Comparison as the Case in hand would admit of nor will I trouble the Reader with long stories of the admirable Conversation of those early Christians which whoso will take the pains may find in Justin Martyr A thenagoras Tertullian Origen and others And he that is willing to decline that trouble may find nearer hand in the Collections of a judicious and faithful Writer in his Book called Primitive Christianity But it may not be unuseful to remark some few particulars Of old to be a Christian was to be all that is holy just and good to be adorned with all those Virtues that can render a man acceptable to God or lovely amongst men Whereever this Religion came it was a Principle of Purity in mens Hearts of Honesty in their Lives and of Peace in Kingdoms and Societies It raised mens minds to a Contemplation and Pursuit of another World and inabled them both to despise the present and to be a blessing to it It did not teach men to speak great swelling words but to live to do and to suffer admirably that the very Pagans their mortal Enemies were astonished at them and some of them gave them this testimony Hi sunt qui vivunt ut loquuntur loquuntur ut vivunt These are the men that are as good as their word and live as high and generously as others talk The Christian Faith was not then a meer trick of Wit nor a bone of Contention but a Principle of sincere Honesty which guided men into the knowledge of their Duty and inspired them with courage and resolution to perform it Give me saith Lactantius a fierce and contentious man and if he will but apply himself to the Grace and Institutions of the Gospel he shall become as mild as a Lamb Give me a Drunkard or a Lascivious person with this Doctrine I will make him chaste and sober Let a Covetous man hearken to this Doctrine and he shall presently dispense his money as charitably as before he raked it together fordidly Give me a timorous and cowardly person this Religion shall presently make him valiant and despise death and danger And so he goes on In those dayes Believing was not an excuse for Disobedience or a commutation for a holy Life but a foundation of Obedience to all the Laws of God and man Then all the Professors of Christianity bad one heart and one lip and then they built towards Heaven in a good sense but since distraction of Mind alienation of Affections and confusion of Language hath made a Babel of a Church There was then but one division of men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were the only Sects the World was divided by all good men were of one way and evil men of another But now there are almost as many Opinions as Men as many Parties as Opinions and as many Religions as either Time was when men sacrificed their Lives in testimony to their Faith as frankly as since they have done to their Passions Revenge or Ambition Then was Charity counted as essential a part of Religion as Censoriousness is now with too many Brotherly love and mutual dearness was a characteristical Note of those then that now may be as well known by their distractions and animosities St. Gregory Nazianzen said of those Times That if one Christian took notice of the error sin or failing of another it was to bewail it to heal it to cover his shame and cure his wound and prevent a scandal to his Profession but he observed that after-times made triumphs of mens weakness and follies and men learnt to justifie their own wickedness by the miscarriages of their Brethren and that he that would prove himself of the highest form of Christians set himself down in the seat of the scorner Nothing was then thought too good or costly for the service of God or Religion Men would not content themselves to serve God with that which cost them nothing It was only Julian or such another that envyed the costly Vessels wherewith Christ was served Works of Piety and Mercy and Charity cost them as much as Luxury and Contention now a dayes When the Gentiles in Tertullian's time upbraided the Christians that they made choice of a Cheap Religion and renounced the Pagan Sacrifices because they would not undergo the charge of them and complained that the Frugality of the Christian Worship caused a decay of Trade for the Eastern Gumms and Spices that used to be spent in the service of the Gods and that by this means the Customs of the Emperors were also diminished To all this he makes this answer We Christians spend more in the relief of the poor than you Gentiles do upon your Gods And though we use not Gumms and Spices for Incense yet we as much promote Trade by the vast proportions of those commodities we spend in the imbalming our dead And lastly if it should happen that the Emperors Exchequer should lose any thing either by the temperance of our Lives or the nature of our Religion yet we make it up another way for we make conscience of paying him his just dues whereas you cheat and defraud him of more than the proportion of your expences above ours would amount to In those early times the Christian Assemblies drained and emptied the Roman Theatres and the multitude thronged into the Church as earnestly as now they crowd out Coimus in coetum ut ad deum quasi manu factâ precationibus ambiamus orantes said the forementioned Tertullian The confluence to the publick Worship was in those dayes so great and the consent of heart and voice so universal that St. Jerome said The Hallelujahs of the Church was like the noise of many Waters and the Amen like Thunder Heaven and Earth then answered each other in a glorious Antiphone and made up one blessed Chorus There was joy in Heaven and peace on Earth The Hymn sung by the Angel at our Saviours Nativity was verified in those first Ages of his Religion Glory to God on High on Earth peace and Good-will amongst men The Holy men of those times that approached our Saviour had as it were some Rayes of his Divinity shed upon them and their faces shone like Moses's when he came down from the Holy Mount A Christian Church was a Colledge of holy and good men and the Glory of God filled the place where they assembled and Fire came down from Heaven too but not to set the World in combustion but to exhale and lift up the Odours of pious and devout Prayers But since those times Zeal hath decayed as if it had not been the intrinsick Excellency of Religion but the fires of Pagan Persecution that kindled that heat in the breasts of Christians And the Church so divided and broken in pieces as if it was not one Lord one Faith one Baptism that united them but a common enemy Dry Opinions have been taken for Faith and Zeal of a
there was just ground for our Recession for as I said it could not be sin to depart when it was so to continue And it is a very reasonable choice rather to be condemned by them of Singularity than to be damned for Company But now it is quite otherwise in the Church of England No man here parts with his Faith upon his Conformity no man is bound to give away his Reason and common Sense for quietness sake No man needs to hazard the Peace of a good and well instructed Conscience for the Peace of the Church No man is tempted to renounce his Integrity but may be as good and holy a man as he will and the more of that the better Church-man This Church keeps none of her Children in an uncomfortable estate of darkness but teaches the true knowledge of God and Christ sincerely and very advantageously She hath no half Communions nor debarrs any of her members of the priviledge and comfort of Christs Institutions She recommends the same Faith and the same Scriptures that all Protestants are agreed in The same God and only he is worshipped the same rules of holy Life are propounded as well as the same hopes and happiness expected By this brief representation the difference between the Church of Rome and the Protestants appears so wide and vast that they agree neither in their Creed nor Object of Worship nor Sacraments nor Rules of Life On the other side the agreements of Protestants with the Church of England is so full and perfect that they have not only the same God and Christ but the same object of Worship the same way of Devotion in a known Tongue the same Sacraments and same rule of life which certainly are all the great things that the Consciences of men are concerned in A man might therefore justly wonder these things being so what should make a breach and what place there is for contention or what can remain considerable enough to occasion the dissatisfaction to provoke the animosity to countenance that distance that is between us And I verily believe it would be hard for a stranger to this Church and Nation that understood the state of the case thus far to guess what should be the bone of contention amongst us I will now as well as I can both saithfully and briefly recite the matters of difference And I must needs confess if we number them only they are many But if we weigh them not only against the things we are agreed in but against peace and agreement it self I perswade my self they will be very light But that I must leave to the judgement of the Reader The things themselves are these and such as these Whether such Prayers shall make up the body of the publick Liturgy as have been conceived by the Governours of the Church and used ever since the Reformation or such as shall pro re nata be occasionally indited by every private Minister Or which perhaps is much the same whether such words expressions and phrases shall be continued in the publick Service as are by long use grown familiar to and intelligible by vulgar people or such shall come in their room as are more modern and grateful to nicer Ears About the several postures of Standing Kneeling and Sitting and whether some one of these be more decorous and accommodate to some part of Gods Worship than another and which to which About observation of Dayes and Times as whether the Anniversaries of the Birth Death and Resurrection of our Saviour and other great passages of the Gospel be of use and fit to be observed And whether some special Time of Abstinence and Mortification in conformity to the Primitive Church may now be retained or not About Habits and Garments such as Gown Surplice c. whether the habit used in ministration in the time of King Edward be not now as lawful as any other About the Ceremony of the Cross in Baptism whether whilest it is declared not essential to Baptism it may not upon other considerations be used in that Sacrament Or lastly which I think is as important as any of the rest whether Subordinacy of the Clergy in the Episcopal way or Co-ordinacy and Parity in the Presbyterian be rather to be preferred Most of the Disputes we have amongst us are either upon these questions or reducible to these or at least of like nature with these Now how inconsiderable these things are in themselves and how fit to be made a Sacrifice to Peace I forbear to say till I have in the second place shewn as I promised that something must be forgone for it 2. It was a worthy and memorable saying of Erasmus Mihi sanè adeò invisa est discordia ut veritas etiam displiceat seditiosa He did not only suspect that Proposition was not true that was not also peaceable but he thought Peace not too dear at the price of some Truth And he that pretends so high a value for the latter as to have no esteem for the former neither understands the one nor the other Greg. Nazianz. puts this Question 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and answers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That peace is not only the most beautiful flower in the Garden of Christianity but also the most soveraign and useful Though it be commonly dealt with as some famed beauty admired and courted but not espoused The Apostle when Rom. 12. 18. he so passionately exhorts If it be possible and as far as in you lyes have peace with all men surely did not mean that we should only accept of Peace when it is offered us for nothing or be quiet till we can pick a quarrel but that we should be at some cost to purchase it and part with something for it and deny our selves something which but upon that account we might lawfully have enjoyed It is true we may buy Gold too dear and so we must have done our Peace if we sought it at the hands of those Hucksters of the Church of Rome as I shewed before But that we cannot reasonably expect it for nothing in any Society in the World I think is demonstratively evident by this one consideration That there are scarcely any intellectual Menaechmi I mean hardly any two persons perfectly of the same apprehension or stature of understanding in the whole world So much difference there is in mens Constitutions such diversity of Education such variety of Interests and Customs and from hence so many kinds of Prejudices and various Conceptions of things that he that resolves to yield to no body can agree with no body and consequently cannot be happy in any Church or Society on this side of Heaven There indeed some think mens minds shall be all of one capacity but whatever be the truth in that particular I much doubt whether those persons will ever make up that society of the Church Triumphant that think themselves bound to disturb the state of the Church Militant unless all things
are most practicable in the Case And in the first place they of the Church of Rome as many and great Schisms as they have laboured under formerly yet now glorying in their Unity and Peace and upbraiding all others with their respective Distractions may seem to have arrived at some remarkable skill and to be fit to be advised withal and they attribute an admirable efficacy to the following Method First By way of Prevention they prescribe that the people be kept in profound Ignorance and then they suppose they will never trouble the Church with Disputes nor themselves with Scruples Let them but be blind enough and they will swallow many a Flye that others strain and boggle at keep them up in the dark like Birds or Wild Beasts and you will render them tame and manageable They affirm Pictures to be Books good enough for the Laity and say Those are the best Sheep that know nothing but their own Fold The Priests lips they confess should preserve knowledge but so they preserve it from the people it is no great matter whether they have it themselves or no. This Opiate or stupefactive Ignorance these Empiricks mightily cry up and for proof of the virtue of it go but over into Spain or Italy and you shall observe what strange cures it hath done It hath made as sagacious people as any in the world naturally so far from Disputes in Religion that they scarce know what it means Administer but a large Dose of this and it shall have the same effect the Plague of Darkness had in Aegypt that suffered no man to stir out of his place But this Advice how successful soever it hath been in other places will not be admitted in England for two reasons 1. If it were commendable in it self yet it comes too late for the people of England know so much already that the only way to cure the inconveniences of that is to let them know more And as an Excellent Person hath well observed concerning Atheism That a little smattering in Philosophy disposes men to it by intangling them in Second Causes which they cannot explicate but a through insight into it leads them through that perplexed maze to the discovery of the First Cause of all things So 't is only superficial knowledge in Christianity that gives occasion to our troubles when men think they know but do not or because they know a little conceit they understand all that is knowable and hereupon refuse instruction and oppose their private opinions to the publick wisdom Whereas did these men see further into things they would then discover a reason of many things they are now dissatisfied with or at least distrust their own understandings and grow modest and peaceable 2. Besides if this Advice came timely yet we take the Remedy to be worse than the Disease for we esteem it better if one be necessary to erre like Men than to be driven like Beasts or acted like Puppets The Gospel Church is frequently called in Scripture the Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of light but by this course of blind Devotion and stupid Ignorance it would become more like Hell which they say hath heat without light God in the Gospel requires a reasonable service and it can never be consistent that those that pretend Christ Jesus is risen upon them as a Sun of Righteousness should think to worship this Sun by turning their backs upon him or shutting their eyes against his light If it were or could be so then this Proposition would be true That the way to become good Christians is to cease to be Men. 2. Secondly They direct us to an Infallible Judge of all Controversies And this they so much magnifie and represent as absolutely necessary to Peace that they tell us we shall labour in vain in the use of all other Expedients and only roll up a weight with infinite pains that will with the greater violence return upon us again till we make use of this Remedy But it is so Mountebank-like to pretend to Infallible Cures that we desire to be resolved of these two or three things before we can comply with the advice 1. We would fain know how it came to pass that so important a point as this is of an Infallible Judge of Controversies which it is pretended would secure the Peace of all States preserve the Concord and the Dignity of all Churches stop the mouths of all Atheists prevent the Sin and the Damnation of many Souls is no more plainly asserted in Scripture nor proved by Reason nor better agreed of amongst themselves that thus recommend it A man would reasonably expect that a business of this nature which is therefore of more value than any one Article of Faith in as much as that it hereupon depends what shall be so should have been more clear and evident than those things that depend upon it but contrariwise we find that no man ever yet could perswade by Reason that one certain man in the World was more than a man and all the rest less And then for Scripture that plainly tells us that all men are lyars i. e. such as may deceive or be deceived and most undoubtedly would never have made such a distinction of Christians as strong men and babes in Christ nor made it our duty to consider one anothers weakness and practise mutual forbearance if it had intended any where to direct us to such an Umpire as should have ended all disputes and made all men equally certain But then for agreement amongst themselves where to lodge this Infallibility whether in the Pope alone or in the Pope and Consistory or in a General Council or in all these together or in something else is for ought I see a Question that needs an Infallible Judge to determine 2. How comes it to pass that all Controversies are not determined and Disputes ended long ago if this were true that is pretended Whether there be any Infallible Judge to resort to now is the point in question but it is certain there was such a thing in the Apostles times they had the assistance of the Holy Spirit in such a manner as to guide them into all truth and gave miraculous proofs that they had so and yet this would not cure all the Schisms nor resolve all Scruples nor silence all Disputes then And how Infallibility in a Pope or any other person if it were there to be found should have better success now than it had in those more sincere and simple times of Christianity I think is not very reasonably expected Besides We find manifestly that those that glory so much of this Remedy have not found such benefit by it as that they commend it to us for For it is well enough known that the Romanists have their Disputes as well as we The Franciscans against the Dominicans and the Jansenists against the Molinists and their several Perswasions managed with as much heat as any of our
the other side requires as great a condescension to our Brethren And if now the scales seem even then certainly the consideration of the Magistrate and Laws in being will be of weight enough to turn the balance and that Humility and Obedience our Religion teaches will prevail with us to leave it to publick Wisdom to decide between both Parties And then the result of all will be that instead of prescribing to the Magistrate what he shall determine or disputing what he hath concluded on we shall compose our minds and order our circumstances to the more easie and cheerful complyance therewith And call to mind the saying of Paulus Aemilius who when several of his Souldiers would be suggesting to him their several Models of management Vos gladios acuite bids them whet their swords and be ready to execute what should be commanded them but leave the management of affairs to him their General CHAP. VII Wherein Christian Liberty consists and that it doth not discharge us from Obedience to Laws ALL that we have hitherto discoursed of the Power of the Magistrate some think may be avoided by pleading the Magna Charta of Christian Liberty contained in the Gospel It will therefore be necessary in the next place to consider the true notion and extent of that That there is such a Charter is out of doubt the New Testament frequently making mention of it putting of us in mind of the gratitude we owe to him that purchased it for us of the price it cost him and requiring us to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free Gal. 5. 1. But what are the Contents of it is not so well agreed on and indeed it is too evident that few of those that contend so much for it and plead it upon all occasions know what it is or wherein it consists It was a smart Answer of a Spartan Captive who being exposed to sale in the Market and there askt as the manner was by one that came to buy Slaves quid sciret what he was good for what business he understood answered Scio quid sit liberum esse I know what belongs to freedom Had Christian Liberty been all along as well understood as talked of the Religion had obtained more Reputation the Church more Peace States and Kingdoms more Security and more Souls had gone to Heaven but for want of this men have committed as gross errors as that Tully complains of Clodius for That he set up Simulacrum Meretricis Tanagraeae The Image of a famous Harlot for that of Liberty The Gnosticks about the Apostles times pleaded Christian Liberty both on the behalf of their cowardly Revolts from Christianity in times of Persecutition and of their sensual Debaucheries as if the knowledge of the Truth gave a priviledge neither to profess nor practise it when either the one proved too incommodious to their Secular Interests or the other too disgustful to their sensual inclinations Others and they also in the first times of Christianity thought Christian Liberty had been a Civil Infranchisement and had extended so far as to cancell all bonds of peoples subjection to their Princes or of Servants to their Masters and hereupon like the pretence of zeal amongst the Jews in their degenerate times Christian Liberty was the Passport of fugitive servants and the pretext for Outrages and Rebellions And this made it necessary for the Apostles almost in all their Writings to press Obedience to Superiours A third sort of men have mistaken this Gospel Liberty to be a discharge from the obligation of the Moral Law and have been so prodigiously absurd as to take the Gospel to contain nothing else properly but a publication of Gods Promises or Decrees rather and to require only a bare assent to them or belief of them and that those Promises are absolute and without any condition of our obedience save only as that should reciprocally become us by way of gratitude not that justification or salvation depended upon it This is the Doctrine of the Antinomians or modern Libertines and is a perswasion fit to debauch the whole world were it not that few men can be so unreasonable as to believe it though they would But it is so contrary to the very name and nature of a Covenant which the Gospel is styled to be so expresly contrary to the whole design of Christian Doctrine and goes so cross to the very sense of every honest mind that I shall not spend any more time or words about it There is a fourth mistake which though I will not say it is equally dangerous with any of the former yet is mischievous enough and equally false That though the bonds of Civil Subjection are not quite dissolved by the Gospel yet that all Christians are discharged from the interpositions of the Magistrate in affairs of Religion and that there he ought no further to intermeddle than he can produce express warrant from Scripture for his particular Injunctions But if notwithstanding the Governour shall arrogate to himself a larger sphere of Authority and make any definitions in Religion or especially the matters of the first Table It is then and in that case not only lawful for a good Christian to refuse Obedience but that it is his duty so to do to withstand an Invasion of his Christian Liberty and an incorachment upon the Prerogative of God This is the mistake that is most rife amongst us and which hath given occasion to much of the unhappiness of this Age. It is not my work laboriously to confute this opinion nor do I think many words necessary in the case yet of the many absurd consequences let us note these following 1. This opinion makes all Civil Government the most ticklish and uncertain and the condition of Magistrates the most servile and precarious that can well be imagined forasmuch as there is scarcely any thing can fall under their care and cognizance or capable to be made matter of Law or Injunction but hath such affinity to or connexion with Religion as to be sufficient upon this principle to raise a dispute of Jurisdiction So that the case between the Civil Laws and Religion will be like the condition of affairs that often happens in those places where the Supremacy of the Pope and Court of Rome is received there is a perpetual contention about bounds and limits of Jurisdiction between the Civil and Ecclesiastical Courts for whilest the Civil Judge goes about to take cognizance of the cause the Ecclesiastical will it may be challenge the person as belonging to his Jurisdiction or if the person be Laick and alieni fort yet it will go hard but the cause shall be found to have some connexion with Religion and so the Ecclesiastical Court either directly or in ordine ad spiritualia draws all matters to it And not unlike was the state of affairs a long while together in the Kingdom and Church of Scotland by virtue of this very perswasion