THE AGREEMENT OF THE ASSOCIATED MINISTERS OF THE County of Essex Proposed to their particular Congregations and to all such of the County that love the Churches Peace with a word of Exhortation to Brotherly Union Rom. 14.19 Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace and things wherewith one may edifie another 1 Cor. 1.10 11 12. Now I beseech you Brethren by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you but that you be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment For it hath been declared unto me of you my Brethren by them which are of the house of Cloe that there are contentions among you Now this I say that every one of you saith I am of Paul I am of Apollo I am of Cephas I am of Christ Rom. 16.17 Mark them that cause divisions and offences contrary to the Doctrine which you have learned and avoid them The second Edition Corrected and much Amended LONDON Printed for Edward Brewster at the Crane in Pauls-Church Yard 1658. THE PREFACE THe richest Crown and highest glory of a people is to be Gods Peculiar related in Covenant-nearness to him dedicated to his Praise trusted with his Word the only perfect Rule guided in the alone way of Salvation the true Religion Religion shining in those greater Beauties of Purity Power and Vnity still that Purity being preserved most tenderly the Power held up eminently the Vnity maintained entirely and to have all due provision made for this Crown and Glory to descend and settle upon Posterity for ever To consider how much of the fore-mentioned Glory hath dwelt in our Land together with its gradual declining great decay almost departing the hopes of Reformation given and heightned but soon disappointed sadly turned into fears confusions and such vast evils which once let in have been so lengthened out Above all to seriously view our present condition of sin after soarest smartings more abounding it spreads farther roots deeper rises higher but comes daily nearer to a filling up Of miseries in complicate distempers imminent dangers and so extreme difficulty of healing settlement and security our hearts cannot but break and bleed within us To see Souls more precious than Worlds whose price can never fall lower to run unwonted higher hazards of utter undoing The numbers among us either more setled in ignorance or improved in prophaneness fixed in meer civility and formality without any Power of Godliness or arrived at very Neutrality and not a few which we tremble to mention under fearful Apostacy of damnable Heresies and vilest practises often also attended with hellish blasphemies These Souls all retaining their invaluable worth and for ought can be known possibility of saving should they not have all endeavour of pulling them out of the fire and if by Covenant-Obligation and Sacramental-Dedication they are Christs Propriety and Right should not his Officers and Stewards strive to the utmost to recover them to the King of Glories use and service yet these poor perishing ones as to any effectual order for Instruction or Reformation remain helpless Ah! that we could not go higher to the injuries and dissecurities of Religion it self in those checks given to the progress damps to the Power wide breaches made in the Vnity and most daring attempts against the very Being and Reality almost no Doctrine or practise escaping vain doubting yea impious vilifying and decrying Add that further danger of Opportunity and Temptation either of shifting wayes and Religions till the substance and foundation is overturned or for to shake off profession of Godliness shut out the Knowledge and sit at home at doing nothing Besides which still more endangers many of the elder sort who should derive Religion to succeeding Times by sinful indifferency are ready to let go their hold of the Truth and most of the younger either distracted at diversities of Wayes and Opinions or disacquainted with the very principles of Christianity are never like to take sure hold of it Oh that we had not to bewail the dissatisfactions divisions distances and oppositions among Brethren of the same houshold of Faith and these arising chiefly from less and lower points and punctillioes when in fundamentals and the main there is so great an accord And to all we annex the offence given the weak discouragements to commers in to godliness just scandal to many at home and in Forraign Nations opening wide the mouths and strengthening the hands of Adversaries against us and the most if not all these evils arising chiefly from our unestablishment as to Scripture and Gospel-Order Therefore when Souls are thus perishing Truth lies bleeding divisions continuing enemies insulting dangers and difficulties not abating and which far transcends all that can be said the most precious and glorious Name of Christ so infinitely suffering All this likewise when our calamitous condition is not utterly hopeless but like the patient languishing not from utter defect of remedy but want of the Physitians willingness to joyn together study the case and apply the cure For these things our hearts melt and eyes mourn till the Lord look down from heaven and help But when all looking bewailing pities and prayers can little avail without endeavours of redress in a right way first resolved and then unanimously carried on for which the conceived expedient is a Brotherly Association long since in our thoughts and already begun by others godly learned in divers Counties others of different judgement in point of Church-Government shewing the hitherto hindred Vnion to arise not so much from difference of principles inconsistent with Vnion as from defect of will and inclination and this from a grand failing in Brotherly Love Therefore laying aside all private respects and carnal interests and resigning our selves wholly up to the Lord we resolve in his strength according to what we have attained to unite together for carrying on the work of Reformation and discharge of our duties in our respective places and not only an Associating in this particular County but correspondency with our Brethren in other parts of the Nation yet hereby not binding up and limiting our selves from further improvement of Vnion which we hope the Lord will teach and stablish in his time Vniversally And for an Introductive to the work in hand and freeing our selves from imputed Innovation in the Doctrine of Religion we declare that as all way formerly we have owned so we do and by Christs assistance will ever own and maintain the form of wholesome words contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament in the constantly received sense of the Orthodox Churches of Christ exprest more especially as to the Fundamentals of Faith in that most Ancient and Vniversally received Creed called the Apostles in the therewith agreeing famous Nicene Creed and that notable Creed of Athanasius to which we might add those excellent Creeds of the Great Councils of
of difference among Ministers themselves distraction among people disadvantage to the free course of the Gospel offence to the weak and opportunity to adversaries to advance their destructive designes against the reformed Religion and agreement therein being so necessary both for uniting our selves and people together joynt carrying on the work of Christ and disappointing the adversaries of Religion and Reformation Therefore we hold forth this following accord for the present and shall endeavour in our Meetings of Association all further lawful and due agreement as God herein shall guide us 1. Seeing that Ordination of Men to the Ministry is an institution of Christ so necessary that in an ordinary way none can preach as a Pastor or administer the Sacraments without it and because Admission and Ordination of a Minister is a work that cannot have too great care and caution about Therefore when a Minister is to be ordained among us we agree that such as are of the Ministery faithful and able be intrusted and imployed in the tryal and approbation of him and in the work of Ordination which Ordination the most of us judge to be that act of Ministers whereby a fit person first duly tryed and approved by them or some of them is solemnly set apart and appointed to the Ministery and sent into the Lords work by such acts and in such manner as is peculiar and proper for that setting apart appointing and sending Namely by such suteable prayer with fasting and laying their hands on him as is according to the Gospel which laying on of hands being the universal practice of the Church of Christ from the Apostles time to this present age grounded on Scripture Rule and Patterne we earnestly desire that all of us might unanimously and constantly practice when occasions are offered we likewise for due and more orderly proceeding agree that when any person desires to be ordained a Minister among us that he do apply himself to that particular Association wherein he is to exercise his Ministery and therefore the Moderator of that Association assisted with some of the Brethren appointed by the Association to joyn with him shall take care that a due tryal be made of the persons fitness according to the direction given by the Assembly in that case or at least to the substance of it and such Brethren as shall be chosen by that Association after the aforesaid tryal and also approbation of him shall ordain him in manner as is fore-expressed and likewise in that place and before that Congregation where the party is to exercise his publike Ministery unless for better conveniency some other place adjoyning and to which the people he is to take charge of may come and be there present shall be chosen that so both Minister and people may together be instructed in and exhorted to their mutual duties We agree though the most of us judge the way of Ordination should be performed as is formerly expressed yet if some Brethren among us are not at present throughly satisfied therein we are willing to keep union with them if that Ordination among them be performed by ordained Ministers solemnly setting a part a person tryed according to the substance of the directions of Tryal expressed and appointing him to the Ministery with sutable prayer and fasting and there shall be endeavour as is formerly provided of further Unity in practise in this particular in our Associate meetings We will also seriously labour a Closure in affection as well as in judgement and practice and to that end we resolve to lay aside all names and termes of difference forbearing so much as may be all such things which may occasion mistakes jealousies or dissatisfaction and practising whatsoever may encrease and confirm Brotherly Union Lastly in respect of the Civil State we will avoid in our Associate meetings and otherwise all such things which may disturb or prejudice the quiet thereof endeavouring by what lies in our sphear and power to promote the publike peace and welfare Consentimus omnes nos infra scripti I believe in God the Father Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth And in Jesus Christ his only Sonne our Lord which was conceived by the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary suffefered under Pontius Pilare was crucified dead and buried he desconded into holl the third day he rose again from the dead He ascended into Heaven and sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead I believe in the Holy Ghost The holy Catholick Church the Communion of Saints the forgiveness of sins The Resurrection of the Body and life everlasting Amen I do heartily take this one God for my only God and chief good and I take this Jesus Christ for my only Saviour and Redeemer and this Holy Ghost for my Sanctifier by his grace giving up my self wholly to this one God to love and obey him sincerely and faithfully according to all his Laws contained in the holy Scriptures and all this unto the Death And also I consent and resolve in the strength of Christ to hold constant Communion with the Church of Christ in the publike Worship of God and to submit to the Discipline and Government which Christ hath ordained for his own glory and his peoples good And that I may have the opportunity of enjoying of these priviledges for the advancement of mine obedience I resolve and promise to submit to the Ministerial Guidance and over-sight exercised according to the Rules of the Word in this Congregation and to the Brotherly advice and admonition of Fellow Christians here 1. I Believe that there is one only true God the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost which are three distinct persons and each of them God and all of them that one and the same God Infinite Eternal Unchangeable in being and all perfection 2. I believe that this God is the Fore-ordainer Maker Preserver and Governour of all things according to the Counsel of his own Will 3. I believe that God made man upright after his own Image in Knowledge Righteousness and Holiness who by transgressing the Law of his Creator fell from that holy and happy estate and brought himself with his whole posterity into an estate of sin and death 4. I believe that man thus fallen not being able to deliver himself from this estate of misery God so loved the world that he sent forth his only begotten Son Jesus Christ who took to himself our nature and became man being conceived by the Holy Ghost in the Womb of the Virgin Mary of her substance and born of her who being perfect God and perfect man in one person free from sin even in his humane nature and life having fulfilled all Righteousness gave himself a Sacrifice for our sins and a Ransome for us by suffering the wrath of God the death of the Cross to reconcile us to God and being buried yet so triumphed over death that
duties we owe to fellow-Christians and preserve us therein Get we but that sincere and ardent Love the Gospel calls for and unity will be both easily brought about and kept a firm and full unity that may answer the Churches present necessity If there be any defect in Union 't is from a deficience in this Bond this affection of Love Were there among other Gospel requisites this publick Spirit were this Gospel Brotherly Love put on this would recover and reduce us to happy unity without which the breaches and distempers are not likely to be healed For to provoke us those especially that are the backward and unactive oh that we could consider things together and once more in Christs name be entreated to endeavour it For is Brotherly Union meerly arbitrary and left to our liberty and not of a Scripture and Gospel necessity Are not divisions among Christians carnall Are not sowers of discord among Brethren abominable to the Lord 1 Cor. 3.3 Prov. 6.12 Rom. 16.17 Must not those that make divisions be marked and also avoided Hath not God in Scripture straitly Commanded Unity Christ most signally and peculiarly enjoyned it Do not his Apostles very frequently in the New Testament Eph. 4.3 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. both require and perswade to it yea must we not look to keep it studiously solicitously and zealously endeavour it And that as in other Scriptures is there urged upon very General and equitable reasons that extend to all Christians There are seven ones and all respecting all the People of God as those Ephesians It is not to be endeavoured only with some single persons whom we shall please to pick out to our selves Or with those particular Congregations we are fixed in but with all Christians in General as their condition requires and opportunity is afforded to us And accordingly have not good Christians in all Ages both assented to the Doctrine and earnestly endeavoured the practice of it Doth not all experience of the Churches Evidence the Necessity of it Did not those Churches so excellently constituted by the Apostles themselves soon discover the use and Necessity of it as we see in the case of the Church of Antioch Acts 15. which occasioned that Application to the Church of Jerusalem and thereupon the first and exemplary Christian Synod Whereby that and likewise other Churches were established in the Faith Let matters be never so well Constituted in Churches yet there ever will be New Emergencies and after cases which will call for and still Necessitate union and correspondencie and that cannot be relieved otherwise At this day those Divisions among the Reformed are not they acknowledged and bewailed as sinfull and greatly desired by the Godly of any moderate spirits of all parties to be healed Yea among our selves is it not so acknowledged and bewailed and accordingly are not our desires and Prayers still a going after it Do we not Evidently see the evils and mischief that will unavoidably every day encrease and Grow upon us without Union Ah! What will become of Truth of all Gospel-Truths and the purity of Doctrine which is preserved by Union When the house is burnt and the Gold and Treasure in it melted is it not hard finding it among the Rubbish Pearles if they should be buried in great heaps of sand will they not hardly be recovered How hard will it be for people to find the Treasure the Pearles of Gospel-Truth in the Rubbish and sands of multiplicities of errours And what will become of the life and power of Godliness when mens zeale and fervour still evaporate and breathe forth in contentions and Christians become engaged to maintain Parties rather then Godliness it self Yea how must Ignorance and Prophaness encrease And how will Popery gaine upon us Yea and how will that be kept out at last look seriously to the close What can Magistrates and Ministers do if unity be not recovered At the best must not the Doctrine be highly hazzarded and hardly be saved Must not the Power of Godliness needs sink and be swallowed up in these Quick-sands of Division yea and withall the civil state When hearts are divided and mens wayes and Conscience so continually clash and run cross must not that needs be but in a crazie condition in comparison of that which General union would produce which also would in time work out a happy settlement in the Civil State What though some are of the opinion that disunion is best that makes it not so in it self But why should union the entirest fullest and largest union in States and Kingdoms be best and not in the Church of Christ and among Christians If single persons or small Townes and particular places cannot carry on the Civil Interest without Civil Union nor never sufficiently provide for the security of the Civil State then why must it or how can it be that single Christians or particular Congregations without Consociation can carry on and preserve Religion in a Nation As all former so late Experience proves and after Experience will ever prove the contrary Thus New England it self also acknowledges and practices the contrary and that upon Experience And they accordingly even the strictest of them do not only wish but encourage and provoke the Godly of different Judgements in this Nation to endeavour Unity And certainly this must be very considerable that they of New England who left this Country for liberty of Conscience and went into a desolate wilderness They that had such excellent Christians and Eminent Ministers to form and make up their Congregations They that had so full a Liberty to choose their own way of Church Government and withall had so great countenance and assistance from the Civil Magistrate as ever Churches in the world had yet these these so accommodated and assisted after almost thirty yeares experience find a Necessity of union of Churches and of godly Christians of different Judgement are in expectation daily of it here blame those that are opposite to it or slothfull in it And certainly this fresh experiment brings a cogent and conclusive Argument that out-weighs all colours and pretences made by any for refusal or neglect of unity But to adde no more we our selves Generally see a Necessity of unity we wish it pray for it and expect it also but this layes great blame and sin to our charge that we do so little for it That our Judgements and Prayers concurre in it but our hands stir not and we do not to any purpose endeavour after it What then is and must be the Obstacle to this so Necessary Unity Is it private advantage like men that having a private Trade are enemies to joynt Stocks and Trading in Companies Is it listlesness and a spirit of slothfulness like the sluggard that will not pull his hands out of his bosom A lothness to be unhinged and taken off our old wonts of unactiveness and doing nothing but for our own particulars and so being