the Apostles were known and professed enemies of the Gospel 2. The Apostles were charged not to teach in the Name of Christ nor to publish any part of the Doctrine of the Gospel which say they was more hard than their case under Bishops who though they cannot endure the truth concerning Government and Reformation of the Church yet are content the Gospel should be preached and preach it themselves They adde 3. The Apostles received not their Calling and Authority from men nor by the hands of men but immediatly from God Himself and therefore alâ—o might not be restrained or deposed by men whereas we though we exercise a function whereof God is the Author yet we are called and ordained by the ministery of men and may therefore by men be also deposed and restrained from the exercise of our Ministery Where as their first and second difference speak clearly to the second and third branches of our Question So this last doth fully speak our mind in this As to what they and Mr. Rutherfurd before them in his Preface to his Survey say of privat persons being Excommunicated their Non-submission to abstain from publick Ordinances As Excommunication is rarely pronounced in this Church except in the case of obstinacie and therefore may easily be prevented So we cannot understand how they can avoid Non-submission unless either they will forcibly obtrude themselves on Ordinances till they be thrust-out and so must come to Non-submission at last Or unlesse they get Ministers who will admit of them and so refuse to submit to the Judicatories which will at last fall in with the former case Though we in the mean time would have such a person seriously to consider whether his edification by these particular Ordinances from which he is debarred by the Sentence means simply necessary to salvation not being taken from him and the want of the rest being but his affliction not his sin take the matter in his own sense ought to be laid in the ballance with the breach made on Order in a Church constitute and setled as is said with the contempt and scandall put upon the Judicatories who yet stand invested with power to rule in Christs House yea and with the stumbling of the whole Congregation upon whom he obtrudeth himself who perhaps judge his Sentence to be as just as he counteth it unjust 2. As to the Submission of inferiour Judicatories to superiour concerning which they argue Arg. 7. pag. 107. And again Arg. 15. pag. 113 114. We grant indeed that the power of the superiour Judicatory is cumulative and not privative to the inferiour Judicatories yet it must be understood in a right sense for 1. It is granted on all hands betwixt us that by the Constitutions of this Kirk every Church-judicatory may not meddle with all things but with things that are of particular concernment within their bounds leaving things of more generall concernment to the Church to superiour Courts yea within their own bounds Congregationall Elderships do not meddle with the matter of Adultery Excommunication and Ordination of Ministers but these things come before the Presbyterie 2. Albeit inferiour Judicatories have intrinsick power given them by Christ and may exercise it independently where providence affordeth them no superiour Judicatorie yet in a Nationall Church it is the will of Christ they exercise that intrinsicall power with a Subordination to the superiour Courts so that so long as they hold the Subordination and do not renounce the Judicatories as Hereticall and corrupt they may indeed do all they have right to do yet so as they must be accountable to others in the case of Appeals or mal-administration who may lay as great claim to that promise Matth. 18. as they can And if the superiour Judicatories judge their proceedings to have been wrong in the case now before us it is no more lawfull for them than for private persons to make a Rupture by Non-submission or not suffering and being passive which will prove a remedy worse than the disease Nor doth this Subordination prove that these inferiour Judicatories must be fenced in name of the superiour Seing they know that even inferiour Civil Courts are not fenced in the name of a Parliament to whom they are subordinate And if this hold not it shall be to no purpose for superiour Judicatories to meet unlesse either to approve all that is done or else it please inferiour Judicatories to be convinced by them And indeed now it is no strange thing to see one privat Presbyterie not only reverse and declare null the Conclusions of a General Assembly but judicially declare the Assembly it self null far contrary to the Book of Discipline where it is expresly provided that Elderships or Presbyteries must alter no Rules made by Generall or Provinciall Assemblies Book 2. chap. 7. pag. 81. and no lesse contrary to the opinion of Beza Epist 44. pag. 244. who judgeth it iniquissimum intolerabile c. most injust and intolerable that things concluded in a Generall Synod should be rescinded by the Authority of one Consistorie unlesse the party passe from his right or things be agreed among parties without any detriment to Ecclesiasticall Discipline V. As to the nature of this Submission or manner of performance thereof two things are worthy our consideration for further clearing the truth in this particular 1. That in pleading for Submission in matters of Sentences as is above qualified we do not urge that men in conscience should approve of all and every of these Sentences as just however we do not therefore grant they are unjust as we shall after hear But only that what ever their judgement be they submit and suffer or be passive having done duty and exonered themselves without counteracting And that because 1. However they count them unjust yet they looking through the prospect of passion and interest may be deceived The Judge thinks them just and it may be many others yea all except the parties concerned 2. However it be yet it is better one or a few persons suffer somewhat than that a Schism be made in an Orthodox and well settled Church This being the true state of the Question and indeed a safe remedy appointed by God that when men in a Church cannot in Conscience obey a command then they may with a good Conscience submit and suffer for the Lord 's commanding us to submit and our engaging thereunto doth import there may be cases wherein we cannot give active obedience It is a miserable mistake all along in the most part of this debate that Obedience is confounded with Submission and Suffering That because a Church ought not in duty to domineer over the Flock pag. 52. therefore none of the Flock may lawfully suffer an injury or supposed so rather than do a greater injury by renting the Flock That because Prelats taught falsly that the Sentence of Superiours is a warrant sufficient to mens Consciences to give active obedience to their
to know wherein Presbyterial Government is an Ordinance of Christ more than is in any reformed Church where there are a plurality of Presbyters but no Judicatories erected It is true the circuit of their jurisdiction hath been fixed by the Judicatories with an eye to that great end of Edification viz. by having respect to the conveniency of their meeting for doing their work to edification and accordingly Assemblies have found it for edification to erect new Presbyteries for the better accommodation of Ministers and People all which being done according to the light of nature and generall rules of the Word they become so constituted divine Ordinances But that they are so alterable in subserviency to edification in these Witnesses sense and the way defended by them as that when persons under the jurisdiction of a Presbyterie do judge that they act not to edification they may turn their back upon them and all other established Judicatories and betake themselves to any plurality of Presbyters who will act these things which they judge to be to edification And that other Ministers who have no power over that Presbyterie may come in upon their work and act authoritatively in and over the Congregations committed to their charge We believe it will be judged a paradox by all those who understand any thing of Church-government And it needs not be thought strange that those Brethren do refuse submission to their own respective Judicatories so long as they maintain that they may usurp upon the power committed to others when they please This assertion of the divine authority of Presbyteries as they are bounded according to the light of nature and general rules of the Word may be further confirmed from the testimonie of the Author of the Course of Conformity who pag. 129. maketh use of the same notion of mixed Ordinances and doth so prosecute the same pag. 135 136 137 c. as doth demonstratively conclude that no Gospel-Ordinance administrated by this or that man in this or that place no Prayer consisting of such and such petitions only and not others no Sacrament administred in these individuall elements and many the like particulars are divine Ordinances unlesse we allow these to be divine Ordinances which are determined in the generall by the Word and in their particular circumstances not needfull nor possible or convenient to be determined in the Word by the light of nature and general rules of the Word We may also appeal to the judgement of the Reverend Assembly of Divines in their Answer to the Reasons of the Dissenting Brethren Edit Edinb 1648. pag. 231. Where though they professe not to plead an expresse institution that such Synods must be necessarily thus and thus bounded c. as neither Independents nor they can plead for the number and bounds of particular Congregations yet they do affirm that Synods thus bounded are agreeable to and warranted by the Word of God And again pag. 237 they make the same parallel betwixt the bounding of Synods and Congregations as being to be regulated by the generall rules of the Word and particular circumstances of times places and persons But leaving these to be further pondered by them who shall read these Treatises themselves We desire further that all discerning Readers will take notice of these few of many absurdities which will be found to follow upon this principle as it is asserted and put in practice by them 1. Whereas it hath been the work of all friends to Presbyteriall Government to prove that it bringeth not Congregations under any forreign jurisdiction as Prelats subjected all to themselves and their Cathedrall Churches seing all the Congregations within the bounds of a Presbyterie are ruled in common by their own Pastors and Elders assembled together This doth indeed bring-in a forreign jurisdiction both upon Presbyteries and People when a company of Presbyters who are neither Synod nor General Assembly set over them by Christ nay nor any Ecclesiastical Court at all shall take upon them to judge of the Call given by a People of the qualifications of him who is to be their Minister and of the Presbyteries carriage and judging in that matter and so shall proceed to the ordination of the Minister 2. By what divine warrant a plurality of Presbyters may act authoritatively in things belonging to a neighbouring Presbyterie they may by the same warrant act in Presbyteries never so remote at least within the National Church And by what warrant they may judge of the Call and Qualifications of a man for the Ministery and accordingly ordain him Minister of a Congregation within the bounds of another Presbyterie if they judge the Presbyterie conspireth to hold him out by the same warrant they may also depose a Minister or Ministers in Presbyteries if they judge their respective Presbyteries conspire to hold them in for we believe the power of Ministers in both these is of a like extent and so a few Presbyters may plant all the vacant Congregations and depose never so many Ministers throughout a National Church in despight of all the standing Judicatories who are hereby made but so many ciphers to signifie nothing Yea by this principle may not some number of Presbyters perhaps erroneous and hereticall plant all the Congregations in a Nationall Church upon the Call of some few of their own mind and yet violate nothing that is divine in Presbyteriall Government 3. By this principle no man is bound to look upon a Presbyterie ruling the Congregations in such a circuit as a divine scripturall Ordinance more than any company of Presbyters met together Seing all wherein the one differeth from the other is but of humane institution as they say 4. No person within the bounds of a Presbyterie shall be bound to owne their own Presbyterie as an Ordinance of God to which they ought to submit and give an account of their actions But they may as well betake themselves to any other Presbyters nearer or further off and if they satisfie them they may reckon they have done enough for obeying any divine Ordinance in this matter 5. May not people also within a Congregation upon the same account refuse submission to their own Minister and betake themselves to any other And may not Ministers intrude upon the Congregations of their Brethren without the transgression of any Ordinance of God Seing the bounding of Congregations is of human institution as well as that of Presbyteries as the Assembly of Divines do urge against Independents in the passages before cited and of which we may reade a witty discourse of Mr. Samuel Hieron in the Pulpits patronage by Thomas Ball part 3. ch 4. arg 9. where he compareth such Overturners of these setled bounds to a fellow who told him he cut timber out of other mens hedges because God never made hedges These and many the like considerations do make it evident that these Witnesses in stead of wyping off have added new jealousies of their way and that
Prelates tenet to that effect and consequently do not speak to the case of passive submission which is the matter in debate betwixt us and for which we hope to give relevant grounds these principles being all granted II. As to the persons or Judicatories to whom this Submission is due We do not urge Subordination or Submission to any Judge incompetent or which is not Ecclesiasticall Nor to any Ecclesiastcal Officer or Judicatory that is not of Christs institution Nor to any corrupt society calling themselves a Church or Judicatory of Christ while they are a Synagogue of Satan standing in opposition to the Doctrine of Christ But we plead for Subordination and Submission in a true Church and to Christs own Courts and Officers in her such as we hold the Church of Scotland now constituted to be For further clearing their mistakes in this matter we shall branch-out this Assertion in these 1. We plead not for Submission to an incompetent Judicatorie or a Judicatory not Ecclesiastical Upon this account among other reasons to be after mentioned as they might have spared Amos his not submitting to Amaziah pag. 100. who was not his Judge and the Apostles not submitting to the Council at Jerusalem pag. 101. which was no Judge-competent to any Officer of the Church of the New Testament there being other Courts appointed for the Government thereof as they conveened a Synod for judging of Doctrine and censuring of Offenders Act. 15. So all their instances of Non-submission of Church-officers in the matters of their Office to Civil Authority in the first instance fall to the ground For we hope it is agreed that Erastianism is contrary to the Word of God and condemned in this Church Though as to this matter we know not what to say of the judgment of these Witnesses For on the one hand they seem to magnifie Osianders observation though none of the most Orthodox Divines nor yet the most moderate of his party concerning the liberty of fleeing to the Magistrate pag. 58 59. and yet pag. 100. they put Civil and Ecclesiastical Authority in one Classe as to the matter of Submission We are sure whatever hath been their practice of application to the Civil Power it hath not been to preserve them from persecution but that they might obtain power to persecute And if they will turn Erastians we can say no further but the more wrongs the worse and omne Schisma parit Errorem as we have too much proof of their many new principles Though indeed whatever their pretences be for their own ends they are known to be alike respective both of Civil and Ecclesiastical Authority and that the overturning of either or both is alike to them before they reach not their ends 2. We plead not for Submission to Officers and Judicatories not of Christs own institution such as not only Popes but Prelates who drew all things in subjection to their Cathedral Church as is cleared by Divines destinguishing betwixt Presbyterial and Episcopal Government and Synods and were no lawful Church-Officers So that here their arguments conclude not taken from the practice of Ministers not submitting to the Sentences of Prelates in this Church pag. 55. For 1 It is not clear to us that they did not submit to the Censures inflicted We do find the contrary supposed in the Writings of these times both of one side and other that upon these Sentences they were to be put out of their places as is insinuated in a Treatise published anno 1620. by an opposer of Conformity bearing the Title of A Dialogue betwixt Cosmophilus and Theophilus As also in Mr. Struthers Letter to the Earl of Airth in the year 1630. printed 1635. It is true some of them preached after their Sentences But it is to be remembred that whatever was the after-strictnesse of Prelats in their Canons published anno 1636. of which mention is made by these Witnesses pag. 111. Yet at their first dealling with honest men so far as they can remember who suffered by them they did not depose them simpliciter from the Ministery but only desposed or removed them from their Ministery at the Kirk where they served and from the Benefice And this they all submitted unto having by their Protestations and Declinators born testimony against them as incompetent Judges though they preached elsewhere And this is the more probable to us in that never any of these sufferers were pursued so far as we can remember with any Censure by them for their preaching after the Sentence and in that when some of them were permitted to return to their charges there was not any re-admission of them thereunto which had been necessary if they had been simpliciter deposed but a simple returning to their work 2. But suppose they did not submit and let it be yeelded also that their Non-submission was nothing the weaker that the cause for which they were Sentenced was unjust as they urge pag. 55 56. and particularly that they were Sentenced for not conforming to Popish Innovations introduced in the Church or not acknowledging Prelatical Authority which is far from our case as we shall after hear yet they laid the weight of their Non-submission upon their Judges being no Officers appointed by Christ to rule His House which some if not all of them witnessed by their Declinatures in the time of their being Sentenced For they can bring no instance of any one of them Sentenced by Presbyteries only and they not submitting And however they alleage pag. 55. that the Prelats did sometime associate to themselves the Ministery of those bounds where the supposed Delinquent served that is the Presbyterie whereof he was a member which was a lawfull Authority Yet we cannot learn that de facto they did associat these unto them in censuring such as did not submit whatever was their practice in censuring some others for grosse scandals but did proceed in these in their High Commission Court Nor do we think these Witnesses believe they did associate or call these unto them that they might act authoritatively with them as a Presbyterie but they did all by their own Authority 3. Withall it is to be remarked that however some Ministers did not give Submission to the Sentences of Prelats in this Church where Prelacy was but in introducing and was not fully setled to the divesting of Presbyteries of their power Yet the practice of Non-conformists in England where that had been the only Government from the beginning of Reformation was different where they not only submitted to the unjust Sentences of Prelats yea of their Commissaries and Officials but being quarrelled therefore by the Brownists they wrote a Treatise in defence of the Church of England and themselves since published by Mr. Rathband anno 1644. under the tittle of A most grave and modest Confutation of the Brownists wherein they assert That the Church of England being a true Church and Episcopall Government the only Church-government established by Authority though
do make and keep up a rent in this Church And all this they do if we believe them lest we should ruine the Government who in all things observe the order constantly practised in this Church since the late Reformation Men would rather say that these actings speak that they will really ruin it upon a fear that we may ruin it take the matter in their own sense but in effect they do so when we are endeavouring to maintain it 3. As to their solemn taking God to record in this matter we shall not meddle with it nor with their sincerity in it as not belonging to our cognition nor are we bound to take never so solemn professions for current payment which will amount to no more than this that they seriously believe their way is not contrary to that Government which they believe to be of God so long as we find mens actings whereby we may judge of their respect or disrespect to the Government so far as is incumbent to us whatever their own inward real thoughts be And here we must tell them that all they alleage of their professing preaching and printing for it of meeting in Presbyteries and Synods as members and of the obedience they professe to yeeld will never speak out their respect to it while they have not spared to break the Judicatories of the Church in a time of so many errours and when her unity was so necessary and so have exposed her as a prey and while they have not only publickly traduced this Church in her Members and Judicatories to the saddening of friends and triumphing of enemies but they themselves will do nothing nor suffer any thing but what they are pleased to accompt right and just let the Judicatories conclude never so often and have never so much to say for the justice of their proceedings These are practices which we know not if their coming to the Judicatories and observing what they like of their proceedings will set off as consistent with respect to the Government But these Witnesses proceed more particularly to vindicate themselves by answering to these things which are laid to their charge as evidences of their wronging the Government These they professe pag. 66. to have insisted on for clearing of themselves and taking away of that rock of offence upon which we have stumbled And we do heartily wish they were able to do it convincingly for it would be most refreshfull to all of us to find all the Members of this Church friends indeed and not in name only to the Government of the Church But we are sorry to find that in stead of rooting out old jealousies they have started new principles which do confirm them and beget more fears And here in the entry of this debate we do once for all intreat the judicious Reader to consider how these men who pretend so fair to adhere to Order and Government and to walk after the pattern of our pious progenitors do in effect but trace the steps of the Remonstrants or Arminians in the Low-Countries For who so will be pleased to peruse the Acts of the Synod of Dort with the Preface thereunto prefixed Edit in folio will find that not only in their Protestations the tenour and reasons whereof do homologate that Protestation of the Arminians against the Synod of Dort but in the most of their projects and practices here defended they have so exactly paralleled them as if they had set them before them as their copie Their tumultuous and disorderly way of planting Congregations of which we will hear more afterward was the very practice of these Remonstrants who made it a great part of their work to obtrude upon vacant Churches Ministers addicted to their opinion excluding where-ever they could all others though never so well qualified and orderly called and desired by the Churches In which they did not only misregard the inclinations of the people who by that means were put to hard shifts and despise the judgment of Classes and Synods but made use of force and power Praefat. pag. 20 21. ad annum 1611. Neither wanted they a pretence for these and the like irregularities contrary to the established Order taken from the distempered state of the Church whereof it was then told them themselves had been indeed the cause and their pretending thereof was in effect a gloriation that they had so far disordered all matters that they could not be remedied Act. Synod pag. 87 88. This is also pretended here pag. 32 33. and doth deserve the same answer That Order procured by some of our Brethren to which somewhat is here also spoken wanted not its own pattern among the Remonstrants who that they might encrease their own party and seclude others from the Ministrie procured that the election of Ministers should be not according to the Order established in that Church before but by four of the Magistrates who for the most part then in Holland were addicted to them and other four to be deputed by the Presbyterie Praefat. pag. 26. ad annum 1614. As they with us have made themselves a distinct body and keep their own meetings under the name of the Godly Party So also did the Remonstrants set up their meeting apart from the rest of their Brethren for carrying-on their own ends Praef. pag. 15. As these Remonstrants by bitter invectives in Pulpits and infamous Libels in writ and print did revile the Protestant Doctrine and Teachers to render them odious and draw people into their faction Praef. pag. 14 20 21. and frequently So this Church hath met with the same measure from such as these Witnesses as is notour to the world and abundantly clear from this very Pamphlet We have here a great debate for Committees of equal numbers of both judgments to be chosen by the respective parties And in this also the Remonstrants have led the way to them who being but a few number in that Church to make themselves strong and equall with the Orthodox did urge it as the first of those conditions upon the granting whereof they would joyn in a Synod that the Synod should consist of Commissioners of equal numbers of both parties each to be chosen by their own party Act. Synod pag. 65 66. As now it is urged that men ought not to submit to Sentences of lawfull Judicatories which they count unlawfull and accordingly men who are censured do still continue in the exercise of their Ministery pretending that the Sentences are unjust So also the Remonstrants maintained they could not submit to any Sentence save in so far as they were convinced in consceince of the equity and justice thereof and when they were censured they did counteract and go on in the exercise of their Ministrie Act. Synod pag. 66. and Praef. pag. 20. And when it was laid to their charge that by Non-submission they did violate their engagement at their entry to the Ministry they used the same shifts for most part which are now
cast in our teeth Act. Synod pag. 87 c. These and many the like passages recorded in that Preface and rejected and refuted in the Synod may shew that it is not without cause we are suspicious of their wayes whom we find to walk in these paths which had well nigh ruined that Church And who so desireth further satisfaction in this matter we intreat that beside the Preface they will ponder the Remonstrants Conditiones habendae Synodi with the Answer of the Synod of Delph thereunto and the judgement of the forreign Divines upon their Declinatour especially of those of Geneva All which are recorded in the Acts of that Synod But we come to the particulars I. They vindicate their Protestations against the two last Assemblies as not being destructive to the Government because they professe the contrary in these very Protestations and these Protestations were only made against undue qualifications of and prelimitations made by persons assuming the exercise of Government which the duty they owe to the Government and preservation thereof constrained them to testifie against after the example of our fathers of old And they think it strange that the Authors of the Declaration should wrap up the authority of those two Assemblies and of that part of the ministeriall Church which is of their judgement in the very being of the Government as if the Government could not be owned nor subsist the authority of these meetings being denied and the corruptions of men discovered and acknowledged So pag. 17 18. Answ This would have been judged strange doctrine in the Generall Assembly 1638. where it is put in the Sentences of severall of the Prelates that declining and protesting against the Assembly is censurable with summar Excommunication and yet these Prelates did pretend reasons of their deed no lesse valid themselves being Judges than they think their own to be in their judgement Yea we are not forgetfull how it was asserted also before our differences by a leading man of that party acquainted with the Acts of this Church That protesting against an Act of a Generall Assembly or of Delegats having their power did deserve the same censure But as to these their Protestations seing they do here not only endeavour to vindicate themselves as doing no wrong to the Government thereby but all along lay the corrupt constitution of these Assemblies as a crime to our charge and do pretend it as a warrant for their irregular actings and a great obstruction to unity as may be seen throughout the Pamphlet We must once for all put them in minde that this matter hath been spoken to already the nullity of their proceeding in these Protestations discovered their exceptions against these Assemblies again repeated in this Pamphlet answered and the practice of our fore-fathers cleared and vindicated partly in the Observations upon our differences and partly in the late Representation which are unanswered to this day And therefore it doth concern them to satisfie unbyassed men with more solid arguments than naked assertions especially in a matter of such importance against which so much hath been argued and upon which they lay so much weight and which if it prove to be wrong they must undoubtedly conclude themselves among the most turbulent men that have lived in a true reformed Church In the mean time till they bethink themselves of this we must tell them 1. Their fair Professions in their Protestations will not blind the eyes of discerning men to make them believe that they did not wrong the Government thereby but had a care of the preservation thereof Experience teacheth that worst of courses do usually lay claim to fairest of pretences and that Innovators do ordinarily intend the quite contrary to what they pretend though we shall be far from judging so of many who followed that course in the simplicity of their heart 2. As to their quarrelling that we wrap the Authority of these Meetings and the plurality of other Judicatories which is the ministeriall Church of our judgement as themselves confesse all-along in the very being of the Government Though we confesse Presbyteriall Government is an Ordinance of Christ and might be owned and subsist albeit there were not a Church in Scotland Yet we are sure it is not mens respect to the abstract notion of Church-government or to the exercise thereof in Vtopia that will prove them friends to it while in the mean time they oppose it as it is exercised in the Reformed Churches And therefore as we are far from judging the discovering of mens corruptions to be destructive to the Government provided the matter be orderly pursued and judicially made out not alleaged only So we do constantly maintain that their rejecting of the Judicatories of this Church as not worthy of their trust upon the account of the corruption of the plurality thereof doth in effect overturn the Government in this Church and striketh against it in all Reformed Churches also there being through the mercie of God generally as fit Officers among us as else where And as to their Protestations we fear not to assert that thereby they have given the saddest blow to the Government of this Church of any it hath met with since the Prelats were removed For hereby they have opened a door to all confusion And as they have striken at the being of two Assemblies So their Reasons if of any weight will conclude as strongly against others before these and their example may teach others as well as themselves to decline all Church-judicatories so often as they please 3. We wonder how they can alleage prelimitations of these Assemblies as a proof of their nullity suppose the charge were true as it hath elsewhere been proven to be a calumnie when yet they will admit of no Assembly as lawfull without prelimitations enow yea where we are the plurality as they expresse themselves pag. 91 93. and elsewhere This is indeed to give out with one measure and take-in with another II. As to the charge of their planting Congregations in a disorderly way and counteracting to the determination of Judicatories in that matter They do upon the matter confesse the thing and indeed the world knoweth they have acted in a tumultuous and disorderly way which themselves acknowledge to be a fault great enough pag. 19. only they strive to mollifie it diverse wayes First by giving an account of the causes moving them so to do which are at length deduced pag. 19 20 21 22. Namely That by the Publick Resolutions and the Constitution and Acts of the late Assemblies malignant men have got up their head in Congregations and Presbyteries to bring-in others like themselves and hold-out able and godly men All which they think might perswade them to a preterition of some things otherwise fit to be observed in the course of formality and order Answ 1. This is indeed a very notable testimony they give their Mother-church in the day of her reproach from adversaries
our part we trust we have obtained mercie to love piety and have much longed to see more fruits of it among those who make so much noise among which we esteem this a special fruit if men were more sober and orderly in their walk and more sparing in talking of their piety and crying-up of themselves And thus we have done with this first part of their Apologie wherein we have insisted the longer now that we may save our selves much labour when we shall so often meet with these things again in this Pamphlet Secondly But lest it might be objected that no such faults of the Judicatories and Congregations did warrant them to sin and break Order They mollifie their practice further pag. 22. by telling us that what they do is a sinlesse preterition of some things otherwise fit to be observed in the course of formality and order and that as they do nothing sinfull and evil of it self so they do nothing from contempt or disrespect to the least point of order and have kept within the bounds warranted and allowed unto them of God This general seemeth to us very strange Divinity that the intruding of a Minister against the consent of the plurality of the Eldership and Congregation to whom belongeth the giving of the Call and without the concurrence or consent of the Presbyterie to which that Congregation is subordinate to his Ordination is but a sinlesse preterition of a formality and no transgression of the bounds warranted of God And we cannot but look upon them as scorning us when they say they break Order but not out of contempt or disrespect to it But afterward pag. 34. we find them endeavouring to clear this matter further where in stead of saying any thing to the interest of the Congregation wronged by them they take it for granted that the man is lawfully called by the Congregation whom the Presbyterie conspireth to keep-out Which indeed is unhandsomly to beg a great part of the Question beside the unjust aspersion cast upon the Presbyterie And as to the wrong done to the Presbyterie by others medling to ordain a Minister within their bounds they are pleased to rectifie our judgements and conceptions by telling us in application of their distinction betwixt the essentials and circumstantials of Presbyterial Government premitted pag. 33. that in the matter of Ordination this is of scriptural divine institution that a Minister be ordained by a plurality of Presbyters but that he be ordained by such a number officiating in such a bounds the Scripture hath not determined Whence they infer that in case a Presbyterie conspire to hold-out one who is lawfully called and rightly qualified it is no breach upon the being and essentials of the Government if he receive his Ordination and Admission from a neighbouring Presbyterie especially when the conspiracy is general and no remedy can be had by a superiour Judicatorie Answ Not to insist upon the falshood of this Assertion That there is a conspiracie in any Presbyterie far lesse a general conspiracie to hold out a godly man lawfully called and rightly qualified because he is not of our judgment though it were no declining from truth in him to be so We must say it that whatever may be said in defence of Ordination by Presbyters only in a Church not constituted Yet it is new and strange Divinity to set up and maintain that practice in a Church constituted and setled in her Judicatories and particularly in this Church where the like assertion or practice was never heard of before since the Reformation of Religion and that notwithstanding all the tyrannical conspiracies of the Prelats to hold out godly men from the Ministrie But it would have been judged as indeed it is an utter subverting of Church-government as it hath been exercised not only now but ever since we had Judicatories that a Presbyterie or Ministers of divers Presbyteries which indeed is the case though in effect a Presbyterie are but so many Presbyters to all those who are not under their jurisdiction or whose scandals fall not to be cognosced by them as to any Ecclesiasticall power they can exercise over them should intrude themselves within the bounds of another Presbyterie and there do the work of that Presbyterie in a Congregation subordinate to them without yea against their consent And that the supposed faults of Presbyteries should be redressed by others who have no jurisdiction over them and not by their respective superiour Judicatories only We find the Scripture giveth the power of Ordination to the Presbyterie 1 Tim. 4.14 which is more than the plurality of Presbyters only And Mr. George Gillespie in his Assertion of the Government of the Church of Scotland part 2. chap. 3. pag. 132. doth reject Sutlivius his glosse upon the word who by the Presbyterie understandeth only the Ministers of the Word Non juris vinculo sed utcunque collectos i. e. gathered and conveened together not by vertue of any legal bond or association but as it may be occasionally and accidentally for such a businesse Which is as like the way of our Brethren in this particular as one thing can be like another To this may be added that the second Book of Discipline to which they professe to adhere pag. 13. doth restrict the exercise of the power of Presbyteries then called particular Elderships to the bounds committed to their charge or where they govern This or the equivalent restriction is four times repeated chap. 7. pag. 80 81. and thrice in that Act of Parliament establishing Presbyteriall Government prefixed to the Books of Discipline pag. 20. As for their distinction betwixt what is of Scripturall institution and what not or as they have it pag. 33. of positive humane institution to be regulated by that great end of Edification and altered accordingly Mr. Gillespie in the foresaid Treatise part 2. chap. 6 pag. 160 161 162 163. hath abundantly cleared that the determination of the several sorts of Ecclesiasticall Assemblies are left to be particularly determined by the Church conform to the light of nature and general rules of Gods Word and that these particular kinds of Assemblies appointed by the Church according to the light and rules foresaid do fall within the compasse of these things which are Divino-Ecclesiastica mixed though not meer divine Ordinances Which also concludeth strongly for the bounding of these Assemblies to be of the same nature For the Word of God having appointed so many Pastors and Elders as can with conveniency ordinarily meet together out of the Congregations in a convenient circuit to make up a common Presbyterie which hath power and authority to govern these Congregations as is held out in the said Treatise part 2. chap. 3. pag. 146 147. And the Church having now determined according to these common rules these several meetings to be common Presbyteries in their respective bounds If we hold these meetings so bounded to be only of positive humane institution we desire
them the power of a General Assembly is but too notour in their judicial condemning the authority and constitution of General Assemblies But wherein this crime of Synods taking that power on them can be charged upon us we know not unlesse it be on this account That now when General Assemblies do not meet yearly as they were wont to do Synods do take-off the Censures of some Ministers according to the Order observed by General Assemblies themselves when they did open the mouthes of any And this we believe will not be condemned but any unbyassed person will judge it unreasonable that men being in a capacity to be imployed in the work of the Lord should be keeped back because a General Assembly who used to reserve such cases to themselves cannot meet to give them liberty We believe that in the want of General Assemblies as in Holland they will not judge that Synods may not do more in things within their own bounds than if they had them yearly And to use their own argument here we think they should not quarrel this who not only wait neither for Presbyteries nor Synods but do themselves take-off their own Censures inflicted by General Assemblies but their extrajudicial meetings do transact and conclude things of most important and general concernment to the Church III. To the complaint of their slandering of us they make a large return pag. 24 31. And First They begin with recrimination making mention of a Latin Piece lately published which they father on a dead man reflecting also on our Preachings and Prayers and other Pamphlets as they call them Ans To adde nothing to what is formerly said of their inhumanity toward the dead we shall only imbrace their own Overture and shall be obliged to any of them who shall be at the pains to turn that Piece in English and let it plead for it self And for our Preachings and Prayers though we love not to justifie our selves or cry-up our abilities and abundance of matter for that work for who is sufficient for these things Yet we make conscience to speak nothing in publick but Truths of God and such things as are suitable to the present condition of our hearers and who so reproacheth us in these things we must leave it at our Masters feet in whose Name we speak However we have learned not to credit all the news they give us of the acceptance of our Ministrie either with these of our or their own judgement being we hope approven not only to God but even in the consciences of our hearers And we may also say there was never more forbearance given in a constituted Church to irregularities in preaching than hath been given to theirs though they be so unparalleled and all out of love to peace Whatever we say or write against their cause and actings therein yet we use not to slander their persons in things extrinsick to the cause as they do to us nor did we publish any thing of that kinde till they by printing and writing had defamed us at home and abroad which necessitated us to say somthing for our selves and the Cause of God in our hands Secondly They justifie these their actings by shewing that they were necessarily drawn thereunto in their own defence wishing us to have patience if these be slanders till God clear our innocencie and discover their malice and treachery But if there be truth in them they may lawfully plead with their Mother for good ends Answ 1. Though we indeed confess it our duty to walk submissively before God under most unjust aspersions yet we believe that doth not hinder us to vindicate our own integrity and the integrity of a National Church far lesse doth it warrant them who put us to this exercise thus to insult over us with such Ironick counsels as they account them we forbear to declare whom they imitate in these pranks and are truly sorry that their pertinacious adhering to such divisive and destructive courses notwithstanding all the sad fruits which they may daily perceive to flow from them doth discover them so much to all impartial observers 2. Our controversie being with them about the Publick Resolutions and admitting of persons to imployment in a Civil State and Armie and about the constitution of a General Assembly we see not what could cast them upon the necessity of this defence of traducing all the Ministrie in that cause seing they were standing Ministers in the Church before not declared uncapable of being in a Gen. Assembly And sure they fell not within the compasse of the Question of the Publick Resolutions and therefore they might well have debated these points without reflecting upon the Ministrie save in so far as they pleased to quarrell so many of them as were upon the Commission and Assembly for their approving the Publick Resolutions wherein they have been sufficiently answered already and those who are concerned are still ready to defend and justifie themselves The truth is after these debates about the Resolutions and Assemblies were become threed-bare and invidious to all sober spirits that they should keep up a rent because of them they fell to a new clamour about purging of which they here speak and in which we did not controvert with them neither before nor in the time of their rent yea nor since save in so far as we have still complained that their disturbing of Church-unity and order made it ineffectuall in many respects What their design is in it may clearly appear from this Pamphlet wherein oftener than once they insinuat and declare that they hold our Judicatories corrupt and would not joyn in a General Assembly so long as men who as they alleage have made a defection by approving the Publick Resolutions are the plurality in them So that to have themselves again in power and others out they make this clamour against us which is unjustly said to be in their own defence but rather in prosecution of their design to overturn the Church-judicatories as now constituted that so they may get all the power in their own hands as was told them in the Declaration 3. It cannot be accounted an act of defence for them to divulge mens supposed faults in stead of seeking to have them judicially tried and censured and when none was pursuing them to blaze them abroad in another Nation and Church to make way for their obtaining of power to themselves over their Brethren 4. Albeit we should be silent as to the truth of their charge yet that passage Hos 2.2 will not justifie their way of proceeding We hope they will not make the state of this Church parallel to the state of Israel at that time when this command was given to the Godly which they now pretend to imitate For then they must conclude this Church not to be Gods wife but an harlot and though she have corrupted neither Doctrine Worship nor Government yet she must be put in the same classe with
their evil courses though we know nothing done but the naked testimonies of Judicatories against them they ought not to repine IV. As to their vindication of their endeavours to set up extra-judiciall Committees of equal numbers for managing of the affairs of this Church to which they speak pag. 31. 39. We cannot but observe a notable piece of nimblenesse in their managing of this defence For they bring-in this challenge mentioned in the Declaration only as it is complained of that the not granting of that Overture of extrajudiciall Committees of equal numbers of both judgements to be chosen by the respective parties was a cause of breaking-up the Conference for Union without mentioning that other part of the complaint that they endeavoured and with much eagernesse prosecuted that design imploying all their credit with all sort of persons for that effect to have the same imposed upon us when they were at London Only they huddle-up what is said of that as a resuming and prosecuting that same point As if the Authors of the Declaration were complaining in both places of their breaking off the Conference only upon this matter And so all-along they hold us to the Article as propounded to us Only they give an hint of an Overture the same for substance as it was propounded to us without speaking to what an Overture it was and when or how given-in This is indeed an handsom or rather unhandsom conveyance or shifting of what they had no will to meet with For to say no more any unbyassed person will see a vast difference betwixt a desire to have an extraordinary Overture take place in a Church by the common consent of those who are concerned and some privat persons endeavouring and that after other designes to the great prejudice if not ruin of this Church had miscarried in their hand to have such things imposed upon the Church by the Civil Power when they had no Commission from the Church for that effect and knew it was dessented from in a former Conference by the Ministers of the Church upon whom they would have it imposed This is an usurpation upon a Church and her Government which we believe no sound Presbyterian will justifie nor any others who are not Erastians as was judged by godly Presbyterians upon the place when these Proposals were made to whom the Churches of Christ owe thanks for their testimonie to the Truth against such projects But to consider what they say leaving that distinction betwixt the essentials and circumstantials of Government pag. 33 34. to which we have spoken before They confesse it is an Overture out of the common road of ordinary procedure pag. 37. and therefore they are but in petitorio with it and had need to make their arguments for perswading us to run out of the way which we believe to be of God very pungent and pressing before we can yeeld to their desire We conceive their discourse on this subject may be reduced to these heads First That the decaying and distempered estate of the Church calleth for and alloweth such an Overture otherwise they professe they would be as far from pressing it as any other pag. 32 33. Which is upon the matter as we may hear more fully afterward that were they once the plurality and in power they would be loath to let it out of their hands or let any such Committee be set over them or any party presume to nominate an equall half of these Committees This we do very easily believe but now so long as they are out and cannot be content of their lot and share in Government as their number in Judicatories alloweth all must be corrupt and all the Judicatories cast loose and trod upon as unwilling and unable to do a good turn But to the matter As we know no other distemper nor unpeaceableness of this Church but what themselves have made and continued and therefore may cure it whenever they please to weary of these courses So for the supposed corruption thereof we have already considered how they have made it out Only we blesse God they will find no unsound Doctrine or Worship nor scandals in conversation approven in this Church nor yet that this Church is upon the declining hand since our differences as to the planting of able and honest Ministers And we do again assert That whatever corruption there be in Members of this Church yet this remedie once admitted of turning the Government out of the channel which we believe to be of God would be far worse than the disease and a preparative of most dangerous consequence whenever any party should be pleased to make use of the same Yea if upon the supposall of our corruption they infer the necessity of extrajudicial Commitees may not others gather much more from such premises Were it even a seperation from us or a prelacy as their Commitees are in effect in some honest hands to controul us in our actings They again inculcate pag. 33. That General Assemblies conceived extraordinary visitations needfull when the Church was in a better condition than now and when not a few in Presbyteries and Synods did say it was a foundation for an imputation upon Synods and Presbyteries Answ But to repeat nothing of what hath been said of the present case of this Church any body with half an eye may see a difference betwixt a General Assembly the Supream Nationall Church-judicatory their appointing their own Delegats chosen without respect to factions by plurality of Suffrages for going about a work and this extrajudicial Committee chosen by parties to do the affairs of Presbyteries and Synods Must it not be strange arguing That because General Assemblies appointed Visitations to try and censure therefore they should conclude guilt is found on the plurality of Ministers whereas themselves have found it otherwise where they have power and made trial of men and where they made as great a clamour of the corruption of men of our judgment as now they raise of them in other places And therefore also either must they who are a dividing party have matters tried in an extrajudiciall way without order otherwise they will do what they can to overturn the Church They retort pag. 37 38. That though they have not the same power the Generall Assembly had so to do yet the Assemblies ground and reason moving them to appoint these Visitations doth yet remain viz. that Presbyteries and Synods were not so healthy as to do these things of themselves which is much more true now when malignant men are got above hatches and sundry of them set to the helm Answ But 1. Is it not great presumption to parallel Visitations appointed by Assemblies and chosen by themselves according to Order and these Committees chosen by parties Did Synods choose such Visitations according to Order as they do upon occasion within their own bounds who would condemn it but for parties to impose a Nomination on a Synod is another matter
any ill that is done without needing to call for a meeting of Delegats from all the parts of the Country and waiting their leasure to advise and consent while in the mean time their Committees may put the matter past remedy one way or other And how can a Synod out the ratification of their proceedings to the question If the not ratification of them be not the other member of the Question And if not ratification import a reversing do not the Synods make too bold with their Masters and Tutors to hazard that upon a Question Or if it import not a reversing then we must learn this new principle of Government that a Synod may not only refuse to ratifie but by a judiciall sentence pronounce the non-ratification of the determination of a Committee subordinate and countable to them and yet these determinations stand unreversed But they assure us further that not only is the Synod free to ratifie but they are not simply tied by the Overture to follow the advice of these Delegats in case of their advising them to reverse the deeds of these Committees Answ But we are sure they are so tied by the Overture that suppose they themselves judge the most part yea all of their Committees deeds to be not only simply worthy to be reversed but most horrid and blasphemous yet they may not without the consent foresaid reverse any of them And if they will allow the corrupt Synods so much as a libertie not to hearken to their Tutors advising them to reverse what they think amisse why will they not also allow them as much on the other hand as libertie to reverse what themselves think amisse though their Counsellers differ from them in that also The truth is we hardly think that indeed they do allow them any such liberty and that there may be a safe glosse were the matter once practicable put upon the Synods not being simply tied by the Overture which would teach them better manners than to sleight the advice of their betters But we professe we are weary and grieved to see men so ludere in re seria and think to please judicious and conscientious men with complements 10. They tell us further that we wrong them in saying this Overture was propounded as a perpetuall standing way alwayes to be followed to perpetuate difference and contentions Answ And yet they have not answered the argument which was propounded in the Declaration for proof of this viz. that yoking of parties of equal numbers together in debates as must be in these Committees will rather widen a breach than heal it seing they will not probably cede to other Sure we are we may lose hope of some of them who in our Judicatories can by no reasoning be drawn to quit the conclusion which they had in all appearance instilled into them before they came in Withall they had done well to answer another argument insinuated for proving this viz. that their power continuing till the present differences be healed the composing whereof with all future divisions is put in their hands and not at all to be meddled with by the Judicatories Are not all the Judicatories then at their mercy to continue them short or long yea perpetually if they please It is true they make an alternative of another better way to be ministred in providence for settling peace upon which their power is to expire But the Judicatories are at a losse about that also being sure our Brethren or their Delegats have a negative voice whether that be a better way indeed or not And we are so much the more afraid of this better way since in case this present way shall not please them they give us no hope of recurring to Christs own Institutions but they will have us look for some better way to be ministred in providence for setling peace which for ought we know may be ten times worse This also being hinted in that short Declaration with other considerations against those Proposals we leave to others to judge why they lost it with other two above repeated in their so large Answer to a short Paper wherein but a few prejudices of many were-mentioned as might be easily made-out by a large addition were it needfull V. As to our challenging of the Order procured by some of them putting the power of giving testimonie to Intrants which is due to Presbyteries only in the hands of some select persons of their own choosing They say pag 61 62. 1. That they wonder this should be mentioned seing the Protesting Party did not imbrace nor make use of that Order Answ But if they did not imbrace nor make use of it because it was prejudicial to the right of Church-judicatories then they confirm all that is said of it viz. That it was an endeavour of some of their party to enervate the power of Church-judicatories though it pleased the Lord to break that snare For their making use of it is not spoken to in the Declaration Yet we must adde that some will tell them That even those who pretended not to imbrace that Order yet dealt with others who were for it to let them have the benefit of it in their particulars which will hardly amount to a serious testimonie and opposition 2. They say that he who is blamed in this matter did but give his advice in that matter being required and when he saw the Order was not accepted he laid it aside and did not prosecute it any further Answ But who authorized him or others if any others of them did joyn with him in it to give advice in matters concerning the whole Kirk without the consent of or Commission from the Kirk which was the crime laid of old in the Prelats dish as a breach of these Caveats whereby their power was at first restrained after they had crept into this Church What warrant had he to lay aside the Presbyteries in that matter as not worthy to be intrusted with testifying concerning those whom they are authorized by Christ to try and ordain and put it in the hand of a Juncto Was it to teach those in power to sleight Church-judicatories With what face can they assert that he thought it fit Certificates should be granted by a select number of both judgements as if this had been a Committee of equal numbers when the quite contrary is clear from that Order For therein Scotland being divided in five Circuits or Provinces and no Intrant being to have maintenance without the Testimonie of four at least of these persons authorized for that effect in the respective Provinces The matter is so conveyed as in no one Circuit there are a competent number to give a Certificate named of our judgement as there is of theirs in every one of them and only here one and there another of ours added and yet there are a sufficient number of Independents named for one of these Provinces which containeth so much bounds as made
up formerly five Diocesses of our Prelats Further if he but gave his simple opinion upon demand in this matter and was not a projecter and procurer of it what needed any opposition to make him lay it aside and not prosecute it any further And how will he or they either convince knowing men that it flowed from his condescendence that that Order was laid aside when it was the deed of these in power here who perceiving the inexpediencie thereof and the prejudice redounding to many Ministers thereby procured the annulling thereof This also we may say further It was no sooner laid aside but they were upon new projects prejudiciall to the Church as is asserted in the Declaration 3. They say that we have done worse our selves for bringing the Ministerie into bondage by clandestine capitulations about Intrants to the Ministrie Answ We wish they had spoken out what they think needlesse to mention and if they had spoken truth it would have appeared how falsly they have charged us with any such clandestine capitulation and how much more falsly they have charged us with bringing the Ministrie under bondage In the mean time for our part we deny that there was any such thing And Mr. Rutherfurd who in his late Preface to his Survey chargeth this on a meeting of Correspondents from Synods hath given in print as much under his hand as that Engagement he speaks of amounts to so that if the rest be of his mind they quarrel not the thing it self but that they have not the credit to do it alone VI. In answer to what is said of their design in their three Proposals at London they give us an account and that in a different character of what we say of the first concerning their seeking a Commission for Plantation of Churches pag. 62. and in more than three pages following speak highly to our observations thereupon but never a word of the other two Proposals which the Authors of the Declaration laid most stresse upon for proving their Conclusion and therefore subjoyned them to the former in a different character that they might be taken notice of These Witnesses foreseeing how truly all these three together might prove the charge did therefore shufle in these as was said before with the businesse of the Conference where these same things were debated That so they might set their thumb upon them as if there were nothing of them here and then cry How weakly is it argued to conclude their attempting the ruin of this Church c because they desired a Commission of Plantation having power of disposing of the legal maintenance of Ministers As if because one of them and possibly the weakest of the three do not conclude it therefore all the three together will not And as if to endeavour the imposing upon Ecclesiasticall-judicatories in Ecclesiastick affairs by the Civil Power were but a peccadillo not worth the noticing by men who are writing Apologeticks of their respect to the Government and answering Calumnies as they call them cast upon them in that matter and when that is one of the particular and weighty charges laid at their door We believe it is no incivility to desiderate ingenuity and candor here and to suspect that this tergiversation speaketh no excesse of honesty in this particular And they know that if all the circumstances of their carriage and way in prosecuting these Proposals and other projects at London tending to the same end were laid open to the world it would give such a character of their respect to Presbyterial Government as would be little pleasing to them But what do they say even as to that Proposal 1. They tell us that they finding the inconvenience of putting the disposing of the legall maintenance of Ministers into the hands of a peculiar Court and then of the Council they did supplicate to have all that way altered and that Ministers might have full accesse to their stipends without Bonds or Engagements c. And that there might be a Commission for Plantation of Churches who might also do the duty of the Civil Magistrate anent Ecclesiastick matters c. Answ We have never heard more of the first part of their Supplication which we heartily wish were granted that they are pleased to tell us here and therefore fides penes Authores and if they have done good service in preserving the Liberties of this Church as they are pleased to take a good Testimony to themselves with a reflection upon their neighbours unbyassed men do perceive their Proposals do witness and one day which neither they nor we can get declined will declare But why do they huddle-up so darkly the matter concerning the power of disposing the Legal Maintenance of Ministers to be given to that Commission under these generals that thâ—y might do the duty of the Civil Magistrate anent Ecclesiastical matters which are the tearms they give us of their Supplication Or why do they make only a supposition of their desiring it when it is in terminis in their Proposal We shall wish them more candor than thus to deal with us and the world in print speaking so to the thing upon supposition as if it were in doubt whether they had done it or not And if their Supplication was so general there have been moe injuries than one in it to desire that all the duties of the Civil Magistrate in reference to Ecclesiastick affairs should be laid upon the shoulders of that one Commission For such a power taken in its latitude might not only include the late Order to which we spoke last in a new dresse and all the power which the Prelats had by vertue of their High Commission but all the power which Civil Courts or any Magistrate did exercise in Ecclesiasticis 2. They tell us it was no fault to endeavour to translate the exercise of that Power from one subject to another the Council being otherwayes necessarily diverted that they cannot conveniently attend it Answ But upon supposal of the resolution of the Civil Powers not to alter the former way of disposing of the Legal Maintenance which they had not only accounted inconvenient but even now pag. 62. had taxed it as a bondage upon the Ministerie by our Capitulations It had been more honestie for them not to condemn themselves in what they allow than thus to meddle to involve more in the guilt of drawing Ministers into such bondage The Council is beholden to them for caring for their ease though few Ministers are wearied with long attendance in that matter But we know these Witnesses better than to believe they would be so officious as to go to London and prosecute this Proposal so vigorously only for the Councils ease if they had not their own interest wrapped in it 3. They say that suppose their design in that Proposal had been to call the Authority of these late Assemblies in question as is charged on them in the Declaration yet not only that but
the pronouncing them null would not bring utter ruin to the Church and those that plead for them Nor do they see any inconsistencie betwixt that Commissions exercising their power and the standing of the Authority of these Assemblies Answ We must tell them again that had they taken-in all the Proposals here the Consequence had not been so dark And yet even that of their pronouncing the late Assemblies null hath given a sorer stroak to the Church than they will know well how to answer for as we have said and elsewhere cleared and keepeth men who plead for these Assemblies under the imputation of a defection and tyrannical usurpation of the power of a Gen. Assembly in this Church And this they will have still kept on foot were it but in such a matter as this till they be at leisure or have power to call them to an account for it And though we make no question but that Commission or any other Civil Court might exercise their lawfull power without any prejudice to the authority of these Assemblies or from the standing thereof yet any who please may see that their desire concerning the rule and way of that Commissions exercise of their power doth conclude them controverted Assemblies 4. In answer to that charge that the design was to have the maintenance put in the hands of men to their mind that so they might discourage all from the Ministerie who are opposit to themselves They are pleased to recriminate upon the Acts of the late Assemblies to which we have answered already and may meet with it again hereafter For they are afraid we forget it and therefore we are so oft told of it to make the volumn the bigger In the mean time we cannot but tell them That had the Church made use of those Acts as they did not yet the comparison is odious betwixt a Church taking course with those who renounce her Authority and are opposit to her just Determinations and a parties endeavouring to crush their Mother-Church and such as adhere to Truth in her that they may promote themselves They tell us again that though they cannot say they are so self-denied as not to have wished it so which we as easily believe as we are sure de jure they ought not to have wished it so yet they never expected nor proposed that there might be such a Commission as might wholly consist of men to their mind Answ Neither did any charge that upon them for sure the Maintenance might have been put into the hands of men to their mind although that Commission did not wholly consist of such It might have sufficed for securing that if they had kept but such a proportion as men to their mind keep in that Order of which we spake in the last Section And though they put us off with this handsome shift yet we are sure they did not labour so hard in it to play an uncertain game to themselves by admitting an equality of parties or any thing like it in that Commission But they say further that though the Commission had consisted mostly or wholly of such there would have been room and encouragement for men of our judgment both to continue and enter into the Ministerie Answ Why they mention our continuance in the Ministerie here not to insist how much it would encroach upon the just power of Congregations and Presbyteries if our room to enter into the Ministerie did depend upon such a Commission we know not unlesse it be to put us in minde to tell them that there was a project also to meddle with the Maintenance of setled Ministers and to have the Stipends of all the Ministers admitted since the year 1650. sequestrate till they should come before such a Commission And though we do think than there were sober-minded men of their judgment let alone by such as these Witnesses and taught to meddle more with what concerned their eternal salvation and not to imbark themselves in controversies of this kind we needed not doubt of receiving all kindness from them Yet so long as they make it their trade to stir-up all who will give them any credit to traduce even the best of those who are opposit to them we will be sparing of setting our seal to their assertion unlesse there be an ambiguity intended here in the matter of encouragement which honest Ministers will never want in the work of the Lord even though Maintenance were withheld from them Having considered what they speak to this head of their own Vindication except what they say here to the matter of Subordination which we leave to come in with the rest that followeth on that subject we shall briefly consider how they remove two other prejudices before they come to the Overtures of Union I. Whereas it was laid to their charge that they began a needlesse rent in the Church upon a question so extrinsick to our Doctrine Worship and Government and that it is a tossing of a debate now so far removed out of our way meaning the debate about the Publick Resolutions To this they give several Answers pag. 67 68 69 70 71. And first They tell us we began the Rent in that some of the Commissioners of the Generall Assembly without giving timous warning to others did in the year 1651. suddenly take these Resolutions when the whole Church of Scotland was in possession of and by Covenants and Vows engaged to the Truths to which these Resolutions are contrary and destructive Answ As to the proceeding of the Commissioners in taking these Resolutions as they needed not go into corners with that Question it being well known that though all of their judgment had been present they would not have made any considerable part of that Commission for stopping their procedure to any such conclusion so they are able to justifie that there was no surreptitious dealing in that matter But that before that Question came to be debated that party had deserted their trust in the Commission in that time of strait and would not come to it But as to the matter it self though their having truth on their side would not justifie them from being the makers of the Rent if it were not relevant or tanti as to bear all the sad consequents of a Schism Yet we are content the Rent be laid to their charge who shall be found in the error in this debate And we must again tell them that it is not fair dealing to stuffe so many Pages on all occasions with lowd outcries against these Resolutions without so much as one Argument to make good their Assertion or any endeavour to answer what is written against them in this mater Let them make it good that there is an errour in these Resolutions That they are condemned either in our Covenants or in the solemn Engagement concerning which it hath already been told them that that Paper was so contrived of purpose as it might not precondemn these Resolutions if
their endeavours to overturn and reject all Judicatories where they are not the plurality that they may have at least an equal hand in all things by their Committees of equal numbers as is frequent in this Pamphlet In the mean time they ought first to prove their way to be sound before they be so industrious to make so many proselytes Next they purge themselves of the crime partly in that though the Commission of the Assembly 1650. be in their judgement still in force yet after these of their judgement who are Members thereof had sitten in that capacity only till they had with the advice of other Brethren of their judgement published Causes of Gods controversie against the Land they have not since acted in that capacity And partly that having offered that we by our selves and without them would purge the house of God and we doing nothing but rather polluting it it was no affecting of domination to take some other course wherein yet they were content we should have more than equall share with themselves pag. 72. Answ 1. Though they boast also of this their condescendence about the Commission pag. 38. Yet as it was the highest of domination in a National Church That a party should judge of the nullity of her supream Church-Judicatory and thereupon continue themselves in a power which was extinct by the meeting of that Judicatory and which upon the same grounds they might perpetuate over the whole Church so long as they pleased That they should also usurp upon their Brethren who were joyned in that Commission with them by the Assembly 1650. in conveening and meeting themselves without calling to them to meet with them That they should meet without their Commission or a copie of it whereby they should know their Members and the Quorum of the Commission and the power and work committed to them and without which they were in mala fide to act And that they should obtrude upon a whole Church and the several Synods such things to be Causes of Gods controversie as were approven duties and had been owned as such by the former Assemblies of this Church as hath been already made out in former printed Papers As we say those pranks did speak the highest of usurpation that hath readily been heard of in a R. formed Church So it is well known that after they had published those Causes of Wrath they have adjourned the meeting of that Commission from time to time and at last did vote in their meetings to set it up again and act in that capacity and had done so if the Council whom they supplicated for that end would have owned them in it So that their ceasing to act since in that capacity is to us no evidence of their coming down in their spirits As may further also appear from the other courses they have since taken up as more compendious for attaining their ends than the way of that Commission For beside as is said that they have no copie of their Commission nor do know the tenor of it and the number which make a Quorum they are but a very small number of the Members of that Commission And if they could make a Quorum yet few moe so that they behoved to be constant Prelats attending on this thing Withall had that Commission right to meet they know if he who was Moderator thereof would conveen all the members they would not signifie much in that meeting and therefore it speaks no great want of a desire of Domination not to insist on that 2. As to the matter of Purging and the means they have projected for making it effectuall we have spoken thereto before and it will come in afterward Only we shall leave to unbyassed men from what hath been said to judge whether their means savour of ambition or not and whether the Church-judicatories and their Brethren have the credit of an equal share let alone more than an equal share as they affirm which indeed is to us a mysterie in managing these trusts And as to the occasion putting them on these courses we owe them thanks indeed that they desired us to purge by our selves when they by their irregularities and dividing from us have made it scarce practicable yea and altogether of none effect did others follow their principles and example But we desire to know where we neglected to try any upon any scandall where-ever we did forbear to censure condignly when any thing was found and wherein this Church hath been polluted by admitting so many or so vicious men as should put them upon these extraordinary remedies Would they as is said before have as purge whether we find guilt or not or else they will fall upon some odd courses Sure where themselves have power and made triall of men of our judgement they have not found so much as to need all this noise And we think it were safest for them to content themselves that they deliver their own souls in their respective stations in thess matters without stretching themselves so far without their line In the last place They shut up this Apologie with a remark that it is one of Satans policies when he cannot find faults in the outward carriage of men in a good work to charge them with inward abominations and mischievous designs which cannot so easily be refuted as justly denied pag. 73. Answ But as to our case in hand there is no need of secret or inward search to find these things which are engraven upon the skirts of their actings And if the things themselves do not make-out our charge to all unbyassed discerning men we shall passe from our compearance Having considered what they say for their own Vindication from alleaged aspersions we proceed in the second place to take a view of their thoughts concerning the Overtures for Union held-out in the Declaration passing their challenge against the Narrative premitted to it as being spoken to in the entry Here we may be the more brief partly because somewhat hath been spoken to this purpose in the Representation where an account is given of the Conference for Union and the breaking it off Partly because the things quarrelled and spoken-to here have many of them occured often before Yet we shall give an account of the whole matter in these particulars 1. This is in general a brief and sad account of it that our tearms of Union are rejected and no other offers made by them but what we may gather from their exceptions made against what we offered They professe indeed pag. 118. that our divisions are among the deepest wounds and greatest afflictions to their souls and that they would redeem a sinlesse Union at any rate that might not pollute their consciences and widen the breach with God And yet why do they leave it to us to make better offers pag. 9 And why would they not here publish to the world what they would be at in order to Peace which they so
much desire that either we might imbrace it or be inexcusable before the world if we rejected it or urged any thing upon them which might entrench upon their consciences and widen the breach with God The truth is whatever charity we have of the Protesting Brethren of whom they speak pag. 118. that many of them are grieved with these divisions and would be at an Union were they let alone Yet we have not the charity that these Witnesses are any of that number but the very fomenters of the flame 2. Because it is declared that we will not accord to their Proposals of extrajudicial Committees of which we have spoken before nor recede from the established Government nor go out of the common road of the Judicatories to the corruption whereof we have also spoken and will speak to Subordination thereunto afterward Therfore they count Union very hopelesse pag. 73 74. Which is in effect as their arguing afterward cleareth to call it desperate So that it is now come to this No Peace not only except the Resolutions and Assemblies be laid aside but except also the other Judicatories be laid aside and men be allowed to submit to no more of their Sentences than they think just A good and safe bargain for the Church of Scotland indeed But we are yet resolved not to quit the Judicatories God hath given us specially since we have no hope of better to be raised out of the rubbish of these 3. Because the Declaration made mention only of these Overtures for Union which were most material upon the according whereof other things in the Conference might easily be setled They are pleased to question pag. 74 75 76. whether we adhere yet to all the condescensions and offers made by us in the Conference And yet the very words of the Declaration cited by themselves do expresly say so much But where men have no good liking of things it is easie to fish faults at them 4. Because our judgment is asserted concerning the Acts of Assemblies relating to our present differences Therefore they alleage we obstruct Union and pag. 76 77. a great noise is made of our receding upon politick grounds from things wherein we pretend to conscience justice and necessity only because the times are changed And withall they tell us over again the injustice of these Acts about things we account so extrinsick and which they account contrary to the Covenant Answ And yet all this needed not as to the matter of Union but that they would needs let a fling at us for however we think them just yet it was never required of them to think them just in order to an Union yea it was promised they should never be troubled with them But when they have spoken here with as much vehemency against them if not more than we have done for them We are both free when all is done to agree not to impose upon one anothers judgment about them and to lay them aside We shall adde no more to what we have said of the justice of these things about which the Acts are for till they prove them to be open breaches of Covenant and Engagement they remain to us Truths of God Nor shall we make any further enquiry who they are that change with times and do bring the Ministrie in contempt for that is too well known and is no pleasing subject whoever have hand in it But for the thing it self we see no such change in our selves as they would give out We judge the thing it self contained in these Acts being considered simply to be just and true at all times That persons obstructing the defence of their Country going to ruin and overturning a supream Church-judicatory do deserve Censure and that it is necessary it be inflicted when it may reach the end to prevent or render ineffectuall their oppositions And yet not only prudentiall grounds but even conscience telleth us that it is neither expedient nor necessary to make such Acts where the matter about which men controvert is not practicable nor to keep them in force when by laying them aside we may obtain the Union of a broken Church In a word we hold it no paradox in Divinity that practical conclusions relating to the publick State of a Nation do alter much with times altering the face of affairs And that in some times things may justly and ought necessarily to be done which at another time conscience teacheth men ought not to be done And as for the future we have offered sufficiently to secure them so far as we can against the hazard of these Acts and that upon the same grounds of conscience which teach us now to lay aside Acts about a Question that is extinct though we cannot be surety that the Church in the like case of a forreign Invasion and being interrogate by the Civil Power shal never determine concerning these Resolutions as they have done and concerning any who shall make the like opposition they have done Yea we are perswaded would themselves but essay their hand with their wonted principles and practices now it would soon be seen how it would be rellished We shall only adde further that as to what they insinuate of change of times it would be more like kindly children for them to be the more peaceable and respective of their Mother that they think the times allow them a liberty to do otherwise It is no great magnanimity to take advantage of her low condition 5. As to what is said by way of Answer to their outcries that though some very few Presbyteries have required of Intrants of whatsoever judgement that they promise not to trouble the peace of the Church with these debates Yet none of these Acts have been de facto a bar to hold out godly men lawfully and orderly called and tried Though they be industrious to thrust in men of their own judgement and crush Godly and able men who do not agree with them They tell us 1. Of much and many wrongs done by these Acts pag. 78. Which we intreat they may verifie and instruct as they say they can before we can answer For whereas they appeal to our knowledge We do declare we know Elders of their judgement kept in and brought-in in Judicatories where we are the plurality though in some places they have cast out of their Elderships all who differed from them in judgement and have never since made another Election though usually before they did yearly change We know also Expectants of their judgement not only admitted among us to triall in order to a liberty to preach but being lawfully called and tried admitted to the Ministry where we have power We fear many young men who went to other Presbyteries to passe their trialls went not upon the account of their judgement but that they might shun the more accurat trials used in Universities and Presbyteries where more learned men are 2. They are pleased indeed to jest by saying that
the Popish and Prelatical Synods they might have forborn all this obloquy In the mean time they know we not only differ from them concerning the subject invested with Ecclesiasticall Authority but in many other weighty circumstances as to the manner of Administration to be cleared hereafter Though yet all Governments do agree in some common principles and rules among which this Submission for which we plead is one This will evidently appear to go no further if we will but compare that Act of the Assembly 1648. above repeated with this very Canon of the Prelats which they bring in to prove our Opinion Prelatical pag. 111. for the Assembly judgeth the common principle of Submission to be a sound Maxime of Government in a true Church though they condemned the power of Prelats and their sentencing men for not corrupting of Worship and Government and therefore do expresse the substance of that Canon in their Act as fit to be observed in Presbyterial Government Yea and without mentioning that they must be lawfull Sentences whereof these Witnesses make so much noise that it is to be understood which yet is expressed in that Canon And as to that of Duvalius which we believe is a Maxime of their Canon-law as the Schoolmen do generally dispute that Head of Excommunication and other Censures out of the Canon-law Albeit we leave his consequences to himself hoping to make some other thing appear out of our opinion and albeit we disclaim his Pope and Church too whether alleaged to act as Christs Instrument or not as no Church-ruler or Judicatory invested with power from Christ and consequently not to be submitted unto Yet we know some of these Witnesses are not so ignorant as to reject all their Maxims of Government being exercised by a true and orthodox Church Otherwise they may as well reject the Baptism of Infants all Deposition of Ministers Excommunication of Members and innumerable other things as matters purely Popish and Antichristian because forsooth they are observed in the Romish Church We know that methods observed in Appeals Processes and the like Ecclesiasticall Procedures in Assemblies are not rejected as tenets purely Popish because recorded in their Canon-law and practised in their Courts they being in themselves agreeable to sound reason and the light of nature As this Maxim also is of Submission even to some unjust Sentence when it is pronounced in a rightly constituted Church sound and orthodox in Doctrine Worship and Government and only mistaking in this or the like particular case in applying Rules to persons and cases And albeit Protestant Divines do dispute against that particular Hypothesis that the Pope's Sentence is to be obeyed because the Pope hath in their judgement and that according to truth no power and would have them cast out of all Church-society and submitting thereunto because they forsake him and his errours and idolatries Yet they never dispute that Question in Thesi that in a true Reformed Church as is above described Submission is not due Having premitted these Considerations and being to fall about a more particular discussion of the Question We cannot but in the entry complain That upon the Overture propounded in the Conference about this matter they have not only all along given this sense of the Controversie that it is an arbitrary absolute and an unlimited Submission to the will and lusts of men which we crave and do aver pag. 41. that in the Conference we did upon the matter require an absolute and unlimited Submission But in their very dispute they give so lax a state of the Question and do so ramble through all the places of Invention to heap-up Arguments against our Assertion which yet may be reduced to a very few as might make the world believe we were not a Reformed Church but a crew of Papists and Arians opening the door to all abominations by our opinion and to the overturning of all Christs precious Interests Whereas any unbyassed person might perceive and themselves knew by the Conference and from these very Answers given to their Queries upon which they build their Assertion pag. 41. that our desire of Submission was relative to the present state of this Church as it is now through mercy setled in the matter of Doctrine Worship and Government and that such a Submission only was desired as had been established and constantly in practice in this Church till our late Differences And was required of them and mutually offered by us together with an agreement in all matters of difference which might possibly minister occasion of jealousie and diffidence Yea the Declaration it self which here they take to task speaketh of no other Submission than that to which they and we were solemnly engaged at our Admission to the Ministery pag. 5. and so could not be fairly declined by them and again pag. 8 9. there is a Submission required only according to the lawfull known principles wherein we have walked formerly and pag. 10. the Submission constantly observed in practice until the times of our late differences This their way as it hath been very unhandsom and not fair so it necessitateth us to take a new method in clearing this Controversie and not to follow them in their discourses and arguments which almost at every step would put us to a repetition of the state of the Question but to sum-up the state of the Controversie with the difficulties therein in some Articles where we shall as it may come in meet with any thing that hath sinnews in their discourse and reasonings which hath not been spoken to in the foregoing Considerations and tither discover the impertinency therof as to our case or the invalidity thereof to impugn our Assertion And I. As to the fountain and riâ—e of this Submission We do not derive it from nor do we urge it as a due to any Church-officer or Judicatory upon the account of their infallibility and that we must receive their Conclusions as Articles of Faith or binding the Conscience eo ipso because dictated by them This being well considered putteth a vast difference betwixt us and the Popish principles and way wherewith they so often brand us and may tell them they might well have spared their pains in many of these things premitted to their Arguments pag. 95 96 97. Seing we acknowledge all men to be fallible and liars to have no priviledge or authority to do wrong and that their Sentences are regulae regulatae and do not oblige the conscience save in so far as they are conform to the Word And upon the same account we do heartily subscribe also to what they cite out of the Jus Divinum written by the Ministers of London and Mr. Gillespies Assertion pag. 116 117 118. and out of the CXI Propositions pag. 56 57. Though yet we must tell them that these passages relate only to the matter of active obedience as is clear from the very words of Mr. Gillespie in his Assertion citing the
constituted Church and how the contrary practice will bring confusion upon all Societies Civil and Ecclesiasticall on earth 5. But to consider what they offer against this distinction and state of the Question as to the matter of Submission And 1. we find them arguing Arg. 5. pag. 103 104 105. That if Submission be due in matters of Discipline and Government then also in matters of Doctrine and Worship unless God hath either put a greater respect on the first than those last or hath given greater latitude in the one than the other Answ To say nothing here of the Submission due in matters of Doctrine and Worship as not lying in our way as was said before seing passive obedience which is the matter in debate betwixt us is relative only to the Criticall power of Judicatories We can soon give them another ground of difference in these than what they are pleased to find out for us viz. That however God hath not put a greater respect on Discipline than on Doctrine and Worship nor hath allowed men to take a greater latitude in the one than the other though yet in many things of Discipline and Government God hath left us to be directed by the light of nature and rules of prudence common in like cases in all Courts as He hath not done in Doctrine and Worship and consequently the multitude of Counsellors in a Judicatorie are more to be respected than one who is loadened with a prejudice of passion and interest in his own particular Yet to submit in the matter of Discipline where the hazard is only personall and of a mans suffering is not tanti to disturb a well setled National Church where Doctrine and Worship are in their integrity whereas the case is of greater moment when a National Church in her Judicatories introduceth false Doctrine and corrupt Worship to be imposed upon a Church 2. They argue Arg. 6. pag. 105. 106. That Submission to the Critick power or exercise of Discipline will infer Submission in matters of Doctrine for which they instance the ratification of and Censures ordained to be inflicted upon the matter of the Publick Resolutions and the matter of Athanasius of which before Answ We see no cogency in this Argument that because a Church may censure Hereticks who submit not to their Dogmatick determinations which none of us ever doubted of therefore our Question with them is not about matters of Discipline only when we are setled in all other points and do professe our adherence thereunto But as to the matter of the Resolutions 1. As we wonder with what face they can conclude all these men taken in to be sons of Belial if it were for no more but upon the account of their own professed respects to many of them To say nothing of the good parts yea and real piety of at least some of them who failed in an hour of trial So they must first prove these Resolutions to be an errour before they can make the Sentences concerning them unjust This we are forced to tell them often because they have the good manners so oft to say much and prove nothing at all 2. This Question being extrinsick to our Doctrine Worship and Government as hath been said men may well be enjoyned silence in it without entrinching upon the matter of Doctrine or mens opinions we are sure it is maintained by the Learned that men having declared their judgements concerning some truths of an inferiour nature they may be silent for peaces sake And so contending Divines have been enjoyned silence by Church-Judicatories And if any would but have a touch of the necessity and equity of these proceedings of the Judicatories against the opposers of these Resolutions let them but take a view of these mens wayes and let these Witnesses but re-act a few of their former pranks Let them but oppose any of these publick Resolutions of conjunction of Forces with either Malignants or very Papists that may be in practice in these Nations Let them refuse to act or enjoy their publick Offices under an Authority owning and putting in practice these Resolutions let them not only write and preach against them as a defection and sin against God but let them protest against Judicatories as not lawfull who owne them Let them draw a faction and keep up a Rent till they be repented of or at least made void and assurance given against them for the future Let them we say but shew forth a little of this their wonted spirit and we hope others will see what they are as well as this Church and Nation hath felt it And if they be true to their principles they must do so still in all times and cases in these confederate Nations Otherwise men will have just cause to suspect them of little conscience in the things they have done But 3. This instance hath nothing to do with our Question for in our Overtures wherein Subordination was required it was also offered that all debates and censurableness about these matters should be laid aside and made void And so had they accepted the Union that would have had nothing to do with the Subordination required for the future IV. As to the persons of whom Submission is required Two things come to be considered which may further clear the Question 1. That Submission is required of ordinary Officers and Church-members only So that their Arguments from the practice of the Apostles and Prophets pag. 47. and Arg. 2. pag. 100 101. might well have been spared For to omit what further may be said afterward to the instance of the Apostles their Calling being neither of man as to the Office it self nor by man as to their call to it but being immediatly called by Christ Himself without the interveening Ministerial Power of Church-judicatories We assert they were not subject to any Church-judicatory on earth as to their continuance or non-continuance in the exercise of their Ministery But ordinary Ministers as they have their Call mediatly by the Church without whose authoritative Mission no inward Call can warrant them to thrust-out themselves So in their continuance in that Office which they have from the Church they are subject to the Church And if they will assert a warrant for their continuance in the Ministery whether the Church will or not Tub preachers may as well improve it to thrust themselves in over the Churches belly And here we may take notice of what is said by the Authors of that Treatise published by Mr. Rathband formerly mentioned who speaking of their yeelding to Suspensions and Deprivations by Bishops and their Courts pag. 41. they tell us that it lieth in them to depose who may ordain and they may shut that may open and afterward and pag. 42. They answer that very Objection from the Answer of the Apostles Act. 4.19 20. urged by the Brownists against their Submission by shewing the differences betwixt the Apostles case and theirs 1. That they who inhibited
shall deny them also any power over our Consciences nor shall we set them on Christs Throne which they charge upon our opinion Arg. 3. as to the acknowledgement of their Sentences to be just or any approbation in our practice and active obedience of what in our Consciences we disallow which is all can be inferred from the principles of Non-conformists concerning the freedom of Conscience mentioned also Arg. 3. Yet it cannot from all these be inferred that there is not a command of God oblieging us in Conscience to suffer unjustly rather than make a Schism and pour contempt upon standing lawfull Authority Nor is it soundly argued that because they do not their duty in their station for which they must give an account to God therefore we are not bound to suffer what we are called to in our stations Or that suppose men should play the Popes in pronouncing an unjust Sentence such as is above qualified against a man as they have it Arg. 14. Therefore the sufferer may lawfully sin too This opinion is so far from dethroning that it doth exalt Christ and doth deny to men what is not due to them and yet giveth to Christ what is due to Him Likewise when they urge so much Arg. 9 and 10. that it argueth the Scriptures of imperfection giveth what is due to them to Judicatories and must infer the infallibility of Judicatories that they must not be contradicted nor contra acted but their will must be a law as they elsewhere tell us There is all along a great mistake in the case For not only is that of not contradicting put in without cause seing men may contradict as to the declaration of their judgement when yet they submit But we never asserted a Judicatory might be contra-acted in no case as we cleared before in laying aside their eleventh Argument and other reasonings we are only now debating about Submission to Sentences qualified as is above expressed And what submission we pay in these we are so far from setting up mens infallibility or from derogating from the Scriptures as to their perfection and sole Authority over our Consciences that it is not out of conscience of the justice of the Sentence but in obedience to the sole command of God bidding us respect lawfull Authority and suffer in such cases that we pay it And it is upon the supposition of the Judges fallibility yea and their erring actually that we presse this Submission as contra-distinct to active obedience So also as to the Scriptures which they cite Arg. 2. That we should not be the servants of men but stand fast in our Christian liberty and obey God rather than men They have borrowed these weapons from Independents who as Mr. Rutherfurd telleth us Peac. Plea pag. 193. borrowed them from Anabaptists and Socinians arguing against the places of Kings Judges and Magistrates But the argument is easily answered that we obey God and not men and are His servants and not theirs in this Submission And that the people of God are free as to the enslaving of their Conscience with the approbation or their practice with doing of any thing that is unjust yet they have not an immunity from stouping to suffer when God calls them to it And let the case be but instanced in a Magistrates unjust Sentence against particular persons and it will say for it self whether their Christian liberty will reach a Non-submission or not Likewise when they urge Arg. 12. that unjust Sentences are null in themselves and therefore cannot bind to Submission and subjection We grant that in foro interno it is a null Sentence not oblieging the Conscience to any approbation thereof Yet in foro externo it is so far valide as a man cannot deny submission thereunto without sinning against God in contemning the standing lawfull Authority of a Church in making a Schism and declining to suffer when God calleth him to it And in this the very Independents agree though they differ about the subject invested with the power of the keyes for they tell us in their Defence of the nine Positions pag. 210. That a Minister derives all his authority from Christ by the Church indeed applying that Office to him to which the authority is annexed by the institution of Christ Hence being the Minister of Christ to them if they without Christ depose him they hinder the exercise of his Office but his right remaineth 2. While they urge that Ministers are over us in the Lord 1 Thess 5.12 Arg. 1. And that we are to be subordinate to Church-power only in the Lord pag. 95 96. That is so far from warranting Non-submission and contra-acting in the Question betwixt us that it doth strongly assert it For to omit many other things which the Learned finde imported in this to be subject in the Lord as it imports 1. An acknowledgment in our Consciences of their lawfull Authority And 2. active obedience to what they command in the Lord So 3. in the case of an unjust Sentence it requireth such submission and passive obedience as He hath enjoyned us in His Word in such cases which what it is hath been spoken to before and so it confirmeth our Assertion That this is not a forced Interpretation may appear were it but from this one consideration That this qualification of Submission and Obedience in the Lord is not required in reference to Chruch-judicatories only but of children also in reference to their Parents and consequently of all inferiours paying subjection to their Superiours in their several stations as is clear from Eph. 6.1 Col. 3.18 and elsewhere Now it is not to be supposed that the Apostle warranteth children servants or subjects to resist and counteract all the unjust corrections and Sentences of their Masters and Superiours but that they should submit and suffer rather For we find in Scripture that it is the commendable duty of children to submit to their parents even when they chasten them for their pleasure only Heb. 12.9 10. As also of christian servants to suffer unjustly under their bad Masters 1 Pet. 2.18 19 20. and generally of all Christians to suffer under their persecuting Magistrats 1 Pet. 3.14 15 16 17. and 4.12 13 14.15 16. and frequently throughout the Scriptures And this together with what hath formerly been produced may satisfie that part of Arg. 1. wherein they call for a precept or precedent in Scripture to clear this matter For here we find there is Scripture-warrant for this Submission to which we may adde That the practice of the suffering People of God in all generations is a clearer Commentary to these Texts than all the glosses tending but to sedition schism and confusion of human society they can fasten upon them 3. While they urge Arg. 15. pag. 113 114. That this brings in a Tyranny in the Church and by parity of reason condemneth defensive Arms which are judged lawfull against State-tyranny We are so far from allowing Tyranny or Injustice
Courts of Christ and consequently not to be submitted unto Yea in case such decrees were published we should hold it a case of Confession for Ministers to preach and people to frequent Ordinances so long as they had liberty or opportunity And so though neither the Apostles nor Prophets had been extraordinarily called nor cloathed with a Commission unrepealable as hath been said by any on earth their warrant was sufficiently clear in that case to hold up the oppressed truth of the Gospel against the sworn enemies of Christ and the Gospel who would neither preach Christ nor suffer Him to be preached by any other as we heard from these worthy Non-conformists Authors of the Treatise against the Brownists formerly mentioned But on the other hand When a Church doth owne all the Truths of the Gospel and all the Ordinances of Christ and doth no sooner put out one from preaching of Christ but they provide another to make up that want and do dispense the Ordinances in purity to the people of God In such a case which through mercy is the case of this Church as we have heard Suppose they do erre in discharging one to Preach and another to come to the Ordinances It is not the will of God that persons so suffering should make a Schism by their Non-submission and counteracting upon the account of their personall suffering or prejudice as the preceding Arguments do abundantly prove But having used all lawfull means of redresse by Appeals to superiour Judicatories they ought to acquiesce and submit to the will of God calling them to suffer rather than run upon the many inconveniences formerly mentioned But to clear this further 2. We would distinguish duties commanded us by God wherein we may be restrained by men For there are some morall duties incumbent to Christians simply and absolutely as they are Christians and which are simply in their own power by themselves and independently from others and enjoyned them without any respect to their Subordination or relation to others in the Church So that to their performance of them they neither need a call impowering them thereunto nor are dependent upon the concurrence of any others in or to the same Such as prayer to God and confessing of Christ which are of morall naturall right And there are other duties of morall positive institution which are not in mens own power severally and by themselves and independently from others in the Church but some way in the power of others beside themselves and are incumbent to men as they stand in relation or Subordination to others And are either duties to be performed by men as they stand cloathed with an Office received by the interveening Ministery of the Church such as the ordinary Ministeriall preaching of the Word and the administration of other publick Ordinances Or priviledges which they do enjoy by the Ministery of others who are to dispense them unto them or also by the joynt concurrence of others with them therein Such as the participation of Sacraments publick Assembly-praying and praising The difference here is very considerable Both as to the power of Disciplinary Sentences about them for Sentences of Church-censures are not conversant about performance of duties of the first sort but only of the second nor can there ever in any case a restraint be lawfully put upon men in the matter of praying and worshipping God or confessing of Christ as there lawfully may be in some cases in the second sort of duties And as to the matter of Submission to Sentences restraining men from and forbearing of the performance of them For the first sort are so intirely in our own power that we neither need a call from any warranting us to go about them nor the concurrent acting of any other for our enjoying the liberty thereof And they are so absolutely commanded without respect to any dependence upon any other and are so absolutely necessary necessitate medii for a mans glorifying of God and his own eternal salvation That it must be a sin not to observe them constantly as affirmative precepts ought to be observed yea a double sin not to adhere to them in a case of Confession as it is when these duties are prohibited by men But as for the second sort of duties Albeit as hath been said there can be no submitting to forbear them upon any decree of men prohibiting them in their very nature and kind Yet being duties that are not absolutly necessary necessitate medii and being as to the exercise thereof not wholly in our own power of and by our selves but some way dependent upon others also So that we cannot go about them without a call and warrant from others nor enjoy the exercise of them by our selves Therefore in case the Church who calleth and ordains a Minister will not suffer him to preach Or a Minister who hath the trust of dispensing Ordinances will not dispense the Sacrament to a member the sufferer breaks no command in suffering that injury after he hath essayed all lawfull means of redresse Seing his forbearance is not a voluntary and elective omission of the duty he is restrained from but a patient suffering of an injury under a necessity whereof providence hath brought him unlesse he would commit a morall evil which he is oblieged not to do by naturall right viz. make a Schism in a true Church and bring contempt on lawfull Authority It is his affliction and not his sin nor is it the violation of any commandment but only a cessation from a duty commanded when he cannot do it without the violation of another command of more universall and necessary obligation Neither is he by this cessation deprived of the exercise of any duty absolutely necessary to the honouring of God enjoying of fellowship with Christ and saving his own soul And if they deny these things they must yeeld also that in some cases beside that of an erring Conscience which is yeelded by all a man may be concluded under a necessity of sinning on all hands As that a Minister must either sin by forbearing to preach or sin in making a Schism by continuing to preach when he is deposed by a lawfull Authority in a true Church though erring in that particular As such a case and snare upon men is held by the Learned to be repugnant to the infinite Holinesse and Wisdom of God the Law-giver So we find godly sufferers before us very far from judging their Submission and suffering to be any violation of Gods command calling them to their work Parker on the Crosse Chap. 4. Sect. 14. cleareth that sufferers in the cause of Non-conformity did not voluntarily wilfully or sinfully give-over their Ministery adding It is not the leaving of the Ministery that is a sin but the causes why the end wherefore and the circumstances wherein that maketh the leaving of it sinfull To wit as he expresseth both before and after in that Section when men leave it for their gain