cause her merciful disposition to take so much the more delight in saving others whom the like necessity should press What in this behalf hath been done towards Nations abroad the parts of Christendom most afflicted can best testifie That which especially concerneth our selves in the present matter we treat of is the state of Reformed Religion a thing at her coming to the Crown even raised as it were by miracle from the dead a thing which we so little hoped to see that even they which beheld it done searcely believed their own senses at the first beholding Yet being then brought to pass thus many years it hath continued standing by no other wordly mean but that one onely hand which erected it that hand which as no kinde of imminent danger could cause at the first to withhold it self so neither have the practises so many so bloody following since been ever able to make weary Nor can we say in this case so justly that Aaron and Hur the Ecclesiastical and Civil States have sustained the hand which did lift it self to Heaven for them as that Heaven it self hath by this hand sustained them no aid or help having thereunto been ministred for performance of the Work of Reformation other then such kinde of help or aid as the Angel in the Prophet Zechariah speaketh of saying Neither by an army nor strength but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts Which Grace and Favor of Divine Assistance having not in one thing or two shewed it self nor for some few days or years appeared but in such sort so long continued our manifold sins and transgressions striving to the contrary What can we less thereupon conclude then that God would at leastwise by tract of time teach the World that the thing which he blesseth defendeth keepeth so strangely cannot chuse but be of him Wherefore if any refuse to believe us disputing for the Verity of Religion established let then believe God himself thus miraculously working for it and with life even for ever and ever unto that Glorious and Sacred Instrument whereby he worketh OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK V. Concerning their Fourth Assertion That touching several Publick Duties of Christian Religion there is amongst us much Superstition retained in them and concerning Persons which for performance of those Duties are endued with the Power of Ecclesiastical Order our Laws and Proceedings according thereunto are many ways herein also corrupted The Matter contained in this Fifth Book 1. TRue Religion is the Root of all true Vertues and the stay of all Well-ordered Commonwealths 2. The must extream opposite to true Religion is affected Atheism 3. Of Superstition and the Rest thereof either misguided zeal or Ignorant fear of Divine glory 4. Of the Redress of Superstition in Gods Church and concerning the Question of this Book 5. Four General Propositions demanding that which may reasonably be granted concerning Matters of outward Form in the Exercise of true Religion And fifthly Of a Rule and safe not reasonable in these Cases 6. The first Proposition touching Iudgment what things are convenient in the outward publick ordering of Church affairs 7. The second Proposition 8. The third Proposition 9. The fourth Proposition 10. The Rule of Mens private spirit not safe in these Cases to be followed 11. Plans for the Publick Service of God 12. The Solemnity of Erecting Churches condemned the Hallowing and Dedicating of them scanned by the Adversary 13. Of the names whereby we distinguish our Churches 14. Of the Fashion of our Churches 15. The Sumptuousness of Churches 16. What Holiness and Vertue we ascribe to the Church more than other places 17. Their pretence that would have Churches utterly vazed 18. Of Publick Teaching or Preaching and the first kinde thereof Catechizing 19. Of Preaching by reading publickly the Books of holy Scripture and concerning supposed Untruths in those Translations of Scripture which we allow to be read as also of the choice which we make in reading 20. Of Preaching by the Publick Reading of other prositable Instructions and concerning Books Apâ—cryphal 21. Of Preaching by Sermons and whether Sermons be the onely ordinary way of Teaching whereby man are brought to the saving knowledge of Gods Truth 22. What they attribute to Sermons onely and what we to Reading also 23. Of Prayer 24. Of Publick Prayer 25. Of the Form of Common Prayer 26. Of them which like not to have any Set Form of Common Prayer 27. Of them who allowing a Set Form of Prayer yet allow not ours 28. The Form of our Liturgy too near the Papists too far different from that of other Reformed Churches as they pretend 29. Attire belonging to the Service of God 30. Of gesture in Praying and of different places chosen to that purpose 31. Easiness of Praying after our Form 32. The length of our Service 33. Instead of such Prayers as the Primitive Churches have used and those that be Reformed now use we have they say divers short cuts or shreaddings rather Wishes them Prayers 34. Lessons intermingled with our Prayers 35. The number of our Prayers for Earthly things and our oft rehearsing of the Lords Prayer 36. The People saying after the Minister 37. Our manner of Reading the Psalms otherwise then the rest of the Scripture 38. Of Musick with Psalms 39. Of Singing or Saying Psalms and other parts of Common Prayer wherein the People and the Minister answer one another by course 40. Of Magnificat Benedictus and Nune Dimittis 41. Of the Litany 42. Of Athanasus Creed and Gloria Patri 43. Our want of particular Thanksgiving 44. In some things the Matter of our Prayer as they affirm is unsound 45. When thou hast overcome the sharpness of Death thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven unto all Believers 46. Touching Prayer for Deliverance from Sudden Death 47. Prayer for these things which we for our worthiness dare not ask God for the worthiness of his Sin would vouchsafe to grant 48. Prayer to be evermore delivered from all Adversity 49. Prayer that all Men may finde Mercy and if the will of God that all Men might be Saved 50. Of the Name the Author and the force of Sacraments which force consisteth in this That God hath ordained them as means to make us partakers of him in Christ and of life through Christ. 51. That God is in Christ by the Personal Incarnation of the Son who is very God 52. The Misinterpretations which Heresit hath made of the manner how God and Man are united in one Christ. 53. That by the union of the one with the other Nature in Christ there groweth neither gain nor loss of Essential Properties to either 54. What Christ hath obtained according to the Flesh by the union of his Flesh with Dâ—iey 55. Of the Personal presence of Christ every where and in what sense it may be granted he is every where present according to the Flesh. 56. The union or mutual Participation which is between Christ
unto God the Sacrifice of Prayse and Thanksgiving in the Congregation so earnestlie exhorteth others to sing Praises unto the Lord in his Courts in his Sanctuary before the memorial of his Holiness and so much complaineth of his own uncomfortable exile wherein although he sustained many most grievous indignities and indured the want of sundry both pleasures and honours before injoyed yet as if this one were his only grief and the rest not felt his speeches are all of the heavenly benefit of Publick Assemblies and the happiness of such as had free access thereunto 25. A great part of the Cause wherefore religious mindes are so inflamed with the love of Publick devotion is that vertue force and efficacy which by experience they finde that the very form and reverend solemnity of Common Prayer duly ordered hath to help that imbecillity and weakness in us by means whereof we are otherwise of our selves the less apt to perform unto God so heavenly a service with such affection of heart and disposition in the powers of our Souls as is requisite To this end therefore all things hereunto appertaining have been ever thought convenient to be done with the most solemnity and majesty that the wisest could devise It is not with Publick as with Private Prayer In this rather secresie is commanded than outward shew whereas that being the publick act of a whole Society requireth accordingly more care to be had of external appearance The very assembling of men therefore unto this service hath been ever solemn And concerning the place of assembly although it serve for other uses as well as this yet seeing that our Lord himself hath to this as to the chiefest of all other plainly sanctified his own Temple by entituling it the House of Prayer what preeminence of dignity soever hath been either by the Ordinance or through the special favour and providence of God annexed unto his Sanctuary the principal cause thereof must needs be in regard of Common Prayer For the honour and furtherance whereof if it be as the gravest of the antient Fathers seriously were perswaded and do oftentimes plainly teach affirming that the House of Prayer is a Court beautified with the presence of Celestial powers that there we stand we pray we sound forth Hymnes unto God having his Angels intermingled as our Associates and that with reference hereunto the Apostle doth require so great care to be had of decency for the Angels sake how can we come to the House of Prayer and not be moved with the very glory of the place it self so to frame our affections Praying as doth best beseem them whose Suits the Almighty doth there sit to hear and his Angels attend to further When this was ingrafted in the mindes of men there needed no penal Statutes to draw them unto publick Prayer The warning sound was no sooner heard but the Churches were presently filled the pavements covered with bodies prostrate and washt with their tears of devout joy And as the place of publick Prayer is a Circumstance in the outward form thereof which hath moment to help devotion so the Person much more with whom the People of God do joyn themselves in this Action as with him that standeth and speaketh in the presence of God for them The authority of his Place the fervour of his Zeal the piety and gravity of his whole Behaviour must needs exceedingly both grace and set forward the service he doth The authority of his Calling is a furtherance because if God have so farr received him into favour as to impose upon him by the hands of men that Office of blessing the People in his Name and making intercession to him in theirs which Office he hath sanctified with his own most gracious Promise and ratified that promise by manifest actual performance thereof when others before in like place have done the same is not his very Ordination a seal as it were to us that the self-same Divine love which hath chosen the instrument to work with will by that instrument effect the thing whereto he ordained it in blessing his People and accepting the Prayers which his Servant offereth up unto God for them It was in this respect a comfortable Title which the Antients used to give unto God's Ministers terming them usually God's most beloved which were ordained to procure by their Prayers his love and favour towards all Again if there be not zeal and fervency in him which proposeth for the rest those sutes and supplications which they by their joyful Acclamations must ratifie if he praise not God with all his might if he pour not out his Soul in Prayer if he take not their Causes to heart and speak not as Moses Daniel and Ezra did for their People how should there be but in them frozen coldness when his affections seem benummed from whom theirs should take fire Vertue and godliness of life are required at the hands of the Minister of God not only in that he is to teach and instruct the People who for the most part are rather led away by the ill example then directed aright by the wholesom instruction of them whose Life swarveth from the rule of their own Doctrine but also much more in regard of this other part of his Function whether we respect the weakness of the People apt to loathe and abhorr the Sanctuary when they which perform the service thereof are such as the Sonnes of Heli were or else consider the inclination of God himself who requireth the lifting up of pure hands in Prayers and hath given the World plainly to understand that the Wicked although they cry shall not be heard They are not fit Supplicants to seek his mercy on the behalf of others whose own un-repented sins provoke his just indignation Let thy Priests therefore O Lord be evermore cloathed with Righteousness that thy Saints may thereby with more devotion rejoice and sing But of all helps for due performance of this Service the greatest is that very set and standing order it self which framed with common advice hath both for matter and form prescribed whatsoever is herein publickly done No doubt from God it hath proceeded and by us it must be acknowledged a Work of singular care and providence that the Church hath evermore held a Prescript form of Common Prayer although not in all things every where the same yet for the most part retaining still the same analogy So that if the Liturgies of all antient Churches throughout the World be compared amongst themselves it may be easily perceived they had all one original mold and that the publick Prayer of the People of God in Churches throughly settled did never use to be voluntary Dictates proceeding from any man's extemporal wit To him which considereth the grievous and scandalous Inconveniencies whereunto they make themselves daily subject with whom any blinde and secret Corner is judged a fit House of
Common Prayer the manifold confusions which they fall into where every man 's private Spirit and Gift as they term it is the only Bishop that ordaineth him to this Ministry the irksome deformities whereby through endless and senseless effusions of indigested Prayers they oftentimes disgrace in most unsufferable manner the worthiest part of Christian duty towards God who herein are subject to no certain Order but pray both what and how they list to him I say which weigheth duly all these things the reasons cannot be obscure why God doth in Publick Prayer so much respect the Solemnitie of Places where the Authority and calling of Persons by whom and the precise Appointment even with what Words or Sentences his Name should be called on amongst his People 26. No man hath hitherto been so impious as plainly and directly to condemn Prayer The best stratagem that Satan hath who knoweth his Kingdom to be no one way more shaken than by the Publick devout Prayers of God's Church is by traducing the form and manner of them to bring them into contempt and so to shake the force of all men's devotion towards them From this and from no other forge hath proceeded a strange conceit that to serve God with any set form of Common Prayer is superstitious As though God himself did not frame to his Priests the very speech wherewith they were charged to bless the People or as if our Lord even of purpose to prevent this fancy of extemporal and voluntary Prayers had not left us of his own framing one which might both remain as a part of the Church-Liturgy and serve as a Pattern whereby to frame all other Prayers with efficacy yet without superfluity of words If Prayers were no otherwise accepted of God then being conceived always new according to the exigence of present occasions if it be right to judge him by our own Bellies and to imagine that he doth loath to have the self-same supplications often iterated even as we do to be every day fed without alteration or change of diet if Prayers he Actions which ought to waste away themselves in the making if being made to remain that they may be resumed and used again as Prayers they be but instruments of Superstition surely we cannot excuse Moses who gave such occasion of scandal to the World by not being contented to praise the Name of Almighty God according to the usual naked simplicity of God's Spirit for that admirable victory given them against Pharaoh unless so dangerous a President were lest for the casting of Prayers into certain Poetical moulds and for the framing of Prayers which might be repeated often although they never had again the same occasions which brought them forth at the first For that very Hymne of Moses grew afterwards to be a part of the ordinary Jewish Liturgy not only that but sundry other sithence invented Their Books of Common-Prayer contained partly Hymns taken out of thē Holy Scripture partly Benedictions Thanksgivings Supplications penned by such as have been from time to time the Governours of that Synagogue These they sorted into their several times and places some to begin the service of God with and some to end some to go before and some to follow and some to be interlaced between the Divine Readings of the Law and Prophets Unto their custom of finishing the Passeover with certain Psalmes there is not any thing more probable then that the holy Evangelist doth evidently allude saying That after the Cup delivered by our Saviour unto his Apostles they sung and went forth to the Mount of Olives As the Jews had their Songs of Moses and David and the rest so the Church of Christ from the very beginning hath both used the same and besides them other also of like nature the Song of the Virgin Mary the Song of Zachary the Song of Simeon such Hymnes as the Apostle doth often speak of saying I will pray and sing with the Spirit Again in Psalms Hymnes and Songs making melody unto the Lord and that heartily Hymnes and Psalms are such kindes of Prayer as are not wont to be conceived upon a sudden but are framed by Meditation before hand or else by Prophetical illumination are inspired as at that time it appeareth they were when God by extraordinary gifts of the Spirit inabled men to all parts of service necessary for the edifying of his Church 27. Now albeit the Admonitioners did seem at the first to allow no Prescript form of Prayer at all but thought it the best that their Minister should always be left at liberty to pray as his own discretion did serve yet because this opinion upon better advice they afterwards retracted their Defender and his Associates have sithence proposed to the World a form such as themselves like and to shew their dislike of ours have taken against it those exceptions which whosoever doth measure by number must needs be greatly out of love with a thing that hath so many faults whosoever by weight cannot chuse but esteem very highly of that wherein the wit of so scrupulous Adversaries hath not hitherto observed any defect which themselves can seriously think to be of moment Gross Errours and manifest Impiety they grant we have taken away Yet many things in it they say are amiss many instances they give of things in our Common Prayer not agreeable as they pretend with the word of God It hath in their eye too great affinity with the form of the Church of Rome it differeth too much from that which Churches elsewhere reformed allow and observe our Attire disgraceth it it is not orderly read nor gestured as beseemeth it requireth nothing to be done which a Childe may not lawfully do it hath a number of short cutts or shreddings which may be better called Wishes than Prayers it intermingleth Prayings and Readings in such manner as if Supplicants should use in proposing their Sutes unto mortal Princes all the World would judge them madd it is too long and by that mean abridgeth Preaching it appointeth the People to say after the Minister it spendeth time in singing and in reading the Psalms by course from side to side it useth the Lord's Prayer too oft the Songs of Magnificat Benedictus and Nune Dimittis it might very well spare it hath the Letany the Creed of Athanasius and Gloria Patri which are superfluous it craveth Earthly things too much for deliverance from those Evils against which we pray it giveth no Thanks some things it asketh unseasonably when they need not to be prayed for as deliverance from Thunder and Tempest when no Danger is nigh some in too abject and diffident manner as that God would give us that which we for our unworthiness dare not ask some which ought not to be desired as the deliverance from sudden Death riddance from all Adversity and the extent of saving Mercy towards all men These and such like are the Imperfections
whereby our form of Common Prayer is thought to swerve from the Word of God A great favourer of that part but yet his Errour that way excepted a learned painful a right vertuous and good man did not fear sometime to undertake against Popish Detractors the general maintenance and defence of our whole Church-Service as having in it nothing repugnant to the Word of God And even they which would file away most the largeness of that Offer do notwithstanding in more sparing terms acknowledge little less For when those opposite judgements which never are wont to construe things doubtful to the better those very tongues which are always prone to aggravate whatsoever hath but the least shew whereby it may be suspected to savour of or to sound towards any evil do by their own voluntary sentence clearly free us from gross Errours and from manifest Impiety herein who would not judge us to be discharged of all blame which are confest to have no great fault even by their very word and testimony in whose eyes no fault of ours hath ever hitherto been accustomed to seem small Nevertheless what they seem to offer us with the one hand the same with the other they pull back again They grant we erre not in palpable manner weare not openly and notoriously impious yet Errors we have which the sharp insight of their wisest men do espy there is hidden impiety which the profounder sort are able enough to disclose Their skilful ears perceive certain harsh and unpleasant discords in the sound of our Common Prayer such as the Rules of Divine Harmony such as the Laws of God cannot bear 28. Touching our Conformity with the Church of Rome as also of the difference between some Reformed Churches and ours that which generally hath been already answered may serve for answer to that Exception which in these two respects they take particularly against the form of our Common Prayer To say that in nothing they may be followed which are of the Church of Rome were violent and extream Some things they do in that they are men in that they are Wise men and Christian men some things some things in that they are men misled and blinded with Errour As farr as they follow Reason and Truth we fear not to tread the self-same steps wherein they have gone and to be their Followers Where Rome keepeth that which is antienter and better others whom we much more affect leaving it for newer and changing it for worse we had rather follow the perfections of them whom we like not than in defects resemble them whom we love For although they profess they agree with us touching a prescript form of Prayer to be used in the Church yet in that very form which they say is agreeable to Gods Word and the use of Reformed Churches they have by special Protestation declared That their meaning is not it shall be prescribed as a thing whereunto they will tye their Minister It shall not they say be necessary for the Minister daily to repeat all these things before mentioned but beginning with some like Confession to proceed to the Sermon which ended he either useth the Prayer for all States before mentioned or else prayeth as the Spirit of God shall move his Heart Herein therefore we hold it much better with the Church of Rome to appoint a prescript form which every man shall be bound to observe then with them to set down a kinde of direction a form for men to use if they list or otherwise to change as pleaseth themselves Furthermore the Church of Rome hath rightly also considered that Publick Prayer is a Duty intire in it self a Duty requisite to be performed much oftner than Sermons can possibly be made For which cause as they so we have likewise a Publick form how to serve God both Morning and Evening whether Sermons may be had or no. On the contrary side their form of Reformed Prayer sheweth only what shall be done upon the dayes appointed for the Preaching of the Word with what words the Minister shall begin when the hour appointed for Sermon is come what shall be said or sung before Sermon and what after So that according to this form of theirs it must stand for a Rule No Sermon No Service Which over-sight occasioned the French spitefully to term Religion that sort exercised a meer Preach Sundry other more particular defects there are which I willingly forbear to rehearse in consideration whereof we cannot be induced to prefert their Reformed form of Prayer before our own what Church soever we resemble therein 29. The Attire which the Minister of God is by Order to use at times of Divine Service being but a matter of meer formality yet such as for Comeliness sake hath hitherto been judged by the wiser sort of men not unnecessary to concurr with other sensible Notes betokening the different kinde or quality of Persons and Actions whereto it is tyed as we think not ourselves the holier because we use it so neither should they with whom no such thing is in use think us therefore unholy because we submit our selves unto that which in a matter so indifferent the wisdom of Authority and Law have thought comely To solemn Actions of Royalty and Justice their suitable Ornaments are a Beauty Are they only in Religion a stain Divine Religion saith Saint Ierom he speaketh of the Priestly Attire of the Law hath one kinde of Habite wherein to minister before the Lord another for ordinary uses belonging unto common life Pelagius having carped at the curious neatness of men's Apparel in those days and through the sowreness of his disposition spoken somewhat too hardly thereof affirming That the glory of Cloaths and Ornaments was a thing contrary to God and godliness S. Ierom whose custom is not to pardon over-easily his Adversaries if any where they chance to trip presseth him as thereby making all sorts of men in the World God's enemies Is it enmity with God saith he if I wear my Coat somewhat handsome If a Bishop a Priest Deacon and the rest of the Ecclesiastical Order come to administer the usual Sacrifice in a white Garment are they hereby God's Adversaries Clarks Monks Widows Virgins take beed it is dangerous for you to be otherwise seen than in soul and ragged Cloaths Not to speak any thing of Secular men which have proclaimed to have war with God as oft as ever they put on precious and shining Cloathes By which words of Ierome we may take it at the least for a probable collection that his meaning was to draw Pelagius into hatred as condemning by so general a speech even the neatness of that very Garment it self wherein the Clergy did then use to administer publickly the holy Sacrament of Christ's most blessed Body and Blood For that they did then use some such Ornament the words of Chrysostome give plain testimony who speaking to the Clergy of Antioch
in the presence of great men as what doth most avail to our own edification in piety and godly zeal If they on the contrary side do think that the same rules of decency which serve for things done unto terrene Powers should universally decide what is fit in the service of God if it be their meaning to hold it for a Maxim That the Church must deliver her publick Supplications unto God in no other form of speech than such as were decent if suit should be made to the Great Turk or some other Monarch let them apply their own rule unto their own form of common-Common-Prayer Suppose that the people of a whole Town with some chosen man before them did continually twice or thrice in a week resort to their King and every time they come first acknowledge themselves guilty of Rebellions and Treasons then sing a Song and after that explain some Statute of the Land to the Standers by and therein spend at the least an hour this done turn themselves again to the King and for every sort of his Subjects crave somewhat of him at the length sing him another Song and so take their leave Might not the King well think that either they knew not what they would have or else that they were distracted in minde or some other such like cause of the disorder of their Supplication This form of suing unto Kings were absurd This form of Praying unto God they allow When God was served with legal Sacrifices such was the miserable and wretched disposition of some mens mindes that the best of every thing they had being culled out for themselves if there were in their flocks any poor starved or diseased thing not worth the keeping they thought it good enough for the Altar of God pretending as wise Hyprocrites do when they rob God to enrich themselves that the fatness of Calves doth benefit him nothing to us the best things are most profitable to him all as one if the minde of the Offerer be good which is the only thing he respecteth In reproof of which their devout fraud the Prophet Malachy alledgeth that gifts are offered unto God not as supplys of his want indeed but yet as testimonies of that affection wherewith we acknowledge and honour his greatness For which cause sith the greater they are whom we honour the more regard we have to the quality and choice of those Presents which we bring them for honor's sake it must needs follow that if we dare not disgrace our worldly Superiours with offering unto them such reffuse as we bring unto God himself we shew plainly that our acknowledgment of his Greatnesse is but feigned in heart we fear him not so much as we dread them If ye offer the blinde for Sacrifice is it not evil Offer it now unto thy Prince Will he be content or accept thy Person saith the Lord of Hosts Cursed be the Deceiver which hath in his Flock a Male and having made a Vow sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing For I am a great King saith the Lord of Hosts Should we hereupon frame a Rule that what form of speech or behaviour soever is fit for Suiters in a Prince's Court the same and no other beseemeth us in our Prayers to Almighty God 35. But in vain we labour to perswade them that any thing can take away the tediousness of Prayer except it be brought to the very same both measure and form which themselves assign Whatsoever therefore our Liturgy hath more than theirs under one devised pretence or other they cut it off We have of Prayers for Earthly things in their opinion too great a number so oft to rehearse the Lords Prayer in so small a time is as they think a loss of time the Peoples praying after the Minister they say both wasteth time and also maketh an unpleasant sound the Psalms they would not have to be made as they are a part of our Common-Prayer nor to be sung or said by turns nor such Musick to be used with them those Evangelical Hymns they allow not to stand in our Liturgy the Letany the Creed of Athanasius the Sentence of Glory wherewith we use to conclude Psalms these things they cancel as having been instituted in regard of occasions peculiar to the times of old and as being therefore now superfluous Touching Prayers for things earthly we ought not to think that the Church hath set down so many of them without cause They peradventure which finde this fault are of the same affection with Solomon so that if God should offer to grant the whatsoever they ask they would neither crave Riches not length of dayes not yet victory over their Enemies but only an understanding heart for which cause themselves having Eagles wings are offended to see others flye so near the ground But the tender kindness of the Church of God it very well beseemeth to help the weaker sort which are by so great oddes moe in number although some few of the perfecter and stronger may be therewith for a time displeased Ignorant we are not that of such as resorted to our Saviour Christ being present on Earth there came not any unto him with better success for the benefit of their Souls everlasting happiness than they whose bodily necessities gave them the first occasion to seek relief when they saw willingness and ability of doing every way good unto all The graces of the Spirit are much more precious than worldly benefits our ghostly evils of greater importance than any harm which the body feeleth Therefore our desires to heaven-ward should both in measure and number no less exceed than their glorious Object doth every way excel in value These things are true and plain in the eye of a perfect Judgement But yet it must be withal considered that the greatest part of the World are they which be farthest from perfection Such being better able by sense to discern the wants of this present life than by spiritual capacity to apprehend things above sense which tend to their happiness in the world to come are in that respect the more apt to apply their mindes even with hearty affection and zeal at the least unto those Branches of Publick prayer wherein their own particular is moved And by this mean there stealeth upon them a double benefit first because that good affection which things of smaller account have once set on work is by so much the more easily raised higher and secondly in that the very custom of seeking so particular aide and relief at the hands of God doth by a secret contradiction withdraw them from endeavouring to help themselves by those wicked shifts which they know can never have his allowance whose assistance their Prayer seeketh These multiplyed Petitions of worldly things in Prayer have therefore besides their direct use a Service whereby the Church under-hand through a kinde of heavenly fraud taketh therewith the Souls of men as with certain baits If
then their calculation be true for so they reckon that a full third of our Prayers be allotted unto earthly benefits for which our Saviour in his platform hath appointed but one Petition amongst seven the difference is without any great disagreement we respecting what men are and doing that which is meer in regard of the common imperfection our Lord contrariwise proposing the most absolute proportion that can be in mens desires the very highest mark whereat we are able to aime For which cause also our custom is both to place it in the front of our Prayers as a Guide and to adde it in the end of some principal limbs or parts as a complement which fully perfecteth whatsoever may be defective in the rest Twice we rehearse it ordinarily and oftner as occasion requireth more solemnity or length in the form of Divine Service not mistrusting till these new curiosities sprang up that ever any man would think our labour herein mis-spent the time wastfully consumed and the Office it self made worse by so repeating that which otherwise would more hardly be made familiar to the simpler sort for the good of whose Souls there is not in Christian Religion any thing of like continual use and force throughout every hour and moment of their whole lives I mean not only because Prayer but because this very Prayer is of such efficacy and necessity for that our Saviour did but set men a bare example how to contrive or devise Prayers of their own and no way binde them to use this is no doubt as Errour Iohn the Baptist's Disciples which had been always brought up in the bosom of God's Church from the time of their first Infancy till they came to the School of Iohn were not so brutish that they could be ignorant how to call upon the Name of God but of their Master they had received a form of Prayer amongst themselves which form none did use saving his Disciples so that by it as by a mark of special difference they were known from others And of this the Apostles having taken notice they request that as Iohn had taught his so Christ would likewise teach them to pray Tertullian and Saint Augustin do for that cause term it Orationem legitimam the Prayer which Christ's own Law hath tyed his Church to use in the same Prescript form of words wherewith he himself did deliver it and therefore what part of the World soever we fall into if Christian Religion have been there received the ordinary use of this very Prayer hath with equal continuance accompanied the same as one of the principal and most material duties of honour done to Jesus Christ. Seeing that we have saith Saint Cyprian an Advocate with the Father for our Sins when we that have sinned come to seek for pardon let us alledge unto God the words which our Advocate hath taught For sith his promise is our plain warrant that in his Name what we aske we shall receive must we not needs much the rather obtain that for which we sue if not only his Name do countenance but also his Speech present our requests Though men should speak with the tongues of Angels yet words so pleasing to the ears of God as those which the Son of God himself hath composed were not possible for men to frame He therefore which made us to live hath also taught us to pray to the end that speaking unto the Father in the Sonn 's own prescript without scholy or gloss of ours we may be sure that we utter nothing which God will either disallow or deny Other Prayers we use may besides this and this oftner than any other although not tyed so to do by any Commandement of Scripture yet moved with such considerations as have been before set down the causeless dislike where of which others have conceived is no sufficient reason for us as much as once to forbear in any place a thing which uttered with true devotion and zeal of heart affordeth to God himself that glory that aide to the weakest sort of men to the most perfect that solid comfort which is unspeakable 36. With our Lords Prayer they would finde no fault so that they might perswade us to use it before or other Sermons only because so their manner is and not as all Christian people have been of old accustomed insert it so often into the Liturgy But the Peoples custom to repeat any thing after the Minister they utterly mislike Twice we appoint that the words which the Minister first pronounceth the whole Congregation shall repeat after him As first in the publick Confession of Sins and again in rehearsal of our Lord's Prayer presently after the blessed Sacrament of his Body and Blood received A thing no way offensive no way unfit or unseemly to be done although it had been so appointed ofner than with us it is But surely with so good reason it standeth in those two places that otherwise to order it were not in all respects so well Could there be any thing devised better then that we all at our first access unto God by Prayer should acknowledge meekly our sins and that not onely in heart but with tongue all which are present being made ear-witnesses even of every mans distinct and deliberate assent unto each particular branch of a common Indictment drawn against our selves How were it possible that the Church should any way else with such ease and certainty provide that none of her Children may as Adam dissemble that wretchedness the penitent confession whereof is so necessary a Preamble especially to Common Prayer In like manner if the Church did ever devise a thing fit and convenient what more then this that when together we have all received those Heavenly Mysteries wherein Christ imparteth himself unto us and giveth visible testification of our blessed communion with him we should in hatred of all Heresies Factions and Schisms the Pastor as a Leader the people as willing followers of him step by step declare openly our selves united as Brethren in one by offering up with all our hearts and tongues that most effectual Supplication wherein he unto whom we offer it hath himself not onely comprehended all our necessities but in such sort also framed every Petition as might most naturally serve for many and doth though not always require yet always import a multitude of speakers together For which cause Communicants have ever used it and we at that time by the form of our very utterance do shew we use it yea every word and syllable of it as Communicants In the rest we observe that custom whereunto St. Paul alludeth and whereof the Fathers of the Church in their Writings make often mention to shew indefinitely what was done but not universally to binde for ever all Prayers unto one onely fashion of utterance The Reasons which we have alledged induce us to think it still a good work which they in their pensive
endless thanks must have their beginning in a state which bringeth the full and final satisfaction of all such perpetual desires Again because our common necessities and the lack which we all have as well of ghostly as of earthly favors is in each kinde so easily known but the gifts of God according to those degrees and times which he in his secrets wisdom seeth meet are so diversly bestowed that it seldom appeareth what all receive what all stand in need of it seldom lieth hid we are not to marvel though the Church do oftner concur in suits then in thanks unto God for particular benefits Nevertheless lest God should be any way unglorified the greatest part of our daily Service they know consisteth according to the â— Blessed Apostles own precise rule in much variety of Psalms and Hymns for no other purpose but onely that out of so plentiful a treasure there might be for every mans heart no chuse out his own Sacrifice and to offer unto God by particular secret instinct what fitteth best the often occasions which any several either Party or Congregation may seem to have They that would clean take from us therefore the daily use of the very best means we have to magnifie and praise the Name of Almighty God for his rich Blessings they that complain of out reading and singing so many Psalms for so good an end they I say that finde fault with our store should of all men be least willing to reprove our scarcity of Thanksgivings But because peradventure they see it is not either generally fit or possible that Churches should frame Thanksgivings answerable to each Petition they shorten somewhat the reins of their censure there are no forms of Thanksgiving they say for release of those common calamities from which we have Petitions to be delivered There are Prayers set forth to be said in the common calamities and Universal scourges of the Realm as Plague Famine c. And indeed so it ought to be by the Word of God But as such Prayers are needful whereby we beg release from our Distresses so there ought to be as necessary Prayers of Thanksgiving when we have received those things at the Lords hand which we asked in our Prayers As oft therefore as any Publick or Universal scourge is removed as oft as we are delivered from those either imminent or present Calamities against the storm and tempest whereof we all instantly craved favor from above let it be a Question what we should render unto God for his Blessings universally sensibly and extraordinarily bestowed A Prayer of three or four lines inserted into some part of our Church Liturgy No we are not perswaded that when God doth in trouble injoyn us the duty of Invocation and promise us the benefit of Deliverance and profess That the thing he expecteth after at our hands is to glorifie him as our mighty and onely Saviour the Church can discharge in manner convenient a work of so great importance by fore-ordaining some short Collect wherein briefly to mention thanks Our custom therefore whensoever so great occasions are incident is by Publick Authority to appoint throughout all Churches set and solemn Forms as well of Supplication as of Thanksgiving the preparations and intended Complements whereof may stir up the mindes of men in much more effectual sort then if onely there should be added to the Book of Prayer that which they require But we err in thinking that they require any such matter For albeit their words to our understanding be very plain that in our Book there are Prayers set forth to be said when common calamities are felt as Plague Famine and such like Again that indeed so it ought to be by the Word of God That likewise there ought to be as necessary Prayers of Thanksgiving when we have received those things Finally that the want of such Forms of Thanksgiving for the release from those common calamities from which we have Petitions to be delivered is the default of the Book of Common Prayer Yet all this they mean but only by way of supposition if express Prayers against so many Earthly miseries were convenient that then indeed as many express and particular Thanksgivings should be likewise necessary Seeing therefore we know that they hold the one superfluous they would not have it so understood as though their mindes were that any such addition to the Book is needful whatsoever they say for Arguments sake concerning this pretented defect The truth is they wave in and out no way sufficiently grounded no way resolved what to think speak or write more then onely that because they have taken it upon them they must no remedy now be opposite 44. The last supposed fault concerneth some few things the very matter whereof is thought to be much amiss In a Song of Praise to our Lord Jesus Christ we have these words When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death thoâ— didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all Believers Which maketh some shew of giving countenance to their Error who think that the faithful which departed this life before the coming of Christ were never till then made partakers of joy but remained all in that place which they term the Lake of the Fathers In our Liturgy request is made that we may be preserved from sudden death This seemeth frivolous because the godly should always be prepared to die Request is made that God would give those things which we for our unworthiness dare not ask This they say carrieth with it the note of Popish servile fear and savoreth not of that confidence and reverent familiarity that the children of God have through Christ with their Heavenly Father Request is made that we may evermore be defended from all adversity For this there is no promise in Scripture and therefore it is no Prayer of Faith or of the which we can assure our selves that we shall obtain it Finally Request is made That God would have mercy upon all men This is impossible because some are the Vessels of Wrath to whom God will never extend his Mercy 45. As Christ hath purchased that Heavenly Kingdom the last perfection whereof is Glory in the life to come Grace in this life a preparation thereunto so the same he hath opened to the World in such sort that whereas none can possibly without him attain salvation by him all that believe are saved Now whatsoever he did or suffered the end thereof was to open the doors of the Kingdom of Heaven which our iniquities had shut up But because by ascending after that the sharpness of death was overcome he took the very local possession of glory and that to the use of all that are his even as himself before had witnessed I go to prepare a place for you And again Whom thou hast given me O Father I will that where I am they be also with me that my glory which thou hast given me they may
lest the sense and signification we give unto it should burthen us as Authors of a new Gospel in the House of God not in respect of some cause which the Fathers had more then we have to use the same nor finally for any such offence or scandal as heretofore it hath been subject unto by Error now reformed in the mindes of Men. 66. The ancient Custom of the Church was after they had Baptized to add thereunto Imposition of Hands with effectual Prayer for the illumination of Gods most holy Spirit to confirm and perfect that which the Grace of the some Spirit had already begun in Baptism For our means to obtain the Graces which God doth bestow are our Prayers Our Prayers to that intent are available as well for others as for ourselves To pray for others is to bless them for whom we pray because Prayer procureth the blessing of God upon them especially the Prayer of such as God either most respecteth for their Piety and Zeal that way or else regardeth for that their place and calling bindeth them above others unto this duty as it doth both Natural and Spiritual Fathers With Prayers of Spiritual and Personal Benediction the manner hath been in all ages to use Imposition of Hands as a Ceremony betokening our restrained desires to the party whom we present unto God by Prayer Thus when Israel blessed Ephraim and Manasses Iosephs sons he imposed upon them his hands and prayed God in whose sight my Fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk God which hath fed me all my life long unto this day and the Angel which hath delivered me from all evil bless these Children The Prophets which healed diseases by Prayer used therein the self-same Ceremony And therefore when Elizeus willed Naaman to wash himself seven times in Iordan for cure of his foul disease it much offended him I thought saith he with my self Surely the man will come forth and stand and call upon the Name of the Lord his God and put his hand on the place to the end he may so heal the â—â—eprosie In Consecrations and Ordinations of Men unto Rooms of Divine Calling the like was usually done from the time of Moses to Christ. Their suits that came unto Christ for help were also tendred oftentimes and are expressed in such forms or phrases of speech as shew that he was himself an observer of the same custom He which with Imposition of Hands and Prayer did so great Works of Mercy for restauration of Bodily health was worthily judged as able to effect the infusion of Heavenly Grace into them whose age was not yet depraved with that malice which might be supposed a bar to the goodness of God towards them They brought him therefore young children to put his hands upon them and pray After the Ascension of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ that which he had begun continued in the daily practice of his Apostles whose Prayer and Imposition of Hands were a mean whereby thousands became partakers of the wonderful Gifts of God The Church had received from Christ a promise that such as believed in him these signs and tokens should follow them To cast one Devils to speak with Tongues to drive away Serpents to be free from the harm which any deadly poyson could work and to cure diseases by Imposition of Hands Which power common at the first in a manner unto all Believers all Believers had not power to derive or communicate unto all other men but whosoever was the instrument of God to instruct convert and baptize them the gift of miraculous operations by the power of the Holy Ghost they had not but onely at the Apostles own hands For which cause Simon Magus perceiving that power to be in none but them and presuming that they which had it might sell it sought to purchase it of them with money And as miraculous Graces of the Spirit continued after the Apostles times For saith Irenaus they which are truly his Disciples do in his Name and through Grace received from him such works for the benefit of other men as every of them is by him enabled to work Some cast one Devils in so much as they which are delivered from wicked spirits have been thereby won unto Christ and do constantly persevere in the Church and Society of Faithful Men Some excel in the knowledge of things to come in the grace of Visions from God and the gift of Prophetical Prediction Some by laying on their hands restore them to health which are grievously afflicted with sickness yea there are that of dead have been made alive and have afterwards many years conversed with us What should I say The gifts are innumerable wherewith God hath inriched his Church throughout the World and by vertue whereof in the Name of Christ crucified under Pontius Pilate the Church every day doth many wonders for the good of Nations neither fraudulently nor in any respect of lucre and gain to her self but as freely bestowing as God on her hath bestowed his Divine Graces So it no where appeareth that ever any did by Prayer and Imposition of Hands sithence the Apostles times make others partakers of the like miraculous gifts and graces as long as it pleased God to continue the same in his Church but onely Bishops the Apostles Successors for a time even in that power St. Augustine acknowledgeth That such gifts were not permitted to last always lest men should wax cold with the commonness of that the strangeness whereof at the first inflamed them Which words of St. Augustine declaring how the vulgar use of these Miracles was then expired are no prejudice to the like extraordinary Graces more rarely observed in some either then or of latter days Now whereas the Successors of the Apostles had but onely for a time such power as by Prayer and Imposition of Hands to bestow the Holy Ghost the reason wherefore Confirmation nevertheless by Prayer and Laying on of Hands hath hitherto always continued is for other very special benefits which the Church thereby enjoyeth The Fathers every where impute unto it that gift or Grace of the Holy Ghost not which maketh us first Christian men but when we are made such assisteth us in all vertue aimeth us against temptation and sin For after Baptism administred there followeth saith Tertullian Imposition of Hands with Invocation and Invitation of the Holy Ghost which willingly cometh down from the Father to rest upon the purified and blessed Bodies as it were acknowledging the Waters of Baptism a fit Seat St. Cyprian in more particular manner alluding to that effect of the Spirit which here especially was respected How great saith he is that power and force wherewith the minde is here he meaneth in Baptism enabled being not onely withdrawn from that pernicious hold which the World before had of it nor onely so purified and made clean that no stain or blemish of
accustomed to name their Tithes the hedge of their Riches Albeit a hedge do onely fence and preserve that which is contained whereas their Tithes and Offerings did more because they procured increase of the heap out of which they were taken God demandeth no such debt for his own need but for their onely benefit that owe it Wherefore detaining the same they hurt not him whom they wrong and themselves whom they think they relieve they wound except men will haply affirm that God did by fair speeches and large promises delude the world in saying Bring ye all the Tithes into the Store-house that there may be meat in mine House deal truly defraud not God of his due but bring all and prove if I will not open unto you the Windows of Heaven and powre down upon you an immeasurable blessing That which Saint Iames hath concerning the effect of our Prayers unto God is for the most part of like moment in our gifts We pray and obtain not because he which knoweth our hearts doth know our desires are evil In like manner we give and we are not the more accepted because he beholdeth how unwisely we spill our Gifts in the bringing It is to him which needeth nothing all one whether any thing or nothing be given him But for our own good it always behoveth that whatsoever we offer up into his hands we bring it seasoned with this cogitation Thou Lord art worthy of all honour With the Church of Christ touching these matters it standeth as it did with the whole World before Moses Whereupon for many years men being desirous to honour God in the same manner as other vertuous and holy Personages before had done both during the time of their life and if farther ability did serve by such devise as might cause their works of piety to remain always it came by these means to pass that the Church from time to time had Treasure proportionable unto the poorer or wealthier estate of Christian men And assoon as the state of the Church could admit thereof they easily condescended to think it most natural and most fit that God should receive as before of all men his antient accustomed Revenues of Tithes Thus therefore both God and Nature have taught to convert things temporal to eternal uses and to provide for the perpetuity of Religion even by that which is most transitory For to the end that in worth and value there might be no abatement of any thing once assigned to such purposes the Law requireth precisely the best of what we possesse and to prevent all dammages by way of commutation where in stead of natural Commodities or other rights the price of them might be taken the Law of Moses determined their rates and the payments to be alwayes made by the Sickle of the Sanctuary wherein there was great advantage of weight above the ordinary currant Sickle The truest and surest way for God to have alwayes his own is by making him payment in kinde out of the very self-same riches which through his gracious benediction the earth doth continually yield This where it may be without inconvenience is for every man's Conscience sake That which commeth from God to us by the natural course of his providence which we know to be innocent and pure is perhaps best accepted because least spotted with the stain of unlawful or indirect procurement Besides whereas prices daily change Nature which commonly is one must needs be the most indifferent and permanent Standard between God and Man But the main foundation of all whereupon the security of these things dependeth as farr as any thing may be ascertained amongst men is that the Title and Right which man had in every of them before Donation doth by the Act and from the time of any such Donation Dedication or Grant remain the proper possession of God till the World's end unless himself renounce or relinquish it For if equity have taught us that every one ought to enjoy his own that what is ours no other can alienate from us but with our own deliberate consent finally that no man having past his consent or deed may change it to the prejudice of any other should we perfume to deal with God worse than God hath allowed any man to deal with us Albeit therefore we be now free from the Law of Moses and consequently not thereby bound to the payment of Tithes yet because Nature hath taught men to honour God with their Substance and Scripture hath left us an example of that particular proportion which for moral considerations hath been thought sittest by him whose wisedom could best judge furthermore seeing that the Church of Christ hath long sithence entred into like obligation it seemeth in these dayes a question altogether vain and superfluous whether Tithes be a matter of Divine Right because howsoever at the first it might have been thought doubtful our case is clearly the same now with theirs unto whom Saint Peter sometime spake saying While it was whole it was whole thine When our Tithes might have probably seemed our own we had colour of liberty to use them as we our selves saw good But having made them His whose they are let us be warned by other mens example what it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to wash or clip that come which hath on it the mark of God For that all these are his possessions and that he doth himself so reckon them appeareth by the form of his own speeches Touching Gifts and Oblations Thou shalt give them me touching Oratories and Churches My House shall be called the House of Prayer touching Tithes Will a man spoil God Yet behold even me your God ye have spoiled notwithstanding ye ask wherein as though ye were ignorant what injury there hath been offered in Tithes ye are heavily accursed because with a kinde of publick consent ye have joyned your selves in one to rob me imagining the commonness of your offence to be every man's particular justification touching Lands Ye shall offer to the Lord a sacred portion of ground and that sacred portion shall belong to the Priests Neither did God onely thus ordain amongst the Jews but the very purpose intent and meaning of all that have honoured him with their substance was to invest him with the property of those benefits the use whereof must needs be committed to the hands of men In which respect the stile of antient Grants and Charters is We have given unto God both for Us and our Hews for ever Yea We know saith Charles the Great that the goods of the Church are the sacred indowments of God to the Lord our God we offer and dedicate whatsoever we deliver unto his Church Whereupon the Laws Imperial doe likewise divide all things in such sort that they make some to belong by right of Nature indifferently unto every man some to be the certain goods and possessions of Common-weals some to
That the Parliament being a mere Temporal Court can neither by the law of Nature nor of God have competent power to define of such matters That Supremacy in this kinde cannot belong unto Kings as Kings because Pagan Emperours whose Princely power was true Soveraignty never challenged so much over the Church That Power in this kinde cannot be the right of any Earthly Crown Prince or State in that they be Christians forasmuch as if they be Christians they all owe subjection to the Pastors of their Souls That the Prince therefore not having it himself cannot communicate it to the Parliament and consequently cannot make Laws here or determine of the Churches Regiment by himself Parliament or any other Court subjected unto him The Parliament of England together with the Convocation annexed thereunto is that whereupon the very essence of all Government within this Kingdom doth depend it is even the body of the whole Realm it consisteth of the King and of all that within the Land are subject unto him The Parliament is a Court not so merely Temporal as if it might meddle with nothing but onely Leather and Wool Those dayes of Queen Mary are not yet forgotten wherein the Realm did submit it self unto the Legate of Pope Iulius at which time had they been perswaded as this man seemeth now to be had they thought that there is no more force in Laws made by Parliament concerning Church-Affairs then if men should take upon them to make Orders for the Hierarchies of Angels in Heaven they might have taken all former Statutes of that kinde as cancelled and by reason of nullity abrogated What need was there that they should bargain with the Cardinal and purchase their Pardon by promise made before-hand that what Laws they had made assented unto or executed against the Bishop of Rome's Supremacy the same they would in that present Parliament effectually abrogate and repeal Had they power to repeal Laws made and none to make Laws concerning the Regiment of the Church Again when they had by suit obtained his confirmation for such Foundations of Bishopricks Cathedral Churches Hospitals Colledges and Schools for such Marriages before made for such Institutions into Livings Ecclesiastical and for all such Judicial Processes as having been ordered according to the Laws before in force but contrary unto the Canons and Orders of the Church of Rome were in that respect thought defective although the Cardinal in his Letters of Dispensation did give validity unto those Acts even Apostolicae firmitatis robur the very strength of Apostolical solidity what had all these been without those grave authentical words Be it enacted by the Authority of this present Parliament that all and singular Articles and Clauses contained in the said Dispensation shall remain and be reputed and taken to all intents and constructions in the Laws of this Realm lawful good and effectual to be alledged and pleaded in all Courts Ecclesiastical and Temporal for good and sufficient matter either for the Plaintiff or Defendant without any Allegation or Objection to be made against the validity of them by pretence of any General Councel Canon or Decree to the contrary Somewhat belike they thought there was in this mere Temporal Court without which the Popes own mere Ecclesiastical Legate's Dispensation had taken small effect in the Church of England neither did they or the Cardinal imagine any thing committed against the Law of Nature or of God because they took order for the Churches Affairs and that even in the Court of Parliament The most natural and Religious course in making Laws is that the matter of them be taken from the judgement of the wisest in those things which they are to concern In matters of God to set down a form of Prayer a solemn confession of the Articles of the Christian Faith and Ceremonies meet for the exercise of Religion It were unnatural not to think the Pastors and Bishops of our Souls a great deal more fit than men of Secular Trades and Callings Howbeit when all which the wisdome of all sorts can do is done for the devising of Laws in the Church it is the general consent of all that giveth them the form and vigour of Laws without which they could be no more unto us than the Councel of Physitians to the sick Well might they seem as wholesom admonitions and instructions but Laws could they never be without consent of the whole Church to be guided by them whereunto both Nature and the practise of the Church of God set down in Scripture is found every way so fully consonant that God himself would not impose no not his own Laws upon his People by the hand of Moses without their free and open consent Wherefore to define and determine even of the Churches Affairs by way of assent and approbation as Laws are defined in that Right of Power which doth give them the force of Laws thus to define of our own Churches Regiment the Parliament of England hath competent Authority Touching that Supremacy of Power which our Kings have in this case of making Laws it resteth principally in the strength of a negative voice which not to give them were to deny them that without which they were Kings but by mere title and not in exercise of Dominion Be it in Regiment Popular Aristocratical or Regal Principality resteth in that Person or those Persons unto whom is given right of excluding any kinde of Law whatsoever it be before establishment This doth belong unto Kings as Kings Pagan Emperors even Nero himself had no less but much more than this in the Laws of his own Empire That he challenged not any interest of giving voice in the laws of the Church I hope no man will so construe as if the cause were conscience and fear to encroach upon the Apostles right If then it be demanded By what right from Constantine downward the Christian Emperors did so far intermeddle with the Churches affairs either we must herein condemn them as being over presumptuously bold or else judge that by a Law which is termed Regia that is to say Regal the People having derived unto their Emperors their whole power for making of Laws and by that means his Edicts being made Laws what matter soever they did concern as Imperial dignity endowed them with competent Authority and power to make Laws for Religion so they were thought by Christianity to use their Power being Christians unto the benefit of the Church of Christ was there any Christian Bishop in the world which did then judge this repugnant unto the dutiful subjection which Christians do ow to the Pastors of their Souls to whom in respect of their Sacred Order it is not by us neither may be denied that Kings and Princes are as much as the very meanest that liveth under them bound in conscience to shew themselves gladly and willingly obedient receiving the Seals of Salvation the blessed Sacraments at their hands as at the
Deut. 31. 13. a De Eccles. Offic l. 1. c. 10. b Psal. 1. 2. c Psal. 119. 16. d Aug. in Ps. â—6 e Cyprian 1. 2. Epist. 5. Lector personat verba sublimia Evangelium Christi 1. g's a frottibus conspieitur cum giudio fraternitatis auditur f Psal. 119. 33 35. T. C. l. 2. p. 383. 384 392. Acts. â— 31. Apoc. 1 3. T. C. l. 2. p. 353. p. 373. Pag. 364. 375. 382 383 384. Pag. 392. Pag. 364. a Ecclus 51. 26.27 Matth. 12. â—â— b 1 Tim. 1. 3. Rom. 14. 1. 1 Thes. 3. 10. c Matth. 5. 6. d Phil. 1. 6. 1 Pet. 5. 10. Matth. 3. 9. e 1 Thes. 4. 18. Pet. 10. â—4 Jude vers 20. 1 Per. 4. 10. f Luke 11. 31. T. C. l. 2. p. 381. T. C. l. 2. p. 372. a T. C. l. 2. p. 38. b Complaint of the Comminâ—â—â— c Dr. Somâ—â— Painter p. 21 d T. C. lib. 2. pag. 335. Of Prayer a Ose. 14. 3. b Revel 5. 8. c Acts. 10. 4. Rom. 1. 9. 1 Thes. 5. 17. Luke 18. 1. 1 Sam. 12. 23. Dan. 9. 20. Acts 10. 13. Of Publick Prayer Psal. 55. 18. Dan. 9. 3. Acts 10. 9. Matth. 18. 20. 2 Cor. 1. 11. Jonah 4. 11. Apolog. 1. 39. Ambros. l. de Poen Multi minimi dum congregantur unanimes sunt magni multorum preces impossibilest contemni Psal. 12. ◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil. Epist. â—â— Psal. 26. 12. 34. 18. Ps. 30 4. 96. 5. Psal. 27. 4. 42. 4. 84. 1. Of the form of Common-Prayer Matth. 6. 5 6. Mat. 21. 13. Chrys. Hom. 14. ad Hebra 24. in Act. 1 Cor. 11. 10. Psal. 96. 6. Power and Beauty are in his Sanctuary Ad domos sletim Dominicas currimus corpora humisternimus mixtis cum sletu gaudija supplicamus Salvia de Prov. l. 7. Num. 6. 23. 2 Chron. 30 27. Col. l. â—â—â—â— 3. de Epi. Cler. 43 44. saepe 1. Tim. 2. 8. John 9. 31. Jer. 11. 11. Ezech. 8. 18. Psal. 132. 9. 2 Chron. 6. 20. Joel 2. 17. 2 Chron. 29. 30. Of them which like not to have any set form of Common Prayer Num. 6. 23. a Mat. 25. 30. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having sung the Psalmes which were unto at that Feast those Psalms which the Jews call the great Hallelujah beginning at the 113 and contiâ—â—â—â—ing to the â—a l. of the ll8 Sâ—e Paul Barâ—â—â—s in Ps. 112 â—â—â—â—â—â—â— and 〈…〉 de 〈…〉 1 Cor. 14. 15. Ephâ—s 5. 19. Of them who allowing a set form Prayer yâ—t allow â—erâ—â—â— a T. C. l. 1. p. â—31 afterwards p. 135. Whereas â—â— Doâ—â—er â—â—â—â—meth that theâ—e can â—e nothing shewed in the whole Book which is not agreeable unto the Word of God I am very â—â—â—â—h c. Notwithstanding my duty of defening the Truth and Love which I have first towards God and then towards my Countrey const 〈…〉 anâ— be inâ—tâ—uâ—â— proâ—eâ—â—â— speak a few words more particularly of the form of Prayer that when the blemishes thereof do appear it may please the Queens Majesty and her Honourable Council with â—hoâ—c of the Parliamâ—nt c. The form of our Liturgy too near the Papists too far different from that of or her reformed Churches as they pretend T. C. l. 1. p. 135. A Boâ—k of the form of Common Prayer tendered to the Parliament p. 46. Pag. 22. Pag. 24. Aâ—te beâ—enging to the Service of God T. C. l. 1 p. â—1 We think the Surplice especially unmeet for a Minister of the Gosp. â— to â—ear p. 75. â—â— is easily seen by Solomo n Eccles. 8. 9. thâ—â— to wear a white Garment was highly esteemed in the Eâ—st parts and was ordinary to those that were in any elimination as black with us and therefore was no several Apparel for the Ministers to execute their Ministry in â— Hierom in 44. Ezech. Pâ—iero Adver Pelag. l. 1. c. 9. T. C. l. 1. p. 77. Be a White Garment is meant a comely Apparel and not slovenly Chrysost. â—â— popul Antioch â—om 5. Serm. 60. T. C. l. 1. p. 75. It is true Chrysostom maketh mention of a White Garment but not in commendation of it but rather to the contrary for he sheweth that the dignity of their Ministery was in taking hâ—d that none unmeet were admitted to the Lords Supper not in going about the Church with a White Garment Eccles. 45. 7. T. C. l. 1. p. â—9 71. 75. 7â— T. C. l. 2 p 403. Lâ— p. â—3 â—6 l. â— p. 403. Lib. 1. p. 76. Page 81. Page 78. Esay 30. 12. a Exod. 18. 2. b Exod. 39.27 c Psal. 149 2. Apoc. 13.9 Mar. 16. 5. T C. l. 1. p. 7â— 1. 2. p 250. Index l 3 c 8. l. 3 p. 262 263. Lib. 3. p. 263. Page 263. Basil. Asect â—â—â—pent 2. l inâ—er 47. Of gesture in praying and of different places chosen to that purpose T C. l. 1 p. 134. T. C. l. 1. p. 203. Mark 12. 6. T C l. 3 p. 215. T. C. l. 1. p â—4 T. C. l 1. p 134. â— 3. p. 137. Acts 1. 13. T. C. l. 1. p. 134. l. 3 p. 137. Easiness of Praying alter our form T.C.l. 1. p. 133. l. 3 p. 184. Another fault in the whole Service or Liturgy of England is for that it maintaineth an unpreaching Ministry in requiring nothing to be done by the Minister which a Child of ten years old cannot do as well and as lawfully as that man wherewith the Book contenteth it self The length of our Service T C l. 1 p. 133. l. 3. p. 184. Aug. Ep. 121. Luke 6. 12. 1 Tim. 2. 1. T. C. l. 1. p. 184. Neh. 8. 3. Acts 20. 9. Instead of such Prayers at the Prâ—mitive Churches have used and those that be reformed now use we have they say divers short cuts or shreddings rather wishes than Prayers T. C. l. 1. p. 138. l. 3. p. 210 211. Lessons intermingled with our Prayers * We have no such forms in Scripture as that we should pray in two or three lines and then after having read a while some other thing come and pray as much more and so the 20. or the 30. time with pauses between If a man should come to a Prince and having very many things to demand after he had demanded one thing would stay a long time and then demand another and so the third the Prince might well think that either he came to aske before he knew what he had need of or that he had forgotten some piece of his Suit or that he were distracted in his understanding or some other like cause of the disorder of his Supplication T. C. l. 1. p. 138. This kinde of reason the Propher in the matter of Sacrifices doth use T. C. 1. 3. p. 210. a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist. Rhet. lib. 1. cap. 9. Mal. 1. 2. 14. The number of our Prayers for earthly things and our oft rehearsing of the Lords Prayer I can make no Geometrical and exact
overcome by the sword which they were very ready to take into their hands So that those very men that began with tender meek Petitions proceeded to print publick Admonitions and then to Satyrical Remonstrances and at last having like David numbred who was not and who was for their Cause they got a supposed Certainty of so great a Party that they durst threaten first the Bishops and not long after both the Queen and Parliament to all which they were secretly encouraged by the Earl of Leicester then in great favour with her Majestie and the reputed Cherisher and Patron-general of these Pretenders to Tenderness of Conscience whom he used as a sacreligious snare to further his Design which was by their means to bring such an odium upon the Bishops as to procure an Alienation of their Lands and a large proportion of them for himself which Avaritious desire had at last so blinded his Reason that his ambitious and greedy Hopes had almost flattered him into present possession of Lambeth-house And to thse strange and dangerous Undertakings the Non-conformists of this Nation were much encouraged and heightened by a Correspondence and Confederacy with that Brotherhood in Scotland so that here they became so bold that one told the Queen openly in a Sermon She was like an untamed Heyfer that would not be ruled by Gods people but obstructed his Discipline And in Scotland they were more confident for there they declared Her an Atheist and grew to such an height as not to be accountable for any thing spoken against Her No nor for Treason against their own King if spoken in the Pulpit Shewing at last such a disobedience even to Him that His Mother being in England and then in distress and in prison and in danger of Death the Church denied the King their Prayers for Her and at another time when he had appointed a day of Feasting their Church declared for a general Fast in opposition to his Authority To this height they were grown in both Nations and by these means there was distill'd into the mindes of the common people such other venemous and turbulent Principles as were inconsistent with the safety of the Church and State And these vented so daringly that beside the loss of Life and Limbs the Church and State were both forced to use such other severities as will not admit of an excuse if it had not been to prevent Confusion and the perilous consequences of it which without such prevention would in short time have brought unavoidable ruine and misery to this numerous Nation These Errors and Animosities were so remarkable that they begot wonder in an ingenious Italian who being about this time come newly into this Nation writ scoffingly to a Friend in his own Countrey That the common people of England were wiser then the wisest of his Nation for here the very Women and Shop-keepers were able to judge of Predestination and determine what Laws were fit to be made concerning Church Government then what were fit to be obeyed or abolished That they were more able or at least thought so to raise and determine perplex'd Cases of Conscience then the most Learned Colledges in Italy That Men of the slightest Learning and the most ignorant of the common people were mad for a new or Super or Re-Reformation of Religion and that in this they appeared like that man who would never cease to whet and whet his Knife till there was no Steel left to make it useful And he concluded his Letter with this observation That those very Men that were most busie in Oppositions and Disputations and Controversies and finding out the faults of their Governors had usually the least of Humility and Mortification or of the Power of Godliness And to heighten all these discontents and dangers there was also sprung up a Generation of Godless-men Men that had so long given way to their own Lusts and Delusions and had so often and so highly opposed the Blessed Motions of his Blessed Spirit and the inward Light of their own Consciences that they had thereby sinned themselves to a belief of what they would but were not able to believe Into a belief which is repugnant even to Humane nature for the Heathens believe there are many gods but these had sinned themselves into a belief that there is no God And so finding nothing in themselves but what is worse then nothing began to wish what they were not able to hope for That they should be like the Beasts that perish and in wicked company which is the Atheists Sanctuary were so bold as to say so Though the worst of mankinde when he is left alone at midnight may wish but cannot then think it Into this wretched this reprobate condition many had then sinned themselves And now When the Church was pestered with them and with all these other Irregularities when her Lands were in danger of Alienation her Power at least neglected and her Peace torn to pieces by several Schisms and such Heresies as do usually attend that sin When the common people seemed ambitious of doing those very things which were attended with most dangers that thereby they might be punished and then applauded and pittied When they called the Spirit of Opposition a Tender Conscience and complained of Persecution because they wanted power to persecute others When the giddy multitude raged and became restless to finde out misery for themselves and others and the râ—â—ble would herd themselves together and endeavor to govern and act in spight of Authority In this extremity fear and danger of the Church and State when to suppress the growing evils of both they needed a Man of Prudence and Piâ—ty and of an high and fearless Fortitude they were blest in all by Iohn Whitgift his being made Archbishop of Canterbury of whom ingenious Sir Henry Wotâ—on that knew him well hath left this true Character That he was a Man of a Reverend and Sacred Memory and of the Premitive temper A Man of such a temper as when the Church by lowliness of Spirit did flourish in highest examples of Vertue And though I dare not undertake to add to his Character yet I shall neither do right to this Discourse nor to my Reader if I forbear to give him a further and short account of the life and manners of this excellent Man and it shall be short for I long to end this digression that I may lead my Reader back to Mr. Hooker where we left him at the Temple Iohn Whitgift was born in the County of Lincoln of a Family that was ancient and noted to be prudent and affable and gentile by nature He was educated in Cambridge much of his Learning was acquired in Pembroke-Hall where Mr. Bradford the Martyr was his Tutor From thence he was remov'd to Peter-house from thence to be Master of Pembroke-Hall and from thence to the Mastership of Trinity Colledge About which time the Queen made him her Chaplain and not
small thing perswadeth them to change their opinions it behoveth that we vigilantly note and prevent by all means those evils whereby the hearts of men are lost which evils for the most part being personal do arm in such sort the Adversaries of God and his Church against us that if through our too much neglect and security the same should run on soon might we feel our estate brought to those lamentable terms whereof this hard and heavy sentence was by one of the Ancients uttered upon like occasions Dolens dico gemens denuncio sacerdotium quod apud nos intus cecidit foris diu stare non poterit But the gracious providence of Almighty God hath I trust put these Thorns of Contradiction in our sides lest that should steal upon the Church in a slumber which now I doubt not but through his assistance may be turned away from us bending thereunto our selves with constancy constancy in labor to do all men good constancy in Prayer unto God for all men Her especially whose sacred power matched with incomparable goodness of Nature hath hitherto been Gods most happy instrument by him miraculously kept for works of so miraculous preservation and safety unto others that as By the Sword of God and Gedeon was sometime the cry of the people of Israel so it might deservedly be at this day the joyful Song of innumerable multitudes yea the Emblem of some Estates and Dominions in the world and which must be eternally confest even with tears of thankfulness the true Inscription Stile or Title of all Churches as yet standing within this Realm By the goodness of Almighty God and his servant Elizabeth we areâ— That God who is able to make Mortality immortal give her such future continuance as may be no less glorious unto all Posterity then the days of Her Regiment past have been happy unto our selves and for his most dear Anointeds sake grant them all prosperity whose Labors Cares and Counsels unfeignedly are referred to Her endless welfare through his unspeakable mercy unto whom we all owe everlasting praise In which desire I will here rest humbly beseeching your Grace to pardon my great boldness and God to multiply his Blessings upon them that fear his Name Your Graces in all duty RICHARD HOOKER A PREFACE To them that seek as they term it The Reformation of Laws and Orders Ecclesiastical IN THE Church of England THough for no other cause yet for this That Posterity may know we have not loosly through silence permitted things to pass away as in a Dream there shall be for Mens information extant thus much concerning the present state of the Church of God established amongst us and their careful endeavor which would have uphold the same At your hands beloved in our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ for in him the love which we bear unto all that would but seem to be born of him it is not the Sea of your Gall and Bitterness that shall ever drown I have no great cause to look for other then the self-same portion and lot which your manner hath been hitherto to lay on them that concur not in Opinion and Sentence with you But our hope it that the God of Peace shall notwithstanding mans nature too impatical of contumelious malediction enable us quietly and even gladly to suffer all things for that work sake which we covet to perform The wonderful seal and fervor wherewith ye have with stood the received Orders of this Church was the first thing which caused me to enter into consideration Whether as all your published Books and Writings peremptorily maintain every Christian man fearing God stand bound to joyn with you for the furtherance of that which ye term The Lords Discipline Wherein I must plainly confess unto you that before I examined your sundry Declarations in that behalf it could not settle in my head to think but that undoubtedly such numbers of otherwise right well-affected and most religiously enclined minds had some marvellous reasonable enducements which led them with so great earnestness that way But when once as near as my slender ability would serve I had with travel and care performed that part of the Apostles advice and counsel in such cases whereby be willeth to try all things and was come at the length so far that there remained only the other clause to be satisfied wherein he concludeth that what good is must be held There was in my poor understanding no remedy but to set down this as my final resolute perswasion Surely the present Form of Church Government which the Laws of this Land have established is such as no Law of God nor Reason of Man hath hitherto been alledged of force sufficient to prove they do ill who to the uttermost of their power withstand the alteration thereof Contrariwise The other which instead of it we are required to accept is onely by Error and misconceipt named the Ordinance of Jesus Christ no one Proof as yet brought forth whereby it may clearly appear to be so in very deed The Explication of which two things I have here thought good to offer into your own hands Heartily beseeching you even by the Meekness of Iesus Christ whom I trust ye love That as ye tender the Peace and Quietness of this Church if there be in you that gracious Humility which hath ever been the Crown and Glory of a Christianly disposed minde If your own souls hearts and consciences the sound integrity whereof can but hardly stand with the refusal of Truth in personal respects be as I doubt not but they are things most dear and precious unto you Let not the Faith which ye have in our Lord Jesus Christ be blemished with partialities regard not who it is which speaketh but weigh onely what is spoken Think not that ye read the words of one who bendeth himself as an Adversary against the Truth which ye have already embraced but the words of one who desireth even to embrace together with you the self same Truth if it be the Truth and for that cause for no other God he knoweth hath undertaken the burthensom labor of this painful kinde of Conference For the plainer access whereunto let it be lawful for me to rip up the very bottom how and by whom your Discipline was planted at such time as this age we live in began to make first tryal thereof 2. A Founder it had whom for mine own part I think incomparably the wisest man that ever the French Church did injoy since the hour it injoyed him His bringing up was in the study of the Civil Law Divine knowledge he gathered not by hearing or reading so much as by teaching others For though thousands were debters to him as touching knowledge in that kinde yet be to none but onely to God the Author of that most blessed Fountain The Book of Life and of the admirable dexterity of Wit together with the helps of other learning which
in this case ye are all bound for the time to suspend and in otherwise doing ye offend against God by troubling his Church without any just or necessary cause Be it that there are some reasons inducing you to think hardly of our Laws Are those reasons demonstrative are they necessary or but meer probabilities onely An Argument necessary and demonstrative is such as being proposed unto any man and understood she minde cannot chase but invardly assent Any one such reason dischargeth I grant the Gonscience and setteth it at full liberty For the publick approbation given by the Body of this whole Church unto those things which are established doth make it but probable that they are good And therefore unto a necessary proofe that they are not good it must give place But if the skilfullest amongst you can shew that all the Books ye have hitherto written be able to afford any one argument of this nature let the instance be given As for probabilities What thing was there ever set down so agreeable with sound reason but some probable shew against it might be made It is meet that when publickly things are received and have taken place General Obedience thereunto should cease to be exacted in case this or that private person led with some probable conceit should make open Protostation Peter or John disallow them and pronounce them naught In which case your answer will be That concerning the Laws of our Church they are not onely condemned in the opinion of a private man but of thousands year and even of those amongst which divers are in publick charge and authority At though when publick consent of the whole hath established any thing every mans judgment being thereunto compared were not private howsoever his calling be to some kinde of publick charge So that of Peace and Quietness there is not any way possible unless the probable voice of every intire Society or Body Politick over-rule all private of like nature in the same Body Which thing effectually proveth That God being Author of Peace and not of Confusion in the Church must needs be Author of those mens peaceable resolutions who concerning these things have determined with themselves to think and do as the Church they are of decreeth till they see necessary cause enforcing them to the contrary 7. Nor is mine own intent any other in these several Books of discourse then to make it appear unto you that for the Ecclesiastical Laws of this Land we are led by great reason to observe them and ye by no necessity bound to impugne them It is no part of my secret meaning to draw you hereby into hatred or to set upon the face of this cause any fairer gloss then the naked truth doth afford but my whole endeavor is to resolve the Conscience and to shew as near as I can what in this Controversie the Heart is to think if it will follow the light of sound and sincere judgment without either cloud of prejudice or mist of passionate affection Wherefore seeing that Laws and Ordinances in particular whether such as we observe or such as your selves would have established when the minde doth sift and examine them it must needs have often recourse to a number of doubts and questions about the nature kindes and qualities of Laws in general whereof unless it be throughly informed there will appear no certainty to stay our perswasion upon I have for that cause set down in the first place an Introduction on both sides needful to be considered declaring therein what Law is how different kindes of Laws there are and what force they are of according unto each kinde This done because ye suppose the Laws for which ye strive are found in Scripture but those not against which we strive And upon this surmise are drawn to hold it as the very main Pillar of your whole cause That Scripture ought to be the onely rule of all our actions and consequently that the Church Orders which we observe being not commanded in Scripture are offensive and displeasant unto God I have spent the second Book in sifting of this point which standeth with you for the first and chiefest principle whereon ye build Whereunto the next in degree is That as God will have always a Church upon Earth while the World doth continue and that Church stand in need of Government of which Government it behoveth himself to be both the Author and Teacher So it cannot stand with duty That man should ever presume in any wise to change and alter the same and therefore That in Scripture there must of necessity be found some particular Form of Ecclesiastical Polity the Laws whereof admit not any kinde of alteration The first three Books being thus ended the fourth proceedeth from the general Grounds and Foundations of your cause unto your general Accusations against us as having in the orders of our Church for so you pretend Corrupted the right Form of Church Polity with manifold Popish Rites and Ceremonies which certain Reformed Churches have banished from amongst them and have thereby given us such example as you think we ought to follow This your Assertion hath herein drawn us to make search whether these be just Exceptions against the Customs of our Church when ye plead that they are the same which the Church of Rome hath or that they are not the same which some other Reformed Churches have devised Of those four Books which remain and are bestowed about the Specialties of that Cause which little in Controversie the first examineth the causes by you alledged wherefore the publick duties of Christian Religion as our Prayers our Sacraments and the rest should not be ordered in such sort as with us they are nor that power whereby the persons of men are consecrated unto the Ministry be disposed of in such manner as the Laws of this Church do allow The second and third are concerning the power of Iurisdiction the one Whether Laymen such as your Governing Elders are ought in all Congregations for ever to be invested with that power The other Whether Bishops may have that power over other Pastors and therewithal that honor which with us they have And because besides the Power of Order which all consecrated persons have and the Power of Iurisdiction which neither they all nor they onely have There is a third power a Power of Ecclesiastical Dominion communicable as we think unto persons not Ecclesiastical and most fit to be restrained unto the Prince our Soveraign Commander over the whole Body Politick The eighth Book we have allotted unto this Question and have sifted therein your Objections against those preeminences Royal which thereunto appertain Thus have I laid before you the Brief of these my Travels and presented under your view the Limbs of that Cause litigious between us the whole intire Body whereof being thus compact it shall be no troublesome thing for any man to finde each particular Controversies resting place
greatness and in regard thereof to fear him By being glorified it is not meant that he doth receive any augmentation of glory at our hands but his Name we glorifie when we testifie our acknowledgement of his glory Which albeit we most effectually do by the vertue of obedience nevertheless it may be perhaps a Question Whether S. Paul did mean that we sin as oft as ever we go about any thing without an express intent and purpose to obey God therein He saith of himself I do in all things please all men seeking not mine own commodity but rather the good of many that they may be saved Shall it hereupon be thought that St. Paul did not move either hand or foot but with express intent even thereby to further the common salvation of men We move we sleep we take the cup at the hand of our friend a number of things we oftentimes do only to satisfie some natural desire without present express and actual reference unto any Commandment of God Unto his glory even these things are done which we naturally perform and not only that which morally and spiritually we do For by every effect proceeding from the most concealed instincts of Nature his power is made manifest But it doth not therefore follow that of necessity we shall sin unless we expresly intend this in every such particular But be it a thing which requireth no more then onely our general presupposed willingness to please God in all things or be it a matter wherein we cannot so glorifie the Name of God as we should without an actual intent to do him in that particular some special obedience yet for any thing there is in this sentence alledged to the contrary God may be glorified by obedience and obeyed by performance of his will and his will be performed with an actual intelligent desire to fulfil that Law which maketh known what his will is although no special clause or sentence of Scripture be in every such action set before mens eyes to warrant it For Scripture is not the onely Law whereby God hath opened his will touching all things that may be done but there are other kinde of Laws which notifie the will of God as in the former Book hath been proved at large nor is there any Law of God whereunto he doth not account our obedience his glory Do therefore all things unto the glory of God saith the Apostle be inoffensive both to the Iews and Grecians and the Church of God even as I please all then in all things not seeking mine own commodity but manies that they may be saved In the least thing done disobediently towards God or offensively against the good of men whose benefit we ought to seek for as for our own we plainly shew that we do not acknowledge God to be such as indeed he is and consequently that we glorifie him not This the blessed Apostle teacheth but doth any Apostle teach that we cannot glorifie God otherwise then onely in doing what we finde that God in Scripture commandeth us to do The Churches dispersed amongst the Heathen in the East part of the World are by the Apostle S. Peter exhorted to have their conversation honest amongst the Gentiles that they which spake evil of them as of evil doers might by the good works which they should see glorifie God in the day of visitation As long as that which Christians did was good and no way subject unto just reproof their vertuous conversation was a mean to work the Heathens conversion unto Christ. Seeing therefore this had been a thing altogether impossible but that Infidels themselves did discents in matters of life and conversation when believers did well and when otherwise when they glorified their Heavenly Father and when not It followeth that somethings wherein God is glorified may be some other way known then onely but the sacred Scripture of which Scripture the Gentiles being utterly ignorant did notwithstanding judge rightly of the quality of Christian mens actions Most certain it is that nothing but onely sin doth dishonoar God So that to glorifie him in all things is to do nothing whereby the Name of God may be blasphemed nothing whereby the salvation of Jew or Grecian or any in the Church of Christ may be let or hindred nothing whereby his Law is transgrest But the Question is Whether only Scripture do shew whatsoever God is glorified in 3. And though meats and drinks be said to be sanctified by the Word of God and by Prayer yet neither is this a Reason sufficient to prove That by Scripture we must of necessity be directed in every light and common thing which is incident unto any part of Mans life Onely it sheweth that unto us the Word that is to say the Gospel of Christ having not delivered any such difference of things clean and unclean as the Law of Moses did unto the Jews there is no cause but that we may use indifferently all things as long as we do not like Swine take the benefit of them without a thankful acknowledgement of his liberality and goodness by whose Providence they are enjoyed And therefore the Apostle gave warning beforeshifhed to that need of such as should enjoyed to abstain from meats which God hath streased to be received will thanksgiving by them which believe and know the Truth For every creature of God in good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving because it sanctified by the Word of God and Prayer The Gospel by not malling many things unclean as the Law did hath sanctified those things generally to asked which particularly each man unto himself must sanctifie by a reverend and holy the â—â— which will hardly be down so far as to serve their purpose who have imagined the World in such sort to sanctifie all things that neither food saw he tastest nor Principle on nor in the World any thing done but this deed must needs be sin in them which do not first know it appointed unto them by Scripture before they do it 4. But to come unto that which of all other things in Scripture is most stood upon that place of S. Paul they say is of all other most clear where speaking of those things which are called indifferent in the end he concludeth That whatsoever is not of faith of sin his Faith is not But th respect of the Word of God therefore whatsoever is not done by the Word of God is sin Whereunto the answer that albest the name of Faith being properly and strictly taken it must needs have reference unto some uttered word as the Object of belief nevertheless sith the ground of credit is the credibility of things credited and things are made credible either by the known condition and quality of the utterer or by the manifest likelihood of Truth which they have in themselves hereupon it riseth that whatsoever we are perswaded of the same we are generally said to
three Synods consisting of many Elderships Deacons Women Church-servants or Widows free consent of the people unto actions of greatest moment after they be by Churches or Synods orderly resolved All this Form of Polity if yet we may term that a form of building when men have laid a few Rafters together and those not all of the foundest neither but howsoever all this Form they conclude is prescribed in such sort that to adde to it any thing as of like importance for so I think they mean or to abrogate of it any thing at all is unlawful In which resolution if they will firmly and constantly persist I see not but that concerning the points which hitherto have been disputed of they must agree that they have molested the Church with needless opposition and henceforward as we said before betake themselves wholly unto the tryal of particulars whether every of those things which they esteem as principal be either so esteemed of or at all established for perpetuity in holy Scripture and whether any particular thing in our Church Polity be received other then the Scripture alloweth of either in greater things or in smaller The Matters wherein Church Polity is conversant are the Publick Religious Duties of the Church as the Administration of the Word and Sacraments Prayers Spiritual Censures and the like To these the Church standeth always bound Laws of Polity are Laws which appoint in what manner these duties shall be performed In performance whereof because all that are of the Church cannot joyntly and equally work the first thing in Polity required is A difference of Persons in the Church without which difference those Functions cannot in orderly sort be executed Hereupon we hold That Gods Clergy are a State which hath been and will be as long as there is a Church upon Earth necessarily by the plain Word of God himself a State whereunto the rest of Gods people must be subject as touching things that appertain to their Souls health For where Polity is it cannot but appoint some to be Leaders of others and some to be led by others If the blinde lead the blinde they both perish It is with the Clergy if their persons be respected even as it is with other men their quality many times far beneath that which the dignity of their place requireth Howbeit according to the Order of Polity they being The lights of the World others though better and wiser must that way be subject unto them Again for as much as where the Clergy are any great multitude order doth necessarily require that by degrees they be distinguished we hold there have ever been and ever ought to be in such case at leastwise two sorts of Ecclesiastical Persons the one subordinate unto the other as to the Apostles in the beginning and to the Bishops always since we finde plainly both in Scripture and in all Ecclesiastical Records other Ministers of the Word and Sacraments have been Moreover it cannot enter into any Mans conceit to think it lawful that every man which listeth should take upon him charge in the Church and therefore a solemn admittance is of such necessity that without it there can be no Church Polity A number of Particularities there are which make for the more convenient Being of these Principal and Perpetual parts in Ecclesiastical Polity but yet are not of such constant use and necessity in Gods Church Of this kinde are times and places appointed for the Exercise of Religion Specialties belonging to the Publick Solemnity of the Word the Sacraments and Prayer the Enlargement or Abridgement of Functions Ministerial depending upon those two Principals beforementioned To conclude even whatsoever doth by way of Formality and Circumstance concern any Publick Action of the Church Now although that which the Scripture hath of things in the former kinde be for ever permanent yet in the latter both much of that which the Scripture teacheth is not always needful and much the Church of God shall always need which the Scripture teacheth not So as the Form of Polity by them set down for perpetuity is three ways faulty Faulty in omitting some things which in Scripture are of that nature as namely the difference that ought to be of Pastors when they grow to any great multitude Faulty in requiring Doctors Deacons Widows and such like as things of perpetual necessity by the Law of God which in Truth are nothing less Faulty also in urging some things by Scripture Immutable as their Lay-Elders which the Scripture neither maketh Immutable nor at all teacheth for any thing either we can as yet finde or they have hitherto been able to prove But hereof more in the Books that follow As for those marvellous Discourses whereby they adventure to argue That God must needs have done the thing which they imagine was to be done I must confess I have often wondred at their exceeding boldness herein When the question is Whether God have delivered in Scripture as they affirm he hath a compleat particular Immutable Form of Church Polity why take they that other both presumptuous and superfluous labor to prove he should have done it there being no way in this case to prove the Deed of God saving onely by producing that evidence wherein he hath done it But if there be no such thing apparent upon Record they do as if one should demand a Legacy by force and vertue of some Written Testament wherein there being no such thing specified he pleadeth That there it must needs be and bringeth arguments from the love or good will which always the Testator bore him imagining that these or the like proofs will convict a Testament to have that in it which other men can no where by reading finde In matters which concern the Actions of God the most dutiful way on our part is to search what God hath done and with meekness to admire that rather then to dispute what he in congruity of Reason ought to do The ways which he hath whereby to do all things for the greatest good of his Church are more in number then we can search other in Nature then that we should presume to determine which of many should be the fittest for him to chuse till such time as we see he hath chosen of many some one which one we then may boldly conclude to be the fittest because he hath taken it before the rest When we do otherwise surely we exceed our bounds who and where weare we forget And therefore needful it is that our Pride in such cases be contrould and our Disputes beaten back with those Demands of the blessed Apostle How unsearchable are his Iudgments and his Ways past finding out Who hath known the Minde of the Lord or who was his Counsellor OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK IV. Concerning their Third Assertion That our Form of Church-Politie is corrupted with Popish Orders Rites and Ceremonies banished out of certain Reformed Churches whose example
in no such consideration to be understood as we have mentioned if it were so that men are condemned as well of the one as of the other only for using the Ceremonies of a Religion contrary unto their own and that this cause is such as ought to prevail no less with us than with them shall it not follow that seeing there is still between our Religion and Paganism the self-same contrariety therefore we are still no less rebukeable if we now deck our Houses with Boughs or send New-years gifts unto our Friends or seast on those days which the Gentiles then did or sit after Prayer as they were accustomed For so they infer upon the premises that as great difference as commodiously may be there should be in all outward Ceremonies between the People of God and them which are not his People Again they teach as hath been declared that there is not as great a difference as may be between them except the one do avoid whatsoever Rites and Ceremonies uncommanded of God the other doth embrace So that generally they teach that the very difference of Spiritual condition it self between the Servants of Christ and others requireth such difference in Ceremonies between them although the one be never so far disjoyned in time or place from the other But in case the People of God and Belial do chance to be Neighbours then as the danger of infection is greater so the same difference they say is thereby made more necessary In this respect as the Jews were severed from the Heathen so most especially from the Heathen nearest them And in the same respect we which ought to differ howsoever from the Church of Rome are now they say by reason of our nearness more bound to differ from them in Ceremonies then from Turks A strange kind of speech unto Christianeus and such as I hope they themselves do acknowledge unadvisedly uttered We are not so much to fear infection from Turks as from Papists What of that we must remember that by conforming rather our selves in that respect to Turks we should be spreaders of a worse infection into others then any we are likely to draw from Papists by our conformity with them in Ceremonies If they did â—ate as Turks do the Christian or as Canaanites did of old the Jewish Religion even in gross the circumstance of local nearness in them unto us might haply inforce in us a duty of greater separation from them then from those other mentioned But forasmuch as Papists are so much in Christ nearer unto us then Turks is there any reasonable man now you but will judge it meeter that our Ceremonies of Christian Religion should be Popish then Turkish or Heathenish Especially considering that we were not brought to dwell amongst them as Israel in Canaan having not been of them For even a very part of them we were And when God did by his good Spirit put it into our hearts first to reform our selves whence grew our separation and then by all good means to seek also their Reformation had we not onely cut off their corruptions but also estranged our selves from them in things indifferent who seeth not how greatly prejudicial this might have been to so good a cause and what occasion it had given them to think to their greater obduration in evil that through a froward or wanton desire of Innovation we did unconstrainedly those things for which conscience was pretended Howsoever the case doth stand as Iuda had been rather to choose conformity in things indifferent with Israel when they were neerest opposites then with the farthest removed Pagans So we in like cases much rather with Papists than with Turks I might add further for a more full and complete Answer so much concerning the large odds between the case of the eldest Churches inregard of those Heathens and ours in respect of the Church of Rome that very cavillation it self should be satisfied and have no shift to fly unto 8. But that no one thing may detain us over-long I return to their Reasons against our conformity with that Church That extreme dissimilitude which they urge upon us is now commended as our best and safest policy for establishment of sound Religion The ground of which politick Position is That Evils must be cured by their contraries and therefore the cure of the Church infected with the poyson of Antichristianity must be done by that which is thereunto as contrary as may be A medled estate of the Orders of the Gospel and the Ceremonies of Popery is not the best way to banish Popery We are contrariwise of opinion that he which will perfectly recover a sick and restore a diseased body unto health must not endeavour so much to bring it to a state of simple contrariety as of fit proportion in contâ—ariety unto those evils which are to be cured He that will take away extreme heat by setting the body in extremity of cold shall undoubtedly remove the disease but together with it the diseased too The first thing therefore in skilful cures is the knowledge of the part affected the next is of the evil which doth affect it the last is not onely of the kind but also of the measure of contrary things whereby to remove it They which measure Religion by dislike of the Church of Rome think every man so much the more sound by how much he can make the corruptions thereof to seem more large And therefore some there are namely the Arrians in reformed Churches of Poland which imagine the Canker to have eaten so far into the very Bones and Marrow of the Church of Rome as if it had not so much as a sound belief no not concerning God himself but that the very belief of the Trinity were a part of Antichristian corruption and that the wonderful providence of God did bring to pass that the Bishop of the See of Rome should be famous for his tripple Crown a sensible mark whereby the world might know him to be that Mystical Beast spoken of in the Revelation to be that great and notorious Antichrist in no one respect so much as in this that he maintaineth the Doctrine of the Trinity Wisdom therefore and skill is requisite to know what parts are sound in that Church and what corrupted Neither is it to all men apparent which complain of unsound parts with what kind of unsoundness every such part is possessed They can say that in Doctrine in Discipline in Prayers in Sacraments the Church of Rome hath as it hath indeed very foul and gross corruptions the nature whereof notwithstanding because they have not for the most part exact skill and knowledge to discern they think that amiss many times which is not and the salve of Reformation they mightily call for but where and what the sores are which need it as they wot full little so they think it not greatly material to search such mens contentment must be wrought by stratagem the
you lay aside by himself and reserve according to that which God hath blessed him with that when I come collections be not then to make and that when I am come whom you shall chuse them I may forthwith send away by Letters to carry your beneficence unto Jerusalem Out of which words to conclude the duty of Uniformity throughout all Churches in all manner of indifferent Ceremonies will be very hard and therefore best to give it over But perhaps they are by so much the more loth to forsake this Argument for that it hath though nothing else yet the name of Scripture to give it some kinde of countenance more then the pretext of Livery-coats affordeth them For neither is it any mans duty to cloath all his children or all his servants with one weed nor theirs to cloath themselves so if it were left to their own judgments as these Ceremonies are left of God to the judgment of the Church And seeing Churches are rather in this case like divers Families then like divers servants of one Family because every Church the state whereof is independent upon any other hath authority to appoint orders for it self in things indifferent therefore of the two we may rather infer That as one Family is not abridged of liberty to be cloathed in Friers Gray for that another doth wear Clay colour so neither are all Churches bound to the self-same indifferent Ceremonies which it liketh sundry to use As for that Canon in the Council of Nice let them but read it and weigh it well The ancient use of the Church throughout all Christendom was for fifty days after Easter which fifty days were called Pentecost though most commonly the last day of them which is Whitsunday he so called in like sort on all Sundays throughout the whole year their manner was to stand at Prayer Whereupon their meetings unto that purpose on those days had the name of Stations given them Of which Custom Tertullian speaketh in this wise It is not with us thought sit either to fast on the Lords day or to pray kneeling The same immunity from Fasting and Kneeling we keep all the time which is between the Feasts of Easter and Pentecost This being therefore an order generally received in the Church when some began to be singular and different from all others and that in a Ceremony which was then judged very convenient for the whole Church even by the whole those few excepted which break out of the common Pale the Council of Nice thought good to enclose them again with the rest by a Law made in this sort Because there are certain which will needs kneel at the time of Prayer on the Lords day and in the fifty days after Easter the holy Synod judging it meet that a convenient custom be observed throughout all Churches hath decreed That Standing we make our Prayers to the Lord. Whereby it plainly appeareth that in things indifferent what the whole Church doth think convenient for the whole the same if any part do wilfully violate it may be reformed and inraised again by that general authority whereunto each particular is subject and that the Spirit of singularity in a few ought to give place unto publick judgment this doth clearly enough appear but not that all Christian Churches are bound in every indifferent Ceremony to be uniform because where the whole Church hath not tyed the parts unto one and the same thing they being therein left each to their own choice may either do as others do or else otherwise without any breach of duty at all Concerning those indifferent things wherein it hath been heretofore thought good that all Christian Churches should be uniform the way which they now conceive to bring this to pass was then never thought on For till now it hath been judged that seeing the Law of God doth not prescribe all particular Ceremonies which the Church of Christ may use and in so great variety of them as may be found out it is not possible That the Law of Nature and Reason should direct all Churches unto the same things each deliberating by it self what is most convenient The way to establish the same things indifferent throughout them all must needs be the judgment of some Judicial authority drawn into one onely sentence which may be a rule for every particular to follow And because such authority over all Churches is too much to be granted unto any one mortal man there yet remaineth that which hath been always followed as the best the safest the most sincere and reasonable way namely the Verdict of the whole Church orderly taken and set down in the Assembly of some General Council But to maintain That all Christian Churches ought for Unities sake to be uniform in all Ceremonies and then to teach that the way of bringing this to pass must be by mutual imitation so that where we have better Ceremonies then others they shall be bound to follow us and we them where theirs are better How should we think it agreeable and consonant unto reason For sith in things of this nature there is such variety of particular inducements whereby one Church may be led to think that better which another Church led by other inducements judgeth to be worse For example the East Church did think it better to keep Easter day after the manner of the Jews the West Church better to do otherwise the Greek Church judgeth it worse to use Unleavened Bread in the Eucharist the Latine Church leavened One Church esteemeth it not so good to receive the Eucharist sitting as standing another Church not so good standing as sitting there being on the one side probable Motives as well as on the other unless they add somewhat else to define more certainly what Ceremonies shall stand for best in such sort That all Churches in the World shall know them to be the best and so know them that there may not remain any question about this point we are not a whit the nearer for that they have hitherto said They themselves although resolved in their own judgments what Ceremonies are best foreseeing that such as they are addicted unto be not all so clearly and so incomparably best but others there are or may be at leastwise when all things are well considered as good knew not which way smoothly to rid their hands of this matter without providing some more certain rule to be followed for establishment of Uniformity in Ceremonies when there are divers kindes of equal goodness And therefore in this case they say That the latter Churches and the fewer should conform themselves unto the elder and the moe Hereupon they conclude that for as much as all the Reformed Churches so far as they know which are of our Confession in Doctrine have agreed already in the Abrogation of divers things which we retain Our Church ought either to shew that they have done evil or else she is found to be in fault
that over-corrupt Fountain from which they come In our speech of most holy things our most frail affections many times are bewrayed Wherefore when we read or recite the Scripture we then deliver to the People properly the Word of God As for our Sermons be they never so sound and perfect his Word they are not as the Sermons of the Prophets were no they are but ambiguously termed his Word because his Word is commonly the Subject whereof they treat and must be the Rule whereby they are framed Notwithstanding by these and the like shifts they derive unto Sermons alone whatsoever is generally spoken concerning the Word Again what seemeth to have been uttered concerning Sermons and their efficacy or necessity in regard of Divine matter and must consequently be verified in sundry other kindes of teaching if the Matter be the same in all their use is to fasten every such Speech unto that one only manner of teaching which is by Sermons that still Sermons may be all in all Thus because Solomon declareth that the People decay or perish for want of Knowledge where no Prophecying at all is they gather that the hope of Life and Salvation is cut off where Preachers are not which prophecy by Sermons how many soever they be in number that read daily the Word of God and deliver though in other sort the self-same matter which Sermons do The people which have no way to come to the knowledge of God no prophecying no teaching perish But that they should of necessity perish where any one way of knowledge lacketh is more then the words of Solomon import Another usual point of their Art in this present question is to make very large and plentiful Discourses how Christ is by Sermons lifted up higher and made more apparent to the eye of Faith how the savour of the Word is more sweet being brayed and more able to nourish being divided by Preaching then by only reading proposed how Sermons are the Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven and do open the Scriptures which being but read remain in comparison still clasped how God giveth richer increase of grace to the Ground that is planted and watered by Preaching than by bare and simple Reading Out of which premises declaring how attainment unto life is easier where Sermons are they conclude an impossibility thereof where Sermons are not Alcidimas the Sophister hath many arguments to prove that voluntary and extemporal far excelleth premeditated speech The like whereunto and in part the same are brought by them who commend Sermons as having which all men I think will acknowledge sundry peculiar and proper vertues such as no other way of Teaching besides hath Aptness to follow particular occasions presently growing to put life into words by countenance voyce and gesture to prevail mightily in the sudden affections of men this Sermons may challenge Wherein notwithstanding so eminent properties whereof Lessons are haply destitute yet Lessons being free from some inconveniences whereunto Sermons are more subject they may in this respect no less take then in other they must give the hand which betokeneth preeminence For there is nothing which is not some way excell'd even by that which it doth excel Sermons therefore and Lessons may each excell other in some respects without any prejudice unto either as touching that vital force which they both have in the work of our Salvation To which effect when we have endeavoured as much as in us doth lye to finde out the strongest causes wherefore they should imagine that Reading is itself so unavailable the most we can learn at their hands is that Sermons are the Ordinance of God the Scriptures dark and the labour of Reading easie First therefore as we know that God doth aide with his grace and by his special providence evermore bless with happy success those things which himself appointeth so his Church we perswade our selves he hath not in such sort given over to a reprobate sense that whatsoever it deviseth for the good of the Souls of men the same he doth still accurse and make frustrate Or if he always did defeat the Ordinances of his Church is not reading the Ordinance of God Wherefore then should we think that the force of his secret grace is accustomed to bless the labour of dividing his Word according unto each man's private discretion in publick Sermons and to withdraw it self from concurring with the publick delivery thereof by such selected portions of Scriptures as the whole Church hath solemnly appointed to be read for the Peoples good either by ordinary course or otherwise according to the exigence of special occasions Reading saith Isidore is to the Hearers no small edifying To them whose delight and meditation is in the Law seeing that happiness and bliss belongeth it is not in us to deny them the benefit of heavenly Grace And I hope we may presume that a rare thing it is not in the Church of God even for that very Word which is read to be both presently their joy and afterwards their study that hear it S. Augustin speaking of devout men noteth how they daily frequented the Church how attentive ear they gave unto the Lessons and Chapters read how careful they were to remember the same and to muse thereupon by themselves St. Cyprian observeth that Reading was not without effect in the hearts of men Their joy and alacity was to him an argument that there is in this Ordinance a blessing such as ordinarily doth accompany the administration of the Word of Life It were much if there should be such a difference between the hearing of Sermons preached and of Lessons read in the Church that he which presenteth himself at the one and maketh his Prayer with the Prophet David Teach me O Lord the way of thy Statutes direct me in the path of thy commandments might have the ground of usual experience wherupon to build his hope of prevailing with God and obtaining the Grace he seeketh they contrariwise not so who crave the like assistance of his Spirit when they give ear to the reading of the other In this therefore Preaching and Reading are equal that both are approved as his Ordinances both assisted with his Grace And if his Grace do assist them both to the nourishment of faith already bred we cannot without some very manifest cause yielded imagin that in breeding or begetting faith his grace doth cleave to the one and utterly forsake the other Touching hardness which is the second pretended impediment as against Homilies being plain and popular instructions it is no bar so neither doth it infringe the efficacy no not of Scriptures although but read The force of reading how small soever they would have it must of necessity be granted sufficient to notifie that which is plain or easie to be understood And of things necessary to all mens salvation we have been hitherto accustomed
lost and that without all hope of recovery This is the true cause of odds between Sermons and other kindes of wholesome Instruction As for the difference which hath been hitherto so much defended on the contrary side making Sermons the only ordinary means unto Faith and eternal Life sith this hath neither evidence of Truth nor proof sufficient to give it warrant a cause of such quality may with fart better grace and conveniency aske that pardon which common humanity doth easily grant than claim in challenging manner that assent which is as unwilling when reason guideth it to be yielded where it is not as with-held where it is apparently due All which notwithstanding as we could greatly wish that the rigour of this their opinion were allayed and mittigated so because we hold it the part of religious ingenuity to honour vertue in whomsoever therefore it is our most hearty desire and shall be always our Prayer unto Almighty God that in the self-same fervent zeal wherewith they seem to effect the good of the Souls of men and to thirst after nothing more than that all men might by all means be directed in the way of life both they and we may constantly persist to the Worlds end For in this we are not their Adversaries though they in the other hitherto have been ours 23. Between the Throne of God in Heaven and his Church upon Earth here militant if it be so that Angels have their continual intercourse where should we finde the same more verified than in those two ghostly Exercises the one Doctrine the other Prayer For what is the Assembling of the Church to learn but the receiving of Angels descended from above What to pray but the sending of Angels upwards His Heavenly Inspirations and our holy Desires are as so many Angels of intercourse and commerce between God and us As Teaching bringeth us to know that God is our supream Truth so Prayer testifieth that we acknowledge him our soveraign Good Besides sith on God as the most High all inferiour Causes in the World are dependant and the higher any Cause is the more it coveteth to impart vertue unto things beneath it how should any kinde of service we do or can do finde greater acceptance than Prayer which sheweth our concurrence with him in desiring that wherewith his very Nature doth most delight Is not the name of Prayer usual to signifie even all the service that ever we do unto God And that for no other cause as I suppose but to shew that there is in Religion no acceptable Duty which devout Invocation of the name of God doth not either presuppose or inferr Prayers are those Calves of Mens lips those most gracious and sweet odours those rich Presents and Gifts which being carried up into Heaven do best restifie our dutiful affection and are for the purchasing of all favour at the hands of God the most undoubted means we can use On others what more easily and yet what more fruitfully bestowed than our Prayers If we give Counsel they are the simpler onely that need it if Almes the poorer only are relieved but by Prayer we do good to all And whereas every other Duty besides is but to shew it self as time and opportunity require for this all times are convenient when we are not able to do any other things for mens behoof when through maliciousness or unkindness they vouchsafe not to accept any other good at our hands Prayer is that which we always have in our power to bestow and they never in theirs to refuse Wherefore God fotbid saith Samuel speaking unto a most unthankful People a People weary of the benefit of his most vertuous Government over them God forbid that I should sin against the Lord and cease to pray for you It is the first thing wherewith a righteous life beginneth and the last wherewith it doth end The knowledge is small which we have on Earth concerning things that are done in Heaven Notwithstanding thus much we know even of Saints in Heaven that they pray And therefore Prayer being a work common to the Church as well Triumphant as Militant a work common unto Men with Angels what should we think but that so much of our Lives is celestial and divine as we spend in the exercise of Prayer For which cause we see that the most comfortable Visitations which God hath sent men from above have taken especially the times of Prayer as their most natural opportunities 24. This holy and religious duty of Service towards God concerneth us one way in that we are men and another way in that we are joined as parts to that visible Mystical Body which is his Church As men we are at our own choice both for time and place and form according to the exigence of our own occasions in private But the service which we do as Members of a Publick Body is publick and for that cause must needs be accompted by so much worthier than the other as a whole society of such condition exceedeth the worth of any one In which consideration unto Christian Assemblies there are most special Promises made St. Paul though likely to prevail with God as much as any one did notwithstanding think it much more both for God's glory and his own good if Prayers might be made and thanks yielded in his behalf by a number of men The Prince and People of Niniveh assembling themselves as a main Army of Supplicants it was not in the power of God to withstand them I speak no otherwise concerning the force of Publick Prayer in the Church of God than before me Tertullian hath done We come by Troops to the Place of Assembly that being banded as it were together we may be Sapplicants enough to besiege God with our Prayers These Forces are unto him acceptable When we publickly make our Prayers it cannot be but that we do it with much more comfort than in private for that the things we aske publickly are approved as needful and good in the Judgement of all we hear them sought for and desired with common consent Again thus much help and furtherance is more yielded in that if so be our zeal and devotion to God-ward be slack the alacrity and fervour of others serveth as a present spurt For even Prayer it self saith Saint Basil when it hath not the consort of many voyces to strengthen it is not it self Finally the good which we do by Publick Prayer is more than in private can be done for that besides the benefit which is here is no less procured to our selves the whole Church is much bettered by our good example and consequently whereas secret neglect of our duty in this kinde is but only our own hurt one man's contempt of the Common Prayer of the Church of God may be and oftentimes is most hurtful unto many In which considerations the Prophet David so often voweth
circumspect Those good and learned men which gave the first direction to this course had reason to wish that their own proceedings at home might be favoured abroad also and that the good affection of such as inclined towards them might be kept alive But if themselves had gone under those sails which they require to be hoised up if they had been themselves to execute their own Theory in this Church I doubt not but castly they would have seen being nearer at hand that the way was not good which they took of advising men first to wear the apparel that thereby they might be free to continue their preaching and then of requiring them so to preach as they might be sure they could not continue except they imagine that Laws which permit them not to do as they would will endure them to speak as they list even against that which themselves do by constraint of Laws they would have easily seen that our People being accustomed to think evermore that thing evil which is publickly under any pretence reproved and the men themselves worse which reprove it and use it too it should be to little purpose for them to salve the wound by making protestations in disgrace of their own actions with plain acknowledgement that they are scandalous or by using fair intreaty with the weak Brethren they would easily have seen how with us it cannot be endured to hear a man openly profess that he putteth fire to his Neighbors house but yet so halloweth the same with Prayer that he hopeth it shall not burn It had been therefore perhaps safer and better for ours to have observed S. Basils advice both in this and in all things of like nature Let him which approveth not his Governours Ordinances either plainly but privately always shew his dislike of he have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strong and invincible reason against them according to the true will and meaning of Scripture or else let him quietly with silence do what is enjoyned Obedience with profest unwillingness to obey is no better than manifest disobedience 30. Having thus disputed whether the Surplice be a fit Garment to be used in the service of God the next Question whereinto we are drawn is Whether it be a thing allowable or no that the Minister should say Service in the Chancel or ruin his face at any time from the People or before Service ended remove from the place where it was begun By them which trouble us with these doubts we would more willingly be resolved of a greater doubt Whether it be not a kinde of taking God's Name in vain to debase Religion with such frivolous disputes a sin to bestow time and labour about them Things of so mean regard and quality although necessary to be ordered are notwithstanding very unsavory when they come to be disputed of because Disputation presupposeth some difficulty in the matter which is argued whereas in things of this nature they must be either very simple or very froward who need to be taught by disputation what is meet When we make profession of our Faith we stand when we acknowledge our sins or seek unto God for favour we fall down because the gesture of constancy becometh us best in the one in the other the behavior of humility Some part of our Liturgy consist in the reading of the word of God and the proclaiming of his Law that the people may thereby learn what their duties are towards him some consist in words of praise and thanksgiving whereby we acknowledge unto God what his blessings are towards us some are such as albeit they serve to singular good purpose even when there is no Communion administred nevertheless being devised at the first for that purpose are at the Table of the Lord for that cause also commonly read some are uttered as from the people some as with them unto God some as from God unto them all as before his sight whom we fear and whose presence to offend with any the least unseemliness we would be surely as loath as they who most reprehend or deride that we do Now because the Gospels which are weekly read do all historically declare something which our Lord Jesus Christ himself either spake did or suffered in his own Person it hath been the custom of Christian men then especially in token of the greater reverence to stand to utter certain words of acclamation and at the name of Jesus to bow Which harmless Ceremonies as there is no man constrained to use so we know no reason wherefore any man should yet imagine it an unsufferable evil It sheweth a reverend regard to the Son of God above other Messengers although speaking as from God also And against Infidels Jews Arians who derogate from the honor of Jesus Christ such Ceremonies are most profitable As for any erroneous estimation advancing the Son above the Father and the holy Ghost seeing that the truth of his equality with them is a mystery so hard for the wits of mortal men to rise unto of all Heresies that which may give him superiority above them is least to befeared But to let go this as a matter scarce worth the speaking of whereas if fault be in these things any where justly found Law hath referred the whole disposition and redress thereof to the Ordinary of the place they which elsewhere complain that disgrace and injury is offered even to the meanest Parish Minister when the Magistrate appointeth him what to wear and leaveth not so small a matter as that to his own discretion being presumed a man discreet and trusted with the care of the Peoples Souls do think the gravest Prelates in the Land no competent Judges to discern and appoint where it is fit for the Minister to stand or which way convenient to look Praying From their Ordinary therefore they appeal to themselves finding great fault that we neither reform the thing against the which they have so long since given sentence nor yet make answer unto what they bring which is that Saint Luke declaring how Peter stood up in the middest of the Disciples did thereby deliver an unchangeable rule that whatsoever is done in the Church ought to be done in the midst of the Church and therefore not Baptism to be administred in one place Marriage solemnized in another the Supper of the Lord received in a third in a fourth Sermons in a fifth Prayers to be made that the custom which we use is Levitical absurd and such as hindreth the understanding of the People that if it be meet for the Minister at some time to look towards the People if the body of the Church be a fit place for some part of Divine Service it must needs follow that whensoever his face is turned any other way or any thing done any other where it hath absurdity All these reasons they say have been brought and were hitherto never answered besides a number of
so many Prayers and Psalms read day by day as do equal in a manner the length of ours and yet in that respect was never thought to deserve blame is it now an offence that the like measure of time is bestowed in the like manner Peradventure the Church had not now the leisure which it had then or else those things whereupon so much time was then well spent have sithence that lost their dignity and worth If the reading of the Law the Prophets and Psalms be a part of the Service of God as needful under Christ as before and the adding of the New Testament as profitable as the ordaining of the Old to be read if therewith instead of Jewish Prayers it be also for the good of the Church to annex that variety which the Apostle doth commend seeing that the time which we spend is no more than the orderly performance of these things necessarily required why are we thought to exceed in length Words be they never so few are too many when they benefit not the Hearer But he which speaketh no more than edifieth is undeservedly reprehended for much speaking That as the Devil under the colour of long Prayer drave Preaching out of the Church heretofore so we in appointing so long Prayers and Readings whereby the less can be spent in Preaching maintain an unpreaching Ministry is neither advisedly nor truly spoken They reprove long Prayer and yet acknowledge it to be in it self a thing commendable For so it must needs be if the Devil have used it as a colour to hide his malicious practises When Malice would work that which is evil and in working avoid the suspition of any evil intent the colour wherewith it overcasteth it self is always a fair and plausible pretence of seeking to further that which is good So that if we both retain that good which Saran hath pretended to seek and avoid the evil which his purpose was to effect have we not better prevented his malice than if as he hath under colour of long Prayer driven Preaching out of the Church so we should take the quarrel of Sermons in hand and revenge their Cause by requital thrusting Prayer in a manner out of doors under colour of long Preaching In case our Prayers being made at their full length did necessarily inforce Sermons to be the shorter yet neither were this to uphold and maintain an unpreaching Ministery unless we will say that those antient Fathers Chrysostom Augustine Leo and the rest whose Homilies in that consideration were shorter for the most part than our Sermons are did then not preach when their Speeches were not long The necessity of shortness causeth men to cut off impertinent Discourses and to comprize much matter in few words But neither did it maintain inabilitie not at all prevent opportunitie of Preaching as long as a competent time is granted for that purpose An hour and an half is they say in reformed Churches ordinarily thought reasonable for their whole Liturgy or Service Do we then continue as Ezra did in reading the Law from morning till mid-day or as the Apostle Saint Paul did in Prayer and Preaching till men through weariness be taken up dead at our feet The huge length whereof they make such complaint is but this that if our whole form of Prayer be read and besides an hour allowed for a Sermon we spend ordinarily in both more time than they do by half an hour Which half hour being such a matter as the age of some and infirmity of other some are not able to bear if we have any sense of the common imbecillity if any care to preserve mens wits from being broken with the very bent of so long attention if any love or desire to provide that things most holy be not with hazard of mens Souls abhorr'd and loathed this half-hours tediousness must be remedied and that only by cutting off the greatest part of our Common Prayer For no other remedie will serve to help so dangerous an Inconvenience 33. The Brethren in AEgypt saith St. Augustin Epist. 121. are reported to have many Prayers but every of them very short as if they were Darts thrown out with a kinde of sudden quickness lest that vigilant and erect attention of minde which in Prayer is very necessary should be wasted or dulled through continuance if their Prayers were few and long But that which St. Augustine doth allow they condemn Those Prayers whereunto devout mindes have added a piercing kinde of brevity as well in that respect which we have already mentioned as also thereby the better to express that quick and speedy expedition wherewith ardent affections the very wings of Prayer are delighted to present our suits in Heaven even sooner than our tongues can devise to utter them they in their mood of contradiction spare not openly to deride and that with so base terms as do very ill beseem men of their gravity Such speeches are scandalous they savour not of God in him that useth them and unto vertuously disposed mindes they are grievous corrosives Our case were miserable if that wherewith we most endeavour to please God were in his sight so vile and despicable as mens disdainful speech would make it 34. Again for as much as effectual Prayer is joyned with a vehement intention of the inferiour powers of the Soul which cannot therein long continue without pain it hath been therefore thought good so by turns to interpose still somewhat for the higher part of the minde the understanding to work upon that both being kept in continual exercise with variety neither might feel any great wearinesse and yet each be a spurre to other For Prayer kindleth our desire to behold God by speculation and the minde delighted with that contemplative sight of God taketh every where new inflammations to pray the riches of the Mysteries of Heavenly wisdom continually stirring up in us correspondent desires towards them So that he which prayeth in due sort is thereby made the more attentive to hear and he which heareth the more earnest to pray for the time which we bestow as well in the one as the other But for what cause soever we do it this intermingling of Lessons with Prayers is in their taste a thing as unsavoury and as unseemly in their sight as if the like should be done in Suits and Supplications before some mighty Prince of the World Our speech to worldly Superiours we frame in such sort as serveth best to inform and perswade the mindes of them who otherwise neither could nor would greatly regard our necessities Whereas because we know that God is indeed a King but a great King who understandeth all things before-hand which no other King besides doth a King which needeth not to be informed what we lack a King readier to grant than we to make our requests therefore in Prayer we do not so much respect what Precepts Art delivereth touching the method of perswasive utterance
infinite and eternal Being which Angels and glorified Saints do intuitively behold we on Earth apprehend principally by Faith in part also by that kinde of knowledge which groweth from experience of those effects the greatness whereof exceedeth the powers and abilities of all Creatures both in Heaven and Earth God is glorified when such his excellency above all things is with due admiration acknowledged Which dutiful acknowledgment of Gods excellency by occasion of special effects being the very proper subject and almost the onely matter purposely treated of in all Psalms if that joyful Hymn of Glory have any use in the Church of God whose Name we therewith extol and magnifie Can we place it more fitly then where now it serveth as a close or conclusion to Psalms Neither is the Form thereof newly or unnecessarily invented We must saith St. Basil as we have received even so Baptize and as we Baptize even so Believe and as we Believe even so give Glory Baptizing we use the Name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost Confessing the Christian Faith we declare our Belief in the Father and in the Son and in the Holy Ghost Ascribing Glory unto God we give it to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost It is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the token of a true and sound understanding for matter of Doctrine about the Trinity when in ministring Baptism and making Confession and giving Glory there is a conjunction of all three and no one of the three severed from the other two Against the Arians affirming the Father to be greater then the Son in honor excellency dignity majesty this form and manner of glorifying God was not at that time first begun but received long before and alledged at that time as an argument for the truth If saith Fabadius there be that inequality which they affirm then do we every day blaspheme God when in Thanksgivings and offerings of Sacrifice we acknowledge those thing common to the Father and the Son The Arians therefore for that they perceived how this did prejudice their cause altered the Hymn of Glory whereupon ensued in the Church of Antioch about the year Three hundred forty nine that jar which Theodoret and Sozomen mention In their Quires while they praised God together as the manner was at the end of the Psalms which they sung it appeared what opinion every man held for as much as they glorified some the Father And the Son And the Holy Ghost some the Father By the Son In the Spirit the one sort thereby declaring themselves to embrase the Sons equality with the Father as the Council of Nice had defined the other sort against the Council of Nice his inequality Leontiuos their Bishop although an enemy to the better part yet wary and subtile as in a manner all the heads of the Arians Faction were could at no time be plainly heard to use either form perhaps lest his open contradiction of them whom he favored not might make them the more eager and by that mean the less apt to be privately won or peradventure for that though he joyned in opinion with that sort of Arians who denied the Son to be equal with the Father yet from them he dissented which thought the Father and the Son not onely unequal but unlike as AEtuis did upon a frivolous and false surmise that because the Apostle hath said One God of whom one Lord by whom one Spirit in whom his different manner of speech doth argue a different Nature and Being in them of whom he speaketh Ou◠of which blinde collection it seemeth that this their new devised Form did first spring But in truth even that very Form which the Arians did then use saving that they chose it to serve as their special mark of Recognisance and gave it secretly within themselves a sinister construction hath not otherwise as much as the shew of any thing which soundeth towards impiety For albeit if we respect Gods glory within it self it be the equal right and possession of all three and that without any odds any difference yet touching his manifestation thereof unto us by continual effects and our perpetual acknowledgment thereof unto him likewise by vertuous Offices Doth not every tongue both ways confess That the brightness of his Glory hath spred it self throughout the World By the Ministery of his onely begotten Son and is In the manifold Graces of the Spirit every way marvellous Again That whatsoever we do to his Glory it is done In the power of the Holy Ghost and made acceptable By the Merit and Mediation of Jesus Christ So that glory to the Father And the Son or glory to the Father By the Son saving onely where evil mindes do abuse and pervert most holy things are not else the voices of Error and Schism but of sound and sincere Religion It hath been the Custom of the Church of Christ to end sometimes Prayers and Sermons always with words of glory wherein as long as the Blessed Trinity had due honor and till Arianism had made it a matter of great sharpness and subtilty of Wit to be a sound believing Christian men were not curious what Syllables or Particles of speech they used Upon which confidence and trust notwithstanding when St. Basil began to practise the like indifferency and to conclude Publick Prayers glorifying sometime the Father with the Son and the Holy Ghost sometime the Father by the Son in the Spirit whereas long custom had enured them unto the former kindealone by means whereof the latter was new and strange in their ears This needless experiment brought afterwards upon him a necessary labor of excusing himself to his Friends and maintaining his own act against them who because the Light of his Candle too much drowned theirs were glad to lay hold on so colorourable matter and exceeding forward to traduce him as an Author of suspicious Innovation How hath the World forsaken that course which it sometime held How are the judgments hearts and affections of men altered May we not wonder that a man of St. Basils authority and quality an Arch-Prelate in the House of God should have his Name far and wide called in question and be driven to his painful Apologies to write in his own defence whole Volumes and yet hardly to obtain with all his endeavor a pardon the crime laid against him being but onely a change of some one or two syllables in their usual Church Liturgy It was thought in him an unpardonable offence to alter any thing in us as intolerable that we suffer any thing to remain unaltered The very Creed of Athanasius and that sacred Hymn of Glory then which nothing doth sound more heavenly in the ears of faithful men are now reckoned as superfluities which we must in any case pare away left we cloy God with too much service Is there in that Confession of Faith any thing which doth not
man doubt how God should accept such Prayers in case they be opposite to his Will or not grant them if they be according unto that which himself willeth our answer is That such suits God accepteth in that they are conformable unto his general inclination which is that all men might be saved yet always he granteth them not for as much as there is in God sometimes a more private occasioned will which determineth the contrary So that the other being the rule of our actions and not this our requests for things opposite to this Will of God are not therefore the less gracious in his sight There is no doubt but we ought in all things to frame our wills to the Will of God and that otherwise in whatsoever we do we sin For of our selves being so apt to err the onely way which we have to streighten our paths is by following the rule of his Will whose footsteps naturally are right If the eye the hand or the foot do that which the will commandeth though they serve as instruments to sin yet is sin the commanders fault and not theirs because Nature hath absolutely and without exception made them subjects to the will of man which is Lord over them As the body is subject to the will of man so mans will to the Will of God for so it behoveth that the better should guide and command the worse But because the subjection of the body to the will is by natural necessity the subjection of the Will unto God voluntary we therefore stand in need of direction after what sort our wills and desires may be rightly conformed to his Which is not done by willing always the self-same thing that God intendeth For it may chance that his purpose is sometime the speedy death of them whose long continuance in life if we should not wish we were unnatural When the object or matter therefore of our desires is as in this case a thing both good of it self and not forbidden of God when the end for which we desire it is vertuous and apparently most holy when the root from which our affection towards it proceedeth is Charity Piety that which we do in declaring our desire by Prayer yea over and besides all this sith we know that to pray for all men living is but to shew the same affection which towards every of them our Lord Jesus Christ hath born who knowing onely as God who are his did as Man taste death for the good of all men surely to that Will of God which ought to be and is the known rule of all our actions we do not herein oppose our selves although his secret determination haply be against us which if we did understand as we do not yet to rest contented with that which God will have done is as much as he requireth at the hands of men And concerning our selves what we earnestly crave in this case the same as all things else that are of like condition we meekly submit unto his most gracious will and pleasure Finally as we have cause sufficient why to think the practice of our Church allowable in this behalf so neither is ours the first which hath been of that minde For to end with the words of Prosper This Law of Supplication for all Men saith he the devout zeal of all Priests and of all faithful Men doth hold with such full Agreement that there is not any part of all the World where Christian people do not use to pray in the same manner The Church every where maketh Prayers unto God not onely for Saints and such as already in Christ are regenerate but for all Infidels and Enemies of the Cross of Iesus Christ for all Idolaters for all that persecute Christ in his followers for Iews to whose blindness the Light of the Gospel doth not yet shine for Hereticks and Schismaticks who from the Unity of Faith and Charity are estranged And for such what doth the Church ask of God but this That leaving their Errors they may be converted unto him that Faith and Charity may be given them and that out of the darkness of ignorance they may come to the knowledge of his truth Which because they cannot themselves do in their own behalf as long as the sway of evil custom ever-beareth them and the chains of Satan detain them bound neither are they able to break through those Errors wherein they are so determinately setled that they pay unto falsity the whole sum of whatsoever love is owing unto Gods Truth Our Lord merciful and just requireth to have all men prayed for that when we behold innumerable multitudes drawn up from the depth of so bottomless evils we may not doubt but in part God hath done the thing we requested nor despair but that being thankful for them towards whom already he hath shewed mercy the rest which are not as yet enlightned shall before they pass out of life be made partakers of the like grace Or if the Grace of him which saveth for so we set is falleth out over-pass some so that the Prayer of the Church for them be not received this we may leave to the hidden Iudgments of Gods Righteousness and acknowledge that in this Secret there is a Gulf which whole we live we shall never sound 50. Instruction and Prayer whereof we have hitherto spoken are duties which serve as Elements Parts or Principles to the rest that follow in which number the Sacraments of the Church are chief The Church is to us that very Mother of our New Birth in whose Bowels we are all bred at whose Brests we receive nourishment As many therefore as are apparently to our judgment born of God they have the Seed of their Regeneration by the Ministery of the Church which useth to that end and purpose not onely the Word but the Sacrament both having Generative force and vertue As oft as we mention a Sacrament properly understood for in the Writings of the Ancient Fathers all Articles which are peculiar to Christian Faith all Duties of Religion containing that which Sense or Natural Reason cannot of it self discern are most commonly named Sacraments our restraint of the Word to some few principal Divine Ceremonies importeth in every such Ceremony two things the Substance of the Ceremony it self which is visible and besides that somewhat else more secret in reference whereunto we conceive that Ceremony to be a Sacrament For we all admire and honor the holy Sacraments not respecting so much the Service which we do unto God in receiving them as the dignity of that Sacred and Secret Gift which we thereby receive from God Seeing that Sacraments therefore consist altogether in relation to some such Gift or Grace Supernatural as onely God can bestow how should any but the Church administer those Ceremonies as Sacraments which are not thought to be Sacraments by any but by the Church There is in Sacraments to be observed their Force and
of things absent neither for naked signs and testimonies assuring us of Grace received before but as they are indeed and in verity for means effectual whereby God when we take the Sacraments delivereth into our hands that Grace available unto Eternal Life which Grace the Sacraments represent or signifie There have grown in the Doctrine concerning Sacraments many difficulties for want of distinct Explication what kinde or degree of Grace doth belong unto each Sacrament For by this it hath come to pass that the true immediate cause why Baptism and why the Supper of our Lord is necessary few do rightly and distinctly consider It cannot be denied but sundry the same effects and benefits which grow unto men by the one Sacrament may rightly be attributed unto the other Yet then doth Baptism challenge to it self but the inchoation of those Graces the consummation whereof dependeth on Mysteries ensuing We receive Christ Jesus in Baptism once as the first beginner in the Eucharist often as being by continual degrees the finisher of our Life By Baptism therefore we receive Christ Jesus and from him that saving Grace which is proper unto Baptism By the other Sacrament we receive him also imparting therein himself and that Grace which the Eucharist properly bestoweth So that each Sacrament having both that which is general or common and that also which is peculiar unto it self we may hereby gather that the Participation of Christ which properly belongeth to any one Sacrament is not otherwise to be obtained but by the Sacrament whereunto it is proper 58. Now even as the Soul doth Organize the Body and give unto every Member thereof that substance quantity and shape which Nature seeth most expedient so the inward Grace of Sacraments may teach what serveth best for their outward form a thing in no part of Christian Religion much less here to be neglected Grace intended by Sacraments was a cause of the choice and is a reason of the fitness of the Elements themselves Furthermore seeing that the Grace which here we receive doth no way depend upon the Natural force of that which we presently behold it was of necessity That words of express Declaration taken from the very mouth of our Lord himself should be added unto visible Elements that the one might infallibly teach what the other do most assuredly bring to pass In writing and speaking of the Blessed Sacrament we use for the most part under the name of their Substance not onely to comprise that whereof they outwardly and sensibly consist but also the secret Grace which they signifie and exhibit This is the reason wherefore commonly in definitions whether they be framed larger to augâ—ment or stricter to abridge the number of Sacraments we finde Grace expresly mentioned as their â—â—â—â— Essential Form Elements as the matter whereunto that Form doth adjoyn it sâ—â— But if that be separated which is secret and that considered alone which is seen as of necessity it must in all those speeches that make distinction of Sacraments from Sacramental Grace the name of a Sacrament in such speeches can imply no more then what the outward substance thereof doth comprehend And to make compleat the outward substance of a Sacrament there is required an outward Form which Form Sacramental Elements receive from Sacramental words Hereupon it groweth that many times there are three things said to make up the Substance of a Sacrament namely the Grace which is thereby offered the Element which shadoweth or signifieth Grace and the Word which expresseth what is done by the Element So that whether we consider the outward by it self alone or both the outward and inward substance of any Sacraments there are in the one respect but two essential parts and in the other but three that concur to give Sacraments their full being Furthermore because definitions are to express but the most immediate and nearest parts of Nature whereas other principles farther off although not specified in defining are notwithstanding in Nature implied and presupposed we must note that in as much as Sacraments are actions religious and mystical which Nature they have not unless they proceed from a serious meaning and what every mans private minde is as we cannot know so neither are we bound to examine Therefore always in these cases the known intent of the Church generally doth suffice and where the contrary is not manifest we may presume that he which outwardly doth the work hath inwardly the purpose of the Church of God Concerning all other Orders Rites Prayers Lessons Sermons Actions and their Circumstances whatsoever they are to the outward Substance of Baptism but things accessory which the wisdom of the Church of Christ is to order according to the exigence of that which is principal Again Considering that such Ordinances have been made to adorn the Sacrament not the Sacrament to depend upon them seeing also that they are not of the Substance of Baptism and that Baptism is far more necessary then any such incident rite or solemnity ordained for the better Administration thereof if the case be such as permitteth not Baptism to have decent Complements of Baptism better it were to enjoy the Body without his Furniture then to wait for this till the opportunity of that for which we desire it be lost Which Premises standing it seemeth to have been no absurd Collection that in cases of necessity which will not suffer delay till Baptism be administred with usual solemnities to speak the least it may be tolerably given without them rather then any man without it should be suffered to depart this life 59. They which deny that any such case of necessity can fall in regard whereof the Church should tolerate Baptism without the decent Rites and Solemnities thereunto belonging pretend that such Tolerations have risen from a false interpretaon which certain men have made of the Scripture grounding a necessity of External Baptism upon the words of our Saviour Christ Unless a man be born again of Water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven For by Water and the Spirit we are in that place to understand as they imagine no more then if the Spirit alone had been mentioned and Water not spoken of Which they think is plain because elswhere it is not improbable that the Holy Ghost and Fire do but signifie the Holy Ghost in operation resembling Fire Whereupon they conclude That seeing Fire in one place may be therefore Water in another place is but a Metaphor Spirit the interpretation thereof and so the words do onely mean That unless a man be born again of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven I hold it for a most infallible rule in Expositions of Sacred Scripture that were a literal construction will stand the farthest from the Letter is commonly the worst There is nothing more dangerous then this licentious and deluding Art which changeth the meaning
the Enemies invasion doth remain but over and besides namely through Prayer and Imposition of Hands becometh yet greater yet mightier in strength so far as to raign with a kinde of Imperial Dominion over the whole Band of that roming and spoiling Adversary As much is signified by Eusebius Emissenus saying The Holy Ghost which descendeth with saving influence upon the Waters of Baptism doth there give that fulness which sufficeth for innocenty and afterwards exhibiteth in Confirmation an Augmentation of further Grace The Fathers therefore being thus perswaded held Confirmation as an Ordinance Apostolick always profitable in Gods Church although not always accompanied with equal largeness of those External Effects which gave it countenance at the first The cause of severing Confirmation from Baptism for most commonly they went together was sometimes in the Minister which being of inferior degree might Baptize but not Confirm as in their case it came to pass whom Peter and Iohn did confirm whereas Philip had before baptized them and in theirs of whom St. Ierome hath said I deny not but the Custom of the Churches is that the Bishop should go abroad and imposing his hands pray for the Gift of the Holy Ghost on them whom Presbyters and Deacons far off in lesser Cities have already â—aptized Which ancient Custom of the Church St. Cyprian groundeth upon the example or Peter and Iohn in the Eighth of the Acts before alledged The faithful in Samaria saith he had already obtained Baptism onely that which was wanting Peter and John supplied by Prayer and Imposition of Hands to the end the Holy Ghost might be poured upon them Which also is done amongst our selves when they which be already Baptized are brought to the Prelates of the Church to obtain by their Prayer and Imposition of Hands the Holy Ghost By this it appeareth that when the Ministers of Baptism were persons of inferior degree the Bishops did after Confirm whom such had before Baptized Sometimes they which by force of their Ecclesiastical Calling might do as well the one as the other were notwithstanding Men whom Heresie had dis-joyned from the Fellowship of true Believers Whereupon when any Man by them Baptized and Confirmed came afterwards to see and renounce their Error there grew in some Churches very hot contention about the manner of admitting such into the Bosome of the true Church as hath been declared already in the question of Rebaptization But the generally received Custom was onely to admit them with Imposition of Hands and Prayer Of which Custom while some imagined the reason to be for that Hereticks might give Remission of Sins by Baptism but not the Spirit by Imposition of Hands because themselves had not Gods Spirit and that therefore their Baptism might stand but Confirmation must be given again The imbecillity of this ground gave Cyprian occasion to oppose himself against the practice of the Church herein laboring many ways to prove That Hereticks could do neither and consequently that their Baptism in all respects was as frustrate as their Chrism for the manner of those times was in Confirming to use Anointing On the other side against Luciferians which ratified onely the Baptism of Hereticks but disannulled their Confirmations and Consecrations under pretence of the reason which hath been before specified Hereticks cannot give the Holy Ghost St. Ierome proveth at large That if Baptism by Hereticks be granted available to Remission of Sins which no man receiveth without the Spirit it must needs follow that the reason taken from disability of bestowing the Holy Ghost was no reason wherefore the Church should admit Converts with any new Imposition of Hands Notwithstanding because it might be objected That if the gift of the Holy Ghost do always joyn it self with true Baptism the Church which thinketh the Bishops Confirmation after others Mens Baptism needful for the obtaining of the Holy Ghost should hold an error Saint Ierome hereunto maketh answer That the cause of this observation is not any absolute impossibility of receiving the Holy Ghost by the Sacrament of Baptism unless a Bishop add after it the Imposition of Hands but rather a certain congruity and fitness to honor Prelacy with such pre-eminences because the safety of the Church dependeth upon the dignity of her chief Superiors to whom if some eminent Offices of Power above others should not be given there would be in the Church as many Schisms as Priests By which answer it appeareth his opinion was That the Holy Ghost is received in Baptism that Confirmation is onely a Sacramental Complement that the reason why Bishops alone did ordinarily confirm was not because the benefit grace and dignity thereof is greater then of Baptism but rather for that by the Sacrament of Baptism Men being admitted into Gods Church it was both reasonable and convenient that if he Baptize them not unto whom the chiefest authority and charge of their Souls belongeth yet for honors sake and in token of his Spiritual Superiority over them because to bless is an act of Authority the performance of this annexed Ceremony should be sought for at his hands Now what effect their Imposition of Hands hath either after Baptism administred by Hereticks or otherwise St. Ierome in that place hath made no mention because all men understood that in Converts it tendeth to the fruits of Repentance and craveth in behalf of the Penitent such grace as David after his fall desired at the hands of God in others the fruit and benefit thereof is that which hath been before shewed Finally Sometime the cause of severing Confirmation from Baptism was in the parties that received Baptism being Infants at which age they might be very well admitted to live in the Family but because to fight in the Army of God to discharge the duties of a Christian man to bring forth the fruits and to do the Works of the Holy Ghost their time of ability was not yet come so that Baptism were not deferred there could by stay of their Confirmation no harm ensue but rather good For by this means it came to pass that Children in expectation thereof were seasoned with the principles of true Religion before malice and corrupt examples depraved their mindes a good foundation was laid betimes for direction of the course of their whole lives the Seed of the Church of God was preserved sincere and sound the Prelates and Fathers of Gods Family to whom the cure of their Souls belonged saw by tryal and examination of them a part of their own heavy burthen discharged reaped comfort by beholding the first beginnings of true godliness in tender years glorified him whose praise they found in the mouths of Infants and neglected not so fit opportunity of giving every one Fatherly encouragement and exhortation Whereunto Imposition of Hands and Prayer being added our Warrant for the great good effect thereof is the same which Patriarks Prophets Priests Apostles Fathers and Men of God have had
mine eyes some small and scarce discernable Grain or Seed whereof Nature maketh a promise that a Tree shall come and when afterwards of that Tree any skilful Artificer undertaketh to frame some exquisite and curious work I look for the event I move no question about performance either of the one or of the other Shall I simply credit Nature in things natural Shall I in things artificial relie my self on Art never offering to make doubt And in that which is above both Art and Nature refuse to believe the Author of both except he acquaint me with his ways and lay the secret of his skill before me Where God himself doth speak those things which either for height and sublimity of Matter or else for secresie of Performance we are not able to reach unto as we may be ignorant without danger so it can be no disgrace to confess we are ignorant Such as love Piety will as much as in them lieth know all things that God commandeth but especially the duties of Service which they ow to God As for his dark and hidden works they prefer as becometh them in such cases simplicity of Faith before that Knowledge which curiously sisting what it should adore and disputing too boldly of that which the wit of man cannot search chilleth for the most part all warmth of zeal and bringeth soundness of belief many times into great hazard Let it therefore be sufficient for me presenting my self at the Lords Table to know what there I receive from him without searching or enquiring of the manner how Christ performeth his promise Let Disputes and Questions Enemies to Piety abatements of true Devotion and hitherto in this cause but over-patiently heard let them take their rest Let curious and sharp-witted Men beat their Heads about what Questions themselves will the very Letter of the Word of Christ giveth plain security that these Mysteries do as Nails fasten us to his very Cross that by them we draw out as touching Efficacy Force and Vertue even the Blood of his goared side In the Wounds of our Redeemer we there dip our Tongues we are died red both within and without our hunger is satisfied and our thirst for ever quenched they are things wonderful which he feeleth great which he seeth and unheard of which he uttereth whose Soul it possest of this Paschal Lamb and made joyful in the strength of this new Wine This Bread hath in it more then the substance which our eyes behold this Cup hallowed with solemn Benediction availeth to the endless life and welfare both of Soul and Body in that it serveth as well for a Medicine to heal our infirmities and purge our sins as for a Sacrifice of Thanksgiving With touching it sanctifieth it enlightneth with belief it truly conformeth us unto the image of Iesus Christ. What these Elements are in themselves it skilleth not it is enough that to me which take them they are the Body and Blood of Christ his Promise in witness hereof sufficeth his Word he knoweth which way to accomplish why should any cogitation possess the minde of a Faithful Communicant but this O my God thou art true O my Soul thou art happy Thus therefore we see that howsoever Mens opinions do otherwise vary nevertheless touching Baptism and the Supper of the Lord we may with consent of the whole Christian World conclude they are necessary the one to initiate or begin the other to consummate or make perfect our life in Christ. 68. In Administring the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ the supposed faults of the Church of England are not greatly material and therefore it shall suffice to touch them in few words The first is That we do not use in a generality once for all to say to Communicants Take eat and drink but unto every particular person Eat thou drink thou which is according to the Popish manner and not the Form that our Saviour did use Our second oversight is by Gesture For in Kneeling there hath been Superstition Sitting agreeth better to the action of a Supper and our Saviour using that which was most fit did himself not kneel A third accusation is for not examining all Communicants whose knowledge in the Mystery of the Gospel should that way be made manifest a thing every where they say used in the Apostles times because all things necessary were used and this in their opinion is necessary yea it is commanded in as much as the Levites are commanded to prepare the people for the Passover and Examination is a part of their Preparation our Lords Supper in place of the Passover The fourth thing misliked is That against the Apostles prohibitionâ— to have any familiarity at all with notorious Offenders Papists being not of the Church are admitted to our very Communion before they have by their Religious and Gospel-like behavior purged themselves of that suspition of Popery which their former life hath caused They are Dogs Swine unclean Beasts Foreigners and Strangers from the Church of God and therefore ought not to be admitted though they offer themselves We are fiftly condemned in as much as when there have been store of people to hear Sermons and Service in the Church we suffer the Communion to be ministred to a few It is not enough that our Book of Common Prayer hath godly Exhortations to move all thereunto which are present For it should not suffer a few to Communicate it should by Ecclesiastical Discipline and Civil punishment provide that such as would withdraw themselves might be brought to Communicate according both to the Law of God and the ancient Church Canons In the sixth and last place cometh the enormity of imparting this Sacrament privately unto the sick Thus far accused we answer briefly to the first That seeing God by Sacraments doth apply in particular unto every mans person the Grace which himself hath provided for the benefit of all mankinde there is no cause why Administring the Sacraments we should forbear to express that in our forms of Speech which he by his Word and Gospel teacheth all to believe In the one Sacrament I Baptize thee displeaseth them not If â—at thou in the other offend them their fancies are no rules for Churches to follow Whether Christ at his last Supper did speak generally once to all or to every one in particular is a thing uncertain His words are recorded in that Form which serveth best for the setting down with Historical brevity what was spoken they are no manifest proof that he spake but once unto all which did then Communicate muchless that we in speaking unto every Communicant severally do amiss although it were clear that we herein do otherwise then Christ did Our imitation of him consisteth not in tying scrupulously our selves unto his syllables but rather in speaking by the Heavenly Direction of that inspired Divine Wisdom which teacheth divers ways to one end and doth therein controul their boldness
the manifold works of Vertue often practised Before the powers of our mindes be brought unto some perfection our first assays and offers towards Vertue must needs be raw yet commendable because they tend unto ripeness For which cause and Wisdom of God hath commanded especially this circumstance amongst others in solemn Feasts That to Children and Novices in Religion they minister the first occasion to ask and enquire of God Whereupon if there follow but so much Piety as hath been mentioned let the Church learn to further imbecillity with Prayer Preserve Lord these good and gracious beginnings that they suddenly dry not up like the morning dew but may prosper and grow as the Trees which Rivers of Waters keep always flourishing Let all mens acclamations be Grace Grace unto it as to that first laid Corner Stone in Zerubbabels Buildings For who hath despised the day of those things which are small Or how dare we take upon us to condemn that very thing which voluntarily we grant maketh as of nothing somewhat seeing all we pretend against it is onely that as yet this somewhat is not much The days of solemnity which are but few cannot chuse but soon finish that outward exercise of Godliness which properly appertaineth to such times howbeit mens inward disposition to Vertue they both augment for the present and by their often returns bring also the same at the length unto that perfection which we most desire So that although by their necessary short continuance they abridge the present exercise of Piety in some kinde yet because by repetition they enlarge strengthen and confirm the habits of all Vertue it remaineth that we honor observe and keep them as Ordinances many ways singularly profitable in Gods Church This Exception being taken against Holidays for that they restrain the Praises of God unto certain times another followeth condemning restraint of men from their ordinary Trades and Labors at those times It is not they say in the Power of the Church to command Rest because God hath left it to all men at liberty that if they think good to bestow Six whole days in labor they may neither is it more lawful for the Church to abridge any man of that liberty which God hath granted then to take away the yoke which God hath laid upon them and to countermand what he doth expresly enjoyn They deny not but in times of publick calamity that men may the better assemble themselves to fast and pray the Church because it hath received Commandment from God to proclaim a Prohibition from ordinary works standeth bound to do it as the Jews afflicted did in Babylon But without some express Commandment from God there is no power they say under Heaven which may presume by any Decree to restrain the liberty that God hath given Which opinion albeit applied here no farther then to this present cause shaketh universally the Fabrick of Government tendeth to Anarchy and meer confusion dissolveth Families dissipateth Colledges Corporations Armies overthroweth Kingdoms Churches and whatsoever is now through the providence of God by Authority and Power upheld For whereas God hath foreptized things of the greatest weight and hath therein precisely defined as well that which every man must perform as that which no man may attempt leaving all sorts of men in the Rest either to be guided by their own good discretion if they be free from subjection to others or else to be ordered by such Commandments and Laws as proceed from those Superiors under whom they live the Patrons of Liberty have here made Solemn Proclamation that all such Laws and Commandments are void in as much as every man is left to the freedom of his own minde in such things as are not either exacted or prohibited by the Law of God And because onely in these things the Positive Precepts of men have place which Precepts cannot possibly be given without some Abridgment of their Liberty to whom they are given Therefore if the Father command the Son or the Husband the Wife or the Lord the Servant or the Leader the Soldier or the Prince the Subject to go or stand sleep or wake at such times as God himself in particular commandeth neither they are to stand in defence of the Freedom which God hath granted and to do as themselves list knowing that men may as lawfully command them things utterly forbidden by the Law of God as tye them to any thing which the Law of God leaveth free The plain contradictory whereunto is unfallibly certain Those things which the Law of God leaveth Arbitrary and at Liberty are all subject to the Positive Laws of Men which Laws for the common benefit abridge particular Mens Liberty in such things as far as the Rules of Equity will suffer This we must either maintain or else over-turn the World and make every man his own Commander Seeing then that Labor and Rest upon any one day of the Six throughout the year are granted free by the Law of God how exempt we them from the force and power of Ecclesiastical Law except we deprive the World of Power to make any Ordinance or Law at all Besides Is it probable that God should not onely allow but command concurrency of Rest with extraordinary occasions of doleful events befalling peradventure some one certain Church or not extending unto many and not as much as permit or licence the like when Piety triumphant with Joy and Gladness maketh solemn commemoration of Gods most rare and unwonted Mercies such especially as the whole race of mankinde doth or might participate Of vacation from labor in times of sorrow the onely cause is for that the general publick Prayers of the whole Church and our own private business cannot both he followed at once whereas of Rest in the famous solemnities of publick Joy there is both this consideration the same and also farther a kinde of natural repugnancy which maketh labors as hath been proved much more unfit to accompany Festival Praises of God then Offices of Humiliation and Grief Again If we sift what they bring for proof and approbation of Rest with Fasting doth it not in all respects as fully warrant and as strictly command Rest whensoever the Church hath equal reason by Feasts and gladsome solemnities to testifie publick thankfulness towards God I would know some cause why those words of the Prophet Ioel Sanctifie a Fast call a solemn Assembly which words were uttered to the Jews in misery and great distress should more binde the Church to do at all times after the like in their like perplexities then the words of Moses to the same people in a time of joyful deliverance from misery Remember this day may warrant any annual celebration of benefits no less importing the good of men and also justifie as touching the manner and form thereof what circumstance soever we imitate onely in respect of natural fitness or decency without any Jewish regard to Ceremonies such as
that men ought to Fast more often then Marry the best Feast-maker is with them the perfectest Saint they are assuredly meer Spirit and therefore these our corporal devotions please them not Thus the one for Montanus and his Superstition The other in a clean contrary tune against the Religion of the Church These Set-fasts away with them for they are Iewish and bring men under the yoke of servitude If I will fast let me chuse my time that Christian Liberty be not abridged Hereupon their glory was to fast especially upon the Sunday because the order of the Church was on that day not to Fast. On Church Fasting days and especially the Week before Easter when with us saith Epiphanius Custom admitteth nothing but lying down upon the Earth abstinence from fleshly delights and pleasures sorrowfulness dry and unsavory Diet Prayer Watching Fasting all the Medicines which holy Affections can minister they are up be times to take in of the strongest for the belly and when their veins are well swoln they make themselves mirth with laughter at this our service wherein we are perswaded we please God By this of Epiphanius it doth appear not onely what Fastings the Church of Christ in those times used but also what other parts of Discipline were together therewith in force according to the ancient use and custom of bringing all men at certain times to a due consideration and an open Humiliation of themselves Two kindes there were of Publick Penitency the one belonging to notorious offenders whose open wickedness had been scandalous the other appertaining to the whole Church and unto every several person whom the same containeth It will be answered That touching this latter kinde it may be exercised well enough by men in private No doubt but Penitency is as Prayer a thing acceptable unto God be it in publick or in secret Howbeit as in the one if men were wholly left to their own voluntary Meditations in their Closets and not drawn by Laws and Orders unto the open Assemblies of the Church that there they may joyn with others in Prayer it may be soon conjectured what Christian devotion that way would come unto in a short time Even so in the other We are by sufficient experience taught how little it booreth to tell men of washing away their sins with tears of Repentance and so to leave them altogether unto themselves O Lord what heaps of grievous transgressions have we committed the best the perfectest the most righteous amongst us all and yet clean pass them over unsorrowed foâ— and unrepented of onely because the Church hath forgotten utterly how to bestow her wonted times of Discipline wherein the publick example of all was unto every particular person a most effectual mean to put them often in minde and even in a manner to draw them to that which now we all quite and clean forget as if Penitency were no part of a Christian mans duty Again besides our private offences which ought not thus loosly to be overslipt suppose we the Body and Corporation of the Church so just that at no time it needeth to shew it self openly cast down in regard of those Faults and Transgressions which though they do not properly belong unto any one had notwithstanding a special Sacrifice appointed for them in the Law of Moses and being common to the whole Society which containeth all must needs so far concern every man in particular as at some time in solemn manner to require acknowledgment with more then daily and ordinary testifications of grief There could not hereunto a fitter preamble be devised then that memorable Commination set down in the Book of Common Prayer if our practice in the rest were suitable The Head already so well drawn doth but wish a proportionable Body And by the Preface to that very part of the English Liturgy it may appear how at the first setting down thereof no less was intended For so we are to interpret the meaning of those words wherein restitution of the Primitive Church Discipline is greatly wished for touching the manner of publick penance in time of Lent Wherewith some being not much acquainted but having framed in their mindes the conceit of a new Discipline far unlike to that of old they make themselves believe it is undoubtedly this their Discipline which at the first was so much desired They have long pretended that the whole Scripture is plain for them If now the Communion Book make for them too I well think the one doth as much as the other it may be hoped that being found such a well-willer unto their cause they will more favor it then they have done Having therefore hitherto spoken both of Festival days and so much of solemn Fasts as may reasonably serve to shew the ground thereof in the Law of Nature the practice partly appointed and partly allowed of God in the Jewish Church the like continued in the Church of Christ together with the sinister oppositions either of Hereticks erroneously abusing the same or of others thereat quarrelling without cause we will onely collect the chiefest points as well of resemblance as of difference between them and so end First In this they agree that because Nature is the general Root of both therefore both have been always common to the Church with Infidels and Heathen men Secondly They also herein accord that as oft as joy is the cause of the one and grief the Well-spring of the other they are incompatible A third degree of affinity between them is That neither being acceptable to God of it self but both tokens of that which is acceptable their approbation with him must necessarily depend on that which they ought to import and signifie So that if herein the minde dispose no it self aright whether we rest or fast we offend A fourth thing common unto them is that the greatest part of the World hath always grosly and palpably offended in both Infidels because they did all in relation to false gods godless sensual and careless mindes for that there is in them no constant true and sincere affection towards those things which are pretended by such exercise yea certain flattering over-sights there are wherewith sundry and they not of the worst sort may be easily in these cases led awry even through abundance of love and liking to that which must be imbraced by all means but with caution in as much as the very admiration of Saints Whether we celebrate their glory or follow them in humility whether we laugh or weep mourn or rejoyce with them is as in all things the affection of Love apt to deceive and doth therefore need the more to be directed by a watchful guide seeing there is manifestly both ways even in them whom we honor that which we are to observe and shun The best have not still been sufficiently mindful that Gods very Angels in Heaven are but Angels and that bodily exercise considered in it self is no
do admit which may be thought repugnant to any thing hitherto alledged and in what special consideration they seem to admit the same Considering therefore that to furnish all places of Cure in this Realm it is not an Army of twelve thousand Learned men that would suffice nor two Universities that can always furnish as many as decay in so great a number nor a fourth part of the Livings with Cure that when they fall are able to yield sufficient maintenance for Learned men is it not plain that unless the greatest part of the People should be left utterly without the publick use and exercise of Religion there is no remedy but to take into the Ecclesiastical Order a number of men meanly qualified in respect of Learning For whatsoever we may imagine in our private Closers or talk for Communication-sake at our Boords yea or write in our Books through a notional conceit of things needful for performance of each man's duty if once we come from the Theory of Learning to take out so many Learned men let them be diligently viewed out of whom the choice shall be made and thereby an estimate made what degree of skill we must either admit or else leave numbers utterly destitute of Guides and I doubt not but that men indued with sense of common equity will soon discern that besides eminent and competent knowledge we are to descend to a lower step receiving knowledge in that degree which is but tolerable When we commend any man for learning our speech importeth him to be more than meanly qualified that way but when Laws do require learning as a quality which maketh capable of any Function our measure to judge a learned man by must be some certain degree of learning beneath which we can hold no man so qualified And if every man that listeth may set that degree himself how shall we ever know when Laws are broken when kept seeing one man may think a lower degree sufficient another may judge them unsufficient that are not qualified in some higher degree Wherefore of necessity either we must have some Judge in whose conscience they that are thought and pronounced sufficient are to be so accepted and taken or else the Law it self is to set down the very lowest degree of fitness that shall be allowable in this kinde So that the question doth grow to this issue Saint Paul requireth Learning in Presbyters yea such Learning as doth inable them to exhort in Doctrine which is sound and to disprove them that gain-say it What measure of ability in such things shall serve to make men capable of that kinde of Office he doth not himself precisely determine but referreth it to the Conscience of Titus and others which had to deal in ordaining Presbyters We must therefore of necessity make this demand whether the Church lacking such as the Apostle would have chosen may with good conscience take out of such as it hath in a meaner degree of fitness them that may serve to perform the service of publick Prayer to minister the Sacraments unto the People to solemnize Marriage to visit the Sick and bury the Dead to instruct by reading although by Preaching they be not as yet so able to benefit and feed Christ's flock We constantly hold that in this case the Apostles Law is not broken Herequireth more in Presbyters than there is found in many whom the Church of England alloweth But no man being tyed unto impossibilities to do that we cannot we are not bound It is but a stratagem of theirs therefore and a very indirect practise when they publish large declamations to prove that Learning is required in the Ministry and to make the silly people believe that the contrary is maintained by the Bishops and upheld by the Laws of the Land whereas the question in truth is not whether Learning be required but whether a Church wherein there is not sufficient store of Learned men to furnish all Congregations should do better to let thousands of Souls grow savage to let them live without any publick service of God to let their Children dye unbaptised to with-hold the benefit of the other Sacrament from them to let them depart this World like Pagans without any thing so much as readd unto them concerning the way of life than as it doth in this necessity to make such Presbyters as are so farr forth sufficient although they want that ability of Preaching which someothers have In this point therefore we obey necessity and of two evils we take the less in the rest a publick utility is sought and in regard thereof some certain inconveniencies tolerated because they are recompenced with greater good The Law giveth liberty of Non-residence for a time to such as will live in Universities if they faithfully there labour to grow in knowledge that so they may afterwards the more edifie and the better instruct their Congregations The Church in their absence is not destitute the Peoples salvation not neglected for the present time the time of their absence is in the intendment of Law bestowed to the Churches great advantage and benefit those necessary helps are procured by it which turn by many degrees more to the Peoples comfort in time to come than if their Pastours had continually abidden with them So that the Law doth hereby provide in some part to remedy and help that evil which the former necessity hath imposed upon the Church For compare two men of equal meanness the one perpetually resident the other absent for a space in such sort as the Law permitteth Allot unto both some nine years continuance with Cure of Souls And must not three years absence in all probability and likelihood make the one more profitable than the other unto God's Church by so much as the increase of his knowledge gotten in those three years may adde unto six years travel following For the greater ability there is added to the instrument wherewith it pleaseth God to save Souls the more facility and expedition it hath to work that which is otherwise hardlier effected As much may be said touching absence granted to them that attend in the families of Bishops which Schools of gravity discretion and wisedom preparing men against the time that they come to reside abroad are in my poor opinion even the fittest places that any ingenious minde can with to enter into between departure from private study and access to a more publick charge of Souls yea no less expedient for men of the best sufficiency and most maturity in knowledge than the very Universities themselves are for the ripening of such as be raw Imployment in the Families of Noble-men or in Princes Courts hath another end for which the self-same leave is given not without great respect to the good of the whole Church For assuredly whosoever doth well observe how much all inferiour things depend upon the orderly courses and motions of those greater Orbes will hardly judge it either meet or good
Correct his Family The Souls of Men are Gods Treasure committed to the Trust and Fidelity of such as must render a strict account for the very least which is under their Custody God hath not invested them with Power to make a Revenue thereof but to use it for the good of them whom Jesus Christ hath most dearly bought And because their Office therein consisteth of sundry functions some belonging to Doctrine some to Discipline all contained in the Name of the Keys they have for matters of Discipline as well Litigious as Criminal their Courts and Consistories erected by the heavenly Authority of his most Sacred Voice who hath said Dic Ecclesia Tell the Church against rebellious and conâ—umacious Persons which refuse to obey their Sentence armed they are with Power to eject such out of the Church to deprive them of the Honours Rights and Priviledges of Christian Men to make them as Heathens and Publicans with whom society was hateful Furthermore lest their Acts should be slenderly accounted of or had in contempt whether they admit to the Fellowship of Saints or seclude from it whether they bind Offenders or set them again at liberty whether they remit or retain Sins whatsoever is done by way of orderly and lawfull proceeding the Lord himself hath promised to ratifie This is that grand Original Warrant by force whereof the Guides and Prelates in Gods Church first his Apostles and afterwards others following them successively did both use and uphold that Discipline the end whereof is to heal Mens Consciences to cure their Sins to reclaim Offenders from iniquity and to make them by Repentance just Neither hath it of Ancient time for any other respect been accustomed to bind by Ecclesiastical Censures to retain so bound till tokens of manifest Repentance appeared and upon apparent Repentance to Release saving only because this was received as a most expedient method for the cure of sin The course of Discipline in former Ages reformed open Transgressors by putting them into Offices of open Penitence especially Confession whereby they declared their own crimes in the hearing of the whole Church and were not from the time of their first Convention capable of the holy Mysteries of Christ till they had solemnly discharged this duty Offenders in secret knowing themselves altogether as unworthy to be admitted to the Lords Table as the other which were with-held being also perswaded that if the Church did direct them in the Offices of their Penitency and assist them with publique Prayer they should more easily obtain that they sought than by trusting wholly to their own endeavours finally having no impediment to stay them from it but bashfulness which countervailed not the former inducements and besides was greatly cased by the good construction which the charity of those times gave to such actions wherein Mens piety and voluntary care to be reconciled to God did purchase them much more love than their faults the testimonies of common frailty were able to procure disgrace they made it not nice to use some one of the Ministers of God by whom the rest might take notice of their faults prescribe them convenient remedies and in the end after publick Confession all joyn in Prayer unto God for them The first beginner of this Custom had the more followers by means of that special favour which alwaies was with good consideration shewed towards voluntary Penitents above the rest But as Professors of Christian belief grew more in number so they waxed worse when Kings and Princes had submitted their Dominions unto the Scepter of Jesus Christ by means whereof Persecution ceasing the Church immediately became subject to those evills which peace and security bringeth forth there was not now that love which before kept all things in tune but every where Schisms Discords Dissentions amongst Men. Conventicles of Hereticks bent more vehemently against the sounder and better sort than very Infidels and Heathens themselves faults not corrected in Charity but noted with delight and kept for malice to use when the deadliest opportunities should be offered Whereupon forasmuch as publick Confessions became dangerous and prejudicial to the safety of well-minded Men and in divers respects advantagious to the Enemies of Gods Church it seemed first unto some and afterwards generally requisite that voluntary Penitents should surcease from open Confession Instead whereof when once private and secret Confession had taken place with the Latins It continued as a profitable Ordinance till the Lateran Council had Decreed that all Men once in a year at the least should confess themselves to the Priest So that being a thing thus made both general and also necessary the next degree of estimation whereunto it grew was to be honoured and and lifted up to the Nature of a Sacramentâ— that as Christ did institute Baptism to give life and the Eucharist to nourish life so Penitence might be thought a Sacrament ordained to recover life and Confession a part of the Sacrament They define therefore their private Penetency to be a Sacrament of remitting sins after Baptism The vertue of Repentance a detestation of wickedness with ful purpose to amend the same and with hope to obtain pardon at Gods hands Wheresoever the Prophets cry Repent and in the Gospel Saint Peter maketh the same Exhortation to the Jews as yet unbaptized they would have the vertue of Repentance only to be understood The Sacrament where he adviseth Simon Magus to repent because the Sin of Simon Magus was after Baptism Now although they have onely external Repentance for a Sacrament internal for a Vertue yet make they Sacramental Repentance nevertheless to be composed of three parts Contrition Confession and Satisfaction which is absurd because Contrition being an inward thing belongeth to the Vertue and not to the Sacrament of Repentance which must consist of external parts if the nature thereof be external Besides which is more absurd they leave out Absolution whereas some of their School Divines handling Penance in the nature of a Sacrament and being not able to espie the least resemblance of a Sacrament save only in Absolution for a Sacrament by their doctrine must both signifie and also confer or bestow some special Divine Grace resolved themselves that the duties of the Penitent could be but meer preparations to the Sacrament and that the Sacrament it self was wholly in Absolution And albeit Thomas with his Followers have thought it safer to maintain as well the services of the Penitent as the words of the Minister necessary unto the essence of their Sacrament the services of the Penitent as a cause material the words of Absolution as a formal for that by them all things else are perfected to the taking away of Sin which opinion now reigneth in all their Schools since the time that the Councel of Trent gave it solemn approbation seeing they all make Absolution if not the whole essence yet the very form whereunto they ascribe chiefly the whole force
that respect meet before men to be acknowledged particularly But in Sins between Man and God there is no necessity that Man should himself make any such open and particular recital of them to God they are known and of us it is required that we cast not the memory of them carelesly and loosly behind our backs but keep in mind as near as we can both our own debt and his grace which remitteth the same Wherefore to let pass Jewish confession and to come unto them which hold confession in the ear of the Priest commanded yea commanded in the nature of a Sacrament and thereby so necessary that Sin without it cannot be pardoned let them find such a Commandment in holy Scripture and we ask no more Iohn the Baptist was an extraordinary person his Birth his Actions of Life his Office extraordinary It is therefore Recorded for the strangeness of the Act but not set down as an everlasting Law for the World That to him Ierusalem and all Iudea made confession of their Sins Besides at the time of this confession their pretended Sacrament of Repentance as they grant was not yet instituted neither was it Sin after Baptism which Penitents did there confess When that which befel the seven sons of Seeva for using the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in their conjurations was notisied to Jews and Grecians in Ephesus it brought an universal fear upon them insomuch that divers of them which had believed before but not obeyed the Laws of Christ as they should have done being terrified by this example came to the Apostle and confessed their wicked deeds Which good and vertuous act no wise man as I suppose will disallow but commend highly in them whom Gods good Spirit shall move to do the like when need requireth Yet neither hath this example the force of any general Commandment or Law to make it necessary for every man to pour into the ears of the Priest whatsoever hath been done amiss or else to remain everlastingly culpable and guilty of Sin in a word it proveth Confession practized as a vertuous act but not commanded as a Sacrament Now concerning St. Iames his Exhortation whether the former branch be considered which saith Is any sick among you let him call for the Ancients of the Church and let them make their prayers for him or the latter which stirreth up all Christian Men unto mutual acknowledment of faults amongst themselves Lay open your minds make your confessions one to another is it not plain that the one hath relation to that gift of healing which our Saviour promised his Church saying They shall lay their hands on the sick and the sick shall recover health relation to that gift of healing whereby the Apostle imposed his hands on the Father of Publius and made him miraculously a sound man relation finally to that gift of healing which so long continued in practice after the Apostles times that whereas the Novatianists denyed the power of the Church of God in curing Sin after Baptism St. Ambrose asked them again Why it might not as well prevail with God for spiritual as far corporal and bodily health yea wherefore saith he do ye your selves lay hands on the diseased and believe it to be a work of benediction or prayer if haply the sick person be restored to his former safety And of the other member which toucheth mutual confession do not some of themselves as namely Cajeâ—an deny that any other Confession is meant then only that which seeketh either association of Prayers or reconciliation or pardon of wrongs is it not confessed by the greatest part of their own retinue that we cannot certainly affirm Sacramental Confession to have been meant or spoken of in this place Howbeit Bellarmine delighted to run a course by himself where colourable sâ—â—ifts of wit will but make the way passable standeth as formally for this place and not less for that in St. Iohn than for this St. Iohn saith If we confess our Sins God is faithful and just to forgive our Sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness doth St. Iohn say If we confess to the Priest God is righteous to forgive and if not that our Sins are unpardonable No but the titles of God just and righteous do import that he pardoneth Sin only for his promise sake And there is not they say any promise of forgiveness upon confession made to God without the Priest Not any promise but with this condition and yet this condition no where exprest Is it not strange that the Scripture speaking so much of Repentance and of the several duties which appertain thereunto should ever mean and no where mention that one condition without which all the rest is utterly of none effect or will they say because our Saviour hath said to his Ministers Whose sins ye retain c. and because they can remit no more than what the offenders have confest that therefore by vertue of his promise it standeth with the Righteousness of God to take away no mans Sins until by auricular confession they be opened unto the Priest They are men that would seem to honour Antiquity and none more to depend upon the reverend judgement thereof I dare boldly affirm that for many hundred years after Christ the Fathers held no such opinion they did not gather by our Saviours words any such necessity of seeking the Priests Absolution from Sin by secret and as they now term it sacramental confession Publick confession they thought necessary by way of Discipline not private confession as in the nature of a Sacrament necessary For to begin with the purest times it is unto them which read and judge without partiality a thing most clear that the ancient 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Confession defined by Tertullian to be a Discipline of humiliation and submission framing mens behaviour in such sort as may be fittest to move pity the confession which they use to speak of in the exercise of Repentance was made openly in the hearing of the whole both Ecclesiastical Consistory and Assembly This is the reason wherefore he perceiving that divers were better content their sores should secretly fester and eat inward then be laid so open to the eyes of many blameth greatly their unwise bashfulness and to reform the same perswadeth with them saying Amongst thy brethren and fellow servants which are partakers with thee of one and the same nature fear joy grief sufferings for us was common Lord and Father we have all received one spirit why shouldest thou not think with thy self that they are but thine own self wherefore dost thou avoid them as likely to insult over thee whom thou knowest subject to the same haps At that which grieveth any one part the whole body cannot rejoyce it must needs be that the whole will labour and strive to help that wherewith a part of it self is molested St. Cyprian being grieved with the dealings
her tears Our Lord doth love that many should become suppliant for one In like sort long before him Tertullian Some few assembled make a Church and the Church is as Christ himself When thou dost therefore put forth thy hands to the knees of thy brethren thou touchest Christ it is Christ unto whom thou art a supplicant so when they pour one tears over them it is even Christ that taketh compassion Christ which prayeth when they pray Neither can that easily be denyed for which the Son is himself contented to become a suitor Whereas in these considerations therefore voluntary Penitents had been long accustomed for great and grievous crimes though secret yet openly both to repent and confess as the Canons of Antient Discipline required the Greek Church first and in processe of time the Latine altered this order judging it sufficient and more convenient that such offenders should do Penance and make confession in private onely The cause why the Latins did Leo declareth saying Although the ripeness of faith be commendable which for the fear of God doth not fear to incur shame before all men yet because every ones crimes are not such that it can be free and safe for them to make publication of all things wherein repentance is necessary let a custome so unfit to be kept be abrogated lest many forbear to use remedies of penitency whilst they either blush or are afraid to acquaint their enemies with those acts for which the Laws may take hold upon them Besides it shall win the more Repentance if the Consciences of Sinners be not emptied into the peoples ears And to this only cause doth Sozomen impure the change which the Grecians made by ordaining throughout all Churches certain Penitentiaries to take the Confessions and appoint the Penances of secret offenders Socrates for this also may be true that more inducements then one did set forward an alteration so generally made affirmeth the Grecians and not unlikely to have specially respected therein the occasion which the Novatianists took at the multititude of publick Penitents to insult over the Discipline of the Church against which they still cryed out wheresoever they had time and place He that sheweth Sinners favour doth but teach the innocent to Sin And therefore they themselves admitted no man to their Communion upon any Repentance which once was known to have offended after Baptism making Sinners thereby not the fewer but the closer and the more obdurate how fair soever their pretence might seem The Grecians Canon for some one Presbyter in every Church to undertake the charge of Penitency and to receive their voluntary Confessions which had sinned after Baptism continued in force for the space of above some hundred years till Nectarius and the Bishops of Churches under him begun a second alteration abolishing even that Confession which their Penitentiaries took in private There came to the Penitentiary of the Church of Constantinople a certain Gentlewoman and to him she made particular Confession of her faults committed after Baptism whom thereupon he advised to continue in Fasting and Prayer that as with tongue she had acknowledged her Sins so there might appear likewise in her some work worthy of Repentance But the Gentlewoman goeth forward and detecteth her self of a crime whereby they were forced to dis-robe an Ecclesiastical person that is to degrade a Deacon of the same Church When the matter by this mean came to publick notice the people were in a kind of tumult offended not onely at that which was done but much more because the Church should thereby endure open infamy and scorn The Clergy was perplexed and altogether doubtfull what way to take till one Eudemon born in Alexandria but at that time a Priest in the Church of Constantinople considering that the causes of voluntary Confession whether publick or private was especially to seek the Churches ayd as hath been before declared lest men should either not communicate with others or wittingly hazard their Souls if so be they did communicate and that the inconvenience which grew to the whole Church was otherwise exceeding great but especially grievous by means of so manifold offensive detections which must needs be continually more as the world did it self wax continually worse for Antiquity together with the gravity and severity thereof saith Sozomen had already begun by little and little to degenerate into loose and careless living whereas before offences were less partly through bashfulness in them which open their own faults and partly by means of their great austerity which sate as judges in this business these things Eudaemon having weighed with himself resolved easily the mind of Nectarius that the Penitentiaries office must be taken away and for participation in Gods holy mysteries every man be left to his own Conscience which was as he thought the onely means to free the Church from danger of Obloquie and Disgrace Thus much saith Socrates I am the bolder to relate because I received it from Eudaemons own mouth to whom mine answer was at that time Whether your counsel Sir have been for the Churches good or otherwise God knoweth But I see you have given occasion whereby we shall not now any more reprehend one anothers faults nor observe that Apostolick precept which saith Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of Darknesse but rather be ye also Reprovers of them With Socrates Sozomen both agreeth in the occasion of abolishing Penitentiaries and moreover testifieth also that in his time living with the younger Theodosius the same Abolition did still continue and that the Bishops had in a manner every where followed the example given them by Nectarius Wherefore to implead the truth of this History Cardinal Baronius alledgeeth that Socrates Sozomen and Eudaemon were all Novatianists and that they falsifie in saying for so they report that as many as held the Consubstantial Being of Christ gave their assent to the abrogation of the forehearsed Canon The summe is he would have it taken for a Fable and the World to be perswaded that Nectarius did never any such thing Why then should Socrates first and afterwards Sozomen publish it To please their Pew-fellows the Disciples of Novatien A poor gratification and they very silly Friends that would take Lyes for Good-turns For the more acceptable the Matter was being deemed true the lesse they must needs when they found the contrary either credit or affect him which had deceived them Notwithstanding we know that joy and gladness rising from false information do not onely make men so forward to believe that which they first hear but also apt to scholie upon it and to report as true whatsoever they wish were true But so farr is Socrates from any such purpose that the Fact of Nectarius which others did both like and follow he doth disallow and reprove His speech to Eudemon before set down is proof sufficient that he writeth nothing but what was famously known to all
God's hands for Publick Confession the last act of Penitency was alwayes made in the form of a contrite Prayer unto God it could not be avoided but they must withall confesse what their offences were This is the opinion of their Prelate seemed from the first beginning as we may probably think to be somewhat burthensome that men whose Crimes were unknown should blaze their own Faults as it were on the Stage acquainting all the People with whatsoever they had done amisse And therefore to remedy this Inconvenience they laid the charge upon one onely Priest chosen out of such as were of best Conversation a silent and a discreet man to whom they which had offended might resort and lay open their Lives He according to the quality of every one's Transgressions appointed what they should do or suffer and left them to execute it upon themselves Can we wish a more direct and evident testimonie that the Office here spoken of was to ease voluntary Penitents from the burthen of publick Confessions and not to constrain notorious Offenders thereunto That such Offenders were not compellable to open Confessions till Novatian's time that is to say till after the dayes of Persecution under Decius the Emperour they of all men should not so peremptorily avouch which whom if Fabian Bishop of Rome who suffered Martyrdom in the first year of Decius be of any authority and credit it must inforce them to reverse their Sentence his words are so plain and clear against them For such as commit those Crimes whereof the Apostle hath said They that do them shall never inherit the Kingdom of Heaven must saith he be forced unto amendment because they slipp down to Hell if Ecclesiastical Authority stay them not Their conceit of Impossibility that one man should suffice to take the general charge of Penitency in such a Church as Constantinople hath risen from a meer erroneous supposal that the Antient manner of private Confession was like the Shrift at this day usual in the Church of Rome which tyeth all men at one certain time to make Confession whereas Confession was then neither looked for till men did offer it nor offered for the most part by any other than such as were guilty of haynous Transgressions nor to them any time appointed for that purpose Finally The drift which Sozomen had in relating the Discipline of Rome and the Form of publick Penitency there retained even till his time is not to signifie that onely publick Confession was abrogated by Nectarius but that the West or Latin Church held still one and the same Order from the very beginning and had not as the Greek first cut off publick voluntary Confession by ordaining and then private by removing Penitentiaries Wherefore to conclude It standeth I hope very plain and clear first against the one Cardinal that Nectarius did truly abrogate Confession in such sort as the Ecclesiastical History hath reported and secondly as clear against them both that it was not publick Confession onely which Nectarius did abolish The Paradox in maintenance whereof Hessels wrote purposely a Book touching this Argument to shew that Nectarius did but put the Penitentiary from his Office and not take away the Office it self is repugnant to the whole advice which Eudaemon gave of leaving the People from that time forward to their own Consciences repugnant to the Conference between Socrates and Eudamon wherein complaint is made of some inconvenience which the want of the Office would breed Finally repugnant to that which the History declareth concerning other Churches which did as Nectarius had done before them not in deposing the same man for that was impossible but in removing the same Office out of their Churches which Nectarius had banished from his For which cause Bellarmin doth well reject the opinion of Hessels howsoever it please Pamelius to admire it as a wonderful happy Invention But in sum they are all gravelled no one of them able to go smoothly away and to satisfie either others or himself with his own conceit concerning Nectarius Only in this they are stiff that Auricular Confession Nectarius did not abrogate left if so much should be acknowledged it might enforce them to grant that the Greek Church at that time held not Confession as the Latin now doth to be the part of a Sacrament instituted by our Saviour Jesus Christ which therefore the Church till the Worlds end hath no power to alter Yet seeing that as long as publick voluntary Confession of private Crimes did continue in either Church as in the one it remained not much above 200. years in the other about 400. the only acts of such Repentance were first the Offender's intimation of those Crimes to some one Presbyter for which imposition of Penance was sought Secondly the undertaking of Penance imposed by the Bishop Thirdly after the same performed and ended open Confession to God in the hearing of the whole Church Whereupon Fourthly ensued the Prayer of the Church Fifthly then the Bishop's imposition of hands and so Sixthly the Parties reconciliation or restitution to his former right in the holy Sacrament I would gladly know of them which make onely private Confession a part of their Sacrament of Penance how it could be so in those times For where the Sacrament of Penance is ministred they hold that Confession to be Sacramental which he receiveth who must absolve whereas during the fore-rehearsed manner of Penance it can no where be shewed that the Priest to whom secret information was given did reconcile or absolve any For how could he when Publick Confession was to goe before Reconciliation and Reconciliation likewise in publick thereupon to ensue â— So that if they did account any Confession Sacramental it was surely publicke which is now abolish'd in the Church of Rome and as for that which the Church of Rome doth so esteem the Ancient neither had it in such estimation nor thought it to be of so absolute necessity for the taking away of Sinne But for any thing that I could ever observe out of them although not onely in Crimes open and notorious which made men unworthy and uncapable of holy Mysteries their Discipline required first publicke Penance and then granted that which Saint Hierona mentioneth saying The Priest layeth his hand upon the Penitent and by invocation intreateth that the holy Ghost may return to him again and so after having enjoyned solemnly all the People to pray for him reconcileth to the Altar him who was delivered to Satan for the destruction of his Flesh that his Spirit might be safe in the day of the Lord. Although I say not onely in such Offences being famously known to the World but also if the same were committed secretly it was the custom of those times both that private Intimation should be given and publick Confession made thereof in which respect whereas all men did willingly the one but would as willingly have withdrawn themselves from the other
had they known how Is it tolerable saith Saint Ambrose that to sue to God thou shouldst be ashamed which blushest not to seek and sue unto Man should it grieve thee to be a Suppliant to him from whom thou canst not possibly hide thy self when to open thy sinnes to him from whom if thou wouldst thou mightest conceal them it doth not any thing at all trouble thee This thou art loath to do in the Church where all being Sinners nothing is more opprobrious indeed than concealment of sinne the most humble the best thought of and the lowliest accounted the justest All this notwithstanding we should do them very great wrong to father any such Opinion upon them as if they did teach it a thing impossible for any Sinner to reconcile himself unto God without confession unto the Priest Would Chrysostom thus perswaded have said Let the enquiry and punishment of thy offences be made in thine own thoughts Let the Tribunal whereat thou arraignest thy self be without witness Let God and only God see thee and thy Confession Would Cassianus so believing have given counsel That if any were withheld with bashfulness from discovering their Faulis to men they should be so much the more instant and constant in opening them by supplication to God himself whose wont is to help without publication of mens shame and not to upbraid them when he pardoneth Finally would Prosper settled in this Opinion have made it as touching Reconciliation to God a matter indifferent Whether men of Ecclesiastical Order did detect their crimes by confession or leaving the World ignorant thereof would separate voluntarily themselves for a time from the Altar though not in affection yet in execution of their Ministry and so bewaile their corrupt life Would he have willed them as he doth to make hold of it that the favour of God being either way recovered by fruits of forcible repentance they should not only receive whatsoever they had lost by sinne but also after this their new enfranchisement aspire to the endless joyes of that supernal City To conclude We every where finde the use of Confession especially publick allowed of and commended by the Fathers but that extream and rigorous necessity of Auricular and private Confession which is at this day so mightily upheld by the Church of Rome we finde nor First it was not then the Faith and Doctrine of God's Church as of the Papacy at this present Secondly That the onely remedy for Sinne after Baptisme is Sacramental Penitency Thirdly That Confession in secret is an essential part thereof Fourthly That God himself cannot now forgive Sin without the Priest That because Forgivenesse at the hands of the Priest must arise from Confession in the Offenders Therefore to confesse unto him is a matter of such necessity as being not either in deed or at the least in desire performed excludeth utterly from all pardon and must consequently in Scripture be commanded wheresoever any Promise or Forgivenesse is made No no these Opinions have Youth in their countenance Antiquity knew them not it never thought nor dreamed of them But to let passe the Papacy For as much as Repentance doth import alteration within the minde of a sinful man whereby through the power of God's most gracious and blessed Spirit he seeth and with unfeigned sorrow acknowledgeth former Offences committed against God hath them in utter detestation seeketh pardon for them in such sort as a Christian should doe and with a resolute purpose settleth himself to avoid them leading as near as God shall assist him for ever after an unspotted life And in the Order which Christian Religion hath taught for procurement of God's mercy towards Sinners Confession is acknowledged a principal duty Yea in some cases Confesion to man not to God onely It is not in Reformed Churches denied by the Learneder sort of Divines but that even this Confession cleared from all Errors is both lawful and behoveful for Gods people Confession by man being either Private or Publick Private Confession to the Minister alone touching secret Crimes or Absolution thereupon ensuing as the one so the other is neither practised by the French Discipline nor used in any of those Churches which have been cast by the French mould Open Confession to be made in the face of the whole Congregation by notorious Malefactors they hold necessary Howbeit not necessary towards the remission of Sinnes But only in some sort to content the Church and that one man's repentance may seem to strengthen many which before have been weakned by one man's fall Saxonians and Bohemians in their Discipline constrain no man to open Confession Their Doctrine is That whose Faults have been Publick and thereby scandalous unto the World such when God giveth them the Spirit of Repentance ought as solemnly to return as they have openly gone astray First for the better testimony of their own unfeigned Conversion unto God Secondly the more to notifie their Reconcilement unto the Church And Lastly that others may make benefit of their Example But concerning Confession in private the Churches of Germany as well the rest as Lutherans agree that all men should at certain times confesse their Offences to God in the hearing of Gods Ministers thereby to shew how their Sinnes displease them to receive instruction for the warier carriage of themselves hereafter to be soundly resolved if any scruple or snare of Conscience do entangle their mindes and which is most material to the end that men may at Gods hands seek every one his own particular pardon through the power of those Keys which the Minister of God using according to our blessed Saviours Institution in that case it is their part to accept the benefit thereof as Gods most merciful Ordinance for their good and without any distrust or doubt to embrace joyfully his Grace so given them according to the Word of our Lord which hath said Whose Sinnes ye remit they are remitted So that grounding upon this assured Belief they are to rest with mindes encouraged and perswaded concerning the forgiveness of all their Sinnes as out of Christ's own Word and Power by the Ministry of the Keyes It standeth with us in the Church of England as touching Publick Confession thus First seeing day by day we in our Church begin our Publick Prayers to Almighty God with Publick acknowledgement of our Sinnes in which Confession every man prostrate as it were before his glorious Majesty cryeth against himself and the Minister with one Sentence pronounceth universally all clear whose acknowledgement so made hath proceeded from a true penitent minde What reason is there every man should not under the general terms of Confession represent to himself his own Particulars whatsoever and adjoyning thereunto that affection which a contrite spirit worketh embrace to as full effect the words of Divine Grace as if the same were severally and particularly uttered with addition of Prayers imposition of hands or all
life Whether it were covetousness or sensuality in their lives absurdity or error in their teaching any breach of the laws and Canons of the Church wherein he espied them faulty certain and sure they were to be thereof most plainly told Which thing they whose dealings were justly culpable could not bear but instead of amending their faults bent their hatred against him who sought their amendment till at length they drove him by extremity of infestation through weariness of striving against their injuries to leave both them and with them the Church Amongst the manifold accusations either generally intended against the Bishops of this our Church or laid particularly to the charge of any of them I cannot find that hitherto their spitefullest adversaries have been able to say justly that any man for telling them their personal faults in good and Christian sort hath sustained in that respect much persecution Wherefore notwithstanding mine own inferior estate and calling in Gods Church the consideration whereof assureth me that in this kind the sweetest Sacrifice which I can offer unto Christ is meek Obedience reverence and aw unto the Prelates which he hath placed in seats of higher Authority over me emboldned I am so far as may conveniently stand with that duty of humble subjection meekly to crave my good L L. your favourable pardon if it shall seem a fault thus far to presume or if otherwise your wonted courteous acceptation AEneid l. 12. Sinite hat haud mollia fatu Sublatis aperite dolis In government be it of what kind soever but especially if it be such kind of Government as Prelates have over the Church there is not one thing publiquely more hurtful then that an hard opinion should be conceived of Governors at the first and a good opinion how should the World ever conceive of them for their after-proceedings in Regiment whose first access and entrance thereunto giveth just occasion to think them corrupt men which fear not that God in whose name they are to rule Wherefore a scandalous thing it is to the Church of God and to the Actors themselves dangerous to have aspired unto rooms of Prelacy by wicked means We are not at this day troubled much with that tumultuous kind of ambition wherewith the elections of Damasus in S. Ieromes age and of Maximus in Gregories time and of others were long sithence stained Our greatest fear is rather the evil which Leo and Anthemius did by Imperial constitution endeavour as much as in them by to prevent He which granteth or he which receiveth the office and dignity of a Bishop otherwise then beseemeth a thing Divine and most holy he which bestoweth and he which obteineth it after any other sort then were honest and lawful to use if our Lord Jesus Christ were present himself on earth to bestow it even with his own hands sinneth a sin by so much more grievous then the sin of Balshazar by how much Offices and Functions heavenly are more precious then the meanest ornaments or implements which thereunto appertain If it be as the Apostle saith that the Holy Ghost doth make Bishops and that the whole action of making them is Gods own deed men being therein but his Agents what spark of the fear of God can there possibly remain in their hearts who representing the person of God in naming worthy men to Ecclesiastial charge do sell that which in his name they are to bestow or who standing as it were at the Throne of the Living God do bargain for that which at his hands they are to receive Wo worth such impious and irreligious prophanations The Church of Christ hath been hereby made not a den of thieves but in a manner the very dwelling place of soul spirits for undoubtedly such a number of them have been in all ages who thus have climbed into the seat of Episcopal Regiment 2. Men may by orderly means be invested with spiritual Authority and yet do harm by reason of ignorance how to use it to the good of the Church It is saith Chrysostom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a thing highly to be accompted of but a hard thing to be that which a Bishop should be Yea a hard and a toilsom thing it is for a Bishop to know the things that belong unto a Bishop A right good man may be a very unfit Magistrate And for discharge of a Bishops Office to be well minded is not enough no not to be well learned also Skill to instruct is a thing necessary skill to govern much more necessary in a Bishop It is not safe for the Church of Christ when Pishops learn what belongeth unto Government as Empericks learn physick by killing of the sick Bishops were wont to be men of great learning in the Laws both Civil and of the Church and while they were so the wisest men in the land for Counsel and Government were Bishops 3. Know we never so well what belongeth unto a charge of so great moment yet can we not therein proceed but with hazard of publique detriment if we relye on our selves alone and use not the benefit of conference with others A singular mean to unity and concord amongst themselves a marvellous help unto uniformity in their dealings no small addition of weight and credit unto that which they do a strong bridle unto such as watch for occasions to stir against them finally a very great stay unto all that are under their Government it could not chuse but be soon found if Bishops did often and seriously use the help of mutual consultation These three rehearsed are things onely preparatory unto the course of Episcopal proceedings But the hurt is more manifestly seen which doth grow to the Church of God by faults inherent in their several actions as when they carelesly Ordein when they Institute negligently when corruptly they bestow Church-Livings Benefices Prebends and rooms especially of Jurisdiction when they visit for gain-sake rather then with serious intent to do good when their Courts erected for the maintenance of good Order are disordered when they regard not the Clergy under them when neither Clergy nor Laity are kept in that aw for which this authority should serve when any thing appeareth in them rather then a fatherly affection towards the flock of Christ when they have no respect to posterity and finally when they neglect the true and requisite means whereby their authority should be upheld Surely the hurt which groweth out of these defects must needs be exceeding great In a Minister ignorance and disability to teach is a maim nor is it held a thing allowable to ordain such were it not for the avoiding of a greater evil which the Church must needs sustain if in so great scarcity of able men and unsufficiency of most Parishes throughout the Land to maintain them both publick Prayer and the Administration of Sacraments should rather want then any man thereunto be admitted lacking dexterity and skill to perform that which
who care not to overthrow all posterity so they may purchase a few days of Ignominious safety unto themselves and their present estates if it may be termed a safety which tendeth so fast unto their very overthrow that are the Purchasers of it in so vile and base manner Men whom it standeth upon to uphold a reverend estimation of themselves in the minds of others without which the very best things they do are hardly able to escape disgrace must before it be over-late remember how much easier it is to retain credit once gotten then to recover it being lost The Executors of Bishops are sued if their Mansion-house be suffered to go to decay But whom shall their Successors sue for the dilapidations which they make of that Credit the unrepaired diminutions whereof will in time bring to pass that they which would most do good in that calling shall not be able by reason of prejudice generally setled in the minds of all sorts against them By what means their estimation hath hitherto decayed it is no hard thing to discern Herod and Archelaus are noted to have sought out purposely the dullest and most ignoble that could be found amongst the people preferring such to the High-Priests Office thereby to abate the great opinion which the multitude had of that Order and to procure a more expedite course for their own wicked Counsels whereunto they saw the High-Priests were no small impediment as long as the common sort did much depend upon them It may be there hath been partly some show and just suspition of like practice in some in procuring the undeserved preferments of some unworthy persons the very cause of whose advancement hath been principally their unworthiness to be advanced But neither could this be done altogether without the inexcusable fault of some preferred before and so oft we cannot imagine it to have been done that either onely or chiefly from thence this decay of their estimation may be thought to grow Somewhat it is that the malice of their cunning Adversaries but much more which themselves have effected against themselves A Bishops estimation doth grow from the excellency of vertues suitable unto his place Unto the place of a Bishop those high Divine Vertues are judged suitable which vertues being not easily found in other sorts of greatmen do make him appear so much the greater in whom they are found Devotion and the feeling sense of Religion are not usual in the noblest wisest and chiefest Personages of State by reason their wits are so much imployed another way and their mindes so seldom conversant in heavenly things If therefore wherein themselves are defective they see that Bishops do blessedly excel it frameth secretly their-hearts to a stooping kinde of disposition clean opposite to contempt The very countenance of Moses was glorious after that God had conferred with him And where Bishops are the powers and faculties of whose souls God hath possest those very actions the kind whereof is common unto them with other men have notwithstanding in them a more high and heavenly form which draweth correspondentestimation unto it by vertue of that celestial impression which deep meditation of holy things and as it were conversation with God doth leave in their mindes So that Bishops which will be esteemed of as they ought must frame themselves to that very pattern from whence those Asian Bishops unto whom St. Iohn writeth were denominated even so far forth as this our frailty will permit shine they must as Angels of God in the midst of perverse men They are not to look that the world should always carry the affection of Constantine to bury that which might derogate from them and to cover their imbecillities More then high time it is that they bethink themselves of the Apostles admonition Attende tibi Have a vigilant eye to thy self They erre if they do not perswade themselves that wheresoever they walk or sit be it in their Churches or in their Consistories abmad or at home at their Tables or in their Closets they are in the midst of snares laid for them Wherefore as they are with the Prophet every one of them to make it their hourly prayer unto God Lead me O Lord in thy righteousness because of enemies so it is not safe for them no not for a moment to slacken their industry in seeking every way that estimation which may further their labours unto the Churches good Absurdity though but in words must needs he this way a maim where nothing but wisdom gravity and judgement is looked for That which the son of Syrach hath concerning the Writings of the old Sages Wise sentences are found in them should be the proper mark and character of Bishops speeches whose lips as doors are not to be opened but for egress of instruction and sound knowledge If base servility and dejection of minde be ever espied in them how should men esteem them as worthy the rooms of the great Ambassadors of God A wretched desire to gain by bad and unseemly means standeth not with a mean mans credit much less with that reputation which Fathers of the Church should be in But if besides all this there be also coldness in works of Piety and Charity utter contempt even of Learning it self no care to further it by any such helps as they easily might and ought to afford no not as much as that due respect unto their very Families about them which all men that are of account do order as neer as they can in such sort that no grievous offensive deformity be therein noted if there still continue in that most Reverend Order such as by so many Engines work day and night to pull down the whole frame of their own estimation amongst men some of the rest secretly also permitting others their industrious opposites every day more and more to seduce the multitude how should the Church of God hope for great good at their hands What we have spoken concerning these things let not malicious accusers think themselves therewith justified no more then Shimei was by his Soveraigns most humble and meek acknowledgment even of that very crime which so impudent a Caitiffs tongue upbraided him withal the one in the virulent rancour of a canckred affection took that delight for the present which in the end did turn to his own more tormenting wo the other in the contrite patience even of deserved malediction had yet this comfort It may be the Lord will look on mine affliction and do we good for his cursing this day As for us over whom Christ hath placed them to be chiefest Guides and Pastors of our souls our common fault is that we look for much more in our Governors then a tolerable sufficiency can yield and bear much less then Humanity and Reason do require we should Too much perfection over rigoâ—ously exacted in them cannot but breed in us perpetual discontentment and on both parts cause all things to be unpleasant It
Dominion over the whole Church of Christ militant doth and that by divine right appertain to the Pope of Rome They did prove it lawful to grant unto others besides Christ the power of Headship in a different kinde from his but they should have proved it lawful to challenge as they did to the Bishop of Rome a Power universal in that different kinde Their fault was therefore in exacting wrongfully so great Power as they challenged in that kinde and not in making two kindes of Power unless some reasons can be shewed for which this distinction of Power should be thought erroneous and false A little they stirr although in vain to prove that we cannot with truth make such distinction of Power whereof the one kinde should agree unto Christ onely and the other be further communicated Thus therefore they argue If there be no Head but Christ in respect of Spiritual Government there is no Head but be in respect of the Word Sacraments and Discipline administred by those whom he hath appointed for as much also as it is his Spiritual Government Their meaning is that whereas we make two kindes of Power of which two the one being Spiritual is proper unto Christ the other men are capable of because it is visible and external We do amiss altogether in distinguishing they think forasmuch as the visible and external power of Regiment over the Church is onely in relation unto the Word Sacraments and Discipline administred by such as Christ hath appointed thereunto and the exercise of this Power is also his Spiritual Government Therefore we do but vainly imagin a visible and external Power in the Church differing from his Spiritual Power Such Disputes as this do somewhat resemble the practising of Well-willers upon their Friends in the pangs of Death whose maner is even their to put smoak in their Nostrils and so to fetch them again alhough they know it a matter impossible to keep them living The kinde of affecton which the Favourers of this laboring cause bear towards it will not suffer them to se it dye although by what means they should make it live they do not see but thy may see that these wrestlings will not help Can they be ignorant how little it boteth to overcast so clear a light with some mist of ambiguity in the name of Spiritual Râ—iment To make things therefore so plain that henceforward a Childes capacity ma serve rightly to conceive our meaning we make the Spiritual Regiment of Christ to â—e generally that whereby his Church is ruled and governed in things Spiritual Of this general we make two distinct kindes the one invisible exercised by Christ himself in his own Person the other outwardly administred by them whom Christ doth allow to be Rulers and Guiders of his Church Touching the former of these two kindes we teach that Christ in regard thereof is particularly termed the Head of the Church of God neither can any other Creature in that sense and meaning be termed Head besides him because it importeth the conduct and government of our Souls by the hand of that blessed Spirit wherewith we are sealed and marked as being peculiarly his Him onely therefore do we acknowledge to be the Lord which dwelleth liveth and reigneth in our hearts him only to be that Head which giveth salvation and life unto his Body him onely to be that Fountain from whence the influence of heavenly Graces distilleth and is derived into all parts whether the Word or the Sacraments or Discipline or whatsoever be the means whereby it floweth As for the Power of administring these things in the Church of Christ which Power we call the Power of Order it is indeed both Spiritual and His Spiritual because such properly concerns as the Spirit His because by him it was instituted Howbeit neither Spiritual as that which is inwardly and invisibly exercised nor His as that which he himself in Person doth exercise Again that power of Dominion which is indeed the point of this Controversie and doth also belong to the second kinde of Spiritual Government namely unto that Regiment which is external and visible this likewise being Spiritual in regard of the manner about which it dealeth and being his in as much as he approveth whatsoever is done by it must notwithstanding be distinguished also from that Power whereby he himself in Person administreth the former kinde of his own Spiritual Regiment because he himself in Person doth not administer this we do not therefore vainly imagine but truly and rightly discern a Power external and visible in the Church exercised by men and severed in nature from that Spiritual Power of Christ's own Regiment which Power is termed Spiritual because it worketh secretly inwardly and invisibly His because none doth nor can it personally exercise either besides or together with him seeing that him onely we may name our Head in regard of His and yet in regard of that other Power from this term others also besides him Heads without any contradiction at all which thing may very well serve for answer unto that also which they further alledge against the aforesaid distinction namely That even the outward Societies and Assemblies of the Church where one or two are gathered together in his Name either for hearing of the Word or for Prayer or any other Church-exercise our Saviour Christ being in the midst of them as Mediatour must be their Head and if he be not there idle but doing the Office of a Head fully it followeth that even in the outward Societies and Meetings of the Church no more man can be called the Head of it seeing that our Saviour Christ doing the whole Office of the Head himself alone leaveth nothing to men by doing whereof they may obtain that Title Which Objection I take as being made for nothing but onely to maintain Argument for they are not so farr gone as to argue this in sooth and right good earnest God standeth saith the Psalmist in the midst of gods if God be there present he must undoubtedly be present as God if he be not there idle but doing the Office of a God fully it followeth that God himself alone doing the whole Office of a God leaveth nothing in such Assemblies to any other by doing whereof they may obtain so high a Name The Psalmist therefore hath spoken amiss and doth ill to call Judges Gods Not so for as God hath his Office differing from theirs and doth fully discharge it even in the midst of them so they are not hereby excluded from all kinde of Duty for which that Name should be given into them also but in that Duty for which it was given them they are encouraged Religiously and carefully to order themselves after the self-same manner Our Lord and Saviour being in the midst of his Church as Head is our comfort without the abridgement of any one duty for performance whereof others are termed Headsm another kinde than he is
labouring and suing for Places and Charges in the Church is not lawful Further whereas at the suit of the Church some of your Honours entertained the Cause and brought it to a near issue that there seemed nothing to remain but the commendation of my Lord the Archbishop of Canterbury when as he could not be satisfied but by my subscribing to his late Articles and that my Answer agreeing to subscribe according to any Law and to the Statute provided in that Case but praying to be respited for subscribing to any other which I could not in Conscience do either for the Temple which otherwise he said he would not commend me to nor for any other Place in the Church did so little please my Lord Archbishop as he resolved that otherwise I should not be commended to it I had utterly here no cause of offence against Mr. Hooker whom I did in no sort esteem to have prevented or undermined me but that God disposed of me as it pleased him by such means and occasions as I have declared Moreover as I have taken no cause of offence at Mr. Hooker for being preferred so there were many Witnesses that I was glad that the place was given him hoping to live in all godly peace and comfort with him both for acquaintance and good-will which hath been between us and for some kinde of affinity in the marriage of his nearest kindred and mine Since his comming I have so carefully endeavoured to entertain all good correspondence and agreement with him as I think he himself will bear me witness of many earnest Disputations and Conferences with him about the matter the rather because that contrary to my expectation he inclined from the beginning but smally thereunto but joyned rather with such as had always opposed themselves to any good order in this Charge and made themselves to be brought indisposed to his present state and proceedings For both knowing that God's Commandement charged me with such Duty and discerning how much on peace might further the good service of God and his Church and the mutual comfort of us both I had resolved constantly to seek for Peace and though it should flye from me as I saw it did by means of some who little desired to see the good of our Church yet according to the rule of God's Word to follow after it Which being so as hereof I take God to witnesse who searcheth the heart and reins and who by his Son will judge the World both quick and dead I hope no charitable Judgement can suppose me to have stood evil-affected towards him for his Place or desirous to fall into any Controversie with him Which my resolution I pursued that whereas I discovered sundry unsound matters in his Doctrine as many of his Sermons tasted of some sour leaven or other yet thus I carried my self towards him Matters of smaller weight and so covertly discovered that no great offence to the Church was to be feared in them I wholly passed by as one that discerned nothing of them or had been unfurnished of replies for others of great moment and so openly delivered as there was just cause of fear left the Truth and Church of God should be prejudiced and perilled by it and such as the Conscience of my Duty and Calling would not suffer me altogether to pass over this was my course to deliver when I should have just cause by my Text the truth of such Doctrine as he lead otherwise taught in general speeches without touch of his Person in any sort and further at convenient opportunity to conferr with him in such points According to which determination whereas he had taught certain things concerning Predestination otherwise than the Word of God doth as it is understood by all Churches professing the Gospel and not unlike that wherewith Coranus sometimes troubled his Church I both delivered the truth of such points in a general Doctrine without any touch of him in particular and conferred with him also privately upon such Articles In which Conference I remember when I urged the consent of all Churches and good Writers against him that I knew and desired if it were otherwise What Authors he had seen of such Doctrine He answered me That his best Author was his own Reason which I wished him to take heed of as a matter standing with Christian modesty and wisdom in a Doctrine not received by the Church not to trust to his own Judgment so farr as to publish it before he had conferred with others of his Profession labouring by daily Prayer and Study to know the will of God as he did to see how they understood such Doctrine Notwithstanding he with wavering replyed That he would some other time deal more largely in the matter I wished him and prayed him not so to do for the peace of the Church which by such means might be hazarded seeing he could not but think that men who make any Couscience of their Ministerie will judge it a necessarie dutie in them to teach the truth and to convince the contrarie Another time upon like occasion of this Doctrine of his That the assurance of that we believe by the Word is not so certain as of that we perceive by sense I both taught the Doctrine otherwise namely the assurance of Faith to be greater which assured both of things above and contrarie to all sense and human understanding and dealt with him also privately upon that point According to which course of late when as he had taught That the Church of Rome is a true Church of Christ and a sanctified Church by profession of that Truth which God both revealed unto us by his Son though not a part and perfect Church and further That be doubted not but that thousands of the Fathers which lived and dyed in the Superstitions of that Church were saved because of their ignorance which excuseth them mis-alledging to that end a Text of Scripture to prove it The matter being ofset purpose openly and at large handled by him and of that moment that might prejudice the Faith of Christ encourage the ill-affected to continue still in their damnable ways and others weak in Faith to suffer themselves easily to be seduced to the destruction of their Souls I thought it my most bounden duty of God and to his Church whilst I might have opportunitie to speak with him to teach the Truth in a general speech in such points of Doctrine At which time I taught That such as dye or have died at any time in the Church of Rome holding in their ignorance that Faith which is taught in it and namely Iustification in part by Works could not be said by the Scriptures to be saved In which matter foreseeing that if I waded not warily in it I should be in danger to be reported as hath fallen out since notwithstanding to condemn all the Fathers I said directly and plainly to all mens understanding That it was not indeed to be
Children from the Cradle to be his Cardinals He hath fawned upon the Kings and Princes of the Earth and by Spiritual Cozenage hath made them sell their lawful Authority and Jurisdiction for Titles of Catholicus Christianissimus Defensor Fidei and such like he hath proclaimed sale of Pardons to inveigle the ignorant built Seminaries to allure young men desirous of Learning erected Stews to gather the dissolute unto him This is the Rock whereupon his Church is built Hereby the man is grown huge and strong like the Cedars which are not shaken with the winde because Princes have been as Children over-tender hearted and could not resist Hereby it is come to pass as you see this day that the Man of Sinne doth war against us not by men of a Language which we cannot understand but he cometh as Iereboam against Iudah and bringeth the fruit of our own Bodies to eat us up that the bowels of the Childe may be made the Mother's grave and hath caused no small number of our Brethren to forsake their Native Countrey and with all disloyalty to cast off the yoke of their Allegiance to our dread Soveraign whom God in mercy hath set over them for whose safeguard if they carried not the hearts of Tygers in the bosomes of men they would think the dearest blood in their Bodies well spent But now saith Abiah to Ieroboam Ye think ye be able to resist the Kingdom of the Lord which is in the hands of the Sonnes of David Ye be a great multitude the golden Calves are with you which Ieroboam made you for gods Have ye not driven away the Priests of the Lord the Sons of Aaron and the Levites and have made you Priests like the People of Nations Whosoever cometh with a young Bullock and seven Rams the same may be a Priest of them that are no gods If I should follow the Comparison and here uncover the Cup of those deadly and ugly Abominations wherewith this Ieroboam of whom we speak hath made the Earth so drunk that it hath retled under us I know your godly Hearts would loath to see them For my own part I delight not to take in such filth I had rather take a Garment upon my Shoulders and go with my face from them to cover them The Lord open their Eyes and cause them if it be possible at the length to see how they are wretched and miserable and poor and blinde and naked Put it O Lord in their hearts to seek white Rayment and to cover themselves that their filthy nakednesse may no longer appear For beloved in Christ we bow our Knees and lift up our hands to Heaven in our Chambers secretly and openly in our Churches we pray heartily and hourly even for them also though the Pope hath given out as a Judge in a solemn Declaratory Sentence of Excommunication against this Land That our gracious Lady hath quite abolished Prayers within her Realm and his Scholars whom he hath taken from the midst of us have in their published Writings charged us nor onely nor to have any holy Assemblies unto the Lord for Prayer but to hold a Common School of Sinne and Flattery to hold Sacriledge to be God's Service Unfaithfulnesse and breach of Promise to God to give it to a Strumpet to be a Vertue to abandon Fasting to abhor Confession to mislike with Penance to like well of Usury to charge none with restitution to finde no good before God in single life not in no well-working that all men as they fall to us are much worse and more than afore corrupted I do not add one word or syllable unto that which Mr. Bristow a man both born and sworn amongst us hath taught his hand to deliver to the view of all I appeal to the Conscience of every Soul that hath been truly converted by us Whether his heart were never raised up to God by our Preaching Whether the words of our Exhortation never wâ—â—â—g any tear of a penitent heart from his eys Whether his Soul never reaped any joy and comfort any consolation in Christ Jesus by our Sacraments and Prayers and Psalms and Thanksgiving Whether he were never bettered but always worsed by us O merciful God! If Heaven and Earth in this case do not witness with us and against them let us be razed out from the Land of the Living Let the Earth on which we stand swallow us quick as it hath done Corah Dathan and Abiram But if we belong unto the Lord our God and have not forsaken him if our Priests the Sons of Aaron minister unto the Lord and the Levites in their Office if we offer unto the Lord every morning and every evening the Burnt-offerings and sweet Incense of Prayers and Thanksgiving if the Bread be set in order upon the pure Table and the Candlestick of Gold with the Lamps thereof burn every morning that is to say if amongst us God's blessed Sacraments be duly administred his holy Word sincerely and daily preached if we keep the Watch of the Lord our God and if ye have forsaken him then doubt ye not this God is with us as a Captain his Priests with sounding Trumpets must cry alarm against you O ye Children of Israel fight not against the Lord God of your Fathers for ye shall not prosper THE SECOND SERMON Epist. JUDE Verse 17 18 19 20 21. But ye beloved remember the words which were spoken before of the Apostles of our Lord Iesus Christ How that they told you that there should be Mockers in the last time which should walk after their own ungodly lusts These are makers of Sects fleshly having not the Spirit But ye beloved edifie your selves in your most holy Faith praying in the Holy Ghost And keep your selves in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Iesus Christ unto eternal life HAving otherwhere spoken of the words of Saint Iude going next before concerning Mockers which should come in the last time and Backsliders which even then should fall away from the Faith of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ I am now by the aide of Almighty God and through the assistance of his good Spirit to lay before you the words of Exhortation which I have read 2. Wherein first of all whosoever hath an eye to see let him open it and he shall well perceive how careful the Lord is for his Children how desirous to see them profit and grow up to a manly stature in Christ how loath to have them any way mis-led either by examples of the wicked or by inticements of the world and by provocation of the flesh or by any other means forcible to deceive them and likely to estrange their hearts from God For God is not at that point with us that he careth not whether we sink or swim No he hath written our names in the Palm of his Hand in the Signet upon his Finger are we graven in Sentences not onely of Mercy but
measure but verily I believe there shall be found more than a third part of the Prayers which are not Psalms and texts of Scripture spent in praying for and praying against the commodities and incommodities of this life which is contrary to all the Arguments or Contents of the Prayers of the Church sit down in the Scripture but especially of our Saviour Christs Prayer by the which ours ought to be directed T. C. l. 1. p. 135. What a reason is this we must rep at the Lords Prayer oftentimes therefore oftentimes in half an hour and one in the neck of another Our Saviour Christ doth not there give a prescript Forme of Prayer whereunto he bindeth us but giveth us a Rule and Squire to frame all our Prayers by I know it is necessary to Pray and Pray often I know also that in a few words it is impossible for any man to frame so pithy a Prayer and I confess that the Church doth well in concluding their Prayers with the Lords Prayer But I stand upon this Thee there is no necessity laid upon us to use these very words and no more T. C. lib. 1. pag. 219. Praemisse legitima ordinaria oratione quasi fundamento accidentium jus est desideriorum jus est superstruendi extrinsecus petitioner Terâ—ol de Orat Luke 11. 1. Cypr. in Orat Dom. The Peoples trying after the Minister Another fault is That all the people are appointed in divers places to say after the Minister whereby not only the time is unprofitably wasted and a confused noise of the people one speaking after another caused but an Opinion bred in their hearts that those only be their Prayers which they pronounce with their own mouths after the Minister otherwise than the order which is left to the Church doth bear 1 Cor. 14. 16. and otherwise than Iustin Martyr sheweth the custom of the Churches to have been in his time T. C. l. 1 p. 139. l. 3. p. 211 212 213. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil. Pâ—â—s in Pral 1 Cor. 14. 15. Our manner of reading the Psalms otherwise then the rest of the Scripture They have always the same profit to be stuâ—ied in to be read and preached upon which ether Scriptures have and this above the rest that they are to be sung * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Diâ—nys Hierar Eccles. cap. 3. But to make daily Prayers of them hand-over-head or otherwise then the present estate wherein we he doth agree with the maner contained in them is an abusing of them T. C. lâ— 3. pag. 206. Of Musick with Psalms * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil. in Psal. Of singing or saying Psalms and other parts of Common Prayer wherein the People and Minister answer one another by course For the singing of Psalms by course and side after side although it be very ancient yet it is not commendable and so much the mere to be suspected for that the Devil hath gone about to get it so great Authority partly by deriving it from Ignatius time and partly in making the World believe that this came from Heaven and that the Angels were heard to sing after this sort Which as it is a meer Fable so is it confuted by Historiographers whereof some ascribe the beginning of this to Damasus some other unto Flavianus and Diodorus T. C. lib. 1. p. 203. a Exod. 19. â— Is 24.3 Deut. 3. 27. 26. 17. Josh. 24.16 b Socrat. Hist. Eccles. lib. 6. cap. 8. a Theod. lib. 2 cap. 24. b Plat. in vitâ— Damasi c Bene mari plerunque comparatur Ecclesia quae primo ingredientis populi agmine totis vestibulis undas comit deinde in oratione totius plebis tanquam undis â—efl â—ensibâ—s strides cum responsuriis Psalmorum canruvinocura mulierum virginum parvulorum consonus undatum stragor resulta Hexam lib. 2. cap. 5. d Basil. Epist. 63. e Plin. secund Epist lib. 10. cp 97. Exod 15. 1. 21. Isai. 6. 3. * From whence soever it came it cannot he good considering that when it is granted that all the people may praise God as it is in singing of Psalms then this ought no to be restrained unto a few and where it is lawful both with heart and voice tosing the whole Psalm there it is not meet that they should sing but the one half with their heart and voice and the other with their heart onely For where they may both with heart and voice sing â—iâ—eâ— the heart is not enough Therefore besides the incommodity which cometh this way in that being tossed after this sort men cannot understand what is sung those other two inconveniences come of this form of singing and therefore it is vanished in all Reformed Churches T. C. lib. 1. p. 103. Ephes. 5. 19. Of Magnificat Benedictus and Nunc dimittis These Thanksgivings were made by occasion of certain particular beâ—â—â—â—e and are no more to be used for ordinary Prayers then the Ave-Maria So that both for this cause and the other before alledged of the Psalms it is not convenient in make ordinary prayers of them T. C. lib. 3. p. 208. 2 Chro. 29.30 Of the Leâ—any a We pray for the avoiding of those dangâ—â—â— which are nothing near us as from Lightning and Thundring in the midst of Winter from Storms and Tempest when the Weather is most fair and the Seas most calm It is true That upon some urgent Calamity a Prayer may and ought to be framed which may beg either the community for want whereof the Church is in distress â—â— the turning away of that mischief which either approacheth or is already upon it But to make those Prayers which are for the present time and danger ordinary and daily Prayers I cannot hitherto see any either Scripture or example of the Primitive Church And here for the simples sake I will set down after what â—urâ— this abuse crept into the Church There was one Mamericus Bishop of Vienna which in the time of great Earth-quakes which were in France instituted certain Supplications which the Grecians and we of them call the Letany which concerned â—hat matter There is no doubt but as other discommodities rose in other Countries they likewise had Prayers accordingly Now Pope Gregory either made himself or gathered the Supplications that were made against the Calamities of every Country and made of them a great Letany or Supplication as Platina calleth in and gave it to be used in all Churches which thing albeit all Churches might do for the time in respect of the case of the Calamity which the Churches suffered yet there is no cause why it should be perpetual that was ordained but for a time â— and why all Lands should pray to be delivered from the Incommodities that some Land hath been troubled with T. C. lib 1. pag. 137. â— Exod. 15.30 Wild. 10. 20. 2 Sam. 6. 1. 1 Chron. 13.4 2 Chron. 20. 3. Joel 1. 1â— b Tertul. lib. â— ad Exor c Terent. Andr. d Hier. Epist.
for the Children unto Dog and he bringeth into the Pasture which is provided for the Sheep Swine and unclean Beasts contrary to the Faith and Trust that ought to be in a Steward of the Lords House as he is For albeit that I doubt not but many of those which are now Papists pertain to the Election of God which God also in his good time will call to the knowledge of his Truth Yet notwithstanding they ought to be unto the Minister and unto the Church touching the Ministring of Sacraments as Strangers and as unclean Beasts The Ministring of the holy Sacraments unto them is a Declaration and Seal of Gods favor and reconciliation with them and a plain Preaching partly that they be washâ—d already from their sin partly that they are of the Houshold of God and such as the Lord will feed to Eternal Life which is not lawful to be done unto those which are not of the Houshold of Faith And therefore I conclude That the compelling of Papists unto the Communion and the dismissing and letting of them go when as they be to be punished for their stubbornness in Popery with this condition if they will receive the Communion is very unlawful when as although they would receive it yet they ought to be kept back till such time as by their Religious and Gospel-like behavior c. T. C. lib. 1. pag. 147. 2 Chro. 30.13 Psal 12â— 1. Luk. 14. 23. T. C. lib 1. pag. 145. a 1 Cor. 15. 21. b Phil. 3. 11. c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 d 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theophyl 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ammon Vide 1 Thes. 4. 17. d Maturatae Resurrection 's laethunila solemnia Cypr. de Coea Deut. cap. 1â— e 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat. Epist. ad Ephes Iren. lib. 4. cap. 34. f Eâ—st â—ih I serile murandum est ex solemnibus tamen ubi aequiras evidens praser sâ—â—irâ—iendum est Lib. 183. ff de Reg. Jur. Of Festival Days and the Natural cause of their convenient Institution 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hippâ—â— l. qua Praterproâ—â— in â—â—abitur Exod. 3. 5. Psal. 118 24. Ecclus. 33. 5. The manner of celebrating Festival Days a Grande vialrâ—â—cer octiciurn seces se choros in pub licurn endurete vicatim epuiaâ— ebitatem taâ—â—rna â—alun â—ole â—â—â— vino lucâ—â— cugrâ—e catervarim cursirare ad injurias ad iniurin ad impuâ—â—citias ad Iâ—biâ—inis illecebras Siccine exprimiâ—â— publicum qanâ—inst per publicum dedecus Tert. Apol. â—p 35. Dies sellos Majestiri altiâ—same dedicarâ—s â—ulli â—â—â—â—â—us voluptatiâ—â—tes accupâ—ri â—l 12. tit 12. lib. 1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thess. â—â—â—iraâ— liâ—iâ— Ser. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Philo. lib. de Abâ—aba Deut. 15. 14. Nehe 8. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist. 1 Chro. 23.30 Esâ—h 9. 27. Joh. 10. 21. 1 Mac. 4. 3â— Gal 4. 10. Si omnem la torum devotionem temporum dierum menlium annorum eralis Apostolus ear Pâ—neta celebramus nanca cireâ—â— in mense primo Cur quinquagiâ—ta â—xinde â—â—â—bus in omai exulrainne decuâ—rimiâ— Lib adver Psyth Aug. de Civir Dci lib 10. cap. 4. Luk 1. 25. Luk. 2. 21. Exceptions against our keeping of other Festival days besides the Sabbath T. C. lib. 6. pag. 151. If they had been never abused neither by the Papists nor by the Jews as they have been and are daily yet such making of Holidays is never without some great danger of bringing in some evil and currupt opinions into the mindes of men I will use an example in one and that the chief of Holidays and most generally and of longest time observed in the Church which is the Feast of Easter which was kept of some more days of some sewer How many thousands are there I will not say of the ignorant Papists but of those also which profess the Gospel which when they have celebrated those days with diligent heed taken unto their life and with some earnest devotion in praying and hearing the Word of God do not by and by think that they have well celebrated the Feast of Easter and yet have they thus notably deceived themselves For Saint Paul reacheth 1 Cor. 5. 8. That the celebrating of the Feast of the Christians Easter is not as the Jews was for certain days but sheweth That we must keep this Feast all the days of our life in the Unleavened Bread of Sincerity and of Truth By which we see that the observing of the Feast of Easter for certain days in the year doth pull out of our mindes ere ever we he aware the Doctrine of the Gospel and causeth us to rest in that near consideration of our duties for the space of a few days which should be extended in all our life * T. C. lib. 1. Pag. 152. I confess that it is in the power of the Church to appoint so many days in the Week or in the Year in the which the Congregation shall assemble to hear the Word of God and receive the Sacraments and offer up Prayers unto God as it shall â—hink sâ—â—l according to the Rules which are before alledged But that it hath power to make so many Holidays as we have wherein men are commanded to â—â—â—se from their daily Vocation ofâ— lâ—ughing and exercising their Malieâ—â—â—s â—â—â— 1 dâ—ny to be in the power of the Church For proof whereof I will take the Fourth Commandment and no other interpretation of it then Mr. Doctor alloweth of which is That God lirâ—â—oâ—â—th and leaâ—eth it at the liberty of every man to work six days in the Week so that he rest the Seventh day Seeing therefore that the Lord hath lest it to all Men at Liberty that they might Labor if they think good Six days I say the Church nor no Man can take this Liberty away from them and drive them to a necessary Rest of the â—â—â—ly And if it be lawful to abridge the Liberty of the Church in this point and instead that the Lord saith Six days thou â—â—ist labor if thou wilt to say Thou shalt not labor Six days I do not see why the Church may not as well whereas the Lord saith Thou shalt rest the Seventh day command That thou shalt not rest the Seventh day For if the Church may â—â— strain the Liberty which God hath given them it may take away the yoke also which God hath put upon them And whereas you say That notwithstanding this Fourth Commandment the Jews has certain other Feast which they observed indeed the Lord which gave this General Law might make as many Exceptions as he thought good and so long as he thought good But it followeth not because the Lord did it that therefore the Church may do it unless it hath Commandment and Authority from God so to do As when there is any General Plague or Judgment of God either upon the Church or coming towards it the Lord commandeth in such a case Ioel 2. 15. That they should sanctifie a General â—aâ—â—