Adultery and Peters Denial of his Lord the one was plain Temptation the other Scandal arising from the to him uninterpretable Suffering of our Saviour though both were great and grievous Sins 3. Scandal is a Temptation to some great Sin or course of Sin For though the least Sin introduc'd upon the Counterfeit of Religion and Reason is truly Scandal and partakes in its Woe Yet those Scandals of daily almost unavoidable Incursion in this imperfect State are broken in their deadly effect by the daily and general Repentance and desire of Pardon and Faith in the Blood of Jesus all true Converts live in the Practice of Who can understand his Scandals Deliver thou me from secret ones may every good man pray But keep back thy Servant from Insolent Scandals that they may not have Dominion so that I be Innocent and free from the great Transgression The sins that Scandal precipitates upon may be either in the refusal disavowment rejection or despight to some of the prime manifestations of God in the World in Infidelity or Unbelief or some great Enormity of Practice and it may be absolv'd and finished in some Notorious Act of Sin or may run through the whole Course of a mans Life in an habitual State of sin or Transgression of the Rule that he acts in all a-long Lives and dies in this Snare of Satan in this Captivity under him It may be partial only there being a reserve of the Soul preserv'd by Grace by which the renewed Soul recovers it self as the Apostles were Offended or Scandalis'd in Christ on the Night of his Passion and Peter in a fouler manner and yet theirs even his Faith did not fail They and he most Eminently escap'd out of the broken Snare But men devoid of any Principle of true saving Grace are though in several degrees lock'd within the Scandal and cannot be rescued out of it but by a Renovation to Repentance the first Repentance Yea even the best men under the power of Scandal as we now discribe it are for the present inwrap'd and involv'd so that the whole man seems to fall and the whole strength for that time so far as is visible is taken Captive Now by all this that hath been spoken it is undeniable that a Man is never Scandalised but when he sins he is not Offended in this Scripture-sense but when he himself Offends To be justly displeas'd with other mens sins or defiling Religion with impure mixtures is not to be Offended but when a man himself displeases and offends God and against his Duty 4. Scandal in wraps in Sin and the dreadful consequents of it for in the mischief and deadly issue of Sin is the complemental nature and notion of Scandal It is in the way of Righteousness onely that there is Life and in the Path-way thereof that there is no Death none of the beginnings and first strokes of it of the avant Couriers of Death It is Wisdom alone that is Health to the Navel and Marrow to the Bones whose ways are ways of pleasantness and all its paths are Peace But the ways of Scandal so closely united with Sin though they seem right in a Man 's own Eyes yet are all along the ways of Death and most evidently so in their end Guilt Divine displeasure Perplexity Anguish of Mind Grief if the Sin be felt however a wound a stripe upon Conscience and a mark of that stroke of that wound and stripe whether felt or not that can never be worn off but by Repentance and Faith in the Blood of Christ Weakness Inability loss of Vigour to a Holy Life 〈◊〉 Action and often down right Apostacy are the Fruit◠〈◊〉 Scandal for every Sin is a prejudice a mortification 〈◊〉 dead works upon the Consciâ—nce dispiriting it to Holiâ—â—â—â— more and more It is the way of Righteousness that is strength to the upright and the joy of the Lord therein is his double strength Through Scandal Men stumble and fall are discouraged and lye down at length out of Choice and with resolution to continue where they are as most easie Qui jacet in terris non habet unde cadat Upon all this ensues at last Eternal Death if not prevented by Repentance 5. Scandal is covered under some plausible pretence or disguise of a principle of Reason or Doctrine of Religion For Reason being an efflux from God the Sovereign Reason and Light from the Father of Lights any true principle of true Reason and rightly applyed is undoubtedly a Divine Oracle and would justifie any pretension grounded upon it Now in all Cases wherein Divine Revelation is refused or avowedly forced from the genuine Sense because either the Revelation or all Natural Interpretation will not serve the turn of Scandal but detects and exposes it it then flyes under an umbrage of Reason as separated from such Revelation or sets it up to limit and control such Revelation But if it professes to own the Scripture it then serves it self of Divine Revelation but wrested and mis-applyed for the higher the Authority is that is vouched and pretended the deeper the Scandal as we may see in the Pharisees the greatest both Masters and Bondmen of Scandal that ever were in the World except the Galley Slaves of it in the Romans Antichristianisme and they were so because they were defended and flanked on all sides as they miserably deluded themselves with the Authority of the Old Testament the Law and the Prophets together with the to them equall or indeed superiour awful Traditions of the Elders by which they circumscribed and kept under the Authority and Sense of Scripture as the Papists do at this day by like Traditions and Faith of their Church Now all these as they would have it joyned in perpetuating the Ceremonial Law as irreversible by God himself and settling an indefeisible state of Inheritance in the true Religion upon the Jews alone without the calling of the Gentiles to be the People of God but as their meer Proselytes All these as they deemed represented a Messiah of quite another Figure another Character than our Saviour and therefore he as they concluded must needs be an Impostor and his Doctrine Blasphemy upon which Rock of offence the Vessel of their Church and even Nation it self besides their particular Souls was most dismally Shipwrack'd But not only things of so good a Title and Claim as the Jewish Religion are counter-scarf'd with a Doctrine but even such vile things as Balaam taught eating things Sacrificed to Idols in honour of the Idol and committing Fornication when contrived into Scandal must have a Doctrine for them For so the Spirit of God calls it the Doctrine of Balaam In Scandal even Jezabel puts on the Vail of a Prophetess and calls her self so and under it teaches and seduces which may abate to us the wonder of Romes calling it self a Church and its Adulteries Sorceries and Idolatries Catholick Christian Religion 6. Scandal by such a Principle of
Divine and to curse all those that derogate from it 4. That having thus rivetted it self it by degrees like Pharaoh's Lean Kine eats out the generous and rich Sense of Scripture and devours the Authority of it and yet it self remains a jejune and starv'd Superstition Quest Who are the great Masters of Tradition Answ They that have under the True Religion set up some private Diana of Profit Honour or Worldly Advantage and cannot maintain it by that True Religion they eke out therefore with Private Tradition what may support it Quest What Antidote is there against the Mischief of Tradition Answ To cleave with full purpose and resolution of Heart and Soul to the Word of God and to that only to have no Religion nor any thing in Religion but what is enjoyned and recommended by Divine Authority in that Blessed Word of God and this is indeed to be of the truly Catholick Apostolick and Publick Religion Quest But is the Sense that hath now been given of Tradition the best Sense of it in Scripture-use Answ No it is not and the Consideration of a better Sense will much clear to us the Nature of Tradition When therefore our Saviour discoursed of the Commandments of Men delivered down from Hand to Hand subsisting only upon the Private Authority of the Elders not founded on the written Canon of the Old Testament at that time the only Rule of Faith Worship and Practice he always names Tradition in the ill Sense already given But when the Doctrine and Rules of the New Testament in those grand Points were just breathing from the Holy Spirit and not yet fixed in that abiding Canon Tradition is so long accepted in a good Sense The History of the Things done by our Saviour though most surely believed Luc. 1. 1. was first but delivered or tradition'd by Word of Mouth but afterwards written that the certainty of them might be more fully known to those that had been before Catechiz'd in them by Oral Tradition All the Ordinances of the Christian Worship were first Traditions 1 Cor. 11. 2. and the very Rules of Life were in Tradition 2 Thess 3. 6. But yet all these though they were Tradâ—â—â—ons delivered by those that were Commissioned immediately by the Holy Ghost and were themselves Eye witnâ—sâ—â—â— and Ear-witnesses of most Things they gave in Tâ—â—dition were yet not sealed so sure as the more sure Word of Prophesie because they were not yet written by Divine Inspiration though given out by it nor generally received and assured as so written till the due time of Trial by former Scripture had passed upon them The first Christians did therefore well to take heed to that former Scripture till they had the full Day of the Gospel as hath been before spoken If Tradition then was not so sure in the first and truly pure Times of it how much less would it have been sure afterwards if it had continued in Tradition All therefore of Doctrine in the New Testament was first prepared by Tradition laid in and proved by the Scriptures of the Old Testament either by direct Consequence or by Interpretation from immediate Revelation demonstrated as the First giving of Scripture always was by Miracles and so all at once and once for all consigned over to the Posterity of Christians by Divinely Inspired Writings so assured so confirmed as to leave no place for Tradition oâ— the Best sense There remains therefore nothing for Tradition now but its Ill sense Quest Why might not True Religion continue in Tradition committed all along to Faithful Men even as it did in â—â—e Custody of the Apostles and such Faithful Persons as they committed it to Answ Even in the time of the Apostles it was trusted no longer to Tradition than it must needs for the Apostle John the Survivor of them closed the Canon of the New Testament that was drawn apace into Writing all along But at that time there was such a continual immediate Energy or Efficacy of the Holy Spirit that Truth mov'd every way like Lightning and both by its direct and straight forward Motion in Doctrine and its reverse strokes in the Conviction of all Falshood Errour was blasted every way But when this Extraordinary Appearance ceased there was then no safety for Truth but in an unchangeable Written Word that was in such an extraordinary Season of Miracles and immediate Revelation setled and established under so great a Supervisal in the midst of so many Witnesses of all things by their Eyes and Ears and it being once written and always so secured by Divine Providence as hath been represented it always speaks the same Things in the same Words it first did Quest Why might not Divine Truth be committed some more Fundamental Parts to Writing and some according to variety of Occasion to Tradition Answ God to whom all Futurity is present who foresaw all that was necessary to be written before he had done writing cannot be supposed to commit his Will in part to Writing and that upon great Reasons and the same Reasons notwithstanding to leave a considerable part or so much as any one Branch obligatory upon the Conscience to Parol-Tradition For if he that offends in one Point is guilty of all there needs the same Authority and as well assured for one Point of Faith and Obedience as for all the rest 2. It is unconceivable what End Tradition unconsign'd by Scripture can serve that Scripture does not more fully and effectually take care for Publick Religion reserves nothing to be a Cabal for Private Interest within a close Cabinet or Conclave 3. Whatever is supposed to be entrusted to Tradition must either be the very same we have in Scripture and then Tradition is needless and superfluous for we have it in Scripture if we duly exercise our selves in it or it is more than Scripture hath declared and yet supposed to be of equal Authority with Scripture and then it must be a Motionary and Itinerant Word of God But where are the daily and continual Seals and Credentials Divine Tradition had and in a constant fresh Motion with it as it moves for so it had need be in so fluid a Thing as Tradition if it would pretend to be Sacred and so Divinely Inspired Tradition had while it continued in Tradition But what Reason can be given Tradition as we now speak of it was not incorporated into Scripture as was argued before Or that in so long a Course of Time it hath not been enroll'd into Scripture as the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles still was Seeing if it had all things else it cannot but want the Benefit of the Divine Contexture and Conveyance that Scripture hath in Words chosen and put together by Inspiration and the ready easie and certain Access to it by all For all are equally concerned in it Now seeing Tradition wants all these how can we accept it How can we look off from Scripture to pore upon Tradition or what hold
can we have of it Quest But how can it be but there must be Tradition seeing there were so many Things spoken and done more than the Scripture contains or the World it self could contain if they were all written These then being known in the first Times have been conserv'd by Tradition Tradition made valuable by those of Honourable Name among Christians and their Discourses of Christianity Answ Granting such things so preserv'd suppose them the Actions and Words of our Saviour himself yet if not written by Inspired Penmen they are not recommended as obligatory upon After-ages For whatever was necessary that we might believe and have Eternal Life was so written and that not only just so much as might serve Necessity for that the One Gospel of St. Joâ—â— might serve to That it self witnesses but also be matter of Bounty and Abundance so that out of that greater World of Truth than our World could receive there was so much selected as was bountifully sufficient and abundant to all Intents and Purposes of Clearness Certainty Enforcement upon the Affections Variety continual Exercise and Delight that so every Christian might be throughly furnished to every good Work to all things that pertain to Life and Godliness As for all that Christ did and spake or that the Apostles spake or did by Infallible Guidance and Immediate Assistance if it be not written a Veil is drawn over it and a Cloud hath received it out of our sight It is a secret thing that belongs not to us but is sealed up from us like the things which the Thunders uttered in the Revelation And indeed the Wisdom of Providence seems to have dealt with all such Sayings or Actions as with the Body of Moses all Monuments of Worth and Certainty after Scripture in relation to them are concealed from us There is a great Darkness upon the History of that Time lest we should superstitiously venerate in place of that which is divinely written and preserved to us the things that were not prepared for our Learning and so to us but as a Body not divinely inspired that is a Body without a Soul All too fierce Disputes about them are therefore raised only by Sathan the Enemy of Light and Truth to no other purpose than that about the Body of Moses that is to found an occasion of Superstition and silently to whisper Scripture is not sufficient And yet we see with what an eager Zeal Men are set upon such Researches not satisfied with the Proportion of Manna allowed by God but even as the Israelites that gathered much had nothing over so may it be truly said of those that would abound beyond Scripture in that which pertains to the true guidance of Conscience That they have nothing over and what they will needs keep as such corrupts Quest Is there Reason sufficient to support this Sentiment Answ This great Reason If we had undoubted but not inspired History of that Time it could not be like the Evangelistick History or the Actes of the Apostles to us we should in some things want the Application and Direction to our use dictated by Divine Wisdom in others the unerring Censure of even Apostolick Actions as in that of the Apostle Peter Galat. 2. 11. Now because our Consciences would be apt to be drawn into subjection to things of so great Reputation and yet there would be no Divine Authority to draw them nor Infallible Authority to support them in which Cases it is the Absolute Will of God they should not be in subjection God hath therefore in his Providence left that time so much in the dark that we may trust in his written Word only For separate Immediate Divine Presence from the Prophets and Apostles themselves and there remains nothing at the highest but the Wisdom and Prudence of Understanding and Good Men applying General Rules to particular Cases Times Places and Events as they for that time could best judge and yet besides the variation of Circumstances in every Age they themselves were as Men subject to mistakes as Nathan about David's building the Temple as Paul assaying to go into Bithynia to like Passions with other Men as in the Contention betwixt Paul and Barnabas to like Temptations as in the Miscarriage of Peter before referred to All they did and said not shining with immediate Light from Heaven must be tried in the Light of what themselves together with all the other Penmen of Scripture had written They themselves therefore acting or speaking by way of Prudence or general Assistance must be tried by themselves acting or speaking according to Revelation and special Assistance in which only they are and ought to be Authoritative Quest But it still remains There might be some things that were not so sit for vulgar Knowledge and so were Secreted into Tradition apart from Scripture and that Tradition deposited with Trusty Men who should successively so deposite it that it might at convenient Seasons be brought forth as Goliah's Sword from behind the Ephod Answ None like it indeed to serve a purpose But to satisfie Reason and Conscience nothing so improper For first let these Traditionaries give clear Expositions and such as are worthy to be acquiesced in of the Prophetick or otherwise Dark Places of Scripture If they cannot do that where is the Wisdom above the Vulgar and why did not Tradition without Scripture inclose those mysterious Visions of the Revelation from Popular Inspection But the things Tradition is imploy'd indeed in are quite of another Nature either the Prelation of Men in Church-Office and Dignity or some Rites of Worship that should change Devotion into Superstition or lull it into Ignorance or some Canons that turn Religion into Trade or Doctrines suited to that End or which serves to all such purposes a Tradition to call back all Scripture out of the Written Word into Oral Tradition by locking it up in a Tongue unknown to the generality of Christians And yet if there were any seemingly Purer or more Contemplational Traditions seeing they are not inrolled into Scripture they must as hath been said give such Evidences of themselves as Divine Revelation hath or be at their highest but Enthusiasm and Fanaticism Quest But what Esteem is to be had of the Writings and Iransactions of the Ancients whom we call Fathers Doctors of the Church Men of eminent Holiness great Abilities Confessors and Martyrs of Christianity Answ It may be easily judg'd by what hath been said already that they must be brought to Scripture laid at its Feet and submitted to its Acceptance whether according to its true Sense or not For if the Apostles when the Holy Spirit was not upon them could not exceed Humane how much less can any of a lower Class pretend The Fathers therefore had so great an Awe of Scripture that they did not assume any thing to themselves or their Writings or yield any thing to the Persons or Writings of those of the same Time with them but
according to the undeniable Sense of Scripture Quest But the nearness of these Fathers to the Days of Christ and the Apostles must needs enable them either from what they themselves received warm from their Lips or from what they had from others not quite cold to know the Apostles Doctrine Discipline Manner of Life Purpose their Sense of the Scope and Meaning of those Things wherein they were Divinely Inspired and so to deliver it to After-ages Answ Whatever they have spoken or written giving us more light and advantage to understand and behold Scripture in its own Light ought from them or from any other to be accepted with great regard but if it do not thus it cannot be accepted even from the Writers of Scriptures themselves upon a single or divided Authority They were so bounded by the very Things and Words they themselves had once spoken and written by the Holy-Ghost that all the deference to their knowledge in Divine Things above others was to be made reasonable in the clearest Expounding what themselves and others had written by Divine Inspiration and to be discerned in the very Writings themselves and not to be drawn oracularly out of their Breasts when the Evidences of Divine Inspiration were not upon them For he that is Spiritual i. e. that God vouchsafes Inspiration to or pretends to it must acknowledge all that is either truly written or spoken by the same Inspiration to be the Commandments of the Lord 1 Cor. 14. 37. And as for the newness freshness and life of Truth given by Divine Revelation God graciously providing it should remain as Revelation left it and the Evidences it hath done so appearing with it it is the same in all Ages Divine never loses of its life nor abates of its vigor what it was so many Ages ago that it abides now what the Holy-Ghost spoke so many Ages ago that it speaks now as warmly as then All Divine Truth given is after the power of an endless life the Eternal Increated Spirit lives in it and gives Divine Quickness to it It is yesterday to day the same for ever and so breathes its own sense in Scripture by the ordinary Assistances it vouchsafes to Holy Humble and diligent Waiters upon him in this even as it did in the first Ages though the extraordinary Motions are withdrawn Quest But still the Gifts and Endowments of those Eminent Men with all the Light Truth Grace Learning and Reason they shine to us with ought to be esteemed and improved Answ Yes doubtless For whatsoever Things are true whatsoever things are pure are of Virtue and deserved praise they are Publick and of God wherever they are found And whatever there is in these Elders in their nearness to the First Times their Holiness their Sufferings their great Learning their Encounters of Paganism their Apologies for Christianity their Heavenliness their Contempt of this World all is a Donation and a Grace of God by them to his Church and Mankind in general Quest And does not there arise great Evidence to Christianity and the Doctrines and Practices of it from such eminent Witnesses Answ No doubt there does both to Christianity in particular and to all Religion Virtue and Goodness in general But yet neither their Writings nor Practices can in any wise become Scripture to us they all lead to Scripture and ought to do so they are all to be seen and reflected in Scripture Light and from thence they receive their lustre For though they are a Subordinate Testimony as hath been said yet Christian Religion hath greater Testimony and first enabled them to give a valuable Testimony to it self by Communicating so great knowledge and worth to them And besides all that hath been spoken the Writings of the Fathers are so Voluminous as not to be read over by the most so doubtful in their Genuiness that they cannot be Examined but with great Labour and well prepared Judgment so disputable in their sense that to attain a certainty in it would cut off Time from the greater Imployment of Meditation in the Word of God day and night where Men's Callings lie otherwise so that to receive our Religion from hence were of too remote an assurance to any one much more to those who have not Books and studie for their Profession But every Man whether learned or unlearned is concerned deeply to try his Religion with his own Eyes and not anothers for him and God hath therefore provided a Word nigh him even in his Mouth and in his Heart and hath also taken care by stirring up so many both of the Ancient and Modern Christians to separate themselves to intermeddle with all sacred knowledge that there is a worthy exercise of the learned World herein and great advantages arise thereby for universal knowledge even to the less learned and the very unlearned Quest But did the Fathers themselves distinguish thus their own and one anothers Writings from Scripture Answ It is most evident as hath been already affirmed they put a greatest difference betwixt the most excellent Monuments of Christianity that were but Humane whether their own or others and inspired Pages else Clement Ignatius and others might as well have been Canoniz'd by them as what is from them come down to us for Sacred Canon it self and even as they did we may see the great odds betwixt the one and the other and as we adore God the supreme Author so the Sovereign Preserver of Scripture who by Divine Evidences and by superintending Providence hath divided the bound of Scripture at so great a remove from all the Writings in the World whether Christian or Prophane the Apocryphal Books not excepted which though too adventurously joyn'd so generally in a Volume with Scripture yet are evidently disproportioned in the Majesty of Sense and Divine Eloquence Quest Is there no greater Authority of the First Councils Answ How many Humanes soever meet they cannot make up Divine where it was not before nor can a multitude of Privates constitute a Publick Divine and Publick may be declared but cannot be made so by such Contribution All Determinations of Councils are infinitely outweighed in Value and over-ruled in Authority by Scripture indeed Publick and Divine Quest But in such a number of his Servants may we not conclude God is certainly among them and does guide them Answ Give them all the advantages that can be given and either we must say they are Infallibly guided and then we must receive their Decrees as Scripture and they must be attested to us as Scripture is attested or they are not Infallibly guided and then their Decrees must be tryed as all Fallibles ought to be by a Rule surer than themselves If even Divine Revelation it self was at first tryed and found perfect nay if even all that God proposes to us as from himself comes laden with its own proper Evidences how much more must that which is confessedly humane be tryed by that which is confessedly
we whatever smaller distinctions make the they and the we are both one in our Lord Jesus Christ We ought therefore to pray for the common benefit of all so united though not bound up in the same form with us for a gracious audience and reception of their and our Worship of God that so the Spirit of Love and Vnion in the main may convey all our services into one before God where indeed if they are as he requires they meet stripp'd of all their outward Circumstances Form and Ceremony Faith and Obedience being alone able to mount thither with them And services so raised can by no means be spar'd for small differences in a National Religious Interest for the Angels of all such behold the Face of our Father in Heaven If Darius though a Heathen Prince had such a sense of the virtue Ezr. 6. 10 of that true Religion he was not of as to engage those of so great difference from him in their sense of God to pray for the peace of the King and his Sons how much more should we who are all of the same true Faith and Worship and know the Force and Energy of it by great acts of Favour to one another in those things wherein we cannot be wholly one yet all joyn in praying for the acceptance of one anothers services and the services of the whole Nation whereof we are not only Civil but Religious Members And if we are truly Religious shall be so accounted with God yet with the abatement of our sinful differences and divisions How should we therefore unite that we may lose none of the things that we have wrought but may receive a full reward Rule 6. It is the happiness of our Nation that if any man truâ—y understands considers and pronounces of our National Religion It stands in the Scripture making us wise to Salvation In Faith in Jesus Christ Repentance Love of God Fear of the Divine Majesty all Acts of Justice Love Mercy Compassion true sincere Preaching the whole Word of God Prayer use of Sacraments the Lords-day Religious Discourses Conferences Catechetical Instructions and Education of Youth in the knowledg of Religion Restraint of Atheism Irreligion Intemperance and Sensuality generally and throughout the Nation Compulsion of the very worst of men to acknowledge a Deity and his Worship for what is hypocrisie in them may turn to the salvation of good men These are the things I say again that are truly our National Religion all things pertaining to Order Decency outward Form or Mode are but the Vehicle the conveyance of that True Religion if the main Ends of which be obtain'd viz. That these Religious Acts are perform'd but with that peace and freedom from confusion Confusion destructive of all publick Actions and with that Honourableness that is agreeable to the state of every Nation and this Nation particularly in the simplicity of Religious Worship It is enough and whatever on these accounts is commanded in our National Religion I freely own and acknowledge as reconcilable with these Characters forbearing such who though agreeing in all main things upon sincere endeavours to understand them so cannot acquiesce in them as so who deserve compassion These things ought to be no Partition-Wall in our National Worshipping of God one with another nor can they without great rigor and censor ousness very evil in the sight of God be condemned in those who for the sake of Substantial National Religion the publickness and more universal benefit of it wherein they are most truly zealous pay obedience to the Rules of them Rule 7. Let us all strive labour preach hear and pray and even suffer in the Reformation of our selves and endeavours to Reform all others according to the most excellent Rules of our most Holy Religion professed in this Kingdom as our National Religion that it may be found to Praise Honour and Glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ and be thought worthy to stand before the Son of Man at his coming before whom nothing but the Gold and precious Stones of Substantial Truth and Goodness can stand all else will be burnt off as Hay and Chaff by the fire of that day and they that have been hot and contentious for them be saved only as by Fire with difficulty and loss And in the mean time that our Vnion and Love in the True Religion may be to us an assurance of the Divine Favour and presence of his protection and blessing that neither our Candlestick may be removed nor our Nation the present place of it be taken away for generally both are removed one with the other or soon after one another Rule 8. Let no man be discouraged from the most zealous Affectionate joyning himself to and promoting National Religion because oâ— that veneration due to the Name of The Church and Churches according to the Scripture For a Nation united in True Christian Religion differs no more in the strictest notion from a Church than a Body of men united and consecrated to God according to the Law of Nature differs from a Society united and consecrated to God according to an Institution that is no more than an Institution planted in Nature differs from an Institution given by Revelation For one is the Appointment of God of old from the very Foundations of Humane Society The other after the Fall of Nature and the Inability of it to its end An Institution therefore does not repeal a Natural Law but takes care it should be fulfill'd and compleated in its chiefest End Israel was a Church to God being so devoted to him by his own Institution and it was a Holy Nation according to the Original Exod. 19. 6. Law being elevated by the Institution to its true perfection as a Nation The Christians to whom the Apostle Peter wrote As they were a Church according to the Institution of Christ so they were a Holy Nation as he stiles them succeeding into the place of that whole Jewish Nation Consecrated to God by the Law of Nature upon Nations though but strangers scattered abroad yet to show the 1 Pet. 1. 1â— great value God has of a Nation devoted to him they are stiled A Holy Nation The Institution of the Catholick Church as the seat 1 Pet. 2. 9. of the True Religion of Jesus Christ makes a Nation united in that True Religion both a Church as that Catholick Church hath thereby a Residence in it and much more than those fore-mentioned scatter'd Jews a Holy Nation as it is Nationally resign'd up to God in the True Religion according to the Law of Nature made perfect by the Institution Where then a Nation is united in the Truth of Christian Doctrine the Purity of Divine Worship the Holy Rules of Practise the Catholick Love of all Christians Baptized into the same Body made to drink into that one Spirit In Pastors and Teachers Ministring the same Gospel the Apostles infallibly deliver'd and seal'd with Miracles All
and a forgivness of seventy seven Injuries in a day upon Acknowledgment Mat. 18. 22. Luke 17. 4. and Repentance been taken care for that Love may be continued The forgivness of God and Christ is set us as an Example and that it may the more affect us the odds between our Offences against God and all Trespasses against our selves is stated as disproportionate as ten thousand Talents to a hundred Pence But however Men think they may justly not love where there is a difference in Divine matters in matters of Religion This is the cause of God and Truth and yet this is generally but the greater Scandal for when the things that Christians differ in are small and that they agree in great and momentous things it is evident the Integrity Honour and Interest of Religion should much more unite and indear than little Interests divide In things that are evidently contrary to Divine Truth and the Law of God there is a just denial of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with respect to that Evil he travels with as the Apostle John the great Minister of Love teaches us and a Method for Reformation or Rejection as our Saviour agreeable to that Law in Leviticus prescribes us not to smother our Mat. 18. 15 c. Lev. 19. 17. hatred or disgusts in silence and reserve by concealing the fault a constant cause and store for our Anger or Ill-will but to bring it to an open procedure that either our misapprehension may be rectified or the person reformed and so our love either way restored or a just reason appear not for our hatred but for our limitting the extent of our Love In such a case it ought not to be as is due to a Christian but to a Publicane or Heathen who is still the Object of our Love but not of that kind that degree of Love adjust to Christians but this must be in a case clear and evident not every Dispute The Truth of Christian Religion and the great Design of it is the Salvation and Happiness of all the Servants of Christ and with an Universal Favour to Mankind and this is preserved only in Love Every thing then that cools and destroys Love under a shew of Just and Right is a Scandal because it overthrows Christianity which is indeed a Religion of Love and makes a man of great Name Pretence Authority in the Church a nothing It is a Scandal for it rises from Scandal it hath the ill effect of Scandal both ensnaring and destroying and it tends to further Scandal It rises from Scandal he that does not Love hath some Lust some interest of Profit Dominion or Pleasure that he serves under a name of Religion They that cause Divisions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Divisions in affection taking advantage Rom. 16. 17. of Dissents in Opinion these serve their own Bellies That Lust which they cloak with Religion that baser Interest they cloath and cover with a better name that Lust so disguised deceives them and enslaves them under it self This moves to further Scandal every one that does not comply with the humour of this Lust and serve it he appears as the Irreligious or the Factious disorderly Person hereupon he must not be received or continued in the Love due to a Brother a Christian though the case be nothing at all to true Christianity Our Saviour as aware of this in his so severe caution of not Scandalising little ones immediatly subjoins those dreadful Precepts of cutting off the Right Hand c. that Scandalise our selves as implying they are the great causes of our Scandalising others This still moves on to further Scandal Scandal to Strangers who thereupon look upon Religion as Austere Morose and Cruel and so are discouraged from coming in to it Scandal to those whom our Saviour calls the little ones in Christianity whom it may be he so calls not that they Marc. 9. 4◠are always so in themselves when yet despised but because they may be only so in the Eyes of those that despise them and think not the honour and regard owing to Christians due to them or because take the meanest in Christianity or those we think or are indeed in most danger to be lost our Saviour in a Scheme in a Figure of little ones would represent they ought to be the most cautiously and tenderly treated Lastly They themselves become Scandalised too often to much higher degrees of Scandal hereby even against those things that carry the truest and most genuine Spirit of Christianity because they would go as far off as they can and be most unlike those from whom they dissent in some things that neither their Praying their Preaching their Phrase and manner of speaking must be accepted by them till they even desert the Examples of the very Scripture it self in those things and come too near Burlesquing the Sacred guise of them or at least what is so nearly united that the reproach that falls upon the one falls upon the other also and all that they may be sure to stand far enough off from the adverse purity of what they have espoused whose Opinions while they seem to strike the things most agreeable to Scripture are the Sufferers too often But he that loves his Brother has no occasion of this 1 John 2. 10 11. sort of stumbling which is not far from the Apostles meaning because as his Soul is rightly compos'd and not Clouded with dark and black passion so he hath no Temptation to dislike any thing in true Christianity out of Hatred to his Brother who professes it but an additional Obligation to keep the Truth entire out of Love to his Brother who is united in it with himself and therefore it is said hereby we know we love the Children of God when we love God and keep his Commandments when our love to them ingages us the more close in a Religious Union with them He that hates his Brother is ready to fall out with every thing that he is for and knows not at what he stumbles whether it be truly of God and Christ or not and so is no just occasion of stumbling though he stumble at it 1 John 5. v. 2. 6. The Government and Authority God hath vested in Conscience to understand with God for it self and the Soul and to guide it self according to his Command who is its only Father and it ought to have none upon Earth beside him even as Christ is its one Master is a Grand Principle of True Religion And this is of so great concernment that though the thing be good a Man does yet if he does it not upon a Judgement a Sense a Dictate of Conscience or if that he refuses be truly Evil yet if it be not rejected in the same manner upon the same Motives neither the one nor the other arises to a Religious action or is accepted with God as done in his Fear but is a vain honour of him