the Lords way for if they be found beyond the Line the brazen wall they may easily be surprized And indeed who but a Foole would run from the shelter of a brazen wall to hide himselfe in a little stubble And yet so doe all who runne to their owne wisedome from the most hazardous engagement that any of the wayes of God can possibly lead them unto It is a sure word and for ever to be rested upon which the Lord gives in to Asa 2 Chron. 15. 2. The Lord is with you while yee be with him An unbiased Magistracy shall never want Gods continued presence Very Jeroboam himselfe receives a promise upon condition of close walking with God in righteous administrations of having an house built him like the house of David 1 Kings 11. 38. What a wall was God to Moses in that great undertaking of being instrumentall for the delivery of Israel from a bondage and slavery of foure hundred yeares continuance Pharoah was against him whom he had deprived of his Soveraignty and dominion over the People and what a provocation the depriving of Soveraignty is unto Potentates needs no demonstration To the corruption of nature which inclines to Heights and exaltations in imitation of the fountaine whence is flowes they have also the corruption of state and condition which hath alwayes enclined to Absolutenesse and Tyranny All Egypt was against him as being by him visibly destroyed wasted spoyled robbed and at length smitten in the Apple of the eye by the losse of their first borne and if this be not enough that the King and People whom he opposed were his enemies the very People for whose sakes he set himsele to oppose the others they also rise up against him yea seek to destroy him one time they appeale to God for Justice against him Exod. 5. 21. The Lord looke upon you and judge They appeale to the righteous God to witnesse that he had not fulfilled what he promised them to wit Liberty Safety and freedome from oppression but that rather by his meanes their Burdens were encreased And in this they were so confident like some amongst us that they appealed unto God for the equity of their complaints Afterward being reduced to a strait such as they could not see how possibly they should be extricated from without utter ruine like our present condition in the apprehension of some they cry out upon him for the whole designe of bringing them into the Wildernesse and affirme positively that though they had perished in their former slavery it had been better for them then to have followed him in this new and dangerous engagement Ex. 14. 11 12 13. That Generation being as Calvin observes so inured to bondage that they were altogether unfit to beare with the workings and pangs of their approaching Liberty Afterwards doe they want drink Moses is the cause did they want meate this Moses would starve them Exod. 15. 24. and 16. 7. He could not let them alone by the Flesh-pots of Egypt for this they are ready to stone him Exod. 17. 3. At this day have we too much Raine or too short a Harvest it is laid on the shoulders of the present Government It was no otherwise of old At length this People came to that height as being frightened by the opposition they heard of and framed to themselves in that place whether Moses would carry them that they presently enter into a conspiracy and revolt consulting to cast off his Government and chose new Commanders and with a violent hand to returne to their former condition Numb. 14. 4. an attempt as frequent at fruitlesse among our selves When this would not doe at length upon the occasion of taking off Corah and his company they assemble themselves together and lay not imprisonment but murder to his charge and that of the people of the Lord Numb. 16. 41. Now what was the issue of all those oppositions What effect had they How did the power of Pharoah the Revenge of Egipt the backsliding of Israel prevaile Why God made this one Moses a fenced brazen wall to them All he was never in the least measure prevailed against so long as he was with God God was with him no matter who was against him One thing onely would I commend to your considerations viz. That this Moses thus preserved thus delivered thus protected falling into one Deviation in one thing from close following the Lord was taken off from enjoying the closure and fruit of all his labour Numb. 20. 12. Otherwise he followed the Lord in a difficult season and did not want unconquerable supportment Take heed of the smallest turning aside from God Oh loose not the fruit of all your labour for selfe for a lust or any thing that may turne you aside Now the Lord will doe this 1. Because of his owne Engagement 2. For our Incouragement 1. Because of his owne Engagement and that is two fold 1. Of Truth and Fidelity 2. Of Honour and Glory 1. His Truth and Veracity is ingaged in it Those that honour him he will honour 1 Sam. 2. 30. If men honour him with Obedience he will honour them with preservation He will be with them while they are with him 2 Chron. 15. 2. While they are with him in constancy of duty he will be with them to keep them in safety He will never leave them nor forsake them Josh. 1. 5. No weapon that is framed against them shall prosper Isa. 54. 17. Now God is never as the waters that faile to any that upon his ingagements waite for him he will not shame the faces of them that put their trust in him Why should our unbeleeving spirits charge that upon the God of Truth which wee dare not impute to a man that is a worme a lyar Will a man faile in his ingagement unto him who upon that ingagement undertakes a difficult imployment for his sake The truth is it is either want of sincerity in our working or want of faith in dependance that makes us at any time come short of the utmost tittle that is in any of the Lords engagements 1. We want sincerity and doe the Lords work but with our owne aimes and ends like Jehu no wonder if we be left to our selves for our wages and defence 2. We want Faith also in the Lords worke turne to our owne counsels for supportment no marvell if we come short of assistance If we will not beleeve we shall not be established Looke to sinceritie in working and faith in dependance Gods truth and fidelity will carry him out to give you inconquerable supportment Deflexion from these will be your destruction You that are working on a new Bottome worke also on new principles put not new Wine into old Bottles new designes into old Hearts Secondly He is engaged in point of Honour if they miscarry in his way What will he doe for his great name Yea so tender is the Lord herein of his Glory that when he
4. The Plea for the punishment of Erring persons from the penall constitution under the Old Testament against Idolaters which in the next place is urged seemes not very firme and convincing The vast distance that is between Idolatry and any Errors whatsoever as meerly such however propagated or maintained with Obstinacy much impaireth the strength of this Argumentation Idolatry is the yeelding unto a Creature the service and worship due to the Creator Reinold de Idol li 2. Cap. 1. S. 1. Idololatria est circa omne Idolum famulatus servitus Tertul. de Pol. The attendance and service of any Idoll Idololatroe dicuntur qui simulachri eam servitutem exhibent quae debetur Deo August lib. 1. de Trinit. Cap. 6. They are Idolaters who give that service to Idols which is due unto God To render glory to the Creature as to God is Idolatry say the Papists Bell. de Eccles Triump lib. 2. cap. 24. Greg. de Valen. de Idol lib. 1. cap. 1. Suitable to the description of it given by the Apostle Rom. 1. 25. plainely that whereunto the Sanction under debate was added as the bond of the Law against it which was the bottom of the commendable proceedings of diverse Kings of Judah against such was a voluntary relinquishment of Jehovah revealed unto them to give the honour due unto him to dunghill Idols Now though Error and Ignorance ofttimes lye as the bottome of this abhomination yet Error properly so called and which under the name of Heresie is opposed is sufficiently differenced therefrom That Common definition of Heresie that it is an Error or Errors in or about the Fundamentals of Religion maintained with stubbornnesse and pertinacy after Conviction for the maine received by most Protestant Divines will be no way suited unto that which was before given of Idolatry and is at commonly received being indeed much more cleare as shall be afterward declared That this latter is proper and suitable to those Scripturall descriptions which we have of Heresie I dare not assert but being received by them who urge the punishment thereof it may be a sufficient ground of affirming that those things whose definitions are so extreamely different are also very distant and discrepant in themselves and therefore Constitutions for the disposall of things concerning the one cannot eo nomine conclude the other Neither is the Inference any stronger then that a man may be hanged for coveting because he may be so for murdering The penall Constitutions of the Judaicall policy for so they were which yet I urge not concerning Idolaters must be stretched beyond their Limits if you intend to enwrap Hereticks within their Verge If Hereticks be also Idolaters as the Papists The poor Indians who worship a piece of red cloath the Egiptians who adored the Deities which grew in their owne Gardens being not more besotted with this abhomination then they who prostrate their soules unto and lavish their Devotion upon a peice of Bread a little before they prepare it for the draught so casting the stumbling block of their iniquities before the faces of poore Heathens and Jewes causing Averroes to breath out his soule in this expression of that scandall Quoniam Christiani manducant Deum quem adorant sit anima mea cum Philosophis I say then the case seemes to me to have received so considerable an alteration that the Plea of forbearance is extreamely weakened as to my present apprehension However for the present I remove such from this debate 5. The like to this also may be said concerning Blasphemy the Law whereof is likewise commonly urged in this cause The establishment for the punishment of a Blasphemer is in Lev. 24. 16. Given it was upon the occasion of the blaspheming and cursing of the Son of an Egyptian upon his striving contending with an Israelite Being probably in his own apprehension wronged by his Adversary he fell to Reviling his God The Word here used to expresse his sinne is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} signifying also to peirce and is twice so rendered Isa. 36. 6. Hab. 3. 14. Desperate expressions peircing the honour and glory of the most High willingly and wilfully were doubtlesse his death deserving crime It is the same word that Balack used to Baalam when he would have perswaded him to a deliberate cursing and powring out of the Imprecations on the people of God Numb. 23. 13 14. A resolved peircing of the Name and glory of God with cursed reproaches is the crime here sentenced to death The Schoolemen tell us that to compleate Blasphemy of the perverse affection in the Heart in detestation of the goodnesse of God joyned with the Reproaches of his Name is required Thom. 22ae g. 13. a. 1. ad 1 um Which how remote it is from Error of any sort I meane within the compasse of them whereof we speak being a pure misapprehension of the understanding imbraced though falsely for the honor of God I suppose is easily conceived and so consequently that the Argument for the death of a person erring because he came off no easier of old who blasphemed is a baculo ad angulum If any shall say that Blasphemy is of a larger extent and more generall acceptation in the Scripture I shall not deny it But yet that that kind of blasphemy which was punishable with violent death was comprehensive of any inferiour crime I suppose cannot be proved However Blasphemy in the Scripture is never taken in any place that I can remember for a mans maintaining his owne Error but for his reviling and speaking evill of the Truth which he receiveth not and so Paul before his conversion was a Blasphemer Now if men to whom forbearance is indulged in by-paths of their owne shall make it their worke to cast dirt on the better wayes of truth it is to me very questionable whether they do not offend against that prime dictate of nature for the preservation of humane society Quod tibi fieri non vis alteri ne feceris and for such I will be no Advocate Neither can indeed the Law of Blaspbemy be impartially urged by us in any case of Heresie whatsoever For 1. The paenall Sanctions of the Lawes of God are not in England esteemed of Morall equity and perpetually indispensable for if so why doe Adulterers unmolested behold the violent death of Stealers 2. The Blasphemer by that Law was not allowed his Clergy Dye he must without mercy no roome being left for the intervention of Repentance as to the removall of his temporall punishment When once the Witnesses Garments were rent he was Anathema But in case of any Heresie repentance yea Recantation is a sure Antidote at least for once so it is among the Papists against all corporall sufferings 6. Neither doth that place in Zachary Chap. 13. v. 3. concerning the running through of the false Prophet more prove or approve of the punishment of death to be inflicted for
generally thus much of private Interest appeares in the severall contesters that Non-toleration is the Opinion of the many and these enjoyning the countenance of Authority Toleration of the Oppressed who alwayes goe under the Name of the faction or factions the unavoidable Livery of the smaller number professing a way of worship by themselves be it right or wrong I doe not desire to lay forth the usuall deportment of men seeking the suppressing of others differing from them towards those in Authority It is but too clearely made out by dayly experience If they close with them they are Custodes utriusque Tabulae the Churches Nursing Fathers c. what they please But if they draw back for want of light or truth to serve them Logges and Storks find not worse entertainement from Froggs then they from some of them Such things as these may nay ought to be especially heeded by every one that knowes what influence corrupt affections have upon the judgements of men and would willingly take the paines to wipe his Eyes for the discerning of the truth These things premised I assert That Non-Toleration in the Latitude which is for Persons in Authority enjoying the truth or supposing they doe enjoy it to punish in an Arbitrary way according to what they shall conceive to be condigne men who will not forsake their owne convictions about any head or heads of Christian Religion whatsoever to joyne with what they hold out either for beliefe or worship after the using of such wayes of perswasion as they shall thinke fit is no way warranted in the Gospel nor can any sound proofe for such a course be taken from the Old Testament The Testimonies out of the Law which I can apprehend to have any colour or appearance of strength in them with the examples approved of God that seem to look this way I considered at our entrance into this discourse I speake of punishing in an Arbitrary way for all instances produced to the purpose in hand that speak of any punishment mention nothing under death it selfe which yet at least in the first place is not aymed at by those that use them in our dayes as I suppose Now some Divines of no small Name maintain that God hath not left the imposition of punishment in any measure to the wils of men Some Arguments for the proofe of the former Assertion as layd downe I shall in due place make use of for the present I desire to commend to the serious pondering of all Christians in generall especially of those in Authority these ensuing considerations 1. That it is no priviledge of truth to furnish it's Assertors with this perswasion that the Dissenters from it ought forceably to be opposed restrained punished No false Religion ever yet in the World did enthrone it selfe in the minds of men enjoyning a civill soveraignty over the persons of others but it there withall commanded them under paine of neglect and contempt of it selfe to crush any underling worship that would perke up in inferiour consciences The old Heathens carryed their Gods into the Warre as did the Philistims 1 Chron. 14. 12. and the Israelites the Arke with Heathenish superstition 1 Sam. 4. 3. to whom they ascribed the successe they obtained and in requitall of their kindnesse they forced the dunghill Deities of the conquered Nations to attend the tryumph of their Victorious Idols and unlesse they adopted them into the number of their owne Gods all further worship to them was forbidden Hence were these inventions among the old Romans by spells and Enchantments to entise away a Deity from any City they besieged they being as expert at the getting of a Devill as Tobias's Raphael or the present Romanists at his fumigation by which means they shrived into the honor of having 30000 unconquered Idols as Varro in Augustine de civit Dei and deserved worthily that change of their Cities Epithete from {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} which it justly inheriteth to this very day Rabsheke's provocation to the example of the Gods of the Nations 2 Kings 18. 33 34. and the Roman Senats consultation concerning the admitting of Christ to a place among their Idols that he might have been freely worshipped their consent being prevented by his Almighty providence who will not be enrolled among the vilest works of his most corrupted creatures do both declare this thing Now not to speak of Caine who seems to me to have layd the foundation of that cruelty which was afterward inserted into the Churches Orthodoxies by the name of Haereticidium we find the four famous Empires of the World to have drunke in this perswasion to the utmost of suppressing all by force and violence that consented not to them in their way of worship Nebuchadnezzar the Crowne of the golden Head sets up a Furnace with an Image and a Negative answer to that Quaery doe you not serve my Gods nor worship my Image served to cast the servants of the living God into the middest of the fire Dan. 3. Daniel's casting into the Lyons Den Chap. 6. shews that the Persian Silver brest and armes did not want Iron hands to crush or breake the Opposers of or dissenters from their Religious Edicts And though we find not much of the short-lived founder of the Grecian Dominion yet what was the practice of the Branches of that Empire especially in the Syrian and Egiptian sprouts the three Books of the Machabees Josephus and others do abundantly manifest For the Romans though their Judgement and practice which fully and wholly are given over from the Dragon to the Beast and false Prophet be written in the blood of thousands of Christians and so not to be questioned yet that it may appear that we are not the onely men in this Generation that this wisedome of punishing dissenters was not born with us I shall briefly give in what grounds they proceeded on and the motives they had to proceed as they did First then they enacted it as a Law that no religious worship should be admitted or practised without the consent decree and establishment of the Senate Mention is made of a formall Law to this purpose in Tertullian Apol. cap. 5. though now we find it not The foundation of it was doubtlesse in that of the twelve Tables Separatim nemo habessit Deos neue novos sed ne Aduenas nisi publice ascitos privatim colunto Let none have Gods to himselfe neither let any privately worship new or strange Deities unlesse they be publiquely owned and enrolled And that it was their practise and in the counsells of the wisest amongst them appeares in that advice given by Maecenas to Augustus in Dio Cassius {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Worship saith he the divine power thy selfe according to the constitutions of thy Countrey alwayes and at all times and compell others so to honeur it not onely for the Gods sake whom yet whoso
these things upon the Catholicks were Pagans enemies of God and Christ but these who so charged Hereticks were Christians themselves And so say I also and therefore for reverence of the name though perhaps I could I say no more But yet this I say that Story which you have in Minutius Felix or Arnobius 8th Book Apologeticall of the meeting of Christians the drawing away of the Light by a Dogge tyed to the Candlestick so to make way for Adulteries and Incests I have heard more then once told with no small confidence of Brownists and Puritans Hath not this very same course been taken in latter ages Consult the Writings of Waldensis and the rest of his Companions about Wickleffe and his Followers see the occasion of his falling off from Rome in our owne Chronicles in Fabian of old yea and Daniel of late to gratifie a Popish Court of Eckius Hosius Staphylus Bolsecte Bellarmine and the rest who have undertaken to pourtray out unto us Luther and Calvin with their followers and you will quickly see that their great designe was to put as they did upon the head of John Huss at the Councell of Constance when he was lead to the stake the ugly vizard of some Devillish Appearance that under that forme they might fit them for Fire and Fagot And herein also is the Politie of the Dragon derived to the false Prophet and a colour tempered for persecutors to imbrue their hands in the blood of Martyrs This was the old Roman Way and I thought it not amisse to cautionate those enjoying Truth and Authority that if it be possible they may not walke in their steps and method the course accounted so soveraigne for the extirpation of Errour was as you see first invented for the extirpation of Truth Secondly I desire it may be observed That the generall Issue and tendance of unlimited arbitrary persecution or punishing for conscience sake because in all Ages {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and the worst of men have sate at the upper end of the World for the most part more false Worshippers having hitherto enjoyed authority over others then Followers of the Lambe hath been pernicious fatall and dreadfull to the Profession and Professors of the Gospel little or not at all serviceable to the truth I have heard it averred by a Reverend and Learned Personage that more blood of Hereticks hath been shed by wholesome Severity in the maintenance of the truth and opposition unto Errors then hath been shed of the witnesses of Jesus by the Sword of Persecution in the hands of Hereticks and false Worshippers An assertion I conceive under favour so exceedingly distant from the reality of the thing it selfe that I dare take upon me against any man breathing that in sundry Christian Provinces almost in every one of the West more Lives have been sacrificed to the one Idoll Haereticidium of those that bear witnesse to the Truth in the Beleife for which they suffered then all the Hereticks properly so called that ever were slaine in all the Provinces of the World by men professing the Gospell And I shall give that worthy Divine or any other of his perswasion his Option among all the chiefest Provinces of Europe to tye me up unto which they please He that shall consider that above sixty thousand persons were in six yeares or little more cut off in a Judiciall way by Duke D' Alua in the Nether-Lands in pursuite of the sentence of the Inquisition will conclude that there is Causa facilis in my hand The Ancient Contest betweene the Homoousians and the Arrians the first Controversie the Churches were agitated withall after they enjoyed a Christian Magistrate and may justly be supposed to be carryed on to the advantage of Error beyond all that went before it because of the Civill Magistrates interessing themselves in the Quarrell was not carryed out to Violence and Blood before the severall perswasions lighted on severall Dominions and State Interests As between the Goths Vandals and the rest of their Companions on one side who were Arrians and the Romans on the other In all whose Bickerings notwithstanding the honour of Severity did still attend the Arrians especially in Affricke where they persecuted the Catholicks with horrible outrage and fury Five thousand at one time barbarously exposed to all manner of cruell Villany Some Eruptions of passion had been before among Emperours themselves but still with this difference that they who Arrianized carryed the Bell for zeale against dissenters Witnesse Valens who gave place in persecution to none of his Pagan Predecessors killing burning slaying making havock of all Orthodox Professors Yea perhaps that which he did at least was done by the countenance of his Authority at Alexandria upon the placing in of Lucius an Arrian in the roome of Athanasius thrusting Peter besides the Chaire who was rightly placed according to the custome of those times perhaps I say the Tumults Rapes Murders then and there acted did outgoe what before had been done by the Pagans see Theodorit Eccles. Hist. lib. 4. cap. 22. it were tedious to pursue the lying slandering invectives banishments deaths tumults murders which attend this counsell all along after once they began to invoke the help of the Emperours one against another Yet in this space some Magistrates weary with persecuting ways did not only abstaine practically from force and violence as most of the Orthodox Emperours did but also enacted Laws for the freedome of such as dissented from them Jovianus a pious man grants all peace that will be peacable offended onely with them who would offer violence to others Socrates Eccles. Hist. lib. 4. cap. 21. Gratianus makes a Law whereby he granted liberty to all Sects but Manichees Photinians and Eunomians Zozo Eccles. Hist. lib. 7. cap. 1. Many more the like examples might be produced The next difference about the Worship of God to the Arrian and its Branches that was controverted in Letters of blood was about Images and their Worship in which though some furious Princes in opposition to that growing Idolatry which by Popes Bishops Priests and especially Monkes was in those dayes violently urged did mingle some of their blood with their Sacrifices yet not to the Tithe almost of what the Iconolatrae getting uppermost returned vpon them and their adherents This if occasion were might be easily demonstrated from Paulus Diaconus and others After this from about the year 850. about which time the Iconolatrae having ensnared the West by politie the posterity of Charles the Great who had stoutly opposed the worship of Images complying with the Popes the Fathers of that Worship for their owne ends and wearied the East by cruelty that Contest growing towards an End the whole power of punishing for Religion became subservient to the Dictates of the Pope the Kings of the Earth giving their power to the Beast unto which point things had been working all along from thence I say untill the death of