hands and afterward by oversight negligence to possesse the minds of them that were about him with careful remembrance of the truth he was by the continuall neernesse pains of them that were cōtrarie minded changed to an other course yet our most high wise gracious Emperour when his majestie shall see that wee are tied by such affection to our harmles profession that wee choose rather patientlie to suffer then rashlie to change as his highnes royal clemencie hath refreshed manie and rid others out of thrall will bee pleased to be our Physitian with his own hand cure the distempered body of this poore kirke restoring to Christs spouse in the land of his highnes happie birth her priviledges and servants for her Lords emploiments that everie one of them receiving that favour may enjoy one another for edification of the kirke his maiesties better service and their mutuall comfort For your owne confirmation and the credite of your cause in whole and everie part of it you haue a sufficient store of strong reasons in your own hand yet because you haue adoe with humbled Christians who as they are taguht of God so they would be faine followers of him and for their vse loue better the pure fountaines of the scripture then the dark compositions and subtile distinctions of Philosophicall Schoole-men you shall not doe amisse to set before your owne eyes for your present use the following Articles of the Lords Supper as straight rules to rectifie the uncomely eye-lasts required to be introduced upon the sound work of this Sacrament 1 Christs practise in the first Supper qualified with his commandement Doe this in remembrance of me and with Pauls precept Bee yee followers of me even as I am of Christ together with the common maxime rightly understood Every action of Christ is our instruction should be the perfect patterne of our practise 2 The command Doe this being grounded upon Christs practise and hauing respect therto cannot be understood but by the understanding of the particulars practised by him For as practise and custome obserued in any matter before a law be made are the best exponers of the law and not the customes and practises that creepe in afterward so in this Sacrament the things done by Christ and his Disciples expone the institution better then the practises customes in the dayes of Dionysius Areopagita of Iustinus Martyr of Tertullian and of the practises of kirkes in these or other ages 3 The example and institution of Christ are fully set downe by Matthew Marke and Luke Euangelists and by Paul the Apostle conioyntly 4 In the night that the Lord was betrayed for the eating of the Lords Supper Christ and his Disciples came together in one place prepared for the eating of the Paschall Lambe and that holy banket 5 In that place where Christ and his Disciples met there was a Table prepared both for the service of the Lambe and for this Sacrament 6 For the reverent eating of this Supper Christ by choyce and no otherwise sate at that Table with his Disciples in the most comely and convenient forme of sitting 7 For visible Elements he vsed both bread and wine such as were at hand for the time and onely these two without any mixture 8 To the bread by way of preparation Christ did foure things he did take it he blessed it he brake it he gaue it and for the right vsing of it he spake three things to the Disciples a commandement Take ye eate yee a declaration This is my body which is given or broken for you a second commandement Doe this in remembrance of me 9 When he had supped for preparation of the cup he did three things he did take it hee blessed it he gaue it them and for right vsing of it hee spake three things a commandement Drinke ye all of it a declaration This is my blood in the new Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins a second commandement Doe this as oft as yee drink it in remembrance of me 10 This service is recōmended to be continued in the kirke and frequently used For as often as yee shall eate this bread and drinke this cuppe yee shew the Lords death till hee come 11 A warning of a fearful danger Whosoever shal eate this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily shall bee guiltie of the body and blood of the Lord. 12 A soueraigne remedy against this danger Let every man therefore examine himselfe and so let him eate of this bread and drink of this cup. 13 This is the truth of this holy sacrament and in the most fauourable times this kirke sought this truth and by the testimonie and commendation of other reformed kirkes found it and not onely the mind of Iesus Christ anent this sacrament but in all the particular heads of religion aboue rehearsed 14 If either the sacrament it selfe the ministers and receiuers thereof were priviledged from mens corruptions there were no feare of craft negligence or compulsion to receiue this sacrament neither necessity to examine what were agreeable or dissonant to the measure of their faith that receiued 15 It is an infallible observation that whosoever after the truth once found seeketh farther then truth shall finde errors and lies 16 Of these Fathers who in Christ Iesus begot you and brought you up through the Gospell delivered to you as they receiued it from the scriptures and from this kirke being reformed yee receiued the sound doctrine and right use of this sacrament and other heads of religion not as a meere doctrine and meere rites but as the annointing of the holy spirit which dwelleth in you If yee shal receiue divers teachers divers doctrines and sacraments you must quite the spirit that dwelleth in you and seek another As the Cotinthians by the distemper of their members and corruptions marked among them by the Apostle transgressed against the first article aboue written so if yee come together in a mixture of nick-named Puritans and conforme people standing under contention expressed there by the Apostle and vnremoved from among you your comming together cannot bee with profite but with great hurt The first maine difference and cause of dissention betwixt you and them ariseth from the fifth article anent a Table and the necessarie vse of it For the sacrament yee holding that it is necessarie for the eating and drinking the sacramentall elements both for the exercise of your faith toward God charitie among your selues is necessarily required in that sacramentall and heavenly banquet and they thinking it onely commodious for the people to kneele at in reverence of the sacrament and others neither necesry nor commodious but a meere Metaphore But you doe well that beleeue that there was a Table at Christs supper as certainly as the hand of him that betrayed him was with him at the Table and as truly for vse as the Apostle Paul tearmeth the
not such throng in the narrow way of suffering as in the broad way of common profession when religion dwelt in the pleasant land of peace in Halcyone dayes like the Spouse of Christ commanding all and subject to none For you must thinke that many looke well in their owne climate that haue neither head nor health to crosse the line and many goe brauely with guilded swords about their owne doores who flye the campe and dare not face the Cannon To beleeue in Christ is a great gift not common to all but to suffer for his sake is a greater and given to few Perhaps it may be that many living by gesse and more ready upon their own respects to professe then carefull to be informed in a truth and no small number of silly spirits by giuing credit to others and misled in the by-paths of errour some unstable Camelion-like hypocrites inclined to be died with the colour of every occasionall profession when they shall see the world to frowne may take another way But pitie them spare them praise God for his favour to you and increase of faith and patience and let no gall and bitternes of speech scarcely becomming the witnesse of a truth make any of whatsoever sort lesse inclinable to returne to you and your way who by memorie of their former proceedings in a different course may be recalled to loue and honor both you and your way The Apostles traine may suffice you If Christ be on your side who can be against you You are debter to him that hath guided the steps of your soule all that is within you to praise him because in these contentions you haue done what you could in defense of the truth and haue kept it and never wronged any man in any matter so that if it be the pleasure of God you shall suffer it is because you dare not forsake a knowne truth whereby you haue received many rich comforts and looketh for to reape endlesse ioy esteeming it your dutie to cleaue to that which is called in question as well as to the rest which seem to be spared for your encouragement you haue a worthy cause to honor you sufficient reasons to defend you and the experience of your owne conscience to uphold you It is true that your large course is so cunningly covered that nothing is permitted to appeare at this time but a smal point the gesture of kneeling at the communion and receving out of the ministers hand with such as shall bee at table vpon the festivall day appointed Yet you must thinke of these particulars as of members of the grosse bodie of conformitie obscuring the frame of Reformation delivered vnto you by the Fathers who begat you in the Lord to bee kept in integritie for your owne use and for the instruction and comfort of your successors For you cannot deny but you haue seene your mother the kirk in her gayest dresse firmly setled vpon the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles and strongly fortified with faire confessions her badges famous in the world and most meet for keeping vnity among her members in doctrine sacraments kirke-service discipline and in the holy ministrie and for abiuring of all poysonable superstition and damnable confusion And with no small joy haue you beheld her watchmen assembled in her sacred meetings for managing her affairs according to the will of her Lord and for that effect strongly fenced with liberties privileges the royal testimonies of his Maiesties loue for strengthening her jurisdiction and furtherance of all her causes How happy were these dayes when her painfull Shepheards were knit together in one minde and judgement with mutuall encouragements all feeding their flockes and pleasantly marching against all enemies without exception as an army with banners How bright were then the starres and how beautifull the candlestickes But now alas you are forced to behold bold mints to draw her off the old foundation to the sandy heapes of humane wisedome her renowned confessions of faith the strong barres of her vnitie aforenamed without just cause reproved and layd aside the doctrine distempered with the vnsavorie mixture of mans learning and presented to the people without relish of the Word and Spirit like an egge without salt to a man of a sound taste yea often with spleene so misapplied against Christians for furthering of mens particulars and worldly projects that hearing bringeth no lesse griefe then edification By new additions mutations both the sacraments are made vncouth and distastfull to many a poore Christian fearing to offend God by passing beyond the measure of their own faith if they should receiue any thing in the sacraments not delivered by the Lord. The necessarie discipline and necessarie vse of the same for purging preservation as behoveful for the kirk as physick for a mans body diseased weakned and almost rejected The holy ministry transformed rent and divided by a swelling humour over-running that somtime solid body and restraining the members thereof from their proper functions the kirke-service prayers and other exercises atled to a new mould and as farre from former edification as pitifully diseased with the daily fits of restlesse change the prerogatiue of the Lords day and due sanctification thereof miserably brought low by setting vp of other dayes of extraordinary respect to be observed with festivall solemnities the jurisdiction liberties and priviledges of the kirke her comfortable and awfull assemblies with the whole pretious substance so wounded and made pale for setting vp of some silly circumstances and that with great losse of concord and quietnesse among all the members of the kirke and no small gaine to superstition confusion and prophannesse And this is the cause moving you to like the first condition of the kirke and to refuse the novations introduced as they are prejudiciall in part or in whole to the religion and order formerlie established For this your judgement your speeches are racked and made to speake against the State and you are brought in the case of Ziterius when the Court was against him making the Emperour Nebuchadnezar And when this flame is kindled against you if you refuse to follow the droue in anie new practise for to defend your libertie by anie good ancient order or custome you are summarilie condemned of Brownish Separation singularitie Puritanisme and of blinde and fained zeale Yet not by all but by such as either hauing forgot or never knowne your prefession in her integritie take advantage by the advantageous name of Conformitie to please themselues and grieve them who cleaue to the forme of godlinesse whereunto you were delivered And even here we must bee patient and repent our own slacknes in following our dutie of good service toward God when so manie pains haue been taken to instruct and strengthen in a contrarie course hoping that although Constantine being at the first for the determination of the Councell of Nice wherunto the contrarie parties put their
AN EPISTLE OF A CHRISTIAN BROTHER Exhorting an other to keepe himselfe vndefiled from the present corruptions brought in to the ministration of the Lords Supper Printed Anno 1624. My reverend and deare brother YOVR doubtfull loue to your owne ancient and well deserved religion and your just feare of this uncouth change was after manie hard assayes with threatnings and terrours strangely enforced rankles your tender heart weary of contending with heavie perplexities of wrath and temporall losses if ye shall continue to walk as ye haue learned and are best perswaded of scandall and defection if ye leaue your own old profession which ye haue judged and judge to be most agreeable to the truth and of shame and of gnawing of conscience if ye shall pollute your self with practises different from your faith and contrary to the best light and likeing of your own mind In these difficulties your case is the more lamentable that ye are drawn under the displeasure of high authoritye which next to God ye would fainest please under the dislike of some Peers and Iudges of the land hauing such particular care to their owne charges giuing them small leasure to sound the depth of ecclesiastical controversies only for a matter of conformitie that known enemy to the vnitie and peace of the kirks of Christ in all the world where it hath found credit And surely your griefe must be the greater that in the day of your sorrow the wise men of your own mind are silent and slack for your help and your great opposites in this distressed cause your neerest friends and old acquaintance but without equall reason on their part or iust desert on yours Who would not be pierced in heart with the pittifull lookes of your wearied countenance as at the last gaspe of your wonted sinceritie and chearfull constancie In this againe if you be left to your selfe affliction is added to the afflicted and our mother the Kirke and her mother the Truth are forsaken And notwithstanding of this strait if any friends of a willing minde shall timously contribute to your comfort some Doeg or some Amazia is euer ready with their biting censure and check of high presumption But praised be the Lord there is no small number of religious and honest men in the kirke and common-weale and the hearts of all are in the hands of the Lord who may at his pleasure moue any that hath the tongue of the learned to speake a word in season to you that are wearie also dispose your friends and brethren of their old ingenuitie and tender compassion of your bleeding heart by their holy wisedome to remoue your doubts confirme your faith and helpe you to be perswaded in your owne minde and to advise you rather now to hold fast that which you haue heard and receiued then afterward with vntimous repentance to change their tune and stile as if you were not a brother but an aduersarie and Apostate if it shall happen as God forbid that you be driven from the bright candle of your knowne profession to the deepe darknesse of an unknowne way and by that unhappy change so much the more blinded as your light hath been greater and with the purest Ivorie turned with fire into saddest black or shal be mis-shapen in a new face stained with the contempt of your first puritie and blushing at the disparagement of your new forme A vile confusion that cannot bee eschewed if you shall suffer your selfe to bee drawne back againe to the deformities for iust causes casten out of the kirk and from that beauty of reformation which you haue before held and with ioy so long professed and vpon no better warrant then a bare example and very authoritie of mens names although for the time fathers and favourers of your profession but after long standing now suddenly moved and so taken with the novelties of the time that for ioyning with them they dare not onely separate from their old masters and fellow brethren but from themselues in respect of that which they were And yet in this maine current some way to be excused by their embarking like simple men in a warre ship and miserable mistaking of these base additions to be layd downe againe when it should please them like good schollers to returne to their owne masters the standard-bearers in our faith with imagined liberty not onely to concurre but to confirme and encourage their owne brethren afresh for the advancement of the interrupted worke of the ministry and edification of the body of Christ as they are bound in conscience and calling But howsoever men haue been inclined to giue place to the streame of the time yet from the day that the kirk hath been crossed and many of all sorts grievously afflicted with the perturbations daily arising about the violent inbringing of these intrused alterations neverthelesse you haue found some sweet refreshment under the shadow of a heavenly dispensation so ruling the pathes of these proceedings that you haue kept the truth suffered reproches and discredit with patience in standing against these misliked novelties so long as they remained without the compasse of your owne practise esteeming your particular losses contented gain and your iniuries excusable for keeping the liberties of Gods service and the secret ioy of your owne conscience to be brooked by your quiet carriage and sober conversation But now if the day of that poore ease be passed and patient walking can haue no further fauour and if you shall be drawen out to a publick stage before the Lord who would keepe you to be his witnesse and in the eyes of men who would gain you to be their disciples you must needs by your owne practise either shamefully recant or honestly confesse the religion wherein you haue stood Choose you this day whether with humbled Esther you will wisely resolue to proue constant and glad the hearts of many people by cleaving to that way wherein you haue found the Saviour with his blessings and benefits of all sorts or if you will against your owne experience of Gods favour to you and hard successe seene upon these novations where they haue beene most greedily embraced hazard by your vnseasonable example to giue occasion of stumbling to many and to loose the patience and labours of your former constancie and now like Peter overwhelmed with feare adventure to seek your comfort and quietnesse in the sway of time as though the Lord could be syled as Absolom was with Chusayes policie If you dare suffer committing your soule to the will of God as vnto a faithfull Creator it is his place to temper the cuppe of all your troubles and when he shall be pleased to try and determine your matter before the highest barre But if you shall deny before men the Lord and his truth once received he will deny you before his heavenly father and will not deliver you from the houre of temptation It may be that you find
sacrament by the name of the Table of the Lord which Table by some Fathers is called the Holy Table and by others the Lords Table a fit meane to represent our vnion and communion with Christ and among our selues in this life Thou doest prepare a Table before me in the sight of my adversaries and in the life to come I haue appointed to you a kingdome that ye may eate and drink at my table in my kingdome which mysterie of spirituall fellowship can no wise be so well adumbrate nor so sensibly perceiued of any beleeving Christian by a common Table in any mans house whosoever The second controversie betwixt you them ariseth from the sixth Article yee holding that Christ and his disciples sate at Table and they obscuring that assertion by alledging of a forme of sitting used by Christ different from your forme and by their law of indifferent things rejecting all forme of sitting and bringing in kneeling as a more humble and convenient gesture for the sacrament then Christ vsed By vertue of the first Article binding you to Christs patterne as you are bound by the Prophet to bee taught of God and consequently not to teach God so by the Apostles precept you should be a follower of Christ and not a reformer either of his practise or institution conforme thereto And as for the diversity of formes of sitting neither kneeling nor standing being opposite gestures to sitting can haue the name of sitting and consequently Christs sitting was no sort of kneeling As for the alledged indifferencie it is taken away by Christs free choyce of sitting expressed in his owne practise when he was neither straited by any occasion compulsion or other inclining cause but at his libertie might haue kneeled it pleased him in his owne wisedome to choose sitting as the meetest gesture for his communicants As for the humilitie of kneeling aboue your humility of sitting we haue no great warrant in the word for there sitting is vsed in preaching in praying in the sacrament but kneeling onely in prayer And yet Christ in his agonie vsed for a more humble forme falling on the ground upon his face Of the three gestures used by the Christian world in religious worship sitting standing and kneeling Christ did choose sitting And if a choyce were to be made of any of the three kneeling for us is most dangerous being the outward badge of their confession who contrary to our faith beleeue Christ to be bodily present either by transubstantiation consubstantiation or some vnknowne maner as also it being the formall adoration of a person and not a signe of reverence to be giuen to the sacramentall elements or any other thing which moved the Schoolemen to affirme that if there remained the substance of bread after the consecration the people would therefore take occasion of Idolatry and in stead of Christs body would giue godly worship to the bread and for avoiding of that idolatry they thought best to remoue away the bread and bring in transubstantiation Thirdly ye differ from them about the distribution of the bread you holding that Christ gaue it to them that were next him and the disciples divided it among themselues and they holding that it should be given by the minister his hand delivering it immediatly into the hand of every single person there present to receiue the communion Your practise as it is conforme to the order of the sacrament observed in this kirk since reformation began so it is most conform to the necessary order of Christs actions and forme of words as they are set down in the eight article But their assertion practise anent distribution can neither agree with the order of Christs actions the forme of his words nor the practise of this reformed kirk As for the order of Christs actions for preparation of the bread he doth three things he took it he blessed it he brake it which of necessity must be understood to be a mystical fraction And being thus prepared as he took the bread for them he exhibiteth and giveth it to them wherby they may be assured to haue good right to that bread and being thus prepared and made theirs he giveth a generall commandement to them all to take it and for the particular form of their taking that they should divide it amōng themselues according to the direction set downe in Luke for the right vse of the cup Divide it among your selues which forme of distribution for exercise of brotherly loue is as necessarie to be vsed upon the bread as upon the cup. And if by the act of giving the distribuoion of the cup were perfected by Christ giving sigillatim to every single person and their sole receiving of it immediatly out of his hand what could be the use of the generall commandement Divide it among you And to ascribe one sence to the act of giving the Cuppe and another of the bread and to thinke that the Apostles could boldly take the one or the other not knowing what right they had to it or what it was it were amisse to think And if the practise of kirkes were a sufficicient rule in sundry kirkes in sundry ages the Deacon delivered the sacrament to the people Since yee professe and faine would bee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and submitting yourselfe to bee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a follower of God by your profession wish and submission rather to follow Christ and his Apostles followers of him then any other man or societie of men and rather the forme of our owne kirke observed since reformation wherin yee haue gotten the comfort that ever yee had or haue by that sacrament and for thir particulars and other causes of contention betwixt you and them that would draw you to a mixture with them in their forme you must deprecate favour while you be better informed and advised and they both to the effect that before you come to communication at the Table yee may be one in faith and articles of religion and of one consent of heart in Ierome his sence calling Augustine of his communion and of Augustines meaning calling a certaine woman of his communion As these differences betwixt you and them are evill in themselues so are they evill in the alledged ground whereby they are occasioned The peoples rudensse and lack of devotion which should be rather removed by diligent instruction then established by a practise founded vpon a necessitie that the sacrament must be alwayes celebrated to a sort of rude people void of reverence to receiue the same in a comely forme By that sort of rusticitie and want of devotion the communion table that in primitiue times stood in the middest of the kirke was separate from the congregation by a Chancellarie since from the middest of the kirke to the east end which was called the Quier then the minister and table both was separate from the people the table turned into an altar the sacrament