of their several Countries whereby their Civil Liberties and Advantages were confirmed unto them And if at any time it take place or prevail amongst Persons of more Light and Knowledge who are able to compare it or the practice of it with the Iâ—stitutions of Christ in the Gospel and the manner of the Admistration therein also directed it greatly alienates the minds of men from the Communion of such Churches Especially it doth so if set up unto an exclusion of that benigne kind spiritual and every way useful Discipline that Christ hath appointed to be exercised in his Church When Corruptions and Abuses were come to the height in the Papacy in this matter we know what ensued thereon Divines indeed and sundry other Persons Learned and Godly did principally insist on the Errors and Heresies which prevailed in the Church of Rome with the Defilements and Abominations of their Worship But that which alienated the minds of Princes Magistrates and whole Nations from them was the Ecclesiastical Domination which they had craftily erectsd and cunningly mannaged unto the ends of their own Ambition Power and Avarice under the name of Church-Rule and Discipline And where-ever any thing of the same kind is continued that a Rule under the same Pretence is erected and exercised in any Church after the nature of Secular Courts by force and power put forth in Legal Citations Penalties Pecuniary Mulcts without an open evidence of mens being acted in what they do herein by Love Charity Compassion towards the Souls of men Zeel for the Glory of God and Honour of Christ with a Design for the Purity Holiness and Reformation of the Members of it that Church may not expect Unity and Peace any longer than the terrour of its Proceedings doth over-ballance other Thoughts and Desires proceeding from a sense of Duty in all that belong unto it Yea whatever is or is to be the manner of the Administration of Discipline in the Church about which there may be doubtful Disputations which men of an ordinary capacity may not be able clearly to determine yet if the avowed end of it be not the Purity and Holiness of the Church and if the Effects of it in a tendency unto that End be not manifest it is hard to find out whence our Obligation to a compliance with it should arise And where an outward Conformity unto some Church-Order is aimed at alone in the room of all other things it will quickly prove it self to be nothing or of no value in the sight of Christ. And these things do alienate the minds of many from an acquiescencie in their Stations or Relations to such Churches For the principal Enforcements of mens Obedience and Reverence unto the Rulers of the Church is because they watch diligently for the good of their Souls as those that must give an Account And if they see such set over them as give no evidence of any such watchful Care acting its self according to those Scripture-Directions which are continually read unto them but rather rule them with force and rigour seeking theirs not them they grow weary of the Yoke and sometimes regularly sometimes irregularly contrive their own Freedom and Deliverance It may not here be amiss to enquire into the Reasons and Occasions that have seduced Churches and their Rulers into the Miscarriages insisted on Now these are chiefly some Principles with their Application that they have trusted unto but which indeed have really deceived them and will yet continue so to do And the first of these is that whereas they are true Churches and thereon intrusted with all Church-Power and Priviledges they need not further concern themselves to seek for Grounds or Warranty to keep up all their Members unto their Communion For be they otherwise what they will so long as they are True Churches it is their duty to abide in their Peace and Order If any call their Church-state into question they take no consideration of them but how they may be punished it may be destroyed as perverse Schismaticks And they are ready to suppose that upon an acknowledgment that they are True Churches every dissent from them in any thing must needs be criminal As if it were all one to be a True Church and to be in the Truth and Right in all things a supposition whereof includes a Nullity in the state of those Churches which in the least differ from them than which there is no more uncharitable nor Schismatical Principle in the world But in the common Definition of Schism that it is a causeless Separation from a true Church that term of causless is very little considered or weighed by them whose Interest it is to lay the Charge of it on others And hence it is come to pass that where-ever there have been complaints of Faults Miscarriages Errors Defections of Churches in late Ages their Counsels have only been how to destroy the Complainers not in the least how they should reform themselves as though in Church-Affairs Truth Right and Equity were entailed on Power and Possession How the Complaints concerning the Church of Rome quickned by the Outcries of so many Provinces of Europe and Evidence in matter of Fact were eluded and frustrated in the Councel of Trent leaving all tfiings to be tried out by Interest and force is full well known For they know that no Reformation can be attempted and accomplished but it will be a business of great Labour Care and Trouble things not delightful unto the minds of men at ease Besides as it may possibly ruffle or discompose some of the Chiefs in their present ways or enjoyments so it will as they fear tend to their Disreputation as though they had formerly been out of the way or neglective of their Duty And this as they suppose would draw after it another Inconvenience by reflecting on them and their Practices as the Occasions of former Disorders and Divisions They chuse therefore generally to flatter themselves under the Name and Authority of the Church and lay up their Defence and Security against an humble painful Reformation in a Plea that they need it not So was it with the Church of Laodicea of old who in the height of her decaying condition flattered her self That she was rich and encreased in Goods and had need of nothing and knew not or would not acknowledge that she was wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked Now it cannot but seem exceeding strange unto men who wisely consider these things that whereas the Churches which were planted and watered by the Apostles themselves and enjoyed for some good season the presence and advantage of their infallible Guidance to preserve them in their original purity and order did within a few years many of them so degenerate and stand in need of Reformation that our Lord Jesus Christ threatned from Heaven to cast them off and destroy them unless they did speedily reform themselves according to his mind that those now
the Church in neither of the former notions is capable of such administrations Some therefore rested in particular Assemblies or such Societies who did or might meet together under the guidance and inspection of their own Elders Overseers Guides or Bishops And hereunto they added the occasional meetings of those Elders and others to advise and determine in common about the especial necessities of any particular Church or the general concernments of more of them as the matter might require These in name and some kind of resemblance are continued throughout the World in Parochial Assemblies Others suppose a particular Church to be such a one as is now called Diocesan though that name in its first use and application to Church Affairs was of a larger extent than what it is now applyed unto for it was of old the name of a Patriarchal Church And herein the sole Rule Guidance and Authoritative inspection of many perhaps a multitude of particular Churches assembling for sacred Worship and the Administration of Gospel Ordinances distinctly is committed unto one man whom in contradistinction from others they call the Bishop For the joyning of others with him or their subordination unto him in the exercise of Jurisdiction hinders not but that the sole Ecclesiastical Power of the Diocess may be thought to reside in him alone For those others do either act in his name or by power derived from him or have no pretence unto any Authority meerly Ecclesiastical however in common use what they exercised may be so termed But the nature of such Churches with the Rule and Discipline exercised in them and over them is too well known to be here insisted on Some rest not here but unto these Diocesan adde Metropolitical Churches which also are esteemed particular Churches though it be uncertain by what warrant or on what grounds In these one person hath in some kind of Resemblance a respect unto and over the Diocesan Bishops like that which they have over the Ministers of Particular Assemblies But these things being animated and regulated by certain Arbitrary Rules and Canons or Civil Laws of the Nations the due bounds and extent of their power cannot be taken from any Nature or Constitution peculiar unto them And therefore are there where-ever they are admitted various Degrees in their Elevation But how much or little the Gospel is concerned in these things is easie for any one to judge Neither is it by wise men pretended to be so any further than that as they suppose it hath left such things to be ordered by humane wisdome for an expediency unto some certain ends One or more of these Metropolitical Churches have been required in latter Ages to constitute a Church National Though the truth is that Apellation had originally another occasion whereunto the invention of these Metropolitical Churches was accommodated For it arose not from any respect unto Ecclesiastical Order or Rule but unto the supream Political Power whereunto the Inhabitants of such a Nation as gives Denomination to the Church are Civilly subject Hence that which was Provincial at the first Erection of this Fabrick which was in the Romish Empire whilst the whole was under the power of one Monarch became National when the several Provinces were turned into Kingdomes with absolute Soveraign power among themselves wholly independent of any other And he who in his own Person and Authority would erect an Ecclesiastical Image of that demolished Empire will allow of such Provincial Churches as have a dependance upon himself but cares not to hear of such National Churches as in their first notion include a Soveraign Power unto all intents and purposes within themselves So the Church of England became National in the dayes of King Henry the Eighth which before was but Provincial Moreover the consent of many had prevailed that there should be Patriarchal Churches comprehending under their Inspection and Jurisdiction many of these Metropolitical and Provincial Churches And these also were looked on as Particular for from their first invention there having been four or five of them no one of them could be imagined to comprize the Catholick Church although those who presided in them according to the pride and vanity of the declining Ages of the Church stiled themselves Oecumenical and Catholick Things being carried thus far about the Fifth and Sixth Century of years after Christ One owned as Principal or chief of this latter sort set up for a Church denominated Papal from a Title he had appropriated unto himself For by Artifices innumerable he ceased not from endeavouring to subject all those other Churches and their Rulers unto himself And by the advantage of his Pre-eminence over the other Patriarks as theirs over Metropolitans and so downwards whereby all Christians were imagined to be comprized within the Precincts of some of them he fell into a claim of a Soveraignty over the whole Body of Christianity and every particular member thereunto belonging This he could have had no pretence for but that he thought them cast into such an Order as that he might possess them on the same grounds on which that Order it self was framed For had not Diocesan Metropolitical and Patriarchal Churches made way for it the thought of a Church Papal comprehensive of all believers had never befallen the minds of mind For it is known that the prodigious Empire which the Pope claimed and had obtained over Christianity was an emergency of the contests that fell out among the Leaders of the greater sorts of Churches about the Rights Titles and Pre-eminences among themselves with some other occasional and intestine Distempers Only he had one singular advantage for the promotion of his Pretense and desire For whereas this whole contiguation of Churchts into all these Storyes in the top whereof he emerged and lifted up himself was nothing but an accommodation of the Church and its Affairs unto the Government of the Roman Empire or the setting up of an Ecclesiastical Image and Representation of its Secular Power and Rule the centring therein of all subordinate Powers and Orders in one Monarch inclined the minds of men to comply with his Design as very reasonable Hence the principal Plea for that Power over the whole Church which at present he claims lyes in this that the Government of it ought to be Monarchial And therein consists a chief part of the mystery of this whole work that whereas this Fabrick of Church Rule was erected in imitation of and complyance with the Roman Empire that he could never effect his Soveraignty whilst that Empire stood in its strength and union under the command of one or more Emperours by consent yet when that Empire was destroyed and the Provinces thereof became parcelled out unto several Nations who erected absolute independent Soveraignties among themselves he was able by the Reputation he had before obtained so to improve all emergencies and advantages as to gather all these new Kingdomes into one Religious
they may be laid aside and made use of in another way Much more may any refuse the communion of such Churches if they impose on them their Corruptions Errors Failings and Mistakes as the coudition of their Communion For hereby they directly make themselves Lords over the Faith and Worship of the Disciples of Christ and are void of all Authority from him in what they so do or impose And it is so far that any mens withdrawing of themselves from the communion of such Churches and entring into a way of Reformation for their own good in obedience to the Laws of Christ should infer in them a want of Love and Peaceableness or a Spirit of Division that to do otherwise were to divide from Christ and to cast out all true Christian Love embracing a Cloud of slothful negligence and carelesness in the great concernments of the Glory of God and their own Souls in the room thereof We are neither the Authors nor the Guides of our own Love He who implants and worketh it in us hath given us Rules how it must be exercised and that on all emergencies It may work as regularly by sharp cutting Rebukes as by the most silken and compliant expressions by manifesting an aversation from all that is evil as by embracing and approving of what is good In all things and cases it is to be directed by the Word And when under the pretence of it we leave that Rule and go off from any Duty which we owe immediately unto God it is Will Pride and Self-conceit in us and not Love And among all the Exhortations that are given us in the Scripture unto Unity and Concord as the Fruits of Love there is not one that we should agree or comply with any in their sins or evil practices But as we are commanded in our selves to obtain from all appearance of evil so are we forbidden a participation in the sins of other men and all fellowship with unfruitful works of darkness Our Love towards such Churches is to work by Pity Compassion Prayer Instructions which are due means for their healing and recovery not by consent unto them or communion with them whereby they may be hardned in the Error of their way and our own Souls be subverted For if we have not a due respect unto the Lord Christ and his Authority all that we have or may pretend to have unto any Church is of no value Neither ought we to take into consideration any terms of Communion whose foundation is not laid in a regard thereunto Moreover as hath been declared there is no such society of Christians in the world whose Assemblies as to Instituted Worship are rejected by Christ so that they have a Bill of Divorce given unto them by the Declaration of the Will of the Lord Jesus to that purpose in the Scripture but that until they are utterly also as it were extirpate by the Providence of God as are many of the Primitive Plantations we are perswaded of them that there are yet some secret hidden ones among them that belong unto the purpose of Gods Grace For we do judge that where-ever the Name of Jesus Christ is called upon there is salvation to be obtained however the wayes of it may be obstructed unto the most by their own Sins and Errors They may also retain that Profession which distinguisheth them from the Infidel world In these things we are still to hold communion with them and on these accounts is our Love to be continued unto them Some kind of communion we may hold with them that that are of no Instituted or Particular Churches or whose Church-State is rejected even as a person excommunicated is to be admonished as a Brother And some kind of communion we may lawfully refuse with some true Churches Instances whereof shall be given afterwards There is therefore no necessity that any should deny all them to be true Churches from whom they may have just reason to withdraw their communion For such as are so may require such things thereunto as it is not lawful for them to accept of or submit unto What Assemblies of Christians we behold visibly worshiping God in Christ we take for granted to be true visible Churches And when we judge of our own communion with them it is not upon this Question whether they are true Churches or no as though the determination of our practice did depend solely thereon For as we are not called to judge of the being of their Constitution as to the substance of it unless they are openly judged in the Scripture as in the case of Idolatry and Persecution persisted in so a determination of the Truth of their constitution or that they are true Churches will not presently resolve us in our Duty as to communion with them for the Reasons before given But in such a cà se two things are by us principally to be considered 1. That nothing sinful in it self or unto us be required of us as the condition of communion 2. That we may in such Churches obtain the immediate end of their Institution and our Conjunction with them which is our Edification in Faith Love and Obedience And the things whereof we have discoursed comprize our Thoughts concerning those Societies of Christians whose degeneracy from their primitive Rule and Institution is most manifest and notorious Whilst there is any Profession of the Gospel any subjection of Souls unto Jesus Christ avowed or any expectation of help from him continued among them we cannot but hope that there are in all of them at least some few Names that are written in the Lambs Book of Life and which shall be saved eternally For as a Relation unto a particular visible Church walking according to the Order and Rule of the Gospel is the Duty of every Believer to give himself up unto as that which is a means appointed and sanctified to the furtherance of his Edification and Salvation so where it cannot be obtained through invincible outward Impediments or is omitted through ignorance of Duty or is on just Causes refused where opportunities make a tender of it or where the being and benefit of it is lost through the Apostasie of those Churches whereunto any persons did belong the utter want of it and that alwayes is not such as necessarily infers the eternal loss of their Souls who suffer under it Other Churches there are in the world which are not evidently guilty of the Enormities in Doctrine Worship and Discipline before discoursed of These all we judge to be true Churches of Christ and do hope that his promised presence is with them in their Assemblies Answerable hereunto is our Judgment concerning their Officers or Rulers and all their Sacred Administrations It becomes us to think and believe that the one have Authority from Christ and that the other are accepted with him For it is most unwarrantable rashness and presumption yea an evident fruit of Ignorance or want of Love or secular private Interest
in the world ordered at first by persons fallible and who in many things were actually deceived should so continue in their purity and holiness from Age to Age as to stand in need of no Reformation or Amendment Well will it be if it prove so at the great Day of Visitation In the mean time it becomes the Guides of all the Churches in the world to take care that there do not such Decays of Truth Holiness and Purity in Worship fall out under their hand in the Churches wherein they preside as that for them they should be rejected by our Lord Jesus Christ as he threatens to deal with those who are guilty of such defections For the state of the Generality of Churches is such at this day in the world as he who thinks them not to stand in need of any Reformation may justly be looked on as a part of their sinful Degeneracy We are not ignorant what is usually pleaded in Barr unto all endeavours after Church-Reformation For they say if upon the Clamours of a few humorous discontented Persons whom nothing will please and who perhaps are not agreed among themselves a Reformation must instantly be made or attempted there will be nothing stable firm or sacred left in the Church Things once well established are not to be called into question upon every ones Exceptions And these things are vehemently pleaded and urged to the exclusion of all thoughts of changing any thing though evidently for the better But long continued complaints and Petitions of Multitudes whose Sincerity hath received as great an attestation as Humane Nature or Christian Religion can give it may be deserve not to be so despised However the Jealousie which Churches and their Rulers ought to have over themselves their state and condition and the presence of the Glory of Christ amongst them or its departure from them especially considering the fearful example of the Defection and Apostacy of many Churches which is continually before their Eyes seems to require a readiness in them on every Intimation or Remembrance to search into their state and condition and to redress what they find amiss For suppose they should be in the Right and blameless as to those Orders and Constitutions wherein others dissent from them yet there may be such Defects and Declensions in Doctrine Holiness and the Fruits of them in the world as the most strict observation of outward Order will neither countenance nor compensate For to think to preserve a Church by Outward Order when its internal Principles of Faith and Holiness are decayed is but to do like him who endeavouring to set a Dead Body upright but failing in his Attempt concluded that there was somewhat wanting within Another Principle of the same importance and applied unto the same purpose is that the people are neither able nor fit to judge for themselves but ought in all things to give themselves up unto the conduct of their Guides and to rest satisfied in what they purpose and prescribe unto them The imbibing of this Apprehension which is exceedingly well suited to be made a Covering to the Pride and Ignorance of those unto whose Interests it is accommodated makes them impatient of hearing any thing concerning the Liberty of Christians in common to judge of what is their Duty what they are to do and what they are not to do in things Sacred and Religious Only it is acknowledged there is so much Ingenuity in the management of this Principle and its Application that it is seldom extended by any beyond their own Concernments For whereas the Church of Rome hath no way to maintain its self in its Doctrine and Essential Parts of its Constitution but by an implicit Faith and Obedience in its Subâ—ects seeing the animating Principles of its Profession will endure no kind of impartial Test or Trial they extend it unto all things as well in Matters of Faith as of Worship and Discipline But those who are secure that the Faith which they profess will endure an examination by the Scripture as being founded therein and thence educed they will allow unto the people at least a Judgment of discerning Truth from Falshood to be exercised about the Doctrines which they teach But as for the things which concern the Worship of God and Rule of the Church wherein they have an especial Interest and Concern there they betake themselves for relief unto this Principle Now as there is more Honesty and Safety in this latter way than in the former so it cannot be denied but that there is less of ingenuity and self-consistency For if you will allow the people to make a judgment in and about any thing that is Sacred or Religious you will never know how to hit a Joint aright to make a separation among such things so as to say with any pretence of Reason about these things they may judge for themselves but not about those And it is a little too open to say that they may exercise a Judgment about what God hath appointed but none about what we appoint our selves But without offence be it spoken this Apprehension in its whole Latitude and under its restrictions is so weak and ridiculous that it must be thought to proceed from an excess of prejudice if any man of Learning should undertake to patronize it Those who speak in these things out of Custom and Interest without a due examination of the Grounds and Reasons of what they affirm or deny as many do are of no consideration And it is not amiss for them to keep their distance and stand upon their Guard lest many of those whom they exclude from judging for themselves should be found more compeâ—ent Judges in those Matters than themselves And let Churches and Church-Rulers do what they please every man at last will be determined in what is meet for him to do by his own Reason and Judgment Churches may inform the minds of men they cannot enforce them And if those that adhere unto any Church do not do so because they judge that it is their duty and best for them so to do they therein differ not much from an Herd of Creatures that are called by another name And yet a secret Apprehension in some that the Disposal of the Concernments of the Worship of God is so left and confined unto themselves as that nothing is left unto the people but the Glory of Obedience without any sedulous enquiry after what is their own duty with respect unto that account which every one must give of himself unto God doth greatly influence them into the neglects insisted on And when any of the people come to know their own Liberty and Duty in these things as they cannot but know it if at all they apply their minds unto the consideration of them they are ready to be alienated from those who will neither permit them to judge for themselves nor are able to answer for them if they should be misled For if the
Schismatick a Divider of the Churches Vnity and an enemy unto the Peace and Order of it Howbeit of Conformity unto such Institutions and Orders of men of Vniformity in the observation of such external Rites in the worship of the Church there is not one word spoken nor any thing of that nature intimated in all the Commands for Vnity which are given unto us nor in the Directions that are sanctified unto the due preservation of it Yet such an Vniformity being set up in the room of Evangelical Unity and Order Means suited unto the preservation of it but really destructive of that whose name it beareth and whose Place it possesseth have not been wanting And it is not unworthy consideration how men endeavour to deceive others and are deceived themselves by manifold Equivocations in their arguings about this Matter For first they lay down the necessity of Vnity among Christians with the evil that is in Breaches Divisions and Schismes which they prove from the Commands of the one and the Reproofs of the other that abound in the Scripture Then with an easie deduction they prove that it is a Duty incumbent on all Christians in their several Capacities to observe keep further and promote this Vnity and to prevent oppose resist and avoid all Divisions that are contrary thereunto If so the Magistrate must do the same in his place and capacity Now seeing it is his Office and unto him of God it is committed to exercise his power in Laws and Penalties for the promoting of what is good and the punishing of what is contrary thereunto it is his Duty to coerce restrain and punish all those who oppose despise or any way break or disturb the Unity of the Church And this Ratiocination would seem reasonable were it not doubly defective For first the Vnity intended in the first Proposition whose necessity is confirmed by Scripture-Testimonies is utterly lost before we come to the Conclusion and the outward Vniformity mentioned is substituted in the room thereof And hereby in the second place are they deceived to believe that external force and penalties are a means to be used by any for the attaining or preserving of Gospel-Vnity It is not improbable indeed but that it may be suited to give countenance unto that external Vniformity which is intended but that it should be so unto the promotion of Gospel-Vnion among Believers is a weak imagination Let such persons keep themselves and their Argument unto that Vnion which the Scripture commends amongst the Disciples of Christ and his Churches with the means fitted and appointed unto the preservation of it and they shall have our compliance with any Conclusion that will thence ensue Herein therefore lies the Fundamental Cause of our Divisions which will not be healed until it be removed and taken out of the way Leave Believers or Professors of the Gospel unto their Duty in seeking after Evangelical Vnity in the use of other Means instituted and blessed unto that End impose nothing on their Consciences or Practice under that Name which indeed belongs not thereunto and although upon the Reasons and Causes afterwards to be mentioned there may for a season remain some Divisions among them yet there will be a way of healing continually ready for them and agreed upon by them as such Where indeed men propose unto themselves different Ends though under the same Name the use of the same Means for the compassing of them will but encrease their variance As where some aim at Evangelical Vnion and others at an External Vniformity both under the name of Vnity and Peace in the use of the same Means for these Ends they will be more divided among themselves But where the same End is aimed at even the debate of the Means for the attaining of it will insensibly bring the Parties at difference into a Coalition and work out in the issue a compleat Reconciliation In the mean time were Christians duly instructed how many lesser Differences in Mind Judgment and Practice are really consistent with the Nature Ends and genuine Fruit of the Vnity that Christ requires among them it would undoubtedly prevail with them so to mannage themselves in their Differences by mutual forbearance and condescention in Love as not to contract the guilt of being Disturbers or Breakers of it For suppose the Minds of any of them to be invincibly prepossessed with the Principles wherein they differ from others yet all who are sincere in their Profession cannot but rejoyce to be directed unto such a Mannagery of them as to be preserved from the guilt of dissolving the Unity appointed by Christ to be observed And to speak plainly among all the Churches in the world which are free from Idolatry and Persecution it is not different Opinions or a difference in Judgment about revealed Truths nor a different practice in sacred Administrations but Pride Self-interest Love of Honour Reputation and Dominion with the influence of Civil or Political Intrigues and Considerations that are the true cause of that defect of Evangelical Vnity that is at this day amongst them For set them aside and the real differences which would remain may be so mannaged in Love Gentleness and Meekness as not to interfere with that Vnity which Christ requireth them to preserve Nothing will from thence follow which shall impeach their common Interest in one Lord one Faith one Love one Spirit and the Administration of the same Ordinances according to their Light and Ability But if we shall cast away this Evangelical Vnion among the Disciples and Churches of Christ if we shall break up the Bounds and Limits fixed unto it and set up in its place a compliance with or an agreement in the Commands and Appointments of men making their Observations the Rule and measure of our Ecclesiastical Concord it cannot be but that innumerable and endless Divisions will ensue thereon If we will not be contented with the Union that Christ hath appointed it is certain we shall have none in this world For concerning that which is of mens finding out there have been and will be Contentions and Divisions whilst there are any on the one side who will endeavour its imposition and on the other who desire to preserve their Consciences entire unto the Authority of Christ in his Laws and Appointments There is none who can be such a Stranger in our Israel as not to know that these things have been the great Occasion and Cause of of the Divisions and Contentions that have been among us near an hundred years and which at this day make our Breaches wide like the Sea that they cannot be healed Let therefore those who have Power and Ability be instrumental to restore to the minds of men the true Notion and Knowledge of the Unity which the Lord Christ requireth among his Churches and Disciples and let them be left unto that Liberty which he hath purchased for them in the pursuit of that Vnity which he hath prescribed