points that no controversies or opinions will shake his faith or destroy his love to God or man Thirdly He will honour God by upright practise and shew forth the power and excellency of religion in the true success upon the heart and life His Religion which begins in solid faith will grow up into sincere Love and good works Fourthly He will be without partiality a Lover of all the servants of Christ and therefore escape temptations to faction and division because his Religion consisteth in those common truths and duties which all profess Fifthly he will not only safely receive all further truths from these principles but all his knowledge and disputes will be sanctified as being all subservient to faith and love and holiness Whereas he that taketh the contrary course and presently falleth to the study of by-opinions and layeth too much upon them will prove too like a superficial hypocrite and a deceiver of himself by thinking that he is something when he is nothing Gal. 6. 5 6. And he will make a pudder in the world for nothing as children do in the house about their babies and their bawbles He will make but an engine of his by-opinions to destroy true Piety and Christian Love in himself first and then in all that will believe him He will first make himself and then many others believe that Religion is nothing but proud self-conceit and faction And he will be the shame of his profession and the hardener of the wicked in their sin and misery by perswading them that the Religious are bnt a few ignorant whimsical fanaticks These are too sad experienced truths DIRECT XXXII Lay not a greater stress upon your different words or manner of prayer than God hath laid And take heed either of scorning reproaching or slighting the words and manner of other mens worship when it is such as God accepteth from the sincere IT is an easie thing to turn the native heat of Religion into a feaverish out-side zeal about words or circumstances or ceremonies whether it be for them or against them O what a wonder is it that by so palpable a trick as thâ—s the Devil should deceive so many and make such a stir and disturbance in the Church I know that one party will cry up Order the other will cry up Spirituality and both will say that God maketh not light of the smallest matters in religion nor no more must we And in this general position there is some truth But if nothing could be said for both their errours they would then be no deceits nor be capable of doing any mischief Some things that you contend about God hath left wholly undetermined and indifferent And some things in which your brother erreth his errour is so small a fault as not at all to hinder his acceptance with God nor with any man that judgeth as God doth Had you ever understood Rom. 14 15. you would have understood all this It would make a knowing Christian weep between indignation and compassion to see in these times what censures and worse are used on both sides about the wording of our prayers to God! How vile and unsufferable some account them that will pray in any words which are not written down for them And how unlawful others account it to pray in their imposed forms some because they are forms and some because they are such forms and some because that Papists have used them and some because they are imposed when God hath given them no command but to pray in faith and fervency according to the state of themselves and others and in such order as is agreeable to the matter and in such method as he hath given them a Rule and Pattern of But of all quarrels about forms and words he hath never made any of their particular determinations no more than whether I shall preach by the help of Notes or study the words or speak those which another studied for me It is a wonder how they that believe the Scriptures came first to make themselves believe that God maketh such a matter as they do of their several words and forms of prayer That he loveth only extemporary prayer as some think and hateth all prescribed forms Or that he loveth only prescribed Forms as others think and hateth all extemporary prayers by habit Certainly in Christs time both Liturgies by forms and also prayers by habit were used And yet Christ never interposed in the Controversie so as to condemn the one or the other He condemneth the Pharisees for making long prayers to cover their devouring widdows houses and for their praying to be seen of men But whether their prayers were a Liturgy and set forme or whether they were extemporary he taketh no notice as telling us that he condemned neither And it s like the Pharisees long Liturgy was in many things worse than ours though the Psalms were a great part of it And yet Christ and his Apostles oft joyned with them and never condemned them Nay as far as I can find the Pharisees and other Jews were not in this so blind and quarrelsome as we nor never made a controversie of it nor ever presumed to condemn either Liturgies or Prayers by habit I shall now pass by their errour who are utterly against publike prayers from a habit as having spoken of it at large elsewhere when I had opportunity I shall now only answer the contrary extreme Obj. Where hath God given any men power to prescribe and impose forms for others or commanded others to obey them Answ. First where ever he hath given any power to teach their inferiours to pray who cannot do it in a better way He hath given Parents this power where he hath bid them Bring up their Children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord Is it not by the Law of nature the Parents duty to teach their children to pray And is not the learning of the words first profitable to their learning of the sense May they not teach their Children the Lords Prayer or a Psalm though it be a Form And why not then other words which are agreeable to their State And he that taught his own Disciples a Form and Rule of Prayer and telleth us that so Iohn taught his Disciples and saith to his Apostles As my Father sent me so send I you by making them Teachers to his Church did allow them to teach either by forms or without as the cause required All the Scripture is now to Preachers a form of Teaching And when we read a Chapter we read a prescribed form of Doctrine And it haâ—h many forms of prayer and praise and forms of Baptizing administring the Lords Supper If you say that the Apostles had an infallible spirit I answer True And that proveth that that their Doctrine was more infallible than other mens but not that they only and not other men may teach by the way of forms All the Books of Sermons now written are
so many prescribed words or forms of teaching And if we may use forms of Teaching as well as the Apostles why not also forms of praying If you say that the Apostles prescribed the Church no Liturgy I answer That only proveth that no one is universally necessary nor to be universally imposed but not that therefore no use of forms of prayer are lawful May we not now use the Lords Prayer or pray in some other Scripture form Obj. But the Apostles compelled none to use them Answ. Christ and his Apostles assumed not the civil Sword and therefore so compelled men to nothing But yet their authority bound the conscience when Christ said when ye pray say Our Father c. he bound them in duty to do as he bid them though he forced them not But Secondly tell me if you can where God forbiddeth you to use good and lawful words in prayer meerly because the Magistrate or Pastor bids you use them Is this the meaning of all the Precepts of honouring and obeying your Superiors Do nothing which they bid you do though otherwise lawful O strange exposition of the Fifth Commandment If you command your Child to learn a Catechism or Form of Prayer before his meat or for other times will you teach him to say Father or Mother it had been lawful for me to use this Form if neither you nor any body had bid me But because you bid me now it is unlawful O whither will not partiality lead men Obj. But though it be lawful to impose forms on children yet not upon aged Christians Answ. Aged persons have too many of them as much need of such forms as children Age maketh not the difference We are fain to teach many aged persons forms of Catechism as well as children Why not therefore forms of prayer Obj. But it is not lawful to impose forms publikely on whole Congregations of Believers Answ. All sects in the world do it I never heard any Separatist or Anabaptist or any other publike Minister but he imposed a form of prayer upon all the Congregation He is void of common sense that thinketh that his extemporary prayer is not as truly a form to all the people as if it had been written in a book The order and words are not of your own invention but invented by another to your hand and imposed upon you to use For I hope you come together to pray and not to hear a prayer only But the difference is First that one imposeth every day a new form on you and the other imposeth every day the same Secondly And that one telleth you not what words you shall pray in before you hear them and the other writeth them down for you to know before hand For my part I wonder why written or unwritten long-premeditated or suddenly expressed prayers should be taken for unlawful But however do not think the difference to lie where it doth not For doubtless to the people they are both formes and both imposed though not imposed by the same persons and authority Obj. But at least you have no proof for imposing forms â—n the Ministers themselves Ans. First I know no man that questioneth but some form of prayer and praise were imposed by God himself on the Iewish Ministers And one was taught by Christ to his Apostles And a form of Profession of faith and of Baptism and the Lords supper is imposed on all the Ministers of the Church And Ioel 2. 17. a form of prayer is taught the Priests Secondly But we are not now pleading for the needless imposing of any forms nor the causless restraint of extemporarary prayers I have fully born my testimony against that in due season But many things are lawfully and necessarily obeyed which are not lawfully commanded as I shall shew you more anon I could heartily wish that we could say that all Ministers of any party were such as were wholly above the need of forms Or at least such whose own composures were better for for the Church than any that could be offered them by others If it were not a contradiction But all that I now expect from the Objectors is that they tell me or themselves what proof they have that it is a sin for a Minister only to use an imposed form when all the Congregation else may use it Answer this well before you go And I pray let all the people note here that it is not nor cannot be denied but that a form even a new one every day may be lawfully be imposed upon all them and that the question is only of the Ministers use of imposed forms Obj. But our Ministers do not impose their prayers by forcâ— Answ. Do you think that there is no imposition but by force Your Pastor is your guide in the worship of God and God hath imposed it on you to to follow him and joyn with him in lawful prayer And what the words shall be and what the matter and order chosen for that time time the Speaker chooseth for you And so he bindeth you by his Ministerial authority which is a true and lawful imposing though he compel you not by the sword or force Obj. But Christ hath given gifts to all his Ministers and commanded them to use them And they use them not when they use imposed formes Therefore we must not obey men against Christ. Answ. No doubt but all that are lawful Ministers have such gifts as are necessary to the essential works of their office But the degrees of their gifts have very great variety as Paul fully sheweth in 1 Cor. 12. and oft elsewhere And the necessary gift for hearty acceptable prayer is true Desire excited by the spirit of supplication which sometime venteth it self but by sighes and groans Rom. 8. 16 26. But the Ministerial gift of prayer is Knowledge and Utterance by which a Minister may be able to express the desires and wants of the people unto God which includeth memory in some degree Even as Knowledge and Utterance are his Gift of preaching And some have more Knowledge and worser Vtterance And some have better Vtterance and less Knowledge And some through want of memory are defective in both The lowest rank of lawful Ministers may be so defective in their own gifts both of Knowledge Memory and Utterance as to have need of the help of the gifts of others who much excel them As a Minister who hath tollerable Gifts for preaâ—hing may yet need the writings of other men before hand and may bring both their Matter and Method into the Pulpit yea and oft times their words so that though he have Gifts yet being weak he may use the gifâ—s of others I have been counselled since I was silenced to compose Sermons my self and give them in writing to some weak Minister that hath an excellent Voice and utterance and to let him preach them And really if I had not known that such have good books enough at hand for such a use
I think I should have done it And who can prove that this had been his sin And yet this was a using of another mans gifts instead of his own And I have heard men that are much against Parish Churches and Liturgies wish that some unlearned men of good utterance might read some excellent Sermonâ—books to the people in ignorant places that can get no better And who can prove the reading of a Homily unlawful Moreover Christ hath given to all his members such gifts as are suitable to their places as well as to Ministers such gifts as are suitable to theirs And the place of a Master of a family requireth the gift of Catechising and instructing the family And they are as truly obliged to use their gifts as Ministers are theirs And yet who doubteth but it is lawful for Parents to teach and catechize their children by such books and forms of Catechisms as are composed by the gifts of abler men Moreover Prayer is the duty of every one and specially of the heads of families And therefore every true Christian hath gifts procured by Christ for so much as is his duty And he is bound to use his gifts And yet those gifts are so low in many that I fear not to call that man effectively an enemy to families souls and prayer who forbiddeth all such to use such forms of prayer as are composed by the gifts of others The famousest Divines in the Church of God even Luther Zwinglius Melancthon Calvin Perkins Sibbs and abundance of Nonconformists of greatest name in England did ordinarily use a form of prayer of their own before their Sermons in the Pulpit and some of them in their families too Now these men did it not through idleness or through temporizing but because some of them found it best for the people to have oft the same words and some of them found such a weakness of memory that they judged it the best improvement of their own gifts Now besides the first composure of these prayers which perhaps was done 20 years before none of these men did use their own gifts any moâ—e than if they had used a form composed by another For the memory utterance is the same of both These all were famous worthy men whom no wise man judgeth to be insufficient for the Ministry for want of gifts But if such as these may so many years forbear the exercise of their gift of extemporary prayer much more may far weaker Ministers do it Abundance of young Ministers are trained up under aged experienced Divines what if one of these should sometimes make use of the same words of prayer which the aged Minister used the day before as finding them fitter than any that he could devise himself Must he forbear to do better because he cannot do so well by the use of his own gifts alone And in some Ordinances as Baptism and the Lords supper c. the same things must be daily prayed for And he that thinketh he must not frequently speak the same things will quite corrupt the Ordinance of Christ. And he that will imâ—gine that he must have always new words will at last have new things or worse than nothing If then it be meet to use often the same words why may not a weak Minister use the better words of others when he hath none meerly of his own that are so fit Nay is it not the Duty of such to do it Every man is bound to do Gods service in the best manner that he can Cursed be the deceiver that hath a better in his flock and bringeth that which is corrupt But to utter prayers and praise to God in a full methodicall and congruous manner and in words suitable to the Majesty of the worship of God is better to the people and to the honour of Religion then to do it in a more confused disorderâ—y broken manner with barrenness and incongruity of speech But this lâ—st is the best that many honest Ministers can do by their own giâ—ts when they may do it in the former better manner by making use of the words and gifts of otherâ— Therefore it is a duty for such men so far to use others gifâ—s of inventing words before their own And among us there is no man forbidden in the Pulptt to use his own gifts to the utmost and pray without any set form of his own or other mens And I would at last desire any of the Objectors but to name that text of Scripture which directly or indirectly commandeth every Minister to use his gift of inventing words and method or his gift of extemporary prayer every time that he prayeth to God Or which forbiddeth to use the gifts of others though better than his own Obj. But what if the forms imposed be worse than the exercise of our own gifts Answ. First That may be below one mans own invention which is above-anothers Secondly And that may be more defective than your own invention could reach to which yet may be more desirable for other advantages As if all the Churches for some good ends should agree to to use one mode or method or form as now we do in singing Psalms the benefit of that concord might do more to the Churches service than my singular better form or words could do And if the lawful Rulers commanded me that which perhaps I could somewhat exceed my self I should do much in obedience to their command Or if the people had a greater averseness or unfitness for my more congruous words than for others more fective I should take that for the best food or physick which is most agreeable to the stomack and disease But especially if I am restrained from the publick preaching of the Gospel or exercise of any of my Ministry unless I will use a more disordered or defective form I shall take it for my duty then to use it Because it is more to the Churches edification In a word God hath bound all his Ministers to use all their gifts to the Churches greatest edification But to use a more defective form with liberty to use my best gifts also and to exercise my Ministry publickly to all is more to the Churches edification than to use my own gifts only a few days in a corner and then to lie in prison and use them no more Though no man must of choise prefer the less congruous before the more congruous when he is free which I confess is a sin yet it is a duty to prefer a less congruous order before none or before a better for a day with a restraint of that and all our Ministery hereafter For my part I have often truly professed that I look at many Liturgies which I have read as I do at the prayers of some honest men who use little method nor very meet words and often toss Gods name through weakness who put that last which should be first that first which should be last but yet the
are but the effects of your prejudice passion or weakness of understanding 28. Do not too much reverence the revelations impulses or most confident opinions of any others upon the account of their sincerity or holiness but try all judiciously and soberly by the word of God 29. Take heed least the trouble of your own disquieted doubting minds do become a snare to draw you to some unâ—outh way of Cure and so make the fancy of some new opinion sect or practice to seem your remedy and give you ease and soperswade you that it is the certain truth 30 Keep in the rank of a humble disciple or Learner in Christs Church till you are fit and called to be Teachers your selves 31. Grow up in the great substantial practical truths and duties and grow downwards in the roots of a clearer belief of the Word of God and the life to come And neither begin too soon with doubtful opinions nor ever lay too much upon them 32. Lay not a greater stress upon your different words and manner of prayer than God hath laid And take heed of scorning reproaching or slighting the words and manner of other mens worship when it is such as God accepteth from the sincere Where the Case about forms of prayer is handled 33. When you are sure that other mens way of worship is sinful yet make it not any other or greater sin than indeed it is and speak not evil of so much in it as is good And slander not God as a hater or rejecter of all mens Services which are mixt with infirmities or as a partial hater of the infirmities of others and not yours 34. Think not that all is unlawfully obeyed which is unlawfully commanded 35. Think not that you are guilty of all the faults of other mens worship with whom you joyn no not of the Ministers or Congregations Nor that you are bound to seperate from all the worship which is faultily performed For then there must be no Church-Communion upon Earth Where is more about extemporary prayer and imposed forms 36. Yet know what Pastors and Church-Communion you may joyn with and what not And think not that I am perswading you to make no difference 37. In your judging of Discipline reformation and any means of the Churches good be sure your eye be upon the true End and upon the particular Rule and not on either of them alone Take not that for a means which is either contrary to the Word of God or is in â—ts nature destructive of the end 38. Neglect not any truth of God much less renounce it or deny it But yet do not take it for your duty to publish all which you judge to be truth nor a sin to silence many lesser truths when the Churches peace and welfare doth require it 39. Know which are the Great duties of a Christian life and wherein the nature of true Religion doth consist And then pretend not any lesser duty against these greater though the least when it is indeed a duty is not to be denyed or neglected 40. Labour for a sound judgement to know good from evil least you trouble your selves and others by mistakes Forsake not the guidance of a judicious Teacher nor the Company of the agreeing generality of the Godly 41. Let not the bare fervour of a Preacher or the loudness of his voice or affectionate utterance draw you too far to admire or follow him without a proportion of solid understanding and judiciousness 43. Your belief of the necessary Articles of faith must be made your own and not taken meerly on the Authority of any And in all points of belief or practice which are necessary to Salvation you must ever keep company with the Universal Church For it were not the Church if it erred in those And in matters of Peace and Concord the major vote must be your guide In matters of humane obedience your Governours must be your guides And in matters of high and difficult speculation the judgment of one man of extraordinary understanding is to be preferred before the Rulers and the major Vote 43. Reject not a good cause because it is owned by some bad men And own not a bad cause for the goodness of the Patrons of it Iudge not of the Cause by the persons when you should judg of the persons by the Cause 44. Yea take the bad examples of religious men to be one of your most perillous temptations And therefore labour to discover what are the special sins of professours in the age you live in that you may be specially fortified against them 45. Desire the highest degree of holiness and to be free from the Corruptions of the times But affect not to be odd and singular from ordinary Christians in lawful things 46. When you have to do only with stigmatized scandalous ones to vindicate the honour of Christianity from their Scandal go as far from them as lawfully you can But with the Common sort of Sinners whose Conversion you are bound to seek go not as far from them as you can but purposely study to come as near them as lawfully you may that you may have the better advantage to win them to the truth 47. Whenever you are avoiding any error forget not that there is a contrary extream to be avoided of which you are not our of danger 48. Think more and talk more of your faults and failings against others especially against Princes Magistrates and Pastors than of their faults and failings against you 49. Take notice of all the good in others which appeareth and talk rather of that behind their backs than of their faults 50. Study the duty of instructing and exhorting more than of reproof and finding fault 51. The more you suffer by Rulers or any mâ—n the more be watchful lest you be tempted to dishonour them or to withdraw or abate the Love which is their due 52. Make Conscience of heart-revenge and tongue-revenge as well as of hand-revenge 53. When you are exasperated by the hurt which you feel from Magistrates remember also the Good which the Church receiveth by them 54. Learn to suffer by good people and by Ministers and not only by ungodly people or by Magistrates 55. When you complain of violence and persecution in others take heed lest the same inward vice work in you by Church cruelties and dimning censures against them or others Persecution and separation often have the same Cause 56. Keep still in your eye the State of all Christs Churches upon earth that you may know what a people they are through the world whom Christ hath Communion with and may not ignorantly separate from almost all the Church of Christ while you think that you separate but from those about you Queres about separation 57. Yet ler not any here cheat you by the bare namees and titles of Unity to the papal usurping head of the Church nor must you dream of any Head and Center of Unity to the universal
that is a temptation or occasion of sinning before another INdeed the word offend hath occasioned the mistake of many in this point to the great ensnaring of themselves and others Offending sometime signifieth only Displeasing or grieving another And this is not the scandal which the Scripture speaks against But it signifieth also the laying of a stumbling block before another upon which he may be occasioned to fall into sin And this is the offence which is called scandal Abundance of well meaning people have thought that they must not use any form or words or order or action especially if it be indifferent in it self which others are displeased or grieved at Because they think that is scandal Indeed there is a grieving others which is scandal that is when by grieving them we occasion them to sin But consider I beseech you these two things First what a wretched person that is who will sin against God every time that his brother doth not humor him Durst these persons profess this openly with their tongues Dare you say Do not you use such a form of prayer or such a ceremony for if you do I will sin against God What elfe do you mean when you blame men for scandalizing you I hope you do not mean that no body must displease you If not you must know that this only is true scandal to occasion you to sin And is it not a shame that you will sin so easily 2. And if bare displeasing had been scandal then peevishness and ignorance would have advanced all that had them to be the Governours of the world For what is it to govern but to have all others obliged to fulfil your wills And if no man must displease you then all must fulfil your wills And he is scandalous that is not ruled by you And if this were so the most childish and womanish sort of Christians who have the weakest judgement and the strongest wils and passions must rule all the world For these are hardliest pleased and no man must displease them But I beseech you remember that scandal lieth in Pleasing men as well as in displeasing them when it may harden them in an errour or tempt them to any sin I will instance to you but in two scandalous acts of Peter himself The first was to Christ in Math. 16. 22 23. Where he thought to please Christ and save him from suffering and would have had him to spare or favour himself And Christ saith Get thee behind me Satan thou art an offence to me the Greek word is A scandal that is Thou wouldst do as satan did even tempt me to sin neglect the work which I came into the world about The other was in Gal. 2. 12 13 Where Peter did scandalize the Iews by pleasing them For fear of offending the weak Judaâ—zing Christians he separated from familiar communion with the Gentiles By which he laid a stumbling block or temptation before them to harden them in the sinful opinion of separation If it had been done in our dayes many would have been drawn away with Barnabas and thought that Peter had not given scandal to the Iewish Christians but only separated for fear of scandalizing them Many a time I have the rather gone to the Common prayers of the publick assemblies for fear of being a scandal to those same men that called the going to them a scandal that is for fear of hardening them in a sinful separation and errour because I knew that that was not scandal which they called scandal that is displeasing them and crossing their opinions but hardening them in an errour or other sin is true scandalizing Understand this or you will displease God under pretence of avoiding scandal DIRECT XXIV Make conscience of scandalizing one party as well as another and those most who are most in danger by your offence MAny persons pretend the avoiding of scandal only to slatter one party and to preserve their own reputation and interest with that side which they are lothest to displease And perhaps discern not the deceit of their own hearts in all this but think that it is indeed the sin of scandal which they avoid But why make you no conscience of scandalizing others on the contrary side Who perhaps are more in number and whose salvation should be as much desired by you The Papist perhaps will not deliver the Lords Supper in both kinds nor will forbear his Image-worship lest he offend the Roman-Catholicks But he careth not much that by so doing he offendeth the Protestants and other Churches Nor that his Images are a scandal to all the Mahometans and keep them from the Christian faith And thus every sect saith If you do this or that you will scandalize and offend many good people Meaning their own side But they â—ever regard how many others they shall really scandalize by the contrary One saith It is scandalous to use extemporary prayers And another saith it is scandalous to pray by forms and books And both sides usually mean no more but that their own party will be displeased and take it for a sin But as he is not scandalized by me who only taketh my action to be a sin but he that is ensnared by it in any sin himself so whether it be displeasing or tempting that you mean you must regard one side as well as the other The heavenly wisdome is without partiality and without hypocrisie Jam. 3. 17. And usually they talk most against scandalizing those whom they account to be the lest And the best are least in danger of sinning And so they accuse them to be the worst or else they know not what they say For suppose a separatist should say If you hold communion with any Parish minister or Church in England it will be a scandal to many good people I would ask such a one why call you those good people that are easily drawn to sin against God Nay that will sin because I do my duty He will say No they will not sin but they will take it to be your sin and they will be troubled at it I must answer him you talk of scandal and know not what scandal is scandal is not troubling men nor making them take me for a sinner but occasioning them to sin themselves by some unlawful or needless act of mine Therefore if you know what you say you make the separatists almost the worst of men that will sin against God because another will not sin yea if they would but sin because another sinneth it were bad enough I would ask you therefore whether you take not the people of the Parish Churches to be more than you and to be worse than you If you took them not for much worse than your selves you would not separate from them And if you do think them worse you must think that they are more in danger of sinning or being turned from the liking of godliness and of the Gospel And if so then we are
you will wound the truth and be warping to their errours and extreams And though by this you may think that some present necessity may be satisfied and some inconveniencies avoided yet at the long running the wound will be found to be increased and the cure the harder because of the delay Converse with all men as those that must be finally judged by God and remember that the Judg is at the door DIRECT XXVI Use not your selves needlesly to the familiar company of that sort of Christians who use to reproach and censure them that are more sober Catholick and charitable than themselves Unless you also be as much or more with the soberer sort who will shew you the sin and mischiefs of uncharitableness censoriousness and divisions NOthing is more experienced than the power which the converse of chosen familiars hath upon the minds of the injudicious and unsetled Which maketh education and the converse of our youth to have so great a hand in choosing mens opinions and Religion And is the cause that Religion is as Languages are diversified by the territories or bounds of Countries They that are bred among such as use to speak of dissenters as odious as hypocrites as hereticks as schismaticks as ungodly as proud fanaticks are very like to be possessed themselves with the same spirit of malice and detraction The words of those whom you respect especially when you hear them not confuted will make you believe that it is so indeed and that the persons are as mad or as odious as they make them And thus the Papists think odiously of the Protestants and the Lutherans of the Calvinists and the Arminians and Anti-Arminians the Diocesans and the Presbyterians the Paedobaptists and Anabaptists of one another because they converse only with such as paint them in an odious shape And thus if you use only or chiefly to converse with the censorious Separatists you shall hear so many invectives against them that are truly Catholick and sober as will make you think that Love and Peace and Catholick Communion are some sinful and mischievous things Sometimes they will deride them as ridiculous and sometimes they will call them temporizers formalists or luke-warm hypocrites who will do any thing in compliance with their own commodities and for the saving of their flesh And sometimes they will thunder out some terrible threatnings against them and their way as heinously sinful And this language will form the belief and affections of ignorant Christians into its own uncharitable mold as a necessary part of Christian zeal As it was the common way of the success of the Quakers to come into Christian assemblies and in a prophetical strain like men commissioned from heaven in the name of the most high God to denounce his judgements against the faithfullest Pastors and their flocks and pronounce them condemned enemies of the light and so by the very terrour of their words they frightened many women and boys into their sect before they understood at all what it was that they were against or for so do the Separatists declaim against the sinfulness of Parish assemblies and communion and of forms of prayer and such like till they have frightened the ignorant into their mistaken zeaâ—â— Therefore though I am not perswading you to separate from these feaverish persons as they do from others yet I would advise all the younger and unsetled sort that love themselves not needlesly to choose the familiar frequent company of such Our private company is at our own choice And as the company of fierce self-conceited dividers is so very dangerous so on the contrary the company of grave experienced sober charitable and judicious Divines and other Christians is exceeding helpful to settle the minds of the younger and weaker sort with them they shall hear the unity of the Church and the doctrine of Christian Love and Concord humility meekness and moderation opened and the sinfulness and lamentable consequents of schism self-conceitedness censoriousness and discord which among others they should never hear And let me leave this warning to the Church of God that if ever it may be hoped that Unity Love and peace shall be recovered it must be by the training up of the younger Christians under the precepts and examples of such grave judicious experienced and peaceable guides instead of educating them in the smoaky schorching chimney of young unexperienced self-conceited teachers who burn with the ambition of applause And let the sober be-think them whether our times and teachers are better and purer than theirs to whom Paul said Act. 20. 30. Of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them And Eph. 4. 14. He gave the Church Pastors and Teachers for its Unity and perâ—ection That we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the sleight of men and â—unning craftiness whereby they lye in wait to deceive DIRECT XXVII Take heed of mis-judging of the Answers of your prayers and of taking those things to be from God which are but the effects of your prejudice passion or weakness of understanding THis is a sin which I know not whether I may say is more common with many godly persons or more injurious to God or more pittiful as to themselves It is so common that it is hard to meet with many women and passionate Christians who are earnest in prayer but sometimes they run into this mistake and judge ungroundedly of the answer of their prayers by such feelings and strong apprehensions of their own as never came from the spirit of God at all And it is a great wrong to God to be made the author of mans infirmities and errours and of that which is contrary to his word And yet it is a very pitiful case as to the offenders because it is usually the sin of persons that are very upright and honest in the main and that are very serious in their prayers to God and of such as have naturally such weakness of reason and strength of affection as that they are less blemeable though less curable than others are To understand this matter the better I pray you consider that Prayer is not to change Gods mind but to make us the meet receivers of his mercies And this it doth by exciting and exercising those apprehensions and desires which make us fit by valuing them to improve them Therefore such principles dispositions and desiers as are in us Prayer doth excite and exercise And every man prayeth according to his own judgement disposition and affection And that apprehension and affection which is most stirred up and exercised is most felt And that which is most felt doth most take us up and is most observed And so we think that it is the impulse of Gods spirit and the answer of our prayers when it is but the operation of our own spirits and the sensible activity of our former principles There
matter is honest good I would not prefer such a man in a Congregation before an abler man who will speak more composedly agreeable to the matter But yet I would not be so peevish as utterly to refuse to joyn with such a one But as God doth not reject his prayers notwithstanding all his weakness no more would I. And I had rather have such prayers than none at all O that men would discern what is the true worth of prayer and how little God is taken with the Oratory of them in comparison of the faith and love and desire which is the soul of prayer And O that men would lay no greater stress on their peculiar modes and words than God doth and condemn no mens prayers further than they are condemned by God nor separate from any further then God rejecteth them or commandeth our separation I cannot forbear telling you the aggravation of this kind of sin It seemeth to me akind of blasphemy against God As if you would make the world believe that God is so much for your modâ— and words that he overlooketh all the desires of the Spirit and all his promises and all mens interest in Christ and forgetteth all his love to his people so that Christ shal not intercede for them or shal not prevail unless they pray to God in the words and mode which you have fancied to be best whether with a Book or without in these words or in those Me thinks you are renewing the old controversie whether in this Mount or at Ierusalem men ought to worship and knew not that the time is come that God will neither accept men for worshipping at this Mount or at Ierusalem here or there with a book or without book but the true worshippers whom he chooseth do worship him as a Spirit in Spirit and in truth as well with Forms as without them And yet some are more wicked than barely to condemn their brethrens prayers because they be not cloathed just as their own They will also break jests and scorns at them and take this for the ingenuity of their piety Like men of several Countreys who thâ—nk the fashions of all Countryes save their own to be ridiculous and laugh at strangers as if they were cloathed in fools Coats So many do by the cloathing of other mens devotions Some scorn at extemporary prayers and some scorn at Forms and Liturgies And the Litany they call conjuring and the Responses they take for a formal jocular playing with holy things when in all these the humble heavenly Christian is lifting up his soul to God By this petulant carnal kind of zeal I remember our divisions were here raised at the first To deridâ— the Common prayer and deride them that used it was too common with some kind of religious people And they excused it by Elias his example As if Idolaters and the true worshippers of God that differ from us in a Form or Ceremony were all one I remember how some of the contrary mind were inflamed to indignation by such scorns when they were going into the Churches in London and heard some Separatists that lookt in at the Church door say The Devil choke thee art thou not out of thy pottage yet because the Common Prayer was not ended So little did men know what spirit they were of But wise and holy Mr. Hildersham Mr. Iohn â—all Mr. Bradshaw Mr. Iohn Paget and other learned Non-conformists of old did foresee and greatly fear this Spirit It is a dangerous thing to scorn and jest at any thing that is done about Gods worship though it should be it self unwarrantable while you scorn at one anothers worship of God you raise a bold unreverence and contempt of holy things in the heâ—rerâ— and perhaps before you are aware in your selves too And you will teach the Atheist to scorn you all unless 〈…〉 where the very object is to be derided as being no God you should be very suspicious of this way I am afraid of making a mock of the grossest erroneous worship of the true God It is fitter to confute it in a way that more expresseth our reverence to the Object God himself our respect to that pious affection which may be engag'd in it I have seldom seen the best tempered people inclined to this way of jesting at other mens manner of worship nor have I observed much good come by it But I have oft seen that it is the way by which young prâ—ud self-conceited persons do kindle a carnal dividing zeal and a contempt of their brethren and quench all holy sober zeal and love together DIRECT XXXIII When you are sure that other mens way of worship is sinful yet make it not any other or greater sin than indeed it is and speak not evil of that much in it which is Good And accuse not God to be a hater or rejecter of all mens service which is mixed with infirmities AS St. Iames saith 3. 2. In many things we â—ffend all but he that â—ffendeth not with his tongue is the perfect man So we may here say in the same sense In many particulars of our prayers and other worship we all offend God But he that bridleth not his tongue from the reproaching of his brothers different way of worship may prove the greatest Offendor of all It would move a charitable understanding hearer to grief and pity to read and hear one party call all prayer by habit no better than crudities whinings bold talking to God and nonsence and whatsoever bitter scorn can speak And to read and hear many on the other extreme to call the Liturgy no less than Idolatry I desire the Reader to peruse a judicious Treatise of Mr. Tombes in answer to one of this language As much as he and I have written against each others opinion about Infant Baptisme our concenting admonition to you should so much the rather be accepted in this And what pitiful arguments have they to prove this charge of Idolatry False worship of the true God is idolatry as well as worshipping a false God But such is the Liturgy Ergo This is all that these rash preachers must trouble the Church and seduce men into a hating factious zeal with But what mean these men by false worship Do they mean worship contrary to Gods word That is which is sinful And do they mean All such sinful worship or some only If they mean all such sinful worship than these words of theirs are Idolatry For they are part of their preaching which is part of Gods worship in their own sense And it is false doctrine and tendeth to mens perdition And so they and all false Teachers should be idolaters By this they would turn all sins in worship into one It is all Idolatry Is not every confused prayer sinful which hath unmeet expressions and disordered and hath wandering thoughts and dull affections Is there any of these Love-killers that dare say they pray without sin And
must we not separate from them then as Idolaters Yea and every man from himself that is He must give over praying because its all Idolatry But perhaps they will say This sin is but in the manner and not in the matter Answ. Very good It seems then that sin in the manner of worship is not Idolatry And how prove you that the faults of the Liturgy are not as far from the Matter of the worship as your own are Will you find some words which you can call false in the matter Suppose it were so When an Antinomian an Anabaptist a Separatist or any one that erreth doth drop some of his errours in his prayers as I think none will deny that they use to do must we needs believe that his prayer is Idolatry therefore as being false worship And is it unlawful to joyn with such Then we shall have more separation than you yet plead for or practise your selves No two men in the world must joyn together if all sinful worship or worship false sometime in the very matter doth necessitate a separation At least where no one knoweth before hand what another will say with his tongue when I know that every man hath some false opinion in his mind But where did these men learn to call their brethrens worship false any more than their own upon the account that God hath not commanded the manner of it when he hath neither commanded us to use a form nor to forbear it but by general precepts of doing all to edification If one man preach in one method and another in another One by written Notes to help his memory and another without one by his own gifts only and another by the help of others which of these is the false prophet the false worshipper or Idolater Hath God said you shall use Notes in preaching No more hath he said you shall preach without Notes yet hath he commanded both to severall persons where edification variously requireth itâ— Is he an Idolater that useth Meeters Tunes Versions Translations Directories Pâ—lpits Cups Table Cloaths Fonts Basins c. which God commandeth not O Lord pity thy poor Church whose Pastors themselves are so peevish in their ignorance and tempt other men by their follies to â—â—stifie all their severities against them and others But what Text of Scripture is it that ever told these men that all false worship is Idolatry what text do they name but such as if they did it on purpose to shew their boldness in adding to Gods Word The second Commandment is the chief which they insist on But what ever Expositions they may forge there is no such word nor sense in the Commandment We all hold that as the gross direct Idolatry is the worshipping of a false God against the first Commandment so to make any such false representation of the true God by words or deeds as maketh him like an Idol and contradicteth his nature and so to worship him this is also a secondary kind of Idolatry Because God is none such as they represent him and therefore it is not God indeed but an Idol which they worship And because God is not like to any thing corporeal in heaven or earth therefore he that maketh an image of any thing in Heaven or earth as like to God or to represent him he maketh an idol of God by blasphemy To what will you liken me that â— should be like unto it saith the Holy one This is the idolatry forbidden in the Second Commandment It is not all false worship but one sort of false worship which is idolatry what else that Commandment forbiddeth is neither called Idolatry nor can so be proved It is an odious sound to hear an ignorant rash self-conceited person especially a Preacher to cry out Idolatry Idolatry against his brethrens prayers to God because they have something in them to be amended while perhaps his own prayers have so much false doctrine in them or false fire of carnal passions and uncharitableness as maketh it a much harder question whether it be lawful to joyn with such as he is while he abhorreth so much to joyn with others All that know me know that it is not my own case and interest that I fit this reprehension to It is twenty times harder to me to remember a Form of words than to express what is in my mind without them But we must not fit our opinions of all our brethrens prayers to our own temperament DIRECT XXXIV Think not that all is unlawful to be obeyed which is unlawfully commanded MAny a Ruler sinneth in his Commands when it is no sin but a duty of the inferior to obey them He that hath but a bad end or bad circumstances may sin in commanding As if a Magistrate command Religious Duties in meer Policy for his own Advantage or if he enforce a lawful Command with unlawful Penalties And yet it will be the Subjects Duty to obey Yea as to the matter it self it may be unlawful for a Ruler to command a thing that will do no good because it is a vain Command and maketh men spend that time in vain and yet it may be the Subjects Duty to do it If the Magistrate choose an inconvenient place for publike worship or an unfit hour or if the Pastor choose a less fit translation meeter or tune or other circumstances of worship it may be their sin to do so and yet the peoples duty to obey them If a Father bid his Child but carry a straw from one place to another it is his fault so to imploy his time in vain but the Child is not faulty in obeying Indeed if the thing commanded be such as is simply evil and forbidden us by God in all cases whatsoever than no ones commands can make it lawful But if it be a thing that is only inconvenient or unlawful by some lesser accident then the command of authority may preponderate as a more weighty accident If it be lawful to give a Thief my purse to save my life which is not lawful for him to demand or take Then sure it is lawful to obey a King a Parent a Master oâ— a Pastor in things not evil in themselves though they unlawfully command them I say not that we must do so in all things which are evil but by accident For some accidents may make it so great an evil as no mans command can preponderate and make it lawful But in some cases it is so though not in all Therefore remember that you do not prove it sinful in you to do such things by proving it a sin in the imposer unless you have some better reason and can shew a Law of God forbidding you DIRECT XXXV Think not that you are guilty of all the Faults of other mens worship with whom you joyn no not of the Ministers or Congregations Nor that you are bound to separate from them in worship because of all the faults in their performance THis
Answ. Do not barely affirm but prove that all fore-knownâ—faults of the Pastors words in prayer are mine if I separate not How doth fore-knowing them make them mine Take heed that thus you make not God the greatest sinner and the worst being in all the world For God fore-knoweth all mens sins and God is present when they commit them and he giveth them all that life and time and strength and breath by which they do them and he hath communion with all the prayers of the faithful in the world what faults soever be in the words or forms he doth not reject them for any such failings Will you say therefore that God approveth or consenteth to all these sins I know before hand as is said before that every man will sin that prayeth either by defect of desire love faith or fervency or by wandering thoughts or disordered words c. And I know that every erroneous person commonly doth use to put his errours into his prayers and preaching But how doth all this make it mine I am bound to hold communion with all Gods people on earth as I have occasion not as they are sinners but as they are Saints And I come as to the Communion of Saints And though both they and I do bring our sins to that communion and I fore-know them yet I lament both theirs and mine and so far am I from consenting to them that they are my grief and I beg forgiveness both for them and me Obj. But you said that it belonged to the Pastors office to word his own Sermons and Prayers Therefore prescribed forms destroy the Pastors office And I may not consent to such usurpations by tyrannical men Answ. First the Pastor is the mouth of God to the people of the people to God And he doth word his own Sermons and Prayers or else his voice could not conduct you But if he that is conscious of his own infirmity do take the help of others in wording them that doth not destroy his office but help him in the exercise of it If a weak Minister learn a prayer out of the writings of some abler Divine and use it in the Pulpit this is no destroying of his office Secondly and if they that fear the effect of Ministers weakness shall force them to use the words of others the speaker still maketh them his own words before you joyn with him And if it did hinder the free exercise of all his office it doth not destroy it Obj. But he doth it voluntarily whereas the weakness of conceived prayer is involuntary Answ. It is with more probability said that a man is involuntary in doing that which another compelleth him to do than that which no man but himself only is the author of It is said to him that readeth the Liturgy Do this or nothing But no body saith to an erring weak confused Minister Put in your errours into your prayers or pray disorderly or you shall be punished Every Separatist Anabaptist and Antinomian doth too willingly put his errours into his prayers Obj. But the Liturgy is imposed on the ablest as well as on the weakest Ministers Answ. Whether it be well or ill imposed is none of the question now in hand No nor whether it be lawfully used by the Speaker But whether you may lawfully joyn in it And however it be imposed till the Minister consent to use it you shall not be put to joyn with him in it And when he doth consent he maketh it his own words and for reasons which seem good to him he doth choose those expressions rather than others Even because he must use those or none so that he is still in the exercise of his office And it is his personal fault if it be a fault to use those words and none of yours Whether he do it willingly as the best or do it with a half will as of necessity or whether there be tyranny in the imposing them or not you are not guilty of any of this by joyning with a Christian Church that useth them DIRECT XXXVI Yet know what Pastors you may own and what not and what Church-communion you may remove from or forbear And think not that I am perswading you to make no difference THis is a point that I have more largely handled elsewhere and can give you now but these brief hints lest I be too tedious First He that is not at all able to do the essential works of the Ministry that is to teach the people the Christian faith and a holy life and to pray and praise God with them and administer the Sacraments and in some measure oversee the manners of the flock is no Minister nor to be owned For he wanteth the essential qualifications As an illiterate man can be no Schoolmaster nor he a Physician a Pilot an Architect who is utterly ignorant of their work Secondly he that preacheth Heresie that is denieth any essential point of Christianity or Godliness after the first and second admonition is to be avoided Thirdly he that in his application endeavoureth to disgrace a Godly life and to disswade the people from it on false pretenses and encourage them to a life of wickedness is a traytor to Christ and not to be owned in the Ministery In a word Any one whose Ministery is such as tendeth to destruction more than to edification and to do more harm then good But then remember that it is not partiality and passion that must here be judge Nor is every one an opposer of Godliness who opposeth the errours of a party or the faults or follies of godly men Fourthly that Pastor or Church who will not let you have communion with them unless you will say or subscribe some falshood or commit any sin of wilful choice doth drive you from their communion by their unlawful terms and it is not you that are the Separatists but they Fifthly When you are to choose what Minister or Church you will statedly have your ordinary communion with you should not prefer a less reformed Church or a less worthy Pastor or one that is erroneous before a better but choose that which is most to your true edification Sixthly If you live under a worse and unreformed Church or unprofitable Minister if necessity hinder not you may remove your dwelling to a better Seventhly and where Churches are near and there is no great hurt or disorder will follow it you may joyn with another Church without removing your dwelling But this you may not do when the hurt to the publick is like to be greater than the good to you Eighthly and you must not conclude that the more faulty Church and Minister may not lawfully be communicated with though for your benefit you choose a better for this is the true crime of sinful separation But surely a mans soul is so precious that all men should prefer the greatest helps for their salvation before the less and think no just means too dear
their wit or learning or if they can take an advantage by it against better men who erre in that one point It is no wonder in all these Cases if the worser sort of men defend the truth For instance If any Sect should rise in England who should deny Christ or the Scripture or the Resurrection or the Life to come or the Lords day for all that they cannot keep it holy yet the worser sort of the people would all rise up against such errours Shall we therefore think that the people are in the wrong So if any better persons deny Infant Baptisme or the use of the Lords Prayer c. the worser sort of people would be all against them and yet be in the right And yet how many do take a form of prayer or Liturgy to be unlawful meerly because the most of the worser sort are for it As a Pharisee can gratifie his hypocrisie by long Prayers which yet are good in themselves so can an ungodly person gratifie his hypocrisie and sloth by Forms and Liturgies which yet doth not prove them to be unlawful DIRECT XLIV Ye take the bad example of religious men to be one of your most peâ—ilous temptations And therefore labour to discover especially what are the sins of Professours in the age that you live in that you may especially watch and sortifie your souls against them SOmetimes the strictest sort run in a gang after one opinion and sometimes after another sometimes to overvalue free will with the Pelagians sometimes to abuse the name and notion of free grace sometimes they are drawn with Peter to lay about them with a private unwarranted Sworâ— or by Politicians tempted into unlawful tumults sometimes they run together into unlawful Compliances and Conformities to escape some censure or danger to the flesh And most commonly they are hurried by Passion to follow some erroneous Leader into Schisme and Divisions which are contrary to Unity Love and Peace Study well what is the common errour of the religious party in the times and places where you live that you may take a special care to escape them For some such or others it is too probable they have Like not their fault for their Religions sake But specially take heed lest the Devil draw you to dislike their Religion for their faults Joyn with them heartily in the one but not in the other DIRECT XLV Desire the highest degree of Holiness and to be free from the corruptions of the times But affect not to be odd and singular from ordinary Christians in lawful things AN affectation of singularity in indifferent things doth either come from such ignonorance as those were guilty of in Rom. 14. or most commonly from Pride though you perceive it not your selves If it be to go in a meaner garb than others and as the Quakers not to put off the hat or with the Fryars to go bâ—refoot or in a distinguishing habit that all men may see and say This is a singular person in Religion it is easie to see how this gratifieth pride Humility desireth not to be specially taken notice of And therefore in all things lawful to do as others do doth gratifie humility very much It 's strange to observe how much stress some persons lay upon their singular habits gestures expressions and actions when they have once taken them up and how sharp they are against all that are contrary For as the Masters of every Sect of Monks among the Papists had their several Rules of singularity in things indifferent and yet presently desired to get disciples to take their names and follow their rules so is it with most that begin in singularity They would have all follow them that it might grow common DIRECT XLVI When you have to do only with stigmatized scandalous ones to vindicate the honour of of Christianity from their scandal go as far from them as lawfully you can But with the common sort of sinners whose conversion you are bound to seek go not as far from them as you can but purposely study to come as near them as lawfully you may that you may have the better advautage to win them to the truth WHen it is our work to avoid persons that they may be ashamed or that we may shew our detestation of their wickedness then going from them is our duty and we must do it To the excommunicate in-publick and to the notoriously wicked and impenitent after admonition in our private way of life But with most men our duty is to labour their conversion and in hope to seek the saving of their souls till they prove as dogs and swine to their exhorters It is a common question whether we should go as far as we may from wicked-men or come as 〈◊〉 them as we may And it is very great ignorance to say either the one of the other without distinguishing of wicked men Seeing our duty lyeth the clean contrary way towards one sort of them and towards another And there is much difference also to be made of the matter in which our joyning with them or going from them doth consist For there are some things which though they are no sin yet are so like sin that our doing them is most like to be a snare and to hinder mens repentance and not to further it And in this we must not come too near them But there are other things in which our going too far from them is like to hinder their repentance The injudicious zeal of many young Christians doth often carry them into this extream Any fashion of apparel which the common people use they will avoid as far as modesty will permit them And any lawfull recreation which they use they will fly the further from because they use it And they think it a scandal to shoot or bowl or use any such game which bad men use And any form or manner of speech which is lawful in it self they think they must avoid because such use it But especially any way of worshipping God or any controvertible opinion in Religion which is owned by bad men they flye as far from as they can By which means all this evil is committed First Their own faith and practise is corrupted For many an errour is taken up by going too far from other mens faults Many a one turneth Pelagian by flying indiscreetly from Antinomianism And many a one turneth Antinomian by avoiding Pelagianism Many a one turneth Papist to shew his detestation of multitudes of sects And many a one turneth to the giddiest sects to avoid the things which are held and practised by the Papists and are so zealous in avoiding the Papists ceremonies and forms and holidays too far that at last they renounce their Ordination and their Baptism and some at last deny the Scriptures the Creed and the Christ which the Papists own Many a one turneth Separatist and Anabaptist and Quaker to get far enough from Bishops and Liturgies And many a one
is ready to over-run his consideration and abuse his conscience in the extent of his compliance with all impositions through the indignation or contempt against the unreasonable humours of the Sectaries And thus mens own judgement and practise is depraved while they think more from whence to go than whither Secondly you lose your advantage of doing good to those you flye from And therein disobey the will of God and have a hand in the loss of the souls of men Paul became a Jew to the Jews and all things to all men to save some 1 Cor. 9. 19 20 21 22. I pray you mark his words It had been no strange thing if he had become wise to gain the foolish and shewed himself strong to win the weak c. But to become a Iew as when he circumcised Timothy and shaved his head because he had a vow c. and to be as under the Law to them that are under Law and as without Law to them that are without Law and to become as weak to them that are weak to gain the weak and to be made all things to all men to save some this is far from the religion of the Separatists What abundance of things do many now blame and censure others for as temporizers which they have nothing against that may be called Reason but only that their neighbours use them If a man stand up at the profession of the Belief or if he stand up when the Psalms and Hymns of Praise to God are uttered they say he conâ—ormeth to the gestures of the Congregation and make that his dispraise which is his praise And what Is not standing a fit gesture to profess our Faith in and a fit gesture to praise God in Or is it praise-worthy to be odd and singular in the Church and not to do as the rest of the Church doth Austin professed his resolution in all such gestures and lawful orders to do as the Church doth where he is And Paul would have us with one mouth as well as with one mind to glorifie God I entreat these men to mark whether it was Christ or the Pharisees that came nearest to their way and whom they now imitate Was it for going too far from sinners that the Pharisees did censure Christ Or was it not for eating and drinking with Publicans and sinners though he did it not to harden them in their sin but as a Physician conversing with the sick to heal them was it not for Sabbath-breaking and not being strict enough in such matâ—ers that they were offended with Christ and his disciples The case is plain But corrupted nature more favoureth the separating zeal of the Pharisees than the Loving winning zeal of Christ And will easilier suffer us to be imitators of the Pharisees than of Christ. Thirdly This going too far from those whom we should win doth not only lose our advantage to do them good but greatly tendeth to harden them in all their prejudices against a religious life and to hinder their conversion and to undo their souls When they hear and see us place any of our Religion in avoiding a lawful recreation or a lawful use of words or a lawful fashion of apparel or a lawful gesture or circumstance in Gods worship they will judge of the rest of our Religion by that part And this is one thing that hath hardened thousands especially of the rich who are enclined to excesses in a scornful contempt of strictness in Religion under the name of Puritans and Bigots and Precisians and such like They think they are but an ignorant humorous sort of people who are almost mad with a pride of their singularity in Religion And think that when you tell them of a Conversion you would have them become such whimsical fanaticks And that the difference between their Religion and yours is but whether such a form of prayer or such a gesture or such a fashion of apparel or such musick or other recreation be lawful or unlawful In which they are confident that they are in the right And what greater cruelty can you shew to souls than thus to harden them in their sin and misery Little do such persons think how many be in Hell through these scandals and snares which they have set before them And yet they take on them that is because they would not encourage men in sin that they thus flye from them When they do their worst to make all the world believe that strict religiousness is but the whimsie of a giddy sort of people who are almost out of their wits with pride And what greater injury can men do to Christ and to Religion than this To make it the scorn and contempt of the world I know they will say that Religion was ever scorned by the wicked and ever will be But if it be scorned for its genuine nature its heavenly wisdome purity and goodness this is the disgrace only of them that scorn it Or if they maliciously and causelesly call wisedome folly or call good evil this will redound to the speakers shame where true Reason hath but leave to work But if you will therefore do as the Jews did and cloath Christ in a fools Coat and put a Reed in his hand for a Scepter to expose him to the laughter and scorn of the beholders it is you that will be found his deriders and crucifiers If you blind-fold him and others smite him and say Read who smote thee his buffetting will prove to be caused by you If you will paint a saint in the garb of a mad man the countries hatred and abuse of saints will be imputed unto you Fourthly yea I may add that you are the great cause of the persecutions of the godly and of the damnation of the persecutors While godly people appear in their own likeness in wisdome and love and humility and meekness and sobriety the world doth usually bear some reverence to them though it hate them But when you have made men believe that those that call themselves Godly people are but a company of superstitious Pharisees that cry Touch not tast not handle not or a sort of melancholly humorists who must sit because their neighbours stand or must go out of the way because their neighbours go in it This maketh them justifie all their cruelties to you and others and think persecution to be their duty and to say that the whip is for the fools back and wanton children must be made wise by the rod and that it is no wrong to a mad man to lie in Bedlam If you say that Godliness hath been alwayes perseâ—uted I answer But if you are the causers of it though it must needs be that scandal or offence come yet wo to him by whom it cometh Math. 18. 7. Luk. 17. 1 2. The way of heavenly wisdome is pure but peaceable and gentle and easie to be entreated The way that Christ and his Apostles have led us is to draw as
near to sinners as we can by Love and all the offices of Love neither following them in any sin nor flying from them in any thing that is lawful that they may be convinced that it is not humour and disdain and pride but true necessity and Gods command which maketh us differ from them as we do And that we may not be disabled by any contrary errours of our own from evincing and oppugning theirs DIRECT XLVII When ever you are avoiding any errour or sin forget not that there is a contrary extream to be avoided of which you are in danger as well as of that which you are opposing THe minds of most men are so narrow that they cannot look many wayes at once If they be intent on one thing they forget another But it is a narrow bridge betwixt dangerous gulfs which Christian faith and obedience must pass over And he that looketh on the one side with the greatest fear and caution is undone if he look not also on the other The common way of avoiding any errour oâ— vice is to run into the contrary And on those terms satan himself will be Orthodox and a reformer and an enemy to vice I gave you some instances even now He is a rare person that is so wise and happy as to flye from every errour and sin with an impartial awakened fear of the contrary And thence it is that the most judicious old experienced Christians are usually in controversies for a middle way and in the croud of contentious sects they commonly are the reconcilers Not only because they are more calm and moderate and peaceable than others but especially because they have seen the errour on both extreams when others see only the errour on one side Only in our inclination to our ultimate end that is in our Love to God we never need to fear over-doing But all the means may be perverted and turned into sin by extreams Many that observe the pollution of the Church by the great neglect of holy Discipline avoid this errour by turning to a sinful separation And many that are offended at separation avoid it by a gross neglect of Christian discipline and taking it for a needless thing Many who observe how heartlesly and hypocritically prescribed forms of prayer are used by too many do avoid it by denying the lawfulness of all forms And many who see the errour of this opinion do escape it by turning to meer formality and deriding all prayer which is not written in a book or prescribed by another If any who see how those that were baptized in Infancy are admitted to adult Communion without ever understanding or seriously owning the Covenant into which they were then entered and seeing how the Church is corrupted hereby do avoid this errour by denying the baptism of Infants And many that see the errour of the Anabaptists do avoid it by countenancing the aforesaid Church-corruption and if Infants be but baptized they never care whether they be called at years of discretion to the solemn renewing and owning of their Covenant And many that see both these extreams do plead for Confirmation as the middle way But they turn it into a meer Ceremony and defeat the ends of it and never bring the baptized to a solemn renewall of their holy Vow And many who see the Papists abuse of Confirmation do wholly cast it off and deny the healing use aforesaid Many who see the effects of Papal tyranny dislike all General Ministery which taketh the care of many Churches And many who see the incoherence of Independent Churches and the calamity of sects do incline to Papal Usurpation Many who see the evils of Indepency in respect of Council and Concord are inclined to a Regimental dependency and subordination of one Church to another as of Divine appointment And many who see that there is no proof that God ever appointed such a Regimental dependency do turn to Independency in point of Council and Concord Many who observe the grossness of their error who would have the people have the power of the Keys and govern the Church by the major Vote do deny the people the liberty of choosing their Pastors and being guided in spirituals as Volunteers And many who see this errour of denying the people liberty do give them the fore-said power of the Keyes and make them Governours of themselves by Vote Many who hear the Papists talk so much of merits and of good works do deny our own Faith and Love and Repentance the place that God hath assigned them in order to pardon and salvation in subordination to Christ And many who hear the presumptuous boast of being Righteous by Christs imputed Righteousness without any fulfilling of the Conditions of the Covenant of Grace on their parts do make as a jest of imputed Righteousness as it is taken in a sound and warrantable sense and do ascribe too much to the works of man Many who hear the Socinians make faith and obedience to be all one do deny that the faith by which we are justified is a giving up the soul in Covenant to Christ intirely in all his office even as our Redeemer and Lord and so an engagement to obedience by subjection And many that hear men say that faith justifieth us only as an instrument apprehending Christs satisfaction and meritorious righteousness as their own do confound our faith and obedience and forget that the faith by which we are justified is our becoming Christians or Assent and Consent to the Covenant which we make in Baptisme nothing more or less and not our living as Christians in after obedience which is the fruit or effect of faith And even in civil things many who observe how Turkish Tartarian Japonian China's and other Heathenish and Infidel Tyranny is the chief Resister of the Gospel and Suppresser of Christianity to the damnation of millions of souls And how Papal tyranny and Muscovian and Spanish cruelties are the chief Maintainers of ignorance and unreformedness in the Churches are ready hereupon to think dishonourably of Monarchy it self and to murmure at the power of Christian Princes and to rush into seditions and rebellions And many that see the mischiefs of seditions conspiraciesâ— and rebellions are ready to forget the grand and heynous sin of Tyranny and the calamity of Souls and Churches and Kingdoms thereby As Campanella saith The abuse of the Potestative Primality is Tyranny the abuse of the Intellective Primality is Heresie and the abuse of the Volitive Primality is Hypocrisie Though indeed he should have mentioned both extreams In a word woe be to the Reformer who feareth not running into the Extream which is contrary to the Errour and Sin which he would reform DIRECT XLVIII Think more and talk more of your faults and failings against others especially against Princes magistrates and Ministers than of their faults and failâ—ngs against you THe Reason of this Counsel is very obvious and past contradiction Another mans sin as
devised stricter terms Many must have other proofs of Godliness besides the understanding voluntary assent and consent to the Baptismal Covenant Yea of those that are in the universal Church already before they can be admitted to its priviledges or to a particular Church And which is worse they here give the Church no certain rule instead of Christs rule which they cast by But one man requireth one account and another requireth another and the rule and test doth vary as the charity or prudence of men do vary This is a superstition which hath already torn the Churches in pieces and is going on still to do worse And it s raised by mistaking-zeal Thirdly that none that at the same time or before are not entered members of some particular Church may by Baptism be entered into the Universal Church is a superstition which some good men have taken up Fourthly that he who is a member only of the Universal Church may not in transitu be admitted to communion with particular Churches unless he bring a Certificate from a particular Church of which he â—ometime was a Member Fifthly that the Pastor may not lawfully receive any member into a particular Church without the consent of the Major Vote of the people Sixthly that a Minister of Christ may not by Baptism receive any into the Universal Church but by the consent of the Major Vote of some particular Church Seventhly that no man is a Minister or Commissioned Officer of Christ for the discipling and baptizing of those without the Church unless he be also the Pastor of some particular Church or at least have been such Eighthly that the people do not only châ—sse the persons who shall be their Pastors but also give them their office or power Ninthly that the people have the power of the Keyes or of Church-Government by Vote Tenthly that the people of a particular Church do give authority to men to be Ministers in the Vniversal Church and to preach and baptize among those that are without Eleventhly that he that is a member of one Church may not communicate with any otâ—er but by the consent of the Pastor and people of that one Twelfthly That he that is a member of a Church may not remove his relation to another Church when his occasions and personal benefit require it and the publick good of many is not hurt by it without the consent of the Pastor and people of that Church Thirteenthly that it is simply unlawful to use a form of prayer or to read a prayer on a book Fourteenthly That if a School-master impose a form upon a schollar or a parent on a child it maketh it become unlawful Fifteenth that our presence maketh us guilty of all the errours or unmeet expressions of the Minister in publick worship At least if we before know of them And therefore that we must joyn with none whose errours or mis-expressions we know of before Sixteenth that as oft as a Minister is removed from his particular flock he becometh but a private men and is no longer a Minister and Officer of Christ. Seventeenth that we are guilty of the sins of all unworthy or scandalous Communicants if we communicate with them Though their admission is not by our fault Eighteenth that he whose judgement is against a Diocesan Church may not lawfully joyn with a Parish Church if the Minister be but subject to the Diocesan Nineteenth that whatsoever is unlawfully commanded is not lawful to be obeyed Twenty that it is unlawful to do any thing in the worship of God which is imposed by men and is not commanded it self in the Scripture As what Translation of the Scripture shall be read what meetre and what Tune of Psalms shall be in use what hour and at what place the Church shall meet Pulpits Tables Fonts c. Printing the Bible c. dividing it into Chapters verses c. These and more such as these are superstitions which some religious people have brought up And among those who are of another opinion wil speak against all the fore-mentioned superstâ—tâ—ons there are too many introduced which they are as fond of because they are their own ☞ As that all the Pastors of the Protestant Churches abroad who had only the election of the people and the ordination of Parochial Pastours and not of Diocesan Bishops are no true Ministers of Christ but Lay-men That therefore those Churches are no true Churches in a political sense and as organized That therefore their Baptism is unlawful and a nullity and all those nations are no baptized Christians Though the Papists who hold the validity of Lay-mens baptizing do here censure more easily That it is not lawful to communicate in such Churches and receive the Sacrament of the Lords supper from such Ministers That those Countries which are baptized by such should be rebaptized That those Ministers who are ordained by such should be re-ordained That it is unlawful to joyn with those Churches where the Minister prayeth only from a Habit of of prayer called extemporary without a fore-known form because they know not but he mayx put somewhat unlawful into his prayers and because the mind cannot so readily try and approve and consent to words which are hastily uttered and not known to the hearers before These and abundance other superstitions some men would introduce on the other side And by all such inventions fathered upon God and made a part of Religion the minds of men are corrupted and disquieted and the Churches disturbed and divided by departing from primitive simplicity I shall only now propose this to the consideration of those of the first sort Whether they are sure that these superstitions of theirs may not run the round as other superstitions have done before them Or some of them at least What if the next age should turn them into a dead formality And what if the next age after that should make Laws to enforce them And then Godly people first scruple them and then flye from them as discerned superstition And then the worst men bâ— glad of that advantage to persecute those that would not submit to them By this circulation if the same men who invented un-ordained Elders new and needless Church-Covenants c. could but live two or 300 years they might come to be among the number of those who cry out of them as superstitious and suffer persecution because they will not use them Yea there are among you now many things of a lower nature which some dare scarce plainly say God commandeth or forbiddeth and yet they are censorious enough about them As heretofore many were against wearing the hair of any considerable length Against wearing cuffs upon a day of humiliation Against dressing meat or feasting at least on the Lords day which is a day of Thanksgiving of divine institution and held That it is necessary to feast twice at least upon a day of Thanksgiving of mans appointment That a Minister should