same Ecclesiastical Governnours and to be obedient to their Laws their Commands and their Censures 6. THAT to compass this Union every party of different perswasion and Judgement in matters of Faith and Discipline ought to abate something of their rigour and their right and come one part of the way to a Reconciliation that is to say that every party ought to recover an insidious peace to abandon the truth he believes he has on his side or to enervate the force of it THESE maxims which are those of Rome have been and will be the cause why there will never be in the World neither Church nor Reformation without some mixture of corruption The Felicity of being freed from these is only to be found in the Independant Church ABOVE all they find the 5 th maxim to be unreasonable wicked and tyrannical◠principally when they press to an Uniformity of Discipline all the Inhabitants of a Territory or Kingdom under one and the same Soveraign about which both the greatest number of people and the most illuminated are divided and do not find one clear constant and perpetual truth in the Sacred Scriptures to press the Uniformity of it nor the necessity of that way that they find as to what concerns Faith Theodosius the II. had his reason better grounded when he commanded all his Subjects to believe according to the Faith of Damasus of Rome and Peter of Alexandria then if he had commanded them an Uniformity in Discipline which he did not do and which he could not execute For he could not be ignorant that as there was but one Faith to which every faithful soul ought to adhere and to be verily perswaded that his was the true it was not without reason that he rather commanded the belief of that Faith than the practise of a discipline since that the one was expresly laid down in the holy Scripture and the other was not 'T IS after this manner the Independant Churches argue They believe with Theodosius that the Subjects of an Empire are obliged to embrace the same Faith supposing it be that of Jesus Christ but they are not obliged to practise one certain discipline which is not found in the holy Scripture THE first maxim was that of Dioclesian who alone did shed more Christian bloud than his Predecessors all together had done It cannot be practised without Fire and Sword and it is as full of Impiety and of Paganism as Excommunication Titus Livius lib. 39. tit 9 puts among the Roman Laws Ne qui Romani Dei neque alio more quam patrio colerentur ne quis in publico sacrove loco novo aut externo ritu sacrificaret The Scythians caused Anacharsis to be put to death for having a Worship a part which he had learnt in Greece And Mecaenas exhorted Augustus to punish those who would not conform themselves to the Religion of the Countrey Dio. lib. 52 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 BUT yet this maxim was not so much practised when the Government was more popular and when Altars were erected to strange Gods and to some unknown for after they had subdued Nations they also brought their Gods in triumph I met with the Defeat and overthrow of the fifth maxim in a discourse at the beginning of a Treatise of that excellent Knight to whom I Dedicated my Fasciculus as an Answer to some questions that were put to him by thoughts much agreeing with mine before ever we had any communication of them together which he also confirms by those of a Learned Divine whose name is Chillingworth and whose Authority is so much the more considerable and weighty as being a Church of England man There are say they but two wayes to make all Christians to enter into one and the same communion either in taking away the diversity of Opinions that divide them which is impossible without a Miracle and unless God had established and set up a visible Judge to whom their differences should be referred or else being all perswaded that this diversity of Opinions ought not to hinder their communion and their Union in things wherein they do agree and where charity complaisance and condescention ought to have place without any ones being deprived of their Opinion or that one should persecute the other that differs from his DOCTOR Jeremy Tailor who was a strong man for the English Hierarchy by reason whereof he was made a Bishop in Ireland and who was extroardinarily illuminated and Learned agreed in the same Sentiment with Dr. Chillingworth and hath published a great Book whose Title is the Liberty of Prophecying against the wicked and unreasonable carriage of those who rigorously impose set Forms of Faith to others and who Persecute and ill-use those who are not of their Opinion in matters of Religion ALSO the Independants have indeavoured not so much to establish the goodness of the Congregational way in sound clear minds because they are soon convinced of it by the description they make of it as to disabuse them of those maxims which are but so many illusions though most commonly it is easier to refute Errours than to establish Truth as Cicero very well says Vtinam tà m facile possem vera probare quà m falsa convincere NOW the tyranny of these maxims which are as much that of the Protestants as of the Papists is the cause why the transition of the Romish Religion to the reformed is but imperfectly done in France Germany England and elsewhere how little complaisance soever we have had for Rome and for an affinity with her it has cost us very dear we have thought we ought not to go from one extremity to another at one leap As we fell from the Impanation to Transubstantiation so likewise have we gone from Transubstantiation to Consubstantiation its Neighbour then we have retained the real presence in the Sacramental Supper which has some agreement and is conciliable with those three illusions of words 'T is said indeed that this presence was spiritual but at the same time it was clothed with the flesh when they kept at the beginning of the reformation such wayes of expressing themselves which have been a great Shock to Bullinger and many other great men of his time That we were nourished in this Sacrament with the substance of the flesh and with the blood of Jesus Christ Which has given occasion to the Bishop of Candom to Mounsieur Arnauld and to Father Maimbourge to put this Interrogatory to us if you speak as we do why do you not believe as we do Especially the Bishop of Condom has made use of it and they have given him reason to triumph over us as much in that as he hath done as to the eminent Authority that is established in our Churches with as much incontestability as if it were Infallible The Missionary Pean sayes that it is a Gallimauphrey of the Protestants to speak of being nourished with the substance of Jesus Christ and with his flesh and
not to believe Transubstantiation A Learned English Dr. named John Hales hath written a Learned Treatise upon this Subject where he condemns this way of Reconciliation that sayes one thing and believes another and that turns again to Rome and he exhorts his Brethren to condemn rather the use of it than to justifie it He sayes also that Martyn Bucer was the first of the Reformed that made use of this way of speaking IT must be confessed that as the weakness of those great lights of Reformation Bucer Calvin and Reza was very great when they explained those Scriptures concerning the Lords Supper by a Comment that was more obscure than the Text nor hath it been less great in those that have come after them when they have explained the words of Jesus Christ in S. John VI. concerning the fleshly eating to the Sacramental and Spiritual eating and when they have made long comments upon the words of Calvin to sweeten and smooth the harshness of them instead of condemning them this obstinacy in adhering to errors hath brought in the pretended infallibility into the Church of Rome and the Incontestability into the Reformed Churches Inter caetera mortalitatis incommoda hoe est errandi necessitas erroris amor Seneca NOW these ways of speaking which simbolize with those of Rome and which give it occasion to insult and triumph over us makes me remember what I have read in the Memoirs and specialties that Joseph Hall hath made of his Life and absolutely convinces me of this truth that it has been so unlikely that they who have believed they might gain upon Rome by retaining some of their ways and modes of speaking or their practises should have succeeded therein that on the contrary She has been so much the more set and hardened against us and have gone so far in it as to make us and their Religion far more reasonable than ours He sayes that in his journey to the Spadan Waters for his health he had before a great company of persons of quality both Papists and Protestants a very hot dispute with a Sorbonist a Prior of the Carmelites who maintained that the Kneeling practised in the Church of England at the receiving of the Eucharist strongly shewed that she believed Transubstantion for that kneeling and the belief of Transubstantiation were things inseparable and always went hand in hand together and since the one had never been believed in the Church without the practise of the other and since it was a distraction of reason and a wicked practise to carry their adorations to Elements that were only Bread and Wine this kneeling of necessity must be a natural consequence of the belief of Transubstantiation Bishop Hall adds that as the company was divided in their judgments and that several of them joyned with those of Rome in condemning this kneeling unless it was a consequence of Transubstantiation more than two thirds of the company were so heated against the poor Bishop that he had not the liberty to speak nor to stand up in defence of the Church's Opinion For if they had given him time to speak he had alleadged the Rubrick of the Church of England which undeceives the Communicants from the thoughts that they might possibly have that that Kneeling or Adoration is carried out to the Bread and the Wine But beside that there is not of a hundred Communicants one who reads the Rubrick it might have happened that those who were so violent against Bishop Hall would have pleasantly stopt his mouth with the Apologue which Beza writ in a Letter to the good Arch-Bishop Edmund Grindal who seeing that he was offended at this kneeling after Transubstantiation was banished endeavoured to cure him of the scandal he had taken making him to know that the Rubrick of the Church of England would give him enough wherewith to be satisfied Upon which Beza returned him this story A Lord having built his house near to the high way where he left a great stone that he had no occasion for just in the road several persons coming by in the night stumbled at it and did hurt themselves and often complaints being made to him about it and intreaties that he would take it out of the way he was very obstinate a long while and was resolved not to meddle with it but being wearied by the continual solicitations that were made to him he bethought himself to set over the stone a Lanthorn with a light Candle in it to warn people of it but that Admonition proving troublesome too one of his friends came and gave him this good Counsel Sir if you would be at quiet take away both stone and Lanthorn together The stone of stumbling is this kneeling at the Sacrament and the Rubrick is for a light and Declaration to signifie to the Communicants that this kneeling is not done to the bread and wine but to Jesus Christ If you take away both you will take away the scandal and the remedy to the scandall You will bring back the way with which Jesus Christ instituted the holy Supper who gave it not kneeling but in the posture of those who take their ordinary repasts at their Tables so that Jesus Christ never required any Genuflexion either at the time or place THESE two stories hit as we generally say two birds with one stone For they may relate to that neerness of assinity with Rome which I have already spoken of above and which I have showed has rather sharpened and embittered the Spirits and tempers of those of that communion to plot against the sacred person of the KING and against his Government than it has any wayes sweetned them and moreover they discover that those who go furthest off from the Doctrines and practises of Rome who renounce all reconciliation with Her as the people of the Congregational way do have most conformity with the blessed peace-Makers of whom Jesus Christ speakes and whereof the Character of the Children of God which he gives them upon this respect carryes them so much the farther from all thoughts of Rebellion CHAP. XII An Apology for the Author of the Conformity of the congregational Churches with that of the Antient Primitive Christians That a disinteressed person such as he is the most sit to write about these matters Of the Obligation he hath to the Bishop of Condom for the light he hath given him I Think my self here obliged to add an Apology as to my own account for what I have said as to the Independant Churches I do imagine I shall be accused at first for having made the description of the congregational way not according as it is in effect but in that manner as Xenophon did the Cyropaedia to be the perfect model of a Prince They will say that any other interest than that of the inward knowledge I have of the goodness truth and holiness of the Congregational way ought to have excited me to commend it so as I have done That I
impressions of the goodness of the Congregational way in the minds of men than would that of a Divine of a Minister of the Gospel or any other person ingaged by profession either to the Episcopal Presbyterian or even to the Congregational way As Reason and Grace in the hopes of glory are the three Ressorts or principles which have alwayes moved and governed me in all the course of my life and in all my Writings so have they been always less violent by the prejudices and interests in the profession I make of a Physician than if I had been either a Divine or a Lawyer I ought here also to acknowledg my Obligation to the Bishop of Condom not only for the first hints of this truth that the Congregational way is of all the Establishments of Discipline and Government the most conformable to reason to the holy Scripture and to the practise of the Apostles and the Primitive Christians but for having absolutely confirmed me in this truth though the design of that Bishop has not been to put the Congregational way above the Romish but only to discover and this he hath done by Arguments that come very near to demonstration that going upon the hypothesis of the necessity of seting up a Tribunal in the Church and of the submission of the people to that Tribunal as being the only Rampiâ—r of the Orthodox Faith and the only means of Uniting Christians preserving peace and good order among them it is incomparably more reasonable that such submission should be made to an infallible Tribunal than to One that is subject to Error and that upon this ground of all the Ecclesiastical ways in the World which acknowledg that every Ecclesiastical Tribunal either supreme or subordinate that every Councel either Oecumenical or Topical is fallible and subject to errour the Congregational way which refuses all manner of submission to a Tribunal subject to errour is the most reasonable and the most just CHAP. XIII The Explication of one difficulty which runs throughout the whole precedent discourse AS it was in my thoughts to finish this discourse by the word Finis a Learned Presbyterian coming in and having apprehended my design put one objection to me against the defeat and overthrow I pretend to make of the necessity of a Tribunal in the Church he said that since that Tribunal which requires the people to submit themselves to it is as much set up in an independant Church as in a National and since both presuppose that that Tribunal is subject to errour the submission of the people is altogether as reasonable to the Tribunal of a National Church as to that of a Congregational I confess there is some weight in this objection which Monsieur Jurieu has not thought of but which nevertheless is easie to be answered according to the principles I lay down 1. THAT all manner of Government Presbyterian Congregational National Episcopal Hierarchical Papal is of the same nature with that of the Magistrate 2. THAT the submission required and given to all manner of Ecclesiastical Government is of the same nature with that which is required and given to a Civil and Political government the Ressorts of which are not the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven nor the power of binding and loosing but the will of the strongest and most numerous that hath so ordain'd it 3. AND consequently that the Censures of excommunication and deposition being of the same nature with the Law of the Magistrate the validity of which is not in the Justice nor equity of the thing but in the will of those that decree and ordain it they ought to be accounted as a Civil punishment THESE three considerations destroy that erection of an Ecclesiastical Tribunal which is equal with the Civil in one and the same Territory since both being of the same nature it would be a pure piece of Gallimaufrey and hotchpot to offer to establish two Civil Governments in one and the same dominion or Territory which should be independant one on the other ALSO this difficulty is easie to be overcome according to the principles of the Independants The Inconvenience of an Excommunicated or deposed person unjustly by his Congregation is not great so long as it does not extend beyond his Jurisdiction and that of a hundred Congregations in one Territory it is impossible but that at least there might be one to recompence the Justice of his cause which is not a thing feasible if he be struck by a National Judgement unless he leaves his Country And since the person oppressed is in the liberty of framing to himself a Congregation Independant on all the Churches of the world though it be but of seven or eight persons his innocence and legitimate right will easily furnish him with the means to do it I add further that a person who is sensible he is guilty of disorders can easily conceal them in the crowd of a National Church which he cannot so well do in a small number of persons and commonly prevent the Censure of his Congregation and not expect that they should excommunicate him and drive him out of it which is done in that manner as St. Jerome and Bishop Godeau would have the Heretick of whom S. Paul speaks in the 3 of Titus 11. knowing that he that is such i. e. an Heretick is subverted and sinneth being condemned of himself To do when he excommunicated himself and saved his Church that trouble IT must not be forgot that tho there is no Government so perfect wherein one cannot find some faults and some Inconvenience yet it is certain there is found less in the Congregational way whereas you may find almost an infinity in that of the National whereof a thousand persons that deserve the censure of the Church there is not one of them that undergoes its because its discipline is like to spiders Webs where the Fly 's are taken but the Birds pass through and where it is impossible in a Town or a Church of many thousands of Christians that one Bishop or Pastor can possibly have an exact inspection over them whereas in a Congregational Church composed but of a few persons and those all cull'd out of the multitude who fun after Vanitics and Vices one has but little or no use of excommunication and deposition and where Avarice Ambition Heresies and quarrels do not enter as in National Churches THESE considerations give me to hope that the learned and illuminated of the Congregational way will agree and joyn with my principles or Hypotheses to establish the true nature of their Jurisdiction and to undo with case the difficulty of the objection although according to their principles it resembles the Foils which touch the person but do not wound it For in case of a wound they have a thousand remedies to heal it presently whereas there is no remedy either against Infallibity in the Church of Rome or against incontestability in a National Church CHAP.