in those very termes covenanted against that the liberty that is granted to some be not extended to Popery and Prelacy And therefore if any Diocesan Bishop should exercise his jurisdiction and excommunicate any person within this Land wherein by Authority as you may see afterward there is also an appointment of another Government we leave it to those that are learned in the Law to determine whether such Diocesan Bishops would not run themselves into a praemunire But if you do not restrain lawfull Pastors to these onely our doubt yet is Whether you mean not onely such Ministers as were ordained by Diocesan Bishops excluding those out of the number that since their being taken away have been ordained by Presbyters onely If this be your sense we shall onely at present minde you of what is published to be the Judgement of Dr Vsher late Primate of Ireland in a Book lately put forth by Dr Bernard Preacher to the Honourable Society of Grayes-Inne and whom though a stranger to us and one of a different judgement from us in the point of Episcopacy yet we reverence for his moderation and profession of his desires for peace wishing that such as do consent in substantials for matter of Doctrine would consider of some conjunction in point of Discipline That private interests and circumstantials might not keep them thus far asunder * See pag. 14◠of his last Book In which wish as we do cordially joyn our selves so we heartily desire that all godly and moderate spirited men throughout the Land would also close But the book which the said Doctor hath lately published is intituled The Judgement of the late Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland c. In this Book this Doctor tells us that the late Primate in Answer to a letter of his sent to him as it should seem for that purpose declares his Judgement touching the ordination of the Ministry in the Reformed Churches in France and Holland There he saith that Episcopus Presbyter gradu tantum differunt non ordine And consequently that in places where Bishops cannot be had the ordination by Presbyters standeth valid And in the close of his Answer about this point he saith That for the testifiying of his Communion with the Churches of the Low-Countryes of whom he had spoken immediately before and which he there professeth He doth love and honour as true members of the Universall Church notwithstanding the difference that was betwixt him and them about the point of Episcopacy he doth profess That with like affection he should receive the blessed Sacrament at the hands of the Dutch Ministers if he were in Holland as he should do at the hands of the French Ministers if he were in Charenton See pag. 125. and 126. Hence you may perceive that the Judgement of Dr Usher was That the Ordination of Presbyters where Bishops cannot be had standeth valid And consequently if you be of his opinion and you must have stronger reasons then ever yet we have seen to bear you out therein if you judge otherwise they ought to be esteemed lawfull Pastors to whom you grant the power of Excommunication Bishops being now taken away and may not therefore ordain according to the present Laws of the Land The said Dr Bernard hath some animadvertisements upon that Letter in which Dr Usher doth deliver his judgement as above said and there shews that he was not in this Judgement of his singular He alledgeth Dr Davenant that pious and learned Bishop of Sarisbury as consenting with him in it in his determinations quaest 42. and produceth the principall of the Schooleman Gulielmus Parisiensis Gerson Durand c. and declares it to be the Generall opinion of the Schoolemen Episcopatum ut distinguitur à simplici sacerdotio non esse alium ordinem c. see pag. 130. of the aforenamed Book as also pag. 131.132 Where the concurrence of Dr Davenant with Dr Vsher in his judgement about this matter is declared more fully He addes also others as in speciall Dr Richard Field in his learned Book of the Church lib. 3. cap. 39. and lib. 5. cap. 27. And also that Book intituled A defence of the Ordination of the Ministers of the Reformed Churches beyond the Seas maintained by Archdeacon Mason against the Romanists And further he saith He hath been assured it was not onely the Judgement of Bishop Overall but that he had a principall hand in it He tell us that the fore-mentioned Author produceth many testimonies The Mr of the Sentences and most of the Schoolemen Bonaventure Thomas Aquinas Durand Dominicus Soto Richardus Armachanus Tostatus Alphonsus a Castro Gerson Petrus Canisius to have affirmed the same and at last quoteth Medina a principall Bishop of the Councill of Trent who affirmed That Jerome Ambrose Augustine Sedulius Primasius Chrysostome Theodoret Theophylact were of the same judgment also But you may see these things your selves in Dr Bernard pag. 132 133 134. Wee have been onely at the pains to transcribe them Wee could alledg many more Testimonies to prove this But wee count these sufficient and do alledg these the rather because brought by one that is of the same Judgment with you as wee suppose But having declared how farr you accord with us in Judgment touching the way of informing the ignorant and reforming the wicked persons and schismatical c. you tell us That you are not therein so wavering and unsettled in your apprehensions of the Case as to submit either it or them either wholly or in part to the contrary Judgment and determination of a general Council of the Eastern and Western Churches much lesse to a new termed Provincial Assembly at Preston wherein you professe no little to differ from us That which wee submitted wholly to the Judgment of the Provincial Assembly was not whether Catechizing was a way appointed by God in his Word for the information of the ignorant but in what way of Catechizing as is expressed in our Paper the ignorant in our Congregations who never offered themselves unto the Sacrament were most like to be brought to some measure of knowledg and which is not a matter of Doctrine but of Order onely Neither was it by us submitted to that Assembly whether the censures of the Church were the means appointed by Christ for the reforming of the scandalous But whether it might not be meet pro hic nunc and as the present case stood to apply the Censures and so put in practice at this time that which in the General wee were sufficiently assured from the word of Truth was the way for their reformation and with which wee were both by God and Man intrusted to dispense unto those that were openly scandalous in our Congregations However they contented themselves to live in the want of the Lords Supper nor ever presented themselves to the Eldership to be admitted to it And this because meerely circumstantiall as to the dispencing of the Censures at
Churches lawfull Pastors have the power of the Keys committed to them to excommunicate such offenders 3. For such as are scandalous and wicked in their lives Admonition private and publique is to be observed according to Christs rule Mat. 18. but if they still continue and will not reform the Churches lawfull Pastors have power to excommunicate such Thus far we accord in judgement touching the way of informing the ignorant and reforming wicked persons and schismatical which course is so fully warranted by the Word of God and the constant practise of the Catholique Church that we are not so wavering and unsetled in our apprehensions of the case as to submit either it or them either wholly or in part to the contrary judgement and determination of a General Council of the Eastern or Western Churches much less to a new termed Provincial Assembly at Preston wherein we no little differ from you Other parts of your Paper are full of darkness to which we cannot so fully assent till further explicated and unfolded by you For 1. Whereas you say That in the several congregations if not in all belonging to this Association there are many persons of all sorts that are members of congregations c. you seem to hint that though your grief may be general as ours for all offenders yet your censures extend onely to those who have admitted themselves members of some Congregation within your Association and yet live inordinately and will not be admonished If so then we who never were any members or associates of yours are not within the verge and compass of your Presbyterian discipline for what have you to do to judge those that are without 2. But whereas your complaint and offence taken is That many there are of all sorts who will not submit themselves to the present Government of the Church but live like lawless persons out of their rank and order If by the present Government of the Church you mean your own as may strongly be conjectured you do then are we also comprehended therein and must fall within your censure and not onely we but all Papists Anabaptists and all other of what Profession and Religion soever who live within the Parish must be taken for members of some one Congregation within your Association and so driven into the common fold of Presbytery and be subject to your Government And this as we suppose is the cheif design of you in this as in other transactions of yours to subject all to your Government which you garnish over with the specious title of Christs Government Throne and Scepter Presbytery is the main thing driven at here and however she cometh ushered in with a Godly pretence of sorrow for the sins and ignorance of the times and a duty incumbent upon you to exercise the power which Christ hath committed to you for edification and not for destruction yet these are but as so many waste papers wherein Presbyterie is wrapped to make it look more handsomely and pass more currently but beware we must for latet anguis in Herbâ Object But you say For want of the vigorous exercise of this Ecclesiastical discipline ignorance Atheism and Licentiousness grows upon us and men live as lawlesse persons out of their rank and order because not subject to your present Government Sol. We pray for the establishment of such Church Government throughout his Highness Dominions as is consonant to the will of God and Universall practice of primitive Churches that Ecclesiasticall discipline may be exercised in the hands of them to whom it was committed by Christ and left by him to be transferred from hand to hand to the end of the World and shall readily joyn with you in humble addresses to his Highness and his great Council for the establishment of such a Church Government In the mean time though there may be such who as you say live as lawless persons out of their rank and order yet are they subject to law and therefore subject to punishment for though your Ecclesiastical sword cannot take hold on them the civill sword doth reach them Your Class may do well then not to contemn as in charity we hope you do not the authority of the civill Magistrate but in stead of warning all and every member belonging to them to complain to the Eldership of those that walk disorderly and will not be reclaimed to the end they may excommunicate them That they exhort them to complain to the civill Magistrate whose sword of Justice is sharper and longer and likely to work a greater reformation in the lives and manners of men by a corporal and pecuniary Mulct then any sword of excommunication or other Church censure your Eldership can any way pretend unto There are other parts of your paper do remain likewise dark which we desire may be made plain unto us for whereas you say There are many persons of all sorts c. That will not submit themselves to the present Government of the Church but live as lawless persons out of their rank and order Our Quaeres thereupon are 1. Why Government in singulari is there no Ecclesiasticall Government but yours may not another Church have its Government different from yours yet not different from that which Christ hath prescribed in his Word Calvin saith yea Scimus enim unicuique Ecclesiae c. And accordingly there are other Churches in England different in Government from yours and as good as yours But if you say yours is the Government 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of eminency as Christs own Government more immediatly and jure divino which you so much defend then why the present is there no present Government in any Church or Assembly of Saints but where your discipline is erected Are all the rest at present without Government or where hath yours been this 1500. years past till this present Hath Antichristianism so overspread the face of the Church that Christs own Government could never get footing till this present But now subjection is required thereto of all yet many of all sorts will not subject but live as lawless persons out of their rank and order Our next Quaere is What must all those that observe not your ranks and orders subject not themselves to your present Government be taken for lawless persons out of their rank and order Yea for so this close connexion of yours seems to import viz. many who do not subject but live c. In your paper you further proceed and make it an order That notice shall be taken of all persons that forsake the publick assembly of Saints We would gladly know how far you extend this Saintship this Church and assembly of Saints if to your own Church onely and such as subject themselves to your Government then S. Augustines Answer against the Donatists who would not acknowledg a Church in the World but amongst themselves may also be yours O Impudentem Vocem saith he Illa non est Quia
County of Lancaster into nine Classical Presbyteries represented from the said County And it was further resolved That the said Houses did approve of the Ministers and other persons represented from the County of Lancaster as fit to be of the several and respective Classes into which the said County was divided Which division of this County into nine Classical Presbyteries and the approval thereof by the said Lords and Commons was forthwith printed and published In this division so made and approved The first Classis is to contain Manchester Parish Prestwich Parish Oldham Parish Flixton Parish Eccles Parish and Ashton under-line Parish as by what was then printed and is yet extant is to be seen Further wee wish you to take notice That in your forementioned Directions pag. 3. Direction 6. it is there thus ordained That all Parishes and places whatsoever as well privileged places and exempt Jurisdictions as others be brought under the government of Congregational Classical and National Assemblies Provided that the Chappels or places in the houses of the Peers of this Realm should continue free for the exercise of Divine Duties to be performed according to the Directory And also that it was ordered by the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament Decemb. 21. 1646. That the several Classes in Lancashire should be one Province As appears by their Order to that purpose As there is also another Order of theirs of Octob. 16. 1648. enabling the several Classes within this Province to send their Delegates to meet in a Provincial Assembly in Preston and appointing the time of their first meeting the number of the Delegates that were to be sent to the said Assembly and the Quorum of the Assembly according to the provision that had been made before by the Parliament before any Provincial Assembly could by virtue of their Authority be enabled to act Provincially By which account thus given it is manifest That the setting up the Presbyterian Government in this County The division of it into several Classes The making of those Classes into a Province and their Acting Provincially As also the appointing this Classis to be the first that is the first in regard of the number onely the account beginning here was all done by Authority of Parliament And that when wee call our selves the first Classis within the Province of Lancaster wee are awarranted thereto by authority of Parliament And so your Saluting us in our own terms which wee gave not to our selves till the Parliament had first given them to us will not seem strange to them that then did or now do acknowledg that Authority and Power which the Parliament exercised in those times Especially considering there was nothing done since either by that Parliament or any other or by his Highnesse and the last Parliament that takes from us what was then granted and as wee shall clear further anon In your Preface to what in your Paper you have to say unto us there is in the first place a mistake of that title which was given by us unto ours which you call a Paper draught for it was not by us intituled a Presentation as you call it but a Draught that represented to the Provincial Assembly our apprehensions in a case by them propounded unto us And was approved by the Provincial under the Title of a Representation But this perhaps was but the mistake of the Scribe and wee insist not on it It is of greater weight and moment to take notice of what you publish as your sense and apprehensions of it not resting in the judgment or determination of any general Council contrary thereunto if any such should be much lesse to one of our Provincial Assemblies Although you tell us wee seem to submit to our Provincial what wee will hardly grant to a general Council in which you professe to differ from us Wee know very well and have learned better from the Scriptures then to resolve our Faith into the determination of any company of men on Earth whatsoever or to build our Faith on the Judgment of Synods Provincial or National or of General Councils that have been heretofore or that may be hereafter Wee are sure all men are fallible and Faith that is a sure and certain grace must have a sure and certain Foundation which is onely the infallible and written Word of God And if this onely be your meaning you have not us differing from you But yet when wee consider That Synods and Councils rightly constituted and regularly called as they may be then of great use for light and guidance so also that they are the Ordinance of God and by him invested with authority and so have an authoritative Judgment belonging to them and which is not in private persons wee dare not contemn them nor speak sleightly of them And seeing the higher Assemblies have greater Authority then the lower as there is more power in the whole then in the part in the whole body then in any one or some members and that however wee are well enough satisfied that wee have the Authority of a Classe yet wee are under the Authority of the Provincial Assembly Wee see not wherein wee offended that wee submitted our apprehensions in the Case propounded by that Assembly unto us unto their Judgment There is concerning matters of Religion Judicium Privatum or a Private Judgment and this belongs to all Christians who are to fee with their own eyes and judge concerning what is necessary for them to know and believe in matters of this nature This Judgment as there is good reason why wee should allow it to our selves so wee should Lord it over mens consciences if wee should deny it to any There is also Judicium Publicum Authoritativum A Publick and an Authoritative Judgment and this is either Concional which belongs to every lawfull Minister to whom the Key of Doctrine is committed by himself singly or else it is Juridical and this belongs to Synods and Councils who having the Key of Discipline are invested with authority to inquire into try examine censure and judg of matters of Doctrine and Discipline authoritatively although they be tyed to the rule of Gods Word in such proceedings as Judges to the Law likewise to censure offenders according to their merit when such cases are regularly and orderly brought before them And in this sense it was that we submitted our apprehensions in the Paper published to the Judgment of the Provincial Assembly And we believe when the Apostle tells us 1. Cor. 14.32 That the spirits of the Prophets are subject to the Prophets And our Saviour Christ saith Mat. 18. Tell the Church And when wee consider what was practised by Paul and Barnabas and certain others who upon occasion of a contest that arose in the Church at Antioch about a matter of Doctrine were sent up from that Church to Jerusalem to the Apostles and Elders about that question from these and other Scriptural grounds wee had
other Ordinances so far as was intended for continuance are moulded up into a complete body with a supply of sundry things that had been never mentioned nor published before in other Ordinances is without any limitation of time for its continuance and remains unrepealed to this day for any thing we have seen or heard to the contrary Nay we think as we shall touch upon anon That by the humble Advice assented to by his Highness this Ordinance as well as others receives strength But by this full account given we think we have made it sufficiently to appear that we have had the Authority of the civill Magistrate to bear us out in what we have acted since the first setting up of the Presbyterian Government untill this present Except there be any that can come forth and charge us to have transgressed the rules appointed by the Parliament for us to observe in our actings against which our own innocency only shall be our defence It now remaines for your further satisfaction and our own vindication that we recite some things particularly out of the form of Church Government which we conceive are thereunto subservient In the very first Words of the Ordinance according to what we have before recited in the directions for the electing and choosing of ruling Elders and is there also to be found you may find it thus Be it ordered and ordained by the Lords and Commons in Parliament Assembled and by Authority of the same That all Parishes and Places whatsoever within the Kingdom of England and Dominion of Wales as well Priviledged Places and exempted jurisdictions as others be brought under the Government of Congregationall Classicall Provinciall and Nationall Assemblies c. Where it is to us unquestionable That by vertue of this appointment such as live within the bounds of our severall congregations and Parishes are under the power of some one or other of the Congregational Elderships constituted by Authority of Parliament within our severall Parishes And that all those that live within the bounds of our Classis mentioned before are under the power of our Classicall Assembly constituted in like manner by the said Authority What power is given particularly to the congregationall Elderships you may finde in the aforesaid form of Church Government and unto which we refer you onely we shall minde you That by vertue thereof they have power as they shall see just occasion to enquire into the knowledge and spirituall estate of any member of the Congregation to admonish and rebuke to suspend from the Lords Table those who are found by them to be ignorant and scandalous and to excommunicate according to the rules and directions after following And it is thereby ordained That the Examination and Judgement of such Persons as shall for their ignorance in the points of Religion mentioned in that Ordinance not be admitted to the Sacrament of the Lords Supper is to be in the power of the Eldership of every Congregation All which will appear by the express Letter of the said Ordinance to any that will consult it and which not only justifies all that is practised in that case by the severall Elderships but also shews what grounds this Classis had for that which was mentioned in our Paper touching both what is therein appointed to the Minister about Catechizing Families and also concerning the Ministers exhorting such as in the severall Families he should finde to be of competent knowledge and know to be of blameless life That they should present themselves to the Eldership The Triall and Judgement in this case not belonging to any one Minister alone but to the Eldership There are also rules and directions given in this Ordinance to be observed by the severall Elderships concerning suspension from the Sacrament of the Lords Supper in cases of scandall which may be seen there particularly But there is no rule given that will allow either the Eldership or Classis according to the several powers to them therein granted either to warn before all or to excommunicate knowing and blameless men for their meer not presenting themselves before the Eldership The rules of this Government prescribe otherwise as we our selves must also needs profess that we are not conscious to our selves that we have given any just occasion by our management thereof That contrary to the express rules appointed therein to be observed by us and to the plain sense of our expressions used in our Paper of which afterward any such a thing should have been so much as supposed to have been intended from any thing there expressed Give us leave to proceed a little further to lay open the order that is prescribed in the above mentioned form of Church Government touching the order of proceeding to excommunication which as it will awarrant the publishing of mens names openly in the Congregation and warning them before all to reform being such as are justly censurable by the rules thereof and particularly where it prescribes that several publique admonitions shall be given to the offenders c. So it will awarrant us in any thing that is made censurable by that Paper of ours that was published To make this to appear as also to shew what reason we had to make known to the several congregations within our bounds what our Paper held forth We shall here declare what offences are censurable with this greatest and last censure of Excommunication according to the order that is there prescribed and which as it requires that it be inflicted with great and mature deliberation and after all other good means have been essayed so it appoints in these express Words That such Errours in practice as subvert the Faith or any other Errours which overthrow the power of Godliness if the party who holds them spread them seeking to draw others after him and such sins in practice as cause the Name and Truth of God to be blasphemed cannot stand with the power of godliness and such practises as in their own nature manifestly subvert that order unity and Peace which Christ hath established in his Church and particularly all those scandalous sins for which any Person is to be suspended from the Sacrament of the Lords Supper obstinately persisted in these being publiquely known to the just scandall of the Church The sentence of Excommunication may and ought to proceed according to the directions after following But the Persons that hold other Errours in Judgement about which learned and Godly men possibly may and do differ and which subvert not the faith nor are destructive to godliness or that be guilty of such sins of infirmities as are commonly found in the Children of God or being otherwise found in the faith and holy in life and so not falling under censure by the former rules endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of Peace and do yet out of conscience not come up to the observation of all those rules which are or shall be established by
Authority for regulating the outward worship of God and Government of his Church The sentence of excommunication for these causes shall not be denounced against them These things this Classis taking into Consideration together with the power they were betrusted with by God and Man for the dispencing the censures of the Church in the cases censurable by the rules here laid down and elsewhere in the form of Church Government And there having been in the Provinciall Assembly severall debates touching such Persons as in the several Congregations were ignorant and scandalous who offered not themselves to the Sacrament not to the Eldership in order to their admission to it and they commending it to the several Classical Presbyteries to be considered of whether some further course was not to be held for the information of the one and the reformation of the other then yet had been taken notwithstanding their neglect and what they judged fittest to be done for the attaining those ends and to represent their thoughts therein to the next Assembly This Classis upon the whole concluded to represent their apprehensions in the Case as is expressed in the Paper that was published which was approved of before by the Provincial Assembly and which they judge is sufficiently awarranted in regard of any thing therein contained by the rules expressed in the above mentioned form of Church Government We having thus far shewed what we have been and are awarranted to practice by the several Ordinances above mentioned we shall now proceed further to declare That however we are no Lawyers and therefore leave the determination of the Case to the learned in the Law to judge of to whom it belongs yet if it may be lawfull for us to judge of a matter of this nature from the principles of reason It seems to us that the above mentioned Ordinances about Church Government as well as other Ordinances of Parliament are confirmed in the humble Advice assented unto by his Highness in the 16. section thereof Where we finde these Words And that nothing contained in this Petition and Advice nor your Highness consent thereunto shall be construed to extend to the repealing or making void of any Act or Ordinance which is not contrary hereunto or to the matters herein contained But that the said Acts and Ordinances not contrary hereunto shall continue and remain in force in such manner as if this present Petition and Advice had not at all been had or made or your Highness consent thereunto given Whence we gather that if in the several Ordinances for Church Government there be nothing contrary to the humble Advice or to the matters therein contained they are not thereby any more then any other Acts or Ordinances of Parliament repealed but left to remain in force At least there seems to us to be a plain intimation that they have a force in them which is not by this humble Advice repealed and made void For it doth not appear to us That there is any thing in the Form of Church Government or any other Ordinances of Parliament about that matter that is contrary to the humble Advice or matters therein contained And whereas in the 11th section there is mention made of some that differ in worship and discipline from the publique profession of these Nations held forth to whom some indulgence is granted It seems to us there is an acknowledgement and owning of what the late Parliament held forth in regard of these the Directory for worship and form of Church Government which they passed as the publique profession of these Nations in regard of worship and discipline And in which apprehensions we are the more confirmed because here in this section mention is made of a confession of faith to be agreed on by his Highness and the Parliament there having nothing in that kind passed the late Parliament that established the Directory for worship and form of Church Government However there had been a Confession of faith drawn up by the late Assembly of Divines Whence it seems to us clear that they own the Directory for worship and the form of Church Government to be that which they hold forth as the publique profession of the Nation for worship and Government To the same purpose we find in the Government of the Commonwealth of England Scotland and Ireland c. As it was publiquely declared at Westminster Decemb. 16. 1653. pag. 43. Sect. 37. Where also they express a worship and Discipline publiquely held forth which must needs referre to the Directory and form of Church Government by us recited There being no other worship or discipline that then had or now hath the civill Sanction in this Nation We have been large in what we have here represented in the generall before we come to speak more particularly to the rest that now follows in your Paper But our pains being greater to make this full representation unto you then it will be for you to read it we must intreat you to excuse us considering it tends as well to rectifie your mistakes as to vindicate our selves being also desirous not to be mistaken any more as also because it layes a foundation for our briefer and more particular Answer unto what follows and to which these things being thus premised we now come In the things wherein you profess your selves to dissent till further explicated and unfolded by us 1 The first thing we meet with here is That by the many Persons of all sorts that are members of Congregations and mentioned in our Paper in your sense thereof we seem to hint that thereby we mean onely such who have admitted themselves members of some Congregation within our association and yet live inordinately c. And that therefore you who never were any members or associates of ours are not within the verge and compass of our Presbyterian discipline c. Unto which we say That we have constantly professed against those of the separation That the several Assemblies of Congregations within this Land that make a profession of the true Christian and Apostolique Faith are true Churches of Jesus Christ That the several members of these Congregations are by their birth members as those that were born in the Jewish Church are said to be by the Apostle Jews by nature Gal. 2. That this their membership was sealed to them in their Baptism that did solemnly admit them as into the universal Church so into the particular wherein they were born We have also constantly maintained against the afore mentioned Persons That the Ministers of these Churches are true Ministers notwithstanding that exception of theirs against them that they were ordained by Bishops who also themselves were true Ministers in our Judgement though we cannot acknowledge that by divine right they were superiour to their fellow brethren either in regard of order or jurisdiction And that therefore the Word and Sacraments the most essential marks of a true visible Church according to the professed
Judgement of our Divines against the Papists on the one hand and those of the separation on the other dispensed by these Ministers were and are the true Ordinances of Jesus Christ And that hereupon our work was not when the Presbyterian Government was appointed to constitute Churches but to reform them onely And that therefore none within our bounds except they shall renounce Christianity and their Baptism can be deemed by us to be without in the Apostles sense and so therefore not within the compass and verge of our Presbyterian Government Neither is it their not associating with us in regard of Government that doth exempt them from censure by it if they should be such offenders as by the rules thereof were justly censurable It not being a matter arbitrary for private Persons at their own will and pleasure to exempt themselves from under that Ecclesiastical Government that is setled by Authority And as you know it would not have been allowed of under the former Government 2 And therefore whether you and all others within our bounds be not comprehended within our Government according to the rules laid down in the Ordinance of Parliament above mentioned appointing the form of Church Government to be used in the Church of England and Ireland and therein ordaining as hath been recited before in the first page thereof and to which we refer you Especially considering that all within the bounds of our several Parishes that are no other now them formerly even Papists and Anabaptists and other Sectaries were under the late Prelatical Government we leave it to you to judge Onely if so we wish you to consider that then you are brought under the Government of Presbytery not so much by us as by the Parliament appointing this Government And then we think you who warn us not to contemn civil power might well out of respect to the Authority ordaining it but especially considering the word Presbytery is a known Scripture expression 1 Tim. 4. and interpreted by sundry of the Fathers as we do as hath been declared before have used a more civil expression then to have called it a common fold into which it should seem your complaint is that you should be driven Although Presbytery layes restraint on none but such as being scandalous in their lives and so contemning the Laws of God are therefore truely and indeed the lawless Persons that we speak of But whereas as you suppose This is our chief design in this as in other transactions of ours to subject all to our Government We do refer our selves to our course of life past and hope it will witness with us to all that will judge impartially what our designs have been in our other transactions And as touching our design in the Paper published whether it hath been ought but the information of the ignorant and reformation of the scandalous to the Glory of God and their salvation we leave it to be judged by those that will judge of mens intentions by what is expressed in their words and actions We know very well we are charged by some that we affect Dominion to Lord it over the People and to have all sorts of Persons of what rank soever to stoop to us But we do openly profess that the Government of the Church that is committed unto men is not Despotical but Ministerial That it is no Dominion but a Ministery onely And that the Officers that are intrusted with it are themselves to be subject both in regard of their bodies and estates to the Civil power That by the Ordinance of God they are appointed to be under and that in their Government they have nothing to do with the bodies and estates of any Persons but with their Souls onely Although here we desire to enquire of you whether if you be indeed for the settling of any Government at all in the Church as you profess to be you do not think that all should be subject to it We cannot judge you to be so irrational as to be for a Government and that yet subjection to it must be denyed And if the late Government of the Prelacy was not blamed by you because it required subjection to it we wish you to consider whether upon this account you have reason to censure us But further whereas you tell us That we garnish our Government with the specious title of Christs Government Throne and Scepter We wish you to consider what in your Answer to an objection that you frame out of our Paper your selves do say You there tell us You pray for the establishment of such Church Government as is consonant to the will of God and universall practice of primitive Churches That Ecclesiastical Discipline may be exercised in the hands of them to whom it was committed by Christ and left by him to be transferred from hand to hand to the end of the World The expressions you here use are as high touching that Government you would have established as any have been that ever we have used of ours For your prayer is That Ecclesiastical Discipline may be exercised in the hands of them to whom it was committed by Christ and left by him to be transferred from hand to hand to the end of the world The Government then that you are for must be with you Christs Government Throne and Scepter And why do you then condemn us if we have used such expressions concerning our Government till you have convinced us that it is not such When yet you take to your selves the Liberty to use the like language concerning the Government you pray may be established But whereas you say Presbytery is the main thing driven at here and that however she comes ushered in with Godly pretence of sorrow for the sins and the ignorance of the times and the duty incumbent upon us to exercise the power that Christ hath committed to us for edification and not for destruction and that these are but so many waste Papers wherein Presbytery is wrapped up to make it look more handsomely and pass more currantly We do earnestly desire That in the examination of your consciences you would seriously consider whether you have not both transgressed the rules of Charity in passing such hard censures upon us and also usurped that which belongs not to you in making your selves judges of what fals not under your cognizance The things you mention belonging only to be tried by your and our Master to whom we must all stand or fall But we are heartily sorry that Presbytery which stands in no need of any painting or cover to make it look more handsomely and passe more currantly should be accounted by you the anguis in herba whereof you had need to beware it having never given that offence to any as to merit such language But now you frame an objection out of our Paper and return your Answer professing That you pray for the establishment of such Church Government throughout his Highness Dominions