as well as the sense of any rational discourse whatsoever And the evidence of Gods Testimony is much more effectual than the arguments of human reason to command assent and quiet mens minds and appease their contests And if we yield not our controversies to be finally decided by this sacred Rule whither shall we go or wherein shall we all be bound up The truth is when men seek out vain inventions to please their own fancies or to serve their own ends and find their devised ways condemned by Gods word then they fall to derogate from its authority and sufficiciency and talk much of the impertinency and folly of those that insist upon it and cry up tradition and reason and that wisdom of Man that is but foolishness with God When things will not be as well as they should they must be as they may There be some usefull truths and practices that may be too dearly bought if purchased with the breach of the Churches Peace and Unity and the hazard of its whole Estate Howbeit then is the best state of things when the Apostolick Doctrine and Discipline is the standardmeasure of all and nothing is retained but what is plainly agreeable thereunto And the safety of pure Religion lies in as through a reformation according to this rule as the times will bear Let the severest reason that is impartial weigh the following words written by one of a Catholick Spirit and true to the Interest of Reformed Christianity touching our departure from Rome We should leave upon us no string or tassel of our ancient Captivity such as whereby they may take hold of us to pull us back again into our former bondage but look upon our selves as absolutely free from any tye to them more than in indeavouring their Conversion and Salvation which we knowing so experimentally not to be compassed by needless Symbolizings with them in any thing I conceive it our best Policy studiously to imitate them in nothing but for all indifferent things to think rather the worse of them for their using them as no Person of Honour would willingly go in the known Garb of any Lewd and Infamous Persons Whatsoever we Court them in they do but turn to our scorn and contempt and are more hardened in their own wickedness Wherefore seeing that needless Symbolizings with them doth them no good but hurt we should account our selves in all things indifferent perfectly free to please and satisfie in the most universal manner we can those of our own Party not caring what Opinions or Customs or outward Formalities the Romanists and others have and may have had from the first Degeneracy of the Church As for the word Popery it is not more odious than ambiguous among Protestants On the one hand some that will speak hard words against it have drawn it into so extreamly narrow a compass as to place it in little more than a secular interest of Power controverted between the Pope and the Princes and Prelates of Christendom and others that make it broader are yet very tender if not fond of many gross Corruptions of the Roman Church On the other hand some have extended it so far as to disparage things good and laudable and requisite and ignorantly call by that name whatsoever they fancy not Nevertheless those useless and offensive things taken up by the Papal Church since the time of their known Apostacy both Doctrines and Customs and that are theirs more peculiarly may justly be called Popish though they were not imposed as Apostolick commands or means of obtaining Pardon of Sin or of working Grace Why should we be tenacious of their Forms to the scandal of those of our own Belief How are we obliged or concerned to conform to their usages more than they are to ours Have they any Authority over us or are they any way a Rule unto us Are not the holy Scriptures of right both their Rule and ours Or can they upbraid us for departing from them in these at least unnecessary Opinions and Customs unless they upbraid us upon those grounds which we have rejected together with their Usurpation and and which if we receive again we must quit Protestancy it self This striving to come so near them whether tends it but to reduce us again into that Church For by all approaches to them they are not drawn one step towards us but are the more hardened and still they rest unmoveable on the rock of their pretended Supremacy and Infallibility The impurity of the Romish Church lies chiefly in its Superstition and Sensuality In the grosser part of its Superstition is manifold gross Idolatry and any way of symbolizing with Idolatry which is spiritual Whoredom should be dreaded by the chast Spouse of Chirst as the retaining of such Images as have been and are apt to be made objects of Religious Adoration and the making choice of the peculiar garbs and fashions of Idolaters in their worship Moreover where the gross Pollutions are avoided if their pomp and train of Ceremonies be retained they will be apt to take up the heart of such as are busied in them and to corrupt the Worship of God and make it a dead work and carnal Service and so the spirit and power of Godliness will decay and die among the People by this means Sensuality the concomitant of Idolatry and all gross Superstition is likewise manifested in their Devotions Of the Israelites Idolatry it is written The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play Sensual sports and pastimes are mingled with the Devotions of carnal Worshippers as is notably seen in the Popish Festivals And this makes the sensual part of Men addicted to such a way To pray a while and then to play is the business of their Sacred Solemnities But this course alienates the mind from true Holiness and tends to much Profaness and not only the Piety but the civility of a Nation will hereby much abate A Church that would maintain the purity of Religion the power of Godliness had need have its solemn days of divine Service distinct from the appointed times of carnal sport mirth and jollity CHAP. XV. The enmity of the World against Godliness and the Calumnies and Reproaches cast upon it considered THe security and increase of true Religion is a matter of no small difficulty The enmity against it is general and perpetual in the first race of Mankind it brake forth even to Bloud and throughout all Ages it hath been propagated that with great rage as well within as without the Pale of the visible Church The adverse World knows not the new Nature what it is for it knows not God whose Image it is The World is not only alienated from the Life of God but opposite to it by the antipathy of the carnal Life and so not only wants the true relish but hath a strong disrelish of the divine and heavenly Nature Moreover true Christianity is a light by which all things
the things here principally looked after are the receiving and propagating of holy Doctrine drawn out of the pure fountain of Sacred Scripture the right administration of true Gospel worship by which God is glorified as God and the worshippers are made more godly The due preaching of Gods word and dispensation of other divine ordinances by personslawfully called thereunto for the conversion of sinners and edification of converts Holy discipline truly and faithfully administred by the Pastors as the necessity of the Church requires and the State thereof will bear Religious family government Private mutual exhortations pious conferences and profitable conversation The predominant influence of religion in the civil government of a nation yet without usurpation or incroachment upon the civil rights of any especially of the higher Powers The unity of Christians and their mutual charity conspicuous and illustrious and lastly in order to all these intents a good frame of Ecclesiastical polity Holy Doctrine is the incorruptible seed of Regeneration by which the new creature is begotten It is not here intended to represent a perfect scheme thereof for it sufficeth to signifie that extracts thereof from holy Scripture are drawn out in the ancient Catholik Creeds and in the harmonious confessions of the present Reformed Churches Nevertheless our design requires the observation of some most important things about the Doctrine of Salvation As that there be first an earnest and hearty belief of the existence and providence of God and his government of mankind by laws congruous to their nature and of the immortallity of human souls and of a life of retribution in the world to come which is the foundation of all religion 2ly Right apprehensions of Gods nature and attributes more especially of his Holiness comprehending as well his purity and justice as his mercy and goodness that as he is ready to procure his creatures happiness and refuseth none that come unto him so that he cannot deny himself and that he receiveth note but upon terms agreeable to his Holiness 3ly An Idea of Godliness in themind not as shaped by any private conceptions but as expressed by the Holy Ghost whose workmanship it is that Christianity in the hearts and lives of men may be the same with Christianity in the Scriptures 4. The receiving of the great mystery of Godliness not as allegorized in the fancies of some Enthusiasts wherein it vanisheth to nothing but as verisied in the truth of the History wherein it becomes the power of God to Salvation and so not to sever the internal spirit of the Christian Religion from its external frame the basis whereof is the Doctrine of the Trinity in the Unity of the Godhead and of the incarnation of the eternal word Lastly Soundness of judgment in those great Gospel verities that are written for the exalting of Gods grace and the promoting of true godliness and the incouraging of the godly in opposition to ungracious ungodly and uncomfortable errours of which sort are these following truths That the study and knowledge of the Scriptures is the duty and priviledge of all Christians that according to their several capacities being skilfull in the word of righteousness they may discern between truth and falshood between good and evil and offer to God a reasonable service according to his revealed will That internal illumination is necessary to the saving knowledge of God the Holy spirit in that regard not inspiring new revelations but inabling to discern savingly what is already revealed in nature and Scripture That man was created after the image of God in righteousness and true holyness and that in this state he was indued with a self-determining principle called Freewill and thereby made capable of abiding holy and happy or of falling into sin and misery according to his own choice and that God left him to the freedom of his own choice having given him whatsoever power or assistance was necessary to his standing That the first man being set in this capacity fell from God and it pleased God not to annihilate him nor to prevent his propagating of an issue in the same fallen state which would follow upon his fall but left the condition of mankind to pass according to the course of nature being now fallen That by the sin of Adam all men are made sinners and corrupt in their whole nature and are under the curse of the Law and liable to eternal condemnation and being left to the wicked bent of their own wills are continually adding to their original sin a heap of actual transgressions and so are of themselves in a miserable and helpless condition That the Lord Jesus Christ according to his full intention and his Fathers commandment hath made propitiation for the sins of the whole world so far as thereby to procure pardon of sin and Salvation of soul to all that do unfeignedly believe and repent That man being dead in sin cannot be quickned to the divine life but by the power of Gods grace raising him above the impotency of lapsed nature That the culpable impotency of lapsed nature to saving good lies in the fixed full aversation of the will by a deplorable obstinacy nilling that good to which the natural faculties can reach and ought to incline as to their due object That the root of godliness lies in regeneration and inward Sanctification That God calleth some by the help of that special grace which infallibly effecteth their conversion and adhesion to him without any impeachment of the natural liberty of the will That whatsoever God doth in time and in whatsoever order he doth it he decreed from eternity to do the same and in the same order and so he decreed from eternity to give that special grace to some and by it to bring them to glory which decree is eternal election to which is opposite the pure negative of Non-election As for preordination to everlasting punishment it passeth not upon any but on the foresight and consideration of their final abode in the state of sin That the more common convictions inclinations and endeavours towards God in persons unregenerate are good in their degree and the ordinary preparative to a saving change and they are the effects of that divine grace which is called common That deligent seeking after God by the help of common grace is not in vain it being the means to some further attainment towards the souls recovery and it is regarded of God in its degree and God doth not deny men further degrees of help till they refuse to follow after him by not using the help already given them and by resisting his further aid That God hath made all men savable and though he doth not simply and absolutely will the conversion and Salvation of all yet he willeth it so far and in such manner as is sufficient to encourage the diligent in their endeavours and to convict the careless of being inexcusable despisers of his grace towards them That there is an
rash with their mouths and hasty to utter any thing before God that is unmeet they are subject to the discipline of the Church to be censured for their errour Moreover heightened affections inlarge the heart and open the mouth and do not make a man at a stand for want of words Indeed astonishing affection or an extasie of Spirit may put one to such a stand but that rarely takes hold of any in a pubick performance But a calm admiration and reverence of God and seriousness and earnestness of address to him doth not hinder but further apâ—expressions For the use of one constant Form it hath been pleaded that a stranger may thereby the better know how we Worship God and that the people better understand and remember that to which they are continually used But on the other hand variety and newness of matter and words are more apt to quicken the affection and perfect the understanding also especially of the attentive whenas under the constant rehersal of one thing the faculties grow flat and dull Besides in the use of this liberty and variety the Prayer being ordinarily the same for substance in the main the vulgar apprehension and memory is help'd by the sameness of the main substance and scope and the affections are raised and the understanding further edified by that which is new in the frame and method and particular matter and the peoples more particular variable concernments are provided for by a more peculiar accommodation and respect thereto as occasions vary And by the received doctrine of Faith a stranger may be sufficiently ascertain'd of the substance of the Worship to be celebrated For a Doctrine of a Church governs its Worship and it is well known that one the same tenor thereof will pass through the several congregations of a nation that are not confined to a stinted Form yet combined in the same faith and order And when all is said that management and performance of this Service is the best that is most effectual to make the Comers thereunto more perfect in knowledge more devout and zealous towards God more pious and blameless in their conversation and every way more perfect in the divine life and it will be so acknowledged by them that are discerning and serious in the things of God But to conciliate the minds of men diversly affected in this matter and to prevent the inconveniencies and to obtain the good of either way a prescribed Form and a free Prayer will do best together in reference to the Churches peace and edification CHAP. VI. The right Administration of Ecclesiastical discipline THe Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the mysteries of God are Pastors of the Church and Pastoral authority includes both teaching and ruling and implies the peoples subjection in the Lord to their Doctrine and discipline To bereave the Church of discipline is to leave it unfurnished of that means which is necessary to the preservation of all orderly Socities of mankind It is to turn the Garden of the Lord by plucking up the fence thereof into a Common or Wilderness The power intrinsecal to this Office is not secular and coercive by temporal penalties but purely Spiritual which is in the name of Christ and by authority from him the chief Pastor to watch over the Flock to encourage them that live conformably to the Gospel by the consolations thereof and to warn them that walk disorderly and if any continue obstinate therein to declare them unworthy of Church-Communion and Christian converse and to require the faithful to have no fellowship with them to the intent that they may be humbled and reformed As the Discipline of all Societies is to be regulated by their true interest and and chief scope so is this of the Church of God Now the Christian Church looks mainly to the honour of Christ and the glory of Gods grace in him and to the Salvation of men for which ends it was ordained And consequently its true interest lies in the conservation and augmentation of true Christianity or the power of godliness but that Church interest which is elsewhere fixed and levelled to an other mark appertains to a carnal and worldly State set up in the room and pretence of this Spiritual Society The Churches true and proper excellency lies not in worldly splendor opulency and power nor in outward rites and formal unity nor in the stability and amplitude of a meer external State but in the inward light and life in the unfained faith and love in the purity and Spiritual unity of believers and in the security and advancement of this internal State and of the external State in order to the internal Wherefore the right end of discipline is not to promote temporal glory and opinions and formalities thereunto subservient but the Apostolick faith and worship and the regeneration of the professors thereof and their sincere devotion Godly unity Sobriety Righteousness Brotherly-kindness and common Charity and all the vital parts of Christianity and to keep and cast out Heresie Superstition Profaness Unrighteousness and all wicked error and practice that tends to frustrate the designs of Christs Gospel as also to prevent and remedy the causless tearing and renting of Churches and those alienations and animosities among Christians that proceed only from the wills and lusts of men And the management hereof to this right end is of far greater consequence than any scrupulosity or preciseness about its external form and order Nay if an external order could be proved to be primitive and Apostolical and were perverted and abused to inforce corrupt doctrines scandalous and insnaring inventions and impositions and in a Ceremonial strictness to indulge real profaness and discourage true Godliness it were no other then the mystery of a carnal state under a Spiritual name having a form of godliness but denying and suppressing the power thereof The right end of Discipline being such as hath been declared it follows that its proper work is to incourage Godliness and to disgrace open sin Accordingly being rightly managed it admonisheth the unruly casts out the obstinate and restores the penitent About these things it is active watchfull and vigorous What severity it hath it exerciseth in correcting real scandals and gross breaches of Gods Law and in maintaining the Churches peace against those that cause divisions and offences contrary to the Doctrine which we have received that is the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles But it careth little for those matters wherein the life and power of Religion and the Churches peace and edification is unconcerned Much less doth it seek to quench godly zeal and to hinder the necessary means of the increase of true godliness or to afflict peaceable and pious Christians by any needless rigors CHAP. VII Religious Family-government IN the time of the Law the solemn Dedication of houses was in use the Solemnity expressing that holy exercises should be performed in it and that the houshold should be
there is a real hazard of a greater mischief and in hasty attempts of changes things may be carried on beyond the commendable end designed even to its utter ruin For commonly men are not Masters of what they get in such precipitate ways CHAP. XXVIII Considerations tending to a due inlargement and unity in Church-communion AN unhappy kind of controversies about Forms of Divine Worship Ecclesiastical Government and qualification of Church Members hath been the calamity of our times The differences in these points have made a sad breach upon Church unity and divided Brethren of the same Reformed Profession both in affection and interest and have been the occasion of much misery In regard whereof some things that make for an amicable condescention among Brethren and for humble submission to Superiors are here propounded for consideration but not as peremptory resolves Though many or most of them seem to me to carry their own evidence Yet it becomes one who is sensible of human weakness and of his own meaness to write modestly in these points about which there is so great a variety of apprehensions The Communion of Saints is the Communion of the Catholick Church and of particular Christians and Churches one with another as Members thereof and therefore we may not restrain our fellowship to any particular Church or Churches so as to with-hold it from the rest of the Catholick Church Our Communion with the Catholick Church is as well in Religious Worship as in Christian Faith and Life As there is one Faith so one Baptism and one Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ and we being many are one Bread and one Body Though we cannot at once locally communicate with the whole Church in external Worship because it cannot possibly meet in one place yet according to our capacity and opportunity we are so to communicate with the several parts thereof and not unwarrantably withdraw from any and this is a vertual communicating with the whole Church Discipline and Government as to the particular Form thereof hath much more obscurity than the Doctrine of Christian Faith and Life and is much more controverted among the Godly Learned And in more dark and doubtfull points humility charity and good discretion teacheth mutual forbearance In Ecclesiastical Regiment all Church Members are not so concern'd as Church Guides and Pastors are Christ hath not left the affairs of his Kingdom in so loose a posture as to give a liberty of leaving or chusing the Communion of a Church according to our own affections without regard to order A particular visible Church being a Body politick cannot subsist without rules of stable Policy Her censures and judgments ought to be clear certain and uniform or of the same tenor and therefore may not proceed upon such a kind of Evidence as at the most is but conjectural and of variable apprehension Our arbitrary conjecture of an others Regeneration is but an uncertain way of admission to sacred Priviledges wherein no uniform judgment can be held between several Churches nor the several Members of the same Church nor by the same Person with himself at several times For mens apprehensions about the Spiritual Estate of others are exceeding different and inconstant But whether a Person make a credible profession or be competently knowing or grosly ignorant whether he be scandalous or walk orderly is capable of certain evidence and of constant regular proceeding thereupon Let it be considered whether of these two either to proceed with men according to our private hopes and fears about their internal state or according to stated Rules and certain Evidence be the surer way to preserve the Church in Peace and to propagate true Piety Also whether Persons passable by such publick Rules can in Ecclesiastical Tryal be judged to be ungodly or to make a false profession whatsoever our private fears are concerning them And if their Profession be not proved false whether it be not to pass for credible in that Tryal Human Laws and publick Judgments presume them to be good that are not evicted to be bad Private familiarity is at every ones choice but our Church-communion being a publick matter must be Governed by publick and common Rules and not by private will If a Church impose such Laws of her Communion as infer a necessity of doing that which is unlawfull there is a necessity of abstaining from her Communion so far as those unlawfull terms extend Churches mentioned in Scripture had their corruptions in Doctrine Worship and Manners yet the Godly did not separate from them for those corruptions nor were commanded so to do Indeed they are commanded to come out of Babylon which is no other than to separate from Idolatrous Heretical Antichristian Societies Yet in suggesting this I do not encourage to a stated Communion in such Churches as have no other Ministers placed in them than such as are altogether unfit to have the charge of Souls commited to them that is who are unable to teach or teach corruptly either teaching pernicious Doctrine or abusing mishandling and misapplying sound Doctrine to encourage the Ungodly and discourage the Godly For the Scripture bids us beware of blind Guides and false Prophets By continuing in Church-communion we partake not of the Sins of others which we have no power to redress nor are we made guilty by their leaven if it doth not infect us and profane Persons are no more countenanced by our presence than those lewd Priests the Sons of Eli were by the Peoples coming to sacrifice In communicating in holy things we have internal Communion only with the faithfull and as for the meer external Communion it is with those that have as yet an outward standing in Christ till they are cut off by the hand of God or due order of Discipline When a Minister hath done his part to keep off the unworthy in the dspensing of the Sacrament to such he is in a moral sense meerly passive so that their unworthy participation cannot be imputed to him Nor in such an Administration is a practical lie or any falshood uttered For the Sacrament seals the mercy of the Covenant not irrespectively but conditionally and the words of the application must be so understood If we have not power to separate an obstinate scandalous offender from the Church yet the withdrawing of our selves from him is an Excommunication in some degree and the effect thereof is hereby in part obtained When Ministers and People do their duties in their Places without usurpation of further Power than they have warrant for then all will be though not so well as it might yet as it can be at present Of several modes and methods of publick Action Prudence makes choice not always of what is simply best but of that which is most passable if it be not so disorderly as to marr the substance or frustrate the end of an Administration In sacred Adminstrations we may yield without sin to others sinfull weaknesses
And though we may not please them in doing that which is evil yet we may in that which is lawfull but less edifying and so we may let go some good in the manner of performance rather than omit the whole Service Here is indeed a sinfull defect yet not on our part but on theirs who urge the way that is less edifying and refuse the better The exercise of Church Discipline being a means and not the end must be govern'd by rules of Prudence among which this is a chief one that the means must not be asserted so stifly as to indanger or destroy the end The exercise of Spiritual Authority is necessarily more regulated by the determination of the Civil Magistrate in a State that maintains the true Religion than in a State that either persecutes or disregards it If it were supposed that Spiritual Power is radically the same in all Ministers of the Gospel let it be considered whether the exercise of that Power may not be more restrained in some and let forth to a larger extent in others upon prudential grounds provided it be not inlarged in some to an exorbitancy and streightened in others to an extream deficiency Likewise if there be a dissent or doubting about a Superiority or Pre-eminence of Spiritual Power in some distinct Ecclesiastical Office let it be considered how far submission may be yielded to a Power objectively Ecclesiastical but formally Political derived from the Civil Magistrate and seated in Ecclesiastical Persons by Temporal Laws Lastly in reference to things imposed there is a wide difference between a quiet submission and an approving free choice It may be the duty of Subjects to do that which may be the sin of Governors to command For in the same things wherein Governors refuse the better way Subjects may do their parts and choose the best way they can If these considerations or others of the like Catholick tendency be found allowable and will pass among Brethren of different judgments they may prevent and heal many breaches and unite dissenters in the bond of Peace and Love and afford unto such as have been intangled a more free scope and large capacity for publick aims and actions CHAP. XXIX Whether the purity and power of Religion be lessened by amplitude and comprehensiveness A Doubt may arise in this place whether it ben ot safer to make the Church-doors narrow and to keep a strict guard upon the entrance into it and to insist upon the exactest purity that Religion may continue uncorrupt and that the Church be not defiled nor its Interest ravished by Strangers In resolving this doubt I forget not that the way is narrow and the Gate is straight that leadeth unto Life But self-denial and real mortification and a conversation in Heaven and not strictness of opinion in Church Order is this narrow way and straight Gate and our Salvation lies upon purity of heart and life and not upon Church purity Besides God hath made the Gate of the visible Church much wider than the Gate of Heaven and Church Discipline cannot be set in that strictness in which the Doctrine of Salvation is to be preached For Doctrine directly judgeth the heart and requireth truth in the inward parts but Discipline judgeth only the exterior conversation and must be satisfied in the credibility of Profession In walking by rigid rules of Discipline though with an aim to advance purity we may easily shut out those whom Christ hath taken in True Piety may be found in many who retain such things as some Godly Christians judge Erroneous or Superstitious and Godly sincerity may be found in many whom some of greater zeal but too censorious may judge to be but formalists It is not good to neglect sober and serious People though in a lower degree of profession who conform to Gods Ordinances and regard a sound Ministery and shew themselves teachable lest we reject those that would help to uphold and honour Religion more than many who will put themselves forward among the strictest sort but indeed are either carnal projecters or busie bodies or froward and fickle Persons and a stain to the Profession in which they seem to glory This narrowness of Church-communion and other reservedness of some strict Professors tends neither to the increase nor stability of pure Religion Zealous Christians are a kind of good leaven like that in the Gospel Parable which if kept alone is of no efficacy but being diffused will season the whole lump If they sever themselves into distinct visible Societies from the body of a Nation professing the true Religion their vertue cannot spread far but they leaven the whole mass of People by being diffused throughout the whole And then they gain reverence and reputation and by their example profane and dissolute Persons may be convinced and much reformed and among those that walk orderly many may be carried on from common to saving Grace Hereunto may be added this inestimable benefit to wit the apparent hope of the propagation of true Religion to the Generations to come which otherwise being unfixed might in time wear away and fail in such a Nation Furthermore sincere Christians are comparatively but a little Flock and of that little Flock the greater number are of low capacities and very defective in political prudence and if they were wholly left to govern themselves in separated Societies they might easily be insnared into Parties and Breaches and manifold inconveniencies Indeed those of them that are best able to govern themselves are most convinced of the need of publick Government Wherefore it is the security of the faithfull to live under a publick and fixed rule and order and consequently to be imbodied with a Nation if it may be in one way of Communion CHAP. XXX Factious usurpations are destructive to Religions interest REligion is by the maligners of it too often called Faction But the name is not more reproachfull than the thing it self is hurtfull to it And the prudent promoters of it will avoid Factious usurpations and all such ways as would turn to a general greivance But if any number of men in a higher degree of profession should seek the ingrossing of profits and preferments within themselves upon the account of their being Religious and the assuming of such power as cannot be maintained but by injury or disregard really or in appearance offered to all others and should so act in Civil Affairs as if they only were the people and think to do this for the advancement of Religion they would much mistake their way For besides the iniquity of this practice the vanity and weakness of it is manifest The intrinsick and permanent strength of strict Religion must be well considered For that which is adventitious is very mutable and may be soon turn'd against it Occasional advantages may suddenly raise it up to reputation and power among men and as suddenly leave it to sink and fall again Wherefore its friends and followers may
of words Ye have heard brethren as well in your private examination and in the exhortation and holy Lessons taken out of the Gospels and Writings of the Apostles of what dignity and how great importance this Office is whereto ye are called that is to say the Messengers the Watchmen the PASTORS and Stewards of the Lord to teach to premonish to feed to provide for the Lords Family I mention my Ordination according to the Episcopal Form because it is of greatest esteem with them to whom this Representation is more especially tendred Nevertheless I own the validity of Presbyterial Ordination and judge that Ministers so Ordained may make the same defence for exercising the Ministery in the same case that is here represented Christ is the Author and the only proper Giver of this Office and though he give it by the mediation of men yet not by them as giving the Office but as instruments of the designation or of the solemn investiture of the Person to whom he gives it As the King is the immediate Giver of the power of a Mayor in a Town Corporate when he gives it by the Mediation of Electors and certain Officers only as instruments of the designation or of the solemn investiture of the Person I am not conscious of disabling my self to the Sacred Ministrations that belong to the Office of a Presbyter by any Opinion or Practice that may render me unfit for the same Touching which matter I humbly offer my self to the tryal of my Superiors to be made according to Gods Word Nothing necessary to authorize me to those Ministrations is wanting that I know of I am Christs Commissioned Officer and I do not find that he hath revoked the authority which I have received from him And without the warrant of his Law no man can take it from me Nor do I find that the nature of this Office or the declared will of Christ requires that it be exercised no otherwise than in subordination to a Disocesan Bishop That I do not exercise the Ministery under the regulation of the Bishop of the Diocess and in other circumstances according to the present established Order the cause is not in me who am ready to submit thereunto but a bar is laid against me by the injunction of some terms in the lawfulness whereof I am not satisfied whereof I am ready to give an account when it is required I do not understand that I am under any Oath or Promise to exercise the Ministery no otherwise than in subordination to the Bishop or the Ordinary of the Place The promise made at my Ordination to obey my Ordinary and other chief Ministers to whom the government and charge over me is committed concerns me only as a Presbyter standing in relation to the Bishop or Ordinary as one of the Clergy of the Diocess or other peculiar Jurisdiction in which relation I do not now stand being cast out and made uncapable thereof Moreover in whatsoever capacity I now stand the said Promise must be understood either limitedly or without limitation If limitedly as in things lawfull and honest as I conceive it ought to be understood then I am not bound by it in the present case For it is not lawfull nor honest for me to comply with the now injoyned Conformity against my conscience or in case of such necessitated non-compliance to desist from the Ministery that I have received in the Lord. If it be understood without limitation it is a sinfull promise in the matter thereof and thereupon void Absolute and unlimited obedience to man may not be promised Let it be considered also that the objected promise could not bind me to more than the Conformity then required But since my Ordination and Promise then made the state of Conformity hath been much altered by the injunction of more and to me harder terms than formerly were injoyned When I was Ordained I thought that the terms then required were such as might be lawfully submitted to But young men such as I then was may be easily drawn to subscribe to things publickly injoyned and so become engaged before they have well considered The Ordainer or Ordainers who designed me to this Office of Christs donation and not theirs could not by any act of theirs lessen it as to its nature or essential state Nor can they derogate from Christs authority over me and the obligation which he hath laid upon me to discharge the Office with which he hath intrusted me That a necessity is laid upon me in my present state to preach the Gospel I am fully perswaded in regard of the necessities of Souls which cry aloud for all the help that can posibly be given by Christs Ministers whether Conformists or Nonconformists The necessary means of their Salvation is more valuable than meer external Order or Uniformity in things accidental I receive the whole Doctrine of Faith and Sacraments according to the Articles of the Church of England and am ready to subscribe the same I have joyned and still am ready to joyn with the legally established Churches in their publick Worship The matter of my sacred Ministrations hath been always consonant to the Doctrine of the Reformed Churches and particularly of the Church of England I meddle not with our present differences but insist on the great and necessary points of Christian Religion I design not the promoting of a severed Party but of meer Christianity or Godliness I am willing to comply with the will of my Superiors as far as is possible with a safe conscience and to return to my Ministerial station in the Established Churches may I be but dispensed with in the injunctions with which my conscience till I be otherwise informed forbids me to comply In the whole of my dissent from the said injunctions I can not be charged with denying any thing essential to Christian Faith and Life or to the constitution of a Church or any of the weightier matters of Religion or with being in any thing inconsistent with good Order and Government My Case as I have sincerely set it forth I humbly represent to the Clemency of my Governours and to the charity equity and â—â—â—â—â—r of all Christs Ministers and People 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 e I design to follow after the things which make for Peace and I hope I am not mistaken in the way to it I. C. FINIS Books lately Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside ONe Hundred of Select Sermons upon several occasions by Tho. Horton D. D. Sermons on the 4th Psal. 42. Psal. 51. and 63. Psal. by Tho. Horton D. D. A Compleat Martyrology both of Foraign and English Martyrs with the Lives of 26 Modern Divines by Sam. Clark A Discourse of Actual Providence by John Collings D. D. An Exposition on the 5 first Chapters of the Revelation of Jesus Christ by Charles Phelpes A Discourse of Grace and Temptation by Tho. Froysall The Revival of Grace Sacramental Reflections on the Death of Christ as Testator A Sacrifice and Curse by John Hurst A Glimps of Eternity to Awaken Sinners and Comfort Saints by Ab. Coley Which is the Church or an Answer to the Question Where was your Church before Luther by Rich. Baxter The Husbandmans Companion or Meditations sutable for Farmers in order to Spiritualize their Employment by Edward Bury Mr. Adams Exposition of the Assemb Catechism showing its Harmony with the Articles and Homilies of the Church of England The present State of New-England with the History of their Wars with the Indies Popery an Enemy to Truth and Civil Government by Jo. Sheldeck Spelling Book for Children by Tho. Lye Principals of Christian Religion with Practical Applications to each Head by Tho. Gouge Almost Christian by Matth. Mead. Godly Mans Ark by Edmund Calamy Heaven and Hell on Earth in a good or bad Conscience by Nath. Vincent Little Catechism for Children with short Histories which may both please and profit them by Nath. Vincent Ark of the Covenant with an Epistle prefixed by John Owen D. D. This Author hath lately Published this Book Intituled The Kingdom of God among men A Tract of the sound state of Religion or that Christianity which is described in the holy Scriptures and of things that make for the security and increase thereof in the World designing its more ample diffusion among professed Christians of all sorts and its surer propagation to future Ages Printed for Tho. Parkhurst
THE KINGDOM OF GOD among Men A TRACT Of the Sound State OF RELIGION Or that Christianity which is described in the Holy Scriptures And of the things that make for the Security and Increase thereof in the World Designing its more ample diffusion among Professed Christians of all Sorts and its surer Propagation to future Ages With the Point of Church-Unity and Schism Discuss'd By JOHN CORBET LONDON Printed for Thomas Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the Lower end of Cheapside 1679. THE PREFACE A Disquisition concerning Religion and the State Ecclesiastical wherein several Parties are vehemently carried divers ways whether right or wrong according to their different interests or apprehensions is apt to stir up jealousie and to meet with prejudice in a high degree and therefore had need be managed as advisedly as sincerely It is humbly craved that the present management thereof may find a favourable reception so far as it hath in it self the evidence of its own Sincerity and Sobriety This Treatise is not framed for a present occasion or any temporary design but insists upon those things that concern the Church universally and perpetually It aims at the advancement of meer Christianity and with respect to the common concernments thereof it leaves the things that are more appropriate to the several Parties and Persuasions to stand or fall It ingageth not in the controversies of these times touching Forms of Church Government but in any Form such depravations or deficiencies are blamed as hinder the Power Purity Unity Stability or amplitude of Religion Nothing prejudicial to Government to the rights of Superiors and Civil Pre-eminences or to Decency Unity and Order in the Church is here suggested Sedition and Faction are evicted to be a contradiction to this Interest which can hold its own only in those ways that make for the common good both of Rulers and Subjects Our design carries no other danger than the more ample diffusion of true Christianity and the power of Godliness among men of all degrees and the surer propagation thereof to future ages Here be some things that are the vitals of Christian Religion and cannot be removed and here be other things of conscientious or prudent Consideration and let these so far pass as they are found clear and cogent I had rather be charged with any defect or weakness than with uncharitableness and therefore am ready to renounce every line and every expression in this Book that cannot stand with true Christian Charity in the utmost extent thereof Let it not be taken amiss that to obviate suspicion or prejudice I declare my self in the things here following I am one aged in the Ministery and by reason of age and experience am not eager for any Party but mellowed with charity towards real Christians of all Parties I have vehemently desired the union of the more moderate Dissenters with the Established Order by reasonable accomodation as for others that remain dissatisfied about such Union yet believe and live as Christians I do as earnestly desire an indulgence for them within such limits as may stand with publick Peace and Safety Though I am cast into the State of Nonconformity yet I am willing to exercise the Ministery under the present Ecclesiastical Government if I were made capable thereof by the relaxation of some injunctions My principle is for a closing with things that are good and laudable in any Established Government and for a bearing with things that are tolerable And the Wisdom of the Governours of the Church will direct them to turn away from such Principles Orders or Practices as tend to the ruine or the great indangering of any Ecclesiastical Polity that retains them whilest the Apostolick Doctrine as it is now Established in the Church of England is maintained THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. THe nature of Christianity and the character of true Christians CHAP. II. Of things pertaining to the sound state of Christian Religion viz. holy Doctrine CHAP. III. The ordering of Divine Worship sutable to the Gospel Dispensation CHAP. IV. The due Dispensation of Gods word or publick Preaching CHAP. V. The due performance of publick Prayer CHAP. VI. The right Administration of Ecclesiastical Discipline CHAP. VII Religious Family-government CHAP. VIII Private mutual Exhortations Pious Discourse and Edifying Conversation CHAP. IX The prevalence of true Religion or real Godliness in the Civil Government of a Nation CHAP. X. Christian Unity and Concord CHAP. XI A good Frame of Ecclesiastical Polity CHAP. XII Of the corrupt state of Religion and first externalness and formality CHAP. XIII The Sectarian and Fanatical degeneration CHAP. XIV Of the way of preserving Religion uncorrupt CHAP. XV. The enmity of the World against real Godliness and the calumnies and reproaches cast upon it considered CHAP. XVI Religions main strength next under the power of God lies in its own intrinsick excellency CHAP. XVII Religion may be advanced by human prudence what ways and methods it cannot admit in order to its advancement CHAP. XVIII The Interest of true Religion lies much in its venerable estimation among men CHAP. XIX The most ample diffusion of the light of knowledge is a sure means of promoting true Religion CHAP. XX. The advantage of human Learning to the same end CHAP. XXI The general civility or common honesty of a Nation makes it more generally receptive of real Christianity or Godliness CHAP. XXII The increase of Religion is promoted by being made as much as may be passable among men CHAP. XXIII The observing of a due latitude in Religion makes for the security and increase thereof CHAP. XXIV The Care and Wisdom of the Church in preventing and curing the evil of Fanatical and Sectarian Error CHAP. XXV The advancement of the sound state of Religion by making it National and the settled Interest of a Nation CHAP. XXVI Of submission to things imposed by Lawfull Authority CHAP. XXVII The surest and safest ways of seeking Reformations CHAP. XXVIII Considerations tending to a due inlargement and unity in Church-Communion CHAP. XXIX Whether the purity and power of Religion be lessened by amplitude and comprehensiveness CHAP. XXX Factious usurpations are destructive to Religions Interest CHAP. XXXI Of leading and following and of Combinations CHAP. XXXII The Wisdom of the Higher Powers in promoting the Religionsness of their People CHAP. XXXIII The Churches true Interest to be pursued by Ecclesiastical Persons The Conclusion A Book Intituled The Interest of England in matter of Religion in Two Parts formerly Published by the same Author PAg. 7. lin 3. read Service pag. 19. l. 11. read whereas pag. 27. l. 24. read So pag. 28. l. 14. read is pag. 29. l. 14. read regardable pag. 31. l. 16. read this ib. l. 18. read apposite pag. 39. l. 14. read is able to make pag. 41. l. 31. read affect pag. 53. l. 19. read For the pag. 59. l. 5. read face of pag. 60. l. 12. read exercises pag. 67. l. 3. read Religions pag. 71. l.
our heads is by custom taken for irreverence and incivility and therefore to be avoided as offensive All matters of necessary decency are in their generals of the Law of nature and in the particulars to be ordered by human prudence All natural expressions of devotion as kneeling and lifting up of the hands and eyes in prayer are allowed by all sorts We call them natural because nature it self teacheth to use them without any positive institution divine or human and a rational man by the meer light of nature is directed to use them yet not without some government and discretion For herein nature it self is subject to some variety and is in part determined and limited by the custom of several ages and countries as for instance in the prostration of the body in the act of adoration in the wearing of Sackcloth and renting of clothes in time of great humiliation which in former ages were sutable and that according to nature but not now adays in regard of the variation of custom And I suppose that in this sense St. Paul speaks against wearing of long hair as contrary to nature But there hath been much controversie about such Ceremonies as contribute nothing to the aforesaid necessary decency and are no natural nor civil and customary expressions of reverence and devotion but are of human institution and of a mystical and meerly instituted signification and made visible stated signs of Gods honour and the immediate expressions of our observance of him and obligation to him and by some supposed to be not meer circumstances but parts of divine Worship and yet more especially if they be designed in their use for that significancy and moral efficacy that belongs to Sacraments and made no less then the Symbals of our Christianity It lies not on me to determine on either side in this controversie nevertheless it is easie to apprehend this that it can be no danger nor dammage to be sparing in those things which being at least doubtfull and unnecessary have turned to endless strife and scandal between those that own the same doctrine of Faith and the same Church Communion Likewise it can do no hurt to reformed Christianity not to insist on that latitude in devised rites of worship that will acquit the greatest part of the Ceremonies used in the Church of Rome from the charge of Superstition and which makes way for the oppressing of the Churches and the sinking of religion under a luggage of unprofitable institutions To make any thing necessary and commanded of God which he hath not commanded and to damn any thing as forbidden by him which he hath left indifferent and to dread left God should not be pleased unless we do somethings which we need not do and lest he should be displeased when we do somethings not forbidden is no doubt the crime of Superstition but it is not the whole extent of that sin For it is no less Superstition to feign God to be pleased with mens vain inventions yea though they be not injoyned or observed as divine precepts and this also is to teach for Doctrines the commandments of men And who are the greater controlers of Gods wisdom and usurpers upon his authority They that fear to do what God hath allowed supposing it to be forbidden or they that presume to add their own inventions for the bettering of his service and make the omission thereof as criminal as the neglect of divine ordinances Doubtless it is a more tolerable Superstition to be over solicitous and scrupulous about the commandments of God than to be over-confident and vehement in the unwarrantable or questionable traditions of men Human devices multiplyed in Gods worship ingender to much vanity and superstition in the zealous observers of them and are apt to extinguish the inward life of Godliness as rank weeds choak the corn and they are commonly made a Cloak to real ungodliness And if some of them were first introduced with pious intention yet they are commonly maintained and multiplied to serve a carnal Interest And they are the more easily entertained and observed because it is easie to the flesh to buy out the inward Service of God and the subjection of the inward man by superficial bodily exercise But the depretiating of these devices serves to pluck off the mask of hypocrisie made up of meer formalities and to invigorate the life and spirit of true Religion To be the Ministration of the Spirit is the excelling glory of the Gospel Ministration wherewith a grave and sober decency and comely ornament doth well accord but excessive gaudiness pompous and theatrical shews various gesticulations and affected postures are vanities too much detracting from its dignity and spiritual Majesty CHAP. IV. The due dispensation of Gods word WHen our Lord Jesus ascended up on high he gave gifts unto men appointing and furnishing Spiritual Officers for the Service of his Kingdom some extraordinary and temporary as Apostles Prophets Evangelists others ordinary and successively perpetual as Pastors and Teachers Wherefore the interest of Christianity lies much in a right Gospel Ministery which is sutable and serviceable to our Lords design and the ends of his Gospel And it is a Ministery which is pure and uncorrupt dispensing the truth as it is in Jesus whereby men are brought to sound faith and true holiness which is vigorous and powerful apt to take hold of the conscience and reach the heart which is sollicitous and laborious travelling in birth till Christ be formed in the hearers and the Man-child the new creature be born into the world which is assiduous and instant in preaching the word by instruction reproof and comfort that as much as in it lies it may present every man perfect in Christ which comes with full Scripture evidence and cogent reason with solid matter in stile and language not negligent much less undecent yet not too curious and elaborate but free vehement grave serious and fit for the work in hand which is not to tickle ear but to break open the heart which is exemplary in faith purity charity self-denial and contempt of the world and finally which is not mercenary but naturally cares for the state of the flock and accommodates it self thereunto as its great charge and chief concern And who is sufficient for these things saith the great Apostle Doubtless much wisdom and grace is needfull in an able Minister of the new Testament and a Workman that needs not to be ashamed It being pre-supposed that he holds fast the form of Sound words and that he is throughly instructed in the mystery of Godliness which he is to impart to others in the first place his prudence will be concerned for the judicious management of the dispensation committed to him A prudent dispenser of the word will take care to deliver nothing to others but what is very intelligible to himself and whereof he can make good sense and render a reason to those that ask it He doth not
Their Union and Fellowship being chiefly mystical and invisible their Unity is far greater than what outwardly appears to the World and sometimes than what themselves can discern among themselves in particular by reason of many inferior yet very disquieting differences and discords Nevertheless it behoves them to provide that it might appear as much as may be what it is indeed and that it be conspicuous and illustrious in the sight of Men by their walking in love and peace Unity is the Churches strength and beauty the honour of the Faithfull and an argument for the certainty of their most holy Faith It makes Religion lovely and draws forth blessing praise from the Beholders of it and wins the World to a love and reverence of that Piety which makes the Professors of it to live in brotherly kindness and mutual charity But Division is the Church's weakness and deformity the reproach of Christians and a scandal against Christianity and an objection put into the mouths of Infidels against the Faith and an occasion of stumbling unto many In the present divided state of Religion each Party is apt to appropriate Godliness to themselves or at least to carry it towards others as if they did so And they that are loudest in accusing Dissenters of uncharitableness in this kind are themselves as uncharitable as any others It is true that God hath a peculiar People distinguished from all others by a peculiar Character but it is not confined to any Party of this or that Persuasion or Denomination that is narrower than meer Christianity And all true Christians are to receive one an other as God hath received them Indeed the best Christians are to be best esteemed and their fellowship is most desired But if they should be severed from the universality and in a strict combination set up as divided Party it tends to the Churches Ruine For a Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand and if the nobler parts of the Body forsake the rest the whole must needs die Christian Concord doth not signifie an aggregation of things inconsistent as the fellowship of righteousness with unrighteousness the communion of light with darkness the concord of Christ with Belial To set up Unity against Piety is a conspiracy against Christ who is King of righteousness and to pretend Piety against Unity is to oppose Christ the Prince of Peace whose Kingdom is the Reign of Love in the Soul Holiness and Peace must kiss each other and as inseperable Companions walk together It is the unity of the Spirit we are charged to keep in the bond of Peace But concord in any external Order without fellowship in the Divine Life is not the unity of the Spirit which is to partake of the same new nature and to walk together in the same holy way This is far more excellent than the greatest compliance in matters of meer external order and consequently much more regardable in our estimation and reception of Persons Though to meet in one place be not of so great importance as to be joyned in one Spirit yet it must not be counted a small matter The unity of Faith and Love is much concern'd in the unity of Church Communion it will be a matter of some difficulty for them to live together in Love whom one Church cannot hold Church divisions commonly divide affections and draw men into Parties and divided Interests and make them seek to strengthen their own Party by weakening all others to the great dammage of true Religion in general For which cause the unchurching of Churches and renouncing of Communion with them that are sound in the Doctrine of Faith and Sacrament and in the substance of Divine Worship should be dreaded by all sober Christians yea all unnecessary distances should be avoided least they lead to greater alienations and direct enmities and oppositions Those Churches that cannot hold local communion one with another by reason of differences that destroy not the essentials of Christianity should yet maintain a dear and tender Christian love one to another and profess their owning of each other as Churches of Jesus Christ and should agree together upon certain just and equal Rules for the management of their unavoidable differences so as may least prejudice charity and common good and least harden the ungodly and grieve the weak or dishonour God or hinder the success of common great and necessary truths upon the Souls of men amicably promoting the common cause of Christianity and every part thereof in which they are agreed and opening their disagreements to the People as little as they can Schism is an unwarrantable separation from or division in a Church and without controversie it is a heinous sin and to be detested both for its exceeding sinfulness and wofull consequents But it hath been so disguised and the odious name hath been so confusedly cast abroad and so unreasonably and maliciously misapplied that it is too slightly thought of where it should be sadly laid to heart For it is common with the strongest Party be it right or wrong to call themselves the Church and to have no better name for others than Schismaticks And so the reproach is but contemned by them that suffer it and the sin it self is too little feared on all sides But it is not a Temporal Law nor Secular Power nor any prevalence of Strength or Interest that makes a Church and none of these things will excuse them from Schism that act uncharitably against their Brethren and obstruct the progress of the Gospel and the increase of Godliness Nor are they forthwith to be counted Schismaticks who cannot in all points observe the Commandments of men and cannot neglect to yield their help to the saving of Souls that would otherwise want due means of Salvation when God hath called them to that Service with a woe unto them if they Preach not the Gospel For as much as all must dread the guilt of Schism truly so called let it be well considered that Ecclesiastical Superiors are as much concerned to take heed of Schismatical impositions as the People are to shun Schismatical Recusancy and Disobedience As well the Pastors Wisdom as the Peoples due submission is here importunately called for When Superiors know how to Command and Inferiors how to Obey things will go as well as may be hoped for in this our imperfect state here upon Earth As the Peace of a corrupt state of Religion is best assured by suppressing all conscientious inquiries into its Decrees so the Peace of the true Church and of the sound state of Religion is most secured by the most perfect exercise of sound Judgment and upright Conscience in all its adherents That Church that claims to her self an infallibility or challenges and obtains from her partakers an implicit Faith in her determinations without further enquiry needs not fear the breaking of the bond of her Peace if she multiply constitutions and impose any devised Doctrines and Ordinances sutable to
her own estate On the other hand it is most evident that a Rational Conscientious and truly Pious Concord among such Christians as know and care what they believe can never be procured without avoiding the imposition of things unwritten and unnecessary in which it is morally impossible for men of sound faith and good conscience generally to agree But when necessary things only are injoyned their weight and truth will soon be known and owned of all honest minds or at least are most likely so to be and much sooner and easier than the weight and truth of little and doubtfull things and by this means they would more easily move with joynt consent in one Godly order the matters of their difference being before hand taken out of the way This moderate course being held the union of unseigned faith and love will become a sure foundation of true Christian concord with sound judgment and good conscience and do that for the suppressing of Schism in the right state of Christianity which implicit faith and blind obedience doth in false corrupt and Antichristian State Here it is mainly requisite that those things that most promote or hinder the New birth and Spiritual life be by Pastors and people universally most regarded and those that make little for or against the same be looked upon as of little moment And the truth is when the greatest and weightiest matters are duely prized and most contended for contentions about little things will soon expire And if this course be taken hypocrites will lose their advantages of seeming Religious by zeal for those things wherein Religion doth not consist and carnal designs and interests that now rend the Churches and trouble all things would be defeated and abandoned Moreover to maintain peace they that Rule had need consider what mistakes and weaknesses are competible to true Believers and sometimes to the best and choicest of them that they might not bear too hard upon them And they that are ruled must consider that the best polity or Constitution so far as it is of mans regulating hath defects and inconveniences and affairs will be complicated and therefore they must not be too unyielding but bear with what is tolerable and not easily remediable though they may not in any wise do a sinfull act or omit a duty in the season of it For by want of such forbearance they may sooner destroy the good part than mend what is amiss It is not seldom in such cases that men seek remedies that prove worse than the disease If the healing of breaches require an yielding or receding from what hath been stood upon it should be on that part where equity and necessity declares it should be It is not so easie for every Christian to resolve what is right in many opinions and usages as for those in power to omit the inforcing of them Unnecessary injunctions may easier be parted with than mens judgments can be altered or their doubting consciences well setled This tenderness and forbearance is no lessoning of the Church ' s honour and power And a little diversity iâ— little things cannot rationally move derisiâ—… in the irreligious nor justly give scandal to any But there be things of that slightness that an over-precise and importunate unifoâ— mity in them may occasion contempt and suspition of hypocrisie or superstitious folly Unity of faith and life is the glory of the trâ—… Church and uniformity in external order is 〈◊〉 be indeavored with Sobriety and is best effecteâ— by cutting off superfluous institutions and lay ing no greater burden on the faithfull thaâ— things necessary And this pacifick state may bâ— as well hoped as wished for if the Guides oâ— the Church would seek the things of Christ morâ— than their own things But alas the usurpations and impositions oâ— proud and selfish men even in pretence oâ— suppressing Schism have hindred Christiaâ— people from uniting in the true center of unity which is Jesus Christ as set forth in the doctrinâ— of the Apostles and Prophets and which 〈◊〉 the same yesterday and to day and for ever In deed they that prevail by power to advancâ— their own devised ways and crush Disenters may make a desolation and then call it peace anâ— union but it is not the peace of Christs Kingdoâ—… Divisions are caused by men of corrupâ— minds and partly by the weakness of Good men ascribing too much to their own apprehen sions and inclinations and not considering thâ— condition of others as their own nor minding the necessity and usefulness of lawfull compliance or of mutual forbearance and discention CHAP. XI A good frame of Ecclesiastical Polity THe promoting of true Christianity and all the things before named pertaining to the sound state of Religion depends much upon a good frame of Ecclesiastical polity Undoubtedly our Lord Jesus Christ hath appointed Spiritual Officers to guide and rule his Church and in the government thereof there be some things of divine right and unalterable by the will of man and there be many things necessary to the support and due managment thereof that are of humane determination as to the particulars Both kinds are liable to depravation and great abuse Things of divine right may be corruptly managed and perverted to wrong ends And things of mans appointment are sometimes not only ill managed but ill ordained as being wholly incongruous and perhaps pernicious to the right ends of goverment Now a good polity is the whole compages of things laid together in the fabrick of the Church fitted and directed to promote the Christian life or the power of Godliness and to prevent or remedy the decay thereof And the more notably and powerfully conducible it is to this end it is by so much the more excellent According to this rule it hath most regard for sincere Christians and insists most upon their incouragement and the increase of their number and it makes all its external orders and interests subservient to the prosperity of the Church regenerate The order wherein it excells is an orderly management of those things which are of divine Command in matter of Doctrine Worship Discipline and Conversation in such manner as is most effectual for the obtaining of their ends by such necessary rules of Prudence as are requisite in all Human actions It prefers purity and spirituality before external pomp though it neglects not those necessary decencies and Ornaments that should attend the Service of God according to the awfull regard that is to be had thereto and the reverend demeanor to be used therein It provides able Ministers of the Gospel and that every Pastor be resident with his own Flock and that he duly feed them and labour in the Word and Doctrine and that the People be not left in the hands of a Mercenary procured at the cheapest rate It provides by a liberal maintenance worthy endowments and priviledges for that meet support and honour of the ministery which is requisit to preserve the
and carnall interests to false ways and vain inventions For which cause it behooves the zealous Religionist to be carefull even to jealousie that he be not imposed upon by himself or others and in this care heartily and intirely to resign and conform himself to the Law of God By such resignation and conformity he secures his own Soul and what in him lies the Sound state of Religion It is here acknowledged that what is written in nature is Gods Law as well as what is written in Scripture and that natural Revelation as well as supernatural is Divine and whatsoever is known of God by the Light of nature in the matter of Religious Worship is to be received as well as that which is known by the Light of Scripture and the divine Goodness is to be owned in both though in the latter it hath appeared more abundantly because therein is given us a full instruction in all things pertaining to Gods Kingdom which in the other is not given For the great mysteries of the Gospel could not be known by nature and in things that could be known thereby the light is but weak and glimmering and not easily able to fix the heart therein not so much for want of evidence in the object as from the pravity of our mind reason being laid asleep and all our faculties being sunk into the brutish life What is the utmost capacity of that light among the Heathens is hard for us to define and though it be harsh to determine that they were all utterly and universally forsaken of God yet it is evident both by Scripture and the lives of the Gentiles that Gentilism was a very forlorn state This is enough to shew the high favour of God toward the Church in supernatural Revelation by which he hath not only instructed us in things supernatural not otherwise to be known in this life but also more perfectly in the Laws of nature now transcribed into the Books of the Old and New Testament so that there is nothing of Religion or Morality that may not be found therein Besides the Law of God written in Nature and Scripture what certain and stable rule of Doctrine Worship Discipline and Conversation hath the Church to walk by that there can be no certainty or consent in meer or all Tradition or in the judgment of the ancient Fathers or the ancient practice of the Catholick Church is so evident as needs no confirmation and there can be no acquiescence or accord in the determinations of any visible universal Supream Power For whereas all Christians acknowledge the Divine Authority of the Scripture they neither do nor ever did nor will unanimously acknowledge that there is such a Power in being And the main Body of them that maintain'd such a Catholick Supremacy cannot agree in what subject the same resides whether in the Pope or a General Council And as several Popes so have several Councils of equal amplitude and authority often crossed one another and consequently some of both kinds must needs have erred And it still remains a controversie undeterminable which Councils are to be received and which to be rejected unless the whole Christian World hitherto disagreeing herein will be bound up by the resolves of one Party that can bring no better proof than their own pretended infallibility To all which may be added that an Oecumenical Council truly so called or a Representative of the universal Church was never yet congregated Wherefore let the Faithfull rest upon the old right foundation the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles whose infallibility is unquestionable Such being the fulness and perfection of holy Scripture which was given by Divine inspiration and that for this end that the man of God might be perfect throughly furnished unto all good works it must needs be safest in Divine matters not to be venturous without its warrant They best secure themselves from error who keep to that rule which is both perfect and infallible some pretending to lay open the folly of the way which they call puritanism affirm that the mystery thereof lies in this principle that nothing ought to be Established in the Worship of God but what is authorized from the Word of God Indeed there are those of that denomination who disallow whatsoever instituted Worship is not so authorized but they are not so ignorant as to suppose that all particular circumstances belonging to Divine Worship which admit of endless variation are defined in the Word of God such as are those natural and civil circumstances without which actions are not performable But they suppose a wide difference between these matters such as time place method furniture c. and those ordinances of Religion which they take for parts of Worship as being made direct and immediate signs of honour given to God by their use And all of this kind some do judge or at least suspect to be unlawfull that are not of Gods appointment My design obligeth me to shun the intangling of this Discourse with controversie and therefore I write not either for or against the lawfulness of such uncommanded Worship But it is sufficient for me to shew that the purity of Religion is more safe by acquiescence in that only which God hath prescribed than by addition of new ordinances of Worship devised by men who even the best of them may too easily deviate from the truth And who knows not that too much yielding to mens devised Forms and Rights which had a shew of Wisdom made way for the departure of so great a part of Christendom from the primitive Christianity All duties of the Law of nature may be clearly proved from Scripture though the particular instances thereof that are innumerable and their infinitely variable circumstances cannot be there expressed As for instituted Worship it is unquestionable that there is no such defect in those parts thereof that are of Divine authority as needs to be made up by the human addition of other new parts And it is granted on all hands that there are things meerly circumstantial belonging to it which are necessary in general but in particular not determined of God and must be ordered by the light of nature and human prudence according to the general rules of Gods word None that know what they say in magnifying the written Word will teach the People not to rely upon impartial reason which no true Revelation did ever contradict But we are so conscious of the weakness of human understanding that in case of any seeming contrariety between Scripture and Reason not to give the Scripture the preeminence we know is most unreasonable Is Scripture liable to be perverted so is Reason Is there obscurity and difficulty in the interpretation of Scripture so in human ratiocinations much more Whosoever can apprehend right reason can rationally apprehend Gods written word which is its own interpreter and whose authentick interpretation of it self we are inabled to discern by rational inferences and deductions
chiefest point thereof being in the essentials and weighty matters of Christian Faith and Life the highest violation thereof and the chiefest point of Schism lies in denying or enormously violating the said essentials or weighty matters And it is directly a violation of the Unity of the Catholick Church and not of particular Churches only Not only particular Persons but Churches yea a large combination of Churches bearing the Christian name may in their Doctrine Worship and other avowed Practice greatly violate the essentials or very weighty matters of Christian Faith and Life and be found guilty of the most enormous breach of Unity It is no Schism to withdraw or depart from any the largest combination or collective body of Churches though for their amplitude they presume to stile their combination the Catholick Church that maintain and avow any Doctrine or Practice which directly or by near and palpable consequence overthrows the said essentials The next point of external Unity being about the essentials and integrals of Church state the Sacraments and other publick Worship the Ministery and Discipline of the Church considered as of Christs institution the next chief point of Schism is the breach hereof And this may be either against the Catholick or a particular Church Of such Schism against the state of the Catholick Church there are these instances 1. When any one part of professed Christians how numerous soever combined by any other terms of Catholick Unity than what Christ hath made account themselves the only Catholick Church excluding all Persons and Churches that are not of their combination 2. When a false Catholick Unity is devised or contended for viz. a devised Unity of Government for the Catholick Church under one terrene Head personal or collective assuming a proper governing power over all Christians upon the face of the whole Earth 3. When there is an utter disowning of most of the true visible Churches in the World as having no true Church state no not the essentials thereof and an utter breaking off from communion with them accordingly Of Schism against a particular Church in point of its Church state there be these instances 1. The renouncing of a true Church as no Church although it be much corrupted much more if it be a purer Church though somewhat faulty 2. An utter refusing of all acts of communion with a true Church when we may have communion with it either in whole or in part without our personal sin of commission or omission 3. The causing of any Divisions or Distempers in the state or frame of a true Church contrary to the Unity of the Spirit But it is no Schism to disown a corrupt frame of Polity supervenient to the essentials and integrals of Church state in any particular Church or combination of Churches like a leprosie in the Body that doth grosly deprave them and in great part frustrate the ends of their constitution The last and lowest point of external Unity lying in the accidental modes of Religion and matters of meer order extrinsick to the essentials and integrals of Church-State the violation thereof is the least and lowest point of Schism I mean in it self considered and not in such aggravating circumstances as it may be in Those accidental Forms and Orders of Religion which are necessary in genere but left in specie to human determination are allowed of God when they are determined according to prudence and charity for Peace and Edification and accordingly they are to be submitted to Consequently it is one point of Schism to make a Division from or in a Church upon the accountal of accident Forms and Orders so determined according to Gods allowance But if any of the accidentals be unlawfull and the maintaining or practicing thereof be imposed upon us as the terms of our communion it is no Schism but Duty to abstain from communion in that case For explicitly and personally to own errors and corruptions even in smaller points is evil in it self which must not be committed that good may come In this case not he that withdraws but he that imposes causeth the Division And this holds of things sinfull either in themselves or by just consequence And herein he that is to act is to discern and judge for his own practice whether the things imposed be such For Gods Law supposeth us rational creatures able to discern its meaning and to apply it for the regulating of our own actions else the Law were given us in vain Submission and reverence towards Superiors obligeth no man to resign his understanding to their determinations or in compliance with them to violate his own conscience Persons meek humble peaceable and throughly conscientious and of competent judgment may not be able by their diligent and impartial search to see the lawfulness of things injoyned and t is a hard case if they should thereupon be declared contumacious Seeing there be several points of Unity the valuation whereof is to be made according to their different value mens judgment and estimation of Unity and Schism is very preposterous who lay the greatest stress on those points that are of least moment and raise things of the lowest rank to the highest in their valuation and set light by things of the greatest moment and highest value as indeed they do who set light by soundness of Faith and holiness of Life and consciencious observance of Divine institutions where there is not also unanimity and uniformity in unscriptural Doctrines and human ceremonies And they that make such an estimate of things and deal with Ministers accordingly do therein little advance the Unity of the Spirit or indeavour to keep it in the bond of Peace Seeing the word of God is the rule of Church Unity a breach is made upon it when other bounds thereof are set than this rule allows An instance hereof is the devising of other terms of Church-communion and Ministerial liberty than God hath commanded or allowed in his Word to be made the terms thereof Also any casting or keeping out of the Church or Ministery such as Gods Word doth not exclude from either but signifies to be qualified and called thereunto God doth not allow on the part of the Imposer such tearms of Church communion or Ministerial station as are neither Scriptural nor necessary to Peace and Edification nor are any part of that necessary order and decency without which the Service of God would be undecent nor are in any regard so necessary but that they may be dispensed with for a greater benefit and the avoiding of a greater mischief And they are found guilty of Schism that urge such unscriptural and unnecessary things unto a breach in the Church Such Imposers are not only an occasion of the breach that follows but a culpable cause thereof because they impose without and against Christs warrant who will not have his Church to be burdened nor the consciences of his Servants intangled with things unnecessary Nevertheless such unscriptural or