instituted Ceremonies come to be significant and what it is they signifie and whether it be lawful to assign a significancy to them in the Worship of God when indeed they have none of the kind intended To free us from any danger herein he informs us p. 108. That all the Magistrates power of instituting significant Ceremonies amounts to no more than a power of determining what shall or what shall not be visible signs of honour and this can be no Vsurpation upon the Consciences of men This is new Language and such as we have not formerly been used unto in the Church of England namely That of the Magistrates Instituting Significant Ceremonies It was of old the Churches appointing Ceremonies for decency and Order But all the Terms of that Assertion are now metamorphosed The Church into the Magistrates Appointing which respects exercise into Institution which respects the nature of the thing and hath a singular use and sense in this matter or let them pass for the same and Order and decency into Ceremonies significant These things were indeed implyed before but not so fully and plainly expressed or avowed But the honour here intended in this matter is the honour which is given to God in his Worship This is the honour of Faith Love Fear Obedience spiritual and holy in Jesus Christ. To say that the Magistrate hath power to institute visible signs of this honour to be observed in the outward Worship of God is upon the matter to say that he hath power to institute new Sacraments for so such things would be And to say what neither is nor can be proved nor is here either Logically or any way regularly attempted so to be The Compiring of the Ceremonies and their signification with words and their signification will not relieve our Author in this matter Some things are naturally significant of one another so Effects are of Causes so is Smoke of Fire and such were the Signes of the Weather mentioned by our Saviour Matth. 16. 2 3. Thus I suppose Ceremonies are not significant they do not Naturally signifie the things whereunto they are applyed for if they did there would be no need of their institution And they are here said to be instituted by the Magistrate Again there are Customary Signes some it may be Catholick many Topical that have prevailed by Custome and Usage to signifie such things as they have no absolute Natural Coherence with or Relation unto such are putting off the Hat in sign of Reverence with others innumerable And both these sorts of Signs may have some use about the Service and Worship of God as might be manifested in Instances But the Signes we enquire after are voluntary arbitrary and instituted as our Author confesseth for we do not treat of appointing some Ceremonies for order and decency which our Canons take notice of but of instituting Ceremonies for Signification such as neither naturally nor meerly by Custome and Usage come to be significant but only by Vertue of their Institution Now concerning these one Rule may be observed namely that they cannot be of one kind and signifie things of another by vertue of any command and consent of men unless they have an absolute Authority both over the sign and thing signified and can change their Natures or Create a new Relation between them To take therefore things Natural that are Outward and Visible and appoint them to be Signs not Natural nor Civil nor Customary but Mystical of things Spiritual Supernatural Inward and Invisible and as such to have them observed in the Church or Worship of God is a thing which is not as yet proved to be Lawfull signifie thus naturally they never can seeing there is no natural Relation between them Civilly or by Consent they do not so for they are things Sacred which they are supposed to signifie and are so far from signifying by consent that those who plead for their Signification do not agree wherein it doth consist They must therefore signifie so Mystically and Spiritually and Signa cum ad res Divinas pertinent sunt Sacramenta sayes Austin these things are Sacraments And when men can give Mystical and Spiritual Efficacy to any of their own Institutions when they can make a Relation between such Signes and the things signified by them when they can make that teaching and instructing in spiritual things and the Worship of God which he hath not made so nor appointed blessed or consecrated to that end when they can bind Gods Promises of Assistance and Acceptance to their own Inventions when they can advance what they will into the same rank and Series of things in the Worship of God with the Sacrifices of old or other parts of instituted Worship introduced into the Church by Gods Command and attended with his promise of gracious Acceptance then and not before may they institute the significant Ceremonies here contended for Words it is true are Signs of things and those of a mixed Nature partly Natural partly by Consent But they are not of one kind and signiâ—ie things of another for say the Schoolmen where words are Signs of Sacred things they are Signs of them as Things but not as Sacred A Survey of the Fourth Chapter IN the fourth Chapter we have no concern The Hypothesis whose Confutation he hath undertaken as it is in it self false so it is rather suited to promote what he aims at than what he opposeth And the principles which himself proceedeth on do seem to some to border on if not to be borrowed from his and those which are here confuted And thence it is that the foundations which he layes down in the entrance of this discourse are as destructive of his own pretensions as of those against which they are by himself improved For it is granted and asserted by him that there are Actions and Duties in and about which the Consciences of men are not to be obliged by humane Authority but have an antecedent Obligation on them from the Authority of God himself So that disobedience unto the contrary commands of humane Authority is no sin but an indispensible Duty And although he seems at first to restrain things of this nature unto things natural and of an essential Rectitude that is the prime dictates of the Law of Nature yet he expresly extends it iâ— Instances unto the belief of the truth of thâ— Gospel which is a matter of meer and purr Revelation And hereon he adds The formall and adequate reason of this exemption of Conscience from humane Authority and iâ— obligation unto duty before its consideration without it and against it which is not because Subjects are in any thing free from the Authority of the Supream power on earth but because they are Subject to a Superiour iâ— Heaven and they are then only excused from the Duty of obedience to their Soveraign when they cannot give it without rebellion against God so that it is not originally any right of their own that
his but is antecedent to his coming or any power given unto Him or granted by Him pag. 40. Magistrates have a power to make that a particular of the Divine Law which God had not made so p. 80. and to introduce new duties in the most important parts of Religion So that there is a publick conscience which men are in things of a publick concern relating to the Worship of God to attend unto and not to their own And if there be any sin in the command he that imposed it shall answer for it and not I whose whole duty it is to obey p. 308. Hence the command of Authority will warrant obedience and obedience will hallow my actions and excuse me from sin ibid. Hence it follows that whatever the Magistrate commands in Religion his Authority doth so immediately affect the Consciences of men that they are bound to observe it on the pain of the greatest sin and punishment And he may appoint and command whatever he pleaseth in Religion that doth not either countenance Vice or disgrace the Deity p. 85. And many other expressions are there of the general Assertion before laid down This therefore seems to me and to the most impartial Considerations of this Discourse that I could bring unto it to be the Doctrine or Opinion proposed and advanced for the quieting and composing of the great tumults described in its entrance namely That the supream Magistrate in every Nation hath power to order and appoint what Religion his Subjects shall profess and observe or what he pleaseth in Religion as to the worship of God required in it provided that he enjoyneth nothing that countenanceth Vice or disgraceth the Deity and thereby binds their Consciences to profess and observe that which is by him so appointed and nothing else are they to observe making it their duty in Conscience so to do and the highest Crime or Sin to do any thing to the contrary and that whatever the precise Truth in these matters be or whatever be the apprehensions of their own Consciences concerning them Now if our Author can produce any Law Usage or Custome of this Kingdom any Statute or Act of Parliament any authentick Record any Acts or Declarations of our Kings any publickly authorised writing before or since the Reformation declaring asserting or otherwise approving the Power and Authority described to belong unto to be claimed or exercised by the Kings of this Nation I will faithfully promise him never to write one word against it although I am sure I shall never be of that mind And if I mistake not in a transient Reflection on these Principles compared with those which the Church of England hath formerly pleaded against them who opposed her Constitutions they are utterly by them cast out of all consideration and this one notion is advanced in the room of all the Foundations which for so many years her Defenders as wife and as Learned as this Author have been building upon But this is not my concernment to examine I shall leave it unto them whose it is and whose it will be made appear to be if we are again necessitated to engage in this dispute For the present be it granted that it is the duty and in the power of every supream Magistrate to Order and Determine what Religion what Way what Modes in Religion shall be allowed publickly owned and countenanced and by publick revenue maintained in his Dominions That is this is allowed with respect to all pretensions of other Soveraigns or of his own Subjects with respect unto God it is his Truth alone the Religion by him revealed and the Worship by him appointed that he can so allow or establish The Rule that holds in private persons with respect to the publick Magistrate holds in him with respect unto God Illud possumus quod jure possumus It is also agreed that no men no individual Person no Order or Society of men are either in their persons or any of their outward concerns exempted or may be so on the account of Religion from His Power and Jurisdiction nor any Causes that are lyable unto a legal political disposal and determination It is also freely acknowledged that whatever such a Magistrate doth determiâ—â— about the Observances of Religion under what penalties soever His Subjects are bound to observe what He doth so command and appoint unless by general or especial Rules their Consciences are obliged to a Dissent or contrary Observation by the Authority of God and His Word In this case they are to keep their Souls entire in their spiritual subjection unto God and quietly and peaceably to bear the troubles and inconveniencies which on the account thereof may befall them without the least withdrawing of their Obedience from the Magistrate And in this state of things as there is no Necessity or appearance of it that any man should be brought into such a condition as wherein Sin on the one hand or the other cannot be avoided so that state of things will probably occurr in the world as it hath done in all Ages hitherto that men may be necessitated to Sin or Suffer To winde up the state of this Controversie we say that antecedent to the Consideration of the power of the Magistrate and all the Influence that it hath upon men or their Consciences there is a superiour determination of what is true what false in Religion what right and what wrong in the Worship of God wherein the Guidance of the Consciences of men doth principally depend and whereinto it is ultimately resolved This gives an Obligation or Liberty unto them antecedent unto the imposition of the Magistrate of whose command and our actual Obedience unto them in these things it is the Rule and Measure And I think there is no Principle no common presumption of Nature nor dictate of Reason more evident known or confessed than this that whatever God commands Us in his Worship or otherwise that we are to do and whatever he forbids us that we are not to do be the things themselves in our eye great or small Neither is there any difference in these things with respect unto the Way or manner of the declaration of the Will of God Whether it be by innate common light or by Revelation all is one The Authority and Will of God in all is to be observed Yea a Command of God made known by Revelation the way which is most contended about may suspend as to any particular Instance the greatest command that we are obliged unto by the Law of Nature in reference unto one another as it did in the precept given to Abraham for the Sacrificing of his Son And we shall find our Author himself setting up the Supremacy of Conscience in opposition unto and competition with that of the Magistrate though with no great self-consistency ascribing the preheminence and prevalency in obligation unto that of Conscience and that in the principal and most important duties of Religion and
the Principles here asserted and contended for either express or represent the supremacy of the Kings of this Nation in matters Ecclesiastical as it is stated and determined by themselves in Parliament but rather so as to give great offence and scandal to the Religion here professed and advantage to the Adversaries thereof for after there appeared some ambiguity in those words of the Oath enacted 1 Eliz. of testifying the Queen to be supream Governour as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or Causes as in Temporal and many doubts and scruples ensued thereon as though there were assigned to her a power over the Consciences of her Subjects in spiritual things or that she had a power Her self to order and administer spiritual things In quinto Elizab. it is enacted by way of Explanation that the Oaths aforesaid shall be expounded in such form as is set forth in the Admonition annexed to the Queens Injunctions published in the first year of Her Reign where disclaiming the power of the Ministry of divine offices in the Church or the power of the Priesthood here by our Author affixed to the supream Magistrate her power and Authority is declared to be a Soveraignty over all manner of persons born within this Realm whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal so that no foraign power hath or ought to have any superiority over them And so is this supremacy stated in the Articles Anno 1562. namely an Authoâ—ity to Rule all Estates and Degrees committed to the charge of the supream Magistrate by God whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal and to restrain the stubborn or evil-doers Of the things contended for by our Author the Authority of the Priesthood and power over the Consciences of men in matters of Religion there is not one word in our Laws but rather they are both of them rejected and condemned I have yet laid the least part of that Load upon this Principle which if it be farther pressed it must expect to be burdened withal and that from the Common Suffrage of Christians in all Ages But yet that I may not transgress against the design of this short and hasty Discourse I shall proceed no farther in the pursuit of it but take a little Survey of what is here pleaded in its defence Now this is undertaken and pursued in the first Chapter with the two next ensuing where an end is put to this Plea For if I understand any thing of his words and expressions our Author in the beginning of his fourth Chapter cuts down all those Gourds and Wild Vines that he had been planting in the three preceding for he not only grants but disputes also for an obligation on the Consciences of men antecedent and superiour unto all humane Laws and their obligation his words are as followeth pag. 115. It is not because Subjects are in any thing free from the Authority of the Supream Power on earth but because they are subject to a Superiour in Heaven and they are only then excused from the duty of Obedience to their Soveraign when they cannot give it without Rebellion against God So that it is not originally any Right of their own that exempts them from a subjection to the Soveraign Power in all things but it is purely Gods right of Governing his own Creatures that Magistrates then invade when they make Edicts to violate or controll his Laws and those who will take off from the Consciences of men all obligations antecedent to those of Humane Laws instead of making the Power of Princes Supream absolute and uncontrollable they utterly enervate all their Authority and set their Subjects at perfect Liberty from all their Commands I know no men that pretend to Exemption from the Obligation of Humane Laws but only on this Plea that God by his Law requires them to do otherwise and if this be so the Authority of such Laws as to the Consciences of men is superseded by the confession of this Author Allow therefore but the Principles here expressed namely that men have a Superiour Power over them in Heaven whose Laws and the Revelation of whose Will concerning them is the Supream Rule of their duty whence an Obligation is laid upon their Consciences of doing whatever is commanded or not doing what is forbidden by him which is superiour unto and actually supersedes all Humane Commands and Laws that interfere therewith and I see neither use of nor place for that Power of Magistrates over the Consciences of men which is so earnestly contended for And our Author also in his ensuing Discourse in that Chapter placeth all the security of Government in the Respect that the Consciences of men have to the Will and Command of God and which they profess to have which in all these Chapters he pleads to be a Principle of all Confusion But it is the first Chapter which alone we are now taking a view of The only Argument therein insisted on to to make good the Ascription unto the Magistrate of the power over Religion and the Consciences of men before described is the absolute and indispensable necessity of it unto publick Tranquility which is the principal and most important End of Government In the pursuit of this Argument sometimes yea often such expressions are used concerning the Magistrates power as in a tolerable Construction declare it to be what no man denyes nor will contend about But it is necessary that they be interpreted according to the Genius and tenor of the Opinion contended for and accordingly we will consider them This alone I say is that which is here pleaded or is given in as the subject of the ensuing Discourse But after all I think that he who shall set himself seriously to find out how any thing here spoken hath a direct and rational cogency towards the establishment of the conclusion before laid down will find himself engaged in no easie an undertakeing We were told I confess at the entrance so as that we may not complain of a surprizal that we must expect to have Invectives twisted with Arguments and some such thing seems here to be aimed at but if a Logical Chymist come and make a separation of the Elements of this Composition he will find if I mistake not an heap of the drossy Invective and scarce the least appearance of any argument Ore Instead of sober rational arguing crimina rasis Librat in Antithetis great Aggravations of mens miscarriages in the pursuit of the Dictates of their Consciences either real or feigned edged against and fiercely reflected upon those whom he makes his Adversaries and these the same for substance repeated over and over in a great variety of well placed words take up the greatest part of his Plea in this Chapter especially the beginning of it wherein alone the Controversie as by himself stated is concerned But if the Power and Authority over Religion and the Consciences of men here ascribed unto Supream Magistrates be so indispensably necessary to
Consciences of men as the Scripture the Nature of the thing it self and the right of the L. Christ to introduce his spiritual Kingdom into all Nations do require That which seems to have imposed on the mind of this Author is that if the Magistrate may make Laws for the regulating of the outward profession of Religion so as publick peace and tranquillity may be kept added to what is his Duty to do in the behalf of the Truth then he must have the power over Religion and the Consciences of men by him ascribed unto him But there is no privity of Interest between these things the Laws which he makes to this purpose are to be regulated by the Word of God and the good of the Community over which in the name of God he doth preside and whence he will take his Warranty to forbid men the exercise of their Consciences in the duties of spiritual Worship whilest the Principles they profess are suited to the light of nature and the fundamental Doctrines of the Gospel with the peace of mankind and their practices absolutely confistent with publick welfare I am yet to seek and so as far as I can yet perceive is the Author of the Discourse under Consideration It will not arise from a Parity of Reason from the power that he hath to restrain cursed Swearing and Blasphemies by penal Coercions For these things are no less against the Light of Nature and no less condemned by the common suffrage of mankind and the persons that contract the guilt of them may be no less effectually brought to judge and condemn themselves than are the greatest outrages that may be committed in and against humane Society That the Gospel will give no countenance hereunto he seems to acknowledge in his assignation of several reasons why the use of the power and exercise of it in the way of compulsion by penalties pleaded for by him is not mentioned therein that Christ and his Apostles behaved themselves as Subjects that he neither took nor exercised any Soveraign power that He gave his Laws to Private men as such and not to the Magistrate that the Power that then was was in bad hands are pleaded as excuses for the silence of the Gospel in this matter But lest this should prove father prejudicial to his present occasion he adds p. 42. the only reason why the Lord Christ bound not the precepts of the Gospel upon mens Consciences by any secular compulsories was not because Compulsion was an improper way to put his Laws in execution for then He had never established them with more enforcing Sanctions but only because himself was not vested with any secular power and so could not use those methods of Government which are proper to its jurisdiction this in plain English is that if Christ had had power he would have ordered the Gospel to have been propagated as Mahomet hath done his Alcoran an Assertion untrue and impious contrary to the whole spirit and Genius of the Gospel and of the Author of it aud the Commands and Precepts of it And it is fondly supposed that the Lord Christ suited all the Management of the affairs of the Gospel unto that state and condition in this world wherein he emptied Himself and took upon Him the form of a Servant making Himself of no reputation that He might be obedient unto Death the death of the Cross He layes the Foundation of the promulgation and propagation of it in the world in the grant of all power unto him in Heaven and Earth All power saith he to his Apostles is given unto me in heaven and earth go ye therefore and Baptize all Nations teaching them to observe all things whatever I have commanded you Matth. 28. 19 20. He is confidered in the dispensation of the Gospel as He who is head over all things to the Church the Lord of Lords and King of Kings whom our Author acknowledgeth to be his Vicegerents On this account the Gospel with all the Worship instituted therein and required thereby is accompanied with a Right to enter into any of the Kingdoms of the Earth and spiritually to make the Inhabitants of them subject to Jesus Christ and so to translate them out of the power of darkness into the Kingdom of the Son of God And this Right is Antecedent and paramount to the Right of all earthly Kings and Princes whatever who have no power or Authority to exclude the Gospel out of their Dominions and what they exercise of that kind is done at their peril The penalties that he hath annexed to the final rejection of the Gospel and disobedience thereunto are pleaded by our Author to justifie the Magistrates power of binding men to the Observation of his Commands in Religion on temporal penalties to be by him inflicted on them unto that is the Discourse of this chapter arrived which was designed unto another end I see neither the order method nor projection of this procedure nor know Amphora cum cepit institui cur Vrceus exit However the pretense it self is weak and impertinent Man was originally made under a Law and constitution of Eternal Bliss or Woe This state with regard to his necessary dependance on God and respect to his utmost end was absolutely unavoidable unto him All possibility of attaining eternal happiness by himself he lost by Sirr and became inevitably obnoxious to eternal Misery and the wrath to come In this condition the Lord Jesus Christ the supream Lord of the souls and Consciences of men interposeth his law of Relief Redemption and Salvation the great means of man's Recovery together with the profession of the way and law hereof He lets them know that those by whom it is refused shall perish under that Wrath of God which before they were obnoxious unto with a new Aggravation of their Sin and Condemnation from the contempt of the Relief provided for them and tendered to them This He applyes to the Souls and Consciences of men and to all the inward secret actings of them in the first place such as are exempted not only from the Judicature of men but from the cognizance of Angels This he doth by spiritual means in a spiritual manner with regard to the subjection of the souls of men unto God and with reference unto their bringing to Him and enjoyment of Him or their being eternally rejected by Him Hence to collect and conclude that Earthly Princes who whatever is pretended are not the Soveraign Lords of the Souls and Consciences of men nor do any of them that I know of plead themselves so to be who cannot interpose any thing by their absolute Authority that should have a necessary respect unto mens Eternal condition who have no knowledge of no acquaintance with nor can judge of the principal things whereon it doth depend from whose temporal jurisdiction and punishment the things of the Gospel and the Worship of God as purely such are by the nature of them being spiritual
and is affirmed to be unspeakable and full of glory he that knows not is scarce meet to Paraphrase upon St. Pauls Epistles Neither is that Peace with God through Jesus Christ which is rought in the Hearts of Believers by the Holy Ghost who creates the fruit of the lipps peace peace unto them a matter of any more affinity with a Moral peaceableness of mind and Affections Our Faith also in God and our Faithfulness in our Duties Trusts Offices and Employments are sufficiently distinct So palpably must the Scripture be corrupted and wrested to be made serviceable to this presumption He yet adds another proof to the same purpose if any man know distinctly what that purpose is namely Titus 2. 11. Where he tells us that the same Apostle make the Grace of God to consist in Gratitude towards God Temperance towards our Selves and Justice towards our Neighbours But these things are not so For the Apostle doth not say that the Grace of God doth consist in these things but that the Grace of God teacheth us these things Neither is the Grace here intended any Subjective or inherent Grace or to speak with our Author any Vertuous Quality or Vertue but the Love and Grace of God himself in sending Jesus Christ as declared in the Gospel was is manifest in the words and context beyond contradiction And I cannot but wonder how our Author desirous to prove that the whole of our Religion consists in Moral Vertues and these only called Graces because of the Miraculous Operations of God from his own Grace in the first Gospel converts should endeavour to do it by these two testimonies the first whereof expresly assigns the Duties of Morality as in Believers to the operation of the Spirit and the latter in his judgment makes them to proceed from Grace Our last inquiry is into what he ascribes unto his Adversaries in this matter and how he deals with them thereupon This therefore he informs us pag. 71. It is not enough say they to be compleatly vertuous unless ye have grace too I can scarce believe that ever he heard any one of them say so or ever read it in any of their writings For there is nothing that they are more positive in than that men cannot in any sense be compleatly vertuous unless they have grace and so cannot suppose them to be so who have it not They say indeed that moral vertues as before described so far as they are attainable by or may be exercised in the strength of Mens own wills and natural faculties are not enough to please God and to make men accepted with him So that vertue as it may be without Grace and some vertues may be so for the substance of them is not available unto salvation And I had almost said that he is no Christian that is of another mind In a word Vertue is or may be without Grace in all or any of the Acceptations of it before laid down Where it is without the Favour of God and the Pardon of sin where it is without the renewing of our natures and the endowment of our Persons with a Principle of spiritual life where it is not wrought in us by present efficacious Grace it is not enough nor will serve any mans turn with respect unto the everlasting concernments of his Soul But he gives in his Exceptions pag. 71. But when saith he we have set aside all manner of vertue let them tell me what remains to be called Grace and give me any notion of it distinct from all morality that consists in the right order and government of our actions in all our Relations and so comprehends all our Duty and therefore if Grace be not included in it it is but a phantasme and an imaginary thing I say first where Grace is we cannot set aside vertue because it will and doth produce and effect it in the minds of men But Vertue may be where Grace is not in the sense so often declared Secondly Take moral vertue in the notion of it here received and explained by our Author and I have given sundry Instances before of Gracious Duties that come not within the verge or compass of the Scheme given us of it Thirdly The whole aimed at lies in this that vertue that governs our actions in all our Duties may be considered either as the Duty we owe to the Law of nature for the ends of it to be performed in the strength of nature and by the direction of it or it may be considered as it is an especial effect of the grace of God in us which gives it a new principle and a new end and a new respect unto the Covenant of Grace Wherein we walk with God the consideration where of frustrates the intention of our Author in this discourse But he renews his charge pag. 73. So destructive of all true and real goodness is the very Religion of those men that are wont to set grace at odds with vertue and are so farr from making them the same that they make them inconsistent and though a man be exact in all the duties of moral goodness yet if he be a graceless person i. e. void of I know not what imaginary Godliness he is but in a cleaner way to Hell and his conversion is more hopeless than the vilest and most notorious sinners and the morally Righteous man is at a greater distance from grace than the prophane and better be lend and debanched than live an honest and vertuous life if you are not of the Godly Party with much more to this purpose For the men that are wont to set grace at odds with vertue and are so far from making them the same that they make them inconsistent I wish our Author would discover them that he might take us along with him in his detestation of them It is not unlikely if all be true that is told of them but that the Gnosticks might have some principles not unlike this but beside them I never heard of any that were of this mind in the world And in truth the liberty that is taken in these discourses is a great instance of the morality under consideration But the following words will direct us where these things are charged For some say that if a man be exact in all the Duties of moral Goodness yet if he be a Graceless Person void of I know not what imaginary Godliness he is but in a cleaner way to Hell I think I know both what and who are intended and that both are dealt withal with that candour we have been now accustomed unto But First you will scarce find those you intend over forward in granting that men may be exact in all the Duties of Moral goodness and yet be graceless persons For taking Moral vertues to comprehend as you do their duties toward God they will tell you such Persons cannot perform one of them aright much less all of them exactly For they can neither trust in
Things evidently deduced and necessarily following the first Principles and Dictates of Nature are of the same kind with themselves and have the Authority of God no less enstamped on them than the other and in respect unto them Conscience cannot by Vertue of inferiour commands plead an exemption Things of meer Revelation do remain and concerning them I desire to know whether we are not bound to observe and do whatever God in his revealed Will commands us to observe and do and to abstain from whatever he forbids and this indispensably If this be denyed I will prove it with the same Arguments whereby I can prove that there is a God and that we are his Creatures made to serve him For the Reason of these things is inseparable from the very Being of God Let this be granted and ascribe what ye will or please or can to the Supream Magistrate and you shall not from me have the least contradiction A Survey of the Third Chapter THe third Chapter entertains us with a Magnificent Grant of Liberty of Conscience The very first Paragraph asserts a Liberty of Conscience in Mankind over all their Actions whether Moral or Strictly Religious But lest this should prove a Bedlam Concession that might mischief the whole design in hand it is delivered to the power of a Keeper who yet upon examination is no less wild and extravagant than it self is esteemed absolutely to be This is That they have it as far as concerns their judgements but not their practice That is They have Liberty of Conscience over their Actions but not their practices or over their Practices but not over their pratices For upon Tryal their Actions and Practices will prove to be the same And I do not as yet well understand what is this Liberty of Conscience over mens Actions Is it to do or not to do as their Consciences dictate to them This is absolutely denied and opposed in the chap. it self Is it to judge of their Actions as done whether they be good or evil This Conscience is at no liberty in For it is determined to a judgment in that kind Naturally and Necessarily and must be so whilest it hath the Light of Nature and Word of God to regard So far as a Rule is capable of giving a measure and Determination to things to be regulated by it That is its moral actings are morally determined What then this Liberty of Conscience over mens actions should be where they can neither Act freely according to their Consciences what they are to do nor abstain from what they are not to do nor are at liberty to judge what they have done to be good or bad I cannot divine Let us search after an Explication of these things in the Paragraph it self whose Contents are represented in the words mentioned Here we are told that this Liberty consists in mens thinking of things according to their own perswasion and therein asserting the freedom of their judgements I would be loth to think that this Liberty of mens Consciences over all their moral Actions should at first dash dwindle into a Liberty in Speculations That men may Think what they will opine as they please in and about things that are not to be brought into practice but yet as far as I can perceive I must think so or matters will come to a worse issue But these things must be a little farther examined and that very briefly Here is mention of Liberty of Conscience but what Conscience is or what that Liberty is is not declared For Conscience it is called sometimes the Mind sometimes the Vnderstanding sometimes Opinion sometimes described by the Liberty of Thinking sometimes termed an Imperious Faculty which things without much discourse and more words than I can now afford to use are not reconcilable amongst themselves Besides Liberty is no properâ—Affection of the Mind or Understanding Though I acknowledge the mind and its Actings to be naturally free from outward Compulsion or Coaction yet it is capable of such a Determination from the things proposed unto it and the manner of their proposal as to make necessary the Elicitation of its Acts. It cannot but judge that two and three make five It is the will that is the proper seat of Liberty and what some suppose to be the ultimate determination of the practical understanding is indeed an Act of the Will It is so if you speak of Liberty naturally and morally and not of state and condition which are here confounded But suppose what you will to be Conscience it is Moral Actions or Duties that are here supposed to be the Object of its actings Now what are or can be the thoughts or actings of the Mind of Man about moral Actions but about their Vertue or their Vice their moral good or evil nor is a conclusion of what is a mans own duty in reference to the practice of them possibly to be separated from them That then which is here asserted is That a man may think judge or conceive such or such a thing to be his Duty and yet have thereby no Obligation put upon him to perform it for Conscience we are informed hath nothing to do beyond the inward thoughts of mens minds To state this matter a little more clearly let us take Conscience in the most usual Acceptation of it and that which answers the experience of every man that ever looks into the Affairs and Concerns within and so it is The practical judgment that men make of themselves and of their Actions or what they are to do and what they are not to do what they have done or what they have omitted with reference unto the Judgement of God at present declared in their own hearts and in his word and to be fully executed at the last day For we speak of Conscience as it is amongst Christians who acknowledge the Word of God and that for a double end First as the Rule of Conscience it self Secondly as the Declaration of the Will of God as to his Approbation or Rejecting of what we do or omit Suppose then that a man make a judgment in his Conscience regulated by the Word of God and with respect unto the judgement of God concerning him that such and such a thing is a duty and whose performance is required of him I desire to know whether any obligation be upon him from thence to act accordingly It is answered that the Territory of Conscience is confined unto mens thoughts judgements and perswasions and these are free yea no doubt but for outward actions there is no remedy but they must be subject to the Cognizance of humane Laws pag. 9. Who ever doubted of it He that would have men so have Liberty from outward Actions as not to have those Actions cognoscible by the civil power as to the end of publick Tranquility but to have their whole station firmed absolutely in the world upon the plea of Conscience would no doubt lay a foundation for
confusion in all government But what is this to the present enquiry whether Conscience lay an Obligation on men as regulated by the word of God and respecting Him to practise according to its dictates It is true enough that if any of its practices do not please or satisfy the Magistrate their Authors must for ought I know stand to what will follow or ensue on them to their prejudice but this frees them not from the Obligation that is upon them in Conscience unto what is their duty This is that which must be here proved if any thing be intended unto the purpose of this Author namely that notwithstanding the judgment of Conscience concerning any duty by the interposition of the Authority of the Magistrate to the contrary there is no Obligation ensues for the performance of that duty This is the Answer that ought plainly to be returned and not a suggestion that outward Actions must fall under the Cognizance of the Magistrate which none ever doubted of and which is nothing to the present purpose unless he would have them to fall under the Magistrates Cognizance as that his will should be the supream Rule of them which I think he cannot prove But what sense the Magistrate will have of the outward Actions wherein the discharge of mans duty doth consist is of another consideration This therefore is the state of the present case applied unto Religious Worship Suppose the Magistrate command such things in Religion as a man in his Conscience guided by the Word and respecting God doth look upon as Vnlawful and such as are Evil and Sin unto him if he should perform them and forbid such things in the Worship of God as he esteems himself obliged in Conscience to observe as commands of Christ If he may practise the things so commanded and omit the things so forbidden I fear he will find himself within doors continually at confession saying with trouble enough I have done those things which I ought not to have done and I have left undone those things which I ought to have done and there is no health in me unless this Author can prove that the Commands of God respect only the minds of men but not their outward actions which are left unto the Authority of the Magistrate alone If no more be here intended but that whatever Conscience may require of any it will not secure them but that when they come to act outwardly according to it the Civil Magistrate may and will consider their Actions and allow them or forbid them according to his own judgement it were surely a madness to deny it as great as to say the Sun shineth not at noon day If Conscience to God be confined to Thoughts and Opinions and Speculations about the general Notions and Notices of things about True and False and unto a liberty of judging and determining upon them what they are whether they are so or no 〈◊〉 the whole nature and being of Conscience and that to the Reason sense and experience of every man is utterly overthrown If Conscience be allowed to make its judgement of what is good or evil what is Duty or sin and no obligation be allowed to ensue from thence unto a suitable practice a wide door is opened unto Atheism and thereby the subversion of all Religion and Government in the world This therefore is the summ of what is asserted in this matter Conscience according to that Apprehension which it hath of the will of God about His worship whereunto we confine our discourse obligeth men to act or forbear accordingly if their Apprehensions are right and true just and equal what the Scripture the great Rule of Conscience doth declare and require I hope none upon second thoughts will deny but that such things are attended with a right unto a Liberty to be practised whilst the Lord Jesus Christ is esteemed the Lord of Lords and King of Kings and is thought to have power to command the observance of his own Institutions Suppose these Apprehensions to be such as may in some things be they more or less be judged not to correspond exactly with the great Rule of Conscience yet supposing them also to contain nothing inconsistent with or of a disturbing nature to civil Society and publick Tranquillity nothing that gives countenance to any Vice or Evil or is opposite to the principal Truths and main Duties of Religion wherein the minds of men in a Nation do coalesce nor carry any politick entangleâ—ments along with them and add thereunto the peaceableness of the persons possesâ— with those Apprehensions and the impossibility they are under to devest themselves of them and I say Natural Right Justice Equity Religion Conscience God himself in all and His Voice in the hearts of all unprejudiced persons do require that neither the persons themselves on the account of their Consciences have violence offered unto them nor their practices in pursuit of their Apprehensions be restrained by severe prohibitions and penalties But whereas the Magistrate is allowed to judge and dispose of all outward Actions in reference to publick tranquility if any shall assert Principles as of Conscience tending or obliging unto the practice of Vice Immorality or Sin or to the disturbance of publick society such principles being all notoriously judged by Scripture Nature the common consent of Mankind and inconsistent with the fundamental principles of Humane Polity may be in all instances of their discovery and practice coerced and restrained But plainly as to the commands of Conscience they are of the same extent with the commands of God If these respect only the inward man or the mind Conscience doth no more if they respect outward Actions Conscience doth so also From the Liberty of Conscience a Proceed is made to Christian Liberty which is said to be a Duty or priviledg founded upon the chimaerical Liberty of Conscience before granted But these things stand not in the Relation imagined Liberty of Conscience is of natural Right Christian Liberty is a Gospel-priviledge though both may be pleaded in bar of unwarrantable Impositions on Conscience But these things are so described by our Author as to be confounded For the Christian Liberty described in this Paragraph is either restrained to matters of pure Speculation wherein the mind of man is left entirely free to judge of the Truth and falsehood of things or as it regards things that fall under Laws and Impositions wherein men are left intirely free to judge of them as they are objects of meer Opinion Now how this differs from the Liberty of Conscience granted before I know not And that there is some mistake in this description of Christian Liberty need no other Consideration to evince but this namely that Christian Liberty as our Author tells us is a Priviledge but this is not so being that which is equally common unto all mankind This Liberty is necessary unto Humane Nature nor can it be divested of it and so it is not
Worship of God to be necessarily and for a continuance observed among them but what they had express Warrant and Authority and command of our Lord Christ for Counsel they gave in particular cases that depended upon present emergencies Directions for the regular and due observation of Institutions and the Application of general Rules in particular practice They also taught a due and sanctified use of Civil customes and the proper use of Moral or Natural Symbols But to impose any Religious Rites on the constant practice of the Church in the Worship of God making them necessary to be alwaies observed by that imposition they did not once attempt to do or assume power for it to themselves Yea when upon an important difficulty and to prevent a ruining scandal they were enforced to declare their judgement to the Churches in some points wherein they were to abridge the practice of their Christian liberty for a season they would do it only in things made necessary by the state of things then among the Churches in reference to the great end of edification whereby all practices are to be regulated before the declaration of their judgement for the restriction mentioned Acts 15. So remote were they from assuming unto themselves a Dominion over the Religion Consciences or faith of the Disciples of Christ or requiring any thing in the constant Worship of the Church but what was according to the Will Appointment and Command of their Lord and Master Little countenance therefore is our Author like to obtain unto his sentiments from the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament or the Example either of the Jews or Christians mentioned in them The Instances he gives from the Church of the Jewes or that may be given are either Civil Observances as the feast of Purim or Moral conveniencies directed by general Rules as the building of Synagogues or customary signes suited to the nature of things as wearing of Sackcloth or such as have no proof of their being approved As the feast of Dedication and some monethly Fasts taken up in the Captivity from none of which any objection can be taken against the position before laid down Those from the Church of the new Testament had either a perpetual binding institution from the Authority of Christ as the Lords day Sabbath or contain only a direction to use Civil Customes and Observances in an holy and sanctified manner as the Love Feasts and Kiss of Charity or such as were never heard of in the New Testament at all as the observation of Lent and Easter He that out of these instances can draw a warranty for the power of the Civil Magistrate over Religion and the Consciences of men to institnte new duties in Religion when he pleaseth so these do not countenance Vice nor disgrace the Deity which all his Christian Subjects shall be bound in conscience to observe or otherwise make good any of those particulat conclusions that therefore Christ is not the ouly Law giver to his Church or that Divinâ— Revelation is not the adequate rule of Divinâ— Worship or that men may add any thing to the Worship of God to be observed in it constantly and indispensiely by the whole Church will manifest himself to have an Excellency in Argumentation beyond what I have ever yet met withal A removal of the Argument taken from the perfection of the Scripture and its sufficiency to instruct us in the whole Counsel and Will of God concerning his Worship and our Obedience unto him is nextly attempted but with no Engines but what have been discovered to be insufficient to that purpose an hundred times It is alledged That what the Scripture commands in the Worship of God is to be observed that what it forbids is to be avoided Which if really acknowledged and a concernment of the Consciences of men be granted therein is sufficiently destructive of the principal Design of our Author But moreover I say that it commands and foâ—â—bids things by general Rules as well by particular Precepts and Inhibition and that if what is so commanded be dâ—served and what is so forbidden be avoided there is a direct-Rule remaining in for the whole worship of God But this is said here to be of substanâ—â— duties but not of external circumstance and if it be so even of substantial dutâ—â— it perfectly overthrows all that our Authoâ— hath been pleading in the three first Chaâ—ters of his Discourse For external circumstances of what nature those are whâ—â— are disposable by humane Authority anâ— Prudence hath been now often declare and needs not here to be repeated The summ of his Apprehensions in thâ— matter about the perfection and sufficiâ—ency of the Scripture in reference to thâ— Worship of God our Author gives us pag. 189. Anything saith he is lawful thâ—â— is in the Worship of God that is noâ— made unlawful by some prohibition for things become evil not upon the scors of there being not commanded but upon that of their being forbidden And what the Scripture forbids not it allows and what it allows is not unlawful and what is not unlawful may lawfully be done This tale I confess we have been told many and many a time but it hath been as often answered that the whole of It as to any thing of reasoning is captious and sophistical Once more therefore what is commanded in the Worship of God is lawful yea is our duty to observe All particular Instances of this sort that are to have actual place in the Worship of God were easily enumerated and so expresly commanded And why among sundry things that might equally belong thereunto one should be commanded and another left at liberty without any Institution no man can divine Of particular things not to be observed there is not the same reason It is morally impossible that all instances of mens Inventions all that they can find out to introduce into the Worship of God at any time in any Age and please themselves therein should be before hand enumerated and prohibited in their particular instances And if because they are not so forbidden they may lawfully be introduced into Divine Worship and imposed upon the practices of men ten thousand things may be made lawful and be so imposed But the truth is although a particular prohibition be needful to render a thing evil in it self a general prohibition is enough to render any thing unlawful in the Worship of God So we grant that what is not forbidden is lawful but withal say that every thing is forbidden that should be esteemed as any part of Divine Worship that is not commanded and if it were not yet for want of such a command or Divine Institution it can have neither use nor efficacy with respect to the end of all Religious Worship Our Author speaks with his wonted confidence in this matter yea it seems to rise to its highest pitch as also doth his contempt of his Adversaries or whatever is or may be offered by
in Conscience to practise according to the publick prescription but only pleads that the Magistrate may punish them if they do not and sain would have it thought that he may do so justly But these things are certain unto us in this matter and are so many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Christian Religion that if the supream Magistrate command any thing in the Worship of God that is Idolatrous we are not to practise it accordingly because we must obey God rather than men Nextly that in our refusal of complyance with the Magistrates commands we do neither rebel nor sin against him For God hath not doth not at any time shut us up in any condition unto a necessity of sinning Thirdly that in case the Magistrate shall think meet through his own mistakes and misapprehensions to punish destroy and burn them alive who shall not comply with his Edicts as did Nebuchadnezzar or as they did in England in times of Popery after all honest and Lawful private wayes of self-preservation used which we are obliged unto we are quietly and patiently to submit to the Will of God in our sufferings without opposing or resisting by force or stirring up seditions or tumults to the disturbance of publick peace But our Author hath elsewhere provided a full Solution of this difficulty Chap. 8. p. 308. Where he tells us that in cases and disputes of a publick concern Private men are not properly sui juris they have no power over thiâ— actions they are not to be directed by theiâ— own judgements or determined by their ouâ— wills but by the commands and determinaâ—â—ons of the publick Conscience And if theâ— be any sin in the command he that imposed iâ— shall answer for it and not I whose Duty it iâ— to obey The commands of Authority will warrant my Obedience my Obedience will hallâ—â— or at least excuse my action and so secure 〈◊〉 from sin if not from errour because I folleâ— the best guide and most probable direction 〈◊〉 am capable of and though I may mistake my integrity shall preserve my innocence and in all doubtfull and disputable cases it is better to err with Authority than to be in the right against it When he shall produce any oâ—â— Divine Writer Any of the Ancient Fathers any sober Schoolmen or Casuists any Learned modern Divines speaking at this rate or giving countenance unto this direction given to men for the regulating of their moral actions it shall be farther attended unto I know some such thing is muttered amongst the pleaders for blind Obedience upon Vowes voluntarily engaged into for that purpose But as it is acknowledged by themselves that by those Vowes they deprive themselves of that Right and Liberty which naturally belongs unto them as unto all other men wherein they place much of the merit of them so by others those Vowes themselves with all the pretended bruitish Obedience that proceeds from them are sufficiently evidenced to be an horrible Abomination and such as make a ready way for the perpetration of all villanies in the world to which purpose that kind of Obedience hath been principally made use of But these things are extreamly fond and not only as applyed unto the Worship of God repugnant to the Gospel but also in themselves to the Law of our Creation and that Moral dependance on God which is indispensible unto all individuals of mankind We are told in the Gospel that every one is to be fully perswaded in his own mind that whatever is not of faith is sin that we are not to be in such things the Servants of men that other mens leading of us amiss whoever they are will not excuse us for if the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch and he that followeth is as sure to perish as he that leadeth The next Guids of the souls and Consciences of men are doubtless those who speak unto them in the name of God or Preachers of the Gospel Yet are all the Disciples of Christ frequently warned to take heed that they be not deceived by any under that pretence but diligently examining what is proposed unto them they discern in themselves what is good and evil Nor doth the great Apostle himself require us to be followers of him any further than he was a follower of Christ. They will find small relief who at the last day shall charge their sins on the commands of others whatever hope to the contrary they are put into by our Author Neither will it be any excuse that we have done according to the Precepts of men if we have done contrary to those of God Ephraim of old was broken in judgement because he willingly walked after the commandment Hos. 5. 14 But would not his Obedience hallow or at least excuse his action And would not the Authority of the King warrant his Obedience Or must Ephraim now answer for the sin and not be only that imposed the command But it seems that when Jeroboam sinned who at that time had this goodly Creature of the publick Conscience in keeping he made Israel sin also who obeyed him It is moreover a brave attempt to assert that Private men with respect to any of their Moral Actions are not properly sui juris have no power over their actions are not to be directed by their own judgements or determined by their own wills This is Circes Rod one stroke whereof turned men into Hoggs For to what purpose serve their Understandings their Judgements their Wills if not to guide and determine them in their Actions I think he would find hard work that should go about to perswade men to put out their own eyes or blind themselves that they might see all by one publick Eye And I am sure it is no less unreasonable to desire them to reject their own Wills Understandings and Judgements to be lead and determined by a publick Conscience considering especially that that publick Conscience it self is a meer Tragelaphus which never had Existence in Rerum natura Besides suppose men should be willing to accept of this condition of renouncing their own Understandings and Judgements from being their Guides as to their Moral actions I fear it will be found that indeed they are not able so to do Mens Understandings and their Consciences are placed in them by him who made them to rule in them and over their actions in his name and with respect unto their dependance on him And let men endeavour it whilest they please they shall never be able utterly to cast of this Yoke of God and destroy this order of things which by him inlaid in the Principles of all Rational Beings Men whilest they are meâ— in things that have a Moral Good or Eâ—â— in them or adhering to them must be guided and determined by their own Understandings whether they will or no. Aâ— if by any means they stisle the actings 〈◊〉 them at present they will not avoid the Judgement which according to
TRUTH AND INNOCENCE VINDICATED IN A SURVEY OF A DISCOURSE Concerning Ecclesiastical Polity And the Authority of the Civil Magistrate over the Consciences of Subjects in Matters of Religion Non Partum studiis agimur sed sumsimus arma Consiliis innimica tuis Discordia Vaecors 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clemens Alexand. London Printed 1669. REVIEW OF THE PREFACE AMong the many Disadvantages which those who plead in any sense for Liberty of Conscience are exposed unto it is not the least that in their arguings and Pleas they are enforced to admit a Supposition That those whom they plead for are indeed really mistaken in their Apprehensions about the matters concerning which they yet desire to be indulged in their practice For unless they will give place to such a supposition or if they will rigidly contend that what they plead in the behalf of is absolutely the Truth and that obedience thereunto is the direct Will and Command of God there remains no proper field for the Debate about Indulgence to be mannaged in For things acknowledged to be such are not capable of an Indulgence properly so called because the utmost Liberty that is necessary unto them is their Right and Due in strict Justice and Law Men therefore in such Discourses speak not to the nature of the things themselves but to the Apprehensions of them with whom they have to do But yet against this Disadvantage every Party which plead for themselves are relieved by that secret reserve that they have in the perswasion of the Truth and Goodness of what they profess and desire to be indulged in the practice of And this also as occasion doth offer it self and in the defence of themselves from the charge of their Adversaries they openly contend and avow Neither was it judged formerly that there was any way to deprive them of this Reserve and Relief but by a direct and particular Debate of the matters specially in difference carried on unto their Conviction by evidence of Truth managed from the Common Principles of it But after Tryal made this way to convince men of their errors and mistakes who stand in need of Indulgence with respect unto the outward Administration of the powers that they are under is found as it should seem tedious unreasonable and ineffectual A new way therefore to this purpose is fixed on and it is earnestly pleaded That there needs no other Argument or Medium to prove men to be mistaken in their Apprehensions and to miscarry in their practice of Religious duties than that at any time or in any place they stand in need of Indulgence To Dissent at all adventures is a crime and he whom others persecute tacitly at least confesseth himself guilty For it is said That the Law of the Magistrate being the sole Rule of Obedience in Religious Worship their Non-complyance with any Law by him established evidencing it self in their desire of Exemption is a sufficient conviction yea a self-acknowledgement not only of their Errors and Mistakes in what they apprehend of their Duty in these things and of their Miscarriages in what they practise but also that themselves are persons Turbulent and Seditious in withdrawing Obedience from the Laws which are justly imposed on them With what Restrictions and Limitations or whether with any or no these Assertions are maintained we shall afterward enquire The Management of this Plea if I greatly mistake him not is one of the principal Designs of the Author of that Discourse a brief Survey whereof is here proposed The Principle which he proceeds herein upon himself it seems knew to be Novel and Uncouth and therefore thought it incumbent on him that both the manner of its handling and the other Principles that he judged meet to associate with it or annex unto it should be of the same kind and complexion This Design hath at length produced us this Discourse which of what use it may prove to the Church of God what tendency it may have to retrive or promote Love and Peace among Christians I know not This I know that it hath filled many persons of all sorts with manifold surprizals and some with amazement I have therefore on sundry Considerations prevailed with my self much against my inclinations for the sake of Truth and Peace to spend a few hours in the examination of the principal parts and seeming pillars of the whole Fabrick And this I was in my own mind the more easily indueed unto because there is no concernment either of the Church or State in the things here under debate unless it be that they should be vindicated from having any concern in the things and opinions here pleaded and argued For as to the present Church if the Principles and reasonings here maintained and managed are agreeable unto her Sentiments and allowed by her yet there can be no offence given in their Examination because she hath no where yet declared them so to be And the truth is if they are once owned and espoused by her to the ends for which they are asserted as the Christians of old triumphed in the thoughts of him who first engaged in wayes of violence against them among the Nations in the world so the Non-Conformists will have no small relief to their minds in their sufferings when they understand these to be the avowed Principles and Grounds on which they are to be persecuted and destroyed And for the power of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction belonging to the Kings of this Nation as it hath been claimed and exercised by them in all ages since the establishment of Christian Religion among us as it is declared in the Laws Statutes and Customs of the Kingdom and prescribed unto an Acknowledgement in the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy it and steddiness of expression which we shall be farther accustomed unto But in what here he avers of himself he seems to have the advantage of our Lord Jesus Christ who upon less provocations than he hath undertaken the consideration of for the Pharisees with whom he had to deal were Gentlemen be tells us unto those with whom himself hath to do as he saith fell into an hot fit of Zeal yea into an height of Impatience which made him act with a seeming fury and transport of passion pag. 7. And if that be indeed his temper which he commends in himself he seems to me to be obliged for it unto his Constitution and Complexion as he speaks and not to his Age seeing his juvenile expressions and confidence will not allow us to think that he suffers under any defervescency of spirit by his years The Philosopher tells us that old men in matters dubious and weighty are not over-forward to be Positive but ready to cry 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 perhaps and it may be so and this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they have experience of the uncertainty of things in this world As indeed those who know what entanglements all humane Affairs are attended withal what appearing
God and shews himself to be God As we formerly said Non-Conformists who are unacquainted with the Mysteries of things of this Nature must needs desire to know whether these be the avowed Principles of the Church of England or whether they are only Inventions to serve a present Turn of the pursuit of some mens designs Are all the old Pleas of the Jus Divinum of Episcopacy of Example and Direction Apostolical of a Parity of reason between the Condition of the Church whilst under extraordinary Officers and whilst under ordinary of the power of the Church to appoint Ceremonies for Decency and Order of the Consistency of Christian Liberty with the necessary practice of indifferent things of the pattern of the Churches of old which whether duly or otherwise we do not now determine have been insisted on in this cause swallowed all up in this Abysse of Magistratical Omnipotency which plainly renders them useless and unprofitable How unhappy hath it been that the Christian World was not sooner blessed with this great Discovery of the only way and means of putting a final end unto all Religious contests That he should not until now appear Qui genus humanum ingenio Superavit omnes Praestrinxit stellas exortus at aetherius sol But every Age produceth not a Columbus Many indeed have been the Disputes of Learned men about the power of Magistrates in and concerning Religion With us it is stated in the recorded Actings of our Soveraign Princes in the Oath of Supremacy and the Acts of Parliament concerning it with other Authentick Writings explanatory thereof Some have denyed him any concern herein our Author is none of them but rather like the Phrenetick Gentleman who when he was accused in former dayes for denying the Corporal presence of Christ in the Sacrament replyed in his own defence that he believed him to be present booted and spurred as he rode to Capernaum He hath brought him in booted and spurred yea armed cap-a-pie into the Church of God and given all power into his hands to dispose of the Worship of God according to his own will and pleasure And that not with respect unto outward Order only but with direct obligation upon the Consciences of men But doubtless it is the Wisdom of Soveraign Princes to beware of this sort of Enemies Persons who to promote their own Interest make Ascriptions of such things unto them as they cannot accept of without the utmost hazzard of the displeasure of God Is it meet that to satisfie the desires of any they should invade the Prerogative of God or set themselves down at his right Hand in the Throne of his only begotten Son I confess they are no way concerned in what others for their advantage sake as they suppose will ascribe unto them which they may sufficiently disown by scorn and silence Nor can their sin involve them in any guilt It was not the vain Acclamation of the multitude unto Herod the voice of God and not of man but his own arrogant satisfaction in that blasphemous Assignation of divine glory to him that exposed him to the judgements and vengeance of God When the Princes of Israel found by the Answer of the Reubenites that they had not transgressed against the Law of Gods Worship in adding unto it or altering of it which they knew would have been a provocation not to have been passed over without a recompence of Revenge They replyed unto them Now have you delivered the Children of Israel out of the hand of the Lord and it is to be desired that all the Princes of the Israel of God in the world all Christian Potentates would diligently watch against giving admission unto any such Insinuations as would deliver them into the hand of the Lord. For my own part such is my Ignorance that I know not that any Magistrate from the foundation of the world unless it were Nebuchadnezzar Caiâ—s Caligula Domitian and Persons like to them ever claimed or pretended to exercise the power here assigned unto them The Instances of the Laws and Edicts of Constantine in the matters of Religion and the Worship of God of Theodosius and Gratian Arcadius Martian and other Emperours of the East remaining in the Code and Novels the Capitular of the Western Emperours and Laws of Gothish Kings the Right of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction inherent in the Imperial Crown of this Nation and occasionally exercised in all Ages are of no concernment in this matter For no man denyes but that it is the duty of the Supream Magistrate to protect and further the true Religion and right Worship of God by all wayes and means suited and appointed of God thereunto To encourage the Professors thereof to protect them from wrong and violence to secure them in the performance of their duties is doubtless incumbent on them Whatever under pretence of Religion brings actual disturbance unto the peace of mankind they may coerce and restrain When Religion as established in any Nation by Law doth or may interest the Professors of it or Guides in it in any Priviledges Advantages or Secular Emoluments which are subject and lyable as all humane concerns to doubts controversies and litigious contests in their security and disposal all these things depend meerly and solely on the power of the Magistrate by whose Authority they are originally grantted and by whose Jurisdictive Power both the Persons vested with them and themselves are disposable But for an Absolute Power over the Consciences of men to bind or oblige them formally thereby to do whatever they shall require in the Worship of God so as to make it their sin deserving eternal damnation not so to do without any consideration whether the things are true or false according to the mind of God or otherwise yea though they are apprehended by them who are so obliged to practise them to be contrary to the Will of God that this hath hitherto been claimed by any Magistrate unless such as those before mentioned I am yet to seek And the case is the same with respect unto them who are not satisâ—ied that what is so prescribed unto them will be accepted with God For whereas in all that men do in the Worship of God they ought to be fully perswaded of its acceptableness to God in their own minds seeing whatever is not of faith is sin he that doubteth is in a very little better Capacity to serve God on such injunctions then he who apprehendeth them to be directly contrary to his mind If an Edict were drawn up for the settlement of Religion and Religious Worship in any Christian Nation according to the Principles and Directions before laid down it may be there would be no great strife in the world by whom it should be first owned and espoused For it must be of this Importance Whereas We have an Vniversal and Absolute Power over the Consciences of all our Subjects in things appertaining to the Worship of God so that if We please We
and Rest such as our Author excellently displayes in all their hideous colours and appearances and which are really pernicious to Humane Policy and Society Were it not much better that all these inconveniencies had been prevented in the first Instance by taking care that the Faith Thoughts Perswasions and Judgements of all Subjects about the things of God should be absolutely bound up unto the declared conceptions of their Rulers in these matters Let it not be pretended that this is impossible and contrary to the natural liberty of the minds of men as rational creatures guiding and determining themselves according to their own reason of things and understandings For do but fix the declared Will of the Ruler in the room and place of Divine Revelation which is no hard matter to do which some actually do universally and our Author as to a great share and proportion and the obligation sought after to prevent all Inconvencies in Government falls as full and directly upon the minds thoughts and judgements of men as upon any of their outward Actions And this for the substance of it is now pleaded for seeing it is pretended that in all things dubious where men cannot satisfie themselves that it is the Will of God that they should do a thing or no the Declaration of the Magistrate determines not only their Practice but their Judgement also and gives them that full perswasion of their minds which is indispensably required unto their acting in such things and that faith which frees them from sin For he that doubteth is damned if he eat But it will be said that there will be no need hereof For let men think and judge what they please whilst they are convinced and satisfied that it is their duty not to practise any thing outwardly in Religion but what is prescribed by their Rulers it is not possible that any publick evil should ensue upon their mental conceptions only We observed before that the condition described is exceedingly uneasie which I suppose will not be denyed by men who have seriously considered what it is either to judge or practise any thing that lyes before them with reference unto the judgment of God And that which should tye men up to rest perpetually in such a restless state is as it seems a meer conviction of their duty They ought to be and are supposed to be convinced that it is their duty to maintain the liberty of their minds and judgements but to submit in their outward practice universally to the Laws of men that are over them And this sense and conviction of duty is a sufficient security unto publick tranquility in all that contrariety and opposition of Sentiments unto Established Religion and Forms of Worship that may be imagined But if this be so why will not the same conviction and sense of duty restrain them who do peaceably exercise the Worship of God according to the Light and Dictates of their Consciences from any actings whatever that may tend to the disturbance of the Publick Peace Duty nakedly considered is even as such the greatest obligation on the minds of men and the great security of others in their Actings ariseth from theâ—c◠〈◊〉 more it is influenced and advantaged by outward considerations the less it is assaulted and opposed by things grievous and perplexing in the way of the Discharge of it the more efficacious will be its operations on the minds of men and the firmer will be the security unto others that thence ariseth Now these Advantages lye absolutely on the part of them who practise or are allowed so to do according to their own Light and Perswasion in the Worship of God wherein they are at rest and full satisfaction of mind and not on theirs who all their dayes are bound up to a perverse distorted posture of mind and soul in judging one thing to be best and most pleasing unto God and practising of the contrary Such an one is the man that of all others Rulers have need I think to be most jealous of For what security can be had of him who hath inured himself unto a continual contradiction between his Faith and his practice For my part I should either expect no other measure from him in any other thing nor ever judge that his profession and wayes of Actings are any sufficient Indications of his mind which takes away all security from mankind or fear that his Convictions of Light and Knowledge as he apprehends would at one time or other precipitate him into attempts of Irregularity and violence for his own relief Hic nigâ—r est hunc tu Romane caveto It will be said perhaps that we need not look farther for the Disturbance of publick peace from them who practise outwardly any thing in the Worship of God but what is prescribed established and enjoyned seeing that every such practice is such a disturbance it self I say this pretence is miserably ridiculous and contemptible and contrary to the common experience of mankind If this were so the whole World for 300 years lived in one continual disturbance and tumult upon the account of Christian Religion whose Professors constantly practised and performed that in the Worship of God which was so far from being established or approved by Publick Authority that it was proscribed and condemned under penalties of all sorts pecuniary corporal and sanguinary or capital But we see no such matter ensued nor the least disquietment unto the World but what was given unto it by the rage of bloody persecutors that introduced the first Convulsions into the Roman Empire which were never well quieted but ended in its dissolution The experience also of the present and next preceding Ages casts this frivolous exception out of consideration And as such a practice even against Legal Prohibitions though it be by the transgression of a penal Law is yet in it self and just consequence remote enough from any disturbance of Government unless we should suppose that every Non-observance of a penal Statute invalidates the Government of a Nation which were to fix it upon such a Foundation as will not afford it the steddiness of a Weathercok so being allowed by way of exemption it contains no invasion upon or intrusion into the rights of others but being accompanied with the Abridgement of the priviledges of none or the neglect of any duty required to the good of the Common-Wealth it is as consistent with and may be as conducing to publick good and Tranquility as any order of Religious things in the World as shall be elsewhere demonstrated It remains therefore that the only answer to this consideration is that men who plead for Indulgence and Liberty of Conscience in the Worship God according to his Word and the Light which He hath given them therein have indeed no conscience at all and so are not to be believed as to what they profess against sinister and evil Practises This Flaile I know no fence against but this only that they
have as good and better grounds to suspect him to have no conscience at all who upon unjust surmises shall so injuriously charge them as finding him in a direct transgression of the principal Rules that Conscience is to be guided and directed by than he hath to pronounce such a judgement concerning them and their sincerity in what they prosess And whether such mutual censures tend not to the utter overthrow of all peace love and security amongst mankind is easie to determine Certainly it is the worst game in the World for the Publick to have men bandying suspicions one against another and thereon managing mutual charges of all that they do surmise or what else they please to give the countenance of surmise unto I acknowledge the notion insisted on namely that mhilest men reserve to themselves the freedom and liberty of judging what they please or what seems good unto them in matters of Religion and the Worship of God they ought to esteem it their duty to practise in all things according to the prescription of their Rulers though every may contrary unto and inconsistent with their own judgements and perswasions unless it be in things that countenance Vice or disgrace the Deity where of yet it may be it will not be thought meet that they themselves should judge for themselves and their own practise seeing they may extend their conceptions about what doth so unto such minute Instances as would frustrate the whole design is exceedingly accommodated to the corrupt lusts and affections of men and suited to make provision for their security in this world by an exemption from the indispensable command of professing the truth communicated and known unto them a sense of the obligation where of hath hitherto exposed innumerable persons in all Ages to great difficulties dangers and sufferings yea to death the height and summ of all For whereas men have been perswaded that with the heart man believeth unto Righteousness and with the mouth Confession is made unto Salvation the latter clause is in many cases hereby sufficiently superseded and the troublesome duty seeming to be required in it is removed out of the way It will not it may be be so easie to prove that in the Religion of the Mahumetans there is any thing enjoyned in practise that will directly fall under the limitations assigned unto the complyance with the commands of Supeperiours contended for And therefore let a man but retain his own apprehensions concerning Jesus Christ and the Gospel it may be lawful for him yea be his duty to observe the worship enjoyned by the Law of Mahomet if his lot fall to live under the power of the Grand Seignior or any Soveraign Prince of the same perswasion But the case is clear in the Religion of the Papists which is under the protection of the greatest number of supream Magistrates in Europe It will not be pretended I suppose by our Author that there is any thing in the confession of the Church of Rome or imposed by it on the practices of men that directly gives countenance unto any Immorality especially as the sense of that term is by him stated and it is no easie matter for ordinary men to prove and satisfie themselves that there is ought in their Modes of Worship of such a tendency as to cast disgrace upon the Deity especially considering with how much learning and diligence the charge of any such miscarriage is endeavoured to be answered and removed all which pleas ought to be satisfied before a man can make sedately a determinate judgement of the contrary Let then men's judgements be what they will in the matters of difference between Protestants and Papists it is on this Hypothesis the duty of all that live under the Dominion of Soveraign Popish Princes outwardly to comply with and practise that Religious Worship that is commanded by them and enjoyned The case is the same also as to the Religion of the Jews Now as this casts a Reflection of incredible folly and unexpiable guilt upon all Protestant Martyrs in casting away their own lives and disobeying the Commands of their lawful Soveraigns so it exposeth all the Protestants in the World who are still in the same condition of subjection to the severe censures of Impiety and Rebellion and must needs exasperate their Rulers to pursue them to destruction under pretence of unwarrantable obstinacy in them For if we wholly take off the protection of Conscience in this matter and its subjection to the Authority of God alone there is no plea left to excuse dissenting Protestants from the guilt of such crimes as may make men justly cry out against them as the Jews did against St. Paul Away with them away with them it is not meet that such Fellows should live or Frotestantes ad Leones according to the old cry of the Pagans against the Primitive Christians But if this should prove to be a way of teaching and justifying the grossest Hypocrisie and Dissimulation that the nature of man is capable of a means to cast off all regard unto the Authority of God over the wayes and lives of men all the Rhetorick in the World shall never perswade me that God hath so moulded and framed the order and state of humane affairs that it should be any way needful to the preservation of publick peace and tranquility Openness plainness of heart Sincerity in our Actions and Professions Generous honesty and an universal respect in all things to the supream Rector of all the great Possessour of Heaven and Earth with an endeavour to comply with His present revealed mind and future judgement are far better Foundations for and ligaments of publick peace and quietness To make this the Foundation of our Political Superstructure that Divisum Imperium Cum Jove Caesar habet God hath immediate and sole power over the minds and inward thoughts of men but the Magistrate over the Exercise of those thoughts in things especially belonging to the Worship of God and in the same Instances seems not to prognosticate a stable or durable building The Prophet was not of that mind of old who in the name of God blamed the people for willingly walking after the Commandment of their Ruler in concerns of Worship not warranted by Divine appointment nor was Daniel so who notwithstanding the severe prohibition made against his praying in his house continued to do so three times a day But besides all this I do not see how this Hypothesis is necessarily subservient to the principal design of the Author but it may be as well improved to quite distant yea contrary ends and purposes His design plainly is to have one Fabrick of Religion erected one Form of External Worship enacted and prescribed which all men should be compelled by penalties to the outward profession and observance of these penalties he would have to be such as should not fail of their end namely of taking away all professed Dissent from his Religious establishment which if
and common Acceptation which strikes no small stroke in the regulating of the conceptions of the wisest Men about the signification of words nothing else is intended by Moral vertues or Duties of Morality but the observation of the Precepts of the second Table Nor is any thing else designed by those Divines who in their writings so frequently declare that it is not morality alone that will render men acceptable to God Others do extend these things further and fix the denomination of moral firstly upon the Law or Rule of all those Habits of the Mind and its Operations which afterwards thence they call moral Now this Moral Law is nothing but the Law of Nature or the Law of our Creation which the Apostle affirms to lye equally obligatory on all men even all the Gentiles themselves Rom. 2. 14 15. and whereof the Decalogue is summarily expressive This Moral Law is therefore the Law written in the hearts of all men by Nature which is resolved partly into the Nature of God himself which cannot but require most of the things of it from Rational Creatures partly into that state and condition of the nature of things and their mutual Relations wherein God was pleased to create and set them These things might be easily instanced and exemplified but that we must not too much divert from our present occasion And herein lyes the largest sense and Acceptation of the Law Moral and consequently of Moral Vertues which have their Form and Being from their Relation and conformity thereunto Let it be then that Moral Vertues consist in the universal observance of the requisites and Precepts of the law of our Creation and dependance on God thereby And this description as we shall see for the substance of it is allowed by our Author Now these Vertues or this conformity of our minds and actions unto the Law of our Creation may be in the light and reason of Christian Religion considered two wayes First as with respect unto the substance or Essence of the Duties themselves they may be performed by men in their own strength under the conduct of their own Reason without any special assistance from the Spirit or Sanctifying Grace of Christ. In this sense they still bare the name of Vertues and for the substance of them deserve so to do Good they are in themselves useful to Mankind and seldome in the Providence of God go without their reward in this World I grant I say that they may be obtained and acted without special assistance of Grace Evangelical though the wiser Heathens acknowledged something Divine in the communication of them to Men. Papinius speaks to that purpose Diva Jovis solio juxta comes undeper Orbem Rara dari TerrÃsque solet contingere virtus Seu Pater Omnipotens tribuit sive ipsa capaces Elegit penetrare Viros But old Homer put it absolutely in the will of his God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus we grant moral vertue to have been in the Heathen of old For this is that alone whereby they were distinguished amongst themselves And he that would exclude them all from any interest in moral vertue takes away all difference between Cato and Nero Aristides and Tiberius Titus and Domitian and overthrows all natural difference between good and evil which besides other abominations that it would plentifully spawn in the World would inevitably destroy all humane Society But now these moral vertues thus performed whatever our Author thinks are distinct from Grace may be without it and in their present description which is not imaginary but real are supposed so to be And if he pleases he may exercise himself in the longsome disputes of Bellarmin Gregory de Valentia and others to this purpose innumerable not to mention Reformed Divines lest they should be scornfully rejected as Systematical And this is enough I am sure to free their Religion from Villany who make a distinction between Moral Vertue and Grace And if our Author is otherwise minded and both believe that there is Grace Evangelical â—â—â—â—ever there is Moral Vertue or that Moral Vertues may be so obtained and exercised without the special assistance of Grace as to become a part of our Religion and accepted with God and will maintain his Opinion in Writing I will promise him if I live to return him an answer on one only condition which is that he will first answer what Augustine hath written against the Pelagians on this Subject Again these moral Vertues this observance of the Precepts of the Law of our Creation in a consonancy whereunto originally the Image of God in us did consist may now under the Gospel be considered as men are principled assisted and enabled to and in their performance by the Grace of God and as they are directed unto the especial end of living unto him in and by Jesus Christ. What is particularly required hereunto shall be afterwards declared Now in this sense no man living ever distinguished between Grace and Vertue any otherwise than the cause and the effect are to be or may be distinguished much less was any Person ever so Bruitish as to fancy an inconsistency between them For take Grace in one sense and it is the efficient cause of this Vertue or of these Vertues which are the effects of it and in another they are all Graces themselves For that which is wrought in us by Grace is Grace as that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit To this purpose something may be spoken concerning Grace also the other term whose ambiguity renders the Discourse under consideration somewhat intricate and perplexed Now as the former term of Moral Vertue owed its Original to the Schools of Philosophy and its use was borrowed from them So this of Grace is purely Scriptural and Evangelical The World knows nothing of it but what is declared in the Word of God especially in the Gospel for the Law was given by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ. All the Books of the Ancient Philosophers will not give us the least light into that notion of Grace which the Scripture declares unto us As then we allowed the sense of the former term given unto it by its first coyners and users so we cannot but think it equal that men be precisely tyed up in their conceptions about Grace unto what is delivered in the Scripture concerning it as having no other Rule either to frame them or judge of them And this We shall attend unto Not that I here design to treat of the nature of Gospel Grace in general but whereas all the Divines that ever I have read on these things whether Ancient or Modern and I have not troubled my self to consider whether they were Systematical ones only or otherwise qualified allow some distinctions of this term to be necessary for the right understanding of those passages of Scripture wherein it is made use of I shall mention that or those only which are
on this of our Author as the rudest most imperfect and weakest Scheme of Christian Religion that ever yet I saw so far from comprising an induction of all particulars belonging to it that there is nothing in it that is constitutive of Christian Religion as such at all I wish he had given us a summary of the Credenda of it as he hath done of its Agenda that we might have had a prospect of the body of his Divinity The ten Commandments would in my mind have done twice as well on this present occasion with the addition of the Explication of them given us in the Church Cateehism But I am afraid that very Catechism may ere long be esteemed Phanatical also One I confess I have read of before who was of this Opinion that all Religion consisted in Morality alone But withall he was so Ingenious as to follow the conduct of his Judgement in this matter unto a full Renunciation of the Gospel which is certainly inconsistent with it This was one Martin Sidelius a Seilesian who gave the ensuing account of his Faith unto Faustus Socinus and his Society at Cracovia Caeterum ut sciatis cujus sim religionis quamvis id scripto meo quod habetis ostenderim tamen hic breviter repetam Et primum quidem doctrina de Messia seu Rege illo promisso ad meam religionem nihil pertinet nam Rex elle tantum Judaeis promissus erat sicut bona illa Canaan Sic etiam circumcisio sacrificia reliquae cerimoniae Mosis ad me non pertinent sed tantum populo Judaico promissa data mandata sunt Neque ista fuerunt cultus Dei apud Judaeos sed inserviebant cultui divino ad cultum deducebant Judaeos Verus autem cultus Dei quem meam religionem appello est Decalogus qui est aeterna Dei voluntas qui Decalogus ideo ad me pertinet quia etiam mihi à Deo datus est non quidem per vocems sonantem de coelo sicut populo Judaico at per creationem insita est menti meae quia autem insitus Decalogus per corruptionem naturae humanae pravis consuetudinibus aliqua ex parte obscuratus est ideo ad illustrandum cum adhibeo vocalem Decalogum qui vocalis Decalogus ideo etiam ad me ad omnes populos pertinet quia cum insito nobis Decalogo consentit imo idem ille Decalogus est Haec est mea sententia de Messia seu rege illo promisso haec est mea religio quam coram vobis ingenue profiteor Martin Seidelius Olavensis Silesius That is But that you may know of what Religion I am although it is expressed in that Writing which you have already yet I will here briefly repeat it And first of all the Doctrine of the Messiah or King that was promised doth not belong to my Religion for that King was promised to the Jews only as was the good Land of Câ—nâ—an So in like manner circumcision Sacrifices and the rest of the Ceremonies of Moses belong not to me but were promised given and granted unto the people of the Jews alone Neither were they the Worship of God among the Jews but were only subservient unto Divine Worship and lead the Jews unto it the same Opinion is maintained by our Author concerning all exterior Worship but the true Worship which I call my Religion is the Decalogue which is the Eternal and immutable Will of God And here also he hath the consent and concurrence of our Author which Decalogue doth therefore belong unto me because it is given by God to me also not indeed by a voice sounding from Heaven as he gave it to the people of the Jews but it is implanted in my mind by nature But because this implanted Decalogue by reason of the corruption of humane nature and through depraved Customs is in some measure obscured for the illustration of it I make use of the vocal Decalogue which therefore also belongs unto me and all people because it consenteth with the Decalogue written in our hearts yea is the same Law with it This is my opinion concerning the Messiah or the promised King and this is my Religion which I freely acknowledge before ye So he This is plain dealing He saw clearly that if all Religion and the Worship of God consisted in Morality only there was neither need nor use of Christ nor the Gospel And accordingly having no outward advantage by them discarded them But setting aside his bold renunciation of Christ as promised I see not any material difference between the Religion of this man and that now contended for The poor deluded souls among our selves who leaving the Scripture pretend that they are guided by the Light within them are upon the matter of the same Religion For that light being nothing but the Dictates of Reason and a natural Conscience it extends not it self beyond Morality which some of them understanding we know what thoughts and apprehensions they have had of Christ and of his Gospel and the Worship of God instituted therein For hence it is and not as our Author pretends with a strange incogitancy concerning them and the Gnosticks that they assert the Scripture to be the only Rule of Religious Worship that they are fallen into these fond imaginations And these are the effects which this Principle doth naturally lead unto I confess then that I do not agree with our Author in and about this Scheme of Christian Religion which I shall therefore first briefly put in my exceptions unto and then offer him another in lieu of it First Then this Scheme seems to represent Religion unto us as suited to the state of Innocency and that very imperfectly also For it is composed to answer the former assertions of confining Religion to Moral Vertues which are granted to consist in our conformity unto and expression of the Dictates of Reason and the Law of Nature Again the whole duty of man is said to refer either to his Creator or his Neighbour or himself Had it been said to God absolutely another interpretation might have been put upon the words But being restrained unto him as our Creator all Duties referring to our Redeemer are excluded or not included which certainly have some place in Christian Religion Our Obedience therein is the Obedience of Faith and must answer the special objects of it And we are taught in the Church Catechism to believe in God the Father who made us and all the world and in God the Son who redeemed us and all Mankind and in God the Holy Ghost who sanctifies us and all the Elect people of God Now these distinct acts of Faith have distinct acts of Obedience attending them whereas none here are admitted or at least required but those which fall under the first head It is also very imperfect as a description of natural Religion or the Duties of the Law of Nature For the
principal Duties of it such as fear love trust affiance of and in God are wholly omitted nor will they be reduced unto either of the heads which all Religion is here distributed unto For Gratitude unto God hath respect formally and directly to the benefits we our selves are made partakers of But these Duties are eternally necessary on the consideration of the nature of God himself antecedent unto the consideration of his communicating of himself unto us by his benefits Prayer proceeds from them and it is an odd Method to reduce the Cause under the head of its effect And Prayer it self is made at length not to be so much a Moral Vertue as somewhat instrumental to the vertues of Morality Secondly I cannot think we have here a compleat Representation of Christian Religion nor an induction of all its particulars because we have neither Supposition nor Assertion of Sin or a Redeemer or of any Duty with respect unto them Gratitude and Prayer I confess are two heads whereunto sundry Duties of Natural Religion without respect unto these things may be reduced But since the fall of Adam there was never any Religion in the world accepted with God that was not built and founded on the supposition of them and whose principal Duties towards God did not respect them To prescribe now unto us a Religion as it respects God without those Duties which arise from the consideration of sin and a Redeemer is to perswade us to throw away our Bibles Sin and the condition of all men on the account thereof their Duty in that condition what God requires of them with reference thereunto the way that God hath found out proposed and requires of us to make use of that we may be delivered from that condition with the duties necessary to that end do even constitute and make up that Religion which the Scripture teacheth us and which as it summarily expresseth it self consists in Repentance towards God and Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ neither of which nor scarce any thing that belongs unto them appears in this Scheme so that Thirdly The most important duties of Christian Religion are here not only omitted but excluded Where shall we find any place here to introduce Repentance and as belonging thereunto Conviction of Sin Humiliation Godly Sorrow Conversion it self to God For my part I will never be of that Religion where these duties towards God have no place Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ with all that is necessary to it preparatory for it included in it and consequentiall on it are in like manner cast out of the verge of Religious duties here schematized An endeavour to fly from the wrath to come to receive Jesus Christ to accept of the attonement to seek after the forgiveness of sins by him that we may cant a little and to give up our souls in universal Obedience to all his commands belong also to the duties of that Religion towards God which the Scripture prescribeth unto us but here they appear not in the least intimation of them No more do the duties which though generally included in the Law of loving God above all yet are prescribed and determined in the Gospel alone Such are self-denyal readiness to take up the Cross and the like Besides all the duties wherein our Christian conflict against our Spiritual Adversaries doth consist and in especial the whole of our duty towards God in the mortification of sin can be of no consideration there where no supposition of sin is made or allowed But there would be no end if all exceptions of this nature that readily offer themselves might here have admittance If this be the Religion of our Adversaries in these things if this be a perfect Scheme of its Duties towards God and induction of all its particulars let our Author insult over and reproach them whilst he pleaseth who blame it as insufficient without Grace and Godliness I would not be in the condition of them who trust their eternal concernments to meer Observance of it as knowing that there is no name under Heaven given unto men whereby they may be saved but only the name of Jesus Christ. It will be in vain pretended that it is not a description of Christian Religion but of Religion as Religion in general that is here attempted For besides that it is Christian Religion and that as used and practised by Christians which is alone under consideration and an Introduction of Religion here under any other notion would be grievously inconsistent and incoherent with the whole Discourse It is acknowledged by our Author in the progress of his Disputation as was before observed when he gives a Reason why Moral Vertue is stiled Grace which is peculiar and appropriate to Christian Religion alone Besides to talk now of a Religion in the World which either hath been or may be since the fall of Adam without respect unto sin is to build Castles in the air All the Religion that God now requires prescribes accepts that is or can be is the Religion of Sinners or of those who are such and of them as such though also under other qualifications On many accounts therefore this scheme of Religion or Religious Duties towards God is exceedingly insufficient and imperfect To lay it therefore as a Foundation whereon to stand and revile them who plead for a superaddition unto it of Grace and Godliness is an undertaking from whence no great success is to be expected I can easily supply another Scheme of Religion in the room of this which though it have not any such contexture of method nor is set out with such gaudy words as those which our Author hath at his disposal yet I am confident in the confession of all Christians shall give a better account than what is here offered unto us both of the Religion we profess and of the Duties that God requires therein and this taken out of one Epistle of St. Paul namely that to the Romans And I shall do it as things come to mind in the haste wherein I am writing He then gives us his Scheme to this purpose As First That all Men sinned in Adam came short of the Glory of God and rendred themselves liable to death and the whole curse of the Law Then that they do all as left to themselves accumulate their Original Sin and Transgression with a world of actual sins and provocations of God That against Men in this condition God testifies his wrath and displeasure both in his works and by his word Hence it necessarily follows that the first Duty of Man towards God is to be sensible of this condition of the guilt of sin with a fear of the wrath and judgement due to them Then he informs us that neither the Jews by the Law nor the Gentiles by the light of Nature could disentangle themselves from this state or do that which is pleasing unto God so as they might obtain forgiveness of Sin and acceptation with him
God no believe him nor fear him nor glorifie him in a due manner Take the Duties of moral Goodness for the duties of the Law between man and man and the observation of the outward Duties of Gods worship and they say indeed that they may be so performed as that in respect of them men may be blameless and yet be Graceless For that account if they mistake not the Apostle Paul gives of himself Phil. 3. 6 7 8. They do say therefore that many of these Duties so as to be useful in the world and blameless before men they may perform who are yet Graceless Thirdly This Gracelessness is said to consist in being void of I know not what imaginary Godliness No no It is to be void of the Spirit of God of the Grace of Christ not to be born again not to have a new spiritual life in Christ not to be united to him or ingrafted in him not to be accepted and made an heir of God and enabled to a due Spiritual Evangelical performance of all Duties of Obedience according to the tenour of the Covenant these are the things intended And as many with their moral Duties may come short of them and be Graceless so those to whom they are imaginary must reject the whole Gospel of Christ as an imagination And I must say to give matter of a new charge that to the best Observation that I have been able to make in the world none have been nor are more negligent in the principal Duties of morality than those who are aptest to exalt them above the Gospel and the whole Mystery of it unless morality do consist in such a course of life and Conversation as I will not at present charactarize It is farther added that the conversion of such a one is more hopeless than the vilest and most notorious Sinners and the morally Righteous man c. Setting aside the inviduous expression of what is here reflected upon and there is nothing more openly taught in the Gospel The Pharisees were a People morally Righteous whereon they trusted to themselves that they were Righteous and yet our Lord Jesus Christ told them that Publicans and Harlots the vilest and most notorious of Sinners entred before them into the Kingdom of God And where Men trust to their own Righteousness their own Duties be they moral or what they will there are no Men farther from the way of the Gospel than they Nay our Saviour lets us know that as such the Gospel is not concerned in them not they in it He came not he sayes to call the Righteous but Sinners to Repentance not Men justifying or lifting up themselves in a coâ—ceit of their moral Duties but those who are burdened and laden with a sense of their sins And so in like manner that the whole have no need of the Physitian but the sick and St. Paul declares what Enemies they were to the Righteousness of God who went about to set up their own Righteousness Rom. 10. Now because moral Duties are incumbent on all Persons at all times they are continually to be pressed upon all from a sense of the Authority and command of God indispensibly requiring all Mens attendance unto them Yet such is the deceitfulness of the heart of Man and the power of unbelief that oftentimes Persons who through their Education or following convictions have been brought to some observance of them and being not enlightned in their minds to discern their insufficiency unto the great end of salvation in and of themselves are apt to take up with them and to rest in them without ever coming to sincere Repentance towards God or faith in our Lord Jesus Christ Whereas others the guilt of whose sins doth unavoidably press upon them as it did on the Publicans and Sinners of old are oft times more ready to look out after relief And those who question these things do nothing but manifest their ignorance in the Scripture and want of experience in the work of the Ministry But yet upon the account of the charge mentioned so unduly framed and impotently managed our Author makes an excursion into such an extravagancy of reproaches as is scaree exceeded in his whole Book Part of it I have considered before in our view of his Preface and I am now so used to the noise and bluster wherewith he pours out the storm of his Indignation that I am altogether inconcerned in it and cannot prevail with my self to give it any further consideration These things though not direct to the Argument in hand and which on that account might have been neglected yet supposing that the Author placed as much of his design in them as in any part of his Discourse I could not wholly omit the consideration of not so much out of a desire for their vindication who are unduly traduced in them as to plead for the Gospel it self and to lay a foundation of a further defence of the Truths of it if ocasiou shall so require And we have also here an insight into the Judgment of our Author or his mistake in this matter He tells us that it is better to tollerate debaucheries and immoralities than liberty of conscience for men to worship God according to their light and perswasion Now all Religion according to him consisting in morality to tollerate immoralities and debauckeries in conversation is plainly to tollerate Atheism which it seems is more eligible than to grant liberty of conscience unto them who differ from the present establishment only as to some things belonging to the outward worship of God These things being premised the Argument it self pleaded in this Chap. is capable of a speedy dispatch It is to this purpose The Magistrate hath power over the consciences of men in reference to Morals or Moral Vertues which are the principal things in Religion and therefore much more hath so in reference to the Worship of God which is of less importance We have complained before of the ambiguity of these general terms but it is to no purpose to do so any more seeing we are not like to be relieved in this discourse Let us then take things as we find them and satisfie our selves in the intention of the Author by that Declaration which he makes of it up and down the Chap. But yet here we are at a loss also When he speaks or seems to speak to this purpose whether in the confirmation of the Proposition or the Inference whereof his Argument consists what he sayes is cast into such an inter-texture with invectives and reproaches and expressed in such a loose declamatory manner as it is hard to discover or find out what it is that he intends Suppose therefore in the first place that a Man should call his consequent into question namely that because the Magistrate hath power over the Consciences of his subjects in morals that therefore he hath so also in matters of Instituted Worship how will he confirm and vindicate it Two
things are all I can observe that are offered in the confirmation of it First That these things of morality moral Vertues are of more importance in Religion than the outward worship of God which the amplitude of power before asserted is now reducing to a respect unto Secondly That there is much more danger of his erring and mistaking in things of morality than in things of outward Worship because of their great weight and importance These things are pleaded p. 28. And elsewhere up and down That any thing else is offered in the confirmation of this consequent I find not And it may be some will think these proofs to be very weak and feeble unable to sustain the weight that is laid upon them For it is certain that the first Rule that he that hath power over the Greater hath so over the Lesser doth not hold unless it be in things of the same nature and kind and it is no less certain and evident that there is an especial and formal difference between these things namely moral Vertues and Instituted Worship the one depending as to their Being and discovery on the light of Nature and the dictates of that Reason which is common to all and speakes the same language in the Consciences of all mankind the other on pure Revelation which may be and is variously apprehended Hence it is that whereas there is no difference in the world about what is Vertue and what is not there is no Agreement about what belongs to divine Worship and what doth not Again lesser things may be exempted from that Power and Authority by especial priviledge or Law which hath the disposal of greater committed into it and intrusted with it As the Magistrate amongst us may take away the life of a Man which is the greatest of his concernments the name of his all for fellony but cannot take away his Estate or Inheritance of Land which is a far less concernment unto him if it be antecedently setled by Law to other uses than his own And if it cannot be proved that the disposal of the Worship of God as to what doth really and truly belong unto it and all the parts of it is exempted from all humane Power by special Law and Priviledge let it be disposed of as who so will shall judge meet Nor is the latter consideration suggested to inforce this consequent of any more validity namely that there is more danger of the Magistrates erring or mistakes about Moral Vertue than about Rites of Worship because that is of most concernment in Religion For it is true that suppose a Man to walk on the top of an high house or Tower on a plain floor with battlements or Walls round about him there will be more danger of breaking his neck if he should fall from thence than if he should fall from the top of a narrow wall that had not the fourth part of the heighth of the house But there would not be so much danger of falling For from the top of the house as circumstantiated he cannot fall unless he will wilfully and violently cast himself down headlong and on the top of the Wall it may be he cannot stand with the utmost of his heed and endeavours The Magistrate cannot mistake about Moral Vertues unless he will do it wilfully They have their station fixed in the world on the same ground and evidence with Magistracy it self The same evidence the same common consent and suffrage of mankind is given unto Moral Vertues as is to any Government in the World And to suppose a supream Magistrate a Law-giver to mistake in these things in judging whether Justice and Temperance or Fortitude be Vertues or no and that in their Legislative capacity is ridiculous Neither Nero nor Caligula were ever in danger of any such mis-adventure All the Magistrates in the World at this day are agreed about these things But as to what concerns the Worship of God they are all at variance There is no such Evidence in these things no such common suffrage about them as to free any absolutely from failings and mistakes so that in respect of them and not of the other lyes the principal danger of miscarrying as to their determination and administration Supposing therefore the Premises our Author layes down to be true his Inference from them is feeble and obnoxious to various impeachments whereof I have given some few Instances only which shall be increased if occasion require But the Assertion it self which is the foundation of these consequences is utterly remote from Accuracy and Truth It is said that the Magistrate hath power over the Consciences of Men in reference unto Moral Duties which are the principal parts of Religion Our first and most difficult inquiry is after the meaning of this Proposition the later after its truth I ask then first whether he hath power over the Consciences of men with respect unto Moral Vertue and over Moral Vertue it self as Vertue and as a part of Religion or on some other account If his power respect Vertue as a part of Religion then it equally extends it self to all that is so by Vertue of a Rule which will not be easily everted But it doth not appear that it so extends it self as to plead an obliging Authority in reference unto all Duties For let but the Scheme of Moral Duties especially those whose Object is God given us by our Author be considered and it will quickly be discerned how many of them are exempted from all humane cognizance and Authority and that from and by their nature as well as their use in the World And it is in vain to ascribe an authority to Magistrates which they have no power to exert or take cognizance whether it be obeyed or no. And what can they do therein with respect unto Gratitude to God which holds the first place in the Scheme of Moral Vertues here given in unto us We are told also p. 83. That in matters both of Moral Vertue and Divine Worship there are some rules of Good and Evil that are of an Eternal and unchangeable obligation and these can never be prejudiced or altered by any humane power because the reason of their Obligation arises from a necessity and constitution of nature and therefore must be 〈◊〉 perpetual as that but then there are other rules of Duty that are alterable according to the various accidents changes and conditions of humane life and depend chiefly upon contracts and positive Laws of Kingdoms It would not be unworthy our inquiry to consider what rules of Moral Duty they are which are alterable and depend on accidents and contracts But we might easily find work enough should we call all such fond Assertions to a just examination Neither doth the distinction here given us between various Rules of Moral Vertue very well answer what we are told p. 69. namely that every particular Vertue is therefore such because it is are semblance and imitation of some
of the Divine Attributes which I suppose they are not whose Rules and formes are alterable upon accidents and occasions And we are taught also pag. 68. that the practice of Vertue consists in living suitable to the dictates of Reason and Nature which are Rules not variable and Changeable There must be some new distinction to reconcile these things which I cannot at present think of That which I would enquire from hence is whether the Magistrates have power over the Consciences of men in reference unto those things in Morality whose Rules of good and evil are of an Eternal obligation That he hath not is evidently implyed in this place And I shall not enter into the confusion of the ensuing Discourse where the latter sort of Rules for Vertue the other member of the distinction are turned into various Methods of executing Laws about outward acts of Vertue or Vice and the Vertues themselves into outward expressions and significations of Duty for I have at present no contest with this Author about his manner of writing nor do intend to have It is enough that here at once all the principal and most important Vertues are vindicated to their own unalterable Rules as such and the Consciences of Men in reference unto them put under another jurisdiction And what then becomes of this Argument That the Magistrate must have power over the Consciences of Men in matters of Divine Worship because he hath so in things Moral which are of greater importance when what is so of importance is exempted from his power Hence it sufficiently appears that the Authority of the Magistrate over men with reference unto Moral Vertue and Duty doth not respect Vertue as Vertue but hath some other consideration Now what this is is evident unto all How Moral Vertues do belong unto Religion and are parts of it hath been before declared But God who hath ordered all things in weight and measure hath fore-designed them also to another end and purpose For preparing mankind for Political Society in the world among themselves for a time as well as for Religious Obedience unto himself he inlayed his nature and composition with principles suited to both those ends and appointed them to be acted with different respects unto them Hence Moral Vertues notwithstanding their peculiar tendency unto him are appointed to be the instrument and ligament of humane Society also As the Law of Moses had in it a typical end use and signification with respect to Christ and the Gospel and a political use as the instrument of the Government of the Nation of the Jews Now the Power of the Magistrate in respect of Moral Vertues is in their latter use namely as they relate to humane policy which is concerned in the outward actings of them This therefore is granted and we shall enquire farther whether any more be proved namely that the Magistrate hath power over the outward actings of Vertue and Vice so far as humane Society or publick Tranquility is concerned in them and on that account Secondly It may be enquired what is the Power and Authority over Moral Vertues which is here ascribed unto the Civil Magistrate and over the Consciences of men with respect unto them Is it such as to make that to be Vertue which was not Vertue before or which was Vice and oblige men in Conscience to practise it as Vertue This would go a great way indeed and answer somewhat of what is or as it is said may be done in the Worship of God when that is made a part of it which was not so before But what name shall these new Vertues be called by A new Vertue both as to its Acts and Objects will as much fly the imaginations of men as a sixth sense doth It may be our Author will satisfie us as to this enquiry for he tells us pag. 80. That he hath power to make that a particular of the Divine Law that God hath not made so I wish he had declared himself how and wherein for I am afraid this expression as here it lyes is offensive The Divine Law is Divine and so is every particular of itâ— and how a man can make a thing Divine that is not so of it self nor by Divine Institution is hard to find out It may be that only the subject matter of the Law and not the Law it self formally is intended and to make a thing a particular of the Divine Law is no more but to make the Divine Law require that in particular of a man which it did not require of him before But this Particular referrs to the Nature Essence and Being of the thing or to the acting and occasion of it in particular And if it be taken in the latter sense here is no more ascribed unto the Magistrate than is common with him to every man in the World For every one that puts himself into new circumstances or new Relations doth so make that unto him to be a particular of the Divine Law which was not so before for he is bound and obliged unto the actual performance of many Duties which as so circumstantiated he was not boâ—â—â— unto before But somewhat else seems to be intendâ—â— from the ensuing discourse they are fully empowred to declare new instances of Vertue and Vice and to introduce new duties in thâ— most important parts of Religion And yâ—â— I am still at the same loss For by his declaring new Instances of Vertue and Vice suppose he intends an Authoritative declaration such as that they have no other foundation nor need none to make them what they are They are new Instances of Vertue and Vice because so declared And this suits unto the introducing of new Duties in the most important parts of Religion made Duties by that introduction I wish I could yet learn what these new Instances of Vertue and Vice are or mean Whether they are new as Vertues and Vices or as Instances For the first would I could see a new practice of old Virtues but to tell you the truth I care not for any of the new Vertues that I have lately observed in the World nor do I hope ever to see any better new ones If it be the Instances that are new I wish again I knew what were more in them than the actual and occasional exercise of old Duties Pag. 79 80. conduce most to extricate us out of these ambiguities There we are informed that the Laws of every Nation do distinguish and settle mens rights and properties and that distinctly with respect whereunto Justice that prime Natural Vertue is in particular Instances to be exercised And pag. 84. It is further declared that in the administration of Justice there may be great difference in the constitution of penalties and execution of men This it seems is that which is aimed at the Magistrate by his Laws determines whteher Titius have set his hedge upon Caius's ground and whether Sempronius hath rightly conveyed his Land or
them in the justification of this principle Infinite certainty on his own part pag. 193. baffled and intolerable impertinencies weak and puny Arguments Cavils of a few hot-headed and brainsick people with other opprobrious expressions of the like nature filling up a great part of his leaves are what he can afford unto those whom he opposeth But yet I am not for all this bluster well satisfied much less infinitely certain that he doth in any competent measure understand aright the Controversie about which he treats with all this wrath and confidence For the summ of all that here he pleads is no more but this that the Circumstances of Actions in particular are various and as they are not so they cannot be determined by the Word of God and therefore must be ordered by humane Prudence and Authority which if he suppose that any men deny I shall the less wonder at his severe Reflections upon them though I shall never judge them necessary or excusable in any case whatever Pag. 198. He imposeth it on others that lye under the power of this perswasion That they are obliged in conscience to act contrary to whatever their Superiours command them in the Worship of God which further sufficiehtly evidenceth that either be understands not the Controversie under debate or that he believes not himself in what he saith which because the harsher imputation I shall avoid the owning of in the least surmise Section 6. From the Concession that the Magistrate may take care that the Laws of Christ be executed that is command and require his Subjects to observe the commands of Christ in that way and by such means as those commands from the nature of the things themselves and according to the Rule of the Gospel may be commanded and required he infers that he hath himself power of making Laws in Relâ—â—gion But why so And how doth thiâ— follow Why saith he It is apparently imâ—plyed because whoever hath a power to see the Laws be executed cannot be without a powâ—â— to command their execution Very good but the conclusion should have been he cannot be without a power to make Laws is the matter about which he looks to the execution which would be good Doctrine for Justices of the Peace to follow But what is here laid down is nothing but repeating of the same thing in words a little varied as if it had been said He that hath power to see the Laws executed or a power to command their execution he hath power to see the Laws executed or a power to command their execution which is very true And this we acknowledge the Magistrate hath in the way before declared But that because he may do this he may also make Laws of his own in Religion it doth not at all follow from hence whether it be true or no. But this is further confirmed from the nature of the Laws of Christ which have only declared the substance and morality of Religious Worship and therefore must needs have left the ordering of its circumstances to the power and wisdom of lawful Authority The Laws of Christ which are intended are those which he hath given concerning the Worship of God That these have determined the morality of Religious Worship I know not how he can well allow who makes the Law of Nature to be the measure of Morality and all Moral Religious Worship And for the substance of Religious Worship I wish it were well declared what is intended by it For my part I think that whatever is commanded by Christ the Observation of it is of the substance of Religious Worship else I am sure the Sacraments are not so Now do but give men leave as rational creatures to observe those commands of Christ in such a way and manner as the nature of them requires them to be observed as he hath himself in general Rules prescribed as the concurrent actions of many in society make necessary and all this Controversie will be at an end When a duty as to the kind of it is commanded in particular or instituted by Christ in the Worship of God he hath given general Rules to guide us in the individual performance of it as to the circumstances that the actions whereby it is performed will be attended withal For the disposal of those circumstances according to those Rules prudence is to take place and to be used For men who are obliged to act as men in all other things are not to be looked on as Brutes in what is required of them in the Worship of God But to institute Mystical Rites and fixed forms of Sacred Administrations whereof nothing in the like kind doth necessarily attend the acting of instituted Worship it not to determine circumstances but to ordain new parts of Divine Worship and such Injunctions are here confessed by our Author pag. 191. to be new and distinct commands by themselves and to enjoyn something that the Scripture no where commands which when he produceeth a Warranty for he will have made a great progress towards the determining of the present Controversie Page 192. He answers an Objection consisting of two branches as by him proposed whereof the first is that it cannot stand with the love and wisdom of God not to take order himself for all things that immediately concern his own Worship and Kingdom Now though I doubt not at all but that God hath so done yet I do not remember at present that I have read any imposing the necessity hereof upon him in answer to his Love and Wisdom I confess Valerianus Magnus a famous Writer of the Church of Rome tells us that never any one did so foolishly institute or order a Commonwealth as Jesus Christ must be thought to have done if he have not left one Supream Judge to determine the faith and Consciences of men in matters of Religion and Divine Worship And our Author seems not to be remote from that kind of reasoning who without an assignment of a power to that purpose contendeth that all things among men will run into confusion of so little concernment do the Scriptures and the Authority of God in them to some seem to be We do indeed thankfully acknowledge that God out of his Love and Wisdom hath ordered all things belonging to his Worship and Spiritual Kingdom in the world And we do suppose we need no other Argument to evince this Assertion but to challenge all men who are otherwise minded to give an instance of any defect in his Institutions to that purpose And this we are the more confirmed in because those things which men think good to add unto them they dare not contend that they are parts of his Worship or that they are added to supply any defect therein Neither did ever any man yet say that there is a defect in the divine Institutions of Worship which must be supplyed by a Ministers wearing Surplice All then that is intended in this consideration though not urged as is
mean time I say such persons as these in themselves and for their own concerns do think it their duty not absolutely to take up in what hath been attained amongst us much less in what many are degenerated into but to endeavour the Reduction of their practice in the Worship of God to what was first appointed by Jesus Christ as being perswaded that he requires it of them and being convinced that in the unspeakable variety that is in humane constitutions Rest unto their Souls and Consciences is not otherwise to be obtained And if at the same time they endeavour not to reduce the Manner and Course of their Conversation to the same Rule and Example by which they would have their Worship of God regulated they are hypocrites Short enough no doubt they come in both of perfection but both they profess to aim equally at And herein alone can their Consciences find rest and peace In the doctrine of faith consented on in the first Reformation and declared in the allowed Writings of the Church of England they agree with others and wish with all their hearts they had more to agree withall Only they cannot come up to the practice of some things in the Worship of God which being confessedly of humane prescription their Obedience in them would lye in a perfect contradiction to their principal design before mentioned For those things being chosen out from a great multitude of things of the same nature invented by those whose Authority was rejected in the first Reformation or Reduction of Religion from its Catholick Apostacy they suppose cannot justly be imposed on them they are sure cannot be honestly received by them whilest they design to reduce themselves unto the primitive Rules and Examples of Obedience In this design they profess themselves ready to be ruled by and to yield subjection unto any Truth or Direction that can or may be given them from the Word of God or any Principles lawfully from thence educed How their conviction is at present attempted let the Book under consideration and some late unparallel'd and illegal Acts of Violence conformable to the spirit of it be a Testimony But in the management of their design they proceed on no other Principles than those of the Libetty of judgement of diâ—eretion or discerning they call it for the determining of themselves and their own practices in what they believe and prosess about Religion and the liberty of their Consciences from all humane impositions than were owned pleaded and contended for by the first Reformers and the most learned defenders of the Church of England in their disputations against the Papists those they will stand to and abide by yea than what are warranted by the Principles of our nature and constitution for no man practiseth any thing nor can practise it but according to his own will and choice Now in these things in their Principle or in their management of it it may be they are mistaken it may be they are in an errour or under many mistakes and errours But from their integrity they know themselves innocent even in their mistakes And it is in the nature of men to think strange of sedate violences that befall them without their demerit and of suffering by Law without any Guilt Their design of reducing themselves in Worship and Conversation to the primitive pattern they openly avow nor dare any directly condemn that design nor can they be convinced of insincerity in what they profess And shall they they be destroyed if they miss it in some matters of smaller concernment which whatever some may boast of is not hitherto tolerably proved Shall now their dissent in Religious Observances on this occasion and those and that about things mostly and chiefly if not only that appear neither name nor thing in the Scripture be judged a crime not to be expiated but by their ruine Are immoralities or vicious debaucheries rather to be tolerated or exempted from punishment than such a dissent What place of Scripture in the Old or New Testament which of the ancient Fathers of the Church do speak at this rate Opinions inconsistent with publick Tranquility with the general Rules of Moral Duties in all Relations and Conditians practices of any tendency in themselves to political disturbances are by none pleaded for Meer dissent it self with different Observances in the Outward Worship of God is by some pretended indeed to be a Civil disturbance It hath alwayes been so by some even by those whose own established wayes have been Superstitious and Idolatrous But wise men begin to smile when they hear private interest pleaded as publick good and the affections which it begets as the common Reason of things And these pretences have been by all parties at one time or another refuted and discarded Let the merit of the cause be stated and considered which is truly as above proposed and no other set aside Prejudices Animosities Advantages from things past and by-gone in political disorders and tumults wherein it hath no concern and it will quickly appear how little it is how much if possible less than nothing that is or can be pleaded for the countenancing of external severity in this case Doth it suite the Spirit of the Gospel or his commands to destroy good Wheat for standing as is supposed a little out of order who would not have men pluck up the tares but to let them stand quietly in the field untill Harvest Doth it answer his mind to destroy his Disciples who profess to love and obey him from the Earth who blamed his Disciples of old for desiring to destroy the Samaritans his Enemies with fire from Heaven We are told that he who was born after the flesh persecuted him who was born after the promise and a work becoming him it was And if men are sincere Disciples of Christ though they may fall into some mistakes and errours the outward persecuting of them on that account will be found to be of the works of the flesh It is certain that for those in particular who take upon them in any place or degree to be Ministers of the Gospel there are commands for meekness patience and forbearance given unto them And it is one of the greatest duties incumbent on them to express the Lord Jesus Christ in the frame of his mind and Spirit unto men and that eminently in his meekness and lowliness which he calls us all in an especial manner to learn of him A peculiar conformity also to the Gospel to the holy Law of Love self-denyal and condescention is required of them that they may not in their spirits wayes and actings make a false representation of him and that which they profess I know not therefore whence it is come to pass that this sort of men do principally if not only stir up Magistrates and Rulers to Laws Seventies Penalties Coercions Imprisonments and the like outward means of fierce and carnal power against those who in any thing dissent