our Saviour the great friend and lover of souls A command so reasonable so easie so full of blessings and benefits to the faithfull observers of it One would think it were no difficult matter to convince men of their duty in this particular and of the necessity of observing so plain an Institution of our Lord that it were no hard thing to persuade men to their interest and to be willing to partake of those great and manifold blessings which all Christians believe to be promised and made good to the frequent and worthy Receivers of this Sacrament Where then lyes the difficulty what should be the cause of all this backwardness which we see in men to so plain so necessary and so beneficial a duty The truth is men have been greatly discouraged from this Sacrament by the unwary pressing and inculcating of two great truths the danger of the unworthy receiving of this holy Sacrament and the necessity of a due preparation for it Which brings me to the III. Third Particular I proposed which was to endeavour to satisfie the Objections and Scruples which have been raised in the minds of men and particularly of many devout and sincere Christians to their great discouragement from the receiving of this Sacrament at least so frequently as they ought And these Objections I told you are chiefly grounded upon what the Apostle says at the 27th verse Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily is guilty of the body and bloud of the Lord. And again ver 29. He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation to himself Upon the mistake and misapplication of these Texts have been grounded two Objections of great force to discourage men from this Sacrament which I shall endeavour with all the tenderness and clearness I can to remove First That the danger of unworthy receiving being so very great it seems the safest way not to receive at all Secondly That so much preparation and worthiness being required in order to our worthy Receiving the more timorous sort of devout Christians can never think themselves duly enough qualified for so sacred an Action 1. That the danger of unworthy receiving being so Obj. 1 very great it seems the safest way wholly to refrain from this Sacrament and not to receive it at all But this Objection is evidently of no force if there be as most certainly there is as great or a greater danger on the other hand viz. in the neglect of this Duty And so though the danger of unworthy receiving be avoided by not receiving yet the danger of neglecting and contemning a plain Institution of Christ is not thereby avoided Surely they in the Parable that refused to come to the marriage-feast of the King's Son and made light of that gracious invitation were at least as faulty as he who came without a wedding garment And we find in the conclusion of the Parable that as he was severely punished for his disrespect so they were destroyed for their disobedience Nay of the two it is the greater sign of contempt wholly to neglect the Sacrament than to partake of it without some due qualification The greatest indisposition that can be for this holy Sacrament is one's being a bad man and he may be as bad and is more likely to continue so who wilfully neglects this Sacrament than he that comes to it with any degree of reverence and preparation though much less than he ought And surely it is very hard for men to come to so solemn an Ordinance without some kind of religious awe upon their spirits and without some good thoughts and resolutions at least for the present If a man that lives in any known wickedness of life do before he receive the Sacrament set himself seriously to be humbled for his sins and to repent of them and to beg God's grace and assistence against them and after the receiving of it does continue for some time in these good resolutions though after a while he may possibly relapse into the same sins again this is some kind of restraint to a wicked life and these good moods and fits of repentance and reformation are much better than a constant and uninterrupted course of sin Even this righteousness which is but as the morning cloud and the early dew which so soon passeth away is better than none And indeed scarce any man can think of coming to the Sacrament but he will by this consideration be excited to some good purposes and put upon some sort of endeavour to amend and reform his life and though he be very much under the bondage and power of evil habits if he do with any competent degree of sincerity and it is his own fault if he do not make use of this excellent means and instrument for the mortifying and subduing of his lusts and for the obtaining of God's grace and assistence it may please God by the use of these means so to abate the force and power of his lusts and to imprint such considerations upon his mind in the receiving of this holy Sacrament and preparing himself for it that he may at last break off his wicked course and become a good man But on the other hand as to those who neglect this Sacrament there is hardly any thing left to restrain them from the greatest enormities of life and to give a check to them in their evil course nothing but the penalty of humane Laws which men may avoid and yet be wicked enough Heretofore men used to be restrained from great and scandalous vices by shame and fear of disgrace and would abstain from many sins out of regard to their honour and reputation among men But men have hardened their faces in this degenerate Age and those gentle restraints of modesty which governed and kept men in order heretofore signifie nothing now adays Blushing is out of fashion and shame is ceased from among the children of men But the Sacrament did always use to lay some kind of restraint upon the worst of men and if it did not wholly reform them it would at least have some good effect upon them for a time If it did not make men good yet it would make them resolve to be so and leave some good thoughts and impressions upon their minds So that I doubt not but it hath been a thing of very bad consequence to discourage men so much from the Sacrament as the way hath been of late years And that many men who were under some kind of check before since they have been driven away from the Sacrament have quite let loose the reins and prostituted themselves to all manner of impiety and vice And among the many ill effects of our past confusions this is none of the least That in many Congregations of this Kingdom Christians were generally disused and deterred from the Sacrament upon a pretence that they were unfit for it and being so they must necessarily incur the
the Church in this Particular by shewing First That Baptismal-Initiation is very beneficial and profitable for Infants And Secondly That the Baptizing of them conduceth very much to the well-being and edification of the Church First then Baptismal-Initiation is very beneficial and profitable for Infants because they are capable of the Benefits and Priviledges of Baptism This I shewed in general before under the first Question and now I will shew it in a more particular manner of Induction by insisting upon the several Ends for which Baptism was ordained First then Baptism was ordained That the Baptized Person might be thereby solemnly consecrated unto God and dedicated to his Service and I hope I need not prove that Children are capable of this benefit since Jewish Infants were Consecrated to God by Circumcision and the Scripture tells us that * * * Judges 13. 15. Sampson was a Nazarite from the Womb and that Samuel from the time of his Weaning was dedicated unto the Lord. Secondly Baptism was ordained That the Baptized Person might be made a Member of Christ's Mystical Body which is the Holy Catholick Church This is a great and honourable Priviledge and no Man can deny but Infants are as capable of it under the New as they were under the Old Testament Nay so far are they from being under any Natural Incapacity as to Church-Membership that they are ordinarily born free of Kingdoms Cities and Companies and therefore why any Man should think it not so proper for the Church-Christian to be as indulgent to them as the Jewish Church was and Civil Societies usually are I profess I cannot tell Thirdly it was ordained That the Baptized Person might by that Solemnity pass from a State of Nature wherein he was a Child of Wrath into a State of Adoption or Grace wherein he becomes a Child of God For by our First Birth we are all Children of Wrath. But by our Second Birth in Baptism we are made Children of God And why it should be so improper for a Child to pass in this solemn manner from one Spiritual as well as from one Temporal State to another or be Solemnly Adopted by God as well as Man or Lastly Why a Child may not be Adopted under the Gospel as well as under the Law I am confident those who are willing to defer the Baptism of Infants would be puzzled to give any rational account In the Fourth place Baptism was instituted for a Sign to Seal unto Baptized Persons the pardon of their Sins and to confer upon them a Right of Inheritance unto Everlasting Life but Baptism hath this Effect upon Infants as well as upon adult Persons for it washes them clean from * * * De hoc etiā David dixisse credendus est illud qui in peccato concepit me mater mea pro hoc Ecclesia ab Apostolis traditionem suscepit etiam parvulis Baptismum dare Sciebant enim illi quibus mysteriorum secreta commissa sunt divinorum quia essent in omnibus genuinae sordes peccati quae per aquam spiritum ablui deberent Origen in Ep. ad Lous l. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Contra Celsum l. 4. Quanto magis prohiberi non debet Infans qui recens natus nihil peccavit nisi quod secundum Adam carnaliter natus contagium mortis antiquae primâ Nativitate contraxit Cyprian in Ep. ad Fidum Those that would see more Testimonies out of the Ancients about Original Sin before the time of the Pelagian Controversie may consult Irenaeus l. 4. cap. 5. l. 5. cap. 16. l. 3. cap. 20. l. 5. cap. 14. 17 21. and many more cited out of Just Mart. in Dial cum Tryph. Tatianus his Scholar Athanasius c. by Vossius in his Hist Pelag. l. 2. part 1. Th. 6. Vid. Can. Concil Carthag 112. Original as it doth Men and Women both from Actual and Original Sin I say it washes them clean from Original Sin and seals the Pardon of it and the assurance of God's favour unto them and being cleansed by the washing of Regeneration from the guilt of that natural vitiosity which they derived from Adam and which made them obnoxious to the displeasure of God they become reconciled unto him and acquire as certain a Right to Eternal Life upon their justification as any actual Believer in the Word I cannot deny but they may be saved without Baptism by the extraordinary and uncovenanted Mercies of God and so may actual Believers who die unbaptized if they did not contemn Baptism but then the hopes which we ought to have of Gods Mercy in extraordinary Cases ought not to make us less regardful of his sure ordinary and covenanted Mercies and the appointed means unto which they are annexed But in the Fifth place Baptism was ordained That being admitted into the Covenant and ingrafted into Christ's Body we might acquire a present Right unto all the Promises of the Gospel and particularly unto te promises of the Spirit which is so ready to assist Initiated Persons that it will descend in its influences upon them at the time of their Initiation in such a manner and measure as they are capable thereof This the Primitive Christians found by experience to be so true that they called Baptism by the names of * * * Heb. 6. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Just Mart. Apol. 2. 94. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gregor Nazianz. Orat. 40. †Vid. Cypriani Ep. 1. ad Donatum Illumination Grace and Unction and we need not doubt but they talked as they felt and for this reason they Baptized Infants because they knew that they acquired a Right unto the same Spirit by Baptism who would be sure to preside and watch over them and act upon their Souls according to the measure of their capacity and prevent them in their very first doings with his gracious helps Wherefore though it should be granted that the Holy Ghost cannot be actually conferred upon Infants in Baptism by reason of their natural incapacity as Anabaptists rashly assert yet the Baptizing of them is not frustraneous as to this great End of Baptism because they thereby acquire an actual Antecedent Right to the Assistances and Illuminations of the Holy Spirit which they shall receive as soon and as fast as their natural incapacity removes This distinction betwixt having the Spirit and having a Right unto the Spirit holds not only in Infant-Baptism but in the Baptism of Hypocrites and secret Sinners who by submitting unto the Ordinances of Baptism acquire an actual Antecedent Right unto the Spirit although they are in a moral incapacity of receiving the Graces of it till their Hypocrisie is removed Nevertheless their Baptism is not ineffectual as to this End but is a means of conferring the Holy Ghost upon them without re-baptization because though they cannot receive it at the moment of their Baptism by reason of their Hypocrisie as sincere Penitents do in whom there is no such Moral
us to observe onely a Feast-Gesture for the due Celebration of it 3. Kneeling is very Comely and Agreeable to the Nature of the Lord's Supper though no Table-Gesture Which I hope will be made evident to every Honest and Unbyassed Mind which Impartially seeks after Truth by these following considerations 1. Kneeling is allowed on all Hands to be a very fit and sutable Gesture for Prayer and Praise and very apt to express our Reverence Humility and Gratitude by and Consequently very fit to be used at the Holy Sacrament and agreeable to its Nature This will appear if we reflect upon what hath been delivered concerning the Nature and Ends of the Lord's Supper For at the Sacrament we express that by Actions as I hinted before which at other times we do by Words and the Lord's Supper is a Solemn Rite of Christian Worship which implyes Prayer and Praise It includes all the Parts of Prayer By partaking of the Signs of his Body broken and Blood shed for our Sins we do Commemorate Represent and Shew forth to God the Father the Sacrifice which his Dearly Beloved Son made upon the Cross we Feast upon the memorials of the great Sin-Offering And in so doing we make an open Confession and Acknowledgment of our Guilt and Unworthiness to God and we plead with him in the Vertue of his Sons Blood which was shed for us for the Pardon and Remission of all our Sins We further Humbly entreat him to be Propitious and Favourable to us and to bestow upon us all those benefits which our Lord purchased with his most Precious Blood We Intercede with him too at the Communion for the whole Church that all our Fellow-Christians and true Members of his Body may Receive Remission of their Sins and all other benefits of his Passion And as Eating and Drinking at his Table is a Visible and Powerful Prayer in the sight of God so it is a Visible Act of Praise and Thanksgiving whereby we let our Heavenly Father see that we retain a deep and lively sense of his Unexpressible Love in sending his onely begotten Son into the World to Dye for us that we might Live through him And that which enlivens our Faith and emboldens our hopes of finding Favour and Acceptance at his Hands at this time above others is this viz. Our Prayers and Praises are not onely put up in the Name of Christ but presented and as it were Writ in his Blood and offered to God over the great Propitiatory Sacrifice All this our Actions signify and speak when we Eat the Consecrated Bread and Drink the Cup of Blessing at the Lord's Table If therefore these things be True and I think no body who understands what he doth when he partakes of the Lord's Supper will gainsay it then Kneeling must be judged as fitting and convenient to be used at such a time when we signify our desires and affections by external Rites and Ceremonies of Gods appointment as when we do it by Words that is when we say our Prayers 2. Our Dissenting Brethren and all good Christians will Grant that our Blessed Saviour ought to be Worshipt and Adored by all worthy Communicants inwardly in their Hearts and Souls when they Receive the Tokens and Pledges of his tender and exceeding great Love in laying down his Life for the Sins of the whole World And if so then whatsoever is very apt and meet to express the inward esteem and veneration of our minds by can't be thought Unsutable and Repugnant to the Nature of the Lord's Supper Because that is a Religious Feast Instituted in Honour of our Lord and is a Solemn Act of Christian Worship performed to our Crucified Saviour Our meeting together at thâ—s Holy Feast in Obedience to his Commands to Commemorate his Death and tell of all his wondrous Works perpetuate the fame of our great Benefactor as much as in us lyes throughout all Ages is an External mark of the Honour and respect we bear towards him in our minds and is properly speaking that which we call Publick Worship Since to Bow our Knees then is allowed to be a proper mode of publick Worship and an External Sign of Reverence why should an adoring posture be thought Unmeet and Unsutable to the Sacrament which in its nature imports Worship and Adoration 3. No good Christian of what Party or Perswasion soever will deny but that to lift our Hands and Eyes to Heaven and to Employ our Tongues in Uttering the Praises of our Blessed Redeemer even in the Act of Receiving is very agreeable to the Nature of the Sacrament why then should Kneeling be thought Unsutable which is no more but onely Glorifying God and our Blessed Saviour with another part of our Body Why should the Gesture be scrupled at more than the Voice or the Bowing of my Knees be esteemed incongruous and unfitting any more than moving my Tongue or raising my Hands and Eyes to Heaven Especially if we consider that the high degree of Honour and Glory to which our Lord is advanced in the Heavens by God the Father as the reward of his Humble and Submissive Obedience here on Earth challenges from us all manner of Respect and Reverence both of Soul and Body He Humbled himself and became Obedient unto Death even the Death of the Cross Wherefore God hath highly exalted him and given him a Name which is above every Name that at the Name of Jesus Phil. 2. 8 9 10 11. every Knee should Bow c. and that every Tongue should Confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the Glory of God the Father 4. The Holy Sacrament was Instituted in Remembrance of our Blessed Saviours Death and Sufferings And therefore I request all our Dissenting Brethren to Consult one place of Scripture concerning our Saviours Bodily Gesture or Deportment in the Heat and Extremity of his Passion wherein he presented himself before his Father in his Agony and Bloody Sweat in the Garden Being in an Agony he offered up this Prayer to his Father If thou be willing remove this Cup from Luke 22. 42 44. me Nevertheless not my Will but thine be done But after what manner or in what Gesture of Body did his perplexed Soul utter these earnest Supplications Why Kneeling or fixing his Knees upon the Earth Now though 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ver. 41. we may remember and meditate on our Saviours Sufferings in the Garden when his Soul was so exceeding Sorrowful when he was reduced to such a Weak and low Estate as to stand in need of Comfort and Support from an Angel though I say this may be done Sitting Ver. 43. yet sure no Sober and Considering Mind will say that to Celebrate the Memory of these Sufferings with bended Knees as his were on the Earth is an Improper and Unsutable behaviour to be used at the Sacrament where our proper work is to Commemorate the Death and Sufferings of our Saviour and particularly these among
the rest 5. The Sacrament was Instituted to be a means of Receiving the benefits of his Death and Passion and a Pledge to assure us thereof If we do but Consider what invaluable Blessings we expect to receive by our worthy partaking of the Consecrated Bread and Wine at the Table of our Lord such as the forgiveness of all our Sins the plentiful Communications of his Grace and Spirit and a Right and Title to Eternal Life we can't think Kneeling an Unmeet and Unbecoming Gesture in the Act of Receiving the Outward Signs and Pledges of this Inward and Invisible Grace If a Graceful Hearty sense of Gods infinite mercy through the Merits and Sufferings of his Son and of the manifold rich benefits which our Lord hath purchased with his most Precious Blood if a mind deeply Humbled under the sense of our own Guilt and Unworthiness to Receive any mercy at all from the Hands of our Creator and Soveraign Lord whom we have by numberless and Heinous Crimes so highly provok't and incensed against us If such an inward temper and disposition of Soul becomes us at this Holy Feast which I think no Man will deny then surely the most Humble and reverential Gesture of our Body will become us too Why should not a Submissive Lowly deportment of Body sute with this Solemnity as well as a Humble Lowly Mind And this is that which our Church Declares See the Declaration at the end of the Communion-Service in the Book of Common Prayer to be the end and design of her Injunction in requiring all her Communicants to Kneel viz. for a Signification of an Humble and Grateful acknowledgment of the Benefits of Christ therein given to all worthy Receivers 6. They who urge Sitting as necessary and the only agreeable Gesture to the Nature of the Lord's Supper because it 's the Common Table-Gesture must make the Sacrament either the same with an Ordinary and Common Feast or onely like it in some respects and unlike it in others as every like is not the same To make it the same is directly to unhallow and prophane the Ordinance it is to Eat and Drink unworthily not discerning 1 Cor 11 29. the Lord's Body as St. Paul charges the Corinthians For it 's clear from that Discourse of the Apostle that their not distinguishing between the Lord's Supper and a Common Meal or Supper was their great fault which he sharply reproves them for as that which render'd them unworthy Communicants Which will appear to any that will take the pains to examine Vid. 20 21 22. and compare them with 33 34. the matter If the Lord's Supper be not the same with an Ordinary Feast how comes it to pass that the same Gesture must be necessarily used at both If they differ in their whole nature then that which is agreeable to the nature of the one must be Repugnant to the nature of the other If they agree in some respects only and differ in others but not in their whole nature then Kneeling may be as proper and sutable in some respects as Sitting is in others For though the Civil Custom of a Table-Gesture be allowed to strike some stroke in a Spiritual Ordinance where there is Eating and Drinking yet other respects in the Lord's Supper have a stroke too and that the greatest if we duly weigh and consider the ends of its Institution which I have already described And if upon such Examination it appear that Kneeling or an adoring Gesture holds fitting Correspondence with the principal respects and ends of the Lord's Supper then the Banquetting Gesture though Lawful and Sutable in some less respects must and ought in reason to give place at least it ought not to be Insisted on as the onely agreeable and necessary Gesture without which we cannot worthily Communicate Whatsoever Gesture answers the principal respects and ends of this Holy Feast best Sutes to its Nature and consequently ought in reason to be best esteemed of and sway more with us than any other if we will wholly guide our selves by the Nature of the thing And that Kneeling or an adoring posture doth best answer the Nature and Ends of the Sacrament I think is clear and undenyable if the account I have given of the Sacrament be good I am sure howsoever that there is no reason why Sitting should justle out Kneeling as Sinful and Unsutable to the Nature of this Holy Ordinance Let Mr. Cartwright a Learned Advocate Annot. in Luk. 22. 14. for Nonconformists be heard in this matter and determine it A Man must not saith he refuse to Receive the Sacrament Kneeling when he cannot have it otherwise 4. The Primitive Church and Ancient Fathers had no such notion of the necessity of a Table-Gesture as is maintained and urged by Dissenters at present which will appear from those Names and Titles they gave to this Holy Feast And First I observe from the Learned Mr. Mede that for the space of 200 years after Christ there is not the least mention made of the name Table in any of their Writings They call the place on which Can. Apost 2. St. Ignat. in 3 Epistles and Philad Trallen Eph. Justin Mart. Irenaeus the Consecrated Elements stood the Altar and the Eucharist An Oblation and a Sacrifice because at this Solemnity they did Commemorate and Represent that Sacrifice which Christ once offered on the Cross for the Sins of the World Now the Eucharist conceived under the Notion of a Sacrifice and the place on which it was offered of an Altar doth not necessarily require a Table-Gesture there is not that strict Connexion and Relation between an Altar or a Sacrifice and a Common Table-Gesture as is conceived to be between a Feast or Table and a Feast or Table-Gesture 2. The Primitive Christians and Ancient Fathers of the Church did not entertain any such conceits about the necessity of a Common Table-Gesture as our Dissenters do As that Kneeling or an adoring Gesture is against Dispute against Kneeling Arg. 1. p. 6. p. 26 27 28 31 37. the Dignity of Guests and Debarrs us the Priviledges and Prerogatives of the Lord's Table such as Social admittance and Social Entertainment that it is against the purpose of Christ whose intention was to Dignify us by Setting us at his Table and much more of this Nature and to this effect Now the Primitive Church little dreamt of this Dignity and Priviledge of Communicants of this purpose of Christ and of this kind of Fellowship and Familiarity with him as the Phrases they use and the August and Venerable Titles they give the Holy Sacrament even when they consider it as a Feast and Supper and speak of the Table on which it was Celebrated plainly demonstrate They call it as St. Paul doth the Lord's Supper the Kingly Royal and most Divine Supper which Import Deference Distance and Respect on our Parts the Dreadful Sacrifice the Venerable and Vnbloody Sacrifice the Wonderful and
in all things that may Lawfully be done I cannot therefore see how they can avoid being self-condemned if they should forsake our Communion for if they judge it Unlawful they sinned Wilfully when they entred into it if they think it Lawful they would then Sin in withdrawing from it since it is injoyned by that Power which they confess they are bound to obey in Lawful things If they should say that they once thought it Unlawful after that they judged it to be Lawful and now conceive it Unlawful again This strange unsteadiness in Opinion would look a great deal more like Humor than Judgment And it might occasion vehement Suspicions in some not otherwise very Censorious that this Uncertainty proceeds not from Conscience but Design and that all their Compliance was only to serve a present turn to decline an Ecclesiastical Censure to keep a beneficial Place or to be qualified for an Office in some great Corporation Thus men might be apt enough to suspect but I am willing to believe any thing rather than that they that have always made shew of so great a Tenderness should be guilty of so much Hypocrisie and Prophaness together as to dare even to approach to the Lord's Table under great dissatisfaction of mind it may be meerly to advance some Secular end But I hope their Behaviour for the future will sufficiently clear them from such an imputation I shall therefore apply my self only to those that do still forbear our Communion and offer something very briefly which I conceive may be useful for the satisfying their most known and ordinary Doubts that as we do all profess the same Faith we may all agree in the same way of Discipline and Worship and all become peaceable and orderly Members of the same Church And for the obtaining this most Excellent end First I shall desire them impartially to consider of some things that may incline them to be Peaceably minded and tend to the removing of the general Prejudices they have unhappily conceived against the Church of England Then I shall endeavor to give what satisfaction I can to the chief Objections against us which they are wont to urge in Defence of the present Separation And lastly I shall exhort them to a brotherly Vnion upon such Motives and Arguments as the Gospel suggests and make for the Credit and Safety of the Protestant Religion The things that I would commend to their serious Consideration which may serve to dispose them to Peace and to remove the Prejudices they have taken up are such as these In the first place they should be very careful that it be not any sinister end or corrupt Passion that did either engage them in the Separation at the beginning or provokes them now to continue in it I do not mention this because I know any one of our Dissenting Brethren to be guilty of it but because it must be confessed that mens minds are too often influenced by their carnal Interests and Affections These will be always mixing themselves in all their Consultations these do commonly blind and pervert their Judgments and lead them into ten thousand Errours These are the occasion that Fancy sometimes passes for Conscience that Melancholy Fumes are admired for Divine Inspirations and that the overflowing of our Gall is looked upon as pure Zeal These and the like are very dangerous and usual Mistakes that do frequently proceed from the prevalency of our Passions If therefore we do divide from a Church it will most highly concern us to be very Cautious that we be not acted by any such Principle For if we hope to Gain and grow Rich by our Departure if we are Ashamed or Scorn to retract the Opinions we have once Professed if we imagine we have more Light than the first Reformers when indeed we are very Ignorant if we cannot endure to be Opposed in any thing if we Murmur and Repine at our Governors when they require our Obedience where we are unwilling to pay it these are signs that our Affections are turbulent and unruly and while we are thus disposed we can never be assured but that Covetousness Pride and Impatience might be the greatest Motives that induced us to make a Separation and the strongest Arguments that we have to maintain it But I cannot charge our Dissenting Brethren with these things I believe that many of them may be Upright and Sincere in their Intentions But because they are all in the same estate of Degeneracy and Corruption which others are I would intreat them to be very careful that they be never led away by these or the like temptations but that they would always labor to preserve those holy Dispositions of Integrity Meekness Humility and Condescension which are the best Preparatives to the receiving of the Truth in the Love of it After they have thus freed their minds from all irregular Passions and Designs it would conduce exceedingly to the PEACE of the Church if they would be sure to express their greatest Care and Concern in the more Weighty and Substantial things of Religion This would prevent many of the Quarrels that do often arise in matters but of small Importance If real Holiness and Piety be the thing that we aim at then when we may be secured of this we should not be so very forward to enter upon fierce and endless Disputes about the external Modes and Circumstances of Worship If I may serve God there in Spirit and in Truth why should a Gown or a Cloak or a Surplice fright me from the Church when either of these is injoyned by my Superiors If I may be instructed in the way of Salvation and eternal Happiness why should I forsake the Publick Assemblies because I am not allowed to joyn my self to what Congregation I please and had not an immediate hand in the choice of my Pastor When our hearts are bent upon the great things of Religion we shall see but little Reason to be Contentious about matters of lesser Consequence a few indifferent Rites will scarce be able to tempt us to break off Communion with that Church with which we are at perfect Agreement in all Fundamental and Necessary points The next thing that may tend to the promoting our Vnion is the Consideration of the heinous Nature and Guilt of Schism which is nothing else but the Separating our selves from a True Church without any just Occasion given The want of due apprehensions of the Sinfulness of this seems to be the main Cause of our present Divisions Men are not generally sufficiently sensible how much they do Oppose that Spirit of Peace and brotherly Love which should diffuse it self through the whole Body of Christian People when they suppose every slender Pretence enough to justifie their departing from us and setting up a Church against a Church They think it a matter almost Indifferent and that they are left to their own Choice to joyn with what Society of Christians they please
say as some have done that it is an Act of Worship to the outward Elements when the Church has declared this to be Idolatry to be abhorred of all Faithful Rubr. after the Communion Christians If it should be said that we ought to receive in the same posture that they received at the first Institution We cannot certainly tell what that was If it were that which is most probably Conjectured it is never used It is wholly laid aside by those that argue the most Zealously for it But sure if the particular Gesture had been so absolutely necessary as some do imagine there would have been some plain and express mention of it somewhere in the Scripture which there is not as I have noted before And then it must be very unwarrantable in those that Separate from our Church because they will not receive in that reverent manner which She has prescribed If there had been nothing injoyned in this matter a man upon a serious apprehension of the infinite mercies of God through the merits and mediation of his blessed Saviour could scarce have forborn falling upon his Knees when he came to partake of the Sacrament of his most precious Body and Blood The commemoration of the Death and Passion of the Son of God by which he was Redeemed would strike him almost naturally into the humblest posture of Adoration But if any reverence be granted to be due at such a time I am sure sitting at the Table is a very unfit posture to express it Or if any man should like it better than that which is required with us yet to make this an occasion of departing from our Communion would argue but too little value for the peace of the Church But some there are who though they be convinced of the Lawfulness of all these Rites and Usages and for their own particular could joyn with us well enough yet they dare not do it for fear of giving Scandal and Offence to those that are not satisfied in these things This matter of Scandal has been so vehemently pleaded sometimes as if it were the only thing to be regarded in all Church Constitutions and that they were to be immediately disused whatever Authority injoyned them assoon as any should be offended at them This puts all external Order in Christian Assemblies into a very tottering condition ready to be presently overturned by every little Scruple that may chance to arise But for answer to this we must observe That they are the Weak and Ignorant that take Offence That their doubts and scruples are not to be nourished and commended See Rom. 14. but only born with for a time That they are bound to take all due Care and convenient Opportunity 1 Cor. 8. of Instruction that they may be fully satisfied and that it is in things meerly Indifferent such as Meats and Drinks where we are obliged to any compliance for the avoiding of Scandal These things thus briefly premised let it be considered whether they who esteem themselves rather more Knowing than others who seem unwilling to part with their Doubts and who have entertained some Prejudices against those that would inform them better are to be treated like weak Brethren And whether we ought to yield to them where Authority has determined the contrary unless we could prove our Obedience as Indifferent as the things scrupled at are supposed to be If it should be said that we ought yet at least it cannot be safely done till it be made appear that all the weak are of one side For in our present Case if there should be as many as doubtless there are that would be offended to see the manner of our Publick Worship altered as there are to see it imposed then though the command of our Superiors should signify nothing we should yet be upon equal terms on the account of Scandal only and as much bound not to Separate as they think they are to Separate by their own Principle But in a word no Scandal taken at an Indifferent thing can be so great as the Sin and Scandal both of Confusion and Disorder and Contempt of Authority There is another Exception near akin to this Some have thought they must withdraw from us because of our mixt Communions and that some which they judg unworthy Receivers are admitted to the Lord's Table This Objection proves nothing but a Supercilious Arrogance and a great want of Charity in those that make it What care they may take in their new way of Discipline I cannot tell but our Church has given the Minister a Power of rejecting those that are guilty See Rubr. before the Communion of any known and scandalous Sin And this is as much as can be done the open Sinner may be excluded but the close Hypocrite will escape the narrowest search that humane Industry can make But if any notorious evil Livers should be admitted through the ignorance inadvertency or negligence of the Minister their Unworthiness cannot defile those that Communicate with them It is generally thought that the Cursed Traytor Judas did partake of the Holy Supper when it was first instituted by our Lord. God be praised I have not heard that amongst us the abuses of this Ordinance did ever arise to that Degree that they were at among the Corinthians when at the very time of receiving one was Hungry and another Drunken 1 Cor. 11. 21. and yet the Apostle does not Command them to forsake the Communion of that Church where these Scandalous Enormities were committed Every man is charged to Examine himself and not another before he presume Ver. 28. to eat of that Bread and drink of that Cup. And it would be very well if all men would hearken to this holy and pious Admonition for he that inquires seriously into his own Sins will find great cause to be Humble and Penitent and so may become a worthy Communicant But he that is curious to pry into the miscarriages of other men will be apt to be vain proud self-conceited and censorious which will make him as unfit for the Table of the Lord as any of those Faults which he so scornfully condemns in his Neighbour that he esteems himself and the ordinances of God polluted by his Company But if none of these Pleas I have mentioned should be sufficient many think they may leave our Assemblies only for the sake of greater Edification which they can find elsewhere This I believe prevails with great numbers of the more ignorant especially to depart from us And I would to God they might obtain what they say they depart for and that they were indeed more Edified and did grow in Grace under what Ministery soever it be But alas This talk of greater Edification is many times meer wantonness and instability of humour and too often rather in Fancy than effect Men conceit that they are better Edified not when they are more fully instructed in any weighty point of Faith or
Churches and Societies of Christians 2. I observe further that tho the exercise of Church Communion as to most of the particular Duties and Offices of it must be confined to a particular Church and Congregation for we cannot Actually joyn in the Communion of Prayers and Sacraments c. but with some particular Church yet every Act of Christian Communion though performed in some particular Church is and must be an Act of Communion with the whole Catholick Church Praying and Hearing and receiving the Lords Supper together does not make us more in Communion with the Church of England than with any other true and Orthodox part of the Church tho in the Remotest parts of the World The exercise of true Christian Communion in a particular Church is nothing else but the exercise of Catholick Communion in a particular Church which the necessity of affairs requires since all the Christians in the World cannot meet together for Acts of Worship But there is nothing in all these Acts of Communion which does more peculiarly Unite us to such a particular Church than to the whole Christian Church When we pray together to God we Pray to him as the Common Father of all Christians and do not challenge any peculiar interest in him as members of such a particular Church but as members of the whole Body of Christ when we Pray in the Name of Christ we consider him as the great High Priest and Saviour of the Body who powerfully interceeds for the whole Church and for us as members of the Universal Church And we Offer up our Prayers and Thanksgiving not only for our selves and those who are present but for all Christians all the World over as our Fellow-members and Praying for one another is the truest notion of Communion of Prayers for Praying with one another is only in order to Praying for one another And thus our Prayers are an exercise of Christian Communion when we Pray to the same common Father through the Merits and Mediation of the same common Saviour and Redeemer for the same common Blessings for our selves and the whole Christian Church Thus when we meet together to Celebrate the Supper of our Lord we do not meet as at a private Supper but as at the common Feast of Christians and therefore it is not an Act of particular Church Fellowship but of Catholick Communion The Supper of our Lord does not signifie any other kind of Union and confederation between those Neighbour Christians who receive together in the same Church than with the whole Body of Christ The Sacramental Bread signifies and represents all those for whom Christ died that one Mystical Body for which he Offered his Natural Body which is the Universal Church and our eating of this Bread signifies our Union to this Body of Christ and therefore is considered as an Act of true Catholick not of a particular Church-Communion And the Sacramental Cup is the Blood of the New Testament and therefore represents our Communion in all the Blessings of the Covenant and with all those who are thus in Covenant with God So that there is nothing particular in this Feast to make it a private Feast or an Act of Communion with a particular Church considered as particular but it is the common Feast of Christians and an Act of Catholick Communion Which by the way plainly shews how groundless that scruple is against mixt Communions that Men think themselves defiled by receiving the Lords Supper with Men who are vicious For tho it is a great defect in Discipline and a great reproach to the Christian Profession when wicked Men are not censured and removed from Christian Communion yet they may as well pretend that their Communion is defiled by bad Men who Communicate in any other part of the Church or any other Congregation as in that in which they live and Communicate For this holy Feast signifies no other Communion between them who receive at the same time and in the same Company than it does with all sincere parts of the Christian Church It is not a Communion with any Persons considered as present but it is a Communion with the Body of Christ and all true members of it whether present or absent Those who separate from a National Church for the sake of corrupt professors though they could form a Society as pure and holy as they seem to desire yet are Schismaticks in it because they confine their Communion to their own select Company and Exclude the whole Body of Christians all the World over out of it their Communion is no larger than their gathered Church for if it be then they must still Communicate with those Churches which have corrupt members as all visible Churches on Earth have unless we will except Independents because they have the confidence to except themselves and then their Separation does not Answer its end which is to avoid such corrupt Communions and yet if they do confine their Communion to their own gathered Churches they are Schismaticks in dividing themselves from the Body of Christians and all their Prayers and Sacraments are not Acts of Christian Communion but a Schismatical Combination This does not prove indeed that particular Churches are not bound to reform themselves and to preserve their own Communion pure from corrupt members unless all the Churches in the World will do so too because every particular Church whether Diocesan or National has power to reform its own members and is accountable to God for such neglects of Discipline but it does prove that no Church without the guilt of Schism can renounce Communion with other Christian Churches or set up a distinct and separate Communion of its own for the sake of such corrupt members which was the pretence of the Novatian and Donatist Schism of Old and is so of the Independent Schism at this day 3. I observe further that our obligation to maintain Communion with a particular Church wholly results from our obligation to Catholick Communion The only reason why I am bound to live in Communion with any particular Church is because I am a member of the whole Christian Church which is the Body of Christ and therefore must live in Communion with the Christian Church and yet it is Impossible to live in Communion with the whole Christian Church without Actual Communion with some part of it when I am in such a place where there is a visible Christian Church as no member can be United to the Natural Body without its being United to some part of the Body for the Union and Communion of the whole Body consists in the Union of all its parts to each other Every Act of Christian Communion though performed in a particular Church or Congregation is not properly an Act of particular Church-Communion but is the exercise of Communion with the whole Church and Body of Christ as I have already proved but it can be no Act of Communion at all if it be not performed
in that place and where I am only occasionally there I can only Communicate occasionally also But to meet with the distempers of this Age and to remove those Apologies some Men make for their Schism it is necessary to make this a question For in this divided state of the Church there are a great many among us who think they cannot maintain constant Communion with the Church of England as constant and fixt Members who yet upon some occasions think they may Communicate with us in all parts of Worship and Actually do so Now when these Men who are fixt Members as they call it of Separate Churches think fit sometimes to Communicate in all parts of Worship with the Church of England we charitably suppose that Men who pretend to so much tenderness of Conscience and care of their Souls will do nothing not so much as once which they believe or suspect to be sinful at the time when they do it and therefore we conclude that those who Communicate occasionally with the Church of England do thereby declare that they believe there is nothing sinful in our Communion and we thank them for this good opinion they express of our Church and earnestly desire to know how they can justifie their ordinary Separation from such a Church as requires no sinful terms of Communion If any thing less than sinful terms of Communion can justifie a Separation then there can be no end of Separations and Catholick-Communion is an Impossible and Impracticable notion that is the Church of Christ neither is one Body nor ever can be For if Men are not bound to Communicate with a Church which observes our Saviours Insttutions without any such corrupt mixtures as make its Communion sinful then there is no bounds to be set to the Fancies of Men but they may new model Churches and divide and subdivide without any end Is that a sound and Orthodox part of the Catholick-Church which has nothing sinful in its Communion If it be not Pray what is it that makes any Church Sound and Orthodox If it be upon what account is it Lawful to Separate from a Sound and Orthodox Church And may we not by the same reason Separate from the whole Catholick Church as from any Sound part of it Nay does not that Man Separate from the whole Catholick Church who Separates from any Sound part of it For the Communion of the Church is but one and he that divides and breaks this union Separates himself from the whole Body Excepting the Independency of Churches which I have proved above to be Schism in the very notion of it the great Pleas for Separation from a Church which has nothing sinful in its Communion are the pretence of greater Edification and purer Ordinances But these are such Pleas as must expose the Church to Eternal Schisms because there are no certain Rules to judge of these matters but the various and uncertain fancies of Men. What they like best that shall be most for their Edification and these shall be purer Ordinances and till Men can agree these matters among themselves which they are never likely to do till they can all agree in the same Diet or in their judgment and opinion about beauty decency fitness convenience they may and will divide without end and if the Peace and Unity of the Church be so necessary a duty it is certain these Principles which are so destructive to Peace and Unity must be false as to consider these things particularly but very briefly What purer Administrations and Ordinances would Men have than those of our Saviours own Institution without any Corrupt and sinful mixtures to spoil their vertue and efficacy as we suppose is acknowledged by those who occasionally Communicate in all parts of our Worship that there is nothing sinful in it the purity of divine Administrations must consist in their agreement with the Institution that there is neither any such defect or addition as alters their Nature and destroys their Vertue For the Efficacy of Gospel Ordinances depends upon their Institution not upon particular modes of Administration which are not expresly Commanded in the Gospel and he who desires greater purity of Ordinances than their conformity to their Institution who thinks that Baptism and the Lords Supper lose their Efficacy unless they be administred in that way which they themselves best like are guilty of gross Superstition and attribute the vertue of Sacraments to the manner of their administration not to their Divine Institution And what Men talk of greater Edification is generally as little understood as the other for Edification is building up and is applied to the Church considered as Gods House and Temple and it is an odd way of building up the Temple of God by dividing and Separating the parts of it from each other This one thing well considered viz. That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Edification or Building according to the Scripture notion of it does always primarily refer to or at least include Church-unity and Communion is sufficient to convince any Man what an ill way it is to seek for greater Edification in breaking the Communion of the Church by Schism and Separation and therefore I shall make it plainly appear that this is the true Scripture notion of Edification and to that end shall consider the most material places where this word is used Now the most proper signification of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which our Translators render by Edification is a House or Building and this is the proper Sense wherein it belongs to the Christian Church Ye are Gods Husbandry ye are Gods Building that is the Church is 1 Cor. 3. 9. Gods House or Building 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus the same Apostle tells us that in Christ the whole Building Eph. 2. 21. i. e. the whole Christian Church fitly framed together groweth unto an holy Temple in the Lord. Matth. 21. 42. Hence the Governours of the Church are called Builders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Apostles are called Labourers Acts 4. 11. together with God in erecting this Spiritual Building and St. Paul calls himself a Master Builder Hence 1 Cor. 3. 9. the increase growth and advances towards perfection 10. in the Church is called the Building or Edification of it For this reason St. Paul commends Prophesie or Expounding the Scriptures before speaking in unknown Tongues without an Interpreter because 1 Cor. 14. 5. by this the Church receives Building or Edification All these Spiritual gifts which were bestowed v. 12. on the Christians were for the Building and Edifying of the Church The Apostolical power in Church censures was for Edification not for Destruction 2 Cor. 10. 8. 12. 19. 13. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Build and not to pull down that is to preserve the Unity of the Church intire and its Communion pure And we may observe that this Edification is primarily applied to the Church That the Church
Assemblies and the Corruptions there though great yet are not such as make the Worship cease to be God's Worship nor of necessity to be swallowed down if one would communicate in that Worship while any Christian that is watchful over his own Heart and Carriage as all ought ever to be may partake in the one without being active in or approving the other there God is yet present there he may be spiritually worshipped served acceptably and really enjoyed 3. They grant that the being present at Divine Worship is no consent to the Corruptions in it Thus Mr. Robinson He that partakes Lawfulness of Heaâ—ing c. p. 19 23. with the Church in the upholding any Evil hath his part in the Evil also But I deny as a most vain Imagination that every one that partakes with a Church in things lawful joyns with it in upholding the things unlawful to be found in it Christ our Lord joyned with the Jewish Church in things lawful and yet upheld nothing unlawful in it So Mr. Nye Case of great and present Use p. 16 18. Cure dir 35. p 196 c. Defence p. 96. Approbation is an act of the Mind it is not shewed until it be expressed outwardly by my Words and Gestures This Mr. Baxter undertakes to prove by several Arguments as that no Man can in Reason and Justice take that for my Profession which I never made by Word or Deed. That the Profession made by Church-Communion is totally distinct from this That this Opinion would make it unlawful to joyn with any Pastor or Church on Earth since every one mixeth Sin with their Prayers 4. They say that Corruptions though foreknown do not yet make those that are present guilty of them Thus the old Non-conformists declare It is all one to the People Letter of Ministers in Old-England to the Brethren in New-England p. 12 13 16. whether the Fault be personal as some distinguish or otherwise known before-hand or not known For if simple Presence defile whether it was known before-hand or not all Presence is faulty And if simple Presence defile not our Presence is not condemned by reason of the Corruptions known whereof we stand not guilty If the Error be such as may be tolerated and I am called to be present by such Fault I am not defiled though known before Mr. Baxter replies to those of a Curâ— p. 200. contrary Opinion after this manner Take heed that thus by affirming that fore-knowing Faults in Worship makes them ours you make not God the greatest Sinner and the worst Being in all the World For God fore-knoweth all Mens Sins and is present when they commit them and he hath Communion with all the Prayers of the Faithful in the World what Faults soever be in the Words or Forms he doth not reject them for any such Failings Will you say therefore that God approveth or consenteth to all these Sins I know before-hand that every Man will sin that prayeth by defect of Desire c. But how doth all this make it mine c. And he otherwhere adds It is another Man's Christian Diâ—ect p. 748 Fault or Error that you fore-know and not your own 5. It 's granted that the Fault of another in the Ministration of Divine Worship is none of ours nor a sufficient Reason to absent from it or to deprive our selves of it Thus Mr. Baxter The Cure p. 197. V. Jerubbaal justified p 16 c. 22 34. wording of the publick Prayers is the Pastors Work and none of mine c. And why should any hold me guilty of another Mans Fault which I neither can help nor belongeth to any Office of mine to help any farther than to admonish him And that the Faults of him that ministers are no sufficient Reasons to debar our selves of Communion in the Worship Mr. Nye affirms and proves by this Argument Case of great and present use p. 10. If I may not omit a Duty in respect to the Evil mixed with it which is my own much less may I thus leave an Ordinance for the Evil that is another Mans no way mine or to be charged upon me this were to make another Mans Sins or Infirmities more mine than my own Thus is the Case resolved Of Scandal a Discours p. 65. with respect to the Cross in Baptism I may not only saith one do that which I judg to be inconvenient but suffer another to do that which I judg to be unlawful rather than be deprived of a necessary Ordinance e. g. If either I must have my Child baptized with the sign of the Cross or not baptized at all I must suffer it to be done in that way though I judg it an unlawful Addition because the manner concerns him that doth it not me at least not so much so long as there is all the Essence He must be responsible for every Irregularity not I. Thus Jacob took Laban's Oath though by his Idols c. V. Crofton's Reformat no Separat p. 24. After the same manner doth Mr. Baxter resolâ—â— the Case in his Christian Directory pag. 49. Seventhly They grant That it is a Duty to joyn Arg. 7 with a defective and faulty Worship where we can have no better Thus the Presbyterian Brethren at the Savoy * * * Confer at the Savoy p. 3 12 13. An inconvenient mode of Worship is a Sin in the Imposer and in the Chuser and voluntary User that may offer God better and will not And yet it may not only be lawful but a Duty to him that by Violence is necessitated to offer up that or none This is acknowledged by an Author that is far from being favourable to Communion with the Church If the Word of God could be no Separat yet no Schism p. 64. where heard or Communion in Sacraments no where enjoyed but only in such Churches that were so corrupt as yours is conceived to be it might be lawful yea and a Duty to joyn with you so far as possibly Christians could without Sin Accordingly Mr. Baxter declares That Def. of Cure part 1. p. 78. it is a Duty to hold Communion constantly with any of the Parish Churches amongst us that have honest competent Pastors when we can have no better and professeth for his own part Were I saith he in Armenia Part 2. p. 176. and Cure p. 265. q. 6. Abassia or among the Greeks I would joyn in a much more defective Form than our Liturgy rather than none And he adds That this is the Judgment of many New-England Ministers to joyn with the English Liturgy rather than have no Church-Worship I have reason to conjecture from the Defence of the Synod c. Defence of Synod Pref. p. 4 5. Def. of Cure part 1. p. 78. n. 6. p. 96. n. 5. Now in what Cases this is to be presumed that we can have no better he shews 1. When it is so by a necessity arising
Speech is not properly Antichristian 2. That the English Liturgy is gathered according P. 155. V. Letter of the Minist in Old Engl. p. 14. Dr. Bryan's dwelling with God p. 309 310. Mr. Baxter's Cure p. 281. to the Ancients the purest of them and is not a Collection out of the Mass-Book but a refining of that Liturgy which heretofore had been stained with the Mass c. and is not a Translation of the Mass but a Restitution of the Ancient Liturgy Thus saith that Learned Person and much more to whom many others do likewise consent And in this Mr. Tombs is so zealous that he concludes I cannot Theodulia p. 102. but judg that either much Ignorance or much Malice it is that makes any traduce the English Common-Prayer Book as if it were the Popish Mass-Book or as bad as it and to deter Men from joining with those Prayers and Services therein which are good as if it were joining with Antichrist the Pope when they can hardly be ignorant that the Martyrs in Queen Mary 's days were burnt for it is impudent falshood Having thus far considered the Forms I shall now Sect. 2. proceed to shew what their Opinion is of the Gestures required in Lay-Communion such as Kneeling at the Sacrament and standing up at the Creed and Gospels As to Kneeling 1. It 's granted that the Posture in the Sacrament is not determined So Mr. Baxter I never yet heard Christian Direct p. 616. any thing to prove Kneeling unlawful there is no Word of God for or against any Gesture 2. It is granted whatever the Gesture of our Saviour V. Faldo's Dialogue betwixt a Minister and a Quaker Noye's Temple measured p. 81. Theod. p. 168. in it was yet that doth not oblige This Mr. Tombs hath undertaken to shew 1. Because this Gesture seems not to have been of choice used by Christ 2. Because St. Paul omits the Gesture which he would not have done if it had been binding 3. He mentions the Night and calls it the Lord's Supper and if the Time be not necessary much less the Gesture 4. If the Gesture doth oblige then Christians must use the self-same that Christ used 3. It is granted that the nature of the Ordinance doth not forbid Kneeling So Mr. Bains Kneeling Christian Letters Let 24. p. 201. Direct p. 616. is not unbeseeming a Feaster when our joy must be mingled with reverent trembling So Mr. Baxter The nature of the Ordinance is mixed And if it be lawful to take a Pardon from the King upon our Knees I know not what can make it unlawful to take a sealed Pardom from Christ by his Ambassador upon our Knee Hence Mr. Bailey reckons it as an Error of Disswasive c 2 p. 30. c. 6. p. 121 122. V. Johnson's Christian Plea Treat 3. c. 10. p. 285. some Independents that they accounted sitting necessary as a Rite significant of fellowship with Christ and a part of our imitation of him and for both these reasons declared it necessary to keep on their Hats at the time of participation 4. It is granted not to be Idolatrous So Mr. Bains Letters Ibid. Kneeling is neither an occasion nor by participation Idolatry Kneeling never bred Bread-worship And V. Baxt. Christ Direct p. 616. our Doctrine of the Sacrament known to all the World doth free us from suspicion of adoration in it To these Mr. Tombs adds 1. That the Papists adore Theodulia p. 256 c. not the Bread at putting it into their Mouths but at the Elevation It being inconsistent with their Principles to worship that which is not above them 2. That the Worship of God not directed to a V. T. D. Jerubbaal p. 41. Mr. Crofton's Answ p. 28. V. Ames Fresh Suit c. 4. § 4. p. 382. Perkins Cases Creature but before it as an occasional Object of adoration to God is not Idolatry 3. That yet in the Church of England the Elements are not occasionally so but the Benefits of Christ in the Lord's Supper And 4. Kneeling is not to the Bread but as the signification of an humble and grateful mind as he shews from the Rubrick Fifthly Those that do account it inconvenient yet account it not to be unlawful Thus Mr. Cartwright Evang. Harm on Luk. 22. v. 14 c. Second Reply p. 262. Kneeling in receiving the Sacrament being incommodious in its own nature and made far more incommodious by Popish Superstition is not therefore so to be rejected that we should abstain from the Sacrament if we cannot otherwise be partakers of it because the thing is not in its own nature unlawful So it 's said of the old Non-conformists Troughton's Apol. p. 90. Kneeling at the Sacrament was disliked by all but yet thought tolerable and that it might be submitted to by some of the most Learned From all which we may conclude with Mr. Vines On the Sacrament p. 102. that the Posture being a circumstance of Action as well as the Time and Place is not of the Free-hold of the Ordinance and with Mr. Baxter that those that think Sacril desert p. 19. they must not receive kneeling think erroneously As for standing up at the Creed c. Mr. Baxter Christ Direct p. 858. Sacril desert p. 96. saith his judgment is for it where it is required and where not doing it would be divisive and scandalous Nay elsewhere he saith that 't is a convenient praising Gesture c. Thus I have considered the most material Points in which the Lay-Members of the Church of England are concern'd and shew'd that the lawfulness of the things injoined upon such is declared and justified by the Suffrage and Judgment of as eminent Non-conformists as have lived in the several Ages since that unhappy Controversy was first set on foot amongst us And now what remains but that every one concerned set himself seriously and impartially to consider it and it becomes such so to do when they go against the stream of the most experienced Writers of their own Party who might pretend to understand the Case as well if not better than any that were conversant in it It becomes such when they bury that under the condemnation of false Worship which the Lord the Author of all Truth doth allow in his Service Ball 's Tryal Epistle to Reader When they forsake the Prayers of the Congregation and depart from the Table of the Lord and break off Society and Communion with the Churches of Christ c. when they expose Religion to Contempt and the Truth of God to Reproach by the Rents and Divisions in the Church as Mr. Ball doth represent it It becomes them when our Division gratifieth the Papists Defence p. 17. 52. and greatly hazardeth the Protestant Religion and by it we may lose all which the several Parties contend about as Mr. Baxter hath proved It becomes them when the Church of England is the Bulwark of
Case and we have an easie resolution of the Question before us viz. That since a greater sin is to be avoided before a less when a man supposes himself to be under a necessity of being guilty of one it is more reasonable that the man we speak of should come to the Sacrament with all his Doubts concerning his unworthiness than that he should customarily and habitually withdraw himself from it because it is a greater sin to do this latter than the former Well but some say How can this consist with St. Paul's Doctrine Who expresly affirms That whoever eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh 1 Cor. 11. 29. Damnation to himself Can there be any more dreadful sin than that which if a man be guilty of it will actually Damn him Certainly one would think by this that a man runs a much less hazard in not Receiving at all than in venturing to Receive whilest he hath the least Doubt that he Receives unworthithily considering the dreadful Consequences of it But to this I briefly answer Such a man as we all along suppose in our Case is in no danger at all of Receiving unworthily in the Sense that St. Paul useth this Term. For the unworthy receiving that he so severly Censures in the Corinthians was their approaching to the Lords Table with so little a sense of what they were about that they made no distinction between the Lords Body and common Food Ibid. v. 29. v. 20 21 22. But under a pretence of meeting for the Celebration of the Lords Supper they used the Church of God as if it was an Eating or Tipling House Some of them Revelling it there to that degree that they went away Drunk from these Religious Assemblies All this appears from the Text. But I hope none among us especially none of those who are so doubtful about their being duly qualified do profane the Sacrament in this manner But further Perhaps the Damnation which St. Paul here denounces is not so frightful as is commonly apprehended For all that he saith if either the Original or the Margin of our English Bibles be consulted will appear to be this He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh Judgment to himself Meaning hereby in all probability that he who doth thus affront our Lords Instistution by making no distinction between the Bread of the Sacrament and common Meat doth by this his profaneness draw severe Judgments of God upon himself For for this cause saith he many are weak and Ver. 30. sickly among you and many are fallen asleep But here is not a word of Everlasting Damnation much less of any mans being put into that State by thus receiving unworthily Unless any man will say that all those who are visited with Gods Judgments in this World are in the State of Damnation as to the next Which is so far from being true that St. Paul in this very place affirms the contrary viz. in the 32. Verse where he tells us That When we are thus judged in this World we are chastened of the Lord that we should not be condemned with the World i. e. with Wicked men in another Life But further Admitting St. Paul in these words to mean Damnation in the usual Sense yet still the utmost they can come to will be no more than this That whosoever eateth and drinketh thus unworthily as the Corinthians did is guilty of a Damnable sin But now there are a great many other Cases besides this of the Sacrament in which a Man is equally guilty of a Damnable Sin if he do not perform his Duty as he ought to do He that Prays or Hears unworthily He that Fasts or gives Alms unworthily In a word He that in any Instance performs the Worship of God or professeth the Christian Religion unworthily I say such a Man according to the Protestant Doctrine may be said to do these things to his own Damnation upon the same account that he is said to Eat and Drink his own Damnation that Communicates unworthily in the Sacrament though indeed not in so high a degree That is to say such a Man is guilty of a Sin that is in its own Nature Damnable and may prove actually so to him unless either by a particular or general Repentance he obtains Gods pardon for it But yet for all this there is no man will for these Reasons think it adviseable to leave off the practice of these Duties but the only Consequence he will draw from hence is that he is so much the more concerned to take care that he perform them as he ought to do But in the last place Let the sin of coming to the Sacrament unworthily be as great and as damnable as we reasonably can suppose it Yet this is that we contend for the sin of totally withdrawing from it is much greater and more damnable So that if he who partakes of it unworthily doth eat and drink Damnation to himself He that partakes not at all is so far from mending the matter that he doth much increase that Damnation The truth of this doth fully appear from what I have before spoke in General concerning the much greater sin of transgressing a known Law of God than of observing that Law as well as we can though with much unworthiness I will only add this further with reference to this Particular of receiving the Sacrament Though I am far from encouraging any to approach to the Lords Table without due Qualifications or from extenuating any mans sin that comes unworthily unworthily I mean in the Scripture Sense of that word and not as it is understood by many melancholly scrupulous Persons Yet this I say That if Men did seriously consider what a sin it is to live without the Sacrament it being no other than living in an open affront to the express Institution of our Lord Jesus and a renouncing the Worship of God and the Communion of the Church in the great Instance of Christian Worship and Christian Communion And withal what dreadful Consequences they bring upon themselves hereby even the depriving themselves of the chief of those ordinary means which our Lord hath appointed for the obtaining Remission of sins and the Grace and Influence of his Holy Spirit I say if men did seriously consider these things they would not look upon it as so slight a matter voluntarily to Excommunicate themselves as to the partaking in this great Duty and Privilege of Christians but what apprehensions soever they had of the sin and the danger of receiving unworthily they would for all that think it more sinful and more dangerous not to receive at all I have said enough in answer to this Objection from St. Paul perhaps too much considering how often these things have been said I will now go on with our Case In the Third place therefore let us suppose our Doubting Man for these or such like Reasons as we have given to have such a Sense of his
Duty that he generally takes the opportunities that are offered him of doing Honour to our Lord by partaking in his Supper though perhaps he is not often very well satisfied about his Preparation But so it happens that since his last Communicating he finds his Mind in a much worse frame than it used to be He hath lived more loosly and carelesly than he was wont or perhaps he hath been very lately guilty of some grievous sin that lies heavy upon his Conscience So that when his next usual time of Receiving comes he cannot but apprehend himself in a very unfit condition to Communicate in so sacred a Mystery Upon this he is in a great perplexity what to do For on the one side he thinks he hath more reason to believe that he offends God if he comes to the Sacrament in these Circumstances than if he forbears because he is more certain that there is a Law of God that forbids him to come unworthily than he is certain that there is a Law of God that commands him to receive every time that he hath opportunity But now on the other hand if it should prove that he is really bound by Gods Law to Commemorate the Death of Christ in the Sacrament every time that an opportunity is offered He is sensible in that Case it is a greater sin to neglect this Duty than to perform it unworthily so long still as he performs it out of Conscience What now is the Man to do in these Circumstances This is an exact Instance of the Case I spoke to in my third Proposition where on one side the Man runs a greater danger of sinning but on the other side if he should prove mistaken he sins in a greater degree Now for a Resolution of this Case I say That if the Question be put concerning the Mans absenting himself only once or twice from the Communion in order to the exercise of Repentance and the putting himself into a better frame of mind against another opportunity The Answer according to our Third Proposition must be this That it is very reasonable thus to do And there is good ground for this Answer For certainly a Man is more in danger of sinning if he receive unworthily than if he do not receive every time that there is a Communion There being an express Law against the one but no express Law obliging to the other For Christ hath no more appointed that we should receive the Sacrament so many times in a year than he hath appointed that we should Pray so many times in a day or that we should give such a determinate proportion of our Annual Income to Charitable Uses As to these things he hath bound us in the General but as to the Particulars the Circumstances of our Condition and the Laws of our Superiors are to determine us Only this we are to remember that the oftner we perform these Duties it is the better and we can hardly be said to be Christians if we do not perform them frequently This now being so Though it be true that a Man would be guilty of a greater sin if he should at any time though but once abstain from the Communion than if he should come to it with such unworthiness as we are here speaking of supposing that Christs Law had precisely tied him up to communicate every time that a Communion is appointed Yet since there is so little appearance of Reason to conclude that Christ has thus tied him up and withal on the other hand he runs so certain a danger of sinning if he should Communicate at this time apprehending himself to be so unworthy as he doth This Consideration of the certain danger must needs in this Case overballance the other of the greater sin and make it appear more Reasonable to the Man to suspend his receiving to another Opportunity against which time he hopes to be better prepared than to adventure upon it in his present Circumstances But then if the Question be put concerning the Mans absenting himself Customarily and Habitually from the Lords Table upon this account of unworthiness that which I have now said will not hold For in this Case the Man is in as much danger of sinning by not receiving at all as by receiving unworthily nay and a great deal more as I shewed in my first particular about this Case And withal he is guilty of a much greater sin in wholly withdrawing from the Sacrament than in coming to it though with never so great Apprehensions of his own unworthiness as I shewed in my second And therefore since the danger is at least equal on both sides he must chuse that side on which the least sin lies That is to say he must Communicate frequently at least so often as the Laws of the Church do enjoin him which is three times a year though he be in danger of doing it unworthily rather than not Communicate at all Having thus gone through Three of our Propositions concerning a Double Doubt All that remains is to put our Case about the Sacrament so as that it may serve for an Instance or Illustration of our fourth and last Here therefore we are to suppose our Doubting Man to be in such a Condition that he apprehends he runs an equal danger of sinning whether he receives the Sacrament or receives it not And withall so unskilful a Judge is he of the morality of Actions that he apprehends no great difference in the degree of the sin whether he do the one or the other In this Case now all the Man can do is to consider what Inducements he has in Point of Prudence or Interest to do or to forbear the Action he doubts about for since all other Considerations in the Case are equal those of this kind are to turn the Ballance according to our Fourth Proposition But if the Case turn upon this Point I dare say no man will be long doubtful whether he should frequent the Sacrament in obedience to the Laws or forbear it For it is plain that he Acts more Prudently and more consults his own Advantage both Temporal and Spiritual As for the Temporal Advantages which a Man receives by obeying the Laws in this matter I will not now insist on them though they are neither few nor inconsiderable That which I desire chiefly to be here considered is this That in point of Spiritual Advantages it is much more advisable for our Doubtting Person to come to the Sacrament than to abstain from it For by frequenting this Ordinance he takes the best method both to grow more worthy if he be now unworthy and likewise to cure the Doubts and Scruples he is now troubled with But if he neglect this means of Grace he not only takes an effectual course to increase and perpetuate his Fears and Doubts it being very probable that the longer he defers his receiving the Sacrament still the more doubtful will he be of his being qualified for it But also is
are not discovered by our Governours either in Church or State No nor by as Learned and Religious Divines of all Perswasions as any in the World The most Divines by far the most and those as Pious and as Able as any are clearly of Opinion that there is nothing Vnlawful in our Worship but that on the contrary all things therein prescribed are at least Innocent and free from sin if not Pure and Apostolical So that if it should at last prove that they are all mistaken Yet the Law of God which forbids these things being so very obscure and the Sense of it so hardly to be found out it is a great Presumption that a man may very innocently and inculpably be Ignorant of it And if so it will be a very little or no sin at all in him to act against it Because if it was not his Duty to know this Law it cannot be his Sin that his Practice is not according to it And if it was his Duty to know it yet it being so obscurely delivered and only to be gathered by such remote Consequences it can at most be but a Sin of Ignorance in an ordinary Person where so many of the best Guides are mistaken if he should transgress it And then farther This must likewise be considered That if Conformity to our Liturgy and Worship should prove a sin in any Instance Yet the Evil Consequences of it extend no farther than the Mans Person that is guilty of it There is no damage ariseth either to the Christian Religion or to the Publick Interest of the Kingdom by any mans being a Conformist But on the contrary as things stand with us Vnity and Conformity to the Established way seem to bring a great advantage to both as I hinted before and to be a probable means to secure us from many Dangers with which our Reformed Religion and the Peace of the Kingdom is threatned Well but now on the other hand Let us suppose the contrary side of the Question to be true viz. That our Governours in this matter are in the Right and we are in the Wrong That there is nothing required of us in the Church of England as a Term of Communion but what is very Innocent and Lawful however it be our misfortune to Doubt that there is and in a zealous Indulgence to these Doubts we take the liberty to live in open disobedience to our Lawful Governous and to break the Unity of the Church into which we were Baptized I say admitting the thing to be thus what kind of Sin shall we be guilty of then Why certainly we are guilty of no less a Sin than causlesly dividing the Body of Christ against which we are so severely cautioned in the New Testament We are guilty of the Breach of as plain Laws as any are in the Bible viz. Of all those that oblige us to keep the Vnity of the Spirit in the Bond of Peace that Command us to Obey those that are over us in the Lord to be subject to the Higher Powers to submit to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake to be subject not only for Wrath. but for Conscience sake I say these plain Laws we disobey for Conscience sake and we disobey them too in such Instances where we have the whole Catholick Church of old and far the greatest and the best part of the present Church of a different Perswasion from us Well but as if this was not enough What are the Consequences of this our Sin For by the Consequences of a sin the greatness of it is always to be estimated I speak as to the Material part of it with which we are here concerned Why they are most Terrible and Dreadful both with respect to our selves and others By this unnatual Separation we do for any thing we know put our selves out of the Communion of the Catholick Church and consequently out of the enjoyment of the ordinary means of Salvation We maintain and keep up Divisions and Disorders in the Church and lend a helping hand to all those Animosities and Hatreds all that bitter Contention and Strife and Uncharitableness which hath long torn the very Bowels of Christs Church and given occasion to that Deluge of Atheism and Profaneness and Impiety which hath over-spread the Face of it We put Affronts upon our Lawful Governours who should be in the place of God to us We give Scandal to all our Brethren that make a Conscience of living Peaceably and Piously And lastly as we offer a very fair Handle and Pretence to all Discontented and Factious men to Practice against the Best of Governments So we take the most effectual course to Ruine the Best Constituted Church in the World and with it the Reformed Religion in this Kingdom This now being the Nature and these being the Consequences of our Separation from the Established Church among us I leave it to any indifferent man to Determine whether any Doubt about the Lawfulness of our Communion though that Doubt be backed with greater Probabilities than do appear on the other side nay if you will with all the Probabilities that can consist with the nature of a Doubt can have weight enough to Ballance against such a Sin and such Consequences as Separation in our Case doth involve a man in I think there is no unconcerned Person but will pronounce that supposing where there are Doubts on both sides a man is to chuse that side on which there is the least appearance of Sin he is in this Case certainly bound to chuse Communion with the Established Church rather than Separation from it And that is all I Contend for But now after all this is said it must be acknowledged that if there be any man who hath other apprehensions of these matters and that after a Consideration of all things that are to be said for or against Conformity it doth appear to him upon the whole matter both more probable that our Communion is sinful than that it is a Duty and withal that to Communicate with us will involve him in a greater sin and in worse Consequences than to continue in Separation I say if any man have so unfortunate an understanding as to make such an estimate of things we must acknowledge that according to all the Rules of a Doubting Conscience such a man is rather to continue a Nonconformist than to obey the Laws of the King and the Church But then let him look to it for his acting in this Case according to the best Rules of a Doubting Conscience will not as I said before at all acquit him either of the Guilt or Consequences of Criminal Schism and Disobedience Supposing that indeed he is all along under a mistake as we say he certainly is and that there is nothing required in our Communion that he might not honestly and lawfully comply with as there certainly is not Unless in the mean time the man fell into these mistakes without any fault
or leave out of it till all Parties amongst us are satisfied which indeed can never be effected as it doth consist in our becoming more truly Christian in our Lives and Tempers They are our vicious Dispositions more than our different Apprehensions that keep us at such a distance Let the terms of Communion with the Church be what they will yet as long as Men retain the same quarrelsom Mind and industriously seek for Doubts and Scruples and are glad to find them and prefer their own private Opinion and Judgment before the Wisdom and Authority of all their Governours whether Civil or Ecclesiastical it is plain our Divisions and Animosities will not cannot cease But this leads me to the last thing I design'd to discourse of which was to propound to you the best ways and means by which men may get rid of and ease their Minds of such Scruples where I shall especially consider those that relate to our communicating with our Parish-Churches You must not expect that I should descend to and answer the particular Exceptions which hinder men from constant Communion with us but only in general I shall crave leave to advise some few things which would mightily tend to the removing those Doubts and Scruples that yet detain so many in a state of utter Separation from us or at least discourage their total and hearty joyning with us Which charitable Design and Attempt however unsuccessful I may be in it yet cannot I hope be unacceptable to any whose Consciences are pester'd with such Scruples since I endeavour only to deliver them from those Mistakes which beside the disservice they do to Religion and the Protestant Interest do also expose them to trouble and danger from the Publick Laws and Civil Magistrate Of many Rules that might be given in this case I shall insist only on these following 1. We should take great care to beget and cherish in our Minds the most high and worthy and honourable Thoughts of God Almighty This is the Foundation of all Religion and as our Apprehensions of God are such for the most part will be his Worship and Service Accordingly as we conceive of his Nature so shall we judge what things are most pleasing to him as also what they are that are most offensive and distastful to him Now consider I beseech you Can that Man have becoming and excellent Thoughts of the Divine Nature who imagines that God regards any particular Gestures Habits and Postures so far as that the acceptance of our Service and Worship should depend upon such Circumstances of our Religious Actions When with all Humility and true devotion of Heart a sincere Christian prostrates himself at the Throne of God's Grace and with earnest Desire and Affections begs those good things that are according to Gods Mind and Will can we believe that the Father of our Spirits shall refuse and reject his Petition because it is delivered in a certain prescribed form of Words Shall his importunate renewed Requests fail of Success because he still useth the same Expressions and reads his Prayers out of a Book Is God pleased with variety of Words or the copiousness of our Invention or the elegancy of our Phrase and Stile Is it not the Heart and inward frame of Spirit that God principally respects in all our Prayers Or can we think so meanly of God that he should shut his ears against the united Prayers of his People because offended at the colour of the Garment in which the Minister officiates Suppose two Persons both with equal Preparation with true Repentance and Faith to approach the Lord's Table one of them out of a deep sense of his Unworthiness to receive so great Blessings and out of a grateful acknowledgment of the Benefits therein conferr'd upon him takes the Sacrament upon his Knees in the humblest Posture the other sitting or standing can you think that the Sacrament is effectual or beneficial or that God blesses it only to him that sits or that it would not have been of the same advantage to him if he also had received it kneeling To surmise any such thing is surely to dishonour God as if he were a low poor humoursome Being like a Father that should disinherit his Child tho in all Respects most dutiful to him and every way deserving his greatest Kindness only because he did not like his Complexion or the colour of his Hair The wiser and greater any Person is to whom we address our selves the less he will stand upon little Punctilio's Under the Jewish Law the minutest circumstances of Worship were exactly described and determined by God himself and it was not ordinarily lawful for the Priests at all to vary from them But it was necessary then that it should be thus because the Jewish Worship was typical of what was to come hereafter and those many nice Observances that were appointed were not commanded for themselves as if there were any Excellency in them but they were shadows of things to come which are all now done away by the Gospel and the bringing in of everlasting Righteousness the only thing always pleasing to God and agreeable to his Nature It is a spiritual rational Service God now expects from us and delights in and he must look upon God as a very fond and captious Being who can perswade himself that our Prayers and Thanksgivings and other Acts of Worship tho we be most hearty and devout in them yet shall be rejected by him only because of some particular Habits or Gestures we used which were neither dishonourable to God nor unsutable to the nature of those religious Performances Such mean Thoughts of God are the true ground of all Superstition when we think to court and please him by making great Conscience about little things and so it hath been truly observed that there is far more Superstition in conscientious abstaining from that which God hath no where forbid than there is in doing that which God hath not commanded A man may certainly do what God hath not commanded and yet never think to flatter God by it nor place any Religion in it but he may do it only out of obedience to his Superiours for outward Order and Decency for which end our Ceremonies are appointed and so there is no Superstition in them But now a Man cannot out of Conscience refuse to do what God hath not forbid and is by lawful Authority required of him but he must think to please God by such abstaining and in this conceit of pleasing or humouring God by indifferent things consists the true Spirit of Superstition 2. Lay out your great care and zeal about the necessary and substantial duties of Religion and this will make you less concerned about things of an inferiour and indifferent nature As on the one hand our fierce Disputes and Debates about little things and circumstances are apt to eat out the Heart and Life of Religion so on the other side minding those things most in
doth not like or approve of it he hath some little Reasons and Exceptions against it it is not the best and fittest all things considered This is properly a Scruple and is certainly the case of all those who do sometimes to save themselves from the severity of the Laws joyn in our Worship and communicate with us which we presume they would never do did they judge it absolutely sinful and forbidden by God So that though it should be granted that a man cannot innocently do that of which his Conscience doubts whether it be lawful or not yet a Man may and in some cases is bound to do that which is not unlawful though upon some other Accounts he scruples the doing of it 2. If the Question be about things wherein we are left wholly to our selves and at Liberty having no very weighty Reason for the doing of them then it may be the safest way to forbear all such things we scruple at Of such cases the Apostle speaks in the fore-mentioned Places of eating or not eating some Meats neither of them was required by any Law Eating was no instance of Duty nor was it any ways forbid Christians where to do or not to do is perfectly at our own choice it is best for a Man to forbear doing that of which he hath some suspicion tho he be not sure that it is sinful As suppose a man have Scruples in his Mind about playing at Cards and Dice or going to see Stage-Plays or putting out his Money to Usury because there is no great Reason or Necessity for any of these things and to be sure they may be innocently forborn without any Detriment to our selves or others though we do not judge them absolutely sinful yet it is safest for him who cannot satisfie himself concerning the Goodness and Fitness of them wholly to deny himself the use of them But in these two cases it is most for the quiet of our Consciences to act against or notwithstanding our Fears and Scruples when either our Superiours to whom we owe Obedience have interposed their Commands or when by it we prevent some great Evil or Mischief 1. When our Superiours either Civil or Ecclesiastical whom by the Will of God we are bound to obey in all lawful things have interposed their Commands our Scruples will not excuse or justifie our Disobedience If indeed we judge what is commanded to be absolutely unlawful tho it be a false erroneous Judgment yet whilst we are under such persuasion we are by no means to do it upon any Inducement whatever If I only doubt of the lawfulness of any particular Action and it be an instance wherein I am at liberty I am still bound not to do it For Whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin I am certainly innocent when I forbear I may commit a Sin If I do it Wisdom would therefore that the safer part be chosen But now if I am by the command of my Superiours obliged to it my choice is then determined it then becomes my Duty and it can never be safe or advisable to neglect a plain Duty for an uncertain Offence Thus most and best Casuists do determine about a doubtful Conscience particularly the forenamed reverend Bishop in the same Sermon Whatsoever is commanded us by those whom God hath set over us either in Church Commonwealth or Family quod tamen not sit certum displicere Deo saith St. Bernard which is not evidently contrary to the Law and Will of God ought to be of us received and obeyed no otherwise than as if God himself had commanded it because God himself hath commanded us to obey the Higher Powers and to submit our selves to their Ordinances But now this is more plain concerning Fears and Scruples only about the conveniency and expediency of things these ought all to be despised when they come in Competition with the Duty of Obedience Would men but think themselves in Conscience bound to pay the same Duty and respect to the Judgment and Authority of Magistrates and Governours whether in Church or State as they do expect their Servants and Children should to themselves they would soon see the reasonableness of such submission For all Government and Subjection would be very precarious and arbitrary if every one that did not approve of a Law or was not fully satisfied about the reasonableness of it was thereby exempted from all Obligations to obey it This is to give the Supreme Authority to the most humoursome or perverse sort of Christians for according to this principle no publick Laws and Constitutions can be valid and binding unless every scrupulous tho a very ignorant Conscience consent to them 2. We are not to mind or stand upon our Scruples when they probably occasion a great evil a general mischief They are not fit to be put in the balance with the Peace of the Church and Unity of Christians Suppose for once that our publick way of Worship is not the best that can be devised that many things might be amended in our Liturgy that we could invent a more agreeable Establishment than this present is which yet no man in the World can ever tell for we cannot know all the inconveniences of any Alteration till it comes to be tryed yet granting all this it cannot be thought so intolerable an Evil as contempt of God's Solemn Worship dividing into Sects and Parties living in Debate Contention and Separation from one another If there be some Rites and Customs amongst us not wisely chosen or determined some Ceremonies against which just Exceptions may be made yet to forsake the Communion of such a true Church of Jesus Christ and set up a distinct Altar in opposition to it to combine and associate into separate Congregations is as it is somewhere expressed like knocking a man on the head because his Teeth are rotten or his Nails too long How much more agreeable is it to the Christian Temper to be willing to sacrifice all such Doubts and Scruples to the Interests of publick Order and divine Charity for better surely it is to serve God in a defective imperfect manner to bear with many Disorders and Faults than to break the Bond of Peace and brotherly Communion For this we have the Example of our Blessed Lord and Saviour who lived and died in Communion with a Church where there were far greater Corruptions both as to Persons and Practises than can be pretended to be in ours at this day yet though he was the great Reformer of Mankind he forsook not the Jewish Church but assembled with them in their publick Synagogues which answer to our Parish-Churches preached in the Temple though they had made it a Den of Thieves observed their Festivals tho some of them of humane Institution nay commanded his Disciples to continue to hear the Scribes and Pharisees tho they were a most vile and wretched Generation of Men. Great were the Pollutions and Misdemeanours in the Churches of Rome Corinth
far and in what instances we are bound to consider the weakness of our Brother First For the resolution of this Question it is necessary to know what is the true notion of a weak Brother Now a weak Brother or weak in Faith in Scripture denotes one newly converted to Christianity and so neither thorowly instructed in the principles nor well setled in the practice of it the same whom our Saviour calls a little one and the Apostle a babe in Christ 1 Cor. 3. 1. Conversion to Christianity is often called our new birth and consequently at Mens first entrance into the Christian Church they were for a while reckoned as in an Infant state and accordingly were to be most tenderly handled and nursed and gently used with all favour and indulgence not driven faster than they were able to go till by degrees by the improvement of their knowledge they came to be of full Age as the Apostle expresseth it Heb. 5. 14. They were at first to be fed with Milk to be taught the easiest and plainest Doctrines against which least exceptions could be made as our Blessed Saviour himself would not at first tell his Disciples of the shame and sufferings he was to undergo and when he did speak of them it was covertly and obscurely so that they did not perfectly understand him lest they should by it have been presently discouraged and tempted to have forsaken him no unnecessary burdens were to be laid upon them which might render their new Profession grievous to them every Stumbling-block and prejudice was to be removed out of their way that might occasion their falling the grown Christians and proficients were Charitably to condescend to the capacity of these Novices and make allowances and for a time bear with their Ignorance and many mistakes and Childish humours and deny themselves their own Liberty and become even as Children with them as if themselves were of the same mind and understood no better than these raw beginners Now these fresh Disciples little ones or Babes are the same with those St. Paul Rom. 14. calls weak Brethren weak for want of Age or Growth or as the Original word rather signifies Sickly and Feeble like a Man beginning to recover from a wasting Disease his distemper tho cured yet hangs a long time upon him the Dregs of it still remain He must for a while be carefully attended and watched since every little thing discomposes him and hazards a relapse So was it with these first Converts As soon as ever they were brought to acknowledg Jesus to be the Son of God and were willing to become his Disciples they were immediately Baptized tho as yet they understood but little of the Nature or design of the Gospel The Apostles and first Preachers of our Religion were in hast to make more Proselytes and therefore presently Baptized all that were willing to it without that previous Instruction and Preparation which afterwards when Churches were setled was made necessary before Heathens or Jews could be admitted by Baptism Thus the same day the Apostles Preached Christ to the Jews Acts 2. they Baptized about three thousand of them and Philip without any delay Baptized the Eunuch as soon as he professed to believe that Jesus was the Son of God and the Jaylor and his Household were Baptized the same hour at midnight at which Paul and Silas spake unto them the word of the Lord. After their Baptism they were to be tutor'd and train'd up in their new Religion where great care was to be taken great prudence and caution used towards them lest they should suddenly flie back and repent of their change for having been bred up and so long lived Jews or Gentiles and then of a sudden turn'd Christians they retain'd still a great love and kindness for many of their old Customs and Opinions they had mighty and inveterate prejudices to overcome the Old man was by degrees to be put off and therefore they were at first treated with all the tenderness and condescension imaginable the stronger and wiser Christians would not stand rigidly on any little matters would for the present tolerate many things which were necessary afterwards to be done away hoping that in time they might be better taught and be brought off those mistakes they now Labour'd under Had the Apostles in the beginning plainly told all the Jews of the ceasing of their Laws the abrogation of their Ceremonies and Worship the no necessity of Circumcision the taking in of the Gentiles they would never have born such Doctrines they would never have become Christians upon such terms nor ever endured those Teachers who seem'd to make so little account of Moses and their Temple Now to gain these St. Paul became weak himself tied up himself while amongst these Jewish Converts to such observances which he was really free from as if he had the same doubts and were of the same opinion with those weak Christians and advises all others who did understand their Liberty yet to oblige their Brethren by the same inoffensive carriage This then was the difference between the strong and the weak the strong were the well-grounded understanding Christians that knew it was lawful for them to Eat all kind of Meats that Christ had set them free from the burdensome Yoke of the Jewish Ceremonies the weak tho Brethren that is believers in Christ yet abstained from some Meats judging them unlawful or unclean and observed days and Zealously retained the Mosaical rites not being yet sufficiently instructed in that Liberty our Saviour had purchased for them or in the nature of his Kingdom which consisted not in Meat or Drink but in Righteousness and Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost Hence I observe 1. That the rules which are laid down in Scripture concerning weak Brethren principally respect those times when our Religion made its first appearance in the World and were temporary provisions for the easier proselyting men to the Faith of Christ or the better securing and fixing those that were already come into the Church They are not standing Laws equally obliging all Christians in all Ages but were suited to the Infant state of the Church or rather to its condition whilst it was but an Embryo till Churches were formed and setled and our Christianity had got firm Footing and Possession in the World Thus St. Paul tells us 1 Cor. 9. 19. For tho I be free from all Men yet have I made my self servant unto all that I might gain the more And unto the Jews I became as a Jew that I might gain the Jews to them that are under the Law as under the Law that I might gain them that are under the Law To them that are without Law as without Law being not without Law to God but under the Law to Christ that I might gain them that are without Law To the weak became I as weak that I might gain the weak I am made all things to all men that I
Just Mart. Apol. 2. p. 93. Ignat. Ep. ad Magn. the Constituted-Prayers (k) (k) (k) Orig. Cont. Cels l. 6. and the Solemn-Prayers (l) (l) (l) Cyp. de laps serm 14. which last was the Title by which the Heathens then distinguish'd and express'd their publick Forms of Prayer (m) (m) (m) Vid. Ovid. l. 6. de fastis Statius Papin l. 4. Senec. in Oedip. Act 2. Sect 2. and consequently in the Language of that Age must signifie a publick Form And as for that particular Form of Prayers so often used in our Liturgy Glory be to the Father c. St. Basil fetches the Original of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the tradition of the Apostles and cites this Doxology from St. Clemens the Apostles Scholar and from Dionysius of Alexandria (n) (n) (n) Basil de sp s c. 27. 29. who was living Anno 200. and Clemens of Alexandria who was living Anno 160 sets down these words as the Christians Form of praising God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 (o) (o) (o) Clem. Alex. Paedag. Praising the Father and the Son with the Holy Ghost And therefore though there are some who attribute the composure of this Eucharistical Hymn to the rise of the Arian Sect yet from these Authorities it is much more probable that it was long before composed and used in the publick Worship of the Church for the Arians are sharply reproved by the Orthodox Fathers for altering this ancient Form into Glory be to the Father by the Son and in the Holy Ghost (p) (p) (p) Theod. Hist Eccl. l. 2. c. 24. And indeed a great-part of the Primitive Worship consisted of Hymns and Doxologies which could no longer be extempore than while the miraculous Gifts continued after which they must necessarily be composed into set Forms for Tertullian tells us that their Coetus antelucani their meetings before day were ad canendum Christo ut Deo to sing to Christ as God (q) (q) (q) Tertul. Apologet. c. 2. And Lucian before him thus describes the practice of Christians that they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 spend whole nights in watching and singing of Psalms (r) (r) (r) Lucian Philop. So also Justin Martyr describing the Christian life tells us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We are to sing Hymns and Psalms and Odes and Praise (s) (s) (s) Just Mart. Epist ad Zen. Heren Now it 's evident that in Pliny's and Lucian's time the Christians used set Forms of Hymns not onely of divine but also of humane composure for so Pliny tells us (t) (t) (t) Plin. Epist l. 10. Ep. 97. That early in the morning it was their manner to sing by turns a Hymn to Christ as to God which Hymn was doubtless of humane composure there being no Hymn to Christ in Scripture of that length as to take up a considerable part of their publick Service And besides Eusebius tells us That very early there were various Psalms and Odes composed by Christians concerning the Divinity of Christ (u) (u) (u) Euseb Hist lib. 5. and that Paulus Samosetanus was condemned for suppressing those Hymns that were made in the Honour of Christ as being the compositions of men of late days (w) (w) (w) Ibid. Hist lib. 7. though in all probability those Hymns were composed within much less than an hundred years after the Apostolical Age but as for this Hymn which Pliny speaks of it was earlier for it could not be much above ten years after the death of St. John that Pliny gave this account of Christians to Trajan and therefore to be sure the Hymn he there speaks of was used in the Age of the Apostles And about the same time Lucian makes mention of a Prayer which they used in their publick Worship 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 beginning from the Father which doubtless was the Lord's Prayer and of a famous Hymn added to the end of their Service (x) (x) (x) Lucian Philop. which in all probability was the Hymn that Pliny speaks of Since therefore the Primitive Worship did in a great measure consist of Hymns which were Forms of Praise intermixt with Prayer and some of these of humane composure this is an evident Testimony of the Primitive use of Forms And doubtless they who made no scruple of praying by Form in verse could not think it unlawful to pray by Form in prose for that praying in Meeter or composed Hymns was a very early Practice in the Christian Church is evident from the Apostolical Constitutions where it is injoyned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let the People sing the verses which answer adversly to one another (y) (y) (y) Constit Apost l. 2. c. 5. which way of singing was so very ancient that Eusebius (z) (z) (z) Euseb Hist Eccles l. 2. c. 17. urges it as an argument to prove the Essenes Christians because they sung by turns answering one another But how could they thus answer to one another in their Hymns and Prayers unless they had constant Forms of Prayer But that they had such Forms of Responsal in Prayer is evident because when Julian for the credit of Gentilism would needs dress it up 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 (a) (a) (a) Sos Hist l. 5. c. 15. after the Order of the Christian Worship one thing wherein he sought to imitate it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in their constituted Prayers that is not in having constituted Forms of Prayer for that the Heathen had before but in having such constituted Forms as the Christians had that is as Nazianzen explains it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Form of Prayer to be said in parts (b) (b) (b) Nazian Orat. 1. p. 102. for this way of praying in parts Nicephorus (c) (c) (c) Niceph. l. 13. c. 8. derives from Ignatius who was a Scholar of the Apostles All which to me is a plain demonstration of the great antiquity of Forms And that in Constantine's time the Church used publick Forms of Prayer is evident from that often-cited place of Eusebius (d) (d) (d) Euseb d◠Laud. Constant where he tells us of Constantine's composing Godly Prayers for the use of his Souldiers and elsewhere tells us in particular what the Prayer was We acknowledge thee O God alone c. (e) (e) (e) Id. de vit Constant c. 20. which is a plain evidence that it was a set Form of words But it 's objected that this Form was composed onely for the use of his Souldiers who were a great part of them Heathens and that Constantine's composing it is a plain evidence that at that time there were no publick Forms in the Church for if there had what need Constantine have composed one To which I answer That this Form indeed was composed onely for his Heathen Souldiers for as for his Christian Souldiers the story tells us that he gave them liberty to go to Church
disparagement at all to the Ministers Office upon these accounts 1. Although the Formal Words of Good Lord deliver us and We beseech thee to hear us Good Lord be uttered by the People yet it must be acknowledged that this is but part of the Prayer of the Litany that which the Minister utters being the other part and the far greater part 2. That the Words of Prayer are begun by the Minister not only in the Invocation of the Holy Trinity first of all but in that Prayer Remember not Lord our Offences and Spare us Good Lord and We beseech thee O Lord God c. So that the Minister does utter the Formal Words of Prayer and the People take them all afterward from him excepting only the Words of that Petition Good Lord deliver us 3. They are but these two short and known Petitions Good Lord deliver us and We beseech thee to hear us Good Lord upon the uttering of which by the People the weight of the Objection lies And if they will allow the People any Vocal part in the Words of Prayer I know not what Petitions are more proper for them than such as these As for the Repetition of them there is this reason for it that there is still new and distinct Matter to which they are applied And I will be bold to say that the repeated application of them is a great relief to attention and minding the business we are about and evidently contributes to keep up an affectionate and ardent frame of Heart in desiring those weighty things we ask of God in this Prayer I could almost appeal to the keenest of our Adversaries if that Petition Good Lord deliver us were applied but once in gross to the Deprecations and Supplications of that part of the Litany to which it belongs whether we should not be more apt to let our attention fall and to forget the meaning and to languish in the offering up of those Prayers than as it is now ordered But 4. I think it is plain that in offering up these Prayers to God the Minister has the Principal and Guiding part in that he utters all the distinct Matter of the Prayer which the People do not whereas he utters Words of Invocation as well as they And now I desire our Brethren to consider whether if the People were to utter that which is the Ministers part now and the Minister to say that only which is theirs they would not have more grievously complained that the Ministers Authority was slighted in the whole design since he seemed only to learn from the People what the Congregation was to pray for It is of great Consequence with what Mind we come to consider any thing if with prejudice and dislike we are then ready to turn all that is reasonably produced in favour for it into an argument of distaste and that seems unreasonable with the quite contrary to which we should have been more displeas'd if this had been instead of the other But surely we may judge of these things with Impartiality and if need be with Candor as we ought to do And if the difficulty of doing so be seen in the frequency of doing the Contrary even amongst Men otherwise good we have the greater need to intreat of God to enlighten our Understandings and to rescue us from prejudices and passions in the Judgment we make of all things of this nature I do not intimate this any way in affectation of seeming not to need this exhortation my self but remembring my own frailty I do hereupon admonish my self as well as others In the mean time if there be any Biass upon my Judgment in that esteem I declare my self to have of the Prayers of the Church I must confess that I believe my self to be byass'd on the right hand For I take it to be much more for the safety of my own Soul as well as the security of the Churches Peace that I should be inclined rather to Judge too favourably of Publick Rules than to value them beneath their just worth and usefulness But I must confess That of all the Prayers in our Liturgie that are of Humane Composition I should be most unwilling to part with the Litany as it now stands there It seems to be what it was designed to be a Form of Prayer apt to excite our most intense and servent desires of God's Grace and Mercy Whilest the Minister leads the people to pray against those several Sins and Evils which a Christian is most concerned to be afraid of and at the end of every convenient period the Congregation with one voice cries out Good Lord deliver us while the Minister leads them to pray for all those particular Blessings which ought to be most dear to a Christian and the whole Congregation with one voice cries out We beseech thee to hear us Good Lord. These Prayers seem to be offered with such affection as I am not well able to express by any ordinary instance In Offering them we seem to be as passionately concerned as a Malefactor upon his knees that begs his own life The whole Office is framed with respect both to matter and contrivance for the raising of the utmost Devotion of good Christians and for the warming of the coldest hearts by the heat of the Congregation And in such a disposition it is then most fit to express our Charity by praying for others even all sorts of Men as distinctly and particularly as Publick Prayers will bear And this the fullness of this Prayer doth admirably provide for as no Man will deny who considers it without aversion and prejudice against it which I pray God deliver all well meaning people from that they may not deprive themselves of so great a benefit I shall say no more concerning this Matter of the peoples joyning in Vocal Prayer and Praise And indeed the Reason why I have dwelt so long upon an Answer to this Objection is because I have observed that some honest persons are very confident that in this thing at least our Liturgie is to be blamed And I hope what hath been said will to such persons give reasonable satisfaction that for this thing it is rather to be commended But because upon this occasion the part of the Congregation in the Litany was last mentioned I shall now speak briefly to some other Objections against the Litany which are commonly made The first of these is That we pray to be delivered from all deadly sin which seems to imply that there are some Sins which are not deadly Now in answer to this it is by some truly enough said That these Words do not necessarily imply a distinction between Sins that are and Sins that are not deadly But admitting that such a distinction was intended yet I think no understanding Christian has reason to be offended with it By Deadly Sin a Protestant means all such Sin as puts a Man out of a state of Favour with God But all
Sins are not thus Deadly For in many things we offend all and as for those Sins which the Regenerate commit through Humane Frailty only they are not thereby put into a state of Damnation And though all Sin be in its own Nature Deadly or Damnable yet through the Mercy of God and the Merits of Christ Sins of meer Infirmity are not imputed to true Believers and therefore not Deadly to them But there are some Sins so heinous that he who Commits them is thereby put into a Damnable state and till he recovers himself by true Repentance and Actual Reformation he cannot upon any good ground promise to himself that the wrath of God does not abide upon him And 't is of such Sins as these that this passage is to be understood as appears by Deadly Sin being added to Fornication From Fornication and all other Deadly Sin Good Lord deliver us So that this Petition seems to be of the same Nature with that of the Psalmist Keep back thy Servant also from presumptuous sins let not them have dominion over me then shall I be upright and I shall be innocent from the great Transgression Psal 19. 13. Whereas therefore these Words of the Litany seem to suppose that some Sins are not Deadly we should be very unjust to make such a Construction of them as if they implyed that some Sins are in their own nature Venial and so slight that they will be forgiven without any consideration for as I have shewn we may hold that distinction which the Words suppose and yet retain that Protestant Doctrine that no Sin is forgiven but through the Mercy of God and the Merits and Mediation of Christ Again some are offended with our praying against Sudden Death But why should we not by Sudden Death understand our being taken out of this World when we are not fit to die For sometimes a thing is said to be Sudden to us when we are not prepared for it And in this sense can any good Christian find fault with the Petition But suppose that by Sudden Death we mean what is commonly understood by it that is a Death of which a Man has not the least warning by Sickness Are there not reasons why even good Men may desire not to die suddenly May they not when they find themselves drawing towards their end by their good Instructions and Admonitions make impression upon their Friends Companions and Relations to the bettering of them May not their Counsels be more effectual with them than ever they were before And is it not reasonable to believe they will be so As for themselves may not the warning they have of Approaching Death be improved to make them more fit to die than they were in their perfect health In a Word he that thinks himself to have sufficiently perfected holiness in the fear of God and not to stand in need of those Acts of Self-Examination Humiliation and Devotion by which good Men improve the warnings of Death which Mortal Sickness or Extream Age gives them let him suspend his Act and refuse to joyn with us when we pray God to deliver us from Sudden Death There is yet another Objection which I should not have named but that some of the Dissenters who seem to understand very little of Religion by making it have it often in their Mouths That is when we pray to be delivered by the Mystery of Christs Holy Incarnation c. by his Agony and Bloody Sweat by his Cross and Passion c. and by the coming of the Holy Ghost They say some of them that this is Swearing some that it is Conjuring and I know not what For which sayings favouring of great profaneness they ought to be severely rebuked and that is all the answer they should have were it not that some of them may be grosly ignorant of the true Sense of these Petitions And therefore I say that they might easily suppose if they would give their Minds to it that we pray to be delivered through the Saving Efficacy of Christs Incarnation and Passion c. And yet I do not take this to be the principal meaning or that which was intended For I conceive that to be this that when we say By the Mystery of thy Holy Incarnation and by thy Cross and Passion c. Good Lord deliver us we implore Christ who has already shewed such inestimable goodness towards us by taking our Nature to his Divinity to Die upon the Cross to be Buryed to Rise again to ascend into Heaven and there to intercede with the Father for us and by sending the Holy Ghost to qualifie the Apostles for their great Work of carrying the Word of Salvation into the World I say we implore him who hath already done such mighty things for our Salvation and we plead with him by that goodness which he hath already given us such great demonstrations of by those wonders of Mercy that he hath wrought for us that he would now go on to deliver us by his powerful Grace from these Evils which we pray against And this is so reasonable so devout and affectionate so humble and thankful a way of Praying that I am sorry that any who call themselves Believers should be so ignorant as not to understand it or so profane and unlike what they pretend to be as to deride it Though God does not need to be put in mind of his former benefits towards us yet it is fit for us to mention them in our most earnest Prayers not only because we are to make a grateful acknowledgment of them to him but likewise because by this means we encourage our selves to ask in Faith since he who unaskt hath done such great things for us will not fail upon our earnest and humble prayer which himself also hath required to give us all other good things that we need and to deliver us from all real evils of which we are in danger I proceed next to consider whether there be any just cause to find fault with the reading of the Apocryphal Lessons in our Church And 1. It must be acknowledged by those who allow the usefulness of Sermons and Catechising in the Church that those Chapters may be read in the Church though they are not Divinely inspired Writings since no sober Man will pretend that the Minister Preaches or Catechises by Inspiration But if other good Instructions may be read or recited in the Church besides the Word of God it self why may not some Lessons out of the Apocryphal Books be read which contain excellent Rules of good Life and Exhortations and Encouragements to Virtue and Piety especially since those writings were greatly esteemed by the Church in its purest Ages when they and other Humane Writings were also Publickly read as well as the Holy Scriptures 2. If it be said that those Chapters of Canonical Scripture which are omitted in the Calendar would be more profitably read instead of the Apocryphal Chapters it ought
that since themselves were desired by them to undertake for this Child they as such Sureties are particularly concerned to mind the Parents of their Duty and if need be to rebuke them sharply for neglecting it since they did in effect and to all purpose of Obligation undertake for the performance of it when the Sureties undertook for the Child Moreover when the Child is grown to years of Knowledge and come abroad into the World he is liable to the Charitable Admonitions of his Sureties as well as of his Parents in case he does amiss and their Reproofs are more likely to take place than those of most other Persons Now though all Christians as Members of one Body are to take care of and to watch over one another yet some are more Particularly Obliged and have greater Advantages to do those Works of Spiritual Charity than others And I appeal to all considering Men if Sureties at Baptism may not with great Authority and with likelyhood of good effect Reprove both those Negligent Parents and Vnruly Children for whom they have undertaken to the Church The Parents for not minding to Educate their Children in the knowledge and keeping of the Baptismal Vow or the Children for not hearkening to good Admonition And in this Age when the Duty of Christian Reproof is so generally omitted it were well if the defect were this way a little supplied But it is by no means desireable that the opportunity thereof and the obligation thereunto should be taken away I know some will be apt to say that this is but rarely Practised But that is no sufficient Answer to what I have said For when we use to judge of the goodness of a Rule or Custom by the good that comes of observing it we must look where 't is kept though it be kept but by few and not where 't is broken And if the Dissenters have nothing to say against the use of Sureties but that the end of this Appointment is seldom regarded themselves may help to remove this Objection by returning to the Church and encreasing the number of those that do pursue the End of it And thus doing they shall have the benefit of this Order of the Church and the Church the benefit of their good Examples As for the use of the Interrogatories put to the Sureties and their Answers they are a Solemn Declaration of what Baptism doth oblige all Baptiz'd Persons to and that Infants do stand ingaged to perform the Vow of Baptism when they shall come to years of knowledge This is the known meaning of the Contract nor did I ever hear of any that otherwise understood it and therefore I see not why it should be said to be liable to misunderstanding After all there is one General Objection yet remaining which still prevails with some Persons and that is That some of our Prayers are to be found in the Mass-Book and the Breviary and the Offices of the Church of Rome This Objection hath made a great noise but I appeal to Understanding Men if there be any sense in it No Man will say that 't is enough to make any Prayer or Form of Devotion or Instruction unlawful to be used that the same is to be found in the Mass-Book c. For then the Lords Prayer the Psalms and a great part of the Scriptures besides and the Creeds must never be used by us And therefore whether any part of the Roman Service is to be used by us or not must be judged of by some other Rule that is by the Word of God So that 't is a vain Exception against any part of our Liturgie to say it was taken out of the Mass-Book unless it could be shewn withal that it is some part of the Romish Superstition I know it has been said that the Scriptures being of necessary use are to be retained by us though the Church of Rome retains them but that there is not the same Reason for Forms which are not necessary but in those we ought to go as far from that Church as ever we can But what reason is there for this For the Danger that may happen to us in coming too near them lies in things wherein they do ill not in which they do well And as for the Papists themselves we do not in the least countenance them wherein they are wrong by agreeing with them wherein they are right And as for the Things themselves they are not the worse for being used by them We should allow the Papists a greater Power to do mischief than they have if their using of some good things should render all use of them hurtful to us The Case in short is this When our Reformers were intent upon the Reformation of the Liturgie they designed to Purge it of all those corrupt Additions which the usurpt Authority of the Church of Rome had long since brought into it and to retain nothing but what was agreeable to the Holy Scriptures and to the Practice of the purer Ages of the Church And in this they did like Wise Men because thus it would be evident to all the World that they Reformed upon just necessary Reasons and not meerly out of a desire of Change and Innovation since they Purged the Forms of Divine Service from nothing but Innovations and Corruptions and an unprofitable croud of Ceremonies No Man can shew a good Reason why those Passages in the Common-Prayer-Book which are to be found in the Mass-Book but which were used also by the Church before Romanism had Corrupted it are not as much to be Valued because they were once used by good Christians as to be run down because they have been since used by Superstitious and Idolatrous Men. But to conclude this Matter If any Man would set himself to expose the Mass-Book he would I suppose lay hold upon nothing but the Corruptions that are in it and things that are obnoxious to just reproof not on things that are justifiable and may easily be defended And the reason of this is plain because the Mass-Book is to blame for those parts of it only but not for these Now for such Passages as the Mass-Book it self is not to be blamed for neither is our Liturgie to be blamed if we will speak justly of things and without Prejudice and Passion I have now considered all those Exceptions against the Solemn Service of God by our Liturgie which the Dissenters are thought to insist most upon Not but that some other Exceptions have been made by the Ministers of that persuasion But this I hope was without design to prejudice the People against our Communion but rather to gain some alterations which in their Judgment would have been advantageous to the Book of Common-Prayer and given it a greater perfection whether they were right in this or not I will not now dispute being very desirous as I pray God we may all be to avoid Controversies in this Matter as much as may be Nay
again For now comes another Exorcising or Conjuring of the Devil And this being also concluded the Priest takes Spittle out of his Mouth and touches therewith the Ears and Nostrils of the Infant And in touching his right and left Ear he saith Ephphatha i. e. Be opened Then touching his Nostrils he saith for a savour of sweetness no doubt mighty sweet Another Conjuration of the Devil followeth in these Words Be packing O Devil for the judgment of God is at hand And now the Priest will make you hope again that he hath not forgotten his main business For he asks the Infant whether he renounces the Devil and all his Works and all his Pomps of which he makes three Questions and the God-Father distinctly answers to them But alas he is thus soon gone off from his proper Work again for now you have him dipping his Thumb in Holy Oyl and Anointing the Infant with it in his Breast and betwixt his Shoulders in the figure of a Cross saying I Anoint thee with the Oyl of Salvation in Christ Jesus our Lord that thou mayest obtain Eternal Life Amen Then next he puts off his Purple Robe and puts on another of a White Colour and falls in good earnest to the great business for having askt three more Questions out of the Creed and received the God-Fathers Answers and this other Question Whether the Infant will be Baptized and received the God-Fathers answer to that he pours Water thrice upon the Childs head as he reciteth over it our Saviours Form of Baptism doing it each time at the naming of each of the three Persons And now that the Priest mayn't conclude less wisely than he began comes the Chrism or Holy Ointment in which dipping his Thumb and Anointing the Infant upon the Crown of his head in the figure of a Cross he thus Prayeth O God Omnipotent the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath regenerated thee of Water and the Holy Ghost and who hath given thee Pardon of all thy Sins Anoint thee with the Chrism of Salvation in the same Christ Jesus our Lord to Eternal Life Amen And next after the Pax tibi and the wiping of his Thumb and the Anointed head he takes a White Linnen Cloath and putting it on the Childs head useth this Form Take the white Garment which thou maist carry unspotted before the Tribunal of our Lord Jesus Christ that thou maist have Eternal Life Amen And Lastly He puts into the Childs or his God-Fathers hand a lighted Candle and saith Receive the burning Lamp and keep thy Baptism blameless keep Gods Commandments that when the Lord shall come to the Wedding thou maist meet him together with all his Saints in the Celestial Court and maist have Eternal Life and live for ever Amen Concluding all with this Form Go in Peace and the Lord be with thee Amen And as if there were not fooling and ridiculous doings enough in this Office of the Common Ritual there are divers other added to them in the Pastorale For instance the Ceremony of blowing thrice in the Childs Face is here to be done Crossways And after the Conjuration following to which two more are here added the Priest Crossing his Forehead saith I Sign thee in the Forehead in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ that thou maist trust in him Then he Crosseth his Eyes saying I bless thy Eyes that thou maist see his Brightness Then his Ears saying I bless thine Ears that thou Which Crossings are also prescribed by the Ritual in the Office of Adult Baptism but with a variation of the Forms maist hear the Word of his truth Then his Nostrils saying I bless thy Nostrils that thou maist smell his sweetness Then his Breast saying I bless thy Breast that thou maist believe in him Then his Shoulders saying I bless thy Shoulders that thou maist bear the Yoke of his Service Then his Mouth saying I bless thy Mouth that thou maist Confess him who Lives and Reigns God with the Father c. Again The Child here receives the Sign of the Cross in his Right-hand the Priest saying calling him by his Name I deliver thee the Sign of our Lord Jesus Christ in thy Right-hand that thou maist Sign thy self and drive away the Enemy on all sides from thee and maist have Eternal Life c. Here also the Priest is to lay his Robe on the Child in the Figure of a Cross with a many dire menaces tormenting the Devil before his time Here also the Ave Maria is added to the Pater Noster The Infant likewise hath this Benediction pronounced over him before his going to the Font The Benediction of God the Father ✚ Almighty and of his Son ✚ and Holy Ghost ✚ descend and abide upon thee and the Angel of the Lord keep thee until thou comest to Holy Baptism As if the poor Creature were in mighty danger of being carried away by the Devil before he could be Baptized notwithstanding all the past Conjurations and dreadful doings that had been made with him and all the Crosses together with the holy Oyl and holy Spittle bestowed on the Infant And lastly to name no more additions though there are divers others the Flax wherewith the anointed places are wiped is ordered to be burnt over a Pond of Water If those who are unacquainted with our Churches Office of Baptism would after the Reading of this of the Romish Church consult ours they will immediately acknowledge that no two things can well be more unlike than are these two Offices And the like as was said may be seen in the rest as those may perceive who if they understand sorry Latine will take the pains to compare theirs with ours And whereas we asserted the same thing of their and our Forms of Morning and Evening Prayers we might particularly instance in the Litanies Our Litany which I think if comparisons may be allowed is the choicest part of our Service is more than any other part of the Liturgy condemned by Dissenters as Savouring of Popish Superstition But as nothing but great Ignorance can make any man think it really doth so so I am perswaded that the meer comparing it with that of the Romanists might incline the most prejudiced to call it a most Protestant piece of Devotion For they shall find Invocations of Saints and Angels to pray for them the greater part of the Popish Litany Next after the Holy Trinity St. Mary is there invoked first by name then as the Mother of God then as the Virgin of Virgins Next to her three Angels are invoked by name Then all the Angels and Arch-Angels together Then all the holy Orders of Blessed Spirits Next John the Baptist Next all the Patriarchs and Prophets Next St. Peter and all the other Apostles and Evangelists by name Then Altogether Then all the holy Disciples of our Lord. Then all the Holy Innocents Then the Protomartyr St. Stephen and Ten other by Name Then all the Holy Martyrs
that the word dedicated doth there import no more than declared by that Ceremony to be dedicated viz. by the foregoing Baptism like as the Priest is said to have cleansed the Leper whom he onely declareth to be clean Lev. 14. 11. And 't is manifest from the account given of the imposing of this Ceremony in that Canon that this Phrase cannot otherwise be understood I shall not need to add any thing more about this Ceremony after I have said that our Church retains it not in imitation of the Church of Rome but of the Primitive Christians they thereby to use the Words of the foresaid Canon making an outward profession even to the astonishment of the Jews that they were not ashamed to acknowledge him for their Lord and Saviour who died for them upon the Cross c. And as it follows this use of the Sign of the Cross in Baptism was held in the Primitive Church as well by the Greeks as the Latins with one consent and great applause c. I conclude with Beza's judgment of the Lawfulness of Resp ad Baldw. p. 324. this Ceremony Saith he I know many too have retained the use of the Sign of the Cross the Adoration of the Cross being taken away Let them as is meet use their own Liberty But in our Church not onely the Adoration of the Cross but likewise all Superstition in the use of it is perfectly abolished How then can it be thought such a Symbolizing with the Church of Rome as may warrant Separation from our Communion 3. As to the Ceremony of Kneeling at the Communion If our Churches Declaration at the end of the Communion-Service will not vindicate her from an Unlawful Symbolizing with Rome herein I have nothing to say in her defence The declaration is this Whereas it is ordained in this Office for the Administration of the Lords Supper that the Communicants should receive the same Kneeling which order is well meant for a signification of our humble and grateful acknowledgment of the benefits of Christ therein given to all worthy Receivers and for the avoiding of such Prophanation and disorder in the Holy Communion as might otherwise ensue yet lest the same Kneeling should by any Persons either out of Ignorance and Infirmity or out of Malice and Obstinacy be misconstrued and depraved It is here declared that thereby no Adoration is intended or ought to be done either unto the Sacramental Bread and Wine there bodily received or unto any Corporal-Presence of Christ's Natural Flesh and Blood For the Sacramental Bread and Wine remain still in their very Natural substances and therefore may not be adored for that were Idolatry to be abhorred of all faithful Christians And the Natural Body and Blood of our Saviour Christ are in Heaven and not here it being against the truth of Christs Natural Body to be at one time in more places than one We see that our Church doth here not only declare that no Adoration is in this Gesture intended either to the Elements or to Christ's Corporal Presence under the Species of Bread and Wine but also that as such a Pretence is absurd and contradictions so the adoring of the Sacramental Bread and Wine would be Idolatry to be abhorred by all faithful Christians So that as nothing is in it self more indifferent than this Gesture in receiving the Holy Communion there being not one Word said of the Gesture in our Saviours Institution of this Sacrament either before his Death to his Disciples or after his Ascension to St. Paul who hath delivered to us what he received of the Lord about this matter as he said that is all that he had received and as Christ hath Consequently lest the particular Gesture to the determination of the Church a Gesture being in the general necessary so this Circumstance of Symbolizing with the Church of Rome herein cannot make Our Churches requiring Kneeling to be Unlawful and much less our Obedience to the Church in using this Gesture seeing all the Idolatry and Superstition too wherewith the Church of Rome hath abused it is perfectly removed and 't is required by our Church meerly as a decent Reverend Gesture 4. As to the Ring in Marriage The Church of Rome as is to be seen in the Office of Matrimony juxta usum Ecclesiae Sarisburiensis abuseth it most notoriously There you have it first blessed with two Prayers in the former of which God is beseeched to send his blessing on this Ring that she who shall wear it may be Armed with the Power of Heavenly defence and it may be beneficial to her to Eternal life through Christ our Lord. And in the latter the Priest Crossing himself Prayeth that God would bless this Ring which we in thy Holy Name bless that whosoever shall wear it may abide in his Peace c. Next Holy Water is sprinkled upon the Ring And lastly the Bridegroom puts it upon the Brides Thumb the Bridegroom saying In the Name of the Father Then upon her second Finger saying And of the Son Then on the third saying And of the Holy Ghost Then on the fourth saying Amen And there he leaves it And there is expressed a special Mystery in leaving it upon that Finger But there is used nothing of this impious or Superstitious fooling about the Ring in our Office of Marriage All the doings about it are the Bridegrooms putting it on the fourth Finger he saying after the Minister With this Ring I thee Wed and the mentioning of it in the Prayer following as a Token and Pledg of the Vow and Covenant made between the Married Persons So that 't is so far from being used as a Sacramental sign among us that it no otherwise differs from a meer civil Ceremony than as 't is a Token and Pledg of a Covenant made between the Parties in the most Solemn manner viz. as in the presence of God And in truth this is such a Symbolizing with the Church of Rome as I should be ashamed to bestow two Words about but that so many of our Brethren have been pleased to take offence at it Lastly As to our Observation of certain Holy days All I shall say about it is 1. That there is no Comparison between the number of our Holy-days and the Popish ones 2. Our few are purged from all the Superstitious and wicked Solemnizations of the Popish ones 3. We observe scarcely any besides such as wherein we have the Primitive Church for our Example Excepting those which are enjoyned upon the account of Deliverances and Calamities in which our own Nation is peculiarly concerned 4. An observation of them void of Superstitious conceits about them and onely as our Church directeth can have no other than a very good Effect upon our Hearts and lives If we could say as St. Austin did of the Christians in his time viz. By Festival Solemnities and set days we dedicate and sanctify to God the memory of his Benefits lest unthankful forgetfulness of
absolve by commission from God more than declaratively I mean I know no one that maketh the Priest's Absolution to be other in Effect than declarative though it signifies more than if pronounced by a Layman Nor your Fourth That the Natural Body and Bloud of Christ is in the Elements of Bread and Wine really Our Church-Catechism saith that The Body and Bloud of Christ are verily and indeed taken and received by the faithfull in the Lord's Supper And I know no Divine of ours that explaineth this otherwise than thus That Believers feed on the Body and Bloud of Christ in the Lord's Supper as truly and really as they do on the Elements but not after a corporal and carnal manner but after a spiritual viz. by applying to themselves the Benefits of Christ's death by faith And I presume you will neither assert this to be Popish Doctrine nor deny that 't is true Doctrine Nor do I know any one of our Divines that holds your Fifth Proposition for it may not be called a Doctrine viz. That our Conformable Congregations are no better than Conventicles where the Minister reads not the Communion Service at the Altar Which you assert to be tantamount to the allowing of Prayers in an Vnknown Tongue because in multitudes of Congregations the People cannot hear a line from him I say I know of no Divine of our Church that ever asserted that such Congregations as the forementioned are no better than Conventicles There was indeed lately a foolish Book published to Prove them Conventicles but it is strongly conjectured that this Book was written by a certain Layman And what Church he is of I cannot say nor is it a pins matter to know But I may as much suspect him to be a Protestant Dissenter as a Popish upon the score of that his Position it being nothing of kin to the allowing of Prayers in an Vnknown tongue For as there is not One of your Multitudes of Congregations wherein the People cannot hear a line from him that reads at the Communion Table except you mean wherein every one of the People cannot for I doubt not the Major part can in all where the Minister hath a voice to be well heard from the Pulpit so all that is read is known before to those who are not Strangers to our Prayers or at least they may have Books to enable them to go along with the Minister whether they can or cannot hear distinctly one sentence from him Nor do I know any one of our Divines that hath ever taught your 6th Doctrine That whole Christ is under each Element which you intimate is the onely foundation on which the Sacrilegious Romish Practice stands But if I could believe that Doctrine to be true I should notwithstanding judge it an intolerable thing to refuse the Cup to the Laity against the express Institution of our Lord. Nor know I any Divine of ou Church guilty of the 7th particular of your Charge viz. That there are those who interpret the Ten Commandments so as that he who will ever be saved must do a great many works of supererogation And if I did know any one that so interpreted the Commandments as to make any one such work necessary to Salvation I would not call him a Papist for it but an Ignoramus who understands not the word Supererogation Nor know I any one that teacheth Original Sin thereby understanding Corruption of Nature to be rather our Misfortune than our Fault which is your 8th Doctrine Nor consequently that Concupiscence is no sin which is your 9th Nor your 10th That man hath a power in his own will to chuse and doe what is spiritually good i. e. without the Assistence of Divine Grace And with this Assistence I hope you Dissenters do all hold it Nor know I any one of our Divines who teacheth That we are not accounted righteous before God or Justified onely for the Merits of Christ that is that there is any other Meritorious cause of our Justification besides the Active and Passive obedience of Christ Nor your 11th That we are not Justified by Faith alone Understanding by Faith not a dead but a living Faith that purefies the heart and works by love Nor your 12th That good works must go before justification and are not the fruits of Faith but Faith it self For I know no one of our Church that asserts more than this that a sincere Resolution to obey all God's Commandments must in order of nature go before Justification Nor your 13th That there is no Eternal Predestination of persons to life and the means tending thereunto I know of none of our Church that have ever taught this Doctrine as you have expressed it nor any worse than this That Eternal Predestination to life is not Irrespective or Absolute which no Article of our Church saith it is And Abundance of you Dissenters hold this Doctrine as well as Church of England men And thus have I gone over all the Doctrines contradictory to the 39 Articles taught by your Ecclesia Loquens yours I say for she is not ours and I declare again that I know of no Divine of our Church that teacheth or holdeth such Doctrines If you know any as one would think you do very many I pray name them You say we spare any names in these cases but be you entreated not to spare them But if you won't be prevailed with we shall very shrewdly guess at the reason Sir to deal freely with you I cannot but wonder at your adventuring into the World this other Celeusma since the Author of the former had so ill success and must needs have repented him heartily of that Undertaking All that have consideratively read his Answerer I am confident are convinced that after a Great Cry Little Wooll appeared or rather none at all Nor can such be ignorant what foul play was used to make our Divines of the Church of England broach Heresie And I doubt not but you your self have blushed at it if you have ever read the Parallela imparia sive Specimen fidei Celeusmaticae Could you catch us thus dealing with the Books of your Authors as ours have been dealt with by that Author and some others that might be named we should at another kind of rate have been exposed than they have been But Sir for God's sake let us make as much Conscience of vile Calumny than which there is not a more express Transgression of the Law of God nor of the very Light of Nature as of Obedience to Authority in such things as no Divine Law can be produced against and nothing but strained and far-fetcht Consequences And for God's sake also let us at length be perswaded to have so great a concern for our common Religion as to give over exposing it by such unchristian doings to the Scorn and Derision of our Common Enemy But I cannot take my leave of this heavy Charge of yours till I have asked you what you inferr
not use means to attract the Praeputium which the Jews did often to avoid Shame and Persecution in Gentile Countries odious and ridiculous to all other People upon the account of it and for this reason it would have been a mighty bar to the Progress of the Gospel had the Gentiles been to be initiated thereby Furthermore it alone was reckoned as a grievous burden by reason of the painful and bloody nature of it and for that Reason also was laid aside as being inconsistent with the free and easie nature of the Christian Religion for if Zipporah was so much offended at Moses and called him a bloody Husband upon the account of it we may well presume how much the Gentiles would have been offended at the Apostles and at their Doctrine upon the account thereof No Religious Rite could be more ungrateful to Flesh and Blood and therefore the Wisdom of our Lord is to be admired in changing of it into the easie and practicable Ceremony of Baptism which was of more universal significancy and which * * * Diabolus ipsas quoque res Sacramentorum divinorum idolorum mysteriis aemulatur tingit ipse quosdam utique credentes ac fideles suos caeterum si Numae superstitiones revolvamus nonne manifeste diabolus morositatem illam Judaicae legis imitatus est Tertull. de praescrip haeret c. 40. O nimium faciles Qui tristia crimina caedis tolli flumineâ posse putatis aquâ Pagans as Paganism was nothing but Judaism corrupted by the Devil practised as well as Jews Hitherto I have given the Reasons of altering the Jewish Oeconomy and of reforming of it into the Christian Church but then my undertaking obliges me to prove what before I observed that * * * Verissimum enim est quod vir doctissimus Hugo Broughtonus ad Danielem notavit Nullos à Christo institutos ritus novos c. Grotii opusc Tom. 3. p. 520. See Dr. Hammond in his discourse of the Baptizing of Infants Christ and his Apostles who were the Reformers of it did build with many of the old Materials and conformed their new house as much as they could after the Platform of the old This will appear from Baptism it self which was a Ceremony by which †††Seld. de jure l. 2. c. 2. de Synedr l. 1. c. 3. Lightfoot Horae Hebraicae p. 42. Hammond on Matth. 3. v. 1. and of the Baptizing of Infants Jacob Altingius dissert Philologica Septima de Proselytis Proselytes both Men Women and Children were initiated into the Jewish Church Though it were but a mere humane Institution or as the dissenting Parties usually phrase it a mere humane Invention yet so much respect had our blessed Lord for the Ancient Orders and Customs of the Jewish Church that being obliged to lay by Circumcision for the reasons above mentioned he consecrated this instead of it to be the Sacrament of initiation into his Church and a Seal of the Righteousness of Faith So likewise the other Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was certainly of | | | Mede 1 Book disc 51. b. 11. Christian Sacrifice Grot. Opusc Tom. 3. p. 510. Dr. Cudworth on the Lord's Supper Thorndike of Religious Assembly chap. 10. Dr. Taylor 's great Exemplar p. 1. disc of Baptism Numb 11. Jewish Original as hath been shewed by many Learned Men and the Correspondence of the Bishops Presbyters and Deacons to the High-Priest Priests and Levites doth shew that the Subordination of the Christian Hierarchy is taken from the Jewish Church as St. Jerome observes in his Epistle to Evagrius Et ut sciamus traditiones Apostolicas sumptas de veteri Testamento quod Aaron filii ejus Levitae in Templo fuerunt hoc sibi Episcopi Presbyteri diaconi vendicent in Ecclesia What the High-Priest Priests and Levites were in the Temple that the Bishops Presbyters and Deacons are in the Church according to Apostolical Constitution taken from the Old Testament Hither also is to be referred that wonderful Correspondence betwixt the Priest-hood and Altar of the Jewish and Christian Church as it is most excellently discoursed by the Learned and Pious a a a In his Discourse concerning the one Altar and the one Priest-hood c. Mr. Dodwell To all which I may add many other Institutions as that of b b b Dr. Taylor his great Exemplar Disc of Baptism Numb 11. Lightfoot on 1 Cor. c. 5. v. 4. Excommunication and of the ritual performance of Ordination Confirmation and Absolution of Penitents by Imposition of Hands all which are of Jewish Original Likewise the Observation of the antient Love-Feasts before the Holy-Eucharist which for their extream inconvenience were taken away by the c c c Concil Sext. in Trull c. 24. Churches Authority the use of Festivals and Fasts the Institution of the Lord's day which is nothing but the Sabbath translated In a word the manifold and almost entire Correspondence of the Church in her publick Assemblies and Worship with the Synagogue as it is set forth by Mr. Thorndike in his Book of Religious Assemblies even to the formal use of the Hebrew-word d d d 1 Cor. 14. 16 Rom. 11. 36. Eph. 3. 21. Phil. 4. 20. 2 Tim. 1. 17. Heb. 23. 27. 1 Pet. 4. 11. Rev. 1. 16. Rev. 1. 7. Just Mart. Ap. 2. p. 97. Iren. l. 2. c. 10. Athan. Apol. ad const Imper. p. 683. Amen Hitherto I have made a short Previous Discourse concerning many useful Particulars As First Concerning the beginning or Original of the Jewish Church Secondly Concerning the Nature of it Thirdly Concerning the initiatory Sacrament into it and the Persons that were capable of Initiation And Lastly Concerning the alteration of it from the Legal into the Evangelical Dispensation wherein I have briefly shewed the true grounds of that blessed Reformation and how tender Christ and his Apostles were of Altering or rejecting more than was necessary or of receding more than was needful from the Jewish Church All these things I thought necessary to be discoursed as Praecognita to fit and prepare the Reader 's mind to understand the State of the Controversie about Infant-Baptism as it is proposed in these five Comprehensive Questions 1. Whether Infants are uncapable of Baptism 2. Whether they are excluded from Baptism by Christ 3. Whether it is lawful to separate from a Church which appointeth Infants to be Baptized 4. Whether it be the duty of Christian Parents to bring their Children unto Baptism 5. Whether it is lawful to Communicate with believers who were Baptized in their Infancy The whole merit of the Controversie about Infant-Baptism lies in these five Comprehensive Questions and I shall presently proceed to the stating of them after I have shew'd that Circumcision was a Sacrament of equal Significancy Force and Perfection with Baptism and that Baptism succeeded in the room of it not as the Antitype succeeded in the
great Significations in them had not the express Institution of God for their warranty and yet were well enough receiv'd in the purest times of the Jewish Church and comply'd with by our Saviour himself Secondly take we a view of the Christian Church and that both as to the first ages of it and all the later Reformations that have been made 1. We may observe even from the days of the Apostles themselves the Church hath taken the Liberty of making use of one Rite or other that hath signifi'd things of greatest weight and moment to instance in a twofold Custom primitively us'd amongst Christians that lookt much more Sacramentally than our use of the Cross in Baptism that is the institution of them seem'd Apostolical being frequently mentioned in their Holy writings and they were immediatly annext to the Holy Eucharist and in their Signification bore some analogy with what that Sacrament it self was in part the token and seal of these were the Holy Kiss and the Agapae or Feasts of Charity The Holy Kiss was perform'd as the best Writers generally conceive after all other preparations immediatly before they entred upon the Celebration of the Dr. Caves prim Christ part 1 Chap. 11. p. 346. 352. Lord's Supper and at the close and upshot of the whole Solemnity from whence Tertullian gives it the term of signaculum orationis the Seal of Prayer This the Apostle is suppos'd to direct to when he enjoyns the Corinthians 1 Cor. 16. 20. to greet one another with an holy kiss And this was kept Quae oratio cum divortio sancti osculi integra Tert. de orat up with that Reverence in Tertullian's time that he speaks as if the Service of the Publick Prayers were maim'd and imperfect if it concluded not with this kiss This was us'd in token of the mutual Communion and Fellowship that Christians had with one another and the unfeigned reconciliation of their Minds that they came with no inward heart-burnings against one another being that great Christian Grace and Vertue so much insisted upon in our Saviour's Gospel and after that by his Apostles made one great Evidence of the Professors having pass'd from Death to Life And yet that this custom had not its Foundation in any Divine Appointment but the voluntary use the Church made of it seems agreed to on all hands because afterward it is not only prohibited by some Councils but by an universal consent in all Churches wholly laid aside and grown out of all use Again we may observe as to that custom of the Agapae or Feasts of Charity which in the Apostles days 1 Cor. 11. 20 21. probably were celebrated immediately before the Lords Supper and in some Ages afterward not till the Holy Communion was finished But whether they had them before or after it is certain they had great Significations in them not only of Christians mutual Love and Communion but also of the equal regards that God and our Blessed Lord had toward all sorts and conditions of Men the poor as well as the rich those of meaner degree and quality as well as the high and noble when they were all to eat freely together at one common meal This the Apostle seems to point at in the remarks he makes upon the disorders in the Church at Corinth that in their Love-Feasts every one taketh before other his own Supper and so did despise the Church of God And those that had Houses to Eat and Drink in sham'd those that had not Now though this custom was hallowed by the practice of the Apostles and had so great Significations in it and was from the first so annext to the Holy Eucharist that it always either begun or concluded it and consequently lookt much more Sacramentally than our Sign of the Cross in Baptism can be suppos'd to do yet is it plain by the universal disuse of it in these later ages of the Church that it self never was esteem'd any Sacrament I might further instance in the Ceremony of insufflation or breathing upon the Person that was to be Baptis'd Aug. de nupt concup lib. 2. 29. call'd by one of the Fathers an ancient Tradition which they us'd as a sign of expelling the Evil Spirit and breathing into them the good Spirit this seem'd to signifie more the Grace of God than Duty of the Christian and yet not suspected as any Sacrament Thus the Baptized Persons stripping of his Garment in token that he put off the Old Man which was corrupt according to his deceitful Lusts doth it not look full as Sacramentally as our Cross in Baptism Yet we find it anciently practis'd without any jealousie of invading the prerogative of Christ in instituting Holy Sacraments To say no more what think we of the trine immersion once accounted a pious usage in the Church whereby the Person being thrice dipt or put under water at the mention of each Person of the Trinity was suppos'd to be Baptiz'd in the beleif of that great Article So Tertullian expresseth it Nam nec semel Advers Praxeam Again in lib de Coron milit sed ter ad singula nomina in Personas singulas tingimur We are dipped not once but three times at each name and so are Baptiz'd into the three Persons And besides this Signification of the three Persons by this threefold immersion which Tertullian and not only he but St. Ambrose have mention'd there are others of the Fathers that have suppos'd the Death the Burial and the Resurrection of our Saviour together with his being in the Grave three days was signifi'd by this custom And yet was this so far from being accounted any Sacrament of it self or a Sacrament within that of Baptism that the Church hath thought fit to lay Immersion aside for the generality and the threefold Immersion much sooner particularly in Spain and that upon a reason that made the single dipping as significant as the Trine had been when it was in use viz to distinguish themselves from the Arrians who had taken occasion from this threefold dipping in Baptism to assert the three distinct substances pretending a Testimony from the Catholick Church by this usage Much such a reason by the way the Reform'd Churches in Poland govern'd themselves by when in a general Synod they decreed against the Posture of sitting at the Lords Supper because that Custom had been brought in first by the Arrians who as they irreverently treat Christ so also his sacred appointments Which leads to a view of the Church in all Synod Petricov An. 1578. its later Reformations 2. Is it not very evident that in none of our later Reformations nay even in those of our Dissenting Brethren themselves but they do in their most Religious Solemnities some things that are very Symbolical Actions that have great significations in them 1. There giving to every Baptiz'd Infant a new Name which both they and we do call the Christian Name this seems to
Pap. of the Presbyt p. 31. before these unhappy Wars began yielded to the laying aside of the Cross and making many material alterations c. They have not those apprehensions of these things that they are unalterable and obligatory upon all Christians as such or that the laying them aside for the bringing about some greater good would be offensive to God I would to God our Brethren at least would but meet us thus far as to throw off those Superstitious prejudices they may have conceiv'd against them and think that as the laying them aside would not be displeasing to God so the use of them cannot be so neither Forgive the expression of Superstitious prejudices For I must suppose we put too high a value upon indifferent rites when we think that either the use or rejection of them will recommend us to God unless there be other accidents of obedience or disobedience to Authority that will alter the Case Otherwise the Imagination we may have of pleasing or displeasing God in any of these things must look like what the Greeks express Superstition by I mean a causeless dread of God It is a passage 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Calvin that it is equally Superstitious to condemn things indifferent as unholy and to command them as if they were holy It is infinitely In 2 Praecept a nobler Conquest over our selves a proper regaining that Christian liberty to which we are redeemed and would be of far happier consequence to the Church of God to possess our selves with such notions of God and of indifferent things as to believe we cannot recommend our selves to him in the least measure by scrupling what he hath interpos'd no Command to make them either Obligatory or Unlawful FINIS A Catalogue of the several Cases c. 1. A Persuasive to Communion with the Church of England 2. A Resolution of some Cases of Conscience which respect Church-Communion 3. The case of Indifferent things used in the Worship of God proposed and Stated by considering these Questions c. 4. A Discourse about Edification 5. The Resolution of this Case of Conscience Whether the Church of England's Symbolizing so far as it doth with the Church of Rome makes it unlawfull to hold Communion with the Church of England 6. A Letter to Anonymus in Answer to his three Letters to Dr. Sherlock about Church-Communion 7. Certain Cases of Conscience resolved concerning the Lawfulness of joyning with Forms of Prayer in Publick Worship In two Parts 8. The Case of mixt Communion Whether it be Lawfull to Separate from a Church upon the account of promiscuous Congregations and mixt Communions 9. An Answer to the Dissenters Objections against the Common Prayers and some other parts of Divine Service prescribed in the Liturgy of the Church of England 10. The Case of Kneeling at the Holy Sacrament stated and resolved c. The first Part. 11. Certain Cases of Conscience c. The second Part. 12. A Discourse of Profiting by Sermons and of going to hear where men think they can profit most 13. A serious Exhortation with some important Advices relating to the late Cases about Conformity recommended to the present Dissenters from the Church of England 14. An Argument for Union taken from the true interest of those Dissenters in England who profess and call themselves Protestants 15. The Case of Kneeling at the Holy Sacrament Stated and Resolved The second Part. 16. The Case of â—ay-Communion with the Church of England considered 17. A Persuasive to frequent Communion c. 18. A Defence of the Resolution of this Case viz. Whether the Church of England 's Symbolizing so far as it doth with the Church of Rome makes it unlawfull to hold Communion with the Church of England In Answer to a Book intituled A Modest Examination of that Resolution 19. The Case of compelling Men to the Holy Sacrament 1. A Discourse about the charge of Novelty upon the Reformed Church of England made by the Papists asking of us the Question Where was our Religion before Luther 2. A Discourse about Tradition shewing what is meant by it and what Tradition is to be received and what Tradition is to be rejected 3. The difference of the Case between the Separation of Protestants from the Church of Rome and the Separation of Dissenters from the Church of England 4. The Protestant Resolution of Faith c. 5. A Discourse concerning a Guide in matters of Faith c. 6. A Discourse concerning Invocation of Saints 7. A Discourse concerning the Unity of the Catholick Church maintained in the Church of England A PERSUASIVE TO Frequent Communion IN THE HOLY SACRAMENT OF THE Lords Supper LONDON Printed by M. Flesher for Brabazon Aylmer at the Three Pigeons against the Royal Exchange in Cornhill and William Rogers at the Sun against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetstreet 1684. A PERSUASIVE TO FREQUENT COMMUNION MY design in this Argument is from the Consideration of the Nature of this Sacrament of the Lord's Supper and of the perpetual Use of it to the end of the World to awaken Men to a sense of their Duty and the great Obligation which lies upon them to the more frequent receiving of it And there is the greater need to make men sensible of their Duty in this particular because in this last Age by the unwary Discourses of some concerning the Nature of this Sacrament and the danger of receiving it unworthily such doubts and fears have been raised in the minds of Men as utterly to deter many and in a great measure to discourage almost the generality of Christians from the use of it to the great prejudice and danger of Mens Souls and the visible abatement of Piety by the gross neglect of so excellent a means of our growth and improvement in it and to the mighty scandal of our Religion by the general disuse and contempt of so plain and solemn an Institution of our blessed Lord and Saviour Therefore I shall take occasion as briefly and clearly as I can to treat of these four Points First Of the Perpetuity of this Institution this the Apostle signifies when he saith that by eating this 1 Cor. 11. 26. Bread and drinking this Cup we do shew the Lord's Death till he come Secondly Of the Obligation that lies upon all Christians to a frequent observance of this Institution this is signified in that Expression of the Apostle As often as ye eat this Bread and drink this Cup which Expression considered and compared together with the practice of the Primitive Church does imply an Obligation upon Christians to the frequent receiving of this Sacrament Thirdly I shall endeavour to satisfie the Objections and Scruples which have been raised in the Minds of Men and particularly of many devout and sincere Christians to their great discouragement from their receiving this Sacrament at least so frequently as they ought which Objections are chiefly grounded upon what the Apostle says Wherefore whosoever
shall eat this Bread and drink this Cup of the Lord unworthily 1 Cor. 11. 27. is guilty of the Body and Bloud of the Lord and doth eat Ver. 29. and drink damnation to himself Fourthly What Preparation of our selves is necessary in order to our worthy receiving of this Sacrament which will give me occasion to explain the Apostle's meaning in those Words But let a man examine himself Ver. 28. and so let him eat of that Bread and drink of that Cup. I. For the Perpetuity of this Institution implyed in those Words For as often as ye eat this Bread and drink this Cup ye do shew forth the Lord's Death till he come or the Words may be read imperatively and by way of Precept shew ye forth the Lord's Death till he come In the three verses immediately before the Apostle particularly declares the Institution of this Sacrament with the manner and circumstances of it as he had received it not onely by the hands of the Apostles but as the Words seem rather to intimate by immediate Revelation from our Lord himself ver 23. For I have received of the Lord that which I also delivered unto you that the Lord Jesus in the same night that he was betrayed took Bread and when he had given Thanks he brake it and said take eat this is my Body which is broken for you this doe in remembrance of me After the same manner also he took the Cup when he had supped saying this Cup is the New Testament in my Bloud this doe as often as ye shall drink it in remembrance of me So that the Institution is in these Words this doe in remembrance of me In which words our Lord commands his Disciples after his Death to repeat these actions of taking and breaking and eating the Bread and of drinking of the Cup by way of solemn Commemoration of him Now whether this was to be done by them once onely or oftner and whether by the Disciples onely during their lives or by all Christians afterwards in all successive Ages of the Church is not so certain merely from the force of these Words doe this in remembrance of me but what the Apostle adds puts the matter out of all doubt that the Institution of this Sacrament was intended for all Ages of the Christian Church For as often as ye eat this Bread and drink this Cup ye do shew the Lord's Death till he come that is untill the time of his second coming which will be at the end of the World So that this Sacrament was designed to be a standing Commemoration of the Death and Passion of our Lord till he should come to Judgment and consequently the Obligation that lies upon Christians to the observation of it is perpetual and shall never cease to the end of the World So that it is a vain conceit and more dream of the Enthusiasts concerning the seculum Spiritûs Sancti the Age and dispensation of the Holy Ghost when as they suppose all humane Teaching shall cease and all external Ordinances and Institutions in Religion shall vanish and there shall be no farther use of them Whereas it is very plain from the new Testament that Prayer and outward Teaching and the Use of the two Sacraments were intended to continue among Christians in all Ages As for Prayer besides our natural Obligation to this duty if there were no revealed Religion we are by our Saviour particularly exhorted to watch and pray with regard to the day of Judgment and in consideration of the uncertainty of the time when it shall be And therefore this will always be a Duty incumbent upon Christians till the day of Judgment because it is prescribed as one of the best ways of Preparation for it That outward Teaching likewise and Baptism were intended to be perpetual is no less plain because Christ hath expresly promised to be with the Teachers of his Church in the use of these Ordinances to the end of the World Matth. 28. 19 20. Go and disciple all Nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost and lo I am with you always to the end of the World Not onely to the end of that particular Age but to the end of the Gospel Age and the consummation of all Ages as the Phrase clearly imports And it is as plain from this Text that the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was intended for a perpetual Institution in the Christian Church till the second coming of Christ viz. his coming to Judgment Because St. Paul tells us that by these Sacramental Signs the Death of Christ is to be represented and commemorated till he comes Doe this in remembrance of me For as oft as ye eat this Bread and drink this Cup ye do shew the Lord's Death till he come And if this be the End and Use of this Sacrament to be a solemn remembrance of the Death and Sufferings of our Lord during his absence from us that is till his coming to Judgment then this Sacrament will never be out of date till the second coming of our Lord. The consideration whereof should mightily strengthen and encourage our Faith in the hope of Eternal Life so often as we partake of this Sacrament since our Lord hath left it to us as a memorial of himself till he come to translate his Church into Heaven and as a sure pledge that he will come again at the end of the World and invest us in that Glory which he is now gone before to prepare for us So that as often as we approach the Table of the Lord we should comfort our selves with the thoughts of that blessed time when we shall eat and drink with him in his Kingdom and shall be admitted to the great Feast of the Lamb and to eternal Communion with God the Judge of all and with our blessed and glorified Redeemer and the holy Angels and the Spirits of just men made perfect And the same consideration should likewise make us afraid to receive this Sacrament unworthily without due Preparation for it and without worthy effects of it upon our Hearts and Lives Because of that dreadfull Sentence of condemnation which at the second coming of our Lord shall be past upon those who by the profanation of this solemn Institution trample under foot the son of God and contemn the bloud of the Covenant that Covenant of Grace and Mercy which God hath ratified with Mankind by the Bloud of his Son The Apostle tells us that he that eateth and drinketh unworthily is guilty of the Body and Bloud of the Lord and eateth and drinketh damnation to himself This indeed is spoken of temporal Judgment as I shall shew in the latter part of this Discourse but the Apostle likewise supposeth that if these temporal Judgments had not their effect to bring men to Repentance but they still persisted in the Profanation of this holy Sacrament they should at last be
condemned with the World For as he that partaketh worthily of this Sacrament confirms his interest in the promises of the Gospel and his Title to eternal Life so he that receives this Sacrament unworthily that is without due Reverence and without fruits meet for it nay on the contrary continues to live in sin whilst he commemorates the Death of Christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity this man aggravates and seals his own Damnation because he is guilty of the Body and Bloud of Christ not onely by the contempt of it but by renewing in some sort the cause of his sufferings and as it were crucifying to himself afresh the Lord of life and glory and putting him to an open shame And when the great Judge of the world shall appear and pass final Sentence upon men such obstinate and impenitent wretches as could not be wrought upon by the remembrance of the dearest love of their dying Lord nor be engaged to leave their sins by all the tyes and obligations of this holy Sacrament shall have their portion with Pilate and Judas with the chief Priests and Souldiers who were the betrayers and murtherers of the Lord of life and glory and shall be dealt withall as those who are in some sort guilty of the body and bloud of the Lord. Which severe threatning ought not to discourage men from the Sacrament but to deter all those from their sins who think of engaging themselves to God by so solemn and holy a Covenant It is by no means a sufficient Reason to make men to fly from the Sacrament but certainly one of the most powerfull Arguments in the world to make men forsake their sins as I shall shew more fully under the third head of this Discourse II. The Obligation that lyes upon all Christians to the frequent observance and practice of this Institution For though it be not necessarily implyed in these Words as oft as ye eat this bread and drink this cup yet if we compare these words of the Apostle with the usage and practice of Christians at that Time which was to communicate in this holy Sacrament so often as they solemnly met together to worship God they plainly suppose and recommend to us the frequent use of this Sacrament or rather imply an obligation upon Christians to embrace all opportunities of receiving it For the sense and meaning of any Law or Institution is best understood by the general practice which follows immediately upon it And to convince men of their obligation hereunto and to ingage them to a sutable practice I shall now endeavour with all the plainness and force of persuasion I can And so much the more because the neglect of it among Christians is grown so general and a great many persons from a superstitious awe and reverence of this Sacrament are by degrees fallen into a profane neglect and contempt of it I shall briefly mention a threefold Obligation lying upon all Christians to frequent Communion in this holy Sacrament each of them sufficient of it self but all of them together of the greatest force imaginable to engage us hereunto 1. We are obliged in point of indispensable duty and in obedience to a plain precept and most solemn institution of our blessed Saviour that great Lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy as St. James calls him He hath bid us doe this And S. Paul who declares nothing in this matter but what he tells us he received from the Lord admonisheth us to doe it often Now for any man that professeth himself a Christian to live in the open and continued contempt or neglect of a plain Law and Institution of Christ is utterly inconsistent with such a profession To such our Lord may say as he did to the Jews Why call ye me Lord Lord and doe not the things which I say How far the Ignorance of this institution or the mistakes which men have been led into about it may extenuate this neglect is another consideration But after we know our Lord's will in this particular and have the Law plainly laid before us there is no cloak for our sin For nothing can excuse the willfull neglect of a plain Institution from a downright contempt of our Saviour's Authority 2. We are likewise obliged hereunto in point of Interest The benefits which we expect to be derived and assured to us by this Sacrament are all the blessings of the new Covenant the forgiveness of our sins the grace and assistence of God's holy Spirit to enable us to perform the conditions of this Covenant required on our part and the comforts of God's holy Spirit to encourage us in well-doing and to support us under sufferings and the glorious reward of eternal life So that in neglecting this Sacrament we neglect our own interest and happiness we forsake our own mercies and judge our selves unworthy of all the blessings of the Gospel and deprive our selves of one of the best means and advantages of confirming and conveying these blessings to us So that if we had not a due sense of our duty the consideration of our own interest should oblige us not to neglect so excellent and so effectual a means of promoting our own comfort and happiness 3. We are likewise particularly obliged in point of gratitude to the carefull observance of this Institution This was the particular thing our Lord gave in charge when he was going to lay down his life for us doe this in remembrance of me Men use religiously to observe the charge of a dying friend and unless it be very difficult and unreasonable to doe what he desires But this is the charge of our best friend nay of the greatest friend and benefactour of all mankind when he was preparing himself to dye in our stead and to offer up himself a sacrifice for us to undergo the most grievous pains and sufferings for our sakes and to yield up himself to the worst of temporal deaths that he might deliver us from the bitter pains of eternal death And can we deny him any thing he asks of us who was going to doe all this for us Can we deny him this so little grievous and burthensome in it self so infinitely beneficial to us Had such a friend and in such circumstances bid us doe some great thing would we not have done it how much more when he hath onely said doe this in remembrance of me when he hath onely commended to us one of the most natural and delightfull Actions as a fit representation and memorial of his wonderfull love to us and of his cruel sufferings for our sakes when he hath onely enjoyned us in a thankfull commemoration of his goodness to meet at his Table and to remember what he hath done for us to look upon him whom we have pierced and to resolve to grieve and wound him no more Can we without the most horrible ingratitude neglect this dying charge of our Sovereign and
danger of unworthy receiving and therefore they had better wholly to abstain from it By which it came to pass that in very many Places this great and solemn Institution of the Christian Religion was almost quite forgotten as if it had been no part of it and the remembrance of Christ's death even lost among Christians So that many Congregations in England might justly have taken up the complaint of the Woman at our Saviour's Sepulchre they have taken away our Lord and we know not where they have laid him But surely men did not well consider what they did nor what the consequences of it would be when they did so earnestly dissuade men from the Sacrament 'T is true indeed the danger of unworthy receiving is great but the proper inference and conclusion from hence is not that men should upon this consideration be deterred from the Sacrament but that they should be affrighted from their sins and from that wicked course of life which is an habitual indisposition and unworthiness St. Paul indeed as I observed before truly represents and very much aggravates the danger of the unworthy receiving of this Sacrament but he did not deter the Corinthians from it because they had sometimes come to it without due reverence but exhorts them to amend what had been amiss and to come better prepared and disposed for the future And therefore after that terrible declaration in the Text Whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily is guilty of the body and bloud of the Lord he does not add therefore let Christians take heed of coming to the Sacrament but let them come prepared and with due reverence not as to a common meal but to a solemn participation of the body and bloud of Christ but let a man examine himself and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. For if this be a good reason to abstain from the Sacrament for fear of performing so sacred an action in an undue manner it were best for a bad man to lay aside all Religion and to give over the exercise of all the duties of Piety of prayer of reading and hearing the Word of God because there is a propoâ—â—ionable danger in the unworthy and unprofitable use of any of these The prayer of the wicked that is of one that resolves to continue so is an abomination to the Lord. And our Saviour gives us the same caution concerning hearing the Word of God take heed how ye hear And St. Paul tells us that those who are not reformed by the Doctrine of the Gospel it is the savour of death that is deadly and damnable to such persons But now will any man from hence argue that it is best for a wicked man not to pray not to hear or reade the Word of God lest by so doing he should endanger and aggravate his condemnation And yet there is as much reason from this consideration to persuade men to give over praying and attending to God's Word as to lay aside the use of the Sacrament And it is every whit as true that he that prays unworthily and hears the Word of God unworthily that is without fruit and benefit is guilty of a great contempt of God and of our blessed Saviour and by his indevout prayers and unfruitfull hearing of God's Word does further and aggravate his own damnation I say this is every whit as true as that he that eats and drinks the Sacrament unworthily is guilty of a high contempt of Christ and eats and drinks his own Judgment so that the danger of the unworthy performing this so sacred an action is no otherwise a reason to any man to abstain from the Sacrament than it is an Argument to him to cast off all Religion He that unworthily useth or performs any part of Religion is in an evil and dangerous condition but he that casts off all Religion plungeth himself into a most desperate state and does certainly damn himself to avoid the danger of damnation Because he that casts off all Religion throws off all the means whereby he should be reclaimed and brought into a better state I cannot more fitly illustrate this matter than by this plain Similitude He that eats and drinks intemperately endangers his health and his life but he that to avoid this danger will not eat at all I need not tell you what will certainly become of him in a very short space There are some conscientious persons who abstain from the Sacrament upon an apprehension that the sins which they shall commit afterwards are unpardonable But this is a great mistake our Saviour having so plainly declared that all manner of sin shall be forgiven men except the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost such as was that of the Pharisees who as our Saviour tells us blasphemed the Holy Ghost in ascribing those great miracles which they saw him work and which he really wrought by the Spirit of God to the power of the Devil Indeed to sin deliberately after so solemn an engagement to the contrary is a great aggravation of sin but not such as to make it unpardonable But the neglect of the Sacrament is not the way to prevent these sins but on the contrary the constant receiving of it with the best preparation we can is one of the most effectual means to prevent sin for the future and to obtain the assistence of God's grace to that end And if we fall into sin afterwards we may be renewed by repentance for we have an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous who is the propitiation for our sins and as such is in a very lively and affecting manner exhibited to us in this blessed Sacrament of his body broken and his bloud shed for the remission of our sins Can we think that the primitive Christians who so frequently received this holy Sacrament did never after the receiving of it fall into any deliberate sin undoubtedly many of them did but far be it from us to think that such sins were unpardonable and that so many good men should because of their carefull and conscientious observance of our Lord's Institution unavoidably fall into condemnation To draw to a conclusion such groundless fears and jealousies as these may be a sign of a good meaning but they are certainly a sign of an injudicious mind For if we stand upon these Scruples no man perhaps was ever so worthily prepared to draw near to God in any duty of Religion but there was still some defect or other in the disposition of his mind and the degree of his preparation But if we prepare our selves as well as we can this is all God expects And for our fears of falling into sin afterwards there is this plain answer to be given to it that the danger of falling into sin is not prevented by neglecting the Sacrament but encreased because a powerfull and probable means of preserving men from sin is neglected And why should
incapable of so performing the one as to receive the other and are resolved to continue so We will not doe our duty in other things and then plead that we are unfit and unworthy to doe it in this particular of the Sacrament 3. The proper Inference and conclusion from a total want of due preparation for the Sacrament is not to cast off all thoughts of receiving it but immediately to set about the work of preparation that so we may be fit to receive it For if this be true that they who are absolutely unprepared ought not to receive the Sacrament nor can do it with any benefit nay by doing it in such a manner render their condition much worse this is a most forcible argument to repentance and amendment of life There is nothing reasonable in this case but immediately to resolve upon a better course that so we may be meet partakers of those holy Mysteries and may no longer provoke God's wrath against us by the wilfull neglect of so great and necessary a duty of the Christian Religion And we do wilfully neglect it so long as we do wilfully refuse to fit and qualifie our selves for the due and worthy performance of it Let us view the thing in a like case A Pardon is graciously offered to a rebel he declines to accept it and modestly excuseth himself because he is not worthy of it And why is he not worthy because he resolves to be a rebel and then his pardon will do him no good but be an aggravation of his crime Very true and it will be no less an aggravation that he refuseth it for such a reason and under a pretence of modesty does the impudentest thing in the world This is just the case and in this case there is but one thing reasonable to be done and that is for a man to make himself capable of the benefit as soon as he can and thankfully to accept of it But to excuse himself from accepting of the benefit offered because he is not worthy of it nor fit for it nor ever intends to be so is as if a man should desire to be excused from being happy because he is resolved to play the fool and to be miserable So that whether our want of preparation be total or onely to some degree it is every way unreasonable If it be in the degree onely it ought not to hinder us from receiving the Sacrament If it be total it ought to put us immediately upon removing the impediment by making such preparation as is necessary to the due and worthy receiving of it And this brings me to the IV. Fourth and last thing I proposed viz. What preparation of our selves is necessary in order to the worthy receiving of this Sacrament Which I told you would give me occasion to explain the Apostle's meaning in the last part of the Text But let a man examine himself and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. I think it very clear from the occasion and circumstances of the Apostle's discourse concerning the Sacrament that he does not intend the examination of our state whether we be Christians or not and sincerely resolved to continue so and consequently that he does not here speak of our habitual preparation by the resolution of a good life This he takes for granted that they were Christians and resolved to continue and persevere in their Christian profession But he speaks of their actual fitness and worthiness at that time when they came to receive the Lord's Supper And for the clearing of this matter we must consider what it was that gave occasion to this discourse At the 20th verse of this Chapter he sharply reproves their irreverent and unsutable carriage at the Lord's Supper They came to it very disorderly one before another It was the custome of Christians to meet at their Feast of Charity in which they did communicate with great sobriety and temperance and when that was ended they celebrated the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper Now among the Corinthians this order was broken The rich met and excluded the poor from this common Feast And after an irregular feast one before another eating his own supper as he came they went to the Sacrament in great disorder one was hungry having eaten nothing at all others were drunk having eaten intemperately and the poor were despised and neglected This the Apostle condemns as a great profanation of that solemn Institution of the Sacrament at the participation whereof they behaved themselves with as little reverence as if they had been met at a common supper or feast And this he calls not discerning the Lord's body making no difference in their behaviour between the Sacrament and a common meal which irreverent and contemptuous carriage of theirs he calls eating and drinking unworthily for which he pronounceth them guilty of the body and bloud of the Lord which were represented and commemorated in their eating of that bread and drinking of that cup. By which irreverent and contemptuous usage of the body and bloud of our Lord he tells them that they did incur the judgment of God which he calls eating and drinking their own judgment For that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which our Transslatours render damnation does not here signifie eternal condemnation but a temporal judgment and chastisement in order to the prevention of eternal condemnation is evident from what follows He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh judgment to himself And then he says For this cause many are weak and sickly among you and many sleep That is for this irreverence of theirs God had sent among them several diseases of which many had dyed And then he adds For if we would judge our selves we should not be judged If we would judge our selves whether this be meant of the publick Censures of the Church or our private censuring of our selves in order to our future amendment and reformation is not certain If of the latter which I think most probable then judging here is much the same with examining our selves ver 28. And then the Apostle's meaning is that if we would censure and examine our selves so as to be more carefull for the future we should escape the judgment of God in these temporal punishments But when we are judged we are chastened of the Lord that we should not be condemned with the world But when we are judged that is when by neglecting thus to judge our selves we provoke God to judge us we are chastened of the Lord that we should not be condemned with the world that is he inflicts these temporal judgments upon us to prevent our eternal condemnation Which plainly shews that the judgment here spoken of is not eternal condemnation And then he concludes Wherefore my Brethren when ye come together to eat tarry for one another And if any man hunger let him eat at home that ye come not together unto judgment where the Apostle plainly
could allot any more time for a solemn preparation for it than they did for any other part of divine worship And consequently that the Apostle when he bids the Corinthians examine themselves could mean no more than that considering the nature and ends of this Institution they should come to it with great reverence and reflecting upon their former miscarriages in this matter should be carefull upon this admonition to avoid them for the future and to amend what had been amiss which to doe requires rather resolution and care than any long time of preparation I speak this that devout persons may not be entangled in an apprehension of a greater necessity than really there is of a long and solemn preparation every time they receive the Sacrament The great necessity that lies upon men is to live as becomes Christians and then they can never be absolutely unprepared Nay I think this to be a very good preparation and I see not why men should not be very well satisfied with it unless they intend to make the same use of the Sacrament that many of the Papists do of Confession and Absolution which is to quit with God once or twice a year that so they may begin to sin again upon a new score But because the Examination of our selves is a thing so very usefull and the time which men are wont to set apart for their preparation for the Sacrament is so advantageous an opportunity for the practice of it therefore I cannot but very much commend those who take this occasion to search and try their ways and to call themselves to a more solemn account of their actions Because this ought to be done sometime and I know no fitter time for it than this And perhaps some would never find time to recollect themselves and to take the condition of their souls into serious consideration were it not upon this solemn occasion The sum of what I have said is this that supposing a person to be habitually prepared by a religious disposition of mind and the general course of a good life this more solemn actual preparation is not always necessary And it is better when there is an opportunity to receive without it than not to receive at all But the greater our actual preparation is the better For no man can examine himself too often and understand the state of his soul too well and exercise repentance and renew the resolutions of a good life too frequently And there is perhaps no fitter opportunity for the doing of all this than when we approach the Lord's table there to commemorate his death and to renew our Covenant with him to live as becomes the Gospel All the Reflexion I shall now make upon this Discourse shall be from the consideration of what hath been said earnestly to excite all that profess and call themselves Christians to a due preparation of themselves for this holy Sacrament and a frequent participation of it according to the intention of our Lord and Saviour in the institution of it and the undoubted practice of Christians in the primitive and best times when men had more devotion and fewer scruples about their duty If we do in good earnest believe that this Sacrament was instituted by our Lord in remembrance of his dying love we cannot but have a very high value and esteem for it upon that account Methinks so often as we reade in the institution of it those words of our dear Lord doe this in remembrance of me and consider what he who said them did for us this dying charge of our best friend should stick with us and make a strong impression upon our minds Especially if we add to these those other words of his not long before his death Greater love than this hath no man that a man lay down his life for his friend ye are my friends if ye doe whatsoever I command you It is a wonderfull love which he hath expressed to us and worthy to be had in perpetual remembrance And all that he expects from us by way of thankfull acknowledgment is to celebrate the remembrance of it by the frequent participation of this blessed Sacrament And shall this charge laid upon us by him who laid down his life for us lay no obligation upon us to the solemn remembrance of that unparallel'd kindness which is the fountain of so many blessings and benefits to us It is a sign we have no great sense of the benefit when we are so unmindfull of our benefactour as to forget him days without number The Obligation he hath laid upon us is so vastly great not onely beyond all requital but beyond all expression that if he had commanded us some very grievous thing we ought with all the readiness and chearfulness in the world to have done it how much more when he hath imposed upon us so easie a commandment a thing of no burthen but of immense benefit when he hath onely said to us Eat O friends and drink O beloved when he onely invites us to his table to the best and most delicious Feast that we can partake of on this side heaven If we seriously believe the great blessings which are there exhibited to us and ready to be conferred upon us we should be so far from neglecting them that we should heartily thank God for every opportunity he offers to us of being made partakers of such benefits When such a price is put into our hands shall we want hearts to make use of it Methinks we should long with David who saw but the shadow of these blessings to be satisfied with the good things of God's house and to draw near his altar and should cry out with him O when shall I come and appear before thee My soul longeth ye even fainteth for the courts of the Lord and my flesh cryeth out for the living God And if we had a just esteem of things we should account it the greatest infelicity and judgment in the world to be debarred of this privilege which yet we do deliberately and frequently deprive our selves of We exclaim against the Church of Rome with great impatience and with a very just indignation for robbing the People of half of this blessed Sacrament and taking from them the cup of blessing the cup of salvation and yet we can patiently endure for some months nay years to exclude our selves wholly from it If no such great benefits and blessings belong to it why do we complain of them for hindring us of any part of it But if there do why do we by our own neglect deprive our selves of the whole In vain do we bemoan the decay of our graces and our slow progress and improvement in Christianity whilst we wilfully despise the best means of our growth in goodness Well do we deserve that God should send leanness into our souls and make them to consume and pine away in perpetual doubting and trouble if when God himself doth spread so bountifull
what past John 13. from Ver. 1. to 31. vid. Hor. Heb. Tal. p. 300. and Mat. 26. 6. between Christ and his Disciples at a common and ordinary meal in Bethany and that for this reason among many others judiciously urged by him because the Disciples thought when our Lord had said to him Ver. 27. That thou doest do quickly that he had given order to Judas who kept the bag to buy those things that they had need of against the Feast viz. the Passover and therefore all those passages and that discourse related by St. John in the foregoing Verses of that Chapter were transacted at an ordinary and common Supper And indeed this seems to be the great end and design which St. John proposed to himself in writing his Gospel and which throughout he constantly pursues viz. To add out of his own Knowledge several remarkable passages especially such as tend to demonstrate the Divinity of our Saviour as had been omitted by the other Evangelists in their History of the Birth Life Actions and Sufferings of our Blessed Saviour There is another passage in St. John's Gospel which in the Judgment of John 5. 53. many Learned Divines both Ancient and Modern hath respect to the Lord's Supper though not at that time instituted when those mysterious words were uttered by our Saviour Except ye Eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and Drink Ver. 54. his Blood ye have no life in you Whoso Eateth my Flesh and Drinketh my Blood hath Eternal Life and I will raise him up at the last day For my Flesh is meat indeed and Ver. 55. my Blood is drink indeed He that Eateth my Flesh and Ver. 56. Drinketh my Blood dwelleth in me and I in him Now all that can be inferr'd from these words as they relate to this Holy Feast is onely thus much that it 's highly necessary for all Christians who have an opportunity to do it to partake of the Lord's Supper as they would partake in the merits of his Sacrifice and the Efficacy of his Death and his Sufferings and that none but such as do receive the tokens and signs of his Body broken and Blood shed for their Sins shall be owned and rewarded by him as his Friends These are all the places that we meet with in the Gospel let us now see what is delivered in the Acts and other Writings of the Apostles and Divinely-inspired Authors Among all their Writings there is but one place which gives any account of the History of the Sacrament and Institution of it and that is in the 1 Epist to the Corinthians Chap. 11. where St. Paul declares that what he delivered to them he received by immediate Revelation from Christ himself viz. That the Lord Jesus the same night in which Ver. 23. Ver. 24. he was betrayed took Bread and when he had given Thanks he brake it and said Take eat this is my Body which is broken for you this do in Remembrance of me After the Ver. 25. same manner he took the Cup when he had Supped saying This Cup is the New Testament in my Bloud this do as oft as ye Drink it in Remembrance of me For as often as Ver. 26. ye eat this Bread and Drink this Cup ye do shew or shew ye the Lord's Death till he come There are several other places wherein the Holy Sacrament is mentioned 1 Cor. 10. 16 21. 1 Cor. 11. 20. Acts 2. 46. Acts 20. 7. and described by several Names and Titles sutable to the nature and ends of it which for brevity sake I omit and desire the Reader to consult at his leisure and I would not put him to that trouble if they did contain any thing that made against Kneeling or that lookt like a command for the use of any other Gesture Let us now look back a little upon the places forementioned and see what our Lord hath ordained and appointed to be of perpetual use in his Church The Apostles and Disciples of our Lord at the Institution of the Sacrament were the Representatives of the whole Church and are to be considered under a double capacity Either as Governours and Ministers entrusted by Christ with the Power of dispensing and administring the Sacrament or as ordinary and lay Communicants If we consider them as Governours and Stewards of the Mysteries their Duty to which they are obliged by the express command of their Lord is to take the Bread into their Hands to bless and consecrate it to that mysterious and Divine use to which he designed it to break it to give it to the Communicants as he gave it them And so in like manner to Take the Cup to bless it to give it to their fellow-Christians That which they were obliged to do by the command of our Lord considered as private Men and in common with all believers was to take and receive the Consecrated Elements of Bread and Wine to eat and Drink and to do all this in Commemoration of his wonderful Love in giving his Body to be broken and his Blood to be shed for the Sins of the World And what the least Syllable or Shadow of a Command is there here in all this History for the use of any Gesture in the Act of Receiving Since then the Holy Scripture is altogether silent as to this matter its silence is a full and clear demonstration that Kneeling is not repugnant to any express Command of our Lord because no Gesture was ever Commanded at all And this hath been ingenuously Confessed in writing by a A Manuscript of an unknown Author cited by Mr. Paybody p. 48. great Enemy to Kneeling and a great Advocate for Sitting That the Gesture of Sitting is but a matter of Circumstance and not expresly Commanded But the Scotch Ministers Assembled at Perth affirm Object that when our Lord at the Institution Commanded his Disciple to do this he did by those words Command them to use that Gesture which he used at that time as well as to Take Eat Drink c. The Force of their Argument lies in this if it have any force at all Our Saviour Sate at the Passover as the Scriptures plainly inform Mat. 26. 20. Mar. 14. 18. Luke 22. 14. us and it is to be supposed he continued in the same posture when he instituted and Administred the Sacrament which was at the close of the Passover therefore Do this relates to and includes the Gesture amongst other things But this is a miserable shift which tends to Sink rather than Support their Cause For first If our Lord did Sit when he Administred Answ I the Sacrament which we will suppose at present yet there is no reason in the World to incline us to think that he intended by those words Do this to oblige us to observe his Gesture onely and not several other Circumstances which he observed at the same time Since Christ hath not restrained and interpreted these words Do
this so that they should onely respect Sitting as he did why should we not think our selves obliged to do all that he did at the same time as well as this For example If these words may be interpreted thus Do this that is Sit as Christ did why not thus also Do this that is celebrate the Sacrament in an upper Room in a private House late at night or the Evening after a full Supper †††Mat. 26. 20. in the Company of 11 or 12 at most Mar. 14. 17. Luke 22. 14. and they onely Men with their Heads Covered according to the custom of those Countries and with unleavened Bread There lyeth as great an Obligation upon all Christians to observe all these Circumstances in Imitation of our Lord by vertue of these words Do this as there doth to Sit. So that this Argument violently recoils upon those that urge it and proves a great deal more than they are willing to have it It concludes strongly against their own Practices and the liberty they take in omitting some things and pressing the necessary observance of others upon a reason which equally obliges to all But I desire our Dissenting Brethren who may be Answ II of the same Perswasion with these Scotch-men to take this further consideration along with them which I think will turn the Scales and make deep impressions upon tender Consciences and oblige them to observe most of the other Circumstances which they omit rather than this of Sitting which they so earnestly press and contend for All those forementioned Circumstances except the two Last which too are generally allowed among Learned Men on all sides are expresly mentioned in the Gospel and were without dispute observed by Christ at the Institution of the Sacrament But the particular Gesture used by him at that time is not expresly mentioned and what it was is very disputable and dubious as I shall evince by and by under the second Query How then can any Man think himself obliged in Conscience by the force of these words Do this to do what Christ is no where expresly said to do and not obliged to do what the Scripture affirms he really did Why that which is dark and dubious should be made an infallible Rule of Conscience and that which is plainly and evidently set down in Scripture should have no force nor be esteemed any Rule at all These are Questions I confess beyond my capacity and surpassing my skill to resolve It 's clear from St. Paul in the forecited place that Answ III those words of our Lord Do this do respect onely the 1 Cor. 11. 23 4 5 6 27 28. Verses Bread and Wine which signify the Body and Bloud of Christ and those other actions there specified by him which are essential to the right and due celebration of that Holy Feast For when it 's said Do this in Remembrance of me and This do ye as oft as ye Drink it in Remembrance of me and As oft as ye Eat this Bread and Drink this Cup ye do shew the Lords Death till he come it 's plain that Do this must be restrained to the Sacramental Actions there mentioned and not extended to the Gesture of which the Apostle speaks not a word Our Lord Instituted the Sacrament in Remembrance of his Death and Passion and not in Remembrance of his Gesture in Administring it And consequently Do this is a general Command obliging us onely to such particular Actions and Rites as he had Instituted and made necessary to be used in order to this great end viz. to signify and represent his Death and that Bloudy Sacrifice which he offered to his Father on the Cross for us miserable Sinners Upon the whole matter I think we may certainly conclude that there is not a tittle of a Command in the whole New Testament to oblige us to receive the Lords Supper in any particular Posture and if any be so scrupulous after all as not to receive it in any other Gesture but what is expresly Commanded they must never receive it as long as they live And then I leave this to their serious consideration How they will be ever able to excuse their neglect of a known necessary duty such as receiving the Sacrament is before God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who loved us so much as to send his Son to be a propitiation for our Sins How they will ever Answer to their Crucified Saviour their Living and Dying in the breach of an express Command of his given a little before his Passion to Do this in Remembrance of him meerly because the Gesture prescribed by Authority was cross to their private Wills and Phansies but not to the Mind and Will of God 2. For the further proof and Confirmation of this Assertion that there is no express Command in Scripture for the use of any particular Gesture in the Act of receiving the Sacrament I will appeal to the Judgment and Practice of our Dissenting Brethren and all the Reformed Churches in Europe 1. To begin with our Non-conforming Brethren There are a great many Serious and Sincere-Hearted persons among them who profess that were they left to their liberty and not tyed up by the Law to Kneel at the Sacrament they could with a safe Conscience use that Gesture as well as any other And they further tell us that they are willing and ready to Communicate with us provided we would Administer the Sacrament to them either Sitting or Standing that is any way but that which is imposed by Law For the Rule by which they conduct their Consciences in this matter is this Things in their own nature indifferent which are no where Commanded or prohibited by God in Scripture cannot nor ought not to be restrained and limited by any Power or Authority of Man And therefore all such things which God left free for us to do or not to do without Sin become sinful to us when imposed by humane Authority It 's remote from my business to shew how weak and false a Principle this is and of what mischievous consequences to the Peace of the Church and for that reason I will pass it by But thus much may be inferr'd from this Tenent to my purpose that they who hold and urge it as a reason why they cannot Receive Kneeling which otherwise they could safely do plainly own that as to the Gesture in the Act of receiving it is in its own nature Indifferent and left free by God for us to use or refuse as we think fit and by necessary consequence that there is no express Command given by God for the use of any particular Gesture It could not be a matter of indifferency to our Dissenting Brethren whose Principle this is if there were no Law of Man to Kneel at the Sacrament and now there is such a Law it could not be Indifferent to them whether they received Sitting or Standing as they profess it is if
the Sacrament can never be demonstrated so as that the conscience may surely build upon it This I shall endeavour to make good these two ways First we have no sure ground for it in Scripture Secondly the Customs observed by the Jews render it very incertain and disputable 1. All that can be gathered from Scripture amounts Mat. 26. 26. Mar. 14. 22. to no more than this that as they were eating or as they did eat as the Phrase is rendred in St. Mark Jesus took Bread and blessed it and brake it and gave it to his Disciples and he took the Cup when he had Supped saith St. Paul after Supper as St. Luke hath 1 Cor. 11. 25. Luke 22. 20. it and gave Thanks and gave it to them saying Drink ye all of it Now it 's very clear from this account which the Scripture gives that our Lord did Institute and Administer the Sacrament to his Disciples and that they did Receive it But whether Sitting Kneeling or Standing is no where mentioned nor plainly determined It 's clear that he Instituted this Holy Feast at the close of the Paschal Feast for he took the Bread as they were Eating and the Cup when he had Supped that he did Celebrate the Passover according to the usual manner of the Jews in those times which was in a Discumbing Luke 22. 14. Mat. 26. 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Marg. posture on Beds placed about the Table much after the manner of our lying or leaning upon Couches Yet whether after all the Apostles Received or our Lord Administred the Sacrament still Sitting after the same manner as they did at the Passover is not exprest nor can it be certainly concluded from the Word of God The utmost strength of their Argument who urge Sitting in imitation of our Saviours example can arise to no more than this That it's probable our Lord did not alter the Gesture he used at the Passover when he Instituted the Sacrament But who sees not that a probability is far from a certainty A thing may be really false though it seem likely to be true And that opinion which is speculatively probable may when reduced to practice become a great Sin and a great Error Thus to refuse to Receive the Holy Sacrament Kneeling and thereby neglect a known necessary Duty and not onely so but to disturb the Peace and break the Unity of the Church upon a bare probability that our Lord sate which we are not cannot be sure of is a great fault in all who are guilty of it For they appeal to an incertain example against a plain certain Command viz. to receive the Tokens and Pledges of our Saviours dying love and to do this in Remembrance of him They therefore who urge the example of Christ for Sitting at the Sacrament and as a Plea against Kneeling would do well first to make the example appear and prove that he did Sit before they press a Conformity 2. If we consult the Records of Jewish Antiquities and the Writings of Learned Men both Jews and Christians concerning the Passover and the manner of the Jews Celebrating it we shall find that they did not keep to one and the same Gesture throughout the Solemnity For the Babylon and Jerusalem Talmud Maimonides and Buxtorf do certifie us that they did alter their posture at the Passover though the Lying or Leaning posture was generally and most Religiously used and observed at this Feast above any other And the Scripture gives some hints and intimations of the Truth of what they deliver 1. It was the antient custom of the Jews and of those Gen. 18. 4. 19. c. 2. 24. 32. Mat. 15. 2. Mar. 7. 3. Luke 7. 44. Eastern Countries at their ordinary Feasts and Entertainments to Wash their Hands and their Feet and especially at their Religious Feasts to Wash their Hands often At the Passover they Washed their Hands thrice at least according to the Talmudists and the Authors forecited Which Ceremony could not well nor was Tract Berachoth â—esachin Maimon in Chametz Umaâ—sah Buxtorf Synag c. 13. not in all likelyhood performed during their Lying or Leaning posture on their left sides as their manner was For the reason of their Washing at all and so frequently was that no legal Impuritie or Uncleanness might cleave to them and to signify the great care they took to keep this Solemn Feast Holy to the Lord. And as they were Nice and Curious in Purifying and Washing themselves so in keeping the Beds Table Dishes and Vid. Buxt Synagoga c. 12. p 286. all other Utensils necessary for this Feast clean and free from all pollution too To Wash so often more than the Law required and the general custom of those Eastern and hot Countries warranted was a Pharisaical Invention and superstitiously abused by them and as such it 's certain our Lord did not use it but that he did Wash sometime before he Eat the Paschal Supper and after he had Sat down as the manner was there is little reason to doubt and all that I infer from hence is that when he Washed be it once or twice he altered his posture and in all probabilitie either arose from his Bed and went Vid. John 2. 6. to the place where Water and Vessels were prepared and set for such uses or had Water brought to him in a Basin wherein he Washed either Sitting upright or Standing which are both different from that Gesture which was peculiar and proper to the Passover St. John in Chap. 13. 2 4 5. Verses will explain and Confirm this Custom we are speaking of There he tells us how that Supper being ended that is in a manner or almost ended for by comparing the 12 and 26 and 27 Verses together we shall find plainly that they had not quite finished their Supper Jesus riseth from Supper and laid aside his Garments and took a Towel and girded himself and after that poureth Water into a Basin and began to Wash the Disciples Feet There are Learned Men on both sides who think all this was Vid. Grot. in loe Dr. Hamond on v. 26. Mark 14. 12. done at the Feast of the Passover and that towards the close of it when he Instituted the Lords Supper but I shall wave this and not infist upon it because as I hinted before I believe as the Learned Dr. Lightfoot doth it was no more then an ordinary or common meal and therefore I onely shall conclude thus much from it which I think is very probable That it was usual with the Jews to Wash at their Feasts and that in Supper-time And that our Saviour complyed with thâ—s custom To Wash the Feet of the Guests was the Office of Servants and it was altogether unusual for the Master of the Feast to do but our Lord to set his Disciples an example of Humility and Charitable condescention one to another performs this servile Office himself Joh. 13. 14 15.
not oblige all Christians to a like Practice 1. Because naked examples without some Rule or Note added to them to signify that it is the mind and will of God to have them constantly followed and perpetually Imitated by us have not the force of a Law perpetually obliging the Conscience Thus in our present Case though our Lord did Sit at the Sacrament yet his example alone doth not become an everlasting Rule for all Ages to observe because he hath no where discovered his binding will and pleasure in this particular And consequently since he hath left us in the Dark we may act contrary to his will and intention when we so zealously press and follow his example especially in this matter relating to Gesture For even under the Law where all other Circumstances of Time Place Habits and the Ceremonies relating to Divine Worship were with great particularity described this of Gesture was left free and undetermined God never obliged them to use any particular Gesture in any particular part of his Worship but left it to their choice whether to Kneel or Stand or Bow down their Heads and Bodies or fall prostrate on the Earth to use all or any one of these as Custom and their own Pious Prudence should prompt and direct them Seeing then that the Gesture in the Worship of God was never determined under the Law Since it was and is in its own nature a Mutable Ceremony in the Service of God it remains so unto this day Our Lord left it as he found it unless it can be proved that he hath by some Command or Note of Immutability fixt and determined it to all succeeding Ages But because no such Command or Note is to be found therefore we are not tyed in Conscience to a strict Imitation of his Example A few instances will clear this point Our Lord was not Baptized till Luke 3. 23. he was about thirty years of Age but this example is not esteemed by the generality of Dissenters a Law or Warrant for us to defer our Baptism so long So he Instituted the Sacrament a little before his Death But is there no obligation upon us to receive it but when we are near our Graves and under a Prospect of Death He also Instituted and Administred the Sacrament after a full Meal in an upper Room to Men onely Doth his bare example oblige us to observe punctually all these Circumstances or no If it doth why do our Brethren of the Separation take the liberty to depart from his example in these things if his example layeth no necessity upon us to follow it in these particulars how doth Sitting become necessary barely upon the account of his example I desire them therefore Seriously and impartially to examine this matter and see if they can assign any reasons for this liberty they take of following the example of our Saviour in some things and not in others where there is no other Rule to guide them I believe they will be constrained to do one of these two things either to withdraw their Suit against Kneeling and quit their own Principle or condemn their own practices as shamefully repugnant to it 2. The bare example of Christ is no Warrant for us to act by because the great end and usefulness of that Glorious example he left us consists in this viz. that it shews the possibility and clears up the sense of his Laws and excites and encourages us to the Practice of them it puts the Rule into activity and sets it forth to the life It is to our lives as Exhortation is to Doctrine it thrusts us forward to do that which we were obliged in Conscience to do before Whatsoever our Lord hath Commanded us to do in that onely we are necessarily bound to Imitate him But where there is no Precept there is no Necessity We may do it if we will and if we can innocently as in the case of a single Life but we are not under Constraint and an indispensable Obligation He hath Commanded us to be Meek and Lowly to be Just and Merciful to be Patient under all our Troubles and Afflictions to follow Peace with all Men to be ever contented and resigned to the Will of our Heavenly Father in all States and Conditions of Life and the life And in all these things he became an Example to us that we might follow his Steps He Commands us to do what he performed himself and that which we are concerned in if we would walk surely is first to look for our Rule and then for our encouragement to look unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith It 's true indeed we are Commanded in Scripture to follow the Examples of the Apostles so far forth as they follow Christ and the Example of our Lord is made the Touchstone to try all others by but then if we would know what is out Duty we must bring his Example to the Rule For as to Preach Christ and to Preach the Gospel to Obey Christ and Obey the 1 Cor. 11. 1. Acts 5. 42. Acts 11. 20. Marc. 16. 15. Heb. 5. 9. 2 Thess 1. 8. Col. 2. 6. Gospel are Phrases of alike Import it Scripture so in like manner to follow Christ is all one with following the Gospel-Rule or doing as Christ did in obedience to his Commands The Sum of all is this An Example may help to Interpret a Law but of it self it is no Law Against a Rule no Example is a Competent Warrant and if the Example be according to the Rule it 's not the Example but the Rule that is the Measure of our Actions 3. The bare Example of Christ is no Warrant for us to go by because he was an extraordinary Person and did many things which we cannot and many which we must not do He Fasted 40 Days and 40 Nights and spent whole Nights in Prayer he wrought many Miracles to prove the Truth of his Doctrine and his Divine Authority by that he was the Messias the Son of God and Saviour of Mankind he was a Prophetical Priest by which Office he was obliged to teach us the whole mind of God in all things necessary to Faith and Salvation and to offer up himself as a propitiatory Sacrifice for the Sins of the World Nothing we should quickly experiment would be more Vain and Foolish than attempts of an Imitation in some things And nothing more Wicked than to think and believe we may and ought to follow his example in others To dye to Sin and Crucify the Flesh with its Affections and Lusts is a good way as the Scripture Teaches and Warrants of Imitating our Lords Death in a Spiritual Sense So to Die rather than deny the Faith and Dishonour our Saviour is great and Praiseworthy but to Die for Sin either our own or other Men's to propose a Meritorious Death to our Selves and by way of expiation is a Sin of so deep a Stain that the Blood of Christ
and use at this day For that was a Discumbing or Leaning Gesture on the left side much after the manner that we lye upon Couches with the upper part of the body almost erect It is agreed by all Learned Men that this was the Ancient Custom of the Jews in our Saviours time and is so to this day at the Passover by which Gesture they distinguish this Festival Night from all others Now if the same Gesture were used by Christ at the Sacrament as was at the Passover and his example makes it necessary and obligatory to all Christians for what Reasons and by what Authority do our Dissenting Brethren change it into Sitting upright according to our Civil way and manner of Feasting When they tell us this it will be very easy to justify Kneeling by the same Authority which they shall alledge for Sitting and our changing the Gesture will be as warrantable as theirs Unless they will say that they alone have the Power and Priviledge to recede from the Example of Christ when and how far they please but our Church hath not nor any other upon the face of the Earth To say Sitting as they do comes nearer to the Gesture used by our Lord at the Passover and consequently as is supposed at the Sacrament then the Kneeling Gesture according to the Custom of our Church will do them no service For there is no Room for this Question Who cometh nearest to the Example they or we when they ought not at all to vary if they keep to their own Rule The Example of Christ as it is urged by them against Kneeling equally Concludes against all other Gestures besides what he himself used And then the supposed Gesture which he observed binds to Lying along For where we have nothing to go by but his Pattern we must cut exactly by it or else we take a liberty to do that of our own heads for which we have no allowance That is we leave the Pattern which we were obliged onely to follow and act at random upon our own heads and then the Pattern cannot be alledg'd for our Justification Though our Church therefore doth not strictly follow the Example of Christ as is objected by requiring all her Communicants to Kneel yet they have no reason to complain and to scruple Communicating with us who do not follow it themselves but receive the Sacrament in their separate Congregations in a Gesture different from what our Lord used at the first Institution of it The Presbyterians if one may Argue from their Practices to their Principles lay very little stress on this Argument taken from the Example of Christ For though they generally choose to Sit yet they do not Condemn Standing as Sinful or Unlawful in its self and several are willing to Receive it in that posture in our Churches which surely is every whit as wide from the Pattern our Lord is supposed to have set us whether he Lay along or Sate upright as that which is Injoyned and Practised by the Church of England There is too a Confessed variation allowed of and Practised by the generality of Dissenters both Presbyterians and Independents from the Institution and Practice of Christ and his Apostles in the other Sacrament of Baptism For they have changed Immersion or Dipping into aspersion or Sprinkling and Pouring Water on the Face Baptism Mat. 3. 16. Mat. 28. 19. by Immersion or Dipping is sutable to the Institution of our Lord and the Practice of his Apostles and was by them ordained and used to represent our Burial with Christ a Death unto Sin and a New Birth Rom. 6. 4. 6. 11. Col. 2. 12. unto Righteousness as St. Paul explains that Rite Now it 's very strange that Kneeling at the Lord's Supper though a different Gesture from that which was used at the first Institution should become a Stumbling-block in the way of Weak and Tender Consciences that it 's more unpassable than the Alpes and yet they can with Ease and Cheerfulness pass by as great or a greater change in the Sacrament of Baptism and Christen as we do without the least murmur or complaint Sitting Kneeling or Standing were none of them Instituted or used to signify and represent any thing Essential to the Lord's Supper as Dipping all over was why cannot Kneeling then be without any wrong to the Conscience as Safely and Innocently used as Sprinkling How comes a Gnat to use our Saviours Proverb to be harder to swallow than a Camel Or why should not the Peace and Unity of the Church and Charity to the Publick prevail with them to Kneel at the Lord's Supper as much or rather more as Mercy and Tenderness to the Infants Body to Sprinkle or pour Water on the Face contrary to the first Institution 4. They who Kneel at the Sacrament in complyance with the Customs and Constitutions of the Church whereof they are Members do manifestly follow the Example of Christ For our Saviour complyed with that Passover-Gesture which was at that time commonly and generally observed by the Jews but cannot be pretended to be Altar Dam. 745. 747. the same that was used at the first Institution of that Feast in Egypt For thus the Command runs Exod. 12. 11. And thus shall ye Eat it with your Loyns Girded your Shoes on your Feet and your Staff in your Hand And you shall Eat it in haste it is the Lord 's Passover This say the Hebrew Doctors was but a temporary Law suted to the necessity of that time and served for that Night onely and did not oblige the following Generations in the Land of Canaan For thus they comment upon it Four things were contained in this Law which did not oblige but for that night at the Vid. Mr. Ainsworth Exod. 12. 6. 11. Passover in Egypt 1. Eating of the Lamb in their Houses dispersed in Egypt 2. Taking up of the Lamb from the tenth Day 3. Striking the Blood on their Door-Posts 4. Eating in Haste Here the Gesture in all probability was Standing though it be not expresly mentioned Howsoever it was different from that used by the Jews in our Saviours time which was a Gesture denoting Ease and Rest and their deliverance from Egyptian Bondage And our Lord's Complyance with this Custom may teach us thus much That we should not be scrupulous about Gestures but conform to the Innocent and prevailing Customs of the Church wheresoever we live To this Practice St. Paul's Rule well sutes Not Phil. 4. 8. onely Whatsoever things are True and Just and Lovely and Pure and Honest but whatsoever things are of good report i. e. well spoken of or laudable Not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 onely If there be any vertue but if there be any praise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if any thing be much approved of in Common esteem or is made commendable by Custom we are to think 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or make account of these things and conform our
the secret Language and Discourse of every Devout Christian at this Holy Feast and with these kind of Meditations he refreshes and delights himself So that from the whole we may conclude that the Lord's Supper is in its own Nature truly and properly a Feast though vastly different from Common and Ordinary Feasts throughout even in those things wherein it seems to be like them As to the several Names and Phrases by which the Nature of it is described they are figurative and borrowed from Civil Entertainments but although it hath received the same names and is represented by Phrases that properly sute to Ordinary Feasts yet the Lord's Supper differs in its Nature from Civil Banquets as much as Heaven and Earth Body and Spirit differ in theirs As to the Bread and Wine which we see and tast they are only Signs and Types of the true Spiritual Feast and serve to raise our minds to and whet the Appetites of our Souls after Celestial and Heavenly Enjoyments Thus much may suffice to inform us what the Nature of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper is considered barely as a Feast 2. For a further Discovery of its Nature we are to be minded that it is a Feast upon a Sacrifice for Sin wherein we are particularly to Commemorate the 1 Cor. 11. 26. Death of Christ by way of expiation for the Sins of the World 3. It was Instituted in Honour of our Lord our great Benefactor and Redeemer where we meet to preserve an Eternal memory of his Wondrous Works to bless and praise him and speak good of his Name And thus partaking of the Lord's Supper is a proper Act of Christian Worship performed to our Saviour It 's the Worship of God manifested in our Flesh and of our Crucified Lord who submitted himself to a Vile and Tormenting Death for the sake of us Vile and Miserable Sinners 4. The Lord's Supper is a Mysterious Rite of Religious Worship which as it respects God the Father hath the Vertue and Efficacy of a Thanksgiving and a Prayer as the Sacrifices under the Law had For our desires and affections may be signified by Actions as well as Words and by Ceremonies as well as Speech And with respect to this Notion and End of the Lord's Supper it was Anciently Stiled the Liturgy and the Eucharist which last name as it was given to it in the most Ignat. Ep. ad Ephes Justin Mar. in Dial. eum Tryph. early Ages of the Church so it still retains the same among all the Christian Churches to this day 5. The Lord's Supper was Instituted to be a Foederal or Covenanting Rite between God and all worthy Communicants Where by permitting us to Eat and Luk. 22. 19. 1 Cor. 11. 24. Drink at his Table he signifies that we are in a State of Peace and Friendship and in a Covenant-relation with him and we by coming to his Table and Eating and Drinking in his presence do own him to be our God and Saviour and in effect plight our troth to him and Swear Fidelity and Allegiance to him we take the Sacrament upon it as we ordinarily say that we will not henceforth live unto our selves but to him alone that Dyed for us and gave himself for us an Offering and a Sacrifice to God for a Sweet Smelling Savour 6. The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was Instituted for this further end viz. to be a means to Convey and Apply to us the Merits of that Sacrifice which Christ offered for Sinners on the Cross and as a Pledge to assure us thereof 7. It was instituted to be a Sacred Bond of Unity and Concord among all Christians to engage and dispose us to Love one another as our Lord Loved us who thought not his Life too dear nor his Blood too much to part with for our Sakes This is a short and so far as it serves my present design a full account of the Nature of the Lord's Supper If the Reader desire to see these things which I have but touched upon more largely proved and explained let him for his satisfaction consult those two excellent Discourses among many others that pass under these names viz. 1. The Christian Sacrifice 2. Discourse of Religious Set forth by 1. Dr. Patriâ— 2. Dr. Sherlock Assemblies Howsoever by what hath been said it appears that the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper is of a complicated Nature and Instituted for various ends that it is vastly different both in its nature and ends from Civil and Ordinary Feasts And therefore I conclude that we are not at this Religious Feast to guide our Selves by the Rules of Common Table-Fellowship but by more Religious and Spiritual Considerations Which leads me to the second thing proposed for the Resolution of the present Case 2. That the Nature of the Lord's Supper doth not absolutely require and necessarily oblige us to observe a Table-Gesture in order to a right and worthy Receiving of it The Reasons that I shall offer for the Proof of this are these 1. If the Nature of the Sacrament considered as a Feast necessarily requires a Table-Gesture then the Nature of the Sacrament considered as a Feast equally concludes for all other Formalities which are either Essential to all Civil Feasts whatsoever or to all Feasts as they obtain among us For if Sitting be necessary purely because the Nature of a Feast requires it then all other Circumstances which the Nature of a Feast requires will be equally necessary too But our Dissenting Brethren will by no means allow of this nor think themselves obliged to observe all other formalities though equally sutable and agreeable to the Nature of a Feast as Sitting is Though for what good reason I am perfectly in the dark For 1. As they omit many things at the Sacrament that are as agreeable to the Nature of a Feast as the Table-Gesture is So they observe several Modes and Circumstances which are not agreeable to the nature of a Feast as the Custom of our Country standeth For instance at our Common and Ordinary Feasts it 's very sutable and agreeable to Laugh to Talk and Discourse together to Congratulate one anothers welfare to enquire of the State of absent Friends and Acquaintance to Sit with the Head Covered to Eat plentifully and Drink Frequently to Carve and Drink to one another It is further necessary and convenient that at such Feasts the Guests should be well attended with Servants and Waiters who are not allowed to Sit down at the Table with â—hose who are Invited It 's agreeable that the Guests should if they please help themselves and their Friends where they like And yet these and many other things of this Nature though very sutable to and commonly practised at our Ordinary Feasts are not allowed of nor practised by nor urged as necessary to be observed at the Sacrament by our Dissenting Brethren But why they should plead for and urge the necessity of a Common Table-Gesture
and the Churches succeeding excluded it out of their Congregations and gave it no Entertainment for the space of 1200 years That Kneeling to receive the Sacrament was not used at the Institution of the Lords Supper nor after in any Age of the Church before the time of Honorius the Third about the year 1220. So also another great Champion for sitting writes Didoclavius maintaineth saith he that which none of our opposites Gillesp Disp against Eng. Pop. Cer. p. 191. Altar Damascen 784. lib. 1. c. 1. are able to infringe viz. That no Testimony can be produced which may evince that ever Kneeling was used before the time of Honorius the Third He further observes from the History of the Waldenses That bowing of the Knees before the Host was then onely enjoyned when the opinion of Transubstantiation got place By the Practice of the Church in the first and purest Ages I conceive they mean thus much That from the Age wherein the holy Apostles lived down to that wherein Transubstantiation was set on foot or that wherein Honorius the Third enjoyned the Adoration of the Host Kneeling in the act of Receiving the Lords Supper was never heard of nor used or as one Author expresly asserts it till the year 1220. Howsoever for sureness sake and in order to the clearing of this matter under our present Consideration I think it will be requisite to fix the time wherein Transubstantiation was first broacht as well as when it was establisht or imposed as an Article of Faith and so too wherein the Adoration of the Host was enjoyned whereby the just bounds and limits will be known beyond which we are not to pass to fetch in Evidence and consequently all extravagancy will be prevented on our part and all cavilling if possible on theirs As for the Time then which we enquire after I think we may safely relie on the judgment of a very Learned Prelate of our own which he delivers after this manner The word Transubstantiation Histori Transub Papal Josian Ep. Dunelm Edit 1675. p. 53 54. is so far from being found in the sacred Scriptures or the Writings of the ancient Fathers that the great Patrons of it do themselves acknowledge it was not so much as heard of before the twelfth Century Nay that the Thing it self without the Word that the Doctrine without the Expression cannot be proved from Scripture is ingenuously acknowledged by the most Learned Schoolmen who endeavour by other Arguments Scotus Durandus Biel Cameracen Cajetan c. therefore to defend it and allow it to be brought in by the Authority of the Pope and not received in the Church of Rome till 1200 years after Christ The first Authors who mention this new-coyn'd word Transubstantiation are Petrus Blesensis who lived under Pope Alexander the Third about the year 1159 and Stephanus Eduensis a Bishop whose Age and Writings are very doubtful The Pope who first establisht this An. Dom. 1215. An. Dom. 1217 or thereabouts monstrous Doctrine by his own Arbitrary power as an Article of Faith was Innocent the Third And his Successor Honorius was the man who decreed Adoration to the Host The first Council which took notice and approved of the Papal Decree for Transubstantiation was that assembled at Constance which condemned A D. 1415. Wiclif for an Heretick because among other truths he had asserted this That the substance of the Bread and Wine remains materially in the Sacrament of the Altar and that in the same Sacrament no accidents of Bread an t Wine remain without a Substance and for this Opinion they ordered his Body to be taken out of his Grave and burnt to ashes Thus things stood till the year 1551. when the Council of Trent publisht it to the world for an infallible Truth and imposed the belief of it upon all under the pain of an Anathema As for the Doctrine of Consubstantiation and the Corporal presence of Christ at with and in the Sacrament it was started long before that of Transubstantiation and was much disputed among learned men He who first broacht it in the East was John Damascen in the days of Gregory the Third And about About the year 740. an hundred years afterwards it was set a-foot in the West by the means of Paschasius Radbertus a Monk of Corbie and one Amalarius a Who wrote de Ecclesias Officiis de ord Antiphon c. contemporary with Amalarius Fortunatus Ar. bp of Triers who wrote de Sac. Baptis ad Carol. M. Deacon of Metz. The former taught that Christ was Consubstantiated or rather enclosed in the Bread and Corporally united to it in the Sacrament for as yet there was no thoughts of the Transubstantiation of Bread The latter gives Amalar. de Ecclesi Offic. lib. 3. c. 24. vid. lib. 3. c. 35. it as part of his Belief That the simple nature of the Bread and Wine mixed is turned into a reasonable nature viz. of the Body and Bloud of Christ Moreover he in another place confesseth that it was past his skill to determine what became of his Body after it was eaten When the Body of Christ is taken with a good intention it is not for me to dispute saith he whether it Amalar. Epist ad Guitardum MS in Biblioth Coll. S. Benedic Cantabri Cod. 55. cited by A. Bp. Vsher Ans Jesuits Chall p. 75. Rabanus Maurus John Erigena Wala Strabo Ratramus or Bertramus be invisibly taken up into Heaven or kept in our Body until the day of our burial or exhaled into the Air or whether it go out of the Body with the Bloud or be sent out by the mouth c. For this and another Foolery of the three parts or kinds of Christs Body he was censured by a Synod held at Cressy wherein it was declared by the Bishops of France That the Bread and Wine are spiritually made the Body of Christ which being a meat of the Mind and not of the Belly is not corrupted but remaineth unto everlasting life From whence we may learn as also from the Writings of several Learned men of that Age who opposed these Dotages of the Corporal presence that the Western Church had not then adulterated the Doctrine of the Sacrament but followed the pure and sound sence of the Ancient Fathers and condemned these Whimseys and gross conceits of the carnal or Oral eating of Christ in the Sacrament Nay in the year 1079. when Hildebrand called Gregory the 7th came to the Papal Chair the Bishops and Doctors were divided in their Opinions concerning the Corporal Presence some maintaining Berengarius his opinion who denied it and some following that of Paschasius as appears from the Acts of that Council writ by those of the Popes Faction which was called on purpose to condemn Berengarius Moreover it 's recorded that Hildebrand himself doubted whether what we receive at the Lords Table be indeed the Body of Christ by a substantial conversion For three
months space was granted to Berengarius to consider in and a Fast appointed to the Cardinals That God would shew by some sign from Heaven who was in the right the Pope or Berengarius It seems the Doctrine of the Popes Bâ—nno Card. in vita Hild. Epis Dunelm Hist Trans p. 135. Infallibility was not known to that Age and that of the Corporal presence much doubted But however thus much we may conclude upon That from the dark and mysterious Writings of those men Paschasius and Amalarius did that monstrous Errour of Transubstantiation spring which afterwards came to be established as an Article of Faith in the Church of Rome As to the time then wherein we are to contain this Discourse it shall be the first 700 years after Christ and to Authors onely that liv'd within that compass I will appeal for evidence in the matter under dispute and surely our Dissenting Brethren will allow that they lived in the first and purest Ages because they were dead before the Doctrines either of Consubstantiation or Transubstantiation were hatcht much less received or establisht in the World If I would take all the advantage that our Adversaries give us I need not confine my self within so narrow a compass For they challenge us to produce one instance for Kneeling before the days of Honorius the Third who lived 1220 or thereabouts and confidently affirm Kneeling was never heard of nor used for 1200 years after Christ I hope therefore they will not complain of foul dealing or that I strain the point since I give away 500 years wherein the pure ancient Catholick Faith touching the Holy Sacrament began to decline and was by various arts and tricks at last foully corrupted Which piece of liberality I need not have exercised but that I design purely to convince not to contend Let us therefore bring this matter under examination and see what the practice of the Church was within the compass of 700 years after Christ or which is all one in the first and purest Ages And what I shall produce out of Antiquity may be conveniently placed under these two general Heads according to the method proposed in the beginning of this Discourse 1 That notwithstanding several Nonconformists well esteemed of for Learning have in their Writings boldly asserted Kneeling to be contrary to all Antiquity it is highly probable the Primitive Christians did Kneel in the act of Receiving as the Custom is in the Church of England 2 It 's certain they used an Adoring posture As to the first I hope I shall be able to make it good by this following Account which I shall give with all possible plainness and sincerity And I declare beforehand to all the World that I will offer nothing for satisfaction to others which I do not think in my Conscience to be true and that I would not use a Fallacy to serve the Cause though I were sure it could never be detected by any of our Separating Brethren In the first place for the first Century or 100 years wherein our Lord and his Apostles lived the Scripture hath left us in the dark and under great uncertainty what the particular Gesture was which they used at the Institution and Celebration of the Holy Sacrament which I think I have sufficiently evinced in my Answers Part 1. p. 17. to the first and second Query In the next place I desire those who urge a common Table-gesture and particularly Sitting which was a usual posture at Meals among those Eastern Nations as well as among us now to observe that Sitting was esteemed a very irreverend Posture to be used in the Worship and Service of God by the Primitive Church of which I shall give a few instances The ancient Loadicean Which met under Pope Sylvester 1. between the Neocaesarian Synod and the first general Council of Nice that is between the years 314 and 325 as some learned men think or Anno Dom. 365. after the first general Nicaene Council as others Synod finding great inconveniencies to arise from the Love-Feasts which were kept at the same time with the Lords Supper prohibited absolutely the said Feasts and the lying upon Couches in the Church as their manner was of Solemnizing those Feasts The words of the Canon are these The Feasts of Charity ought Can. 28. not to be kept in the Lords House or in the Church neither may ye eat or make Couches in the House of God This was afterward forbidden by the Council of Carthage and the Decrees of both these Provincial or National Councils were ratified by the 6th Trullan Council and that under the pain of Excommunication Can. 74. upon which in some time the Custom dwindled to nothing Now the Reasons which induced these holy Bishops and ancient Fathers to prohibit these Feasts of Charity and the use of a discumbing posture upon Beds or Couches in the House of God which was too an ordinary Table-gesture according to the custome of those times were in all probability taken from the Disorder and Irreverence the Animosities and Excess that accompanied these Feasts and which both poor and rich were guilty of They did not distinguish between their spiritual and corporal Food between the Lords Supper and an ordinary Meal they did not discern the Lords Body as St. Paul speaks and I am apt to think that the same abuses which had crept in so early into the Church of Corinth and which St. Paul took notice of and reproved continued and spread till the Church by her Censures and Decrees opposed the growing evil and rooted up the causes of such mischievous effects To these Canons of Councils if we adde the Testimony of particular Bishops who lived in those first Ages and who speak not their own private sence and Opinions but Customes and Usages of the Church in their time we shall plainly discern that Sitting was accounted an irreverent posture in the Worship of God while they were engaged in Prayer or Praise or receiving the Holy Sacrament Justin Martyr who lived in the second Century which immediately Flor. Ann. D. 155. succeeded that of the Apostles seems to hint that the people sate at the Sermon and while the Lessons were reading when he informs us concerning the Christian Assemblies in his Apol. 2. time and the place where he lived After the reading of the Lessons and the exhortatory Sermon of the Bishop we rise up saith he all together and send up our Prayers He doth not indeed signifie what the particular Gesture was which they used at their Prayers but it 's clear enough they did not Sit and they might Kneel for any thing he saith to the contrary For it 's customary among us to sit at the Sermon and during the reading of the Lessons and after they are ended we may be truly said to rise up all together and send up our Prayers But if any one should hence infer that we stood and not kneeled he would conclude
publick Worship of God and all this without the least notice taken by without any complaint or opposition from any particular person either in the then present or succeeding generation 3 The Primitive Church esteemed the Holy Sacrament to be the most solemn part of Christian Worship as that which deservedly challenged from them the utmost pitch of Devotion and the highest degree of Reverence that they could possibly pay and express either with their Souls or Bodies This is clear partly from those Honorary Titles they bestowed upon this Ordinance and adorn'd it with which import the greatest deference and the most awful regard imaginable partly from that tedious See part 1. p. 58. and severe Discipline which she exercised the Catechumens and Penitents with before she admitted them into the Communion of the Faithful and approved of them as fit to partake of the Holy Mysteries To be admitted to the Sacrament so onely as to behold it and to be present at those Prayers which were put up by worthy Communicants over the great Propitiatory Sacrifice was heretofore accounted a high honour and priviledge But to make one at this heavenly Feast and to receive the pledges of our Lords love was esteemed the top and perfection of Christianity and the extremity of honour and happiness that a Christian is capable of in this life Heretofore with shame and reproach be it spoken to our stupidly wicked and degenerate Age to be excluded from the Holy Communion was look'd upon as the greatest curse and punishment that could be inflicted and on the other hand to be a Communicant to have a freedom of access to the Lords Table as the greatest blessing and most ample reward that could be propounded the sum of a Christians hopes the center of all his wishes during his abode here 4. For standing in time of Divine Service both at their Prayers and at the Sacrament there are so many and so clear testimonies extant in pure Antiquity that a man must take a great deal of pains not to see this truth who is never so little conversant in the Records of those times and in such a man it must be height of folly or impudence to deny it The bare asserting of it shall be sufficient because to insist upon the proof of it by an enumeration of particulars would swell this Discourse beyond measure and besides it would be a needless labour since the great Patrons of sitting or the common Table-gesture Gillesp Disp against En. Po. Cer. point 1660. p. 190 191. do frankly own and acknowledge that Standing was a posture generally used by the ancient Church in her religious Assemblies both at their ordinary Prayers and at the Communion-service Howsoever I shall be forced to say something concerning this matter under the following particular 5 Which is this That the Primitive Christians though on the Lords days and for the space of 50 days between Easter and Whitsunday they observed Standing yet at other times used the gesture of Kneeling at their publick Devotions Which will appear from a Decree pass'd in the first general Council assembled at Nice in words to this effect Because there are some Can 20 about the year 325. which Kneel on the Lords day and in the days of Pentecost that is between Easter and Whitsunday it is therefore ordained by this holy Synod that when we pay our Vows unto the Lord in Prayer we observe a Standing gesture to the end that a uniform and agreeable Custom may be maintained or secured through all Churches By which Canon provision was made against Kneeling not as if it were an inconvenient and unbecoming gesture to be used at all in the publick Worship of God but onely as being an irregular and unfit posture to be used at such particular times and occasions as is there specified viz. on the Lords days and the Feast of Pentecost when for any Christian to stand was to cross the general Custom and Practice of the Church at that time For this Council did not you must note introduce and establish any new thing in the Church but onely endeavoured by its authority to keep alive and in credit an ancient Custom which they saw began to be neglected by some Christians And from that clause in the Canon Because there are some which Kneel on the Lords day and in the days of Pentecost c. we may with good reason infer that Kneeling was the posture that was generally used at other times in their religious Assemblies For if Standing had been generally observed by all Churches in time of Divine Service at all other times as well as those mentioned in the Decree what occasion or necessity had there been for such an Injunction whereby all Christians were obliged to do that which they constantly and universally did before There is a passage in the Author of the Questions and Answers in Justin Martyr which will put this matter out of doubt and give us the reason why they altered their posture on the Lords day It is Respons ad quest 115. p. 468. saith he that by this means we may be put in mind both of our Fall by Sin and our Resurrection and Restitution by the Grace of Christ that for six days we pray upon our Knees is in token of our Fall by Sin but that on the Lords day we do not bow the Knee doth symbolically represent our Resurrection c. This he there tells us was a Custom derived from the very times of the Apostles for which he cites Irenaeus in his Book concerning Easter That it was ancient appears from Tertullian who lived in the same Age with Irenaeus and speaks of it as if it had been establish'd An. Dom. 198. by Apostolical Authority or at least by Custom had obtained the force of a Law for these are his words We esteem Die dominico jejunium nefas ducimus vel de geniculis adorare Tert. de Cor. mil. c. 3. 206. Col. Agrip. edit 1617. Epiph. exposit Fid. Cathol p. 1105. edit Par. Flor. An. Dom. 390. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 St. Hieronym prolog Comment in Ep. ad Ephes it a great act of wickedness or villany either to Fast or Kneel on the Lords day Which intimates too that Fasting and Kneeling in their publick Worship were both lawful and customary at other times To whose Testimony if we joyn that of another Father who lived some time after the first general Nicene Council we need not produce any more witnesses to clear the matter It is that of Epiphanius in his Exposition of the Catholick Faith where he certifies that the weekly stated Fasts of Wednesday and Friday were diligently kept by the Catholick Church the whole year round excepting the fifty days of Pentecost on which they do not Kneel nor is there any Fast appointed The reason of which Custom was as both St. Jerome and St. Augustin attest because all that space between Easter and Whitsunday was a time of
joy and triumph viz. over Death and the Grave and therefore on these days we neither Fast nor bend our Knees nor incline and bow down our Bodies but with our Lord are lifted up to Heaven We pray standing all that time which is a sign of the Resurrection St. August Ep. 119. ad Jan. c. 15. By which posture that is we signifie our belief of that Article From whence we may conclude that as the Christians of those first Ages did at other times certainly Fast so they did also certainly Kneel at their Prayers in their publick and religious Assemblies 6 Another thing I would have observed in order to my present design is this That the Primitive Christians were wont to receive the Holy Sacrament every day as oft as they came together for publick Worship which Custom as it was introduced Acts 2. 42 46. Acts 20. 7. compared with 1 Cor. 10. 16. and practised by the Apostles themselves according to the judgement of very Learned men and that not without good grounds from the Holy Scripture so it continued a considerable time in the Church even down to St. Austin who flourisht in the beginning Ann. Dom. 410. St. Aug Epist 118. ad Januarium c. 2 3. p. 556. 7. Basil edit a Froben 1541. St. Ambr. cap. ult lib. 5. c. 4. de Sacram. p. 449. Paris St. Hier. adver Jovinian p 37. Paris id in Epist ad Lucinium Baeticum p. 71. edit of the fifth Century and seems clearly to intimate to us in his Writings that it was customary in his days as St. Ambrose and St. Hierome had hinted before him concerning the Churches of Millan and Rome in their times From St. Cyprian we are fully Vid. Dr. Cave Prim. Christ p. 339. St. Cypr. de Orat. Dom. p. 147. Oxon. edit 1682. Can. 9. Apost Antiochen Concil Can. 2. Basil Ep. 289. ad Caesariam Patriciam To. 3. p. 279. assured that it was so in his days viz. about the year 250. For in his explication of that Petition in the Lords Prayer Give us this day our daily bread he expresly tells us that they did receive the Eucharist every day as the food that nourisht them to Salvation St. Basil Bishop of Caesaria who lived about 370 years after Christ affirms that in his Church they communicated four times a Week on the Lords day Wednesday Friday and Saturday two of which were station-days or set days of Fasting which were punctually observed by the generality of Christians in those times And this I the rather note because in all probability since they did receive the Sacrament on these days they did not alter the Posture of the day but received Kneeling For if Kneeling was adjudged by the Catholick Church an unsutable and improper posture for times of mirth and joy such as the Lords days and those of Pentecost were and if they were thought guilty of a great irregularity who used that posture on those Festivals then we may reasonably conclude that Standing which was the Festival Posture was not used by the Catholick Church on days of Fasting and Humiliation and that they who stood at their publick Devotions on Fasting days were as irregular as they who kneel'd on a Festival And that this was really so may I think be clearly collected from a passage in Tertullian to this purpose Tertull. de Orat c. 3. p. 206. Edit Col. Agrip 1617. We judge it an unlawful and impious thing says he either to Fast or Kneel at our Devotions on the Lords day We rejoyce in the same freedom or immunity from Easter to Whitsontide To be freed and exempted from Fasting and Kneeling not onely on the Lords day but all the days of Pentecost was esteemed a great priviledge and matter of much joy to this Holy Father and the Christians who lived in his days And from hence I infer that at other times when they met together for publick Worship especially on days of Fasting they generally used Kneeling and that at the Lords Supper which was administred every day in the African So St. Cyprian before cited Church whereof Tertullian was a Presbyter For if they had generally stood at all other times of the year in their religious Assemblies as well at their Prayers as at the Lords Supper where is the priviledge and immunity they boasted so much of and rejoyced in viz. that they were freed from Kneeling on such days and at such certain times Not to Fast on the Lords day was a Priviledge because they did Fast on the Week-days and so say I of Standing To Stand on the Lords days and all the time between Easter and Whitsunday could not be thought a special act of favour and the Prerogative of those seasons if Kneeling had not been the ordinary and common Gesture at all other times throughout the year And if Kneeling was the Didoclavius his own argument retorted Si stabant inter orandum viz. Die Dominico toto temporis intervallo inter Pascha Pentecosten non est probabile de geniculis adorasse cum perciperent Eucharistiam sed potius contrarium nempe stetisse Altar Damasc p. 784. Gesture which the Christians did then commonly use at their Prayers on the Week-days then in all probability when they received the Sacrament on those days they received in the ordinary posture The 7th and last particular which I would observe relating to this business is this That the Primitive Christians received the Holy Sacrament Praying The whole Communion Service was performed with Prayer and Praise It was begun with a general Prayer wherein the Minister and the whole Congregation joyntly prayed for the Vniversal Tert. Apol. c. 39. p. 47. St. Aug. Ep. 118. Const Apost l. 2. c. 57. p. 881. St. Chrys Hom. 1. in 2. cap. Epist 1. Tim. Peace and Welfare of the Church for the Tranquillity and the quietness of the World for the Prosperity of the Age for wholesome Weather and fruitful Seasons for Kings and Emperours and all in Authority c. The Elements were sanctified by a solemn Benediction the form whereof is set down by St. Ambrose and De Sacr. lib. 4. c 5. p. 439. See Dr. Cave's Primitive Christianity c. 11. p. 347. the whole action was concluded with Prayer and Thanksgiving But that which more particularly affects the matter in hand is that the Minister used a Prayer at the delivery of the Sacrament to each Communicant to which every one at their receiving said Amen The Apostolical Constitutions though in some things much corrupted and adulterated yet in many things are very sound and in this particular seem to express the most Ancient Practice of the Church For there we find this Account The Apostolical Constitutions confessed by all hands to be very Mr. Daillé sets them at the latter end of the 5 Century Const Apost lib. 8. c. 13. p. 483. Ancient though not altogether so much as is pretended in some things give us this
plain account in these words Let the Bishop give the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sacrifice by which name the Holy Sacrament was called in Primitive times saying The Body of Christ and let him that receives say Amen Then let the Deacon take the Cup and at the delivery say The Bloud of Christ the Cup of Life and let him that drinketh say Amen Now although it cannot be denied but that these Constitutions are in many things adulterated yet it is allowed on the other hand that in many things they are very sincere and convey to us the pure Practice of the most ancient times That they give a true and sound account in this matter relating to the Sacrament we may rest fully satisfied from the concuring Evidence of other ancient Writers who lived in the fourth Century For both St. Ambrose and St. Cyril of Jerusalem Ambr. de Sacr. lib 4. c. 5. p. 440. To. 4. St. Cyril Hiero. Catech. Mystag 5. Universa Ecclesia accepto Christi Sanguine dicit Amen Resp ad Orosi quest 49. To. 4. p. 691. Basil 1541. make express mention of the peoples saying Amen when the Minister said The Body of Christ So also St. Austin speaks of it as universally practised by the Church of Christ when the Cup was delivered And there is a very remarkable passage recorded by Eusebius in his Ecclesiastical History which being very apposite to our purpose I will set down for the close of all Novatius a Presbyter of the Church of Rome having renounced the Communion of the Church and the Authority of his rightful Bishop Cornelius set up for himself and became the head Epist Cornel. ad Fab. apud Euseb Eccles Hist lib. 6. c. 35. de Novato of an unreasonable and unnatural Schism and the better to secure to him the Proselytes he had gained he altered the usual form of Prayer at the Sacrament and in the room thereof substituted a new-fangled Oath which he obliged every Communicant to take at the time of their receiving which among other wicked actions is particulary taken notice of and charged upon him by Cornelius as the worst of all and the most villanous Innovation When he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 came says he to offer Sacrafices i. e. to celebrate the Lords Supper and to distribute to every one his part at the delivery of it he constrained those persons who unhappily sided with him to take an Oath instead of offering up Prayers and Praises according to custom and instead of saying Amen he forced every Communicant when he received the Bread to say I will never return to Cornelius as long as I live From these plain instances we may see how closely our Church follows the steps of pure antiquity in the Form of Prayer appointed to be used by the Minister at the giving of the Bread and the Cup to the people which runs thus The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ and The Bloud of our Lord Jesus Christ preserve thy Body and Soul to everlasting life c. which last Clause was added by latter times by way of explication to that short Form which the Primitive Church used and surely it 's every Christians interest as well as his duty to joyn with the Minister in such a Prayer and return a hearty Amen to it I will now briefly sum up the Evidence that hath been produced out of Antiquity in justification of Kneeling at the Holy Communion according to the custom and practice of our Church and observe where it directs us to fix and what to resolve upon And in this order it lies Sitting was adjudged by the ancient Catholick Church a very unfit and irreverent posture to be used in time of Divine Service when they were solemnly engaged in the Worship of God the Holy Sacrament was esteemed the most solemn Act or Branch of Christian Worship The Primitive Christians generally used standing at their publick Devotions onely on the Lords days and all that space of time that falls between Easter and Whitsunday At all other times in their religious Assemblies Kneeling was their Worshipping posture and they were wont to meet and receive the Lords Supper every day and particularly on their stated Weekly Fasts which they kept every Wednesday and Friday when to stand was thought as great an irregularity as to kneel was on the Lords day And lastly the Holy Sacrament was delivered and received with a Form of Prayer and that on those days when they constantly prayed Kneeling All these things therefore being considered I think the least that can be concluded from them is what I asserted and designed viz. that in all likelihood the Primitive Christians did kneel at the Holy Communion as the Custom is in the Church of England For sitting was generally condemned as an indecent and irreverent Gesture by the Primitive Church and no man in his wits will say that prostration or lying flat upon the ground was ever used in the act of receiving or ever fit to be so it must be therefore one of these two either Standing or Kneeling As for Standing all the time of publick Worship which was used onely on the Lords day and in Pentecost the reason thereof was drawn not from the Sacrament but from the day and festival season when they did more particularly Communicate the Resurrection of our blessed Saviour openly testified their belief of that great Article at such times therefore they chose standing as being a gesture sutable to the present occasion and as an Emblem and sign of the Resurrection And from hence I gather that on their common and ordinary days when there was no peculiar reason to invite or oblige them to stand at the Sacrament in all likelyhood they used Kneeling that is the ordinary posture They used one and the same posture viz. Standing both at their Prayers and at the Sacrament on the Lords day and for fifty days after Easter contrary to what was usual at other times and why then should any man think they did not observe one and the same posture at all other times viz. that as at such times they did constantly Kneel at their Prayers so they did also constantly Kneel at the Sacrament which was given and received in a Prayer From the strength of these Premises I may howsoever promise my self thus much success That whosoever shall carefully weigh and peruse them with a teachable and unprejudiced mind shall find himself much more inclin'd to believe the Primitive Church used at some times to Kneel as we do at the Holy Communion than that they never did Kneel at all or that such a posture was never used nor heard of but excluded from their Congregations as some great advocates for Sitting have confidently proclaimed it to the World 2. But secondly Suppose they never did Kneel as we do yet this is most certain that they received the Lords Supper in an adoring posture which is the same thing and will sufficiently justifie the present
practice of our Church as being agreeable to that of pure Antiquity For the proof of this numerous testimonies both of Greek and Latine Fathers might be alledged but I will content my self and I hope the Reader too with a few of each sort which are so plain and express that he who will except against them will also with the same face and assurance except against the Whiteness of Snow and the Light of the Sun at Noon-day And first for the Greek Fathers let the testimony of St. Cyril St. Cyril Hierosol Mystag Catech. 5. versus finem Paris edit p. 244. be heard than which nothing can be more plain and express to our purpose This holy Father in a place before cited gives instructions to Communicants how to behave themselves when they approach the Lords Table and that in the act of receiving both the Bread and the Wine At the receiving of the Cup he advises thus Approach says he not rudely stretching forth thy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 245. A. hands but bowing thy self and in a posture of Worship and Adoration saying Amen To the same purpose St. Chrysostome speaks in his 14th Homily on the first Epistle to the Corinthians Where he provokes and excites the Christians of his time to an awful and reverential deportment at the Holy Communion by the example of the Wise men who adored our Saviour in his Infancy after Matth. 2. 1 11. this manner This Body the Wise men reverenced even when it lay in the Manger and approaching thereunto worshipped it with fear and great trembling Let 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 24 Hom. Ep. ad Cor. p. 538. To. 9. Paris us therefore who are Citizens of Heaven imitate at least these Barbarians But thou seest this Body not in a Manger but on the Altar not held by a Woman but by the Priest c. Let us therefore stir up our selves and be horribly afraid and manifest a much greater Reverence than those Barbarians lest coming lightly and at a venture we heap fire on our heads In another place the same Father expresly bids them to fall down and communicate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 St. Chrys Hom. 3. in Ep. ad Ephes in moral p. 1151. when the Table was prepared and the King himself present and in order to beget in their minds great and awful thoughts concerning that Holy and Mysterious Feast he further advises them that when they saw the Chancel doors opened then they should suppose Heaven it self was unfolded from above and that the Angels descended to be spectators I suppose he means of their carriage and behaviour at the Lords Table and by giving their attendance to grace the solemnity With the Testimony of these ancient Writers Theodoret concurs who in a Dialogue between an Orthodox Flor. A. D. 440. Christian and an Heretick introduces Orthodoxus thus discoursing concerning the Lords Supper The mysterious Symbols or signs in the Sacrament viz. Bread and Wine depart not from their proper nature for they abide in their former Essence retain their former shape and form and approve themselves both to our sight and touch to be what they were before but they are considered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dialog 2. To. 4. p. 85. Paris edit for such as they are made that is with respect to their Spiritual signification and that Divine use to which they were consecrated and are believed and adored as those very things which they are believed to be Which words clearly import thus much that the consecrated Elements were received with a Gesture of Adoration and withal assure us that such a carriage at the Sacrament was not built upon the Doctrine of Transubstantiation For there is not a clearer instance in all Antiquity against that absurd Doctrine which the Church of Rome so obstinately believes at this day than what Theodoret furnisheth us with in the words above mentioned Lastly to produce no more out of the Greek Fathers that story which Gregory Nazianzen Gregor Naz. Orat. in laud. Gorg. p. 187. Paris edit Gregor Flor. Ann. Dom. 370. relates concerning his Sister Gorgonia will serve to corroborate what hath been said viz. That being sick and having made use of several Remedies to no purpose at last she resolved upon this course In the stilness of the night she repaired to the publick Church and being provided with some of the consecrated Elements which she had reserved at home she fell down on her Knees before the Altar and with a loud voice supplicated him whom she adored and in conclusion was made hole I am not much concerned whether the Reader shall think fit to believe or censure the Miracle but it 's certain that this famous Bishop hath put it upon Record and applauds his Sister for the method she used for her recovery and which speaks home to my purpose it 's clearly intimated that this pious Woman did Kneel or use an adoring posture at least when she eat the Sacramental Bread And there is no doubt to be made but Gorgonia in Communicating observed the same posture that others generally did in publick She did that in her sickness which all others were wont to do in their health when they came to the Lords Table i. e. fall down and Kneel For it is not to be imagined that at such a time as this when she came to beg so great a Blessing at Gods hands in the publick Church at the Altar stiled by the Ancients the Place of Prayer she would be guilty of any irregularity and used a singular Posture different from what was generally used by Christians when they came to the same place to Communicate and Pray over the great Propitiatory Sacrifice which they esteemed the most powerful and effectual way of Praying the most likely to render God propitious and to prevail with him above all other Prayers which they offered at any other time or in any other place So much for the testimonies of the Greek Fathers who were men famous for Learning and Piety in their generations and great Lights and Ornaments in the Ancient Church With these the Latine Fathers perfectly agree in their judgements concerning our present subject And of these I will onely mention two though more might be produced for brevity sake and they very eminent and illustrious persons held in great esteem by the then present Age wherein they flourish'd and by all succeeding Generations The first is St. Ambrose Bishop of Millain in a Flor. A. D. 370. Psal 98. Ps 99. 5. in our Translation Ambros de Sp. Sto. l. 3. c. 12. Book he wrote concerning the Holy Spirit where inquiring after the meaning of the Psalmist when he exhorts men to exalt the Lord and to worship his Foot-stool he gives us the sence in these words That it seems to belong unto the mystery of our Lords Incarnation and then proceeds to shew for what reason it may be accommodated to that Mysterie and at last
all your Party formerly may prevail with you more than any of ours give me leave to mind you what Mr. Hildersham hath resolved in several cases like to ours particularly about this of Mens leaving their own Pastors to hear others VI. 1. And first he resolves this That it is the Ordinance of God every Pastor should have his own Flock to attend and every one of Gods People should have a Pastor of his own to depend upon From whence he concludes that none of those People may ordinarily and usually leave that Pastor because then he doth not depend upon his Ministry which he proves every one of them is bound to do 2. And that you may not imagine he means any other Pastor than such as ours his second Resolution is this that they who dwell next together should be of the same Congregation whence the name of Paroichia and Parish first came 3. Now thirdly if it happen that he who is the setled Pastor of the place where you dwell is a man whose Gifts are far inferiour to some others his Resolution in this case is That he being a Man whose Gift is approved by Gods Church and who is conscionable in his Place and of an unblameable Life you ought not to leave him at any time with contempt of his Ministry And then you contemn his Ministry when you speak or think thus in your heart Alas he is no Body a good honest Man but he hath no Gifts I cannot profit by him Mind I beseech you these Words which are none of mine but Mr. Hildersham's and I doubt too common Language now among you and mark the Reasons he gives which I shall contract why you may not do this First A Man may be a true Minister though his Gifts be far inferiour to many others and consequently secondly You are bound to love him and reverence him and thank God for him and thirdly Doubtless you may profit by him if the Fault be not in your selves The best Christian that is may profit by the meanest of Christs Servants And I am perswaded saith he There is never a Minister that is of the most excellent Gifts if he have a godly Heart but he can truly say he never heard any faithful Minister in his Life that was so mean but he could discern some Gift in him that was wanting in himself and could receive some profit by him Which is a thing worthy your consideration now for there is none of your Ministers dare say that they cannot profit by the Sermons that are commonly preached in our Churches and therefore so may you if you please to be impartial how meanly soever you may think of any of our Ministers especially if you observe this fourth thing which the same Mr. Hildersham judiciously adds That 4. The Fruit and Profit which is to be received from the Ministry depends not only nor chifely upon the Gifts of the Man that preaches but upon the Blessing that God is pleased to give unto his own Ordinance To which he applies those Words of the Apostle 1 Cor. 3. 5 6 7 8. Who is Paul and who is Apollo but Ministers by whom ye beleived even as the Lord gave to every Man I have planted Apollo watred but God gave the Increase So then neither is he that planted any thing nor he that watereth but God that giveth the Increase c. And God doth oft give a greater Blessing to weake than to stronger means and therefoer consider saith he the Fault may be rather in thy self than in the Preacher that thou canst not profit And indeed how shouldst thou profit by his Ministry if thou come with Prejudice without any Reverence or Delight unto it and dost scarce acknowledg God's Ordinance in it nor ever seek to God for his Blessing upon it but look wholly at the Man who preaches To conclude this he observes the great want of Judgment that appears in this sort of Christians in the choice they make of their Teachers and the applause they give unto them which shews how necessary it is they should be confined commonly to their own For as some admire and follow another rather than their own Pastor because he can make more ostentation of Eloquence Reading Learning and such like humane Gifts than their own Pastor doth upon which account the Corinthians preferred sundry Teachers before St. Paul himself so there are those who leave their own Pastor and go to others only for Varieties sake Though their own have never such excellent Gifts yet can they not like any one Man long but having itching Ears must have an heap of Teachers And some also prefer others before their own Pastor only because they shew more Zeal mark this in their Voice and Gesture and Phrase of Speech and manner of Delivery though happily the Doctrine it self be nothing so wholsome or powerful or fit to edifie their Consciences as the Doctrine of their own Pastor is Any though these be the best of the three sorts now mentioned and pretend much Love and Zeal yet we may wish them more Knowledg and Judgment I omit other things upon this Subject which you may find in his 58th Lecture upon the 4th of St. John Where he admits indeed that a man may some time go from his own Parish Church to hear another whose gifts he more admires But then like a judicious Divine adds this notable observation to correct and regulate this liberty that it may not prove an evil Humour viz. He only makes right use of the benefit of hearing such as have more excellent Gifts than his own Pastor as learns thereby to like his own Pastor the better and to profit more by him Mark it I most earnestly intreat you together with his Illustration of it by this Example The excellent Gifts God hath bestowed on others in this case may be fitly resembled unto Physick which they use well whose appitite is thereby amended and are made able to rellish and like their ordinary food the better If after men have heard one of excellent Gifts they begin to distaste the Ministry of their ordinary Pastors and can like of none profit by none unless they have rare Gifts they become at length like to those who by accustoming themselves to drink hot and strong Waters bring their Stomacks to that pass that they can find no Relish or Vertue in any Drink or Water be it never so hot or strong Believe it they receive no true profit from the most admired Preacher who learn not by hearing him to profit by any one that delivers to them the wholesome Words of our Lord Jesus and the Doctrine that is according unto Godliness though in the plainest manner imaginable both for Method and Language This I have chosen to write in his Words because there are some I fear that would scarce indure such Doctrine from us which may at least be more reverently received and duly considered proceeding from a Person of such note heretofore
have brought your self to much liberty I doubt not you will find that you are in a wrong way and therefore resolve to alter it and come into the way of the Church Where if you do not meet presently with such advantages for your Spiritual growth as you are told you may receive you have reason to conclude as the forenamed Mr. Hildersham doth to those that said they could not find such Lights such Power such Comfort in the Word as was spoken of First either you have not sought it aright not with earnestness or not with a good Heart or Secundly if you have and do not find it at first yet you shall hereafter if you seek it here with an honest heart VIII And the preaching of Gods holy Word among us would be of greater efficacy upon your Hearts if when you come to partake of it you would remember and observe some Rules delivered by the same Author in another place Lecture XXVI about the Publick Worship of God which now alas are generally neglected and therefore had need to be pressed for the disposing all Mens Hearts to profit by their attendance on it 1. One is that at your coming into the Congregation and during the whole time of your abode there you would behave your selves reverently For we may not come into the place of Gods Worship as we would into a dancing-School or Play-House laughing or toying c. neither may we go out of it as we would out of such a one but in our very coming in and going out and whole outward carriage there we ought to give some signification of the reverence that we bear to this Place and that we do indeed account it the House of God Which serious temper of Mind and awful sense of Gods Presence possessing the Mind would no doubt be an excellent preparation to receive benefit by the whole Service of God as well as by the Sermon For which end 2. Another Rule is that we must all come to the beginning of Gods publick worship and carry till all be done Yea it is the Duty of Gods People saith he to be in Gods House before the beginning For it becomes them to wait for the Minister of God and not to let him wait for them The Reasons he gives for this are two First there is Nothing done in our Assemblies but all may receive profit by it For example by the confession of Sins and Absolution I may add and all other Prayers used in the Congregation a man may receive more profit and comfort than by any other Which is the reason why the Apostles even after Christs Ascention when the typical Honour of the Temple was abolished c. were so delighted to go to the Temple to pray at the times of publick Prayer 1. Act. 3. c. And so he goes on to shew how by hearing the Word read all may profit and by hearing it preached even by the meanest Minister of Christ if the fault be not in themselves How the singing of Psalms also furthers the fruit of the Word in the Hearts of Believers and much more benefit may the faithful receive by the Sacrament of the Lords Supper Nay by being present at the Administration of Baptisme all may receive profit being put in mind there-by of the Covenant God made with them in Baptism c. Lastly by the blessing pronounced by Gods Minister all may receive good and therefore none ought to absent himself from any part of the publick Service of God For which his second Reason is very remarkable that though we could receive no profit by the Exercises used in our Assemblies yet we must be present at them all to do our homage unto God and shew the reverent respect we have to his Ordinances For there is nothing done in Gods publick Worship among us observe this but it is done by the Instruction and Ordinance and Commandment of the Lord. As he shews particularly that it is his ordinance there should be all sorts and kinds of Prayers used yea this is the chief duty to be performed in our assemblies 1 K. 11. 1 2. that in our publick assemblies the Word of God should be read as well as preached the Holy Communion administred c. that is all things should be done as they are now in our Common-Prayer to which it is plain he hath respect And this he repeats again Lecture XXVIII If thou wast sure thou couldst not profit yet must thou come to do thy Homage to God and to shew thy reverence to his Ordinance 3. Another of his general Rules is that when we are present we ought to joyn with the Congregation in all the parts of Gods Worship and do as the Congregation doth For it makes much for the come liness and reverence of Gods Worship that all things be done in good order without confusion And it is a principle part of this good order that should be in the Congregation when they all come together and go together pray together sing together kneel together in a word when every part of Gods Worship is to be performed by the Congregation as if the whole Congregation were but one Man And in several places he reproves with a great deal of Zeal mens great carelessness in this particularly their neglect of kneeling in the Prayers having observed that men who will kneel at their own private prayers can never be seen to kneel at the common and publick Prayer His last general Rule is that we ought to teach our Children and Servants to shew Reverence to the Sanctuary and publick Worship of God For God cannot indure profaneness and contempt of Religion no not in Children And it stands us all upon to use the utmost Authority we have to maintain the Reverence of Gods Sanctuary for the open contempt done by any may bring Gods curse on us all And certainly saith he among other causes of the Plauge and other Judgments of God upon the Land this is not the least that Gods publick Worship is performed among us with so little Reverence and Devotion as it is I am tempted to transcribe a great deal more of these Lectures because by them you may see that if I had moved all that hath been said about our Sermons I might according to the Judgment of this devout and learned man have maintain'd that there wants not sufficient means of profiting in our Congregations if there were none as long as the word of God is there read by which together with the other holy duties all may receive the greatest profit and comfort if they please For it is of far greater excellence authority and certainty than the Sermons of any Preacher in the World First because it comes more immediately from God and though it be translated by men yet is there in it far less mixture of humane Ignorance and Infirmity than in Sermons While the Word is read we are sure we hear God speaking to us and that it is the
Revelation insomuch as when the truth which is but One shall appear to the simple multitude no less variable than contrary to it self the Faith of Men will soon after dye away by degrees and all Religion be held inscorn and contempt Fourthly If several contrary Parties be established by way of sufferance no progress is likely to be made towards the perfecting of Religion For the suffering of divers Errors is not the way to the reforming of them One Principle only can be true and the blending of such as are contrary with it createth the greatest of Impurities a mixture of that which is profane with that which is sacred Fifthly Many Dissenters are not likely to erect a Model by which Christianity may be improved amongst us because they lay aside Rules of discretion and rely not on God's assistance in the use of good means but depend wholly upon immediate illumination without the aids of Prudence And some of the more sober amongst them have inclined too much towards this extream In Reformation said one * * * Mr. S. Sympson in A. 1643. Reform Preservat p. 126 27. in his Sermon before the Commons do not make reason your Rule nor Line you go by It is the line of all the Papists The second Covenant doth forbid not only Reason but all Divine Reason that is not contain'd by Institution in the Worship of God God's Worship hath no ground in any reason but God's Will Sixthly There are already provided in this Church more probable means for the promoting of pure Religion than those which have been proposed by all or any of the Dissenting Parties It is true each Church is capable of improvement by the change of obsolete Words Phrases and Customs by the addition of Forms upon new Occasions by adjusting discreetly some Circumstantials of External Order But to change the Present Model for any other that has yet been offered to publick consideration is to make a very injudicious bargain There are in it all the necessaries to Faith and Godliness there is preserved Primitive Discipline Decency and Order And under the means of it there are great numbers grown up into such an improvement of Judicious Knowledge and useful prudent serious Piety that it requireth a Laborious Scrutiny to find Parallels to them in any Nations under the Heavens I do not take pleasure in distastful Comparisons Yet I ought not sure to pass by with unthankful negligence that excellent Spirit which God hath raised up among the Writers and Preachers of this Church their labours being so instrumental towards the right information of the Judgment and the amendment of the Lives of unprejudic'd Hearers It must be confessed that there is some trifling on all sides And it will be so whilst Men are Men. But there is now blessed be God as little of it in the Church of England as in any Age. And the very few who do it appear plainly to be what they are Phantasticks and Actors rather than Preachers But amongst the Parties the folly and weakness puts on a more venerable pretence and they give vent to it with studied shews of mighty seriousness and deliver it solemnly as the immediate dictate of God's Holy Spirit And I cannot but call to mind one Minister in this Church who would for instance sake have deliberately used these words of Mr. Rutherford in a solemn audience * * * Ruth on Dan. 6. 26. p. 8. A. 1643. bef the Commons and after this manner God permits Sins and such solemn Sins that there may be room in the Play for pardoning Grace It seemeth also not unfit for me to take notice that the Changes formerly made in Church-matters in England by Dissenters were not so conducive in their nature to the edifying of the Body of Christ as the things illegally removed The Doctrine of God's Secret decrees taught in their Catechisms was a stronger and more improper kind of meat than that with which the Church of England had fed her Children Ordination by a Bishop accompany'd with Presbyters was more certain and satisfactory than that by Presbyters without a Bishop There was not that sobriety in many of the present and unstudied Effusions which appeared in every of those publick Forms which were considered and fixed And it sounded more decently for example sake to pray in the Churches words and say from Fornication Good Lord deliver us than to use those of an eminent Dissenter * * * Prayers at the end of Farewell Sermons Mr U's Prayer bef Serm. p. 31. Lord un-lust us Nor did the long continued Prayers help Men so much against Distraction as those shorter ones with breaks and Pauses in the Liturgy and the great and continued length of them introduced by consent sitting at Prayer Neither did it tend less to edification to repeat the Creed standing than to leave it quite out of the Directory for publick Worship Neither was it an advantage to Christian Piety to change the gesture of kneeling in the Eucharist when the Sacred Elements were given together with Prayer for that less reverend one of sitting Of sitting especially with the Haâ—t on as the most uncomely practice of some was the People being taught to cover the Head * * * Edward's Gangrena part 1 Error 112. p. 25. whilst the Minister was to remain bare amongst them Nor was the civil Pledge of the Ring in Marriage bettered by the invention of some Pastors who as is storied of them took a Ring * * * See Edw. Grangr 2 part p. 13. of some Women-converts upon their admittance into their Church Neither was the Alteration of the Form of giving the Holy Elements an amendment For the Minister was directed to the use of these words * * * Directory for publick Worship p. 27. Tak ye eat ye this is the Body of Christ which is broken for you This Cup is the New Testament in the blood of Christ which is shed for the Remission of the Sins of many The words denoting Christ's present Crucifix and either actually or in the future certainty of it give countenance to the Romish Sacrifice of the Mass though I verily believe they were not so intended Nor did the forbidding the Observation of Christ's Nativity and other Holy-days add one Hairs bredth to the Piety of the Nation but on the other hand it took away at least from the common People one ready means of fixing in their Memories the most useful History of the Christian Religion It is easy enough even for Men who are Dwarfs in the Politicks in such sort to alter a constitution as to make it more pleasing for a time to themselves during their Passion and the novelty of the Model in their Fancy not yet disturbed by some unforeseen Mischief or inconveniencie but 't is extream difficult upon the whole matter to make a true and lasting Improvement there being so many parts in the frame to be mutually fitted and such
Secession from us and professing you cannot joyn with us as Members and setting up Congregations of another Communion be more properly called Schism You gather Churches out of your Churches and set up Churches in an opposite way to our Churches and all this you do voluntarily and unwarrantably not having any sufficient cause for it And in the same Book they tell us of a Two-fold Schism Negative and Positive Negative when Men do peaceably and quietly withdraw from Communion with a Church not making a Head against that Church from which they are departed the other is when Persons so withdrawing do consociate and withdraw themselves into a distinct and opposite Body setting up a Church against a Church which say they Camero calls a Schism by way of Eminency and further tells us There are Four Causes that make a Separation from a Church lawful 1. When they that Separate are grievously and intollerably Persecuted 2. When the Church they Separate from is Heretical 3. When it is Idolatrous 4. When it is the Seat of Antichrist And where none of these four are found there the Separation is insufficient and Schism Now we are fully assured that none of these Four Causes can be justly charg'd upon our Congregations therefore you must not be displeased with us but with your selves if we blame you as guilty of positive Schism All which is as true now as it was then and as applicable to us and them as it was to them and their Dissenters Admit then there were some things in our Constitution that might be contrived to better purposes and that needed Amendment and Alteration yet I hope every Defect or supposed Corruption in a Church is not a sufficient ground for Separation or warrant enough to rend and tear the Church in pieces Let Mr. Calvin judge between us in this matter Institut lib. 4. Sect. 10 11 12. fol. 349. who says That wherever the Word of God is duely Preached and reverently attended to and the true use of the Sacraments kept up there is the plain Appearance of a true Church whose Authority no Man may safely despise or reject its Admonitions or resist its Counsels or set at nought its Discipline much less Separate from it and Violate its Unity for that our Lord has so great regard to the Communion of his Church that he accounts him an Apostate from his Religion who obstinately Separates from any Christian Society which keeps up the true Ministry of the Word and Sacraments that such a Separation is a denial of God and Christ and that it is a dangerous and pernicious Temptation so much as to think of Separating from such a Church the Communion whereof is never to be rejected so long as it continues in the true use of the Word and Sacraments though otherwise it be over-run with many Blemishes and Corrupons Which is as plain and full a Determination of the Case as if he had particularly designed it against the Doctrine and Practice of the Modern Dissenters from our Church IV. Fourthly We entreat them to Consider Whether it be pure Conscience and mere Zeal for the Honour of Religion and not very often Discontent or Trade and Interest that has the main stroke in keeping them from Communion with our Church Far be it from me to judge the Secrets of Mens Hearts or to fasten such a Charge on the whole Body of Dissenters yea I accuse not any particular Person but only desire they would lay their Hand upon their Hearts and deal impartially with themselves and say whether they stand clear before God in this matter And there is the more Reason to put Men upon this Enquiry not only because Secular Ends are very apt to mix with and shelter themselves under the shadow of Religion but because this has been an old Artifice made use of to promote Separation Thus the Donatists in the Primitive Times upheld their Separation from the Catholick Church and kept their Party fast together by Trading only within themselves by imploying none to Till their Grounds or be their Stewards but those that would be of their side nay and sometimes hiring Persons by large Sums of Money to be Baptiz'd into their Party as Crispin did the People of Mappalia And how evident the same Policy is among our Modern Vid. Aug. Epist 173. ad Crisp Quakers is too notorious to need either Proof or Observation Time was when it was made an Argument to prove Independency to be a Faction and not Edward's further Discovery p. 185. matter of Conscience because Needy broken decayed Men who knew not how to live and hoped to get something turned Independents and became Sticklers for it that some who had businesses Causes and Matters depending struck in with them and pleaded for them that so they might find Friends be sooner dispatched and fare better in their Causes that Ambitious Proud Covetous Men who had a mind to Offices places of profit about the Army Excise c. turned about to the Independents and were great Zealots for them Thus it was then and whether the same Leaven do not still spread and ferment and perhaps as much as ever there is just cause to suspect Whoever looks into the Trading part of this City and indeed of the whole Nation must needs be a very heedless and indiligent Observer if he do not take notice how Interests are formed and by what Methods Parties and Factions are kept up how many Thousands of the Poorer sort of Dissenters depend on this or that Man for their Work and consequently for their Livelihood and Subsistence how many depend upon others for their Trade and Custom whom accordingly these Men can readily Command and do produce to give Votes and increase Parties on all Publick Occasions and what little Encouragement any Man finds from them that once deserts them and comes over to the Church of England There is another thing that contributes not a little to this Jealousie and Suspicion that many of the Chiefest and most Stiff and Zealous of the Dissenting Party are they at least the immediate Descendants of those who in the late Evil-Times by Rapine and Violence shared among themselves the Revenues of the Church and the Patrimony of the Crown and are said still privately to keep on foot their Titles to them And if so what wonder if such Men look on themselves as obliged in point of Interest to widen Breaches foment Differences increase Factions and all this to Subvert and over-turn the Church of England being well assured they can never hope but over the Ruines of this Church to make way to their once sweet Possessions Let Men therefore impartially examine themselves and search whether a Worldly Spirit be not at the bottom of their Zeal and Stiffness These I confess are Designs too Base and Sordid to be owned above Board but be not Deceived God is not Mocked Man looks to the outward Appearance but God looks to the Heart V. Fifthly
He was an eminent Minister of the Presbyterian Party Epist Dedicat to Gangraen print 1646. One who as he tells the Parliament had out of Choice and Judgment from the very beginning Embarqued himself with Wife Children and Estate and all that was dear to him in the same Ship with them to sink and perish or to come safe to Land with them and that in the most doubtful and difficult Times not only in the beginning of the War and Troubles in a Malignant place among Courtiers where he had Pleaded their Cause justified their Wars and Satisfied many that Scrupled but when their Affairs were at lowest had been most Zealous for them Preaching Praying stirring up the People to stand for them and had both gone out in Person and lent Mony to them He held Correspondence with considerable Persons in all parts of the Nation and was careful to have the best Intelligence from all Quarters and professes to lay down the Opinion and Errours which he mentions in terminis and in their own Words and Phrases Syllabically and as near as might be Now amongst infinite other things he tells us Catal. and discov of Errors p. 15 c. vid. 2 d. Part. p. 5. 22. 24 27. 105. 110. fresh discov p. 115. 16â— alibi passim 't was then commonly maintained That the Scriptures cannot be said to be the Word of God and are no more to be Credited than the Writings of men being not a divine but Humane Tradition that God has a Hand in and is the Author of the Sinfulness of his People not of the Actions alone but of the very Pravity which is in them that all Lies come forth out of his Mouth that the Prince of the Air that Rules in the Children of Disobedience is God that in the Unity of the God-head there is not a Trinity of Persons but that it is a Popish Tradition that the Doctrine of Repentance is a Soul-destroying Doctrine and that Children are not bound to Obey their Parents at all if they be Ungodly that the Soul of Man is Mortal as the Soul of a Beast that there is no Resurrection at all of the Bodies of Men nor Heaven nor Hell after this Life I instance only in these as a Tast not that they are all or the Hundred part no nor the worst there being other Blasphemies and Impieties which my Pen trembles to Relate Secondly The Liturgy of our Church being discharged and thrown out and every one left to his own liberty 't is scarce possible to believe what wild and prodigious Extravagancies were upon all occasions used in holy things not in Preaching only but especially in Prayer the most immediate Act of Worship and Address to God It is an affront to the Majesty of Religious Worship that there should be any thing in it Childish and Trivial Absurd and Frivolous that its Sacred Mysteries should be exposed to Contempt and Scandal by that Levity and distraction that heat and Boldness those weaknesses and Indiscretions those Loose Raw and Incongruous Effusions which in most Congregations of those Times did too commonly attend it But the things I intend to Instance in are of a far worse colour and complexion for whose Ears would it not make to tingle to hear men in the Pulpit telling God That if he did not finish the good Work which he had begun View of the late troubles in Eng. cap. 43. p. 567 c. See also Edwards Gang 3 d. Part a little before in the Reformation of the Church he would shew himself to be the God of Confusion and such a One as by cunning Stratagems had contrived the Destruction of his own Children That God would bless the King and Mollifie his hard Heart that delights in Blood for that he was fallen from Faith in God and become an Enemy to his Church let thine Hand we pray thee O Lord our God be upon him and upon his Fathers p. 17. House but not upon thy people that they should be Plagued O God O God many are the Hands lift up against us but there is one God it is thou thy self O Father who dost us more Mischief than they all We know O Lord that Abraham made a Covenant Moses and David made a Covenant and our Saviour made a Covenant but thy Parliaments Covenant is the greatest of all Covenants I presume the Devout and Serious Reader desires no more of such intolerable Profane and Lewd Stuff as this is They that are curious of more may find it besides others in The short view of the late Troubles in England where Times Places and Persons are Particularly named Thirdly The Fences of Order and Discipline in the Church of England being broken down what a horrid Inundation of all manner of Vice and Wickedness did immediatly over-flow the Land The Assembly at Westminster Petitioned the Parliament That July 19. 1644. some Severe Course might be taken against Fornication Adultery and Incest which sry they do greatly abound especially of late by reason of Impunity Further discov p. 187. 3 d. Part p. 185 c. And Mr. Edwards speaking of the whole Tribe of Sectaries tells us He was confident that for this many Hundred Years there had not been a Party that hath pretended to so much Holiness Strictness power of Godliness tenderness of Conscience above all other Men as this Party hath â—lone that hath been guilty of so great Sins horrible wickedness provoking Abominations as they are with much more both there and elsewhere to the same purpose and the Charge very often made good by particular Instances So that indeed Hell seemed to have broke loose and to have Invaded all Quarters in despite of their Covenant and all the little Schemes of their so much Magnified Reformation The Covenant Cries God grant not against you for Reformation of the Kingdom the Extirpation of Heresies Schisms Profaneness c. and these Impieties abound as if we had taken a Covenant to maintain them and since it was taken these Sins which we have Covenanted against have more abounded than in the space of Ten Times so many Years before as Mr. Jenkin tells the Lords in Parliament And that all East Sermon Jan. 27. 1646. p. 29. that I have mentioned which yet is â—nfinitely short of what might be said was the effect of the Ruin of the Church of England and let in by the Method they took for Reformation we have from their own confessions We says Mr. Edwards in these Four Cat. and discov p. 73 74 76. last Years have over-passed the Deeds of the Prelates and justified the Bishops in whose time never so many nor so great Errours were heard of much less such Blasphemies or Confusions we have worse things among us than ever were in all the Bishops Days more corrupt Doctrines and unheard of Practices than in Eighty Years before I am persuaded if Seven Years ago the Bishops and their Chaplains had but Preached
together Then Seven more Saints Then all the Bishops and Confessors together Then all the Holy Doctors Then Five more of their own great Saints by Name Then all the Holy Priests and Levites Then all the Holy Monks and Hermites Then Seven She Saints by Name Then all the Holy Virgins and Widows And Lastly All the He and She Saints together But the brevity I am confined to in this Discourse will not permit me to abide any longer upon this Argument of the vast distance between these two Churches in reference to their Publick Prayers and Offices Fourthly We proceed to shew that there is also no small distance between the Church of England and that of Rome in reference to the Books they receive for Canonical This will be Immediately dispatched For no more is to be said upon this subject but that whereas the Church of Rome takes all the Apocryphal Books into her Canon the Church of England like all other Protestant Churches receives only those Books of the Old and New Testament for Canonical Scripture as she declares in her Sixth Article of whose Authority there was never any doubt in the Church And she declareth concerning the Apocryphal Books in the same Article citing St. Hierom for her Authority That the Church doth read them for Example of life and Instruction of manners but yet it doth not apply them to Establish any Doctrine And after the example of the Primitive Church no more doth ours and appoints the reading some of them only upon the foresaid Account In the Fifth and Last place The Church of England is at the greatest distance possible from the Church of Rome in reference to the Authority on which they each found their whole Religion As to the Church of Rome she makes her own Infallibility the Foundation of Faith For 1. Our belief of the Divine Authority of the Holy Scriptures themselves must according to her Doctrine be founded upon her infallible Testimony 2. As to that Prodigious deal which she hath added of her own to the Doctrines and Precepts of the Holy Scriptures and which she makes as necessary to be believed and practised as any matters of Faith and Practice contained in the Scriptures and more necessary too than many of them the Authority of those things is founded upon her unwritten Traditions and the Decrees of her Councils which she will have to be no less inspired by the Holy Ghost than were the Prophets and Apostles themselves But Contrariwise the Church of England doth 1. Build the whole of her Religion upon the Sole Authority of Divine Revelation in the Holy Scriptures And therefore she takes every jot thereof out of the Bible She makes the Scriptures the Complete Rule of her Faith and of her Practice too in all matters necessary to Salvation that is in all the parts or Religion nor is there any Genuine Son of this Church that maketh any thing a part of his Religion that is not plainly contained in the Bible Let us see what our Church declareth to this purpose in her 16 Article viz. That Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to Salvation so that whatsoever is not read therein nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any Man that it should be believed as an Article of Faith or be thought requisite or necessary to Salvation So that as Mr. Chillingworth saith THE BIBLE THE BIBLE IS THE RELIGION OF PROTESTANTS So you see the Bible is the Religion of the Protestant Church of England Nor doth she fetch one Tittle of her Religion either out of unwritten Traditions or Decrees of Councils Notwithstanding she hath a great Reverence for those Councils which were not a Company of Bishops and Priests of the Popes packing to serve his purposes and which have best deserved the Name of General Councils especially the Four first yet her Reverence of them consisteth not in any opinion of their Infallibility As appears by Article 14. General Councils may not be gathered together without the Commandment and Will of Princes and when they be gathered together for as much as they be an Assembly of Men whereof all be not Governed with the Spirit and Word of God they may Err and sometimes have Erred even in things pertaining unto God Wherefore things ordained by them as necessary to Salvation have neither Strength nor Authority unless it may be declared that is manifestly proved that they be taken out of Holy Scripture Let us see again how our Church speaks of the matter in hand Article 20. The Church hath Power to decree Rites or Ceremonies and Authority in Controversies of Faith And yet it is not Lawful for the Church to Ordain any thing that is contrary to Gods Word Written neither may it so Expound one place of Scripture that it be Repugnant to another Wherefore although the Church be a Witness and Keeper of Holy Writ that is as the Jewish Church was so of the Canon of the Old Testament by whose Tradition alone it could be known what Books were Canonical and what not so the Catholick Christian Church from Christ and his Apostles downwards is so of the Canon of the New Yet as it ought not to decree any thing against the same so besides the same ought it not to inforce any thing to be believed for necessity of Salvation If it be asked who is to Judge what is agreeable or contrary to Holy Writ 't is manifest that Our Church leaves it to every Man to Judge for himself But 't is Objected that 't is to be acknowledged that if the Church only claimed a Power to Decree Rites and Ceremonies that is according to the general Rules of doing all things Decently and Orderly and to Edification which Power all Churches have ever Exercised this may well enough consist with private Persons Liberty to Judge for themselves but 't is also said in the now Cited Article that the Church hath Authority in Controversies of Faith and accordingly Our Church hath Publisht 39 Articles and requires of the Clergy c. Subscription to them To this we answer that we shall make one Article Egregiously to Contradict another and one and the same to Contradict it self if we understand by the Authority in Controversies of Faith which Our Church acknowledges all Churches to have any more than Authority to Oblige their Members to outward Submission when their Decisions are such as Contradict not any of the Essentials of our Religion whether they be Articles of Faith or Rules of Life not an Authority to Oblige them to assent to their Decrees as infallibly true But it is necessary to the maintaining of Peace that all Churches should be invested with a Power to bind their Members to outward submission in the Case aforesaid that is when their supposed Errors are not of that Moment as that 't is of more pernicious Consequence to bear with them than to break the Peace of the Church by opposing them And as to the fore-mentioned