of their Hearts into the Schism and Faction as I make no question there have been some let your Eyes be now opened and behold the prospect of your Folly into which you have been miserably seduced by your Leaders and Guides and as you tender your own safety to withdraw from the Tents of Chorah that State of Schism and Antichristianism as the Ancient Fathers accounted it Come out of this Babylon and renounce with Abhorrence all Seditious and Factious Tenents and Opinions all disloyal Principles and Practices whatsoever and return into Communion of your Mother the Church of England For however invincible Ignorance heretofore might extenuate your Crimes yet now it will not when it will certainly be no less than Sin against Knowledge and Experience it will be wilful and affected Ignorance shutting your Eyes against clear Evidence and Demonstration which will no more excuse you notwithstanding your pretences of Conscience than it did the Jews in Crucifying our Saviour or those that killed the Apostles because their wicked Consciences told them That therein they did God good Service And it cannot but be matter of great wonder that after such clear and evident Discovery and Detection of the abominable Hypocrisie and Wickedness of Fanaticism That ever there should remain any one among us at this day Those therefore that still remain such must needs be looked upon as having most prostituted and malicious Souls who are in Judgment given up to a reprobate Mind whose end is Destruction as the Apostle speaks And it is a matter of great wonder That there are so many in our days still to remain so sottish as when they make use of the Rules of Prudence and Discretion in all their other Concernments yet as to their greatest Concernment their Immortal Souls they lay them aside and every or any pitiful Schismatick and Imposter or any piece of Folly Ignorance Peevishness and Ignorance must serve their turn be the Director and Guide of their Souls and yet nevertheless they will profess to believe That Miracles are ceased in the Church To perswade us all now to learn to be Dutiful and Loyal Subjects to our Prince and Liege Lord the King our Gracious Sovereign Let us consider as one of late hath well observed That the Worth Excellency and Providence of a Prince are not sufficient to make a Kingdom or Nation Happy His Subjects ought to Contribute their Proportions also to it Let us therefore abhorr and detest and cast away those Seditious Principles of the late times That we may do Evil that Good may come and That a lawful Prince may be withstood and resisted when-ever they themselves shall judge that Religion and Property is invaded or in Danger For when these dangerous Opinions prevail among Subjects in what Circumstances must needs that Prince be when-ever an Opportunity offers it self our late times have sufficiently verified by plain Demonstrations Let us entertain therefore in our Minds the Honest Christian Loyal Principles of the Church of England Let us be obedient Sons unto Her Let us be of humble peaceable and complying Tempers for this is an undeniable Truth That it is a far less Crime to commit an Error on the right Hand that is to say in a peaceable Compliance with just and lawful Authority to promote thereby Order Government Peace and Vnity Than on the left that is to say to commit an Error in disobedience to just Authority in this sence it may be well said Melius est Humilitas in malis quam Superbia in bonis For as the first proceeds from Humility and dutiful Subjection to Authority and is the Preserver of publick Order Government Unity and Peace wherein the Welfare of Mankind principally consists in this World So the other is the product of Pride Presumption and Insolence and over-turns all Government Order and Peace in the World and brings in nothing but Disturbances Strife and Contention Rebellion Blood and Ruin and in short if Subjects would be Loyal Kingdoms could not be miserable But I would not herein be misunderstood to plead for Sin in any case for the obtaining the greatest good although a Heathen once said Iniquissimam pacem justissimo bello antefero he preferr'd an unjust Peace before a most just War But this I am confident of We cannot be innocent when-ever we disobey a just Authority except the unlawfulness of the thing commanded be as clear and apparent as our Duty of Obedience is And for my own part I would chuse rather to run to the utmost extent of what is lawful before I would refuse Active Obedience to a just and lawful Authority either in Church or State and I think I have the Holy Christian Religion on my side to justifie me herein And I am ready to think also that according to this Rule all our Dissenters and Fanaticks will be Tryed one day at the Great Tribunal when their Proud Ignorant Pievish and Froward Consciences shall be no excuse to them It doubtless therefore very much concerns us to consider seriously of the great danger there is in those no small Sins of Heresie and Schism to such as are really and truly such And we are more easily deceived in these kind of Sins in regard Satan herein is notably transformed into an Angel of Light And such Persons who are not so easily tempted to Intemperance and Debauchery yet herein greedily swallow down his Baits and spiritual Pride that is ready to attend such Men as are free from Debauchery and Prophaneness many times helps forward the Temptation likewise the greatest Hereticks and Schismaticks that ever were in the World have had very fair outsides at least I mean of good and pious Conversations How much therefore doth it concern us to have a great Care of that Sin that attends such as are possibly otherwise good Men but nevertheless of all Vices is one of the greatest and most pernicious For as one well said Whereas all other Vices proceed from some ill in us some sinful Imbecility of our Nature This alone ariseth out of our good Parts Now to let us know what these Sins are Calvin speaketh thus in his Institutes They are called Hereticks and Schismaticks who making a Division do break in sunder the Communion of the Church which is contained in two Bonds viz. The Agreement of true Doctrine and Brotherly Love whereupon St. Austin saith he putteth this difference between Schismaticks and Hereticks because the latter viz. Hereticks corrupt with false Opinions the sincerity of the Faith and the former viz. Schismaticks even where there is like Faith do break the the Bond of Fellowship But yet we are farther to consider to make an Heretick There must be not only frror in Intellectu but Pertinacia in Voluntate not only Error in the Understanding but Obstinacy in the Will for as St. Austin speaketh Qui sententiam suam quamvis falsam atque perversam nullae pertinaci animositate defendunt quaerunt autem cauta sollicitudine veritatem
be doubted they will not especially when the Sin hath become in great part General and National For particular Persons are to expect their Judgment and Punishment in the other Life but Nations Kingdoms and Societies of Men cannot then be punished as such as our Divines hold And in consideration of the great mischief and danger in Schisms and Rents among Christians I mean such as profess to own that Name in the Christian World May we not therefore well Pray earnestly to Almighty God as our Mother the Church of England directs us for the Good Estate of the Catholick Church That it may be so guided and governed by God's Good Spirit that all who profess and call themselves Christians may be led into the way of Truth and hold the Faith in Vnity of Spirit in the Bond of Peace and Righteousness of Life It cannot possible therefore favour of a Christian Spirit or Temper to be of peevish froward contentious Spirits but to study Peace at Home in the Church we live in And in the next place it is doubtless our great Duty as Christians not to be wid'ning the Christian Church's Wounds abroad but rather earnestly to endeavour if possible to heal them to promote the Peace and Unity of Christendom That all sober Christians throughout the World might be united together Although in regard of the Lusts and Passions of Men and that there are so few sincere and true Christians in Christendom it seems to be a Work next to impossible to be effected although indeed all good Christians could willingly joyn with that Worthy Man who said Who would not be ready with the loss of his Life to Redeem and free Christianity from that horrid Scandal of Discord and Dissention Mar. Bucer As for the Differences among Christians in the Christian World I heartily wish they were less than they truly are at this Day But this is most certain That by their Passions and Animosities on all Hands they are made greater than they truly are when we all agree in the main and principal Foundation of our Faith contained in the Three Creeds that of the Apostles the Athanasian and the Nicene Creed This one would think should make us more kind and treatable one to another especially not to damn one another to the Pit of Hell and Destruction as too many do But in this respect the Church of England by their Moderation shew themselves to be the better Christians who to their Honor abound in Charity to their bitter Enemies the Romanists and allow unto them a possibility though not without Difficulty of Salvation in their Communion who yet have nothing in return for their Charity but Hereticks and Damnation But certainly they very weakly and absurdly argue from it That therefore it is safest for us to go over to them Just as if I being in a tyte well-built and sound Ship should leave it and go over into an unsound and leaky Vessel upon this presumption That possibly I may with hazard and danger come safe to Land in the same But certainly we may better argue with them and say Amend the apparent Leaks and Faults in your Vessel and if there be any Faults in ours we are willing to amend them also that we may both with safety and in Christian Love and Unity accompany one another in our Course for the Celestial Port which we both porfess to intend and aim at And to this purpose let me present you with what the Worthy Dr. Brown in his Religio Medici speaks to this purpose I have not saith he so shaken hands with those desperate Resolutions meaning the Romanists who had rather venture at large their decayed bottom than bring her in to be new Trim'd in the Dock who had rather promiscuously retain all than abridge any and obstinately be what they are than what they have been as to stand in Diameter and Swords point with them And then speaking of the Reformation he saith As there were many Reformers so likewise many Reformations some angrily and with Extremity others calmly and with Mediocrity not rending but easily dividing the Community and leaving an honest possibility of a Reconciliation which though peaceable Spirits do desire and may conceive that Revolution of Time and the Mercies of God may effect yet that Judgment that shall consider the present Antipathies between the two Extreams their Contrarieties in Condition Affection and Opinion may with the same hopes expect an Union in the Poles of Heaven It is saith he as uncharitable a point in us to fall upon those popular Scurrilities and Opprobrious Scoffs of the Bishop of Rome whom as to a Temporal Prince we owe the duty of good Language I confess there is cause of Passion between us by his Sentence I stand Excommunicated Heretick is the best Language he affords me yet can no Ear witness I ever returned to him the name of Antichrist Man of Sin or Whore of Babylon It is the Method of Charity to suffer without Re-action Those usual Satyrs and Invectives of the Pulpit may perchance produce a good Effect on the Vulgar whose Ears are opener to Rhetorick than Logick yet do they in no wise confirm the Faith of wiser Believers who know that a good Cause needs not be patron'd by Passion but can sustain it self upon a temperate Dispute The true Sons of the Church of England consider this and that Passion and unnatual Heats and Transports never do advantage a Good Cause and that Uncharitableness and much more Cruelty is unworthy and unbecoming Christians and therefore avoid them But Alas their Adversaries the Romanists as if they were faultless and had not given just Occasion of Offence Retort in requital nothing but Damnation and most bitter Reproaches yea brutish Revenge and Cruelty which disingenious Dealing how much it hath been to their Reproach and Dishonor to the disadvantage of their Cause in the Christian World I shall leave them seriously to consider For honest and ingenious Souls are not to be imposed upon by Club-Law to receive for Articles of Faith such Doctrines and Opinions which have no Foundation from the Scriptures and the Antient and Primitive Church Alas The great Disorder and Confusion that is upon the face of the Christian World at this day is not to be so much wondered at if we consider the Corruption the Wickedness which abounds in the Hearts of most Men in the World which corrupts all things Why therefore should it not in process of time as it did among the very Jews themselves corrupt and deprave the Holy and Pure Religion of Jesus Christ especially in time of Prosperity that like Sun-shine Weather corrupts most things subject to Corruption even the very Humors of our Bodies and breed Abuses in the Christian Church Plenty and Prosperity strangely prevailing upon Men's Minds yea sometimes the best of Men to corrupt them with Pride Idleness Covetousness And by this means the Holy Christian Religion came to be debased to be corrupted both in
worthy Author goes on to the Fancies of such as because we ought at all times to lead a Life worthy of our Profession think it therefore superstitious to have one time wherein to exact or expect it more than other but do thus rather conceive that the corruption of Times and wickedness of Man's Nature is so exorbitant that it is a hard matter to hold the ordinary sort of Men at all times within the Lists of Piety Justice and Sobriety It is fit therefore there should be one time at least in the year and that of a reasonable continuance according to the practice of all Men for the Jews and Turks have their Lents to constrain Men how wicked and wretchless soever for that time at least to recal themselves to some more severe Cogitations and Courses lest Sin having no such Bridle to check it at any time should at length become head-strong and unconquerable in them as also to inure Men though but to a bare shew of Vertue they might afterwards perhaps more seriously persist in it Thus we have the Relation of the manner of Observation of Lent in foreign parts among the Romanists with his Judicious Comment thereupon Now certainly we have as great Reason to be obliged to the strict Observation of this time as others upon the Reasons aforesaid For it is too evident Vice and Wickedness grows upon us and abounds and had need have Restraints put upon it lest it swallow us up and therefore instead of making a mock at the Religious Observation of this Solemn Time among the Romanists let us learn Vertue and Goodness from our Adversaries and laying aside our Vanity and Wickedness let us become grave and serious sober penitent and reformed For shall it be said when the whole Christian World are all solemnly sober serious considerative are humbling their Souls before God with Fastings and Mortifications and are upon their Knees before God and frequent and fervent in their Devotions That we in England that own our selves to be Reformed and better Christians are taken up with our Jollities and Feastings yea our Debauches and Excesses and have not so much sense of our Sins and Transgressions of the Divine Laws and our great Provocations of the Divine Majesty as to be so far displeased with our selves for the same as to deny our selves now and then a meals Meat or at least somewhat of our Excesses or from our more pleasant food in the sense of our great unworthiness by reason of our horrid Ingratitude in our many heinous Sins and Offences against the Supreme Majesty of Heaven and thereby taking an actual Revenge upon our selves for the same or so far however at least as the same Abstinence may promote and further in us a solemn serious Consideration of our Ways and Doings the state of our Souls and may enflame and add force to our Devotions to God both in behalf of our selves and others yea the whole Church of God Let us consider also of this outward Appearance and Face of Religion and to be serious although it be but for a time what effect it may have upon us Who knows not but it may somewhat make Impression on mens Minds as to fall in love and likeing of sincere and true Piety and it may in time prevail upon them to become honest and upright and not only lay aside their Wickedness for a season but wholly abandon their Lusts For this restraint for a time must mightily convince them That they have a power over themselves to restrain their disordered and vitious Appetites for a time and then why not longer if they please It will also inure and accustom them to the duties of Religion and denial of their sensual Appetites but however they are more worthy of Commendation and are doubtless less wicked who thus far subject themselves to Authority than such who will not be perswaded to lay aside their sins for a time and who will observe no time of Humiliation of their Souls and extraordinary Devotions and of Seriousness and Consideration Especially if we consider how far a formal and hypocritical Humiliation of a wicked Ahab had acceptance with God as the deliverance of him from a temporal Judgment and that it should be suspended during his days Let us consider further How highly Advantageous the Religious Observation of the time of Lent may prove to such Christians who are desirous and will but endeavour sincerely to set about the Religious Duties of this Holy Fast of Consideration and serious Reflection upon themselves of Reading Meditation Fasting and Prayer Repentance by putting them upon this great Work which if it were not imposed upon them they would perhaps very carelesly and slightly pass over or possibly never find a time to apply themselves to these Duties at all and if it should be but only to lay aside our Sins for a season as I touch'd before they being then estranged and as it weree mancipated from their Lusts and Habits of Sin for a time and so far in a greater Capacity to discern and apprehend Divine Truths and the Excellency of Christianity of Vertue and true Goodness and to taste of that present Felicity which is in the very practice of it which if Men had but once a Relish of they would doubtless never return to live upon Husks with Swine any more which else by the continual steam of their Lusts and Vices while they wallow in them would be so blinded and infatuated in their Understandings not able to know their right hand from the left not to distinguish between Light and Darkness Good and Evil which together with the Advantage to themselves of their extraordinary Devotions for God's Grace to Assist them in their honest endeavours and then consulting at that time also a good Spiritual Director of their Souls for his ghostly Councel and Advice especially how to avoid the occasions of Sin for the future and to be armed against such Assaults as they may meet with in their Christian Course and how to frame their holy Resolutions of Amendment of their Lives so that they may be successful to them for the future that they may vow and perform their Vows to God All which afore-mentioned Duties are doubtless the Christian Duties as at other times so especially what this time puts us upon And as to such Persons as are truly vertuous and good how pleasant and acceptable must needs such a time be to them a season of extraordinary Exercise of Piety Charity and Devotion having this more Solemn time of Consideration and Examination of their Hearts and Ways their Slips and Deviations from their Holy Profession and making their Accounts even with God and en-enjoying his Favor for as we speak in our Temporal Concerns That often and even reckoning makes long Friends so without question this is the best way to keep friendship with Heaven and humbling their Souls before God in a sense of their own Sins and Transgressions And then bewailing the
Foundation all Natural Moral Justice and Honesty and in place thereof to set up a New Body of Carneades his Philosophy instead of the old Heathen dry Principles of Integrity and Uprightness that one Law of Interest and Passion and Self-Preservation So that as Machiavel thought Religion would emasculate and enfeeble Common-wealths We have more reason to complain saith he That it hath debauched and corrupted Lives That Christian Men are the impurest Part of the World That Sathan's after-game hath proved more lucky and prosperous to him than his first Designment did That his Night-walks hath brought him more Proselytes than his unlimited Range of going up and down to and fro over the Face of the Earth That as Sin by the Law so Sathan by the Faith of Christ hath taken occasion and so deceived and ruined us more desperately more universally than by all the National Idolatrous Customs of Heathenism he hath been able to do And let us seriously consider That all this complicated Mass of Wickedness not to be parallel'd under the Sun was committed and done in the Face of the World by those who stiled themselves and would needs be accounted the only Protestants of the Kingdom Things being brought to this Conclusion and upshot What an easie Perswasion might prevail with sober and considering Honest-hearted Men in Exile forthwith to abandon and renounce this Protestant Religion as a Religion to be abhorred by all Men as being as opposite to the true Christian Religion and what likewise in truth was professed by the Church of England as Darkness was to Light And a great part if not all this Mischief arose and was carried on as I humbly conceive with submission to better Judgments from a furious and mad Antipathy and Averseness against Popery and Papists which made them to imagine they never could run far enough from Rome until they came to Munster Where I will leave them with their Fellow Protestants if all such who are opposite to Rome must be Protestants as of late many in England would have made them and that by a Law also But Alas these abominable and horrid Impieties what honest and pious Heart can seriously consider of and not dissolve into Tears and humbly and affectionately beg of God not to lay these Sins to England's Charge but to wipe out the Guilt thereof from the Nation More especially considering what a loud Cry innocent Blood yea the Blood of The Lord 's Anointed hath to Heaven for Vengeance especially upon Fanaticks and such as retain the fore-said wicked Tenents and Principles which were productive of all the said Villainies Let them further seriously consider Mr. Baxter's own Words in his last Answer to Bagshaw pag. 30. cited by a Worthy Author Nothing saith Mr. Baxter that I know of in the World doth so strongly tempt some sober Consciencious Men to think Popery necessary for the Concord of Churches and a violent Church-Government necessary to our Peace as the woful Experience of the Errors and Schism the mad and manifold Sects that arise among those that are most against them To which purpose the Worthy Dr. Parker speaking of the Phanaticks endangering Religion several ways saith thus I know no other grounds of Fear or Danger from them unless this may prove one at last That by their wanton and unreasonable Peevishness to the Ingenious and Moderate Discipline of the Church of England they give their Governours too much Reason to suspect That they are never to be kept in order by a milder and more gentle Government than that of the Church of Rome and force them at last to scourge them into better manners with the Bryars and Thorns of their Discipline Let us further consider seriously the abounding of Debauchery and Wickedness among us at this Day which can portend nothing but Mischief to us the horrid Oaths Blasphemies and Curses that continually fly about our Ears almost in all Companies and in every Place more or less yea as we pass along the Streets enough to amaze us What abounding in Swinish Drunkenness and Excess How have our Times curiously studied to find out variety of Liquors to make an Acceptable Sacrifice thereof to Bacchus What Fulness of Bread and Idleness what Intemperance Gaming Uncleanness and Lasciviousness and the Consequents of these Quarrelling and Duelling having as it were lost the Sense of Good and Evil our very Natural Modesty and Shame we are become impudent and exquisite in Sin And which is most sad to consider these are those Rotten Bones as one hath well observed which would lie hid under the Painted Sepulchre of Honor These some would make the Accomplishments of a Gentleman The Learned Doctor Hammond observes That many irrational Sins through some Local custom have gotten the Reputation not only of sinless and lawful but of laudable also as Duelling and in favour of Sins of Uncleanness whereby it is become a more creditable thing among us To have been guilty of defiling and invading another Man's Bed than to be the Innocent Person which hath been thus robb'd by the Adulterer Now Let us consider seriously of these things as a Divine of our own hath well observed How that Atheism and Enthusiasm are apart and by themselves the most desperate and dangerous Causes of Misery and Calamity and Ruin to Mankind And that when ever they should combine Interests and joyn Forces what Government can withstand their Fury in that there is no Wickedness that is necessary to the carrying on the Cause that they will not undertake Do we not therefore stand in great need of Sober and Serious Consideration and of humbling our Souls before God in Dust and Ashes for all these before-mentioned Abominations and making our Peace with an offended Majesty and by frequent and fervent Devotions imploring his Mercies and in the Language of our Church upon Ash-Wednesday say Almighty and EverlastingGod who hatest nothing that Thou hast made and dost forgive the Sins of all them that are Penitent Create and make in us new and contrite Hearts that we worthily lamenting our Sins and acknowledging our Wretchedness may obtain of Thee the God of all Mercy perfect Remission and Forgiveness through Jesus Christ our Lord And further to enlarge our Devotions to God That He would please to bless and prosper our Gracious Sovereign Lord the King's Majesty and his Gracious Consort and all the Royal Family That He would furnish his Majesty's Royal Heart with Wisdom to go in and out before this great People committed to his Charge by the Supreme Lord of all the Kings of the Earth That God would support and strengthen him under that great Weight of Government that now lies upon his Shoulders in the Governing of a Licencious People very much tainted with with Schismatical Seditious and Wicked Principles which can be no pleasing Task for any Prince to undergo ThatGod would be pleased to direct and guide his Counsels and cloath his Enemies with Shame and Confusion and That upon his Head
corrigi parati cum invenerint nequaquam sunt inter Hereticos deputandi They that do not pertinaciously and stubbornly defend their erroneous and corrupt Opinions but with great Care and Ingenuity seek the Truth are ready to submit unto it when they find it these are not to be reputed in the number of Hereticks so true is that saying that no truly good Man can be an Heretick although he may be in an Error And to back what I have said and to convince you of the Danger of Heresie and Schism let me present before you in brief what the Worthy and Learned Dr. Hammond speaks in his Treatise of Schism There is saith he no one Vice which hath fallen under so much of the Displeasure and Correption and and severest Discipline of the Holy Fathers of the Ancient Church as this of Schism and the Ingredients and Preparatives to it have done They judged That it was contrary to the Faith even when it had not in respect of Doctrinal Points any Heresie joyned with it That it was contrary to Charity yea contrary to all the Advantages that belong to a Member of the Church Quisquis ab Ecclesia segregatus Adulteriae jungitur a promissis Ecclesiae separatur St. Cyprian Whosoever is separated from the Church is joyned to an Harlot he is separated from the Promises God hath given to his Church from the Benefits of Prayer and the Sacraments That it was as bad as Heresie according to St. Chrysostom That there was never any Heresie in the Church which was not founded in it That constantly it is forced in its own Defence to conclude in some Heresie or other All which being put together will be sufficient as the said Author speaks to keep Men from being in love with the Guilt or Company of Schismaticks But saith he It is further branded with these Super-additions of Terror That there is scarce any Crime so great as Schism Non esse quicquam gravius Sacrilegio Schismatis St. Austin Ingens flagitium Schismatis Traditioni junxerunt Optat. No Crime so great not Idolatry not Sacrilege That it hath been under the peculiar Mark of God's Indignation as in Case of the Ten Tribes and of the Samaritans who are ranked with the Gentiles Matth. 10. 5. and so in the Story of Core That it is the Anti-Christianism mentioned by St. John Ab Ecclesia qui separatur Haereticus est Antichristus Prosper He that is a Separatist from the Church is an Heretick and Antichrist The worshipping and serving of the Devil Ignatius And in a word so great a Crime that it is not expiable by Martyrdom to him that continues in it and hath not repented and returned from it Much more of this Subject is every where to be met with in the Antient Monuments and nothing of Alleviation to be had for any who have not the Excuse of involuntary Seduction of Error or Simplicity to plead for them And the surest way to do that effectually to qualify them for that Plea is To forsake their Course to get out of that so dangerous a Snare Nay it is further observable how unsafe it hath been deemed by these for light and inconsiderable Causes to break this Unity it being very hard if not impossible to receive such an Injury or Provocation from the Governours of the Church as may make a Rupture or Separation excusable And for the truly Catholick and Universal Church of Christ it is not in St. Augustin's Opinion possible that there should be any just Cause for any to separate from it nor consequently Apology to be made for those that on any whether true or false pretended Cause whatsoever have really incurred this Guilt From which Premises thus acknowledged and undeniable the Conclusion follows irrefragably That it is not the Examination of the Occasion or Cause or Motive of any Man's Schism that is worth the producing or heeding in this Matter The one thing that is of force and moment and by Consequence pertinent to be enquired into is The Truth of the matter of Fact whether this Charge be sufficiently proved or confessed i. e. Whether he that is thus accused stands really guilty of Separation from the Church of Christ. And he further describes this Sin of Schism It is saith he a voluntary dividing or a separating or receding of any Member from the Unity of the Body i. e. The Church of Christ and so that the Schismatick is he that divides himself from the Church of God not that is cut off or separated he that goes out and with-draws or recedes of his own Accord not he that is cast out by the Governours of the Church But the Offender or guilty Person who is therefore said to accuse to cast to condemn himself throwing himself by his voluntary Recession from the Church into that very Condition into which the Adulterer and obstinate Offender is cast by the Censure of the Church And the said Worthy Author concludes nevertheless with this Caution But how desirable and valuable soever an entire inviolable Peace with all Christians with all Men together with the Approbation of our willing cheerful Obedience and Submission of our Judgments and Practices to our Superiors must for ever be deemed by all true Disciples of Christ Yet must not the Purchace of this Treasure be attempted by the Admission of any Sin any more than the Glory of God might be projected by the Apostle's Lye Thus much I thought fit to Transcribe out of this Worthy Author To which I may further add Mr. Causabon's Excellent Rule taken out of St. Cyprian Epist 69. as it is set forth by a late Author of our own That whensoever the Pious People adhere to their lawful and true Bishop they are God's Church insomuch that whosoever separates himself from the Congregation it cannot be doubted but that he is not in the Church These things deserving the most serious Consideration of all Men but more especially of our Dissenters who have very much Guilt of this sort lying upon them it is very much to be feared As for their Pretences of Conscience St. Bernard will Answer them Non est Conscientia sine Scientia nec verae si caeca It is not Conscience without Knowledge nor can it be true if blind and ignorant For if Pretences of Conscience that is to say Men's stubborn and perverse Minds at the best their Weakness and and affected Ignorance must justify and bear them out against God's Law against Lawful Authority then it will be no matter what becomes of the Laws of God when their Consciences must command and bear Rule against them and those who killed the Apostles because their Consciences told them That therein they did God good Service shall be acquitted at God's Tribunal at last It therefore much concerns all our Fanaticks to beware and be assured That without Repentance their Damnation slumbereth not if possibly they escape God's Judgments even in this Life which it is much to