Conscience should be pretended when the question is whether to turn Christian or not Is it possible that there should be such a doubt in that point that a man to whom the Reason why he ought to be a Christian is sufficiently proposed can be said to be under a light that convinceth him not Which if it be true then is there nothing in Christianity which there is not a sufficient light to convict that man of to whose Office it belongs Otherwise it could not being to his Office not being able to discern the Obligation of it It is therefore a horrible reproach to Christianity to say that any doubting Conscience is not under a light sufficient to resolve it Scruples of Conscience there may be which may eternally have recourse and that no disparagement to the Faith Because the Faith provides a Resolution that they who have scruples in Conscience are bound in Conscience to lay them aside Nay to act positively against them But he that says that being a Christian he is not under a light sufficient to clear him in any doubt of Conscience says that the Faith obligeth him to sin Whereas it is not the Faith but the want of it which obligeth not the erring Conscience to sin but intangleth him so that he must sin if the obligation of acting fall out before the errour be removed Suppose the Jews convict by the Epistle to the Romans that Salvation comes only by Faith and not by the Law also And you suppose them under a light that neither the Law nor any Ordinance then standing by virtue of the Law could oblige But suppose them in love with themselves and with their Ancestors and to have such an Opinion of Salvation intailed upon them and their issue by the Law as to think that they could not have it by God that gave the Law if the Gentiles might have it as well as themselves and they might very well for consequence of Reason though very ill for their own account oversee the light they were under Suppose we now those that make this Plea not to believe one Catholick Church and one Baptism for the remission of sins But had rather gratifie the Socinians and deny that any Christian can be obliged to any thing that appears not to his own Reason out of Canonical Scripture Then imagine he should gratifie the Papist if he should grant that Catholick Communion always made the Catholick Church Suppose them not to believe that the Faith which only saveth includeth Baptism in the Catholick Church And that this Church is not Reformed unless it be restored to the same form I say supposing them possest with such prejudices as these and marvel not to see them eternally doubting whether or no it be lawful for them to obey the Laws which this Church and Kingdom is able to make Nay to see them break out into Schism as all Parties now seem to do rather then obey them when they shall be out of hope to give their own Law to the Kingdom Never forecasting how it may appear to continue a Church when they have given such Laws to it CHAP. XIV That it is not Forbearance to allow their Orders I Suppose they who make this Plea will not grant that they are in any errour so near the Foundation as these which I name Nor do I think that those Christian Jews at Rome that doubted of transgressing the Law when they knew that Salvation comes only by Faith did deny the Foundation of Faith For as long as they lived in the Church they were in the way to learn and understand how both were true Neither will I say that any of those who desire Forbearance for the weak are in any errour destructive to the Foundation of Faith and the hope of Salvation till they break out into Conventicles When that is done I am thenceforth bound to charge them with all the Error which the Title of their Schism can signifie And therefore I charge them with Hypocrisie when they pretend to Forbearance because they are weak and yet break out into Conventieles when they do so then they can be counted no more the weak among Christians then those Jews which S. Paul will have to be forborn as the weak among Christians supposing them to have renounced the Faith afterwards rather then continue in the Church And therefore the Plea of weak Consciences cannot be allowed those that ingage in Conventicles They have cut themselves off from it by leaving the Church Let them return and then make the best of it As to them the Church is under a new Precept of S. Paul which says A man that is an Heretick after the first and second admonition avoid Knowing that such a one is out of the way and sinneth being condemned by himself Titus III. 10 11. Because saith S. Hierom after S. Cyprian Whereas other sinners are put out of the Church by those that manage the Keys of the Church Hereticks and Schismaticks put themselves out of the Church Therefore Titus that is all Titus his flock are to avoid them for Excommunicate persons who do Excommunicate themselves As for those that continue in the Church though with a pretense of giving such Laws to the Church as no man knows how soon they may unchurch it let them make their best of it But being grounded at least upon a pretense of weakness there can be no question made but some errour must be granted for the ground of this weakness Let themselves at their leisure assign what errour they will acknowledge if they like not that which I have assigned Only let them shew the world that is the Legislative Power of this Kingdom what errour it is that they have hitherto had which being avoided for the future all those difficulties will cease which this Discourse pretendeth cannot be met with but by bounding the Reformation within the Faith and the Laws of the Catholick Church In the mean time let me go on to shew that those who were Ordained in and for the late Schism composed by the Laws at his Majesties Return by Presbyters against their Bishops cannot claim by virtue of it to be owned for Presbyters Or in the terms of the Ancient Church to be received in their own Orders A thing which there can no question be made in by any body that understands what the Church or what a Schism signifies And it is marvel how they that would be thought to allow Episcopacy should question it To acknowledge the Authority of giving Orders in the Bishops according to the Laws by which we both maintain this Church to be Reformed and yet to allow those that are made Presbyters by those Bishops not to Ordain others but to Minister the Office of their Order according to the Reformation setled in this Church I say to allow them to Ordain others to Minister their Office by other Laws not only without but against the consent of the Bishops from whom they have their
Church as one of the Articles of our Creed professes indowed by God with a Right in and over the same And therefore I do not attribute the cause of our divisions to it as unjust but as indefinite and unlimited And I instance in the Tenure of our Ecclesiastical Courts Which by a branch of this Law are declared to be the Kings Courts and the Judges of them the Kings Judges A thing necessarily following upon the Resumption of the Rights of the Crown usurped by the See of Rome into the Crown But which hath turned so great dissatisfaction in the establishment of Religion by the Law of this Land because the Right of the Church in that part of their Jurisdiction which necessarily ariseth from the Founding of the Church by our Lord Christ hath not been reserved to the Church by express Provision of Law Thereupon followed another Law which gave the Judges of these Courts the Priviledge of being Married At such time as the Law of the Land allowed not the Clergy to Marry And by consequence made them no Clergy-men whom the Law owned for the Kings Judges of these Courts Exempting them thereby from the Canonical Obedience which they of Clergy owe their Bishops And leaving their Ministring of the Laws in their respective Jurisdiction to their own discretion as well against as without the consent of their Bishops It is true they subsist by Patents granted by their Bishops and other Ecclesiastical Dignities indowed with Jurisdictions But the Law having declared them the Kings Judges I refer it to Judgment whether it were any marvel that the Bishops and other Dignities with Jurisdiction should discharge themselves of their Jurisdiction upon such Judges as the Law had qualified rather then cross the Law in taking them upon their own charge Part whereof in ministring the Power of the Keys and in correcting the inferior Clergie is essential and necessary to the Office which Ordination makes the Clergy Bishops and Presbyters capable of For it is resolved upon by the Sages of our Laws that such a Patent being granted for term of life the Patentee is inabled to exercise the whole Jurisdiction without and against the consent of him that grants it and shall be maintained against him in so doing by the Law of the Land I am neither to blame nor to excuse them that have not done their utmost to redeem the Office which we are consecrated to a capacity of managing out of that Possession which the Law of the Land thus ingageth For it is granted and it is to be granted that the Church cannot pardon sin As if it could pardon him that is not qualified for pardon Or keep him from pardon that is But the Church pardons sin by bringing him to be qualified for pardon that is not And declaring him pardoned that is If we were Fanaticks and believed no Condition of pardon but only to imagine that we are pardoned There would be no Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Keys of the Church to manage If we believed as some understand the Council of Trent That sin is pardoned by submitting it to the Keys of the Church And that the mortification of the flesh serves only to redeem the temporal Penalty remaining due when the sin is pardoned A Lay Judge having knowledge might manage the Keys of the Church as well as a Priest But because a notorious sinner becomes qualified for pardon when the Concupiscence is mortified which his sin gratifies And because he undergoes his Mortification because he cannot have the Communion otherwise Therefore are they only that consecrate the Eucharist to judge whether he be qualified or not and to give or refuse him that which they consecrate And Commutation of Penance when it supposes not the inward contrition of the heart performed by outward mortification of the flesh is but the betraying of that Soul to damnation whom it admits to Communion not being qualified for it True it is nothing hinders him that is discharged of Excommunication to become qualified by his own private endeavours But God would never have founded his Church upon the Power of the Keys if the Office thereof were only not to hinder and not also to procure notorious sinners to be fit for Communion with the Church And that to procure must be the Office of those who by the Foundation of the Church are to judge who is fit and who not If therefore the Law of the Land provide not that that Office of the Church may be in force to that effect for which the Power of the Keys is given them that consecrate the Eucharist Is it any marvel that the Judgment and Vengeance of God should lye so heavy upon the Land professing Reformation and not inabling that which it professeth to take place My present business therefore is now to say That the Interests which cause our Divisions are so far imputable to these Laws as without the Reforming of the Laws they cannot be cured Two of these Interests I name contradictory the one to the other in their Pretenses For what doth the World complain of but of the abuse of Excommunication daily imployed to inforce the contentious Jurisdiction of these Courts Never imployed to the correction of sin and recalling of sinners Which being the Office of those that receove the Power of the Keys by Ordination cannot be exercised by the Laity without Sacriledge Now granting that the Usurpation of the See of Rome or the Indulgence of Christian Princes and States have procured or granted to the Clergy a larger Jurisdiction then their Office required It would have been no Inconvenience that the whole Jurisdiction should be inforced by Excommunication signifying imprisonment by the Law of the Land If a difference had been made between the proper Jurisdiction of the Church and the Accessory For in this part of it it is an oppression to Christian Subjects that they should be barred the Communion for maintaining themselves and their Right by Law in matters of any Right of this World Though the Clergy were Judges by the Law of the Land But it would be no oppression to them that the Jurisdiction of the Kings Courts should be inforced by imprisonment which Excommunication might signifie by the Law of the Land without signifying a Bar to the Communion of the Eucharist if these were duely distinguished In the mean time the whole indowment of the Church in a manner being irrecoverable by these Courts without Excommunication the scandal of these Jurisdictions becomes a Popular Plea to strip the Clergy of their maintenance Tyths being no farther paid then it please Frantick Fanaticks or contentious neighbours to do right of good will Knowing that Excommunication being odious Imprisonment is not like easily to follow upon it I said that there is another Interest on foot upon a Pretense contradictory to this And I mean that which vulgar Professors of the Laws of the Land set up to themselves out of these scandals To reduce the whole
be a Church Conviction which is the Act of the Law making the Crime notorious how can Christianity be protected and the Church not able to renounce them that renounce it by their deeds The increase of sin so flagrant in this Nation since the War began makes the necessity of this Law flagrant I was speaking of the Leviathan that Monster of a Christian that with one Book allowed by the Act of Oblivion because the Doctrine was not damned when the Person was pardoned hath introduced that Deluge of Atheism and Prophaneness which we are ready to be drowned with Let Publick Justice have the convicting of the Blasphemies which he hath taught if the Church be not in Case to bear the envy of such a trust But to account for such a crime by a pecuniary mulct is to sell our Christianity at the price at which it is defied Unless Infamy follow and Excommunication to bring it on farewel Christianity which compoundeth with Apostasie The Father of the Sect thinks I believe that he hath as good Right to the Communion as the rest of His Majesties Subjects Who though he should profess Penitence for his crime could not be believed having given the World warning that he may be bound to say and to swear that which he doth not believe What course but this to suppress the Vanity of committing Murther under the name of a Duel For in all Common-wealths where mens memory is not liable to Infamy sin is not out of countenance In that which is Christian what can be infamous if to forfeit Communion with the Church be not As for Adultery what punishment hath this Kingdom left for it Or how shall it be counted a Christian Kingdom having none Be the tryal of it as Civil Interest shall require If it pass without Excommunication though the Law of the Land lay no hold on it what can clear the Kingdom of the expectation of Gods vengeance By consequence hereof they that are convicted of Simony in Civil Justice must remain Irregular to the Church That is though their Ordination can never be void yet their persons must remain incapable of any trust which their Clergy should make them capable of And why should not the Priviledge of their Clergy cease and they remain Excommunicate for such a Crime The other Law concerning the Clergy is the confining of every one to one Diocese Which is but the Restoring of that Order which the See of Rome had disordered on purpose to ingage in the disorders of it all that they obliged by such Priviledges For the Priviledges reserved to the Crown Nobility and Bishops whereby the abuse is but displaced will not be considerable in comparison with the Reformation which it hindreth It seems strange to those that find themselves Interested that two Benefices with Cure should be allowed in one Diocese not in several Dioceses though at less distance But the Law cannot be understood to allow all that it forbids not Because there may be Reason why the Publick good will not allow the forbidding of that which is left to the Conscience of particular persons Were all Benefices restored to that Provision which the Cures might require perhaps Priviledges of Pluralities might be extinguished In the mean time is it not enough that whatsoever the Quality be the Office of Priest and Deacon is relative to their Respective Bishops that no man can be answerable to one Bishop for a Charge in which he is answerable to another for the same Which if it hold not in one and the same Diocese the Reason of the difference is both sufficient and evident Always the Ground being laid that the Reformation of the Church is to be Ruled by the Canons of the Primitive Church there can be no more question in this then is in any thing where the Primitive Institution is as Visible as the decay and abuse But this will principally concern Archdeacons and the Dignified Clergy which are to bear a part in the Bishops Office For how should they be charged with that which they are not charged to execute CHAP. XXVI Of Forbearance due or not due in two Instances I Have proposed a Conference I have determined that all is to be tryed by the agreement of the Catholick Church But if we stay till the Parties agree to that there must be no Conference What have we to overcome this difficulty with Considering how the necessity of losing all Religion presses all Parties and considering how slight the pretenses of dissatisfaction at the Act of Uniformity are though I cannot depart from my claim that the Reformation cannot duely be made but by and to that Pattern yet I see it may be laid aside in the Tryal not supposing that the Will of God is declared by it But if the advantage be not allowed which the consent of Christendom from the beginning hath in the judgment of common Reason above any Opinion of this time or any Party pretending Reformation what course can they hold that have not reasonable Creatures to deal with For how can they be counted reasonable that prefer their own Reason before the Reason of Christendom Or how shall they distinguish their private Spirits from the Enthusiasms of Fanaticks that insist upon those Interpretations and Consequences of Scripture which had any man seen before them the Church had never been as it hath been In fine the Case being stated I see no cause to apprehend any obstinacy in the Parties to prefer any faction or partiality before Reason so manifested and so concerning the common Christianity I will insist upon two Instances All the World knows that one of the abuses which made the necessity of Reformation most appear was that of private Masses where the Eucharist was celebrated and the people did not communicate It is as well known that the Reformation according to Calvin contents it self with four Communions a year but no Assembly without Preaching The Church of England hath aimed at the Communion every Lords-day and Holy-day at Sermons as frequent as can be had so as to maintain the reverence due to Religion to Preaching and to the Church What question can there be in Religion that the Eucharist is the principal Office of Religious Assemblies What pretense of Reformation in restoring Preaching by silencing the Eucharist It will be said that there is fear of prophaning so Religious an Office But where is Reformation if it make not the people fit for it The Papists say Private Masses are not commanded they would have the people communicate and incourage them to it But what do they do to bring them to it Surely more then they do that silence the Eucharist for the Sermon That are not contented till so much Preaching be commanded that they know the Eucharist must be silenced Let them think what abilities are requisite to maintain so frequent Preaching that there shall be no time for the Eucharist Let them think of the Scandals that must needs fall out