern of all sober and virtuous men to strengthen those hands that others would enfeeble and support that reputation they would infringe and violate And those that consider this will not out of levity wantonness or rashness controll Laws or dispute with Magistrates about smaller matters lest they thereby render them unable to protect them in their greater and more important concerns Nos ipsius dei imperium in Imperatoribus suspicimus said Tertullian in the name of the Christians in his time They then made their interpretation of Authority and Laws in favour of obedience and of the Governour they did not as St. James expresses it instead of being Doers of the Law make themselves Judges of the Law and Law-makers too Nor will it be either a foolish charity or a blind obedience to permit our selves to the conduct of our Superiours in those little matters we discourse of since we have great reason to perswade our selves that as those that stand higher than we may see further so those that are concerned for the whole may give a better judgement than those that respect but a part And that we our selves may as easily lye under prejudice as they and be as much transported with consideration of Ease and Liberty as they may probably be suspected to be with Ambition For why may not they have a reason for their actions which either we cannot reach or are not come to the knowledge of Especially since that may be best for the whole that is less commodious to us in particular and by being so it is not made unlawful for him that hath the charge and oversight of the whole to command nor warrantable for us to disobey Nulla lex satis commoda omnibus id modò quaeritur si majori parti in summum prodest said Cato in Livy Besides as I have intimated before There are no less different capacities of mind than constitutions of body and as great a difference in mens outward circumstances as in either of the former therefore neither can the reasons of Laws be equally understood nor the matter of Laws or the things imposed be equally easie and accommodate to the practice of all men And consequently those that would have the Laws exactly fitted to their own humour without respect to other men imitate the barbarous custome of the infamous Procrustes who is said to have either rackt all those persons that fell into his hands and stretcht them to his own size if they were too short or cut them off to his own proportion if they were too long So these men would exercise the same cruelty themselves which they forbid the Magistrate and lay down a principle of equal severity towards others as of fondness and indulgence to themselves Till we can reconcile the divers Constitutions I say of mind and body the several humours and contrary Interests of all men to one standard it will be impossible that the wisest Constitutions imaginable should prevent all scruple or be alike acceptable to all Parties Either therefore there must be no Laws made which must be the ruine of the whole or one of the Parties must be content upon the account of publick good that their private Interests or Opinions be less complyed with that is Since the Laws cannot be fitted to every man some men must fit and accommodate themselves to the Laws And this being resolved on the only question remaining will be on which of the Parties this shall fall that is which shall bend to the Law And the decision of this will be very easie for though on the one side Self-love and favour to our own Perswasion incline us to contend for the case and incouragement of our own way yet Christian Charity on
The Prince or the State could enact nothing almost but the Kirk-men found themselves grieved and Religion concerned and Excommunication is denounced The Kirk on the other side make their Decrees and the Civil Power declares them null and grants Prohibitions c. He that will satisfie himself of the truth of these things and thereby convince himself of the mischief of the Principle we are speaking of let him read the Judicious History of the Church of Scotland written by the Most Reverend Arch-Bishop Spot swood And he shall find that this unhappy notion raised and maintained for many years a bellum limitaneum and that it is like the Marches or bateable ground betwixt two bordering Potentates a Scene of contention and a field of blood Whereas did we agree of certain Limits and make the Magistrates Power and Province extend to all that which God hath not taken in by express Law both Gods Glory and the Magistrates Authority would be kept entire and there would be neither cause nor room for Controversie 2. This opinion at once condemns all the States and Kingdoms in the whole world of Impiety and Irreligion forasmuch as there neither is nor ever hath been any such constitution as hath not had some Laws of Religion that could not be deduced particularly from the Scriptures And so he that is of this perswasion and will be true to it is bound in Conscience to be a Rebel where-ever he lives 3. It is an unreasonable Fear a meer Melancholy Jealousie and express Superstition instead of Religion to suspect that either the Magistrate can offend in making or the people in obeying such Laws as though they are not expresly warranted yet are no where forbidden by the Scripture For it is a supposition that a man may be a Sinner when yet he breaks no Law contrary to the express words of St. John 1 Ep. 3. 4. who defineth Sin to be a transgression of a Law And as is the usual Genius of all Superstition it mis-represents God as cruel and tyrannical that can condemn men ex post sacto for doing of that against which there was no Law in being But 4. Which is most observable this Doctrine instead of asserting Christian Liberty in truth subverts it and layes far more severe bonds upon the Consciences of men than the very Law of Moses did That was a yoke say the Apostles Acts 15. 10. which neither we nor our Fathers were able to bear upon this account especially because it injoyned a great number of little Observances which by their multitude were hard to be remembred by their nicety difficult to be observed and by their meer positive nature and having no essential goodness in themselves had less power upon the Consciences of men to awaken their care and diligence about them It is manifest that Law contained no precept that was in it self impossible to be performed but because it is hard for the mind of man to attend to many things at once especially if also the things in which his care and obedience is required be such as are not enacted in his Conscience and when he can see no other reason of or advantage by his obedience but meerly his obedience therefore was that Law called impossible Now if a man were bound by the Gospel to avoid all those particulars that were commanded by Moses it is plain the servitude and the difficulty would be the same but if not only so but he be also bound to avoid all that which the Scripture is silent in his obligation is infinite and his servitude intolerable For Positives are determinate and definite and so fall more easily within our care and attention but Negatives are infinite and therefore such a yoke must be properly impossible These mistakes therefore being removed The true Notion of Christian Liberty will best be understood if we consider That in the times of the Old Testament the visible Church of God was inclosed within a narrow pale and none could be members of it without submission to Circumscision and the other Rites of Judaism Whence it came to pass that at the first publication of the Gospel it was a riddle and an astonishment to the very Apostles themselves that the Gentiles were to be taken into it And when the effecting this was taken in hand Acts 15. 1. the Jewish Christians stood upon their priviledge and would not admit the Gentile Converts into Society nor become of one body with them unless they would be circumcised and keep the Law Hereupon a Council is called and there the Apostles find out a temper and middle way for both parts to meet in for the present which was that the Gentile Converts should submit to the terms of Proselytism at large or the precepts given to the Sons of Noah as some understand the passage or as is indubitable that they should comply with the Jews in these three things of abstaining from fornication from things strangled and from blood And on the other side the Jewish Converts should abate of their rigor and not require of the Gentiles the strict terms of compleat Judaism At which decision the Gentile Christians were transported with Joy rejoyced at the consolation v. 31. For as I said till then none could be of the same body with the Jews in respect of visible Church Society without Circumcision and universal submission to the Law of Moses This therefore was an expedient for the present till the Jews should be by degrees better instructed in the liberty of that Christian Religion they had lately received But when the Gospel was fully published then the aforesaid Inclosure is laid open and all Nations invited into the Society of the Church upon equal terms neither party being bound to those nice Laws of Moses nor any other but those plain and reasonable ones contained in the Gospel and such other not contradictory to them as publick Wisdom Peace and Charity should dictate and recommend And to this purpose is the observation of Eusebius in his Praepaeratio Evangelica That Christianity is nothing else but the old Patriarchal Religion revived a restitution of that Primitive simplicity and liberty that was before the Law of Moses and that now there lyes no more bonds upon the Consciences of Christians than did upon the Antient Patriarchs saving those improvements our Saviour hath made upon the Law of Nature and those few positive Institutions of his expresly set down in the Gospel And that men obeying these are at liberty to conform to whatsoever common Reason and equity or publick Authority shall impose And this discourse of Eusebius is in effect the same with that of the Apostle Rom. 4. and Gal. 3. especially v. 19. where he puts this question Wherefore then served the Law he answers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it was added c. it was a kind of interim or like a parenthesis which when it shall be left out the former and latter parts joyn together again without any interruption
of the sence That is when this interim or temporary provision of the Law shall be taken away the Primitive Patriarchal Religion and that brought in by our Saviour shall seem to be of one piece the latter beginning where the former ended The Contents then of the great Charter purchased for us and brought in by our Lord Jesus are these That beside the freeing of us from the power and dominion of sin which the Law of Moses could not do and from the Tyranny of Sathan which the Gentile world lay under till Christ came I say besides these which are no matters of our present dispute our Christian Infranchisement discharges us not only from a necessity of observing the Mosaick Law and Rites of Judaism but further and especially sets our Consciences at Liberty to pursue our own Reason and to obey any Laws of men that shall not contradict the express Laws of the Gospel That we are as perfectly free as those were that lived before any Scripture was written as to all those things that are not determined in those Scriptures and that within all that sphere we may without guilt or burden upon our Consciences serve all the interests of peace and order in the world And consequently that neither the Magistrate need to fetch a particular warrant from the Scripture to authorize his Prescriptions nor we an express licence thence to legitimate our respective obedience but the former may freely consult his own reason common prudence and the interest of his Government and the latter their own peace and tranquillity This is true and real Freedom when with a good and a quiet Conscience we may conform our selves to the Wisdom of our Superiours and the interests of Society when I have a power in utramque and may do or leave undone all those matters that are not defined in Scripture according as publick Laws and the ends of all Society shall require And that this is the true notion of Christian Liberty will appear further by this That the Apostle in several of his Epistles but especially that to the Romans injoyns the Christians in their scruples about Eating or not Eating of certain Meats and in the conduct of themselves in all such matters to consult charity towards their weak Brethren the peace of the Church and their own edification that is such principles of resolving scruples as before I described and bids them not to apply themselves to any Scripture or to expect a determination of such questions thence See Rom. 14. 3 5 13 14 15 19. and chap. 15. v. 2 c. From whence these two things follow 1. That Christian Liberty doth consist in a freedom in utramque that is that antecedently to the considerations of Prudence Peace and Charity it is equally in the power of a Christian to do or not do any or all those things that are not expresly forbidden by the holy Scriptures and that where the Scripture is silent the Conscience is free in the general and only to be determined by those considerations 2. That it is no infringement but an exercise of this liberty actually to be determined to that side towards which Prudence or Charity shall incline though in the mean time the other side be in the general as lawful as that Hence it is that we find liberty and condescension or self-denyal joyned together by St. Paul Gal. 5. 13. Ye have been called unto liberty only use not liberty as an occasion to the flesh but by love serve one another and by St. Peter 1 Ep. 2. 16. As free yet not using your liberty as a cloke of maliciousness but as the servants of God Which two places are so clear in themselves as no Commentary can make them more so and so full to our purpose that nothing further can reasonably be desired And so these two points thus gained will give abundant foundation for a third to be inferred from them viz. That whatsoever is so free to me that I may do it or not do it according as I shall be inclined by the consideration of Brotherly Charity and Compassion must of necessity be also as free to me to obey the Magistrate and serve publick Peace and Order in without either prostitution of my Liberty or violation of Gods right and Prerogative For whatsoever I may do in compassion to my Brothers infirmity surely that I may much more do in reverence to Gods Ordinance the Lawful Magistrate which is the point we have all this while drove at CHAP. VIII Of a Tender Conscience what it is and its Priviledges IF pleading our Charter of Christian Liberty will not give us a discharge from Obedience to our Superiours whether in things Sacred or Civil as I have proved it cannot yet possibly the plea of a Tender Conscience may This is thought to have not only a Priviledge but a kind of Prerogative to carry with it an exemption from all humane Laws whatsoever but especially Ecclesiastical It pretends to be Gods peculiar and exempt from any inferiour cognizance like the Monastick Orders in the Church of Rome which are immediately and only subject to the Pope so this to Gods Tribunal and none else Nay it looks like a Dictatorian Authority and seem to be legibus soluta This they would make us believe can limit the Magistrate null Laws forbid execution and which is yet more change the very nature of things and make that good and holy which was wicked and rebellious before This can canonize any Opinion legitimate any action warrant any extravagancy in the person that owns it The man of a Tender Conscience may pass all guards all mounds and barrs that are set to confine others must be open to him He is a righteous man and for him there is no Law no controllment no punishment The Tenderness of his Conscience is an inviolable Sanctuary and he that meddles with such a man is a fighter against God Make use of the best arguments to convince him discourse to him with the greatest evidence he is not bound to hear you his Conscience is his Priest Prophet and King too he hangs and draws and all within himself as we say whatsoever he thinks can be no heresie and whatsover he does can be no sin Unless therefore we can pull down this Usurper we must look for no Magistracy and except we discover the weakness and absurdity of this pretension all endeavours of restoring Uniformity in the Church will be vain and useless Let us 1. Therefore consider what Conscience is in general and then we shall better come to understand the grounds and strength of this mighty pretender 2. What a tender Conscience is 3. What priviledges or exemptions it may lay claim to 1. What Conscience is And indeed the original of the mistake in this matter seems to lye here some have given such pompous and Romantick descriptions of Conscience that they have beguiled men into an apprehension that it is far a Mightier Potentate than indeed
it is I have read of a vulgar person who first having heard himself resembled to the Prince for stature and complexion and afterwards heightned up into the conceit by the flatteries of some and arts of others that had ends to serve by him came at last to conceit himself to be the Prince indeed and gave sufficient trouble to the King in possession Men have spoken so magnificently of Conscience that divers have grown into a belief that it was some Ghost or Spirit and little thought it was nothing but their own inconsiderable selves It is called a Tutelar Genius a Familiar a Domestick Deity a God within men and at least Gods Vicegerent inthroned in our bosoms Now under these disguises men have been ready to fall down and worship themselves and like the Pagans have given Divine honours to their own Passions but the least that could follow from such premises was that the Magistrate must strike sail to this admired Numen Hence probably Quakerism took its rise the men of which way are generally a stubborn and incurable generation Bring Scripture or Reason or any Authority against them they slight all and only appeal to the light within them that mighty Deity that internal Christ their Conscience Hence also it 's probable that mischievous principle arose That it is lawful to do Evil that Good may come of it in spite of the Apostle And it is believed that for a good cause and under a good intention that is the perswasion of our Conscience especially if Providence also smile upon our undertakings and incourage us with hopes of success that it is lawful for any man of what quality soever to set up for a Reformer and turn the world upside down Nay so far have some been bewildred by these cloudy and misty descriptions that whatsoever Humour hath been predominant in their Bodies whatever Passion of their Mind whatever Prejudice of Education or Interest or Profit all this hath past for Conscience and under that name been uncontrollable But now if such men would consider and loved plain English and to understand what they say Conscience is neither God nor Angel nor Spirit nor any thing that will bear all that weight is thus laid upon it But is plainly this and no more namely It is a mans own mind or understanding under the distinct consideration of reflecting upon himself his own actions and duty When we take notice of things that do not concern us morally then this notice is called understanding only or mind or opinion or science or some such name but when we consider whether a thing be good or evil morally lawful or unlawful that is whether it be agreeable to such a rule of action or suitable to the end of eternal happiness then we call this notice or reflection of our mind Conscience Now when we speak thus plainly a great part of the aforesaid Legendary conceits vanish for scarcely any man that sayes his Conscience is incontrollable will say his own opinion or Reason is the ultimate rule of his actions but will confess he may as a man err and be mistaken and therefore hath need of a Guid or some Law or light to direct him Therefore it is plain that men deceive themselves with Metaphors with words and phrases Some man perhaps will say That allowing Conscience to be nothing but the Mind of man as aforesaid yet even so it is subject to no humane Laws forasmuch as no man can force me to think otherwise than I do nor compell me to be of his opinion in the inward sence of my mind My Mind therefore or Conscience is only obnoxious to God But the answer to this is easie That though it be true that neither men can know my thoughts nor put any constraint upon the free actings of my Mind yet for all this since my Mind is not infallible I may and must needs have something to guide my mind in its judgement and determinations and that is it which we call Law and though this cannot force me to follow its direction yet it morally obliges me that is it will be my sin if I do not In short The most that Mind or Conscience can pretend to is to be a Judge yet is it but such a Judge as is subject to the Laws and they must guide it as that guides the man or otherwise its petty Soveraignty that it pretends to will not secure it from the wrath of the great Soveraign of the world by whom Kings reign But if it be further objected That we are notwithstanding bound to obey the dictates of our Mind or Conscience before any Law or command of any humane Authority whatsoever if they happen to interfere I answer It is true in things notoriously and plainly evil and the reason is not because my Mind or Conscience supersedes the Law of the Magistrate but because some higher Law of God or Reason by which my Conscience is guided hath in that case made a nullity in the Law of the Magistrate for if my Conscience have not the direction and warranty of such superiour Law the meer Opinion of my Mind or Conscience will afford me no security for where those are silent there the Law of the Magistrate is the immediate Rule of my Conscience and then to oppose or contradict that is to affront the publick Tribunal with a private Consistory and to set my own Opinion against Gods Institution If yet it be further urged That if after all my consideration of the reason of publick Laws I cannot satisfie my self of the lawfulness of the thing commanded I must then govern my self by my Conscience and not by the Law I reply That if the unlawfulness of the thing commanded is not as plain and visible as the Command of God for obeying Authority is my Opinion or Conscience will be no excuse to me because I forsake a certain Rule to follow an uncertain But if after all endeavours of satisfying my self to obey the humane Law yet the thing commanded by the Magistrate however innocent it may be in it self seems to me as plainly unlawful as obedience is plainly a duty I say this case is pittyable and will make some abatement of the sin of disobedience but doth not totally excuse it much less make a nullity of the Law It cannot make the Law null for that depends upon its own Reasonableness and the Authority enacting it and not upon the Conceptions of men Nor can it totally excuse from sin for sin is the transgression of a Law according to the definition of the Apostle All therefore that can be allowed in the case is That by reason of such a mans unhappy circumstances his disobedience will then be only a sin of infirmity which is pittyable amongst men upon consideration of common humanity and is pardonable with God as other errors are upon a general repentance 2. Now let us proceed to consider what a Tender Conscience is and how that will alter
the case And it is no more easie to find out what men mean by Tenderness than what they meant by Conscience Doubtless when men speak of a Tender Conscience they do not mean such an one as will endure no check or restraint that like an unbroken Horse will admit of no rein of Government nor yet a nice and phantastical Conscience that can brook nothing contrary to its own humour These at the first view are plainly vitious and most of all need and deserve the restraint of Laws and to be inured to that they so stubbornly decline Nor yet on the other side can Tenderness be taken in the same latitude with a Good Conscience Every good man hath such a tenderness as to be afraid of sin and to decline the occasions and temptations to it and it would be too arrogant and presumptuous for those that plead the tenderness of their Consciences to suppose themselves the only men that make Conscience of what they do for then the contrary to a tender Conscience must be a brawny and obdurate or stupid Conscience which it would be too contumelious to reproach all other men but themselves with It remains then That that which is meant by Tenderness is something betwixt these two namely neither a steady well instructed nor yet a sturdy and rebellious Conscience but a weak unsetled and timorous one And now having before resolved Conscience in general to be nothing but the Mind or practical Understanding a Tender Conscience will be nothing but either an ignorant or uninstructed Mind or a sickly melancholy and superstitious Understanding And then to speak plainly A man of a tender Conscience is such a person as being right and honest for the main yet either through the weakness of his Intellectuals or prejudices of his Education or through the melancholy of his Constitution doth not rightly understand his duty and consequently is apt to doubt and scruple and fear where no fear is and by this mistake from the causes aforesaid renders those things evil to himself that are not so in themselves Now this being so that a Tender Conscience is this and no more a man will justly wonder whence it should come to pass that either the pretence of such a Conscience should be a matter of ambition as we see it is with some and much more that it should be thought fit to give Laws to the world as it seems to be the mind of others However we grant it pittyable but before we shew what priviledges it may claim we will a little unfold more particularly the qualifications it must have to be able to sue out its priviledges And in general I have said already That such a person must be right and sincerely honest for the main Now of that he that pleads tender Conscience must give proof in these following Instances 1. He that pleads for Compassion upon the account of his Weakness must be so ingenuous as willingly to submit himself to instruction for he that scorns it and thinks himself wiser than all the world besides of all men hath the least right to make this plea. I do not see how he that hath the confidence to be a Preacher to others or a Disputer for opinions can pretend to the priviledges of that Tenderness we speak of For either a man owns himself an ignorant or a knowing man if he be an ignorant man he ought not to take upon him to teach others but to learn if he be a knowing man he ought not to scruple but to obey 2. He that pretends Tenderness of Conscience must make good his claim by being uniformly conscientious that is making as much Conscience in other things as that he pleads exemption from Otherwise it will be but Pharisaism to strain at a Gnat and swallow a Camel Davids heart smote him when he cut off the skirt of Saul 's Garment but it would never have been called Tenderness of Conscience in David if at another time he should have attempted the life of Saul St. Austin speaks of some that prescribed to themselves stricter limits of Matrimony than the Laws did per Mores non fiebat quod per Leges licebat factum horrebatur licitum ob vicinitatem illiciti But then they were severly holy men in all their conversation otherwise this would have deserved no better esteem than Superstition in them or worse He that shall scruple a Ceremony and neglects an Institution of Christ that dares not kneel at the Sacrament but dares neglect the Communion that scruples the observation of Lent but scruples not Sensuality or Lust Drunkenness or Gluttony that is afraid to eat blood but not afraid to shed the blood of men that will abstain from things strangled but not from fornication Let such a man pretend what he will he neither hath nor can plead the priviledges of a Tender Conscience 3. He that is truly tender if he cannot do all that he is commanded will yet do all that he can He will not make the breach wider nor the distance greater than needs must lest he should betray more of humour and stomach than Conscience He that cannot bow at the name of Jesus yet perhaps can stand up at the Creed or if not that neither yet probably he can be present at it He that cannot kneel when he is required may express so much reverence as to stand And he that is not satisfied in all the parts of the publick Prayers may possibly be able to come to Church or if none of these yet at least 4. He that cannot perform what the Laws require of him may forbear judging and censuring those that do His Conscience is a rule to himself but doth not oblige him to pass severe Censures upon all other men It is a very proud Conscience that will transcend its own Province and prescribe to all the world besides If he be weak and ignorant it is very unsuitable that he should carry himself as the only sagacious man and make his mind the publick standard of truth and falshood of good and evil For in so doing he contradicts himself pleads ignorance and pretends knowledge would be dealt with as the most weak but deals by others as if he was the most strong and skilful The man of a tender Conscience finds it enough to rule and judge his own actions but leaves other men to their own masters He is so modest upon the sense of his own defects and consequently so charitable as to think other men may know a reason of that he is not satisfied in But they that must erect a Judicature for all those that differ from them and arraign them of Superstition or Popery that are not of their own mind shall sooner convict themselves of pride and pragmaticalness than give proof of any true tenderness of Conscience 5. The truly tender Conscience will freely part with Money and whatever else uses to be valuable of that kind to preserve its own Innocency and Peace
there was just ground for our Recession for as I said it could not be sin to depart when it was so to continue And it is a very reasonable choice rather to be condemned by them of Singularity than to be damned for Company But now it is quite otherwise in the Church of England No man here parts with his Faith upon his Conformity no man is bound to give away his Reason and common Sense for quietness sake No man needs to hazard the Peace of a good and well instructed Conscience for the Peace of the Church No man is tempted to renounce his Integrity but may be as good and holy a man as he will and the more of that the better Church-man This Church keeps none of her Children in an uncomfortable estate of darkness but teaches the true knowledge of God and Christ sincerely and very advantageously She hath no half Communions nor debarrs any of her members of the priviledge and comfort of Christs Institutions She recommends the same Faith and the same Scriptures that all Protestants are agreed in The same God and only he is worshipped the same rules of holy Life are propounded as well as the same hopes and happiness expected By this brief representation the difference between the Church of Rome and the Protestants appears so wide and vast that they agree neither in their Creed nor Object of Worship nor Sacraments nor Rules of Life On the other side the agreements of Protestants with the Church of England is so full and perfect that they have not only the same God and Christ but the same object of Worship the same way of Devotion in a known Tongue the same Sacraments and same rule of life which certainly are all the great things that the Consciences of men are concerned in A man might therefore justly wonder these things being so what should make a breach and what place there is for contention or what can remain considerable enough to occasion the dissatisfaction to provoke the animosity to countenance that distance that is between us And I verily believe it would be hard for a stranger to this Church and Nation that understood the state of the case thus far to guess what should be the bone of contention amongst us I will now as well as I can both saithfully and briefly recite the matters of difference And I must needs confess if we number them only they are many But if we weigh them not only against the things we are agreed in but against peace and agreement it self I perswade my self they will be very light But that I must leave to the judgement of the Reader The things themselves are these and such as these Whether such Prayers shall make up the body of the publick Liturgy as have been conceived by the Governours of the Church and used ever since the Reformation or such as shall pro re nata be occasionally indited by every private Minister Or which perhaps is much the same whether such words expressions and phrases shall be continued in the publick Service as are by long use grown familiar to and intelligible by vulgar people or such shall come in their room as are more modern and grateful to nicer Ears About the several postures of Standing Kneeling and Sitting and whether some one of these be more decorous and accommodate to some part of Gods Worship than another and which to which About observation of Dayes and Times as whether the Anniversaries of the Birth Death and Resurrection of our Saviour and other great passages of the Gospel be of use and fit to be observed And whether some special Time of Abstinence and Mortification in conformity to the Primitive Church may now be retained or not About Habits and Garments such as Gown Surplice c. whether the habit used in ministration in the time of King Edward be not now as lawful as any other About the Ceremony of the Cross in Baptism whether whilest it is declared not essential to Baptism it may not upon other considerations be used in that Sacrament Or lastly which I think is as important as any of the rest whether Subordinacy of the Clergy in the Episcopal way or Co-ordinacy and Parity in the Presbyterian be rather to be preferred Most of the Disputes we have amongst us are either upon these questions or reducible to these or at least of like nature with these Now how inconsiderable these things are in themselves and how fit to be made a Sacrifice to Peace I forbear to say till I have in the second place shewn as I promised that something must be forgone for it 2. It was a worthy and memorable saying of Erasmus Mihi sanè adeò invisa est discordia ut veritas etiam displiceat seditiosa He did not only suspect that Proposition was not true that was not also peaceable but he thought Peace not too dear at the price of some Truth And he that pretends so high a value for the latter as to have no esteem for the former neither understands the one nor the other Greg. Nazianz. puts this Question 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and answers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That peace is not only the most beautiful flower in the Garden of Christianity but also the most soveraign and useful Though it be commonly dealt with as some famed beauty admired and courted but not espoused The Apostle when Rom. 12. 18. he so passionately exhorts If it be possible and as far as in you lyes have peace with all men surely did not mean that we should only accept of Peace when it is offered us for nothing or be quiet till we can pick a quarrel but that we should be at some cost to purchase it and part with something for it and deny our selves something which but upon that account we might lawfully have enjoyed It is true we may buy Gold too dear and so we must have done our Peace if we sought it at the hands of those Hucksters of the Church of Rome as I shewed before But that we cannot reasonably expect it for nothing in any Society in the World I think is demonstratively evident by this one consideration That there are scarcely any intellectual Menaechmi I mean hardly any two persons perfectly of the same apprehension or stature of understanding in the whole world So much difference there is in mens Constitutions such diversity of Education such variety of Interests and Customs and from hence so many kinds of Prejudices and various Conceptions of things that he that resolves to yield to no body can agree with no body and consequently cannot be happy in any Church or Society on this side of Heaven There indeed some think mens minds shall be all of one capacity but whatever be the truth in that particular I much doubt whether those persons will ever make up that society of the Church Triumphant that think themselves bound to disturb the state of the Church Militant unless all things