that he should make a Liturgy differing from the Liturgies of Q. Eliz. and K. James and K. Charles I. I must needs say that is no false accusation Mounsieur Chabret in his Letter recorded pag. 82. Doth not say that it was reported Archbishop Laud had compiled a new Liturgy for the Church of England but onely that a new one was compilled by him which had occasioned much clamour and been the ground of fears and jealousies Now I beseech Mr. Durell to tell me Did not Arch-bishop Laud compile a Liturgy for the Scotch Nation if he did not let those who have charged him so to do in allowed writings be confuted If he did compile that Liturgy or which is all one direct those who compiled it I am sure it did differ from ours and occasioned much clamour raised many fears and jealousies which at last ended in a war betwixt the two Nations Yea there were some few alterations made by the said Archbish or some of his Creatures in the Liturgy for our own Church which were not very well relished by those that never were enemies to the legally established Government what those alterations were may be seen in the Dedicatory of Mr. Prynn's Quench Coal But I must give check to my running pen and take notice of some â—â—ner failures against truth p. 8. Mr. Durell thus Pâ—â—â—sifieth Oecolampadius who reformed the City of Basil is stiled Bishop of that Church upon his Tomb of which Bellarmine himself was an eye witnes in his time much against his will for this we are referred to Bellar. de notis Eecles l. 4 c. 8. where Bellarm. indeed does tell us That he was at Basil and there saw the inscription on Oecolampadius his Tomb and read it not without laughter Now it is hard to conceive that he should see that much against his will the sight whereof caused laughter in him but the truth is Bellar. laughter was ridiculous for the words upon the Tomb are not Primus hujus urbis Episcopus as Bellarm. quotes them but Author Evangelicae doctrinae in hac urbe primus Episcopus indeed he is called but how Hujus Templi verus Episcopus and if such an Episcopus will do Mr. Durell any pleasure he most be a very humoursome man that will envy him such a pleasure Ninthly Page 13. He fears not to affirme That all understanding men among the French Churches say plainly that if God Almighty were pleased that all France should embrace the Reformed Religion as England hath the Episcopal Government must of necessity be established in their Churches That all understanding men should say this and say it plainly is certainly a all understanding men were never heard to speak about this matter and should they be called together to speak they would not utter any such speech as is here fathered on them it is scarce sence to say if all France should embrace the Reformed Religion as England hath for certainly all England hath not embraced the Reformed Religion the more the pity and what necessity could there be if France should generally embrace the Reformed Religion that Episcopal Government should be established in it I am not more certain that ever I saw the Sun than I am certain that many understanding Frenchmen will never be brought to say that Episcopal Government must necessarily be established Tenthly Page 27. Having told us the Helvetick Confession does vehemently approve of the observation of some Holy-days he dreads not to tell us That the Ministers of the Church of Scotland subscribed that Confession An. 1566. the Ministers of that Church being then of another Judgment and of a temper far different from that their Successors have shewed of latter years Whereas the Scotch Ministers who subscribed the Helvetick Confession subscribed it with express exception of that part of it which concerns the observation of the Holy-days and so as to that matter plainly shewed themselves to be of the same temper and Judgment with their Successors as plainly appears from the Records of that Church Let the World judge what credit is to be given to Mr. Durell concerning remote Churches who relates things so contrary to truth about a neigbour Church Eleventhly Page 28. He would perswade us That the Crosses have not been pulled down from the top of Churches unless perhaps in som popular Storm but we can tell him of Crosses that have been taken from the top of Churches by the Magistrates appointment and with the Ministers aprobation which things are not to be found in a popular Storm Twelfthly P. 29. He bears us in hand That the Bohemians have solemn dedication of Churches which Ceremony is to be performed with them by the Bishop in the same manner as with us here in England Which words I know not how to reconcile to truth For what Law is there among us enjoyning Churches to be Consecrated by a Bishop or where may a man find the form and manner of Consecraring a Church here in England or read the Prayers with the which the Consecration is to be performed how shall I be able to convince Parishoners that they are bound to desire the Consecration of their newly built or newly inlarged Churches or the Bishop that he is bound to undertake this Consecra .. I though he be not desired and must the Diocesan bear the charges of his journey or have them born by the people sundry such questions as these need resolution which is a sign that the Laws and Canons now in force concern not themselves at all in this business of Consecraition 13thly Pag. 30. Mr. D. bears witness against the Directorians which is either non-sense or a falsity for these are his words At Bazil in the Cathedral Church they have their Fonts of Stone and use them for the baptism of Infants as we do here they have use them alike in the City of Breme and so in other places by which we see they are not of the same judgment with the Directorians who find Popery and Superstition in the very placing of them If the meaning of these words be that the Directorians find Popery and Superstition in placing of Fonts as they are placed at Bazil and Breme it is a perfect calumny if the meaning be that the Directorians find Popery and Superstition in some kind of placing of the Fonts how can a man thence gather that they of Breme and Bazil are not of the same judgment with the Directorians all that the Directory orders is that Baptisme be administred in the face of the Congregation where the people may most conveniently see and hear and not in the places where Fonts in the time of Popery were unfitly and superstitiously placed Here is no finding of Popery and Superstition in the very placing of Fonts but onely a prohibiting the administration of Baptisme in the places where Fonts in the time of Popery were unfitly and superstitiously placed and what I wonder could move the Papists to place their Fonts where
Caluminator Bishop Carleton hath written an examination of Mountagues appeal And pag. 111. gives us to understand That instead of yielding his consent to that strange conceit of the parity of Ministers to be instituted by Christ which was inserted into the Belgick Confession he openly protested his dissent thereunto And I believe that such protestation was by him made in his own name and the name of those sent out of England with him But I would willingly be satisfied why the Divines of other Churches did not make such protestation also Did they think the parity of Ministers a strange conceit If they did not down falls the whole structure of Mr. Durells Book if they did why did they enter no dissent to this strange conceit And I would also be satisfied what might move our Reverend and Learned Carleton to say That the cause of all the troubles in the Belgick Church was this That they had not Bishops amongst them who by their Authority might repress those who brought in novelties Sure I am that not long after the sitting of that Synod the Arminian novelties were broached to purpose in England and yet we who wanted not Bishops either would not or could not repress the broachers of them This Reverend Prelate was Diocesan to Mr. Mountague who made it his business to infect us with Arminianism If his Episcopal power were so soveraign an Antidote against the spreading of this infection why did he never make use of it or how came it to have so little success Oh that it were not too manifest that errours may grow in a Reformed Church where Hierarchy is established I have one thing more to add which it may not be amiss here to relate The Ministers of the Palatinate being brought into a great deal of distress his late Majesty thought meet under the Broad Seal to grant them a Collection here in England for their Relief The Letters Patents being Sealed Archbishop Laud thought meet to have an Alteration made in the form of the Letters and obtained of the King to have it made It had been said that the Ministers extream miseries fell upon them for their sincerity and constancy in the true Religion which we together with them profess and because they would not submit themselves to the Antichristian yoke our most Reverend Primate thought not meet to have Popery call'd the Antichristian Yoke though it had been so called here in England by Persons as great as himself Nor did it relish with him that the Religion of the Palatinate Churches should be called the same with ours Dr. Heylin in the History of his Life pag. 306. gives the reason Because by the Religion of those Churches the Calvinian rigors about Predestination c. are received as Orthodox and because they maintain a parity of Ministers directly contrary both to the Doctrine and Government of the Church of England Either therefore what Mr. Durell saith from the Palatinate Ministers in favour of our English Hierarchy is a meer falsity or else there is some such Alteration made in the Judgment of those men of late as the world formerly knew not of or else the Archbishop and his Second laid to the charge of the Palatinate Ministers what they were not truly to be charged with I have insisted too long on this point and shall conclude it with a profession of my perswasion that if a Synod should be called made up of the most sober forreign Divines they would advise his Majesty to establish a moderated limited Episcopacy as more suited to the Generality of our English tempers than that Presbytery which the two Houses to satisfie the importunities of the Sects rather made a shew they would establish then did establish but I can as soon believe they would publish to the whole world their own Hypocrisie as advise to settle a Government by Bishops pretending to be Jure Divino superiour to the Presbyters claiming sole power of Order and Jurisdiction and exercising their Jurisdiction by Lay-Chancellors and if they would not advise this much less would they advise to silence every one that should not assent to and approve of such a Government If you can think that Mr. Durells Testimonies prove they would I beseech you then make use of your Logick reduce his Testimonies into the form of a Syllogism and if the conclusion follow from every one of his premises or from any one of them I will then humbly beg your pardon and his too Indeed some of his Testimonies are such as I much doubt whether he brought them in jest or in earnest Peter Martyr and Bogerman are made to approve the English Hierarchy pag. 252 268. Because the one did write the other speak to English Bishops by those names and titles by which they are commonly notified here in England But is not this to affront us as if we were quite void of Learning may we not as well argue from Mr. Prynn's un-Bishoping of Timothy and Titus that he also approved the English Hierarchy because he dedicates a Book with that name to the two Arch-Bishops by the Titles of Right Reverend Fathers in God Primates and Metropolitanes of all England Is not this to lay a stumbling block in the way of the blind Quakers and to make that silly Generation yet more averse from giving men those names by which they are dignified in the places where they live To suggest that a man cannot call one by the name commonly given him but he must be interpreted to approve his office and the way of coming to his office and the claim he makes to his office But it is also said of Peter Martyr that he submitted to the Bishops whilst he was in England pag. 252. Did he so In what I wonder Had they any power over the Kings Professor Could they either visit him or silence him And what if he had submitted to them must he needs submit to them as to an order of men superior by Divine Law to that Order of which he himself was Cranmer most familiar with Martyr never claim'd to be of such an Order as his Manuscript kept by Dr. Stillingfleet will witness much less did he desire Martyr or Bucer or Fagius to be reordain'd by him that they might be capable of Ecclesiastical preferments so as submission then was quite another thing to what it is now Yet even the Non-Conformists of that age thought they had wherewith to justifie their Non-Conformity and to speak as softly as is possible they did as much credit the cause of the Protestants by suffering as did any of the Conformists And if I might make comparisons none of them ever recanted for a time as Cranmer did none of them during the time of imprisonment went to Mass as Ridley had begun to do and probably had continued so to do had he not been recalled from that abomination by the Letter of his Nonconforming Friend Mr. Bradford And the exemplary courage and constancy of our Protomartyr
should not have dealt slightly in this matter which yet any one may observe that he does for instead of giving us instances of Reformed Churches that use the Cross in Baptisme He contents himself to give us a few instances of Reformed Churches that use the Cross out of Baptisme the Church of Geneva he saies Makes the Christian Religion in a picture to lean upon the Cross page 21. and page 31. Does not think the Christian Religion sufficiently represented without the figure of a Cross And the French Churches agreed Anno 1609. That they would not debarre from the Sacrament such as should wear Crosses upon their Cloaks in case the King would not allow them the maintenance for maimed souldiers untill they did wear such Crosses He might also have added that the Erectors of the short lived Commonwealth among us did appoint a Cross to be set upon that Money which they presumed to Coin and also put the figure of a Cross into the Flags of those ships which they set forth against his Sacred Majesty and had he so done would not any one at last have asked him to what purpose is all this waste of Examples never did sober Presbyterian or Independant question such kind of Crosses many of them perhaps will be found to have them in their Coat of Arms and in their Signets with which they use to Seal their Letters and yet would at no hand be induced to suffer their Children to be Baptized with the sign of the Cross as a signe of their Dedication to God or as a token that afterwards they should not be ashamed of Christ Crucified c. Mr. Durell had sure forgot that the Cross our Church appoints is a Transient Cross by which Bishop Sanderson would have it distinguished sufficiently from the Cross of the Papists which is permanent else he would not have brought so many instances of permanent Crosses which being the Objects of sight may occasion in us some good thoughts and meditations concerning the Cross on which our Lord Jesus did suffer but the Transient Cross leaving no visible impression on us has no such aptness objectively to stir in us any good thought concerning Christ Crucified and it is hard to conceive how it should be useful in the way of admonition unless we had some one to admonish us that we were Crossed with such a Cross I know that dipping or sprinkling the Water upon the body leaves no visible impression upon it neither but the spirit who alwaies abides in believers hath an office to bring baptism to their remembrance and hath so effectually brought it to remembrance that they have from considerations drawn from it quenched the fiery darts of Satan that this blessed Spirit will concern himself to bring our being Crossed in Baptisme to remembrance Mr. Durell will not hastily affirm what then would Presbyterians better approve of the making of a permanent Cross on the forehead of newly Baptised Infants surely no. But they sometimes argue thus ad hominem and think that their is strength in their arguings Mr. Durell hath no where that I can find shewed their strength to be but weakness rather he hath strengthened their hands by some expressions used in his Sermon pag. 23. Where he placeth Chrism used in Confirmation amongst superstitious or superfluous Ceremonies Now why the Chrism in Confirmation should be accounted superstitious or superfluous and the Cross in Baptisme not be so accounted there can no good reason at all be assigned Is the Cross antient so is Chrisme the Cross as much abused by the Papists as ever was the Chrism the Cross made significant of what Baptisme it self signified and signified more clearly than the Cross can signifie and therefore superfluous enough if that be superfluous which is used for the doing of that which was sufficiently done before whereas in Confirmation there is no outward visible sign to signifie that which Chrism signifies viz. Anointing with the Holy Ghost inwardly as may be collected from a Petition yet retained in the Liturgy for Confirmation I am not now at leisure to enquire strictly into the usuages of Reformed Churches abroad nor into the Sentiments of their Divines concerning our Ceremonies but this I have found that those who have gone from our Universities and travelled into forreign Reformed Churches and Kingdomes have generally returned to us again with very little fondness for our Ceremonies now it seems very strange that if the same Ceremonies be used abroad that are used here or if they abroad count them as indifferent as we do them at home that Travells should ingenerate in any a dislike of them and it is strange also if Mr. Beza had no worse thoughts of out Discipline and Rights then Mr. Durell would make shew of that he should have so good thoughts of Mr. Travers and several other chief Nonconformists in England as to make them his greatest Correspondents for so I can prove he did by Letters still extant Hitherto I have shewed you how much Mr. Durell hath mistaken and mis-represented the state of those Controversies that are on foot among us I will now give you in a short Catalogue of Impertinences by which you shall see that he hath stuffed his Book with Testimonies to prove that which never any Presbyterian denyed or ever gave him the least occasion to think he denyed The first place in this Catalogue is due to his Testimonies mustered up pag. 51 52. relating to Sacriledge a Species whereof he saies is the purchasing and detaining of Church Lands I for my part think so too and never yet met with a Presbyterian that thought otherwise if there be a true superfluity of Church Lands then the Magistrate doubtless may out of that superfluity take for any other good use though it be not directly Ecclesiastical In cases also of great necessity Church Lands seem not to be priviledged from sale nor can any wise man doubt but that it is the Magistrates duty to convert such Lands as were given to the Church by a Zeale without knowledge and to promote Idolatry and Superstition unto such uses as are truly pious and acceptable unto God These and other such like Cases excepted the Presbyterians would as willingly have a Noli me tangere upon every parcel of the Church Lands as Mr. Durell himself He tells us indeed page 51. That many here among us and some of them Presbyterian Ministers made nothing of purchasing and detaining Church Lands and another as very a Scribler as himself hath told us That in the Annotations commonly known by the name of the Assemblies Annotations he could never meet with any thing against Sacriledge in any of those places where he had consulted them the first edition of those Annotations I have not by me but if that Edition had nothing in it against Sacriledge let the Saddle be set upon the right Horse and the blame laid upon Dr. Daniel Feately who Commenting upon Romans the 2d where the word Sacriledge
Reverence and Obeysance towards the East at our coming in or going out of the Church that the Rule of Charity prescribed by the Apostle may be observed i. e. That they which use this Rite despise not them who use it not and that they who use it not condemn not those that use it And how will the Presbyterians rejoyce to read those high commendations of the Bohemian Churches 'T is said page 64. That they are the first that Reformed Religion from Popery to True and Primitive Christianity and page 99. 't is said Happy had been all the Christian word if as the said Churches were the first that Reformed themselves from Popery the way of their Reformation had been followed by all others who Reformed after them This his high Opinion he confirms by the Testimony of Learned Zaâ—chy and might also have confirmed it by the Testimony of Luther Well! this being supposed must not the Presbyterians carry the day they think they must and therefore one of them not many years since Translated Comenius into English as making very much for that Plat-form they aimed at Indeed in the Order of those Churches I find Lay-Presbyters and which is more Lay-Presbytresses and Eleemosynaries answering to the Presbyterians Deacons Officers I know they have called by the name of Antistites which may be rendered Bishops but every one of them to submit himself to the judgment not only of his Colleagues but also of the Conseniours and to admit admonition Counsels and reproof from them and these Conseniours are together with their Antistites to exercise Discipline upon Ministers The Lords day those Churches keep as strictly as the Presbyterians contend to have them kept Baptisme they administer without the sign of the Cross with them none are thought to belong to the Pastoral Cure of Ministers but those who do with good will submit themselves to that Unity and Order whereas among us every one must be a Church Member or else go to the Common Goal and that which answers unto Confirmation amongst them is performed only by the Minister and before every Sacrament the Master of a Family and his Household come to the Minister and are by him examined some few Holy-dayes indeed are kept in these Churches but so that when Divine Service is ended people go to their work as upon other dayes There is no order among them to abstain from the works of their Calling on the Saints day or to keep the Evening before Fast so that these Churches are as Presbyterian as Presbyterians themselves can desire what was it then that moved Mr. Durell so transcendently to extol them page 46. He tells us That those Churches that first Reformed from Popery receive the Communion kneeling and it is true they do so but they did not do so from the beginning In the year 1494. they received the Communion standing but were forced to leave off that gesture because their Persecutors were the more bitter upon that account and would not this be a goodly Argument think you the Bohemian Church to avoid persecution receives the Sacrament kneeling therefore it is conformable with the English Church that persecutes all who do not receive the Sacrament kneeling I but when these Churches did joyn with those of Major Polonia and Lithuania it was unanimously forbidden to receive that blessed Sacrament sitting because among other Reasons that unmannerly and irreverent gesture was peculiar to those Miscreants the Arrians amongst them and they made this observation That the custome of sitting at the Lords Table was first brought into some of their Churches by those who most miserably falling from their Communion did renounce the Lord who redeemed them wherefore they intreat and exhort all their Company and Bretheren that they would change sitting into standing or kneeling For this Mr. Durell refers us to a general Synod celebrated 1583. But every one that looks into the Harmony of Confessions will see that Mr. Durell hath not dealt fairly for first He leaves out a Parenthesis of the Synod in the which it is expresly said That that gesture of Session with others is free Secondly Whereas the Synod saies that Session was brought in potissimum malo Auspicio This Mr. Durell Translates was first brought in I grant indeed that in another Synod to which this Synod doth refer celebrated 1578. it is expresly said That they who fell off to Arrianisme were the first Authors of sitting in their Churches but that Synods words Mr. Durell does not Translate and therefore has Translated either ignorantly or dishonestly Let it also be observed that this Synod does pray and beseech people to leave off sitting not command them under the pain of Excommunication yea this Synod by allowing what was done in the former Synod does determine That it is unlawful to smite Godly men with Ecclesiastical Descipline because of external Rites Let me also add that the Fathers of this Synod were under a mistake when they said That no Church in Europe anno 1583. did use sitting at the Lords Table and Mr. Durell is much more mistaken if he thinks that any Socinians first brought up the custome of sitting amongst us here in England for what if Dr. Owen said truly when he confuted the Socinians That Socinianisme had generally spread it self into the Nation yet sitting had been used before Socinianisme so spread it self I never heard that there was a Socinian either in the Assembly or in the two Houses untill that one Mr. Free got among the Commons who for his Blasphemies was cashiered that House as I have somewhere read Had Mr. Durell pleased he might have consulted a Catechisme made by Thomas Beacon Prebend of Canterbury and Printed cum Privilegio 1563. in which Catechisme the Learned Divine and Godly Confessour saith That if sitting at the Lords Table which was then used in certain Reformed Churches were recived by publick Authority and common Consent and might be conveniently used in our Churches he could allow that gesture best And Mr. Robert Nicholls in a Discourse of kneeling in the act of Receiving long since presented to Bishop Morton but not printed till 1660 would have informed him That in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Raign standing was Ordained at Coventry and Northampton by her Majesties Commission and kneeling abolished But there was another thing perhaps that might move Mr. Durell to be so superlative in the commendation of the Bohemian Churches namely a Crotchet got into his head of calling an Assembly of forreign Divines that should all give their suffrage for the Discipline and Rites of the English Church which Crotchet did so please him that he begins to call that Assembly page 200 and Comenius the only surviving Bishop of the Bohemian Churches he will give the Honour to speak first and accordingly doth bring him in pag. 202 203 204 205. with a long Harangue of words in the commendation of Unity or Order but is so uncivil to the aged Bishop as not to allow him