THE Protestant Reconciler PART II. Earnestly perswading the DISSENTING LAITY To joyn in FULL COMMUNION WITH THE Church of England And Answering all the Objections of the Non-Conformists against the Lawfulness of their Submission unto the Rites and Constitutions of that CHURCH By a Well-wisher to the Churches Peace and a Lamenter of Her Sad Divisions Anglicanam Ego Ecclesiam exoticis pravis superflitiosis cultibus erroribusque aut impiis aut periculosis egregiè ex scripturarum coelestium norma purgatam tot támque illustribus Martyriis probatam pietate in Deum in homines Charitate laudatissimisque bonorum operum exemplis abundantem laetissimo doctissimorum ac sapientissimorâ—m virorum preventu jam à Reformationis principio ad hodierna usque tempora florentem equidem es quo debui loco habui hactenus ac dum vivam habebo ejus nomen honos laudes semper apud me manebunt Dallaeus de cultibus Religiosis Latinorum part 2. l. 2. cap. 1. p. 97 98. LONDON Printed for Awnsham Churchil at the Black-Swan near Amen-Corner 1683. THE PREFACE TO THE Dissenting Laity The Contents of the PREFACE Six Arguments from the Book called the Protestant Reconciler to perswade the Dissenting Laity to submit to the conditions of Communion required of them by the Church of England viz. 1. That they stand bound to do what lawfully they may in order to it and that nothing unlawful is required of them § 1.2 Because they are to do to their Superiors as in like case they would be dealt with § 2.3 From the liberty they take of changing a Ceremony of Christ's own institution § 3.4 Because the mischiefs which will follow on their refusal to submit are greater than those which will ensue on their Conformity § 4.5 From the example of St. Paul § 5.6 From the pernicious nature of Schism § 6. Other Arguments produced 1. From that of the Apostle If any man will be contentious we have no such custom 1 Cor. 11.16 § 7. 2. From his command to give no offence to the Church of God § 8.3 Because God is not the Author of Confusion but of Peace § 9.4 Because he requires the believing Wife not to desert her unbelieving Husband vice versâ because God hath called us to Peace § 10.5 Because were all things left indifferent the Minister must impose in some cases § 11.6 From the power committed to Church Governours and the necessity of submission to it § 12.7 From the sad result of their refusing this submission § 13. Two propositions conducing to this end 1. That no prejudices or scruples of Dissenters can excuse them from the guilt of Schism in separating from us till they have done all that lawfully they can for the removal of them § 14.2 That their imagination that the Magistrate exceeds or else unduly doth exert his power in commanding any thing will not warrant their refusal of Obedience to it § 15. Requests to them who cannot fully comply with us viz. 1. To comply so far as they declare either by words or actions that they lawfully may do it § 16.2 To refrain from censuring reproaching or speaking evil of their Governours in Church or State § 17.3 To abstain carefully from all Rebellious Principles and Practices and to confess ingenuously and heartily renounce what hath been done by men of their perswasions in that kind § 18. Brethren MY hearts desire and prayer to God in your behalf is this That you may fully be united to the Communion of the Church of England And in pursuance of this passionate desire I have composed the following Treatise containing a full Answer to all the scruples obstructing your Communion with us which I could meet with in the writings of our Dissenting Brethren And let me O my Friends entreat you by the love of God and your own souls of the Church of Christ which is his body and of her union peace edification by your concern for Christian Religion in the general and for the Protestant Religion in particular which I hope is very great by all the motives which Christianity affords to love peace unity by all the blessings it doth promise to the promoters and all the dreadful evils it doth threaten to the disturbers of them by the sad experience you have had already of the most fatal consequences of our Divisions and by your present fears of a more dreadful issue of them lastly by all that you are like to suffer in your souls and bodies by refractory persisting in your Separation let me I say beseech you on my bended knees by all these weighty motives to lay to heart what I have offered in this Book and in this Preface shall farther offer to engage you to conform and seriously to consider of it and act according to the convictions it may minister unto you as you will Answer your neglect to do so at the great and terrible day of the Lord. Now the considerations I would humbly offer to you are either 1. Such as are proper to induce you to the desired Conformity or 2. Such as may tend to keep you peaceable and conscientious though you do not Conform and may preserve you from doing any thing which may reflect on your Religion towards God or Loyalty towards your Soveraign § 1 1. Then to move you to the desired Conformity be pleased seriously to consider what hath been offered in a late Book stiled The Protestant Reconciler to that end In which Book as the Author pleads warmly for an indulgence or mitigation of some lesser things which do obstruct your full Communion with us which nothing but a due sense of the great danger and unsafe condition of your present state could have induced him to do and nothing but his fervent love to souls and his sincere desire of their Salvation can excuse so hath he many passages which seem most strongly to conclude for your desired submission to the injunctions of Superiors For First P. 34 35. He lays down this position That you stand bound in Conscience to do whatsoever lawfully you may for the prevention and removal of our Schisms and the occasions of them and for the healing our Divisions Which is a proposition evident in it self and there confirmed from plain Scripture testimony and the concern we ought to have for Christian Faith the Protestant Religion the welfare of the Nation and for the peace the order the edification of the Church Secondly He adds That nothing can be unlawful which is not by God forbidden 1 John 3.4 sin being the transgression of a Law and the Apostle having told us Rom. 4.15 P. 198. that where there is no Law there is no transgression whence he infers That Dissenters cannot satisfie their Consciences in their refusal to obey the commands of their Superiors unless they can shew some plain precept which renders that unlawful to be done by them which is commanded by Superiors And seeing God in Scripture hath enjoined
lawful to Communicate with us in Prayer and hearing of the word and in Receiving of the Sacrament upon occasion stand bound in Conscience so to do as oft as by the Magistrate you are required so to do and it can only be pretence of Conscience which doth induce you to forbear such Communion with us at these times for seeing negative precepts do bind always and at all times so that no man at any time may do what is forbidden by God It follows that there can be no prohibition against doing that at other times which we can sometimes do and which cannot be more or less lawful or unlawful for being done at one time than another as clearly seems to be the case with reference to your occasional Communion It therefore is to be suspected that men only pretend Conscience against that Communion with us at all times which they at sometimes can maintain And yet I wish there were no instances of men of your perswasions who when they are presented or when they find it necessary to qualifie them for an Office or to give a vote in which they may do service to their party will attend upon the publick worship used in our Churches and will receive the Sacrament according to the order of the Church of England who before never did and afterwards neglect to do so Now whilst men do thus vary in their practice according as their interest and as their circumstances vary they tempt men shrewdly to suspect that they act rather out of interest than Conscience in these matters and that they notwithstanding all their pretence to Conscience have either none at all or a bad Conscience for if they thought Communion with us in those Ordinances unlawful by doing it in the forementioned circumstances they only must be doing evil that good may come and making Conscience and Religion stoop to interest which is the proper character of Hypocrites but if they did conceive it lawful their Separation and refusal of it cannot be excused from Schism or from transgression of the injunctions of St. Paul If it be possible as much as in you lies live peaceably with all men follow after the things which make for peace give no offence unto the Church of God obey Superiors and submit your selves Ah my Dear Brethren by doing of these things you have given greater scandal unto others than your submission to the Constitutions of the Church of England could have done and therefore if you do indeed abstain from our Commuon for fear of giving scandal to weak Brethren do you more carefully abstain from matters of this nature which carry with them such a plain semblance of Hypocrisie that no pretence can hide no Charity excuse it Under this head I cannot pass by your violence in Petitioning His Sacred Majesty against His Royal Proclamation to the contrary for be it granted that the Law did authorize or give permission to you to Petition sure I am it laid upon you no necessity to do so and so this might have been forborn in compliance with the pleasure of his Majesty And if you do Reply That then you may by Proclamations be abridged of that liberty the Law affords you Consider I beseech you what it is that you expect and call for from Superiors viz. That for your sakes and out of pity to your weakness they would abate the exercise of their own power and with what equity and justice can you expect they should do this if you at their request will abate nothing of that liberty and power which the Law allows you § 17 2. If you cannot conform let me intreat you Religiously to abstain from censuring reproaching or speaking evil of your Governours in Church or State For this undoubtedly you may do and it doth very much concern you so to do For they who being Christians do reproach and do speak evil of their Civil Governours do that which the Wiseman would not permit the Jew to think of for his command runs thus Eccles 10.20 Curse not the King in thy heart or Entertain not any light vain contemptuous or dishonourable thoughts of him Assemb Annot. wish thou no evil to his Person Crown or Dignity in thy most secret retirements They do what all good men should tremble to commit for of such men St. Peter gives this Character Presumptuous are they 2 Pet. 2.10 self-willed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they do not tremble when they speak evil of Dignities Such persons dare to offer that to Gods Vicegerents to those who bear his Name or Character on Earth which Michael the Archangel durst not offer to the vilest and the worst of Creatures Jude 8 9. for he contending with the Devil durst not bring against him a railing accusation and yet it well deserves to be observed that if this sin was capable of pardon or excuse in any case or circumstances it must have been so in the reproaching of the then present Governours they being by consent of all Historians the greatest monsters of mankind and the most bloody Persecutors of the Christian Faith Moreover they who offend in the like kind against their Ecclesiastical Superiors do that which blessed Paul when he had ignorantly done to a corrupt High-Priest acknowledged as a crime condemned in the Law of God I wist not saith he that he was the High-Priest Acts 23.5 for it is written thou shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people they do that which the Conscience of a Jew could not let pass without just indignation and reproof for when St. Paul had said God shall smite thee thou whited wall v. 3 4. they presently cry out Revilest thou Gods High-Priest There lies indeed no obligation on us to call evil good or flatter our Superiors in their sins or judge well of them against the clearest evidence of Sense or Reason but then we are obliged not to cherish evil thoughts or harbour groundless jealousies of our Superiors much less must we express our inward apprehensions of them by opprobrious language or disrespectful carriage towards them And yet 't is but too evident that both the Writings and Discourses of Dissenters are too often stuft with these malevolent reflections in which they take the liberty of speaking evil of the Rulers of the people and of blaspheming Dignities and representing the Reverend Bishops as Popish Antichristian and Ithacian Prelates § 18 Lastly Let me conjure you by that affection which you bear unto the Name and Doctrine of our common Lord and Saviour and to the credit of the Protestant Religion to abstain carefully from all Seditious and Rebellious Principles and Practices and to do all you can to clear your selves from all suspicion of maintaining or approving of them For to deal plainly with you this is one great fault among you that you have many of you vented and more of you have practised sutably to those Opinions which are Seditious and Rebellious and these Opinions
his commands in lawful matters as our weak Brethren can be to see us yield obedience to him in such things 2ly Others will be as prone to censure our refusal of Obedience as Turbulent Sehismatical as disobedience to the Higher Powers and disorderly walking as the weak Brother is to censure our Conformity as Popish Superstitious and the like And 3ly Why may not others be as well tempted by their refusal to conform to separate and to do as they do with a doubting Conscience as the weak Brother may by our conformity be tempted likewise to conform with a doubting Conscience Moreover whosoever doth consider the temper of the Nonconformists will find occasion to believe that there is little fear of drawing them by our examples to conform but rather that they will be apt to censure us for our Conformity and could we do so we should only tempt them to perform their Duty tho against their Conscience Prop. 6 The Scandal caused by the Dissenter on supposition that he refuses where he may lawfully obey which is the case in question is Scandalum datum i.e. Scandal arising from the omission of his Duty the Scandal ministred by the Conformist can be only Scandalum acceptum sed non datum or Scandal arising not from the action of him that doth conform but from the ignorance and weakness of him who is offended at his doing so for certainly by doing of my Duty in things lawful I give to my weak Brother no just occasion to be grieved at what I do or to pass censure on me as an Evil doer or to Separate from Communion with me or to do with a doubting Conscience what he sees me do but by omission of my Duty to Superiors I shall give just occasion both to them and all who peaceably conform to grieve at my action to pass their censures on me as a disobedient Person And if I do by my example occasion the omission of my Brothers Duty and his separation I shall be justly charged with his guilt as Ministring temptation to him by that example to neglect what lawfully he mought and by God is Commanded to perform and so I must offend him more in the Apostles sense by tempting him to sin or to continue in sin The sum is this by refusing to conform in such a lawful case lest we should offend our weak Brother we seem directly to sin our selves to avoid an occasion of sin in him we do as far as I can judge offend God the King the Law the Church and Conscience too by not doing our Duty lest we should offend our Brother by doing it Now sure it must concern us more to avoid a Scandal given with these circumstances then to avoid a Scandal which is only taken Now from these Propositions it is easie to return an Answer to all that is Objected by Amesins Scholast disp p. 42 43. and transcribed by Mr. Jeans to prove the unreasonableness of this Assertion That Authority is to be obeyed in things Lawful even tho Scandal should ensue against this Doctrine which he ascribeth to our Prelates he disputes thus Obj. 1 A Scandal in the nature of it is Spiritual murther § 2 now suppose a Superior should command a thing in it self indifferent whereupon Murther were like to follow as to run a Horse or a Cart in a certain way at a certain time when it may be unwitting to the Commander little Children were playing in the way would any Mans Conscience ferve him to do it Answ Yes if he saw there were more or like danger of as great mischief by running of this Horse or driving of this Cart in any other way which as I have already shewed is the present case with reference to our refusal of Obedience to the Commands of our Superiors concerning things indifferent and Lawful in themselves Obj. 2 Avoiding of Scandal is a main Duty of Charity may Superiors at their pleasure appoint how far I shall shew my Charity towards my Brother then surely an Inferior Earthly Court may cross the determination of the High Court of Heaven Answ This argument I thus retort Obedience to Superiors Civil and Sacred is a main Duty of Christianity and to avoid all Schisms and Divisions of the Church which is Christs Body all disturbance of her Peace all needless Seperations from her Communion are all important Duties of Christianity may then the ignorance and consequential weakness of my Brother appoint how far I shall be obedient to Gods Vice-Gerent or Christs Messengers how far I shall avoid dividing and disturbing of the Churches Peace then surely may my Brothers ignorance and error cross the determinations of the High Court of Heaven what if they be offended at my paying Tribute in that Quotum which the Law of our Superiors prescribes will Charity oblige me to refuse to pay it Or is it not as much my Duty to obey Gods Vice-Gerents in all other Lawful matters as in the ease of Tribute Is not the precept as express for the one as for the other 2ly This strongly proveth it our Duty in the present circumstances to conform since by refusal so to do we only exercise our Charity towards our weak Brother but by conforming we exercise like Charity and care to avoid Scandal towards more and more deserving Persons and also do avoid dividing and disturbing of the Churches Peace By our refusal to conform to lawful institutions of Superiors that so we may avoid the Scandal of weak Brethren we disobey them whom God Commands us to obey we harden our weak Brother in his Disobedience and Schism we rob our selves of the benefit of the Publick Ordinances bring Penalties and Excommunications on our selves we rob the Church of her Unity Peace and Love and if we be Ministers we deprive our selves of opportunity to exercise our calling to the good of Souls now to avoid the Scandal of a weak Brother by incurring all this guilt is so far from being a main Duty of Charity that it doth flatly contradict the ground and measure of all Charity Self-Love and seemeth to be only doing many Evils that one good may come Obj. 3 Superiors have no power given them for destruction but for Edification if therefore they Command Scandals they go beyond their Commission neither are we tied therein to do as they bid but as they should bid Answ 1. If they Command us to do that which of its own Nature giveth Scandal by being a direct and an immediate cause of sin 't is true we must not do as they bid but as they should bid or rather as their great Superior bids but not if they Command what only through the sin or ignorance of others proves to them a Scandal especially when our refusal to obey them will Minister an equal Scandal which is apparently the present case 2ly I Answer That it belongs not to private persons to enquire whether their Superiors do go beyond their Commission in Commanding of these
have been asserted and been made publick not only in the times of the late Civil Wars but also since the happy Restoration of His Sacred Majesty whom God preserve For this great scandal you have hereby ministred both to Religion in the general and to the Protestant Religion in particular I verily believe you by just judgment of Almighty God do suffer and will smart severely Wherefore my counsel to you is 1. No longer to defend to countenance or to extenuate those wicked principles and execrable practices which followed from them but humbly to confess and take the shame due to your party for them and patiently bear the indignation of the Lord because you have thus sin'd against him Be pleased I pray you in order to this end to ponder seriously these words of your admired Mr. Defence of the principles of love p. 14 15 16. Baxter who speaks thus unto you I beseech you let us review the effects of the late War is it possible for any sober Christian in the world to take them to be blameless or to be little sins What both the violating the person and the life of the King and the change of the fundamental Government or constitution c. Was all this lawful and to do all this as for God with dreadful appeals to him Dare any man not blinded and hardned justifie all this If none of all this was Rebellion or Treason or Murther is there any such crime think you possible to be committed Are Papists insulting over us in our shame are thousands hardned by these and such like dealings into a scorn of all Religion are our Rulers by all this exasperated to the severities which we feel are we made by it the by-word and hissing of the Nations and the shame and pity of all our friends and yet is all this to be justified or silenced and none of it at all to be openly repented of I openly profess to you that I believe till this be done we are never like to be healed or restored and that it is heinous gross impenitence that keepeth Ministers and people under their distress and I take it for the sad prognostick of our future woe and lengthened affliction to hear so little open profession of repentance even for unquestionable heinous crimes for the saving of those who are undone by these scandals and for the reparation of the honour of Religion which is most notoriously injured Your Commissioners at the Savoy give this account of their faith to his Majesty whom God preserve viz. that in things no way against the Law of God the commands of our Governours must be obeyed but if they command what God forbids we must patiently submit to suffering and every soul must be subject to the higher powers for conscience sake and not resist these are our principles And these must be your principles or you can never reasonably expect the favour or protection of the Government For what their Subjects do at present or may hereafter think forbidden by God in these divided times and contrariety of various sects the Higher Powers cannot know and therefore if they cannot be secured of this I mean by the ordinary way of security given by oaths subscriptions declarations that when their subjects think God hath forbidden what the higher powers do command they patiently will submit to suffering and not resist they cannot be secured of the peace and quiet of their Kingdom I therefore cannot but conceive you are obliged in Conscience as you desire to avoid the truly odious name of Rebel and the just imputation of seditious persons and to wipe off in some good measure the horrid scandal which lies upon your party for your former practices That you are bound in justice as you desire to repair the credit of the Protestant Religion which hath so deeply suffered by the past Rebellions of men of your perswasions and give security unto that Government from which both you and yours expect security That you are bound in policy and prudence as you desire to abate the just suspicions which the Government at present hath and will have of you till you secure them of the contrary and to wipe off the manifold reproaches which are cast upon you as you desire to remove the Prejudices all loyal subjects have against you from their experience of your seditious principles and practices I say I cannot but conceive you highly stand obliged on all these accounts to publish your sincere repentance for and your abhorrence of what men of your perswasion have already done to make now solemn declarations and protestations of your present loyal principles to shew your readiness to give all satisfaction to the Government which can be reasonably desired from you that you do not at present hold nor ever will maintain rebellious principles to remonstrate that if you cannot yet obey in all things the commands of your Superiours you in no cases will resist the Government but patiently will suffer under it and lastly that you will permit no person to be of your communion who will not make this declaration heartily and sincerely Bishop of Winton's Sermon before the King Nov. 5.67 p. 38. For as a Reverend Prelate of our Church doth truly say The best and safest way for Prince State and People is to protect cherish and allow of that Religion and that only which allows of no rising up against or resisting soveraign power no not in its own defence nor upon any other account whatsoever which most Christian and most Orthodox profession if those of the Romish and those of other perswasions that live among us but are not of us would make as frankly and as ingenuously and as sincerely as we do though it would not presently reconcile all other differences betwixt us and them yet it would perhaps be enough to make us live peaceably and charitably and securely together without fear or jealousie of one another which would be a good step towards an accommodation of all other controversies betwixt us in time also Now to conclude this Preface with the Prayer of our own Church Blessed Jesu our Saviour and our Peace who didst shed thy precious Blood upon the Cross that thou mightest abolish and destroy all enmity among men and reconcile them in one body unto God look down in much pity and compassion upon this distressed Church and Nation whose bleeding wounds occasioned by the lamentable Divisions that are among us cry aloud for thy speedy help and saving relief stir up we beseech thee every Soul of us carefully as becometh sincere Christians to root out of our hearts all pride and vain-glory all wrath and bitterness all unjust prejudice and causless jealousie all hatred and malice and desire of revenge and whatsoever it is that may exasperate our minds or hinder us from discerning the things which belong unto our Peace and by the power of thy Holy Spirit of Peace dispose all our hearts to such meekness of wisdom
already in many instances of things no where determined by the Law of Moses and yet enjoyned by them 't is also contrary to the Apostles Practice who forbad the using of things strangled and blood tho they not only were things in themselves indifferent but things required by that Ceremonial Law from which our Lord had freed his Servants and therefore more might have been pleaded against submitting unto that Decree than to the Constitutions of the Church of England concerning other things indifferent Lastly St. Paul requires that all things which relate unto Gods Publick Worship of which he there discourseth should be done decently and orderly but how shall Rulers be able to order matters so if it be an Infringement of our Christian Liberty to have any thing imposed upon us by our Governours for decency and orders sake Particular Rules being not given us in Scripture about this matter which to be sure would have been done were they not left to the determination of the Rulers of the Church Wherefore to give a brief but a sufficient Answer to the Objections mentioned § 4 1. From what hath been discoursed it is evident that Christian Liberty cannot be violated by these Impositions because the Conscience is obliged by them that is 't is bound to yield obedience to them when they are imposed for if this maketh the Commands of our Superiors to violate our Christian Liberty Then 1. All the Commands of Masters Parents and Superiors respecting things indifferent civil or sacred must be repugnant to that Liberty because we are if Servants Children or Subjects obliged to obey them in all lawful matters even for Conscience sake 2ly Then our own vows and resolutions concerning any thing indifferent must violate our Christian Liberty because we are obliged in Conscience to perform them 3ly Then can we not abstain from any thing indifferent in case of Scandal as St. Paul Commands us without infringing of our Christian Liberty because our Conscience is then bound for fear of Scandal to abstain from what is in it self indifferent 2ly It also is exceeding evident that Christian Liberty cannot be violated by requiring Persons to do that of which their Conscience being erroneous doubts or which it doth Condemn as is insinuated in the fourth Objection For were this so Then 1. our Laws must violate true Christian Liberty when they command the Quaker to pay Tythes for he not only doubts the lawfulness thereof but peremptorily pronounceth it unlawful so to do Then 2ly our Laws Commanding all Papists to come to Church to obey the King in opposition to the Pope to take the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy must violate his Christian Liberty because he doubts the lawfulness of yielding obedience to them 3ly By the same Rule my Christian Liberty must be infring'd much more when Magistrates Command me to abstain from what my Conscience tells me I should do now seeing an Erroneous Conscience may urge Men to the greatest wickedness since it may make them verily believe they ought to do many things contrary to the Name of Jesus Acts 26.9 and that by killing his Disciples they would do God Service Joh. 16.2 no Laws according to this Doctrine can be laid on Men whose Conscience is Erroneous to bind them not to do the worst of Evils 3ly In Answer to that passage of St. Paul we are bought with a Price 1 Cor. 7.23 and therefore must not be the Servants of Men. I say 1. That it is only an advice unto those Christians who being Slaves to Heathens had once bought their Liberty or by the bounty of their Friends had been redeemed from Slavery not to sell themselves again or to return to the condition of their former Servitude but to continue in that Liberty it therefore should be thus Translated are ye bought with a Price Be not ye the Servants of Men To make this clear consider that the Apostle is there instructing Christians how to behave themselves in their particular stations and callings and not upon pretence of Christianity to think themselves obliged to alter their condition or to neglect those Duties their proper station did require thus from v. 12th to the 16th he requires the believing â—usband not to desert the unbelieving Wife and the believing Wife not to part from her unbelieving Husband but to abide in that condition in which the Lord had called them In the 18th and 19th verses he advises the Circumcised Christian not to desire to be Uncircumcised vice versa but to abide as they were from v. 21. to v. 24. he gives advice to those who were believing Servants thus Art thou called being a Servant care not for it think it not a disparagement to Christianity that thou art still a Bondman but if thou maist be made Free prefer Freedom before Bondage Are you bought with a Price as by the Charity of Christians many believers then were be not then the Servants of Men return not any more to the condition of your former Slavery This without doubt is the true import of the words But 2ly according to the ordinary reading and interpretation of them viz. ye are bought with a Price even with the Blood of Christ be ye not the Servants of Men it giveth no Commission to the Christian to refuse obedience to his Superiors in lawful matters for to be the Servants of Men which is the thing forbidden to Christs Servants is only not to yield obedience to Men in any thing repugnant to that Service which they owe to Christ and therefore it is so far from being prejudicial to that obedience we owe unto Superiors for the Lords sake that for this very reason we are required to obey them in all lawful things because 't is part of that obedience which Christ requires from us as his Servants and which we are required to do for the Lords sake So Col. 3.20 Children obey your Parents in all things for this is well pleasing to the Lord and v. â—â— Servants obey your Masters in all things and whatsoever you do do it heartily as to the Lord for in serving them you serve the Lord Christ it being his ordinance that you obey in yielding to them in all lawful things And again 1 Pet. 2.13 16. Submit your selves to every Ordinance of Man for the Lords sake as the servants of God So that you see our being bought with a Price being that which maketh us Christs servants even when we are free from Slavery to Men it must engage us the more strictly to Obedience to Masters Parents and Superiors this being that we owe unto them in all lawful matters for the Lords sake and which we are obliged to perform as the servants of Christ. Lastly In Answer to that enquiry of St. Paul If you be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the World Coloss 2.20 wherefore as living in the World are ye subject to Ordinances Touch not taste not handle not c. I say 1. That the