abilities will stand up to defend the Church-rights and so these blasts of Jesuites and other Sectaries designs and practises against the Ministers shall prove but as winde shaking trees and thereby causing them to take the stronger root Sure I am that such pernicious pieces as this against Tythes have in other cases formerly awakened good Authors and occasioned them to write many things for the necessary defence of the Truth and Rites of the Church of Christ so that the Adversaries thereof in the issue proved but as those Geese which gave the Alarum to the Court of Guard in the Capitol whereby both that and the City were preserved Of these things let the prudent Reader judge and the good Lord God open all our understandings that knowing the Truth consenting and obeying we may be happy in the God of Peace and Vnity our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Amen ERRATA Page 4. line 35. read preached the Gospel p. 6. l. 7. now ere p. 8 l. 2 not certain p. 9. l. 15. nay but do you not know p. 11 l. 10. Pharises and Scribes p. 12. l. 14. as received p. 13 l. 20. which could not p. 16. l. 30. where they pleased p. 17. l. 7. notoriously faulty p. 18 l. 9. deserens ibid. l. 5. Nicene p. 19. l. 33 when you mind but. p. 21. l. 11. Mr. Selden p. 29. l. 3. at nunc p. 31. l. 27. hives of drones p. 40. antepenult would gladly p. 51 l. 31. captions p. 53. l. ult to the faithful Moses p. 55. l. 14. Minister p. 56. l. 28. Josh 2.1 p. 57. l. 15. levity of the Greeks ibid. l. 23. arrangeth p. 59. l. 11. proportion between p. 63. l. 30. not unwillingly grudgingly or p. 64. l. 27. as honesty p. 66. l. 28. concerning whom we only say p. 68. l. 3. alta pa◠p. 74. l. 7. laws p. 78. l. 16. unhappy p. 81. l. 11. faithful Ministers ibid. l. 13. and all Ministe s. The Great Case of Tythes Stated TO the Countrymen Farmers c. The Author very considerably addresseth this Pamphlet to those who are as Marchant-men to men of War where he may probably expect some purchase and not many knocks It is for your sakes c. Job 1.7 2.2 1 Pet. 5.8 Satan might have said as much to sinners and Pharisees to their Proselytes for whose sakes they travelled not to save but to destroy them Are they not much beholden to you There is but one God one truth which whether you or we follow let the prudent Reader judg when he hath seriously considered what is here objected and answered You might be truly informed Be but sincere to make that one word truly good and I will have no controversie with you Of all that I could find written c. I on your side I do not conceive that you would be so tenacious of your error had you but so diligently read the truth which many have clearly written on this subject More than two years last past You see me to confess either much want of apprehension or will to understand any but those who were of your party and opinion It shall be acceptabl to me to receive it on which promise I offer you this following discourse The state of the question in hand understand thus Whether Tithes for Gospel Ministers maintenance are due to them by the unchangeable morality of Gods Law This we affirm hence we claim to this what ever you object we shall endeavour to answer against this law no reason can conclude no authority or decrees of man be of value To your objections now you say of Tithes But they were for the Levites That the Priests you say received no Tithes of the People for these belonged to the Levites whence if you would infer that Tithes belong not unto Gospel Ministers succeding them it were a meer caption to beguile your Reader for we are to know that first Priests were Ministers of the Lord Joel 1.9 13. 2.17 and next in that Tithes are confessed to have been due to the Levites they must be confessed to have been due to the Priests for all the Priests were Levites though all the Levites were not Priests The Priests were of an higher order and dignity in the service of the Tabernacle in which they were to Minister the Levites were to bear the burdens of the Tabernacle when it was to be removed to prepare the wood water fire vessels and instruments for the Sacrifice and holy rites c. Now the Priests as they had a more excellent Office so had they a more honorable Portion For first they had the Tythe of their brethren the Levites part the tenth part of the Tythe of all the Land which because they were but few as I shall shew anon was a large allowance unto them So that as the learned Mr. S. Nettles observeth it Ans to the Jewish part the history Tythes it appears by practise that the Priests received Tythes as well as the Levites So much doth Chimki intimate on Mal. 3.10 He commanded the people to pay the tenth of their yearly encrease unto the Levites and the Priests and this is plainly taught by the Apostle Heb. 7.5 For verily they which are the children of Levi which receive the office of the Priesthood have a Commandment to take according to the Law Tythes of the people c. which by Lyra is explained thus Levitae generaliter recipiebant decimas à reliquo populo inter Levitas autem illi qui erant majores illius tribus videlicet Sacerdotes summi filii Aaron non solum accipiebant decimam cum Levitis à populo sed etiam de parte Levitarum recipiebant quae vocabatur decima decimae Num. 18. And therefore by all this it is evident that the Priests received Tythes of the people and not only the inferior Levites Hererto add that in the general grant of the tenth to the Children of Levi for an inheritance in respect of their service in the Tabernacle Num. 18.21 The whole Tribe both Priests and Levites are included Here it seems the Pamphleter followed Mr. Selden too close and caught some knock which made him forget his own words pag. 12. when he comes there to speak of the Popes working under colour of Jewish lawes he saith By which Tythes were given to the Levitical Priesthood dic sodes How given to the Priest-hood if no Priest received them Truly Priests were by their vocation more honorable then the rest of the Levites as being to perform the holy ceremonies within the Sanctuary therefore they received a more honorable portion than the rest of the Levits for they had the tenth of their part of the Tythes of all the land Now because they were but few in respect of the whole Tribe of Levi of which were numbred above 22000 Therefore considering the first fruits and their fees out of the Sacrifices and other offerings Num. 3.39 43. besides their part of the Tythes
you have so pillaged them that you have scarce left themselves bread You say farther not any Councels that expresly supposed them a duty of common right before the Councel of Lateran held in the year 1215. Were this so much as probable it would condemn the Christian world and the Prelates of much defect herein We are too sure that many are faulty herein now because Satan hath blinded the minds of many and stirred up sundry impostors to write and speak against the ordinance of God for support of the Ministry his design being to steal away the oyl from the Tabernacle lamps that their light failing his Kingdome of darkness may be advanced but if now Governors should set out some more strict decrees for Ministers more easie recovery of their Tythes then formerly have been seeing the apostacy of so many sectaries would those decrees be any proof in future ages that Tythes were never supposed a duty of common right before the year 1659. or some following time Yet you say were they free to dispose them were they pleased until the Popish Councels restrained their liberty Say now bona fide were Tythes due to Priests and Levites under the Law or Ministers of the Gospel ever free to be disposed of by the people in a setled state of any Church constituted where the people pleased If you mean tenths for the poor they are out of the verge of this present controversie and so you trifle If you mean Tythes for Ministers and maintenance of Gods service we justly require your proof we know that under the law God never allowed any such liberty to his people neither can it appear in the Gospel that ever he left the Ministers thereof to a less certain and determinate maintenance then he did the Priests and Levites here now being the Ministry of a more excellent Testament established upon better promises and how else did Paul avow his power therein 1 Cor. 9. however in those times of the Churches troubles he used it not You say farther The old Roman doctrine that Tythes ought to be paid And was the law for paying Tythes old Roman doctrine Was Moses a Roman Or was Christ a Roman who allowed the same in the Pharisees practise But to take your meaning with favourable interpretation of unadvised words I must put you in mind that the old Roman doctrine was pure Rom. 1.8 when S. Paul commended their faith and so it continued unto their latter apostacy I so much reverence antiquity as to avow that quod antiquissimum verissimum To your following Allegations I say what laws and canons for Tythes among the Saxons determined doth not prove that Tythes are not due to Ministers by divine right And as to the rest I say if they made laws to bind the people to obey Gods moral Law they did well therein and concerning the people so bound it is pity that they as we now needed such coercive laws to restrain their Sacriledge To that which you say pag. 10. That notwithstanding the many Laws Canons and Decrees of Kings it was left to the owner to confer it where he pleased We answer to these tautologies if they were true that is no wonder if there was no absolute reformation at once specially there where the peoples great Diana secular interest hath a part But now consider Of what strength is your argument à facto ad jus faciendi They did say you leave it to the owner to confer it where he pleased ergo it was just and lawfull so to do that consequence will appear notoriously faulty in other instances For example The people of Judah built them High places and Images and Groves on every high hill yea 1 King 14.23 in Asa's good reign The high places were not removed 1 King 15.14 In that miscellanie of Religion 2 King 17.29.32 to which may be added our modern confusion Every Nation made Gods of their own and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made c. and made unto themselves of the lowest of them Priests of the high places So Jeroboam made Priests of the lowest of the people 2 Chro. 33.17 which were not of the sons of Levi whosoever would he consecrated him 1 King 12.31 and he became one of the Priests of the high places And this became a sin to the house of Jeroboam even to cut it off he made him Priests for the Devils and for the Calves which he had made 2 Chron. 11.15 Under him the people fell to Idolatry their fact concluded it not just and in the Prophet Malachies time the people did not pay their Tythes and Offerings Did that exempt them from the curse Mal. 3. because there were multitudes of offenders No no it brought it upon the whole Nation no examples of multitudes shall excuse Sacriledge And Parishes you say are but of late erection What would not he make his ignorant Reader swallow Page 10. Damasus speaking of Dionysius who lived about the year 260. saith Presbyteris Ecclesias divisit caemiteria parochiasque dioeceses constituit he distributed unto Priests Churches and Church-yards and appointed Parishes and Dioceses Vit. Pontif. Dionys init So also Platina in the life of Dionysius testifieth in the 2d Councel of Carthage the argument of the 11 Canon is Bin. Concil To. 1. Vt nullus parochiam alienam praesumat invadere That no man should presume to invade anothers Parish which Councel though but Provincial was confirmed by a general Councel in Trullo Câ—rranz sum concil this was held in Cyprians time that ancient Martyr In the decrees of Urban in the year 230. it is said of lands dedicated and given to the Church ipsae verores inditione singularum parochiarum c. In the Ancyran Councel Ib. Carran held about the year 308. approved by the Necene it was decreed that Bishops and their Ministers should endeavour utterly to root out that devillish invention and art of sortiledge è parochiis suis Ib. Carran pag. 157. In the 3 Canon of the Councel of Antioch we read thus Si quis presbyter aut diaconus aut omnino quilibet ex Clero parochiam propriam derens vel omnino demigrans in alia parochia c. This Councel was approved in the sixt general Councel of Constantinople In the Councel of Sardis it was ordained Canon 18.19 That no Bishop should ordain a Minister ex aliâ parochiâ without the consent of his Bishop In the Laodicean Councel Canon 14. see the like It were easie to weary the Reader with such proofs And is not it a notorious falshood to say that Parishes are but of late erection One thing is here considerable that when there were but few Christians Parishes were of much greater circuit of land then since the more abundant plantation of the Gospel wherein for the ease and accommodation of Parishioners many Chappels of ease erected have since by Acts of
Parliaments been made Parish Churches subject to the Bishops and their Diocesses Pag. 11. The people you say then generally being Papists did yield their obedience Yet that God had ever some good corne among those tares I conceive you have so much faith to believe if you believe that he had in all ages a Catholick Church though possibly you have not so much Charity as to confess that he had such excellent Saints then as are among you now in this last and worst of ages You say What before was owned for a gift was now claimed as a debt Shew if you are a true man who ever owned it as a gift or free benevolence of men except those who knew not or would not acknowledge the divine institution of Tythes we own them as Gods gift and therefore as mans due to be paid unto us God made us not your almes-men but in things spiritual our peoples rulers Heb. 13.7 17. watchmen and guides set over them in the Lord. 1 Thes 5.12 And so not to live of your benevolence but duty as spiritual Parents and shew if you can why that duty should be less determinate and certain then it was under the law to Priests and Levites that he ever reserved out of the rest which he gave to Israel to himself and to his service never leaving it arbitrary to mans will or wisdom to appoint no not to Moses himself And how prove you that he leaves us to your will and charity now All acknowledg a Law for paying Tythes to those who serve about holy things shew us in any one Text of the Old or New Testament where that law is repealed or the whole of Ministers maintenance left to the peoples pleasure Seeing you say themselves in a snare To you it seems that the ordinance of God is a snare this discovereth your dangerous condi ion and is an impious expression Again you say The Pope hath been imperious or in a great heigth of pride What is that to us If so it was his sin for which he is responsible to God who can make wicked men instrumental to some eminent good as in the example of Judas as to the passion of Christ for our Redemption and Salvation appeareth to whom we may add the rest who did therein that which the hand and Councel of God determined before to be done And who can deny but that he might also work good by the Popes commanding Tythes to be paid for the support of the preaching of the Gospel to the then living elect the powerfull instrument of Salvation however it proved a savour of death to many possibly of those that preached it but obeyed it not Next you trouble your readers about canon-Canon-laws and Parochial payment of Tythes setled What suppose you that no good could be professed done or setled in that time wherein error and wickedness had miserably overspread a Church I suppose you will not on second thoughts conclude so when you mind not the propagation of the Gospel in Israel when the Jews Princes Priests and people generally persecuted the faith of Christ Next you talk of the poor Pag. 11. For whose sakes you say Tythes were chiefly given If you mean that these specified Parliaments did settle Tythes chiefly for the relief of the poor you do but trifle knowing that Tythes were anciently appointed for several uses 1. Ornament of Churches 2. For the poor 3. For love Feasts 4. For Ministers maintenance What ever Parliaments enacted must be judged by Gods laws human law is to our duty à mensura mensuraâ—â— Ã lege divina â—ae q. 19. whose end is the utility of men therefore to that supream power and justice must we look and in that rest So that this your argument is childish and impertinent except you could shew that we take human Laws and Statutes of Parliaments to be the ground of our right to Tythes we say after that ancient Councel of Matiscon forecited God hath appointed them for our inheritance or hereditary portion You say moreover He that did not pay no great punishment could they inflict on him but excommunication You mean I suppose that men could not you cannot be ignorant of the power of God to punish the Sacrilegious who hath denounced the curse on them Mal. 3. but was excommunication no great punishment 1. Cor. 5. in the Apostles sence delivering to Satan Possibly you account this punishment the less because herein the sacrilegious were but delivered to their own Master As for the exemptions you mention we dislike them as well as you as little to your purpose is that which you say in your following censure of Popish imitation of Jews l. 1. c. 7. c. 8. c. ib. c. 4. c. which as to those rites which your Durand citeth in his Rationale we utterly dislike But you say Henry 8. being a Papist c. One thing is remarkable you use to call all Popery which suits not with your fancy If Henry 8. did any thing according to Gods Will and Word that is no more Popish than that was Devillish which the Devil said Mar. 5.7 Henry 8. was a Papist and he made a Law that every man should set out his Tythes What is the conclusion yon drive to ergo paying of those duties is Popish Poor Sophistry You are not ignorant that this were a Sophism Non causae pro causâ His being a Papist was not the cause of his making that law for Tythes but as your self confess because he believed that Tythes were due to God and his holy Church In that you call that the Popes doctrine which by your own party is confessed to be grounded on the Law of God you commend the Popes Doctrine though with an intent to calumniate ours And you say First of our Parliament laws for Tythes Pag. 12. and that upon which the rest are grounded Here is another notorious untruth Was our Henry 8. before Athelston who reigned in this land about the year of our Lord 924 Would you have your readers believe that Henry 8. made a Law about 600 years before he was born and crowned King Was he King of this land before Edgar living about the year 959 or before Canutus who reigned here about An. 1016 or William the Conquerer Henry 1 Henry 2. Henry 3. Hist of Tythes c. 8. by William Selden cited as Law-makers for the payment of Tythes to the Ministers One thing out of the learned S. H. Spelman I desire the Reader to consider King Henry 3. Large work of Tythes saith he In the 9th year of his reign by that sacred Charter made in the name of himself and his heires for ever granted all this anew unto God We have granted saith he unto God and by this our present Charter have confirmed for us and for our heirs for evermore that the Church of England shall be free and shall have all her holy rites inviolable Magna c. 1.
as a Levitical but as a moral duty belonging to God long before either Levites or ceremonial Law were in being and therefore they continue under the Gospel because moral duties are unchangeable And it is observeable that Melchisedech met not Abraham the father of the faithfull with bloody Sacrifice like a Priest of the Law but with a supply of bread and wine the elements of a Gospel-Sacrament which the Ministers are to divide unto the people That Tythes are not Levitical or Ceremonially due it may appear because 1. They are much more ancient then the Levitical Law 2. Secondly Tythes are positively declared to be the Lords and so to belong to his Ministers about holy things for ever 3. Ceremonies of the levitical-Levitical-law were all significative as of somthing to be performed by Christ for the work of our redemption but so are not Tythes 4. Tything now used is not after the manner of the Levitical Law but after the manner of Abrahams paying tythes to Melchisedec who was not of the tribe of Levi So our tything is now to Christ who was of the tribe of Judah Heb. 7.13 of which no man gave attendance at the Altar 5. The end whereto tythe was ordained is moral in point of Piety Justice and Gratitude First Piety for that will maintain the worship of God Secondly Justice for that is to give every man his due Now the laborer is worthy of his reward 1 Tim. 5.18 1 Cor. 9.14 and God hath appointed tythes for a reward or maintenance of those who serve him in the Gospel as well as under the Law Thirdly Gratitude for benefits received of him to whom we ow and offer such thanks adde hereto that these are to be paid to incourage and sustain the laborers in the work of the Lord as Hezekiah commanded the people to give the portion of the Priests and the Levites that they might be encouraged in the Law of the Lord 2 Chron. 31.4 And we may here consider that in the Levitical Law the Lord had regard to provision for Gospel Ministers for he saith in one of the branches thereof Thou shalt not muzzle the Ox that treadeth out the Corn which the Apostle applieth to inforce payment of honorable maintenance of Gospel Ministers Neither was that equity new neither the Gospel it self The first appearance whereof which we read of was from the beginning when God said It that is the seed of the Woman Gen. 3. Gal. 4.4 Christ made of a Woman shall bruise thy head that is the Serpents head in which his life and venome principally lieth This Gospel promise lay hid for ages and generations Ephes 3.9 Col. 1.26 Exod. 4. Heb. 9.7 18.22 Gen. 3.19 4.4 Gal. 4. Joh. 1. under dark and mysterious shadows and figures So that though the Law like Tamars Zarah as it were first put out the hand which was before its birth marked with a skarlet thred blood and death yet in some sort the Gospel was first born like Pharez Gen. 38.28 29 30. and was as the day light by little and little toward the fulness of time wherein the Sun of Righteousness should arise to enlighten the World manifested See Gen. 49.10 Numb 24.17 Isai 7.14 11.1 10 12. Dan. 9. Mich. 5 c. and at the last clearly interpreted 1 John 3.8 Rom. 6.22 8.2 3. 1. Cor. 15.55 c. Hos 13.14 For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil ruine death and hell And because God would manifest this his mercy to the World for the comfort and confirmation of his Elect in all ages after mans fall he still sent out some Interpreters and Preachers of his Sacred Mystery furnished with such means as might every ways enable them thereto and support them as to their humane necessities And it is not probable that an alwise God would slack his hand and appoint a less certain determinate and comfortable maintenance to the Ministers of the most excellent Testament the Eternal Gospel than he did unto the Priests of the more imperfect which was to cease and be done away So that the Gospel-maintenance as to the Moral equity thereof was before the Law of Moses given many hundred years after the Gospel-promises 2. Your second Observation is That amongst the Jews no outward Law was appointed for the recovery of Tythes but he that did not pay them robbed God c. And think you that robbing God against which the curse of the whole Nation was denounced had no punishment following it Think you not that every sin separating between the sinner and God the sole Fountain of Blessedness was not a sufficient punishment to it self in the guilt thereof And do you conceive that we are now bound by Israels Judicial Laws any further than some Statute Law of this Nation makes them in force to binde us It seems grievous to you that any Law is made by good Princes and their great Councils for recovery of Tythes but for which you and others of your Sect would venture on Gods Justice as if it were a light matter by the contempt of Divine Laws to fall into his hands Heb. 12.29 who is a consuming fire But know you that it is both lawful and necessary for those who have Legislative power in Republicks of authority to execute Justice to binde their Subjects from running into sin and pulling down curses upon their Souls and therefore to enact Laws to compel them by respective punishments to obedience to Gods Moral Laws As in case of prophanation and common swearing for which the Land mourneth adultery murder theft oppression c. I suppose you will allow You say again That Tythes were not for the Levites onely 3. It is easily granted Jerom on Ezek. lib. 14. cap. 45. shews That there were tythes of four sorts First For the Levites Secondly For the Priests Thirdly For Love-feasts Fourthly For the Poor Which whether this Pamphleter dissembleth that he may have something to say though to no purpose except to trouble the Reader I know not You say again That when the Levitical Priesthood was changed by the coming of Christ Jesus 4. the Law for tything was also changed as Paul writ to the Hebrews Now Samson will pull the House upon his own head That very Text which you cite is point-blanck against your self the Law that is the Ceremonial Law was changed therefore something was appointed in its place What but the Gospel and the Ministery thereof And as the Office so of the necessity of humane condition respect must be had for the supplies thereof whereby it may continue There was therefore a change of this Law as to that which was Ceremonial for example in the manner of paying Tythes to the Priests and Levites the place where at Jerusalem or other publick store-houses thereto appointed but not in respect of the morality or any branch thereof So that the Priesthood after
have but such as would Act with you and in your progress toward hell have ready their go up and prosper But you say we are Godly people yea and your Actions have prettily well declared you such unto the World 'T was godliness with you to spoile our goods to sequester and imprison us though we are silent these injuries cry at the gates of Heaven and posterity willl freely speak of this your pretended godliness Oh Sir but we ever held out the profession of reformation truly as those crested pictures which comming on shew Sainct but going off devil And what competent maintenance faithfull Ministers were like to have of such Professors but that of Ahabs allowance 1 King 22.27 Put this fellow in Prison and feed him with the bread of affliction and with the water of affliction here would be your competency for the Ministers of Christ 15. Tythes and Offerings as grounded on the Moral Law are due to those who serve about holy things of the Gospel for all except Atheists and Semiatheistical Antinomians confess that the moral Law doth now as strictly bind quoad vinculum as before Christ came into the World to take away the curse of the Law he took not away our duty therein commanded he did not in respect of our obedience dissolve one jot or tittle of the morality thereof If therefore the moral Law still binds men to pay Tythes it binds to pay them to Ministers whom God hath called and assigned to receive that his part reserved and appointed by him for their service in his publick worship and to none other Christ repeating the first Commandment of the moral Law enjoining our serving God saith Mat. 4.10 him only shalt thou serve which another Scripture expresseth honor the Lord with thy substance Prov. 8 9. and with the first fruits of all thy encrease The quotam partem whereof he determineth by Tythes which are therefore enjoined in the first precept in the moral Law Likewise in the fourth precept for sanctification of the Sabbath by Prayer hearing the Word c. And how shall they hear without a Preacher And how shall Ministers Preach without necessary means to keep them alive and to furnish them with accomodations necessary to the performance of their Ministerial charge which is to give attendance to reading c. that they may both save themselves and their hearers when they have not so much as means to preserve their lives and to supply them with food and raiment much less to buy books Likewise Tythes are commanded in the fifth precept for honouring of our Spiritual parents 1 Cor. 4.15 1 Tim. 5.17 Mal. 3. who are to be counted worthy of double honor that is relief and maintenance This is the first Commandment with promise which the Prophet toucheth when he speaks of Tythes and Offerings duly paid this cannot be in an imaginary competency but in that which God hath appointed a definite setled maintenance for those that serve him in his publick Worship which he never left in Law or Gospel to the will or courtesie of man Now other definite or setled means for Ministers maintenance he never appointed any Decimà certam partem desi nat Alens part 4. q. 2. m 2. but by Tythes Offerings and other like perquisites appertinent to those who served in the Tabernacle Temple or Church constituted therefore these must be their maintenance if any Lastly As Tythes are God's part reserved to himself and his assignes so are they commanded in the eighth Commandment which in the negative part saith Thou shalt not steal and God's Prophet sheweth that taking away or detention of Tythes is stealing and the Apostle Mal. 3. Rom. 2. that Sacriledg the worst thievery is found under the Gospel as it was also under the Law why saith he else Thou that abhorrest an Idol committest thou Sacriledg If there be nothing now sacred in the time of the Gospel as some prophane men affirm How unadvisedly did Paul ask that question concerning a thing which is not in being neither can be And if there be any thing amongst us sacred Are not those things such as God hath consecrated and hallowed And did he not Consecrate and set apart from common use Tythes for their maintenance whom he appointed to serve in his publick Worship Now the eighth precept in the negative part forbiddeth all taking away and detention of others right in the affirmative therefore it commands to yield give and preserve what thou canst every ones right so Tythes belong to the eighth precept and indeed the end of ordaining Tythes is evidently moral as in point of piety equity and gratitude as hath been noted and that to which all men of all ages in the World places and conditions are respectively bound as well under the Ghospel as the Law And Abraham and Jacob paying Tythes had the word of promise To Abraham and his seed in the faith whereof he was justified Rom. 4.9 10 11. before he had received Circumcision a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised So that the Gospel was preached before the giving of the Law by Moses to Abraham Gal. 3.8 Whence it appears that paying Tythes is a Gospel duty performed before their payment under the Law given on Sina and Abraham payed them before the Levitical Law determined them In which determination God did not infer any new thing or right of Tything into his Church but according to the necessity of the present state thereof so regulated and ordered Tythes for the Priests and Levites to govern the people by the Law which was their Schoolmaster to Christ who being come altered nothing of the morality of his Law although the changeable rites like outworn garments and beggerly rudiments Zeck 3.4 were then to be cast off as Joshuas filthy garments and other habits of sanctity and religious Gospel-worship to be put on with Christ the new Man the same body his Church Eph. 4. en ire in every part under the same sacred head Christ Jesus John 1. remaining the same the Law then was given by Moses Ministry but grace and truth by Christ who perfectly fullfilled all that which was prefigured in those Ceremonies And we read that Abel offered firistlings of his flock Qui credidit obtulit decimas Alens Part. 4. Ib. Alens Heb. 1.6 A naturae rationalis lege est ut Dâ—us colatur honoretur Alens quo s and the fat thereof he of Adam's posterity was primus verè fidelis before the deluge after which and the growth of Idolatry the first we read of paying Tythes was Abraham the father of the faithfull Now God was to be Worshiped before and after the giving of the Law at all times and by all persons which the very Law of Nature dictated to reasonable men and God's Worship supposing his Ordinance by the Ministry of man could not be without Ministers to officiate neither could
Again in the writing of the history of the Creation Moses mentioneth not the Creation of Angels What will you say that Angels were not created because in Moses writings we read not of their Creation Nay but Moses saith Gen. 2.1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them You may say and that truly in that general word all are comprehended the particulars though not nominalitèr and expresly named for indeed omne or totum est extra quod nihil est and why I demand where the Apostle saith Gal. 6.6 Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good things that is in all his goods for he would not teach any to offer è rapina holocaustum to rob others to pay his teacher and why may not the Apostles all comprehend the unspecified particulars Tythes and Offerings as well as Moses all comprehendeth unspecified Angels By this it appears how feeble your main argument is to prove no use or practise of payment of Tythes because we read them not commanded or paid in express words in the New Testament and seldome in ancient councels of the first age of the Church yet ye will not deny Tythes expresly specified and paid Heb. 7. Abraham paid Tythes or gave a tenth of all to Melchisedech pag. 5. Of Ambrose you say But his authority he produceth wholly from Moses writings And would you desire better authority then Moses writings which Christ the Lord of the Prophets citeth See whither blind zeal precipitates men But you say They imposed their own opinion with so heavy Penalties How were they their own opinions if from the Law given to the Israelites they take as you confess their whole Doctrine 2 Pet. 1.19 St. Peter would teach you better That no prophesie of the Scripture is of any private interpretation But h ly men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost And what say these men of God as to this matter more or less then God spake by the Prophets Moses and Malachi Ye are cursed with a Curse Deut. 33.11 Mal. 3. ye have robbed me in Tythes and Offerings pag. 6. You say Tythes Easter Pentecost Now for another sigary Our question is concerning Tythes What are Easter and Pentecost to that Will he not bring the Poles Artick and an-Arcick together if he please But you say It was not a general received Doctrine that Tythes ought to be paid Nor as it seems by you is it now it sufficeth us that the devouter sort as your self confess gave Tenths or greater parts of their annual encrease And who knowes not that the better part of the people is very seldome the greater You say Fathers Popes Bishops Praesto pretty Legerdemain you shuffle in Popes hoping as it seems in that company to render Fathers and Bishops odious to the vulgar but if we consider the original of that name Papa was once a name of honour and reverence importing only Patrem Patriae a father of the Country and so was it long used in the better part as Cypriano Papae Cyprian l 2. ep 7. 16. l. 3. ep 11 12. so ad Cornelium Papam This use of that name continued until after the time of Gregory the last of the good Roman Bishops and the first of the bad When Boniface 3. obtained of the Emperor Phocas that the Church of Rome should be called Caput omnium Ecclesiarum which his predecessor Gregory gave for the mark of Antichrist or his fore-runner then was his Seat quickly exalted to Supremacie not only above all Bishops of the Western Churches but also to a claim of Superiority over Kings Princes and People hence the name Papa Pope began to fall into an odium with all those who received not the marke of the beast Rev. 13. But if Popes did in any thing declare or determine Truth and Equity would you eo nomine reject it Remember that the Pharisees Scribes sitting in Moses Chair though bitter enemies to the Person and Doctrine of Christ were to be heard Yea If the devil confess Christ to be the Son of the most high would you reject it as devilish Nay but consider that though the Devil spake it it is the truth of God which when Satan uttereth he speaks not his own God hath so over-ruled some wicked men as to make them instrumental to that eminent good which he who can do nothing but good fore-ordained to do by them See it in the example of Judas the high Priests Herod and Pontius Pilat Act. 4.27 28. You say None of the first 8 general Councils of the Church did so much as mention the name of Tythes While none contradicted there was no cause why they should speak of them yet were the issue and determination of your controversie put upon antiquity we could say enough thereof We can prove that Tythes are more ancient then the law of Moses who shews that Abraham paid them and you cannot shew them taken away by any law of God why general Councels did not make Canons for them Agobardus cited by Mr. Sâ—lden some give this reason Nulla enim compulit necessitas fervente ubique religiosa devotione c. indeed the actual payment of Tythes was not exacted in the infancy of the Church of Christ but respited until the greater interests of Faith and Obedience to the Gospel were setled in a Church constituted yet Paul sheweth that there was much due unto him in respect of his Ministry 1 Cor. 9. but concluded that he had not used that liberty but as the time and present condition of the Gospel required suffered all things that he might not hinder the propagation thereof and that he might stop the mouths of backbiters Add hereto that there appeared more probability that men of the world and Pagans would more readily entertain the truth which cost them nothing and when the Ministers could not be suspected to preach for gain honor or any selfishness but only for their auditors Salvation That which you say That Tythes were never so much as named in the first 8 general Councels makes nothing against their right yet you may know that though we avow not the Canons attributed to the Apostles to be indeed the children of those fathers yet that the first of them are very ancient and neer the Apostles times it may appear in that Dionysius exiguus who lived within 400 years of the Apostles translated them out of the Greek and received long before in the Eastern Church Sr. Henry Spelmans large work of Tythes c. 20. of which City you may see Plin. lib. 3. c. 1. Stra. lib. 3. c. Bin. To. 4. See thereof the fifth Canon likewise the Council Agrippinense is cited Anno 356. Decreeing that Tythes should be called Dei census Gods rent The Concilium Hispalense or Spalense as Garsias citeth it held about the time of Gregory 1. about the year 603. in a
fragment thereof saith Omnes primitias decimas tam de pecoribus quam de frugibus dives simul pauper Ecclesiis suis rectè offerant The same citeth Mal. 3. and thereon saith Sicut enim Dominus omnia dedit ita de omnibus decimam exigit ut de fructibus agri c. siquis autem haec omnia non decimaverit praedo Dei est fur latro maledicta quae intulit Dominus Cain congeruntur That is all the first fruites and Tythes both of Cattle and Fruits let both rich and poor duly offer or set out to their Churches for as the Lord gave all so of all he requireth the tenth as of the fruits of the field c. If any man will not pay Tythes of all these he is a Thief and robber of God and the curses which the Lord brought on Cain are heaped upon that man The second Councel of Matiscon Carranz Sum. Concil Anno 588. by some accounted a general Councel because therein all the Metropolitan Bishops met saith Canon 5. Leges namque divinae consulentes Sacerdotibus ac Ministris Ecclesiarum pro haereditaria portione omni populo praeceperunt decimas fructuum suorum locis sacris prestare quas leges Christianorum congeries longis temporibus custodivit intemeratas unde statuimus ut decimas Ecclesiasticas omnis populus inferat That is Divine Laws providing for Priests and Ministers of Churches have commanded all the people for an hereditarie portion to bring the Tythes of their fruits to the holy places which laws multitudes of Christians have kept inviolable a long time Therefore we decree that all the people shall bring in their Ecclesiastical tenths Concil Turonense held in the time of Charls the great An. 813. saith Nonas ac decimas qui res Ecclesiasticas tenent solvere rectoribus Ecclesiarum ordinati sunt It were easie to add hereto many more Testimonies of ancient Councels but because others have sufficiently travelled herein I shall refer the Reader who is desirous to be further satisfied to the large work of the learned Sir H. Spelman c. 20. Dr. Tilsley Animad on hist of Tythes Preface and Catalogue only let me have leave to inform them who know not what is the difference between a general and a provinciall Councel In a general Council omnes provinciarum Episcopi conveniebant yet the forecited Councel of Matiscon ordained Ut quolibet triennio universalis Synodus celebraretur which would not be intended concerning a General Councel in the first acceptation except that Matiscon Councel may be allowed for a general one as some account it for a Provincial could not prescribe a General one though the General might prescribe the Provincial The Provincial thus differed from the General in numbers of voices and suffrages as in that it was of inferiour authority to the General But concerning this matter I shall content me to observe That 1. No humane Constitutions can any more give credit to precepts divine on which all must ground then many Torches can give light to the Sun which can be discerned by none but its own light nor can all testimonies or decrees of men impair the truth of God 2. Testimonies of men are not to be valued by number but weight nor weighed by any but the standard of the Sanctuary the word of God and so far forth to be received as they hold weight therewith that is divine truth 3. Christ promised his presence where two or three should be gathered together in his name whose truth is not limited unto or by multitudes in Councels As the little Mole-hill may as truly have the Sun-beams shining upon it as the vast Mountain so may few gathered together in Christs name be as truly assisted by the Spirit of Jesus Christ as where a multitude are met together Yet here are two Cautions very necessary to be held 1. That not every assembly which saith lo here is Christ is to be taken for such as are indeed gathered together in the name of Christ but such are so to be esteemed who sincerely hold the truth of Christ 2. Though holding the truth of Christ with a comfortable assistance of Gods Spirit as to their own particular Interest yet may they not presume to make and give Laws for the Churches publick discipline But if Christ be with them they must shew it in their peaceable obedience to authority and order either actively if with good conscience they may or passively if otherwise they cannot 4. We may note that in the general Councels venerable for truth and antiquity some have dissented and departed 1 King 18.19 1 King 22.6 8 5. The major part have not always been the best nor the lesser the worst Ahabs Prophets were hundreds against one Elijah and so against one Micaiah 6. Generall Councels though exceeding the Provincial in number and suffrages yet may they not excel them in weight there may be error of many as may appear in the second Nicene Councel can 7. Decreeing for Images and the Councel of Trent c. and there may be truth in few The Apostles in the Councel at Jerusalem were not many but sufficient to determine for the world because assisted by the Spirit of God 7. Provincial Councels as occasion was offered them Decreed that Tythes should be duly paid which if the General did not meddle withall it may be conceived that it was because they had no occasion thereof presented to them by any complaint and they being then in pursuit of the enemies of truth would not divert to the care of things thereto subordinate and much inferior These things laid down the prudent Reader may be satisfied concerning this argument of Councels and perceive the weakness thereof and the falshood of that assertion that these Councels did not so much as name or mention Tythes until the Lateran Councel Ann. 1119. and after a little pawse he saith Ann. 1180. Oh for the whetstone For the use of the poor This ointment said Judas might have been sold for much and given to the poor but this he said pag. 7. not that he cared for the poor but because he was a thief c. Mat. 26 9. Joh. 12.6 Now whether the poor are here intended and mentioned for love and care of them or malice to the Ministers against whom you bring this argument God knows and all good men know that a Sacrilegious person is a thief I fear your Charity would be contented that any one the devil not excepted should have your Tythes would he but send his Tything-Carts abroad for them so that Ministers might be deprived of them your work were done If some Charles Martell would take the Churches estate to pay Souldiers you would resolve upon the question it were Christian policy But to your often repeated objection we say that there were Tythes allotted for the poor distinct from the Ministers Tythes who have willingly relieved the poor and would do still but that
the order of Melchisedec is not abolished nor the Tythes to the same belonging as the Apostle shews Heb. 7.8 saying And here men that dye receive tythes but there he receives them of whom it is written that he liveth that is Christ So then tythes still follow the Priesthood and so the Apostle makes a Priest and a receiver of tythes equivalents Instead of saying Men that dye are Priests he saith That men that receive tythes And instead of saying He that lives is a Priest he saith He that lives takes tythes As if in his judgment Tythes and Priesthood were as inseparable in point of right as Kingdom and Tribute and so the portion due to Christ is still due to his Assigns the Ministers of the Gospel who are his receivers and in their Ministration in his stead 2 Cor. 5.20 And so hath Christ appointed 1 Cor. 9.14 But to your Objection I suppose your familiar on which you rely is known to you except coming up Janus-like double faced you do not so well mark it The one is a Parologism à dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter the other is your old acquaintance Petitio principii We say that changing the Priesthood the Ceremonial part of the Law onely was changed but not the Law for tything which is Moral You say that Paul wrote so that the Law for tything was also changed Pauls words to the Hebrews in the cited place are these The Priesthood changed there is made of necessity a change also of the Law You corrupt the Text by adding thereto of tythes shew us these words The Law for tything was also changed either in that place or any other writing of St. Paul or in all the New Testament and we will rest satisfied therewith and never more speak for tythes But seeing you cannot for shame and danger of these plagues which are threatned Revel 22.18 leave that cause which you cannot uphold without so many untruths and falsification of the sacred Scripture You say For the first three hundred years while the purisy and simplicity of the Gospel was retained no tythes were paid among Christians If this were true what could it make against our right to tythes The causes which hindred their payment are laid down in our answer to that which you objected in your third Page Also for that you speak concerning the Apostles free Preaching of the Gospel to which I here adde that Origen who flourished about 226. or 230. in his 11. Hom. in Numb after many other forcible perswasions to pay their tythes by that which Christ said to the Pharisees This ought you to have done c. he presently addeth How therefore shall your righteousness exceed the righteousness of Scribes and Pharisees if they dare not taste the Fruits of their Land Priusquam primitias sacerdotibus offerant Levitis decimae separentur Lib. 1. ep 9. Cyprian whose Martyrdom fell not long after speaking of the Levites tythes saith Quae nunc ratio forma in clero tenetur c. And he blameth Victor for appointing Geminius Actorem his Attorney because he would not have him distracted from his Ministry and citeth these things as a Decree of his Ancestors The same Father in his third Tract De simpl Praelat speaking of the times before him complaineth of Charities growing cold Tunc domos fundos voenundabant Distribuenda in usus indigentium precia Apostolis offerebant Ut nunc de patrimonio ne decimas damus Sic in nobis emarcuit vigor fidei Sic credentium robur elanguit Then they sold Houses and Lands and offered the price to the Apostles to be distributed for the use of the poor but now we scarce give tythes of our Patrimonies Thus hath the vigor of Faith languished in us so hath the power of Believers grown faint Much concerning this hath been noted by others therefore I content me with these two antient witnesses but what now would you hence conclude What that craft and impurity brought in tythes among Christians But that were a poor fallacy Non causa pro causa Such as the old man used who said That Tenterden Steeple was the cause of Goodwin Sands For said he just as that was building they began to appear But if in the Primitive Church they had not the use of tything understanding Readers will consider that which hath been said therein persecution everywhere raging could not suffer the people to pay or Ministers to receive their tythes Yet no time can prevent God in his reserved right no use or practice of paying tythes while persecution hindred therefore there was no jus in re non sequitur Tythes came into use in Christian Churches so soon as the owners their selves retained use and dominion in their Possessions except in case of Scandal at the first planting the Gospel See 1 Cor. 9.4 1 Cor. 12.15 c. 1 Thes 2.9 That as the mystery of iniquity began to work c. Again 5. here is a Fallacia non causae pro causá Say soberly Think you that the working of the mystery of iniquity was the cause of Ministers Preaching of that which God had commanded to be done Or was that mens imagination as you say the ground whereof you confess was fetcht from the Law of Moses It is to be hoped that your second thoughts will be better Your sixth Observation is nothing to the purpose and therefore deserves no answer You say That in the first payment of tythes Pag. 15. they were not paid as tythes but as Free-offerings at the bounty of the giver c. Say now when where or by whom were tythes ever paid otherwise than by Gods Ordinance from the first mention of them unto this present and shew us if you can how identity admits of disparity Payment of tythes not paid as tythes You say As Free-offerings not as answering any Law that required the tenth part c. This hath and will appear most false mean time circular Arguments are usque ad nauseam tedious and absurd tautologies odious to the prudent Readers But Abraham paid tythes to Melchisedec and Jacob vowed a tenth to God which no doubt he also paid Did these acts of theirs answer no command or motion of Gods Spirit equivalent thereto Heb. 11.13 How then is it testified that these died in the faith Can faith as to please God be without a divine precept If you would suppose That Abraham gave tythes to Melchisedec as of meer benevolence to some distressed Prince how think you came Jacob to vow a tenth rather then some other part how so great a part of the world if not by imitation of Gods people constantly and religiously paying tythes Whatever you conclude of these certainly they were not guilty of Will-worship of whom God testifieth that they died in the faith It was not say you a received Doctrine that tythes ought to be paid till about the year One thousand and two It is easie to answer
know all things and therefore may err in some but still we must remember that it is the Cause not the Punishment which makes the Martyr Few are perswaded that either the Conclave which canonized Garnet had power to make him a Saint or that your Neoteric Saints have authority or warrant from God to unsaint the Evangelists Apostles and Disciples of Christ by the holy Ghost and Church ever since their times owned for Saints Rom. 1.7 Rom. 16.15 1 Cor. 1.2 2 Cor. 1.1 Eph. 1.1 c. and so by calling we fear least their next attempt should be to devest St. Mathew St. John St. Thomas c. and to send them out among the vulgar by the names of Mat Jac and Tom But now justifie your assertion and shew us any one Martyr of Christ who ever was of your opinion in denying the payment Tythes and suffering death for the same Next you demand Page 16. Whether any person have a true and legal property in the tenth part of another mans encrease Concerning such legality by the Laws of man I conceive you make no question concerning divine Law if your quaere be that upon the matter is to doubt whether God hath property in mans encreases or hath power and right to assign the same to whom he will For the first part of such a question I take it to be indisputable with all those who take Gods Word to be their rule and guide he saying expresly all the Tythes of the Land whether of the seed of the Land or the fruit of the Tree is the Lords it is holy unto the Lord so of the Tythe of the Herd or of the Flock the tenth shall be holy unto the Lord Levit. 27.30 32. And concerning these he saith Ye have robbed me though the Jewes said as many amongst us now think it is no robbing of God to take away M l 3. or detain Tythes from his Ministers Wherein have we robbed thee God saith Ye have robbed me in Tythes and Offerings and therefore were they cursed even the whole Nation As for the second part of the doubt all know that the right and absolute Proprietor who holds not of any other but is the Lord Paramount hath right and free power to assign his propriety to any other or others Now God doth as expresly say Numb 18.24 c. The Tythes I have given to the Levites to inherit Of which he yet reserved to himself the Heave-offering as it were a Quit-rent for their acknowledgment of his Soveraign right over all Now from his grant we claim a moral and so an unalterable right due to those whom he appointeth to serve about holy things and not solely from the Laws of good Princes and States though as your self presently confess in the same Paragraph Tythes are to be paid because commanded by the State and that Law and equity obliges the payment That which you after say That the person that claims them may have no particular interest is contradictory to the forecited Scriptures and your own Concessions as also by that which immediatly you grant it appeareth false where you say if a true legal Property be in another person to the tenth part of my encrease I ought in conscience to yeeld and set it forth because it is not mine To which we say First What can be a true or legal Property if that be not such which God himself gives makes the conveiance and in his holy Word testifieth that he hath given and setled as Inheritance and for such service on those whom he hath appointed to minister about holy things Next we say that you can have no right in Tythes that they should become yours either by purchase for who hath right to sell Gods part and that invito Domino Nor by descent or prescription The first you say claims these to be due jure divino and produce the Law of Moses for it c. What other mens opinions are or have been cannot make our right and claim by Gods divine donation by the moral Law void and therefore we trouble not our selves about them I have you say again diligently for two years and more Page 17. laboured to enform my self c. Here you bring an argument from the time you have spent in studying this point and implied unerring faculty of apprehension For if this were not no time can profit to good information Concerning the validity of this reason I leave to others to judge who better know your abilities of Art and Nature than I yet do but now give me leave to ask what Authors studied you Very likely some who were in the same error with you others who could have informed you better you condemn unknown and because your aim is to uphold a party for the carrying on a secret design you did not receive the love of the truth and therefore cannot want strong delusions and so may you still be of their form who are ever learning and never able to come to the knowledg of the truth if you study to deceive your self and others which if it be not so I am confident that you may find enough in the writings of sound and Orthodox Divines to undeceive you if at least you will not shut your eyes if the vail be laid over your eyes none but God can make you see whom we pray in his good time to remove it You speak again of changing the Law by Christ c. Concerning the change of the Ceremonial Law you have been answered that change is granted you without advantage to you or apparent damage to us See what hath been said to your 14 pag. Further we say that Christ changed not the moral Law in any one jot or title thereof as to the morality of it Matth. 5. he protested against it who is the faithful and true witness So that the precepts thereof having no repeal appearing in all Gods Word binde for ever unto the worlds end Shew us if you can where the Law-giver ever repealed the Law for tything Bring us any one Text of holy Scripture either expresly declaring it or by necessary consequence concluding it Which seeing you cannot do abuse not the Scripture making it to speak what you please to hold up your party In a right use of Scriptures we must carry sense from them not bring it to them Your pretending to an absolute change of the Law causeth your ignorant and credulous Readers presently to think they are discharged from all duty to Moral precepts not considering that it must continually binde all men and that the Ceremonial and Judicial Law were positive for a time and appertaining to Israel onely 12ae q. 122. 1. 2m as determinationes moralium which being changed the Moral Law still continues A discharge of obedience hereto granted what an Harvest would the Devil reap from these pernicious Tares which you scatter in the Lords field and what unspeakable confusion would follow what out of
Hell can be imagined more damnable Consider therefore what designs of Satan your captious disputes carry on You will say you intend no such thing Parum interest quo animo feceris quod fecisse malum est but it skills not with what intent you do that which is evil to be done You say Much more colour had the Quiristers c. Homo suavis a merry man I trow But I am not at leisure to exchange words concerning odde Crotchets But say you How doth Gospel-Ministry succeed to the Levites c. We have spoken hereof before and say more first they succeed the Legal Priesthood as they are Ministers of holy things and therefore must live of Christs portion which is tythes though their office in some things differ as shall appear in its place Next the Apostle will shew you Heb. 7.12 The Priesthood saith he being changed there is made of necessity a change also of the Law Where note that he saith not that the Priesthood is abolished but changed So the Law in the Morality thereof is not abolished but the Ceremonies and things thereto belonging are changed Now changing presupposeth a suffection or substitution of some other thing in place of that which is removed So the Ministers succeed in place of the Levitical Priesthood and their honorary and maintenance accompanieth the same Now the portion due to Melchisedec's Priesthood which is a permanent order is tythes these being due to Christs Priesthood are due to Christs Ministers As for your buzzing about here and there and no where seâ—ling concerning the Priesthood it is nothing to purpose And what say you was the Primitive Church assured of for some hundred years After you have done trifling we shall have it that the Church for some hundreds of years never called for tythes Your own citations of Jerom Ambrose Augustine c. shew this to be grosly false except by some hundreds you mean onely the first three hundred wherein the rage of persecution neither permitted Christians to pay nor Ministers to receive their tythes concerning which we have already spoken in answer to the same objection You say again What is this to the payment of tythes Pag. 18. What that Abraham paid tythes very much First this imports a right in Melchisedec to take them and therefore a debitum in Abraham to pay them who having a special direction by some inspiration which had the force of an injunction Abraham's act was of duty not arbitrary benevolence yea by the Moral Law which before the exact transcript thereof on the Tables of Stone was the very same with the Law of Nature which bound not onely Abraham but all persons respectively to all times and places For to worship God is a Moral Precept though for the time the determination thereof 12 ae q. 99. as to the manner how appertained to the Ceremonial which being antiquated and changed into another manner of worship under the Gospel yet is still the same in point of Morality which bound and unchangeably bindeth all You possibly may say Abraham paid tythes but once but there needs no other proof that he constantly paid them at other times as well as that once specified to Melchisedec because God testified concerning him saying Gen. 18.19 I know him that he will command his children and his houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment which is afterwards interpreted Deut. 32 46. By doing all the words of this Law Adde hereto that he onely is good and just who is constantly so and accordingly Jacob also paid tythes because the Morality of the Law universally binding to this duty of Equity and Justice bound all men and ever respectively to do the same how else fell Abraham and Jacob upon a tenth rather then on a fifth seventh or twelfth part Without faith it is impossible to please God as also to do any thing in faith which God commandeth not You say more that few are now left who will onely stand to it and the generality are of a contrary minde Few are now left We may thank your rage for that But I demand doth the appearing paucity of any Truths Professors disparage their Cause What then shall we think of Eliah crying I onely am left Were there not then many thousands on the Prophets side whom he knew not of might it not even then have been answered to him as Elisha said to his servant 2 Kings 6.6 Fear not for they that be with us are more then they that be with them But what you mean by onely stand to it I know not but doubt hic ambiguo ludimur Mean you onely stand to it that jus of receiving of tythes and so wave and disclaim all right which in confirmation of the same good Princes and Parliaments or Donations and Bequeathments which well-affected men have given us by several Laws and Acts in divers ages past That were foolishly and ingratefully done so to value these grants to which you confess your self bound to obey Even for Conscience sake That the generality are against Right and Truth I do no more wonder then that you are And so you say the greatest part of the people of England deny tythes to be due by Gods Law To this and that which immediately precedeth I think no more answer then this necessary if so it is the more shame for them Concerning the end of paying tythes you have been answered As for Impropriators they are out of the verge of our present question which concerns the Ministers portion yet here we may use the saying of Boniface Archbishop of Mentz in his Epistle to Cuthbert Archbishop of Canterbury Our complaints saith he hereof are not much unlike to a dogs barking at theeves and robbers breaking open digging through and rifting his Masters house Quia defensionis auxiliatores non habeat Spelm. Concil decret pag. 239 submurmurans ingemiscat lugeat Because he cannot have helpers for defence yet growling he will grumble and whimper And this you say leaves every man free to give to him that teacheth I am sure you are not very free to give to him that teacheth and for all this preceding Miscellany you leave us in doubt what you mean by this leaves this what your irresolute conclusion and confused resolution Do these make for your dream of the Castle in the air Competent maintenance for Ministers and that arbitrary voluntary contribution If you mean voluntary to import willingly performed as all good works must be we accord Paul Preached the Gospel willingly that act of Preaching was a voluntary act of Paul 1 Cor 9.16 17. yet wo had been unto him if he had not preached the Gospel because a dispensation of the Gospel was committed unto him Concerning those you speak of who you say Pag 19. are transformed as Apostles and Ministers of Christ who have the form but want the power who teach for filthy lucre c.
a motion till then we require your patience if we hold fast Gods Ordinance and the Ministers just maintenance Further you say Halt no longer between two c. Aeschylus Jasonem ebrium n scena quâdam induxi◠quo vitio laboraba◠ipse poeta tragicus comentitus Heroas Athenae l. 10. c. 7. We must tell you Sir here you entitle us to your own faults as that drunken Poet Aeschylus did the noble hero Jason and other Grecians to his own vices 't is you who halt between Papist and a Schismatical pretender to Reformation So Ahab would have put the crime of troubling Israel on the Prophet of the Lord as for us God knows that our souls desire is to cleave stedfastly unto him and his sacred Ordinances and we have not yet temporized as too many have done God preserving us in our suffering of hard things Is this halting with Sir Gregory Nonsense Next you talk of A more Gospel-like way of maintenance c. To which 't is easily answered that not only you but no Creature Men or Angels of Heaven can prescribe a more Gospel-like way than that which God hath appointed and Christ approved The light which you talk of we own not for such who have a more sure word of Prophesie unto which as unto light that shineth in a dark place we attend until the day dawn As for those ignes fatui of Mens inventions we neither value them nor find any cause to follow them Next you speak of a way to establish the Nation upon a sure foundation of true freedom as to the conscience We say 1. Use not your Liberty for a cloke of malitiousness 2. Beware that you be not of their number of whom the Apostle speaks 1 Pet. 2.16 2 Pet. 2.18.19 who when they speak great swelling words of vanity while they promise them liberty they themselves are the servants of corruption 3. If you dissemble not but bear good will to your Countries freedom and good conscience we cannot but pitty the seeming disproportion between your zeal and knowledg as we would pitty to see mettle in a blind jade Jer. 15.19 As for giving content to separate Congragations our rule is the same which God of old gave the Prophet Let them return unto thee but return not thou unto them And as for satisfying such as are self-excommunicate and divided from the womb of the Church we pitty them but must leave them to Gods tribunal for our selves we have learned of the Apostle Gal. 1.10 If I yet please men I should not be the servant of Christ That on which you spend your Rhetorick about contention for Tythes as if that were a sufficient cause why they should be taken away is very childish Tell me have there not been and still are many bloody contentions about the preaching of the Gospel of Christ What would it be a sure foundation of true freedom as to the conscience to obey the command of those Rulers Elders and Scribes Annas Caiphas c. Not to speak at all Act. 4.18 nor teach in the name of Jesus Is it your best prescript for the cure of the head-ache to cut off the head medice cura teipsum But seriously your argument is a fallacia accidentis a wholsom way were for the people duly to pay and set out their Tythes according to Laws divine and humane I conceive that no man would be so ill-advised as to sue for his right if he might have it without trouble and charge of Law That you say Paying unreasonable c. You speak like your self But doth paying Tythes hinder Tillage and the staff of bread as you pretend Here is again another fallacia accidentis if that be true which you say or a fallacia non causae pro causa if false It is not paying of Tythes which is the obstruction to plenty but mens unbelief God himself saying Prove me now if I will not pour you out a blessing c. Mal. 3.10 Of what kind Of the encreases of the Earth And what is the condition to which that promise relateth Is it not paying Tythes and leaving their Sacriledg Let no man say you henceforth think it strange c. We shall not think it strange that some men refuse to pay Tythes while there is a Devil to tempt them to Sacriledg nor wonder that some will pay Tythes because we have a good God who though he justly permit many to strong delusions that they may perish yet will he preserve his elect and encline their hearts to obey his Laws and Ordinances that it may be well with them and theirs HAving thus answered these cavils I propose the ensuing conclusions to the good readers consideration 1. All are bound to do the most high Lord God homage and service of whom it is written Him only shalt thou serve Mat. 4. This is a rule so evidently just that the very heathens in their twelve Tables of their Law acknowledged it on this ground Az or l. 6. c. 63. Cic. de leg l. 2. 12ae q. 44. 6. Lex natura is non potest deleri quoad prima principia that God is the Lord and disposer of all things For as Schoolmen say the Law of Nature cannot be extinguished as to its first Principles Now there is no Nation of the World so immane and barbarous but that it believes there is a God who created and still governeth this Universe So that the brutish Poticius for his ignorance of God was esteemed a kind of Paradox in Nature a Prodigy and Monster of Man-kind Cic. Plaut God's Word teacheth us that he must be worshiped but as his self commandeth in it which is his revealed will as 't is written Mic. 6.8 He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what doth the Lord require of thee 2. We must be faithfull and true to him whom we adore as our God the searcher of hearts not encroaching upon any part of that which the holy Word declareth as a reserved right to belong unto the Lord our God 3. What ever carnal reason or wisdom of the flesh pretend or suggest to the contrary we must duly and willingly render and pay unto him all his Rights and Duties belonging unto him as a supream Lord of all As it is written Give unto God the things that are Gods Mat 12.21 1 Chro. 29 14. Psal 115.16 which when we have truly done we must acknowledg with David Of thy own hand have we given thee all is thine The earth hath he given unto the children of men only reserving to himself as it were a smal Lords-rent as an acknowledgment of his Soverain Dominion 4. The things which God hath reserved as a Tribute or Rent to himself are 1. Either of the time measured unto man for this present life out of which he hath reserved a Seventh part or a Sabbath and holy rest that we may be enabled to subsist and serve him without which
combination or consent of multitudes may change or alter Gods sacred Ordinances under any pretence of Reformation or of more convenience or bettering them by any means The vain and impious dream of some competency for Ministers maintenance instead of tythes is meer rebellion against God and his Laws no better than an high and mad presumption to correct his wisdom rectifie his providence and attempting to controul and amend his Decreed and Sacred Ordinances oblikely censuring them as defective or erroneous which is an acme and heighth of more than Luciferian resolution he said Similis ero altissimo I will be like the most high but Isa 14.14 upon the matter these would be supra altissimum above the most high to controll and alter his Decrees Had the Jews attempted to have changed the maintenance of Priests and Levites in the whole or any part thereof by God appointed and declared though they had given them more than the value of their tythes and offerings in money or some other kinde of commodity Would God have connived any more at such sacriledge than at the rebellion of Corah and his Confederates they would have changed Gods Ordinance in the authority of Moses and Aaron and his sons Ministery And can we reasonably conceive that for such as now attempt to take away the Ministers and Gods publick worship branch and root the Earth hath not yet more back-doors to open for such Conspirators that they may go down body and soul alive to Hell Be advised it is the same God still and therefore it is a dangerous undertaking to meddle with that Heb. 13 8. which he hath appointed reserved for his own part and assigned as an honorary for their service whom he calleth and designeth thereto not whom the assembly of Corah would substitute and ordain to serve in the Sanctuary And now if you will rest on the Apostles sentence Gospel Ministers in the change of the Law succeeding the Priests and Levites must likewise be maintained not by an arbitrary allowance by the will of man but by that which God appointed for them So the Apostle applieth the same moral equity for the Ministers of Christ The Priests and Levites portion was tythes and offerings c. even so hath God appointed or ordained That they which preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel 1 Cor. 9.13 14. To what relateth that even so but unto that which he before spake of even as Legal Priests lived or were maintained by tythes and offerings so must Ministers of the Gospel be maintained by tythes and offerings I demand of our Competency-men how even so if tythes be taken away and Ministers left to the peoples benevolence even so must signifie nothing so but even so by your wills they who preach the Gospel shall have nothing except a meals meat when they will flatter you 14. Without all controversie there was a certain determinate allowance for Priests and Levites under the Law and what reason can be shewed why we should conceive that God hath not appointed as competent and comfortable means for Ministers subsistence What Scripture can be produced to demonstrate or solid reason urged to make it so much as probable that God who so disposed of Legal Priests and Levites that they were as I may say fed out of Gods own hand and reserved part should remit the Ministers of a better testament and a better hope to the unkinde hands of unconstant men to be maintained in a dubious and uncertain condition of subsistence Would he have them under the Law of Moses depend on his own holy Providence and Ministers of his dear Son Jesus on men For you must observe that though the quota pars for Priests and Levites was determinate in Tythes and Offerings yet in the whole or dividends thereof it must needs arise more or less as God blessed their Land with encreases much or little Heb. 3.2 Add heerto if God would not trust the Magistrates of his Israel no nor Moses so faithfull a servant in his house so dear so familiar as he was with God to leave the determination of the Priests and Levites portion unto him but limited him in every particular thereof How much less would he leave the Gospel-Ministers livelihood to the fidelity and discretion of any modern Trustees specially in the declining age of the world which he foresaw would be more unconstant to all good in the coldness of charity towards the end The face of the Skie and great deeps is variable bur mens minds are incomparably more fluctuant Had the prodigious changes which we have seen in this giddy age been foretold us Who could have believed such a report The Changes I say not in matters of small moment or examples of obscure condition or men of vulgar quality but of the most eminent in their kinds There were changes in the primitive Church when the most evident gifts of the holy Ghost flourished among Christ's Disciples one while the Lystrians were hardly restrained from sacrificing to Paul and Barnabas as Gods Act. 14.28 presently they stone them as the worst of men Now the Pharisees emissaries report Never man spake as this man speaks John 7. ere long the people would stone him as if he had been a blaspheamer now they make the streets and Temple of Jerusalem ring of their Hosanna's presently they roar out their Crucify John 18. Crucify Truth begets enemies where pride begets impatience of reproof Ahab discovered the true cause why he conceived that Michaiah prophesied no good to him 1 King 22.8 in saying I hate him They that have some appearance of Religion in them know not all and therefore may have some erroneous Opinions and though possibly they will hear like and love you while you comply with their judgments yet if you dissent they presently bid defiance So the Galatians who received Paul as an Angel of God even as Christ Jesus Gal. 4.14 15. presently took him for an enemy because he told them the truth which crossed their opinion So the Jews hearing Paul say that he must be sent far off to the Gentiles Act. 22.21 22. gave him audience unto this word and then lift up their voices and said away with such a fellow from the earth for it is not fit that he should live Herod heard John Baptist gladly and did many things but when John reproved Herods incest John must to Prison and die And are not men as wicked now as in those days What hath been the cause of so much cruelty towards fruitfull Ministers and Preachers of the truth of Christ but Auditors impatience of reproof And had you but the pernicious liberty which you so much affect to have all Ministers your Almsmen Who should with safety to his life and liberty roprove you who have been so impatient of hearing truth though you have not yet such a bond on Ministers tongues as you would have What Prophets could you hope to
they had a very large allowance appointed them by the Lord. I had done with this point but that I desire the Reader to consider how our adversary crosseth himself somtimes denying sometimes affirming the same thing pag. 1. he saith No Tythes did the Priests receive of the People but pag. 3. he saith The Priest-hood which had a Command to take Tythes of their brethren Thus his first foundation failes him So was their maintenance distinct That which you said impertinently before you now make an introduction Pag. 2. to that which you would fetch in scil That the Levites maintenance was Tyths but the Priests was distinct from that ergo What the Priests maintenance was not Tythes neither ought the Ministers succeding them to be Tythes but you have marred this argument by your own former concessions Which were figures c. Who or what were figures because you express not I owe no answer only I conjecture what you reach at Changing the Priesthood which had a command to take Tythes of their brethren Pag. 3. there was made of necessty also a change of the Law True there was made a change of all that was changeable therein that is the ceremonial part thereof if you mean a change of all simply you had need study the point wo years more for here would be a begging the question and paralogisme a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simplicitèr There was a change of the Law not simply and in all the branches thereof as the Antinomians would have it but of the ceremonial and judicial part thereof The morality is unchangeable in the whole and every part thereof save only that which was even therein ceremonial and so alterable as bringing titles to Jerusalem c. observation of the seventh-day-Sabbath from the Creation c. But the morality is unalterable and indispensable in respect of all times places and persons In the rest which followeth you seem a while to fight with your own shadow Nor did the Apostles you say go about to establish the law by which Tythes were given your foundation is here laid on a false ground and such will your superstruction be you suppose Tythes given by the ceremonial Law in Abrahams example as we shall hereafter see in its convenient place it appears that Tythes were due some hundreds of years before God gave the ceremonial Law by Moses and God did not then give tithes to the Priesthood of Aaron as a new donation for their maintenance but only determined them according to that present age of his Church as for the moral Law on which Tithes are grounded Rom 3.31 the Apostle saith plainly Do we then make void the law through faith God forbid yea we establish the law Yea out of the ceremonial law he takes out this morality appliable for Ministers of the Gospel Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges 1 Cor. 9.7 c. Who planteth a vineyard and eateth not of the fruit thereof c. for it is written in the law of Moses Thou shalt not muzle the mouth of the Ox that treadeth out the corn for our sakes no doubt this is written c. Do ye not know that they which Minister about holy things live of the things of the Temple And they which wait at the Altar are partakers with the Altar Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel But freely preacheth the Gospel c. What inferr you from hence The Apostles required no Tythes ergo Gospel-Ministers ought to require none First I say if the Apostles example without respect to the difference of the several states of the Church newly planted and peaceably constituted must prescribe us in all things then are we bound to suffer persecutions to have no setled charge but to travel up and down to preach to all Nations which implies not a few impossibilities Secondly If your conclusion be the Apostles took no Tythes ergo the Gospel-Minister hath no right to them The answer is apparent in the forecited place where Paul saith It was not because he had no power but for the exigents of those times For 1. Christianity was yet but a stranger on Earth believers being very few in respect of the numerous heathens bred up in Idolatry 2. Tythes whereof the heathens had some knowledg by the principles of nature or otherwise were generally paid to the Idol-Priests of the Pagans and Idol-service as by Tythes paid to Hercules and many other like may appear See Sir H. Spelman larger work of Tythes c. 26. 3. Christians being generally in Cities they had few predial Tythes and so they were incompetent to maintain Ministers 4. For the first 300 years until the reign of Constantine persecution almost every where raging so that few Christians were masters of their own lives liberties or possessions but were almost every day counted as sheep for the slaughter Rom. 8.36 2 King 5.26 almost every place streaming Christian blood Therefore as Elisha said to Gehazi Was this a time to take And that from new converted people lately clensed from the filthy Leprosie of sin Was it not rather a time to give if they possibly could to the relief of those they taught Every thing hath its time the time was not yet come that a constituted Church should demand her own In the Wilderness wherein the people were in frequent travels the very seal of Gods Covenant Circumcision was intermitted by the space of 40 years together and in the Apostles times their often journying and perils of waters Josh 5.7 perils of robbers 2 Cor. 11.26 32 33. c. and frequent persecution enforcing them to flie for their lives gave them no possible means of receiving Tythes but as the Levites received them not in their travel but when they were setled in Canaan so the Apostles after Christs ascension being in continual travel through one part or another of the world and one while in prison another while in flight and persecution what convenience in such condition had either Christians to pay or Ministers to receive Tythes which were to be taken in the seasons of their maturities and only on those places where they grew to be due nor ere that time came they who in right ought to receive them were by the guidance of the holy Ghost in some other Country preaching the Gospel many hundred miles from the place where their Tythes grew due See it in S. Peters example walking through all quarters Act. 9.32 c. Sometimes at Lydda or Joppa sometime at Jerusalem at Babylon or Egypt sometimes 1 Pet. 5.13 or the Apostles Paul and Barnabas somtimes at Antioch Seleucia in Syria Salamis Paphus in Cyprus Perga in Pamphilia Antioch in Pisidia Iconium Act. 13. Act. 14.6 Lystra Derbe in Lycaonia Phrygia Galatia Mysiae Samothracia Philippi in Macedonia of Greece S. Bartholmew in India Jerom Catal. Script Eccles S. Thomas in Persia
Hyrcania Bactria S. Mathew in Ethiopia c. What should these men have done with their Tythes Where should they have had Barns for them who were so little masters of their selves What security could they have had either to gather or keep such things from rapine and spoil If in a Church and State so lately setled so happily governed in peace we have had so much experience of plundering and sequestration What think you could have come to the Apostles and their primitive successors if before the Churches peace they had claimed their Tythes 5. Charity of Christians in those first ages of the Church was so abundant toward those that taught them Gal. 4.14 15. that they needed not any other supply by Tythes but when that began to grow cold it was but reason that their due to Tythes should be revived and their proper right claimed and received How long this charitable contribution continued it is uncertain but as it decayed good Princes by Gods providence in the overspreading encreases of Christianity did well to make laws for the maintenance of Gods worship and for the same what so good a way could they take as that by Tythes which Gods wisdom had apointed So Princes gave not Tythes to the Clergy by their laws but only as need required restored them to the just Proprieters God gave them though in several ages he put it into the minds of Councels to require them and of religious Princes to make coercive laws to bind their Subjects to pay them 6. Another cause of intermission of their claim was that high opinion of the devouter Clergy of voluntary poverty which dream of theirs Gods providence made use of to make their persons venerable and their doctrine of more esteem among the Gentiles when they saw that their teachers aimed not at their own ease safety honor or enriching but only saving of souls 7. Lastly Fear of scandal caused not only St. Paul to forbear his claim and using his just power 1 Cor. 9.12 2 Cor. 11.12 but others also Hence probably it came to to pass that so little mention is made of Tythes in the primitive age of the Church or the exaction of them yet we must remember that St. Paul saith it was not that he had not power to have used his right as he plainly shews 1 Cor. 9.4 6 7 9 10 11 12 c. So that if it be granted that in those several obstructions for some ages we neither read of any claim or use of Tythes What can our adversaries hence infer No use or claim ergo no jus decimandi Neither read we of any use of the Sabbath in all the history of the Patriarchs recorded by Moses or of any Priestly or Prophetical function neither taxing the neglect or exhorting to the use or observation thereof but can we reasonably conceive that these ancient Saints either so long omitted the sanctification of the Sabbath or Priestly exercises of Religion no use therefore no opinion of the right What think you of the 40 years intermitting Circumcision whereof we have before spoken did that take away all opinion of the right Weekly Offerings for the Saints c. for the poor Saints What argument is this against Tythes Good Christians now relieve the necessities of the Saints where collections are made for them Doth this impeach their duty of paying Tythes Nay but this ought ye to do and not to leave the other undone This way of contribution continued in the Church c. how long it is not uncertain but certainly the Pamphleter was not well advised to say that it continued till the great persecution under Maximinian and Dioclesian about the year 304. before which time his vouchers Tertullian Origen and Cyprian were dead which appears saith he by the writings of Tertullian Origen Cyprian Tertullian flourisheth about the year 208. then wrote he against Marcion Origen flourished about the year 232. and died about the year 252. And Cyprian was crowned with Martyrdome by Eusebius computation in the year 259. in the eight persecution under Valerian as other Chronologers reckon Dioclesian caused that long and bloody Persecution which was the tenth in order Your self confess in your next Paragraph save one Pag. 4. that Cyprian lived about the year 250. Now suppose that the specified contribution did continue till the year 304. how can that appear by the writings of Tertullian Origen and Cyprian Did dead men write for your Assertion But learn to bring your untruthes closer together and at least to hold the Poets rule to write ficta possibilia possible though not true things Pag. 5. By whose writings it also appears that there was not the least use or practise of the payment of Tythes in those former ages Hence you would conclude that there ought to be none now but that Ministers must live on the abundant charity and contributions of charitable people now To which I first answer Shew us that charity of people towards their Ministers now adays and then urge their example against Tythes but while you take from us all that you can their example is improperly pleaded against us which you will not have to hold for us Next I say that by their writings it neither doth nor can appear which you here say and how prove you this your negative There was not the least use or practice of payment of Tythes in those former ages besides those which we have to shew for the contrary Know you not that many excellent writings are lost and so never come to our sight Like divers famous Cities mentioned by Strabo and other Geographers whereof little else now remains but the bare names read the industrious Erasmus his complaint in the end of Jerom's Catalogue of Ecclesiastical writers where after other expressions of our loss of eminent Authors he concludeth Verum hic dolor extimulare debet onmes bonis addictos autoribus ut id certè quod superest tanto legant avidius quanto minus est quod temporum ruina nobis fecit reliquum moreover who knows not that both sacred and Ecclesiastcal and other Authors wrote many Treatises pro re natâ and as enemies of the truth gave them emergent occasions of necessary defence thereof without which most probably they had therein been silent For what need they have written or armed themselves or others when none opposed But now dato non concesso Suppose that we read not in the writings of ancient Councels or Fathers any the least use or practise of the payment of Tythes What Therefore no Tythes were paid in those former ages Nay but you do not know that all that which our Saviour Christ himself did never came to our knowledg Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his Disciples which are not written in this book John 20.30 21.25 There seems an impossibility of writing all done but not written concludes à non scripto ad non factum non valere argumentum
That with Unbelievers the Gospel which Christs Sacred Lips Preached was a Doctrine not generally received Was the Jews unbelief which gave that holy Doctrine no better reception any prejudice to the truth of Christ He said of John Baptist Matth. 11.14 If ye will receive it this is Elias which was for to come And again Matth. 17.12 I say unto you that Elias is come already What if the Jews then would not or Papists now will not receive this Doctrine as their learned Cardinal Bellarmine Tom. 1. l. 3. c. 6. de Pontif. Rom. Tom. 4 de gra Prim. hom c. 14. who affi meth That Enoch and Elias shall come before the end of the world to oppose Antichrist and to convert the Jews Doth mans unbelief any whit annul the truth of Christ You see the feebleness of this your Argument from the generality of mens not receiving a Doctrine to conclude it not true Your nineth and tenth Observations are to no purpose against us Moreover you say 11. That tythes were brought in as a duty owing to God and were so required and enforced c. This may be an Argument against you it is nothing against us But we say more What can any Law made by man have for so sure a ground as the Law and Commandment of God upon which all Humane Laws and Decrees are or ought to be grounded And who gives Divine or Civil property as to justice indefeaceable but God whose the Earth is Psal 24.1 and all the fulness thereof From him we claim our portion As for the Coercive Laws of Princes giving us a jus ad rem we look upon Gods good providence therein and thankfully acknowledge their favors for the preservation of Gods worship and our Ministers subsistence without which it is too evident that many mens Atheistical confidence would embolden them securely to venture on the Justice of God as they commonly do when there are no witnesses of their sacriledge present They have no Law of Conscience to hinder them from taking away what they can from Ministers You say again That till the year Twelve hundred 12. or thereabouts it was the common practice for every one to bestow his tythes where he pleased Supposing it a free-gift the owner had fair colour so to do But were this true as it is far from it what were the common practice of every one against the Law of God more or less than a general Rebellion against him And your self in your next Observation shew the mischief ensuing on such arbitrary dispositions to wit inriching those lives of Drones Abbeys and Monasteries And you also confess That all exemptions from payment of tythes came from the Pope You say here To bestow his tythes as if they were alms of free benevolence and not duty by God injoyned But we claim a right not depending on your charity knowing it too well You are not so kinde to the Prophet 1 Kings 17.6 as the Ravens at the Brook of Cherich they brought him Bread and Flesh in the morning and likewise in the evening but you would rather starve your Prophet and pick out his eyes Your fifteenth and sixteenth Observation we conceive make nothing against us Next you talk of tythes That they are the same thing whether claimed by an Abbey or Impropriator or a Priest and stand upon the same ground and foundation c. That they are the same in materiâ subjectâ it is true but to no purpose urged Would you intimate that there is in the Creatures tythed such an inherent mischief as that quatenus ipsum they must needs be evil which are once tythed whether taken by Gods Law or by man impropriated If so the madness of your Argument sufficiently appears Sacrificing flesh to idols did not in St. Pauls judgment 1 Cor. 10.25 27 28. so pollute it but that it might be eaten asking no question for Conscience sake That you mention an Impropriator or a Priest and tythes standing on the same ground If you mean by Priest a Minister of the Gospel and tythes impropriated you cross your own Concessions and the Dictates of Gods Law Truly by your obscure grumbling you seem to be very angry and that you would fain bite but that you know that your Toothless Argument cannot hurt us And this possibly so discomposed the Animal that as if he had forgotten on which side he is in his seventeenth Observation he doth ingenuously confess A state of a Church declining to corruption and error clearly to be discerned and traced in that as the power of truth was lost so was the fruit thereof which caused such earnest pressing to needful contributions Pag. 15. and when that would not serve Laws and Decrees were made to force them But in the beginning it was not so for while the purity and simplicity of the Gospel was retained there needed no pressing for their charity then abounded not onely to the tenth part that is tythes but for greater parts Antonii gladios potuit contemnere si sic omnia dixisset 18. Next you say That the right of tythes was never cleared even among the greatest Papists What is that to us Ipsi videant were ever all Cases of Conscience cleared among them advise with your own Casuists Further you say In all ages there were those that withstood the payment of them What then we know it to our grief Hereto you may cite this present age with a witness our self at Conclude now we challenge you thereto but conclude categorically Whatsoever hath been withstood by some in all ages is not good or just The payment of Tythes to Ministers hath been withstood by some in all ages ergo the payment of Tythes to Ministers is not good or just To such a conclusion your medium looks if you deal rationally and if so who sees not the falshood of your major Proposition which can neither by you nor any Sophister in the World be proved For if that were universally true that whatsoever hath been withstood by some in all ages is not good or just What would become of the holy Gospel it self You know what the Jews at Rome said to Paul Act. 28.22 As concerning this Sect we know that every where it is spoken against What truth was ever yet so evident to all men that it found no contradiction Blind Harpaste will contend that the room hath no light Antiquity wanted not an Anaxagoras so paradoxical Fir. Lactant. as to affirm that the snow is black of all truths Satan will be sure that the Gospel shall never want Adversaries some Jewes or other to gain-say the preaching thereof and to withstand the Ministers as Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses 2 Tim. 3.8 some tinkerly Alexander the Copper-Smith 2 Tim. 4.4 O but some of the Martyrs saith our Antagonist among other things suffered in flames you say for that sci denying payment of Tythes We answer possibly a Martyr may not
We may take up the Eunuchs quere Of whom speaks he this of himself Acts 8.34 or of some other man Where is the power of godliness on your part when you broach many falshoods setting up impious doctrines of men instead of Gods oracles Non soles te respicere cum aliis maledicis Is it filthy lucre in us to require the portion which God hath appointed us or in you who would take it from us Gods Word doth evidently enough shew to any whose eyes are not closed by prejudicate opinion That as there was a Legal service to which belonged a legal maintenance a Temple and an Altar service to which God allotted Temple and Altar portions or maintenance to them who there served so by the same Moral equity there is a Gospel service preaching administration of Holy Sacraments c. to which appertain the things or temporal perquisites belonging to the maintenance thereof which is laid down in sundry places of holy Scripture See Gal. 6.6 Prov. 3.6 1 Tim. 5.17 Now if there be a portion to be set out unto God and his Ministers out of all and every the temporal goods of every one instructed in the Gospel according to the sum and purport of these places of holy Scripture and no certain portion or maintenance for Ministers be found in Gods Word but tythes then are tythes the portion and maintenance allotted by Gods Word to Ministers for their service But there is a portion to be set out to God and his Ministers out of all the temporal goods of every one instructed in the Gospel and no other determinate certainty for Ministers maintenance mentioned in holy Scripture Ergo Tythes are the principal portion allotted by Gods Word to Ministers for their service And no reason can our adversaries alleage to make it probable that God would have Gospel-Ministers means of subsistence less certain and definite then the Priests and Levites means was under the Law To conclude a Law for payment of Tythes for the maintenance of Gods publick worship all confess shew us in all Gods Word where that Law was ever repealed Pag. 19. But you say He always took care for such as he sent forth and they never wanted c. And what reason can you shew why they now should I presume not to ask why so many of Christs faithful Ministers have of late been driven into great wants and so are still Your device of competent maintenance doth here but corvis hiantibus illudere They who were sent out by Christ you say reaped the fruit of their labor What proves this but that they ought to do so still Concerning Churches which you say were gathered we say you ought to consider a great difference between a setled or constituted Church and that which in the Primitive Age of the Gospel was setling and there to be constituted Therefore that which was then done cannot reasonably prescribe a maintenance for Ministers of a Church constituted There was besides persecution unadvised zeal of voluntary poverty a Bird as rare to be found in this age as a Phenix or black Swan There was danger of scandal given we know none now except taken not given in requiring our Tithes of such as you Herewith say you let our now called Churches be proved c. God be blessed we have a more just and certain proof then your Lesbian rule to try our Calling by Christ saying By this shall all men know that ye are my Disciples if you love one another and for the rest The laborer is worthy of his hire This is appointed us by the Lord of the Vineyard by God out of his own reserved part not contracted for or arbitrarily determined by man This we understand that which God knew to be a proportionable honorary not that which fickle man fancieth to be so This is no mercenary wages such as your own party confess are upon Covenant Compact Agreement or Promise Now it cannot appear that ever the Apostles maintenance was grounded on Covenant Compact Agreeement Promise c. but on Gods Providence and Ordinance Mercenary wages is definite particular as to the sum agreed on between party and party so was not the Apostles maintenance in any of the Churches to which they preached Yea say you for their preaching was free Why they took not Tythes you have heard formerly that they had maintenance from the Churches is above all dispute but you would have us preach freely that is taking no Tythes because in the Primitive Church Charity abounding you say it appeareth not that Tythes were paid To which we say be you such first as those Christians were to their Teachers and then talk of gathering Churches and our ceasing to take Tythes In the mean time you cannot reasonably require us to leave our good way seeing you will not leave your evil one of sharking Ministers Wages is or ought to be proportionable to the merit of those that serve by Covenant but the maintenance of the Apostles and Ministers could not can not be such for they Minister Spiritual things and reap Carnal And now Why quarrel you our receiving these supplies of the World to which we Preach And from what part thereof should we reasonably expect to reap but from that on which we sow 1 Cor. 9. God hath determined that we shall live of the Gospel which we preach according to the equity of the moral Law for this one and the same justice is to be observed in the Law and Gospel 12ae q. 108. 2. o. 19. The School-men well note that the Gospel commands no other Moralities then the same which the Law commanded And here you say rulers should have wisdom c. Rom. 13.4 We take you for a pretty Counseller of State and the Apostle saith of the Magistrate He beareth not the Sword in vain for he is the Minister of God a revenger to execute wrath on him that doth evil But in vain carrieth he the Sword who hath not wisdom to direct it And is that wisdom which you here offer our Magistrates for Counsel of State to leave Christ's Kingdom to his own rule What to punish no offenders To cry to Christ as those rebellious Tribes 1 King 14.16 See to thine own house David What would become of such inactive Magistrates and such a Laish For defect of Justice in the due execution thereof Judg 18.7 Gen. 18.25 Ezek. 5.8 the Lord the Judg of all the Earth will do right as he saith because they had not kept his judgments Therefore thus saith the Lord God behold I even I am against thee and will execute judgment in the midst of thee See also Ezek. 11.9 2 Chron 24.23 24. in the sight of the nations So when Joash hearkened to wicked Counsel and did not justice upon delinquents the Lord brought upon Princes and people the Assyrian Army so they executed judgment upon Joash Thus will it still come to pass that for want of Magistrates due
which but seems so unto deluded mindes but Conscience on the infallible Word of God in which can be no falshood Shew us now if you be true men that this is indeed your Conscience and we will go along with you But excuse us if we subscribe not unto such dull and stupid opinions for which you cannot shew that Christs Ministers were ever in your sense made manifest But you would have Magistrates punish and restrain the evil We wish it so but doubt that you would wince when you were under the lash for Sacriledge and your Opinion could not save your You say Would not this ease the Magistrate and be more acceptable to God To so impious and vain a question it is enough to answer No. Who say you made him a Judge c He or they who made him a Magistrate and a restrainer of the evil Pag. 20. A third sort you say plead for Decrees c. I am loath to be expensive of precious time in examination of that which others plead and I content me to say concerning the rubbish which you here scrape together That those things have been sufficiently answered by the learned and most industrious Dr. Tilsley Animad on Hist. of Tythes to whom I refer the Reader who desireth further to be satisfied concerning those things And then you say about that time it came to be received and believed that tythes ought to be paid c. I cannot but think you dissemble your knowledge who say That it was about a thousand years after Christ before it came to be received and believed that tythes ought to be paid Origen Cyprian Jerom Ambrose Augustine c. believed them to be due and payable or else they would not have pleaded so earnestly for them and you know that these lived some hundred of years before the time which you mention Consider what your self have confessed and for shame contradict not that You say That in England as well as other Nations every man might have given his tythes where he pleased till about the year One thousand two hundred If that were true I could not but think it great pitty that they were so long ignorant But must we still be troubled with your Crambe and often repetitions of one and the same falshood surely it is already nauseous to the understanding Reader Page 21. Pleaded for Humane right To this and many things else gathered out of Mr. Seldens History of Tythes I answer again That it skills not much what others plead God gave Ministers the jus and right of Tythes from that time that he had a Church I say Jus in re a right in Tythes though Humane Laws may be said to give them Jus ad rem that is a Law and Custom of Court to claim and recover them as their right To this if Kings and Parliaments have contributed their power and authority by Laws and Decrees they did justly and religiously therein For therefore God put the power into their hands well knowing how malicious Satan is against Ministers of the Gospel and how in his ambition to bring men to his Kingdom of Darkness and Atheism the subtil Impostor works as you do on the worldly minder of Neuters in Religion who wouldly gladly be of the cheapest one that they might spare their purses and the newest that they might be in the fashion Now for Statutes of Kings and Parliaments suppose they have power concerning mutual Humane rights i. e. Meum and tuum God onely hath right in his reserves Suum cuique is the Rule of Justice and Christ said Give to Caesar that which is Caesars to every one that which is his onely let Gods Portion be sacred and inviolable We look therefore on Statutes as effects of Gods mercy towards his Church making Kings and high Powers her Nursing-fathers and yet we say that we ground not our Claim and Interest therein God hereby used a Coercive power to restrain the Sacriledgious because of the hardness of their hearts who regard not Gods Laws but fear Mans. The Law you say doth not give any man a property But sure the Law of God doth of and by which we hold from whence we claim our portion And we further say That if no Humane Law Act or Decree had been made for us on this behalf yet had we a firm right to that which God assigned us by his Will revealed in his Word Yet we thankfully acknowledge that we ow very much to the Laws and Grants of good Princes Magistrates Councils and Judges for our actual recovery of our dues without which it may too easily appear by you and your party how little comfort and support mens consciences would afford Ministers notwithstanding your pretended sufficient maintenance for them whose Judges you would appoint your selves Was not Ticonius your Tutor August Ep. Vincent Cic. Acad. q l. 4. or one of that Sect who said Quod volumus sanctum est or some Protagoras affirming Id cuique verum esse quod cuique videatur You say He that saith they are onely due by Humane Right Pag. 22. c. We know not any of ours who say so We say they are due by the Law of God and Man and recoverable by Humane Laws to God subordinate As Stante Repub. Israeliticâ peculiar Rights and Interests by the Moral Law due and claimable were justly recovered by the Judicial which God appointed as a subsidium thereto and Band of Obedience the execution whereof was by men appointed to judge so now For Magistrates are still to execute justice according to those Laws which by Statute or Statutes are made Judicial to us And if our Magistrates may justly judge for me I may as justly claim and recover my right by the same Law and Equity Adde hereto That Councils may and ought to make Laws to binde the people to obey Gods Moral Law and by just punishments appoint restraints of transgressors thereof that it may be well with them and their children For Salus populi suprema Lex This may appear if we consider either first or second Table As in case of prophanation and common swearing or prophanation of the Sabbath or against Murder Adultery Theft we have wholsome and necessary Laws Now if for the obedience to God Humane Laws be good and necessary in respect of one Moral duty why not in others As if for the maintenance of Gods worship in the quotâ parte of time by God reserved and thereto still necessary Why is it not as just and necessary in the quotâ parte of our substance by the same Law of God reserved to and necessary for the same To the matters in your following Cavils concerning Civil Rights Ministers Proprieties and Courts wherein they have been or ought to be recovered you vainly trouble your Reader our claim being from Divine Law whereto all Laws and Courts ought to be subordinate Pag. 22. You say further That the Act for Tythes gives nothing but
commands what was before Herein you say true For God gave them from the beginning and man confirmed them in sundry times following Next you demand how Laws of Kings and Parliaments c. binde the Conscience Your self have formerly answered but the Apostle more definitively saith Rom. 13.1 5. Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers Ye must be subject needs be subject not onely for wrath but also for conscience sake 1 Pet. 2.13 And St. Peter Submit your selves to every Ordinance of Man for the Lords sake And will this double band hold Samson if it doth sin not against Conscience Satan-like endeavoring to seduce others and draw them in society of sin Pag. 23. Tythes you say be not due by the Law of God This is a shameless begging of the question which will never be approved by us or proved by you But you say Who hath set them up the Law of man at best Here is another begging of the question at another door as also in the following words where you say in the place where God disanulled his own command We offer here again to joyn issue with you and challenge you to shew us any one Text of Gods Word whereby it appears that God ever disanulled or repealed his Law of Tything For the rest if you could cite and urge as many Decrees of Princes or Acts of Parliaments against us as you have cited for Tythes yet no Decrees of men can Impeach our Right therein seeing God by the Magna Charta of his holy Word hath setled it for an Inheritance upon the Ministry You demand Who put this power into the hand of man Pag. 23. to raise a compulsory maintenance for Ministers The Apostle will tell you Rom. 13.4 The Magistrate is the Minister of God a revenger to execute wrath on him that doth evil Is not execution of wrath a compulsory means think you Or is not Sacriledg evil in your Theology That you further say that the Ministers of Christ never lookt for or durst own such a way of provision We say First That the maintenance of Ministers ought to be willingly aforded them not grudgingly or sparingly as also their ministration this is as to the first intention of the Law but if men will be obstinate Compulsion is a second intention hereof Secondly Suppose that Ministers did not own such a way of provision for recovery of Tythes before such Acts of Parliament were made for them What hindereth but that they may justly use such Laws now Enacted and in Force You proceed What Nation in Europe will not say they have a Christian Magistracy Do you not forget how great a part of Europe is under the Turk Your many following impertinences should have had no answer but that you say heavy punishments are inflicted upon such as cannot for conscience sake conform unto them To which I say it was never well since mens Consciences were tied to their Purse-strings and that opinions not so much as probable must go for Conscience Shew us Gods Word for your Conscience and we will submit to the same bond but we think it an abominable Idolatry to set up opinions of beguiled Men instead of Gods sacred Oracles Concerning This day of clear and Sunshine light We say Isai 8.20 to the Law and to the Testimony if they speak not according to this word it is because there is no light in them To this Law we appeal and willingly submit Doth this savor in you tender sensory of the old Popish Spirit Who sees not your endeavour to re-establish Popery though you so much seem to speak against it And now let me bonâ cum veniâ tel you that either your hypocrisie or ignorance is somthing gross And is this as you say a shame to our reformation Or is the practise of you deformers a shame to Christian Religion It is probable that you carry on the Jesuits design of reducing England to darkness of Popery again by decrying Ministers right to a setled maintenance that by taking them away you may remove the Candlestick out of his place the light of the Gospel from us and then you may possibly bring many to Popery and Atheism I must needs say that this personated Zelote speaks much against Popery but works what he can for it on whom I look as on Thames-water-men with their faces one way but labouring might and main to carry their Passengers and Vessel another You add Were the Law just commanding Tythes c. What will he not question Pag. 24. who doubteth of the equity of the Law I hope you mean humane Law which yet is founded on Gods Law and have you not learned of Socrates to doubt of all things Concerning treble damages or other punishments which the Law hath appointed obstinate transgressors I suppose you know that the plaintifs charges of the Suit commonly exceed the dammage justly awarded him towards his reparation therein so that even under the tender hands of just Judges the remedy is more burdensome than the disease these punishments therefore are but just What injustice is it think you to force a Thief or Possessor malae fidei to restore the goods of another man which he hath injuriously possessed himself of and still deteineth What injustice can be in a legal reinvesting the true owner And in case that the iniurious refuse to submit to the Law to compel him by some severe punishment by Law provided in such case And if this be justice in one case Why shall it not be so in another kind of wrong or robberry Why not in case of Sacriledg the worst of robberies if in inferior thieveries O but you say our consciences tell us that detention of Tythes from Mininisters is no sin What if a Thieves Conscience as you account Conscience should tell him that had robbed you that stealing is no sin Would you not pursue him and prosecute law against him I doubt in your next scruple your weak and tender Consciences will tell you that 't is a sin to pay your Land-lords any Rent or at least their sin to Distrain or Sue for any though you can but will not for your Conscience sake forsooth pay him any And will not the next question in your Schools be whether it be lawful In foro Conscientiae to pay any Debt To set out Tythes c. You say this is against his Conscience once again we require you to shew us any one Text of Scripture prohibiting seting out of Tythes that we may know that it is Conscience and not Opinion grounded on humane fancy malice greedy desire of enriching your selves by pillaging the Ministers which moveth you to think so You say This age so much pretends to reformation and every one cries wo wo and he complain's that help 's to make it so Are you not a chief pretender to Reformation Why then trouble you the sacred peace of the Church And truly I fear that it will come to pass
which you next say that Papists your honoured Patrones shall rise in judgment against you and condemn you they own some Order Unity Government and Law they have some shew of Devotion and religious Charity but in our new Sectaries I see very little of these if any at all Your following objections in this Page are but quarrelsom captious as to the present not deserving answer You say By conscientious men Pag. 25. far more heavy than the loyns of the Law Conscientious men and Opinatours are with you convertible terms as concerning abuses in offices we are ignorant But what if there were such things What were this to our Cause You say nothing against those wealthy Kerns who by detaining Tythes begger poor Ministers and their Families which we know to be true In this 't is marvel but you think they do God service John 16.2 You say The Pope himself hath no such penalties No what think you of his holy House forsooth his Inquisition Preaching with fire and faggot You say You write what you can prove by manifold instances It may be so in some things impertinent and possibly you are acquainted with the Popes Ecclesiastical Courts and what ever you seem under your present disguise are a right trusty Advocate for them You say Priests are not able to pay tenths unto the Protector c. What Priests you talk of we enquire We own not that title in any but Christ a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec that faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God Heb. 2.17 And as we conceive ancient Councils Fathers and the Rubrick of our Church Liturgy attribute that name to Ministers of the Gospel Cyprian ep Caecilio l. 2. ep 3. by way of analogy and allusion to that which was under the now-antiquated Ceremonies of the Law So Irenaeus l. 4. c. 20. saith Sacerdotes autem sunt omnes Domini Apostoli semper Altari â—eo serviunt That is in respect of their succeeding the Levitical Priesthood and allusion to their service So Cap. 3.32 Sacrificium Deo cor contribulatum and Cap. 33. Incensa Johannis in Apocalypsi orationes ait esse sanctorum For as Cyprian saith Adv. Jud. l. 17. the old Priesthood was to cease ut novus sacerdos veniret qui in aeternum futurus esset that is onely Christ See Heb. 7.23 an elegant figure whereof immediately preceded Christs coming when Zachary the Levitical Priest was to come out and bless the people he was dumb For then God would bless his people by his Son Christ the Eternal Priest after the order of Melchisedec who not onely auspicated his preaching with sundry blessings but ascending into Heaven lifting up his hands Matth. 5.2 c. Luk. 24.50 51. blessed his Disciples When he was to come into the World the Priest the son of Aaron could not speak that by that sign God might teach his people to expect another Priesthood and Priest in whom not onely Jews but all the Nations of the World should be blessed Gal. 3.8 And this was also intimated in that the Levitical Priests were after the morning Sacrifice onely to lift up their hands and bless the people but not after the Mincha or evening Sacrifice Maimon tract de Orat. c. 14. Heb. 1.1 2. 13.10 15. for in the evening of time God spake unto his people by his own Son Christ To our purpose again the Lords Table may be called an Altar and praises of God a Sacrifice as it is written By him therefore let us offer the Sacrifice of praise to God continually So will we render the calves of our lips Hos 4. â— So are all the Servants of Christ Priests not by propriety of speaking Rev. 1.6 5.10 20.6 1 Pet. 2.5 but as they are also called Kings by analogy and representation Nor do I remember where Ministers are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Priests in the Gospel Here it is necessary to consider 1. How Ministers may be called Priests 2. How not or wherein there appears a real difference between them and Levitical Priests properly so called 1. In that the Apostle saith The Priesthood being changed Heb. 7.12 he implyeth that the Office of Ministration in the publick worship of God is not abolished or taken quite away so that there is nothing substituted in the place thereof but that the Office as to the morality thereof so continues as that Analogically Ministers of the Gospel may in some sense be called Priests The Prophet Joel makes them convertible terms Joel â— 17 saying Let the Priests the Ministers of the Lord weep And the Prophet Isaiah speaking of the calling of the Gentiles Isai 66.21 c. saith I will also take of them for Priests and for Levites saith the Lord. 2. The Levitical Priest served at the Altar that is Did there that service which by Gods Law he was there to perform And so the Minister is to do that service in the Church which God hath under the Gospel appointed and setled on him in his Calling thereto and separation from the people in preaching the Gospel Praying Administration of the Holy Sacraments and those other Ministerial Functions which are peculiar to his Calling 3. That Priests had their certain and determinate allowance and maintenance assigned them out of the encreases of the Earth by Gods donation for his service Hebr. 7.5 never being left to the curtesie or charity of men no not the faith Moses to dispose of and so have the Ministers of the Gospel In both which it was and is sacriledge to alienate take away detain or change the whole or any part thereof otherwise reserved by God to his own service and assigned to the Ministers thereof or to reduce the same to common uses 4. The Ministers of the Gospel succeeding the Legal Priests in the publick service of God as persons in their Office sacred to which they are set apart or separated Rom. 1.1 Gal. 1.15 may not desert or be distracted from their Calling nor impropriated to any other Thus and in such like respects they may analogically be stiled Priests as hath been said thanksgiving may be called a Sacrifice Psal 116.17 Spiritual not bodily or proper Psal 141.2 as Prayers are Spiritual incense Let my prayer be directed as incense in thy sight and the lifting up my hands as the evening sacrifice and as I said the Lords Table may be called an Altar not properly but by way of allusion to that to which it succeeded So may Gospel Ministers be stiled Priests 2. Herein observe That the Legal Priests and the Ministers of the Gospel differ 1. The Legal Priests were to be onely of that tribe of Levi and family of Aaron Exod. 40.13 14. But the Ministers of the Gospel if lawfully called are limitted to no one stock or family but may be of any So that the Legal Priests were in some sort born to the Priesthood but Ministers
genuinum dentem laesus infigere But I say onely consider with whom the Apostle araigneth revilers 1 Cor. 6.10 and what is the root of railing Perverse disputings of men of corrupt mindes and destitute of the truth and mark well if in that glass you do not discern your own countenance That you wish for Old Priests and old Ecclesiastical Courts that is Popish I easily believe that herein you do not dissemble But if there be any such abuses as you pretend what is that to the cause of tything doth an abuse by man in your logick conclude a just cause to take away the holy use of that which hath been abused if that were so how little good would be left us of all the Creatures of God and what cruelty is it Pag. 26. think you severely and according to Law to punish obstinate offenders who can but will not let go that which they have robbed just owners of Next you stomack it that some say Minsters have as good right to the tenth part as the owner hath to the other nine which is most true Consider for the better understanding hereof 1. The common or civil right of men which the Laws of Nations give and confirm to every possessor bonae fidei by purchase discent c. this right to the creatures a Turk or Pagan may have in that determinate portion which he possesseth 2. The divine right which man had in his Creation but lost in his fall and utterly forfeited in the first Adams attaindor this was restored again to believers in the second Adam Christ of which he saith 1 Cor. 3.22 23. All are yours and ye are Christs This belongs only to the Elect. In both these kinds we are to observe 1. a Right common to any so all or any may have a civil right to any kind of Creature 2. A Right peculiar to some as being separated from the common Condition by some special Act of Gods Providence of which sort are Tythes given by him to those who serve about holy things in his publick Worship which being laid down it may appear that Ministers of the Gospel have as good right to the Tenth or Tythe as the owner hath to the other nine parts if at least you will grant that God giveth as good right by his divine donation as any sale or assignment of man can make But you say Yet am I not bound to pay them c. True if neither Laws of God Pag. 26. Mark 5.3 nor man can bind you but that like the Masterless Gadaren possessed of the Devil you break Chains and Fetters and no man can bind you but if divine or humane Law can hold you are bound to pay and that by such a Bond as no Laws Decrees Statutes or Dispensations of Man can discharge you from but to speak to them whose Consciences tell them that the Law of God is and ought to be their rule How posterity stands bound in publick Grants Donations Vows or Covenants consider in the example of Israel and the Gibeonites before mentioned how in private legacies and bequeathments the Apostle will inform you Gal. 3.15 Though it be but a mans Testament yet if it be confirmed no man disanulleth it That is no man ought to make it void by any violation thereof but this belongeth to another question our claim being grounded not on the assignment or grant of man but on the revealed Will of God who commanded To give Tythes of all the encrease of their Land c. Numb 18.21 26 30. And to make their Teachers partakers of all their good things Gal. 6.6 Doth this bind men think you to pay the setled maintenance of Ministers Tythes Predial Personal and Mixt Or are you resolved to suspend your obedience to God herein until you be delivered into the everholding Chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgment Be well advised in time for there will be no change in eternity And doth your next Supposition conclude it arbitrary 2 Thes 3. to work or live inordinately Or were there not the like propositions between Tythes and yearly values of the Lands on which they grew under the Law to any that can be pretended to What sober man amongst you ever grumbled at the nimietie of wealth Who quarrelleth at the largeness of a Lords Estate who is a Peer of the Land or a Gentlemans or Yeomans as too much for him and his Family except some lawless impious Leveller Though perhaps one of these Estates be fourty times more than the Ministers incom and possibly the Laicks revenue is spent in Luxury Debauchery or Idleness at least while the poor Minister is envied and grudged his portion of Gods blessing the Earths encrease which he gives you with him that I may not say for him the Minister I say spending many carefull hours Night and Day for your Souls Edification Comfort and Salvation Sudat alget like Jacob over Labans Flock at Padan-Aram in the day consumed with drought and by the frost in the night and his sleep departeth from his eyes Gen. 31.40 You say A tenth part of the encrease is generally more worth than the Land on which it grows What have you dwelt at Gerar where Isaac reaped an hundred-fold in a Year Or is it because you have little skill in the Georgicks I am confident that this one untruth would yield you a Million by the year if you could make it true but were it as you say did ever much encrease of fruits make an exception in Gods grant of them as that the Tythes should be holy to him and his service and paid to the Priests of the Sanctuary or Ministers of the Gospel provided that they did not exceed such or such a value Methinks in reason the more bountifully God giveth encrease of the Earth the more willing men should be to render him that part thereof which he hath reserved as it were a Lords-rent unto himself and his own service and here excuse me that I tell you your objections seem not much unlike the declamation of some ill-contrived Orator so undistinctly hudled out that neither doth the Speaker well consider nor the hearer easily understand what he saith more then that quod vult valdè vult Your following Cavils and Cases Pasturing and Stocking Land Mal. 1.14 may shew that you have craft enough to beguile the Minister of due maintenance but cursed be the deceiver and it were but lost labour to teach others this skill seeing that too many without your Magistery have enough of the knave already Pag. 28. Next you talk Of new payment of Tythes c. To which we answer That payment of Tythes is evidently as old as Abraham and for ought you know as Adam To the rest of your Objections present we say Abusus non tollit usum that which hath been abused by some may yet be returned to the true service of God again So the censers of the rebellious Israelites made covers
for the Altar of God and truly the annexed reason is remarkable For they were offered before the Lord therefore they are hallowed Numb 16.38 And is not the same reason good for reducing Tythes abused to superstitious uses in former times unto the present true worship of God seeing they were hallowed not by the dedication of a rebellious Corah but by God himself and that to his own holy service And what els means our Saviour by the Parable of the strong mans Fort Luk. 11.22 and reprizal of all his impropriated Vessels but Christs overcoming Satan and recovering the bodies and souls of his Elect from his Power and Captivity Body and Soul must perish eternally if that alteration which is wrought in the sinner by the Spirit of Sanctification make him not acceptable and beloved of God as a son who was before his reconciliation by Christ an enemy How else saith the Apostle speaking of many sorts of pollution by sin Such were some of you Rom. 5. â— Cor. 6.10 but ye are washed but ye are sanctified but ye are justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God Upon the accompt of reducing that to a good use acceptable to God which hath been abused unto evil we retain our Churches and Oratories and worship God in Spirit and in Truth therein though they have been in times of Popery houses of Idols and Idolatry To your many following impertinencies if I should follow you in your Wilde-Goose-Chase I should tire the patient Reader therefore I onely adde That there is much difference between tythes of Mines Quarries of Iron Brass Tin Lead Coles and that which the Earths superficies brings forth as Corn Grass Fruits Wood c. though by your leave all these are increases of the Earth and therefore tythable Sir Edward Coke by you cited limits his sentence with a Till they be severed from the Land So that though no tythe be paid of the Land yet are they to be paid from the Land Your frequent talking of Popery is but to make your incautious Reader believe that you are no Papist and that you may insinuate into the peoples mindes an odium against Ministers whereas indeed in such seeming-opposition you do your uttermost endeavor to bring in Popery You further say When I bought my Land I bought not the tythes c. This you say some object to which you frame your answer But we require our liberty to answer for our selves Neither could you nor any man buy out Gods part for that no man had power to sell you So that in your conveyance there needed no specification of Covenant for or exemption from a tenth part of the increase of the Land that being presupposed payable by Gods reservation thereof unto his own service What ever man buyeth or selleth in point of commutative justice Gods part cometh not within the compass thereof neither can it be sold or alienated neither can any sale or purchase of man lessen or impeach his right or any part thereof which he never granted to any but those whom he appointeth to serve about holy things Next you bravely say I answer Pag. 29. that I have already proved all Land is tythe-free c. Indeed I think he meant it Magnis tamen excidit ausis Tell me now in sadness who can free the earth from the charge of tythes but that supream power of God who gave them for an inheritance unto those whom he designed to his publick service Here we require your explication of this term Tythe-free mean you this in respect of any Humane Law Ordinance Provision or Prescription of Men thereto pretended If so it is to no purpose seeing as hath been said None but God hath power of giving or alienating tythes Now once again we challenge you to shew us where God in holy Scripture ever repealed his Law of tything Further we say that all the habitable parts of the Christian world which yield increase are tythable and none exempted there-from by Gods Law in which if you beat our ears with a thousand beggings of the question you shall never obtain it of us That you say Tythes are a burden which the Pope laid on us Is a fallacious assertion the Heathen could here teach you that quod in divinis rebus sumes Plaut Mil. glor sapienti lucro est But God laid this duty on us which you call a burden and this grant of his no Ordinance or Law of Man though enjoyning the same duty can more drown than a Lease can a Fee-simple Mans Laws are alterable but the morality of Gods Law is not Next you talk of Theeves and Robbers Whom you mean I onely guess at and say Quis tulerit Gracchos de seditione querentes Clodius accusat maechos What great Theeves make hue and cry after true men you Church-Robbers stealers of tythes of whom you are at best an a better are the Theeves and Robbers Mal. 3. in Gods judgment if there be any such on these borders You say next That you may by as good reason be eased of your tythes as of the Popes yoke Which is in effect to say that you may as justly cast off Gods Law as the Popes is this Popery ho The reason offered as to the question if formed would appear to be a fallacia non causae pro causa Your Land you say was purchased when the Popes authority lay heavy on this Land That being cast off you would infer that we may with as good reason cast off tythes which he commanded to be paid Yea but consider a superior command and cause I mean a Divine inforcing that duty of paying tythes although the Pope had not at all commanded such payment and your fallacy is dissolved You say First to preach that tythes are due Pag. 29. and then to limit them to Parishes c. And why not Gods Word warranting the one and mans just accommodation requiring the other Once again I say as concerning Parishes there is a parochial or particular dueness of tythes or that of Parishes to the Minister there officiating in Gods publick service And there is a general dueness of tythes that is to say of tythes to be paid to the body of the Ministry which is by Gods providence distributed into several parochial Cures where they are by the increases of the Earth thence arising to be maintained that they may there preach the Gospel and administer the holy Sacraments c. unto the people there inhabiting You say again That tythes were at first as charity at most as a freewil-offering of the owner This is an absurd falshood and a shameless begging of the question and you seem to dispute non ad idem but circularly Speak plainly Do you mean that Mans charity giving and not Gods Law commanding brought tythes to be the Ministers maintenance If so it is apparantly false by Gods several commands to pay them to the Levitical Priesthood wherein I
upon Country-men open your eyes and let not these Wolves in Sheeps-clothing any longer beguile you the Fox under a stupid Animal's skin enough discovers his appetite to catch Geese and to bring you and your Children into the miserable darkness of Popery and the Tyranny thereof Consider before it be too late how easily they will do it if by taking away the Ministers of Christ from you depriving them of lively-hood they bring into their places Popish Priests and Jesuits if they get footing here again their little finger will prove heavier than your Ministers loyns were to you Tythes would not long suffice them John 9.21 Next yout talk of Impropriators Claim by purchase Concerning one of them we only say as the Parents of the once blind man answered the Jews he is of age ask him he shall speak for himself Here we thank you for your ingenuous Confession those you say that sold him Impropriations had no good Title neither can theirs be made good which is derived from them Page 31. By which you say it doth plainly appear that no man at this day can claim Tythe of another either by divine or humane Right c. If you speak of Impropriate Tythes we have nothing here to do with them If of Appropriate we say if begging the question would serve your turn we would at once confess actum est de decimis but you are here come to the same point of your Circle in evident begging the question saying no man at this day can claim Tythes of another either by Divine or Humane Right prae clara verba sed verba What Caesar's Veni Vidi Vici A singular faculty you seem to yourself to have no sooner do you think a thing but it must plainly appear to be so but that we sufficiently know your quality of begging the question we might think that some miles gloriosus were entred into the Scene telling how many thousand flying Enemies he fetcht down with his limed Barbolts and slew in one day To the next we say that we are not called to meddle with State-Interests and concerning the Pope and his we have here nothing to do only we mark how the declining of the Pope's Supreamacy sticks in your Stomack Now say you to plead for such wages of unrighteousness You dare call Gods Donation wages of Vnrighteousness Page 3◠speaking as they who care not what though blaspemy but how much they speak To that which you say concerning Priests receiuing Augmentations I say I know no Priest so much favoured here I know some reverend Ministers who are Which you say they may as well take away meaning Gleb-land as their predecessors did the revenues of Abbeys and Monasteries Yet your selves confess Page 33. that they were the Hives of lazy Drones We wish that in their just dissolution they had been better imployed but affirm that none can justifie the taking away things consecrated to Gods service but you constantly grumble at the decay of Popery we wish that your vizard were pulled off that speaking bare-faced your incautious reader might discerne on which side you are Whose Tythes you say again are often as much worth as the Land I once heard one Page 34. who being censured for reporting a gross untruth replied that he had told it so often that his self began to think that it was true But I hope you here speak Philosopher-like ex aliorum sententia not your own but others opinion Forthwith throw away Tythes c. We thank you as much as though we did and shall think of your Motion You say So long as they continue there can never be any possibility of raising maintenance in such places If you mean so long as impropriations continue c. per nos alia pax esto if otherwise your argument hence derived as to the taking away Tythes is very feeble being a fallacia non causae pro causâ For what hinderance can paying and receiving of sythes be to those places where none are payable as praedial as in Towns and Cities wherein are no fields But consider you that fear God what Azariah acknowledged 2 Chron. 31.10 Since the people began to bring the Offerings with their Tythes as appears there v. 5 6. We have had enough for the Lord hath blessed his people which was according to that which God speaks Mal. 3.10 Bring ye all the Tythes into the Store-house and prove me now herewith saith the Lord of hosts if I will not open you the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it Next you ask concerning Towns and Cities or Lands Impropriate where there is no competency of maintenance by Tythes Must they never have an able Minister Have they no share in our Gospel because they have no maintenance I answer the cause why such as you specifie have no greater share of our Ministers pains is not so much because they have no maintenance as because they will have none while Gadaren-like they value their swine or temporal interests more than the Gospel And now think you that they do not put the Word of God from them and judg themselves unworthy of everlasting life not only who contradict the Word when it is preached but they also who take a course that it may never be preached unto them I speak of them who dwelling in populous Towns and Cities will not agree together to levy some such means for the support of an able Minister as may keep him alive and enable him to the service of God But to pass by this fault of Towns-men and Citizens c. we can justifie by thousands of witnesses that the Gospel hath been powerfully and diligently preached in sundry Towns by able Ministers where no maintenance was either raised by any Impropriator or otherwise could be by any appropriated Tythes there growing I will add without any reward of their pains either retributed by the auditors or expected by those preachers You demand again Have you not a more righteous Rule What than that which Gods Word prescribed This and your following farrago libelli may be satisfied with this answer that it is a dangerous thing to account a mans self more wise than God and a foolish presumption to endeavour any amendment of his Ordinances needs must he find his human wisdom foolishness who opposeth it to divine Your objection from the inequality of paying is vain for who can be ignorant that there were inequalities of Estates under the Law or that every man was bound to pay according to that which he had not according to that which he had not Your following cavils are more suitable to the gallfull pen of some apostate Julian or jeering Lucian than the writing of any professed Christian To that which you say of Throwing away Tythes as an old relique of Popery We answer that when you have proved them to be such you may have some ground for such
Resurrection The moral precepts as simply such are unalterable and indispensable as to all times places and persons Neither did God ever dispense with the morality of his own Laws Mat. 5. Neither did Christ in any one jot or tittle dissolve them whatsoever seems contrary is but expository in the result as Christ doing most of his great works on the Sabbath was no dispensation with the fourth precept but only an interpretation thereof shewing that works of necessity and mercy Luk. 13.15 14.5 are works of the Sabbath So God commanding Israel to borrow of the Egyptians and take away the things so borrowed Exod. 11.2 Gen. 18. by that Act of his justice doing Israel right he being the great Judg of all the World in giving them their just wages for their unjust servitude which wages the Egyptians detained from them doth but interpret the eigth Commandment Thou shal not steal That is not by any means take away another mans goods invito domino i. e. bonae fidei possessore Now first we must consider That due wages belonging to Israel in point of morality which saith the labourer is worthy of his hire Luk. 10.7 was in the Egyptians hands who therefore were thereof but malae fidei possessores from whom as from a thief or usurper it was legally to be recovered that might not be done without warrant from a competent Judg therefore God's warrant empowred them so to do 2 Chron. 19.6 as the sentence of those who now judg for God may warrant a labourer or servant to recover his due hire or wages unjustly detained from him Secondly it is considerable That we may not take from him who though of some other Nation is yet united in the same bonds of community and amity with the republick Exod. 13.18 Numb 14.3 11. c. Deut. 17.16 Gen. 44.14 of which we are a part which the Egyptians from that time were no longer to be except in case of legal proceeding or lawfull hostility wherein as thou maist take away the life of an enemy so maist thou his goods but in an unjust War the murder or latrociny is double injury 8. In man's fall some moral Laws were to his understanding more unextinct than others So were the precepts of the first Table which concerned our duty to and worship of God more obliterated than the precepts of the second Table which concern the maintenance of humane society as Honour thy father and thy mother Thou shalt not kill Commit adultery steal c. The very Heathens knew that such things were unjust impious and destructive to humane society therefore they prohibited them in their 12 tables or abridgment of their Laws and accordingly severely punished the offenders Towards the divine precepts of the first table which enjoyned the due worship of one true God their unerstandings were more darkened though even thereof they had some very slender remains by natural principles not utterly extinct as may appear in their worshipping of those whom they took to be Gods 9. The Scripture affirms not only that which is therein expressed totidem verbis but that also which by necessary consequence followeth the true sense thereof as appears in that which Christ said to the Saduces Mat. 22.29 Ye erre not knowing the Scriptures Wherein Exod. 3.6 In that which God said unto Moses I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. Why here 's not a word or syllable concerning the resurrection of the dead concerning which Christ there spake true if we consider express words but from necessary consequence it followeth If God be the God of the living and not of the dead then Abraham Isaac and Jacob are not so dead but that they still live with God in their Spirits and therefore their bodies shall rise again to be with God the God of the living which they not understanding knew not the Scriptures and Power of God to raise the dead in the Scriptures declared This may also appear in that which the Catholick Church believeth concerning the sacred Trinity which is no where named in holy Scripture totidem Syllabis 1 John 5. but by certain consequence from thence proved The same also we must understand concerning Baptising Infants and the observation of the Christian Sabbath and so of paying Tythes to Gospel Ministers c 10. God's precepts be they never so ancient having no repeal appearing in holy Scripture are ever binding unto the end of the World and no man can with any security of conscience attempt to free himself from the bond of any duty imposed by Gods moral law at all or from his positive precepts without clear evidence of the lawgivers will for the cessation thereof 11. No moral Law of God is temporary as concerning the future but as it bindeth every man without exception respectively so doth it ever bind Such is the Law of tything which is enjoyned in the first fourth fifth and eighth precepts of the moral Law as will appear in its place 12. No man councels or authority of men may dispense with any one precept of Gods Law Christ disavoweth any dissolution of it by himself in the least jot as to the morality thereof Therefore it is a sin and such as shall exclude a man from the Kingdom of Heaven to attempt it though with consent of many or most suffrages of men under any pretence whatsoever So when God saith Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Image What will it avail the Idolater to plead before his Tribunal that a great part of the people say that Idols are Laymens books Shall their distinction of dulia and latria excuse them What that some think the Sabbath peculiar to the Jews and therefore that it ought to vanish away with the ceremonial Law What that some think that Christian liberty freeth them from Obedience to their civill Magistrates and that it was proper to the Jewish policy only that some impious Nicolaitans thought fornication no sin or that Christian Liberty freeth them from Gods Law forbidding all uncleanness and filthy lust If all Nations and people should or possibly could dispense with these or any one precept of Gods Moral Law such consent could not amount to more or less than a general apostasie from God and his sacred Law What if people and Nations should cry down tythes as when the Hunnes Goths and Vandals invading the Western parts of the Christian World Tythes and Churches were pulled down Universities Colledges and Schools of good learning were overthrown as our adversaries would fain have it now Could all this do any more than make their outrages more infamous hateful to God and Man and more odious to all posterities to whom their detestable and unhappy memory should come and for present themselves instrumental to pull down Gods curses and plagues upon themselves and their Countrey unappy in the birth and breeding up of such prodigious miscreants 13. No