be so to judge for himself And this Foundation once laid upon which many of our most irrefragible Arguments against the Papists are built all pretensions of imposing upon men contrary to their own Judgments and Consciences will with apparent reason fall to the ground For if I stand obliged to God as a creature by him enabled and fitted so to do to make a Judgment within my self according to the measure of Light I have of all things I believe or practise in Religion then I can never come under an obligation to obey any Commands that compel me against my Light nor ever to follow the Judgments of others farther than I am convinced by it and it becomes my own Now to make this evident that every man under the Gospel is bound at last to judge for himself in all things relating to God and his own Soul let these things following be considered First Every Person in the World is under a Scripture-command To prove all things and hold fast that which is good Whatever comes from Ministers by way of instruction or from Magistrates by way of command 't is a duty to give a due respect to it and seriously to way it and at last by the best Light we have to make a judgment of it and settle the Conscience about it but no way are we bound to follow blindfold whether we like it or not To prove and examine shows a necessary use of Reason and an act of the Understanding in weighing and pondering and to hold fast in choosing and determining We are bid To obey God rather than Man That Command can never be put in practice but by judging what is of God and what is of Man and it must necessarily refer to a judgment of our own for all mens pretence is that what they enjoyn is of God Secondly Every man is bound to do whatever he does in Religion in Faith for that the rule is positive Whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin he that doubts is damned if be eat To do an action in Faith is to do it upon a judgment made within himself that what I do is that I ought to do and that I perform my duty therein And herein I must necessarily be my own judge no other mans Faith can so serve my turn as to excuse me from sin If any thing be commanded me contrary to my own judgment I can never obey it in Faith and so never obey it without Sin The ground of all Faith lies in the information and satisfaction of the Judgment without the concurrence of that no action in Religion can ever be done in Faith and so never be done as it ought to be done And therefore it is that the Apostle pronounced him happy that condemneth not himself in the thing that he alloweth A man through an Erroneous Judgment may do a thing in Faith and yet do it sinfully his Faith will not excuse him but yet he is bound to exercise Faith in every thing he does He that doth any thing without Faith sins in it he that doth an ill action in Faith hath an excuse for it thereby à tanto though not à toto so that in the one Faith lessens the sin of the action and in the other makes it compleatly good Thirdly Every man must needs be a Judge for himself because God will accept or not accept and deal with him here and hereafter according to what his own judgment was and his suitable conforming himself thereto For this we have a plain Scripture Every man shall give an account of himself to God Every mans Understanding is his Talent God expects he should imploy it and not hide it and accordingly deals with men Where much is given much is required and where little is given little is required Whence comes the satisfaction of Conscience in this World but that while we walk sincerely according to our Light we rest satisfied of an acceptance with God and we find accordingly God accepteth such and abhors an Hypocrite That God will hereafter judge men according to the knowledge they have and the Judgment they make within themselves the Scripture is every where clear He that knows his Masters will and doth it not he shall be beaten with many stripes God will judge men out of their own Mouthes and out of their own Breasts if then God deals with men here and judges them hereafter according to the Light they have 't is that sure that should be the Rule of our living To say I did what others bid me and never judged within my self what God required from me nay when I was convinced he required the contrary from me will be but a poor excuse when mens Consciences shall come upon the Stage to do the Office of excusing or accusing in that great day Our Divines say very right when they tell us Every mans Light is to be his Guide If it be false and erronious he lies under sin because 't is his duty to be better informed but till he is so 't is his duty to puruse that light he has as the lesser evil Fourthly To say a man is not to judge for himself is to unman him and change him from a rational Creature to a Bruit What has God lighted such a Candle in man as knowledge and understanding for but to judge and discern by and be a guide to him God that has given a man an ability to judge does he ever forbid nay does he not always enjoyn the use of it that way Besides 't is impossible that a man supposing him a rational Creature should consent any thing without passing first an act of his Judgment upon it He that yields up himself to the Infallibility of Rome passes a Judgment first that 't is best to do so and therefore when men are perswaded to joyn themselves in the Roman Church and trust wholly to that in believing whatever the Church believes they are first admitted to judge that 't is best to do so and are made first Judges for themselves before they resign up their Judgment to others to what end else were all Perswasion and Reasoning about such matters The Papists while they profess against this private judgment as a detestable thing that every man should be a Judge for himself they cannot deny but that every man is actually so and therfore Bellarmine flies to this sorty shift he says Before men are in the Church they must judge for themselves but when they are once in the Church they must resign themselves to her Infallibility The English of which is That before a man is a Romanist he may use his Reason but after must be led and driven like a Bruit And the truth is a Church constituted with an implicit Belief under an imposed Infallibility differs little from a dumb Herd of Cattel Either in such a case I make use of my Reason or I do not if I do not I cease to be a man under the denomination of
forcing men to perform Gospel-Duties in Hypocrisie Moral Actions are positively good and evil in their own nature Gospel-Duties performed are only so as they are circumstantiated And therefore the two Instances of Ahab and the Ninevites will no way fit this matter What was done by the Ninevites for ought appears was well done with all the circumstances that should make it to be so for our Saviour saith They repented at the Preaching of Jonah What Ahab did will be clearly differenced in two things First it was a voluntary action And Secondly it was only a Moral action 'T was voluntary for it arose from the dictates of his own Conscience upon what the Prophet Elijah said to him And Secondly it was purely a Moral act his Humiliation was no other He himself was an Hypocrite and his Service was hypocritical and abominable in the sight of God yet the outward act of his Humiliation was in it self good and God rewards it with an outward blessing That men may be compelled about actions Morally good and evil is out of doubt and that God does likewise with outward blessings and judgments reward and punish Moral good and evil is also plain But herein lies the difference of forceing men in things Moral and things Divine In things Moral the action in it self however circumstantiated is positively good or evil Things of Divine Institution are quite otherwise there the manner of the performance makes the action good or evil He that sacrificeth an Ox is as if he killed a man he that killeth a Lamb as if he cut off a Dogs neck Where the manner of performing the command is not observed as well as the bare outward act of performance And so in all Gospel Duties the Institutions of Christ as Baptism the Lords Supper and the rest the actions themselves in those things are not simply good nay they are accidentally evil unless they have all the due circumstances attending them the goodness of those things depends wholly upon Institution and there the manner as well as the matter must be punctually observed Nay the manner of doing such things determines the matter of them for if they be performed in their due manner the Action is good if not the Action it self is sinful Having thus far endeavoured to establish this Truth That the exercise of force by the hand of the civil Power is ho means appointed by Christ either for setling or regulating the Churches of the New-Testament and is a thing in its own nature altogether unreasonable so to be And that Princes and Magistrates under the Gospel should imploy their care to see the Laws of Christ's Kingdom put in execution in the way and manner he himself hath appointed and ought to rest themselves satisfied therewith as that which his infinite Wisdom hath provided and to leave things that are purely Gospel-offences to Gospel-punishments as most adaequate and proper knowing well that if after such punishments inflicted Errors and Heresies shall continue in the Church Christ will over-rule the Being of them for holy ends and purposes acccording to that of Paul There must be Heresies that those that are approved may be made manifest which though it be no good ground to indulge Heresie from any punishment Christ hath appointed for it yet 't is a very good ground to satisfie our selves upon after all Christs means used and to stop us from all violent and irregular proceedings when we consider That Christ will extract good out of such evil and turn such things to his own Glory and the good of such as are sincere I say having endeavoured the proof of these things that the plainest Truths of the Gospel ought not to be enforced upon men much less those more doubtful and obscure concerning Discipline and Order of the obscurity of which there needs no other evidence than that the holiest wisest and most impartial men have in all Ages differed about them How may we lament over the present Imposition of the Ceremonies now enjoyned amongst us in England which are no part of Divine Truth nor any of Christs Institutions but things perfectly Humane in their creation and yet are enforced by the civil Power upon the practice and Consciences of men If Christ did not appoint his own Laws to be inforced upon the Church but to be received and executed by the influence and operating power of the Holy Ghost concurring with them How little pleased will he be to have Laws and Rules made by others to be so inforced If it be neither reasonable nor warrantable for a Magistrate to inforce the Truths of the Gospel in his own sense of them How much less is it so to enjoyn things in the Worship of God wholly framed by men and of their devising Those as being Divine are in their own nature infallible and certainly true These as being Humane are lyable to all Error and Mistake How unmerciful a thing is it and how unlike the Primitive Christians to make such Ceremonies a Rule of the Churches Communion which used to be nothing but the Creed That a man now only out of Conscience to God and without a just imputation of either Faction or Folly or any other designed end may very well become a Non-Conformist to these present imposed Ceremonies hath been often evinced These things may afford us some prospect into those grounds upon which Liberty of Conscience ought to be asserted and also the due and natural bounds of it When men discoursing of this Subject are enumerating what parties may be tolerated and what not What Fundamentals are necessary to be believed to make a man a capable Subject of this Liberty and how far the punishment is to be inflicted upon men for matters of this Nature are to proceed and where to be terminated they do but lose themselves and come to be involved with inextricable inconveniences and do usually little more then discover their own particular inclinations and interests and at last often end in this Determination That none are fit to be Indulged but such as are punctually of their own belief and perswasion The general Laws of Nature and the general Laws of the Gospel are the best Umpire in this Case As the first renders it a thing unreasonable so the other makes it unlawful to tolerate any thing upon any pretence against the common Light and the common Interest and natural good of mankind And so on the other hand 't is equally as unreasonable and as unlawful to force men about things wholly Supernatural and purely Spiritual and so are all the matters of the Gospel which lie seated in mens Belief and Perswasion in reference to their own Eternal Condition and as they have no proper relation to Humane Concerns so they are in Aliena republica and are only cognizable there and only to be dealt with by such Spiritual means and punishments as Christ in the Gospel hath appointed for that end Hear the Opinion of the Learned Alsted on this subject at
Reflect Act in Adams knowledge that he fully viewed and beheld himself and knew in what a happy estate God had made him is also clear and that this exercise of his knowledge also in a way of Conscience he had to tell him he was accepted of God and did well in whatsoever he did but that equal reflection of mans Understanding both towards good and evil allowing the one and condemning the other was first introduced when he did eat of the Tree of knowledge of Good and Evil which was so called by anticipation because by the sin committed in eating of it Adam who knew nothing before neither in himself nor any other Creature but what was perfectly good came to the miserable knowledge of good and evil Evil before he could not know for till he had sinned there could be no such thing presented to his view but in that act of his sinning he saw the greatest Evil and the root of all other Evil what was Good also by his fall he came to know in another manner than before for before he knew it only simply considered in it self but now as it stood in a direct contrariety and opposition unto Evil. That perfect knowledge man had at the first so far retains since the fall its excellent nature as to be a distinguisher between Good and Evil and a constant witness for God in his soul and by secret reference to what he was at first tells him what he still ought to be And this is the thing we call Conscince which as it is the best thing left in man by far since the fall so 't is the noblest and worthiest thing the world hath left in it and which above all others ought to be cherished and valued as that whereby God is most acknowledged each man in his own brest most quieted and settled and mankind best enabled to live peaceably in society and converse together That it hath continued amongst men ever since the Fall is plain if we consider that even in the darkest times of divine Knowledge before any Law from God was written this knowledge men had of themselves in reference to God was a Law unto them Their natural light derived to them from their first creation dictating to them what they ought to do and what not and enabling them to pass a judgment upon themselves of their due behaviour towards God and this the Apostle in the Epistle to the Romans calls Conscience which will either excuse them or accuse them in the great Judgment day when the secrets of mens hearts shall be made known There be since mans fall two things eminently left in him A sence and knowledge of God though remote and that two ways first by Instinct in his very composition and constitution God making him at first in his own Image and secondly by the use of his reason in beholding the works of creation and providence which he does daily behold and converse with and which do eminently preach God unto him the other thing is a sence of pleasing or displeasing God by doing what his understanding tells him is good or ill and this is to each man a Law so Paul in that place of the Romans tells us That those that have not the Law written are a Law unto themselves and do by nature the things contained in the Law When afterwards men came to be under a law written and the knowledge of Gods mind concerning man was more clearly revealed every man came to have a larger view of his duty and clearer reflection upon himself in reference to it and so came to have a more enlightned Conscience suitable to the enlargedness of his understanding in his walking before God This then being premised that mans perfect knowledge which he had at first does still retain a taste of and a discerning principle between good and evil and does enable a man to judge of himself in reference to his pleasing or displeasing of God by the one and the other and that every man hath more or less in him of that we call Conscience unless in some particular cases whereby often endeavouring to resist and oppose Conscience God in just judgment takes away the use of it and that Conscience is wholly regulated by the understanding and the light thereof We will consider First That men do and always have differed in their understandings and apprehensions and so in their Consciences about divine things and their duty to God Secondly what the grounds and reasons are upon which men come to differ And Thirdly How far men are to be tolerated and indulged one by another in such variety and difference of knowledge and conscience For the first we shall find it too obviously plain so to have been in all times A man must have some ill will either to himself or his Reader that should spend much time in the proof of it If we look into those early times before any Law was written though all men had one common instinct of God in their nature and being and had the same outward Mediums of the knowledge of God which were the works of Creation and Providence for there is no place where their Voice sounded not yet doubtless the various Apprehensions of God and of mans duty to him were very great some improving those common Rudiments of Divinity to more reverent thoughts of a Deity and a more sober virtuous way of living by their natural light and others so far degenerating from them as that when they know God and might have known more of him they glorified him not as God but turned the glory of the true and incorruptible God into mock-Deities of Birds and Beasts and so came to be given up to all manner of Evil. Such who lived in those dayes and were by dreams visions voices and otherwise particularly enlightned had other kind of apprehensions of God and principles of Conscience suitable thereunto which yet could reach no further than themselves nor be obliging to others farther than they could justifie those divine discoveries in their own nature or by the credit of their own testimony gain belief and perswade men thereunto When aferwards the Law came to be written in Stone which was from the beginning written in the Heart and was in truth no other than a transcript of the Law of Nature and the Light thereof yet what great variety do we find in the Exposition of it and what various Principles derived from it he is a great stranger to all Rabbinical Learning who knows not the wide compass of the Jewish Debates and Controversies And since the times of the largest and fullest Revelation of the Mind and Will of God in the days of the Gospel do we not see that knowledge hath multiplied Division What great variety of thoughts have arisen amongst men not only concerning those more obscure Notions of the Order and Discipline of the Gospel Church but of most of the other Doctrines and Truths of Religion And so general
have the mis-apprehensions been that have possessed men in these things that sometimes we find in the Christian Church Truth shut up and thrust into a very narrow Corner and sometimes an Athanasius and some very few opposing the torrent of mistakes with which the generality of Christian understandings were possessed And still the variety of mens Apprehensions have produced the same variety in several sorts of Consciences and the effects of it If we seriously ponder the reasons of these things we shall find them to come under several heads in the viewing of which we may arrive at some satisfaction in the second thing proposed which is to know how such uneven disproportionate Thoughts Opinions and Consciences come to be amongst men The first and great account that may be given of it is this An innate infirmity in the Soul of man since his fall not to be able always to make a right judgment of things but to receive various impressions in the understanding faculty by reason of the infirmity and imperfection of it according to all the several accidents and circumstances relating to its information and the object 't is conversant about Adam in his naming the Creatures and what-else he did before the fall was not capable of a mistake but man since lies very open to all delusion and deceit being not able always to represent to himself in his understanding-faculty all those things that should be known to make up a perfect judgment nor if he could do so were he able by the intrinsick strength of that faculty perfectly and infallibly to judge of what should evidently appear before him nor lastly to remain fixed in any determination being not only subject to alter and change by seeing farther and having more presented to his view than what he at the first knew but also in his own nature now become mutable and apt to change in his best and truest resolves And from such a womb of infirmity 't is not hard to conceive what various and differing thoughts may be born Secondly The great variety there is of suitable means to operate upon such a weakness in the Soul and to prevail over the Infirmity of mens understanding to lead them in several Paths This we shall easily find if we consider the several postures and conditions mankind is settled in as to Education Company Studies and many such accidential matters by which the minds of men are variously seasoned and engaged in their apprehensions and so come to have differing foundations laid of Conscience according to impressions received thereby And where as in most it is very weak and ordinary motives prevail and no larger compass is taken to settle the judgment than those accidential means that first prevail with us yet as positive an obligation of Conscience ariseth from such things as from any whatsoever there can be no perswasion so impotent but may meet with some capacities over which it may easily have dominion and the bounds of such mens knowledge though never so mean must needs be a rule to the Conscience so that to imagine all mens Minds and Consciences should be the same is to imagine all men to be educated a like all Company to talk a like and all Books to be written a like and that all other things that work upon the minds of men should all concenter to inculcate the same thing Thirdly Besides all this there is an in-bred disposition in the Souls of men according to the Bodies they dwell in to apprehend and believe diversly of things without any other outward help to such a variety some men being naturally prone to believe some things and others to imbibe those of a contrary Nature and this is to be found without much difficulty in the several constitutions and composures of men where we shall find their thoughts and opinions holding great correspondence with and bearing much proportion to their natural inclinations and tempers and at several times several thoughts prevailing according as the concommitant Humours of nature are predominant in them so that let a man but phylosophically view over the divers humors in mens Bodies such as make men cholerick flegmatick or the like and the wonderful mixture of those humors in the various Temperament of them and he will not be much to seek for the various Thoughts Opinions and Consciences that are in the World and to force men out of these through any door than that of the understanding and means suited thereunto is to force them out of their very nature and existence that Soul in man that was at first Lord over the Body and could receive no sophistication from it takes now a great tincture from thence and savours much in all its operations of the vessel 't is kept in Lastly Let us seriously ponder the wonderful variety there is in that inward divine illumination afforded to men more or less as God pleaseth by which their judgments and consciences are in several measures settled and determined As nothing can give us a clearer account of that variety there is in the World in divine things so nothing can be more prevailing upon us to have compassion upon men severally informed and perswaded than when we consider God affordeth divine light severally to them as he pleaseth and gives it in what proportion little or much seems best to his Wisdom and by making men of several growths and statures in divine knowledge does seem to let us know he would have men of several sizes and attainments in that kind to live quietly together in the World These things being able in some measure to discover to us the grounds of these disagreeing Principles we find amongst men we will go on to the third and chief thing we have in pursuit by this discourse which is a serious Enquiry How far men are to be Tolerated one by another whose Judgments and Consciences about Divine things are found to differ Conscience in it self considered being nothing else but the Understanding under such a kind of Exercise as is before described is such a thing as can by no means come under any possibility of Force or Restraint beyond its own Bounds and is as much out of the reach of all humane Power as the Soul it self is and therefore is chosen of God to be the Witness which he gives to himself amongst the Sons of men of their due behaviour towards him and is a thing neither in the power of others nor in the man himself no man can point out what another shall believe nor can he chuse out his own Belief but still the Understanding gives in its testimony by the Conscience though in actings the Will may sometimes prevail against it This is that which chiefly differs a man as to his relativeness to God from other Creatures and is that whereby God keeps up his solemn claim of Soveraignity over us in our own breasts by such means as we can no way oppose nor avoid This Dominion of God was
by becoming Christian hath no addition of power to what he had before Magistracy is the same and as legitimated amongst Heathens as Christians A Magistrate when Christian exercises the power he had before otherwise but receives no addition of power to his Office Christ in the Gospel hath made no alteration in Magistratical Power nor hath he given any addition to it when exercised by Christian hands but a Magistrate when Christian is bound to exert his power in a way suitable to the light he then hath He that hath no other than the light of nature hath as much power about Religion as if he were Christian and is to take as much care of the Souls of his Subjects suitable to that Light as any Christian Magistrate is to do suitable to his The power a Parent hath over his Child a Master over his Servant a Prince over his Subjects is no more when they become Christian than it was before only that power must be otherwise exercised according to that improvement of light Christianity brings with it All natural and moral Power was the same from the beginning though God was not pleased to set that power distinctly in a Law written till long after the light of nature gave a plentiful information about these things The duty of all such relations in the performance mutually of them amongst men is greatly furthered by the Light of the Gospel but the duty is still the same several things do evidently evince this general Truth 1st All natural and moral Relations belong to men as men only so considered and not as Chrstians and are fully compleat and perfect amongst mankind both in the power of the one and the duty of the other without any reference to any Perswasion in Religion or other Qualification whatever 2dly It appears from hence because whatsoever the Gospel reveals to be the duty of such relations each to other we find practised by the light and law of nature from the beginning these things being of absolute necessity to uphold the frame and policy of mankind God had naturally endowed them with a sufficient discovery of his mind about them 3dly It appears to be so because Christians are obliged by the Laws of the Gospel to give the same obedience and perform the same duties in these Relations to Unbelievers that they are to Believers the Gospel speaks of these things without distinction Subjects are commanded to obey Heathen Magistrates in all things lawful and we are to obey Christian no farther Servants are commanded with the utmost duty of Servants to obey unbelieving Masters and so Wives to be subject to unbelieving Husbands all which declares these Relations perfectly inherent in mankind as such and no way relative to any other Qualification whatsoever These two preliminary considerations of the Magistrate 1st That he has his original in the light and law of Nature 2dly That his power and being is thereby perfect and compleat and that Christianity gives no addition of Power to such an Office will much further the right stating the chief and last thing proposed How far a Christian Magistrate under the Gospel is impowered negatively and positively in these things Before I proceed to which I shall come to the third thing intended which is To shew how some eminent Mistakes about the Magistrates Power in Religious things have involved us into very destructive and pernicious Extremities A Prospect of which may be had in these three things into which the various writings and discourses of that subject have chiefly issued themselves First Some do make the Magistrate the sole Judge of all Spiritual matters ascribe to him the power of setling what Government he pleases in the Church appointing Officers in it determining all differences in Religious things suppressing by his power all Errors and Heresies and superceding all matters that appertain to the Gospel A second sort with an equal warmth affirm the Magistrates Power in Religious things but say 'T is never to be exercised but in a perfect subservency to the Church and that whatsoever the Church determines he is bound to execute by the temporal Sword as the great Law of Christ A third sort as wide of the Truth as either of the other say positively The Magistrate hath nothing at all to do in Religious concerns that he is a meer civil Officer to take care of mens civil Interests and hath nothing to do with things of a spiritual nature That all these Principles have produced hurtful effects and that the truth lies distant from them all will be found in a distinct consideration of them The first does little less than revive in the Magistrate now much of that power Christ himself and the Apostles by his delegation exercised at first in setling the Gospel Church and unless it can be punctually made appear where in the Gospel Christ hath substituted the Magistrate to exercise such a dominion over his House it will soberly be found a dangerous Intrenchment upon his Kingly Office 't is one thing to take care of the execution of what Christ hath already setled and another to make Laws and Customs about those things This opinion as it is by many late Writers maintained dissolves all Ecclesiastical Regiment and annexeth the Government of the Church to the civil Power or indeed drowns the Church into the State or at least mixes them as much or more than they were mixed together under the Judaical policy What ever Government the Magistrate settles cannot be Ecclesiastical but Civil if it be Forreign to what is already divinely appointed if it be not then it s not the setling but the executing of what is already setled unless you will say that Christ entrusted him to settle the Ecclesiastical Government of his Church and that will seem not a little strange that the Magistrate who is no spiritual Officer set in the Church nor cannot himself administer in executing the least thing within it should have such a supream Power over it Either Christ and the Apostles did settle a Government in the Church or they did not if they did the Magistrate as well as others is obliged by it if they did not but that 't is left to the Magistrate he has a greater power at least in the exercise of it than ever they had For if we suppose they had power to settle a Government but did not think fit to exert that power but left it to the Magistrate his power in the execution of it is greater than theirs 'T is much that the infallible Wisdom of Christ and his Apostles could not better find out an order for the Gospel Church than to leave it to the mercy of every Magistrates discretion and 't is equally to be wondred at that an Officer of such necessary importance to the Church as to settle the Government of it should be wanting when the Gospel was first planted and every thing ordinary and extraordinary belonging to it was presented to accompany
the Glorious Presence of Christ upon Earth and which might any way contribute to rear up the Fabrick of the New-Testament Church 'T is much that such an Officer of so absolute concernment as this Opinion makes him should not be in the Christian World for three hundred years together If we will seek the meaning of this providential disposal of things may we not soberly think it to be that the Gospel was a thing wholly founded upon Spiritual Power was compleat therein and needed not any Temporal power to contribute to its perfection This impowering the Magistrate with a Superlative Authority in setling what relates to the Government of the Church supposeth this That the Scripture hath revealed no Truth that is binding in this matter but this That what the Magistrate pleaseth to settle in every place that is right and this I am sure the Scripture hath no where revealed and so we are like to have as many distinct Governments as there are States and distinct Kindgdoms in the World 't is strange those that are for exact Uniformity in any one Church should lay a foundation of such confused multiplicity in the Church Universal Either we must suppose Christ was not faithful to reveal all that concerned the Government of the Gospel-Church which God intrusted him with or else that it was the Will of God there should be no more revealed but that all should be transiently left to the Magistrate To say the first were but to urge Blasphemy for Reason if the second 't is to impower an Officer in such a necessary and weighty matter whose very being in the Church with an ability to do it had a futurity of three hundred years to come During all which time if Christ and the Apostles setled no Government in the Church and there being no Christian Magistrate that could settle any How could the Church then come lawfully to have any If it be said Where there is no Christian Magistrate every Church may use their own discretion then 't is plain the Government of the Church under the Gospel hath no other bottom than what every Magistrate and every particular Church pleaseth and so not only Magistrates but Churches and indeed all the World may be their own Carvers in this weighty matter 'T is very hard to be credited that the Government of the Church which does so greatly relate to the preservation of the Truth of Doctrine in it should be left to such floating uncertainties Besides this Position makes all that part of the Gospel which lies in Precept and President about the Rule of the Church and what was by the Apostles then practised and commanded to be of no use to us nor obligation upon us farther then the Magistrate pleaseth 't is to give him a dominion over that part of the Scriptures and opens a door to make him as some have fully done Lord over the whole New-Testament Two things are usually said to prop up this Power in the Magistrate First That there is nothing positively determined in the Gospel about these things because the Gospel being to take place throughout the whole world no one frame or Model of Government could be composed that would conveniently fit all Persons and Places where the Gospel might come to be received and setled and therefore the Wisdom of Christ hath left things of that nature wholly undetermined This is a thing taken for granted and wholly without any Divine Ground to warrant it and is in the reason of the thing it self insufficient for we find nothing in command or practice by the Apostles in setling the Christian Churches but what will agree with any Nation or People in the World He that will say That the Order of the Gospel as we there find it practised and required will not agree to any place may with as much reason if not more say That the receiving of the Gospel it self in the general belief of it will not agree to that place These things make it evident that the Order and Discipline we find setled in the Gospel-Churches in the Apostles time must needs fit every place and people and can do no hurt any where 1st It highly intends to heighten and compleat the duty incumbent on all Moral and Natural Relations that which Christ hath appointed to preserve order among Christians as Christians will never hinder but farther it amongst men as men 2dly The power upon which Christ's Rule setled in his Church is founded is wholly Spiritual it can never do any Violence to mankind nor clash with any humane power because that is the Boundery of it 3dly The thing designed and attained by the Order of the Gospel-Church is no more than to preserve men in a regular capacity to enjoy all Christs Institutions and therefore he that will say This Order will not sute any Nation must say in effect None of Christs Institutions will agree to that Nation 4thly There is nothing in Christs Government of his Church that is properly relative to the Political Government of a State or does any way determine the form of it but it may be equally exercised under any Government whatsoever The Religious policy of the Jews did highly relate to the State and was commixed with it and the same Government of that Church could not have been without a sutable conformity of the State to it and so could not well reach beyond that Nation and peculiar Country and People But the Gospel-Church and the Rule of it is grounded upon quite other terms and hath its first Principle in that saying of our Saviour Where ever two or three are met together in my Name there am I in the midst of them And there is no place nor people under the Sun but where with much advantage the order of the Gospel as well as the Gospel it self may be introduced A Second thing made to prop up this power in the Magistrate is Because of the wonderful difficulty we find in the New-Testament about matters of this nature This I acknowledge should put us upon much enquiry and great indulgence to each other but I cannot yield it a good reason to establish a visible Judge to settle a Civil Pope for at last upon the same grounds it will be found out that the Scripture in Doctrinals is obscure too and so the Magistrate must be likewise an Umpire in those things and finally in all Were once all these Carnal Interests and Political Concerns that are now twisted into the Government of the Church laid by it would be found a thing very feasible to deduce from Scripture Precept and Example limitted to no particular case in the reason of it a systeme of Ecclesiastical Rule sufficient for the obtaining all the holy and good ends designed by the Gospel and compleating men in a Spiritual Society as an Organical-Church and if a Church can be so constituted which is a thing in it self of no harship if men would be contented with the simplicity of
the Gospel and Christs wisdom in these things as that Church will be most pure as having nothing of humane make in it so it will perfectly annihilate all those pretended necessities for the interposition of humane Authority about such things If the Magistrate hath likewise a farther power to suppress all Errors and Heresies and to establish by force the Orthodox Truth the Rule of which must needs be what he thinks to be so this will inevitably follow that there can be never any such thing as Liberty of Conscience in any case or upon any terms in the world under a Christian Magistrate he sins if he suffer to tolerate any thing but what he thinks punctually right If he be the proper Judge entrusted first to judge and then to execute his Judgment with the Temporal Power all Liberty to whosoever is not of his mind is perfectly gone This is no other than to make the Magistrate's Power a meer Inquisition And by this means a Christian Magistrate will prove a marvellous hurt to much of the Church where he governs for unless you will suppose all the Truth and all sound Christians to be included in what he establishes for Orthodox if there be any Truth or true Professors of Christianity amongst all the other Opinions he persecutes they are sure to be sufferers and it will ever fall out that all those that are not of the Magistrates Opinion had better live under one of Gallio's temper than under a Magistrate so practising These large positions about the Magistrates Power have no visible ground for themselves in the Gospel and when 't is said the reason of it is because there was no Christian Magistrate till long after and so little mention is made of his Authority in these things there is nothing said that can be any way satisfactory because what Power soever any shall exercise in or over the Gospel Church to the end of the world must have its rise and derivation from what was then established by Christ and his Apostles However they are sure of a popular acceptance 1. Because they bring us to a visible Judge and a humane certainty which most men had rather be at than a laborious inquiry after divine Truth in the way God hath revealed it in the Scriptures And 2. Because they are positions that land us in a very safe harbour and free us from any danger of suffering about those things he that thinks it his duty to be alwayes of the Magistrates Religion is so secured in that duty that no Religion can possibly ever hurt him and whoever thinks the Magistrate is Gods substitute to determine all matters of Religion as he pleaseth must needs think it a duty to be of his mind The second Extream about the Magistrates Power is in asserting the Magistrate to have ample concerns about Religion and a power sufficient entrusted to him but the manner in which it is to be exercised is in a punctual suberviency to the Church that is they are to determine and he is to execute they are to be his eye and he is to be their hand As the first Extream debaseth the Church and all Ecclesiastical power under the Magistrates feet and makes him the sole Lord of all so this in another extream makes the Magistrate a Slave to the Church this is an unreasonable Imposition upon him and gives him less liberty than each private Christian ought to have to oblige him to put a civil Sanction and execute by his Authority whatever the Church decrees whether he judge it to be right or no this is only to make him a Sword-bearer to the Clergy This is the great Engine by which the Church of Rome has inslaved so much of the World Antichrist could never have been setled in his Throne if Kingdoms had not thus given up their power to him How shamefully upon this pretence that the Civil power must be subject to the Ecclesiastical have the Popes of Rome brought Kings and Emperors not only to employ their power as they pleased but to suffer all the scorns and indignities from them imaginable The story of what Hildebrand did to the Emperor Henry and many others do abundantly shew this The truth is the carnal Conjunction of the Temporal Power with the Spiritual is that which has made all Ecclesiastical Regiment odious and unsavoury in the nostrils of the world in all Ages and hath had no other effect but to enable the Clergy under a pretext of the power of the Gospel to trample by the power of the World mankind under their Feet That the Civil Magistrate ought not to employ his power in such a sub-ordination let these things be considered First This is to suppose either an insufficiency in that Spiritual Power which Christ did at first leave in his Church or else that he fails in that Promise of being with them to the end of the World and continuing his Presence to make his Laws effectual for the end they are intended Christ hath appointed the means of Converting men to the Gospel to be the preaching of it to them If you will compel men by the Civil power to become Converts it plainly intimates we judge Christs way insufficient and use the other as what we judge a better As Christ hath appointed Preaching the Gospel as the great means to bring men into the Church so he hath appointed Excommunication as the great means to cast offenders out of the Church and force is as unreasonable in the one as in the other The outward advantages a man has by becoming a Christian lies in the enjoyment of all Christs Institutions and the punishment of all Gospel-crimes lies in being cast out from those priviledges and undergoing the weight that Christ shall lay upon the Conscience thereby When a person is excommunicated to deliver him over to the Temporal power to be corporally punished must either be because we think Christs punishment in that case not enough or else because our own animosity prompts us to go farther Chrysost Serm. de Anathem hath a pious and prudent saying Dogmata impia quae ab Hereticis profecta sunt arguere Anathematizare opertet hominibus autem parcendum pro salute eorum orandum that is We must confute and pronounce Anathema to the wicked opinions of Hereticks but we must spare their Persons and pray for their Salvation Secondly This way alters the manner of Christs rule under the Gospel which is in the Spirits and Consciences of men 'T is much of Christs glory to rule his Subjects under the Gospel by a Spiritual power 't is that power makes a man a Christian 't is that power in all Gospel Institutions that keeps men in their due obedience unto Christ and 't is that power carries the sting of the punishment when men are cast out of the Church 't is indeed that power does all under the Gospel and to bring in the Temporal Sword is to make the weapons of the
Gospel not mighty through God but mighty through the Magistrates power and wholly to alter the nature of the Gospel and all its Institutions 't is to arm the Church with Weapons Christ never gave her and to make her a Military rather than a Spiritual Society Thirdly Suppose but this truth That all Churches even the purest are in the execution of Christs Laws fallible and lyable to mistake this Doctrine hath a marvellous tendency to bring the Magistrate under great transgression and each Christian under a possibility of such bondage as the Gospel no where imposes on him If a man be unjustly cast out of a Church and the Magistrate proceeds against him he executes an evil Sentence and does it blindfold being by this Doctrine an Officer no way competent nor in any capacity to make a judgment of the truth or error of it and so cannot possibly escape a greater sin A Christian unduly cast out of a Church hath this security against such a proceeding that Christ will never ratifie it upon his Conscience but by this manner of execution he is sure whether the Sentence be right or no to fall under as heavy an outward suffering as the Magistrates Sword can inflict upon him And by this means it will come to pass that men shall be more dangerously concerned in their Lives and Estates by being in the Church than by being Members of any Society whatsoever The third Extream in this matter lies amongst those who say That the Magistrate hath nothing at all to do about Religion This lies very wide from truth and cannot in such a general Position be made good if we consider First That every man in the World as he is a Creature and a Subject to the great God is bound in his station and in Gods way to promote his honour and endeavour that his Will may be done in the World it would be strange that the Magistrate who is his chief Officer should be no way concerned to see the Laws which God gives the World put in execution by the Persons and in the manner he hath appointed it 't is not to be imagined that he that hath the complicated relation of a Christian and a Magistrate to others should have no care relative to their Spiritual good 't were to say the Magistrate must not do that which every man else in the World is bound to do Secondly God never since the world began trusted any with the care of mens bodies but he entrusted them likewise with some care of their Souls If we look over all the Natural and Moral Relations in the world such as Parents Masters General of Armies we shall ever find it so Men are to be ruled over as Creatures that have immortal Souls to be chiefly cared for and they are to be ruled over as such who have a special relation to God and a homage to pay him above all the rest of the world a rule over men without some respect to this would denominate mankind into Brutes Thirdly To say the Magistrate hath nothing to do about Religion is to deny what hath been practised by the Light of Nature before the Law was practised under the Law suitable to that dispensation and both commanded and commended and is to be practised under the Gospel suitable to this dispensation and is foretold as a blessing so to be and in fact hath been so ever since there hath been a Magistrate Christian in the world Having thus considered these hurtful Extreams about the Magistrates Power the last thing to come under consideration will be the due bounds of a Magistrates Power under the Gospel that is How far a Magistrate being Christian may improvedly exercise his natural power for the advantage and benefit of the Gospel and wherein he stands bounded and obliged not to proceed The preserving a right state whereof through the torrent of these Extreams will be of singular moment to the matter in hand We have seen that the power of a Heathen and a Christian Magistrate differs nothing at all in kind A Heathen Magistrate hath the same right and is bound to do as much in Religion as a Christian only the one having more knowledge of God and his Mind is bound improvedly to exercise his power accordingly the first thing a Christian Magistrate stands bound to do for the good of Religion is to afford the Churches all negative good that is to remove all Oppression from them and all things that do any way hinder them to enjoy the Institutions of Christ he is to give them rest that they may be edified and walk in the comforts of the Holy Ghost and lead quiet and peaceable Lives in all godliness and honesty This as 't is a special blessing the Church does not often enjoy so 't is one chief part of that benefit it receives by Christian Rulers And this the Light of Nature will easily guide a Magistrate to do for any Religion of the truth of which he is perswaded In the Affirmative he is not only to see that the Gospel be preached and all under him fully instructed in the truths thereof to unite all Christians and as much as in him lies preserve peace in the Church to encourage those he finds most zealous constant and sincere in the profession of the Gospel and by his own example to lead forth his Subjects in all sound Orthodox Profession and Practice But to comprehend all in one he is to endeavour in a Gospel-way to see all the Laws of Christ put in execution and as much as in him lies see his Will done in the World he is so far from being bound to execute only what the Church will have him that he is to over-see their proceedings and to take care as Christs chief Officer in the World that all things in the Church be duly and according to Christs appointment administred The Apostles words are general and full Let every Soul be subject to the higher Powers Wheresoever the highest power is it must needs be so unless you will have a highest and a highest which will breed inevitable confusion the Civil power bidding a man do one thing and the Ecclesiastical another it hath ever in fact been so but under the Roman Church where the Emperors were made believe that 't was the highest piece of Religion voluntarily to yield up their Power to the Church and submit to her direction for the use of it which at first they confessed was inherent in the Emperors and not in the Church Before the Law not only the Power but the Exercise of the Priesthood it self naturally fell into the Magistrate 'T was so in Noah in Abraham and in Melchizedeck who was a King and a Priest 'T was so in Moses the Regal and Sacerdotal power were both in him till they were by God divided between him and Aaron ever since which time the exercises of Magistracy and Ministry have been and are to be distinct 'T was so likewise amongst
appear both from the different station and posture those Kings were in from all Magistrates now and also from the different condition of the Church then and now and many circumstances peculiarly relating to both First The worship and policy of the Jews being in it self typical and representive of what was to come hereafter their Government was likewise so and in their Kings very eminently that David and Soloman did very plainly in the type represent the Kingly Dominion of Christ none will deny and 't is as plain that the very Throne of David it self upon which the succeeding Kings of Judah sate was likewise so there being that Prophesie long before That the Scepter should not depart from Judah until Shiloh came and therefore the Power David and Solomon and the succeeding Kings of Judah for amongst the Kings of Israel after Solomon we find not one concerned for the true Worship of God who were of the lineage of David exercised had a peculiarity in it that is not applicable to any Magistrate now Secondly God was pleased in those times upon all eminent occasions of reformation in his Worship and proceedings of that nature to send Prophets to declare his positive mind and to put an end to all doubts that could be about such things nay some of the Kings themselves were Prophets immediately inspired and did not only take care of the Worship established by Moses but did themselves by divine Authority bring in things of a new Institution into the Worship of God this David did and Solomon in bringing Musick into the Temple and setling the courses of the Priests and were divinely inspired to write part of the holy Scriptures No Magistrates now can pretend to any such power in themselves nor have they any such extraordinary direction to guide them but are punctualy obliged to whatever Christ hath revealed in the Gospel and therefore in this respect the Analogy no way holds good Thirdly The state of the Jewish Church and Common-wealth was such as wholly differed them from all others since that was a Church and a State in the very constitution of them mixed together none could be brought into one but he was a member of the other nor could a man be cast out of the Church but he was thereby cast out of the State to be out-lawed and excommunicated was there amongst the Jews the same thing Grotius expresseth it well At that time saith he the Wisdom in Divine and Humane Law was not divided and he proves it by this As the Magistrate did intermeddle in Church Affairs so the Priest did intermeddle in Cvil things For saith he the Priest was a Judge and did not only give Judgment in Sacred but in Civil Affairs being the best Interpreter of the whole Law And saith the same Grotius further That the Priest had Magistracy This alone may be proved in Deut. 17.8 That he is to dye who obeys not the Command of the Priest 'T is most clear also That Eli was chief Priest in Israel and chief Judge in Shiloe 'T is not any way to be avoided but that the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power lay then interchangeably mixed and with as equal reason may we bring Magistracy into the Ministerial Power of the Gospel from what the Priests then exercised and their example as to bring such a power in Religion into the Magistrates under the Gospel from the parallel of what those Kings did then Besides the Magistratical power was so absolutely necessary to the Jewish Church-Policy so mixed that it could not be upheld without it the very Municipal Law of the Nation was their Religion He that was chief in the State must needs be Head of the Church They were a Holy People living in a Holy Land appointed to Worship in one Holy City and in one Holy place of that City and to offer upon one Altar in that Holy place The Church of the Gospel is totally of another nature perfectly distinct from the civil State can well subsist without a relation to it and is no way intermixed in its Concerns with it And therefore to say all Magistrates now must do as those did that governed such a mixed complicated Church and State in one carries no proportion at all of reason or equity in it more then if a man should argue from a Par ratio that what Moses did at first amongst the Jews who was King in Jeshuron that Kings may now do amongst Christians under the Gospel Lastly What was then done was by Gods command and was in a way suitable to the frame and state of the Church the Jews were imbodied in and lay chiefly in bringing men from Idolatry to the Worship of the true God for in differences between Sect and Sect amongst themselves there was nothing that we find done at any time they continued till our Saviours time and putting such a kind of Worship in execution as lay in outward carnal Services and was in every minute particular exactly set down and determined First The state of the gospel-Gospel-Church now is wholly differing from what that was and is setled upon clear other grounds and principles Secondly Here is no command in the Gospel for the Magistrate to do any thing of that nature Thirdly Let it be granted as truth that in parity of reason because Magistrates were appointed to take care of Religion then they are to do so still it must of necessity be granted also that they must do it by the means appointed by Christ under the Gospel as they did heretofore by those God appointed under the Law It is an Inference very infirm That because the Kings of Israel and Judah compelled men by Gods own appointment to acknowledge the true God and forsake Idolatry therefore Magistrates now may not only without but against Christs commands and the whole tenor of the New Testament compel men to the Spiritual Belief and Worship of the Gospel The truth is the civil Power of the Magistrate is no means of Christs appointing for the carrying on of the Gospel the Gospel in the very nature of it carries an Antipathy in it to all outward force Instead of all the temporal promises and corporal punishments under the Law Christ makes this Declaration He that believes shall be saved and he that believes not shall be damned That 's the Language of the Gospel Christ sets Hell and Wrath to come before men and by his Spirit working upon and convincing the Conscience works more admirable effects upon men that way than all the outward punishments in the World could ever bring about The Word of Christ is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged Sword and can divide between the Soul and the Spirit the Joynts and the Marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the Heart We have in the Hebrews a very perfect account of Gods dealing with men under the Law and now under the Gospel and the plain difference in the manner of the one and
certain evil that way But the Author proceeds and tells us In a little time it will remove the cause of the Error That is to say Forcing men if you do it long enough will convert them and the reason he gives is this Because Paul ranks his Heresies amongst the works of the Flesh and it is not seated so solely in the mind but that it hath often no sublimer motives then other sensual transgressions and as outward considerations are sometimes the cause so they may be the cure of it That ever any man did change an Opinion first or last by being forced since the World began is without instance and impossible in the nature of the thing to be One says well You may as well cure a man of the Cholick by brushing his Cout or fill a mans Belly with a Syllogisme These things do not communicate in matter and so neither in action or passion But Heresie is a work of the Flesh so is every mistake of the Soul Heresie is a work of the Soul rather in mis-believing than mis-doing 't is a thing in Opinion rather than Fact The Apostle in Galatians 5. where Heresie is reckoned amongst the works of the flesh does not put the distinction between works of the flesh as things outwardly acted opposite to what is inwardly believed but by the flesh he means the corrupt and carnal mind opposite to the Spirit of God for he says plainly in the Verse before The Flesh lusts against the Spirit and the Spirit against the Flesh By the Flesh there he means the corrupt state of man in Soul and Body so that Heresie may be a work of the flesh and yet purely seated in the mind Every corruption in the mind is a work of the flesh and yet as 't is there only is in some sence a thing spiritual and speculative But saith he Outward considerations are sometimes the cause of an Opinion and may be sometimes the cure of it If outward considerations suitable to a conviction of my understanding have wrought upon my understanding and made me really believe a thing there is then no proportion at all of reason to say That force because 't is an outward thing wholly incapable of working upon my understanding may make me as well disbelieve it And if those outward considerations he means have not really convinced me then 't is not my Opinion Either outward considerations are the ground of such Opinions or they are not if they be they will best discover themselves in their effects such causes are best so known and only so known and those effects will be obvious if they be evil to a due punishment if they be not the cause of them 't is first a superlative want of Charity to make our selves evil Judges of other mens hearts and then an eminent piece of injustice to punish men upon such a false supposition He that will take upon him to judge the grounds of any mans Principles which he knows not may make any Opinion have what Original he pleaseth 'T is a most absurd thing to believe any man for outward respects should suffer all reproach and persecution You may as well say all the Martyrs suffered only to set up a Pillar and get themselves a Name 't is obvious enough to any impartial eye those outward considerations are more probably to be mens temptations that go another way Fourthly No man under the Gospel ought to be compelâ—ed to believe or practice any thing and if not to believe then not to practice for the practice ought to correspond with and be but the counter-part of the belief 't is strangely unreasonable to require uniformity in the practice where there is variety and difference in the Judgment 't is to bid a man go directly against his Light 't is miserable to rend a man into two pieces his Conscience in one part and his outward man and practice in another part God arrests him and draws him in a way suitable to his rational Soul one way and men by means wholly contrary another Who think we has the greatest right and whether is it better to obey God or man in such a case Those that thus impose upon men do what in them lies to ruin them eternally I say 't is not reasonable to compel men to believe or practice for practice should suppose belief because God tells so very often He only accepts a willing Service in his Worship and abhors all other God detests the smell of a Sacrifice where the heart is not where the heart is far from him and 't is impossible it should be near him where a man is compelled directly against his own judgment How much does the beauty of the Gospel lie in this that Gods People are made by him a willing People and that God hath his Creature wholly in his Service Such are the Converts of the Gospel where every man is in his rational Soul so satisfied enlightned and convinced that he does all freely 'T is a severe thing to enjoyn me by penal Laws to worship God in a way I neither like nor he accepts which he does not though it be what he has appointed for the matter if I come not in the manner he has likewise appointed to it I shall neither please him nor advantage my own Soul This was the case of the Jews when God hated their solemn Assemblies and said Incense was an abomination to him 'T is usually false worship that needs force 't was Jeroboam that upon Politick grounds began to force a Religion and 't is said of him He made Israel to sin by compelling them to Dan and Bethel If men intend to make Converts to God they must not do more for him than he does for himself he never violates the liberty of the rational Soul but approves things to the understanding if they under this pretext intend to make Proselites to their own power 't is very sinful Fifthly The practice of Christ and the Apostles positively contradicts this course they could have commanded what power they had pleased if that had been the way of setling the Gospel in the world Christ would have no Fire come down from Heaven but that of the Holy Ghost nor no Sword used in the Church but that of the Spirit he bids them Teach all Nations Baptizing them c. that is his way of initiating men into the Church Not as the Spainards Convert the Indians who leave them no choice but to be Baptized or Murthered Men are first to be enlightned and then led into conformable practice Paul prays for men That the Eyes of their understandings might be enlightned And our Saviour when he preached called for an eye and an ear to hear and discern his Doctrine 'T is no matter for either where force is the Medium This deserves to be very well weighed that the Apostles never urged the Truths of the Gospel in their infallible Ministry of them upon farther or other terms than Perswasion
a rational Creature if I do I must necessarily be a Judge for my self for if I am guided by another judgment than my own as that I think best for me there is as clear an act of my judgment in so doing as if I were punctually directed by my own This we call knowledge in men God hath given to taste Principles and Notions as the Mouth tasteth Meats take away once the use of this taste and you take away the noblest accomplishment of a man You make a man created in honour if he do not understand like a Beast that perisheth as the Eye guideth the Body so the judgment of the Understanding guides the Soul force a man once from the use of this and you betray him into a dark Chaos of slavery and bruitish subjection and render him an object fit for the same scorn and contempt that Sampson found when he had lost his two Eyes By these things we may plainly discern that the necessity of every mans being a Judge for himself in divine things is grounded both upon Scripture and Reason and that 't is not only lawful but a positive duty God expects the performance of and obliges every man living to And this being so for any Power on Earth to compel men to believe or practise contrary to their Judgment and Conscience must needs be both unlawful and unreasonable Lastly The ill success Force and Imposition in Religion hath ever had and which it hath a necessary tendency to have may very well make us out of love with it there can possibly be no other effect of it but either to debauch men in their Consciences or bring violent Persecutions upon their Persons and Estates If the first those that impose bring a guilt upon themselves and partake of the sin as being the great occasion and causers of it So did Jeroboam when he made Israel to sin the guilt stuck to himself as well as to the People If the second men are sufferers from men for doing their duty to God and part with their Estates because they cannot with their Integrity and in this case the Punishment falls upon the Sufferers but the Guilt still upon the Imposer Either a Magistrate imposing in Religion is to be obey'd in whatsoever he commands or not if he be we shall then excuse those that obey'd Jeroboam and cast reproach upon all the Martyrs that have suffered for refusing the sinful commands of Superiors If they be not there must be then some judgment when they are to be obey'd and when not and that can be no other than every mans own Conscience And if every mans own Conscience and the light of it is to be his Rule by which he is to judge then whenever I refuse to obey a command in Religion because my Conscience tells me 't is sinful I am plainly punished for doing my Duty and following that Light God hath given to guide me Nay suppose my Conscience be erroneous 't is confessed by all 't is a sin not to follow it till better informed and if so I am sure 't is likewise a sin to force me out of it Conscientia quamvis errans semper ligat ita ut ille peccat qui agit contra Conscientiam quoniam agit contra voluntatem Dei quamvis non materialiter vere tamen formaliter interpretive Ames de cas Con. If we look upon this practice in the Roman Church where 't is in its Meridian what a Massacre of Souls hath it made What Darkness and miserable Ignorance is grown up in the Laity by it And amongst the Clergy what Pride Corruption and Tyranny Where it has been practised in the Reformed Churches it has introduced nothing but Divisions and Animosities and the sad effects of them those who have been freed from the Roman Imposition and enlightened in the Protestant Truths being less able to endure Imposition than any being by their departure from Rome furnished with Principles that do wholly overthrow any such Power by whomsoever exercised How little hurt would variety of Opinions about Religion do in the World if it were not for this What hurt could any mans Opinion do me if he used no other Weapons than Reasoning and Discourse 'T is the Imposing Opinions makes them pernicious and troublesom to the World and makes every Party strive to get the Magistrate on their side that they may suppress the rest and turn Religion into a worldly Interest Religion troubles no body as Christ left it but as men make it By this practice men of differing judgments in Religion can never live together in the World nor enjoy the great advantages they might afford one to another in civil concerns and in Religion too so far as they agree because their Consciences will not let them come up to the practice of an imposed Uniformity in all things How different from this were the thoughts of Paul he bids us joyn together so far as we agree and in other matters wherein we do not agree to wait till God shall reveal himself to us What an unreasonable thing is it to oblige Christians either to suffer or follow all the changes made by human Powers in Religion upon what worldly or political ends soever to have the Conscience floating about at the Magistrates pleasure as his property which is only God's peculiar Those that lived in the days of Henry the 8th Edward the 6th Q. Mary and Q. Elizabeth had occasion enough to experience this who must either have withstood a conformable practice with suffering or else surely have been sometimes out of the way But that which should put us perfectly out of all charity with the use of Force in Religion is when we consider the true Worship of the Gospel can never be established by it You may establish a false Worship or a formal outside Worship but never make such Worshippers as Christ speaks of when he saith The true Worshippers under the Gospel are such who Worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth You may establish a false Worship that is a Worship of mens appointing for if they be but outwardly obey'd in what they institute they look no farther Jeroboam's business was to keep the People from Jerusalem if they came but to Dan and Bethel he cared for no more he little minded the Religion he had set up for he made Priests of the meanest of the People his end was Political to bring men into subjection to himself You may also establish a formal Worship you may by force make men hypocritically conform to the out-side of true Worship you may force men to the Sacraments but without they be qualified with those Praerequisites God requires instead of performing an acceptable Service you force them to commit a great Sin That you cannot by force establish the right Gospel-Worship appears by these two things 1st 'T is a spiritual Worship and 2dly 'T is a voluntary Worship First 'T is a Spiritual Worship there is no one
by their Number outgrown the Political part of Persecution For the Second Consideration of Liberty the giving it so as will naturally produce several Principles and Opinions in men he that would prevent that must give no Liberty to the Protestant Religion must not let the Bible be read by the Vulgar There is no way to keep out several Opinions in Religion but an implicit ignorant Subjection to an imposed Infallibility and to do as the Turks do who will not have any Learning or Discourse amongst them of Religion for that very Reason because they will have no Religion but Mahomet nor no Learning but the Alcoran Such Policy to Murder mens Souls is hatcht in Hell The Art of Printing was at the first thought dangerous because it was looked on as a thing like to introduce several Opinions in Religion Cardinal Woolsey in a Letter of his to the Pope hath this Passage about it That his Holiness could not be ignorant what divers Effects the New Invention of Printing had produced for as it had brought in and restored Books and Learning so together it hath been the occasion of these Sects and Schisms which daily appear in the World but chiefly in Germany where men begin now to call in question the present Faith and Tenents of the Church and to examine how far Religion is departed from its Primitive Institution And that which particularly was most to be lamented they had exhorted the Lay and Ordinary men to read the Scriptures and to Pray in their Vulgar Tongue That if this were suffered besides all other dangers the common People at last might come to believe that there was not so much use of the Clergy for if men were perswaded once they could make their own way to God and that Prayers in their native and ordinary Language might pierce Heaven as well as in Latin How much would the Authority of the Mass fall How Prejudicial might this prove unto all our Ecclesiastical Orders Lord Herberts History of Hen. 8. Liberty of Conscience lies as naturally necessary to a Protestant State as Imposition to a Popish State he must be a good Artist that can find a right middle way between these two 'T is the Glory of Protestant-States to have much of the Knowledge of God amongst them and that variety of mens Opinions about some less weighty and more obscure matters of Religion as it much tends to a discovery of the Truth of them so it no way breaks the Bond of Protestant Union where men generally agree in the same Rule of Religion and in all the chief and necessary Fundamentals of Salvation Liberty of Conscience in such States as it is their true and genuine Interest and without which they will but deny themselves those advantages they might otherwise arrive at so with the forementioned Boundaries can never prove hurtful or dangerous there being always a just distinction to be made between those who desire only to serve God and such who pretend that to become injurious to men And thus we have seen that not only Religion but Reason not only Duty but Interest do invocate Princes and States in this particular To whom it may fitly be said in the words of the Psalmist Be wise now therefore O ye Kings and be instructed O ye Judges of the Earth FINIS De Christiana Libertate Or the Mischief of Impositions amongst the People called Quakers Made Manifest Shewing The Inconsistency betwixt the Church Discipline Order and Government erected by G. Fox and those of Party with him and that in the Primitive Times Being Historically treated on WITH A Word of Advice to the Pencilvanians And is the First Part of Naked Truth By FRANCIS BUGG GAL. 6.12 As many as desire to make a fair shew in the Flesh they constrain you to be Circumcised c. GAL. 5.1 Stand fast therefore in the Liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and be not again intangled in the Yoak of Bondage GAL. 5.2 Touch not taste not handle not c. London Printed for the Author 1682. An EPISTLE Dedicated to the Noble BEREANS Of this Age. HAving by the Book prefixed laid before the Magistrates and others concerned a clear Demonstration and many weighty Arguments for Liberty of Conscience to all Protestant Dissenters who desire to live a peaceable Life under the Government I am now come to treat on the Religious Differences amongst us the People called Quakers and therein to vindicate the Christian-Quakers who retain their Primitive Principles and defend their Plea for Liberty of Conscience from the Calumny and Reproach which the Innovators have put upon both it and the Pleaders thereof as if the Tendency thereof was to introduce Loosness Ranterism or the like sort of Abominations all which we detest and deny And in the Introduction to the Accus c. they have Sentenced William Rogers to be no Quaker by which they mean no Christian for if I may be in their account a true Christian and yet no Quaker then what damage is it to be no Quaker So that as the Baptists and others about the Year 72. by their Dialogues and otherwise rendred us no Christians because our Creed lay not litterally in their 8th Article of Faith So doth the Apostate and Innovator endeavour to Unchristian the true Christian-Quaker And the two principal Reasons that can be alledged against us are First our Nonsubmission and Nonconformity to the New Order of the Women Erected by G. Fox and Confirmed by a London Yearly-Meeting And Secondly That their way of compelling and Antichristian way of Proceeding to bring to and force a Uniformity is by us slighted and contemned and published in Justification of our Plea for the Liberty of the exercise of our Conscience in Matters Spiritual I say these two are the grand Reasons for which they render us no Quakers as I said consequently in their Esteem no Christians Whereupon we the Caluminated Abettors of the Cause of Truth can do no less than call to you the BEREANS of our Age not to believe every wandring Book that is put forth against us but read and examine the Matter and before you pass Judgment see what we can say for our selves in Defence of our Christian-Plea for Liberty of Conscience and for which Reason I choose to Dedicate the Ensuing Tract in the first Place to you expecting your Impartial Examination c. For as William Penn very well says in his Epistle to you the Noble and Examining BEREANS who usually hear both Sides in the Front of the Book Entituled the Christian-Quaker and his Divine Testimony Vindicated c. So we find it Experimentally viz. The Insatiable Thirst of men after Religious or Civil Empire hath filled almost every Age with Contest There is something in Man that prompts to Religion and such as stand not in the TRADITIONS of Men nor any meer Formality But Man that he may not loose the Honour of a Share with an unwarrantable Activity so Adulterates by
his People was our Principle the very Foundation Principle and Corner Stone in our Building there are yet many Living Witnesses and our Work and Labour in that day was to turn Peoples minds thereunto as to the more sure Word of Prophesy whereunto as many as took heed did well and that there was Sufficiency in it being obeyed to lead to Salvation And as our Minds came to be turned to this Inward Teacher And as we came to experience the Vertue and Excellency of this Holy Vnction so we held a publick Testimony thereof to others that they might thereby be provoked to make tryal thereof that so they might have the Witness in themselves and see for themselves and tast for themselves and to this Word nigh in the Heart were we committed and recommended suitable to the Doctrine and Antient Prophesies of Christ Jesus our Lord and his Blessed Apostles and Prophets and in that Day How did our Harmony sound in our Assemblies And how did our Love abound one towards another And our Zeal for the Holy Name of our God In this stood our Unity in this stood our Fellowship even in that Inward Testimony which God committed to us to bear for his Names sake here was the moving Cause of our Love to God one toward another even the Inward Testimony or Manifestation of his Spirit which God in his Infinite Love hath given us to profit withal persuant to his former Promises to our Fathers by his Prophets saying I will give Him for a Light to the Gentiles and to be my Salvation to the Ends of the Earth I will give him for a Commander and a Leader to my People Israel And as we came to believe this Report and to experience the fulfilling of these Promises and to be Witnesses of the Vertue of this his Blessed Appearance so we declare to others that they also might believe and have Fellowship with us therein and the more we came thus to be Spiritually-minded and Spiritually-exercised and the more we came to take delight therein and to meditate therein the more the Lord manifested his Love unto us and his pure Power amongst us and became a Hedge about us and a Wall unto us and gave us Favour in the Sight of the People Blessed and Praised be his Holy Name for ever And in that Day when others would boast of their Church Authority and Church Discipline Vseful Ceremonies Comely Orders and Decent Vestments c. We told them the Spirit of God was the Foundation of our Church as well as the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles That Christ Jesus the Second Adam the Lord from Heaven who is a Quickning Spirit was Head of our Church Lawgiver to our Church on whose Shoulders the Government and Authority of our Church is laid yea the Hedge and Pale of our Church and able to preserve our Church and in this Faith we lived and walked in pure undefiled Love If any said to us Lo here is Christ in this Ordinance or in that Observation We told them Nay Christ is within and there they must wait to know Him except they were Reprobates for the Kingdom of Heaven is within and there they must wait to receive the Earnest of it for it comes not by Outward Observations This we told People this we proved to the People out of the Holy Scriptures This upon all occasions we testified to all People Professor and Prophane Bond and Free Noble and Ignoble When they told us of their Articles of Faith and how many they had and of the Scripture being the Rule c. We told them That Faith was the Gift of God and to be waited for and that Faith was the Evidence of things not seen and that although in the World there were Faiths many and Lords many yet to us there was but one Faith and one Lord Jesus Christ who was the Author of that Faith And that although the Scriptures were good and a true Declaration of those Things which were most surely believed by the Apostles and by us ought to be believed yet not the only Rule But still the Spirit of God which was the First Principle the Foundation Principle the Palc and only Hedge of the Church and Sanctified People of God so likewise it was the Rule of Life Practice first and before any other Rule and always had the Preheminency in our Testimony from the Beginning And if any question the Truth of what I have here affirmed then for Proof thereof I refer them to the Testimonies of Isaac Pennington Edward Burrough George Bishop c. Published by T. Crisp together with the Writings of Francis Howgil Richard Hubberthorn and many other Antient Friends c. And in that Day if any Brethren gave forth a Letter of Advice and Counsel for the Help and Information of the weak and lately Convinced It was so worded as that Christian-Liberty was preserved and the People not Impos'd upon beyond their Freedom And that it was so I shall prove by an undeniable Instance in a Letter of Advice from the Brethren in the North about twenty Years since containing twenty particular Things wherein Advice and Counsel is given yet SO as to leave them to their Freedom and not to impose them further than Friends to whom they wrote could receive them or see a Service in them as is evident both from the Title or Direction of the said Paper and also from the Closure and Conclusion of the said Letter both which I shall here insert as also that Clause or particular Advice about Marriage which is the seventh particular thing wherein Counsel is given in the said Paper or Letter of Advice That is to say The Elders and Brethren sendeth unto the Brethren in the North these necessary Things following to which if you in the Light wait to be kept in Obedience you will do well Fare you well This is the Title or Direction of the said Letter of Advice now follows the 7th Particular which is about Marriage c. That as any are moved of the Lord and in his Light called to take a Brother or Sister in Marriage Marriage being honourable in all and the Bed Vndefiled let it be made known to the Children of Light especially to those of the Meeting of which the Parties are Members that all in the Light may it witness to be of God and being in the Light made manifest to be of God let them be joyned together in the Lord and in his Fear in the presence of many Witnesses according to the Example of the Holy Men of God in the Scriptures of Truth recorded which was written for our Example and Learning and that no Scandal may rest upon the Truth nor any thing be done in secret but all things to the Light brought that Truth may triumph over all Deceit and that they who are joyned together in the Lord may not by Man be put asunder whom the Lord hath joyned together That there may
him and that the Author of the Accuser c. in Answer to W. R's Book may not say to me as he in pag. 86. Viz. Howbeit W. R. produceth not any now Prescriptions Methods Rules Orders and Forms of Church-Government Now saith the said Author of the Accuser c. Now he should have produced some new Orders and Forms of Church-Government Introduced amongst in since that time meaning the Year 1673. to prove his Charge of Apostacy and Innovation against G. F. and those he calls his Party c. And Pag. 133. We affirm that his meaning W. R. crying out Impositions Form of Church-Government Orders Prescriptions c. in general is no Answer nor any Proof of his Charge of Apostate and Innovator against us let him either specifie saith this notable as well as confident Author of the Accuser c. the Particulars thereof that he condemns us for as Apostates and that we practice as Church Discipline or else for ever be ashamed c. And Pag. 3. And what New and Unchristian Doctrines and Practices are they meaning G. F. and his Party fallen into we find no Proof nor Discovery thereof in all his Books c. And Pag. 128. of the said confident Author of the Accusers c. We do profess seriously a notable serious George if we may believe him we see no real Cause or valid Reason our Opposer meaning W. R. shews for the great Noyse and Rumble he makes about Outward Laws Prescriptions Orders Edicts or Decrees Outward Form of Government Apostacy Innovation Impositions Lording over Faith over Conscience c. whil'st he shews us no unjust no unlawful nor uncomly Order or Proceedings amongst us as a People nor yet gives us any Instances or Catologue of those Impositions Innovations New Doctrines or Practices brought in and received amongst us which are inconsistent with our First Testimony to the Light and Grace of God within and Teachings thereof c. I say things considered as practised amongst us I marvel that the said Author which is said to be G. Whitehead should have the Confidence thus to call for a Proof to call for a Catologue of the New Orders that are Introduced amongst us when he at the time of his Writing could not be ignorant of the Things complained of by W. R. who 't is probable thought there was no need to produce such Proof such a Catalogue and such manifest Instances to prove the same and that none would have the Confidence or rather Impudence to deny such Things as are every Month put in Practice amongst us But as I said that be may not say so to me I will bring him both Proof and President and if he will call them a Catologue he may But first the Confirmation of the Foundation of the Womens-Meetings Namely George Fox his Order above recited by a General Council held at London Anno 1675. Concerning Propounding Marriages London the 27th of 3d. Mon. 1675. IT is our Judgment that for better Satisfaction to all Parties that there may be due time for Inquiry of clearness of the Persons concerned it is convenient that Marriages be at twise propounded to the Meetings that are to take care therein both to the Mens and Womens Meetings where both are Established before they are accomplished and when Things are cleared that the Marriage be accomplished in a Grave and publick Assembly of Friends and Relations Observations And now set the Authority and Confirmation of the Womans Meetings and how G. F. his pretended Motion is corroborated and strengthed I am necessitated to transcribe more of the Transaction of this notable if not Universal Council than I am willing lest G. Whitchead should again call for a Proof or Catologue of their new stamped Government c. Concerning Mens and Womens-Meetings IT is our Judgment and Testimony in the Word of Gods Wisdom that the Rise and Practice Setting up and Establishment of Mens and Womens-Meetings in the Church of Christ in this our Day and Generation is according to the Mind and Counsel of God and done in the ordering and leading of his Eternal Spirit and that it is the Duty of all Friends and Brethren in the Power of God in all Places to be diligent therein and to incourage and further each other in that blessed Work and particularly that Friends and Brethren in their respective Countries incourage their Faithful grave Women in the Settlement of the said Meetings and if any professing Truth shall either directly or indirectly discountence a notable Warning and little obeyed except by G. F. his Men of War or weaken the Hands of either Man or Woman in the VVork and Service of the Lord let such be admonished according to the Order of the Gospel and if they receive it not but resist Counsel and persist in the work of Division we cannot but look upon them as therein not in Unity with the Church of Christ and Order of the Gospel Therefore let Friends go on in the Power of God and in that Work for Him his Truth and People and not to be swayed or hindred by them or their Opposition Observations Behold the difference between this Decree and the Letter of Advice and Counsel in the First Chapter of this Treatise that hath a particular relation to the Scripture and the Practice of the Holy Men recorded therein but this is wholly a stranger to any such Authority yet that was not proposed otherwise than Advice and Counsel and not as a Form or Rule to walk by notwithstanding there was so much in it to justifie the pressing of it both as being bottom'd on Scripture Authority and the Practice of the holy Men of God recorded in Scripture but this no relation to Scripture Authority Precept or President no relation to the Example of the holy Men of God recorded in Scripture nor any Command of God or Jesus Christ who is Head of the true Church and Lawgiver too but notwithstanding the Authors of this Decretal Order are peremptory and positive none must refuse a Complyance none must discountenance the Observatition of it directly or indirectly for if they do they are not to be lookt upon in Unity with the Church that is not to be lookt on as Christians and Members of Christs Church and so at once made Heathens by this new fashoned Edict But to make good Provision against any that shall yet dare to slight this new Model or new found Method of Church-Government or call in question their Power or Authority See what a strict and severe Admonition is uttered forth even as if it had come from the Popes Council of Jesuits and crafty Fryars I Know that some will be mighty angry and sore displeased with me for transcribing so much of their hidden Mysteries but in my apprehension there is no reason for it for if Womens-Meetings be of such Excellency and their Government and Jurisdiction so vertuous amiable as that whoever comply and yield obedience to them are in
the state of Salvation and within the Pale of the Church and capable to be in Spiritual Union and Fellowship with the Brethren But on the contrary such as do not countenance them but either directly or indirectly weaken the hands of such Womens-Meetings they are to be looked upon as out of the Unity of the Church I say if it be so Why should not the Episcopalians Presbyterians Independants Baptists c. know of them how to erect them spedily I will not say the Papists for I perceive by Richard Richardsons Ingredients that they have something like it Viz. their Nunneries c. But if it be a meer Imagination of their own Brain and an Idol of their own erecting Why should it not publickly be brought to Light and made as manifest as the Lord Cromwel made the Papists great Idol Viz. the Rood of Grace which had goggling Eyes and would smile when a good Gift was offered to it when he caused it to be brought to Pauls-Cross where the People tore it all to pieces in King Henry the Eigth's Time which did not a little vex that infallible People So then take it which way you will and it doth not amount to a publishing in Gath and a telling in Askelon suitable to that made mention of by David c. But to return let us hear what shall be said to such as transgress this Ordinance this notable not Scriptural but Anti-Scriptural Edict VIZ. It is our Sence Advice Admonition and Judgment in the Fear of God and the authority of his Power and Spirit to Friends and Brethren in their several Meetings that no such slight and contemptible Names arid Expressions as calling Mens or Womens-Meetings Courts Sessions or Synods that they are Popish Impositions useless and Burthen-some that faithful Friends Papers which we testifie have been given forth by the Spirit and Power of God are Mens Edicts or Cannons or imbracing them bowing to Men. Elders in the Service of the Church Popes and Bishops with such scornful Sayings be permitted among them but let Gods Power be set upon the top of that unsavoury Spirit that uses them c. Observations This Admonition thus stamped with the Name and Authority of Gods Divine Power is enough to put any man to a stand and to admire their Confidence First To erect a new Model of Church-Government even such an one as no one Society from Noahs Flood to this Day ever practised and to bring all into a Subjection to this New Discipline use these high and lofty Expressions and yet this is not all but now they are resolved to secure their Interest and the way to do it is very notable First To make a Law that the Churches Testimony is to be recorded and the Condemnation of Transgressors except they come and acknowledge their Fault That Part of this Yearly Cannon I may subscribe and then leave it as having taken enough to shew the Author to the Accuser a Proof of their Innovations and manifest Apostacies and Degeneration from the Nature and Tendency of the Epistle mentioned to be wrote to Friends in the North in the First Chapter of this Treatise c. Concerning Recording the Churches Testimony and the Party's Condemnations c. THat the Churches Testimony and Judgment against disorderly and scandalous Walkers also the Repentance and Condemnation of the Parties restored be recorded in a distinct Book in the respective Monthly and Quarterly Meeting for the clearing Truths Friends and our holy Profession to be produced or published for that end and purpose so far only as in Gods Heavenly Wisdom they shall be needful and 't is our Advice in the Love of God that after any Friends Repentance and Restauration he abiding faithful in the Truth that condemns the Evil none among you so remember his Transgression as to cast it at him or upbraid him with it for that is not according to the Mercy of God c. Subscribed by William Penn. George Whitchead Steven Crisp Alex. Parker Tho. Salthouse John Burnyeat Observations Perhaps some may expect a great deal of sincerity under these fine Pretences and that the meaning hereof is to Record the Condemnations of such Persons as have lived a scandalous Life and broke the Commands of God disobeyed the Precepts of Christ laid down in the four Evangelists or refused Obedience to the Doctrine of the holy Apostles But alas if I may speak what I have known and what my Eye hath been a Witness of ever since these Cannonical Rules were made I must say the contrary for let any man search the Records of our Quarterly-Meeting Book in Hadenham in the Isle of Ely and they shall there find a Record of Condemnation against John Ansloe a Minister of the Gospel and every way so far as ever I heard or knew of a blameless Conversation wherein he is recorded out of the Unity not for any Breach of Christ his Commands or any matter of Evil Fact but for not taking his Wife according to the Order of Friends i. e. not publishing his Intention before the Womens-Meetings as hereafter will be further manifest but not one Recorded that ever I remember for any Breach of Gods Commandments or matter of evil Fact in all the said Quarterly-Book and if any man can convince me that there is a man called a Quaker in the Isle of Ely or else where that hath lived so uprightly as that in all his time of being under that Denomination he hath not in any wise violated some of Gods Commandments or Christs Precepts whereby he hath sinned against God and grieved his holy Spirit and stood in need of his Pardon Mercy and Forgiveness then I shall conclude and not while then that there is some sincerity in the Contrivers of these Cannons and the Recorders of these Condemnations for if there be any such Man or Men they may leave out that part of the Lords Prayer which he taught his Disclples who well knew what Form of Prayer suited best with the Condition and State of Man who by Nature is prone to Sin and liable to Temptations and no longer preserved from entring into the Temptation than there is a diligent Watch kept the Clause I mean is this Forgive us our Sins as we forgive them that trespass against us And truly that man that says He hath no need to make this one of his Petitions or after that manner when he put up his Prayers to God I am satisfied he too much resembles the proud Pharisee who said he was not as other Men c. A General Observarion upon the four foregoing Branches of the said General Councils Grant and Confirmation of G. F. his Erecting of Womens-Meetings as appears by his Order about the beginning of this Second Chapter and then I shall proceed to the next Chapter First It is decreed that Marriages from the day of the date of those Cannons shall be propounded that is the Intention thereof published yea no less than twice published
we see you are for a Rule as much as any People only you must have a Rule of your own Making of your own Framing a Child of your own Brain must be your own Darling As for our Parts we profess Christ to be our Lawgiver and though we be for an Outward Rule yet it is such a Rule as Christ hath left us but you lay aside the Scriptures of Christ and his Apostles and use not so much as one Verse thereof to corroborate and strengthen your late Laws and Cannons withal and so make to your selves a Graven Image and an Exact Rule neither to permit nor suffer any to Marry except they will Conform and Square their Actions to your Rule Whereby we perceive you manifest Innovators not only by W. R. his Description of you but by the undeniable Testimony of F. H. whose Judgment was That those that set up other Traditions than the Apostle Delivered in point of Worship and Marriage is a Point of Worship it being Gods Ordinance by Word or Writing that they are INNOVATORRS Wherefore hear what the Professors may further say as a Word of Vse and Application G. Fox says The Worlds Touchstone is without them Professors say That G. F. and his Adherents their Touchstone is without them no Conformity to the Womens Meeting no Unity with them do but Conform Vnity Vnity Vnity G. F. says The World is Ruled by Outward Rules c. Professors say That G. F. and his Party are Ruled by Outward Rules at least they would Rule others by Outward Rules see ad and 3d. Chapter G. F. says The Worlds Guide is without them in the Traditions and Precepts of Men which lead from God Professors say That G. F. and his Party have their Guide without them in the Traditions of Men that lead from the Anointing within to Observations without c. G. F. Asks the Professors what Scripture they have for sprinkling Children and for the word Sacrament and if no Scripture then Whether it be not the Commands of Men taught for Doctrine Professors Ask G. F. what Scripture he had for Erecting Womens Meeitngs distinct from the Men once a Month about the 10th hour of the Day to get a little Mony or Stock by them and there to sit until some are intended to Marry and then they are ready to hear them publish their Intentions And what Scripture he and his Adherents have to Record out of the Unity such as will not Conform to this Non-such way of Church-Government And if no Scripture then Whether it be not Mens Command taught for Doctrine Behold the Parellel Upon the whole Matter it may appear that our Testimony was against Imposition on Tender Consciences as R. H. with great Reason doth affirm and F. H. speak home to the purpose and very pertinent and G. F. too in his Gospel Liberty and Royal Law of Love c. But how he is gone from the same in practice is manifest both in what I have said and in what W. R. hath said in his Christian-Quaker disting c. To which I refer the Reader CHAP. V. Shews the Opinion of several of the Clergy both Bishops and Ministers to be against Impositions and the Imposers are the culpable Deviders and Authors of Schism HAving throughly proved and clearly manifected a Change in our Church-Government and shewed how our Cannons and Outward Rules have been Introduced I am now come to shew that the very moderate Bishops and others of the Clergy who are considerate in their way and not filled with Prejudice are against Impositions on Consciences which cannot Conform nor Submit before Conviction c. I will begin with Bishop Doveman who speaking on Col. 2.20 concerning Rites and Ceremonies this I took out of a Book in Answer to Dr. Stillingfleet Viz. If you be free from the Rites that God did prescribe then are you free from the Traditions of Men It is a most wicked thing they should Impose this Yoak upon you and you are most foolish to submit your Necks to it for God would not have abolished the Ceremonial Law Instituted by himself that a New one may be invented by Man Dr. Stillingfleet in his Iron p. 122. saith Certainly the Primitive Church that did not charge Mens Faith with such a Load of Articles as now in these latter Ages Men be charged with would much less burthen men With Imposing doubtful Practices upon them as the ground of Church-Communion Dr. Stillingfleets Iron 120. saith Let men turn and wind themselves which way they will by the very same Arguments that any will prove the Separation from the Church of Rome Lawful because She required unlawful Things as Conditions of her Communion it will be proved Lawful not to Conform to any suspected or unlawful Practice required by any Church Governour upon the same Terms If the thing so required be after serious and sober Inquiry Judged unwarrantable by a Man 's own Conscience and withal it would be further considered whether when our best Writers do lay the Imputation of Schism NOT on those that withdraw Communion but on them for requiring such Conditions of Communion c. whereby they do rather eject Men from their Communion than the others separate from them Arch-Bishop Land against Fisher as quoted by Dr. Stillingfleet in his Rational Account p. 324. 'T is too true says he indeed that there is a miserable Rent in the Church and I make no question but the best men do most bemoan it nor is he a Christian that would not have Vnity might he ahve it with Truth but I never said or thought that the Protestants made this Rent the Cause of Schisme is yours for you thrust us from you because we called for Truth and Redress of Abuses for a Schisme must need be theirs whose the Cause of it is c. The Bishop of Hereford in his Edition in Folio p. 10. earnestly Addresses himself to the Bishops thus My Reverend Fathers and Judges of the Church I with St. Paul Col. 3. BESEECH you put on Fatherly Bowels of Mercy Kindness Humbleness of Mind Meekness Long suffering towards your poor weak Children and so long as they hold fast the Body of Christ be not so rigorous with them for Shaddows if they submit to you in Substance have patience though they do not submit in Ceremonies and give me leave to tell you my poor Opinion This VIOLENT PRESSING OF CEREMONIES hath I humbly conceive been a great Hinderance from imbracing them Men fearing your Intentions to be far worse than really they are and therefore abhor them And p. 11. This Force urging Conformity in Worship hath caused great Division in Faith as well as in Charity for had you by abolishing some Ceremonies taken the weak Brethren c. Now I beseech you in the Fear of God set before your Eyes the dreadful Day of Judgment when Christ in his Tribunal of Justice shall require an account of every Word and Deed and shall thus question you
own Hand would neither Answer the Letter nor so much as Discourse me but when I had given them the Letter C. T. bad me be gone All which shews the Author to the Accuser his Pretentions to an Accommodation Condiscention to be fallacious Deceitful and Hypocritical Object BY this time some may be ready to object and say It is true these Things as Stated cannot be denyed but to have used a more private way might have been as convincing and not have ministred that occasion to such as are Enemies to all Religion as this way of Proceeding perhaps may especially since the Author of the Accuser says p. 127. We can the more easily concur and accord as to Circumstances and Outward Methods and in the Wisdom of God so condiscend one to another and accommodate Matters as not to divid about them Answ That I with many other have used private meanes for about the space of four years without any Redress nay not so much as a Christian Answer and that the Pretence of the Author of the Accuser to Condiscention and Accommodation is fallacious and false and a meer piece of feigned Hypocrisy to amuse his Reader and delude the World I shall make evidently appear before I pass this Chapter especially considering what meanes I used at our Quarterly-Meeting in the Case of J. A. made mention of in the third Chapter both by Letters and Queries First then see a Letter that eleven Friends belonging to our Meeting in Milden-Hall sent to our Quarterly Meeting who were so far from Condiscention Accommodation as that they refused to have it read amongst them but said We were all deluded A Copy whereof followeth To Friends at the Quarterly Meeting in Hadenham the 4th Mo. 80. Dear Friends THese Lines are to put you in Mind that many Friends belonging to our Meeting as well as in divers other Places are offended and burthened by reason of the continued Record against John Ansloe which exclude him what in you lye out of the Unity of Friends which is nothing less than Excommunication to the utmost of your Power whereby we are constrained to visit you in this manner entreating you to race out the said Record out of your Quarterly Book Indeed had J. A. denyed Marriage the very forbidding of which is a Doctrine of Devils you might justly have thrown him out for Marriage is Gods Ordinance But the Controversy is not here but about manifesting his Intention to Marry Behold the Crime as you account it and consider of it we beseech you for Peace sake and lay not such a Stress where Christ nor his Primitive Followers laid none And that thereunto you may be encouraged ponder the saying of W. P. in his Address to Prot. p. 77. I beseech you Protestants by the Mercies of God and Love of Jesus Christ ratified to you in his most precious Blood FLY ROME AT ROME Look to the Enemies of your own House have a care of this Presumption carry it not too high lay not Stress where God hath laid none The Impositions of such Opinions is the Priviledge of Hypocrites and the Snare of many honest Minds And p. 93. If we consider the Matter well I fear saith W. P. it will be found that the occasion of Disturbance in the Church of Christ hath in most Ages been found to lye on the Side of those who have had the greatest Sway in it And Pag. 94. If the Spiritual Guides and Fathers of the Church would be a little sparing of incumbring Churches with needless Supersluities there were far less danger of Schism and Superstition And Pag. 144. Nay Christ himself to whom all Power was given in Heaven and Earth submitted himself to the Test He did not require them to believe him because he would be believed he refers them to the Witness that God bore of him saying If I bear witness of my self my witness is not true He also sends them to the Scriptures but an Imposing Church bears witness of her self and will be both Party and Judge require Assent without Evidence and Faith without Proof therefore false But Christian Religion ought to be carryed on only by that way by which it was Introduced which was Perswasion If any Man will be my Disciple let him take up his Cross and follow me Pag. 146. For if I believe what the Church believes only beause She believes and not because I am convinced in my Vnderstanding of the Truth of what She believes my Faith is false though hers be true I say 't is not true to me I have no Evidence of it And Pag. 141. The Apostle became all unto all that he might win some but this is becoming all unto none to force all he therefore recomends the utmost Condiscention that can be lawful he stooped he became all unto all that is he stooped to all Capacities and humbled himself to those Degrees of Knowledge that Men had and valued that which was good in all These Allurements were all his Injunctions nay in this Case he makes it an Injunction to use no other Let us therefore saith he as many as be perfect be thus minded and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded God shall reveal even this unto you you shall not be Imposed upon Stigmatized or Excommunicated for want of full satisfaction or because you do not consent before Conviction Thus far William Penn. Now let us a little animadvert upon this Noble Mans Words Lay no Stress saith he where God hath not laid Stress as if he should have said Friends God never laid any such Stress about publishing the Intent of Marriage Why then do you Have a care of this Presumption carry not things too high neither Smite Record nor Excommunicate one another about such Things which are at best but Mens Traditions and Impositions which may prove a Snare to the Honest and Conscientious but a seeming Priviledge to the conformable Hypocrite for you see that such as have the greatest Sway in the Church are evermore the cause of these Disturbances who pretending themselves Fathers and Spiritual Guides are not sparing of cumbring the Churches with needless Superfluities and such Orders as Christ never commanded nor his Apostles ever practised which had they been so useful as you pretend they be surely Christ and his Apostles would not have been so forgetful of Prescribing such Outward Observations nay but on the contrary they have told us in Holy Writ The Kingdom of Heaven comes not that way neither consists in such things You also may perceive that Christ was such an Example of Meekness and Self-denyal and so far and free from Force and Imposition that he only said If any Man will be my Discipie let him take up his Cross and follow me but an Imposing Church bears witness of her self and though She sets up such Orders as Christ never commanded yet She requires assent without Evidence and Faith without Proof for She will be both Party and Judge
this Exommunication are more zealous for G. Fox his Laws and written Prescriptions which that Book of W. R. ath manifestly Detected than they are for the Scriptures for a Man may transgress the Scripture days without number but yet never be Excommunicated by G.F. nor his Party but J. B. never sold but one Book namely that of W. R. his Publishing that ever I heard of and lo you see he is Dismembred no Spiritual Fellowship no Spiritual Communion they can have with him until he returns to the Mother Church no by no meanes Stand off for I am more Holy than thou crys the Proud Pharisee for I am not as other men nay they do not only testifie against that BAD SPIRIT as they account it but HIM ALSO Viz the MAN ALSO Oh that we could but say Take him Goaler and that Effectually So that I do not find a Parallel betwixt the Proceedings of the Protestant Bishops with the Sons of their Church to wit the Booksellers to equalize the Proceedings of G. F. and his Party with W. R. for Writing and J. B. for Selling the Book called The Christian-Quaker c. For Edmund Hickeringal wrote the naked-Naked-Truth of Matters and Things transacted amongst the Clergy and the Booksellers Disperse and Sell them but for the same we hear of no Excommunication or such bitter Invectives as attend W. R. J. B. and as many as adhere receive or favour the said Book or Liberty the Authors thereof stand for and vindicates A Coppy of the said Bitter Invectives Censorious Antichristiand Dreadful Judgments uttered against W. R. for Writing J. B. for Selling my self and others for Buying Owning and Reading the said Book of W. R. Entituled The Christian-Quaker Distinguished c. and for refusing subjection to the Jurisdiction of the Women as I took them out of several Books approved on by the Second-days Meeting in London for which very piece of Service Stamp and Probatum est I think that very Meeting deserves to have a TRIPPLE-CROWN Pray hear the Invectives and then Judge VIZ. The Accusers of the Brethren driven out from the Presence of the Lord Vnsavoury Salt Heady Wilful Highminded Vnruly Passionate and Furious this miserable Man W. R. who through Vnwatchfulness Disobedience Rebellion against God which is as the Sin of Witchcraft The unclean Spirit Adversary of Mans Soul the old Accuser of the Brethren having now the Rule in him meaning W. R. and over him makes War through him against the Lamb and his Followers Rude Insolent His prophane speaking concerning the Power of God but from the Spirit of Antichrist the cruel outragious deadly hellish Spirit or Image of Iealousie a murmuring complaining dividing Spirit a rending tearing Spirit a dark jealous Spirit a loose gain-saying opposite Spirit a proud exalted Spirit a contemning scornful Spirit a self-conceited Spirit a turbulent willful froward Spirit This cursed Spirit of Satan is now entered into the Heart Soul of William Rogers and such of his Abetters as own the Printing and Publishing his wicked Book aforesaid And are become twice dead pluckt up by the Roots and through Perverseness Peevishness Cross-spiritedness enter'd into the way of Cain and Spirit of Korah and his Company of which Number and sort is William Rogers and his Adherents who have attempted such manifest Rebellion against Gods pure Power A cross Canker'd Spirit Fal'n Antichristian Instruments and which I say be Co-workers with the Prince of Darkness where the First-Born of Death Rules Reigns without any good Order of that Seed Spirit ye are joyned to and led by against the very Heart of God and his Light and Life which his People live with him in c. These with many such other Terms are to be found in several Books approved on by the Second-days-Meeting as at large appears in the Preface to the Reader where the Books and Pages out of which I took them are Quoted I say A Parallel whereof I know not where to find nay had I all their Books of Controversy by me I presume it were a thing too hard for me to undertake so that I must take a step into the Papists Road of Cruelty and Severity and then perhaps I may first then see the Prohibition sent by Cuthbert Tonstal Bishop of London to his Arch-Deacons c. in King Henry the Eighths Time as left upon Record by Fox in his Eighth Book continuing the History of the Martyrs c. Pag. 248. Cuthbert By the Permission c. By Duty of our Pastoral Care we are bound diligently with all our Power to Foresee Provide for Root out and put away all those things which seem to tend to the Peril and Danger of our Subjects and especially the Destructions of their Souls wherefore we having Vnderstanding by the Report of divers credible Persons and also by the Evident Appearance of the Matter that many Children of Iniquity Maintainers of Luthers Sect Blinded through extream Wickedness the Old and New Pretence wandring from the way of Truth and the Catholick Faith craftily have Translated the New Testament into our English Tongue and Erronious Opinions pernitious and Offensive seducing the Simple People Pestiferous and most pernitious Poyson dispersed throughout all our Dyocess of London in great number which truly without it be speedily foreseen without doubt will infect the Flock And with much of this Nature giving the People 30 Days to bring in all the Books which have been dispersed c. But Richard Bayfield who refused so to do but still Owned and Dispersed those Books which opened the private Cabonet of the obscure Consults of the close Designing Papists was Sentenced and Condemned and Burnt as you may read in p. 291. 292. of the aforesaid Book for bringing into London and publishing several Books which were wrote by Luther Zuinglius Lambert Bucer Hus Frith and others as bad Spirits to the Interst and Design of the then Papists as W. R. can be to G. F. and his Party and yet doubtless they think he and his Friends are bad enough or else they would not have given them the Characters afore described except they be Arrant Hypocrites indeed c. But one thing by the way that Fox noted is worthy our Consideration which is set down p. 289. Intimating that the Papists might have of these Books to read and peruse them and to answer them upon occasion as G.W. and others have had of the Books of W. R. but not a word against them as if they were Heirs apparent to that right honourable in the Papists account Sir Thomas Moor. Hear what Fox says Although all these Books were Inhibited Viz. Prohibited c. Yet Licence was granted before to Sir Thomas Moor by Tonstal Bishop of London Anno 1527. That he notwithstanding might have and peruse them with a Letter also sent to him from the said Bishop or rather by the advice of other Bishops desiring him that he would shew his Cunning and play the pritty