observable that they had no such limits set them nor no such punctual directions given them by Divine Revelation but were wholly Governed by Prudence and the general reasons of Religion insomuch that neither the very building of Synagogues nor any part of the Worship there performed had any Divine Law concerning it in all the Old Testament nor indeed was it needful there should here being nothing Symbolical as in the former but natural Religion which the notions they had of God and the common sense of Mankind was sufficient to guide them in Or at least if those common Rules should fall short in any respect yet by any error of that kind they could not deprive themselves of any farther advantage or discovery God intended them as in the Temple worship they might Now thus it is in the Gospel The Christian Religion being a plain easie intelligible and rational way of serving God it was not necessary that our Saviour or his Apostles should curiously order or minutely describe what Rites and Circumstances should be used in it but might safely enough leave those to prudence and expediency the general reason of so plain and natural a Religion being sufficient to secure the Church against any capital mistake And therefore he that reads the Gospel without coloured Spectacles will find that our Saviour made it his business to expound the Law to vindicate it from the corrupt glosses of the Jews to prescribe men the Rules of true Holiness and Righteousness to raise them to a noble and generous pitch and set them an excellent Copy of the Divine Life and to encourage their endeavours after it by revealing and demonstrating the Judgement to come and the rewards in another world and never went about the composure of Laws either of Civil or Ecclesiastical Policy And for his Apostles they preached the Gospel of the Kingdom and gave certain directions suited to the conditions of the times and places and people respectively but never composed a standing Ritual for all after-times which will be put beyond all dispute by this one Observation That several things instituted by the Apostles in the Primitive Churches and given in command in their Sacred Writings their Epistles were intendded and so construed to be obliging only so long as circumstances should stand as then they did and no longer Of this nature were the Feasts of Love the Holy Kiss the Order of Deaconesses which things with several other are no where that I know of now observed nor is any man scrupled about the abrogation of them Which is a plain evidence that the generality of Christians where passion and prejudice do not mis-guide them acknowledge it to have been no design of the Apostles to have strictly obliged men to a certain form of Rituals But besides all this the Religion God instituted amongst the Jews was only fitted to that people and appropriate to that place and Countrey and intended to oblige no body else It was contrived on purpose to distinguish them from all other people in the world and therefore is called by the Apostle the middle wall of partition Eph. 2. 14. And to the end that such separation and distance might last the boundaries of their Rituals must be immoveable But the Christian Religion was to throw down all Inclosures to unite all the world under one Head and make of all Nations one people and therefore must be left with that freedome as to Circumstantials as that all Nations notwithstanding their several Limits divers Customs and Forms of Government might be capable of receiving it For as our Saviour tells us his Kingdom was not of this world so he never intended that his Religion should alter the Bounds or change the Customes or disturb the Governments of people but only principle the hearts of men with true holiness and goodness and so leave them to their distinct Policies And indeed it was one of the singular advantages of the Christian Religion and that which made it fit to be the Catholick Religion that is of all times Countreys and people That the external Policy of it being undetermined it reconciled it self to the condition and state of things where it came as well as recommended it self to the minds of men by its reasonableness and goodness Hereto agrees the known saying of Optatus Millevitanus Respublica non est in Ecclesia sed Ecclesia est in Republica That the Church being contained in the Civil Society conforms it self as to Externals to that which contains it Upon all which it is exceedingly evident That it is very unreasonable to expect that every Ceremony made use of by Christians should be found prescribed in the Scripture or proved thence and therefore those that expect to find such definitions in the New Testament do as they do too often in other cases as I have noted heretofore bring an Old Testament Spirit to the writings of the New and Jewish prejudices to the Christian Doctrine And those that can be so fond as to perswade themselves they can find such prescriptions there it is hard to say whether humour or weakness doth more betray it self in such pretence for they catch hold of such weak twigs as no body would do but in desperation of other help and they plead such obscure passages as it is a wonder if prejudice it self can be contented with them And in short they can as little agree amongst themselves either in the proofs or the things to be proved as they do with us 4. If then there must be some determination of Circumstance or no Society and God hath made no such determination what remains but that men must And then who fitter than our Governours who best understand the Civil Policy and what will suit therewith and with the customs and inclinations of the people under their Charge And when such determination is made what should hinder us from obedience and conformity thereto especially when the particulars so determined as they are not enjoyned by Scripture so are not contrary to it or forbidden by it I conclude therefore Whosoever shall go about to disturb a setled Order concluded on by good 〈◊〉 men reverenced and admired by others incorporated into the Laws of the Land rivetted by Custome and that hath now given proof of it self by above an hundred years experience for the sake of new and unpracticable Notions shall little consult the real advantage of the present Generation and less their own reputation for discretion with Posterity This occasion brings to my mind the famous Story of Pacuvius Calavius of Capua The people were all in a rage against their Senate and would needs in a hurry have them all deposed and have used other outrages to their persons This wise Plebeian shuts up the Senators all together and puts a Guard upon them and then coming to the people tells them all was in their power now advises them to determine their several faces according to their demerits one by one This they
have taken an effectual course to make it so durable by this stratagem When he had framed the body of their Laws he pretends occasion of Travail to consult the Oracle at Delphos about their affairs but first takes an Oath of all the Lacedemonians to preserve the Laws in being inviolable till his return Which having done he resolvedly never returns to them again By this means whilest the people were by the Religion of their Oath and a long expectation of his delayed return for a long time used to the Constitutions he had established they grew so well practised in them that at last Custom had habituated and even naturalized them to them that they became unchangeable Agreeable hereunto is the observation of our own Lawyers that the Common Law as they call it is never grievous to the people and seldome repealed whatever defects are in it as Statute-Laws frequently are because long Custom and Use hath fitted either that to the men or the men to it that all things run easily and naturally that way It is observed also by Divines That when God Almighty gave a peculiar Body of Laws to the people of Israel he took not only the opportunity of their straits and adversities at their coming out of Aegypt that his Institutions might the more easily be received but also kept them fourty years under the continual education in and exercise of those Laws and that in the Wilderness where they were not likely to take in any other impressions nor have other examples before their eyes to tempt or corrupt them And besides all this in a wonderful providence he so ordered it that all those men that came out of Aegypt except Caleb and Joshua and had observed other Customs and Laws and so might be likely to give beginning to innovation should all dye before they came into the Land of Canaan That by all these means the Laws he gave them might take the deeper root and so remain unalterable to all generations I cannot choose but observe one thing more to this purpose That when our Blessed Saviour had by himself and his Apostles planted his Religion in the World though it was such a Law as sufficiently recommended it self to the minds of men by its own goodness easiness and reasonableness and therefore was likely to be an everlasting Religion or Righteousness as the Prophet Daniel calls it yet for more security it pleased the Divine Providence to restrain the rage of Pagans and Jews for a good while and to give the Christians above sixty years of peace before any considerable persecution broke in upon them that in that warm Sun it might spread its roots and get some considerable strength and footing in the world But it was the will of God that the strength of this new-born Church of England should be early tryed And that it might give proof of its divine extraction it must like Hercules conslict with Serpents in its cradle and undergo a severe persecution the good King Edward the Sixth dying immaturely and Queen Mary succeeding him in the Throne By which means it came to pass that as this Infant-Reformation gave egregious proof of its intrinsick truth and reasonableness many fealing it with their blood so it had this disadvantage that we are all this while representing namely that by reason of this persecution a great number of the Ministers and other members of this Church were driven into other Countreys for refuge and shelter from the storm and there were as it 's easie to imagine tempted with novelty and distracted with variety of Rites and Customs before they were well instructed in the reasons or habituated to the practice of their own And hereupon as it is usually observed of English Travailers brought home with them those foreign fashions the fond singularity of which is still very taking with too many to this day I say thus it came to pass that those that went out from us returned not again to us when they did return in regard that before they were well inured to the English Reformation they became inamoured of the Rites of other Churches not much considering whether they were better so long as they were fresher and newer nor minding that there are oft-times reasons that make one Form necessary to be established in one place or people and not in another when otherwise it is possible they may be both indifferent in themselves but not equally fit to the humour and custome of the people or consonant to the Civil Constitutions nor yet observing that many things were taken up and brought into use in other Churches not upon choice but necessity not because they were absolutely better in themselves but the state of affairs so requiring As for instance where the Reformation had not at first the countenance of the Civil Government there the Reformers were constrained to enter into particular confederations with one another from whence Presbyterian Government seems to have taken its rise I say these Exiled English Protestants not entring into so deep a search into the special causes or occasions of those different Rites and Forms they found in the places whither they fled for succour as to discover whether they were strictly Religious or meerly Political but observing some pretexts of Scripture to be made for them and in process of time during their abode in those parts being used to them and by use confirmed in them they at last when they might with safety return to England again came home laden with these Foreign Commodities and crying them up with a good grace found too many Chapmen for such Novelties Thus as the children of Israel even then when they had Bread from Heaven Angels food longed for the Onions and Garlike of Aegypt remembring how sweet those were to them under their bitter bondage and had upon all occasions and upon every pet or disgust a mind to return thither So these men retained as long as they lived a lingring after those entertainments which they found then very pleasant when other was denyed them and so much the more in that as I said before they received a tincture of these before they had well imbibed or sufficiently understood the reasons of the Church of England And though these men are now dead yet the Childrens Teeth are still set on edge with the sowre Grapes their Fathers have eaten For those persons being considerable for their Zeal against Popery and very much recommended to the esteem of people at their return by the travail and hardship they had underwent for the Protestant profession were easily able with great advantage to communicate their Sentiments and propagate their Prejudices amongst the Members of this Church Here therefore I think we may justly lay the first Scene of the Distractions of this Church A second Cause may be reckoned the bad and incompetent provision for a Learned and Able Ministry in the Corporations and generality of great Parishes in England It is easie to observe that
the multitudes of Opinions that deform and trouble this Church are generally hatcht and nursed up in the Corporations Market-Towns and other great places whereas the lesser Countrey Villages are for the most part quiet and peaceably comply with Establish't Orders And if I should say that not only the Dissatisfaction with the Rites and Government of the Church but also the Convulsions and Confusions of State took their Origin from the bad humours of those greater Societies or Congregations of people I suppose I should say no more than what the observation of every considerative man will allow and confirm Now he that searching for a reason of this difference shall impute it either to the Ease Fulness and Luxury of the former whereby they have leisure and curiosity to excogitate Novelties and spirit and confidence to maintain and abett them whilest the latter tired with hard labour neither trouble themselves nor others but apply themselves to till the ground and earn their bread with the sweat of their brows or to the multitude and great concourse of people in the former amongst whom Notions are more easily started better protected and parties sooner formed for the defence and dissemination of them He I say that discourses thus gives a true account for so much but searches not far enough to the bottom For had there been an able Learned Orthodox Clergy setled in such places they by their wisdome and vigilance would in a great measure have obvated all beginnings of these disorders partly by principling the minds of men with sound Doctrine partly convincing Gain-sayers and especially rendring the Government of the Church lovely and venerable by their wise deportment In order therefore hereunto there ought to have been the most liberal Maintenance and ingenuous Encouragement setled upon such important places That where the work was greatest and the importance most considerable the motives to undertake it might be so too To the intent that the most able and judicious Clergy-men might have been invited to and setled upon those places that most needed them But contrariwise it is most visible that in those places where most Skill is to be exercised and most Labour to be undertaken there is little Revenue to encourage the Workman In a little obscure Parish or Country Village often-times there is a well endowed Church but in these great ones generally where the Flock is great the Fleece is shorn to the Shepherds hands and so pittiful a pittance left to the Curate or Minister that he can scarce afford himself Books to study nor perhaps Bread to eat without too servile a dependance upon the Benevolence of his richer Neighbours By which means either his Spirit is broken with Adversity or the Dignity of his Office obscured in the meanness of his condition or his Influence and Authority evacuated having neither wherewith to live charitably nor hospitably or all these together nay it is well if to help himself under these Pressures he is not tempted to a sordid Connivance at or Complyance with all those Follies and Irregularities he should correct and remedy And so like Esau sell his Birthright the Dignity of the Priesthood for a mess of Pottage Now how this comes to pass that the greatest Cures have generally the least Maintenance is easily found for it is well enough known that in those Times when the Popes had a Paramount Power in England a great part of the Tythes and Revenues of Churches were by their extravagant Authority ravisht from them and applyed to the Abbies and Monasteries and this like an Ostracisme fell commonly upon the greatest Parishes as having the best Revenues and consequently the more desirable Booty to those hungry Caterpillers and so the Issue was that the richest Churches were made the poorest in many such places little more than the Perquisites and Easter-Offerings being left to those that shall discharge the Cure And then though afterwards these superstitious Societies were dissolved yet the Tythes being not thought fit to be restored to their respective Churches the consequence is that those places which ought for the good both of Church and State to be well provided for are too often supplyed by the most inconsiderable Clergy-men or those men made so by the places they supply My meaning is that by reason of the incompetent Legal Maintenance provided for such Ministers the people have it in their power either to corrupt an easie and necessitous man or to starve out a worthy and inflexible one and so whatever the humour of the place shall be it is uncontroulable and incurable To remedy these inconveniencies it hath of late pleased His Majesty and the Parliament to make some provision so far as concerns the City of London and it is hoped the same wisdom will in time take like care of other great places in the same condition for till some such course be taken it will be in vain to expect that the Church of England or the best Laws of Religion that can be devised should either obtain just Veneration or due Effect 3. I account the late Wars another Cause of the bad estate of the Church and Religion amongst us Which may perhaps seem the more strange since when men put their Lives most in danger one would think they should then take the most care to put their Souls out of danger Besides it hath been the wisdom of most Nations to desire the countenance and incouragement of Religion in all their Martial undertakings The Romans made great scruple of enterprizing any thing of that nature till either their Priests from inspection of the Sacrifice or some other of their Pagan Oracles had given them the signal And the Turkish Mufti or High-Priest must give the Prime Visier his blessing before he enters upon the business Whether it be that men indeed believe God Almighty to be the Lord of Hosts and to give Victory to those that stand best approved with him or whether it be only that they apprehend that the opinion of being under Gods favour gives reputation to their Arms inspires their men with valour and resolution and disheartens their enemies or upon whatsoever consideration it is certain the matter of Fact is true and that Religion is of great efficacy in Warlike exploits It may I say therefore seem the more strange that War should be injurious to that which it seeks to for countenance and encouragement But most strange of all that Enemies abroad should make men quarrel with their Friends at home that Iron and Steel Wounds and Blows should make men tender-conscienced that those who can find in their hearts to shed the blood of Men of Christians and of their Brethren without remorse should be so queasie stomached as to scruple every punctilio and nicety in Ecclesiastick matters And yet he that narrowly considers the rise and progress of our Disorders will find that the distractions of the Church have kept pace with those of the State and as before the War our
what age soever do not think themselves at years of discretion enough to pass a judgement upon and prescribe to the Body Politick whether Church or State Though it usually happens that such Empiricks either to shew their wit suspecting distempers where there are none make them or whilest they rashly adventure quiet a movere and like Englishmen will be alwayes mending they make work for better skill than their own or lastly if they discover some small matter amiss mistaking the cause of it not only lose their time and labour which would be easily pardonable but exhaust the spirits of the Patient with improper medicines and purge out the good and useful juices as noxious humours and so the Physician becomes far the greater disease of the two That our Church is of a sound and healthful constitution and might have continued so had it not met with this fortune I think I have sufficiently though briefly manifested in the foregoing Introduction But some men either loving to be alwayes reforming or having first separated from it that they may either commend their own skill or justifie their own fact must accuse the Church We read of Brutus that having killed Caesar he was alwayes after inveighing against him as a Tyrant Ità enim facto ejus expediebat saith the Historian It was expedient he should call Caesar Tyrant for otherwise himself must be a notorious Traytor So these men though the greatest disorders of the Church be but what themselves have made must find faults that they may not seem to have raised all the dust and withdrawn themselves and others from it without cause 1. And in the first place the Doctrine of this Church is blamed though thanks be to God there are but few that are of so little discretion as to bring in this charge and those that are will never be able to prove it The main if not the only thing excepted against in this kind is that the thirty nine Articles are not so punctual in defining the five points debated at the Synod of Dort as they could wish But this though it neither needs nor deserves an answer yet I shall reply these two things to it First That it is not so with the Doctrine of Christianity as with common Arts and Sciences which depend upon humane wit and invention and consequently are capable of daily improvements For the mind of man having not an intuitive knowledge but proceeding by way of discourse discovers one thing by another and infers things from one another so that there is not a Nè plus ultrà in those things but daily new discoveries dies diem docet Whereto accords the saying of wise men Antiquitas saeculi est juventus mundi That which we call the old World is but indeed the infancy of knowledge and the latter Times must needs have as much the advantage of truth as they have of deliberation and experiment But it is quite otherwise with Christianity for that depending solely upon Divine Revelation can admit of no new discoveries time may obscure it and the busie wit of man may perplex and confound it with its inventions but can never discover any thing new or bring to light any truth that was not so from the beginning For if we admit of new Revelations we lose the old and our Religion together we accuse our Saviour and his Apostles as if they had not sufficiently revealed Gods mind to the world and we incurr St. Paul's Anathema which he denounces against him whosoever it shall be nay if an Anger from Heaven that shall preach any other doctrine than what had been received And St. Jude hath told us the Faith was once that is either at once or once for all delivered to or by the Saints But if we shall pretend a private Spirit or Revelation to discover and interpret what was before delivered we do as bad we suppose Christ and his Apostles not to be able to deliver the mind of God and we open a Gap for all Impostures and delusions perpetually to infest and corrupt Christian Doctrine The consequence of these premises is that contrary to what I affirmed before of other Sciences the elder any Doctrine of Christianity can be proved to be it must needs be the truer and accordingly deserve the greater veneration from us as coming nearer the fountain of Evangelical Truth Divine Revelation and that he that talks of more clear Light of the latter times and clearer discoveries in Religion talks as foolishly as he that should affirm he could discern things better at a miles distance than the man that hath as good eyes as himself and yet stood close by the object This being so it must needs be the excellency and great commendation of this Church that her Articles of Doctrine agree better with the first Times of Christianity than the last Age and is an irrefragable Argument that she derived it not from any Lake or lower streams troubled and mudded with mens passions and disputes but from the Fountain of the holy Scripture and from those who certainly had best advantage of understanding it in its own simplicity the Primitive Church That no one Father or Writer of the Church whether Greek or Latin before St. Austin's time agreed in Doctrine with the determination of the Synod of Dort is so notoriously plain that it needs no proof nor can be denyed And if he I mean St. Austin agrees therewith yet it is certain that in so doing he disagrees as much with himself as he doth with us of the Church of England And what if St. Austin a devout good man but whose Piety was far more commendable than his Reason being hard put to it by the Manichees on one hand and the Pelagians on the other was not able to extricate himself who can help it Shall his Opinion and that which he was rather forced into by disputation than made choice of but especially shall the Determination of a few Divines at Dort vye with the constant Doctrine of the Primitive Church or make that an imputation upon our Church which is really amongst its Glories Must a novel Dutch Synod prescribe Doctrine to the Church of England and outweigh all Antiquity Shall those that knew not how God could be just unless he was cruel nor great unless he decreed to damn the greatest part of Mankind that could not tell how man should be kept humble unless they made him not a man but a stock or stone Shall I say such Men and such Opinions confront the Antient Catholick Apostolick Faith held forth in the Church of England Secondly The Articles of the Doctrine of this Church do with such admirable prudence and wariness handle these points we are now speaking of as if particular respect was had to these men and care taken that they might abundare suo sensu enjoy their own Judgements and yet without check subscribe to these Articles And accordingly it is well known that not many years since
the Church by ripping up the miscarriages of the other perswasions For besides that I have not so leaned Christ I have observed so much of the world that such uncharitable recriminations have not only made an Apology for the Atheism and Profaneness of the Age but afford a pleasant spectacle to all evil men to behold Divines coming upon the Stage like Gladiators and wounding and murdering one anothers reputation To which add that I verily hope the Lives of the generality at least of the Clergy of England are so unblameable and commendable in themselves that they need not the soil of other mens deformities to set them off or recommend them Yet I will say these two two things further in the case 1. If a man be a male-content with the Government and forsaking the Church resort to private Assemblies or if being a Clergy-man and continuing in the Church he shall debauch his Office and undermine the Church which he should uphold such a man may then debauch his Life too and yet have a very charitable construction amongst the generality of dissenters And on the other side if a man be of singular sanctity and the most holy conversation but withal zealous of the interest of the Church and his own duty in it this man shall have worse quarter and be more maligned by the fiery Zealots of other parties than one that is both of a more loose life and meaner abilities Whence it plainly appears that the bad lives of Clergy-men if it were true is but a pretext not the true cause of quarrel with the Church 2. If impertinent and phantastical talking of Religion be Religion if endless scrupulosity and straining at Gnats if censoriousness and rash judging our Betters and Superiours if melancholy sighing and complaining be true Christianity if going from Sermon to Sermon without allowing our selves time to mediate on what we hear or leisure to instruct our Families if these and such as these are the main points of true Godliness then I must confess the Sons of the Church of England are not generally the most holy men and the Non-conformists are But if a reverent sense of God and Conscience of keeping all his express Laws if Justice Mercy Contentment Humility Patience Peaceableness and Obedience to Governours be the principal ingredients of a good life as doubtless they are if we take our measures either from our Saviour the Apostles or Prophets Then I do not despair but the Church-men may be good Christians and of far more holy lives than their accusers notwithstanding all the contempt cast upon them For upon this Issue I dare challenge Malice it self to be able to fasten any brand of bad life upon the generality or body of the Clergy I know this Age is not without some of the brood of Cham who will take the impudence to uncover their Fathers nakedness and expose those deformities which they ought not only out of charity or reverence but wisdom also to conceal And it is not to be expected that such a body of men made of the same flesh and blood and solicited with the same temptations with other men should be altogether without spot or blemish yet I do really believe those are extream few of that number that justly deserve any scandalous character and also very inconsiderable in respect of the whole And he that shall for the miscarriages of a few reflect dishonour upon the Clergy in general shall do as unrighteously as he that shall take a downright honest man and omitting his many and great vertues and innumerable good actions only rake up and represent in an odious Catalogue all the follies of his youth and errors of his life By the which artifice the best man in the world much more the best Society of men may be rendred odious enough It is well enough known that the healthfullest body is not without some humours which if they were all drawn together into some one part or member would make an ill and dangerous spectacle but whilest they lye dispersed in the whole mass of blood where there is a vast predominancy of the good or else are lockt up in their private cells glandulae or other receptacles till they shall be critically evacuated do in the mean time little or nothing indanger or deform such a body I need not apply this to the case in hand To conclude therefore Were there but either so much Charity and Humanity as ought to be in Men and Christians or so much unprejudicacy as becomes wise and good men used in this matter we should instead of reproaching the failings or miscarriages of a few heartily thank God for that remarkable Holiness Humility and Charity that is yet alive and warm in the breasts of so many of the Divines of this Church in this cold and degenerate Age. And for the rest we should think of that saying of Tacitus Vitia erunt donec homines sed neque haec continua meliorum interventu pensantur CHAP. II. Of the more remote and less observed Causes of the infelicity of this Church such as 1. The Reign of Queen Mary and return of Popery under her in the Infancy of the Reformation 2. The bad provision for Ministers in Corporations c. 3. Frequent Wars 4. The liberty in Religion that Trade seems to require 5. The secret designs of Atheists and Papists HItherto I have only noted and refuted the Scandals and Contumelies cast upon this Church which how groundless and unreasonable soever they are yet do not a little mischief when they are whispered in corners and insinuated in Conventicles I might have reckoned up some more of the same nature and as easily have disproved them but they are either reducible to those we have touched or will fall under consideration in due time I now proceed from those Imaginary to inquire into and consider of the true and real Causes of the present disaffection to the English Reformation and they will be found to be of several kinds but I will not trouble my self curiously to distinguish them into exact Classes contenting my self faithfully to relate them and represent their peculiar malignant influences And in this Chapter I will bring into view these five following 1. It was the misfortune and is the great disadvantage of this Church that it was not well confirmed and swadled in its Infancy It is the observation of wise men that it greatly contributes to the duration and longevity of any Society to have a good time of Peace in its Minority and not to have been put upon difficulties and tryals till its limbs and joints were setled and confirmed that is till the people were competently inured to the Laws and the Constitutions by time digested into Customs and made natural to them The State of Sparta remained intire without any considerable change in its Constitution or Laws the longest of any Society we have read of And Lycurgus the Law-giver and Founder of that Common-wealth is thought to
Livings like the Silver-smiths at Ephesus no wonder if Apostolical Doctrine and Government be cryed down and the Great Diana be cryed up The summ is this Some men were blindly led by their Education others by their Interest a third sort by their Reputation to make good what they had ingaged themselves and others in and these three things are able to form a great Party against the Church 4. The Fourth and Last Cause and I wish it be not the greatest of the Distractions and ill Estate of this Church is the want of true Christian Zeal and of a deep and serious sense of Piety in defect of which hath succeeded that wantonness curiosity novelty scrupulosity and contention we complain of What was it made the Primitive Church so unanimous that it was not crumbled into Parties nor mouldered away in Divisions nor quarrelled about Opinions nor separated one part from another upon occasion of little scruples How came it to pass as I observed in the Introduction to this Discourse that all good men were of one way and all evil men of another that those that travailed to the same City the heavenly Jerusalem kept the same Rode and parted not company It could not be that they should be without different apprehensions for mens Parts were no more alike nor their Educations more equal in those times than now There were then several Rites and Ceremonies that might have afforded matter of scruple if the Christians had been so disposed as well as now and I think both more in number and as lyable to exception as any thing now in use There was then bowing towards the East observation of Lent and other dayes distinction of Garments and innumerable other Observations in the early dayes of Tertullian and yet neither any Scripture brought to prove them nor any such proof thought necessary and yet they were observed without suspicion on one side or objection on the other Harum aliarum ejusmodi disciplinarum si legem expostules Scripturarum nullam invenies sed traditio praetenditur auctrix consuetudo conservatrix fides observatrix saith he in his Book De Corona militis St. Austin saith in his time the number and burden of Ceremonies was grown as great as under the Law of Moses and therefore wishes for a Reformation thereof in his Epistles to Januarius yet never thought these things a sufficient ground of Separation from the Church There was then some diversity of Expression in which the Governours and Pastors of several Churches delivered themselves yet did they not dispute themselves hereupon into Parties nor accuse one another of false Doctrine or either Side make the division of the Church the Evidence of its Orthodoxy or the Trophy of its Victory The true reason then of the different Event of the same Causes then and now seems to be this That in those dayes men were sincerely good and devout and set their hearts upon the main the huge Consequence and concern of which easily prevailed with those holy men to overlook their private satisfactions They were intent upon that wherein the Power of Godliness consisted and upon which the Salvation of Souls depended and so all that was secure they were not so superstitiously concerned for Rituals nor so unreasonably fond of Opinions as to play away the Peace of the Church and the Honour of Religion against trifles and meer tricks of wit and fancy They considered that they all had one God one Faith one Baptism one Lord Jesus Christ in which they all agreed and these great matters were able to unite them in lesser They Good men found enough to do to mortifie their Passions to their burdens of Affliction and Persecution to withstand the Temptations of the Devil and the contagion of evil Examples from the world and had not leisure for those little Disputes that now imploy the minds of men and vex the Church They spent their Heat and Zeal another way and so their Spirits were not easily inflammable with every petty Controversie But when men grow cold and indifferent about great things then they become servent about the lesser When they give over to mind a holy Life and heavenly Conversation then they grow great Disputers and mightily scrupulous about a Ceremony When they cease to study their own hearts then they become censorious of other men then they have both the leisure and the confidence to raise Sarmises and Jealousies and to find fault with their Superiours In short then and not till then do the little Appendages of Religion grow great and mighty matters in mens esteem when the Essentials the great and weighty matters are become little and inconsiderable And that this is the Case with us in this Nation is too evident to require further proof and too lamentable a subject for any good Christian to take pleasure in dilating upon I conclude therefore in this Point lyes a great part of the Unhappiness of this Church and Kingdom PART II. Wherein several serious Considerations are propounded tending to perswade all English Protestants to comply with and conform to the Religion and Government of this Church as it is established by Law CHAP. 1. A Reflection upon divers Wayes or Methods for the Prevention and Cure of Church-Divisions HAving in the former Part of this Discourse diligently enquired into and faithfully recited the principal Causes of the discontents with and secession from this Church It would now ill beseem Christian Charity to rest here for God knows neither the Evils nor the Causes afford any pleasant speculation It was a bad state of things at Rome which the Historian reports in these words Nec morbos nec remedia pati possumus That they were come to so ill a pass that they could neither indure their Distempers nor admit of the Remedies But I perswade my self though the condition of our affairs be bad enough yet that it is not so deplorable as to discourage all Endeavours of a cure And in this hope I take the courage to propound the following considerations wherein if I be deceived and miss of my aim I shall notwithstanding have that of Quintilian to comfort my self withal Prohabilis est cupiditas honestorum vel tutioris est audaciae tentare ea quibus est paratior venia It hath not been the single Unhappiness of this Church alone to be molested with Disputes loaden with Objections and dishonoured by Separation Nor can it be hoped that where the business is Religion and the concern Eternal Life that men should incuriously swallow every thing without moving any question or stirring any dispute And therefore all Churches must of necessity more or less have conflicted with the same difficulties we complain of And consequently the disease being so common it cannot be but that many and divers Remedies have been tryed and made use of And out of that store we will in this Chapter make election of such as seem best to fit the condition of the Patient and
with his Apostles that they might be throughly instructed and not differ in the delivery of his mind to the world and with what extraordinary ardour he prayed for them upon this very account John 17. 11. And the Apostles themselves answered their Masters care with their own diligence and circumspection He that observes how industrious they were to resist all beginnings of Schism in every Church to heal all breaches to take away all occasions of division to unite all hearts and reconcile all minds How they taught people to detest this distemper as the bane of Christianity charging them to use the greatest caution against it to mark and avoid all those men that inclined that way as persons of a contagious breath and infectious society What odious names they give it as Carnality the work of the flesh and of the Devil He I say that observes all this cannot but be apprehensive of the greatness of this sin But he that shall trace the sense of the Church a little farther will find the Primitive Christians hating it in such detestation that they thought it equal to the most notorious sins Idolatry Murder and Sacriledge St. Cyprian amongst the rest affirms it to be of so horrible a guilt that Martyrdom was not a sufficient expiation of it that to dye for Christ the Head would not wash out the stain of having divided the Church his Body And all this was no more than the case deserved for had the Christian Church been broken into Factions and Parties in those times as it hath been since it is not easie to imagine how it could have resisted the whole World that was united against it Or if yet it could have subsisted in its several divided Parties the mischief would have been little less for then those of after-times would have had the several Opinions and distinct and peculiar Sentiments of those divided Parties delivered down to them with equal heat and earnestness so that it would have proved impossible to have distinguisht the Truth of God from the Opinions of men and the common Faith from the Shiboleth and cognizances of the several Sects and Parties And for this cause it pleased God that his Church should rather in those early dayes be harassed with persecutions which made it unite it self the closer and paring off all superfluities keep to the necessary and essential Doctrines delivered to it than to be softened and made wanton by ease and so to corrupt the Simplicity of the Gospel Nor is the importance of Unity much less in these latter dayes of Christianity forasmuch as all Divisions in all times destroy that beauty and loveliness which would otherwise attract all mens admiration and affection Beauty properly is nothing but order and harmony of parts the excellency of any Fabrick consists not so much in the quality of the materials as in the curious method they are digested into and the good respect and correspondence one part hath with another It is not the sublimity of Christian Doctrine nor the gloriousness of the Hopes it propounds that will so recommend it to the opinion and esteem of Beholders as when it shall be said Ecce ut Christiani amant when they shall observe the love concord and unanimity amongst the professors of it And the want of this hardens the hearts of Jews and Turks and Pagans more against it than all the reasons and proofs we can give for it will soften them and instead of opening their ears and hearts to entertain it opens their mouths in contempt and blasphemy against it But besides the disadvantage Christianity is exposed to by its Divisions in respect of those that are without it suffers unspeakably within its own Territories For who will be perswaded patiently to hear attentively to consider or impartially to judge of the discourses of him against whom he hath an animosity Every thing the truer it is the more it is for its advantage to be calmly considered and by how much of the more importance it is by so much is he that would have his proposition successful bound in wisdome to take care that the minds of men be not by passion and prejudice indisposed to receive it Livy observes that prodigious Stories Lyes and Fables find best entertainment in troublesome times quia tutius finguntur facilius creduntur men are not then at leisure to consider strictly what is true and false and so truth loses its advantage-ground and error succeeds in it Our Saviour therefore chose to come into the world in a time of the most profound peace not only because such a season became the Prince of Peace but especially for this advantage of his Doctrine we are speaking of namely that he might find men in calm thoughts and at leisure to consider the reasonableness of his propositions For who can maturely weigh things when all is in hurry and tumult Who can discern exactly the difference of things when all is in motion Especially who is there that is willing either to do good to or to receive good from him against whom he hath an exulcerate mind In short then and to speak summarily From Schisms and Divisions amongst Christians comes that prejudice upon the minds of people that discourages the indeavours and frustrates the labours of the Ministers of Religion From thence come all the Suspicions Jealousies Whisperings Backbitings and all other instances of Uncharitableness These hinder the fervour of mens Prayers and abate the edge of their Devotions These evaporate the true Spirit and Life of Religion in impertinent Disputes so that men lose the substance whilest they contend for the shadow By these the sinews of all Society are dissolved for when the Church is disturbed it seldome rests here but the State is concerned too and Schism in the former proves Sedition in the latter And this consideration is able to provoke the Magistrate to keep a jealous eye upon the Church and Religion All these things are so true in themselves and withal so generally acknowledged by all Parties that a man might justly wonder how any Christian should be guilty of Schism which all so much abominate Were it not that we may observe too that some have found pleasure to get that Child they would by no means have laid at their own door Schism is so mishapen as well as ill-begotten a Brat that no body is willing to father it It was the early proof Solomon gave of his wisdom in discovering the true Mother of the living Child to which both the Litigants laid equal claim It is a matter of no less importance and some think of equal difficulty to make discovery who the distractions of the Church are justly to be imputed to But as that Wise Prince discerned the true Mother by the tenderness of her bowels towards the Infant so we perhaps may discover the true Children of the Church by their respect and tenderness and consequently the Schismaticks by their irreverence and unnaturalness towards
separation then there can be no such sin as Schism at all forasmuch as there never was nor probably ever will be such a Church as required nothing of those in her Communion but things strictly and absolutely necessary as I have shewed partly in the Introduction and could easily make appear at large through all Ages And then may the Author of the Tract about Schism securely as he doth somewhat too lightly call it only a Theological Scarcrow 3. It will be manifest to any considering person that some things are necessary to the Constitution and Administration of a particular Church that are not in themselves necessary absolutely considered And of this I will give two instances The first in the Apostles times The abstaining from things strangled and blood was by the Council at Jerusalem adjudged and declared necessary to be observed by the Gentiles in order to an accomodation betwixt them and the Jews of which I shall say more hereafter and yet I suppose scarce any body thinks the observation of that abstinence so enjoyned necessary in it self The second instance shall be Church-Government Whatever disputes there are about the several Forms of it as whether it ought to be Monarchical or Aristocratical Episcopal or Consistorial and whatever zeal for opinion may transport men to say in favour of either of them yet I suppose few or none will affirm that either of these Forms is absolutely necessary for if one be of absolute necessity the other must be absolutely unlawful and not only so but then also those that do not receive that absolutely necessary Form can be no Churches for that Society which is defective in absolutely necessaries can be no Christian Church Notwithstanding it is not only lawful to determine and define this unnecessary point but it is necessary to the constitution of every particular Church that it be defined one way or other I mean so far as concerns that Church for if this be left indifferent in this particular Church as perhaps it is in it self in the general it is manifest there can be no Superiour nor Inferiour no Governour nor governed no Order and consequently a meer Rout and no Church Therefore some things not necessary in themselves not only may but must be defined in a particular Church and consequently it will be no just exception against a Church nor excuse from Schism if we separate from that Communion because such definitions are made in it CHAP. III. Of the nature and importance of those things that are scrupled or objected against in this Church and that they are such as may without sin be sacrificed to Peace and therefore cannot excuse us from sin in separating from the Church upon their account IT is the custome of those that have a mind to quarrel to aggravate and heighten the causes of discontent to the end that the ensuing mischief may not be imputed to the frowardness of their temper but to the greatness of the provocation And passion is such a Magnifying-glass as is able to extend a Mole-hill to a Mountain The way of Peace therefore is to take just measures of things and as upon the account of Truth we must not make the matters of our dispute less than they are so for the sake of both Truth and Peace we ought not to make them greater Wherefore if men would be perswaded to set aside passion and calmly consider the nature and just value of those things that we in this Church are divided upon we should then be so far from seeing reason to perpetuate our distance and animosities that we should on the contrary be seized with wonder and indignation that we have hitherto been imposed upon so far as to take those things for great deformities which upon mature consideration are really nothing worse than Moles which may be upon the most beautiful face To this purpose therefore having in the former Chapter represented the nature of Schism and the guilt and mischiefs attending it I proceed now to shew the unreasonableness of the temptations to it I mean the littleness and small importance of the Objections against this Church and that neither any of them single nor all of them together can countervail the blessing of Peace or the evil of Division In order hereto I will first shew that the causes of Dissensions amongst us are not like those upon which we separated from the Roman Communion 2. That something must be given for Peace by them that will have it 3. That all the scruples and objections against this Church are not too great a price to pay for it 1. Touching the first it is said by some in heat and passion That there is as much cause for secession from this Church now as there was from the Roman in the time of our Ancestors but with no more reason than if the arguments and discourses written against a notorious Tyrant and Usurper should be turned against a good and lawful Prince As will easily be manifest if we consider the just state of the case on either hand We could not continue in the Roman Church upon any better conditions than Nahash propounded to the men of Jabesh Gilead 1 Sam. 11. to put out our right Eyes that we might be fit for her blind devotion We must for the sake of Peace have denyed the Faith renounced our Reason and contradicted our very Senses That Church instead of instructing men in knowledge professes to nurse them up in ignorance in lieu of the Scriptures it gives them Traditions and instead of such things as were from the beginning and the faith once delivered to the Saints it prescribes those things that had their beginning from private interests and secular advantages They make seven Secraments five more than Christ ever intended for such and take away from the people the half of one of those he expresly instituted and enjoyned They teach men to pray to Saints instead of God and to use a Language in their Devotions which he that pronounces understands no more than the Saint he prayes to doth his Needs and Requests Nay they give divine honour to a piece of Bread and must swallow Idolatry in spite of their teeth herein little better than the Aegyptians who worshipt that for a God which they put into their Bellies They have taken away one of the Ten Commandments and have arts of evacuating allthe rest for they elude the necessity of a true and serious Repentance and subvert the principles of holy Life In short they have brought in Pageantry instead of Piety and Devotion effaced the true lineaments of Christianity and instead thereof recommended and obtruded upon the world the dictates of Ambition the artifices of Gain and a colluvies of almost all the Superstitions Errors and Corruptions of former Ages and this must be received and swallowed by all those that will continue in that Communion These things could not be submitted to without grievous Sin and manifest danger of Damnation therefore
there was just ground for our Recession for as I said it could not be sin to depart when it was so to continue And it is a very reasonable choice rather to be condemned by them of Singularity than to be damned for Company But now it is quite otherwise in the Church of England No man here parts with his Faith upon his Conformity no man is bound to give away his Reason and common Sense for quietness sake No man needs to hazard the Peace of a good and well instructed Conscience for the Peace of the Church No man is tempted to renounce his Integrity but may be as good and holy a man as he will and the more of that the better Church-man This Church keeps none of her Children in an uncomfortable estate of darkness but teaches the true knowledge of God and Christ sincerely and very advantageously She hath no half Communions nor debarrs any of her members of the priviledge and comfort of Christs Institutions She recommends the same Faith and the same Scriptures that all Protestants are agreed in The same God and only he is worshipped the same rules of holy Life are propounded as well as the same hopes and happiness expected By this brief representation the difference between the Church of Rome and the Protestants appears so wide and vast that they agree neither in their Creed nor Object of Worship nor Sacraments nor Rules of Life On the other side the agreements of Protestants with the Church of England is so full and perfect that they have not only the same God and Christ but the same object of Worship the same way of Devotion in a known Tongue the same Sacraments and same rule of life which certainly are all the great things that the Consciences of men are concerned in A man might therefore justly wonder these things being so what should make a breach and what place there is for contention or what can remain considerable enough to occasion the dissatisfaction to provoke the animosity to countenance that distance that is between us And I verily believe it would be hard for a stranger to this Church and Nation that understood the state of the case thus far to guess what should be the bone of contention amongst us I will now as well as I can both saithfully and briefly recite the matters of difference And I must needs confess if we number them only they are many But if we weigh them not only against the things we are agreed in but against peace and agreement it self I perswade my self they will be very light But that I must leave to the judgement of the Reader The things themselves are these and such as these Whether such Prayers shall make up the body of the publick Liturgy as have been conceived by the Governours of the Church and used ever since the Reformation or such as shall pro re nata be occasionally indited by every private Minister Or which perhaps is much the same whether such words expressions and phrases shall be continued in the publick Service as are by long use grown familiar to and intelligible by vulgar people or such shall come in their room as are more modern and grateful to nicer Ears About the several postures of Standing Kneeling and Sitting and whether some one of these be more decorous and accommodate to some part of Gods Worship than another and which to which About observation of Dayes and Times as whether the Anniversaries of the Birth Death and Resurrection of our Saviour and other great passages of the Gospel be of use and fit to be observed And whether some special Time of Abstinence and Mortification in conformity to the Primitive Church may now be retained or not About Habits and Garments such as Gown Surplice c. whether the habit used in ministration in the time of King Edward be not now as lawful as any other About the Ceremony of the Cross in Baptism whether whilest it is declared not essential to Baptism it may not upon other considerations be used in that Sacrament Or lastly which I think is as important as any of the rest whether Subordinacy of the Clergy in the Episcopal way or Co-ordinacy and Parity in the Presbyterian be rather to be preferred Most of the Disputes we have amongst us are either upon these questions or reducible to these or at least of like nature with these Now how inconsiderable these things are in themselves and how fit to be made a Sacrifice to Peace I forbear to say till I have in the second place shewn as I promised that something must be forgone for it 2. It was a worthy and memorable saying of Erasmus Mihi sanè adeò invisa est discordia ut veritas etiam displiceat seditiosa He did not only suspect that Proposition was not true that was not also peaceable but he thought Peace not too dear at the price of some Truth And he that pretends so high a value for the latter as to have no esteem for the former neither understands the one nor the other Greg. Nazianz. puts this Question 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and answers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That peace is not only the most beautiful flower in the Garden of Christianity but also the most soveraign and useful Though it be commonly dealt with as some famed beauty admired and courted but not espoused The Apostle when Rom. 12. 18. he so passionately exhorts If it be possible and as far as in you lyes have peace with all men surely did not mean that we should only accept of Peace when it is offered us for nothing or be quiet till we can pick a quarrel but that we should be at some cost to purchase it and part with something for it and deny our selves something which but upon that account we might lawfully have enjoyed It is true we may buy Gold too dear and so we must have done our Peace if we sought it at the hands of those Hucksters of the Church of Rome as I shewed before But that we cannot reasonably expect it for nothing in any Society in the World I think is demonstratively evident by this one consideration That there are scarcely any intellectual Menaechmi I mean hardly any two persons perfectly of the same apprehension or stature of understanding in the whole world So much difference there is in mens Constitutions such diversity of Education such variety of Interests and Customs and from hence so many kinds of Prejudices and various Conceptions of things that he that resolves to yield to no body can agree with no body and consequently cannot be happy in any Church or Society on this side of Heaven There indeed some think mens minds shall be all of one capacity but whatever be the truth in that particular I much doubt whether those persons will ever make up that society of the Church Triumphant that think themselves bound to disturb the state of the Church Militant unless all things
the other side requires as great a condescension to our Brethren And if now the scales seem even then certainly the consideration of the Magistrate and Laws in being will be of weight enough to turn the balance and that Humility and Obedience our Religion teaches will prevail with us to leave it to publick Wisdom to decide between both Parties And then the result of all will be that instead of prescribing to the Magistrate what he shall determine or disputing what he hath concluded on we shall compose our minds and order our circumstances to the more easie and cheerful complyance therewith And call to mind the saying of Paulus Aemilius who when several of his Souldiers would be suggesting to him their several Models of management Vos gladios acuite bids them whet their swords and be ready to execute what should be commanded them but leave the management of affairs to him their General CHAP. VII Wherein Christian Liberty consists and that it doth not discharge us from Obedience to Laws ALL that we have hitherto discoursed of the Power of the Magistrate some think may be avoided by pleading the Magna Charta of Christian Liberty contained in the Gospel It will therefore be necessary in the next place to consider the true notion and extent of that That there is such a Charter is out of doubt the New Testament frequently making mention of it putting of us in mind of the gratitude we owe to him that purchased it for us of the price it cost him and requiring us to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free Gal. 5. 1. But what are the Contents of it is not so well agreed on and indeed it is too evident that few of those that contend so much for it and plead it upon all occasions know what it is or wherein it consists It was a smart Answer of a Spartan Captive who being exposed to sale in the Market and there askt as the manner was by one that came to buy Slaves quid sciret what he was good for what business he understood answered Scio quid sit liberum esse I know what belongs to freedom Had Christian Liberty been all along as well understood as talked of the Religion had obtained more Reputation the Church more Peace States and Kingdoms more Security and more Souls had gone to Heaven but for want of this men have committed as gross errors as that Tully complains of Clodius for That he set up Simulacrum Meretricis Tanagraeae The Image of a famous Harlot for that of Liberty The Gnosticks about the Apostles times pleaded Christian Liberty both on the behalf of their cowardly Revolts from Christianity in times of Persecutition and of their sensual Debaucheries as if the knowledge of the Truth gave a priviledge neither to profess nor practise it when either the one proved too incommodious to their Secular Interests or the other too disgustful to their sensual inclinations Others and they also in the first times of Christianity thought Christian Liberty had been a Civil Infranchisement and had extended so far as to cancell all bonds of peoples subjection to their Princes or of Servants to their Masters and hereupon like the pretence of zeal amongst the Jews in their degenerate times Christian Liberty was the Passport of fugitive servants and the pretext for Outrages and Rebellions And this made it necessary for the Apostles almost in all their Writings to press Obedience to Superiours A third sort of men have mistaken this Gospel Liberty to be a discharge from the obligation of the Moral Law and have been so prodigiously absurd as to take the Gospel to contain nothing else properly but a publication of Gods Promises or Decrees rather and to require only a bare assent to them or belief of them and that those Promises are absolute and without any condition of our obedience save only as that should reciprocally become us by way of gratitude not that justification or salvation depended upon it This is the Doctrine of the Antinomians or modern Libertines and is a perswasion fit to debauch the whole world were it not that few men can be so unreasonable as to believe it though they would But it is so contrary to the very name and nature of a Covenant which the Gospel is styled to be so expresly contrary to the whole design of Christian Doctrine and goes so cross to the very sense of every honest mind that I shall not spend any more time or words about it There is a fourth mistake which though I will not say it is equally dangerous with any of the former yet is mischievous enough and equally false That though the bonds of Civil Subjection are not quite dissolved by the Gospel yet that all Christians are discharged from the interpositions of the Magistrate in affairs of Religion and that there he ought no further to intermeddle than he can produce express warrant from Scripture for his particular Injunctions But if notwithstanding the Governour shall arrogate to himself a larger sphere of Authority and make any definitions in Religion or especially the matters of the first Table It is then and in that case not only lawful for a good Christian to refuse Obedience but that it is his duty so to do to withstand an Invasion of his Christian Liberty and an incorachment upon the Prerogative of God This is the mistake that is most rife amongst us and which hath given occasion to much of the unhappiness of this Age. It is not my work laboriously to confute this opinion nor do I think many words necessary in the case yet of the many absurd consequences let us note these following 1. This opinion makes all Civil Government the most ticklish and uncertain and the condition of Magistrates the most servile and precarious that can well be imagined forasmuch as there is scarcely any thing can fall under their care and cognizance or capable to be made matter of Law or Injunction but hath such affinity to or connexion with Religion as to be sufficient upon this principle to raise a dispute of Jurisdiction So that the case between the Civil Laws and Religion will be like the condition of affairs that often happens in those places where the Supremacy of the Pope and Court of Rome is received there is a perpetual contention about bounds and limits of Jurisdiction between the Civil and Ecclesiastical Courts for whilest the Civil Judge goes about to take cognizance of the cause the Ecclesiastical will it may be challenge the person as belonging to his Jurisdiction or if the person be Laick and alieni fort yet it will go hard but the cause shall be found to have some connexion with Religion and so the Ecclesiastical Court either directly or in ordine ad spiritualia draws all matters to it And not unlike was the state of affairs a long while together in the Kingdom and Church of Scotland by virtue of this very perswasion
Conviction and Argument In short he that resolves never to change his opinion nor hopes to be wiser than he is either will be alwayes a fool or hath the fortune of such an one or both Now then he that seeing Reason to incline him to take new measures shall yet upon Secular considerations think fit not to own a change may have the reputation of a cunning man but never of an honest and shall lose more in the Judgement of wise men than he shall gain with the vulgar 2. Epecially let it be considered how much the honour of our Religion is of more value than our Personal reputation and how much that is concerned in the peaceable and obedient temper of all those that pretend to it and withal what it suffers in defect of this And surely a due sense of these things will have such weight with all those that are sincerely Christian as to depress and keep down the turgency of our phancy and vain glory It was an effectual course Haman took Esther 3. 8. and he had wit in his malice when he designing to ruine the whole Church of the Jews first undermines the reputation of their Profession delates their Religion as not fit for the protection of the Prince and that it contained Laws contrary to all people and that they would not obey the Kings Laws There is nothing casts so indeleble a blemish upon Religion as when the Professors of it are turbulent unperswadable ungovernable When that which should strengthen the hands of the Magistrate shall weaken them when that which should ease his care and save the labour of his Animadversions shall it self awaken and raise his Jealousie when that which should enact his Laws in the very Consciences of men shall pretend to abrogate or dispense with them when men shall smite and break the two Tables one against another and put other limitations and conditions upon Princes than God hath and pretend a revocation of the Broad Seal of Civil Authority by the Privy Signet of Religion whereever this is done that Prince or Magistrate had need be a very devout man indeed that casts a benign aspect upon that Profession which hath so malignant an influence upon his Government And all considering men will with great reason doubt whether that Religion be of God that gives such trouble to his Vicegerent and whether that will carry men to Heaven hereafter that makes tumults confusions and a Hell upon earth But I have said so much to this business heretofore when I considered the mischiefs of Schism that I shall need to say the less now Only let me observe That the more raised and elevated any Religion pretends to be the more it professes a Contempt of this world the more it speaks of Patience Contentation Humility and the more it glories in the hopes of another world still the more horribly absurd and contradictious will it be that this should give countenance to disobedience and disturbance of Government I have also noted before that it was the great advantage Christianity had for the planting it self in the world that it disturbed no setled Form made no noise or commotion but fell like the dew of Heaven upon a Fleece of Wooll Our Saviour himself was so careful of giving offence that he not only gave no jealousie to those in possession of the Government but also abridged his own Liberty rather than he would seem to retrench their Power St. Paul when he was accused by an eloquent Orator Tertullus Acts 24. 5. as a mover of Sedition doth with equal eloquence disprove the charge and detest the Crime And that the generality of Christians were of the same temper and spirit Tertullian gives ample testimony Externi sumus vestra omnia implevimus urbes insulas castella municipia castra ipsa tribus decurias palatium senatum forum c. cui bello non idenei c. Apol. c. 37. We want saith he neither numbers nor Leaders nor Spirit to inable us for any attempt but that we have learnt to suffer ill and not to do it to obey and submit not to contend with our Rulers And Ammianus Marcellinus a Pagan Souldier in Julian's Army and therefore the more undeniable witness in the case gives this short description of the Christian Religion Nil nisi justum suadet lene It is saith he compounded of nothing but mildness and innocency It makes men just and honest it fills mens hearts with virtuous principles but not their heads with troublesome niceties It teaches men not to be troublers of the World but to go quietly and inoffensively through it with as little noise and provocation as is possible and so to arrive at eternal rest and peace in Heaven And as this is the known glory of Christianity in general so it was peculiarly of the English Reformation in particular as I shewed before It was brought in by the Prince not by the rout of people it was establisht orderly by Law did not force its way by popular tumult and was truly what it ought to be a revival of Primitive purity and simplicity And it is infinite pity that its glory should afterwards be stained by the insolence and impatience of those that pretend to it It is a great blot in the writings of Mr. Calvin that after he had discoursed rarely well of the power of Princes and the duty of Subjects in the last Chapter of his Institutions and the one and thirtieth Paragraph he undoes all again with an unhappy exception in these words de privatis hominibus semper loquor A passage of that ill aspect upon Government that it is suspected by some and not altogether without cause that most of the confusions of Kingdoms which have happened since and especially the troubles of this Nation have received incouragement if not taken rise from thence But whether that be so or no it is certain that it hath furnisht the Papists with a recrimination upon the Protestant Doctrine when we have charged theirs as blowing a Trumpet to Sedition and Rebellion And though the true Protestant Doctrine be as innocent as theirs is guilty in this kind yet if it can be objected against us that our Churches are alwayes infested with Divisions and the States under which we live imbroyled in troubles we have reason to be concerned forasmuch as we have no reason to expect that our Adversaries will be so just or charitable as to distinguish betwixt the faults of the Doctrine and the miscarriages of those that Profess it but will be sure to involve both in the dishonour For it cannot be but that either the Seed must be very bad that brings forth such Fruit or the Soil very corrupt that makes good Seed so degenerate that is either the Religion must be very faulty that fills men generally with so bad Principles or at least the Men must be extreamly evil that debauch good Doctrine And whether soever of these two things be concluded on as it
The Prince or the State could enact nothing almost but the Kirk-men found themselves grieved and Religion concerned and Excommunication is denounced The Kirk on the other side make their Decrees and the Civil Power declares them null and grants Prohibitions c. He that will satisfie himself of the truth of these things and thereby convince himself of the mischief of the Principle we are speaking of let him read the Judicious History of the Church of Scotland written by the Most Reverend Arch-Bishop Spot swood And he shall find that this unhappy notion raised and maintained for many years a bellum limitaneum and that it is like the Marches or bateable ground betwixt two bordering Potentates a Scene of contention and a field of blood Whereas did we agree of certain Limits and make the Magistrates Power and Province extend to all that which God hath not taken in by express Law both Gods Glory and the Magistrates Authority would be kept entire and there would be neither cause nor room for Controversie 2. This opinion at once condemns all the States and Kingdoms in the whole world of Impiety and Irreligion forasmuch as there neither is nor ever hath been any such constitution as hath not had some Laws of Religion that could not be deduced particularly from the Scriptures And so he that is of this perswasion and will be true to it is bound in Conscience to be a Rebel where-ever he lives 3. It is an unreasonable Fear a meer Melancholy Jealousie and express Superstition instead of Religion to suspect that either the Magistrate can offend in making or the people in obeying such Laws as though they are not expresly warranted yet are no where forbidden by the Scripture For it is a supposition that a man may be a Sinner when yet he breaks no Law contrary to the express words of St. John 1 Ep. 3. 4. who defineth Sin to be a transgression of a Law And as is the usual Genius of all Superstition it mis-represents God as cruel and tyrannical that can condemn men ex post sacto for doing of that against which there was no Law in being But 4. Which is most observable this Doctrine instead of asserting Christian Liberty in truth subverts it and layes far more severe bonds upon the Consciences of men than the very Law of Moses did That was a yoke say the Apostles Acts 15. 10. which neither we nor our Fathers were able to bear upon this account especially because it injoyned a great number of little Observances which by their multitude were hard to be remembred by their nicety difficult to be observed and by their meer positive nature and having no essential goodness in themselves had less power upon the Consciences of men to awaken their care and diligence about them It is manifest that Law contained no precept that was in it self impossible to be performed but because it is hard for the mind of man to attend to many things at once especially if also the things in which his care and obedience is required be such as are not enacted in his Conscience and when he can see no other reason of or advantage by his obedience but meerly his obedience therefore was that Law called impossible Now if a man were bound by the Gospel to avoid all those particulars that were commanded by Moses it is plain the servitude and the difficulty would be the same but if not only so but he be also bound to avoid all that which the Scripture is silent in his obligation is infinite and his servitude intolerable For Positives are determinate and definite and so fall more easily within our care and attention but Negatives are infinite and therefore such a yoke must be properly impossible These mistakes therefore being removed The true Notion of Christian Liberty will best be understood if we consider That in the times of the Old Testament the visible Church of God was inclosed within a narrow pale and none could be members of it without submission to Circumscision and the other Rites of Judaism Whence it came to pass that at the first publication of the Gospel it was a riddle and an astonishment to the very Apostles themselves that the Gentiles were to be taken into it And when the effecting this was taken in hand Acts 15. 1. the Jewish Christians stood upon their priviledge and would not admit the Gentile Converts into Society nor become of one body with them unless they would be circumcised and keep the Law Hereupon a Council is called and there the Apostles find out a temper and middle way for both parts to meet in for the present which was that the Gentile Converts should submit to the terms of Proselytism at large or the precepts given to the Sons of Noah as some understand the passage or as is indubitable that they should comply with the Jews in these three things of abstaining from fornication from things strangled and from blood And on the other side the Jewish Converts should abate of their rigor and not require of the Gentiles the strict terms of compleat Judaism At which decision the Gentile Christians were transported with Joy rejoyced at the consolation v. 31. For as I said till then none could be of the same body with the Jews in respect of visible Church Society without Circumcision and universal submission to the Law of Moses This therefore was an expedient for the present till the Jews should be by degrees better instructed in the liberty of that Christian Religion they had lately received But when the Gospel was fully published then the aforesaid Inclosure is laid open and all Nations invited into the Society of the Church upon equal terms neither party being bound to those nice Laws of Moses nor any other but those plain and reasonable ones contained in the Gospel and such other not contradictory to them as publick Wisdom Peace and Charity should dictate and recommend And to this purpose is the observation of Eusebius in his Praepaeratio Evangelica That Christianity is nothing else but the old Patriarchal Religion revived a restitution of that Primitive simplicity and liberty that was before the Law of Moses and that now there lyes no more bonds upon the Consciences of Christians than did upon the Antient Patriarchs saving those improvements our Saviour hath made upon the Law of Nature and those few positive Institutions of his expresly set down in the Gospel And that men obeying these are at liberty to conform to whatsoever common Reason and equity or publick Authority shall impose And this discourse of Eusebius is in effect the same with that of the Apostle Rom. 4. and Gal. 3. especially v. 19. where he puts this question Wherefore then served the Law he answers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it was added c. it was a kind of interim or like a parenthesis which when it shall be left out the former and latter parts joyn together again without any interruption