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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A51154	An apology for the clergy of Scotland chiefly oppos'd to the censures, calumnies, and accusations of a late Presbyterian vindicator, in a letter to a friend : wherein his vanity, partiality and sophistry are modestly reproved, and the legal establishment of episcopacy in that kingdom, from the beginning of the Reformation, is made evident from history and the records of Parliament : together with a postscript, relating to a scandalous pamphlet intituled, An answer to The Scotch Presbyterian eloquence.	Monro, Alexander, d. 1715?	1693 (1693)	Wing M2437; ESTC R20155	87,009	107

leads them to do every thing against the Spirit and Practice of the Church and though the Canonical and Universal Methods of the Church are tempered with regard to our weakness and infirmities yet they love to fly in the Face of their Mother when she tenderly binds up their Wounds and offers her Assistance to prevent their Ruin and Danger I have almost forgot to enquire into the meaning of that distinction of occasional and fixed Communion Why may not one do that constantly since the Common Tyes of Christianity oblige him that he may do occasionally But if the meaning be that their Consciences allow them now and then to hear an Episcopal Presbyter Preach or Read though they dare not venture upon the highest Acts of Communion such as receiving of the Lords Supper at this rate they may have this occasional Communion with Papists Grecians Jews and Mahumetans for they all teach some great and common Truths which they dare not refuse But secondly It is apparent that the Scots Presbyterians are Schismaticks in the strictest Sense because by their Principles they must needs profess that if they had lived one hundred and fifty years before the first Council of Nice there was then a necessity to separate from the Unity of the Church For then all those things that they scruple at in the Publick Worship were practised by the Universal Church the Solemnities and Festivities the Publick Fasts the Altars the Hierarchy of Bishop Presbyter and Deacon Nay the Dignity of Metrapolitans is supposed as Ancient and Venerable by the first Council of Nice So upon the Presbyterian Hypothesis they should have been obliged if they had lived amongst the Ancients then to keep up distinct and separate Conventicles when the Purity of their Lives and the Glory of Martyrdom and Patience made them shine to the Confusion of their Enemies when their Zeal for God made them victorious over all the Powers of Darkness when by their Fastings and their Prayers they crucified the Flesh with all its Lusts and Affections when they taught the Gospel in its Majesty and Simplicity and bafled the Objection of the Pagans by their heavenly Conversation Let my Soul be with those first Christians I would chuse their Company at all adventures without the least fear of either Christmas Easter or Good Friday But thirdly The present Presbyterians must be Schismaticks by the Doctrine and Practice of their Predecessors This I have touched a little before Fourthly I desire the Presbyterians to name some Schismaticks in the Records of Ecclesiastical History that are now acknowledged by the common consent of all Churches to be Schismaticks and then I enquire what it was that made them such and if this be not agreeable to the Presbyterians more eminently than to any rank of the ancient Schismaticks I am mistaken But fifthly They themselves do not deny nor can they but that they are Schismaticks in St. Cyprian's Notion of Schism since to separate from ones own Bishop was a just and Apostolical Notion of Schism And the Presbyterians of Scotland are by so much the more inexcusable in that they have stubbornly and factiously Conspired against the Apostolical Hierarchy of Bishop Presbyter and Deacon The next thing that I remark is his Censure of the I piscopal Clergy for Preaching Morality pag. 62. and 63. He tells us that the Author of the Second Letter wrote That the Episcopal Party understand the Christian Philosophy better and that it was never understood or preached better in Scotland than under Episcopacy The Vindicator replies very wittily That he thought the Commendation of a Minister had been rather to understand Christian Divinity than Christian Philosophy But softly Sir I do not see that nice distinction between Christian Divinity and Christian Philosophy for if Philosophy be truely Christian it must be refined upon no lower Standard than the Morals that our Saviour practised and recommended and is not this Christian Divinity in it Nature and Tendency The Author of that Letter did not understand by Philosophy the lame and defective Systems of the Pagans but rather that Heavenly and Spiritual Rule delivered by our Saviour I hope he has not the Impudence to accuse the Clergy that they recommended the Pagan Morals as a perfect Rule of Life to their Hearers or that they themselves did neither believe nor exhort others to believe the Mysteries of Faith the Credenda of our Religion It may be they did fortifie some excellent Arguments among the Philosophers with Christian Motives and what the Philosophers who spoke of the Immortality of the Soul with dissidence and hesitation could not recommend but faintly the Christian Preachers did assert boldly since the Resurrection of our Saviour from the Dead was an invincible and infallible Argument not only of our Resurrection but of the Glory that shall afterwards be revealed There is nothing truly excellent among the Pagan Writers but what is in one place or other for the Matter found in the New Testament and purer Morals and greater heights than the Pagans could discern Nor can I think but that the Preachers of the Gospel may make very good use of Pagan Moralists I always thought Seneca a very excellent Book but if Seneca be Christianised as the Vindicator speaks I cannot see what fault the Vindicator can find with Seneca or Marcus Aurelius or any of our Ancient Friends For certainly Christian Morality in its true extent and latitude is nothing else but Evangelical Obedience and Holiness without which no man shall see God And I believe the Author of that Letter intended no more than that the Episcopal Clergy did plainly and seriously recommend to their Hearers the Reformation of their 〈◊〉 according to the Christian Standard And truly Sir notwithstanding the Vindicators Sarcastic Paraphrase I think this is very good Philosophy nay more I think Moral Philosophy never arrived at its true Elevation and Meridian Purity but by the Doctrine of our Saviour and his Apostles and does the Vindicator know better Philosophy than what is taught in the Sermon upon the Mount and in the 12th to the Romans we Preach that the Wisdom which is from above is pure peaceable gentle and easie to be entreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without hypocrisie we Preach that a man endowed with knowledge should shew out of a good Conversation his Works with meekness of Wisdom We Preach That if any seem to be religious and bridleth not his Tongue but deceiveth his own heart that this mans Religion is vain because true Religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the Fatherless and Widow in their Afflictions and to keep himself unspotted from the world We Preach that the Grace of God that bringeth salvation bath appeared to all men teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly Lusts we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world And truly Sir I think this very good Morality and

who can help it Why shall men give themselves the trouble to answer Books so accurately as the Vindicator pretends to do that there must not be a Cobweb in all their foldings unswept This put the Vindicator upon many impertinent Essays and if I had time to insist upon them I could furnish you with very pleasant Instances out of his Answers to Mr. Morer's Letter But the Vindicator must refute accurately and this obliges him to condescensions below Gravity and Manhood Every where we have visible marks of the Vindicators Genius every where he stoops so low when he has nothing to pick up but straws and broken Pins the Spirit of Contradiction eats out the vitals of his Soul and ever and anon puts him upon silly and extravagant importinencies For to nothing else can it be imputed than to his impardonable vanity his wishing this Sciolist or some other would attempt the refuting his Books I must confess I read his Vindications and his pretended Answer to the Ironicum and if he be not improved since he wrote those Tracts he deserves no particular Answer for his Explication of S. Jerom's Epistle and his Decretum praedamnatum of which hereafter are Indications of his groundless and illiterate Fopperies if he had defended himself by the common Pleas of learned Presbyterians he ought to be treated with Civility and Discretion but when he presumes to dictate either blasphemous Nonsence such as his decretum praedamnatum or visionary and childish Romances such as his fancy of the meaning of Ordinatio in S. Jerom's Epistle he should in this case be treated according to his Character for it is not possible that so much ignorance could dwell but in the company of so much Pride and therefore I appeal to all the Scots Presbyterians if ever they yet discovered any such monstrous Nonsence written or said by any man that pretended to have read but one System in his lifetime and yet this Mormo of a Scholar must forsooth strat with so much insolence and vanity as if he were teaching some Americans who were never acquainted with the civilized part of Mankind There have been many attempts used by different Parties to expose one another for their Ignorance and Immoralities but I defie all men to name one Instance of greater Ignorance either before or after the Reformation than this one Notion of his Decretum praedamnatum and yet forsooth he must pretend to explain and defend the Calvinian System and takes occasion by an innocent Sentence or two to thrust himself into this Scuffle without considering whether he understood the Controversie or not but I leave him to the Chastisement of others Good Nature and Christian Modesty teach us to hide and extenuate the weaknesses of others but when those very men pretend to give Rules to all mankind they ought to be put in mind that it is not yet time for them to appear so arrogant and presumptuous Affectation is the meanest Vice and an intollerable piece of Hypocrisie we are not so ugly by our natural defects as by the Accomplishments that we counterfeit and this is the Hereditary uncurable Disease of our Pedling little Reformers They cannot indure to follow the common Sentiments of Mankind they are all for heights and singularities He that walks not in the common Road where the way is safe must be silly and bypocondriack or proud and designing and therefore the Spirit of Christianity teaches us to believe and practice the indisputable Truths of our Religion more than the peculiar Opinions of broken Schismaticks and lesser Fraternities Sometimes I have had some kind Thoughts towards the Quakers but when I considered that they needlesly forsake the innocent Customs of Mankind the Universally acknowledged Rules of Decency and the Universal Tradition of the Church I must think that they are led by a Spirit of Delusion and Pride Nothing recommends us to God more than true Humility and it is an undeniable proof of Integrity and Self denial to comply with the innocent Customs of the World and therefore our Saviour left us an Example by which we may in the midst of all tentations live in the World and yet continue unspotted by its infection I have digressed two far not from what I designed but from the Vindicators account of things I am afraid I may get upon the Finger-ends because I did not name my Witnesses for the Latin Eleganeies that I lately mentioned but if he waites to the Bookseller whose name is prefixt he shall know as many Witnesses as are necessary and forty more such Barbarisms To end and to complete this Character of the Vindicator I might mention his apparent Shufflings and Tergiversations for when the Outrages done to the Clergy are open and notorious then he extenuates it as no great Injury when some of them were beat upon the Head and Legs and others of them made to go through deep waters in the midst of Winter But among all the Flights of his Invention there is none more remarkable than this unwary concession that Ecclesiastical Judicatories that enquire into Scandals are not obliged to follow the Forms of other Courts I thought that the Forms of Civil Courts were wisely appointed partly to prevent our being surprized partly to hinder as far as humane Prudence could prevent all Forgeries and Combinations against the innocent and that the Forms were but the external Fences that the Law invented to guard Justice and Equity But this Author tells us that it s doubted no doubt amongst Learned Men whether the Ecclesiastical Court be obliged to follow such Forms It is very odd that the Laity among the Scots Presbyterians who pretend to be at the greatest Remove from Popery shall thus calmly stoop to the most intollerable slavery of the Inquisition Next to this Concession is his fair Advertisement to the Church of England that indeed the Covenanters do not think themselves obliged to reform the Church of England unless they are called to it but if the Godly in England call them then all their Ammunition must be employed to serve their dear Brethren in England Next to this let me instance his shameful Shuffling about the Toleration lately granted to Presbyterians in Scotland he tells us that they expressed as much as they were capable their dislike of the Toleration given to the Papists for their Herosies and Idolatry yet their Agents then at Court wrote Books such as they were pleading that the Penal Laws ought to be Repealed but withal the Vindicator adds that they do not grudge Liberty to any others who can shew as good a Warrant for their way of Worship as they do i. e. they have a Divine Right for their way and none others can have a Divine Right if they have it because their way is different from all others and therefore at bottom they are against Toleration as the most mischievous thing in the World and in the time of the late Troubles they exclaimed against