it is not the Duty of every one tho a licensed Stranger to communicate with this Church Now to avoid the Question here you have a pretty Notion whereby you would make French Protestants to have no Church calling them an Ecclesiastical Colony belonging to the Church abroad But all Church-Power being exercised amongst themselves here you have no more ground to call them an Ecclesiastical Colony in respect of the French Church than you may call ours so in respect of any other to which we might have formerly belonged especially since they cannot meet with the Mother-Church in France for Acts of Worship and therefore have your own allowed Distinction from that But if these refuse to communicate with our Church you make Schismaticks of them only excuse them as being exempted from the Jurisdiction of this Church But this you condemn as being contrary to the Practice of the Primitive Church and besides consider not what you said to Mr. Humphreys his Project nor your charging the Dissenters with Schism for not communicating with each other notwithstanding that one cannot pretend Jurisdiction over the other and so must be in the same case with those that are priviledged or exempted Wherefore the French Protestants are beholden to you for a good Lift. But taking it for granted that 't is the Duty of these French Protestants to communicate with our Church when ever they are required you take no notice of the Consequence from your Tenent which is that they ought notwithstanding an Exemption for else it follows that our Church is too streight in its Terms of Communion And you cannot surely but remember where we are taught That Vnion to the Body consists in Vnion to that Part which is next 2. But I ask'd you further Whether it does not follow from the Obligation to communicate or to be ready to communicate with any true Church where Distance does not hinder that a Member of the Church of England is not obliged to constant Communion with that Church but may occasionally communicate with the French Church nay with Dissenters too if he believes that any of their Congregations is a true Member of the Catholick Church Here I lie under your sore displeasure for turning your own Artillery upon you And you think No Man in his Wits ever understood this Question in any other Sence than that whatever Church I can occasionally communicate with I am also bound to communicate constantly with whenever such Reasons as are necessary to determine my Communion to a particular Church make it my Duty so to do And a very doughty Question this is for surely 't is beyond dispute that whatever necessarily determines my Communion to a particular sound Church makes constant Communion with it my Duty and is no more than that what makes it my Duty makes it my Duty But the Question is Whether any thing necessarily determines my Communion to a particular Church and what it is And thus I might leave you upon your Mistake of the Question But I think 't is demonstrable from what you your self say that the Place does not determine my Communion with a sound Church no not so much as ordinarily You distinguish between a State of Communion and Acts of Communion But unless a Man tho he has sufficient Opportunities may be in a State of Communion without any actual Communion I know not what is meant by saying No Act of Communion more peculiarly unites us to any particular Church than to the whole Christian Church and that 't is no Interruption of our Communion with the Church of England to communicate actually with any Church that is in Communion with it And yet a Member as a Member is in constant Communion Perhaps indeed if the Communion of Churches is suppos'd to be upon the Catholick essential Terms actual Communion with a Church which is in Communion with this is no Interruption or Suspension of Communion with this But admit now that the French Church which you say is in Communion with ours would be ready if required to hold communion with us in every Point wherein we may seem to differ but yet should keep up their separate Meetings or Assemblies and an English Protestant believing that he may receive most Benefit from their Preachers should never actually communicate with our Church but always with that would he be in a State of Communion with our Church or no And tho the Civil Power has made a Distinction of Parishes and some other Places appointed or allowed by its Laws in one of which it requires the Sacraments to be received at such and such times If they receive not in any of these Places will the receiving with the French Church justify them and free them from the danger of being excommunicated as Schismaticks If it will not as you must acknowledg then either the French Church is not in communion with us whereas you say they are in communion with us or else communicating with a Church in communion with ours is not a Communion with our Church Nay and you say that according to the Laws of Catholick Communion nothing but Distance of Place can suspend our Obligation to actual Communion But if I may communicate with the French Church as being in communion with us then the Place does not determine even my ordinary presential or actual Communion to ours nor does it yet appear what does But you offer at it when you tell us 't is separate Power and Jurisdiction which determines this Matter but separate Communion would be Schismatical But still what Jurisdiction can there be to oblige me contrary to the Terms of Catholick Communion which according to your own concession will suffer me to wander Is it the Civil Power as it unites us under a National Church Pray remember how you run Mr. Humphreys down upon the Supposition that the Civil Power should take off the Obligation to Episcopal Communion Is it the Divine Right Pray consider Mr. D. again and then you may think your self beholden to me for bringing your Notions under the Protection of so ingenious a Person In the mean while be pleased to shew wherein you differ from him when you suppose you have found a National Church antecedent to any Human Authority For this is either as you make the Union of the Bishops to be the National Church or the Union of the Clergy and Laity together If you make it to consist in the Union of the Bishops then certainly to make that antecedent to Human Authority you must betake your self to D lism at least you have not yet invented any other way who a working Head may do Wonders If the Union be of Clergy and Laity together then it is by Consent which is Humane Contract or Agreement and is the same with Humane Law by you exploded And Consent you say is all that is necessary to unite a Body or Society in one Communion But then this
Wound in the Arm which does not sever it from the Body 'T is not every Quarrel or Contention agreeably to your Notion you might add tho it be such as the Apostle calls Schism which makes a Schism but the Breach of Christian Communion Let me desire you to consider whether by departing from the Scripture-Account of this misled perhaps by the Disputes of some of the Ancients thundring against each other you will not enter at least into the Confines of Donatism You say of those Hereticks They confined the Church of Christ to Africa and to their own Communion Mr. Chillingworth gives us a fuller Account wherein their Heresy lay in these Words That upon a vain Pretence of the Corruption of the Church they separated themselves from the Communion of other Parts of the Church and that they required it as a necessary Condition to make a Man a Member of the Church that he should be of their Communion and divide himself from all other Communions from which they were divided It seems according to them to use your Words Tho a Church retained the Purity of the Faith and Worship and was so far true yet it was not every way sound and Orthodox nor a Catholick Church unless it observ'd those Conditions of Catholick Communion which were two 1. That it must be in Communion with theirs 2. That it must divide from all other Communions from which they are divided 1. For the first you teach us that The visible Vnion of all Churches in and to Christ consists in their visible Communion with each other and Communion with a particular Church which is it self in Catholick Communion is as necessary as Communion with the Catholick Church Whoever lives in England and renounces Communion with the Church of England is a Schismatick from the Catholick Church And if occasionally we communicate with some other sound Part of the Catholick Church in the same Communion we may do it without Schism so this be as owning our selves Members But an ordinary withdrawing upon a profest Dislike you make as destructive of a State of Communion as a formal Renunciation Wherefore as you hold that we are bound to maintain Communion with all sound Parts of the Catholick Church and that in other Matters besides the Agreement in all the Articles of Faith and Essentials of Worship it does follow that it must be in those very Matters which distinguish one Communion from another And the National Church being that sound Part wherewith every Christian here is to communicate herein you have found out a Root Fountain and Principle of Vnion or Beginning of the Catholick Church to which all particular Churches are or ought to be united and by virtue of this Catholick Vnity are one Catholick Church If it be ask'd What 't is which brings one with safety to this Beginning of the Catholick Church 'T is not humane Law as it has plac'd us under such a Government and Discipline and which makes the only Distinction of Churches you allow of but the Principles of Catholick Communion against which whatever Church offends you will not yield it to be sound and Orthodox And you assure us We have nothing else to do but to judg whether that part of the Church wherein we live be so sound and Orthodox that we may communicate with it according to the Principles of Catholick Communion If it be we are bound to communicate with it under peril of Schism from the Catholick Church if we do not And consequently whatever Church refuses our Communion 't is not sound and Orthodox or any part of the Catholick Church as not retaining the true Principles of Catholick Communion Thus far Donatus might have gone taking it for granted that his Church was the Beginning of the Catholick Church 2. This first Point being setled 't is no wonder if it be likewise required that we must divide from the Communion of all that are divided from this sound part of the Catholick Church And methinks Donatus himself might argue That 't is evident the pretended Catholicks understand not the true Principles of Catholicism for if they did they would never proffer a Composition with us and yield that the surviving Bishop should govern these which are now distinct Communions They must own either that they are not any part of Christ's Body or else that we are not for 't is impossible that two Churches which are not in Communion with each other can both belong to the same Body And therefore the Obligation to Catholick Communion does equally oblige us to renounce the Communion of Schismaticks You in effect justify Donatus his Terms of Communion and when you say Their Churches were in all Things like the Catholick Churches excepting Catholick Communion you as good as tell us he only mistook the Church which he should have made the Beginning of the Catholick Church If he had been with St. Austin he had been no Heretick for refusing to receive Hereticks into the Church without Re-baptization and damning all that were of a Communion divided from his or that would not consent to have them excommunicated who without proof had been accused of being Traditors But as you teach us that that Church is not sound which keeps not to the Principles of Catholick Communion Mr. Chillingworth shews wherein they swerv'd from that sound Principle The Condition of their Communion says he was both unnecessary and unlawful to be required and therefore the exacting of it was directly opposite to the Churches Catholicism For ought yet appears Donatus and you are pretty well agreed in the Notion of Catholick Communion and of the Breach of this Unity wherein we are taught that the full Nature of Schism lies He with you confin'd the Influences of the Holy Spirit to this Vnity Yet whether he would have intreagu'd this Business of Church-Communion as you have done I cannot tell All the Sence which I can gather out of your Notion as the Leaf-Gold is spread out is this That to be a Member of the Christian Church and in a State of Communion with it 't is not enough to be admitted into the Church by Baptism nor to exercise any Acts of Communion with a particular Church unless it be in Communion with every sound part of the Christian Church and that so as to own your self for a Member of every such sound Church And tho you do own your self a Member as perhaps every one will that agrees in Essentials yet if you ordinarily withdraw from that sound Church where you are which must always be the only sound Church on the Place upon any profest Dislike or communicate with them that are of a divided and consequently a Schismatical Communion you forfeit your Membership even tho that other Church has nothing sinful in its Communion Which in one place you think enough to make any Church sound and Orthodox whereas in others
uncharitable But to bring Compurgators of such whose Friendships as they are dulce decus meum so they are praesidium too against such fatal Miscarriages would but expose their venerable Names to such Usage as I have met with But be that never so hard for once I will set an Example to a Clergy-man and shew that I can contain my self after all these causeless Calumnies tho you cannot bear to be told of the Truth Wherefore I shall calmly shew I. How groundless both your open and imply'd Accusations are against me II. What cause I had to put you upon explaining your self III. How unsatisfactory your Explanation is in its own Nature So much of your Charge as I am concern'd to answer particularly resolves it self into these general Heads 1. My Want of Love to the Church of England and taking part with Dissenters out of Zeal for their Cause or Vain-Glory 2. That I have a Spite at the whole Order of Clergy-men and disown part of the Power of Bishops 3. That I designed to affront Dr. Stillingfleet and Dr. Tillotson 4. That I discover a Contempt of all Church-Authority and think the Church it self an insignificant Thing 5. And lastly That I am guilty of Deism and Socinianism And That my Principles tend to undermine Christianity and to the Contempt of all revealed Religion First Article In the first Article you would argue me guilty of Hypocrisy in pretending to be in constant Communion with the Church of England when I want that Love for it which is essential to Union and Communion with it or of a great deal of Vanity in labouring to shew my Wit in the Defence of a Cause which I my self know to stand in need of Wit and Artifice But if it happen that the Church of England is no more concerned in your Censures than perhaps you may think your self to be in the Doctrine of its Articles or Homiles And that it gives you no warrant to call the Dissenters Schismaticks and such as are deprived of the Influences of the Divine Spirit while they scruple Conformity My taxing you with want of Charity towards Dissenters will be as far from the suspicion of such a Zeal for them as implies a Dis-esteem of our Church or such a Defence of their Cause as may be imputed to Wantonness or Vanity that it may be more like the Act of that Samaritan who took care of the poor Man who had been most barbarously used by Thieves and could meet with no pity from the Priest and the Levite who past by on the other side Whatever you think of this Matter I am bold to affirm that our Church no-where warrants your Assertions either in its Articles Homilies or Canons Indeed in the Canons of King James the Authority of which as to us Lay-men I need not here enquire into I find Schismatici mentioned in some of the Titles but not in any of the Canons to be sure by no means applied in your manner But then you tell me No Man who had any kindness for the Church with which he pretends to hold Communion would make such a vile Insinuation as if profest Atheists were admitted to Communion But certainly there may be a profest Atheist tho he doth not profess himself so at the time of his communicating for want of that Euphemia which one cannot greatly offend against by one single Word of no ill signification I am sure you of all Men have no reason to press hard upon me in this Particular Third Article That I may be depriv'd of the Patronage of two such great Luminaries of our Church as Dr. Stillingfleet and Dr. Tillotson you tax me with a Design of affronting Dr. S. and dealing with the other great Man at the same rate Secret Things belong to God but I am sure you could have no Revelation from above of any such Design nor can any thing that I have said look that way Assure your self I cited the Words against the absolute Necessity of Church-Communion whence you ground your Reflection in the same Sence as I receive them which is in their utmost Latitude but by no means as if they would set aside all Government in the Church But you are certainly guilty of the Affront against them if you think there is any harm in the Quotations or as if I expose their Failings thereby I will not here return upon you That you never spare any Man's Reputation to serve your Design c. which would come as properly from me as it did from you But when you were upon such Authorities you would have done well to have reconciled your self to Dr. Stillingfleet's Sence of Schism which if his Judgment be valuable in competition with Dr. Sherlock's lies not in a voluntary Departure out of any particular Church but the true Catholick Church And the Reason which he gives for it is the Ground which I go upon If you will teach me my Catechism better in this Point I am very ready to learn Fourth Article The fourth Article has many in the Belly of it for under the supposed Contempt of Church-Authority are in your Sence contained 1. The thinking the Church it self an insignificant Thing and that no causeless Separation from it can be a Schism 2. A despising the Evangelical Priesthood as you call it 3. The looking upon the Sacraments as very indifferent Ceremonies 1. In the first you as is usual with you would take advantage of your own Confusion in blending together the Notion of the Catholick and of a particular Church For tho one may think that it signifies not much or is not one's Duty to communicate with every particular sound Church yet it is no doubt always his Duty to communicate actually or in Inclination with the Church of Christ in that which essentially constitutes it his Church Nay and there may be a Schismatical Separation even upon the account of lesser Matters But my Question is Whether there may not be a Separation causeless in the Nature of the Thing occasioning it tho not in relation to the Party's Conscience who scruples it and that without Schism But as Dr. Stillingfleet rightly distinguishes between what is necessary to Salvation and what is necessary to the Government of the Church my receiving his Sence has sufficiently anticipated and removed this Imputation unless you will fix it upon him too 2. But for the second If by an Evangelical Priesthood you mean such as is necessary to offer up Sacrifices for us I know of no such upon Earth by the Gospel-Institution 3. For the third which may take in what may seem omitted on the foregoing Head I desire to be inform'd what one Passage has faln from me which looks like an excusing the Contempt or Neglect of the Sacraments or of them to whom ordinarily it belongs to administer them Yet methinks you do not duly consider that a Thing may be one's Duty by virtue of a positive Command and
who you say shall at the last day be judged not as Infidels but as wicked and Apostate Christians 7. The seventh Query which goes upon that Ground which you give and do not yet recede from for the Belief of your lodging Church-Power so with the Clergy that they who conform not to them or who incur their Displeasure would be in a woful Case you answer only with a Scoff but say not whether the Clergy are the Church Representative or whether what I urge would follow from that Supposition or no. These were the general Questions and whether most of them were impertinent or are now fairly answered 't is for others to determine From hence I am obliged to follow you to my three Sets of Queries as you call them relating to sveral Propositions and the parting-blow of four Queries relating to the Text. Because of my asking Questions concerning your Sense of our Saviour's Promise to his Apostles which you seem to suppose to go along with Church-Governours in Succession as distinguish'd from the Body of Christians and without allowing private Christians that share which the Words of the Promise import you intimate my designing to confute our Saviour and burlesque his Institution But to use mostly your own Expressions if my design of Charity and to deliver that blessed Institution from the Freaks of an Enthusiastick Fancy and to expound it to a plain and easy Sense such as is agreeable to the Vnderstanding of Men and worthy of the Spirit of God be to burlesque Scripture I acknowledg the Charge To my first Qustion Whether our Saviour's Promise of Divine Assistance did not extend to all the Members of the Church considering every Man in his respective Station and Capacity as well as to the Apostles as Church-Governours You answer That there are Promises which relate to the whole Church and Promises which belong to particular Christians as well as Promises which relate particularly to the Apostles and Governours of the Church Well for the comfort of us poor Lay-men there are some Promises which relate to us It being so then I may well ask 2. Whether it signifies any thing to say there is no Promise to particular Churches provided there be to particular Persons such as are in Charity with all Men and are ready to communicate with any Church which requires no more of them than what they conceive to be their Duty according to the Divine Covenant You think it hard to know what this Query means But surely 't is material to know whether or no such Men may be saved otherwise than under Church-Governors And truly you tell us pretty plainly I wish for your own sake it had been a little more covert that such have no Promises but as Members of the Church that is of the visible Church under Church-Officers if you answer to the purpose You add indeed When Communion may be had upon lawful Terms I hope this implies that 't is possible the Terms may be unlawful Which yields me my fourth Question upon this Matter But it likewise yields That if the Terms are unlawful private Christians are entitled to these Promises tho not visibly admitted into a Church-State which is contrary to what you all along drive at But it seems however your Charity to these Men who think the Terms such as they ought not to comply with is so great to believe them guilty of Schism as adhering to their own private Fancies in opposition to Church-Authority out of Pride and Opinionativeness which God alone can judg 3. The third Query is Whether if the Promise you mention be confined to the Apostles as Church-Governors it will not exclude the Civil Power To which you answer That the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power are very distinct but very consistent But such a Power in the Church-Officers as would make them the Church-Representative and prevent a National Reformation tho by the Civil Power is of another Nature Nor do you think fit yet to declare what the Power is which you would have lodged in Church-Officers But for fear you should go beyond your Warrant in this Matter I shall mind you of what our Church teaches us which is that We must not think that this Comforter was either promised or else given only to the Apostles but to the Vniversal Church of Christ dispersed through the whole World And speaking of Christ's Promise that the Spirit of Truth should abide with them for ever and that he would be always with them he meaneth saith our Church by Grace Vertue and Power and that it says was indifferently to all that should believe in him through their the Apostles Words that is to wit for his whole Church To my Inferences from the second Proposition which I consider apart You make such an Answer as if we had been at cross Purposes For my Questions were grounded upon your asserting without any limitation That 't is absurd to gather a Church out of a Church of Baptized Christians And indeed it is but a Golden Aphorism wherein you epitomize a great Part of your Discourses on this Subject And you answer That the Independents are out in their way of gathering Churches and that we separated not from the Papists upon their Principles Which is nothing to the purpose But you do confess indeed that we may separate from any Church of baptized Christians if their Communion be sinful But wherein the Difference lies I know not except by Separation you would only have a withdrawing from Communion but will not allow the setting up a distinct Church-Communion be the Cause of withdrawing never so just Which unless you mean I hope you will be so ingenuous to confess this was not so warily worded and so sound as might have been But if you have a Patent to make Words signify what you please besides their natural and presumable Intendment to make generals particular or vice versâ much good may it do you provided they afford you not a Loop-hole for the most uncharitable Censures Yet give me leave before I quit this to demonstrate that you have not answered fairly in restraining this as if spoke only of Independents These were your own Words When there is one Church within the Bowels of another a new Church gathered out of a Church already constituted and formed into a distinct and separate Society this divides Christian Communion and is a notorious Schism This is the plain case of the Presbyterian and Independent Churches and those other Conventicles of Sectaries which are among us They are Churches in a Church Churches formed out of the National Church by which means Christians who live together refuse to worship God in the same Assemblies Pray Sir would you have me fancy some general Scope and Design which no Man can understand from the Words you utter in any particular Place This I suppose may satisfy reasonable Men that all my Queries under this Head
call this a sinful Term in that Respect be pleas'd to consider again how a Church commanding things sinful and admitting none into Communion with it but upon those sinful Terms can avoid the Imputation of being Schismatical in its Frame and essential Constitution any more than the Independents for requiring a new Church-Covenant If you say the Church may quit those Terms and still continue a sound Church so may they and yet continue Independent But if I ought to learn my Catechism from our Church it self rather than from any Doctor in it I should think that whereever there is any Congregation or Fellowship of God's faithful and elect People built upon the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Jesus Christ being the Head Corner-stone that must be such a Church as cannot possibly differ in its essential Frame and Constitution from any other sound Church But when you say 'T is impossible that a Church which is not Schismatical should excommunicate Schismatically 't is worth enquiring whether you mean That tho it does enjoin Terms sinful and unlawful in themselves and excommunicate them who cannot comply in such Matters it has by that exercise of its Power of the Keys deprived those Dissenters of Catholick Communion as not being Schismatical in its essential Frame and Constitution Being excellent good at leaving out the Force of any Question to which you are loth to give a direct Answer you say my three first Queries relating to the meaning of the Text come onely to this Whether every particular Church may not be called the Body of Christ Whereas it was Whether it might not be an entire Body And you yield my Question yet you say all the Churches in the World are but one Body and must be but one Communion Which if you will allow to be by virtue of a mystical or spiritual Union need not be disputed Yet it being a Question Whether you would yield a particular Church to be a proper Body of Christ why might I not ask Whether it may not at least be taken so in a Metaphorical Sence And surely you who have been charg'd to turn the Priesthood of our Saviour from proper into Metaphorical might well enough understand what I meant by this Word But if you consider the Force of the Question upon the Text it is to know your Warrant for arguing that it is always Schism to refuse the Communion of any sound Church where-ever you find it whether it has Authority over you or no from a Text which only charges Schism upon Members of the same particular Church or Body of Christ with which they did actually communicate For my 4th Query from the Text of the Nature of Schism you condemn me to the Drudgery of examining the Defence of Dr. Stillingfleet But as you speak not directly to it I shall here take it for unanswered yet I shall not deny it some Consideration in its due time But thus you say you have honestly answered all my Queries in my first Letter And truly the Judgment of Charity obliges me to hope that you have according to the Intention of your own Mind And yet 't is a very difficult thing to believe that you should not have discernment enough of your self to see through all your false Colours If they are Errors of your Understanding I hope God will not call you to so severe an Account for them as you threaten to well-meaning Dissenters My second Letter you may if you please term peevish for conjuring you as a Protestant Divine to answer my Doubts categorically and that without referring me to what Mr. D. or any profest Papist had writ on that Subject But perhaps very few Men that observe the Neighbourhood of the Doctrines through Mediums not far differing leading to the like End will much condemn the Caution which I there gave you Wherefore to vindicate my self to you I shall give a taste of your Agreement with Popish Mediums And since you disown D lism shall as much as conveniently may be strip your Positions of what is directly his way And perhaps it will not seem improbable that you should have borrowed some of those Arguments which I look upon as tending to or proceeding from Uncharitableness from the Author of Charity maintained by Catholicks His Labour is to prove all Protestants Schismaticks because they withdrew from the Communion of the visible Church that is in his Sence the Church of Rome and those that were in Communion with her And he cites St. Austin to prove That not a diverse Faith but the divided Society of Communion doth make Schismaticks From whence he argues That the Catholick or Universal Church is one Congregation or Company of Faithful People and therefore implies not only Faith to make them faithful Believers but also Communion or common Union to make them one in Charity which excludes Separation and Division He goes on By the Definition of Schism may be inferred that the Guilt thereof is contracted not only by Division from the Universal Church but also by a Separation from a particular Church or Diocess which agrees with the Universal You would prove That Men as they would avoid the Sin of Schism must communicate with the National Church or with some Church that is in Communion with it and reject the Communion of all other Parties and Sects of Christians Indeed you will say that you qualify it if the National Church be sound that is if there be nothing sinful in its Constitution and Worship Yet 't is a Question whether your Arguments go not as far as the Jesuit's For you suppose with him that there must be some particular Church with which we must communicate under Church-Officers Or to use your own Words We must of necessity join in the actual and visible Communion of the Church Suppose the Dissenters say with Mr. Chillingworth We don't leave the Church but only its external Communion You look upon that as absurd and wonder that they should assign Reasons why they cannot communicate with us and yet at the same time will not own that they have made any Separation Nay you affirm That for two Churches to renounce each others Communion or at least to withdraw ordinary Communion from each other from a profest Dislike and yet still to continue in a State of Communion with one another is a downright Contradiction Well be it so then it seems Protestants by withdrawing from the Communion of the Romish Church put themselves out of a State of Communion with the Christian Church just as Dissenters do Yet our great Champion thought he had furnish'd us with a litle Armour which might repel all the Jesuit's Batteries and could not understand it to be a Contradiction to say One leaves the Church by ceasing to be a Member of it by ceasing to have those Requisites which constitute a Man a Member of it as Faith and Obedience But we leave the external Communion of
Presbyters of another I take leave to inform you that the Stat. 14. of this King cap. 4. has provided that every Person which was not then in holy Orders by Episcopal Ordination or should not be so ordained before a Day prefixt should be utterly disabled and ipso facto depriv'd from all manner of Ecclesiastical Promotions and that none for the future should be admitted to any such Promotion nor should presume to consecrate and administer the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper unless Episcopally ordained The Penalty indeed is not made to extend to Foreigners of Reformed Churches allowed here but quere whether the Declaration of Disability does not If you say by the Lutheran Church you mean only those religious Societies of Lutherans which are in Sweden and Denmark under Bishops or at least that have Superintendents or Generales ordained and ordaining Episcopally which surely some Lutheran Societies want you may avoid the Consequence as to such and all others of the Reformation which are without Episcopal Orders by denying them to be Christian Churches if you please for then indeed it would not follow from your condemning such Societies that you thereby refuse Communion with a sound Church This brings me to our Churches Sence and Application of this Matter O says it how the Church is divided O how the Cities be cut and mangled O how the Coat of Christ which was without Seam is all to rent and torn O Body mystical of Christ where is that holy Unity out of which whosoever is he is not in Christ If one Member be pulled from another where is the Body If the Body be drawn from the Head where is the Life of the Body We cannot be joined to Christ our Head except we be glued with Concord and Charity to one another For he that is not of this Unity is not of the Church of Christ which is a Congregation or Vnity together not a Division St. Paul saith that as long as Emulation or Envying Contention and Factions or Sects be among us we be carnal and walk according to the fleshly Man And St. James saith If ye have bitter Emulation or Envying and Contention in our Hearts glory not of it for where Contention is there is Vnstedfastness and all evil Deeds And why do we not hear St. Paul which prayeth us whereas he might command us I beseech you in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you speak all one Thing and that there be no Dissention among you but that you will be one whole Body of one Mind and of one Opinion in the Truth If his Desire be reasonable and honest why do we not grant it If his Request be for our Profit why do we refuse it And if we list not to hear his Petition of Prayer yet let us hear his Exhortation where he saith I exhort you that you walk a becomes the Vocation in which you be called with all submission and meekness with lenity and softness of Mind bearing one another by Charity studying to keep the Vnity of the Spirit by the Bond of of Peace For there is one Body one Spirit one Faith one Baptism There is saith he but one Body of the which he can be no lively Member that is at variance with the other Members There is one Spirit which joineth and knitteth all Things in one and how can this Spirit reign in us when among our selves we be divided There is but one Frith and how can we then say He is of the Old Faith and he is of the New Faith There is but one Baptism and then shall not all they which be baptized be one Contention causeth Division wherefore it ought not to be among Christians whom one Faith and Baptism joineth in an Unity If all Differences in Opinions be here forbid as cutting Men off from Christ's Body it may be said perhaps that Schism cannot possibly be avoided But what seems intended by the Apostles and by our Church is That notwithstanding such Differences Men should be united in the same Faith by the Bond of Charity which you may call a magical Vnion when Men divide from each other in their Opinions if you please Certain it is neither the Scriptures nor our Church speak of dividing Communions yet there is no doubt but that may be Schism in a divided Communion which is in a joint And whoever want true Christian Charity they are the Schismaticks whether in communion with a Visible Church or withdrawing from it Having shewn what Account the Scriptures and our Church give of Schism it may not be improper to shew in what sence it has been taken by some of the greatest Eminency in our Church I had before shewn how Dr. Stillingfleet had defended our Church against the Imputation of Schism in dividing Communion from the Papists and how the Primitive Fathers ought to be understood when they write of this That Schism did not lie in a voluntary Departure out of any particular Church upon the account of any Thing extrinsecal and accidental Christian Charity to be sure is essential I shall only subjoin the Testimony of Mr. Hooker and if I have these two on my side I shall think my self sufficiently well back'd The Apostle affirmeth plainly saith he of all Men Christian that be they Jews or Gentiles bond or free they are all incorporated into one Company they all make but one Body the Vnity of which visible Body and Church of Christ consisteth in that Vniformity which all several Persons thereunto belonging have by reason of that one Lord whose Servants they all profess themselves that one Faith which they all acknowledg that one Baptism wherewith they are all initiated The Visible Church of Christ is therefore one in outward Profession of those Things which supernaturally appertain to the very Essence of Christianity and are necessarily required in every particular Man Let all the House of Israel know for certain faith Peter that God hath made him both Lord and Christ even this Jesus whom ye have crucified Christians therefore they are not which call not him their Master and Lord. But this extraordinary Person could not think himself obliged in Charity to his own Soul and to deliver himself from the Guilt of the Blood of Dissenters to instruct them in the Necessity of one Communion in Accidentals if they would continue Christians Nay he thought that altho they should be excommunicated yet even that could not cut them off from Christ's Body His Words are these As for the Act of Excommunication it neither shutteth out from the Mystical nor clean from the Visible Church but only from Fellowship with the Visible in Holy Duties But you it seems have considered this Matter better than Mr. Hooker and affirm That every Bishop and Presbyter shuts out of the Catholick Church by Excommunication And this leads me to the Notion of a true or sound Church And surely it was not impertinent for me to desire you to define what you meant by it when considered as Catholick and Universal when in a more restrained Sence seeing as I had shewn you seem to have no other Idea of it but as particular visible nay and that national too or at least as being the only true Church within