the times What is the compleat subject of Church power or the power of the Keyes These Brethren say perhaps truly that the Truth herein hath been long lost in a double extreme The one was the tyranny of the Clergy so called or rather of the Prelacy who ingrossed all or the chiefe part of that power unto themselves not only from the people but also from the Pastors of particular Congregations The other is the Anarchy or popularity of the Separatists or Brownists as they after call them who gave the people a place and claime to the whole power and made the Elders set over them but their servants to exercise that power which was properly theirs Probable it is that Truth may lye in the middle between these two extremes but how to find it out is not so easie Our Brethren goe about it but me thinks they doe not hit it They say The Saints in these knowing Times finding that the Key of knowledge hath so far opened their hearts that they see with their owne eyes into the substantials of godlinesse c. They doe begin more than to suspect that some share in the Key of power should likewise appertaine unto them Truly just one as much as another The Brethren suppose the Saints have a share in the Key of Knowledge when they say they suspect they have likewise a share in the Key of power But first they have no share in the Key of knowledge which is preaching and administration of the Seales as the Authour speaks except passively as to have their hearts opened by it as the Brethrens words are So nor have they any share in the Key of power except it be by a voluntary consent in obedience to the Will and Rule of Christ as the Authour himselfe speaks page 15. And divers times elsewhere as we shall heare even an orderly subjection according to the Order of the Gospell page 11. Though the truth is some have taken more upon them than to suspect they have a share even to practise the Key of power and that through the instruction and guidance of their Teachers which how little it comes short of the plea and practise of the other extreme shall ere long appeare For the present These Brethren say they conceive the disposall of this power may lye in a due allotment into divers hands according to their severall concernments rather than in an entire and sole trust committed to any one man or any one sort or ranke of men or Officers Herein perhaps we might agree with them But I am sure they agree not with their Authour herein who places all the power in one sort of men alone that is The way p. 45. the Brethren without Officers and gives them leave to elect ordaine Officers admit members and passe Church censures without any Officers yea to censure all their Officers though we thinke he contradicts himselfe in this Tract of the Keyes The Brethren tell us The Authour to whom they Preface takes upon him to distribute the bounds of this power And layes downe this as a maxime That looke in whose hands soever it fall they have it immediately from Christ that is in regard of delegation or dependance on each other And thus farre we doe not dissent He then say they considers the power of a Congregation which supposing to have a Presbytery of its owne he asserteth to be the prime subject of entire power within it selfe yea and the sole native subject of the power of Ordination and Excommunication But 1. he needed not to have made such a supposition that the Congregation hath a Presbytery of its owne The way p. 50 51. For if they have no Presbytery of their owne he asserteth that they have the power of Ordination and Excommunication which is the highest censure within themselves and want a Warrant to repaire to the Presbytery of another Church for either 2. Both he and these Brethren know that this is denyed by many who make the first Subject of all church-Church-power to be the generall visible Church and secondarily the Congregation though having a Presbytery of its owne As a man is the first subject of Risibility Peter but at second hand The Congregation consisting of Elders and Brethren For as for women and children there is a speciall exception by a Statute Law of Christ against their enjoyment of any part of this publicke power say the Brethren which I see no reason for in regard of some part of this power as we shall see anon the Authour labours to share the interest and power between the Elders and the Brethren And he manifests it say they by way of a parallell As in some of our Townes corporate the power is given to a company of Aldermen the Rulers and a Common Councell a Body of the people But I pray observe the dissimilitude in this similitude His maine designe is to give the people a share in the Church power of Government But then the parallell will not run even For the Company of Aldermen and the Common-Councell are both Rulers of the Corporation though in severall ranks and subordination But I suppose neither the Authour nor the Brethren can truly say the whole company of the people are Rulers in the Church as the Common-Councell is in the Corporation If all the people be Rulers who are the ruled In the City there are multitudes of people subject to the Company of Aldermen and Common-Councell but here are all Governours or governed The parallell were fairely laid thus The Company of Aldermen resemble the Pastors and Teachers The Common-Councell the Ruling-Elders Officers of another ranke The Citizens besides those the Brethren out of Office in the Congregation Thus all things correspond well But they make the Presbytery to be the Aldermen and the whole Body of the people to be the Common-Councell which sure they are not what ever they say for then the distinction of Rulers and ruled is lost And this appeares clearly in his application of this similitude He gives to the Elders or Presbytery a binding power of Rule and Authority unto the Brethren a power to concurre with them and that such affaires should not be transacted without a joynt-agreement of both What power such as the Common-Councell hath in the Corporation that 's more than a bare priviledge that 's a power of Rule and Authority a binding power concurring with the Aldermen But they should have said Not the Common-Councell but the Common people of a City have such a power to concurre with the Aldermen that such affaires be not transacted but with their joynt-agreement But this they cannot say and then the parallell will not hold unlesse they change the Common-people for the Common-Councell thus As the people of a City only cannot proceed to any publicke sentence unlesse they have Aldermen over them so nor have the Aldermen power to sentence without the concurrence of the people which is apparently false The parallell must be thus
which makes me wonder at the liberty taken by Separatists and allowed and practised by your self The way p. 41. That the Church or Brethren without Officers may not only elect but ordaine and impose hands upon their highest Officers As for the third place Acts 14.23 The word cannot be well rendred They ordained them Elders chosen by lifting up of hands For it is not to be referred to the people but to Paul and Barnabas who surely did not ordaine Elders by lifting up but by laying on of hands And so taken it excludes the people for the Substantive to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Paul and Barnabas If they chose the Elders by lifting up of hands then the people are excepted not only from ordination of their Officers but from election too by this Text. But further some of your Brethren hold that election is the chiefest peece of a Ministers calling and ordination but a complement to the solemnity of it And if so the people doe ordaine them as well as elect and that 's more then a liberty even as full authority as the Brownists give to the people Your selfe doe acknowledge some where The way p. 48. that Ordination is a worke of Rule And yet you say also Ibid. 45. That the Brethren may ordaine their Officers Therefore the people have more than a key of liberty The Keyes p. 8. and often Ordination jurisdiction pertaine indifferently to all the Presbyters The way p. 49 they have a key of rule and authority which yet againe you doe reserve as proper to the Elders Consider how you can reconcile the contradictions That the people have a liberty justly to except or rationally to approve of their Officers is granted but this is I still say nothing to the power of the Keyes which consists in Ordination of Officers chosen not in the election of Officers to be ordained 2. The second liberty of the people is To send out messengers for the publicke service of the Church Phil. 2.25 This may be granted a liberty but nothing to the power of the keyes People may assent to or approve of the reasonable choice of messengers to be sent forth just as poore Cottiers in the Countrey that have no votes in the election of their Knights and Burgesses have yet a consent and approbation to send them to the Parliament 3. A third Liberty To accept against such as offer themselves to communion or unto the seales of it Acts 9.26 This is nothing more to the power of the keyes than the former Any woman may in a scandall except against any that offers to partake of the Sacrament by way of information to the Officers yet hath no interest in the keyes 4. A fourth To joyne with the Elders in inquiring hearing judging of publick scandals so as to bind notorious offendors under censures and to forgive the penitens If this be not aequivocaly spoken it is certainly more then a liberty That they may enquire for their own satisfaction and heare by way of presence is a liberty not to be denyed But if you meane any more it is more then a liberty an act of rule and authority Heare your owne words spoken with respect to Bishops but will better fit our purpose The way p. 48. If the Holy-Ghost had appointed the people to any share in the keyes he would have appointed them also some eminent worke But what shall that be Shall it be Ordination Why that is a work of Rule Or shall it be hearing accusations against Elders and censuring them accordingly Why that is a worke of Rule also Let me adde shall it be judging of publick scandals so as to bind notorious offendors under censure Why that is a worke of Rule also And consider now whether they have not a key of authority as full as the Elders themselves If you meane a judgement of discretion only which all the multitude have at an Assizes it is just nothing to the purpose a stranger none of the Congregation a woman an heathen may doe as much But you say The Apostle alloweth to all the Brethren a power to judge them that are within 1 Cor. 5.22 But either this is fallacious There was a power in the Church of Corinth to judge those within ergo this power was in the people or else it is false if meant of authoritative judgement or if only a judgement of discretion it is quite besides the question But you fearing an objection prevent it to judge is an act of Rule which is proper to the Elders you answer There is a judgement of discretion As in the Iury it is an act of their popular liberty in the Iudge an act of judiciall authority To this I have many things to say 1. A judgement of discretion will not serve your turne for that as I said is common to all the people at an Assizes and that is common to women and heathens if present at your Consistories and if this be all what difference is there between the judgement of a woman an heathen and of one of your Church-members 2. The judgement of the Iury is indeed an act of popular liberty but not of their liberty more than of those that are not of the Iury. For I aske why are not all the rest of the people whom it concernes as much as those twelve men of the Iury admitted to the same judgement with them Are not they wronged in point of popular liberty would not you say The Brethren not admitted to the hearing and judging of an offender were wronged if only twelve of the Congregation were designed to heare and judge him In our native Countrey the Iudge dispenses no sentence but according to the verdict of the Iury c. The way p. 102. 3. The judgement of the Iury is more than of discretion so all by-standers judge even of authority in some degree and kind though not compleat For they condemne or acquit the party which all the rest together cannot doe 4. The Iudge I take it may not condemne who they acquit nor acquit whom they condemne except by a speciall indulgence and that 's farre more than a judgement of discretion in the Iury. If it be so with the Brethren here as the Epistolers say it is certainly they have more than a judgement of discretion But your selfe say as much you give the Brethren not only joyned with their Elders but without any Officers at all full power to censure offenders Remember your owne words The way p. 45 101. As for mutuall instruction and admission election and ordination of officers opening the doores of the Church by admission of members and shutting the same by Church-censures These things they may doe if need be without Officers yea and if all their Officers were found culpable either in hereticall doctrine or scandalous crime yet the Church hath lawfull authority to proceed to the censure of them all If this be not as full or more authority
distributes it among the Officers respectively Then say I your middle way fals out to be the extreme of Brownists who make the people the first subject of all power But I thinke the truth is That the Apostles betrusted the power of the Officers not first with the Churches but with the Officers themselves They and Evangelists ordained Elders in every City not the Churches Paul gives Timothy a charge to commit that which he had received of him to faithfull men that might be able to teach others also 2 Tim. 2.2 To conclude this You said above That the Keyes were distributed into severall hands the Key of Liberty unto the Brethren the Key of Authority unto the Officers and is not this a contradiction to what your first proposition doth assert That the particular Church of Brethren is the first subject of all Church-offices and of all church-Church-power and so of the Authority of the Officers consider it 3. Propos When the Church of a particular congregation walketh together in the truth and peace the Brethren are the first subject of Church liberty and the Elders thereof of Church-authority and both of all church-Church-power needfull to be exercised amongst themselves This is very cautelously delivered yet not enough to cover your contradiction Either this proposition is the same with the first or else it contradicts it There you said that the particular congregation of Saints was the first subject of all the Church-offices with all their spirituall gifts and power Now you divide this power between them and the Elders giving the one Church-liberty the other Authority 2. There is a limitation for this too it is but when they walke in truth and Peace But if they walke not so what is the first subject of all that power Have not the Brethren their Liberty and the Elders their Authority as the first Subjects when they differ If so then your caution is idle when they walke in truth and peace If not then neither of them single nor both together are the first subject of all power needfull to be exercised amongst themselves And we shall heare anon a Synod is the first subject of all power needfull to be exercised amongst themselves When there are divisions and factions among them page 47. Yet againe in your other Tract you give the particular Congregation of Brethren the whole power of chusing ordaining Officers and censures of their Officers if they be hereticall 1. That the Brethren are the first subject of Church-liberty you labour to prove thus By removall of any former subject whence they might derive it Not from their Elders for they had power to chuse their owne Elders Not from other Churches for all Churches are equall Not from a Synod they of Antioch borrowed none of their Liberties from Ierusalem I answer the enumeration is not sufficient For though they received it from none of those yet they might derive it from some others namely from the Elders of other Churches by whom they were first converted to the Faith For the Liberties or priviledges that a Congregation hath as distinct from Elders comes to them by vertue of their interest either in the Body mysticall or Catholicke visible Church which is in Order before their membership of a particular Congregation They must be visible Saints before they can gather into a congregation of visible Saints and every one single hath a liberty or priviledge to associate before they can all be associated Now thence it followes that those Elders that first converted them did virtually derive that liberty or priviledge to them Faith comes by hearing How shall they heare without a Preacher Remember your owne words The Keyes p. 10. The Key of knowledge or which is all one the Key of Faith belongeth to all the faithfull whether joyned to any particular Church or no which argueth that the key of knowledge is given not only to the Church but to some before they enter into the Church Now who gave them this key of Faith instrumentally but the Ministers by whom they beleeved Therefore the Church of a particular Congregation are not the first subject of Church-liberty but every particular Beleever hath it first and that derived from some Elders And certainly in the first plantation of Churches the Officers Elders I meane were before the Churches themselves The Planters were before the plantation The Apostles being first converted and ordained by Christ himselfe were sent abroad and converted people many times single afterwards when they were increased they united into Churches Now you suppose the Church to be before the Elders because they chuse their owne Elders which is not generally true Though it may be so in Churches planted yet not in the first plantation of Churches Indeed in your way the Churches are before their Elders and doe chuse and ordaine their Elders but from the beginning it was not so And besides Elders now in order of nature if not in time are before the Churches in all Reformed Churches being ordained for the most part to be Elders before they be Elders to this or that particular Church And though your Churches doe chuse their Elders yet I hope they doe not make or ordaine them Elders but after they are ordained chuse them to be theirs The Keyes p 55. You speake sometimes of translation of an Elder from one Church to another which in my apprehension implyes him an Elder before he be translated to another Church Though I know you are not constant to your selfe herein holding it as a principle Elder and flocke are relates and giving the Brethren without any Officers power not only to chuse but to ordaine their Elders and so your Churches are before their Elders and give them their power by election and ordination and Brownists doe no more I would gladly know a reason why if the Churches had power to chuse and ordaine their owne Officers the Apostle should trouble himselfe and them to send Timothy and Titus to ordaine Elders in every City had it not been easier to have written to the Churches to doe it themselves 2. That the Elders are the first subject of Rule and Authority you endeavour to prove 1. Because the charge of Rule over the Church is committed to them immediately from Christ But this first is contradictory to your first proposition which made the particular congregation the first subject of all Church-officers and all church-Church-power and the Church communicates and derives that power to the Officers chusing and ordaining them 2. If the charge of Rule be immediately committed to them from Christ how can the Church be the first subject of all power The Apostles indeed had all their power immediately from Christ but other Officers had it immediately from them and from others intrusted by them with that power When you say The Office it selfe is ordained by Christ though the Elders be chosen to their Office by the Church of Brethren You vary the question For the question is not
who ordaines the Office but who ordaines the Officers Those that the Apostles ordained had their Office immediately from Christ but had not their Ordination immediately from Christ that was the priviledge of the Apostles Now from whomsoever the Officers derive their Ordination immediately from them immediately they doe derive their Authority But say you the Officers doe immediately derive their Ordination from the Church of Brethren ergo they derive immediately their Authority from the Church of Brethren And consequently the Church of Brethren is the first subject of authority as well as of Liberty and not the Elders Certainly all your 3 characters of a first subject fall upon the Apostles and their Successors 1. They first received their power from Christ 2. They first put forth the exercise of that power 3. They first communicated that power to others You say here God hath not given a spirit of Rule and Government ordinarily to the greater part of the body of the Brethren and ergo neither hath he given them the first receit of the Key of Authority to whom he hath not given the gift to imploy it But you give the body of the Brethren alone the first receit and exercise too of the Key of Authority when you give them power to chuse and ordaine their Officers which Ordination is confessed by your selfe to be an Act of Rule and authority ergo The way p. 48. you doe directly contradict your selfe without any possibility of reconciliation that I can imagine Obj. 1. How can the Brethren invest an Elder with Rule if they had not power of Rule in themselves Sol. Partly by chusing him to that Office which God hath invested with Rule partly by subjecting themselves unto him Reply 1. Your first reason is of no validity chusing to an Office doth not invest with the Rule of that Office Election gives not an Office but only nominates or designes a person fit for that Office It is Ordination that gives the Office and the Rule or authority of that Office The seven Deacons chosen by the people were not Officers till the Apostles had ordained them If they were not then election gives no Office and consequently no authority belonging to that Office If they were then Ordination is a meere empty Ceremony and the Brethren doe properly give them authority which themselves have not to give Besides election to this or that place presupposes at least sometimes the party invested with authority before as in the case of translation of an Elder from one Church to another and only admits him to the exercise of it pro hic nunc as they speake 2. Your second reason is as weake as the former Because they professe their subjection to him This cannot invest him with the Rule such as we speake of Suppose a company of Brethren chuse a gifted Brother to prophesie to them and professe their subjection to him in the Lord doth this invest him with authority of an Elder to rule over them If it doe then Ordination is a thing not necessary either by the Brethren or Elders yet by and by we shall heare you require Ordination of Elders to make a compleat Elder If it doe not then you have not satisfied the objection Obj. 2. The Church is Christs Spouse Wife Queene ergo she hath the Keyes of Rule at her girdle Sol. There is a great difference between Queens and poore mens Wives The first have their Officers for every businesse and service and so no Key left in their hands of any Office but of Liberty to call for what they want according to the Kings Royall allowance But poore mens wives that have no Officers may carry the keyes at their owne girdles Reply This answer overthroweth it selfe For 1. the liberty which you grant this Queene the Church is part of the power of the Keyes and a great part too if not the whole viz. to chuse and ordaine her owne Officers and to censure them offending which no Queene is allowed to doe ergo the Church hath the Keyes at her girdle which a Queen hath not 2. You say and that truly The Queene hath only a liberty to call for what she wants but hath no power to make her owne Officers The King doth that by some Officers deputed by himselfe for that purpose to set them apart to give them their commission or oath c. Just so it is in the Church All the Officers are given to the Church objectivè for the good and benefit of the Church but they have no power to make and ordaine their owne Officers but only to call upon them for that allowance which the King of the Church hath granted them 3. If poore mens wives may carry the Keyes of any Office at their owne girdles when their husbands have no Officers you seeme to give a greater honour and liberty to them then to Queenes or Ladyes and withall you give us leave to inferre That Churches that have no Officers of their owne are in better case than those that have They that have Officers have put the Keyes in their Officers hands They that have none may and doe weare them at their owne girdles which if you affirme as you often doe I dare affirme it to be flat Brownisme and not the middle way you pretend Obj. 3. The whole body naturall is the first subject of all the naturall power as sight is first in the body before in the eye Soil It is not in the mysticall as with the naturall body there the faculties are inexistent not so here Reply 1. This againe contradicts your first proposition where you say a particular Church is the first subject of all Church-offices and power And here you say they are not actually inexistent how then is it the first Subject seeing accidentis esse est inesse 2. If the Church chuse out of themselves Officers gifted are not they then inexistent 3. You confesse they are in some cases unlesse say you some of them have all the gifts of all the Officers which often they have not True but oftentimes they have either Presbyters or men fit to be Presbyters And then you answer not the objection And if they have Presbyters before they chuse them to be theirs as your words seeme to import they may then they doe not invest them with power of Elders by chusing them as formerly you seemed to assert Lastly you say If the power of the Presbytery were given to a particular Church of Brethren as such primò per se then it would be found in every particular Church of Brethren But say I you assert both the Antecedent in the first proposition Every particular Congregation is the first subject of all Church power and the consequence when you say Every particular Church hath power to chuse ordaine and censure ergo Obj. 4. The Government is mixt of Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy ergo the people have some power in Government Sol. Your first answer seemes to
Anabaptisme 2. I aske by what power of the keyes doe your Pastors admit a member of another Church to partake of the Lords Supper in yours Or in what relation doth your Pastor stand to that member of another Church You say Pastor and Church are relates and he is a Pastor to none but of his owne Church Either then to administer the Lords Supper to a member of another Church is no Pastorall act but may be done by a gifted brother Or else a Pastor and his Church are not so relates but that he is a Pastor beyond the limits of his owne Congregation which yet you doe deny 3. You are also very sparing in granting this liberty For you adde In case neither himselfe nor the Church from whence he comes doe lye under any publicke offence But what if that party be free from the guilt of that offence Shall the innocent suffer for the nocent what charity what justice is in this 4. But your reason I like very well For we receive the Lords Supper not only as a Seale of our Communion with the Lord Iesus and with his members in our owne Church but also in all the Churches of the Saints Whence I inferre then it is not any favour dispensed by you to a member of another Church but a dignity or priviledge common to every member of that body by vertue of that membership and not with respect to his particular Church membership And I pray is not Baptisme also a Seale of our Communion with all the members of Christs body Why then may you not admit the children of the members of any Church to be baptized by your Pastors upon just occasion as well as to admit the parents to the Lords Supper Nay further If the Sacraments be Seales of our communion with all the members of Christ why doe you not admit any true Christian and his children to the communion of the Sacraments though they be not as yet admitted members of any particular Congregation How dare you deny any member of that Body communion with its fellow-members when it hath union and communion with the Head Consider it 2. A second way of your communion of Churches is By way of recommendation as Paul in the behalfe of Phoebe c. But this is so farre from being any part of the power of the Keyes that it is a duty which a Church or party owe to any Christian that is godly not by vertue of any particular Church-membership but by the common interest of Christianity yea by the common right of humanity even to an honest Heathen according to the ninth Commandement which requires us to beare true witnesse to our brother if we be thereto required The letters are only declarative of the good behaviour of the party occasioned to remove to such a place Was this thinke you a part of the power of the Keyes delivered to Peter and the rest of the Apostles Besides if there be any vertue in these letters to admit a member into communion is there not a like vertue in them to excommunicate one ungodly And if these letters dimissory have power to admit a member of one Church to be a member of another without any new covenanting have they not the like power to admit the Pastor of one Church to be a Pastor of another Church without any new Ordination which yet I beleeve you doe not practise 3. By way of Consultation and 4 by Congregation into a Synod But what is all this to the power of the Keyes If upon Congregation and consultation of other Church-Officers there be not a binding power it is rather a latch of a doore which may be opened and shut at any bodies pleasure than a Key to let in or locke out with any Authority But of the power of Synods more hereafter 4. A fifth way is The liberty of giving and receiving mutuall supplyes one from another gifted men or benevolences c. I conceive first these are rather duties of common charity than of Church liberty or any power of the Keyes And I desire to know what those gifted men were that the Church of Antioch sent to other Countries Were they not Apostles or Prophets or Teachers in Office Then they were Pastors or Teachers by Office before they were sent before they were elected or ordained by the Churches to which they were sent Thereupon it followes that a Pastor or Teacher because you may say a Pastor relates to his owne flocke a Teacher so was Barnabas Acts 13.1 is a Teacher to the generall visible Church not to the particular Church only as you hold And then againe a Teacher quâ Teacher may preach to another Church and convert Heathens and not as a gifted brother only as you sometimes speake A sixth way is By way of mutuall admonition when a publicke offence is found amongst them One Church may send to admonish another and if that Church will not heare take two or three other Churches and if not heare them then withdraw c. This admonition is a duty of every brother at least of every Christian as a Christian and no power of the Keyes at all And let it be considered that the place Matth. 18.15 16. Those two or three are not considered as a Church-body but as a sufficient number of witnesses to joyne with a brother offended c. agreeing in a duty of brotherly love c. The way p. 53. doth not make the admonition of one or more brethren any power of the Keyes but a duty only concerning every man in order to the censure of the Church But if one or more Churches may proceed with a Church-offending as private persons with an offending brother why may they not take the third step as the last remedy to excommunicate her being obstinate as the Church doth an obstinate bâ—o her No Because the Churches are all of equall authority But so are all the members of a Congregation of equall authority yet the whole may excommunicate him And if there be as much Church-communion between Churches as there is between members of a particular Congregation I see no reason why many Churches assembled in a Synod may not as well excommunicate an obstinate Church as a Congregation a particular member If you deny excommunication of a Church others will and doe deny excommunication of a member and say non-communion or withdrawing is as much as can be done And if you say the Churches may withdraw communion I demand first what is that in effect but excommunication wanting only a Synodicall Decree yet page 25. you say A Synod hath power to determine to withdraw communion from an offending Church And is it any more in the excommunicâ—tion of an offending brother They doe but determine all shall withdraw communion from him This is therefore but a meere Logomâ—chie 6. The last way of Communion of Churches is by way of propâ—gation or multiplication of Churches But 1. This is rather a division of Churches
relates which if it be not a fine delusion let the world judge We deny not but gifted Brethren of such abilities as are fit for Office for learning and judgement c. may for approbation exercise their gifts But we only note the difference of these Masters and that these of ours are nearer to Brownisme who by their constant preaching as gifted Brethren countenance and encourage private members supposing themselves gifted sufficiently to preach ordinarily yea and to administer the Seales which as it is lesse * Christ sent me not to baptize but to preach the Gospell than preaching so also is annexed unto preaching Mat. 28. as your selfe here speakes and complaine of this practise page 6. 2. A second Act of Authority common to the Elders is They have power to call the Church together 1. You said before Rule was an Act proper to the Office of Elders Now you say it is common you meane perhaps common to both sorts of Elders But then you should have explained the difference or resolved us whether the Ruling-Elders have equall power with the preaching Elders in this Act. For your instance of the Apostles calling the Church together Acts 6.2 is but for one sort of Elders and you bring nothing for the other 2. Besides to call the Church together seemes rather a matter of Order than of Authority For one Elder of either sort may be deputed to this worke But if this be proper to Elders what if the Elders be all offenders who shall call the Church together then Truly this power seemes first to be in the Church in your way who as they had power to gather themselves into one Body without Officers so much more to call an Assembly of themselves That of Ioel 2. for the Priests is weakly alleadged For it appeares not that they were called on to call an Assembly but only to weep v. 17. it was rather the Magistrates Act to proclaime a Fast 3. To examine all members or Officers before they be received of the Church But this according to your principles is spoken to the whole Church and so no proper Act of Elders And expressely above you made this one part of the priviledge or liberty of the people to propound just exceptions against such as offer themselves and if so then also to examine them page 13. 4. A fourth Act of their Rule is Ordination of Officers But 1. This is too confused What Elders doe you meane Preaching or Ruling Have the Ruling-Elders power of Ordination of Pastors and Teachers This as it is without all president of Scripture so it is against a Rule The greater is blessed of the lesser which cannot be by the Apostles Divinity 2. This is no Act proper to the Elders but common to the Brethren by your owne judgement if your minde be not altered since you writ The Way p. 50 51. See it 5. To open the doores of speech and silence in the Assembly But 1. one Elder doth this ergo one Elder hath power and authority not over the Church only but over his fellow Elders also 2. You take it from them presently in some cases When the Elders themselves lye under offence the Brethren have liberty to require satisfaction c. That is the Brethren may open the doore and begin to speake And still you are confused not declaring whether this power belongs to either sort of Elders or both alike especially your instance of the Rulers of the Synagogue seeming to carry it to the Ruling Elders 6. To prepare matters before hand for the Church and to reject causelesse and disorderly complaints c. But doe not you hold Mat. 18.17 to speake of the Church of the Brethren with the Elders then that place is impertinently alleadged to prove an Act proper to the Elders 2. Have the Elders power to judge a complaint to be causelesse and to reject it without the cognizance of the people why then have they not power to judge a complaint to be just and to censure it without their cognizance also Doe you not intrench a little too much upon your peoples Liberty 7. The Elders have authority in handling an offence before the Church both jus dicere and sententiam ferre But all this I thinke the Brownists yeeld who yet give the chiefe if not the only power to the people and give the Elders leave sententiam ferre to pronounce the sentence as their mouth and Deputies And you say They are first to informe the Church what the Law of Christ is which is jus dicere and then when the Church discerneth the same and condiscendeth to it by consent to give sentence But what if the people discerne it not or condiscend not that the sentence shall passe Then they may have power jus dicere which every understanding brother hath but not sententiam ferre A goodly Authority 8. They have power to dismisse the Church with a Blessing To this I say little only I say it is too confused what Elders you meane preaching or Ruling and then I say this is but a matter of Order one only does it and yet I thinke you will not say he hath Authority over his fellowes 9. The Elders have power to charge any of the people in private that they live not inordinately c. 2 Thes 3.6 c. This is very weakly alleadged by a man of your strength The Apostle speaks this to all the Brethren the Thessalonians yea it may concerne women sometimes to warne the unruly especially being to be done in private and doe you bring this for the power of your Elders which sort of Elders doth it concerne to doe this for neither are mentioned Againe the Apostle speaks not of charging or warning at all but peremptorily bids them withdraw v. 6. and to note him by a Letter and have no company with him v. 14. 10. If the Church fall away to blasphemy against Christ c. and no Synod hoped for or no help by it The Elders have power to withdraw the Disciples from them and to carry away the Ordinances with them c. But 1. the case is mislaid for Acts 19.9 the Jewes that there blasphemed were not of the Church but only such as came to heare Paul preach which an Infidell might doe but then this was no proper withdrawing as a power of the Keyes For what had Paul to doe or the Elders with them that are without 2. Suppose the whole Church fall away what shall the Elders doe now They may not excommunicate them you said above and if they may withdraw that 's no more power than the Brethren have of the Elders Apostate 3. How can the Elders carry away the Ordinances from them For first the Elders cease to be Elders when the flocke is separated and ceases to be their flocke Secondly the Brethren may keep the Ordinances with them and have power in your way to chuse new Officers to exercise the Ordinances and then what care they for their withdrawing
than a passive approbation it might be yeelded but if you meane an actuall or active concurrence that they had not been valid without their votes and consent it s far more than liberty as good authority as any the Apostles and Elders had Obj. But Elders in a Synod have no authority to determine any act to bind the Churches but according to their instructions You answer We doe not so apprehend it For what need Churches send to a Synod for light and direction if they be resolved afore hand how far they will goe Reply Here either you destroy the liberty of the Brethren afore granted and give the Synod a binding power which you seeme to deny or else prevaricate in this cause For according to your principles the Synod hath no power to bind the Churches to stand to their arbitrement for that 's the true power of your Synods under any penall censure only they may withdraw And then I returne you your owne words What need Churches send to a Synod for light and direction c. if they be resolved afore hand how far they will goe 3. Q. Whether the Synod hath power to enjoyne things both in their nature and use indifferent You resolve it negatively 1. From the patterne of Synods Acts 15.28 who enjoyned nothing but necessaries in nature or use Sol. This is an Argument from Scripture negativè they did not here enjoyne any thing but necessaries ergo they had no power to enjoyne things indifferent The consequence is naught 2. The Apostles are commanded to teach what Christ commanded ergo if they teach more they exceed their commission Sol. This Argument is like the former They were to teach what Christ commanded ergo they might teach nothing else in things indifferent They might teach nothing as a commandement of Christ doctrinally in matters of Faith or worship but this hinders not but they might enjoyne some things indifferent as they did forbid the use of some things indifferent in their owne nature viz. bloud and strangled If it be said those were not indifferent in their use at that time I answer There is nothing in the individuall properly indifferent in the use because it fals under some generall rules of Scripture and so is to be used or not used accordingly The question therefore should be Whether a Synod may enjoyne or forbid the use of a thing in its owne nature indifferent And then I should answer affirmatively and defend my selfe by this very president of the Apostles Acts 15. Who did forbid the use of somethings in their owne nature indifferent I would not therefore answer Christ speaketh only of teaching such things which he had commanded as necessary to salvation But I would say Christ speaks of matters of faith or worship That they should teach nothing to be beleeved as a Doctrine of Faith or practised as a part of Gods worship but what he had commanded them Otherwise the Apostles did goe beyond their commission in teaching as necessary to abstaine from bloud c. which Christ never commanded them but rather forbad in abrogating the Ceremoniall Law And whereas you say The Apostle 1 Cor. 14.40 doth not at all enjoyne nor allow the Church to enjoyne such things as decent whose want or whose contrary is not undecent nor such orders whose want or contrary would be no disorder I answer that for men to pray or prophesie with their heads covered or with long haire and women uncovered were things in their owne nature indifferent unlesse you make it necessary as a morall duty for men to pray or prophesie uncovered and women contra which no Interpreters upon that Text doe and yet the Apostle enjoynes the Corinthians so to doe ergo the Synod may doe so too And for your instance of preaching in a gowne A gowne say you is a decent garment to preach in yet such an injunction for Ministers to preach in a gowne is not grounded upon that Text of the Apostle For then a Minister in neglecting to preach in a gowne should neglect the commandement of the Apostle which yet he doth not for if he preach in a cloake he preacheth decently enough True he sins not in point of decency but supposing such a custome in a Church as the custome was for men amongst Corinthians to preach uncovered and the women to be convened in the Congregations the Synod might enjoyne all the Ministers to preach in a gowne as the Apostle did enjoyne them to preach uncovered and he that shall preach in a cloke preaches decently indeed but not orderly and so sins against the Apostles rule of order though not of decency You so speake as if there were only one Rule to be observed or two at most in the use of things indifferent whereas there are at least five to that purpose And by the same reason that the Apostle enjoynes men to keep decency he enjoynes to keep order and so other rules concerning things indifferent Doth not the Apostle complaine of disorder in the Corinthians preaching covered yet the contrary Order was not necessary but in it selfe indifferent The eating of things offered to Idols was a thing in it selfe before that decree of the Apostles indifferent 1 Cor. 10.25 1 Cor. 8.8 yet was now forbidden If you say this was offensive to the Iewes and ergo necessary pro hic nunc I answer this reason made it necessary only where such eating was knowne to be offensive but the Canon made it necessary every where 3. A third reason is taken you say from the nature of the Ministeriall Office in Church or Synod which is stewardly not Lordly and ergo they may dispense no more injunctions to Gods house than Christ hath appointed them I answer its true he may dispense nothing as an institution of Christ but what he hath commanded But yet a Steward may require of the Family and enjoyne them the use of things in themselves indifferent for Order and uniformity As that all shall meet in such an houre in such a place to prayers c. So I thinke you doe in your owne Churches It is indifferent to receive the Lords Supper at Morning or at Evening yet some of you enjoyne it to be done at Evening It is indifferent to baptize in a river in a paile in a Font in a Bason yet I beleeve you enjoyne one of these and forbid the other And whereas you say Christ in these things never provided for uniformity but only for unity I answer then the Apostle exceeded his commission in enjoyning the Corinthians uniformity in their orderly praying or prophecying yea unity is much preserved by uniformity But you propound à question Whether a Synod hath power of Ordination or excommunication And answer 1. That you doubt it was not so from the beginning 2. That if any such occasion should arise amongst you you in a Synod should determine it fit to be done but referre the administration of both to the Presbytery of severall
Churches So perhaps would the Presbyteriall Churches But the question is what is to be done if the Officers of the particular Churches be dead or hereticall who then shall doe those acts Either the Synod must doe it but that you refuse or a Classis The way p. 50 51. or a Presbytery of another Congregation but that you also deny as having no warrant Then it followes the Brethren without Officers must both ordaine Elders Page 100. and excommunicate offenders which you fully grant in the other Tract But as clearly contradict in this as is evident in the former Chapter If it be said for Synodicall Ordination that Matthias was so called to be an Apostle Acts 1. you answer It appeares not they acted them in a Synodicall way But I pray Sir remember what you said above concerning that Synod Acts 15. That it rise up to be a Synod or generall Councell by the Apostles presence they being Elders of all the Churches So it may be said of that Assembly Acts 1. the Apostles presence and the whole Church then extant there assembled made it a Synod and if so then in a Synod there was an Apostle ordained If I may use that word of an Apostle which I may the better to doe by your grants who urge the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Keyes p. 12. he was voted by the common suffrages of them all And if an Apostle much more a Deacon or other Officers as Acts 6. in another like Assembly The other instance of the Presbyters imposing hands upon Paul and Barnabas Paul and Barnabas were ordained to that Office of Apostleship by the imposition of hands of some Officers or members of the Church The way p. 45 was not indeed an Ordination properly so called though you call it a separation of them to the worke of the Apostleship nor in a Synod but in a particular Church yet it was in a Presbytery of Prophets and Teachers perhaps of severall Churches there occasionally met and yeelds us this instruction That Elders of one or more Churches may impose hands that is ordaine in your sense Elders imployed in other Churches for so were Paul and Barnabas Whence we would inferre two things more 1. That if a Classis or Presbytery may ordaine then may a Synod ordaine 2. That however the people or Brethren have no power to ordaine or impose hands for those were Prophets and Teachers that imposed hands on Paul and Barnabas To conclude this Chapter whereas you said The Synod Acts 15. did dispense no censure against the false Teachers an evident argument they left the censure to the particular Churches I answer This is an Argument like the former They dispensed no censure ergo they had no power perhaps they revoked their errour and repented and so there was no need However the Synod could not censure them till they knew them obstinate What was after done we know not CHAP. VII The first Subject of all this Power and of Independency LEtting passe what is said of Christ the soveraigne Subject of all power as out of all question we consider only what you say of Ministeriall power 1. Propos A particular Church or Congregation of Saints is the first subject of all the Church-offices with all their spirituall gifts and power 1 Cor. 3.22 c. But under favour all the Texts produced to prove the Proposition are mistaken or misapplyed The first 1 Cor. 3.22 is not spoken to the Church of Corinth or any other particular Church as a peculiar priviledge unto them but either of all Saints in the world or of those in the Church of Corinth as Saints not promiscuously of the whole Church as a Church consisting of good and bad For was Paul and Apollos was life and death were things present and things to come given to wicked men and hypocrites in that Church was Paul an Apostle and Cephas another given as a peculiar priviledge to the Church of Corinth only Yea is not this meant of the invisible mysticall Church and not of any particular Church For the second 1 Cor. 14.23 you say Theirs was such a Church of whom it is said They came altogether into one place But we have told you at the beginning this was not such a Church as you described A Congregation of Saints professing the faith without their Officers which I thinke you meane here also for these things are taken out of The way p. 1. This was a Church that had many Officers The third Text 1 Cor. 12.28 is not meant of a particular Church For I pray were the Apostles set in the Church of Corinth only as a particular Church Were not they Ministers of all and given to all Churches Your labour about 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some to referre it to the Apostles is but a meere criticisme for let it be some or which it matters not For those Apostles or Prophets were not set in the Church of Corinth as the first subject thereof but in the generall visible Church so the paralell place Eph. 4.12 is necessarily meant of the Church of Saints or the body of Christ generally or indefinitely not of this or that particular Church What weake proofes are these for a proposition of so great concernment as being the very foundation of the Independent Government But you read of no Nationall Church nor Nationall Officers given to them by Christ Yet say we we reade of Officers more than Nationall given to the Churches even universall as Apostles and Prophets And some thinke we reade of Nationall Officers such was Titus for Crete as an Evangelist though we take these to be extraordinary 2. We read of Nationall Churches living under one common government as the Churches of Galatia yet but one Church and the Church of Ierusalem had many Congregations yet but one Church And if many Congregations may be called one Church in a City why all the Congregations in a Nation may not be called one Nationall Church I see no great reason Not indeed in a typicall sense as the Church of the Jewes was a Nationall Church 3. You grant that the Officers of particular Churches of a Province or Nation may meet as a Synod by an Ordinance of Christ Iohn speaks of the dimensions of many particular Iewish Churches combining together in some causes even to the communion of a thousand Churches and all of them will have such mutuall care and yeeld such mutuall help and communion one to another as if they were all but one Body The Keyes p. 56. and there determine and enjoyne things for all their Churches and this Synod you call a Church of Churches Now are not those Officers Officers to all those Churches and may not they be called Nationall Officers in a candid sense It is therefore a meere Logomachy to dispute whether there be a Nationall Church or Nationall Officers or no But the Officers themselves say you and the Synods themselves and all their power
are primarily given to the severall Churches of particular Congregations either as the first subject in whom they are resident or as the first object about whom they are conversant c. Let me first tell you you plainly vary the question which is of the first subject not of the first object 2. The first object of all the Church Officers is not the particular Churches certainly the first object of the Apostles and Prophets was the generall visible Church not any particular Church Nay every Pastor is first given to the whole Church secondarily to this or that particular Church as the object as I thinke I have proved above at least you doe not sufficiently disprove it But 3. that the power which a Synod puts forth is subjectively first in the Synod The Keyes p. 47. is your owne assertion in your 4. proposition you did therefore much forget your selfe here to assert the contrary and thinke to evade by altering the state of the question putting the first object for the first subject or joyning them together when the question is of the first subject only Surely if the power of a Synod be any thing more than the power of a particular Congregation the particular Congregation cannot be the first subject in whom the power of the Synod is resident But when I consider your first proposition better I begin to thinke your meaning is that the Church particular even without Officers is the first Subject of all church-Church-power because 1. such a Church you define in The Way to be the only instituted Church and secondly you give them power to derive their power upon their Officers in chusing and ordaining them and then sending them to a Synod and so indeed they are the first Subject even of the power put forth in the Synod But if this be not downright Brownisme I confesse I know not what is Let me but make use of your owne characters of the first Subject of all power The first subject of any power hath it reciprocally But a particular Congregation of Saints hath not all Church-offices and all spirituall power reciprocally For it may be without all Officers so cannot fire the first Subject of heate be without heate Againe take the second character It first putteth forth the exercise of that power But say I a particular Congregation without Officers doth not first put forth the power of an Officer or of a Synod ergo If you say yet the third will fit it rightly It first communicateth that power to others because the Church first makes her owne Officers and then imployes them in the Church or Synod I aske whether this be not that extreme which the Brethren speake of giving the chiefe if not the whole of the power into the hands of the people without their Officers as if Christ had radically and originally estated it in the people Epist p. 2. 2. Propos The Apostles were the first subject of Apostolicall power But then 1. why doe you not say proportionably that the Pastors are the first Subject of Pastorall power and the Ruling-Elders of Ruling power c 2. If the first Subject of all the Church-offices with all their spirituall gifts and power be a particular Congregation how can you say now that the Apostles were the first subject of Apostolicall power Nay rather in your way the particular Congregation is the first subject even of Apostolicall power and the Apostles had it by derivation from them and so make the Church the Queene that bestoweth all these Offices upon her Officers and so say the Brownists But to the contrary its certaine there were Apostles who had this Apostolicall power before there was any particular Congregation As shall appeare in the particulars 1. You say their power stood in this That each Apostle had in him all ministeriall power of all the officers of the Church Pastors Teachers Rulers Deacons But this is a flat contradiction to your first proposition That a particular Congregation was the first subject of all the Church-offices and power There cannot be two first subjects much lesse three first subjects of one Adjunct and yet here you joyne Evangelists with Apostles and say that one Apostle or Evangelist carried about with him the liberty and power of the whole Church and ergo might alone baptize and censure If you should say they received this power from the Church you say that which jumps with the Brownists opinion and that which is apparantly false Take all your 3. characters of a first subject 1. It first receiveth that power 2. It first puts forth the exercise of that power 3. It first communicateth that power to others They all fall upon the Apostles before there was any particular Congregation They first received power from Christ They first exercised that power They first communicated that power by making Pastors Elders Deacons Besides in your other Tract you say expressely as much or more The way p. 83. One Apostle received both the gifts and power of all the Officers of the Church and might exercise them all alone without the Church Though your Brethren that published that Tract doe affixe their Starre against it which according to their intimation in their Epistle signifies as much as Magister non tenetur And no marvell for you are not constant to your selfe Your first and second propositions doe directly contradict one another 2. Apostolicall power say you extended it selfe to all Churches as much as to any one and so they were the first and last subject of Apostolicall power This still makes the contradiction greater For how then could you truly say The particular congregation was the first subject of all Church-power when the power of a particular Congregation extends it selfe no further then its owne bounds and Apostolicall power extends to all Churches 2. How can you say they were the last subject of all power when you said afore The particular congregation is the first subject of all power And when you say here That ample and universall latitude of power which was conjoyned in them is now divided even by themselves amongst all the Churches and all the Officers respectively Then it followes 1. That the Church is not the first subject of all power for it is divided by the Apostles amongst all the Churches 2. That the Apostles were not the last subject of all Apostolicall power for it is left with the Churches and Officers But still the question is whom the Apostles did betrust first with the ordinary power of Pastors Teachers Elders Deacons The Churches say you and the Officers respectively But what doe you meane that one part of that power was given first to the Churches another part first to the Officers This is not consentaneous to your first proposition where you say The Church is the first subject of all Church offices and all Church power Or doe you meane as you should if you speake congruously that the Church receives all power first and then
yeeld the thing In a large sense Authority may be acknowledged in the people As 1. when a man acteth by counsell he is then Lord of his owne action But that 's nothing to the objection The people of the Assizes act by counsell in approving the sentence If you grant the Brethren no more you mocke them and grant them nothing 2. But you grant them far more Election of Officers concurrence in censures determination of Synodall acts c. you might have added Ordination and then you had given them full Authority by these they have a great stroke or power in ordering Church affaires A great stroke indeed as full Authority as you give the Elders And this you grant when you give your reason to the contrary and would allow them only liberty For say you no act of the peoples power or liberty is binding unlesse the authority of the Presbytery concurre with it No more doth any act of the Presbytery bind unlesse the power of the people joyne with it So say your Prefacers Epist p. 4. So say your self when you allow them such a power as the want thereof retards the sentence But why doe you darken your owne meaning by such ambiguous answers when you grant the Government to be democraticall The way 100 but not meerely democraticall yea if I understand any thing you make it as meerely democraticall as Brownists themselves when you give them power without any Officers to chuse ordaine censure even Officers themselves as we have often told you I pray Sir when the Brethren ordaine or censure Officers without a Presbytery doth not that act of theirs properly bind It must or it is meere vanity having no Presbytery to joyne with them And if so is not this properly Authority without more adoe But you would prove Elders to be the first Subject of Authority from removall of other Subjects They have is not from the Elders of other Churches or from a Synod All Churches and all Elders are equall But 1. This is apparently false in the Scripâ—ure way For the Elders of the first Churches were ordained by the Apostles and Evangelists who were Elders of all Churches and as Elders not as Apostles ordained Elders and so gave them their Authority immediately from Christ 2. Your reason because they are all equall will hurt your selfe For if that be a good reason why they cannot derive it from Elders of the other Churches because they are equall it is much more strong against you they cannot derive it from the people who are their inferiours Besides by this rule Elders of their own Church cannot ordaine any Elders to that Church when they want for they are all â—quâ—ll But by your favour he that is to receive the Office and with it the Authority of an Elder is inferiour to those Elders who are to ordaine him for the lesser is blessed of the greater though when he is once ordained he be their equall And though the Elders of a Synod be equall singly considered yet joyntly they are superiour to any one single and have more Authority than he hath or else all you speake of Synods is but vanity But if they have not their Authority derived from Elders of other Churches nor from Synods nor from the Elders of their owne Church because they are all equall either they must derive it from the people or they have none of all and so the people have as much Authority as any Elder of them all yea in your way more 3. The third branch of the third Propos Both Elders and Brethren together are the first subject of all power needfull amongst themselves You prove it by instance 1. In point of Ordination which is compleat when the people have chosen him and the Presbytery of the Church have laid their hands upon him But 1. I observe that here you make Ordination an Act of Authority and place it in the Elders ergo either the Brethren cannot ordaine Elders which yet you say they may or else they have Authority which yet you seeme to deny 2. Some of your Brethren here hold Ordination to be nothing but a ceremoniall solemnity the substance of a Ministers calling is say they in the peoples election ergo either Authority is in the people who give the substance and liberty only in the Elders who give but the ceremony or the calling of a Minister is compleat without Ordination and yet you require Ordination to the integrity of it But if the Brethren may ordaine without their Officers then they alone are the first Subject not of Liberty only but of Authority also And so this Proposition is needlesse A second Argument is taken from their independent and indispensable power in Church censures which are ratified in Heaven The same answer will serve to this also For first the Brethren alone without Elders say you may censure and if rightly done it is indispensable not to be reversed by any power on Earth because ratified in Heaven ergo they are the first subject of all Church-power needfull within themselves 2. And that the rather if they can ordaine Elders too for then the Elders derive their power from them 3. But suppose which is possible enough the Brethren and Elders erre in their censure of a member is not the censure then reversible I aske by whom if all power needfull for themselves be within themselves what shall the wronged party doe Is he remedilesly miserable If it be dispensable and reversible it must be by some other Church or Clâ—ssis c. But then a Congregation of Brethren and Elders are not the first subject of all power needfull amongst themselves If you say you meane when they walke in truth and peace you should yet have told us what the party must doe when they walke not in truth and peace And if they have not a power to right a wronged party they have not all power needfull to be exercised among themselves The Objections by you brought and answered rather concerne the Episcopall than the Presbyteriall way at least some of them only 2 or 3 may be vindicated Obj 1. To tell the Church is to tell the Presbytery of the Church Sol. We deny not the offence is to be told to the Presbytery yet not to them as the Church but as the guides of the Church Reply This is partly to yeeld the cause For you grant that the businesse is to be told first to the Presbytery who if upon hearing the cause and examining the witnesses they find it ripe for publicke censure they are then to propound it to the Church c. And you grant the people no more but consent to the judgement and sentence of the Elders The Presbytery also are to admonish the party authoritatively and if he will not heare them to passe the sentence upon him ergo the Presbytery is the Church there meant and not the people who neither admonish nor censure authoritatively but only discerne the nature of
I Have diligently perused this Treatise called Vindiciae Clavium and perceiving that the judicious Authour hath exactly performed what he undertakes I cannot but conceive it will conduce very much to the ending of our Vnchristian Contentions concerning Church-Government the setling of some that waver and reclaiming of some that are mis-lead and appose Imprimatur IA. CRANFORD July 4 1645. VINDICIAE CLAVIVM OR A Vindication of the KEYES of the Kingdome of Heaven into the hands of the right Owners Being some Animadversions upon a Tract of Mr. I. C. called The Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven As also upon another Tract of his called The way of the Churches of NEVV-ENGLAND Manifesting 1. The weaknesse of his proofes 2. The Contradictions to himselfe and others 3. The Middle-way so called of Independents to be the Extreme or By-way of the Brownists By an earnest well-wisher to the Truth IER 6.16 Stand ye in the wayes see and aske for the old pathes where is the good way and walke therein LONDON Printed by T.H. for Peter Whaley and are to be sold in Ivy-Lane at the Signe of the Gun 1645. To the READER IT is true which the Prefacers to the Tract called The way of the Churches of Christ in New-England do say That we have long called for a fuller Declaration of themselves For all that hath as yet bin published hath not satisfied our expectation Nor do we think them able to satisfie any unprejudiced man The 32. Questions The Apologeticall Narration The Reasons of the dissenting Brethren The way of the Churches c. Now by them published have all been answered which yet these Brethren take no notice of The Keyes are now in question in the following discourse how well they doe fit the words in The way described or how sutable they are to the parties allowed to weare them There is one thing very suspicious That the Brethren doe not agree among themselves in the use and application of them For those two Brethren tell us in their Epistle That they hold with the Churches of New-England yet it is evident they agree not with their Author in The way For they professe That they doe not yet fully close with some expressions passim frequent in the Booke before some of which belike there are more they minded it to note a Star in the Margin This they could not but say and doe pace tanti Authoris or they could not assert the Booke And will this satisfie any indifferent Reader In the Title page they promise us a full declaration of the Church-way in all particulars But in the second page of their Epistle they tell us They doe not close with some expressions in the Book And there are no lesse than ten Stars affixed in the margine of the Booke wherein they intimate they cannot assert the Booke Of the same minde are the other two Brethren Ep. p. 6. the Prefacers to the Keyes and that not in bare expressions but in Doctrinall assertions How should such Tracts satisfie us when themselves are not satisfied And no marvâ—ll for those Brethren in their Apologeticall Narration doe wisely professe they keep a reserve open to alter their judgements upon occasion of New-light Besides this its evident that the Author of the Keyes does directly contradict the Authour of The way that is himself which when I have pleaded to some friends of his I have been told that he hath altered his judgement since he writ The way in many particulars I have heard indeed he hath often altered his judgement since he went to New-England But I cannot well beleeve it in this because the Prefacers to The way Ep. p. 3. bring us his owne words in a Letter newly written comming to their hands when their Epistle was in the Presse wherein he affirmes That there is not a jot of difference in any Doctrine of Divinity or Church practise So Mr. Cotton in his Letter to Mr. R.M. If it be true that he hath altered his opinion since he writ the Way they have done him wrong to publish it after the Keyes wherein the alteration is If he have not they would be requested to reconcile him to himselfe For I find he doth as flatly contradict himselfe as ever any man did I will instance but in one place and leave the rest to the following Discourse In the Keyes page 4. he sayes The Keyes were delivered to Peter as an Apostle as an Elder and as a Beleever The sense of the words sayes he will be most full if all the severall considerations be taken joyntly together But in The way page 27 he sayes The power of the Keyes is given to the Church to Peter not as an Apostle not as an Elder but as a profest Beleever in the name of Beleevers c. Is not this a flat contradiction and yet the Prefacers seeme to approve it for they set no Starre in the margine I shall leave it to them to reconcile How justly then may we call for a fuller Declaration and how unjustly doe the Brethren quarrell us for calling for it Ep. p. 5. Doe not they themselves promise us yet a fuller Treatise of the same Subject with amplier demonstrations by joynt consent of the Churches of Old and New-England That 's it that we expect the joynt-consent of the Churches and Brethren for their inconstancy and difference in judgement hath caused as our non-satisfaction so our just lamentation That they should rend a poore-rent-already-Church into peeces by setting up the practise of a New way and not be agreed of the platforme whereby they practise There are as I touched before no lesse then ten severall Stars affixed by these Brethren wherein I should conceive they differ from their Authour if not their Master not in bare expressions but in the Doctrine there delivered as page 45. VVhether the Church hath power to proceed against all her Officers if they be culpable in hereticall Doctrine or scandalous crime The Authour holds the affirmative they seeme to hold the Negative Againe page 53. VVhether a Church may consist of lesse than seven p. 55 VVhether confession of sinnes and profession of faith be necessary for a member admitted page 68. VVhether sitting at the Sacrament have a Symbolicall use made by Christ himselfe to teach the Church their Majority over their Ministers in some cases c In these and the rest we are unsatisfied and these Brethren may doe well to declare their judgement in their fuller Treatise promised This disagreement amongst themselves is prejudicious to their cause and way to those that are judicious that are not sworn to the words of any Master but Christ much more when the same person is not at agreement with himself which if it be not the case of the Authour of the Keyes I referre to the judgement of the indifferent Reader when he hath read the following Discourse Animadversions upon the Brethrens Epistle to the Reader IT is indeed the great controversie of
As the Brethren only cannot proceed to any publick censure without their Elders so nor have the Elders power to censure without the concurrence of the Brethren which is as false as the former Indeed these are very parallell As on the one side the Common-Councell cannot doe any valid act without the Aldermen nor the Aldermen without the Common-Councell unlesse there be some reserved cases so as the Ruling-Elders cannot censure without the Pastor so nor the Pastor without the Ruling-Elders but applyed to the Brethren is as in the City if so it were to make the Government popular as those doe that are in the one extreme or I understand nothing And then the last clause of the Brethren is to be paralleld thus As the Common-Councell have not power of censuring the whole Court of Aldermen nor the Aldermen the whole Common-Councell though together they have power over any particular person or persons of each so the Presbytery alone have not power of excommunicating the whole Body of the Brethren nor the Brethren the Presbytery though together they have power over any person in each But then ther 's one thing wanting The Aldermen and Common-Councell have power over all the people of the City as well as over particular persons amongst themselves But in these Brethrens way There are no other people over which the Presbytery and Brethren should have power and so the Scene is mislaid I only note againe That the Brethren and the Authour are not both of one mind They say The Brethren only could not proceed to any publick censures without they have Elders over them nor retrò But whether he say The Elders have power to censure the Body of the Brethren or no we shall heare anon this I am sure he sayes The way p. 45 The Brethren have power to censure the whole Presbytery as was noted afore The next thing which they comment on is the power of Synods because Congregations may miscarry Wherein say they he grants an Association of Churches as an Ordinance of Christ with power above that of a Congregation a Ministeriall power to determine and enjoyne things concerning the Congregations The words are full and faire but the sense is flat and empty For all this power of determining and enjoyning is but Doctrinall or declarative Every Minister hath in himselfe alone a Ministeriall Doctrinall Authority over the whole Church that is his charge and every person in it Ep. p. 9. differing nothing in kind from the power of every single Pastor but in degree of weight as a greater Testimony as three cords twisted together are stronger than each of them single A power not binding or loosing but doctrinally only not armed with power of censures if injunctions be not obeyed But if this power of the Synod be not juridicall what is it All power in those Pastors thus assembled as an Ordinance of Christ is either a power of Order or of jurisdiction The power of determining or decrecing together is not the power of Order for then every Pastor quâ Pastor by vertue of his Order might decree and impose it upon the Congregation which is denyed by all Therefore it must be a power of jurisdiction which yet these Brethren and their Authour doe deny And if it be not armed with power of censure it will come to nothing as shall appeare hereafter For as for their withdrawing communion it will be little regarded by an offending obstinate Congregation The Brethren Epistolers now begin to applaud themselves as jumping in judgement with their Authour though so farre remote as New-England But men agree in errour sometimes that never knew one another Their middle way is this very way held forth by this Authour Yet they say afterwards in some things in his Discourse Hic Magister non tenetur They say It is the middle way between that which is called Brownisme and the Presbyteriall Government as it is practised c. But if they remember themselves well the two extremes were Prelacy and Brownisme Whereof the one doth in effect put the chiefe if not the whole of the Rule and Government into the hands of the people c. The other taking the principall parts of that Rule the due of each Congregation into the jurisdiction of a common Presbytery of severall Congregâ—tions c. I appeale their wisedome if the latter part doe not better fall upon the Prelacy who in the other extreme tooke the principall parts of Rule due in part to the Pastors of Congregations into their owne hands Then the middle way may chance fall out to be the Presbyteriall way and not theirs For certainly that is between those two extremes And their way I dare say and hope to make it appeare comes nearer to Brownisme than the Presbyteriall way to the Prelaticall For the present only marke That the Presbyteriall way gives the power of Church Government neither to the Clergy alone as the Prelacy nor to the people alone or chiefly as the Brownists doe but to both For the Presbyteries Classicall as well as Congregationall consist of Pastors and Ruling Elders who are the Representatives of the people and chosen by their consent But to give the Brethren the people alone without Officers a power to elect ordaine censure c. as the Authour doth whatever these Brethren doe is to put not only the chiefe as Brownists doe but the whole of the Rule into their hands which for ought I know the Brownists doe not Nor doth the Presbytery swallow up the peoples interests as they affirme for their interest is saved in their Ruling-Elders chosen by themselves as the interest of the common people of a Corporation is saved in their Common-Councell chosen by themselves And that the votes of the Elders of that Congregation concerned should be swallowed up in the Classis c. is no more absurd than that the votes of the Burgesse of a Corporation should be swallowed up in the Parliament or that the votes of the Elders should be swallowed up in a Synod confessed to be the Ordinance of Christ unlesse the Brethren thinke a Synod may not determine or decree any thing without the joynt-consent of every Elder there assembled After all this agreement of the Brethren with this absent Authour to a wonder if not to a miracle as they would have us thinke though we beleeve they were not strangers to the plot of this Authour either before or since his going over they enter their dissent against some opinions and passages of this Authour in the platforme by him described I purpose not here to debate much lesse to decide the controversie between them I only desire to have it observed That it may rather seeme a wonder that these and other Brethren having so long studied and professed this middle way should not yet be able to walke hand in hand therein When will they be agreed that we may see their new platforme to be uniforme One of them must needs be
beside the way and why may not both But we shall observe greater differences than these hereafter They now againe resume the difference between the peoples interest and the Elders Rule and Authority and illustrate it by the former similitude Of a Company of Aldermen and a Common-Councell or Body of the people in some Corporations where the interest of the one is distinct from the other so as without the concurrence of both nothing is esteemed as a City act But so as in this Company of the Elders this power is properly Authority but in the people is a priviledge or power Enough hath been said to this already Only I would know why they call the Common-Councell a Body of the people Sure they doe not know any Corporations I thinke where the whole Corporation meets with the Aldermen as a Body The Common-Councell are a distinct Body from the common-people a Body representative only But then the parallell is spoiled for the Brethren as distinct from the Elders are not a representative Body for whom should they represent And if all the people of a corporation should meet as the Common-Councell so that nothing may be esteemed as a City Act without their concurrence Surely the Government were Democraticall The great mistake in the plot is That the Presbytery is compared to the Court of Aldermen and the Brethren to the Common-Councell But so they are not for the Common-Councell are Governours of the Corporation It cannot be said in the Company of Aldermen it is Authority but in the Common-Councell a priviledge for it is Authority also in the Common-Councell and if it be so in the Brethren as it must if they be parallell to the Common-Councell I see not but the Independent way and the way of the Brownists one of the extremes forementioned is one and the same And let the Brethren consider The multitude of the Church doth ordinarily execute all discipline and censures by the Presbyters the Presbyters by their consent The way p. 98. whether the Brownists doe not select two or three or more persons and put them in Office and betrust them with an entire interest of power for a multitude to which that multitude ought by a command from Christ to be subject and obedient as to an Ordinance to guide them in their consent and in whose sentence the ultimate formall Ministeriall Act of binding and loosing shall consist and yet place the Rule and Authority originally and chiefly in the people And then see how little difference there is between themselves and them It s true indeed that without the concurrence of the Aldermen and Common Councell in the major part nothing is esteemed as a City Act But without the concurrence of the body of the people it is So without the concurrence of the Pastors and Elders nothing is to be esteemed as a Church act but if the parallell be right without the Brethren it is That the Brethren have any power of concurrence with the Elders in their Acts is begged not proved And their owne words confute it The multitude say they ought by a command from Christ to be subject and obedient to the power of the Elders as to an Ordinance c. as Rulers set over them But if they ought to be subject and obedient to the acts of their Elders or Rulers they have no more concurrence to their acts by way of power than the common people have to the acts of the Aldermen and Common-Councell which is a meere passive concurrence and consent The next similitude of a Virgin is nothing parallell to the case in hand A Virgin say they hath a power ultimately to dissent upon an unsatisfied dislike and the match is not valid without her consent But the common people in a Corporation have no such power ultimately to dissent then againe the Government were Democraticall And if they give this power to the Brethren ultimately to dissent they give them more than an interest even a power of Authority to annull all acts and censures made by the Elders which I take it is no lesse than Brownisme for they can say no more Againe they suppose a Government tempered of Aristocracy and Democracy in which the people have a share and their actuall consent is neccessary to all Lawes and sentences whereas a few Nobles that are set over them in whom the formall sanction of all should lye in these it were Rule and Authority in that multitude but power or interest But I pray is not that Government where the peoples actuall consent and so their dissent is necessary to all Lawes and sentences meerely popular and in shew only Aristocraticall The case is just the Brownists Their Church seemes to be tempered of Aristocracy in their select Officers chosen and ordained by themselves as yours are and Democracy in the body of the people But they granting the peoples actuall consent and dissent necessary to all Acts and sentences swallow up the votes of the Elders and so their Government is wholly or chiefly popular Give such a power to the people as you doe and I will use your owne words All that is said in the New Testament about the Rule of the Elders and the peoples obedience to them is to be lookt upon but as Metaphors and to hold no proportion with any substantiall reality of Rule and Government The Brethren to make their way more plausible shew a reason of the difference between the Times of the Old and New Testament Then the Church was in her Nonage and therefore the sole power of all Church-matters was in their Tutors and Governours But now the Church is out of her Nonage and more generally able being visible Saints as they should be to joyne with their guides c. But they forget themselves presently confessing the weaknesse and unskilfulnesse of the people for the generality of them in comparison of their Officers gifted for the Government He hath therefore placed a Rule and Authority in those Officers over them not directing only but binding so as not only nothing should be done without them but not esteemed validly done unlesse done by them Now I pray was it any more in the Government of the Church of the Old Testament were not they to be visible Saints were not their Guides gifted for that purpose sutable to those Times And I thinke the Brownists may grant them thus much Their Officers are but the Churches servants and yet they say nothing may in an ordinary way of Church-Government be done without them nor validly done unlesse done by them But I marvell they should call the power of the Elders a binding power when as they said before The Elders had no power to censure without the concurrence of the people as nor the people without the Elders which is just the same which Brownists say Nor can this ballancing of the power prevent Anarchie what ever it may doe Tyranny for certainly if the peoples consent and concurrence be necessary
to every Church-act it s an easie thing for them to bring in Anarchy being alwaies the greater number and so to swallow up the votes of the Elders as Brownists doe That Ministeriall Doctrinall Authority should be severed from the power of excommunication in some parties we never doubted because excommunication is an act of jurisdiction which is common to many but Doctrinall Authority is an affluxe of Order But to sever Rule and Authority from the power of concurrence to excommunication and censures as they doe in the people is a meer nullity of Rule and Authority too That the power of excommunication should be inseparably linked to a Congregation they would faine illustrate by a knowne comparison As the custome is in our Land The sentencing of a man to death is not by Lawyers nor by Iudges alone but by his Peeres a Iury of men like himselfe Their similitude still halts on the maine legge For who are the Iudges with them but the Presbytery and who are the Iury but all the Brethren But this is not so in a Corporation All the City are not the Delinquents Peeres but a select dozen of men Now suppose a man be accused as an offender in a Corporation shall the whole City be his Peeres or Iury to try him have they any such interest or priviledge is their consent or dissent regarded So the parallell required If a brother deserve censure he shall not be judged by the Pastors alone or with the Elders chosen by the people as his Iury for the Government of the Congregation but all the people are to be his Peeres or Iury This were strange to see in a City and would breed nothing but Anarchy and confusion So in the Church That Christ hath not betrusted a generall Assembly of Elders with that power he hath done the Congregation is begged not proved The reason is invalid Because say they they are abstracted from the people But that 's not true for the people are there representatively in their Elders who are able to represent the case of the offender with all the circumstances as fully as if all the people were there present But Christ say they would have this Tribe of men the brethren personally concurring not by delegation alone not to the execution only but even to the legall sentence also of cutting men off This is all begged and is the question And it is as if they should say in the parallell instance God would have all the Corporation personally concurring to the legall sentence or cutting off a malefactor not by delegation only as the Iury doe nor to the execution only which were a strange confusion So that as at the Assizes the multitude of the people present have no concurrence to the legall sentence c. but the Iudge and Iury only so the Brethren are to have no concurrence to the legall sentence of excommunication except to yeeld obedience in the execution but the Elders only and so the parallell is full And to conclude if the distance of the Presbyteries Clasficall c. may necessitate the censure to pertaine to the particular Congregation because of the circumstances better knowne to them By the same reason every Towne where a malefactor lives should have the Sessions kept amongst them because there the person and fact is better knowne and not one man to be absent from the censure Nay a man being to be excommunicated out of a particular Church is excommunicated out of all Churches therefore all the Churches must be present at the censure VINDICIAE Clavium OR A Vindication of the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven CHAP. I. What the Keyes be and what their power 1. THat by the Kingdome of Heaven is meant both the Kingdome of Glory which is above and the Kingdome of Grace which is the Church on Earth I easily grant But I only desire in the beginning of this discourse to be informed what you meane by the Church Whether 1. The invisible and mysticall Church of true Beleevers opposed to Reprobates or 2. The Catholicke visible Church opposed to Heathens or 3. The particular Congregation of Beleevers associated in Church-communion as you use to speake If we may guesse at your meaning by the whole proceeding of this Tract or by your discovery of your selfe in the other Discourse called The way of the Churches in New-England which though it was published after this of the Keyes yet was written and went up and downe in the darke before it I thinke you meane it in the latter sense for a particular Congregation For your first Proposition there gives us this Resolution That the Church which Christ in the Gospell hath instituted The way p. 1. and to which he hath committed the Keyes c. it coetus fidelium a combination of godly men commonly called a particular visible Church But of all the rest this is the most improbable sense of our Saviours words Mat. 16.19 For 1. By the Kingdome of Heaven on Earth he meanes that Church of which he had spoken before in v. 18. But that was either the Catholicke visible Church or rather the invisible mysticall Church for that only is built upon the rocke and against that the gates of hell shall never prevaile whereas particular Churches may faile 2. The kingdome of Glory the one part of the meaning of the Kingdome of Heaven is not contradistinguished to a particular Congregation but to the generall visible Church on Earth opposed to the World by your selfe The Keyes p. 2. On Earth that is say you in the Church on Earth for he gave him no power to bind in the World 3. That Church was there meant say you the way p. 1. whereof Peter was one But Peter was not a member of such a particular congregation for there was none such extant when Christ spake these words to Peter 4. You say againe it was that Church unto which Peter or any offended brother might tell the offence and have it censured But that was never done in a Church of Saints Beleevers without officers neither was the church of Corinth such a church as you described before for that had Officers who authoritatively might censure the incestuous person yet you joyne them both together 5. It was say you a Church who all met in one place for the administration of the Ordinances of Christ But the Ordinances of Christ are not to be found much lesse administred in a Church of Beleevers without Officers 6. When you say Christ committed the Keyes to the Church that is a particular Congregation you must meane it either Subjectivè or Objectivè If you meane it in the latter sense That the Keyes are committed to the Church as the object of the exercise of the Keyes that is for the use and good of the Church you say true but nothing to the purpose In this sense the Keyes are given first and more immediately to the invisible mysticall Church All are yours whether Paul c. then
to the generall visible Church for their sakes and then to the particular Congregation as a part or member of that generall visible Church But if you meane it in the former sense as you doe and must or else you aequivocate with us from the beginning and throughout your whole Booke you fall into that extreme of the Brownists which you so labour to avoid For to take the Church in Mat. 16. for a particular Congregation of Beleevers without Officers is a new and strange and false glosse maintained by none but Brownists and such like Separatists To conclude The Church of which our Saviour speaks is called here the Kingdome of Heaven on Earth But a particular Congregation of Beleevers is never called the Kingdome of Heaven being but a member or corporation of that Kingdome It were as improper to call a congregation Christs Kingdome as to call London the Kingdome of England yet so your party speake sometimes This I thought good to note to cleare the way for the better understanding of that which followes And now goe on 2. The next thing to be explicated is what the Keyes of the Kingdome be wherein you resolve us thus The Keyes are the Ordinances of Christ which he hath instituted to be administred in his Church as the preaching of the Word as also the administring of Seales and censures I take what you grant only I shall animadvert some things In this Paragraph as you doe clearely lay downe the state of the question so you doe strongly confute the scope of your whole Booke which is to give the people a share in the power of the Keyes that is in the government of the Church which appeares upon these considerations 1. You say the Keyes are the Ordinances which Christ hath instituted But the Ordinances of Christ are given indeed for the Church of Beleevers that is for their good and benefit objectivè But are never in all the Scripture nor in all Antiquity said to be given to that Church subjectivè It sounds ill at first hearing to say that the people have any power to exercise Ordinances of preaching or administring of Seales or Censures The power of preaching or administring Sacraments by the people as none but Separatists doe usurpe so your selfe complaine of it page 6. And why you should allow them power in censures there is very little reason 2. You say the Keyes are Ordinances which Christ hath instituted to be administred in his Church What Church the Church of Beleevers a particular Congregation for so you meane as was shewed afore Marke it to be administred in that Church scil by Officers instituted for that purpose not by that Church without Officers 3. You adde that which to me clearly excludes the people of your Church These Keyes are neither sword nor scepter c. for they conveigh not soveraign power but stewardly ministeriall Whence thus I argue The people or Congregation of Beleevers have no stewardly or ministeriall power over themselves ergo they have nothing to doe with the power of the Keyes They are not as Hilkiah was whose Office was over the house Isa 22.15 22. nor Stewards in the house as he was Gen 43.19 nor as those are who are spoken of 1 Cor. 4.1 2. Stewards of the mysteries of God But you adde a clause to draw in the people saying This power to open and shut the gates of Heaven lyeth partly in their spirituall calling whether it be their Office or their place and order in the Church c. I suppose the word calling should be taken here of a speciall calling or office as we use to call it which againe would exclude the people from any power in the Keyes as having no office in the Church But you adde by way of explication of your owne sense Whether it be their Office or their place and order in the Church on purpose to steale in the interest of the people in some share of the Keyes But if place order in the Church give the people out of office any power in the Keyes that is the Ordinances so you say again then may women children claim an inâ—erest in those Keyes for they have a place and Order in the Church as well as men which yet you would seeme to deny But let me professe at first what I shall make good from your selfe hereafter I see not but women and children may challenge a great part of that power of the Keyes which you give to the Brethren 3. Concerning the third What are the Acts of the Keyes and the fourth what is the subject to be bound and loosed I shall not contend with you The fifth To whom the power of the Keyes is given requires a more serious consideration as being the very foundation of all your new Fabricke which stands or fals with it The Text is expresse To thee Simon Peter will I give the Keyes c. in a cleare contradistinction to the Church before mentioned upon this rock of thy confession will I build my Church which you take for a particular congregation though by a great mistake as was shewed above But let it be granted for the present to be so then the words in all cleare construction run thus I will build my Church the particular congregation upon that rocke and I will give the Keyes of that Church called the Kingdome of Heaven and so by you interpreted to thee Peter and to such Officers as thou art Otherwise he would have said On this rocke will I build my Church and I will give unto it the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven that is of the Church it selfe which is scarse a reasonable interpretation of the words To make way therefore for your great designe you undertake to resolve that busie question as you call it How Peter is to be considered in receiving this power of the Keyes whether as an Apostle or as an Elder or as a Beleever c. Before I come to consider your answer I would make bold to put one ingredient more into the question whether Peter was not considered as a Deacon as well as an Elder or Beleever For seeing a Deacon is one of the Officers of the New Testament The Keyes p. 32. The way p. 83. some say Iudas was Christs Deacon and your selfe say all the Officers of the Church were virtually in the Apostles They were Pastors Teachers Ruling-Elders Deacons c. It may not unfitly be questioned whether Peter did not then represent a Deacon as well as an Elder or Beleever And then againe whether the Keyes were not given to Peter as a Deacon and why a Deacon only is denyed any power in the Keyes when beleevers are admitted to have a share therin seeing a Deacon hath power to collect and distribute the goods and treasury of the Church I leave these to your consideration or theirs who shall reply and come to your answer To shew your desire of peace and your impartiality in inclining
to any party you consider you say Peter in a threefold notion when he received the Keyes As an Apostle Elder Beleever so the sense of the words you say will be most full if all the considerations be taken joyntly together The sense indeed is most full to your purpose but I thinke least of all true * The power of the Keyes is given to the Churâ—h to Peter not as an Apostle not as an Elder but as a profest Beleever in the name of Beleevers c. The way p. 27. a flat contradiction And you doe beg the question to say Peter received the power of the Keyes as all these and in particular as a Beleever For of all the senses the last was least thought on in any age of the Church till this last when the Brownists and such like stumbled upon it When Saint Austin said Peter received the Keyes in the name of the Church Whether he did mistake the sense of the place or no you doe utterly mistake him to draw him to your meaning For 1. he did not meane your Church a particular congregation but either the generall vâ—sible Church or the invisible mysticall Church 2. Nor that neither subjectivè but objectivè that the Keyes were given to Peter as an Officer for the use and benefit of the Church But you proceed to say It appeares Christ gave the power of the Keyes to the Body of the Church even to the fraternity with the Presbytery Mat. 18.17 18. When they are met in his Name and agree together in the censure of an offendor But by this place and your former notion of Peter as a Beleever you may as well inferre that the Keyes are given to the Sororietie q.d. as to the Fraternity as Beleevers and as a part of the Body of the Church which I thinke is flat Anabaptisme worse than Brownisme You know there are some who deny that Mat. 18.17 18. holds forth any censure of excommunication at all Others that grant it yet by Church there understand the Officers of the Church such as the Apostles were to whom Christ spake What ye binde what ye loose c. You must not therefore beg a foundation to your building lest if it be fetched home your building fall on your owne head But you say All agree in this That no offender is to be excommunicated but with some concourse of the congregation at least by way 1. of consent to the sentence 2. of actuall execution of it by withdrawing themselves from him and this we conceive is some part of the exercise of the power of the Keyes But truly this is but the gingling of the Keyes at most no part of the power of the Keyes For 1. it belongs to Stewards in a Family only to exercise the power of the Keyes to take in and cast out what servants they please The rest of the servants heare the Keyes gingle when they turne the Keyes but have no part in the exercise of them no not so much as by consent active consent I meane so that if they consent not nothing is done but by a passive consent only as approving what the Steward hath done If you grant the Fraternity any more you make them joynt Stewards of the Family the Church as you shall heare hereafter Nay sometimes you seeme to give them no more The people discerning and approving the justnesse of the censures before administred by the Elders The Keyes p. 15. they give consent in obedience to the will and rule of Christ which is no part of the exercise of the power of the Keyes For suppose the censure be justly administred and the people deny their consent shall not a Delinquent be censured unlesse they will consent If not they have full power in the Keyes arising to authority which is the errour of the one extreme If so only as passively to consent its evident this is no part of the power of the Keyes 2. For their withdrawing that 's much lesse any power in the Keyes The Steward of a Family having discharged a naughty servant and turned and locked him out of doores all the rest of the servants are to withdraw from him but this is not by way of active power but passive obedience Is the withdrawing of people from a man outlawed in civill affaires any interest in the Keyes of Iudicature If it be said except the people consent and withdraw communion from a censured person the censure is in vaine I answer If the people should be so rebellious to civill Authority as not to withdraw from an outlawed man nothing were done the sentence was so farre in vaine If no man could be gotten to execute a malefactor condemned the sentence were frustrated in respect of the execution But doth this inferre that the people have an interest in the Keyes of secular power The question is not de facto what the people stubbornly may doe but whether they ought not to consent and withdraw and whether if they doe not they can challenge any interest in the power of the Keyes Againe if the Keyes were given to Peter as a Beleever I see no reason but women and children may come in and challenge a power in the Keyes It suffices not to say as the Epistolers say pag. 3. Women and children are excepted by a Statute Law of Christ against their enjoyment of any part of this publick power For though they be forbidden to speake in the Congregation or might by impotence as some say be excepted in some particulars yet there seemes no reason why they should be exempted from that power here given to the Fraternity which concernes them as well as men and they are as well able to exercise it as men viz. to give a passive consent or to withdraw from the party excommunicated which they may and must doe as well as men For as women may be offended so they should in reason have satisfaction by consenting to the sentence And as women may offend in keeping company with a brother or sister excommunicated so they ought to withdraw from them then if this be any exercise of the power of the Keyes you may heare them gingle at the womens girdles which is an extreme beyond the Brownists even downright Anabaptisticall But you give the Fraternity more power than this hereafter there we shall consider it Hitherto you have given them nothing but what is common to them with women CHAP. II. Of the distribution of the Keyes YOu first lay downe the ordinary Distribution of the Keyes and then except against it as defective in foure things 1. That any key of the kingdome of heaven should be left without power for the key of knowledge is contradistinguished from a key of power To this I answer It may be this distribution is not every way exact and perfect yet I thinke yours is rather worse And your exception fals upon your owne distribution a little more remotely For your key of Faith or
knowledge for you make them both one is distinguished from the key of Order which Order is either of power or authority and so your key of knowledge is left without power also 2. Your key of power as you call it is it selfe left without all power at least active power being only an obedientiall power to consent and yeeld submission to the will of Christs made knowne by the Elders 2. There wants say you an integrall part of the keyes the key of power or liberty belonging to the Church it selfe But to this I say This is so farre from being an integrall part of the keyes that it is no key at all no proper power at all as hath partly been shewed already A key in all mens judgement that ever writ of the power of the Church carries in the notion of it a power and authority properly called power in government till now of late yea even the Brownists themselves make it a key of Authority and Rule in the people Onely you to make us beleeve you differ from them call it a power improperly called Authority pag. 36. or a liberty or a priviledge which was never before called a key till now For there are many liberties or priviledges belonging to servants in a family or people in a State which no man cals a key of power or a power in the Keyes And the truth is you are not constant to your selfe For sometimes you call it only liberty c. sometimes you give the Church the Brethren without their Officers as full power as the Officers themselves have and as full rule and authority as the Brownists give them as we shall manifest in the sequell But you adde Protestant Churches having recovered the liberty of preaching the Gospell and ministry of the Sacraments have looked no farther some of them nor d scerned the defect of Church power or liberty due unto them in point of discipline To this I say The errour of the Protestant Churches was not that they looked not after the power of discipline for the people but that they laboured not to recover it for their Elders letting the Prelates keep quietly the discipline to themselves But the errour on the other hand was more easie to be fallen into and more dangerous which you observe to have followed That others finding themselves wronged as they did but suppose in the withholding a key of power which belongs to them have wrested to themselves an undue power which belongs not to them the key of Authority True it is some have done so for being allowed by some perhaps your selfe the key of power or liberty in discipline as you call it they have wrested not only the key of knowledge in preaching and administring Sacraments which belongs not to them but also the key of authority as you speake And so will your people too ere long I feare when they are once possessed a while of the key of power wrest the key of authority in all both in preaching and administring Sacraments and pronouncing censures and well they may by your owne grants as we shall heare anon 3. A third defect you observe In dividing the Key of Order from the Key of jurisdiction of purpose to make way for the power of Chancellors c. But 1. That might be the errour of the distributors not of the distribution For the distribution gives both the keyes to the same men For the same men that had the key of knowledge had also the key of order and jurisdiction in the intention of the first sounders of that distribution which after ages divided in practise And yet their Chancellors and Commissaries c. some of them at least were Deacons who were reputed of the Clergy as they speake and might preach if they would and so had both keyes in one person though limited in some particular acts of them But if our late Deacons were as some of our brethren have said they were virtually Presbyters and needed no new Ordination then certainly they had the power of jurisdiction with the power of Order though limited by the corruption of the distributors 2. This defect may chance to fall upon your owne distribution Doe not you divide the key of Order from the key of jurisdiction in your owne Deacons You say expresly in these words The Order of Deacons The Keyes page 6. whereof our Lord spake nothing touching jurisdiction I hope you will not say the Office of a Deacon fals not under the key of Order yet for ought I perceive you make little account of him in your distribution 3. You say Those Chancellors c. were invested with jurisdiction and more than ministeriall authority even above those Elders who labour in Word and Doctrine But doe not you invest the people with as much power and jurisdiction more than ministeriall even above those Elders who labour in the word and doctrine both to open and shut the doores of the Church against them page 9. besides what you say elsewhere 4. I would gladly be resolved whether you doe not divide the key of Order into a key of power or liberty and a key of authority on purpose to make way for the power of the people as they of old did for the power of the Chancellors c. Lastly I pray you seriously to consider whether by this sacrilegious breach of Order investing the people with a key of power even above those Elders that labour in the Word and Doctrine to open and shut the doores against them page 9. which is the breaking as it were of the files and rankes in an Army they are your owne words Satan is not like againe to rout and ruine a great part of the liberty and power of Church officers and the purity of the Churches and of all the Ordinances of Christ in them 4. A fourth defect is That Order is appropriated to the Officers of the Church only We put a difference between Office and Order We shall speake more fully to this hereafter All we say for the present is but this That Office and Order in the strict and Ecclesiasticall sense of the word Order have hitherto been taken for the same And your selfe grant page 7. They may be admitted as aquivalent in a right sense Let us now consider your owne Distribution There is say you a key of Faith and a key of Order and you have a Text of Scripture for it Col. 2.5 6. But by Faith and Order there the Apostle meanes not the keyes of the kingdome of Heaven as they are understood in this controversie but as I take it their Faith manifested in their orderly walking as becomes Christians professing the Gospell So that by Order there is meant their morall orderly walking as in other duties according to the Rule so in their submission to the order of government or exercise of the keyes in the hands of their Officers I beleeve no Interpreter but your selfe and some others of late ever tooke those words in
an Ecclesiasticall sense for the keyes delivered unto Peter But we goe on The key of Faith say you is the sâ—me with the key of knowledge Luke 11.52 which the Lawyers had taken aw y. But 1. by your favour the key of Faith and knowledge are not both one if you understand it of justifying Faith A man may have much knowledge and no Faith Knowledge may in a sense be said to be the key of Faith as being the inlet or Antecedent of Faith but so Faith and knowledge are not the same 2. The key of knowledge is one thing and knowledge is another The key of knowledge is the great Ordinance of preaching you said the keyes of the kingdome of Heaven were the Ordinances of Christ as the preaching of the Word the opening and applying of it p. 2 c. But this key of knowledge here you speake of is you say common to all Beleevers but a little before this you complaine that private Christians had usurped this key to preach the Gospell c. page 6 Whereas this key of knowledge is peculiar to the Ministers of the Gospell The Priests lips keep the key of knowledge c. and Faith comes by the Word preached This was the key of knowledge which the Lawyers had taken away either by not interpreting or misinterpreting the Scripture They could not take away the peoples knowledge much lesse their Faith They might take away the key both of knowledge and Faith that is preaching as the Papists doe by locking up the Word in a strange language and ours lately did by crying and putting downe preaching 2. Whereas you say They that had the key of knowledge had power to enter into the kingdome of Heaven and it may be to open the doore to others to enter also I answer The key s given to Peter Matth. 16. were not to open the Kingdome of Heaven to himselfe for that key if a key it was he had before but to open it to others by opening and applying the Word as you said above our Saviour speaks of binding and loosing others Whose sins ye bind on earth c. and of opening for and shutting out others not himselfe Keyes are given to Stewards not properly to let in or shut out themselves but by way of Office to let in or locke out others Besides A priviledge to find an open doore to enter into the fellowship of the Church p. 11. which is passive and in plaine sense one fit to be admitted into the Church So the Epistolers p. 2. The key of knowledge hath opened their hearts that is I think preaching the key of knowledge and Faith which you describe here is common to all Beleevers even women but I beleeve you will not give them a key to open and shut heaven to others that is the key of preaching Then againe why doe you dislike the former distribution when you also make one key to be the key of knowledge and so leave one of the keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven without power contra-distinguishing the key of Faith or knowledge for with you they are both one from the key of power which fals under your key of Order Lastly whereas you say a faithfull soule by this key entreth into a state of grace and into the fellowship of the Church c. You may remember that by the Kingdome of Heaven which is the Church on Earth you understand a particular Congregation But a man may have this key of Faith or knowledge and never enter into your particular Church and so this key is given to a man out of the Church and yet you say the keyes are given to the Church I leave you to consider it These things hang not well together In the next place you come to the key of Order of which you thus write The key of Order is the power whereby every member of the Church walketh orderly himselfe according to his place in the Church and helpeth his brethren to walke orderly also But this is a strange expression of the key of Order never heard of before too generally and aequivocally spoken For Order may be taken either morally or Ecclesiastically Passively or Actively Morally so it is taken passively for a conformity in carriage to the rules of the word in Doctrine as well as discipline But Ecclesiastically it is an Active power acting upon others The very name of a key imports a power intrusted for others good and not their owne properly Every one is to keep Order but every one hath not the key of Order Order and Office in this Ecclesiasticall sense are both one None hath the key of Order but one in Office But your key of Order is common to every member of the Church The Keyes p ge 21. And that it is no more than morall or passive Order your selfe doe seeme to grant when you say The brethren stand in an Order even in an orderly subjection according to the order of the Gospell Every servant in a Family and every man woman and childe in a corporation stand in such an order and must walke orderly themselves and help others to walke orderly also but will any man say therefore these have interest in the keyes of the Family or Corporation If every member of a Congregation have this key of Order how and why are women and children excepted or are they no members of the Church or may they walke disorderly The instance of Saint Pauls walking orderly according to the orders of the Iewish Church manifests the morall sense of the word For certainly the Fraternity of the Iewes had no power of the Keyes The meaning was that Saint Paul by his conformity to some Iewish Ceremonies should manifest that he did not absolutely oppose the Rites of the Iewish Church not that he had any power of the Keyes of the government of that Church Surely the Iewes were bound all of them to withdraw from every brother that walked disorderly yet did not beleeve that that was any part of the exercise of the key of Order No more was it in those of Thessalonica when they did warne the unruly or withdraw from him that walked disorderly And this Key of Order if a Key it were was common not only to Elders and Brethren as you say but even to women and children as I said afore Of Order you say there be 2. Keyes one of power or interest another of Authority or Rule The first of these is called in Scripture Liberty c. Before I examine the particulars I shall note some few things 1. How modest errour is at first Here it is first called power mollified by interest and then by liberty after by priviledge all which are rather passive than active but afterwards it is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 power which though it sometimes signifies a priviledge honour or dignity Iohn 1.12 in a passive construction as given and received yet when it relates to Government or a power of the Keyes
civilly it then is taken actively and signifies Authority Romanes 13.1 But page 36. it is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which properly though you say otherwise signifies Authority Authority after a sort may be acknowledged in the people And the acts there and elsewhere given to the people some of them at least as joyning in Censures and in determination of Synodall acts c. called a great stroke or power in ordering Church affaires amounts almost to as full authority as the Elders have any 2. Another thing I note is that this power interest priviledge of the people c. was never called a Key till some new Lock smiths made this new pick-locke of the power of Church-Officers For what is all that is given them if no more than is their due to the government of the Church In a Family in a Corporation I say it againe the servants and Citizens have some priviledges and interests who yet have no stroke in ordering of the Keyes either of Family or City 3. I desire to know under which of the parts of this distribution doth the Deacon fall There be 2. Keyes of Order of power or interest of Authority or Rule Now a Deacon qua Deacon fals under neither of these Not the first for so he is considered only as a Beleever Not the second for so he is denyed jurisdiction as we heard afore If you say he fals under the Key of Order as an Officer yet then you divide the Key of Order from the Key of jurisdiction which you blamed in the other distribution and levell the Deacon an Officer with people no Officers We should now come to the particulars of the power or interest of the Brethren They have a liberty say you in many things but they are more fully laid downe in Chapter 4. there we shall consider them Only now we shall consider the proofe of this power of the people out of the Scripture Your Text is Gal. 5.13 Brethren you have been called unto Liberty c. This Text under favour is miserably mistaken and that not in mine only but in the judgement of all Interpreters which you knowing had rather appeale to the Context than to the Commentators I shall follow you at your owne weapon Your strength lyes in the word Liberty They have a power and liberty to wit to joyne with the sounder part of the Presbytery in casting them out c. But I shall appeale the Apostle himselfe to be Iudge between us In the first verse of this Chapter he uses the same word Stand fast in the Liberty c. where it is without all controversie understood of their liberty or freedome from the Ceremoniall Law called there the yoke of bondâ—ge which some false teachers would impose upon their necks Now that the Apostle speaking still of the same matter should use the same word in so different a sense is no wayes probable Nay secondly in the 11. verse the Apostle sayes If I yet preach circumcision why doe I yet suffer persecution c. And then ver 13. comes in againe with this Brethren you are called unto Liberty c. viz. from that Law of Circumcision and the like not to the liberty by you pretended To chuse Officers or to joyne in Censures c. though these were granted to them yet not in this place And your glosse is very far fetcht and improbable I would they were cut off that trouble you where say you he declares what censure he wishes against those that troubled them viz. cut off to wit by excommunication Obj. But what power have we to cut them off The Apostle answers They have a power and liberty to wit to joyne with the sounder part of the Presbytery in casting them out For saith he you are called unto Liberty There is not one word of this glosse in the Text. And if there were any such power the people have full power given themselves to cut them off for here is not one word of joyning with a Presbytery See againe v. 16. where the Apostle resumes his exhortation ver 13. Vse not your liberty as an occasion unto the flesh saying I say then walke in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh Which makes it evident that the Apostle chiefly exhorts ad bonos more 's though he touch other things by the bye but discipline is least of all intended And lest they should use their liberty from those legall and ceremoniall yokes to contention or licentiousnesse he cautions against it v. 13 16. Carnall contention is indeed as you say an usuall disease of popular liberty which I feare you and your partners too much foment by giving the people this power and liberty which you so much talke of and by gingling these Keyes in the eares of the people have almost made them wilde not only one against another but against their Elders or Governours also And no marvell when you grant them so much power As to open a doore of entrance to the Ministers Calling so to shut the doore of entrance against them in some cases page 9. much more than which the Brownists doe not grant then And so much of the pick-locke of Order The Key of Authority is a morall power in a superiour order or state binding or releasing an inferiour in point of subjection To this I say 1. To call Authority a morall power is very improper For every single Pastor yea perhaps brother hath a morall power to bind and release not only an inferiour but a superiour also in point of subjection by propounding the commands of God You might rather have called it a juridicall or Ecclesiasticall power and that without any danger seeing you reserve this power to the Officers or superiours in Order But 2. you speake too confusedly For the people have a power to joyne with the Officers in the censures that is in binding and releasing as you say page 14. The whole Church may be said to binde and loose Nay to open and shut the doores against their Ministers who are their superiors and so Authority is a morall power in inferiours also And page 12. you say the people have a power To prevent the tyranny and Oligarchy and exorbitance of the Elders Surely this must be by a negative voice and that 's more than liberty even full authority and being by inferiours is flatly against your owne definition Furthermore as you say the Brethren with the Elders have power to open and shut c. So you say the Elders with the Brethren doe bind and release page 10. So it seemes as the Brethren can doe nothing without the Elders so the Elders can doe nothing without the Brethren as the Epistolers say expressely page 4. And who would not now conclude that the liberty is equall in both or rather the authority is the same in both and what say the Brownists more And now I thinke you cannot truly say you have received this distribution of
the Keyes from the Scripture nor yet from antiquity though you would faine have us beleeve you would not sticke upon the former distribution if the words be rightly explained As how 1. Let them say you allow some spirituall power to the Key of knowledge though not a church power But have you not all this while been speaking of the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven that is the Church and now is the power of the Key of knowledge no Church power Againe have not you your selfe taken away from the Key of knowledge not only Church power but all power whatever by contradistinguishing it to the Key of power 3. Is that Key whereby he that hath it not onâ—y enters himselfe into the Kingdome of Heaven but also opens the doore for others to enter no Church power You adde secondly Let them put in a Key of liberty as well as of authority into Church power But both these are but one Key or nothing as we have said Nothing indeed to purpose if both these must consent or nothing is done as you and the Brethren assert 3. Let them not say you divide from the Key of Order or Office the Key of jurisdiction for Christ hath given no jurisdiction but to whom he hath given Office But 1. Christ it seemes hath divided the Key of Office from the Key of jurisdiction for hee hath given no jurisdiction to Deacons 2. You should have said and your scope required it Christ hath given to none the Key of Order or Office but to whom he hath given the Key of jurisdiction but that had contradicted your selfe in the instance of Deacons Concerning whom say you our Lord spake nothing of jurisdiction page 6. Now is it not as strange that there should be an Office in the Church without some jurisdiction As that there should among the Prelates bee jurisdiction without an Office at least instituted by Christ as it was in Chancellors Commissaries c. Nay is it not as strange that there should be Authority that is jurisdiction to binde and loose in those that have no Office at all as there is in the people in your way as that there should be an Office without jurisdiction And now I leave you to consider whether of these Distributions is most consentaneous to the truth CHAP. III. Of the Subject of the Key of Knowledge and Order YOu first tell us in generall That as the Keyes be divers so are the Subjects to whom they are committed divers But this is very doubtfull and disputable because at first all the Keyes were given to Peter at once and therefore one subject may possesse them all And sure they all meet in Pastors every one of them hath all the Keyes of knowledge and of power of Order and jurisdiction according to the old distribution and perhaps in yours also As the Apostles had all the Keyes by your confession They might exhort as Pastors The Keyes p. 32. teach as Teachers rule as Rulers receive and distribute the oblations of the Church as Deacons So I see no reason but every Minister of the Gospell hath virtually in him all the same power and Offices And if they be since divided into more hands for case and Order yet the subject is primarily but one and for the diversity of subjects of the Keyes it concernes them who plead it to make it good by Scripture Vpon this reason there are some who as they question the Office of a ruling Elder having 1. no direct or expresse instituted for it in the Scripture 2. No instance of any such that ruled and were not also Pastors 3. Nor doe you say That Peter received the Keyes as a ruling-Elder but as a Pastor so they would not yeeld the Office of the Deacon but that they finde expresse instituted of it afterwards by the Apostles But I will not multiply controversies but come to your particulars 1 The Key of knowledge or which is all one the Key of faith belongeth to all the faithfull whether joyned to any particular Church or no. But 1. Then one of the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven belongs to women yea to Infidels When God gives them Faith he gives them a Key to receive Christ and to find an open doore to enter into the fellowship of the Church But sure the Apostle Peter did not represent Infidels when the Keyes were committed to him 2. The Keyes you said were given to the Church but now you say they are given to some before they enter into the Church But I pray Sir is not he entred into the Church who hath received Christ and makes profession of his faith Yes you may say into the mysticall Church but not into a particular church-fellowship I answer he is entred also into the generall visible Church by profession of his faith to which Church we thinke the Keyes were first given and after to the particular Church But you have so long dreamed of a particular Church to be the first and only instituted Church that you seeme to forget the visible generall Church The way p. 10 and indeed to call it a Chimara This we thinke you learned from your Cousins if not your Brethren the Brownists Heretofore in Scripture language so soone as men beleeved and professed their faith they were said to be added to the Church not to a particular Congregation for so some were never added for ought we know as the Eunuch and some others but to the generall visible Church And I pray what Key was it that opened the doore to enter them into the Church Was it the key of their owne particular knowledge or Faith or the key of preaching viz. the key of knowledge in the Ministers of the Gospell and not in themselves You say here which is the truth that they find an open doore to enter into the fellowship of the Church which is passively to be capable to be admitted into the Church and not actively to open the doore to themselves 2. The Key of Order belongeth to all such as are in Church order whether Elders or Brethren But this is doubtfully spoken in a double respect 1. What you meane by Order as afore If Order and Office be all one as you seemed to yeeld then the key of Order belongs not to the Brethren at all but to the Elders who are in office If Order be taken for orderly carriage or as you your selfe speak in this very Paragraph For orderly subjection according to the order of the Gospell it is just nothing to the power of the Keyes For keyes imply an active power orderly subjection is morally passive 2. It is also doubtfull what is meant by Church in this place If it be taken for the generall visible Church that hath nothing to doe with the power of the keyes which are committed say you to the particular Church If for the particular Congregation it is then doubtfull still For it may be asked what power have the Brethren in
than the Elders have over all the Brethren I professe I understand nothing in this controversie yet this I understand that you speake cleare otherwise sometimes denying the Brethren any rule or authority reserving it only to the Elders As if you meant no more but that the people did but yeeld consent to the judgement of their Elders by obedience to the will of Christ and many such like words 5. But to the point in hand The Iury then doth not represent the Brethren but the Ruling Elders which ruling Elders stand in stead of all the Brethren as the Iury doth in stead of all the people and so the priviledge of the people is saved Otherwise all the people should be of the Iury as all the Congregation are allowed by you and others to be Iudges of the offender And the truth is it is a liberty or priviledge to the party that is arraigned that he may be judged by his Peeres It is not a liberty of the Iury So it is a priviledge for any accused brother that he shall be tryed and judged by his Peeres the ruling-Elders It is no priviledge of the rest of the Brethren to be his Iudges as it is no priviledge of all the people at the Assizes that they may claime a place in the Iury. 6. That which you adde that there is great difference between the Iudge and Iury For say you though the Iury have given up their verdict yet the malefactor is not thereupon legally condemned much lesse executed but upon the sentence of the Iudge This being rightly paralelld will make against you so though the ruling-Elders representing the people give up their votes and judgement yet the party is not excommunicated but upon the sentence of the Pastor And indeed the Iury rather seeme to acquit or condemne than the Iudge he doth but pronounce the sentence as they have adjudged it so the ruling-Elders being more in number by votes determine the cause which is pronounced by the Pastor and so the paralell is faire and full But that all the people at the Assizes should give up their verdict as well as the Iury is not in practise in the Common-wealth and so spoiles the paralell of the votes of all the Brethren in the Church And yet you persist to say The whole Church may be said to bind and loose in that they consent and concurre with the Elders both in discerning it to be just and in declaring their judgement by lifting up of hands or by silence and after by rejecting the party c. Iust as all the people at an Assizes may be said to condemne or acquit because they consent with the Iudge and Iury both by discerning it to be just and in declaring their judgement by lifting up their hands or by silence and after by rejecting the party But what if the people doe not consent as discerning it not to be just nor will reject the party Is he then acquitted Thus it must be or it holds not proportion with the case in hand For if the Brethren doe no more but approve and execute the sentence of the Presbytery this is just nothing to the power of the keyes intended to be given them and is a meere passive priviledge And that you may see your owne inconstancy consider what you say elsewhere page 11. The Brethren stand in an Order even in an orderly subjection according to the order of the Gospell page 15. They give consent in obedience to the will of Christ page 37. They the people discerning the light and truth readily yeeld obedience to their overseers page 41. That they may consent to the judgement and sentence of the Elders Had you kept your selfe constant to these expressions you had both preserved the truth of the Gospell and the peace of the Church And now for a conclusion of this Section Let me urge you with an argument of your owne against Episcopacy page 39. Hierome sayes the Churches were governed by the Common-councell of the Presbyters * That nothing was done without their counsell implyeth that nothing was done without their authority The way page 31. The Prelates evasion is By their counsell asked not followed You answer This would imply a contradiction to Hieromes words For in asking their counsell and not following it the Bishop should govern the church against their Councel which is a contradiction So say I The Church say you is governed by the consent of the Brethren I aske whether you meane their counsell and consent asked only or followed also If the later then the Brethren have as full authority with the Elders as the Presbyter had with the Bishop If the former it is a contradiction to say The Church is governed by the consent of the Brethren and yet is governed against their consent so that the question clearly stated is this Whether the Brethren have such concurrence and consent as that they have a negative vote or casting voice If they have it s that popular Anarchy of you know whom If not it s nothing to the power of the Keyes Only let me but remember you what elsewhere you say concerning the peoples power in government of the Church The way p. 100. In case the Officers doe erre and commit offence they shall be governed by the whole body of the Brethren though otherwise the Brethren are bound to obey and submit to them in the Lord. How you can reconcile these things I know not But now you propound a sad question Whether the Church hath power of proceeding to the utmost censure of their whole Presbytery Before I take your answer I observe 1. That you might have made the question also whether the Presbytery hath power to proceed to the utmost censure of the Church and the Brethren the Epistolers resolve both negatively Epist p. 4. 2. That you suppose here that the Church may proceed to some though not to the utmost censure of their Presbytery and that as you would seeme to deny it in your answer so is more than liberty it is a great degree of Authority not only over one of your members but over your Overseers And now I shall view your answer 1. Answ It cannot say you be well conceived that the whole Presbytery should be proceeded against because some a strong party perhaps will side with them and then the Church ought not to proceed without consulting with the Synod Reply But 1. this is besides the question which supposes the whole Presbytery and the whole Church opposed and so your answer may seeme to intimate that if none did side with them the Church might proceed against them and that to the utmost censure but only in a dissension of the Church they may not 2. If in any case they ought not to proceed doth not this destroy their independency if they must fly to a Synod No say you they ought only to consult the Synod But if the Synod have no power to determine and censure they
are still but where they were What if the Presbytery or Church will not submit to their determination or Declaration for it is no more what remedy hath the Church against their erring hereticall scandalous Presbytery If the Synod have a power of censure then againe you destroy your Independency No The Church may withdraw from them So they might before they consulted the Synod nay they were bound to doe it in your way without consulting the Synod But you may call to mind your former thoughts In your other Tract you give them full power to censure their Officers without any Officers as hath more then once been said above And thus your second answer is also answered already You say Excommunication is one of the highest acts of Rule The way p. 101. and ergo cannot be performed but by some Rulers Yet you contradict this fâ—â—â—ly in your other Tract when you say In case of offence given by an Elder or by the whole Eldership together the Church hath Authority marke that Authority which in this Booke you oft deny to require satisfaction of them and if they doe not give due satisfaction to proceed to censure according to the quality of the offence And yet which is strange me thinks here you resolve the cleane contrary The Church cannot excommunicate the whole Presbytery because they have not received from Christ an office of Rule without their Officers But now if this reason be good then on the other side it might seeme reasonable That the Presbytery might excommunicate the whole Church Apostate because they have received from Christ an office of Rule without the Church No say you They must tell the Church and joyne with the Church in that censure But this is to say and unsay For if the Church must joyne with them then the Church hath received some peece of an Office of Rule which was before denyed If you say they have not received any Office of Rule without their Officers This may imply that with their Officers they have received an Office of Rule which all this while you have seemed to deny allowing them a Liberty but no Rule or Authority And whereas you say They must tell the Church but that cannot be when the Church is Apostate I rejoyne this makes it reasonable to me That there is another Church to which they must tell the offence by way of appeale or else both an erring Presbytery or an Apostate Church have no remedy to recover them instituted by Christ and so the Church a multitude or a Presbytery is not so well provided for as one particular member But you have found a remedy The Church wants not liberty to withdraw from them Is not this even tantamount with excommunication Is it not the execution of that sentence to withdraw especially in your way Excommunication is the contrary to communion Now how doth the Church communicate their Elders Take your owne words As they set up the Presbytery The Keyes p 17. by professing their subjection to them in the Lord so they avoid them that is in sense excommunicate them by professed withdrawing their subjection from them according to God And this is as much as any people doe or need to doe to persons excommunicate unlesse you grant them a power to the very Act and decree of excommunication which as you have clearly done in your other Tract so you doe here giving them a power more than Ministeriall even a Kingly and more than a Kingly power when you say They rule the Church by appointing their owne Officers and likewise in censuring offenders not only by their Officers which is as much as Kings are wont to doe but also by their owne Royall assent which Kings are not wont to doe but only in the execution of Nobles Satis pro imperio 5. The last Liberty of the Church is Liberty of communion with other Churches which is seven wayes exercised c. To this I say in generall This is rather communion of Saints than communion of Churches because in your way every Church is independent and hath no Church-state in relation to any but it s owne members We suppose this communion is the liberty or priviledge of every Christian by vertue of his interest in the generall visible Church and not by any peculiar interest in a particular Congregation He that is a professed Christian and baptized hath a right to all the Ordinances of God where ever he find them As of old he that was a Citizen of Rome or so borne was a freeman through all the Romane Empire and enjoyed the priviledges of a Roman A Christian is a free Deacon in any part of the Christian world A Citizen with the Saints and of the houshold of God Eph. 2.19 And this to me seemes reasonable upon these grounds 1. Because every Christian not yet in a particular Church or Congregation is at liberty to joyne himselfe to any Church tyed by no obligation to one more than another 2. Because it is lawfull for any member of a particular Church upon just reasons to leave that Church and to joyne himselfe to another and nothing can hinder his removall or communion with another Church except he be scandalous c. 3. It was the custome of the first times before Congregations were fixed to adde them to the visible Church were their number lesser or greater and give them communion in all the Ordinances of Christ 4. Because the whole visible Church is but one City one Kingdome though for orders sake divided into severall Corporations It is not so in civill respects A Citizen of one Corporation cannot goe and set up trade in another because they have their severall Charters But in the City of God the Kingdome of Christ there is but one Charter for all and no more is required to admit a man a member of any Congregation but that he professe himselfe a Christian and live accordingly Your New Covenant to tye men to your particular Church that he may not remove without a generall leave will I feare prove a snare and a tyranny worse than yet we can imagine 1. But come we to your particulars First by way of participation of the Lords Supper the members of one Church comming to another Church c. But 1. Why doe you instance in this Ordinance only Have not their children occasionally borne there a liberty also of Baptisme Where neither of the parents can claim right to the Lords Supper there their Infants cannot claime right to Baptisme The way p. 81. Nor the childe of an excommunicate person p. 85. The rather because Baptisme is not administred with respect to this or that Church but to the generall visible Church Unlesse you hold that a man or childe is baptized to no Church but that particular and an Infidell to all the rest Yet some of your brethren will hardly baptize a childe of any but a member of their owne Church which is next doore to
than either propagation or multiplication For these very Churches were before all one Church now only divided into two The Apostles and the first Planters did not thus propagate Churches but went into places where no Churches were no Christians and there gathered and multiplyed Churches We have enough of this division of Churches since your way set up but little of the propagation or multiplication Primitive and Apostolicall For I pray Sir tell us next time you write over how many Churches have you multiplyed amongst the Indians in New-England Not one that I ever heard of You have d vided Churches indeed from old England but propagated none And our Brethren at home how many Churches have they divided and dâ—stracted since their returne but have multiplyed none If some new Teachers should arise in New England and gather or rather steale some members out of every of your Congregations would you call this multiplication of Churches or rather division Had you gone into New England and sent out your Pastors who are by calling spirituall Fathers to convert Indians as was pretended or our Brethren here gone and sent into Wales and other parts little better than heathens and converted them and had gathered them into Churches this had been a propagation of Churches indeed But this they doe not nor will doe nor well can doe For their opinion is and yours too in New England that no Pastor is a Pastor to any but his particular Congregation so their Pastors are only Nurses to give sucke not spirituall Fathers to propagate and beget children to God and his Church That they leave to every gifted brother to raise up seed to their Brethren and not to themselves For if once the children be borne and a little growne up then these Fathers in Law take them up or rather steale them from them who have spent their strength in begetting and breeding them travelling in paine till Christ was formed in them But if a Pastor and flocke be relates is a Teacher so too They may doe well then to send Teachers to beget children for their Pastors lest it be said No man in Office hath any skill or will or power to propagate but only to divide Churches Againe why doe you call this a power of the Keyes for a Church to send out a Congregation as an Hive doth a swarm when they are too full This is their liberty not yours They have power without you to gather themselves together and to enter into a Church-way and to chuse their Officers and doe all as well as you had Lastly if Pastors quâ Pastors or Teachers quâ Teachers are tyed to a particular Congregation then cannot they propigate Churches only gifted Brethren can doe that And so gifted Brethren not Pastors and Teachers are the Successors of the Apostles We thinke Pastors and Teachers are Officers to the whole Church as the Apostles were You will say then they are Apostles First will you say your gifted Brethren are Apostles because they goe abroad to convert and propagate Churches Secondly it followes not That which made the Apostles differ from the Pastors is delivered by your selfe to stand in two things 1. The Keyes p. 32. That an Apostle had in him in all ministeriall power of all the Officers of the Church 2. That Apostolicall power extended to all Churches as much as to any one But withall you say That this power conjoyned in them is now divided by them amongst all the Churches and all the Officers of the Churches respectively I aske then what Officer of the Church hath power to plant and propagate Churches Your gifted Brethren are no Officers of the Church I hope Ruling Elders and Deacons are tyed as well to their particular Churches as the Pastors and Teachers ergo it must fall upon the Pastors and Teachers or there is no such thing now as propagation of Churches But take once more your owne grant in this Paragraph where now we are Though the Apostles be dead whose Office it was to plant and gather Churches yet the worke is not dead but the same power of the Keyes is left with the Churches in common c. Marke first you call it a power of the keyes to plant and gather Churches and an Office of the Apostles But this power of the Keyes this Office is not bequeathed to gifted Brethren nor to Ruling-Elders or Deacons ergo it is left to the Pastors or Teachers Next you say the same power of the Keyes is left with the Churches in common You should say with the Pastors or Teachers of the Church or with the Churches indeed but in the hands of her Officers Otherwise you make not only the brethren but sisters too according to their measure as you speake Fathers and Mothers To propagate and inlarge the Kingdome of Christ throughout all generations as God shall give opportunity But were it so yet then much more would it concerne the Pastors and Teachers the Successors of the Apostles if they have any at all to propagate and inlarge the Kingdome of Christ as God shall give opportunity CHAP. V. Of the Subject of the Key of Authority THe Key of Authority or Rule is committed to the Elders of the Church and so the Act of Rule is proper to their Office But me thinks you should have done well to distinguish both of Authority and Rule and also of Elders preaching from those they call Ruling-Elders For Authority and Rule may be distinguished because there is Rule in those that are called Ruling-Elders but not Authority to preach and administer Sacraments I would not have noted it but that you confusedly reckon up the particulars of Authority and Rule without distinction what belongs to one sort of Elders what to another As if they did equally belong to both 1. The first is That which the Eldâ—rs who labour in the Word and Doctrine are to attend unto chiefly that is the preaching of the word and the administration of the Sacramentâ— For the first the preaching of the Word some of your Brethren say that private gifted Brethren may prophecye that is preach and others say they may baptize too who yet are denyed power in ruling as being not Elders not Officers to whom the Act of Ruling is proper Indeed you seeme to deny gifted Brethren power to prophesie publickly but your Prefacers write Magister hic non tenetur Yet their owne resolution of the case and their practise doth not well agree They say a gifted Brother may occasionally preach not in an ordinary course But we see they doe it ordinarily and constantly witnesse all their Lecturers their double and treble beneficed Lecturers and one who takes a Benefice but perhaps not the charge of soules nor administration of Sacraments where he constantly preaches If you say They are Elders or Pastors I answer they are so to their owne select Congregations but they are but as gifted Brethren to other Congregations for their principle is Pastor and flocke are
either themselves or the Ordinances 4. It seemes not justifiable that Elders should withdraw and carry away the Ordinances from a company of erring Brethren The Prophets of old did not so but continued still to preach though the people were obstinate For this is the remedy to cure their obstinacy and so the Apostle directs 2 Tim. 2.25 26. In the close of this Chapter you propound a question If the Elders have this power of Rule how are they then the servants of the Church You answer by a similitude A Queen may call her servants her mariners to conduct her over Sea yet they being called by her to such an Office she must not rule them in steering their course c. If such be the case between the Church and her Elders as you say it is I see little or no difference between you and the Brownists For they make the Church a Queen and the Elders but her servants called by her to such an Office to exercise the power of the Keyes in her name You say here The Elders rule the Church from Christ and so from their call and above sect 7. The Church condiscending to the information of the Elders what the Law of Christ is it is a further act of the Elders power to give sentence against the offender Just as the Mariner when the Queene who hath called him to that Office tels him she is resolved to goe to such a place puts her command in execution by steering his course to that place CHAP. VI. Of the Authority of Synods IN that you acknowledge Synods as an Ordinance of Christ and set downe the causes of assembling Churches into Synods we shall easily agree with you The maine controversie is about their power Concerning which you move three questions 1. Q. What power it is they have received which you thus resolve Not only to counsell and give light but also to command and enjoyne things to be beleeved and done But this as was noted in your Prefacers Epistle is but an empty grant For you meane it rather materially than formally by any Authority the Synod hath to bind them to obedience or censure Yes formally you say from the authority of the Synod which being an Ordinance of Christ bindeth the more for the Synods sake But the great scruple is To make their counsell the more weighty and acceptable but not to invest them with more rule or authority The way p 51. what kind of Authority this is whether it differ specifically from the power of a single Pastor or of a Congregationall Presbytery or only gradually as a greater testimony for so some of yours understand it If in this latter sense I see not how it can be called an Ordinance of Christ or authority distinct from the Authority of one single Pastor For he hath Authority ministerially to declare and command people what God commands and declares to be his will with all Authority And this seemes to be your meaning for you say A truth of the Gospell taught by a Minister bindeth to faith and obedience not only because it is Gospell but also because it is taught by a Minister for his callings sake Now suppose 20 or 40 or more Pastors met together teach and declare a truth of the Gospell enjoyne it to their severall Congregations by way of a Decree I aske what difference is there between this Authority of theirs and the Authority of any one of them single If you say none but graduall then I say they have no Authority as a Synod but as Pastors If you say specificall that is juridicall whereas a Pastors is but doctrinall you yeeld the cause as we would have it But then they have a power not only of decreeing which one Pastor hath not but also of censuring upon the disobedience of the people which you will not easily grant Againe I thinke you take the authority of a Presbytery in a Congregation to be an Ordinance of Christ and to differ not only gradually but specifically And the authority of a Pastor or Teacher or Ruling-Elders single Now it may seeme strange if a Synod be an Ordinance of Christ as you grant that a single Presbytery should have a juridicall authority to decree and censure and yet a Synod which is a Presbytery of Presbyteries should have but only a doctrinall authority You may rather deny Synods to be an Ordinance of Christ and call them as your Prefacers call the first Synod of the Apostles a Consultation or if you will a Reference by way of Arbitration for deciding of controversies c. Which the particular Churches unlesse they bind themselves by promise need not stand to but may plead their owne Liberty But say you they have a power if they cannot heale the offenders to determine to withdraw communion from them This power all the Brethren have as to withdraw from their owne Elders apostate so from other Churches obstinate against their admonitions Or if you place any emphasis in the word determine that is to decree a separation from them then you give them a juridicall power which is aequivalent with the power of excommunication whereof withdrawing is but the execution 2. Q. How far the Fraternity may concurre with the Elders in the power of the Synod You resolve it in 3 particulars 1. They have liberty to dispute their doubts among the Elders Acts 15.7.12 The place I thinke is much mistaken The disputation for ought appeares was amongst the Apostles and Elders before the Brethren not by the Brethren And when in v. 12. the whole multitude are said to keep silence it proves not that they did dispute For 1. certainly that had been too much confusion for a multitude to speake all at once 2. Their silence now argues not that they disputed before Acts 21.40 22.2 the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies no more but this they were quiet or held their peace from noise or murmurings usuall with multitudes as at an Assizes we feare it they hearkened attentively 2. They had liberty to joyne with the Apostles and Elders in approving the sentence and determining the same as the common sentence of them all That they had a liberty to joyne in approving the sentence is no more than the multitude at an Assizes have to joyne with the Judge in approving of his sentence But that they joyned in determining the same as the common sentence of them all is far more than the multitude have at the Assizes and is as full Authority as the Elders have And yet this you presently deny when you say Yet the Authority of the Decrees lay chiefly if not only in the Apostles and Elders◠The Apostles and Elders did no more but joyne with Iames in determining the sentence as the common sentence of them all 3 They had liberty to joyne with the Apostles and Elders in chusing and sending messengers and writing Synodall Letters in the names of all If you meant no more
the offence and consent unto the sentence The Church there meant is that part of the Church which the party refuses to heare but he refuses to heare the Presbytery who doe speake to him not the people who doe not authoritatively speake to him ergo to tell the Church is to tell the Presbytery Sol. 2. The Church is never put for the Presbytery alone in the New Testament Reply 1. This is to beg the question we say it must so be understood in this place and you doe not disprove it Nay 2. you rather confirme it by your answer to the first objection Our Saviour alludes to the Church-censure in the Iewish Church But there the Church censuring was the Synagogue a Court of the Consistory ergo as shall further appeare in the next Obj. 2. In the old Testament the Congregation is often put for the Elders and Rulers of the Church Sol. Not alone but sitting in the presence of the Congregation Reply That is enough for our purpose For we doe not deny but the people might be present to heare things then and so they may now But if the Elders be called the Church as distinct from the people when they sate in presence of the people much more may they be called the Church when they sit alone And to that custome of the Jewes your selfe acknowledge in answer to the first objection doth our Saviour allude when he sayes Tell the Church But the custome of the Jewes was to tell the Elders and Rulers not the people And whereas you say If a sentence illegall was passed by them the people did sometimes protest against it sometime refuse to execute it and the same they might and ought to doe at any time in like cases Though this may be true when things are done in an illegall way and evidently illegall as the instances are yet it is a dangerous assertion to Government for under that pretence people will take liberty to make void any sentence if they conceive it but illegall Obj. 3. By Church he meant a Synod or Classis of Presbyters of many Churches Sol. 1. We find not any where that a Church is put for a Synod of Presbyteries Reply The question is of this place and you must not beg that it is not here meant of a Synod of Presbyteries If it be meant but of the Congregationall Presbytery it quite destroyes the power of the people But we doe not say it is directly meant of a Synod of Presbyteries but by a just consequence If a Congregationall Presbytery be here meant as we thinke it is to reclaime a particular offending party in a Congregation Then by proportion here is meant a Synod of Presbyteries when a whole Church erres or is hereticall or else Christ hath not provided so well for a whole Church as for a particular person And thirdly we cannot see a reason why a Church may not be taken for a Synod of Presbyteries as well as a Synod may be called A Church of Churches as it is by your selfe page 49. A Congregation of Churches a Church of Churches for what is a Synod but a Church of Churches so you Sol. 2. As a Congregation cannot reach the removall of all offences so it may be said that it were not fit to trouble Synode with every offence and when they doe meet they may erre also and so may a generall Councell and so no remedy for them Reply 1. We doe not say that Synods are to be troubled with every small offence or to take the businesse of a Congregation out of their hands but only with greater matters and when the Congregationall Presbytery cannot end them or is so bad it will not 2. Synods and Councels may erre but not so easily as a particular Congregation And alicubi sistendum there must be an end of pursuit and referre the businesse to the judgement of Jesus Christ the King of the Church As in case of Parliaments the highest Tribunall that we have they may erre and if they doe private persons must sit downe or appeale to the next But that is a strange assertion That it was not the purpose of Christ to prescribe a rule for the removall of all offences out of the Church but only such private and lesse hainous as grow notorious by obstinacy For if they be publicke the Apostle gives another rule to cast such a person out of all communion without that admonition c. Reply The Apostle did not meane absolutely that they should cast out the incestuous person but supposing his impenitency and obstinacy to give satisfaction For I cannot imagine that the Apostle would have an humbled penitent offender cast out of all communion And you know it is supposed by many learned Divines the man was not excommunicated but upon the charge reproofe and admonition yeelded and escaped the censure Of which more by and by But say you What if the whole Presbytery offend or such a party as will draw a faction in the Church The readiest course is to bring the matter to a Synod But you have prescribed two other remedies elsewhere 1. The Brethren may withdraw or 2. they may proceed to censure their whole Presbytery that is I thinke to excommunicate them why then should they trouble themselves with a Synod which is hardly procured If the Congregation be found faithfull and willing to remove an offence by due censure why should the offence be called up to more publick Iudicature and the plaister made broader than the sore They are your owne words page 42. I forbeare the other objections Arg. 3. From the practise and example of the Church of Corinth Obj. This was the act of Paul no act of judiciall authority in the Church but rather of subjection to his sentence c. Sol. The judgement of Paul was not a judiciall sentence delivering him to Satan but a judicious doctrine and instruction teaching them what to doe in that case Reply Thus you may evade that other Text where yet you grant that Paul alone did excommunicate Alexander and justifie his doing of it as having in him the power of the whole Church and when absent from the Church or party he might use it Are not the places paralell I have delivered him to Satan and I have judged already that such an one be delivered to Satan Else it might be said Paul did not deliver Alexander to Satan but only judged it doctrinally that the Church ought to excommunicate him And that the Church did by a juridicall sentence deliver the incestuous person to Satan is not evident as I said afore but rather that hearing of the Apostles sentence decreed against him he repented and so the execution was stayed Sufficient unto the man is the rebuke of many 2 Cor. 2.6 As for their forgivenesse of him it might be only brotherly by way of charity as offended by him not juridicall by way of authority For the brethren by your owne confession had only Liberty not
Authority and ergo could not authoritatively forgive him as nor authoritatively bind him The same power binds and looses But the Elders only did or could authoritatively bind ergo Obj. 2. Some in the Church of Corinth did it viz. the Presbytery Sol. It is apparent by the Text that the Brethren concurred and that with some act of power viz. such power as the want of putting it forth retarded the sentence and the putting it forth was requâ—site to the administration of the sentence Reply This is not evident in the Text yea if such power be in the Brethren surely it is more than liberty it is direct authority viz. a negative vote to retard the sentence which is as much as the Elders have If you meane only a judgement of discretion and a withdrawing to execute the sentence it is true that liberty they have a rationall consent or dissent but that is rather a passive than an active concurrence to the sentence But the question is whether the sentence be null if they will not concurre to it If so then the Apostles own sentence might have been nullified when he delivered this party or Alexander to Satan and he could not say I have delivered him unto Satan For it was in the peoples power and a liberty you say purchased for them by Christ to retard or speed the sentence Not one of your reasons prove that the Brethren concurred actively to the sentence For 1. the whole Church might and were reproved for not mourning and for not withdrawing for their parts not for not sentencing of him 2. The Commandement was directed to the Church when gathered together yet not to all alike the presence of the Brethren the sentence of the Elders Many things are so directed to a whole Church which yet must respectively be executed As if the Apostle should say when you are all gathered together I will that there be preaching and administration of Sacraments doth this command concerne actively the Brethren 3. The Apostles words doe not declare this act of theirs to be a judiciall act when he sayes Doe not â—ou judge them that are within Even this first may be referred to the Officers and secondly it is by your selfe understood of a judgement of discretion not of authority of which we speake A judgement of discretion is allowed all the people at an Assizes but this hath no power at all in it properly so called And truly if the Apostles words carry any colour of judgement in the Brethren it may seeme to import a judgement of authority rather than of discretion so he gives them more than you dare plead for though not more than I feare they will ere long usurpe 4. It is granted the Brethren may and must forgive him as well as the Elders but not with one and the same kind of forgivenesse The people at an Assizes doe in their judgement of discretion acquit the party whom the Iudge and Iury doe acquit with the judgement of Authority What poore and weak proofes are these for a matter of such moment as easily denyed as affirmed Obj. 3. Corinth was a Presbyteriall Church Sol. No such thing appeares Reply It more than probably appeares it being a Mother-City where God had much people and they had many Elders and Teachers with excellent gifts as you granâ— it is not likely therefore they had but one Congregation And if there were many it may as probably be said that this command was directed to the Elders of severall Congregations met together as the contrary can by you be proved Arg 4. From the guilt of offence which lyeth upon every Church when any offence committed by their members lyeth uncensured as on Pergamus Thyatira c. Sol. It doth not appeare that those Churches were each but one single Congregation but of some of them the contrary as Ephesus which had many Elders and much people converted c. And besides I desire you would call to mind your owne exposition of some of those Texts when it is said To the Angell of such a Church that is say the Prelaticall party To the Bishop you answer Angell is put for Angels The way p. 49. a company of Elders Not a single person but the whole company of the Ministers of the Church the whole Presbytery of persons more than one as is evident by his speech unto them as unto many unto you and some of you c. whence these 3. things may be collected 1. That the guilt is not imputed to the whole Church but to the Angell of such a Church that is say you the Ministers which quite destroyes your Argument 2. That these Ministers were a whole Presbytery the whole company of the Ministers of the Church therefore it s very probable there were more Congregations than one in each of those Churches and so we find Presbyteriall not Independent Churches 3. That the Church is sometime taken for the Presbytery of the Church which afore you have denyed However I pray consider that the Brethren are never called the Angels of the Church nor yet are the Ruling-Elders any where called Angels but the Ministers only as you call these Angels which makes it more than probable that it is spoken to a Presbyteriall Church the Ministers of severall Congregations even according to your owne exposition at least to the Presbytery of each Congregation which confutes your assertion that the Brethren have any interest in the power of the Keyes 4. Propos In case a particular Church be disturbed with error or scandall and the same maintained by a faction amongst them Now a Synod of Churches or of their Messengers is the first subject of that power and authority whereby errour is judicially convinced and condemned the truth searched out and determined and the way of truth and peace declared and imposed upon the Churches This Proposition you undertake to make good by two Arguments First From the want of power in such a Church to passe a binding sentence because the promise of binding and loosing is made to a Church 1. not erring 2. agreeing truth 18.17 c. In answer hereunto I will not say That this Argument proves not the proposition for it proves indeed that a particular Church is not the first Subject of this power and authority but it doth not prove that a Synod is But this I say that by this way of arguing a Church can seldome or never have power to bind or loose when there is not an universall agreement which how rarely it happens experience tels us now and will doe more hereafter in your owne Churches Few Churches there are that so walke together in peace and truth that there is no disagreeing party amongst them therefore that power is seldome in their hands but upon every difference or faction amongst them their power reverts to a Synod and so a Synod must be called which is not easily done and troubled with every difference of a Congregation which you impute unjustly
as a fault upon the Presbyteriall way 2. You have otherwise determined in the way Suppose the whole Presbytery be in an errour or scandall as they may shall the faction now devest the Brethren of their power and authority to censure and cast them out which you have fully given them there and here doe seem to take away 3. You mitigate the businesse much when you say A Synod of Churches is the first subject of that power whereby errour is convinced c. and the way of â—ruth and peace declared and imposed on the Church For all this is only a doctrinall declaration and imposition not authoritatively by way of jurisdiction The censure you reserve to the Congregation where you had placed it before But what if the Synod of Churches erre or disagree there be a faction also amongst them you will know your owne words An erring or disagreeing Church binds not So all will come to nothing The censure of the Synod binds not for they can but declare what is truth The censure of the particular Church binds not for they are in a faction so you give the Brethren a power and presently take it away againe If then a considerable party fall into errour or faction by variance they presently lose like the Bee her sting their power of binding and loosing and if this be but once knowne as it cannot be hid how easie is it for any Delinquent to make a party or faction and so escape all binding censure seeing neither the Church erring or at variance nor a Synod hath any binding power Your second Argument is From the patterne Acts 15.1 c. When there grew errour and faction in the Church of Antioch they determine not the case but referred it to the Apostles and Elders But first the Church of Ierusalem did only doctrinally declare the truth they did not censure the erring Brethren so you pleaded above but referred that to the Church of Antioch 2. If declaration had been sufficient the Church of Antioch needed not to have sent so farre as Ierusalem Paul and Barnabas were able enough to declare the truth at home and so that particular Church though erring and at variance was the first subject of that power here given to a Synod 3. You mislay the comparison when you say As in the case of an offence of a faithfull brother persisted in the matter is at last judged in a church which is a Congregation of the faithfull so in the offence of a Church the matter is at last judged in a congregation of Churches c. For the judgement is not of the same kind but you doe meerely aequivocate with us The judgement of the Church upon a Brother is juridicall even by way of censure of excommunication But the judgement of a Synod is only doctrinall and declarative If you grant any more you and we are agreed Before I conclude this proposition I only animadvert these few things 1. That you grant the Assembly of the Apostles and Elders at Ierusalem Acts 15.1 to have been a formall Synod wherein your Disciples here doe discent from you as appeares in their Epistle and call it only a Consultation by way of Arbitration To which Arbitration it seemes the Church of Antioch was not bound to stand for they did not for ought appeares promise or bind themselves to stand to their arbitrement nor might they so bind themselves by your doctrine and theirs too for that were to give away their priviledge purchased by the bloud of Christ 2. You yeeld also The Keyes p. 57. that the Apostles did not act herein as Apostles and determine the matter by Apostolicall Authority but as Elders in an ordinary way as the whole proceeding in the businesse proves as you well observe Yet your Schollers here submit not to your doctrine as they professe in their Epistle though they neither shew any reason for it nor confute yours 3. You call a Synod a Congregation of Churches for what is a Synod but a Church of Churches and yet deny that a Presbytery of Churches is ever called a Church 4. You say The Elders there at Jerusalem were not a few the Beleevers in Jerusalem being many thousands Therefore say wee they were more than could meet together in one place and yet called but one Church whence we may inferre There was not an Independent Church of one but a Presbyteriall Church of many Congregations Lastly you say This patterne plainly sheweth to whom the Key of Authority is committed when there groweth offence and difference in a Church But the Key of Authority if you remember what you said above hath this power in it as to administer the Seales so to bind an obstinate offender under excommunication and to release and forgive him upon repentance Grant but your Synod of Churches such a Key of Authority to bind an offending party or Church and to release them upon repentance and the matter is at an end But if you grant no more but a doctrinall declarative power you grant but what every Pastor single hath And whether this be the Key of Authority given by our Saviour to the Church let every indifferent Reader judge And now you come to your Corollaries concerning the Independency of Churches to shew how they are or are not Independent Wherein I purpose not to follow you and that for this reason because for the most part you doe but repeate what you have said before You say your selfe You take the first Subject and the Independent Subject to be all one Therefore say I if the Church of a particular Congregation be not the first Subject of all church-Church-power as is evinced above neither is it the Independent Subject of that power I have only some things to observe in your second Corollarie and then I shall conclude You say The establishment of pure Religion and the Reformation of corruptions in Religion doe much concerne the civill peace If Religion be corrupted there will be warre in the gates Judges 5.8 and no peace to him that commeth in or goeth out 2 Chron. 15.3 5 6. But where Religion rejoyceth the civill State flourisheth And this you truly refer to the Civill Magistrate partly by commanding and by stirring up the Churches and Ministers thereof to goe about it in their spirituall way partly also by civill punishments upon the wilfull opposers and disturbers of the same Whereupon I desire to know 1. By what Authority our Brethren here in Old-England having not only Christian Magistrates covenanting to reforme but also calling and commanding an Assembly of Divines to reforme according to the Word doe take upon them to set up and establish a forme of Church-Government of their owne before they have demonstrated it to be the way of God to the great disturbance of the peace both of Church and State 2. I doe demand also why many of your disciples here plead for a Toleration of all Religions which you will not tollerate in New-England which they call Liberty of conscience and the prosecution of such disturbers they call persecution When as they may heare you say It belongs to the Magistrate to punish the wilfull opposers and disturbers of Reformation And more then that you tell them Of the Times of the New Testament it is prophesied that in some cases capitall punishment shall proceed against false Prophets and that by procurement of their nearest kindred Zach. 13.3 And the execution thereof is described Rev. 16.4 to 7. Where the rivers and fountaines of waters that is the Priests and Iesuits that conveigh the Religion of the Sea of Rome throughout the Countries are turned to bloud that is have bloud given them to drinke by the civill Magistrate Does this hold true only against Priests and Jesuits and are all other erroneous schismaticall blasphemous Sectaries to be tolerated I leave them to consider it and you and them to reconcile this and other your many differences and contradictions amongst your selves And when you are well agreed in the way we shall consider how farre you agree with the Truth FINIS Errata Page 7. l. 22. reade offender and often after p. 23. l. last r. institution p. 24. l. 4. r. institution p. 25. l. 16. r. for p. 26. l. 26. for 1. r. 15. p. 30. â— 23. r. except p. 32. l. 15. r. whom p. 34. l. last but one r. Counsell p. 35. l. 8. r. Presbyters p. 45. l. 17. put out the second in p. 53. l. last for And r. from p. 55. l. 2. for feare r. heare p. 76. l. 10. for of r. at