jejuno and so St. Augustin counsels Januarius Sic etiam tu ad quam forte Ecclesiam veneris ejus morem serva which plainly concludes that Christian peace and order requires that we should conform to the Rites and Canons of that Church in whose Jurisdiction we live The five Presbyters of Carthage were by St. Cyprian sentenced for Schismaticks because being within the Diocess of Carthage and so under his inspection they notwithstanding gathered to themselves Assemblies and exercised Ministerial Offices without his Authority And for the same reason Athanasius accused Ischyras of Schism for modelling a Congregation in Mareoles without any subjection or dependance upon him the Bishop of Alexandria unto whose Jurisdiction that Countrey belonged for he shews us his Title in these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. All the Presbyters of this Province have their peculiar Cures or Parishes but all the Churches of this Region are under the Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Alexandria And the very same thing Epiphanius tells us in his second Book adversus Haereses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That there were several Parochial Churches in which the Inhabitants might assemble with greater convenience and these Congregations were under the Ministery of peculiar Presbyters but all these Presbyters and their respective Churches were governed by the Superintendence of the Arch-bishop of Alexandria and this was the universal model of unity and order in all other Provinces of the Catholick Church Now the Arch-bishops of Canterbury and York have as much Jurisdiction over the Christians in England as Athanasius had over the Province of Alexandria or St. Cyprian in the Diocess of Carthage for beside the Right of Church-Government which their succession from the Apostles give them they are impowr'd to exercise their Jurisdiction by the Laws of our Christian Prince and therefore those Societies of Christians living under the Jurisdiction of the Arch-bishops and Bishops of England and yet do separate from their communion and Government are Schismaticks from the Church of England To conclude this if the Novatians and Donatists if the five Presbyters of Carthage if Ischyras in Alexandria were Schismaticks if from the Ascension of our Lord to his second Advent there was or can be a Schismatick then the Sectaries of England are Schismaticks not only from the Church of England but from the whole Catholick Church Having thus stated the antient notion of Schism and found it a henous impiety though our Non-conformists sport with it as an Ecclesiastical Scarecrow I shall next do them the justice to examine the Doctors Plea and see how well he vindicates them from the guilt of Schism First He denyes that there is any such creature as a National stated governing Church of England If the Doctor means by all these rumbling Epithets of stated National governing organical Church of England that there is no such distinct organical Church in England that is a separate body from the Catholick Church I am then of his opinion But if he means that the Bishops of England have no power of Government over the Christians in England it is a very foul mistake to speak in the modestest phrase for I have already prov'd that the Arch-bishops and Bishops have as much Jurisdiction in their respective Provinces and Dioceses of England as any other Patriarchs and Bishops of the Catholick Church ever had in theirs and if the Act of Uniformity be a Law I am sure there is such an establish'd being as a National Church In Pag. 30. his gravity drolls and gives us a very merry Argument to prove that there is no such creature as a National Church of England for sayes he Whoso will erect a stated National governing Church in England must find us an Officer clothed with Authority to excommunicate from Michael ' s Mount in Cornwall to Carlisle in Berwick Now Sir let this pass for a piece of wit though it is as wide from reason as Cornwall from Berwick What though the Bishop of Antioch could not excommunicate from Antioch to Constantinople and from thence to the borders of Persia must there therefore be no governing Church in Greece and might the Christians in Antioch by that Logick separate themselves from the communion and jurisdiction of their proper Patriarchs without Schism If our Author could have prov'd that there were any Provinces or Natives of England that were de jure exempt from the Canons of this Church and the jurisdiction of the English Bishops then there had been something of argument But if the Doctor for contumacy and disorder should be excommunicated from Church of England in Berwick I am sure without absolution de jure he could not communicate with any Assembly of the Church in England though he travail'd from Berwick to Carlisle and from thence to Mount Michael in Cornwall and this I fancy does strongly conclude That the Church of England is such a part of the Catholick Church which hath a proper and peculiar jurisdiction over all the Christians in this Kingdom Our Doctor pag. 10. sect 12. owns it as a confess'd principle That every individual member of the Church Catholick visible is bound in duty both to God and his own soul to joyn himself to some particular Society of Christians with which he may enjoy all the Ordinances of God so as may be for his souls advantage Well then why do they not communicate with the Church of England where all the Ordinances of God are observ'd and solemniz'd with as much gravity and faithfulness as in any other part of the Catholick Church To this he answers pag. 11. That the business is so stated by the Act of Uniformity that they cannot communicate with us without doing what they judge to be sinful There is nothing can justly be called sinful but what transgresses some manifest Law of God or Nature and could the Doctor have prov'd that any thing practised or enjoyn'd by the Church of England did violate any of those Divine Rules his Plea had been allowed and his Party might vindicate their Non-conformity But to Transgress a plain Law of God to disobey the Orders of our Governours and yet to give us no better reason for it than to say they fancy the things are sinful is so far from excusing that it aggravates the guilt For First Their disobedience is an affront to their Governours and then the doing this only upon the account of their own judgement or fancy is an affront to God for private conscience to usurp the Soveraignty of God and to lay such Divine Obligations upon the soul and mind which God never impos'd The nature and guilt of this disobedience is exactly represented by the story of the young Prophet 1 Kings 13. he was sent to prophesie against the Altar in Bethel now Jeroboam having cast off all the Priests and Levites of the Aaronical line and erected a new model of Religion therefore that the young Prophet might have no communion
Imprimatur G. Jane R. P. D. Henr. Episc Lond. Ã sac domesticis May 17. 1676. THE NOTION OF SCHISM Stated according to the ANTIENTS And considered with Reference to the NON-CONFORMISTS And the PLEAS for SCHISMATICKS examined Being Animadversions upon the Plea for the Non-Conformists With Reflections on that Famous Tract of Schism Written by M r. Hales In Two Letters to a very Worthy Gentleman LONDON Printed by R. W. for William Oliver and George Rose Booksellers in Norwich and are to be sold by them there and Nath. Brooks at the Angel in Cornhill and R. Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-yard 1676. TO THE READER THE Plea for Non-conformists tending to vindicate them from Schism came to my hands long after its Edition and then by accident too But the Schism being still continued I hope you will not think it too Late or Impertinent to publish these Animadversions upon that Tract Now should I protest against all Vanity and Popularity disavow all Interest and Sinister designs should I tell you in most Solemn and Sacred protestations that I have no other end in the publication of these Papers but the Honour of God and the Peace of his Church yet it were still at your mercy to credit these Asseverations or receive them as the usual pretensions of every Author Therefore I resolve against the Impertinence of an Apologie and leave you to the common liberty of Censure If I meet with the fate of St. Paul to pass through good as well as bad Report I shall have Honour and content enough If thou art a sound and sober member of the Church of England I know thy Temper cannot be Sullen or Ill-natur'd it is thy Genius to be Candid and Generous and thy Religion makes thee Charitable and therefore I am assured that thy Balms cannot break my Head and if these Papers may in any measure contribute towards thy firmer settlement in the Communion of this Church my principal End is then effected If thou art a Dissenter from this established Church but hast not lost that Christian Temper of Modesty and Humility read on there is hope of thy recovery that thou wilt not dye a Schismatick But if thou art one who hast given up thy Name and thy Reason too to the Leader of a Conventicle let me beseech thee to read no further for this little Discourse will but provoke thy Passion I have no Hope to prevail upon Pertinacious resolutions I never yet cleansed a Leper nor raised the Dead but if I had I should notwithstanding Despond of ever perswading any Obstinate or Passionate man for it does not appear to me evident in all the History of the Gospel that our Lord among his many Mighty Works and Miracles ever cured Perverseness If thou art a Romish Recusant let me intreat thee to Suffer thy Reason to recover its Liberty and not alwayes be in Vassallage to those Roman Dictators I know there are many of that Religion in this Nation who are Gentlemen of Complaisant Converse and Ingenuous Education but I wonder that ye who pretend so much Abhorrence of Fanaticism and boast of Loyalty to your Prince should yet degrade your selves to the same Level with the Basest Sectaries and live in constant Rebellion to the Laws of your Natural Soveraign There is great Reason that the Kings of England should ever have a peculiar Jealousie upon your Party for though your Bodies and Estates are Subjects of England yet your Souls or Religion are under the Empire of a Forreign Jurisdiction and as long as ye continue so there is no Reason in the world that can give the Crown sufficient Security for your lasting Allegiance As for those of your Religion who live under the Laws of the Romish Dominions I have great Charity for them for they can plead submission to their own Superiours and I am apt to believe that Plea may be very considerable when they come to appear before the Prince of Peace and the God of Order But for you whose Lot hath cast you under the Government of the Kingdom and Catholick Church of England and yet to Divide from their Jurisdiction and subject your selves to the Canons of a Forreign Church is not only a Disobedience against the Laws of this Church and State but a Violation of the Antient Canons of the Catholick Church and is so great a Disorder and unreasonableness that the Penalties inflicted for your Recusancy are as Just as they are Severe and ye merit no Compassion Indeed if your deserting the Romish would put you out of the Catholick Church I would never upon those hard terms perswade you into our Communion Our Profession of Faith ye will acknowledge to be the antient Catholick and Apostolick Creed I know your principal Prejudice is against the Succession of our Bishops and the Authority of our Priesthood But let me beseech you to do so much Right to us and so much Justice to your selves as impartially to peruse Mr Mason's Vindication of the Ministry of the Church of England and if his Transcript of those Acts and Monuments of our Church will not satisfie you let some of your subtilest Jesuits convict that Author of Falshood or Imposture and I will acknowledge that we are no Catholick Church and you no Schismaticks There are many of your Religion persons of great Honour and Estates in this Kingdom who may easily have the Advantage to view and examine the Original Records of the Consecration of our English Bishops in that great Crisis of our Reformation and methinks in so weighty a matter where your Estates if not some raster Interest are highly concern'd ye should be strictly inquisitive and not so blindly acquiesce in a popular Mistake and Jesuitical delusion In the mean time I charge you with the guilt of Schism in Dividing from the Church of England and if you think your selves injur'd by this Indictment let any of your Romish Champions be the Doctor 's Second and publish a Plea for your Vindication and though I am none of the Worthies of England yet I will engage for a Reply If any of you shall think fit to require it I dare undertake to prove that the Canons of the Romish Church do no more oblige any Subject of England than our Statute Laws do bind the Poles or Moscovites and that it is as great a Disorder and Impertinence for the Bishop of Rome to excommunicate any of the people of England as it were for the Lord Chief Justice of England to outlaw Don Juan of Austria And now Reader I leave you to enjoy your Humour to be Candid or Clamorous as your fancy inclines you To be wounded with the Arrows of Bitter Words is a very easie kind of Martyrdom and say what you please I am resolv'd to be unconcern'd and subscribe my self Your Christian Friend R. C. Worthy Sir I Not long since receiv'd from the hand of a Non-conforming Pastor by way of Answer to my impeaching
him of Schism this Tract Intitul'd A Plea for the Non-conformists tending to justifie them against the clamorous charge of Schism by a Doctor of Divinity whom the Dissenters call Dr. Owen And whether I may attribute it to the slighting or carelesness of our Clergie I know not but as yet I have neither seen or heard of an Answer to it Sir The true Friendship I have for you and your abilities which I am no stranger unto prompts me to put this Plea into your handling and beg your Animadversions upon it Supposing the Doctor has much wandered from that Notion of Schism deliver'd down to us from the Primitive Fathers the sense of which Sacred Priests I shall alwayes rather espouse in any point I find so clearly determin'd by them than the crude and partial if not Enthusiastick Writings of some Moderns whose heads seem rather flatus't with a prejudic'd Interest than ballac'd with an Apostolick Sobriety When I reflect upon this Intrigue of the present Dissenters from the Church of England in confounding the Notion of Schism with that of Heresie and by that jejune project would evade that Scandal of being Schismaticks a discrimination esteemed so odious and perilous among all good Catholicks in all Ages of the Christian Church I can fancy no other reason they can have than this viz. lest their Proselytes and followers should be justly affrighted at the dangerous guilt of Schism and Separation and consult their return to that Fold which they have deserted which is certainly their safest Interest Another Stratagem which has not been less useful for them than the former is their contemning an Apostolical Succession of Priesthood and thereby lessening the hazard of a Schismatick condition in the opinion of the people This unchristian humour they continually instill into the Populacy and inforce it with this Anti-Apostolick Maxim That there is no difference between a Priest and a Laick but that the first reads the Prayers of the Church and Preaches Morally as they call it and the other is gifted with continual Revelations for that they must mean if any thing by praying by the Spirit in their notion I must confess I am as yet unconverted to these Opinions and have an awful respect to your Sacred Order and I could be as easily Proselyted to Atheism as to think a Knipperdolling or an Hugh Peters were as true Priests of the Living God as a Tertullian or a Chrysostom Sir As an obedient Son of the Church of England and a Loyal Subject to my Soveraign and so oblig'd to be very solicitous of the Welfare of Church and State give me leave to sigh out some thoughts which have been and are afflictive to my Solitudes and may detect if not the causes at least the encouragements of our Schisms When I see the admir'd providence of our indulgent Prince so eminently expressed in his Royal Amnestie and Act of Oblivion for the obliterating all Animosities and Rancours which might still ferment in the hearts of men so Diametrically opposite and who had espoused Cases as contradictory as best and worst contemned and flouted by an undutiful and unchristian humour of persisting in the same stubborness wherewith they have check'd two Glorious Princes and Mated a third God bless the fourth and wherewith they brought upon our Church and Kingdom the late horrid and lamentable confusions Indignation prompts me to think that Sincere Religion cannot reside in an ungrateful heart nor true Piety and Loyalty where there are no Symptoms of their repentance And let me appeal to common sense and reason what a frightful face of Government there would appear in this Nation if all His Majesties evil-disposed Subjects should as boldly resolve to perpetrate all those Crimes prohibited by the Common and Statute Laws of this Realm as the Dissenters do temerariously transgress or fraudulently evade those Statutes relating to Conformity When I see some of your Sacred Order fly at a Dignity a Bishoprick and when they have truss'd it quarry and prune themselves upon it and live as if a Diocess were only designed to Gorge and Aggrandize the Bishop and he not concern'd to be a faithful Shepherd to his flock but negligent if not wholly careless in no small part of his Episcopal Function and Paternal charge witness the omission of that Solemn Office of Confirmation nor obliged to moderate over and inspect the manners of his inferiour Clergie who are in Law but his Curates and whose vices and disorders reflect a Blot upon himself and a Scandal to the Church then I think the longer time runs its sand will be the fuller of dust and I am ready to renounce my Philosphy and believe that Gold may rust and we have too many Rosy-Crucians in Divinity to make their Remarques When our Parochial Clergie shall out of good nature tepidity or perjury omit if not all at least some part of the Divine Service to curry their Males and coaks their Females when to please a weak Sister the Cross after Baptism must not be used and for a bribe the Sacrament shall be Administred to a sitting Bumkin and the Priest shall civilly be from home when a thing departed is to have the Burial of an Ass when every Parish shall have a singular Directory and every waxen Priest shall assume a Papism to dispense with Oath Canons and Statutes and the Diocesan shall be demurely compos'd into a posture of consent with closed eyes and folded arms are we then like to be blest with one faith and one way When too many of our Nobility and Gentry shall assume that honour and glory to list themselves in and be reputed Sons of our Church of England but by their Profaneness Debauchery and prodigious vice live Antipodes to that holy Profession and act below the dictates of uneducated nature then I think this must be influential upon the Manners of the Populacy and create an inclination to Schism if not an absolute contempt of Religion in them who are commonly capable of no other direction in their Morals and Piety than the vertuous examples of their Superiours When too many of our Nobility and Gentry shall desert their antient Seats and Countrey Interests to enjoy an urbane effeminacy immerge in the gulfs of Luxury and to enervate in the Venereal Laboratories of the Town with the greater Security to their names and less observation of the world this must be reputed no small cause of Schism in their Tenants and Dependents who in many Lordships and places of the Nation want nothing more than the antique Hospitality of England and the Orthodox practice of their Landlords and Patrons to secure them against the cantings of the Wolves and to shame them into a conformable obedience and were it seriously consider'd how easie and natural the motion is from immorality and Atheism to disloyalty and civile Apostasie these Monsters would be proscrib'd the Courts of Princes to learn humanity among flocks and herds But when the Sacred Name of Jesus
were of none at all Sir There are many impertinencies in that little Book which I thought not worthy the examination and which your Judgement will easily answer from the grounds of this discourse Such is his branding Parish Churches for a Popish invention which any sober man would rather have thought to have been the contrivance of Reason and convenience for we find this invention elder than the Pope for they were founded in the Province of Alexandria in the dayes of Athanasius as Athanasius and Epiphanius inform us Such another impertinence is his tedious Harangue about Separation from Parochial Organical Churches which no way concern the constitution of the Catholick Church or the Church of England for though deserting our Parish Church in some circumstance may be a disorder yet it is no Schism if we communicate with any other regular Assembly of the same communion Athanasius does not accuse Ischyras of Schism for separating from his Parochial Congregation and Priest but for erecting a Conventicle and dividing from the Bishop and the whole Catholick Church in Alexandria As for Mr. H's Discourse about the Obligation of Humane Laws I shall refer him for an Answer to St. Paul and Bishop Sanderson and when they are answered we must enquire further I take no notice of the Railery against Ceremonies The necessity of them in Publick Worship and the Authority of the Church in enjoyning them is substantially prov'd by Mr. Hooker and lately by Mr. Falkner and if their Reasons will not prevail I will not pretend to work a Miracle or hope to open the eyes of them who are resolv'd to be blind Sir I hope that these Papers will satisfie you that these men are Schismaticks and assure you that I am Sir Your faithful Friend and Servant R. C. Honoured Sir THere lately came to my hand the Works of Mr. Hales Entituled Golden Remains The most Sacred of these Reliques is a little Tract of Schism which you find celebrated by the High and Mighty Transproser and applauded by your Doctor of Divinity and is the fam'd Sanctuary of our dividing Parties Therefore having some Months since presented you with my thoughts concerning Schism I thought my self oblig'd to an impartial perusal of this Famous Tract for fear I might through weakness of judgement have impos'd an error upon you and my self I found the Remains of Mr. Hales prefac'd with so vast an Encomium of the Author that I address'd my self to his Tract of Schism with a very awful reverence resolving to submit to the clearest Reasons and not to be asham'd to be convinc'd by a Person of that admir'd Acuteness But having with the most strict intention consider'd that Discourse I find my notion of Schism left untouch'd But because our Non-conformists so oft Appeal to this Tractate I resolv'd to consider how far it could serve their Interest and justifie their Separation First therefore he informs us That there are two things which serve to compleat a Schism 1. The choice of a Bishop in opposition to the former 2. The erecting of a Church or Oratory for the dividing parties to meet in Now I acknowledge this notion of Schism to be both Antient and Orthodox Schism being consider'd as a breach of charity or a dissolving of that Bond of Peace which we are so often solemnly changed to preserve inviolate And without a great and evident necessity this Dividing must be very displeasing unto the Prince of Peace who did command us to be One even as He and the Father are One. Of this nature was the Schism of the Arrians Miletians and Donatiss at their first dividing They set up Altar against Altar had Bishops of their own party and their peculiar Oratories and would have no communion with the Bishops or Assemblies of that standing part that alwayes called themselves the Catholick Church The Church of England by the title of long prescription and the establishment of a Law is the standing Church of this Nation with which all the people of this Kingdom are bound to communicate But our Non-conformists have chosen to themselves Pastors in opposition to the Bishops and Priests of the Church of England and have erected their distinct Congregations to confront our Church Assemblies and therefore by Mr. Hales's definition they are guilty of compleat Schism But Sir it must be observ'd that these men have run further than the Arrians Miletians and Donatists did at their first dividing for though they had so little charity as for a matter of dispute to divide from the communion of the other part of the Church yet they had so much Prudence as they preserv'd to themselves some Bishops and Priests who had receiv'd their Consecration and Orders from the Catholick Church and when their Bishops and Priesthood were worn out the Factions expir'd for they were not arriv'd to such a height of Fanaticism as to think themselves a Church without the Government and Priesthood of the Apostolick line No they were so sacred and curious in this that I find the Arrians cavilling at the Ordination of Athanasius as not being Catholick and Canonical just as the Papists objected against us the Naggs-head Consecration And by the way that was the most weighty and considerable attempt that ever Rome made upon the Church of England and could they clearly have invalidated and disannull'd our succession of Bishops and Priesthood all the learning of England could not have prov'd us a Catholick Church But this Cavil was with demonstration confuted by that elaborate Piece of Mr. Mason Arch-Deacon of Norfolk Sir I hope that the merit of this Digression will beg its own pardon But to return to our English Sectaries according to Mr. Hales's notion it would be indeed a very unhappy Schism in the Church of England for the Bishop of Norwich and his Presbyters and Jurisdiction to divide from the communion of the Archbishop of Canterbury and to set up a Church of the East Angles divided from that of the West But supposing this there were yet left to us this satisfaction that we were still under the Government and Ministry of that Bishop and Priesthood of whose Consecration and Orders we were sufficiently assur'd and though this would be an unlucky Faction in the English Hierarchy yet it would be no Schism from the Catholick Church But our Separatists are run to a further distance for they have not set up Altar against Altar or one Bishop in opposition to another but have thrown off all the Bishops and Priests of the Apostolick Succession and have erected a Synagogue against the Church and set up a Lay-Elder in opposition to the Bishop and Priest And this is not only a disobedience against the Laws and a Schism from the establish'd Church of England but is a separation from the Catholick Church And seeing our Sectaries have no Priesthood I believe their Conventicles to be no more a Church than a Club of Mechanicks in a Coffee-house For though some of these
it would be happy if all Christians would quietly enjoy their Differences of Opinion and be so far of one mind as to go up together to the Temple to pray and communicate with the Catholick Church in Sacris The Church of England retains no Sacraments but those which have the manifest Authority of Divine Institution All the Prayers of this Church are immediately directed to the Eternal God and all presented in the Name of Jesus We Petition for nothing but what the Religion of Jesus allows us to supplicate And therefore I see no reason why all the People of this Nation who are not Atheists and Anti-christian should not communicate with us in those confessed Services of Prayers Praises and Sacramentals And this is all that is required by that Tyrannical Act of Uniformity And therefore that great Popular Orator in his late Harangue to the House of Lords has imposed a Fallacy upon us For he passionately complains against the Law for devesting the People of their Properties only because they cannot agree with Church-men in some uncertain Opinions of Religion I hope it will not amount to Scandalum Magnatum to say that this is meer Sophistry For our Laws prosecute no man for difference of Opinion no so far from this that the very Act against Conventicles allows our Dissenters not only their different Opinions but the quiet use and enjoyment of their several Religions in their own Families nay it granted them a further Favour and Liberty that they might receive four or five more of the same dissenting Brotherhood to make the exercise more full and satisfying Here was nothing prohibited but noise and multitude But they might notwithstanding that Law have peaceably enjoyed their different Opinions and Property too that great Fundamental of State Religion The Church doth not put the souls of men upon the Rack or command an exact consent to all her Publick Articles but indulges a difference of Opinion it only provides for the Beauty Order and Solemnity of Publick Worship by enjoyning all the Christians of this Kingdom to communicate with us in those common Sacra that all sober Christians acknowledge to be of universal obligation But here your Doctor would Rejoyn that it is as far from Cornwall to Berwick as from Berwick to Cornwall and demand a Reason why we do not exercise as much charity to others as we expect to our selves or why we should not with as much Reason be obliged to communicate with their Assemblies as to expect them to be present at ours For our Author was so kind to Dissenters as he tells us He sees no Reason why we should not mix with those divided Assemblies where there was nothing done but what True Piety and Devotion would brook If I may credit my own conscience I have a very serious love and veneration for all True Piety and Devotion But I am resolved to have no communion with Conventicles and will faithfully acquaint you with my Reasons for that Resolve First My ears are not fitted for the unintelligible Rapsodies of Enthusiastick Divinity Nothing impresses upon me but what my Reason and Judgement can give a sober account of And I am sure there are many Assemblies in England called Religious Meetings whose chiefest Devotions consist in nothing but Froth and Groans to borrow an odd phrase from our Author Secondly I will appeal from our Author to Mr. Hales who towards the end of this Tract gives us a very Orthodox Definition of a Conventicle A Conventicle is a Congregation of Schismaticks or all Meetings upon unnecessary separation and concludes that it is not lawful no not for Prayer for Hearing for Conference or for any other Religious Office whatsoever for the People to Assemble otherwise than by Publick Order is allowed Now since I can enjoy a communion with the Catholick Church and all the advantages of Christianity without going to a Conventicle I think it were neither Piety nor Devotion for me to communicate with those Congregations which our Author grants to be unlawful Assemblies Had I lived in the dayes of Dioclefian I would have been a member of the Ecclesia Subterranea and have assembled with the Catholick Christians in Caves and Grotto's which necessity had consecrated into Holy Places But since it is my happy Lot to live in that Age and Kingdom where Christianity may be confessed above ground since a just Authority hath opened our Churches seeing I may offer all the Publick Devotions that God requires in those Solemn Places which the Law appoints Since I can at the same time be both Devout towards God and Obedient to my Governours I resolve I will have no communion with those Assemblies which the Law of the Nation and the Canons of the Church make irregular Sir I assure you it adds some cheerfulness to my Publick Devotions that I can at the same time both give unto God the things that are God's and to Caesar the things that are Caesar's Thirdly I resolve I will never be a member of our separate Congregations because in them I cannot be assured of my compleat communion with the Catholick Church or the advantages of a Regular Priesthood I question not but God may pardon without the Absolution of a Priest and give a man possession of eternal life without the seal or title of a Sacrament but salvation is a matter of such vast importance that I would never adventure it upon extraordinary Methods in concerns of Religion and everlasting interest I love to enjoy all the security that God hath given to mankind In that great Schism of Israel some of the most sober and considering Jews were not satisfied with their communion in that new Church of Israel though it was established by the Law of Jeroboam but returned to worship at Jerusalem yet the Tribes of Israel retain'd the same Creed with those of Judah and the Calves of Dan and Bethel were not design'd for Idols but set up in imitation of the Cherubims in the Temple but these wise men were dissatisfied because their Priests were not of the Aaronical Line and had no other Consecration or Authority but what was deriv'd from the Patents of Jeroboam and they could not be assured that God would accept their Oblations from the hands of those men who had no Regular Priesthood Now there is great Reason to believe that there should be as much order in the Kingdom of Jesus as there was in the Jewish Polity and therefore I am assur'd both by Reason and Sacred Oracles that there is an Evangelical Priesthood that hath succeeded that of Aaron That there is a peculiar Order of men who have receiv'd this Priestly Authority by a Regular Ordination from the Apostles Successors And I esteem these men according to St. Paul's Injunction as the Stewards of the manifold Mysteries of God and the Ministers of Reconciliation and therefore without an inevitable necessity I will never live without the advantage and satisfaction of their Ministerial Authority St.