Saying this all together and Exod. xxiv 3. They answered it with one voice Baals Prophets did not choose one Foreman to speak for them when they all with one mouth prophecied good to Ahab 1 King xxii 35. Nor had the mutinous Ephesians one Spokesman when they cried out so long together with one voice Act. xix 34. but each man vocally joyned with the rest Thus when the Singers and those who played on Musical Instruments united their Notes to praise God they are said to make One sound 2 Chron. v. 13. or as the LXX read it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They made one Voice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. while they answered each other in singing with one voice their confession and praise to God And S. Basil expresly uses the phrase in this Sense where he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil Epist 63. They all in common as with one mouth and one heart offer up the Psalm of Confession every one making these penitential Words to be his own This Psalm probably was the LI however certainly it was a Form repeated vocally by Priest and People and this is the true Notion of a Common-prayer and a Prayer with one Mouth Having thus justified my Exposition I need not stand upon his petty Objections viz. 1st If the People answered there would not be one but two Voices I 'le grant if he please sometimes there were Two thousand Voices yet if they all repeated the same Form or all joyned by Turns to carry on the same Common-service as in responsory Prayers and alternate Hymns it is very proper to say All these have one Voice and glorifie God with one Mouth 2ly He notes That S. Paul saith expresly With one Mouth Rom. xv but Clemens ' s words are As it were with one mouth or voice I reply The Father only designs to soften the Apostles Expression because when many vocally joyn in public Forms they have not strictly one Voice but as it were one Voice Yet we see the phrase of One voice is properly and often applied to many joyning in the same words But Clemens phrase and S. Basils As it were with one mouth can never be properly applied to the Extempore man who is absolutely and throughout the only Mouth of his silent Auditors Pag. 28. It is no fault in Mr. Cl. to have nothing but Conjectures for his Opinion in this and the following Ages but he wonders I should insist upon Conjectures I gave divers Reasons why we must expect little more than probable Proofs in this time and supported my Conjectures with Arguments Mr. S. B. touches not either the Reasons or Arguments but censures my way of proceeding He doth not deny that the Christians imitated the Jews in the Hours of Prayer and I have proved by many Authors that they imitated them in alternate Singing and Praying by Forms so that though it be but a Conjecture from Clemens attesting they used the Jewish Hours of Prayer to infer a probability of their imitating them in Forms yet the thing is plainly proved elsewhere and so he ought not to expose this Notion as all over Conjecture and one Doctor 's Opinion especially since he cannot confute it but by saying If the Christians of that Age were of another Opinion what becomes of my Argument I am sure this is meer Conjecture Let him bring as many Proofs that these early Christians were for Extempore prayers and praises as I have done for Forms and then he shall have leave sometimes to suppose it till then his if is an evasion no answer As to the place I alledged out of Clemens which shews the Method of the Christians Prayers and the main things they pray'd for He is right as to the Quotation but mistaken in saying I applied it to public Prayer neither I nor Clemens limited it either to public or private Prayer If he please I will suppose this place refers to private Prayers and then I must ask how Clemens could know so well and so exactly describe the method and matter of mens private Prayers if they were not in Forms and if they used Forms in private 't is more than probable they used them in public also Mr. S. B. concludes with diverting his Friend By my dextrous device as he calls it of mens looking up to Heaven while they use the Common Prayer Now in this there is no device at all it is plain matter of Fact which I have done and seen a Thousand times it being as common for such as prayed by our Liturgy to look frequently up to Heaven in imitation of the primitive Christians as it is for Mr. S. B's Friends to wink when they pray Extempore and if he could prove they looked up to Heaven while their Eyes were shut that would be a dextrous device indeed § 5. Pag. 30. Tertullian is my next Witness and he first speaking of the Lords Prayer calls it A new Form of Prayer which Christ had given his Disciples which Mr. Cl. did not deny But the Conformist to shew himself a greater Enemy to Forms than Mr. Cl. boldly asserts that Tertullian means by Novam formam only A new direction how to perform the Duty of Prayer But his manifest perverting that Fathers Sense appears by considering That in this Tract Tertullian is expounding the very words of Christs Form and immediately after he had described it by the new Form he gave to his Disciples he parallels it with and prefers it before the Form which John taught his Scholars And doth he think John's was only a Directory Did not Christ and S. John both teach their Disciples a Form yea doth not Tertullian there observe that the very words of our Saviours Prayer were extant but Johns were not Nothing can be plainer than that he means the Lords Prayer by this New Form and that the Christians then used it as a Form for he introduces the words to be expounded thus We say Our Father c. we request his Name may be hallowed not saying let it be hallowed in us they varied not a word Then he also saith We add Let thy Will be done c. And after his Comment is finished which so fully declares they used those very words he is as clear that they joyned it to their other Prayers for he observes Christ allows us to ask other things after he had premised the legal and ordinary Prayer as a foundation This is the Lords Prayer which Christs Law enjoyns and Christians ordinarily or daily used making that the Foundation on which they built up their other Requests in their Liturgies and it is most likely the Superstructure was suitable to the Foundation that is a Form at least I confess Tertullian doth by way of Preface before he expounds the Form and as a conclusion after it touch upon some Passages in Math. VI concerning the manner of using this Form but the new Form the legitimate and ordinary Prayer which they said daily signifie the Lords Prayer
was a Prayer in Origen's time and not added by his Translators But if Mr. S. B. dislike Origen's Explication of this Prayer because he thinks it imports a desire to suffer as the Prophets did 't is a sign he knows little of Origen who thirsted earnestly after Martyrdom and so was likely enough to give it this Sense and it is nothing to my purpose whether that be the true sense or no since I have sufficiently proved it was a known Form of Prayer Pag. 40. I had proved by Scripture and other Authors that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Origen lib 6. in Cels signifies Prescribed Forms of Prayer Mr. S. B. without examining my Evidence pronounces Sentence viz. that it means no more than praying according to the Rules God hath given for performing this Duty for that is to be the meaning right or wrong of any Phrase that seems to countenance Forms But he runs into that mistake which I had noted in Mr. Cl. that is he considers not that Origen is not speaking of the manner of praying but of the Prayers themselves They used prescribed or enjoyned Prayers At last he dreams of a Directory in Origen's days which he calls an Order for the method of performing Prayer without prescribing the words but if he impartially examine my Instances he will find they signifie more than so and I add now that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word of the same import Luke I. 1. signifies to write down an History and not barely to contrive a method by which others might compose it in their own words As to the last words of this Quotation That such as use these enjoyned Prayers cannot be overcome by Magicians or Devils Mr. Cl. left them out as well as I Disc of Lit. p. 140. both of us judging them nothing to our Question which is not about the effect of these Prayers but about their being Forms And now how scandalous is Mr. S. B's partiality If it be a fault to omit them why are we not both blamed if it be none why doth he blame me I perceive he fancies the Devil is more afraid of an Extempore Prayer than a Form But he forgets that Christ put Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil into his Form to secure us against the Devil and his Instruments The Devil hath often been afraid of our Lords Form but that he dreads not an Extempore Prayer appears from Conjurers and Witches who actually dealt with the Devil and yet were admired for this kind of praying Hist. Lit. par 2. pag. 278. Finally He that is so unhappy in expounding Origen's Writings is very unfit to tell us what he thought he himself admires Extempore Prayer and thence concludes Origen doted on it also but the Centuriaters who knew Origen's Sense better than he or Mr. Cl. declare expresly there were Forms in Origen's time Lastly The full proof I brought that Mr. Cl. was grosly mistaken in pretending that Origen cited those passages out of the Psalter which he brings in with this Preface We find we say in the Prayer as he did the Collect pag. 37. would have silenced any man but Mr. S. B. who takes no notice that I proved Origen cited many other passages out of the Psalms directly without this Preface that these were Sentences proper for Liturgies and that the Offices at Alexandria well known to Origen were taken chiefly out of the Psalms And though he can make no reply to this Evidence that he may not seem wholly silent he First flies to his old shift and calls for an antecedent proof of Liturgies Now had I brought none before the citing whole Sentences as known and certain parts of a Liturgy commonly used is a good proof if it were the first But I have brought divers before which want nothing to make them authentic but his allowance which he resolves never to grant and then hopes he is safe Secondly When he had stated the case wrong and kept all that makes for me secret he appeals to his partial and misinformed Friend But if that Friend will consider that Origen doth cite many passages out of the Psalter and other places which are also in the Psalter expresly out of the Prayer and refers to known words said and used in Prayer he shall then have liberty to judge whether there were not divers Forms taken out of the Psalms and used in the Prayers to which Origen doth refer in plain words There is another clear confutation of Mr. Cl's Exposition of Origen's Homily on Numb xi and a further confirmation of my Opinion that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies no more than Fervently pag. 63 64. both which Mr. S. B. passes over in silence § 3. pag. 41 c. That there were Forms of Prayer used in S. Cyprian's time I inferred first from his allowing the use of the Lords Prayer as a Form and his owning the repeating of the very words of it The Examiner first saith If this be supposed it will not amount to a proof of Liturgies in our Sense I answer If he grant this it proves praying by a Form lawful and ancient instituted by Christ and continued to be used in public yea repeated by the People among the primitive Christians it proves one main part of the public Service was an invariable Form and such a part as was to be the pattern of all other prayers which must be Forms also if they exactly imitated this Divine Exemplar the prospect of which Consequences make Mr. S. B. fly off again from his concession and labour for two whole pages to prove that S. Cyprian doth not intimate the use of those words but only our following the directions which Christ had given for the manner of performing the duty of Prayer But the bare reading the Father not only confutes but exposes this poor Evasion He is about to explain this Form and first saith Christ gave us a Form of Prayer and explains himself presently thus ut dum prece oratione quam filius docuit apud patrem Loquimur faciliùs audiamur Where we see the Form is those very words which Christ taught and which we speak to his Father and Mr. S. B. fallaciously leaves out loquimur the main word in the Sentence importing our repeating the very words on purpose to impose upon his Reader S. Cyprian adds This is the most spiritual and true Prayer which was pronounced by his mouth for when Christs Prayer ascends to Gods ears the Father will own the Sons words He saith also When we ask forgiveness we pronounce the words of our Advocate and not only ask in his Name but by his own Prayer Can any man now doubt that Forma orandi here signifies the words of our Lords Prayer or deny Cyprian's commending the use of that Form Let us apply the aforesaid passages to his Notion of Directions and Instructions and see how ridiculous it will appear Do we speak or say over Christ's directions about
good evidence That the same Spirit directed them all to appoint Forms from the very beginning § 3. pag. 7. His own loose consequences do not discourage him from censuring me as discoursing too loosly Wherefore having passed by our Saviours Hymn and his Prayer in the Garden clear instances of his choosing allowing and using Forms both of Prayer and Praise He gives our Saviours Prayer on the Cross which I said was probably taken out of Psal xxii as an instance of my loose discoursing asking me Who put the petitions in Form for Christ and obliged him to use no other words I reply to his Insinuation That if my Conjecture be too loose he should and might have confuted it but his not attempting that shews it was close enough To his Question I answer David by the Spirit of Prophecy long before composed this Prayer for Christ as appears by his voluntary choosing of this Form when he could have made a New prayer and if my Examiner will allow he prayed by the Spirit when he used this Form then it is no loose inference to say We may pray by the Spirit in using Forms and to affirm It is no hardship to enjoyn men to serve God in that way which Jesus chose as the best when he was free from all constraint and infinitely more able than any of us to have prayed otherwise In my 8th page I proved by S. Austin and Beza That the Apostles both used and setled Forms and from others that prescribed Forms had been used from the Apostolical times Mr. S. B. I doubt thought this too close and so never offers to answer it But when I had granted the Lords Prayer to be both a Form and a Direction to draw other Forms by And That Liturgies are other words indeed but such as are agreeable to it i. e. to the Lords Prayer both as to the Form and Matter of them The Examiner first adds No to my words and cites them thus Liturgies are No other words c. and then insinuates they are Non-sense and an odd Expression to fall from a learned Doctor But I am sure 't is an odd Trick of a Non-conforming Conformist to put No into the midst of a Sentence to be so greedy of making reflections after his promise to the contrary that he falfies my words to get an opportunity The adding No to Scripture it self may make it non-sense or blasphemy and if I should add it to his Preface and say He is no Conformist he useth not the Liturgy some think I had not done him much wrong though he would no doubt have resented it Well leave out No then here and my sense is plain That Liturgies are other words different in syllables from the Lords Prayer but agreeing to it both as to the Form or method of the Petitions and as to the Subject matter of them which I proved by an induction of particulars pag. 10. to which he doth not vouchsafe any answer But upon my granting the Lords Prayer was a Direction as well as a Form he asks a notable Question and repeats it again pag. 9. viz. Why may not à Minister keeping to the words of the Lords Prayer use other words than those in the Liturgy as well as the Liturgy-men use other words than those in the Lords Prayer this had been close if he had not forgot our Ministers circumstances The Church hath drawn up a Liturgy very carefully following the direction of the Lords Prayer and for such Reasons as he may find in my 2d Part pag. 325 enjoyned all Ministers to use it constantly and they have sincerely I hope consented thereto Now to ask his Question in our case is to ask why every Captain who thinks himself wiser than his superior Officer may not cross the Orders given by his General or a Council of War and give new ones to his own Company He must find out some Reason as New as an Extempore prayer to prove that private Ministers in a setled Church ought to have liberty to do all those Acts which their Governors may do before his Question can concern us or be worth answering To go on Mr. Cl. brought many Authorities to shew that the ancient Christians used the Lords prayer not out of any apprehension that it was enjoyned Math. vi These Quotations I examined particularly and shewed they were not sufficient for his purpose Mr. S. B. who loves not to meddle with reading instead of examining my Answers refers the Reader to examine them himself only among eight Authors he picks out Maldonat whose sense without citing his very words I said was only That we are not always bound to use the very words of the Lords Prayer And Maldonat doth not only say Non his necessariò verbis but ut quotiescunque oramus omnia aut aliqua aut nihil certe his contrarium peteremus However Mr. S. B. conceives his Sense to be That we are not absolutely bound to use those very words at any time Which not only contradicts Maldonat's words but shews my Examiner did not know this Author was a Jesuit and a rigid Papist bound by the Rules of his Church and Order to say so many Paternosters every Day otherwise he could not have asserted this Jesuit so openly turned Fanatick as to affirm in a Book which was to pass the Censors That no man is bound at any time to say a Pater-Noster He follows this with a notable Question which Examiners and some others claim a priviledge to ask viz. If we be not always bound to use the Lords words how we came to be bound to use always other peoples words I reply We of this Church are bound to use the Lords Prayer as often as we use the Liturgy in public and sincere Conformists deliberately bound themselves to use the Lords words and the Churches too in all their public Administrations believing them to be fitter for those occasions than any they can invent How Mr. S. B. came to be bound he knows best perhaps Advantage drew him to do that which he now dislikes but he should have asked this Question before and then he had escaped the Snare of making enquiry after Vows Prov. xx 25. § 4. pag. 8. I had owned there was an extraordinary Gift of Prayer in the Apostles times and long after which I observed none could claim by Scripture in this Age and answered all the places produced by some for this claim in four or five Pages To which Mr. S. B. gives no Answer but is very large in giving us his own Notion of the Gift of Prayer which he defines An ability to represent the sentiments of a Soul duly affected with the general and particular matter of prayer in suitable Expressions proper to beget and improve such affections and resentments in those who shall hear and joyn in the use of them to that purpose A Logician can no more reduce this definition to his Rules of Art than he can give a regular
in too much haste for an Examiner otherwise he would not have asked how 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 comes to be a proof of Liturgies he should have said of one Form of Praise If he will stay for my answer I will tell him Tertullian proves That Christians must not go to Pagan shews because of the indecency of using the same words and actions in a vain Theatre and at the Church to clap those hands to a Stage-player which had been lifted up to God in prayer to give testimony to a Gladiator with that mouth which had pronounced Amen in the Sacrament to say World without end 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so 't is in the best Copies de spect p. 83. Here is a plain comparison between Words and Actions to be used in the Church and in the Theatre by persons who went to both places they clapped and lifted up the same hands they shouted and said Amen with the same mouth to very different objects and on occasions that did no way agree In the Theatre they said in a solemn Form of acclamation World without end to a mortal yea to a wicked man that is to Commodus the Emperor for Xiphiline notes the Romans a little before this had used those words in a solemn Exclamation to Commodus Epist Dion in Com. p. 383. But in the Church these very words were in a Form of praise to God and Christ as out of Irenaeus and Clemens Romanus I noted before wherefore it would be little less than Blasphemy to apply the words of a Christian Hymn proper to an Eternal Being unto a lewd mortal Man Thus Tertullian argues and if his Comparison be truly made as it was a Form used by all the people at the Theatre so it must be in some Form which the People repeated at Church that is probably in the Gloria Patri because it still stands in that part of this Hymn which the People say but it serves my purpose as well since it must be a Form said by the People as if it were the end of any other Hymn But he wonders that the Africans who belonged to the Latin Church should say the Gloria Patri in Greek Whereas it doth not follow from Tertullian that they said it in Greek his Argument is as good if they had said it in Latin Only the Romans used many solemn Forms in Greek both in their Theatres and their Temples and Xiphiline sets down this in Greek so that probably Tertullian refers to that passage in the Historian and only means it was used in Greek in the Theatre He might also read it in Greek in Clemens Romanus and in Irenaeus and so cite it in Greek but that will no more prove the African Service was in Greek than that the Roman or Gallican Churches used to say it in Greek in Clemens or Irenaeus times Only from this and many other Greek words left uninterpreted in Tertullian and other African Fathers we may be sure the African People knew some Greek especially short and common Forms and Phrases Pag. 34. Mr. Cl. had produced three places of Tertullian to justifie the Extempore way all which I answered For the two first Mr. S. B. refers the Reader to Mr. Cl. because I said so little concerning them though I said so much indeed that he is not able to answer it nor clear Mr. Cl. who is evidently mistaken in referring that Singing which was used after the Love-feast to the Christians public Devotions 'T is known that they were always fasting till after their Morning solemn Service of which this Singing could be no part because it was after the Common Meal Secondly I shewed there is nothing in Tertullian which hinders us from believing that the Hymns made de proprio ingenio were composed at home and if so then they were Forms as well as those taken out of Scripture Thirdly The use of private Composures in an Inspired Age will not justifie the use of them now As to the second place I proved expresly out of Tertullian and S. Cyprian that the Christians did often look down in Prayer and so shewed Mr. Cl. was mistaken when from their constant looking up to Heaven in prayer he argued they used no Books to pray by Which I think is as full an Answer to Mr. Cl. as can be desired And the true Reason why Mr. S. B. doth examine nothing of all this is because he could find no evasion Pag. 35. But Mr. Cl's main proof for Extempore Prayer is Thirdly from Tertullian's saying they prayed de pectore which phrase I shewed in four pages was capable of several more proper Interpretations Mr. S. B. replies not to any of these Proofs but diverts his Reader by telling him what he conceives and apprehends to be Tertullian's meaning First He resets to a place of S. Paul 1 Tim. ii 8. where though the Apostles first words Lifting up holy hands may explain Manibus expansis c. yet how without wrath and doubting should expound Tertullian's praying Bare-head and without a Monitor I cannot imagine Secondly He would explain this place by another in the same Author a few Lines after which speaks of a Prayer proceeding from a chaste Body an innocent Soal and from the Holy Spirit Yet here again a chaste Body and an innocent Soul doth not explain praying with Lifted-up hands and a Bare-head and none but the worst of Enthusiasts will pretend that a Prayer out of our own Breast is the same with one proceeding from the Holy Spirit Besides if his bad Edition do not mislead him he is much to blame in reading and pointing this place majorem hostiam quà m ipse mandavit orationem de carne pudicâ c. which makes the sense or non-sense to lie that the good Christian offers a greater Sacrifice than God hath commanded But the true reading is Ei offero opimam majorem hostiam quam ipse mandavit orationem de carne pudicâ de animâ innocenti de Spiritu Sancto profectam Apol c. 30. He speaks here of the Lords Prayer the very same Prayer which Christ commanded which was a greater and better Sacrifice than any that the Heathen offered when it was offered up with a chaste Body a holy Soul and those devout affections which are excited by the holy Ghost Now let him try his faculty how the purity innocence and devotion of Christians saying the Lords Prayer a Form commanded by Christ can prove that praying out of the breast in praying for the Emperors in the former place signifies Praying extempore as he and Mr. Cl. pretend I will only add to my former Exposition that the Breast signifies the Memory these Notes A Monitor is properly to help memory but the Christians who could say their Forms by heart or out of their breast needed no Monitor as the Pagans did in reciting their Forms So of a person fixed in the Memory Persius Sat. 5. saith sinuoso in pectore fixi And Socrates clearly uses Tertullian's