Solomon in defining her to be the true Mother that could not endure that the Child should be divided and killed And whatever Church is cruell and remorsless in either Temporall persecution or the Eternall damnation of such men as believe in Christ according to the plain and easie meaning of the Scripture and live accordingly she may approve her self to be an imperious Harlot but no discerning spirit will ever take her for the true Mother that new Ierusalem which is the Spouse of Christ or Wife of the Lamb. Wherefore those are very weak Christians that are so low-belled by this terror as to be taken up and captivated by the Church of Rome and acknowledge her the mother-Church by force of that Argument that demonstrates the contrary to say nothing of their disingenuous abuse of the Charity of the Reformed Churches But for my own part I confess that for sureness I had rather exercise my Charity in wishing them Converts from Popery then express any great confidence of their being safe in that Religion Not that it is possible for me who cannot infallibly demonstrate to my self that all that lived under Paganisme are certainly damned to imagine that all that have gone under the name of Papists have tumbled down into Hell But the case is much like that in Shipwrack on the sea or Pestilence in a City where we will suppose not a house free no man can pronounce that it is impossible that such or such a person should escape nor that any of them are in any tolerable safety The danger is alike to them that adhere to the Apostate Church for though there be a possibility of some mens being saved by an extraordinary or miraculous Providence they breaking through all those impediments and snares that are laid in their way and attaining to a Dispensation above the Church they live in as haply some under Paganisme did yet it cannot be denied but that the Oeconomie of that Church naturally tends to the betraying of Souls to Eternall destruction that falling out which our Saviour said of old of the Pharisees They compass sea and land to make one profelyte and when he is made he becomes twofold more the child of the devil then themselves For he will not stint his Hypocrisie in Religion by the measure of their gain that invented the forme and submit to it for their End but for his own namely that he may excuse himself from all reall holiness by keeping to the observation and profession of their vain inventions And thus are the Commandements of God made of none effect by their Traditions In brief the whole frame of that Church is fashioned out so near to the ancient guise of Idolatrous Paganisme or else to the liveless and ineffectual forme of Judaisme both which Christ appeared on purpose to destroy as either contrary or ineffectuall to Salvation and does explicitly recommend to the world a pure and spirituall worship that we should worship the Father in Spirit and in truth or lastly is so full of Contradictions and Impossibilities in their feigned Stories and imperiously-obtruded Opinions that the natural result of being born under such a Religion or of turning to it is either to become a besotted Superstitionist to believe or do any thing that others will have him to do which is a sign the Spirit of Regeneration has not yet passed upon him and that there is no life nor light in him or else which is too frequent to turn down-right Atheist it being so grosly discernable that the Tenents of their Church are impossible and their Practices fraudulent fitted chiefly for filthy lucre and their Ceremonies useless thankless and ridiculous And therefore if any be saved in the Church of Rome they are such as are not truely of it but above it and fend for themselves as well as they may by some pardonable sleights of Prudence accompanied with an impregnable innocency of Spirit and readiness of doing all possible good they can they sparing their own lives and liberties upon no other account then that and out of a perswasion that he that commanded them to be wise as Serpents as well as innocent as Doves has given them no commission inconsiderately and to no purpose to betray themselves into the power of his usurping Enemy But for others that are perfect Papists and swallow down all that Church proposes to them without chewing or distasting any thing it is a Demonstration there is no Principle of life in them but that they are like dead earthen pitchers which receive poison and wholesome liquors with a like admittance And if there be no principle of life there is no seed of Salvation in a man For it is most certainly true and the Scripture it self doth witness to it That unless a man be born from above he cannot see the kingdome of God That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit This is the new Creature that is created in wisdome righteousness and true holiness The first of which the Church of Rome expunges in that it gives no leave to a man never so regenerate to judge for himself but he must say as the Church sayes right or wrong and for the other two all their superstitious Ceremonies put together adde nothing to them but rather stifle and sufflaminate them Again S. John tell us That he that hates his brother is in the dark and walketh in the dark and knows no whither he goes But others may know it as appears by another saying of the same Apostle Every one that hates his brother is a murderer and no murderer hath eternall life abiding in him But on the contrary he affirms That Love is of God and that he that loveth is born of God and knowes God Now to apply the Case to these Rules If Love be an essential Character of a Regenerate soul and Hatred of Errour Darkness and Eternal Death or to come yet closer If Hatred it self be Murder what will Murder it self be added thereunto And if any thing be Murder I demand whether this be not namely to take away the life of a member of Iesus Christ who does fully and freely profess the Ancient and Apostolick Faith according to the Letter or History of the New Testament and does seriously compose his life according to the Precepts therein contained and does onely declare against and reject the Contradictious Opinions and Idolatrous Practices that have no ground at all in Scripture nor Reason but are quite contrary to both I say if this be no Murder there is no Murder in the world and how guilty the Church of Rome is of this Crime all the world knowes Wherefore this being one of the Principles of that bloudy Church and he that is a perfect Papist being of one mind and suffrage with his Church in all things for she will be held no less then Infallible 't is apparent that no through-paced Papist can ever go to
that convenience of them which we have alledged we question not but that it is lawfull in it self where there is no Command from God to the contrary And where his Command is most express as it is to the Nation of the Jews yet it is very well known that there was also there a religious use of Images as is plain in the Cherubims that covered the Mercy-seat and the Brasen Serpent which they were to look up to in the wilderness For through that did the Almighty exert his healing power upon those that were stung with fiery Serpents For such Effects as these are not from Nature or Art but from the efficacie of Religion as the very word Telesme does plainly bewray Now it seems to us a thing incredible that God should command any thing absolutely evil in it self and therefore undeniable but that the use of Images in Divine worship is not in it self evil 7. Nor does that which is mainly and most ordinarily alledged against Images in Religious worship viz. That it is impossible to represent God by any outward figure seem of any weight at all to us For neither do we admit that these Images are intended for Figures and Representations of God but only for the Sensible setting out to our sight the Effects and Objects of those Powers and Attributes which we adore in him And if we did admit it yet we have wherewith to defend our selves For it we are not to use Images in Divine worship because they cannot set out the Nature of God as he is in himself we are not at all to think of him when we worship him the Thoughts concerning his very Nature or Person which we frame of him though haply they be not without some truth having yet as little similitude with him whom we worship as the Imagination of a man born blind hath with the glorious Image of the Sun He feels indeed the comfortable Effects of his presence upon his body but his Eyes did never see nor can his Mind conceive how illustrious he is to look upon 8. To this purpose the most witty cautious and subtile sort of the Pagans apologize for themselves nor are we to envy them if they hit upon any thing more weighty and substantial in their Apologie For Christianity is so excellent in it self that we need not phansy any Religions worse then they are the better to set off its eminency Besides the more tolerable sense we can make of the affairs of the ancient Pagans the easier Province we shall have to maintain against prophane and Atheistical men to whom if you would grant That Providence had utterly neglected for so many Ages together all the Nations of the world except that little handfull of the Iews they would whether you would or no from thence infer That there was no Providence over them neither consequently no God it being a thing incredible that there should be any Providence at all in things of the highest concernment unless it dispread it self further then into such an inconsiderable part of the World as some imagine But that the Heathen were not so utterly destitute of means as some would make them S. Paul seems largely enough to declare in his Epistle to the Romans And that their condition was not so horridly desperate he may perhaps seem to intimate from that favourable expression in his Speech to the Athenians where he saith God connived at the times of their Ignorance But I had almost forgot my self my design being not to apologize for the Heathen but to answer what they apologize for themselves which I shall doe very briefly CHAP. V. 1. An Answer to the last Apology of the Pagans as first That it concerns but few of them 2. and that those few were rather of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then pure Pagans 3. That the worship of Images is expresly forbid by God in the Law of Moses 4. That they rather obscure then help our conceptions of the Divine Powers 5. That there is great danger of these Images intercepting the worship directed to God 6. He referrs the curious and unsatisfied to the fuller Discussions in Polemical Divinity 1. FIrst therefore we are to consider that what has been here alledged in defence of the Pagans concerns but very few of them the generality of them being Idolaters in the grossest sense as is manifest out of the complaints of David Psalm 135. as also out of the Epistle of Ieremy and other places 2. Secondly It is questionable whether those few such as Pythagoras Socrates Plato Plotinus Plutarch and the like are to be reputed mere Pagans or whether they came nearer to the nature of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having been imbued with the Knowledge of that one Eternal Spirit which is the Creator and Governor of all things by conversing with the Iews or by conversing with them that had conversed with them And that they had the Knowledge of Him by the communication of some such hidden Tradition or Cabbala seems manifest in that these more holy and more expert men in Divine Mysteries amongst the Heathen taught also the Triunity as well as the Immateriality of the Godhead I mean the First and Chiefest of them such as Pythagoras and Plato which being a reach above humane wit and a thing so usefull to be taken into Christianity is to me a strong Argument that it was none of their own invention but that they had it either from those that were inspired themselves or had received it from those that were inspired 3. Thirdly The making of graven Images and falling down before them is a thing expressly forbidden to the people of God in that Religion where himself thought fit to appear in the framing of it which is an evident sign of the faultiness of the Use of Idols in Divine worship 4. Fourthly The pretended serviceableness of Images for the instructing the people and the setting out to them the nature of that Divine Power which they are to adore seems very questionable For the presence of so strange an object before their eyes striking the outward Sense so strongly may rather hinder the inward operation of their Mind from more pure and genuine conceptions of God then at all further them in the framing of them and as Memory is too often lost by the use of writing so the power of Imagination as to Divine things may be spoiled and enfeebled by these false props of external representations 5. Fifthly and lastly There is a great danger of which the Jealousie of God seems very sensible that these Vice-Royes and Representatives of the Divine Majesty as they would have them to be may prove treacherous to the highest Soveraignty intercepting and keeping to themselves all those Praiers and Praises all those immolations and sacrifices that are offered by the people For the unskilfull Multitude seeing the Priest sacrifice and all the people pour forth their devotions with their eyes fixed on the Idol
not look then like a piece of irreligious rudeness which is truly a kinde of Prophaneness to expect that Almighty God and his Son Jesus Christ should give us the meeting in squalid and sordid places even then when we pretend most to shew our Reverence and Devotion to him For though we may make bold one with another to meet where we please yet we making our approaches to God in those places and he thereby making his special approaches to us for in a Philosophical sense he is every where alike questionless it cannot but be an expression of our Reverence unto him to have the Structure of the place proportionably capacious well and fairly built and handsomely adorned and as properly and significantly of our Religion and devotional homages we owe to our crucified Saviour as can be without suspicion of Idolatry or any scandalous Superstition For it is true from the very light of Nature which the knowledge of Christ does not extinguish but direct and perfect That Houses of Publick worship ought to have some Stateliness and Splendour in them expressive of the Reverence we bear to the Godhead we do adore And therefore the Christian Magistrate for the honour of his Saviour who suffered so much shame for him as also for making Christian Religion more recommendable to them that are without for Religion will not seem Religion to any without Publick worship nor a desirable Religion unless this Publick worship be performed with inoffensive Splendour and Decency ought to assist and abett such good practices as these 3. It is beyond the limits of my present Discourse to make any curious inquisition or determination concerning the particularities of this Publick Worship though I cannot abstain from giving some general hints concerning the due managements of the chief matters thereof such as are most obvious to think of and most useful to consider And such are the Enquiries into the nature of the Place of this Publick worship and the Holiness thereof and our Demeanour therein and especially of those chief performances of Preaching Praying Receiving the Sacrament of Baptisme also and of Holy-days To which we may adde those accessory helps of Devotion as some account them Musick and Pictures Concerning which I shall rather simply declare my sense of things then solicitously endeavour to demonstrate my Conclusions by over-operose Reasonings which will but raise a dust and provoke the Polemical Rabble 4. Concerning therefore this House of Publick Worship the Christians meet in I conceive there is no need to phansie it a Temple nay rather it seems fit to look upon it as no Temple the use of that Ceremony being antiquated by the excellency and supereminency of our Religion For the famed Iehovah is not now a Topical Deity nor Christ confined to this or that City or People but is the declared Worship of the whole Earth and is not contained within the wals of any Temple but has his personal Residence in Heaven whither our Devotions are to be directed and our Mindes suspended and lifted up thitherward not debased nor defixed to the corners of any earthly Edifice into which when a man looks he findes nothing worthy of adoration To which Truth both Stephen and Paul give their suffrage the one declaring to the Iews the other to the Areopagites That the most High who is Lord of Heaven and Earth dwelleth not in Temples made with hands And our Saviour himself to the Samaritan woman who was solicitous which of those Temples that of Samaria or that of Ierusalem was the right place of Worship he tels her plainly that such Topical or Figurative worshipping of God was shortly to cease That the hour was coming and then was when the true Worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in truth For the Father seeketh such to worship him God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in truth that is by the inward Sanctity of their Souls and with the true service of Prayers and Praises and Alms-deeds of which Incense and Sacrifices were but the figures and shadows Let my prayer be set forth before thee as Incense and the lifting up of my hands as the Evening Sacrifice To do good and to communicate forget not for with such Sacrifices God is well pleased And lastly S. Iohn in his Apocalyps describing the condition of the New Ierusalem which is the Church of Christ in her best state I saw saith he no Temple there for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the Temple of it That is their worship is directed immediatly towards God and Christ not to any place as the Jews ever worshipped toward the Temple of Ierusalem 5. But though the nature and name of a Temple does not belong to this House of Publick worship according to the sense of Scripture which made also the Primitive Christians carefully abstain from that nomination yet I do not see any ground at all why some of our phanciful Sects should take offence at the name of Church applied thereto For the Church being an house wherein we meet to serve the Lord whether God the Father or Christ his Son both which are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this house is naturally there from denominated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek whence is our English word Church as every trivial Grammarian can tell them 6. But now it being thus plain that it is an house for Divine worship and therefore has a special relation to God though it be not dedicated in such a solemn manner as Solomon's Temple yet it does necessarily contract a kinde of Holiness hereby and by this Holiness some measure of respect namely that it should be kept in handsome repair and be carefully defended from all foulness and nastiness both within and without And because Custome has appropriated it to the service of God unless very great necessity urge it is not to be made use of to any other purposes Those that are otherwise affected in this matter may justly seem guilty of a kinde of Incivility against God as I may so call it and hazard the being accounted Clowns in the sight of the Court of Heaven and all the holy Angels As that also might be reputed a piece of unskilfulness and obsolete Courtship to complement any one part of this House as if there were the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there and the Ark of the Covenant For this would be to turn the Church of Christ into a Temple Wherefore those that at their entrance into the Congregation either kneel down or standing do their private devotion and continue bare-headed before Divine Service begin they mean not this Devotion to the Edifice but testifie only with what fear and reverence they make their approaches to God and their Hearts being in preparation to a nearer approach shew their sense of his coming nearer to them by this reverential observance For Veneration is done at the coming of great
for the poor by chearful Obedience to our Superiours and abundance of kindness and discreet condescensions one to another by unspotted Righteousness and an unshaken Peace by the removal of every unjust yoke by mutual forbearance and bearing up one another as living stones of that Temple where there is not to be heard the noise of either axe or hammer no squable or clamour about Formes or Opinions but a peaceable study and endeavour of provoking one another to love and good works Provided this be the Idea of those happy Ages to come the inculcating of this belief in my judgement cannot but be very useful it bearing along with it both a detection and reprehension of the degeneracy of the present Age and a warmth and encouragement to hasten those good times by endeavouring to correct our lives according to this Pattern we have of them 20. That also will be accounted a Defect by some that I have said no more of Publick worship and nothing at all of Church-government But I must again answer That it was beside my Scope to meddle with such things To which I may adde That the world is full of such Controversies and as much said already as either Wit or Zeal can excogitate My design was onely to represent Christianity in the Fundamentals thereof with that purity and clearness as might most of all conciliate belief and strengthen our Faith in the most necessary points such as concerned every private Christian to believe and to live accordingly to the end that though the iniquity of the times should have proved such that he knew not whither to turn him or whom to joine withall in any publick worship or profession yet he might rest satisfied in this that he was immutably grounded in the saving Truths of the Gospel and was able to give an account of his Faith to himself and to as many as were fit to receive it and living uprightly might not be affraid to find himself alone knowing that every single man is a Church if his Body once become the Temple of the Holy Ghost My onely solicitude therefore was to corroborate that Faith that is plainly propounded to us out of the Scripture which is sufficient to Salvation and to exalt that Life that has lyen dead and buried for these many Ages under a vast heap of humane Inventions useless and cumbersome Ceremonies and unpeaceable Opinions not at all doubting but that if the Life of Christ were once awakened in the world he that clothes the lilies of the field and adornes the birds of the aire with their severall comely and orderly-disposed colours will not be wanting to such a Church as has the principle of life in it self but that it will grow up into such an external forme and comeliness in all points as most befits and are the most proper results of those Vitall operations in it Whenas the best Externals without these are but as the skin of an Animal stuffed with wooll or straw 21. But besides that it was beyond my scope it was also above my abilities to give judgement concerning the curiosities of Church-government it depending upon studies too tedious and voluminous for the strength of my Body as also very little gratefull to the rellishes of my Mind whose Genius has irresistibly carried me captive into another country and a quite different scene of Speculations and Objects All therefore that I could with confidence and safety have pronounced is That in general Church-government and Discipline is as assuredly jure Divino as the Civil Magistrate and it may be should have adventured to adde That in a Christian polity the power of appointing and ordering things in the Church is lodged in the Supremacy of every such Body Politick and that all degrees Ecclesiastick are but Under-ministers to this Supreme Power who is Head of all next to Christ. That this Supreme Power is to regulate the affairs of the Church as near to the Prescripts and Practices of the Apostolick times as they can guesse unless those Practices and Prescripts may be conceived to have been founded upon such a constitution of the Church as is not in the present affairs of this or that part of Christendome which is concerned That if the External forme of Church-government were of such mighty consequence as that this ought to be called Antichristian that reputed jure Divino and that it were essential to a true Church to have such or such a kind of Government rather then another Christ would have left more express command and direction concerning it that the Church might not be liable to erre in so fundamental a matter That the main end of Church-government and Discipline is the countenancing and promoting the Christian Life and an holy observation of such Precepts of Christ as do not make men obnoxious to the secular Law by the transgressing of them to keep out also Idolatry and every errour or superstitious practice that tends to the supplanting or defeating the Power of the Gospel and that therefore we ought rather to be solicitous about managing this government to the right end then disturb the peace of the Church by over-scrupulous examination of the exteriour frame thereof That if Christ had left an exact Platforme of Government and the Church kept to it if the above-said end were not aimed at in the management thereof but in stead of being a countenance and encouragement to reall Godliness it should be directed to the upholding of useless or mischievous Opinions scandalous Ceremonies and ensnaring Inventions of men the more exactly they kept to this outward platforme of Christ the more plainly they would discover themselves to be Antichristian that is a pretended Christian power against the reall interest of Christ and that conjunction of the Horns of the Lamb with the voice of the Dragon would more evidently appear That Church-discipline and Government is as a Fort or Castle of excellent use if it be in the hands of the faithfull souldiery of Christ or as a safe Vessell for precious liquour or as restringent and corroborative Physick where there is an unexpected evacuation of the serviceable supports of life But if Traitours to the Kingdome of Christ get possession of this Castle poison be mingled with this precious liquour and foul and malignant humours be lodged in the Body it were more desirable the Castle were ruined the Vessell broken the Physick cast down the sink and the Body left free to the course of Nature then that things so hatefull and pernicious should be continued and conserved by them that is to say It were better that Christian Religion were left to support it self by the innate evidence of its own Truth then being sophisticated with vain lies and wicked inventions be forcibly maintained for other Ends then it was intended for nay be made to serve contrary Ends and prove a Mystery of tyranny and ungodliness and that therefore the first and chief point is to make
themselves yet to be so streight to one another as not to acknowledge that mutual Right seems enormously harsh and unchristian For we all agreeing in the Truth of the Scriptures which certainly are sufficient to Salvation since the Belief and Practice of what is plain in them will not fail to carry a man to Heaven what an unreasonable thing is it that there should be that hatred and persecution against those that God so well approves that he will save them and Christ so dearly loved that he gave his life a ransome for them Again there being also a necessity as I have said in the Persecuted of thinking as he does and an uncertainty in the Opinions that the Persecutour would promote as being demonstrable by neither Reason nor Scripture how unwarrantable an action is it to do a certain injury for an uncertain conceit To all which you may adde That the Love of Knowledge is but the work of the Devil how much more then is bitter Zeal and brawling about it but the depretiating of humane devices tends much to the exaltation of true Sanctity that mask of Hyprocrisie patcht up of empty Opinions and Formalities being by this means torn off and leaving the face bare that their Complexion may be more discernable how pure and sincere it is or how unsound cadaverous and deformed And lastly a mutuall agreement of bearing with one anothers dissents in the Non-fundamentals of Religion is really a greater Ornament of Christianity then the most exact Uniformity imaginable it being an eminent act or exercise of Charity the Flower of all Christian graces and the best way I think at the long run to make the Church as Uniforme as can justly be desired For if true Christian Love could once get the rule in the Hearts of men the Apostle will undertake for her that she shall do nothing unseemly For Charity is indeed the Mother of Unity and bond of Perfection and he that is really spirited thereby I dare promise for him that he will never oftentate his Sanctimony by a pretended queziness of Conscience as if he had a more delicate sense and a more peculiar discernment in things appertaining to Godliness then others have But whatever a good round force would urge him to out of love to himself and his own safety he would not fail of his own accord to comply therewith out of the love of Order and the Reverence he bears to the authority of the Church he lives under Nor on the other side would the Church ever offer to obtrude upon her children what is either false or useless For they both of them being once imbued with that Divine sense we speak of cannot but be well assured That neither Circumcision nor Uncircumcision availeth any thing but Faith working by Love And whosoever walketh by this Rule peace be upon him and upon the true Israel of God H. M. From my Study at Christs Coll. in Cambridge Iune 12. 1660. AN EXPLANATION OF The grand Mystery OF GODLINESS CHAP. I. 1. The Four main Properties of a Mystery 2. The first Propertie Obscurity 3. The second Intelligibleness 4. The third Truth 5. The fourth Usefulness 6. A more full Description of the Nature of a Mystery 7. The Distribution of the whole Treatise 1. EVery legitimate Mystery comprehends in it at least these Four Properties It is a piece of Knowledge First competently Obscure Recondite and Abstruse That is It is not so utterly hid and intricate but that in the Second place It is in a due measure Intelligible Thirdly It is not only Intelligible what is meant by it but it is evidently and certainly True Fourthly and lastly It is no impertinent or idle Speculation but a Truth very Usefull and Profitable We may well add also for some Religious End 2. This Obscuritie and Abstruseness makes not only the Mystery more solemn and venerable to those to whom it is communicated but hides it also from their eyes that are not worthy to partake thereof From whence some Criticks have derived Mysterium from the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to hide Which is well aimed at as to the sense But others with more judgment in Grammar acknowledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be a proper Greek word and fetch the Derivation of it from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they to whom it is communicated are to keep silence and not to impart it to unmeet persons And in this sense Chrysostome expounds Mysterium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A matter wonderfull unknown and not to be easily or rashly communicated to others 3. Nor indeed could it be at all if it were utterly Unintelligible Wherefore Intelligibleness adds this further requisite also to a Mystery that it thereby becomes Communicable to such as are fitly prepared to be instructed therein For which reason the Etymologists give also this Notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is to teach and instruct a man in Divine matters so far forth as the party is fit to receive Hence is also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mysta a Scholar or Commencer in Divine Mysteries one that is more slightly imbued in the knowledge of such Holy things 4. But there is afterward a clearer manifestation and a fuller satisfaction and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being now more firmly ascertained of the Truth which he did but obscurely apprehend before From which Clearness and Certainty of the thing represented there necessarily arises a full and free assent of his Understanding without any further doubt or hesitancy the Proverb being made good in this case That Seeing is Believing 5. But that there may not be a mere dry Belief without any love or liking of the Object thereof we added also that this Mystery is not only certainly True but very concerningly Usefull and Profitable which though the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it self does not implie yet another in the same language and of the like sense does which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Initiations into sacred Mysteries The Usefulness whereof a Platonist admirably well describes not without a verbal allusion in this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which if we would render it in our more familiar language sounds thus The scope or aim of all Religious Mysteries is the bringing back faln man into his pristine condition of Happiness and to lead him again to that high station which he then first forsook when he preferr'd his own Will and the pleasure of the Animal life before the Will of God and that Life and Sense which is truly Divine 6. Wherefore not to dwell too long on the threshold we conclude briefly and in general that a Mystery is a piece of Divine knowledge measurably Abstruse whereby it becomes more Venerable but yet Intelligible that it may be Communicable and
True and Certain that it may win firm Assent and lastly very Usefull and Effectual for the perfecting of the Souls of men and restoring them to that Happiness which they anciently had faln from that so near a Concernment may as well gain upon their Affections as the Evidence of Truth engage their Understandings and so the whole man may be carried on to a devout embracement of what is exhibited unto him by the knowledge of his Religion 7. What we have thus Generally proposed we shall now applie more Particularly and more fully prosecute those Four primary Properties in that Grand Mystery of Godliness which we call Christianity distributing our Discourse into these Four main Parts The First whereof shall insist somewhat upon the Abstruseness and Obscurity of our Religion the Second upon the Intelligibleness of it the Third upon the Certainty of it and the Fourth on the great concerning Usefulness thereof To which we shall add what Considerations we think fittest concerning the Secondary Properties which emerge out of these Primary ones CHAP. II. 1. That it is fit that the Mystery of Christianity should be in some measure Obscure to exclude the Sensuall and Worldly 2. As also to defeat disobedient Learning and Industry 3. And for the pleasure and improvement of the godly and obedient 4. The high Gratifications of the Speculative Soul from the Obscurity of the Scriptures 1. THat there is a considerable Obscurity and Abstrusenesse in Christian Religion is easily made evident as well from the Cause as the Effects of this Obscurity For besides that from the common nature of a Mystery Christianity ought to be competently Obscure and Abstruse that it may thereby become more Venerable and more safely removed out of all danger of contempt we cannot but see what a speciall Congruity there is in the matter it self to have so holy and so highly-concerning a Mystery as our Religion is Abstruse and Obscure For that Divine wisdome that orders all things justly ought not to communicate those precious Truths in so plain a manner that the Unworthy may as easily apprehend them as the Worthy but does most righteously neglect the Sensuall and Careless permitting every man to carry home wares proportionable to the price he would pay in the open market for them And when they can bestow so great industry upon things of little moment will not spare to punish their undervaluing this inestimable Pearle by the perpetual losse of it For what a palpable piece of Hypocrisie is it for a man to excuse himself from the study of Piety by complaining against the Intricacies and Difficulties of the Mystery thereof whenas he never yet laid out upon it the tenth part of that pains and affection that he does upon the ordinary trivial things of this world 2. Thus are the careless voluptuous Epicure and over-careful Worldling justly met with But not they alone For the Obscurity of this Mystery we speak of is such that all the knowledge of Nature and Geometry can never reach the Depth of it or rellish the Excellency of it nor all the skill of Tongues rightly interpret it unless that true Interpreter and great Mystagogus the Spirit of God himself vouchsafe the opening of it unto us and set it on so home in our Understandings that it begets Faith in our Hearts so that our Hearts misgive us not in the profession of what we would acknowledge as True For as for the outward Letter it self of the Holy Scriptures God has not so plainly delivered himself therein that he has given the staff out of his own hands but does still direct the humble and single-hearted while he suffers the proud searcher to lose himself in this Obscure field of Truth Wherefore disobedient both Learning and Industry are turned off from obtaining any certain and satisfactory Knowledge of this Divine Mystery as well as Worldliness and Voluptuousness According as our Blessed Saviour has pronounced in that devout Doxology I thank thee O Father Lord of heaven and earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes Even so Father for so it seemed good in thy sight 3. Nor are the Wicked onely disappointed but the Godly very much gratified by the Intricacy of this sacred Mystery For the Spirit of man being so naturally given to search after Knowledge and his Understanding being one of the chiefest and choicest Faculties in him it cannot be but a very high delight to him to employ his noblest endowments upon the divinest Objects and very congruous and decorous they should be so employ'd Besides the present Doubtfulness of Truth makes the holy Soul more devout and dependant on God the onely true and safe guide thereunto From whence we should be so far from murmuring against Divine Providence for the Obscurity and Ambiguity of the Holy Scriptures that we should rather magnifie his Wisdome therein We having discovered so many and so weighty Reasons why those Divine Oracles should be Obscure The wicked thereby being excluded the due Reverence of the Mystery maintained and the worthy partakers thereof much advantaged and highly gratified 4. For what can indeed more highly gratifie a man whose very Nature is Reason and special Prerogative Speech then by his skill in Arts and Languages by the Sagacity of his Understanding and industrious comparing of one place of those Sacred pages with another to work out or at least to clear up some Divine Truth out of the Scripture to the unexpected satisfaction of himself and general service of the Church the dearest Faculty of his Soul and greatest glory of his Nature acting then with the fullest commission and to so good an end that it need know no bounds but Joy and Triumph may be unlimited the Heart exulting in that in which we cannot exceed viz. the Honor of God and the Good of his people All which gratulations of the Soul in her successful pursuits of Divine Truth would be utterly lost or prevented if the Holy Scriptures set down all things so fully plainly and methodically that our reading and understanding would every where keep equal pace together Wherefore that the Mind of man may be worthily employ'd and taken up with a kind of Spiritual husbandry God has not made the Scriptures like an artificial Garden wherein the Walks are plain and regular the Plants sorted and set in order the Fruits ripe and the Flowers blown and all things fully exposed to our view but rather like an uncultivated field where indeed we have the ground and hidden seeds of all precious things but nothing can be brought to any great beauty order fulness or maturity without our own industry nor indeed with it unless the dew of His grace descend upon it without whose blessing this Spiritual Culture will thrive as little as the labour of the husbandman without showres of rain CHAP. III. 1. The Obscurity of the Christian Mystery argued from the Effect as from the Iews
of this blessed happy condition Which designe is of so high consequence that I shall hold my self very defective in my treating thereof unless I adde also what would be serviceable for direction touching the entrance into this New Covenant we have described and for our advance and progress in the same Which we shall doe by shewing the adequate Object thereof the true Principle that moves us to covenant and the most effectual means to make us faithfull pursuers of what we first purposed and agreed to CHAP. VIII 1. The adequate Object of saving Faith or Christian Covenant 2. That there is an Obligation on our parts plain from the very Inscription of the New Testament 3. What the meaning of Bloud in Covenants is 4. And answerably what of the Bloud of Christ in the Christian Covenant 5. The dangerous Errour and damnable Hypocrisie of those that would perswade themselves and others that no performance is required on their side in this Covenant 6. That the Heavenly Inheritance is promised to us only upon Condition evinced out of several places of Scripture 1. THE adequate Object of saving Faith or Christian Covenant For I mean by Covenant our faithfull and sincere closing with the terms of the Gospel is that which we ordinarily call The New Testament that is to say those concerning Truths that are there upon record as well Precepts as Promises all these are to be believed and assented to Or to speak yet more comprehensively All that Christ is said there to have done or suffered to have acted or procured for us whatever good he has done for us already or promised for the future on his part this is to be believed without any evil suspicion or wavering And what on our part is required to be done is also with a free and plenary purpose of minde to be accepted and promised and with all stedfastness and sincerity to the utmost of our power to be endeavoured after without any fraud or tergiversation without any elusive tricks or perverse misconstructions of the holy Precepts of the Gospel 2. For the very Inscription of this Record we call the New Testament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bears before it the Notion of a Covenant that is of mutual obligation though it may also signifie a New Law Which title would more roughly confute those Hypocritical Flatterers both of themselves and their Followers who by their deceitfull Interpretations would make them believe that nothing is expected on our hand in this Gospel-dispensation And besides a Law is not for nothing defined in Aristotle by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Covenant it being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Lycophron has defined it The Law being our common sponsour or undertaker that there shall be just dealing betwixt party and party Nor can they decline the truth we aim by pretending that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is only the New Testament in such a sense as relates to dying men and therefore may signifie a right conveied to another without any mutual obligation For in this sense it cannot be called a New Testament because there was no Old one answering to it For the Law of God or Covenant by Moses could not be called a Testament in this sense For God the Father did not die nor is Moses his Law any Legacy or last Will and Testament in reference to Moses his death 3. It remains therefore that Christianity is an obligatory Covenant whereby party is tied to party that is God to man and man to God that the Mediatour of this Covenant is Iesus Christ whose bloud shed upon the Cross is the bloud of this Covenant as your most sacred and solemn Covenants amongst the Nations and with the Jews too were as I have above intimated with the sprinkling of bloud Which Ceremonie of sacrificing and effusion of bloud was nothing but an insinuation of a mutual imprecation or commination of the highest evil to one another if they dealt treacherously in the Covenant Grotius produces an ancient form of the Pagan Religion which is express to this purpose Qui prior defexit tu illum Iupiter sic ferito ut ego hunc porcum hodie feriam tantóque magis quanto magis potes pollésque And so the Trojans and Graecians making a solemn Covenant and religiously obliging one another to stand to the terms thereof upon the sacrificing of lambs and pouring out a drink-offering to the Gods one uttered this Imprecation or Commination indifferently to either party that should prove false 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thrice great and glorious Iove and ye the Gods His Heavenly Senators which of these twain First break this solemn League and fall at odds As doth this Wine so may their scattered Brain Pash'd from their cursed sculls the pavement stain 4. From this general notion and meaning of the Bloud in the sanction of Covenants we may the better understand what is the meaning thereof in that Covenant which God has made with us through the bloud of Christ. For at his last Passion he called the Wine his bloud of the New Covenant to be shed for many for the remission of Sins that is for peace and reconciliation betwixt God and man But in these solemn Leagues Pacifications and Covenants which were made with bloud though it were a Ceremonie of agreement yet the effusion of bloud did not cease to be of a comminatory signification for those that were faithless in their Covenant So it is also much more with the bloud of the Son of God As the peace is of higher concernment so is the breach of Covenant of the greater danger This the Authour to the Hebrews does expresly take notice of and shews that upon wilfull misdemeanours and perverse revoltings from God the expiatory and pacificatory virtue of the bloud of Christ then ceases and the comminatory part takes place Hebr. 10.26 For if we sin wilfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins but a certain fearfull looking for of judgement and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries He that despised Moses law died without mercy under two or three witnesses Of how much severer punishment think ye shall he be thought worthy who hath troden under foot the Son of God and hath counted the bloud of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing and hath done despight unto the Spirit of grace And therefore as S. Peter speaks 2 Epist. 2. It had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness then after they have known it to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them Which persons he decyphers in he foregoing verse That they were such as had escaped the pollutions of the World through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ but were again entangled therein and overcome being brought into the bondage of sin by giving place to the deceitfull doctrines of
Christian Magistrate if he can supply himself with those that are 3. That the Christian Magistrate is to lay aside the fallible opinions of men and promote every one in Church and State according to his merit in the Christian life and his ability promoting the interest of the Church of Christ and the Nation he serves 4. That he is to continue or provide an honourable and competent allowance for them that labour in the word and doctrine 5. That the vigilancy of the Christian Magistrate is to keep under such Sects as pretend to Immediate Inspiration unaccountable and unintelligible to sober Reason and why 6 That the endeavour of impoverishing the Clergy smels rank of Prophaneness Atheisme and Infidelity 7. That the Christian Magistrate is either to erect or keep up Schools of Humane Learning with the weighty grounds thereof 8. A further enforcement of those grounds upon the fanatick Perfectionists 9. The hideous danger of casting away the History of the Gospel upon pretence of keeping to the Light within us 1. TO come to a Conclusion therefore and to touch the Point we have aimed at all this time What a Christian Prince or the Supreme Magistracy may contribute to the advancement of the Gospel of Christ From these general Principles we may inferre First that he is to give Liberty of Conscience to all such as have not forfeited it namely such as I have last of all described especially if they be Natives of the place were it possible for them to be of any Religion then Christian. But withall to require a publick and solemn account of their change of Religion wherein it may appear whether it be Conscience or Design or humour that makes them Apostatize Which either fraud or giddiness shall make the party obnoxious to such rebuke and penalty as may probably deterre the people from the like causeless revolts But if the person be of a serious life and shall be found to have changed his opinion upon such grounds of Reason as though false yet may possibly mislead a wel-meaning man yet for sureness he shall be put upon his Oath Which test though it be abused to over-petty matters yet certainly must not loose its due use in causes of so solemn importance In which kind of cases if any refuse upon a pretended scrupulosity of swearing at all and in an affectation of seeming more precisely holy then others without question it is not Religion but some fathomless depth of knavery that lies at the bottom and they may justly be suspected of some treasonable and treacherous design against the Religion and Government under which they live Wherefore before they should have liberty to profess themselves of another Religion they should be required to take a solemn Oath with a deep Imprecation of Divine vengeance upon Soul and Body that nothing moves them thereto but mere conviction of Conscience and that they have no secular design at all in their change nor desire any more liberty then what they think themselves bound in conscience to allow to others Which publick Examination and Oath is very useful also and justifiable upon mens relinquishing of the publick worship of God in the Churches though they do not professedly declare themselves to be no Christians For not to joyn with them in publick worship is the next door to that Apostasy This practice would be of infinite advantage for the Truth of Christianity For hereby the Priesthood will be more cautious how they clogge the Gospel with unwarrantable trumperies and those that would revolt by this calling them to an account first shall be forced to feel the strength and solidity of that Religion they would bid adieu to and their secret designes prevented by the solemnity of an Oath And lastly the Christian Magistrate by giving this liberty after these due circumstances which assuredly he will have very seldome occasion for by reason of the Evidence of our Religion will avoid the justifying the iniquity of other Religions who not by power of Reason and Conscience but by outward Force hinder their Natives from turning Christians 2. But Secondly Though these serious people shall not be deprived of their Liberty Lives or Estates nor any way impaired in their private fortunes yet they shall be disabled from bearing any Office of trust in the Commonwealth especially if there be of the Christian Religion that will manage them with equal skil and fidelity For it is plainly unnaturall if not impossible that a man that is serious in his Religion should not prefer one of his own Faith before a Stranger if in other things they be equal Besides that the Lawes of Caution and Prudence cannot fail to suggest so reasonable a choice which are very much to be listned to in things of this nature For present possession of power is better assurance then the Oath of well-meaning but withall of temptable and lapsable Mortals 3. Thirdly The Christian Magistrate is to give no assistance of his power nor countenance any further then Christianity it self is concerned that is to say He is to give that assistance which is due from a Magistrate for the defending and promoting of our Religion so far forth as it is plainly discoverable in the written Word of God in the Literal and Historical meaning thereof For to cant onely in Allegories is to deny the Faith of Christ. And as for Opinions though some may be better then othersome yet none should exclude from the fullest enjoyment of either private or publick Rights suppose there be no venome of the Persecutive spirit mingled with them But every one that professes the Faith of Christ and believeth the Scripture in the Historical sense thereof let his Opinions be otherwise what they will he is according to his life worth and ability every where to be preferred in either Church or State Which is absolutely the most advantageous way for the advancing of the Gospel and making the World good that the Wit of man can find out And External Force being so unfitting in it self and most of all unbecoming the Christian Magistrate in matters of Religion what one might fancy lost in laying aside Persecution would in as great a measure be regained by countenancing this free and naked Representation of the Beauty and Perfection of the Gospel quite rid of all pretended Traditions and whatever obfuscations and entanglements of humane Invention For then the Truth of God would be like an unsheathed sword bright and glittering sharp and cutting and irresistibly convincing the rational Spirit of a man Whenas now our Religion is wrapt up in so many wreathes of hay and straw that mo man can see nor feel the edge of it 4. Fourthly Being Compulsion is not to be used nor Prudence excluded For it is the same fanatical madness to exile Prudence out of affairs of Church and State as to exclude Reason and Mathematicks out of Philosophy it is very plain that the Christian Magistrate is engaged to adde to Liberty
when others in civil respect put it off are the main Effects of that Spirit that distinguisheth you from others of the Nation 3. Is this therefore the great purchase you have obtained by turning your back on Christ and contemning of his Person to grow rude and clownish to all the World beside But methinks I hear you answer again As for this man we know not what is become of him but behold the Spirit is sensibly present amongst us even at this day But I demand by what Signs O we shiver and quake every joynt of us But that is no certain signe of the Spirit of God Was not the winde suddenly turned into the North or had you not an Ephemera or was not your over-excited Choler entangled or turned out of the way by Phlegme or Melancholy What miraculous power is there in all this O but there are also amongst us that have fallen down into a trance that have foamed and swelled till their buttons break off Wherefore of a truth these men could not but be full of the Spirit and this be a Miracle indeed If your Religion oweth not its growth to the tricks of Juglers and Tumblers or to artificial Epilepsies I do confesse it is a Miracle from these Symptomes if Satan himself drives not on the designe For these are plainly the passions of Pythonicks such a kinde of possession as seized the Pagan-Prophets and Priests of old who were no better then the worshippers of Devils whose Oracles Christ has silenced long since Wherefore examine your selves if you glory not in your shame See how you tread look behinde you or rather search within you who is the Prompter or first Mover in this new Scene of things 4. For tell me I beseech you what did your foaming Prophets when they vented themselves discharge into your ears whereby they may be deemed more Divine then those Fanatick Pagans Was not their continual song so soon as they got upon their feet the burning up of all Ordinances From whence therefore could this voice come but out of the flames of hell or what could swell the bodies of your Inspired but the venome and poison of the Devil which at last working up to their mouths he spit out enviously against the worship of Christs Person and all his holy Offices Which is another evidence against you that your pretended Inspirations are not divine but diabolical and that the mystery of Satan worketh amongst you who would fain pull down Him whom of a truth God hath set up to be a King and Priest to the Nations for ever 5. But the sweetest satisfaction of all is that you are so extraordinarily illuminated that you understand all the Mysteries of Christs kingdom better then any one else and can in a supercilious pity bemoan the ignorance of the World or with an imperious bitterness fly in their faces and reproach them for it especially the Teachers of the people that they have not taken up your Allegorical knacks nor know how to give a mystical meaning of the Gospel from the preaching of Iohn the Baptist to the coming of Christ to Judgement But you are indeed so unilluminated as not to understand that such devices as these are merely Allusions of humane Wit and help very little to the enforcing of that they are made to signifie namely Repentance and Mortification of every evil lust and concupiscence and a renovation of our mindes into the perfect image of Christ that his spirit may rule in us and that the works of death and darknesse may be utterly destroied For this Truth is plainly and literally contained in the Scripture so that if your mindes were not more set upon fancies then savoury instruction you need not run a gadding after any new Guide for the attainment of this light And God be thanked many honest plain-hearted Christians that do not swagger and make such a noise with Mystical phrases as you both hear and live according to these Gospel-Precepts using a secret and silent severity upon themselves not acting the rough and hairy Baptist upon others as you do who love to oâ—tentate your self-chosen austerities to the eyes of the world like the Pharisees who made sowr faces for fear the people should not take notice that they afflicted their bodies with fasting What purchase therefore have you got by your Allegorical Mysteries unlesse you have been emboldned thereby to let go the Historical truth of the Gospel and have found your selves much at ease that your belief is not charged with such miraculous things as are written of Christ partly done already and partly to be done at the end of the World For hereby you do proclaim your selves Infidels and that for all your boasting your spirits are so foul and impure that they are no fit receptacles of the holy Christian Faith but that you have levelled your selves as low as Epicures and Atheists who are no more capable of the belief of these things then the Beasts of the Field 6. If it be thus with you I dare appeal unto you whether you keep so precisely to the light within you but that you have consulted with that blinde Guide H. Nicolas and tasted of the treacherous sops of his abhorred Passover whose Fanatick boldness has led the dance to this mad Apostasy Have you not celebrated his detestable Phase who has gone about to perswade the World that the greatest and truest Arcanum of the Lords Supper is Iudas-like to betray their Master to kill Christ according to the flesh that is to lay aside and misbelieve the Truth of his History Ask your own hearts if the warmth of this sop has not so encouraged you nay inflamed you with insufferable bitternesse against the Ministers of Christ as teaching nothing but lies because they have not ceased to believe the Truth Has not this with him that entred in with it so intoxicated you with rage that you have trampled the holy Bible under your feet Is it not this that hath made you so often roar against and revile the Preacher in the Pulpit and disturb the publick Assemblies by your rude and frantick interpellations Which Extravagancies demonstrate by what Spirit you are led and that you are plainly Rebels against Christ and are revolted to the Powers of the dark Kingdom 7. These things I could not forbear to write as being very much pressed in Spirit thereunto For the Light within me that is my Reason and Conscience does assure me that the ancient and Apostolick Faith according to the Historical meaning thereof is very solid and true and that the Offices of Christ are never to be antiquated till his visible return to Judgement according to the literal sense of the Creed and that Familisme is a mere Flam of the Devil a smooth tale to seduce the simple from their Allegeance to Christ. And therefore I beseech every man in these daies of Liberty to take heed how they turn in thither especially those that are of an