all 21. What if a thousand honest weak Men mistake and think that the things imposed as necessary to their Sacramental Communion are great Sins and it be not so as our Doubts against Conformity are thought to be Mistakes yea the Anabaptists Error Can he prove that all such are damning Errors for want of Sacraments 22. Gods Oath is also to confirm our Faith And if a Man may be saved that beâ—ieveth Gods 〈◊〉 and knoweth not of his Oath why not he that believeth it and knoweth not of the Sacrament 23. Doth not his Doctrine make the Priests the absolute Lords of all Mens Souls that can deny Salvation to any or all Men by denying them the Sacrament Is this the sense of their having the Power of the Keys 24. Is not this abuse of Tibi dabo Claves and the office of Key-bearing the knack by which Popes have subdued Kings and Kingdoms 25. Is not the Argument which this Man manageth against the Reformed Churches to prove them â—o Churches and to have no Ministery and Sacrament the Achilles of the Papists in which is their chief coâ—fidence but often baffled as by Voetius against Jarâ—nius aforesaid 26. Nay the Papists themselves are far more moderate than this Man for they take a Laymans Baptism yea a Womans to be sufficient to salvation when this Man denieth it of all the most learned and holy Pastors that have not uninterrupted Episcopal Ordination 27. Bishops have too oft conspired to corrupt Gods Sacraments witness the Lateran Council sub Innc. 3. and to interdict Kingdoms and oppress Princes and People and may do so again And have the People no remedy against them 28. A Minister justly ordained and unjustly suspended or silenced by a Bishop hath more authority than Laymen and their Sacraments are not Nullities by the Romanists Confession 29. Is not this Mans Doctrine far grosser than Cyprians and the Africans yea the Dâ—natists that denied the validity of Heretick Baptism 30. A Lay-Chancellor in these mens judgments useth the Keys of Excommunication and Absolution validly and yet are not the Sacraments or Ordination of the Reformed Churches aforesaid valid 31. Surrogate Priests by the Bishops consent validly Excommunicate that are no Bishops 32. No People can be sure by this Mans Rule that they have Sacraments or shall be saved except by faâ—lible presumption not knowing that their Priest hath uninterrupted successive Ordination 33. When your presumptuous Ordination is discovered to be Null must all the People be Re-baptized 34. The Church of England giveth none the Lords Supper till 16 years old Doth it become absolutely necessary to Salvation just at that Age and not before 35. The Burial Office pronounceth all saved that never Communicated so they be Baptized and not Excommunicate nor kill themselves 36. What work would this Man make for Rebaptizers if all the Protestanâ—s of all Nations must be Re-baptized that have not the foresaid Ordination 37. Is it suitable to the description of God and his grace in Scripture to believe that he layeth all mens Salvation upon Sacraments performed by men Ordained as he describeth 38. Are not we Reproached Silenced Ministers as like to be good Protestants as such men as this that say that 1. The Reformed Churches that have not Episcopal Ordination from uninterrupted Succession are no true Churches 2. Have no true Ministers 3. Nor true Sacraments 4. Nor part in the Covenant of Grace 5. Nor hope of Salvation by promise from God 6. That their Ministery and Sacraments is the Sin against the Holy Ghost 7. That the Church of Rome hath this uninter rupted Succession as he tells me 8. That as will hence follow the French Protestant were better turn Papists than be as they are Sect. XXXI There are as many and greater Objections that I should lay before him about his Doctrine of an Universal Church-Policy and that sort of Episcopacy which he rather supposeth than proveth necessary and such other Points But I will no more tire the Reader herein Sect. XXXII All the definition of the Protestant Religion that I can extort from him is Communicating with the Church of England and those that it holds communion with 1. And so did the Papists saith Dr. Heylin in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign till the Pope forbad them 2. The Church of England never renounced Communion with the Reformed Churches which he renounceth 3. A particular Church is no Standard of Religion Nor England more than the rest Sect. XXXIII If he renounce Communion with all these Reformed Churches and with the Romans also what a Separatist is this Man and how narrow is his Communion and into how small a number hath he reduced the Universal Church If neither Papists nor any Churches that have not Ordination from uninterrupted Succession be parts of the Catholick Church it is very little if not invisible Sect. XXXIV He thus teacheth almost all the Christian world instead of Love and Concord to Unchurch Unchristen and Condemn each other The Romans on such accounts already Unchurch all the rest The rest will far more easily prove that Simony Heresie uncalled Popes uncapable ones and manifold Schisms have oft interrupted his described Succession at Rome And so Turks and Heathens have matter given them against us all Already by such kind of Schismatical Principles there are few parts of the Church on Earth that are not by others Unchurched and Unchurch not others But yet it is but few of them that have proceeded to that Anabaptistical height as to nullifie all their Sacraments and to expect that almost all the Christian world should be again baptized Yea this is far more Schismatical than common Anabaptism For the Anabaptists with us Re-baptize not them that were baptized at age by such Ministers as this Writer and such others degrade much less do they damn almost all the Christian world or other Reformed Churches and say They have no part in Gods Covenant of Grace and Promise of Salvation and that they sin against the Holy Ghost as this Man doth CHAP. X. None of these terms will unite a National Church or any Associated Churches nor well any single Church Though by other means a competent Vnion may be kept in some Churches notwithstanding such Schismatical Courses § I. THE same Reasons which prove that none of these terms will ever unite the Universal Church but that all are fitted to promote Divisions will prove also that they tend of themselves to the dividing and distracting of all lesser Church Societies and Communions Though yet we do not deny but de facto a particular Church may easilier agree in an Error or be kept in some Concord under the same Pastor where a Sin or Error prevaileth than the Universal Church on Earth can As the Church of Rome may agree in Popery but all the Christian world will not And as a great part hath agreed in Arianism called Christians and a great part in Nestorianism and to this day in Eutychianism
his Presbyters and Deacons 2. Nor with the question whether these should have Arch-Bishops over them as successours to the Apostolical and other general Overseers of the first age in the ordinary continued parts of their office 3. Nor whether Patriarchs Diocesans and Lay Chancellours as officers of the King exercising under him such Government of the Church as belongeth to Kings according to our Oath of Supremacy be lawful to which in such exercise all subjects must for Conscience sake submit 4. Nor whether it was well done or of Divine appointment that about temporal matters as well as Church Controversies the Bishops were chosen arbitrators by the ancient Christians and so did that which Christian Magistrates now must do till upon the conversion of Princes and States the said Power of externals circa sacra fell into their hands 5. Nor yet if Diocesans become the sole Bishops infimi ordinis over many hundred Parishes all the Bishops and Parish Churches under them being put down and turned into Curates and Chapels partes ecclesiae infimae speciei whether a Minister and every Subject ought yet to live quietly and peaceably under them It is none of these that are the questions which I decide II. In my confutation of Mr. Dodwell some may mistake me as if I denied that our Religion had come down to us by a continued succession from the Apostles or that the ministerial office in specie or that the Vniversal Church had ever been without a true Ministry or Religion I have proved where our Church was in all ages before Luther in my second book against Johnson alias Terret Nor do I say what I do to avoid deriving our Ministerial succession from Rome For History puts me out of doubt that the multitude of uncapable Popes and Schisms will prove a far greater interruption of Canonical and Legitimate succession at Rome than can be proved of England and perhaps than hath happened to almost any other Church in the world And I am fully satisfied that the present Church of England as National deriveth its succession from the ancient Brittish and Scottish Church and not from Rome and that Christianity was the Religion of England long before Gregory or Augustine the Monks days and that notwithstanding Gildas his smart reproofs when the Brittish and Scottish Clergy and people disclaimed all obedience to the Pope and would not so much as eat or lodge in the same house with Gregory's Clergy the persons were better or at least their doctrine and Religion more sound than that which Rome did afterwards obtrude And as the blood of this nation though called English will upon just consideration be found to be twenty if not an hundred fold more British than either Roman Saxon or Norman so the Ordination of the Bishops is derived so much more from the Brittains and Scots than from Rome as that Augustine the Monks successours were afterward almost quite extinct only one Wini a Simonist being left in anno 668. the rest of the Bishops being all of Brittish ordination All which with much more of great importance is so fully proved after Usher by M. T. Jones of Oswestree late Chaplain to the Duke of York in an excellent Historical Treatise hereof called Of the Heart and its right Soveraign that I am sorry that book is no more commonly bought and read But withal I must say that this our certain succession disproveth the Papists and Mr. Dodwells plea for the necessity of their sort of Episcopal Canonical uninterrupted succession For as the Bishops of Denmark have their succession but from Bugenhagius Pomeranus a Presbyter his ordination so Aidan and Finan that came from Scotland out of Columbanus Monastery were no Bishops as Beda and others fully testifie And after Beda and others Mr. Jones hath cleared it that it was not only the Northern Bishops that were ordained by Aidan and Finan and Dhuma but that the Bishops of the whole land had their ordination derived from them and such as they and those whom they ordained so that the denying of the Validity of the Ordination by Presbyters shaketh the succession of the Episcopal Church of England and proveth it on that supposition interrupted And if they derive it from Rome it will be as much shaken III. In perusal I find that I have more than once mentioned some things in this treatise and the repetition may be an offense to some To which I say 1. That this is usual in controversies where several objections and occasions call for the same material answer 2. But I confess it is the effect of my hast and weakness And it is my judgement while I think that I write no needless books that I should rather write any one that is truly useful with such imperfections of manner and style as only so far disgrace the author than for want of time to leave it undone to the loss of others But if it be needless it is a greater fault to write it than to write it no more accurately My dear friend and judicious brother Mr. John Corbett hath newly published a small book to the same purpose with this of the true state of Religion and Interest of the Church with a discourse of Schism which I commend to the Reader as much worthy of his perusal and which if written on the hearts of Rulers and Teachers and people according to its certain truth and weight would heal us all The Lord forgive our heinous sins which deserve that he should excommunicate and forsake us and save England from English men and save us all from our selves our most dangerous enemies and Christians and Pastors and friends from one another For as Mr. Jones his Welsh Proverb saith Though thy dog be thy own trust him not when he is mad IV. I hear some say of my book that cometh out with this of the case of the Non-conformists and may say of this that 1. It is unseasonable to mention our own differences when we are called to unite against the Papists 2. And that too hard-accusations of conformity are intimated I answer to the first 1. That it is never more seasonable to write for Vnity than when we are most obliged to unite Though indeed it can never be unseasonable And to take Non-conformists for heinous Schismaticks and call on Magistrates to silence and imprison and ruine them is not the way to unity nor consisteut with it and therefore to deprecate such unpeaceable ways is the necessary work of a Peacemaker 2. I have waited in vain these seventeen years for a fit season And with me in likelyhood it must be Now or Never for there is no doing it in the grave and I dare not die and leave it undone on pretence that it was not seasonable To the second I say 1. I have professed that I write not to accuse Conformists but if men accuse us as enemies to order obedience and peace and as fit for silencing and utter ruine and tell the
world falsly that it is but Things Indifferent that we deny obedience to and call on us to tell them what it is that we fear if we conform and when we tell them they make this also our crime because they think themselves accused what remedy have we against such men 2. I love and honour all good and pious men that Conform For I consider how variously the same thing is represented to and apprehended by men of various educations converse and advantages so that the same sin materially heinous may formally be much less in some than in others As was Paul's ignorant unbelief and persecution Or else saith the Papist Answerer of the three books for the Jesuites Loyalty Most Princes must be most heinous sinners that make wars against each other in which multitudes are killed when both sides cannot have a just cause unless the supposition that their cause was good by mistake excuse them THE CONTENTS The First Part. THe Reasons for Christian Vnity and Concord after the nature of it described and how much may be hoped for on earth Chap. 1. The Text opened The Doctrines named The method proposed page 1 Chap. 2. The Nature of Vnity and this Vnity of the Spirit opened p. 10. Chap. 3. The necessity and benefits of this Vnity and Peace to all men p. 30. Chap. 4. The Vnity of the Spirit is the welfare of the Church p. 45. Chap. 5. This Vnity is for the good of the World without the Church p. 67. Chap. 6. It is due to the honour of Christ and amiable to God p. 71. Chap. 7. What obligations are on all Christians to avoid sinful divisions and discord and to promote this unity and peace p. 75. Chap. 8. What sort and measure of Vnion may or may not be hoped for on earth p. 79. Chap. 9. That Christ who commanded our Vnion hath himself prescribed the terms p. 98. Chap. 10. No humane terms not made by Christ or his Spirit extraordinarily given to the Apostles are necessary to the Being of particular Churches but divers humane Acts are necessary to their existence p. 100. Chap. 11. The danger of the two extremes And first of despairing of Concord and unjust tolerations p. 114. Chap. 12. The sin and danger of making too much necessary to Vnion and Communion p. 119. Chap. 13. To cry out of the mischiefs of Toleration and call for sharper execution while dividing snares are made the terms of Vnion is the work of ignorant proud and malignant Church destroyers p. 125. The Second Part. THe Terms of Concord Chap. 1. In General what are the true and only terms of Church Concord and what not p. 135. Chap. 2. Instances of Gods description of these terms in Scripture p. 143. Chap. 3. The true terms of Catholick Vnion and Concord more particularly described as the chief means of hope for the Churches peace p. 162. Chap. 4. What are the terms necessary for the continuance of this Communion and what are the causes of abscission and excommunication p. 177. Chap. 5. What are the terms necessary to the office and exercise of the Sacred Ministry p. 200. Chap. 6. What is necessary to the Constitution administration and Communion of single Churches p. 228. Chap. 7. What are the necessary terms of Concord of those single Churches with one another in the same Kingdome or in divers p. 243. Chap. 8. What is necessary to the Civil peace and Concord of Christians and what is the part of the Christian Magistrate about Religion as to his promoting or tolerating mens doctrines or practices therein p. 248. Chap. 9. Objections answered about Toleration especially p. 267. Chap. 10. A draught or Specimen of such Forms as are mentioned for Approved and Tolerated Ministers p. 279. The Third Part. Of Schism ESpecially the false dividing Terms of Vnion and other Causes of Schism Chap. 1. What SCHISM is and what are its Causes and effects p. 1. Chap. 2. The true Preventions and Remedies of Schism p. 16. Chap. 3. More of the same Twenty things necessary hereunto p. 26. Chap. 4. The Catholick Church will never unite in the Papacy p. 29. 1. What the Papists opinion is of the Terms of Vnion 2. The fifth Monarchy opinion of Campanella de Regno Dei and some other Papists That it is really an Vniversal Kingdome which is claimed by the Pope 3. The Christian world will never unite in one Pope Chap. 5. The Catholick Church will never unite in Patriarchs or any humane Church officers or forms of Government p. 41. Chap. 6. The Catholick Church will never unite in General Councils as their Head or necessary center or terms of Concord p. 52. Chap. 7. The Catholick Church will never unite in a Multitude of pretended articles of faith not proved certainly to be Divine nor in subscribing to or owning any unnecessary doubtful opinions or practices p. 60. Chap. 8. The Catholick Church will never unite by receiving all that is now owned by the Greek or Latine Church the Abassine Armenian the Lutherans or Calvinists or in a full Conformity to any divided party which addeth to the primitive simplicity in her terms of Concord p. 68. Chap. 9. The pretended necessity of an uninterrupted successive ordination by Diocesan Bishops will never unite the Churches but is Schismatical Mr. Dodwells book hereof confuted p. 73. Chap. 10. None of these terms will unite a National Church associated Churches nor well any single Church Though by other means a competent Vnion may be kept in some Churches notwithstanding some such Schismatical inventions as lesser diseases destroy not nature p. 104. Chap. 11. The severity and force of Magistrates denying necessary Toleration and punishing dissenters from uncertain unnecessary things will never procure Church Vnion and Concord but division p. 107. Chap. 12. Excommunicating and Anathematizing in such cases will not do it p. 112. Chap. 13. Any one unlawful uncertain doctrine oath Covenant profession subscription or practice so imposed will divide p. 116. Chap. 14. Vnlimited Toleration will divide and wrong the Church p. 118. Chap. 15. The Catholick Church will never unite in a reception and subscription to every word verse or book of the holy Scripture as in our Translations or any particular Copy nor otherwise known but some will still doubt of the Divine authority of some parts p. 134. Chap. 16. The Church will never unite in any mens Commentaries on the Bible p. 137. Chap. 17. A summary recital of the true terms of Concord and of the Causes of Schism p. 139. Id quod natura remittit Invida jura negant Ovid. ERRATA In the First and Second Parts Page 17. line 19. for more read as p. 19. for affecteth r. asserteth p. 26. l. 11. dele with p. 45. l. 17. for in r. is p. 58. l. 13. r. above p. 96. l. 7. r. to their p. 130. l. 2. r. Placeus p. 225. l. 2. r. condemn In the Third Part. Page 4. line 25. read sin p. 5. l. 11. r.
them I was once blamed for dating a book out of the Common gaol or prison in London as if it reflected on the Magistrate But I imitated Paul and mentioned nothing which the Rulers took for a dishonour as their actions shewed Doct. 2. Beseeching is the mode and language of wise and faithful Pastors in pleading for Vnity and against Schism in the Church For they are not Lords over the flocks but helpers of their faith They have no power of the sword but of the word They rule not by constraint but willingly nor such as are constrained by them but Voluntiers It is not the way to win Love to God to Pastors or to one another to say Love me or I will lay thee in a gaol stripes are useful to cause fear and timerous obedience but not directly to cause Love And hated Preachers seldom prosper in Converting or Edifying souls or healing disordered divided Churches Doct. 3. Though Grace find us unworthy it maketh men such as walk worthy of their high and heavenly calling that is in a suitable conversation answerable to the principles of their faith and hope Christianity were little better than the false Religions of the world if it made men no better If Christ made not his disciples greatly to differ from the disciples of a meer philosopher he would not be â—hought greatly to differ from them himself The â—ruits of his doctrine and spirit on our hearts and lives are the proofs and witness of his truth we wrong him heinously when we live but like other men And we weaken our own and other mens faith by obscuring a great evidence of the Christian Verity And those that are of eminent holiness and righteousness of life are the great and powerful preachers of faith and shew men by proofs and not only by words that Christ is true Doct. 4. Lowliness is a great part of Christian worthiness and a necessary cause of Christian Vnity and peace This 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is but the same thing which Paul elsewhere Act. 20. 19. tells this same Church that he practised towards them exemplarily himself Lowliness of mind containeth both low and humble thoughts of our selves and low expectations as to honour and respect from others with a submissive temper that can stoop and yield and a deportment liker to the lower sort of people than to the stout and great ones of the world As Mat. 5. to be poor in spirit is to have a spirit fit for a state of poverty not in Love with riches but content with little and patient with all that poor men must endure so Lowliness of mind is a disposition and deportment not like the Grandees of the world but suited to Low persons and Low things condescending to the lowest persons employments and indignities or contempt that shall be cast upon us A proud high-minded person that is looking for preferment and must be somebody in the world is of a spirit contrary to that of Christianity and will never lie even in the sacred Edifice nor be a healer but a troubler of the Church of Christ and must be converted and become as a little child before he can enter into the Kingdom of heaven Mat. 18. 3. And indeed only by selfishness and pride have come the divisions and contentions in the Church even by those that have made it the means of their domination to cry down division because they must have all to Unite in them in Conformity to their opinions Interests and wills A humble soul that can be content to follow a Crucified Christ and to be made of no reputation Phil. 2. 7. Heb. 12. 1 2 3. and to be a servant to all and a Lord of none and can yield and stoop and be despised when ever the ends of his office do require it is a Christian indeed and fit to be a healer Doct. 5. Meekness or Lenity is another part of Christian worthiness and a necessary cause of Vnity and Peace Though in some this hath extraordinary advantage or disadvantage in the temperature of the body yet it is that which persons of all tempers may be brought to by grace A boisterous furious or wild kind of disposition is not the Christian healing spirit If passion be apt to stir wisdom and grace must repress it and Lenity must be our ordinary temper we must be like tame creatures that familiarly come to a mans hand and not like wild things that flye from us as untractable otherwise how will such in Love and peace and sociable concord ever carry on the work of Christ Doct. 6. Love to each other is a great part of Christian worthiness and a most necessary cause of Vnity and peace Of which I hope to say so much by it self if God will as that I shall here pass it by It being the very Heart and Life of Vnity Doct. 7. Long suffering or a patient mind not rash or hasty is another part of Christian worthiness and a necessary Cause of Vnity and peace 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath more in it than many well consider of I know it is commonly taken for restraint of anger by patient long-suffering But I think that it chiefly signifieth here and elsewhere in Pauls Epistles that deliberate slowness and calmness of mind which is contrary to passionate haste and rashness When a passionate man is hasty and rash and cannot stay to hear another speak for himself nor to deliberate of the matter and search out the truth nor forbear revenge while he thinketh whether it will do good or harm or what the case will appear in the review this Longanimity will stay men and compose their minds and cause them to take time before they judge of opinions practices or persons and before they venture to speak or do lest what they do in haste they repent at leisure It appeaseth those passions which blind the judgment when wrath doth precipitate men into those conceptions words and deeds which they must after wish that they had never known Hasty rashness in judging and doing for want of the patience lenity of a slow deliberating mind is the cause of most errors Heresies and divisions and of abundance of sin and misery in the world Doct. 8. Bearing supporting and forbearing one another in Love is another part of Gospel worthiness and needful means of Vnity and peace Doubtless to forbear each other patiently under injuries and provocations is a great part of the duty here meant But both Beza who translated it sustinentes and the Vulgar Latine which translateth it supportantes seemed to think that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth something more While we are imperfect sinful men we shall have need of mutual support and help yea we shall be injurious provoking and troublesome to each other And when Christians yea Church Pastors are so far from supporting and sustaining the weak that they cannot so much as patiently bear their censures neglects or other effects of weakness Unity
the world that doth not save his own disciples from sin and folly No wonder that God hath no pleasure in fools and that the foolish shall not stand in his fight when they are such a dishonour to Christ and him what fellowship hath Light with darkness And who knoweth not that disagreement proveth ignorance and errour in one party at least When they hold and plead for contrary opinions both cannot be in the right And when this is but in dark and difficult matters of no great influence on our hearts and lives and future hopes it is tolerable and no more to be wondered at than that we are yet but imperfect men in flesh and in this low and darksome world But when it amounteth to that which maketh Christians judge it necessary to anathematize one another and to cast out each other from their communion as intolerable and perhaps to seek one anothers destruction do they not loudly proclaim their shameful ignorance to the world § 3. I know that discipline must be exercised and the precious separated from the vile and this especially for the honour of Christianity For if the Church be as a Swinesty and the clean and unclean the sober and the drunken the chaste and the fornicators equally members of it such a society and their religion will be contemned For sin is a reproach to any people But casting a felon or murderer in Jaile doth much differ from a civil war For the Church to cast out the impure that repent not is necessary to their honour but to divide and subdivide among themselves is their reproach though the dividers have never so fair pretences § 4. I know also what pretences against heresie c. the dividing sects have had in all ages They have pretended that they only being the true Church the condemning and rejecting of all others was necessary to the Churches honour But is it indeed to the honour of the Christian name that so great bodies for so many ages have continu'd to condemn and anathematize each other That the Greek Church condemneth the Western and the Western them That the Eastern and Southern are separated from both And the Western Christians so divided among themselves Who that is not a stranger to man and history knoweth not that it hath been to exercise a Dominion over others and also to extol the skill of their understandings as speaking rightlier than others when they strove about ambiguous words that very much of their anathematizing hath been used And when the Pope hath anathematized the Patriarch of Constantinople he hath anathematized him again yea so hath the Patriarch of Alexandria also And when the three parties the Orthodox the Nestorians and the Eutychians for so many ages have continued anathematizing each other the dishonour falleth on them all in the eyes of beholders and no party recovereth their honour with the rest § 5. Undoubtedly it is they that God shall make the blessed instruments of restoring the necessary means of Concord and thereby of reviving Christian Love and peace that will be the chief and honourable agents for the repairing of the honour of the Christian Church if ever it be repaired in this world All parties seem agreed in this even they that most foolishly and cruelly tear and distract the Church that it must be Love and Concord that at last must heal it and recover its glory if ever it be healed And how much Christ is pleased to see his servants live in Love and peace his office his nature his many and vehement Commands do tell us CHAP. VII III. What obligations are on all Christians to avoid sinful divisions and discord and to promote this Vnity and peace § 1. FRom what is already said it is easie to gather that many and great obligations are on all Christians to be promoters of Concord and enemies of discord and divisions I. The many and express commands of Christ in Scripture do oblige them This is no dark or controverted point written in words which are hard to be understood but plainly uttered and often urged Yea when several of Gods commands are mentioned this is still preferred before most others that can be imagined to stand in competition against it As the uniting Love of God is called the first and great Command so the uniting Love of man is called the second like to that and the summ of the second table and the fulfilling of the Law It is not mentioned as an Accident of the New Creature but as an essential part not as the high qualification of some rare Christian but as that which is necessary and common to all that are the living members of Christ Not only as needful to some inferiour uses but as necessary to all the great Ends of our Religion preferred before sacrifice and all the rituals and not to be dispensed with on any pretence § 2. II. No man therefore can be an obedient servant of Christ that seeketh not to keep the Vnity of the spirit in the bond of peace If he that breaketh one of the least commands and teacheth men so to do shall be called Least in the Kingdom of God what shall he be called and where shall be his lot that breaketh the greatest § 3. III. The Love of God our Father and of Christ our Redeemer doth oblige us For if he that loveth not his brother whom he seâ—th daily cannot Love God whom he never saw how much less he that loveth not the multitude of believers and so great an interest of God in the world as is that unity and concord of the body of Christ And if he that doth or doth not good to one of the least of the servants of Christ is supposed to have done it or not done it to himself how much more he that doth or omitteth that which Christ and his whole Church is so much concerned in § 4. IV. The Love of our own souls obligeth us considering how many and great impediments discord doth raise against all grace and duty and against our holiness comfort and salvation And how much Christian Love and Concord do conduce to the preservation of all grace and to the attainment of Glory All men in true Concord are our helpers and all men in discord are our hinderers and tempters How fair and easie is the way to Heaven among true Loving and agreeing Christians and how hard is it where divisions and contentions take place § 5. V. The Love of our neighbours souls obligeth us to this That which is best for us is best for them Alas carnal minds deceived by sin need not to have the way to heaven made harder nor to be tempted by the discords of Christians to despise them Their own malignity and the devils temptations when we have done our best may suffice to deceive them and undo them Every Christian should be a helper to the salvation of all about him and a souldier under Christ to fight against Satan as he
be conscionable men of upright lives will become of the same minds and look on the persecutors as the enemies of good men and of publick peace that do all this by pride and domination The ungodly rabble of drunkards prophane swearers adulterers and such like for the most part hating Godliness and strict living will cry up the Prelates and triumph over the sufferers And thus the Land will be divided the Prelates and other prosecutors with the dirty malignant rabble of the licentious will make one party and these will call themselves Orthodox and the Church The sufferers and all that pity them and like them better than the Persecutors will be the other party The conjunction of the debauched and malignant rabble with the Prelates and their party will increase sober mens disaffection to them and make men take them for the patrons of impiety And how sad a condition must such Churches be in To say nothing of the state concussions and diseases that usually follow Whatever ignorant men may dream these prognosticks are most certain as any man that can discern effects in moral causes may see and as history and sad experience prove to all men of reading observation and understanding § 13. And in Pastors of the Church this will be a double crime and shame because 1. It is their office to gather and edifie Christs flock and not to scatter and afflict them 2. Because they should most imitate Christ in tender bowels gentleness and long-suffering bearing the Lambs in their armes and not breaking the bruised reed nor quenching the smoaking flax Nurses or Mothers use not to kill their Children for crying nor to turn them out of doors because they are unclean nor to cut their throats to make them swallow bigger morsels instead of cutting their meat Much less to cast them off for obeying their father 3. Because it is supposed that they best know the will of Christ and should be best acquainted with the wayes of peace And therefore should understand Rom. 14. 15. Him that is weak in the faith Receive but not to doubtful disputations The Kingdom of God is not meats and drinks but righteousness peace and joy in the Holy Ghost And he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men that is of wise and good men but not of proud persecutors Rom. 14. 17 18. Wherefore receive ye one another as Christ also received to the Glory of God Rom. 15. 7. If the people were Schismatical and inclined to fall in pieces the Guides and builders should soder and cement them and as pillars and bases in the Church which is the house of the living God as Timothy is called should bear them up that they fall not by division § 14. In a word whoever will impartially read Church History especially of the Councils and Popes shall find that the self-conceited Usurpation of proud Prelates imposing unnecessary devices of their own professions or practices on the Churches and this with proud and fierce impatience toward dissenters and usurping a Legislation which Christ never gave them hath been the great cause of much of the hatred schisms persecutions wars rebellions against Emperours and Kings false excommunications interdicts and the disgrace of Christistianity weakning of the Church and hindering the Conversion of Jews and Infidels and been a chief Granado Thunderbolt or Wild-fire by which Satan much prospered in storming of the Church CHAP. XIII To cry out of the intolerable mischiefs of Toleration and call for sharper execution while dividing snares are made the terms of Vnion is the work of ignorant proud and malignant Church-destroyers § 1. TO tolerate all evil that pretendeth Religion is to be no friend to Religion Government or peace To tolerate no error in Religion is for no Prince to tolerate himself his wife his child or any one subject And to pretend to this is to crave self-destruction neque enim lex justior ulla est c. and to proclaim himself ignorant yea grosly ignorant what is a Church a Pastor a Government a Christian or a Man § 2. Multitudes of Books are written for and against Toleration They that are lowest usually write for it Even Jer. Taylor 's Liberty of Prophecying before he was a Bishop was thought a commendable or tolerable Book But most are against it that are in power and think they can force others to their wills But it is wise and just and impartial men that are here the discerners of the truth whose judgements are not biassed by interest or passion nor blinded by unacquaintedness with their adversaries or their cause or perverted by using only one ear and one eye He knoweth not mankind who knoweth not how greatly not only the common gang but even learned men yea and zealous religious men are to be suspected in their evil characters and reports of those that they are speaking against as adversaries It grieveth me to know and think how little most adversaries in this case are to be believed § 3. To describe the due bounds of Toleration is far from being impossible or very difficult to an understanding and impartial man But to stop the mouth or rage of Contradicters and to reconcile the multitude of ignorant proud tyrannical uncharitable interessed factious partial men to such certain measures is next impossible and never yet even among the Clergy was attained since the Spirit of infallibility simplicity and Love departed and the Spirit of darkness pride and malignity in most places got the upper hand § 4. Many and many Books of this nature I have lately read that cry down liberty and Toleration and call for greater severities and describe those whose ruine or sufferings they plead for as ignorantly and falsly as if they talkt of men at the Antipodes whom they had never seen and as if they had never heard their Cause and as cruelly as if they had been preaching to Souldiers and confuting John Baptist or preaching a Visitation Sermon to Bonner or Gardiner And yet the falshoods or injuries set off with so great confidence and well composed words and zeal against schism and error and especially for the Church and Government that it grieveth my soul to think how difficult such men do make it to strangers that must know all on trust from others and men of other business that cannot have while to search into the truth to escape deceit and the consequent mischiefs Zeal for piety is not more abused by Sectaries than zeal for themselves and their power and wealth called zeal for the Church and truth and order is abused by bad domineering men Or else the world had not been embroiled by the Clergy these twelve hundred years at least nor Rome arrived at its pernicious Greatness and power to destroy § 5. And let mens different Religions or Opinions be never so many and notable yet every where the same plea against Toleration is used and the same Arguments seem good for every
as well as wicked There is so full testimony given to the world that there is a God and a life to come that still some men will believe it and will think whither they must go next and therefore will not forsake their religion through fear seeing that is to forsake their God and their salvation 2. And if you could accomplish it it were not worth your labour If all the Princes on earth should force their subjects to be of One Religion it would be their own And then five parts of six would be Heathens and Mahometans and of the sixth part a third or fourth would be Papists and above two parts of the other three would have foul corruptions for which they would be sharply censured by the rest Is it not better that in Congo China c. Christianity is tolerated than that they had all continued of their One Religion And so is it that the Turks do tolerate the Greeks and other Christians And I think if Spain had both Papists and Protestants it were better than to have but Papists only And if the Swedes Danes and Saxons did tolerate the more Reformed it would do more good than harm If Prelacy were banished out of Scotland and England many would think it better to tolerate it § 12. It is certain that Unity and Concord is most desirable and as certain that these over-doers do destroy it while they lay it upon impossible terms 1. The most desirable Concord is in common perfection of wisdom and holiness But it 's certain it will not be nor are any perfect 2. The next desirable Concord is in such high degrees of Wisdom and Goodness as that all Christians be strong and excellent and err not notably in a word ceremony or mode But it is certain this is not to be expected 3. The next degree desirable is that all should be so far teachable and perswadeable as to yield to every truth and lawful imposition when reason is set before them But it is certain this is not to be expected And he that denyeth it knoweth not man § 13. A Peace-maker therefore must understand 1. What Concord is already among all Christians and what is of necessity to Communion with the Church universal 2. And what more is necessary to Communion in a particular Church 3. And what more is necessary to the Association and Concord of such particular Churches 4. And what is necessary only to eminency praise and special encouragement 5. And what is necessary to meer humane neighbourhood and converse And accordingly he should study 1. How all men may be used like men and all peaceable men as peaceable 2. How all Christians may be used as Christians 3. How all the members of particular Churches may hold such Concord as the ends of their society require 4. How all such Churches may keep such Love and Correspondency as tendeth to the good of all 5. And how eminent Christians may be used according to their worth 6. And how heresie and sin may be suppressed without contradicting any of these ends § 14. If once unnecessary terms of Unity and Concord be taken for necessary even multitudes of honest well meaning men will hence bend all their strength to do mischief They will think that all Peace-makers must promote these terms and all must be used as Schismaticks that are against them and so all the fore-mentioned accusations cruelties and persecutions will alas go for the work even of Peace-makers And so the common engine of Church-division and persecution and discord will be preaching and writing against Schism and crying up peace and aggravating dissent as a heinous crime even when it is a duty and making all odious as far as they can that are not of their mind The Second Part. The Terms of Concord CHAP. I. In general What are the true and only terms of Church-Vnion and Concord and what not § 1. THE true works of a Peace-maker consisteth 1. In finding out the true and necessary terms of Concord and discerning the evil and insufficiency of the false terms 2. In finding out the meet and necessary Instruments and helps 3. In discovering the Hinderances and Enemies and 4. In faithful prosecuting his known duty And the first is not the least § 2. Having proved what Christ himself hath already done in instituting the terms of Unity and Concord I shall here further shew I. In General what these Terms are and must be and what not II. What Texts of Scripture describe them III. Particularly and distinctly what they are IV. I shall answer some of the objections that are made against them And V. The false Terms shall be detected and confuted in the third Part. § 3. I. In General the terms of Catholick Unity and Concord necessary to all Christians must be and are I. Only things Great and needful II. Only things True and Sure III. Only things plain and intelligible IV. Only things of Gods institution or authority V. And but Few and not very many as to matter of Knowledge and belief § 4. If they were not such mans known incapacity would make them unfit to be any means of the intended end And this is fully proved by all the foregoing proofs of unavoidable diversity that will be found in men And I will here add yet more profs that Concord is so very difficult as that it will not be had on any stricter terms and when all is done it will be very imperfect in this life § 5. The great difficulty of Concord doth further thus appear 1. It cannot be expected but that the greatest part of men will be of low capacity and partial and ignorant and therefore uncapable of understanding higher terms than these 2. The Greater number or too many will be bad though their profest Religion be Good And bad men will be still self-troublers and troublers of others There is no Peace saith my God to the wicked They are like the troubled Sea that casteth up mire and dirt Isa 46. Piety and true Concord must grow together There will be in Christs Kingdom things that offend and men that work iniquity There will be Pastors and people that are Worldly Covetous Lovers of themselves Lovers of pleasures more than of God proud boasters haters of those that are good striving who shall be greatest And these will be unfit materials in the building as to full unity peace and concord 3. Yea there will be Satans Souldiers and bitter enemies to true piety in the Ministry and all ranks of men In the same houshold as he that was born after the flesh did persecute him that was born after the Spirit even so saith St. Paul is it now and so it will be The first born man was a murderer of his own brother because his works were evil and his brothers good 4. And Christ saith that the Rich shall hardly enter into heaven And yet we see the Rich will be the Rulers It hath been so and will be so and
persecute them and never repent of it because they err How many Lutherans slander Calvinists and they the Lutherans and Papists and Protestants oft make each others matters seem otherwise than they are Yea so do Conformists and Nonconformists Anabaptists and Padobaptists and most that disagree and yet repent not thinking that to be true that is not and so that they do well § 10. Therefore two things must concur in the sin that deserveth an Excommunication from Catholick Communion 1. That it be such as some call a Mortal sin that is Not a sin of meer infirmity and ignorance which may consist with sincere Love to God and holiness and subjection to the Government of Christ but a sin which in an impenitent person proveth the absence of such Subjection and Love And the mark of this is That it be a sin which is so much in the power of the Will that no one can keep it that is sincerely willing to leave it and which must be known to be sin by all that are truly willing to know it A sin that men may know if they are willing and had rather keep than leave 2. And that it be unrepented of and such as due information and perswasion with patience do not bring the sinner to repent of A heinous mortal wilful sin unrepented of § 11. By this it appeareth who is to be sentenced cut off from the Catholick Church and who not None but those that first really depart because the sentence must be true and just And this departure is either direct by Apostasie renouncing God the Father the Son or the Holy Ghost or some essential part of Godliness or Christianity 2. Or indirectly when men deny not any of these in words but in works do that which is evidently inconsistent with them and may be so discerned by any willing mind § 12. And hence it appeareth 1. that the number of these is greater than the Pastors that cast off true discipline do acknowledge That is All those that are guilty of living in such sins as the common light of nature detecteth to every willing mind such as are fornication adultery drunkenness perjury malignity persecution slanderous preaching or speech hating others especially for good c. and are obstinate in refusing to repent and amend And alas how great a number live in our Churches never excommunicated nor publickly admonished who lye in such sins and will not repent The Papists Priests themselves conform by unjust oaths and professing to assent and consent to many Decrees and Canons of Councils which are false and sinful and by many other sinful practices Their very persecution of men better than themselves on false pretences of heresie and schism is a crime that many were they truly willing might soon know Drunkenness whoredom lying perjury prophane swearing cursing and slandering covetous and proud oppressing and many such like yea even professed Saduceism and infidelity and deriding serious Godliness are all too common in the world Yet few of all these are ever excommunicated § 13. 2. Yet hence also it is plain that the commonest sort of Excommunications for these thousand years at least have been but the acts of carnal tyrannical usurpation like a plague or publick war or fire to the Churches Viz. I. Anathematizing men for a dark ambiguous word or phrase though inept and though in the obvious sence by undiscerned consequence it might be inconsistent with the essentials of Religion is tyrannical and unjust § 14. 1. When the words only are bad and the man doth not so mean them this is no heresie in the man If that word which signifieth God or Heaven should in another language or by mis-information be used to signifie Satan or Hell and so have opprobrious epithers annexed this were no blasphemy or errour in the man For he used the words as significations of his mind And they are not Natural but arbitrary signs Else all unskilful speakers would be hereticks Yea all men would be damned For there are few words but are ambiguous or of many sens◠and are good in one sence and bad in another § 15. 2. And as Amesius hath well noted there is so harmonious a connexion between all the Moral parts of Religion that if you deny any one by consequence it will overthrow the rest and every errour though not in History topography Genealogy Chronology c. yet in morality wrongeth yea subverteth the foundation § 16. 3. And not only Davenant Morton Hall but all peace-making Divines are agreed that unseen consequences are not to be taken for a mans judgement rather than the contrary truths which he professedly owneth § 17. For instances I will over-pass the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not resolve the Controversie whether Eusebius Caesariensis proved by D. Petavius and others to have been indeed an Arian after all his great labours in his History his Praeparatio Demonstratio Evangelica ought to have been cut off from the Catholick Church or whether Constantine justly chid Alexander as well as Arius for their contention Nor whether Hilary justly blamed the making of New Creeds beginning with the Nicene Nor whether Justin and all the rest of the Ancient Fathers whose words Petavius citeth as speaking as the Arians should have been Excommunicated Doubtless the denyal of Christs Godhead is the denyal of his Essence But there be subtile School-men that think the word substance is spoken of God but equivocally or metaphorically yea some and no small men or number say the same of Ens it self which yet the Scotists contradict them in And many choose rather to call God A Pure Act than a substance And these men think that they that know not what substance meaneth as spoken of God should not excommunicate men for denying Christ to be of the 〈◊〉 substance unless they better understood the subject And they think that Damascene that subtilly calleth God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must needs be as guilty as they that denyed Christ to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that where there is no substance there is no same substance And therefore thinking that some men mean the same word heretically and some well they wish that the word had never been put into a Creed which must be the test of all Church-members Though the word be true § 18. But there are abundance of other heresies that I may safely instance in as Philastrius * yea and Epiphanius have described them I am ashamed to mention some ridiculous heresies in Philastrius as calling the stars by the names of living Creatures and other better And divers in Epiphanius are not much worse But I will speak only of three or four that have made the greatest divisions in the Church § 19. I. Cyprian with his African Councils with Firmilian judging for the re-baptization of those baptized by hereticks was judged a heresie which their Countreymen the Donatists followed Yet Augustine saith that Cyprian was no heretick for it And
Ministers be tryed men of sound understanding in that which they must teach and do and therefore that both the ordainers and the hearers try them This account of their understanding is better than the imposing of humane forms upon them for subscription Not but that Teachers should know more than the flock that is than the essentials nor that I presume to condemn all the Churches that impose their Confessions to be subscribed in their own and not in Scripture-words while they keep only to necessary certain things But I shall afterward prove that this way though tolerable is not best but unnecessary and dangerous 1. the Scripture affording us apt words enow to form our Confessions in which are past Controversie 2. and there being no probability of bounding mens Impositions of this kind when once they set upon this way 3. and most Confessions of that nature now extant having some needless words which other Churches or good Christians do dissent from 4. And the ancient Creeds understood which the ordainers must try and the old Catechistical Verities being sufficient to this use 5. And there being means of restraining men from preaching and vending heresies which are more safe and congruous 3. I add therefore that a certain Confession containing the certainest and needfullest Integrals of Religion should or may well be drawn up as a Law forbidding all upon meet penalties to preach or speak against them without any subscribing promising or professing 4. And upon proof of the violating of such a Law and preaching against such articles it is sufficient that both the Church and the Christian Magistrate in their several ways may judge them and by just penalties correct them of which more after in due place For it is very hard so to form long Confessions beyond the old Creeds Lords Prayer Decalogue and the General belief of Scripture and this not in Scripture-terms which shall not have some words which sound and honest Ministers cannot assent to without lying which they will not do But to silence many words which yet we conceive true and forbear speaking against some things which yet he cannot profess assent to there are very few sober men but will do And an errour never spoken or written hurts not others nor is to be judged being not known Non apparere here is as non esse And if it be vended the person may be judged as well as if he had sworn subscribed or promised And they that will tell us yet what evil may befall secret whispering errours without out such oaths subscriptions or promises do by this over-doing dangerously undo and lest man should be man and the Church imperfect on pretence of avoiding a possible unavoidable hurt they will set up knaves that will say any thing shut out honest men and necessitate divisions confusions and persecutions where they can never stop on this side banishing or killing or continued imprisoning multitudes of faithful men and never the more attain their ends Sound doctrine may be kept up as far as is to be hoped by the aforesaid means § 41. III. It is greatly needful to the well-being of Ministry and Church that Gods publick worship and Sacraments be kept pure Not that any thing done by man will be void of imperfection but that it be such as is acceptable to God honourable to Religion and profitable and suitable to the flock and to good men To which end 1. Christian simplicity here also is necessary That it be not corrupted or clogged with things uncertain needless curious nor yet much defective not confused disorderly much less erroneous superstitious ludicrous undecent false or prophane 2. It is needful that men to be ordained be tryed and known to be such as can speak to God and men without such unsufferable mis-performance 3. And that they be responsible to the Church and Magistrate for what they say and do Of Liturgies I am to speak in the third Part Only here 4. I add that fit words and spiritual life are the body and soul of worship and one must not be pleaded against another nor any by Formality mortifie holy worship and turn it into a Carkass or a lifeless image Nor yet on pretence of spirituality condemned the frequent use of the same words commonly called Forms whether prepared by the speaker who best knoweth what he needeth or agreed on by the Churches in fit cases and measures for greater Concord § 42. IV. It is needful to the well-being of the Ministry and Churches that all Pastors in their places be not only allowed to use Christs true Discipline but that it be expected and really done in every Church and that this Discipline be neither cast aside nor corrupted and turned into malignant war against the good nor into tyranny and usurpation § 43. What this Discipline is is opened before It is described by Christ in Matth. 18. If thy brother trespass against thee tell him his fault between thee and him If he hear thee thou hast won thy brother If he hear thee not take with thee two or three If he hear not them tell the Church If he hear not the Church let him be to thee as a Heathen or a publican Serious convincing admonition must be used with due patience to bring a sinner to repentance And more publick admonition after private And the person sentenced unfit for Christian Communion when refusing all he sheweth himself utterly impenitent And he must be reconciled absolved and received when he giveth the Church just proof of his true repentance § 44. 1. It is a great corruption of this Discipline when it is exercised by Lay-Chancellors or other Lay-men to whom the Keyes of the Church-Government were never committed by Christ § 45. 2. It is a great corruption when it is done only by an officer of another species than Christ ever instituted § 46. 3. It is an usurpation and corruption when it is done by the Pastor of some other Church and not by the proper Pastor of the Church where the sinner liveth Such is Papal Usurpation when the Bishop of Rome will be judge in London § 47. 4. Especially when such a pretender liveth far from the place where persons and actions are not half known and that only by great charge and travel When the Pastor and people of the present Church may easily know all and it belongeth to them who are executively either to communicate with him or avoid him which distant strangers have no opportunity or occasion to do further than by declared consent § 48. 5. It is a heinous corruption of it to Excommunicate men in a prophane worldly manner without wise serious patient endeavours to apply Gods word to the sinners case and conscience to bring him to true repentance and amendment § 49. 6. And it is yet more heinous abuse to excommunicate the faithful for a fearful avoiding sin in some imposed Oath Covenant Profession promise subscription or unnecessary Ceremony or Form and especially withal
Pastor is dead it is an existent Community and virtually and morally a Political Church because by the Law and the peoples resolution another is to be seasonably chosen As an elective Kingdom in the interregnum is virtually and morally a Kingdom But if the purpose of chosing a Successour be changed the Kingdom and so the Church is dissolved or changed into somewhat else § 12. 5. It is indifferent to the being though not usually to the well-being of a Church whether it have one Pastor or many § 13. 6. The number of the people though not precisely determined must be competent to the Ends of the Society If it be Greater or smaller than is necessary to the Ends it is no Church of this defined species As Logicians say of the subject of other relations If a Boat or Ship be no bigger than a spoon it is not a Boat or Ship but equivocally And it may be so big as to be no Boat or Ship when it is uncapable of the Ends. A Family is too small to be a City And a Kingdom or the world is too big Dispositio materiae est necessaria ad receptionem formae § 14. 7. It is impossible to be a Church without the cement of Consent professed or cordial If many be forced into a Temple not consenting it is a Prison and they are not a Church If they consent only to meet on other occasions or for some occasional act of Religion it is not thereby made a Church If they be commanded to consent and do not and if it only be their duty it maketh them not a Church but only proveth that they ought to be one No Law or command maketh a Church without Consent But this Consent may be divers waies expressed The plainest most obliging way is best but is not absolutely necessary In some times and cases it may be more needful than at others especially at the first gathering and forming of a Church sometime ordinary Communion or attendance specially of persons born in that Church may signifie necessary Consent It 's pity then that men should be so weak as some to make express Covenanting of each member with the Church and Pastor necessary and others to deride it when it is laudable ad bene esse but not necessary ad esse But some signification of Consent is necessary ad esse that is A Consent to be a member of the society and submit to the Pastor and hold Communion with the Church to the Ends in the definition And the plainer this is exprest it is the fitter to satisfie the Church and oblige the person But whether the Consent be signified by words writings or deeds is undetermined No man can have the great priviledges of a member either of the universal or particular Church against or without his will and consent And no Minister not consenting can be a Pastor to any The Relation of a Church member consisteth in a Right to great benefits due to no refuser or unwilling person and in obligation to duty contracted by Consent besides the obligation of Gods Command We can no further prove any Company of Christians to be a Church than we can prove that they Consent to Church relation for Church Ends. § 15. Christianity it self consisteth in a believing Consent to the Covenant of Grace and as no man is a Christian nor hath right to Christ and his saving benefits without Consent so no man can have right to the Sacraments that seal and deliver this Covenant and benefits without consent No Christian in his wits is for the Baptizing of any adult person that consenteth not And the Lords Supper is a seal of the same Covenant and no more due to non-consenters than Baptism And as it is not enough to say I am willing to be Baptized but not by a Minister or not in the order appointed by Christ so it is not enough to say I would have the Sacrament and Communion with the Church but I will not submit to the Ministry Doctrine Worship or Discipline of that Church For this is as great a contradiction as to say I will be a servant to you but I will not work or obey but only have my wages or I will be a Soldier but I will not fight but be paid He that will have Communion with the Church must consent to the Ministry Worship and Discipline of that Church in which Communion consisteth § 16. And if a Minister shall be so imposed on as that any man or woman may come when they please and force him to give them the Sacrament of Communion without consenting to take him for their Pastor or to be taught or guided by him yea or give him satisfactory notice that they know what the Sacrament is or who Christ is he is a slave and not a Pastor Baser than any School-master Philosopher or Physicion that are not forced to take a Scholar Pupil or Patient against their will or that will not take them for their Teacher or Physicion and obey them § 17. Yet if on this pretence any Bishop or Pastor will impose unnecessary Covenants promises or professions on the Church or any Christians and make their wills a Law and oblige men to give them any other Belief or Obedience than truly belongeth to the Pastoral Office and so will set up a tyranny instead of a Christian Ministry they are not herein to be obeyed lest we be guilty of the corruption § 18. Yea if every integral part of the Pastors power and the peoples duty be put into such Promises or Contracts and the people required to profess their Consent as a necessary condition of their Communion it is sinful tyranny contrary to Gods Law and common reason and the constant practice of the Primitive Church Christ himself requireth unto Baptism no other Consent as necessary save to the essentials of Religion A thousand Integrals may be unknown to the Baptized and are so to most Christians It is our duty never to think speak or do amiss But Christ maketh not such duty necessary to our Baptism Christianity or Church Communion It is the duty of every member of a single Church to hear believe and obey the Pastor in many things where the best may fail To excommunicate a man therefore for not subscribing or professing assent to some unnecessary doubtful form for not being convinced by a Lay-Chancellours sayings in a doubted case or for not paying the Court Fees or for not appearing the day that one is summoned to appear at the Chancellours Court and such like are but tyrannical Schismatical acts The King himself is satisfied with the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacie and doth not require all the subjects no nor the wisest Lawyers or Judges to swear subscribe or profess that they assent and consent to all the Laws of the land § 19. 8. The great Controversie of the age and many ages is about the true and formal difference between the lowest species of Churches which
will say You shall not communicate with us unless you will swear or say or do some unnecessary thing it is he then that is the divider and unjustly casteth out a Christian CHAP. VII What are the necessary terms of Concord of these single Churches with one another in the same Kingdome or in divers § 1. THat they be under the Government of a Christian Magistrate is necessary to the well-being or great advantage of them though not to the being of which more in due place § 2. That they live as neighbour Churches in Unity of faith and love and avoid all things contrary and to their power help each other according to need and opportunity is their duty § 3. It is necessary that they agree in all things necessary to the communion of men as members of the Church universal mention'd before and in all things essential to particular Churches § 4. If any one excommunicated justly for heresie apostasie or impenitence in any crimes shall offer to defile and endanger any other Church by intrusion or deceit the Church which cast him out is bound by the Laws of Love and Concord to send notice to such endangered neighbour Churches of the person and his case to prevent their hurt And unless the Church that cast him out have criminally forfeited their credit other Churches are bound by the Law of Charity to take their sentence as probably just and not to receive the ejected person till he have either proved his sentence unjust or profess repentance Not that they are bound absolutely to exclude him and deny him audience though yet they claim no superiority over the Church that excommunicated him but as neighbours and parts of the same Church universal they must hear both sides before they deny any Christian communion that claimeth it at least when his allegations have great probability of truth and seem to weigh down all that they have received against him And they may absolve the Criminal upon a just profession of true repentance but such a prosession will not stand with a refusal to confess in the same Church where the man sinned without some special probable reason it being that Church which is most wronged by the scandal and hath heard the causes § 5. If any Church in the same Kingdom or another be accused of violating the Christian faith or of any crime which Christians are bound to disown by avoiding the criminal it is the duty of the accused Church to be ready to satisfie the offended Churches by answering the accusation not as to Rulers by the reasons of obedience but as to Christian neighbours by the rule of common equity and love and for the preservation of unity and peace § 6. If the charge be but general that the Church is guilty of heresie or unsoundness in the faith it is the duty of the accused Church to send to the offended the Profession of their Faith and Religion which need to be no more than this which the offended ought to take as satisfactory We hereby profess that we stand to our Baptismal Covenant fiducially believing in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost our Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier and give up our selves to him accordingly in these Relations Believing the articles of all the Creeds in which the universal Church ever agreed and desiring the things contained in the Lords Prayer and consenting to obey the ten Commandements as delivered to us in nature and by Christ and we profess our obligation and Consent to Believe Love and obey all that we do or shall understand to be the revealed word of God even the sacred Canonical books of Scripture and in this common Belief and Love and practice to livein the Communion of the unniversal Church of Christ Renouncing the Devil the world and the flesh as they are enemies to any of this and all doctrines desires and practices contrary hereunto so far as unfeignedly to endeavour to resâ—â—t and overcome them and when we 〈◊〉 and sin to rise by true repentance And all this in Hope of the Love of God the Father the Grace of the Son in our Pardon Justification and Adoption and the Communion of the Holy Ghost and of the Perfection of these and of our selves with the Church in everlasting Glory This may be briefly exprest in Baptism and to present persons that may receive our explications where they doubt of our understanding or sincerity But to distant suspecting persons or Churches such largeness is useful and this is enough § 7. But if any particular heresie or crime be charged on a neighbour Church it is not to be believed without proof nor they to be disclaimed till the charge be sent to them and their defence be heard And herein they ought to offer satisfaction to the offended Church 1. By denying the charge if false 2. By explaining words and actions which are ambiguous and to be suspected 3. In controverted cases by renewing the foresaid profession of all that is necessary explicitely to be held and promising to renounce any opinion or practice as soon as they perceive it contrary thereto 4. And in all cases of words or deeds expressly contrary to Gods doctrine or Law or which they shall be convinced to be sinfull to confess the errour or crime and humbly crave the prayers of the Church for pardon and profess their purpose of future reformation This is the means and this is enough for the offenders satisfaction And if the errour be no real and discerned denyal of any necessary article of faith but an undiscerned remote consequential contrariety with which the professed holding of that particular necessary article which they seem to overthrow may stand that Church or person is not to be rejected from Communion or hereticated For instance If a Church be accused to be Nestorians or Eutychians or Monothelites their answer ought to be Mary is the Mother of Christ who is God and in that sense of God but not of the Deity or as God And Christs Naâ—ures Wills and operations are two as distinct but not two as divided But if they have not so much easie skill to explain themselves but say rudely as Nestorius I will not say that God was two or three months old or as Cyril and Eutychius and Dioscorus Christs natures were two before the Union but since One and not Two if withal they prosess that they believe Christ to be true God and true man in one person and do not destroy deny or confound the Godhead and manhood or any other essential point of faith or religion they ought not to be hereticated or rejected § 8. No Church hath power or duty to deny any other Communion to another Church or person but such as they had power to grant them But to remote persons or Churches never seen by them as in other lands or Countries they can grant them no Presential local Communion but only Mental Therefore they can eject them from none but mental They
as that they forfeit their Toleration § 47. Those are to be accounted Intolerable who do more hurt than good and whose silencing and suppression will do more good than harm All men are faulty and do some harm And few are so bad as to do no good But that which prevaileth must prevail in the judgement of the Magistrate And yet when the suppression of a hurtful person will do by accident much more hurt to the Church or Commonwealth than the doth as it may fall out he is not to be so hurtfully suppressed § 48. Those therefore are intolerable in the Ministry 1. who through ignorance or disability are utterly insufficient for the necessary acts of the office and so will marr and disgrace the work appointed them and make Religious exercises scorned 2. Those that are hereticks in a strict sense that is that deny any Article of faith or practice necessary to Salvation or preach that which plainly overthroweth it 3. Those that are against or utterly corrupt any necessary part of Church-order or of the publick worship of God so as that God accepteth not worship so corrupted or that it tendethto more hurt than good to the assembly 4. those that will not profess the Essentials of Christianity Ministry and Church Communion 5. Those that live such scandalous and wicked lives as disgrace the Ministry and do more hurt than they do good 6. Those that will not promise and perform necessary diligence in the work of the Ministry which they undertake but idly neglect the flock 7. Those that by malignity and misapplication of truth turn their preaching or discourse to the reproach of serious godliness making people think that it is needless or hypocrisie 8. Those that will not promise and perform subjection to the supream Governours of the Kingdom or Republick 9. Those that will not forbear such reviling of Tolerable dissenters as tendeth plainly to destroy love and peace and to turn publick assemblies into stages of malignant strife 10. Those whose Religion or opinion is for burning destroying or exterminating either all dissenters or the innocent or tolerable while they call them Hereticks or that are for the subjecting of Kings or States or people to foreign Usurpers or for giving such a foreign Usurper power to excommunicate depose or murther Kings or temporal Lords and absolve their subjects from their Oaths of allegiance or force them to destroy or exterminate their innocent or tolerable subjects and that exempt the Clergy from subjection to Kings § 49. The Approved Tolerable and Intolerable thus distinguished and thus used by the Magistrate will best answer the ends and interest of Christianity and the Laws of Christ and will do as much to preserve Love Unity and peace as is on earth to be expected which all other contrary ways will unavoidably violate CHAP. IX Objections answered § 1. 1. SOme object against any restraint in Religion and the countenancing and preferring of one sort before others and say that the Magistrate should equally tolerate all or else he will discontent those that are but tolerated and much more those whom he useth as intolerable But this is so unchristian and unreasonable that I think it needless to say much against it Few men that believe there is a God and a life to come and that religion is mans duty and interest can believe that God hath appointed Government for no higher ends than our bodily peace and safety If men once believed what divers Popes have written that the office of the Priest excelleth the Kings as far as the soul excelleth the body and as the Sun excelleth the Stars it would cause religious people to set as light by Kings as they do by these worldly things which Kings have power over § 2. 2. Obj. But each party think themselves in the right and Kings and Parliaments are fallible and if they trouble those that are in the right they are persecutors if others yet they shall be accounted so Answ Being is before Thinking either the King is in the right or the sufferers If they are in the Right either their cause is evident and such as a willing diligent person may understand or not If it be clear the Prince is a persecutor that troubleth them If it be too hard for him he is unfit to be an active man against them for he cannot do it in faith and therefore sinneth and may be a persecutor for ought he knoweth If he or they be ignorant through wilfulness or negligence it will not excuse them If their cause seem clearly good to them and clearly bad to him one of them must needs be sinfully erroneous and it is the erring party that God is against who will be the final judge § 3. 3. Obj. But it is a thing that Princes and Statesmen are ignorant of they are not bred up in the study of Religion Bishops and Clergy-men are liker to understand such matters and it is their work Ans 1. God hath commanded that Kings and all Rulers study his word As Justices should know the Kings Laws the King and they should know Gods Laws It is as truly their office to Rule by them as it is the Ministers to Teach and Guide by them Government by the Sword and Church Government by the word and Keys are to be exercised according to the same Law of God and both have their use about causes Ecclesiastical in which we swear the King to be supreme as to that part which is to be done by the sword or corporal force 2. This objection long used by Popes and their Prelates hath been sufficiently confuted by themselves Church history putteth us quite past doubt that it went ill with the Church while the Clergy had all the power of Religion It hath been Popes and Prelates and Priests that have worse corrupted Religion and disgraced the Church and embroiled the world in religious quarrels and Schisms than ever Emperors and Kings have done Thirteen hundred years lamentable experience confuteth such thoughts as many have and as I have sometime been tempted to my self how well it would go with the Church if the disposal of all matters of Religion were rather in the hands of the Bishops and Clergy than of Kings and Parliaments Nay rarely are any Magistrates so hot for persecution and religious cruelty as the Bishops and Clergy or those that are stirr'd up by them against dissenters or one another The doleful devastations and Schisms about Nestorianism Eutychinnism and such like were caused more by the Bishops than the Magistrates And though Constantius and Valens did much against truth and peace it was by their Clergies instigation He that will consider the lives of Constantine M. Theodosius Senior and Theodosius Junior Aâ—astasius c. and of Charles Otho the Henries and others since in the West will see how much ado the Emperors had to keep the Prelates from Schisms and confusions And he that readeth but the Laws of the Spanish French
and unskilful Mountebanks have long tryed in vain CHAP. III. More of the same subject Twenty things necessary in all that will deliver the Church from Schism Sect. I. BEcause this dividing Spirit goeth not easily out I shall repeat and summe up the common Duties of all men that will herein successefully serve the Church for it is not every man that is fit for so excellent a work though every man be bound to it in his place The sad Experience of the World assureth us that hitherto few skilful and effectual Physicians have been found Sect. II. In short all men that will promote the Churches concord whether Magistrates Pastors or People must observe all these following things as the necessary means which if they be wanting yea but one of them the Churches will be so far disquieted and diseased 1. The foresaid simple Terms of Union must be understood and received and false and ensnaring terms must be avoided 2. Magistrates must preferre Christs interest before their own and see that their own lyeth in preferring his and must value conscionable upright men though dissenters in tolerable cases and not encourage their unconscionable enemies And must keep peace among the Clergy and among all 3. Men must be taught to place their Religion in worshipping God in Spirit and Truth and to study the power and practice of Godliness Sobriety Justice and Charity more than Opinions self-exalting or Will-worship and to love their Neighbours as themselves and do as they would be done by 4. Men must learn of Christ to see the amiableness of Sincerity and Holiness under many differences and weaknesses and so love what is amiable and bear with what is tolerable and pardon what is pardonable in all and to receive the weak even in the Faith but not to doubtfull Disputations and to speak more of the Good that is in upright men than of the Evil yea never speak evil of any man till they be certain of the truth nor then till they be well satisfied that it is like to do more good than harm 5. Men must labour to know themselves and be acquianted with their own fallibility and defectibility mutability and insufficiency and to remember how much they have to be pardoned and tolerated and so to cast the first stone at themselves to fly from Pride and know how unmeet they are to be the Rule of all mens Judgments and Practices or to seem so wise as that none shall be tolerated that differ from them nor speak publickly to God but in the words which they prescribe 6. Men must not be too strange to one another nor keep too distant for neerness and acquaintance reconcileth and distance cherisheth false reports and suspicions and men take liberty to hear think and speak ill of strangers behind their backs which familiarity would cure 7. None but Volunteers must be taken for true Christians nor admitted to holy Communion to receive the Seals of Pardon and Life 8. To use more a friendly discoursing way for convincing Dissenters than disgracefull passionate militant disputations Though dangerous seducers must be confuted by necessary disputation 9. To abhorre Envy and Emulation the Off-spring of Selfishness and Pride and not to grudge at other mens esteem that are preferred before us especially that Preachers and Pastors envy not the preference of other Teachers nor murmur at their liberty honour or success but rejoyce with Paul Phil. 1. that Christ is preached though it be by Contentious men that do it in Envy and Strife to adde affliction to the afflicted 10. To dread Persecution and unjust violence to men of Conscience and not to force them to sin and damnation by bearing down Conscience in unnecessary things 11. To be well furnished with holy Reason and Love and for Ministers to be confined to the use of these from all use of Violence by the Sword and kept to their proper work and Government by the Word and Church-keyes 12. To rebuke and frown away malignant and Religious Calumniators Whisperers Censurers and Backbiters 13. To teach the People wherein the uniting Substance of Religion doth consist and what a sin it is to be censorious and separate causelesly from others and represent their different Opinions Modes and Circumstances of Worship unjustly odious to stirre up other mens hatred and separating distastes and how great a sin and danger Schism or Division is 14. To avoid all needless novelties and singularities and to keep to Vincent Lerinensis's Measure of holding to that which hath ever been received as necessary by the whole Church and was the primitive Faith and Religion 15. To avoid contending about meer ambiguous words and ever to agree of the sence of all the terms before you enter on further disputation and to suspect such ambiguity in all debates 16. As Magistrates must be just and impartial so people must be taught to obey them under Christ in all lawfull things belonging to their Office and that as a part of their Obedience to God 17. Peace-makers must be men of Piety and blameless Lives that may honour their works and not by scandal harden adversaries nor lay Stumbling-blocks before the weak and such as study to do good to all 18. They must submit to men of the lowest and weakest ranks and not despise them and the strong must bear the Infirmities of the weak restoring the fallen with the spirit of meekness remembring that they also may be tempted 19. They must not expect such a degree of Concord on Earth as is not to be expected lest for want of it they be tempted to murmur at God doubt of Religion and make the breach wider by unjust severities against the weak 20. When any are accused of Heresie or Scandal they must be ready with patience to give satisfaction to others to the Churches to Rulers to Equals or Inferiors Referring them to their Profession of Faith and answering what is charged on them and willingly amending what they are convinced is amiss But all this and much more I have formerly written in a Book called The Cure of Church-divisions CHAP. IV. Popery or the Papacie will never unite the Church Sect. I. I Come now to prove the insufficiency and ineptness of the terms of Union which many men have devised and obtruded on the Churches Repeating that few things more divide than false Means of uniting while these engage men to set against all that cannot yield to them And I shall begin with the terms of the Papal party as being the chief Pretenders Sect. II. The Papists think that the way of Union and avoiding Schism is for one Man the Pope of Rome to be taken for the Universal Vicar of Christ on Earth even the governing Head under Christ of all the Christians on Earth yea and of all the World in order to make them Christians and that the Church on Earth is one such politick Body of which Christ is the invisible Head of influence and the Pope is the visible Head
one Nature only but they meant that Christ had but one Nature as undivided which the Orthodox granted but denied not that the Godhead and Manhood were distinct And what was the difference then but whether the undivided Godhead and Manhood should be called one Nature or two which truly in one sense was two and in another one The like was the Monothelites Heresie for and against which were many Councils about one or two Wills and Operations no more disagreeing than as aforesaid about the sense of One and Two And had not a wise Explication and patient Reconciliation done better service than Cursing did whose doleful effects Hatred Hereticating and Schism continue to this day Should I come to the Councils about Images and that at Constantine that decreed the Tribus Capitulis and the multitudes since that have deposed Emperors and Kings raised Wars set up Popes and Anti-Popes c. Alas how sad a History would it be to convince us that Councils of Bishops have caused most of the Schisms Church-Tyranny Rebellions and Confusions in the Christian world And if the Popes have been restrained or deposed or Schisms at Rome partly stopt by any the flame hath quickly more broke out and condemned Popes have oft got the better of them And if one Council hath said That the Pope is responsible another hath determined the contrary If Basil and Constance decreed That a Council be called every ten years it was not done but was a mockery in the event In a word Councils of Bishops have been but Church-Armies of which at first the Patriarchs were Generals and afterwards Popes and Emperors and came to fight it out for Victory the sequel being usually Schism and Calamity And must this be the only way of Universal Peace CHAP. VII The Vniversal Church will never unite in many pretended Articles of Faith not proved to be Divine nor in owning unnecessary doubtful Opinions or Practices as Religious or Worship of God notwithstanding the pretense of Tradition Sect. I. I Need say no more for proof of this than is said in the first Part. If Preachers say that this or that is an Article of Faith If Popes say it If Councils say it this saying will never unite all Christians in the belief of it It is no belief of God whose object is not revealed by God and perceived so to be and received as such That the sacred Scriptures are written by Divine Inspiration Christians are commonly agreed But that Popes Prelates or Councils speak by Divine Inspiration even when they expound the Scriptures all Christians neither are agreed nor ever will be And till a man perceiveth that it is God that speaketh or that the word spoken is Gods Word he cannot believe it with a Divine Faith which is nothing but believing it to be Gods Word and trusting it accordingly God is true but men are Lyers Rom. 3. Sect. II. Before we can receive any thing as Truth from Man we must have evidence that it is true indeed And that must be 1. Either from the nature of the thing and its causes 2. Or from some testimony of God either concomitant as Miracles were or subsequent in the Effects 3. Or from our knowledge of the Veracity Authority Inspiration and Infallibility of the Instrument or Speaker If therefore any Church or company of men shall tell us that this is a Divine Truth or Article of Faith no more of the World can be expected to believe them than are convinced of it by one of these three proofs The first is the case of natural Revelation and not now questioned The Second none but the Church of Rome do plead for their own belief viz. that they work Miracles and therefore are to be believed in whatever they affirm to be the Word of God Knot against Chillingworth and others of them do ultimately resolve their Faith or their proof of the truth of their Religion into the Miracles wrought in the Church of Rome by which God testifieth his approbation of their Assertions Other Christians that may have more miracles than Papists yet resolve not their proof of Christianity into them but lay more stress on other Evidence and particularly on Christs and his Ministers miracles attesting the holy Scriptures and Gospel to be of God And when we can find just proof of the Papists Miracles we shall be willing to study the meaning of them But hitherto we have not found such proof If any Council in Rome France Germany or England shall say These are Divine revealed Truths and as such you must believe subscribe or swear to them the world will never agree in believing them when no sober man is bound to believe them but as humane uncertain and fallible witnesses according to the measure of their Credibility Sect. III. Long experience fully proveth this No Age of the Church did ever agree in Articles of meer humane Assertion for that had been but a humane Faith That which the Council of Nice said was denyed by the Councils at Sirmium Ariminum c. That which the Council at Ephesus the first and at Chalcedon affirmed they at the Council of Ephesus the second denyed That which the Monotholites under Philippicus innumerable Bishops saith Binius affirmed many other Councils condemned That which the Council at Nice the second decreed for Images was condemned by many other Councils That which the Councils at â—isa Constance and Basil decreed to be Articles of Faith the Council at Florence and others abhorre Much less will a Provincial Synod or a Convocation or a Parliament be taken by all the Christian world to be infallible Sect. IV. And indeed the obtruding of â—alshoods or Uncertainties on the Churches is a notorious cause of Schism For what can you expect that men of Sobriety and Conscience should do in such a case Discern the certainty of the thing they cannot nor can they believe that all must needs be true that is said by a Synod a Convocation or a Parliament And they dare not lie in saying they believe that which they do not And to take all for Schismaticks that dare not deliberately lie or that set not up 〈◊〉 men as Lords of their Conscience instead of God is Schismatical unchristian and inhumane And as mens mere wills ought not to rule their understandings nor the will of Synods of Bishops or others to be the rule and measure of our wills so though we were never so willing to believe all to be true that Councils of Bishops or Princes say 〈◊〉 are not our understandings in the power of our 〈◊〉 We cannot believe what we list To know or believe without evidence of truth is to see without light False Hypocrites may force their tongues to say that they believe this or that at the Command of man but they cannot force themselves indeed to believe 〈◊〉 How then can a book of Articles or the Decrees of a Council or the Laws of a Prince bring the World to any unity
of Belief in things not evidently of God Sect. V. What I say of Divine Faith I say of Points of Religious Practice For though all things believed be not to be done yet all things to be done as commanded by God must first be believed to be commanded by him And to believe and do is somewhat more than only to believe Sect. VI. But it 's one thing to say This is Gods Command and another to say This is our Command The first none will agree to that see not evidence to believe it The second is 1. Either according to Gods Command to drive Men to obey it 2. Or beside his Command 3. Or against his Command 1. Those Laws of Men which are according to Gods Laws those only will obey who discern them so to be on that account Therefore it must be in evident Cases or they will be no measure of Concord as such 2. Those that are but besides Gods Laws Men should obey so far as they can find that the Commanders have power from God to make them And how few such will be matter of Universal Concord 3. Those that are against Gods Laws no good Christians will knowingly consent to Sect. VII And I have before truly told them what great diversity of capacities and understandings there be in the world so that even in common matters that are still before our eyes at least in many or most few persons long agree In matters of Fact at any distance or matters of Prudence Husband and Wife Parents and Children Master and Servants daily differ Mens faces scarce differ more than their understandings It is only in few plain easie things that all Men are agreed And are ever all Christians like to agree in many humane dark opinions Or will it be taken for certain to all Men because it is so to some of clearer understandings or because a self-confident Imposer vevehemently asserteth it They know not themselves they know no Man that presume to unite the Church this way Sect. VIII Therefore the Popish numerous Decrees de Fide are but so many Engines of Schism made on the pretence of declaring Points of Faith If they were Articles of Faith before they may be maniâ—est to be so in the Divine Revelation that is the Holy Scriptures But for the Council to tell a Man This or That is in the Bible but we cannot shew you it there nor can you find it if you search but you must take our words as infallible This is not a center that the Christian world will ever unite in And if it be an Article of Faith either the Church held it before the Council declared it or not If they did then it was known without a Councils Declaration And what need a Council to declare that which all the Church did hold before and was in possession of But if not then either it was an Article of Faith before or not If it was then the Church before held not that Faith and so was Heretical Corrupt or wanted Faith and so by their own reckoning who will not endure the distinction of essentials from the rest was no Church If not then the Council declared that to be an Article of Faith which was none It must be such before it can be truly declared such else a false Declaration that it was such did now make it such But if they had openly professed That by Declaring it an Article they meant the Making one they must prove 1. That they are Prophets and have new Revelations even of Faith 2. And that the Scriptures were not sufficient measures of the Churches Faith to the end of the world 3. And that the Churches Faith is alterable and crescent and the old Church had not the same Faith which the present Church hath And will the Christian world any more agree in such absurdities than in a Quakers of Familists professing that he speaketh by Inspiration If the Members of the Council before they came thither were no wiser nor honester than other Men nor their words more credible how shall we know that when they are there they are become inspired and their words are Gods own words But if it be said That they neither make new Articles of Faith nor declare what is in Scripture by Exposition but declare the Verbal Tradition of the Apostles I ask 1. If so big a Book as the Bible contain not so much as all the Churches Creed 2. Where hath this Traditional Faith been kept till now If by all the Church then it was held possessed and known before that Declaration If but by part of the Church then it was but part of the Church that had the true Faith and one part was of one Religion and another part of another And which part was it that kept this Tradition And how come we to know that they were righter than the rest that had it not If it was Rome only then they had a Faith different from the rest of the Churches And how shall we know that they are not as true and sound as Rome But how hath this Tradition been carried on and kept right Was it by Writing or by Word If by Writings why are they not cited seen and tryed Other men can read as well as Popes and Councils If unwritten was it by publick Preaching or private Talk If the former then it was commonly known and declared before the Council declared it If by private Talk how shall we be sure 1. That they were honest men that would keep private the Publick Faith especially being Preachers that by office were to publish it 2. And that it hath been well remembred and carried on without alteration And were it preached or whispered mans memory is so frail and words so uncertain that for the Church or a piece of the Church to carry down from the Apostles from Fathers to Children so many Articles more than are in all the Bible and so hard and mysterious and by many now controverted and this not by writing and to be sure that no mistake hath been made by oblivion or misexpression this is a thing that the Church will never unite in the belief of And was it in a set form of unchangeable words that all these Articles or Expositions were carried down till now or not If yea we should have had that Form deliver'd us as we have other Forms the Creed Lords Prayer c. If not how shall we know that the Fathers and Children had the same understanding of the matter and changed not the Faith by change of words And it 's like that all the Churches since the Apostles delivered not these Articles down in the same words when in several Countries and Ages they spake not the same language And it is a wonder that they would never write their Faith for their Children to learn when the Jews Deut. 6. and 11. were commanded to teach their Children by writing the Law upon the very Posts of their Houses and their
Gates And it is a greater wonder that Parents and Children should through so many Generations and Countries have so unerring surâ— a memory And it is strange how their own Commentators come to differ about the sense of Thousands of Texts of Scripture if the Churches Tradition have publickly and notoriously delivered down the meaning of them If not how Councils come to be the infallible Commentators and Declarers of the Sense of Scriptures But if really such men believe themselves it will be long before either by fraud or force they can make all others believe such things Sect. IX Gods wisdom appointed a few great and necessary things to be the terms of the Churches Unity and Love but Ignorance and Pride by pretences of Enmity to Error and Heresie have plagued and torn the Churches by Decrees and Canons and led us into a Labyrinth so that men know not where they are nor what to hold nor what the Christian Religion is nor who are Orthodox and who are not so great a work it is to understand such Voluminous Councils and then to be sure that they are all right even when they condemn and damn each other That which hath been the chief Cause and Engine of Division will never become the means or terms of the Unity or Concord of all the Churches But such are the multitude of unnecessary uncertain humane Decrees Laws and Canons of Faith and Religion whatever the proud and ignorant say to the contrary CHAP. VIII The Vniversal Church will never Vnite by receiving all that is now received by Greeks Latines Armenians Abassines Lutherans Calvinists Diocesane Presbyterians Independants Erastians Anabaptists or in full Conformity to any of the present Parties which addeth to the Primitive Simplicity in her terms of Communion or Concord Sect. I. I Must expect that the Evil Spirit which hath long torn the Church and made multitudes tear themselves and foam out Reproach yea and Blood against each other will presently meet the very Title of this Chapter with a charge of Pride against the Writer and say What are you that you should know more than all the Churches in the World And preâ—ume to charge them all with so great Error as not to know the terms of Christian Concord nor the way of Universal Peace But I answer 1. Is the Church now United in any of these terms or ways Are they all Papists Are they all of the Greek Church or Armenian Abassine c Are they all Lutherans or Calvinists c If not why should you conclude that ever they will be Or that any of these are congruous terms of Concord and that the same that doth not heal will heal them Will not Christians be the same as now Sect. II. They never were United on any of these terms I have proved that they were never all Papists And it will be easily granted of the rest that they were never all Greeks Lutherans c. And that which never did unite the Church never will do Sect. III. If you think all must be united in any of these wayes which of them is it And why that rather than any of the rest 1. Must they all be of the Greek opinions You see that the Papists condemn them for Schismaticks And other Churches lament their manifold Corruptions And the Eastern Countries long since divided from them We have here in London a Greek Church new built and Tolerated and their work is done so ignorantly and unreverently that they have usually not twice the number of the officiating or present Priests who join with them 2. Must they all be Papists Never was more Policy and Cruelty used to propagate and prop up any Church under Heaven and yet they cannot prevail for Universal Subjection Nay many Kingdoms and Countries are fallen from them while they used such means to keep them insomuch that by many of the soundest Churches they are taken for no better than Antichristian Hereticks And even the Greek Church separateth from them and pronounceth them Schijmaticks and Excommunicates them every year And they can never obliterate the History of their horrid Schisms and Usurpations and inhumane Butcheries which will alienate many from them Will all the world ever agree to the Dominion of one Usurper Will they all believe the Monster of Transubstantiation Will they all agree That all the Senses of all men are deceived who think that they see and taste Bread and Wine and there is none And that it is necessary to Salvation to renounce all our Senses and the Scripture that oft calls it Bread after the Consecration 1 Cor. 11. Will all agree That God who cannot lie by Supernatural Revelation is the Father of all the lies to Sense that perceive real Bread and Wine and deceiveth them all by his Natural Revelation Will all men believe That every lying fornicating proud and covetous Priest even many Thousands of them can work Miracles at their pleasures every day in the week by making Bread no Bread and turning it into Flesh and 〈◊〉 And that there are visible Accidents without a Subject even a round nothing a white nothing a sweet nothing c. And that there are no substantial sâ—â—ns in that Sacrament of the thing signified And that Christs true Flesh was broken and his Blood shed by himself in the Sacrament before it was broken and shed on the Cross And that two General Councils who decree as de Fide that Christ hath not now Flesh in Heaven hath yet heavenly Flesh in the Sacrament I know that Augustine retracted somewhat as an oversight that looked that way But two General Councils that at Constantinople called the 7th General by some and that at Nice 2d which damned one another about Images yet agreed in this That Christ hath not Flesh in Heaven The words are Bin. p. 378. defin 7. Siauis non confessus fuerit Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum post Assumptionem animatae rationalis intelleâ—â—â—â— carnis simul sedere cum Deo â—atre atque ita quique rursus venturum cum Paternâ Majestate judicaturum vâ—vos mortuos non amplius quidem Carnem neque incorporeum tamen ut videatur ab iâ—s a quibus conpunctus est maneat Deus extra crassitudinem Carnis Anathema And in this they say that the Constantin Council which they are condemning was in the right so that they anathematize the Church of Rome which think that Christ hath Flesh in Heaven and in the Eucharist which they deny yet saying that he hath a Body And let those that would pervert the word Crassitudinem note that he doth not distinguish of Christs flesh and ours as two sorts and say extra carnem Crassam but deny him to have flesh and say extra crassitudinem carnis as an essential property of flesh And one of these Councils the Papists own Will all Christians agree that every Priest must first make his God and then eat him or that he must communicate alone without communion
and Congregations of true Christians that have true Pastors to be true Churches of Christ And they take such Ministers as Conform to be notwithstanding that true Ministers though culpable and therefore they separate not from any such Churches as no Churches or from such Ministers as none 2. They take particular Churches associated under Diocesanes Archbishops and Nationally under one King and represented in one Convocation or Synod to be still true Churches and such as may be lawfully communicated with and these Diocesane Provincial and National Associations to be laudable as they are meer Associations for Concord and though culpable in some other respects yet such as good Christians may lawfully live under submissively and in peace 3. They think it lawful to preach and administer the Sacraments in the Parish Churches and have these 17 years been cast out and kept out much against their wills and laboured and hoped though in vain for Restoration 4. It is not Communion with any Christian Church in Faith Love or Holy Worship or any thing of Gods Institution no nor any thing of Mans commanding but what they believe God hath forbidden them which they deny To deny to take many Covenants Oaths Professions or to do some Practices which upon their best enquiry they verily believe to be great Sins this is not separating from any thing of God 5. They do not depart from the Churches but are cast out The Ministers are Silenced and â—â—â—cted as they verily believe for not sinning and hazarding their Souls Ministers and People are expresly by the Canon of the Church Excommunicated ipso facto which is sine sententia judicis if they but say that there is any thing in the Conformity which a good Christian may not with a good Conscience do The Canon is visible and plain so that they cannot possibly avoid being cast out and think that the Ejecters are the Schismaticks 6. When they are thus cast out or driven away they yet hold distant Christian Communion with all Christians in one universal Church one Spirit one Lord one God one Faith one Baptismal Covenant and one Hope Ephes 4. But local Communion they can have but in one place at once and none are said to separate from all the Churches where they are not present 7. The King by his Licence allowed them for a time to hold their own Assemblies and the Conformists themselves swear the Oath of Supremacy and take the King to be Supreme Governor in all Causes and over all Persons Ecclesiastical and Civil And yet then accused the Licensed of Schism 8. Though there be some things in the Liturgy which the Nonconformists dare not Declare Assent and Consent to and therefore suffer yet they hold it lawful both to join in Hearing Prayer and Sacraments with the Parish Churches and Conformists in the Lords days Worship and use of that Liturgy and many of them do so ordinarily And others do not hold it unlawful but are hindered by Preaching themselves where they can which they dare not forbear And the People that hold it lawful yet hold that better is to be preferred when they can have it And he that preferreth a Minister which he findeth most Edification by doth not therefore separate from all others because he is absent from them 9. The Nonconformists have in their appointed Treaties for Concord offered to use the Liturgy with some Emendations and to submit even to the present Archbishops Bishops and other parts of the Church-Government as is expressed in the Kings Declaration about Ecclesiastical Affairs By which visible in Print it may be seen how far they were from separating inclinations but it could not by the Bishops be accepted 10. But it is true withall that many of the Common People having constantly preferred that which they thought they were bound to prefer and seeing their former Pastors cast out and silenced thought they ought notwithstanding to adhere to them and grew into so hard thoughts of the Bishops that silenced them about 2000 at once that they are more alienated than before from them and their Assemblies as Chrysostoms Joannites were at Constantinople till the kindness of Atticus and Prâ—â—lus brought them back to the old publick Church Sect. XVII It is commonly confessed by their sharpest Accusers that the Nonconformists do well to forbear all that can be proved to be sinful And if they prove not Conformity sinful they are content to suffer as real Schismaticks Sect. XVIII We all agree of the necessity of a continued Succession in the Universal Church of the same Faith Religion and Ministerial Office which we profess and possess We have no one new Article of Faith or Religion nor any that have not continued in the Church we have no new Office But that the Office and Administrations cannot pass as valid unless the particular Minister can prove that he had Canonical Ordination from one that had the like and he from one that had the like and he from another that had the like and so up to the Apostles this we suppose irrational schismatical false and of malignant tendency against the Church and Interest of Christ Sect. XIX Mr. Henry Dodwell is the Man that hath newly and copiously promoted this Schismatical Error in a Book pretended to be against the Nonconformists Schism but disowned by the Conformable Doctors themselves many of them And indeed notwithstanding the tedious wordiness of it it hath little in it in comparison of Jansenius long ago fully answered by Voetius And though I told him over and over first that if he did not answer Voetius and my dispute of Ordination we should take him but to labor in vain as to our use yet hath he taken no notice of either of them at all If he intend it in any following Book it is but fraudulent to send out this great Volume first to do his work before he gave any notice of what is already said against him Must we write the same things as oft as Men arise that will repeat the Arguments so oft confuted Sect. XX His Design and Schismatical Doctrine is thus laid 1. That the ordinary means of Salvation are in respect of every particular person confined to the Episcopal Communion to the place he lives in as long as he lives in it 2. That we cannot be assured that God will do for us what is necessary for Salvation on his part otherwise than by his express promises that he will do it 3. Therefore we must have interest in his Covenant 4. Therefore we must have the Sacrament by which the Covenant is transacted 5. These as Legally valid are to be had only in the external Communion of the Visible Church 6. This is only the Episcopal Communion of the place we live in 7. The Validity of the Sacraments depends on the Authority of the persons by whom they are administred 8. No Ministers have Authority of administring Sacraments but only they that have their Orders in the Episcopal
Sins are not within his Cognizance 3. To do the work of Parents Pastors Tutors or Physicians is no part of the Office to which he is appointed and authorized 4. But he may drive on all these to do their duties by due means 5. It is unlawful to seek to cure a lesser Evil with a greater That is to be numbred with the things which the Prince cannot do which he cannot do by lawful means or such as do more hurt than good 6. The Mischiefs before enumerated against the Princes Safety and Honour and against Love and Justice and Conscience and Religion are so great as that no Severity must be used which procureth them and doth not a greater good 7. The punishing of small Faults by great Punishments is Injustice and Unlawful 8. Abundance of Infirmities and humane Frailties and Errors are such as must be endured so they be but by Doctrine Love and gentle Reproofs rebuked and disowned without Punishments Ecclesiastical or Corporal else there will be no Love or Peace 9. Preachers must not be suffered to persuade Men from the Faith Love or Obedience of God in Christ against any Article of the Creed or Petition of the Lords Prayer or Precept of the Decalogue or any essential part of the Christian Religion 10. If such speak a damnable Error or Heresie by Ignorance or Heedlesness they must have a first and second Admonition and they 〈◊〉 repent But if they forbear not upon Admonition they do it studiously and wilfully and such are to be Silenced till they Reform because the Preaching of one that opposeth an essential Point of Religion will do more harm than good except among Heathens or where no better Preachers can be had 11. It will not be unmeet for the Rulers to draw up either a Catalogue of integral Points of Religion of great moment which all shall be forbidden to Preach or Dispute against or else a Catalogue of Errors contrary to such which none shall have leave to propagate But it is not every one that violateth the Law that is to be forbidden to preach Christs Gospel but lesser pecuniary Mulcts may be sufficient punishment to many and the bare denying them preferment or maintenance and casting them among the disowned that are but tolerated may be better punishment and more effectual in case of tolerable Faults than the more severe 12. Rulers should do much more to restrain from Evils than to constrain to Religious Duties And those Evils are of these sorts First Such as blaspheme God Secondly Such as draw the Hearers Souls into damnable Error or Sin Thirdly Such as tend to overthrow the Honour and Safety of the Governors Fourthly Such as tend directly to breed Hatred in men against each other and kindle the fire of Contention and Enmity Fifthly Such as draw men from the common duties of Justice towards Neighbors or Relations into Fraud and Injury 13. It is the greatest part of the Magistrates duty about Religion First To see Gods own Laws kept in Honour Secondly And to keep Peace by Church Justices among Clergymen and People that are apt to take occasion from Religion to abuse and calumniate one another 14. Yet Rulers may and must compel Persons that are grosly ignorant or erroneous to hear what can be said against their Error and for their Instruction As Parents so Magistrates may compel Children and Subjects to be Catechized and to hear Gods Word and may compel them to hear such Teachers as have the Rulers Licence either as Approved or Tolerated to Teach 15. Men ought not to be compelled to receive the Sacraments of Baptism or the Lords Supper by the Sword or Force because it is to receive a sealed Pardon of Sin and Donation of Christ and Life which no unwilling person hath right to or doth receive For to say I am unwilling is to say I receive not and so the reception of the outward sign is Hypocrisie Prophanation and taking the Name of God in vain 16. Yet those that being Baptized and at Age avoid Communion are after Admonition to be taken for Revolters so far and to be declared such as so far cast themselves from the Communion of the Church And the Christian Magistrate may well deny them many Priviledges in the Commonwealth which he should appropriate to sound persevering Christians 17. Places in Government Trust Burgess-ship and Votes in Elections of Governors and such like are best appropriated to the Approved part of Christians and some the Tolerated but never granted to Apostates proper Hereticks or any that are intolerable 18. Pastors of the Churches should not be constrained to give the Sacrament of Baptism or the Lords Supper to any one against their Consciences because First It is their Office to be Judges who is to be Baptized and to Communicate This is the power of the Keys Secondly If they may not judge of the very Act which they are to perform they have not so much as that judicium discretionis which belongeth to every man as a man and so must act brutishly Thirdly If they may administer against Conscience when they think it Sin the same reason would hold for all men to sin whenever a Ruler commandeth them that judgeth it no Sin what Bounds shall be set against absolute blind Obedience Fourthly Whereas the Objection is from Inconveniences As Then every Pastor may deny Men Sacraments I answer 1. So every Tutor Physician c. may abuse his Trust 2. Therefore men must have care whom they choose and trust 3. There are better Remedies than sinful slavery in the Minister even consulting with Synods of Ministers or where Bishops rule appealing to them 4. The persons that expect the Sacrament may have it from some other Pastor that is willing It is a less inconvenience that a single person remove or else communicate in another Assembly than that the Pastor whose Office is to use the Church Keys be enslaved to sin against his Conscience 5. We suppose that of ancient right the Church is not to have a Pastor over them whom they consent not to Therefore if the Church find themselves wronged by the Pastors Fact they have their Remedy They may admonish the Pastor and if he hear not tell the Bishop Synod or Magistrate for I am not now determining the case of superior Bishops but tell what is the actual Remedy where such bear Rule And if he hear not the Church Synod Bishop or Magistrate they may desert him and choose a fitter Pastor and yet neither Excommunicate nor Silence him but the same man may be more sutable to another Flock which will desire him They that object Inconveniences in this motion should consider First That a Mischief and Sin is worse than an Inconvenience Secondly That there is nothing desirable here without Inconveniences which may furnish an unwise Contender with Objections Thirdly That they that cry up the Canons and Traditions Custom or judgment of Antiquity Bishops Councils Fathers and the Catholick
saying That for one infallible old Gentleman at Rome we have Thousands of Hot Spirits in England that pretend to more of the Divine Perfections than ever he did For if the Holy Ghost doth personally indwell in Sectaries then they are personally possessed with all the glorious Attributes of the Godhead pag. 26. And 28. The Idolatry of the Papists will be as excusable at the great day of Accounts as the unreverent Rudeness and superstitious Sowreness of the Sectary And p. 29. The gross Usurpation and Invasion of the Priestly Office by Sectaries to erect Churches c. throws more dirt upon the Christian Religion than the grossest Errors in the Roman Church c. Answ 1. I know none so worthy of the Name of Sectaries as the Papists that damn all Christians save themselves and feign themselves onely to be all the Church 2. It 's like by these Sectaries he meaneth those that are not Re-ordained or have not uninterrupted Episcopal Ordination And if all such Reformed Churches are so much more dirty and injurious to Christianity than the grossest Errors of the Papists it 's better be of the Papal Church than of them 3. Doth pretending to the help of Gods Spirit in Praying and Preaching and Living arrogate more than pretending to Papal Infallibility in the Office of an Universal Monarch and Judge of the sense of all Gods Word The word Personal I have heard used by none but this and such Accusers But what he meaneth by it who can tell First If it refer to the Person of the Receiver how can the Holy Ghost dwell in any man and not dwell in his person Secondly If it refer to the Person of the Holy Ghost what Christian before this man did ever doubt that took the Holy Ghost to be God whether the Person as well as the Essence of the Holy Ghost be every where Doth not the Scripture say That the Holy Spirit dwelleth in Believers Rom. 8. 11. 1 Cor. 3. 16. 2 Tim. 1. 14. c. and God dwelleth in us 1 Joh. 4. 12. 15 16. And that we are an habitation of God by the Spirit Ephes 2. 22. Is Gods Word worse than Popery Or is not this to reproach God and his Word and Spirit more than the Reformed Churches do by not having Bishops who are accused by Mr. Dodwell to sin against the Holy Ghost Thirdly But if Personal should mean the mode and title of Union as if by Hypostatical Union like Christs the Holy Ghost and Believers be made one Person who are those Sectaries that hold such a thing who shew the state of the English Religion And this is one of the men that cry out against Toleration and tells us that There can be no stability of Government in England till there be a settlement in Religion No settlement of Religion but by uniting Affections No uniting Affections but by unity of Religion And so on Therefore Rulers must force all to be of one Religion Next to the thought of the Heathen and Apostate Nations case it is one of the saddest to me that Rulers and People that have too little studied such matters should lie under the temptation and horrid abuse of Clergymen that write and talk at such a rate as this man doth 1. Will he maintain That there is no Union of Religion wherever men are not of one opinion form or mode in every Circumstance Rite or Ceremony or every accident or integral of Faith Are any two men in the world then of one Religion any more than of one visage or slature c 2. If this man had Rulers that differed from him as much as he doth from the Nonconformists would he and could he presently change his judgment or would he falsly profess a change lest he should not be of one Religion with his Prince or rather must it not be he or such as he that must be the standard of that one Religion to all 3. Doth he believe That Prisons or Flames will make men of one Affection Would such usage win himself to love the judgment and way of those that he suffered by 4. Or if men of many Opinions and Affections be forced into the same Temple as a Prison doth their corporal presence make them of one Religion and Affection It is a doleful thing to hear Preachers of the Gospel cry out for Blood Flames or Prisons to make whole Kingdoms of one Religion confessing how unfit they are to do it themselves who have undertaken the Office that should do it Woe to the Princes Church and People that have not wit and grace to escape the snares of such ignorant Tyrannical Counsellors Abundance more such Pamphlets have lately endeavoured to destroy Love and Peace and infect the Land with Malice and Cruelty § XII The Roman Doctrine and Laws for exterminating and burning Hereticks is the top and perfection of this hypocritical wickedness which murdereth Gods Servants and depopulateth Countries on pretence of Charity Unity and Government And when so many Princes became guilty of serving this bloody Clergy that never knew what manner of spirit they were of it was Gods wisdom and justice to permit the same Councils of Bishops and the same Popes to decree their Deposition which decreed their Subjects extermination Lateran sub Innoc. 3. what can be more contrary to Nature to Humane Interest or to the Doctrine Example and Spirit of Christ And whose blood is safe while such blood-sucking Leeches are taken for the Rulers of the world and the Physicians of Souls § XIII All this I perceive is on occasion of Objections but superadded to what I fullier said before Part II. Chap. 8. But I still say That Toleration must have its due bounds and not extend to intolerable Doctrines Practices or Persons To proceed then Every one that will must not be Tolerated to be a publick Pastor and Preacher no not of the Truth For some insufficient men may by that manner bring a scandal or scorn on the sacred Doctrine and Worship of God and taking Gods Name profanely and in vain is worse than silence much less should men be suffered to preach or dispute down anys Point of Christian Faith or Duty § XIV In a word The Prince that will escape the dangerous Extreams of Licentiousness and oppressing Persecution must 1. Have an eye to the Holy Scripture and Apostolical Institution and to the Law of Nature together as his Rule 2. He must make the true publick Good which lieth in mens spiritual welfare his end 3. He must make the promoting of Obedience to God and his Laws the chief work of his Office and of his own Laws 4. He must abhor and avoid all carnal Interests contrary to the Interest of Christ and mens Souls 5. He must do all with Caution from a Spirit of Love and a Care to preserve mens fear of God 6. He must take heed of Partiality or hearkning to the counsel either of Atheists prophane men or of an ignorant proud and cruel
Clergy And must hearken to wise pious considerate peaceable and experienced Counsellors and avoid the examples both of Rehoboam and of Jeroboam and be neither an Oppressor nor a Corrupter § XV. And to conclude good and wise men may well know their duty whom to silence and eject and whom to tolerate if they are but true to God by this one Rule They may by hearing all the case and knowledge of the Persons discern whether that mans Preaching consideratis considerandis is clearly like to do more good or harm and do accordingly But then they must not judge of good and harm by carnal sinful lusts and interests and by the counsels of selfish partial men but by wise and just reason guided by the Word of God § XVI And in all doubtful Cases choose the safer side and when the danger of overdoing is the greater as in case of Persecution rather do too little than too much And prefer not Ceremonies before Substance nor tything Mint Annise and Cummin before Love Truth and Judgment and the great things of the Law And be sure that you learn what this meaneth I will have mercy and not sacrifice that you may not condemn or accuse the Guiltless CHAP. XV. The Catholick Church will never unite in a Reception and Subscription to every Word Verse or Book of the Holy Scripture as it is in any one Translation or any one Copy in the Original now known § I. THis needeth no other proof than the reason of the thing and common experience 1. All Translations are the work of imperfect fallible men we have none made by the Spirit as working infallibly in the Apostles unless as some think the Greek of St. Matthews Gospel be a Translation The pretences of Inspiration of the Seventy two that are said to be the Authors of that Greek Translation of the Old Testament is not yet agreed on in the Church nor whether it was more than the Pentateuch which they Translated The Authority and Reasons of Hierome still much prevail Sect. II. And the Vulgar Latine most valued by the Papists is yet so much matter of Controversie between them that when Sixtus Quintus had stablished a corrected Edition Clement the 8th altered it in many hundred places after Sect. III. And all Protestants acknowledge the imperfection of all their own Translations English Dutch French c. And in the same Church of England we have the publick prescribed Use of two different Translations of the Psalms one sometime directly contrary to the other as Yea and Nay and one leaving a whole Verse which the other hath Sect. IV. And we know of no man that pretendeth to be sure that he hath a Copy of the Hebrew and Greek Text which he is certain is perfectly agreeable to the autography or first draught And the multitude of various Readings put us out of all hope of ever having certainly so perfect a Copy All therefore have the marks of humane frailty which cannot be denied Sect. V. And no wise and good man should deliberately deny this and so justifie falsly every humane slip But yet there is no such difference among Copies or Translations as should any way shake our foundations or any point necessary to salvation doth depend upon For in all such points they all agree Sect. VI. Object But if Copies and Translations differ and err how can we make them our rule of judgment Answ I say again They agree in as many things as we need them for as a Rule of Judgment And where they differ it being in words of no such use and moment that hindereth not our being Ruled by them where they agree The Kings Laws may be written in divers Languages for divers Countries of his Subjects And verbal differences may be no hinderance to their regulating use no more than the King himself doth lose his authority if his hair turn white Sect. VIII Object 2. But what then must all subscribe to if not to all the Bible Have you any other measure or test Answ We must subscribe That we believe all Gods Word to be true and all the true Canon of Scripture to be his Word and that we will faithfully endeavor to discern all the Canon And we must expresly subscribe to the Essentials of Christianity of which before and after Sect. VIII It was a considerable time before many Churches received the Epistle of James the 2d of Peter that to the Hebrews the Revelation c. And no doubt they were nevertheless true Christians And if now any believe all the Essentials of Religion and should doubt only whether the Canticles or the Epistle to â—iâ—â—mon or the two last of John or that of Jude were Canonical he might for all that be a true Christian and more meet to be a Bishop than Synesius was before he believed the Resurrection or Neclarâ—us before he was baptized c. Sect. IX The Churches are not fully agreed to this day about the Canonical Books of Scripture more than the Papists call some Books Canonical which we call Apocryphal And it is said that the Abassines and Syrians have divers not only as Ecclesiastical but as Canonical which we have not nor know not of Though we have good cause to judge best of our own received number by the proof well produced by Bishop Consins and many others yet have we no cause to unchurch all Churches that differ from us Sect. X. No Church therefore ought to cast out all Ministers that doubt of some words in any Translation or Copy or of some Verse Chapter or Book who hold the main and all the necessary Doctrines No such Test was imposed on the primitive Christians And it 's sad to hear the report that even the sound and humble Churches of Helvetia should lately make it necessary to the Ministery to subscribe to the antiquity of the Hebrew points though it may be a true and useful Assertion CHAP. XVI The Catholick Church will never unite in the subscribing to any mens whole Commentaries on the Bible § I. THis is yet more evident than the former 1. They do not at this day nor ever did agree in any mens Commentary They have great respect to the Commentaries of some of the Ancients and others but subscribe them not as infallible Though the Trent Oath of Pope Pius swear men not to expound the Scriptures otherwise than according to the agreeing Exposition of the Fathers it is well known 1. That they never told and proved to us who are to be taken for Fathers and who not 2. It 's known that few of them have written large Commentaries and fewer on all the Bible if any 3. That they oft differ among themselves 4. And the best have confessed their own Errors 5. And more have been found erroneous by others and are by us at this day 6. Yea they have cast out and condemned one another as the Case of Nazianzene Epiphanius Chrysostom Theophilus Alexand. Cyril and Theodoret and many
more besides Origen sheweth 6. The Papists ordinarily take liberty to differ from the Commentaries of divers of the most Renowned of the Fathers 7. And the learnedst men of the Papists themselves do differ from one another 8. And no General Council that pretend to be the Judge of thesense of the Scripture durst ever yet venture to write a Commentary on it 9. No nor any Pope nor any by his appointment or a Councils is written by any other and by them approved as infallible By all which and much more it is evident That subscribing wholly to any Commentary will never unite the Churches of Christ Sect. II. And no wonder when that 1. God hath composed the Scripture of such various parts as that all are not of the same neceâ—sity or intelligibility but some are harder than the rest to be understood and many hundred Texts are such that a man that understands them not may be saved 2. And Pastors as well as People are of various degrees of understanding and all imperfect and know but in part Sect. III. Yet are good Commentaries of great use as other teaching is but not to be subscribed as the terms of the Unity or Liberty of the Churches Sect. IV. Nay those particular Expositions which General Councils the Pretenders to deciding judgment have made are not to be subscribed as infallible as I have before proved by the quality of the men and by their many Errors and contradicting and condemning one another CHAP. XVII A Summary Recital of the true Terms of Concord and some of the true Causes of Schism THE Sum of all that is said of Schism and Unity is this § I. Schism is an unlawful separating from one or many Churches or making Parties and Divisions in them and is caused usually either 1. By unskilful proud Church-Tyrants Dogmatists or Superstitious Persons by departing from Christs instituted terms of Concord the Christian Purity and Simplicity and denying Communion to those that unite not on their sinful or unnecessary self-devised terms and obey not their ensnaring Canons or Wills or malignantly forbidding what Christ hath commanded and excommunicating and persecuting men for obeying him 2. Or else by erroneous proud self-conceited persons that will not unite and live in Communion upon Christs instituted terms but feigning some Doctrine or Practice of their devising to be true good and necessary which is not or something to be intolerably sinful that is good or lawful do therefore cast off their Guides and the Communion of the Church as unlawful on pretence of choosing a better necessary way § II. 2. The necessary means of Unity and Church Concord are these 1. That every Catechized understanding person professing Repentance Belief and Consent to the Baptismal Covenant and the Children of such dedicated by them to Christ be Baptized And the Baptized accounted Christians having right to Christian Communion till their Profession be validly disproved by an inconsistent Profession or Conversation that is by some Doctrine against the Essence of Christianity or some scandalous wilful sin with Impenitence after sufficient Admonition And that no man be Excommunicated that is not proved thus far to Excommunicate himself And that the Catechized or Examined person be put upon no other profession of Belief Consent and Practice as interpreting the Sacramental Covenant but of the Articles of the Creed the Lords Prayer and Decalogue understood and the general belief of consent to and practice of all that he discerneth to be the Word of God 2. That in Church Cases and Religion I. The Magistrate have the onely publick judgment whom he shall countenance and maintain or tolerate and whom he shall punish or not tolerate nor maintain and never be the Executioner of the Clergies Sentence without or against his own Conscience and Judgment II. That the Ordainers being the senior Pastors or a Bishop or President with other Pastors which is to be left to the concurrent judgments of themselves and the people be the Judges of the fitness of the Ordained person to be a Minister of Christ and the said Pastors in their respective particular Churches be the Key-bearers or Judges who is to be Baptized and admitted to Communion in the Church and who not and not constrained to Baptize or to give or deny Communion there by the judgment of others against their Consciences though in case of forfeiture or just cause they may be removed from that Church or from the sacred Office III. That the People of that Church be the private discerning Judges who shall be their Pastors to whose conduct they will trust their Souls if not so far as to be the first Electors at least so far as to have a free consenting or dissenting power and they be not forced to trust their Souls with any man as a Pastor against their Consciences And that every man be the private discerning Judge of his own Duty to God and Man and of his sin forbidden and of his own secret Case whether he believe in God and Christ and purpose to obey him or whether he be an Atheist or Infidel or secretly wicked and so fit or unfit for Baptism and Communion so that though he be not to be received without the judgment of the Pastors yet he may exclude himself if conscious of incapacity and therefore that none be forced by corporal Penalties or Mulcts to be Baptized or to Communicate 3. That the Christian Magistrate make three sorts of Laws one for the approved and maintained Churches and Pastors another for the Tolerated and a third sort for the Intolerable I. And that a sufficient number of the ablest soundest and worthiest Ministers be made the publick approved maintained Preachers and Pastors And where Parish Bounds are judged necessary that all persons living in the Parish be constrained to contribute proportionably to maintain the Parish Ministers and Temple and Poor and to hear publick Teaching and to worship God either in that or some other Approved or Tolerated Church within their convenient reach or neighborhood II. And that the Tolerated Ministers tryed and licensed have protection and peace in the publick exercise of their Ministery though not Approbation and Maintenance III. But that the Intolerable be restrained by sutable restraints 4. That the Approved and Maintained Ministers be put to subscribe their Belief of Consent to and resolved practice or obedience of all the Sacred Canonical Scriptures so far as by diligent study they are able to understand them and more particularly of the Christian Religion summarily contained in the Sacramental Covenant and in the ancient Creeds received by the Universal Church the Lords Prayer and the Decalogue as it is the Law of Christ and expounded by him in the Holy Scriptures And that they will be faithful to the King and Kingdom and as Ministers will faithfully guide the Flocks in holy Doctrine Worship Discipline and Example of Life labouring to promote Truth Holiness Love Peace and Justice for the salvation of mens Souls