Speratus the Martyr about the same time denied to swear so because he knew not what the Genius of the Emperor meant Tertullian tells us in the second Century That Christians would not swear by the Genius or Daemon or Fortune of Cesar but by the health or safety of the Emperor they did because they understood by that God and the Lord Christ And when other Christians did in publick cases swear being required by Authority yet the Bishops of the Church were not put to swear as Basilius a Bishop pleaded for his priviledge when in the Council of Chalcedon he was required to give Oath the sanctity of his Life and honour of his Order being assurance sufficient for his truth The Christian Souldiers as Vegetius tells us took Oath in the name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit to obey their Commanders not to desert their Colours and to dye for the common welfare which was called Sacramentum militare both before and after Christianity had prevailed in the Empire And hence the name Sacrament came to be applied to Christian Mysteries which are special and solemn dedications of them to the true God and Saviour In the Nicene Council Arrius with an Oath renounced his heretical Opinion So in the Ephesine Council it was ordered that Nestorius should abjure all heterodox and profane Doctrines In the Sixth Synod of Constantinople Gregorius the Librarian made Oath tactis Evangeliis upon the Bible that he left the Books in the Library such as he found them without any blotting out or inserting which Oath I wish the Romish Expurgators had taken and kept as to their Edition of ancient Church-Authors Fathers and others Athanasius who seems and is very zealous against profane and popular swearing yet in his Apology to Constantius purges himself by Oath from the calumnies cast upon him by impudent persons citing for his defence the example of S. Paul Nor is it any news to read of Christian Kings and Magistrates requiring and Subjects giving their Faith by Oath in matters civil sacred and solemn when the form of Oathes were such as consisted with the truth of Christian Religion and the honour of the true God Nor did any Canons of the Church ever forbid such Swearing Indeed while Christians lived in persecution without any protection from the civil Indicatories there can be no examples of their Swearing after the heathenish manner But when Christianity and Christians came to be wrapped up in the Imperial Laws and defended by the Supream powers and were enabled to vindicate their civil rights in judicial proceeding they did not think that unlawful which God had of old commanded which hath a moral that is an eternal good end in it as an act of trust and appeal of agnition and veneration toward God of justice and satisfaction to man also of private and publick charity as the School-men truly observe for the ending of controversies and taking away of jealousies Only due circumstances were strictly required according to the word of God in judgment righteousness and truth Yea we read of old some condemned by the orthodox part of the Church as S. Austin and others tell us for this error among others that they denied all swearing to be lawful So did the Samosatâ—nians and some Pelagians in Syracuse so the Massilians and Euchites so in S. Bernard's days some of the Albigenses and of later dayes some Anabaptists and now the Quakers whether out of policy and art or simplicity and ignorance God knows It were as needless as endless in respect of the Quakers satisfaction who do not value them to produce the consonant judgements of Modern Writers of the Reformed Churches or the Romanists and the most eminent Divines among them which may easily be seen in the Harmony of their Confessions or in their particular Tracts in this Subject Swearing All agreeing as in just severity against false idle and profane Oathes against all perjury intentional and eventual So they do all assent to the moral good in a judicious and solemn swearing with due circumstances upon just occasions by lawful Call of Authority in cases honest and true especially to end controversies to secure Princes and preserve the common wellfare in Iustice and Peace Nor do they think that by any positive Law of Christ all swearing is become now unlawful to Christians among whom the same end use necessity and sanctity of Oaths may be and still are to be had which was once lawful to the Jewes and used in all Nations but only that kind of evil swearing which then was become customary and thought either not sinful or venial This is and ever was forbidden as by the Law of God of old so by the renewed vigor and force of it which Christ restored after it had been so much depraved by the Pharisaical presumption and popular profaneness which imposed rigors where God had laid none and affected liberties where God had given none Agreeably all eminent Writers of the Greek and Roman Church among the learnedest Papists Lutherans and Calvinists Canonists and Casâ—ists as well as those in these British Churches do assert the Authority of lawful Magistrates to require and impose religious Oathes and the duty of Subjects to obey both God and them in taking them as becomes Christians with due reverence to the Majesty of God and with fitting obedience to these commands of Superiours who have their power from God and are to use it to his Glory Nor do they disallow even private and spontaneous attestations of God in weighty matters as to quench the fire of jealousie or to purge away an unjust infamy or to give some such security as justice and charity may require for our own and others goods as a sober Heathen tells us to the just condemnation of Christians who in trivial affairs venture to prostitute the sacredness of an Oath And thus I have with greater prolixity then I intended my wonted fault and Apology endeavoured to vindicate the Divine and true sense of our Saviours words First to remove the crying sin of Swearing vainly rashly irreverently profanely falsly in small or great matters Next to shew the moral end and religious use of Oathes lawful for matter and form and particularly those required in Judicial proceedings according to the Laws and Customes of England both Ecclesiastical and Civil or common agreeable to the word of God and the judgement of the best Christians in all Ages Having herein no design but to give Testimony to that Truth which I believe to justifie the sanctity of our Lawes to serve His Majesty and to do the duty of a good Subject a good Christian a good Minister of Christ and a good Bishop of this Church dispelling the needless scruples and superstitious fears of these poor people called Quakers shewing them their safe liberty to obey and how to escape the Penalties for disobeying the Laws and obstructing Justice by refusing
and nearest the medium both of humanity as a man and of charity as a Christian measuring all Policies by Christs golden Rule To do as I would be done unto Secondly In point of State-Policy also or methods of true Government I do conceive that meer plagiary counsels and punitive courses are never likely to obtain the main End which is to stop the contagion of errors and to extirpate those depraved opinions which are justly thought to be the spawn of dangerous actions For unless the generality of credulous people who are spectators of those that differ and suffer for their opinions and consciences do also see so much light of Reason and clear Religion as may justifie the severity of the Laws executed upon those offenders who profess Conscience for their Disobedience and Scripture for their Consciences it is most certain that the spectators of their sufferings will very much soften to a compassion for them and by sympathizing with their persons in affliction they will by degrees symbolize with their opinions easily running as metal that is melted into the same mold at length the populacy if not fortified by pregnant demonstrations of Truth against those spreading errors and their Pseudo-Martyrs will mightily cry up their Piety admire their Courage magnifie their Constancy At last they will conclude those sufferers to have some special support or diviner Spirit above ordinary men because they seem to be so much above the ordinary passions of fear and hope self-love and preservation which prospect of patience Justin Martyr tells us was the first occasion of his examining the Doctrine of Christians that he might see on what ground so fixed a constancy grew which shewed a Divine security midst humane infirmity By such popular pity and applause not only sufferers will be confirmed in their pertinacy but their spectators also will dayly encrease and multiply as the shootes of Trees do by the lopping off their branches especially if the lives and actions of such dissenters and sufferers be morally just and civilly innocent For nothing sooner discovers and blasts such cross opinions and withers the glory of their factious spectators then vile injurious and insolent demeanor either in words or deeds such as all men confess to deserve the Gaole and Gibbet This indeed as in the mad pranks of John of Leyden and his Anabaptistick crew in Germany and so in our Hacket and other Disciplinarians in England in the late presumption of the Presbyterian Reformations and Independent Confusions full of Perjury Sacrilâ—dge Treason and innocent Blood This I say will as the barking of Trees round presently bring any Opinionists and Factionists to publick scorn and hatred as it did those Papists who heretofore in the Marian Persecutions in the horrid Powder-Plot and in the late Irish Rebellion full of perfidy and cruelty have so blemished the repute of that Catholick cause as it can never be redeemed from just jealousies but by actions of extraordinary Loyalty Meekness and Humanity besides the renouncing of some opinions But where harmlesness of life sets a glosse on Opiniont and Errors thereby grow more lusty and rank as ill weeds in good ground there meer robust power or punitive severity can no more pull them up then a strong arm doth thorns and bushes when they are deeply rooted breaking off the stem or top of them but leaving the roots still in the ground which will spring again and spread farther Here nothing is so effectual to do execution upon errors as clear demonstrations of Reason and Religion which reaching mens Consciences by the proper methods of conviction do like a sharp Spade and Mattock fetch up the very roots and fibres of evil opinions to the utter extirpation of such noxious plants in a short time except where knavery and hypocrisie do husband Opinions to the best advantage of secular ends and interests of reputation profit or power After this charitable method and temper were those many learned Works and elaborate Tracts of the Ancient Fathers of the Church Irenaeus Tertullian Cyprian Saint Austin Prosper Cyril Hilary Optatus Saint Jerom and others written conforme to the Canons and Decrees of Ecclesiastical Councils guided by the Word and Spirit of God and seasonably applied by their skilful and charitable hands to cure the maladies and stop the Gangrenes of such pestilent opinions as sprang up in their dayes from Hereticks Schismaticks and Fanaticks Nor did those holy men at any time so despise the meannesse of any Christians outward condition or the fatuity of their opinions as not to set a great value on their souls for which Christ had died ever applying first the sword of the Spirit the Word of Truth in meekness of wisedom before they craved the assistance or incouraged the severity of the secular Sword from Christian Emperours and Magistrates using all rational and religious means untill they found that depraved opinions put men upon desperate actions as in those of the Novatians Donatists and Arrians also of the Manichees Euchites and Circumcellians a primitive kind of Quakers who by a specious constancy in praying and affectation of suffering so seduced the vulgar people that the numbers of their devout idle and hungry associates at length gave them confidence to make a prey and spoile of other mens goods estates and lives too till by armed Forces they were repressed and by just Laws prohibited in Honorius and other Emperors times Then indeed Charity to the publick peace and welfare must be preferred before any pity charity forbearance or indulgence to private persons parties and opinions which growing rude and insolent in their words or deeds sufficiently discover they are not upon the pure account of Conscience or principles of true Christian Religion which is as farre as Heaven from Hell or Christ from Belial from teaching or impelling men to any actings or approvings of private sinnes and immoralities much more from publick conspirings and practisings of Factions Schisms Sedition and Rebellion in Churches and Kingdomes for which Christ never gave any Commission to his Disciples nor the least countenance but on the contrary most eminent precepts and examples of humility meekness and patience under any sufferings for conscience sake sufficient for ever to confute the most specious pretensions of any who violently carry on their private Opinions and pretended Reformations against the will and power of lawful Magistrates and settled Churches I do judge it both Piety Charity and Policy to establish the rule of publick Religion by Lâ—wes for uniformity in Doctrine Devotion Discipline and Decency accompanied as with Rewards and Priviledges to the Conformers so with some moderate pecuniary Penalties on Dissenters according to mens estates and influences but I confess I am not for heavy mulcts and rigorous exactions which shal imprison banish impoverish or destroy modest Dissenters and their families onely for the variety of their judgment when their civil actions are otherwise moral just and inoffensive This severity would in some Countries and
which though attended with many persecutions yet was not without many blessings peculiar to true believers from vers 3. to vers 12. Secondly our Saviour gives many singular lessons or precepts of more eminent deligence patience charity mortification self-denial sincerity conspicuity perseverance and perfection of obedience required now under the Gospel above what either the Letter of the Mosaick Law seemed to exact or by the Pharisaical Interpretations were taught to the Iewes So that unless their righteousness did exceed that so popularly admired of the Pharisees they could not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven vers 20. Thirdly our Saviour with much earnestness and exactness applyes in this Sermon to reform those abuses which either by the Pharisaical glosses either too much loosning or restraining the meaning of Gods Law or by their depraved examples or by popular custom had prevailed among the Iewes contrary to the true meaning of the moral Law of God and the primitive Institution which gives us the clearest view of the Law-givers intention For the exact observation of which however by Divine indulgence and connivence or by the hardness and uncharitableness of their own hearts and the customary depravedness of times and manners they might seem to have had some temporary dispensation heretofore granted to them or at least had presumed to take it to themselves yet now under the Evangelical strictness to which Christ came to restore or raise the Church they might not fancy to themselves any such liberty but were to keep themselves in thought look desire word and deed to that sanctity and severity which was required by the Law and most conform to the holy Will Attributes and Nature of that God whom they ought to imitate as their heavenly Father in all sacred perfections which humane Nature assisted by the light of the Gospel the grace of Gods Spirit and the visible example of Christ was capable to attain at least sincerely to aim at and endeavour So vers 22. He tells them that not only wilful murder or malicious killing was forbidden but rash unreasonable and irreconcilable anger Vers 28. That not only Adultery but all lust inordinate after a Woman that is not in order to marriage and the honest ends of it were so severely forbidden under pain of Hell fire that it were better to deny those sensual pleasures of the flesh which seem as dear to men as the delight of their eyes or the strength of their hands then to indulge them with the danger of their souls Vers 32. So in the case of humorous and lascivious Divorces usually given to Wives upon no just cause Christ restrains that indulgence only to the case of a Wives deserving to be put away for having broke her conjugal vow and band of Matrimony by her Adultery Not to instance in many other particulars of abuses which Christ reckons up and reforms in that Sermon as touching private Revenge vers 39. not publick and vindicative Iustice so of loving our enemies vers 44 of almes prayer and fasting without ostentation pride or hypocrisie against immoderate love and care for things of this world and the like the immediately next is this of Swearing vers 33 34. In which as in many other things the Iews had much depraved both the true nature and use of Oaths 1. They pretended indeed as Philo and Iosephus tell us a great reverence of the Name of God and seemed to make great conscience of swearing in small matters by the name of the Lord according to the Letter of the Scripture yea they made scruple to swear at all in any case by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lord liveth For which the Heathens mocked the Iewes as in that of Martial Jura verpe per Anchialum These Oaths they thought binding nor would they in these easily swear or forswear themselves Which regard to their Gods was in use among the gravest Heathens as is observed out of Homer therefore they took any obvious thing to swear by 2. But they indulged themselves in other familiar Oaths or forms of common Swearing as many Christians now do by whatever came next to their minds or tongues as by the Temple and holy City by their own or others Heads Hands Lives and Souls so by Heaven and Earth and the Light Thus waving the attestation of Gods omniscient Justice and the swearing by his name as was commanded in righteousness judgement and truth they put this Character of Divinity on the Creatures no way competent for them unless as they are in relation to depending on and derived from the blessed God 3. These vulgar Oaths they used not only in a familiarity and facility of inconsiderate swearing upon small and light occasions yea and in asserting of things not true as to their knowledge and intention which was doubly a false swearing but in things of weight and concerne as to that charity justice and equity which they owed to others they chose this way of Creature-Swearing both promissory and assertory because they fancied such Oaths being not with the solemnity of invocating Gods name were not binding upon their Souls either as to truth or right but they might play with them at fast and loose according as their own interest or pleasure did sway them Hence as they sware amiss in point of form so also as to the matter without any regard in these cases to that Command of God against forswearing and for the performance of Oaths to the Lord which places Christ cites and to which Law they professed to adhere so far only as they used the name of God else they dispensed with their Oaths and easily digested even perjury it self Upon this occasion and to reform these gross abuses our blessed Saviour gives this Command Swear not at all that is as Erasmus paraphraseth not after those usual presumptuous and unlawful forms by the names of Creatures of which he gives so many following instances to express his meaning For he doth not instance in the lawful use of religious Oaths by the name of the true God which was not only allowed but in such cases as did require an Oath with its due circumstances of Judgement Justice and Truth commanded 2. He tells them that even in those Oaths which were attested only by the naming of any Creature as by Heaven or Earth or Jerusalem or their Head c. there was a tacit calling of God to witness since every Creature depends on God and relates to him as the Center and Circumference the Source and Sea of all things Heaven is Gods Throne Earth Gods Foot-stoole the Temple Gods Sanctuary Jerusalem the City of God the most eminent place of the great King of Heavens residency on Earth 3. He implyes that however such various and irregular forms of Oaths by the name of any Creature were as to the manner of them unlawful yet they obliged men to perform them if the matter of them were lawful nor were