good whilest they think that they only despise the praise or dispraise of men We are commanded not to please our selves but to please all men for their good to edification Rom. 15. 1 2 3. Our power over them is upon their minds and wills and not like Magistrates upon their bodies or estates Therefore when we have lost their hearts we have lost our power to do them good They will not easily hear him that is despised or abhorred by them Therefore a prudent care must be taken that we be not prodigal of our interest in them lest it prove to be cruelty to their souls Secondly And yet if we give up our selves to their conceits and humours and forsake the way of truth or peace to keep their favour it will prove the more dangerous extream I have before noted the peril of Ministers and the Church by this temptation The rawest and the rashest professours are commonly the most violent and censorious And so ready to scorn and vilifie the gravest wisest Pastors who cross their opinions that many honest Ministers have been overcome by the temptation to forsake their own judgement and to comply with the violent to escape their censures and contempt But this is not the way to the Churches peace It may prove a palliate cure for a time to put by at the present some sudden inconvenience But it prepareth for after troubles and confusions First it will make the rashest and indiscreetest people which is usually the women and young men to be the Governours of the Church Whilest all their Teachers must humour them lest they displease them Secondly When you have followed them a little way and think there to stop you must follow them still further and never can foresee the end For that weakness and passion of theirs which crieth up one errour to day is pregnant with innumerable more and may cry up more to morrow and so on And one errour commonly draweth on more and one miscarriage engageth them to another And the last are usually the worst And the same ends and reasons which made you go out of the way to please them will make you still follow them how far soever they go unless you repent Thirdly And if you repent and leave them it must cost you dearer than prevention would have done And you might have at much cheaper rates forsaken them just there where they forsook the way of truth and peace Fourthly And you will by following the conduct of giddiness and passion disâ—dvantage your Ministry as to all the less zealous and all the more sober and peaceable of the godly And you will bring your selves into contempt with these for your levity injudiciousness and instability And so you will lose much more than you will get Fifthly And in the mean time you will be made but the vulgars instrument to do hurt you will be used by them but to confirm themselves in their errours and to further dividing and unpeaceable designes-Sixthly And when all is done and your consciences are wounded and you are made the heads or leaders of factions at last those of themselves that God sheweth mercy to will see their errour and when they repent they will give you little thanks for your compliance A sinful humouring of rash professours is as great a temptation to godly Ministers as a sinful compliance with the Great ones of the world I mean it is a sin which our station and disposition afford us as great temptations to For though to a worldling wealth and honour be stronger temptations yet to a godly man the applause or censure of those whom we account most wise and godly may tempt much stronglier And alas how ordinarily doth the fire of Church and state which flameth about our own ears convince us of our errour in following those whom we should lead O how many doleful instances of it doth Church history afford us There are not many of the tumults that have cost the lives of thousands about Religion but were kindled by the young injudicious professours who drew in their Teachers to humour them in countenancing too much of their disorders Historians tell us that when King Francis of France had forbid the reproaching of the Papists way of worship and silenced the Ministers for not obeying him many of the hot brain'd people took up the way of provoking them by scornful pictures libels hanging up and down in the streets suchridiâ—ulous and reproachful rhimes and images But this which was none of the way of God began that persecution by provoking the King which cost many thousands if not hundred thousand lives before it ended And the Synod at Rochel which refused the grave counsel of Du Plessis Du Moulin and many such others was stirred up by the peoples zeal and ended in the blood of many score thousands and the ruine of the power of the Protestants in France Abundance of such sad instances might be given if England need to go any whether else for matter of warning than to it self He that after the experiences of this age will think it fit to follow the conduct of injudicious zealots is left as unexcusable as almost any man that never had a sight of hell The dreadful ruine of Ierusalem according to Christs prediction such as the world hath scarce seen besides was just in the like manner brought about by those furious ones whom Iosephus calleth the zealots But if you will do all things good and lawful to win men and offend them by no unnecessary thing and yet stand your ground and stir not an inch from truth or seberness piety or peace to please any people in the world This way shall do your work at last Men will at last perceive the worth of sober principles and wayes At least when Mountebanks have killed most of their patients the rest will repent and wish that tâ—ey had hearkened to the counsellers of peace They that run round when they find themselves giddy and ready to fall will lay hold upon somewhat which is firm and stable Compliance with one of the contentious parties may make you cried up by that party for a time But the contrary faction will as much cry you down and your estimation is but like an Almanack for a year And they themselves that needed your sinful help for some present job will be like enough ere long to cast you off as is aforesaid And if they do not you are objects of pity to sober standers by And in the next age the name of a Melancthon a Bucer a Bergiuâ— a Crocius an Vsher and other such Peace-makers will be pretious to posterity when the memory of fiery dividers will be dishonourable Keep your standing and stick closer to truth and justice and peace than to any party and resolvedly give up your selves to please God and you will be no loosers by it And its two to one but at last some of the contenders will desire you to be the arbitrators of
Church but Christ himself 58. Take heed of superstition indiserâ—â—t â—â—al â—â—th been the usual beginner of superstition Mâ—lignity in that age the sharpest opposer for the Aâ—thorâ—s sake Formality in the next age hath made a Religion of it And then the zealous who first invented it have turned most against it for the sake of the last owners And thus the world hath turned round Instances lay'd down of the superstition of Religions people in this age 59. If through the fault of either side or both you cannot meet together in the same assemblies yet keep that Unity in faith love and practice which all neighbour Churches should maintain And use not your different assemblies to revâ—ling and destroying Love and Peace 60. When the Love-killing spirit either cruel or dividing is abroad among Christians be not idle nor discouraged Spectators nor betray the Churches peace by lazy wishes But make it a great part of your labour and Religion to revive Love and Peace and to destroy their contraries And let no censures or contempt of any party take you off But account it as comfortable to be a Martyr for Love Peace by blind Zealots or proud Usurpers as for the saith by Infidels or Heathens And take the pleasing of God whoever is displeased for your full reward The Additional Directions to the Pastors 1. Let it be our first care to know and do our own duty And when we see the peoples weakness and divisions let us first examine and judge our selves and lament and reform our own neglects Ministers are the Cause of most divisions 2. It is needful to the peoples Edification and Concord that their Pastors much excel them in knowledge and utterance and also in prudence holiness and heavenly mindedness that the reverence of their callings and persons may be preserved and the people taught by their Examples 3. Inculcate still the necessary conjunction of Holiness and Peace and of the Love of God and Man And that Love is their Holiness it self and the sum of their Religion the End of faith and the fulfilling of the Law And that as Love to God uniteth us to Him so Love to man must unite us to each other And that all doctrine and practices which are against Love and Unity are against God against Christ against the Spirit against the Church and against Mankind 4. If others shew their weakness by unwarrantable singularities or divisions shew not your greater weakness by impatience and uncharitable censures or usage of them especially when self-interest provoketh you 5. Distinguish between them that separate from the Universal Church or from all the Orthodox and Reformed parts of it and those who only turn from the Ministery of some one person or sort of persons without refusing Communion with the rest 6. Distinguish between them who deny the Being of the Ministry and Church from which they separate and those who remove only for their own Edification as from a worse or weaker Ministry a Church less pure 7. Distinguish between those who hold it simply unlawful to have Communion with you and those who only hold it unlawful to prefer your assemblies before such as they think to be more pure 8. Remember Christs interest in the weakest of his Servants and do nothing against them which Christ will not take well 9. Distinguish between weakness of Gifts and of Graces and remember that many who are weaker in the understanding of Church-orders may yet be stronger in grace than you 10. Think on the Common Calamity of mankind what strange disparity there is in mens understandings and will be And how the Church here is a Hospital of diseased souls of whom none are perfectly healed in this life 11. Distinguish still between those truths and duties which are or are not of necessity and between the tolerable and the intolerable errors And never think of a Common Unity and Concord but upon the terms of necessary points and of the primitive simplicity and the forbearance of dissenters in tolerable differences 12. Remember that the Pestoral Government is a work of Light and Love And what these cannot do we cannot do Our great study therefore must be first to know more and to Love more than the people and then to convince them by cogent evidence of truth and to cause the warmth of our Love to be felt by them in all the parts of our ministration and converse As the warmth of the Mothers milk is needful to the good nutrition of the Child The History of Martin 13. When you see many evils which Love and evidence will leave uncured yet do not reject this way till you have found one that will better do the work and with fewer inconveniences 14. When you reprove those weak Christians who are subject to errors disorders and divisions reflect noâ— any disgrace upon piety it self but be the more careful to proclaim the honour of Godliness and true Conscientious strictness lest the ungodly take occasion to despise it by hearing of the faults of such as are accounted the zealousest professors of it 15. Discourage not the people from so much of Religions exercises in their families and with one another as is meet for them in their private stâ—tions 16. Be not wanting in abilities watchfulness and diligence to resist Seducers by the evidence of truth that there may be no need of other weapons And quench the sparks among the people before they break out into flames 17. Be not strange to the poet ones of your flocks but impartial to all and the servants of all Mind not high things but condescend to men of low estate 18. Spend and be spent for your peoples good Do all the good that you are able for their bodies as well as for their souls And think nothing that you have too dear to win them that they may see that you are truely fathers to them and that their welfare is your chiefest care 19. Keep up the reverence of the ancient and experienced sort of Christians and teach the younger what honour they owe to them that are their Elders in age and grace For whilest the Elder who are usually sober and peaceable are duly reverenced the heat of rash and giddy youth will be the better kept in order 20. Neither neglect your interest in the Religious persons of your charge lest you lose your power to do them good Nor yet be so tender of it as to depart from sober principles or wayes to please them Make them not your Rulers nor follow them into any exorbitancies to get their love or to escape any of their censures 21. Let not the Pastors contend among themselves especially through envy against any whom the people most esteem A reproof of ignorant pievish backbiting quarrelsome Ministers 22. Study our great pattern of Love and tenderness meekness and patience and all those texts which commend these virtues till they are digested into a nature in you that healing virtue may go from you
these are such as come to their knowledge by hard and laborious studies and meditation though also by the spirit blessing their endeavours And they are such as give proof of the knowledge which they pretend to And they are such as employ their knowledge to preserve the peace and concord of believers and do not proudly make a stir with it to set up their own names though thereby they set the world on fire Make therefore no more of these vain defences of your Pride Let no man think of himself and his own understanding above what is meet I perswade you not to deny any truth which indeed you know nor to doubt of any thing which is made truly certain to you But value not your understandings above their worth and fix not too rashly upon your first apprehensions and go not away with a passionate confidence in your poor raw untryed and defective conceptions But remember that you know but little and must have time and labour to grow up to the rest Be not wise in your own conceits Rom. 12. 16. 11. 25. Prov. 26. 5. 28. 11. And this is commonly the sin of the slothful that never were at that pains for knowledge by which it must be attained The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can render a reason Prov. 26. 16. You little think when you are conceited of your knowledge that you are further from wisdom than a fool Prov. 26. 12. Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit There is more hope of a fool than of him Be not wise in thy own eyes Prov. 3. 3. Wo to them that are wise in their own eyes and prudent in their own sight Isa. 5. 21. Be not righteous overmuch neither make thy self over-wise why shouldst thou destroy thy self The self-conceited must become fools in their own esteem if ever they will be wise as the worldly wise must own that which is folly in the judgment of the world if ever they will be wise 1 Cor. 3. 18. 2. And there is a Religious Pride of Goodness as well as of Knowledge which must yet more carefully be avoided as being yet worse than the former as the thing abused is much better And this worketh as subtilly and secretly as the former It may not only consist with many complaints and confessions of sinfulness weakness and unworthyness but even with doubts of sincerity and so much dejectedness as seemeth to draw near to desparation It is an ordinary thing to hear the same persons talk in a complaining doubting and almost despairing manner of speech and yet to have high expectations of respect from others and to be most proudly impatient of the least undervaluing or neglect Yea Pride will make an advantage to it self of all these humble confessions and complaints And it is an old observation that many are proud of their humility For though it be true that Austin saith that Grace is a thing which no man can use amiss the meaning is only that Grace efficiently can do nothing amiâ—s For if it do amiss so far it is not grace Yet objectively all Grace may be abused that is a man may make it the object of his Pride and the occasion of many other sins And this Religious Pride of Goodness doth ordinarily work under the pretext of Thankfullness to God for his grace and Zeal for Holyness But it may be known by this that it always tendeth to lift us up and to the diminishing of Love to oothers and to the contempt of the weak and the censuring of our brethren and the division and disturbance of the Church of God They are lamentable effects which this Pride produceth in the Church and all Societies where it cometh It maketh all mens Goodness seem little except our own It causeth the people to undervalue their Pastors and turneth compassion of meâ—s weaknesses into a sowr contempt It setteth a man in his own conceit so near to God that he looketh down on other men as earthly animals in comparison of himself It maketh new terms of Church-Communion and teacheth men to make narrower the door of the Church than God hath made it It causeth men to deny and vâ—liâ—ie Gods grace in those that answer not their expectations And to think that the Church is not worthy of their Communion And to think that none are so fit as they to be the Reformers of the Church and of the world I intreat those who are in danger of this pernicious sin to think with themselves 1. What a heynous crime and folly it is for one that but lately was a child of the Devil and a sink of sin to be proud so quickly of their goodness And for one that so lately was groaning and weeping with a broken heart for a sinful life to be already puffed up with the conceits of godlyness And for one who daily maketh confession to God of a sinful heart and a faulty life and of great unworthyness to contradict all this by an over-valuing of his own piety And how incongruous it is for one who professeth to hope for justification by free grace mercy only to have nothing of his own but what 's defiled and who abhorreth the Doctrine of merit and talketh so much of our emptyness and insufficiency to be yet puffed up with the conceit of his spirituality and worth And what an odious self-conâ—radiction it is to make your self like the Devil in pride because you think you are like God in holiness 2. And consider that the more you are proud of your Goodness the less you have to be proud of If this sin be predominant it is certain that you have no saving grace at all And what an odious thing and miserable case is it to be proud of Holyness when you are unholy and to be damned both for want of it and for being proud of it That a man should be proud of that for want of which he must suffer the fire of Hell But if your pride be not predominant yet it is certain that in what measure soever you have that vice in that measure you are destitute of grace For true grace and pride are as contrary as life and death 3. And study well the meaning of all these Scriptures For you shall not say that I mis-interpret them to you Why was it that Christ mentioneth the Parable of the Phaâ—â—see and the Publican one thanking God that he was not so bad as others and the other thinking himself unworthy to look up to heaven Luke 18. 10 11. c. Why did he give us the parable of the prodigal who confesseth that he was unworthy to be called a Son and of his elder brother who swelled with envy at his entertainment Why was it that Christ seemed not strict enough to the Pharisees in keeping the Sabbath nor in his Diet nor in his Company but they called him a gluttonous person and a wine-bibber and a friend of Publicans
thou judge thy brother or why dâ—st thou set at nought thy brother we shall all stand before the judgement seat of Christ. Let us not therefore judge one another any more v. 13. 14. I know and am pâ—rswaded by the Lord Iesus that there is nothing unclean of it self but to him that esteemeth any thing unclean to him it is unclean v. 17. For the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men Let us therefore follow after the things that make for peace v. 22. Hast thou faith Have it to thy self before God Ch. 15. 1 2. We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please our selves Let us every one please his neighbour for his good to edification For even Christ pleased not himself v. 5. 6. Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like minded one â—owards another according to Christ Iesus that ye may with ONE MIND and ONE MOuTH glorifie God wherefore receive ye one another as Christ received us to the glory of God Ch. 16. 17 18. Now I beseech you brethren mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned and avoid them For they that are such serve not our Lord Iesus but their own belly and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple Act. 20. 30. Also of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away Disciples after them Joh. 13. 35. By this shall all men know that ye are my Disciples if ye have love one to another 1 Cor. 11. 17 18. I hear there are divisions among you For there must be also heresies among you that they which are approved may be made manifest Math. 13. 29 30. Nay lest while ye gather up the â—ares ye root up also the wheat with them Let both grow together till the harvest 41. The Angels shall gather out of his Kingdom all things that offend and them which do iniquity and shall cast them into a furnace of fire Then shall the righteous shine forth as the Sun in the Kingdom of their Father V. 47. The Kingdom of Heaven is like a net cast into the Sea which gathered of every kind which when it was full they drew to the shore and sate down and gathered the good into Vessels and the bad they cast away so shall it be at the end of the world Math. 22. 9 10. Go into the high ways and as many as ye find bid to the marriage or as Luk. 14. Compel them to come in so those servants went unto the high ways and gathered all as many as they found both bad and good and the wedding was furnished with guests And the King saw there a man that had not on a wedding garment and said Friend How camâ—st thou in hither c. Mark thus he will condemn wicked hypocrites themselves but blameth not the Ministers that compelled them or that let them in Gal. 6. 1. If a man be overtaken in a fault ye that are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness Considering thy self lest thou also be tempted Bear ye one anothers burdens and so fulfill the Law of Christ Let every man prove his own work Note that Paul purified himself as having a Vow He circumcised Timothy He became a Jew to the Jews and all things to all men that he might win some Phil. 1. 15 16. Some preach Christ of envy c. as aforecited Phil. 2. 1 2 3. If there be any consolation in in Christ fulfill ye my joy that ye be like minded having the same love being of one accord and of one mind Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves 14. Do all things without murmurings and disputings Ch. 3. 15 16. Let as many as are perfect be thus minded and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded God shall reveal even this unto you But whereunto we have already attained let us walk by the same rule let us mind the same things 1 Thes. 5. 12 13. We beseech you brethren to know them that labour among you and are over you in the Lord c. and be at peace among your selves Tit. 3. 10. A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition avoid knowing that he that is such is subverted and sinneth being condemned of himself Jam. 3. 1 2 13 c. My brethren be not many Masters knowing that ye shall receive the greater condemnation For in many things we offend all who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you Let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom But if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts glory not and lie not against the truth This wisdom descendeth not from above but is earthly sensual devilish For where envying and strife is there is confusion and every evil work The wisdom from above is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be entreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality without hypocrisie and the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace Mat. 12. 25. Iesus said every Kingdom divided against it self is brought to desolation and every City or house divided against it self shall not stand I have cited so many Texts against division and for the Unity of the Church and concord of Christians as one would think by the very hearing of them without expositions or argumentation should utterly mortifie all inclination to divisions and hard censures in all true believers yea so many Texts as I am perswaded many that most need them will think it tedious to read them over And yet I have cause to fear lest many such will feel as little of the sense and authority of them as if there were no such words in the Scripture and none of this had been set before them Out of all these you may gather these reasons of the necessity of Unity and of the evil of schism or division First It is One God One Head One Saviour and One Holy Spirit into whose name we are all baptized Secondly It is One Covenant which all in Baptism make with this One God Thirdly It is One Spirit by which we are all regenerated and One new Nature which is in all the truly sanctified Fourthly It is One Gospel or holy word of God which is to us all the seed of our new birth the rule of our faith and lives and the foundation of our hope and must be our daily meditation and delight and the food on which the children of Gods family must all live Fifthly It is One Body of Christ whereof we are all members As Christ is not divided so his Body that is his Church both as
your foul back-biting reviling censorious contentious tongues do not prove the contrary 13. who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you Let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisedome that is Let him that would be thought more knowing and religious than his neighbours be so much more blameless and meek to all men and excel them in good works v. 14. But if ye have a bitter zeal for so is the Greek word and strife in your hearts glory not in such a zeal or in your greater knowledge and lie not against the truth 15. This wisdome descendeth not from above as you imagine who father it on Gods word and spirit but is earthly sensual or natural and devillish O doleful mistake that the world the flesh and the Devil should prove the cause of that conceited spiritual knowledge and excellency which they thought had been the inspiration of the spirit v. 16. For where zeal and strife 〈◊〉 that is a striving contentious zeal against brethren there is confusion or tumult and unquietness and every evil work O lamentable reformers that set up every evil work while they seemed zealous against evil v. 17. But the wisdome that is from above is first pure then peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality or wrangling and without Hypocrisie And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace when peace-breakers that sow in divisions and contention shall reap the fruit of unrighteousness though they call their way by the most religious names Thus I have briefly shewed you what Vâ—nity and Division are that wrong apprehensions draw you not to sin DIRECT VIII When any thing needeth amendment in the Church remember that the best Christian must be the forwardest to reformation and â—he backwardest to Division and must search and try all means of Reforming which make not against the concord of the Church I Do not here determine in what cases you may or may not separate from any company of faulty Christians I only say that you must never separate what God hath conjoyned the Holiness and the Vnity of believers If corruptions blemish and dishonour the Congregation Do not say Let sin alone I must not oppose it for fear of division But be the forwardest to reduce all to the will of God And yet if you cannot prevail as you desire be the backwardest to divide and separate and do it not without a certain warrant and extream necessity Resolve with Austin I will not be the chaff and yet I will not go out of the floor though the chaff be there Never give over your just desire and endeavour of Reformation And yet as long as possibly you can avoid it forsake not the Church which you desire to reform As Paul said to them that were ready to forsake a sea-wrackt vessel If these abide not in the ship ye cannot be saved Many a one by unlawful flying and shifting for his own greater peace and safety doth much more hazard his own and others DIRECT IX Forget not the great difference between casting out the wicked and impenitent from the Church by discipline and the godlies separating from the Church it self because the wicked are not cast out The first is a great duty The second is ordinarily a great sin THe question is not Whether the impenitent should be put away from Church-Communion That 's not denied But whether you should separate from the Church because they are permitted This is it which we call you to beware Not but that in some cases a Christian may lawfully remove from one Church to another that hath more light and purity for the edification of his soul. But before you separate from a faulty Church as such as may not lawfully be communicated with you must look well about you and be able to prove that thing which you affirm Many weak Christians marking those Texts which bid us avoid a man that is an Heretick and to have no company with disorderly walkers and not to eat with flagitious persons do not sufficiently mark their sense but take them as if they call'd us to separate from the Church with which these persons do communicate Whereas if you mark all the Texts in the Gospel you shall find that all the separation which is commanded in such cases besides our separation from the Infidels or Idolatrous world or Antichristian and Heretical confederacies and no-Churches is but one of these two sorts First either that the Church cast out the impenitent sinner by the power of the Keyes Secondly or that private men avoid all private familiarity with them And both these we would promote and no way hinder Thirdly but that the private members should separate from the Church because such persons are not cast out of it shew me one Text to prove it if you can Let us here peruse the Texts that speak of our withdrawing from the wicked 1 Cor. 5. Is expresly written to the whole Church as obliged to put away the incestuous person from among them and so not to eat with such offenders So is that in 2 Thes. 3. and that in Tit. 3. 10. A man that is an Heretick after the first and second admonition avoid Unless it be a Heretick that hath already separated himself from our communion And then it can be put private familiarity which we are further to avoid In brief there is no other place of Scripture that I know of which commandeth any more I have before shewed that abundance of Church corruptions or of scandalous members were then among them and yet the Apostle never spake a syllable to any one Christian to separate from any one of all those Churches Which we cannot imagine that the Holy Ghost would have wholly omitted if indeed it had been the will of God Obj. But then why did Luther and the first Pretestants separate from the Church of Rome and how will you justifie them from Schisme Ans. Its pity that sloth and sortishness should keep any Protestant or Papist either in such ignorance as to need any help to answer so easie a question at this day Let not equivocal names deceive us and the case is easie By the word Church the Scripture still meaneth first either the Universal Church which is the body or Kingdome of Christ alone Secondly or particular Congregations associated for personal communion in Gods worship But the Pope hath feigned another kind of thing and called it The Church That is The Vniversality of Christians as headed by himself as the constitutive and governing head Whereas first God never instituted or allowed such a Church Secondly nor did ever the Universality of Christians acknowledge this usurping Head Shew me in Scripture or in Church-History that either there ever was de facto or ought to be de jure such a thing in the world as they call the Church and I profess I will immediately turn
points that no controversies or opinions will shake his faith or destroy his love to God or man Thirdly He will honour God by upright practise and shew forth the power and excellency of religion in the true success upon the heart and life His Religion which begins in solid faith will grow up into sincere Love and good works Fourthly He will be without partiality a Lover of all the servants of Christ and therefore escape temptations to faction and division because his Religion consisteth in those common truths and duties which all profess Fifthly he will not only safely receive all further truths from these principles but all his knowledge and disputes will be sanctified as being all subservient to faith and love and holiness Whereas he that taketh the contrary course and presently falleth to the study of by-opinions and layeth too much upon them will prove too like a superficial hypocrite and a deceiver of himself by thinking that he is something when he is nothing Gal. 6. 5 6. And he will make a pudder in the world for nothing as children do in the house about their babies and their bawbles He will make but an engine of his by-opinions to destroy true Piety and Christian Love in himself first and then in all that will believe him He will first make himself and then many others believe that Religion is nothing but proud self-conceit and faction And he will be the shame of his profession and the hardener of the wicked in their sin and misery by perswading them that the Religious are bnt a few ignorant whimsical fanaticks These are too sad experienced truths DIRECT XXXII Lay not a greater stress upon your different words or manner of prayer than God hath laid And take heed either of scorning reproaching or slighting the words and manner of other mens worship when it is such as God accepteth from the sincere IT is an easie thing to turn the native heat of Religion into a feaverish out-side zeal about words or circumstances or ceremonies whether it be for them or against them O what a wonder is it that by so palpable a trick as thâ—s the Devil should deceive so many and make such a stir and disturbance in the Church I know that one party will cry up Order the other will cry up Spirituality and both will say that God maketh not light of the smallest matters in religion nor no more must we And in this general position there is some truth But if nothing could be said for both their errours they would then be no deceits nor be capable of doing any mischief Some things that you contend about God hath left wholly undetermined and indifferent And some things in which your brother erreth his errour is so small a fault as not at all to hinder his acceptance with God nor with any man that judgeth as God doth Had you ever understood Rom. 14 15. you would have understood all this It would make a knowing Christian weep between indignation and compassion to see in these times what censures and worse are used on both sides about the wording of our prayers to God! How vile and unsufferable some account them that will pray in any words which are not written down for them And how unlawful others account it to pray in their imposed forms some because they are forms and some because they are such forms and some because that Papists have used them and some because they are imposed when God hath given them no command but to pray in faith and fervency according to the state of themselves and others and in such order as is agreeable to the matter and in such method as he hath given them a Rule and Pattern of But of all quarrels about forms and words he hath never made any of their particular determinations no more than whether I shall preach by the help of Notes or study the words or speak those which another studied for me It is a wonder how they that believe the Scriptures came first to make themselves believe that God maketh such a matter as they do of their several words and forms of prayer That he loveth only extemporary prayer as some think and hateth all prescribed forms Or that he loveth only prescribed Forms as others think and hateth all extemporary prayers by habit Certainly in Christs time both Liturgies by forms and also prayers by habit were used And yet Christ never interposed in the Controversie so as to condemn the one or the other He condemneth the Pharisees for making long prayers to cover their devouring widdows houses and for their praying to be seen of men But whether their prayers were a Liturgy and set forme or whether they were extemporary he taketh no notice as telling us that he condemned neither And it s like the Pharisees long Liturgy was in many things worse than ours though the Psalms were a great part of it And yet Christ and his Apostles oft joyned with them and never condemned them Nay as far as I can find the Pharisees and other Jews were not in this so blind and quarrelsome as we nor never made a controversie of it nor ever presumed to condemn either Liturgies or Prayers by habit I shall now pass by their errour who are utterly against publike prayers from a habit as having spoken of it at large elsewhere when I had opportunity I shall now only answer the contrary extreme Obj. Where hath God given any men power to prescribe and impose forms for others or commanded others to obey them Answ. First where ever he hath given any power to teach their inferiours to pray who cannot do it in a better way He hath given Parents this power where he hath bid them Bring up their Children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord Is it not by the Law of nature the Parents duty to teach their children to pray And is not the learning of the words first profitable to their learning of the sense May they not teach their Children the Lords Prayer or a Psalm though it be a Form And why not then other words which are agreeable to their State And he that taught his own Disciples a Form and Rule of Prayer and telleth us that so Iohn taught his Disciples and saith to his Apostles As my Father sent me so send I you by making them Teachers to his Church did allow them to teach either by forms or without as the cause required All the Scripture is now to Preachers a form of Teaching And when we read a Chapter we read a prescribed form of Doctrine And it haâ—h many forms of prayer and praise and forms of Baptizing administring the Lords Supper If you say that the Apostles had an infallible spirit I answer True And that proveth that that their Doctrine was more infallible than other mens but not that they only and not other men may teach by the way of forms All the Books of Sermons now written are
to purchase them DIRECT XXXVII In your judging of Discipline Reformation and any means of the Churches good be sure your Eye be both upon the true End and upon the particular Rule and not on either of them alone Take not that for a means which is either contrary to the word of God or is in its nature destructive of the End THere are great miscarriages come for want of the true observation of this rule First If a thing seem to you very needful to a good end and yet the word be against it avoid it For God knoweth better than we what means is fittest and what he will bless As for instance some think that many self-devised ways of worship contrary to Col. 2. 21 23. would be very profitable to the Church And some think that striking with the sword as Peter did is the way to rescue Christ or the Gospel But both are bad because the Scripture is against them Secondly and if you think that the Scripture commandeth you this or that positive means if Nature and true Reason assure you that it is against the End and is like to do much more harm than good be assured that you mistake that Scripture For first God telleth us in general that the means as such are for the End and therefore are no means when they are against it The Ministery is for edification and not for destruction The Sabbath is for man and not man for the Sabbath Secondly God hath told us that no positive duty is a duty at all times To pray when I should be saving my neighbours life is a sin and not a duty though we are commanded to pray continually So is it to be preaching or hearing on the Lords day when I should be quenching a fire in the town or doing necessary works of mercy Wherefore the Disciples Sabbath-breaking was justified by Christ and he giveth us all a charge to learn what this meaneth I will have mercy and not sacrifice which must needs import I prefer mercy before sacrifice and would have no sacrifice which hindereth mercy Therefore if a Sermon were to be preached so unseasonably or in such unsuitable circumstances as that according to Gods ordinary way of working it were like to do more hurt than good it were no duty at that time Discipline is an Ordinance of Christ But if sound reason tell me that if I publickly call this man to Repentance or excommunicate him it is like to do much hurt to the Church and no good to him it would be at that time no duty but a sin As Physick must be forborn where the Disease will but be exasperated by it Therefore Christ boundeth our very preaching and reproof with a Shake off the dust off your feet as a testimony against them And give not that which is holy to dogs c. When treading under foot and turning again and rending us is lâ—kest to be the success the wisdome of Christ and not that of the flesh only requireth us to take it for no duty This is to be observed by them that think that Admonitions and excommunications and exclusion from the Sacrament must be used in all places and at all times alike without respect to the End come of it what will Or that will tempt God by presuming that he will certainly either bless or at least justifie their unseasonable and imprudent actions as if they were a duty at all times To be either against the Scripture or against the End is a certain proof that an action is no duty because no means DIRECT XXXVIII Neglect not any truth of God much less renounce it or deny it For lying and contempt of Sacred truth is always sinful But yet do not take it for your duty to publish all which you judge to be truth nor a sin to silence many lesser truths when the Churches peace and welfare doth require it TO speak or subscribe against any truth is not to be done on any pretense whatsoever For lying is a sin at all times But it is the opinion of injudicious furious spirits that no truth is to be silenced for peace Truth is not to be sold for carnal prosperity but it is to be forborn for spiritual advantage and true necessity First if the publishing of all truths were at all times a duty then all men live every moment in ten thousand sins of omission because there are more than so many truths which I am not publishing Nay which I never shall publish whilest I live Secondly Positives bind not always and to all times Thirdly while you are preaching that opinion which your zeal is so much for you are omitting far greater and more necessary Truths And is it not as great a sin to omit them as the lesser Fourthly Mercy is to be preferred before sacrifice What if the present uttering some truth would cost many thousand mens lives Were not that an untimely and unmerciful word And is it not as bad if but accidentally it tend to the ruine of the Church and the hurt of souls It were easie to instance in unseasonable and imprudent words of truth spoken to Princes which have raised persecutions of long continuance and ruined Churches silenced Ministers and caused the death of multitudes of men Fifthly And where is there any word of God which commandeth us to speak all that we know and which forbiddeth us to forbear the utterance of any one truth Sixthly And for the most part those men who are most pregnant and impatient of holding in their opinions on the pretense of the pretiousness of truth do but proudly esteem their own understandings precious and do vend some raw undigested notions vain janglings or errors under the name of that truth which must by no means be concealed though the vending of it tend to envy and strife and to confusion and every evil work When those that have the Truth indeed have more wisdome and goodness to know how to use it It is not Truth but Goodness which is the ultimate object of the soul. And God who is infinite Goodness it self hath revealed his Truths to the world to do men Good and not to hurt them And the Devil who is the Destroyer so he may but do men hurt will be content to make use even of Truth to do it Though usually he only pretendeth Truth to cover his lies And this angel of Light hath his ministers of Light and Righteousness who are known by their fruits whilest the pretenses of Light and Righteousness are used to Satans ends and not to Christs to hurt and destroy and to hinder Christs Kingdome and not to save and to do good As the Wolf is known by his bloody jaws even in his sheeps cloathing DIRECT XXXIX Know which are the great duties of a Christian life and wherein the nature of true Religion doth consist And then pretend not any lesser duty against those greater though the least when it is indeed a duty is not to
that he taketh them for no Churches and disowneth the administration of all the Ministers in the world whom you disown or yet that it is safe to separate where Christ doth not separate and to be gone from his Hoâ—se while he there abideth and to condemn those whom he condemneth not nor yet commandeth you to forsake or to condemn Obj. The Church of Christ is a little flock and not to be estimated by number And if he confine his grace to never so few I will confine my Communion to as few Answ. First Grace is not visible to you but the Profession of it only Therefore your Communion must be extended according to mens profession and not according to sincerity which you know not when the question is who hath grace and who hath not God hath not made you a heart searching Judge but hath made profession the sign which you must judge by And he that professeth Christianity professeth all that is of necessity to salvation Secondly If Christs flock was little when he spake those words it is much greater now And if it be little still as it is in comparison of the world of Heathens Infidels and Hypocrites will he give them thanks that will make it less yea a thousand times less than it is indeed Hath he so few and will you take from him almost all those few If you had but a hundred sheep when your neighbour had a thousand would you thank him that would rob you of all save one Thirdly So far as God hath revealed the fewness of the saved we reverence his Counsels and believe his word But if you will make it so much less a number while you falsifie Gods word you will tempt your selves at last not to bâ—lieve it because you have made it false and incredible by making it your own Brethren I beseech you be not angry with us while we pity you and would save your souls from your own snares and delâ—sions You know not how fast you are hastening to infidelity and to the renouncing of Christ himself you little suspect that your extraordinary strictness for the purity of the Church doth tend to your turning heathens and denying the whole Church But remember that the nature of God is so infiaitly Good as well as Iust and the Gospel is such glad tydings to all the world and Christ called the Saviour of the world and God is said so to love the world in giving him Joh. 3. 16. that if you should say God would save but one man in the world or ten or a thousand and damn all the rest if you did in your bravadâ— believe your selves this year by the next you might be like enough to believe that the Gospel is but a fable I have much adoe to forbear naming some high Professours known lately at Wâ—rcester Exeter and other parts who died Apostate-infidels deriding Christianity and the immortality of the soul who once were Separatists And I must profess to you that for my own part if I did believe that Christs Church were no more numerous than all the Separatists on earth it would make the work of faith more difficult For as he is no King that hath no Kingdom so he is next to no King whose Kingdom is next to none He that would prove that our King is only King of â—slington or Hackney and no more would by deriding him to day prepare for the deposing him to morrow They are glorious things that are spoken of the Kingdom of Christ even that the Kingdoms of the world are become his Kingdoms And if you will take from him all save two or three Cottages I mean the separated Churches only it is but a little addition to your treason to take the rest and to Crucifie Christ afresh and write over him in derâ—sion the title of a King You do not discern the design of Satan He that cannot entice an Apple from a Child if he can get him to let him eat all the rest till it come to a little of the Core will then easily get him to throw away that worthless relict If to day you will needs believe that Christ will reject all the world and all the Churches save only a few persons who have pride enough to condemn all the rest by to morrow or eâ—e loâ—g you are like enough to add one other degree to your derision and to deny him to be Christ. Obj. But we are more than were in the Ark of Noah Answ. First You never yet proved that all that were out of the Ark were damned and no more saved from Hell than were savedâ— from the Deluge Secondly If you had yet thâ—â— Scripture speaketh such great things of the Universal Gospel Church as that which maketh up 〈◊〉 former diminutions and losses and helpeth 〈…〉 against such difficulties DIRECT LVII Yet let not any here cheat you by overdoing nor meer names and titles of Unity deceive you instead of the thing it self Nor must you ever dream of any Head and Center of the Unity of the Catholick Church but Christ himself THere is no part of Religion which Satan doth not endeavour to destroy under pretense of promoting it And his way is to overgo Christ and his Apostles and to seem more zealouâ— than ever they were and to mend their work by doing it better or doing more Christ was not strict enough for the Pharisees in keeping the 〈◊〉 nor in his company nor in his diet Sataâ—â— hath always two ways to destroy both truth and duty The first is by direct opposing it But 〈◊〉 that will not do the next is by overdoing and pretending to defend it If he cannot destroy zeal by scorning it and quenching it he will try to do it by overheating and distempering it If he cannot destroy knowledge by the way of gross ignorance he will try to spin it out into the finer threds of vain and innumerable questions and speculations and to crumble it into such invisible atomes that it shall be reduced to scepticisme or nothing If he cannot destroy faith by open infidelity he will try to make men believe too much by making the objects of their own belief and calling that a particular faith altering God word and casting away the Reasons and evidences of faith to shew the strength and nobleness of their faith which needeth no such helps as these till by over-doing they have raised their edifice in the ayr and rejected their foundations and put out their eys in honour of the sun and of their Physician lest either of them should be accused as insufficient Even so when Satan findeth that he cannot directly destroy the Unity of the Church and bring division into credit he will be more zealous for unity than Christ himself He will then endure no disagreement among Christians no not in an opinion nor a form or ceremony not in meats or drinks or keeping of days or in judging of things lawful or unlawful which are not of necessity
old can do And if you extend the case to all other parts of the Ministery where the reason is the same they will say what reverence is due to such or why should we maintain and honour men for doing no more than our children can do And the Popish devise to make a disparity by keeping the people in ignorance is the basest and most pernicious plot of all When the Pastors instead of excelling the people would keep down the people from increasing in their knowledge and expression this is so notorious a discovery of envy pride and malignity conjunct that the people presently flye from such Pastors as supposing them to be ministers of the Devil because they see them bear his image What do we teach them for if we would not have them learn and profit What greater honour can a Teacher have than to make his Schollars as wise and able as himself Every one who is a child of Light and believeth in him who is the Light of the world will suspect that man to be a Minister of the Prince of darkness who is a malicious adverstry of Light This is that brand of the Roman iniquity the hindering men from the reading of the Scriptures and magnifying ignorance which maketh men so commonly think them to be the Ecclesia malignantium and the Antichristian brood Thus Cardinal Wolsey declaimed against the Art of Printing as that which would take down the honour and profit of the Priesthood by making the people as wise as they It is not by keeping them down or envying their abilities that we must keep our distance from the people but by rising higher our selves and excelling them in all ministerial gifts Else why should we be thought any fitter to be their Teachers and Guides than they to be ours Yea though we excel them in all these abilities it will not serve turn to the ends of our Ministery unless we also excel them in holiness and every Christian vertue The Devil knoweth more than Ministers And if he have a tongue to speak he wanteth not utterance He is the most excellent and honourable who is likest to God and hath most of his image And God hath more proposed himself to mans imitation in Goodness than in Greatness He hath not said Be Great for the Lord your God is Great but walk in the Light as he is in the Light 1 Iob. 1. 7. and Be holy for the Lord your God is holy 1 Pet. 1. 16. Lev. 20. 7. 19. 2. 21. 8. To be Great and Bad is to be able to do mischief To be Learned ingenious and Bad is to be wise to do evil and a crafty and subtle instrument of the devil Ier. 4. 22. It was no laudable description of Elymas Act. 13. 8 10. O full of subtlety and all mischiefs thou child of the devil and enemy of all righteousness wilt thou not cease to pervert the right wayes of the Lord Satan would never transform himself into an Angel of Light nor his ministers into the Ministers of Righteousness nor would Pharisees and hypocrites cover oppression by long prayers if Light Righteousness and long prayers were not laudable in themselves and necessary in the preachers of the word of God and had not a goodness in them capable of being a cloak to their iniquity 2 Cor. 11. 14 15. Mat. 23. 14. God is Light 1 Iob. 1. 5. And God is Holy If therefore Satan or any hypocrite would credit their falshood and wickedness they must pretend to Light and Holiness And he that will keep up the true honour of his Ministery and be accepted with God and reverenced by good men mâ—st do it by real Light and Holiness An ungodly Minister hath a radicated enmity to the holy doctrine which he preacheth and to the holy duties and life which he exhorteth the people to And how well how sincerely how readily how faithfully they are like to do the work which they are enemies to you may easily judge The carnal mind is enmity to God for it is not subject to his law nor indeed can be Rom. 8. 6 7 8. I knoâ— that they are not enemies to the honour nor to the maintenance and therefore may force themselves to do much of the outside of the work But where there is an inward enmity to the life and ends of it we can expect but a formal unwilling and unconstant discharge of such unpleasing duty Truth is for Goodness The Knowledge which maketh you not Good is lost and hath mist its end If therefore your Love to God and man your mortification and unblameableness of life your heavenly mindedness be no greater than the peoples or perhaps much less do not wonder if you lose your honour with them and if you grow contemptible in their eyes Mal. 1. 10. 14. I have no pleasure in you saith the Lord Cursed be the deceiver which hath in his flock a male and voweth and sacrificeth to the Lord a corrupt thing Mal. 2. And now O ye Priests this commandement is for you If ye will not hear and if ye will not lay it to heart to give glory to my name I will send a curse upon you The Law of truth was in Levi's mouth and iniquity was not found in his lips He walked with me in peace and equity and did turn away many from iniquity For the Priests lips should keep knowledge and they should seek the law at his mouth for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts But ye are departed out of the way ye have caused many to stumble at the Law ye have corrupted the Covenant of Levi saith the Lord of hosts Therefore also have I made you contemptible and base before all the people according as ye have not kept my wayes but have been partial in the Law 1 Sam. 2. 17. 24 30. The sin of the young men was very great before the Lord for men abhorred the offering of the Lord Ye make the Lords people to transgress Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and at my offering which I have commanded I said indeed that thy house should walk before me for ever But now the Lord saith Be it far from me for them that honour me I will honour and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed If as Moses you stand nearer to God than the people do you must be so much holier than they and your faces must shine with the beames of God in the peoples eyes They that with open face behold in Christ as in a glass the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory as by the spirit of the Lord. 2 Cor. 3. 7. 17 18. If therefore by your low and common parts and carnal lives you make your selves contemptible instead of exclaiming against the people cry out against your selves and lament your sins and the more you have aggravated the crimes of Schism and other errors in your flocks the more penitently bewail your
in Christendome and the blood of the many hundred thousands that have for conscience sake been shed and the enduring of the outcries of the imprisoned and banished and their prayers to heaven for deliverance from mens hands and the leaving of such a name on record to posterity as is usually left in History on the authors of such sufferings besides the present regret of mind in the calamities of others and the sad divisions and destruction of Charity which cometh hereupon I say whether it be worth the suffering of all this and O how small a part is this and all to keep our Churches from the primitive simplicity and from the same way and Communion which Peter and Paul and the Churches of their times established and practised Shall we speak so highly of Christ and his Apostles and the sacred Scriptures and yet think all this blood and misery division and distraction worthy to be endured rather than our Union and Communion should be held on the terms which they did appoint and practise or rather than such terms should be tolerated among us I know what is said against all this But this is no place to answer all that is said by such as cannot see how to answer themselves in so clear a case DIRECT XII Remember that the Pastoral Government is a Work of LIGHT and LOVE and what cannot be done by these is not at all to be done by you And therefore you must make it your great study and employment first to Know more than the people and to Love them more than they Love you or one another and then to convince them by unresistable evidence of truth and to cause the warmth of your Love to be felt by them in every word and act of your Ministration As the Miâ—k is waâ—m by the natural heat of the mother and so is fitted for the nourishment of the child AS the Gospel is the revelation of the Love of God and it is a message of Love which we have to bring and a work of Love which we cooperate to effect so it is a spirit of Love which must be our principle and it is an office and work of Love which we are called to and the manner must be answerable to the work Faith is the Head and Love is the Heart of the new Creature And as there is no Light in our office and work if there be no Faith and evidence of Truth so there is no Life in it if there be no Love God himself in the great work of our Redemption Christ in his Incarnation life and suffering hath taught the world that the manifestation of Love is the way to win Love and to cure enmity And he is not worthy the name of a Minister of Christ who hath not learned this lesson and doth not imitate his Lord in this That as our office participateth subordinately of his office both Ruling Teaching Priestly so we may participate of that Spirit of Love which was his Principle and must be ours If it be not a work of Love which we do it is not the work of a Minister of Christ and Preacher of the Gospel Can you well Preach so great Love of Christ to men without Love if you shew not Love to them you can never expect to win their Love to your selves And when you overmuch desire to be loved your selves as which of you doth not you pretend that it is to make your endeavours more successful when you perswade them to the love of Christ. And doubtless a just Love to the person of the Preacher is a good advantage to this success And in good sadness can you believe that any thing is so likely to win Love as Love or did experience ever teach you that reproach or contempt or hurting men was the effectual way to make them Love you This way hath been long tried by the Mountebanks in Italy Spain and many other Countries but alas with what success Indeed solitudinem faciunt paâ—â—m vocant as Tertullian saith When they have killed those that they had first oppressed they affrighted the rest to say they loved them and really won the Love of their surviving blood-thirsty enemies but that was all If the new knack of transfusion of blood cannot do this feat by letting in the blood of a Spaniel who loveth him that beateth him when you let out their own phlebotomy will never do it Account then that Sermon that converse that reproof that discipline in which Love is not apparently predominant to be but a lifeless useless thing as to the winning of a sinners heart to Christ. Though I deny not but when the case of the sinner appeareth desperate the severity of Discipline in casting him off may express more of another affection as to him But that is because in so doing you must shew greater Love to the Church which must be saved from the infection But perhaps you 'l say They despise me and injure me and follow others and admire them who deserve not so well of them as I do Answ. First we are most of us too partial to be competent Judges of our own deserts Selfishness too often maketh us think better of our selves our preaching and our lives than there is cause And it too often filleth men with envy against those whose greater worth and better labours cause them to be preferred by the hearers And envy usually breeds detraction I know that many giddy persons heap up Teachers to them selves and follow seducers coutemn the faithfullest servants of the Lord. But I know withall that there is usually a convincing power in the preaching of able experienced Ministers which is not to be found in the cold formal discourses of an hypocrite And that there is a suitable principle in true spiritual experienced Christians which causeth them to relish this spiritual experimental preaching much more than the more-adorned carkasâ—es of formality And seriousness is still acceptable to serious Christians Yea even to common natural men unless the malicious possess them by slanders with prejudice against it Now if this should be the cause that others are preferred before you O how heynous were your sin As if it were not enough for you to neglect your duty and to do the work of God deceitfully and injure the souls of men in a cause of such importance but you must also impenitently justifie such a crime and also maligne those that have more of the grace and gifts of God than you and that do more to help to save mens souls Secondly But suppose that your deserts be as great as you conceive and their love to you as little I would further ask you First is it for their own sake who thus hinder their own edification by it that you are troubled at them or is it for your selves because you have not the respect which is your due If it be the later I need not tell you what it is for Ministers of Christ
living acceptable sacrifice Rom. 12. 1. They have need to make a better proof of their authority than Kelley did of his Revelation when he brought Doctor Dee to consent to adultery by the same pretended warrant God who is Love accepteth not such a sacrifice at the hands of Love-killers and Church-destroyers But especially when besides this acrimony of mind there shall other more pernicious diseases be contracted and foment these censures reproaches of their brethren the malignity of the disease is a sad prognostick Two such causes of it Paul layeth open one Act. 20. 30. the other Rom. 16. 17 18. One is the devilish sin of pride and a desire to have many disciples to be our applauders They shal speak perverse things to draw awaydisciples after them The other selfishness carnality and coveteousness They serve not the Lord Iesus but their own bellies And so 2 Pet. 2. 3. Through Coveteousness they shall with feigned words make Merchandise of you They buy and sell mens souls for gain These are Gainsayers in a double sense Their craft bringeth them in no small gain and lest it should be set at nought for gain they do gain-say the truth and raise up tumults against the best of the servants of Christ as Act. 19. 24 27. It is for gain and worldly glory that they say what they say against those that are wiser and sincerer than themselves The sum of all this and most that followeth is in 1 Tim. 6. 3 4 5. If any man teach otherwise and consent not to the wholesome words the words of our Lord Iesus Christ mark it is not to the words of any new faith-makers devâ—sing and to the doctrine which is according to Godliness he is proud though he may cry down pride knowing nothing though he may cry down ignorance but doting about questions though he may seem to be wise and of high attainments and strifes of words while he seemeth to plead for the life of Religion whereof cometh envy strife railings evil surmisings while they pretend to no less necessary a work than the saving of Truth and the peoples souls Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds the impatient scratchings of those whose corrupt blood must needs have vent and therefore causeth this itch of quarrelling and destitute of the truth whilest they think they are saving the life of truth supposing that gain is godliness being so blinded by the love of gain that they make themselves believe that is the cause of truth and Godliness which maketh for their gain and that the raising of them is the raising of the Church and that all tendeth to the interest of religion which tendeth to make them great and rich From such turn away that is own them not in hypocritical wranglings but turn your backs upon them as men unworthy to be disputed with in their way Answer not the fool according to his folly i. e. word it not with him in his foolish way lest you make him think himself worthy to be disputed with Talk not with him at his rates And yet answer him according to his folly by such conviction and rebukes as is meet for fooles and as may make him understand his folly lest he be wise in his own eyes and think that none can stand before him Secondly And it is commonly the most ignorant sort of Ministers who are the liberallest of their supercilious contempt of those whose understandings and worth are above their censures If a controversie be started which they either never studied or have only turned over the pages of a few books to number the sheets and never spent one year in the deep and serious search of the truth which is in question Or if they have clumsie wits that cannot feel so fine a thred nor are capable of mastering the difficulties None then are usually so ready to shoot their bolt and pass a Magisterial sentence and gravely and ignorantly tell the ignorant what eâ—rours such or such a one maintaineth as these that talk of that which they never understood For as I have known many unlearned sots that had no artifice to keep up the reputation of their learning than in all companies to cry down such and such who were wiser than themselves for no schollars but unlearned men so many that are or should be conscious of the dulness and ignorance of their fumbling and unfurnished brains have no way to keep up the reputation of their wisedome with their simple followers but to tell them O such a one hath dangerous errours and such a book is a dangerous book and they hold this and they hold that and so to make odious the opinions or practises of others which they understand not And this doth their business with these silly soals who hear not what can be said against them as well as if they were the words of truth and soberness As for the younger and emptier sort of Ministers it is no wonder if they understand not that which they had never opportunity to study or have taken but a superficial taste of But it were to be wished that they were so humble as to confess that they are yet but beardless and that time and long study is needful to make them as wise as those who with equal wit and grace have had many more years of serious study and greater opportunities to know the truth and that they have not their wisdome by special inspiration or revelation nor so far excel the rest of mankind in a miraculous wit as to know that by a few years lazy study which others know not by the laborious humble fearâ—hâ—s of a far longer time One would think that a little humility 〈…〉 the turn for thus much But it ignorance get possâ—ssion of the ancient and 〈◊〉 headed it triumpheth then and desiâ—◠〈…〉 and saith Give me a man that 〈…〉 with him Or rather Away with 〈…〉 is not worthy to be disputed 〈…〉 groweth not with years 〈…〉 wit may be poaring forty or fifty 〈…〉 that which another may sooner understand Much time and study is necessary to great wisedome But much time and study may consist with very mean attainments and doth not alwayes reach the wisedome which is sought And in such a case the ancient and grey-headed think that veneration is their due and that if they gravely sentence such or such to be erroneous they are injured if they are not believed They have not wisdome enough to make their age honourable and therefore they expect that their age should make their wisdome honourable Thirdly and because they are not able to endure the light nor to stand before the power of open truth they find it necessary to do almost all their work by back-biting When they are out of the hearing of those whom they back-bite among such as are as little sensible of this hateful sin as they then they have this man and that man this party and that party to reproach Fourthly And as Mr. Robert
of strict observing it And make New Duties and new sins which scripture makes not such II. Account all those ungodly that use set prayers or worship not God in the same manner as you do III. Brand all Dissenters with the odious names of graceleâ—s formaâ—ists That you may make them all seem unlovely to others IV. When this hath stirr'd them up to wrath call them wicked persecutors and have no communion with them V. Backbite and reproach all those as Compliers with sin or such as strengthen the hands of the wicked and the persecutors who would recal you to Love and Humility And cherish all sects be they never so erroneous or Passionate that will take your part and speak against them But First when the Wrath which you thus kindled hath consumed you Secondly or your Divisions crumbled you all to dust Thirdly and your scandals hardened men to scorn Religion to their damnation remember Wo to the world because of offences and wo to him by whom offence cometh Read Act. 20. 30. 1 Cor. 1. 10. 13. 3. 3. Rom. 16. 17 18. Iam. 3. 13 14 15 16 17. Study these on your knees I deny not but that our Antagonists in these Conâ—roversies may peradventure have met with some not â—nlike to Ithacius who mightily bending himself by â—â—ll means against the Heresie of Priscillian the haâ—red of which one evil was all the vertue he had ☜ became so wise in the end that every man carefull of vertuous conversation studious of the Scripture and given to any abstinence in diet was set down in his Kalender for suspected Priscillianist◠☜ For whom it should be expedient to approve thâ—ir soundness of faith by a more licentious and loose behaviour ☜ Such Prâ—ctors and Patrons the truth might â—are Yet is not their grossness so â—â—â—â—llerable as on the contrary side the scurrilous and more than satyrical immodesty of Marrinism the first published schedules whereof being brought to the hands of a grave and very honourable Knight with signification given that the Book would refresh his spirits he took it saw what the title was read over an unsavoury sentence or two and delivered back the Libel with this answer I am sorry you are of the mind to be solaced with these sports and sorrier you have herein thought my affection like your own FINIS Errata P Râ—f p. â— lin 23. for 〈◊〉 read not pag. 〈◊〉 l. 27. for enâ—â—ameâ—r enslave Contents p. 1. l. 14. dele to be p 2 l. 3. for timer true p. 3. l. 3. for own Church read outward Church p. 6. l. 28. for Solomons knowledge r. common knowledge p 7. l. 11 for their r. then p. 17. l. 32. r. christianity p. 26. l. 11. for moved r. proved p. 〈◊〉 15. for sâ—em r. serve p 9. l. 27 for they read the p. 95 〈◊〉 26. dele in p. 132. l. 19. read â—word thâ—m p. 144. l 11. for ever r. even p 162. l. 26. for them 〈…〉 p. 165. l. 4. for Historical read Histerical p. 16â— l. 1. read reveal 〈◊〉 p. 16â— l. penultu for is read in p. 180. l. 30 dele be p. 181 l. â— dele time p. 183. l. 20. read 20 years p 185. l. 30 read deâ—ectiâ—e p. 21â— l. 15. read 〈◊〉 p. 221. l. â— read 〈◊〉 taâ—â— p. 13â— l. â— read Independency p. 170. l. 13. read appealed p. 298. l. 27. for be read become A Catalogue of Books written and published by the same Author 1. THE Aphorisms 2. The Saints Everlasting rest in quarto 3. Plain Scripture proof of Infant Church-membership and Baptism in quarto 4. The right Method for a setled Peace of Conscience and Spiritual Comforts in thirty two Directions in octavo 5. Christian Concord or the Agreement of the Associated Pastors and Churches of Worcestershire in quarto 6. True Christianity or Christ Absolute Dominion c. in two Assize Sermons preacht at Worcester in twelves 7. A Sermon of Judgement preacht at Pauls London Decemb. 17. 1654. new enlarged 12o. 8. Making light of Christ and salvation too oft the issue of Gospel-Invitations manifested in a Sermon preached at Lawrence Iury in London in octavo 9. The Agreement of divers Ministers of Christ in the County of Worcester for Catechiâ—ing or Personal Instructing all in their several Parishes that will consent thereunto containing 1. The Articles of our Agreement 2. An Exhortation to the People to submit to this necessary work 3. The Profession of Faith and Catechism in octavo 10 〈…〉 The Refoâ—med Pastorâ— shewing the nature of the Pastoral work especially in private Instruction and Catechizing in octavo 11. Certain Disputations of Right to Sacraments and the true nature of visible Christianity in quarto 12. Of Justification four Disputations clearing and amicably defending the Truth against the unnecessary Oppositions of divers Learned and Reverend Brethren in quarto 13. A Treatise of Conversion preached and now published for the use of those that are strangers to a tâ—ue Conversion c. in quarto 14 One sheet for the Ministery against the Malignants of all sorts 15. A winding-sheet for Popery 16. One sheet against the Quakers 17. A second sheet for the Ministery c. 18. Directions to Justices of Peace especially in Corporations to the discharge of their duty to God c. 19 The crucifying of the World by the Cross of Christ c. in quarto 20. A call to the Unconverted to Turn and Live and accept of mercy while mercy may be bad as ever they would find mercy in the day of their extremity From the Living God To be read in Families where any are unconverteâ—◠〈◊〉 21. Of saving Faith That it is not only gradually but specifically distinct from all Common Faith The Agreement of Richard 〈◊〉 with that very Learned consenting Adversary that hath maintained his Assertion by a pretended Consuâ—ation in the end of 〈◊〉 Shepheards Book of Sincerity and Hypocâ—â—â—â— in quarto 22. Directions and Perswasionâ— to a sound Conversion c. in octavo 23. The Grotian Religion discovered at the invitation of Mr. Thomas Pierce in his Vindâ—cation With a Preface vindicating the Synod of Dore from the calumnies of the new Tiâ—â—nus and David Peter c. and the Puritans and Sequestrations c. from the censures of Mr. Pierce in 〈◊〉 24. Confirmation and Restauration the necessary means of Reformation and Reconciliation c. in octavo 25. Five Disputations of Church-Government in quarto 26. A Key for Catholicks to open the jugling of the Jesuites and satisfie all thaâ— are but truly willing to understand whether the cause of Roman or Reformed Churches be of God and to leave the Reader utterly â—nexcusable that after this will be a Papist in quarto 27. A Treatise of Self-denial in quarto 28. His Apology against the Exceptions of Mr. Blake Kendal Crandon Eires L. Moulinâ— in quarto 29. The unreasonableâ—ess of Infidelity in four partâ— c. in octavo 30. The Worcester-shire 〈◊〉 to the Parliament for the Ministery