Nicene Creeds have so Interpreted Scripture but what if one should ask him How he is sure the Doctrines of the Creed are true Expositions of Scripture Either he must fall into the Circle or resolve his Faith into the Infallibility of the Church and Compilers of those Creeds and therein he turns his back upon the Church of England and all the Reformed in one of the Principal and most Important Points of Controversie the Resolution of Faith I will not suppose him so ignorant as to think that the Apostles were the Authors of that Creed that goes under their Name Bishop Pearson and Dr. Towerson will tell him the contrary and by the Confession of all Protestants These Creeds are but summary Collections of the most principal Doctrines of Faith put into that form by Fallible Men and are to be received no further and on no other account than as they are Consonant to the Word of God and therefore were never intended as a Standard or Rule of Faith or as an infallible Interpreter of that which is so I wonder how this Gentleman would have been infallibly assured of the Divinity of Christ if he had lived before these Symbols were extant I wonder how he is infallibly assured of the true sence of these Creeds I doubt he wants one Creed to give an Infallible Interpretation of another and so ad Infinitum but if he say the sence of these Creeds is very plain and obvious to any ordinary Capacity so is the Scripture too in all Fundamental Points and is sufficient Assurance of the Truth of them without the joint Security of Ancient Creeds and Churches Whether these odd Opinions are to be imputed to his inconsiderateness of which every Page affords us instances enough or rather to the Happy Illuminations of his great Rabbi Mr. Dodwell I will not determine but the latter is not improbable if we compare it with what that Amphibious Gentleman writes Separation of Churches p. 542. That the Power actually received by Ordained Ministers must not be measured by the true Sence of Scriptures but by that wherein the Ordainers understood them c. Many other Effata of the like Nature have proceeded from that great Oracle which would scarcely have been encouraged or so much as suffered in any Reformed Church besides our own but it was sufficient to make these things passable that they were levelled at the Dissenters and sent them all headlong into the Pit I think it may not be amiss to defend the Vindicator from the Imputation of Malice against the late Arch-Bishop of Canterbury which this Gentleman very unfairly suggests the Passage aimed at is this To say that Bishops Vindic. p. 18. which are stated Pastors in an Organical Church are the Apostles Successors in their Apostolical Power is destructive to their own Notion of Church Government and would give the Bishop of Rome as great Power in England as the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury when there is any All the Malice lies in this little Parenthesis when there is any and here the Citizen clamours upon him for reviling Gods High Priest Reply p. 18. and speaking evil of the Ruler of his People What Apology will the Vindicator now make Truely if it was my own Case I would desire no better than that of St. Paul under the same Accusation I wist not Brethren that he was the High Priest The late Arch-Bishop had been deprived by Law above half a Year before that Vindication was writ and the Metropolitane See was vacant a considerable time after this was Printed and yet it was a malicious Reviling of the Ruler of Gods People to say there was none I will not drive this too far I hope he can give a better Reason for calling the Deprived Prelate the Ruler of Gods People than I can for him If he was the Ruler still What becomes of the Authority of those that deprived him It had been more becoming this Gentleman to have answered that Argument wherein this Parenthesis had its Place than by falling foul upon so Innocent an Expression to expose those thoughts which Prudence would have concealed I know not of any thing else in his Reply that needs to be taken notice of but what will fall under the General Heads of this following Treatise wherein I have attempted at least to prove that our Congregations are not Schismatical or Unlawful though many of our Ministers were not Ordained by Diocesan Bishops though the Places we meet in be distinct from the Parish Churches and the Mode of our Worship in some things different from theirs And because I find the most Learned of our Adversaries condemn our Present Practice 1. As Inconsistent with Catholick Unity and Communion 2. As Guilty of Disobedience to Superiours Civil and Spiritual 3. And of Scandalous Indecencies and a Breach of good Rules and Order I shall examine the matter as carefully as I can under all these Particulars heartily Praying that whatever Censures I bring upon my self the Interests of Truth and Peace may be promoted ERRATA PAge 6. l. 38. r. retain'd p. 16. l. 13. r. consciousness p. 20. margent r. August p. 33. l. 38. r. Diaboli instinctu p. 37. l. 15. p. 38. l. 12. for rite r. right p. 117. l. 17. for Ananias r. Anianus Several lesser faults will occur which are referr'd to the Reader 's Candor and Emendation A Defence of the Vindication c. CHAP. 1. The true Notion of Catholick Unity distinguished into Political and Moral A Regular Ministry not Essential to this Unity The Judgment of the Fathers and others IT is the observation of an Ingenious Gentleman that the World has never been without some extraordinary word to fill mens mouths and furnish out Pamphlets and by which the Sentiments of men have been for the most part more absolutely governed than by the true reason of things for Reason concludes nothing without disquisition but the other like a kind of spell captivates and determines mens thoughts many times beyond the Relief of the most rational and convincing Arguments Amongst all the Charms of this nature which take place as the Interests and Designs of Parties or posture of Publick Affairs vary and direct I know of none that has been more unmercifully tortured and forced to speak things never intended by it than this of Unity It has been the Motto and Device of every Ascendant Party in the Militant Church to frighten the weak and timorous and chastise the more resolute opposers of Spiritual Usurpation and Tyranny The Papists for the good Service it has done them have preferr'd it to be the Seventh Note of their Church according to the Order in which their great Cardinal has marshall'd them and under the Umbrage thereof have raised the greatest Feuds and Divisions that ever infested the Christian World In their most bloody Persecutions barbarous and funest Tragedies they have still pretended to act by the Commission of Catholick Unity to advance her Interests
and to make her glorious in the World when in the mean time Christianity it self has been rendred odious and contemptible Ridente Turce nec dolente Judaeo Turks Jews and Pagans have beheld her flames with pleasure and warmed themselves and said Aha thus we would have it It must not be denied but that Catholick Unity where it is so happy as to be understood acquaints us with something very sacred and venerable of which we cannot be too fond or tender it bears the Image of Divinity and if it were not in it self a most excellent thing the name of it could never be made so specious a pretence It has been often and confidently asserted that all the Dissenters in England have departed from the Unity and Communion of the Catholick Church This lies as a mighty prejudice in the minds of many both against our way Arch-Rebel p. 28. Reply p. 1. and persons too and their common Inference from hence is That we are out of a State of Salvation have no right to any of the Promises of the Gospel that all our Hopes are unwarrantable and groundless Fancies that we are contemners of the Peace and Unity which Christ has bequeathed to his Church and if they will demonstrate that our case is indeed such as they describe it we will not persist in it a day longer for we cannot be so fond of the Inconveniencies of Non-Conformity here as meerly for the sake thereof to purchase to our selves greater Miseries hereafter But that we may evince how void of Reason and Humanity the Sentence which they have past upon us is let us enquire wherein the Catholick Unity and Communion of the Church consists and then try whether none of our Dissenting Congregations be within the Verge of it By this Catholick Unity our Adversaries understand not that which is accidental may be present or absent without the destruction of the Subject which some Churches may have and other True Churches may be without for then it would not serve their purpose which is to conclude all that want this Unity to be in a State of Damnation and indeed it is the truest acceptation of the word to make it signifie Essential Universal Unity Uniformity in accidentals belonging more properly to the common place of order in this sense therefore we shall speak of it that we may come up as close to their thoughts as we can Nothing then belongs to the Catholick Unity of the Church but what belongs to the being of the Church that which makes it a Church makes it one Ens Unum being convertible and nothing can dissolve its Unity which does not destroy its Essence and certainly the being and the state of the Church must not be confounded Many things are required to the due and orderly state and form in which the Church ought to be and appear in the World and which may contribute to her stability beauty and enlargement which suppose her Essence but do not constitute it This Essential Catholick Unity whereof we speak may be distinguished into Political and Moral Political whereby all the True Members of the Church are united unto Christ the Head and that is by true Faith And Moral by which they are United one to another and that is by Christian Love which in some degree always follows the former those that have a mind to it may quarrel with the terms of this distinction but if I may but express my meaning by them I shall not be at all concerned about it 1. The Political Unity is that which does primarily necessarily and immediately constitute that Sacred Society the Church of God which was therefore by the Primitive Christians as well as our first Reformers frequently known by this short definition Catus fidelium the Congregation of the Faithful sometimes the Body of Christ the Temple of God Divin Instit l. 4. c. 13. and such like So Lactantius Ecclesia est verum Templum Dei quod non in parietibus est sed in corde fide hominum qui credunt in eum vocantur fideles The Church is the True Temple of God which does not consist in the bare Walls but in the Hearts and Faith of Men that believe on him and are called Faithful and before him Ignatius in the same sense calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Holy Congregation Ep. ad Trall vid. Isidor Pelus Epist l. 2. Ep. 247. the Assembly of the Saints To the same purpose speak all those Fathers who affirm that the Church was built upon the Faith of Peter not upon his Person or Authority a great Cloud whereof the Illustrious Chamier has collected to our hand proving thereby that our Union with the Church De Oecumen Pont. l. 11. c. 4. is founded in our believing on Christ the True Foundation and Chief Corner Stone nothing therefore can dissolve this Union but what is inconsistent with True Faith in Christ And this agrees fully with the tenour of Holy Scripture which every where lays the Salvation of Men upon their believing Ephes 3.17.4.13 1 Pet. 2.6 Behold I lay in Zion a Chief Corner Stone elect precious and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded By this Faith Men are United to Christ and therefore cannot be divided from his Body which is the Church St. Paul calls the Church of God the House or Family of God and how a Man comes to be a Member of that Noble Family we are told Eph. 2.18 by the Spirit i. e. working of Faith we have access unto the Father and are no more Strangers and Forreigners but Fellow-Citizens of the Saints Gal. 6.10 and of the Houshold of God and therefore this Houshold of God is elsewhere called the Houshold of Faith In short nothing is more evident than that the Apostles received Men and Women into the Visible Church by Baptism upon the Profession of their Faith in Christ and thereby invested them in all the Sacred Priviledges of the New Covenant which belong only to the Church of God This Excellent Grace of Faith from whence our Union with Christ and his Body the Church doth flow is a very comprehensive thing it includes our solemn and hearty Choice of the Eternal God as our chiefest Happiness and hereby all the True Members of the Church are United in the Love and Service of One God and so distinguished from the Pagan World and in an humble affiance in One Mediator in whose hand alone they are brought back unto God and hereby are distinguished from Mahometans and those that call themselves Deists they are also United in the gracious Influences of One blessed Spirit and hereby are distinguished from all impenitent sensual persons who have grieved and quenched that Spirit And they are hereby United in One Rule of Faith Worship and Obedience not that they all understand this Rule alike or are fully conformed unto it but in this they agree that they all take it for their Rule
Societies off from the Unity of the Catholick Church and then the whole thread of his discourse is spoiled which every where makes Schism to be Separation from the Communion of the Catholick Church out of which he says truly there is no true Ministry nor Sacrament 2. If all Schismatical Societies are Unchurched then either they lose the Apostolical Succession and Power or else there may be Apostolical Power where there is no Church And it would be very strange to find a Power to Ordain and to Administer Sacraments in Societies where there can be no Ministry nor Sacraments Church Power without a Church a Right to Gevern the Church by Apostolical Succession and yet no Right to the Church or any of its Priviledges The power which is an adjunct without the Church which is its Subject These are mysteries which I am no more worthy to understand than that of Transubstantiation 3. If the Papal Churches through which this Power is conveyed be not Schismatical then he makes the Founders of his own Church so for he says There 's no way of holding Communion with the Universal Church Arch-Rebel p. 6. but by holding Communion with the Particular Churches we live amongst if they be not Schismatical Instead of speaking plainly to these things he asks us whether Re-ordination of those that come over from the Church of Rome to the Reformed was ever required We answer No and can give a good reason for it upon our Principles but it will be hard to do so upon his We do not think the validity of the Ministry depends upon such Line nor do we believe that either Schism or Heresie as such do utterly destroy their Church state indeed a renunciation of any of the fundamental Articles of our Faith would do it but every heresie will not We believe the Church of Rome to be both Schismatical and Heretical but do not therefore say their Church state is utterly lost though greatly corrupted for then it would be hard to allow their Ordinations especially if we thought Ordination so necessary and that the Validity thereof depended upon the Administrators as this Gentleman affirms Therefore where he says the Vindicator attempts to unchurch the Church of England because our Bishops derive their consecration from Rome he utterly mistakes himself the Vindicator spoke ad hominem and only shewed him what would be the consequence of his own arguing He tells us It is the Judgement of all Reformed Divines that formal Schism can never invalidate the power of formal and regular Ordination But if those Reformed Divines thought as be that formal Schism utterly excludes out of the Catholick Church they must needs acknowledge that where there is formal Schism there can be no such things as regular Ordination and 't is strange this Gentleman that makes Schism such an unchurching thing shall talk of a regular Ordination in a formal Schism one would think the regularity would have been spoiled if the Essence thereof should happily escape Dr. Sherlock Vindic. of Prot. Princ. p. 107 108. And yet some of our Doctor make this the very reason why the Dissenters Ordinations are Null because they ordain in a Schism granting that in case of necessity they may do it But as to the Reformed Divines if they allow the Ordination of Schismaticks to be valid it is either because they think the validity of the Orders does not depend upon the quallfications of the person conferring there or that Schism does not necessarily exclude a Person or People out of the Communion of the Catholick Church and here lies this Gentlemans Error he would tack the candid conclusion of the Reformed formed Churches to the unmerciful Premises of his own but they will by no means comport This Notion of the Necessity of an uninterrupted Line of Succession for the conveyance of Power like Water by Pipes and Conduits the Vindicator made bold to call a Whimsie which has exceedingly raised the Gentlemans Spleen A Whimsie says he that 's some Phantastick device or the Creature of an unst able unsettled Brain which being applied to Prelates that bear the Authority of Christ can be no less than Blasphemy But the Vindicator never charged this Whimsie upon the Prelates the greatest part of whom I dare say will not thank this man for hanging their Authority upon so slender a thread 't is his own Whimsie and so silly a one that we will never charge it on any that do not expresly own it and yet if a Man should venture to say of some Prelates that they are unstable and their Brains unsettled as namely the late Bishops of Oxford and Ely c. I know not how it can be proved Blasphemy nor will any man call it so that has not made an Idol of the Mitre or the Head that wears it unless these clamours proceed from the same Principle with those of the Ephesians who were as tender of their Diana as these men are of the Hierarchy and this Image of Succession that dropt down from Jupiter After all we have said against the Necessity of such a Line yet if this Gentleman or any for him will clear it we will have as much Benefit by it as himself having largely proved that Presbyters are the same with Bishops by the Law of God and therefore our Ordinations are as valid as theirs but we will never so far betray the Honour of the Church nor the Peace of mens Consciences as to make all depend upon that which is impossible to be proved and certainly if it be a thing of that consequence this Gentleman makes it the proof should be as strong and clear as that of the most essential Doctrines of our Religion and to say as Mr. Dodwel is forced at last that a Presumptive Title may serve is to unsay all and to confess that it is not the reality of such a Line on which the Power depends but the strong Conceit and Presumption of men which is the worst Basis that Episcopacy has ever yet been fixed upon 2. The second thing in our Plea is That the whole Jurisdiction of our English Bishops and the Power of their Canons is derived from the Civil Magistrate and Laws of the Land And this I think will follow from the former if this Prelatical Power be not from the Laws of God it must be from the Laws of the Land Here I expect some will reply Datur tertium there is the Jus Ecclesiasticum resulting from the Customs and Canons of the Church by which Bishops formerly laid claim to this Power even when there was no Christian Magistrate but this will be soon answered For 1. This Jus Ecclesiasticum has not the proper nature of a Law nor does it oblige by virtue of strict Authority we are not bound in Conscience by the Canons of Ancient Foreign Churches any farther than the matter of them brings the stamp of Scripture along with it Grot. de Impsum Potestat p. 168. The
it plainly speaks of that Extraordinary Mission of the Apostles to the Gentile World by them as Men infallibly inspired for that End were the great Doctrines of the Gospel delivered and the perpetual Rule of Faith laid down this they must by no means have presumed to do had they not been sent of God and yet without such a Gospel the World had never believed on Christ and this Apostolical Doctrine is still the great Instrument by which God converts Souls sometimes by reading of it themselves sometimes by hearing it from others whether duely ordained or no sometimes by bringing it to their Remembrance when they are neither reading nor hearing it though the usual way is by the Preaching of a faithful Ordained Ministry but to say that it is never done by other means cannot be proved by Scripture and is evidently contradicted by Experience I cannot but have a great value for the Judgment of Monsieur Claude in this particular and shall therefore transcribe his words in that learned Treatise before mentioned Histor Def. Part 4. p. 54. viz. It is the Church that produces the Ordinary Ministry and not the Ordinary Ministry that produces the Church The Church was the fruit of the Extraordinary Ministry of the Apostles and Evangelists That Ministry of theirs produc'd it at first and not only produc'd it but it has always made use of that means or that source for its Subsistence and we may truly say That it yet produces it and that it will produce it unto the End of the World For it is the Faith that makes and always will make the Church and it is the Ministry of the Apostles that makes and always will make the Faith It is their Voice that calls Christians together at this day it is their word that essembles them and their teaching that unites them It is certain that the Ministry of the Apostles was singular that is to say only tyed to their Persons without Succession without Communication or Propagation but it ought not to be thought that it was also transitory as that of other Men for it is perpetual in the Church Death has not shut their Mouths as it has others they speak they instruct they incessantly spread abroad Faith and Holiness among the Souls of Christians and there is not another Fountain from whence those Virtues can descend but from them If any demand of us what is the perpetual Voice that we ascribe unto them We answer That it is the Doctrine of the New Testament where they have set down all the Efficacy of their Ministry and the whole virtue of that Word which gave a Being to the Church there is their true Chair and Apostolick See there is the Center of Christian Unity there it is that they incessantly call Men and joyn them into a Society But as to the ordinary Ministry we cannot say the same thing of them it is not their Voice as distinct from that of the Apostles that begets the Faith that assembles Christians into a Society or that produces the Church They are no more but meer Dispensers of the words of the Apostles or external Instruments to make us the better understand their Voice to speak properly it is not the Voice of the ordinary Pastors that produces Faith where it was not before it is the word of the Apostles themselves They are no more but those External Guides that God has established in the Church to lead Men to the Scripture and even such Guides as cannot hinder us from going thither of our selves if we will Therefore there is a great difference betwixt these two sorts of Ministers the one preceded the Church the other follows it the one has an independent and sovereign Authority with Infallibility on its side the other is exposed to Vices Disorders Errors and humane Weaknesses inferior to and depending on the Church And indeed to affirm that no Man can be truly converted but by a Regular Ministry would involve the Minds of Men in endless Perplexities A Man must know all those things that belong to the due mission of the Preacher and must be assured that all those met in the person by whose Ministry he was helped to believe before he can know that he has true Faith this would keep persons in a dark and uncomfortable state all their days especially if a Line of uninterrupted Succession be necessary to a true Mission for then a Man must be able to prove that the Bishop that ordained his Converter was ordained by another Bishop and that by another and so up to the Apostles which because no man in the World can be morally assured of it is impossible for any Man to know that he has true Faith This is an insuperable difficulty on the one hand And on the other those Persons that know they have true Faith by the powerful effects of it upon their Hearts and Lives must conclude from hence that their Preachers were duely ordained and called otherwise they could nor have been instrumental in their Conversion and yet this would not be true for doubtless there are many honest Souls that fear God and work Righteousness amongst those Sects that have no Regular Ministry amongst them So that this Assertion would rob many Souls of the comfort of a true Faith because of the uncertainty of their Ministers Mission and it would confirm others in an irregular and unauthorized Ministry because of the cerainty of their Faith I hope by this time I may venture to conclude That the essential Unity of the Church consists in Gospel-Faith and Love hereby Men are made Saints and unired to Christ and Members of the Catholick Church Did I think the Chester Gentleman would not yet take it I would be so civil to him as to and some more Testimonies That of Clemens Alexandranus is apposite enough The ancient Catholick Church is but one only Church Strom. l. 7. and assembles in the Unity of one only Faith by the Will of one only God and Ministration of one only Lord all those who were before Predestanted to be just having known them before the Foundation of the World In Cant. Hom. 1. In Maten 16. De Ar◠Patr. l. 1. c. 3 In Psal 35. De coronà indilitis So likewise Origen The Church is the Society of the Saints and else where The Church which God builds consists in those who are upright and full of those Thoughts Words and Actions which lead to Blessedness St. Amtrose tells us The Assembly of the Righteous is God's Tabernacle and that the Saints are the Members of Jesus Christ Terrullian says Where there are Three there is a Church though they be Laicks for every one lives by his own Faith S. In Job c. 26. Jerome speaks to the same purpose saying The Church which is the Assembly of all Saints is the Pillar and Ground of Truth because she has in Jesus Christ an Eternal firmness In Cant. Hom. 1. and elsewhere The Church
disagree and easie to be mistaken whereas the Fundamentals being more directly and positively asserted in the Word of God admit of clearer demonstration 'T is true indeed those that think it their duty in all the lesser matters of Religion to follow their Leaders and that make their Commands in these things the Standard of Sin and Duty have found out an easie Rule of Controversie and this seems to be his opinion for he says if Mr. H. were better acquainted with Church History he would find that whole Churches and Nations had their peculiar Customs and Ceremonies and yet their Members agreed well enough in their opinions about them And I will venture to add if this Gentleman be as well acquainted with Church History as he pretends he knows in his Conscience that he imposes upon his Reader and would obtrude a great fallacy upon the World The first Attempt for the introducing such Customs and Ceremonies into the Worship of God occasioned a great deal of Contention and Discord in the Apostles times and the Imposers were severely check'd by them for their Arrogance Gal. 5.1 and all Christians commanded to stand fast in the Liberty wherewith Christ had made them free and not suffer themselves to be entangled with the yoak of Bondage and so great a Disturbance was raised by urgeing such Ceremonies v. 12. that the Apostle wishes they were cut off that troubled the Church with them And after the Apostles were dead when Ceremonies began to encrease though they were not for some time enjoyned but the People took them up partly of their own accord partly upon the example of those they had a great Veneration for yet they occasioned great Animosities and Discord in the Churches of which Socrates gives us many instances Lib. 5. c. 21 22. Sozom. l. 7.19 And when Victor would needs impose his Observation of Easter such Feuds and Heats were raised thereby as made them the scorn of the Pagans and were greatly lamented by all sober Bishops and Christians and both Cyprian and Irenaeus greatly blame him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as stretching the Rigour of his Government Euseb l. 5. c. 24. not only beyond his line but also to Causes of indifferency which would not admit of such severe Censures And as Ceremonies and Impositions encreased Contentions grew up with them till at last a great part of the Christian World was laid in a dead sleep with that Poison poured into the Church and for a long time became like Issachar a strong Ass submitting to every Burthen then indeed there was almost a Universal Agreement about Ceremonies and a general Prostitution of Conscience to the dictates of the pretended Catholick Church but that was the darkest and worst state wherein Christianity ever was in the World I come now to examine this Gentleman's Account of the Corinthian Schism and indeed hic pes figendus this is the Core of the Controversie and the hinge upon which it turns if he be right in this he has broken Mr. H's Measures and put him upon a new Enquiry Mr. H. supposes that these Corinthians who are reproved for their Schismatical Contentions were agreed in the fundamental Articles of Faith and great Truths of the Gospel but engaged in foolish and uncharitable Contests about the Apostles some commending Paul and preferring him before the rest others crying up Cephas and a third sort Apollos thus having the Faith of Christ with respect of Persons This Gentleman has learned from Dr. Hammend to say That the Persons reproved for these Contentions were the Gnostick Hereticks Review p. 20 21. that denied the Resurrection of the Dead and lived in Incest and disswaded the People from Marriage and sacrificed to Idols that they might escape Persecution some of them pretend they had their heretical Doctrines from St. Paul P. 22. others fathered theirs upon Apollos others upon Cephas and another sort pretended they had seen Christ himself and received those Doctrines from his Mouth And he affirms they were Heretical Gnosticks only and not the Orthodox P. 24. who are reprehended by the Apostle for saying I am of Paul and I of Apollos and concludes that the Schism of the Corinthians lay in opposing the sound Orthodox Doctors and maintaining their own wild Heresies under the Umbrage of these great Names Were it not for these Gnostick Hereticks I know not what some Men could do to misunderstand plain Scripture if we meet with any smart Reproofs in the Apostolical Epistles still they must be levell'd at the Gnostick Hereticks if any were guilty of Fornication it was the Gnosticks if any of Temporizing or of Schism they were Gnosticks as if all besides them had been Pure and Innocent This is too great partiality and savours much of the Pharisaical Humour of some Modern Men that are for casting the Odium of every ill thing upon those they are pleased to call Schismaticks that under this Blind all the Sons of the Church may come off clear and be thought in every thing blameless and inoffensive Now although I make no question but there were such Hereticks in those days and that they were as bad as he describes them that some of them lived amongst the Corinthians and that the Apostle sometimes speaks concerning them though I seldom find that he speaks directly to them yet that these were the persons here reproved for Schism much less the only persons I can never believe For these reasons 1. 1 Cor. 1. The Character which the Apostle gives of these contentious Corinthians in the context will by no means fit the Gnostick Hereticks for we find he calls them the Church of God Saints and in the 9th verse Persons that were called into the Fellowship of Christ Jesus our Lord and in the very same verses wherein he admonishes them of their Schismatical Contentions he calls them Brethren v. 10. Now I beseech you Brethren by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions amongst you For it hath been declared unto me of you my Brethren that there are contentions among you Now this I say that every one of you saith I am of Paul c. Can any Man imagine these such gross and damned Hereticks as the Gnosticks have been always described Can we believe the same Apostle that was so sharp upon those that urged the Jewish Ceremonies as to call them Dogs and Evil Workers and bid the Christians beware of them would be so tender and kind so affectionate and endearing to the vilest corrupters of the Christian Faith as to call them Saints and Brethren and all the good names imaginable I am sure the Church of England seldom speaks to Protestant Dissenters in such obliging language and yet I hope we are not altogether so bad as the Gnostick Hereticks 2. If the fault here reproved had been Herefie and such as this Gentleman speaks of there 's no question but the Apostle