Omnipotentiam non credunt 'T IS true they are accused for depriving the Magistrate from the same Authority and Soveraign Intendence over the Ecclesiastical State as over that of the Civil But notwithstanding they do sufficiently satisfy all reasonable and considerate persons of this in the four and twentieth Chapter of their Confession Beside those who condemn that collaterality of Governments and of Tribunals the one Ecclesiastical and the other Civil in one and the same territory and who believe that it comes from the forge of Antichrist and that it hath introduced Popery into the world do not trouble themselves about resolving the difficulty nor about assigning to each his Lawes his Courts his Officers his Soveraign and the measure of his Power and Authority I add that as the force and efficacy of Laws does not consist in whither they are Ecclesiastical or Civil nor in their goodness justice and truth but in the will of him or those who sit at the Helm of Affairs the Congregational Churches must of necessity acknowledg the force of all those Laws whither for the Ecclesiastical or the Civil State only they affirm that as the Magistrate is not Infallible he may possibly abuse his right and orr either in the publication or the execution of his Laws of what Nature soever they be and as they are not obliged to obey all Civil Laws no more are they obliged to obey all Laws Ecclesiastical they affirm also that as the Empire of Jesus Christ in matters of Religion is not over the bodies but over the hearts of men the Magistrate who is the Protector and Defender of the visible Church of Jesus Christ in his Territories sins extremely when he makes Laws and Ordinances that do violence to the bodies of his Subjects and that take from them that liberty which every man ought to have in the choice of his Religion and in the manner of serving God BUT that crime which is imposed on them supposing it to be one is incomparably less than that of Presbyterian Churches all which follow the establishment and the practise of Calvin who set up in Geneva an Ecclesiastical Tribunal Independant and distinct from that of the Magistrate insomuch that a learned man named Monsieur Jurieu has writ a large Book wherein he endeavours to prove that the Soveraign Magistrate considered as such has not any jurisdiction nor Intendence over the Collected Churches in his Dominions and that he hath no other right than that of Inspection and considered as a Christian and one of his principal Members wherein Monsieur Jurieu is more Independant than the Independants themselves and he does not afford so much Authority to the Magistrate over the Churches that are collected within his Territories and Dominions as the Independants do THE Independant Churches and their Pastors are very wide from these thoughts and practises For the Authority of every Congregation being as that of every Family what liberty soever it has to govern it self according to its own way and humour it is not neither in right nor in power nor even in will to set up a Tribunal distinct from and Independent on that of the Magistrate AFTER all a Prince who should endeavour to establish an Arbitrary Power in his Kingdom that should depend only upon God and his Sword might imagine he should be less hindred by several thousands of Independant Congregations not only on him and on his Courts but also the one Independant on the other than by one entire body of all those Churches which should set up by their deputies an Ecclesiastical Tribunal distinct from and Independant on the Civil For the strengeh of all those Independant Congregations would be like that of several threads which may easily be broke one after another whereas the strength of all those Churches joyned in one body would be like to that of all those threads twisted together which it would be almost if not absolutely impossible to break or to undo but by the same way that Alexander took to break the Gordian-knot AS the Independent Churches do come the nearest to those of the Apostles so likewise they are further off than any of the other reformed Churches from that thought and practise which has accomplished the Mystery of Inquity which is nothing else but the Empire of the Clergy and so consequently That of the Pope in the Empire of the secular Powers under the Mask and Disguise of Religion and Ecclesiastical power AS to the Objection that is made against them that in case there should be no other Ecclesiastical Establishment in a Kingdom than theirs the three fourths of the Inhabitants would live in great negligence and a gross Ignorance of Religion To that they say that their way does not exempt Pastors from attending upon the Office of their Ministry at all times and places both within and without their particular Congregations and to take the same pains as the Presbyterian Ministers do for what repects the preaching of the word in the most publick places also they do very much approve that the Magistrate should erect Academies and Colledges assign Tithes and Revenues and Temples establish persons to be imployed in the instruction of people in publick to invite them to it and to excite the Ignorant to frequent the Schools and the Lectures of the Professors of Arts and Sciences where they should go for the love of vertue and knowledge without being constrained AS to the crime of Schism which is imposed on them as their being seperate from all the visible Churches of Jesus Christ in the same manner as the Donatists the Novatians and the Luciferians did 't is a false Accu sation Those who accuse them of Schism do not understand the nature of Schism 1. 'T IS not Schism when a particular Church separates from another Church as the Church of Luther from that of Calvin nor the Protestants from the Papists nor even one particular reformed Church from some other with which it made before but one body of a Church But true Schism is formed among the Members of one and the same particular Church as was that of Corinth 2. 'T IS not Schism when a number of Hereticks separate from the Orthodox party of a particular Church to make a Congregation apart to the end they may profess their heresie with greater liberty but it is an Apostasie and an abandoning and forsaking of the Orthodox faith or Church of Jesus Christ which is Catholick and visible and upon this ground the Church of Rome is not a Schismatical but an Apostate Church although it be one for the first reason because that what ingagement or tye soever all its Members have to one head however they are not all agreed together Schism properly is when the Members of one Church are at variance as were those of the Church of Corinth and upon that account there is alwayes a Schism in the Romish Church 3. THERE is no Schism among several particular Churches that
differ one from the other in discipline but that retain and keep all the same foundation and ground of faith and who have for that point a great union and a strict correspondence with other Churches And this being so no more is there any Schism when the Congregationals are Independant on other Churches and on their Synods but when their Churches are so among themselves 4. THERE is no Schism among several particular Churches that agree in one and the fame faith and discipline as are those of Metz and Sedan but do their own business apart independantly not only on one another but likewise on the Synods 'T is with Independant Churches or with several other particular Churches as with several families or Neighbourhoods or those that are pretty distant the one from the other who may all be good friends and live in good Intelligence together without any thing of Schism or rupture between them and yet every one does their own particular business by themselves 5. THE Congregational men are no more guilty of Schism when they form to themselves Congregations distinct from Parishes contrary to the command of the Magistrate 't is a disobedience not to a National Church which Jesus Christ hath not instituted much less invested with either Jurisdiction or power to make Laws in matters of Religion but to the Magistrate whom to disobey is not Schism but a crime of laesoe Majestaetis or rebellion but yet it ceases to be that too when it acts only from this principle of obeying God rather than men NOW this clearing up of the Nature of Schism which strongly establishes the Independancy of the Churches and makes it altogether reasonable does not destroy the Confederation of the Churches into one body even under a national Synod when for the mutual preservation of these Churches against a common Enemy that persecutes them they are constrained to make but one body of State or of Churches such as is the Confederation of our Churches in France But then that necessity does not destroy the natural liberty of every particular Church to be Independant 't is a Confederation established with prudence in that manner as was that of the Cities of Achaida and as is at this day that of the Low-Countries and of the Swizers the conjunction of which into one body and under one and the same jurisdiction does not divest any Town or Province of their natural freedome and liberty to be Independant on one another THERE is however this temper and menage to be observed in this Religious Confederation that it ought to be made not by vertue of the Power of binding and loosing and of the Keys of the Kingdome of heaven which it is pretended that God hath committed to Pastors or Synods but by vertue of a confederated discipline which is in the place of a Magistrate Also the Councel of Monsieur Amyraule should be observed and it is the same that the Cities of Achaia observed before viz. that nothing should pass in the general Assembly but what has been first reviewed and approved of by every particular Church AND this is that wherein the prudence of our first Reformers in France have been wanting when they sat up a discipline by vertue of an Ecclesiastical power distinct from that of the Magistrate and from that which has its operation upon the heart by the Ministry of the word and of a power fastened to the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven and to that of binding and loosing by vertue of which power they depose and excommunicate that is to say as Monsieur Claude says they deliver up a person to the Devil but they also deliver him to him in the name and Authority of Jesus Christ that so the people may not imagine this power to be that of the Magistrate or of the confederate discipline but of Jesus Christ the Mediatour and King of his Church and by vertue of the power that he exercises over it and of which the Pastors and Ministers are the depositers AS to those who blame as much the separation of the Independants as that of the Donatists the Novatians and Luciferians it is ill grounded the vice of the Donatists was in that they owned no other Church of Jesus Christ in the World than theirs for they rebaptized those who came from the Catholick Church to them the Independants are far from these thoughts and practices they do as those who having a particular care of their health withdraw into a better place and sounder Air but yet they do not think but that they may do very well in places where the Air is not so good BEFORE I go to another Chapter I shall take notice that the result of the thoughts and of the practises of the Congregationals their Churches and their Pastors do come to these two Maxims 1. THAT to establish peace and true Religion in the World and among Christians we must go back to the Materia prima of the Congregational Churches which is that every person and every Society hath the liberty to deliberate and consult about the choice of a Religion and of the way to serve God and to take upon that point the counsel of wise and sincere persons provided that that counsel tends not to Irreligion and to some Establishment of such maxims which shock the natural Notions concerning the existence of a God his Providence the Immortality of the soul the necessity of a Divine Worship provided also that the manner which every person and every Church hath chosen to govern it self by doth not trouble the State in which one lives unless that trouble happen by accident in the manner that Jesus Christ sayes of the Gospel which excites troubles and brings Wars and contentions into the World 2. THAT this maxim of a national Church in every Territory with an uniformity of Doctrine and discipline distinct from the civil Tribunals in jurisdiction and officers hath introduced the Pope into the World that it hath been it is and it will be the cause that there never will be a Church in the World in its true purity unless Almighty God reserves some among the Congregational Churches CHAP. VII That the Congregational way has been practised in all Ages of the World I Could easily shew that for above this four thousand years before Jesus Christ and even during the height of Popery and in the bosome of the Church of Rome God hath alwayes reserved some true Worshippers of Jesus Christ by the way of Congregational Assemblies there were an infinite number of them in the Roman Empire during the persecution that was set on foot by the Arrians and when as St. Jerome sayes all the World were Arrians BUT to come more particularly to the thing they have had Independant Churches in all times and in all places before the Law and under the Law in the time of Jesus Christ and of the Apostles and after the Apostles there were of them in the time of Exos the Son of
that their spirit was not that of contention nor animosity one against another but of peace and concord IF the Book of that excellent Author Eutychius the Patriarch of Alexandria had appeared with all its Truths and had been seen by all those that had eyes and would use them during the lives of Monsieur Salmasius Monsieur Blundel c. they had been yet more strongly perswaded than they were that all those circumstances so distant from the relation that Eutychius makes of them savours as much of Romance as those three Crosses which Helena Mother of Constantine found or as the donation of that Emperour to Silvester CERTAINLY the providence of God did clearly appear in the choise of those three hundred and eighteen Bishops 'T was an Act of God and not man when he raised up the good Bishop of Alexandria to recommend them to Constantine and when he inclined the heart of that Prince to hearken to his Counsel For if the Emperour had let himself been overruled at the beginning of that Counsel by any other Bishop as he did at the end of his Life the first Establishment of Faith and Religion had been that of Arrianisme whereas the orthodox Faith taking the first possession under the first Christian Emperour this served most powerfully to gain it credit and to make it pass and transmit it to posterity I would ask here by the way those that deprive the Soveraign Magistrate of the Intendance of regulating by a Soveraign Authority in all places either of an Empire or a Territory the matters of Religion and give him no other Authority than that of a private person I would ask those I say what expedient a good Bishop such as this of Alexandria could be able to find out to authorize the Faith that was contrary to that of Arrius in case God had not inclined the heart of Constantine to establish it by his commands in all the places of his Empire I ought not to forget here one circumstance in our Author that extreamly fortifies the right of the Magistrate especially if he be Orthodox to the Soveraign Intendance in the Government of the Church and which moreover strongly proves that the Rules Canons Censures and Anathemas of Councils are only Councils and the declarations of wise and experienced men before the Magistrate hath given them Authority by his Sanction In short this passage of Eutychius is the accomplishment of the prophesie of S. Paul 1 Cor. 6. 2. Know you not that the Saints shall judge the World that is to say know you not that God will one day establish Faithful Magistrates who shall be governours in chief of the Church he says than that the choice of three hundred and eighteen Bishops being made Constantine entred into their Assembly and after he had saluted and harrangued to them he laid his Scepter upon the Table his Ring and his sword and said to them I give you the power of regulating the affairs of the Church that done the Fathers humbly thanked him for the Authority which he was pleased to fortifie them with and rendered him his Scepter his Ring and his Sword 'T IS true if Constantine had been an Arrian his erronious opinion had done as much mischief as the contrary opinion to that of Arrius and wherewith he was possessed did good by its Establishment but it is true also that if the Soveraign of an Empire hath no other authority in the Church than that of a private person it will never be possible and it can never happen that an Orthodox Prince will be able to establish the true Religion by his Commandments in all the places of his Empire 'T is true by this Soveraign Authority of the Magistrate Errour and Impiety may as well be established by Lawes as truth and piety but it is true also that when the Soveraign Magistrate either hath no part nor is interessed in the affairs of Religion as during the three first Ages of the Church nothing could keep the Bishops as were those two thousand and forty eight of whom Eutychius speaks from divinding into many erronious parties and the Orthodox party to be always the least in number and this cannot happen when God gives to the Church such Princes as resemble Constantine the Great Theodosius and Martian IT happens notwithstanding that during such disorders and such confusions of diverse opinions as were those of the two thousand and forty that God reserves always a small number of good Pastors as were those three hundred and eighteen who form in a great Empire such as was the Roman several little Congregations all like to those of our Independants whom God makes use of amidst the greater corruption and confusion to keep and perpetuate to himself an Orthodox and faithful people in the world 'T IS true then that whither God gives a Christian Magistrate but a Heretick or whether he does not give any if he be not possibly a Heathen as during the three first Ages the inconvenience is great but it is otherwise certain that when God blesses his Church with a Magistrate that favours the Orthodox and true Worshippers of Jesus Christ the condition of the Church of God is incomparably more happy than under any other establishment of Religion or of the State For although persecution ought to unite Christians by a holy and the same Faith and by a life correspondent to it yet it hath not that Efficacy nor that vertue to produce those two good effects which commonly follow under the Reign of good Princes as David Hezekiah Josiah Constantine Theodosius c. under whom the people are united well otherwise and kept in good order and in the profession of one and the same and a good Religion which they are not under persecution For even the Church is not without disorders and violent shakings under the best and most Orthodox Princes which happens by their Indulgence who keep not up that Authority they ought to take in the government of the Church and who delegate it to the Clergy and permit them to exercise by a pretended power derived from Jesus Christ Independant on the Magistrate and who in short raise up Bishops to such a greatness and wealth as to have credit enough to partake and share the Soveraignty and to dispute the moiety of it with him who of right is the Soveraign of the whole leaving him the temporal Soveraignty and reserving to themselves the spiritual as they call it BUT these matters I discourse of in my Book not yet Printed intituled An Essay towards a true Ecclesiastical History One Theophilus of Alexandria and his Successor Cyrillus were equal and went check by jole in Authority with the Emperour and had built an Empire in that of their Soveraign For even those and their Successours had built several of them when a Pope was set up among them who subjugated them all and made them all agree to set up but one Catholick Church for before there were in
is a pernicious Sect which from the very foundation overthrows the Empires and Governments of the World and others have no better opinion of them imputing to them practises contrary to truth as to receive into their Communion the most loose disordered and impious persons though on the contrary their fault if it be one is just at the other extremity not to receive neither into their Society nor their Communion any but such in whom they probably find the marks of regeneration and that beside their greatest Crime is to condemn the practise of Churches as Popish and Tyrannical when by a right pretended to be divine and by vertue of the power of the Keyes and of that of binding and loosing they erect a Tribunal or a National Ecclesiastical power independent and distinct from that of the Magistrate though otherwise they approve of the Government of our Churches of France according to the principles of those who establish it upon a natural right and upon a considerate discipline in a manner absolutely like to the civil and politick For it is upon this ground of natural right of confederation of Arbitrary Discipline and purely humane which may and ought to be changed and altered according to times and places it is upon this ground I say that the Discipline of the Reformed Churches of France is established and founded as the last Article of their Discipline says it in the very express terms CHAP. II. The Advantage of the Congregational way above any other establishment of the Church beside That it is the most reasonable and that oll others have insuperable inconveniencies THIS Congregational way hath incredible advantages over and above all the other establishments of Religion which most commonly are of the same extent as the civil State of every Territory but beyond all this way introduces into all the Churches which conform to it or at least into a great many of those Churches a Reformation in Doctrine in Discipline and in manner of Government wholly Apostolical it being impossible that of a hundred Congregations or particular Churches which should differ one from another in Faith and in the way of Government otherwise Independant each on the other or on the Synods but that there should be some or other which does retain this Apostolical holiness whereas it is not any wayes possible as we have seen by experience since the time of Constantine the Great but that one national Church of the same extent as the civil State or as the Empire or Dominion of a Prince must needs have many defects errours and apparent disorders not only in Discipline but also in Doctrine for these following Reasons 1. We must consider a National Church either in the manner as it was established by Constantine Theodostus and Justinian of as great an extent as the Roman Empire in which the State Ecclesiastical was regulated after the Model of the Civil State where the Bishop of a City or place whose extent was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was parallel to the Defensor Civitatis or to the Dux The Archbishop or the Metropolitan of the Province was parallel to the Praeses or Proconsul and Corrector The Diocesan the Primate or the Patriarch who was also the Hexarch in the time of the Calcedonian Council was parallel to the Legat of the Emperour or Vicarius where the Praetorium was and where there was in the Ecclesiastical State a subordination of Courts and Tribunals as in the Civil State for that was the Errour of the Antients to adjust the Ecclesiastical Government to the Civil instead of practising the quite contrary according to the judicious maxim of a wise Italian Politician Bisogna accomodare la ragione di Stato alla Religione non la Religione alla rag one di Stato Or we must consider the National Church when the Pastors are in an equality of rank and dignity but with subordination to Provincial or National Assemblies Consistories Colloquies and Synods Now in either manner of establishment where there is observed in all things an uniformity of Doctrine and of Discipline and which is pressed by the same rigorous severities in the State Ecclesiastical as the Laws are in the Civil in either manner I say even when the Magistrate favours the true Worshippers of Jesus Christ there happens Errours and disorders innumerable which never would be found in the establishment of the Congregational way as when the Bishop or a small number of Pastors has the whole management and supervision of affairs and where it is impossible but that Heresie Ambition Envy Politick regards temporal interest the Spirit of Pride and Grandeur and Factions should reign among them and that these Errours and disorders should so easily be visible and taken notice of as in a particular composed of one or two Pastors and of a small number of People This is what has been observed by the Historians Socrates and Sozomen and by the Fathers Gregory Nazianzen sayes that he had never seen Synods to produce any good effects but that they had rather increased Heresie then stifled and suppress'd it Martyn the Bishop of Tours had no better opinion of them All the Synods especially the Oecumenical had been Shire halls houses of confusion or even Aceldama's if the Emperours or their Commissaries had not thrown water upon the fire which they had kindled Yet they could not always so hinder but that these two great evils of Synods and Bishops the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did transport them to the very extremities of tyranny and cruelty insomuch that Dioscorus who was President in the second Council of Ephesus over four hundred persons was so moved with rage and passion against Flavian Bishop of Antioch that he rose up from his seat and killed him with blows and kicks and also trampled upon his body after he was dead 'T is remarkable that the Canons full of piety and pure Doctrine were never made in Numerous and Oecumenical Synods but in those that were private and composed of a few persons such as was that of Orenge where we read these words that deserve to be writ in Gold Tales nos amat Deus quales futuri sumus ipsius dono non quales sumus nostro merito having in it only the first Nicene Council which hath produced us this most Nervous confession concerning the blessed Trinity I add that in the Establishment of a National Church which observes in a large extent of Dominion the same uniformity of Religion as of Polity it is neither goodness nor truth neither sincerity nor a well-form'd design that acts but it is hazard worldly interrest power and the greatest number which is oftentimes the most erroncous and the will of one single Person invested with an absolute power which is most commonly taken up by Flatterers and Counsellors who are animated with other motives than those of Conscience or who how good soever and sincere otherwise are not illuminated
nor learned enough to give a right judgement about matters of Religion Carneades said that the State of Athens was unhappy in which wise men made fair Overtures and gave good Counsels but Fools judged of them and ordered all things according to their idle and extravagant fancies And indeed Wise men may consult but it is the greatest number or the longest and best sword that determines which is too often in the hands of those who have more strength of power than force of judgement so that by this establishment of a National Ecclesiastical Government thousands of Christians and faithful Souls are as much obliged to submit themselves to the Religion of a whole Empire according to the establishment which shall be made of it by an Idolatrous Rehoboam by an Arrian Constantius by an Apostate Julian by a Popish Mary Queen of England as to that which shall be set up by a David by a Constantine the the Great and by a Queen Elizabeth of ever blessed memory which Inconveniencies neither can nor ever will be able to happen in a place where the Congregational way shall be established It may be one Soveraign who shall be as Heretick as Constantius will issue forth his commands for the establishment of his heresie in all the places of his dominion as Theodosius the second made another for that of the Orthodox Faith when he commanded that all the Subjects of his Empire should receive the faith from Damaseus of Rome and from Peter of Alexandria But it may likewise fall out that that same Emperour to wit Theodosius the second might make two Ordinances which may mutually destroy one another for he convoked the first Synod of Ephesus which condemned the Opinion of Nestorius and some years after he convoked the second Synod of Ephesus which contradicted it and allowed the opinion of Nestorius 2. THIS same inconvenience is verified by the establishment of the best reformed Churches in the World I mean that of Luther and of Calvin For as the Reformation was that of a National Church of the same extent with that of the Territory of the Soveraign where it was established so likewise did it carry the Obligation into Germany Sweedland and Denmark that they should submit to Consubstantiation without any bodies having the liberty to form assemblies to themselves which may reject it which Churches might do if they were Independant The same inconvenience is happened and must happen from the National establishment of the Reformation which Calvin hath made in England Holland some parts of Germany and elsewhere and how pure soever the Reformation was as for the Doctrine of that holy man it is extremely defective as to the Discipline the power Ecclesiastick and that Tribunal which he Erected in Geneva distinct and Independant on the Magistrate by vertue of a pretended Divine right and power which hath been the cause of all those infinite disorders confusions and even Schisms in England Scotland Holland and Geneva even in the time of Calvin as we read in his Epistles 3. ONE great convenience which is found in the Establishment of a National Government is that it is always grounded upon humane principles cruel and barbarous as to constrain to persecute and even to burn those who in matter of Religion do not embrace that of the Ecclesiastical State or of the Magistrate that establishes it and do not conform to all the practices that he appoints and commands 4. THEY say that this National establishment of Ecclesiastical Government deprives Man of his Reason and his natural and Religious liberty in the choice he ought to make of his God and of the worship he ought to render him and to which he should not be constrained but perswaded neither to be brought to it by custome nor by birth nor likewise by the Law of the Magistrate unless he be convinced that his Ordinances and commands in matters of Religion are conformable to the word of God for they press mightily upon this consideration that this establishment divests Man of the same liberty in his religious life as he hath in the Civil where he is not restrained by any Law of the Magistrate to choose his house his Wife his Master his Servant his Lawyer his Physitian his Calling nor any one particular manner how to govern his Family provided it may be done without breaking the publick peace 5. THEY say that how unjust or how extravagant soever the Laws of the Magistrate might be for the regulating of Politie yet there is nothing unreasonable neither in the Magistrate generally to command the practice of them nor in all Subjects submitting to them without reserve or exception so long as the importance of those Laws do not extend beyond the present life but if it reaches further and Conscience and Eternal Salvation be concerned therein they believe that an uniformity of Faith and of Religion which should be imposed upon us how good so ever the thing might be in its self it would be wicked and unreasonable because it would do violence to the Conscience of which the Magistrate is not the Master nor the Arbiter as he is of the Bodies and estates of Men. CHAP. III. That upon the ground of this Hypothesis That every Supream Authority either in the Popish or the Presbyterian Church is subject to Error Monsieur de Condom hath reason to approve of the Congregational way and the Independency of particular Churches on any other Authority than that of Jesus Christ in his VVord BUT there is nothing which does more reasonably establish the Independancy of particular Churches nor which more powerfully destroyes this Authority in the Church by a divine right and the necessity there is that a person or a particular Church should depend upon its Ordinances unless that Supream Authority is infallible for if it be subject to Error it must of necessity do violence to the Christian liberty of the faithful and so degenerate into a Tyrannical Authority there is nothing I say which establishes more reasonably the Independency of particular Churches nor which more powerfully destroyes their dependency than the account which the Bishop of Condom gives of the judgements of the Independants and of the Sentence that the Synod of Charenton pronounced against them THEY believe sayes he that every faithful Member ought to follow the illuminations of his own Conscience without submitting his judgement to the Authority of any Body nor any Ecclesiastical Assembly and they do not refuse to submit to the word of God nor to embrace the decisions of Synods when after a due and through Examination of them they find them reasonable That which they refuse to do is to submit their judgement to that of any Assembly because it is a Society of Men that are subject to Errour THE Gospel it self is not more true than this perswasion of Independants and that Bishop could not approve of one more reasonable to wit that a particular person or Church ought not to submit
their Faith their Religion nor the guidance of their manners to an Authority which is subject to errour but only to the Word of God which is an infallible Authority Upon this ground the Bishop of Condom hath reason to condemn the Synod of Charenton for having taxed the Judgement of the Independants with Errour which consists as sayes the Synod in what they teach that every Church ought to be governed by its own laws without any dependance upon any in matters Ecclesiastical and without any obligation to acknowledge the authority of Synods for its governance and conduct THEN a little after this same Synod decides that this Sect is as prejudicial to the State as to the Church that it opens a door to all sorts of Irregularities and extravagancies that it takes away all the means of bringing any remedy to them and that if it had field-room enough it would form to it self as many Religions as Parishes or particular Assemblies THESE last words sayes the Bishop discover that it is principally in matters of Faith that the Synod would establish dependancy since the greatest inconvenience that he takes notice of into which the faithful people of God would fall by independancy is that they would frame as many Religions as Parishes then says he of necessity according to the Doctrine of that Synod each Church and by a stronger reason each particular must depend as to what respects faith upon a supreme Authority which resides in some Assembly or in some body to which Authority all the faithful people of God ought to submit their Judgement THIS Bishop could take notice of nothing more unreasonable and more extravagant in our Synods than to oblige a private person to submit himself in matters of Faith to the Judgment of an Assembly whose decisions are not the Word of God that is to say not infallible 'T IS true that pre-supposing all Supreme Authority in the Church whether in the Protestant or Romish is subject to errour the Government of the Adversaries of Rome of Independants or other Protestants is equally justifiable when they refuse to pay submission to the Authority of Rome since that it is incomparably more defective than that which the Protestants set up in their Churches BUT on the other side if it be true that upon this ground the Government of the Independants is more justifiable and more reasonable than that of other Protestants who blindly submit themselves to a Tribunal subject to errour and whose conduct and gonance is beyond all comparison further off from Reason than is that of the Papists for pre-supposing that the Authority of Rome is infallible the submission which the people pay to that supreme Authority is so much the more reasonable as that of the Protestants is the less when they submit to a supreme Authority which they themselves believe is subject to errour IN short the Bishop of Condom hath great reason to be sure that the Protestants are mightily beside the Cushion and to blame for condemning the Infallibility of Rome so long as the Incontestability and indisputableness which they invest their supreme Authority withal carries the same Obligation along with it to obedience and submission A great Divine of ours who relates the Judgement of the Protestants hereupon libr. 1. cap. 8. de Clavibus expresses himself in these words Hujus ligamenti quo Pastores Ecelesiae constringunt peccatores tanta est vis certitudo ut Christus pronunciet si quid ligaverint pastores in terris id fore ligâ—tum in coelo id est Deum Ratum habiturum hanc ligationem potest fieri aliquando ut ligatio sit injusta vult tamen Christus eam ratam esse non enim fas est homini qui injuste excommunicatus est invaaere sacram Coenam invitis Pastoribus irrumpere in communionem Ecclesiae IS not that to tell us that a man excommunicated unjustly is as much obliged to submit himself to the excommunication pronounced against him by an Authority which hath erred as when it is given by an Authority which hath not erred And is not that to tell us that in every way whither justly or unjustly a person delivered to Satan as is the general opinion of all Protestants excepting my Father that to deliver to Satan and to excommunicate are one and the same thing ought not to dispute oâ—â— resist that Authority which hath delivered him up to that evil Spirit To conclude is not that to speak in the Language of the Canon Si papa distinct 40 which will by no means permit a person cast thus to the Devil although against all right and justice by the Authority of the Pope to resist that supreme Authority THE Bishop likewise hath no less good Reason to be sure that the conjunction of all the parts of Romish Church in one body would be unreasonable if they were not cimented by infallibility and to divest it of its Infallibility is to break it in pieces is to cast every of its least parts into Independancy and to give liberty to every of them to govern themselves according to their own mode and way and to do their business by themselves BUT here we should observe as we go along that of two depths of Satan the Ecclesiastical Power and Infallibility the first is a Lie an Imposture and a cheat but that presupposing that it is not a cheat but a thing that is good and true and the use of which is necessary in the Church Infallibility is naturally and reasonably a consequence of it And in truth our Reformers have placed Incontestability in the room of Infallibility But it is true also that if Infallibility be a pure cheat the other is a pure and absolute tyranny and it is less reasonable in not being a natural consequence of Ecclesiastical power incontestability is a thousand times worse than Infallibity except it be in one thing and that is that it hath not been of so long a Duration 'T IS here no doubt wherein the illuminations of humane Reason were not so great to our first Reformers as to the generation of men in this Age For as those soresaw in it that a submission of so many Princes and people who differed in Customes Laws and Languages to an Authority subject to errour was not only unreasonable but also impossible to prevent the revolt both of Kings and people they with a great deal of Justice invested it with Infallibility AND 't is here too that the Bishop of Condom triumphs over us and has great reason for it on his side when he reproaches us that we have been deficient in our Politicks in not erecting among us an infallible Tribunal and that we are much to blame for obliging the faithful people of God with so much rigour and severity to submit to a tribunal subject to errour but those of Rome are not so for they oblige their people to submit to one that is infallible BUT the Independants as they are led by
is impossible I say that he can suffice and attend upon the Instruction of all those Auditors and of every one of them in particular which is most easy to be done by the way that the Pastors of Independant Churches take whereof every Congregation is not at the most above two hundred persons and who are also eased and help'd by their Coadjutors in the work of the holy Ministry so that this kind of Congregational way seems to be the accomplishment of the Prophesy concerning the Covenant of Grace which God was to make in the lest times with his people where there shall be no more need to have recourse to the Bishop or to his Curate for receiving instruction because every person who is in the Covenant of Grace as the greatest number of those who compose those Congregations do belong to that Covenant shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord and the Pastor himself shall go to visit his sheep and take a particular care of them So likewise this is the way of the Pastors of the little flock of Jesus Christ to whom he will give the Kingdom THERE are also other Considerations which confirm me absolutely in this opinion that God in a more especial manner approves of the Congregational way One is that most an end in all others the Ministers are influenced by worldly interest by ambition and the desire of ruling that its Establishment could never be made without noise and without the opposition of the Magistrate and the people for they have been always against this erection of a National tribunal Independant on the Magistrates who never had given their consent to it till after the advocates and pleaders for this national tribunal had been indefatigably buzzing into their ears these fair and specious Remonstrances that it was the voice of God and of Jesus Chriâ—t that the world should be governed by two Collaterall powers This is what the Decretals made the Kings and the people to believe in the ninth age and they strongly insisted that the Bishop of Rome was to be at the head of the Ecclesiastical power and to prescribe laws to them by the Ministry of his Clergy for the regulating of Religion and for the Affaires of the Church And this is what Calvin also made those to believe who left the Church of Rome when he erected a Tribunal for the matters of Religion in which the Magistrates should not be seen in the quality of Magistrates but only as Members of the consistory But yet a Tribunal that should be as much invested with Incontestability and with a power not to appeal from it as that of Rome is with Infallibility And this is what Calvin carryed by main force not only against the will of the Magistrate and of the people of Geneva but against the practise of all Churches and against the Judgment of all the Divines of his time BUT it hath not been so with the Establishment of the Congregational way to which the people have had as great an Inclination and natural forwardness as the Pastors themselves Which has been seen in England for above this forty years For of more than sixscore persons who made up the Assembly of Ministers there was above a hundred of them for the Presbyterian Government and about eight or ten for the Congregational way and two only Coleman and Lightfoot for the opinion of Erastus Yet nevertheless when it came to the Execution and practise there was not one of ten thousand people that would submit to the Presbyterian Government And one of them who was the most Eminent confessed to me that being Pastor of the greatest Parish in London he was never able to establish in it a consistory nor find any that would be of it but a pitiful Scotch Taylor This difficulty was not seen as to the Congregational way for whereas only the Pastors were for the Presbyterian way there were proportionably as many people as Ministers who joined in the Assemblies of the Congregational way Which they did with more heat and fervour than the Parliament would have had them in so much that they were forced to publish a Declaration by which they exhorted the people to put off the gathering of Churches till the Parliament had made a more publick regulation thereof As to the opinion of Erastus though it was not approved in the Assembly but by two Divines it had notwithstanding the applause of most of the Magistrates of the learned and more illuminated who were not of the Gowne which discovers 1. THAT Interest is the Toole and Engine that moves most men in the world and that if the Magistrates were for an Intendance which the Presbyterians would take away from them these were no less in love with and eager of it 2. THAT it is very probable that the Advocates of the Congregational way were sincere whilest their number had a just proportion of Ministers Magistrates and People that were much for it I proved in the sixt Chapter of my Jugulum causae that of these two truths the first was put beyond all peradventure that Totus Mundus exercet histrionem that the greatest men do oft times mix some grain of wordly interest with that of Heaven adding not the Vtile to the honestum but the honestum to the Vtile espousing or quitting their Opinion according as they are actuated by the moving principle of sua cuique Vtilitas as Tacitus speaks For they resemble Pope Pius II d. who being a Cardinal submited the Pope to the Council but he changed his Opinion as soon as ever he came to be Pope himself Much about twenty years since the Learned Dr. Stillingfleet preferred the Presbyterian Government to the Episcopal but now he has had several fat benefices bestowed upon him and he is advanced to the Deanry of S. Paul Episcopacy is most excellent both in his esteem and opinion and in his writings THIS way is so much the more excellent just and reasonable as it hath a Compatibility with the Government of a National Church which makes but one entire body with that of the Republick as under the legal Oeconomy whereas the Government of a National Church distinct and Independant upon that of the Republick is not compatible with any government neither with that of the Magistrate nor with that of the Congregational Churches though the government of this latter might be compatible with all kinds of Government if it would be suffered for a multitude of small Congregational Churches is as much compatible with the Civil State as is a multitude of Families because neither the one nor the other do form to themselves a body by their deputies which establishes a Tribunal distinct from and independant on that of the Civil State whereas the Popish Episcopal and Presbyterian Government erects a Tribunal in every Territory independant on all others Calvin gave the first Model of it in Geneva Volui sayes he ut Judicium Ecclesiasticum disticium esset à Civili
XIV Remarks upon the Fault that some may find in the Title of this discourse I Will finish these conderations by the discussion and explication of the Title of this discourse to which some have excepted because they find there is not one Ecclesiastical Government even of those which differ most from one another that do not pretend to this Conformity as indeed they have either more or less for there is not one of them no not even of those that are the farthest off from the Doctrines and Government of the Ancient Christians and that have but very little agreement one with the other there is not one I say but what hath in something a conformity with them Every way of Government boasts of their retaining this conformity with the Ancient Christians I my self pretend to this glory in favour of the Congregational way Not long since a Learned Minister of Roüen published a Book intituled the Conformity of the discipline of the Churches of France to that of the Ancient Christians Beside though the discipline of the Church of England hath not any agreement with that of the Churches of France and it is impossible that two disciplines so disagreeing to each other should have both of them much conformity to the discipline of the Ancient Christians yet it hath so happened that a Famous Divine in his preface to his English Translation of the Novelty of Popery maintains very zealously the same thing in favour of the Discipline of the Church of England as Monsieur Larroque has done in favour of those of France If I were sayes he to speak to Frenchmen I would indeavour to convince them fully that we retain in England more of the Primitive and Apostolick Government than all the other Churches in the world Dr. Floyd and Dr. Tillotson say the same thing But I believe that this conformity is much what like to that which is between Jesus Christ and St. Francis For I do openly maintain that of all the Establishments of Religion That of the Church of England is widest from the discipline and practise of the Ancient Christians But he is not the only person hath spoke after this manner England is full of Books upon the subject of the Conformity of its Hierarchy and of its Episcopal Government to that of the Ancient Christians The Bishops Bilson Andrews Hall Morton and Pearson find it in Clemens Romanus and in Ignatius some of the Doctors of Rome meet with it in Denis the Areopagite but unless this Conformity be restrained to the times of the Apostles to which I find more footsteps in the Congregational way than in any other I believe we are all in an error as to what concerns our conformity to the Doctrine Discipline and Life of the Ancient Christians Above all the disagreement is found in the life which was heretofore much more exact and exemplary than in these last times it is the Devotion of our days is but cold and languishing in comparison of theirs It was in that that their glory did consist whereas ours is in having a greater knowledg and a more full and ample illumination into the mysteries of Faith than the first Christians had also to be better versed at this day in the knowledg of the Apostolical conduct of the nature and Government of the Church of its Authority and of that of its Pastors who were the Christians that immediately succeeded the Apostles I will finish where I began and that shall be by the force of those prejudices wherewith all Christians as well Protestants as Papists are anticipated and prepossest when they generally imagine that the Primitive Church was more Orthodox and pure in Doctrine than that of the following Ages because of their nearness with the times of the Apostles but I am as much perswaded of the contary as of any thing in the world 'T is said that God never built a Temple near to which the enemy of our Salvation has not built a Chappel but than it was a Chappel both greater and more spacious than the temple it self For during the time whilest God built a little Temple wherein he had circumscribed the twelve Apostles and a small flock of faithful people who conformed themselves to the purity their Doctrine and the holiness of their lives a number incomparably greater of false Apostles false Doctors and false Brethren separated from them For even in the first three hundred years of Christianity all or the most part of sincere persons and also of Fathers had a great deal of false allay mixt among their gold This is what we learn from Eutychius who lived in the first Ages of Christianity from whom we have the History of the Church in Arabyck published by Mr. Selden and Mr. Pocock and whom they recommend for an Author of an irreprochable fidelity There he tells us that Constantine the Great sent to all the Churches of his Empire Letters to let them understand that they were to make choice of the most Religious Bishops and those that were most learned in the Mysteries of the Christian Faith and that they then immediately set themselves to obey the Orders of the Emperour and that two thousand and forty eight Bishops came to the Town of Nice whereof near two thousand how pious and sincere soever otherwise they were were either most ignorant or most erronious in the knowledg of the Christian Religion For they were either Manichees or Murcionites or Montanists or Valentinians or Samosatenians or Arrians and in that great number of Bishops there were but three hundred and eighteen who had an affection for and ingaged themselves to the Orthodox Faith which was that of Alexander Bishop of Alexandria THIS Relation according to Eutychius is much more probable than after that manner as it is reported by Eusebius by Socrates by Baronius and by Monsieur Claude For what likelihood is there that that number of Bishops convoked from all places of Europe a great part of Africa and also of Asia Phaenicia Greece Maceaonia Thessalia Palestine Arabia Pamphilia Bythinia Capadocia Thrace Cilicia Pontus Persia and Scythia should amount but to three hundred and eighteen Bishops There is also less likelihood that those three hundred and eighteen Bishops should appear so sharp and so divided among themselves as to put out Libels of accusation one against another and that during their Session they made a cruel War within themselves These Accusations might be true as to the other Bishops who were as much divided in affections as in Judgments but not of these three hundred and eighteen who because they were all Orthodox and Children of peace and well united in their affections such as were Alexander Spiridion and Paphnutius were chosen by Constantine and Alexander out of the multitude of Hereticks Factious and contentious persons Beside the unanimity of these three hundred and eighteen Bishops in the composing of the Faith of the Council having but four Bishops that refused subscribing to it plainly shews