of sincere obedience to lawfull authority as well as we conceited good probably included in the very obiect of the action he that doth that which in his private opinion he suspecteth to be evil because injoyned by lawfull authority doth not evil that good may come of it seeing the goodnesse of obedience is no consequent of the action but a motive precedent authority maketh actions indifferent to be good and necessary Ans He beggeth the question The goodnesse of sincere obedience to authority saith he may countervail the evil that we in our private choice fear to be in the action But first obedience to authority in things wanting Gods word whereof he speaketh now is not obedience but sinning because doing without faith 2. I take the Doctor at his word refusing obedience to mens will-worship or to practise even to the ruin of the weak things indifferent for fear of the greatest evil the offending of God by adding to his worship Rev. 22. 18 19. is obedience to God and not a privation the purpose I say of this obedience to God may countervail all evil that can be imagined in non-obedience to men and sure obedience to God though probably obedience is as good and better then obedience to men though probably obedience Jesuites and Formalists say Rulers are in possession to command Ergo We cannot thrust them out of possession where we are not perswaded that they command against reason saith Sanches So I say God is in just possession commanding us to venture upon no indifferent action where the conscience doubteth and shall we not no lesse contend for Gods just possession as time-servers do for mortall Rulers unjust possession in this 2. I prove that it were Lawfull then to sin against God A Iew is alike perswaded that Maries Son iâ— the true Messiah and that he is a deceiver Opinions about a man might seem indifferent to the Iews And it is all one saith Jackson as if the thing be indifferent Now the Pharisees in a Councell determine that Maries Son is a deceiver Then it is lawfull for the Jew upon purpose of sincere obedience to Pharisees who sit in Moses chair to believe that Maries son is a deceiver because the conceit of sincere obedience is an essentiall motive to transubstantiate unbelief into sincere obedience and the Iew may venture upon the faith that Maries Son is a deceiver and crucifie the Lord of glory being commanded thereunto by his Commanders because Gods providence favoureth more positive actions then privations 3. He saith He that obeyeth for the sole authority of Rulers doth not evil that good may come of it 1. Because the goodnesse of obedience countervaileth the evil of the actions But 1 The question is if it be obedience Ergo If it be no obedience it cannot countervail the evil 2. If it be the evil of sin with a doubting conscience to do what judges commandeth having no warrant of faith but the will and lust of men no purpose of good though it were to save all the world can counter-redeem the evil of sin against God 2. Because saith he such a one doth not evil that good may come of it Then he that stealeth moneys to give to the poor doth not evil that good may come of it by Dr. Jacksons reason Because the goodnesse of purposing to help the poor is not a consequent but a precedent motive of the action and so maketh it good We all know the intention of the end goeth in the intention before the action but not as an essentiall cause to make an evil action good or make an indifferent action necessary and honest A good intention doth make a good action good and better but that a good intention as Idolators are full of good intentions can never so season the means as this Doctor saith that it can make evil to be good Vasquez condemneth the Fathers of ignorance because they said Propositum bonum excusat malum opus so Cassianus said It was lawfull to lie for a good end and Chrysostoâ— and Ambrose said the same as Vasquez saith see Aquinas for this 3. It is the doctrine of the man of sin That Pope or Rulers sole and bare authority can make an action indifferent and so neither good nor evil to be indifferent and good as Bellarmine saith for God only by his institution createth morall goodnesse in actions mans will is no creatrix of goodnesse 4. Neither resolutions nor skill are to be credited or followed because private or publick because authority of man as such is no light nor warrant to the conscience to adventure upon moral actions and the Lord giveth light to private men to obey Psal 25. 8 9. 1 Cor. 2. 14 15. Ioh. 7. 17 â—8 Ioh. 7. 27. 2 Cor 3. 18. 2 Cor. 4. 4. As he doth to Rulers to Command So Sylvester Tartaretus so Rivetus Doctot Field I proceed to answer other Arguments As 1. We must not obey Not only for wrath but for conscience the violation of a speciall Law necessarily draweth with it the violation of the generall Law of the fift Commandment But the violation of the generall saith Learned Pareus hurteth the Conscience and the Magistrate punisheth not for generall Violation but for the Violation of this speciall Law Ergo this speciall Law obligeth in Conscience And it seemeth to carry reason Every just punishment presupposeth essentially a sin else it is not a just punishment but the Ruler doth justly punish the particular Transgression of an humane Law Ergo the Transgression of a particular Law of Rulers is sin The Proposition is confirmed by grave School-men Soto Sylvester and Ioan Eselius Who thinke that there cannot be a Law obliging to a punishment and not to a fault because punishment hath an intrinsecall relation to a sin nor can it be a just punishment that is not proportioned to a sin for the Law saith That cometh not under damage which cometh not under fault Ans Though the Violation of the generall Law hurteth the Conscience it being against the fifth Commandment it followeth not that the Violation of every particular Law even that that is meerly Positive hurteth the Conscience before God For then the carrying of Armour in the Night Suppose no Ruler on earth make a Law there anent should be a sin before God which no wise man can say 2. The other reason is more important and draweth with it that School-question agitated by Iurists also and Ganonists An ulla detur lox pure paenalis If there be a Law purely Penall without sin in it And if the Law of Rulers in things meerly Positive be meerly Penall and co-active and not formally obliging to sin But I Answer Rulers do justly punish the Transgression of a Positive Law not as particularly humane and Positive But as 1. It hath connexion with the Morall Reason of the Law 2. As the particular transgression is scandalous
and against order in which case the formall object of the just punishment inflicted by the Ruler is in very deed not the simple omission of the positive act of a particular humane Law but the violation of the morall goodnesse annexed to it and of the scandall given Now in this meaning the transgression of the positive humane Law is not kindely Per se of it self punishable but by accident and so it bindeth the conscience by accident And in this sense great Doctors as Ambrose Anselme Theodoret Chrysostom Navarra Felinus Taraquel say That humane Laws oblige the conscience But the most learned of the Canonists aver that not to obey civill Laws laying aside the evil of scandall is no mortall sin and so doth not involve the conscience in guiltinesse before God 2. They object To resist the Laws of the Magistrate is to resist himself and to resist himself is to resist the Ordinance of God Ans To resist the Laws positive and particular in connexion with the morall reason of the Law is to resist the Ruler true But so the question is not concluded against us for by accident in that sense humane Laws binde the conscience but to resist the particular Laws as particular Laws as particular positive Laws is not to resist the Ruler A Ruler as a Ruler doth never command a thing meerly indifferent as such but as good edificative profitable and except you resist the morality of the positive humane Law you resist not the Ruler yea nor yet is the Law resisted 3. The Iesuit Lod. Meratius objecteth Every true Law obligeth either to guiltinesse or to punishment but the civill and Canonick Laws are Laws properly so called But they do not ever oblige to punishment only Ergo They oblige to sin Ans It is denied that Laws civill or Canonicall as meerly particularly positive do oblige as Laws or that they are Laws they be only Laws according to the morality in them that can promove us to our last end eternall felicity It is also false that the Iesuit saith If thou wilt be saved keep the Commandments doth command the keeping of all Civill and Canonick Laws or that hence is concluded a Law obliging the conscience that is humane and positive as if a Lent Fast a Pilgrimage and not carrying Armour in the night were commanded by Christ as necessary to life eternall The same Meratius striveth to answer the Argument of Almain and Gerson which is this Who ever can oblige to sin mortall before God he can inflict eternall punishment but no mortall man can inflict eternall punishment 1. Saith he This Argument would prove sins against the Law of nature as homicide and adultery not to be deadly sins for by the Law of nature eternall punishment is not inflicted for sins against the Law of nature but by the positive will of God If any say God is the author of the Law of nature because he is the Creator of that humane nature in the which this law is written So if that be sufficient that the law of nature oblige under eternall punishment so also the civill and Ecclesiasticall lavv shall binde the conscience because he is the author of that power which maketh Civill and Ecclesiastick laws for there is no power but it is of God Ans 1. By the Law of nature sins against the Law of nature deserve eternall punishment and that essentially laying aside the positive will of God to whom I grant it is free to inflict punishment or not to inflict and this agreeth to all sin But to carry Armour in the night laying aside the case of scandall and the morality thereof that no murther follow thereupon deserveth neither temporall nor eternall punishment And if this Argument of the Iesuits hold good no mortall sin shall oblige to eternall punishment because Gods positive will is the nearest cause of actuall punishment eternall in all sins 2. God is not the Author of a propper noâ—othetick power in man for that is the question 2. He answereth Distinguishing the Proposition None can oblige to a mortall sin but he who can inflict the eternall punishment of a mortall sin It is true saith he of the punishment which wholly dependeth upon the will of the judge who made the Law but it is not true of that punishment which no way dependeth upon the will of the Iudge such as is eternall punishment excommunication dependeth upon the vvill of man and it obligeth to eternall punishment yet man cannot inflict that eternall punishment for a man may command an act the omission whereof or the commission whereof is of such moment that it serveth much for the good of a community and therefore he vvho of knowledge and vvillingly doth such an act doth sin against right reason and so against the eternall lavv of God Ans 1. The distinction of the Jesuit is but a begging of the question He vvho can oblige to mortall sin by his Lavv can also oblige to eternall punishment if eternall punishment depend vvholly on his free vvill as the Lavv doth What is that but the inflicting of eternal punishment belongeth to him who maketh a Law obliging to sin mortal so being the inflicting of eternall punishment belong to him But our Argument is he who hath dominion and authority to make a Law hath dominion and authority to inflict a punishment answerable to the transgression of that Law for it is one dominion and power to make the Law and to inflict the penalty of the Law Man cannot make the penalty of eternall wrath Ergo he cannot make a Law obliging to eternall wrath 2. Excommunication is not done by mans will but by the power of the keys for a mortall sin deserving excommunication and so eternall wrath If any Excommunicate upon his sole will as wicked Popes have done in that case the will of a man obligeth neither to punishment nor to eternall punishment it is but Brutum Fulmen and not to be feared 3. If any Commit an act that hurteth a whole Community and is forbidden by men in Authority he sinneth against the Law of God though men had never forbidden that Act And we deny not but humane Laws agreeing with the Law of Nature doth oblige the Conscience both to sin and eternall punishment but then they are not humane Laws but Divine Laws and in that case two guiltinesses Duo reatus are Committed one against the fifth Commandment in doing what Superiors according to Gods Word forbiddeth and there is another guiltinesse against the matter it self and a Divine Law which also should stand as a sin before God thought the Ruler had never forbidden it But if any carry Armour in the Night being forbidden by the Iudge for eschewing of night homicide if no homicide follow at all and the matter be not known and so not scandalous the carrier of Armour is involved in no guiltinesse before God CAP. III. Of the power of the
spake nothing from his Father either in his own person or his Apostles in the New-Testament or in the old by Moses and the Prophets of invocation of Saints Purgatory Worshipping of Images and Reliques and the rest of their unwritten Traditions these being positives of worship and more then unseparable and connaturall attendants such as are common Time Place Person Name Country Habite Gesture are therefore unlawfull because Christ neither heard them of the Father nor spake them to the Apostles and just the like say we of Surplice Crosse c. That they are no part of the will of God which the Father revealed to Christ and these same Texts Papists use to prove that the Scriptures are not perfect because they speak nothing of the Traditions of the Church so Bellarmine Because the Counsell of Trent Andradius Stapleton and all the rest and they prove as well if Crosse and Surplice and humane Offices as Prelates stand good and lawfull that yet the Scriptures are unperfect 3. We say that the whole will of God revealed by the Father to Christ and by Christ to the Prophets and Apostles requireth the immutability of all Laws of Church-Policy in this sence that men should not dare to make and unmake erect command alter and injoyne positive Laws of doctrine or policy at their pleasure Hooker ibid. p. 113. There is more reason to say that God hath a lesse care of the Church under the New-Testament then under the Old then a Philosopher had to say because God hath provided better for beasts that are born with hornes skins hair and garments by nature then man who is born without these that therefore nature is a carefull mother to beasts and a hard-hearted Step-dame to man for Gods affection consisteth not in these for even herein shineth his wisdom that though the wayes of his providence be many yet the end which he bringeth all at the length unto is one and the self same yea it should follow that because God hath not prescribed Rites and Laws of civill Policy to us as to the Iews that he hath lesse love to us and lesse care of our Temporall estate in the world then of theirs Ans 1. It s true indeed God should have lesse care of man who is born naked then of beasts born with hair in lieu of garments if God had not given reason to man according to which by nature he may provide garments for himself and the comparison should go aptly on four feet God should have lesse love and should declare lesse love to some of mankinde if he gave some naturall reason to devise a Bible and a Religion of their own that they might walk to heaven in the light of a fire of their own kindling without the Scriptures of God which is a false supposition and if he had denied reason to another part of mankinde surely all would say God had so far forth been more carefull of the salvation of the former as he should have willed their salvation and loved those in a higher measure to whom he gave reason on these termes and should have been lesse carefull of the salvation of those to whom he denied reason as he he had no more created such capable of salvation and of his love for the saving of them then brute beasts are and this answer layeth down a ground that naturall reason is sufficient without the light of Scripture to guide us in all these things of policy that are alterable then say I God did take a great deal of needlesse and superfluous pains in setting down so many particular Laws of Ceremonies and Civill Policy for the Iews if with the help of reason they might have steerd their course to Christ and salvation by the help of the star light of reason as a man though born naked may by help of reason make shift for garments to infants which beasts void of reason cannot do for thus the comparison must run and it shall be indeed a cavilling at Gods wisdom as Papists do calling the Scriptures inky Divinity 2. The word of God maketh it a great love of God and a work of Free grace that the great things of Gods Law are written to Ephraim Hos 8. 12. And their sin the greater that they should dare to multiply Altars v. 11. without warrant of Gods word as Formalists multiplied Altars Saints-dayes Surplices c. And it is an act of singular love that God gave his judgements Word and Statutes even of Ceremonies and policy to Israel and Iacob and did not so to every Nation Psal 149. 19 20. Ezek. 20. 11 12 13. This was Israels excellency above all Nations on earth Deut. 4. 6. Deut. 20. 33. Rom. 3. 1 2. Rom. 9. 4. that God gave them particular Lawes Iudgements Statutes not only in Morals but also in Ceremonials and Policy yet Hooker dare say We may not measure the affection of God towards us by such differences 3. It shall not hence follow God hath a greater love to the Iews then to us because he gave them Laws concerning civill policy which he gave not to us Except the Lord had given us power to make civill Laws which laid Morall obligation on our consciences even in civill things which morality He expressed in particular Laws written to them and not to us as Formalists teach for then he hath left us in Moralls to the darknesse of naturall reason in which condition we could not but erre and sin and make that morally good and obligatory of conscience which is morally evil for reason knoweth not what is positive Morally good except the light of Gods Word teach us and in Morals such as judiciall Laws were to the Jews the Lord should have been more carefull in his particular directing of them then of us and more tender to have them preserved from the sin of will-worship then us which cannot consist with the Dispensation of lesse light greater obscurity in regard of types and shadows toward them and of the Day-light of the Gospel and the arising of the Day-star and the filling of the earth with knowledge of the Lord toward us under the New Testament But the comparison must go upon this supposition that the Lord purposed to make Politick Laws in their Positives Morall and Obligatory of the Conscience of the Jews and the Civill Laws of the Gentiles under the New Testament in their Positives such as is not to carry Armour in the night and the like not to be Morall nor Obligatory of the Conscience But as touching that which is Morall in all Civill Laws the Lord is as carefull of our Temporall state as of theirs in condescending to particularize all Morals to us as well as to them Hooker That Christ did not mean to set down particular Positive Laws for all things in such sort as Moses did the very different manner of delivering the Laws of Moses and the Laws of Christ doth plainly shew Moses had Commandement to
a lege aeternâ as they depend on the eternall law Ergo they oblige in Conscience it followeth not They oblige in Conscience as their Major and Minor proposition in that which is morall can be proved out of Gods word but so in their morallity they are meerely divine and not humane and positive and so the argument concludeth not against us They oblige in Conscience as they depend upon the eternall law that is as they are deduced from the eternall Law of God in a Major proposition without probation of the assumption that we deny and it is in question now The people 1 Sam. 8. in rejecting Samuel from being their judge rejected God not because Samuel had a power of making lawes without the warrant of Gods word Neither Moses nor Jeremiah nor Ezekiel nor any Prophet were in that servants subordinate to God for they vvere onely to heare the vvord at Gods mouth 3. We could have no more at Bellarmines hand then Jackson saith For Bellarmine saith In a good sense Christ gave to Peter a power to make that which is sinne to be no sin and that which is no sinne to be sinne So Iackson the interposition of derived authority maketh that which would be murther other wayes to bee a good worke that is men may doe what God onely can doe If Isaac then at the commandement of Abraham his father offer his sonne Iacob to God in a bloody Sacrifice then Abrahams derived authority maketh that a lawfull sacrifice as to strike a Prophet of it selfe is a degree of murther but when a Prophet commandeth another to strike a Prophet it is lawfull But can any blasphemer say that this was humane derived authority without warrant of the word of the Lord such as are humane positive lawes and our humane ceremonies see the text 1 King 20. 35. And a certaine man of the sonnes of the Prophets said unto his neighbour in the word of the Lord smite me This was immediate divine and Propheticall authoritie and not humane Doth the Kings letter of Mart make robbing a Spaniard lawfull Court Parasites speake so he refuteth himselfe The Kings letter of Mart for wrongs done to the State maketh that which is Piracy lawfull then the Kings authority doth not here by a nomothetick power and a law laid upon the Conscience but the wrongs of Piracy by Spaine done to the State of England may make the robbing of Spaniards an act of lawfull warre and an act of justice flowing from the King as a lawfull Magistrate Now Iackson is speaking of mandates of Rulers in that place which have no warrant of the word of God Yea even Stapleton a Papist saith as Doctor Field also observeth That humane laws binde for the utility and neoessity of the matter and not from the will of the Lawgiver And so saith Gerson Almain Decius Mencha and our owne Iunius saith The plenitude of power of lawes is onely in the princpall agent not in the instrument Doctor Iackson saith unlimited and absolute faith or submission of conscience we owe not to rulers that is due to God but we owe to them conditionall assent and cautionary obedience if they speake from God suppose they fetch not an expresse commission from Scripture for if Pastors be then onely to be obeyed when they bring evident commission out of Scripture I were no more bound to beleeve obey my governours then they are bound to beleeve and obey in Bellarm. contr 3. lih 4. cap. 6. not 89. my Governours then ther are bound to believe and obey me for equals are oblieged to obey equalls when they bring a warrant from Gods word and so the povver of Rulers vvere not reall but titular and the same do th Sutluvius and Bellarmine say Answ We owe to equalls to Mahomet conditionall and cautionary faith and obedience thus I beleeve what Mahomet saith so he speake Gods word yea so Samaritans who worshipped they knew not what John 4. 26. gave saith to their Teachers in a blinde way so they speake according to Gods word 2. It followeth in no sort if Rulers are onely to be obeyed when they bring Gods Word that then they are no more to be obeyed then equalls Infetiours because there is a double obedience one of conscience and objective coming from the thing commanded And in respect of this the word hath no lesse authority and doth no lesse challenge obedience of Confcience and objective when my equall speaketh it in a private way yea when I writ it in my muse then when a Pastor speaketh it by publike authority for we teach against Papists that the word borroweth â—o authority from men nor is it with certainty of faith to be received as the Word of man but as indeed the Word of God as the Scripture saith 1. There is another obedience officiall which is also obedience of Conscience because the fifth Commandement injoyneth it Yet not obedience of Conscience coming from the particular commanded in humane Lawes as humane so I owe obedience of subjection and submission of affection of feare love honour respect by vertue of the fift Commandement to Rulers when they command according to Gods Word and this I owe not to equals or inferiours and so it followeth not that the power of Rulers and Synods is titular because they must warrant their mandates from the Word But it s alwayes this mans hap to be against sound truth But 3. That I owe no more objective subjection of conscience to this Thou shalt not murther Beleeve in Iesus Christ when Rulers and Pastors command them then when I read them in Gods word I prove 1. If this from a Ruler Thou shalt not murther challenge faith and subjection of Conscience of six degrees but as I read it my selfe or as my equall in a private way saith Thou shalt not murther it challenge saith and subjection of foure degrees onely then is it more obligatory of Conscience and so of more intrinsecall authority and so more the word of God when the Ruler commandeth it then when I read it or my equall speaketh it to me This were absurd for the speaker whether publike or private person addeth not any intrinsecall authority to the word for then the word should be more or lesse Gods word as the bearers were publike or private more or lesse worthy As Gods word spoken by Amos a Prophet should not be a word of such intrinfecall authority as spoken by Moses both a Prince and a Prophet 2. My faith of subjection of Conscience should be resolved as concerning the two degrees of obedience of faith to the word spoken by the Ruler on the sole authority of the Ruler and not on the authority of God the Author of his own word 4. I answer to Sutluvius That Christ in the externall policy of his owne house is a Lawgiver ordaining such and such officers himselfe Ezek. 4. 11. commanding order and decency
Circumcision did typifie much naturall and originall heart corruption which cannot be punished by men or the Church but it followes not because Legall uncleannesse signifieth some other uncleannesse then that which is scandalous and censurable by the Church Ergo it signifieth not sinnes scandalous and censurable by the Church Erastus He that was legally unclean a long time or all his life as a Leper was not esteemed as no Iew or uncircumcised or a damned man he was to keepe the Sabbath yea none unclean were excluded from the Sacrament of the generall expiation in the 10. Moneth Lev. 16. and 23. Yea every soul under the pain of cutting off was to afflict his soule that day then the Lepers were not as Heathen and Publicans and condemned men yea the Magistrate could not punish a man for Leprosie Ans This is a poor argument because Ceremoniall Excommunication differeth from Christian Excommunication Ergo the former is not a type of the latter it followeth not Isaacs blood was never really shed Christ was really crucified Isaac was not mocked spitted on did not wear a crown of Thornes Iews and Gentiles crucified him not between two Theevs Ergo Isaac was no figure of Christ offered for our sins it followeth not 2. Nor are Lepers no Iews but in some respect they might no more come to the Temple 2. Nor amongst the people of God nor 3. Eate the Passeover then Heathens might doe and so are the Excommunicated with uâ— they are not exempted from faith repenting afflicting their soule for the sinnes of the Land nor are they eternally damned so they repent But Erastus hath no ground to say because the unclean were to afflict their soules and abstaine from servile worke in the day of atonement as our Excommunicants are not loosed from the duties of the ten Commandements wholly but from some publike Church duties but I see not how it followes Ergo The uncleane were to come to the holy convocation in the day of expiation and to observe the publike solemnities with Gods people One Law of God is not contradicent to another and the Leper and unclean were separated Ergo God could not tie them to be mingled with his people 3. The Leper was not punished by the Magistrate for he suffered onely for his Leprosie But it followeth not that the Magistrate should not punish a person obstinate to the Church Erastus When some uncleane persons were debarred from the Tabernacle and sacrifices many wickedmen were admitted Ergo. Moses both commanded men at the same time to come to the holy things and not to come Answ Moses bade the unclean come he bade all clean so they were not scandalously and openly wicked come and some came that were not bidden but rebuked for their coming as Ier. 7. 8. 9. Psal 50. 15. Here is no contradiction Erastus There be no figures of things present but of things to come morall uncleannesse was present at least there be no figures of things that incurre in the senses as theft and homicide Ans Circumcision the Lords Supper are signes and Symbols of things present as of Originall sinne our present union with Christ and communion of love amongst our selves Col. 2. 11. 1 Cor. 10. 16 17 18. 2. Scandals as they are spirituall wickednes incurre not in our senses yet other wayes they are visible 3. Christs dying was both tyipfied to Iohn the Apostle and Mary and his death incurred in their senses they saw him die So was Christ raised from the dead typified by Ionas in the belly of the Whale and with their eyes they saw him after he rose againe Erastus Houses cloaths trees stones were capable of legall uncleannes men onely of Morall Legall uncleannes is a qualitie wickednes morall is in actions Ans I am ashamed and wearied to put in Paper such childish things all this will not prove that Legall uncleannes is no type of Morall uncleannes Isaac was but a man Moses a man onely Ergo they cannot be Types of Christ who is more then a man Bread and Wine are some other thing then Christ then cannot these be symbols of Christ and our spirituall communion with him I see nothing here but a challenging of Gods wisedome who hath chosen leprosie bodily to figure out sinnes spirituall Leprosie Erastus will say not so Leprosie is in the category of quality and sinfull actions in the category of actions Erastus Legall uncleannes signifieth naturall corruption not scandals Ans Yea but Leprosie and other uncleannes legall was contagious and infectious and did relate to wicked actions that infect as a canker sin originall being common to all is not that contagious from one to many nor did the Lord ever command Separation for sinne Originall but for transgression of Ceremoniall Lawes he did Erastus The Ceremoniall uncleannes does typifie the justification and washing of a sinner in Christs blood because no unclean thing can enter in the New Ierusalem and so the Scripture Rev. 21. Esa 4â— Ioel 3. Acts 15. And it shadowes out no such thing as Excommunication out of the Church Ans All the arguments that Erastusmade to prove that legall separation and uncleannes proveth not Excommunication and Morall uncleannes will with the same force conclude that Legall uncleannes is not that which excludes men out of heaven As for instance to begin with the last Legall uncleannesse signifieth sinne originall not wicked actions therefore it signifieth not scandals then by this Legall uncleannes that caused legall separation is signified mens exclusion out of the high Jerusalem for onely sinne Originall not for actuall sins This type must be a lying type for actuall sins especially debaâ—res us out of the New Jerusalem Rev. 21. 8. c. 22. 15. 1 Cor. 6. 9. 2. Legall uncleannes and corruption of nature differ as much as legall uncleannes and actuall wickednesse But Erastus said the former cannot typifie the latter 1. Because Legall uncleannes is often involuntary 2. It is not universally forbidden 3. Many godly men may be legally unclean but actuall morall wickednesse is not so even so say I. 1. All naturall or originall uncleannes is voluntary in Adam 2. Is universally forbidden 3. It cannot consist with that holines which we must have or we cannot see God 3. By Erastus his fourth difference legall uncleannes was otherwise punished then naturall corruption for naturall corruption is punished with the first and second death Ephes 2. 2. Rom. 5. 15 16. the like may be said of all the rest 4. Numb 12. 14. Shame was unseparably annexed to Leprosie with contagion so leavening of others and shame is annexed to â—oul scandals and annexed to casting out of the Church 1 Cor. 5 6 7. 2 Thes 3. 14. Gal. 5. 9 10. But though a necessity of washing may be holden forth to us in Legall uncleannes ere we enter into Heaven yet not so directly as in legall separation for in it men scandalous are excluded out of the church least the uncleane
the Church though amongst the Turkes is in the world but not of the world If he keep the faith and if he do so he shall repent and come home to Christs visible Kingdom but because he keepeth the faith yet he is not a member of a visible Church except he professe it and repent for even the sound in faith if obstinate in Scandals may deserve Excommunication 6. There is nothing said against Excommunication in the two last Reasons but what striketh against Timothy his publike rebuking and threatning wrath against those that sin openly for they may through their owne corruption so farre abuse publike threatnings as they may be led on despaire and hypocrisie Now Erastus as we shall hear granteth those are to be rebuked openly who sin openly 7. We say not to deliver to Satan any man is to deliver him to the World but to cast him out of the Church that consequenter he may be left to the World but that he should sinne and be led away with the World is neither the intrinsecall end of Excommunication or of the Church but an event or end by accident the intrinsecall end is the Salvation of the man Beza saith that Paul speaketh of a spirituall punishment and not of a corporall Erastus saith When Peter killed Ananias corporally was not this corporall punishment When Paul gave some to Satan for the destruction of the flesh and God punisheth our sinnes with temporall death how shall you prove that God and the Apostles punisheth not sinnes with corporall or politicke punishment Ans The instance of Peters killing Ananias is in vain brought in It s but a begging os the question for it is not said Peter delivered Ananias to Satan that his Spirit might be saved Who revealed this secret to Erastus that Peter used the Ministery of Satan in killing Ananias We have as good reason to say Peter delivered Ananias to a good Angell to be killed as Erastus hath for his dreame 2. We deny not but God and the Apostles did punish sinne with corporall punishment but let him show without the bounds of the place in controversie for we must expound Scripture by Scripture where ever the Church conveened together in the Name of the Lord Jesus did judge and miraculously kill any member of the Church that the Spirit may be saved in the day of God Beza said This killing by the people would be ground of a great Calumnie to make many say Christians did usurpe the Sword of the Magistrate and that they were not subject to the Magistrate Erastus We give this power of miraculous killing onely to the Apostles Ans Yea But the calumny standeth so long as Erastus giveth to all the people the faith of Miracles to conveene and pray that Paul might miraculously kill those that offended the Church and its probable when the enemies objected to Christians all they could falsely they would not have omitted this that the very people by their prayers meet in one Church-jury to kill Cesars Subjects Beza said The Christian Magistrate should by this kill all the drunkards fornicators and the like with the Sword Erastus answereth 1. All faults deserve not killing but some other punishment of a lower degree 2. The Lord himselfe appointed that the Magistrate should compell men to doe their duty why then should Beza speake against God and call this a compelling of men to be Hipocrites Ans If other sins as drunkennesse fornication extortion doe infect the Church and be scandalous to the very Gentiles as the Apostle saith of incest 1 Cor. 5. 1. 6 7. Upon the same reason Paul should have rebuked them because they did not from the faith of Miracles pray that Paul might inflict some miraculous judgement by the Ministery of Satan though lesse then death for other sinnes But I pray you Paul had either a warrant from God to kill this man or he had none at all If he had a warrant why did he not that which is the part of a miraculous Magistrate without the prayers of the Corinthians Did Paul chide them because they prayed not to God that he might doe his duty if he had no warrant at all Why should he chide the Corinthians for that they prayed not that he might doe a duty which was not his duty For that is not Pauls duty for the doing whereof he hath no warrant from God if it was his duty onely conditionally 1. What warrant is there in Scripture to say Paul should have miraculously killed the incestuous person upon condition that the Corinthians had by the faith of Miracles prayed that he might worke that miraculous slaughter which because they did not Paul was either exonered of that as no duty or then Paul chided them because they prayed not to prevene Pauls sinfull neglect 2. How was this revealed to the Corinthians that they should pray that God by Paul as by his Magistrate might revenge this incest and not revenge their fronication coveteousnes extortion Idolatry especially seeing he saith that v. 9. He had written to them in another Epistle not to keâ—p company with such Whence I thinke it evident that Paul in another Epistle had ordained separation of Fornicators Coveteous persons and the like from amongst them and so censures for all scandalous persons And how shal we believe he would not teach them to cast out incestuous persons that are far more scandalous And if so he must have written in another Epistle of this miracle that they were to pray he might work Is it not evident by this that Erastus his way is full of Conjectures and groundlesse uncertainties 2. We deny not that the Magistrate may compell men to do their duty nor doth Beza deny that But that the Church hath or had any influence in the blood of an incestuous person and in working of miracles for the bodily destruction of any is most false and cannot be proved by this Text Nor do we think that the Church the weapons of whose warfare are carnall can compell any man by corporall punishment to duties by the Sword for so their Spirituall way which is terminated on the Conscience should lead men to Hypocrisie in profession of the truth for so reasoneth Erastus the Magistrate with the Sword rather punisheth sins committed in Gods Service then forceth to duties The fifth Argument of Beza is vindicated already Erastus We say not that Paul was to deliver the man to Satan that he may be saved but that Paul was to punish this high transgression with the Sword to the terror of others but only he set bounds to Satan that he should only kill his body but not meddle with his soul but because the man repented Paul hoped well of his soul that his soul should be saved in the day of Christ Ans 1. Here Erastus doth more fully reveal the vilenesse of his opinion for he granteth the intrinsecall end of this miraculous killing is not the Salvation of the mans
in the second table Rom. 13. 3 4. Isai 49 23. and you said elsewhere that externall peace is too narrow an object for the Magistrate for the intrinsecall end of a Magistrate is also a supernaturall good and not only a peaceable but also a godly life 1 Tim. 2. 2. Ans It is true the Magistrate as the Magistrate doth care for the supernaturall good of subjects and the duties of Religion and the first table but how intrinsecally and as a magistrate that is that men worship God according to his word But 1. The magistrate as such hath nothing to do with the spirit nor can he command the sincerity of the worship his care is that there be a divine worship that is materially and externally right and consonant externally to the rules of the word and for this cause learned divines make the externall man the object of the magistrates office but not the externall man as doing the duties of the second table only but also as serving God in the duties of the first table for which cause I said Augustine meant the same when he said that Kings serve God as men and as Kings 2. Magistrates as magistrates are to extend their power for Christ that is that not only there be Iustice and Peace amongst men but also that there be Religion in the land yea that the Gospel be preached so all our Divines make the King to be custos â—t vindex utriusque tabule Yea I think he is a keeper and preserver of the Gospel also and is to command men to serve Christ and professe the Gospel and to punish the blaspheming of Iesus Christ and this is royall and magistraticall service that the King as King performeth to God and to Iesus Christ the mediator ex conditione operis in regard that good which he procureth as King materially and externally is consonant to the supernaturall Law of the Gospel but it is not magistraticall service to Christ ex intentione operantis Obj. 4. When it s required that the Magistrates be men fearing God hating coveteousnesse c. is not this an essentiall ingredient of an King as a King that he read in the book of the Law that he may feare God Deut. 17 Ans There is a twofold goodnesse here to be considered one of the magistrate as a magistrate another as a good and Christian magistrate The former is an officiall goodnesse or a magistraticall prudence justice and goodnesse this is required of all magistrates as such to judge the people so the acts of an heathen magistrate done according to common naturall equity by Nebuchadnezzar Pilate Cesar Felix Festus are to be acknowledged as acts of a Lawfull Magistrate valide and no lesse essentially Magistraticall then if performed by King David and of this goodnesse the Scriptures speak not as essentiall to a Magistrate as a Magistrate But there is another goodnesse required of Magistrates as they are Members of the Iewish Church and as they are Christians and of these the Scripture speaketh and so Magistrates not as Magistrates but as good and Christian are to be such as feare God hate covetousnesse respect not the face and favour of men so it s denied that the fear of God hating of covteousnesse are essentiall ingredients of Kings as Kings For Kings as Kings intend justice peace godlinesse materially considered both ex conditione operis and operantium But for justice and righteous judgement in a spirituall and an Evangelick way that belongeth not to the essence of a Magistrate nec ex conditione seu ex intentione operis nec ex conditione operantis The Holy Ghost requireth it of judges as they would approve themselves as truly Holy and Religious and would be accepted of God and in this sense Kings as Kings do not serve God nor the mediator Christ nor yet as men only they serve God and the mediator Christ as Christian Kings or as Christian men rather III. According to that third member of our seventh Distinction The unjust and evil exercise of the Ministeriall power is obnoxious to the magistrate as the magistrate thus in that he beareth the sword against all evil doers Ro. 13. 1. The magistrate as the magistrate doth only command well doing in order to praise and a good name or temporall reward amongst men Rom. 13. 3. Do that which is good and thou shalt have praise of the power 1 Tim. 5. 17. Matth. 10. 10. Nor can the magistrate as the magistrate promise or command the Elders to feed the Flock with the promise of the reward that Peter promiseth 1 Pet. 5. 4. to wit That when the chief shepheard shall appear they shall receive a Crown of glory that fadeth not away The magistrate as a Preacher if he be one as David and Solomon were both or as a godly religious Christian man may hold forth such a promise but not as a Magistrate and upon the same ground the Magistrate as the Magistrate cannot forbid careles unsound preaching and rigorous and tyrannicall ruling or rather domineering over the Flock under the pain of death eternall for he can but kill the body and hath but the carnall and temporall sword Rom. 13. 4. and so he can inhibite ill doing only in order to temporary punishment and though the duty of the former be spirituall and the sinne of the latter also yet the externall man is capable only of the Magistrates promises and threatnings as they respect evill or good temporary so that it is a wonder to me that M. Pryn or any learned man can say that magistrates can make Lawes to binde the conscience sure it is ill divinity 2. If there never had been sin there should have been no government but of Fathers and Husbands there should have been no magistraticall dominion not any magistraticall allurement to weldoing by temporall rewards not any terrifying from evill doing from fear of the sword death stripes or bands and God governed the Apostolick Church and they attained the Crowne and supernaturall end of life eternall without the accessory hire of a a temporary reward from the magistrate and the subsidy of his sword Ergo it is evident that the magistrate is neither an essentiall nor an integrall part of the visible Church as the visible Church injoying all the Ordinances of God Word Sacraments Discipline Censures Rebukes Admonition Excommunication Prayers Mutuall edification in as great perfection as is happily attainable in this life without yea against the will of the civill magistrate Though it be a great incouragement to have the King a Nurse-father yet hath not Christ counted it simply necessary to his visible Church injoying all the Ordinances of God to the full 3. If the magistrate do only command the teachers and Pastors to preach and determine synodically in order to a temporall reward and forbid them to abuse their ministeriall power in order to temporary punishment by the temporary sword then surely the Pastors and Teachers are
to be vertue But much good doe it you Masters of Arts. Yet Bellarmine in his recognitions saith not so much of his great Pope-Prelate as you say of your little Prelates for he will not give the foresaid power to the Pope but in doubtsome acts and in acts of positive lawes about fasting you give to Prelates more to wit that their commanding will may make sinnes forbidden in the law of nature to be not imputed as the matter of our guiltinesse and to be no sinnes We cannot want dispensations and indulgences at home ere it be long if happily we pay well for them Yet Bernard will not have the Popes commandement to make that which is simply evill to be lawfull The Popes pleasure make not things good saith Tolet yea a subject saith Alphonsus dâ—â—â—astro may without sinne contemne the law of his Superiour judging it to be evill and contrary to reason But I reason thus It is the incommunicable power of the Supreame Law giver to make the killing of Isaac which otherwayes would have been imputed to Abraham as a matter of guiltinesse and crueltie to be no sinne Ergo Prelates have not power to make an act of soul murther to be no sinne to scandalize a weake brother is to destroy him for whom Christ died Rom. 14. v. 15. 1 Cor. 8. v. 11. yea and by the same law Rulers may make an act of Adulterie an act of Chastitie an act of lying an act of truth speaking 2. If Rulers even the Apostle Paul be tyed by the law of Nature to Charitie to their brethren as Rom. 14. 15. Not to stay him for whom Christ died not to seâ—ke their owne things but the good of their brethren 1 Cor. 10. 24. Not to eat things sacrificed to idols before the weake v. 29. To doe all for the glory of God v. 32. Then is it sinne in the Ruler himselfe to scandalize the weake Ergo Rulers cannot command to others that as obedience which they cannot doe themselves without prodigious disobedience to God What Paul forbiddeth in Canonical Scripture as murther that he cannot command in Church Canons as obedience Canonicall to Superiours 3. Prelates shall have immediate Dominion over our consciences to bind us to obedience by doing acts that otherwise should be imputed to â—s as the matter of our guiltinesse and because the same power that bindeth the conscience may also loose so they may dispense with all the ten Commandements and coyne to us a new Decalogue and a new Gospell They may legitimate murthers paricides and illegitimate Godlinesse and rightâ—â—â—snesse and sobriâ—tiâ— by this Divinitie 4. That must be false It is better to obey God nor man Act. 5. but to abstaine from scandalizing a weake brother is an act of obedience to the sixt Commandement Ergo the contrary cannot be done at the command of Prelates 6. Gods positive lawes yeildeth Thou shalt not kill to wit to the law of nature David may eat shew bread when he is famishing Ergo the Prelates law farre more must yeild to the sixt Commandement thou shalt not scandalizâ— nor kill the soule of him for whom Christ died 7. Rulers must all be infallible law-makers 8. Rulers might command bodilie murther and it should not be murther they may command to digge pitts in the way of Travellers To marry with Infidelâ— to send abroad a goaring Ox to give knives to little children They object A Master a father may command a servant and a son to do that which if the servant or son refuse to do their disobedience scandalizeth And again a Master a Father may command the contrary and if they disobey they scandalizâ— culpably Erg. The commanding will of a Master and a Father and farre more of publick Rulers may make that to be active scandall which is no active scandall A Carpenter may command his servant to remove a tree from the East end of his house to the West end and againe he may for his sole will to try his servants obedience command him to remove it againe to the East end of his house Answer 1. The Master Father Carpenter command either these things as artificiall agents from reason of art and then the question is not touched for in scandalls men are considered as morall agents or they command them as morall agents and that either for their sole will and pleasure and so they be idle and unreasonable actions and cannot be lawfull commandements and so are they scandalous both to Commanders and obeyers but they may well command upon just reasons that which if servants and sonnes obey not they give Scandall and they may command the contrary of that same at another time when now contrary reasons maketh it lawfull and expedient and if servants and sonnes obey not the contrary they also give Scandall but here the change is not from the will and authoritie of the Commanders but from the things themselves which are changed so that which is an active scandall at some time the contrary of it may be an active scandall at another time as in the ease Rom. 14. To eat meats before the weake which they conceive to be forbidden by Gods law is to slay him for whom Christ died and an active scandall because then the Ceremonies were mortall and indifferent nothing essentially constituteth an active and a given scandall but these two 1. That it may be left undone as the author of the course of conformitie saith well out of Hieronimus Without hurting of the truth of a sound life and a sound faith and righteousnesse 2. If upon the practice of a thing indifferent and not necessarie any of the foresaid three wayes we see some shall be scandalized though they take scandall upon an unjust ground it is an active scandall as to eat such meats before the weake Rom. 14. is in another time and case as Galat. 2. when the Ceremonies are now deadly and upon just reasons not necessarie the practising I say of the same is an active scandall and so if any be scandalized at the eating Rom. 14. it is scandall both taken and also culpably given and if any be scandalized at the not eating as the case is Galat. 2. That is only a passive scandall and so not given because the times of the expyring of the dutie of Ceremonies and the full promulgation of the Gospell varieth the case now and the sole will of Rulers maketh not the change So if any offer Incence to the Brazen Serpent so long as it hath vertue as Gods ordinance to cure the stinged persons he is scandalized by a passive scandall onely for Gods institution maketh it now the necessary ordinance of God And the Magistrates suffering of the Brazen Serpent to remaine now is no active scandall and the passive scandall is onely taken away by information and the sound exponing of the right use of a necessary ordinance of God But after that the Brazen Serpent loseth its vertue and
and such meats before a weake Iew for feare to scandalize him for whom Christ died But this later is untrue for by the law of nature and a perpetuall law Paul would never for meat offend his brother the law of naturall Charitie will dictate this to us without any positive mandate we are not for a mâ—â—thfull of meat the losse whereof is so small to put the soule of our brother to so incomparable a hazard as to be losed Ans These meats Rom. 14. and 1 Cor. 8. 10. were then indifferent but they are not so now when the Gospell is fully promulgate for we may not now to abstaine from Meats forbidden in the Ceremonial law for feare to offend a weake Iew for our abstinence should harden them in their â—â—beliefe that Christ is not yet come in the flesh To make Temples and houses dedicated to Saintâ— as indifferent now as meats were then and the argument were concludent But to demolish Churches and remove their physicall use now were as Iudaicall as to forbeare to eat Swines flesh We are not to deprive our selves of the physicall use of 〈…〉 of this or this meat as thinking we are bound by any law of God to forbeare the use thereof and especially we are not to doe it as conceiving we are under the tye of a law given to the Iewes whereas we are under no such tye or law at all But the disusing of Temples dedicated to Saints that the Adversaries plead for Deut. 7. is a totall renouncing of all use of them the places they alledge from the Ceremoniall law doth conclude it for the Temples silver and gold of the Idols of Canâ—an were altogether uselesse to Israel It was Achan's sinne that he tooke the Babilonish garment and the wedge of Gold for any use civill or religious though he should have bestowed these for any religious use or the reliefe of the poore and indigent yea though it was scandalous to none he having taken these privately and by theft yet the very taking of them was a curse to him and the whole Camp of Israel for the totall abandoning of all use whatsoever of these houses Gold and Silver which in themselves and by the law of Creation were physicall and in regard of that naturall use they had from their Creator to supply our necessitie can have its rise from no other totall and compleat cause but from the sole positive will of God discharging his people of the whole use of these creatures at all as if they had never been created for the use of man whether their use should be scandalous to others or not scandalous But by the law of nature which I grant saith Thou shalt not scandalize nor murther the soule of him for whom Christ hath died The Romans Rom. 14. and the Corinthians 1 Cor. 8 were forbidden the eating of fleshes forbidden in Moses law But with these two restrictions 1. they were forbidden not all eating of these meats in private but only in the presence of a weak Iew and for the conscience of others in the case of scandal 1 Cor 10 28 29. 2 They were not by the law of nature that inhibites scandall forbidden the totall use of these meats in any case so as they should make these meats utterly uselesse to themselves or to any others As the Iewes were forbidden to make use of the Canaanitish Idols Gold and money And of the Cattell of the Amalekites either secretly or openly either in the case of scandall given to others or not given And Achan payed deare for his Babilonish garment and his wedge of Gold though he tooke it by theft Ob. 2. But the reason of the law is the soule of the law Now the reason of the Law Deut. 7. 25. why God forbade his people to take the Gold or Silver of the graven image is lâ—st thou be ensnared therein But this reason holdeth under the Now Testament and is moral and perpetuall The very matâ—riall house dedicated to Saints and Idolâ— by Papists is a snare to our soules if we shall worship God in them or if we shall name the Church from Cutbert Giles or the like except we would say as Papists doe that we are not now under the New Testament so much â—â—clined to Idolatrie as the people of the Iewes were of old Ans The halfe-reason or incompleat morall ground of the law is not the soule of the law But you must take in all the reasons the words of the text are these Thou shalt not desire the silver and gold that is on them nor take it to thee lest thou be insnared therein for it is an abomination unto the Lord thy God v. 26. Neither shalt thou bring an abomination into thine house lest thou be a cursed thing like it Now what made that Gold an abomination to the Lord more then all the gold of the earth it is of it selfe the good and usefull creature of God no lesse then all the gold of the earth nothing made it an abomination to God but if we look to the originall cause there was a positive free command of God forbidding Israel to covet or use that Gold The Canaanites themselves by the law of nature might lawfully have melted that same very Gold and made use of it without sinne 2. It is not a good reason Such a law had a morâ—ll and perpetuall reason Ergo the law it selfe is perpetuall and morall It followeth only Ergo the moralitie of that law is perpetuall For all the Ceremoniall laws had a morall and perpetuall reason As the shadows had a moral substantiall ground in Christ the bodie of all shadowes but it doth not follow therefore the shadows and Ceremoniall law in the letter must bee perpetuall Very often in the booke of Leviticus there is no reason given of the Ceremoniall laws But be ye holy I am the Lord that sanctifies you This is a morall and perpetuall reason that endureth to the end of the world yet it is no due consequence therefore all these shadowes and Ceremonies shall indure to the end of the world The reason is because it is the sole positive will of God that maketh a temporarie concatenation between not eating blood and not being cruell and between sacrificing and being holy and yet not being cruel is perpetuall not eating blood temporarie 3 If things indifferent as the eating of flesh before a weak Jew Rom. 14. be a snare to my owne soule and to the soules of others I am to abstaine from these and the like But that I must abstaine from the totall use of any creature that God has made usefull for the life of man by the law of creation as Israel was to abstaine from the cattell of the Amalakites and to stamp in powder and make altogether uselesse the Gold and Silver of the heathen Idol-Gods is altogether unlawfull and a very Judaizing and it s to make as Paul saith Jesus Christ of no effect Object
observe Saints-dayes and believe Crossing and Surplice hath this Religious signification because the Church saith so then is our obedience of conscience finally resolved in the Testimony of men so speaking at their own discretion without any warrant of scripture 2. To believe and obey in any Religious Positives because it is the pleasure of men so to Command is to be servants of men and to make their will the formall reason of our obedience which is unlawfull If it be said that we are to believe and Practise many things in naturall necessity as to eat move sleep and many circumstantials of Church-Policy because the Law of naturall reason saith so and because there is an intrinsecall conveniency and an aptitude to edifie to decore and beautifie in an orderly and a decent way the service of God and not simply because the Church saith so nor yet because the Lord speaketh so in the Scripture and therefore all our obedience is not Ultimately and finally resolved into the Testimony of the Scripture I Answer That there be some things that the Law of Nature commandeth as to move eat sleepe and here with leave I distinguish Factum the common practise of men from the jus what men in conscience ought to do as concerning the former morall and naturall mens practise is all resolved in their own carnall will and lusts and so they eat move and sleep because nature and carnall will leadeth them thereinto not because God in the Law of nature which I humbly conceive to be a part of the first elements and principles of the Morall Law or Decalogue and so a part of Scripture doth so warrant us to do and therefore the moving eating drinking of naturall Moralists are materially lawfull and conforme to scripture for God by the Law of nature commandeth both Heathen men and pure Moralists within the visible Church to do naturall acts of this kinde because the Lord hath revealed that to be his will in the Book of nature But these Heathen do these acts because they are suitable to their Lusts and carnall will and not because God hath commanded them so to do in the Book of nature and this is their sin in the manner of doing though materially Et quod substantiam actus the action be good and the same is the sin of naturall men within the visible Church and a greater sin for God not only commandeth them in the Law of nature but also in Scripture to do all these naturall acts because God hath revealed his will in these naturall actions as they are morall to naturall men within the visible Church both in the Law of nature and in the scripture and De jure they ought to obey because God so commandeth in both and in regard all within the visible Church are obliged to all naturall actions in a spirituall way though their eating moving sleeping be lawfull materially Et quod substantiam actus yet because they do them without any the least habituall reference to God so commanding in natures Law and scripture they are in the manner of doing sinfull otherwise Formalists go on with Papists and Arminians to justifie the actions of the unregenerated as simply Lawfull and good though performed by them with no respect to God or his Commandment 2. As concerning actions of Church-Policy that cannot be warranted by the light of nature and yet have intrinsecall conveniency and aptitude to edifie and decently to Accomodate the worship of God I conceive these may be done but not because the Church so commandeth as if their commandment were the formall reason of our obedience but because partly the light of the Law of reason partly scripture doth warrant them but that Crosse and Surplice can be thus warranted is utterly denied Again I conceive that there be two sort of positives in the externals of Government or worship 1. Some Divine as that there be in the Publique Worship Prayers Praising Preaching Sacraments and these are substantials that there be such Officers Pastors Teachers Elders and Deacons that there be such censures as rebuking Excommunication and the like are morally Divine or Divinely Morall and when the Church formeth a Directory for worship and Government the Directory it self is in the Form not simply Divine And if it be said that neither the Church of the Jews nor the Church Apostolique had more a written Directory nor they had a written Leiturgy or book of Common Prayers or Publick Church-service I answer nor had either the Iewish or Apostolick Church any written Creed or systeme written of fundamentall Articles such as is that which is commonly called the Apostolick Creed but they had materially in the scripture the Apostolick Creed and the Directory they had also the same way for they practised all the Ordinances directed though they had no written Directory in a formall contexture or frame for Prayers Preaching Praising Sacraments and Censures never Church wanted in some one order or other though we cannot say that the Apostolick Church had this same very order and forme But a Leiturgy which is a commanded imposed stinted Form in such words and no other is another thing then a Directory as an unlawfull thing is different from a Lawfull 2. There be some things Positive humane as the Ordering of some parts or worship or Prayer the forme of words or phrases and some things of the Circumstantials of the Sacrament as what Cups Wood or Mettall in these the Directory layeth a tie upon no man nor can the Church in this make a Directory to be a Church Compulsory to strain men And this way the Directory is not ordered and commanded in the frame and contexture as was the Service-Book and the Pastor or people in these are not properly Morall Agents nor do we presse that scripture should regulate men in these But sure in Crossing in Surplice men must be Morall Agents no lesse then in eating and drinking at the Lords-Supper and therefore they ought to be as particularly regulated by Scripture in the one as in the other Quest But who shall be judge of these things which you say are Circumstantials only as time place c. and of these that Formalists say are adjuncts and Circumstances of worship though also they have a Symbolicall and Religious signification must not the Church judge what things are indifferent what necessary what are expedient what Lawfull Answer There is no such question imaginable but in the Synagogue of Antichrist For as concerning Norma judiâ—andi the Rule of judging without all exception the scripture ought to be the only rule and measure of all practicall truths how Formalists can make the Scripture the rule of judging of unwritten Ceremonies which have no warrant in Scripture more then Papists can admit scripture to regulate and warrant their unwritten Traditions I see not we yield that the Church is the Politick Ministeriall and visible judge of things necessary and expedient or of things not necessary
God removed the doubts and answered him 5. Paul in eating or not eating which are things most indifferent requireth a certain perswasion of positive assurance Rom. 14. 14. I know and am perswaded by the Lord Iesus that there is nothing unclean of it self but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean it is unclean Master Sanderson saith In things substantiall of Gods Worship and in things to be done upon necessity of salvation what is not of Faith certainly assuring us it is conforme positively to Gods word it is sin so we abhor Popish Additions But in the actions of our life as the lifting of a straw and in Ceremoniall worship or accidentals it holdeth not saith Morton and Doctor Burges not in all particulars saith Paybodie for there should be no end saith Doct. Iackson of doubting for Papists might doubt to assist our King against Roman Catholicks Ans 1. Let Formalists explain themselves Doctrinals Substantials and essentiall worship is such as God hath commanded in the Proposition and in the Assumption and particularly in Gods word Accidentals are such as he hath commanded in generall but left particulars to mens will so they define like Mâ—sters of Arts. But this our Masters say in all that Christ hath particularly Commanded his Testament is perfect and so I believe what God hath set down he hath set down and so we have Scripture right down as perfect as the Fables of Esop Nasoes Metamorphosis what is in Esopes and Nasoes books is in their books and what they command you are with certainty of Faith to believe they command and what the Prophets and Apostles writ that they writ and that is essentiall worship what they writ not they writ not 2. Mr. Sandersons lifting up a straw is a straw for an instance actions of imagination are not Morall we give him leave to ruh his beard without Faith as he weareth white sheets above his garments in Divine service against Faith 3. To do in Faith is to know that in that I serve Christ and am accepted of God Rom. 14. 2. To do that which condemneth me not and maketh me happy in the doing thereof v. 21. 3. It is a Faith that I have before God in my conscience v. 2â— 4. It is a perswasion by the Lord Iesus that it is clean 5. It is such as I know is positively Lawfull by Scriptures expresse warrant 1 Cor. 10. 26. The earth is the Lords and the fulnesse thereof Ergo I have certainty of faith that it is positively conform to Scripture what I do but in things negatively Lawfull as lifting a straw wearing a Surplice I have no perswasion by the Lord Iesus that I serve Christ and am accepted of God in so doing and know not from Psa 24. 1. or from any other scripture that it is lawfull what I do 3. A generall warrant is either when the major Proposition only is sure by Scripture but you must take the Assumption upon the Formalists Merchant-word or where both Proposition and assumption can indure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according as it is written this latter wee imbrace with both our hands but Formalists deny it to us The first is their meaning This what is decent and not contrary to Gods Word that the Rulers may command But Surplice Crossing c. are decent and not contrary to Gods Word Ergo. So one Giles Widdows saith Man and Wife are one flesh Ergo the Ring in Marriage is good And Fine linnen is the Righteousnesse of the Saints Rev. 19. Ergo a Surplice is good And Matth. 16. Take up your crosse Ergo the Crossing in Baptisme is lawfull Enough of this But so the worship of the Devil is lawfull and Aarons golden Calf is lawfull for I can finde a major Proposition for them in Scripture of which you have a Faith both Negative and Positive as this Whatever God commandeth in his Word that is lawfull But God commandeth the Indians Devil vvorship in his Word Ergo c. I am not holden to give my Faith for the Assumption Yet it is as good as our Masters reasoning 4. Jackson is wide in his lawfull Negatives for to fight against Roman Catholicks at our Kings Command upon good grounds is not an indifferent thing Except to kill men and shed blood be indifferent and lawfull Negatively I thought to make War had been amongst the Substantials and Positively conform to Gods Word 5. The Fathers as Origen Ambrose Chrysostom Theophylact Oecumenius Theodoret Anselm and Ierome upon the place Rom. 14. 23. as Vasquez saith from this place Rom 14 23. that What any doth must be warranted by the light of the conscience as lawfull If Formalist stand to this they must give us some things against conscience and something beside conscience that is morally lawfull and therefore if conscience see not such a thing against Scripture though it have no warrant in Scripture yet it is lawfull and done in a certain perswasion of a well informed conscience but these who eat things thought to be unclean by Gods Law to the scandall of others who knew these meats were not against Piety and Gods Lavv nor yet that the eating of them was against charity while Paul delivered the Doctrine of Scandall yet their eating was unlawfull 6. Formalists say nothing here but what Papists said before them they say Men may go to War doubting of the lawfulnesse thereof and therefore Vasquez Angelus Corduba and Navarr will us While the doubt remaineth to choose the surest side as conscience ought to do And Vasquez saith Manente dubio c. To do so long as the doubt remaineth is to do against the judgement of conscience And Adrianus saith While they doubt and yet go to War they expose themselves to the danger of Man-slaughter and by not going to War they should onely sin by not obeying Suarez saith It is a speculative doubt vvhen Superiors commandeth it And Sylvester saith Such a doubt should be expelled at the commandment of Superiors And no marvell the command of Superiors to Papists is an Oracle and blinde obedience is good meriting therefore Gratian and the Iesuit Sanches saith Inferiors are not holden to examine the commandments of Superiors 5. Iackson saith This Whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin holdeth in omission of good as in commission of evil Ergo Your not practising indifferent Ceremonies is not of Faith and so Sin Ans He that obeyeth doubtingly is condemned and he that obeyeth not doubtingly is condemned But Master Doctor your enumeration is not sufficient and may strike against doubting to worship a Romish Idol at the command of Superiors for I shew you a third and its Pauls way Eat not obey not and abstain with perswasion of Faith that what you do is agreeable Positively to Gods Word Jackson saith They sin not by doubting if the fear of evil after mature
deliberation be not extraordinary and such as cannot be recompenced by the goodnes which appeareth in the act of Obedience Doubting is no internall part or essentiall cause of sin vve sin not because vve doubt but because vvhile vve doubt vve prefer an evil or a lesse good before a good or a greater good So their sin vvas not doubting but they preferred not eating vvhich vvas a bodily losse onely to the evil feared vvhich vvas to be partakers of the Table of Devils and being Apostates from the Israel of God Ans Paul expresly saith doubting is sin and condemneth it ver 23. and requireth ver 5. Let every man be perswaded in his conscience v. 21. Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that which he alloweth v. 23. Whatsoever more or lesse in Morall actions is not of Faith is sin 2. Internall perswasion Rom. 14. 14. Is an internall cause of obedience as v. 21. And therefore doubting being a sin that condemneth Rom. 14. 23. must be such a sinfull ingredient as maketh the action sinfull 3. We both sin because we doubt and also because we prefer a lesse good or an evil to a greater good 4. No feared evil though never so evil whether of sin or punishment if it follow not kindly but only by accident and through the corruption of our nature should or can make us do any thing doubtingly or sinfully for then we might do evil that good might come of it No good of obedience can warrant me to sin and disobey God nor should that be called obedience nor is it obedience to men which is disobedience to God 5. It is an untruth that non-eating was only a bodily losse for non-eating Physicall is a bodily losse but Paul urgeth non-eating morall to eschew the fall of one for whom Christ died 6. The Doctor saith Ibidem No power under the Heaven could make a Law over the Romans injoyning such meats because Gods law as they conceive condemned them Now how pleasant are right words I assume we conceive God hath denounced all the plagues written in his Book upon practisers of humane Ceremonies as upon adders to the word of God Rev. 22. 19. Yea Heresies to with that Christ is not the consubstantiall Son of God may seem probable to us shall the good of obedience in believing my Pastor whom God hath set over me hinder me to obey 7. Papists say also that Scripture is perfect in generall allowing that Ceremonies should be when Paul saith Let all things be done in order and decency 1 Cor. 14. But the Scripture giveth no particular warrant for these but onely the Churches determination So Scotus Suarez Bellarmine Vasquez Bannes and Duvallius The Scripture implicitely and generally containeth all the substantials necessary for salvation but not traditions in particular that is the Churches part just as Formalists say order and decency is commanded in the word but Crossing Surplice Humane dayes and such are left to the Prelates Kalender to fill up what his Lordship thinketh good So Hooker c Speech is necessary but it is not necessary that all speak one kinde of Language Government is necessary but the particulars Surplice Crossing c. Are left to the Church 2. What is negatively Lawfull here cannot be admitted If Rulers may Command one thing that is negatively Lawfull they may Command all things because what they Command under this formall reason as not against Scripture they should not adde nor devise new worship though they Command all of that kinde But the latter is absurd for so they might Command in Gods worship 1. The actions of sole imagination the lifting of a straw and all idle actions that cannot edifie 2. They might Command a new Ark to represent Christ incarnat as the Jews Ark did represent him to be incarnat a new Passeover to represent the Lambe already slain and all the materials of the Ceremoniall Law with reference to Christ already incarnat dead and risen again For all these are by Formalists Learning negatively Lawfull Shew us a Scripture where they are forbidden more then Surplice Crossing except because they be not Commanded If it be said They do not Command things negatively Lawfull as such but as they edifie and teach Well then 1. As they edifie and teach they are positively good and apt to edifie and so must be proved by the Word as Commanded and so not negatively Lawfull and not as beside but as Commanded in the Word 2. Yet it will follow that all these may be used in Faith that is out of a sure perswasion that they are not contrary to Gods Word and so Lawfull I might dance in a new linnen Ephod before a new Iewish Ark representing Christ already incarnat and that in the negative Faith of Mr. Sanderson Hooker and Jackson for this Ark is not against Scripture yet this Ark is not Commanded and so not forbidden 3. Idle actions that have no use or end might be Lawfully Commanded by this because they are not forbidden yet are such unlawfull Quia carent justâ necessitate et utilitate as Gregorius saith I prove the connexion because an action Morall such as to Sign with the Crosse performed by a Subject of Christs visible Kingdom for Gods glory and edification of the Church which yet is neither Commanded nor forbidden by God nor Commanded by natures light for none but those that are beside reason will say this nor light of Gods word or the habit of Religion hath no more reason then the making or forming a Syllogisme in Barbara which of it self cometh only from Art and as such hath no Morall use and by as good reason may the Church Command dancing before a new devised Ark yea such an action involveth a contradiction and is Morall and not Morall for of its own nature it tendeth to no edification for then it might be proved by good reason to be edificative and an action cannot be edificative from the will of men for Gods will not mens will giveth being to things 4. What is beside Scripture as a thing not repugnant thereunto wanteth that by which every thing is essentially Lawfull Ergo It is not Lawfull The Consequence is sure I prove the Antecedent Gods Commanding will doth essentially constitute a thing Lawfull Gods Commanding will only maketh eating and drinking bread and wine in the Lords Supper Lawfull and the Lords forbidding will should make it unlawfull and Gods forbidding to eat of the Fruit of the Tree of knowledge of good and evil maketh the non-eating obedience and the eating disobedience As the killing of Isaac by Abraham is Lawfull and that because God Commandeth it and the not killing of him again is Lawfull when God forbiddeth it But things negatively Lawfull and beside the word of God wanteth Gods Commanding will for God Commandeth not the materials of Jewish Ceremonies to represent Christ already come and such like for if he should Command them they
and setting downe a perfect discipline in the New Testament in all particulars that have influence religious morall mystically significant in Gods worship and there is reason that Synods and Pastors should rather promulgate Gods Lawes then the people 1. Because God hath given to them by office the key of knowledge 2. Because by office they are watch-men and so have authority of office to heare the Law at Gods mouth and in Synods to give Directories or Canons according to that word which people have not and that their Canons must be according to Gods Word is said in the word Nehemiah 10. 32. Also we â—â—ade ordinances for us 34. as it is written in the law of the Lord. Iackson saith Of things good in themselves and apprehended so by us without any scruple of evil every mans conselence htah sufficient authority to inioyn it only the alacrity of doing in what time or measure it is to be done or such circumstances cometh within the subiect of obedience to governours Answ Then because faith in Christ is evidently good by the Doctors learning the Pastor hath no more authority to command the people to beleeve in Christ then the people hath to command the same to him So in preaching all the necessary fundamentals of salvation the authority of Pastors is meerely titular There be then little necessitie of a publike Ministery as Socinians teach us 2. The alaâ—rity and manner and measure of beleeving and doing things evidently good is as particularly set downe in Gods Word as obliging the Conscience as the Mandates themselves God who commandeth us to love him and to beleeve in his Sonne hath not left that power to Prelates that createth wretched Ceremonies to command us to love God with all our heart or not and to serve God with alacrity or not or to beleeve in Christ with all the heart or with halfe a heart the sincerity measure and manner of the loving of God is no more the subject of obedience to rulers then the loving of God Rulers doe command both alike Pari authoritate except the man say that we obey Gods Law perfectly when we give obedience to it according to the substance of the acts though we obey not sincerely The Doctor giveth us Rules in obeying Rulers We are not to adventure on the action whereof we are perswaded there be much evil and no good in it Ans Then we cannot venture upon Ceremonies that bringeth adders to Gods word under all the Plagues written in Gods word 2. Gods word not mens perswasions of conscience except in this also he be an Arminian is the rule of mens actions The servants of Caiaphas may be perswaded there is no good but much evil in confessing Christ We are to lay aside the erroneous perswasion and obey if the action be good in itself Iackson Some actions apprehended as meerly evil may be undertaken with lesse danger then others which are apprehended partly as evil partly as good the action is evil as long as we fear the evil in it to be greater then the good we can hope for Ans To do any thing as apprehended evil of which sort are humane Ceremonies to us for any respect is to do with a doubting conscience and to sin Rom. 14. 23. 2 God 's word not probabilities should lead us in adventuring upon actions Iackson 3. If the measure of the good apprehended be as great as the evil feared in private choice we may adventure upon the action leaving the event to Gods providence which favoureth actions more then privations works rather then idlenesse and following of that which is good rather then abstinence from evil for vvhere this indifference of perswasion is authority may cast the ballance and sway the private choice so also Hooker Ans This is the Iesuit Suarez his doctrine and so saith the Iesuit of Corduba Sanches when the subject is in a doubt whether the thing commanded by the Superiour be lawfull or not he is obliged to obey and he is to be excused because of the command of the superiour 1. Because say they the Commanders condition is better and for a speculative doubt he is not to be spoiled of his power of commanding where reason saith he commandeth nothing against reason 2. Because the inferiour hath resigned his will to the superiour Deut. 17. 2. Paral. 19. Ergo In things doubtsome God commanded to stand to the determination of the Priest and it is a truth that the will of the Superiour doth not vary and change the nature of a thing in it self yet it varieth to the inferiours conscience Now indifference of perswasion is all one to Doctor Iackson with indifferency of the thing for so he dictates If one have indifferency of reasons of twelve degrees on both sides that Arianisme or Arminianisme is truth if authority determine both to be truth the weight of authority in indifferency of perswasion should cast the ballance and to believe this or not to believe it where Arguments are of twelve grains of light of truth on both sides it is to the doubting man as if the thing were indifferent so is the doubter to give up his soul conscience and faith to believe Arianisme to be truth not from light of conscience for equally as much light of conscience are in either side as is supposed but for the meer will of humane authority without Gods word Now though the matter here be indifferent in it self yet not so to the doubter for Ceremonies in our perswasion are not indifferent See here Ignatius Loyola say Give over your self to your Ruler Give the Prelate your faith to keep while ye be in eternity and at the last judgement he will restore the pawn And this is â—aith Gregory de Valent. to give your two eyes to your guide I had rather they stick in my own head To these Iesuits I oppose the minde of Vasquez and Salas who say in that case the subject should first lay aside his errour and then obey 2 God requireth a full perswasion by the Lord Iesus even in things indifferent Rom. 14. 14 22 23. But poor naked humane authority cannot ingender perswasion of faith and here is doubting 3. It is false That providence favoureth positive actions more then privations for Rom. 14. God loveth better abstinence from meats in themselves lawfull and clean as the Apostle proveth ver 14. Because nothing is unclean of it self then that the eater doubt if he be not transgressing the Law of God in eating though a great Apostle say there is no danger in eating And Jackson addeth of the same nature these The good of obedience is not a consequent only of the action but either an essentiall part or such a circumstance and motive precedent as bringeth a new essence for its concomitant whereby the evil which we out of private perswasions fear may be countervaled by the goodnesse that is in the purpose
but will it follow therefore the Pastor should not watch over him to try in another way in a Pastorall way by his walking profession and practicall knowledge whether he be in Christ or no. The contrary is Heb. 13. 17. They watch for the souls of the people as they that must give an accompt And they are so far to try that are Shepherds that they are obliged in a Pastorall way to know those of the flock that are diseased Ezech. 34. 4. Sick broken driven away and lost And to what end should they try themselves least they eat damnation to themselves Ergo the Stewards should try the stomacks that they eat not poyson If then the Lords Law bid men beware they be not tempted to Sorcery Sodomy Murthers and if every man ought to have personall watchfulnesse over his own conscience that he be not insnared to those sins and Achan was to try if his heart was ingaged to the wedge of Gold and to be wary to meddle with it but it doth not follow that Magistrates as Joshua should not try out Sorcerers Sodomites and other Achans to punish them Erastus 2 Cor. 13. is against this a person is to try himselfe Will it follow when he hath tryed himselfe that he cannot come to the Lords Supper except he seem meet to the Elders And this not our consequence let Erastus owne it we care not In a constitute Church he should else Erastus provides no way against a Pagan who hath heard the Word as he may doe 1 Cor. 14. 23. may without the Elders and Church sit downe at the Lords Supper for Erastus provides no stop for him but only his own pagan Conscience and so may one by that rule but trample on the Sacrament his owne Conscience is all his rule contrary to what he saith himselfe lib. 3. c. â— p. 207. Erastus 1 Cor. 11. Paul forbiddeth none to come to the Supper but upon supposition that they come as the manner is he biddeth them come worthily as all are bidden hear the Word though they â—e forbidden to he are it as if it were some prophane History nor doth the Lord command sinfull coming for no act commanded of God is evill Ans 1. Paul then forbiddeth not Pagans more to come to the Supper and Children then he forbiddeth them to heare the Word which is absurd he commandeth all to heare but he commandeth not all to come to the Supper but those onely that can discerne the Lords body for to heare the Word though I be not prepared is simply necessary if I would be saved and to sacrifice if I would be reconciled and to pray if I would obtaine any blessing though the manner of doing all these be commanded that I heare sacrifice and pray in faith But to come to the Supper is not commanded to all not to Pagans not to children not to the unregenerated but onely to the regenerated and to those who discerne the Lords body and for a child to come to the Lords Supper or an unrenewed man is forbidden not commanded and no ill act is commanded and it is a sinne that they come at all But Erastus will have it lawfull as it is to heare the Word then doth Christ command Turks and children to come to the Supper for he commandeth them to heare the Word and Peter bade Simon Magus pray Act. 8. 22. but he neither bids give the Supper to him nor bids he him receive it but by the contrary forbids pearles to be cast unto Swine Erastus Arg. 16. God will not have fewer Christians to be members of the Church now then of Iewes to be members of the Iewish Church But God would have all circumcised even the most flagitious that were punished by the Magistrate to be members of the Iewes Church Ergo God will have all the baptized to be Members of the Church Ans This will prove that all baptized even children should come to the Supper 2. I deny the Minor to wit that all the most wicked remained Members of the visible Iewish Church jure before God the wicked Iewes to God were as Sodom and Gomorrah Esa 1. 10. Yea he saith Amos 9. 7. Are ye not unto me as children of Ethiopians O children of Israel saith the Lord What they were de facto and not cast out was the fault of the Priests and that the Church does tollerate Iezabels Wolves Lions in the flock and admitteth them to holy things is their sin Erastus But Repentance was not alwaies commanded to those Iewes especially who were unclean by touching an unclean thing against their will and ignorantly and the purging of them depended on their owne will so they observed the Ceremonies of Moses Ans That is much for us if those who were uncleane against their will and cast out of the campe it being a trying Type that far more those that are wickedly scandalous are to be cast out of the Church Erastus The Church is a draw-â—et a field a marriage Supper there be good and ill in it and it was not the sinne of the inviters who are bidden invite all good and bad Mat. 22. But the man that came himselfe without the wedding garment he is cast into utter darkenesse Ergo The Officers are to invite all and forbid none Ans They are to invite all to all Ordinances and Seals even Dogs and Swine that is false They are to invite all to some Ordinances to heare the Law and Gospel preached but not the Seales that were to cast Pearles to Swine 2. The way of Erastus is that none are to be debarred nor to debarre themselves from the Seales more then from the Word The Lords forbidding Adam to touch the tree of Life and his casting of him out of Paradise and Cains being cast out from the presence of the Lord to me are rather Types presignifying Excommunication and that God will have wicked men debarred from holy things then patternes of Excommunications and so are they alledged by Beza and our Divines CHAP. VII Quest 3. Whether Erastus doth justly deny that Excommunication was typified in the Old Testament VVEe take types of uncleannesse in the Old Testament to be rightly expounded when the holy Ghost in the New-Testament doth expound them Now that Ceremoniall uncleannes did typifie Morall uncleannesse is cleare 2 Cor. 7. 17. Touch no uncleane thing and I will receive you 18. And I will be a Father unto you and yee shall be my Sonnes and Daughters saith the Lord Almighty This is a manifest Exposition of the Ceremoniall holinesse and cleannesse commanded in the booke of Leviticus for after the Lord hath given them a number of Lawes about eschewing of uncleane things he saith in generall Lev. 26. 3. If ye walke in my Statutes and keepe my Commandements and doe them 11. I will set my Tabernacle amongst you and I will be your God and ye shall be my people And it is a cleare allusion to Numb 19. 11. He that toucheth
the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven dayes 16. He that toucheth one that is slaine with the sword in the open field is uncleane 22. Whatsoever the uncleane person toucheth shall be uncleane So Paul Tit. 1. 15. To them that are defiled and unbeleeving nothing is pure but even their minde and conscience is defiled 2. The Prophets expound it so Ezek. 36. 25. Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you and yee shall be clean From all your filthinesse and all your Idols will I cleanse you Hath he not a cleare reference to the water of Separation Num. 19. With this water the unclean person and his clothes were washed yea the Tents and the Vessels ver 17 21. According to which saith Paul 2 Cor. 7. 1. Having therefore these promises dearly beloved let us cleanse our selves from all filthinesse of the flesh and spirit Here a cleare Allusion to Ceremoniall filthines bodily and of the flesh and of Tents and Vessels Heb. 10. 22. To both these washings there is a reference Let us draw neere having our hearts sprinkled from an evill conscience and our bodies washed with pure water And Heb. 9. 13. If the blood of buls and goates and the ashes of an heifer mingled with running water Num. 19. 17. which purged vessels that were but capable of Ceremoniall uncleannesse sprinkling the unclean sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh 14. How much more shall the bloud of Christ purge your conscience from dead works It is cleare also that the unclean were separated and the Leper put out of the campe so as the children of Israel might not touch any thing Ceremonially unclean and all uncleane persons were put out of the Congregation Hence the Hypocrites word alluding to that separation Esa 64. 5. Stand by thy selfe come not neere to me for I am holier then thou So was Miriam removed and leprous King Vzziah out of the Congregation of the Lord. Erastus We deny that the Ceremoniall uncleannes signified the wickednes of conversation so that it can be proved that both these uncleannesses were punished with the same punishment 1. Because many against their will were polluted legally as the night pollutions the diseases monethly of women when they were necessitated to be with Children Parents Wife brethren when they died sometimes they touched unclean things ignorantly but no man lives wickedly against his will 2. God could not forbid in every time and place the touching of the dead onely God commanded the polluted to be purified according to the Law God vvould have his people neere their dying friends but God never gave leave to any to live vvickedly 3. A holy man not sinning in his thought remaining holy might be legally unclean vvithout either his vvill or knovvledge by touching some uncleane thing that he knevv not to be unclean But a vvicked man doth not at one time both doe vvickedly and remaine pure and holy Ans All this is a meere cavilling at the wisedome of God in making such Ceremoniall lawes and such punishments against the transgressors of them as the wise Law-giver of his free-will thought fit because these Lawes seeme ridiculous But the foolishnes of God is wiser then men 1. We say not that the punishment of legall and morall uncleannesse is all one every way and alwayes it is enough for our purpose that God will have those who are legally uncleane separated from holy things while they bee purified and little sinne and guiltinesse seeme to bee in legall uncleannesse as when bodily Leprosie came on persons against their will yet when God will have them punished with being removed from the people of God from the Sanctuary and the holy things this could not be for it selfe for as Paul saith Doth God take care of Oxen So we doth God hate bodily diseases which are his owne just actions not our sinfull doings since I say God hateth them not and putteth not punishment on them for themselves therefore it must be to signifie what detestation and punishment the Lord our God would have his Church to put upon morall wickednesse So we thinke Erastus might have spared paper and paines in proving a difference which no Divine denieth between Ceremoniall and Morall uncleannesse and the punishment of the one and of the other for it can never prove his conclusion Ergo Separation for legall uncleannesse cannot typifie separation for Morall uncleannesse I could give eight and twenty differences between Isaac and Christ as Erastus giveth seventeen or eighteen between Legall and Morall uncleannesse and the punishment of both But I hope that should never conclude against the Holy Ghost Heb. 11. 17 18 19. Gal. 4. 28 29 30. Rom. 9. 9. that Isaac was not a type of Iesus Christ 2. Night pollutions are not altogether against our will they are sinfull pollutions except concupiscence and lustfull habituall day lusts the cause of them be not sinfull pollutions yea and forbidden in the seventh Commandement 3. These pollutions Legall caused by invincible ignorance were types or symbolicall signes of our originall iniquity and give me leave to doubt if all actuall touching of things unclean was no Morall sinfulnesse I conceive the Iewes as the Christians also were obliged to walk 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ephes 5. 15. and were to take heed to the outer-man that they should come neere no uncleane thing in some cases leprosie and other legall uncleannes came on them without either will or knowledge 4. If the standing beside the dying friends be all one with touching the dead I remit to the principles of Physicke and if the touching of any dead be excepted in the Law Ceremoniall let the learned judge All the other differences assigned by Erastus I leave as not concludent against us they tend all either to blame God who should punish some legall uncleannes that is altogether against the will of man with any punishment at all as the three first differences insinuate Or 2. that God punished some Legall uncleannes more severely then homicide and Morall uncleannes as the 5. difference doth insinuate and the 4. difference And this is to challenge God to whom I desire to ascribe a Soveraignty both in punishing or pardoning as he thinketh good Or in punishing more severely or more mildely these same sinnes or in punishing greater sins with lighter punishment and with a heavier rod lighter sinnes Erastus Any legally unclean was debarred from the Temple the difference was onely in the time but you debarre not all wicked men from the Supper Ans The most that were legally unclean were also morally unclean in that they willingly transgressed a known Law Ergo Legall uncleannes was also Morall uncleannes 2. Though we debar not all wicked men but onely the scandalous yet we have in readinesse vengeance against all and so against latent disobedience which is a high censure in debarring hypocrites from heaven and we conceive Legall uncleannes as the monthly diseases of women night pollutions want of
perfect in the one as in the other 5. The great error is here that Erastus being sleeping when he wrote thinketh that to eat and drinke unworthily to offer a gift at the Altar the offerer being unreconciled to his brother is an action internall and known to God and that can no more be known to man then the thoughts of the heart A palpable untruth is not worshipping of Baalim murthering stealing whoring killing the Children to Molâ—ch and coming to stand in the Temple of the Lord which are called a prophaning of Gods holy name Ier. 7. 9 10 11. Ezek. 23. 38 39. are not these actions visible externall and as feazable to be judged by man as murther may be judged by a Magistrate Yea by this let a Pagan come to the table of the Lord we are not to hinder him why it is an internall action knowne citra errorem to God only and we cannot then judge whither he have examined himself or not if he be not against us here he is with us saith Erastus Quod deus facere jussit ab eo revocari aut retrahi nullus ab hominibus debet si modo externe sic fiat ut precepit deus Yea so the Magistrate cannot hinder either Pagan or the open enemy and persecutor who will trample upon the Sacrament from the Sacraments the contrary whereof Erastus said pag. 207. hunc ego minime admittendum censeo and let Erastus give us Scripture either expresse or by consequence where a Pagan or a persecutor may be impeded by Church or Magistrate from externall receiving of the seals except that we are not to give pearls to swine But was it not as hard to judge whether Saul persecuting the Church out of blind zeal was a swine or a dogge as to judge whether he that killeth his sonne to Molech out of blind devotion and cometh the same day to the Temple of the Lord doth prophane the Name of the Lord 6. If we must do nothing in externalls without the expresse commandement of God nor may we without Gods command either expresse or a necessary consequence admit dogs and swine to the Lords table 7. Paul indeed rejoyced that Christ was preached though out of envy Phil. 1. but by men called and gifted of God to preach and therefore ought not to be forbidden to preach while the Church for their scandalous life do cast them out say they are called Ministers once the Church is not to cast them out for this or that particular sinne if they be not contumatious and Paul saith he Rejoyceth that Christ was preached but he saith not he rejoyced that they preached Christ tali modo out of contention thinking to add affliction to his bonds Yet God forbiddeth the externall act of preaching in those that hateth to be reformed Psal 50. 16 17. and forbiddeth the Church to lay hands on or to call to the Ministery wicked men that hateth to be reformed or to keep them in the Ministery and this hindreth not but Paul might rejoyce at the consequent of their Ministery to wit at the preaching of the Gospel so long as they remained in the Ministery as we may rejoyce in that Christ was crucified for sinners and not allow that Herod and Pilate did with wicked hands crucifie the Lord of Glory nor yet are we to rejoyce in their sinne But all this hindreth not but he that is at wrath with his brother and knowne to be so by the Priests should be hindred to offer his gift while he be reconciled to him 8. We are not to hinder acts of externall worship as praying praising preaching nor can the Church forbid them except where God by his Commandement require that we do them wiâ—h a speciall visible qualification and order As first be reconciled to your brother first examine your selfe and then ofâ—er your gift and come and eat and drinke at the Lords table and in Negatives Come to my Temple but come not that very day you killed your sonnes to Molech while ye repent and be humbled for that sinne Erastus The godly Kings compelled the people to observe the rites ordained of God at least externally and 2 Chron. 15. killed those that sought not the Lord then they sinne who punish sinnes by debarring men from the Sacrament for beside that they forbid a thing commanded of God and as it falleth under mens judgement that is as it is externall and good so they cast their sickle in another mans field because the correcting of sinnes in so farre as they are externall belongeth to the Magistrate and in so farre as they come from a depraved will they belong to God onely Ans Here is one palpable error that all externall scandals are punished either by the Magistrate as the Magistrate so he must be understood else he saith nothing or by God onely contrary to 1 Cor. 5. 11. Rom. 16. 17. 2 Thes 3. 14 15. For we give a third they are punished by the Church but only in a Ministeriall way It is false that the godly Kings could compell the unclean Jewes though circumcised to come to the Temple or the murtherers of their Children that same day to come with bloody hands to the Temple Yet the very locall and personall presence of a Iew in the Temple and the very posture of his body in looking with his face toward the Temple while he prayed was an externall lawfull Ordinance of God They could not then lawfully compell the Iews to these rites except with such and such previous qualifications they could not compell the Priests unwashed and having drunk wine to go to the Sanctuary 2 Chro. 15. It is not said they were to be put to death that should omit any Ceremony though every Religious observance be a seeking of God but they that would not seek God by entring in Covenant to renounce idols and serve the Lord or should prove apostates from the sworne Covenant were to be put to death 3. If that be a punishment we contend for things not for names which is a privation of good inflicted for a sinne then let Erastus sâ—e if the Priests punish not who debarred men from the holy things of God by Erastus his grant for Ceremoniall omissions against a Law of God And if the Priests should not suffer an unreconciled man to offer gifts and if the Church should deny pearls to apostates if this be not punishment and if the Magistrate be to cast out or inflict Ecclesiasticall censures shall he not punish in so doing Erastus To be cast out of the Synogogue is not to be Excommunicated For the Synagogue signified sometime all Iudea sometime a particular Congregation or the place of meeting or the sermon By no Law could a circumcised Iew be cast out of all Iudea and sent to the Gentitles or be compelled to say they were not Iews Yea they were killed who denyed Iudaisme 2 Maccabees so the cast out of the Synagogue were not debarred from the Temple
not subjected to them in conscience after any Ecclesiasticall way for the power of commanding in magistrates as magistrates must be commensurable to the power of punishing the transgressors of the command if the one be in order to a temporary good the other cannot but be in order to an eternall ill if ministers command in the name of Christ in order to an eternall reward they cannot threaten the transgressors in order to a temporary punishment but it must be in order to an eternall punishment so that it is most clear that the magistrate though he be in some sense a little God and invested with the authority and Majesty of God in that he commandeth and threatneth upon proposall of temporary reward and temporary good the very same duties that God injoyneth and forbiddeth the same evills of sinne that God forbiddeth yet he holdeth not these out to the soul and conscience of the subjects as the Ambassador of Iesus Christ upon condition of eternall life if they obey and of eternall death if they disobey but he holdeth out to the external man these that are materially divine commandements divine inhibitions but in another consideration but formally only they are the mandates of the Magistrates in order to temporary reward and temporary punishment Then the Ministers as Ministers in preaching and Synods forbid adultery incest murther but they propose them to those that are within the visible Church And that 1. to their consciences 2. Under the paine of eternall wrath 3. As the Ambassadors of Christ craving spirituall subjection of conscience and divine faith to those charges But Magistrates as Magistrates hold forth in their Law-abstinence from those same sinnes of adultery incest murther But 1. Not to the consciences of their subjects but to the outer man as Members of the common-wealth 2. Not under the paine of eternall wrath and condemnation before the judge of quick and dead Magistrates as Magistrates have neither calling office place nor power to threaten or inflict eternall punishment if Magistrates do perswade the equity of abstinence from adultery incest murther in their Statutes or Acts of Parliament from the word of God from the sixth and seventh command of the Decalogue from the judgement and eternall punishment that followeth these sinnes they so perswade not as Magistrates but as Divines and as godly and Christian men yet my sense is not that the Magistrate can Lawfully command obedience in matters of Religion not understood or knowne by the subjects that were to exact blind obedience but my meaning is that the Magistrate as the Magistrate holdeth not forth his commandements to teach and informe the conscience as Pastors do but he presupposeth that his mandates are knowne to be agreeable to the word of God and proposeth them to the subjects to be obeyed 3. Magistrates as Magistrates hold forth in their Law abstinence from these sinnes not as the Ambassadors of Christ craving subjection of coâ—science and divine faith to those charges but only externall obedience for though Ministers as Ministers crave faith and subjection of conscience to all commandements and inhibitions as in Christs stead 2 Co. 5. 19 20. yet the Magistrate as the Magistrate doth not crave either faith or subjection of conscience nor is he in Christs stead to lay divine bands on the conscience to submit the soul and conscience to beleeve and abstaine he is the depâ—â—y of God as the God of Order and as the Creator and founder and another of humane societies and of Peace to exact externall obedience and to lay bands on your hands not to shed innoceat blood and on your body not to defile it with adultery or incest nor to violate the châ—stâ—â—y of your brother hence it is evident that the adversaries are far our who would have Ministers who do hold forth commands that layeth hold on the conscience and craveth faith and soul-submission under the paine of eternall wrath to do and act as the deputies and Vicars of those who have nothing to do with the conscience and have neither office nor authority to crave soul submission or to threaten or inflict any punishment but such as is circumâ—cribed within the limits of time and which the body of clay is capable of yea when the Magistrate punisheth spirituall sinnes heresie idolatry he punisheth them only with temporary punishment Obj. 5. When a Minister speaketh that which is treason against the Prince in the Pulpit by way of Doctrine the Church only doth take on them to judge him and censure him and he will not answer the civill judge for his Doctrine but decline him and appeal to a Synod and yet if another man in private speak these same words of treason he is judged by the civill judge and can give no deâ—linature against this civill judicature this must be unequall dealing except the civill judge may by his office judge whether the Minister spoke treason or not Ans It cannot be denied but that which is spoken by way of Doctrine by an Ambassador speaking the word in publick and that which is spoken in private although the â—ame words are very different for a private man in private to slander the Prince may be treason he hath no place nor calling to speak of the Prince but a Pastor hath a calling as the watchman of the Lord of hosts to rebuke Herod for incest and in a constitute Church the Church is to try whether Iohn Baptist preached treason or not 2. If it be a slander of the Prince and treason indeed the Prophet who preached it is first subject to the Prophets who are to condemne and censure him and then the magistrate is to inflict bodily punishment on him for it but the Church should labour to gaine the slanderers soule before the civill judge take away his life IV. Assert The Magistrate de jure is obliged not only to permit but also to procure the free exercise of the ministery in dispensing Word Sacraments and Discipline and owe his accumulative power to convene Synods to adde his sanction to the lawfull and necessary constitutions and ordination of worthy and to the Deposition of unworthy officers in the Church 1. Because he is a Nurse-father in the Church Isa 49 23. 2. And by office as a Publike father to procure the good of the soules of the subjects in his coactive way that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godlines and honesty 1 Tim. 2. 2. 3. He is not onely to permit but also positively to procure all peace in the exercise of all lawfull and profitable trades and Arts Ergo farre more that glory may dwell in the Land and that the Peace thereof may be as a River Isa 48. 18. by the presence of Christ walking in the midst of the Golden Candlesticks V. Assertion When the Magistrate commandeth painfull and sound administration in preaching and governing with provision of the praysing and rewarding of well doing he doth not subordinate
action either Civil Natural or Supernatural yet marriage is not Morally or Theologically indifferent So as to marry or not marry is a matter of a mans free choice and of his own free will not obnoxious to any binding Law as is kneeling not-kneeling crossing not-crossing in the minde of our Adversaries 1. If it were morally indifferent to marry or not to marry Rulers might make Laws either commanding all to marry or none to marry or some to marry some not to marry which were no small tyranny and the very doctrine of Devils 2. The gift of Continency is to some a commandment of God that they marry not and burning is to some a commandment obliging them in conscience to marry else they sin therefore to marry or not to marry is necessary to all men or then unlawful and so not indifferent as our Divines teach against Papists their Supererogatorie Works The Lords calling of any to suffer for his Truth is instead of a command of God though the man might be saved though he suffer not for the Truth 3. If there be no necessitie in marrying but onely conditional in the manner oâ— marrying then all mankinde without sin might abstain from marrying which it most absurd 4. The place 1 Cor. 7. 39. saith not that a Widow is under no necessitie of marrying but onely under a necessity of well and spiritual marrying For the libertie that the Widow hath there is not that it is indifferent to her to marry or not to marry for since our Adversaries teach That Rulers may make Laws in things indifferent they might then make a Law that no Widows shall marry which were vile tyrannie But the libertie that the Widow hath to marry whom she will is opposed onely to a Law and Obligation Matrimonial that she was under while her Husband did live And the words clearly speaketh onely of thiâ— freedom not of Moral freedom of indifference from all Law of God necessitating her to marry The Wise is bound by the Law as long as her Husband liveth but if her Husband be dead she is at liberty to marry whom she will onely in the Lord. But there are no smal oddes betwixt libertie to marry this or that man because the Husband is dead of which libertie onely the Apostle speaketh and liberty and indifference without all restraint of Gods Law to marry at all or not to marry This latter libertie the Scripture speaketh not of onely the Doctor alleageth it Object Kneeling at the Sacrament howbeit antecedente and immediately it be necessary by Gods Law yet consequently and by the mediation of lawful Authority it is now necessary to us not by necessity of the thing it self but by necessity of obedience order and peace and so according to the practice it is for the time necessary by Gods Law and cannot be omitted without sin So Forbes Answ Necessitie of obeying the Church can make nothing necessary and good for the Church commandeth it because it is necessary and good and it hath not goodnesse necessitie and aptnesse to edifie from mens will and the Churches commandment 2. I ask if no kneeling now in Scotland laying aside the respect of Authority and Law be in it self undecent and unapt to edifie if not then the Church hath no more ground and reason for order and decency in our Ceremonies for what I say of one holdeth true in all then there is for the want of Ceremonies and if that be true the sole will and lust of Authority maketh our Ceremonies lawful What can Romish impudence give more to the Man of sin But if there be unorderlinesse and indecency in our Ceremonies then kneeling now must be sin even laying aside the respect of Humane Laws 3. It is strange Divinity That that which is no sin of it self cannot be omitted without sin for the sole will and pleasure of men Humane Authority then may make it sin not to rub our Beards not to claw our Heads when we come to the Church to hear Gods Word If Humane Authority can make an indifferent Act lawful and the omission of it sinful they may make all the indifferent Acts in the World lawful Acts they might then make piping leaping laughing Acts oâ— Divine Worship and might make a Decalogue of their own And if they may make an indifferent Act to be sin if it be omitted they may by as good reason make sinful Acts as Adulterie Incest Murther Robbery to be lawful Acts For if mans inhibiting will be the formal reason of sin then his commanding will must be the formal reason of obedience And so Rulers might command Murther Robbery Incest Blasphemy Object We may perform an individual act coming from deliberate will and that without sin and we may omit the same without sin Whether we practise these indifferent actions or omit them we should refer both practice and omission to Gods glory and these actions we call indifferent or free as indifferent and free is opposed to that which is morally necessary which are either necessary to be done or necessary to be omitted by necessity of a Divine Law Howbeit every action that is not of Faith be sin Rom. 14. 23. Yet the faith whereby I beleeve this action is necessary and must be done is not necessary to the eschewing of sin But if I do it that I do it in Faith and for Gods glory is necessary but the necessity of the goodnesse of the action doth not make the action necessary for it were to lay a yoak of continual doubting upon mens conscience if they should beleeve every individual act that they do to be necessary for whether should they turn them while they think of doing or not doing these actions that they know to be commanded by no Word of God That a Widow marry in the Lord if she marry is necessary but it is not necessary that she marry but it is indifferent to her to marry or not to marry Doctor Forbes Answ It is a contradiction that an action individual should be indifferent and so neither good nor evil and yet done in Faith and referred to Gods glory For the ground of doing which is Faith and the end which is Gods glory are individual properties necessarily concurring to the individuation of the Action Moral 2. An action individual that is meerly indifferent and so without sin may be performed without sin or omitted without sin cannot be an action of Faith referred to Gods glory For what may be done without sin and may not be done without sin is a will-action and wanteth all necessitie of reason and so is an idle and sinful action but a sinful action may be done in fancy but in Faith it cannot be done it may in the vain intention of the doer be referred to Gods glory In intentione erronea operantis but ex conditione operis according to the nature of the work it serveth not for Gods glory This way to cast stones in the water
as he had said Yet a band of men had been more necessarie then the Ceremonies So 2 King 23. 10 Josiah is commended for defiling Tophet to prevent occasion of offering Children to Molech for this cause God iudgeth an house without Battlement and the sending abroad a goaring Oxe to be murther Deut. 27. 28. Exod. 22. 28. 29. 33. Exod. 23. â— Deut. 7. 3. and Levit. 19. 14. Thou shalt not lay a stumbling block before the blind Marrying with the Canaanites was forbidden for the ruine occasioned by that to the soules of Gods people I prove the Assumption Gretzer saith In Ceremonies Calvinists are the apes of Catholicks 2. If such a worship had been in the Temple or Synagogue so as the Jewes in the same act might have worshipped Jehovah and the Canaanites Baall or Dagon as at one table the Papists may kneele and adore bread with the Protestant receiving the Sacrament it would be a raigning scandall 3. Atheists have mocked Religion for the Surplice and other Masse-toyes 4. Papists say Protestants are returning to their Mother Church of Rome 5. Wee cannot in zeale preach against Popish traditions and practise Popish Ceremonies 6. Lascivious carousings drunkenness harlatrie come from observing of holy dayes That this may be more cleare 1. The nature of a scandall would bee cleared 2 The Doctrine of the Apostle Paul about Scandall proponed A Scandall is a word or action or the omission of both inordinately spoken or done whence we know or ought to know the fall of weake wilfull or both is occasioned to thâ—se who are within or without the Church 1. It is a word or deed seene to others Sinfull thoughts not being seen are not publick scandalls though to the man himselfe they occasion sinne Hence non-conformitie simply to a thing indifferent must onely be scandalous as joyned with contempt formall contempt in things indifferent is inward and invisible to men 2. Omission of words and deeds scandalize Silence in Preachers when God matters go wrong is scandalous So Sanches 3. Not every word deed doth scandalize but such as are done unorderly Sanches saith these words and deeds Quae carent rectitudine which want some morall rectitude oâ— as Aquinas saith of themselves are inductive to sinne doth scandâ—lize or that M. Anton. De Dominis Archiep. Spalatens saith which is indictive to sinne or the cause of great evill or hindereth good as our faith zeale love c. that scundalizeth For though none of these fall out if the work or word or omission of either be such as of it selfe is apt to scandalize it is an active scandall Hence every little scandall is a sinne either in it selfe or in the unordinate way of doing â— But what objects are properly scandalous shall be discussed 3. When we know such words and deeds doe scandalize and they be not necessarie to be done yea and if wee ought to know for though the pronness and proclivitiâ— of our brethren or others to sinne be in some respect questio facti yet is it also questio juris a question of Law the ignorance whereof condemneth when the things themselves are doubtsomely evill but not necessary to be done Hence the practice of a thing indifferent when there be none that probably can be scandalized and hath some necessitie is lawfull as Colos 2. 16. Let no man therfore judge you in meat â—r drinke c. yet in case of scandall it is unlawfull to cat See 1 Cor. 10. 27. Eat whatsoever is set before you asking no question for conscience sake 28. But if any say this is offered in sacrifice to Idolls eat not for his sake who shewedit for conscience sake Conscience I say not thine owne but of others Therefore practising of things indifferent or non-practising are both lawfull according as persons are present who may be scandalized or not scandalized but this is in things though in nature indifferent yet in use having some necessitie as eating of meats but the case is otherwayes in things altogether indifferent as our Ceremonies are which are supponed to lay no ty on the conscience before God o incline to either side as they say to crosse or not to crosse laying aside the Commandement of men For if no-crossing be all 's good as crossing then though there be non-scandalized yet because it is such an action in Gods worship as is acknowledged to be indifferent and hath appearance of adding to Gods word and worship it is inductive to sinne and scandalous though none should hence be actu secundo ruinated and made to stumble But if any in Pauls time as the case was in the Church of Corinth should eat meates at a table forbidden in the Law he not knowing that a Jew was there this may seeme invincible ignorance because ignorance of a meere fact not of a law if that Jew should be scandalized through his eating it should seeme to me to be scandall taken but not culpably given 4. It is said in the definition That these inordinate words or deeds occasioneth the fall of others 1. Because the will of the scandalized or his ignorance is the efficacious and neerest cause why he is scandalized that is why he sinneth actions or words are occasions onely or causes by accident for none ought to be scandalized as none ought to sinne ad peccatum nulla est obligatiâ— 2. Because as to be scandalized is sinne so to scandalize actively is sinne though actuall scandall follow not as Peter scandalized Christ culpably when he counselled him not to die for sinners though it was impossible that Christ could be scandalized 5. It is said whereby weake or wilfull within or withoâ—t the Church may be scandalized For I hope to prove that it is no lesse sinne actively to scandalize the wilfull and malicious then the weak though there be degrees of sinning here and we must eschew things scandalous for their sake who are without the Church For the Second I set down these Propositions 1. from Rom. 14. 1. Proposit The weake are not to be thraled in judgement or practice in thornie and intricate disputes in matters indifferent This is cleare Rom. 14. v. 1. Ergo When people know not mistie distinctions of relative and absolute adoration of worship essentiall or accidentall they are not to be here thraled by a Law to practice Ceremonies humane 2 Proposit If a weake one eat herbs fearing the practice of things forbidden by Gods law he is commended and his abstinence praise-worthy as Rom. 14. v. 2. 3. and he ought not to be judged and so ought not to be a wed by a Law Then abstinence and non-conformitie is lawfull in such a case 3. Proposit He that eateth he that eateth not he that practiseth he that practiseth not indifferent things is not to be judged 1. God hath received the eater 2. You are not to judge another mans servant It is against the Law of Nations 3. If the weake fall God is able
is onely possible and the good lesse necessary then the good of non-scandalizing then we are not for hope of a possible dutie and lesse necessarie to doe that from whence a Scandall doth arise So it was not lawfull for Paul to take stipend which should have hindered the promoving of the Gospell though he might have imployed that stipend upon charitable uses because that Charitie was a dutie onely possible and incomparably lesse necessarie then the promoting of the Gospell So 1 Cor. 6. 7. Why suffer ye not rather losse yet by that suffering losse they were lesse able for workes of Charitie and to provide for their Familie and Children but the gaine was temporall and not to be compared with a good fame upon Christian religion which was slandered by heathen when they went to law Christian against Christian before an Heathen Judge The fourth scandalous object is that which hath appearance of evill Not every thing is such for good hath the appearance of evill Paybodie to elude this sheweth a number of things which have appearance of evill but â—are good and he nameth among them Hushaies abiding with Absolon in his conspiracie which was plaine dissimulation but that properly hath appearance of evill 1. Quod plaerumque fit malo fine as the Schoolemen define it that which ordinarily is done for an evill end as to ly in bed with another mans wife to sit at the Idols table to bow to an Image 2. That which being good in it selfe yet because of the circumstances is exponed vain-glory as to pray in the streets it s ordinarily exponed to be for this end to be seen of men These who expone that place 1 Thess 5. Abstaine from all appearance of evill to be abstaine from that which seemeth evill to the conscience and judgement of the doer or onely of doctrine reach not the Apostles minde for to sit at the Idols table to bow to an Image and keepe the heart to God are out of doubt appearances of evill forbidden in the text yet are they not doctrines seeming evill alwayes to the judgement of the practisers They object to looke up to the beavens and Sunne may have appearance of praying to the Sunne and heavens for in the externall fact no more could be done by a person adoring the Sun Ergo such appearances cannot be scandalous Objects Answer lifting up of the eyes in prayer are naturall adumbrations and expressions of the elevation of the heart required in prayer Psal 25. v. 1. and so commonly exponed by all Nations and therefore cannot be appearances of evill Hence these rules I. Suppose all be strong in whose presence I practise a thing indifferent yet if it have no necessitie no aptitude to edifie and have onely all its goodness from the will of commanders in practising I scandalize 1. Because the strong are apt to sinne and so apt to be scandalized and the action is idle and not reasonable having no other reason but the meere will of Rulers 2. If I probably know my practice shall come to the knowledge of these who shall be scandalized I scandalize them in such an action II. Rule Though the practice of things indifferent having some necessitie be lawfull as 1 Cor. 10. 27. Eat what is set before you asking no question for conscience sake Yet the â—aith and conscience of things indifferent is never indifferent we are never to judge a thing indifferent necessarie nor a thing necessarie indifferent and practice in that judgement so erroneous is finfull and not of faith Rom. 14 â— 22. III Rule An universall omission of good of obeying affirinative precepts for the eschewing of scandall cannot be lawfull for it is 1. necessarie for my salvation to obey affinnative precepts though not in all differences of time In this meaning Augustine said We are not to abstaine from good workes he meaneth a totall abstainence for any scandall And Tertullian good offendeth non save a wicked minde But at sometime an obedience to an affirmative precept hic nunc may be omitted when we see that from the doing thereof the ignorant and weake will commit great sinnes So Aquinas Bannes Sanches for affirmative precepts of the law of nature saith Bannes must sometime be omitted for the eschewing of scandall for they doe not obliedge but when and after such a manner as is convenient V. Rule To doe any good action or lawfull or indifferent when I probably foresee a scandall will follow is an active scandall for I preferre my owne will to my brothers salvation saith Antoninus and Navarret and therefore saith i Antoninus A virgin going abroad without just necessitie where her beautie shall be a snarâ— to young men or to goe out upon a necessary cause with a whorish attire is an active scandall her feet abideth not in her house saith Solomon And Navarr saith It is to sinne mortally and Silvester saith If the Popes commandement doe but smell of veniall sinne and if by giving audience thereunto it be presumed that the state of the Church shall be troubled or a scandall shall arise though the commandement goe out under the paine of Excommunication it is not to bee obeyed Vasques and Suarez say to sell gift or dispose of any things indifferent when we foresee they shall abuse them is to commit the sinne of active scandalizing Yea the forme of an Idol though he never adore it doth highly scandalize and Antoninus Silvester Corduba Metina the Jesuit Zanches teach That to contribute to that which we see shall induce any to sinne is to be guilty of scandalizing And the reasons be these 1. We are not to preferre our will to the salvation of our brother 2. Things lesse necessarie then our brothers salvation in that case become not necessarie and so fruitlesse and idle 3. Charitie inferferreth that we hinder so far as we can the ruine of our brothers soul Scandaell is spirituall homicide 4. To contribute any morall help and influence to our brothers fall and soul-ruine is to be accessarie to his sinne Hence Ceremonies and things not necessarie to salvation may be omitted altogether in their specialities when the practising of them doth scandalize and so though kneeling in Gods worship cannot well be universally omitted yet kneeling appropriate to such an act of worship may be omitted and ought to be omitted if it scandalize and Ceremonies which scandalize universally seeing they are not in their very kinde necessarie to salvation are to be abolished Yet I may adde one caution here To contribute helpe for the doing of that which of it selfe is necessarie which I know an other in respect of humane frailtie will abuse to sinne is no active scandall So to lay hands on a qualified Pastor is not sinne though I foresee through humane frailtie he will abuse his power in some things to sinne So for
give but doe not grant that they are not unlawfull but indifferent 2. Though to take wages be lawfull yet it followeth not that it is not in Pauls caâ—e at Corinth of it selfe scandalous for to eat all meates is lawfull Rom. 14. and 1 Cor. 10. 23. All things are lawfull v. 26. The earth is the Lords yet to eat before the weake was in it selfe scandalous Rom. 14. 15. 16. 17. 1 Cor. 10. 28. 29. 3. It is a most weake reason to prove that to take wages was not scandalous because forâ—ooth the Corinthians should not have been scandalized for to be scandalized is to sinne and there is no reason in sinning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If this be good adulterie and murther in David is not of it selfe scandalous for as no man hath reason to sinne so no man hath reason to be scandalized at Davids sinne Pauls taking wages at Corinth should have been a sinfull hindering of the Gospels progresse and therefore of it self sinfull and so of it selfe scandalous But I return to the Doctors Duplyers pag 67. 68. n. 46 47. As for that which yee say that when Scandall may be taken at the doing of the thing commanded then the thing commanded becommeth inexpedient and so ought not to be obeyed that yee be not more deceived with this errour we pray you marke that a thing commanded by our Superiours in Church or Policie mâ—y be two wayes inexpedient to wit either in respect of some particular Persons who thâ—ough weaknesse or maliâ—e doe stumble at it or else in respect of the body in generall because it is contrary to Order Decencie and Edification If the thing commanded be inexpedient the former way we may indeed in such a case for eschewing the Scandall of the weake forbeare the practice of the thing commanded Hic nunc in some particular places and times provyding alwayes we doe this without offence of our Superiours and without the scandall of others but we cannot totally forbeare practice for we are to looke more to the utilitie which the body of the Church may receive by the thing commanded and by our obedience to our Superiours then to some particular persons 47. But if the thing commanded be in our private judgement inexpedient the other way we ought not for that to deny Obedience to the lawes of the Church for when the inexpediencie of a thing is questionable and probable arguments may be brought pro and contra concerning the expediencie of it wee have sufficient warrant to practise it if the Church inact it as expedient Otherwayes your way is so dangerous that there shall never be peace nor unitie in the Church for men ordinarily are divided in judgement concerneing the expediencie of things Suppose a Synode consisting of one hundred Pastours threescore shall think this particular Ceremonie expedient for the good of the Church and in respect of pluralitie of voyces make an act to be concluded for the establishing of it shall the remnant fourty who are of the contrary judgement deny obedience to the acts of the Synode Answer 1. This distinction of inexpedient in the matter of indifferent Ceremonies is Popish and vaine for if the Ceremonie be indifferent and may be wanted in the worship of God as these Ceremonies be if one soule for whom Christ died shall be murthered thereby it is hoc ipso to be judged inexpedient and scandalous in it selfe and so cannot fall under the object of a Church Canon as 1 Cor. 8. 13. If meat make my brother to stumb'le he saith not the whole Church I will not eat Ergo he cannot command others to eat 1 Cor. 10. 28. But if any man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say to you this is offered in sacrifice to Idols eat not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for his sake that shewed it Ergo if it seem expedient and so be scandalous to one let alone to a whole Church we are totally to forbeare it and Paul would while the world standeth 1 Cor. 8. 13. forbeare it 2. You will not have us to forbeare a thing indifferent that actively for the passive scandall I hope you regard not as a scandall doth scandalize but with a provision that we doe it without offence of Superiours and without the scandall of others But I aske Doctors what you meane by Offence of Superiours if you meane without displeasing and inciting our Superiours to anger 1. You ignorantly confound displeasing and Scandalizing When a Pastor rebuketh Superiours as Jeremiah Elias and John Baptist in the good old world did they did displease Superiours but not scandalize them yea they did edifie their Superiours while as they did offend them It is wicked Divinitie to mean that we are not to eschew the murthering of a weake brother for whom Christ died providing we offend not that is displease not our Superiours Will you to please men displease the God of heaven and commit spiritual homicide This is worse then Poperie But if you meane that wee are to forbeare the thing commanded for eschewing the scandall of the weake providing we doe it without the offence of Superiours that is without the active scandalizing of Superiours then 1. your distinction is vaine for if we scandalize culpably our superiours by our forbearance though it be inexpedient to all private persons we are not to forbeare because in no case can we breake the sixt Commandement and scandalize our Superiours 2. You shall be forced to giveâ— case wherein we are necessitated by Gods providence and that by way of contradiction whether we forbeare or forbeare not to murther either the soules of some weake ones or the soules of Superiours by our forbearance of the practice of things judged expedient by Superiours you make us to murther the soules of Superiours by the non-forbearance or you will have us to murther the soules of weake breathren if we practise This is a wronging of Providence and a Maâ—ichean tenent that we can be under such a necessitie of sinning Yea there must be two centraâ—y revealed wills in God commanding by forbearing the Ceremonies not to murther Superiours and commanding by not forbearing not to murther weak brethren and so God commandeth both to forbeare and also not to forbeare If you say the weake may be informed and then it is a passive scandall onely and practising is lawfull at the commandement of Superiours I answer 1. Then your distinction hath no use here 2. I answer Let the Superiours who have more knowledge be informed that to abstaine from a practice that may murther any one redeemed by Christ is Christs commandement Thou shalt doe no murther then it is but a passive scandall and not an active or culpably given scandall Ergo we are to forbeare the thing commanded for eschewing of the scandall hic nunc of the weake even though with the offence that is the passive scandall of Superiours and others which is contradictorie to the Doctours 3. If we may forbeare obedience to Gods
primatam Ecclesia Anglicanae and regeâ— sâ—cro olcâ— uncti capaces sunt spiritualis jurisdictionis Rex propriâ— autorite creat Episcopus See Cald. â—u altar Dam. p. 14 15 16. seq That Magistrates are more hot against punishing of sin by the Church then against sinfull omissions which argueth that they are unpatient of Christs yoak rather then that they desire to vindicate the liberty of the subject in this point Not any power or office subject to any but to God immediately subjection is properly of persons A Magistrate and a Christian different Two things in a Christian Magistrate jus authoritie aptitudo habilitie Pareâ—â— Com. in Rom. 13. dub Iac. Triglandius de potest civ Ecclesiastica c. 10. 207 208. Vbi nam injuâ—xit Christus Magistratui Christiano ut oves Christi quae â—ales Regat Christianity maketh no new power of or to Magistrates Jac. Trig. land diâ—â—er Theo. de potest civ c. 8. p. 174. A fourfold consideration of the exercise of Ministerial power most necessary upon which the former Distinctions followeth ten very considerable Assertions 1. Assert The Magistrate as the Magistrate commandeth the exercise of Ministeriall power but not the spirituall and sincere manner of the exercise Magistrates as godly men not as Magistrates command sincerity and zeal in the manner of the exercise of ministeriall power Augustin contr literas petilian l. 2. c. 92. contr Cresconi l. 8. c. 5. reges serviunt Dâ—o in quantum sunt homines in quantum sunt reges Exo. 18. 21 Deu. 1. 16. 17. Dâ—u 17. 19 20. A two fold good in a Christian Magistrate essentiall accidentall Asser 3. The Magistrate as such commandeth only in order to temporary reward and punisheth and layeth no commands on the constience Nota. Nota. Magistrates as Magistrates forbid not sin as sin under the paine of eternall wrath Two sorts of subordinations Civill Ecclesiastick Ministers not the Ambassadors of an earthly King but of the King of Kings Church Officers as such not subordinate to the Magistrate See the Arminian Remonstrance in Apol. c. 25. fol. 299 300. What power Erastiaus give to Magistrates in Church matters The minde of Arminians touching the Magistrates power in Church matters Remonstrant Arminian c. 25. p. 304 â—â—c Trig. de potest 〈…〉 Eccelesiastica dissâ—â—tatio Thâ—â—l p. 123 Tâ—mâ—lorum usus sâ—ipeâ—â—iorum publâ—â—orum â—â—â— in re nihil potest ille enimextrinsâ—â—us accedit ad res Ecclesiasticas eorumque naturam atque indolem nihil immutat A threefold consideration of the magistrate in relation to the Church Course of conformity part 3. pag. 146. Reciprocation of subordinaâ—â—â—ns between Church and Magistrate Aâ—t Walens p. 2. de quatenus pastor subjiciatur magist pag. 15 16. Iac. Trig. disser Thel de potest civ Ecclesi c. 5. pag. 124. profess Leyden in Syno purioris Theol. dis de disc Ecclesi de magistrati Zipperus de pâ—litâ—a Ecclesiast l. 3. c. 13. Calvinus Insti l. 4. c. 11. Pet. Cabel Iavins in apolâ—gâ—tico Rescript pro libert Ecelesi c. 6. p. 79. M. Cot. in a Model of Church and civill power P. Matyr loc Communi l. 4. c. 13. D. Pareus in prefat ad hâ—seam Epist ad langravi August confess Artic. de potâ—st Ecclesi Helv. confess Anno 1566. Art 18. Suevica confess Art 13. Saxonica Art 12. Anglic. fol. 132. Scotic confess The Ministers as Ministers neither Magistrates nor subjects The Magistrate as such neither manageth his office under Christ as mediator nor under Satan but under God as creator A Prince as a gifted Christian may preach and spread the Gospell to a land where the Gospell hath not bin heard before but not as a Magistrate Ità videlius Ep. Const quest 11. Vtenbogard cont Pontific primat p. 71 72 73 Anto. Wal. p. 2. p. 30 31. Cabcl Iavius apol disser de l. Eccles c. 6. p. 82. Iac. Trig. Des Thho The King and the Priest kept the book of the Law but in a farre different way Bloody Tenent Cap. 82. page 119. C. 65. â—a 123. C. 85. pa. 124. The Pastors and the Iudges do reciprocally judge and censure one another God hath not given a power to the magistrate and Church and to judge contrary wayes justly and unjustly in one and the same cause Bloody Te. c. 84. p. â—22 Bellarmine de laicis c. 17. c. 18. Slatius iâ— aperta declaratione p. 53. Magistratus non valet sub penaâ—terne condemnation is gladio uti aut dominatum petere quisquus id facit Christianus non est Welsing lib. de officiâ— homi Christiani p. 1. Sim. Epis dis 13. c. 18. 19. Divers opinions of the Magistrates power in causes Eccleâ—iasticall It is one thing to complain to the Magistrate another thing to appeal What an appeal is Refuge to the Magistrate is not an appeal A twofold appeal De Lib. Eceles c. 9. p. 134 135. Iac. Trig. de civili Ecclesiastic potest â— 20. p. 420. 421. Mr. Pryn his Truth Triumphing sect 2. and 3. p. 7 8 c. 16. Sect. 13 14 15 16. Prinne Truth Triump p. 31. The Magistrates punishing or his interest of faith proveth him not be a judge in Synods Truth triumphing sect 2. 31 32. Page 31. Of Pauls appeal to Cesar that it proveth not that in Ecclesiasticall controversies we may appeal to Heathen or Christian Magistrates as to Iudges of matters Ecclesiastick from the Church Paul appealed from an inferiour civill judge to a superiour civill and heathen judge in a matter of his life not in a matter of Religion What power a conquerour hath to set up a religion in a conquered nation Videlius de Episcopat Constant p. 77. Vtenbogard p. 33. Camero prelâ—ct in Mat. 16. v. 18. 19. Tu es pâ—trus p. 17. Due right of Presbyteries p. 435 436. 437 438. c. Camero 16 17. 18. There were no appeals made to the godly Emperors of old 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To lay bands on the conscience of the Prince to tye him to blind obedience Popish not our Doctrine Platina in Bonifac. 3. Baronius an 602. n. 18. Baronius an 606. n. 3. Baroni an 1085. Onuphorius an 1527. 1540. Mr. Prinne Truth triumphing Remonstr in apolog p. 299. esse papatus corculum esse id ipsum in quo â—iâ—a est fâ—rma papatus five papalis hierar â—biâ—s Remonstr in apolog So Stapleton Bellarmine and other Papists argue The Magistrate as a Magistrate cannot forbid sin as sin The Magistrate as the Magistrate promoteth Christs mediatory Kingdom materially not directly and formally The Magistrate as such not the Vicar of the Mediator Christ The adversaries in the doctrine of the Magistrate Popish not we at all Andreas Rivetus Iesuit Vapul in Castigati Notarum in Epist ad Balsacum Edit 1644. c. â—1 page 40. Christus neque Reges neque principes instituit in Ecclesia sed neque successores habet neque vicarios quibus competat jus dominatus ministros tantum instituit nomine principis unius legatione