Prophesie but of the Press also A shrewd sign that they disguise the truth and are afraid to be discovered and that they do distrust the Judgment of the World upon such their Actions For it is a derogation to Faith to dread the publishing of Truths All the World hath ever complained of the Vices Incroachments and Male-government of the Clergy attributing the cause of all State Distempers to be that the Clergy did creep into and busie themselves in the Courts of Princes and in the Affairs of the World being Judges Chancellors Secretaries Treasurers What not there being but few Officers of State into which some Ecclesiasticks have not insinuated themselves and crept in which is to ridicule Religion and shamefully to confound Spiritual and Temporal things together which is altogether Unapostolical This I am sure is forbidden by St. Paul and the whole tenor of the Scripture who thought it necessary that a Soldier of the Church should abstain from Secular imployments 2 Tim. 2.4 for Christianity is a continual Warfare they would take it very ill if one should say that Priesthood were not Jure Divino and happily well they may and I doubt they will take it as ill if we say that because it is Jure Divino therefore no Priest from the Presbyter to the Pope ought to busie themselves or take any Secular Imployment that may any way impede their daily Ministrations distract or avert their Thoughts or necessarily enforce their absence Vid. Canon Apost 7.80 And in the Ecclesiastical Laws there is a whole Title Ne Clerci vel Monachi secularibus negotiis innisceant Pope Clement the Seventh to serve a turn made all demonstration that he had laid aside all thoughts of Temporal things I could wish our Priests would do it in good earnest And St. Chrysostom hath a long discourse complaining of Clergy-men leaving the care of Souls and become Proctors Economists c. Preaching things unbeseeming the Ministery And it is not only against Precept Divine but against Moral and Natural right as appeareth Luke 10.7 and Matth. 10.10 1 Tim. 5.18 It is the labourer the workman not the lasie drone and loyterer that is worthy of his hire his meat and his reward It is they who minister not they who do not minister about holy things that have right to live of the things of the Temple and they that wait not they that do not wait at the Altar not at the Court or on secular Imployments that have right to be partakers of the Altar for the Lord hath so ordained that they which preach not they who preach not the Gospel should live of the Gospel 1 Cor. 9. 13 14. For Priesthood was at first instituted not for Honours nor for Dignities nor for Rewards as now used and have been so used many hundreds of Years but for Ministeries and Charges called by St. Paul Works and those that excrcise them called by Christ Workmen tho Priest-craft hath turned them into Benefices For Priests are most properly God's Workmen And St. Paul's practice was anserable to his Doctrine and the charge is given Rom. 12.7 8. to wait on that office whereunto we are called whether to prophecy let us prophecy according to the proportion of faith or ministery let us wait on our ministery or be that teacheth on teaching c. Where there is a Commandment there lies a Bond upon the Conscience to do To Preach the Gospel there is a Duty ever binding a Minister with a woe annexed if he Preach not Moreover the work of Preaching is so much more excellent above all other Acts of the Ministery that for my part I cannot imagine what that great and important business of the Ministery can be to which it can become preaching to submit I am sure not Sacraments and if not Sacraments I am sure nothing more excellent Christ sent me not to baptize but to preach the Gospel 1 Cor. 1.17 he might as well have said not to domineer not to do any thing in this sense comparatively as he desires to be understood Besides is there any thing more honourable Hear the same Apostle 1 Tim. 5.17 the Elders that rule well are worthy of double honour Call it Reverence or Maintenance or both however a specialty in it belongs to them that labour in the Word and Doctrine And it is most certain that more sound honour is to be gained in the Hearts of the People by Preaching than by all outward helps whatsoever What say I honour amongst Men yea more comfort to their Consciences and glory in God's Kingdom Hear Solomon Prov. 11.30 he that winneth Souls is wise and Daniel 12.3 they that turn others to righteousness shall shine as the Stars in the firmament And Paul 1 Thess 2.19 What is our hope our joy our crown of rejoycing are ou not it in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming What comfort like this when a Minister comes before the Lord the great Shepheard of the Sheep with the word of Isaiah applied to our Saviour Lo me and the Children thou hast given me Isai 8.18 the Sons and Daughters which by thy blessing I have begotten unto thee in the Gospel One of the Apostles on whose Shoulders lay the care of all the Churches yet denounces woe to himself if he preach not the Gospel And Timothy hath that charge laid on him with an heavy adjuration to preach the Word 2 Tim. 4.1 2. Besides their very Priesthood obligeth them to be Watchmen and therefore to watch continually on their Ministry and if any of their Flock miscarry thro' their unwatchfulness their blood will be required at their hands and they cannot be ignorant that Sathan with millions of sins and stratagems are ever besieging inticing clamoring haling rebelling intruding with Love with Strength with Law with Arguments with Importunities always importuning and diverting their Flocks from the right way and therefore they ought always to stand Sentinel to forewarn and help Certainly if the Apostles were so Puritanical so Phanatical so Whiggish and so scrupulous of entertaining any Imployment tho' never so Pious and Charitable that might any way in the least hinder the main end of their Duty viz. to preach the Gospel I humbly conceive that our Bishops and Priests accounting themselves successors of the Apostles and sent as they were sent ought also to follow their Doctrine and Examples as well in this particular as in any other And sith the Lords provision for Levites was so made that they might attend the Altar and wait continually on the Sanctuary without the distraction and cumber of any civil Imployments I cannot see how plunging conflicting earthly Imployments can consist with the duty and charge of a Minister and execution of his Commission seeing to preach the Gospel being a duty ever binding Ministers with a Woe annxed if they preach not Woe to the idle shepherds if they preach not Ezek. 34.2 as heavy as to those that are at ease in Sion They cannot
command was to have peace one with another Mark 9.50 and the unity of the spirit is preserved by the bond of peace Ephes 4.3 But the little self-ends of Earth and Interest of the Preferments Ambition and Domination is the cause of Controversies Animosities and Contentions to which Priests are as subject as others 2. I say There were false Prophets among the Jews and was foretold that as there were false Prophets among them so there should be false teachers among us 2 Pet. 2.1 And St. Paul forewarned the Bishop of Ephesus That out of your own selves should arise men speaking perverse things Acts 20.30 and Christ himself when he cautioneth us to beware of false Prophets by calling which shall be found false by their teaching St. Paul also granteth many to be ministers of Christ by profession and yet in words and deeds the ministers of Satan 2 Cor. 11.13 14 15. such false Apostles saith he are deceitful workers and transform themselves into the Apostles of Christ and for certain these Priests of such different Perswasions Principles and Doctrines cannot both be in the right and therefore good Reason that if poor Laicks are to live and die Eternally according to the Doctrines our Pastors pulpit to us it is but just and right that we should try the Spirits as commanded John 1.41 and judg of Doctrine as directed Cor. 10.15 for certainly we are not to live by the deputy Faith of our Officers but by our own Faith and must stand and fall accordingly Now seeing our Teachers cannot agree Doctrines as in point of Resistance and Passive Obedience taking and refusing new Oaths Ceremonies Conformity as well as in many others they do not and both cannot be in the right then are their Flocks in a very sad condition Pulpit-rebels both to the one and to the other as the one or the other prevails for neither are Infallible so that we are clearly left to be our own Judges and both Priest and People have no other Divine Rule or Authority without them warrantable to one another as a common Ground or Rule either for Holy living or decision of Controversies in Matters of Religion unto which all ought to submit but the Scriptures nor any other within either Priest or People But the Illumination of the Spirit so interpreting the same Scriptures as warrantable both to Priests and People and to such whose Consciences they can so perswade can have no other ground in matters of Religion but only from the same Scriptures and these not being possible to be understood without Divine Illumination which no man can know at all times to be in himself much less to be at any time for certain in another and therefore the Scriptures being the only infallible Rule of life and of judging Controversies and the Light within us no farther Light than wherein it agrees with this Word if it do not it is Darkness not Light Now these things considered will justifie our taking up the Cudgels for our own Defence and Justification in these great and dangerous Disputes having Souls Lives Fortunes Liberties to save and enjoy as well as Ecclesiasticks Though the Church of England be the best constituted Church in the World wherein the lively Oracles of God are purely Preached and full fraught with many very worthy pious and learned Priests and Prelates yet there are amongst them many false Prophets and no wonder was not there a Judas among the Twelve and false Teachers nay very many time-servers that pimp for Domination Honors Preferments and other vile and base ends and like Micha's Levite for a little better reward swallow any thing stick at nothing by School-quirks and false Reasonings perverting Scriptures to rob whole Kingdoms of their Laws Liberties and Religion that daub with untempered Mortar flatter Profaneness court and allure Royalties to Perjury and Robbery whilst they Preach Quod libet licet and Sovereignty absolutely Absolute to be in Kings and their unaccountableness betray Truths smothering and dissembling the Strictness and Purity of holy Ways I contend not here against the lazy Drones that suck the Hony from the Bees by their Non-residency nor against the Dammees Euphoniae gratia these are personal Sins and hurt others only by Example and such there are but my contest is against those Ecclesiasticks who living and had interest at the upper end of the World not only usurped more Powers than they had right unto but abused those Powers and that Interest they had at Court from which abuse of Power pulpiting Divine Prerogatives of Kings beyond measure their unaccountableness misconstruing and extending Passive Obedience beyond its just Bounds Which have been the Harrangues of Prints and Pulpits till their own Copiholds came to be concerned come all the disturbances of Government in Church and State to whole Kingdoms No wonder then if contempt be poured on such of the Clergy and on such of them only as Preach such destructive Doctrines as deserve the severe Reprimand of whole Kingdoms for thereby all Laws Liberty Property Religion and Honesty would be trampled under foot Therefore it 's no Crime in the Laity to stand up in the defence of their own Rights and Concerns As it is the duty of Priests Ministers of the Gospel to teach us with Wisdom and Knowledge so it is our duty to esteem them highly in love if they do so for their Works sake and they that labour in the Word and Doctrine are worthy of double Honour and double Revenue they cannot have too much but they that do not Teach us with Knowledge and Understanding are worthy of neither but when they abuse and usurp Powers they have no right unto and claim them as their due by the most Potent Claim in the World Jure Divino monstrum horrendum Witness Excommunication because there hath as of old so of more late Days so much ill use made thereof of which I shall only say with Erastus de Excommunicatione that there is no such thing as it is now used in all the Scripture in Sanctis Scripturâ—s nullum extat mandatum sed commentum est pure humanum p. 67. Which renders the Execution thereof abominable To wrest Scripture to maintain such unlawful Powers doth very ill become the Priests of the most High God As it is their Duty to Teach so it is our Priviledge and Right to judge of their Doctrines yea and to put them in mind and admonish them also of their duty Coloss 4.17 Mistake me not as if this were bent against the Bishops only no no Papist Presbyter Independant are all to blame in this Point and it 's no excuse to us if we are deceived by the cunning Crastiness of our Ghostly Fathers whereby they lie in wait to deceive Let us look a little back no farther than our own Times and Memories and let them stand or fall in the good Graces of the Kingdom according to their Merits or Demerits Rushworth 644 1628. In the time of
Dead of many Superfluities which creep into the Churches under the name of Order and Decency did interpose it self For to charge Churches and Liturgies with things unnecessary was the beginning of all Superstition and when scruples of Conscience began to be made or pretended then Schisms began to break in If the Spiritual Guides and Fathers of the Church would be a little sparing of incumbring Churches with superfluities and not over-rigid in either reviving obsolete Customs or imposing new there were far less danger of Schism or Superstition and all the inconveniences likely to ensue would be but this they should in so doing yield a little to the Imbecillity of Inferiors a thing which St. Paul would never have refused to do Mean while wheresoever false and suspected Opinions are made a piece of the Church Liturgy he that separates is not the Schismatick for that is a like unlawful to make Profession of known or suspected Falshoods as to put in practice unlawful or suspect Actions Much of the same Opinion is Bishop Usher If at this day we should take a Survey of the several Professions of Christianity that have any large spread in any part of the World as of the Religion of the Romans and the Reformed Churches in our Quarters of the Egyptians and Ethiopians in the South of the Graecians and other Christians in the East and should put by the Points wherein they differ one from another and gather from one Body the rest of the Articles wherein they all did generally agree we should find that in those Propositions which without Controversie are Universally received in the whole Christian World so much Truth is contained that being joyned with Holy Obedience may be sufficient to bring Men into everlasting Salvation His Sermon on Ephes 4.13 preached before his Majesty 1624. If our Ecclesiastical Grandees in the last Reformation of our Liturgy had been of St. Paul's mind as they ought to have been and not abuse their Power in the Gospel who though he was free from all Men yet made himself Servant unto all that he might gain the more to the Jew a Jew to them that are under the Law as under the Law to them that are without the Law as without the Law being not without Law to God but under the Law to Christ To the weak as weak and was made all things to all men that by any means he might save some And this he did for the Gospel sake 1 Cor. 9.18 23. And by his so doing he gave no offence neither to the Jews nor the Gentiles nor to the Church of God but he pleased all men in all things not seeking his own profit but the profit of many that they might be saved chap. 10. ver 32 33. There had been no complaining of our Prelates nor any matter left to pick quarrels withall and the Kingdom much happier than now it is which Doctrine of Compliance is to be understood only of things indifferent And our Non-cons desire but the like in things indifferent Sure if St. Paul so much a more excellent Person than our Pontiffs held it his Duty thus to comply it would be no disparagement to our Prelates to do the same Certainly none will dare to aver That our Conventicles quatenus Conventicles are unlawful but unlawful only upon Presumptions and ungrounded Prejudices and Surmizes that their Non-conformist Teachers mostly Presbyterians or Independants do teach or foment Rebellion Schism Faction Now if in truth they are not guilty of such Crimes but their good Conversation is falsly abused by them 1 Pet. 3.16 What have such Conformist Church of England Men to answer for themselves that so slander them by laying such Crimes to their charge as they are no ways guilty of and in their Pulpits out of which nothing should be Preach't but what is as true as Gospel One Mr. J.T. in his Sermon on Eccl. 10.20 pag. 29 31. hath so hard thoughts of them as to believe That we shall never be free of a Plot if not against the Lafe of the King yet against the Peace and Honour of his Government so long as there is one Conventicle in England left And that as it is Death by the Laws of this Nation for a Popish Priest to be seen upon English Ground so it would be very well if it were so for a Non conforming one too Very Ghostly Councel to come from a Ministor of the Gospel of Peace I could wish that he and those of the like Junto did understand their Priesthood as it ought to be understood then they would Preach things that now were Holy Pure Peaceable and of good Report without such Trash This Gentleman is not alone in these stabbing Censures there are more of his Quire that sing to the like Tune a temper very ill becoming Preachers of the Gospel of Peace One other Mr. M. B. commonly known in the University by the Character of his Majesty's D ee Chaplain was turned out for what it 's a shame to tell tho' since crept in again in his Sermon on Luke 19.14 tells us That among Phanaticks a new Nick-name for old Puritans their Loyalty is Rebellion and their Religion is Treason and whose very Gospel is the Mystery of Iniquity and that amongst Phanaticks and Atheists transformed into malitious Fiends by the Hellish divinity of that Monster of a Priest the Author of Julian the Apostate whose whole Book it as great an Apostacy from the Practice of the Primitive Christians the Precepts of Obedience delivered by Christ and his Apostles and Christianity it self as ever Julian was guilty of pag. 19. As false a Scandal as a Priest of Baal could pulpit These are your Boanarges pure Church of England Men in their right Colours and Pontificalibus Nay the unclean Spirits like the Frogs that came out of the mouth of the Dragon and out of the mouth of the Beast and out of the mouth of the false Prophet which are the Spirits of Devils which go forth unto the Kings of the Earth c. Rev. 26.13 14. who are not content falsly to Calumniate the Non-cons only but to Stigmatize also true Nathaniels Witness M. B. charging as a profligate Wretch and mercenary Scribler the late Writer of Julian the Apostate of which Charge the generality and best and wisest both of Clergy and Laiety do now acquit and justifie him to be the more Orthodox by their Pulpits Prints and Practices Sure sure Pulpits were never designed to spit Venome nor fulsly to Calumniate any especially for Printing and Publishing Gospel truths as that of lawful Resistance and Passive Obedience which Doctrines the generality of the Nation Lords Commons Bishops Priests Clergy and Laiety now own and practice and which was ever the Doctrine of the Church of England and of all sound Divines tho' metamorphosised and misrepresented by some Mungril Church of England Men as thwarting their sublunary designs of Pride Ambition Covetousness Honours and Preferments very ill becoming that most
submitting to the narrow and more strict Rules of the Apostles of abstaining from all appearance of Evil of resisting unto Blood siriving against sin of endeavouring to be holy as our Heavenly Father is Holy and perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect And certainly it is much more agreeable tot he Mind of Christ to Conventicle with Assemblies of the Faithful than to be blind watch men ignerant dumb Dogs that cannot bark sleeping lying down loving to slumber yea greedy Dogs that cannot have enough shopherds that cannot understand that look to their own way every one for his gain 〈◊〉 56.10 11. that feed themselves but not the flock Ezek. 34.2 3 4. Such as these are they that teach for hire and divine for money that soist their own Straw and Stubble upon the foundation laid by Christ our Lord that will understand God other wise than he will be understood and will not account that sense of Scripture truest that most restraineth their corrupt humours that thwarteth and crosseth their high imaginations and designs We have with us and amongst us thousands that ask Counsel at their Stocks and whose Staff declareth unto them for the spirit of whoredoms hath caused them to err and they have gone a whoring from under their God Hos 4.12 and yet not excommunicated nor so severely persecuted as those that Conventicle and Assemble with the Brotherhood We have also with us thousands of worthy very worthy pious and learned Prelates Priests and People that labour in the Word and Doctrine and mourn in secret for the violences done to such Assemblies in whom the Light of the Glorious Gospel most eminently and gloriously shineth and who preach and practice God's pure and sincere Ordinances so that no Nation under Heaven hath them more purely taught and exalted in Mercies than our own It is the rotten part of the Clergy only whose Popish and other Books publishing Doctrines destructive to whole Kingdoms only herein meant that occasions such contempt of the Clergy the very tail of Priests Isai 9.15 that teach Lyes and Doctrines that subject the whole Race of Mankind unto slavery and vassallage whose Hearts the love of the Wrold of Riches Honours and Preferments hath debauched and prevailed with to hearken to the Flesh when she pleads her secular contentments no need of this zeal this accurateness this pressing this violence for Heaven and upon presumptuous and false prejudices to account such strictness unnecessary presuming on the easiness of a future Reformation not considering that the least sin doth desile the Soul and that the smallest omission qualifie for Hell but can delight in sinful and desperate fellowships blessing themselves in their own wickedness and yet revile and malign our Conventicles much better imployed than themselves being bewitcht to dore on present Contentments to dispence with much unjust Liberty using lawful things unlawfully to steal even from God's own Day to gratifie their own corrupt humours and fleshly desires Rom. 8.5 6 7 13 14. by promoting and countenancing a Book of Sports but discountenancing and prohibiting Sermons on Sundays in the Afternoon and Lectures on the Week-days Pulpit-preaching is the least part of a Ministers work Paul taught from house to house day and night with tears Acts 20.20 Most certainly St. Paul was more Heavenly minded who accounted all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge not notional only but experimental also of Christ Jesus our Lord for whom he suffered the loss of all things and accounted them but dung that he might win Christ Phil 3.9 If these sticklers against Conventicles did but live now as they will wish they had done when they come to die a time speedily approaching they would be of another mind and would not be of the Bedlam opinion of the World who like not such zeal such strictness such violence for Heaven Assembling together for edification and comfort is a Command from Heaven and no human Law ought to contradict it nor hath any Government more Power to forbid private than publick preaching of the Gospel Human Laws and Ordinances or Customs against the Law of God or Nature are corruption and derogate from the Authority of the Almighty and are ipso facto void and null Pope Paul the Fourth usually cursed Colloquies Councils Dyets for that they were always upon his Back I lay no such charge to our Clergy that do not favour of fancy such Conventicles But I vehemently suspect that they look upon them as reproaches to themselves as being the more diligent and the more laborious and the more zealous in the word and Doctrine than themselves These differences would not be if they would be governed according to the Scriptures which ought to be the rule of Resolutions without respect to private Ends and worldly Interests and manifest vices corrected according to the Wrod of God For which Reasons I conceive it a Spiritual Tyranny to forbid the Assembling of Bretheren together for the glory of God the increase of Godliness and of Brotherly Love among the Faithful And therefore conclude that suppressing such Conventicles cannot proceed from the Wisdom which is from above which is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be intreated full of mercy and good sruits without partiality and without bypecrisie James 3.17 but from that wisdom which is earthly sensual devillish For why should not that Liberty be granted to this Age which other Ages have enjoyed with Spiritual Fruit even in the infancy and purest Ages of the Church and when all Nations were bitter and accursed Enemies to christ and his Gospel Certainly to forbid the Faithful to assemble to improve and make use of their proper Gifts and Graces in publick or in private to bring Souls to Heaven cannot proceed from any good intent For the Holy Ghost is nto the Clergy Petultar but variety of Spiritual Gifts and Graces belongs so essentially to the perfection of the Church that it is the very glory thereof and of every individual We are all so addicted to Sin and so prone to Impieties that all the allurements and inticements to holy living ought to be encouraged not discountenanced nor prohibited lest the care of strict Piety and eact walking in the ways of Holiness be abandoned And those Solemn Assemblies are but to husband are precious moments of lie for one Hour whereof tormented Souls in Hell would give all the World if they had the disposal thereof to be but in the same possibilities of Salvation to make their Peace and Reconciliation with their provoked God to the advantage of the Lord of the Harvest that when he comes he may find them so doing It seems very strange to thinking Men and to right Reason it self to deprive Men of their true Spiritual Liberty and their just Right and then perswade them to be content and speak evil of them accounting them Seditious Schismatical and Phanatical if they do not acquiesce And they are not only against the liberty of