wisdome and Truth that the Disousser should publish the delights of Christ in a confussed way without distinguishing things that differ and so not dividing the Word aright It is true that Christ delighteth not in the bloud of men but shed his owne for his bloudiest enemies and gainsayers to wit whilst they gainsaying him and bloudily persecute him or his out of ignorance In this case indeed he prayeth for them and dieth for them Father forgive them they know not what they doe Luk. 23.34 whilest wee were enemies Christ died for us Rom. 5.8 10. But to say that Christ delighteth not in the bloud of men who after the acknowledgement of his Truth doe tread the bloud of his Covenant under foote and wittingly and willingly reject him from reigning over them To hold it forth that Christ delighteth not in the bloud of such men or that he would not have such molested by the civill Sword who gainsay Christ known and professed and joyn with his enemy Antichrist in blaspheming and persecuting Christ and his Saints This the Discusser can never make good to be the word of Christ It is indeed to publish the glad Tidings of the Gospel not to the humble and meeke Lambes of Christ but to the seed of the Serpent to sow pillowes under all elbowes to make the hearts of the righteous sad whom God would not make sad and to strengthen the hands of the wicked in their Apostacy from the truth and malignity against it Christ hath pronounced it upon earth and ratifyed it in Heaven Those mine enemies that would not that I should reigne over them bring them hither and slay them before my face Luk. 19.27 Are these the words of him that delighteth not in the bloud of his bloudyest enemies and gainsayers when the Lord Jesus sendeth forth his servants to powre out bloudy vengeance upon Antichristian emissaries and openeth the hearts mouthes of his Saints to praise him for thus judging Rev. 16.4 7 Is this to proclaime a Magna-Charta of highest libertyes even to his gainsayers and to such as joyn with his enemy Antichrist Time was when Jehu justly demanded What peace what hast thou to doe with peace so long as the whor domes of thy Mother Jezebel and her witcherafts are so many 2 Kings 9.22 And are the times now so farre changed that the Sword of Jebu shall proclaime peace to Jezebel and peace to all that call her mother and peace to her whoredomes and peace to her witchcrafts and then to blesse our selves with a glorious expectation That soone shall every Brow and house be stucke with O live branches The Lord keepe us from being bewitched with the Whores cup lest whilst wee seeme to detest and reject her with open face of profession wee doe not bring her in by a back doore of Toleration and so come at last to drink deepely of the cup of the Lords wrath and be filled with the cup of her plagues Amen CHAP. 79. Touching the Modell of Church and civill Power composed by Mr. Cotton and the Ministers of New-England and sent to the Church of Salem c. Examined by the Discusser and Answered THis Title or Inscription which the Examiner setteth up of this Modell holdeth forth to the world a double falshood 1. That the Modell was composed by Mr. Cotton and other Ministers of New-England This is one falshood What other Ministers of new-New-England did in it themselves know But for Mr. Cotton I know that he was none of them that composed it 2. That this Modell was sent to the Church of Salem if he meane sent by those Ministers as the following words imply for the confirmation of their Doctrine that is another falshood The Ministers themselves that composed the Modell doe deny it Howsoever the Modell came to Salem the Ministers say it was not sent by them But see when men are left of God openly and boldly to write against the truth in matter of Doctrin how readily and freely they can write and speake falshood in matter of fact It is therefore lesse marvell that in Answer to the preface of the Modell he breaketh forth into such vast hyperboles That the Modell awakeneth Meses from his unknowne Grave and denyeth Jesus yet to have seen the earth A speech as devoid of reason as of truth The observation of Moses Lawes doth not awaken Moses out of his grave nor is there any reason it should The validity of Lawes doth not in reason depend upon the life or resurrection of the Lawgiver the Examiner himselfe I suppose would not doubt but the Lawes of Moses were of force to the Israelites in the Land of Canaan when yet Moses was dead and buried before their entrance into the Land Neither did their observation of them awaken Moses out of his grave but argued his Lawes to be in force as well after his death as whilst he was yet living If it be said That Christ at his coming in the flesh when he was buried himselfe buried also the Lawes of Moses with him in his grave Then the Examiner should not have said that the Modell raised up Moses out of his grave but that it raised up Christ out of his grave If it be said againe the Examiner saith It denyed Christ to have seen the earth which was of as ill consequence Be it so but yet still this maketh nothing to the rasing up of Moses out of his grave I Answer further Neither doth it at all deny Christ to have seen the earth For Christ came not to destroy the Law of Moses Mat. 5.17 Neither the Morall Law for in the sequele of that Chapter he doth at large expound it and establish it No nor did he come to destroy the judiciall Lawes such of them as are of Morall equity Or else the Conscience of the civill Magistrate could never doe any act of civill justice out of faith because he should have no word of God to be the ground of his action if the Lawes of judgement in the Old-Testament were abrogated and none extant in the New As for the exception which the Examiner taketh against the Preface It is as easily avoided as Objected If saith he the civill Magistrate even the highest being a Member of the Church be subject to Church-Censure how can this stand with their common Tenent that he must keepe the first Table Reforme the Church be Judge and Governor in all causes as well ecclesiasticall as Civill Secondly how can a Magistrate both sit on the Bench and stand at the Bar of Christ Jesus Is it not as impossible as to reconcile east and west together Yea is not the Text in Isa 49 23. Lamentably wrested to prove both these Reply One Answer may easily remove both Exceptions And that one Text doth expresly hold forth both these Points which the Examiner conceiveth to be so irreconcilable For if Princes be nursing Fathers to the Church as that Text speaketh then they are to provide that the children of
ignorant and scandalous persons drunkards whoremongers despisers and persecutors of them that are good Prophane swearers that have not so much as a forme of godlinesse but doe utterly deny and deride the power of it Answ This is indeed just matter of mourning and lamentation to all the Saints of Christ and may be also in due order just warrant of some degree of separation from them as from a corrupt Church It cannot but offend and deeply grieve the spirit of a Christian to sit downe at the Lords Table and drinke the bloud of the Lord with such who may be ready the next day to spill the bloud of sincere Communicants as Puritan Round-Heads But whilest the Saints of Christ continue amongst them the mixt fellowship of ignorant and prophane persons doth not evacuate or disanull their Church estate The store of malignant and noysome humours in the body yea the deadnesse and rottennesse of many members in the body though they may make the body an unsound and corrupt body yet they doe not make the body no body When the Prophet Isaiah complained that in the Church of Judah from the soale of the foote to the crowne of the head there was no soundnesse in it but wounds and bruises and putrifying sores yet whilest there was a Remnant amongst them of faithfull Saints they were not yet no Church they were not yet Sodome and Gomorrha though but for that Remnant they had been as Sodome and like unto Gomorrha Isa 1.6 with 9. Say not though Hierusalem and Judah were at that time degenerate yet they had been at first an holy Nation a faithfull Citie Isa 1.21 and so had a true constitution which the Churches of England never had For 1. I might answer That though in regard of some prime members Hierusalem was counted a faithfull Citie and the Nation Holy by Priviledge of their Covenant yet for the body of the people Hierusalem was alwayes a City of the provocation of Gods wrath from the day they built it Jer. 32.31 32. And for the body of the Nation Moses charged them Yee have alwayes been rebellious against the Lord since the day that I knew you Deut. 9.7.24 And Stephen protesteth against them They had alwayes wont to resist the Holy Ghost they and their fathers Act. 7.51 2. I doe not understand but that according to Scripture those corruptions which doe not destroy a Church constituted the same do not destroy the constitution of a Church The Church is constituted and continued by the same Grace 3. The estate of the Churches of England was not corrupt in their first constitution Baronius himselfe confesseth that England received the Gospel ten yeares before Rome and that from the Ministery of the Apostles and Apostolick men who doubtlesse constituted the English Churches not after the manner of Rome which was then Pagan but after the Apostolick Rules and Patternes This may suffice touching the matter of the English Churches Now touching the second thing objected which was from the efficient cause of their constitution It is said they were gathered not by the preaching of the Gospel by which Churches should be planted and constituted but by the Proclamation of Princes Answ 1. The efficient cause of a Church is a thing without the Church and so no essentiall cause of the Constitution of a Church The Proclamation of King Hezekiah and of the Princes drew on multitudes of Apostate Israelites to the Communion of the Church at Hierusalem and many of them in much pollution yet neither their own pollution nor the Proclamation of the King and Princes did evacuate their Church-estate but encourage them rather in their Church-worke 2 Chron. 30.5 to 9. and verses 11 12.17 18 19 20. It was no pollution to the second Temple at Hierusalem that it was built by the encouragement of the Proclamation of Cyrus Ezra 1. Answ 2. Wheresoever there be visible Saints gathered into a Church they were first gathered by the Ministery of the Gospel For Proclamations cannot make Saints but the word of the Gospel onely If any hypocrites or time-servers doe for feare joyne themselves with the Saints in such a worke though their fellowship may weaken and blemish the worke yet it doth not destroy it Thus much touching the constitution of their Parishionall Churches Now touching their Nationall Constitution it standeth partly in their Nationall Officers Archbishops Bishops and their Servitors partly in their Nationall Synods and convocations and partly also in their Nationall Ecclesiasticall Courts The Examiner is not ignorant that by the Grace of Christ we have withdrawen our selves and our Churches also from this Nationall Constitution and from all Communion with them If it be said But we still keepe Communion with the Parish-Churches in hearing the Word there who doe subject themselves to these Nationall Officers Convocations and Courts Answ 1. Though the Parish-Churches were lately subject to them it was a burden which as they did discerne the iniquitie thereof they groaned under and now by the mightie Power of the gracious Redemption of the Lord Jesus they have shaken off through the helpe of the Honorable and Religious Prudence and Piety of the Parliament 2. Though those Nationall Courts in their Officers did for many yeares tread downe the Parish-Churches yet they did not extinguish their Church-estate The Text is plaine The Gentiles that is men of Gentile-like prophanenesse and malignitie and iniquitie who had the keeping of the Church-Courts they did tread downe the Holy City Rev. 11.2 Tread downe I say but not destroy the Holy City Yea though the Translation reade it They did tread it downe or Tread it under-foote yet the Originall word may be rendred somewhat more mildly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may expresse their walking upon it or else the Peripateticks were a more violent sect then either their Principles or their Practise did declare them I come now to speake of the second Falshood which the Examiner chargeth upon the English Churches which was the falsenesse of their Ministery which wherein it lyeth he should have done well to have told us for himselfe disliketh it in me to wander in Generalities But for our selves we are farre from that supercilious and Pharisaicall arrogancy as to condemne such for false Ministers in whom we finde Truth of Godlinesse Truth of Ministeriall Gifts Truth of Election and acceptance unto Office by true Churches of Christ Truth of sound wholesome and soule-saving Doctrine and Truth of holy and exemplary Conversation And such are all the Ministers whom either the members of our Churches affect to Heare or our Churches doe allow them ordinarily for to Heare And when I say Truth I speake it not in opposition to Eminency for sundry of them excell in Eminency of sundry of these things but in opposition to the falshood which the Examiner objecteth I know not what exception lyeth against their Ministery to argue it of falshood save what hath been excepted and answered already touching the constitution
yeild obedience to such Doctrines and worships as are by men Invented and Appointed As the three famous Jewes were cast into the fiery Furnace in a non-conformity to the whole conforming world before the Golden Image Dan. 3.21 c. Defender Thus a man may find a knot in a Bulrush yea thus a man that were disposed might find fault with the Comforts of God for not being full and Compleate with the Affirmative Comforts because they doe not expresse the Negative and with the Negative because they doe not expresse the Affirmative He that maketh it persecution for cause of Conscience when a man is punished for professing such Doctrine which he beleiveth in Conscience to be the truth he maketh it a Pari Persecution for cause of Conscience when a man is punished for Renouncing such Doctrines which he beleiveth in Conscience to be Erroneous And he that maketh it Persecution for cause of Conscience when a man is punished for practising such a worke which he beleives in conscience to be a Religious duty He maketh it no lesse Persecution for cause of Conscience when a man is punished for not practising such a worke which he beleiveth in Conscience to be a sin CHAP. 4. A Reply to his fourth Chapter touching the distinction of Doctrines Some fundamentall others circumstantiall and lesse Principall IN points of Doctrine I said in my Answer to the Prisoners Letter some are Fundamentall without right beleife whereof a man cannot be saved others are circumstantiall and lesse Principall wherein one man may differ from another in judgement without prejudice of salvation on either part Discusser To this distinction He saith Truth dare not subscribe for then thousands ten thousands should everlastingly be condemned yea the whole Generation of the Righteous who since the falling away have and doe erre fundamently concerning the true matter Constitution Gathering Governing of the Church And yet farre be it from any pious Breast to Imagine that they are not saved c. Defender Fundamentall Doctrines are of two sorts Some hold forth the foundation of Christian Religion as the Doctrines of salvation by Christ and of faith in his Name Repentance from dead workes Resurrection from the dead and the like Others concerne the Foundation of the Church as the matter and forme of it and the proper Adjuncts accompaning the same The Apostle speaketh of both these sorts of Foundations together Heb. 6.1.2 I speake of the former sort of these onely namely the Foundation or fundamentall points of Christian Religion which who so subverteth and Renounceth he renounceth also his owne salvation The other sort I looke at as lesse principall in comparison of these though some of them have a fundamentall vse in Church order It was pertinent to the Question propounded in the Prisoners Letter to expresse how farre I allowed Toleration even in such fundamentall Errors as subverted the Foundation of Christian Religion And in other Errors lesse dangerous such as neither subverted Religion nor Salvation It would easily be conceived that Toleration might more easily be allowed How farre New English Churches partake with the Old English Parish Churches in any of the Ordinances of God and upon what ground hath been declared in the Reply to the Answer of the other Letter Where also it hath been cleared how farre off the Churches here have been from persecuting or oppressing any of their Brethren for presenting light to them about this point which may prevent and still the lamentation of peace in the beginning of this fith Chapter CHAP. 5. A Reply to his fifth Chapter Concerning a distinction of Points of Practise IN Answer to the Prisoners Letter I said in points of Practise some concerne the weightier Duties of the Law as what God we worship and with what kinde of Worship whether it be such as if it be right Fellowship with God is held If false Fellowship with God is lost Discusser It is worth the Inquiry what kinde of worship he intendeth whether in generall acceptation the Rightnesse or Corruptnesse of the Church or the Ministery of the Church or the Ministrations of the Word Prayer Seales c. And because it pleaseth the Spirit of God to make the Ministery one of the foundations of Christian Religion Heb. 6.1.2 and also to make the Ministery of the Word and Prayer in the Church to be two speciall workes even of the Apostles themselves Acts 6.2 I shall desire it may well be considered in the feare of God 1. Concerning the Ministery of the Word If their new Ministery and ordination be true then the former was false And if false then will it not follow according to this distinction that fellowship with God was lost 2. Concerning Prayer the New English Ministers have disclaimed and written against that Worship of God by Common or set formes of Prayer which yet themselves practised in England And though they were faithfully admonished for vseing the Common Prayer yet at that time they satisfied their hearts with the practise of the Author of the Councell of Trent c. But now I aske whether or no fellowship with God in such Prayers was lost c. 3. Gods People may live and die in such kinde of worship notwithstanding light presented to them able to convince yet not reaching to a conviction and to forsakeing of such wayes which is Contrary to his Conclusion That Fundamentalls are so cleare that a man cannot but be convinced in Conscience after once or twice Admonition And therefore such a person not being convinced he is condemned of himselfe and may be persecuted for sinning against his Conscience 4. I Observe here that Mr. Cotton herein measureth to others that which himselfe when he lived in such practises would not have had measured to himselfe As 1. That it might have been affirmed of him that in such practises he did sin against his Conscience having sufficient light shinning about him 2. That he should or might have been cut off by death or Banishment as an Hereticke sinning against his Conscience c. Defender 1. It needs no inquiry what worship I meanes whether Church and Minister or Ministrations of the Word Prayer Seales c. For I meane none of these as they are dispenced in the Churches of England Though there have been corruptions in the order and dispensations of these things amongst them especially in the times when we lived there yet neither their Churches nor Ministry nor Ministrations were such or so false that fellowship with God could not be held of them not onely inwardly and secretly but also outwardly and visibly not onely in inward conversion and conviction but also in outward and visible Reformation according to light received Take my words as I wrote them and as he relateth them and my meaning is plaine enough I speake of such worship which if false fellowship with God is lost which cannot truly be avouched of any part of the Worship of God in England It is not truly said
it a folly to make boasts in comparisons even of sufferings And therefore I choose to be sparing and briefe in this Argument wherein otherwise I could be copious there being another Volume of the Booke of Martyrs as I heare extant in the Countrey though not in print of the sufferings of the godly Ministers and people beginning where Mr. Fox left When he saith Their witnesses against Bishops and Ceremonies whom he calleth Puritans have seldome met in separate Assemblies from the common It seemeth he never read the story of the Classes in Northamptonshire Suffolk Essex London Cambridge discovered by a false brother to Doctor Bancroft Chaplain then to Lord Chancellor Hatton afterwards Bishop of London and after that Archbishop of Canterbury nor that he ever tooke notice of Doctor Bancrofts Booke against them entituled Dangerous Positions and practises against Religion and State neither doth it seeme that he doth acknowledge their frequent and continuall meetings to duties of humiliation as any separate meetings from the common But I doubt not the Lord tooke notice of both and hath now rewarded their sighes and groanes prayers and teares in private with an open recompence and deliverance in the view of all men Besides though he pleased to confine the witnesse of these he calleth Puritans unto Testimony against Bishops and Ceremonies yet I did not thinke he had been such a stranger in Israel if by his leave I may call it Israel as to be ignorant how farre both the Admonitions to the Parliament have reached to beare witnesse beyond Bishops and Ceremonies To say nothing of Mr. Deerings Sermon before the Queene or Mr. Chadertons at Pauls Crosse or Mr. Parkers Ecclesiastica Politica or Mr. Baines his Diocesans Tryall Though he say None of them suffered unto death onely Mr. Vdall was neere it Yet the truth is he dyed by the annoyance of the Prison which he might as well have acknowledged as he doth of some of the Separatists in this very Paragraph that they were choaked in Prison This I have understood by faithfull witnesses that when the Coroners Jury according to the Law of England came as the manner is in such cases to survey the dead body of Mr. Vdall in Prison he bled freshly though cold before as a testimony against the murderous illegall proceedings of the State against him for so the godly did apprehend it judicious Perkins acknowledgeth such a kinde of bleeding to be a part of the accomplishment of that Scripture in Heb. 11. That the bloud of Abel still speaketh In like sort for the same cause choaked in the prison suffered Mr. Randall Bates an heavenly Saint nor could he be released though Doctor Hering a learned and beloved Physician earnestly solicited Bishop Neale for his enlargement as he tendred his life but the suite of the Physician was repulsed with reproaches And the life of his patient spilt by that rigor He is therefore much mistaken when he saith None of them suffered unto death And it is alike mistake when he maketh Mr. Penry one of his witnesses unto the death for Separation I have received it from Mr. Hildersom a man of a thousand that Mr. Penry did ingenuously acknowledge before his death That though he had not deserved death for any dishonour put upon the Queene by that Booke which was found in his study and intended by himselfe to be presented to her own hand nor by the compiling of Martin Marprelate of both which he was falsly charged yet he confessed he deserved death at the Queenes hand for that he had seduced many of her loyall Subjects to a separation from hearing the Word of life in the Parish Churches Which though himselfe had learned to discerne the evill thereof yet he could never prevaile to recover divers of her Subjects whom he had seduced and therefore the bloud of their soules was now justly required at his hands Let the Examiner consider whether he will own this Mr. Penry for one of his faithfull witnesses hereafter If he doe let him endeavour to doe as he did seeke to reduce those soules whom he hath seduced from hearing the word of life or else let him confesse as Mr. Penry did the bloud of those soules may justly be required at his hands if Mr. Penries witnesse be of waight with him Touching his other witnesse to the death of Mr. Barrow this I can say from the testimony of holy and blessed Mr. Dod who speaking of this Mr. Barrow God is not wont saith he to make choice of men infamous for grosse vices before their calling to make them any notable instruments of Reformation after their Calling Mr. Barrow whilest he lived in Court was wont to be a great Gamster and Dicer and often getting much by play would boast Vivo de die in spem noctis nothing ashamed to boast of his hopes of his nights lodgings in the bosomes of his Courtizens As his spirit was high and rough before his reformation so was it after even to his death When he stood under the Gibbet he lift up his eyes and Lord saith he if I be deceived thou hast deceived me And so being stopt by the hand of God he was not able to proceed to speake any thing to purpose more either to the glory of God or to the edification of the people Mr. Greenwood the Examiners last witnesse unto death he indeed of all the rest was the more to be lamented as being of a more tender and conscientious spirit but this have I heard reported of him by the same credible hands That if he could have been sundred from Mr. Barrow he was tractable to have been gained to the truth But when the Examiner goeth on to make comparisons between the Sufferings of the Separatists and of those he styleth Puritans in his Margent and in his Booke No comparison will hold from the Separatists to them but a Minori What compulsory banishments have been put upon those blessed and glorious lights Mr. Cartwright Parker Ames To say nothing of those in Scotland or New-England When have the Prisons been vacant of some or other godly Ministers and Professors When will the Examiner shew forth alike company of his witnesses to those 300. Ministers whom Mr. Parker compareth to the 300. Souldiers of Gideon who in one storme of persecution were some suspended some excommunicated some imprisoned all of them deprived of their Ministery and of their maintenance And provision made that none might practise Phyficke or teach Schoole unlesse they would accept a Licence with subscription So that of necessicie had not the Lord been wiser and stronger then men they must in remedilesse misery they and theirs have either begged or starved But that with the Lord there be bowells of mercy and fatherly compassions and with him are plenteous redemptions and provisions and protections when men faile The Examiner proceedeth in his Answer to tell us further That he beleeveth there hath hardly ever been a Conscientious Separatist who was
separation of holy from unholy penitent from impenitent godly from ungodly And that to frame any other building upon such grounds and foundations is no other then to raise the forme of a square house upon the keele of a Ship which will never prove a soule saving true Arke or Church of Christ Jesus according to the patterne Reply I cannot acknowledge what he saith that I have not duely considered that all the grounds and principles leading to oppose Bishops and Ceremonies c. doe necessarily conclude a separation of holy from unholy c. For I have considered and well weighed after my slender measure that they doe indeed conclude a three-fold separation of holy from unholy 1. Doctrinall that the Minister of Christ whilest he liveth amongst such dissolute and scandalous persons he is to separate them in the application of his doctrine between the holy and unholy between the precious and the vile so as to make sad the hearts of the wicked whom God would have to be made sad and to strengthen the heart and hands of the righteous whom God would have to be comforted Secondly A practicall separation in a mans own person that what a man findeth upon those grounds and principles to be unwarrantable and sinfull he doe forbeare the same in his own practise and disswade others from the same by his doctrine and example Thirdly An Ecclesiasticall separation that when a man cannot continue in fellowship with such a Church but that he shall be compelled to the practise of some sinne or of necessitie to communicate with the sinnes of others then after all good means used in vaine to redresse those evils meekly to separate and withdraw himselfe from fellowship with them in Church-Communion as one that cannot enjoy the good which is found amongst them without partaking in sundry evils that cleave to them Thus farre I have considered the grounds and Principles of Reformation of which the Examiner speaketh and doe finde that they doe necessarily conclude a separation of holy from unholy thus farre But I confesse I have not considered nor can I finde out by any further due consideration that the principles and grounds of Reformation doe necessarily conclude a separation from the English Churches as false Churches from their Ministery as a false Ministery from their worship as a false worship from all their professors as from no visible Saints Nor can I finde that they doe either necessarily or probably conclude a separation from hearing the word preached by godly Ministers in the Parish-Churches in England Nor can I finde that the building of our Churches in these ends of the world is the raising up of a square house upon the keele of a Ship unlesse it be the Arke of Noah for as the soules in the Arke were saved from water so we finde by experience and good evidence from the word that the Lord blesseth our Church-Communion and administrations with soule-saving efficacy through his grace in Christ Thirdly The third particular which the Examiner saith I have not duely considered is The multitudes of holy and faithfull men and women who have witnessed this truth from Queene Maries dayes by writing disputing and suffering farre above what the Non-conformists have done c. Reply This particular hath been considered above in Answer to Chapter 23. Fourthly The fourth particular which he desireth might be better considered Is our own practise and profession Our practise in constituting our Churches of none but godly persons and uniting them into a body by voluntary mutuall Covenant and adding none to them but persons carefully examined and approved and entering by way of confession both of their sinnes and of their faith Our practise also in suppressing other English who have attempted to set up a Congregation in a Parishionall way Our profession in the late Answer we gave to many worthy persons whom yet we account godly Ministers and people that we could not permit them to live in the same Common-wealth together with us if they should set up any other Church and Worship then what our selves practise Reply 1. Our practise in the constituting and ordering our own Churches here holdeth forth what matter and forme and order of the Church we doe beleeve to be most agreeable to the patterne set before us in the Gospel of Christ And our not receiving all commers unto the Communion of the Lords Table and other parts of Church-fellowship saving onely unto the publick hearing of the Word and presence at other duties it argueth indeed that such persons either thinke themselves unfit materialls for Church-fellowship and so they never offer themselves to us or else that we our selves conceive them to be as stones standing in need of a little more hewing and squaring before they be layed as living stones in the walls of the Lords house All which amounteth onely to this That we doe consider and bewaile the defects of the Churches of England in receiving ignorant and scandalous persons to all the liberties of the Lords Table and of his house as other wayes But it doth not at all argue neither is it our minde it should argue their Churches and worship and Ministery and members should all of them be separated from as false or none at all Our practise in suppressing such as have attempted to set up a Parishionall way I never heard of such a thing here to this day And if any such thing were done before my coming into the Countrey I do not thinke it was done by forcible compulsion but by rationall conviction But as for our profession that wee should answer many worthy Ministers and people in England that wee could not permit them to live in the same Common-wealth with us if they varied from us I have cleared it above in Answer to Chapt. 11. to be a notorious falshood and but that I know the Devill is able to create slander of nothing as God is able to create truths of nothing I should thinke it incredible that any man who hath been in New-England should be able to say as the Examiner here doth that we persecute the Parishes in New-England and yet frequent the Parishes in Old England Fiftly The fift particular which he thinks I have not duely considered is That in the Parishes which Mr Cotton holdeth but inventions of men how ever they would have liberty to frequent the worship of the Word yet they separate from the Sacraments And yet according to our own Principles there is as true Communion in the ministration of the Word as in the Seales What mystery saith he should be in this but that here to wit in Old England the Crosse of Christ may be avoyded if persons come to Church Reply 1. It is an untruth that Mr. Cotton holdeth the Parishes to be but inventions of men for though I hold that the receiving of all the Inhabitants in the Parish into the full fellowship of the Church and the admitting of them all unto the liberty of all