Common Prayer the manifold confusions which they fall into where every man 's private Spirit and Gift as they term it is the only Bishop that ordaineth him to this Ministry the irksome deformities whereby through endless and senseless effusions of indigested Prayers they oftentimes disgrace in most unsufferable manner the worthiest part of Christian duty towards God who herein are subject to no certain Order but pray both what and how they list to him I say which weigheth duly all these things the reasons cannot be obscure why God doth in Publick Prayer so much respect the Solemnitie of Places where the Authority and calling of Persons by whom and the precise Appointment even with what Words or Sentences his Name should be called on amongst his People 26. No man hath hitherto been so impious as plainly and directly to condemn Prayer The best stratagem that Satan hath who knoweth his Kingdom to be no one way more shaken than by the Publick devout Prayers of God's Church is by traducing the form and manner of them to bring them into contempt and so to shake the force of all men's devotion towards them From this and from no other forge hath proceeded a strange conceit that to serve God with any set form of Common Prayer is superstitious As though God himself did not frame to his Priests the very speech wherewith they were charged to bless the People or as if our Lord even of purpose to prevent this fancy of extemporal and voluntary Prayers had not left us of his own framing one which might both remain as a part of the Church-Liturgy and serve as a Pattern whereby to frame all other Prayers with efficacy yet without superfluity of words If Prayers were no otherwise accepted of God then being conceived always new according to the exigence of present occasions if it be right to judge him by our own Bellies and to imagine that he doth loath to have the self-same supplications often iterated even as we do to be every day fed without alteration or change of diet if Prayers he Actions which ought to waste away themselves in the making if being made to remain that they may be resumed and used again as Prayers they be but instruments of Superstition surely we cannot excuse Moses who gave such occasion of scandal to the World by not being contented to praise the Name of Almighty God according to the usual naked simplicity of God's Spirit for that admirable victory given them against Pharaoh unless so dangerous a President were lest for the casting of Prayers into certain Poetical moulds and for the framing of Prayers which might be repeated often although they never had again the same occasions which brought them forth at the first For that very Hymne of Moses grew afterwards to be a part of the ordinary Jewish Liturgy not only that but sundry other sithence invented Their Books of Common-Prayer contained partly Hymns taken out of thē Holy Scripture partly Benedictions Thanksgivings Supplications penned by such as have been from time to time the Governours of that Synagogue These they sorted into their several times and places some to begin the service of God with and some to end some to go before and some to follow and some to be interlaced between the Divine Readings of the Law and Prophets Unto their custom of finishing the Passeover with certain Psalmes there is not any thing more probable then that the holy Evangelist doth evidently allude saying That after the Cup delivered by our Saviour unto his Apostles they sung and went forth to the Mount of Olives As the Jews had their Songs of Moses and David and the rest so the Church of Christ from the very beginning hath both used the same and besides them other also of like nature the Song of the Virgin Mary the Song of Zachary the Song of Simeon such Hymnes as the Apostle doth often speak of saying I will pray and sing with the Spirit Again in Psalms Hymnes and Songs making melody unto the Lord and that heartily Hymnes and Psalms are such kindes of Prayer as are not wont to be conceived upon a sudden but are framed by Meditation before hand or else by Prophetical illumination are inspired as at that time it appeareth they were when God by extraordinary gifts of the Spirit inabled men to all parts of service necessary for the edifying of his Church 27. Now albeit the Admonitioners did seem at the first to allow no Prescript form of Prayer at all but thought it the best that their Minister should always be left at liberty to pray as his own discretion did serve yet because this opinion upon better advice they afterwards retracted their Defender and his Associates have sithence proposed to the World a form such as themselves like and to shew their dislike of ours have taken against it those exceptions which whosoever doth measure by number must needs be greatly out of love with a thing that hath so many faults whosoever by weight cannot chuse but esteem very highly of that wherein the wit of so scrupulous Adversaries hath not hitherto observed any defect which themselves can seriously think to be of moment Gross Errours and manifest Impiety they grant we have taken away Yet many things in it they say are amiss many instances they give of things in our Common Prayer not agreeable as they pretend with the word of God It hath in their eye too great affinity with the form of the Church of Rome it differeth too much from that which Churches elsewhere reformed allow and observe our Attire disgraceth it it is not orderly read nor gestured as beseemeth it requireth nothing to be done which a Childe may not lawfully do it hath a number of short cutts or shreddings which may be better called Wishes than Prayers it intermingleth Prayings and Readings in such manner as if Supplicants should use in proposing their Sutes unto mortal Princes all the World would judge them madd it is too long and by that mean abridgeth Preaching it appointeth the People to say after the Minister it spendeth time in singing and in reading the Psalms by course from side to side it useth the Lord's Prayer too oft the Songs of Magnificat Benedictus and Nune Dimittis it might very well spare it hath the Letany the Creed of Athanasius and Gloria Patri which are superfluous it craveth Earthly things too much for deliverance from those Evils against which we pray it giveth no Thanks some things it asketh unseasonably when they need not to be prayed for as deliverance from Thunder and Tempest when no Danger is nigh some in too abject and diffident manner as that God would give us that which we for our unworthiness dare not ask some which ought not to be desired as the deliverance from sudden Death riddance from all Adversity and the extent of saving Mercy towards all men These and such like are the Imperfections
lest the sense and signification we give unto it should burthen us as Authors of a new Gospel in the House of God not in respect of some cause which the Fathers had more then we have to use the same nor finally for any such offence or scandal as heretofore it hath been subject unto by Error now reformed in the mindes of Men. 66. The ancient Custom of the Church was after they had Baptized to add thereunto Imposition of Hands with effectual Prayer for the illumination of Gods most holy Spirit to confirm and perfect that which the Grace of the some Spirit had already begun in Baptism For our means to obtain the Graces which God doth bestow are our Prayers Our Prayers to that intent are available as well for others as for ourselves To pray for others is to bless them for whom we pray because Prayer procureth the blessing of God upon them especially the Prayer of such as God either most respecteth for their Piety and Zeal that way or else regardeth for that their place and calling bindeth them above others unto this duty as it doth both Natural and Spiritual Fathers With Prayers of Spiritual and Personal Benediction the manner hath been in all ages to use Imposition of Hands as a Ceremony betokening our restrained desires to the party whom we present unto God by Prayer Thus when Israel blessed Ephraim and Manasses Iosephs sons he imposed upon them his hands and prayed God in whose sight my Fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk God which hath fed me all my life long unto this day and the Angel which hath delivered me from all evil bless these Children The Prophets which healed diseases by Prayer used therein the self-same Ceremony And therefore when Elizeus willed Naaman to wash himself seven times in Iordan for cure of his foul disease it much offended him I thought saith he with my self Surely the man will come forth and stand and call upon the Name of the Lord his God and put his hand on the place to the end he may so heal the â—â—eprosie In Consecrations and Ordinations of Men unto Rooms of Divine Calling the like was usually done from the time of Moses to Christ. Their suits that came unto Christ for help were also tendred oftentimes and are expressed in such forms or phrases of speech as shew that he was himself an observer of the same custom He which with Imposition of Hands and Prayer did so great Works of Mercy for restauration of Bodily health was worthily judged as able to effect the infusion of Heavenly Grace into them whose age was not yet depraved with that malice which might be supposed a bar to the goodness of God towards them They brought him therefore young children to put his hands upon them and pray After the Ascension of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ that which he had begun continued in the daily practice of his Apostles whose Prayer and Imposition of Hands were a mean whereby thousands became partakers of the wonderful Gifts of God The Church had received from Christ a promise that such as believed in him these signs and tokens should follow them To cast one Devils to speak with Tongues to drive away Serpents to be free from the harm which any deadly poyson could work and to cure diseases by Imposition of Hands Which power common at the first in a manner unto all Believers all Believers had not power to derive or communicate unto all other men but whosoever was the instrument of God to instruct convert and baptize them the gift of miraculous operations by the power of the Holy Ghost they had not but onely at the Apostles own hands For which cause Simon Magus perceiving that power to be in none but them and presuming that they which had it might sell it sought to purchase it of them with money And as miraculous Graces of the Spirit continued after the Apostles times For saith Irenaus they which are truly his Disciples do in his Name and through Grace received from him such works for the benefit of other men as every of them is by him enabled to work Some cast one Devils in so much as they which are delivered from wicked spirits have been thereby won unto Christ and do constantly persevere in the Church and Society of Faithful Men Some excel in the knowledge of things to come in the grace of Visions from God and the gift of Prophetical Prediction Some by laying on their hands restore them to health which are grievously afflicted with sickness yea there are that of dead have been made alive and have afterwards many years conversed with us What should I say The gifts are innumerable wherewith God hath inriched his Church throughout the World and by vertue whereof in the Name of Christ crucified under Pontius Pilate the Church every day doth many wonders for the good of Nations neither fraudulently nor in any respect of lucre and gain to her self but as freely bestowing as God on her hath bestowed his Divine Graces So it no where appeareth that ever any did by Prayer and Imposition of Hands sithence the Apostles times make others partakers of the like miraculous gifts and graces as long as it pleased God to continue the same in his Church but onely Bishops the Apostles Successors for a time even in that power St. Augustine acknowledgeth That such gifts were not permitted to last always lest men should wax cold with the commonness of that the strangeness whereof at the first inflamed them Which words of St. Augustine declaring how the vulgar use of these Miracles was then expired are no prejudice to the like extraordinary Graces more rarely observed in some either then or of latter days Now whereas the Successors of the Apostles had but onely for a time such power as by Prayer and Imposition of Hands to bestow the Holy Ghost the reason wherefore Confirmation nevertheless by Prayer and Laying on of Hands hath hitherto always continued is for other very special benefits which the Church thereby enjoyeth The Fathers every where impute unto it that gift or Grace of the Holy Ghost not which maketh us first Christian men but when we are made such assisteth us in all vertue aimeth us against temptation and sin For after Baptism administred there followeth saith Tertullian Imposition of Hands with Invocation and Invitation of the Holy Ghost which willingly cometh down from the Father to rest upon the purified and blessed Bodies as it were acknowledging the Waters of Baptism a fit Seat St. Cyprian in more particular manner alluding to that effect of the Spirit which here especially was respected How great saith he is that power and force wherewith the minde is here he meaneth in Baptism enabled being not onely withdrawn from that pernicious hold which the World before had of it nor onely so purified and made clean that no stain or blemish of
mercy towards them so he likewise said Their transgressions I will punish with a rod he knew that it could not stand with any reason we should set the measure of our own punishments and prescribe unto God how great or how long our sufferings shall be he knew that we were blind and altogether ignorant what is best for us that we sue for many things very unwisely against our selves thinking we ask Fish when indeed we crave a Serpent he knew that when the thing we ask is good and ye God seemeth slow to grant it he doth not deny but deferr our Petitions to the end we might learn to desire great things greatly all this he knew But beholding the Land which God had severed for his own People and seeing it abandoned unto Heathen Nations viewing how reproachfully they did tread it down and wholly make havock of it at their pleasure beholding the Lords own Royal Seat made an heap of Stones his Temple defiled the carkasles of his Servants cast out for the fowls of the air to devour and the flesh of his meek ones for the beasts of the fields to feed upon being conscious to himself how long and how earnestly he had cryed Succouâ—â—â— O God of our well-fare for the Glory of thine own Name and feeling that their sore was still encreased the conceit of repugnancy between this which was objected to his eyes and that which Faith upon promise of the Law did look for made so deep an impression and so strong that he disputeth not the matter but without any further inquiry or search inferreth as we see The Law doth fail Of us who is here which cannot very soberly advice his Brother Sir you must learn to strengthen your Faith by that experience which heretofore you have had of God's great goodness towards you Per ea quae agnoscas praestita discas sperare promissa By those things which you have known performed learn to hope for those things which are promised Doe you acknowledge to have received much Let that make you certain to receive more Habenti debitur To him that hath more shall be given When you doubt what you shall have search what you have had at God's hands Make this reckoning that the benefits which he hath bestowed are Bills obligatory and sufficient Sureties that he will bestow further His present Mercy is full a warrant of his future love because whom he loveth he loveth unto the end Is it not thus Yet if we could reckon up as many evident clear undoubted signs of God's reconciled love towards us as there are years yea dayes yea hours past over our heads all these set together have no such force to confirm our Faith as the loss and sometimes the onely fear of losing a little transitory goods credit honour or favour of men a small calamity a matter of nothing to breed a conceit and such a conceit as is not easily again removed that we are clean crost out of God's hook that he regards us not that he looketh upon others but passeth by us like a Stranger to whom we are not known Then we think looking upon others and comparing them with our selves Their Tables are furnished day by day earth and ashes are our bread they sing to the Lute and they see their Children dance before them our hearts are heavy in our bodies as lead our sighs beat as thick as a swift Pulse our tears do wash the beds wherein we lye the Sun shineth fair upon their fore-heads we are hanged up like Bottles in the smoak cast into corners like the sherds of a broken Pot tell not us of the promises of God's favour tell such as do reap the fruit of them they belong not to us they are made to others the Lord be merciful to our weakness but thus it is Well let the frailty of our Nature the subtilty of Satan the force of our deceivable imaginations be as we cannot deny but they are things that threaten every moment the utter subversion of our Faith Faith notwithstanding is not hazarded by these things That which one sometimes told the Senators of Rome Ego sic existimabam P. C. â—ntipatrem sape meum praedicantem eudiveram Qui vestram amicitiaâ—s diligenter colerent cos multum laborem suscipere caeterùm ex omnibus maxime tutos esse As I have often heard my Father acknowledge so I my self did ever think that the friends and favourers of this State charged themselves with great labour but no man's condition so safe as theirs the same we may say a great deal more justly in this case Our Fathers and Prophets our Lord and Master hath full often spoken by long experience we have found it true as many as have entred their names in the mystical book of life cos maximum si laborem suscipere they have taken upon them a laboursome a toylsome a painful profession sed omnium maximè tutos esse but no man's security like to theirs Simon Simon Satan hath desired to win now thee as wheat Here is our toyl but I have prayed for thee that thy Faith fail not this is our safety No man's condition sure as ours the Prayer of Christ is more than sufficient both to strengthen us be we never so weak and to overthrow all adversary power be it never so strong and potent His Prayer must not exclude out labour their thoughts are vain who think that their watching can preserve the City which God himself is not willing to keep And are not theirs as vain who think that God will keep the City for which they themselves are not careful to watch The Husband-man may not therefore burn his Plough nor the Merchant forsake his Trade because God Hath promised I will not forsake thee And do the promises of God concerning our stability think you make it a matter indifferent for us to use or not to use the means whereby to attend or not to attend to reading to pray or not to pray that we fall not into temptations Surely if we look to stand in the faith of the Sons of God we must hourly continually be providing and setting our selves to strive It was not the meaning of our Lord and Saviour in saying Father keep them in thy name that we should be careless to keep our selves To our own safety our own sedulity is required And then blessed for ever and ever be that Mothers Child whose Faith hath made him the Child of God The Earth may shake the Pillars of the World may tremble under us the countenance of the Heaven may be appaled the Sun may lose his light the Moon her beauty the Stars their glory but concerning the man that trusteth in God if the fire have proclaimed it self unable as much as to singe a hair of his head if Lyons Beasts ravenous by nature and keen with hunger being set to devour have as it were religiously adored the very flesh of the Faithful man what is there in the
Reasons were not powerful enough to incline him to a willing acceptance of it his wish was rather to gain a better Country Living where he might be free from Noise so he exprest the desire of his Heart and eat that bread which he might more properly call his own in privacy and quietness But notwithstanding this aversness he was at last perswaded to accept of the Bishops Proposal and was by Patent for Life made Master of the Temple the 17th of March 1585. He being then in the 34th year of his Age. And here I shall make a stop and that the Reader may the better judge of what follows give him a Character of the Times and Temper of the people of this Nation when Mr. Hooker had his Admission into this Place A Place which he accepted rather than desired and yet here he promised himself a virtuous quietness that blessed Tranquillity which he always prayed and laboured for that so he might in Peace bring forth the Fruits of Peace and glorifie God by uninterrupted Prayers and praises for this he always thirsted and yet this was denied him For his Admission into this Place was the very beginning of those Oppositions and Anxieties which till then this Good man was a stranger to and of which the Reader may guess by what follows In this Character of the Times I shall by the Readers favour and for his information look so far back as to the beginning of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth a time in which the many pretended Titles to the Crown the frequent Treasons the Doubts of her Successour the late Civil War and the sharp Persecution that had raged to the effusion of so much Blood in the Reign of Queen Mary were fresh in the memory of all men and these begot fears in the most Pious and Wisest of this Nation least the like days should return again to them or their present Posterity The apprehension of which Dangers begot an earnest desire of a Settlement in the Church and State believing there was no other probable way left to make them sit quietly under their own Vines and Fig-trees and enjoy the desired Fruit of their Labours But Time and Peace and Plenty begot Self-ends and those begot Animosities Envy Opposition and Unthankfulness for those blessings for which they lately thirsted being then the very utmost of their Desires and even beyond their Hopes This was the temper of the Times in the beginning of her Reign and thus it continued too long For those very people that had enjoyed the desires of their hearts in a Reformation from the Church of Rome became at last so like the Grave as never to be satisfied but were still thirsting for more and more neglecting to pay that Obedience to Government and perform those Vows to God which they made in their days of Adversities and Fear so that in short time theree appeared thre several Interests each of them fearless and restless in the prosecution of their Designs they may for distinction be called The active Romanists The restless Non-conformists of which there were many sorts and The passive peaceable Protestant The Counsels of the first considered and resolved on in Rome the second in Scotland in Geneva and in divers selected secret dangerous Conventicles both there and within the bosom of our own Nation the third pleaded and defended their Cause by Establisht Laws both Ecclesiastical and Civil and if they were active it was to prevent the other two from destroying what was by those known Laws happily establisht to them and their Posterity I shall forbear to mention the very many and as Dangerous Plots of the Romanists against the Church and State because what is principally intended in this Digression is an account of the Opinions and Activity of the Non-conformists against whose judgement and practice Mr. Hooker became at last but most unwillingly to be ingaged in a Book-war a War which he maintained not as against an Enemy but with the spirit of Meekness and Reason In which number of Non-conformists though some might be sincere and well-meaning men whose indiscreet zeal might be so like Charity as thereby to cover a multitude of Errors yet of this Party there were many that were possest with an high degree of Spiritual wickedness I mean with an innate restles radical Pride and Malice I mean not those lesser sins that are more visible and more properly Carnal and sins against a mans self as Gluttony and Drunkenness and the like from which good Lord deliver us but sins of an higher nature because more unlike to the nature of God which is Love and Mercy and Peace and more like the Devil who is not a glutton nor can be drunk and yet is a Devil those wickednesses of Malice and Revenge and Opposition and a Complacence in working and beholding Confusion which are more properly his work who is the Enemy and disturber of mankind and greater sins though many will not believe it Men whom a furious Zeal and Prejudice had blinded and made incapable of hearing Reason or adhearing to the ways of Peace Men whom Pride and Self-conceit had made to overvalue their own Wisdom and become pertinacious and to hold foolish and unmannerly disputes against those Men which they ought to Reverence and those Laws which they ought to obey Men that laboured and joyed to speak evil of Government and then to be the Authors of Confusion of Confusion as it is Confusion whom Company and Conversation and Custom had blinded and made insensible that these were Errours and at last became so restless and so hardened in their opinions that like those which perisht in the gain-saying of Core so these dyed without repenting these spiritual wickednesses of which Coppinger and Hacket and their adherents are too sad testimonies And in these times which tended thus to Coâ—fusion there were also many others that pretended a Tenderness of Conscience refusing to submit to Ceremonies or to take an Oath before a lawful Magistrate and yet these very Mâ—n did in their secret Conventicles Covenant and Swear to each other to be assiduous and faithful in using their best endeavours to set up a Church Government that they had not agreed on To which end there was many Select parties that wandered up and down and were active in sowing Discontents and Sedition by venemous and secret Murmurings and a Dispersion of scurrilous Pamphlets and Libels against the Church and State but especially against the Bishops by which means together with very bold and as indiscreet Sermons the Common people became so Phanatick as St. Peter observed there were in his time some that wrested the Scripture to their own destruction so by these men and this means many came to believe the Bishops to be Antichrist and the onely Obstructers of Gods Discipline and many of them were at last given over to such desperate delusions as to find out a Text in the Revelation of St. Iohn that Antichrist was to be
much as the Hem of Christs Garment If they do wherefore should I doubt but that Vertue may proceed from Christ to save them No I will not be afraid to say to such a one You erre in your opinion but be of good comfort you have to do with a Merciful God who will make the best of that little which you hold well and not with a captions Sophister who gathereth the worst out of every thing in which you are mistaken But it will be said The admittance of Merit in any degree overthroweth the Foundation excladeth from the hope of Mercy from all possibility of Salvation And now Mr. Hookers own words follow What though they hold the truth sincerely in all other parts of Christian Faith Although they have in some measure all the Vertues and Graces of the Spirit Although they have all other Tokens of Gods Children in them Although they be far from having any proud opinion that they shall be saved by the worthiness of their Deeds Although the onely thing that troubleth and molesteth them be a little too much dejection somewhat too great a fire arising from an erronious conceit That God will require a worthiness in them which they are grieved to finde wanting in themselves Although they be not obstinate in this Opinion Although they be willing and would be glad to forsake it if any one Reason were brought sufficient to disprove it Although the onely cause why they do not forsake it ere they die be their ignorance of that means by which it might be disproved Although the cause why the ignorance in this point is not removed be the want of knowledge in such as should be able and are not to remove it Let me die says Mr. Hooker if it be ever proved That simply an Error doth exclude a Pope or Cardinal in such a case utterly from hope of life Surely I must confess That if it be an Error to think that God may be merciful to save men even when they err my greatest comfort is my error Were it not for the love I bear to this Error I would never wish to speak or to live I was willing to take notice of these two points as supposing them to be very material and that as they are thus contracted they may prove useful to my Reader as also for that the Answers be Arguments of Mr. Hookers great and clear Reason and equal Charity Other Exceptions were also made against him as That he prayed before and not after his Sermons that in his Prayers be named Bishops that be kneeled both when he prayed and he when he received the Sacrament and says Mr. Hooker in his Defence other Exceptions so like these as but to name I should have thought a greater fault then to commit them And 't is not unworthy the noting that in the menage of so great a Controversie a sharper reproof then this and one like it did never fall from the happy Pen of this humble Man That like it was upon a like occasion of Exceptious to which his Answer was Your next Argument consists of Railing and of Reasons to your Railing I say nothing to your Reasons I say what follows And I am glad of this fair occasion to testifie the Dove-like temper of this meek this matchless Man and doubtless it Almighty God had blest the Dissenters from the Ceremonies and Discipline of this Church with a like measure of Wisdom and Humility instead of their pertinacious Zeal then Obedience and Truth had kissed each other then Peace and Piety had flourished in our Nation and this Church and State had been blest like Ierusalem that is at unity with it self but that can never be expected till God shall bless the common people with a belief That Schism is a sin and that there may be offences taken which are not given and that Laws are not made for private men to dispute but to obey And this also maybe worthy of noting That these Exceptions of Mr. Travers against Mr. Hooker were the cause of his transcribing several of his Sermons which we now see Printed with his Books of his Answer to Mr. Travers his Supplication and of his most learned and useful Discourse of Iustification of Faith and Works and by their Transcription they fell into the hands of others that have preserved them from being lost as too many of his other matchless Writings have been and from these I have gathered many observations in this Discourse of his Life After the publication of his Answer to the Petition of Mr. Travers Mr. Hooker grew daily into greater repute with the most Learned and Wise of the Nation but it had a contrary effect in very many of the Temple that were zealous for Mr. Travers and for his Church Discipline insomuch that though Mr. Travers left the place yet the Seeds of Discontent could not be rooted out of that Society by the great Reason and as great Meekness of this humble Man For though the Cheif Benchers gave him much Reverence and Incouragement yet he there met with many neglects and oppositions-by-those of Mr. Travers judgment insomuch that it turned to his extream grief And that he might unbeguile and win them he designed to write a deliberate sober Treatise of the Churches power to make Cannons for the use of Ceremonies and by Law to impose an obedience to them as upon Her Children and this he proposed to do in Eight Books of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity intending therein to shew such Arguments as should force an assent from all Men if Reason delivered in sweet Language and void of any provocation were able to do it And that he might prevent all prejudice he wrote before it a large Preface or Epistle to the Dissenting Brethren wherein there were such Bowels of Love and such a Commixture of that Love with Reason as was never exceeded but in Holy Writ and particularly by that of St. Paul to his dear Brother and Fellow-Laborer Philemon Then which none ever was more like this Epistle of Mr. Hookers So that his dear Friend and Companion in his Studies Doctor Spencer might after his Death justly say What admirable height of Learning and depth of Iudgment dwelt in the lowly minde of this truly humble Man great in all wise mens eyes except his own With what gravity and majesty of Speech his Tongue and Pen uttered Heavenly Mysteries whose eyes in the Humility of his Heart were always cast down to the ground How all things that proceeded from him were breathed as from the Spirit of Love as if he like the Bird of the Holy Ghost the Dove had wanted Gall Let those that knew him not in his Person judge by these living Images of his Soul his Writings The Foundation of these Books was laid in the Temple but he found it no fit place to finish what he had there designed and therefore solicited the Archbishop for a remove to whom he spake to this purpose My Lord
infirmities and live in love because as St. Iohn says He that lives in love lives in God for God is Love And to maintain this holy Fire of Love constantly burning on the Altar of a pure Heart his advice was to watch and pray and always keep themselves fit to receive the Communion and then to receive it often for it was both a confirming and a strengthning of their Graces This was his advice and at his entrance or departure out of any house he would usually speak to the whole Family and bless them by name insomuch that as he seem'd in his youth to be taught of God so he seem'd in this place to teach his Precepts as Enoch did by walking with him in all Holiness and Humility making each day a step towards a blessed Eternity And though in this weak and declining age of the World such examples are become barren and almost incredible yet let his memory be blest with this true Recordation because he that praises Richard Hooker praises God who hath given such gifts to men and let this humble and affectionate Relation of him become such a pattern as may invite Posterity to imitate his Vertues This was his constant behavior at Borne thus as Enoch so he walked with God thus did he tread in the footsteps of Primitive Piety and yet as that great example of meekness and purity even our Blessed Iesus was not free from false accusations no more was this Disciple of his This most humble most innocent holy Man his was a slander parallel to that of chaste Susannaes by the wicked Elders or that against St. Athanasius as it is Recorded in his life for that holy Man had Heretical enemies and which this age calls Trepanning The particulars need not a repetition and that it was false needs no other Testimony then the publick punishment of his accusers and their open confession of his innocency 'T was said that the accusation was contrived by a Dissenting Brother one that indur'd not Church Ceremonies hating him for his Books sake which he was not able to Answer and his name hath been told me But I have not so much confidence in the Relation as to make my Pen fix a scandal on him to Posterity I shall rather leave it doubtful till the great day of Revelation But this is certain that he lay under the great charge and the anxiety of this accusation and kept it secret to himself for many moneths And being a helpless man had lain longer under this heavy burthen but that the Protector of the innocent gave such an accidental occasion as forced him to make it known to his two dear Friends Edwin Sandys and George Cranmer who were so sensible of their Tutors sufferings that they gave themselves no rest till by their disquisitions and diligence they had found out the Fraud and brought him the welcome news that his accusers did confess they had wrong'd him and begg'd his pardon To which the good mans reply was to this purpose The Lord forgive them and The Lord bless you for this comfortable news Now I have a just occasion to say with Solomon Friends are born for the days of Adversity and such you have prov'd to me And to my God I say as did the Mother of St. John Baptist Thus hath the Lord dealt with me in the day wherein he looked upon me to take away my reproach among men And O my God neither my life nor my reputation are safe in mine own keeping but in thine who didst take care of me when I yet hanged upon my Mothers Brest Blessed are they that put their trust in thee O Lord for when false witnesses were risen up against me when shame was ready to cover my face when I was bowed down with an horrible dread and went mourning all the day long when my nights were restless and my sleeps broken with a fear worse then death when my Soul thirsted for a deliverance as the Hart panteth after the Rivers of Waters Then thou Lord didst bear my complaints pitty my condition and art new become my Deliverer and as long as I live I will hold up my hands in this manner and magnifie thy Mercies who didst not give me over as a prey to mine enemies O blessed are they that put their trust in thee and no prosperity shall make me forget those days of sorrow or to perform those vows that I have made to thee in the days of my fears and affliction for with such sacrifices thou O God art well pleased and I will pay them Thus did the joy and gratitude of this good Mans heart break forth and 't is observable that as the invitation to this slander was his meek behavior and Dove like simplicity for which he was remarkable so his Christian Charity ought to be imitated For though the Spirit of Revenge is so pleasing to mankinde that it is never conquered but by a Supernatural Grace being indeed so deeply rooted in Humane Nature that to prevent the excesses of it for men would not know Moderation Almighty God allows not any degree of it to any man but says Vengeance is mine And though this be said by God himself yet this revenge is so pleasing that man is hardly perswaded to submit the menage of it to the Time and Justice and Wisdom of his Creator but would hasten to be his own executioner of it And yet nevertheless if any man ever did wholly decline and leave this pleasing Passion to the time and measure of God alone it was this Richard Hooker of whom I write For when his slanderers were to suffer he labored to procure their Pardon and when that was denied him his Reply was That however he would fast and pray that God would give them Repentance and Patience to undergo their Punishment And his Prayers were so for returned into his own bosom that the first was granted if we may believe a Penitent Behavior and an open Confession And 't is observable that after this time he would often say to Dr. Saravia O with what quietness did I enjoy my Soul after I was free from the fears of my slander And how much more after a conflict and victory ever my desires of Revenge In the Year One thousand six hundred and of his Age Forty six he fell into a long and sharp sickness occasioned by a Cold taken in his Passage betwixt London and Gravesend from the malignity of which he was never recovered for till his death he was not free from thoughtful days and restless nights but a submission to his Will that makes the sick mans bed easie by giving rest to his Soul made his very languishment comfortable And yet all this time he was solicitous in his Study and said often to Dr. Saravia who saw him daily and was the cheifâ— comfort of his life That he did not beg a long life of God for any other reason but to live to finish his three remaining Books of POLITY and
cause her merciful disposition to take so much the more delight in saving others whom the like necessity should press What in this behalf hath been done towards Nations abroad the parts of Christendom most afflicted can best testifie That which especially concerneth our selves in the present matter we treat of is the state of Reformed Religion a thing at her coming to the Crown even raised as it were by miracle from the dead a thing which we so little hoped to see that even they which beheld it done searcely believed their own senses at the first beholding Yet being then brought to pass thus many years it hath continued standing by no other wordly mean but that one onely hand which erected it that hand which as no kinde of imminent danger could cause at the first to withhold it self so neither have the practises so many so bloody following since been ever able to make weary Nor can we say in this case so justly that Aaron and Hur the Ecclesiastical and Civil States have sustained the hand which did lift it self to Heaven for them as that Heaven it self hath by this hand sustained them no aid or help having thereunto been ministred for performance of the Work of Reformation other then such kinde of help or aid as the Angel in the Prophet Zechariah speaketh of saying Neither by an army nor strength but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts Which Grace and Favor of Divine Assistance having not in one thing or two shewed it self nor for some few days or years appeared but in such sort so long continued our manifold sins and transgressions striving to the contrary What can we less thereupon conclude then that God would at leastwise by tract of time teach the World that the thing which he blesseth defendeth keepeth so strangely cannot chuse but be of him Wherefore if any refuse to believe us disputing for the Verity of Religion established let then believe God himself thus miraculously working for it and with life even for ever and ever unto that Glorious and Sacred Instrument whereby he worketh OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK V. Concerning their Fourth Assertion That touching several Publick Duties of Christian Religion there is amongst us much Superstition retained in them and concerning Persons which for performance of those Duties are endued with the Power of Ecclesiastical Order our Laws and Proceedings according thereunto are many ways herein also corrupted The Matter contained in this Fifth Book 1. TRue Religion is the Root of all true Vertues and the stay of all Well-ordered Commonwealths 2. The must extream opposite to true Religion is affected Atheism 3. Of Superstition and the Rest thereof either misguided zeal or Ignorant fear of Divine glory 4. Of the Redress of Superstition in Gods Church and concerning the Question of this Book 5. Four General Propositions demanding that which may reasonably be granted concerning Matters of outward Form in the Exercise of true Religion And fifthly Of a Rule and safe not reasonable in these Cases 6. The first Proposition touching Iudgment what things are convenient in the outward publick ordering of Church affairs 7. The second Proposition 8. The third Proposition 9. The fourth Proposition 10. The Rule of Mens private spirit not safe in these Cases to be followed 11. Plans for the Publick Service of God 12. The Solemnity of Erecting Churches condemned the Hallowing and Dedicating of them scanned by the Adversary 13. Of the names whereby we distinguish our Churches 14. Of the Fashion of our Churches 15. The Sumptuousness of Churches 16. What Holiness and Vertue we ascribe to the Church more than other places 17. Their pretence that would have Churches utterly vazed 18. Of Publick Teaching or Preaching and the first kinde thereof Catechizing 19. Of Preaching by reading publickly the Books of holy Scripture and concerning supposed Untruths in those Translations of Scripture which we allow to be read as also of the choice which we make in reading 20. Of Preaching by the Publick Reading of other prositable Instructions and concerning Books Apâ—cryphal 21. Of Preaching by Sermons and whether Sermons be the onely ordinary way of Teaching whereby man are brought to the saving knowledge of Gods Truth 22. What they attribute to Sermons onely and what we to Reading also 23. Of Prayer 24. Of Publick Prayer 25. Of the Form of Common Prayer 26. Of them which like not to have any Set Form of Common Prayer 27. Of them who allowing a Set Form of Prayer yet allow not ours 28. The Form of our Liturgy too near the Papists too far different from that of other Reformed Churches as they pretend 29. Attire belonging to the Service of God 30. Of gesture in Praying and of different places chosen to that purpose 31. Easiness of Praying after our Form 32. The length of our Service 33. Instead of such Prayers as the Primitive Churches have used and those that be Reformed now use we have they say divers short cuts or shreaddings rather Wishes them Prayers 34. Lessons intermingled with our Prayers 35. The number of our Prayers for Earthly things and our oft rehearsing of the Lords Prayer 36. The People saying after the Minister 37. Our manner of Reading the Psalms otherwise then the rest of the Scripture 38. Of Musick with Psalms 39. Of Singing or Saying Psalms and other parts of Common Prayer wherein the People and the Minister answer one another by course 40. Of Magnificat Benedictus and Nune Dimittis 41. Of the Litany 42. Of Athanasus Creed and Gloria Patri 43. Our want of particular Thanksgiving 44. In some things the Matter of our Prayer as they affirm is unsound 45. When thou hast overcome the sharpness of Death thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven unto all Believers 46. Touching Prayer for Deliverance from Sudden Death 47. Prayer for these things which we for our worthiness dare not ask God for the worthiness of his Sin would vouchsafe to grant 48. Prayer to be evermore delivered from all Adversity 49. Prayer that all Men may finde Mercy and if the will of God that all Men might be Saved 50. Of the Name the Author and the force of Sacraments which force consisteth in this That God hath ordained them as means to make us partakers of him in Christ and of life through Christ. 51. That God is in Christ by the Personal Incarnation of the Son who is very God 52. The Misinterpretations which Heresit hath made of the manner how God and Man are united in one Christ. 53. That by the union of the one with the other Nature in Christ there groweth neither gain nor loss of Essential Properties to either 54. What Christ hath obtained according to the Flesh by the union of his Flesh with Dâ—iey 55. Of the Personal presence of Christ every where and in what sense it may be granted he is every where present according to the Flesh. 56. The union or mutual Participation which is between Christ
lost and that without all hope of recovery This is the true cause of odds between Sermons and other kindes of wholesome Instruction As for the difference which hath been hitherto so much defended on the contrary side making Sermons the only ordinary means unto Faith and eternal Life sith this hath neither evidence of Truth nor proof sufficient to give it warrant a cause of such quality may with fart better grace and conveniency aske that pardon which common humanity doth easily grant than claim in challenging manner that assent which is as unwilling when reason guideth it to be yielded where it is not as with-held where it is apparently due All which notwithstanding as we could greatly wish that the rigour of this their opinion were allayed and mittigated so because we hold it the part of religious ingenuity to honour vertue in whomsoever therefore it is our most hearty desire and shall be always our Prayer unto Almighty God that in the self-same fervent zeal wherewith they seem to effect the good of the Souls of men and to thirst after nothing more than that all men might by all means be directed in the way of life both they and we may constantly persist to the Worlds end For in this we are not their Adversaries though they in the other hitherto have been ours 23. Between the Throne of God in Heaven and his Church upon Earth here militant if it be so that Angels have their continual intercourse where should we finde the same more verified than in those two ghostly Exercises the one Doctrine the other Prayer For what is the Assembling of the Church to learn but the receiving of Angels descended from above What to pray but the sending of Angels upwards His Heavenly Inspirations and our holy Desires are as so many Angels of intercourse and commerce between God and us As Teaching bringeth us to know that God is our supream Truth so Prayer testifieth that we acknowledge him our soveraign Good Besides sith on God as the most High all inferiour Causes in the World are dependant and the higher any Cause is the more it coveteth to impart vertue unto things beneath it how should any kinde of service we do or can do finde greater acceptance than Prayer which sheweth our concurrence with him in desiring that wherewith his very Nature doth most delight Is not the name of Prayer usual to signifie even all the service that ever we do unto God And that for no other cause as I suppose but to shew that there is in Religion no acceptable Duty which devout Invocation of the name of God doth not either presuppose or inferr Prayers are those Calves of Mens lips those most gracious and sweet odours those rich Presents and Gifts which being carried up into Heaven do best restifie our dutiful affection and are for the purchasing of all favour at the hands of God the most undoubted means we can use On others what more easily and yet what more fruitfully bestowed than our Prayers If we give Counsel they are the simpler onely that need it if Almes the poorer only are relieved but by Prayer we do good to all And whereas every other Duty besides is but to shew it self as time and opportunity require for this all times are convenient when we are not able to do any other things for mens behoof when through maliciousness or unkindness they vouchsafe not to accept any other good at our hands Prayer is that which we always have in our power to bestow and they never in theirs to refuse Wherefore God fotbid saith Samuel speaking unto a most unthankful People a People weary of the benefit of his most vertuous Government over them God forbid that I should sin against the Lord and cease to pray for you It is the first thing wherewith a righteous life beginneth and the last wherewith it doth end The knowledge is small which we have on Earth concerning things that are done in Heaven Notwithstanding thus much we know even of Saints in Heaven that they pray And therefore Prayer being a work common to the Church as well Triumphant as Militant a work common unto Men with Angels what should we think but that so much of our Lives is celestial and divine as we spend in the exercise of Prayer For which cause we see that the most comfortable Visitations which God hath sent men from above have taken especially the times of Prayer as their most natural opportunities 24. This holy and religious duty of Service towards God concerneth us one way in that we are men and another way in that we are joined as parts to that visible Mystical Body which is his Church As men we are at our own choice both for time and place and form according to the exigence of our own occasions in private But the service which we do as Members of a Publick Body is publick and for that cause must needs be accompted by so much worthier than the other as a whole society of such condition exceedeth the worth of any one In which consideration unto Christian Assemblies there are most special Promises made St. Paul though likely to prevail with God as much as any one did notwithstanding think it much more both for God's glory and his own good if Prayers might be made and thanks yielded in his behalf by a number of men The Prince and People of Niniveh assembling themselves as a main Army of Supplicants it was not in the power of God to withstand them I speak no otherwise concerning the force of Publick Prayer in the Church of God than before me Tertullian hath done We come by Troops to the Place of Assembly that being banded as it were together we may be Sapplicants enough to besiege God with our Prayers These Forces are unto him acceptable When we publickly make our Prayers it cannot be but that we do it with much more comfort than in private for that the things we aske publickly are approved as needful and good in the Judgement of all we hear them sought for and desired with common consent Again thus much help and furtherance is more yielded in that if so be our zeal and devotion to God-ward be slack the alacrity and fervour of others serveth as a present spurt For even Prayer it self saith Saint Basil when it hath not the consort of many voyces to strengthen it is not it self Finally the good which we do by Publick Prayer is more than in private can be done for that besides the benefit which is here is no less procured to our selves the whole Church is much bettered by our good example and consequently whereas secret neglect of our duty in this kinde is but only our own hurt one man's contempt of the Common Prayer of the Church of God may be and oftentimes is most hurtful unto many In which considerations the Prophet David so often voweth
unto God the Sacrifice of Prayse and Thanksgiving in the Congregation so earnestlie exhorteth others to sing Praises unto the Lord in his Courts in his Sanctuary before the memorial of his Holiness and so much complaineth of his own uncomfortable exile wherein although he sustained many most grievous indignities and indured the want of sundry both pleasures and honours before injoyed yet as if this one were his only grief and the rest not felt his speeches are all of the heavenly benefit of Publick Assemblies and the happiness of such as had free access thereunto 25. A great part of the Cause wherefore religious mindes are so inflamed with the love of Publick devotion is that vertue force and efficacy which by experience they finde that the very form and reverend solemnity of Common Prayer duly ordered hath to help that imbecillity and weakness in us by means whereof we are otherwise of our selves the less apt to perform unto God so heavenly a service with such affection of heart and disposition in the powers of our Souls as is requisite To this end therefore all things hereunto appertaining have been ever thought convenient to be done with the most solemnity and majesty that the wisest could devise It is not with Publick as with Private Prayer In this rather secresie is commanded than outward shew whereas that being the publick act of a whole Society requireth accordingly more care to be had of external appearance The very assembling of men therefore unto this service hath been ever solemn And concerning the place of assembly although it serve for other uses as well as this yet seeing that our Lord himself hath to this as to the chiefest of all other plainly sanctified his own Temple by entituling it the House of Prayer what preeminence of dignity soever hath been either by the Ordinance or through the special favour and providence of God annexed unto his Sanctuary the principal cause thereof must needs be in regard of Common Prayer For the honour and furtherance whereof if it be as the gravest of the antient Fathers seriously were perswaded and do oftentimes plainly teach affirming that the House of Prayer is a Court beautified with the presence of Celestial powers that there we stand we pray we sound forth Hymnes unto God having his Angels intermingled as our Associates and that with reference hereunto the Apostle doth require so great care to be had of decency for the Angels sake how can we come to the House of Prayer and not be moved with the very glory of the place it self so to frame our affections Praying as doth best beseem them whose Suits the Almighty doth there sit to hear and his Angels attend to further When this was ingrafted in the mindes of men there needed no penal Statutes to draw them unto publick Prayer The warning sound was no sooner heard but the Churches were presently filled the pavements covered with bodies prostrate and washt with their tears of devout joy And as the place of publick Prayer is a Circumstance in the outward form thereof which hath moment to help devotion so the Person much more with whom the People of God do joyn themselves in this Action as with him that standeth and speaketh in the presence of God for them The authority of his Place the fervour of his Zeal the piety and gravity of his whole Behaviour must needs exceedingly both grace and set forward the service he doth The authority of his Calling is a furtherance because if God have so farr received him into favour as to impose upon him by the hands of men that Office of blessing the People in his Name and making intercession to him in theirs which Office he hath sanctified with his own most gracious Promise and ratified that promise by manifest actual performance thereof when others before in like place have done the same is not his very Ordination a seal as it were to us that the self-same Divine love which hath chosen the instrument to work with will by that instrument effect the thing whereto he ordained it in blessing his People and accepting the Prayers which his Servant offereth up unto God for them It was in this respect a comfortable Title which the Antients used to give unto God's Ministers terming them usually God's most beloved which were ordained to procure by their Prayers his love and favour towards all Again if there be not zeal and fervency in him which proposeth for the rest those sutes and supplications which they by their joyful Acclamations must ratifie if he praise not God with all his might if he pour not out his Soul in Prayer if he take not their Causes to heart and speak not as Moses Daniel and Ezra did for their People how should there be but in them frozen coldness when his affections seem benummed from whom theirs should take fire Vertue and godliness of life are required at the hands of the Minister of God not only in that he is to teach and instruct the People who for the most part are rather led away by the ill example then directed aright by the wholesom instruction of them whose Life swarveth from the rule of their own Doctrine but also much more in regard of this other part of his Function whether we respect the weakness of the People apt to loathe and abhorr the Sanctuary when they which perform the service thereof are such as the Sonnes of Heli were or else consider the inclination of God himself who requireth the lifting up of pure hands in Prayers and hath given the World plainly to understand that the Wicked although they cry shall not be heard They are not fit Supplicants to seek his mercy on the behalf of others whose own un-repented sins provoke his just indignation Let thy Priests therefore O Lord be evermore cloathed with Righteousness that thy Saints may thereby with more devotion rejoice and sing But of all helps for due performance of this Service the greatest is that very set and standing order it self which framed with common advice hath both for matter and form prescribed whatsoever is herein publickly done No doubt from God it hath proceeded and by us it must be acknowledged a Work of singular care and providence that the Church hath evermore held a Prescript form of Common Prayer although not in all things every where the same yet for the most part retaining still the same analogy So that if the Liturgies of all antient Churches throughout the World be compared amongst themselves it may be easily perceived they had all one original mold and that the publick Prayer of the People of God in Churches throughly settled did never use to be voluntary Dictates proceeding from any man's extemporal wit To him which considereth the grievous and scandalous Inconveniencies whereunto they make themselves daily subject with whom any blinde and secret Corner is judged a fit House of
metriments and jests unanswered likewise wherewith they have pleasantly moved much laughter at our manner of serving God Such is their evil hap to play upon dull spirited men We are still perswaded that a bare denyal is answer sufficient to things which meer fancy objecteth and that the best Apology to words of scorn and petulancy is Isaac's Apology to his Brother Ismael the Apology which patience and silence maketh Our Answer therefore to their Reasons is no to their Scoffs nothing 31. When they object that our Book requireth nothing to be done which a Childe may not do as lawfully and as well as that man wherewith the Book conteneth it self Is it their meaning that the service of God ought to be a matter of great difficulty a Labour which requireth great learning and deep skill or elsē that the Book containing it should teach what men are fit to attend upon it and forbid either men unlearned or Children to be admitted thereunto In setting down the form of Common-Prayer there was no need that the Book should mention either the learning of a fit or the unfitness of an ignorant Minister more than that he which describeth the manner how to pitch a field should speak of moderation and sobriety in diet And concerning the duty it self although the hardness thereof be not such as needeth much Art yet surely they seem to be very farr carried besides themselves to whom the dignity of Publick Prayer doth not discover somewhat more fitness in men of gravity and ripe discretion than in children of ten years of age for the decent discharge and performance of that Office It cannot be that they who speak thus should thus judge At the board and in private it very well becommeth Children's innocency to pray and their Elders to say Amen Which being a part of their vertuous education serveth greatly both to nourish in them the fear of God and to put us in continual remembrance of that powerful grace which openeth the mouths of Infants to sound his praise But Publick Prayer the service of God in the solemn Assembly of Saints is a work though easie yet withal so weighty and of such respect that the great facility thereof is but a slender argument to prove it may be as well and as lawfully committed to Children as to men of years howsoever their ability of learning be but only to do that in decent order wherewith the Book contenteth it self The Book requireth but orderly reading As in truth what should any Prescript form of Prayer framed to the Minister's hand require but only so to be read as behoveth We know that there are in the world certain voluntary Over-seers of all Books whose censure in this respect would fall as sharp on us as it hath done on many others if delivering but a form of Prayer we should either express or include an thing more than doth properly concern Prayer The Ministers greatness or meanness of knowledge to do other things his aptness or insufficiency otherwise than by reading to instruct the flock standeth in this place as a Stranger with whom our form of Common-Prayer hath nothing to do Wherein their exception against easiness as if that did nourish Ignorance proceedeth altogether out of a needless jealousie I have often heard it inquired of by many how it might be brought to pass that the Church should every where have able Preachers to instruct the People what impediments there are to hinder it and which were the speediest way to remove them In which consultation the multitude of Parishes the paucity of Schools the manifold discouragements which are offered unto mens inclinations that way the penury of the Ecclesiastical estate the irrecoverable loss of so many Livings of principal value clean taken away from the Church long sithence by being appropriated the daily bruises that Spiritual promotions use to take by often falling the want of somewhat in certain Statutes which concern the state of the Church the too great facility of many Bishops the stony hardness of too many Patrons hearts not touched with any feeling in this case such things oftentimes are debated and much thought upon by them that enter into any discourse concerning any defect of knowledge in the Clergy But whosoever be found guilty the Communion Book hath surely deserved least to be called in question for this fault If all the Clergie were as learned as themselves are that most complain of ignorance in others yet our Book of Prayer might remain the same and remaining the same it is I see not how it can be a lett unto any man's skill in Preaching Which thing we acknowledge to be God's good gift howbeit no such necessarie element that every act of Religion should he thought imperfect and lame wherein there is not somewhat exacted that none can discharge but an able Preacher 32. Two faults there are which our Lord and Saviour himself especially reproved in Prayer the one when ostentation did cause it to be open the other when superstition made it long As therefore Prayers the one way are faulty not whensoever they be openly made but when Hypocrisie is the cause of open Praying so the length of Prayer is likewise a fault howbeit not simply but where errour and superstition causeth more than convenient repetition or continuation of speech to be used It is not as some do imagine saith Saint Augustine that long Praying is that fault of much speaking in Prayer which our Saviour did reprove for then would not he himself in Prayer have continued whole nights Use in Prayer no vain superfluity of words as the Heathens doe for they imagine that their much speaking will cause them to be heard whereas in truth the thing which God doth regard is how vertuous their mindes are and not how copious their tongues in Prayer how well they think and not how long they talk who come to present their Supplications before him Notwithstanding for as much as in Publick Prayer we are not only to consider what is needful in respect of God but there is also in men that which we must regard we somewhat the rather incline to length lest over-quick dispatch of a Duty so important should give the World occasion to deem that the thing it self is but little accounted of wherein but little time is bestowed Length thereof is a thing which the gravity and weight of such actions doth require Beside this benefit also it hath that they whom earnest letts and impediments do often hinder from being Partakers of the whole have yet through the length of Divine Service opportunity sleft them at the least for access unto some reasonable part thereof Again it should be considered how it doth come to pass that we are so long For if that very Service of God in the Jewish Synagogues which our Lord did approve and sanctifie with the presence of his own Person had so large portions of the Law and the Prophets together with
so many Prayers and Psalms read day by day as do equal in a manner the length of ours and yet in that respect was never thought to deserve blame is it now an offence that the like measure of time is bestowed in the like manner Peradventure the Church had not now the leisure which it had then or else those things whereupon so much time was then well spent have sithence that lost their dignity and worth If the reading of the Law the Prophets and Psalms be a part of the Service of God as needful under Christ as before and the adding of the New Testament as profitable as the ordaining of the Old to be read if therewith instead of Jewish Prayers it be also for the good of the Church to annex that variety which the Apostle doth commend seeing that the time which we spend is no more than the orderly performance of these things necessarily required why are we thought to exceed in length Words be they never so few are too many when they benefit not the Hearer But he which speaketh no more than edifieth is undeservedly reprehended for much speaking That as the Devil under the colour of long Prayer drave Preaching out of the Church heretofore so we in appointing so long Prayers and Readings whereby the less can be spent in Preaching maintain an unpreaching Ministry is neither advisedly nor truly spoken They reprove long Prayer and yet acknowledge it to be in it self a thing commendable For so it must needs be if the Devil have used it as a colour to hide his malicious practises When Malice would work that which is evil and in working avoid the suspition of any evil intent the colour wherewith it overcasteth it self is always a fair and plausible pretence of seeking to further that which is good So that if we both retain that good which Saran hath pretended to seek and avoid the evil which his purpose was to effect have we not better prevented his malice than if as he hath under colour of long Prayer driven Preaching out of the Church so we should take the quarrel of Sermons in hand and revenge their Cause by requital thrusting Prayer in a manner out of doors under colour of long Preaching In case our Prayers being made at their full length did necessarily inforce Sermons to be the shorter yet neither were this to uphold and maintain an unpreaching Ministery unless we will say that those antient Fathers Chrysostom Augustine Leo and the rest whose Homilies in that consideration were shorter for the most part than our Sermons are did then not preach when their Speeches were not long The necessity of shortness causeth men to cut off impertinent Discourses and to comprize much matter in few words But neither did it maintain inabilitie not at all prevent opportunitie of Preaching as long as a competent time is granted for that purpose An hour and an half is they say in reformed Churches ordinarily thought reasonable for their whole Liturgy or Service Do we then continue as Ezra did in reading the Law from morning till mid-day or as the Apostle Saint Paul did in Prayer and Preaching till men through weariness be taken up dead at our feet The huge length whereof they make such complaint is but this that if our whole form of Prayer be read and besides an hour allowed for a Sermon we spend ordinarily in both more time than they do by half an hour Which half hour being such a matter as the age of some and infirmity of other some are not able to bear if we have any sense of the common imbecillity if any care to preserve mens wits from being broken with the very bent of so long attention if any love or desire to provide that things most holy be not with hazard of mens Souls abhorr'd and loathed this half-hours tediousness must be remedied and that only by cutting off the greatest part of our Common Prayer For no other remedie will serve to help so dangerous an Inconvenience 33. The Brethren in AEgypt saith St. Augustin Epist. 121. are reported to have many Prayers but every of them very short as if they were Darts thrown out with a kinde of sudden quickness lest that vigilant and erect attention of minde which in Prayer is very necessary should be wasted or dulled through continuance if their Prayers were few and long But that which St. Augustine doth allow they condemn Those Prayers whereunto devout mindes have added a piercing kinde of brevity as well in that respect which we have already mentioned as also thereby the better to express that quick and speedy expedition wherewith ardent affections the very wings of Prayer are delighted to present our suits in Heaven even sooner than our tongues can devise to utter them they in their mood of contradiction spare not openly to deride and that with so base terms as do very ill beseem men of their gravity Such speeches are scandalous they savour not of God in him that useth them and unto vertuously disposed mindes they are grievous corrosives Our case were miserable if that wherewith we most endeavour to please God were in his sight so vile and despicable as mens disdainful speech would make it 34. Again for as much as effectual Prayer is joyned with a vehement intention of the inferiour powers of the Soul which cannot therein long continue without pain it hath been therefore thought good so by turns to interpose still somewhat for the higher part of the minde the understanding to work upon that both being kept in continual exercise with variety neither might feel any great wearinesse and yet each be a spurre to other For Prayer kindleth our desire to behold God by speculation and the minde delighted with that contemplative sight of God taketh every where new inflammations to pray the riches of the Mysteries of Heavenly wisdom continually stirring up in us correspondent desires towards them So that he which prayeth in due sort is thereby made the more attentive to hear and he which heareth the more earnest to pray for the time which we bestow as well in the one as the other But for what cause soever we do it this intermingling of Lessons with Prayers is in their taste a thing as unsavoury and as unseemly in their sight as if the like should be done in Suits and Supplications before some mighty Prince of the World Our speech to worldly Superiours we frame in such sort as serveth best to inform and perswade the mindes of them who otherwise neither could nor would greatly regard our necessities Whereas because we know that God is indeed a King but a great King who understandeth all things before-hand which no other King besides doth a King which needeth not to be informed what we lack a King readier to grant than we to make our requests therefore in Prayer we do not so much respect what Precepts Art delivereth touching the method of perswasive utterance
in the presence of great men as what doth most avail to our own edification in piety and godly zeal If they on the contrary side do think that the same rules of decency which serve for things done unto terrene Powers should universally decide what is fit in the service of God if it be their meaning to hold it for a Maxim That the Church must deliver her publick Supplications unto God in no other form of speech than such as were decent if suit should be made to the Great Turk or some other Monarch let them apply their own rule unto their own form of Common-Prayer Suppose that the people of a whole Town with some chosen man before them did continually twice or thrice in a week resort to their King and every time they come first acknowledge themselves guilty of Rebellions and Treasons then sing a Song and after that explain some Statute of the Land to the Standers by and therein spend at the least an hour this done turn themselves again to the King and for every sort of his Subjects crave somewhat of him at the length sing him another Song and so take their leave Might not the King well think that either they knew not what they would have or else that they were distracted in minde or some other such like cause of the disorder of their Supplication This form of suing unto Kings were absurd This form of Praying unto God they allow When God was served with legal Sacrifices such was the miserable and wretched disposition of some mens mindes that the best of every thing they had being culled out for themselves if there were in their flocks any poor starved or diseased thing not worth the keeping they thought it good enough for the Altar of God pretending as wise Hyprocrites do when they rob God to enrich themselves that the fatness of Calves doth benefit him nothing to us the best things are most profitable to him all as one if the minde of the Offerer be good which is the only thing he respecteth In reproof of which their devout fraud the Prophet Malachy alledgeth that gifts are offered unto God not as supplys of his want indeed but yet as testimonies of that affection wherewith we acknowledge and honour his greatness For which cause sith the greater they are whom we honour the more regard we have to the quality and choice of those Presents which we bring them for honor's sake it must needs follow that if we dare not disgrace our worldly Superiours with offering unto them such reffuse as we bring unto God himself we shew plainly that our acknowledgment of his Greatnesse is but feigned in heart we fear him not so much as we dread them If ye offer the blinde for Sacrifice is it not evil Offer it now unto thy Prince Will he be content or accept thy Person saith the Lord of Hosts Cursed be the Deceiver which hath in his Flock a Male and having made a Vow sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing For I am a great King saith the Lord of Hosts Should we hereupon frame a Rule that what form of speech or behaviour soever is fit for Suiters in a Prince's Court the same and no other beseemeth us in our Prayers to Almighty God 35. But in vain we labour to perswade them that any thing can take away the tediousness of Prayer except it be brought to the very same both measure and form which themselves assign Whatsoever therefore our Liturgy hath more than theirs under one devised pretence or other they cut it off We have of Prayers for Earthly things in their opinion too great a number so oft to rehearse the Lords Prayer in so small a time is as they think a loss of time the Peoples praying after the Minister they say both wasteth time and also maketh an unpleasant sound the Psalms they would not have to be made as they are a part of our common-Common-Prayer nor to be sung or said by turns nor such Musick to be used with them those Evangelical Hymns they allow not to stand in our Liturgy the Letany the Creed of Athanasius the Sentence of Glory wherewith we use to conclude Psalms these things they cancel as having been instituted in regard of occasions peculiar to the times of old and as being therefore now superfluous Touching Prayers for things earthly we ought not to think that the Church hath set down so many of them without cause They peradventure which finde this fault are of the same affection with Solomon so that if God should offer to grant the whatsoever they ask they would neither crave Riches not length of dayes not yet victory over their Enemies but only an understanding heart for which cause themselves having Eagles wings are offended to see others flye so near the ground But the tender kindness of the Church of God it very well beseemeth to help the weaker sort which are by so great oddes moe in number although some few of the perfecter and stronger may be therewith for a time displeased Ignorant we are not that of such as resorted to our Saviour Christ being present on Earth there came not any unto him with better success for the benefit of their Souls everlasting happiness than they whose bodily necessities gave them the first occasion to seek relief when they saw willingness and ability of doing every way good unto all The graces of the Spirit are much more precious than worldly benefits our ghostly evils of greater importance than any harm which the body feeleth Therefore our desires to heaven-ward should both in measure and number no less exceed than their glorious Object doth every way excel in value These things are true and plain in the eye of a perfect Judgement But yet it must be withal considered that the greatest part of the World are they which be farthest from perfection Such being better able by sense to discern the wants of this present life than by spiritual capacity to apprehend things above sense which tend to their happiness in the world to come are in that respect the more apt to apply their mindes even with hearty affection and zeal at the least unto those Branches of Publick prayer wherein their own particular is moved And by this mean there stealeth upon them a double benefit first because that good affection which things of smaller account have once set on work is by so much the more easily raised higher and secondly in that the very custom of seeking so particular aide and relief at the hands of God doth by a secret contradiction withdraw them from endeavouring to help themselves by those wicked shifts which they know can never have his allowance whose assistance their Prayer seeketh These multiplyed Petitions of worldly things in Prayer have therefore besides their direct use a Service whereby the Church under-hand through a kinde of heavenly fraud taketh therewith the Souls of men as with certain baits If
then their calculation be true for so they reckon that a full third of our Prayers be allotted unto earthly benefits for which our Saviour in his platform hath appointed but one Petition amongst seven the difference is without any great disagreement we respecting what men are and doing that which is meer in regard of the common imperfection our Lord contrariwise proposing the most absolute proportion that can be in mens desires the very highest mark whereat we are able to aime For which cause also our custom is both to place it in the front of our Prayers as a Guide and to adde it in the end of some principal limbs or parts as a complement which fully perfecteth whatsoever may be defective in the rest Twice we rehearse it ordinarily and oftner as occasion requireth more solemnity or length in the form of Divine Service not mistrusting till these new curiosities sprang up that ever any man would think our labour herein mis-spent the time wastfully consumed and the Office it self made worse by so repeating that which otherwise would more hardly be made familiar to the simpler sort for the good of whose Souls there is not in Christian Religion any thing of like continual use and force throughout every hour and moment of their whole lives I mean not only because Prayer but because this very Prayer is of such efficacy and necessity for that our Saviour did but set men a bare example how to contrive or devise Prayers of their own and no way binde them to use this is no doubt as Errour Iohn the Baptist's Disciples which had been always brought up in the bosom of God's Church from the time of their first Infancy till they came to the School of Iohn were not so brutish that they could be ignorant how to call upon the Name of God but of their Master they had received a form of Prayer amongst themselves which form none did use saving his Disciples so that by it as by a mark of special difference they were known from others And of this the Apostles having taken notice they request that as Iohn had taught his so Christ would likewise teach them to pray Tertullian and Saint Augustin do for that cause term it Orationem legitimam the Prayer which Christ's own Law hath tyed his Church to use in the same Prescript form of words wherewith he himself did deliver it and therefore what part of the World soever we fall into if Christian Religion have been there received the ordinary use of this very Prayer hath with equal continuance accompanied the same as one of the principal and most material duties of honour done to Jesus Christ. Seeing that we have saith Saint Cyprian an Advocate with the Father for our Sins when we that have sinned come to seek for pardon let us alledge unto God the words which our Advocate hath taught For sith his promise is our plain warrant that in his Name what we aske we shall receive must we not needs much the rather obtain that for which we sue if not only his Name do countenance but also his Speech present our requests Though men should speak with the tongues of Angels yet words so pleasing to the ears of God as those which the Son of God himself hath composed were not possible for men to frame He therefore which made us to live hath also taught us to pray to the end that speaking unto the Father in the Sonn 's own prescript without scholy or gloss of ours we may be sure that we utter nothing which God will either disallow or deny Other Prayers we use may besides this and this oftner than any other although not tyed so to do by any Commandement of Scripture yet moved with such considerations as have been before set down the causeless dislike where of which others have conceived is no sufficient reason for us as much as once to forbear in any place a thing which uttered with true devotion and zeal of heart affordeth to God himself that glory that aide to the weakest sort of men to the most perfect that solid comfort which is unspeakable 36. With our Lords Prayer they would finde no fault so that they might perswade us to use it before or other Sermons only because so their manner is and not as all Christian people have been of old accustomed insert it so often into the Liturgy But the Peoples custom to repeat any thing after the Minister they utterly mislike Twice we appoint that the words which the Minister first pronounceth the whole Congregation shall repeat after him As first in the publick Confession of Sins and again in rehearsal of our Lord's Prayer presently after the blessed Sacrament of his Body and Blood received A thing no way offensive no way unfit or unseemly to be done although it had been so appointed ofner than with us it is But surely with so good reason it standeth in those two places that otherwise to order it were not in all respects so well Could there be any thing devised better then that we all at our first access unto God by Prayer should acknowledge meekly our sins and that not onely in heart but with tongue all which are present being made ear-witnesses even of every mans distinct and deliberate assent unto each particular branch of a common Indictment drawn against our selves How were it possible that the Church should any way else with such ease and certainty provide that none of her Children may as Adam dissemble that wretchedness the penitent confession whereof is so necessary a Preamble especially to Common Prayer In like manner if the Church did ever devise a thing fit and convenient what more then this that when together we have all received those Heavenly Mysteries wherein Christ imparteth himself unto us and giveth visible testification of our blessed communion with him we should in hatred of all Heresies Factions and Schisms the Pastor as a Leader the people as willing followers of him step by step declare openly our selves united as Brethren in one by offering up with all our hearts and tongues that most effectual Supplication wherein he unto whom we offer it hath himself not onely comprehended all our necessities but in such sort also framed every Petition as might most naturally serve for many and doth though not always require yet always import a multitude of speakers together For which cause Communicants have ever used it and we at that time by the form of our very utterance do shew we use it yea every word and syllable of it as Communicants In the rest we observe that custom whereunto St. Paul alludeth and whereof the Fathers of the Church in their Writings make often mention to shew indefinitely what was done but not universally to binde for ever all Prayers unto one onely fashion of utterance The Reasons which we have alledged induce us to think it still a good work which they in their pensive
it cometh may give us some convenient respight or secondly If that be denied us of God yet we may have wisdom to provide always beforehand that those evils overtake us not which death unexpected doth use to bring upon careless men and that although it be sudden in it self nevertheless in regard of our prepared mindes it may not be sudden 47. But is it credible that the very acknowledgment of our own unworthiness to obtain and in that respect our professed fearfulness to ask anything otherwise then onely for his sake to whom God can deny nothing that this should be noted for a Popish Error that this should be termed baseness abjection of minde or servility is it credible That which we for our unworthiness are afraid to crave our Prayer is That God for the worthiness of his Son would notwithstanding vouchsafe to grant May it please them to shew us which of these words it is that carrieth the note of Popish and servile fear In reference to other Creatures of this inferior World Mans worth and excellency is admired Compared with God the truest Inscription wherewith we can circle so base a coyn is that of David Universa vanitas est omnis homo Whosoever hath the name of a mortal man there is in him whatsoever the name of vanity doth comprehend And therefore what we say of our own unworthiness there is no doubt but Truth will ratifie alledged in Prayer it both becometh and behoveth Saints For as Humility is in Suiters a decent vertue so the testification thereof by such effectual acknowledgments not onely argueth a sound apprehension of his super-eminent Glory and Majesty before whom we stand but putteth also into his hands a kinde of pledge of bond for security against our unthankfulness the very Natural Root whereof is always either Ignorance Dissimulation or Pride Ignorance when we know not the Author from whom our good cometh Dissimulation when our hands are more open then our eyes upon that we receive Pride when we think our selves worthy of that which meer Grace and undeserved Mercy bestoweth In Prayer therefore to abate so vain imaginations with the true conceit of unworthiness is rather to prevent then commit a fault It being no error thus to think no fault thus to speak of our selves when we pray is it a fault that the consideration of our unworthiness maketh us fearful to open our mouths by way of suit While Iob had prosperity and lived in honor men feared him for his authorities sake and in token of their fear when they saw him they hid themselves Between Elihis and the rest of Iobs Familiars the greatest disparity was but in years And he though riper then they in judgment doing them reverence in regard of age stood long doubtful and very loth to adventure upon speech in his Elders hearing If so small inequality between man and man make their modesty a commendable vertue who respecting Superiors as Superiors can neither speak nor stand before them without fear that the Publican approacheth not more boldly to God that when Christ in mercy draweth near to Peter he in humility and fear craveth distance That being to stand to speak to sue in the presence of so great Majesty we are afraid let no man blame us In which consideration notwithstanding because to flie altogether from God to despair that Creatures unworthy shall be able to obtain any thing at his hands and under that pretence to surcease from Prayers as bootless or fruitless offices were to him no less injurious then pernicious to our own souls even that which we tremble to do we do we ask those things which we dare not ask The knowledge of our own unworthiness is not without belief in the merits of Christ. With that true fear which the one causeth there is coupled true boldness and encouragement drawn from the other The very silence which our unworthiness putteth us unto doth it self make request for us and that in the confidence of his Grace Looking inward we are stricken dumb looking upward we speak and prevail O happy mixture wherein things contrary do so qualifie and correct the one the danger of the others excess that neither boldness can make us presume as long as we are kept under with the sense of our own wretchedness nor while we trust in the Mercy of God through Jesus Christ fear be able to tyrannize over us As therefore our fear excludeth not that boldness which becometh Saints so if our familiarity with God do not savor of this fear it draweth too near that irreverend confidence wherewith true Humility can never stand 48. Touching continual deliverance in the World from all adversity their conceit is that we ought not to ask it of God by Prayer for as much as in Scripture there is no promise that we shall be evermore free from vexations calamities and troubles Mindes religiously affected are wont in every thing of weight and moment which they do or see to examine according unto rules of Piety what dependency it hath on God what reference to themselves what coherence with any of those duties whereunto all things in the World should lead and accordingly they frame the inward disposition of their mindes sometime to admire God sometimes to bless him and give him thanks sometime to exult in his love sometime to implore his mercy All which different elevations of spirit unto God are contained in the name of Prayer Every good and holy desire though it lack the form hath notwithstanding in it seft the substance and with him the force of a Prayer who regardeth the very moanings groans and sighs of the heart of man Petitionary Prayer belongeth onely to such as are in themselves impotent and stand in need of relief from others We thereby declare unto God what our own desire is that he by his power should effect It presupposeth therefore in us First the want of that which we pray for Secondly a feeling of that want Thirdly an earnest willingness of minde to be eased therein Fourthly a declaration of this our desire in the sight of God not as if he should be otherwise ignorant of our necessities but because we this way shew that we honor him as our God and are verily perswaded that no good thing can come to pass which he by his omnipotent Power effecteth not Now because there is no mans Prayer acceptable whose person is odious neither any mans person gracious without Faith it is of necessity required that they which pray do believe The Prayers which our Lord and Saviour made were for his own worthiness accepted ours God accepteth not but with this condition If they be joyned with belief in Christ. The Prayers of the Just are accepted always but not always those things granted for which they pray For in Prayer if Faith and Assurance to obtain were both one and the same thing seeing that the effect of not obtaining is a
plain testimony that they which prayed were not sure they should obtain it would follow that their Prayer being without certainty of the event was also made unto God without Faith and consequently that God abhorred it Which to think of so many Prayers of Saints as we finde have failed in particular requests how absurd were it His faithful people have this comfort that whatsoever they rightly ask the same no doubt but they shall receive so far as may stand with the glory of God and their own everlasting good unto either of which two it is no vertuous mans purpose to seek or desire to obtain any thing prejudicial and therefore that clause which our Lord and Saviour in the Prayer of his Agony did express we in Petitions of like nature do always imply Pater si possibile est If it may stand with thy will and pleasure Or if not but that there be secret impediments and causes in regard whereof the thing we pray for is denied us yet the Prayer it self which we make is a pleasing Sacrifice to God who both accepteth and rewardeth it some other way So that sinners in very truth are denied when they seem to prevail in their Supplications because it is not for their sakes or to their good that their sutes take place the faithful contrariwise because it is for their good oftentimes that their Petitions do not take place prevail even then when they most seem denied Our Lord God in anger hath granted some impenitent mens requests as on the other side the Apostles sute he hath of â—avor and mercy not granted saith St. Augustine To think we may pray unto God for nothing but what he hath promised in holy Scripture we shall obtain is perhaps an error For of Prayer there are two uses It serveth as a mean to procure those things which God hath promised to grant when we ask and it serveth as a mean to express our lawful desires also towards that which whether we shall have or no we know not till we see the event Things in themselves unholy or unseemly we may not ask we may whatsoever being not forbidden either Nature or Grace shall reasonably move us to wish as importing the good of men albeit God himself have no where by promise assured us of that particular which our Prayer craveth To pray for that which is in it self and of its own nature apparently a thing impossible were not convenient Wherefore though men do without offence wish daily that the affairs which with evil success are past might have faln out much better yet to pray that they may have been any other then they are this being a manifest impossibilty in it self the Rules of Religion do not permit Whereas contrariwise when things of their own nature contingent and mutable are by the secret determination of God appointed one way though we the other way make our Prayers and consequently ask those things of God which are by this supposition impossible we notwithstanding do not hereby in Prayer transgress our lawful bounds That Christ as the onely begotten Son of God having no Superior and therefore owing honor unto none neither standing in any need should either give thanks or make petition unto God were most absurd As Man what could beseem him better whether we respect his affection to God-ward or his own necessity or his charity and love towards men Some things he knew should come to pass and notwithstanding prayed for them because he also knew that the necessary means to effect them were his Prayers As in the Psalm it is said Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine Inheritance and the ends of the Earth for thy possession Wherefore that which here God promiseth his Son the same in the Seventeenth of Iohn he prayeth for Father the hour is now come glorifie thy Son that thy Son also may glorifie thee according as thou hast given him power over all flesh But had Christ the like promise concerning the effect of every particular for which he prayed That which was not effected could not be promised And we know in what sort he prayed for removal of that bitter Cup which Cup he tasted notwithstanding his Prayer To shift off this example they answer first That as other children of God so Christ had a promise of deliverance as far as the glory of God in the accomplishment of his vocation would suffer And if we our selves have not also in that sort the promise of God to be evermore delivered from all adversity what meaneth the Sacred Scripture to speak in so large terms Be obedient and the Lord thy God will make thee plenteous in every work of thy hand in the fruit of thy body and in the fruit of thy cattel and in the fruit of the Land for thy wealth Again Keep his Laws and thou shalt be blest above all people the Lord shall take from the all infirmities The man whose delight is in the Law of God whatsoever he doth it shall prosper For the ungodly there are great plagues remaining but whosoever putteth his trust in the Lord Mercy imbraceth him on every side Not onely that mercy which keepeth from being over-laid or opprest but Mercy which saveth from being touched with grievous miseries Mercy which turneth away the course of the great water flouds and permitteth them not to come near Nevertheless because the Prayer of Christ did concern but one calamity they are still bold to deny the lawfulness of our Prayer for deliverance out of all yea though we pray with the same exception that he did If such deliverance may stand with the pleasure of Almighty God and not otherwise For they have secondly found out a Rule that Prayer ought onely to be made for deliverance from this or that particular adversity whereof we know not but upon the event what the pleasure of God is Which quite overthroweth that other principle wherein they require unto every Prayer which is of Faith an assurance to obtain the thing we pray for At the first to pray against all adversity was unlawful because we cannot assure our selves that this will be granted Now we have licence to pray against any particular adversity and the reason given because we know not but upon the event what God will do If we know not what God will do it followeth that for any assurance we have he may do otherwise then we pray and we faithfully pray for that which we cannot assuredly presume that God will grant Seeing therefore neither of these two Answers will serve the turn they have a third which is That to pray in such sort is but idly mispent labor because God hath already revealed his Will touching this request and we know that the sute we make is denied before we make it Which neither is true and if it were was Christ ignorant what God had determined touching those things which
just and unjust when it meaneth not the same man nor by imagining the same man learned and unlearned if learned in one skill and in another kinde of learning unskilful because the parts of every true opposition do always both concern the same subject and have reference to the same thing sith otherwise they are but in shew opposite and not in truth So the Will about one and the same thing may in contrary respects have contrary inclinations and that without contrariety The Minister of Justice may for publike example to others virtuously will the execution of that party whose pardon another for cousanguinities sake as virtuously may desire Consider death in it self and nature teacheth Christ to shun it Consider death as a mean to procure the salvation of the World and mercy worketh in Christ all willingness of minde towards it Therefore in these two desires there can be no repugnant opposition Again compare them with the Will of God and if any opposition be it must be onely between his appointment of Christs death and the former desire which wisheth deliverance from death But neither is this desire opposite to the Will of God The Will of God was that Christ should suffer the pains of death Not so his will as if the torment of innocency did in it self please and delight God but such was his Will in regard of the end whereunto it was necessary that Christ should suffer The death of Christ in it self therefore God willeth not which to the end we might thereby obtain life he both alloweth and appointeth In like manner the Son of Man endureth willingly to that purpose those grievous painsâ— which simply not to have shunned had been against Nature and by consequent against God I take it therefore to be an error that Christ either knew not what himself was to suffer or else had forgotten the things he knew The root of which error was an over-restrained consideration of Prayer as though it had no other lawful use but onely to serve for a chosen mean whereby the Will resolveth to seek that which the Understanding certainly knoweth it shall obtain Whereas Prayers in truth both unto are and his were as well sometime a presentation of meer desires as a mean of procuring desired effects at the hands of God We are therefore taught by his example that the presence of dolorous and dreadful objects even in mindes most perfect may as clouds over-cast all sensible joy that no assurance touching future victories can make present conflicts so sweet and easie but nature will shun and shrink from them nature will desire case and deliverance from oppressive burthens that the contrary determination of God is oftentimes against the effect of this desire yet not against the affection it self because it is naturally in us that in such case our Prayers cannot serve us as means to obtain the thing we desire that notwithstanding they are unto God most acceptable sacrifices because they testifie we desire nothing but at his hands and our desires we submit with contentment to be over-ruled by his Will and in general they are not repugnant unto the Natural Will of God which wisheth to the works of his own hands in that they are his own handy-work all happiness although perhaps for some special cause in our own particular a contrary determination have seemed more convenient finally that thus to propose our desires which cannot take such effects as we specifie shall notwithstanding otherwise procure us his Heavenly grace even as this very Prayer of Christ obtained Angels to be sent him as comforters in his Agony And according to this example we are not afraid to present unto God our Prayers for those things which that he will perform unto us we have no sure nor certain knowledge St. Pauls Prayer for the Church of Corinth was that they might not do any evil although he knew that no man liveth which sinneth not although he knew that in this life we always must pray Forgive us our sins It is our frailty that in many things we all do amiss but a vertue that we would do amiss in nothing and a testimony of that vertue when we pray That what occasion of sin soever do offer it self we may be strengthned from above to withstand it They pray in vain to have sin pardoned which seek not also to prevent sin by Prayer even every particular sin by Prayer against all sin except men can name some transgression wherewith we ought to have truce For in very deed although we cannot be free from all sin collectively in such sort that no part thereof shall be found inherent in us yet distributively at the least all great and grievous actual offences as they offer themselves one by one both may and ought to be by all means avoided So that in this sense to be preserved from all sin is not impossible Finally concerning deliverance it self from all adversity we use not to say men are in adversity whensoever they feel any small hinderance of their welfare in this World but when some notable affliction or cross some great calamity or trouble befalleth them Tribulation hath in it divers circumstances the Minde sundry faculties to apprehend them It offereth sometime it self to the lower powers of the Soul as a most unpleasant spectacle to the higher sometimes as drawing after it a train of dangerous inconveniences sometime as bringing with it remedies for the curing of sundry evils as Gods instrument of revenge and fury sometime sometime as a rod of his just yet moderate ire and displeasure sometime as matter for them that spightfully hate us to exercise their poysoned malice sometime as a furnace of tryal for vertue to shew it self and through conflict to obtain glory Which different contemplations of adversity do work for the most part their answerable effects Adversity either apprehended by Sense as a thing offensive and grievous to Nature or by Reason conceived as a snare an occasion of many mens falling from God a sequel of Gods indignation and wrath a thing which Satan desireth and would be glad to behold Tribulation thus considered being present causeth sorrow and being imminent breedeth fear For moderation of which two affections growing from the very natural bitterness and gall of adversity the Scripture much alledgeth contrary fruits which Affliction likewise hath whensoever it falleth on them that are tractable the grace of Gods holy Spirit concurring therewith But when the Apostle St. Paul teacheth That every one which will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution and by many tribulations we must enter into the Kingdom of Heaven because in a Forest of many Wolves Sheep cannot chuse bat feed in continual danger of life or when St. Iames exhorteth to account it a matter of exceeding joy when we fall into divers temptations because by the tryal of Faith Patience is brought forth was it suppose we their meaning to frustrate
our Lords admonition Pray that ye enter not into temptation When himself pronounceth them blessed that should for his Names sake be subject to all kindes of ignominy and opprobrious malediction was it his purpose that no man should ever pray with David Lord remove from me shame and contempt In those tribulations saith St. Augustine which may hurt as well as profit we must say with the Apostle What we should ask as we ought we know not yet because they are tough because they are grievous because the sense of our weakness flieth them we pray according to the general desire of the will of man that God would turn them away from us owing in the mean while this devotion to the Lord our God that if he remove them not yet we do not therefore imagine our selves in his sight despised but rather with godly sufferance of evils expect greater good at his merciful hands For thus is vertue in weakness perfected To the flesh as the Apostle himself granteth all affliction is naturally grievous Therefore Nature which causeth to fear teacheth to pray against all adversity Prosperity in regard of our corrupt inclination to abuse the blessings of Almighty God doth prove for the most part a thing dangerous to the Souls of Men. Very Ease it self is death to the wicked and the prosperity of fools slayeth them Their Table is a Snare and their Felicity their utter overthrow Few men there are which long prosper and sin not Howbeit even as these ill effects although they be very usual and common are no bar to the hearty prayers whereby most vertuous mindes with peace and prosperity always where they love because they consider that this in it self is a thing naturally desired So because all adversity is in it self against nature what should hinder to pray against it although the providence of God turn it often unto the great good of many men Such Prayers of the Church to be delivered from all adversity are no more repugnant to any reasonable disposition of mens mindes towards death much less to that blessed Patience and meek Contentment which Saints by Heavenly inspiration have to endure what cross or calamity soever it pleaseth God to lay upon them then our Lord and Saviours own Prayer before his Passion was repugnant unto his most gracious resolution to die for the sins of the whole World 49. In praying for deliverance from all adversity we seek that which Nature doth wish to it self but by intreating for Mercy towards all we declare that Affection wherewith Christian Charity thirsteth after the good of the whole World we discharge that duty which the Apostle himself doth impose on the Church of Christ as a commendable office a sacrifice acceptable in Gods sight a service according to his heart whose desire is to have all men saved A work most suitable with his purpose who gave himself to be the price of redemption for all and a forcible mean to procure the conversion of all such as are not yet acquainted with the Mysteries of that Truth which must save their Souls Against it there is but the bare shew of this one Impediment that all mens salvation and many mens eternal condemnation or death are things the one repugnant to the other that both cannot be brought to pass that we know there are Vessels of Wrath to whom God will never extend mercy and therefore that wittingly we ask an impossible thing to be had The truth is that as life and death mercy and wrath are matters of meer understanding or knowledge all mens salvation and some mens endless perdition are things so opposite that whosoever doth affirm the one must necessarily deny the order God himself cannot effect both or determine that both shall be There is in the knowledge both of God and Man this certainty That life and death have divided between them the whole Body of mankinde What portion either of the two hath God himself knoweth for us he hath left no sufficient means to comprehend and for that cause neither given any leave to search in particular who are infalliby the heirs of the Kingdom of God who cast-aways Howbeit concerning the state of all men with whom we live for onely of them our Prayers are meant we may till the Worlds end for the present always presume That as far as in us there is power to discern what others are and as far as any duty of ours dependeth upon the notice of their condition in respect of God the safest Axioms for Charity to rest it self upon are these He which believeth already is and he which believeth not as yet may be the childe of God It becometh not us during life altogether to condemn any man seeing that for any thing we know there is hope of every mans forgiveness the possibility of whose repentance is not yet cut off by death And therefore Charity which hopeth all things prayeth also for all Men. Wherefore to let go Personal Knowledge touching Vessels of Wrath and Mercy what they are inwardly in the sight of God it skilleth not for us there is cause sufficient in all men whereupon to ground our Prayers unto God in their behalf For whatsoever the Minde of Man apprehencieth as good the Will of Charity and Love is to have it inlarged in the very uttermost extent that all may enjoy it to whom it can any way add perfection Because therefore the father a good thing doth reach the nobler and worthier we reckon it our Prayers for all mens good no less then for our own the Apostle with very fit terms commendeth as being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a work commendable for the largeness of the affection from whence it springeth even as theirs which have requested at Gods hands the salvation of many with the loss of their own Souls drowning as it were and over-whelming themselves in the abundance of their love towards others is proposed as being in regard of the rareness of such affections 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more then excellent But this extraordinary height of desire after other mens salvation is no common mark The other is a duty which belongeth unto all and prevaileth with God daily For as it is in it self good so God accepteth and taketh it in very good part at the hands of faithful men Our Prayers for all men do include both them that shall finde mercy and them also that shall finde none For them that shall no man will doubt but our Prayers are both accepted and granted Touching them for whom we crave that mercy which is not to be obtained let us not think that our Saviour did mis-instruct his Disciples willing them to pray for the peace even of such as should be uncapable of so great a blessing or that the Prayers of the Prophet Ieremy offended God because the answer of God was a resolute denial of favor to them for whom Supplication was made And if any
man doubt how God should accept such Prayers in case they be opposite to his Will or not grant them if they be according unto that which himself willeth our answer is That such suits God accepteth in that they are conformable unto his general inclination which is that all men might be saved yet always he granteth them not for as much as there is in God sometimes a more private occasioned will which determineth the contrary So that the other being the rule of our actions and not this our requests for things opposite to this Will of God are not therefore the less gracious in his sight There is no doubt but we ought in all things to frame our wills to the Will of God and that otherwise in whatsoever we do we sin For of our selves being so apt to err the onely way which we have to streighten our paths is by following the rule of his Will whose footsteps naturally are right If the eye the hand or the foot do that which the will commandeth though they serve as instruments to sin yet is sin the commanders fault and not theirs because Nature hath absolutely and without exception made them subjects to the will of man which is Lord over them As the body is subject to the will of man so mans will to the Will of God for so it behoveth that the better should guide and command the worse But because the subjection of the body to the will is by natural necessity the subjection of the Will unto God voluntary we therefore stand in need of direction after what sort our wills and desires may be rightly conformed to his Which is not done by willing always the self-same thing that God intendeth For it may chance that his purpose is sometime the speedy death of them whose long continuance in life if we should not wish we were unnatural When the object or matter therefore of our desires is as in this case a thing both good of it self and not forbidden of God when the end for which we desire it is vertuous and apparently most holy when the root from which our affection towards it proceedeth is Charity Piety that which we do in declaring our desire by Prayer yea over and besides all this sith we know that to pray for all men living is but to shew the same affection which towards every of them our Lord Jesus Christ hath born who knowing onely as God who are his did as Man taste death for the good of all men surely to that Will of God which ought to be and is the known rule of all our actions we do not herein oppose our selves although his secret determination haply be against us which if we did understand as we do not yet to rest contented with that which God will have done is as much as he requireth at the hands of men And concerning our selves what we earnestly crave in this case the same as all things else that are of like condition we meekly submit unto his most gracious will and pleasure Finally as we have cause sufficient why to think the practice of our Church allowable in this behalf so neither is ours the first which hath been of that minde For to end with the words of Prosper This Law of Supplication for all Men saith he the devout zeal of all Priests and of all faithful Men doth hold with such full Agreement that there is not any part of all the World where Christian people do not use to pray in the same manner The Church every where maketh Prayers unto God not onely for Saints and such as already in Christ are regenerate but for all Infidels and Enemies of the Cross of Iesus Christ for all Idolaters for all that persecute Christ in his followers for Iews to whose blindness the Light of the Gospel doth not yet shine for Hereticks and Schismaticks who from the Unity of Faith and Charity are estranged And for such what doth the Church ask of God but this That leaving their Errors they may be converted unto him that Faith and Charity may be given them and that out of the darkness of ignorance they may come to the knowledge of his truth Which because they cannot themselves do in their own behalf as long as the sway of evil custom ever-beareth them and the chains of Satan detain them bound neither are they able to break through those Errors wherein they are so determinately setled that they pay unto falsity the whole sum of whatsoever love is owing unto Gods Truth Our Lord merciful and just requireth to have all men prayed for that when we behold innumerable multitudes drawn up from the depth of so bottomless evils we may not doubt but in part God hath done the thing we requested nor despair but that being thankful for them towards whom already he hath shewed mercy the rest which are not as yet enlightned shall before they pass out of life be made partakers of the like grace Or if the Grace of him which saveth for so we set is falleth out over-pass some so that the Prayer of the Church for them be not received this we may leave to the hidden Iudgments of Gods Righteousness and acknowledge that in this Secret there is a Gulf which whole we live we shall never sound 50. Instruction and Prayer whereof we have hitherto spoken are duties which serve as Elements Parts or Principles to the rest that follow in which number the Sacraments of the Church are chief The Church is to us that very Mother of our New Birth in whose Bowels we are all bred at whose Brests we receive nourishment As many therefore as are apparently to our judgment born of God they have the Seed of their Regeneration by the Ministery of the Church which useth to that end and purpose not onely the Word but the Sacrament both having Generative force and vertue As oft as we mention a Sacrament properly understood for in the Writings of the Ancient Fathers all Articles which are peculiar to Christian Faith all Duties of Religion containing that which Sense or Natural Reason cannot of it self discern are most commonly named Sacraments our restraint of the Word to some few principal Divine Ceremonies importeth in every such Ceremony two things the Substance of the Ceremony it self which is visible and besides that somewhat else more secret in reference whereunto we conceive that Ceremony to be a Sacrament For we all admire and honor the holy Sacraments not respecting so much the Service which we do unto God in receiving them as the dignity of that Sacred and Secret Gift which we thereby receive from God Seeing that Sacraments therefore consist altogether in relation to some such Gift or Grace Supernatural as onely God can bestow how should any but the Church administer those Ceremonies as Sacraments which are not thought to be Sacraments by any but by the Church There is in Sacraments to be observed their Force and
that men ought to Fast more often then Marry the best Feast-maker is with them the perfectest Saint they are assuredly meer Spirit and therefore these our corporal devotions please them not Thus the one for Montanus and his Superstition The other in a clean contrary tune against the Religion of the Church These Set-fasts away with them for they are Iewish and bring men under the yoke of servitude If I will fast let me chuse my time that Christian Liberty be not abridged Hereupon their glory was to fast especially upon the Sunday because the order of the Church was on that day not to Fast. On Church Fasting days and especially the Week before Easter when with us saith Epiphanius Custom admitteth nothing but lying down upon the Earth abstinence from fleshly delights and pleasures sorrowfulness dry and unsavory Diet Prayer Watching Fasting all the Medicines which holy Affections can minister they are up be times to take in of the strongest for the belly and when their veins are well swoln they make themselves mirth with laughter at this our service wherein we are perswaded we please God By this of Epiphanius it doth appear not onely what Fastings the Church of Christ in those times used but also what other parts of Discipline were together therewith in force according to the ancient use and custom of bringing all men at certain times to a due consideration and an open Humiliation of themselves Two kindes there were of Publick Penitency the one belonging to notorious offenders whose open wickedness had been scandalous the other appertaining to the whole Church and unto every several person whom the same containeth It will be answered That touching this latter kinde it may be exercised well enough by men in private No doubt but Penitency is as Prayer a thing acceptable unto God be it in publick or in secret Howbeit as in the one if men were wholly left to their own voluntary Meditations in their Closets and not drawn by Laws and Orders unto the open Assemblies of the Church that there they may joyn with others in Prayer it may be soon conjectured what Christian devotion that way would come unto in a short time Even so in the other We are by sufficient experience taught how little it booreth to tell men of washing away their sins with tears of Repentance and so to leave them altogether unto themselves O Lord what heaps of grievous transgressions have we committed the best the perfectest the most righteous amongst us all and yet clean pass them over unsorrowed foâ— and unrepented of onely because the Church hath forgotten utterly how to bestow her wonted times of Discipline wherein the publick example of all was unto every particular person a most effectual mean to put them often in minde and even in a manner to draw them to that which now we all quite and clean forget as if Penitency were no part of a Christian mans duty Again besides our private offences which ought not thus loosly to be overslipt suppose we the Body and Corporation of the Church so just that at no time it needeth to shew it self openly cast down in regard of those Faults and Transgressions which though they do not properly belong unto any one had notwithstanding a special Sacrifice appointed for them in the Law of Moses and being common to the whole Society which containeth all must needs so far concern every man in particular as at some time in solemn manner to require acknowledgment with more then daily and ordinary testifications of grief There could not hereunto a fitter preamble be devised then that memorable Commination set down in the Book of Common Prayer if our practice in the rest were suitable The Head already so well drawn doth but wish a proportionable Body And by the Preface to that very part of the English Liturgy it may appear how at the first setting down thereof no less was intended For so we are to interpret the meaning of those words wherein restitution of the Primitive Church Discipline is greatly wished for touching the manner of publick penance in time of Lent Wherewith some being not much acquainted but having framed in their mindes the conceit of a new Discipline far unlike to that of old they make themselves believe it is undoubtedly this their Discipline which at the first was so much desired They have long pretended that the whole Scripture is plain for them If now the Communion Book make for them too I well think the one doth as much as the other it may be hoped that being found such a well-willer unto their cause they will more favor it then they have done Having therefore hitherto spoken both of Festival days and so much of solemn Fasts as may reasonably serve to shew the ground thereof in the Law of Nature the practice partly appointed and partly allowed of God in the Jewish Church the like continued in the Church of Christ together with the sinister oppositions either of Hereticks erroneously abusing the same or of others thereat quarrelling without cause we will onely collect the chiefest points as well of resemblance as of difference between them and so end First In this they agree that because Nature is the general Root of both therefore both have been always common to the Church with Infidels and Heathen men Secondly They also herein accord that as oft as joy is the cause of the one and grief the Well-spring of the other they are incompatible A third degree of affinity between them is That neither being acceptable to God of it self but both tokens of that which is acceptable their approbation with him must necessarily depend on that which they ought to import and signifie So that if herein the minde dispose no it self aright whether we rest or fast we offend A fourth thing common unto them is that the greatest part of the World hath always grosly and palpably offended in both Infidels because they did all in relation to false gods godless sensual and careless mindes for that there is in them no constant true and sincere affection towards those things which are pretended by such exercise yea certain flattering over-sights there are wherewith sundry and they not of the worst sort may be easily in these cases led awry even through abundance of love and liking to that which must be imbraced by all means but with caution in as much as the very admiration of Saints Whether we celebrate their glory or follow them in humility whether we laugh or weep mourn or rejoyce with them is as in all things the affection of Love apt to deceive and doth therefore need the more to be directed by a watchful guide seeing there is manifestly both ways even in them whom we honor that which we are to observe and shun The best have not still been sufficiently mindful that Gods very Angels in Heaven are but Angels and that bodily exercise considered in it self is no
the Congregation that so their allowance might seal my Calling The effect of my Answer was That as in a place where such Order is I would not break so here where in never was I might not of my own head take upon me to begin it But liking very well the motion of the Opinion which I had of his good meaning who made it requested him not to mislike my Answer though it were not correspondent to his minde 4. When this had so displeased some that whatsoever was afterwards done or spoken by me it offended their taste angry informations were daily sent out intelligence given farr and wide what à dangerous Enemy was crept in the worst that Jealousie could imagine was spoken and written to so many that at the length some knowing me well and perceiving how injurious the Reports were which grew daily more and more unto my discredit wrought means to bring Mr. Travers and me to a second Conference Wherein when a common Friend unto us both had quietly requested him to utter those things wherewith he found himself any way grieved He first renewed the memory of my entring into this Charge by vertue only of an Humane Creature for so the want of that formality of Popular Allowance was then censured and unto this was annexed a Catalogue partly of causeless Surmises as That I had conspired against him and that I sought Superiority over him and partly of Faults which to note I should have thought it a greater offence than to commit if I did account them Faults and had heard them so curiously observed in any other than myself they are such silly things as Praying in the entrance of my Sermon onely and not in the end naming Bishops in my Prayer Kneeling when I pray and Kneeling when I receive the Communion with such like which I would be as loath to recite as I was sorry to hear them objected if the rehearsal thereof were not by him thus wrested from me These are the Conferences wherewith I have been wooed to entertain Peace and good Agreement 5. As for the vehement Exhortations he speaketh of I would gladly know some reason wherefore he thought them needful to be used Was there any thing found in my Speeches or Dealings that gave them occasion who are studious of Peace to think that I disposed my self to some unquiet kinde of Proceedings Surely the special Providence of God I do now see it was that the first words I spake in this Place should make the first thing whereof I am accused to appear not onely untrue but improbable to as many as then heard me with indifferent ears and do I doubt not in their Consciences clear me of this suspition Howbeit I grant this were nothing if it might he shewed that my Deeds following were not suitable to my words If I had spoken of Peace at the first and afterwards sought to molest and grieve him by crossing him in his Function by storming if my pleasure were not asked and my Will obeyed in the least occurrences by carping needlesly sometimes at the manner of his Teaching sometimes at this sometimes at that Point of his Doctrine I might then with some likelihood have been blamed as one disdaining a peaceable hand when it had been offered But if I be able as I am to prove that my self have now a full year together born the continuance of such dealings not onely without any manner of resistance but also without any such complaint as might lett or hinder him in his course I see no cause in the world why of this I should he accused unlesse it be lest I should accuse which I meant not If therefore I have given him occasion to use conferences and exhortations to peace if when they were bestowed upon me I have despised them it will not be hard to shew some one Word or Deed wherewith I have gone about to work disturbance one is not much I require but one Onely I require if any thing be shewed it may be proved and not objected onely as this is That I have joyned to such as have alwayes opposed to any good order in his Church and made themselves to be thought indisposed to the present estate and proceedings The words have reference as it seemeth unto some such things as being attempted before my comming to the Temple went not so effectually perhaps forward as he that devised them would have wished An Order as I learn there was tendred that Communicants should neither kneel as in most places of the Realm nor sit as in this Place the Custom is but walk to the one side of the Table and there standing till they had received pass afterwards away round about by the other Which being on a sudden begun to be practised in the Church some sate wondering what it should mean others deliberating what to do Till such time as at length by name one of them being called openly thereunto requested that they might do as they had been accustomed which was granted and as Mr. Travers had ministred this way to the rest so a Curate was sent to minister to them after their way Which unprosperous beginning of a thing saving onely for the inconvenience of needless alterations otherwise harmlesse did to disgrace that Order in their conceit who had to allow or disallow it that it took no place For neither could they ever induce themselves to think it good and it so much offended Mr. Travers who supposed it to be the best that he since that time although contented to receive it as they do at the hands of others yet hath not thought it meet they should ever receive out of his which would not admit that Order of receiving it and therefore in my time hath been always present not to minister but only to be ministred unto 6. Another Order there was likewise devised but an Order of much more weight and importance This soil in respect of certain Immunities and other Specialties belonging unto it seemed likely to bear that which in other places of the Realm of England doth not take For which cause request was made to her Majesties Privy Councel that whereas it is provided by a Statute there should be Collectors and Sidemen in Churches which thing or somewhat correspondent unto it this place did greatly want it would please their Honours to motion such a matter to the Antients of the Temple And according to their honourable manner of helping forward all motions so grounded they wrote their Letters as I am informed to that effect Whereupon although these Houses never had use of such Collectors and Sidemen as are appointed in other places yet they both erected a Box to receive mens Devotions for the Poor appointing the Treasurer of both Houses to take care for bestowing it where need was and granting further that if any could he entreated as in the end some were to undertake the labour of observing mens slacknesse in Divine duties they should be allowed
World that shall change his Heart over-throw his Faith alter his affection towards God or the affection of God to him If I be of this note who shall make a separation between me and my God shall tribulation or anguish or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword No I am perswaded that neither tribulation nor anguish nor persecution or famine nor nakedness nor peril nor sword nor death nor life nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other Creature shall ever prevail so far over me I know in whom I have believed I am not ignorant whose precious blood hath been shed for me I have a Shepheard full of kindness full of care and full of power unto him I commit my self his own finger hath engraven this sentence in the Tables of my heart Satan hath desired to winnow thee as wheat but I have prayed that thy Faith fail not Therefore the assurance of my hope I will labour to keep as a Jewel unto the end and by labour through the gracious mediation of his Prayer I shall keep it To the Worshipful Mr. GEORGE SUMMASTER Principal of Broad-Gates Hall in Oxford Henry Iackson wisheth all Happiness SIR YOur kinde acceptance of a former testification of that respect I owe you hath made me venture to shâ—w the World these godly Sermons under your name In which as every point is worth observation so some especially are to be noted The first that as the spirit of Prophesie is from God himself who doth inwardly heat and enlighten the hearts and mindes of his holy Pen-men which if some would diligently consider they would not puzzle themselves with the contentions of Scot and Thomas Whether God only or his Ministring Spirits do infuse into men's mindes prophetical Revelations per species intelligibiles so God framed their words also Whence he holy Father St. Augustine religiously observeth That all those who understand the Sacred Writers will also perceive that they ought not to use other words than they did in expressing those heavenly Mysteries which their hearts conceived as the Blessed Virgin did our Saviour By the Holy Ghost The greater is Castell-o his offence who hath laboured to teach the Prophets to speak otherwise than they have already Much like to that impious King of Spain Alphonsus the tenth who found fault with God's works Si inquit Creationi assuissiem Mundum melius ordinassem If he had been with God at the Creation of the World the World had gone better than now it doth As this man found fault with God's works so did the other with God's words but because we have a most sure word of the Prophets to which we must take heed I will let his words pass with the winde having elsewhere spoken to you more largely of his errours whom notwithstanding for his other excellent parts I much respect You shall moreover from hence understand how Christianity consists not in formal and seeming purity under which who knows not notorious Villany to mâ—sk but in the heart root Whence the Author truly teacheth that Mockers which use Religious as a Cloak to put off and on as the Weather serveth are worse than Pagans and Infidels Where I cannot omit to shew how justly this kinde of men hath been reproved by that renowned Martyr of Jesus Christ E. Latimer both because it will be opposite in this purpose and also free that Christian Worthy from the slanderous reproaches of him who was if ever any a Moâ—ker of God Religion and all good men But first I must desire you and in you all Readers not to think lightly of that excellent man for using this and the like witty similitudes in his Sermons For whosoever will call to minde with what riff-raff God's people were fed in those days when their Priests whose lips should have preserved Knowledge preached nothing else but dreams and false miracles of counterfeit Saints enrolled in that sâ—ttish Legend coyned and amplified by a drousie head between sleeping and waking He that will consider this and also how the People were delighted with such toys God sending them strong delusions that they should believe lyes and how hard it would have been for any man wholly and upon the sudden to draw their mindes to another bent will easily perceive both how necessary it was to use Symbolical Discourse and how wisely and moderately it was applied by the religious Father to the end he might lead their understanding so far till it were so convinced informed and setled that it might forget the means and way by which it was led and think only of that it had acquired Far in all such mystical speeches who knows not that the end for which they are used is only to be thought upon This then being first considered let us hear the story as it is related by Mr. Fox Mr. Latuner saith he in his Sermon gave the People certain Cards out of the fifth sixth and seventh chapters of Matthew For the chief Triumph in the Cards be limited the Heart as the principal thing that they should serve God withal whereby he quite overthrew all hypocritical and external Ceremonies not tending to the necessary furtherance of God's holy Word and Sacraments By this he exhorted all men to serve the Lord with inward heart and true affection and not with outward Ceremonies adding moreover to the praise of that Triumph that though it were never so small yet it would take up the best Coat-card beside in the Bunch yea though it were the King of Clubs c. meaning thereby how the Lord would be worshipped and served in simplicity of the heart and verity wherein consisteth true Christian Religion c. Thus Master Fox By which it appears that the holy man's intention was to lift up the Peoples hearts to God and not that he made a Sermon of playing at Cards and taught them how to play at Triumph and plaid himself at Cards in the Pulpit as that base companion Parsons reports the matter in his wonted scurrilous vein of railing whence he calleth it a Christmas-Sermon Now he that will think ill of such Allusions may out of the abundance of his folly jest at Demosthenes for his story of the Sheep Wolves and Doggs and Menenius for his fiction of the Belly But hinc illae lacrymae The good Bishop meant that the Romish Religion came not from the heart but consisted in outward Ceremonies Which sorely grieved Parsons who never had the least warmth or spark of honesty Whether B. Latimer compared the Bishops to the Knave of Clubs as the Fellow interprets him I know not I am sure Parsons of all others deserved those colours and so I leave him We see then what inward purity is required of all Christians which if they have then in Prayer and all other Christian duties they shall lift up pure hands as the
Children from the Cradle to be his Cardinals He hath fawned upon the Kings and Princes of the Earth and by Spiritual Cozenage hath made them sell their lawful Authority and Jurisdiction for Titles of Catholicus Christianissimus Defensor Fidei and such like he hath proclaimed sale of Pardons to inveigle the ignorant built Seminaries to allure young men desirous of Learning erected Stews to gather the dissolute unto him This is the Rock whereupon his Church is built Hereby the man is grown huge and strong like the Cedars which are not shaken with the winde because Princes have been as Children over-tender hearted and could not resist Hereby it is come to pass as you see this day that the Man of Sinne doth war against us not by men of a Language which we cannot understand but he cometh as Iereboam against Iudah and bringeth the fruit of our own Bodies to eat us up that the bowels of the Childe may be made the Mother's grave and hath caused no small number of our Brethren to forsake their Native Countrey and with all disloyalty to cast off the yoke of their Allegiance to our dread Soveraign whom God in mercy hath set over them for whose safeguard if they carried not the hearts of Tygers in the bosomes of men they would think the dearest blood in their Bodies well spent But now saith Abiah to Ieroboam Ye think ye be able to resist the Kingdom of the Lord which is in the hands of the Sonnes of David Ye be a great multitude the golden Calves are with you which Ieroboam made you for gods Have ye not driven away the Priests of the Lord the Sons of Aaron and the Levites and have made you Priests like the People of Nations Whosoever cometh with a young Bullock and seven Rams the same may be a Priest of them that are no gods If I should follow the Comparison and here uncover the Cup of those deadly and ugly Abominations wherewith this Ieroboam of whom we speak hath made the Earth so drunk that it hath retled under us I know your godly Hearts would loath to see them For my own part I delight not to take in such filth I had rather take a Garment upon my Shoulders and go with my face from them to cover them The Lord open their Eyes and cause them if it be possible at the length to see how they are wretched and miserable and poor and blinde and naked Put it O Lord in their hearts to seek white Rayment and to cover themselves that their filthy nakednesse may no longer appear For beloved in Christ we bow our Knees and lift up our hands to Heaven in our Chambers secretly and openly in our Churches we pray heartily and hourly even for them also though the Pope hath given out as a Judge in a solemn Declaratory Sentence of Excommunication against this Land That our gracious Lady hath quite abolished Prayers within her Realm and his Scholars whom he hath taken from the midst of us have in their published Writings charged us nor onely nor to have any holy Assemblies unto the Lord for Prayer but to hold a Common School of Sinne and Flattery to hold Sacriledge to be God's Service Unfaithfulnesse and breach of Promise to God to give it to a Strumpet to be a Vertue to abandon Fasting to abhor Confession to mislike with Penance to like well of Usury to charge none with restitution to finde no good before God in single life not in no well-working that all men as they fall to us are much worse and more than afore corrupted I do not add one word or syllable unto that which Mr. Bristow a man both born and sworn amongst us hath taught his hand to deliver to the view of all I appeal to the Conscience of every Soul that hath been truly converted by us Whether his heart were never raised up to God by our Preaching Whether the words of our Exhortation never wâ—â—â—g any tear of a penitent heart from his eys Whether his Soul never reaped any joy and comfort any consolation in Christ Jesus by our Sacraments and Prayers and Psalms and Thanksgiving Whether he were never bettered but always worsed by us O merciful God! If Heaven and Earth in this case do not witness with us and against them let us be razed out from the Land of the Living Let the Earth on which we stand swallow us quick as it hath done Corah Dathan and Abiram But if we belong unto the Lord our God and have not forsaken him if our Priests the Sons of Aaron minister unto the Lord and the Levites in their Office if we offer unto the Lord every morning and every evening the Burnt-offerings and sweet Incense of Prayers and Thanksgiving if the Bread be set in order upon the pure Table and the Candlestick of Gold with the Lamps thereof burn every morning that is to say if amongst us God's blessed Sacraments be duly administred his holy Word sincerely and daily preached if we keep the Watch of the Lord our God and if ye have forsaken him then doubt ye not this God is with us as a Captain his Priests with sounding Trumpets must cry alarm against you O ye Children of Israel fight not against the Lord God of your Fathers for ye shall not prosper THE SECOND SERMON Epist. JUDE Verse 17 18 19 20 21. But ye beloved remember the words which were spoken before of the Apostles of our Lord Iesus Christ How that they told you that there should be Mockers in the last time which should walk after their own ungodly lusts These are makers of Sects fleshly having not the Spirit But ye beloved edifie your selves in your most holy Faith praying in the Holy Ghost And keep your selves in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Iesus Christ unto eternal life HAving otherwhere spoken of the words of Saint Iude going next before concerning Mockers which should come in the last time and Backsliders which even then should fall away from the Faith of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ I am now by the aide of Almighty God and through the assistance of his good Spirit to lay before you the words of Exhortation which I have read 2. Wherein first of all whosoever hath an eye to see let him open it and he shall well perceive how careful the Lord is for his Children how desirous to see them profit and grow up to a manly stature in Christ how loath to have them any way mis-led either by examples of the wicked or by inticements of the world and by provocation of the flesh or by any other means forcible to deceive them and likely to estrange their hearts from God For God is not at that point with us that he careth not whether we sink or swim No he hath written our names in the Palm of his Hand in the Signet upon his Finger are we graven in Sentences not onely of Mercy but
measure but verily I believe there shall be found more than a third part of the Prayers which are not Psalms and texts of Scripture spent in praying for and praying against the commodities and incommodities of this life which is contrary to all the Arguments or Contents of the Prayers of the Church sit down in the Scripture but especially of our Saviour Christs Prayer by the which ours ought to be directed T. C. l. 1. p. 135. What a reason is this we must rep at the Lords Prayer oftentimes therefore oftentimes in half an hour and one in the neck of another Our Saviour Christ doth not there give a prescript Forme of Prayer whereunto he bindeth us but giveth us a Rule and Squire to frame all our Prayers by I know it is necessary to Pray and Pray often I know also that in a few words it is impossible for any man to frame so pithy a Prayer and I confess that the Church doth well in concluding their Prayers with the Lords Prayer But I stand upon this Thee there is no necessity laid upon us to use these very words and no more T. C. lib. 1. pag. 219. Praemisse legitima ordinaria oratione quasi fundamento accidentium jus est desideriorum jus est superstruendi extrinsecus petitioner Terâ—ol de Orat Luke 11. 1. Cypr. in Orat Dom. The Peoples trying after the Minister Another fault is That all the people are appointed in divers places to say after the Minister whereby not only the time is unprofitably wasted and a confused noise of the people one speaking after another caused but an Opinion bred in their hearts that those only be their Prayers which they pronounce with their own mouths after the Minister otherwise than the order which is left to the Church doth bear 1 Cor. 14. 16. and otherwise than Iustin Martyr sheweth the custom of the Churches to have been in his time T. C. l. 1 p. 139. l. 3. p. 211 212 213. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil. Pâ—â—s in Pral 1 Cor. 14. 15. Our manner of reading the Psalms otherwise then the rest of the Scripture They have always the same profit to be stuâ—ied in to be read and preached upon which ether Scriptures have and this above the rest that they are to be sung * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Diâ—nys Hierar Eccles. cap. 3. But to make daily Prayers of them hand-over-head or otherwise then the present estate wherein we he doth agree with the maner contained in them is an abusing of them T. C. lâ— 3. pag. 206. Of Musick with Psalms * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil. in Psal. Of singing or saying Psalms and other parts of Common Prayer wherein the People and Minister answer one another by course For the singing of Psalms by course and side after side although it be very ancient yet it is not commendable and so much the mere to be suspected for that the Devil hath gone about to get it so great Authority partly by deriving it from Ignatius time and partly in making the World believe that this came from Heaven and that the Angels were heard to sing after this sort Which as it is a meer Fable so is it confuted by Historiographers whereof some ascribe the beginning of this to Damasus some other unto Flavianus and Diodorus T. C. lib. 1. p. 203. a Exod. 19. â— Is 24.3 Deut. 3. 27. 26. 17. Josh. 24.16 b Socrat. Hist. Eccles. lib. 6. cap. 8. a Theod. lib. 2 cap. 24. b Plat. in vitâ— Damasi c Bene mari plerunque comparatur Ecclesia quae primo ingredientis populi agmine totis vestibulis undas comit deinde in oratione totius plebis tanquam undis â—efl â—ensibâ—s strides cum responsuriis Psalmorum canruvinocura mulierum virginum parvulorum consonus undatum stragor resulta Hexam lib. 2. cap. 5. d Basil. Epist. 63. e Plin. secund Epist lib. 10. cp 97. Exod 15. 1. 21. Isai. 6. 3. * From whence soever it came it cannot he good considering that when it is granted that all the people may praise God as it is in singing of Psalms then this ought no to be restrained unto a few and where it is lawful both with heart and voice tosing the whole Psalm there it is not meet that they should sing but the one half with their heart and voice and the other with their heart onely For where they may both with heart and voice sing â—iâ—eâ— the heart is not enough Therefore besides the incommodity which cometh this way in that being tossed after this sort men cannot understand what is sung those other two inconveniences come of this form of singing and therefore it is vanished in all Reformed Churches T. C. lib. 1. p. 103. Ephes. 5. 19. Of Magnificat Benedictus and Nunc dimittis These Thanksgivings were made by occasion of certain particular beâ—â—â—â—e and are no more to be used for ordinary Prayers then the Ave-Maria So that both for this cause and the other before alledged of the Psalms it is not convenient in make ordinary prayers of them T. C. lib. 3. p. 208. 2 Chro. 29.30 Of the Leâ—any a We pray for the avoiding of those dangâ—â—â— which are nothing near us as from Lightning and Thundring in the midst of Winter from Storms and Tempest when the Weather is most fair and the Seas most calm It is true That upon some urgent Calamity a Prayer may and ought to be framed which may beg either the community for want whereof the Church is in distress â—â— the turning away of that mischief which either approacheth or is already upon it But to make those Prayers which are for the present time and danger ordinary and daily Prayers I cannot hitherto see any either Scripture or example of the Primitive Church And here for the simples sake I will set down after what â—urâ— this abuse crept into the Church There was one Mamericus Bishop of Vienna which in the time of great Earth-quakes which were in France instituted certain Supplications which the Grecians and we of them call the Letany which concerned â—hat matter There is no doubt but as other discommodities rose in other Countries they likewise had Prayers accordingly Now Pope Gregory either made himself or gathered the Supplications that were made against the Calamities of every Country and made of them a great Letany or Supplication as Platina calleth in and gave it to be used in all Churches which thing albeit all Churches might do for the time in respect of the case of the Calamity which the Churches suffered yet there is no cause why it should be perpetual that was ordained but for a time â— and why all Lands should pray to be delivered from the Incommodities that some Land hath been troubled with T. C. lib 1. pag. 137. â— Exod. 15.30 Wild. 10. 20. 2 Sam. 6. 1. 1 Chron. 13.4 2 Chron. 20. 3. Joel 1. 1â— b Tertul. lib. â— ad Exor c Terent. Andr. d Hier. Epist.