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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67882	The way to peace amongst all Protestants: being a letter of reconciliation sent by Bp. Ridley to Bp. Hooper, with some observations upon it. Licensed, July the 14. 1688.	Johnson, Samuel, 1649-1703.; Ridley, Nicholas, 1500?-1555.; Hooper, John, d. 1555.	1688 (1688)	Wing J847A; ESTC R3678	9,940	11

else to do Or as Ridley's words are When the World so furiously rageth against the Grounds and substantial points of our Religion in these our days Is it a time for us to trouble our heads with trivial matters when the sum and substance of our Religion is in danger and lies at stake For have we not lately seen the Papists laying the Axe to the root of the Tree and the weekly Representer in particular for several Weeks successively Ridiculing and making Sport with our Bible which is the whole Religion of Protestants Does he not say that we have as many Bibles as Heads that is to say That the Bible it self without their Infallible Blind Guides to interpret it is wholly Useless to us and every Man may as well frame a several Religion of his own Head without any Bible at all Truly if it be so Useless and so Mischievous a Book as that Author has Represented it it is not enough to put a stop to the Printing of it but it ought also to be Prohibited Do they not daily make Scandalous attempts and efforts against the Trinity of Divine Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost in whose Names we are Baptized only because we will not also believe in a Breaden God Almighty In a word Do they not endeavour to wrest all Scripture out of our Hands because we will not receive their false and forged Traditions with the same Reverenc● Our present Business therefore is to lay a dead hold upon our Bibles and to maintain the Grounds and Substantial Points of our Religion and to suffer Circumstances and By-matters to take their Chance Nay we ought to be in a readiness to Compound for our Bibles and rather to throw all Ceremonies over-board with our own Hands than to endanger the Protestant Religion which is infinitely more Valuable And though I know not of any one Ceremony injoyned in the Church of England which is not both Lawful and Primitive and of an elder date than Popery yet because the Slovenly Papists have spit in them and by corrupting and abusing them have endeavoured to make them their Own I hope the Wisedom of the Nation may hereafter suffer them to be so Especially since all wise Protestants know very well that we can Live without them And we ought the rather to be of this mind because 3. In the third place we see to what Terms of Abatement and Accommodation that Blessed Martyr Ridley has descended in these following words Howsoever in time past in certain By-matters and circumstances of Religion your Wisdom and my Simplicity I grant hath a little jarred each of us following the abundance of his own Sense and Iudgement Ridley had sincerely followed his own great Judgement in this Dispute but because that Judgement had jarred with the Sense of as Hearty a Protestant as himself therefore you see how he undervalues and disparages it We take it for granted that Hooper was in the wrong and Ridley was in the right especially because a Law had interposed in that behalf And yet here it seems that the two Contending Parties were Hooper's Wisdom and Ridley's Simplicity A little of these Good Mens inward humility self-denial and mutual condescension would heal our Breaches and compose our Differences much better than the most strict outward Uniformity could For as the Levelling project to make all Mens Estates Equal was only a Project for a Day for on the Morrow all their Estates would have been Unequal again Whereas Contentment is that standing Leveller which makes every man always as rich as another In like manner a perfect Uniformity in these Circumstances and By-matters if it were possible to be attained would not last long because as our Church in the Preface to the Common-Prayer has wisely observed Rites and Ceremonies are in their own nature Alterable and Changeable according to the variety of Times and Occasions whereby they are Expedient at one time and Inexpedient at another for which reason even the same Persons and those the most Constant the farthest from newfangledness cannot be always alike satisfied with them much more they will be sure to be Liked and Disliked by several Persons according to their several apprehensions who must needs differ about them But on the other hand a mutual forbearance allowance and condescension in these By-matters would supply the place of a perfect Uniformity to the worlds end I must confess that Ridley says these Diminishing things of himself in the absence of the Law and after those Statutes which enacted these Ceremonies were Repealed and swallowed up by Popery For which cause it cannot be Expected That the Church of England-Clergy should make such Condescensions at this time as Ridley did and acknowledge their Simplicity in adhering to the Laws For Laws while they are in Being have as much Reverence due to them as is owing to the wisdom of the whole Community by which they were made and nothing else but our Preingagements to God himself can excuse us from the observance of them And therefore it cannot be required by the Dissenters in order to that good Understanding which I here endeavour and humbly beg there may be amongst Protestants that we should arraign Five and twenty Statute Laws at once under the Infamous Name of Draconica Especially when by one of the Draconica the whole Church of England and under the Covert of the Church of England all the Dissenters in England hold their Bibles● No Every wise and considerate Protestant though he be not a Nonconformist would rather lie under all the penalties of Non-conformity than go about to weaken or undermine the Authority of the Laws which secure to all Protestants their Lives and a much greater thing than their Lives I mean the Bible which I say again is the whole Religion of all Protestants As for By-matters they may very well be left where the Law for Ages Immemorial has lodged all the Concerns of the English Church which is in a Lawful English Parliament whose necessary Power in that behalf appears by the very Writ both of their Summons and of their due Election And in the mean time notwithstanding our different apprehensions about them let us love one another And which brings me to the next point 4ly Let us mutually express our selves in the following words of the Blessed Martyr Now I say be you assured that even with my whole heart God is my Witness in the bowels of Iesus Christ I love you in the Truth and for the Truth's-sake which abideth in us and as I am perswaded shall by the Grace of God abide in us for evermore Men that love the Truth for God's sake will love other Men for the Truth 's sake which they all Profess And I am satisfied that this was the reason which moved Hooper to seek first to Ridley and to prevent him with two kind Letters before his present Answer was written For when Hooper saw Ridley stand up as a Champion for the

The WAY To PEACE AMONGST All Protestants Being A LETTER Of RECONCILIATION Sent by Bp. Ridley to Bp. Hooper With some Observations upon it Licensed July the 14 1688. LONDON Printed for Richard Baldwin 1688. Books lately Printed for Rich. Baldwin PVrgatory prov'd by Miracles Collected out of Roman-Catholick Authors With some remarkable Histories relating to British English and Irish Saints With a Preface concerning the Miracles 6 d. The Tryal of Philip Stansfield Son to Sir Iames Stansfield of New-Milns for the murther of his Father and other Crimes Libell'd against him Feb. 7. 1688. 1 s. The Revolter A Tragi-Comedy Acted between the Hind and Panther and Religio Laici c. 6 d. An Historical Relation of several Great and Learned Romanists who did embrace the Protestant Religion with the Reasons of ●heir Change delivered in their own Words Collected chiefly from the most Eminent Historians of the Roman Persuasion to which is added a Catalogue of several Great Persons of the Roman Catholick Religion who hath all along oppos'ed the Tenents of the Church of Rome 6 d. A Seasonable Discourse shewing the Unreasonableness and Mischiefs of Impositions in Matters of Religion Recommended to Serious Consideration By Andrew Marvell Esq late Member of Parliament 6 d. Reflections upon the New Test and the Reply thereto with a Letter of Sir Francis Walsingham's concerning the Penal Laws made in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth 3 d. A Letter of Advice to a Young Lady being Motives and Directions to establish her in the Protestant Religion Written by a Person of Honour and made publick for the use of that Sex. 3 d. A Seasonable Collection of Plain Texts of Scripture in words at length against several Points in the Romish Religion for the Use of English Protestants 2 d. they may be able to do good to many Farewell in the Lord my most dear Brother and if there be any more in Prison with you for Christ's cause I beseech you as you may salute them in my Name To whose Prayers I do most humbly and heartily commend my self and my fellow Prisoners and Captives in the Lord And yet once again and for ever in Christ my most Dear Brother farewell N. Ridley Some Observations upon the foregoing Letter There cannot be a more Blessed Work than to Reconcile Protestants with Protestants And a man would think it should be one of the Easiest because we are able to say to them as Moses did to the two contending Israelites Sirs Ye are Brethren why do ye wrong one to another The meekest Man in all the Earth took another course with the Egyptian but as for Brethren he endeavoured all he could to set them at one again This is the only Design of this Paper in laying before you the Example of two Protestant Bishops who wisely found out the way to put an happy period to their unhappy Differences Which are the very same as have been since taken up by Protestants again af●er those two Good Men had laid them down In the struglings of Ridley and Hooper there were two Nations strugling in the Womb the two great Parties of the Conformists and Nonconformists For those two Persons differed about the self-same matters as we do now the establish'd Ceremonies the dress of Religion certain By-matters and circumstances of Religion which Hooper the Nonconformist could not comply with And Ridley the Conformist because they were according to Law insisted upon and would not abate So that in their old Differences we find exactly our present distemper And therefore in their Cure why should we not also find our own Remedy It is an Approved remedy it cured men who thought one another Superstitious and Imposing on one side and stubborn and intolerably willful on the other side And yet they came afterwards to Believe one another to be as they Really were Upright Men on both sides We have the Receipt in these few but very weighty words But now my Dear Brother forasmuch as I understand by your Works which I have but superficially seen That we throughly agree and wholly consent together in those things which are the Grounds and substantial Points of our Religion against the which the World so furiously rageth in these our days Howsoever in time past in certain By-matters and Circumstances of Religion your Wisdom and my Simplicity I grant hath a little jarred each of us following the abundance of his own Sense and Iudgment Now I say b● you assured that even with my whole heart God is my witness in the Bowels of Christ I Love you in the Truth and for the Truths-sake which abideth in us and as I am perswaded shall by the grace of God abide in us evermore 1. The first Consideration which arises from these words is this That the Agreement there is amongst Protestants in the main matters of Religion should drown and extinguish all lesser Differences The Substance of Religion which we all hold ought in reason to have more power to Unite us than all the By-matters and Circumstances in the world to Divide us We have all but one Rule of Faith and Life one Standard of Religious Worship and Practice which is one and the same English Bible And why should we not then All be of One Heart and One Soul We all believe that there is one God in opposition to Polytheism We believe that this God is to be worshipped in Spirit and in Truth in contradiction to Idolatry without absurdly changing the Glory of the Incorruptible God into the similitude of a Corruptible Man or worshipping our Maker in form of Bread. We all believe in the Father Son and Holy Ghost in whose Names we are Baptized We are all taught of God to Hope for everlasting Happiness through the merits of our only Redeemer Mediatour and Advocate Iesus Christ the Righteous who is the Author of eternal Salvation to all those that Obey him We are all assured by many Infallible proofs that he is gone to Heaven to prepare a place for all his true Disciples and Followers And that the Heavens must contain him till the r●stitution of all things And that therefore He is not in any Tabernacles or Boxes here below We all know assuredly That in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh Righteousness is accepted of him And that the Church of God is not now limited or confined to the Iewish or to any other Nation but is truly Catholick and Universal We all believe the two future states of Heaven and Hell for the Just and for the Unjust And neither our Books nor we know of any other nor indeed of any other sorts of Men Nor do any of us believe one word concerning the Profitableness of singing for a Soul. In a word since we are so Unanimous in these and many other the most important Truths shall we fall out about Ceremonies about Postures and Gestures about the Hatt and the Knee about dignifiing and distinguishing Titles about Garbs or Garments about Modes and

Fashions and things which are very far from the Heart and many removes from the Essence of Religion nay things which are Shadows and meer Nothings when compared with the Substantial matters wherein we are Agreed Nay further I am bold to say we are all Agreed in these inferiour Matters of Difference and do not know it For instance we are all agreed That kneeling at the Sacrament is no part of our Saviour's Institution That kneeling at the most solemn Prayer that can be is a fitting posture That kneeling to the Sacrament in imitation of or compliance with the Popish worship of the Host is absolutely Unlawful And yet we squabble and will not hear one another out nor understand one anothers Meanings but scuffle in the Dark when we are all Friends and all of a side In short all the distance that is betwixt English Protestants is occasioned by little Mistakes and misapprehensions about very little matters and still they are so much of one mind even as to the matters in Difference that if the Conformists thought the Ceremonies Popish they would immediately turn Nonconformists and if the Nonconformists did not app●ehend them to be Popish they would never have scrupled them So that they both of them plainly mean the same thing Hooper scrupled the Ceremonies under the notion of Popish Ceremonies and under the same notion Ridley would have hated and rejected them Ridley and the other Bishops said in defence of these Ceremonies That they were small matters and that the Fault was in the Abuse of the things and not in the things themselves and that Hooper ought not to be so stubborn in so light a matter and that his Willfulness therein was not to be suffered And would not Hooper himself have passed the same Censure upon his own Refusal if he had had just the same thoughts and opinion of the Ceremonies But he thought that a thing in it self indiffe●ent but having been abused to Superstitious purposes could never after be lookt upon as indiff●rent and innocent but it must of necessity pass under that Notion which common and corrupt Usage had put upon it and that it was spoyled and had utterly lost its former Indifferency For which reason these Rites and Ceremonies were offensive to his Conscience as the King 's Grant of Dispensation to him by the Advice of the Privy Council expresses it But Cranmer and Ridley and the other Bishops were so far determined by the Laws that the King's Dispensation granted to Hooper upon that occasion did not take place Nor indeed was it in their power to admit of it For being these Ceremonies were Enacted by Law and fastened to the Freehold and made part of the Establishment by the Universal Consent of the Nation nothing but the same Consent could take them away again Now therefore the nicety of the Difference betwixt them lay in this whether Ceremonies which were once indifferent and had been abused might be so purged and freed from those Abuses as to become indifferent and fit to be used again And this is a matter so hard to be decided that it must be weighed in Gold Scales where the very least moment or even a Man's breath on the one side or the other is sufficient to incline the ballance For it is with indifferent Ceremonies and Usages as it is with Words that are indifferent The word Ballad was once an innocent and inoffensive word and signified as the word Song now does but the word has been abused and applied to the meanest and most rascally sort of Poetry and has for a long time been taken in the worser sense Suppose therefore that some Men desirous to speak as their Fore-fathers did who called the Book of Canticles the Ballad of Ballads as reverently as we now call it the Song of Songs should say That if Authority require that this word be used in its first and best sense why then we may very lawfully and reverently use it in that sense again Because though the word has been abused and ill applied yet the Fault is in the abuse of the word and not in the word it self And further that no man ought to refuse to read that Book upon this trifling account because he dislikes the Title of it Especially when a publick Law has declared That the self-same is meant by this Title as if the Dissenter had had the wording of it himself to his own Mind and had called it the Hymn of Hymns This is the substance of what Cranmer and Ridley said On the other hand Hooper's Opinion in this supposed Case was That though our Fore-fathers had used that word very Religiously and Reverently yet it had since been so corrupted and abused and had contracted so profane a Signification as no Authority could wholly deface nor could so inoffensively resto●e the word to be used in Religious Matters any more but that Sober Men would always hav● a Prejudice against it This was Hooper's very sense He looked upon the Reformed Ceremonies as still retaining a Popish Tang. But tho a Law could not cure his Prejudices yet that and the higher Considerations of doing Service in the Church of God did quite over-rule them And he wisely complied with those Ceremonies which if he had been left to his Choice he would rather have forborn Obj. But now it may here be objected and said That when the Clergy of the Church of England saw that good Men and great Men and the glorious Martyrs of Jesus Christ such as Hooper was were offended with these Ceremonies they should have used their utmost endeavours to have gotten them discharged by Law as they were imposed by Law and not have left them to remain as a standing offence and a perpetual Stumbling-block to all others of Hooper's mind Answ. This I confess would be an Objection very much to the Prejudice of the Church of England could it not be truly said that the Clergy did heartily endeavour to procure this ease to scrupulous Consciences though without success For all the eminent Bishops of England in Queen Elizabeth's time Sandys Iewel Horn Grindall c. nay Dr. Cox himself Bishop of Ely who was the unhappy occasion of all the Troubles at Franckfort did all of them labour in this point and could not prevail with the Queen to consent to it As appears by a heap of their Letters written to Bullinger at Zurick which is still extant Which being the Remains of those great Men and so noble a Monument of the Church of England's Moderation is very well worth the going thither to see it But to conclude make your best and your worst of Ceremonies they are in Ridle●'s words but Circumstances and By-matters they are of as little concern to Religion as those Meats which occasioned differences in the Apostles times and they will not bear the Charges of falling out about them either on the one side or on the other 2. Especially in the second place when Protestants have somewhat