to all Communities of men and to the flourishing of Religion I do not find that in the Law of Moses there was any direction or command in particular that when that people should chuse them a King that he should use his authority in causing both Priests and people to do their Duty in the several parts of Gods Worship enjoined by Moses his Law any more than Kings now under the New Testament are in particular appointed and required to see that the Christians under them both Ministers and People do their duty in matters relating to Gods publick Worship And yet when Hezekiah for instance to restore Religion after a decay of it in his Dominions commanded the Priests and Levites to do the duty of their places according to the Law of Moses and with advice of the Princes summon'd the People of the Land to come and keep the Passover and the like in the Conclusion it is said thus of him Thus did Hezekiah throughout all Judah and wrought that which was right and good and true before the Lord his God and in every work which he began in the service of the house of God and in the Law and in the commandments to seek his God he did it with all his heart and prospered 2 Chro. 31.20 21. And if this and the like in other good Kings was highly acceptable to God as we see it was then we have little reason to think it should be displeasing to him when Kings now do any thing like it He is the minister of God to thee for good saith St. Paul Rom. 13.4 and so long as he promotes the publick good in things temporal or spiritual Civil or Ecclesiastical he is not out of his way If it were a thing so well pleasing to God for Abraham to command his Children and his great Houshold to keep the way of the Lord as that God himself applauded him for it Gen. 18.19 it cannot certainly be an offence to him for Kings to command their Subjects to do likewise It was no small blessing that God promised to the Church when he said that Kings should be their nursing Fathers and Queens their nursing mothers and it would be great ingratitude not to acknowledge it to be so when they use their power and authority not only to protect and incourage them in the profession of the Christian Religion but also in making provision as Nursing Fathers for their spiritual nourishment Isa 49. And the truth is the more the Higher Powers concern themselves in due ways to promote Religion in their Dominions the more usually it flourisheth as we see not only by examples in the Scriptures and other History but experience teacheth us that there is generally the least face of Religion in such places as have been most neglected in the publick provision I would advise those among you who are most tender in this point touching the Magistrates Power in matters of Religion to hear what is said in answer to a Question of this Nature by J. O. in some Sheets intituled Two Questions concerning the power of the supream Magistrate about Religion and the worship of God with one about Tythes proposed and resolved Whose words I know they will more regard than anothers The Question is Whether the Supream Magistrate in a Nation or Common-wealth of men professing the Religion of Jesus Christ may or ought to exert his power Legislative and Executive for the supportment preservation and furtherance of the profession of the faith and worship of God and whether he may and ought to forbid coerce or restrain such principles and practices as are contrary to them and destructive of them The Answer to which is managed under ten Heads of Arguments The affirmative saith he of both parts of this Question is proved 1. From the light and Law of Nature 2. From the Law of Nations 3. From Gods Institution in and by Laws positive upon Doctrines of faith and ways of worship of pure Revelation 4. From the example of all godly Magistrates accepted with God from the foundation of the World 5. From the promise of Gospel times 6. From the equity of Gospel rules 7. From the confession of all the Protestant Churches in the World 8. From the confession of those in particular who suffer in the World on account of the largeness of their Principles as to toleration and forbearance 9. From the spiritual sense of the generality of godly men in the World 10. From the pernicious consequences of the contrary assertion This was good Doctrine in 1659. And if upon apprehension and experience such Higher Powers do judge that all the Christian Ministers and People in their Dominions are never like to prove so wise and sober as not to abuse an absolute liberty by making different parties in the Church by chusing different ways of administration and if to prevent this and to preserve Peace and Unity in the Church as of great concernment for their edification and comfort and for the honour and reputation of the Christian Religion and for the better propagation of it they have thought it best to prescribe some method and form to be used by all it is to be seriously considered by you That if nothing in that method and form be enjoined you as a condition of Communion which is not sinful for you to submit to Then which is most eligible whether to separate or to submit to that method and form though it should not in your apprehension be so useful beneficial and grateful to you as a liberty for you and your Ministers would be to use what way you liked best If you say to separate is most eligible and fittest to be chosen in this case Then you must prove that which no man will ever I think be able to do to wit That it is lawful to break Churches to pieces upon the account only of some conveniencies you desire and inconveniencies which in your apprehension you suffer when otherwise you might lawfully and without defiling your selves with sin continue and maintain your Communion in those Churches to your own and their edification with whom you were united No doubt but the great differences that were on foot between the Judaising and Gentile Christians in the Apostles times did somewhat burden their Communion together in the same Church with some considerable inconvenience and so did the scandalous opinions and practices of many in the seven Churches of Asia and other Churches make the Communion which those had with them who had not defiled their garments the less pleasant and comfortable and in some respect burdensome to them But we hear nothing of separation and breaking of Churches in pieces upon that account nor of any encouragement given thereto by the Apostles but the quite contrary To bring this business down from above let us try it a little in your own Court Suppose the Higher Powers should not have concerned themselves in prescribing any Common form to be used in all particular
Anabaptists more true to their principles than they and that then the baptizing of persons may be as well deferred till they have special grace as their particular Church-membership may and so upon that account among others have gone over to them Secondly hereby some who may have no saving grace are in great danger of being betrayed into self flattery and into a being confident that they have because so good and knowing a Congregation as they esteem such a Church to be hath judged that they have and so rest secure in an unsafe condition Which made several of the New-England Ministers after their long experience of the effects of this way at last in their joint answer to Mr. Davenports Apologetical Preface p. 43 44. to say thus Indeed when men confound these two and do tie visible Church-membership unto such conditions and qualifications as are enough to salvation this may tend to harden men and to make them conceit that if they be got into the Church they are sure of heaven whenas alas it may be they are far from it Thirdly A guiltiness of a great Schism in the Church and consequently of the many sad effects of it some of which I have mentioned before If the separation built upon the principle under consideration had been matter of duty by vertue of that principle they that have engaged in it would not have been accountable for the evils consequent upon it no more than they were of setting Father against Son and Son against Father Mother against Daughter and Daughter against Mother by preaching the Gospel Lu. 12.53 But whosoever hath undertaken a separation from though but part of the Church upon insufficient grounds and mistaken principles must be accountable for the ill effects and consequences of it until they repent and leave off as well as for the Schism it self which caused them But now I have already represented to you why a Judgment in the Church that persons have not saving grace cannot be the rule of non-admission of them to particular Church Communion supposing them to have been baptized into the Church Universal and I have shewed likewise how that in the account of Scripture such have been visible Church-members and externally related to God and to Christ and called by his name and denominated Saints upon another account than that of saving grace or internal holiness Which if truly represented then it cannot be matter of duty but the contrary to ground a separation from such Congregations as are constituted upon other terms and because they are so In that those of the Churches mentioned in Scripture have been stiled Saints it is no argument why none are to be admitted to Church-fellowship but such as are Saints in a saving sense though this principle of separation I now speak of is wont to be grounded on that For some in those Churches which were not Saints in that sense were yet stiled Saints from their being separated and set apart to own and profess the worshipping of the most holy God only and to be of his holy Religion as I have shewed both in this discourse and elsewhere more at large Saints then was the common appellation of those that profest the Christian Religion as Christian is now and was not then used to discriminate the sincere from the unsound Christians as it is now This was a device of a later date and is too like that of the Church of Rome which does appropriate the honour of being Saints unto such only as they esteem to have been eminently Religious The conclusion then is that if the separation of these friends with that of your own be unaccountable from the Scriptures then they and you must needs be accountable for it as an unlawful and naughty Schism and for the many evils produced by it until pardon be obtained by repentance which none can promise themselves but upon reformation THE last thing I shall observe from the foregoing discourse is that it doth afford us a substantial ground for National Churches That is it affords us ground to conclude that the whole body of a Nation who are baptized into the Universal Church and that profess Gods true Religion are in that respect subject matter of a Church though this is indeed a thing which lies cross to your thoughts and which you are wont to oppose with some indignation The whole body of the Nation of the Jews as was shewed before were by Gods call and their profession Abrahams Spiritual Seed and as such were Church matter and a Church inorganically considered And for the same reason if the whole body of a Nation now by Gods call and their profession of the true Religion become Abrahams Spiritual Seed in a sense they must needs be as well National Church matter as the Nation of the Jews were Now that other Nations which have profest Gods true Religion have thereby become Abrahams Spiritual Seed in a large sense as well as the Nation of the Jews ever were we have good reason to believe not only from the nature of the thing it self but also from the Scriptures The Lord said unto Abraham My Covenant is with thee and thou shalt be a father of many Nations a father of many Nations have I made thee Gen. 17.4 5. Which is not to be understood in a restrained sense of his being a father of many Nations by natural generation only but also if not only of his being a spiritual father of many Nations who were to derive their being and what they should be in a spiritual or religious capacity from him from whom the true saving doctrine hath been since propagated first to the Nation of the Jews and then to Nations of the Gentiles And thus St. Paul interprets the aforesaid promise of God to Abraham Rom. 4.16 17. That the promise might be sure to all the seed not to that only which is of the law but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham who is the father of us all as it is written I have made thee a father of many Nations Now if Abraham be hath been and shall be a spiritual Father of many Nations then many Nations must needs be his spiritual Children For Father and Children are corlaretives and in what sense the one is a Father the other must be his Children And when St. Paul saith if ye be Christs then are ye Abrahams seed Gal. 3.29 is true of all that are so and in the same sense in which men are Christs in that sense they are Abrahams Seed whether it be by profession only or by a sound Faith also And in correspondence to all this the Kingdoms of this World are said to become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ Which must be understood of their becoming professors of the Gospel of Christ or the Christian Religion Revel 11.15 And this hath come to pass according as was foretold by the Prophets as well as to Abraham himself To instance in one instead
account of our divisions so as it never would have done if they never had been begun besides the hazard we run of exposing our posterities to lose the substance by our contending for circumstance and besides the temptation we have thereby put upon men to call the whole of Christianity into question and thereupon to give reins to their lusts more than ever before since the Reformation was first made I pray God so to bind the consideration of these things upon your minds that you may be awakened thereby out of I know not what dream into which a great many of the good people of this Nation have fallen There is nothing hardly in Christianity more evident than that matters of less moment are to give way to those of greater circumstance to substance conveniencies to necessaries a less convenience to a greater a greater inconveniency to a less duties only by Positive Institution to those which are morally or naturally such as might be shewed in many other Scriptures Hos 6.6 Mat. 12.4 5 6 7. besides those now touch'd on about Christian liberty And I think nothing gives a more direct contradiction to all this than the Schism that is made among us or the things by which it is made because by this you make matters of greater moment to truckle and yield to those that are less circumstance to substance matters necessary to those of conveniency a greater convenience to a less and so on For I appeal to the light of your own reason and to your Conscience whether the affairs of Religion in reference to the Church of God and to the World are so much concerned in having Gods worship and Ordinances administred in your way rather than in the way of the Church of England as they are in the peace and unity of the Church and in what depends upon them Whether the Souls of men in general both of those which adhere to you and of those which do not are advantaged by your way of administration above what they are and would be in the way of the Church of England more than they are hurt by the division and separation that is made about that difference Whether the Christian Religion be more honoured abroad in other Nations among Christians and Infidels by the one than hurt by the other Whether the Protestant Cause both at home and abroad gains more by the one than it is hurt by the other and whether more secured to posterity by the one than endangered by the other Whether error and heresie be more supprest by the one than propagated by the other and lastly whether Charity Humility and other Christian vertues or graces wherein the substance and power of Religion consists are farthered in your way above what they are and would be in the way of the Church of England more than they are hindered by Schism and separation Now if the affairs and concerns of Religion among men do in these and many other respects lose more by your Schism than they get by having the worship of God administred in your way rather than in the way of the Church of England as doubtless they do and the thing is too manifest to be denied Then you must needs be as certainly guilty of making matters of greater moment to stoop and submit to those of less as ever the Pharisees were of passing over the weightier matters of the Law and contenting themselves that they tithed Mint Anise and Cummin There is no such proportion of value in your way of external administration of holy things as different from that of the Church of England as makes it worthy to be put in competition with the peace and unity of the Church and what depends thereon For the Scripture no where lays any such injunction upon us to observe one way or manner of external administration of the right substance of worship supposing it to be done in common language as it does for the keeping of the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace nor gives any such caution against any external form of administration except that which is made in an unknown tongue as it does against the breach of the peace and unity of the Church and the many consequent ill effects thereof Nor is there any such utility in your way of administration as different from that of the Church of England as makes it worthy to be put in competition with the peace and unity of the Church I presume there is no sober serious Christian among you will say that your way of administration makes any such difference in the hearts and lives of Christians but that there were heretofore and are now Christians in Communion with the Church of England as sober righteous and godly as any among you I know nothing therein to hinder a man from being as holy and as good as he hath a mind to be It is the difference in mens more or less attendance to the substance of Christianity that makes them better or worse Christians and not their using different undetermined circumstances in the administration of worship And if it be so that your way of administration as different from that of the Church of England holds no such proportion of value or utility as makes it worthy to be brought in competition with the peace and unity of the Church Then for you to bring it into competition therewith nay to prefer it above the peace and unity of the Church and what depends thereon as it is apparent you do is a thing altogether unaccountable and a flat contradiction to that vein of Doctrine in the Scripture which I have mentioned above I know you will be ready enough to say that if it be so bad a thing in us to put undetermined circumstances in the administration of holy things into competition with the peace and unity of the Church as you say it is Then it cannot be good in them who by imposing such things upon us as conditions of Communion do put them into competition with the peace and unity of the Church also which is divided upon that account There is I grant little question but that the imposing of nothing as a condition of Communion but what is generally freest from exception is a very good way to preserve peace and unity in the Church But yet the using of some indifferent circumstances in the worship of God upon the first Reformation from Popery in this Nation was doubtless thought as convenient for the bringing people to Church then as ever a complying with the Jews in their usages not sinful in themselves was at the first Conversion of them to Christianity thought convenient to bring them to and to keep them in the Church then And though you think the case is so altered since the Reformation as that what was a reason of their use then to wit the bringing folk to Church is a reason of their dis-use and laying aside now as tending to the same end yet