of God But such are the Assemblies in England Therefore they are the Churches of God As touching the Spirit of God it hath been said before Whereupon it also followeth that he likewise put his Word in their mouths considering that the Spirit of God is not given but by his Word And seeing that the Lord in mercy hath set up divers burning Lamps in those Assemblies whereby light is conveyed more or less into all the parts of the Land it seemeth that the Church of England should receive injury if it should not be counted among the Golden Candlesticks which serve to keep out darkness and night from the Lords House until such time as the day-spring and Lucifer arise in our hearts If you say All do not believe the Gospel truly which profess The same exception lyeth against all other Churches how reformed soever If there be fewer faithful in our Churches than in others The truth of the Church standeth not in number for it there were in every Church one truly undissemblingly faithful all the rest holding the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ in words onely yet should all those Churches be to us the Churches of God And if you say that all those Assemblies as it were all the branches and arms of the Candlestick have not light set upon them the greater part of them being damped by a dumb ministry notwithstanding by the way you confess that those Assemblies upon whom the Lord hath set up the lamp of a preaching Ministery are the Churches of God which seemeth to cast down that hill which standeth in the way against our rejoyning whereby you cannot afford us the name of Gods Churches because we have not the Discipline by him appointed Now for that other whether they have some glaunce of knowledge by that dumb Ministery or not may afterward in another place be considered For the present I answer That even those Congregations for so much as they both have by some former Ministery or means which the Lord hath used towards them received faith standing thereby in our Saviour Christ as in the shaft of the Candlestick and being members of the same body they may well receive some supply of their wants from the light that shineth in the next branch unto them for if every Assembly being without a lamp of the Ministery should by and by be holden to be broken from the shaft of the Church-Candlestick then at every vacation of the Ministery and whensoever by death the Lord should put out one of his lights it should follow that that Assembly by the fall of their Minister into the grave should from the highest heaven fall into the grave of Hell But you will say peradventure that an Assembly that hath a dumb Minister is in worse case than that which bath none at all If that be granted it followeth not therefore that the Assembly which yesterday being without a dumb Minister was the Church of God should to day having such a one set over them be the Synagogue of Satan And here methink when you go about to make nothing of the dumb Ministery you ascribe more force unto it than it hath for you make him not so much a guide as an Head of the Church as that those which before in all equal judgment were to be deemed members of Christ by having of them should suddenly become members of Antichrist I do not therefore yield unto you in that you say they are the chief alway in the Synagogue our Saviour Christ in whom those companies do believe being the chief with whom through faith they grow to be one body rather than with Satan by hearing the dumb Minister to be one with him Say therefore that it is a fault in them to hear such a Minister thrust upon them yet that it is an Apostacy from God and an utter falling away from the Gospel I se not with what great appearance of truth it can be spoken Moses when divers of the people clave unto Coreh Dathan and Abiram forsaking willingly the lawful and ordinary Ministery of the Aaronites did not therefore cast them forth from the Lords host And should the Churches of God for hearing a dumb Minister which is thrust upon them forthwith be reputed for runagates from the Lord Again The Lord is in Covenant with the people to whom he gives the Seals of his Covenant This he doth to our Assemblies in England Therefore they are the Lords Confederates If you say that the Seals set to by the dumb Ministery are no Seals which afterward cometh to be examined yet you thereby confess that those which are ministered by sufficient Ministers are true and uncounterfeit Sacraments of the Church whereby it falleth out again that you seem to hold that the Churches of England are not the true Churches of Christ because they have not his commanded Discipline Hereto may be added all the Churches in Europe all which give the right hand of Society in the house of God unto the Assemblies which are in England Which argument of Churches Authority although it be not so strong as it will enforce yet ought it to stay all sudden judgment unto the contrary and so long to cause silence until the Cause being ripely on both sides debated the contrary of it which the Churches should do through the lightsomness of the truth thereof break forth And if it be meet to proceed softly and as it were with a leaden foot unto the Excommunication of one onely member of the Church of God there ought verily to have been great consultation taken or ever the Churches of two whole Islands should have been cast out especially when they be holden in by Voices not onely of divers persons but of all the Churches to whom knowledge of their estate hath come And if there were but one man worthy to be Excommunicate yet if the greater part of your Assembly would not yield consent thereunto I hold it that the order of the Discipliae requireth that the rest are to bear the person whom they cannot remove And therefore though the Assemblies of England had deserved through want of Discipline and of a preaching Ministery to be cast out from the accompt of the Churches of God yet being holden in by the Voices of the Churches themselves ought to have been so far born with as the communicating should not make them guilty of a falling away from the Lord. Now I come to those two Reasons whereby you think you may justly hold the Assemblies in England for no Churches of God And first of all to the reason of the Discipline for the want whereof you gave them all without exception the black stone of condemnation from being the Churches of God Where it is to be understood that as in a Man there are certain parts essential and such as without which the man cannot stand and other some serving to his comelyness or to his long continuance So it is in this matter there is the
foundation CHRIST whereupon it is necessary that by faith the Assemblies be laid which groweth unto the Lords building without the which it cannot be his Church which thing being whatsoever is wanting of that which is commanded or remaining of that which is forbidden is not able to put that Assembly which by faith is laid upon Christ from the right and title of being the Church of Christ for Faith can admit no such thing which giveth an utter overthrow and turning upside down of the truth By this title of the Faithful the Apostle in his Epistles noteth out the Churches of God it being all one with him to say To the Faithful or To the Saints as To the Church of such a place Whatsoever wanteth unto this or is more than enough that wanteth or aboundeth to the disgrace or uncomelyness or to the hazard of continuance and not to the present overthrow of the Church Hereupon the people of Israel which neglected for the space of forty years the holy Sacrament of Circumcision and the Passeover also as it seemeth one onely time excepted ceased not therefore to be the Churches of God and to have the Sanctuary among them And in this respect the Dutch Assemblies whereof the greatest part in High Germany which beside the main of Discipline which is common to our Churches are groslly deceived in the matter of the Supper are notwithstanding holden in the Roul of the Churches of God In this respect also certain Assemblies of our Profession which having the use of the Discipline permitted unto them are not suffered to have the use of the Lords Supper are not therefore when the Lords Churches are mustered and their names written and enrouled up cast out as unfit to be in any accompt of the Lords hosts Without any part of that Order or Discipline which the Lord hath appointed I grant there can be no Church of Christ or that without some part of it there can be no faith in Jesus Christ It is a part of the Discipline of our Saviour Christ that there should be certain which should be chosen out of the rest to preach the Gospel by preaching whereof the Churches are gathered together Where therefore there is no Ministery of the Word there it is plain that there are no visible and apparent Churches It is another piece of the Discipline of the Lord that the rest of the body of the Church should obey those that are set over them in the Lord wheresoever therefore there is no obedience of the people to the Ministers that in the Lords name preach unto them there can be no true Church of Christ But where these two be although other points want yea although there be some defect in these that neither the Ministers do in all points preach as they ought nor the Assemblies in all points obey unto the wholesome doctrine of their Teachers yet do they for the reason above-said retein the right of the Churches of God This is made plain by a similitude from the body of a man whereinto we are already entred For if a man should have both his hands and his arms cut off his eyes put out c. yet as long as the head standeth and other vital parts he is to be accompted a Man although a maimed man Even so it is in the Assembly as long as it holdeth the head how defective soever it is otherwise it hath the due and right of the Church of God And although a man should have six fingers in one hand and but three in another and albeit they should stand where the mouth doth yet all this deformity should not hinder him from being truely holden to be a Man although it should be a great deformity in him On the other part if he had no Head at all or that there were no natural conjunction of the parts one with another but a whole and through displacing of every part from his proper seat then verily would he be denyed to have either the proportion of a Man or his life So likewise if an Assembly should not hold the Head which is Jesus Christ or be nothing elss but a confused multitude without part of the order which the Son of God hath appointed the same is justly crossed out of the accompt of Gods Church Was not Jerusalem after the return from Babylon the City of the great King until such time as Nehemiah came and builded the Walls of the City To say therefore it is none of the Church of God because it hath not received the Discipline metthinks it is all one with this as if a man should say It is no City because it hath no Wall or that it is no Vineyard because it hath neither ditch nor hedge It is not I grant so sightly a City or Vineyard nor yet so safe against the invasion of their several enemies which lye in wait for them yet are they truely both Cities and Vineyards There remaineth that other point which is against those Assemblies onely which have a dumb Minister wherein the part of your conclusion That that Assembly where they be is none of the Church of God is before answered Therein resteth that part of your conclusion whereby you infer That the Sacraments ministred by them are none of Gods Sacraments and therefore that a man may not receive any part of them at their hands Here first I agree with you that their Ministery is unlawful and to themselves without repentance a certain matter of destruction especially in those to whom knowledge of corruption is come to the Churches where they be presently hurtful and in the end without remedy deadly But that they are no Ministers of God so far as to receive the good they offer unto us that I suppose I may not yield unto The ground whereof I take from the former part of my Answer That for so much as they are allowed by the Churches of God they ought until remedy may be found of so great disorder to be heard and retained so far as they can give us any thing that is of Christ And for this cause our Saviour commanded that the Scribes should be heard for that they taught truely which honour our Saviour would never have given unto them unless the Church-calling had moved him thereunto Neither had it been lawful for the people otherwise to have heard them for it is evident that their unfitness and unlawfulness in the Ministery although another way was as great as it is in our reading Ministers They were altogether deceived in the Messias for neither knew they that Jesus was Christ nor yet that Christ whom they looked for should be the Son of God but held him for a bare and naked man It appeareth also that they taught the Justification by the Law of Works not onely in the 18. of Luke but even in the same very place where our Saviour Christ commandeth this audience for speaking of the works of the moral Law which
they would not touch with one of their fingers he saith that they laid them upon the peoples backs as burthens which cannot be born whereby our Saviour beside their Pharisaical pride and lordlyness in teaching signifieth that they taught them to Justification seeing that if they had onely taught them as testimonies and fruits or faith they had not been intolerable bur as our Saviour Christ saith an easie yoke and as S. John saith not grievous nor heavy Now the dumb Ministery is not farther off from the justification of a lawful Ministery than to teach untruely in the chief grounds of Religion neither is the edifying of the Church respected in making Laws for the Ministery less hindred by an unpreaching Ministery And according to this saying of our Saviour Christ we may see what the practice of the Prophets had been before who although they had oftentimes to do with false teachers and Priests that were dumb dogs and not able to bark yet giving the people warning of their corruptions and insufficiencies threatning also the casting of them from their Ministery in that good time when the Lord shall take pity on his Church they are never found to have forbidden the people to have come unto their sacrifices commanded by the Law unto them Yea our Saviour Christ that lived in the corruptest times of the Church and when things were most confused and fewest steps of any lawful Calling to be seen yet commanded he the man whom he purged from Leprosie to shew himself to the Priests generally without willing him to make choice of a Priest better instructed or affected to the truth than the rest The high Priest although he entred by Simony and reward to the Romans yet notwihstanding we see our Saviour Christ bore him reverence for his office sake and as before his Judge in Spiritual Causes gave an accompt of his doctrine We have another example of reverence given to such Rulers even in things that were done by them wrongfully For Jeremy being for a time suspended from coming into the Temple being at liberty would not least as it seemeth he should make a tumult enter the Temple and therefore having written that which he had to say sent Baruch to read his Sermon in the Temple Moreover when a Magistrate is not able to do some part of his office as for example being able to do the duties which are to be performed in peace is insufficient for Martial affaire yet no man refuseth that which he is able to give because he is not able to do all that is required Even so endeavouring to our uttermost a sufficient Ministery I would think in the mean season that the good things they are able to give us may be taken at their hands And if any man say that it is of the substance of a Church-Minister to be able to teach and therefore that he is no Minister that hath not that ability It may be answered that it is of the substance of a good and lawful Minister of God but not simply of a Minister whereunto it is sufficient to have the Churches calling As it is of the substance rather of a lawful Magistrate to be able to judge between his Subjects than simply of a Magistrate whom the election of the people or of other to whom his choice belongeth maketh a Magistrate of the Lord although he be no lawful nor sufficient Magistrate As therefore we call him a Magistrate who for the ignorance of his charge may be called an Idol Magistrate even so it seemeth that he may be holden for a Minister which hath his Churches Calling although he be not able to do the principal charge of the Ministery Neither doth the place of the Prophet Hosee which saith because they have refused knowledge they shall be no Priests unto the Lord stand against this the Prophet rather giving a rule to follow in the election or disposition of them shewing how far they may be used Finally to that which is objected of communicating with their impiety in any taking any thing at their hands I Answer the same might have been laid to the peoples charge under the Law which is never done by the Prophets Secondly if by communicating with him we should make him Minister I grant that a piece of his guilt would stick to our fingers but when that is not I see not how by receiving the Sacrament of him we partake more of his wickedness than the Son is partaker of his Fathers murther because he receiveth of his Fathers gift some part of his lands or moveables And so much the less there than here as the Father giveth his own things whereas the dumb Minister doth onely dispense the gifts of the Lord. Wherefore it may be rather feared lest in refusing the Sacraments offered by him we put the Lord away from us whose they be than in taking of the Sacraments at his hands be partakers of impiety which is the mans and can take no hold of the Sacraments in any sort For even as I not able to avoid him may communicate with a Minister that is an Adulterer without being partaker of his Adultery so also may I communicate with a dumb Minister and yet nevertheless be free from his impiety Thus you have mine Answer written not without the fear and trembling your selves make mention of whereby it will not be hard for you to understand how both our desires of being united together may be performed And although I write in good assurance especially in the former part as touching the rightful title of the Churches of Christ to be due to the Assemblies of England yet remembring beside the common frailties of our whole race special breaches and decaies in my self I willingly hearken to any much more to you whom the Lord hath bestowed good graces upon shewing better things for which cause if further conference be needful I must through business be forced to refer to conference by mouth some time after diner And thus with most humble prayers to the Lord our God for his Holy Spirit where-through we may be able to discern the things that differ to our inoffensive walking in the sight of all men even to the day of the Lord I bid you farewel Yours Thomas Cartwright THE JUDGMENT OF Mr. Baxter CONCERNING CEREMONIES AND CONFORMITY THose Modes or Circumstances of Worship which are Necessary in Genere but left undetermined by God in Specie are left by God to humane Prudential Determination else an Impossibility should be necessary But many such there are that are Necessary in Genere but left undetermined of God in Specie therefore many such are left to humane Prudential Determination § 5. Yet it is in the power of a man to determine of such Modes and Circumstances as are necessary to the performance of that Worship which God hath instituted in his Word and therefore lawful Governors may in such cases bind us by their Commands 1. It