a one should tell them That it will seem unequal to deny a Toleration to them and grant it unto others that are here pleaded for which is in effect to say They have as good reason to expect an Indulgence from this State as others that maintain the Doctrine of the Church of England yea such as communicate in her publike Worship Is there no better way of exalting Prelacy and disgracing its supposed Adversaries then by this Reproach and Damage done to the whole Protestant Profession Yea he so far extenuates the guilt of Papists and brings it down so low as to make it common to all other Sects In which one would think he should have been more wary who in one place stretcheth the notion of Sect so far as to make its reason to lye in being different from the Established Form of Church Government Now for matter of practice he imputes the same guilt to all other Sects And if the Papists saith he have any Doctrines which countenance those Practises that is to be accounted as the issue of their insolency in their own greatness And he implies That it is onely the want of strength that other Sects are not so bad as they for such kind of Doctrine as well as Practice Such passages falling from a Protestants Pen may do the Papists better service than their late Apology But why doth he say If the Papists have any such Doctrines Doth he not know they have The Church of England was assured of it when concerning the Adherents of Rome she used this expression in a publike form of Prayer Whose Religion is Rebellion and whose Faith is Faction We wish their eyes were open who cannot see more permanent and effectual causes of the aforesaid Crimes peculiar to that Religion and rooted in the Principles thereof The evidence hereof given in the former Discourse is not needful to be rehersed in this place This Author as others that oppose the wayes of Amity and Peace loves to grate upon a string that sounds harsh To renew the remembrance of the late Warr. Those distracted Times are the great Storehouse and Armory out of which such men do fetch their Weapons of offence and the great Strong-hold unto which they always retreat when they are vanquished by the force of Reason and then they think they are safe though therein they contradict the true intent of the Act of Oblivion Some of those that now so importunately urge the Injury and Tyranny of those Times did then sufâ—iciently comply with Usurpers and left Episcopacy to sink or swim and did partake of the chiefest Favours and Preferments that were then conferred And on the other hand such as they upbraid and are now Sufferers did as little comply with those that subverted the Government and did as zealously appear for the rescue of our late Sovereign and for the restitution of His present Majesty as any sort of men in the Realm But to intermeddle in the Differences of those Times and to repeat Odious Matters and to use Recriminations that will disturb the minds of men and tend to a perpetual Mischief is aliene from and opposite unto my Pacifick Endeavours As for his charging the Nonconformists with certain Doctrines and Positions by him there mentioned which I know none that maintains and other Accusations and Reports relating to the time of the Warr the Truth or Falshood the Equity or Iniquity the Candor or Disingenuity of his Testimony in those things is left to the judgment of the Righteous God and of Impartial Men. SECT IX Whether their Inconformity be Conscientious or Wilful ANother part of the Proceeding is very Unrighteous and Presumptuous The Dissenting Ministers appeal to God That they dare not Conform for Conscience sake This Author hence inferrs The force of the Argument is There is a Necessity of Toleration because they Will not conform Is a Cannot for Conscience sake of no more force than a bare Will not But who best knows their hearts themselves or their Adversaries He would make the world believe that not Conscience but Obstinacy and Faction is the cause of their holding out and that the greatest part were trapann'd into Nonconformity That trifling story of their being trapann'd is not worthy of serious discourse It is so evident as not to be denied That about the time the Act of Uniformity was to be put in practice there were motions and overtures of Indulgence from the King and some of the great Officers of State who were known to have high affection and esteem for the Church of England yet did approve and promote those Overtures as the best Expedient for the setling of this Church and Kingdom But to let that pass Can men of Understanding and Candor think that so many serious persons who as well as others may be thought to love themselves their Families and Relations should continue such egregiously obstinate Fools as to refuse the Comforts of their Temporal Being for a Humor and remain in a state of Deprivation into which they had been meerly trapann'd As for the objected unprofitableness of their returning how doth it appear What hinders their Capacity of gaining Benefices yea and Dignities if they could Conform Why should they not find as good acceptation as others in their Preaching and Conversation It may be they would enter too fast for the good liking of some into those Preferments who therefore would set such Barrs against them as they should not be able to break thorough SECT X. Of their peaceable Inclinations and readiness to be satisfied IN the late Times of Usurpation there were apparent predispositions in this sort of men to Peace and Concord The longing desire and expectation that was in them as much as in any others of a National Settlement and general Composure did accelerate His Majesty's Peaceable Restauration Surely they were not so stupid as to imagine that great Turn of Affairs without the thoughts of their own yeilding and such as they hoped would be effectual with those of the other Perswasion Their early and ready Overtures of Reconciliation which are publikely made known will testifie their Moderation to the present and future Ages Their Offers of Acquiescing in Episcopacy Regulated and the Liturgy Reformed was on their part a good advance towards Union His Majesty hath given this Testimony of them in His Declaration When We were in Holland We were attended by many Grave and Learned Ministers from hence who were looked upon as the most able and principal Assertors of the Presbyterian Opinions with whom We had as much Conference as the multitude of Affairs which were then upon Vs would permit Vs to have and to Our great Satisfaction and Comfort found them persons full of Affection to Vs of Zeal for the Peace of the Church and State and neither Enemies as they had been given out to he to Episcopacy or Liturgy but modestly to desire such alterations as without shaking Foundations might best allay the present Distempers which
rightly comprehended this matter in His Declaration concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs where He saith We are the rather induced to take this upon Vs that is to give some determination to the matters in difference by finding upon a full Conference that we have had with the Learned men of several Perswasions That the Mischiefs under which both Church and State do at present suffer do not result from any formed Doctrine or Conclusion which either Party maintains or avows but from the Passion Appetite and Interest of particular persons which contract greater prejudice to each other by those Affections than would naturally arise from their Opinions It is apparent that the avowed Doctrines on either side could not set the Parties at this distance if their Spirits and Interests were reconciled SECT III. What may be esteemed a good Constitution of the State Ecclesiastical AS concerning the publike Order it imports exceedingly to discern and make a difference between things desirable but morally impossible or extreamly improbable and things necessary and attainable Perfect unanimity about matters of Religion and a harmony of Opinion in all Theological Truths is very desirable but it was never yet found in any Age of the World among those that owned the same Religion and consequently it cannot be necessary in all those that ought to be comprehended in the same Church or Religious Communion For which cause a precise Uniformity in matters of meer Opinion will hardly ever pass with general satisfaction Neither is it of that importance that some make it to be for Peace and Edification There is another thing not onely desirable but the indispensable duty of all particular persons which is Brotherly Love among all that receive the common Faith once given to the Saints This is of far greater consequence than the former and more largely attainable because it is a Catholick Disposition and the right Spirit of true Christianity and indeed the failing hereof is lamentable and reproachful Howbeit this excellent Christian Vertue is commonly much interrupted and impaired in many by prejudicate Opinions and depraved Affections and it must not be expected but that Animosities and Jealousies may remain between men of different Perswasions by reason of the corruption of man's nature and the infirmities of the best of men Aud therefore the foundation of a solid National Settlement must not and need not be laid in mens good dispositions and inclinations For although the distemper of many minds continue yet publike Order and steddy Government is in no wise impossible Things are necessary either as the End or the Means The things here considered that are necessary as the End are The Advancement of the Protestant Religion and the Kingdom of England the Tranquility of Church and State and the Security of all sound Protestants and good Subjects That which is necessary as the Means is the Publike Rule and Standard by which these blessed Ends may be obtained that notwithstanding the remainder of mens Perversness the common high Concerns of Reformed Religion and of this Kingdom be not disturbed impaired or cast back by the Altercations that may chance to arise between men of different private Opinions and different partial Interests The high Importance and Necessity of a stated Rule of such Force and Efficacy evinceth the possibility thereof For so Noble and Necessary Ends cannot be destitute of all possible Means leading thereunto Evil Dispositions and Manners are the rise of Good Laws And Law-makers that are subject to like passions with other men have the Wisdom to limit themselves and others for the Universal Good wherein the good of every Individual is secured The Publike Rule being to be framed to the proportion of the People that are to be setled under it the chief regard must be had to their fixed and unmovable Perswasions and Inclinations lest They should break the Rule or the Rule break them In a Nation whose Active Part is zealous of Religion and able to discern and addicted to discourse the Grounds thereof the Order of Things ought in the first place to be directed to the satisfying of the Just and Reasonable Demands of Conscience which being troubled is a restless thing and then to the outward Incouragements of Piety and Learning and withall to the bridling of Ambition Avarice Faction and all depraved Appetite It must be expected That divers Obliquities and Deficiencies may remain and Troubles will arise but if that which is Wholesom and Good be so predominant as to Master the Evils though not to extinguish them it is to be esteemed a Good Constitution SECT IV. The Comprehensiveness of the Establishment and the Allowance of a just Latitude of Dissents is the best Remedy against Dissentions THere was lately published a Discourse for a due Latitude in Religion by Comprehension Toleration and Connivence directed to this End That the occasions of those Discords which divide the Members and distract the whole Body of the Protestant Profession might cease and that the common Concernments wherein the disagreeing Parties have a large joint Stock in things of greatest moment might be pursued This is encountred with an adverse Discourse which is here to be examined and the state and reason of the aforesaid Latitude is to be further cleared Toleration being commonly understood of the permission of different ways of Religion without the Line of the Approved Way A Discourse of Toleration doth not hit the Discourse of the Religion of England in the main thereof whose chief Design is the Extension of the Established Order and the Moderation therein required and then Toleration is treated of analogically with respect not only to common Charity but to the Safety of the setled Polity It is no less besides the mark to argue from the Mischiefs of a boundless and licentious Toleration against that which is Limited and well Managed and hath for the Subject thereof nothing that is intolerable But if under this Name be comprehended also the Permission of diversity of Opinion in the same Established Order let it be considered Whether any ample Polity can consist without such Permission For it is a thing utterly unknown and seems morally impossible for any numerous Society of Inquiring men to be of the same judgment in all points of Religion And though the Sons of the Church as they are called agree in those points wherein they all differ from the Nonconformists yet they differ among themselves in far weightier Matters and such as have caused great Schisms and have been the subjects of the Debates and Determinations of some Synods in the Reformed Churches Now if Charity among themselves and their appropriate Interest dispose them to this mutual forbearance a more extensive Charity and the common Interest of Reformed Christianity should incline them to a forbearance in those other matters There is yet a greater Error committed about the Subject of Toleration which the Answerer by mistake will have to be Dissentions in Religion but is nothing so in the design
of that Discourse to which he pretends an Answer And this hath brought forth a large Impertinency which takes up more than a third part of his Book For those whose Liberty He seeks to withstand are not touched with that which he writes at large of the nature of Dissentions with their Causes and Consequences and the Magistrates duty concerning them whether it be right or wrong setting aside the injurious application thereof And all that labour had been spared if he had put a difference between Dissention and Dissent words that are near in sound and perhaps sometimes promiscuously used but in their strict and proper sense far distant For Dissention is no sooner presented to the mind but it is apprehended as something either culpable and offensive or calamitous and unhappy But Dissent is of a better notion and is not necessarily on both sides either a Fault or a Grievance But if this Author means by Dissentions no more then dissents or differences of Opinion with what truth and justice can he charge them all as he doth with such execrable Causes and Effects Dissentions have been and may be remedied and their fuel being taken away those flames will be extinguished But diversity of Opinion seems in this state of Human Nature to be irremediable It is therefore hoped that the state of this Church and Kingdom is not so deplorable as to want a Settlement while these Dissents remain Moreover there are private dissents between particular men within the latitude of the Publike Rule and there are dissents that may be called Publike as being from the Publike Rule or some parts thereof Now the broader and more comprehensive the Rule is the fewer will be the Dissenters from it And the permission of private diversities of Opinion in a just Latitude within the Rule is the means to lessen Publike Dissents and consequently Dissentions much more And this was the main scope of the first Discourse The great importance of Vnity in the Church of Christ is acknowledged and contended for as much on this side as on the other Howbeit we do not believe that Christ our Head hath laid the Conservation and Unity of His Church upon unwritten and unnecessary Doctrines and little Opinions and Sacred Rites and Ceremonies of meer Human Tradition and Institution But He hath set out the Rule and Measure of Unity in such sort as that upon Dissents in those things the Members of this Society might not break into Schisms to a mutual condemnation and abhorrency The imposing of such things except in those Ages whose Blindness and Barbarism disposed them to stupidity and gross security in their Religion hath been ever found to break Unity and to destroy or much impair Charity Goodness Meekness and Patience which are Vital Parts and chief Excellencies of Christianity SECT V. Whether the present Dissentions are but so many Factions in the State ONE grand Objection is That the Dissentions among us are but so many several Factions in the State But meer dissents in Religion are no State-Factions at all but proceed from a more lasting Cause than particular Designs or any temporary Occasions even from the incurable Infirmity of our Nature And if it were granted That the Dissentions were State-Factions yet they are not so originally and radically but by accident Some may take advantage to raise and keep up Factions by them For this cause take out of the way the stumbling-block of needless rigors and then Dissentions will cease or languish and consequently the State Factions if there be any such that are kept up by them will come to nothing It is so evident that Toleration which came not in till after the breach between the Late King and Parliament did not open the avenues to our Miseries that one may wonder any should say it did But meet Indulgence to all sound Protestants is the likeliest means of stopping such avenues And if it be for the Interest of England to have no Factions the best way is to remove those burdens which like a partition-wall hath kept asunder the Professors of the same Religion Then the Masters of our Troubles whosoever they be cannot have that advantage by their Eminency in their Parties to drive on their Designs in the State Factious Spirits are disappointed when Honest Minds are satisfied and secured This Author relates the Aims of several Parties on this manner The Papists are for the Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome some of the other Sects are for a Commonwealth others are for the Fift Monarchy But if the true state of the Nonconformists be well considered it will be found that in Them as well as any others the King and Kingdom is concerned and the good of Both promoted It is not with them as with the Popish Party who have such a severed Interest to themselves that the State is little concerned in it save onely to beware of its Incroachments But the Protestant Dissenters are such as do much of the Business of the Nation and have not their Interest apart but in strict conjunction with the whole Body-Politick Yea they have no possible means of ensuring their Interest but by Legal-Security obtained from the Higher Power and by comporting with the general tranquility both of the Church and State of England They cannot flye to the Refuge of any Foreign Prince or State as the Papists have done frequently they acknowledg no Foreign Jurisdiction which is a Principle of the Popish Faith but all their Stake lies at home and they can have no sure Hold that is aliene from the Happiness of the King and Kingdom An Impartial Observer cannot but discern this If it be lawful to name a thing so much to be abhorred as a Change of the Ancient Laws and Government they could not be happy nor do their Work by such an unhappy Change Experience witnesseth That their Interest is not for hasty and unstable Victory or unfixed Liberty but for a state of firm Consistence and Security and that they cannot hold their own but by the common Safety both of Prince and People The summ of this Matter is That a Party not onely comporting with the good Estate of this Realm but even subsisting by it and therefore firmly linked unto it should not be cast off SECT VI. Whether the NONCONFORMISTS Principles tend to Sects and Schisms SOme Reasons were offered to shew That Indulgence towards Dissenting Protestants did much concern the Peace and Happiness of this Realm And the Prudent will judg Arguments of that sort to be of the greatest weight in the Affairs of Government There is no need to reinforce the cogency of those Reasons The Adversary hath wrested them to an odious meaning contrary to their manifest true intent but whether he hath indeed evinced them to be of little or no moment or whether they stand in full force let judicious men consider The whole reasoning in that particular rests upon this Maxime That it is the SOVEREIGN's true Interest to make
his divided People to be one among themselves and to keep them all in dependance upon Himself as the Procurer of their common safety The Prejudices that have been conceived and the Calumnies that have been raised against the Nonconformists gave occasion of resolving this Question Whether they be of a judgment and temper that makes them capable of being brought under the Magistrates Paternal Care and Conduct to such a stated Order as will comport with this Church and Kingdom This by the Answerer is termed a Dialect of Canting and is wilfully wrested into a Question of another nature Whether he had occasion given him to speak so scornfully let any judg that understand sober language But that they might appear uncapable of a Comprehension he sticks not to affirm That the Principles of Presbyterian Perswasion do not admit of any stability but may be drawn out to patronize the wildest Sects that are or have been And his main proof is taken from the bare word of Two of their Eminent Adversaries He might have remembred That the same Reproach is cast upon the Principles of Protestantism by Romish Writers One may well ask Where is the Truth and Candor of those men that write after this manner Consider the French Dutch Helvetian Churches how intire they keep themselves in Orthodox Unity from the Gangrene of Sects and Schisms The Church of Scotland whilst it was Presbyterian was inferior to none in the Unity of Doctrine and Church-Communion Did Prelacy ever effect the like Unity in the Church of England And shall the Sects that now are or lately were in this Nation be charged upon Presbytery that was never setled among us and against which the Sectaries had the greatest indignation Though that Way never obtained in England nor was favoured with the Magistrates vigorous aid yet it is very untrue that the first admirers and friends thereof grew sick of it and hissed for the other Sects to affront reproach and baffle it It is well known that it received those disgraces from another sort of men The asserting of this Government is far from the design of this or the former Treatise yet it may be lawful to vindicate it from unjust aspersions The Answerer is pleased to stile it No other but a Sect. I hope he doth not intend to make the Foreign Reformed Churches but so many Combinations of Sectaries If his meaning be that is no better than a Sect in England because another Government is established by Law let him tell us Whether Episcopacy would be a Sect if it should appear in those Countries where Presbytery is the Legal Government No less will follow if the Notion of Sect be extended so far as to fetch in whatsoever dissents from the Order by Law established SECT VII Of their Principles touching OBEDIENCE and GOVERNMENT ANother great Prejudice taken up against the Nonconformists is That they are inconsistent with any Regular Government And this Author reports that it is a common Maxime among the Dissenters That an Indifferent Thing becomes Vnlawful by being Commanded But let the World hear them speak for themselves out of their Account to His Majesty concerning the Review and Alteration of the Liturgy We humbly beseech Your Majesty to believe That we own no Principles of Faction or Disobedience nor patronize the Errors or Obstinacy of any It is granted us by all That nothing should be commanded us by man which is contrary to the Word of God That if it be and we know it we are bound not to perform it God being the Absolute Universal Sovereign That we must use all just means to discern the Will of God and whether the Commands of Men be contrary to it That if the Command be sinful and any through neglect of sufficient search should judg it Lawful his culpable Error excuseth not his doing it from being sin And therefore as a reasonable creature must needs have a judgment of discerning that he may rationally obey it so is he with the greatest care and diligence to exercise it in the greatest things even the obeying of God and the saving of his Soul And that where a strong probability of a great Sin and Danger lieth before us we must not rashly run on without search And that to go on against Conscience where it is mistaken is sin and danger to him that erreth And on the other side we are remembred that in things no way against the Law of God the Commands of our Governors 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 The Publike Judgment Civil or Ecclesiastical belongeth only to publike persons and not to any private man That no man must be be causlesly or pragmatically inquisitive into the reasons of his Superiors Commands nor by Pride and Self-conceitedness exalt his own understanding above its Worth and Office but all to be modestly and humbly self-suspicious That none must erroneously pretend to God's Law against the just Command of his Superiors nor pretend the doing of his duty to be a sin That he who suspecteth his Superiors Commands to be against Gods Laws must use all means for full information before he settle in a course of disobeying them And that he who indeed discovereth any thing commanded to be a sin though he must not do it must manage his Opinion with very great care and tenderness of the Publike Peace and the honour of his Governors These are our Principles If we are otherwise represented to Your Majesty we are mis-represented If we are accused of contradicting them we humbly crave that we may not be condemned before we be heard This is sound speech that cannot be reproved Wherefore if the Clemency of their Superiors shall remit those Injunctions that may wellbe dispensed with and unto which they cannot yeeld conformity for fear lest they sin against God their Principles will dispose them with an humble and thankful acquiescence to receive so great a Benefit SECT VIII Of placing them in the same rank for Crime and Guilt with the PAPISTS THE Answerer hath not feared to set the Papists and the Protestant Dissenters upon the same level in the guilt of Rebellion Cruelty and Turbulency For a high Charge having been made good against Popery That it disposeth Subjects to Rebellion That it persecutes all other Religions within its reach That wheresoever it finds encouragement it is restless till it bear down all or hath put all in disorder He comes and tells the World That the Nonconformists are no more innocent of the same Crimes Can men of sound minds and temperate spirits believe this And what greater advantage can be given the Popish Party then that a Protestant Writer should declare and publish that so great a part of Protestants are equally involved with them in those heinous Crimes with which the Protestants have always charged them And that such
look upon them as theirs when they hold their Publike Stations Unto all this may be added That the Ancient Nonconformists earnestly opposed the Separation of the Brownists and held communion with the Church of England in its Publike Worship And doubtless it is the Ministers Interest not to have their Subsistence by the Arbitrary Benevolence of the people and so to live in continual dependance upon their mutable dispositions for a Maintenance that is poor and low in comparison of the Publike Encouragements Hereby one may partly judg whether Learned and Prudent men be Nonconformists by the pleasure of their own will or the constraining-force of Conscience Now their Consciences may be relieved if they be not made personally to profess or practice any thing against the dictates thereof And retaining their own private judgments they may well hold to this Catholick Principle That in a Church acknowledged to be sound in Doctrine and in the Substance or main Parts of Divine Worship and not defective in any vital part of Christian Religion they are bound to bear with much which they take to be amiss in others Practice in which they do not personally bear a part themselves As concerning a Form of Church-Government and Rule of Discipline Men that understand their own Interest cannot for self-ends as they have been upbraided couet the Power of such a Discipline as inevitably procures envy and ill-will without any temporal profit or dignity And if the Higher Powers will not admit such a Form I deliver my own private judgment without prejudice to other mens this may tend to satisfie the Subjects Conscience That Ecclesiastical Government is necessarily more directed and ordered in the exercise thereof by the Determinations of the Civil Magistrate in places where the true Religion is maintained then where it is persecuted or disregarded And they that have received the Power must answer to God for it They that are discharged from it shall never account for that whereof they have been bereaved SECT XIX It behoves both the Comprehended and the Tolerated to prefer the common Interest of Religion and the setling of the Nation before their own particular Perswasions AS those Dissenters whose Consciences will permit will best comply with their own good by entring into the Establishment if a door be open for their access So they of Narrower Principles that cannot enter into it will be safest within the Limits of such Indulgence as Authority would vouchsafe to grant them with respect to the Common Good Men of all Perswasions should rather chuse to be limited by Publike Rules with mutual Confidence between their Governors and Themselves then to be left to the liberty of their own Affections upon terms uncertain and unsecure Besides the Concernment of their own Peace there is this great Perswasive That this Advice is a compliance with that state of things which will best satisfie and settle the Nation and maintain Reformed Religion against Popery and Christianity against Atheism and Infidelity True Englishmen and Lovers of their dear Countrey which is impaired and reproached by these breaches should yeeld as much to its Wealth and Honour as their Consciences can allow Loyal Subjects and good Patriots should consider what the Kingdom will bear and prefer such bounded Liberty of Comprehension and Indulgence as tends to Union before a loose though larger Liberty that will keep the Breaches open and the Minds of People unquiet and unsetled And it is not of little moment to mind this That the high Concerns of Conscience cannot be better secured then in the Peace and Safety of the excellent Constitution of this Kingdom For the Amplitude of Reformed Religion all true Protestants should promote an ample Establishmeâ—t thereof both for the incompassing of all that be sound in that Profession as also for the more capacious reception of those that may become Converts thereunto And not onely the encrease and glory thereof but its stability in these Dominions is promoted by such an ample Establishment Witness our great Defence against Popery by the common zeal of all Protestants of the several Perswasions for Protestancy in general By this concurrent Zeal the insolencies of the Papists have been repressed and their Confidences defeated Could the Protestant Conformists or Nonconformists either of them upon their own single account if one should exterminate or utterly disable the other be so well secured against Popery as now they are by their common Interest And to imagine by rigor to compel the depressed Party to incorporate with the Party advanced so that one should acquire the Strength of both would in the issue be found a great Error By such proceeding indeed a Party may be wounded and broken and rendred unserviceable to the common good but shall never be gained as an addition of Strength to those who have so handled them But an Accommodation would make both to be as one And seeing in their present divided state the concurrent Zeal of Both hath been so formidable as to dash the hopes of the Popish Party how much more in a state of Union might their Strength increase against their common Adversaries Wherefore the One should open the Way and the Other should readily come in upon just Terms This should be the rather minded on both sides because the Considerate Nonconformists will never promote their own Liberty by such ways and means as would bring in a Toleration of Popery yea they would rather help to bear up the present Ecclesiastical state then that Popery should break in by Anarchy or the Dissolution of all Church-Government Moreover an ample fixed state Ecclesiastical is necessary to uphold and encrease true Religion as well against Infidelity as against Popery The loose part of the World would turn to a weariness and contempt of Divine Institutions and Christianity it self would be much endangered in a state of Ataxy and unfixedness By what ordinary means hath the Doctrine and Institution of Christ been propagated and perpetuated in large Kingdoms and Nations and in the Universe but by incompassing under its external Rule and Order great Multitudes that may fall short of the Life and Power thereof And it doth not root and spread in any sort considerable in a Region where the external Order is set by the Rigid and Narrow Principles of a small Party and the general Multitude lyes open as wast ground for any to invade or occupy Let considerate men judg how much the ample state of a meer Orthodox Profession is to be preferred before Infidelity or Popery or any other Sect of the Christian Name that is Idolatrous or Heretical There be few Converts to the Power of Godliness from Infidelity or Popery or any Heresie but they are generally made out of the Mass of People of an Orthodox Profession If it be the will of God that one must suffer for the Cause of Religion it is more for the Honour of Christianity to suffer from Infidels then from Papists likewise it is more