this how dare you blame me for writing to save you from confusion and every evil work 6. I will conclude with the repetition of one thing delivered in this Treatise that among all the rest two separating dividing principles will never give peace to the Church where they prevail The one is the confounding mens Title to visible Church Membership and Communion with their Title to Justification and Salvation The other is the Imposing of new terms and titles of Visible membership and Communion and rejecting the sufficiency of the â—erms and title of Christs appointment Christ hath solemnly and purposely made the Baptismal Covenanting with him to be the terms and title to Church membership and Communion And the owning of this same Covenant is the sufficient Title of the adult And the Imposers that come after and require another kind of evidence of Conversion or Sanctification than this do confound the Church and enflame the people and leave no certain way of tryal but make as various terms and titles as there are various degrees of wisdome and Charity and various opinions in the Pastors yea in all the people to whom they allow the judgement of such Causes in the several Churches In this point the sober Anabaptists seem to come nearer the truth than they I add no more but Christs conclusion that a house or Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand The Book it self was written near two years ago but this Preface Feb. 2. 1669. AN ABSTRACT OF THE DIRECTIONS 1. FOrget not the difference between the younger sort of Christians and the Elder The peril of the Church from young Christians 2. Observe the secret workings of spiritual pride and how deep rooted and odious a sin it is and what special temptations to it the younger and emptier sort of Christians have 3. Overvalue not the Common gift of utterance nor a high profession as if grace were appropriated to such alone who are to be called Professors 4. Affect not to be made enâ—lnent and conspicuous in holiness by standing at a further distance from common Christians than God would have you 5. Understand the true difference between the Church as Visible and as Regenerate or mystical and the several qualifications of the Members What Scandals were in the primitive Churches in Scripture times 6. Understand well the different Conditions and terms of Communion with the Church as mystical and as visible and the different priviledges of the members that you may not presume to impose any Conditions which God hath not imposed nor unjustly grudge at 〈…〉 essence of those that are not sincere 7. Get time and sleep apprehensions of the necessity and reasons of Christian Vnity and Concord and of the sin and misery of divisions and discord what Scripture saith herein 8. When any thing needeth amendment in the Church the best Christians must be the forwardest to Reform and the backwardest to divide on that pretence 9. Forget 〈◊〉 the great difference betweene the Churches 〈◊〉 the 〈…〉 and the Godlyes separating from the Church it self because the wicked are not cast out The first is a great duty the second usually a great sin Luthers case 10. Expect not that any one lawfully received into the Church by Baptism should be cast out of it or denyed the priviledges of the Church but according to the rules of Christian discipline by the power of the Keys that is for oâ—stinate impenitency in a gross on scandalous sin upon proof and after sufficient private and publick admonition 11. Understand what the Power of the Keys is and what the Pastors office is as they are the Governours of the Church entrusted by Christ with the power of admission and rejection that so you may know how far you are to rest in the Pastors judgment and may not usurp any part of their office to your selves 12. Study well Christs gracious nature and office and his great readiness to receive the weakest that come to him that so you may desire a Church discipline agreeable to the Gospel 13. Yet lest you run into the worse extream remember still that the destroying of sin and the sanctifying of man to God was the work of our Redeemer And that Holiness and Peace must go together And that our own Church-order and discipline must be subservient to the inward spirituality and prosperity of the Church-regenerate And no such favour must be shewed to sinners as favoureth sin and hindereth Holiness 14. Though your Governours are the Iudges what persons shall be of your publick-Church-Communion yet it is you that must judge who are fit or unfit for your private familiarity 15. Vnderstand how much it hath pleased God to lay all mens happiness or misery upon their own choice And seek not to alter this order of God 16. Though the profession of Christianity which entitleth men to Church-Communion must be credible yet remember that there are various degrees of Credibility And that every Profession which is not proved false is credible in such a degree as must be accepted by the Church 17. Know how far it is that either Grace or Gifts are necessary to a Minister that you may give to both their due 18. Vnderstand well the necessity of your Communion with all the Universal Church and wherein it consisteth and how far it is to be preferred before your Communion with any particular Church 19. Engage not your selves too far in any divided Sect and espouse not the interest of any party of Christians to the neglect or injury of the universal Church and the Christian Cause 20. Be very suspicious of your Religious passions and carefully distinguish between a sound and sinful zeal least you father your sin on the Spirit of God and think you please him more when you most offend him 21. Lend not a patient ear to backbiters nor hastily believe the most religious people when they speak ill of others 22. Make not your selves selves judges of other mens actions much less of their state before you have a Call or before you have sufficient knowledge of the person and of the Case 23. Mistake not the nature of the sin of Scandal as if it were the bare displeasing of another when it is the laying of a stumbling-block or occasion of sinning before another 24. Make Conscience of Scandalizing one party as well as another and those most who are most in danger by your offence 25. Be not over tender of your reputation with any sort of men on earth nor too impatient of their displeasure censures or contempt But live above them 26. Use not your selves needlesly to the familiar company of that sort of Christians who use to censure them that are more sober Catholick and charitable than themselves Unless you be as much or more with the soberer sort who will shew you the sin and mischief of Love-killing principles and divisions 27. Take heed of misjudging of the answers of your prayers and of taking those things to be from God which
your foul back-biting reviling censorious contentious tongues do not prove the contrary 13. who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you Let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisedome that is Let him that would be thought more knowing and religious than his neighbours be so much more blameless and meek to all men and excel them in good works v. 14. But if ye have a bitter zeal for so is the Greek word and strife in your hearts glory not in such a zeal or in your greater knowledge and lie not against the truth 15. This wisdome descendeth not from above as you imagine who father it on Gods word and spirit but is earthly sensual or natural and devillish O doleful mistake that the world the flesh and the Devil should prove the cause of that conceited spiritual knowledge and excellency which they thought had been the inspiration of the spirit v. 16. For where zeal and strife 〈◊〉 that is a striving contentious zeal against brethren there is confusion or tumult and unquietness and every evil work O lamentable reformers that set up every evil work while they seemed zealous against evil v. 17. But the wisdome that is from above is first pure then peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality or wrangling and without Hypocrisie And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace when peace-breakers that sow in divisions and contention shall reap the fruit of unrighteousness though they call their way by the most religious names Thus I have briefly shewed you what Vâ—nity and Division are that wrong apprehensions draw you not to sin DIRECT VIII When any thing needeth amendment in the Church remember that the best Christian must be the forwardest to reformation and â—he backwardest to Division and must search and try all means of Reforming which make not against the concord of the Church I Do not here determine in what cases you may or may not separate from any company of faulty Christians I only say that you must never separate what God hath conjoyned the Holiness and the Vnity of believers If corruptions blemish and dishonour the Congregation Do not say Let sin alone I must not oppose it for fear of division But be the forwardest to reduce all to the will of God And yet if you cannot prevail as you desire be the backwardest to divide and separate and do it not without a certain warrant and extream necessity Resolve with Austin I will not be the chaff and yet I will not go out of the floor though the chaff be there Never give over your just desire and endeavour of Reformation And yet as long as possibly you can avoid it forsake not the Church which you desire to reform As Paul said to them that were ready to forsake a sea-wrackt vessel If these abide not in the ship ye cannot be saved Many a one by unlawful flying and shifting for his own greater peace and safety doth much more hazard his own and others DIRECT IX Forget not the great difference between casting out the wicked and impenitent from the Church by discipline and the godlies separating from the Church it self because the wicked are not cast out The first is a great duty The second is ordinarily a great sin THe question is not Whether the impenitent should be put away from Church-Communion That 's not denied But whether you should separate from the Church because they are permitted This is it which we call you to beware Not but that in some cases a Christian may lawfully remove from one Church to another that hath more light and purity for the edification of his soul. But before you separate from a faulty Church as such as may not lawfully be communicated with you must look well about you and be able to prove that thing which you affirm Many weak Christians marking those Texts which bid us avoid a man that is an Heretick and to have no company with disorderly walkers and not to eat with flagitious persons do not sufficiently mark their sense but take them as if they call'd us to separate from the Church with which these persons do communicate Whereas if you mark all the Texts in the Gospel you shall find that all the separation which is commanded in such cases besides our separation from the Infidels or Idolatrous world or Antichristian and Heretical confederacies and no-Churches is but one of these two sorts First either that the Church cast out the impenitent sinner by the power of the Keyes Secondly or that private men avoid all private familiarity with them And both these we would promote and no way hinder Thirdly but that the private members should separate from the Church because such persons are not cast out of it shew me one Text to prove it if you can Let us here peruse the Texts that speak of our withdrawing from the wicked 1 Cor. 5. Is expresly written to the whole Church as obliged to put away the incestuous person from among them and so not to eat with such offenders So is that in 2 Thes. 3. and that in Tit. 3. 10. A man that is an Heretick after the first and second admonition avoid Unless it be a Heretick that hath already separated himself from our communion And then it can be put private familiarity which we are further to avoid In brief there is no other place of Scripture that I know of which commandeth any more I have before shewed that abundance of Church corruptions or of scandalous members were then among them and yet the Apostle never spake a syllable to any one Christian to separate from any one of all those Churches Which we cannot imagine that the Holy Ghost would have wholly omitted if indeed it had been the will of God Obj. But then why did Luther and the first Pretestants separate from the Church of Rome and how will you justifie them from Schisme Ans. Its pity that sloth and sortishness should keep any Protestant or Papist either in such ignorance as to need any help to answer so easie a question at this day Let not equivocal names deceive us and the case is easie By the word Church the Scripture still meaneth first either the Universal Church which is the body or Kingdome of Christ alone Secondly or particular Congregations associated for personal communion in Gods worship But the Pope hath feigned another kind of thing and called it The Church That is The Vniversality of Christians as headed by himself as the constitutive and governing head Whereas first God never instituted or allowed such a Church Secondly nor did ever the Universality of Christians acknowledge this usurping Head Shew me in Scripture or in Church-History that either there ever was de facto or ought to be de jure such a thing in the world as they call the Church and I profess I will immediately turn
as well as the hurt IF you look all at the evil in any man and overlook the good you cannot choose but hate hâ—m And if you think only of what you suffer by Magistrates you may easily know what the effect must be And the sin is so great that it should not be made light of by a tender conscience The good of the Office and of the person is of God and the evil is of Satan And should you so look at Satans part as to pass by all Gods part What ingratitude is it to take notice so deeply of your suffering and to take no notice of your mercies There are few Heathen Magistrates from whom those Christians who live under them receive not much more good than hurt Much more Christian Magistrates are a blessing to believers For if they persecute some yet they usually protect more from the fury of the vulgar rabble who would quickly devour them if Rulers did not restrain them And the countenancing of the Christian Religion in the essentials and defending Christian assemblies for Gods worship is an unvaluable mercy If Paul said to the Romans Rulers are not a terrour to good works but to evil Do that which is good and thou shalt have praise of the same for he is the Minister of God to thee for good Rom. 13. 3 4. How much more may those say so who have Christian Magistrates Or if some particular persons do suffer more under some such than Paul or the Christians did under Heathens Acts 28. last yet every true Christian must more regard the publick interest than his own and must rejoyce that the Gospel hath any protection and furtherance and the souls of the people any benefit whatever his personal suffering be Read Phil. 1. 12 to the 20. DIRECT LIV. Learn to suffer by Ministers and Good people and not only by Magistrates nor only by the ungodly I Confess it is a thing most unnatural for one true Christian to afflict another and especially for a Minister who is the father of the flock to be a hurter of them and to do like an enemy and to fleece them and devour them But yet it is a thing which sometimes must be born I have observed that Religious people when a Magistrate though a usurper persecuteth them they can in some sort undergo it as no strange thing And they are not so forward to cast off the office and abhor the persons by whom they suffer But if they suffer never so little by a Minister they flye away from him and are uncapable of comfortable communion with him and the breach is hardly ever made up I confess there is some more colour for this impatiency to be mentioned in another place But yet Gods servants have been tryed by this kind of suffering also and therefore you must not be so tender of it nor be driven by it into sinful separations or into a contempt of the Ministers of the Gospel as too many sects in these times have been Read what at large is said of the afflicting Shepherds Ezek. 34. Zech. 10. 11. And you will see that it is not a thing to be wondered at to have Shepherds which fleece and destroy the flocks and tread down their pasture and muddy their waters and feed themselves and not the flocks and gather not that which goeth â—stray Nay their own Shepherds pitied them not Zech. 11. 5 I know that it is the Magistrates that are often meant by Shepherds in the Prophets but the Priests also are usually meant with them and sometime distinctly by the same word And their falshood and cruelty oft expressed as in Ier. 2. 8 26. 5. 31. and 26. 7 8 11. 32. 32. Ezek. 22. 26. Hos. 6. 9. Mich. 3. 11. Zeph. 3. 4. Mal. 1. 6 2. 1. c. And remember that all the wickedness of these Priests and their abuse of the people did not warrant the people to forsake the Jewish Church Though the Ark was taken by the Philistines for the wickedness and violence of Eli's sons and the people tempted to desire a King by the sins of the sons of Samuel yet none of their mis-doings did warrant a separation from that Church Yea Christ who was persecuted by the Priests did yet bid the cleansed Lepeâ— go shew himself to the Priest and offer according to the Law Therefore a true Christian must learn though not to favour any mans sin nor to be indifferent what Ministery he liveth under yet patiently to suffer much abuse and persecution sometimes from Ministers themselves and to see that it drive them not in peevish impatiency into any extream or to any unlawful sect or separation nor to a disdain of the sacred office which they abuse nor to lose the benefit of it or be unthankful for it And though it be sad that true Christians should abuse each other yet this also must be born Many can bearâ—th scorn and cruelties of the openly profane who can scarce bear to be neglected or set light by much less to be hardly censured by the Religious But observe first that your Pride may notably appear in this and it is no great sign of humility to suffer only from the worst For you look on them as persons of no honour and the â—fore not capable of dishonouring you For a dog to bark at you you take for no disgrace Nay you take it for your honour to suffer by such persons as supposing it a mark of Christs disciples But the Religious you more reverence and think their contempt is a great dishonour to you and fore your pride will not suffer you to bear it patiently Secondly And remember that different opinions and interests may possibly so far exasperate some that are otherwise religious as to make them afflicters or more plainly persecâ—tors of one another though Godliness it self be applauded by them all The experience of England Scotland and Ireland within these 25 years doth sadly tell us and the world how far men can go in persecuting each other for different interests and opinions who all profess a zeal for godliness And let it have your special remark that one reason why all men as Christians and Godly do more easily and commonly love one another is because aâ— Christians and Godly they do not hurt or wrong each other But as they are of various sects they hate and envy one another because as they are sectaries they hurt and injure one another For the spirit and zeal of a sect as such is censorious hurtful unpeaceable and dividing But the spirit and zeal of Godliness and Christianity is kind and gentle and inclineth to do good to all Remember that you have never learâ—n the Christian art of suffering aright till you can suffer not only by bad men but by men that otherwise are good nor only by enemies but by friends nor only by them that bear the sword but also by some who preach the word and will not by
aggravate the faults of all that are against their way As if every infirmity were a crime and had no excuse yea they are oft glad to hear of some miscarriage in them for which they may speak against them And very readily take up such reports and are the willing-tongues of slanderous fame And in all this their faction maketh them impenitent For they think it tendeth to the disgrace of the other Party and so of their Cause which they account an errour and consequently that God hath use for their malicious Calumnies to his glory What company can you come into of forward Christians but they are talking against those of other parties except a few true entire Christians who are throughly possessed with the loving compassionate spirit of their Lord and have received the true impression of the Gospel And if you mark the cause you will find it as a sectarian spirit that prevaileth against the Catholick spirit of Christianity And in no sect more than in those that pretend to be the only Catholicks and to do all this against the Sectaries as such What bitter lies do the Popish sects under the name of Catholicks daily vent not only against Luther Calvin and other Reformers but any that stand against the peculiar interest of their party And they that can get the upper hand-and by worldly advantages become the domineering sect do think that thereby they are exempted from the name and number of sectaries and that all are sectaries that question their authority and do not absolutely obey them In all their discourse the stigmatizing of dissenters is an ordinary part One side reproacheth the other as Hereticks and Schismaticks And the other reproacheth them as hypocrites formalists and pharisaical persecutors And every party think that all this is a part of Christian zeal and if they did it not they should be guilty of lukewarmness and neutrality and consenting to the sins of others And thus the Church of Christ is engaged in a war against it self And when all men should know them to be Christs disciples by loving one another most men may perceive that they have too much contrariety to the Christian nature by their endeavouring to make each other odious And all because instead of distinguishing the members of the same Body by their several offices and degrees we are grown to make several Bodies of them and to set one part against another How many a Kingdomes conversion from Infidelity hath been hindered and how many a faithful Minister silenced or reproached and how many excellent Christians slandered and vilified and how many blamless customs forms and practises accused and how many infirmities aggravated as mortal crimes by a siding factious disposition and to promote the cause and interest of a Sect. Therefore as you love your integrity and peace keep up an impartial universal love and honour to all Christians as such and take heed of a dividing spirit DIRECT XX. Be very suspicious of your Religious passions and carefully distinguish between a sound and a sinful zeal lest you should father your sin on the spirit of holiness and think that you are most pleasing God when you offend him WE are seldome more mistaken in justifying our selves than in our Passions And when our Passions are Religious the mistake is both most easie and most perillous Easie because we are apt to be most confident and not suspect them the matter seeming so great and good about which they are exercised And Perilous because the greatness and goodness of the matter doth make the errour the greater and the worse I have shewed before how easie it is to think that our Religious passions are all the works of the spirit of God For we are apt to estimate them by the depth and earnestness which we feel But excellent persons have been here mistaken as Iames and Iohn were And not only so but when the passion is up the judgement it self is seldome to be far trusted For it inclineth us to err in all things that concern the present business Therefore still remember the difference between true zeal and false And know that he that is upright in the main and whose zeal for Christianity is sound may yet have much zeal that is unsound with it First It is an ill sign when your zeal is raised about some singular opinion which you have owned and not for the common salvation and substance of the Christian faith or practise Or at least when your odd opinion hath a greater proportion of your zeal than many more plain and necessary truths Secondly when your zeal is moved by any personal interest of your own By honour or dishonour By any wrong that is done you or any reputation of wisdome or goodness which lieth on the cause Or at least when your own interest hath too large a proportion in your zeal Thirdly when your zeal is more for the interest of your party than for the Universal Church and the common cause of Godliness and Christianity and can be content that some detriment to the whole may further the interest of the party Fourthly when your zeal tendeth to hurt and crueley and would have God rather to glorifie his Iustice by some present notable judgement than his Mercy by patience and forgiving And when your secret desire of fire from heaven or some destruction of the adversaries is greater than your desire and prayer for their conversion The sure mark of true zeal is that it is zealous Love It maketh you love your neighbours and enemies more fervently than others do But false zeal maketh you more inclined to their suffering and to reproach and hurt them Fifthly It is an ill signe when your zeal is beyond the proportion of your understanding And your prudence and experience is as much less than other mens as your zeal is greater True zeal hath some equality of Light and Heat Sixthly It is an ill sign when it is a zeal which is easily kept alive and hardly restrained For that sheweth the slesh and the Devil are too much its friends The true zeal of the spirit doth need the fuel of all holy means and the bellows of meditation and prayer to kindle it and all is too little to keep it up in the constancy that we desire But carnal zeal will burn of it self without such endeavours Seventhly It is an ill signe when some sect or false-teacher was the kindler of it and not the sober preaching of the truth Eighthly And it is an ill sign when it burneth in the same soul where lust and wrath and pride and malice burn And when it prospereth at the same time when the love of God and a heavenly mind and life decay The zeal of a sensualist of a proud man of a covetous man of a self-conceited empty person can hardly be thought a spiritual zeal 9. And it is an ill sign wâ—en it carrieth you from the holy rule and pretendeth to come from a spirit which will