the Crowd of all my other Imployments which would allow me no great Leisure for Polishing and Exactness or any Ornament so that I scarce ever wrote one Sheet twice over nor stayed to make any Bloâ—s or Interlinings but was fain to let it go as it was first conceived And when my own Desire was rather to stay upon one thing long than run over many some sudden Occasions or other extorted almost all my Writings from me and the Apprehensions of Present Usefulness or Necessity prevailed against all other Motives So that the Divines which were at hand with me still put me on and approved of what I did because they were moved by Present Necessities as well as I But those that were far off and felt not those nearer Motives did rather wish that I had taken the other way and published a few elaborate Writings and I am ready my self to be of their Mind when I forgot the Case that then I stood in and have lost the Sense of former Motives The opposing of the Anabaptists Separatists Quakers Antinomians Seekers c. were Works which then seemed necessary and so did the Debates about Church Government and Communion which touched our present Practice but now all those Reasons are past and gone I could wish I had rather been doing some work of more durable Usefulness But even to a foreseeing Man who knoweth what will be of longest use it is hard to discern how far that which is presently needful may be omitted for the sake of a greater future Good There are some other works wherein my Heart hath more been set than any of those forementioned in which I have met with great Obstructions For I must declare that in this as in many other Matters I have found that we are not the Choosers of our own Imployments no more than of our own Successes § 213. Because it is Soul-Experiments which those that urge me to this kind of Writing do expect that I should especially communicate to others and I have said little of God's dealing with my Soul since the time of my younger Years I shall only give the Reader so much Satisfaction as to acquaint him truly what Change God hath made upon my Mind and Heart since those unriper times and wherein I now differ in Judgment and Disposition from my self And for any more particular Account of Heart-Occurrences and God's Operations on me I think it somewhat unsavory to recite them seeing God's Dealings are much what the same with all his Servants in the main and the Points wherein he varieth are usually so small that I think not such fit to be repeated Nor have I any thing extraordinary to glory in which is not common to the rest of my Brethren who have the same Spirit and are Servants of the same Lord. And the true Reason why I do adventure so far upon the Censure of the World as to tell them wherein the Case is altered with me is that I may take off young unexperienced Christians from being over confident in their first Apprehensions or overvaluing their first degrees of Grace or too much applauding and following unfurnished unexperienced Men but may somewhat be directed what Mind and Course of Life to prefer by the Judgment of one that hath tryed both before them 1. The Temper of my Mind hath somewhat altered with the Temper of my Body When I was young I was more vigorous affectionate and servent in Preaching Conference and Prayer than ordinarily I can be now my Stile was more extemporate and laxe but by the Advantage of Affection and a very familiar moving Voice and Utterance my preaching then did more affect the Auditory than many of the last Years before I gave over Preaching but yet what I delivered was much more raw and had more Passages that would not bear the Tryal of accurate Judgments and my Discourses had both less Substance and less Iudgment than of late 2. My understanding was then quicker and could easilyer manage any thing that was newly presented to it upon a sudden but it is since better furnished and acquainted with the ways of Truth and Error and with a Multitude of particular Mistakes of the World which then I was the more in Danger of because I had only the Faculty of Knowing them but did not actually know them I was then like a Man of a quick Understanding that was to travail a way which he never went before or to cast up an Account which he never laboured in before or to play on an Instrument of Musick which he never saw before And I am now like one of somewhat a slower Understanding by that praematura Senectus which weakness and excessive bleedings brought me to who is travelling a Way which he hath often gone and is casting up an Account which he hath often cast up and hath ready at hand and that is playing on an Instrument which he hath often played on So that I can very confidently say that my Judgment is much sounder and firmer now than it was then for though I am now as competent Judge of the Actings of my own Understanding then yet I can judge of the Effects And when I peruse the Writings which I wrote in my younger Years I can find the Footsteps of my unfurnished Mind and of my Emptyness and Insufficiency So that the Man that followed my Judgment then was liker to have been misled by me than he that should follow it now And yet that I may not say worse than it deserveth of my former measure of Understanding I shall truly tell you what change I find now in the perusal of my own Writings Those Points which then I throughly studied my Judgment is the same of now as it was then and therefore in the Substance of my Religion and in those Controversies which I then searcht into with some extraordinary Diligence I find not my mind disposed to a Change But in divers Points that I studied slightly and by the halves and in many things which I took upon trust from others I have found since that my Apprehensions were either erroneous or very lame And those things which I was Orthodox in I had either insufficient Reasons for or a mixture of some sound and some insufficient ones or else an insufficient Apprehension of those Reasons so that I scarcely knew what I seemed to know And though in my Writings I found little in substance which my present Judgment differeth from yet in my Aphorisms and Saints Rest which were my first Writings I find some raw unmeet Expressions and one common Infirmity I perceive that I put off Matters with some kind of Confidence as if I had done something new or more than ordinary in them when upon my more mature Reviews I find that I said not half that which the Subject did require As E. g. in the Doctrine of the Covenants and of Justification but especially about the Divine Authority of the Scripture in the second part of
for that way now which most suiteth with the Inclination of the People who most esteem them which is to go far enough from the Conformists or too far but the rest who are less followed by the People are generally more for Peace and Moderation § 163. This Year the Act against Conventicles was renewed and made more severe than ever And as all that ever I spake with of it supposed with an Eye upon my Case they put in divers Clauses As that the fault of the Mittimus should not disable it that all doubtful Clauses in the Act should be interpreted as would most favour the suppression of Conventicles that they that fled or removed their Dwelling into another County should be pursued by Execution to this Sense What a strait is a Man in among People of such Extremes One side pursueth us with implacable Wrath while we are charged with nothing but Preaching Christ's Gospel in the most peaceable manner we can And the other censureth us as Compliers with Persecutors and Enemies to Piety because we desire to live peaceable with all Men and to separate from them no further than they separate from God § 164. Their own Laws against Conventicles hinder us from doing their own Wills They write and clamour against me for not perswading the People to Conformity And when I would draw them but to that Communion which I had within my self the Law disableth me to Communicate a Letter to them seeing no more than four must meet together which way among many hundred or thousand Dissenters would make many Years work of Communicating that one part of my Advice Thus do our Shepherds use the Flocks § 165. At this time Mr. Giles Firmin a worthy Minister that had lived in New-England writing against some Errors of Mr. Hooker Mr. Shepherd Mr. Daniel Rogers and Mr. Perkins gave me also also a gentle reproof for tying Men too strictly to Meditation whereto I wrote a short answer called A Review of the Doctrine of Meditation § 166. A worthy Lady was perverted from the Lord's Day to the Saturday-Sabbath desiring my Judgment and Mr. Francis Bamfield a Minster who hath lain about seven Years in Dorchester-Goal the Brother of Sir Iohn Bamfield deceased being gone to the same Opinion and many following them I wrote by the Perswasion of some Friends a small Tractate also on that Subject to prove the divine appointment of the Lord's Day and the cessation of the Iewish Sabbath § 167. Dr. Manton though he had the greatest Friends and promise of Favour of any of the Presbyterians vvas sent Prisoner to the Gatehouse for Preaching the Gospel in his own House in the Parish vvhere he had been called formerly to the Ministery and for not taking the Oxford-Oath and coming within five Miles of a Corporation where he continued six Months but it proved convenient to his â—ase because those six Months were spent in London in a hot pursuit of such private Preaching by Bands of Soldiers to the terrour of many and the death of some § 168. Madam the King's Sister dyed in France when she returned from visiting His Majesty in England to his very great grief § 169. Sir Iohn Babor talk'd to the Lord Arlington of our late Treaty upon the Lord Keeper's Invitation with Bishop Wilkins whereupon Dr. Manton sent to me as from him to Communicate the Terms and Papers But they were at Acton from whence they had driven me and I had medled enough in such Matters only to my cost So that though he said the King was to see them I could not then answer his desire and I heard no more of it § 170. Upon the Publication of my Book against Divisions and the Rumour of my Conforming the Earl of Lauder dale invited me to speak with him Where he opened to me the purpose of taking off the Oath of Canonical Obedience and all Impositions of Conformity in Scotland save only that it should be necessary to sit in Presbyteries and Synods with the Bishops and Moderators there being already no Liturgy Ceremonies or Subscription save only to the Doctrine of the Church Hereupon he expressed his great Kindness to me and told me he had the King's Consent to speak with me and being going into Scotland he offered me what place in Scotland I would choose either a Church or a Colledge in the University or a Bishoprick And shortly after as he went thither at Barnet he sent for me and I gave him the Answer following in these Papers besides what I gave him by word to the same purpose But when he came thither such Acts against Conventicles were presently made as are very well worthy the Reader 's serious Persual who would know the true Complexion of this Age. § 171. My Lord BEing deeply sensible of your Lordship's Favours and in special of your Liberal Offers for my Entertainment in Scotland I humbly return you my very hearty Thanks But these Considerations forbid me to entertain any hopes or further thoughts of such a remove 1. The Experience of my great Weakness and decay of Strength and particularly of this last Winter's Pain and how much worse I am in Winter than in Summer doth fully persuade me That I shall live but a little while in Scotland and that in a disabled useless Condition rather keeping my Bed than the Pulpit 2. I am engaged in Writing a Book which if I could hope to live to finish is almost all the Service that I expect to do God and his Church more in the World A Latin Methodus Theologiae And I can hardly hope to live so long it requiring yet near a Years labour more Now if I should go spend that one half Year or Year which should finish that Work in Travel and the trouble of such a Removal and then having intended Work undone it would disappoint me of the ends of my Life For I live only for Work and therefore should remove only for Work and not for Wealth and Honour if ever I remove 3. If I were there all that I could hope for were liberty to Preach the Gospel of Salvation and especially in some Vniversity among young Scholars But I hear that you have enough already for this Work that are like to do it better than I can 4. I have a Family and in it a Mother-in-Law of 80 Years of Age of Honourable Extract and great Worth whom I must not neglect and who cannot Travel And it is to such a one as I so great a business to remove a Family and all our Goods and Books so far as deterreth me to think of it having paid so dear for Removals these 8 Years as I have done and being but yesterday settled in a House which I have newly taken and that with great trouble and loss of time And if I should find Scotland disagree with me which I fully conclude of to remove all back again All this concurreth to deprive me of this Benefit of your Lordship's Favour But
as gross Drunkards and such like and also some few Civil Men that had assisted in the Wars against the Parliament or set up bowing to Altars and such Innovations But they had left in near one half the Ministers that were not good enough to do much Service nor bad enough to be cast out as utterly intollerable These were a company of Poor weak Preachers that had no great Skill in Divinity nor Zeal for Godliness but preached weakly that which is True and lived in no gross notorious Sin These Men were not cast out but yet their People greatly needed help for their dark sleepy Preaching did but little Good Therefore we resolved that some of the abler Ministers should often voluntarily help them but all the Care was how to do it without offending them And it fell out seasonably that the Londoners of that County at their yearly Feast did collect about 30 l. and send it me by that worthy Man Mr. Thomas Stanley of Bread-street to set up a Lecture for that Year Whereupon we covered all our Designs under the Name of the Londoners Lecture which took off the Offence And we chose four worthy Men Mr. And. Tristram Mr. Hen. Oasland Mr. Tho. Baldwin and Mr. Ios. Treble who only now conformeth who undertook to go each Man his Day once a Month which was every Lord's Day between the four and to preach at those Places which had most need twice on a Lord's Day but to avoid all ill Consequents and Offence they were sometimes to go to abler Mens Congregations and wherever they came to say somewhat always to draw the People to the Honour and special Regard of their own Pastors that how weak soever they were they might see that we came not to draw away the Peoples Hearts from them but to strengthen their Hands and help them in their Work This Lecture did a great deal of Good and though the Londoners gave their Money but that one Year yet when it was once set on foot we continued it voluntarily till the Ministers were turned out and all these Works went down together So much of the Way and Helps of those Successes which I mention because many have enquired after them as willing with their own Flocks to take that Course which other Men have by Experience found to be effectual § 138. Having before said somewhat of my Troubles with Mr. Tombes I shall here more fully tell the Reader how it was Mr. Tombs being my Neighbour within two Miles and denying Infant Baptism and having written a Book or two against it he was not a little desâ—ous of the Propagation of his Opinion and the Success of his Writings and he thought that I was his chiefest Hinderer though I never medled with the point Whereupon he came constantly to my Weekly Lecture waiting for an Opportunity to fall upon that Controversy in his Conference with me But I studiously avoided it so that he knew not how to begin And he had so high a Conceit of his Writings that he thought them unanswerable and that none could deal with them in that way At last some how he urged me to give my Judgment of his Writings and I let him know that they did not satisfie me to be of his Mind but went no farther with him Upon this he forbore coming any more to our Lecture and he unavoidably contrived me into the Controversy which I shun'd for there came unto me five or six of his chief Proselites as if they were yet unresolved and desired me to give them in Writing the Arguments which satisfied me for Infant Baptism I asked them whether they came not by Mr. Tombes's Direction And they confessed that they did I asked them whether they had read the Books of Mr. Cobbet Mr. Marshall Mr. Church Mr. Blake for Infant Baptism And they told me No. I desired them to read that which is written already before they call'd for more and then come to me and tell me what they had to say against them But this they would by no means do but must have my Writings I told them that now they plainly confessed that they came upon a Design to promote their Party by contentious Writings and not in sincere Desire to be informed as they pretended But to be short they had no more Modesty than to insist on their Demands and to tell me that if they turned against Infant Baptism and I denied to give them my Arguments in Writing they must lay it upon me I asked them whether they would continue unresolved till Mr. Tombes and I had done our Writings seeing it was some Years since Mr. Blake and he began and have not ended yet But no Reasoning served the turn with them but they still call for my written Arguments When I saw their factious Design and Immodesty I bid them tell Mr. Tombes that he should neither thus command me to lose a Years time in my Weakness in quarrelling with him nor yet should have his End in insulting over me as if I fled from the Light of Truth Therefore I offered him if we must needs contend that we might do it the shortest and most satisfactory way and spend one Day in a Dispute at his own Church where I would attend him that his People might not remain unsatisfied till they saw which of us would have the last Word and after that we would consider of Writing So Mr. Tombes and I agreed to meet at his Church on Ian. 1. And in great Weakness thither I came and from Nine of the Clock in the Morning till Five at Night in a crowded Congregation we continued our Dispute which was all spent in manageing one Argument from Infants right to Church-Membership to their Right to Baptism of which he after complained as if I assaulted him in a new way which he had not considered of before But this was not the first time that I had dealt with Anabaptists who had so much to do with them in the Army as I had In a Word this Dispute satisfied all my own People and the Country that came in and Mr. Tombes's own Townsmen except about Twenty whom he had perverted who gathered into his Church which never increased to above Twenty two that I could learn So much of that Dispute of the Writing more anon § 139. If any shall demand whether the increase of Godliness was answerable in all Places to what I have mentioned and none deny that it was with us I answer that however Men that measure Godliness by their Gain and Interest and Domination do go about to persuade the World that Godliness then went down and was almost extinguished I must bear this faithful Witness to those times that as far as I was acquainted where before there was one godly profitable Preacher there was then six or ten and taking one Place with another I conjecture there is a proportionable increase of truly godly People not counting Hereticks or perfidious Rebels or Church-disturbers as such
thereabouts though the Cases be not named by way of Question But where it was necessary the Cases are distinctly named and handled My intent in writing this was at once to satisfie that motion so earnestly made by Bishop Usher mentioned in the Preface to my Call to the Unconverted which I had been hindred from doing by parts before And I had some little respect to the request which was long ago sent to him from some Transmarine Divines to help them to a Sum of Practical Divinity in the English method But though necessary brevity hath deprived it of all life and lustre of Stile it being but a Skeleton of Practical Heads yet is it so large by reason of the multitude of things to be handled that I see it will not be of so common a use as I first intended it To young Ministers and to the more intelligent and diligent sort of Masters of Families who would have a Practical Directory at hand to teach them every Christian Duty and how to help others in the practice it may be not unserviceable 2. Another Manuscript is called A christian indeed It consisteth of two Parts The first is a Discovery of the calamities which folow the weakness and faultiness of many true Christians and Directions for their strengthening and growth in Grace which was intended as the third particular Tractate in fulfilling the foresaid request of Bishop Usher The Call to the Unconverted being for that sort and the Directions for a sound Conversion being for the second sort who are yet as it were in the birth And this being for the weaker and faultier sort of Christians which are the third sort To which is added a second Part containing the just Description of a sound confirmed Christian whom I call a Christian indeed in sixty Characters of Marks and with each of them is adjoyned the Character of the weak Christian and of the Hypocrite about the same part of Duty But all is but briefly done the Heads being many without any life or ornament of Stile This short Treatise I offered to Mr. Thomas Grigg the Bishop of London's Chaplain to be licensed for the Press a man that but lately Conformed and professed special respect to me but he utterly refused it pretending that it favoured of Discontent and would be interpreted as against the Bishops and the Times And the matter was that in several Passages I spake of the Prosperity of the Wicked and the Adversity of the Godly and described Hypocrites by their Enmity to the Godly and their forsaking the Truth for fear of Suffering and described the Godly by their undergoing the Enmity of the wicked World and being stedfast whatever it shall cost them c. And all this was interpreted as against the Church or Prelatists I asked him whether they would license that of mine which they would do of another man 's against whom they had not displeasure in the same words And he told me No because the words would receive their interpretation with the Readers from the mind of the Author And he askt me whether I did not think my self that Nonconformists would interpret it as against the Times I answered him yes I thought they would and so they do all those Passages of Scripture which speak of Persecution and the Suffering of the Godly but I hoped Bibles should be licensed for all that I asked him whether that was the Rule which they went by that they would license nothing of mine which they thought any Readers would interpret as against the Bishops or their Party And when he told me plainly that it was their Rule or Resolution I took it for my final Answer and purposed never to offer him more For I despair of writing that which men will not interpret according to their own Condition and Opinion especially against those whose Crimes are notorious before the World This made me think what a troublesome thing is Guilt which as Seneca saith is like a Sore which is pained not only with a little touch but sometime upon a conceit that it is touched and maketh a man think that every Bryar is a Sergeant to Arrest him or with Cain that every one that seeth him would kill him A Cainites heart and life hath usually the attendance of a Cainities Conscience I did but try the Licenser with this small inconsiderable Script that I might know what to expect for my more valued Writings And I told him that I had troubled the World with so much already and said enough for one man's part that I could not think it very necessary to say any more to them and therefore I should accept of his discharge But fain they would have had my Controversal Writings about Universal Redemption Predetermination c. in which my Judgment is more pleasing to them but I was unwilling to publish them alone while the Practical Writings are refused And I give God thanks that I once saw Times of greater Liberty though under an Usurper or else as far as I can discern scarce any of my Books had ever seen the Light 3. Another Manuscript that lyeth by me is a Disputation for some Universality of Redemption which hath lain by me near Twenty years unfinished partly because many narrow minded Brethren would have been offended with it and and partly because at last came out after Amyraldus and Davenant's Dissâ—rtations a Treatise of Dallaeus which contained the same things but especially the same Testimonies of concordant Writers which I had prepared to produce 4. There is also by me an imperfect Manuscript of Predetermination 5. And divers Disputations of sufficient Grace 6. And divers miscellaneous Disputations on several Questions in Divinity cursorily managed at our Monthly Meetings 7. And my two Replies to Mr. Cartwright's Exceptions against my Aphorisms 8. And my two Replies to Mr. Lawson's Animadversions on the same Book 9. And my Reply to Mr. Iohn Warren's Animadversions which being first done is least digested 10. And the beginning of a Reply to Dr. Wallis's Animadversions 11. And a Discourse of the Power of Magistrates in Religion against those that would not have them to meddle in such Matters being an Assize Sermon preached at Shrewsbury when Coll. Thomas Hunt was Sheriff 12. And some Fragments of Poetry 13. And a Multitude of Theological Letters 14. And an imperfect Treatise of Christ's Dominion being many popular Sermons preached twenty Years ago and very rude and undigested with divers others § 212. And concerning almost all my Writings I must confess that my own Judgment is that fewer well studied and polished had been better but the Reader who can safely censure the Books is not fit to censure the Author unless he had been upon the Place and acquainted with all the Occasions and Circumstances Indeed for the Saints Rest I had Four Months Vacancy to write it but in the midst of continual Languishing and Medicine But for the rest I wrote them in
or to turn to something else which though there be some reason for it I feel cometh from a want of Zeal for the Truth and from an impatient Temper of Mind I am ready to think that People should quickly understand all in a few words and if they cannot lazily to despair of them and leave them to themselves And I the more know that it is sinful in me because it is partly so in other things even about the Faults of my Servants or other Inferiours if three or four times warning do no good on them I am much tempted to despair of them and turn them away and leave them to themselves I mention all these Distempers that my Faults may be a warning to others to take heed as they call on my self for Repentance and Watchfulness O Lord for the Merits and Sacrifice and Intercession of Christ be merciful to me a Sinner and forgive my known and unknown Sins THE LIFE OF THE REVEREND Mr. Richard Baxter LIB I. PART II. § 1. IN the Time of the late unhappy Wars in these Kingdoms the Controversies about Church Government were in most Mens mouths and made the greatest Noise being hotly agitated by States-men and Divines by Words and Writings which made it necessary to me to set my self to the most serious study of those Points The result of which was this confident and setled Judgment that of the four contending Parties the Erastian Episcopal Presbyterian and Independant each one had some Truths in peculiar which the other overlookt or took little notice of and each one had their proper Mistakes which gave advantage to their Adversaries though all of them had so much truth in common among them as would have made these Kingdoms happy if it had been unanimously and soberly reduced to practice by prudent and charitable Men. § 2. 1. The Erastians I thought were thus far in the right in asserting more fully than others the Magistrates Power in Matters of Religion that all Coercive Power by Mulcts or Force is only in their hands which is the full sence of our Oath of Supremacy and that no such Power belongeth to the Pastors or People of the Church and that thus as Dr. Ludov. Molinaeâ—â— pleadeth there should not be any Imperium in Imperio or any Coercive Power challenged by Pope Prelate Presbytery or any but by the Magistrate alone that the Pastoral Power is only Perswasive or exercised on Volunteers yet not private such as belongeth to every Man to perswade that hath a perswading Facultyâ— but Publick and Authoritative by Divine appointment And not only to perswade by Sermons or general Speeches but by particular oversight of their particular Flocks much like the Authority of Plato or Zenâ— in his School or a Master in any Academy of Volunteers or of a Physician in his Hospital supposing these were Officers of God's Institution who could as the ground of their perswasitantâ— produce his Commission or Command for what they said and did But though the Diocesans and the Presbyterians of Scotland who had Laws to enable them opposed this Doctrine or the Party at least yet I perceived that indeed it was but on the ground of their Civil Advantages as the Magistrate had impowered by them by his Laws which the Erastians did not contradict except some few of the higher 〈◊〉 sort who pleaded as the Papists for somewhat more which yet they could not themselves tell what to make of But the generality of each Party indeed owned this Doctrine and I could speak with no sober Judicious Prelatist Presbyterian or Independant but confessed that no Secular or Forcing Power belonged to any Pastors of the Church as such and unless the Magistrates authorized them as his Officers they could not touch mens Bodies or Estates but the Conscience alone which can be of none but of Assenters § 3. 2. The Episcopal Party seemed to have reason on their side in 〈◊〉 that in the Primitive Church there were some Apostles Evangelists and others who were general unfixed Officers of the Church not tyed to any particular Chaâ—ge and had some Superiority some of them â—â—over-fixed Bishops or Pastors And though the extraordinary Parts of the Apostles Office ceased with them I saw no proof of the Cessation of any ordinary part of their Office such as Church Government is confessed to be All the doubt that I saw in this was Whether the Apostles themselves were constituted Governours of other Pastors or only over-ruled them by the Eminency of their Gifts and Priviledge of Infallibility For it seemed to me unmeet to affirm without proof that Christ setled a Form of Government in his Church to endure only for one Age and changed it for a New one when that Age was ended And as to fixed Bishops of particular Churches that were Superiours in degree to Presbyters though I saw nothing at all in Scripture for them which was any whit cogent yet I saw that the Reception of them in all the Churches was so timely even in the days of one of the Apostles in some Churches and so general that I thought it a most improbable thing that if it had been contrary to the Apostles mind we should never read that they themselves or any one of their Disciples that conversed with them no nor any Christian or Heretick in the World should once speak or write a word against it till long after it was generally setled in the Curches This therefore I resolved never to oppose § 4. 3. And as for the Presbyterians I found that the Office of Preaching Presbyters was allowed by all that deserve the Name of Christians and that this Office did participate subserviently to Christ of the Prophetical or Teaching the Priestly or worshipping and the Governing Power and that both Scripture Antiquity and the perswasive Nature of Church Government clearly shew that all Presbyters were Church Governours as well as Church Teachers and that to deny this was to destroy the Office and to endeavour to destroy the Churches And I saw in Scripture Antiquity and Reason that the Association of Pastors and Churches for Agreement and their Synods in Cases of Necessity are a plain duty and that their ordinary stated Synods are usually very convenient And I saw that in England the Persons which were called Presbyterians were emiment for Learning Sobriety and Piety and the Pastors so called were they that went through the Work of the Ministry in diligent serious preaching to the People and edifying Mens Souls and keeping up Religion in the Land § 5. 4. And for the Independants I saw that most of them were Zealous and very many Learned discreet and godly Men and fit to be very serviceable in the Church And I found in the search of Scripture and Antiquity that in the beginning a Governed Church and a stated worshipping Church were all one and not two several things And that though there might be other byâ—Meetings in places like our Chappels or private Houses
Schism and Herefie come to be opened it will not be found to lye where you imagin nor so easily proved as rashly affirmed or intimated 2. Do not be too sensible of Persecution when Liberty of Conscience is so proclaimed though the Restriction be somewhat on your side O the difference of your Persecution and theirs that suffered by you 3. The only conscionable and safe way for the Church and your own Souls is to love long for pray and consult for Peace Close in the unanimous practice of so much as all are agreed in In amicable Meetings endeavour the healing of all breaches Disown the ungodly of all Parties Lay by the new violent Opinions inconsistant with Unity I expect not that this advice should please the prejudiced But that it 's the only safe and comfortable way is the Confident Opinion of Your Brother Richard Baxter All the Disturbance I had in my own Parish was by Sir Ralph Clare's refusing to Communicate with us unless I would give it him kneeling on a distinct Day and not with those that received it fitting To which Demand I gave him this following Answer SIR UPon Consultation with others and my own Conscience I return this Answer to your last motion beseeching you to believe that it had been more pleasing if it would have stood with the pleasing of God and any own Conscience 1. In general it is my resolution to be so far from being the Author of any Divisions in any part of the Church of Christ as that I shall do all that lawfully I can to avoid them 2. I am so far from the Judgment and Practices of the late Prelates of England in point of compelling all to obey or imitate them in gestures and other indifferent things on pain of being deprived of God's greatest Ordinances which are not indifferents beside the ruine of their Estates c. that I would become all things lawful to all Men for their good and as I know that the Kingdom of God standeth not in such things so neither would I shut any out of his visible Kingdom for such things as judging that our Office is to see God's Law obeyed as far as we can procure it and not to be Law-gives to the Church our selves and in Circumstantials to make no more Determinations than are necessary left they prove but Engines to ensnare Mens Consciences and to divide the Church And as I would impose no such things on other Churches if I had power so neither will I do it on this Church of which I have some oversight 3. More particularly I am certain that sitting in the receiving of the Lord's Supper is lawful or else Christ and his Apostles and all his Churches for many hundred years after him did sin which cannot be And I take it to be intolerable arrogancy and unmannerliness to speak easily to call that unreverence and sawciness as many do which Christ and the Apostles and all the Church so long used with one consent He better knew what pleaseth himself than we do The vain pretended difference between the Apostles Gesture and ours is nothing to the matter He that sitteth on the Ground sitteth as well as he that sitteth on a Stool And if any difference were it was their Gesture that seems the more homely and no such difference can be pretended in the Christian Churches many hundred years after And I think it is a naked pretence having no shew of reason to cover it of them that against all this will plead a necessity of kneeling because of our unworthiness For 1. The Churches of so long time were unworthy as well as we 2. We may kneel as low as the Dust and on our bare knees if we please immediately before in praying for a blessing and for the pardon of our sins and as soon as we have done 3. Man must not by his own Conceits make those things necessary to the Church which Christ and his Church for so long thought unnecessary 4. On this pretence we might refuse the Sacrament it self for they are more unworthy to eat the Flesh of Christ and to drink his blood than to sit at his Table 5. The Gospel is Glad Tidings the Effects of it are Faith and Peace and Joy the Benefits are to make us one with Christ and to be his Spouse and Members the work of it is the joyful Commemoration of these Benefits and living in Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost And the Sacramental Signs are such as suit the Benefits and Duties If therefore Christ have called us by his Example and the Example of all his Church to sit with him at his Table to represent Our Union Communion and joyful redeemed State and our everlasting sitting with him at his Table in his Kingdom it as little beseems us to reject this Mercy and Duty because of our Unworthiness as to be our own Lawgivers And on the like Reasons men might say I will not be united to thee nor be a Member of thy Body or married to thee nor sit with thee on thy Throne Rev. 3. 21. according to thy Promise because it would be too great sawciness in me Gospel Mercies and Gospel Duties and Signs must be all suited and so Christ hath done them and we may not undo them 4. I must profess that upon such Considerations I am not certain that sitting is not of commanded Necessity as I am sure it is lawful nor am I certain that kneeling in the Act of Receiving when done of choice is not a flat sin For I know it is not only against Scripture Example where though Circumstances apparently occasional bind not as an upper Room c. yet that 's nothing to others but also it is against the Canons of Councils yea a General Council at Trull in Constantinople and against so concurrent a Judgment and Practice of the Church for many hundred years that it seems to fight with Vincentius Lerinens Catholick Rule quod semper ubique ab omnibus receptum c. Let them therefore justifie kneeling as lawful that can for I cannot and therefore dare not do that which shall be an owning of it when we may freely do otherwise 5. Yet for all this I so much incline to Thoughts of Peace and Closure with others that I will not say that sitting is of necessity nor that kneeling is unlawful unless where other Circumstances make it so nor condemn any that differ from me herein Yea if I could not otherwise Communicate with the Church in the Sacrament I would take it kneeling myself as being certain that the Sacrament is a Duty and not certain that kneeling is a sin and in that Case I believe it is not 6. As for them that think kneeling a Duty because of the Canons of the late Bishops enjoyning it I have more to say against their Judgment than this Paper will contain Only in a word 1. If it be the Secular Powers establishing those Canons that binds
E. g. The Time and Place of their Convention must be agreed on by them and the lesser part must yield to the greater or else by diffent no time or place may ever be agreed on So that if the greater part agree on one Translation of the Bible to be used in all the associated Churches or on one Version of the Singing Psalms it will tend much to Edification and agrees with the Scripture Commands of Unity If therefore that which they agree on seem to a particular Church or Pastor no better than another Version or scarce so good yet for Unity if it be not unlawful or like to be more hurtful than the Diversity will be they ought to concur But still be it remembred that the Churches Peace or Unity should be laid by Agreements on nothing unnecessary And therefore all agreements may not be seconded with an avoiding all Dissenters 17. Because in the great Case of taking Members from other Churches or Parishes the Exception from the general Rule of Parish Limits cannot be so enumerated as punctually to resolve each Doubt that may occur let us first lay down what Rules or Exceptions we can agree on at least this general that we will take no such Person into our Churches when it tendeth more to the hurt than the furtherance of the common Good and Christian Cause And therefore that we will first bring the particular case to the Association or at least be there responsible concerning it as we are about other Church Affairs Accordingly when any is actually offended that another hath taken a Member out of his or another's Church or Parish let the Association hear the case on both sides and if they justifie the accused there is an End if not they are to convince him or them that they go against some Rule of Scripture or Nature e. g. against the Honour of Christ and good of the Churches or christian Cause And if neither he nor they can be convinced nor brought to reform after sufficient Admonition it must be considered whether the case be small and tollerable or great and intollerable If the former we must bear with it yet professing our Judgment against it if intollerable we must proceed to disclaim Communion with the guilty and so to exclude them from the Association and common Communion which yet must not be done but in heinous cases And thus the particular cases must be tryed and concluded as they fall out for there is no laying down any Rule beforehand that will fit all cases particularly 18. Those first Associations being composed of such Pastors and Churches as are near and within a capacity of such Communion as aforesaid voluntarily combined should also hold correspondence with Neighbour Associations either by Delegates in some more general Meetings as in each County one or at least by Letters and Messengers which Communion is to be extended even as far as our Natural Capacity extendeth and the Edification or Preservation of the Churches shall require it And thus the Presbyterians and Congregational Men are agreed if they are willing If all will not let those agree that have hearts and not stay for the rest And here you see a Satisfaction to your two Demands My Question was What are the things that the Congregational must have and will insist on the denial whereof doth binder our Unity and Agreement Your Answer was in these words To manage all Church Affairs by the Elders and Brethren within themselves and without dependance unless for Advice on any other Ecclesiastical Power 2. To take in such as are qualified and freely offer themselves to joyn though of other Parishes Yet so as if a particular Church in that Parish which for the Substance is gathered according to the Order of the Gospel and the Party a Member thereof an account is to be given to the Church or the Elders of it of the Cause of his removal that it may be if possible with consent And this is all that hinders our Agreement it seems Alas 1. For the first it is granted you in terminis only in point of Ordination yield but to be Ordained by Teaching Elders which you confess lawful and others think necessary And remember 1. That to depend on other Ecclesiastical Power even for Advice is a great dependance 2. That to depend on them not as a Superiour Power but as a Link upon the Chain for Union and Communion we can never exempt you from nor will you sure desire it There is a fourfold Advice 1. An Authoratative Advice of Governours as Parents Schoolmasters Pastors to their Inferiours who are bound to obey them on a double account ratione materiae authoritatis Thus the Pastors in a Synod advise their Flocks conjunctly 2. The Authoratative Advice of one Officer to another And so as we preach to one another I think as Christ's Ministers we must advise one another 3. An Advice of a Major part among Equals in Order to Union and Concord and this is the Principal to be respected in these Conventions 4. An Advice of a private Person not authorized by Office and this binds but ratione materiae c. 2. To your second you will grant as I hope by the printed Debates that ordinarily Parish-bounds shall be the Rule for Limitation alter Parishes if they be amiss and that you 'l not swerve from this Rule but upon necessary Cause and not when it is to the apparent wrong of the Cause and Interest of Christ and you will yield to be responsible to the Association which you are a Member of concerning the Case when you are questioned And this shall agree us And why should I not add two Propositions for Peace with the Episcopal That way or the Persons are not so contemptible if you consider the Antiquity the great Difficulty their Number and Extent and the Works of many of them as to be refused our Communion though on some Abatements to them Prop. 19. Let therefore these Presbyteries of particular Churches have one to be the stated President as long as he is found fittest and let all the Associations at least where Episcopal worthy Men require it have such fixed Presidents quam diu bene se gesserint as your Assembly at Westminster had by common Consent Bishop Hall and Usher say this will satisfie but it will not without the next Prop. 20. Seeing the Presbyterians and Congregational say That except in case of necessity it 's lawful to forbear Ordination till the President be there and One and to take him with you and the Episcopal say That it 's of necessity therefore let the Case of Necessity and the Title be purposely silenced and left to each Man's Judgment but de facto let your Licet yield for Peace to their Oportet at least for some years trial And agree to Ordain none but in necessity without the President as he shall Ordain none without the Consent of the Association or at least the Elders of the
pretence of promoting Godliness so they fear'd the enraged Prelatical Party would renew their Persecution under pretence of Order and Government And some that thought R. Cromwell's Resignation was not plain and full did scruple it Whether they were not at present obliged to him for though they knew that he had no Original Right and though the condemned the Act of those Men as Treason who set up both his Father and him yet when he was set up and the Government had been Twelve years in their Hands and the House of Commons had sworn Subjection to him they thought it was very doubtful whether they were not obliged to him as the Possessor And withal many had alienated the Hearts of Men from the King making them believe that he was uncertain in his Religion c. and that the Duke of York was a Papist and that they would set up the revengeful Cavaliers but these things were quickly at an end For many Gentlemen who had been with the King in Scotland especially the Earl of Lauderdaile and Colonel Greavâ—â— who were of Reputation with the People did spread abroad mighty Commendations of the King both as to his Temper and Piety whereby the Fears of many at that time were much quieted § 69. As for my self I came to London April the 13th 1660. where I was no sooner arrived but I was accosted by the Earl of Lauderdale just then released from his tedious Confinement in Windsor Castle by the restor'd Parliament who having heard from some of the Sectarian Party that my Judgment was that our Obligations to Richard Cromwell were not dissolved nor could be till another Parliament or a fuller Renunciation of the Government took a great deal of pains with me to satisfie me in that point And for the quieting People's Minds that were in no small Commotion through clandestine Rumours he by means of Sir Robert Murray and the Countess of Balcares then in France procured several Letters to be written from thence full of high Elogiums of the King and Assurances of his firmness in the Protestant Religion which he got translated and publisht Among others one was sent to me from Monsieur Gaches a famous pious Preacher at Chatenton wherein after an high strain of Complements to my self he gave a pomâ—ous Character of the King and assured me that during his Exile he never forbore the Publick Profession of the Protestant Religion no not even in those places where it seemed prejudicial to his Affairs that he was present at Divine Worship in the French Churches at Roan and Rochel though not at Charenton during his stay at Paris and earnestly press't me to use my utmost interest that the King might be restored by means of the Presbyterians c. The Letter being long and already publisht shall not be here inserted But I could not forbear making divers Reflections upon the Receipt of such a Letter as this was § 70. This Excellent Divine with divers others living at a distance knew not the state of Affairs in England so well as we that were upon the place They knew not how much the Presbyterians had done to bring in the King or else they would not have thought it needful to use any Exhortations to them to that end And they knew not those Men who with the King were to be restored so well as we did What the Presbyterians did to preserve and restore the King is a thing that we need not go to any Corners or Cabinets to prove The Votes for Agreement upon the King's Concessions in the Isle of Wight prove it The Ejection and Imprisonment of most of the House of Commons and all the House of Lords prove it The Calamitous overthrow of two Scottish Armies prove it The Death of Mr. Love with the Imprisonment and Flight of other London Ministers prove it The wars in Scotland and their Conquest by Cromwell prove it The Rising of Sir George Booth and his Army's overthrow prove it The Surprize of Dublin-Castle from the Anabaptists by Colonel Iohn Bridges and others in Ireland and the Gratulations of General Monk in England the Concurrence of the Londonners and the Ministers there the Actual Preparations of the Restored Members of the Long Parliament and the Consent of the Council of State left by them and the Calling in of the King hereupon by the next Parliament without one contradicting Voice and finally the Lords and Gentlemen of the King 's old Party in all Countreys addressing themselves to the Parliamentarians and the King 's grateful Acknowledgments in his Letters and his Speeches in Parliament do all put this Matter out of question Of which I have said more in my Key for Catholicks § 71. And when I read this Reverend Man's excessive Praises and his concluding Prayer for the Success of my Labours I thought with my self how little doth the good Man understand how ill the beginning and end of his words accord He prayeth for my Congregation and the Blessing of my Labours when he hath perswaded me to put an end to my Labours by ssetting up those Prelates who will Silence me and many a hundred more He perswadeth me to that which will separate me from my Flock and then prayeth that I may be a Blessing to them He overvalueth and magnifieth my Service to the Church and then perswadeth me to that which will put a Period to my Service and to the Service of many hundreds better than my self But yet his Cause and Arguments are honest and I am so far from being against him in it that I think I am much more for it than he for he is for our Restoring the King that our Ministry may be freed from the obloquy of malicious Enemies but I am for restoring of the King that when we are Silenced and our Ministry at an end and some of us lye in Prisons we may there and in that Condition have Peace of Conscience in the Discharge of our Duty and the Exercise of Faith Patience and Charity in our Sufferings § 72. And I confess at that time the Thoughts of Mens hearts were various according to their several Expectations The Sectarian Party cried out that God had in Justice cut off the Family that Reigned over us and to return to it again was to betray the Church and the Souls of Men. Some others said That the Sectaries had traiterously and wickedly pull'd down the King and Parliament and set up themselves and broken their Oaths and pull'd down all Government and made the Name of Religion a Reproach and brought that Blot upon it which is never till the Day of Judgment like to be wiped off But yet that after Twelve years alienation of the Government and when a House of Commons hath sworn Fidelity to another and the King 's own Party had taken the Engagement their Obligations to that Family were by Providence against their Wills dissolved and that they were not bound to be Actors in that which will Silence
c. After Baptism put Seing this Child is Sacramentally Regenerated And in the Prayer following put it That it hath pleased Thee Sacramentally to Regenerate and Adopt this Infant and to incorporate him into thy Holy Church Instead of the new Rubrick it is certain by God's Word c. put True Christian Parents have no cause to doubt of the Salvation of their Children dedicated to God in Baptism and dying before they commit any actual sin In the Exhortation put it thus Doubt not therefore but earnestly believe That if this Infant be sincerely dedicated to God by those who have that power and trust God will likewise favourably receive him c. Let not Baptism be privately administred but by a lawful Minister and before sufficient Witnesses and when it is evident that any was so Baptized let no part of the Administration be reiterated Add to the Rubrick of Confirmation or the Preface And the tolerable Understanding of the same Points which are necessary to Confirmation with this owning of their baptismal Covenant shall be also required of those that are not confirmed before their admission to the holy Communion Let it be lawful for the Minister to put other Questions besides those in the Catechism to help the Learners to understand and also to tell them the meaning of the Words as he goeth along Alterations in the Catechism or another allowed Q. WHat is your Name A. N. Q. When was this Name given you A. In my Baptism Q. What was done for you in your Baptism A. I was devoted to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost and entred into his Holy Covenant and engaged to take him for my only God my reconciled Father my Saviour and my Sanctifier And to believe the Articles of the Christian Faith and keep God's Commandments sincerely all the Days of my Life Renouncing the Devil and all his works the Pomps and Vanities of this wicked World and all the sinful Lusts of the Flesh. Q. What Mercy did you receive from God in this Covenant of Baptism A. God the Father Son and Holy Ghost as my reconciled Father my Saviour and my Sanctifier did forgive my Original Sin and receive me as a Member of Christ and of his Church and as his Adopted Child and Heir of Heaven Q. Do you think that you are now bound to keep this Covenant and to believe and live according to it A. Yes Verily c. Q. Rehcarse c. A. I Believe c. Q. What c. A. First c. Q. What be the Commandments of God which you have Covenanted to observe A. The Ten Commandments written by God in Stone besides Christ's Precepts in the Gospel Q. Which be the Ten Commandments After the Answer to What is thy Duty towards God add And to keep holy the Day which he separateth for his Worship In the next let to bear no malice c. be put before to be true and just In the Answ. to the Quest. after the Lord's Prayer after all People put that we may Honour and Love him as our God That his Kingdom of Grace may be set up in our Souls and throughout the World and his Kingdom of Glory may come and that God's Law and not Men's sinful Lusts and Wills may be obeyed and Earth may be liker unto Heaven And I Pray c. Q. How many Sacraments of the Covenant of Grace hath Christ Ordained in his Church A. Two only Baptism and the Supper of the Lord. Q. What meanest thou c. A. I mean that Solemn Covenanting with God wherein there is an outward visible sign of our giving up our selves to Him and of his giving his Grace in Christ to us being ordained by Christ himself as a means whereby we receive that Grace and a pledge to assure us of it To Q. What is the inward Spiritual Grace A. The pardon of our Sins by the Blood of Christ whose Members we are made and a death unto sin c. Q. Why are Infants Baptized A. Because they are the Children of the Faithful to whom God's Promises are made and are by them devoted unto God to be entered into Covenant with Him by his own appointment which when they come to Age themselves are bound to perform After the next Answer add And for our Communion with Him and with his Church To Q. What are the Benefits c. A. The renewed Pardon of our Sins and our Communion with Christ and his Church by Faith and Love and the strengthening c. In the Visitation of the Sick let the Minister have leave to vary his Prayer as Occasions shall require And let the Absolution be conditional If thou truly believe in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost and truly repentest of thy sins I pronounce thee absolved through the Sacrifice and Merits of Iesus Christ. If any who is to kept from the Communion for Atheism Infidelity Heresie or Impenitency in gross sin shall in sickness desire Absolution or the Communion And if any Minister intrusted with the power of the Keys do perceive no probable sign of true Repentance and therefore dare not in conscience absolve him or give him the Sacrament left he profane God's Ordinance and harden the wicked in presumption and impenitency let not that Minister be forced to that Office against his conscience but let the sick chuse some other as he please And at the Burial of any who were lawfully kept from the Communion for the same causes and not absolved let the Minister be at liberty to change the words thus For asmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God to take out of this world the soul of this deceased person we commit his body c. believing a Resurrection of the just and unjust some to joy and some to punishment And to leave out in the Prayer We give thee hearty thanks for that it hath pleased thee to deliver this our brother out of the miseries of this sinful world And instead of it put And the souls of tne wicked to wo and miseryâ— We beseech thee to convert us all from sin by true and speedy repentance And teach us to spend this little time in an holy and heavenly conversation that we may be always prepared for Death and Iudgment And And in the next Collect to leave out as our hope is this our brother doth But in the Rubrick before Burial instead of any that die unbaptized put anythat die unbaptized at years of discretion That the Infants of Christian Parents who die unbaptized be not numbered with the Excommunicate and Self-murderers and denied Christian Burial Let the Psalms in the Parish-Churches be read in the last Translation Let the Liturgy either be abbreviated by leaving out the short Versicles and Responses Or else let the Minister have leave to omit them and in times of cold or haste to omit some of the Collects as he seeth cause In Churches where many cannot read let the Minister read all the Psalms himself because the confused
far cease But one part of the Papists themselves are as high to the Bishops as the Bishops to us nothing â—ut all will serve their turns Whether they will have Wit enough to take less 〈◊〉 the first I hope yet the Wisdom of the Superiours will keep us from knowing by experience But after all this we were as before and the talk of Liberty did but occasion the writing many bitter Pamphlets against Toleration And among others they have gathered out of mine and other Mens Books all that we had then said against Liberty for Popery and for Quakers railing against the Ministers in the open Congregations and this they applied now as against a Toleration of our selves because the bare name of Toleration did seem in the People's Ears to serve their turn by signifying the same thing And because we had said that Men should not be tolerated to preach against Jesus Christ and the Scriptures they would thence justifie themselves for not tolerating us to preach for Jesus Christ unless we would be deliberate Liars and use all their Inventions And those same Men who when Commissioned with us to make such Alterations in the Liturgy as were necessary to satisfie tender Consciences did maintain that no alteration was necessary to satisfie them and did moreover contrary to all our importunity make so many new burdens of their own to be anew imposed on us had now little to say but that they must be obeyed because they are imposed Before the imposing Laws were made they could by no means be kept from making them that when they were made they might plead Law against those that denied to use their Impositions Before the Law was made they pleaded the Ceremonies and Formalities will be all duties when their is a Law made for them Ergo. a Law shall be made not only for them but for swearing unswearing subscribing declaring all things imposed to be so true and so good that we assent and consent to all And when the Laws are made then O what Rebels are these that will not obey the Law Then they cry out If every Man shall be Judge what is Lawful and shall prefer his own Wit above the Law what is become of Order and Government How inconsistent are-these Rebellious Principles with a Commonwealth or any Rule or Peace As if they knew not that the same words may be said for obedience to the Laws about Religion under Lutherans Calvinists Arrians Papists Turks c. And if Hobb's Leviathan be not set up a Magistrate that must be Master of our Religion what signifieth all this Yet had this talk been more ingenuous by Men that had found all these Laws and could not procure them to be amended But for those Men that first resolutely procure them for these ends to plead them afterwards in this manner as the reason of all their Actions and violence is like the Spider in the Fable to make Webs with great Industry to catch the Flies and hang them in their way and then to accuse them of a mortal Crime for coming into their Webs Or to make Nets to catch the Fish and take them in it and then accuse them for coming into their Nets I speak not this of the Law-makers but of the Prelatical Commissioners before-mentioned and their after Practices § 88. About this time or before came out a Book called A friendly debate between a Conformist and Nonconformist written as was doubted by Dr. Simon Patrick which made much talk and a second part after that and a third part with an Appendix after that He had before written a Book called the Pilgrim which with many laudable things had sharply pleaded that Obedience must enter the definition of Iustifying Faith and had censured tartly those that taught otherwise And by this he incurred as sharp a censure by many of the Nonconformists Some thought that this exasperated him others thought that without exasperation he followed his own Genius and Judgment He was one of those then called a Latitudinar an a sober learned able Man that had written many things well and was well enough esteemed But this Book was so dis-ingenuous and virulent as caused most Religious People to abhor it for the strain and tendency and probable Effects It cannot be denied but that many godly zealous Ministers are guilty of weakness of Judgment and expression and that many mistakes are found among them for who is it that hath no Errors And it cannot be denied but that the greater number of the common People who are seriously Religious and Conscionable are yet much weaker in Judgment and Language than the Ministers For if sudden Conversion and Repentance as soon as it hath changed a Man's mind and will and life in the matters which his Salvation lieth on did also possess him with all the exactness of Notions and Language which Academicks attain to in many years study to what purpose were Academies and those Studies And then it would be as miraculous a work as the first gift of Tongues This Learned Man having met with the weak passages of some Ministers especially Mr. Bridge and some of the then Independent Party who in an excessive opposition to the Arminians spake something unwarily if not unsoundly under the pretence of extolling free Grace he scrapes these together for matter of Reproach And having heard the crude and unmeet Expressions of many well-meaning Women and unlearned private Men especially that are inclined most to Self-conceitedness and unwarrantable singularities and separation he bundleth up these and bringeth them all forth in a way of Dialogue between a Conformist and a Nonconformist in which he maketh the Nonconformist speak as foolishly as he had a mind to represent him and only such filly things as he knew he could easily shame And while he pretendeth but to humble the Nonconformists for over-valuing themselves and censuring others as ungodly and erroneous and to shew them what errours and weaknesses are among themselves he speaketh to the Nonconformists in general though acknowledging some sober Persons to be among them that which is nothing to the cause of Non-conformity and laboureth to prove that the Religion of the Non-conformists is foolish ridiculous c. As if he should have sought to prove the Religion of Christians or Protestants foolish because there are ignorant persons among them And instanâ—ing in things that concern not Non-conformity but Prayer and Preaching and Discourse of Religion the Book did exceedingly fit the humours not only of the â—aters of the Non-conformists but also of all the prophane despisers and deriders of serious Godliness So that it was greedily read by all that desired matter of Contempt and Scorn against both Non-conformity and Piety and was greatly fitted to exasperate them to further Persecutions and to harden them in impenitency who had already made such doleful havock in the Church It was as sit an Engine to destroy Christian Love on both sides and to engage Men in those ways
which was necessary to deal with such an Adversary he was quickly answered by fastening on the weakest parts with new reproach and triumph And the Author was doubly exposed to suffering For whereas he was so neer Conformity as that he had taken the Oxford Oath and read some Common prayer and therefore by connivance was permitted to preach in South-Work to an Hospital where he had 40 l. per Ann. and was now in expectation of Liberty at a better place in Bridewell he was now deprived of that And 〈◊〉 had little relief from the Nonconformists because he Conformed so far as he did And having a numerous family was in great want § 93. The next year came out a far more virulent book called Ecclesiastical Policy written by Sam. Parker a young Man of pregnant parts who had been brought up among the Sectaries and seeing some weaknesses among them and being of an eager Spirit was turned with the Times into the contrary extreme for which he giveth thanks to God And judging of 〈◊〉 called Puritans and Nonconformists by the people that he was bred amongst and being now made Arch-Bishop Sheldon's houshold Chaplain where such work was to be done he writeth the most scornfully and rashly and prophanely and cruelly against the Nonconformists of any man that ever yet assaulted them that I have heard of And in a fluent fervent ingenious style of Natural Rhetorick poureth out floods of Odious reproaches and with incautelous Extremities saith as much to make them hated and to stir up the Parliament to destroy them as he could well speak And all this was to play the old game at once to please the Devil the Prelates and the prophane and so to twist all three into one party than which if prelacy be of God a greater injury could not be done to it being the surest tryed way to engage all the Religious if not the Sober also of the Land against it § 93. Soon after Dr. Iohn Owen first tryed to have engaged me to answer it by telling me and others that I was the fittest Man in England for that work on what account I now enquire not But I had above all men been oft enough searched in the malignant fire and contended with them with so little thanks from the Independents tho they could say little against it that I resolved not to meddle with them any more without a clearer call than this And besides Patrick and that Party by excepting me from those whom they reproached in respect of Doctrine disposition and practice made me the unfittest person to rise up against them Which if I had done they that applauded me before would soon have made me seem as odious almost as the rest For they had some at hand that in evil speaking were such Masters of Language that they never wanted Matter nor Words but could say what they listed as voluminously as they desired § 94. Whereupon Dr. Owen answered it himself selecting the most odious Doctrinal Assertions with some others of Parker's book and laid them so naked in the Judgment of all Readers that ever I met with that they concluded Parker could never answer it Especially because the Answer was delayed about a year By which Dr. Owen's esteem was much advanced with the Nonconformists § 95. But Parker contriv'd to have his Answer ready against the Sessions of the Parliament in Octob. 1670. And shortly after it came out In which he doth with the most voluminous torrent of naturall and malicious Rhetorick speak over the same things which might have been Comprized in a few Sentences viz. The Nonconformists Calvinists Presbyterians Hugonots are the most villanous unsufferable sort of sanctified Fools Knaves and unquiet Rebels that ever were in the World With their naughty Godliness and holy Hypocrisie and Villanies making it necessary to fall upon their Teachers and not to spare them for the Conquering of the rest But yet he putteth more Exceptions here of the Soberer honest peaceable sort whom he loveth but pittyeth for the unhappiness of their Education and in particular speaketh kindly of me than he had done before For when he had before persuaded men to fall upon the Ministers and said What are an hundred men to be valued in Comparison of the safety of the whole When Dr. Owen and others commonly understood him as meaning that there was but a 100 Nonconformable Ministers when 1800 were silenced he found out this shift to abate both the Charge of malignant Cruelty and Untruth and saith that he meant that he hoped the seditious hot headed party that misled the people were but a few Whereby he vindicated fifteen hundred Nonconformable Ministers against those Charges which he and others frequently lay on the Nonconformists by that name But the second part of the Matter of his book was managed with more advantage because of all the Men in England Dr. Owen was the Chief that had Headed the Independents in the Army with the greatest height and Confidence and Applause and afterward had been the greater persuader of Fleetwood Desborough and the rest of the Officers of the Army who were his Gathered Church to Compel Rich. Cromwell to dissolve his Parliament which being done he fell with it and the King was brought in So that Parker had so many of his Parliament and Army Sermons to cite in which he urgeth them to Justice and prophesyeth of the ruine of the Western Kings and telleth them that their work was to take down Civil and Ecclesiastical Tyranny with such like that the Dr. being neither able to repent hitherto or to justify all this must be silent or only plead the Art of Oblivion And so I fear his unfitness for this Work was a general injury to the Nonconformists § 96. And here I think I ought to give Posterity notice that by the Prelatist's malice and unreasonable implacable Violence Independency and Separation got greater advantages against Presbytery and all setled accidental extrinsick order and means of Concord than ever it had in these Kingdoms since the World began For powerful and Godly Preachers though now most silenced had in twenty years liberty brought such numbers to serious Godliness that it was vain for the Devil or his Servants to hope that suffering could make the most forsake it And to the Prelatists they would never turn while they saw them for the sake of their own Wealth and Lordships and a few Forms and Ceremonies silence so many hundred worthy self-denying Ministers that had been Instruments of their Good and to become the Son of the prophane malignant Enmity to the far greatest part of the most serious Religious People in Three Kingdoms And Presbyterians were forced to forbear all Exercise of their way they durst not meet together Synodically unless in a Goal They could not ordinarily be the Pastors of Parish-Churches no not for the private part of the Work being driven five Miles from all their former Charges and Auditors and from every City
the loss of one Grain of Love was worse than a long Imprisonment And that it much more concerned us to be sure that we deserved not Suffering than that we be delivered from it and to see that we wronged not our Superiours than that they wrong not us seeing we are not near so much hurt by their Severities as we are by our Sins Some told me that they hoped this would make me stand a little further from the Prelates and their Worship than I had done To whom I answered That I wondred that they should think that a Prison should change my Judgment I rather thought now it was my Duty to set a stricter watch upon my Passions lest they should pervert my Judgment and carry me into Extreams in opposition to my Afflictors And not past a Year and half after two Gentlemen turned Quakers in Prison If Passion made me lose my Love or my Religion the loss would be my own And Truth did not change because I was in a Goal The temper of my Visitors called me much to this kind of talk § 126. When I was in Prison the Lord Chief Baron at the Table at Serjeant's Inn before the rest of the Judges gave such a Character of me openly without fear of any Man's displeasure as is not fit for me to own or recite who was so much reverenced by the rest who were every one Strangers to me save by hear-say that I believe it much settled their Resolutions The Lord Chief Justice Vaughan was no Friend to Nonconformity or Puritans but he had been one of Selden's Executors and so Judge Hale's old Acquaintance Judge Tyrell was a well-affected sober Man and Serjeant Fountain's Brother-in-Law by Marriage and sometime his Fellow-Commissioner for keeping the Great Seal and Chancery Judge Archer was one that privately favoured Religious People And Judge Wild though greatly for the Prelates way yet was noted for a Righteous Man And these were the Four Judges of the Court. § 127. My Habeas Corpus being demanded at the Common Pleas was granted and a Day appointed for my Appearance But when I came the Judges I believe having not before studied the Oxford-Act when Judge Wild had first said I hope you will not use to trouble this Court with such Causes asked whether the King's Council had been acquainted with the Case and seen the Order of the Court which being denied I was remanded back to Prison and a new Day set They suffered me not to stand at the Bar but called me up on the Table which was an unusual respect and they sent me not to the Fleet as is usual but to the same Prison which was a greater favour § 128. When I came next the Lord Chief Justice coming towards Westminster Hall went into White-Hall by the way which caused much talk among the People When he came Judge Wild began and having shewed that he was no Friend to Conventicles opened the Act aâ—d then opened many defaults in the Mittimus for which he pronounced it invalid but in Civility to the Justices said that the Act was so Penned that it was a very hard thing to draw up a Mittimus by it which was no Compliment to the Parliament Judge Archer next spake largely against the Mittimus without any word of disparagement to the main Cause And so did Judge Tyrell after him I will not be so tâ—dious as to recite their Arguments Judge Vaughan concluded in the same manner but with these two Singularities above the rest 1. That he made it an Error in the Mittimus that the Witnesses were not named seeing that the Oxford-Act giving the Justices so great a power if the Witnesses be unknown any innocent Person may be laid in Prison and shall never know where or against whom to seek remedy which was a Matter of great moment 2. When he had done with the Cause he made a Speech to the People and told them That by the apperance he perceived that this was a Cause of as great Expectation as had been before them and it being usual with People to carry away things by the halves and their misreports might mislead others he therefore acquainted them That though he understood that Mr. Baxter was a Man of great Learning and of a good Life yet he having this singularity the Law was against Conventicles and it was only upon the Error of the Warrant that he was released and that they use in their Charge at Assizes to enquire after Conventicles and they are against the Law so that if they that made the Mittimus had but known how to make it they could not have delivered him nor can do it for him on any that shall so transgress the Law This was supposed to be that which was resolved on at White-Hall by the way But he had never heard what I had to say in the main Cause to prove my self no Transgressor of the Law Nor did he at all tell them how to know what a Conventicle is which the Common Law is so much against § 129. Being discharged of my Imprisonment my Sufferings began for I had there better Health than I had of a long time before or after I had now more exasperated the Authors of my Imprisonment I was not at all acquit as to the main Cause they might ameâ—d their Mittimus and lay me in again I knew no way how to bring my main Cause whether they had power to put the Oxford-Oath on me to a legal Tryal And my Counsellors advised me not to do it much less to question the Justices for false Imprisonment lest I were born down by power I had now a great House of great Rent on my Hands which I must not come to I had no House to dwell in I knew not what to do with all my Goods and Family I must go out of Middlesex I must not come within five Miles of City Corporation c. where to find such a place and therein a House and how to remove my Goods thither and what to do with my House the while till my time expired were more trouble than my quiet Prison by far and the Consequents yet worse § 130. Gratitude commandeth me to tell the World who were my Benefactors in my Imprisonment and Calumny as much obligeth me because it is said among some that I was 〈◊〉 by it Serjeant Fountain's general Counsel ruled me Mr. Wallop and Mr. Offley sent me their Counsel and would take nothing Of four Serjeants that pleaded my Cause two of them Serjeant Windham afterwards Baron of the Exchequer and Serjeant Sise would take nothing Sir Iohn Bernard a Person that I never saw but once sent me no less than Twenty Pieces and the Countess of 〈◊〉 Ten Pound And Alderman Bard Five and I received no more but I confess more was offered me which I refused and more would have been but that they knew I needed it not And this much defrayed my Law and Prison Charges § 131. When
themselves believed it that the love of Kiderminster would make me Conform and they concurred in vending the Report insomuch that one certainly told me that he came then from a worthy Minister to whom the Arch-bishop of York Sterne spake these Words Take it on my Word Mr. Baxter doth Conform and is gone to his Beloved Kiderminster And so both Parties concurred in the false Report though one only raised it § 151. Another Accident fell out also which promoted it For Mr. Crofton having a Tryal as I hear upon the Oxford Act of Confinement at the King's Bench Judge Keeling said You need not be so hasty for I hear that Mr. Crofton is about to Conform And Judge Morton said And I hear that Mr. Baxter hath a Book in the Press against their private Meetings Judge Rainsford said somewhat that he was glad to hear it and Judge Morton again That it was but time for the Quakers in Buckingham-shire he was confident were Acted by the Papists for they spake for Purgatory already This Talk being used in so high a Court of Justice by the Grave and Reverend Judges all Men thought then that they might lawfully believe it and report it So Contagious may the Breath of one Religious Man be as to infect his Party and of that Religious Party as to infect the Land and more than one Land with the belief and report of such ungrounded Lies § 152. At the same time in the end of my Life of Faith I Printed a Revocation of my Book called Political Aphorisms or A Holy Common-wealth which exasperated those who had been for the Parliament's War as much as the former but both together did greatly provoke them Of which I must give the Reader this Advertisement I wrote that Book 1659. by the provocation of Mr. Iames Harrington the Author of Oceana and next by the Endeavours of Sir Hen. Vane for a Common-wealth Not that I had any Enmity to a well ordered Democracy but 1. I knew that Cromwell and the Army were resolved against it and it would not be 2. And I perceived that Harrington's Common-wealth was fitted to Heathenism and Vane's to Fanaticism and neither of them would take Therefore I thought that the improvement of our Legal Form of Government was best for us And by Harrington's Scorn Printed in a half Sheet of Gibberish was then provoked to write that Book But the madness of the several Parties before it could be Printed pull'd down Rich. Cromwell and chang'd the Government so oft in a few Months as brought in the King contrary to the hopes of his closest Adherents and the expectations of almost any in the Land And ever since the King came in that Book of mine was preached against before the King spoken against in the Parliament and wrote against by such as desired my Ruine Morley Bishop of Worcester and many after him branded it with Treason and the King was still told that I would not retract it but was still of the same mind and ready to raise another War and a Person not to be indured New Books every Year came out against it and even Men that had been taken for Sober and Religious when they had a mind of Preferment and to be taken notice of at Court and by the Prelates did fall on Preaching or Writing against me and specially against that Book as the probablest means to accomplish their Ends. When I had endured this ten Years and found no stop but that still they proceeded to make me odious to the King and Kingdom and seeking utter ruine this way I thought it my Duty to remove this stumbling Block out of their way and without recanting any particular Doctrine in it to revoke the Book and to disown it and desire the Reader to take it as non Scriptum and to tell him that I repented of the writing of it And so I did Yet telling him That I retracted none of the Doctrine of the first Part which was to prove the Monarch of God but for the sake of the whole second Part I repented that I wrote it For I was resolved at least to have that much to say against all that after wrote and preach'd and talk'd against it That I have revoked that Book and therefore shall not defend it And the incessant bloody Malice of the Reproachers made me heartily wish on two or three accounts that I had never written it 1. Because it was done just at the fall of the Government and was buried in onr ruines and never that I know of did any great good 2. Because I find it best for Ministers to meddle as little as may be with Matters of Poliâ—y how great soever their Provocations may be and therefore I wish that I had never written on any such Subject 3. And I repented that I meddled against Vane and Harrington which was the second Part in Defence of Monarchy seeing that the Consequents had been no better and that my Reward had been to be silenced imprisoned turned out of all and reproached implacably and incessantly as Criminal and never like to see an end of it He that had wrote for so little and so great displeasure might be tempted as well as I to wish that he had sat still and let GOD and Man alone with Matters of Civil Policy Though I was not convinced of many Errors in that Book so called by some Accusers to recant yet I repented the writing of it as an infelicity and as that which did no good but hurt § 153. But because an Appendix to that Book had given several Reasons of my adhering to the Parliament at first many thought I changed my Judgment about the first part of the Parliament's Cause And the rather because I disclaimed the Army's Rebellious Overthrows of Government as I had always done I knew I could not revoke the Book but the busie pevishness of censorious Professors would fall upon me as a Revolter And I knew that I could not for bear the said Revocation without those ill Effects which I supposed greater And which was worst of all I had no possible Liberty further to explain any Reasons § 154. When my Cure of Church Divisions came out the sober Party of Ministers were reconciled to it especially the Ancienter sort and those that had seen the Eviâ—s of Separation But some of the London Ministers who had kept up Publick Assemblies thought it should have been less sharp and some thought because they were under the Bishop's Severities that it was unseasonable For the Truth is most Men judged by Sense and take that to be good or bad which they feel do them good or hurt at the present And because the People's Alienation from the Prelates and Liturgy and Parish-Churches did seem to make against the Prelates and to make for the Nonconformist's Interest they thought it not Prudence to gratifie the Prelates so far as to gain-say it And so they considered not from whence dividing Principles come
my Lord there are other Fruits of it which I am not altogether hopeless of Receiving When I am commanded to pray for Kings and all in Authority I am allowed the Ambition of this Preferment which is all that ever I aspired after to live a quiet and peaceable Life in all Godliness and Honesty Diu nimis habitavit anima mea inter osores pacis I am weary of the Noise of contentious Revilers and have oft had Thoughts to go into a Foreign Land if I could find any where I might have a healthful Air and quietness that I might but Live and Die in peace When I sit in a Corner and meddle with no Body and hope the World will forget that I am alive Court City and Country is still fill'd with Clamours against me and when a Preacher wanteth Preferment his way is to Preach or write a Book against the Nonconformists and me by Name So that the Menstrua of the Press and Pulpits of some is some Bloody Invectives against my self as if my Peace were inconsistent with the Kingdom 's Happiness And never did my Eyes read such impudent Untruths in Matter of Fact as these Writings contain and they cry out for Answers and Reasons of my Nonconformity while they know the Law forbiddeth me to answer them Unlicensed I expect not that any Favour or Justice of my Superiours should Cure any of this But 1. If I might but be heard speak for my self before I be judged by them and such things believed For to contemn the Judgment of my Rulers is to dishonour them 2. I might live quietly to follow my private Study and might once again have the use of my Books which I have not seen these ten Years and pay for a Room for their standing at Kiderminster where they are eaten with Worms and Rats having no security for my quiet Abode in any place enough to encourage me to send for them And if I might have the Liberty that every Beggar hath to Travel from Town to Town I mean but to London to over-fee the Press when any thing of mine is Licensed for it And 3. If I be sent to Newgate for Preaching Christ's Gospel For I dare not sacrilegiously renounce my Calling to which I am Consecrated per Sacramentum Ordinis if I have the Favour of a better Prison where I may but walk and write These I should take as very great Favours and acknowledge your Lordship my Benefactor if you procure them For I will not so much injure you as to desire or my Reason as to expect any greater Matters no not the Benefit of the Law I think I broke no Law in any of the Preachings which I am accused of and I most confidently think that no Law imposeth on me the Oxford-Oath any more than any Conformable Minister and I am past doubting the present Mittimus for my Imprisonment is quite without Law But if the Justices think otherwise now or at any time I know no Remedy I have yet a License to Preach publickly in London-Diocess under the Arch-bishop's own Hand and Seal which is yet valid for occasional Sermons tho' not for Lectures or Cures But I dare not use it because it is in the Bishop's power to recall it Would but the Bishop who one would think should not be against the Preaching of the Gospel not re-call my License I could preach occasional Sermons which would absolve my Conscience from all Obligations to private Preaching For 't is not Maintenance that I expect I never received a Farthing for my Preaching to my Knowledge since May 1 1662. I thank God I have Food and Raiment without being chargeable to any Man which is all that I desire had I but leave to Preach for nothing and that only where there is a notorious Necessity I humbly Crave your Lordship's Pardon for the tediousness and again return you my very great Thanks for your great Favours remaining My Lord Your Lordship 's Humble Much Obliged Servant Richard Baxter Iune 24. 1670. One Reason more also as additional moveth me That the People of Scotland would have such jealous Thoughts of a Stranger especially at this time when Fame hath rung it abroad that I Conform that I should do little good among them and especially when there are Men enough among themselves that are able if Impediments were removed Another Letter to the E. of Lauderdale I Scarce account him worthy the Name of a Man much less of an English-man and least of all of a Christian who is not sensible of the great Sinfulness and Calamity of our divided and distracted Condition in his Majesty's Dominions The Sin is a Compendium of very many heinous Crimes The Calamity is 1. The King 's to have the trouble and peril of Governing such a divided People 2. The Kingdom 's to be as Guelphes and Gibelines hating and reviling one another and living in a Heart-War and a Tongue-War which are the Sparks that usually kindle a Hand-War and I tremble to think what a Temptation it is to Secret and to Foreign Enemies to make Attempts against our Peace and to read Infallibility it self pronouncing it a Maxim which the Devil himself is practically acquainted with That a House or Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand 3. The Churches To have Pastors against Pastors and Churches against Churches and Sermons against Sermons and the Bishops to be accounted the perfidiousest Enemies of the People's Souls and the Wolves that devour the Flock of Christ and so many of the People to be accounted by Bishops to be Rebellious Schismaticks and Fanaticks whose Religiousness and Zeal is the Plague of the Church and whose ruine or depression is the Pastor's Interest against whom the most vicious may be imployed as being more trusty and obedient to the Orders of the Church How doleful a Case is it that Christian Love and delight in doing good to one another is turned almost every where into wrath and bitterness and a longing after the downful of each other and to hear in most Companies the edifying Language of Love and Christianity turned into most odious Descriptions of each other and into the pernicious Language of Malice and Calumny It is to sober Men a wonderful sort of wickedness that all this is so obstinately persisted in even by those that decry the evil of it in others And to one sort all seemeth justified by saying that others are their Inferiours and to the other by saying that they are Persecuted And 't is a wonderful sort of Calamity which is so much loved that in the face of such Light and in the fore-sight of such Dangers and in the present Experience of such great Concussions and Confusions the Peace-killers will not hold their hands My Lord Many sober By-standers think That this Sin might cease and this misery be healed at a very easie Rate and therefore that it is not so much Ignorance as Interest that hindereth the Cure And they wonder who those Persons
them as we could and not to hold any Communion with any that did Conform having Printed his Third Reviling Libel against me called for my Third Reply which I Entitled The Church told of c. But being Printed without License Lestrange the Searcher Surprized part of it in the Press there being lately greater Penalties laid on them that Print without License than ever before And about the Day that it came out Mr. Bagshaw died a Prisoner though not in Prison Which made it grievous to me to think that I must seem to write against the Dead While we wrangle here in the dark we are dying and passing to the World that will decide all our Controversies And the safest Passage thither is by peaceable Holiness § 196. About Ian. 1. the King caused his Exchequer to be shut up So that whereas a multitude of Merchants and others had put their Money into the Banker's hands and the Bankers lent it to the King and the King gave Order to pay out no more of it of a Year the murmur and complaint in the City was very great that their Estates should be as they called it so surprized And the rather because it being supposed â—o be in order to the Assisting of the French in a War against the Dutch they took a Year to be equal to perpetuity and the stop to be a loss of all seeing Wars use to increase Necessities and not to supply them And among others all the Money and Estate except 10 l. per Ann. for 11 or 12 Years that I had in the World of my own not given away to others whom Charity commanded me to give it to for their Maintenance before was there which indeed was not my own which I will mention to Counsel any Man that would do good to do it speedily and with all their might I had got in all my Life the just Sum of 1000 l. Having no Child I devoted almost all of it to a Charitable Use a Free-School c. I used my best and ablest Friends for 7 Years with all the Skill and Industry I could to help me to some Purchase of House or Land to lay it out on that it might be accordingly setled And though there were never more Sellers I could never by all these Friends hear of any that Reason could encourage a Man to lay it out on as secure and a tolerable Bargain So that I told them I did perceive the Devil's Resistance of it and did verily suspect that he would prevail and I should never settle but it would be lost So hard is it to do any good when a Man is fully resolved that divers such Observations verily confirm me That there are Devils that keep up a War against Goodness in the World § 197. The great Preparations of the French to invade the Vnited Provinces and of the English to assist them do make now the Protestants Hearts to tremble and to think that the Low Countries will be Conquered and with them the Protestant Cause deeply endangered Though their vicious worldly Lives deserve God's Judgments on themselves yet they are a great part of the Protestants Humane Strength But the Issue must expound God's purposes without which Men's Designs are vain § 198. This Year a new Play-House being built in Salisbury-Court in Fleet-Street called the Duke of York's the Lord Mayor as is said desired of the King that it might not be the Youth of the City being already so corrupted by Sensual Pleasures but he obtained not his desire And this Ian. 1671. the King's Play-House in Drury Lane took Fire and was burnt down but not alone for about fifty or sixty Houses adjoyning by Fire and blowing up accompanied it § 199. A Stranger calling himself Sam. Herbert wrote me a Letter against the Christian Religion and the Scriptures as charging them with Contradictions and urged me to answer them which I did And his Name inviting my memory I adjoyned an Answer to the Strength of a Book heretofore written by Edward Lord Herbert of Cherbury some-time Ambassador in France the Author of the History of Henry VII called de Veritate being the most powerful Assault against the Christian Religion placing all the Religion that 's certain in the Common or Natural Notices I entitled the Book More Reasons for the Christian Religion and none against it Or a Second Appendix to the Reason for the Christian Religion § 200. The foresaid Mr. Hinkley by his impertinent Answer to my former Letters extorted from me a large Reply but when I was sending it him in Writing I heard that he intended to Print some scraps of it with his Papers the better to put them off Whereupon I sent him word he should not have them till he satisfied me that he would not so abuse them c. The rather because 1. The Subject of them was much to prove that the War was raised in England by an Episcopal Parliament jealous of other Episcopal Men as to Popery and Propriety 2. And it was so much against Diocesanes and their new Oaths as would much displease them 3. And in a sharper stile than was fit for publick View And as to the first Reason I was afraid lest any Papists would lay hold of it to make any Princes that already hate the the Non-conformists and Presbyterians to hate the Conformists and Prelatists also and so to seem themselves the most Loyal And I had rather they hated and cast off the Non-conformists alone than both This mindeth me to add that § 201. About a Year ago one Henry Fowlis Son to Sir David Fowlis an Oxford Man who had wrote against the Presbyterians with as filthy a Language almost as a man in his Wits could do having written also against the Papists His Book after his Death was Printed in a large Folio so opening the Principles and Practices of Papists against Kings their Lives and Kingdoms by multitudes of most express Citatioâ—s from their own Writers that the like hath not before been done by any Man nor is there extant such another Collection on that Subject though he left out the Irish Massacre But whereas the way of the Papists is to make a grievous Complaint against any Book that is written effectually against them as injurious as they did against Pet. Moulin's Answer to Philanax Anglicus and against Dr. Stillingfleet's late Book or the contrary this Book being copious true Citations and History is so terrible to them that their method is to say nothing of it but endeavour to keep it unknown for of late they have left the disputing way and bend all their endeavours to creep into Houses and pervert Persons in secret but especially to insinuate into the Houses and Fantiliarity of all the Rulers of the World where they can be received § 202. The Death of some the worthy Labours and great Sufferings of others maketh me remember that the just characterizing of some of the Ministers of Christ that now suffered for not
swearing subscibing declaring conforming and for refusing Re-ordination is a duty which I owe to the honour of God's Graces in them But because no Man can expect that I should be so voluminous as to describe particularly all the Eighteen hundred silenced I shall but tell you what my own Neighbours were not speaking by hearsay but personal acquaintance herein imitating Thuanus Micrelius and many others in the truth and brevity of the Character but giving you nothing of any unknown Person by bare report 1. In the County where I lived in Worcester City was silenced Mr. Ioseph Baker born in Stourbridge whose Wifes Funeral Sermon and Life I printed He was a Learâ—ed Man of a blameless Life Preaching constantly Catechising the People and conferring with the several Families especially before he first admitted them to the Lord's Supper personally But of extraordinary Prudence Calmness Patience Gravityâ— and Soundness of Judgment neither for Prelacy Presbytery nor Independency as then formed into Parties but for that which was â—ound in all the Parties and for Concord upon such Catholick terms The Parish of St. Andrews where he was Minister had but about six Pound a year maintenance of which he took none but gave it to a Woman to teach the poor Children of the Parish to read living upon his own and some small augmentation granted by the Parliament 2. At the Cathedral Mr. Simon Moor was silenced an old Independent who somewhat lost the Peoples Love upon Reasons which I here omit 3. In the same City was silenced Mr Iuice his Son-in-Law a moderate Independent and a sober grave serious peaceable blameless able Minister 4. In the same City was silenced Mr. Fincher a moderate Independent a zealous able Preacher of a good Life 5. At Kemsey was put out Mr. Tho. Bromwich an ancient reverend able Minister of an upright Life But when Bishop Morley was there and Mr. Collier of Blockley had conformed he was over-perswaded to take the Declaration But before he came to profess his Assent and Consent openly and fully to conform he was cast into great and long distress of Conscience and went no farther But yet by Preaching he used that Liberty that he had so procured 6. At Vpton upon Severn was silenced Mr. Benjamin Baxter Son to that old holy reverend Mr. George Baxter Pastor at little Wenlock in Shropshire near the Wrekon-Hill who lived there till about eighty six years of Age in the constant faithful Preaching and practising of the Gospel His Son now mentioned was a Preacher of extraordinary Skill especially in matter and method so that few that ever I heard excelled him He lived uprightly to near fifty seven Years of Age and suffered much by the lowness of his Estate by his Ejection who before had lived plentifully 7. His Brother Mr. Stephen Baxter though below him in utterance was of a solid Understanding and a calm peaceable Spirit most humble and blameless in his Life and liveth since his silencing in the practise of Physick 8. At Evesham was silenced Mr. George Hopkins Son to Mr. William Hopkins the most eminent wise and truly Religious magistrat of Bewdley my old dear Friend at last a member of the long Parliament This his Son having long been Pastor at Evesham was many Years silenced and when the Oxford Oath came out he was over perswaded to take it in his own Sence and so not to be forced five miles from the People But he died either on or very near the same day that he should have had the benefit of it He was a very judicious godly moderate peaceable and upright man He hath one Writing extant called Salvation from Sin 9. At Martley was silenced and ejected Mr. Ambrose Sparry heretofore School-master at Stourbridge where he was born he was an ancient sober peaceable moderate humble godly judicious man formerly for the Conformists but now cast out among the rest But his great Prudence and moderation and Learning and the chief of Stourbridge being his Friends caused the Chancellor to connive at last at his teaching the School at Stourbridge again where he had been in his Youth where he is yet connived at and liveth with great acceptance though he was a while maliciously laid in Goal 10. At Bewdley was silenced Mr. Henry Oatland the most lively servent moving Preacher in all the County of an honest upright Life who rode about from place to place Preaching fervently and winning many Souls to God besides all his very great Labours with his own People publickly and from House to House And he yet continueth Preaching up and down privately where he can have opportunity with zeal and diligence And though those that excelled others in zealous Preaching and acceptance with the People were apter to be carried in my Judgment a little too far from Conformity and the Prelate's Indignation against the Church-Tyranny but not at all forsaking Orthodox and sound Principles yet so was not he 11. At Stourbridge was silenced Mr. Iarvis Bryan Brother to Dr. Bryan of Coventry a most humble upright faithful Minister of a blameless Life and sound Doctrine 12. At Stone was silenced Mr. Richard Serjeant formerly my Assistant a man of such extraordinary Prudence Humility Sincerity Self-denial Patience and blamelessness of Life that I know not of all the Years that he assisted me of any one person in Town or Parish that was against him or that ever accused him of saying or doing any thng amiss So that though many excelled him in Learning and utterance yet none that ever I knew as far as I could Judge in Innocency and Sincerity which made him beloved of all above many abler Men. 13. At Broom was silenced Mr. Humphrey Waldern my Assistant after Mr. Serjeant exactly agreeing in the same Character I gave him in the next degree of good Learning and Utterance 14. At Womborne was silenced Mr. Wilsby an ancient judicious peaceable moderate Divine who had long kept one of the most learned of the Prelatists in his House At Bremicham where he lived privately he was troubled by Sir Robert Holt but under many Infirmities is yet alive a man of humility and an unblameable Life I mention not the Judgment of any of these that I may say of all together that as far as I could perceive they were neither for Prelacy Presbytery or Independency as now in Parties but as I said of them before of the primitive temper for Concord on the Terms that all sound and good men are agreed in and for the practice of that rather than contending about more And of the primitive extraordinary Humility and Innocency 15. The same I must say of Mr. Andrew Tristram first of Clent then silenced at Bridgnorth a Man of more than ordinary ability in Preaching and Prayer and of an upright Life and now a Physician 16. The same I must say of Mr. Iohn Reignolds silenced at Wolverhamptom a Man of more than ordinary Ability for Learning and Preaching and now also a
Physician 17. At Avely was silenced Mr. Lovel formerly Schoolmaster at Walverley who having been supposed still to be not only against the Parliament's Cause but for the Prelates and Conformity and never coming into our ministerial Meetings where we monthly kept up disputations and Discipline but only extraordinary constant at my Lecture at Kiderminster he was as a stranger to us all till the silencing time came and then he suffered with the most patient and resolved and hath since appeared on fuller notice a prudent and very worthy Man and is yet living in his patient Silence aged about sixty two 18. At Bromsgrove was silenced Mr. Iohn Spilsbury born in Bewdley a man accounted an Independent but of extraordinary worth for moderation peaceableness ability and ministerial diligence and an upright Life 19. At Whitley was silenced Mr. Ioseph Read born in Kiderminster and sent by me to Cambridge and after living in my House and for one Year my assistant at Kiderminster a man of great sincerity and worth 20. At Churchil was cast out Mr. Edward Boucher another young man born in Kiderminster-Parish of great humility sincerity peaceableness and good ministerial parts Brother to Iames Boucher a Husbandman who can but write his Name and is of as good understanding in Divinity as many Divines of good account and moreable in Prayer than most Ministers that ever I heard And of so calm a Spirit and blameless a life that I never saw him laugh or sad nor ever heard him speak an idle Word nor ever heard Man accuse him of a sinful Word or Deed which I note with Joy and to tell the Reader that he and others of his Temper in Kiderminster did by their Example exceedingly farther my success 21. At Clent was silenced Mr. Tho. Baldwin a godly calm sober Preacher of a blameless Life 22. From Chaddesley was cast out Mr. Thomas Baldwin Senior who had been our Schoolmaster at Kiderminster sent to me by Mr. Vines from Cambridge a good Schollar a sober calm grave moderate peaceable minister whose Conversation I never heard one Person blame for any one Word or Deed an extraordinary Preacher Wherefore I desired when I was driven from Kiderminster that the People would be ruled by him and Mr. Serjeant and he liveth yet among them and teacheth them privately from House to House He was present with me when I had Conference with Bishop Morley when he silenced me and the witness of our Discourse which with the imprisonment of the most Religious and blameless of the Flock and the experience of the Quality of some Preachers that were sent to the People in my stead and the rest of the havock made in the Churches did alienate him so much from Prelacy and Conformity and the People with him that though afterward they got a godly Conformable Minister I could not get them to Communicate with him though I got them constantly to hear him On this occasion I will mention the great Mercy of God to that Town and Country in the raising of one Man Mr. Thomas Foley who from almost nothing did get about five Thoosand Pound per Annum or more by Iron-works and that with so just and blameless Dealing that all Men that ever he had to do with that ever I heard of magnified his great Integrity and Honesty which was questioned by none And being a Religious Faithful Man he purchased among other Lands the Patronage of several great places and among the rest of Stourbridge and Kiderminster and so chose the best Conformable Ministers to them that could be got And not only so but placed his Eldest-Son's Habitation in Kiderminster which became a great Protection and Blessing to the Town having placed two Families more elsewhere of his two other Sons all three Religious worthy Men. And in thankfulness to God for his Mercies to him built a well-founded Hospital near Stourbridge to teach poor children to read and write and then set them Apprentices and endowed it with about five hund Pounds a Year per Annum Such worthy Persons and such strange Prosperity and holy use of it are so rare and the interest of my poor Neighbours in it so great that I thought meet to mention it to God's Praise and his § 203. There were more Ministers silenced of that Countrey but I will not be tedious i◠naming more of them A word of the other places where I my self had lived In Coventry both the Ministers were cast out 1. Dr. Iohn Bryan an ancient Learned Divine of a quick and active Temper very humble faithful and of a Godly upright Life who had so great a fitness to teach and educate Youth that there have gone out of his House more worthy Ministers into the Church of God than out of many Colledges in the University in that time And he had three Sons that were all worthy Non-conformable Ministers all silenced 2. Dr. Grew a Man of a different natural temper yet both Concordant lovingly in the work of God a calm Grave sober sedate Divine more retired and of less activity but godly able and faithful in his Ministry 3. At Birmingham was silenced Mr. Wills a sedate retired peaceable able Divine also born in Coventry 4. As for Mr. Anthony Burgess of Sutton Coldfield a place of near 300 l. per Annum which he left I need not describe him he was so famously known in the Assembly and London and by his many Learned Godly Writings for a Man eminently Learned and Pious And though in the old Conformity he was before a Conformable Man yet he was so far from the New Conformity that on his Death-bed he professed great satisfaction in his Mind that he had not Conformed 5. From Walshall was cast out Mr. Burdall a very Learned able and Godly Divine of more than ordinary parts and worth now dead also 6. At Wedgbury was silenced Mr. Fincher whom I have seen but was not much acquainted with but he was reputed a very Godly Man and a good Preacher But I pass by all those I knew not my self 7. From Rowley had lately removed Mr. Ioseph Rock and was silenced a very calm humble sober peaceable godly and blameless Minister and of very good Abilities like our Worcestershire Ministers before described as to his temper and judgment of Church-Government 8. At Kings-Norton was silenced Mr. Tho. Hall an ancient Divine known by his many Writings of a quick Spirit a Godly upright man and the only Presbyterian whom I knew in that County 9. At Tippon Mr. Hinks was silenced a Godly Preacher a moderate Independent 10. At Hales-Owen was silenced Mr. Paston a sober moderate peaceable Minister of a godly upright Life 11. Near Newcastle was silenced Mr. Sound an ancient Divine of great Learning moderation judgment and calmness of Spirit and of a Godly upright Life born by Worvile near Bridgworth known to me about thirty years ago who though with others he was of old a Conformist is far enough from the new
perversi ordinatores nullis denuo ordinationibus intersunt and least you may reply that he speaks not this of all our present Bishops he immediately subjoins these Words Where then shall we have a Bishop to ordain of the old accused Tribe Is not this Christian Filial Duty of Presbyters toward the Bishops their Fathers Reply to Sect. 10. 1. For that Desire you again mention of Bishops in the Reformed Churches it is an unproved vain Assertion against full Evidence It is only of a few particular Persons in those Churches that you can prove it If so many Writings against Bishops and Constitutions and actual Practice will not prove them willing to be without them or at least not necessitated there is no Proof of any Man's Will or Necessity 2. What I said I must needs maintain till you say somewhat to change my Judgment I am past doubt it 's ill trusting the Betrayers and Destroyers of the Church with the Government of it And this I did prove and can with great Ease and Evidence prove it more fully 3. I pray you do not persuade Men that by the old accused Tribe I meant all the late English Bishops they were not all accused of destroying or betraying the Church that I ever heard of Where be the Articles that were put in against Usher Hall Davenant Potter Westfield Prideaux c. All those that I call the accused Tribe you may find Articles against in Parliament for their Devastations or Abuses Should the Arrians or other Heretick Bishops say to those that forsook them as you do of me is not this Christian Filial Duty of Presbyters towards the Bishops their Fathers There is no Duty to any Episcopal Father that will hold against God and his Church Take heed of making their Sins your own Except Sect. 11. And elsewhere by Irony he adds O what a rash thing it was to imprison though when he was imprisoned I believe it was by the Name of Dr. Wren or Bishop Wren for excommunicating depriving c. p. 51. and p. 68. To begin at home it is most certain according to many ancient Canons which are their Laws our English Bishops were incapable of ordaining for they lost their Authority by involving themselves in secular and publick Administrations Canon 80. Apostolig N B. That Canon is 30. beyond the Canons Apostolical for even the Papists themselves admit but of fifty genuine and he would eject all our Bishops by the 80th Canon Apostolical Lost their Authority also for neglect of instructing their Floâ—â— most or many of them and many more for non Residence c. Reply to Sect. 11. And why not Wren without any further Title as well as Calvin Luther Beza Zanchy Grotius c. 2. Let the indifferent Reader peruse all my words and blame me if he can What seems it so small a matter in your eyes to expel so many thousand Christian Families and silence and suspend and deprive so many able Ministers in so small a room and so short a time as that it is disobedience to our Fathers not to consent to their punishment It seems then these silly Lambs must be devoured not only without resistance but without complaint or accusing the Wolves because they say they were our Fathers God never set such Saturnine Fathers over his Church so as to authorize them in this or to prohibite a just remedy He never gave them power for Destruction but for Edification 3. What I said of our Bishops incapacity upon that reason was expresly ad hominem against mine own Judgement viz. upon supposition that those Canons are of such force as those imagine against whom I dispute 4. The Canon 80 Apost was also brought ad hominem for though it be confessed not of equal Antiquity with the rest yet for that Antiquity they have it is known how much use those men make of their supposed Authority But are there not enough others that may evince the point in hand besides that you may easily know it and in many Canons that null their Office who come in by the Magistracy Exception to Sect. 12. And whereas we are ready to make good against all the Papists in the world that our English Protestant Bishops had due Ordination in Queen Eliz. and King Edwards time by such who had been Ordained in King Henry the Eighths time Mr. Baxter tells us the Popish Bishops who Ordained in the days of Hen. 8. and many Ages before had no power of Ordination and this he speaks as his own judgment not only from the consequences of his Adversaries for he adds this I prove in that they received their Ordination from no other Bishops of the Province nor Metropolitan but only from the Pope singly yet this is all the Argument he hath to overthrow consequentially upon our objections the Ordination of those Protestant Bishops which himself acknowledges Learned Pious Reverend Men and all that Ordained or were Ordained in Hen. 8. 7. and many Ages before as he saith And indeed if his Discourse were of any force not only in our English Church but also in all the Churches of the West France Spain Polonia Swedland Denmark and throughout the Empire of Germany for these and those many Ages before which he speaks of and all this that our new Presbyterians of Enngland Volunteers in Ordaining and being Ordained without Bishops without pretence of necessity yea or difficulty or colour of difficulty except what themselves had created wherein they have as little Communion with the Protestants beyond seas as they have with the Episcopal Protestants of the true Reformed Church of England may be acknowledged good and lawful Presbyters and Pastors with power conjunctim divisim any one of them alone as Mr. Baxter thinks to Excommunicate and Absolve in foro Ecclesiastico Reply to Sect. 12. The word Due may signifie either such as is not null or else such as is fully regular or else such as they had Authority to perform who did ordain though they might have some Faults or Irregularities If you take it in the first Sense many will yield it who yet deny it in the last as supposing in some Cases Ordination Passive may be valid and so due in the Receiver when yet Ordination Active is without all just Authority in the Ordainer Though this may seem strange I am ready to give some Reasons for it It must be in the last Sense conjunct with the first that you must take the Word Due if you will speak to the point in Hand 2. I do expresly say there that it is according to the Doctrine of the Objectors consequentially that I affirm this not affirming or denying it to be mine own Judgment and to that end bring the Proof which is mentioned And yet you are pleased to affirm that I speak it as my own Judgment and not only from the Consequences of Adversaries Supposing your Grounds which I confidently deny that an uninterrupted Succession of due Authoritative Ordination
either take it upon himself or the People may be the Judges to call him out to it or the Magistrate either Then they have the same Authority which we must have if the Succession be interrupted and the Door of the Vineyard nailed up by Providence and so their Authority seems built upon your own Principles Now to all this if you say that it is their Error to be Anabaptists and it is their Error to Judge the visible Ministry of England to be no Church-Offices and that it is their Duty to quit themselves of these Errors that they may be in a Capacity to receive Ordinations and the Presbytery in a Capacity to Ordain them as you do in effect say To this I answer that I think as well as you that these are their Errors and that these Errors ought to be laid aside But yet this being said doth not absolve them from the case of extream Necessity which I speak of An erroneous Conscience binding as strongly as a sound and an Error appearing Truth lays as great a Necessity upon the Party to frame his Practise to it as Truth And so the Necessity becomes still as importunate Methinks this Answer which you give may be made â—y Papists to us Protestants and by the Episcopal Party to you Presbyteries when we tell the Papists that we dare not take Orders from them or the Presbyterian tells the Episcopacy that they dare not take Orders from them How easily may the Papists say to us it is our Error how seriously may the Episcopal say to the Presbyterian it is your Error You create Impossibilities and Necessities upon your selves by your erronious Consciences But if we Protestants cannot reject that Necessity which lies upon us of refusing Orders from the Papists or if the Presbyterian cannot reject the Impossibility that lies before them of taking Orders from the Prelates whilst their Conciences tells them they may not Why may not the Sectary upon as good Ground and as justifiable Principles refuse Orders from the Presbyterian and plead as strongly a moral Impossibility and a nailing up the Vineyards Door by Providence whilst their Consciences tells them they may not and so baulking those that we call Church Officers enter as regularly into the Ministry or at least as inconfutably as any other Men if the Succession be interrupted And therefore I cannot think that you have answered this Argument except the two first Lines contains it where you say That the best things may be made use of as Occasions to encourage Men in Sin c. because I think that there is much Truth in that and that the Inconvenience which this Argument hath hanged upon that Assertion is but incommodum per accidens which may be fastened upon most of the Truths of God I supersede likewise in that Answer to my third Argument As for my Fourth Argument I confess it was frivolously urged to the present Question and I have wondered at my self how I came to hoole it in under the present Debate and therefore I will return you nothing to what you have said against it But giving you many Thanks for that Help which you have held out to my Understanding towards that weighty Question of justifying the Calling of the Ministry I beseech the Almighty long continue your Life to the Advantage of his Church And this done without further Ceremony I bid you farewell and rest Your Fellow Labourer in the Gospel of Christâ— M. Johnson Wamborne Nov. 9. 1653. For my Reverend c. very worthy Friend Mr. Baxter Minister of the Word at Kidderminister These Mr. Baxter's Second Letter to Mr. Johnson Reverend Brother I Know not whether I am more glad of your Satisfaction or sorrowful that you will needs supercede the Task which you undertook I confess it is a Labour which I apprehend would be useful to me many ways but a strong Conceit of the Impossibility of performing it did slack my Desires But now you tantalize me expressing here a higher Confidence of the Feaseableness of your Work than before in your defying all the World on the contrary So that I must again renew my suit to you that you would perform that Work and prove de facto an uninterrupted Succession I profess it is for my own Edification that I desire it and if you suspect whether it be to cavil or enter a Quarrel with you mistake me Such a Discovery would dispatch several Difficulties with me in several Controversies As for your Animadversions last sent I shall reply to the substance of them in brief 1. The First I conceive little worth the insisting on because first you confess it is but a Motive to induce you to think there is weight in the Point 2. Because if there were any thing in it the contrary Judgments of all the Learned Divines of France Belgia upper Germany Helvetia Denmark Sweeden Scotland Transilvania Hungary with a great part of the English who are against the necessity of an uninterrupted Succession is as strong a motive to an unprejudiced Man as is the Judgment of the Bishops of England alone But 2. It is a known Case past all doubt that the English Bishops opposed the Papists in this Point till of later Years and to name you more what need I when you know I named you so many in my Book To all which add That even the late exasperated Episcopal Divines whereof some have been suspected of halting do yet confess the Truth of the Reformed Churches and Ministry that have no Bishops as doth Dr. Fern Dr. Stewart's Answer to Fountain's Letter Bishop Bromhall against Militerius who yet would have the Pope to be principium Unitatis to all the Church I do not think you can find one of twenty that wrote against the Papists before the late King's Reign or the Treaty of the Spanish Match but were all against the Papists in this Point of the necessity of uninterrupted Succession if they medled with the Point Ad 2 um The Reason why you saw not a Formal Answer in my Words I conceive was your Oversight you took no notice of the Force of my Answer You required this Proposition to be proved from Scripture They that are thus and thus qualified may preach the Word I told you it is contained in this which is in Scripture Men thus and thus qualified shall be appointed to preach the Word Here you overlook the Strength of my Answer which is in the Word shall and you not only obscure the Emphasis but change the Word and put may for shall Here is contained a Precept comprehensive both of the Preacher's Work and the Ordainers conjunctly Now all my Business was to shew you that as in this there are more Precepts than one so that secundum materiam subjectam they have not the same Degree of Obligation and that though God do lay down together his Law both de re de modo of the Work and the Order of entring on it yet that the
then untaught You know I suppose that a Man that must go but from House to House can speak but to few Persons in a Year 1. If all Families were ready and willing how little a part of great Parishes would be taught 2. People are commonly poor and from Morning to Night about their hard Labour and cannot hear us 3. They are unwilling that we should come into their Houses and see their Disorder and Poverty and Uncleanness 4. Many Ministers are so Valetudinary that their cold Houses would destroy their Health to talk with them there but an Hour 5. By this way we must be almost continually speaking and he that can preach once or twice a Week cannot preach four or five times every Day without which it would be next to nothing One may preach to Two Thousand at once in Publick when to say the same to those Two Thousand by One or by Four at a time must take Five Hundred Sermons 6. By this means Ministers were there Bodies able must do nothing else and whereas most have little or no maintenance of their own what time will you allow them to labour with their Hands to get Bread for their Families how shall their Rents and Charges be paid 7. Or if they must beg or live on others Charity where shall they have it if they take your Course If they teach but few few will relieve them if they stay from Cities and Corporations in poor Country Villages few are able if willing to relieve them Some that have done so and Preached too have yet been put to keep Wife and Children upon little besides brown Rye Bread and Water By what Law is both Silence and Famine made their due 8. You know doubtless that in such Parishes as Stepney White-chappel Algate Giles Cripplegate Sepulchres Giles in the Fields Andrews Holbourn Clement Danes Martins c. it is but a small part of the People that can hear in publick I suppose there may be Twenty or Thirty Thousand untaught in the Parish whence Mr. Read is gone to Goale for teaching The People say that this Parish hath Fourscore Thousand Souls suppose it be less when scarce Two Thousand can hear well in the Church Are you risen up now so near the Silencers Opinion as that you would have all these Souls untaught and America transplanted into London Is the Gospel grown so indifferent to you in Comparison of your 〈◊〉 indifferent can they believe without hearing and hear without preachâ—â—â— I am not yet grown so desperate a Gamester as to cast away so many thousand Souls to the Devil at hap hazard for fear of hearing Schism Schism Why should Preachers be sent to the Americans rather than to St. Martins St. Giles and such like places Quest. 15. How will you absolve us from our Ordination Vow even Papists say the Character is indelible we were not ordained pro tempore or on Tryal If a Man may forbid us preaching to all save four among a Thousand or Forty Thousand or Fourscore Thousand why not also to those Four If to all Corporations and Cities where Churches only were planted at first why not also to the Villages If where Souls need the Number of Twenty or Ten Teachers all may be forbidden save one why not that one also How many hundred Years did prohibited Pastors teach and guide the Churches I beseech you clearly satisfy us what it is that disobligeth us all from God's dreadful Charge 2 Tim. 4. 1. 2. Before God and the Lord Iesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his Kingdom to preach the Word be instant in season out of season c. And why we may not as well be disobliged by Man's Prohibition from relieving the Poor that else will perish Yea our own Children Quest. 16. Might not Daniel then have forborn Praying and may not yea ought not you if forbidden forbear praying in your House reading the Scripture or exhorting and admonishing and teaching others in your place and Converse Quest. 17. Is it likely to be of God which is so pleasing to the Flesh the Papists and the Devil as our ceasing to preach the Gospel would be Quest. 18. Is it not the great Mark to know all false Sects and Sectmasters by that they are still for that which hindereth the Gospel and hurteth Souls The grievous Wolves though in Sheeps Cloathing devour the Flocks the Thorns and Thistles have Pricks instead of Grapes and Figs And if the silencing one faithful Minister in the Churches Necessity be a heinous Crime what are you turned to if you would have near Two Thousand silence themselves They that silence us by a Prison cause not our sin because it is not voluntary but forced but you would make us the sinful Doers of it our selves which is far worse Quest. 19. Is it the way to prevent our threatned Judgments to call us all to Repentance for preaching the Gospel these Fourteen Years and to call us all off from preaching it for the Future that we might not call Sinners to Repentance for their Sins how glad would the Papists be if you could prevail but with a few that most molest them what a Life have I to repent of if this must be my Repentance and at how cheap and easy a rate might I have prevented it must I that have hazarded my Life for many a single Sermon now repent of all what then can I take Comfort in of all my Life Quest. 20. Is it not as sinful to Write and Counsel when prohibited as to Preach and must we repent of all our prohibited Writings to If God bless out Preaching and Writing to the good of many Souls doth it not forbid us to repent or at least make it very hard to us can I honestly wish all undone again I pray you hasten your convincing Reasons to keep me out of Prison and further Guilt if this be criminal Pag. 197 198 c. You speak principally to me which bids me further ask you Quest. 21. Whether we did profess that our private catechizing alone did all that Good without our publick preaching or rather with it If not whether you did not unhappily hence collect our Unhappiness Quest. 22. If I were able in this Parish or the last I lived in or the ejected Pastor who liveth near me to go from House to House it would be many Years before he or I could go over half the Parish And do you think that to be taught once a Year or in many Years is enough to counterwork Sin the Devil and his Instruments Would you have no more except for Two or Three Thousand of all the Parish Quest. 23. But are you not too suspicious when you talk of shrewdly suspecting p. 198 199. those that support the Ministers unless they would do it to them that cease Preaching You must needs know that in most Country Parishes the People cannot support them and others far off are less apt to feel