must be confessed Cisterns of Ministerial power and Ecclesiastical authority and immediate successors to the Apostles and so the Bond of Baptisme binds to Gospel-Ministers as the explicite and preceptive institution of Christ whil'st Episcopal order can claim no more but tradition and that very disputable the Prelatical Divines of our Nation would not be thus tyed to the observation of the Lords day nor I to the observation of Easter yet both these especially the first look as like an immediate institution of Christ preceptive and explicite or tacite and exemplary as any order or kinde of Episcopacy he suggesteth to be upheld by the bond of baptisme As to what the Doctor addeth concerning the signal and intolerable injuries offered to the persons of such excellent Bishops as England lately had and still may have and the abatement of the honour of this whole Church and its Ministry c. I wish it may be considered That the Covenant is not levelled against any Real Excellency in the Bishops but an unwarrantable greatness power and authority assumed by them or attributed to them which conferred an unfitting honour on the Church and then the exclusion of it is no injury and the mighty abatement thereof is a positive duty I cannot think but that learning and the due honour of the Church may and will be best encouraged by the vailing of that pompous worldly state and wicked superiority her Governours had obtained the Churches perspicuity seems not to me so necessary that it must needs shine in Lawn Sleeves and succession of Bishops of paternal authority over their brethren nor know I to what Churches save those of Rome who make the Succession of their Bishops the sole and singular Note of the true Church a Supersedeas of such Episcopal order how ancient or venerable soever it be deemed can be so scandalous as is suggested I am sure few of the Reformed Churches see cause so to judge it and then Sir we finde little force in this his complicated Answer Thus Sir I have made bold to consider the Doctors indirect answer and arguments wherein he endeavoureth to shake and subvert the whole fabrick of the Solemn League and Covenant and in them to my judgement there is so little strength of Reason or true Religion that it affords but a poor ground for his insulting and triumphant discharge in page 13. These things being thus premised are sufficient as I conceive to abate the Edge and Rigour of the Covenant and to ravel that cabel and bond of Religious obligation For Sir notwithstanding his supposal asserted in good earnest there is neither Law of God or man requiring imposing or comprobating any such Covenant The Boanergesses will finde cause to thunder out terrour against Covenant-breaking lest Rhetorical flourishes without strength of Reasons should release the consciences of the vulgar from the power of religious bonds It may be Sir we shall finde more strength in the Doctors down-right stroaks His direct answer than in his back-blows His batteries in his indirect answers attempted have bespoken his purpose to break in sunder the Sacred bond of the Covenant His power to effect it in point of Episcopacy must appear in his direct Answer wherein we thank him he looks on the Covenant in the softest sence that can be made as it is a voluntary vow or Religious bond which private men spontaneously took upon themselves c. But yet he suggesteth it was taken by very few not one fourth part of the Nation now living and those few made to take it by the terrors of prison plunder sequestration and the like wracks Unto which before we observe his particular reconciling Answers relating to the special point of Episcopacy I propound to consideration that The paucity of Covenantets will not discharge its obligation be there never so few I hope those few may be free in asserting and must be faithful in adhering to the Covenant in which their confidence may be the greater for that His most Sacred Majesty comes in to make up the number But if the Doctor saw with my eyes he would not suppose the number to be so small if all Tables were as legible as those of the Lords and Commons I believe their number would be found many more than the fourth part of the Nation But can any considerable observer take notice the Covenant was imposed on and submitted unto by all sorts and degrees of men in all Counties Cities and Towns tendred and since testified by their publique subscriptions by the most Ministers in the several Counties unto their individual Congregations and that under the success of War which usually extendeth a Covenant unto all who come under its influence and yet without the supposal of a very great mortality imagine not the fourth part of the Nation to have taken the Covenant The Doctor sure judgeth by such with whom he converseth and I easily believe they are not a fourth part of the Nation yet methinks he himself being to be reckoned into the number might well conjecture them to be more But again Sir the capacity of the Covenanters is more considerable than the number and will make it a question well worth consideration Whether it be not obligatory to the whole Nation When I consider the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled and under that notion and capacity swearing the Covenant as the collective body of the Nation though not near a fourth part in number I am apt to think it looks very like a National Obligation For I know not how they can take pardons if they may not make promises in our names especially when the assent of His Most Sacred Majesty is made so legible by His Royal Subjection to the same Solemn League and Covenant I am much mistaken if the Oath of Zedekiah and the Princes without popular delegates did not binde the people of Israel I hope the Doctor will be more warie than to plunge the whole Kingdome into perjury That there was any such Logick as Prisons Plunder and Sequestrations to enforce the Covenant I am not well-pleased I hope he had more fortitude than to suffer his Reason and Religion to be so captivated he knoweth the will cannot be compelled and I imagine he will not make extortion by force any more than fraude absolve the Obligation and warrant the recession or violation of an Oath he knows that Nature and Scripture do teach the contrary whatever was Cicero's affection to him he knows wherein he commends Pomponius the Tribune as to his extorted Oath nor will a Casuist deny Juramentum metu extorium to bind greater force can besiege none to the making of an Oath nor greater fury from God follow any for breaking the oath so forced than that which befell Zedekiah to the King of Babylon But let us see by what strength of Reason he worketh out release from this voluntary vow that we may be also free-men and it is produced by several suggestions where of The
from Presbyters pag. 21. arrogate unto themselves the sole power of Ordaining Ministers and to be the chief Conservators Cisterns and Conduits of Ecclesiastical authority and Ministerial power page 12. who have not only Precedency and Order but paternal authority page 18. and that not only over people but their Pastors who are by this antithesis fraternal with them and so fillial to the paternal power of the Bishops and make up the paternal fraternal and filial unity of Bishops Presbyters and people pa. 5. Nay in opposition to whom the ordinary Minister or Presbyter is divested of all power and degraded of all dignity among the people and the Bishop as dignified above him so distinguished from him by his Lawn sleeves which is plainly suggested when he tells us The people of England are not to be governed by their equals and inferiors because they are in black Coats page 17. All these expressions with many of the like nature do seem to set up and point out such an Episcopacy as is not Primitive and Regular And I say if this be the meaning of his Episcopacy as the word in the vulgar acceptation by the too long appropriation of it to such an unjust and Anti-christian frame of Government may be understood Truly Sir then I must be free to tell him the sence and very Letter of the Covenant is clear against it and binds the taker in terminis to the extirpation of Prelacy that is to say the Government by Arch-Bishops Bishops their Chancellors and Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-Deacons and all other Ecclesiastical Officers depending on that Hierarchy So that it is the thing not its abuse the subject not its adjuncts the Fabrick not its defects and excesses is covenanted against nor will the Covenant be accomplished or the conscience be satisfied by the removal of the pride presumption dulnesse covetousnesse and tyranny of Bishops whilst the preheminence prerogative paternal power and juridical authority assumed by them as distinct from and above all other Ministers of the Gospel as the only immediate Successours of the Apostles and enforced by their High Commission and starchamher with other imperial Courts Officers and proceedings are continued and established nor must he think by his Sophistical comparison to deceive and delude the conscience telling us page 17 18. That they that Covenanted against Popery cannot think they did abjure or must abhorre all those saving truths and duties of Christianity which are mixed with Popery for whatsoever is formal popery though it be an English Masse or Altar that all that though only that must be abhorred and I conceive it yet remains to be proved that the paternal authority of Episcopacy is a saving truth or Christian duty or not of the formality of prelacy and that government covenanted against It is no hard case of conscience to resolve whether a man may use the good and substantial materials of a destroyed Fabrick but I conceive it an high fallacy from thence to impose the very form resolved against You see Sir at what uncertainty we are left whilst the object of the obligation is propounded under a general term whose proper primitive and genuine signification suggests one thing and the vulgar and long-used acceptation suggests another and our resolution is darkned by the multitude of expressions concluding sometimes one and sometimes the other thing which of these shall a conscientious Covenanter embrace You cannot Sir but know the work of a Casuist is to be full and clear in the discovery of the Ratio formalis thing or matter concerning which the conscience conceiveth it self obliged and that it is a great unhappiness in an Interpreter and much greater in a Casuist to resolve obscura per obscuriora But Sir that I may testifie my willingness to understand him and cement what in me lieth the sad differences in the Church Shall I intreat you will please to provoke the Dr. and his Anti-covenant brethren such as seem to advance and promote an Episcopacy scrupled by Covenanters to speak out and clearly to declare whether they will admit the removal of the Government by Arch-Bishops and that late Hierarchy which he concludes page 18 is dead and must rise in another quality and according to what is suggested in the Reduction by him urged consent to the establishment of Congregational Classical Provincial and National Assembâ—ies oâ— Synods of Church-Officers Presbytarial Episcopacy admitted Communi concilio Presbyterorâ—m to debate and determine the affairs of the Church and exercise all Acts of discipline and Ecclesiastick power In each of which if there be Ignatius his Angel Tertullian his Summus sacerdos or Armagh's Bishop or Super-intendent for order-sake to call Assemblies propound questions gather suffrages require Order and composure in audience and debate pronounce sentence and sign Decrees and to be fixed in that place enjoying all the dignities thereto belonging and to be distinguished by some special denomination from his Chorepiscopi or Colleagues they shall not only enjoy my consent who I hope make conscience of the Covenant but also endeavour which I think will not much need that all the Covenanted Ministers may joyne with them in a Petition to His Majesty that by a Synod by His Majesties Authority called it may be speedily consulted and concluded on under which I doubt not but the Peace of the Church will be preserved and power truth and godliness promoted But if nothing will serve them but Bishops distinct in Office from Presbyters and exercising over them a paternal authority appropriating to themselves the power of ordaining Ministers Domineering Prelacy refused and the succession ro the Apostles and the Jurisdiction before noted we must intreat him to produce those clear pregnant and constant beams of right reason and true Religion which shineth in the brightness and stability of Divine and Humane Laws which may be the pillars of this truth firm supports of duty sure bounds of obedience and safe repose of conscience in this point greatly darkned by the many disputes of Bishops and Presbyters Papists and Protestants nay by the positive assertions of both Papists and Protestant Divines and determinations of Schoolmen who have concluded Bishops and Presbyters to be Ministers ejusdem ordinis equal in Office and authority and in this very case of government all which his very Reduction proposed doth not obscurely suggest Sir the conscience is by him confessed to be more tender than to be deluded with Sophistry or silenced by a pretence of Regulation and Moderation which intends no other save a Reduction of Episcopacy to its pristine and corrupt estate not unto Presbytery Thus Sir I have noted the first Rock and the Doctor 's unhappy dashing against it which must needs render ineffectual whatever he after writeth The inadvertency of his expressions will appear no less evident Inadvertency of expression than his ambiguous state of the Scruple and its resolution if we either observe its fierceness or falsehood The
propounded the answer had need be clear and arguments convincing that follow such provocations unto prejudice which would make a sober much more a scrupulous conscience turn aside and reade no further when conscience is so tender that reason is ready to pinch it into passion how little need is there to provoke it by Railings and reflexion of just miscarriages much less unjust calumnies Though Ironies and Satyrs may become Oratours in reproof they beseem not Casuists in the resolution of conscience-doubts But I proceed to consider his answer and Arguments The imbecillity of his answer and arguments the third Rock of conscience-resolution purposing by Gods grace to yield to the power of Reason that is in them though they come under so great disadvantages as have been noted His Answer is as himself suggesteth double indirect and direct His first Answer is indirect an oblique stroak at the whole body of the Covenant His indirect answer considered which work how prudently it is undertaken considering the universal obligation of the Covenant on all men fâ—om His Sacred Majesty to the meanest Subject let wise men judge and how proper to him who if my information faile not is himself engaged in it It is indeed a notable piece of policy under pretence of Reconciling the Covenant in one Article to Episcopacy to invalidate the whole and expose it to vulgar contempt but if it be sinful let it go His Rhetorick is Angelical but let us try the strength of his Reasons unto the loosing of St. Peters bonds The main strength of what he doth suggest against the Covenant The general scope of his arguments lieth in the miscarried Circumstances which do relate unto the imposing and taking of it viz. its defect in point if imposing power the terrour and tumults with which it was enforced the policy and humour from whence it did arise and the novelâ—y or unacquaintednesse of it as to our English Laws and Constitutions or the like Unto all which I shall only desire the Dr. on serious and second thoughts to give a candid clear rational and Scriptural resolve to this general case of conscience viz. if an Oath Vow or Covenant containing in it matter good and lawful though not necessary and positive duty be imposed by fraude as was that of the Gibeonites or force and factions Army and tumults as that of Zedekiah to Nebuchadnezzar without any formal authority other than a mans or peoples own voluntary Act and submission which is new unto and unacquainted with the Laws and Constitutions accustomed in the place and to the people be by reason of any or all these miscarried Circumstances void and null I am much mistaken if he cross not the common resolution of Divines and Casuists if he conclude the affirmative but let us consider his suggestions singly and so we shall best try their strength And his first on-set begins with an I might shrewdly batter the Covenant First argument the Covenants defectiveness as to authority page 6. and so he assaults it with that which I must consess is indeed a battering Ram and being admitted will endanger to beat down all that hath been done in this Kingdom since 1641. arraigning censuring and condemning all the proceedings of the two Houses of Parliament in which I shall leave his prudence and discretion to be judged by such as are sensible how far His Majesties Honour the Kingdoms satisfaction and establishment in the desired peace is endangered by so much as a dispute thereof But the strength of it lieth in this the defâ—ctiveness of and so the invalidity of the Covenant as to any lawful constant or compleat authority capable to binde the Subâ—ects and people of England in any Court of Conâ—cience or Judicature in which nothing can have any permanent bond or tie in Law except Gods Word as the vow of a servant son daughter or wife c. This I must confess is a fierce assault and specious argument yet methinks I finde a Covenanter fortified against its force by the Wool-sacks of these considerations First Answer to it The The two Houses of Parliament and those two had more than ordinary power are co-ordinate and sharers in the Legislation of England and so a constant lawful authority It is Sir worth you observation how warily in p. 18. your Casuist binds the King to protect and preserve his Episcopacy but barres His change of it without the counsel and desire of the two Houses whom he judgeth Propitious to it Secondly This Covenant was ordered by the Parliament during their Session And although I will not determine that an Order or Ordinance of one or both Houses can have the force and permanent tie of a law which yet among us will admit a dispute by the ablest Lawyers and many purchasers will plead for with vigour yet I think it will not be ordinarily denied that it may lay the Subjects under a permanent bond and I conceive these are terms very different that is a bond on Conscience which is not a Law and Tie in Judicature Orders of Parliament directing an Act presently to be executed will not I hope be denied obedience or the execution be voided by the after-dissolution of it especially where it is in its own nature permanent and abiding An Oath is in it self naturâ Rei a permanent bond once laid it ever binds a Parliament are a power sufficiently compleat to impose and enjoyn it if they see cause to bring a Colledge or Corporation under any special Oath by an Order during their Session I hope no Englishman will question their Authority nor Divine deny the Obligation of the Oath nor the one or other determine this tie to be discharged when the Parliament is dissolved Thirdly The supposed defect hath been since supplied and His Majesties consent or assent fully expressed by His swearing the same Solemn League and by Oath promising His Royal assent to all Acts and Ordinances enjoyning the same and by His Royal Declaration of the 16 th of August 1650. declaring His full perswasion of the justice and equity of every the Heads and Articles of the Solemn League and Covenant and so far justifying the taking of it by His Subjects that He graciously professeth to know no friends but the friends of the Covenant and no enemies but the enemies of the Covenant Hereby whatever defect was in the first imposing of it is fully made up to fasten it on the people now it is taken so that by reason of this subsequent Act I may say if by Moses he will be judged to Moses he shall go and admitting his parallel which some doubt will not in this case square if the Father Master Husband in the day that he heareth the vow of the Wife Child or Servant and hold his peace contradict it not much more if He justifie allow and commendit as His most Sacred Majesty hath done on most serious and deliberate though in a most publique
conscience made legible by the Lancashire and Cheshire plea for Non-subscribers and the testimonies of the Ministers in the several Counties of England published with their names subscribed and indeed Imprinted by the invasion and divastation of Scotland the Sequestrations and Sufferings even unto imprisonment and death of many in England pursuing His Majesties restitution on the account of the Covenant How can the Doctor confess Doubtlesse the sence of the Covenant hath lately quickned many mens consciences in their allegiance to the King so as to bring Him as David home with infinite joy and triumph page 25. and yet here complain that it was so easily vacated in point of its express Loyalty for the King's preservation If it were ever vacated when or how was it renewed and re-inforced If I may speak it without vanity had not the firm bond of the Covenant vigorously contended in the point of Loyalty against the violent powers which bare it down His late Majesties Martyrdom had not broken forth with such lustre not His now Majesty whom God long preserve been restored to that estate of Honour in which we now enjoy Him so that the Antecedent of this suggested Argument will be most positively denied But if we should admit it I cannot but wonder to hear a Divine say and inferre upon it If it were so easily vacated in point of Loyalty I do not see how it can be so binding against Episcopacy I think it to be no good Logick and worse Divinity from some mens evasion and violation to infer a vacation and non-obligation or from a vacation of it in one point to infer its non-obligation as to others sin indeed is apt but it must not be allowed to engender sin by Gods grace gradual violation shall not effect in me a total rejection of the Covenant His sixth suggestion seems indeed to be of more force than the former viz. 6th Suggestion in his indirect answer p. 8. The Covenant if so interpreted must needs grate sore upon and pierce to the quick those former lawful Oaths which had prepossessed the souls and consciences of most of us in England not only of Subjects as those of Allegiance and Supremacy besides that of Ministerial Canonical obedience to our lawful Superiours but even the conscience of the late King as bound by his Coronation-Oath c. From which Oaths as we know no absolution so neither can there be any superfetation of such a contradictory vow and Covenant without apparent perjury To all which I offer to consideration That the dissatisfaction of His late Majesty of Blessed Memory and in nothing more blessed than in the conscience He made of the Oath of God upon Him and the charge He hath left His now glorious Majesty That if God brought Him to His own Right on hard conditions He should be careful to performe what He should promise that is now beyond dispute and His Majesty that now is not only free from those Fetters which restrained His Royal Father but also is engaged in the same League and Covenant and this supposed contradiction cast out of doors and as to the contradiction of the Covenant to the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy non constat it appeares not nor would it ever as it hath done have quickned the hearts of some to suffer for and to struggle under their Loyalty untill His Majesties Honourable Restitution if it were so repugnant to them Let its contradiction in this point be noted and we shall speak to it and as to that of Canonical obedience to our lawful Superiors its contradiction is suggested with an If it be so interpreted Let the interpretation be cleared before the contradiction be concluded and argued for if that Oath did bind an obedience to Bishops as invested with paternal authority and as a distinct and superior order of Ministry and it s unexplained etcaetera included more a grating upon and piercing to the quick this Oath was no other but duty and then the Argument is of no more force save to speak the fretting of their spirits who foolishly sware they know not what and now desire to maintain it more for fancy than conscience for it is not yet proved that such are lawful superiors in Church or State His seventh Answer or Argument is ab incommodo the inconvenience which must be very great and visible if it discharge an Oath And here he tells us It must needs run us upon a great Rock of not only Novelty but Schisme c. unto which I desire Sir you will please to observe 1. The loss we are at by the uncertainty of the object he urgeth this Argument with his universal discretive all Episcopal order and government We must Sir have a clear Notion of Episcopal Order and Government before we can with care shun the Schism nor is it explained to us by the general terms of Practice and Judgement of the Catholick Church in all ages and places till of later dayes for we know that superiority and paternal power over other Bishops and Ministers did too soon appear and too universally spread after the Apostles days unto the advancement of the man of sin though it prevailed not without great reluctancy and its removal hath been aimed at and endeavored by the Reformation Again must we take it for granted that conformity is essential to communion with the Church and agreement in discipline unavoidally necessary to union Certaiâ—ly if so we must make the very form of Discipline an Article of our Creed And truly Sir the jus divinum or Apostolical institution of the form he seems to plead for lieth too much in the dark for such a conclusion and therefore the most himself tells us of it is That it looks like an immediate institution of Christ preceptive and explicite or tacite and exemplary pag. 13. but he knows not whether yet well knows simile non est idem and therefore he here calls it but an ancient tradition and universal observation and then the 34 th Article of the Church of England secureth us from this Rock of Schisme whilst it teacheth us 39 Articles of Religion in the Convocation held 1562. It is not necessary that traditions be in all places one and utterly alike c. In Politicks we well know different forms of Administration are consistent with union in the same Kingdome and Communion in the same Government It is no strange thing to see Corporations in England governed by their twelve Jurors without a Mayor and Court of Aldermen but it would be thought very strange from thence to charge them with sedition and it must be a jus divinum and immediate institution not Apostolical tradition or Universal observation must bar us from the priviledges any more than the dictated properties common to all policy Moreover Sir if this form of Discipline which he noteth some few Reformed Churches of later dayes want though they do not contemne but approve and venerate in others be so necessary a
by Covenant excluded Fabrik be not a transgression of the Law and plunging the Nation into perjury which how consistent it is with the honour of King or Kingdom let wise men judge The Doctors fourth fifth and eighth Suggestions do relate unto the good of Episcopacie concerning which he supposeth a good which I must confess I am not clear to admit as for that good in this which is common to all Governments viz. the Principles and proportions of Order The good nesse of Eplscopacy denied Subordination and Government we shall not deny it only conceive it is not here pleadable for it may he continued in the Government which shall be established but as to that of good in it by Scriptural Precepts and Patterns in the Jewish Church Apostolique constitution and Primitive use of Ecclesiastical custome and holy mens general approbation and universal imitation it is under dispute and not yet obvious and so not of force to conclude for it and as to Englands experience of the much good done by it since the Reformation it is very obscure whil'st the best of benefit imaginable to have been reaped by it hath been to preserve the Reformation in the state and degree in which King Edward the sixth and Queen Elizabeth left it for wherein hath Episcopacie promoted it nay rather wherein hath not Episcopacie by its silencing and suspending zealous Ministers excommunicating imprisoning banishing and stigmatizing pious Christians for no fault at all save endeavonring it retarded the progress and perfection of the Reformation nay hath not Episcopacie by its turning our Chancels into railes insancta sanctorums our Communion-tables into adored Altars our glass windows into popish pictures and changing our common and est ablished Liturgy into a more compleat conformity to the Popish Mass-book for form of administration Order of worship Rites and Ceremonies brought the Reformation into a most palpable and apparent Retrogradation and hath not then your Doctor cause to tell us it were extream folly and madness prophaneness and blasphemy to cry it down as evill and engage in Covenant against it as such truly Sir to all his supposed good whereby it is so beneficial in his eye to the being compleat and regular being of any Church and none more than England I shall only oppose that one evill for which were there in it no more it deserveth to be decried and extirpated by the Covenant and that evill I find so inherent to Episcopacy that this very moderate man cannot divide them viz. the not only degrading all ordinary Pastors and Ministers in the sight of the people making their Ministery greatly ineffectual but also divesting them of all authority and superiority over the people preferring the people to and above them as their equals and superiousr whereby all their administrations whil'st in black Coats are represented to be meer Cyphors to which the Bishops Lawn sleeves must be the only figure significant Sir can it be less than duty to extirpate that which doth engross to its self and so enervate in others all Gospel Ministery if Cephas and Apollo be not Ministers of Jesus Christ as well as Paul the Apostle I see no cause to chide the Corinthians for their Schisme but passing his Hypothesis let us try the strength of his Propositions by which he would bind the Covenanter to his Episcopacy and they sound very strangely in my ears 1. A Covenant can bind no man in conscience against any thing that is in its nature good or not Morally evil for this were to bind a mans self and others beyond Gods eternal righteousness this is unto me a lesson of new Divinity Oaths may bind against good indiffe ent for Sir be pleased to note that the good he speaks of is natural not moral much less Theological good it is a good which is not in it self necessary but may be necessary in its time and place so that it is a plain Adiaphoron a thing indifferent that to bind men to what is morally evil is a Covenant of hell I can easily be convinced but that to bind them against what is allowed of God as good and lawful but not duty necessary untill circumstanced with time and place shou'd be so is sure but one Doctors opinion I did ever conceive Adiaphorous to be subject to the Magistrates command and a mans own Covenant and so distinct from Divine prescription the eating of flesh is in its nature good and not morally evil the Apostle is apt to Covenant with a weak brother never to eat flesh is this to bind himself beyond Gods eternal bonds of righteousness or in a Covenant with hell I mistake such Casuists as I have read if they conclude not the contrary 2. No man may vow or Covenant much lesse keep any such Covenant as he hath taken intentionally against the evil corruption or abuse of any thing Oaths against evil hindring the use of some good do binde so as to involve the good and usefulness of it and to condemn that to destruction and extirpation Truly Sir I must confess not only judicial such as is his instance of the Jndge of all the earth in his righteous destribution towards Sodom and so impertinent to his case but also rational and Religious discrimination of objects is good and necessary but that a Covenant involving good and usefulness whil'st it is intended against evil and abuse is therefore void and not to be kept I cannot believe I have read Juramentum non esse illicitum aut obligandi vim non amittere praecise ab hoc Sanderson de juramen to praelect 3. Sect. 12. quod videtur esse impeditivum majeris boni an oath is not therefore void because it hinders a greater that is more than simple good I shall willingly wish men may not be so transported as to swear against a good when it can be separated from the evil nor yet to discharge the Oath because the good which might have been divided is involved It is a mans duty to distinguish between the Superstructures of men and foundation of Christ and his Apostles of which order his Episcopacy doth not yet appear And it is a mans liberty to restrain himself from the thing that is in its own nature good and useful when attended with plain and positive nay accidental evil I knew a man passing through an old rotten house got a knock on his pate and in his passion sware he would pull it down and burn it every stick his work-men advised him to use some of the materials good and useful in his new Fabrick the good man is conscious of his Oath though rash and unadvised Will the Doctor please to resolve his conscience Or again Hezekiah observes the brazen serpent the sometimes means and now Memorial of Israels remedy and type of the Redeemer abused to Idolatry sweareth he will destroy it and accordingly executes his Oath Suppose it at that time as it had its good to be as useful as