abroad against the Persons and Prayers of the Ministery of England that we have been so negligent in asserting the frequent use of Our Lords Prayer of which the most are guilty or contrary to their former practice which it is hoped they performed in Faith have wholly abandoned the use of it as too many and what is worst of all that any Disciple after Confession of its excellency and crying Hosanna to it should almost in the same breath denounce a crucifigite that with its blessed Maker it might be betrayed with a kiss When an Enemy when the Sea invadeth our Land and threatneth destruction we all joyn as one man to make up the breaches but when our Religion our Zion is assaulted by more Enemies then ever when her Turrets and Battlements are broken down no man layeth it to heart This is Zion whom no man seeketh after was her Motto of old Ier. 30. 17. How secure and negligent have we been for the most part disserviceable and injurious to the Cause of Christ and his Church against the unchristian reasonings and unreasonable practices of such men who would drive us from our last and best refuge Quid enim nisi vota for what can Christians better confide in then in their Prayers and what Prayer is like to be more safe and effectual then this I shall expose my self not animated with the expectation of success and victory being on the defensive part but to discharge my duty to shew my readiness in the cause of Christ and to strengthen the feeble knees and lift up the hands that hang down lest that which is lame be turned out of the way And yet seeing that Magna est veritas praevalebit truth is great and will prevail though the Advocate that pleadeth for it be never so weak and seeing that no truth hath more express foundation in Scripture or for that cause hath had more universal practice in the Church I despair not but the eyes of those that are not wilfully blind may be opened at least the mouths of such as are not desperately wicked may be stopped from reproching the footsteps of Gods anointing in decrying rhe pious use of this most excellent Prayer by that which through the blessing of God shall be said on its behalfe in this ensuing Exercitation Which that it may not swell with a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or digression I shal insert a few things by way of Introduction against the opinion of such as oppose this Prayer under the notion of being a form as 1. that though som forms may justly be dislik'd yet the ground of disliking them because they are forms is very unjust forasmuch as God himself prescribed divers forms which were accordingly practised by the Jewish Church under the Law and our Saviour and the Christian Church after his Example have in all ages done the like under the Gospel Most unhappy therefore are they who heap such disrespect on that most Heavenly Prayer delivered and inculcated by our Saviour once and again to his Disciples meerely on the account of its being a form in as much as they seem to fight against God and proclaim that to be common and unclean which God and our Saviour have Sanctified by their reiterated injunction and practice And with what greater pompe the Friends of the English Liturgy could have solemnized its funerals then the enemies of it have done in causing this sacred form to accompany it to its grave no Master of Ceremonies could well have contrived In condemning this they have as much as in them lay justified that and given its friends some hope there being so much Divinity in the Grave with it that one day it may have a refined resurrection But at such a Funerall as this the Church cannot but mourn in the words of old Jacob Ioseph is not and Simeon is not and will ye take Benjamin away all these things are against me But that in the Old Testament divers forms were prescribed by God and used by the Jewes sundry instances will evince That of Alsteed shall lead the Chorus Etsi in S S. nihil tradatur de formula precum Although nothing be recorded in Scripture concerning a form of Prayer used by the Fathers before the floud for that which the Jewes say of certain Psalmes then used is uncertain yet sure it is that they had a set form of Prayer because they had a set form of worshipping God i. e. certain Rites Ceremonies and Sacrifices for the worship of God without Prayer is imperfect and God was then invocated To this that they had a certain sort of Books wherein 't is likly such forms were recorded But after the floud before the promulgation of the Law there were extant the devout Prayers of Abraham Jacob and Moses Moreover when God delivered the Law of the Nazarites he injoyned Aaron and his Sons a form of Prayer which others afterward did imitate Thus far Alsteed And I find his first conjecture to be approved by many learned men viz. that Sacrifice was alway attended with solemn invocation which appeareth from Gen. 12. 8. Abraham built an Altar and called upon the Name of the Lord and from Psalm 116. verse 13 17. I will take the cup of salvation and will call upon the Name of the Lord. I will offer to thee the sacrifice of Thankesgiving and will call upon the name of the Lord. Sigonius saith that from the time of their settlement in Canaan the Jewes had In omnibus urbibus loca quaedam destinata precibus solennibus certain places set apart in every City for solemne Prayers so that Prayers it seemeth were more usual then Sacrifice and thus Bertram Conveniebat populus ad Synagogas extra Jerusalem ad preces solennes the people met in certain Synagogues without Jerusalem for solemne Prayer but now as Dr. Lightfoot noteth they are content as appeareth in their Common-Prayer-book and they pray God to be so too with Prayers without Sacrifices The Jewes have a form of Prayer recorded which they say was used by Noah how truly I will not contend but these following instances of prescribed forms so used are undoubtedly true as the blessing injoyned Aaron and his sonnes was constantly pronounced and continued untill the dayes of Simeon the Just who imbraced Christ in his armes The Song of Moses Exod. 15. 1. was used on all occasions of Thanksgiving by that Church The form injoyned at the end of tithing on the third year Paulus Fagius giveth us the form of Prayer used by Aaron over the Scape-goat Quae forma haec fuit which form was this O Lord thy people the children of Israel have sinned they have done wickedly they have grievously transgressed against thee I beseech thee now O Lord forgive their sinnes iniquities and transgressions wherein thy people the children of Israel have sinned and done wickedly and transgressed against thee And another form when the bullock
was offered v. 27. And he giveth a third form on ch 8. and addeth 〈◊〉 simile est Christum quibusdam quae in his precibus continentur usum fuisse It is likely that Christ made use of some things in these prayers but of this hereafter Hoernebeck repeating the seven precepts of Noah viz. 1. For avoyding Idolatry 2. Not cursing of God 3. Not shedding of blood 4. Not discovering of nakedness or fornication 5. Of theft and rapine 6. Of Judgement 7. Of not eating any part of a living creature all which the Jewes say were given by Noah and so continued till Abraham who received a precept for circumcision and appointed Morning-prayer Isaac consecrated Tithes and added another prayer to be said before day Jacob added another precept De non comedendo nervo oblivioso of not eating the nerve of forgetfulness and prayers for the Evening and at length by Moses was the Law consummate Mr. Herbert Thornedike proves the use of forms from 1 Chron. 23. 30. where the Levites were to bless and praise the God of Israel using some Psalmes of David particularly those Psalmes of Degrees from Psalm 121. to Psalm 135. which being ended they pronounced the blessing appointed in the Law And indeed the Titles of those Psalmes directed for the Masters of Musick do intimate that they were to be used in the service of the Temple and learned men also assure us they were constantly so used many of Davids Psalmes were used as the Jewish Liturgy on all occasions Psalm 104 105 106 107. were of frequent use Psalm 92. was appointed for the Sabbath Psalm 118. for Festivals Psalm 102. for the afflicted Saint Hierome observes that four of them are expresly called Prayers Mr. Perkins saith that most of them are so Psalm 90. is called A Prayer of Moses the man of God which because Scripture saith it we ought to believe it was so Hezekiah we read commanded the Levites to praise God in the words of David and Asaph and that he had a form of thanksgiving which he used all the dayes of his life is very probable from Isa. 38. 20. for it was appointed for the House of the Lord. Calvin saith Consilium Spiritus Sancti meo judicio fuit ordinariam precandi formam Ecclesiae tradere cujus usum ex verbis fuisse colligimus quoties discrimen aliquod instabat It was the counsel of the Spirit of God to give his Church an ordinary form of Prayer which was used in words as oft as any danger approched In a Samaritan Chronicle which the renowned Archbishop of Armagh procured from the Library of the admirably learned Joseph Scaliger is another testimony of the Antiquity of forms Postea mortuus est Adrianus c. After this died Adrian in whose time the high Priest took away that most excellent booke that was in their hands ever since the calm and peaceable times which contained those Songs and Prayers which were ever used before the Sacrifices for before every several sacrifice they had their several songs still used in those times of peace All which accurately written were transmitted to the subsequent generations from the time of the Legate Moses unto this day by the Ministery of the high Priest this book he the high Priest took away then which no History besides the Pentateuch of Moses was found more ancient These memorials of forms of publick and prescribed Prayer before the time of Ezra may suffice here the studious Reader may observe many more in the Rabbines works and from them in Scaliger Selden Fagius Buxtorfe c. From the time of Ezra until Christs it is yet more evident that publick forms were used Mr. Selden saith that certain forms of Prayer were to be used dayly by every one by Law or received custome which were composed by Ezra and his house or consistory Capel us relateth the same and that Ezra and his house the great Synagogue appointed eighteen forms of Benedictions Rabbi Tanchum saith The wise men made these eighteen Prayers for so many bones in the back of a man which are to be bowed at the rehearsal of them because David saith All my bones shall praise thee which Benedictions were to be pronounced in words already conceived And that the number of their Prayers was according to the number of their Sacrifices their morning Prayer their mincha minor and major i. the lesser and greater oblation their Evening Prayer their additionary Prayer and the concluding Prayer and he addeth The Prayer for which Peter and John Acts 3. 1. went into the Temple was the mincha minor which answered to the Evening-sacrifice of the Law and the hour according to our account was three of the clock in the afternoon Selden addeth that the Prayers prescribed by Ezra were to be learned by every man that so the prayers of the unskilfull might be as perfect as of the eloquent man that every act of praying was begun with O Lord open thou our lips c. and concluded with Into thy hands I commit my spirit The learned Scaliger saith Rara illis benedictio erat sine his verbis solennibus Benedictus es Domine Deus noster c. There was seldome a blessing without these words Blessed art thou O Lord God King of Ages who hast sanctified us and hast given commandment about these and these things Joseph Albo Ikkar saith The men of the great Synagogue attributed the work of the Resurrection only to the power of God in this form Tu potens in seculum Domine c. Thou O Lord art Almighty for ever thou restorest the dead to life and art of great power to save A little before the dispersion of the Jewes R. Gamaliel added a nineteenth Prayer to those of Ezra and after him others until the dayly service grew to an hundred Prayers The Jewes Talmud especially that part called the Mischna is full of such forms which carrie the names of the ancient Rabbines that composed them the first Chapter of the Talmud is intitled as Buxtorf observeth Berachos i. of Blessings and Prayers for the fruits of the Earth and the practice of the Iewes ever since the penning of the Talmud in recording their set forms of Prayers upon divers occasions is an Argument that it was their use to compose such and use them in more ancient times Now this is evident by the many volumes of publick Devotions published by them of which it shall suffice to name these following In the History of Pascha are the Blessings and Prayers belonging to that Festival The second part of Sepher Haa haua is concerning Prayers Also a great Rituall and commentary upon the Prayers of the Iewes Another Precationes quibus utuntur ante post cibum Of Prayers used before and after meat which were divers some at publick Feasts and others at private meals Another named Selichos being Prayers appointed for obtaining mercy
Iohn also taught that is giving them a form It seemeth that because Religion was miserably corrupted by the false Glosses and superstitious Traditions of the Pharisees as also by a general depravation of manners so that it was no marvel if very few of them either rightly practised or truly understood the main part of Gods worship which is in devout and faithful prayer therefore whereas now the long promised redemption of the faithful drew neer it was necessary that their hope should be strengthened by prayer to expect it so that Iohn Baptist whose office it was to prepare the way of Christ did out of most evident places of Scripture thereto pertinent compose for his Disciples whom he was to instruct and fit to receive the Messias some private prayer suitable to their present condition and the spiritual Kingdom of Christ which they were to profess Diodate on the words as Iohn also taught that is giving them some express form of it Doctor Lightfoot whom we have before named sayes they that deny this for a form of prayer either know not or consider not what kind of prayers the eminent men among the Iews taught them Sect. 6. And whosoever shall read the Mischna and Gemara Seder Tephiloth of the Iewes of Portugal the Comment on Perke Avoth Sepher Hammusar Machazor and other Rabbinical writings he may see many remains of forms of Prayer made by their ancient Doctors and retaining still the inscription of their names It is to be known saith learned Mr. Thorndike that things related in the Misna written in the dayes of Antoninus Pius are not to be understood as if they were of no greater standing then that time but are the most ancient orders of that people practised and delivered long before from hand to hand as things not lawful to be committed to writing and then first written for fear that their manifold dispersions might bring their rules and orders into oblivion And from the first title of the Misna we have enough to evince this whole point for there we have divers cases concerning the formal words of divers of those prayers which still they use resolved by Doctors that lived not long after our Saviours time and therefore the terms and cases of more ancient Doctors disputed at that time by these must needs be of greater antiquity Scaligers hand shall be the last that shall be applied for the settlement of this stone Si quis neget c. If any deny the antiquity of these Record it is all one as if he should deny the Determinations of Papinian Paul Ulpian and other Lawyers registred in the Digests of Justinian to be their resolutions under whose names they are cited And now I know no more to be done toward the settlement of this stone but to fill up the chinks and to polish it I shall adde these considerations Sect. 7. 1. That S. Iohns Disciples did use such a distinct form of prayer as that they were thereby known by all that heard them to belong unto him is cleerly intimated in the Disciples question which was occasioned by this observation of theirs Master teach us to pray as Iohn also taught his Disciples 2. This prayer so commonly used by them must be either of their own composure agreeable to certain heads prescribed by their Master or else a set form That it should be of their own composure according to their divers abilities is unlikely 1. Because the Disciples of Iohn were generally but of a mean condition and to think that they had any extraordinary gifts bestowed upon them so early our Saviours own Disciples after they had been a long time with him being but meanly qualified before the coming of the Holy Ghost is somewhat dissonant from the truth of the holy Scriptures and the wisdom of our Saviour that did not on this supposition chuse Disciples for himself as well qualified as S. Iohns were but in all probability they were both of them ignorant not onely of the matter what to ask but which seemeth most difficult of the manner also how to ask aright 2. Because as hath been proved other Doctors among the Iewes did usually prescribe the very form of prayer that was used by their Disciples and the composure of publick prayer was not the work of ordinary Disciples but the office of one or more eminent men in all ages of that Church 3. Because if S. Iohn had onely given his Disciples heads of prayer and not a set form this would not have conduced to the production of that effect which the Scripture intimates to have followed viz. to make them known to all that heard them whose Disciples they were for though their prayers for the matter of them might be agreeable yet differing wholly in form and variety of expressions they could not be well understood by people of mean capacities to have followed the same rule this I guesse from the little uniformity observed in the devotion of such as follow the heads of prayer prescribed by the Directory For though there be a good method and excellent matter proposed yet men being left to their own composures they either slight the method or so invert confound perplex and obscure the matter thereof in their own expressions as that it can justly be said but of a few these do observe the Directory 4. Questionless the matter of S. Iohns prayer had a great harmony with the chief heads which were ordinarily used by the Disciples of other Iewish Doctors and therefore it must be the form that made the distinction 5. And lasty If we may judge of a deed by its counterpart our Saviour delivering in his answer a form of prayer as is granted by all doth more then intimate that the prayer taught by Iohn and that which was desired by his own Disciples unlesse we should think that our Saviour answered impertinently was a form So that if we should paraphrase the words thus Lord teach us a prayer whereby we may be known to be thy Disciples as Iohn also taught his Disciples a prayer whereby we and all that hear them may know whose Disciples they are Our Saviours answer delivering a composed form doth approve this interpretation When ye pray say this form Our Father Sect. 8. And upon these premises I may build this conclusion that the prayer delivered by our Saviour on the request of his Disciples according to the instance of S. John was not intended only as a Directory for matter and method of prayer but as a set form to be used by them and to serve as a peculiar mark and character that they were his Disciples Sect. 9. But before we consider the words of the injunction and command this one thing may be opportunely and materially inserted that as it hath been already proved forms of prayer were used in the Iewish Church until our Saviourstime so our Saviour himself did not dislike or abhor from either forms of prayer in general or
for it both matter order and words for though it be a gift of the Spirit yet it is not to be expected that it should suddenly be infused into us without any premeditation of our own no more then the gift of preaching for which the ablest Ministers are bound to prepare themselves with diligence and study there being not any ground for a man to expect more immediate supplies from above in the duty of Prayer then in that of preaching And page 15. Because there will be sometime a necessity that our affections should follow and be stirred up by our expressions which is especially to be aimed at when we pray in publick in reference to those that joyn with us and will very often fall out likewise in our secret devotions therefore it is requisite that a man should be alwayes furnished with such premeditated forms as may be most effectual to this end namely to excite the affections and to this purpose if those heads which will be alwaies pertinent and of continual necessity were comprehended in some set forms studied with care and diligence they might perhaps be more serviceable for the stirring up our faith and affections then they could otherwise be if they did proceed onely from our own sudden conceptions and page 17. Such crude notions and confused matter as some by their neglect in this kind will vent doth rather nauseate and flat the devotion then excite it page 18. There is nothing more unsuitable to the solemnity of this duty to that reverence which we owe to the Divine Majesty then to be speak him in a loose careless empty manner And to that objection from Matthew 10. 19. Take not thought how or what ye shall speake for it shall be given you in that same houre He answers When men may use the common means it is a great presumption to depend upon extraordinary helps such as were there promised to assist them in special services The son of Sirach saith Before thou prayest prepare thy self and be not as one that tempts the Lord he that rusheth upon this duty without using the common means of fitting himself for it doth tempt God Of this those are guilty who depend so much upon immediate infusion as to neglect all previous study This de jure concerning the lawfulness and great conveniency of formes The matter o fact and the constant use of them in the Church hath been sufficiently testified already from those ancient Liturgies before named many of which though as all Protestants grant have been lamentably adulterated by the additions and alterations of late Sophisters doe yet retain manifest impressions of antiquity so that though it may be disputed concerning them as about Theseus his ship at Athens whether it were the same ship or not every part almost being changed yet it was granted that such a ship there had once been Even so certain it is there were Liturgies in those Primitive times though we cannot affirm of any one Liturgy now commended to us under those Apostolical names that it is compleatly the same as it was of old Rivet indeed reckoneth those Liturgies among zizania or tares which were sowne by the enemy while the husbandmen slept but certainly the husbandman had sown good seed in those fields though the enemy tooke the advantage of sowing suddenly after them the foundation was good though ungodly men built hay and stubble on it St. Augustine observed many corruptions in these publick devotions in his time but yet highly commended the praiers of the Church Utinam tardi corde c. I would to God that they who are of a slow heart would so hear our disputes that they would also consider our prayers which the Church hath alwayes had and will have unto the worlds end The Magdeburgenses have this observation from St. Cyprian that the rite observed in the publick Prayers of the Church was this The Priest at the beginning of Prayer did stir up the people to a devout calling on God saying Sursum corda Lift up your hearts and they answered We lift them up unto the Lord and they adde Formulas quasdam precationum sine dubio habuerant They had without doubt certain forms of Prayer Origen hath some remains of those ancient forms he sayes they had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ordained Prayers to some of which he often alludes as on Jeremy Frequenter in oratione dicimus c. We often say in our prayers Grant this O heavenly Father grant us a portion with thy Prophets and the Apostles of thy Christ. Eusebius saith that Constantine had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for his Army and Family and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 studied premeditated and appointed prayers The Councel of Laodicea speaks of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Liturgy of Prayer and that at the entrance into the Church first the Prayer of the Catechumeni was said then that of the Penitents and lastly that of the Faithful And the Councel of Carthage ordained thus Quicunque preces aliunde desumit c. Whoever did frame any other prayers should first consult with his more learned brethren The Milevitan Councel took care that the Prayers of the Church and no others should be used Then St. Basil Though we are bid to pray concinually saith he yet may we not despise the prayers of the Church And Concil Gangren hath made one Canon to this end Ne orationes Ecclesiae contemnantur That the Prayers of the Church be not contemned The chief Objection against the use of forms of Prayer is for ever silenced by Doctor Preston The Objection is this That in stinted Prayers the Spirit is straitned when a man is tied to a form then he shall have his Spirit as it were bounded and limited that he cannot go beyond that which is prescribed and therefore say they it is reason a man should be left to more liberty as he is in conceived Prayer and not tied to a strict form To this I answer saith he that even those men that are against this and that use this reason they do the same thing dayly in the congregation for when another prayes that is a set form to him that hears it I say it is a set form for put the case that he which is the hearer and doth attend another praying suppose that his spirit be more inlarged it is a straitning of him he hath no more liberty to go out he is bound to keep his mind intent upon that which the other prayeth and therefore if that were a sufficient reason that a man might not use a set form because the spirit is straitned a man should not hear another pray though it be a conceived Prayer because in that case his spirit is limited it may be that the hearer hath a larger heart a great deal then he that speaks and prayes so that there is a bounding straitning and limiting of the Spirit to him and therefore that reason
cannot be good So far that pious Doctor And if his reason be good it will follow That the Church doth no more quench or limit the Spirit in prescribing a form to the Ministers then they doe quench or limit the Spirit in the people whom they from time to time doe confine unto those forms which they do presently conceive and utter among them And as the spirit of the people is in this respect subject to the Prophets so the spirit of the Prophets divisim severally is subject to the Prophets conjunctim joyntly That which is objected by some against the use of forms from 1 Corinthians 14. 15. I will pray with the Spirit c. is not at all understood by the Objectors Calvine sayes Spiritus voce singulare linguarum donum c. By the word Spirit that extraordinary gift of tongues is to be understood And Beza on Orabo spiritu i. saith he linguâ perogrinâ quam mihi dictat Spiritus I will pray in the spirit is no more then this I will pray in a strange tongue as the Spirit shall dictate to me and so on verse 16. When thou shalt bless with the spirit i. in a strange tongue how shall he c. Or if this place could possibly be understood of extemporary effusions in Prayer they were extraordinary ones wherein the Spirit dictated words as well as matter and such as cannot now be pretended to But lastly if by that Scripture praying in the spirit excludes forms of Prayer then by Verse 15. singing in the spirit excludes forms of singing and so we should bring in extemporarie Psalmes too and then I fear we should transgress that of our Apostle verse 40. Let all things be done decently and in order According to appointment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among you It is the dutie of every Christian to grow in the exercise of his gifts and graces in Prayer to be able on all occasions to lift up holy desires to God and he that indeavours not this may be marked with that Character of an hypocrite which Eliphaz would have stamped on him Thou restrainest prayer from God Thou keepest thy prayer from growing So Fenner And they that cannot go to spread their wants in the presence of God without the help of a form are strangers to a great part of their happiness which consisteth in a free filial and ingenuous communion with God And I make no question but Ministers may and ought on new occasions to adde and alter many Petitions and after long experience and practice in private may exercise those gifts of Prayer which God hath given them in publick but yet if the occasion may be fore-known if it do not surprize him too suddenly no question but by study and deliberation he may better comply with it and excite the peoples affections more then he can in an extemporarie manner And when in the main both the matter and method of Prayer as Invocation Confession Supplication Intercession and Thanksgiving are still the same there can be as no sure sign of grace in varying the words so no just cause of rash censure in retaining and using the same for since we pray to the same God in the Name of the same Mediator profess our belief in the same truths feel the same wants and fear the same evils inward and outward and all these are in a great measure common to all we may as well meditate and prepare in what words a in what sense and in what manner we ought to come before the Majesty of God as for what end and certainly wholesome words deliberately fitted by one or more judicious and experienced Disciples to the capacities and understanding of the hearers are soonest received into their hearts and have a greater influence upon the affections to raise them and lift them up to God in Prayer then any other But enough of these premisses The conclusion is this If both publick and private forms be lawful and expedient as both the practice of the Church and the judgement of men famous for Learning and Piety do assert surely then there cannot be any fault on the account of its being a form justly imputed to our Lords Prayer or which may justifie the disuse of it For let all the Arguments that are brought in defence of other forms as for singing Psalmes administration of the Sacraments blessing the people be all summed up and each of them may be easily and highly improved for the lawfull use of this form I shall give you for instance a view of these Arguments that are urged by a Reverend and judicious Divine for singing Psalmes and every one may perceive how fitly they may be accommodated to the use of our Lords Prayer 1. If singing of Psalmes in Davids forms in which are many Prayers be a Gospel-Ordinance so is praying unto God in our Saviour form 2. If there be no reason why our conceived Psalmes should thrust out Davids Psalmes neither is there any reason why our conceived prayers should thrust out our Saviours Prayer 3. If upon concession that we must sing Psalmes Davids Psalmes will carrie it there being no art or spirit of man that can come near that of David Then also upon concession that we must pray Christs Prayer will carrie it there being no art or spirit of man that can come near that of Christ. 4. If none dare deny but that the Levites had the assistance of the Spirit when they praised God in the words of David then neither can any denie whatever they dare but that the Disciples of Christ may have the assistance of the Spirit when they pray to God in the words of Christ Quâ nulla spiritualior oratio Then which there is no prayer more spiritual as Tertul. 5. Are Davids Psalmes to be sung because they suit with all occasions of the people of God as well or better then any songs composed by an ordinarie gift for the same reason ought our Saviours Prayer to be used it being fitted to the necessities of the people of God in all ages in all conditions and for all just desires And thus every Argument for any other form may à fortiori be more strongly applied to this and all Answers to any Objections against them will be subservient to this most excellent form Of which as Hooker saith 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 for he that made us live hath also taught us to pray to the end that speaking to the Father in the Sons prescript form without scholy or gloss of ours we may be sure that we offer nothing that God will disallow or deny A Prayer which uttered with true devotion and zeal of heart affordeth to God himself that glory that aid to the weaker sort to the most perfect that solid comfort
melius est ut scandalum oriutur quà m ut verìtas relinquatur saith Gregory If scandal be taken against any truth it is better that men should be causelesly offended then the truth shamefully betrayed Sin gets strength and takes advantage by the Commandements of the Law and sometimes the corruption of mans heart is inraged and heightned by the preaching of the Gospel yet notwithstanding these and many more offences taken by wicked men we must preach both the Law and the Gospel too though it prove a stone of stumbling and a savour of death to some yet it is the savour of life and salvation unto others Suppose then this form be abused to ill purposes by some and as is said occasioneth formalitie in others yet they that know it to be their dutie and have grace to use it better may not neglect it upon that pretence certain it is our good use of it will more benefit them then their abuse of it can prejudice us and we know as the Civilians teach nulla est obligatio ad illicita there can be no obligation laid on us to doe what is forbidden or to leave undone what is required by Law both these being illicita unlawful Yea supposing this form had not been prescribed but left as a thing indifferent to be used or not used pro arbitrio yet seeing indifferent things do then become necessary when by the use of them God may have most glory and his people most benefit as well by the increase of peace and holiness as by the prevention of division and wickedness I would gladly joyn issue here and bring it to a fair trial and determination with any sober man whether the using or not using the Lords Prayer as a forme be most conducible to these ends And should we give it but Lidford Law and sit in judgement after Execution to hear the indictment and evidences produced against it and after the general neglect of it I should aske the same question as the Governour did in behalf of its Maker what evil hath it done and upon hearing no evil but a great good hath appeared in the use of it and contrary no good but a great deal of evil by the omission and after this the multitude should continue and heighten their clamours against it and those who have been chiefly faulty herein should instead of washing their hands or acknowledging that they have sinned in denying this most excellent useful Prayer say still the guilt be upon us and upon our children there is just ground of suspition given that they have not that Christian prudence and pious affection to the things of Christ as they ought to have that profess themselves his Disciples And now if as I have heard since I first thought on this subject any mans blood and passion shall be troubled by the view of these considerations as natural concupiscence is often excited by the Law which seeks to restrain it so as that they do sound a trumpet and bid defiance and make parties against such as in obedience to an apparent command of Christ shall continue or reassume this practice let them know that they do not deal with others whose consciences may be as tender as their own as they themselves would be dealt with and it will but little extenuate their sin that do oppose the practice of any Ordinance of Jesus Christ though they should be perswaded that therein they doe God good service and as surely as it was piously and in obedience to our Saviours in junction practised by the people of God in former ages so it cannot be omitted much less opposed by any among us without great suspition of pride and disobedience But this by way of caution I go on to argue the case in hand And in the next place It is a thing impossible for any rational man to conceive that when our Saviour bid his Disciples when they pray to say Our Father c. that it should be his sense and intent that we ought not to say so or that we should doe amiss in so doing Had there been any danger in using of it our Saviour who foresaw all possible inconveniences and offences and bid us especially to pray that we might not be led into temptation would not have brought us to a precipice or as Satan carried him upon a Pinacle of the Temple from whence we might the more easily and irrecoverably fall having a Scriptum est to cast us head-long into that supposed offence of saying as he taught us for most certain it is that upon these very words of our Saviour Thus pray ye and when ye pray say the Church of Christ in all ages hath been induced to use the very words of this prayer in all their solemn Devotions if they have offended in so doing or if the inconveniences which have followed the practice be chargeable upon it as proper effects of it let those that so judge consider whether they do not make our Saviour an accessarie if not a principal in all those offences and it is more safe to be reputed an offender with him then innocent in any society that separates from him But it will be objected That our Saviour commanded this Prayer as a plat-form to frame our Prayers like unto it in matter and method onely and not at all in the use of the same words That our Saviour should make it a form and so use it more then once and yet intend it only for a plat-form is wondrously strange and why we who use to hear the prayers and praises of holy men in their several forms and expressions as well as matter may not as innocently and devoutly use this of our Saviour is a very rare and abstruse speculation The Creed the Rule of Faith must not be varied in words by any private person nor the Decalogue the rule of works yet this which is not onely a Rule but a most perfect Form of Prayer must not be used in the prescribed words Suppose a Minister should frame his whole publick prayer of scripture-Scripture-forms and expressions such as we have fitted to all occasions no doubt but such a Prayer though it consisted of forms would be of excellent use and efficacy and why the summing up of that Prayer or rather the consummating of it in our Lords Prayer should be accounted less useful and effectual no impartial eye can discern seeing as the matter of this would be more comprehensive so the Architecture and composure of it is far beyond the contrivance of any humane inventions and if our care to study the Scriptures and out of them to chuse acceptable words and phrases for the composition of our Prayers then surely our fixing upon this most wholesome form of words deserves yet a greater commendation and necessitate medii as well as praecepti becomes necessary as being most fit to affect the understanding and thereby to stir up the affections by the
like that which the Papists make against the use of the Scriptures by the Lay-people that one egge is not more like another viz. Because in them are some things hard to be understood therefore they permit them not to converse with them and to use means lay hold on opportunities to understand them better It is great pitty that the excellency of things should render them useless that the exemplary justice and goodness of Aristides should be the ground of his banishment Besides suppose the people be ignorant of the proper sense of one or two Petitions it cannot charitably be supposed that they are ignorant of all and their ignorance of some particulars will not be a sufficient excuse for the total omission of this duty no more I think then if a man should plead I am not in perfect charity I am dull and indisposed therefore I will not pray though such a one may sin in his prayer yet he sins more in the wilful omission and it is better to pray in a sense of our infirmities and unworthiness which still accompany us then not to pray at all because we cannot in some things justifie our selves Doctor Preston makes Prayer the best preparation to Prayer and Saint James commends it as a good mean to obtain spiritual knowledge If any man lack wisedome let him aske it of God and it shall be given him If this Prayer be so positively injoyned then it ought to be used as the only prayer at least it should be added to all other Affirmative precepts doe alwayes oblige us to the performance of them but not to the actual exercise of the duties injoyned by them at all times Thus when we are bid to pray continually we may as well conclude that we ought to do nothing but pray for which opinion the Euchites and Messalians were accounted Hereticks as to infer from hence that we ought to use this form only or this at all times of prayer and so from that Precept vers 6. of Matthew 6. we might as truly infer that all but closet prayers are unlawful because Christ there saith when thou prayest enter into thy closet whereas we might rather infer that as our Saviour commended closet prayers to his Disciples to distinguish them from hypocrites who were wont to pray chiefly in the streets and high wayes so he commendeth this form to difference them from the heathen and to be as a cognizance of their Discipleship to be used pro hic nunc on solemn occasions in publick and once a day at least in private as is implied in the fourth Petition 2. Supposing as some contend that our Saviour had injoyned this Prayer as a platform only as then there would have been no necessity of conforming every occasional Petition to the whole method and frame of it but it should have served as a rule by which to conform our more solemn Devotions so now our publick prayers being framed by it we ought to apply the form it self to these especially as a rule to discover their rectitude or deficiency and to supply their imperfections which if it were duly done as oft as we worship God in publick it would be as salt to season our Devotions and give the people assurance that we have done according to the pattern in the mount it might cover a multitude of infirmities and commend our Devotions to God and man And lastly it might prove an effectuall mean to revive that Unanimitie and Charitie which hath so long been cold and dead amongst us When I have kept close to the matter of this prayer in my devotion it is but a vain repetition to say over the form If those that fail in observing the matter and method would use the forme and the use of one of these is undoubtedly their dutie the farre greater part of our Ministers would use it 2. There can be no great danger in saying our prayers too oft whether in the same or other words Our Saviour repeated the same words three times when he was in an Agony Matthew 26. 44. O my Father if it be possible let this cup pass from me And if the same conceptions may be often repeated in other words of our own invention as is generally practised why may they not be once repeated in Christs words To goe from a less perfect form to a more perfect from our own to Christs is a good method There is an Art taught by Saint Paul how to make an old prayer new Phil. 3. 18. namely by renewing our fervent affections Of whom I have told you often and now tell you even weeping the increase of zeal and fervour of spirit will add new life and efficacy to any prayer But we find our hearts dull and cold under this as well as under other forms To this we may answer as the Apostle in another case ye are not straitned by this forme ye are straitned in your own bowels It may be your hearts are stupid at the reading of the Scriptures must that Ordinance therefore cease Mr. Ball telleth us of one Smith that would cast reading of Scripture out of the Assembly because in his opinion it quenched the Spirit But in such cases the deadness of our hearts is to be blamed not the form of Prayer which is full of life and spirit yet it is strange that any mans heart should be active and fervent under one that prayes a form to him ten or twenty times to him as long and presently grow stupid and cold at the devout repetition of this form perhaps by the same Minister Doth the holy Spirit assist you in hearing the Ministers form and withdraw from you in hearing this no doubtless but as we may be edified by Psalms and Hymnes and spiritual Songs brought into forms by men so much more by the use of this form composed and injoyned by the Son of God I should rather therefore think that the hearts of those that have been dull or disaffected under the prayers of the Ministers should be quickned and elevated by this as the drooping Disciples going to Emaus while Christ was speaking to them their hearts burned and so indeed the people in former dayes by their more reverend gestures their chearful and unanimous joyning with their Ministers in the use of this prayer were wont to express their most hearty devotion And here we may observe how little the enemies of the truth do agree One accusing it for being more large and comprehensive then their spirits and understandings can apprehend another for that it doth too much straiten and confine their spirits and make them flat and dull which accusations as they cannot be both true so without better proof we have no reason to believe either But most men cannot safe y say this Prayer they cannot call God Father nor pray for forgivenesse on that hard condition for such our Saviour maketh it of being forgiven as they doe
But it is natural to us to see a mote in a brothers eye and not to consider the beam that is in our own If they reproch it that conform to it and in a conscientious obedience to our Saviours prescription repeat it in the same words and apply it to their own prayers to supply the defects of them what do they that pronounce the saying of it which is prescribed to be ridiculous and a charm and question whether the saying of these words which Christ and his Evangelists have put into our mouths be a part of the worship of God or whether any promise of acceptation no matter with what affection and devotion it be said be annexed to the saying so and many such things the mentioning of which will be a sufficient confutation But I forbeare and close with Master Ball who first grants it is a form and addeth The principal use of it is to direct all Gods People to make their Prayers by it Dr. Owen Our Saviour hath prescribed a forme of prayer to be used as a form by repetition of the same words therefore we may use it yea we must use it is an invincible Argument on supposition of the truth of the Proposition But our Saviour hath prescribed us such a form therefore we may use another hath neither shew nor colour of reason in it Reply He must either wilfully shut his eyes or have a weak sight that cannot discern more then a colour of Reason in this consequence viz. Our Saviour hath prescribed us one form as lawful therefore we may use other formes lawfully for surely our Saviour did not prescribe any thing which was in genere suo unlawful Indeed the contrarie inference is strange and hard to be proved viz. Our Saviour hath asserted the lawfulness of one or more forms therefore all others not so asserted are unlawfull When it was prescribed at a solemn Fast that the Priests should say Spare thy people O Lord c. Is it reasonable to think that they made use of no other prayers as of Davids penitential Psalmes and the like but onely of that short form there prescribed or that they did offend in so doing Or what if any should argue thus Our Saviour hath prescribed us this form therefore those in Hosea Joel c. are unlawful to be used The Primitive Christians saw more then a colour of Reason in this Consequence when on this very ground because Christ gave his Disciples a form of Prayer they did with study and meditation compose their publick devotions after this Example So Tertullian Praemissâ legitimâ ordinariâ oratione quasi fundamento jus est desideriorum jus est superstruendi extrinsecus petitiones The lawfull and ordinary prayer being premised it becomes the rule of all our desires and of raising all our Petitions upon it and Mr. Ball who maketh it a form saith also that Christ admitteth all Languages Words and Forms agreeable to it whether read rehearsed by heart or presently conceived And Espencaus observeth the same Ducta est hinc Ecclejiae consuctudo Deum precandi precibus instar ejus quam constituit composuit Dominus utendi From this practice of our Saviour the Church hath grounded her practice of praying unto God and using such Prayers as the Lord did appoint and compose Dr. Owen But how will Master Beedle prove that Christ doth not here instruct his Disciples in what they ought to pray for and for what they ought in prayer to address themselves unto God and under what considerations they are to looke on God in their approches to him and the like onely but also that he prescribeth the words there mentioned by him to be repeated by them in their supplications Reply The task which the Doctor sets Mr. Beedle to prove in the Negative should have been proved by himself in the Affirmative and I think it will be sufficiently difficult to demonstrate that the matter and heads of Prayer and the method and considerations by and under which we are to call on God cum multis aliis and other such things are all of them and onely prescribed and yet the form it self not intended especially if the context in Saint Luke be heeded Lord teach us to pray as John also taught his Disciples that is in the judgement of many learned Divines already named to whom I shall add Espencaeus Doce nos orandi formulam teach us a form of Prayer But the Doctor essayes the proof of this by telling us Dr. Owen That whereas in Luke 11. Christ bids his Disciples say Our Father c. this in Matthew 6. is Pray after this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to this purpose Reply The importance of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thus in Saint Matthew as well as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Saint Luke hath been already considered and the reason of expounding Saint Matthew by Saint Luke and not Saint Luke by Saint Matthew sufficiently asserted against any thing that hath yet been leaded for the contrary Dr. Owen I do not think the Prophet prescribeth a form of words to be used by the Church when he saith Take with you words but rather calleth them to fervent supplication for pardon for sin as God should inable them to deal with him Reply Bernardus non videt omnia Calvine was of this judgement non de quibustibet verbis hic loquitur Propheta sed mutuam esse relationem inter Verba Dei bominum ostendit ubi ergo ita ex ore Dei sumimus verba afferrimus ad ipsum hoc est sumere verba The Prophet doth not speak here of any words but sheweth the mutual relation between the Words of God and the words of man when therefore we doe thus take words from the mouth of God and bring them to him this is to take words So our Annotators words that is say they from Gods mouth and to be spoken to him and again say unto him he dictateth as it were the solemne form and manner of their conversion Doctor Reynolds hath observed these two parts in this Text 1. A general Instruction 2. A particular Form And it is easie to observe as an Exhortation and Directory for prayer in the former words viz. O Israel return unto the Lord thy God c. so a set form in the following words Take away all iniquitie and receive us graciously c. Hutchinsons third Note on this Verse is Our words in prayer ought not to be such or so ordered as we please but God is the prescriber of our prayers whose directions we are bound to follow for so much doth this direction given by him teach After consultation with these and some other Authors my thoughts are that the faithful people of God then living having received from an undoubted Prophet of the Lord a prescribed forme of prayer whatever other prayers they did use besides they did most certainly use this also And that
of David or any other though it be not injoyned but the use of it debitâ cum reverentiâ hath its acceptance there is no reason to question the acceptation of this which is prescribed Let us sincerely perform the dutie and we may confidently trust God with the reward whether expresly annexed or not yet if as Saint Cyprian saith there be a promise Verily verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name he will give it you how much rather if unto his name we adde his words also Dr. Owen Whether the Spirit of Grace and Supplication be not promised unto all believeers and whether he be not given to inable them to pray both as to the matter and manner Reply All persons that have the grace of the Spirit have not the gift of utterance and of a readie elocution nor is it the proper Office of the Spirit of Grace to dictate words but to quicken and raise the affections The Spirit of God doth not teach believers to despise forms nor alway inable them to solemn devotions without the help of forms They who have their hearts enlarged toward God whose very sighs and groans are accepted may yet like narrow-mouth'd vessels not be inabled to express their desires in a ready composed manner yea there be many believers on earth and glorified Saints in heaven who never were enabled to pray unto God in a more publick solemn manner but by the help of composed forms and Mayer observeth that if a Minister have the Spirit yet there is danger through weakness of memory of omitting things necessary to be prayed for in the congregation of Excursions and running out into Clauses impertinent and idle and of tautologies repeating the same things again and again to the wearying of the hearers and Plutarch observed the like danger in speaking ex tempore long before him But besides all this the Objection lieth as well against the observation of the matter as the form prescribed for if believers are inabled to both they are not obliged to regard either Dr. Owen And if so whether the repetition of the words mentioned by them who have not the Spirit given them for the ends before mentioned be available Reply The repetition of these words by them who have the Spirit but are not alwaies inabled by that Spirit as to the gift of utterance and a ready composure may certainly be available for even they who have the gift of utterance as well as of the Spirit of Prayer may effectually pray unto God in this or in other formes composed by themselves or others and therefore they that have the Grace but want the gift of exercising that Grace externally may also for if the Spirit of God doe inable them to pray effectually in their own formes certainly that Spirit will not withdraw from them when they address themselves to him in that form which was taught us by his beloved Son in whom he is well pleased Dr. Owen And whether Prayer by the Spirit where these words are repeated as to the letters and syllables and order wherein they stand be acceptable to God Reply Prayers by the Spirit of Grace in whatsoever words syllables and order are acceptable yet God is the God of Order also but not of confusion and if the broken expressions of the weakest believer then much more Prayers by the Spirit in the words which our Saviour hath in great Wisedome and order composed and sanctified are acceptable to God there are degrees of acceptation Dr. Owen Whether the prescription of a form of words and the gift of the Spirit of Prayer be consistent Reply When Christ prayed in the words of David and sung a Hymne in the words of David Quere whether the use of a form of words and the gift of the spirit of Prayer be consistent I am sure beyond all scruple that Christ never used any thing in Prayer himself nor commanded it to be used by others but what was highly consistent with the gift of the Spirit and if the use of any one or more forms of Prayer in Scripture not positively injoyned be lawful and consistent with the spirit of Prayer much more that form of words whereof Christ is the prescriber hath a Benjamins portion They who have the spirit of assisting them in their extemporary prayers need not doubt of it when they study and meditate for the composing of one or more formes to be used by themselues and indeed the people who in the Congregations pray unto God in that forme of words in which the Minister goeth before them should never pray with the Spirit if the prescription of a forme of words and the gift of the Spirit of Prayer were not consistent And why may it not be as well questioned whether the Spirit of Grace be consistent with a form of words in the administration of the Sacraments as in Prayer I aver therefore that nothing is more consistent then such a Divine Prescription of a forme of words and the Spirit of Prayer for as much as the prescribed words of God are that Chariot and Jacobs Ladder by which the Spirit of God ordinarily descendeth into the hearts of men and the souls of men ascend up to God and therefore to intimate an inconsistency of these two is as the dashing of the two Tables against each other it is to oppose Martine to Luther and to sowe discord among brethren they have both one Father The gift of the Spirit of Prayer is either Internall which we may call the infused Grace or Externall which is the ability to exercise that Grace which ability is attained per modum habitus acquisiti as an acquired habit by study meditation and frequent exercise so that he who would fitly exercise the Grace of the Spirit is obliged to use such means as God hath appointed to inable him thereunto even as he who would exercise the gift of the Spirit in preaching and this studying and reducing the gift of the Spirit into a form either of Preaching or Praying doth not extinguish but cherish the Grace of the Spirit as Saint Pauls precept to Timothy doth plainly teach Meditate upon these things give thy self wholly to them that thy profiting may appear to all And seeing it is likely that we may serve God better and edifie his people more by our premeditating and studying both the matter and expressions of our Prayers we ought to do it unless we will adventure to appear empty before the Lord and to serve him of that which cost us nothing The truth is there is an immediate infusion and an assistance of the Spirit in an extraordinary manner pretended unto in exemporary Prayers as if there were a dabitur in eâ hor â a present enthusiasme given from above to supersede them from all study and premeditation which Opinion all sober Christians must condemne or they will cast a great prejudice upon the Devotion of all
and forgiveness of sinne Genebrard hath translated from Maimonides officium lugentium the office of mourners wherein are many forms of Prayer Sol. Bar R. Nathan composed a form of Prayer to be said at the visiting of Sepulchres of which the learned Pocock saith Principium Orationis hujus c. The beginning of this Prayer is taken out of that which is among the forms of the hundred Benedictions extant in the publick Liturgy of the Jewes and in the Margine he saith This is otherwise attributed to Abraham Aben Ezrae on Eccles. 1. preferreth the Hymnes made by R. Saadiah Haggaon before those of Rabbi Eliezar Hakkalir Now considering the Antiquity of many of these forms more then a thousand years since and the tenaciousness of that people in adhering to the traditions of their Fathers and that in the Mischna are many forms used by the Iewes before our Saviours dayes as shall be proved hereafter it is a convinceing Argument that it was usual for their Rabbies and Doctors even before our Saviours time as to expound the Law in the Temple and Synagogues so to guide the people in their devotions in the Synagogues and Proseucha's which were very many by certain composed forms of Prayer which Prayers were learned and delivered onely by orall tradition and not permitted to be written or made publick untill that R. Hakkadosh composed the Mischna And whereas Master Thorndike hath observed their Prayers were read by one whom they called the Apparator of the Synagogue who was of inferiour rank to the Scribes and great Doctors and of a like degree and qualitie as Deacons in the Christian Church this is an Argument that they were not intrusted to direct the Devotion of their betters by any ex tempore effusions but to pronounce such Prayers as had been composed by their Superiors And thus we have brought down the continued use of set and prescribed forms of Prayer to our Saviours dayes wherein I have greatly exercised the patience of my Reader but I could not avoid it this being a part of my ground-work on which I intend after a little more labour to build this assertion That Saint John Baptist a most eminent Prophet being to gather a new Church and to make a reformation of Religion and by instructing his Disciples in the Doctrine of Repentance to prepare them for the receiving of the Messeas did after the manner of other Doctors and teachers among the Iewes collect out of the Prayers and Hymnes of Moses David the Prophets and other devout men such heads of Prayer as concerned the dayes of the Messiah his Offices and Doctrine and of these did compose a form of Prayer which he delivered to his Disciples to be publickly used by them on all solemn occasions and to serve as a Cognizance of their professing and owning the Doctrine taught by him which the Disciples of our Saviour observing on this occasion and for the same end they aske and our Saviour prescribeth this form of Prayer and injoyns the use of it when ye pray say c. But that I may not in this discourse seem to fight with my own shadow as the Pontikes once did Qui per errorem longius cadentes umbras quasi hostium corpora petebant I may say as David coming down to the battell against the Philistines Is there not a cause Are there not too many enemies both in opinion and practice to our Lords Prayer are not the Consequences of neglecting it extremely sad when many Christians have so far degenerated as to thank God they have forgotten what our Saviour commanded his Disciples to learn and say Our Father c. The grounds on which the most moderate dissenters proceed are these First that nothing is to be admitted into Christian practice as far as it concerneth the publick worship of God for which there is not an express or sufficient warrant in Scripture Secondly That to use Prayer as a form there is no such warrant either in that of Saint Matthew 6. 9. or Saint Luke 11. 12. The first plea divers learned men have answered I shall onely offer against it that which Doctor Sanderson hath written to this effect What scandall and advantage hath been given to Anabaptists and Quakers by What command have you in Scripture It is like the opening the Trojan horse or Pandora's box as if all had been let loose Unà Eurusque Notusque ruunt and swarms of Sectaries have overspread the land and the young striplings soon outstrip their leaders upon their own ground as they said what command or example for kneeling at the Communion for Surplices Lord Bishops a penned Liturgy and Holy dayes and there stopt These adde further Where are your Lay-Presbyters your Classes your Steeple-houses and national Churches your Tithes and Mortuaries your Infant-sprinklings and meeter-Psalmes your two Sacraments and weekly Sabbaths so far they are gone already Et erranti nullus terminus there is no bound to an erroneous spirit Nor indeed can they that set them a going now stop or relaim them Fugiunt trepidi vera manifesta loquentem Stoicidae for they proceed upon their own principles and if they say Haec ego nunquam Mandavi dices olim nec talia suasi We never intended nor countenanced these things the reply is ready Mentis causa malae tamen est origo pencs te The fountain of all these bitter and turbulent waters is with you They that made a stand sooner are displeased with such as rusht on further and declare against them but no great reason when they lent them the premisses to fall out with the conclusion The master in the Fable did not well to beat his maid for serving him with thinne milk when his own Cow gave it Why should he that giveth another scancal be angry with him for taking it or he that setteth a stone tumbling down the hill blame it for not stopping where he would have it So mischievous a thing it is not to lay the foundation on a firm bottom It were well if this were helpt ere it went too far So far that Reverend Dr. As to the second ground that there is no warrant in Scripture for the use of this Prayer as a form sub judice lis est All that I shall say here is That it is a sad thing when men are so blinded by the opinions and prejudices which they have espoused as that they can see nothing but what they have a mind to see or being defective in their own sight will needs perswade others as she in the Comedy that there is no light in the room And in our dayes the Proverb is verified even of Aarons bells As every man doth think So the bells do clink I cannot promise any Eye-salve to cure such inveterate diseases it is opus Deo dignum the Almighties work Those that are not wholly blinded I shall lend the best spectacles I have and make it my daily Prayer for my self
and all as Bartimeus did Lord that our eyes may be opened To all my Readers I commend this rule Not easily to believe every Doctrine and take up their Religion upon trust but to search the Scriptures as those more noble Bereans did whether things be so or no And having tried all things to hold fast that which is good An EXERCITATION Concerning the frequent use of Our LORD'S PRAYER In the Publick worship of God MATTH 6. 9. After this manner therefore pray ye or as the Original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus pray ye Our Father c. LUKE 11. 2. And he said unto them when ye pray say Our Father c. THESE two Evangelists seem to differ not onely in the divers expressions used by our Saviour in the prescribing of this form but also in the time and occasion of the delivery thereof some of the ancient Fathers assert that it was twice delivered that in S. Matthew in the second year of our Saviours baptisme this of S. Luke in the third as learned Mr. Mede computes it The different occasion Mr. Calvin observes Lucas rogatum fuisse dicit Mattheus inducit ultro docentem Luke affirmes that our Saviour was desired to teach it Matthew that he taught it voluntary and so he favours the opinion of Mr. Mede who with some others of great esteem do conjecture that the Disciples when it was first given them in Matthew understood not that their Master intended it for a form of publick Prayer whereby they might be known to be his Disciples and therefore they desire of him in Luke such a distinguishing form and that according to the example S. John Baptist his forerunner for it was usual for the eminent Doctors among the Jews to compose formes of Prayer and praise for their Disciples Lord teach us to pray as John also taught his Disciples Sect. 2. The immediate occasion of prescribing this form in S. Matthew was our Saviours great dislike of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 superfluous repetition of words used by one Battus a Poet and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or much-babling is of a neer signification as Hesychius and Suidas expound it learned men do parallel these expressions with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Munster paraphraseth the word thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. Do not multiply words and Grotius compares it with that phrase in Ecclesiasticus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is translated Use not much babling when thou prayest Heinsius would not be beholding to Ovid's Battus for the word but thinks that our Saviour condemnes a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when the lips and tongue pray without the mind which the Rabbines call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the speech of the lips and the word may be as well compounded of Hebrew and Greek and as fitly as of Latin and Greek Lyra gives the same sense of the word Hi exercendae linguae magis operam dant quà m mundandae menti They did exercise their voice more then their affections thinking to move their Gods as a prisoner his judge by oftensolicitation importunity or as if their God were at a great distance and must be called neerer by their loud cries of this fault the Jews were not guilty whose prayers were generally concise and often times submissa voce with a low voice They pretend they learned to make short prayers from Elias in this tradition R. Josi saith on a time I walking on the way went into one of the Deserts to pray then came Eliah of blessed memory and watched me at the Gate and stayed for me till I had ended my prayer after that he saith unto me Peace be upon thee Rabbi I said to him Peace be upon thee Rabbi and Master then said he to me My Son wherefore wentest thou into the Desart I said to pray He said to me thou mightest have prayed in the way Then said I I was afraid lest Passengers would interrupt me He said unto me Thou shouldest have prayed a short Prayer At that time I learned of him three things 1. That we should not go into the Desart 2. That we should pray by the way 3. That he that prayeth by the way should pray a short prayer Two of these Traditions our Saviour reproves here but nothing against the third Now the Heathen were generally guilty of irksomness and babling as a Poet of their own sayes they thought their Gods nil intelligere nisi illud dictum sit centies to understand nothing but what was repeated an hundred times and therefore they did for some houres together chaunt aloud the same words as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. of which practice of theirs the Scripture records two examples the one of Baals Prophets crying from Morning till Noon O Baal hear us The other of the Ephesians crying for two houres space Great is Diana of the Ephesians More of this nature may be seen in Brisonius de formulis and not much unlike are the Tautologies in the Popish Missals Jesu Jesu Jesu miserere Jesu Jesu Jesu adjuva Jesu Jesu Jesu da mihi purgatorium meum hic In opposition to such practices our Saviour prescribes a succinct form of most significant words not onely injoyning them when they did compose Prayers of their own to have respect to this as a rule but when they did actually and solemnly pray to use this form for here is evidently transitus à formulâ ad formulam a passing from one form to another from their tedious Tautologies who thought their Gods needed them to awaken and excite them to their help by loud noise and long clamour to a compendious and most comprehensive expression of all such desires as concern the glory of God or mans temporal or eternal happiness all which being composed in a most exquisite form he commends to his Disciples and the multitude with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thus pray ye or more plainly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when ye pray say Our Father Sect. 3. The occasion of repeating this form in S. Luke was an earnest request of the Disciples who having observed the practice of S. John's Disciples desire that our Saviour would teach them as John also had taught his Disciples In which request we may plainly observe 1. Rem The desired matter Teach us to pray 2. Modum The manner As John also taught his Disciples For they were as yet ignorant both as to the matter what things to ask and also to the manner how to ask fitly and orderly In our Saviours answer are also two parts 1 Indeterminatio temporis The not determining of the time when ye pray 2 Determinatio orationis ad rem modum The determining of the Prayer as well in its manner and form as matter say Our Father c. For beyond all question our Saviour in this as in all other good things did satisfie the desires
of his Disciples as well in the manner as the matter of their request direction for both these being desired if therefore it shall be proved that John Baptist taught his Disciples a form of Prayer which they used publickly and by which they were distinguished from the Disciples of other Jewish Doctors and known to be followers of S. John it may be irrefragably inferred that our Saviour taught his Disciples this Prayer to be also used as a publick form and to serve as a cognizance whereby they might be known to be his followers Sect. 4. Now to confirm this I shall add to what hath been alledged in the Preface the authorities of divers learned men and such for the most part whose piety and judgment have in other things a great esteem and influence upon such as dissent as an argument ad homines But in the first place I shall briefly premise that John Baptist being himself a Jewish Doctor did as our Saviour also did observe the Rites and Customes then in use among that people and accommodate them to the business of the Gospel thus it was usual with them to admit Proselytes by baptisme for as Doctor Lightfoot observes that in Solomons time when men became Proselytes by thousands they admitted them by baptisme as some Jews do witness saith he And Arias Montanus a man that knew the customes and practices of that people as well as any in his time gives this brief Comment on the occasion of prescribing this Prayer Aliquâ orationis formuld certi argumenti nos imbue ut caeteri Magistri suos Discipulos utque Johannes qui ex doctrinae suae de poenitentia praeceptis precationes opportunas composuit i. Give us a form of Prayer of an invariable matter or Argument as other Masters gave their Disciples and as John who out of the Precepts of his doctrine of Repentance did compose certain seasonable Prayers And doubtless our own Expositors have not taken up this opinion upon bare trust but deliver it to us as their judgment upon good grounds Calvin who here as on most other places comments most judiciously gives the like sense his words are these in respect of the more publick Prayers of that Church Johannes privatam orandi formam tradidit suis Discipulis id fecisse existimo prout temporis ratio ferebat Res tunc valdè apud Iudaeos corruptas fuisse notum est tota certè religio sic collapsa erat ut mirum non sit precandi morem à paucis ritè cultum fuisse rursus quum instaret promissa redemptio fidelium mentes precando ad ejus spem desiderium excitari oportuit Johannes ergo ex variis Scriptura locis certam aliquam precationem conficere potuit quae tempori congrueret ac propiùs accederet ad spirituale Christi regnum quod jam patefieri coeperat i. Iohn gave his Disciples a private form of Prayer which I think he did as the custom of that age did require Great corruption was then among the Iewes their whole religion was so decayed that it is no wonder that the manner of praying was rightly observed by very few and because the promised redemption drew nigh it was necessary to excite the mindes of the faithful by prayer to hope and desire the accomplishment thereof Iohn therefore out of divers places of Scripture could i. as I understand him de jure rightly and with good authority for he had spoken de facto before compose some certain form of prayer which was agreeable to the present time and most suitable to the spiritual Kingdom of Christ which then began to be manifested This I suppose is a just interpretation of Mr. Calvins words and sense and in this he fully accords with my assertion concerning the practice of the Iewish Doctors and particularly of Iohn Baptist in teaching their Disciples a form of prayer to him I joyn our judicious Hooker who in this conjurat amicè is of the same mind Iohn Baptists disciples saith he which had alwayes been brought up in the bosom of the Church from the time of their first infancy till the time that they came to the School of Iohn were not so brutish that they could be ignorant 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 but 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 taught his Disciples so Christ would likewise teach them to pray Doctor Lightfoot will make this argument stronger yet thus saith he Christ taught this prayer almost a year and half ago in his Sermon on the Mount and now being desired to teach his Disciples to pray he gives the same again Iohn had taught his to pray after the same manner and use of the Nation and Christ being desired to teach his Disciples as Iohn had taught his rehearseth this form which he had given them before were these arguments considered without prejudice I should not need to adde more to prove this prayer a Form intended for publick use But I fear all that may be said will not satisfie some men yet because this argument will be as a chief stone on which as to the context we may lay some stress I shall take a little more pains to settle it viz. That Iohn did after the manner of Iewish Doctors teach his Disciples a brief form of prayer to be frequently used by them which accordingly they did often and publickly use whereby they were known to be his Disciples Sect. 5. I was once confidently informed that the late Bishop of Worcester had in some determinations of his when he was Doctor of the Chair in Oxford repeated the form of prayer that was dictated by S. Iohn to his Disciples but upon inquiry I could find no such thing and indeed I did despair of it when instead of finding it recorded among ancient monuments I found that many learned men did bewail the losse of it In all probability it did agree both in matter and form with this of our Saviour as their form of Doctrine was alike Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand so likely was their form of Prayer However their authority that argue meerly negatively that there was no such form because it is not recorded in Scripture will signifie but little when in the first place it shall be considered how many things are mentioned in Scripture as done the particulars whereof in regestâ are not to be found and Tertullian tells us that Iohns form was purposely omitted that our Saviours alone might be used Iohn must decrease that Christ may increase and secondly when it shall be layed in the balance with the judgment of those learned and famous men that are otherwise minded The Assembly in their Annotations comment thus As
those forms which were then in use among the Jews in particular for the Scripture assures us that in a great extremity when as we may all think our Saviour would pray most fervently he used the same words three times viz. Father if it be possible let this cup pass from me And it is the opinion of many learned men that our Saviour on the Cross did repeat not onely the first verse of Psal. 22. but the whole Psalm throughout which undoubtedly is a form S. Hierom speaking of Christs prayer on the Cross repeats more as spoken by Christ then is recorded by S. Matthew Sic Christus or avit in Cruce My God my God why hast thou forsaken me why art thou so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring Sect. 10. Moreover it is proved by learned men beyond all contradiction that our Saviour in the dispensation of the New Testament did retain and practise several formes which were used by the Iewes under the Old Particularly in the Institution and administration of his last Supper our Saviour varied very little from the forms and customes used by them at the celebration of the Passeover of the truth whereof besides other reasons this in the opinion of learned men is a sufficient confirmation That as the Iewes were wont to shut up the solemnity of the Passeover by singing some of Davids Psalms so our Saviour after the celebration of the Sacrament of his body and bloud went out with his Disciples to the Mount of Olives 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having sung the Hymn which Hymn say the best Expositors was the same that the Iewes did ordinarily sing after the Passeover and is called by them the great Hallel which as Pau'us Brugensis sayes consisted of six Psalmes from Psal. 113. to Psal. 118. and he addes verisimile est hos à Domino decantatos it is most like that these were sung by our Saviour And Drusius sayes hunc hymnum hodieque canunt in nocte Paschatis The Iewes sing this Hymn in the evening of the Passeover to this day The learned Scaliger having largely described the formes and rites of celebrating the Passeover concludes thus This was the true rite of celebrating the Passeover in the times of the Messias No man will deny that this last was like unto the former and that Christ did celebrate them in the same manner as the Iewes viz. both of them in the manner expounded And he concludes thus They that object that Christ did not submit to the Iewish customes may be confuted by six hundred arguments if it were of moment and I believe that Drusius Capellus Doctor Lightfoot and others have made up the full number In the conference at Hampton Court we have this passage the Dean of the Chappel who I suppose was Bishop Mountague remembred the practice of the Iewes who unto the Institution of the Passeover prescribed unto them by Moses had as the Rabbines witnesse added both signes and words eating sowre herbs and drinking wine with these words Take eat these in remembrance c. And Drink this in remembrance c. upon which Addition and Tradition of theirs our Saviour instituted the Sacrament of his last Supper celebrating it with the same words and after the same manner thereby approving that fact of theirs in particular Scaliger tells us there was Bread also as well as Wine exhibited at the Passeover with these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is the bread of affliction which your fathers did eat in the land of Egypt let every one that hungreth come and eat let every one that hath need come and keep the Passeover ye were sometime servants there but now ye are in the land of Israel ye were sometime servants there but now ye are free in the land of Israel Now if our Saviour did accommodate the Iewish formes some of which were meerly of humane invention to the solemn administration of that most blessed Sacrament which is to continue in his Church until his coming again we may not think it strange that he should prescribe a form of prayer of his own composure and enjoyn his Disciples the frequent use of it in their solemn devotions Doctor Lightfoot descends to particular instances as that our Saviour after the cup of blessing took some of the unleavened bread and blessed and brake it and gave it to be eaten for his body from thenceforth in that sense that the flesh of the Paschal Lamb had been his body unto that time and that which was called the Cup of Hallel he taketh and ordaineth for the Cup of the New Testament in his bloud and after sung the Hallel throughout and so went out to the Mount of Olives And Arias Montanus notes that the use of this Hymn was an action and rite common and most familiar to all Mr. Trap gives also another instance of our Saviours using a form of thanksgiving by which as it is intimated in S. Luke his Disciples knew him I shall not insist on this but certainly the Iews had forms of blessing their meat and drink as these usual forms do evince The blessing of the bread was this Benedictus tu Domine Deus noster Rex Seculi qui educis panem è terra And Benedictus c. qui creas fructum vitis i. Blessed art thou O Lord our God everlasting King who dost bring forth bread out of the earth and blessed c. who createst the fruit of the vine But enough of this he that would see more of the former particulars let him view Cassander Morney of the Mass Beza Doctor Lightfoot Doctor Heylyn of Liturgies All my observations do concentre with that of a Reverend Divine in his book of singing Psalmes that this opinion is the constant vote of all the learned And here by the way that assertion of Grotius is sufficiently confuted Neque enim eo tempore syllabis adstringebantur for what he onely sayes in the Negative Scaliger and many others of great learning and integrity do not onely say but prove in the affirmative i. that the people were not in those dayes confined to words and syllables By what hath been said it appears that our Saviour was no such enemy to forms either of prayer or thanksgiving as those who now profess themselves to be his choice Disciples are known to be even to his own form of prayer Sect. 11. But I shall make an essay beyond this to prove that our Saviour in the composure of his prayer had respect unto the devotion prayers of the Church of the Jews then in use was pleased to compose his for marter and method like unto theirs And that I may allay the prejudice which this conjecture is like to create I offer these grounds for it 1. That our Saviour being to reconcile Iewes and Gentiles into one could not use a better medium to winne upon them both then by injoyning such an
uniformity in the chief part of Gods worship as was consistent with the common good and desires of all mankind in general and agreeable to the Iewes own forms of devotion they having been for a long time Gods peculiar people in special Nor 2. is it any disparagement to our Saviour the eternal Wisdom of the Father that he did create a prayer as beautiful as the heavens out of such a Chaos and gather up those Jewels out of that dunghil wherein they had obscured them and set them in such a heavenly frame as nothing out of heaven or the Scriptures whereof this is the summe as many Divines affirm is half so perfect For certainly they had these petitions out of the Scripture from the Prophets and holy men of God And Mr. Lightfoot applies that to the Talmud wherein many of these are which was said of the works of Origen Ubi bene nemo meliùs That which is good is very good and that which is bad is very bad And now remembring you that our Saviour did in other parts of Gods worship comply with the accustomed forms of the Jewish Church it will appear very probable that he did the same in respect of Prayer both as to the method and form of it The likeness of Method hath been observed from Mr. Selden who sayes that of the eighteen Prayers or Benedictions called in the Gemara composed or appointed Prayers and which were for a long time the chief body of their devotion the three first and the three last respected the glory of God the other twelve those things that were necessary either for the whole people of God or for every particular man And whether our Saviour did not design his Prayer though not according to the number of their Petitions yet to the general method and matter of them vi the three first branches of it and the conclusion which may serve for three more referring to the glory of God the other intermediate to the publick and private necessities of Gods people is of easie observation Then for the particular Heads and Petitions they are more obvious we shall give an instance of each First for the Preface it is commonly known that the Jewes did prefix to their Prayers these two letters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which as Buxtorf in his Abbreviations sayes do signifie the Preface of our Lords Prayer viz. Our Father which art in Heaven Dr. Lightfoot notes that in Folio 5. of their Common-prayer-book is this passage Humble your hearts before your Father which is in Heaven and he proves the appellation of Our Father to be common among the Jewes in those dayes and both he and Heinsius do adde Ubique Christus hoc egisse videtur ut ad receptas paroemias axiomata vel formulas respiceret The Doctor seems to translate him thus Christ hath an eye and reference to their Customes Language Doctrines Traditions and Opinions almost in every line Drusius gives the reason why to the appellation of Our Father they added as a note of distinction Which art in Heaven because they did frequently call the Patriarchs by that Title Pater noster Abraham Isaac Pater noster Jacob Pater noster our father Abraham c. Therefore when they call God Our Father they usually adde which art in Heaven and so Capellus giveth the Preface intire out of Seder Tephilloth of the Jewes of Portugal i. their order of Prayers for the whole year used as Buxtorf sayes by the Iewes of France Germany Poland Italy and Spain thus Our Father which art in Heaven be gracious unto us And in Machazor i. Cyclus a circle of Prayers for their greatest Festivals Let our Prayers be accepted before our Father which is in Heaven Then for the first Petition Hallowed be thy Name in Seder Tephilloth Hallowed be thy Name O Lord our God and let thy memorial be glorified O our King in heaven above and on the earth beneath Master Gregory from the comment on Perk Avoth transcribes the second Petition Let thy Kingdom reign over us for ever and ever Doctor Lightfoot sayes they pray almost in every other prayer thy Kingdome come and that bimherah beiamenu quickly in these our dayes And Drusius mentioneth all these Deus noster qui in coelo unicus es c. Our God which art one in Heaven let thy Name be established for ever let thy Kingdome rule over us for ever and ever and let thy Name be sanctified by our works The fourth Petition hath such an evident agreement with that Prayer of Agur Feed me with food convenient for me which phrase our Bibles do parallel with this Petition by quoting it in the margine and is such an approved Exposition of it in the Rabbins sense that I will not trouble my self or Reader to transcribe other instances The fifth Petition they express thus Our pious forefathers were wont to say remit and pardon all them that trouble me This Drusius Doctor Lightfoot and Master Gregory observe from the Comment on Avoth fol. 24. The last Petition is in Seder Tephilloth p. 115. Lead us not into sin nor into transgression nor into temptation and remove from me every evil imagination The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth the Devil or Original sinne and concupiscence This Petition Master Gregory repeats thus out of Sepher Hammassar p. 49. Lead us not into the power of temptation but deliver us from evil And to this they immediately subjoyn a like Doxology Quia tuum est regnum regnabis gloriosè in seculae seculorum Of this we shall have occasion to speak hereafter Solomon Glassius asserts also very confidently that our Saviour in this Doxology had respect to that of Solomon Thine O Lord is the greatness and the power and the glory and again thine is the Kingdome Ex qua desumpsisse Christus clausulam istam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 omnino videtur from which form it fully appears our Saviour took the Doxologie in the close of his Prayer And very usual it was with the Iewes to shut up their devotions with such short forms of praise And thus having found both the method and the matter of our Lords Prayer in the Devotion of the Iewes it onely remaineth that we answer one Objection or two against our assertion viz. That our Saviour in the framing of this most heavenly form had respect unto the forms of Prayer then in use among the Iewes the grounds of which we have laid already The first Objection is that these books from which it is supposed that our Saviour borrowed the heads of his Prayer are of a far later date then our Saviours time and therefore they may more probably be thought to have transcribed something out of the Gospels then that our Saviour the very wisedome of God should borrow any thing from their devotions To this Objection a satisfactory answer hath been given already by Scaliger and Master
Thorndike to which ex abundanti it may be added That it is true the Books themselves are not some of them above a thousand or eleven hundred years old but yet they do record matter of a far greater Antiquity as books printed in this very age may record such rites and forms as were in use among primitive Christians for more then a thousand years since so for instance in the late Liturgy were the best parts and offices of devotion preserved that had been used by any Church since the Apostle dayes And as for the Mischna wherein most of these petitions are extant it is known to be one part of that Talmud which was compiled by R. Hakkadosh who lived in the year of Christ 150. that is 1508. years since and the Title and Contents of it is this Liber traditionum qui Patrum traditiones continet quae inde à Mose observatae successivè per oralem traditionem propagatae fuerunt The book of traditions which containeth the traditions of the Fathers which had been observed from that time unto Moses and were successively propagated by Oral tradition Maimonides gives us this series of the tradition R. Hakkadosh had it from Simeon his father he from Gamaliel his father he from another Simeon his father he from another Gamaliel his father he from a third Simeon he from Hillel he from Shemaiah and Abtalion his masters they from Judas the son of Tabbaeus c. unto Simeon the Just who had it from Ezra he from the Prophets successively they from the Judges and Elders of Israel they from Joshua he from Moses who as they pretend had many of them from God Arias Montanus speaking of the form in which Christ gave thanks saith thus Porro illa gratiarum actionis formula antiqua est ut constat ex 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Israelitarum ex Mischnaioth Now if these books prove the antiquity of that form used by our Saviour they must relate it as a matter of fact beyond the time of our Saviour in the judgement of that learned man And certainly the forms and heads of Devotion used and recorded by these later Jewes of Portugal were the product of more ancienttimes and were then collected and composed by them that they might not be lost and forgotten in the dispersion as they had lost many Customes and Manners and their very Language in the Babylonish captivity In one of the Petitions above named they say so much expresly dicebant pii priores Our pious forefathers were wont to say c. And considering how superstitiously tenacious they have ever been of the customes and traditions of their forefathers retaining and practising in their Synagogues to this very day many things which their Ancestors practised long before our Saviours time it cannot reasonably be thought that they did coin any new devotions or at least that they did insert any such there but least of all would they have stampt upon them the likeness of our Lords Prayer in every Character as we shall now shew in answer to the second Objection which is 2. Object That possibly the Rabbines since the dayes of our Saviour may have borrowed some parts and expressions of their Devotion from our Lords Prayer and from other Evangelical passages but that our Saviour the very wisedome of his Father should be beholden to the Jewish Liturgies and Forms for his Devotion is not with any reason to be imagined 1. Answer This Objection is made somewhat unadvisedly for if it were true that the Jewes did insert these Petitions into their Devotion from our Saviours Prayer it would be a sad consideration that the Jewes should shew more respect and observance to the prescriptions of our Saviour then such as would be accounted the most excellent Christians Secondly It hath been already proved beyond all contradiction that our Saviour was pleased to practise and retain divers Jewish forms and adapted them to the Ministerie of the Gospel and commended them to his Disciples in the principal service of God and therefore there is sufficient ground to assert that he did the same in this business of devotion But on the contrary there will be but rare instances given that the Jewes did make use of any new Rite Institution Doctrine or History which is proper to the Gospel in those ancient Records of theirs so as to use or approve the same and therefore it is unlike that they had any respect to this Prayer in their Devotions Thirdly It is yet more incredible that the Jewes who abhor the very name of Christ and make many solemn publick imprecations against him and all his followers should transcribe any thing of his into their Devotion much less that every Petition of our Saviours Prayer should find place in theirs for in the very Talmud one Chapter is intitled De Idololatriâ ac vitanda omni conversatione societate cum Christianis Of Idolatrie and of avoyding all manner of societie and conversation with the Christians And Buxtorf saith of them In secretissimis corum libris scribunt docent quòd anima Esaui corpus Christi subingressa est They call Christians Edomites and Esauites and in exemplaribus vetustis saith he they have sundry forms of imprecation against Christians of which take this one Let them be destroyed and have no more hope and let all the Infidels they mean Christians especially perish in the twinkling of an eye and all thy enemies which have hated thee O Lord our God be suddenly rooted out and that proud and presumptuous Kingdome be quickly overthrown and at last come to a totall ruine and make them without delay subservient to us in these our dayes That the Turks should record some of our Saviours sentences is not strange seeing they account him to have been a Prophet and I have read that among their devotions they have a Prayer which they call the Prayer of Jesus the Son of Mary which differs little from ours onely it ends thus And let not him have rule over me that will have no mercy upon me O thou most High But that the Jewes who hate and nauseate every thing that hath the least savour of Christianitie eo nomine as it is Christian should insert this most Christian Prayer in its full latitude into their prayers is certainly a vain imagination Yet as you see both Iewes and Turkes doe retain though not as Christian both the form and matter of this Prayer where then are the enemies of it if they be friends Alas in Christs own house among them for whose sake chiefly it was written and unto whom it was not onely commended as a priviledge but commanded as a duty among Christs own stewards and servants Of our own selves as the Apostle saith have men arose speaking perverse things they that had made it their familiar and would not eat at Gods Table or sleep in their own beds without it have I will not say
done it themselves but given occasion to others to lift up the heel against or as the Marginal reading is have magnified every pettie imperfect prayer against it We applaud and admire the gifts and forms of Prayer used by divers men all which are beautiful in their kind and have done excellently and for them I shall joyn with any to bless God but when this Prayer which excelleth them all non laudatur or as Pagnines interlineary interpretation non Epithalamio celebratur is not celebrated and espoused but is neglected and slighted when as the Apostle observes One is of Paul another of Apollos another of Cephas to the having mens persons in admiration and slighting the things of Christ in their plainenesse and simplicitie this is utterly a fault As to the rise of this practice in former times I can discern no other ground but either the stifeling of some truth or the venting of some heresie or the continuing more securely in some sin one or more of which hath been certainly the ground why the use of it hath been formerly laid aside The first enemy to the use of it was Pelagius as both St. Augustine and St. Hierome assure us Pelagioni or ationem Dominicam impiis disputationibus auferre conabantur evertentes duos artieulos Dimitte nobis Ne nos inducas The Pelagians did indeavour with wicked disputations to take away the use of our Lords Prayer overthrowing these two Articles For give us our trespasses and lead us not into temptation You see they would have sacrificed this Prayer to their heresies for which among other things they are worthily branded for hereticks in Church-Historie Saint Hierome deals more roundly with him thus Sic docuit Apostolos suos ut quotidie in corporis illius sacrificio oredentes audeant loqui Pater noster c. Thus did Christ teach his Apostles that they should constantly at the Sacrament of his Body say Our Father and accordingly they desire that the name of God which is most holy in it self may be sanctified in them but thou sayest Lord thou knowest how holy innocent and pure my hands are They say Thy Kingdome come antedating the hope of Christs Kingdome that was to come that he reigning sin might not reign in their mortal bodies They say Thy will be done that humane weakness might imitate the Angels Thou saist a man may if he will be free from all sin They say Give us c. praying for that supersubstantial bread that they might be fit to receive the body of Christ And ye by supererrogatory holiness and a confident righteousness boldly challenge heavenly gifts They as it follows For give us c. coming from the Font of Baptisme and being regenerate through the Lord our Saviour presently at the first communion of Christs body They say Forgive us c. not in a feigned pretence of humilitie but in consciousness of their humane weakness They say Lead us not c. Thou saist with Jovinian that they who have by Faith received Baptisme cannot be tempted or sin any more Lastly They say Deliver us c. Why do they pray for that which they have in the power of their own freewill This is the Leader and these the grounds of his defiance against the Lords Prayer viz. that he might raise his errors upon the ruine of it And whether heretiques in our dayes have not served themselves and advantaged their errors both in Doctrine and Practise by the disuse of it ought by all sober Christians to be considered and laid to heart The Papists are marshalled in the next rank as enemies to this Prayer and that first for locking up the whole Prayer from the people under an unknown language and giving them onely the shell to chew upon their affections and understandings being unmoved and silent while their lips and tongues are busie Secondly for curtailing it and omitting the whole Doxologie Thirdly for preferring the use of their Ave Maria's and Prayers of other Saints above this as learned Chemnitius complains In Papatu circumtulerunt precationes Sanctae Brigiddae promittentes largas indulgentias iis qui eas recitarunt interim Orationis Dominicae prorsus obliti erant In the papacie they carry about the Prayers of Saint Bridget promising large Indulgencies to such as would recite them being in the mean time wholly forgetful of our Lords Prayer Lonicer reckoneth also the Disciples of one Martine Steinsback of Selestad in Germany for professed enemies to it who as once a proud Spaniard said that if he had been with God at the Creation he would have contrived things better did go about to correct the Lords Prayer as not well composed King James sayes the Brownists did not like it because it was a form Maresius a learned Frenchman numbers divers others that have imagined strange things against it And lastly for I am not so well acquainted with the enemies tenets as to reckon all Ross tells us of some that are against forms chiefly the Lords Prayer accounting such forms a choaking of the Spirit And when our Saviour tells us that He that is not with him is against him there are many more that are not so fast friends unto this Prayer as they ought to be for it is not enough to call him Lord and Master except we also do the things that he hath commanded us we profess to worship him in Prayers and Supplications of our own devising and these things indeed we ought to doe but then we should be sure not to leave the other undone that is to worship and invocate him in the same manner and form as he hath prescribed in his Word It may suffice to have offered these Arguments from the occasion and context of which this is a Sylloge 1. Forms of Prayer were in use among the Jewes 2. Their Doctors did ordinarily compose prayers to be used by their Disciples 3. Saint Iohn at first a Iewish Doctor upon new emergencies taught his Disciples a new form 4. The Disciples so used that form as that they were thereby observed and known to be Iohns Disciples 5. Upon this consideration the Disciples of our Saviour desired from him such a forme of Prayer 6. Our Saviour who was no enemy to forms in general nor to the forms of Prayer then used by the Iews in particular did agreeably to them compose for his Disciples a certain form to be used by them delivering it to them at two several times and on divers occasions but on both these with a plain injunction Thus pray ye and when we pay say Our Father c. It comes now to be considered whether the terms under which our Saviour injoyns it do aamount to the nature of a Precept so as to oblige Christians to the use of this Prayer in express words and as a form and this supposing it had not been twice delivered nor on such an occasion as St. Luke relates And in
order hereunto we have the import of two words in Saint Matthew to be considered viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And here I must remember you that our Saviour having reproved the tedious repetitions of heathnish forms passeth on to a most excellent form of his own and injoyns it with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus pray ye Which word is in all languages used to signifie an identity and individuality with the thing to which it hath reference as when I endite to any and bid him write thus or thus I intend he should write the same words and so doubtless when Christ commanded his Disciples to pray Thus he meant in the same words Indeed when we deal in similitudes and make application by this word Thus or So there is onely a likeness to be understood but in all Problemes and School-Disputes in all quotations and repetitions it is used to signifie the same thing in terms to which it is annexed Thus when in the Philosopher we reade 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and when we repeat Syllogismes with a sic disputas we do or ought to respect the very terms and thus a good Grammarian tells us of the word Si Logicum spectes usum it is not a redditionis a note of Repetition and a disputant may be justly displeased if ye alter his terms and will tell you nonsic sed sic argumentatus sum I did not dispute so that is in your words but so that is in my own and in this sense the word is interpreted by most judicious Expositors as signifying not after this manner as our Translation paraphraseth it but which it will better bear in this form and in these words which Interpretation is warranted from the use of it in that signification in the Scriptures both of the Old and New Testament Thus when Aaron and his sons were commanded On this wise ye shall bless the people the word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Septuagint render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and I am assured that the Priests kept to the very words of that Benediction and whether they should not have offended if they had done otherwise is to be considered Maimonides in his More Neuochim upon the words Sic benedicetis i. saith he hâc linguâ in this very language but there is no necessitie of understanding them so strictly onely it shewes they were far from varying the form And questionless they did and might with more faith and better success retain and use this and several other forms that were commanded them under this or a like expression then if they had varied them into any other words whatsoever If you or I should command a servant to deliver a message to a superior and put words in his mouth in oyning him to say thus or if you will after this manner I trow we think so well of our own expressions and know our own case and the qualitie of the person to whom we send so well that we should censure that servant as guilty of high presumption who should purt osely lay aside all our expressions which he might very well have remembred and deliver our message in words of his own framing nor are such servants like to mend the matter and therefore it is every where obvious in Scripture that the messengers of great and holy men Kings and Prophets have delivered their Embassie in the same words they received it and it would have been an act of disobedience and an argument of pride to have altered matter method and form and yet this is done to our Saviours injunction by all those who neither say this nor thus When God sent Moses to the children of Israel he commanded him Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel and the Text sayes Moses told Aaron all the words and Aaron spake all the words which the Lord had spoken unto Moses So in the New Testament when our Saviour sent two of his Disciples to bring him a Colt he commanded them if any should ask them why they loosed the Colt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus shall ye say unto them The Lord hath need of him such an answer might seem very unsatisfactory to the owner yet we find they say neither more nor less though their safety were at stake then what they were in express words commanded and therefore it cannot well be presumed that they made any variation here where the word of injunction is the same and the matter of a greater importance and so lastly when any Sentence is quoted out of the Old Testament in the New in the same terms The holy Penmen make â—se of this Word which also the Apostle parallels with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what saith the Law and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it speaketh thus And the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how are both used in one sense and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answereth to both And when in any of our writeings or sayings we quote the authority of learned men with a Sic dixit Aristot. Augustin c. we should be unfaithful did we not deliver their very words in their own language or as near as we can translate them in ours There is also somewhat considerable in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as joyned with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus pray ye Our Saviour doth not say look to this copy frame your Prayers after this example but when you actually pray Pray thus which is the same with St. Lukes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pray or say Our Father Pray or say Hallowed be thy Name for although the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should be of a larger extent in its proper notion and like the materia prima be capable of all forms yet being here limited to the act of Praying and the act determined by a certain form the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath now received its principle of individuation and as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when it respects a person is of the same signification with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 respecting a certain thing of the same signification as if our Saviour had said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. Pray ye in these words And when our Saviour delivers an intire uninterrupted Form of Prayer and immediately subjoyns a brief rational upon what seemed most harsh and obscure in it for if ye forgive c. But if ye forgive not c. This is to me a good Argument that that Prayer ought to be used by us without any addition or alteration pro hic nunc at certain times and occasions which he himself would not dismember by any Parenthesis or Exposition of his own But last of al supposing the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did signifie only after this manner or to this purpose yet doubtless there is no danger in using the very words also whereas on the contrary if it
were our Saviours intention that we should say these words as the Church of God have practised and the best Expositors in all ages have understood it there is then a certain fault in those that slight and omit them So that there will lie more then an appearance of evil upon the dissenters but none at all upon the practises and we know who hath commanded us to abstain from all appearance of evil Quicquid est malè coloratum saith Saint Bernard whatever hath any shew or tincture of sin and disobedience This for the words of prescription in Saint Matthew But now when our Saviour was desired by his Disciples in Saint Luke to teach them to pray as John taught his Disciples respecting the manner and form as well as the matter and our Saviour in compliance with their desires gives them a complete form and plainly injoyns them without a thus or after this manner although that be plain enough too to say 1. totident verbis in express words Our Father I must needs say saith judicious Hooker that the Opinion of some who affirm that our Saviour did set his Disciples a bare example to contrive and devise Prayers of their own and no way bind them to use his is undoubtedly an error And Master Perkins is not far from his opinion Whereas faith he sundry men in our Church hold it unlawful to use this very form of words as they are set down by our Saviour Christ for a Prayer they are far deceived and in answer to a third Objection which is That the pattern to make all Prayers by should not be used as a Prayer I answer sayes Master Perkins that therefore the rather it may be used as a Prayer and sure it is that ancient and worthy Divines have reverenced it as a Prayer choosing rather to use these words then any other as Cyprian Tertullian and Augustine wherefore saith he that opinion is full of ignorance and error And I may adde if the opinion be full the practice cannot be empty And indeed as Master Mede and Master Hodges say what more significant expression supposing it had been our Saviours mind to injoyn it as a form could be fitted or contrived to intimate it to his Disciples then this when ye pray say c. Or had our Saviour foreseen the controversies that would arise in these last dayes concerning the use of it and doubtless he did foresee them all how could he more positively have decided them then by this plain expression when ye pray say Suppose this had been the sense of the Disciples in this place asking a Prayer as some learned men conceive it was Lord thou gavest us a Prayer in the Mount but whether that was intended for publick use or no we are not fully satisfied wherefore now we beseech thee teach us such a one as John also taught his Disciples what more punctual answer could be devised then this when ye pray say c Such as dissent from this opinion and practice finding themselves overborn by the weight of this expression in Saint Luke are wont to retreat to that of Saint Matthew by whom they plead Saint Luke ought to be expounded to which if we should give way as it would not much help them that fortress having declared already for the contrary opinion so I doubt not but we may easily block up all avenues to that refuge and evince by sufficient Arguments that Saint Luke should rather expound Saint Matthew then be expounded by him For seeing it is true as many learned men do affirm that our Saviour did twice deliver this form and the Disciples not fully apprehending it at first to be intended for publick use he repeats the same form a second time under a more plain injunction this signifieth he intended it so in Saint Matthew and his second injunction is but a more solemn sanction of it as a form for publick use and that it was twice delivered appears partly from what Master Mede saith that it is impossible to make these two relations of the Evangelists to be coincident for time and the different occasion heightens the impossibility Marlorate makes this of Saint Luke to agree with another passage of Saint Matthew Chapter 14. 23. where our Saviour is said to go into a Mountain apart to pray and so here in Saint Luke He prayed and that alone or apart so that the coincidency of these two places is far more probable then the other For this Prayer of St. Matthew was delivered in the first year saith Chemnitius in the second year of our Saviours Ministery saith Master Mede this of Saint Luke in the third year in all probabilitie there was more then the distance of a compleat year whereas by the general consent of Harmonists that of the 14. of Mat. is much more coincident in time and the occasion seems one and the same onely Saint Matthew having recorded this Prayer before passeth it by here and Saint Luke omitting it in the Sermon on the mount where Saint Matthew had recorded it repeats it here where Saint Matthew had omitted it for all know that is the usual manner of the Evangelists as to repeat that more briefly which the former had enlarged so to inlarge that more fully which the other did but touch or pretermitted which double Sanction as it is a good Argument to prove that Christ intended it for a form so it doth also strongly infer that which I intend that the injunction in Saint Luke is the most express and plain unless we should affirm that our Saviour did make things more perplext and obscure by his often repetition of them and being most express and plain it ought certainly to expound that which is more dark and doubtful unless contrary to the Rules of all good method we will teach ignotum per ignotius which is as to make the blind lead the lame And seeing all Expositors do grant that Saint Luke is most exact in the orderly disposing of things according to their time and relating their occasions it will still follow although we should grant the places of both Evangelists to be for time coincident that Saint Luke who recordeth the occasion more fully and the injunction more plainly ought to expound Saint Matthew and not to be expounded by him and so we see Saint Matthewes sic hath its sicut in Saint Luke After this manner pray ye is of the same force as when ye pray say c. Doubtless our Saviour could express his mind so appositely and foresee all inconveniences so clearly that had it been his mind that his Disciples should not have used this Prayer as a form or that their successors should offend in so doing he would have propounded it with some caution or limitation either he would not have made it a form or being such he would not have commended it unto them under such an apparent injunction as when ye pray say c.
which sounds quite contrary to such an intent for in this sense it hath been understood and accordingly practised by the Church in all Ages and any vulgar eye that vieweth the whole structure may observe that it was fitted by our Saviour for publick Devotion to be used by his Disciples in consort and to serve as a note of distinction to such as heard them whose Disciples they were And Doctor Hammonds Paraphrase most genuinely agrees with the Text One of his Disciples besought him to give them a form of Prayer which they might constantly use as John Baptist had given to his Disciples and upon that demand of his being at another time and upon another occasion from that in the Sermon on the Mount Christ said to his Disciples Whensoever ye pray solemnly omit not to use this form of words For if Saint Johns Disciples did publickly use the form of Prayer given them by their Master and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 si quando if at any time ye will pray so as to be known that ye are my Disciples what can this signifie less then when ye pray solemly omit not to use this form of words Master Hodges his Argument hath also its weight and may be improved thus Suppose the Disciples had asked Master teach us to sing as David taught the people of God or which is the same teach us to pray as David taught the People of God for he taught them Psalmes of Prayer as well as Praise and hereupon our Saviour had composed some Psalmes of Praise and Prayer I demand whether we should not have been obliged to use those Hymnes of Prayer and Praise although there had been no injunction annexed to them And doubtless as the people of God under the Old Testament and we under the New ought to use Davids Hymnes of Prayer and Praise as an Ordinance of God in his publick Worship so ought we more especially and at least as frequently to use this most solemn and Divine form of Prayer And thus of the Arguments from the words of injunction whereof this is a Sylloge 1. The injunction of Saint Matthew is sufficiently clear to all unprejudiced persons 2. That of Saint Luke delivered a second time and on a different occasion hath yet as the dissenters grant a more clear command by which 3. That of Saint Matthew if there had been any difficulty in it ought to be interpreted 4. There cannot be a more apposite expression given to signifie that it ought to be used as a form And fifthly had our Saviour intended it onely as a Pattern or heads for Prayer or foreseen any inconvenience in the use of it as a form he would never have commended it under such words as in the judgement of the Church and eminent servants of God in all ages hath the full import of a positive injunction When ye pray say The next thing to be considered is the matter of fact what hath been the practice of the Disciples of the Church of God and of pious and learned Christians in all ages And although it be no where in Scripture set down positively that the Apostles did use this form of words as neither that they did use the same method or matter yet this being but a negative argument concludes no more that they did not use this form of Prayer then because we read not that they baptized any In the Name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost therefore they did not so baptize any which form was yet injoyned by our Saviour as a prime Office of their Ministery and beyond all peradventure they did strictly observe as oft as they baptized any And when the Scripture assures us that it was their practice to use Psalms and Hymns and spiritual songs praysing God and praying unto him in the words of David when they did keep to the same prescibed words in the administration of both Sacraments when they observed forms in the benediction of the people in the close of their Epistles and in other solemn Acts of Gods worship all of which forms were not so authentick as to be of our Saviours own composure and prescription what should hinder but that they might and did use this most excellent form of Prayer in their devotion Most certain it is that they who retain a form of Benediction over the people when they dismiss them and of administration of both Sacraments have no more to say in their defence then they who retain and use this form of Prayer for Christ who gave commission to his Disciples to go and discipline all Nations baptizing them c. He that said Take eat this is my body c. the same commanded also as positively when ye pray say c. And when we all account it our duty to praise God in singing Davids Psalmes some of which as we use them are of a mean composure and carry expressions beneath the Majesty of Scripture others such as concerned the Jewish Church onely why ought not the Apostles and we as necessarily to use this form of Prayer sanctified by our Saviours own lips Can we charitably think they asked a Prayer in sense of their own insufficiency for that duty and such a one as by the use thereof they might be known to be his Disciples and when they obtained one so heavenly so succinct and yet so significant and injoyned under such plain terms yet did refuse or neglect to use it doubtless they did bestow some time to commit it to memory they did often con it and meditate upon it and when they repeated it I suppose it was not without some affection devotion and lifting up their souls to God and if so they did use it as a form of Prayer And surely that of Saint Augustine may take take place here if any where Quod universa tenet Ecclesia c. In practical matters the use whereof is obscure the general practice of the Church is the best Interpreter His rule is this That which the universal Church doth hold not as being instituted by Councels but as alway retained in the Church we rightly believe it to be of Apostolical authority Now indeed the Councels did often check the neglect and determine the times and order of using it but never imposed it de novo as a thing that had not been formerly practised Quia quotidiana Oratio est quotidie dici oportet saith the Toletan Counel Because it respects our dayly needs it ought to be said dayly Nothing can be more certainly affirmed from Ecclesiastical Records concerning any matter of fact then that the Church of Christ did early and constantly use this form as a chief part of their devotion That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One Common Prayer used in the time of Ignatius who saw Christ in the flesh it was in all probability this or some other form Genebrard in his Chronol
tels us of a School at Alexandria wherein Saint Mark had appointed that there should be continually such Doctors as should teach the Fundamentals of Christian Religion he nameth Pantenus who lived under Commodus the Emperour Clemens Alexandrinus and Origen and he saith from Tertullian and Socrates that in this School were taught the Creed the Decalogue and the Lords Prayer Saint Hieromes authority you have had already So Christ taught his Apostles saith he that they should constantly at the Sacrament of his body say Our Father and accordingly they desire c. repeating the whole Prayer The next testimony is Tertullians Praemissâ legitimâ ordinariâ precatione quasi fundamento jus est desideriorum jus est super struendi extrinsecus petitiones Haveing first said the lawful and ordinary prayer as a foundation we make it the rule of our desires and of framing all our Petitions according to it He calls it lawful as appointed in the Gospel by the Law of Christ and being ordinary it is an Argument that the general use of it had prevailed through ancient custome in more Primitive times and that Father is large in the commendation of it calling it Breviarium totius Evangelii a breviary of the whole Gospel which is not more succinct in words then it is inlarged in matter comprehending not onely all the Offices of prayer but all the sayings of Christ. If any credit may be given to the Clementine Constitutions it was of ordinary use even in Apostolical times They naming the Lords Prayer adde Ad hunc modum precamini ter singulis diebus use this Prayer three times a day and again Let the baptized person standing up say the Prayer which the Lord hath taught us Gregory being asked why he did annex the Lords prayer to the Canon for celebration of the Lords Supper gives this reason Mos fuit Apostolorum ut ad ipsam solummodo Orationem Dominicam c. It was the practice of the Apostles to consecrate the Holy Sacrament onely by the Lords prayer And indeed the many Comments and pious Expositions of this prayer in all those Primitive times of the Church by their chiefest Doctors is to me an argument of its ordinary use and were those Expositions collected into one volume and well digested it might prove as great a help to devotion as any that I know But I may easily tire my Reader leading him onely through a few of those many ancient paths where evident footsteps of the common and frequent use of this Prayer doe appear as in those most ancient Liturgies collected by Bignius and George Cassander many of which are for the chief parts of them and as far as concerns the matter in hand authentique though in other things they have suffered additions and alterations in these generally this prayer is inserted sometimes more then once thus in those that bare the names of Saint Mark Saint James Chrysostome and Basil his Greek Liturgie and that which he translated out of the Syriack the Ethiopian Armenian and the Roman before the defection of that Church in all these this prayer is used and Master Hooker hath observed That 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. Saint Augustine makes many memorials of the use of it as in his Enchiridion Ecce tibi est Symbolum oratio Dominica c. You have the Creed and the Lords prayer what shorter rule is heard or read or more easily committed to memory And again They that walk in the wayes of the Lord say Forgive us our trespasses and again the dayly prayer which the Lord himself taught whence it is called the Lords prayer doth obtain pardon for dayly sins And speaking of the prayer used at the administration of the Sacrament he saith Which prayer almost all the Church concludes with the Lords prayer we cannot pray for any thing else saith he seeing whatever may be desired of God this one prayer taught by Christ doth contain and all in that order as it ought to be desired so that this prayer is to be preferred above all as for brevity of words so for plenty of things and their orderly disposure And that diligent and devout Father hath divers entire Comments upon it I shall adde onely one saying more of his Si quis vestrum non poterit tenere perfectè audiendo quotidie tenebit If any of you have not learned it perfectly by hearing it dayly he may Saint Ambrose on the fifteenth Petition of this prayer saith thus Therefore dayly say this Petition that thou maist dayly obtain pardon for thy debt And again Let us hear what the Disciple of Christ doth pray namely that which his master taught him Hear saith he what the Priest saith Through Jesus Christ in whom and with whom unto thee be honour praise and glory This was a clause added by the Latine Church to our Lords prayer instead of the Doxology of which more hereafter Saint Cyprian is most excellent in the commendation of this prayer and the use of it as a form his words are these seeing this prayer was breathed forth from God our Saviour what can be more acceptable what more effectual with God the Father what should be more dear and familiar to us Lest thou shouldest be ignorant how God is to be spoken to God himself puts words into thy mouth and lest thou shouldest doubt how ready he is to hear thy prayers he himself directs thee how to pray in such a manner as is fit to be heard and lest thou shouldest complain that a form of prayer being prescribed thou hast lost thy liberty of asking the things thou needest whatever things thou mightest rightly desire are all included and our Saviour hath included them in a prayer that gives us so great honour that raiseth us to so great hope that flowes with so much sweetness as no tongue can express and it is to be wished the understanding of the supplicant could aspire thereunto Let us therefore pray beloved brethren as he goes on as God our Master hath taught us it is a friendly and familiar Prayer to intreat God in his own words when the Prayer of Christ shall ascend from our mouths to the ears of God the Father will own the Sons words when we pray unto him in them if whatever we aske in his Sonnes Name he will give us how much more effectually shall we obtain if we ask in Christs Name by his Prayer Thus Saint Cyprian Lucas Brugensis speaking of the manner of saying the Lords Prayer in the Latine Church saith it was so ab istis Apostolorum temporibus from the Apostles dayes Saint Chrysostome doth record it as a Rule of the Church which we
have already mentioned out of the Clementine Constitutions and by this of Saint Chrysostome it receiveth a further confirmation that the baptized person should say the Lords Prayer from which custome he proves against the Hereticks of his time that the People of God were not by Baptisme secured from falling into sin nor were they excluded from all hope of remission if they did repent for the sins which were committed after Baptisme seeing that the Church doth not teach them in vain presently upon that Ordinance to say Forgive us our trespasses In the Canons of King Canut under Aethelnoth this is one Moreover we exhort that every Christian do so learn as that he well understand the true Faith and have the Lords prayer and the Apostles Creed familiar for Christ himself did first teach that prayer and gave it to his Disciples and he that will not learn these shall never partake of happiness with Christians when he dies not living shall be admitted to the Eucharist nor shall he be counted worthy the name of a Christian. I shall adde but one testimonie more and that for antiquities sake from the mouth of an heathen namely Lucian the Scoffer who in his Philopatris purposely derides the doctrine and practices of Christians he names our Saviour Chrestus by way of contempt he calls his scholar by the word used in the Primitive Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one that is to be catechized He sets down the Doctrine of the Trinitie as it was then taught One in Three and Three in One which expression of his is acknowledged by Socinus to be so faire an evidence for the Doctrine of the Trinity that he sayes he never read any thing more strong He describes the Creation and Moses St. Paul and the Sacrament of Baptism and at last bespeaks Critias that personated a young Christian disciple thus But let these alone and goe say thy Prayer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Beginning with Father and adding that famous Doxologie This Rigaltius on Tertullian notes that the Pagan meant it of the Lords prayer and it is brought by the learned Mr. Gregorie to prove against the Papists that the Doxologie is authentique and he that considers the design of that left-witted heathen cannot devise what else he should mean And if so it appears that it was the frequent practice of Christians in Lucians dayes that is in the time of Trajan less then two hundred years after it was delivered by Christ to use this form of Prayer publicly for how else could this Pagan come to the knowledge of it or scoffingly injoyn it as a dutie to be performed by him that would become a Christian And now let it be considered whence had these most Primitive times this custome of using and injoyning our Lords prayer if not as they do all testifie uno ore with one consent from the practice of the Apostles as they had it from the precept of Christ He must bring some convincing Argument or Demonstration that will disprove all these Evidences and until that be done we may safely acquiesce in these If I should now adde the authorities and opinions of modern Divines whose names and memories are and ever will be fresh and fragrant in all the reformed Church I should far exceed my intended limits I shall therefore mention onely the most eminent and them chiefly who are of greatest repute with the dissenters And first Mr. Calvin saith Now not onely a more certain rule but the very form it self of prayer is to be taught and again for Christ prescribed us a form And as this prayer was used in the Geneva Liturgy so frequently by Mr. Calvin himself at or before his Homilies And Beza became his scholar in this also for he sayes Our Lords Prayer is precum formula divinitùs nobis quasi praeseriptis verbis mandata A form of prayer commanded unto us from heaven as it were in prescribed words Next Chemnitius in his Harmony sayes That the Disciples desired of Christ after the example of St. John a certain form of prayer which they might use in their devotion and by which they might the more easily obtain what they desired Again we know that when we recite the Lords Prayer we injoy a great priviledge seeing that he who taught us sits in heaven the Master of our requests who also presents our prayers and intercedes for us Cum primis verò illud notatu dignum est as he saith This especially ought to be observed That when Christ in the first year of his Ministery had taught his Disciples how to pray and here again being desired to teach them to pray taught no new form but repeated the old it shewes we should not be troubled every day about new forms nor that our prayers are therefore unacceptable other requisites being observed because we repeat the same form for as he quoteth from St. Augustine All the prayers of the Saints are nothing else but the Pater noster c. inlarged and in it is comprised the marrow of all the prayers of the old Testament and hence saith he the word Collect is used to signifie a prayer this prayer being a collection of all good prayers that ever were made in the world Mr. Thomas Cartwright sayes I know in so few words it is impossible for any man to frame so pithie a prayer onely there is no necessity laid on us to use this and no more where he seems to grant a necessity of using this and again I confess the Church doth well in concluding their prayers with the Lords prayer And indeed the use of it hath been preserved in all famous Liturgies of the Reformed Churches as well Lutheran as Calvinists in that which was composed by the English exiles at Frankefort in the Marian daies and printed at Geneva 1556. it is twice inserted But of all Champions Pareus hath most succesfully defended it Seeing saith he this prayer is read in two different places it is made a question whether it was twice delivered and I see nothing to the contrary but it was prescribed twice once in the mount to the Disciples and people another time to the Disciples alone to which opinion the different occasions in Matthew and Luke do perswade me for it seems the Disciple who in Luke demanded a prayer was not present at the Sermon on the Mount or the form first given was forgotten for the Disciples were ignorant sua ruditate for their dulness of some things which were twice or thrice delivered to them Then it may be demanded saith he whether our Saviour did so strictly oblige us to this form and words as that we may not use any other thish e deservedly denieth using St. Augustines distinction viz. we may pray aliter or aliis verbis in other forms and words but we cannot pray for aliud any other thing then what is included in these words but yet he saith both to publick and
private prayers we doe rightly adde this form as a seal of them For which he gives these reasons 1. That we may obey the command of the Sonne of God 2. Because it may not be doubted but these words of prayer are most acceptable to our heavenly Father for the Father ever heareth the Sonne therefore he will hear the Sons words 3 Because it most succinctly contains a perfect sum of all things desireable so that in whatever particular our own prayers have been defective this form will make a supply 4. This prayer is granted as an incouragement to those who are yet more slow and ignorant that the Sonne of God hath instructed them how to the prayers of the Church they should joyn their own in this short form Thus Pareus and our Assembly in their works have done worthily on this behalf In their Catechisme they have this question How is the Lords prayer to be used The answer is The Lords prayer is not onely for direction as a pattern according to which we are to make our prayers but may also be used as a prayer so that it be done with understanding reverence faith and other gifts necessary to the right performance of the duty of prayer More fully yet in their Directory The prayer which Christ taught his Disciples is not only a pattern of prayer but it self a most comprehensive prayer Therefore we recommend it to be used in the prayers of the Church And above and beyond this is that which is delivered by them in the large Annotations This is a true summe and forme of all Christian prayer set down both in precept and practice And on Luke 11. 2. When ye pray Compare say they Matthew 6. 9. and the circumstances shew that Christ did twice at least teach them the very form of prayer and hence it appeareth that as this is the most absolute and compleat pattern of prayer comprehending all that we must aske so is it the most exact and sacred form of prayer indited and taught his Disciples who were to teach the whole world the rules and practice of true Religion by Christ himselfe who is best able to teach his Disciples to pray Again on the word Say Christ prescribed this form of prayer to his Disciples to be used by them not rejecting others which his spirit taught or teacheth That is as I suppose other formes which the Spirit did or might teach but to abridge all necessary petitions into this one summe Thus that grave Assembly And Dr. Hammond tells us he heard one of the gravest members of it being asked concerning the use of the Lords Prayer to answer thus God forbid I should ever be upon my knees in prayer and rise up without adding Christs form to my imperfect petitions So that even they who reject other forms of prayer think it fit to retain this And what pity is it when the General Assembly teach it so well to others any particular members should make it a castaway in their own practice The Dutch Annotations say thus Order all your prayers according to this form not that we are bound alwayes or onely to hese words f in necessities that may fallout it is also lawful farther to enlarge some petitions and also to express them in other words Junius on Matthew thus Substantiam orationis c. Christ taught the substance of prayer in that most holy form which is observed in the Church and in the notes with Tremelius on Luke 11. It is probable that John did compose a certain praier out of divers places of Scripture which agreed to the time and came near to the spiritual Kingdom of Christ that was to be revealed Lucas Brugensis on the word Say Use this form which being extracted out of the holy Scripture contains the summe of all petitions and it is no wonder if Christ did repeat this most perfect form not twice onely but more often which he would have his Disciples use daily Bishop Andrewes speaking of Prayer sayes And in this also we want not fancies in this age especially wherein an idle conceit is taken up that never came into the heads of any of the old hereticks though never so brain-sick once to imagine Our Saviour Christ thus willeth us when ye pray say Our Father c. A most fond imagination is start up in our times never once dreamed of before that telleth us in no case we must say Our Father with which form if Saint Augustine be to be beleeved as a witness of Antiquity the Universal Church of Christ hath ever used to begin and end all her prayers as striving indeed to express the sense of that prayer but not being able to come nigh the high art and most excellent spirit of perfection in that pattern they alway conclude with it as being sure however they may for divers defects not attain to the depth of it by it they shall be sure to beg all things necessary at Gods hands Bishop Usher in his body of Divinity to the Question What is the Lords prayer Answers It is an absolute prayer in it self a prayer giving perfect direction to frame all other prayers by And again it is a prayer which we may and ought to pray See Baldwines Cases of Conscience Maresius saith Christ did not onely present us with an Idea but a Form of prayer when to his Disciples asking him Teach us to pray he answered when ye pray say c. Alsted saith The Lords prayer is the breviary of the Gospel therefore with this form of prayer especially God is to be invocated Mr. Ball saith To refuse this form savoureth of a proud contempt of Christs Ordinance Ravenella from Tertullian tells us It is that new form of prayer which Christ hath determined for the Disciples of the New Testament Here are Champions sufficient and yet to these we might call in if need were and those no forreign forces neither the votes of all those National Churches and famous Persons which have both practised and pleaded for not this form onely but the use of other forms of far inferiour rank and I have not yet heard or seen their Arguments or practice disproved by any The Albingenses Waldenses Lutherans generally the Protestants of France Denmarke Swethland Helvetia both Germanies Geneva and Franckefort Wickliff Hus Luther Melanchton Calvine Bucer Phagius Cranmer Latimer Ridley Bradford Hooper Taylor almost an army of Martyrs Fox Dr. John Reynolds Burges Greenham Baines Hildersham Perkins Preston Ball Sibi Dod with many others all which being confessedly the Luminaries of their several Generations have given light to the lawfulness and consent liking to the use of forms in general and much more of this in particular For if forms of prayer have been approved by all these then questionless this which is the rule and standard of all and is disliked chiefly if not only for its being a form was approved above all And if its
being a form or our using it as such be a fault both these may be charged on our Saviours account who yet knew no sin though he used divers forms and why we should be such professed enemies to what our Saviour declared himself so much a friend especially if we consider how much the formes used by him were beneath that which he commanded us I fear a satisfactory reason can be scarcely given Nay when we doe the same thing in other parts of Gods Worship why should we disallow our selves in this The Scriptures which we read are formes There are formes of Doctrine and formes of wholesome words formes of praysing God and praying unto him in the words of Abraham Jacob Moses Deborah David Solomon Hezekiah c. and when we may and ought to bless and praise God in some of these forms why ought we not also to pray unto God in this It seems forms are lawful in our praises in the administration of both Sacraments in our benedictions yea and our excommunications too onely in our prayers they are not so And is not this greatly to be wondred at that in our Generation men should so much dote upon and contend for petty forms of Discipline which till of late dayes were never fancied to be either in the Scriptures of God or the practice of his Church for which notwithstanding the veil of the Temple yea the very bowels of the Church are rent and Christ himself seems to be crucified afresh when this form so positively prescribed in Scripture so universally practised by the Church in all ages is most undeservedly and unworthily exploded Our Saviours own practice was a sufficient warrant for the Primitive Church to compose and make use of forms of Prayer in the publick worship of God and that promise of his which also implies a precept was a firm ground of raising their faith and hope of obtaining a blessing on them I say unto you that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall aske it shall be done for them c. And indeed it will require the serious study experience wisedome and premeditation of more then one Disciple to express the necessities of all the people of God and suit them to the capacities and affections of them all And now having already given you a series of the use of forms in the service of God under the Old Testament and seeing the use of this prayer is disliked chiefly because it is a form I am even necessitated to say somewhat of the use of forms also under the New And that they that seek a stumbling-block may find none I shall choose to doe it in the words of pious and approved men who are above all exception And such an one in the first place I take Mr. Calvin to be who in his Epistle to the then Protector of England sayes thus As for formes of Prayer and Ecclesiastical rites I greatly approve that there be set formes from which the Pastors may not depart in their offices and whereby provision will be made to assist the simplicity and indiscretion of some and the consent of all Churches may more visibly appear and it will prove a remedy against the desultory levity of some men that still affect innovations as I have shewed saith he that the Catechisme it self serves for this purpose so therefore there ought to be a set form of Catechisme a set form of the administration of the Sacraments and of publick prayer The worst that Mr. Calvine said of the English Liturgy when it was newly purged from the dross of Popery being importuned by some dissenting English at Franckfort to pass his censure upon it was this that the things most obvious to exception were tolerabiles ineptiae trifles that might be tolerated rather then contended about and his toleration of the worst implies his approbation of the rest Upon one of these grounds the heathen themselves made use of formes which indeed were grown more universal then the Church her self ne fortè aliquid praeposterè dicatur lest any unfit thing should be spoken they read their Prayers before their sacrifices out of a book And in truth as at the building of the Temple there was no noise of axes and hammers heard but all the materials were hewed and formed before hand so in the publick service of God we should use all lawful means to secure our selves from those weaknesses indecencies and miscarriages to which we are all subject Marosius tells us that adstata pietas officia c. It is both lawful and expedient in the constant duties of Piety as well private as publick to use preconceived forms whereby both the mind and tongue may be guided in the performance for this saith he was the constant practice of the Church in all ages and grounded upon most firm testimonies of Scripture Next Alsted sayes That certain formes of prayer have been alwayes used in the Church and although to pray in a right manner be a gift of the holy Ghost tamen formulae precum divinitus praescriptae c. yet formes of prayer which are by divine prescription are not to be neglected as the precepts of living well are not therefore to be despised because the holy Spirit doth work Holiness in us Bishop Andrewes reproves an imagination against Orabo Spiritu praying in the Spirit 1 Cor. 14. 15. by finding fault with a fit Liturgy which they call stinted Prayers and giving themselves to imagine Prayers at the same instant whereby it is plain they so occupy their minds with devising what to say next that their spirit is unfruitful no less then the others understanding and both the understanding of the mind and the affection of the spirit are there necessarily required And again St. Cyprian saith It was ever in Christs Church counted an absurd thing ventilari precs inconditis vocibus the absurdity whereof would better appear if seeing under prayers here Psalmes and spiritual Songs are contained both being parts of Invocation they would have no stinted Psalmes but conceive their songs too and so sing them for in truth there is no more reason for the one then for the other but Gods Church hath ever had as a form of Doctrine both of Faith in the Creed and of life in the Decalogue so of Prayer too which from Acts 13. 2. the Fathers in all ages have called a Liturgy or the Service of God So the Reverend Bishop And Alsted sayes Eruditio eruditionum est Symbolum Virtus virtutum est Decalogus Litania litaniarum est Oratio Dominica I shall close this with that which D. Wilkins hath said of this subject who after a debate pro and con for Prayer by form and without form concludes That generally it is both lawful and necessary to prepare our selves as for the gift in general so for every particular Act of it by premeditating if we have leisure
quickness plainness significancie and fulness of it Suppose our Saviour instead of this form had set down only the heads of Prayer as thus when ye pray observe these Rules First invocate God as your Heavenly Father and pray that he would dispose of you and all things to the glory of his Name and Holy Attributes then for the inlargement and consummation of his Kingdome grace and glory c. And having so done a Christian Disciple should have done by our Saviours Directorie as some have done by the Assemblie's turn the heads and matter of Prayer with little alteration into a form which form would have been like this of our Lords Prayer doubtless that prayer would have been very pious and acceptable and seeing it was our Saviours good pleasure to save us that labour and to compose those heads more summarily and significantly then we can do I wonder why the same words ought not to be used by us If it be required that in all our prayers we should have this pattern for matter in our minds why should we not sometimes have the same form of words in our mouths It is hard measure to make a man an offender for such words as these Our prayers which are then onely acceptable when presented in our Saviours Name do not ipso facto become void when presented in his words That rule which gives rectitude to another is it self most right and perfect to all uses and purposes If on sudden emergencies we may use some briefer forms of prayer without a precept why on more solemn occasions may we not use this most exquisite form which is so positively injoyned Every prayer by whomsoever indited is acceptable to God when presented in faith though read out of a book or repeated by memory other essential properties of prayer being joyned why not this then which is put into our mouths by him who gave us a right to ask as well as instructions how to ask aright That holy Spirit which helpeth our infirmities and assists our weak devotions even in sighs and grones did and will doubtless abound in every Petition of this prayer when offered from a penitent heart That Dove loves such Olive-branches I have heard and read that wicked spirits have been conjured and dispossessed by an impious perverting and abuse of this prayer but that the good Spirit of God who indited it for use should abandon it when used by humble and faithful Christians is a degree of blasphemy to think And upon what account we Protestants shall be able to justifie our quarrel against the Papists for leaving out the Doxology when at once we casheer the whole Prayer will be hard to find Beza saith it is Vera omnium Christianarum precum summa ac formula Annot. in Matth. Let us therefore dear Brethren whom God hath made his more publick servants as gladly and readily continue and reassume the practice of this long-neglected duty as the people did the feast of Tabernacles which they celebrated with very great gladness after it had been omitted for some hundreds of years I can only pray and hope that every publick Minister will bring the spices and flames of his Devotion that he may help to raise this Phoenix out of her ashes or at least that everie one whose judgement and conscience is convinced that 't is his dutie to use it will not be withheld from the exercise of it by any shame or fear whatever it is no shame to rectifie an error but to persevere in it and fear and shame where there is no sin but contrarily a manifest dutie incumbent on us are but bugbears to affright children and cowards and should not at all move any good souldier of Jesus Christ from his station or if any such thing might befall us yet the great dishonour that hath redounded to our Nation and the Church of Christ among us through the neglect of this dutie should to a publick person and will if he have a publick spirit too render all personal reflections inconsiderable We have not been afraid or ashamed to plead for and practice some forms of which there is not so clear a warrant in Scripture as for this although they are lawful and necessary in their kind onely this like the wounded person is past by without any commiseration from Priest or Levite although we cannot practice any of them in so much faith as this for God having commended his Son to us saying this is my beloved Son hear him how confidently may we recommend our prayers back unto him and say Lord thus thy beloved Son hath taught us to pray Hear thou us in his Name and Words Besides it may be considered whether this prayer may not as well be left out in our Catechismes for the instruction of youth and if this then the Creed and the Commandements too and so we should reduce our selves to that which some would have i. no Catechisme at all for fear of forms as well as from our prayers in the Congregation for even among the elder people are some children in knowledge who need to be taught again the first Principles of Christian Religion and who indeed are uncapable of higher attainments unless such a soundation be laid and if these things should be disused experience may assure us that some would slight them and others forget them and a great part of our people be willingly ignorant of the true sense and meaning as well as of the letter of them and which is also a sad truth cast off the very form of godliness as well as the form of prayer all which mischiefs seeing the frequent use and occasional interpretation of these fundamentals of our Religion may in all probability through the blessing of God prevent for the future we are in duty obliged to the use of them And if those masters of Families which wholly neglect the duty of prayer and so have not the appearance of Christianity among them the Heathen and the families that call not on Gods Name being both alike would begin that duty with this form and some other joyned to it and having learned themselves the true meaning of each Petition the prime and literal sense whereof would be easily found would teach it to their families I doubt not but as hereby they would give an evidence of their being Christians so they might certainly obtain the blessing of God for themselves and families and who knows whether the wisedom of God did not abbreviate the Doctrine and form of prayer and make it so plain and easie for this end among others to render them inexcusable who should omit this duty when it would cost them so little labour study or time the words being so few and plain so nigh them even in their mouths Oratirnem saith Lyra brevibus verbis composuit ut sit nobis siducia citò annuendi quod breviter vult rogari Our Saviour composed this prayer in few words that
we might believe to receive speedily what he commands us to aske briefly And Mr. Calvine to the same purpose The onely Sonne of God hath put words into our mouths which may clear our minds from all doubting It was convenient saith Aquinas to the consummation of our hope that a form of Prayer should be delivered by Christ wherein he shewes what things we may hope for from him by what he hath willed us to aske of him It is doubtless a commendable Office to instruct both our Churches and Families as Christ did instruct his yea and to inculcate the same lesson again and again as Christ did untill they be perfectly acquainted with it Not that I would have any the most private Christian to set up his rest here or in any other forms but my desire is that such as have not yet gone so far would begin with this as a step and help yea as a pillar and foundation of their devotions and whatever progress they make they will see so much imperfection in this if they be humble Christians that as they say of Apelles when with great care and skill he drew the picture of Campaspe he fell in love with the Original they will imbrace and reverence this Prayer the more as long as they live Remember therefore that Christ hath injoyned the use of this prayer whose injunction as it makes it our duty so it will be our discharge and the practice of learned and pious Christians will be our incouragement And if any contentious spirit shall withdraw his neck from this gentle and easie yoke that is imposed by the precept of Christ and so kick against both I will onely say as the Apostle doth we have no such custome neither the Churches of God If all this will not move I beseech my brethren sadly to reflect on the manifold inconveniences and mischiefs that have followed upon the neglect of observing the matter and form of this prayer for of both these omissions our age is generally guiltie and it is a rare thing to finde any that neglects the form to comply duly with the matter and method of it and then they doe undoubtedly offend when they neither say this nor thus as Christ did command them Do not some men forget the Publicans confession and onely satisfie themselves with the Pharisees congratulation are not those faults grown rise and common against which our Saviour prescribed this prayer as a remedy Is it not true which the Poet observed of old nocitura petuntur some things have been desired that have been for the matter unlawful and for the manner of asking sinful One thinks this prayer a mean contemprible thing unfit to be taught their children another speaks it out That there is more devotion in a verse or two of Davids Psalmes then in all our Lords Prayer It is agreeable to the nature of publick prayer that whatsoever news or occurrences opinion or interest passion or prejudice whatever design or debate publick or private men do espouse should be made the subject of publick prayer and so the people have many times stones given them instead of bread And whereas it is said that the use of this and other forms hath a direct tendency to spiritual laziness and formalitie in prayer I can onely wish that the prayers of those that despise this were secured from the temptations of speaking rashly and unadvisedly with their lips of priding themselves in the ostentation of parts and gifts to the raising of invincible prejudice in the hearts of the people against such as have not the like faculties and causing them to have some mens persons in admiration as if invention and the apt cadencie of words and confident elocution were the principal parts of Christian oratory whereas it is undeniable that men of unsanctified spirits may in these exercises exceed the soundest Christians as the Rabbines say Achitophel did who had three new prayers for every day and our late writers affirm of Hacket who in the dayes of Queen Elizabeth died a blasphemer yet could perform this exercise to the admiration of his hearers Alas how many disorderly and impertinent prayers have been publickly delivered what a monstrous excess in some and a like defect of the essential parts of prayer in others no marks of our Saviours rule either in matter method or form as if we had found out some new North-west passage to the throne of Grace which the wisedome of our great Pilot did not discover Against such prayers as these good Christians may safely oppose that form of Plato Deus Rex optime bona quaeque nobis voventibus non vo ventibus tribue mala autem etiam poscentibus abesse jube O God our great King grant us all good things whether we aske them or not and command evil things to be kept from us though we desire them never so earnestly These things remember me of Esops Fables of a River that railed against the Fountain as being sluggish and immoveable and had not a Fish in it whereas her streams did abound with variety of fish and did incessantly pass by the fruitful vallies making musick as they went whereat the Fountain was displeased and restrained his waters and so the streams dried up the fishe perished and all the pleasant murmurs ceased I speak not this any wayes to reproch the holy prayers of those ancient and experienced Saints of God who by his blessing upon their daily industrie and constant exercises of devotion have attained a more excellent way for which gifts and graces as I do from my soul bless God and account them the horsemen and Chariots of our Israel so it is also the desire of my heart to be remembred of them in all their addresses to the throne of Grace But onely to express the just regret of my soul for the many miscarriages of rash and inconsiderate persons discovered in publick devotions which through the defect of necessary matter and the redundancy of impertinencies and for the great disorder and want of method having no imaginable resemblance with our Saviours form we may name Ichabod where is the glory Against all these real or but possible evils did we lay the line and rule of our Lords Prayer to our devotions and apply it to each part Componens manibusque manus atque oribus ora as the Prophet Elisha put his mouth upon the dead childs mouth his eyes upon the childs eyes c. we might perceive new life and spirit to inspire them to the comfort of all that hear them To such therefore especially as are conscious to themselves that they have been often surprized to speak rashly and impertinently in the Congregation to such as in Mr. Calvines phrase are guilty of desultorie levity and are tempted to ostentation and vain glory I earnestly recommend this remedy that they would better observe the matter and method of Christs Prayer and study more to conform their
own thereunto and for fear of failing in this would they devoutly use the very form too as Christ hath injoyned them it would prove an excellent remedy against the above named evils and surely when neither in matter nor form we express any care to resemble this Architype we do as much as in us lieth make void this injunction of our Saviour Again this mischief hath been the product of disusing this Prayer that some whom we should judge more sober and knowing Christians by their profession if they hear a Minister summe up his devotions in it though he be a person of excellent parts and pietie they presently conceive a prejudice against him as being a man of a carnal formal temper and of a different perswasion from themselves and so deprive themselves of that Spiritual comfort and edification which otherwise they might receive by his Ministery yea it hath been known that on the very repetition of this Prayer some have immediately withdrawn themselves from the Ordinances of God and so forsaken their own mercies for whom my hearts desire is that they may have time and hearts in humilitie and faith to say this Prayer once at least before they die and God forbid that I should ceas to pray for them in another form of our Saviour Father forgive them they know not what they do If for thirtie or fortie years since or any age of the Church beyond that home to our Saviours time it should have been adjudged scandalous to use the Lords Prayer the Creed or the Commandements or any should have made it the mark of a faithful Disciple to omit these things the present Church would doubtles have branded the authors of that Opinion for Arch-hereticks and yet not this opinion onely but the practice too hath like a gangrene so spread it self over the face of the land and the hearts of the people that those Ministers are generally excluded from the number of Christs faithful and able Disciples who devoutly repeat these things And if this maladie only were cured I shall account this labour happily bestowed But beside this some sober men whose judgements and practices have been for the use of this prayer as a form being called to pray in Congregations of a contrarie perswasion to avoid the Charybdis of giving a groundless offence have run on the Scylla of disobeying Christ and swerving from their own principles as if they were ashamed of Christ and of his words in an adulterous generation And who knowes whether for our wilful neglect of this one many among us have not been justly deprived of other of Gods Ordinances and given up to contempt of them But there are yet sadder effects then these The disuse of it by some hath been improved to a contempt of it in others in so much that they whose dutie it was to have blessed God for it as for a Jacobs ladder to lift them nearer Heaven have degenerated so far from Christianitie as to thank God they have forgotten it and to abhor the teaching of it to their children as if it were some unluckie spell or charm yea and what is enough to make us all tremble have quaked at the repetition of it These are sad considerations and cannot be denied to be for the most part the proper effects of omitting this prayer and as ever we hope to have them cease we should joyn with one consent to remove the cause and renew our first love to this Ordinance bring back again with joy and gladness this Ark to the House of God and prove if he will not open the windows of heaven and pour down his blessings upon us To such as have conscienciously continued the use of this prayer I say as the Angel did to the Church of Philadelphia Hold thou that fast which thou hast Let no man take thy Crown it hath not been nor ever will it be a barren or fruitless prayer unless want of faith and true devotion in us do hinder its efficacie Take heed of a hastie perfunctorie posting of it over as if the words were too hot for our mouths whereby we may cause our good to be evil spoken of Let it be uttered with deliberation and servencie in faith and an actual apprehension of those mercies which we want and chieflie desire under each Petition that both our own and our peoples judgements and affections may accompanie it And on all occasions open this box of precious ointment or in a plain and familiar Exposition of the chief parts of it unto the people that the spices thereof may send forth their smell even a sweet savour of reconciliation and acceptation with God a savour of Pietie Charitie and Life unto the people cautionate them against formalitie and lio-labour onelie in this prayer which as the flie which Solomon speaks of will cause the whole composition to corrupt The drawing nigh unto God with the lips though in this most excellent Prayer while the heart is far from him will turn this Sacrifice of God into an offering of fools and therefore instruct them how every desire of theirs may and all their present wants and requests ought to be referred to and expressed in one of these Petitions the diligent Reader may see what Reverend Mr. Ball hath written to this purpose And let none thinke it enough to use it as a form onely but let him study to conform all his more solemn devotions to the matter and method of it and so we shall be sure to observe our Saviours injunction and obtain his blessing It remains onely now that we wipe off those Objections that stick on this practice which although as so many Vipers on Saint Pauls hand coming out of the fire which contentious spirits have kindled may seem to argue its guiltiness of divers accusations yet after that we have had the patience to look on them awhile we shall see them fall off of their own accord and the sight thereof I hope will cause the Objectors to change their minds The first Objection is this The form related by St. Matthew doth differ from that in St. Luke as in the fourth Petition what St. Matthew expresseth by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 day by day St. Luke renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 day by day and in the fifth Petition for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in St. Matthew is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in St. Luke Our debts our trespasses which varietie of readings argueth that it was not intended for a form of words to be precisely so used It is more then probable that our Saviour did deliver it both times in the same words they that hold it was but once delivered must of necessitie acknowledge it but our Saviour using the same Syriack Dialect which the Apostles afterward expressed in Greek as their own style guided them it is almost impossible to think how they should accord better considering that although the Holy Ghost did assist them in calling things
to their remembrance and dictating Divine truths to them yet did not as is reported of the Seventie Interpreters suggest each word and syllable but left both the Apostles and Prophets free to use their own expressions from whence it is that this Josephs coat hath such divers colours I mean that there are such different styles of the holy Pen-men 2. There is not a better Harmonie in any one passage delivered by any of the Evangelists then in this and the difference that is in them is very inconsiderable being in shew only and not in sense 3. St. Augustine resolves the greatest of these doubts in a Question Quid est debitum nisi peccatum what is our debt but our sin A sinner in Hebrew is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and sometime 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but more frequently in the Syriack language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is used to denote any that is obnoxious to debt or guilt and punishment and in this sense the Chaldee Paraphrase useth the word four times in Solomons Prayer Forgive the debts of thy people Israel and the Syriak in Psalm 1. 1. read thus Blessed is the man that hath not stood in the way 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Debtors this was in the Syriak language the common name for sinners and then no wonder if St. Luke knowing the import of the word and being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 best skilled in the Greek Language did very significantly render that word sins which St. Matthew more literally renders debts and St. Luke presently expounds himself to deliver the same thing with St. Matthew for having said And forgive us our trespasses he adds as we forgive them that are indebted unto us and Grotius saith that St. Lukes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is but an Exposition of what St. Matthew meant by debts And Beza makes the other two words of one signification Idem declarabit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 atque apud Matthaeum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that i as much as we shall need this day and so the vulgate reads hodiè this day in both places The varietie of expressions doth onely help to understand the true sense and meaning of our Saviour the better as several Translations doe to the understanding of the Original and in respect of the Language wherein our Saviour delivered this Prayer the Greeke is but a Translation But I foresee that this objection may be much improved by what hath been said by some men of great reputation and learning concerning the vast difference of these forms in St. Matthew and St. Luke not in words onely but in sense and some essential parts of it for in the vulgate Latine these things are omitted Noster qui es in coelis the whole third Petition Thy will be done c. and deliver us from evil all this in Saint Lukes relation is wanting and they with some others doe think that the whole Doxologie in Saint Matthew was surreptitious and not of the Text But of this anon Of the particulars left out by St. Luke Beza saith this Haec non legic vetus interpres c. These things an ancient Interpreter doth not read he means the Vulgate and it appears out of Augustine to Laurentius that the Latine exemplars had onely five Petitions in this Prayer the third being omitted and the latter part of the sixth which were afterward supplied out of Matthew which that it was done olim long agoe appears not onely by the Greek Copies but also by the Syriack Translation So Beza and after him Grotius to the like purpose Omnino oredibile est c. It is very credible that the particulars omitted in Lukes copie were added out of the Greek of Matthew his reason also the same Cùm non extet in Latinis antiquis illud Because it is not in the ancient Latines Now this is the force of the Objection If our Saviour had intended these words for a form of Prayer he would not have made so great a difference not in terms onely but in some of its chief and essential parts which difference doth evince that it was not our Saviours will to tie us precisely to the words To this I answer first that on this supposition of defectiveness as it is not a form so neither may it be admitted as a perfect rule or platform seeing some necessarie things are left out and so we should make void the injunction of Christ to both purposes Secondly The difference of these forms is in our Translations which agree with the most ancient and best Greek copies inconsiderable being as you have heard in the answer to the former Objection in shew only not at all in sense and I remember that I am to deal now with Protestants who do own the Translation now in use and by consequence the copies from which it was translated as most authentique And I beseech them to consider what an unhansome reflection is hereby made not on our Translators only but on all the Reformers as if they wanted judgement and discretion to choose or integritie to make use of the best copies In imitando non optimum proponere is no wise mans part But thirdly I doubt not but that it will appear that the most and best Greek copies have these particulars Originally and consequently our Translations are good and authentique And first all that Grotius saith is Graeci quidam codices omittunt Some Greek copies but not many do omit the third Petition Two things therefore I will inquire First the number of those Greek copies that retain these particulars Secondly their qualitie and authoritie which in all probability are most authentique either the Copies which omit or those which retain them 1. For the number it will be easily granted that there are more with us then against us for in my observation these parts are omitted only in these 1. That of Bezn given to the Universitie of Cambridge 2. In that second copie of Henry Stephens where yet the word Amen is added 3. In that of March Velesius there wanteth only the first particular viz. Our which art in Heaven 4. In that of Magdalene Colledge in Oxford wants only which art in Heaven So that by the way it is worth observation that like false witnesses neither of these defective copies do agree among themselves or with the Vulgate Latine that of Beza onely excepted Now there are three or four copies to one that retain these parts and they are agreeable to each other as learned Chemnitius observes We follow the Greek copies saith he in which there is no difference as to the sense in either form onely two words are changed but of a like signification and therefore he expounds the forms jointly p. 785. and there adds The Greek copies doe relate the whole Prayer in Luke after the same manner as in Matthew except onely the Doxology Then for the Latine Translations though the Vulgate have it not yet
Christ and his Apostles and their sense of them also being fresh in memory for this Language Christ did use and for this cause wise men would even equal it with the Greek fountain See also what Tremelius saith of it in his Preface to the New Testament And Chamier tells us the Syrians did use the Doxologie in their Liturgy as well as in the Gospel 2. Maldonate confesses that it is in the Hebrew copy also and he attempts to prove that St. Matthews Gospel was originally written in Hebrew and urgeth St. Hieroms testimony who had seen and made use of the Hebrew copy and therefore he concludes it to be not a temeritatis a note of rashness to deny it and answers Objections to the contrary if this be true it must needs be authentique however the antiquity of this Hebrew copy is beyond St. Hieroms time 3. It is also in some Arabick translations in that printed by Erpenius and a manuscript in Queens Colledge Library Certain it is that many of the books of the New Testament were translated into this Language in the Apostles dayes yea 't is said that they have certain Epistles of St. Paul and other Apostles which are not yet extant in any other Languages that St. Paul himself was among them appears from Gal. 1. 17. and this will help to justifie it against the Vulgate also 4. The learned Mr. Gregory gives two reasons more for its authority the first is that it was used by the Christians in Lucians dayes long before any of those books that omit it were extant 5. Because in all probability as our Saviour had respect unto the prayers of the Jewes in all other parts of his prayer so had he also in this and it appears that as they used the last Petition so they annexed the Doxology unto it as Libera nos à malo quia tuum est regnum regnà bis gloriose in secula seculorum i. Deliver us from evil for thine is the Kingdome and thou shalt reign in glory for ever and ever 6. It s conformitie with the analogy of Faith throughout the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament is an argument in the judgement of Sol. Glassius that it is authentique who thinks that our Saviour had respect to a like clause 1 Chron 29. see also 2 Tim. 4. 18. and sure I am it could not serve the design of any Heretick to insert it 7. The Prayer it self would be less perfect without it and therefore it was not originally wanting the Councel of Trent saith Orationis Dominicae duae sunt partes there are two parts of the Lords Praye Petition and Thanksgiving and as Morton saith Lest we should deprive God of one part of his worship which consists of thanksgiving this clause must be annexed for though the two first Petitions Thy Kingdome come c. seem to imply thanksgiving yet is it not actually performed except in the Doxologie Having thus confirmed the Protestant Tenet we shall also confute the Papists Objections against it 1. Bellarmine objects that the Latine Fathers do not expound it when they open all other parts of the Prayer To this it is briefly answered that this will conclude nothing against its authoritie seeing the Greek Fathers who in the Primitive times were more and had more advantages to know the truth did retain it in their Expositions for as Chamier saith Non à Latinis ad Graecos sed à Graecis ad Latinos scripturae pervenere The Scriptures were not delivered from the Latine to the Greeke but from the Greeke to the Latine Fathers 2. He saith Graeci in sua liturgiâ recitant quidem haec verba c. The Greek Liturgies do recite these words after the Lords Prayer but doe not continue them with the Prayer To this Chamier Answers That they did continue it with the Prayer as in St. Basil and St. Chrysostome appears and it was the order of the Church then that the Priest onely should pronounce it which also is an argument of its authoritie the most solemn offices being alway performed by them So Montanus Sacerdoti duntaxat licere verba ista proferre It was lawfull for the Priest onely to pronounce these words and so Master Gregory the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is alway the Priests and it would be a strange inference to conclude that therefore it was less authentique or that it was not originally in the Greek books Yet again Huntly saith Istis Verbis respondebat Populus Sacerdotiâ—i post orationem Dominicam That in the Greek Liturgies the people did answer the Priest in these words But whether both of these be true or false they will conclude nothing against the authoritie of this clause as will appear in answer to the next Objection Some Protestants do joyn with the Papists objecting that this clause was inserted into the Greek copies from their Liturgies So Brugens Verisimile fit c. It is probable that this clause was added by the Grecians out of their Liturgy or some other solemn form into the Gospel of Matthew as also out of some such form these words are added to the Angelical Salutation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because thou hast born the Saviour of our souls But by the way be it known that we Protestants disown any such surreptitious addition to that place of St. Luke in the copies which we follow and therefore the Objection concludes not against them or us upon this account But to goe on with the Objection in which Grotius agrees with Brugensis thus Seeing this clause is not extant in some ancient Greek exemplars but is in the Syriack and Latine and Arabick it is an argument that not onely the Arabick and Latine but the Syriack translation also were made after that the Liturgies of the Church had received a certain form for this Doxologie rather then a part of Prayer was annexed according to a custome of Greece altogether unknown to the Latines And what Beza saith you have heard already that it did creep into the context c. And he and Grotius will not grant the Amen to be Canonical but that both it and the Doxology came in as a thing in use among those Primitive Christians Thus I have made the most of the Objection and shall now do my best endeavour to answer it And first whereas the Objectors suppose that the Doxology crept in from the Greek Liturgies into those many and ancient copies it will undeniably follow from this supposition that the use of the Liturgies and publick form of Prayer was of Apostolical authority and antiquity for so are many of the Greek Syriaeck Hebrew and Arabick copies that do retain this Doxology to say nothing of the Latine which Grotius also mentioneth And whoever he be that agrees with the Objectors in this supposition cannot possibly be at any great distance with me in my main proposition for if publick Prayers were by Apostolical
practice used in the service of God in other forms then this form was used by them much more there being not any of those supposed or reall Liturgies which did not use our Lords Prayer as a chief office of devotion 2. It is an uncharitable and high presumption for any to think that those Apostolical men that penned those holy books should be such prophane daring persons as to harbour any thought much less actually to attempt the mending of our Lords Prayer when not onely their care and diligence to prevent the like practice from others but their fidelity to the Gospel and truths of Christ which they maintained with the expence of their blood and lives is so apparent to all certainly if they had Liturgies so anciently which I think my present adversaries will not grant or if they do we shall be adversaries no longer they would rather have reformed their Liturgies by the Gospel out of which indeed the materials of them were taken and not the Gospel by their Liturgies And though they used many forms in their devotions as frequently as this Doxology which they did also immediately annex and insert to portions of Scripture used in their Liturgy yet we never find them guilty of annexing or inserting them to the holy Writ as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Glory be to the Father after the Psalmes and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Angelical Salutation Surely whatever succeeding ages were they were not so unfaithful to the great depositum of the Gospel as to consent unto much less to be contrivers of and actors in the corruption of it by any additions or otherwise It may with much more charity and probability be thought that this clause was in progress of time omitted by the Latine Translators as a thing of form and dayly use which none could be ignorant of or forget as when we transcribe any thing of accustomed forms we write a part and supply the rest of it with c. and this Doxology was not onely used to the Lords Prayer but from thence added to other parts of devotion also and so became most familiar this I say may be more charitably thought then that those most ancient unquestionable Writers should purposely without any reason or design with high presumption and a heavie curse which was but even then pronounced being almost the last words of the Scriptures adde it unto the holy Gospel besides these did onely transcribe it from Greeke to Greeke and every one knowes there is less danger of error in transcribing then in translating there will likely be somewhat lost in tossing liquors from vessel to vessel by the most steddy hand And that all that guilt which I wipe off from the Greeke transcribers may not stick on the Latine translators whoever they were I shall offer with submission to better judgements this conjecture as the ground why they did omit the Doxology which at best was but pia fraus a pious fraud I read in St. Ambrose after he had expounded the rest of our Lords Prayer thus Quid sequitur saith he Audi quid dicit Sacerdes Per Dominum nostrā Jesum Christū in quo tibi est cum quo tibi est honor laus gloria magnificentia potestas cum Spiritu Sancto à seculis nunc semper in omnia secula seculorum Amen i. What followes hear what the Priest saith Through Jesus Christ our Lord in whom and with whom be unto thee together with the holy Spirit honour praise glory magnificence and power from all ages both now and alwayes for ever and ever Amen Now plain it is that the Latine Church did use this clause with the Lords Prayer and that it was pronounced by the Priest as also that it was fitted by that Church to maintain the Doctrine of the Trinitie which was by many contradicted So that my opinion is that having first left out the genuine and proper clause of our Lords Prayer in their Liturgies and established this in the place of it as most conducing to the ends they aimed at and being so setled in progress of time they did omit the true Doxology to gain the more credit to this new one and when as all learned Protestants know there were many corruptions and additions and omissions too in the Vulgate Latine even in those dayes which St. Hierome himself did note but not amend Ne nimis multa immutasse videretur Lest he should seem to change too many things no wonder if this were past over among others And we know also that the Latine Church hath not for a long time upward been so tender of the Scriptures as they should Cardinal Hosius was not afraid to write meliùs actum fuisse cum Ecclesia si nulla unquam Sciptura extitisset It might have been better with the Church if none of the Scriptures tures had ever been extant And seeing as Grotius observes they did add to the Gospels out of their rituals it is likely they did omit also from the Gospels Then for the word Amen which is not in Beza's copy and is disliked by Grotius who saith it was not added by Christ but came in from a custome of the Church which did approve their prayers by that word this that learned man onely saith for what he alledgeth afterward will prove the contray that the word is used in the Old and new Testament Now this word is also retained in the Latine and Brugensis who in the business of the Doxology opposed us saith of this word Syriacum manuscriptum Graecique omnes libri quos vidi c. The Syriack manuscript and all the Greek books that I have seen doe conspire with these Latine ones that have it Hierome with Euthemius elegantly expound it calling it Signaculum Dominicae Orationis the Seal of the Lords Prayer as it is a note of confirmation so he teacheth in two Epistles to Marcellinus and the Apostle useth the word 1 Cor. 14. 6. See this great Scholar urgeth the same Argument for it which Grotius urged against it Now if Beza's copy and those few others which onely in some things consent with his be true then the many ancient generally receiv'd and approved Greek Hebrew Syriack Arabick copies which differ from his but agree among themselves are false or if these be true as I hope appears to every impartial person then his is false in this particular of the Doxology and if it be faulty in St. Mattehw much more in that of Saint Luke as himself grants in his Epistle and especially in omitting those severall parts of our Lords Prayer which those more ancient copies retain And here I may also conclude with reverend M. Crook That the Doxology is causelesly and without warrant omitted by the Church of Rome And now we come in the last place to inquire after the rise and authority of the vulgate Latine upon whose credit both Beza and Grotius do dissent
unjustly This taste is enough to make us know how much that impure vessel hath tainted the precious liquor of Gods word and yet the Papists will not permit the people to drink at the Fountain but only at these impure streams Huntly sayes Nos Graecum textum corruptum esse pronunciamus praesertim ubi dissentit à vulgatâ nostrâ We pronounce the Greek Text to be corrupted especially where it dissenteth from our vulgate Latine but I hope that the premisses which we have laid down will bear this conclusion That the Greeke copies ought to be consulted and believed by us both for the determining of controversies the understanding of difficulties and for the intire and pure delivery of the truths of God And thus we have proved the Doxology in St. Matthew to be authentique and the forms in both Evangelists to be entirely the same though delivered at several times onely in Saint Luke the Doxology is not added whence will arise ano-Objection The form in Saint Luke which is most strictly injoyned is less perfect and the quere will be which form ought to be used To this I answer that it is usual with the later Evangelists to deliver those particulars more briefly which had been insisted on more at large by the former thus in an important cmmand v. 33. of this Chap. Seek the Kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof c. St. Luke reads onely this seek the Kingdom of God and all these things shall be added and this is also the method observed by the Evangelists as to repeat some things already delivered more briefly so to express other things omitted more plainly and it seems it was the aim of St. Luke to express the word of precept and injunction for the using of this form so as that it should admit no contradiction But I remember that this Prayer was twice delivered and so our Saviour himself might here in Saint Luke repeat it more contractedly to his Disciples alone who we may suppose had all recorded and learned it throughout or at least that St. Luke might abbreviate it as a thing sufficiently known from St. Matthews relation But however it be when two forms are prescribed we need not dispute which we should use much less may we deny to use either but as it is our duty to use one so it will be our sin to omit both and our own prudence and the practice of the Church in all ages may direct us to use that which is most perfect And our Assembly gives the same advice in a like matter for whereas the Apostle differs from the Evangelist in the form of words used at the Institution of the Lords Supper which in St. Matthew 26. 26. is Take eat this is my body and at the cup Drink ye all of it for this is my blood of the New Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins But in St. Paul thus Take eat this is my body which is broken for you this do in remembrance of me and at the cup This cup is the New Testament in my blood this do you as oft as ye drink it in remembrance of me The first are Christs own words according to St. Matthew and St. Paul saith also That he received of the Lord that which he delivered unto the Corinthians yet as there is a necessity of using one of those forms so the Directory giveth us liberty to use either The same advice will hold in this business of the two forms of Prayer One we are bound to use we have liberty to choose which but Christian prudence directs us to use that which is most compleat and Chemnitius assures us that the Doxology which is wanting in St. Luke may be piously supplied from St. Matthew and then there is not the least difference in the forms That all our Prayers ought to be made in knowledge and understanding But these Petitions are either obscure in their terms or comprehend such mountains of matter and mysteries under each expression as the common sort of people cannot actually apprehend under such brief expressions Having proved it to be our duty by vertue o Christs command all objections for the non performance of it arising from our own incapacity will be found to be but vain pretences an such is this For first I beseech the Objectors to consider what our Saviour was doing when he delivered this Prayer he was instructing not onely his Disciples but the whole multitude also in the chief parts of Gods worship wherein he no doubt descended to the capacities of them whom he intended to instruct and did not now speak in Parables as at other times but proposed plain truths to guide their spirits and raise their affections in Prayer and other exercises of Religion And I cannot thinke any man as good a Master of Method or a plainer teacher then our Saviour 2. They that have not a competent degree of Knowledge to apprehend the prime sense of each Petition in this Prayer if they be Ministers they are not sufficiently qualified to utter Prayers ex tempore in the Congregation or if they be people they are less able at one and the first hearing to understand all the uncouth words and mysterious expressions of those that do so pray before them 3. The prime and literal sense is obvious and easie to be understood by every ordinary capacity but if there be any thing difficult there are few established Ministers but are able to expound it and were all Ministers as diligent in unfolding the Method and heads of this Prayer as the ancient Fathers were and as it is their duty to be this Objection would soon vanish 4. That which the whole Assembly makes an argument to commend the use of it as a form namely the comprehensiveness of it is but unhappily urged by any one or more inferior persons against the use of it as such 5. This Objection would condemn the use of any Petitions wherein the Attributes of God are mentioned and any Scripture-purase to which more senses then one may be accommodated is used and as the Jewes say there are Mountains of Divinity on every point of Scripture 6. Nor indeed is it necessary that we should in every Prayer have an actual apprehension of every particular that may upon deliberation be referred to each head of this Prayer but onely of such things as we do stand in need of and for the supply of which we do at that time make our addresses to the throne of Grace and if we should stand to enumerate our particular wants to confess our several sins and to implore grace against each infirmity in every Prayer it is not a day that would be sufficient for these and such like things And it it not in vain that our Saviour hath said Your heavenly Father knoweth what things ye have need of so immediately before this injunction Thus therefore pray ye 7. This Objection is so
forgive others lest they should doe as Adonijah did the words of whose Petition were spoken against his own life To the first part of the Objection Dr. Lightfoot answereth thus They that doe deny this Prayer is to be used by any but real Saints because as they say none but such can call God Father either know not or consider not how usual this compellation was among that Nation in their devotions and Christ speaketh constantly according to the common and most usual Language of the Countrey And if Christ did from the common practice of the Jewes insert it into his own prayer it argues his approbation of it too in the common devotion of Christians 2. To both parts of the Objection I Answer that every man that would pray fitly and acceptably in the congregation or in his closet ought to follow this prayer as his Rule Directory in observing the matter of it at least if not the form also otherwise Christ hath made it a form and rule in vain Now I say if our keeping of the form be dangerous so is our observing the matter too and then by this reason if the most of men may not pray in this form neither may they pray according to this matter for as no solemn prayer should be made without asking God forgiveness so no forgiveness can be expected without the condition of forgiving our brethren it is as Montanus saith Praecisa irrevocabilis sententia sine exceptione a general unalterable rule without exception If ye forgive not men their trespasses neither will your Heavenly Father forgive your trespasses And what a vain excuse this will be in the ears of God I did not pray nor aske pardon because I could not call God Father nor forgive my brethren or because there were some in the Assembly that had not faith to call God Father or charity to forgive their brethren every Christian ear can try But if this be the reason why some have so long omitted it let me mind them of what our Saviour told some of his Disciples Ye know not what spirit ye are of Now the frequent use of this Petition would lay on new and strong Obligations upon all persons to perform that most excellent Christian dutie so much wanting among us of a free and full forgiveness of our brethren to which religious practice it is well if by any Art we could oblige our people yea this very terror of the Lord which is here put into our own mouths of obtaining no forgiveness from God but on condition of forgiving others would effectually perswade us to it or else keep us under a tacite sentence in our own consciences of being Excommunicated from the throne of Grace and of receiving no benefit by all our prayers And suppose there be some such in each Congregation as cannot or at least will not joyn with the rest in saying this Prayer must the rest of the Congregation be deprived of the benefit of it for their sakes It may be all the Ministers Prayers may not be as suitable and profitable to the most and best of the people as this and it is a sad thing if a Minister shall comply rather with the weakness and malice of a few then with the devotion and benefit of many The use of holy and honest things is not to be laid aside because some are causelesly offended at them especially when the greater part are justly prejudiced at the omission And finally this also is to be considered that the yielding to scrupulous and contentious persons in lesser things although I account this one of the greatest magnitude is the way to harden them in their present prejudices and to dispose them for more and greater Amicus SOCRATES Amicus PLATO Magis amica veritas THat which Dr. Owen hath said concerning the use of this form is in his Answer to Beedles 11. Questions and the Answer thereto Beedles Question is this Did not Christ prescribe a form of Prayer to his Disciples so that there remaineth no doubt touching the lawfulness of using a form To this he answers Luke 11. 1 2 3. To this thus replieth Dr. Owen If Christ prescribed a form of Prayer to his Disciples to be used as a form by the repetition of the same words I confess it will be out of question that it is lawful to use a form Reply But Christ did prescribe a form of Prayer c. Therefore it is lawful to use a forme The minor Proposition is chiefly to be proved and the conclusion viz. the lawfulness of using a form indefinitely which is that which Beedle contends for and the Doctor here grants will be of considerable importance hereafter Now the truth of this Proposition will appear by the proof of its parts thus Either it is not a form or not prescribed to be used as such but it is a form and prescribed to be used as such Ergo. That it is a form is granted by all and made the apple of contention by most that disuse it under that notion but the rottenness of this assertion is so apparent that the next scruple is added as a leaf to cover it i. whether it is prescribed to be used as such This although it be sufficiently clear cannot be seen by those who have entertained the former prejudice for being professed enemies to all forms of Prayer they are resolved to make it good that our Saviour was no friend to them which is contrary to his own practice as hath been shewed and against a double precept also in as plain expressions as could be used to that purpose But none are more unlike to discern the mind of God in the Scriptures then they that sift them rather to find or fancy something in them to confirm their opinions then to direct and settle their judgements otherwise they that observe and use a form of words prescribed in the administration of both Sacraments might with the same eyes observe this also prescribed for use in prayer But 2. It is also granted that there is a plain and positive prescription preceding this form When ye pray say And thus pray ye And I never heard as yet that any have questioned the sufficiency of the injunction about what then is the contest this they fancy that the matter onely of that form doth fall under the prescription and not the form of words So that the truth of both assertions is granted in sensu diviso viz. that there is a form and a prescription but not insensu composito that that form is to be used as such by vertue of this prescription But what God hath joyned together let no man put asunder for the decision of this I will make my appeal to any impartial person as Judge when there is a form composed by Christ himself and commanded to his Disciples with a plain precept prefixed viz. When ye pray say how unreasonable it is to affirm that the prescript should
concern the matter or the method only and not the form of words also Quis discrevit what sufficient cause of divorce between these two can be assigned or what reason hath any to distinguish where the Law of God doth not had the Disciple asked our Saviour thus Master teach us what things to pray for give us some heads of Devotion then this inference might have some colour of truth but even then our Saviour giving and prescribing a form with the matter it would have been hard measure to exclude the form of words from the prescription when Christ had included it The proposition being thus confirmed the conclusion is granted by the Doctor viz. that out of question it is lawfull to use a form this Beedle infers The lawfulness of using a form indefinitely and in this the Doctor gratifieth him which we do here observe because the Doctor presently withdrawes saying His Conclusion must be that that forme ought to bee used not at all that any else may Dr. Owen But that is lawful not to use a form or that a man may use any Prayer but a form on that supposition will not be so easily determined Reply This is the Doctors Argument If it be lawful to use a form of Prayer then any other prayer But a form is unlawful As if forms and non-non-forms were as irreconcileable as light and darkness or Christ and Belial I know none that useth forms so to Idolize them as to condemn the use of Extempotary prayer especially in secret to which they doe earnestly exhort all Christians to aspire as to a degree of perfection in their devotion neither their principles nor their practice will own this conclusion of condemning all prayers that are not forms as unlawfull We who account it lawfull to read the Scripture in the form that we have received it do not make it unlawfull to meditate and comment to write or reade pious and learned discourses expounding the sense of it The people may be holy in a sense as well as the Priests although not so solemnly consecrated this Prayer indeed like its Maker is anointed with a holy Oyl above its fellows but yet that Oyl as from Aarons head runs down to the skirts of his garments to every private extemporary Prayer and ejaculation that is breathed out of a contrite heart Prayers are not therefore lawfull or unlawfull because they are formes or extemporary the Spirit may assist each and either may be performed without the assistance of the Spirit Therefore as Saint Paul said in another case I will pray with the Spirit and I will pray with the Understanding also So I may pray by a forme and I may pray ex tempore also Dr. Owen The words of Christ are When ye pray say Our Father c. If in this prescription not the Matter onely but the Words also are attended and that Forme of them which followes is prescribed to bee used by vertue of this Command of Christ it will be hard to discover on what ground wee may otherwise pray seeing our Saviours Command is Positive When ye pray say c. This is the Center to which many of the Doctors Lines doe tend That which Master Beedle is to prove is That our SAVIOUR hath prescribed the Repetition of the same words ensuing and when hee hath so done if hee can his Conclusion must bee that that Forme ought to bee used not at all that any else may Reply There is a plaine Non sequitur in this Argument viz. If this Form be lawfull then the other formes are unlawfull The Standard was a rule to all other measures were other measures therefore which agreed with the Standard unlawful It is indeed the perfection of other prayers to be as like this both in matter and form as may be the contrary might indeed be more rationally inferred viz. If this form be prescribed and lawful then other forms especially prescribed ones are lawfull also which consequence seeing the Doctor did with good reason grant we will take him to his word not because we need it or shall account it as a gift but because we have right and just title to it Indeed if the whole mass of form had been corrupted and our Saviour had chosen and sanctified this one onely the Doctors consequence had been good but seeing they were originally lawfull and prescribed by God himself in the Old Testament and many of them approved by our Saviours practice as well as this by his positive precept in the New it seems harsh Doctrine pardon the Expression to leave them all under an absolute irrespective decree In a word our Saviour did not prescribe that which was unlawful before to make it lawfull but that which was lawfull to make it necessary Besides Christ doth not injoyn this Prayer exclusivè as if it were unlawfull to adde other but eminentèr as a visible Character of being his Disciples to be used occasionally pro hic nunc as a token that they owned him for their Master and were constant in the Faith delivered by him Dr. Owen If our Saviour have prescribed us a forme how shall any man dare to prescribe another or can any man doe it without casting on this the roproch of imperfection and insufficiencie Reply Our Saviour having prescribed us a form it is a dutifull no daring thing to follow him in so plain and practicall a part of Piety we ought to conform all our Devotions to this pattern in the mount They certainly are the daring spirits that neglect and slight this prescribed form All grant that we ought to conform our prayers to Christs this then will be the question Whether it is lawful to meditate and study that our prayers may be comformable to his or to presume of such a conformity at an adventure If you say as all sober Christians will that study and meditation are requisite I rejoyn study and meditation to compose our prayers and conform them unto Christs is the constituting of them forms therefore if study and meditation c. be lawfull other forms of prayer are lawfull and being lawfull the prescribing of them to such as need them for helps to their Devotion doth not make them unlawful Suppose I should argue from the Doctors supposition viz. that it is the matter onely that is prescribed thus If the matter of this Prayer onely be prescribed then the prescribing and using of any heads or matter of prayer more or less then are in this prayer is unlawfull I should not conclude rationally nor piously but cast a reproch on many devout supplications of private Christians and on publick Forms and Directories too But certainly the framing of our Petitions like to this is to honour it as our rule not to cast reproch on it as imperfect and insufficient let them look to that who reject the use of it and are so much enamoured with their own forms for forms they are to all but themselves as to abandon this
which the Doctor addeth viz. that God calleth them to fervent Supplication as he should inable them to deal with him doth not overthrow but rather confirm the Prophets prescribing a form of words to be used for seeing Gods ordinary way of inabling his people was by directions given to his Prophets on their behalf by whose Ministrie the Lord puts words in their mouth as here and in Joel 2. It had been great presumption in them to have neglected the dispensation of the Spirit by the Prophet which with great Faith and confidence they might have used in the prescribed words and to have expected it by an immediate impulse on their own spirits in an extraordinary manner Dr. Owen And though the Apostles never prayed for any thing but what they were for the substance directed to by this Prayer of our Saviour yet we doe not finde that ever they repeated the very words here mentioned or once commanded or prescribed the use of them to any of the Saints in their dayes whom they exhorted to pray so fervently and earnestly Reply This Argument concludeth nothing being meerly Negative and it would certainly brand the Apostles with a note of disobedience as well for not observing the heads and matter of this Prayer as for omitting the form for we doe not hear or read of any publick or solemn Prayer of theirs wherein the matter and method was fully observed may we therefore conclude that they followed neither matter nor form If any one defect be enough to denominate a thing evil and nothing is good but what hath all its due circumstances attending I doe not see how those more solemne publicke Prayers can be so highly excellent which are hudled up without any respect to this either as to matter method or form and perhaps carry not the sense of more then one or two Petitions though they exceed it almost an hundred times in length But as for Apostolical practice there are many credible authorities among the ancients to induce us to believe that they did frequently use it as Saint Augustine Gregory c. nor can the bare denial of any one or more modern and prejudiced persons overthrow their testimonies or at least such a way of Arguing would raze many fundamentals of our Religion As for their commanding or prescribing the use of these words to others I cannot think so uncharitably of the Apostles as to conceive they omitted this dutie seeing our Savior gave them in charge To teach the people all things whatsoever he commanded them And the Apostle saith Hee had kept backe nothing that was profitable unto them And as in criminal Causes where there wanteth cleare Evidence concerning matter of Fact Judgement may justly be pronounced upon evident and pregnant Circumstances concerning the same So in this cause also Dr. Owen Nor in any of the rules and directions that are given for our praying either in reference to our selves or him by whom we have access to God is the use of these words at any time in the least recorded to us or recalled to mind as a matter of dutie Reply This was done twice by our Saviour in a most solemne manner and what need there should be of a third repetition by the Disciples I know not when the master had so authoritatively prescribed it what weight could the servants Fiat add doubless this double command was enough to oblige them nor will any good servant expect more then a twofold injunction to doe his dutie It is safer by far in a business of this nature to obey then dispute the commands of our Superiours Dr. Owen Our Saviour saith when ye pray say Our Father c. on supposition of the sense contended for and that a form of words is prescribed I aske whether we may at any time pray and not say so Reply Without doubt we may Our Saviour bids when we pray to enter into our closets Quere whether we may at any time pray and not enter into our closets Who doubts of this Again our Saviour bids us when we pray to observe the matter and method of this Prayer Quere whether we may pray at any time and not intirely observe the matter and method of this Prayer yes we doe and may both alter the method and omit many heads of the matter in our occasional Petitions Affirmative precepts bind us to the actual performance of such duties as are injoyned by them onely pro hic nunc as occasion shall require But yet when I consider that this Prayer is by our Saviour adapted to publick devotion and was given to his Disciples to be used as a Cognizance to whom they did belong I am somewhat of the Doctors mind that we may not at any time pray publickly and not say so Dr Owen Q. Whether the saying of these words be a part of the worship of God Reply That words are a part of the worship of God who requireth the service of the outward as well as of the inward man is undeniable and what words can lay better claim to this priviledge then Christs own If the varying of the matter of this Prayer into expressions of our own be to worship God then much more to present the same matter in Christs words for our alteration of the words may invert the method and change the sense and certainly the use of these very words other requisites in Prayer being adjoyned is as solemne and acceptable a service as any we can doe God and our Saviour Jesus Christ. When God bid the people Hos. 14. 2. to take with them words and the Priests in Joel 2. 17. to say Spare thy people c. it would sound harsh to make a Quere whether the saying of those prescribed words were a part of the worship of God If the praysing of God and praying unto God in the words of David be a part of Gods worship as undeniably it is then much more the praying unto God in the prescribed words of Christ. Dr. Owen Or whether any promise of acceptation be annexed to the saying so Reply Our Saviour was never yet reputed so hard a Master as to injoyn a Dutie and not to imply or express a promise of acceptation Every precept virtually carrieth a reward with it In keeping of them saith the Psalmist there is great reward What better promise then the forgiveness of sins yet this Christ annexeth to the due performance of the dutie in one of the Petitions For if ye forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you and why is that Parable in Saint Luke adjoyned so immediately to this Prayer which our Saviour concludeth thus Aske and it shall be given you seeke and ye shall finde c. but to assure us that God will accept of their devotions who importune him their heavenly Father according to the manner and matter prescribed And when there is no Psalm or Prayer in Scripture either
that have not a like faculty I deny not but ingenious and exercised persons may by the Gift of God and the concourse of Naturall causes and circumstances have their spirits so quickned their faculties of inventing and disposing matter so improved and their delivering thereof in ready and significant expressions so familiar as may become the publick service of God but still I say he that can doe this ex tempore may doe much better with study and meditation and that as well in Prayer as in Preaching Dr. Owen Whether the forme be prescribed because believers are not able to pray without it Reply The Apostles desire will in part resolve this doubt Lord say they teach us to pray they were conscious of their own insufficiency and yet were believers indeed neither they nor we could have prayed so regularly and devoutly as now we may had not this forme been recorded And had that of the Apostle been considered All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for Doctrine for Reproof for Correction for Instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be perfect throughly furnished to all good workes this Quere might have seemed superfluous It may in a sort be as justly questioned whether the Scriptures be written because we cannot be instructed in our Christian Faith and obedience without them for Eadem est ratio partium totius Seeing that Christ did prescribe it to teach his Disciples doubtless it was intended as a help of devotion for all them that should believe in his Name unto the end of the world Master Hutchinson in his fourth Note on Hos. 14. 2. speaketh very pertinently to this Quere It may be saith he the condition of Gods humble and exercised People that they cannot command their own dispositions nor get their heaerts brought into frame before God in which case however he abhor those that draw nigh unto him with their lips c. yet they who are sensible of the backwardness of their hearts ought not to stay away because of that but should come if it were but with words to God to seeke of him that he would give them more to bring unto him So much for this take with you words albeit they could command no more So that it is not derogatory to the glory of God either to say that all believers have great help to their devotions from this form or that some believers at sometimes need this or other formes of inferiour rank with which they may go to God in Prayer nor doth it derogate from the efficacy of the Spirit promised and given to believers because that spirit doth not alway work the external faculty or gift of exercising Prayer where it doth infuse the inward Grace the most gracious heart may be joyned with a slow tongue as it was in Moses And where the spirit doth work the gift it is not by an immediate inspiration suddenly elevating the Intellectuals and Faculties of man to an extraordinary degree of Invention and Elocution but gradually by Meditation study and the use of means especially such as are commended and prescribed in the Word of God for that purpose of which means this form is the chiefest and therefore most usefull to teach believers for what and how to pray Dr. Owen Or because there is a peculiar energy in the letters words and syllables as they stand in this form And whether to say this be not to assert the using of a charm in the worship of God Reply I grant that in bare words and syllables used in Prayer and in opere operato the lip-labour onely there is not any efficacy at all Saint Cyprian saith indeed Agnoscit Pater verba Filii sui that the Father will own his Sons words but it is when filiall affections are joyned with them in the suppliant else they have no peculiar energy with God But yet as to man whose affections are ordinarily wrought upon by words these words of our Saviour may have a peculiar energy for being sanctified by his lips they are more then common and being so appositely fitted to the matter they are like to make the greater impression upon our understandings and being injoyned by our mercifull Saviour and Mediator they have yet a greater energy because they raise the devout soul to a more confident expectation of receiving the desired blessings because as to the matter and words they doe not aske amiss So Calvin magnum consolationis fructum percipimus c. We gather hence abundant fruit of consolation in that we know we aske nothing that is absurd or strange or wicked yea nothing which is not acceptable to him who beseech him in words that came out of his own mouth And what if we should say with the Poet Inest sua gratia verbis Job saith the same How forcecible are right words and Solomon A word fitly spoken is like Apples of Gold in pictures of Silver and the Preacher is said to have sought out acceptable words of which words it is said in the next verse they are as goads and nails fastned by the Masters of Assembly And holy Job speaks of choosing out his words to reason with God upon which Doctor Wilkins observeth that it is amongst expressions as with persons and things some are choice and beautifull others refuse and improper And certainly that injunction of Saint Paul to Timothy is very considerable as to this who biddeth him to hold fast the forme of sound words which he heard of him that is saith Master Calvin not onely the substance but the very form of speech for the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth the lively representation of things by words properly accommodated to their Nature which because none can be more adapt and fit then the Pen-men of the Holy Scriptures therefore the least declining from that form of words is dangerous So that in these respects the words of this Prayer being deliberate proper and pertinent they will leave a strong and lasting Impression upon the hearers and as Master Calvine saith once again Unigenitus Dei Filius nobis verba in os suggerit quae mentem nostram omni haesitatione expediant The onely Sonne of God hath put such words in our mouths as may clear our hearts from all doubtings So that there is certainly great reason to keep exactly to these words because although there be no peculiar efficacy in them in respect of God yet there may be in respect of men and therefore it is an unhandsome Expression to name a charm with that form of Divine words God give us all grace to heare and obey the voyce of that Charmer then whom never any charmed more wisely Dr. Owen Whether in this respect the Pater Noster be not as good as Our Father Reply It is to him that knoweth the use of that Language every way as effectual in Latine or Greek as in English yet to him that wants
true devotion there is much difference between the use of a prayer in a known tongue where possibly the expressions and the necessary blessings desired by him may inflame his affections and in an unknown tongue where in all probability no such effect can follow I think if we should preach all our Sermons in Latine and so pray before our people we should do less good upon the unconverted then we may by Gods blessing in English There is utterly a fault as Master Mayer observeth in those Popes that promise pardon for the saying of seven Pater noster's and as many Ave Maria's every day and it is a fault too as he addeth so to detract from this Prayer as to account 〈◊〉 better or not so worthy as a mans own conceived Prayer which is derogatorie and arrogant Dr. Owen Whether innumerable poor souls are not deluded and hardned by satisfying their Consciences with the use of this forme never knowing what it is to pray in the Holy Ghost Reply The right use of this form never deluded or hardned any nor is it easie to think how any that hath in faith and knowledge used this Prayer should not also endeavour for other inlargements Instruct a poore soul in the right use of this and there is no such method in the world to fit him for praying in the Holy Ghost and therefore to oppose the use of this form under a pretence of satisfiing the Conscience therewith to pray in the Holy Ghost is no pious or laudable Artifice as if this Prayer were exclusive of the Grace of the Spirit or as if that Holy Spirit had refused the waters of Siloah that goe softly and chosen to reside in troubled waters and whirle-winds Dr. Owen And whether the asserting this forme of words hath not confirmed many in their Atheisticall blaspheming of the Holy Spirit of God and his Grace in the prayers of his people Reply Cujus contrarium This I dare affirm with equal truth and confidence that not the asserting but the disusing and condemning this form of words hath confirmed many in their Atheistical blaspheming of the holy Spirit of God and his Grace in the Prayers of his People I offer this instance which is notoriously known When a Minister of God of great integritie and abilitie for many such there be beyond all contradiction that use this form cannot repeat this Pryaer but a great part of his auditors in some Congregations instantly conceive an invincible prejudice against both his Person and services as if there were an impossibility of being edified by them Can any good thing come out of Nazareth yea and when some actually withdraw from the Ordinance of Christ as if the Preaching of the Gospel by such men were foolishness indeed this is not far from an Atheistical blaspheming of the Holy Spirit of God and his grace in the Prayers of his People and this effect hath not been produced by the asserting but by the laying aside the use of this form in our Prayers as a fruitless carnall ordinance which hath made too many of our people to conceit of it as so much Collquiutida that maketh all the Service of God unsavourie And in my best observation I could never discover that it was the designe of those that assert this form to cast any contempt upon other well-ordered Devotions although contrarily the practice and pleading against the use of this bringeth a certain disrespect both upon this Forme and upon all other Prayers to which this is annexed But what if the asserting of a commanded duty doe confirme some in causeless prejudices It is better that others be scandalized without our fault then Christ be disobeyed and dishonoured by our fault The preaching of the Gospel is a rock of offence and a savour of death to many shall these evil effects be charged upon the Gospel as the proper products thereof God forbid Indeed the wilfull neglect of an injoyned duty and fixing of contempt upon a Precept of our Saviour and upon the universall practice of his Church in all Ages may make wary Christians jealous of some other practices of such men for we all know they have not the Spirit who despise the Word and it is as well known that to speak against some opinions and practices which in our generation pretend much to the Spirit is neither Atheisticall nor blesphemous I suppose therefore we may safely walke by this rule Not to judge of our duty by the event but by the lawfulness thereof and the authority of its prescription If any draw an ill conclusion from good premises it is his fault not ours When Christ hath commanded a duty we must doe it though all the world should be offended at it Fiat justitia ruat coelum Dr. Owen And whether the repetition of these words after men have been long praying for the things contained in them as the manner of some is be not so remote from any pretence or colour of warrant in Scripture as that it is in plain terms ridiculous Reply That our Saviour intended we should use other Prayers besides this I doubt not and what warrant the use of this hath in Scripture let every Christian Reader judge I am sure the reviling of this Practice hath none And now it is too apparent who it is that casteth reproch on this Prayer when the repetition of it is in plain terms pronounced ridiculous that stomach must be very foul that nauseates manna it self It cannot be adjudged ridiculous in our Saviour to prescribe this form twice and how cometh it to be so to use it once It was not ridiculous in him to use the same words three times on the same occasion in a great agony nor in David to bless God six and twentie times in the same words annexed to other Nor is it adjudged ridiculous to use frequent variations of words on the same matter in our Prayers nor when we have gone over the heads of our Sermons more then once to recount them again in our Prayers and yet when we have prayed to God and being conscious of the imperfections and failings of our Prayers both as to the matter and manner doe continue them in Christs own words as a supply of those defects this is pronounced in plain termes ridiculous The Prophet speaketh of some that have swords in their lips such a sword is this thorough the sides of Christs Ministers teacheth his own I end this with a note of Master Mayer As a wrestler saith he having used his best skill and strength to over come in wrestling yet finding the getting of the victory to be very hard he reinforceth himselfe at the last with all his might force and skill together that be may carry away the prize So the Christian man wrestling as Jacob with God by Prayer in the end reinforceth himselfe in this Prayer that he may not depart unblessed Dr. Owen When Master Beedle or any on his behalfe hath answered