the King hath not the said Power of the Spiritual Keys and Sacraments 5. And specially the most learned and zealous Defenders of Monarchy and Prelacy Bilson of Chest Obed. and Perp. Gov. and Andrews in Tortura Torti have most plainly and vehemently renounced it and shewed their malice or ignorance that impute such an Arrogation to our Kings So also Carlton of Jurisdic Jewel Whitaker and who not 6. What a King may do virtually by another I think unless Inconveniencies hinder the exercise he hath power to do himself But I think the King may not Administer Sacraments or Spiritual Discipline himself Which of our Kings did it Or who since Uzziah offered Sacrifice among the Jews 7. Our Kings never yet pretended so much as to Ordain that is to Invest another in that Power Ministerially in the Name of Christ But as to the Supremacy it 's true that the King is the Supream over Physicians Philosophers c. but not the Supream Physician or Philosopher He exerciseth Coercive Government by the Sword over Bishops who use Spiritual Government by the Keys and Word but hath not Authority to use this same sort of oversight himself unless a Clergy-man were King as some are Magistrates As to the Proxies of the Lords Spiritual in Parliament when you have as well proved that Christ hath allowed them to Preach Administer Sacraments and exercise the Keys by Proxies I will yield all that Cause But they will be loath to go to Heaven by Proxy Page 21. As to Jebosaphats Mission and his Nobles Teaching I answer 1. Teaching is not so proper to a Pastor or Clergy-man as the Keys and Sacraments Parents have their Office or Power of teaching and School-masters and Lay Catechists have theirs and Magistrates have theirs Judges on the Bench do usually teach the People even religious Duties so did Constantine and so may any King But there is a different teaching whith is proper to the Clergy which is by teaching to gather Churches and guide them and edifie them as Pastors devoted or separated to this as their proper Office As there is a difference between the Office of a Physician and a Womans healing a cut finger or giving a Cordial to one that fainteth But this proper Teaching which God did not leave in common to others no Prince can use no Bishop can do by Proxy Nor can he delegate to a Lay-man the power of the Keys and Sacraments 2. And the King may no doubt command Pastors to do their Duty as well as Physicians to do theirs I take none of this to be quarrelling but plain truth Your telling us that Chancellors may direct and advise the Surrogates may signifie something in another Land but not with us If we had never seen their Courts nor read Travers Of the difference between Christs Discipline and theirs yet Cousin's Tables are in our Libraries You add We are all but the Bishops Curates in the exercise of it Answ 1. I ventured to deny that to Bag shaw who made it the Reason of Separation And I will yet deny it of some others though not of you If we are all but the Bishops Curates the Italian Bishops of Trent were not so absurd as they were made in making the Bishops the Popes Curates How easie should I be were I a Curate could I believe that I have no more to answer for than the Bishop imposed on me and that he must answer for all the rest I suppose that the Office of the Presbyters or Ministers of Christ is immediately Instituted and described in the Scriptures and that the Bishop doth but Invest them in it and that their work is their own as properly as the Bishop's is his own and that his Precminence maketh not him the Communicator of the Power to them as from himself nor them to be his Curates 2. And while I think that I can prove this very easily censure us not too deeply for not swearing to the Bishops if the sence of it be to make us his Curates Not that I think my self too good to be a Servant to the Bishop's Coach man but that I dare not subvert Christ's established Church Orders As for your Engine and Wonders and Babel and Lucifer and trembling I have not learning enough to answer them As to your talk of Absolute Autocratical c. they are but Oratorical Flowers that speak against none of our particular Doctrines but are the rant of your Magisterial style And your talk of Excommunicating Kings may pass as part of your equal ways to one that hath written so oft against Excommunicating Kings when yet Bishop Andrews and other Prelates maintain the Refusing them the Communion and you know in what Case Chrysostom rather offered to lose Hand and Life even then to give the Sacrament to the Greatest that was unworthy Prove that ever any of the present Non-conformists who were called to present the judgment or desires of the rest did ever say more than Andrews and Bilson or so much But the Lord Digby is your Author Answ 1. Were we and our present Controversie for the most of us in being and at age when the Lord Digby spake that Is not Conformity now another thing Do all or half the Non-conformists profess themselves Presbyterians Are Presbyterians all for Excommunicating Kings And do not some that are for it confine it only to such Pastors as Kings themselves shall commit their Souls to and give leave to exercise that Power Are we I say we now living and silenced answerable for all that any Presbyterian holdeth any more than you are for what Hooker holdeth Some Scots-men refuse the Oath of Supremacy Are we guilty of that Mistake who Take it and Write for it Or did we spring out of their Loins and must be silenced for such Original sin derived from them that were no kin to us 2. But where did the Lord Digby say it You cite no Book or Speech of his but cite Rushworth p. 218. Where is no syllable of any such matter nor any where else that I can yet find 3. Suppose he had Did he not say in his Letter to Sir Ken. Digby Printed That the Primitive Church Government will be found pecking towards Presbytery He was then Episcopal he is now a Papist Is not his Authority then ad hominem while he was one of your own more valued against you than against them that were not of his Party or way and is this good arguing Whatever the Lord Digby Bancroft Heylin and if you will Bellarmine charge the Presbyterians with 1640 or I know not when or where all that are the Non-conformists Episcopal Presbyterians Independents and Catholick Moderators are guilty of in 1671. But the Lord Digby sometimes said that the Presbyterians would Excommunicate Kings Ergo the present Nonconformists even Episcopal and all are guilty of that Opinion even they that write against it But all your ways are just and equal But I pray you why was no Article about
respectively P. 7. Some are as Colonels of Regiments others as Captains of Troops the Body is but One the Members many P. 13. The New Testament saith The Churches of Galatia Gal. 1. 2. the Churches of Judea Asia Yet One body All the faithful make One heavenly City one Church of the first born so that Gods Church on Earth is Many Churches and yet but One Church Do you not think now that we are agreed But hear him judge himself P. 15. I will shew one common Errour or mistake in multitudes of our able Divines That those we call particular Churches are counted Parts and Members of the Church Universal This I deny Mr. Baxter makes the Church of England or the Churches of England to be an integral part of the Church Universal as a Troop of an Army or a City of a Kingdom So the Independents I overthrow this Errour by this Argument One and the same thing cannot be both a Body and a Member a whole and a part a society and one single person But that which we call a single or particular Church is not a Member but a Body it is not a limb or part of a Church but a whole and entire Church It hath a whole within it London is not a Member of England but a City and aggregation of Members It 's no less than a flat contradiction in terms what Dr. Ames saith Medul l. 1. c. 32. that a particular Church est Membrum ex aggregatione variorum Membrorum singulorum compositum contrary to common reason and plain Scripture P. 18. A bare Member in the Body hath no Authority but acteth by mere natural life and appetite and is not endued with rational authority nor can be capable of any That which we call a single Church is a Catholick or Universal Church It hath an Universal Head To be a Christian is to be of an universal impartial spirit where there is an All there is an Universal But every single Church hath an All within it the Pastor and all his flock The Church Universal and particular do only differ as to place and number A Church of godly Ministers and people in France Holland and England differ but as to place Every Church of Christians must needs be a Church Universal not a limb or member of another Church but a true body or entire Christian society P. 20. Christs Body is One not as one is opposed to Multitude but to division contrariety and destruction § 4. P. 21. This leads me to shew the unsoundness of another part of Mr. Baxters Doctrine and some others with him He saith There are two essentially different Policies or Forms of Church-Government of Christs Institution never to be altered by man 1. The Form of the Universal Church as Headed by Christ himself which all Christians own as they are Christians in their Baptism 2. Particular Churches headed by their particular Bishops or Pastors and are parts of the Universal as a Troop of an Army or a City of a Kingdom And he defines the Universal Church to be The universality of Baptized Christians headed by Christ himself These his sayings contain many Errours I will first note them out and then confute and prove them to be Errours 1. It is an Errour in the art of defining to put in those words Headed by Christ himself 2. It is another Errour to define the Universal Church without Guides and Ministers as one essential constituent part 3. It is another Errour to say that the Universal Church and Churches particular differ essentially 1. It is an Errour in the art of desining to say Headed by Christ himself that 's supposed but need not be in the definition He finds fault himself with such a defect in the definition of a particular Church Grant them to be Christians and you grant they own Christ 2. It is an Errour to define the Universal Church without Pastors So doth the Assemblies Confession and Mr. Hudson His definition of the Church without Pastors is as if he defined a living healthful man without a stomach liver or lungs P. 24. 3. If there be an essential difference between Church and Church what then is the difference between the Church and the World Heaven and Hell the righteous and the wicked How can any man know which is the right Church We shall never be able to confute Popery nor Infidelity by this Doctrine For this Doctrine supposeth two essentially different Churches The Universal Church without Pastors and of this Christ is Head himself Particular Churches of which Christ is no Head but particular Pastors are the Heads By this Doctrine the same thing shall be contrary to it self Christs Church in this world is but one And can one and the same thing have two different Essences beings and definitions Quae conveniunt uno tertio c. But the Church Universal and particular agree in uno tertio They stand on one foundation are directed by one rule quickned by one spirit an addition of homogeneous Particles makes no essential difference It will necessarily infer that God is contrary to himself and that the essentiating principles of Church holiness order and government are black and white darkness and light P. 25. If this opinion stand Religion cannot stand Two essentially different Forms of Churches will infer two sorts of Holiness the one repugnant to the other yet subordinata non pugnant If Christ set up two repugnant or essentially different Church-Forms he is not the Saviour but the deceiver of the world O dreadful § 5. P. 92. A word more ad hominem of that opinion That particular Churches are parts of the Universal as a Troop is of an Army or a City of a Kingdom This is Mr. Baxters opinion why then do you blame the turning all the parish-Parish-Churches into Chappels and making them to be but parts of the Diocesan as a Troop is of an Army c. who sees not that your Doctrine doth the same that you condemn c. If they are but parts and Members of another Church the Universal then they are not Churches It is not unlikely but you can find somewhat to say in defence of this your self-contradicting Doctrine but I believe it will match your wit were it ten times more and prove too hard for you Look to it if your disputations against Prelacie stand down goes this main assertion of yours If your disputations against Prelacie be found to have a hollow and false bottom then you have made you work for repentance you have greatly injured the Church of God and particularly the Church of England and have deceived a great many Look what Bellarmine maketh the Pope to be to all the Pastors Churches and Christians through the world That do you make this which you call the Church Universal for you say that particular Churches as headed by their respective Bishops and Pastors are parts and members of another Church called the Church Universal By which assertion you set up
so of every one City Corporation c. is no part of it I would desire them to allow him his own Exposition for he mcaneth not so ill as he saith § XV. To say that one whole cannot be a Member or part of another whole is yet if possible more than the former What may not Corpus politicum be a member of a larger body Politick Is there any part of the Universe if this be true at least save Atomes and Spirits And in what sense an Atome or Anima or Spiritus may be called totum Scaliger and the Schoolmen and Metaphysicks commonly tell you Are not whole stones part of Mountains and whole Trees of the Forrest and whole Herbs of the whole Garden and whole Fields of the whole Countrey and whole Parishes of the whole Diocess and County and those of the Kingdom and that of Europe and that of the world Is not a whole hand or foot part of a whole man Is not the mateial Universe made up of compounded parts What a trick has he found to exempt us all from Government every man may say I am a whole man therefore I am no part of the Bishop of Londons Diocess or of the Parish or of the Family Deny or destroy all such parts and you deny or destroy the whole Did he think that all Noun Substantives signified the same thing which have the same Adjective and that a whole Man and a whole Dog or World are all one § XVI It 's little better when he argueth that homogeneal parts make not a new species As if he could prove that the Church is Totum homogeneum Are not Christ and Christians the King and the Subjects of the Universal Church partes heterogeneae in esse politico relativo Are not Bishops and Laicks partes heterogeneae Had he forgot how much of his Book is to prove even Bishops and Presbyters as widely different No Christian denyeth it of the Church Universal nor any of single Churches that denyes not a Ministry and the being of such Churches as Political § XVII While thus he maketh National Churches Metropolitical Diocesane Parochial and the very Independent which he most revileth all one or of one essential species it seemeth that he knoweth not how he unsaith most that he said before § XVIII It is little better that he maketh several Churches viz. at Paris and at Plimouth c. to differ only in Number and Place 1. Do not the Popish Protestant Episcopal and Presbyterian differ in the Form of Government 2. Do not those of the same Form differ as Individuals by their several Rulers besides abundance of accidental differences § XIX And what Doctrine is it to say Christs Body is one not as one is opposed to multitude but to division and destruction Hath Christ a multitude of Bodies univocally so called even such a Body as we treat of Hath Christ many Universal Churches containing all Christians headed by Christ § XX. When he had so grosly wronged himself as to say It is an errour in the art of defining to say of the Universal Church it is Headed by Christ himself what other Head or formal Regent part doth he name will he have another or will he have none in the definition Is that the art of defining § XXI It 's little better to say Is is an errour to define the Universal Church without Pastors as the Assembly did What! a better Logician than all the Assembly too Alas how fell the good man under this temptation He instanceth in a body defined without Liver Stomack c. But 1. I hope he doth not think all is excluded that is not to be named 2. Is there no better definition of a man than Animal implume bipes c. or one that hath a Liver and Stomack c. When to the Entelechia or anima he added Corpus organicum Aristotle thought he said enough of the body Is not Animal rationale a just definition of a man without naming his Liver and Spleen or Heart Is not the Genus differentia enough for a definition Definitiones debent esse breves nihil otiosum continere otiosum est quo ablato definitio reliqua rei essentiam explicat A Kingdom is defined by naming no more than the King and Subjects in general without naming Judges Justices Sheriffs c. There are no constitutive principles in Nature but Mater materiae dispositio forma And the imperfect definitions of accidents must be as like as may be to those of substances The specifying form here is only Christ the Head so related Though he made Christians before Ministers and were all Pastors dead the Church were still Christs Universal Body yet I grant it is not a just organized body without Pastors but that maketh them but to be the nobler part of the disposed matter men do not use to play the Anatomists in definitions and instead of Animal or of Corpus organicum to name Heart Stomack Lungs c. But it is a healthful man that Mr. Ch. is defining Answ 1. But it is not a healthful Church but a true Church in essence that I was defining 2. If it had been otherwise the name of the parts need not enter the definition of health And are these his saving truths § XXII And what an intimation is it that if there be an essential difference between the Universal and particular Church there 's none between the Church and the world the righteous and the wicked Heaven and Hell These things are fitter to be answered by Interjections which be no words but voces non vocabula than by Speech If Christ and a Bishop in esse relationis politicae differ essentially must good and bad Heaven and Hell be all one If an Army and a Regiment and a Troop differ in their formal specifying essences must a Subject and a Rebel the Court and the Gallows therefore be all one Proh apage § XXIII Next he asks How can any man know the right Church then Answ What! no way but by making Christ and a Bishop formally the Head we know the Universal Church by its true definition and a true particular Church by its true definition and properties § XXIV Yea he saith we shall never be able to confute Popery and Infidelity by this Doctrine Answ Alas will the good man turn Papist or Infidel unless the Universal Church and a Diocesane have the same specifying difference or formal Head Then what remedy § XXV I have no Interjection deep enough for that which followeth viz. This Doctrine supposeth two essentially different Churches The Universal Church without Pastors Putares and of this Christ is Head particular Churches of which Christ is no Head Putares Where said I any such thing Is this lawful As if 1. there must be no Pastors unless they be the formal Head of the Universal Church 2. And as if there must be no Christ the Supream Head if the Bishop be the formal differencing specifying
of Diocesan Prelacy Therefore to save us any more trouble we will refer all that Controversie to your own Ignatius alone who determineth That in every Church there is one Altar and one Bishop with his Presbyters and Deacons and with that we are content In your Page 6 to keep your wont 1. You feign me to say that which I tell you is objected to me by others 2. You falsly feign me to allow the Conformists to have some Hebrew Chaldee Syriac and Arabic my very mention of which words you out lay hold on as an Honour granted to your â—â—â—â— But it is all a false supposition I never apâ—roved hofe words to the Conformists I only told you that valuing Matter before Words I 〈…〉 the Church had men that speak sound Doctrine in an apt and serious manner for bringing Sinners to repentance in English than such as can lace an insipid empty senceless Discourse with some shreds of Chaldee Syriac or Arabic and though I could wish that all the Ministers of Christ had all Accomplishments fit even for the adorning of their â—acred Work yet I had rather hear a meer English Divine than an Hebrew or a Syriac Sot You put me to the troublesom repeating of my words by your falsification I did not mention Conformists at all nor had any thought of appropriating these Passages to them any more than others But only to tell you that be he Conformist on Non-conformist if like Augustine Ambrose c. he had sound Divinity without the Languages now mentioned I could better bear with him than with one whoever that had Words for Ostentation without Sense and to free you from all suspicion of Injury I never heard one of the young Conformists which I mention make any ostentation or credible signification of his skill in any one of those Tongues Nor do I remember but exceeding few Conformists in England of my acquaintance that I will accuse or suspect of any such skill But having a Lad in my house not long ago come from School who hath some acquaintance in all these Languages and as many more who I assure you is too young to be a Conformable Preacher or Divine he being next me suggested the Matter of my Comparison when you vilified I know not whom some unnamed Non-conformists for knowing little more than English Books can teach them One Pressick a Sadler in Leverpool hath written That against some of your Sect in English which all their Languages will hardly enable them to Confute And I hear but few of you that in real knowledge are much more Angelical than Aquinas subtle than Scotus profound than Bradwardine c. when yet they and their Scholastick Tribe were commonly very sorry Linguists But it s needful that I intreat you that you affirm me not to have called them all Non-conformistâ— because I name them in this Comparison As for the loads of Dirt that you say I cast and your saying that you see you should have said feel that its difficult to forbear reproach towards them from whom we differ I answer 1. And I see that it s no wonder if that Tribe who think themselves persecuted when they may not persecute and silence others do also think themselves reproached when others are justly vindicated from their reproach 2. But it s hard that as Transubstantiation must be an Article of some mens Faith so we also must be obliged to believe that all our Senses and Experience are deceived And that he that walketh in the Frost is a reproach for saying it is cold because another affirmeth that the Summer is colder because of now and then a rainy day Alas are so many great Chappelries and many Parish Churches in several parts of the Land utterly without any Minister at all Are so many others so supplied yea so many hundreds as the Lovers of Souls do groan and weep for and must we neither see nor feel it But Sir if we must not feel it to you let us feel it to God that we may feelingly and not formally pray him to send forth more and better Labourers into his Harvest For my part I seriously profess that if the Gospel be but better Preached and the Souls of all the Parishes in the Three Kingdoms better instructed for their Salvation without us than with us I will never more speak for a Liberty to Preach much less desire a Farthing of the Maintenance But Sir if you talk in Print as you do to me in private Letters you might make strangers of your Mind But to the People of the present Age that see that hear that know the Persons your words will be all vain You may call them the Children of Hell for not believing you but men are so naturally sensible that your Anger will not change them neer London and in it I think are the worthiest Conformists in the Land proportionably And yet how many places not far off it feel what I say A worthy Learned judicious peaceable Divine bred up in one of the next Parishes to you awhile Mr. John Warren is silenced at a great Town Hatfield Broadoak in the Bishop of London's Presentation Thus he hath long lived and done much good yet since 1662 that he was silenced the Place hath been void many years because the Maintenance is small and there must be none at all rather than such a one as He. But you call this casting Dirt too The starved Souls must not take on them to feel their Case And to be past feeling in such cases is a state that men are prone to of themselves and need no Preachers to help them to be indifferent in Well! Souls must be starved or not be humble How can we prefer others before our selves unless we will be content that those for whom Christ died be neglected and Ignorance set up to teach men knowledge and the Ungodly to teach them Godliness But as in Natune so in Grace there is a Principle that will not suffer men by Words to be brought to take Famine for Food nor saying a dry Lesson for teaching men the Way to Heaven Blessed be God that hath possessed all renewed Christians with a new Nature which differenceth the Chaff from the Wheat and words from real worth and substance But you heard a Preacher say That he thanked God he never heard a Preacher but he could get something by him Answer And I also am of Mr. Herbert's mind Church-porch p. 15. If all want sense God takes a Text and preacheth Patience But for all that I will not by my Approbation contract the Guilt of such Preachers nor of those that set them up and would have others silenced and calumniated and then plead Humility for the valuing of these Every Text that is preached on is eaifying and I hope by bare reading it we may be edified And in Muscovy where all Preaching is put down for fear of Treason 1671. and yet now by Treason they are just between Life and Death
us Suppose that the Powers were bound to take it in the Imposers sense but did not the Question is whether it bind them not in their own sense And in some possible Cases in both and to both You add You mention some good things in the Covenant as the Declaration against Popery Schism and Prophaneness But you pass by the second Article c. Ans So I perceive you would have me Conform that I may Preach And what should I Preach against but Sin And will you not give me leave to suppose that Perjury is one of the greatest of all sins and that he that is knowingly for Perjury is against humane society and not capable of Trust or Credit and is against the safety of the King which dependeth much on the Conscience of the Oath of Allegiance in his Subjects and that he that would but say I would declare my self for Perjury that I may preach against all other sins â—â— These things being premised I ask you Are you in good sadness What! after such a confident Perswasive to Conformity Will you tell your Hearers If you Vow to God Repentance Obedience or any Good this Vow bindeth none of you all if there were but some Evil joyned with it And so if a Jesuit would take the Oath of Allegiance or Supremacy yea or the Vow of Baptism be taken at our Christening if either Ignorance or Knavery do but joyn some bad things with it nothing of all the rest is obligatory What Cheater then will not foist in some bad thing into his Vows that he may be disobliged from all the rest If you dare preach such Doctrine and dare die in the Aprobation of it and dare perswade others to do the like as their Duty to God your Book 's Title shall make me view S. Paul's warning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Would you have me deliberately undertake to justifie all men from the lawful or good parts of a Vow that I may have leave to preach against sin You add And the Power imposing the whole Answ Still all alike What will you tell your Hearers that no Oath or Vow bindeth them which powerless man imposed The want of power in the Imposers proveth indeed that no Power of theirs obliged you to take it But what if you had taken it to save your life from a Thief or within your Closet-walls voluntarily without the command of any Power doth it not oblige to lawful matters Bishop Sanderson would have taught you otherwise to resolve that Case This is a hard way to Conformity You add What was good in it we were obliged to by a former Covenant Answ And what then Is that another Doctrine that Conformists must preach That no Vow or Oath obligeth you to any good that you were obliged to before Oh dreadful The Jesuits Morals would abhor such a Doctrine If there may be new Vows to the same thing there may be new or additional Obligations to the same thing else all the following Vows are no Vows What if the Oath of Allegiance be thrice taken Doth it oblige only the first time Then if a man be at Baptism obliged to Christianity no after Vows at the Lords Supper or other time are obligatory Sir be not angry with me for telling you that Non-conformists have somewhat in them that will not permit them to take these for indifferent things And that the diminution of your glory and mens temptation to separation from you hath too much occasion and colour from your selves You add The worst of Hereticks maintain some Truths Answ And quid inde Suppose so the Covenant hath some good Our question is not whether we are bound to the bad but to the good And will you say that I must receive no truth which a Heretick holdeth or am bound by it to no good which is contained in a Vow that hath evil with it § 12 13 14. Will any thing convince you of an Error or Sin if the visibility of my words and yours and my reminding you of your visible misreport will not do it but still when you see your words and mine and hear of your mistake you will yet go on yea and falsly add that In one breath I say I did and I did not retract them This practice and your fore-going Doctrine well agree When I had askt you Whether it be all one to say I had expunged all that you accuse me of or charge me with and that I expunged all that you pervert or falsly took occasion from for a visible slander This is no stop to you nor worthy of any Answer but you go on Yea when you tell me the Page you meant and see that there is no such thing there as you mentioned yet all this nor my many Writings against that same Opinion are nothing at all to stop your Calumny I am not justifying what I expunged but if it were faulty must it needs contain a Doctrine which it never mentioned which I openly wrote against This dealing is enough to tell me to what purpose a Disputation of Conformity with you would prove when Sense it self will not convince you And all your justification is you give the sense though not the words Utterly false there are no words there how bad soever of any such sense The words speak mostly De fine belli and not of the Justifying power which is ever supposed besides a good end I never thought that War might be made against Authority for Religion sake what ever I might then think of the Subjectum in quo of that Authority though not as Hooker did § Still Confusion and Untruth twisted I deny not that I led many if you will call Convincing Reason Leading into an Association was that in the Question before I rejoyce and glory in it and thank God for it as much as almost any passage of my life I told you before and two Printed Agreements told the World what our Associations were for One was to exercise so much Discipline as all the three Parties were agreed in contradicting none of them in our Agreement The other for Catechising and Instructing every Family at stated Days every Week in course And what 's this to mens present coming to your Churches which you talk of If they Conform no more than I I am not ashamed to be esteemed a Promoter of their Judgment If they Conform less than I that they never had that from me my Five Disputes of Church Government then written are a visible Witness against your rash and heedless Calumny § 16. Be not offended with me for judging some Conformists honest And I could wish that you would consider of it before you teach your People that there are no honest Sinners For that 's all one as to say that the World hath never had one honest man but Christ and Adam and Eve a while Though a man be not honest quatenus vel in quantum a sinner nor I think quatenus a Conformist yet I hope
say the Prelatists for then it will set Presbyters too high or rather take hundreds from that which belongeth to their Office whilst one in the same Office exerciseth the Keys upon all their people and themselves that are his equals Et par in parem non habet potestatem Not as Bishops for they are not such really and the Episcopacy cannot be delegated as I proved You said which I am glad of That it may be you could wish that Excommunication were reduced into a more Scriptural Apostolical and Primitive Channel as much as my self But you never look that the Church below should be without spot or wrinkle Answ You speak here so well that it half reconcileth us If so then the main difference left is not whether we shall live peaceably in such a Church or promise to do so for that I have oft done yea and did subscribe to the Archbishop that now is when he gave me a Licence to Preach and I could have had it without subscribing a word that I would not Preach against the Doctrine Liturgy or Ceremonies of the Church But whether I may deliberately give my hand and profession that I assent and consent to such a frame and may swear that I will not any time endeavour an alteration of that Government which runs not in the Scriptural Apostolick Primitive Channel nor of its acknowledged spots and wrinkles That is To promise or swear that I will not obey God nor seek the Reformation of any such thing in his Church which is acknowledged amiss no not in my place and calling and by any lawful means Whereas in my Baptism I vowed my self and service to Christ as the Saviour of his Body and in my Ordination I vowed my self to him as a Minister and I daily pray for the hallowing of his Name the coming of his Kingdom the doing of his Will on Earth even as it is done in Heaven And therefore will not by swearing to the contrary renounce my Baptism Ministery or Prayers Pardon the description of the Sin as it would be to me I do not say that it is such in you or another that seeth not what I see Good Meanings and Latitudes and stretching Expositions will not make this pass with me among things indifferent And for your own sake not mine who stand or fall to a higher Tribunal I entreat you to judge of us in this as of men that are dying daily and neer a World where Preferments and Wealth and humane Favour signifie nothing and who are so unwilling to neglect our undertaken Office for mens Souls that we offer our Superiours to take it joyfully as a Favour to be any way punished for this supposed Sin of not lying nor being perjur'd so it may not hinder us from Preaching the Gospel of Salvation Even to be punished as deeply as common Swearers Drunkards or Adulterers are to rid Channels to Dig or Plow or to be burnt in the hand as Felons are or our Ears bored or cropt as Rogues or perjur'd Persons are so we may but Preach Christ or see the Kingdoms so supplyed as that our Labours may be truly needless to mens Salvation I would take all this thankfully on my Knees much more be denied the Levites Bread or Ministerial Maintenance But these are too high Favours for such as we to hope for in such a time and from such Persons as Experience proveth except that the Clemency of the King vouchsafeth us some convenience against the will of such of the Clergy as you Nothing but either Debauching our Consciences and stretching them so wide as that any thing will afterward go down or else deserting the Preaching of Christ for mens Salvation will serve with some men that I have talkt with For it is not my Superiours now that I am speaking of I did all that I was able unfeignedly to have brought all men once to Union with the Church upon any other terms than these when the thing was feasible as to the most But was an Enemy and one that deserved shame and ruine for it But I am gone back To return I am glad also that you say That the Surrogates have the power of the Keys and indeed so most School-men say and so Spalatensis hath notably and oft proved But what it will infer against Bishops denying them to all the Presbyters in a whole Diocess save one or two or few I will not repeat You say I did not well to overlook what you said about Chancellour's Skill in the Civil Law c. Answ I did not overlook it but past it by as an Impertinency supposing we had been agreed 1. That the holy Scriptures are the Universal Rule of Church Discipline as to the Essentials and the Laws of the Land and Canonical Agreements the subservient Rules about Circumstances and Adjuncts and for the execution of the former 2. And that Ability in Scriptures much less in the Roman Laws doth give no man authority to the exercise of the Spiritual Keys without a Call being but his remote Capacity 3. And that he that is called hereunto is called to be a Clergy-man to whome the Keys are proper I pray you Sir deny none of this Let Begging this once go instead of Arguing 4. And he may be fit to Advise and Assist a Bishop that is himself no Clergy man but Advising and judicial Decreeing are several things 5. And I am weary with saying that we submit to Chancellors as Magistrates doing that which belongeth to Magistrates according to the sense of the Oath of Supremacy But what 's all this to our Case in hand You add Tell me Sir may not a man be said to do that virtually which he doth not immediately Answ Yes a man may pay a Debt by his Servant or Deputy but not Baptize or Administer the Lords Supper or Discipline by another because Christ hath annexed the Office to the Person and the Office is an Obligation and Authority to do the work You add The King doth neither Preach nor Administer Sacraments yet hath a Supremacy of Power in all things belonging to the Church Answ Now I cannot follow you so far as to believe that the King doth virtually Administer the Sacraments per alios At least I durst not swear it If you think it is but a Gorgons head that affrighteth me hear and judge 1. Christ gave the Keys immediately to Ministers and not to Kings and distinguished their Offices 2. Queen Elizabeth ' K. Iames and the Convocation have publickly disclaimed such a sense of the Oath of Supremacy and taken it for the Papists slanders and disclaimed such a Power of the Keys in the King and so hath our present King wisely in my hearing 3. Some Scots are well charged with an injurious refusal of the Oath of Supremacy on the account of such a false Exposition which is the Papists Case 4. Almost all the Papists and Protestants in the World that ever I heard or read are agreed that
poor Bishop that renounced all their Communions for it is Canonized a Saint while Hooker himself justly reproacheth Ignatius And it made me marvail to read in Bellarmine de Scriptor Ecles pag. 100. this great Lie that Ithacius whom he falsly makes the same with Idacius who was one of the same Synod and Author of the Chron. in Jos Scaliger de emend temp In eo reprehensus punitus ab Episcopis fuit quod Priscillianum apud seculares judices accusaverit occidi cur averit Whenas 1. The Bishops never punished him for it 2. The Synod of Bishops joyned with him 3. Martin was despised as an unlearned Hypocrite and Favourer of the Hereticks that did renounce their way and Communion 4. Ithacius and Idacius because of the common Odium would have pretended that they put not on the Magistrate hereunto And that Bellarmine one of the Tribe that is for burning Hereticks should yet leave this blot on Idacius and seek by untruths to excuse the rest of the Bishops of it whence is it but that the Memory of the just shall be blessed and the Name of the wicked the cruel especially shall rot I digress only to tell you that the honour of violence will end in shame and he be odious to Posterity who may be set up as high as Gardiner or Bonner to serve the turn in some present Execution And I had rather be luke-warm than have a destroying or slandering heat To what you say of Beza and Selden I answer 1. Did I or the present Nonconformists ever subscribe to Beza or Geneva 2. Is it not palpably against your self that cry down Lay Elders though many with Ministers have power but in one Presbytery or Synod when our Lay Chancellor hath the power over hundreds of Ministers and Churches You that cry up or keep up Lay-mens Church Discipline may worse speak against Lay-mens Church Discipline than we that are against it in all whomsoever 3. But Beza and Geneva do not take them for Lay Elders nor the Scots neither but for Church Elders and part of the Clergy of Divine Institution none of which is pretended for Lay Chancellors And is that no difference For Selden as I know what he saith against the Diocesan Church Bishops in Eutychius Alexandr So I know what he saith against all of us for Erastianism de Synedriis better than by any Citations out of Heylin And I know he was one of the Long Parliament that raised the War whom even now you had possessed with the Spirit of Presbytery And you may judge of many of the rest by Selden And must you or I be Erastians because Selden and other Lawyers in the Parliament were so § 46. The Quibble in this Section is Content without an Answer § 47. I judged but of your Words and judge you of my Motives for refusing a Bishoprick no worse than I give you cause I answer you it intimated no Ingratitude to His Majesty nor did I ever repent And that I did it not to keep up a Party or Interest in them the Lord Chancellor had Evidence and my voluntary endeavours against all Faction and casting away my Reputation with all such declareth when I could as easily have kept it as you with yours and had no outward interest to move me to renounce it I say this because you seem suspectingly to talk of my Motives § 48. Our Question is Whether a Church of One Altar as they spake of old Associated for personal Communion and a Church of never so many Altars or Congregations Associated for other ends and not for personal Communion be ejusdem speciei And so whether the word Church here signifies but one Species You hold the Affirmative of both and I the Negative My reason is 1. Because it being a Relative which is in question The ends of the Society specifically differing make the Societies specifically to differ the Terminus being essential to the Relation But here are different sorts of ends Ergo here are different sorts of Relations I use the word ends to signifie the nearest end which specifieth and not the remote And to avoid the ambiguity of the word Terminus which as Finis cujus finis cui are distinguished so they use variously sometimes for the Correlate and sometimes for the nearest end and so I now use it As a Master to teach a Grammar-school and a Master to rule a Family or to guide a Ship are Relations specifically distinct à fine And so is a Magistrate and a Pastor and a Physician c. This is clear And for the Minor That these Churches in question have different nearest ends is evident For the end of a particular Church is personal â—ummunion in God's publick Worship and holy living to their mutual assistance But the ends of Churches that never know each other but live an 100 or 1000 Miles asunder They say some of our Islands and Plantations are parts of some English Diocesan Church can be no such thing but only a distant communion in the same Faith Love and Obedience The end of a single Church is the personal Communion of Christians in that one Society The end of an Association of many Churches is the Communion of those many Churches in distant mental Concord or by Delegates or Synods sometimes in â—ase of need And who ever thought that a particular Church a Patriarchal Church and a Pabal or the Universal Church were ejusdem speâ—iâ—i when they agree only in remote ends and differ in the Terminus vel finis proximus As a Kingdom and a Corporation differ Ex differentia â—inium because though both are Societies for Ciâ—il Communion and Government and so agree â—n genere yet the end of one is Kingdom government and Communion and the end of the other is â—ut Corporation-government and Communion 2. Where there are different sorts of Relates corâ—elates there are different sorts of Relations But â—â— a particular Church and a Patriarchal Dioceâ—n or other Combination of many Churches â—here are different sorts of Relates correlates Ergo there are different sorts of Relations The â—hing supposed in the major is undeniable that â—â—e Relate correlate enter the definition â—â—erefore the major is undeniable The minorâ—pposeth â—pposeth a Church to be Constituted of the â—ars dirigens vel regens and the pars subdita as relate correlate which is undeniable And â—en it is proved per partes 1. The Pastor of a â—â—gle Church and a Patriarch Pope or Dioceâ—n of a multitude of combined Churches are not the same Relate for they have not the same Relation I suppose the Relation of a Church to be thus Constitute of the two Complicate Relations as well the Church subjectively of the two Relates For 1. The different Work 2. And the different Correlate prove these Pastors to be two sorts of Relation however agreeing inâ—genere 1. It is not the same sort of Works personally to guide a present people in Doctrine Worship and Discipline
all Religion Christianity the Gospel the Church all Government Introducing Popery c. Especially for asserting 1. That Christ hath Instituted one Universal Church of which he onely is the Head and particular Churches as parts of it of which the Pastors are Subordinate Heads or Governours and so formally differenced 2. That neither of them is Constituted without some signification of consent which he never before heard one Christian deny CHAP. I. PREFATORY § 1. COntending though Defensive and made necessary by Accusers is an unpleasant work As I would choose a Prison before a Defensive War were it for no greater interest than my own so I would choose to be in Print proclaimed an Heretick Schismatick Atheist or any thing rather than be at the unpleasing labour of a Confutation of all Accusers were it not for a higher interest than mine For though we must contend for the Faith yet the servant of the Lord must not needlesly strive 2 Tim. 2. 24 25. And experience tells us the good seldome answereth the bad effects § 2. And there are few that call me to a publick Account that I answer less willingly than Mr. Cheney because his Accusations are such gross Mistakes that I cannot Answer them in the gentlest manner according to truth without opening that which will bring him lower in the Readers esteem than I desire and I much fear will be to himself a temptation which he will hardly overcome as I see by this his 2d Book Had he that was my familiar Neighbour thought meet to have spoken with me before his Publications I am past doubt that I could have convinced him of multitudes of Untruths and Errours so as to have prevented such a publication of them for in private he would easilier have born the detection of them than in the hearing of the World which he has chosen But whereas some cast away his Book as a fardel of Dotage and shameless Lyes I must remember such that I am confident he wrote no falshoods with a purpose knowingly to deceive and therefore they are not strictly Lyes but as rash untruths are such in a larger sense which ignorant men assert for want of due tryal It is a great errour to over-value such poor frail ignorant men as we all are Mr. Ch. and I have both over-valued one another and this errour now we have both escaped but not laid by our Christian love And as God will not take Mens Diseases for their Sins his bodily temper is to me a great excuse of his strong confident mistakes § 3. The very Introductory Preface of his Books disowning Cruelty and uncharitable dividing Impositions enableth me to forgive him the multitude of rash untruths and slanders and instead of a Mentiris I shall put but a Putares or Non-putares I have just such a task in dealing with Mr. Ch. as with one that is hard of hearing when I speak to such a one that heareth but one half and mis-heareth the rest he answereth me as he heard and when I tell him his mistake his last reply is I thought you had said thus and thus but if I should dispute a whole day with such a man I should be sharply censured if I printed the Dispute and told the World how many hundred times the man mis-heard and so mistook me And I fear neither he himself nor the Reader that valueth his time would thank me for such exercise of my Arithmetick with Mr. Cheney § 4. For his Preface I thank him It tells me that all our Accusers do it not in meer Malignity and that he hath a few steps further to tumble before he come to the bottom of the hill His Book consisteth partly of a handsome considerable discourse for Prelacie and other Church-Offices of Humane Invention and partly of a new singular Doctrine about Church-Forms partly in a critical discharge of his fancy and unpacking his preparations against the Independant Covenant and Church-Form and partly in detecting my many Atheistical Infidel Impious Errours by which he supposeth I am deceiving the world and partly n a multitude of falshoods of me and others in matter of fact and partly I hope an ignorant plea for the Pope To open all these fully would tire the Reader and me CHAP. II. What the Doctrine is which he accuseth of Atheism Impiety c. § 1. THE Reader that hath well perused my Writings knoweth it but I cannot expect that all should do so that read his Book The abstract is this I. That Jesus Christ is Head over all things to the Church Eph. 1. 22 23. II. That the Mosaical Law as such never bound other Kingdoms and is ceased with their Commonwealth and is abrogated by Christ and that he as King of the Church hath established a sufficient Law for all that is universally necessary for Doctrine Worship and Church-order or Government and was faithful in all his house as Moses and Commissioned his Apostles to Disciple Nations Baptizing them and teaching them what Christ himself had commanded them Matth. 28. 19. III. That he setled the Ministry and Church-Form before he made any Magistrate Christian and that no Magistrate hath power to change them IV. That what his Apostles did by his Commission and Spirit he did by them V. That Church-Forms being so Instituted and Constituted he hath not left them so much to the will of Man as he hath done the Forms of Civil Government VI. That Christ hath One Universal Church of which he is the onely Head and Law-giver and no Vicar personal or collective as one Political person or power of which professed believers and consenters in Baptism are the visible Members and sincere Believers and Consenters the Spiritual saved Members VII That the World and Church are not all one nor Heathens and Infidels the same with Christians nor any parts of the Church properly called VIII That Christs Ministers first work to which they were Commissioned was not on the Church or any Member of it but the Infidel world to gather them into a Church and the first Baptized person was not Baptized into a pre-existent Church but the Church existing Baptism entereth men into it IX That the first Baptizer was no Pastor of such an existent Church but an Organical Minister to gather a Christian Church X. That though at Baptism one may enter into the Universal and a particular Church yet Baptisme qua talis entereth us onely into the Universal being our Christening or Covenant-uniting to the body of Christ XI That a Pastor in the Scripture and usual sense is a Relate to Oves the Sheep or Flock and not to Infidels And a Ministry to Infidels and an Episcopacy or Pastorship of the flock are different notions but if any will use the terms otherwise we contend not de nomine though you call him a Pastor of Infidels or what else you can devise XII To explain my self when I mention a Bishop or Pastor I mean the Bishop or Pastor of
their own principle in baptizing the Infants of Non-Confederates p. 129. I do utterly withstand it as Wickedness and Abomination in Gods Church I am to die and burn at a stake before I yield to any such thing This is Mr. Baxters way He offers it to Bishop Morley and Bishop Gunning in his Preface to his last Book of Concord that posterity may see what it is that he would have had and laboured to set up in all the Churches And accordingly let both the present and future Ages see and know p. 130. Your way is not so innocent as that of re-baptizing For the very matter and terms of your Church-Covenant are unsafe and plainly Schismatical As if Constables and people of each Town must Confederate to be a Corporation an Independent body having all jurisdiction within themselves and such as will not enter into this Confederacy must be counted none of the Kings Subjects To say there are no Churches in the world but a few Independent Churches were to go beyond Brownism It were rather to teach Infidelity such an opinion would be abhorred by all Now Mr. Baxter and the Independents Doctrine saith it Their errour should they hold it habitually predominantly and practically would be certainly their damnation p. 141 I see not but Pagans gross Hereticks Apostates Thieves and Robbers might combine together and say I take thee for my Pastor and I take you for my people Doth not your Doctrine infer it p. 143. If I yield to their assertion I must subvert the office of Christ and his Apostles and all his faithful Ministers and all the Churches to this day which I will not do for fear of the censure of any man living no nor of a whole Council of men p. 57. The way that Mr. Baxter offers seems to be a worse way It is the way of rigid Independencie Indeed Mr. B. in all his Writings seems to be against the Office of Lay-Elders But that he is not for them under another notion as Heads and delegates of the people mutually chosen by the Pastor and people for assistance in Discipline may be doubted He seems to hint at it c. § 2. How little truth is in all this and abundance such 1. either it is truth that I am for rigid Independency or not If not if yea I am glad that the Independent way is no worse I am not much acquainted with them But if this man say true 1. They are for no Covenanting but consent to the relation signifyed 2. They are not for binding any to continue in that relation 3. They are not for binding any from a regular use of any other Minister or Churches Communion 4. In places where Parishes are divided by Law and the ordinary attendance on the Pastors Ministration goeth for a sign of consent they are true Churches and Members that thus signifie it and ad esse it is usually enough though ad bene esse in doubtful cases the more express as more intelligible caeteris paribus is best 5. They are against an Office of Lay-Elders distinct from Ministers of the Word and Sacraments as of Gods institution for Church-government 6. They are against Democracie or the Church-governing power of the People 7. They take reformed Parish-Churches for the best Order not taking all for Members that are in the Parish but all the capable 8. They are against gathering Churches out of such Parish-Churches without great necessity 9. They are greatly against requiring any qualification as necessary to Communion in point of holiness but express consent to the Baptismal Covenant or profession of Christianity not disproved 10. They make not the peoples Election of their Pastors necessary ad esse but meer consent though the Patron or others Elect them 11. They suppose that the peoples Election or consent is not necessary to make a man a Minister in the Universal Church but only to make him their Pastor As to make a Physician and to make him my Physician differ 12. They suppose that a true Minister officiateth as such where ever he doth it 13. They suppose that associations or correspondencies of Churches for concord and help and Synods to that end and dependencie on such Synods is usually a duty where it can well be had and needless discord a fault 14. They refuse not to submit in practice to the instructions or admonitions of any general Visiter or Overseer of many Churches called by some Archbishops 15. They refuse not the precedency of one Pastor in every particular Church over the rest of the Presbyters 16. They refuse him not the name of the Bishop nor yet to submit to his negative voice as of the Quorum or the Archbishops either in Ordinations and all great publick matters 17. They are for separating from no Christians further than they separate from Christ or would force them to sin but are for universal Love and Concord 18. They are for obeying the Magistrate in all lawful things belonging to his function 19. They take the most extensive Love Peace and Concord for the most desirable and best 20. It is next their obedience to Christ and his sufficient Laws the great reason why they are against the terms imposed in most places of the Christian world where things unnecessary and suspected are made necessary to Communion Reader Mr. Ch. is so honest a man that it were unjust to take him for a deliberate studied Lyar. Therefore seeing he saith that my way is rigid Independency and oft maketh me a downright Independent I that know my own Judgement and knew not theirs so well as he seems to do am glad to hear that they are no worse and that they are wronged by such as accuse them of denying any of those Twenty points § 3. And supposing that he saith true and that they hold but my way as he calls it I will now try the force and honesty of his charge against them And first it savours of a spirit worse than his own that when he had before used the word Oath as owned by me and then said he repented of it that he still useth the word Covenant here as mine instead of Consent which is the word which I use and over and over say that I own no Covenant but any signification of Consent to the relation onely because I said that not ad esse but ad bene esse plain or express Consent in doubtful cases is best This smells of an ill intention and now I will try his arguments against this Consent § 4. P. 101. he saith Mr. B. acts contrary to his own Principles in baptizing the Children of No◠confederates The Universal and Particular Church make but one Church of God He that refuseth one Essential of Church-communion is no Christian and is to be debarred the Priviledges of Christians But according to you Non-confederates refuse one essential of Church-communion I may not baptize you you are to me a Pagan Ans Putares sed calumniaris Here is
fallacia aequivocationis and so quatuour termini This Parish-Church and the Universal are not the same The word Church in the Major signifieth one thing and in the Minor another All is not essential to Communion in the Church Universal which is essential to Communion with this or that or any particular political Church To the later there must be you say Neighbourhood and I say proper Pastors and Flocks for personal Communion But the Eunuch Acts 8. was baptized into the Universal Church and not into any Neighbourhood Parish Diocess Assembly or had any stated Pastor He came into no Church-meeting Philip the Deacon supposed was snatcht away from him in the open field c. Baptism as such enters us into no particular Church Your words you are a Pagan to me are too false for a Christian to have used He that believeth with all his heart is no Pagan I am a Minister of Christ to the world but Infidels are not my Flock or a Church Catechizers should teach Children all this plain truth § 5. II. P. 102. Ask Mr. Baxter saith he Whom do you mean by the word Church and at last he must come to one man the Pastor as the Papist◠the Pope He that covenanteth first covenantet◠with none but the Pastor You change your terms What Church must he covenant with that was first baptized Ans Christ was baptized and his first baptized Disciple and he were the Embryo of the Universal Church if you can prove that one was baptized alone And as to a particular Church the Gatherer at first is onely a Minister in the Church Universal and authorized to that gathering which shall be the Foundation of his future relation And the first person that consenteth and he are not a proper Church for it is an Embryo and in fieri as a Troop when the Captain hath listed the first man But usually many are made Christians first and then they are materia disposita and Consent maketh the Pastors and them to be particular Churches Acts 14. 23. They ordained them Elders in every Church Elders of their own Acts 20. the Elders of the Church of Ephesus and so of the rest of the Churches are mentioned And is the Captain a Troop or the Pastor a Church if he be the gatherer of it § 6. III. You name not Christ saith he but the Pastor Ans When we say Captain A. B's Troop we name not the General When we say the Bishop of London 's Diocess the King's Dominion c. we name not Christ or God For onely the Genus proximum is to be in definitions The Superiour are supposed they are Christians first § 7. IV. You say saith he that before this Covenant men are but hewed stones that is all the faithful are Pagans Ans Putares To be prepared for Baptism is somewhat more than to be Pagans But till consent Christians are not Members of any particular Church The Eunuch was but a hewn stone as you call it as to a formed Congregation but he was no Pagan but a Member of the Body of Christ § 8. V. This saith he makes the most excellent Ministers Apostles c. mere Lay-men such as go up and down preaching to Pagans where Christ is not known plainly subverts the Gospel c. Ans They are Christ's Ministers and not Lay-men while they convert Pagans and yet Pagans are no Church And till they are a Church no Apostle is a Pastor of them as a Church The Gospel standeth for all this § 9. But saith he may not a man be a Shepherd by calling and occupation unless he have a Flock as well as a Physician c. Ans Either you quarrel de re or de nomine If de re do you mean any more than that he is authorized to gather and rule a Flock If more what is it If not you calumniate if you pretend that I deny this but if it be onely de nomine whether the name of a Pastor may be given him that yet hath no Flock or of a Captain to him that hath no Troop I answer 1. When you wrangle but about Names try once more to stay that list of laying the overthrow of the Gospel on your Names 2. Titles of Relation may be given aptitudinally ex intentione de futuro But if one may be called a Pastor by relation to an intended Flock much more to an actual Flock and still it is a Relative to such a Flock intended 3. Try in Scripture and Councils and all Church-writers whether the title Pastor be not usually given onely to those that have actual Flocks But to avoid your quarrel call you them by what name you list if that will ease or please you § 10. VI. According to this Doctrine a Minister hath no Office or Authority but just to those of his own charge he preacheth elsewhere but as a gifted man Ans Still false as to me of whom you speak what a strange Chain of Calumnies can you make A Minister is 1. Christ's Officer to the world to convert them 2. To gather a Church in fieri 3. To officiate pro tempore in any other Church as a Licensed Physician to others even to Physicians doth his office § 11. VII It maketh void saith he Gods Ordinance of Ordination for either they are Ministers by Ordination or not If yea this Doctrine is erroneous Ans Unproved Ordination sine titulo maketh a man a Minister to the World and to the Church indefinitely Ordination with Institution doth that and more viz. it tieth a Minister to a consenting people Your Writings are all stigmatized with the shame of naked affirmations without proof and then forgetfully you oft say I have proved Why may not Consent and Ordination and Institution and Induction too be all needful Is a man and womans Consent needless unless the Ministers marrying them be needless May not a Town Hospital or Person chuse a Physician as theirs if he were licensed be-before If a Captain have commission to raise a Troop is consent of the Listed needless So of a Major a Pilot or any relation which requires Consent § 12. VIII It inferreth saith he that the Church is before the Officers viz. Pagans a Church Ans All fictions as to me to whom he speaks I said before they are as the Heart to the Body the punctum saliens is the first organical part to make the rest but not a part of the Body till the Body be made They are Ministers to gather Churches and then Pastors of Churches onely by consent And when Churches are gathered and the Pastor dead the people are Intentionally a Society but actually but a Community till a Pastor related to them make them a politick society And then relata sunt simul § 13. IX This Doctrine puts a new clause into Baptism which Christ never put in and altereth Christianity saith he Before I baptize you I must have an antecedent Covenant or signified Consent from you to submit to
me and you must be baptized in the name of Paul c. No Church-covenant no Church-member no right to any Church-ordinance Ans Confundendo fortiter caluminaris 1. The Eunuch consented to be a Christian of the Church Universal but not to be of a particular Church without that Consent he had not been baptized but this was not needful to it 2. The dispute whether Lay-mens baptism be valid I leave to you But if yea it is not necessary that I judge the Baptizer a Minister If not then it is necessary and my consent is necessary to make me a Christian but not him a Minister But mutual consent is necessary to his Pastoral relation to a particular Church 3. An Ordinance common to the Church Universal and proper to a particular Church should not be confounded nor so much as the modal ministration Do I adde to Baptism if I say that by the Canons and Custom of all the Churches for one Thousand years a man was not to be taken for the Bishop of any Church without mutual consent what 's this to Baptism And what temerity is it to feign men to wrong Christ by that which was his Institution and so judged and used in all the Churches § 14. X. Saith he It maketh the people Church-Rulers or Co-partners in office with the Pastors so that without their Consent they can do nothing not baptize Ans Of me the calumny hath no excuse I have written so much to the contrary Yea the very Act calumniated essentially containeth the contrary in it As he that consenteth to be a Servant consenteth not to be Master but to obey So they that consent to be Lay-members of a Pastors Flock consent that he and not they shall rule and that they will be the obeying part How could you wink so hard as not to see that your false witness confuteth it self And what if he cannot be their Governour without their consent doth this give them any part in governing Nay what if he cannot baptize a Non-consenter or give him the Lords Supper is the Refuser a Church-governour The man had got a heap of Notions against the Independents in his mind or his instigator that hath the same disease had thrust them in and out they must come against he knew not whom or what upon the word Consent What work would he make in the Church if he should deny the necessity of this Consent and have the Church made a Prison where Infidels should be cram'd and drencht with the Sacrament § 15. XI It sets up saith he Rebaptization by a Law For it requireth of godly baptized ones an antecedent Covenant to be Members of the particular Church As if a man should covenant to be a godly Citizen of London to be a Member of Gods Church at K. and hold communion therewith the people are called on to be new Christians as if they had been no Christians before Ans It is a sin to read such words without grief and indignation What! is every renewal of the Covenant of Godliness or Christianity a Rebaptizing or supposeth us Pagans Is this made by a Minister a heinous sin Are we not to do it in every partaking of the Lords Supper Yea explicitely or implicitely in every prayer Is Mr. Allen's Book for Covenanting and Mr. Rawlet's of Sacramental Covenanting such unchristening Heresies Is it damnable or sinful to covenant to be a godly Servant or a godly Husband or Wife or a godly Minister or Magistrate Doth this suppose them ungodly before with wat weapons are we assaulted § 16. XII He addes It bindeth people to be dwellers within the precincts of that one Church to hear no other Minister to joyn with no other Congregation Ans Concatenated Calumnies as to me They onely consent to the Relation of Lay-members till they remove their dwelling or relation They consent to take that Church but as a part of the Universal and therefore to hold just Communion with all others and receive what benefit they can from any other Ministers I abhor a Covenant that renounceth Communion with the Universal Church or any part of it without necessary cause Putide haec putares § 17. XIII He addes What shall godly Strangers Travellers c. do your Doctrine maketh them invaders Ans 1. If I have no notice of their consent to communicate with us pro tempore they expect it not And de ignotis non judicat Ecclesia and non apparere is equal to non esse If I have notice of their Consent it supposeth some notice that they are baptized or Christians and have more right than Heathens to Communion And if so 1. They consent to be Members of the Universal Church and as such I shall give them the Sacrament and Communion though I were no Pastor of any particular stated Church 2. They consent to a Transient Temporary Communion with me as a Minister in the Catholick Church And 3. They consent to transient temporary Communion with that particular Church and transient temporary Communion I will give them yea and may call them transient Members of that Church but no further any of these than they consent A Christian giving evidence of his Christianity hath right to transient Communion in all Churches in the world where he cometh yea all are not bound to live in stated Churches some are Travellers some unsetled Embassadors some Factors amongst Heathens some of no Habitation Beggars Pedlars Tinkers and such wandring Trades some live where is no Church with whom they may hold lawful Communion c. Now we have a new Divine risen up in the end of the world that seems to make all the setled Churches of Christ in the world for many hundred years to be all Traitors to Christ because these wanderers must not consent to their special relations nor enjoy their proper Priviledges and because they consent themselves to a more setled relation and Communion than these wanderers or refusers are capable of What would all the old Church that made so many Canons about their proper Communion have thought of this mans Doctrine if he had come among them at their Elections Discipline Distributions to the Widows and Poor and said Hold Sirs You are all destroying Baptism and Christianity by consenting to more towards one another than you owe to every unknown wanderer or refuser of a setled Church-state As if with our new Politician all Cities and Corporations are Traytors or deny or wrong the King because all Subjects are not Citizens some being Vagrants some in Villages some Souldiers some in odde Houses c. and because Cities consent to a special sort of Government which the rest have not Between the Anathematizers and these over-wise Censurers there are few Christians in the world that are not condemned as no Christians for being sound Christians § 18. XIV He was aware that we say that every one that may come into the Temple is not a part of my special Charge as a Pastor which I
the Scripture and Canons 1. A constant publick Teaching them which they owe not to all others or any 2. Constant Government by the Keys 3. Constant Administration of the Lords Supper 4. Constant leading them in publick Worship Prayer Praise c. 5. A special care of the Poor 6. Ordinary Visitation of the Sick 7. Comforting the Afflicted admonishing Offenders watching over all The Canons will tell you much which every man oweth more to his own Charge than to others V. It is certain that this Flock oweth a more special attendance and account and obedience to these Pastors than to Strangers or others of other Churches 1. To hear them 2. To receive the Communion ordinarily of them 3. To maintain them and so in the rest V. I. It is certain that none of this was done or can be done without mutual Consent VII It is certain that this Church-state Office and Duty was setled by Christ's Apostles and continued by the common consent of the Churches on Earth from age to age § 28. That it was an Apostolical Establishment is plain in Acts 14. 23. They ordained them Elders in every Church To omit the sence of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which in the most usual sence includeth Suffrages it is evident that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 implieth the fixing of the several Elders to their several Churches so as to make them the stated Elders of those Churches as their Flock in pepeculiar Acts 20. 17. Are they called the Elders of that Church over which as their Flock the Holy Ghost had made them Overseers to feed the Church of God to imitate Paul that taught them publickly and from house to house and was this no peculiar pastoral relation or were any but Consenters Members of that Church Tit. 1. 5. when Titus was to ordain Elders in every City it is equal to every Church And it stated them as their peculiar Pastors even Bishops as Gods Stewards over them in particular v. 7. more than others Jam. 5. 14. the sick that must call for the Elders of the Church were their proper Flock as is supposed The Angels of the seven Churches Rev. 2 and 3. were not equally the Angels of other Churches Phil. 1. 1. the Bishops and Deacons of the Church at Philippi had a fixed peculiar relation to them as theirs Archippus had a proper Ministry at Colosse Col. 4. 17. And Laodicea had a peculiar Church v. 16. 1 Thess 5. 12 13. sheweth the common state of the Christian Churches Know them which labour among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their works sake And be at peace among your selves Here Pastors to labour and admonish and be over them are to be known owned esteemed beloved persons dwelling among them and knowing their own Flock and the peoples duty to them and one another laid down And shall a Christian Minister say O but do not promise no nor signifie any consent to do it for that is to be rebaptized and is damning to the practisers The Bishops and Elders that Timothy is instructed about were such as had their proper Flocks and took care of them as the Church of God that were to rule them well and labour in the Word and Doctrine to preach the word in season and out of season reprove rebuke exhort with all long-suffering and Doctrine c. 1 Pet. 5. 1 2 3. the Elders that Peter writeth to were to feed the Flock of God which was among them taking the oversight of them more than of all the world not by constrain but willingly and may they not signifie willingness not as Lords but Examples to their Flocks and Shepherds under the chief Shepherd Heb. 13. 7 17 24. fully expresseth it Obey them that have the rule over you they watch for your Souls as those that must give account not of all the world but of that Flock that they oversee The same Church had Bishops that had Deacons and some Deaconesses Widows c. but it was never known that Deacons were to be indefinite Overseers of the poor of all Churches but they had ever relation to particular Churches This is the ordering of the Churches appointed by the Holy Ghost Tit. 1. 5. And yet this man maketh it an abuse or injury against Christ and overthrow of the Gospel § 29. II. As for the constant judgement and practice of all Churches I am ashamed that such usage should put me to such a work as to prove that they ever held and practised that which this man condemneth in me He knoweth nothing of the Churches state and History and Canons that knoeth not 1. That all Churches were Societies of Christians united under their proper known Bishops or Pastors fixed to those Flocks by proper relation though also related to the World and the Church Universal 2. That the people did not onely Consent but Chuse their Pastors and he was to be no Bishop that had not their consent 3. That the Laity of other Churches promiscuously had no power to chuse them but onely those whom they were set over 4. That the Bishops as Ignatius speaks were to know the particular Members of their Churches and see that they came constantly to the Assemblies even to enquire after Maids and Servants saith he by name 5. That they made multitudes of Canons for exercising particular Discipline on each person that needed it by long suspending some from Communion restoring others taking care of the poor and of all 6. That they took not the Catechumens for the Church but Candidates and prepared and tried them before admittance 7. That it was not mere baptizing that made them of that Flock for they preached and baptized in other places 8. That it was not mere neighbourhood of Christians for there were sometime divers Churches in one City as in Meletius case at Alexandria and Dr. Hammond thinks the Jewish and Gentile Christians at first had several Bishops and Churches in the same Cities ordinarily And the Audians Luciferians Donatists and others that were of the same Religion had divers Churches besides such as the Novatians that had some little Doctrinal differences and none till now ever thought that these were all the same Pastors special Flocks and the same particular Churches Yea I have elsewhere cited that Council that decreed that if any Bishop neglected to convert the Hereticks c. he that converted them should have them as his Flock or Church In a word all Church-history and Canons describing their particular Churches and their Elections Orders Offices Priviledges Discipline c. and limiting them that strove for the greatest from encroaching one on another tell us so fully that they were so many incorporate Christian Societies consisting by mutual Consent of their proper Pastors and Flocks that Et pudet piget that such a task as the proofs should be thus imposed on me by a Minister § 30. The same is still continued even