duty of all men but even whatsoever may possibly be known to be of that quality so that the same be by necessary consequence deduced out of clear and manifest principles For if once we descend unto probable Collections what is convenient formen we are then in the Territory where free and arbitrary Determinations the Territory where Humane Laws take place which Laws are after to be considered 9. Now the due observation of this Law which Reason teacheth us cannot but be effectual unto their great good that observe the same For we see the whole World and each part thereof so compacted that as long as each thing performeth onely that work which is natural unto it it thereby preserveth both other things and also it self Contrariwise let any principal thing as the Sun the Moon any one of the Heavens or Elements but once cease or fail or swerve and who doth not easily conceive that the sequel thereof would be ruine both to it self and whatsoever dependeth on it And is it possible that Man being not onely the noblest Creature in the World but even a very World in himself his transgressing the Law of his Nature should draw no manner of harm after it Yes Tribulation and anguish unto every soul that doth evil Good doth follow unto all things by observing the course of their nature and on the contrary side evil by not observing it but not unto Natural Agents that good which we call Reward not that evil which we properly term Punishment The reason whereof is because amongst Creatures in this World onely Mans observation of the Law of his Nature is Righteousness onely Mans transgression Sin And the reason of this is the difference in his manner of observing or transgressing the Law of his Nature He doth not otherwise then voluntarily the one or the other What we do against our wills or constrainedly we are not properly said to do it because the motive cause of doing it is not in our selves but carrieth us as if the Wind should drive a Feather in the Air we no whit furthering that whereby we are driven In such cases therefore the evil which is done moveth compassion Men are pittied for it as being rather miserable in such respect then culpable Some things are likewise done by Man though not through outward force and impulsion though not against yet without their Wills as in Alienation of Minde or any the like inevitable utter absence of Wit and Judgment For which cause no Man did ever think the hurtful actions of furious Men and Innocents to be punishable Again some things we do neither against nor without and yet not simply and meerly with our Wills but with our Wills in such sort moved that albeit there be no impossibility but that we might nevertheless we are not so easily able to do otherwise In this consideration one evil deed is made more pardonable then another Finally that which we do being evil is notwithstanding by so much more pardonable by how much the exigence of so doing or the difficulty of doing otherwise is greater unless this necessity or difficulty have originally risen from our selves It is no excuse therefore unto him who being drunk committeth incest and alledgeth that his wits were not his own in as much as himself might have chosen whether his wits should by that mean have been taken from him Now Rewards and Punishments do always presuppose some thing willingly done well or ill without which respect though we may sometimes receive good or harm yet then the one is onely a Benefit and not a Reward the other simply an Hurt not a Punishment From the sundry dispositions of Mans will which is the root of all his actions there groweth variety in the sequel of Rewards and Punishments which are by these and the like rules measured Take away the will and all acts are equal That which we do not and would do is commonly accepted as done By these and the like rules Mens actions are determined of and judged whether they be in their own nature rewardable or punishable Rewards and Punishments are not received but at the hands of such as being above us have power to examine and judge our deeds How men come to have this authority one over another in External Actions we shall more diligently examine in that which followeth But for this present so much all do acknowledge that sith every mans heart and conscience doth in good or evil even secretly committed and known to none but it self either like or disallow it self and accordingly either rejoyce very Nature exulting as it were in certain hope of reward or else grieve as it were in a sense of future punishment neither of which can in this case be looked for from any other saving onely from him who discerneth and judgeth the very secrets of all hearts Therefore he is the onely Rewarder and Revenger of all such Actions although not of such actions onely but of all whereby the Law of Nature is broken whereof himself is Author For which cause the Roman Laws called The Laws of the Twelve Tables requiring offices of inward affection which the eye of Man cannot reach unto threaten the neglecters of them with none but Divine Punishment 10. That which hitherto we have set down is I hope sufficient to shew their brutishness which imagine that Religion and Vertue are onely as Men will account of them that we might make as much account if we would of the contrary without any harm unto our selves and that in Nature they are as indifferent one as the other We see then how Nature it self reacheth Laws and Statutes to live by The Laws which have been hitherto mentioned do binde men absolutely even as they are men although they have never any setled Fellowship never any solemn Agreement amongst themselves what to do or not to do But forasmuch as we are not by our selves sufficient to furnish our selves with competent store of things needful for such a life as our Nature doth desire a life fit for the dignity of man Therefore to supply those defects and imperfections which are in us living single and solely by our selves we are naturally enduced to seek Communion and Fellowship with others This was the cause of Mens uniting themselves at the first in Politick Societies which Societies could not be without government nor government without a distinct kinde of Law from that which hath been already declared Two Foundations there are which beat up Publick Societies the one a Natural Inclination whereby all men desire sociable life and fellowship the other an order expresly or secretly agreed upon touching the manner of their Union in living together The latter is that which we call the Law of a Commonweal the very Soul of a Politick Body the parts whereof are by Law animated held together and set on work in such Actions as the common good requireth Laws Politick ordained for External Order and Regiment
and operation of their Sacrament surely to admit the matter as a part and not to admit the form hath small congruity with reason Again for as much as a Sacrament is compleat having the matter and form which it ought what should lead them to set down any other parts of Sacramental Repentance then Confession and Absolution as Durandus hath done For touching Satisfaction the end thereof as they understand it is a further matter which resteth after the Sacrament administred and therefore can be no part of the Sacrament Will they draw in Contrition with Satisfaction which are no parts and exclude Absolution a principal part yea the very complement form and perfection of the rest as themselves account it But for their breach of precepts in art it skilleth not if their Doctrine otherwise concerning Penitency and in Penitency touching Confession might be found true We say let no man look for pardon which doth sin other and conceal Sin where in duty it should be revealed The cause why God requireth Confession to be made to him is that thereby testifying a deep hatred of our own iniquity the only cause of his hatred and wrath towards us we might because we are humble be so much the more capable of that compassion and tender mercy which knoweth not how to condemn sinners that condemn themselves If it be our Saviours own principle that the conceipt we have of our debt forgiven proportioneth our thankfulness and love to him at whose hands we receive pardon doth not God fore-see that they which with ill-advised modesty seek to hide their Sin like Adam that they which rake it up under ashes and confess it not are very unlikely to requite with offices of love afterwards the grace which they shew themselves unwilling to prize at the very time when they sue for it in as much as their not confessing what crimes they have committed is a plain signification how loth they are that the benefit of Gods most gracious pardon should seem great Nothing more true then that of Tertullian Confession doth as much abate the weight of mens offences as Concealment doth make them heavier For he which confesseth hath a purpose to appease God he a determination to persist and continue obstinate which keeps them secret to himself St. Chrysostome almost in the same words Wickedness is by being acknowledged lessened and doth but grow by being hid If men having done amiss let it slip as though they knew no such matter what is there to stay them from falling into one and the same evil To call our selves Sinners availeth nothing except we lay our faults in the ballance and take the weight of them one by one Confess thy crimes to God disclose thy transgressions before thy Judge by way of humble Supplication and suit if not with tongue at the least with heart and in this sort seek mercy A general perswasion that thou art a Sinner will neither so humble nor bridle thy Soul as if the Catalogue of thy Sins examined severally be continually kept in mind This shall make thee lowly in thine own eyes this shall preserve thy feet from falling and sharpen thy desires towards all good things The mind I know doth hardly admit such unpleasant remembrances but we must force it we must constrain it thereunto It is safer now to be bitten with the memory then hereafter with the torment of Sin The Jews with whom no Repentance for Sin is available without Confession either conceived in mind or uttered which latter kind they call usually 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confession delivered by word of mouth had first that general Confession which once every year was made both severally by each of the people for himself upon the day of expiation and by the Priest for them all On the day of expiation the high Priest maketh three express Confessions acknowledging unto God the manifold transgressions of the whole Nation his own personal offences likewise together with the Sins as well of his Family as of the rest of his rank and order They had again their voluntary Confessions at the times and seasons when men bethinking themselves of their wicked conversation past were resolved to change their course the beginning of which alteration was still Confession of Sins Thirdly over and besides these the Law imposed upon them also that special Confession which they in their book call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confession of that particular fault for which we namely seek pardon at Gods hands The words of the Law concerning Confession in this kind are as followeth When a Man or Woman shall commit any Sin that Men commit and transgress against the Lord their Sin which they have done that is to say the very deed it self in particular they shall acknowledge In Leviticus after certain transgressions there mentioned we read the like When a Man hath sinned in any one of these things he shall then confess how in that thing he hath offended For such kind of special Sins they had also special Sacrifices wherein the manner was that the Offender should lay his hands on the head of the Sacrifice which he brought and should there make Confession to God saying Now O Lord that I have offended committed Sin and done wickedly in thy sight this or this being my fault behold I repent me and am utterly ashamed of my doings my purpose is never to return more to the same crime None of them whom either the house of judgement had condemned to die or of them which are to be punished with stripes can be clear by being executed or scourged till they repent and confess their faults Finally there was no man amongst them at any time either condemned to suffer death or corrected or chastized with stripes none ever sick and near his end but they called upon him to repent and confess his Sins Of Malefactors convict by witnesses and thereupon either adjudged to die or otherwise chastized their custom was to exact as Ioshua did of Achan open confession My son now give Glory to the Lord God of Israel confess unto him and declare unto me what thou hast committed conceal it not from me Jos. 7. 19. Concerning injuries and trespasses which happen between men they highly commend such as will acknowledge before many It is in him which repenteth accepted as an high Sacrifice if he will confess before many make them acquainted with his over-sights and reveal the transgressions which have passed between him and any of his brethren saying I have verily offended this Man thus and thus I have done unto him but behold I do now repent and am sorry Contariwise whosoever is proud and will not be known of his faults but cloaketh them is not yet come to perfect Repentance for so it is written He that hides his Sins shall not prosper which words of Solomon they do not further extend then only to Sins committed against Men which are in
that respect meet before men to be acknowledged particularly But in Sins between Man and God there is no necessity that Man should himself make any such open and particular recital of them to God they are known and of us it is required that we cast not the memory of them carelesly and loosly behind our backs but keep in mind as near as we can both our own debt and his grace which remitteth the same Wherefore to let pass Jewish confession and to come unto them which hold confession in the ear of the Priest commanded yea commanded in the nature of a Sacrament and thereby so necessary that Sin without it cannot be pardoned let them find such a Commandment in holy Scripture and we ask no more Iohn the Baptist was an extraordinary person his Birth his Actions of Life his Office extraordinary It is therefore Recorded for the strangeness of the Act but not set down as an everlasting Law for the World That to him Ierusalem and all Iudea made confession of their Sins Besides at the time of this confession their pretended Sacrament of Repentance as they grant was not yet instituted neither was it Sin after Baptism which Penitents did there confess When that which befel the seven sons of Seeva for using the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in their conjurations was notisied to Jews and Grecians in Ephesus it brought an universal fear upon them insomuch that divers of them which had believed before but not obeyed the Laws of Christ as they should have done being terrified by this example came to the Apostle and confessed their wicked deeds Which good and vertuous act no wise man as I suppose will disallow but commend highly in them whom Gods good Spirit shall move to do the like when need requireth Yet neither hath this example the force of any general Commandment or Law to make it necessary for every man to pour into the ears of the Priest whatsoever hath been done amiss or else to remain everlastingly culpable and guilty of Sin in a word it proveth Confession practized as a vertuous act but not commanded as a Sacrament Now concerning St. Iames his Exhortation whether the former branch be considered which saith Is any sick among you let him call for the Ancients of the Church and let them make their prayers for him or the latter which stirreth up all Christian Men unto mutual acknowledment of faults amongst themselves Lay open your minds make your confessions one to another is it not plain that the one hath relation to that gift of healing which our Saviour promised his Church saying They shall lay their hands on the sick and the sick shall recover health relation to that gift of healing whereby the Apostle imposed his hands on the Father of Publius and made him miraculously a sound man relation finally to that gift of healing which so long continued in practice after the Apostles times that whereas the Novatianists denyed the power of the Church of God in curing Sin after Baptism St. Ambrose asked them again Why it might not as well prevail with God for spiritual as far corporal and bodily health yea wherefore saith he do ye your selves lay hands on the diseased and believe it to be a work of benediction or prayer if haply the sick person be restored to his former safety And of the other member which toucheth mutual confession do not some of themselves as namely Cajeâ—an deny that any other Confession is meant then only that which seeketh either association of Prayers or reconciliation or pardon of wrongs is it not confessed by the greatest part of their own retinue that we cannot certainly affirm Sacramental Confession to have been meant or spoken of in this place Howbeit Bellarmine delighted to run a course by himself where colourable sâ—â—ifts of wit will but make the way passable standeth as formally for this place and not less for that in St. Iohn than for this St. Iohn saith If we confess our Sins God is faithful and just to forgive our Sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness doth St. Iohn say If we confess to the Priest God is righteous to forgive and if not that our Sins are unpardonable No but the titles of God just and righteous do import that he pardoneth Sin only for his promise sake And there is not they say any promise of forgiveness upon confession made to God without the Priest Not any promise but with this condition and yet this condition no where exprest Is it not strange that the Scripture speaking so much of Repentance and of the several duties which appertain thereunto should ever mean and no where mention that one condition without which all the rest is utterly of none effect or will they say because our Saviour hath said to his Ministers Whose sins ye retain c. and because they can remit no more than what the offenders have confest that therefore by vertue of his promise it standeth with the Righteousness of God to take away no mans Sins until by auricular confession they be opened unto the Priest They are men that would seem to honour Antiquity and none more to depend upon the reverend judgement thereof I dare boldly affirm that for many hundred years after Christ the Fathers held no such opinion they did not gather by our Saviours words any such necessity of seeking the Priests Absolution from Sin by secret and as they now term it sacramental confession Publick confession they thought necessary by way of Discipline not private confession as in the nature of a Sacrament necessary For to begin with the purest times it is unto them which read and judge without partiality a thing most clear that the ancient 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Confession defined by Tertullian to be a Discipline of humiliation and submission framing mens behaviour in such sort as may be fittest to move pity the confession which they use to speak of in the exercise of Repentance was made openly in the hearing of the whole both Ecclesiastical Consistory and Assembly This is the reason wherefore he perceiving that divers were better content their sores should secretly fester and eat inward then be laid so open to the eyes of many blameth greatly their unwise bashfulness and to reform the same perswadeth with them saying Amongst thy brethren and fellow servants which are partakers with thee of one and the same nature fear joy grief sufferings for us was common Lord and Father we have all received one spirit why shouldest thou not think with thy self that they are but thine own self wherefore dost thou avoid them as likely to insult over thee whom thou knowest subject to the same haps At that which grieveth any one part the whole body cannot rejoyce it must needs be that the whole will labour and strive to help that wherewith a part of it self is molested St. Cyprian being grieved with the dealings
Stupidity the highest top of Wisdom and Commiseration the deadlyest sin became by Institution and Study the very same which the other had been before through a secret natural Distemper upon his Conversion to the Christian Faith and recovery from Sickness which moved him to receive the Sacrament of Baptisme in his Bed The Bishops contrary to the Canons of the Church would needs in special love towards him ordain him Presbyter which favour satisfied not him who thought himself worthy of greater Place and Dignity He closed therefore with a number of well-minded men and not suspicious what his secret purposes were and having made them sure unto him by fraud procureth his own Consecration to be their Bishop His Prelacy now was able as he thought to countenance what he intended to publish and therefore his Letters went presently abroad to sundry Churches advising them never to admit to the Fellowship of Holy Mysteryes such as had after Baptisme offered Sacrifice to Idols There was present at the Council of Nice together with other Bishops one Acesius a Novatianist touching whose diversity in opinion from the Church the Emperour desirous to hear some reason asked of him certain Questions for Answer whereunto Acesius weaveth out a long History of things that hapned in the Persecution under Decius And of men which to savelife forsook Faith But in the end was a certain bitter Canon framed in their own School That men which fall into deadly sin after holy Baptism ought never to be again admitted to the Communion of Divine Mysteries That they are to be exhorted unto Repentance howbeit not to be put in hope that Pardon can be bad at the Priest's hands but with God which hath Soveraign Power and Authority in himself to remit sins it may be in the end they shall finde Mercy These Followers of Novatian which gave themselves the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clean pure and unspotted men had one point of Montanism more than their Master did professe for amongst Sinnes unpardonable they reckoned second Marriages of which opinion Tertullian making as his usual manner was a salt Apology Such is saith he our stony hardness that defaming our Comforter with a kinde of enormity in Discipline we dam up the doors of the Church no less against twice-married men then against Adulterers and Fornicators Of this sort therefore it was ordained by the Nycene Synod that if any such did return to the Catholick and Apostolick unity they should in Writing binde themselves to observe the Orders of the Church and Communicate as well with them which had been often married or had fallen in time of Persecution as with other sort of Christian people But further to relate or at all to refel the errour of mis-believing men concerning this point is not now to our present purpose greatly necessary The Church may receive no small detriment by corrupt practice even there where Doctrine concerning the substance of things practised is free from any great or dangerous corruption If therefore that which the Papacy doth in matter of Confessions and Absolution be offensive if it palpably serve in the use of the Keyes howsoever that which it teacheth in general concerning the Churches power to retain and forgive sinnes be admitted true have they not on the one side as much whereat to be abasht as on the other wherein to rejoyce They binde all men upon pain of everlasting condemnation and death to make Confessions to their Ghostly Fathers of every great offence they know and can remember that they have committed against God Hath Christ in his Gospel so delivered the Doctrine of Repentance unto the World Did his Apostles so preach it to Nations Have the Fathers so believed or so taught Surely Novatian was not so merciless in depriving the Church of power to Absolve some certain Offenders as they in imposing upon all a necessity thus to confess Novatian would not deny but God might remit that which the Church could not whereas in the Papacy it is maintained that what we conceal from men God himself shall never pardon By which over-sight as they have here surcharged the World with multitude but much abated the weight of Confessions so the careless manner of their Absolution hath made Discipline for the most part amongst them a bare Formality Yea rather a mean of emboldening unto vicious and wicked life then either any help to prevent future or medicine to remedy present evils in the Soul of man The Fathers were slow and alwayes fearful to absolve any before very manifest tokens given of a true Penitent and Contrite spirit It was not their custom to remit sin first and then to impose works of satisfaction as the fashion of Rome is now in so much that this their preposterous course and mis-ordered practises hath bred also in them an errour concerning the end and purpose of these works For against the guiltiness of sin and the danger of everlasting condemnation thereby incurâ—ed Confession and Absolution succeeding the same are as they take it a remedy sufficient and therefore what their Penitentiaries do think to enjoyn farther whether it be a number of Ave-Maries dayly to be scored up a Journey of Pilgrimage to be undertaken some few Dishes of ordinary Diet to be exchanged Offerings to be made at the shrines of Saints or a little to be scraped off from Mens superfluities for relief of poor People all is in lieu or exchange with God whose Justice notwithstanding our Pardon yet oweth us still some Temporal punishment either in this or in the life to come except we quit it our selves here with works of the former kinde and continued till the ballance of God's most strict severity shall finde the pains we have taken equivalent with the plagues which we should endure or else the mercy of the Pope relieve us And at this Postern-gate cometh in the whole Mart of Papal Indulgences so infinitely strewed that the pardon of Sinne which heretofore was obtained hardly and by much suit is with them become now almost impossible to be escaped To set down then the force of this Sentence in Absolving Penitents There are in Sinne these three things The Act which passeth away and vanisheth The Pollution wherewith it leaveth the Soul defiled And the Punishment whereunto they are made subject that have committed it The act of Sin is every deed word and thought against the Law of God For Sinne is the transgression of the Law and although the deed it self do not continue yet is that bad quality permanent whereby it maketh the Soul unrighteous and deformed in God's sight From the Heart come evil Cogitations Murthers Adulteries Fornications Thefts false Testimonies Slanders These are things which defile a man They do not only as effects of impurity argue the Nest no be unclean out of which they came but as causes they strengthen that disposition unto Wickedness which brought them forth They are both fruits and seeds
to keep the wound of Contrition bleeding they unfold the circumstances of their Transgressions and endeavour to leave nothing which may be heavy against themselves Yet do what they can they are still fearful lest herein also they do not that which they ought and might Come to Prayer their coldnesse taketh all heart and courage from them with fasting albeit their Flesh should be withered and their Blood clean dryed up would they ever the lesse object What is this to David's humiliation Wherein notwithstanding there was not any thing more than necessary In works of Charity and Alms-deed It is not all the World can perswade them they did ever reach the poor bounty of the Widdow's two Mites or by many millions of Leagues come near to the mark which Cornelius touched so farr they are off from the proud surmise of any Penitential Supererrogation in miserable wretched Wormes of the Earth Notwithstanding for as much as they wrong themselves with over-rigorous and extreme Exactions by means whereof they fall sometimes into such Perplexities as can hardly be allayed It hath therefore pleased Almighty God in tender commiseration over these imbecillities of men to ordain for their Spiritual and Ghostly comfort consecrated Persons which by Sentence of Power and Authority given from above may as it were out of his very mouth ascertain timerous and doubtful mindes in their own particular ease them of all their scrupulosities leave them settled in Peace and satisfied touching the Mercy of God towards them To use the benefit of this help for the better satisfaction in such cases is so natural that it can be forbidden no man but yet not so necessary that all men should be in case to need it They me of the two the happier therefore that can content and satisfie themselves by judging discreetly what they perform and soundly what God doth require of them For having that which is most material the substance of Penitency rightly bred touching signes and tokens thereof we may affirm that they do boldly which imagine for every offence a certain proportionable degree in the Passions and Griefs of Minde whereunto whosoever aspireth not repenteth in vain That to frustrate mens Confession and Considerations of Sinne except every Circumstance which may aggravate the same be unript and laid in the Ballance is a mercilesse extremity although it be true that as near as we can such Wounds must be searched to the very bottom Last of all to set down the like stint and to shut up the doors of Mercy against Penitents which come short thereof in the devotion of their Prayers in the continuance of their Falls in the largeness and bounty of their Almes or in the course of any other such like Duties is more than God himself hath thought meet and consequently more than mortal men should presume to do That which God doth chiefly respect in mens penitency is their Hearts The Heart is it which maketh Repentance sincere Sincerity that which findeth favour in God's sight and the favour of God that which supplyeth by Gracious acceptation whatsoever may seem defective in the faithful hearty and true Offices of his Servants Take it saith Chrysostome upon my credit Such is God's merciful inclination towards men that repentance offered with a single and sincere minde he never refuseth no not although we be come to the very top of Iniquity If there be a will and desire to return he receiveth imbraceth and omitteth nothing which may restore us to former happiness yea that which is yet above all the rest albeit we cannot in the duty of satisfying him attain what we ought and would but come farre behinde our mark he taketh neverthelesse in good worth that little which we doe be it never so mean we lose not our labour therein The least and lowest step of Repentance in Saint Chrysostome's Judgement severeth and setteth us above them that perish in their Sinne I therefore will end with Saint Augustine's Conclusion Lord in thy Booke and Volume of Life all shall be written as well the Least of thy Saints as the Chiefest Let not therefore the Unperfect fear Let them onely proceed and go forward OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK VII Their Sixth Assertion That there ought not to be in the Church Bishops indued with such Authority and Honour as ours are The Matter contained in this Seventh Book 1. THe state of Bishops although sometime oppugned and that by such as therein would most seems to please God yet by his providence upheld hitherto whose glory it is to maintain that whereof himself is the Author 2. What a Bishop is what his name doth import and what doth belong unto his office as he is a Bishop 3. In Bishops two things traduced of which two the one their Authority and in is the first thing condemned their superiority over other Ministers what kinde of superiority in Ministers it â—â— which the one part holdeth and the other denieth lawful 4. From whence it hath grown that the Church is governed by Bishops 5. The time and cause of instituting every where Bishops with restraint 6. What manner of power Bishops from the first beginning have had 7. After what sort Bishops together with Presbyters have used to govern the Churches which were under them 8. How far the power of Bishops hath reached from the beginning in respect of territory or local compass 9. In what respects Episcopal Regiment hath been gainsaid of old by Aerius 10. In what respect Episcopal Regiment is gainsaid by the Authors of pretended Reformation at this day 11. Their arguments in disgrace of Regiment by Bishops as being a meer invention of man and not found in Scripture answered 12. Their arguments to prove there was no necessity of instituting Bishops in the Church 13. The fore-alleadged Arguments answered 14. An answer unto those things which are objected concerning the difference between that Power which Bishops now have and that which ancient Bishops had more then other Presbyters 15. Concerning the civil Power and Authority which our Bishops have 16. The Arguments answered whereby they would prove that the Law of God and the judgement of the best in all ages condemneth the ruling superiority of our Minister over another 17. The second malicious thing wherein the state of Bishops suffereth oblaquy is their Honour 18. What good doth publickly grow from the Prelacy 19. What kinds of Honor be due unto Bishops 20. Honor in Title Place Ornament Attendance and Priviledge 21. Honor by endowment with Lands and Livings 22. That of Ecclessiastical Goods and consequently of the Lands and Livings which Bishops enjoy the propriety belongs unto God alone 23. That Ecclesiastical persons are receivers of Gods Rents and that the honour of Prelates is to be thereof his chief Receivers not without liberty from him granted of converting the same unto their own use even in large manner 24. That for their unworthiness to deprive both them and their
Reasons were not powerful enough to incline him to a willing acceptance of it his wish was rather to gain a better Country Living where he might be free from Noise so he exprest the desire of his Heart and eat that bread which he might more properly call his own in privacy and quietness But notwithstanding this aversness he was at last perswaded to accept of the Bishops Proposal and was by Patent for Life made Master of the Temple the 17th of March 1585. He being then in the 34th year of his Age. And here I shall make a stop and that the Reader may the better judge of what follows give him a Character of the Times and Temper of the people of this Nation when Mr. Hooker had his Admission into this Place A Place which he accepted rather than desired and yet here he promised himself a virtuous quietness that blessed Tranquillity which he always prayed and laboured for that so he might in Peace bring forth the Fruits of Peace and glorifie God by uninterrupted Prayers and praises for this he always thirsted and yet this was denied him For his Admission into this Place was the very beginning of those Oppositions and Anxieties which till then this Good man was a stranger to and of which the Reader may guess by what follows In this Character of the Times I shall by the Readers favour and for his information look so far back as to the beginning of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth a time in which the many pretended Titles to the Crown the frequent Treasons the Doubts of her Successour the late Civil War and the sharp Persecution that had raged to the effusion of so much Blood in the Reign of Queen Mary were fresh in the memory of all men and these begot fears in the most Pious and Wisest of this Nation least the like days should return again to them or their present Posterity The apprehension of which Dangers begot an earnest desire of a Settlement in the Church and State believing there was no other probable way left to make them sit quietly under their own Vines and Fig-trees and enjoy the desired Fruit of their Labours But Time and Peace and Plenty begot Self-ends and those begot Animosities Envy Opposition and Unthankfulness for those blessings for which they lately thirsted being then the very utmost of their Desires and even beyond their Hopes This was the temper of the Times in the beginning of her Reign and thus it continued too long For those very people that had enjoyed the desires of their hearts in a Reformation from the Church of Rome became at last so like the Grave as never to be satisfied but were still thirsting for more and more neglecting to pay that Obedience to Government and perform those Vows to God which they made in their days of Adversities and Fear so that in short time theree appeared thre several Interests each of them fearless and restless in the prosecution of their Designs they may for distinction be called The active Romanists The restless Non-conformists of which there were many sorts and The passive peaceable Protestant The Counsels of the first considered and resolved on in Rome the second in Scotland in Geneva and in divers selected secret dangerous Conventicles both there and within the bosom of our own Nation the third pleaded and defended their Cause by Establisht Laws both Ecclesiastical and Civil and if they were active it was to prevent the other two from destroying what was by those known Laws happily establisht to them and their Posterity I shall forbear to mention the very many and as Dangerous Plots of the Romanists against the Church and State because what is principally intended in this Digression is an account of the Opinions and Activity of the Non-conformists against whose judgement and practice Mr. Hooker became at last but most unwillingly to be ingaged in a Book-war a War which he maintained not as against an Enemy but with the spirit of Meekness and Reason In which number of Non-conformists though some might be sincere and well-meaning men whose indiscreet zeal might be so like Charity as thereby to cover a multitude of Errors yet of this Party there were many that were possest with an high degree of Spiritual wickedness I mean with an innate restles radical Pride and Malice I mean not those lesser sins that are more visible and more properly Carnal and sins against a mans self as Gluttony and Drunkenness and the like from which good Lord deliver us but sins of an higher nature because more unlike to the nature of God which is Love and Mercy and Peace and more like the Devil who is not a glutton nor can be drunk and yet is a Devil those wickednesses of Malice and Revenge and Opposition and a Complacence in working and beholding Confusion which are more properly his work who is the Enemy and disturber of mankind and greater sins though many will not believe it Men whom a furious Zeal and Prejudice had blinded and made incapable of hearing Reason or adhearing to the ways of Peace Men whom Pride and Self-conceit had made to overvalue their own Wisdom and become pertinacious and to hold foolish and unmannerly disputes against those Men which they ought to Reverence and those Laws which they ought to obey Men that laboured and joyed to speak evil of Government and then to be the Authors of Confusion of Confusion as it is Confusion whom Company and Conversation and Custom had blinded and made insensible that these were Errours and at last became so restless and so hardened in their opinions that like those which perisht in the gain-saying of Core so these dyed without repenting these spiritual wickednesses of which Coppinger and Hacket and their adherents are too sad testimonies And in these times which tended thus to Coâ—fusion there were also many others that pretended a Tenderness of Conscience refusing to submit to Ceremonies or to take an Oath before a lawful Magistrate and yet these very Mâ—n did in their secret Conventicles Covenant and Swear to each other to be assiduous and faithful in using their best endeavours to set up a Church Government that they had not agreed on To which end there was many Select parties that wandered up and down and were active in sowing Discontents and Sedition by venemous and secret Murmurings and a Dispersion of scurrilous Pamphlets and Libels against the Church and State but especially against the Bishops by which means together with very bold and as indiscreet Sermons the Common people became so Phanatick as St. Peter observed there were in his time some that wrested the Scripture to their own destruction so by these men and this means many came to believe the Bishops to be Antichrist and the onely Obstructers of Gods Discipline and many of them were at last given over to such desperate delusions as to find out a Text in the Revelation of St. Iohn that Antichrist was to be
which Admonitions all that I mean to say is but this There will come a time when three words uttered with Charity and Meekness shall receive a far more blessed Reward then three thousand Volumns written with disdainful sharpness of Wit But the manner of Mens Writings must not alienate our hearts from the Truth if it appear they have the Truth as the Followers of the same Defender do think he hath and in that perswasion they follow him no otherwise then himself doth Calvin Beza and others with the like perswasion that they in this cause had the Truth We being as fully perswaded otherwise it resteth that some kinde of tryal be used to finde out which part is in error 3. The first mean whereby Nature teacheth men to judge good from evil as well in Laws as in other things is the force of their own discretion Hereunto therefore St. Paul referreth oftentimes his own speech to be considered of by them that heard him I speak as to them which have understanding Judge ye what I say Again afterward Judge in your selves is it comly that a woman pray uncovered The exercise of this kinde of judgment our Saviour requireth in the Iews In them of Berea the Scripture commendeth it Finally Whatsoever we do if our own secret judgment consent not unto it as fit and good to be done the doing of it to us is sin although the thing it self be allowable St. Pauls rule therefore generally is Let every man in his own minde be fully perswaded of that thing which he either alloweth or doth Some things are so familiar and plain that Truth from Falshood and Good from Evil is most easily discerned in them even by men of no deep capacity And of that nature for the most part are things absolutely unto all Mens salvation necessary either to he held or denied either to be done or avoided For which cause St. Augustine acknowledgeth that they are not onely set down but also plainly set down in Scripture So that he which heareth or readeth may without any great difficulty understand Other things also there are belonging though in a lower degree of importance unto the offices of Christian men Which because they are more obscure more intricate and hard to be judged of therefore God hath appointed some to spend their whole time principally in the study of things Divine to the end that in these more doubtful cases their understanding might be a light to direct others If the understanding power or faculty of the Soul be saith the Grand Physitian like unto bodily sight not of equal sharpness in all What can be more convenient then that even as the dark-sighted man is directed by the clear about things visible so likewise in matters of deeper discourse the wise in heart do shew the simple where his way lieth In our doubtful Cases of Law what man is there who seeth not how requisite it is that Professors of skill in that Faculty be our Directors so it is in all other kindes of knowledge And even in this kinde likewise the Lord hath himself appointed That the Priests lips should preserve knowledge and that other men should seek the truth at his mouth because he is the Messenger of the Lord of Hosts Gregory Nazianzen offended at the peoples too great presumption in controlling the judgment of them to whom in such cases they should have rather submitted their own seeketh by earnest entreaty to stay them within their bounds Presume not ye that are Sheep to make your selves Guides of them that should guide you neither seek ye to overslip the fold which they about you have pitched It sufficeth for your part if ye can well frame your selves to be ordered Take not upon you to judge your selves nor to make them subject to your Laws who should be a Law to you for God is not a God of Sedition and Confusion but of Order and of Peace But ye will say that if the Guides of the people be blinde the common sort of men must not close up their own eyes and be led by the conduct of such If the Priest be partial in the Law the flock must not therefore depart from the ways of sincere Truth and in simplicity yield to be followers of him for his place sake and office over them Which thing though in it self most true is in your defence notwithstanding weak because the matter wherein ye think that ye see and imagine that your ways are sincere is of far deeper consideration then any one amongst Five hundred of you conceiveth Let the vulgar sort among you know that there is not the least branch of the Cause wherein they are so resolute but to the tryal of it a great deal more appertaineth then their conceit doth reach unto I write not this in disgrace of the simplest that way given but I would gladly they knew the nature of that cause wherein they think themselves throughly instructed and are not by means whereof they daily run themselves without feeling their own hazzard upon the dint of the Apostles sentence against evil speakers as touching things wherein they are ignorant If it be granted a thing unlawful for private men not called unto Publick Consultation to dispute which is the best State of Civil Policy with a desire of bringing in some other kinde them that under which they already live for of such Disputes I take it his meaning was If it be a thing confest that of such Questions they cannot determine without rashness in as much as a great part of them consisteth in special Circumstances and for one kinde as many Reasons may be brought as for another Is there any reason in the World why they should better judge what kinde of Regiment Ecclesiastical is the fittest For in the Civil State more insight and in those affairs more experience a great deal must needs be granted them then in this they can possibly have When they which write in defence of your Discipline and commend it unto the Highest not in the least cunning manner are forced notwithstanding to acknowledge That with whom the Truth is they know not they are not certain what certainly or knowledge can the multitude have thereof Weigh what doth move the common sort so much to favor this Innovation and it shall soon appear unto you that the force of particular Reasons which for your several Opinions are alleaged is a thing whereof the multitude never did nor could so consider as to be therewith wholly carried but certain general Inducements are used to make saleable your Cause in gross And when once men have cast a fancy towards it any slight Declaration of Specialties will serve to lead forward mens inclineable and prepared mindes The method of winning the peoples affection unto a general liking of the Cause for so ye term it hath been this First in the hearing of the multitude the faults especially of
higher Callings are ripped up with marvellous exceeding severity and sharpness of Reproof which being oftentimes dont begetteth a great good opinion of Integrity zeal and Holiness to such constant reprovers of sin as by likelihood would never be so much offended at that which is evil unless themselves were singularly good The next thing hereunto is to impute all Faults and Corruptions wherewith the World aboundeth unto the kinde of Ecclesiastical Government established Wherein as before by reproving Faults they purchased unto themselves with the multitude a name to be vertuous so by finding out this kinde of Cause they obtain to be judged wise above others whereas in truth unto the Form even of Iewish Government which the Lord himself they all confess did establish with like shew of Reason they might impute those Faults which the Prophets condemn in the Governors of that Commonwealth as to the English kinde of Regiment Ecclesiastical whereof also God himself though in another sort is Author the stains and blemishes found in our State which springing from the Root of Humane Frailty and Corruption not onely are but have been always more or less yea and for any thing we know to the contrary will be till the Worlds end complained of what Form of Government soever take place Having gotten thus much sway in the hearts of men a third step is to propose their own Form of Church Government as the onely soveraign remedy of all Evils and to adorn it with all the glorious Titles that may be And the Nature as of men that have sick bodies so likewise of the people in the crazedness of their Mindes possest with dislike and discontentment at things present is to imagine that any thing the vertue whereof they hear commended would help them but that most which they least have tryed The fourth degree of Inducements is by fashioning the very notions and conceits of mens mindes in such sort that when they read the Scripture they may think that every thing soundeth towards the advancement of that Discipline and to the utter disgrace of the contrary Pythagoras by bringing up his Schollars in speculative knowledge of numbers made their conceipts therein so strong that when they came to the contemplation of things natural they imagined that in every particular thing they even beheld as it were with their eyes how the Elements of Number gave Essence and Being to the Works of Nature A thing in reason impossible which notwithstanding through their misfashioned preconceit appeared unto them no less certain then if Nature had written it in the very Foreheads of all the Creatures of God When they of the Family of Love have it once in their heads that Christ doth not signifie any one Person but a Quality whereof many are partakers that to be raised is nothing else but to be regenerated or endued with the said quality and that when Separation of them which have if from them which have it not is here made this is judgment How plainly do they imagine that the Scripture every where speaketh in the favor of that Sect And assuredly the very cause which maketh the simple and ignorant to think they even see how the Word of God runneth currantly on your side is That their mindes are forestalled and their conceits perverted beforehand by being taught that an Elder doth signifie a Lay-man admitted onely to the Office of Rule or Government in the Church a Doctor one which may onely Teach and neither Preach nor Administer the Sacraments a Deacon one which hath charge of the Alms-box and of nothing else That the Scepter the Rod the Throne and Kingdom of Christ art a Form of Regiment onely by Pastors Elders Doctors and Deacons that by Mystical Resemblance Mount Sion and Jerusalem are the Churches which admit Samaria and Babylon the Churches which oppugne the said Form of Regiment And in like sort they are taught to apply all things spoken of repairing the Walls and decayed parts of the City and Temple of God by Esdras Nehemias and the rest As if purposely the Holy Ghost had therein meant to fore-signifie what the Authors of Admonitions to the Parliament of Supplications to the Council of Petitions to Her Majesty and of such other-like Writs should either do or suffer in behalf of this their Cause From hence they proceed to an higher point which is the perswading of men credulous and over-capable of such pleasing Errors That it is the special illumination of the Holy Ghost whereby they discern those things in the Word which others reading yet discern them not Dearly Beloved saith St. John Give not credit unto every spirit There are but two ways whereby the Spirit leadeth men into all Truth the one extraordinary the other common the one belonging but unto some few the other extending it self unto all that are of God the one that which we call by a special divine excellency Revelation the other Reason If the Spirit by such Revelation have discovered unto them the secrets of that Discipline out of Scripture they must profess themselves to be all even Men Women and Children Prophets Or if Reason be the hand which the Spirit hath led them by for as much as Perswasions grounded upon Reason are either weaker or stronger according to the force of those Reasons whereupon the same are grounded they must every of them from the greatest to the least be able for every several Article to shew some special Reason as strong as their Perswasion therein is earnest Otherwise how can it be but that some other sinews there are from which that everplus of strength in Perswasion doth arise Most sure it is That when Mens Affections do frame their Opinions they are in defence of Error more earnest a great deal then for the most part sound Believers in the maintenance of Truth apprehended according to the nature of that evidence which Scripture yieldeth Which being in some things plain as in the Principles of Christian Doctrine in some things as in these Matters of Discipline more dark and doubtful frameth correspondently that inward assent which Gods most gracious Spirit worketh by it as by his Effectual Instrument It is not therefore the servent earnestness of their perswasion but the soundness of those Reasons whereupon the same is built which must declare their Opinions in these things to have been wrought by the Holy Ghost and not by the Fraud of that evil spirit which is even in his illusions strong After that the fancy of the common sort hath once thorowly apprehended the Spirit to be Author of their Perswasions concerning Discipline then is instilled into their hearts that the same Spirit leading men into this opinion doth thereby seal them to be Gods Children and that as the state of the times now standeth the most special taken to know them that are Gods own from others is an earnest affection that way This hath bred high terms of Separation between such and the rest of the
World whereby the one sort are named The Brethren the Godly and so forth the other Worldlings Time-servers Pleasers of Men not of God with such like From hence they are easily drawn on to think it exceeding necessary for fear of quenching that good Spirit to use all means whereby the same may be both strengthned in themselves and made manifest unto others This maketh them diligent bearers of such as are known that way to incline this maketh them eager to take and seek all occasions of secret Conference with such this maketh them glad to use such as Counsellors and Directors in all their dealings which are of weight as Contracts Testaments and the like this maketh them through an unweariable desire of receiving instruction from the Masters of that Company to cast off the care of those very affairs which do most concern their estate and to think that then they are like unto Mary commendable for making choice of the better part Finally This is it which maketh them willing to charge yea oftentimes even to over-charge themselves for such Mens sustenance and relief least their zeal to the Cause should any way be unwitnessed For what is it which poor beguiled souls will not do through so powerful incitements In which respect it is also noted that most labor hath been bestowed to win and retain towards this Cause them whose judgments are commonly weakest by reason of their sex And although not Women loaden with sins as the Apostle St. Paul speaketh but as we verily esteem of them for the most part Women propense and inclinable to holiness be otherwise edified in good things rather then carried away as captives into any kinde of sin and evil by such as enter into their houses with purpose to plant there a zeal and a love towards this kinde of Discipline yet some occasion is hereby ministred for Men to think that if the Cause which is thus furthered did gain by the soundness of proof whereupon it doth build it self it would not most busily endeavor to prevail where least ability of judgment is And therefore that this so eminent industry in making Proselytes more of that sex then of the other groweth for that they are deemed apter to serve as instruments and helps in the Cause Apter they are through the eagerness of their affection that maketh them which way soever they take diligent in drawing their Husbands Children Servants Friends and Allies the same way Apter through that natural inclination unto pity which breedeth in them a greater readiness then in men to be bountiful towards their Preachers who suffer want Apter through sundry opportunities which they especially have to procure encouragements for their Brethren Finally Apter through a singular delight which they take in giving very large and particular intelligence how all near about them stand affected as concerning the same Cause But be they Women or be they Men if once they have tasted of that Cup let any man of contrary opinion open his mouth to perswade them they close up their ears his Reasons they weigh not all is answered with rehearsal of the words of John We are of God he that knoweth God heareth us As for the rest Ye are of the World for this Worlds pomp and vanity it is that ye speak and the World whose ye are heareth you Which cloke sitteth no less fit oâ— the lack of their Cause then of the Anabaptists when the Dignity Authority and Honor of Gods Magistrates is upheld against them Shew these eagerly-affected men their inability to judge of such matters their answer is God hath chosen the simple Convince them of Folly and that so plainly that very children upbraid them with it they have their bucklers of like defence Christs own Apostle was accounted mad The best men evermore by the sentence of the World have been judged to be out of their right mindes When instruction doth them no good let them feel but the least degree of most mercifully tempered Severity they fasten on the head of the Lords Vicegerents here on Earth whatsoever they any where finde uttered against the cruelty of Blood-thirsty men and to themselves they draw all the Sentences which Scripture hath in the favor of Innocency persecuted for the Truth yea they are of their due and deserved sufferings no less proud then those ancient disturbers to whom St. Augustine writeth saying Martyrs rightly so named are they not which suffer for their disorder and for the ungodly breach they have made of Christian Unity but which for Righteousness sake are persecuted For Agar also suffered persecution at the hands of Sara wherein she which did impose was holy and she unrighteous which did bear the burthen In like sort with the Theeves was the Lord himself crucified but they who were matcht in the pain which they suffered were in the cause of their sufferings dis-joyned If that must needs be the true Church which doth endure persecution and not that which persecuteth let them ask of the Apostle what Church Sara did represent when she held her Maid in affliction For even our Mother which is free the Heavenly Ierusalem that is to say The true Church of God was as he doth affirm prefigured in that very Woman by whom the Bond-maid was so sharply handled Although if all things be throughly skanned she did in truth more persecute Sara by proud resistance then Sara her by severity of punishment These are the paths wherein ye have walked that are of the ordinary sort of men these are the very steps ye have trodden and the manifest degrees whereby ye are of your Guides and Directors trained up in that School A custom of inuring your ears with reproof of faults especially in your Governors and use to attribute those faults to the kinde of Spiritual Regiment under which ye live boldness in warranting the force of their Discipline for the cure of all such evils a slight of framing your conceits to imagine that Scripture every where favoreth that Discipline perswasion that the cause why ye finde it in Scripture is the illumination of the Spirit that the same Spirit is a Seal unto you of your nearness unto God that ye are by all means to nourish and witness it in your selves and to strengthen on every side your mindes against whatsoever might be of force to withdraw you from it 4. Wherefore to come unto you whose judgment is a Lanthorn of Direction for all the rest you that frame thus the peoples hearts not altogether as I willingly perswade my self of a politick intent or purpose but your selves being first over-borne with the weight of greater mens judgments on your shoulders is laid the burthen of upholding the cause by Argument For which purpose Sentences out of the Word of God ye alledge divers but so that when the same are aiscust thus it always in a manner falleth out That what things by vertue thereof ye urge upon us as altogether
followeth That there is no particular object so good but it may have the shew of some difficulty or unpleasant quality annexed to itâ— in respect whereof the Will may shrink and decline it Contrariwise for so things are blended there is no particular evil which hath not some appearance of goodness whereby to inâ—inuate it self For evil as evil cannot be desired if that be desired which is evil the cause is the goodness which is or seemeth to be joyned with it Goodness doth not move by being but by being apparent and therefore many things are neglected which are most precious onely because the value of them lieth hid Sensible Goodness is most apparent neer and present which causeth the Appetite to be therewith strongly provoked Now Pursuit and Refusal in the Will do follow the one the Affirmation the other the Negation of Goodness which the Understanding apprehendeth grounding it self upon Sease unless some higher Reason do chance to teach the contraty And if Reason have taught it rightly to be good yet not so apparently that the Minde receiveth it with utter impossibility of being otherwise still there is place left for the Will to take or leave Whereas therefore amongst so many things as are to be done there are so few the goodness whereof Reason in such sort doth or easily can discover we are not to marvel at the choice of evil even then when the contrary is probably known Hereby it cometh to pass that Custom inuring the Minde by long practice and so leaving there a sensible Impression prevaileth more then reasonable Perswasion what way soever Reason therefore may rightly discern the thing which is good and yet the Will of Man not incline it self thereunto as oft as the prejudice of sensible Experience doth oversway Nor let any Man think that this doth make any thing for the just excuse of Iniquity for there was never sin committed wherein a less good was not preferred before a greater and that wilfully which cannot be done without the singular disgrace of Nature and the utter disturbance of that Divine Order whereby the preheminence of chiefest Acceptation is by the best things worthily challenged There is not that good which concerneth us but it hath evidence enough for it self if Reason were diligent to search it out Through neglect thereof abused we are with the shew of that which is not sometimes the subrilty of Satan enveighling us as it did Evâ— sometimes the hastiness of our Wills preventing the more considerate Advice of sound Reason as in the Apostles when they no sooner saw what they liked not but they forthwith were desirous of fire from Heaven sometimes the very custom of evil making the heart obdurate against whatsoever instructions to the contrary as in them over whom our Saviour spake weeping O Ierusalem how often and thou wouldst not Still therefore that wherewith we stand blameable and can no way excuse it is in doing evil we prefer a less good before a greater the greatness whereof is by Reason investigable and may be known The search of Knowledge is a thing painful and the painfulness of Knowledge is that which maketh the Will so hardly inclinable thereunto The Root hereof Divine Malediction whereby the Instruments being weakned wherewithal the Soul especially in reasoning doth work it prefereth rest in Ignorance before wearisome labor to know For a spur of Diligence therefore we have a natural thirst after Knowledge ingrafted in us But by Reason of that original weakness in the Instruments without which the Understanding part is not able in this World by discourse to work the very conceit of painfulness is as a bridle to stay us For which cause the Apostle who knew right well that the weariness of the flesh is an heavy clog to the Will striketh mightily upon this Key Awake thou that sleepest cast off all which presseth down watch labor strive to go forward and to grow in knowledge 8. Wherefore to return to our former intent of discovering the Natural way whereby Rules have been found out concerning that Goodness wherewith the Will of Man ought to be moved in Humane Actions as every thing naturally and necessarily doth desire the utmost good and greatest Perfection whereof Nature hath made it capable even so Man Our felicity therefore being the object and accomplishment of our desire we cannot chuse but wish and cover it All particular things which are subject unto Action the Will doth so far forth incline unto as Reason judgeth them the better for us and consequently the more available to our bliss If Reason err we fall into evil and are so far forth deprived of the general Perfection we seek Seeing therefore that for the framing of Mens actions the knowledge of good from evil is necessary it onely resteth that we search how this may be had Neither must we suppose that there needeth one Rule to know the good and another the evil by For he that knoweth what is straight doth even thereby discern what is crooked because the absence of straightness in bodies capable thereof is crookedness Goodness in Actions is like unto straightness wherefore that which is done well we term right For as the straight way is most acceptable to him that travelleth because by it he cometh soonest to his journeys end so in Action that which doth lie the evenest between us and the end we desire must needs be the fittest for our use Besides which fitness for use there is also in rectitude Beauty as contrariwise in obliquity deformity And that which is good in the Actions of Men doth not onely delight as profitable but as amiable also In which consideration the Grecians most divinely have given to the Active perfection of Men a name expressing both Beauty and Goodness because Goodness in ordinary speech is for the most part applied onely to that which is beneficial But we in the name of Goodness do here imply both And of discerning Goodness there are but these two ways the one the knowledge of the causes whereby it is made such the other the observation of those signs and tokens which being annexed always unto Goodness argue That where they are found there also Goodness is although we know not the cause by force whereof it is there The former of these is the most sure and infallible way but so hard that all shun it and had rather walk as men do in the dark by hap-hazard then tread so long and intricate Mazes for Knowledge sake As therefore Physitians are many times forced to leave such Methods of curing as themselves know to be the fittest and being over-ruled by their Patients impatiency are fain to try the best they can in taking that way of cure which the cured will yield unto In like sort considering how the case doth stand with this present Age full of Tongue and weak of Brain behold we yield to the stream thereof into the Causes of Goodness we
will not make any curious or deep inquiry to touch them now and then it shall be sufficient when they are so near at hand that easily they may be conceived without any far removed discourse That way we are contented to prove which being the worse in it self is notwithstanding now by reason of common imbecillity the fitter and likelier to be brooked Signs and tokens to know good by are of sundry kindes some more certain and some less The most certain token of evident Goodness is if the general perswasion of all men do so account it And therefore a common received Error is never utterly overthrown till such times as we go from Signs unto Causes and shew some manifest Root or Fountain thereof common unto all whereby it may clearly appear how it hath come to pass that so many have been overseen In which case surmises and slight probabilities will not serve because the universal consent of men is the perfectest and strongest in this kinde which comprehendeth onely the signs and tokens of Goodness Things casual do vary and that which a man doth but chance to think well of cannot still have the like hap Wherefore although we know not the cause yet thus much we may know that some necessary cause there is whensoever the judgments of all men generally or for the most part run one and the same way especially in matters of that discourse For of things necessarily and naturally done there is no more affirmed but this They keep either always or for the most part one Tenure The general and perpetual voice of men is as the Sentence of God himself For that which all men have at all times learned Nature her self must needs have taught and God being the Author of Nature her voice is but his Instrument By her from him we receive whatsoever in such sort we learn Infinite duties there are the goodness whereof is by this rule sufficiently manifested although we had no other warrant besides to approve them The Apostle St. Paul having speech concerning the Heathen saith of them They are a Law unto themselves His meaning is that by force of the Light of Reason wherewith God illuminateth every one which cometh into the World Men being enabled to know truth from falshood and good from evil do thereby learn in many things what the Will of God is which will himself not revealing by any extraordinary means unto them but they by natural discourse attaining the knowledge thereof seem the Makers of those Laws which indeed are his and they but onely the finders of them out A Law therefore generally taken is a directive rule unto goodness of operation The rule of Divine Operations outward is the definitive appointment of Gods own Wisdom set down within himself The rule of Natural Agents that work by simple necessity is the determination of the Wisdom of God known to God himself the Principal Director of them but not unto them that are directed to execute the same The rule of Natural Agents which work after a sort of their own accord as the Beasts do is the judgment of common sense or fancy concerning the sensible goodness of those objects wherewith they are moved The rule of Ghostly or Immaterial Natures as Spirits and Angels is their intuitive intellectual judgment concerning the amiable beauty and high goodness of that object which with unspeakble joy and delight doth set them on work The rule of Voluntary Agents on Earth is the sentence that Reason giveth concerning the goodness of those things which they are to do And the sentences which Reason giveth are some more some less general before it come to define in particular actions what is good The main principles of Reason are in themselves apparent For to make nothing evident of it self unto Mans understanding were to take away all possibility of knowing any thing And herein that of Theophrastus is true They that seek a reason of all things do utterly overthrow Reason In every kinde of Knowledge some such grounds there are as that being proposed the Minde doth presently embrace them as tree from all possibility of Error clear and manifest without proof In which kinde Axioms or Principles more general are such as this That the greater good is to be chosen before the less If therefore it should be demanded what reason there is why the will of man which doth necessarily shun harm and covet whatsoever is pleasant and sweet should be commanded to count the pleasures of sin Gall and notwithstanding the bitter Accidents wherewith Vertuous Actions are compast yet still to rejoyce and delight in them Surely this could never stand with Reason but that Wisdom thus prescribing groundeth her Laws upon an infallible rule of Comparison which is That small difficulties when exceeding great good is sure to ensue and on the other side momentany benefits when the hurt which they draw after them is unspeakable are not at all to be respected This rule is the ground whereupon the Wisdom of the Apostle buildeth a Law enjoyning Patience unto himself The present lightness of our affliction worketh unto us even with abundance upon abundance an eternal weight of glory while we look not on the things which are seen but on the things which are not seen For the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal Therefore Christianity to be embraced whatsoever calamities in those times it was accompanied withal Upon the same ground our Saviour proveth the Law most reasonable that doth forbid those crimes which men for gains sake fall into For a man to win the World if it be with the loss of his Soul what benefit or good is it Axioms less general yet so manifest that they need no farther proof are such as these God to be worshipped Parents to be honored Others to be used by us as we our selves would be by them Such things as soon as they are alledged all men acknowledge to be good they require no proof or further discourse to be assured of their goodness Notwithstanding whatsoever such principle there is it was at the first found out by discourse and drawn from out of the very Bowels of Heaven and Earth For we are to note that things in the World are to us discernable not onely so far forth as serveth for our vital preservation but further also in a twofold higher respect For first if all other uses were utterly taken away yet the Minde of Man being by Nature speculative and delighted with contemplation in it self they were to be known even for meer Knowledge and Understandings sake Yea further besides this the knowledge of every the least thing in the World hath in it a second peculiar benefit unto us in as much as it serveth to minister Rules Canons and Laws for Men to direct those actions by which we properly term Humane This did the very Heathens themselves obscurely insinuate by making Themis
which we call Ius or Right to be the Daughter of Heaven and Earth We know things either as they are in themselves or as they are in mutual relation one to another The knowledge of that which Man is in reference unto himself and other things in relation unto Man I may justly term the Mother of all those Principles which are as it were Edicts Statutes and Decrees in that Law of Nature whereby Humane Actions are framed First therefore having observed that the best things where they are not hindred do still produce the best Operations for which cause where many things are to concur unto one effect the best is in all congruity of Reason to guide the residue that it prevailing most the work principally done by it may have greatest perfection when hereupon we come to observe in our selves of what excellency our Souls are in comparison of our Bodies and the divine part in relation unto the baser of our Souls seeing that all these concur in producing Humane Actions it cannot be well unless the chiefest do command and direct the rest The Soul then ought to conduct the Body and the Spirit of our Mindes the Soul This is therefore the first Law whereby the highest power of the Minde requireth general obedience at the hands of all the rest concurring with it unto Action Touching the several grand Mandates which being imposed by the understanding Faculty of the Minde must be obeyed by the Will of Man they are by the same method found out whether they import our duty towards God or towards Man Touching the one I may not here stand to open by what degrees of discourse the Mindes even of meer Natural Men have attained to know not onely that there is a God but also what Power Force Wisdom and other properties that God hath and how all things depend on him This being therefore presupposed from that known relation which God hath unto us as unto children and unto all good things as unto effects whereof himself is the principal cause these Axioms and Laws Natural concerning our duty have arisen That in all things we go about his aid is by Prayer to be craved That be cannot have sufficient honor done unto him but the uttermost of that we can do to honor him we must which is in effect the same that we read Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart with all thy soul and with all thy minde Which Law our Saviour doth term The first and the great Commandment Touching the next which as our Saviour addeth as like unto this he meaneth in amplitude and largeness in as much as it is the Root out of which all Laws of duty to Men-ward have grown as out of the former all Offices of Religion towards God the like Natural enducement hath brought men to know that it is their duty no less to love others then themselves For seeing those things which are equal must needs all have one measure if I cannot but wish to receive all good even as much at every mans hand as any man can wish unto his own soul how should I look to have any part of my desire herein satisfied unless my self be careful to satisfie the like desire which is undoubtedly in other men we all being of one and the same Nature To have any thing offered them repugnant to this desire must needs in all respects grieve them as much as me So that if I do harm I must look to suffer there being no reason that others should shew greater measure of love to me then they have by me shewed unto them My desire therefore to be loved of my equals in nature as much as possible may be imposeth upon me a natural duty of bearing to them-ward fully the like affection From which relation of equality between our selves and them that are as our selves what several Rules and Canons Natural Reason hath drawn for direction of life no man is ignorant as namely That because we would take no harm we must therefore do none that sith we would not be in any thing extreamly dealt with we must our selves avoid all extremity in our dealings that from all violence and wrong we are utterly to abstain with such like which further to wade in would be tedious and to our present purpose not altogether so necessary seeing that on these two General Heads already mentioned all other specialities are dependent Wherefore the natural measure whereby to judge our doings is the sentence of Reason determining and setting down what is good to be done Which sentence is either mandatory shewing what must be done or else permissive declaring onely what may be done or thirdly admonitory opening what is the most convenient for us to do The first taketh place where the comparison doth stand altogether between doing and not doing of one thing which in it self is absolutely good or evil as it had been for Ioseph to yield or not to yield to the impotent desire of his leud Mistress the one evil the other good simply The second is when of divers things evil all being not evitable we are permitted to take one which one saving onely in case of so great urgency were not otherwise to be taken as in the matter of Divorce amongst the Jews The last when of divers things good one is principal and most eminent as in their act who sold their possessions and laid the price at the Apostles feet which possessions they might have retained unto themselves without sin Again in the Apostle St. Pauls own choice to maintain himself by his own labor whereas in living by the Churches maintenance as others did there had been no offence committed In goodness therefore there is a latitude or extent whereby it cometh to pass that even of good actions some are better then other some whereas otherwise one man could not excel another but all should be either absolutely good as hitting jump that indivisible Point or Centre wherein goodness consisteth or else missing it they should be excluded out of the number of well-doers Degrees of well-doing there could be none except perhaps in the seldomness and oftenness of doing well But the Nature of Goodness being thus ample a Law is properly that which Reason in such sort defineth to be good that it must be done And the Law of Reason or Humane Nature is that which men by discourse of Natural Reason have rightly found out themselves to be all for ever bound unto in their actions Laws of Reason have these marks to be known by Such as keep them resemble most lively in their voluntary actions that very manner of working which Nature her self doth necessarily observe in the course of the whole World The Works of Nature are all behoveful beautiful without superfluity or defect even so theirs if they be framed according to that which the Law of Reason teacheth Secondly Those Laws are investigable by Reason without
cause her merciful disposition to take so much the more delight in saving others whom the like necessity should press What in this behalf hath been done towards Nations abroad the parts of Christendom most afflicted can best testifie That which especially concerneth our selves in the present matter we treat of is the state of Reformed Religion a thing at her coming to the Crown even raised as it were by miracle from the dead a thing which we so little hoped to see that even they which beheld it done searcely believed their own senses at the first beholding Yet being then brought to pass thus many years it hath continued standing by no other wordly mean but that one onely hand which erected it that hand which as no kinde of imminent danger could cause at the first to withhold it self so neither have the practises so many so bloody following since been ever able to make weary Nor can we say in this case so justly that Aaron and Hur the Ecclesiastical and Civil States have sustained the hand which did lift it self to Heaven for them as that Heaven it self hath by this hand sustained them no aid or help having thereunto been ministred for performance of the Work of Reformation other then such kinde of help or aid as the Angel in the Prophet Zechariah speaketh of saying Neither by an army nor strength but by my Spirit saith the Lord of Hosts Which Grace and Favor of Divine Assistance having not in one thing or two shewed it self nor for some few days or years appeared but in such sort so long continued our manifold sins and transgressions striving to the contrary What can we less thereupon conclude then that God would at leastwise by tract of time teach the World that the thing which he blesseth defendeth keepeth so strangely cannot chuse but be of him Wherefore if any refuse to believe us disputing for the Verity of Religion established let then believe God himself thus miraculously working for it and with life even for ever and ever unto that Glorious and Sacred Instrument whereby he worketh OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK V. Concerning their Fourth Assertion That touching several Publick Duties of Christian Religion there is amongst us much Superstition retained in them and concerning Persons which for performance of those Duties are endued with the Power of Ecclesiastical Order our Laws and Proceedings according thereunto are many ways herein also corrupted The Matter contained in this Fifth Book 1. TRue Religion is the Root of all true Vertues and the stay of all Well-ordered Commonwealths 2. The must extream opposite to true Religion is affected Atheism 3. Of Superstition and the Rest thereof either misguided zeal or Ignorant fear of Divine glory 4. Of the Redress of Superstition in Gods Church and concerning the Question of this Book 5. Four General Propositions demanding that which may reasonably be granted concerning Matters of outward Form in the Exercise of true Religion And fifthly Of a Rule and safe not reasonable in these Cases 6. The first Proposition touching Iudgment what things are convenient in the outward publick ordering of Church affairs 7. The second Proposition 8. The third Proposition 9. The fourth Proposition 10. The Rule of Mens private spirit not safe in these Cases to be followed 11. Plans for the Publick Service of God 12. The Solemnity of Erecting Churches condemned the Hallowing and Dedicating of them scanned by the Adversary 13. Of the names whereby we distinguish our Churches 14. Of the Fashion of our Churches 15. The Sumptuousness of Churches 16. What Holiness and Vertue we ascribe to the Church more than other places 17. Their pretence that would have Churches utterly vazed 18. Of Publick Teaching or Preaching and the first kinde thereof Catechizing 19. Of Preaching by reading publickly the Books of holy Scripture and concerning supposed Untruths in those Translations of Scripture which we allow to be read as also of the choice which we make in reading 20. Of Preaching by the Publick Reading of other prositable Instructions and concerning Books Apâ—cryphal 21. Of Preaching by Sermons and whether Sermons be the onely ordinary way of Teaching whereby man are brought to the saving knowledge of Gods Truth 22. What they attribute to Sermons onely and what we to Reading also 23. Of Prayer 24. Of Publick Prayer 25. Of the Form of Common Prayer 26. Of them which like not to have any Set Form of Common Prayer 27. Of them who allowing a Set Form of Prayer yet allow not ours 28. The Form of our Liturgy too near the Papists too far different from that of other Reformed Churches as they pretend 29. Attire belonging to the Service of God 30. Of gesture in Praying and of different places chosen to that purpose 31. Easiness of Praying after our Form 32. The length of our Service 33. Instead of such Prayers as the Primitive Churches have used and those that be Reformed now use we have they say divers short cuts or shreaddings rather Wishes them Prayers 34. Lessons intermingled with our Prayers 35. The number of our Prayers for Earthly things and our oft rehearsing of the Lords Prayer 36. The People saying after the Minister 37. Our manner of Reading the Psalms otherwise then the rest of the Scripture 38. Of Musick with Psalms 39. Of Singing or Saying Psalms and other parts of Common Prayer wherein the People and the Minister answer one another by course 40. Of Magnificat Benedictus and Nune Dimittis 41. Of the Litany 42. Of Athanasus Creed and Gloria Patri 43. Our want of particular Thanksgiving 44. In some things the Matter of our Prayer as they affirm is unsound 45. When thou hast overcome the sharpness of Death thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven unto all Believers 46. Touching Prayer for Deliverance from Sudden Death 47. Prayer for these things which we for our worthiness dare not ask God for the worthiness of his Sin would vouchsafe to grant 48. Prayer to be evermore delivered from all Adversity 49. Prayer that all Men may finde Mercy and if the will of God that all Men might be Saved 50. Of the Name the Author and the force of Sacraments which force consisteth in this That God hath ordained them as means to make us partakers of him in Christ and of life through Christ. 51. That God is in Christ by the Personal Incarnation of the Son who is very God 52. The Misinterpretations which Heresit hath made of the manner how God and Man are united in one Christ. 53. That by the union of the one with the other Nature in Christ there groweth neither gain nor loss of Essential Properties to either 54. What Christ hath obtained according to the Flesh by the union of his Flesh with Dâ—iey 55. Of the Personal presence of Christ every where and in what sense it may be granted he is every where present according to the Flesh. 56. The union or mutual Participation which is between Christ
likewise said Thou shalt utterly deface and destroy all these Synagogues and places where such Idols have been worshipped This Law containeth the Temporal punishment which God hath set down and willeth that men execute for the breach of the other Law They which spare them therefore do but reserve as the Hypocrite Saul did exterable things to worship God withall The truth is that as no man serveth God and loveth him not so neither can any man sincerely love God and not extreamly abhor that sin which is the highest degree of Treason against the Supream Guide and Monarch of the whole world with whose Divine Authority and Power it investeth others By means whereof the state of Idolaters is two wayes miserable First In that which they worship they find no succour and secondly At his hands whom they ought to serve there is no other thing to be looked for but the effects of most just displeasure the withdrawing of Grace dereliction in this world and in the world to come confusion Paul and Barnabas when Infidels admiring their vertues went about to sacrifice unto them rent their Garments in token of horrour and as frighted persons run crying thorow the press of the people O men wherefore doyâ— these things They knew the force of that dreadful Curse whereunto Idolatry maketh subject Nor is there cause why the guilty sustaining the same should grudge or complain of Injustice For whatsoever Evil befalleth in that respect themselves have made themselves worthy to suffer it As for those things either whereon or else wherewith Superstition worketh polluted they are by such abuse and deprived of that Dignity which their Nature delighteth in For there is nothing which doth not grieve and as it were even loath it self whensoever iniquity causeth it to serve unto vile purposes Idolatry therefore maketh whatsoever it toucheth the worse Howbeit sith Creatures which have no understanding can shew no will and where no will is there is no sin and only that which sinneth is subject to punishment Which way should any such Creature be punishable by the Law of God There may be cause sometime to abolish or to extiguish them But surely never by way of punishment to the things themselves Yea farther howsoever the Law of Moses did punish Idolaters we find not that God hath appointed for us any definite or certain temporal judgment which the Christian Magistrate is of necessity for ever bound to execute upon Offenders in that kind much less upon things that way abused as mere instruments For what God did command touching Canaan the same concerneth not us any otherwise than only as a fearful pattern of his just displeasure and wrath against sinful Nations It teacheth us how God thought good to plague and afflict them it doth not appoint in what form and manner we ought to punish the sin of Idolaty in all others Unless they will say that because the Israelites were commanded to make no Covenant with the people of that Land therefore Leagues and Truces made between Superstitious Persons and such as serve God aright are unlawful altogether or because God commanded the Israelites to smite the Inhabitants of Canaan and to root them out that therefore reformed Churches are bound to put all others to the edge of the sword Now whereas Commandment was also given to destroy all places where the Canaanites had served their gods and not to convert any one of them to the honour of the true God this Precept had reference unto a special intent and purpose which was that there should be but one only Place in the whole Land whereunto the People might bring such Offerings Gifts and Sacrifices as their Levitical Law did require By which Law severe charge was given them in that respect not to convert those places to the worship of the living God where Nations before them had served Idols But to seek the place which the Lord their God should chuse out of all their Tribes Besides it is reason we should likewise consider how great a difference there is between their proceedings who erect a new Common-wealth which is to have neither People nor Law neither Regiment nor Religion the same that was and theirs who only reform a decayed estate by reducing it to that perfection from which it hath swarved In this case we are to retain as much in the other as little of former things as we may Sith therefore Examples have not generally the force of Laws which all men ought to keep but of Counsels only and Perswasions not amiss to be followed by them whose Case is the like surely where Cases are so unlike as theirs and ours I see not how that which they did should induce much less any way enforce us to the same practise especially considering that Groves and Hill-altars were while they did remain both dangerous in regard of the secret access which People superstitiously given might have always thereunto with ease neither could they remaining serve with any fitness unto better purpose whereas our Temples their former abuse being by order of Law removed are not only free from such peril but withall so conveniently framed for the people of God to serve and honour him therein that no man beholding them can chuse but think it exceeding great pity they should be ever any otherwise employed Yea but the Cattel of Amalek you will say were fit for sacrifice and this was the very conceit which sometime deceived Soul It was so Nor do I any thing doubt but that Saul upon this conceit might even lawfully have offered to God those reserved spoyls had not the Lord in that particular case given special charge to the contrary And therefore notwithstanding the commandement of Israel to destroy Canaanites Idolaters may be converied and live So the Temples which have served Idolatry as Instruments may be sanctified again and continue albeit to Israel commandement have been given that they should destroy all Idolatrous places in their Lead and to the good Kings of Israel commendation for fulfilling to the evil for disobeying the same Commandement sometimes punishment always sharp and severe reproof hath even from the Lord himself befallen Thus much it may suffice to have written in defence of those Christian Oratories the overthrow and ruine whereof is desired not now by Infidels Pagans or Turks but by a special refined Sect of Christian Believers pretending themselves exceedingly grieved at our Solemnities in erecting Churches at the Names which we suffer them to hold at their form and fashion at the stateliness of them and costliness at the opinion which we have of them and at the manifold supertitious abuses whereunto they have been put 18. Places of publick resort being thus provided for our repair thither is especially for mutual conference and as it were commerce to be had between God and us Because therefore want of the knowledge of God is the cause of all iniquity amongst
then their calculation be true for so they reckon that a full third of our Prayers be allotted unto earthly benefits for which our Saviour in his platform hath appointed but one Petition amongst seven the difference is without any great disagreement we respecting what men are and doing that which is meer in regard of the common imperfection our Lord contrariwise proposing the most absolute proportion that can be in mens desires the very highest mark whereat we are able to aime For which cause also our custom is both to place it in the front of our Prayers as a Guide and to adde it in the end of some principal limbs or parts as a complement which fully perfecteth whatsoever may be defective in the rest Twice we rehearse it ordinarily and oftner as occasion requireth more solemnity or length in the form of Divine Service not mistrusting till these new curiosities sprang up that ever any man would think our labour herein mis-spent the time wastfully consumed and the Office it self made worse by so repeating that which otherwise would more hardly be made familiar to the simpler sort for the good of whose Souls there is not in Christian Religion any thing of like continual use and force throughout every hour and moment of their whole lives I mean not only because Prayer but because this very Prayer is of such efficacy and necessity for that our Saviour did but set men a bare example how to contrive or devise Prayers of their own and no way binde them to use this is no doubt as Errour Iohn the Baptist's Disciples which had been always brought up in the bosom of God's Church from the time of their first Infancy till they came to the School of Iohn were not so brutish that they could be ignorant how to call upon the Name of God but of their Master they had received a form of Prayer amongst themselves which form none did use saving his Disciples so that by it as by a mark of special difference they were known from others And of this the Apostles having taken notice they request that as Iohn had taught his so Christ would likewise teach them to pray Tertullian and Saint Augustin do for that cause term it Orationem legitimam the Prayer which Christ's own Law hath tyed his Church to use in the same Prescript form of words wherewith he himself did deliver it and therefore what part of the World soever we fall into if Christian Religion have been there received the ordinary use of this very Prayer hath with equal continuance accompanied the same as one of the principal and most material duties of honour done to Jesus Christ. Seeing that we have saith Saint Cyprian an Advocate with the Father for our Sins when we that have sinned come to seek for pardon let us alledge unto God the words which our Advocate hath taught For sith his promise is our plain warrant that in his Name what we aske we shall receive must we not needs much the rather obtain that for which we sue if not only his Name do countenance but also his Speech present our requests Though men should speak with the tongues of Angels yet words so pleasing to the ears of God as those which the Son of God himself hath composed were not possible for men to frame He therefore which made us to live hath also taught us to pray to the end that speaking unto the Father in the Sonn 's own prescript without scholy or gloss of ours we may be sure that we utter nothing which God will either disallow or deny Other Prayers we use may besides this and this oftner than any other although not tyed so to do by any Commandement of Scripture yet moved with such considerations as have been before set down the causeless dislike where of which others have conceived is no sufficient reason for us as much as once to forbear in any place a thing which uttered with true devotion and zeal of heart affordeth to God himself that glory that aide to the weakest sort of men to the most perfect that solid comfort which is unspeakable 36. With our Lords Prayer they would finde no fault so that they might perswade us to use it before or other Sermons only because so their manner is and not as all Christian people have been of old accustomed insert it so often into the Liturgy But the Peoples custom to repeat any thing after the Minister they utterly mislike Twice we appoint that the words which the Minister first pronounceth the whole Congregation shall repeat after him As first in the publick Confession of Sins and again in rehearsal of our Lord's Prayer presently after the blessed Sacrament of his Body and Blood received A thing no way offensive no way unfit or unseemly to be done although it had been so appointed ofner than with us it is But surely with so good reason it standeth in those two places that otherwise to order it were not in all respects so well Could there be any thing devised better then that we all at our first access unto God by Prayer should acknowledge meekly our sins and that not onely in heart but with tongue all which are present being made ear-witnesses even of every mans distinct and deliberate assent unto each particular branch of a common Indictment drawn against our selves How were it possible that the Church should any way else with such ease and certainty provide that none of her Children may as Adam dissemble that wretchedness the penitent confession whereof is so necessary a Preamble especially to Common Prayer In like manner if the Church did ever devise a thing fit and convenient what more then this that when together we have all received those Heavenly Mysteries wherein Christ imparteth himself unto us and giveth visible testification of our blessed communion with him we should in hatred of all Heresies Factions and Schisms the Pastor as a Leader the people as willing followers of him step by step declare openly our selves united as Brethren in one by offering up with all our hearts and tongues that most effectual Supplication wherein he unto whom we offer it hath himself not onely comprehended all our necessities but in such sort also framed every Petition as might most naturally serve for many and doth though not always require yet always import a multitude of speakers together For which cause Communicants have ever used it and we at that time by the form of our very utterance do shew we use it yea every word and syllable of it as Communicants In the rest we observe that custom whereunto St. Paul alludeth and whereof the Fathers of the Church in their Writings make often mention to shew indefinitely what was done but not universally to binde for ever all Prayers unto one onely fashion of utterance The Reasons which we have alledged induce us to think it still a good work which they in their pensive
just and unjust when it meaneth not the same man nor by imagining the same man learned and unlearned if learned in one skill and in another kinde of learning unskilful because the parts of every true opposition do always both concern the same subject and have reference to the same thing sith otherwise they are but in shew opposite and not in truth So the Will about one and the same thing may in contrary respects have contrary inclinations and that without contrariety The Minister of Justice may for publike example to others virtuously will the execution of that party whose pardon another for cousanguinities sake as virtuously may desire Consider death in it self and nature teacheth Christ to shun it Consider death as a mean to procure the salvation of the World and mercy worketh in Christ all willingness of minde towards it Therefore in these two desires there can be no repugnant opposition Again compare them with the Will of God and if any opposition be it must be onely between his appointment of Christs death and the former desire which wisheth deliverance from death But neither is this desire opposite to the Will of God The Will of God was that Christ should suffer the pains of death Not so his will as if the torment of innocency did in it self please and delight God but such was his Will in regard of the end whereunto it was necessary that Christ should suffer The death of Christ in it self therefore God willeth not which to the end we might thereby obtain life he both alloweth and appointeth In like manner the Son of Man endureth willingly to that purpose those grievous painsâ— which simply not to have shunned had been against Nature and by consequent against God I take it therefore to be an error that Christ either knew not what himself was to suffer or else had forgotten the things he knew The root of which error was an over-restrained consideration of Prayer as though it had no other lawful use but onely to serve for a chosen mean whereby the Will resolveth to seek that which the Understanding certainly knoweth it shall obtain Whereas Prayers in truth both unto are and his were as well sometime a presentation of meer desires as a mean of procuring desired effects at the hands of God We are therefore taught by his example that the presence of dolorous and dreadful objects even in mindes most perfect may as clouds over-cast all sensible joy that no assurance touching future victories can make present conflicts so sweet and easie but nature will shun and shrink from them nature will desire case and deliverance from oppressive burthens that the contrary determination of God is oftentimes against the effect of this desire yet not against the affection it self because it is naturally in us that in such case our Prayers cannot serve us as means to obtain the thing we desire that notwithstanding they are unto God most acceptable sacrifices because they testifie we desire nothing but at his hands and our desires we submit with contentment to be over-ruled by his Will and in general they are not repugnant unto the Natural Will of God which wisheth to the works of his own hands in that they are his own handy-work all happiness although perhaps for some special cause in our own particular a contrary determination have seemed more convenient finally that thus to propose our desires which cannot take such effects as we specifie shall notwithstanding otherwise procure us his Heavenly grace even as this very Prayer of Christ obtained Angels to be sent him as comforters in his Agony And according to this example we are not afraid to present unto God our Prayers for those things which that he will perform unto us we have no sure nor certain knowledge St. Pauls Prayer for the Church of Corinth was that they might not do any evil although he knew that no man liveth which sinneth not although he knew that in this life we always must pray Forgive us our sins It is our frailty that in many things we all do amiss but a vertue that we would do amiss in nothing and a testimony of that vertue when we pray That what occasion of sin soever do offer it self we may be strengthned from above to withstand it They pray in vain to have sin pardoned which seek not also to prevent sin by Prayer even every particular sin by Prayer against all sin except men can name some transgression wherewith we ought to have truce For in very deed although we cannot be free from all sin collectively in such sort that no part thereof shall be found inherent in us yet distributively at the least all great and grievous actual offences as they offer themselves one by one both may and ought to be by all means avoided So that in this sense to be preserved from all sin is not impossible Finally concerning deliverance it self from all adversity we use not to say men are in adversity whensoever they feel any small hinderance of their welfare in this World but when some notable affliction or cross some great calamity or trouble befalleth them Tribulation hath in it divers circumstances the Minde sundry faculties to apprehend them It offereth sometime it self to the lower powers of the Soul as a most unpleasant spectacle to the higher sometimes as drawing after it a train of dangerous inconveniences sometime as bringing with it remedies for the curing of sundry evils as Gods instrument of revenge and fury sometime sometime as a rod of his just yet moderate ire and displeasure sometime as matter for them that spightfully hate us to exercise their poysoned malice sometime as a furnace of tryal for vertue to shew it self and through conflict to obtain glory Which different contemplations of adversity do work for the most part their answerable effects Adversity either apprehended by Sense as a thing offensive and grievous to Nature or by Reason conceived as a snare an occasion of many mens falling from God a sequel of Gods indignation and wrath a thing which Satan desireth and would be glad to behold Tribulation thus considered being present causeth sorrow and being imminent breedeth fear For moderation of which two affections growing from the very natural bitterness and gall of adversity the Scripture much alledgeth contrary fruits which Affliction likewise hath whensoever it falleth on them that are tractable the grace of Gods holy Spirit concurring therewith But when the Apostle St. Paul teacheth That every one which will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution and by many tribulations we must enter into the Kingdom of Heaven because in a Forest of many Wolves Sheep cannot chuse bat feed in continual danger of life or when St. Iames exhorteth to account it a matter of exceeding joy when we fall into divers temptations because by the tryal of Faith Patience is brought forth was it suppose we their meaning to frustrate
God no more instituted then the other howsoever they pretend the other hurtful and this profitable it followeth That even in their own opinion if their words do shew their mindes there is no necessity of stripping Sacraments out of all such attire of Ceremonies as Mans wisdom hath at any time cloathed them withal and consequently That either they must reform their speech as over-general or else condemn their own practice as unlawful Ceremonies have more in weight then in sight they work by commonness of use much although in the several acts of their usage we scarcely discern any good they do And because the use which they have for the most part is not perfectly understood Superstition is apt to impute unto them greater vertue then indeed they have For prevention whereof when we use this Ceremony we always plainly express the end whereunto it serveth namely For a Sign of Remembrance to put us in minde of our duty But by this mean they say we make it a great deal worse For why Seeing God hath no where commanded to draw two lines in token of the duty which we ow to Christ our practice with this Exposition publisheth a new Gospel and causeth another Word to have place in the Church of Christ where no voice ought to be heard but his By which good reason the Authors of those grave admonitions to the Parliament are well-holpen up which held That sitting at Communions betokeneth rest and full accomplishment of Legal Ceremonies in our Saviour Christ. For although it be the Word of God That such Ceremonies are expired yet seeing it is not the Word of God that men to signifie so much should sit at the Table of our Lord these have their doom as well as others Guilty of a new devised Gospel in the Church of Christ. Which strange imagination is begotten of a special dislike they have to hear that Ceremonies now in use should be thought significant whereas in truth such as are not significant must needs be vain Ceremonies destitute of signification are no better then the idle gestures of men whose broken wits are not Masters of what they do For if we look but into Secular and Civil Complements what other cause can there possibly be given why to omit them where of course they are looked for for where they are not so due to use them bringeth mens secret intents often-times into great jealousie I would know I say What reason we are able to yield why things so light in their own nature should weigh in the opinions of men so much saving onely in regard of that which they use to signifie or betoken Doth not our Lord Jesus Christ himself impute the omission of some courteous Ceremonies even in domestical entertainment to a colder degree of loving affection and take the contrary in better part not so much respecting what was less done as what was signified less by the one then by the other For to that very end he referreth in part those gracious Expostulations Simon seest thou this Woman since I entred unto thine house thou gavest me no water for my feet but she hath washed my seet with tears and wiped them with the hairs of her head Thou gavest me no kiss but this Woman since the time I came in hath not ceased to kiss my feet Mine head with oyl thou didst not anoint but this Woman hath anointed my feet with oynment Wherefore as the usual dumb Ceremonies of common life are in request or dislike according to that they import even so Religion having likewise her silent Rites the chiefest rule whereby to judge of their quality is that which they mean or betoken For if they signifie good things as somewhat they must of necessity signifie because it is of their very nature to be signs of intimation presenting both themselves unto outward sense and besides themselves some other thing to the understanding of beholders unless they be either greatly mischosen to signifie the same or else applied where that which they signifie agreeth not there is no cause of exception against them as against evil and unlawful Ceremonies much less of excepting against them onely in that they are not without sense And if every Religious Ceremony which hath been invented of men to signifie any thing that God himself alloweth were the publication of another Gospel in the Church of Christ seeing that no Christian Church in the World is or can be without continual use of some Ceremonies which men have instituted and that to signifie good things unless they be vain and frivolous Ceremonies it would follow That the World hath no Christian Church which doth not daily proclaim new Gospels a sequel the manifest absurdity whereof argueth the rawness of that Supposal cut of which it groweth Now the cause why Antiquity did the more in actions of common life honor the Ceremony of the Cross might be for that they lived with Infidels But that which they did in the Sacrament of Baptism was for the self-same good of Believers which is thereby intended still The Cross is for us an admonition no less necessary then for them to glory in the Service of Jesus Christ and not to hang down our heads as men ashamed thereof although it procure us reproach and obloquy at the hands of this wretched World Shame is a kinde of fear to incur disgrace and ignominy Now whereas some things are worthy of reproach some things ignominious onely through a false opinion which men have conceived of them Nature that generally feareth opprobtious reprehension must by Reason and Religion be taught what it should be ashamed of and what not But be we never so well instructed what our duty is in this behalf without some present admonition at the very instant of practise what we know is many times not called to minde till that be done whereupon our just confusion ensueth To supply the absence of such as that way might do us good when they see us in danger of sliding there are judicious and wise men which think we may greatly relieve our selves by a bare imagined presence of some whose Authority we fear and would be loath to offend if indeed they were present with us Witnesses at hand are a bridle unto many offences Let the minde have always some whom it feareth some whose Authority may keep even secret thoughts under aw Take Cato or if he be too harsh and rugged chuse some other of a softer mettal whose gravity of life and speech thou lovest his minde and countenance carry with thee set him always before thine eyes either as a watch or as a pattern That which is crooked we cannot streighten but by some such level If men of so good experience and insight in the maims of our weak flesh have thought these fancied remembrances available to awaken shamefastness that so the boldness of sin may be staid ere it look abroad surely the Wisdom of the Church of
that men ought to Fast more often then Marry the best Feast-maker is with them the perfectest Saint they are assuredly meer Spirit and therefore these our corporal devotions please them not Thus the one for Montanus and his Superstition The other in a clean contrary tune against the Religion of the Church These Set-fasts away with them for they are Iewish and bring men under the yoke of servitude If I will fast let me chuse my time that Christian Liberty be not abridged Hereupon their glory was to fast especially upon the Sunday because the order of the Church was on that day not to Fast. On Church Fasting days and especially the Week before Easter when with us saith Epiphanius Custom admitteth nothing but lying down upon the Earth abstinence from fleshly delights and pleasures sorrowfulness dry and unsavory Diet Prayer Watching Fasting all the Medicines which holy Affections can minister they are up be times to take in of the strongest for the belly and when their veins are well swoln they make themselves mirth with laughter at this our service wherein we are perswaded we please God By this of Epiphanius it doth appear not onely what Fastings the Church of Christ in those times used but also what other parts of Discipline were together therewith in force according to the ancient use and custom of bringing all men at certain times to a due consideration and an open Humiliation of themselves Two kindes there were of Publick Penitency the one belonging to notorious offenders whose open wickedness had been scandalous the other appertaining to the whole Church and unto every several person whom the same containeth It will be answered That touching this latter kinde it may be exercised well enough by men in private No doubt but Penitency is as Prayer a thing acceptable unto God be it in publick or in secret Howbeit as in the one if men were wholly left to their own voluntary Meditations in their Closets and not drawn by Laws and Orders unto the open Assemblies of the Church that there they may joyn with others in Prayer it may be soon conjectured what Christian devotion that way would come unto in a short time Even so in the other We are by sufficient experience taught how little it booreth to tell men of washing away their sins with tears of Repentance and so to leave them altogether unto themselves O Lord what heaps of grievous transgressions have we committed the best the perfectest the most righteous amongst us all and yet clean pass them over unsorrowed foâ— and unrepented of onely because the Church hath forgotten utterly how to bestow her wonted times of Discipline wherein the publick example of all was unto every particular person a most effectual mean to put them often in minde and even in a manner to draw them to that which now we all quite and clean forget as if Penitency were no part of a Christian mans duty Again besides our private offences which ought not thus loosly to be overslipt suppose we the Body and Corporation of the Church so just that at no time it needeth to shew it self openly cast down in regard of those Faults and Transgressions which though they do not properly belong unto any one had notwithstanding a special Sacrifice appointed for them in the Law of Moses and being common to the whole Society which containeth all must needs so far concern every man in particular as at some time in solemn manner to require acknowledgment with more then daily and ordinary testifications of grief There could not hereunto a fitter preamble be devised then that memorable Commination set down in the Book of Common Prayer if our practice in the rest were suitable The Head already so well drawn doth but wish a proportionable Body And by the Preface to that very part of the English Liturgy it may appear how at the first setting down thereof no less was intended For so we are to interpret the meaning of those words wherein restitution of the Primitive Church Discipline is greatly wished for touching the manner of publick penance in time of Lent Wherewith some being not much acquainted but having framed in their mindes the conceit of a new Discipline far unlike to that of old they make themselves believe it is undoubtedly this their Discipline which at the first was so much desired They have long pretended that the whole Scripture is plain for them If now the Communion Book make for them too I well think the one doth as much as the other it may be hoped that being found such a well-willer unto their cause they will more favor it then they have done Having therefore hitherto spoken both of Festival days and so much of solemn Fasts as may reasonably serve to shew the ground thereof in the Law of Nature the practice partly appointed and partly allowed of God in the Jewish Church the like continued in the Church of Christ together with the sinister oppositions either of Hereticks erroneously abusing the same or of others thereat quarrelling without cause we will onely collect the chiefest points as well of resemblance as of difference between them and so end First In this they agree that because Nature is the general Root of both therefore both have been always common to the Church with Infidels and Heathen men Secondly They also herein accord that as oft as joy is the cause of the one and grief the Well-spring of the other they are incompatible A third degree of affinity between them is That neither being acceptable to God of it self but both tokens of that which is acceptable their approbation with him must necessarily depend on that which they ought to import and signifie So that if herein the minde dispose no it self aright whether we rest or fast we offend A fourth thing common unto them is that the greatest part of the World hath always grosly and palpably offended in both Infidels because they did all in relation to false gods godless sensual and careless mindes for that there is in them no constant true and sincere affection towards those things which are pretended by such exercise yea certain flattering over-sights there are wherewith sundry and they not of the worst sort may be easily in these cases led awry even through abundance of love and liking to that which must be imbraced by all means but with caution in as much as the very admiration of Saints Whether we celebrate their glory or follow them in humility whether we laugh or weep mourn or rejoyce with them is as in all things the affection of Love apt to deceive and doth therefore need the more to be directed by a watchful guide seeing there is manifestly both ways even in them whom we honor that which we are to observe and shun The best have not still been sufficiently mindful that Gods very Angels in Heaven are but Angels and that bodily exercise considered in it self is no
had they known how Is it tolerable saith Saint Ambrose that to sue to God thou shouldst be ashamed which blushest not to seek and sue unto Man should it grieve thee to be a Suppliant to him from whom thou canst not possibly hide thy self when to open thy sinnes to him from whom if thou wouldst thou mightest conceal them it doth not any thing at all trouble thee This thou art loath to do in the Church where all being Sinners nothing is more opprobrious indeed than concealment of sinne the most humble the best thought of and the lowliest accounted the justest All this notwithstanding we should do them very great wrong to father any such Opinion upon them as if they did teach it a thing impossible for any Sinner to reconcile himself unto God without confession unto the Priest Would Chrysostom thus perswaded have said Let the enquiry and punishment of thy offences be made in thine own thoughts Let the Tribunal whereat thou arraignest thy self be without witness Let God and only God see thee and thy Confession Would Cassianus so believing have given counsel That if any were withheld with bashfulness from discovering their Faulis to men they should be so much the more instant and constant in opening them by supplication to God himself whose wont is to help without publication of mens shame and not to upbraid them when he pardoneth Finally would Prosper settled in this Opinion have made it as touching Reconciliation to God a matter indifferent Whether men of Ecclesiastical Order did detect their crimes by confession or leaving the World ignorant thereof would separate voluntarily themselves for a time from the Altar though not in affection yet in execution of their Ministry and so bewaile their corrupt life Would he have willed them as he doth to make hold of it that the favour of God being either way recovered by fruits of forcible repentance they should not only receive whatsoever they had lost by sinne but also after this their new enfranchisement aspire to the endless joyes of that supernal City To conclude We every where finde the use of Confession especially publick allowed of and commended by the Fathers but that extream and rigorous necessity of Auricular and private Confession which is at this day so mightily upheld by the Church of Rome we finde nor First it was not then the Faith and Doctrine of God's Church as of the Papacy at this present Secondly That the onely remedy for Sinne after Baptisme is Sacramental Penitency Thirdly That Confession in secret is an essential part thereof Fourthly That God himself cannot now forgive Sin without the Priest That because Forgivenesse at the hands of the Priest must arise from Confession in the Offenders Therefore to confesse unto him is a matter of such necessity as being not either in deed or at the least in desire performed excludeth utterly from all pardon and must consequently in Scripture be commanded wheresoever any Promise or Forgivenesse is made No no these Opinions have Youth in their countenance Antiquity knew them not it never thought nor dreamed of them But to let passe the Papacy For as much as Repentance doth import alteration within the minde of a sinful man whereby through the power of God's most gracious and blessed Spirit he seeth and with unfeigned sorrow acknowledgeth former Offences committed against God hath them in utter detestation seeketh pardon for them in such sort as a Christian should doe and with a resolute purpose settleth himself to avoid them leading as near as God shall assist him for ever after an unspotted life And in the Order which Christian Religion hath taught for procurement of God's mercy towards Sinners Confession is acknowledged a principal duty Yea in some cases Confesion to man not to God onely It is not in Reformed Churches denied by the Learneder sort of Divines but that even this Confession cleared from all Errors is both lawful and behoveful for Gods people Confession by man being either Private or Publick Private Confession to the Minister alone touching secret Crimes or Absolution thereupon ensuing as the one so the other is neither practised by the French Discipline nor used in any of those Churches which have been cast by the French mould Open Confession to be made in the face of the whole Congregation by notorious Malefactors they hold necessary Howbeit not necessary towards the remission of Sinnes But only in some sort to content the Church and that one man's repentance may seem to strengthen many which before have been weakned by one man's fall Saxonians and Bohemians in their Discipline constrain no man to open Confession Their Doctrine is That whose Faults have been Publick and thereby scandalous unto the World such when God giveth them the Spirit of Repentance ought as solemnly to return as they have openly gone astray First for the better testimony of their own unfeigned Conversion unto God Secondly the more to notifie their Reconcilement unto the Church And Lastly that others may make benefit of their Example But concerning Confession in private the Churches of Germany as well the rest as Lutherans agree that all men should at certain times confesse their Offences to God in the hearing of Gods Ministers thereby to shew how their Sinnes displease them to receive instruction for the warier carriage of themselves hereafter to be soundly resolved if any scruple or snare of Conscience do entangle their mindes and which is most material to the end that men may at Gods hands seek every one his own particular pardon through the power of those Keys which the Minister of God using according to our blessed Saviours Institution in that case it is their part to accept the benefit thereof as Gods most merciful Ordinance for their good and without any distrust or doubt to embrace joyfully his Grace so given them according to the Word of our Lord which hath said Whose Sinnes ye remit they are remitted So that grounding upon this assured Belief they are to rest with mindes encouraged and perswaded concerning the forgiveness of all their Sinnes as out of Christ's own Word and Power by the Ministry of the Keyes It standeth with us in the Church of England as touching Publick Confession thus First seeing day by day we in our Church begin our Publick Prayers to Almighty God with Publick acknowledgement of our Sinnes in which Confession every man prostrate as it were before his glorious Majesty cryeth against himself and the Minister with one Sentence pronounceth universally all clear whose acknowledgement so made hath proceeded from a true penitent minde What reason is there every man should not under the general terms of Confession represent to himself his own Particulars whatsoever and adjoyning thereunto that affection which a contrite spirit worketh embrace to as full effect the words of Divine Grace as if the same were severally and particularly uttered with addition of Prayers imposition of hands or all
to the Minister of God he presently absolveth in this case the sick Party from all Sinnes by that Authority which Jesus Christ hath committed unto him knowing that God respecteth not so much what time is spent as what truth is shewed in Repentance In summe when the Offence doth stand onely between God and Man's Conscience the Counsel is good which Saint Chrysostom giveth I wish thee not to bewray thy self publickly nor to accuse thy self before others I wish thee to obey the Prophet who saith Disclose thy way unto the Lord confesse thy sins before him Tell thy sins to him that he may blot them out If thou be abashed to tell unto any other wherein thou hast offended rehearse them every day between thee and thy Soul I wish thee not to confesse them to thy fellow-servant who may upbraid thee with them Tell them to God who will cure them There is no need for thee in the presence of Witnesses to acknowledge them Let God alone see thee at thy Confession I pray and beseech you that you would more often than you do confesse to God eternal and reckoning up your Trespasses desire his Pardon I carry you not into a Theatre or open Court of many your Fellow-Servants I seek not to detect your crimes before men Disclose your Conscience before God unfold yourselves to him lay forth your wounds before him the best Physician that is and desire of him salve for them If hereupon it follow as it did with David I thought I will confesse against my self my wickednesse unto thee O Lord and thou forgavest me the plague of my Sinne we have our desire and there remaineth only thankfulnesse accompanied with perpetuity of care to avoid that which being not avoided we know we cannot remedy without new perplexity and grief Contrariwise if peace with God do not follow the pains we have taken in seeking afterit if we continue disquieted and not delivered from anguish mistrusting whether that we do be sufficient it argueth that our Soar doth exceed the power of our own skill and that the wisedom of the Pastor must binde up those parts which being bruised are not able to be recured of themselves Of Satisfaction THere resteth now Satisfaction only to be considered A point which the Fathers do often touch albeit they never aspire to such Mysteries as the Papacy hath found enwrapped within the folds and plaits thereof And it is happy for the Church of God that we have the Writings of the Fathers to shew what their meaning was The name of Satisfaction as the Antient Fathers meant it containeth whatsoever a Penitent should do in the humbling himself unto God and testifying by deeds of Contrition the same which Confession in words pretendeth He which by Repentance for Sins saith Tertullian speaking of fickle-minded-men had a purpose to satisfie the Lord will now by repenting his Repentance make Satan satisfaction and be so much more hateful to God as he is unto Gods enemy more acceptable Is it not plain that Satisfaction doth here include the whole work of Penitency and that God is Satisfied when men are restored through Sin into favour by Repentance How canst thou saith Chrysostom move God to pity thee when thou wilt not seem as much as to know that thou hast offended By appeasing pacifying and moving God to pity Saint Chrysostom meaneth the very same with the Latin Fathers when they speak of satisfying God We feel saith Cyprian the bitter smart of his rod and scourge because there is in us neither care to please him with our good deeds nor to satisfie him for our evil Again Let the eyes which have looked on Idols spunge out their unlawful acts with those sorrowful tears which have power to satisfie God The Master of Sentences alledgeth out of Saint Augustine that which is plain enough to this purpose Three things there are in perfect Penitency Compunction Confession and Satisfaction that as we three wayes offend God namely in Heart Word and Deed so by three Duties we may satisfie God Satisfaction as a part comprehendeth only that which the Papists meant by worthy of Repentance and if we speak of the whole work of Repentance it self we may in the phrase of Antiquity term it very well Satisfaction Satisfaction is a work which Justice requireth to be done for contentment of Persons injured Neither is it in the eye of Justice a sufficient satisfaction unless it fully equal the Injury for which we satisfie Seeing then that sin against God Eternal and Infinite must needs be an infinite wrong Justice in regard thereof doth necessarily exact an infinite recompence or else inflict upon the Offender infinite punishment Now because God was thus to be satisfied and man not able to make satisfaction in such sort his unspeakable love and inclination to save mankinde from eternal death ordained in our behalf a Mediatour to do that which had been for any other impossible Wherefore all sin is remitted in the only faith of Christ's passion and no man without belief thereof justified Bonavent in Sentent 4. dist 15. 9. 9. Faith alone maketh Christ's satisfaction ours howbeit that Faith alone which after sinne maketh us by Conversion his For in as much as God will have the benefit of Christ's satisfaction both thankfully acknowledged and duly esteemed of all such as enjoy the same he therefore imparteth so high a treasure unto no man whose Faith hath not made him willing by Repentance to do even that which of it self how unavailable soever yet being required and accepted with God we are in Christ thereby made capable and sit Vessels to receive the fruits of his Satisfaction Yea we so farr please and content God that because when we have offended he looketh but for Repentance at our hands our Repentance and the works thereof are therefore termed satisfactory not for that so much is thereby done as the Justice of God can exact but because such actions of grief and humility in man after sinne are illices divine misericordiae as Tertullian speaketh of them they draw that pity of God's towards us wherein he is for Christ's sake contented upon our submission to pardon our rebellion against him and when that little which his Law appointeth is faithfully executed it pleaseth him in tender compassion and mercy to require no more Repentance is a name which noteth the habit and operation of a certain grace or vertue in us Satisfaction the effect which it hath either with God or man And it is not in this respect said amiss that Satisfaction importeth Acceptation Reconciliation and Amity because that through Satisfaction on the one part made and allowed on the other they which before did reject are now content to receive they to be won again which were lost and they to love unto whom just cause of hatred was given We satisfie therefore in doing that which is sufficient to this effect and they towards whom we do it are
with our Ministerie God really performing the same which Man is authorized to act as in his Name there shall need for decision of this point no great labour To Remission of Sins there are two things necessary Grace as the only cause which taketh away Iniquity and Repentance as a Duty or Condition required in us To make Repentance such as it should be what doth God demand but inward sincerity joyned with fit and convenient Offices for that purpose the one referred wholly to our own Consciences the other best discerned by them whom God hath appointed Judges in this Court. So that having first the promises of God for pardon generally unto all Offenders penitent and particularly for our own unfeigned meaning the unfallible testimony of a good Conscience the sentence of God's appointed Officer and Vicegerent to approve with unpartial Judgement the quality of that we have done and as from his Tribunal in that respect to assoil us of any Crime I see no cause but that by the Rules of our Faith and Religion we may rest our selves very well assured touching God's most merciful Pardon and Grace who especially for the strengthening of weak timerous and fearful mindes hath so farr indued his Church with Power to absolve Sinners It pleaseth God that men sometimes should by missing this help perceive how much they stand bound to him for so precious a Benefit enjoyed And surely so long as the World lived in any awe or fear of falling away from God so dear were his Ministers to the People chiefly in this respect that being through tyranny and persecution deprived of Pastors the doleful rehearsal of their lost felicities hath not any one thing more eminent than that Sinners distrest should not now know how or where to unlade their Burthens Strange it were unto me that the Fathers who so much every where extol the Grace of Jesus Christ in leaving unto his Church this Heavenly and Divine power should as men whose simplicity had universally been abused agree all to admire the magnifie and needless Office The Sentence therefore of Ministerial Absolution hath two effects touching sin it only declareth us freed from the guiltiness thereof and restored into God's favour but concerning right in Sacred and Divine Mysteries whereof through Sin we were made unworthy as the power of the Church did before effectually binde and retain us from access unto them so upon our apparent repentance it truly restoreth our Liberty looseth and Chains wherewith we were tyed remitteth all whatsoever is past and accepteth us no less returned than if we never had gone astray For in as much as the Power which our Saviour gave to his Church is of two kindes the one to be exercised over voluntary Penitents only the other over such as are to be brought to Amendment by Ecclesiastical Censures the words wherein he hath given this Authority must be so understood as the Subject or Matter whereupon it worketh will permit It doth not permit that in the former kinde that is to say in the use of Power over voluntarie Converts to binde or loose remit or retain should signifie any other than only to pronounce of Sinners according to that which may be gathered by outward signes because really to effect the removal or continuance of Sinne in the Soul of any Offender is no Priestly act but a Work which farr exceedeth their Ability Contrariwise in the latter kinde of Spiritual Jurisdiction which by Censures constraineth men to amend their Lives It is is true that the Minister of God doth then more declare and signifie what God hath wrought And this Power true it is that the Church hath invested in it Howbeit as other truths so this hath by errour been oppugned and depraved through abuse The first of Name that openly in Writing withstood the Churches Authority and Power to remit Sinne was Tertullian after he had combined himself with Montanists drawn to the liking of their Heresie through the very sowreness of his own nature which neither his incredible skill and knowledge otherwise nor the Doctrine of the Gospel it self could but so much alter as to make him savour any thing which carried with it the taste of lenity A Spunge steeped in Worm-wood and Gall a Man through too much severity merciless and neither able to endure nor to be endured of any His Book entituled concerning Chastity and written professedly against the Discipline of the Church hath many fretful and angry Sentences declaring a minde very much offended with such as would not perswade themselves that of Sins some be pardonable by the Keyes of the Church some uncapable of Forgiveness That middle and moderate Offences having received chastisement may by Spiritual Authority afterwards be remitted but greater Transgressions must as touching Indulgence be left to the only pleasure of Almighty God in the World to come That as Idolatry and Bloodshed so likewise Fornication and sinful Lust are of this nature that they which so farr have fallen from God ought to continue for ever after barred from access unto his Sanctuary condemned to perpetual profusion of Tears deprived of all expectation and hope to receive any thing at the Churches hands but publication of their shame For saith he who will fear to waste out that which he hopeth he may recover Who will be careful for ever to hold that which be knoweth cannot for ever be withheld from him He which slackneth the Bridle to sinne doth thereby give it even the spurr also Take away fear and that which presently succeedeth in stead thereof is Licencious desire Greater Offences therefore are punishable but not pardonable by the Church If any Prophet or Apostle be found to have remitted such Transgressions they did it not by the ordinary course of Discipline but by extraordinary power For they also raised the Dead which none but God is able to do they restored the Impotent and Lame men a work peculiar to Jesus Christ Yea that which Christ would not do because executions of such severity beseemed not him who came to save and redeem the World by his sufferings they by their power strook Elymas and Ananias the one blinde and the other dead Approve first your selves to be as they were Apostles or Prophets and then take upon you to pardon all men But if the Authority you have be only Ministerial and no way Soveraign over-reach not the limits which God hath set you know that to pardon capital Sin is beyond your Commission Howbeit as oftentimes the vices of wicked men do cause other their commendable qualities to be abhorred so the honour of great mens vertues is easily a Cloak of their Errours In which respect Tertullian hath past with much less obloquy and reprehension than Novatian who broaching afterwards the same opinion had not otherwise wherewith to countervail the Offence he gave and to procure it the like toleration Novatian at the first a Stoical Phylosopher which kinde of men hath alwayes accounted
Tyrant it self must of necessity endure perpetual Anguish and Grief For as the Body is rent with stripes so the Minde with guiltiness of Cruelty Lust and wicked Resolutions Which Furies brought the Emperour Tyberius sometimes into such perplexity that writing to the Senate his wonted art of dissimulation failed him utterly in this Case And whereas it had been ever his peculiar delight so to speak that no man might be able to sound his meaning he had not the power to conceal what he felt through the secret scourge of an evil Conscience though no necessity did now enforce him to disclose the same What to write or how to write at this present if I know saith Tyberius let the Gods and Goddesses who thus continually eat me only be worse to me than they are It was not his Imperial Dignity and Power that could provide a way to protect him against himself the fears and suspitions which improbity had bred being strengthned by every occasion and those Vertues clean banished which are the only foundation of sound tranquility of minde For which cause it hath been truly said and agreeably with all mens experience that if the vertuous did excel in no other priviledge yet farr happier they are than the contrary sort of men for that their hopes be alwayes better Neither are we to marvel that these things known unto all do stay so few from being Authors of their own woe For we see by the antient example of Ioseph's unkinde Brethren how it commeth to remembrance easily when Crimes are once past what the difference is of good from evil and of right from wrong But such consideration when they should have prevented Sinne were over-match'd by inordinate desires Are we not bound then with all thankfulnesse to acknowledge his infinite goodnesse and mercy which hath revealed unto us the way how to rid our selves of these mazes the way how to shake off that yoke which no Flesh is able to bear the way how to change most grisly horror into a comfortable apprehension of heavenly joy Whereunto there are many which labour with so much the greater difficultie because imbecillity of minde doth not suffer them to censure rightly their own doings Some fearful lest the enormity of their Crimes be so unpardonable that no Repentance can do them good some lest the imperfection of their Repentance make it uneffectual to the taking away of Sinne The one drive all things to this issue whether they be not men that have sinned against the Holy Ghost the other to this what Repentance is sufficient to clear Sinners and to assure them that they are delivered Such as by Error charge themselves of unpardonable Sinne must think it may be they deem that unpardonable which is not Our Saviour speaketh indeed of Blasphemy which shall never be forgiven But have they any sure and infallible knowledge what that Blasphemy is If not why are they unjust and cruel to their own Souls imagining certainty of Guiltiness in a Crime concerning the very nature whereof they are uncertain For mine own part although where this Blasphemy is mentioned the cause why our Saviour spake thereof was the Pharisees Blasphemy which was not afraid to say He had an unclean Spirit and did cast out Spirits by the Power of Beelzebub Neverthelesse I dare not precisely deny but that even the Pharisees themselves might have repented and been forgiven and that our Lord Jesus Christ peradventure might but take occasion at their Blasphemy which as yet was pardonable to tell them further of an unpardonable Blasphemy whereinto he foresaw that the Jews would fall For it is plain that many thousands at the first professing Christian Religion became afterwards wilful Apostates moved with no other cause of revolt but mere indignation that the Gentiles should enjoy the benefit of the Gospel as much as they and yet not be burthened with the yoke of Moses his Law The Apostles by Preaching had won them to Christ in whose Name they embraced with great alacrity the full remission of their former sinnes and iniquities they received by the imposition of the Apostles hands that Grace and Power of the Holy Ghost whereby they cured Diseases Prophecyed spake with Tongues and yet in the end after all this they fell utterly away renounced the Mysteries of Christian Faith Blasphemed in their formal Abjurations that most glorious and blessed Spirit the Gifts whereof themselves had possest and by this means sunk their Souls in the Gulf of that unpardonable Sinne whereof as our Lord JESUS CHRIST had told them before hand so the Apostle at the first appearance of such their revolt putteth them in minde again that falling now to their former Blasphemies their Salvation was irrecoverably gone It was for them in this Case impossible to be renewed by any Repentance because they were now in the state of Satan and his Angels the Judge of quick and dead had passed his irrevocable Sentence against them So great difference there is between Infidels unconverted and Backsliders in this manner fallen away that always we have hope to reclaim the one which only hate whom they never knew but to the other which know and Blaspheme to them that with more than infernal malice accurse both the seen brightnesse of Glory which is in him and in themselves the tasted goodness of Divine Grace as those execrable Miscreants did who first received in extraordinary miraculous manner and then in outragious sort blasphemed the Holy Ghost abusing both it and the whole Religion which God by it did confirm and magnifie To such as wilfully thus sinne after so great light of the Truth and Gifts of the Spirit there remaineth justly no fruit or benefit to be expected by Christ's Sacrifice For all other Offenders without exception or stint whether they be Strangers that seek accesse or Followers that will make return unto God upon the tender of their Repentance the grant of his Grace standeth everlastingly signed with his blood in the Book of Eternal life That which in this Case over-terrifieth fearful Souls is a mis-conceit whereby they imagine every act which they doe knowing that they doe amisse and every wilful Breach or Transgression of God's Law to be mere Sinne against the Holy Ghost forgetting that the Law of Moses it self ordained Sacrifices of Expiation as well for Faults presumptuously committed as Things wherein men offend by Errour Now there are on the contrary side others who doubting not of God's mercy towards all that perfectly repent remain notwithstanding scrupulous and troubled with continual fear lest defects in their own Repentance be a barr against them These cast themselves into very great and peradventure needlesse Agonies through mis-construction of things spoken about proportioning our griefs to our Sinnes for which they never think they have wept and mourned enough yea if they have not alwayes a stream of Tears at command they take it for a heart congealed and hardned in sinne when
to stand upon I think the like to this and other such in this Sermon and the rest of this matter hath not been heard in Publick places within this Land since Queen Mary's days What consequence this Doctrine may be of if he be not by Authority ordered to revoke it I beseech your H H. as the truth of God and his Gospel is dear and precious unto you according to your godly wisdome to consider I have been bold to offer to your H H. a long and tedious Discourse of these matters but Speech being like to Tapestry which if it be folded up sheweth but part of that which is wrought and being unlapt and laid open sheweth plainly to the eye all the work that is in it I thought it necessary to unfold this Tapestry and to hang up the whole Chamber of it in your most Honourable Senate that so you may the more easily discern of all the Pieces and the sundry Works and Matters contained in it Wherein my hope is your H H. may see I have not deserved so great a Punishment as is laid upon the Church for my sake and also upon my self in taking from me the excercise of my Ministerie Which Punishment how heavy it may seem to the Church or fall out indeed to be I referr it to them to judge and spare to write what I fear but to my self it is exceeding grievous for that it taketh from me the excercise of my Calling Which I do not say is dear unto me as the means of that little benefit whereby I live although this be a lawful consideration and to be regarded of me in due place and of the Authority under whose Protection I most willingly live even by God's Commandment both unto them and unto me but which ought to be more precious unto me than my life for the love which I should bear to the glory and honour of Almighty God and to the edification and salvation of his Church for that my life cannot any other way be of like service to God nor of such use and profit to men by any means For which Cause as I discern how dear my Ministery ought to be unto me so it is my hearty desire and most humble request unto God to your H H. and to all the Authority I live under to whom any dealing herein belongeth that I may spend my life according to his Example who in a word of like sound of fuller sense comparing by it the bestowing of his life to the Offering poured out upon the Sacrifice of the Faith of God's people and especially of this Church whereupon I have already poured out a great part thereof in the same Calling from which I stand now restrained And if your H H. shall finde it so that I have not deserved so great a Punishment but rather performed the Duty which a good and faithful Servant ought in such case to do to his Lord and the People he putteth them in trust withal carefully to keep I am a most humble Suiter by these presents to your H H. that by your godly wisdom some good course may be taken for the restoring of me to my Ministery and Place again Which so great a favour shall binde me yet in a greater obligation of Duty which is already so great as it seemed nothing could be added unto it to make it greater to honour God daily for the continuance and encrease of your good estate and to be ready with all the poor means God hath given me to do your H H. that faithful Service I may possibly perform But if notwithstanding my Cause he never so good your H H. can by no means pacifie such as are offended nor restore me again then am I to rest in the good pleasure of God and to commend to your H H. protection under Her Majesties my private life while it shall be led in duty and the Church to him who hath redeemed to himself a People with his precious Blood and is making ready to come to judge both the Quick and the Dead to give to every one according as he hath done in this life be it good or evil to the Wicked and Unbelievers Justice unto death but to the Faithful and such as love his truth Mercy and Grace to life everlasting Your Honours most bounden and most humble Suppliant WALTER TRAVERS Minister of the Gospel Mr. HOOKER'S ANSVVER TO THE SUPPLICATION THAT Mr. TRAVERS Made to the COUNCIL To my Lord of Canterburie his Grace MY Duty in my most humble wise remembred May it please your Grace to understand That whereas there hath been a late Controversie raised in the Temple and pursued by Mr. Travers upon conceit taken at some words by me uttered with a most simple and harmless meaning In the heat of which pursuit after three publick Invectives silence being enjoyned him by Authority he hath hereupon for defence of his proceedings both presented the Right Honourable Lords and others of Her Majesties Privy Councel with a Writing and also caused or suffered the same to be Copied out and spread through the hands of so many that well nigh all sorts of men have it in their bosomes The matters wherewith I am therein charged being of such quality as they are and my self being better known to your Grace than to any other of their Honors besides I have chosen to offer to your Grace's hands a plain Declaration of my Innocence in all those things wherewith I am so hardly and so heavily charged lest if I still remain silent that which I do for quietness sake be taken as an Argument that I lack what to speak truly and justly in mine own defence 2. First because M. Travers thinketh it an expedient to breed an Opinion in mens mindes that the root of all inconvenient events which are now sprung out is the surly and unpeaceable disposition of the man with whom he hath to do therefore the first in the rank of Accusations laid against me is my intorformity which have so little inclined to so many and so earnest Exhortations and Conferences as my self he saith can witness to have been spent upon me for my better fashioning unto good correspondence and agreement 3. Indeed when at the first by means of special Well-willers without any suit of mine as they very well know although I do not think it had been a mortal sinne in a reasonable sort to have shewed a moderate desire that way yet when by their endeavour without instigation of mine some Reverend and Honourable favourably affecting me had procured her Majesties's grant of the Place At the very point of my eptring thereinto the Evening before I was first to Preach he came and two other Gentlemen joyned with him The effect of his Conference then was That he thought it his Duty to advise me not to enter with a strong hand but to change my purpose of Preaching there the next day and to stay till he had given notice of me to
the Body without the Soul in the Body Christ hath merited to make us just but as a medicine which is made for health doth not head by being made but by being applied so by the merits of Christ there can be no Justification without the application of his Merits Thus farr we joyn hands with the Church of Rome 5. Wherein then do we disagree We disagree about the future and offence of the Medicine whereby Christ cureth our Disease about the 〈…〉 of applying it about the number and the power of means which God requireth in as for the effectual applying thereof to our Souls comfort When they are re 〈…〉 that the righteousness is whereby a Christian man is justified they answer that it is a Divine Spiritual quality which quality received into the Soul doth first make it to be one of them who are born of God and secondly indue it with power to bring forth such works as they do that are born of him even as the Soul of Man being joyned to his Body doth first make him to be of the number of reasonable Creatures and secondly inable him to perform the natural Functions which are proper to his kinde That it maketh the Soul amiable and gracious in the sight of God in regard whereof it is termed Grace That is purgeth purifieth and washeth out all the stains and pollutions of sins that by it through the merit of Christ we are delivered as from sin so from eternal death and condemnation the reward of sin This Grace they will have to be applied by infusion to the end that as the Body is warm by the heat which is in the Body so the Soul might be righteous by inherent Grace which Grace they make capable of increase as the Body may be more and more warm so the Soul more and more justified according as Grace should be augmented the augmentation whereof is merited by good Works as good Works are made meritorious by it Wherefore the first receit of Grace in their Divinity is the first Justification the increase thereof the second Justification As Grace may be increased by the merit of good Works so it may be diminished by the demerit of sins venial it may be lost by mortal sin In as much therefore as it is needful in the one case to repair in the other to recover the loss which is made the infusion of Grace hath her sundry after-meals for the which cause they make many ways to apply the infusion of Grace It is applyed to Infants through Baptism without either Faith or Works and in them really it taketh away Original sinne and the punishment due unto it It is applied to Infidels and wicked men in the first Justification through Baptism without Works yet not without Faith and it taketh away both Sinnes Actual and Original together with all whatsoever punishment eternal or temporal thereby deserved Unto such as have attained the first Justification that is to say the first receit of Grace it is applied farther by good Works to the increase of former Grace which is the second Justification If they work more and more Grace doth more increase and they are more and more justified To such as diminished it by venial sinnes it is applied by Holy-water Ave Marie's Crossings Papal Salutations and such like which serve for reparations of Grace decayed To such as have lost it through mortal sinne it is applied by the Sacrament as they term it of Penance which Sacrament hath force to conferr Grace anew yet in such sort that being so conferred it hath not altogether so much power as at the first For it onely cleanseth out the stain or guilt of sinne committed and changeth the punishment eternal into a temporal satisfactory punishment here if time doe serve if not hereafter to be endured except it be lightned by Masses Works of Charity Pilgrimages Fasts and such like or else shortned by pardon for term or by plenary pardon quite removed and taken away This is the mystery of the man of sinne This maze the Church of Rome doth cause her Followers to tread when they ask her the way to Justification I cannot stand now to untip this Building and to siâ— it piece by piece onely I will passe by it in few words that that may befall Bâ—… in the presence of that which God hath builded as hapned unto Dagon before the Ark. 6. Doubtless saith the Apostle I have counted all things loss and judge them to be doing that I may win Christ and to be found in him not having my own righteousness but that which is through the Faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God through Faith Whether they speak of the first or second Justification they make it the essence of a Divine quality inherent they make it Righteousnesse which is in us If it be in us then is it ours as our Souls are ours though we have them from God and can hold them no longer than pleaseth him for if he withdraw the breath of our nostrils we fall to dust but the Righteousness wherein we must be found if we will be justified is not our own therefore we cannot be justified by any inherent quality Christ hath merited righteousness for as many as are found in him In him God findeth us if we be faithful for by Faith we are incorporated into Christ. Then although in our selves we be altogether sinful and unrighteous yet even the man which is impious in himself full of iniquity full of sin him being found in Christ through Faith and having his sinne remitted through Repentance him God upholdeth with a gracious eye putteth away his sinne by not imputing it taketh quite away the Punishment due thereunto by pardoning it and accepteth him in Jesus Christ as perfectly righteous as if he had fulfilled all that was commanded him in the Law shall I say more perfectly righteous than if himself had fulfilled the whole Law I must take heed what I say but the Apostle saith God made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him Such we are in the sight of God the Father as is the very Son of God himself Let it be counted folly or frensie or fury whatsoever it is our comfort and our wisdom we care for no knowledge in the World but this That man hath sinned and God hath suffered That God hath made himself the Son of Man and that men are made the righteousness of God You see therefore that the Church of Rome in teaching Justification by inherent Grace doth pervert the truth of Christ and that by the hands of the Apostles we have received otherwise than she reacheth Now concerning the righteousness of Sanctification we deny it not to be inherent we grant that unless we work we have it not onely we distinguish it as a thing different in nature from the righteousness of Justification we are righteous the one
the web of Salvation is spun Except your Righteousness exceed the Righteousness of the Stribes and Pharisees ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven They were rigorous exacters of things not utterly to be neglected and left undone washing and tything c. As they were in these so must we be in judgement and the love of God Christ in Works Ceremonial giveth more liberty in moral much less than they did Works of Righteousness therefore are added in the one Proposition as in the other Circumcision is 31. But we say our Salvation is by Christ alone therefore howsoever or whatsoever we adde unto Christ in the matter of Salvation we overthrow Christ. Our Case were very hard if this Argument so universally meant as it is proposed were sound and good We our selves do not teach Christ alone excluding our own Faith unto Justification Christ alone excluding our own Works unto Sanctification Christ alone excluding the one or the other unnecessary unto Salvation It is a childish Cavil wherewith in the matter of Justification our Adversaries do so greatly please themselves exclaiming that we tread all Christian vertues under our feet and require nothing in Christians but Faith because we teach that Faith alone justifieth whereas by this speech we never meant to excluded either Hope or Charity from being always joyned as inseparable Mates with Faith in the man that is justified or Works from being added as necessary Duties required at the hands of every justified man But to shew that Faith is the onely hand which putteth on Christ unto Justification and Christ the onely Garment which being so put on covereth the shame of our defiled natures hideth the imperfection of our Works preserveth us blameless in the sight of God before whom otherwise the weaknesse of our Faith were cause sufficent to make us culpable yea to shut us from the Kingdom of Heaven where nothing that is not absolute can enter That our dealing with them he not as childish as theirs with us when we hear of Salvation by Christ alone considering that alone as an exclusive Particle we are to note what it doth exclude and where If I say Such a Iudge onely ought to determine such a case all things incident to the determination thereof besides the Person of the Judge as Laws Depositions Evidences c. are not hereby excluded Persons are not excluded from witnessing herein or assisting but onely from determining and giving Sentence How then is our Salvation wrought by Christ alone Is it our meaning that nothing is requisite to man's Salvation but Christ to save and he to be saved quietly without any more adoe No we acknowledge no such Foundation As we have received so we teach that besides the bare and naked work wherein Christ without any other Associate finished all the parts of our Redemption and purchased Salvation himself alone for conveyance of this eminent blessing unto us many things are of necessity required as to be known and chosen of God before the foundation of the World in the World to be called justified sanctified after we have lest the World to be received unto glory Christ in every of these hath somewhat which he worketh alone Through him according to the Eternal purpose of God before the foundation of the World Born Crucified Buried Raised c. we were in a gracious acceptation known unto God long before we were seen of men God knew us loved us was kinde to us in Jesus Christ in him we were elected to be Heirs of Life Thus farr God through Christ hath wrought in such sort alone that our selves are mere Patients working no more than dead and senseless Matter Wood Stone or Iron doth in the Artificers hands no more than Clay when the Potter appointeth it to be framed for an honourable use nay not so much for the matter whereupon the Craftsman worketh he chuseth being moved by the fitness which is in it to serve his turn in us no such thing Touching the rest which is laid for the foundation of our Faith it importeth farther That by him we are called that we have Redemption Remission of sins through his blood Health by his stripes Justice by him that he doth sanctifie his Church and make it glorius to himself that entrance into joy shall be given us by Him yea all things by him alone Howbeit not so by him alone as if in us to our Vocation the hearing of the Gospel to our Justification Faith to our Sanctification the fruits of the Spirit to our entrance into rest perseverance in Hope in Faith in Holinesse were not necessary 32. Then what is the fault of the Church of Rome Not that she requireth Works at their hands which will be saved but that she attributeth unto Works a power of satisfying God for Sinne yea a vertue to merit both Grace here and in Heaven Glory That this overthroweth the foundation of Faith I grant willingly that it is a direct elenyal thereof Iutterly deny What it is to hold and what directly to deny the foundation of Faith I have already opened Apply it particularly to this Cause and there needs no more adoe The thing which is handled if the form under which it is handled be added thereunto it sheweth the foundation of any Doctrine whatsoever Christ is the Matter whereof the Doctrin of the Gospel treateth and it treateth of Christ as of a Saviour Salvation therefore by Christ is the foundation of Christianity as for works they are a thing subordinate no otherwise than because our Sanctification cannot be accomplished without them The Doctrine concerning them is a thing builded upon the foundation therefore the Doctrin which addeth unto them the power of satisfying or of meriting addeth unto a thing sabordinated builded upon the foundation not to the very foundation it self yet is the foundation by this addition consequently overthrown forasmuch as out of this addition it may be negatively concluded He which maketh any work good and acceptable in the sight of God to proceed from the natural freedom of our will he which giveth unto any good works of ours the force of satisfying the wrath of God for sinne the power of meriting either earthly or heavenly rewards he which holdeth Works going before our Vocation in congruity to merit our Vocation Works following our first to merit our second Justification and by condignity our last Reward in the Kingdom of Heaven pulleth up the Doctrin of Faith by the roots for out of every of these the plain direct denial thereof may be necessarily concluded Not this onely but what other Heresie is there that doth not raze the very foundation of Faith by consequent Howbeit we make a difference of Heresies accounting them in the next degree to infidelity which directly deny any one thing to be which is expresly acknowledged in the Articles of our Belief for out of any one Article so denied the denial of
Covenants of Mercy and the Law of Moses and the service of God and the promises of Christ were made impropriate who not onely were the Off-spring of Abraham Father unto all them which do believe but Christ their Off-spring which is God to be blessed for evermore 20. Consider this People and learn what it is to build your selves in Faith They were the Lord's Vine He brought it out of Egypt he threw out the Heathen from their places that it might be planted he made room for it and caused it to take root till it had filled the earth the Mountains were covered with the shadow of it and the boughs thereof were as the goodly Cedars she stretched out her branches unto the Sea and her boughs unto the River But when God having sent both his Servants and his Son to vâ—siâ—s this Vine they neither spared the one nor received the other but stoned the 〈…〉 s and crucified the Lord of glory which came unto them then began the curse â—â— God to come upon them even the curse whereof the Prophet David hath spoken saying Let their table be made a snare and a net and a stumbling block even for a recompence unto them Let their eyes be darkned that they do not see how down their backs for ever keep them down And sithence the hour that the measure of their infidelity was first made up they have been spoiled with Warrs eaten up with Piagues spent with Hunger and Famine they wander from place to place and are become the most â—ase and contemptible people that are under the Sun Ephraim which before was a terrour unto Nations and they trembled at his voyce is now by infidelity so vile that he seemeâ—h as a thing cast out to be trampled under mens feet In the midst of these desolations they cry Returâ— we beseech thee O God of hosts look down from heaven behold and visit their Vine but their very Prayers are turned into sin and their crys are no better than the lowing of â—easts before him Well saith the Apostle by their anbelief they are broken off and thou dost standby thy Faith Behold therefore the bountifulness and severity of God towards them severity because they have fallen bountifulness towards thee if thou continue in his bountifulness or else thou shalt be cut off If they forsake their unbelief and be grafted in again and we at any time for the hardness of our hearts be broken off it will be such a judgment as will amaze all the Powers and Principalities which are above Who hath searched the counsel of God concerning this secret And who doth not see that Infidelity doth threaten Lo-ammi unto the Gentiles as it hath brought Lo-ruchama upon the Jews It may be that these words seem dark unto you But the words of the Apostle in the eleventh to the Romans are plain enough If God have not spared the natural branches take heed take heed lest he spare not thee Build thy self in Faith Thus much of the thing which is prescribed and wherein we are exhorted to edifie our selves Now consider the Condition and Properties which are in this place annexed unto Faith The former of them for there are but two is this Edifie your selves in your Faith 21. A strange and a strong delusion it is wherewith the man of Sin hath bewitched the World a forcible spirit of Errour it must needs be which hath brought men to such a senseless and unreasonable perswasion as this is not onely that men cloathed with mortality and sinne as we our selves are can do God so much service as shall be able to make a full and perfect satisfaction before the Tribunal seat of God for their own sinnes yea a great deal more than is sufficient for themselves but also that a man at the hands of a Bishop or a Pope for such or such a price may buy the over-plus of other mens merits purchase the fruits of other men's labours and build his Soul by another man's faith Is not this man drowned in the gall of bitterness Is his heart right in the sight of God Can he have any part or fellowship with Peter and with the Successors of Peter which thinketh so vilely of building the precious Temples of the Holy Ghost Let his money perish with him and he with it because he judgeth that the Gift of God may be sold for money 22. But beloved in the Lord deceive not your selves neither suffer ye your selves to be deceived Ye can receive no more ease nor comfort for your Souls by another man's faith than warmth for your Bodies by another man's cloaths or sustenance by the bread which another man doth eat The just shall live by his own Faith Let a Saint yea a Martyr content himself that he hath cleansed himself of his own sins saith Tertullian No Saint or Martyr can cleanse himself of his own sins But if so be a Saint or a Martyr can cleanse himself of his own sins it is sufficient that he can do it for himself Did ever any man by his death deliver another man from death except onely the Sonne of God He indeed was able to Safe-conduct a Thief from the Cross to Paradise for to this end he came that being himself pure from sinne he might obey for Sinners Thou which thinkest to do the like and supposest that thou canst justifie another by thy Righteousness if thou be without sinne then lay down thy life for thy Brother dye for me But if thou be a Sinner even as I am a Sinner how can the Oyl of thy Lamp be sufficient both for thee and for me Virgins that are wise get ye Oyl while ye have day into your own Lamps For out of all peradventure others though they would can neither give nor sell. Edifie your selves in your own most holy faith And let this be observed for the first property of that wherein we ought to edifie our selves 23. Our Faith being such is that indeed which St. Iude doth here term Faith namely a thing most holy The reason is this We are justified by Faith For Abraham believed and this was imputed unto him for Righteousness Being justified all our iniquities are covered God beholdeth us in the Righteousness which is imputed and not in the Sins which we have committed 24. It is true we are full of sin both original and actual whosoever denieth it is a double Sinner for he is both a Sinner and a Lyar. To deny sin is most plainly and clearly to prove it because he that saith he hath no sin lyeth and by lying proveth that he hath sin 25. But imputation of Righteousness hath covered the sins of every Soul which believeth God by pardoning our sin hath taken it away So that now although our transgressions be multiplied above the hairs of our head yet being justified we are as free and as clear as if there were no one spot or stain of any uncleanness in us For it