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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A35696	Jus Cæsaris et ecclesiæ vere dictæ or, A treatise wherein independency, presbytery, the power of kings, and of the church, or of the brethren in ecclesiastical concerns, government and discipline of the church : and wherein also the use of liturgies, tolleration, connivence, conventicles or private assemblies, excomminication, election of popes, bishops, priests what and whom are meant by the term church, 18 Matthew are discoursed : and how I Cor. 14. 32. generally misunderstand is rightly expounded : wherein also the popes power over princes, and the liberty of the press, are discoursed / by William Denton ...	Denton, William, 1605-1691.	1681 (1681)	Wing D1066; ESTC R9164	326,898	268

the Jewish Church is not so well known in our days as when our Saviour spake the words we may justly be excused if we plead and demur thereunto Take Text and Context together Moreover if thy Brother shall trespass against thee go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone if he shall hear thee thou hast gained thy Brother v. 15. But if he will not hear thee then take with thee one or two more that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established v. 16. And if he neglect to hear them tell it unto the Church but if he neglect to hear the Church let him be unto thee as a Heathen man and Publican v. 17. Verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound on Heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven v. 18. Again I say unto you if two of you shall agree on Earth as touching any thing that they shall ask it shall be done for them of my Father which is in Heaven v. 19. For where two or three are gathered together in my Name there am I in the midst of them v. 20. What is here meant by the Church whether the Church of Christ then only in fieri not yet planted as some would have it or the Jewish Church then planted and setled or the Civil Assemblies that God ordained in the Commonwealth to govern his People and determine their Quarrels breeds great Questions amongst Divines themselves which alone is some Justification to us if we make further Enquiry and try Spirits especially having a Command so to do and to beware of false Prophets The Reason that prevails with some to believe that the Church of Christ is not by these words meant are 1. This was a Direction to the Jews serving them for their present State and Time 2. Christ had then no Church in Jewry to which they might address themselves and complain for he ever preached in the Synagogues and Temple whither all that would resorted John 18.20 Much less did he gather Churches sapart from the Jews to receive and consider and redress the Complaint and Injuries of their Brethren and if he did yet is there not one Syllable in the Text to induce us to believe that such Church or Assembly was constituted only of Ecclesiasticks of Popes or of Presbyters or that it was to continue and remain in force for ever in the Church 3. The Matters to becomplained of are of that nature as Priests of Christ may not challenge Judicially and Authoritatively to hear and determine Private Wrongs and Offences betwixt man and man must be redressed by compromise or judicially by Laws and consequently belongs to the Civil Magistrate The Church of Christ quatenus a Church hath no Warrant to make Laws or give Judgment in Civil or Private Wrongs and Trespasses and therefore I suppose that no Clergy except the Romish will pretend to this Christ himself when he was desired to make peace to end a Strife about parting an Inheritance answered Man who made me a Judge or Divider among you Luke 12.13 14. What Christ refused as no part of his Calling the Bishops Pastors and Presbyters of his Church must not challenge as annexed to their Commission and Vocation The Disciple is not above his Master Luke 6.40 Mat. 10.24 As his Father sent him so sent he them John 20. ●1 but not with a farther or larger Commission 4. That Church is here spoken of which abhorred Ethnicks as unclean persons and shunned all Society with Publicans but neither Christ nor his Church did ever so therefore the Church of Christ is not probably meant by these words Let him be to thee as an Heathen and a Publican for they never refused nor declined to converse with either To the Baptism of John came the Publicans Luke 3.12 and were received of him Our Saviour was accounted a friend unto them Mark 11.19 Matthew the Apostle was chosen sitting at the Receipt of Custom Mat. 9.9 Zackeus a chief Publican was the Child of Abraham Luke 19.9 The Publican that prayed in the Temple was justisied before the Pharisee Luke 18.14 and told by Christ that they should go into Heaven before the Scribes and Elders that despised them Mat. 21.21 The Publicans then were Members of Christs Church and Inheritors of his Kingdom and therefore by slying and sorsaking the Fellowship of Publicans the Church of Christ could not be described nor thereby meant The like may be said of Ethnicks and Gentiles who though they were Strangers to the Commonwealth of Israel when as yet they knew no God yet never were they persons excommunicated and since the Incarnation of Christ they became partakers of this Promises and true Members of hi● Catholick Church so that this can be no Rule for Christs Church to ground Excommunication upon nor yet to measure persons excommunicated by Gentiles and Publicans seeing that amongst the Jews Publicans believed and entred the Kingdom of God and after the Rejection of that Nation the Church of Christ consisted chiefly if not wholly of Gentiles and Ethnicks converted Others argue thus 1. They were Jews to whom Christ spake 2. Bidding them tell it to the Church he sends them to some Judge or Judicature to which they could go and were bound to obey 3. It is certain the Mosaical Judicial Law was then in being and to them obligatory and stood so till Christs Death he and his Apostles living under the Obligation of it 4. They say for certain the Christian Church was not then Constituted so that it is irrational if not ridiculous to say that he sends them when he bids them tell it to the Church to any Episcopal Presbyterian or Independent Judges when there were no such things in the World 5. It is then evident that he sends them there to some Jewish Judges to whom they could go and were bound to obey And the Jews had then as also before and after three Courts of Judicature 1. The Supreme the Sanhedrim which sate only in Jerusalem 2. The Consessus-viginti-trium-viralis which consisted of 23 persons in greater Towns and Cities 3. Consessus trium-viralis wherein the Judges were only three and such a Judicature they had in all lesser Towns and every one of those Courts was usually called Ecclesia a Church so that to those so opinionated it seems certain that the Persons and the Cause an Action of Trespass only considered it was the Consessus triumviralis he sends them unto The Christian Church say they cannot for the Reasons above-said be meant in those Words Tell it to the Church though with the same Breath they cannot deny but acknowledge that wherever Christ taught and converted men there was a Christian Church yet say that while he lived it was under the Legal Oeconomy and not that of the Gospel for that when our Saviour spake that the Sacrament of Baptism which only makes a Member of the Christian

Christians have to study each others good to endeavour the conversion and confirming of one another Tu autem conversus confirma fratres It is a general Command to all and consequently a duty perpetually obliging to desire earnestly spiritual gifts but rather that they may prophesie according to 1 Cor. 1.14 in which Chapter by Prophets is not meant the Clergy only as it is generally so misunderstood but all Christians in general and by Prophesying is meant speaking unto men to edification and exhortation and comfort V. 3. the duty of every individual And I do not know but that a solemn private Assembly of Christians met in these our days in the name and fear of God exercising holy duties and Ordinances is as true a Church in Gospel understanding as the like number so congregated in the days of Christ and his Apostles according to Matth. 18. These things rightly considered I cannot but wonder and that not without some astonishment with what face or shew of conscience any especially of our Protestant Clergy for in our Alternate changes they have been all some way or other this way culpable whether Prelate Presbyter or Independent all striving to set up themselves can countenance advise or any way consent to forbid such Assembling is it not enough that submission to the present Established Government of Church and State be the qualification to all Ecclesiastical Livings and Preferments for those that can and will submit and conform thereto but they must silence dissenters as truly worshipping and serving God in truth as themselves tho happily not so modishly nor yet so Ceremoniously I pray God forgive them and that the Character of Whited wall given to the High Priest by St. Paul may never be their doom § In things indifferent and good so they be liberal and free it may so happen that an error may be committed against the Princes command but for those duties that are expresly commanded by God the 5. Acts 29. It s better to obey God than Man must take place Consider the contrary if a Prince command lawful things must we notwithstanding have license from another to obey him and without it is it a Non licet And shall not Gods Commands be lawfully obeyed without license from another Nature in all her sinal drifts giveth also such faculties and powers as are requisite and necessary for attaining the same and shall God prescribe an end and Commandments and shall they not be obeyed and put in practice without the favour and license of men Absit its too absurd and inconvenient I have been the freer herein because I have been so far from frequenting or countenancing such Assemblies by my presence that I have been but once at any one of them above these 20 years nor do I converse with any of them Happily I can conform with better satisfaction to conscience than they can that so congregate It is hard kicking against the Pricks Acts 26.14 and ill offending little ones a heavy doom lyes at the doors of such for their Angels do alwayes behold the face of God in Heaven Mat. 18.10 you know the charge was given to Kings themselves saying touch not mine anointed and do my Prophets no harm 105 Psal 14.15 stopping such mouths is injurious to God and man Doth the Law judge any man before it hear him and know what he doth 9 John 51. The sum then is that as all Men and Doctrines condemning sin and wicked lives are to be tollerated nay encouraged So to stop the Mouths and Pens of such is to hinder them from doing their duty and from obeying the Laws and Commands of God Now if such should in truth prove to be the very case of our Conventiclers and that their solemn meetings together be in good earnest for the better and not for the worse to wrestle with God with strong and importunate prayers for the Welfare of King and Kingdom of Church and State and to mourn not only for their own personal Sins but for all the abominations that are done in the midst of the Land and to preach Jesus Christ and him Crucified only and that he would make a high way of Holiness through the Land that way-faring-men tho fools may not err therein 35 Esay 8. To stir up the gifts and spirits that are in them by fruitful and seasonable conferences each borrowing light from his Brothers Candle If such should prove to be the truth of their case as they and their Auditors most solemnly aver it to be and it hath not yet judicially appeared to have been otherwise will not then the Oppugners of such Christian liberty Gospel precepts and Apostolick practices be accounted to have laid Snares in Mispah and spread Nets upon Tabor to have used Laws Menaces and Subtilties to keep Gods people from his Court and Sanctuary and to confine and oblige them to Worship after the modes of men And will not such obligations come within the lash and verge of the Woe denounced by Isaiah against those that make a Man an Offender for a word and lay a Snare for them that reprove in the Gate and turn aside the Just for a thing of naught 29.21 Nay will it not look like that old Machivilian trick Audacter calumniari the better to bring about ends and purposes little conducing to the power and encrease of Godliness It is an undoubted Gospel truth that no Power hath lawful Right and Authority to forbid Christians assembling together to Preach the Gospel and to perform Spiritual duties When God sent his own Son out of his own Bosom to take on him the form of a Servant and to become obedient to the death of the Cross for us Men and for our Salvation he gave him the Heathen for his Inheritance and the uttermost parts of the Earth for his Possession 2 Psal 8. and anoynted him with the Oyl of gladness above his fellows whereby he became King of Kings and Lord of Lords whose Throne was to endure for ever and ever and the Scepter of Righteousness to be the Scepter of his Kingdom 1 Heb. 8.9 who whilst in the dayes of his flesh did gather a Church a Kingdom out of Jews and Gentiles peculiar to himself and established the Government thereof sufficient to all its ends and purposes by his own Laws and Precepts far different and distinct from all other Governments in the World to which all other Kings and Governments in the World were to conform and submit and to become nursing Fathers and Mothers thereof and that under a severe prophetical Menace of being else broken with a rod of Iron and dasht in pieces like a Potters vessel 2. Psal 9. and therefore Christs Worship and Government being Independent and subject to no other Laws or Jurisdictions but his own which no Nation how great soever hath so Righteous 4 Deut. 8. no other Power or Principality can Lawfully forbid any Assemblies or Congregations to meet and worship him according to