yet because Ministers have laid the stress of that examination upon the meer necessity of fitness for that Ordinance and not upon their common duty to see the state and proficiency of each member of their Flock at all fit seasons and upon the peoples duty to submit to the guidance and instruction of the Pastors at all times they have therefore occasioned people ignorantly to quarrel against their examinations and call for the proof Whereas it is an easie thing to prove that any Schollar in Christs School is bound at any time to be accountable to his Teachers and to obey them in all lawful things in order to their own edification and salvation though it may be more difficult to prove a necessity that a Minister must so examine them in order to the Lords Supper any more then in order to a day of Thanksgiving or a Lords day or the Baptizing of their children Now by this course we shall discern their fitness in an unquestionable way 7. ANother Benefit will be this We shall by this means be the better enabled to help our people against their particular temptations and we shall much better prevent their entertainment of any particular errors or heresies or their falling into Schism to the hazard of themselves and the Church For men will freelyer open their thoughts and scruples to us and if they are infected already or inclined to any errour or schism they will be ready to discover it and so may receive satisfaction before they are past cure And familiarity with their Teachers will the more encourage them to open their doubts to them at any other time The common cause of our peoples infections and heresies is the familiarity of Seducers with them and the strangeness of their own Pastors When they hear us only in publike and hear Seducers frequently in private unsaying all that we say and we never know it or help them against it this fettleth them in heresies before we are aware of it Alas our people are most of them so weak that whoever hath 1. Most interest in their estimations and affections and 2. Most opportunity in private frequent conferences to instill his opinions into them of that mans religion will they ordinarily be It is pity then that we should let deceivers take such opportunities to undo them and we should not be as industrious and use our advantages to their good We have much advantage against Seducers in many respects if our negligence and their diligence did not frustrate them 8. ANother and one of the greatest Benefits of our work will be this It will better inform men of the true nature of the Ministerial office or awaken them to better consideration of it then is now usual It is now too common for men to think that the work of the Ministery is nothing but to preach well and to Baptize and administer the Lords Supper and visit the sick and by this means the people will submit to no more and too many Ministers are negligently or wilfully such strangers to their own calling that they will do no more It hath oft grieved my heart to observe some eminent able Preachers how little they do for the saving of souls save only in the Pulpit and to how little purpose much of their labour is by this neglect They have hundreds of people that they never spoke a word to personally for their salvation and if we may judge by their practice they take it not for their duty and the principal thing that hardeneth men in this oversight is the common neglect of the private part of the work by others There are so few that do much in it and the omission is grown so common among pious able men that they have abated the disgrace of it by their parts and a man may now be guilty of it without any common observance or dishonour Never doth sin so reign in a Church or State as when it hath gained reputation or at least is no disgrace to the sinner nor a matter of any offence to beholders But I make no doubt through the mercy of God but the restored practice of personal oversight will convince many Ministers that this is as truly their work as that which they now do and may awaken them to see that the Ministery is another kind of business then too many excellent Preachers do take it to be Brethren do but set your selves closely to this work and follow on diligently and though you do it silently without any words to them that are negligent I am in hope that most of you here may live to see the day that the neglect of private personal Oversight of all the Flock shall be taken for a scandalous and adious omission and shall be as disgraceful to them that are guilty of it as preaching but once a day was heretofore A School master must not only read a common Lecture but take a personal account of his Scholars or else he is like to do little good If Physicians should only read a publike Lecture of Physick their patients would not be much the better for them Nor would a Lawyer secure your estate by reading a Lecture of Law The charge of a Pastor requireth personal dealing as well as any of these Let us shew the world this by our practise for most men are grown regardless of bare words The truth is we have been occasioned exceedingly to wrong the Church in this by the contrary extream of the Papists who bring all their people to Auricular confession For in the overthrowing of this error of theirs we have run into the contrary extream and led our people much further into it then we are gone our selves It troubled me to read in an Orthodox Historian that licentiousness and a desire to be from under the strict enquiries of the Priests in Confession did much further the entertainment of the Reformed Religion in Germany And yet its like enough to be true that they that were against Reformation in other respects yet partly for the change and partly on that licentious account might joyn with better men in crying down the Romish Clergy But by this means lest we should seem to favour the said Auricular Confession we have too commonly neglected all personal instruction except when we occasionally fall into mens company few make it a stated part of their work I am past doubt that the Popish Auricular Confession is a sinful novelty which the antient Church was unacquainted with But perhaps some will think strange that I should say that our common neglect of personal Instruction is much worse if we consider their Confessions in themselves and not as they respect their connexed Doctrines of satisfaction and purgatory Many of the Southern and Eastern Churches do use a Confession of sin to the Priest And how far Mr. Tho. Hocker in his Souls Preparat and other Divines do ordinarily require it as necessary or useful is well known If any among us should be
a Ruler unto whom the people must submit v. 17. Besides every Minister is vested with this authority at his Ordination Whose sins thou dost forgive they are forgiven whose sins thou dost retain c. 2. Every Minister is vested with this authority by the Laws of this Land The words of the Rubrick for the administration of the Lords Supper which do enable us thereto are these If any of those which intend to be partakers of the holy Communion be an open notorious evil liver so that the Congregation by him is offended or have done wrong to his neighbours by word or deed the curate having knowledge thereof shall call him and advertise him in any wise not to presume to the Lords Table until he have openly declared himself to have truly repented and amended his former naughty life that the Congregation may thereby be satisfied which afore were offended and that he have recompenced the parties whom he hath done wrong to or at least declare himself to be in full purpose so to do as soon as he conveniently may Besides this our Authority in this particular is confirmed by an Ordinance of the Lords and Commons in Parliament c. So far Mr. Lyfords words The other is Mr. Tho. Ball of Northampton in his late Book for the Ministry where Part 3. Cap. 4. he bringeth many Arguments to prove it the Ministers duty to exercise Discipline as well as to preach and the seventh Argument is this What was given by the Bishops unto such Ministers as they ordained and laid their hands upon should not be grudged or denyed to them by any body for they were never accounted lavish or over liberal unto them especially in point of Jurisdiction that was alwaies a very tender point and had a guard and centry alwaies on it for conceiving themselves the sole possessors of it they were not willing to admit of partners Whatever they indulged in other points as Pharaoh to Ioseph Only in the throne I will be greater then thou Yet Bishops granted to all that they ordained Presbyters the use and exercise of Discipline as well as Doctrine as appears in the Book of ordering Bishops Priests and Deacons whereof the Interrogatories propounded to the party to be ordained is Will you then give your faithful diligence alwaies so to Minister the Doctrine and Sacraments and the Discipline of Christ as the Lord hath commanded and as this Realm hath received the same according to the Commandments of God so that you may teach the people committed to your care and charge with all diligence to keep and observe the same Which a Reverend and Learned Brother not observing would confine all jurisdiction to Diocesan Bishops c. Argu. 8. What is granted and allowed to Ministers by the Laws and Customs of this Nation cannot reasonably be denyed for the Laws of England have never favoured usurpation in the Clergy c. But the Laws and customs of this Nation allows to the Ministers of England the use and exercise of Discipline as well as Doctrine for such of them as have Parsonages or Rectories are in all process and proceedings called Rectors c. 2. And as to the point of the Peoples interest the moderate seem to differ but in words Some say the People are to Govern by Vote I confess if this were understood as it is spoken according to the proper sense of the words and practised accordingly it were contrary to the express commands of Scripture which Command the Elders to Rule well and the people to obey them as their Rulers in the Lord And it seems to me to be destructive to the Being of a Political Church whose constitutive parts are the Ruling and the Ruled parts as every School consisteth of Master and Scholars and every common-wealth of the Pars imperans pars subdita And therefore those that rigidly stick to this do cast out themselves from all particular Political Churches Communion of Christs institution Which because I have formerly said or somewhat to that purpose a late nameless Writer makes me cruel to his party while I seem for them and so self-contradicting as if it were cruelty to tell a Brother of his sin and not to leave it on him Or as if I understood not my self because he understands me not But I perceive the moderate mean not any such things as these words in their proper sense import They only would have the Church Ruled as a free people as from unjust impositions and in a due subordination to Christ And we are all agreed that the Pastors have the Judicium Directionis the Teaching Directing Power by Office and that the People have Judicium Discretionis and must try his Directions and not obey them when they lead to sin and therefore we cannot expect that the people should execute any of our Directions except their Iudgement lead them to execute them Though if their Iudgement be wrong God requireth them to rectifie it And as for the Judicial Decisive power about which there is so great contending in the strictest sense it is the Prerogative of Christ and belongeth to neither of them For only Christ is proper Law-giver and Iudge of the Church whose Law and Iudgement is Absolute of it self Determinative and not subjected to our tryal of its equity or obligation So that we must as much conclude that there is no final Iudge of Controversies in a Particular Church as we do against the Papists that there is none in the Church in general And therefore the Churches Iudicial Decisive Power is but improperly such reducible to the former which seeing we are agreed in we are as far in sense agreed in this A Pastor is Iudge as a Physician in an Hospital or as Plato or Zeno was in his School or any Tutour in a Colledge of voluntary Students For any more it belongeth to Christ and to the Magistrate Why then do we stand quarreling about the names One saith The people have a Power of Liberty and the Ministers only the Power of Authority And what 's this more then we yield them viz. That the guiding Authority being only in the Guides and the people commanded to obey them in a due subordination to Christ there is a Liberty belonging to all the Saints from any other kind of Ministerial Rule that is from a sic volo sic jubeo a Rule without Divine authority and therefore the people must first try and judge whether the Direction be according to God and so obey And this in Church censures as well as other cases So that 1. As the people ought not to dissent or disobey their Guides unless they lead them to sin and therefore must see a danger of sin before they suspend obedience So 2. the Guides cannot bring the people to execute their Censures or Directions but by procuring their consent And therefore though he must do his duty and may pass his Directive censure though they dissent and Ministerially require them in
out their voice and stir up themselves to an earnest utterance But if they do speak loud and earnestly how few do answer it with earnestness of matter and the voice doth little good the people will take it but as meer bauling when the matter doth not correspond It would grieve one to hear what excellent Doctrines some Ministers have in hand and let it die in their hands for want of close and lively application What fit matter they have for convincing sinners and how little they make of it and what a deal of good it might do if it were set home and yet they cannot or will not do it O sirs how plain how close and earnestly should we deliver a message of such a nature as ours is when the everlasting life or death of men is concerned in it Me thinks we are nowhere so wanting as in this seriousness There is nothing more unsuitable to such a business then to be slight and dull What! speak coldly for God! and for mens salvation Can we believe that our people must be converted or condemned and yet can we speak in a drowsie tone In the name of God Brethren labour to awaken your hearts before you come and when you are in the work that you may be fit to waken the hearts of sinners Remember that they must be wakened or damned and a sleepy Preacher will hardly wake them If you give the holy things of God the highest praises in words and yet do it coldly you will seem in the manner to unsay what you said in the matter It is a kind of contempt of great things especially so great to speak of them without great affection and fervency The manner as well as the words must set them forth If we are commanded what ever our hand findeth to do to do it with all our might then certainly such a work as preaching for mens salvation should be done with all our might But alas how few how thin are such men here one and there one even among good Ministers that have an earnest perswading working way or that the people can feel him preach when they hear him SECT VI. 3. IF we are all heartily Devoted to the work of God why do we not compassionate the poor unprovided Congregations about us and take care to help them to able Ministers and in the mean time step out now and then to their assistance when the business of our own particular charge will give us any leave A Lecture in the more ignorant places purposely for the work of conversion performed by the most lively working-preachers might be a great help where constant means is wanting SECT VII 4. THE negligent execution of acknowledged duties doth shew that we be not so wholly Devoted to the work as we should be If there be any work of Reformation to be set a foot how many are there that will go no further then they are drawn And it were well if all would do but that much If any business for the Church be on foot how many neglect it for their own private business when we should meet and consult together for the unanimous and successful performance of our work one hath this business of his own and another that business which must be preferred before Gods business And when a work is like to prove difficult and costly how backward are we to it and make excuses and will not come on For instance What hath been for more talked of and prayed for and contended about in England for many years past then the business of Discipline And there are but few men the Erastians but they seem zealous in disputing for one side or other some for the Prelatical way and some for the Presbyterian and some for the Congregational And yet when we come to the practice of it for ought I see we are most of us for no way It hath made me admire sometimes to look on the face of England and see how few Congregations in the Land have any considerable execution of Discipline and to think withall what volumns they have written for it and how almost all the Ministery of the Nation is engaged for it how zealously they have contended for it and made many a just exclamation against the opposers of it and yet for all this will do little or nothing in the exercise of it I have marvelled what should make them so zealous in siding for that which their practice shews that their hearts are against But I see a disputing zeal is more natural then a holy obedient practizing zeal How many Ministers in England be there that know not their own charge that plead for the truth of their particular Churches and know not which they be or who be members of them and that never cast out one obstinate sinner no nor brought one to publike Confession and expression of Repentance and promise of reformation No nor admonished one publikely to call him to such Repentance But they think they do their duties if they give them not the Sacrament of the Lords Supper when it is perhaps avoided voluntarily by themselves and thousands will keep away themselves without our prohibiting them and in the mean time we leave them stated members of our Churches and grant them all other Communion with the Church and call them not to personal Repentance for their sin Read Albaspinaens a sober Papist in his Observat 1. and 2. and 3. after his Annot on O tatus and see whether Church-Communion in former times was taken to consist only â—n co-partaking of the Lords Supper Either these hundreds that we communicate not with in the Supper are members of our Churches or not If not then we are Separatists while we so much disclaim it for we have not cast them out nor have we called them to any profession whether they own or disown their membership but only whether they will be examined in order to a Sacrament nor do we use to let them know that we take their refusal of Examination for a refusal of Church membership and exclusion of themselves It follows therefore that we have gathered Churches out of Churches before they were unchurched or before we took Gods way to cast any of them much less all of them out But if they are taken for members how can we satisfie our consciences to forbear all execution of Discipline upon them It is not Gods Ordinance that they should be personally rebuked and admonished and then publikely called to Repentance and be cast out if they remain impenitent If these be no duties why have we made such a noise and stir about them in the world as we have done If they be duties why do we not practise them If none of all these persons be scandalous why do we not admit them to the Lords Supper If they keep away themselves is not that a sin which a brother should not be permitted to remain in Is it not a scandal for them to avoid the
guilty of this gross mistake as to think when he hath preached he hath done all his work let us shew him to his face by our practice of the rest that there is much more to be done and that taking heed to all the Flock is another business then careless lazy Ministers do consider of If a man have the least apprehension that duty and the chiefest duty is no duty he is like to neglect it and be impenitent in the neglect 9. ANother singular Benefit which we may hope for from the faithful performance of this work is that It will help our people better to understand the nature of their duty towards their Overseers and consequently to discharge it better Which were no matter if it were only for our sakes but their own salvation is very much concerned in it I am confident by sad experience that it is none of the least impediments to their happiness and to a true Reformation of the Church that the people understand not what the work and power of a Minister is and what their own duty towards them is They commonly think that a Minister hath no more to do with them but to preach to them and visit them in sickness and administer Sacraments and that if they hear him and receive the Sacrament from him they owe no further obedience nor can he require any more at their hands Little do they know that the Minister is in the Church as the Schoolmaster in his School to teach and take an account of every one in particular and that all Christians ordinarily must be Disciples or Scholars in some such School They think not that a Minister is in the Church as a Physician in a Town for all people to resort to for personal advice for the curing of all those diseases that are fit to be brought to a Physician and that the Priests lips must preserve knowledge and the people must ask the Law at their mouths because he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts And that every soul in the Congregation is bound for their own safety to have personal recourse to him for the resolving of their doubts and for help against their sins and for direction in duty and for increase of knowledge and all saving grace and that Ministers are purposely settled in Congregations to this end to be still ready to advise and help the Flock If our people did but know their duty they would readily come to us when they are desired to be instructed and to give an account of their knowledge faith and lives and they would come themselves without sending for and knock oftner at our doors and call for advice and help for their souls and ask What shall we do to be saved Whereas now the matter is come to that sad pass that they think a Minister hath nothing to do with them and if he admonish them they will bid him look to himself he shall not answer for them and if he call them to be Catechized or instructed or to be prepared for the Lords Supper or other holy Ordinance or would take an account of their faith and profiting they will ask him By what authority he doth these things and think that he is a busie pragmatical fellow that loves to be medling where he hath nothing to do or a proud fellow that would bear rule over their consciences When they may as well ask him By what authority he preacheth or prayeth for them or giveth them the Sacrament or they may as well ask a School-master By what authority he cals his Scholars to learn or say their lesson Or a Physitian By what authority he enjoyment them to take his Medicine people consider not that all our authority is but for our work even a Power to do our duty and our work is for them so that it is but an authority to do them good And the silly wretches do talk no wiselyer then if they should thus quarrel with a man that would held to quench the fire in their thatch and ask him By what authority he doth it Or that would give his money to relieve the poor and they should ask him By what authority do you require us to take this money Or as if I offered my hand to one that is fallen to help him up or to one that is in the water to save him from drowning and he should ask me By what authority I do it Truly we have no wiser nor thankfuller dealing from these men Nay it is worse in that we are doubly obliged both by Christian Charity and the Ministerial office to do them good I know not of any Simile that doth more aptly express the Ministerial power and duty and the peoples duty then these two conjunct viz. even such as a Physician is in an Hospital that hath taken the charge of it and such as a School-master is in his School especially such as the Philosophers or teachers of any science or art whose Schools have the aged and voluntary members as well as children Christs hath all ages even such is a Minister in the Church and such is their work and their authority to do it and the duty of the people to submit thereto allowing such differences as the subject requireth And what is it that hath brought people to this ignorance of their duty but custom It s long of us Brethren to speak truly and plainly its long of us that have not used them nor our selves to any more then the common publike work We see how much custom doth with the people Where it is the custom they stick not among the Papists at the confessing of all their sins to the Priest And because it is not the custom among us they disdain to be questioned catechized or instructed They wonder at it as a strange thing and say such things were never done before And if we can but prevail to make this duty become as usual as other duties they will much more easily submit to it then now What a happy thing would it be if you might live to see the day that it should be as ordinary for people of all ages to come in course to their Teachers for personal advice and help for their salvation as it is now usual for them to come to Church or as it is for them to send their children thither to be Catechized Our diligence in this work is the way to do this 10. MOreover our practice will give the Governors of the Nation some better information about the nature and burden of the Ministery and so may procure their further assistance It is a lamentable impediment to the Reformation of the Church and the saving of souls that in most populous Congregations there is but one or two men to over-see many thousand souls and so there are not labourers in any measure answerable to the work but it becomes an impossible thing to them to do any considerable measure of that personal duty which should be done
beholden to him for his bloodshed and how all your hope and life is in him he will make you see the vanity of this world and all that it can afford you and that all your happiness is with God in that everlasting life where with Saints and Angels you may behold his Glory and live in his loves and praises when those that reject him shall be tormented with the devils And because it is only Christ the Redeemer that can bring you to that glory and deliver you from that torment he will make you look to him as your hope and life and cast your burdened soul upon him and give up your selves to be saved and taught and ruled by him and he will possess you with the spirit of holyness that your heart shall set upon God and heaven as your treasure and the care of your mind and the business of your life shall be to obtain it and you shall despise this world and deny your fleshly interests and desires and cast away the sin with abhorrence which you delighted in and count no pains too great nor no suffering too dear for the obtaining of that everlasting life with God Let me tell you that till this work be done upon you you are a miserable man and if you dye before it s done you are lost for ever Now you have hope and help before you but then there will be none Let me therefore intreat these two or three things of you and do not deny them me as you love your soul First That you will not rest in this Condition that you are in Be not quiet in your mind till you find a true conversion to be wrought Think when you rise in the morning O what if this day should be my last and death should find me in an unrenewed state Think when you are about your labour O how much greater a work have I yet to do to get my soul reconciled to God and possessed of his Spirit Think when you are eating or drinking or looking on any thing that you possess in the world what good will all this do me if I live and die an enemy to God and a stranger to Christ and his Spirit and we must perish for ever Let these thoughts be day night upon your mind till your soul be changed The second thing that I would intreat of you is that you would bethink you seriously what a vain thing this world is and how shortly it will leave you to a cold grave and to everlasting misery if you have not a better treasure then this and bethink you what it is to live in the sight of the face of God and to reign with Christ and be like the Angels and that this is the life that Christ hath procured you and is preparing for you and offereth you if you will accept it in and with himself upon his easie reasonable terms bethink your self whether it be not madness to slight such an endless glory and to prefer these fleshly dreams and earthly shadows before it Use your self to such considerations as these when you are alone and let them dwell upon your mind The third thing that I would intreat of you is that you will presently without any more delay Accept of this felicity and this Saviour close with the Lord Jesus that offereth you this eternal life Joyfully and thankfully accept his offer as the only way to make you happy and then you may believe that all your sins shall be done away by him My fourth request to you is that you will resolve presently against your former sins find out what hath defiled your heart and life and cast it up now by the vomit of Repentance as you would do Poyson out of your stomach and abhor the thought of taking it in again My fifth and last request to you is that you will set your selves close to the use of Gods means till this change be wrought and then continue his means till you are confirmed and at last perfected 1. Because you cannot of your selves make this change upon your heart and life betake your self daily to God for it by prayer and beg earnestly as for your life that he will pardon all your former sins and change your heart and shew you the riches of his Grace in Christ and the Glory of his Kingdom and draw up your heart to himself Follow God day and night with these requests 2. That you will fly from temptations and occasions of sin and forsake your former evil company and betake your selves into the company of those that fear God and will help you in the way to heaven 3. That you will specially spend the Lords day in holy exercises both publike and private and lose not one quarter of an hour of any of your time but specially of that most precious time which God hath given you purposely that you may set your mind upon him and be instructed by him and to prepare your self for your latter end What say you will you do this presently at least so much of it as you can do if you will Will you promise me to think of these things that I before mentioned and to pray daily for a changed heart till you have obtained it and to change your Company and Courses and fall upon the use of Gods means in reading or hearing the Scriptures meditating on them specially on the Lords day And here be sure if we can to get their promise and engage them to amendment especially to use means and change their company and forsake actual sinning because these are more in their reach and in this way they may wait for the accomplishing of that change that is not yet wrought And do this solemnly remembring them of the presence of God that heareth their promises and will expect the performance And when you have afterward opportunity you may remember them of that promise Direction 9. At the dismissing of them do these two things 1. Again lenifie their minds by a deprecation of offence in a word E. G. I pray you take it not ill that I have put you to this trouble or dealt thus freely with you It s as little pleasure to me as to you if I did not know these things to be true and necessary I would have spared this labour to my self and you But I know that we shall be here together but a little while we are almost at the world to come already and therefore its time for us all to look about us and see that we be ready when God shall call us 2. Because it is but seldom that we our selves shall have opportunity to speak with the same persons set them in a way for the perfecting of what is begun 1. Engage the Governor of each family to call all his family to account every Lords day before they go to bed what they can rehearse of the Catechism and so to continue till they have all learned it perfectly and when they
have done so yet still to continue to hear them recite it at least once in two or three Lords daies that they may not forget it For even to the most judicious it will be an excellent help to have still in memory a sum of the Christian Doctrine for matter method and words 2. As for the Rulers of families themselves or those that are under such rulers as will not help them if they have learnt some small part of the Catechism only engage them either to come again to you though before their course when they have learnt the rest or else to go to some able experienced neighbour and recite it to them and take their assistance when you cannot have time your self Direction 10. Have all the names of your Parishioners by you in a book and when they come and recite the Catechism note in your Book who come and who do not and who are so grosly ignorant as to be utterly uncapable of the Lords Supper and other holy Communion and who not and as you perceive the necessities of each so deal with them for the future But for those that are utterly obstinate and will not come to you nor be instructed by you remember the last Article of our Agreement to deal with them as the obstinate despisers of Instruction should be deals with in regard of Communion and the application of sealing and confirming Ordinances which is to avoid them and not hold holy or familiar Communion with them in the Lords Supper or other Ordinances and though some Reverend Brethren are for admitting their children to Baptism and offended with me for contradicting it yet so cannot I be nor shall I dare to do it upon any pretences of their Ancestors faith or of a Dogmatical faith of these Rebellious Parents supposing them both to be such as in that Article we have mentioned To these particulars I add this General Dâ—rection 11. Through the whole course of your conference with them see that the manner as well as the matter be suited to the end And concerning the manner observe these particulars 1. That you make a difference according to the difference of the persons that you have to deal with To the dull and obstinate you must be more earnest and sharp To the tender and timerous that are already humbled you must rather insist on direction and confirmation To the youthful you must lay greater shame on sensual voluptuousness and shew them the nature and necessity of mortification To the Aged you must do more to disgrace this present world and make them apprehensive of the nearness of their change and the aggravations of their sin if they shall live and dye in ignorance or impenitency To Inferiors and the Younger you must be more free to Superiors and Elders more reverend To the rich this world must be more disgraced and the nature and necessity of self-denyal opened and the damnableness of preferring the present prosperity to the future with the necessity of improving their talents in well-doing To the poor we must shew the great Riches of Glory which is propounded to them in the Gospel and how well the present things may be spared where the everlasting may be got Also those sins must be most insisted on which each ones age or sex or temperature of body or calling and employment in the world doth most encline tehm to As in females loquacity evil speeches passion malice pride c. In males drunkenness ambition c. Of all which and abundance more differences calling to us for different carriage See Gregor Mag. de Officio Pastor 2. Be as condescending familiar and plain as is possible with those that are of the weaker capacity 3. Give them the Scripture proof the light of full evidence and reason of all as you go that they may see that it is not you only but God by you that speaketh to them 4. Be as serious in all but specially in the Applicatory part as you can I scarce fear any thing more then least some careless Ministers will slubber over the work and do all superficially and without life and destroy this as they do all other duties by turning it into a meer formality putting a few cold questions to them and giving them two or three cold words of advice without any life and feeling in themselves nor likely to produce any feeling in the hearers But sure he that valueth souls and knoweth what an opportunity is before him will do it accordingly 5. To this end I should think it very necessary that we do both before and in the work take special pains with our own hearts especially to excite and strengthen our Belief of the Truth of the Gospel and the Invisible Glory and Misery that is to come I am confident this work will exceedingly try the strength of our belief For he that is but superficially a Christian and not sound in the faith will likely feel his Zeal quite fail him specially when the duty is grown common for want of a Belief of the things which he is to treat of to keep it alive An affected fervency and hypocritical stage-action will not hold up in such kind of duties long A Pulpit shall have more of them then a conference with poor ignorant souls For the Pulpit is the hypocritical Ministers stage There and in the Press and in Publike acts where there is room for oftentation you shall have his best and almost all It is other kind of men that must effectually do the work now in hand 6. It is therefore very meet that we prepare our selves to it by private prayer and if time would permit and there be many together if we did begin and end with a short prayer with our people it were best 7. Carry on all even the most earnest passages in clear demonstrations of love to their souls and make them feel through the whole that you aim at nothing but their own salvation and avoid all harsh discouraging passages throughout 8. If you have not time to deal so fully with each one particularly as is here directed then 1. Omit not the most necessary parts 2. Take several of them together that are friends and will not seek to divulge each others weaknesses and speak to them in common as much as concerneth all and only the Examinations of their Knowledge and state and convictions of misery and special directions must be used to the individuals alone But take heed of slubbering it over uponan unfaithful laziness or being too brief without a real Necessity Direction 12. Lastly if God enable you extend your charity to those of the poorest sort before they part from you Give them somewhat towards their relief and for the time that is thus taken from their labours Especially for encouragement of them that do best and to the rest promise them so much when they have learned the Catechism I know you cannot give what you have not but I speak to them that can And
virtutes promoventur ergo qui hanc disciplinam restitutam nolunt quomodo audent dicere se vitia odisse virtutum vero amantes esse pietatis promotores impietatis osores Hâc conservatur regitur Ecclesia singulaeque Ecclesiae membra suo quaeque loco cohaerent Ergo quomodo qui hanc expulsam volunt dicunt se velle Christi Ecclesiam bene rectam si quando sine hac bene regi non potest Si nulla domus nullum opidum nulla urbs nulla respublica nullum regnum imo ne exiguus quidem ludus literarius sinè disciplina regi potest quomodo poterit Ecclesia I would Magistrates would read the rest which is purposely to them Et fol. 135. At timetur seditio tumultus Resp Ergo neque Evangelium est praedicandum c. Quid Annon vident Principes Magstratus nostri quantum malum in Ecclesia oriatur intus foris ex neglectu contemptuve hujus disciplinae Foris nulla res est quae magis Papistas alios arceat vel saltem retrudet amplectendo evangelio atque haec disciplinae Ecclesiasticae destitutio quae est in Ecclesiis nostris Intus nihil quod magis alat vitia haeresis c. Annon vident Ecclesias suas principes plenas sectis haereticorum impurorum hominum Ad has confluit omne genus hominum fanaticorum impurorum c. tanquam ad asylum Quare quia ibi nulla disciplina Sciant ergo principes quicunque illi sint qui Disciplinam Ecclesiasticam in Ecclesiis restitutam nolunt sed ei adversantur eamque proscribunt se Christo adversari qui ministros impediunt ne cam exerceant se Christum Deum impedire ne sua fungantur potestate Quid enim agunt Ministri cum excommunicant Pronunciant sententiam Domini Ait enim Christus Quicquid liga veritis in terris c. Quid igitur agunt qui impediunt Ecclesiam ne sententiam Domini pronunciet Peccant contra Christum rei sunt laesae Divinae Majestatis Annon reus esset laesae Majestatis Caesareae siquis ejus judicem ne sententiam Caesaris pronunciet impediat Videant igitur quid agant Hactenus Christus rexit Ecclesiam suam hac Disciplinâ ipsi Principes imo Ministri aliquot nolunt eam sic regi Viderint ipsi Pronuncio Proclamo Protestor eos peccare qui cum possint debeant eam restituere non restituunt I hope both Magistrates and Ministers that are guilty will give me leave to say the like with Zanchy if not to call them Traitors against the Majesty of God that hinder Discipline and adversaries to Christ yet at least to Pronounce Proclaim Protest that they sin against God who set it not up when they may and ought But what if the Magistrate will not help us Nay What if he were against it So he was for about 300. years when Discipline was exercised in the primitive Church To this Zanchy adds ib. Ministri Ecclesiae quantum per consensum pacem Ecclesiae licet hanc Disciplinam exercere debetis Hanc enim potestatem vobis dedit Dominus neque quispiam auferre eam potest nec contenti esse debetis ut doceatis quid agendum quid fugiendum sit utut quisque pro sua libidine vivat nihil curantes sed urgenda disciplina vid. August de fide operib c. 4. Obj. At impedimur per Magistratum Resp Tunc illi significate quam male agat c. Read the rest of the solid advice that Calvin and Zanchy in the forecited places do give both to Ministers and people where Discipline is wanting The great Objection that seemeth to hinder some from this work is because we are not agreed yet who it is that must do it Whether only a Prelate or whether a Presbyterie or a single Pastor or the People Answ Let so much be exercised as is out of doubt 1. It s granted that a single Pastor may expound and apply the word of God He may rebuke a notorious sinner by name He may make known to the Church that God hath commanded them with such a one no not to eat and require them to obey this command c. I shall say no more of this now then to cite the words of two learned godly moderate Divines impartial in this cause The one is Mr. Lyford a maintainer of Episcopacy in his Legacy of Admission to the Lords Supper who pag. 55. saith Q. In which of the Ministers is this power placed Answ Every Minister hath the power of all Christs Ordinances to dispense the same in that Congregation or Flock over which the Holy-Ghost hath made him Overseer yet with this difference he may preach the word baptize and administer the holy Supper alone of himself without the assistance or consent of the People But not excommunicate alone he means not without the people though of that more must be said because excommunication doth presuppose an offence to the Congregation a conviction and proof of that offence and witnesses of the parties obstinacy and therefore hereunto is required the action of more then one c. Excommunication comprizeth several acts Admonition private publike the last act is the casting out of a wicked obstinate person from the society of the faithful 1. By the authority of Christ 2. Dispensed and executed by the Ministers of the Gospel 3. With the assistance and consent of the Congregation c. 2. If you ask by whose office and Ministry this sentence is denounced I answer by the Ministers of the Gospel we bind and loose doctrinally in our preaching peace to the godly and curses to the wicked But in excommunication we denounce the wrath of God against this or that particular person Thou art the man thou hast no part with us and that not only declaratively but judicially It is like the sentence of a Judge on the bench c. 3. If you ask Whether this be done by the Minister alone I answ No it must be done by the assistance and consent of the Congregation 1 Cor. 5. 4. Excommunication must not be done in a corner by the Chancellor and his Register c. But whosoever doth by his offences lose his right to the holy things of God he must lose it in the face of the Congregation and that after proofs and allegations as is abovesaid the people hear and see the offence complain of it and are grieved at his society with them and judge him worthy to be cast out This concurrence and consent being supposed every Minister is Episcopus Gregis a Bishop in his own Parish N. B. Act. 20. 28. To all the Flock over which the Holy-Ghost hath made you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Overseers And Heb. 13. 17. Remember them which have the Rule over you who have spoken to you the word of God Where note that they who preach the word of God must Rule and Govern the Church and every Preacher is
dare not do it but confess that we are sinners And we should heartily rejoyce to find the signs of imperfect sincerity in them that so confidently pretend to sinless perfection yea if in some of them we could find but common honesty and a freedom from some of the crying abominations of the ungodly such as cruel bloodiness lying slandering railing c. If it would make a man perfect to say he is perfect and if it would deliver a man from sin to say I have no sin I confess this vvere an easie vvay to perfection There is one Richard Farnworth called a Quaker that hath lately published a Pamphlet against our Agreement for Catechizing and the substance of it is this because vve confess that by neglecting that vvork of the Lord vve have sinned and do beg pardon of our miscarriages and say that by Nature vve are children of vvrath and prone to do evil c. therefore he vvill prove us deceivers and no Ministers of Christ as from our ovvn Confession As if they that are Dead by Nature may not be made alive by Grace And as if Are is not as proper a term as Were when we speak of the state of all mankind in their natural condition wherein the most do still abide And as if the confessing our sin would prove us to be ungodly O shameless men God saith He that confesseth and forsaketh his sin shall have mercy And the Quaker maketh it a matter of his reproach Iohn saith If we confess he is faithful and just to forgive And the Quaker maketh it a sign that we are not forgiven God will not forgive us if we refuse to confess And the Quaker makes us unpardoned because we do it What would this wretch have said to David Ezra Nehemiah Daniel c. if he had lived in their daies who made such full confessions of their sins God hit them not in the teeth with them but the Quakers will Christ did forgive even Peters denyal of him but it seems the Quaker would have condemned him for the penitent lamenting of it Is Paul damned for confessing himself the chief of sinners of whom I am chief 1 Tim. 1. 15. and that formerly he was a persecutor blasphemer c. Or because he saith Eph. 3. 8. Vnto me who am less then the least of Saints Or for crying out O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death What I would that I do not and what I hate that do I. I find a Law that when I would do good evil is present with me c. Rom. 7. 24. 15. 21. Or is Isaiah a wicked man and no Prophet of God for saying Wo is me I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips c. Isa 6. 5. Or Jacob for saying Gen. 32. 10. I am not worthy of the least of all thy mercies c. Or Job for abhorring himself in dust and ashes Iob 42. 6. It irketh me to spend words upon such Impudent revilers But in this much you have a sufficient Reply to his book But for our parts we believe that he that saith he hath no sin deceiveth himself and the truth is not in him I Iohn 1. 8. and that in many things we offend all I am 3. 2. and we profess to know but in part and to have our treasure in earthen vessels and to be insufficient for these things And therefore see that you love and imitate the holiness of your Pastors but take not occasion of dis-esteeming or reproaching them for their infirmities 2. I take it to be my duty as a watchman for your souls to give you notice of a train that is laid for your perdition The Papists who have found that they could not well play their game here with open face have masked themselves and taken the vizards of several sects and by the advantage of the licence of the times are busily at work abroad this Land to bring you back to Rome What names or garb soever they bear you may strongly conjecture which be they by these marks following 1. Their main design is to unsettle you and to make you believe that you have been all this while misled and to bring you to a loss in a matter of Religion that when they have made you dislike or suspect that which you had or seemed to have you may be the more respective of theirs 2. To which end their next means is to bring you to suspect first and then to contemn and reject your Teachers For saith Rushworth one of their Writers Not one of ten among the people indeed do ground their faith on the Scripture but on the credit of their teachers c. therefore they think if they can but bring you to suspect your teachers and so to reject them they may deal with the sheep without the Shepherds and dispute with the Scholars without their Teachers and quickly make you say what their list To this end their design is partly to cry them down as false teachers but how are they baffled when it comes to the proof and partly to perswade you that they have no calling to the work and urge them to prove their calling which how easily can we do and partly to work upon your covetous humour by crying down tythes and all established maintenance for the Ministry And withal they are busie yet in contriving how to procure the Governors of the Nation to withdraw their publique countenance and maintenance and sacrilegiously to deprive the Church of the remnant that is devoted to it for God and to leave the Ministry on equal terms with themselves or all other sects which in Spain Italy France c. they will be loth to do And time will shew you whether God will suffer them to prevail with the Governors of this sinful land to betray the Gospel into their hands or not but we have reason to hope for better things 3. Their next design is to diminish the Authority and sufficiency of Scripture and because they dare not yet speak out to tell us what they set up in its stead some of them will tell you of New Prophets and Revelations and some of them will tell you that in that they are yet at a loss themselves that is they are of no Religion and then they are no Christians I shall now proceed no further in the discovery but only warn you as you love your souls keep close to Scripture and a faithful Ministry and despise not your Shepherds if you would escape the wolves If any question our calling send them to our writings where we have fully proved them or send them to us who are ready to justifie them against any Papist or Heretick upon earth And let me tell you that for all the sins of the Ministry which we have here confessed the known world hath not a more able faithful godly Ministry then Brittain hath at this day If at the Synod of Dort the Clerus
Angel of light to deceive He will get within you and trip up your heels before you are aware He will play the juglar with you undiscerned and cheat you of your faith or innocency and you shall not know that you have lost it nay he will make you believe it is multiplyed or increased when it is lost You shall see neither hook nor line much less the subtile Angler himself whole he is offering you his bait And his baits shall be so fitted to your temper and disposition that he will be sure to find advantages within you and make your own principles and inclinations to betray you and when ever he ruineth you he will make you the instruments of your own ruine O what a conquest will he think he hath got if he can make a Minister lazy and unfaithful if he can tempt a Minister into covetousness or scandal He will glory against the Church and say These are your holy Preachers you see what their preciseness is and whither it will bring them He will glory against Jesus Christ himself and say These are thy Champions I can make thy chiefest servants to abuse thee I can make the Stewards of thy house unfaithful If he did so insult against God upon a false surmise and tell him he could make Iob to curse him to his face Iob 1. 11. What would he do if he should indeed prevail against us And at last he will insult as much over you that ever he could draw you to be false to your great trust and to blemish your holy profession and to do him so much service that was your enemy O do not so far gratifie Satan do not make him so much sport suffer him not to use you as the Philistines did Sampson first to deprive you of your strength and then to put out your eyes and so to make you the matter of his triumph and derision SECT XIII 5. TAke heed to your selves also because there are many eyes upon you and therefore there will be many observers of your fals You cannot miscarry but the world will ring of it The Ecclipses of the Sun by day time are seldom without witnesses If you take your selves for the Lights of the Churches you may well expect that mens eyes should be upon you If other men may sin without observation so cannot you And you should thankfully consider how great a mercy this is That you have so many eyes to watch over you and so many ready to tell you of your faults and so have greater helps then others at least for the restraining of your sin Though they may do it with a malicious mind yet you have the advantage by it God forbid that we should prove so impudent as to do evil in the publike view of all and to sin wilfully while the world is gazing on us He that is drunk is drunk in the night and he that sleepeth doth sleep in the night 1 These 5. 7. What fornicator so impudent as to sin in the open streets while all look on Why consider that you are still in the open light Even the Light of your own Doctrine will disclose your evil doings While you are as Lights set upon a hill look not to lie hid Mat. 5. 14. Take heed therefore to your selves and do your works as those that remember that the world looks on them and that with the quick-sighted eye of malice ready to make the worst of all and to find the smallest fault where it is and aggravate it where they find it and divulge it and make it advantagious to their designs and to make faults where they cannot find them How cautelously then should we walk before so many ill-minded observers SECT XIV 6. TAke heed also to your selves for your sins have more hainous aggravations then other mens Its noted among King Alphonsus sayings that a great man cannot commit a small sin we may much more say that a learned man or a Teacher of others cannot commit a small sin or at least that the sin is great as committed by him which is smaller in another I. You are liker then others to sin against knowledge because you have more then they At least you sin against more light or means of knowledge What do you not know that Covetousness and Pride are sins do you not know what it is to be unfaithful to your trust and by negligence or self-seeking to betray mens souls You know your masters will and if you do it not shall be beaten with many stripes There must needs therefore be the more wilfulness by how much there is the more knowledge If you sin it is because you will sin 2. Your sins have more hypocrisie in them then other mens by how much the more you have spoke against them O what a hainous thing is it in us to study how to disgrace sin to the utmost and make it as odious to our people as we can and when we have done to live in it and secretly cherish that which we openly disgrace What vile hypocrisie is it to make it our daily work to cry it down and yet to keep it to call it publikely all to naught and privately to make it our bed-fellow and companion To bind heavy burdens for others and not to touch them our selves with a finger What can you say to this in judgement Did you think as ill of sin as you spoke or did you not If you did not why would you dissemblingly speak it If you did why would you keep it and commit it O bear not that badge of a miserable Pharisee They say but do not Mat. 23. 3. Many a minister of the Gospel will be confounded and not be able to look up by reason of this heavy charge of hypocrisie 3. Moreover your sins have more perfidiousness in them then other mens You have more engaged your selves against them Besides all your common engagements as Christians you have many more as Ministers How oft have you proclaimed the evil and danger of it and called sinners from it how oft have you declared the terrors of the Lord all these did imply that you renounced it your selves Every Sermon that you preacht against it every private Exhortation every Confession of it in the Congregation did lay an engagement upon you to forsake it Every child that you have baptized and entred into the Covenant with Christ and every administration of the Supper of the Lord wherein you called men to renew their Covenant did import your own renouncing of the flesh and the world and your engagement unto Christ How oft and how openly have you born witness of the odiousness and damnable nature of sin and yet will you entertain it against all these professions and testimonies of your own O what treachery is it to make such a stir in the Pulpit against it and after all to entertain it in the heart and give it the room that is due to God and even prefer it before
shall be all ungoverned And the Physitian that will undertake the Guidance of all the sick people in a whole Nation or County when he is not able to visit or direct the hundreth man of them may as well say Let them perish Ob. But though they cannot Rule them by themselves they may do it by others Answ The nature of the Pastoral work is such as must be done by the Pastor himself He may not delegate a man that is no Pastor to Baptize or administer the Lords Supper or to be the Teacher of the Church No more may he commit the Government of it to another Otherwise by so doing he makes that man the Bishop if he make him the immediate Ruler and Guid of the Church And if a Bishop may make each Presbyter a Bishop so he do but derive the power from him then let it no more be held unlawful for them to Govern or to be Bishops And if a Prelate may do it it is like Christ or his Apostles might and have done it for as we are to preach in Christs name and no in any mans so it s likely that we must Rule in his name But of this somewhat more anon Yet still it must be acknowledged that in case of necessity where there are not more to be had one man may under take the charge of more souls then he is able well to over-see particularly But then he must only undertake to do what he can for them and not to do all that a Pastor ordinarily ought to do And this is the case of some of us that 〈◊〉 greater Parishes then we are able to take 〈…〉 â—eed to as their state requireth I must proteâ—â— or my own part I am so far from their boldness in 〈…〉 venture on the sole Government of a County that I would not for all England have undertaken to have been one of the two that should do all the Padoral work that God enjoyneth to that one Parish where I live had I not this to satisfie my conscience that through the Churches necessities more cannot be had and therefore I must rather do what I can than leave all undone because I cannot do all But cases of unavoidable necessity are not to be the standing condition of the Church or at least it is not desirable that it should so be O happy Church of Christ were the Labourers but Able and Faithful and proportioned in number to the number of souls So that the Pastors were so many or the particular Flocks or Churches so small that we might be able to Take heed to All the Flocks SECT II. HAving told you these two things that are here implyed I come next to the duty it self that is exprest And this Taking heed to All the Flock in general is A very great care of the whole and every part with great watchfulness and diligence in the use of all those holy actions and Ordinances which God hath required us to use for their salvation More particularly this work is to be considered 1. In respect to the subject matter of it 2. In respect to the object 3. In respect to the work it self or the Actions which we must do And 4. In respect to the End which we must intend Or it is not amiss if I begin first with this last as being first in our intention though last as to the attainment 1. The ultimate end of our Pastoral over-sight is that which is the ultimate end of our whole lives Even the Pleasing and Glorifying of God to which is connext the Glory of the humane nature also of Christ and the Glorification of his Church and of our selves in particular And the neerer ends of our office are the sanctification and holy obedience of the people of our charge their unity order beauty strength preservation and increase and the right worshipping of God especially in the solemn Assemblies By which it is manifest that before a man is capable of being a true Pastor of a Church according to the mind of Christ he must have so high an estimation of these things that they may be indeed his ends 1. That man therefore that is not himself taken-up with the predominant love of God and is not himself devoted to him and doth not devote to him all that he hath and can do that man that is not addicted to the pleasing of God and maketh him not the Center of all his actions and liveth not to him as his God and Happiness That is that man that is not a sincere Christian himself is utterly unfit to be a Pastor of a Church And if we be not in a case of desperate necessity the Church should not admit such so far as they can discover them Though to inferiour common works as to teach the Languages and some Philosophy to translate Scriptures c. they may be admitted A man that is not heartily devoted to God addicted to his service honour will never set heartily about the Pastoral work nor indeed can he possibly while he remaineth such do one part of that work no nor of any other nor speak one word in Christian sincerity For no man can be sincere in the means that is not so in his intentions of the end A man must heartily Love God above all before he can heartily serve him before all 2. No man is fit to be a Minister of Christ that is not of a publike spirit as to the Church and delighteth not in its beauty and longeth not for its felicity As the good of the Common-wealth must be the end of the Magistrate his neerer end so must the felicity of the Church be the end of the Pastors of it So that we must rejoyce in its welfare and be willing to spend and be spent for its sake 3. No man is fit to be a Pastor of a Church that doth not set his heart on the life to come and regard the matters of everlasting life above all the matters of this present life and that is not sensible in some measure how much the inestimable riches of glory are to be preferred to the trifles of this world For he will never set his heart on the work of mens salvation that doth not heartily believe and value that salvation 4. He that delighteth not in holiness hateth not iniquity loveth not the Unity and Purity of the Church and abhorreth not discord and divisions and taketh not pleasure in the Communion of Saints and the publike worship of God with his people is not fit to be a Pastor of a Church For none of all these can have the true ends of a Pastor and therefore cannot do the works For of what necessity the end is to the Means and in Relations is easily known SECT III. II. THE subject matter of the Ministerial work is in general spiritual things or matters that concern the Pleasing of God and the Salvation of our people It is not about temporal and transitory things It is
a vile usurpation of the Pope and his Prelates to assume the management of the temporal sword and immerse themselves in the businesses of the world to exercise the violent coertion of the Magistrate when they should use only the spiritual weapons of Christ Our business is not to dispose of Common-wealths nor to touch mens purses or persons by our penalties but it consisteth only in these two things 1. In revealing to men that Happiness or chief Good which must be their ultimate end 2. In acquainting them with the right means for the attainment of this end and helping them to use them and hindring them from the contrary 1. It is the first and great work of the Ministers of Christ to acquaint men with that God that made them and is their Happiness to open to them the treasures of his Goodness and tell them of the Glory that is in his presence which all his chosen people shall enjoy That so by shewing men the Certainty and the Excellency of the promised felicity and the perfect blessedness in the life to come compared with the vanities of this present life we may turn the stream of their cogitations and affections and bring them to a due contempt of this world and set them on seeking the durable treasure And this is the work that we should lie at with them night and day could we once get them right in regard of the end and set their hearts unfeignedly on God and heaven the chiefest part of the work were done for all the rest would undoubtedly follow And here we must diligently disgrace their seeming sensual felicity and convince them of the baseness of those pleasures which they prefer before the delights of God 2. Having shewed them the right end our next work is to acquaint them with the right means of attaining it Where the wrong way must be disgraced the evil of all sin must be manifested and the danger that it hath brought us into and the hurt it hath already done us must be discovered Then have we the great mysterie of Redemption to disclose the Person Natures Incarnation Perfection Life Miracles Sufferings Death Burial Resurrection Ascension Glorification Dominion Intercession of the blessed Son of God As also the tenor of his promises the conditions imposed on us the duties which he hath Commanded us and the Everlasting Torments which he hath threatned to the final Impenitent neglecters of his grace O what a treasury of his blessings and Graces and the priviledges of his Saints have we to unfold What a blessed life of Holiness and Communion therein have we to recommend to the sons of men And yet how many temptations difficulties and dangers to disclose and assist them against How many precious spiritual duties have we to set them upon and excite them to and direct them in How many objections of flesh and blood and cavils of vain men have we to confute How much of their own corruptions and sinful inclinations to discover and root out We have the depth of Gods bottomless Love and Mercy the depth of the mysteries of his Designs and Works of Creation Redemption Providence Justification Adoption Sanctification Glorification the depth of Satans temptations and the depth of their own hearts to disclose In a word we must teach them as much as we can of the whole Word and Works of God O what two volumns are there for a Minister to Preach upon how great how excellent how wonderful and mysterious All Christians are Disciples or Schollars of Christ the Church is his School we are his Ushers the Bible is his Grammer This is it that we must be daily teaching them The Papists would teach them without book lest they should learn heresies from the Word of truth least they learn falshood from the Book of God they must learn only the books or words of their Priests But Our business is not to teach them without Book but to help them to undrstand this Book of God So much for the subject matter of our work SECT IV. III. THE Object of our Pastoral care is All the Flock That is the Church and every member of it It is considered by us 1. In the whole body or society 2. In the parts or individual members 1. Our first care must be about the whole And therefore the first duties to be done are publike duties which are done to the whole As our people are bound to prefer publike duties before private so are we much more But this is so commonly confessed that I shall say no more of it 2. But that which is less understood or considered is That All the Flock even each individual member of our charge must be taken heed of and watched over by us in our Ministery To which end it is presupposed necessary that unless where absolute necessity forbiddeth it through the scarcity of Pastors and greatness of the Flock We should know every person that belongeth to our charge For how can we take heed to them if we do not know them Or how can we take that heed that belongeth to the special charge that we have undertaken if we know not who be of our charge and who not though we know the persons Our obligation is not to all neighbour Churches or to all straglers as great as it is to those whom we are set over How can we tell whom to exclude till we know who are included Or how can we refel the accusations of the offended that tell us of the ungodly or defiled members of our Churches when we know not who be members and who not Doubtless the bounds of our Parishes will not tell us as long as Papists and some worse do there inhabit Nor will bare hearing us certainly discover it as long as those are used to hear that are members of other Churches or of none at all Nor is meer participation of the Lords Supper a sure note while strangers may be admitted and many a member accidentally be kept off Though much probability may be gathered by these or some of these yet a fuller knowledge of our charge is necessary where it may be had and that must be the fittest expression of Consent because it is Consent that is necessary to the Relation All the Flock being thus known must afterward be Heeded One would think all reasonable men should be satisfied of this and it should need no further proof Doth not a careful Shepherd look after every individual Sheep And a good Schoolmaster look to every individual Scholler both for instruction and correction And a good Physitian look after every particular Patient And good Commanders look after every individual souldier Why then should not the Teachers the Pastors the Physitians the Guides of the Churches of Christ take heed to every individual member of their charge Christ himself the great and good Shepherd and master of the Church that hath the whole to look after doth yet take care of every individual In the 15. of
are intimated before 2. And because they are so fully handled by many 3. And because I find I have already run into more tediousness then I intended 1. One part of our work and that the most excellent because it tendeth to work on many is the publike preaching of the word A work that requireth greater skill and especially greater life and zeal then any of us bring to it It is no small matter to stand up in the face of a Congregation and deliver a Message of salvation or damnation as from the living God in the name of our Redeemer It is no easie matter to speak so plain that the ignorant may understand us and so seriously that the deadest hearts may feel us and so convincingly that the contradicting Cavilers may be silenced I know it is a great dispute whether preaching be proper to the Ministers or not The decision seems not very difficult Preaching to a Congregation as their ordinary Teacher is proper to a Minister in office And Preaching to the unbelieving world Jews Mahometans or Pagans as one that hath given up himself to that work and is separated and set apart to it is proper to a Minister in office But Preaching to a Church or to Infidels occasionally as an act of Charity extraordinarily or upon special call to that act may be common to others The Governor of a Church when he cannot preach himself may in a case of necessity appoint a private man pro tempore to do it that is able as Mr. Thorndike hath shewed But no private man may obtrude without his consent who by office is the Guide and Pastor of that Church And a master of a family may preach to his own family and a School-master to his Schollars and any man to those whom he is obliged to teach so be it he go not beyond his ability and do it in a due subordination to Church-teaching and not in a way of opposition and division A man that is not of the trade may do some one act of a trades-man in a Corporation for his own use or his family or friend but he may not addict or separate himself to it or set it up and make it his profession nor live upon it unless he had been Apprentice and were free For though one man of ten thousand may do it of himself as well as he that hath served an Apprentiship yet it is not to be presumed that it is ordinarily so And the standing Rule must not bend to rarities and extraordinaries lest it undo all For that which is extraordinary and rare in such cases the Law doth look upon as a non ens But the best way to silence such usurping Teachers is for those to whom it belongeth to do it themselves so diligently that the people may not have need to go a begging and to do it so judiciously and affectingly that a plain difference may appear between them and usurpers and that other mens works may be shamed by theirs and also by the adding of holy lives and unwearied diligence to high abilities to keep up the reputation of their sacred office that neither Seducers nor tempted ones may fetch matter of Temptation from our blemishes or neglects But I shall say no more of this duty 2. Another part of our Pastoral work is to administer the holy mysteries or Seals of Gods Covenant Baptism and the Lords Supper This also is claimed by private usurpers but I 'le not stand to discuss their claim A great fault it is among our selves that some are so careless in the manner and others do reform that with a total neglect and others do lay such a stress on circumstances and make them a matter of so much contention even in that ordinance where Union and Communion is so profest 3. Another part of our work is to Guide our people and be as their mouth in the publike prayers of the Church and the publike praises of God as also to bless them in the name of the Lord. This sacerdotal part of the work is not the least nor to be so much thrust into a corner as by too many of us it is A great part of Gods service in the Church-Assemblies was wont in all ages of the Church till of late to consist in Publike Praises and Eucharistical acts in holy Communion and the Lords Day was still kept as a day of Thanksgiving in the Hymns and Common rejoycings of the faithful in special Commemoration of the work of Redemption and the happy condition of the Gospel Church I am as apprehensive of the necessity of Preaching as some others but yet me thinks the solemn Praises of God should take up much more of the Lords day then in most places they do And me thinks they that are for the magnifying of Gospel Prviledges and for a life of love and heavenly joyes should be of my mind in this and their worship should be Evangelical as well as their Doctrine pretendeth to be 4 Another part of the Ministerial work is to have a special care and over-sight of each member of the Flock The parts whereof are these that follow 1. We must labour to be acquainted with the state of all our people as fully as we can Both to know the persons and their inclinations and conversations to know what are the sins that they are most in danger of and what duties they neglect for the matter or manner and what temptations they are most liable to For if we know not the temperament or disease we are like to prove but unsuccessful Physitians 2. We must use all the means we can to instruct the ignorant in the matters of their salvation by our own most plain familiar words by giving or lending or otherwise helping them to books that are fit for them by perswading them to learn Catechisms and those that cannot read to get help of their neighbours and to perswade their neighbours to afford them help who have best opportunities thereto 3. We must be ready to give advice to those that come to us with cases of conscience especially the great case which the Jews put to Peter and the Jaylor to Paul and Silas Acts 16. What must we do to be saved A Minister is not only for Publike Preaching but to be a known Counsellor for their souls as the Lawyer is for their estates and the Physitian for their bodies so that each man that is in doubts and straits should bring his case to him and desire Resolution Not that a Minister should be troubled with every small matter which judicious neighbours can give them advice in as well as he no more then a Lawyer or Physitian should be troubled for every trifle or familiar case where others can tell them as much as they but as when their estate or life is in danger they will go to these so when their souls are in danger they should go to Ministers As Nicodemus came to Christ and as was usual with the
soever impenitent sinners make of it that he hath provided the everlasting torments of Hell for the punishment of it and no lesser means can prevent that punishment then the Sacrifice of the blood of the Son of God applyed to those that truly Repent of it and forsake it and therefore God that calleth all men to Repentance hath commanded us to exhort one another daily while it is called to day least any be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin Heb. 3. 13. and that we do not hate our Brother in our heart but in any wise rebuke our neighbour and not suffer sin upon him Lev. 19. 17. and that if our brother offend us we should tell him his fault between him and us and if he hear not take two or three and if he hear not them tell the Church and if he hear not the Church he must be to us as a heathen or a Publican Mat. 18. 17. and those that sin we must rebuke before all that others may fear 1 Tim. 5. 20. and rebuke with all authority Tit. 1. 15. Yea were it an Apostle of Christ that should openly sin he must be openly reproved as Paul did Peter Gal. 2. 11 14. and if they repent not we must avoid them and with such not so much as eat 2 Thes 3. 6 12 14. 1 Cor. 5. 11 13. According to these commands of the Lord having heard of the scandalous practice of N. N. of this Church or Parish and having received sufficient proof that he hath committed the odious sin of We have seriously dealt with him to bring him to repentance but to the grief of our hearts do perceive no satisfactory success of our endeavours but he seemeth still to remain impenitent or still liveth in the same sin though he verbally profess repentance We do therefore judge it our necessary duty to proceed to the use of that further remedy which Christ hath commanded us to try and hence we desire him in the Name of the Lord without any further delay to lay by his obstinacy against the Lord and to submit to his rebuke and will and to lay to heart the greatness of his sin the wrong he hath done to Christ and to himself and the scandal and grief that he hath caused to others and how unable he is to contend with the Almighty and prevail against the Holy God who to the impenitent is a consuming fire or to save himself from his burning indignation And I do earnestly beseech him for the sake of his own soul that he will but soberly consider What it is that he can gain by his sin or impenitency and whether it will pay for the loss of everlasting life and how he thinks to stand before God in Iudgement or to appear before the Lord Jesus one of these daies when death shall snatch his soul from his body if he be found in this impenitent state when the Lord Jesus himself in whose blood they pretend to trust hath told such with his own mouth that except they repent they shall all perish Luk. 13. 3 5. And I do beseech him for the sake of his own soul and require him as a Messenger of Iesus Christ as he will answer the contrary at the Bar of God that he lay by the stoutness and impenitency of his heart and unfeignedly confess and lament his sin before God and this Congregation And this desire I here publish not out of any ill will to his person as the Lord knoweth but in love to his soul and in obedience to Christ that hath made it my duty desiring that if it be possible that he may be saved from his sin and from the power of Satan and from the everlasting burning wrath of God and may be reconciled to God and to his Church and therefore that he may be humbled by true contrition before he be humbled by remediless condemnation Thus or to this purpose I conceive our publike admonition should proceed And in some cases where the sinner taketh his sin to be small the aggravation of it will be necessary and specially the citing of some texts of Scripture that do aggravate and threaten it And in case he either will not be present that such admonition may be given him or will not be brought to a discovery of Repentance and to desire the prayers of the Congregation for him it will be meet that with such a preface as this afore expressed we desire the prayers of the Congregation for him our selves That the people would consider what a fearful condition the impenitent are in and have pitty on a poor soul that is so blinded and hardened by sin and Satan that he cannot pitty himself and think what it is for a man to appear before the living God in such a case and therefore that they would joyn in earnest prayer to God that he would open his eyes and soften and humble his stubborn heart before he be in hell beyond remedy And accordingly let us be very earnest in prayer for them that the Congregation may be provoked affectionately to joyn with us and who knows but God may hear such prayers and the sinners heart may more relent then our own exhortation could procure it to do However the people will perceive that we make not light of sin and preach not to them in meer custom or formality If Ministers would be conscionable in thus carrying on the work of God entirely and self-denyingly they might make something of it and expect a fuller blessing But when we will shrink from all that is dangerous or ungrateful and shift off all that is costly or troublesom they cannot expect that any great matter should be done by such a carnal partial use of means and though some may be here and there called home to God yet we cannot look that the Gospel should prevail and run and be glorified where it is so lamely and defectively carryed on 4. When a sinner is thus Admonished and Prayed for if it please the Lord to open his eyes and give him remorse before we proceed to any further censure it is our next duty to proceed to his full recovery where these things must be observed 1. That we do not either discourage him by too much severity nor yet by too much facility and levity make nothing of Discipline nor help him to any saving cure but meerly slubber and palliate it over If therefore he have sinned scandalously but once if his Repentance seem deep and serious we may in some cases Restore him at that time that is If the wound that he hath given us to the credit of the Church be not so deep as to require more ado for satisfaction or the sin so hainous as may cause us to delay But if it be so or if he have lived long in the sin it is most meet that he do wait in Penitence a convenient time before he be Restored 2. And when the time comes whether at the first confession
or after it is meet that we urge him to be serious in his humiliation and set it home upon his conscience till he seem to be truly sensible of his sin For it is not a vain formality but the Recovery and saving of a soul that we expect 3. We must see that he beg the Communion of the Church and their prayers to God for his Pardon and Salvation 4. And that he Promise to fly from such sins for the time to come and watch more narrowly and walk more warily 5. And then we have these things more to do 1. To assure him of the riches of Gods love and the sufficiency of Christs blood to pardon his sins and that if his Repentance be sincere the Lord doth pardon him of which we are authorized as his Messengers to assure him 2. To charge him to persevere and perform his promises and avoid temptations and continue to beg mercy and strengthening grace 3. To charge the Church that they imitate Christ in forgiving and retain or if he were cast out receive the Penitent person in their Communion that they never reproach him with his sins or cast them in his teeth but forgive and forget them as Christ doth 4. And then to give God thanks for his recovery so far and to pray for his confirmation and future preservation 5. The next part of Discipline is the Rejecting and Removing from the Churches Communion those that after sufficient tryaldo remain impenitent Where note 1. That if a man have sinned but once so scandalously or twice it is but a Profession of Repentance that we can expect for our satisfaction but if he be accustomed to sin or have oft broke such Promises then it is an actual reformation that we must expect And therefore he that will refuse either of these to Reform or to Profess and manifest Repentance is to be taken by us as living in the sin For a hainous sin but once committed is morally continued in till it be Repented of and a bare forbearing of the act is not sufficient 2. Yet have we no warrant to rip up matters that are worn out of the publike memory and so to make that publike again that is ceased to be publike at least in ordinary cases 3. Exclusion from Church-Communion commonly called Excommunication is of divers sorts or degrees more then two or three which are not to be confounded of which I will not so far digress as here to treat 4. That which is most commonly to be practised among us is Only to remove an impenitent sinner from our Communion till it shall please the Lord to give him Repentance 5. In this Exclusion or Removal the Minister or Governors of that Church are Authoritatively to charge the people in the name of the Lord to avoid Communion with him and to pronounce him one whose Communion the Church is bound to avoid and the Peoples duty is Obedientially to avoid him in case the Pastors charge contradict not the word of God So that he hath the Guiding or Governing Power and they have 1. A discerning power whether his charge be just 2. And an executive power For it s they that must execute the sentence in part by avoiding the Rejected as he himself must execute it by denying him those Ordinances and Priviledges not due to him whereof he is the Administrator 6. It is very convenient to pray for the Repentance and restauration even of the Excommunicate 7. And if God shall give them Repentance they are gladly to be received into the Communion of the Church again Of the manner of all these I shall say no more they being things that have so much said of them already And for the manner of other particular duties of which I have said little or nothing you have much already as in other writings so in the Directory of the late Assemblie Would we were but so far faithful in the Practice of this Discipline as we are satisfied both of the matter and manner and did not dispraise and reproach it by our negligence while we write and plead for it with the highest commendations It is worthy our consideration Who is like to have the heavyer charge about this matter at the Bar of God Whether those deluded ones that have reproached and hindred discipline by their tongues because they knew not its nature and necessity or we that have so vilified it by our constant omission while with our tongues we have magnified it If hypocrisie be no sin or if the knowledge of our Masters will be no aggravation of the evil of disobedience then we are in a better case then they I will not advise the zealous maintainers and obstinate neglecters and rejecters of Discipline to unsay all that they have said till they are ready to do as they say nor to recant their defences of Discipline till they mean to practice it nor to burn all the Books that they have written for it and all the Records of their cost and hazzards for it least they rise up in Judgement against them to their confusion not that they recant their condemnation of the Prelates in this till they mean a little further to outgo them But I would perswade them without any more delay to conform their Practices to these Testimonies which they have given lest the more they are proved to have commended Discipline the more they are proved to have condemned themselves for neglecting it I have often marvailed that the same men who have been much offended at the Books that have been written for Free Admission to the Lords Supper or for mixt Communion in that one part have been no more offended at as Free permission in a Church state and as Free admission to other parts of Communion and that they have made so small a matter at as much mixture in all the rest I should think that it is a greater profanation to permit an obstinate scandalous sinner to be a stated member of that particular Church without any private first and then publike Admonition Prayer for him or censure of him then for a single Pastor to admit him to the Lords Supper if he had no power to censure him as these suppose I should think that the faithful Practice of Discipline in the other parts would soon put an end to the Controversie about Free Admission to the Lords Supper and heal the hurt that such Discourses have done to the rebellions of our people For those Discourses have more modesty then to plead for a Free Admission of the Censured or Rejected ones but its only of those that have yet their standing in that Church and are not censured And if when they forfeit their title to Church-Communion we would deal with them in Christs appointed way till we had either reclaimed them to Repentance or censured them to be Avoided it would be past controversie then that they were not to be admitted to that one act of Communion in the Supper who are justly
Christ had not been in the case as now it is the Nations of Lutherans and Calvinsts abroad and the differing parties here at home would not have been plotting the subversion of one another nor remain at that distance and in that uncharitable bitterness nor strengthen the common enemy and hinder the building and prosperity of the Church as they have done CHAP. IV. SECT I. Use REverend and dear Brethren our business here this day is to humble our souls before the Lord for our former negligence especially of Catechizing and personal instructing those committed to our charge and to desire Gods assistance of us in our undertaken employment for the time to come Indeed we can scarce expect the later without the former If God will help us in our future duty and amendment he will sure humble us first for our former sin He that hath not so much sense of his faults as unfeignedly to lament them will hardly have so much more as may move him to reform them The sorrow of Repentance may go without the change of heart and life because a Passion may be easier wrought then a true conversion but the change cannot go without some good measure of the sorrow Indeed we may justly here begin our Confessions It is too common with us to expect that from our people which we do little or nothing in our selves What pains take we to humble them while our selves are unhumbled How hard do we squeeze them by all our expostulations convictions and aggravations to wring out of them a few penitent tears and all too little when our own eyes are dry and our hearts too strange to true remorse and we give them an example of hard-heartedness while we are endeavouring by our words to mollifie and melt them O if we did but study half as much to affect and amend our own hearts as we do our hearers it would not be with many of us as it is It s a great deal too little that we do for their humiliation but I fear its much less that some of us do for our own Too many do somewhat for other mens souls while they seem to forget that they have any of their own to regard They so carry the matter as if their part of the work lay in calling for Repentance and the hearers in Repenting their 's in speaking tears and sorrow and other-mens-only in weeping and sorrowing theirs in preaching duty and the hearers in performing it their 's in crying down sin and the peoples in forsakeing it But we find that the Guides of the Church in Scripture did confess their own sins as well as the sins of the people and did begin to them in tears for their own and the peoples sins Ezra confesseth the sins of the Priests as well as of the people weeping and casting himself down before the house of God Ezr. 9. 6 7 10. and 10. 1. So did the Levites Neh. 9. 32 33 34. Daniel confessed his own sin as well as the peoples Dan. 9. 20. And God calleth such to it as well as others Joel 2. 15 16 17. When the fast is summoned the people gathered the Congregation sanctified the Elders assembled the Priests the Ministers of the Lord are called to begin to them in weeping and calling upon God for mercy I think if we consider well of the Duties already opened and withal how we have done them of the Rule and of our unanswerableness thereto we need not demurr upon the question nor put it to a question Whether we have cause of humiliation I must needs say though I judge my self in saying it that he that readeth but this one Exhortation of Paul in Acts 20. and compareth his life with it is too stupid and hard-hearted if he do not melt in the sense of his neglects and be not laid in the dust before God and forced to bewail his great omissions and to flye for refuge to the blood of Christ and to his pardoning grace I am confident Brethren that none of you do in judgement approve of the Libertine Doctrine that cryeth down the necessity of Confession Contrition and true humiliation yea and in order to the pardon of sin Is it not pitty then that our Hearts are not more Orthodox as well as our heads But I see our lesson is but half learnt when we know it and can say it When the understanding hath learned it there is more ado to teach it our Wills and Affections our eyes our tongues and hands It is a sad thing that so many of us do use to preach our hearers asleep but it s sadder if we have studyed and preacht our selves asleep and have talkt so long against hardness of heart till our own grow hardned under the noise of our own reproofs Though the head only have eyes and ears and smell and taste the heart should have life and feeling and motion as well as the head And that you may see that it is not a causeless sorrow that God calleth us to I shall take it to be my duty to call to remembrance our mainfold sins or those that are most obvious and set them this day in order before God and our own faces that God may cast them behind his back and to deal plainly and faithfully in a free confession that he who is faithful and just may forgive them and to judge our selves that we be not judged of the Lord. Wherein I suppose I have your free and hearty consent and that you will be so far from being offended with the disgrace of your persons and of others in this office that you will readily subscribe the charge and be humble self-accusers and so far am I from justifying my self by the accusation of others that I do unfeignedly put my name with the first in the bill For how can a wretched sinner of so great transgressions presume to justifie himself with God Or how can he plead Guiltless whose conscience hath so much to say against him If I cast shame upon the Ministery it is not on the office but on our persons by opening that sin which is our shame The glory of our high imployment doth not communicate any glory to our sin nor will afford it the smallest covering for its nakedness For sin is a reproach to any people or persons Prov. 14. 34. And it is my self as well as others on whom I must lay the shame And if this may not be done What do we here to day Our business is to take shame to our selves and to give God the glory and faithfully to open our sins that he may cover them and to make our selves bare by confession as we have done by transgression that we may have the white rayment which cloatheth none but the penitent For be they Pastors or people it is only he that confesseth and forsaketh his sins that shall have mercy when he that hardeneth his heart shall fal into mischief Pro. 28. 13. And I think it will not be
For those of the antient Prelacy are more moderate I know it will be displeasing to them and I have no mind to displease them but yet I will more avoid the treacherous or unfaithful silence which may wrong them then the words of faithful friendship which may displease them And I will say no more to them then if I know my self I should say if I were resolved for Prelacy It is the judgement of these men that I now speak of that a Prelate is essential to a Church and there is no Church without them and that their Ordination is of necessity to the essence of a Presbyter and that those that are ordained without them though some will except a case of necessity are not Ministers of Christ Hereupon they conclude that our Congregations in England are no true Churches except where the Presbyter dependeth on some Prelate and the Ministers ordained by Presbyters only are no true Ministers and they will not allow men to hear them or communicate with them but withdraw from our Congregations like Separatists or Recusants And the same note many of them brand upon all the Reformed Churches abroad that have no Prelates as they do on us So that the Church of Rome is admirably gratified by it and instead of demanding where our Church vvas before Luther they begin to demand of us Where it is now And indeed had it been no more visible in the ages before Luther then a Reformed Prelatical Church is now they would have a fairer pretence then â—ow they have to call upon us for the proof of its visibility Suppose that the Presbyters who rejected Prelacy were guilty of all that schism and other sin as they are ordinarily accused of For I will now go on such suppositions Must the people therefore turn their back on the Assemblies and Ordinances of God Is it better for them to have no preaching and no Sacraments and no publike Communion in Gods worship then to have it in an Assembly that hath not a Prelate over it or from a Minister ordained without his consent I confess I would not for all the world stand guilty before God of the injury that this Doctrine hath already done to mens souls much less of what it evidently tendeth to There are through the great mercy of God abundance of painful and able young Ministers that were in the Universities in the time of the wars and had no hand in it and were ordained since Bishops became to them either invisible or inaccestible and its like they judge not their Ordination to be of necessity They lay out themselves faithfully for the healing of that ignorance and common prophaneness which got so much head under their careless or drunken predecessors They desire nothing more then the saving of souls They preach sound Doctrine They live in Peace And it is the greatest of their grief that many of their hearers remain so ignorant and obstinate still And see what a help these poor impenitent sinners have for their cure They are taught to turn their backs upon their Teachers and whereas before they heard them but with disregard they are now taught not to hear them at all And if we privately speak to them they can tell us that its the Judgement of such and such learned men that we are not to be heard nor our Churches to be communicated with nor we to be at all regarded as Christs Ministers And thus Drunkards and Swearers and worldlings and all sorts of sensualists are got out of gun-shot and beyond the reach of our teaching or reproof And those that do not for shame of the world obey their Doctrine to stay from the Assembly yet do they there hear us with prejudice and contempt and from the Communion of the Church in the Lords Supper they commonly abstain Were it only the case of those few Civil persons that conscientiously go this way and address themselves to these kind of men for Government and Sacraments I would never have mentioned the thing For it is not them that I intend For what care I what Minister they hear or obey so it be one that leadeth them in the waies of truth and holiness Let them follow Christ and forsake their sins and go to heaven and I will never much contend with them for the forsaking of my Conduct But it is the common sort of prophane and sensual men that are everywhere hardened against the Ministery and they have nothing but the reputation of the Prelatical Divines to countenance it with If their Teachers do but differ in a gesture from these men they vilifie them and reject their guidance having nothing but the authority of such men to support them Fain would we reach their consciences to awaken them from their security for it pittyeth us to see them so neer unto perdition But we can do no good upon them for our Ministery is in contempt because of the contrary judgement of these men Not that the poor people care any more for a Prelate as such then for an ordinary Minister For if Prelates would have troubled them as much with their preaching and reproofs and discipline they would have hated them as much as they do the Ministers But because they found by experience that under their Government they might sin quietly and make a scorn of godliness without any danger or trouble and that to this day the men of that way are so much against those precise Ministers that will not let them go quietly to hell therefore are they all for Prelacy and make this the great shelter for their disobedience and unreformed lives So that I confess I think that the hurt that Separatists and Anabaptists do in England at this day is little to the hurt that is done by these men For I count that the greatest hurt which hardeneth the greatest number in the state and way of greatest danger An Anabaptist may yet be a penitent and godly person and be saved But the sensual and impenitent worldlings can never be saved in that condition I see by experience that if separation infect two or three or half a score in a Parish or if Anabaptistry infect as many and perhaps neither of them mortally this obstinate contempt of Ministerial exhortation encouraged by the countenance of the contrary minded doth infect them by the scores or hundreds If we come to them in a case where they have no countenance from the Ministery how mute or tractable comparatively do we find them But if it be a case where they can but say that the Prelatical Divines are of another judgement how unmoveable are they though they have nothing else to say Try when we come to set afoot this work that we are now upon of Catechizing and private instruction whether this will not be one of our greatest impediments though in a work of unquestioned lawfulness and necessity Even because they are taught that we are none of their Pastors and have no authority over
of Ancient things will seem novelty to those that know not what was Anciently and the expulsion of prevailing novelties will seem a novelty to them that known not what is such indeed So the Papists censure us as Novelists for casting out many of their Innovations and our common people tell us we bring up new Customs if we do not kneel at the receiving of the Lords Supper A notorious Novelty Even in the sixth General Council at Trull in Constantinop this was the ninth Canon Ne Dominicis diebus genua flectamus à Divinis Patribus nostris Canonice accepimus Quare post vespertinum ingressum Sacerdotum in Sabbato ad Altare ut more observatum est nemo genu flectii usque ad sequentem vesperem post dominicam It is that which is indeed Novelty that I disswade you from and not the demolishing of Novelties Some have already introduced such New Phrases at least even about the great points of faith lustification and the like that there may be reason to reduce them to the Primitive Patterns A great stir is made in the world about the test of a Christian and true Church with whom we may have Communion and about that true Center and Cement of the Unity of the Church in and by which our Common calamitous breaches must be healed And indeed the true Cause of our Contrived divisions and misery is for want of discerning the center of our unity and the terms on which it must be done which is great pity when it was once so easie a matter till the ancient test was thought insufficient If any of the Ancient Creeds might serve we might be soon agreed If Vincâ—ntius Lirineus test might serve we might yet make some good shift viz. To believe explicitly all that quod ubique quod semper quod ab omnibus creditum est For as he addeth hoc est etenim verè proprièque Catholicum But then we must come 1. That the first age may not be excluded which gave the rule to the rest 2. And that this extend not to every Ceremony which never was taken for unalterable but to matters of faith and that the acts and Canons of Councils which were not about such matters of faith but meer variable order and which newly constituted those things which the Apostolike Age knew not and therefore were not properly Credita much less semper ab omnibus may have no hand in this work I say if either the ancient Western or Eastern Creed or this Catholick faith of Vincentius might be taken as the test for explicit saith or else rather all those Scripture texts that express the Credenda with a note of necessity and the the whole Scripture moreover be confessed to be Gods word and so believed in other points at least implicitly this Course might produce a more general Communion and agreement and more lines would meet in this Center then otherwise are like to meet And indeed till men can be again content to make the Scripture the sufficient Rule in Necessaries to be explicitly believed and in all the rest implicitly we are never like to see a Catholike Christian durable Peace If we must needs make the Council of Trent or the Papal Judgement our test or if we must make a blind bargain with the Papists to come as near them as ever we dare and so to compass another Interim and make that a test when God never made it so and all Christians never be of a mind in it but some dare go nearer Rome then others dare and that in several degrees or if we must thrust in all the Canons of the former Councils about matters of order discipline and ceremonies into our test or gather up all the opinions of the Fathers for the three or four first ages and make them our test None of all these will ever seem to do the business and a Catholike Union will never be founded in them It is an easie matter infallibly to foretel this Much less can the writings of any single man as Austin Aquinas Luther Calvin Beza c. or yet the late Confessors of any Churches that add to the ancient test be ever capable of this use and honour I know it is said that a man may subscribe the Scripture and the ancient Creeds and yet maintain Socinianism or other heresies To which I answer 1. So he may another test which your own brains shall contrive and while you make a snare to catch hereticks instead of a test for the Churches Communion you will miss your end and the heretick by the slipperyness of his conscience will break through and the tender Christian may possibly be ensnared And by your new Creed the Church is like to have new divisions if you keep not close to the words of Scripture 2. In such cases when hereticks contradict the Scripture which they have subscribed this calls not for a new or more sufficient test but the Church must take notice of it and call him to account and if he be impenitent exclude him their Communion What I must we have new Laws made every time the old ones are broken as if the Law were not sufficient because men break it Or rather must not the penalty of the violated Law be executed It is a most sad case that such reasons as these should prevail with so many learned godly men to deny the sufficiency of Scripture as a test for Church-Communion and to be still framing new ones that depart at least from Scripture-phrase as if this were necessary to obviate heresies Two things are necessary to obviate heresies the Law and good execution God hath made the former and his Rule and Law is both for sense and phrase translated sufficient and all their additional inventions as to the foresaid use are as spiders webs Let us but do our part in the Due execution of the Laws of Christ by questioning offenders in orderly Synods for the breaking of these Laws and let us avoid Communion with the impenitent and what can the Church do more The rest belongs to the Magistrate to restrain him from seducing his subjects and not to us Well! this is the thing that I would recommend therefore to all my Brethren as the most necessary thing to the Churches peace that you Unite in necessary truths and tolerate tolerable failings and bear with one another in things that may be born with and do not make a larger Creed and more necessaries then God hath done And to that end let no mans writings nor the judgement of any party though right be taken as a test or made that rule And I Lay not too great a stress upon controverted opinions which have godly men and specially whole Churches on both sides 2. Lay not too great a stress on those Controversies that are ultimately resolved into Philosophical uncertainties as some unprofitable controversies are about Free-will and the manner of the spirits operation of Grace and the Divine Decrees and
me thinks a little humility should make men ashamed of that common conceit of unquiet spirits viz. That the welfare of the Church doth so lye upon their opinions that they must needs vent and propagate them whatever come of it If they are indeed a living part of the body the hurt of the whole will be so much their own that they cannot desire it for the sake of any party or opinion Were men but impartial to consider in every such case of difference how far their promoting their own judgement may help or hurt the whole they might escape many dangerous waies that are now trod If you can see no where else look in the face of the Churches enemies how they rejoyce and deride us And as Seneca saith to demulce the angry Vide ne inimiciâ— iracundia tua voluptati sit When we have all done I know not what party of us will prove a gayner so true are the old proverbs Dissensio ducum hostium succum And Gaudent praedones dum discordant regiones And is it not a wonder that godly Ministers that know all this how the common adversary derideth us all and what a scandal our divisions are through the world and how much the Church doth lose by it should yet go on and after all the loudest calls and invitations to peace go on still and few if any sound a retreat and seriously call to their Brethren for a retreat Can an honest heart be insensisile of the sad distractions and sadder Apostacies that our divisions have occasioned Saepâ—rixam conclamatum in vicino incendium solvit saith Seneca What scolds so furious that will not give over when the house is on fire over their heads Well if the Lord hath given that evil spirit whose name is Legion such power over the hearts of any that yet they will sit still yea and quarrel at the pacificatory endeavours of others who hunger after the healing of the Church and rather carp and reproach and hinder such works then to help them on I shall say but this to them How diligently soever such men may preach and how pious soever they may seem to be if this way tend to their everlasting peace and if they be not preparing sorrow for themselves then I am a stranger to the way of peace SECT XI 7. THE next branch of my Exhortation is that You would no longer neglect the execution of so much Discipline in your Congregations as it of confessed necessity and right I desire not to sour on any one to an unseasonable performance of the greatest duty But will it never be a fit season Would you forbear Sermons and Sacraments so many years on pretence of unseasonableness Will you have better season for it when you are dead How many are dead already before they ever did any thing in this work that were long preparing for it It is now near three years since many of us here did engage our selves to this duty And have we been faithful in performance of that engagement I know some have more discouragements and hinderances then others But what discouragements can excuse us from such a duty Besides the Reasons that we then considered of let these few be further laid to heart 1. How sad a sign do we make it to be in our preaching to our people to live in the willful continued omission of any known duty And shall we do so even year after year and all our daies If excuses will take off the danger of this sign what man will not find them as well as you Read Amesius medul cap. 37. de Disciplin Eccles Gelespi's Aarons rod with Rutherford and many more that are written to prove the Need and Dueness of Discipline saith Ames ib. sect 5. Immo peccat in Christum authorem ac institutorem quisquis non facit quod in se est ad hanc Disciplinam in Ecclesiis Dei constituendam promovendam And do you think it safe to live and dye in such a known sin 2. You gratifie the present designs of dividers whose business is to unchurch us and unchristen us to prove our Parishes no true Churches and our selves no baptized Christians For if you take them for people uncapable of Discipline they must be uncapable of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper and other Church-Communion and then they are no Church And so you will plainly seem to preach meerly as they do to gather Churches where there were none before And indeed if that be your case that your people are not Christians and you have no particular Churches and so are no Pastors tell us so and manifest it and we shall not blame you 3. We do manifest plain laziness and sloath if not unfaithfulness in the work of Christ I speak from experience It was laziness that kept me off so long and pleaded hard against this duty It is indeed a troublesom and painful work and such as calls for some self-denyal because it will cast us upon the displeasure of the wicked But dare we preferr our carnal ease and quietness and the love or peace of wicked men before our service to Christ our Master Can sloathful servants look for a good reward Remember Brethren that we of this County have thus Promised before God in the second Article of our Agreement We agree and resolve by Gods help that so far as God doth make known our duty to us we will faithfully endeavour to discharge it and will not desist through any fears or losses in our estates or the frowns and displeasure of men or any the like carnal inducements whatsoever I pray you study this promise and compare your performance with it And do not think that you were ensnared by thus engaging for Gods Law hath laid an obligation on you to all the same duty before your engagement did it Here is nothing but what others are bound to as well as you 4. The Ministery that are for the Presbyterian Government have already by their common neglect of the execution made those of the separating way believe that they do it in a meer carnal compliance with the unruly part of the people that while we exasperate them not with our Discipline we might have them on our side And we should do nothing needless that hath so great an appearance of evil and is so scandalous to others It was the sin and ruine of many of the Clergy of the last times to please and comply with them that they should have reproved and corrected by unfaithfulness in preaching and neglect of Discipline 5. The neglect of Discipline hath a strong tendency to the deluding of souls by making them think they are Christians that are not while they are permitted to live in the reputation of such and be not separated from the rest by Gods Ordinance and it may make the scandalous to think their sin a tolerable thing which is so tolerated by the Pastors of the Church 6. We do corrupt Christianity if self in
birth of them till Christ be formed in them And then you will take such opportunities as your harvest-time and as the un-shine daies in a rainy harvest in which it is unreasonable unexcusable to be idle If you have any spark of Christian compassion in you it wil sure seem worth your utmost labour to save so many souls from death and to recover so great a multitude of sins If you are indeed co-workers with Christ set then to his work and neglect not the souls for whom he dyed O remember when you are talking with the unconverted that now there is an opportunity in your hands to save a soul and to rejoyce the Angels of heaven and to rejoyce Christ himself and that your work is to cast Satan out of a sinner and to increase the family of God And what is your own Hope or Joy or Crown of rejoycing Is it not your saved people in the presence of Christ Jesus at his coming Yea doubtless they are your glory and your joy 1 Thes 2. 19 20. 2. THE second happy Benefit of our work if well managed will be The most orderly building up of those that are converted and the stablishing them in the faith It hazardeth the whole work or at least much hindereth it when we do it not in the order that it must be done How can you build if you first lay not a good foundation or how can you set on the top-stone while the middle parts are neglected Gratia non facit saltum any more than nature The second order of Christian Truths have such dependance upon the first that they can never be well learned till the first are learned This makes so many deluded novices that are pust up with the vain conceits of knowledge while they are grosly ignorant and itch to be preaching before they well know what it is to be Christians because they took not the work before them but learnt some lesser matters which they heard most talk of before they learnt the vital Principles And this makes many labour so much in vain and are still learning but never come to the knowledge of the Truth because they would learn to read before they learn to spell or to know their letters And this makes so many fall away and shaken with every wind of temptation because they were not well settled in the fundamentals It is these Fundamentals that must lead men to further truths It is these they must bottom and build all upon It is these that they must live upon and that must actuate all their graces and animate all their duties It is these that must fortifie them against particular temptations and he that knows these well doth know so much as will make him happy and he that knows not these knows nothing and he that knows these best is the best and most understanding Christian The most godly people therefore in your Congregations will find it worth their labour to learn the very words of a Catechism And if you would safely edifie them and firmly stablish them be diligent in this work 3. A Third Benefit that may be expected by the well-managing of this work is this It will make our publike preaching to be better understood and regarded When you have acquainted them with the Principles they will the better understand all that you say They will perceive what you drive at when they are once acquainted with the main This prepareth their minds and openeth you a way to their hearts when without this you may lose the most of your labour and the more pains you take in accurate preparations the less good you do As you would not therefore lose your publike labour see that you be faithful in this private work 4. AND this is not a contemptible Benefit that by this course you will come to be familiar with your people when you have had the opportunity of familiar conference And the want of this with us that have very numerous Parishes is a great impediment to the success of our labours By distance and unacquaintedness slanderers and deceivers have opportunity to possess them with false conceits of you which prejudice their minds against your doctrine and by this distance and strangeness abundance of mistakes between Ministers and people are fomented Besides that familiarity it self doth tend to beget those affections which may open their ears to further teaching And when we are familiar with them they will be more encouraged to open their doubts and seek resolution and deal freely with us But when a minister knoweth not his people or is as strange to them as if he did not know them it must be a great hindrance to his doing them any good 5. BEsides by the means of these private Instructions we shall come to be the better acquainted with each persons spiritual state and so the better know how to watch over them and carry our selves towards them ever after We may know the better how to preach to them when we know their temper and their chief objections and so what they have most need to hear We shall the better know wherein to be jealous of them with a pious jealousie and what temptations to help them most against We shal the better know how to lament for them and to rejoyce with them and to pray for them to God For as he that will pray rightly for himself will know his own sores and wants and the diseases of his own heart so he that will pray rightly for others should know theirs as far as he may and as is meet If a man have the charge but of sheep or cattle he cannot so well discharge his trust if he know them not and their state and qualities So is it with the Master that will well teach his Schollars and Parents that will rightly educate their children And so with us 6. AND then this tryal of and acquaintance with our peoples state will better satisfie us in the administration of the Sacraments We may the better understand how far they are fit or unfit Though this give them not the state or relation of a Member of that Church whereof we are Over-seers yet because the Members of the Church Universal though they are of no particular Church may in some cases have a right to the Ordinances of Christ in those particular Churches where they come and in some cases they have no right we may by this means be the better informed how to deal with them though they be no members of that particular Church And whereas many will question a Minister that examineth his people in order to the Lords Supper by what authority he doth it the same work will be done this way in a course beyond exception Though I doubt not but a Minister may require his Flock to come to him at any convenient season to give an account of their faith and proficiency and to receive instruction and therefore he may do it in preparation to the Sacrament
you will not do as far as you can your selves When you threaten them for neglecting it you threaten your own souls 12. All our hard censures of the Magistrate for doing no more and all our reproofs of him for permitting Seducers and denying his further assistance to the Ministers doth condemn our selves if we refuse our own duty What must all the Rulers of the world be servants to our sloathfulness or light us the candle to do nothing or only hold the stirrup to our Pride or make our beds for us that we may sleep by day-light Should they do their part in a subordinate office to protect and further us and should not we do ours who stand nearest to the end 13. All the maintenance that we take for our service if we be unfaithful will condemn us For who is it that will pay a servant to take his pleasure or sit still or work for himself If we have the Fleece it is sure that we may look to the â—lock And by taking the wages we oblige our selves to the work 14. All the honour that we expect or receive from the people and all the Ministerial Priviledges before mentioned will condemn the unfaithful For the honour is but the encouragement to the work and obligeth to it 15. All the witness that we have born against the scandalous negligent Ministers of this age and the words we have spoken against them and all the endeavours that we have used for their removal will condemn the unfaithful For God is no respecter of persons If we succed them in their sins we spoke all that against ourselves And as we condemned them God and others will condemn us if we imitate them And though we be not so bad as they it will prove sad to be too like them 16. All the Judgements that God hath executed on them in this age before our eyes will condemn us if we be unfaithful Hath he made the idle Shepherds and sensual drones to stink in the nostrils of the people and will he honour us if we be idle and sensual Hath he sequestred them and cast them our of their habitations and out of the Pulpits and laid them by as dead while they are alive and made them a hissing and a by-word in the Land and yet dare we imitate them Are not their sufferings our warnings and did not all this befall them for our examples If any thing in the world should waken Ministers to self-denyal and diligence one would think we had seen enough to do it If the Judgements of God on one man should do so much what should so many years judgement on so many hundreds of them do Would you have imitated the old world if you had seen the flood that drowned them Would you have taken up the sins of Sodom Pride Fulness of bread Idleness if you had stood by and seen the flames of Sodom This was Gods argument to deter the Israelites from the Nations sins because for all these things they had seen them cast one before them Who would have been a Iudas that had seen him hanged and burst and who would have been a lying sacrilegious hypocrite that had seen â—nanias and Saphira dye And who would not have been afraid to contradict the Gospel that had seen â—lâ—mas smitten blind And shall we prove self-seeking idle Ministers when we have seen God scourging such out of his Temple and sweeping them away as dirt into the Channels God forbid For then how great and how manifold will our condemnation be 17. All the Disputations and eager contests that we have had against unfaithful men and for a faithful Ministry will condemn us if we be unfaithful And so will the Books that we have written to those ends How many score if not hundreds of Catechisms are written in England and yet shall we forbear to use them How many Books have been written for Discipline by English and Scottish Divines and how fully hath it been defended and what reproach hath been cast upon the adversaries of it through the Land And yet shall we lay it by as useless when we have free leave to use O fearful hypocrisie What can we call it less Did we think when we were writing against this sect and the sect that opposed Discipline that we were writing all that against our selves O what Evidence do the Book-sellers shops and their own Libraries contain against the greatest part even of the godly Ministers of the Land The Lord cause them seasonably to lay it to heart 18. All the daies of fasting and prayer that have been of late years kept in England so a Reformation will rise up in Judgement against the unreformed that will not be perswaded to the painful part of the work And I confess it is so heavy an aggravation of our sin that it makes me ready to tremble to think of it Was there ever a Nation on the race of the earth that hath so solemnly and so long followed God with fasting and prayer as we have done Before the Parliament began how frequent and servent were wein secret After that for many years time together we had a monethly Fast commanded by the Parliament besides frequent private and publike Faâ—â—s on the by And what was all this for What ever was sometime the means that we lookt at yet still the end of all our Prayers was Church-Reformation and therein especially these two things A faithful Ministry and Exercise of Discipline in the Church And did it once enter then into the hearts of the people yea or into our own hearts to imagine that when we had all that we would have and the matter was put into our own hands to be as painful as we could and to exercise what Discipline we would that then we would do nothing but publikely preach that we would not be at the pains of Catechizing and Instructing our people personally nor exercise any considerable part of Discipline at all It astonisheth me to think of it What a depth of deceit is it the heart of man What are good mens hearts so deceitful Are all mens hearts so deceitful I confess I told many souldiers and other sensual men then that when they had fought for a Reformation I was confident they would abhorr it and be enemies to it when they saw and felt it thinking that the yoak of Discipline would have pincht their necks and that when they had been catechized and personally dealt with and reproved for their sin in private and publike and brought to publike confestion and repentance or avoided as impenitent they would have scorned and spurned against all this and have taken the yoak of Christ for tyrannie But little did I think that the Ministers would have let all fall and put almost none of this upon them but have let them alone for fear of displeasing them and have let all run on as it did before O the earnest prayers that I have heard in secret daies heretofore for
a Painful Ministry and for Discipline As if they had even wrestled for salvation it self Yea they commonly called Discipline The Kingdom of Christ or the Exercise of his Kingly office in his Church and so preached and prayed for it as if the setting up of Discipline had been the setting up of the Kingdom of Christ And did I then think that they would refuse to set it up when they might What is the Kingdom of Christ now reckoned among the things indifferent If the God of heaven that knew our hearts had in the midst of our Prayers and Cries on one of our Publike monethly Fasts returned us this answer with his dreadful voice in the audience of the Assembly You deceitful hearted sinners what Hypocrisio is this to weary me with your cries for that which you will not have if I would give it you and thus to lift up your voices for that which your souls abhor what is Reformation but the instructing and importunate perswading of sinners to entertain my Christ and Grace as offered them and the Governing my Church according to my word and these which are your work you will not be perswaded to when you come to find it troublesom and ungreatful when I have delivered you it is not me but your selves that you will serve and I must be as earnest to perswade you to reform the Church in doing your own duty as you are earnest with me to grant you liberty for reformation and when all is done you will leave it undone and will be long before you will be perswaded to my work I say if the Lord or any Messenger of his had given us in such an answer would it not have amazed us and have seemed incredible to us that our hearts should have been such as now they prove and would we not have said as Hazael Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing Or as Peter Though all men forsake or deny thee I will not Well Brethren too sad experience hath shewed us our frailty We have denyed the troublesom and costly part of the Reformation that we prayed for But Christ yet turneth back and looketh with a merciful eye upon us O that we had yet the hearts immediately to go out weep bitterly and to do so as we have done no more lest a worse thing come unto us and now to follow Christ through labour and suffering though it were to the death whom we have so far forsaken 19. All the Judgements upon the Nation the cost the labour the blood and the deliverances and all the endeavours of the Governors for Reformation will rise up against us if we now refuse to be faithful for a Reformation when it is before us and at our will I have said somewhat of this before Hath God been hewing us out a way with his sword and levelling opposers by his terrible Judgements and yet will we sit still or play the sluggards Have England Scotland and Ireland paid so dear for a Reformation and now shall some men treacherously strangle it in the birth and others expose it to contempt and over-run it and others sit still and look on it as a thing not worth the trouble How many thousand persons may come to the condemnation of such men The whole Countries may say Lord we have been plundred and ruined or much impover shed we have paid taxes these many years and it was a Reformation that was pretended and that we were promised in all and now the Ministers that should be the instruments of it do neglect it Many thousands may say Lord we ventured our lives in obedience to a Parliament that promised Reformation and now we cannot have it The souls of many that have dyed in these wars may cry out against us Lord it was the hopes of a Reformation that we fought and suffered for in obedience to those Governors that professed to intend it and now the Pastors reject it by their idleness The Parliament may say How long did we sit and consult about Reformation and now the Ministers will not execute the power that is granted them The Nation may say How oft did we beg it of God and Petition the Parliament for it and now the Ministers deny us the enjoyment of it Yea God himself may say How many prayers have I heard and what dangers have I delivered you from how many and how great and in what a wonderful manner And what do you think it was that I delivered you for Was it not that you should do my work And will you betray it or neglect it after all this Truly Sirs I know not what others think but when I consider the Judgements that we have felt and the wonders of Mercy that my eyes have seen to the frequent astonishment of my soul as I know it is great matters that these things oblige us to so I am afraid lest they should be charged on me as the aggravations of my neglect I hear every exasperated party still flying in the faces of the rest and one saith It was you that killed the King and the other saith It was you that fought against a Parliament and put them to defend themselves and drencht the land in blood But the Lord grant that it be not we if we prove negligent in our Ministry and betray the Reformation that God hath called us to that shall have all this blood and misery charged on us yea though we had never any other hand therein And that the Lord say not of us as of John even when he had destroyed the house of Ahab by his command because he accomplished not the Reformation which that execution tended to Yet a little while and I will avenge the blood of Iezrael on the house of Jehn Hof 1. 4. O Sirs can we find in our hearts to lose all the cost and trouble of the three Nations and all to save us a little trouble in the Issue and so to bring the guilt of all upon our selves Far be it from us if we have the hearts of Christians 20. Lastly if we should yet refuse a Reformation in our Instructing of the Ignorant or our exercise of Christs Discipline how many Vows and Promises of our own may rise up in Judgement against us and condemn usâ— 1. In the National Covenant those that entered into it did vow and Promise most solemnly before the Lord and his people that Having before our eyes the Glory of God and the advancement of the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ we would sincerely really and constantly endeavour in our several places and callings the Reformation of Religion â—n Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government and we did profess our true and unfeigned purpose desire and endeavour for our selves and all others under our power and charge both in publike and private in all dutes we ow to God and man to amend our lives and each one to go before another in the Example of a Real
so much shall serve for Directions to the younger Ministers in their dealing with the more ignorant or carnal sort of persons AS for them that are under fears and troubles of mind who yet give us hopes of the work of saving grace on their souls though it deserve a full discourse to direct us in dealing with them yet I shall not meddle with it now 1. Because I intended this discourse for another end 2. Because Divines being at some variance about the methods of comforting and confirming troubled minds are many of them so impatient of reading any thing which is not cut out according to their present opinions that I perceive it my duty as far as I can to avoid points controverted 3. Because I have done so much as I think necessary already in my Directions for peace of Conscience CHAP. VIII SECT 1. ANother fort there are that we may have occasion of conference with though they will scarce stoop to be Catechized and that is Opinionative Questionists that being tainted with Pride and self-conceitedness are readyer to teach then to be taught and to vent their own conceits and quarrel with you as being ignorant or erroneous your selves then to receive instruction and if they are tainted with any notable errour or schismatical disposition they will seek to waste the time in vain janglings and to dispute rather then to learn I am not now directing you what to do with those men at other times of that I shall give a touch anon but only if they come to you at this time which is appointed for Catechizing and edifying Instruction Nor is it my thought to presume to direct any but the weaker sort of Ministers in this any more then in the former It s like you will have some come to you amongst the rest that when they should give an account of their faith will fall into a Teaching and Contentious dâ—scourse and one will tell you that you have no tâ—ue Church because you have such bad members another will ask you by what authority you baptize Infantâ— another will ask you how you can be a true Minister if you had your Ordination from Prelates and another will tell you that you are no true Minister because you had not your Ordination from Prelates another will ask you What Scripture you have for Praying or singing Psalmâ— in a mixt Assembly and another will quarrel with you because you administer not the Lords Supper to them in the gesture and manner as they desire and were â—ont to receive it or because you exercise any Discipline among them If any such person should come to you and thus seek to divert your better discourse I' should think it best to take this course with them 1. Let them know that this meeting is appointed for another use that is for the Instructing of the people in the Principles of Religion and you think it very unmeet to peâ—vert it from that use it being a sin to do Gods work disorderly or to be doing a lesser work when you should be doing a greater And therefore as you durst not turn Gods publike worship on the Lords day into vain or contentious disputings which discompose mens minds and spoil a greater work so neither do you think it lawful to abuse these times to lower uses which are appointed for higher 2. Yet let him know that you do not this to avoid any tryal of the truth and that he may know so much you will at any other fit season when he will come on purpose to that end endeavour to give him full satisfaction or you will as willingly receive instruction from him if he be able and have the truth as you desire he should receive instruction from you and if it must be so you will yield to his desire before you part if there be but time when you have dispatcht the greater work but upon condition only that he will submit to the greater first 3. Then desire him first to give you some account of the Principles in the Catechism And if he deny it conuince him before all of the iniquity of his course 1. In that it is the Principles that salvation most dependeth on and therefore being of greatest Excellency and Necessity are first to be taken into consideration 2. In that it is the appointed business of this day 3. It is orderly to begin with the fundamentals because they bear up the rest which suppose them flow from them and cannot be understood without them 4. It is the note of a Proud vain-glorious hypocrite to make a flourish about lesser things and yet either to be ignorant of the greater or to scorn to give that account of his knowledge which the people whom he despiseth refuse not to give If he yield to you ask him only such questions as seem to be of great weight and yet strain him up a peg higher then you do the common people and especially keep out the predicate usually from your Question and put him most upon defining or distinguishing or expounding some terms or sentences of Scripture c. As such questions as these may be put to him which call for definitions wherein it s ten to one but you will find him ignorant E. G What is God What is Jesus Christ What is the Holy-Ghost What is Person in the Trinity How many natures hath Christ Was Christ a creature before his Incarnation or the Creation Is he called the first-born of all creatures as God or as man Is he called the Image of the Invisible God and the express Image of the Fathers person or subsistence as a creature or as God Was Adam bound to believe in Christ Was one or two Covenants made with Adam before his fall Did the first Covenant of Nature make any promise of everlasting celestial glory Did it threaten hell fire or only temporal death Did it threaten eternal torment to the soul only or to the body also Should there have been any Resurrection of the body if Christ had not come to procure it Should Christ have com or been our Head or have brought us to glory if man had not fallen What is the first Covenant what its conditions What the second Covenant and its Conditions What was the difference between the Covenant with Adam and that by Moses Was it a Covenant of Works or of Grace that was made by Moses What were the conditions of salvation before Christs Incarnation What is forgiveness of sin What is Justification How are we said to be Justified by faith how by works What is faith What repentance What Sanctification Vocation Regeneration Is the Covenant of Works Abrogated or not Is the Covenant of Grace made with the Elect only or with all or with whom What is Freewill Is there any conversion without the word What is the true nature of special grace and what is the proper difference of a Regenerate man from all others What is the Catholike Church How will you know
the true Church How know you the Scripture to be the word of God What is Christs Priestly Prophetical Kingly office Be they three offices or but one and be they all with abundance the like And if it be Sacrament Controversies which he raiseth tell him it is necessary that you be first agreed what Baptism is what the Lords Supper is before you dispute who should be Baptized c. And its twenty to one he is not able truly to tell you what the Sacrament it self is A true Definition of Baptism or the Lords Supper is not so commonly given as pretended to be given 4. If he discover his Ignorance in the cases propounded endeavour to humble him in the sense of his pride and presumption And let him know what it is and what it signifieth to go about with a Teaching Contentious proud behaviour while he is indeed so ignorant in things of greater moment 5. But see that you are able to give him better information your selves in the points wherein you find him ignorant 6. But specially take care that you discern the spirit of the man And if he be a setled perverse Schismatick or Heretick so that you see him peremptory and resolved and quite transported with pride and have no great hopes of his recovery then do all this that I have before said openly before all that are present that he may be humbled or shamed before all and the rest may be confirmed But if you find him godly and temperate and that there is any hope of his reduction then see that you do all this privately between him and you only and let not fall any bitter words nor that tend to his disparagement And thus I advise both because we must be as tender of the reputation of all good men as fidelity to them and to the truth will permit we must bear one anothers burdens and not encrease them and we must restore those with a spirit of meekness that fall through infirmity remembring that we our selves also may be tempted and also because there is small hope that you should ever do them good if once you exasperate them and dis-affect them towards you And therefore 7. See that to such erring persons as you have any hopes of you carry your selves with as much tenderness and love as will consist with your duty to the Church of God For most of them when they are once tainted this way are so selfish and high-minded that they are much more impatient of reproof then many of the prophaner sort of people This way did Musculus take with the Anabaptists visiting them in Prison and relieving them even while they railed at him as Antichristian and so continued without disputing with them till they were convinced that he loved them and then they sought to him for advice themselves many of them were reclaimed by him 8 Either in the Conclusion of your meeting or at another appointed time when you come to debate their Controversie with them tell them That seeing they think you unable to teach them and think themselves able to teach you it is your desire to learn You suppose disputing as tending usually to exâ—sperate mens minds rather then to satisfie them is to be used as the last remedy Therefore you are here ready if they are able to Teach you to learn of them and desire them to speak their minds Which if they refuse tell them you think it the humblest and most Christian edifying way for him that hath most knowledge to Teach and the other to Learn and therefore your purpose is to be either a Learner or a Teacher and not be Disputant till they make it to be Necessary When they have declared their minds to you in a teaching way if it be nothing but the common pleas of the seduced as its like it will not till then that this is no new thing to you it is not the first time that you have heard it or Considered of it and if you had found a Divine Evidence in it you had received it long ago You are truly willing to receive all truth but you have received that which is contrarie to this doctrine with far better Evidence then they bring for it c. If they desire to hear what your Evidence is tell them if they will hear as learners you shall communicate your Evidence in the meetest way you can which if they promise to do let them know that this promise obligeth them to impartialitie and an humble free entertainment of the truth and that they do not turn back in cash carping and contention but take what shall be delivered into sober Consideration which if they promise 1. If you are so far vers't in the point in hand as to mannage it well ex tempore or the person be temperate and fit for such debates then come in with your evidence in a discoursive way first shewing your reasons against the grossest imperfections of his own discourse and then giving him your grounds from Scripture not many but rather a few of the clearest best improved And 2. When you have done or without verbal teaching if you find him unfit to learn that way give him some book that most effectually defendeth the questioned truth and tell him that it is a vain thing to say that over so oft which is so fully said alreadie and a man may better consider of what he hath before his eyes then of that which slideth through his ears and is mistaken or forgotten and therefore you desire him as an humble learner to peruse that Book with leisurely consideration because there are the same things that you would say to him and desire him to bring you in a sober and solid answer to the chief strength of it if after perusal he judge it to be unsound But if it may be fasten some one of the most sticking Evidences on him before you leave him If he refuse to read the book endeavour to convince him of his unfaithfulness to the Truth and his own soul Doth he think that Gods truth is not worth his study or will he venture his soul as the ungodly do and the Churches peace with it and all to save himself so small a labour Is it not just with God to give him over to delusion that will not be at a little pains to be informed nor afford the truth an equal hearing 9. But above all before you part yea or before you debate the Controversie see that you do sum up the precedent Truths wherein you are both agreed 1. Know whether he agree to all that is in the Catechism which you teach the people 2. Whether he suppose that you may attain salvation if you be true to so much as you are agreed in 3. Whether they that are so far agreed as you are should not live in Love and Peace as children of the same God and members of the same Christ and heirs of the same Kingdom 4. Whether you are not