Presbytery in Scotland Chap. 10. pag. 124. Consideration 8. Says We Separate not from men but Errors we Separate from Papism kindly properly and totally from Christian Articles in no sort And pag. 123. We have not Separate from Rome's Baptism and Ordination of Pastours according to the Substance of the Act nor from the letter of the twelve Articles of the Creed and Contents of the Old and New Testament as they stand with relation to the mind and intent of the Holy Ghost Howbeit we have left the false Interpretations of the Lords of poor Peoples Faith and Conscience The Historian himself in some cases grants that we should joyn in the Worship of God with these who comply with Prelacy notwithstanding of all they have done as we saw from his concessions in the stating of the Question and yet here he speaks as if all Uniting with them were sinful If the hearing of these who have complyed with Prelacy be at any time a Duty then the hearing of them is no complyance with Prelacy and if the hearing of them who have really complyed with Prelacy be not a complyance with Prelacy then suppose the Indulged Ministers had really complyed with an Erastian Power in the Magistrate yet the hearing of the Indulged Ministers would not have been any complyance with Erastianism How much then is this Historian in the wrong to the poor People who would fright them from hearing the Indulged Ministers who have never complyed with any Erastian Power or sinful Supremacy in the Magistrate as if the hearing of the Word of God Preached by them were sinful a homologating of a sinful Supremacy He adds Alas this our strength will prove our weakness let us remember that of Esay 8.11 12 13 14. He means that Uniting in the Worship of God in these paroches where Indulged Ministers are settled is our weakness and so that it's Peoples strength to withdraw from the Worship of God in these Paroches This must be his meaning or he says nothing to the purpose in hand This is one of the Historians Paradoxes that Union in the true Worship of God is the Churches weakness and that the breaking off that Union is the Churches strength That is to say a Church divided shall stand It seems a Church is not like other Societies for our Saviour says A House and Kingdom divided cannot stand This is a pitiful Paradox for it 's contrary to Scripture Reason Common Sense Experience and the Author brings no shadow of Reason to give it any colour of probability but as he began his last Reason with praying so he Ushers in this pitiful Paradox with lamentation that seeing it had nothing in it nor upon it to plead for it's admission it might be received of meer pity He should have considered that a Printed Book would readily come to the hands of Rational men who regard not Passions that are void of Reason and who will not be prayed or lamented out of their wits Yet this will pass currant among weak People who will be more moved with an Oh or an Alas than with ten solid Reasons or Scripture-Testimonies The Scripture which he exhorts us to remember makes nothing for withdrawing from hearing the Word of God Preached by the Lords Ministers When the Lord Instructed the Prophet That he should not walk in the way of that People nor say a Confederacy to all them to whom that People said a Confederacy He did not discharge the Prophet to hear the Word of God or to joyn with the Lords People in the Worship of God The way of Gods Ordinances is the way of God in which the Lords goings are and in which his People walk with him and in which he hath commanded them to walk but the way of that People was their sinful ways ways of their own which were not Gods ways the Confederacy discharged was not joyning together in the Lords Ordinances for the Lord had commanded his People to Assemble together for his Solemn Worship Deut. 12.11 12 13. Deut. 15.19 20. Deut. 16.7 8.16.17 But the Confederacy discharged is a Confederacy with the King of Assyria He cites Amos 4.12 13. Where the Lord directs his People to prepare to meet their God This Scripture is as little to the Historians purpose as the former for the way to meet with God is not to withdraw from the Worship of God but upon the contrary they who would meet with God must come to his Ordinances for there he meets with them Exod. 25.22 Exod. 29 42 43. He hath said That they who hear his Servants hear himself and hath blessed these who hear him and watch daily at his gates and wait at the Posts of his Doors That 's the way to find him to find Life c. Prov. 8.32 33. He hath promised that where he Records his Name he will come to his People and bless them Separation from the Lords Ordinances is no preparation to meet with God but it is a departing from God And if this Separation from the Lords People and from his Worship be comprehended under the Separating of our selves from every sinful course the Christian complyance which he speaks of is an unchristian mis-application of that word in the 4th of Amos And if he thought that they who have heard the Indulged Ministers must utterly forsake that way as a way provoking the Lord to wrath he was quite out and utterly mistaken about this utter forsaking The Scripture with which he closeth Zeph. 2.1 2 3. is not for his scattering of the Lords People but for the gathering of them together to the Solemn Worship of God If the Author had pondered this Scripture and observed the directions of the Spirit of the Lord which are given in it he would not have endeavoured to scatter the Lords People and if he had made more Conscience of seeking Righteousness he would not have done so many and great wrongs and injuries to his innocent Brethren who had done him no wrong and who were doing right things and if he had made more Conscience of seeking Meekness he would have been more quiet and either altogether been silent or spoken and written of these things with more calmness and composure of Spirit If meekness as they say were lost it would be a hard work to find it in this History in which there is much of the wrath of man which perfects not the Righteousness of God He concludes well with two Petitions of the Lords Prayer Thy Kingdom come thy Will be done If he had looked to the Exposition of the Second Petition of the Lords Prayer in the larger Catechism he would have found that this is a part of the meaning of that Petition that the Church may be countenanced and maintained by the Civil Magistrate and to confirm this the 1 Tim. 2.1 2. is cited I exhort therefore that first of all Supplications Prayers Intercessions and Thanksgivings be made for all men for Kings and for all that are in
sin 1. Because it is contrary to Charity towards our Neighbour 2. It is contrary to the Edification of him who Separates in depriving him of Communion in Spiritual good 3. It 's contrary to the Honour of Christ as being contrary to the Unity of his Mystical Body 4. It makes way for Heresie and Separation from Christ If ye would be cleared of the unlawfulness of this Schism or Separation in your withdrawing from the Indulged Ministers and these Congregations where they Preach or which is all one in withdrawing from that Church-communion in the Worship of God which ye had formerly in these Congregations as if it were unlawful to joyn with them in the Worship of God I desire you would read the Writings of the Old Non-Conformists against Separatists particularly I recommend to you Mr. Rutherfurd's Peaceable Plea for Paul's Presbytery in Scotland Chap. 10. from pag. 120. to pag. 149. Where he proves that it 's unlawful to Separate from the true Church visible for the corruption of Teachers and the wickedness of Pastours and Professours Where Faith is begotten by the Preaching of Professed Truth it is not every Error or Corruption in Ministers or Professours which will warrant Separation as he shews A Minister who Preaches the body of Divinity soundly howbeit he mixes Errors with it may be heard and yet we may be no way defiled with his Error if we reject it We are saith he to hear the Pharisees but to beware of their leaven and finding it to be sour and unsound Doctrine we are to reject it What think ye would he have judged of your Separation Seeing ye Separate from a Church where the Minister and People who submits to his Ministry do profess and hold the whole Doctrine of Salvation contained in the Word of God and particularly in the Confessions of Faith of this National Church and rejects all Errors contrary thereto they have all the parts of Worship of Divine Institution and no false Worship 3. They own and submit to the Discipline of the Church which is of Divine Institution and owns no Offices or Officers in the Church of God but such as the Lord hath appointed to be in his House Again your Separating from a particular Church where the Worship of God is in every thing according to Christs Institution is by necessary and undeniable consequence a Separation from all other Churches where the Worship of God is celebrated according to Christs Institution and so is a Separation from the Universal Church and from Christ in it The tendency and efficacy of this sinful Separation may be seen in the mischievous effects of it in dissolving the Bond of Love in taking People off from the Duties of Love and mutual Edification and tends to Malice Hatred Envy Whispering rash uncharitable judging Censuring Lying Back-biting Slandering Reproaching Defaming Vain jangling Strife Contention and the evil works which follow thereupon This Separation is one of the most groundless Separations that ever was in the Church and so one of the most vile Schisms that ever hath been heard of And the more groundless any Separation is as it is the more sinful so it produces ordinarily the more sin for when People have groundlesly Separate and cannot give an account of the cause of their Separation and yet will not Repent and return they are under a dreadful temptation to make up or take up false Reproaches and Calumnies against these from whom they Separate that they may have something to say for themselves and this increases to more and more ungodliness and unrighteousness to Strife Envy Confusion and every evil work Farmer I cannot deny that some have run into a great height of contempt of Magistrates and Ministers I confess I am astonished at this late Band and Sanchar Declaration Min. The Seeds of the Confusion which is in these Papers were sown here and there in some Papers which were before scattered among the People who did not consider whereto they would grow Preacher I wonder why there should be so much out-crying against that Band seeing it hath so excellent a Design the Glory of God the Propagation of his Kingdom Reformation of Religion Extirpation of what is contrary to the Kingdom of Christ Min. Such Designs do usually beguile simple People who think if the intention be good all is right but Sir you who are a Preacher know that there are many more things required to make any one Action good beside a right intention We must not do evil that good may come of it the intention of good will not justifie the doing of evil Some have as they thought designed the serving of God when they were killing his Servants but this did not justifie their Murther Preach What are these evils which are in that Band and Declaration Min. It would take a long time to relate them let be to refute them I have seen two Refutations of that Band. I shall give you some short Observations out of one of these Papers 1. They have been very injurious to Presbyterians in arrogating to themselves the Title of the True Presbyterian Party seeing their Principles and Practices are contrary to the Principles of Presbyterians which are published in their Confessions of Faith and Covenants And they have in this very Bond so clearly distinguished themselves from and constitute themselves a Party Separate from the generality of the Presbyterians that they who would gladly have fastened and Fathered this Band and Declaration upon Presbyterians have given over that unreasonable attempt for they saw that tale would not tell 2. The whole contrivance looks like an Act of Enthusiasm or of men desperate rushing upon ruine and Death They say they are put to it by God which looks like an Enthusiastick impulse Some endeavoured to excuse them from Enthusiasm by the words of the first Article where they take the Scriptures to be the object of their Faith and Rule of their Conversation but when they looked more narrowly to the words and found that they say not the Word of God in the Scriptures but his Scriptures and Word they found that they had not sufficiently cleared themselves of Enthusiasm for this seems to say that there is a word distinct from the Scriptures which they also take for the Object of their Faith and Rule of their Conversation some Enthusiastick expressions dropped in Sermons did increase the suspicion 3. When they say their Conscience and Men put them to it how shall we know that it was not an erring Conscience they must shew us by what Rule their Conscience was directed And men are fallible both in making and breaking Covenants They like men saith the Lord by the Prophet Hosea have transgressed the Covenant These men might have consulted with flesh and blood and imagined that by getting others engaged in the same danger with themselves they might be safer in a throng Meâ— are not to lippen to except these Hâ—ly men of God who spoke as they were moved
you take up doubtings whether ye should do what God hath commanded and that upon meer alledgances that these duties are sin you lay your self open to the tentations of Satan who by this method will drive you from all duty and by your doubtings make void the law of God for he will strongly alledg that it 's a sin to pray to God and if ye upon this doubt if ye should pray and then upon your doubting forbear praying what comes of the command That men must always pray and not faint There is a great difference betwixt praying hearing the word of God and the eating of meats which the Apostle speaks of in that fourteenth Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans for it was once unlawful to eat of those meats which was discharged in the Ceremonial Law and it was not necessary by any precept to eat of those meats so that the weak Christian who did not yet understand that the Ceremonial Law was abrogate was under no obligation to eat of those meats it was lawful to those who knew their Christian liberty to eat providing they did not use their liberty unseasonably before weak ones and so induce them to do what they judged unlawful and it was lawful to them to forbear the use of these things being at that time as Mr. Rutherfurd shews in his Treatise of Scandal every way indifferent The doubting of these weak ones did arise from the Ceremonial Law which was unquestionably the Law of God and there was no Law obliging them to eat of these meats at that time and so their doubting in such a case at that time was a doubt very incident to those who did know the Law and were tender of it and their knowledg that that Ceremonial Law was the Law of God and their fear to break the Law of God occasioned their doubting and there was no hazard of sin in forbearing to eat but there was sin in eating so long as their doubt remained and therefore the Lord would not have the strong eating before these weak ones to wound their weak Consciences Hence it appears that they who would from this place plead for their forbearing to pray or to hear the word of God because forsooth they doubt if they should pray or hear Gods word they fearfully misapply and wrest that Scripture for this doubt is no ways like the Jews doubt a-about eating of such or such meats for the Lord had once forbidden to eat of these meats but he never forbad the hearing of his own Word he never forbad prayer 2. There was no command obliging these weak Jews to eat of these forbidden meats at that time but there is a command obliging us to hear the Word of God and not to forsake the assembling of our selves together not to despise prophecying and obliging us to pray without ceasing 3. These doubtings of the weak Jews was not damnable for they did not incur the hazard of damnation by their doubting but by their eating with a doubting Conscience But the doubting of these who doubt if they should hear the Word of God and if they should joyn with the Church of God in hearing the Word of God in praying and praising their doubting is damnable and they should repel it with detestation and abhorrency and not so much as listen to such a suggestion of the Devil who goes about to make void the Law of God by raising such prophane and godless doubtings in mens minds that he may drive them from all Religious exercises to gross profanity And if people would observe what absurdities this doubting to hear Indulged Ministers has produced it might through the blessing of God be a means to clear them of these doubtings I doubt not but ye have heard of some who from doubting to hear Indulged Ministers have proceeded to doubt if they should hear any Ministers who were for hearing Indulged Ministers and some have gone that length that they would hear none but those who were not only against hearing Indulged Ministers but also Preached against the hearing of them and some have doubted themselves out of all hearing and some are come to that that they will not joyn in private prayer with those who hear Indulged Ministers It 's true wisdom and tenderness to repel doubts and scruples which hinder us from the worship of God or move us in it that they may not get any entrance into our minds and consciences and if they have entered we should cast them out with detestation Farm But though that was granted that there were no sin in hearing them yet seeing they are not the Ministers of those Congregations where they are setled there is no obligation upon these people to hear them seeing they are not their Ministers Min. Some of them are in the Parishes where they were ordained Ministers by the laying on of the hands of the Presbytery Others of them who had no access to the Congregations where they were ordained were cordially invited by vacant destitute Congregations and the Ministers concerned approved of the peoples invitation and of the Ministers going to these Parishes upon the peoples invitation And what more could be expected in a broken time when Presbyterial Government was broken and General Assembles Synods Presbyteries dissolved and Presbyterian Ministers turned out of their Churches and dispersed and scattered through the Nation If these Congregations cast at these Indulged Ministers and disown them as not their Ministers and so think themselves loosed of all obligation to hear them they shake themselves loose of any obligation to hear any Ministers for no other Ministers can pretend such interest in these Congregations as they really have upon the grounds which I mentioned If you be not obliged to hear the Indulged Minister who is in your Parish because he is not your Minister then upon the same ground ye are not obliged to hear any outed Ministers who occasionally come alongs to Preach for they are not Ministers of this Congregation And if ye be obliged to hear them though they be not Ministers of this Congregation why are ye not also obliged to hear the Indulged Ministers though they were not Ministers of these Congregations They who shake themselves loose of any relation to the Indulged Ministers will very easily shake themselves loose of any obligation to hear others And this is the thing which the Devil designs to cast the people loose of all relation to Ministers and of all obligation to hear any whether Indulged or no Indulged And he hath gained this design as to some who are come to that that they think not themselves obliged to hear any except it be one or two whom they think the only witnesses and others think themselves obliged not to hear these and think it much better to hear none than to hear these who teach such strange and wild conceits which tend to the confusion both of the Church and Kingdom and many finding that all obligation to hear any Ministers is
all the Ministers of the Province of London forthwith to put in Execution the Ordinances concerning Church-Government we thought it requisite humbly and faithfully as in the sight of God to shew our judgments and resolutions about this weighty matter for clearing of our integrity and preserving our Consciences void of offence both towards God and man We have secondly pondered the state of things and find our selves whether we act as is required or act not in a very great strait On the one side Prelacy being justly pulled down and the Church miserably groaning under discord and confusion many things cry aloud upon us in our places to put Church-Government into actual Execution the Glory of God the edification of his Church the duty of our Functions the engagement of our solemn Covenant with God the command of the Civil Magistrate which so far as we can with a good Conscience we are resolved and hold it our duty to obey and the present unspeakable miseries of the Church by woful Divisions Blasphemies Heresies abominable Laziness Libertinism Atheism the spiritual ruines of many Congregations through false Teachers for want of faithful Pastors for lack of Ordination On the other hand upon consideration of all the Ordinances of Parliament about Church-Government we find many necessary things not yet established and some things wherein our Consciences are not fully satisfied and therefore in our beginning to act we cannot but see how sinisterly we are like to be interpreted by many who are prone to misconstruct all our actions of this nature We hereupon hold it necessary to express upon what grounds we may proceed to act upon the Ordinances already established by Authority although that we conceive the power of Church-Censures and particularly the Lords Supper to be in the Church Officers by the will and appointment of Jesus Christ and from him they receive their Office and Authority yet we acknowledg it belongs to the Magistrate to have his Conscience satisfied in the truth of the Government of the Church which he will set up by his Authority from whom the Church-Officers do receive Authority of the publick exercise of their Offices in his Dominions and in case the Magistrate be not fully informed as to set up a right and perfect rule in every particular the Church-Officers may act under that rule provided they do not subscribe to nor otherwise acknowledg that rule to be intire and right in all points and therefore for these particular Ordinances although we humbly conceive they do not hold forth a compleat rule nor are in all points satisfactory to our Consciences yet because we find many things established in them agreeable to the word of God for which we desire heartily to bless God and to be thankful to the Honourable House provision being made for enabling of the Elderships by their Authority to keep away from the Lords Supper all ignorant persons and many scandalous persons with a Declaration of their resolution that all notorious and scandalous persons shall be keeped from the Sacrament and that there shall be an addition to the scandalous offences formerly enumerated We conceive it is our duty to begin to act in reference to Church-Government by Congregational Classical Provincial and National Assemblies resolving by the grace of God to walk in all things according to the Word and according to the Ordinances so far as we conceive them correspondent to it and to be countable to the Magistrate wheresoever he shall call us thereto hoping so to carry our selves as not only to enjoy his concurrence with us on all occasions but also that he will supply what is lacking to make the Government entire and likewise to make alterations in all things that shall happen to be amiss In this doing we trust we shall not grieve the Spirits of the truly godly either at home or abroad nor give any just occasion to them who are contrary-minded to blame our Proceedings By which Paper we may see how respectfully and courteously these worthy and godly men walked towards the Magistrate how much they give him as his due even when he was exercising Erastianism in a great height giving Rules and Directions to regulate them in admission to the Lords Supper limiting them as to scandal with divers other things which they here but generally hint and yet having given this sober salvo for quieting their Consciences and guarding against offences they do not refuse to go the length they have access for doing their duty And thus I have shewed you that they are much mistaken who imagine that our zealous Ancestors were of that humour that they would take nothing except they got all which they thought due and that they would do nothing except they got leave to do all without any restriction put upon them by the Magistrate That Calderwood in his History p. 381. relates That the Synod of Fife Anno 1597. instructs their Commissioners to travel with the Ministers Barons and Noblemen that a supplication may be given in for the Ministers of Edenburgh and Mr. David Black that they may be restored again to their Flocks and to behave themselves therein in the fear of God and love of Christ and his Kingdom faithfully and providently with all dutiful reverence to the Kings Majesty And p. 470. That Anno 1603. Mr. Robert Bruce desired his Majesties warrant of his re-entry to his calling or reposition to his place And in that same Page in his Letter to the Council of Edenburgh he says And to this effect I craved that the Act of Council which stood against me which closeth up my mouth might be deleted and that also I might have a warrant from his Majesty to testifie his Majesties good will to my free and full Reposition That passage of Scripture Exod. 10.26 Not an hoof shall be left behind is frequently used and very often abused and misapplyed as in the present case Moses would not leave a hoof and therefore Ministers should not preach the Gospel when the Magistrate permits it except he permit Presbyteries Synods General Assemblies and restore Peesbyterial Government entirely as it was But there is so great disparity in the cases that there it no ground for the inference of the one from the other For Moses was made a God to Pharaoh Exod. 7.1 He was King in Jesurun as he was extraordinarily raised up by God so he was backed by the miraculous power of God which plagued Pharaoh and the Egyptians Again Moses and Israel were in possession of their Beasts and had the extraordinary warrant and protection of God to secure their possessions Further Moses had also a reason for his refusal to leave a beast for says he Thereof we must take to serve the Lord and we know not with what we must serve the Lord until we come thither If Moses had been a meer Subject of Pharaoh and if Pharaoh had taken away all the Israelites Beasts and had them in his possession if Moses being
their knowledge He hath an eye to that Scripture 1 Chron. 12.32 Among those who were ready armed to the War and came to David to Hebron to turn the Kingdom of Saul to him according to the word of the Lord Ver. 23. There are some of the Children of Issachar v. 32. And of the Children of Issachar which were men that had understanding of the Times to know what Israel ought to do the Heads of them were two hundred and all their Brethren were at their command These men of Issachar spoken of were as â—he Dutch Interpreters expound the place underâ—tanding and expert men which are able to give good Advice and Counsel at what time it were best â—o attempt any thing or desist from it whether in War or civil Affairs as Esther 1.13 or in Husbanâ—ry and Countrey Affairs Some Interpreters reâ—â—r this to the knowledge of Astronomy as Diodate â—ews but others sayes he understand and take it to be only wisdom and sagacity either natural or gotten by long experience to discern and know the very moment of Opportunities a thing very important whence ordinarily depends the good success of Affairs Others shew that these men of Issachar were men eminently skilful and endued with prudence to know what was to be done and when and gave evidence of this sagacity at this time in taking this fit opportunity in turning the Kingdom of Saul to David and they were followed by their Brethren in this matter This Knowledge of the Times was not common to all the Professors in Israel for if so this Knowledge of the Times would not have been noted by the Spirit of God as something remarkable in these men of Issachar And no doubt there were many Israelites who were taught of God and were sufficiently distinguished from those who were brutish in their knowledge who yet had not this Knowledge of the Times to know when it was time to make War and to make alterations in the State in turning the Kingdom from the house of Saul to David This Knowledge of the Times is very desirable but every thing desirable is not a duty Moses wishes that all the Lords People were Prophets but it is not the duty of every one of the Lords People to be a Prophet and to Prophesie Again there are several things which we are oblidged to have and to do which yet are not the Cognizance or the Badges and Marks whereby they who are taught of God are distinguished from them who are brutish in their Knowledge as for example an eminent measure of Knowledge of Prudence of Love of Assurance these indeed are excellent Ornaments but they are not Badges and Marks common to all those who are taught of God and distinguishing them from those who are brutish in their Knowledg for there are many honest Professors who are taught of God who have not attained to these eminent degrees of Knowledge Prudence Love and Assurance Again it 's the duty of all Professors to obey the Law of God perfectly otherways their defects in obedience would not be sins But that perfection is not the Badg or Cognizance to distinguish those who are taught of God from those who are brutish in their Knowledge So that though that knowledge of the times were a thing which all Israelites should be adorned with yet it would not be right to make it their Cognizance or a distinguishing Mark to difference them from those who are brutish in their Knowledge But for any thing that appears from the Text or the Interpreters which I have consulted this Knowledge of the Times was a natural or political sagacity attained by long experience by which these men of Issachar knew what was the fit seasons of making War and alterations in matters of State which concerned all Israel Now for this sort of Knowledge of times I suppose the Author of the Epistle will not say that it is the duty of every Professor in the Church of Scotland to have this politick sagacity to discern the Seasons of making War and making alterations in State matters and much less is this politick sagacity and prudence which is not ordinarily acquired even by men imployed in State-Affairs but by much exercise and long experience to be made a Cognizance distinguishing those who are taught of God from those who have not saving knowledge for this knowledge of the Times is as Interpreters think a natural or politick knowledge and so no evidence or mark of a Spiritual and supernatural estate This is certain from the Scripture that this Knowledge of the Times was a Knowledge which distinguished some of the Tribe of Issachar from the Generality of the people of Israel and therefore this Scripture is misapplyed when this Knowledge of the Times is alledged to be the Mark and Cognizance of all who are taught of God distinguishing them from those who have no true Wisdom but are brutish in their Knowledge and so like the beasts that perish This is an ill token that the Author of this Epistle hath stumbled in the threshold and in the very Entry of his Address and his stumbling is the more dangerous because it may be a stumbling-block to private Professors by putting this conceit in their heads that they must either have the knowledge of the Times that the men of Issachar had concerning the fit seasons of making War and peace and of making State-alterations or else they are brutish in their Knowledge and are not taught of God This were the way to put all Professors Male and Female Lad and Lasse to become Politicians and to take on them to know and determine what Israel should do to determine what the State and Church should do And thus they are diverted from studying to know what they ought to do themselves and how they ought to rule their own Families and set a work to dive into the intrigues of State-policy and to plot alterations of States and conclude when to make Wars and to alledge that all who are taught of God have that Knowledge of the Times which the men of Issachar had is to deceive them and make them imagine that they have that Knowledge which they have not and to tempt them to meddle with things that are too high for them and to crack their brains by racking them to reach those things which are beyond their Capacity and to stretch themselves beyond their line and pass the bounds of their Station and Vocation Such flattering insinuations which either puff up people with a conceit of their Wisdom to manage the greatest and most important Affairs of Kirk and State and that they are fit to guide their Guides and break the Ice to them as the Historian says in his 28 Questions and Vindication hath done much harm to several well-meaning people and put them from minding the duties of their particular Callings and the Duties of their Christian Vocation in the exercise of Faith and Repentance and in giving diligence in the exercise of
themselves and their People We may see our sins in the sins of Rulers if Christ had been in Truth as he was in Word acknowledged alone Head and Lord of his own house if his Divine Wisdom and Sovereign Will had been only observed and followed in the matters of God and if mens wills and humours and conceits and interests had not been mixed in these things and if those to whom the Lord had given the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven had keeped close to their Spiritual Function it might have prevented all encroachments upon the Spiritual Power of the Church O that the Lord himself would teach Rulers with a strong hand that no other power is good but that which is of God and to God and no other power but that which is of God by whom Kings reign is for their honour and interest all other power is vanity nothing and worse than nothing and will be to their loss shame and sorrow Darius found that that Decree which seemed to confer too much honour upon him in pretending to make him God alone for thirty days was but a miserable cheating snare as Flatterers are a great plague to Rulers so wise and faithful Instructors Counsellors and Reprovers who out of pure Zeal for God and true love to Rulers shew them what is right and wrong in the sight of God are great blessings to them It is not every one that is fit to reprove equals far less any Superiors and least of all Rulers and it is not every one that hath some fitness that is called of God to this work They who are called to it must manage this difficil work with all Wisdom Faithfulness love to the person of the Ruler and respect to his Authority that in discovering his sin his Authority be not brought into Contempt As they must not lessen their sin so they must not make it worse than it is If we must not lye upon the Devil far less upon those whom the Lord hath called Gods it were also good to say nothing of them behind their backs but what we could say to them if we were called to it and had access for to vent things of Rulers behind their backs and when called to an account to deny or mince and extenuate and put another face upon it than it had at first is not ingenuous dealing It is found in sad experience that bitter invectives against Rulers published by uncertain Authors and which overlashes and passes the bounds of verity irritates and provokes Rulers and makes them think that such invectives flow from hatred to their persons and contempt of their Authority and tempts them to reject the truths which are mixt with these falshoods and thus many by overdoing undo all that they intended to do I wish the Author of the Preface and Cup of cold Water and of the Letters had not overlashed and passed the bounds of Truth in their exagerations of the Magistrates sins and in uttering things derogatory to their Authority as for example that no Magistrate either Heathen Turk or Christian ever arrogated such a Supremacy Some have arrogated to themselves the Deity and to be God alone as Darius did by signing the Decree Herod arrogated to himself to be God and not man And that allegiance that they have delete the apprehension of that eternal God who is above them would fasten that upon them which many think the greatest profest Atheists though they intend it yet can never attain unto it to get the apprehension of a Deity rased out It 's also said that they have the purity of enmity at and implacability against all who desire to be faithful and loyal to Christ And elsewhere it is said If it be not an abuse of language to call them Rulers whose Goverment is pure Tyranny They have much real guilt why should we make our selves guilty in alledging upon them that which we cannot prove The Lord hath forbidden to speak evil of any man and in a special manner he hath forbidden to revile Rulers as we should beware of idolizing Rulers so we should beware of despising Dignities if the pains and time that hath been spent in telling how our Rulers had been taken up in earnest Prayers and Endeavours to make them better it might have been better both for them and us The exaggerating of their sins to scare us from all Addresses to them from all seekings and receivings hath a direct tendency to put them and us in a state of hostility and render us hateful to Rulers as Persons who are utterly alienate from them and will have nothing to do with them It may seem a very cleanly-like conceit to well-meaning people to forbear all making and medling with Rulers who have highly provoked the Lord and vexed his People but this is but a conceited cleanliness The first Magistrate that Israel had to do with was a grievous Oppressor of the Lords People and an Idolater and an insolent despiser of God who makes nothing of God Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice and let Israel go I know not the Lord neither will I let Israel go And yet the Lord sends Moses and Aaron to him to desire him to let Israel go to serve him in the Wilderness and after he hath given that blasphemous insolent answer full of tempting of God they insist humbly to pray him to let them go Exod. 5.1 2 3. And they are many times after sent by the Lord to Pharoah with the same desire It were easie to multiply instances of this nature but this one is sufficient here are frequent Addresses made by the Lords servants to a most Godless Atheistical Blasphemer and Persecutor of the Lords people and that in a religious matter It 's for liberty to go and worship God If a company of Christians were taken at Sea by a company of profligate godless Pyrates who were stronger than they might not the Christians desire of them Liberty to worship God together who will question it And if an address may be made to such Ruffians who neither fear God nor regard man and who have no Authority over the Christians but keep them Prisoners by strong hand how much more may Addresses be made to the Magistrate who whatever be his sins hath Authority from God to do good and the same Authority that a godly Magistrate hath and to draw out this power by Petitions and to take the benefit of the exercise of it When the Magistrate doth any good to the Church and undoeth any ill formerly done it is not a touching of any unclean thing but a making use of that Authority which is the excellent Ordinance of God I shall shut up this with a Testimony of precious Mr. Rutherford in his Divine Right of Church-Government and Excommunication Chap. 24. Quest 20. pag. 539 541. Now the Magistrate Heathen as Magistrate even Nero when the Church of God is in his Court and Dominions hath the same Jus the same
who did not think themselves obliged to give in a written or verbal Confession Testimony or Protestation against the Supremacy and the Invasions made upon the Government of the Church and yet the Author of this Epistle urges none of these with his Queries but only the Indulged Ministers though they have somewhat to say for their forbearance of any such Protestation which others had not seeing they were called to the Council in a time when the Magistrate was relenting somewhat as to the severity formerly used and they were called to get some relaxation from the restraint laid formerly upon them and their irritating of the Magistrate might not only have prejudged themselves of that freedom but also have been prejudicial to others who were in expectation of it who might very readily have blamed them for their imprudency in tristing their Protestation with that season not only to their own prejudice but to the prejudice of others And I leave it to the Consideration of indifferent persons whether or not the Magistrate would in all probability have said These men and others of them made no Protestation against us when we turned them out and subverted their Government but now when we begin to shew favour to any of them they grow more insolent and therefore it 's best policy to forbear our favours and to use severities And seeing all these Brethren and the whole Presbyterians in Scotland were concerned in the Invasions made upon the Church and were concerned in the bad effects that might have followed upon the irritation of the Magistrate in that juncture of Affairs if it had been fit for a few private Ministers without the concurrence of all concerned or at lest without their counsel and advice to have given in such a Testimony or Protestation as the Author requires and it 's well known that no such concurrence was offered nor such advice given to these Ministers by the rest of their Judgment who were concerned in this matter I shall not repeat what the Author of the Answer to the Countrey-mans Scruples anent the Indulgence hath said concerning Testimonies in which he hath shewed from Scripture and solid Reason the rashness and unreasonableness of those who have condemned the suffering Ministers and the Indulged Ministers for not giving Testimonies He hath excellently discovered from Scripture when Testimonies are to be given and when not when they are seasonable and when unseasonable He hath also shewed how written Testimonies which Synods had prepared when Prelacy was coming in particularly the Synod of Fife were obstructed by the Magistrates raising of these Synods and that they who had no clearness to make any use of the Indulgence did obstruct the written Testimony which was prepared against the evils which were in the complex acts which related to the Indulgence he hath also shewed how many Testimonies have been given by word in Preaching and before the Council and by suffering and by not obeying the Instructions of the Council I shall only shew that the Ministers who first appeared before the Council at the first Indulgence did witness a good Confession in the presence of the Council They declare that they had received their Ministry from Jesus Christ and after design themselves the Ministers of Jesus Christ They speak of their Ministry as Paul did of his Ministry Acts 22.24 The Ministry saith he which I have received of the Lord Jesus And by the way we may take notice that the Ministry is not a meer Power or Authority but comprehends the exercise of that Authority the exercise of the Ministerial Office for Paul speaks of finishing the Ministry which he had received which unquestionably points at the exercise of his Ministry and they design themselves as Paul designs Ministers 1 Cor. 4.1 Let a man so account of us as of the Ministers of Christ 2 Cor. 11.23 Are they Ministers of Christ I speak as a fool I am more They who quarrel this part of their Confession must fall first upon the Apostle Paul or rather upon the Holy Ghost for the Apostle spoke as he was moved by the Holy Ghost 2. They declare that they had received from Christ full prescriptions for regulating them in their Ministry as they had acknowledged Christ the giver of the Ministry so they acknowledge him the Law-giver from whom they have the prescriptions to regulate them in the Ministry both in their entrance into it and exercise of it then they declare that these prescriptions of Christs are full This excludes all other prescriptions though they had said no more but that they had received prescriptions from Christ to regulate them this would have sufficiently excluded all other prescriptions For the prescriptions being the prescriptions of God we must not diminish from them and so we must not admit any Rules contrary to them or that derogate any way from them and we must not add unto them because they are his words Prov. 30.5 6. Every word of God is pure add thou not to his words lest he reprove thee and thou be found a liar And then seeing Christ hath given these prescriptions to regulate Ministers in their Ministry this shews that these prescriptions are a perfect Rule a Rule must be perfect else it is not a Rule as our Divines maintain against the Papists in pleading for the perfection of the Scripture seeing Christ hath given prescriptions to his Ministers to regulate them in their Ministry these prescriptions are perfect else they were not sufficient to reach the end of regulating His work is perfect he is faithful in his house as a son over his own house he hath finished all the work that was given him to do But when they further assert that these prescriptions were full this did clearly exclude all other prescriptions for regulating them in their Ministry as superfluous and as Additions to that which God had made full and perfect but last of all this is one of the Lords prescriptions that we should not add to his Word nor diminish from it Deut. 4.2 Again that is another of his prescriptions that they do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus And seeing they are the Ministers of Christ and their work the work of the Ministry received from Christ any that will not shut their eyes may see that they behoved to be regulated by his prescriptions alone in the matter of their Ministry 3. They confess Christ to be their Judge to whom they were countable in the discharge of their Ministry for these are the words which Mr. Hutcheson spoke in their name We have received our Ministry from Jesus Christ with full prescriptions from him for regulating us therein and must in discharge thereof be accountable to him This doth clearly evidence that they behoved upon their greatest peril to adhere closely to these prescriptions which they had received from the Lord Jesus Seeing they were to give an account unto Christ how they had discharged their Ministry according to his full
to this purpose in the place cited but from what hath bin cited from the Authors mentioned whose Books are common and no doubt have been seen by the Author of the Epistle he might have seen that it was great rashness to suppose that none would or could deny that Christ by his blood did intercede for vengeance Those Authors mentioned have a far other up-taking of Christs Priestly Office and of that part of it his Priestly Intercession by his blood for they think his Priestly Office was wholly an Office of Grace and altogether an Office of Grace founded in Grace and Mercy and that Mercy is an essential qualification of a Priest as a Priest that it 's an Office for men for expiating sin and not for punishing it that the designe of it is mercy and grace that the Priestly intercession is only for the Elect and in this distinguished from Christs Royal Power which as it is for protecting the Elect so it is for punishing the enemies of his Church 2. But suppose Christ did intercede by his blood against some I enquire at him how he knows that he intercedes by his blood for vengeance upon the Authors of the Indulgence what knows he but some of them may be elect I am sure he will not say that the blood of Christ which was shed on earth for the Elect doth plead against them within the vail in Heaven if he say that he knows they are all Reprobates he knows more than the Author of the Cup of cold Water knew in the year 1678. for pag. 40. he says It may be there are some of the Elect so far left at present as to run along with this course I hope he will not take on him to say They have sinned the sin against the Holy Ghost If by vengeance he mean eternal vengeance he must conclude them Reprobates if he mean temporal vengeance how knows he that Christs blood pleads for that We see Aaron as Priest stood betwixt the dead and the living to stay the Plague he made an atonement to avert the wrath of God and not to bring it on Numb 16.46 47 48. And the Plague which came after the numbring of the people is stayed by building an altar It belonged to the Priest as Priest to bless in the name of the Lord for ever 2 Chron. 23.13 and offering burnt-offerings and peace-offerings 2 Sam. 24.25 Again whatsoever Christ intercedes for by his blood he obtaineth it now how knows he that temporal vengeance will certainly come upon the Authors of the Indulgence May not Sovereign grace avert the temporal judgment which mens heinous sins have deserved who can set bounds to the Grace of God who hath Mercy on whom he will have Mercy and hath shewed mercy to some of those who were the chief of sinners 3. Suppose that were granted that Christ did by his blood intercede for vengeance and that the Author of this Epistle could condescend upon the particular persons against whom Christ intercedes and that he intercedes against the Authors of the Indulgence because of the complex of this deed of the Indulgence yet this would make no discrepancy betwixt Christs Intercession in Heaven and Mr. Hutchesons Speech upon earth for except he proves that Christ intercedes for vengeance upon them for their taking off the civil restraints of penal Statutes and granting the peaceable exercise of the Ministry all he says is nothing to the purpose For Mr. H. and the Indulged Ministers did give thanks for this and not for the complex of the Indulgence for they never gave thanks for the Instructions He will never prove that Christ as King willeth the execution of vengeance upon Magistrates for taking off such undue restraints and much less will he be able to prove that Christ as Priest intercedes by his blood for vengeance upon that account And as for the Prayer which is in the end of Mr. Hutchesons Speech That the Lord would bless his Majesty in his Person and Govenment and their L. L. in the publick Administration that was according to the Lords Command 1 Tim. 2.1 2 3. where it is expresly said That this praying for Kings and all that are in Authority is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour And what they meant by his Majesties Government is clear from what they said before in the Description of Magistracy which they design lawful Authority and the excellent Ordinance of God Seeing Mr. Hutcheson spoke according to the good and acceptable will of the Lord revealed in his word this alledged discrepancy betwixt Christs Intercession and their Speech is one of the Authors roaveries a Melancholy dream with which he may affright himself but the Indulged Ministers are not such weak Fools as to be affrighted with his many terrible words of terrour trembling confusion of face shame and astonishment This minds me of the censure which I saw of him in an Answer to the History of the Indulgence that he hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 passions without reason The Indulged Ministers believe that they have followed the Lords will in not slighting the opportunity of the peaceable exercise of their Ministry which the Lord in his good providence did offer to them and they look upon the direction which they had from the Lord in this matter to chuse the good and refuse the ill and upon the Lords assistance of them in the exercise of their Ministry and his helping them hitherto to run with patience in the course of their Ministry notwithstanding of the contradictions and false reproaches they have met with from some from whom they expected better things and upon the blessing of the Lord in the exercise of their Ministry as the fruits of Christs Intercession so far are they from being confounded and terrified with reflecting upon the Intercession of Christ There are other things in this 3d. Question which may be denyed at for example That our Rulers in affronting Christ have outdone all that ever went before them and were resolved never to be out-done by any who should come after them What no not by the Council at Jerusalem who condemned him of Blasphemy and after commanded his Apostles not to speak at all to any man in the name of Jesus But the Gentlemans observation holds here for he goes as far as his fancy can go he minds me of a Drunken man in the times of Popery who could not get on upon his Horse at length having prayed to the Haly-rude of Crail to help him on he went to some advantage and did cast himself over the Horse and then he blamed Haly-rude of Crail because it could not do except it did over-do I wish his stile were as solid and temperate as that Speech of Mr. Hutchesons which though he slightingly calls an Harangue yet was such as did well become a Minister of the Gospel whereas this Author by a flood of great swelling words is often carryed away beyond all bounds of Rime
that hath no other effect but a non-advantage and damage of godly persons is no censure approven of Christ for he hath commanded his servants and people that they do all their things in love and for edification How the Indulged Ministers can be still dear to those who cast them out of their Prayers to their damage I cannot understand I suppose when he and those who take his Method have seriously reflected upon the matter they will find that they themselves have more disadvantage by this uncharitable neglect of duty than the Indulged Minsters have He saith he finds himself in fetters as to praying for them ignorance and prejudice and humour and such like distempers will fetter folk in duty I am sure his fetters are not made of the cords of love I am very confident that more light and more love would loose these fetters If those fervent judicious gracious persons that he speaks of were more judicious and had more of the grace of charity and had learned to love more fervently they would not have fallen into that ignorant and uncharitable case of Conscience which binds them up from making Conscience of praying for those who are as he says dear unto them If they had more judgment and more fervent charity they would pray much more better than they do and when they pray better the Indulged Ministers will not be cast out of their Prayers And I cannot but tell him so long as he and they take such unwarrantable and uncharitable methods of praying Christians who are truly judicious will not think so much of their Prayers as it seems he and they do who would terrifie the Indulged Ministers by their forbearing to pray for them from the exercise of their Ministry in those Congregations in which through the good Providence of God they have had in a sad time the peaceable exercise thereof That these people do not account the Indulged Ministers a part of the suffering remnant is another of their mistakes for though their sufferings have not run in the channel of the sufferings of others yet they have had their large share in sufferings if the scourge of Tongues and Calumnies back-bitings and heart-breaking reproaches be sufferings they may be reckoned among sufferers These and many other sad things they have endured with much patience and these things they have suffered because they could not in Conscience neglect to take the opportunity of the peaceable exercise of their Ministry It 's another of their mistakes that they look on the Indulged Ministers as guilty of defection They might have had patience till the Ministry of the Church of Scotland had tried and found the practice of the Indulged Ministers defection But at their own hand to condemn so many judicious and conscientious Ministers of defection and cast them out of their Prayers are among the wild Practises of this evil time in which many folk do what is right in their own eyes But I perceive a new sort of negative Religion is like to come in fashion in this Generation Practical Divines condemn the ill-grounded confidence of those who please themselves because they forbear gross evils though they neglect that which is good and justly because the tree that brings not forth good fruit is hewen down and cast into the fire But now many please themselves as if they were more judicious gracious tender than others because they forbear to hear the word of God preached by those whom they dare not to deny to be Ministers of the Gospel and because they forsake the assemblies of the Lords People met together for the Lords worship and because they do not pray for those who are dear to them and whom they dare not deny to be godly until they actually do that which they desire them O what need have we to walk humbly and pray earnestly for the Spirit of a sound mind He saith in that same page That God hath written an History against the Indulged Ministers acceptance I wish he had forborn this rash assertion the right order had been to have shewed that the practice of the Indulged Ministers was contrary to the written word of God he knows that Providence is not our Bible I know not what History this is and what these effects that he speaks of as flowing from the Indulged Ministers practice which he mentions elsewhere are and so cannot speak particularly to them if he meant that some have been very busie to draw people away from hearing the Indulged Ministers he may remember that there were some who endeavoured to draw away the people from hearing Christ himself He is mad said they why hear ye him If he mean that some people who once countenanced their Ministry have withdrawn from them he knows that many of Christs Disciples went back and walked no more with him and they who would once have pulled out their eyes and given them to Paul looked on him as an enemy because he told them the truth many have stumbled at Christ and the Gospel and the Ministers of it without cause If he mean the renting and division that is no effect of the practice of the Indulged Ministers but of those who did set themselves to draw the people off from them and upon such grounds that too many people are become very indifferent and careless of hearing any Ministers and some are only for hearing some few and how long they will continue their respect for such who can tell for it 's the work of a spirit of Schism to divide and subdivide Mr. Rutherford used to say that Providence was not our Bible and Mr. Ro. Blare used to call the Arguments which the English usurpers took from success Turkish Arguments till all be broken in shivers and crumbled away to nothing We should be very tender in speaking of Gods written Histories against or for any thing There are great mysteries in divine Providence which does not appear at first till the Lords work be compleat and all his Counsel appear and therefore folk who are hasty in determining in this matter run a great hazard of taking the Name of God in vain In his next page he expresses some hope that amongst the Indulged themselves among so many godly men there were some that the Lord should make use of to discover the evil of this Indulgence and says That that man shall be blessed Ans As for the evil that is in the complex of the Indulgence several of the Indulged Ministers have discovered it to much better purpose than the Author of the following History hath done but these same Ministers have given such solid Reasons for the warrantableness of their own Practice in what they have done upon the Magistrates Indulgence that he cannot in reason expect that they should condemn themselves in that in which they have so much peace upon so solid grounds In his last Section he says Many will cry out against the following History who shall never be able to
answer its Reason but by clamour as unanswerable I answer If he had been pleased to have read what the Indulged Ministers and others have written in answer to what the Author of this History sent before this History in Letters and Questions he might have seen any thing that this Author hath said against the practise of the Indulged Ministers very rationally and solidly answered As for his first reason for the seasonableness of this I answer The evil which is in the Magistrates actings which relate to the Indulgence have been more solidly discovered than this Author doth but this Authors great design is to fasten all the Magistrates faults in this matter upon the Indulged Ministers And if this last be the Testimony which the Author means in his second Reason it 's a false Testimony and of no value and worth and worse than nothing In his third he is mistaken for several who are dissatisfied with the Indulgence are much more dissatisfied with this History as a Book which they think will do much mischief among ignorant and profane people in hardning them in a careless neglect of the Lords Ordinances and profaning of the Sabbath and jumble many weak and well-meaning people and confound them with things that they do not understand His fourth Reason for the seasonableness of it is because the Indulged Brethren had been threatning and boasting with a Vindication of the lawfulness of their acceptance I answer The Author either saw these Vindications for there were many of them or not if he saw them not might he not have had patience till he had seen what they had to say for themselves it was injustice to condemn men unheard who were offering a Vindication of their Practice but it seemed he had a mind to give them Couper Justice But it may be he thought he could imagine all that they had to say but this was rashness and too much self-confidence he should have heard them before he had answered seeing he knew they had spoken for themselves If he saw any of these Vindications as some think he did why did he not examine them it may be he found them too hot for his handling If he had sent this History to the Indulged Ministers privately that they might have given him a return this had been fairly done but to print it and publish it to the World at the very first was not fair non amice factum ab amico His first Reason for the seasonableness of it is because the Non-indulged Ministers had done somewhat to strengthen the hands of the Indulged by giving them new confidence in their course in obliquo covering all aid carrying towards them as if they had done nothing amiss but upon the the matter by a direct Homologatry of the Indulgence for now silence as to all speaking against this evil is made the very door and porch through which all entrance to the Ministry must pass And therefore saith he it 's now simply necessary and more than high time to discover and detect the blackness of its Defection when the Church is thus brought in bondage by it Ans I did not think that the Author though he be very confident upon small evidence had so far passed the bounds of modesty as that he durst in Print have avowed and justified the deed of two young men who contrary to Presbyterian Principles did set themselves to counteract the judgment and sentence of the suffering Ministers of the Church of Scotland for their way did manifestly tend to the subversion of the very foundation of all Government and Order It 's a strange Reason that because the Non indulged Ministers endeavoured to strengthen the hands of the Indulged Ministers that therefore it was seasonable to put out a Book condemning all together and what else was this but for two men living at a distance to take upon them to condemn the whole Presbyterian Ministers of the Church of Scotland and to encourage two unruly youths in their contempt of any remnant of Authority that that poor remnant had What sober person who hath any Judgment in matters of that nature can but commend the Practice of these Non-indulged Ministers who laboured to prevent the breaking of the Church by that Question about the Indulgence by restraining these young men who made it their great work to cry out against the Indulged Ministers and the hearing of them and yet this Author is so far from having that reverence that he ought to have had to the Judgment of the generality of the Ministers of the Church of Scotland that he thinks because they agreed together to endeavour to prevent the renting of the Church therefore it was seasonable to cast in a new fire-ball of Contention among the people and so render all their endeavours of Unity ineffectual and what more effectual way would he have taken to render all the suffering Ministers of the Church of Scotland contemptible in the eyes of all who will believe him than to charge all the Indulged Ministers with so black and fearful a defection and all the rest of the Ministers with a direct homologating of the Indulgence In this he hath done service very acceptable to Prelatists Papists and Quakers though I believe he designed no such thing His sixth taken from the severe insulting over some of the poor remnant who could not forbear to witness their abhorrency of it flows from misinformation the insulting was among some of those who quarrelled with the Indulged Ministers and who took occasion from the Indulged Ministers forbearance to meddle with that matter in their Sermons to say that they had nothing to say for themselves and thus their silence for peace sake was turned into a prejudice against them They who live in these parts where Indulged Ministers are can bear witness how much forbearance and tenderness hath been used towards the poor people who were confounded with these doubtful Disputations and frighted with unknown words of Homologations and Homologatings and imposed upon by strong alledgencies and parables and allegories without Scripture or solid Reasons This way of witnessing which he means the withdrawing from the Lords Ordinances to which they formerly resorted and in the use of which they profited is a way of witnessing that if they who take it have little cause to be ashamed of it as he says I am sure they have as little cause to glory in it for there needs no more to qualifie folk for giving this Testimony but laziness and gross profanity and contempt of Ordinances There can be no great matter in that which any profane man as he is profane and because he is profane can do As for his seventh neither this Author nor he hath proven that the Indulged Ministers entring into these Parishes was a coming in not by the door but a climbing up another way His last consists of hopes That some of these godly men Indulged may be by this History taken off and that the Non-indulged will
compendious way if I be not mistaken to meet with any thing he says is to consider what is in his Arguments against the Indulgence for he resumes there what he had remarked on the Kings Letter and what he hath in his Vindication is taken out of these Arguments In these Reasons against the Indulgence he saith the Reader may see at one view what was scattered up and down the foregoing Relation so here we will find all his forces united and drawn up in order Pag. 85. 1. He promises to shew in how many particulars Injury was done by the Indulgence as accepted unto our Lord Jesus Christ the only Head and King of his Church Ans That which the Indulged Ministers accepted was a freedom from or a relaxation of that civil restraint which had hindered the peaceable exercise of their Ministry as was cleared before If he alledge that they accepted of the Instructions c. This is an acceptation of his own making and he may make any thing if he pleases for the Indulged Ministers cannot hinder any body to fight against their own fancies having premised this I come to the particulars of his charge against them 1. Saith he in that hereby they declared they did not hold their Ministry wholly and solely of Christ Jesus How proves he this We saith he saw above how the Indulged did plainly and positively refuse to say that they held their Ministry of Jesus Christ alone where ex professo the word alone was left out See what is remarked on Mr. Hutchesons Speech and what was said in answer to the Informer whâ— was dissatisfied with M. Blair whereby an injury of a very high nature was done unto our Lord Jesus That which is remarked on Mr. Hutchesons Speech is in pag. 24. 9. they say That they received their Ministry from Jesus Christ Buâ— why was it not said as some of them if I am nâ— misinformed desired only from Jesus Christ wheâ— this was designedly and deliberately left out leâ— all the World judge whether in this they carried a faithful Ministers of the Gospel or not For mâ— part I cannot but judge that this was a manifest betraying of the Cause and a giving up of all iâ— the Magistrate for hereby they declared that eitheâ— in their judgment they had their Ministry from others as well as from Christ that is from the Magistrate as well as from Christ and that in an equality and Co-ordination or else that they had it nâ— from Christ immediately but from men from thâ— Magistrate in subordination to Christ And then he reasons against both these and concludes that therefore when they kept out the Word only they did plainly declare that they held their Ministry partly of the Magistrate And after he hath started another Objection about holding the peaceable exercise of the Ministry from the Magistrate he concludes So that use what devices men can to cover this matter a manifest betraying of the Cause will break through and a receding from received and sworn Principles will be visible In the answer to the Informer to which also he refers he saith pag. 71. Ministers receiving instructions for regulating them in the exercise of their Ministry from Magistrates acting like themselves Magisterially and Architectonically do if not formally yet at least virtually deny Christ to be the only Head and Lawgiver of his Church But again pag. 85. he objects That this fault was but personal and accidental to the Indulgence and so cannot effect the same or make it an encroachment upon Christ of so high a nature He answers That being spoken at that occasion when the King and Council were acknowledged thankfully for granting of the Indulgence and being spâ—ken with understanding it must be granted that it had reference to the Indulgence it self and so saith he their discourse was to this purpose in effect We declare that we hold not our Ministry of Christ alone but of Christ and of the Magistrate and therefore do accept of this Indulgence without scruple He adds afterward Further this Discourse of theirs so worded purposely and deliberately saith That if they had not believed that they held their Ministry not of Christ alone but of others also they could not have accepted of the Indulgence Ans This is the Authors great Gun with which he thought fit to begin the battel if this misgive and do no skaith there is no less reason to fear his lesser Ordnance It 's strange that he should have begun with a piece of Ordnance which he knows not whether it be fixed or not he is not sure whether the word only was by some of the Indulged Ministers desired to be added for when he says it he casts in this doubtful Parenthesis If I be not misinformed He got many wrong Informations and this may be one among the rest I do not remember of any such thing and if he be misinformed his first Argument hath neither matter nor form I have heard it alledged that some people by telling uncertainties yea falshoods come themselves to believe them and confidently to add to them I find something like this in this Author 1. We see he speaks doubtfully if I be not misinformed but the oftener he repeats it he grows the more positive and confident for we never hear more of any doubt of his Inforformation yea in repeating he wonderfully amplifies the matter and makes the not saying of this only to say many things For saith he hereby they declared that they did not hold their Ministry wholly and solely of Christ He might have easily perceived that a positive Declaration that they did not hold their Ministry from Christ only is more than a not-saying that they had it from him only A man may truly say I had this gift from my Father though he add not the exclusive word only Who yet cannot positively declare that he had not the gift only from his Faâ—her because he as I suppose received it from â—is Father and not from any other Again he granted that some of the Indulged desired that the word only might be put in sure â—hese did not positively and plainly refuse to say That they held their Ministry from Christ alone and yet here he charges it upon the Indulged generally that they refused to say so This is another of his Amplifications Then he judgeth that this was a manifest betraying of the Cause and refers it to the judgment of the world if they carried as faithful Ministers What shall Ministers be condemned â—as not faithful because they spoke of their Ministry in the words that the Holy Ghost taught Paul to speak Acts 20.24 Shall the using of the Words of God be judged a betraying of the cause of God Suppose that that word was designedly and deliberately left out this might have been the reason that they durst not adventure to add a word to the words of the Apostle who spoke by the Inspiration of God He amplifies yet further This was saith
he a giving up all to the Magistrate That is a wonderful amplification There is no mention made of the Magistrate in that sentence at all nor any giving of any thing to him there but an acknowledgment that they had received their Ministry from Christ and yet he will conclude that by this all was given up to the Magistrate What was nothing given to Christ from whom they acknowledge they had received their Ministry expresly and all given to the Magistrate whom they do not so much as mention there But he will prove that they gave up all to the Magistrate For saith he hereby they declared that in their judgment they had their Ministry from others as well as from Christ Here he eats in again somewhat he had said for even now all was given to the Magistrate but here he leaves something at least to Christ but takes in others with him but who are these others That is saith he the Magistrate as well as from Christ What was there no others but the Magistrate that they might have their Ministry from I think he might rather have supposed that it was the Father and the Holy Ghost than the Magistrate especially when he is speaking of an equality for it was an abominable alledgance of Blasphemy to say that they declared in their judgment that they had their Ministry from the Magistrate as well as from Christ and that in an Equality and Co-ordination Or else saith he that they had it not from Christ immediately but from men from the Magistrate in subordination to Christ But were there no other men beside the Magistrate if he would have dealt candidly he might have supposed that Presbyterians meaned rather the Presbytery than the Magistrate and therefore saith he when they kept out the word only they did plainly declare that they held their Ministry partly of the Magistrate quod erat demonstrandum He is not sure if this word was desired to be put in he knows not whether it was kept out upon design he knows not upon what design it was kept out suppose it had been designedly kept out and how then can he conclude from this That these Ministers declared and that they plainly declared that they held their Ministry of the Magistrate he may conclude any thing he pleases at this rate of reasoning yet I perceive he hath forgotten himself as very ordinarily men who pass the bounds of truth do except they have very good memories for a little before he alledged all was given up to the Magistrate but here he hath reduced him to a part what is cited from pag. 71. relates to the instructions which will come in afterwards That the want of this only was a personal fault or was an encroachment upon Christ or did affect the Indulgence as he speaks he must prove he would make it a fault affecting the Indulgence because it was at that occasion when the King and Council were thankfully acknowledged for the granting of the Indulgence and because it was spoken with understanding but this hath no shew of Reason if it be considered what it was they thankfully acknowledged the freeing of them from the restraint which was upon the publick exercise of their Ministry any who are not blinded with prejudice may see that this was the design of these Presbyterian Ministers to shew that though they acknowledged the Magistrates taking off that restraint yet they did not look on themselves as the Magistrates Ministers but as the Ministers of Jesus Christ who had received their Ministry from him But the thing that he says must be granted whether there be reason or no and so he proceeds in his Amplifications and out of the want of this only he forms a Charrang and Discourse and puts it in these Ministers mouths and so if ye will believe him their Discourse was to this purpose in effect We declare that we hold not our Ministry of Christ alone but of Christ and the Magistrate and therefore do accept of this Indulgence without scruple But which is more strange he will not only have them to say as he says but also believe as he alledges upom them he will not only impose Charrangs upon them but he will impose a Creed upon them For saith he this Discourse of theirs saith That if they had not believed that they held their Ministry not of Christ alone but of others also they could not have accepted of the Indulgence I am sure no judicious person who reads these things will think that they deserve any refutation and I am very apprehensive such will alledge that I had little to do who transcribed them When I was writing this and reflecting upon the wild conceits that the Author hath fallen into upon this supposition that only was purposely kept out and that his amplifications grow still the more remote from truth it put me in mind of a censure which an English man passed upon a Scottish Gentleman with whom he was acquainted this Gentleman told him strange things which the English man could not believe they were so leasing-like This English man having occasion to speak of this Gentleman said of him He is said he a very pretty Gentleman but he amplifies mightily This Author hath amplified mightily upon the word only and if he had been professedly making Romances it had been more tolerable but in a matter of so great importance to give his fancy leave to rove so as to condemn a Scripture-expression made use of by the Indulged Ministers and to draw Treason against Christ and a betraying of the Cause out of a Scripture sentence uttered by the Apostle Paul speaking by the Inspiration of the Spirit and not only to condemn them for using the words that the Holy Ghost useth but to impose words of his own and a Creed of his own devising upon them and then condemn them because of that Faith and Profession is very intollerable insolency His Argument if reduced to a form must be to this purpose Whosoever designedly and deliberately declares that they have received their Ministry from the Lord Jesus and says not that they have not received their Ministry from Jesus Christ only they deny Christ to be alone head of his Church and are guilty of High Treason against the King of kings and betrayers of the Cause and they set the Magistrate in Christs Throne and hold their Ministry of the Magistrate c. but so is it the Indulged have designedly and deliberately declared c. and therefore c. Ans He is not sure of the truth of the matter for he brings in the Story pag. 24. with that doubtful Parenthesis if I be not misinformed many say that it was the Authors mshap that he was many times misinformed and it s like this may be a piece of his bad intelligence it 's doubtful if it was refused by any of the Indulged Ministers to say they received their Ministry from Christ only The Author doubts of the truth of
the Parish and withal where was the Act of the Presbytery giving them Ministerially a potestative mission The Council both called choosed and sent and so were both the flocks and Presbytery Ans He still playeth the Dictator and what he should prove he alledgeth that it is sufficienly known It 's well known that there could be no access to the peaceable exercise of the Ministry without the Magistrate 2. Ministers could not prescribe to the Council when they should make their Acts of Indulgence had it been fit for them to have desired the Council to make no Acts in reference to any Ministers until the Election of the Parish and the Act of the Presbytery had gone before the Presbyteries were dissolved and to quarrel that there was no Presbyteries is but to quarrel against the holy Providence of God who had deprived us of these Courts and to have declared that they would not have the Council make any such Act till Presbyteries were again setled would have been to have refused any thing from the Council except they would give all and this as matters then stood had been a refusal of any thing from the Magistrate this had been very sutable to the design of the Author and the Author of the Epistle to the Reader and Cup of cold Water who are for receiving nothing from the Magistrate But when it 's exeamined by reason it will be found to be nothing but unreasonable humor That the Councils Act which made way for the peaceable exercise of their Ministry in such places went before the peoples invitation flowed from the Councils pleasure which was not in the power of the Indulged Ministers But after the Council had passed their Act it was in the power of the Parishes to have invited there Ministers or not to have invited them as they saw fit Mr. Thomas Wylie hath in that Paper which he emitted for Vindication of the Indulged Ministers cleared the freedom of the peoples invitation it was in their power to have invited or to have forborn to invite and though they had forborn to invite they would have been but in the condition they were formerly in And it was in the power of these Ministers in these bounds to have consented or not consented to the invitation of the Parishes and it was in the power of the Indulged Ministers when they saw the Invitation of the people to have gone or not to have gone to these Parishes as they saw reason for though the Councils Act made way for their going yet it did not settle them in these Parishes nor make any relation betwixt them and there Parishes Now when it is considered that all Ministers are Ministers of the Church Universal and in a special manner of the National Church in which they were ordained Ministers and many exercise their Ministerial Offices in other Congregations than those where they were ordained as Presbyterians maintain against Independents if there be no just Impediment nor wrong done to any by the exercise of their Ministry and that these Congregations who invited them were destitute and earnestly desired their help and that the Ministers of these bounds consented or acquiesced to the peoples inviting them and their coming upon the peoples invitation When these things are considered I suppose every judicious unperjudiced person will acknowledge that these Ministers had a sufficient call to help these destitute people who earnestly desired their help until they might have regress to their own Congregations where they were ordained Ministers He saw that if the call of the Indulged Misters were questioned then the call of these who preach in the Fields would be questioned also therefore having moved that question What shall then be said of them who preach in the Fields pag. 89. Sect. 3. he answers Every one may see how impertinent this question is for this preaching in the Fields or Houses is no fixed stated oversight over a distinct company as is that of a Minister over a particular flock but a meer occasional act depending upon a providential Call from God and the cordial intreaty of this persecuted people which is all that is requisite thereunto Ans This is a piece of art in some Disputers to slight that as clearly impertinent which they cannot answer there is no doubt of a difference betwixt fixed and occasional Preaching for a fixed stated preaching hath many advantages which an ambulatory occasional preaching wants but the question is whether they who preach in the Fields be called of God to preach and to take as much inspection as they can for that occasion of the peoples case to whom they preach and if their call be good as I hope he will not deny the call of the Indulged Ministers must be good also For the Indulged had a more deliberate Invitation and intreaty than these Preachers ordinarily can have and a more general invitation from these concerned than these Preachers have or can wait for And the Ministers of the bounds knew of the invitation given to the Indulged Ministers a considerable time before they came so that if they had been disposed to have excepted against it they had opportunity to have acquainted the people or the Indulged Minister with their exceptions but these occasional Preachers are often come and gone before Ministers concerned in these bounds hear any thing of it and therefore if the one be good the other cannot be evil The fixedness of the Indulged Ministers makes not their call bad I suppose those people did intreat one of these who preaches in the Fields to stay with them and take inspetcion of them as long as he could with safety would his continuing to labour among them make his Call which was at first good become bad afterwards if it was good the first time he preached why should it be ill the next if he may preach for a month why not for a year c. The term of a providential Call is a kittle word and some have said That only Providential Ministers are the Ministers that should be heard We had need to beware of new words in a time when folk are so much addicted to Novelties ordinarily new words are big with Novelties new Conceits and new things how he would define a Providential Call I know not but if that be the thing he means That the Lord in his Providence makes way for and gives an opportunity of occasional Preaching then it may be said that the Lord in his Providence made way by what the Magistrate did for the peaceable exercise of the Indulged Ministers Ministry in the Congregations where they are setled I shall say no more of this but for any thing I can see if this Author be believed neither Presbyterians that preach fixedly nor these who preach occasionally can say that their Ministerial oversight or inspection is by the Holy Ghost for he affirms this of the Indulged and does not think it requisite in those who preach occasionally and of how
exercise of the Ministry as if he had thereby acknowledged That they had the exercise of their Ministry from the Magistrate but if Mr. H. had used such words as this Author doth when he speaks of the Non-Indulged who as he says have not so much as freedom to exercise any part of their Ministry O what out-crying should we have heard when he makes such a noise about Mr. H's words though he not only adds liberty and freedom but also publick to the exercise of the Ministry and subjoyns after so long a restraint and under the protection of lawful Authority If Mr. H. had said in the words of this Author My Lords whereas since we were turned out we had not so much as freedom to exercise any part of our Ministry but now we have freedom to exercise our Ministry c. What Commentaries and Harangues would have been made upon and out of these words Now if the Non-indulged want the freedom to exercise any part of their Ministry is it not by the penal Statutes that they are deprived of this freedom were it not an advantage to have this freedom which they want and this they cannot have without the Magistrate and why may they not accept of this freedom from the Magistrate and if they may what ails the Author at the Indulged Ministers for the accepting of that freedom which they wanted 2. He deals not equally with the Indulged and Non-indulged The Non-indulged are saith he allowed of God to do all they can seeing they cannot do as they would but he would have the Indulged Ministers do more than they can He would have the Indulged Ministers keeping Presbyteries and Synods which they can no more do without hazard than the Non-indulged yea their hazard would be much greater than the hazard of the Non-indulged for the Magistrate would know where to find them if they had a mind to take them or if they cited them they behoved either to appear or to lose the peaceable exercise of their Ministry which the Non-indulged have not and so cannot lose His tacite insinuation that the Indulged are not countenanced in the exercise of Discipline and Preaching as the Ambassadours of Christ and his asserting that they are under the Leesheet of the Supremacy as if they acknowledged any Erastian or absolute Supremacy in the Magistrate in Ecclesiastical matters and his reflection on the constitution and guiding of some of their Sessions are a new addition to his former unproven and ill-grounded alledgances As for his 12. the Indulged Ministers cum periculo as well as the Non-indulged ordain Ministers they have accepted of no terms to incapacitate them for Ordination But this would not satisfie this Author except they did relinquish the Indulgence and betake themselves to the fields but we saw before why nothing but the fields will please this Author Pag. 101. We have his 7th head of Arguments He alledgeth That the Indulged Ministers have stepped off in such a way as cannot but be accounted a falling off from the cause and ground of our sufferings We have answered already these Arguments whereby he would prove this alledgance in his first seven Sections His 8. Section makes much against him and for the Indulged Ministers as we saw before As for his 9th it 's no new thing to see Ministers compearing before the Council the first Book of Discipline was directed by Ministers to the Council which was much more than compearance He supposes the Indulged to have accepted the instructions but it 's a false supposition as hath been before cleared If he will make a parallel case either in the year 1649. or any year he pleaseth the Indulged Ministers are content to leave to all who are fit to judge of matters of this nature to judge concerning their practice As for the History which is in his 10. he speaks as if the Indulged Ministers generally had said they had not seen these instructions which is very false His 11th He indefinitely charges the Indulged Ministers with laying aside the Lecture which is another falshood That any of them who do not Lecture have forsaken it upon the command of the Council is another of his groundless alledgances as some few of the indulged Ministers so several of the not-indulged do not lecture But I hope he will not say That it 's the command of the Council that they forbear it They have other Reasons some found themselves not able to lecture and preach twice on the Lords day His 12th is resumed in his 8 head of Arguments pag. 104. where he undertakes to prove That the hands of Prelates are strengthened by the Indulgence The Prelates I suppose are not of that mind themselves First saith he not to mention the open door that is left to them to accept of the Prelates Collation nor the encouragement they have to seek and obtain He did well not to mention this for it is not worth the mentioning It 's false That the indulged Ministers put themselves in prison under the Bishops lock and key As for his second the Churches where the indulged Ministers are setled are not encumbred with those who own Prelacy as they were before the Indulgence which is no small disadvantage to Prelacy It 's a false alledgance That the indulged Ministers were content that their Ministry should be confined within limited places let the necessity of the Church be what it would or could be how knows he that the indulged Ministers would not deny to help people that are destitute in other places if they saw that the necessity of the Church did require it It would be a prejudice and no advantage to the Church needlesly to leave the charges where they are setled and to leave the Congregations where they are to be planted with Conformists His third Section in which he alledgeth the friendly and brotherly love and correspondence betwixt some of the indulged and Neighbour-hirelings and the want of Zeal against Prelates wherever the Indulgence is is grounded upon misinformation That Prelates will possibly say That one Field-Conventicle hath done them and their cause more prejudice than many preachings of all the indulged men is another of his groundâ—ess guessiings and needs no other refutation but â—his That possibly they will not say it Possibile esse possibile non esse It 's another of his groundless guesâ—ings That they use more keenness against Field-Preachers than against Prelates The indulged Ministers as they have occasion preach against Erastianism and an absolute Supremacy and shew from the Scripture That the keys of the Kingâ—om of Heaven are not committed to the Magistrate and that all the powers on earth have â—o power to dispose or order Ecclesiastical matters â—t their pleasure but that all things in the house â—f God should be done according to the will of God â—evealed in the Scripture His 4th is a begging of the question he should â—ave proven That the indulged Ministers have accepted of any thing
to preach to destitute Congregations the Lords work might have been â—arried on in all probability with as much sucâ—ess as by their preaching in the mountains To his fourth If all had refused to make any â—se of the Indulgence upon the grounds of this â—uthor and the Author of the Epistle prefixed 〈◊〉 this Book and of the Cup of cold Water In all â—ppearance this would have been the result of it â—hat the Magistrate being more provoked â—ould have raised more forces to have suppresâ—d Conventicles and this would have exposed â—ore to suffering and have heightned the troubles 〈◊〉 Nonconformists so that the execution of the penal Statutes would have been objectively extended and intensively encreased To his 5th in which he says That all the people of these Parishes where indulged Ministers are have been withheld or withdrawn from waiting upon the Lord at these blessed and wonderfully countenanced occasions whereby the followers of the Lord are broken divided and weakened and so become a more ready prey to the Adversary I answer It were to be wished That the blessing of these occasions had been really as great as it was called many who had no prejudice against but loved these occasions have found by sad experience that all was not Gold that glistered and so many people who for a time ran to these occasions have by their practises which are not sutable to the Gospel confirmed the sad truths which outed Ministers who heard of or observed their way preached to them and they have too much verified the fearful apprehensions that they had concerning them and the tendency of their way There were some observed That they did not find the people who withdrew from indulged Ministers any whit better either in their knowledge or in their Conversation by their withdrawing but several of them to decline in both and to become more vain and censorious and addicted to evil-speaking The people who did not withdraw from the Indulged Ministers are very unjustly charged with dividing If they who attended the Ordinances of the Lord dispenced by indulged Ministers were following the Lord in doing so then by their attendance they did not break off from the followers of the Lord. To his 6th I have answered in speaking to his 4th There is greater probability of sad consequences that would have followed upon an absolute refusal of making any use of the Indulgence than there is of these good consequences which he imagines would have followed upon the refusal of it His 7th is a meer begging of the question and so is his 8th For the indulged Minsters have not exposed other Ministers who are not indulged to any cruelties or barbarities I perceive by his way of reasoning if the Council had a little after the Act of Glasgow retracted that Act and have given all these Ministers liberty to return to their several Parishes if they had excepted but one or two this Author could not have allowed of their return for he would have interpreted this to be an exposing of those who were excepted to the fury of Adversaries and would have condemned them as guilty of all the cruelties which the excepted persons might meet with By the same reason prisoners imprisoned for the truth might not accept of freedom from prison except they were all released at once by this means one wilful man who would refuse to accept of liberty from prison upon very honest and just terms might keep a hundred or thousand who had freedom to accept of release upon such honest and just terms I say this one might keep them all in prâ—son by this Argument That their leaving of him would expose him to more severity His 12th and last head of Arguments against the accepting of the Indulgence as taken from the real ground of offence which he alledges was in the accepting of the Indulgence and the scandal that was thereby given to one and other And this he saith is valid enough alone to militate against it and sufficient to condemn it unto all who understand the nature of scandal and the dreadfulness of the sin of giving scandal by any thing we do whether as to matter or manner and who remember what Christ and his Apostles have said of this Ans The all who understand the nature of scandal are not so many as it seems the Author hath imagined the greatest Divines who have searched most into the nature of Scandal have found it very intricate and obscure Mr. Rutherford in his dispute touching Scandal and Christian liberty subjoyned to his Divine right of Church-government pag. 81. saith That the Doctrine of Scandal is more intricate and obscure than every Divine conceives If folk would forbear to condemn the practises of others as scandalous until they understood the nature of Scandal there would be much less Scandal in the World than there is there are many who give Scandal by calling these things scandalous which are not scandalous It 's a grievous sin though many be not aware of it to add to the word of God in making more sins and scandalous sins than they can prove to be sins or scandalous sins from the perfect rule of the word of God Mr. Rutherford shews in the forecited dispute That many alledged That there was Scandal given by telling of Bells and Ministers preaching in a Gown and naming the days of the week from the Planets as Sunday from the Sun and Monday from the Moon c. and in worshipping in Churches which had been built in the times of Popery to the honour of some Saint But he shews that these were not Scandals given but taken for saith he pag. 53. we read not of Scandals culpable in Gods word but there be some apparent moral reasons in them it 's not enough to alledg that this or that is Scandalous but we must if we would prove any thing scandalous shew that there is a moral reason and an apparent moral reason in such things which renders them scandalous The Lords people would be deprived of the liberty wherewith Christ hath made them free and brought under an intolerable yoke 〈◊〉 bondage if they were obliged to abstain from every thing which either the malicious or the weak would alledg without reason to be scandalous There is no way saith the Author to evite the force of this Argument but by affirming and proving the Action at which the offence is taken or may be taken is not only lawful in it self but as circumstantial is expedient and necessary to be done Ans The Aurhor should if he would have said any thing to the purpose have proven or at least endeavoured to have proven that the acceptance of the peaceable exercise of the Ministry under the protection of lawful Authority or which is all one the acceptance of the Relaxation of that Civil restraint which had so long restrained the publick exercise of the Ministry That this acceptance did give offence or was of it self an occasion of stumbling or ruine
heat and cold is a part of the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free Now any who will not shut their eyes may see that the seeking and taking the Protection of lawful Authority is more necessary than the making use of this or that individual House We cannot have the benefit of publick houses for worship without the Magistrate But secondly The Protection of the Magistrate defends from injuries that are much more injurious and hurtful than the injuries of Wind and Rain and scorching by the Sun a house can but defend from showers of Rain Hail scorching-Heat c. but the Protection of lawful Authority defends from showers of Bullets and the scorching-Heat of Persecution Again men might be sheltred by another house though St. Cuthberts or St. Giles's Kirk were cast down but the peaceable exercise of the preaching and hearing of the word in publick cannot be had without the Protection of Civil Authority Now if the Scandal taken at taking the shelter of St. Cuthberts Kirk in hearing the word should not make folk disuse that Kirk nor deprive themselveS of the use of it much less should the taking offence at the taking of the Protection of lawful Authority for the publick peaceable exercise of the Ministry make Ministers and people deprive themselves of the Protection of Magistrates whom the Lord calls the Shields of the earth seeing the Magistrates permitting and allowing Ministers to preach and protecting them in preaching is the very exercise of that Authority which they have from God for good And further from Mr. Rutherfords words we may see That the eating or not eating in the places cited by the Author does no way quadrate with the case of acceptance or no acceptance for as Mr. Rutherford shews That at that time the eating or not eating was both Physically and Morally indifferent The Author hath not proven the acceptance or no acceptance to be indifferent and any who will take up this Club and Quarrel will find it a hard task to prove the acceptance or no acceptance Physically and Morally indifferent and so the case Rom. 14. 1 Cor. 8. do no way quadrate with this The eating of flesh forbidden in the Ceremonial Law was no ways necessary at that time when the Apostle Paul wrote his Epistles to the Romans and his first Epistle to the Corinthians it was neither Physically nor Morally necessary at that time to eat those fleshes before a weak Jew for they who knew their Christian liberty might eat those fleshes in private and when such weak Brethren were not present But the acceptance of the relaxation of the Civil restraint formerly laid on by the Magistrate the acceptance of the Protection of lawful Authority was several ways necessary as we saw before The peaceable fixed setled preaching and hearing of the Gospel is a very desirable end and the acceptance of the Protection of Civil Authority is necessary in order to this end for as the Reverend Author of the late Apology printed Anno 1677. acknowledgeth the peaceable exercise of the Ministry is from the Magistrate pag. 111. where he grants That it is within the compass of the Magistrates power to give liberty to Ministers and people for serving and worshipping of God in his Son Jesus Christ This saith he we do not deny but chearfully grant That although the exercise of Church-power that is properly such be independent on the Magistrate yet the peaceable exercise of it is truly from him Pag. 113. Sect. 1. He says That the accepters of the Indulgence did hereby give offence to such of their Brethren as had the offer but were noâ— cleared nor convinced of the lawfulness of the embracing of such a favour at such a time Now how proves he this That they gave offence For saith he by their example these were encouraged and moved to do that which they judged sinful and unlawful for them to do I wonder how a reasonable man who had read any thing concerning the nature of Scandal could give such a reason for according to this reason whosoever does that which another judges unlawful for him to do he by his doing gives offence this is a most false and absurd Proposition Our Saviour did several things which the Jews judged sinful and unlawful for them to do but it were blasphemous to infer that therefore our Saviour in doing these things gave offence to the Jews This Doctrine of the Author teaches people that will believe him to judge that whatsoever they judge unlawful for them to do that that is in it self sinful and unlawful for whatsoever gives offence is sinful for every thing that gives offence is some way or other inordinate and this makes the judgment it may be but of one man who judges something sinful and unlawful for him to do to bind up others that they cannot do that which he thinks sinful for if they should do it according to this Author they should give offence and so sin this would make the Judgment of one erring man who thinks that sinful which is not so to be a Law to others which were an intolerable yoke of bondage The Reverend Brethren who had not clearness to make use of the Indulgence were far from this erroneous conceit to think That because they had not clearness to accept of the Indulgence that therefore they who accepted of it did sin and give offence The Scriptures which he cites as we did shew before out of Mr. Rutherfords Dispute of Scandal are impertinently cited because the eating or not eating of these meats at that time was every way indifferent Physically and Morally indifferent and no way necessary but the acceptance was in several respects necessary as was shewed before especially because they could not have the peaceable exercise of their Ministry without the Magistrate but the eating of these meats the Apostle speaks of might be forborn without any prejudice to him who was perswaded of his Christian liberty he might forbear it without any prejudice or hurt to his body for he might get other meat to eat when these weak Brethren who took offence at eating were present If there had been no other meat and he would have been in hazard of his life if he did not eat and if he could not have gotten shifted out of the presence of these weak Brethren then the case would have been altered and not eating in that case had been a breach of the sixth Commandment Thou shalt not kill In such a necessity it was lawful for David to eat the Shew-bread and so his eating would have been necessary and the offence would have been taken by the weak Brethren but not given by the eater but if he found these meats useful for his body and could get the presence of the weak shifted he might eat them in private as Mr. Rutherford sheweth in the foresaid Dispute Again he might forbear eating without any prejudice to his soul because as Mr. Rutherford sheweth at that time the
Speeches are Persecutions Matth. 5.11 Jer. 18.18 they incite one another to devise devices against Jeremiah and to smite him with the Tongue I remember not of any thing in the Letters which I have missed except his Predictions for the Historian is a sort of a Prophet he hath a faculty of foretelling things to come I know not how he hath fallen upon it or whether it be be ill come or not he very confidently affirmed in the year 1677. That if Mr. John Welsh had hearkened to the desire of drawing near to the shelter of an house for meeting with the people but for one Sabbath though that might have contributed for taking off all Sentences against himself and others and to an Universal Liberty for all outed Ministers to preach without Molestation that then he would have forefaulted all the protection and countenance he had singularly enjoyed before that time This was far said No sober judicious Person will think that it could be unlawful in such Circumstances at least to preach at a house but though there had been somewhat wrong in it how comes he to know that for that failing Mr. Welsh would have lost the Protection and Countenance which he had formerly enjoyed it was presumptuous boldness for him to take upon him to determine so peremptorily concerning the forefaulting of the Protection and Countenance of God who hath mercy on whom he will have mercy and does for his names sake even when his peoples sins testifie against them and remembers his Covenant and Mercy for his People Another of his Predictions is That all indifferent Spectators will judge as he says and that Posterity will see and say as he says whether the indulged men will or not But I think they are over-credulous who will believe that he had the foreknowledge what way the Judgments of men present and of the Generations to come would incline and determine There is yet a third Prediction of another Author which is That the Indulgence should become as odious and detestable to all the godly in the Land as ever Prelacy was To this Prophecy the Author of the History and Letters makes an Addition while he says in one of his Letters That what that person was perswaded of will quickly appear the first had only said it would be but he says it will quickly appear augur augurem but these Prophets were so fearfully mistaken in seeing things that were that there is very good reason to doubt of their foresight of things to come yet there is more Art in this inartificial Argument founded upon the Authority of a man who hath but confidence to say boldly what he says concerning things to come than in many artificial Arguments and these Predictions will go further with weak credulous people than very solid reasons for people of that sort especially if they be curious think more of a man who will take upon him to tell but some things that will be though the event be of small consequence than they will think of a solid judicious man who can tell them from the word of God what they should do that they may glorifie and enjoy God and therefore there is such flocking of people to Fortune-tellers Speamen Dummeos Wizzards and Southsayers Now if curious people have such a conceit of those who foretel though they be suspected to have their Knowledge from the Devil they will think much more of men who are in reputation for Religion if they take on them to foretel things to come they will readily be very desirous that such Predictions may not fail I know one who pressed some of his acquaintaince to get weapons for fighting in such a year upon this ground That if there were not Blood that year then such a person who had foretold that there would be Blood would prove a false Prophet These Predictions are very taking when they suit with peoples Inclinations and when the fulfilling of these Predictions contribute to their honour and when they who are not active in fulfilling them are casten as ungodly and despicable and therefore these Predictions of Ministers which did foretel That the Indulgence would become despicable could not but be very taking with people who were inclined to despise it and this could not but be very effectual to press them to despise it that if they did it not then they would be known to be none of the godly and this would press others to despise it that they might not be ranked among the ungodly I have observed that several have an Art of bringing about several things by foretelling them some make people offend at these things which they would never have offended at by foretelling that the people will be offended So Satan hath brought about many mischiefs by foretelling them and the Actors of them this was a very effectual trick to render the Indulgence despicable to foretel that it would become odious and detestable to all the godly for they who believe these Predictions would reason them If we do not detest and hate the Indulgence we cannot list our selves among the godly and then if the Indulged Ministers did not relinquish the Indulgence and hate it that they could not be reckoned among the godly and if they did not make haste to hate it and detest it very shortly that then they could not be accounted godly because this Prediction was to be quickly accomplished It was no great matter to foretell that the Indulgence and indulged Ministers would become odious when there was so many Letters and Copies of printed Books full of odious reproaches cast at the Indulgence and Indulged Ministers when such causes were working and such Fire-balls cast and the people were so prepared to take fire it was an easie thing without any Spirit of Prophesie to foretel a Fire when such trains were laid and kindled Again when a poor Church is going to ruin the ordinary Forerunner of that ruin is the contempt of the Ministers 2 Chron. last They mocked the Messengers of God and despised his words and misused his Prophets until the wrath of the Lord rose against his people till there was no remedy O Jerusalem Jerusalem thou who killest the Prophets read Matth. 23. ver 34. to the end so that if these two Ministers had spoken a little more indefinitely they might have passed for pretty good Guessors if they had said only that the Indulgence would be detestable to the godly but taking on them to foretel that it would be detestable to all the godly and that quickly hath quite broken their credit as Prophets for there are many of the godly who have always been far from detesting the Indulgence and they are much further from detesting it now than before And the Authors of these Predictions have by these Predictions and some other Practices of that nature much wronged their own Reputation This is ordinary when a Church is going to ruin the Despisers of the Lords Servants go before this contempt uses
it would have been clear but there is no matters before in his Speech but the Councils Instructions and a description of them now if these matters have not a reference to these Instructions they have a reference to nothing that the hearer or reader of them can understand though the matters he meant might be distinct enough in his own mind they could not be distinctly taken up by his hearers or readers except he had some way signified his mind He is now speaking of distinct Testimonies and Testimonies are not given by meer thinking so that the Instructions of the Council must be meant by these matters or else they will have no sense at all that we can understand from his words and words that have no sense are not distinct words If by these matters he means the Councils Instructions then the Council might have urged them to obey these Instructions Thus seeing ye are the Servants of Christ in these Instructions then why will ye not serve Christ in observing these Instructions or doing these matters in which ye are the Servants of Christ Why refuse ye to receive these Instructions or these matters in which ye are the Servants of Christ And does he not here fall in the fault which he very unreasonably charges Mr. H. with He alledges that Mr. H. in giving to the Magistrate a Power objectively Ecclesiastical did give him a Power to make Rules intrinsecally Ecclesiastical for Regulating Ministers in the exercise of their Ministry and to give these very Rules which he had said he could not receive from the Magistrate there was neither Reason nor shadow of Reason for charging Mr. H. with this contradiction but the Author of the History hath laid himself very open to this charge For if these Instructions be matters wherein Ministers are the Servants of Christ then he hath yielded to the Magistrate a Power to command Ministers to observe them for Magistrates may command Ministers to serve Christ in doing these things in which they are the Servants of Christ If it be said that he meant the matters of their Ministry and not the Councils Instructions then his meaning was good but his words were not distinct at all and far less more distinct than Mr. H's It 's true his words are some fewer that he leaves out some of Mr. H's words but they are so much the worse and confused and by his brevity he falls in obscurity brevis esse laboro obscurus fio These words of his which he prescribes for a form as more distinct and short than Mr. H's words are either not good Grammar having a Relative without any Antecedent in the preceding words to which they can relate and so they are without sense I shall not say non-sense or they have a bad sense in acknowledging these Instructions to be matters in which Ministers are Christs Servants and such a fault in Morality was large worse than a Grammatical failing in speaking non-sense And they involve a contradiction or they give a Reason why they could not receive these Instructions which will infer the conclusion that 's contradictory to their Assertion But make the best of them that may be they are not more distinct than Mr. H's nay for any thing that I can see they are words very confused and if they relate to all the Instructions as I shewed they are manifestly false By the Historians own confession one of them had no Ecclesiastical Being at all being wholly Political and therefore they could not truly say of all of them that they could not receive them as being Rules intrinsecally c. It is strange that the Historian who is here finding fault with the Indulged Ministers words as a dis-ingenuous indistinct confused cothurnus could not speak more truly and distinctly himself he who would teach others to speak should have learned his Grammar better and he who blames honest men for dis-ingenuity should not have endeavoured to put a lie in their mouth and that even in the form of speech which he prescribes as more distinct he should be so very confused is a very strange thing The more I examine the Historians quibblings against these Brethrens words before the Council I think the more of these Brethrens words and am confirmed that the Lord was with their mouth and gave them what to speak and I am the more confirmed in this by observing that this Historian could not mend what they said without falling into a manifest falshood and into a form of speech which either is non-sense or hath an ill sense and destroys it self by giving a Reason in the end of the speech for refusing the Instructions which doth prove that they should not be refused and so the end destroys the beginning of it And thus the integrity and faithfulness of these Ministers is cleared and whether or not all the Cavils and Quibblings of the Historian against their acceptance of the peaceable exercise of their Ministry and against their Speeches before the Council be not sufficiently if not superabundantly refuted I leave it to the impartial judgment of the judicious Reader The Brother who hath Answered this History hath shewed the falshood of the two Observations which the Historian makes pag. 56. by shewing That upon the call of the Congregation of Irwin that Reverend Brother after his Confinement was changed by the Council upon the supplication of the said Congregation did remove to Irwin And that the Act of Council which came to that Ministers hand made no mention of the Instructions So that his seeing that the Act of Council is the All and onely ground of transportation and that the Instructions always go with the Indulgence are two other of his false Visions And thus I have considered all the Historians Reasons against the acceptance of the Indulgence and discovered their unreasonableness and have considered his Answers to these Objections which he was pleased to propose to himself and have found his Answers to be indeed no Answers I have also examined all his quibblings against the Speeches of these of the Indulged Ministers who appeared before the Council and have discovered how vain they are and I refer it to the judgment of the judicious Reader if I have passed any thing in his Arguings that had any appearance or shadow of Reason I am so far from apprehending that the judicious Reader will censure me for omitting any thing which deserved an Answer that upon the contrary I fear I shall be censured by the judicious for refuting many things which are so manifestly false that they did not deserve to be noticed I shall onely desire such to consider that many things which are manifestly false may appear true to those who are weak and who have not their senses exercised to discern both good and evil And so that which is needless to the strong may be necessary for those who are weak It remains that I examine his Vindication of such as scruple to hear and own the
kindly to it and it takes well with them and they with it And Error is like a fretting gangreen the longer it continues it rots and spreads the more And it 's observed that when People drinks in erroneous Doctrines upon the bare word of these who teach Division and their heart and affection takes with Error though they have neither shadow of Scripture or Reason for it that they are hardly recovered from these delusions for People who are misled by some wrested Scripture or captious Reasoning they may be more easily recovered by shewing the true meaning of the wrested and mis-applyed Scripture and the captiousness of the false Reasoning But when People will err and love to wander and will stumble though they wot not at what and are so affectionately addicted to their erroneous Opinions that they will hear nothing that makes against them there is little probability of Cure for as they received them without Reason because they would receive them so they retain them against Reason and cannot endure to have these beloved tenets brought under examination and tryal and therefore they readily flee out in Passion upon any who would inform them as mens Lusts are their Idols so are their Errors when they are once settled in their hearts Augustine said that his error was his God Error meus erat Deus meus Now if this Historian who was a man of letters be so confounded and confused in stating this Question and is involved in gross contradictions what wonder if the poor people who are not fit for Debates be whirled round by such whirl-winds and contrary winds into a confused giddiness that they wot not what they say or affirm and know not what to do and be like Children that have so long run about that they fall down as unable to stand or move any more So they are so confounded with these perplexed Questions about hearing which cannot be propounded and far less resolved without manifest Absurdities and Contradictions that many of them are fallen over in a careless laziness and indifferency about all hearing of the Word and spends the Lords day in sleeping loytering and idle wandring The Historian doth but waste time and paper when he says that in our best times People were not so tyed to the hearing of their Ministers as that they might never or in no case hear others for that is not the Question But this is the true state of the Question Whether People who have these Ministers to hear who were formerly Ordained by the laying on of the hands of the Presbytery to be their Pastors and those who have these Ministers to hear whom they invited to come and help them when they were destitute and had none to Preach to them If these People who have consented to receive the Lords Ordinances from these Ministers and have waited on their Ministry and joyned with them in the Lords Worship if they ought to break off that Church-fellowship and though they acknowledge these Ministers to be Ministers of the Gospel and though these Ministers Preach the Gospel and dispense the Lords Ordinances according to the Lords Institution yet if they ought to withdraw constantly from hearing them and that because it 's unlawful to hear them and there is sin wrapt up in hearing them and that they are called of God to withdraw that in doing so they may bear witness against the sinful Usurpations manifest in the Indulgence and the many evils in accepting it or more shortly If it be sin for these People to hear these Ministers and if it be their Duty to desert them and separate themselves from these Congregations where they exercise their Ministry This Historian seemeth to be for the Affirmative and so confident that these People do right in withdrawing that he says One might think it strange that there should be any necessity to vindicate them considering what he hath said above I am one of these who have considered what he hath said above and I thought it very strange how he could vent such gross and manifestly false Calumnies against faithful Ministers and how he could wrest and pervert their true right honest words contrary to common sense and equity that he might wring out of them that which never entred in the thoughts or heart of these Ministers And again I think it strange that by these false and groundless Calumnies which he hath cast upon these honest Ministers he should labour to rent the Church of God by Schism by breaking these who will listen to him off from communicating with the true Church in the true Worship of God and by pressing them to disown and desert these Ministers whom they formerly owned and countenanced and whom they are still obliged to own and have no just cause to desert except his false Calumnies be accounted just causes Having observed the confusion and contradictions in which the Historian hath involved himself in stating the Question it remains to consider what he says for the vindication of these who scruple to hear and own the Indulged Ministers But seeing he says nothing but what he hath said before and is formerly refuted I hope the Reader will not expect that I should play the goke in repeating again his Cuckows and refuting them although I followed him before in his extravagant wandrings when he without and contrary to all sense and reason imagined that this or that or the other thing was the meaning of the Indulged Ministers words yet I cannot have any pretext for making meer repetitions in his wandrings there was variety of vain imaginations which made the refutation of them less tedious but to repeat the same things to no purpose but to waste time and paper would be intolerably tedious and nauseating I shall onely by answering his first Question shew the way of answering the rest 1. Seeing by what is said under our first head of Arguments c. Answ Seeing by what is said in answer to your first head of Arguments it is manifest that the Indulged in and by their accepting of the Indulgence have not wronged our Lord Jesus Christ who is the onely Head of the Church and King in Zion in any of these nine several particulars which are nine several Calumnies the ordinary Arguments which he makes use of against the Indulged Ministers for he could find no true Arguments to his purpose against them How can they but be blamed who out of a sinful credulity make up or take up such vile Reproaches against faithful Ministers and then out of these Calumnies create to themselves scruples which scare them from hearing these whom the Lord hath sent to Preach the Gospel to them And so through the rest of his Questions where he refers to his heads of Arguments I refer to the Answers which cuts off both heads and tails of these captions As for the Arguments taken out of the late Apology which contrary to the intention of the Apologist he abuses for he perverts the words
Authoritative decision even supposing that side on which the Error lies to be approved For first there is no necessity for such as have Authority for them to press others in their judgment and practice in such things neither can it be thought that such a decision can of it self satisfie all scruples neither yet that men doubtingly may follow Nor lastly that such Controversies can bear the weight of troubling the Church by censuring such as otherways may be faithful seeing sometimes even unfaithful men have been spared with respect to the Churches good as hath been said And Secondly upon the other side such a constitution of the Church doth not involve all that keep Communion therein in the guilt thereof if personally they be free as in the instance of the Jewish Church is clear where no question many corrupt Acts have been established yet did it neither make Communion in Worship or Government to be unlawful where the matter and manner of carriage was Lawful Beside this would infer that no Judicatory could keep Union where there were contrary votes or a Sentence passed without unanimity because that is certainly wrong to them who think otherwise and if so there could be no Judicatory expected either in Church or State for it cannot be expected that they shall be still unanimous or that the greater part shall cede to the lesser and rescind their own Act. And suppose there should be such a Division upon one difference can it be expected that those who unite upon the divided sides respectively shall again have no more difference among themselves and if they have shall there not be a new Division and where shall this end And seeing men must resolve to keep Unity where there are faults of such a nature or to have none at all it is as good to keep it at first as to be necessitated to it afterward The Orthodox urge this Argument against the Donatists who would not keep Union with them because of pretended corruptions in the proceedings of Judicatories and Ordinations yet were constrained to bear with such amongst themselves and particularly to receive and unite with the Maximinianists whose Communion they had once rejected though a branch of their own Faction because they saw no end of Divisions if they did not resolve to dispense with such things amongst themselves And Augustine often asserted that they were never able to Answer this Argument when it was propounded to them to wit why they did not give them that same Latitude in keeping communion with them which they had given to the Maximinianists who were guilty of such things as they imputed to them We conceive then that even in such a case there may be Union for prosecuting the main work of the Gospel notwithstanding of such a Circumstantial difference if men otherwise set themselves to it and the general grounds formerly laid down do confirm this Thus far I have transcribed the words of the Godly Learned Peaceable Mr. Durham I would desire the Reader to read also his 12th Chapter and his whole Book which is a precious Treasure which if the Historian had pondered and practised he and they who follow him might through the Lords Blessing been kept out of these divisive and destructive ways If the Historian would have followed Mr. Durham's Advice first he might have forborn to vent and to press others to vent this which he calls Light thought it had been Light indeed For it is no Fundamental truth that he and they call Light He cannot charge the Indulged Ministers that they maintain Doctrinally any Erastian Error All that he alledges upon them when he explains himself is that they have by their practice Interpretatively homologate the Supremacy Now seeing these Ministers taught no erroneous Doctrine concerning the Magistrates Power about Church-matters but maintain the Principles of all Orthodox Anti-erastian Divines And seeing they are known to be conscientious men and declare upon all occasions that their practice in making use of the Indulgence is not contrary to but consistent with and according to the Principles of these Anti-erastian Divines The most that the Author could make out of this was that they were mistaken in the application of these Principles to that particular Fact of acceptance of the Peaceable exercise of their Ministry from the Magistrate Now what necessity was there in venting this Light This Interpretative homologation of the Supremacy which yet is but confounding darkness to the poor People who know not what he means by these words by which he explains how these Ministers are guilty they cannot Interpret his Interpretative homologation His light is to them darkness He clears these Indulged Ministers of having any Erastian Error in their Head he grants they had no ill intention in their mind and heart when they accepted the Indulgence He grants there was no ill intention in the worker but in the work done by them and that what they did did not formally and explicitly import any approbation of any sinful Supremacy but onely implicitely virtually and interpretatively What necessity was there of telling the People this implicite Error in a matter of Fact seeing when he tells it most distinctly it 's so subtil a kind of fault that the People cannot understand it it 's so wompled up in Latine implicite perplexed words that they cannot get a sight of it And though the Historian did really intend to diminish the sin of the Indulged Ministers when he said they themselves did not intend any ill in their acceptance but it was onely the intention of the work And when he said that the work did not formally and explicitely tend to ill but virtually implicitely and interpretatively Yet the People are not capable of understanding these diminishing terms and so thinking it to be some ill thing these words that are unintelligible by them increases the apprehension of the ilness or evil of it even as when simple People knows that the thing commended is good if ye commend it in words that they do not understand it heightens their conceit of the goodness of it What effect could the Historian think that this dark light could have upon the minds and affections of the poor People but to beget an ill Opinion of and prejudice against and hatred of these honest men who as he grants himself meant no ill Now did this any way tend to the Peoples Edification Did it not upon the contrary tend to their hurt For whereas before they were Edified by the Ministry of these Ministers they are put in an incapacity of getting that good by their Ministry which they were wont formerly to get so that they are no way Edified but prejudged and their Edification hindred But 2. If he would have been Advised by Mr. Durham he might well have forborn to have vented this light because the forbearance of venting it could no way have endangered the Salvation of the Souls of the People nor marred them in any Duty that the Church
grieved that they should have started that Question at all among them and if it were to do again would be better advised and are very desirous to have the divisive Distempers of the People cured and the Preachers of Schism discountenanced And yet this Historian with two or three of the younger sort would contrary to the mind and heart to the tears and prayers of all his Brethren increase the Disease which they were studying to cure and encourage these rash and inconsiderate Youths to cast more fire-brands and add Oyl to the flame I have considered the 47 48 49 Verses of the 7th Chap. of John with Mr. H's Notes and the more I consider it I think it the more impertinently alledged For these Pharisees and Rulers were Enemies of Christ they believed not themselves and they endeavoured to hinder others to believe on Christ and are enraged that the People did believe on him Now the Ministers of whom he is speaking are not Enemies of Christ but his Servants and faithful Servants and zealous for his Glory and are so far from hindering People from believing in Christ or from looking on them as ignorant and cursed upon that account that they study to bring People to believe in Christ and are grieved that this Author and his Associates withdraws them from Christ by withdrawing them from his Ordinances where he comes and blesses his People and is in the midst of them and withdraws them from hearing these whom Christ sends to Preach to them and so hinders them from believing for Faith comes by hearing and it increases by hearing Mr. H. takes notice that these Pharisees were puffed up and I leave it to the consideration of the Reader if the way of these Faithful and Zealous Ministers seems not to be farther from this than the way that this Historian hath taken in this History He shews it's an old Engine to keep men from Christ by the opposition of able and eminent Church-men But the stress of the Argument which he proposes to answer did not lie most upon that that they were Church-men in eminent place of great parts but on that that they were Faithful and Zealous Ministers and that they were not seeking themselves or their own things but the things of Christ and the Edification of the Body of Christ appears in this that they are not like the Historians Youths who cry down all but themselves and draws away the People from all others to hear themselves and tells the People there is a cursed thing in other Meetings and warns them to beware of it But their Faithful Ministers does not seek to engross all the Peoples affection to themselves but they are for their hearing of others they behave as the Lords Ministers were wont to do in the Primitive times and as we find the Apostles doing in their Epistles they commend and recommend their fellow-labourers to the Churches and strengthens their hands Again these Pharisees took it as an evidence of the Ignorance and Misery of the People that they believed on Christ These who speak of the Ignorance of the People who withdraw from hearing Indulged Ministers are far from thinking them Ignorant and Cursed upon that account But they know that many of them are very ignorant of Christ and of the way of Salvation and it 's sad to them that are drawn away from the means of Knowledge Preaching and Catechising from learning the grounds of Religion and their Heads filled with vain janglings And they learn not to know their own sins in order to their Humiliation and Self-denial but learns to know the sins of others more than their own and that readily puffs them up What he adds about the Peoples guiding and breaking the Ice it blows up the People with a conceit that God hath made them Guides and Leaders to go before the Ministers and made the Sheep to lead the Shepherds There was enough of wind in this Bladder before the Historian might have without any hazard spared his breath here and not blown up the People with the ill wind of an anti-scriptural conceit When the Lord guides his People in his way he guides them according to his Word in the use of the means that he himself hath appointed he leads his People like a Flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron and for my part when I observe that these whom the Lord hath not made Guides and Leaders and Shepherds wilfully refusing to be guided and led by these whom God hath made Guides and Shepherds and confidently taking upon them to lead their Leaders I am very suspicious that all is not right and that both the Leaders and they who are led by them are wrong But this is an old trick used by these who stir up People to Schism or Sedition to give the People fair words and make much of them Corah Dathan and Abiram do highly complement the People All the Congregation say they is holy every one of them and the Lord is among them Such fair words will easily beguile unstable Souls I remember a judicious and sober Countrey-man said of one of these Preachers who made it a great part of his work to draw away the People from hearing Indulged Ministers That he thought he clapped the Bairns heads too much The Historian was mistaken if he thought that withdrawing from the Indulged Ministers had it's rise from the People for it was some Preachers who by private conferences and publick Preaching drew them away He alledges that the matter about hearing the Curats is a sufficient instance of the Peoples good guiding Yet I perceive by what he says that he would not follow the Peoples guiding even in this matter for he does not think the Baptisms administrated by them to be no Baptisms But some of the People have thought their Baptism to be the mark of the Beast and that 's much worse than nothing He does not think the hearing of Curats simply unlawful and thinks if there were no other to hear they should be heard But some of the leading People have thought the hearing of them simply unlawful I heard of some who said that the hearing of them was as unlawful as Fornication Adultery as the Worshipping of the Calves of Dan and Bethel And I suppose the Historian will not deny that Fornication c. are simply unlawful Some have been so far from thinking that hearing them could ever become Lawful that they have placed their Religion and Sincerity in this A Minister informed me that when he was enquiring concerning the estate of a dying woman he got no other account of any Evidence that it was well or would be well with her but this that she had never heard a Curate and I suppose the Historian would have looked on this as a Soul-deluding and destructive Error to make that an Evidence of Sincerity which a Lazy Profane Atheistical Person can so easily forbear and that from a Principle of Laziness Profanity or Atheism From
Authority That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all Godliness and Honesty Which shews that the Assembly of Divines at Westminster did not think that the Kingdom of Christ is to be set up by ruining earthly Kings and Kingdoms and that they take not the right way to advance Christs Kingdom who reject the Magistrates countenance and maintenance of the Church Or who by despising and provoking Magistrates to wrath tempts them to discountenance the Church And seeing they look on the Church as Christs Kingdom the Historian hath not taken the right way to advance this Kingdom but hath taken the way to ruine it by dividing it For a Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand And if he had pondered the explication of the third Petition it might have been a mean to have prevented his giving so much place to his own Humour and Will in this History and helped him to more submission unto the Holy Providence of God than doth appear in this History I wish he had ere he began to write this History put up that Petition And lead us not into temptation Or at the close of it put up that Petition And forgive us our sins We have great need ere we begin Debates and Controversies even when they are necessary to pray that we be not led into temptation And great need to close such Debates even when the cause maintained is right with praying Lord forgive us our sins I have examined all that had any appearance of Reason in this History and refuted many things which needed no refutation if it had not been for the sake of simple People who are often deceived by big words where there is no shew or colour of Reason I have often by Reason refuted the unreasonable clamours both of the Author of the Epistle and of the History whereas I might have opposed clamour to clamour for what is founded upon meer clamour may be as easily cried down as it 's cried up Let none because of the Authors errors in this History cast at other useful Books which he hath published nor reject any thing that is true and right in this History Good men have their failings and we may not take our measures of them from their miscarriages under a fit of temptation Job's Friends had a just hatred against Hypocrisie and they mistake Job and falls foul upon him as a Hypocrite and speaks many things that are not right things in the heat of Debate This Author had a just indignation against Erastianism and a Spiritual Supremacy in Magistrates and he apprehended that his brethren had interpretatively homologate this Erastian and Spiritual Supream power in the Magistrate and having mistaken them he hath fallen foully upon them and spoken much evil of them without cause These things which in the Epistle and History are wrong are things for the most part which several people had drunk in and the printing of these errours hath given occasion to rectifie the mistakes of erring people if they will not shut their eyes against the light The Lord who is excellent in working draws good out of evil and maketh all things work together for good to them who love him and are the called according to his purpose he can over-rule the darkness of error so as it shall be subservient to clear the truth In the worst times the Elect hath obtained and shall obtain The Lord reigneth and ruleth in the midst of Enemies he can when men are scattering the dust of Zion be making way for laying a solid foundation in the deep humiliation of his people for building his house The Church hath been before as dry and scattered bones as bones scattered at the graves mouth and yet he who raiseth the dead hath made these bones to come together and live It 's our best to leave the answering of that Question Can these Bones live To the Lord himself to Jehovah who makes things that are not to be who doeth great things and unsearchable marvellous things and without number If we would take shame and confusion of face to our selves and would humble our selves in the sight and sense of our sins our darkness and stumblings and justlings in the dark and justifie the Lord in his judgments that are come upon us and yet ascribe to him the glory of his Mercy and out of our depths and darkness cry to him that he would cause his face to shine and enlighten our darkness and send out his Light and Truth and pour out the Spirit of a sound mind and that he would quicken us by the Spirit of Life that is in Christ Jesus that we might call on his Name and look on him whom we have pierced and mourn that when mens endeavours to gather the scattered sheep are not effectual that he the great Shepherd would seek out his sheep and deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day And if we would wait on him in the way of his Judgments and hope in his Word his Covenant which he uses to remember for his People and to repent according to the multitude of his Mercies and though we have no ground of hope in our selves yet hope against hope on the Lord who is the hope of Israel and the Saviour thereof in the time of trouble and that because with him there is Mercy and plenteous Redemption And so continue humbly praying hoping waiting for him He could soon redeem us from all our Iniquities and all our Troubles and cure all our distractions and distempers and give Light and Life and Unity and Peace Let us take shame to our selves and give him the glory due to his Name that his Name may endure for ever and be continued as long as the Sun that men may be Blessed in him and all Nations call him Blessed Blessed be the Lord God the God of Israel who onely doeth wondrous things And Blessed be his Glorious Name for ever and ever and let the whole Earth be filled with his Glory Amen and Amen The Conference continued Farmer SIR there are many things considerable in this Answer to the History of the Indulgence which I purpose to consider but there is one thing which not a little troubles me That the withdrawing from hearing the Indulged Ministers is called Schism Now I remember we are by Covenant bound to extirpate Schism and if I have been practising Schism in withdrawing from hearing the Indulged Ministers I have been Acting contrary to the Covenant Minister They who deal truly in the matter of the Covenant will study to fulfill their Vows not onely in some things but in all things Schism is a dissolution of that Union which ought to be among Christians and especially it appears in refusing that Church-fellowship or Ecclesiastical Communion which ought to be observed or in an unwillingness to communicate or to have communion with the true Church in Holy Actions Casuists shew that it is a most grievous
20. Servants be Subject to your Masters with all fear not only to the good but to the froward or perverse as it 's also rendered This Scripture is cited in the larger Catechism in explication of the fifth Commandment to shew what is the Honour that Inferiours owe to Superiours If the miscarriages of Magistrates Masters Parents or the miscarriages of Inferiours did dissolve the Relation and make it void And if the miscarriages of Married Persons did nullifie the Marriage-relation and loose the Party wronged from all Obligation towards the Party that 's injurious this would quickly dissolve the Bonds of all Humane Society and make Men like a multitude of loose Cartel If Subjects were not bound to give due Obedience to Magistrates except they did preserve the true Religion then all the Directions that Christ and his Apostles gave to Honour and be Subject to and pay Tribute to and pray for the Magistrates and Powers that then were did not oblige the People to whom they were first directed for all the Magistrates then were Infidels and Idolaters In the Confession of Faith Chap. 23. Art 4. It 's the Duty of People to pray for Magistrates to Honour their Persons to pay them Tribute and other dues to obey their Lawful Commands and to be Subject to their Authority for Conscience sake Infidelity or difference of Religion doth not make void the Magistrates just and Legal Authority nor free the People from their due obedience to him And the General Assembly Anno 1639. in their Supplication to the Commissioner and Council say We have Solemnly sworn and do swear not only our mutual Concurrence and Assistance for the cause of Religion and to the utmost of our Power with our Means and Lives to stand to the Defence of our dread Sovereign his Person and Authority in the Preservation of true Religion Liberties and Laws of this Kirk and Kingdom but also in every Cause which may concern His Majesties Honour shall concur with our Friends and followers as we shall be required Preach Subjects are not obliged to concur with and assist Rulers in doing ill Min. That 's true for to concur with them in assisting them to do evil were to partake of their sin But though we may not partake of their evil yet that will not follow that we must not maintain their Person and Authority Although the Israelites would not assist and concur with Saul in destroying Jonathan but rescued him yet they thought themselves bound to defend Saul's Person and Authority It 's one thing not to concur with Superiours in evil and another thing to destroy their Persons and their Power because they do evil But ye cannot deny but the Covenant obliges to defend and maintain the King in so far as he maintains the true Religion and Righteousness and I think ye will not deny that the King doth in part maintain the true Religion and Righteousness and therefore ye are bound to defend his Person and Authority and how can ye defend his Person and Authority in doing any good if ye destroy his Person and Power as is designed and sworn in this Band. There are many other Absurdities in that fourth Article of the Band which were tedious to repeat and refute In the fifth Article they say We then being made free by God and their own doings he giving the Law and they giving the transgression of that Law which is the cause that we are loosed from all Obligations Divine and Civil to them It 's strange that men who cry out against these who break other Articles of the Covenant should so boldly shake off the Obligation of the third Article of the Covenant and so increase the sin of the Nation by adding the breach of the Civil part of the Covenant to the breach of the Religious part of it To make out what they assert it 's not enough to prove that the Rulers have transgressed the Law of God for they must also shew from the Law that it is the will of God that Subjects should upon such and such transgressions shake off all Obligations towards such Rulers But this they have never attempted because they could not I would enquire at them doth every transgression loose these Obligations If not then how many and how great must these transgressions be And then shall a few private Persons who have very little Interest in the Nation determine this Question How many and how great transgressions makes Rulers no Rulers and Subjects no Subjects Then they promise to set up Government and Governours according to the Word of God especially Exod. 18.21 Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the People able Men such as fear God Men of Truth hating Covetousness c. I wish they had pondered Prov. 24.21 22. My Son fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with them that are given to change For their Calamity shall rise suddenly and who knoweth the ruine of them both The Dutch Interpreters expound it of these who are addicted to changes and novelties departing from the Obedience which they owe to God and their Lawful Magistrates and rising up in Rebellion against them Moses was King in Jesurun and his setting up subordinate Rulers is no pattern for their shaking off the Yoke of Subjection and setting up Usurpers and an unlawful Government The 16 of Numbers where Subjects do Seditiously exalt themselves against Moses and Aaron quadrats better with their case than the 18 of Exodus where Moses makes subordinate Rulers for his own and the Peoples ease And how could they in Reason expect that able men wise and prudent men fit for Government or men fearing God or men of Truth would undertake to be Governours over them For wise men would see the sin and snare and hazard in breaking down the hedge of Civil or Ecclesiastical Government Eccles 10.8 Men fearing God they also fear the King and fear an Oath and men of Truth will not deal falsely in the matter of their Covenant with God or Man And who but foolish rash Persons would take upon them to Rule such an unruly and disorderly People who had destroyed all Order Civil and Ecclesiastical It 's strange that they durst speak as they do of Kingly Government and Lineal Succession seeing the Lord established both among his People in the House of David the man after his own heart Kingly Government as established in these Nations in which King and Parliament make Laws is a form of Government so excellent that few except Persons byassed with prejudice will find fault with it The faults of Rulers should not be imputed to the form of Government They engage to set up the Judicial Law but they apprehend it would not reach far enough and they reject some parts of it but beside these things which they mention there are several other things which would not suit with us Some even of their Capital Laws have intimate connexion with their Ceremonial Law and derive much of
Councils ministerially to determine controversies of Faith and cases of Conscience to set down Rules and Directions for the better ordering of the publick Worship of God and government of his Church Art 5. Synods and Councils are to conclude nothing but that which is Ecclesiastical and are not to meddle with Civil affairs which concern the Commonwealth unless by way of humble petition in cases extraordinary or by way of advice for satisfaction of conscience if they be thereto required by the Civil Magistrate Chap. 23. Art 3. The Civil Magistrate may not assume to himself the administration of word and Sacraments as the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven yet he hath authority and it is his duty to take order that unity and peace be preserved in the Church that the truth of God be kept pure and intire that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed all corruptions and abuses in worship or discipline prevented or reformed and all Ordinances of God duly setled administred and observed for the better effecting whereof he hath power to call Synods to be present at them and to provide that whatsoever is transacted in them be according to the word of God These Articles and the Scripture-proofs do clearly hold out and confirm That Christ not the Magistrate is the Head King Lord of the Church which is the Body House and Kingdom of Christ that Church and not the Magistrate is the Fountain of the Spiritual Power of the keys of the kingdom of Heaven that the Offices in the Church are of divine institution given by Christ and that these Offices which Christ hath given are sufficient for gathering and perfecting the Church seeing he hath given them for that end and that they are Ministerial and not Lordly and hence it follows that the Office of a Prelate who claims a majority of Directive and Coercive power over Ministers who not only takes upon him without election to moderate Synods but also is above the censure of the Synod and who can hinder the Synod from concluding any thing how necessary soever they find it and without whose Authority the Synod is no Synod who imposes Moderators upon the meetings for exercise and to whom these meetings are countable for their actings without whom there can be no ordination deposition excommunication relaxation from it who exacteth an Oath of Canonical obedience from Ministers not being in the Rolls of the Offices and Officers given by Christ and being a Lordly and so more than a Ministerial Office Presbyterians cannot own it nor judg it useful for gathering or perfecting of the Church They shew also that the Magistrate to whom God hath given the Lordly power of the sword is so far from having a spiritual Supreme power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven that he hath not the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven given to him at all for the power of the keys which Christ hath given is Ministerial and makes those who are invested with it Ministers of the Church but the power of the Sword is Magistratical and a Lordly Dominion and that it belongs to Synods and Councils and not to Magistrates to make Ecclesiastical Rules c. and that none neither Magistrates nor Ministers may order Ecclesiastical matters according to their mind and pleasure but those things must be ordered according to the mind and will of God revealed in his word And all true Presbyterians believe That seeing both the Lordly Power of the Magistrate in general and in special the Kingly Power and the Ministerial Power of Church-Officers are of God and his Ordinances that they are not contrary to one another for the Ordinances of God do not justle one against another but sweetly agree and any justling or clashing which hath proceeded from the corruptions of Magistrates or Ministers are not to be imputed to the Lords Ordinances and it 's the earnest desire of all truly godly and loyal subjects who seek the glory of God and the Magistrates true honour and interest That whatsoever in the actings of their rightful Magistrates hath exceeded the bounds which the Lord hath set to them may be in mercy discovered to them and in time reformed That all occasions of grief and stumbling may be taken out of the way of truly loyal subjects and all occasion of doing mischief may be cut off from those who take advantage from those excesses to render the Magistrate contemptible and to overthrow that Power which they have from God As for what they say of Ministers hindering those who would have given a testimony and censuring others who did give it the truth is Presbyterian Ministers endeavoured to restrain some young men who instead of preaching the Gospel made it their work to revile the Magistrate and Ministers who made use of the liberty granted by the Magistrate but these youths discovered themselves not to be of Presbyterian Principles by their refusing to be subordinate to the Ministers and by reproaching them who would have reclaimed them from their disorderly and Schismatick practices By this the Magistrate may perceive if the Presbyterian Ministers who are Presbyterians indeed had by allowance of the Magistrate the peaceable exercise of their Ministry and liberty of meeting for regulating their own actings and the actings of those who profess themselves to be Presbyterians such unruly persons who stir up the people to Schism and Sedition would not be admitted to the Ministry or if they after their admission discovered themselves to be of pernicious principles they would be put from the Ministry and so the people who are true to Presbyterian Principles would not own them and so they would not have access to pervert the people with Seditious and Schismatick doctrine this would be found the most proper Remedy for these distempers But what wonder is it if young men who are ordinarily rash being but Novices who have not studied the Body of Divinity and who have no experience and know not the Principles and Practices of Presbyterial Government who are not put ro Presbyterial Exercises for their trial and instruction and who it may be have never seen any thing of the Exercise of Presbyterial Government in Presbyteries or Synods and who are not under the iâ—spection of meetings of Presbyterians but wander to and fro at random not thinking themselves accountable to any meeting of Ministers nor censurable by any What wonder is it if such persons when they are blown up with the vain applause of some ignorant and humorous people who under their sad sufferings have taken up such prejudice against the Magistrate and all to whom the Magistrate shews any favour that they think what is most cross to the Magistrate is most right and any thing which the Magistrate allows they think it wrong and so they cry up those Preachers most who speak most invectively against the Magistrate and against those Ministers to whom the Magistrate shews any favour I say what wonder is
c. But the donation of the Office and spiritual authority annexed thereunto is only derived from Jesus Christ our Mediator he alone gives all Church-Officers and therefore none may devise or superadd any new Officers Ephes 4.7 8 10 11. 1 Cor. 12.28 And he alone derives all authority and power Spiritual to these Officers for dispensing the Word Sacraments Censures and all Ordinances Mat. 16.19 28.18 19 20. Joh. 20.21 22 23. 2 Cor. 10.8 13.10 and therefore it is not safe for any creature to intrude upon this Prerogative Royal of Christ to give any power to any Officer of the Church And thus we see that these Learned and Godly Ministers who solidly in that same Book refute Erastianism yet assert that it belongs to the Magistrate to protect countenance authorize defend maintain Ministers in the publick exercise of their Ministry which they have received from the Lord Jesus But it 's the ignorance of the solid writings of Presbyterians which makes some folks so confident that they are true Presbyterians and adhering to Presbyterian Principles when in the mean time they are publishing to the world that they are strangers to the solid writings of sound Presbyterians And there is no Orthodox Divine who would find fault with these Ministers who when they appeared before the Council did give humble thanks to the Kings Majesty and the Lords of his Majesties Council for the peaceable exercise of the Ministry which they had received from the Lord Jesus The elicite act of the Will is too Philosophical for common people to subscribe or swear to for they can hardly be made to understand it And what they say concerning it is not Philosophical enough to be approven by those who understand what an elicite act is for elicite acts of the Will are such as immediately flow from the Will as love or hatred volition or nolition Now translation of power from Ministers to Magistrates is not made by these inward acts of the Will but by some external imperate acts as speaking writing c. Politick acts of surrender or translation of power are not effectuate by meer elicite internal acts of the Will But their ignorance of the nature of an elicite act of the Will and their opposing acts of force and constraint to elicite acts whereas elicite acts use to be contra-distinguished from imperate acts and their insinuating That if an act be not an elicite act of the Will it is an act of force and constraint whereas the imperate acts of the Will are not elicite acts and yet being commanded by the Will they are not acts of force and constraint these are more harmless mistakes But it is a very injurious calumny that those Ministers who appeared before the Council translated the power of sending out ordering and censuring Ministers to the Magistrate It 's a ridiculous ignorant conceit to imagine that what these Ministers did in appearing before the Council was a translation of the power of order of Potestative mission or else such censuring to the Magistrate or changing their Master and making themselves the Ministers of men and a quitting of the Government and succession of a Presbyterian Ministry These are meer calumnies and ridiculous fopperies that none who understand any thing in these matters will think worthy of any answer They were very injurious to the poor people many of whom are simple and ready through prejudice to believe any ill word spoken against indulged Ministers who in their Papers and Pamphlets abused them with such slanders But they are more injurious to them who would have them to subscribe and swear such injurious calumnies and ridiculous fopperies which are not only far from truth but from any appearance of truth And so much hath been said in several Papers written in vindication of the practice of the Indulged Ministers that it were to waste time and paper to answer any more to these Calumniators and the best answer to them is to pray that the Lord would give them repentance for these abominable reproaches whereby they have very actively driven on the design of Satan and his instruments the Papists and Quakers c. which is to render the Ministry contemptible And it was seen and told long ago that they would not rest satisfied with the reproachieg of a few Ministers but would proceed to render all contemptible The contrivers of this Bond have made a great progress in this Devilish work of rendering Ministers contemptible and useless for they have casten all except some few who for any thing known did not exceed the number of four and some think that they were but three at most and one of them was casten by the other two It is strange that any person who had the use of reason could be so far blinded with prejudice as to think that these Ministers did translate the power of sending out Ministers or the power of Potestative mission to the Magistrate for as was said the Magistrate supposed them to be Ordained ministers and so to have a Potestative mission to Preach the Gospel already for ministers are potestatively sent to preach the Gospel when they are Ordained ministers this clearly appeared by the Councils inquiring if they were and where or by whom they were Ordained ministers if the Council had called some persons who were not Ordained and sent them to Preach and Baptize c. then they might have alledged that the Magistrate did assume the power of sending out ministers or of a Potestative mission but they never pretended to any thing like that Preacher But Sir did not the Council send these ministers to these Congregations Minist 1. The Council did not so much as use the word of sending 2. Suppose they had used the word of sending that would not have imported a Potestative mission because the Magistrate did suppose that they were already Ordained Ye heard also that Mr. Welsh in his Preface to King James desires the King to send ministers throughout the Land it were great ignorance and perverseness to gather from that word that he translated to the King the power of a Potestative mission 3. Suppose the Magistrate had said nothing concerning their being Ordained Ministers before it had been great perverseness to have concluded from the Magistrates sending of them that they ceased to be the Ministers of Christ and became the Ministers of men Will any be so perverse as to conclude because Jehoshaphat 2 Chron. 17.8 9. sent Priests and Levites through all the Cities of Judah to teach the people that therefore these Priests and Levites ceased to be the Lords Ministers and became the ministers of the King Preach But Jehoshaphet was a godly reforming King Minist That is nothing to the purpose in hand Ye might have remembred that Mr. Rutherford shews that the magistratical power in reference to the Church is the same in Nero and in a Christian magistrate and if a godly King 's sending ministers does not annul their ministry then
what Doctrine they should preach which was an encroachment beyond any thing done by the secret Council Some talk of Presbytery and Presbyterian parity and of their detestation of Prelacy and in the mean time set up Prelacy it 's a great evidence of a Spirit of giddiness when people run round as those who run in a Circle and so run to that point from which they once did run The Declaration at Sanquair is refuted in the Confutation of the Bonds and the truth is such principles and practices are so absurd and destructive to all Rule and Government that they are not worthy of Refutation and should be answered with detestation and abhorrence They conclude that Declaration hoping that none will blame them for or offend at their rewarding those that are against them as they have done to them if they had considered Prov. 20.22 Say not thou I will recompence evil but wait on the Lord and he shall save thee and Prov. 24.29 Say not I will do so to him as he hath done to me I will render to the man according to his work Rom. 12.14 17 18 19 20 21 1 Thes 5.15 1 Pet. 3.9 10 11 12 13 14. They might have seen how groundless and absurd this hope was The 8 and 9 veses of the 137 Psalm are wrested when applied to justifie such unchristian Practices for that Scripture is a prediction of the prosperous success that the Medes and Persians should have in destroying Babylon which is also foretold Isa 45.1 3 4 13. and not a Rule to warrand us to revenge our selves and to dash out the brains of Infants It 's among the delusions of the time that some know not of what Spirit they are and imagine that to be the Zeal of God which is nothing but the wrath of man which worketh not the Righteousness of God It is meet to shut up this sad Subject with humble and earnest Supplications That the Lord would humble us in the sight and sense of our sins which have procured the dreadful Judgments and Plagues which have come upon this sinful Generation That he would convince us of our sins and make every one sensible of the Plagues of his own heart and of the Plagues that are upon the hearts of others which are among the most dreadful evidences of the anger of God that Magistrates Ministers people of all ranks may take with their sins and take shame and confusion of face to themselves because of their own sins and the sins of others That he would so turn in mercy and loving-kindness and turn us again that our backslidings be not perpetual and turn the hearts of Rulers and the hearts of people to himself and the hearts of Rulers to the people and the hearts of people to the Rulers the hearts of the fathers to the children and of the children to the fathers that Rulers may have the love kindness pity and compassion of fathers towards the people and may not by rigor and severity provoke the children to wrath and may pity those who are distempered by sad sufferings and that the Lord would incline their hearts to take speedy course that the poor people who wander as sheep without shepherds and who through their own ignorance and humours and distempers are exposed as a prey to seducers to Jesuits and those who are influenced by them who drive poor unstable people who are destitute of faithful Teachers to discover to them the devices of Satan and of his Instruments into snares and mischievous practices and makes them imagine that those pathes of the destroyer are the way to an outgate from their calamities That the Lord would incline I say their hearts to take speedy course that these poor wandering sheep may be provided with Pastors after the Lords heart who may feed them with knowledg and understanding with sound doctrine with the wholesome words of Christ that they may not be turned from the truth unto fables but by the words of the Lords mouth they may be keeped out of the paths of the destroyer and any who are intangled through the devices of Satan and subtil deceivers may be recovered in time out of these snares And that the Lord would incline the hearts of people to be subject to principalities and powers and to obey Magistrates to fear God and honour the King and keep them that they be not tempted by grievous pressures to cast off the yoke of lawful Authority but may possess their souls in patience and wait on the Lord in the way of his judgments who often makes use of lawful Magistrates to punish his people for their sins and though the Magistrate may be wrong yet God is righteous and we should be humbled under his hand It 's a very humbling dispensation when Parents and Magistrates are alienate from and rigid against their children and subjects and we should not be chafed and enraged but humbled under the mighty hand of God and carry with that lowliness and meekness patience and respect to lawful Authority that we may commend ourselves to the consciences of all in the sight of God that being reviled we may bless being persecuted we may suffer it being defamed we may entreat And seeing the Devil is so active to rent the Church and to ruine it and to render the Ministers of the Gospel and so the Gospel it self contemptible we should if we can do no more pray for the peace of Jerusalem and that the Lord would let people see the devices of Satan and Seducers who draw them away from under the eye of the Shepherd that they may destroy them and that he would convince people that it 's their duty to esteem Ministers very highly in love for their works sake and for their Masters sake for they who despise them despise Christ and the Father who sent Christ Farmer Sir I think my self much obliged to you for the pains you have taken for my information and I ingenuously acknowledg I am by what I have heard instructed in many things of which I was ignorant I shall desire before we part that ye would give me some directions how to order my way in this dark and dangerous time in which my lot hath fallen it 's seldome that I have occasion to converse with Ministers which makes me the more desirous to make the best use of their company I can when any of them come this way Minist There are many excellent directions in several of these Papers that I was speaking of before it were your advantage to have them I shall only give you a few 1. Let that be your earnest study to be in Christ and to walk in him to know him and to be found in him having his righteousness and to be conformed to him to walk at he walked The Apostle Paul counted all things loss for the excellency of the knowledg of Christ and to be found in him c. and he travelled as in birth to have Christ formed in the
suggesting that such or such a Scripture makes for his deluding suggestions Peter roved even when he was in the Mount beholding Christs Transfiguration when he moved that Christ might abide in the Mount and after he had given that excellent Confession of Christ That he was the Son of God which not flesh and blood but the Father had revealed to him Satan suggests to him to disswade Christ from going to Jerusalem to suffer which drew that sharp rebuke from the blessed mouth of Christ Get thee behind me Satan The Devil can back his suggestions with Scriptures which he perverts as we see he did when he tempted Christ to cast himself down from the Pinacle of the Temple and therefore there is the more need to search the Scripture and to compare Scripture with Scripture and to consider what goeth before and what followeth in the Scripture and to know the Analogy of Faith from the Scriptures that are more clear and as it is holden forth from the Scriptures in the Confession of Faith and Catechisms that ye may not receive any sense of Scripture which is contrary to the Analogy of Faith to the Doctrine which is according to godliness received in the Reformed Churches Beware of adding to the word of God by making these things Duties which God hath not commanded or making any thing sinful which God hath not forbidden there are too many who will confidently impose their Conceits upon others and too many who are easily imposed upon simple people who believe every word and are tossed to and fro with every wind Study to be well founded in the Scriptures that with the Bereans ye may try Doctrines and Practices by the Rule of the holy Scripture It 's lamentable that there is so great ignorance of the Scriptuees and many are more in reading other writings than in reading the holy Scriptures Walk exactly according to the light which the Lord hath given to you from his word detain it not in unrighteousness and beware ye go no further than the light of the word directs you for if ye go out of the light and be in the dark ye know not how far ye may wander they who without direction from the word do blindly follow the example of others and know not whether it be right or wrong or take what others do to be right because such or such persons does it they are in an ill taking Beware ye go not without the word walk in the Law of the Lord in the light of the word which is a light to the feet and a Lamp to the paths 4. And that ye may be nourished up in the knowledge of the Scriptures of truth go to the publick Ordinances forsake not assembling together with the Lords people who meet in his name the Lord hath commanded his Ministers to teach and baptize c. and hath promised to be with them to the end of the world and hath promised That where he records his Name there he will come and bless his people he hath appointed Ministers for this end to feed his people with the knowledge and understanding of the word with the sincere Milk of the word and therefore if ye would glorifie the Name of the Lord if ye would have fellowship with God if you would have his presence and his Blessing if ye would know his mind and will revealed in his word frequent his Ordinances beware of those who would draw you away from the Shepherds Tents for they draw you away from Christ himself for it 's there that he feeds and makes his Flocks to rest Believe not those who say That he is not to be found in his own Ordinances for there he is and hath trysted his people to meet him there and he hath promised to come there and bless them whenever they are met in his name He is present he is not to come when they are met in his Name for he is come already There am I saith he in the midst of them The sins of those who are present at the Lords Ordinances shall not deprive those who upon his call comes to record his Name of his Presence and blessing for he is faithful who hath promised and they who come according to his appointment to glorifie his Name in his own Ordinances may be assured that he comes and blesses them though it may be they do not sensibly discern it and they are bound to believe it that he hath come and blessed them because he hath said it Beware of those who think they are the best and most tender Christians who are readiest to cast Ministers as no Ministers and Churches as no Churches there were many great faults in the Church of Corinth in several of the Churches of Asia and their Angels and yet Christ himself owns them and their Angels as Chuches and Angels and we find not that the Lord directs any to separate from these Churches or their Assemblies for publick worship because of those scandalous sins which were among them We find Christ himself present in the Church of Lacdicea which was the worst of them and standing at their door and knocking It 's insolent boldness to cast these as no Churches and Ministers whom Christ owns or who condemn going to these Meetings where Christ himself comes and blesses his people remember that your great busines in Ordinances is with the Lord himself for they are his Ordinances he hath appointed them the efficacy of them depends upon his Institution and Blessing and not upon the worthiness and intention of Ministers whoever absent themselves ye may be sure he is present whom your soul should seek come because he calls you and because he comes and blesses his people where he causes his Name to be recorded Learn to hear the Word not as the word of man but as the word of God Esteem the Ministers of Christ very highly in love for their works-sake and for their Masters sake Beware of the way of those who cast at the Ordinances if they be not dispensed by Ministers of the most eminent gifts or by Ministers who are in all things of their opinion receive the Lords message of the hand of any of his Messengers Beware of idolizing any Minister Remember that neither he that planteth nor he that watereth is any thing but God who giveth the encrease And beware of undervaluing any of the Lords Ministers seeing they are the Ministers of Christ 1 Cor. 4.1 In which Chapter the Apostle disswades the Corinthians who overvalued some and undervalued others of their Ministers from this comparing and rash judging of Ministers and among other Arguments uses this That they judge before the time he desires them to let alone that judging till the Lord come ver 5. who knew the counsels of the heart and the hidden things of darkness Neglect not the private exercises of Religion upon the Lords day but beware of the way of those who neglect the publick Ordinances though they have the
opportunity of them these private Meetings which were kept in England in a separating way from the solemn Assembly became the Seminaries of error and heresie when the sheep leave the shepherds tents and the green Pastures of the Lords own Ordinances what wonder if they wander and grow sick and dote about questions 5. In your private converse seek for the things which make for peace and for mutual edification beware ye waste not your time in vain janglings and unedifying debates which distemper the minds and hearts of those who dote upon them and diverts them from edifying purposes When ye meet with those who are given to these janglings if ye can by Scripture and reason reclaim them from that snare essay it with meekness of wisdom If ye find them impatient to be contradicted and not capable through passion and prejudice to receive instruction then fall upon some good edâ—fying purposes wherein you and they agree that whereunto ye have attained ye may walk according to the same rule If you find that they will neither hold off their janglings and that 's very ordinary for a spirit of error or schism to hold people perpetually upon those things which foster error or division nor yet receive instruction your converse with such is not like to be fruitful imploy others to deal with them and be much in praying for them and be ready to do them any good that they will admit or accept of Beware of wasting your time in speaking ill of absent persons remember the words Tit. 3. To speak evil of no man c. Make not that your design to wrong the fame of any person as the word imports hate the way of such whose work it is to render Ministers and those who differ from them in any thing hateful and to put them out of capacity as far as in them lyes to serve the Lord in their generation and station Beware of rash determinations of questions which ye understand not some people are so rash that no question is started but they will presently determine it and having vented their judgment they will not readily retract Meddle not as a busie-body in other mens matters and in things too high for you which are not within the compass of your calling Waste not your precious time as many people do in State-intrigues It belongs to the Representatives of Nations and not to private persons to determine matters of that nature What the Representatives of Nations may do for righting what is wrong in the Government of Nations is a question which the Representatives of Nations and not private persons should move and resolve It 's a trick of Satan and seditious Jesuits to divert people from the duties of their Christian and particular callings and to break and crack their brains in over-stretching them to reach things that are above them and to grasp matters which they can never comprehend and though they could understand them have no call to meddle with them And if private persons take the sword which God hath not given to them to right what they think wrong by strong hand And if private persons take upon them to depose Ministers for real or apprehended faults this is the high-way to all confusion to turn State and Church upside down and to fill the world with murthers and butcheries to turn it into a Butcher-house and to fill the Church with schism and damnable errors These are the methods of the lying and murthering spirit to make havock of the souls and bodies of men 6. Imitate the example of our Lord Jesus Ephes 5.1 Be followers of God as dear children and walk in love as Christ also hath loved us Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice and be ye kind one to another tender hearted forgiving one another even as God for Christs sake hath forgiven you Put on therefore as the Elect of God holy and beloved bowels of mercies kindness humbleness of mind meekness long-suffering forbearing one another and forgiving one another If any man have a quarrel against any even as Christ forgave you so also do ye And above all things put on charity which is the bond of perfectness Love them that hate you Bless and curse not Be not overcome with evil but overcome evil with good Learn of Christ to be meek and lowly in heart shew all meekness to all men The ornament of a meek and quiet spirit is of great price in the sight of God When ye are injured and persecuted learn of Christ to be patient and in your patience possess your souls Look above men who wrong you unto God who is correcting or trying you and be humbled and patient under the mighty hand of God fret not at the prosperity of those who for a while bring evil devices to pass but trust in the Lord and be doing good And delight thy self in the Lord Commit your way to him Wait on the Lord and in well-doing commit your self to him as to a faithful Creator Take heed to your spirit beware that ye be not deluded by Satan and brought to imagine that wrathful revenge is zeal Who is a wise man and endued with knowledg among you let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom hut if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts glory not and be not against the truth This wisdom descendeth not from above but is earthly sensual devilish for where envying and strife is there is confusion and every evil work But the wisdom that is from above is first pure then peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without hypocrisie And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace The Spirit of Christ opposeth that spirit which lusteth to envy and revenge When James and John would have been at fire from Heaven to consume the Samaritans Christ turned and rebuked them and said Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of for the Son of man is not come to destroy mens lives but to save them Let that be your constant design and endeavour to express the praises the vertues of Christ in resembling him in loveliness in love in bowels and mercies in humility lowliness of heart in self-denial in gentleness meekness patience long-suffering forbearance forgiveness that the same mind may be in you that was in Christ Jesus that ye may be in the world as he was in the world that ye may walk in his steps that ye may be conformed to the Image of the Son of God and Christ formed in you He countenanced the Ordinances he heard John was baptized of him when the people were baptized he was Circumcised he Prayed Preached and eated the Passover when Judas the Traytor was present he directed the Lepers whom he cured to shew themselves to the Priest he was subject to Joseph
and his Mother he payed tribut to Caesar and directed others to do so It adorns the Doctrine of God when those who profess it are dutiful in their several places and Stations when they join Righteousness with Religion when they fear God and honour the King when they are subject to Magistrates out of a principle of Conscience when they are obedient Children faithful servants doing their work heartily as to the Lord. And when it is other ways the name of God is blasphemed and the way of God is evil spoken of 7. Beware of the first beginnings of sinful courses beware left any root of bitterness spring up if ye give way to the first motions of evil they will encrease to more ungodliness if the desire after the sincere milk of the word begin to languish if ye look not to it in time ye may come to an indifferency whether you hear the word or not and that may increase to a loathing and lightlying of the word and that may increase to a contempt of the Preaching of the word and then God in his righteous judgment may leave you to be plagued with Papers and Pamphlets and Teachers after your own lusts which will foster you in the contempt of the Ordinances and make you imagine that it's tenderness and zeal and a testimony to despise the Lords Ordinances and so far delude you as to make you imagine that profanity is Religion If you let that honour and respect which by the command of God is due to Magistrates decay you may come next to despise them and curse them in your heart and thought and then mutter out these revilings in private and then vent them openly and from virulent words come to open violence to design and endeavour to turn them out of their places and murther them and then be plagued with Papers and Doctrines deluding you to that height as to bring you to think that this fury is the zeal of God If ye lose the esteem and love that ye should have to the Ministers of Christ ye may come by degrees to despise them and revile them and to think it good service to God to make their Ministry useless and contemptible yea ye may come to that to think it good service to God to kill his servants and in the righteous judgment of God you may be left to the delusions of Satan to imagine that these abominations make you holier than others tremble at the deceitfulness of the desperately wicked heart of man and at the dreadful but holy judgments of God who gives over the backslider in heart to be filled with his own ways and plagues those who receive not the truth in love and who harbours and entertains lusts contrary to the word of God with strong delusions and with deluding Teachers who tickle the itching ears of those who after their lusts heap up Teachers to themselves with Doctrines which are suitable to their lusts 8. That you may see the mischief of error and schism and be guarded against it Read Mr. Durham's excellent Treatise of Scandal and the Preface prefixed by Mr. Robert Blair that eminent Servant of the Lord in whom holiness learning wisdom prudence zeal experience Ministerial authority and gravity were contemperate in an eminent degree in the end of that Preface he saith 〈…〉 much longer the Reader from the Treatise it self having added these few considerations for heart-uniting in the Lord which of all other I conceive ought to be most weighty in the judgment and on the affections of all the lovers of our Lord Jesus Christ 1. From Eph. 2.14 15 16 17. the great peace-maker in offering up himself in a sacrifice for the sins of the Elect intended with the reconciling of them to God to unite them in one body among themselves yea even those who were at furthest distance and greatest enmity Jew and Gentile and consequently other his Elect in their several differences and divisions throughout their generations He took on him the debt of their sins and enmities and lâ—fâ—ed up with himself these on his Cross representatively virtually and meritoriously to expâ—â—te them in his flesh and by his Spirit efficiently to slay and abolish them in due time by making them one 〈…〉 in himsâ—lf Mark I pray from that Scrâ—â—â—â—re cited that this complex business is the grâ—at 〈◊〉 of our blessed and great peace-maker 〈◊〉 2ly in the Sacrifice-feast of his Supper this is still represented and exhibited till he come again So that this standing Ordinance destinated and appointed of God to carry on and seal up uniting with God and one with another till he come again at his coming will stand up and testifie against all who comply not with Christ but following their own inclination act rather against his design And 3ly in his solemn prayer Joh. 17. which is a Specimen of his future Intercession he mainly presseth after the Salvation and Sanctification of those that are given him v. 21. That they also may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us that the world may believe that thou hast sent me Do not these words significantly and shiningly hold out what the Mediator is still about and that uniting in God is his design still And 4ly upon the same very ground the great Apostle speaking to Jews and Gentiles who had embraced the Gospel and in them to all dissentients who love the Gospel-truths and Ordinances saith Rom. 15.7 Wherefore receive ye one another as Christ also received us to the glory of God Meritoriously and virtually the Elect are received to the glory of God And to the end they may be actually received Receive one another saith the Apostle as it were suspending the one upon the other And now upon these grounds Christ our Lord his grand design being so conspicuous his Supper-Ordinance standing as a land-mark in the way having this engraven upon it Union Communion the Glorious Mediator his Intercession running in the same channel and the blessed Apostle making â—his the upshot of his Doctrine what lover of our Lord well advised and recollecting himself dare stifly stand out from complying with him to satisfie their own inclination and habituated custom and carriage My fear is that every one of us will look to some others rather than themselves as obstructing the desired uniting in the Lord. But upon mature after-thoughts it will be found the mind of Christ that we narrowly search our selves every one of us how we have provoked the Holy One to smite us so in his displeasure and accurately to try what yet remains in us obstructive to this union and withal to flee to our slighted duty as in a city they run to the quenching of a publick burning laying this evil to heart more than Sword or Pestilence All the writings and actings against Presbyterian Government which is the wall of the house of God have never wronged or hurt it so much as our ill-raised
and worse continued contests Our nakedness-discovering writings what have they done but added oyl to the flame For Christs sake my reverend and dear Brethren hearken to this word in season from the Oracles of God and treasures of pure antiquity pointing out the way of a godly and edifying peace It will be no grief of heart but sweet peace and consolation when we are to appear before the Judg of the quick and the deed Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one towards another according to Christ Jesus So heartily prayeth your Brother and fellow-â—ervant ROBERT BLAIR Thus far Reverend Mr. Blair who was both a Son of Thunder â—nd a Son of Peace a Peace maker O with what authority and seriousneâ—s did I hear him press unity in Preaching before a Synod from these words Phil. 2.1 If there be therefore any consolation in Christ if any comfort of love if any fellowship of the spirit if any bowels mercies fulfil ye my joy that ye be like minded having the same love being of one accord of one mind And I heard him say upon Preaching before a general Assembly That he could be content to be carried from the place in which he was Preaching to his grave to have the rent that then was in the Church cured Ignorant and rash youths who have not experience and consider not what an abominable sin Schism is and what are the mischievous consequences of it and how it ordinarily ends in the ruin desolation of a Church they know little what they are doing when they are blowing up the fire of contention and it 's a sport to some to cast such fire-brands But they who have Heavenly wisdom see that that sporting is mischievous madness that it will be bitter in the latter end It is not for nought that the Spirit of God directed the Apost Paul in writing to the Church of the Corinthians in which there were many things wrong to fall first upon the ill of divisions 1 Cor. 1.10 and when he is shutting up that Epistle he exhorts that all these things be done with charity and to greet one another with an holy kiss And when he is shutting up the 2 Epist he concludes Finally Brethren farewell be perfect be of good comfort be of one mind live in peace and the God of love and peace shall be with you Greet one another with an holy kiss So thus he begins and ends with this unity and peace 9. And because no speaking nor reasoning will prevail against the working of a spirit of error and schism without the effectual working of the pirit of the Lord let us humbly and earnestly pray that the Lord would have mercy upon us for his Sons sake who came to destroy the works of the Devil pour upon us the spirit of grace and of supplications the spirit of faith repentance that we may look on him whom we have pierced mourn the spirit of a sound mind the spirit of love peace And that every one Magistrates Ministers and people may be made sensible of their own sins We should pray that the Lord would send his Spirit that convinces the world of sin to let us see our sins and to let us see them written in our judgments that we may accept of the punishment of our sins justifie the Lord when he judges The Lord often writes the sins of men in so great and legible letters in their judgments that they who run may read them David despised the Lord and occasioned the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme by his adultery and murther incestuous filthiness breaks out in his house the sword departs not from his house his people despise him and follow Absalom Shimei an exasperate Benjamite is let loose upon him to revile and curse him and cast stones at him he disowns him as no King gives him no title of honour but only calls him a man and which was worse a bloody man a man of Belial and does not cry and then flee but goes along in the sight and hearing of the King Courtiers and Soldiers cursing casting stones and dust David sees that tho' Shimei did this contrary to the Law of God which says Thou shalt not revile the Gods nor curse the ruler of thy people Yet that he did it not without the over-ruling Providence of God he saw that the Lord had let Shimei loose upon him is humbled under the hand of God Uzziah will needs go to the Temple exercise the Priests Office the Lord by Leprosie cuts him off from the House of the Lord and from the exercise of his Kingly Office When the Priests did not impartially apply the Law of God to reclaim the people from their sins no doubt they thought thus to keep in with the people but this brought them to be base contemptible before all the people Mal. 2.9 The Jews that remained in the land after the ruin of the Temple though they had but one Prophet yet they despise him they will not hear the word which Jeremiah spoke in the name of the Lord but they would do what went out of their own mouth and therefore the Lord leaves them to live like Pagans swears by his great name that his name should not be named any more in their mouths they should not have so much as the form profession of the worship of the true God Jer. 44.16 26. they would not be reproved by Ezek. ch 3.26 they are plagued with the want of a reprover When people will reject the counsel of the Lord will not hearken to his voice nor take his gracious offer made in the Gospel when they will not endure sound Doctrine nor desire the sincere milk of the word nor receive the truth in love the Lord justly gives them up to their own hearts lusts to walk in their own counsels to strong delusions to believe lyes to be tossed to and fro with every wind of Doctrine to turn aside to fables When they despise his servants will not receive his mâ—ssengers their message count them enemies for telling the truth the Lord removes his servants from them leaves them to be deluded with teachers which are after their own humours and lusts When people refuse to hear the Lords words and walk after the imaginations of their own heart Jer. 13.10 the Lord fills them with drunkenness that they destroy one another like drunken men who know not what they are doing v. 13. Behold I will fill all the Inhabitants of this Land even the Kings that sit upon Davids Throne and the Priests and the Prophets and all the Inhabitants of Jerusalem with drunkenness And I will dash them one against another even the Fathers and the Sons together saith the Lord I will not pity nor spare nor have mercy but destroy them Hear ye and give car be not proud for the Lord hath spoken Give glory to
the Lord your God before he cause darkness and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains and while ye look for light he turn it into the shadow of death and make it gross darkness When folk will follow their own imaginations and will not walk in the light of the word of God the Lord fills them with drunkenness and leaves them to dash upon one another and destroy one another like drunken men fighting in the dark But neither words nor rods will be rightly understood or laid to heart till the Spirit be poured from on high If the Lord would pour out his Spirit we would not only be brought to see our sins but to be ashamed of them to take shame and confusion of face to our selves we would sorrow and mourn and lament after the Lord we would turn from our sins to the Lord and joyn our selves to the Lord and we would joyn together in seeking the Lord in his Ordinances then the Wilderness would be a fruitful field the dead and scattered bones would be joyned together and live then Judah and Israel would be one stick in the hand of the Lord Ezek. 37. Then the Children of Israel and Judah would come together going and weeping seeking the Lord their God asking the way to Sion with their faces thitherward saying Come and let us joyn our selves unto the Lord in a perpetual Covenant that shall not be forgotten Jer. 50.4 5. When the Spirit is poured out from on high upon his people then the Lord turns to them a pure Language that they may call upon the Name of the Lord to serve him with one consent then they turn humble Suplicants and pour out their hearts in groans and sighs that cannot be uttered then Pride and Haughtiness is taken away and people become poor in Spirit and have no confidence in the flesh but trust in the Lord and rejoyce in the Lord Jesus Zeph. 3.9 10 11 12. Rom. 8.26 27. Phil. 3.3 Till the Lord come till he return with mercy and loving-kindness and turn us again and cause his face to shine and see our ways and heal us we will but wax worse and worse there is no remedy for us but in his Sovereign Gracc and those mercies that have been of old and endure for ever Let us look to him who is exalted to give Repentance to Israel and Remission of sins that he would turn us that we may be turned and heal our backslidings and heal our breaches that he may utter that quickning word Ezek. 37.9 Come from the four winds O breath and breath upon these slain that they may live O Lord come and overcome our evil with thy goodness for who is a God like unto thee that pardoneth iniquity and passes by the transgression of the Remnant of thy heritage and retains not anger for ever because thou delights in mercy who will turn again and will have compassion upon us he will subdue our iniquities and thou wilt cast all their sins in the depth of the Sea thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob and the mercy to Abraham which thou hast sworn to our Fathers from the days of old Micha 7.18 19 20. We have not remembred our Covenant but have spoken words falsly in making a Covenant Nevertheless O Lord remember thy Covenant and establish to us an everlasting Covenant that we may remember our ways and be ashamed Establish thy Covenant with us that we may know that thou art the Lord that we may remember and be confounded and never open our mouth any more because of our shame when thou art pacified toward us for all that we have done O Lord Righteousness belongs to thee but unto us confusion of faces as it is this day to all of us to our Kings Princes Fathers Ministers people of all ranks belongs Confusion but to the Lord our God belongs mercies and forgiveness tho' we have sinned against him Lord give us Repentance and turn us and we shall be turned Let thy power be great according as thou hast spoken saying The Lord is long-suffering and of great mercy forgiving iniquity and transgression Lord humble our uncircumcised hearts that we may take with our sins and accept of the punishment of them that we may remember them with shame and sorrow but do not thou remember against us former iniquities but according to thy mercy remember us for thy goodness sake O Lord remember for us thy Covenant and repent according to the multitude of thy mercies and for thy names-sake pardon our iniquities for they are many and great And when Wisdom and Council and Strength when Light and Life is gone and when Unity is gone when there is none to help and none of the Sons of Zion to take her by the hand in her distress when there is none to make up the breach no Intercessor let thine own arm bring salvation When all earthly Glory is stained blasted and gone appear in thine own Glory in the glory of thy wisdom power and Sovereign grace in building Sion build the house and bear the glory that when thou hast done the work by thy Spirit grace grace may be glorified and that this may be written for the Generations to come that the people which shall be created may praise the Lord. We do not present our Supplications before thee for our righteousness for we are all as an unclean thing and our righteousness as filthy rags but for thy great mercy O Lord hear O Lord forgive O Lord hearken and do defer not for thy own sake O our God! for this people are called by thy Name O Lord the hope of Israel the Savior thereof in the time of trouble though our iniquities testifie against us do for thy name sake if thou mark our iniquity we cannot stand but there is forgiveness with thee that thou may be feared there is mercy with thee and plenteous redemption and thou redeemest Israel from all his iniquities and troubles O remember not against us former iniquities let thy tender mercies speedily prevent us for we are brought very low help us O God of our Salvation for the Glory of thy name and deliver and purge away our sins for thy name sake save this people bless thy Inheritance feed them also and lift them up for ever Save us O Lord our God and gather us to give thanks unto thy holy name and to triumph in thy praise Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting and let all the people say Amen Praise ye the Lord. Unto the King eternal immortal invisible the only wise God be Honour and Glory for ever and and ever Amen FINIS