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duty_n	husband_n	marriage_n	wife_n	3,594	5	7.6210	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27035	A second true defence of the meer nonconformists against the untrue accusations, reasonings, and history of Dr. Edward Stillingfleet ... clearly proving that it is (not sin but) duty 1. not wilfully to commit the many sins of conformity, 2. not sacrilegiously to forsake the preaching of the Gospel, 3. not to cease publick worshipping of God, 4. to use needful pastoral helps for salvation ... / written by Richard Baxter ... ; with some notes on Mr. Joseph Glanviles Zealous and impartial Protestant, and Dr. L. Moulins character.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1681 (1681)	Wing B1405; ESTC R5124	188,187	234

is a matter of more weight than Tythes and Temples If Tythes be proved not to be of Divine Right all that can be expected is that if the flock cannot trust him whom the Patron chuseth they let him give his Tythes and Temple to whom he please and they will trust their souls with such as they dare and safely may But if he will chuse and offer them one whom they can safely and comfortably accept so as Tythes and Temples shall preponderate in case of small difference in the men prudence obligeth them to accept of the advantage The same I say of the Magistrates countenance and approbation But if the difference be very great it 's better stretch our purses to build new Temples and pay our Pastors than trust our souls on the Pastoral Conduct of ignorant malignant unfaithful or heretical men § 6. V. I have oft said that mutual consent is necessary to the being of the relation of Pastor and Flock And though sometimes the Rulers imposition and the Patrons choice may make it the Peoples duty in prudence to consent when the good preponderates the hurt not else yet till they consent the Relation is not existent As if Children were bound to take Wives and Husbands by the Command and fore choice of Parents yet it 's no Marriage till they consent § 7. The common objection is from the inconvenience if the several parties agree not To which I answer 1. The mischief of the contrary way is worse than that inconvenience 2. There is nothing in this World without inconveniences where all things and persons and actions are imperfect 3. If Parents and Children agree not about their Marriage it hath great inconveniences And yet neither Parents Government nor Childrens consenting Liberty must be denyed 4. In so weighty a Case divers Locks and Keys keep the Churches treasure safe Prince Patron People and Ordainers will not so often agree on a vile person as any one of them alone may do § 8. And now judge how Logically how honestly the Doctor hath stated the Case and made me Intolerably indiscreet and tragical against Magistrates Patrons and Laws And try if you can understand what it is instead of this that he would have I tell him again that if he deny the necessity of the flocks consent to the mutual relation he notoriously opposeth the judgment and practice of Antiquity and the Universal Church of Princes Patriarchs Prelates Councils and People and fights against the full stream of Historical evidence for a new crooked way that would make as many modes of Religion as there are different Princes And here he wonders what he said that occasioned such undecent passion It seems he felt some passion in reading it and thought he must have the like that wrote it And so let any man obtrude any pernicious thing on the Church and he can easily prove the detector to have undecent passion for giving a bad Cause its proper name § 9. But he cannot find out the reason of my inference that then Princes may impose what Religion they please Answ Not understanding with some men goes for confuting To put Religion for the mode of Religion is too little a slip of his to be insisted on But is not my inference necessary I urged him to tell me in what Countries and under what sort of Princes the Rule holds that the People must not judge whether the offered Pastors be Hereticks nor refuse them if Prince and Patron present them He will not be entreated to tell me I tell him that if the Rule be universal when a Papist Socinian Anabaptist Antiepiscopal c. Prince and Patron present men of their own mind and they are instituted the People must take and trust them as their Pastors And is not this to set up in all the Churches what modish Religion Prince and Patron please Is this hard to be understood Yet he calls this Railing on him for suppositions of my own making And here he steps over to another man § 10. Before I come to his undertakings I will repeat anothers railing and undecent passion against his Cause And I desire the Reader to note how well the Doctors of the Church of England agree and to learn which of them it is that we must believe both as to History and Right It is Mr. Herbert Thorndike in his Treatise of Forbearance of Penal It is to no purpose to talk of Reformation in the Church to regular Government without restoring the Liberty of chusing Bishops and the priviledge of enjoying them to the Synods Clergy and People of each Diocess So evident is the right of Synods Clergy and People in the making of those of whom they consist and by whom they are to be Governed that I need make no other reason of the neglect of Episcopacy than the neglect of it Yet these two are Doctors of one Church but we are no Members of it § 11. I again say that either the Reader hath read the Church History and Canons or not If not how can he tell who to believe that report them the Doctor or me But if he have I will no more dispute this Case with him than I would do whether English Parliaments used to make Laws He is past my conviction if he be not convinced § 12. And I will again say that I will yet suppose the Doctor so humble as to acknowledge himself much inferiour to Paulus sarpi servita venerunt in point of Church History At least I say to the Reader peruse what he hath said of this Controversie and of the alteration of Church Government in his History of the Council of Trent and his Book of Church Benefices lately translated by Dr. Denton and doubt if you can § 13. And in general I add I. I suppose no man of such reading maketh any doubt of the first 300 years whether any Bishops were made over any Church without the free Election or Consent of the Flocks and the whole Clergy and the approbation of the Ordainers I will not for shame stay to prove this having said so much of it in my first Plea for Peace and Episcopal Church History which are unanswered II. And since the first 300 years it 's so notorious in History that it 's a shame to need proof of it that the Christian Emperours confirmed the Churches in this right and use and for many hundred years after permitted and ordered that Bishops should be chosen by the People Clergy and Synods and when the Peoples Election was infringed the necessity of their consent long continued And it was only in the choice of the five Patriarchs that the Emperours used to meddle and that not always nor at all chusing them alone but commending some one to the People and Clergy to chuse or confirming some one that they had nominated And this held on till Popery sprung up III. And even then the Popes long continued it But 1. They strove specially in Hildebrand's days and

not by signs but instituteth signs for humane use It is to dedicate them to God's service § 3. He saith It represents the duty and not the Grace Answ 1. The words are to his service whose benefits bestowed on them in baptism the name of the Cross doth represent Are the benefits so bestowed no Graoe or is Representing no Representing or shall we believe the Doctor against the Church or is this the kind of Conformity that he would teach us by denying what we subscribe to 2. Sure the Cross of Christ with his dying on it exprest also in the words of the Canon is Grace To represent or signifie Christ dying on the Cross which are the words and use is immediately to represent or signifie the very Grace of Redemption it self 3. To be listed under Christ as the Captain of our Salvation and to be received into the Congregation of Christs flock to fight under his banner c. are all great Grace 4. The moral operation on the soul which the preface of the Liturgy ascribes to the Ceremonies is Grace to be wrought by them 5. To make a common symbol or badge of Christianity solemnly obliging as a Covenanting sign by which they must be distinguished from Infidels and this even at our first Covenanting with Christ is to make a Sacrament in the old sence What was the Souldiers Sacramentum Militare more from which the Church seems to have borrowed the name The Oath was obliging The colours or cingulum was obliging and a signifying badge The good received was the honour relation and hope of future pay or preferment upon performance And is not all this in ours 6. If you have wit strong enough to justifie all this humane addition to Christs great institution must all men be compelled to practise as you and such others judge because you think they do not confute you Who gave you or such others right to silence reject from Christendom c. all such as are not herein of your mind even when you deny what your Canon expresly saith § 4. He saith It addeth nothing to Baptism which is compleat before Answ What 's this to our question It adds another Sacrament to Baptism The Lords Supper is another Sacrament of the same Covenant added to perfect Baptism by Christ and the Cross by men § 5. But all the difficulty is thus removed he thinks and by the foresaid quibble of I baptize and we receive Answ Difficulties are easilier removed with some men than with others 1. He dare not say that the Minister speaks not as from Christ when-ever he saith we in the plural number 2. Doubtless it is first Christs act and then the Churches to Receive the Baptized into the flock of Christ And the Minister herein first speaketh Christs act and then the Churches 3. The words we receive him goeth before the Crossing and is named especially as part of the Ministration of Baptism being its immediate effect And what a dangerous invention is it to say that the Minister here speaketh not from Christ but the Church in receiving in those dedicated to him 4. And he will make us a hard task of it to know when the Priest speaks as God's Minister and when as the peoples Minister or mouth § 6. He brings us the instance of one after Baptism engaging himself in the Independent Church Covenant by holding up his hand Answ 1. It is supposed that the Covenant which he mentioneth is not the Covenant of Christianity but that supposed a consent or promise to live in the relation and duty of a Christian member of that particular flock And this is much like a Covenant between a Christian Man and Wife Tutor and Pupil And as men may make particular contracts they may make particular signs of them as is the Ring and taking hands in Marriage the crowning of a Christian King c. But if you suppose the Independant Covenant to repeat also and contain the Covenant of Christianity it self as the first part then that which is required is but signified consent And as all Christians renew their consent at each Eucharist Sacramentally so do they frequently by word and deed and all due signification of consent Nature and Custom of humane converse have made words and gestures signifiers of consent But Sacraments and solemn badges of this nature signifie by Institution of the inventer or imposer The sin lyeth in arrogating Christs prerogative and accusing his Laws of insufficiency If Christ by his act and spirit had not separated one day in seven for the Commemoration of his Resurrection he had not told us that this is his own work as Legislator But now he hath separated one day if man will make a Law that another day also of the week shall be separated to the same use it is as much as to say 1. We have authority to make such Laws as Christ made 2. And to amend his Law by this addition For if it had been fit to be made there was the same reason then for Christ to have separated two days So is it in this case If Christ had made no Sacraments we might more have doubted whether he took it for his proper work But where he hath made two to make more of the same nature to me seemeth too bold He could have made the Sacrament of the dedicating Cross if he would have had it If our Bishops should command us to say we believe Christs resurrection or to stand up to signifie it to avoid confused noise we refuse it not But if they would make a Law that none shall be Christened that will not let the Priest put him into a Coffin or Grave and take him out again to represent the Resurrection I think it fafest to deny obedience to such arrogant usurpation § 7. He confesseth It belongs to Christ only to appoint the means of conveying his own grace Answ I have before proved that the Cross is by this Church appointed as such a means and named the Grace and conveyance § 8. He saith Though it belong to the King to make the badge or symbol of his own subjects yet every Nobleman may give a distinct Livery without treason Answ True And this opens the Case A badge of the Kings subjects is not the same thing with the badge of a subjects servant But the Cross is not the badge of a humane subordinate contract or relation as City Covenants or Pastoral particular contracts c. but of Christianity it self and of the subjects of Christ as such § 9. p. 353. He saith Is our worship directed to it or may we kneel before it as Mr. B. allows men may do before a Crucifix Answ But if this be not true or be a deceiving intimation you should not allow your self to write it My words are in Christ Direct q. 113. p. 876. When I had named 21 Cases in which an Image may not be used and among the rest when it is scandalous or tempting to

1. The Eunuch baptized in his Travails Acts. 9 was only a Member of the Church Universal 2. Those that were converted by Frumentius and Edesius when there was no particular Church And all that are first converted in any Infidel or Heathen Land before any Church be formed 3. Those that by Shipwrack are cast on heathen Countries where no Churches are 4. Travellers that go from Country to Countries as Lythgow did nineteen years and others many And I think he unhappily named Jerusalem where Travellers come that are of no fixed Church unless he in that also be a Superindependant and think that men may be many years Members of a Church many hundred miles off which they have no personal communion with 5. Merchants and Factors who are called to dwell long among Infidels where are no Churches 6. Embassadors who by their Princes are sent to reside among such much of their lives 7. Wanderers that have no fixed habitations as many Pedlers and other poor wandering Tradesmen and loose Beggars that have no Dwelling 8. Those thot live among Papists or any other Christians who impose some sin as a condition of communion 9. Those that live among such Christians as have no true Pastors who are constitutive parts of particular Churches Some being incapable through insufficiency some by Heresie and some for want of a true Call Such as by Mr Dodwells Doctrine most of the Christian World are for want of uninterrupted rrue Episcopal Ordination 10. Those who are subjects to such as permit them not to be fixed Members As Wives hindred by Husbands Children by Parents and some Subjects violently hindred by Princes who yet allow them transient Communion And verily a man would think by the writings of many Conformists that they took it for a Duty to obey a Prince in such a case 11. Those who live where Church-corruptions are not so great as to make transient Communion unlawful but so great as to make fixed communion seem to be a culpable consent If I come in travel to a Church of Strangers I am not bound to examine what their Discipline is what their Lives be or how their Pastors are called But where I am fixed I am more bound to know these and if I find them exclude Discipline live wickedly and have unlawful Pastors I may in some cases be a partaker of the sin if I fix among them 12. They that live in a time and place of Schism and distraction striving who shall prevail and condemning each other all following several Factions and needing Reconcilers It may for a time become in prudence the duty of peace-makers to own no Faction nor to be more of one Church than of another while he seeth that it will do more hurt than good And those that wait in hope as the Nonconformists now do to see whether their Rulers will restore them to reformed Parish Churches may at once in prudence find it needful neither to fix as Members in some Parish Churches till reformed in the Teachers at least nor to seem to be Separatists by gathering new Churches In none of all these cases is a man unchristened nor schismatical for being no fixed member of any Church besides the Universal And as it is the ill hap of these men commonly to strike themselves I doubt they will prove Grotius himself no Christian by this Rule who for many years before he died they say joyned with no particular Church as a fixed member And I know not well what particular Church they make the King a Member of Sect. 2. To his Questions Pag. 3. Were we not Baptized into this Church and do you not Renounce Membership This is scarce a civility I answer 1. This Church which Church do you mean I was not Baptized into St. Giles's nor St. Andrew's Parish Church but into one above an hundred miles off and yet my removal made me no culpable Separatist Or doth he mean This Diocesan Church No I was Baptized in the Diocess of Lichfield Doth he mean This National Church as it is supposed a political body constituted of the Ecclesiastical Governing and Governed Parts he saith there is no such Church of England but that It inferreth Popery to assert such But if he equivocate here and mean not by a Church as in the rest but either a christian Kingdom or an agreeing Association of many Churches I am still a fixed member of such a Kingdom and of such an Association in all things necessary to Churches and Christian Communion 2. But Baptism as such entred me only into the Universal Church much less did it fix me in any other I was Baptized where I was to stay but a little while And this phrase of being Baptized into our Church is to me of ill sound or intimation Bellarmine saith that all that are baptized are interpretatively thereby engaged to the Pope I was baptized in a Parish and in a Diocess and in a Christian Kingdom but not so into them as to be obliged to continue under that Priest or Bishop or in that Kingdom And my Baptism I hope did not oblige me to every Canon Ceremony Form or Sin of the associated Churches in England abusively by him called one Church 3. And unhappily it is not meer Independancy that he is still pleading for but some extremes which the moderate Independants disclaim viz. That a member of their Churches is so tyed to them that they may not remove to another without their consent And am I so tyed to what to Parochial or to the Diocesan or to the association of English Churches If it had been to the Species I would fain know whether their things called by them Indifferents specifie them Sect. 3. P. 111 112. He yet more pleads as for Separation why then above once or twice why should I so countenance defective Worship and not rather reprove it by total forbearance of Communion c. Answ My Reasons I told him because the accidents may continue which made it a Duty but I cannot hinder others from yielding to his arguments Let him make his best of them Only I must tell him yet 1. that if he lay his cause on this that their Parochial or Diocesan Churches are not defective 2. Or that the defects cannot by others be avoided he will quite marr his matter and undo all by overdoing 3. And if he indeed think that all defective Churches must be forsaken he will be one of the greatest Schismaticks in the World But who can reconcile this with the scope of his whole Book Sect. 4. P. 112. He saith Here are no bounds set to peoples Fancies of purer Administrations Answ Have I so oft and copiously named the bounds and now is the answer Here are none Are there none in all the same Books he citeth 2. Scripture is their bounds as he well openeth in his desence of Bi●hop Laud. Sect. 5. P. 114. He complains of my leaving out the best part of his argument viz. The people may go

King be of any I know not Sect. 37. But p. 152. he comes upon me why I thought it not my duty all this while to Baptize Administer the Sacrament was I not solemnly bound by Ordination to one as well as the other Presbyters of old were rarely allowed to preach Ans 1. You tell the World what measure we must expect from such as you If we had all forborn any Church gatherings and Pastoral undertaking of Flocks and both Sacraments c. and only preached as loth to offend you more than needs our accusations had but been the greater which incourageth your more ingenious Dissenters to do what they also are accused of 2. Do you not know our Reasons They are these 1. Because we suppose there is a greater want of our preaching than of our administring Sacraments And we would obey the 〈…〉 in all things lawful and go from you and offend you no further than 〈…〉 will justifie us 2. Because a Ministers Relation to the Church 〈…〉 and to the world ceaseth not when his relation to a Parish Church may cease And we have not the same obligations to give the Sacrament to all the Christians or World where we preach as we have in a Parish Charge Paul thanketh God that he baptized not many Corinthians because he was not sent to baptize but to preach the Gospel nor is the terrible charge 2 Tim. 4. 12. equal as to both 3. Our Ordination bound us to preach and administer Sacraments when we are thereto lawfully called And we were so called to one when we were not to the other nor were all of us so called alike But when we know that this way doth as much offend you we may go further in due time Aud do you in one part of your Book blame us for going further than the old Nonconformists as you thought and in the second thus accuse us for not going further Sect. 38. He is again at his talk of only occasional Communion And had his mistake no Occasion yes he that readeth my Books may see what that is 1. When I have said that some Parishes having not capable or called Pastors I take to be no true Political Churches but yet can communicate with such as Oratories or Chappels 2. That some true Churches I communicate with in transitu or occasionally as strangers whose Discipline and Ministers Calling I am not bound to take account of 3. I tell those that withdraw too far and take some true Churches for none that were it so they might occasionally join with them as Oratories 4. And those that dare not commit their Souls to the Pastoral Conduct of some weak and bad men that yet they may occasionally communicate with them upon great and urgent Reasons And here he gathereth his oft repeated untrue Reports Sect. 39. p. 156. He grants there is no Separation where there is no Obligation And he will prove us obliged to constant Communion with them 1. Because we must use all lawful means for Peace and Unity Ans 1. We are ready to prove that our Conformity nor our forbearing to preach the Gospel are no lawful means 2. Can you as well prove 1. That it is not lawful for you to joyn with us 2. And to forbear silencing excommunicating fining and imprisoning us Was it no lawful means for Peace and Unity to have forborn imposing all the Covenants Professions Subscriptions Oaths and Practises of what you call indifferent and we think sunful 3. And is it not lawful for Parents to enter their own Children at Baptism in Covenant with God 4. Is it unlawful to Christen such as scruple your use of the Cross 5. Or to receive those to Communion that scruple your Gesture 6. 〈…〉 forbear Canonical Excommunicating all professed Nonconformi●… Land 7. Or to let Lords and Gentlemen choose any Nonconfo●… to be Tutors to their Children whilst the Papists may send theirs to Doway St. Omers c. He saith he is perswaded it is one of the provoking sins of the Nonconformists that they have been so backward to do what they were convinced they might with a good conscience Ans Woe to us if we be not willing to know our sins But 1. If you will tell me of any one lawful thing that I have omitted that tended to Peace I will thank you 2. An indifferent thing is no means of Peace when it will do more hurt than good To cease the Ministry we durst not To use some indifferent forms in your Churches we could not being cast and kept out And to use the same to those that are against them when it will hurt them and procure no peace with you and those have sped worst from you that have come nearest you aud nothing will serve but all what tendency hath this to Unity You know my own case proveth all this I regarded not the censures of any that go too far so as to keep me from doing what I judged lawful And did it tend to peace No one sends me to Jail when I went twice a day to his Church Others say He is like an Ape that is so much the more ugly because he is like a man Another more sober saith I know not what to make of Mr. B. He communicateth with us and he preacheth to the Nonconformists Like a man that will go one step on one side the hedge and another step on the other And this man is much in the right for I say still It is the separating hedges in Christ's Vineyard that I hate and the enclosing hedge that I am for I have Business Friends Relations and great Duties on both sides the hedge some with you and some with others And if your hedges would separate Parents from Children Husband and Wife Christian Neighbours c. causelesly I will not be so separated but do my best to pull down that hedge And again consider whose sin it is that so many lawful things are denyed us for Unity Hold but to your Rule here and we are agreed And he seemeth to consent For Sect. 40. p. 176. Of the Rule Phil. 3. 16. he saith If I will but allow that by virtue of that Rule men are bound to do all things lawful for the preserving the peace of the Church we have no further difference about this matter Ans It 's well he will say so much of the Rule we gladly consent Then all the question is what 's lawful on both sides I add one Q. more Is it not lawful for peace to forbear forcing men to disoblige 1000 whom they never knew from being obliged by an Oath and Vow to that part of the matter which is good If it be the conjunction of some things bad that disobligeth them then he that inserteth a bad thing is free from all obligations of his vow even in materia licita necessaria And if the 〈…〉 of imposing Power be made the cause whether is the Cor●… Oath imposed by a superior Power on the King or