have not met with them § 3. But though little Sects for this use some appearance of Scripture-reason as the Anabaptists that say The unbaptized are no Church-Members but you are all unbaptized c. yet there are few big Sects but worldly advantage and cheating Words and Names are the strength of their Cause by which they do more than by any sober shew of reason The assumed names of the Church and Catholicks and Ancient and the Names of Hereticks and Schismaâ—icks and Lutherans and Calvinists and Novelists falsly imposed on their Adversaries next to the Sword and Flames are the Engines of the Popish Sect by which they defend their Separation from all other Christians in the World And such use the gross Schismatical parts do make of the names of The Church of Enâ—land and Catholick Communion appropriated to themselves and the names of Seperatists and Schismaticks imposed arbitrarily on others Next to the Sword this is their chief proof That men are Separatists if they will not separate from all save them and such as they § 3. Among all the Casuists I found none abound with this sort of Logick so much as the Resolver of three Cases about Church-Communion which when I had read I am so much against Separation that I thought meet to joyn with the rest of the Casuists who unite against Schism so far as to disswade Men from this Man's and Mr. Dodwells extraordnary Schismatical Doctrine § 4. But when I had written a just Confutation of him hearing by fame who he is I thought it my duty before I publisht it to see the Book which he wrote against Mr. Humphrey and Me because he may perhaps be there more intelligible for I had never before seen it and would not seek it because I would not tempt my self to a work which I have so little pleasure in as is the confutation of such men But when I had read it I found the Author a great deal sounder in his opinions than in his words and than he was represented to me to be There is a great deal that 's good and worthy the reading in his Book when he doth but keep off from his Schismatical cause He handsomely openeth some Doctrinals and so fairly alloweth forbearance of others in Doctrinal differences that were he as Catholick and equal in his opinion about Government and that which he calleth Catholick Communion he would be against Schism a Catholick indeed He doth fairly disclaim even Archbishop Bramhall's concession to the Papists And he handsomely confuteth Mr. Dodwell and maintaineth the validity of Sacraments and the duty of our Communion with the foreign Churches that have no Bishops and justifieth the Church of England that hath still owned Communion with them He hath proved the no necessity of continued Successive ordination by Bishops He hath defended the Independency of Diocesan Churches in point of Government and that one Church hath not proper Governing Power over another but only an obligation to Communion of which more anon § 5. But I must say That though he hath a smooth and handsom Stile for an Orator either He or I which of us I am no fit Judge is so wofully defective in Logick and Politicks that of these Subjects one of us is utterly unfit for a strict dispute not knowing the usual Sense of ordinary terms nor explaining them aright nor seeming to know what a true Definition is nor proceeding in any Scholar-like method But that little explication of Terms which he giveth is usually near the end of the â—ook when a confused dispute before hath tended but to seduce which ever of us it is that is in the fault it 's a great wrong to the Reader And if it be he I find no likelihood that any should cure him but himself or some one that he hath a very high opinion of For when his mistakes are discovered the substance of his Answer is a haughty ignorant scorn at the discovery Had he happily learnt to Explain Define and Distinguish and Methodize when he was young enough to submit to his Tutor it had been well for him But it being now to be learnt when he is a Doctor and such a Doctor Scorning and ignorant Wrangling will take the place of necessary Learning § 6. This I must tell the Reader That the Man speaketh so much worse than he seemeth by after Contradictions to think and hath so little Skill in exact expressing the matter or his mind that I can scarce ever pretend with any confidence to know his meaning For when he hath said worst and is confuted he comes over it again and scorneth us for misunderstanding him and tells us that he meant as we do So that it is his Words that I only undertake to confute and not his meaning till I am better able to say that I know it Nor would I think it a work beseeming me to write a Book to tell the World how unskilful this man is in speaking intelligibly and aptly if I did not find that others are seduced by receiving his words in the usual sence of such not knowing that he meaneth not as he speaketh So far as he meaneth well I think I am his Friend in perswading people to be of his mind and to believe what he thinks and not what he saith And if he hold on his way and fall not out with the Truth for my sake I am in hope that the effect also of this Survey will be that in the next he will renounce all his Errors save the terms and will say that he meant as I did And then if he do rail and scorn at me only as misunderstanding him I can bear it § 7. Nor should I think it a Duty in my condition to save Readers from his real errors were it not that they notoriously tend to perswade the Land to think of Thousands of the faithfullest Christians that I know as damnable intollerable Schismaticks guilty of the sin that will damn them as soon as Adultery and Murder and consequently to call Men to hate them as such and to proceed in silencing ruining and imprisoning them which is to tell all them that do so that they do well which if it should prove otherwise who can express the greatness of his sin against the Souls of one party and the Lives Estate and Ministry of the other § 8. His scorn p. 11 12. for my purpose to have medled with such Men in the Cause of Conformity no more seems some invitation to me to prevent the like But the foresaid Motives are far greater P. 35 36. While he over and over repeated the confused words of One Communion which must excuse us from Schism as dangerous as Murder and we that live among Men that use to distinguish Union from Communion and know that Communion yea and Union too hath a Multitude of degrees and our desire was that he would but explain in what he fixt it that we might understand his accusation he tells
in Accidents as in Patriarchs Metropolitans extended Diocess's c. Nor are they bound to take account of the Ordinations Presentation Titles and Rights of all the foreign Churches of other Kingdoms with whom they are to hold Communion nor to be Tryers or Judges between contending Parties which is the true Pastor Though in the same Kingdom and under the same Laws order may require this oft times Possession and Profession may satisfie them V. Though the Churches had all the degrees of Union besides yet nothing maketh them One Church in the proper political Sense as it signifyeth One Governed Society but their Union with Christ. But their own Capacity is necessary to the reception of this Unity with Christ. All Politicks difference a meer Community from a publick Body A hundred or a thousand persons agreed together to manage their affairs by a common Stock and Converse are a Community but not Civitas or Respublica No though they purpose to set up a Government But when they are formed into a Body under one supream Government they are a XII They are all obliged to use Pastors Church-Assemblies Word Prayer Praise and Sacraments that are the same of Christ's institution Now Reader judg whether all this be no Union and Communion among our selves And whether his Cant of Catholick Communion undistinguisht be intelligible Qu. But wherein lieth your difference then Ans. Let him that maketh it and accuseth us tell For my part either his confused head cannot tell what he would have or my dull head cannot understand him But I can tell you what it is that I deny I. Tho we are all sanctified by one Spirit and have one faith and hope there is great difference among us in the degrees of these II. Tho we are all under one Universal Law of Love Peace Concord and Obedience every man breaketh this Law in some degree but every breach doth not out-law us or prove us Rebels against God Whoever so far breaks the Law of Christian Love Peace and Concord as will prove that he hath not the sincere Love of God and his Brethren it is as truly damning in its degree as Murder or Adultery specially if it be notorious in silencings revilings of godly men and persecution to the hinderance of the Gospel and the encouraging of prophane unconscionable men But whoever breaks the Laws of Christian Love Peace and Concord only so far as may proceed from meer imperfection of Knowledg Love and Obedience in a sincere heart where Love is predominant God pardoneth him tho he may correct him and it doth not Unchurch him III. He that despiseth the Ministry out of predominant pride or prophaness or unbelief doth it damnably But so doth not he that in uprightness of heart for fear of guilt flyeth further from an ignorant false or malignant Teacher than he ought IV. If Hereticks or other uncapable men get uppermost and in possession that binds not all Christians or any to own them V. If Power impose men without fitness and without the Flocks consent to be all the Peoples Pastors so that they are Usurpers or such as wise men cannot safely trust their souls with as Pastors it is no sin much less damnable to choose better Pastors if they may be had without more hurt than benefit It hath ever been Satan's way against Christ to thrust his Servants into the Sacred Office to butcher the Flocks and then cry out against all as Schismaticks that would save their souls and others from them VI. The Laws of Rulers that set up Patriarchs Metropolitans and other Humane Orders in the Church if they be but to do what man can impower them to do must be as far obeyed as other Humane Laws not being against Gods Laws But the breach of them unchristens not nor is punishable but as the breach of other Humane Laws which some Casuists say bind only in case of scandal if we break them others only if they be for common good but I say if they be not against it and be things which belong to their Office to determine VII In the Roman Empire the Christian Pastors at first had no such way to preserve the people from Heresie as by keeping close Concord among themselves and agreeing that all should disown those that were regularly rejected by their own Pastors which in case of Controversie Councils were to try And Christian Emperors added their civil sanction to this power of Councils and banished such as the Councils condemned as Heresiarks And this combination they called the Catholick Church in the Empire to distinguish it from all the Heresies that brake from them And Emperors not using the Sword to compel any to Communion nor enabling the Bishops to do it this course was needful and did great Service to the Church as long as the Majority of the Clergy kept sound But when worldly Baits drew worldly men into the Bishops seats this turned clean the other way and Arians and every Sect that by power could get uppermost called themselves the Catholick Church and persecuted the rest as Schismaticks In this case the Orthodox durst not plead Majority but 1. They fled to the Scriptures to try which was the sound part 2. And they appealed to the Nicene and first Councils when the Church was sound But the Second Council at Const. began a breach the Third at Ephesus made it wider and was rejected by a great party The Fourth at Ephesus made it yet wider and was utterly disowned by the soundest part The Fifth at Calcedon call'd the Fourth made it yet wider and rent the Church almost into equal parts And the following Councils went on till they set up Images and Popery and tore all to pieces Therefore I conclude that uniting on the Decrees of General Councils as such is no necessary nor sure way of Catholick Communion But while godly Pastors use Synods really for Love and Peace and the Churches welfare it is the duty of all the People finis gratia and in obedience to their proper agreeing Pastors to keep such bonds of Peace But a failing therein is not an unchurching crime tho a fault VIII If Councils of Bishops will arrogate a Legislative power over all the Church or over those that are not of their Flocks it is part of our duty to Christ and means of Concord to disown their Usurpation IX If a company of uncalled usurping obtruded Pastors keep Councils their Pastoral Authority bindeth not X. If lawful Bishops will make Agreements for needless or noxious things on pretence of Concord or Ornament and lay on them such necessity that none shall communicate without them and make them dividing Snares and Engines particular Bishops ought to disown this and their authority binds none to obey such Canons whatever the end the Churches peace may do XI Bishops and Pastors in the same Kingdom may well be used to try what Pastors are fit for their Communion But as I said before were we bound to disown the
City-Engines need not be fetcht to quench Ignorant Preachers must have some forbearance in their Self-conceitedness and petulent Temerity of what Sect or Faction soever they be Conformists or Nonconformists II. I do it much to go as far in National Concord in Religion as possibly I can and for the avoiding all that makes against it The foresaid Book The whole Duty of Nations will convince any impartial capable Reader of what great Duty and Advantage National Countenance and Concord is to the interest of Religion And though it bring in multitudes of Hypocrites God makes some use for the Church of such I would ask the Dissenters but two Questions 1. Would you not wish the prosperity of the Church your Selves and that all Power and Laws promoted Godliness and true Reformation No doubt you wish it And would not that bring in multitudes of Hypocrites They are like Vermin and Flies who swarm most in the warmest Seasons 2. If all the Hypocrites in the World should renounce Christianity and leave none to profess it but the sincere would not those few be left as a wonder and a prey O what a blow would it be to Religion in the World Will you root out not only the Tares but the Straw and Chaff on pretence to save the Corn III. I do it to keep up Brotherly Love amongst us which certainly censorious accusations of one another doth destroy When you fly from them you seem to accuse them as men uncapable of your Christian Communion and this seemeth hatred or contempt And as sure as Fire causeth Fire and Water quencheth it Love causeth Love and Hatred destroyeth it and causeth hatred And Christian Love is no small Duty IV. I do it very much to avoid the scandal of seeming to judge Parish Communion an unlawful thing and seeming to separate from them on that account That they err who judge it so unlawful I am satisfyed And that scandal is a great Sin the second Commandment and Christ's dreadful threatning of the scandalous and Paul's abhorrence of it satisfies me The second Commandment forbids Corporal Scandalous seeming to be Idolaters what ever the Heart be And I must not seem to unchurch ot sinfully censure what ever be in my Thoughts I know it is no such Scandal that I go not here to the Greek Church to the French Church or the Dutch Church For no man hath any reason to interpret it to signifie that I separate from their Communion as unlawful But there is great reason to interpret my total avoiding the Parish Churches to signifie that I judge it unlawful to Communicate with them as is evident in these Particulars 1. There are divers Nonconforming Separatists who have lately written to prove it unlawful 2. Multitudes suffer much upon the publick accusations because they will not Communicate with them who tell the people that they take it to be Sin 3. I and Others are censured by such as Sinners for doing it 4. Parochial Churches are the settled National order 5. The Laws command our joining with them 6. The Magistrates accuse and prosecute the refusers 7. The Parish Ministers are offended at our refusal and accuse it as sinful separation and so interpret it All this set together maketh it past all denial that after all this to avoid all Parish Communion is by our Actions to say that we judge it unlawful whatever is in our Hearts Had we all these calls to go sometimes to the French and Dutch Church supposing that we understood them and would not go it were a scandalous signification that we judge it sinful And one may Lie by Deeds as well as by Words V. I take it to be a great Sin to bear false Witness against my Neighbour and wrongfully accuse a single person But much greater so to accuse a Church and much more nine thousand Churches But to say by my action that their worship of God is so sinful that it is unlawful to join with them is as I think so to accuse them I dare not say so of an Anabaptists Church VI. I much more dread to separate from almost all Christ's Church on Earth For if Christ have no Church he is no Head King or Saviour of it And to say that he accepteth not of their Worship is to say that he presenteth it not to God as their intercessor The Article of our Believing the Holy Catholick Church and the Communion of Saints is a practical Article If there be no such Body I can be no Member of it And this seemeth a renouncing of my part in the Prayers of almost all the Church when I take them to be intollerably sinful and not accepted by God Whereas I take it to be my great Duty to put up no one Prayer to God but in mental Communion with all the Church on Earth that is As a Member of that Society And I would not take all the Riches of the World for my part in the Love Prayers and Communion of the universal Church If I cut off my self from the Body I cut off my self from the Head and am a withered Branch to be united and baptized into Christ and to the Church are two effects of one action and so would it be to separate And I take it for such a Crime against Christ to say that almost all his Church is not His but Satans as it would be against the King to say that almost all his Kingdoms are none of his but his Enemies I may say that the Irish the Highlanders or Orcades are the most ignorant barbarous part of his Dominions but not that they are none And a slander of almost all the Christian World is a very great one But to separate from our Parrish Churches upon a Cause that is Common to almost all the Christian World is Virtually and Interpretatively to separate from almost all And to separate because of the faultiness of the Liturgy the Ministry in many or the people is to separate on a cause common to almost all 1. The recorded Liturgies of the several Sects of Christians in the World in the Biblioth Patrum and elsewhere shew it evidently that they are all far faultier than ours All the Abassines Coptics Iacobites Nestorians Melchites Maronites the Armenians Georgians Circassians Meugrelians the Greeks and Muscovites have Liturgies far worse than ours Let them that doubt of it go to the Greek-Church in Sohoe-Fields The Nestorian Liturgy is one of the soundest and best that I find recorded which intimateth that they are not so bad as some make them The Papists Mass I think we are agreed is far worse And the Lutheran Protestants Images Ceremonies Consubstantiation shew that theirs is no better than ours 2. And that their Ministers and People in all these Sects are worse than our Parishes alas we must confess with grief Qu. But would you Communicate with all these Ans. I separate from none of them further than they separate from Christ. I mentally separate from the Sin that
stairs to hatred and destroying it 's his way to cure Schism that is commonly painted with Horns and Cloven feet If a man come from a Countrey Village and be made by Covenant a Citizen of London how prove you that he renounceth King or Kingdom But he saith p. 9. Those who wilfully separate from the Corporation to which the Charter was granted forfeit their Interest in the Charter Ans. What Reader doth this man presume upon that will not ask him how he proveth 1. That Gods Law or Charter to his Church doth not require them to congregate in distinct single Churches as London Charter doth to erect several Companies and the Universities several Colledges 2. And that God hath not in his Word given order or command for such single Churches But that the Apostles and Titus by fixing Elders to their several Churches and Cities separated from the Universal Church 3. And that their subordinate Churches have not need of distinct subordinate consent and duty And that our Diocesan Churches all separate from the Universal Did he think these things need no proof at all It may be he will say that the Diocesan depend on the Vniversal but the Presbyterian or Independent do not I Answer Dependance is either that of Subjects on Soveraign or Magistrates for Government or that of a Community of Equals for Communion In the former respect they depend on none but Christ as Universal Soveraign Nor on any Foriegners for Governments In the latter they depend on all true Churches for Communion And Doctor Hammond and most Diocesans hitherto have said that Diocesan Churches are thus far Independent or National at most And if any be for a Forreign Iurisdiction in Charity before they perswade England to it they should procure them a Dispensation from all the Oaths that have sworn all this Kingdom against endeavouring any change of Government and against a Foreign Iurisdiction For some Fanaticks now Dream that PER is the Mark of the Beast and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the number of his Name is nominal as well as numeral and refers to CH-urch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and STate For as for them that find a mans name in them I abhorr their Exposition more § 11. P. 9. God saith he hath not made any Covenant in particular with the Church of Geneva France or England c. A. 1. God hath made one General Law for Christians congregating with their fixed Elders or Bishops in particular Churches all the World over And his Command is not without Promise of being with them to the End of the World and that Promise becometh a Promise to every Church so congregate God hath not made distinct Laws or Promises to every Christian But the Promise to Justifie all Believers justifieth each single Person when he believeth If the King should make one common Law to command all his Subjects that are Freeholders to live in Corporations or Hundreds described with their priviledges those priviledges would be all theirs that are so incorporated As one Charter may Priviledge every London Company diversified by subordinate Agreements 2. And that God who will have them thus incorporated and distributed into several single Churches doth Covenant or Promise according to their demerits to each Do I need to recite the peculiar Promises and threats to the seven Asian Churches Rev. 2. and 3. which are Covenants to them § 12. Next Pag. 10. He will tell us what Communion is and in many words it is to tell us that Communion is nothing but Vnion I know that quoad notationem nominis Communion may signifie Vnion with others But they that write Politicks have hitherto distinguished Vnion and Communion taking Communion for Actual Communication or exercise of the duties of men in Union But to speak cross to other Writers on the same Subjects and give no reason for it and to confound Vnion and Communion is one part of this edifying Resolution § 13. Pag. 11. Our Communion with the Church consists in being members of the Church which we are made by Baptism saith he Then the Baptized are still in Communion with the Church till their baptism be nullified And hath he proved us Apostates § 14. Pag. 12. Should any man who is no member of the Church nor owns himself to be so intrude into the Church and Communicate in all Holy Offices it 's no Act of Communion c. A. I thought communicating ordinarily in Holy Offices had gone for an owning of Communion If it do not would you would tell us how to know who are of your Church § 15. P. 13. Saith he Church-Communion does not consist in particular Acts of Communion which can be performed among those who are present and Neighbours but in membership Now as a member is a member of the whole Body not meerly of any part of it c. All the Subjects of England who never saw nor converst with each other are members of the same Kingdom A. 1. That word meerly hath more Craft than Justice or Honesty Meerly signifieth Only I suppose and if he would make his Reader think that they that are for single Church peculiar membership and consent do take themselves to be meerly or only members of those single Churches and not of the Universal it is shameless injury 2. Will he ever draw men to conformity by making them believe that because they owe Common Communion to all Christians therefore we owe no special duty to the Bishops Priests Churches or Neighbours where we are setled Do the Men of one Colledge School Corporation owe no more duty to that than to all others Do the Free-holders of Bedford-shire choose Knights for Middlesex or the Citizens of Oxford choose Officers in London These seem strange Resolutions to us 3. But doth he remember that if Communion consist not in Acts of Communion to such but in membership even with the distant then he that is baptized and no Apostate and performeth no other Acts of Communion to the Bishops Parson or People where he liveth than he is bound to perform to them a hundred or thousand miles off is no Separatist Methinks this favours Separation too much § 16. Pag. 14. When he denyed any Divine Covenant to make us members of particular Churches distinguish't from the Vniversal as all National Diocesan and Parochial are as parts from the whole he presently confuteth all again saying The exercise of Church Communion as to most of the particular duties and Offices of it must be confined to a particular Church and Congregation for we cannot actually joyn in the Communion of Prayers and Sacraments c. but with some particular Church A. Oportuit fuisse memorem 1. Reader doth not this man here confess that there are particular Churches 2. If these be not distinct from the whole then each particular is the whole 3. If the Exercise must be in particular Churches must not men Consent to their Relations and Duties Is it a sin to Promise
Duty 4. Sure it is not meer Place but a mutual Relation of Pastors and People that distinguisheth these Churches The Presbyterians preach't once in the same Places that you do and yet you take them not for the same Church Pastors If one from York or Cornwall come into your Pulpit without consent do People stand as much related to him as to you Some men are of extraordinary sufficiency to resist and conquer the clearest evidence of Truth But he addes every Act of Communion thô performed to some particular Church is and must be an Act of Communion with the whole Catholick Church A. And who denyeth this No sober Independent or Presbyterian that ever I met with It 's a weighty Truth § 17. P. 14. Saith he Praying and Hearing and Receiving the Lords Supper together doth not make us more in Communion with the Church of England than with any other true and Orthodox part of the Church thô in the remotest part of the World A. I think that 's not true With the remotest parts you have only Catholick Communion with the Church Universal In England and London you have that and more even special subordinate Communion with your own King Bishop and Flock 2. And hath not the Church of England such Communion in obedience to its own Laws as the Act of Uniformity Convocation and Canons which you have not with all abroad Do your Bishops in Convocation make Canon Laws for all the World Do you Swear Canonical obedience as much to the Bishop of Paris or Haffnia c. as to your Ordinary Do the Canons of all Churches impose our Liturgy or ipso facto excommunicate all that affirm any thing in it or our Ceremonies or Church Government to be against Gods word Sure this is a peculiar kind of Communion 3. If not why are all the Nonconformists cast out that offer to officiate and Communicate on such terms as are common to all sound Churches Pag. 15. Saith he There is nothing in all these Acts of Communion which does more peculiarly unite us to such a particular Church than to the whole Christian Church A. What neither in these Acts nor any other Then we are no more bound to hear you or maintain you as our Pastor than to hear and maintain the whole Christian Church § 18. P. 20. Saith he There is no other Rule of Catholick Communion for private Christians but to communicate in all Religious Offices and all Acts of Government and Discipline with Christians those with whom they live A. 1. Elsewhere you added sound and Orthodox Else they that live with Arians Socinians Papists in Spain France Italy c. are bound to communicate with them in all Religious Offices and obey them 2. This concludeth that where Presbytery or Independency is the way of the place where we live all must thus communicate and obey The King and Custom then may make any way to become our Duty 3. If you tell us that it 's only with the Sound and Orthodox you were as good say nothing unless you tell us who must judge that whether the People themselves or who for them 4. But if this be the only rule for private Christians what shall they do e. g. in Aethiopa Egypt Syria and many other Countreys where the Churches are such as General Councils and other Churches judge Hereticks or Schismaticks And what shall they do when at Antioch Alexandria Constantinople c. one party is uppermost by the Judgment of Councils and Prince one Year and another contrary party the next And what shall they do where the Prince equally tolerateth both and it 's hard to know which is the more numerous as in Zeno's and Anastasius Reign c. And what shall they do when many Churches in one City are of divers Tongues as well as Customs Have the Greeks French and Dutch in London no rule of Catholick Communion but communicating in all Offices with the English and obeying all your Bishops Courts § 19. P. 21. Saith he Distinct and particular Churches which are in Communion with each other must have their distinct bounds and limits as every member has it's natural and proper place and Situation in the Body A. Why may not the Greeks Dutch and French live in Communion with the Churches London though they live dispersedly among them In Brandenburg Hassia and many free Cities and Belgia where Lutherans and Calvinists as called live together and own each other as Brethren why may not both be Churches of Christ § 20. P. 21 22. A great deal more he hath of the like making Schismaticks at his Pleasure This is plain in the Case of the Presbyterian and Independent Churches and those other Conventicles They are Churches in a Church Nothing can justifie the Distinction of Christians into several Churches but only such a distance of place as makes it necessary c. p. 22. Distinct Churches in the same place can never be under the same Communion A. These things are repeated so oft and the word separate so deceitfully rolled over and over that I will answer all together under his third Case at the End § 21. P. 27. See how openly he recanteth most aforesaid There is a sence indeed wherein we may be said to be members of one particular Church considered as distinct from all other particular Churches But that principally consists in Government and Discipline Every Christian is a member of the Whole Christian Church and in Communion with it but he is under the immediate instruction and Government of his own Bishop and Presbyters and is bound to personal Communion with them and this constitutes a particular Church in which all Acts of Worship and all Acts of Discipline and Government are under the Direction and conduct of a particular Bishop A. Omitting that he seemeth to make the Parochial Churches no Churches but parts of one here he saith all that he seemed to write against and that those that he reproacheth hold allowing the difference of the extent of Churches And is it Edifying to read such a discourse that saith and unsaith by self-contradiction And he adjoyns 28. p. how by agreement Patriarchal and National Churches are made And is not Agreement a humane Contract CHAP. II. Of his first Case § 1. PAge 31. His first Case Whether Communion with some Church or other be a necessary Duty incumbent on Christians And he thinks the Resolution of this is as plain as whether it be necessary for every man to be a Christian For every Christian is baptized into the Communion of the Church A. In this I know no Christian adversary to him But it being the Vniversal Church that he giveth his proof of necessary Communion with it 's odde to say We must have Communion with some Church or other As if there were more than one Universal Church 2. But we grant more that all that can well should be also members of some single Church § 2. P. 32. He saith External and Actual
should not only hold any errour or practise sin but require men to subscribe and approve it and say it is no sin no man ought to do this nor yet to live like an Atheist and forsake all Worship because men forbid him if it were but to subscribe one untruth But alas this is no rare Case In one Emperours Reign all were Anathematized that subscribed not to the Council of Chalcedon and quickly after all that did or that would not renounce it The same division and changes were made by the Councils against and for the Monothelites de tribus Capitulis Images c. And when all Men living have many Errours and the Church of England disclaimeth her Infallibility and yet will receive no Minister that will not subscribe that there is nothing in her Books contrary to the word of God the Case is hard But when all the things mentioned in the Plea for Peace are proved lawful we shall be more yielding in this Case XLV 9. If true and sound Christians mistakingly think one or many things to be heinous sins as Perjury Lying Renouncing Obedience to God and Repentance c. which are things indifferent but of so great difficulty that most Learned and Godly and Willing Men cannot discern the Lawfulness and agree and yet are not necessary nor just conditions of Ministry or Communion and so it is the Imposer that entangleth them by difficulty in their dissent it is not lawful for these men therefore to forbear all Church Worship but must use it as they can XLVI 10. If any Church unjustly excommunicate such men or others they must not forbear all Church order and worship because men so excommunicate them No man must Sin to escape Excommunication and every man in the World is a sinner And therefore all the World must be excommunicated if all Sinners must be so As I before said the times oft were when almost all the Bishops in the Empire were excommunicated by one another Councils and Popes have oft excommunicated some for trifles and some for Truth end Duty And such must not therefore renounce all Church Worship and Communion The Church of England do by their standing Law ipso facto excommunicate all as aforesaid that affirm any thing to be repugnant to Gods Word or sinful in their whole Church Government Articles Liturgy and Ceremonies and so to stand till they Publickly revoke this as a wicked Errour Now many Lords and Commoners in Parliaments have spoken against some of these particulars and some out of Parliament Many Ministers have done the like when the King Commissioned them to treat for Alterations And many when the Accusations or demands of others have called them to give a Reason of their Actions Some have maintained that it is repugnant to Gods word that Lay Civilians should have the decretive Power of the Keyes and that the Parish Minister must cast out of Communnion all that the Lay Doctors or Chancellors excommunicate and all that dare not receive kneeling and that they should deny Christendom to all that scruple the English sort of God-Fathers Covenants and the transient Symbolical Image of the Cross with abundance such things Now all these are ipso sacto excommunicate And thô they be not bound to avoid the Church till this be applicatorily declared yet actually excommunicate they are and that by a higher authority thâ—n the Bishops and they know the Churches decree and the Priests are sworn to Canonical Obedience And he that will not tempt them to be forsworn nor come into a Church that hath excommunicated him seems therein excuseable But must he therefore renounce the Church of God XLVII 11. If the People are so set against one Bishop for another as that half being for one and half for the other and both Orthodox they cannot be perswaded to unite in one A Council at Rome determined in the Case of Paulinus and Flavian at Antioch that both of them should hold their distinct Churches and so live in love and peace And though one or both parties in this were mistaken Sinners so are all morral men who yet must not live like Atheists XLVIII 12. An undetermined accident must be so determined as most serveth to do the greatest good and avoid the greatest Evil But whether divers Churches shall promiscuously live in the same City or Diocess or Parish is an Accident not determined by God and either way may be for the greatest good as circumstances vary e. g. When in a Church half cannot consent to condemn the words of Theodoret Theodore Mopsuest and Ibas and half will condemn them with the Council if these can serve God quietly in Love and Peace in different Congregations but cannot endure one another in the same it is most for the Churches Peace that they be permitted to joyn with those of their own Mind When one Pope declared that it 's sound Doctrine to say One of the Trinity was Crucified when another had declared that it is not sound Doctrine they that held with one Pope and they that held with the other might both be true Churches in different Assemblies When Iustinian raised the bloody controversie between the Corrupticolae and the Phantasiastae wise men thought both sides were true Churches Yea and so did many wise men think of the Orthodox and Nestorians and many Eutychians XLIX 13. It 's a common case under Turks and Heathens that they give liberty of Conscience for Christians of all parties Now suppose that in Aâ—â—ppo in Constantinople or elsewhere there be partly for Countrey sake and partly for Language but most for different Judgments one Church of Armenians one of Greeks one of English-men c. what Law of God makes only one of these to be a true Church and which is it L. 14. Suppose that the setled Church e. g. in Holland Sweden Saxony is for Presbytery or for an Episcopacy that arose from Presbyters ordination or that had none or a short Liturgy and the Prince would tolerate English men as Frankford did to set up a Church of the English Form and Liturgy I think few Prelatists would deny it to be lawful LI. I omit other instances and come to the matter of Separation which word serveth this man and such other in so general and undistinguished a sence as would make one think he were of Mr. Dodwell's mind That words in dispute have but one signification which all are bound to know that use them Even a Bell by the same sound sometime signifieth a call to Church and sometime a Funeral and sometime Joy but Separate Separate is rung over and over with these men as if it signified but one thing 1. He that heareth half the Sermon and Service and goeth out of Church doth Separate at that time from the rest When a Protestant Heretick was doing Penitence with his Faggot at St. Maries in Oxford and the Fryer was Preaching a mistaken Voice in the street made them think the Hereticks had set the
all that obey the twentieth Canon of the Nicene Council And from all that obey the Councils that forbid communicating with a Fornicating Priest And from all that obey the Councils which nullifie the Episcopacy of such as are obtruded by Magistrates or not consented to by the Clergy and People And many more such Abundance more instances of their Separation and Damnation I might adde In a word I think their Principles are as I first said for damning and separating from all men living for all men living are gulity of some sort and degree of Schism that is of Errours Principles or Practices in which they culpably Violate that Union and Concord that should be among Christians and Churches Every defect of Christian Love and every sinful Errour is some degree of such a violation All Christians differ in as great matters as things indifferent And no man living knoweth all things Indifferent to be such And these men distinguish not of Schism nor will take notice of the necessary distinctions given in the third Part of the Treatise of Church Concord And solutio continui causeth pain nor do they at all make us understand what sort of Separation it is that they fasten on but talk of Separation in general as aforesaid LXXXVII They seem to be themselves deceived by the Papists in exposition of Cyprians words de Vnit. Eccles. Vnus est Episcopatus c. But they themselves seem to separate from Cyprian as a Schismatick and consequently from all the Church that hath profest Communion with him and with all the Councils and Churches that joyned with him For Cyprian and his Council erred by going too far from the Schism and Heresie of others nullifying all their Baptisms Ordinations and Communions And for this errour they declared against the Judgment of the Bishop of Rome and other Churches and they were for it condemned as Schismaticks by the said Bishop And here is a far wider Separation than we can be charged with 2. And Cyprians words came from the Mind that was possest with these opinions and are expressive of his Inclination 3. Yet they are true and good understood as he himself oft expounds them the Bishop of Oxford citeth some instances many more are obvious in which he opposeth the Bishop of Rome saying that none of them pretendeth to be a Bishop of Bishops and limiting every man to his own Province and saying that they were to give account to none but God with much the like But in what sence is Episcopacie one 1. Undoubtedly not as numerically in the personal Subjectum Relationis One Bishop is not another if you should say Paternity is One none believe that one mans Relation of Paternity is anothers The Relation is an accident of its own Subject as well as Quantity Quality c. 2. Nor doth any man believe that many Bishops go to make up one Bishop in Naturals 3. Nor did ever Cyprian hold or say that all Bishops go to make up one Politick Governing Aristocracie as many go to make one Senate or Parliament that hath a power of Legislation and Judgment by Vote as one Persona politica He never owned such a humane Soveraignty But Episcopatus unus est 1. In specie all Bishops have one Office 2. Objectivè As the Catholick Church is one whose welfare all Bishops ought to seek 3. And so finaliter as to the remote End and are bound to endeavour Concord 4. And as effects all are from one efficient institutor As it may be said that all official Magistracy in England is one 1. As from one King or summa potestas 2. As described by one Law and as Justices of one Species 3. As all their Cities and Counties and Hundreds are but part of one Kingdom whose welfare all are for 4. And as they are all bound to keep as much common Concord as they can if any mean more they should tell us what If any mean that all Bishops make one numerical Universal Government they are heinous Schismaticks and the Kingdom is Sworn against their Judgment And these Men damn them in damning Schismaticks The truth is Cyprian de Vnitate Ecclesiae leaving out the Papists additions is a good Book and worthy to be read of all and take Cyprian's Description of the Episcopacy of the Church which we must unite with and the nature of that Union and we would rejoyce in such But if Cyprian had lived to see either Arians or Donatists the greater number or any Sect after call themselves the Church because that Princes set them up and had seen them depose Chrysostome and such other doubtless he would never have pleaded the Unity of Episcopacy for this but have judged as he did in the Case of Martial and Basilides nor did he ever plead for an universal humane Soveraignty LXXXVIII If we are damned Schismaticks I can imagine no pretended manner of Separation in which our Schism consists but first either Local as such 2. Or Mental as such 3. Or Local caused by Mental If Local as such be it All Christians are Schismaticks for being locally separated from others and absent from all Churches and places save one If Mental Separation be it either all Mental Division is such or but some only if all then all mortal men are Schismaticks as differing in a multitude of things from others If it be not all what is it is it all difference in the Essentials of Christianity we grant it and we are charg'd with no such thing Is it all difference in the Integrals or Accidents so do all differ that are not perfect Is it all want of Love or all Vncharitableness to one another all on earth have some degree of it and those are likest to have most that do as the Bishops did against the Priscillianists bring godly people under reproach on pretence of opposing Heresie or that seek the Silencing Imprisonment Banishment or Ruine of men as faithful as themselves For our parts we profess it our great Duty to love all men as men all Christians as Christians all godly men as godly all Magistrates as Magistrates c. Is it for our separating in mind from any Principles in specie necessary to Communion in the Church Universal or single Churches let it be opened what those Principles be We own all Christianity and all Ministry of Gods Institution and all his Church Ordinances We own Bishops over their Flocks let them be never so large so they be capable of the Work and End and alter not the true species and we submit to any that shall by the Word admonish Pastors of many Churches of their Duty or Sin or seek their good Nor do we refuse Obedience to any humane Officers set up by Princes to do nothing against Christs Laws nor nothing but what is in Princes power in the Accidents circa Sacra Is it because we disown any Numerical Rulers we own the King and his Magistrates we own all that we can understand to be true
proper Authority but only in such matters as concern the Unity of the Episcopacy or the Peace and Communion of the Catholick Church If a Bishop be convicted of Heresie or Schism or some great wickedness or impiety they may depose him and forbid his people to communicate with him and ordain another in his stead because he subverts the Unity of the Faith or divides the Unity of the Church or is himself unfit for Communion Ans. 1. Either these are meant as acts of Government or not If yea then why do you so oft disclaim it and call it only Advice and Communion Then you place this governing Power in Forreigners when they are no further off than with ease and convenience we may confederate with them And whither this will lead I 'le not enquire If nay then it seems men may depose Bishops and set up or ordain others in their stead without any governing Power over them If so then by Authority you must mean Authoritatem Doctoris vel Nimcii and so I confess Pastors may in Christ's Name require other Churches to do their duty and not Authoritatem Regentis And if so it 's as true that when there is just cause a few may depose many as many depose a few But men use not to call it deposing and ordaining in his place when men do but charge others in Christ's Name to do their duty I find not thaâ— St. Martin excommunicated the Bishops and Synods in Ithacius and Idacius time but I find that he renounced Communion with them and so may Equals do § 43. P. 140. he saith The sensless imputation of Cassandrianism and French Popery is managed so knavishly by Mr. Lob and with such blind fury by Mr. Baxter with so much confusion c. Ans. The Terms I wonder not at but whatever we are for Knavery or blind Fury if this man help us against Confusion it 's strange § 44. P. 173. he grants that the Bishops are not the Governours of the Church as united in one common regent Head over the whole Church but as every Bishop governeth his own share And this of true Bishops who denieth him P. 183. It is but a voluntary combination and stricter associasion for preserving Unity by advice c. All this is good tho damned by him in the Independents if they would combine to rule according to the Laws of Christ and not make any of their own without authority nor so as to accuse Christ's Laws of insufficiency nor make dividing noxious snares § 45. Saith he p. 189. That this Church is Universal is founded on the Laws of Catholick Communion Ans. No Humane Laws make the Church Universal Men may make their own Subjects or Confederates unite in accidents either just as in one Translation of Scripture one time and place and meeting c. or unjust when it 's hurtful vain or belongs not to them but it is only he that maketh the Church a Church who thereby maketh it One Church in Essentials And in Integrals he that maketh it entire by institution or efficiency 2. This Union is founded in mens Unity in Christianity Eph. 4.3 4 5 6. § 46. P. 192. He saith The Association and Confederacy of Neighbour-Churches is founded on the Law of Catholick Communion and the Catholick Communion cannot be maintained without it Ans. Not without Baptismal Confederaâ—y in the necessary Duties commanded by Christ But as to your Confederacies in Humane new Church-Forms Patriarchal Metropolitan c. was not the Church One without them before they were invented Here he maketh voluntary Confederacies to make new Church-Canons or Laws of Discipline necessary to Unity and that Unity necessary to Salvation all being cut off from Christ that break it As if Christ had not made Laws enough necessary to salvation and he that only kept his Laws and not mens Canons could not be saved Can he tell us then where to fix our Religion On what Bishops and on what Canons I am certain that his Religion will not stand with certainty of salvation when no man can be certain what is necessary to salvation nor what de novo will by Bishops be made necessary the next year nor who those Bishops must be 2. See here again When he made it a renouncing our Christianity to confederate and associate to do mens duty in a particular Church he yet maketh it necessary to Unity and so to salvation by confederacy to make new Humane Church Forms All this is to bring all mens salvation opinionatively into the power of those that can get uppermost as if men could as easily damn others as themselves § 47. P. 200 201. saith he If the Church cannot be a Political Society without one constitutive Regent Head then the Church is not a Political Society for it neither has nor can have any such on Earth over the whole Ans. We thank you for that much But the Church is a Political Society and to deny it is to deny an Article of the Creed and to unchurch it quoad ipsam formam And Christ is its constitutive regent Head The whole Family in Heaven and Earth is named by him from whom the whole compacted body is increast and edified And it 's dangerous false Doctrine worse than breaking one of your Canons to hold that the Church cannot be a Political Society unless it have an Head on Earth § 48. He adds when I shewed that all Episcopal Writers as Hooker Spalatensis c. of Church Polity take the Church for one Body Politick But what is this to the purposo Does Hooker set up one Regent Head Ans. 1. Yes Christ. 2. Was it not directly to my purpose to prove it a Polity which was that which I alledged it for But saith he do any of them prove That Civil and Ecclesiastick Polity is the same thing Ans. Yes in genere Do they use the word equivocally Is not Polity or Government in Civils and Ecclesiasticks Polity in genere How can these else be distinct species of it Was this ever denied by Conformist before Saith he ' Do not the Civil and Ecclesiastick Commonwealth differ as much as the Church and the State Ans. And do not Church and State differ in specie as being both Politick Bodies sub uno genere He adds Therefore he must still prove That as one supreme Regent Head is necessary to the Unity of a State or Kingdom so it is to the Unity of the Church which will be a fair advance towards Popery Ans. 1. Every Christian holds That Christ is the Head over all things to his Church But every Christian says not That this is an advance to Popery Is Christianity Popery 2. Is one State and Kingdom all the World All that I have to prove is That as all the Earth is one Divine Kingdom God being the absolute Soveraign and each particular Kingdom is part of it a Political Body subordinate informed by its One Humane Soveraign even so the Universal Church is one Body
and Devote himself to Him Therefore to force the unwilling to be Baptized is a Sacrilegious Prophanation of Baptism 4. To be Baptized is to be solemnly invested in a visible State of Regeneration Pardon Adoption and Right to Christ and Life Eternal by a Ministerial Delivery of such Right as in the Name of Christ. But no unwilling Person hath any Right to these unvaluable Gifts Therefore no unwilling Person should be forced to receive the said Investiture 5. Christ's Tryal and Description of the Willing is Whether they resolve to accept of his Grace forsaking all worldly interest that stands against it Luke 14.26 27 to the end Therefore to Baptize all that are forced to it by the Sword and had rather be Baptized and say they Believe than lose all they have and lie in Gaol is to Preach another Gospel in part 6. Persons Baptized in infancy have no right to Communion in the Lord's Supper till they profess their personal Faith and Consent to the Baptismal Covenant And the Unbaptized are not to be forced to Communicate The Lords Supper redelivering all the same great unvaluable Gifts to the Receivers which were delivered in Baptism the Unwillâ—ng are no more capable of one than the other And to force them to say they are Willing and to receive that which they have no right to is Sacrilegious prophaning Holy things 7. The ancient Churches for many hundred years were so far from forcing any to Baptism or Church-Communion or thinking that they should be forced that they admitted none that did not earnestly desire it And if the Baptized by Impenitency or Apostacy or â—long withdrawing from Communion did shew themselves again uncapable by unwillingness they Declaratively cast them out 8. And that the Excommunicate as such should be laid up in Prison and undone to force them again to be Willing to be Christians or to Communicate hath the same Reasons against it as against doing it at the first and to take them for Willing and Capable of Absolution and Salvation who had rather say they Repent and Consent than lye in Gaol is to pervert Christ's Gospel and Sacraments and confound the Church And the ancient Churches would have abhorred the motion of such a thing 9. But it is just and meet that Princes make a difference between Christian and Infidel Subjects and between those that live Willingly in Communion of the Church and those that refuse it And that a Christian Kingdom should give those Powers and Immunities to willing Christians which they give not to Infidels and the justly Excommunicate especially in matters relating to Government Legislative and Judiciary and especially about Reâ—igion and the Church And if any to obtain such Immunities or Powers do Hypocritically profess Christianity and consent themselves only are guilty of the Prophanation no wrong means was used and the Church is no searcher of the Heart 10. But Christianity being necessary to our Salvation and it being the Christian Magistrates Duty to do his best for the Salvation of all his Subjects and Knowledge being the means of Consent and Teaching and Learning the means of Knowledge it is the Duty of such Magistrates to provide sufficâ—ent Teachers for Number and Qualâ—ty for all the Subjects and to compel men to Hear Conâ—er and Learn as Catechumens The ancient Churches had their previous Instructions for such who were yet dismissed before the Communion Exercises proper to the faithful § 3. II. To the second case I Answer 1. There is nothing in this World that Man can do without all inconveniencies or which may not be turned to some occasion of Evil. On one side 1. It is most desirable that all Kingdoms were wholly Christians and the Princes be Defenders and Promoters of Religion and the Church and Kingdom be materially the same and the Civil Government used Holily according to God's Laws to holy ends 2. And it is desirable accordingly that the Kingdom being all Christian be divided into fit parts for Christian Conversation and Communion such as our Parishes are and that all be of the Church who are of the Parish and the Civil State sanctified and the Ecclesiastick grow up as Body and Soul into one And that all in the Parish be of one mind and of one Church and that there be no just cause given for any to separate from the rest nor any do it without cause 3. And it is desirable that all these Parish-Churches in a Kingdom living under one civil Government do by the means of Senior Pastors and Synods hold such Correspondence as is necessary to their common Concord and Strength These things being Desirable it is no wonder if good Governours Endeavour them and that ignorant men Plead for all such Concomitants Subordinates and Consequents as do suppose them When as in Fact the case being quite otherwise to administer matters on a false supposition of the matter of Fact as if that were which is not is but like the Men of Gothams striving and fighting which way they should drive their Sheep and where they should pasture them when they had none 1. No Kingdom is so wholly Christian as not to have many alas how many uncapable of Church-Communion 2. Yet it is a matter of order to be endeavoured that the Country be divided into Parishes and that they have an Ecclesiastick as well as a Civil Relation That is That each of these Parishes have a stated Teacher or many for the Catechumens who are uncapable of Communion And that the same Men be the Pastors of all in that Parish who consent and have the Temples and Tythes by the Magistrates Countenance and Consent And this great advantage of Publick Countenance and Maintenance will no doubt prevail with the main Body of Christians in that Parish if the men be desirable or tollerable to chuse them rather than others to avoid discountenance and the maintaining of others As all in the Hospital will be for the established Physician who dare trust him with their Lives But if this should be carried further to bind all persons to an absolute acceptance of such Parish Priests to be their only Pastors under the Bishops who are put upon them the mischiefs would be intollerable For 1. Then all must accept of Papists Priests only in France Spain Italy Bavaria Austria c and of bare Readers in Muâ—covy 2. Or else all Subjects are made Judges of the qualification of their Kings whether they are Orthoodox enough to chuse them Pastors while they are not allowed to judge what Pastor to trust 3. And then every ignorant malignant or prophane Man who by inheritance or purchase hath got Advowsons or Presentations hath got an advantage greatly to hinder the Salvation of all the Parish And if Money may buy Souls for so much probability of Damnation no wonder if the god of this World imploy many rich Merchants to purchase Advowsons For how ordinarily God worketh according to the suitableness of means Scripture and full Experience
separate from a Church meerly because I meet not with them else I should separate from all the World save the place where I am present But I avoid these several degrees of sinful separation 1. Accounting true Churches and Ministers to be none such as the Papists do by all that have not an uninterrupted succession of Diocesan Ordination 2. Accounting the Ministry and Worship and Government so bad as makes Communion with the Church unlawful if it be not so 3. Doing that needlesly which hath the scandalous appearing signification of such a judgment 10. I know many of the Parish-Ministers to be men of very laudable abilities and conversations and to have the consent of the most of the Communicants of the Parish 11. I am past doubt that so much of the Liturgie as is used every Lords Day as the common Worship is so far sound as to the matter of it that it hath no more material faultiness than is too often in extemporate Church-praying And that the disorder and faultiness in the Manner is no greater than is used also by many in free prayer with whom we all think it lawful to joyn And that prejudice maketh it seem to many much more faulty than it is The greatest dislike is of the Responses by the People and the shortness of the Prayers both which were used in the Ancient Churches when no sound Christians scrupled it much less separated for it Christ approved of the short Prayer of the Publican God be merciful to me a sinner Repetitions and the Peoples Acclamations and Responses were used in the Iewish Church as is evident in Ezra and in many Psalms c. We all allow the Peoples speaking even as much as the Minister in singing Psalms And the Congregation would murmur if the People should be but Hearers while the Minister singeth alone Of old their singing was like our saying and not in Rithmes like ours Will any pretend to prove that it 's lawful for the People to sing God's Praise and not to say it But they that dislike it may be silent As to the Objection that it 's unlawful to use imposed forms I have answered it so fully in my Cuâ—e of Church-Divisions and in my Christian Directory that I will here say no more but that 1. Every Ministers Prayer is a Form to the People and imposed on them to joyn in putting it up to God 2. And that its lawful for a Child to use a Form imposed by Parents therefore not simply evil 3. And that we all allow imposed Forms of Catechizing and of singing Prayers and Praise to God And that he that said Speak to one another in Psalms and Hymns and spiritual Songs never meant that they must not be premeditated 4. And many men sin by needless impositions when the use of the thing imposed is no sin but a duty And I am satitsfied that the Number of the Christian Churches on Earth which worship God without a Form far worse than ours is so small as that the soundness of ours is almost singular The supposed great 〈◊〉 in the By-Offices about God-Fathers Crossing the form of Burial and such other the Hearers of the common Lords-day-Service have no business with For my part I profess I take the ordinary Liturgy so â—he best part of the publick Service in half the Churches in England and had rather have it without the Sermon than the Sermon without it in those Churches 12. I therefore take it to be my duty as a private Hearer 1. When I am where there is a tolerable Minister and no other Church but the Parochial to joyn in Worship and Communion with them constantly 2. As a Minister on whom the Conditions in the Laws are put to refuse some of those Conditions 3. As an Hearer where the Minister is utterly intolerable to do nothing which seemeth an owning him as a Minister 4. In a place where the Parochial Ministry is the best but a private Minister and Church is peaceable and sound I will go ordinarily to the Parish-Church but sometime to the weaker if my forbearance would seem a disowning of their Communion yea tho it were to one that is against Infant-Baptism by mistake 5. In a place where the privater Minister and Worship is most spiritual powerful and profitable I would go ordinarily thither if I may But sometimes to a tolerable Parish-Minister and Communion in case my not going seem to signifie that I separate from their Communion as utterly unlawful And if I be a Preacher in a privater Church I will sometimes get another to supply my place and go to the Parish-Church if else my forbearance would seem to signifie that I judg it unlawful 6. I therefore take the same thing here to be lawful to one and a fault in another and a duty to another Those that have far better Helps and Communion all things considered should not ordinarily prefer worse And when the case differs not much the Will of a Parent an Husband a Master or a Magistrate should sway much And where it is a duty to noted persons to go to the Parish-Church sometime because else it will signifie that they think it unlawful an hundred Children Servants Wives poor people who are not noted or mist and their absence is no scandal are not bound to go at all while they have much better Helps and Communion elsewhere Having told you my Judgment of which in my Two forementioned Books I have given a fuller account I shall next add the reason of my Practice both to satisfie those that censure me and those that crave my help for their information but not making my self a Judg of them that differ The Reasons of my Practice in Parochial-Communion § 4. III. But here I am in the same streight as when I gave an account of my Nonconformity When upon many years urgency I did but tell men what the sins were which I thought I should commit if I conformed some said that I made the Conformists a Faction of unconscionable perjured Villains And if I now tell the Reasons why I joyn in the Parish-Churches some will say that these Reasons accuse them that do not of the guilt of Schism and sinful suffering But he that will perform no duty which none will be offended at shall scarce do any in the World My Reasons then are these I. I do it much for my own Edification And who can prove my Edification unlawful There is so sound judicious preaching in my Parish-Church where I now go that I take it to be my considerable loss when sickness keepeth me away And who can bind me to my loss If a stranger give now and then a peevish ignorant flirt at such as differ from him as those called Arminians and some others use to do I am not so thin-skin'd as thereby to smart nor so foolish as to raise a stir by talking against it which by taking no notice will go out like a Squib which the
to sin they will shew so much partiality and self-esteem and so much impatient tenderness of themselves as will too much harden their Accusers Obj. 4. Many Learned good men do differ from you Ans. I think a thousand to one through the World differ from them Obj. 5. It will save none from suffering there being so many other Laws against them Ans. It is my duty to save men from mistakes and sinful censure and suffering for mistakes and so it may save me from the guilt of Omission Obj. 6. It is but Man's Law which you suppose maketh it a duty Ans. 1. I make not light of the Laws of men about lawful things But your supposition is not true Were there no Law for it but God's it is my duty Obj. 7. Some body will answer you and so it will cause strife Ans. Do or must all men forbear giving a Reason of their Judgment and Practice to those that think them sinful yea or to confute the mistakes of others for fear of being censured Will you censure us and must not hear our Reasons Are you so much worse than Lawyers that can plead without breach of Charity May not friendly debates beat out the truth to our mutual edification No truths are so clear to us before they are controverted usually as after Reproach not the Nonconformists as if they could not bear contradiction Obj. 8. Your Cure of Church-Divisions did increase Divisions Ans. The Disease then is very far gone if the Remedy increase it But I have cause to believe that it healed many But I confess as the Books by which I drew off many Anabaptists did increase Division from their Party by ceasing the Divisions from the Church so it may be here Obj. 9. But if men believe it lawful to go to the Parish-Churches they will come to your Assemblies no more Ans. 1. Experience confuteth this I think most who hear me do think it lawful and oft go thither 2. I have oft told them publickly That I desire none of them to hear me who do not need my help If they have room and sufficient helps in the Parish-Churches I had rather they would not take up with us the room which others should have who truly need our help If nothing bring them to me but an Opinion that it's sin to joyn with the Common-Prayer I will do my best to drive them from me But if any cannot have room elsewhere or cannot overcome the foresaid mistake of the sin of hearing the Parish-Miâ—ister I will give them the best help I can And if any live where publick hearing is but lawful and they truly need more suitable help the bare lawfulness of hearing elsewhere will never keep away those persons who feel their need of better and the benefit no more than it will make them forsake better Cloathing good Physick or Estate because a worse is sometime lawful Obj. 10. But why do not you conform if you can communicate with them Ans. 1. Why cannot I be carnal contentious drink too much at the Sacrament if I could have communicated with the Church of Corinth that had such Why did not Christ commit the Synagogue-sins if he could communicate in the Synagogues The persons who put this question disgrace themselves by judging of things which they understand not If they know not what more is in Ministers Conformity than in joyning as private persons in the Parish-Worship let them read my first Plea for Peace and they may know I will joyfully conform I. If they will impose on us no sinful Oaths Covenants Promises Subscriptions Declarations or Practices II. I would rejoice in the Reformation if while some essentiate a Church by a Bishop they would restore the Parishes to be Churches which they make but Parts of the lowest Churches as Chappels are and make the Parish-Ministers Pastors again whom they have degraded to be but Half-Pastors or Curates to the lowest Pastors III. I would hope that we might yet escape back-sliding into Popery if that part of the Clergy never govern the Ship who are not content with a National Government but make it our necessary duty as against Schism that all come under a Forreign Iurisdiction And if the true Protestant Clergy will ioyn in the renunciation of that Jurisdiction but not of Communion with Forreign Churches § 11. IV. Why I publish my Reasons at this time Ans. 1. Because I think I have an urgent cause to endeavour to save some from the guilt of Persecution And if I note the mistakes of One side only I shall be justly charged with partiality 2. Because mens censure of my practice as sinful doth continue And I owe them an account of the Reasons of it 3. Dr. Stillingfleet and such others would make the World believe that we defend that Separation which by word and practice we have long opposed And we owe fuller satisfaction to them and to such as they misinform 4. I am much obliged to rectifie mens mistake of the Reason why many Nonconforming Ministers here come not to the Parish Churches Many were agreed to come when the Oxford Act of Confinement coming out prevented it For to have appeared in the Churches would have exposed them to Six months imprisonment for being in the City And since then the same Reason hindereth many which keepeth Conformists from communicating with each other even their own labours at home But many do go to the Churches in publick and I conjecture others hereafter will get their Places sometime supplied by others that they may go For most of my acquaintance hold it lawful as far as I can judg 5. I would stop them that censure as sinners unjustly the late Parliaments the Common-Council Iurors and all the good Christians thrâ—ugh all the Kingdom who differ from them and that have no Ministers but Conformists 6. I remember why Mr. Io. Ball wrote against Separation just when Reformation was intended Many thought it unseasonable but it proved otherwise by the sad effects which he would have prevented 7. I cannot forget what this mistake hath wrought in England from 1641. to 1660. which I will not further recite but only say That when there was neither Bishops nor their Courts nor Liturgy nor Ceremonies imposed on them separate Assemblies were as numerous and as much and more pleaded for than now and managed with too much strife and reconciling and Unity was much resisted by that side 8. I am bound to have real compassion on the multitudes who suffer as for Recusancy and not by silence wrong their Consciences and their Purses If I shut up the bowels of my compassion where is the love of God 9. I am bound to do my best to keep out Popery which must be by keeping up as much of Religion as is possible in the Parish-Churches that it be not first thrust into corners and then out of the Land and by concord with the Parish-Ministers who are honest And many such through God's mercy there are
I durst no longer see Thousands of good Christians misguided into mistakes and like to be ruined for them and hereby hardening their Persecutors rejoycing the Papists who joyn with them in Separation reducing the Protestant Religion into corners and giving it up as publick to we may know whom censuring one another and dividing on these mistakes and fathering all this on God I say I durst not stand by in silence to see all this no more than to see men drowning or the City on fire without endeavouring to save men It is an exceeding great quiet to my Conscience under all the Confusions and Divisions that have befallâ—n us that in 1660 and 1661. I plainly and earnestly foretold the King and Bishops of them and did my best to have prevented them And the Author that I deal with necessitateth me to recite the late fruits of Separation in pulling down all Governments casting out all the Ministers in Wales and were near casting down those of England with Tythes and Universities persecuting and killing godly men and fathering all on God and now flying from the Bishops when they had opened them the door to return He layeth his main Cause on the ill fruits of Liturgies which indeed are rather the fruits of Pride and Malignity and constraineth me to shew the fruits of Separation I dare not bury that in silence which God so dreadfully disowned by their own dissâ—lution without any blood and that when multitudes are running into the old error by mistaking the Iudgment of the Nonconforming Ministers thinking that they took that for unlawful which they did not and condemning all the excellent old Nonconformists and Conformists and almost all the Churches on Earth Let wiser men deal wiselier I use the best wisdom that I have It 's true that abundance of good people fear and distaste Communion in the Liturgy What wonder when such Reasonings as these Twelve Arguments which how gross soever poor people have not the skill to answer perswade them it is false Worship and heinous sin and say others Idolatry They are conquered as the Mexicans were by the Spaniards by the frightful roaring of their Cannons the Militia used Acts 15.1 2. Ye cannot be saved and as the Pope conquered Kings and Kingdoms by threatning to keep them out of Heaven Even as since men tell me that they medicate their Wines with Arsenick and Mercury I am afraid to drink them which before I feared not so are honest souls affrightned from Liturgies and Communion How much in them I dissent from my self I have openly intimated to the World But he that will joyn in no good that is mixt by men with faultiness and evil must separate from all the World and all from him But how will he separate from himself England in her Articles and Ordination professeth to cleave to Scripture-sufficiency as being the Protestant Religion I go to joyn in this profest Religion If the Speaker of any side add any unwarrantable passages by book or without book let him answer for them I own them not Did my presence own all that I hear I would joyn with no man living The Lord fit us for a wiser and more loving World The Twelve Arguments said to be Dr. Owens impartially considered D. O. Posit It is not Lawful for us to go to and joyn in Publick Worship by the Common Prayer because that Worship it self according to the Rule of the Gospel is not Lawful 1. Ans. I Shall use the same Method that he hath used and first give you my Positions and then the supposed Matter of Fact and then consider his Arguments Posit It is not only Lawful but a Duty for those that cannot have better publick Church-worship without more hurt than benefit and are near a competent Parish Minister to go to and joyn in Publick Worship performed according to the Liturgie and in Sacramental Communion And for those that can have better to joyn sometime with such Parish Churches when their forbearance scandalously seemeth to signifie that they take such Communion for unlawful and so would tempt others to the same Accusation and uncharitable Separation The History of the Matter of Fact must be premised for the right deciding of the Case which is as followeth 1. God hath commanded us to Preach Pray Praise him and Administer his Sacraments and Discipline and hath told us what Doctrine we must preach what things we must pray and give thanks for and what Sacraments and Discipline we must Administer But he hath not told us in what Words we must do these nor in what Posture nor in what particular Method nor whether we must use oftest the same words or various nor whether they shall be before prepared or spoken immediately without preparation of words nor whether written or remembred nor whether prepared and composed by our selves or by others with such like 2. God prescribed divers Forms of Prayer Confession and Praise to the Iews in Moses Law and a Prophetical Song which they were all to learn Deut. 32. 3. The Psalms were a chief part of the Iews Liturgie in which there are many Forms of Prayer and Praise some made by David some by Asaph some by others and some in or after the Captivity no one knoweth by whom And those Psalms were not in Metre and sung in Tunes like ours now but loâ—dly said over 4. Iohn taught his Disciples to pray not only as to the Matter but as to the Words and so did Christ his Disciples at their Request who had not then the after-pouring out of the Spirit nay knew not that Christ must die for Sin rise and reign in Heaven c. and he said When ye pay say Our Father c. tho not tying them only to these words yet giving them a Form of Words to be used as they had occasion as well as a perfect Directory for Method 5. Christ himself joyned with the Iews in Synagogues and Temple when they used Forms and so did the Apostles and never blamed them for the use of such Forms 6. Christ prescribed a Form of Words in Baptism and in the Administration of the Lords Supper and used a Hymn in Form 7. There are divers Forms of Prayer and Thanksgiving in the New Testament in Luke 1. 2. and the Acts and Pauls Epistles and the Revelations which its Lawful and Laudable to use 8. We are commanded to use Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs which are Forms of Prayer and Praise and was not then in Rhime And it was not every one in the Church that composed these Extempâ—re but some made them for the rest to use And if none Impose them by Office Authority or Perswasion the Churches will never use the same Christians in the primitive ages of the Church were known to the Heathen by their constant use of such Hymns sung to Christ and of Christ. 9. The Churches from Christs time to this had a Creed or Form of sound Words or necessary Articles of Faith
would meet about it when they were desired to come to Sion Colledge and after they Printed a Thanksgiving to the King for his Declaration so that then they were not against all imposed Liturgies so that the Imposition had no unmercifulness in it 20. The forreign Churches in Holland France Germany c. are so much used to pray in the same form of words that if they were put to do all ex tempore it would be lamentably done by most even far worse than it is 21. I have formerly told the world That many of the most noted Nonconformists in London met and concluded for communicating in the Parish-Churches about 1664. And two things done by the Conformists stopt them One was a storm then arising against those that could not do it which they feared to seem to countenance by their compliance And Plague and Fâ—re interrupting the purposes of some The Oxford Act of Confinement made it unpracticable because to be seen in a Church would have cast them six Months in the Goal with Malefactors 22. Being thus hindered and delayed the King's Declaration after giving them liberty to have Assemblies otherwise they were then kept from the Parish-Churches by their labours with their own â—locks as the Parish-Ministers be from hearing one another 23. Some in the City and more in the Countries all this while went constantly to the Parish Churches before this liberty and as oft as they could after lest they should by their practice draw the people to thâ—nk that they took it for unlawful 24 Others that thought it lawful judg it not necessary when they might do that which they judged better And finding many Hearers offended at it were loath to displease them and bear their censures till at last by long disuse the people thought their judgment was against it And when necessity driveth them to declare their judgments and change their practice their Hearers and their Adversaries call them unconscionable Temporizers 25. Tho Mr. Tombs wrote for Parish-Communion few Anabaptists followed him and tho Mr. Nye wrote for hearing the Parish-Ministers few Indâ—pendents consented But some of their Ministers took the advantage of the foresaid forbearance of others and so brought Separation to pass for a common duty with many And renewed sufferings made it easier to draw men from the Communion of those that they so much suffered by following the eâ—ample of St. Martin and saying That persecutors obtruded without their conâ—ent were none of their Pastors and that it 's no Schism not to communicate with the Church which causelesly hath ipso facto excommunicated them in Can. 6 7 8 c. This is the true premised History D. O. Some things must be promised to the confirmation of this Position 1. The whole 〈◊〉 of Liturgical Worship with all its inseparable dependences are intendâ—â— For as such it is established by Law and not in any part of it only as 〈…〉 is required that we receive it and attend unto it It is not in our powâ—â— it is not left to our judgment or liberty to close with or make use of any pâ—rt of it as we shall think fit There are in the Mass-book many Prayers directed to God only by Iesus Christ yet it is not lawful for us thereon to go to Mass under a pretence only of joyning in such lawful Prayers As we must not affect their Drink-Offerings of Blood so we must not tâ—ke up their names in our lips Psal. 16.4 Have no communion with them § 2. I Shall now examine the Doctor 's Premises To the first I answer 1. If he will include all that is in the Liturgy the Nonconformists confess that there is somewhat in it which they dissent from as unjuâ—tifiable And so there is in all mens Worship of God 2. He intimateth That it is not in our power to close with some I. Error and not withall This is his First Error Tho Man give us no such power God doth As it is in my power 〈◊〉 believe all that one speaketh truly and well and not that which he speaketh amiss I am not bound to own all that any Preacher or Priest shall say in the Church God put it in the Disciples power to beware of the Leven of the Pharisees and yet to hear them Proving all things is not approving all things 2. Tho the Mass have many good Prayers the corruption by twisted Idolatry and Heresie maketh Communion there unlawful Heathent and Turks have good Prayers Prove any such Heresie or Idolatry in the Church-Worship by the Liturgy and we will avoid it But if I may joyn with your own good Prayers and Preaching notwithstanding your many Failings and such Errors as are here pleaded for why not with others 3. Psal. 16.4 is too sadly abused which speaketh only of sacrificing to and worshipping false Gods D. O. 2. It is to be considered as armed with Laws 1. Such as declare and enjoyn it as the only true Worship of the Church 2. Such as prohibit condemn and punish all other ways of the Worship of God in Church-Assemblies By our communion and conjunction in it we justifie those Laws § 3. THat our Communion justifieth all the Laws that impose the Liturgy yea the penal severeties is too gross an Error to be written with any shew of proof What if the Creed or Lord's Prayer were too rigorously imposed II. Error or Presbytery or Indepency must we forbear them or justifie the Law I can prove Episcopacy excluded too severely by the Covenant But every one that is against it justifieth not the imposition of that Covenant in that rigor What if rigorous Laws should make it imprisonment or death not to use our Translation of the Scriptures our approved Catechisms our Metre and Tunes of the Psalms not to put off the Hat at Prayer not to meet at the appointed Place and Hour c. Doth every man justifie the rigor of the imposition who obeyeth the Law Then a rigorous Law-maker may take away our Christian Liberty by commanding us to use such things too strictly yea he may turn Duty by too strict commanding it into Sin These are your unproved Premises D. O. 3. This conjunction in Communion by the Worship of the Liturgy is the Symbol Pledg and Token of an Ecclesiastical Incorporation with the Church of England in its present Constitution It is so in the Law of the Land It is so in the Canons of the Church It is so in the common Understanding of all men And by these Rules must our Profession and Practice be judged and not by any reserves of our own which neither God nor good men will allow of Wherefore § 4. TO the Third Premise I answer 1. The Church of England is an ambiguous word 1. As it signifieth a part of the Universal Church agreeing in Faith one God one Christ and all essential to the Church so we desire the honour of being parts of it 2. And also as it is a Christian
Kingdom under one King 3. And as it is a Confederacy of many Churches to keep Concord in lawful Circumstantials as well as Integrals In all these sences it is a lawful Association 4. But if any Church go beyond these bounds and on good pretences shall agree upon any error or evil it is a mistake to hold That all that incorporate with them in the Three foresaid lawful respects do therefore confederate with them in their error IV. Error This is your Fourth Error I will give you a general Instance and a particular one 1. You cannot name me one combined company of Churches from the Apostles days till now that had no error You take Episcopacy to be an error in the very constitution Name one Church from the 3 d or 4 th Century for a thousand years that was without it either Catholicks or Hereticks that were indeed a Church And must Christians have forborn associating with any of them Or might not own the good in their Associations without owning the evil 2. The Independents gathered a Synod at the Savoy and there among their Doctrinals or Articles of Faith laid down Two Points expresly contrary to Scripture 1. That it is not Faith but Christ's Righteousness that we are justified by when as it is both and the Scripture often saith the contrary 2. That Christ's Righteousness imputed is our sâ—le Righteousness Whereas the Scripture doth many hundred times name also our inherent and practical Righteousness I asked some yet living why they consented to these and did not rather expound the Scripture than deny it And they said That it was Dr O's doing Now doth it follow that every one that there conâ—ederated with you owned these errors The Churches of Helvetia are a very honourable part of the Reformed Churches They are commonly such as we call Erastian for no Discipline but the Magistrates Are ail that confederate with them as Churches guilty of this error 2. But I further distinguish between the many Parish-Churches and the Diocesan and the Church of England as constituted of such Diocesan Churches The Old Nonconformists commonly owned the Parish-Churches and the Church of England as made up of such but not the Diocesan This they openly professed It is therefore another of your Mistakes that owning the Parish-Churches and Worship is an owning of the present Diocesan Constitution Also it is your Mistake to say That Communion by the Liturgy is the Symbol and Pledg of the foresaid Incorporation in the Church of England in its present constitution V. Error It is only a part of the Communion commanded but no such Symbol VI. Error For 1. The Rulers openly declare that they take multitudes to be none of their Church who joyn in the Liturgy And it is subscribing declaring and swearing Obedience which is the Symbol yea they excommunicate many that come to the Liturgy-Service 2. And many come to it who openly disown the Diocesan present constitution So did as I said the Old Nonconformists and many Forreigners French Dutch c. that come over hither 3. If one may joyn in Communion of Worship with a Presbyterian Independent or Anabaptist-Church without owning the Errors of their constitution then so one may with a Parish-Church But c. You mistake when you say It is so by the Law of the Land You mistake again when you say it is so by the Canon You mistake again when you say It is so in the common understanding of all I formerly instanced in one of the sharpest Nonconformists Old Mr. Humphrey Fen of Coventry who would say aloud Amen to all the Common-Prayer save that for the Bishops by which all there knew his mind Whether it were right or wrong VII VIII IX Error I now determine not So here are Three more of your Mistakes 4. You make all other reserves of our own to be allowed neither by God or good men Here are two more mistakes 1. God maketh it our great duty to hold Communion with most X.XI. Error or almost all Churches on Earth with such reserves that is to own them in all that is good and disown all their evil tho their Laws command the owning of them without this reserve I would not joyn with yours or any Church on Earth that is If my Communion were an owning of all their faultiness 2. And it 's an immodest Error to say That none are good men that in this are not of your mind Is there any spotless Church on Earth or must we renounce the Communion with them all or reserve exception against their faults and misperformances D. O. 4. He that joyns in the Worship of the Common-Prayer doth by his practice make Profession That it is the true Worship of God accepted with him approved of him and wholly agreeable to his Mind and Will To do it with other reserves is hypocrisie and worse than the thing it self without them Happy is he that condemneth not himself in the thing which he alloweth Rom. 14 12. § 5. THis is your twelfth mistake and one that hath dreadful consequents 1. It contradicteth the express Profession of the Communicants who openly tell the World That they take not all in the Liturgy XII Error to be wholly agreeable to Gods Mind and Will And you are not to feign a Profession of men contrary to their open Protestation 2. It is most direful to your own separating followers who by this are supposed to profess all your Worship to be wholly agreeable to Gods Mind and Will And so the honest well-meaning people are made guilty of all the Errors which you put into your Worship 3. It is contrary to your own former Profession That you could in charity communicate with Presbyterians or Anabaptists c. And so you approved of all the Errors of their Worship 4. It maketh it a down right Sin to communicate with any Church on Earth For all have their faults and errors even in Worship which you feign all that Communicate with them to justifie as wholly agreeable to Gods Will And to justifie Sin and teach men so to do and to father it on God are sad Aggravations such shall be called least in the Kingdom of God By this rule you would have separated from every Church on Earth that we have notice of for a thousand years yea and to this day and is not that near separating from Christ And when no man knoweth before you speak in prayer what you will say How shall any man that joyneth with you koow but he may be guilty of your Sin at the next Sentence 5. It is a breach of the ninth Commandment thus to charge all the Ancient Churches and Reformers and the Noncoformists with hypocrisie and worse than open sinning who have all communicated on the contrary Supposition 6. It is no friendly act to the Church to lay down such a Principle of perpetual Separation and condemning each others Communion and so to make the Communion and
humane Covenant for Christ hath made but one Covenant with Mankind which is contained in the Vow of Baptism if it be then no man is a Christian but an Independent Ans. Alas for the Church that is taught at this rate 1. I never saw what Independents do in this case but I think none of them that are Sober own any other sort of Church but the universal and single Churches as members of it and therefore require no Contract but 1. To the Covenant of Baptism or Christianity 2. To the Duties of their particular Church-relation 2. And nothing is here of necessity but manifested Consent which is a real Contract but a clearer or a darker an explicite or implicite consent differ only ad meliús esse 3. Is not God the Author of Magistracy Marriage c. And is it any violation of Gods part if Rulers and People Husband and Wife be Covenanters by his command 4. Is it any renuntiation of Baptism to promise at Ordination to obey the Arch-Bishop and Bishop and to take the Oath of Canonical Obedience Is it not still exacted Are not the Takers of it obliged are not Covenants imposed on all that will be Ministers in the act of Uniformity are not multitudes kept out and cast out for not making these Covenants Quo teneam nodo c. How should one deal with such slippery men Good Mr. Zachary Cawdry that wrote to have all men to covenant Submission to Bishops and Parish Ministers did not dream that it was any violation of Baptism 5. Do not men owe duty to their Pastors which they owe to no others If not put them not on it Why are you angry with them for going from you Why doth the Canon suspend those that receive them to Communion from another Parish that hath no Preacher Why are we ruined for not covenanting as aforesaid if yea then is it against Baptism to promise to do our duty 6. But hath God commanded or instituted no Covenant but Baptism Yes sure the Matrimonial at least and I think Ordination is covenanting for the Ministry Did not the Apostle Acts 14.23 ordain Elders in every Church if you would have by Suffrage left out of the Translation no sober man can doubt but it was by the Peoples consent and was it without their consent that Titus was to ordain Elders in every City Could any then come otherwise in Did not all Churches hold and practise this after and was it none of Gods Institution If so God requireth us not to take any of you for our Bishops or Pastors Who then requireth it What meaneth Paul when he saith they gave up themselves to the Lord and to us by the Will of God 7. Can the wit of man imagine how it is possible without consent for a man to be made the Pastor of any Flock Who ever ordained a man against his will or for any man to have Title against his will to the proper over-sight and pastoral care of any one Pastor or the priviledges of any Church If any think they may be cramm'd and drencht with the Sacrament or that an unwilling man may have a sealed pardon and gift of Salvation delivered him he will make a new Gospel And how any particular Pastor is bound to give that man the Sacrament ordinarily that consents not ordinarily to receive it of him I know not No man is a member of any City or any Company of Free-men in the City but by mutual consent and the Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy to the King maketh not the Oath of a Citizen as such or of a Member of a Company as such unlawful 8. Doth this Doctor think that he ever yet proved to sober men that the Covenant aforesaid of Godfathers and Godmothers to make Christians and members of the universal Church is more or so much of Gods Institution than the Contract or Consent between Bishops or Pastors and People to make a single Political Church 9. If it follow not that no man is the Kings Subject that sweareth not to the City It will not follow that none is a Christian but an Independent or Church-consenter 10. How are your Parish or Diocesan Church members known to your selves or any others Are all that dwell in the Parish or Diocess your Church members Then Atheists Sadducees Hobbists and all vicious men and thousands that never communicate are such Yea those that you call Separatists If it be every transient Communicant have you a proper Pastoral care of every Travellers Soul that so communicates with you You after plead that his very ordinary Communion maketh him not a member if he be unwilling to be one And is not his consent then necessary Or if ordinary Communion be the test how few then of great Parishes are of the Church yet that is because such Communion signifieth their Consent to your over-sight of them § 9. But it 's much to be approved which p. 5. and oft he saith that to be taken into Covenant with God and to be received into the Church is the very same thing as to the Universal Church By which all his gross Schismatical Accusations afterwards are confuted No man then is out of the Church that is not out of the Baptismal Covenant either by not taking it or by renouncing some Essential part of it And when will he prove that to take him rather than Dr. Bates that was cast out to be a Teacher or Pastor at Dunstans or to take this man and not another to be the Lawful Bishop or Priest and to obey him in every Oath and Ceremony is an Essential part of the Baptismal Covenant or of Christianity But such a rope of Sand as Mr. Dodwell and this man tye together to bind men to their Sect will serve turn with some that know not who speaks Truth by any surer way than prejudice § 10. His Doctrine of Separation and gathering Churches out of Churches is anon to be considered But whereas he addes p. 7. These men convert Christians from common Christianity and the Communion of the Vniversal Church to Independency Ans. My acquaintance with them is small save by reading their Books And there are few Men of any Common Denomination Episcopal or other that are not in many things disagreed But I must in Charity to them say that as far as I can judge by their Writings or Speech he palpably slandereth them and that none that are grave and sober among them do separate their Churches from the common Christianity or the Universal Church any more than the Company of Stationers Ironmongers c. are separated from the City of London or London from England or Trinity Colledge from the University of Cambridge or Oxford I never met with man and I am confident never shall do that doth not take his Independent Church to be part of the Universal and Dependent as a part on the whole If belying others stopt at words the wrong were small But when it 's made but the
Communion is an Essential duty of a Church-member meaning a Christian. A. 1. And yet before he denyed that Communion lay essentially in this Exercise but only in Vnion Yea and Nay is his Custom 2. Some few Christians as those that live where such Communion cannot be had without sin c. are not bound to it therefore it is not true that it is Essential to Universal Church-membership And I think sickness endeth not the essentials that disableth men 3. Note Reader that by this mans Doctrine we are all unchristened and damned if we do not gather into disallowed Churches if we be unjustly cast out of the allowed ones For all must be Church members that will be Christians and an unjust Excommunication cannot disoblige us from Christianity nor bind us to consent to be damned Now read the 5 th 6 th 7 th 8 th c. Canons of the Church of England which ipso facto Excommunicate all that affirm any thing in their Liturgy Articles Ceremonies or Government sinful and answer Spalatensis arguments against Excommunicating ipso facto and prove all this just and you may prove what you will just But you see where he layeth the Controversie If any be Excommunicated without sufficient cause or by Lay Civilians to whom God never gave that power or by such Bishops or Pastors as have no just Authority for want of a true call or Consent or if any unlawful thing be made necessary to Communion all such persons must by his own confessions hold Church-communion whether these imposers will or not for all Christians are bound to be of some Church § 3. p. 33 34. He saith that None but publick Prayers are the Prayers of the Church properly and acts of Communion that is such as are offered by the hands of men authorized and set apart for that purpose c. Ans. Who would have thought that we are more for the Liturgy than he I undertake to prove that all the Responsal Prayers and all the Litany Prayers in which the Minister names but the matter to them and the People make it a Prayer by speaking the petitioning parts are all the publick Prayers of the Church and so are all the petitioning Psalms spoke or sung by the People and not only that which is offered by the Priest I do not think that he believeth what he carelesly saith here himself But the Independents are stiffer for his first Thesis of the necessity of Church-communion than he is his unfit words I pass by CHAP. III. Of his second Case § 1. THE next question of Occasional Communion as distinct from fixed he turns out of doors as if there could be no such thing and it 's very true as to the Church universal but as to visible actual Communion with this or that particular Church it is not true 1. A Traveller of another Country who on his journey communicateth with every Church where he passeth is not a fixed Member of that Church for 1. The Pastor or Bishop hath not that peculiar Charge of him as of fixed members 2. He is not bound where he passeth to take such notice of the lives of Communicants or Pastors and to admonish the Offenders and tell the Church as fixed members are 3. He hath not the right in chooseing Pastors or Deacons as the fixed Members have 4. An itinerant Bishop in transitu is not their fixed Bishop ergo an Iterant Lay-man is not a fixed Member The same I may say of one that is a fixed member of another Church in the same City and cometh to that only to signifie universal Communion or neighbourly which though he deny to be lawful I shall further prove anon And the same I may say of those that dwell where there is no fixed single Church at all for want of a Pastor but they congregate only when some strange Minister passeth through the Town CHAP. IV. His third Case § 1. PAge 48 49. He resolveth his third Case Whether it be lawful to Communicate with two distinct and separate Churches negatively and saith It is contrary to all the Principles of Church Communion as any thing can possibly be it is to be contrary to our selves it is Communicating with Schism That the Presbyterian and Independent Churches have made an actual separation from the Church of England he hath evidently proved and they are Schismaticks and to communicate with them is to partake in their Schism and if Schism be a great sin and that which will damn us as soon as Adultery and Murther then it must needs be a dangerous thing to communicate with Schismaticks And p. 42. There cannot be two distinct Churches in one place one for occasional and another for constant Communion without Schism Ans. To save those that are willing from the Poyson of these Schismatical Doctrines lapt up in confusion by men that abhor distinction or understand not what they say I will first lay down that truth that he fights against with convincing evidence and then shew you the mischief of his false Doctrine and Application § 2. The confusion of these words Church Communion Separation and Schism which every one signifie divers things is the chief means to blind and deceive his Reader whether it do so by himself I know not I. The Word Church signifieth sometime the universal Church sometime a single Organized Church as part of it and sometime humane combinations of such single Churches and that into Diocesan Classical Provincial Patriarchal National and Papal II. The Specification and Nomination of Churches is from the formal cause and the proper Government is that form And the Individuation is from matter and form but principally from the form III. The Union of Pastor and Flock in Relation makes that which is a form aptitudinal as the Soul to the Body to be the form in act as the Union of Soul and Body and Gods command and consent with the consent of the necessary relate and correlate cause that union IV. Union is in order to Communion which is primary by the exercise of the formal powers on the matter and secondary by the action of all the parts according to their several capacities and Offices V. The Union of the Church is of divers degrees 1. The formal Union of the Head and Body which maketh it essentially the Christian Church 2. The Vnion of the parts among themselves as Christian which maketh them a Body capable of Union with the Head 3. The Union of the parts as unequal Organized the Official with the rest which maketh it an Organized Body fit for its special use and welfare 4. Union in integrity of parts which maketh it an intire Body 5. Union in due temperament and Qualities which maketh it a healthful Body 6. Unity in Common Accidents which make it a Comely Beautiful Body joined with the rest But 7. Union in mutable Accidents is unnecessary and impossible VI. These several degrees of Union are found in Bodies natural and Politick 1. The
a larger Council of many Nations and that the Synod at Dort had not as much Power as a lesser at Hague or a Synod of many Nations as much as one in Scotland But if as by parity of Reason they must they say that General or large Councils are the Governours of National Assemblies as they are of Classis and Presbyteries then they bring us under a Foreign Jurisdiction which the Kingdom is sworn against and I think they are Papists but of the French sort who make General Councils Superior Governours of the Universal Church And if they determine the bounds of Church-Power by the Magistrates Laws and yet damn Erastians they seem in ignorance to deal too hardly with themselves 15. Another Instance is in the Place of Publick Worship God hath not determined where the Assembly shall meet where the Pulpit Font Table c. shall stand And if great and lofty Structures called Temples be Built purely to shew how we honour God and Religion as Constantine and others after him did at Constantinople Alexandria Ierusalem over the Grave of Christ and all over the Empire this Actual Expression of Honour to God is Cultus modalis secundarius a subservient sort of Worship and no Idolatry but Lawful 16. The same I say of Church Utensils If for the Honour of God and Religion the Pulpits and Tables have Ornaments of Silk Cups and Trenchers and Flaggons of Silver the Font and Seats have some special Neatness c. this is left to Man's Determination without any particular Institution and is no Idolatry 17. And if as Judges and Lawyers have distinguishing Habits the Ministers have so officiating and at other times to no worse end or manner than the said Utensils are put I know no Institution that is crost by it nor that forbids it 18. Another Instance may be of Speaking in the Assembly whether it shall be One Minister or Two or Three Whether Lay-men may not be Interlocutors by Questions yea and sometime Preach and Pray c. God hath not particularly determined but left to Human Choice 19. Many good Christians knowing the Lord's Day to be an Instituted Day of Thanksgiving for the greatest Mercies do as an Act of Honour wear their best Cloathes and Feast themselves and the Poor accordingly that day This is Lawful by the General Law but not particularly Instituted by God 20. Professing Signs in our Covenantings with God and Confessing of our Religion are left to be chosen onely by the General Laws of Edification and Order When a Nation or Church or Person renew their Covenant with God and their Confession of Faith it may be done when the Ruler demandeth their consent either by word or by subscribing or by lifting up the hand or by standing up or by bowing the Head for these are all or most found in Scripture instances yea sometimes they fell by Prostration to the Ground yea and so they oft did in receiving a Charge or Message from God by his Ministers I will add no more Instances These are enough If yet it be said That none of these be acts of Worship I again Answer 1. Then do not by Slander call them so and say still that Man's inventing or using these is using false Worship If they be no Worship they are no false Worship Confess then that it 's but a bare name that you charged with Idolatry for its onely such things as these that we would add 2. But de nomine If an Action done directly to honour God be to be called Worship some of these at least may be called Secondary subordinate Worship But if you appropriate the Name to Gods stated Ordinances these must not be called Worship but the manner order circumstances or accidents of Worship But call them what you will they are but what God alloweth and the General of them he commandeth I need not say much to his Applicatory Words 1. To return from Separation to Love and Union is as fitly called a Returning to their Vomit as returning from Drunkenness and Fornication to Sobriety and Chastity may be so called Repentance is casting up our Sin 2. The Names of bowing to Baal Dan and Bethel Babylon Idols c. are as easily used by Quakers Ranters Familists c. against all God's Church and Worship And they were worn so thread-bare by the railing Separatists then called Brownists against the Old Learned Godly Nonconformists that they turned to the Speakers reproach And I suppose he knoweth that the Scots were called as bad and worse by the Army that conquered them in 1650 c. 3. That sitting or drinking with the superstitious in acts of religious adoration is a sign of defection This would make all Backsliders who so sit and drink with him and such as he who is so superstitious as to turn sin into duty and duty into sin and falsly father Laws on God Yea that is worse than superstitious as is after manifested 2. Superstition is an offering somewhat as pleasing to God which is not pleasing to him All Christians have some degree of this in Matter or Manner for we know but in part and prophesie in part c. And so no Christians must joyn with others But must they not give over all Religious Duty themselves seeing their own defects more defile them than other mens 3. Christ doth not disown all imperfect worship that hath some Superstition And we must receive one another as Christ receiveth us 4. It was Superstitious persons that Paul commandeth Christians to receive to Communion Rom. 14. 5. Thus he condemneth the Apostles and the Churches then and the Scripture it self 6. It is dreadful revolting to choose rather forbearance of all Church Communion than to Communicate with our Parish Churches when better cannot be had and men are not forced to any sin themselves And he that will communicate with none that sin in Preaching Prayer Sacraments shall communicate with none 7. It is a gross Service of Satan and Popery to fight against Love and Unity and bring all the Publick Assemblies under disgrace as unlawful that Popery may take possession unresisted 4. His words of silly Sheep bleating after any Shepherd c. are but a Net to catch silly Souls It 's the common Trap of the Papists to put ignorant people to prove the Calling of the Ministers or forsake them They that preach the Gospel and do the Office tho faultily and are in possession have a Calling sufficient to justifie the Hearers when it may not be enough to justifie themselves A better Call than the High Priests that Christ did send men to 5. As to the Argument of Scandal It is of dreadful weight to deter a tender Conscience as from conforming to sin so from his groundless Separation and war against Unity and Love 6. That God saith such Means shall not profit yea curseth it is a slander against God and Scripture and all the Church on Earth that 's known by perverting and misapplying
and all Ministers belong to his Worship and yet Christ hath not in Scripture named you but left the Choice of you to Man So of all Accidents undetermined It is another Error That the Prescription of Forms and Modes of things in Worship XXXV Error not commanded by Christ can arise from nothing but from Supposition of a defect in the Wisdom care and faithfulness of Christ. I confute it 1. You know not the hearts of all the World and therefore cannot say That this can arise from nothing else Did you know Ambrose that made the Te Deum and all that made and prescribed Psalms Hymns and Prayers and Calvin that made a Liturgy and Bucer and the Martyrs here and all that prescribed Translations and Metres c. so well as to know that all these and almost all the Churches on Earth do suppose Christ to be unfaithful 2. Is it only such a charge or Supposition against Christ which made you your self prescribe your form of Church-Covenant your Savoy Articles your Catalogue of Fundamentals your Lay-Elders your time and place of Meeting your Utensils and Ornaments at the Sacraments c 3. I tell you another possible end They did it because they thought that these Modes are mutable according to Persons Place Time Occasion c. And therfore that it belonged not to Christs faithfulness to detemine them and that they should deny his faithfulness if they did deny that it hath left them to humane Determination under general Rules and bid the people obey them that have the rule over you c. D. O. 5. Argument That which is a means humanely invented for the attaining of an end in Divine Worship which Christ hath ordained a means for unto the exclusion of that means so appointed by Christ is false Worship and not to be complied withal The end intended is the Edification of the Church in the Administration of all its holy Ordinances this the Service-book is ordained and appointed by men for or it hath no end or use at all but the Lord Christ hath appointed other means for the attaining this end as is expresly declared He has given gifts unto men for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the Body Ephes. 4.7 8 11 12. that is in all Gospel Administrations But this means ordained by Christ namely the exercise of spiritual gifts in Gospel Administrations unto the Edification of the Church is excluded yea expresly prohibited in the Prescription of this Liturgical Worship § 19. TO the Major of your 5 th Argument I answer As to the former No man is to comply by Approbation with any thing that excludeth any of Gods means for instance not with you that exclude the great duty of Catholick Communion But we may so far comply with you and others as to joyn with you in Gods Worship tho you mix some evil Mr. Faldo at Barnet was fain many years to Preach to a people that excluded singing Psalms He did what they would bear when he could not do what he would He complied not by Approbation with exclusion for he spake against it Are you sure that all your ways have tended to the Edification of the Church Every weak Minister that preacheth or prayeth when an abler might be had hindereth the Edification of the Church Is it a Sin therefore to hear any but the ablest 2. That which hindereth the Churches Edification by the Rulers fault it may be the Peoples duty to obey for a greater good For instance â—t is less edifying to use our old singing Psalms than a better Version And yet for Concord if the Ruler appoint them the People must use them because Concord with that imperfection is better than to sing every one a several better Version or divers at once so a faulty Translation of Scripture a weak Sermon an inconvenient hour and place when Concord is necessary and cannot be had in the more edifying circumstances it must be had in the best way we can If the Sheriff appoint an unfit time and place to meet to chuse Parliament-men it 's a duty to comply rather than not to meet at all every evil so far excludeth good And yet we must not renounce Communion in all good where men mix any evil left we also give over all good our selves 3. Christ giveth gifts to men now in the due use of means and not by miracle Therefore he giveth them in great diversity and by hard Study and long Time Heb. 5. For the time they ought to have been teachers c. Therefore a Novice must not be a Bishop but an Elder whence the Office had its name All your pupils people or Ministers that had the Spirits gifts had not your redundancy of Expression And many can talk more fluently for falshood than good men can for truth I was never much troubled my self for want of words to express what I know but I have ten thousand times more beg'd hard for more Knowledg Faith Love and Hope than ever I did for the gift of utterance a full heart is earnest fervent and ready It is another mistake That the exercise of Spiritual gifts is expresly forbidden XXXVI Error unless you had meant that just at the use of the Litutgy extemporate utterance is forbidden but it is not so in the Pulpit And you should not confound things so different as is the use of the Liturgy and the forbidding of other prayers Nor yet the act of the Commander and of the People If Rulers should command Preaching Prayer c. to exclude the singing Psalms that is their Sin and not the Peoples who must not like peevish Children at meat refuse all because they cannot have what they would D. O. The pretence of mens liberty to use their Gifts in Prayer before Sermons and in Preaching is ridiculous they are excluded in all the solemn Worship of the Church § 20. THis answer is not only a mistake but of an ill aspect on your selves XXXVII Error It 's not true That the use of Gifts is excludeded in all the solemn Worship of the Church As if Prayer Praise Thanksgiving Confession Explication of the Scripture Reproof Exhortation Comfort Direction Benediction were no part of the solemn Worship of the Church Indeed some Superconformists have said so but I had hoped you would not 2. I said It 's of an ill aspect For 1. If Preaching and Pulpit-Prayer before and after be none of the solemn Worship of the Churches then all those Churches which seldom use any other saving a Psalm which is a Liturgick form have no solemn Worship at all 2. But if it be otherwise as it is then the Parish Churches so far excel most of you that they have all that you have Pulpit Prayer and Sermon and sometimes a Chapter and all the Common Prayer more And is not that better than your nothing except at Sacraments I know that the Nonconformists that I have converst with are in judgment for more
and godly Ministers in the Parish-Churches and some have such as I would never own or encourage in the Ministry by seeming to own them Some can remove their Dwelling and some cannot Some had Liberty the last year that cannot have it this year without more hurt than their benefit will compensate In these Cases where God hath not at all tied us to a Book or no Book to this Church or to that he that can truly tell which way he shall do and get most good or hurt may by that better know his Duty than by these Arguments or Mens Censures But verily my chief Reason for Communion in publick is the very same which you bring against it Even the avoiding of hainous Scandal I have told the World 1. That Scandal is not displeasing men but laying before them a temptation to sin 2. That if the Separatists be the best Christians they are farthest out of the danger of Scandal It is the worst that are easiliest tempted to Sin and so whom we should be most fearful to scandalize 3. And it 's a greater Sin to scandalize many than few 4. And worse by scandal to tempt men to the mortal Sins of persecuting or scorning godly men than merely to tempt them to some small mistakes or to grieve them 5. And to scandalize our Rulers is worse than to scandalize Inferiors Caeteris paribus And now I tell you I the rather joyn in Publick 1. Lest I should harden thousands in the Opinion That we take that to be unlawful which is not and that we are for sinful Separation and that we separate from and unchurch almost all Christs Church and that we are Enemies to Order and Peace and Concord and that we are unruly enemies to Government and giddy ignorant self-conceited people 2. And so lest we breed throughout the Land such a contempt of Conscience in Gods service as they have of Quakers and thousands by this should be alienated from the Reverence of serious Religion and Youth should be educated to the like contempt under these temptations 3. And lest if any in Church-matters be guilty of sinful Extreams on the other side in Oaths Professions Ceremonies or Practices we should harden them therein by tempting them to think that we have no worse against their way than the Use of a Liturgy 4. Lest the Conceit that we are but a company of giddy Fanaticks encourage any contentious Preachers to render us odious and rail at us in the Pulpits to their own shame and the widening of our Breaches 5. And lest the same Error should tempt any Bishops or Magistrates to think they do God and their Church and Countrey service in silencing imprisoning reproaching and ruining Gods faithful Servants without cause and bring the Land under Gods wrath by persecution Are these no Scandals or not greater than offending or displeasing the dissenting Separators to say nothing of ocsioning our Reproach in all the Foreign Churches which have a Liturgy If against all this the displeasing your mistaken Flocks should prevail then their weakness and error would constitute them our chief Governours D. O. Argument 9. That Worship which is unsuited to the spiritual relish of the New Creature which is inconsistent with the conduct of the Spirit of God in Prayer is unlawful For the Nature Use and Benefit of Prayer is overthrown hereby in a great measure Now let any one consider what are the Prâ—mises Aids of the Holy Spirit with respect to the Prayers of the Church whether as to the Matter of them or as unto Ability for their performance or as unto the Manner of it and he shall find that they are all rejected and excluded by this Form of Worship as is pretended comprizing the whâ—le Matter limiting the whole Manner and giving all the Abilities of Prayer that are needful or required This hath been proved at large § 25. TO your Ninth Argument I answer 1. O! confine not the New Creature to those of your Opinion Do you think none of the Old Nonconformists or Conformists none of the Reformed Churhes and no Church on Earth for a Thousand years had any of the New Creature When you have affrighted People with telling them it is heinous sin and returning to Babylon and also by long disuse made a Liturgy uncouth to them do not ascribe all their averseness to the New Creature which is from prejudice and disuse For my part when God taught me first to pray I had no averseness to a Form When I heard it charg'd with sin I began to be averse to it When I had studied the case I was cured of that aversness but never reconciled to the forbidding of all other Prayer nor to the faults of any Forms And who knoweth not that Man 's culpable Nature loveth Novelties and are hardly kept in lively Affections under any thing that is very often said A Book or Sermon tho never so good affecteth us not so much after many times reading and hearing as at the first We must not lay this weakness on the New Creature tho it should teach Imposers to suit the Remedy to the Disease and give children such food as is not too displeasing to their Appetites And yet I find not the generality of Appetites even in your Flocks is against the Forms of Psalms being not prejudiced against them It is not true that Liturgies are inconsistent with the conduct of the Spirit in Prayer It is a Mistake also XL. Error That this Form of Worship rejecteth and excludeth the matter of Prayer whenas the Visible Book tells all the contrary Do all those words express none of the Matter of Prayer It is untrue That it rejecteth and excludeth the Manner as to the chief part For the Lord's Prayer is a perfect Form for Matter Order and Method And the Psalms read and sung are for Matter and Manner neither evil nor excluded And sure there is much of the rest laudable If all Matter and Manner be rejected and excluded then the Martyrs that used it and all the Churches on Earth almost have no Church-Prayers But again I tell The use of Forms and the forbidding all other Prayers are Two different things which you ill confound D. O. Argument 10. That which overthrows and dissolves our Church-Covenant as unto the principal end of it is as to us unlawful This end is the professed joynt subjection of our souls and consciences unto the Authority of Christ in the observasion of whatever he commands and nothing else in the Worship of God But by this practice this end of the Church-Covenant is destroyed and thereby the Church-Covenant it self broken For we do and observe that which Christ hath not commanded And while some stand unto the Terms of the Covenant which others relinquish it will fill the Church with confusion and disorder § 26. TO your Tenth Argument I answer 1. What your Church-Covenant is I know not But if it profess subjection to nothing in Worship but what