A Christian Directory

CHAP. VI. Directions to the People concerning their Internal and Private Duty to their Pastors, and the improvement of their Ministerial Office and Gifts.

THe Peoples Internal and Private duty to their Pastors (which I may treat of without an appearance of • ncroachment upon the work of the Canons, Rubrics and Diocesans) I shall open to you in these Directions following.

§. 1. Direct. 1. Understand first the true Ground, and Nature, and Reasons of the Ministerial Office, or else you will not understand the Grounds, and Nature, and Reasons of your duty to them. The Nature and Works of the Ministerial Office I have so pl • inly opened already that I shall refer you to it to avoid repetition. H • re are two sorts of Reasons to be given you: 1. The Reasons of the necessity of the Ministerial work: 2. Why certain persons must be separated to this work, and it must not be left to all in common.

§. 2. 1. The Necessity of the work itself appeareth in the very Nature of it, and enumeration of the parts of it. Two sorts of Ministers Christ hath made use of for his Church: The first s • rt was for the Revelation of some New Law or Doctrine, to be the Churches Rule of Faith or Life: And these were to prove their authority and credibility by some Divine attestation; which was especially by Miracles; and so Moses revealed the Law to the Jews, and (Christ and) the Apostles revealed the Gospel. The second sort of Ministers are appointed to Guide the Church to salvation by opening and applying the Rule thus already sealed and delivered: And these as they are to bring no new Revelations or Doctrines of faith, or Rule of life▪ so they need not bring any Miracle to prove their call or authority to the Church: For they have no power to deliver any new Doctrine or Gospel to the Church, but only that which is confirmed by Miracles already. And it is impudency to demand that the same Gospel be proved by new Miracles by every Minister that shall expound or preach it: That would make Miracles to be no Miracles.

§. 3. The work of the ordinary Ministry (such as the Priests and Teachers were under the Law, and ordinary Pastors and Teachers are under the Gospel) being only to Gather and Govern the Churches, their work lay in Explaining and Applying the Word of God, and delivering his Sacraments, and now containeth th • se particulars following: 1. To Preach the Gospel for the Conversion of the unbelieving and ungodly world. And that is done, partly by expounding the words by a Translation into a tongue which the hearers or readers understand; and partly by opening the sense and matter. 2. In this they are not only Teachers, but Messengers sent from God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost to charge, and command, and entreat men in his N • me to Repent, and believe, and be reconciled to God; and in his Name to offer them a s • all • d pardon of all their sins, and title to eternal life. 3. Those that become the Disciples of Christ, they are (as his Stewards) to receive into his house, as fellow Citizens of the Saints, and of the Household of God; and as his Commissioned Officers, to solemnize by Baptism their entrance into the holy Covenant, and to receive their engagement to God, and to be the Messengers of God's Engagement unto them, and by Investiture to deliver them by that Sacrament, the pardon of all their sin, and their title by Adoption to • ternal life: As a house is delivered by the delivery of a Key, or Land, by a Twig and Turfe, or Knighthood by a Sword or Garter, &c. 4. These Ministers are to gather these Converts into solemn Assemblies, and ordered Churches for their solemn worshipping of God, and mutual edification, communion and safe proceeding in their Christian course. 5. They are to be the stated Teachers of the Assemblies, by expounding and applying that Word which is fit to build them up. 6. They are to be the Guides of the Congregation in public▪ Worship, and to stand between them and Christ in things pertaining to God, as subservient to Christ in his Priestly Office: And so both for the people, and also in their names, to put up the public Prayers and Praises of the Church to God. 7. It is their duty to Administer to them as in the Name and stead of Christ, his Body and Blood as broken and shed for them, and so in the frequent renewals of the holy Covenants to subserve Christ especially in his Priestly Office, to offer and deliver Christ and his benefits to them, and to be their Agent in offering themselves to God. 8. They are appointed to Overs • e and Govern the Church, in the public Ordering of the solemn Worship of God, and in r • buking any that are there disorderly, and seeing that all things be done to edification. 9. They are appointed as Teachers for every particular Member of the Church to have private and personal recourse to (as far as may be), for the resolving of their weighty doubts, and instruction in cases of difficulty and necessity, and for the settling of their peace and comfort. 10. They are appointed, as Physicians under Christ, to watch over all the individual Members of their charge, and take care that they be not infected with Heresy, or corrupted by vice; and to admonish the offenders, and reduce them unto the way of Truth and Holiness, and if they continue impenitent after public admonition, to reject them from the Communion of the Church, and command the Church to avoid them. 11. They are as to bind over the impenitent to answer their contumacy at the Barr of Christ, so to Absolve the penitent, and comfort them, and require the Church to re-admit them to their Communion. 12. They are appointed, as Stewards in the household of Christ, to have a tender care of the very bodily welfare of their flocks, so as to endeavor the supplying of their wants, and stirring up the rich to relieve the poor, and faithfully (by themselves or the Deacons) to distribute what is entrusted with them for that use. 13. They are especially to visit the sick, and when they are sent for, to pray for them and with them, and to instruct them in their special preparations for Death, and confirm them against those last assaults. 14. They are appointed to be the public Champions of the Truth, to defend it against all Heretical and profane opposers, and thereby to preserve the flock from being seduced. 15. They are appointed to be (under Christ the Head) the Nerves and Ligaments of the several Churches, by which they are kept not only in vigor by communication of nutriment, but also in Concord, and such Communion as they are capable of, by the correspondencies and consultations, and councils of their Pastors. All these are the distinct and special uses to which Christ hath appointed the Office of the Sacred Ministry: which having but named to you, I need to say no more to show you the Excellency, and Necessity, and Benefits of it.

§. 4. Herein also the Reasons are apparent, why Christ did institute this Sacred Office. 1. Because it was meet his Kingdom should have Officers, suited to his work in the Administration of it: 2. It was meet that they be Men, like ourselves, that we can familiarly converse with. 3. The great necessity of his Church required it, where the most are weak▪ and insufficient to perform all these Offices for themselves; and cannot well subsist without the support of others. It was meet therefore that the Pastors were selected persons, wiser, and holier, and stronger than the people, and fit for so great and necessary a work. 4. It was requisite also to the Order of the Church: For if it were like an Army without Officers, there would be nothing but confusion, and neither order nor edification.

§. 5 By this you may also see the Nature and Reasons of your Obedience to your Pastors: As they are not appointed to Govern you by force, but willingly, not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, not as being Lord's over God's Heritage, but as ensamples to the flock, so you must willingly and cheerfully obey them in their work. As their Government is not by and bodily penalties or mulcts (for that is the Magistrates work and not theirs) but a Government by the force of TRUTH and LOVE; so your Obedience of them consisteth in the Loving and Thankful reception of the Truth which they teach you, and the mercies which they offer you from Christ.

§. 6. You see then that the Reasons of your obedience are manifold: 1. Some of them from God: He hath sent his Messengers to you, and set his Officers over you; and Christ hath told you that he that heareth them heareth him, and he that despiseth them despiseth him, and him that sent him: He commandeth you to hear and obey them as his Officers. 2. From themselves: They have Authority by their Commission, and they have Ability in their qualifications, which require your obedience and improvement. 3 From yourselves: Have you reason to obey your natural Parents on whom your livelihood in the world dependeth? Have you reason to obey him that tendereth you a Pardon from the King when you are condemned? o • that offereth you Gold or Riches in your want? or that inviteth you to a feast in a time of famine? or that offereth to defend and save you from your enemies? Much more have you reason to obey Christ's Ministers when they call you to Repentance, and offer you pardon of sin, and peace, and salvation, and eternal life. Did you ever hear a man so mad or churlish, as to say to one that offered him Riches, or Liberty, or Life, I am not bound to obey you: Offer them to those that you have authority over! When the Office of the Ministry is as well subservient to Christ as a Savior and Benefactor, as to Christ as your Teacher and your King, the very nature of their work engageth you to obey them as you Love yourselves. If you were in Hell and Christ should send for you out, you would not refuse to go, till the Messenger had proved his authority: And when you are the Heirs of Hell, condemned by the Law, and going thither, will you refuse to turn back, and yield to the offers and commands of Grace, till you have skill enough to read the Ministers Commission?

§. 7. By this also you see, that the power of your Pastors is not absolute, nor coercive and Lordly but Ministerial: And though the Papists make a scorn of the word [ Minister ] it is but in that pride, and p • ssion, and malice which maketh them speak against their knowledge: For their Pope himself calleth himself the Servant of God's Servants; and Paul saith, 1 Cor. 4. 1. Let a man so account of us as of the Ministers of Christ, and Stewards of the Mysteries of God, 1 Cor. 3. 5. Who then is Paul, and who is Apollo, but Ministers by whom ye believed, 2 Cor. 3. 6. Who made us able Ministers of the New Testament. 2 Cor. 6. 4. In all things approving ourselves as the Ministers of God: Even Magistrates, yea, and Angels are not too good to be called (and used as) the Ministers of God for the good of his servants, Rom. 13. 3, 6. Heb. 1. 7. and to minister for them shall be heirs of salvation, Heb. 1. 14. Yea, Christ himself is so called, Rom. 15. 8. And therefore you have no more excuse for your disobedience, than for refusing his help that would pull you out of fire or water when you are perishing. You see here that your Pastors cannot command you what they list; nor how they list: They have nothing to do with the Magistrates work; nor can they usurp the Power of a Master over his Servants, nor command you how to do your work and worldly business (except in the Morality of it). In the fifteen particulars before mentioned their work and office doth consist, and in those it is that you owe them a rational obedience.

§. 8. Direct. 2. Know your own Pastors in particular: and know both what you owe to a Minister as a Minister of Christ in common, and what you owe him moreover as your Pastor by special relation and charge. When any Minister of Christ delivereth his Word to you, he must be heard as a Minister of Christ, and not as a Private man: But to your own Pastor you are bound in a peculiar relation, to an ordinary and regular attendance upon his Ministry in all the particulars before mentioned that concern you: Your own Bishop must in a special manner be obeyed:

1. As one that laboreth among you, and is over you in the Lord, and admonisheth you, and preacheth to you the Word of God, watching for your souls as one that must give account, 1 Thess. 5. 12. Heb. 13. 7. 17. and as one that Ruleth well, and especially that laboreth in the Word and Doctrine, 1 Tim. 5. 17. teaching you publicly and from house to house, taking heed to himself, and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made him an Overseer, not ceasing to warn everyone night and day with tears. Acts 20. 19, 20, 24, 28, 31, 33. Preaching Christ, and warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom, that he may present every man perfect in Christ, Col. 1. 28.

2. He is to be obeyed as the Guide of the Congregation in the management of God's public worship: you must seriously and reverently join with him every Lord's Day at least in the public Prayers and Praises of the Church, and not ordinarily go from him to another.

3. You must receive from him or with him, the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ: which of old was administered every Lord's Day, and that only in the Church where the Bishop was, that is, in every Church of the faithful: for as Ignatius most observably saith [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ] UNUM ALTARE OMNI ECCLESIAE, ET UNUS EPISCOPUS CUM PRESBITERIO ET DIACONIS —IN EVERY CHURCH there is ONE ALTAR, and ONE BISHOP, WITH THE PRESBYTERY and DEACONS—] So in his Epist. ad Magnes. [ Come all as one, to the Temple of God, as to one Altar, as to one Jesus Christ: ] And saith Tertullian, [ Eucharistae Sacramentum—nec de aliorum manu quam praesidentium sumimus ] We take not the Sacrament of the Eucharist from the hand of any but the President.

4. You must have recourse to him especially for the resolution of your weighty doubts, in private.

5. You must hear your Bishops and Repent, when in Meekness and Love they convince and admonish you against your sins, and not resist the Word of God which they powerfully and patiently lay home to your Consciences, nor put them with grief to cut you off, as impentient in scandalous sins, from the Communion of the Church.

6. You must after any scandalous sin which hath brought you under the censure of the Church, go humble yourselves by penitent confession, and crave absolution and restoration to the Communion of the Church.

7. Your public Church-alms should ordinarily be deposited into the Bishops hands, who relieveth the Orphans and Widows, and is the Curator or Guardian to all absolutely that are in want, saith Ignatius to Poly • . cited by Dr. Hammond on 1 Cor. 12. 28.

8. You must send for him in your sickness to pray with you and advise you: See Dr. Hammond on James 5. 14. And on 1 Cor. 12. 28. he saith, [Polycarp himself speaking of the Elders or Bishops saith, They visit and take care of all that are sick, not neglecting the Widows, the Orphans or the poor: ] And Dr. Hammond on I am. 5. 14. showeth out of Antiquity, that [ One part of the Bishops Office is set down that they are those that Visit all the sick: ] Not but that a stranger may be made use of also; but ordinarily and especially your own Bishop must be sent for: Because as you are his special charge, and he watcheth for your souls as one that must give account, Heb. 13. 17. So it is supposed that he is better acquainted with your spiritual state and life than others are, and therefore in less danger of wronging you by mistake and misapplications: For its supposed that you have acquainted him with your personal condition in your health, having taken him as your ordinary Counselor for your souls, and that he hath acquainted himself with your condition, and confirmed you, and watched over you by name, as Ignatius to Polycarp Bishop of Smyrna saith [ Saepe Congregationes fiant: ex nomine omnes quaere: servos & ancillas ne despicias ] (as Bishop Ushers old Latin Transl. hath it) [Let Congregations be often held: Enquire after all by name: Despise not Servants and Maids. ] The Bishop took notice of every Servant and Maid by name; and he had opportunity to see whether they were in the Congregation.

9. You must use him as your Leader or Champion against all Heretics, Infidels and subtle adversaries of the truth, with whom you are unable to contend yourselves, that your Bishop may clear up and defend the cause of Christ and righteousness, and by irresistible evidence, stop the mouths of all gain-sayers. It is for your own benefit, and not for theirs, that you are required in all these works of their office to use them and readily obey them. And what hurt can it do you to obey them in any of these?

§. 9. Direct. 3. Understand how it is that Christ doth authorize and send forth his Ministers, lest Wolves and deceivers should either obtrude themselves upon you as your lawful Pastors, or should alienate you from th • se that God hath set over you, by puzzling you in subtle questioring or disputing against their call. Not only Paul's warnings, Act. 20. 30. and 2 Tim. 3. 6. but lamentable experience, telleth us what an eager desire there is in Proud and Self-conceited men, to obtrude themselves as Teachers and Pastors on the Churches, to creep into houses and lead people captive, and draw away Disciples after them, and say (and perhaps think) that others are deceivers, and none are the true Teachers indeed but they. And the first part of the art and work of wolves, is to separate you from your Pastors, and catch up the stragglers that are thus separated: The malice, and slanders and lies, and railing of hirelings and deceivers and all the powers of Hell, are principally poured out on the faithful Pastors and leaders of the flocks: The principal work of the Jesuits against you, is to make you believe that your Pastors are no true Pastors, but uncalled private persons, and mere usurpers: and the reason must be, because they have not an Ordination of Bishops successively from the Apostles without interruption. I confess if our interruptions had been half as lamentable as theirs (by their Schisms, and variety of Popes at once; and Popes accused, or condemned by General Councils, for Heretics; and their variety of ways of electing Popes, and their incapacities by Simony, Usurpation, &c. ) I should think at least that our Ancestors had cause to have questioned the calling of some that were then over them. But I will help you in a few words to discern the juggling of these deceivers, by showing you the truth concerning the way of Christ's giving his commission to the Ministers that are truly called, and the needlesness of the proof of an uninterrupted succession of regular ordination, to your reception of your Pastors and their Ministrations.

§. 10. The ministerial commission is contained in, and conveyed by the Law of Christ, which is the Charter of the Church, and every true Bishop or Pastor hath his Power from Christ, and not at all from the efficient conveyance of any mortal man: Even as Kings have their power not from man, but from God himself, but with this difference, that in the Church Christ hath immediately determined of the species of Church offices, but in the Civil Government, only of the Genus (absolutely and immediately.) You cannot have a plainer illustration, than by considering how Mayors and Bailiffs and Constables are annually made in Corporations: The King by his Charter saith that [ every year at a certain time the freemen or Burgesses shall meet, and choose one to be their Mayor, and the Steward or Town Clerk shall give him his oath, and thus or he shall be invested in his place, and this shall be his power and work and no other: ] So the King by his Law appointeth that Constables and Church-wardens shall be chosen in every Parish. Now let our two questions be here decided: 1. Who it is that giveth these Officers their Power? 2. Whether an uninterrupted succession of such officers through all generations since the enacting of that Law be necessary to the validity of the present officers authority? To the first, It is certain that it is the King by his Law or Charter that giveth the officers their power; and that the Corporations and Parishes do not give it them by electing, or investing them: yea though the King hath made such election and Investiture to be in a sort his instrument in the conveying it, it is but, as the opening of the door, to let them in, sine quo non; but it doth not make the Instruments to be at all the Givers of the Power, nor were they the receiving, or containing mediate causes of it. The King never gave them the Power which the officers receive, either to Use, or to Give: but only makes the Electors his Instruments to determine of the person that shall receive the Power immediately from the Law or Charter; and the Investers he ma keth his Instruments of solemnizing the Tradition and admission: which if the Law or Charter make absolutely Necessary ad esse officii, it will be so: but if it make it necessary only ad melius esse, or but for order and regular admittance when no necessity hindereth it, the necessity will be no more. And to the second question, It is plain that the Law which is the Fundamentum juris remaining still the same, if a Parish omit for divers years to choose any Constable or Church-warden, yet the next time they do choose one according to Law, the Law doth authorize him, nevertheless, though there was an interruption or vacancy so long: And so in Corporations, (unless the Law or Charter say the contrary): so is it in the present case. 1. It is the established Law of Christ, which describeth the office, determineth of the degree and kind of power, and Granteth or Conveyeth it, when the person is determined of by the Electors and Ordainers, though by Ordination the Delivery and Admission is regularly to be solemnized; which actions are of just so much necessity as that Law hath made them, and no more. 2. And if there were never so long an interruption or vacancy, he that afterward entereth lawfully, so as to want nothing which the Law of Christ hath made necessary to the Being of the office, doth receive his power nevertheless immediately from the Law of Christ. And Bellarmine himself saith that it is not necessary to the people, and to the validity of Sacraments and offices to them, to know that their Pastors be truly called or ordained: And if it be not necessary to the validity of Sacraments, it is not necessary to the validity of Ordination. And W. Johnson confesseth to me that Consecration is not absolutely necessary ad esse officii to the Pope himself: no nor any one sort of Electors in his Election ( p. 333.) And in his Repl. Term. Expl. pag. 45. he saith [ Neither Papal nor Episcopal jurisdiction (as all the Learned know) depends of Episcopal or Papal ordination: nor was there ever interruptions of successions in Episcopal jurisdiction in any see, for want of that alone, that is necessary for consecrating others validly, and not for jurisdiction over them. ] You see then how little sincerity is in these men's disputations, when they would persuade you to reject your lawful Pastors as no true Ministers of Christ, for want of their Ordination or Succession.

§. 11. Direct. 4. Though the Sacraments and other ministerial offices are valid, when a Minister is qualified ( in his abilities and call ) but with so much as is essential to the office, though he be defective in degree of parts and faithfulness, and have personal faults which prove his own destruction; yet so great is the difference between a holy, heavenly, learned, judicious, experienced, skillful, zealous, laborious, faithful Minister, and an ignorant, ungodly, idle, unskillful one; and so highly should every wise man value the best means and advantages to his eternal happiness, that he should use all lawful means in his power to enjoy and live under such an able, godly, powerful ministry, though he part with his worldly wealth and pleasure to attain it. I know no evil must be done for the attainment of the greatest helps: (For we cannot expect that God should bless a sinful course, or that our sin should tend to the saving of our souls.) And I know God can bless the weakest means, when they are such as he appointeth us to use; and can teach us by Angels when he denieth us the help of men: But Scripture, reason and experience telleth us, that ordinarily he worketh morally by means, and fitteth the means to the work which he will do by them: And as he doth not use to light men by a cold or stone, but by a Candle, nor by a rotten post or Glow-worm so much as by a Torch or Luminary; so he doth not use to work as much, by an ignorant, drunken, idle person; who despiseth the God, the Heaven, the Christ, the Spirit, the Grace, the sacred Word which he Preacheth, and vilifieth both his own, and other men's souls; as he doth by an able and compassionate Minister. And the soul is of so much more worth than the Body, and Eternal things than temporal, that a little commodity to the soul in order to the securing of our salvation, must be prefer • before a great deal of worldly riches. He that knoweth what his soul, hi • S • viour, and Heaven is worth, will not easily sit down contented, under such a dark and dull and st • rving Minister 〈…〉 feeleth he can but little profit by, if better may be had on lawful terms. H • that feeleth no difference between the Ministry of these two sorts of men, it is because he is a stranger to the work of the Gospel on the soul: And if the Gospel (in its truth or worth or use ) be • id, it is • id to them that • re lost, the God of this world having blinded their minds. It must be no small matter that must satis • ie a serious Christian to cast his soul upon any hurtful or dangerous disadvantage. Though Daniel and his company may live well on pulse, yea and Ezekiel upon bread baked with dung, when God will have it so, yet no wise man will choose such a diet, especially if his diseases require the exactest diet, or his weakness the most restorative, and all to • little; which, alas, is the common case. Yet this caution you must here take with you, 1. That you pretend not your own Benefit, to the common loss or hurt of others. 2. And that you consider as well where you may do most good, as where you may get most: For the way of greatest service, is the way of Greatest gain.

§. 12. Direct. 5. Understand what sort and measure of Belief it is that you owe to your Teachers, that so your incredulity hinder not your faith in Christ, nor your overmuch credulity betray you not to heresy, nor make you the servants of men, contrary to Matth. 23. 8, 9, 10. Ephes. 4. 13. 2 Cor. 1. 24. Act. 20. 30. We see on one side how many poor souls are cheated into Schism and dangerous • rrours, by forsaking their • eachers and refusing their necessary help, and all upon this pretence, that [they must not make men the Lord's of their faith, nor pin their faith on the Ministers sleeve, nor take their Religion upon trust]. And on the other side we see among the Papists, and in every Sect, what lamentable work is made by an overmuch credulity and belief of ambitious, worldly, factious, proud and erroneous Guides. That you may escape both these extremes you must observe the truth of these conclusions following, which show you what it is that your Teachers have to Reveal unto you, and in what Order, and how far the several particulars are, or are not to be taken upon their words.

§. 13. And first, as a preparative, it is presupposed, 1. That you find yourself ignorant, and one that needeth a Teacher: For i • you think you know all that you need to know already, you are like a full bottle that will hold no more. 2. It is presupposed that you take the man that you learn of to be wiser than yourself and fit to teach you: either because fame or other men's reports have told you so (as the Woman John. 4. drew the Samaritans to Christ), or because his own Profession of skill doth make you think so (as you will hearken to him that professeth to be able to Teach you any Art or Science): Or else because your present hearing his discourse doth convince you of his Wisdom: By one of these means you are brought to think that he is one that you may learn of, and is fit for you to hear: (so that here is no need that first you take him to be infallible, or that you know which is the true Church, as the Papists say) These are presupposed.

§. 14. The Doctrines which he is to teach you are these, and in this method to be taught. 1. He will teach you the natural knowledge of yourself; that being a man▪ you are a Rational free ag • nt, made by another for his will and use, and by him to be Ruled in order to your ultimate end, being wholly his, and at his dispose.

§. 15. 2. He will next teach you that there is a God that made you, and what he is, and what relation he standeth in to you, and you to him, as your Creator, your Owner, your Ruler and your Benefactor and your End: And what duty you owe him in these Relations, to submit to him and resign yourselves to him as his own, to be obedient to all his Laws, and to Love him and delight in him: and this with all your heart and soul and might; even to serve him with all the Powers of your soul and Body and with your estates and all his blessings.

§. 16. 3. He will next teach you that this God hath made your souls immortal, and that there is a lite after this where everlasting Happiness or M • sery will be your part, and where the Great Rewards and Punishments are executed by the Judge o • all the World as men have behaved themselves in this present life. That your End and happiness is not here, but in the life to come, and that this Life is th • way and time of preparation, in which everlasting Happiness is won or lost.

§. 17. Thus far he needeth no supernatural proof of what he saith; but can prove it all to you from the light of nature: And these things you are not primarily to receive of him as a Testifier by m • er Believing him; but as a Teacher by Learning of him the Evidences by which you may by degrees come to know these things yourselves.

§. 18. Yet it is supposed that all along you give him so much credit as the difference between his Knowledge and yours doth require, so far as it appeareth to you: As you will hear a Physician, a Lawyer, a Philosopher, or any man with reverence, while he discourseth of the matters of his own profession; as confessing his judgment to be better than yours, and therefore more suspecting your own apprehensions than his. Not but that the Truth may compel you to discern it, though you should come with no such reverence or respect to him; but then you cast yourself upon much disadvantage irrationally: And this human belief of him is but a medium to your Learning, and so to the knowledge of the matter: so that you do not stop and rest in his authority or credibility, but only use it in order to your discovery of that evidence which you rest in, which as a Teacher he acquaints you with.

§. 19. These things being thus far revealed by natural light are (usually) at first apprehended by natural reason, not so as presently to put or prove the soul in a state of saving grace; but so as to awaken it to make further enquiry, and so when the soul is come so far as to see the same truths by supernatural Grace in the supernatural revelation of the Holy Scriptures, then they become more effectual and sa • ing, which before were known but preparatorily: And so the same Truths are then both the objects of Knowledge and of faith.

§. 20. 4. Having acquainted you with man's ultimate End and Happiness in the life to come, the next thing to be taught you by the Ministers of Christ is, that [ Christ as our Savior, and faith and repentance and sincere obedience to be performed by us through his grace, is the way to Heaven, or the means by which we must attain this end ]. Though the Knowledge of the Preachers wisdom, piety and credibility remove some impediments which would make the receiving of this the more difficult to you, yet you are not to take it barely on his word, as a point of human faith; but you are to call for his proof of it, that you may see better reasons than his affirmations for the entertainment of it.

§. 21. 5. The proof that he will give you is in these two Propositions, 1. God's Revelations are all true: 2. This is one of God's Revelations: This is an argument [ Whatsoever God saith is true: But this God saith, Therefore this is true. ] The first Proposition you • re not to take upon the trust of his word, but to learn of him as a Teacher to know it in its proper Evidence: For it is the formal object of your faith: The veracity of God is first known to you, by the same Evidence and means as you know that there is a God: And then it is by the force of this that you believe the particular truths which are the material object of faith. 2. And the second Proposition [ that God hath revealed this ] is orderly to be first proved, and so received upon its proper evidence; and not taken merely upon your Teachers word: Yet if you do believe him by a human faith as a man that is likely to know what he saith, and this in order to a Divine faith, it will not hinder, but help your Divine faith and salvation; and is indeed no more than is your duty.

§. 22. Here not, 1. That primarily these two Great Principles of faith, [ God is True, and this is God's revelation ] are not themselves Credenda, the Material objects of Divine faith, but of Knowledge. 2. That yet the result of both is de fide, matter of faith. 3. And the same principles are secondarily de fide, as it is that there is a God. For though they are first to be known by natural evidence, yet when the Scripture is opened to us, we shall find them there revealed: And so the same thing may be the object both of knowledge and of faith. 4. And Faith itself is a sort of Knowledge: For though human faith have that uncertainty in its premises (for the most part), as forbiddeth us to say (properly) I know this to be true, because such a man said it: Yet Divine faith hath that certainty which may make it an excellent sort of Knowledge: (as I have proved copiously elsewhere.) In believing man we argue thus [ Whatsoever so wise and honest a man saith, is credible, that is, most likely to be true: But this he saith: Therefore, &c. But in believing God we argue thus: Whatever God saith is credible, that is, as infallible truth: But this God saith, Therefore, &c.] So that the word Credible, signifieth not the same thing in the two arguments; nor is Divine Faith, and Human faith the same.

§. 23. 6. The next thing that the Preacher hath to teach you is the proof of the foresaid Minor Proposition (for the Major was proved in the proof of a Deity ) And that is thus: The Gospel which Christ and his Apostles first Preached, and is now delivered in the Sacred Scriptures is the Word (or infallible revelation of God: ) But this doctrine, that Christ, with faith and Repentance and obedience on our parts, are the way to life Eternal, is the Gospel which Christ and his Apostles first Preached, &c. Therefore it is the Word of God. For the Minor you need not take your Teachers word, if you can read; for you may see it in the Books: (of which more anon): But the Major is that which all men will desire to be assured of (that the Gospel is God's word ) And for that, though a Belief of your Teacher is a help and good preparatory yet you are not there to stop, but to use him as a Teacher to show you the Truth of it in the proofs: (else you must take anything for God's Word, which your Teacher affirmeth to be such). And the proof which he will give you, must be some Divine attestation which may be shown to those whom we would convince.

§. 24. 7. This Divine attestation, which he is next to show you, hath many parts (that it may be complete and satisfactory) 1. God's antecedent Testimony. 2. His inherent or impressed testimony. 3. His adherent concomitant Testimony. 4. His subsequent Testimony. 1. God's Antecedent Testimony by which he attesteth the Gospel, is the train of Promises, Prophesies, Types, and the preparing Ministry of John, which all foretold Christ, and were fulfilled in him. 2. God's impressed testimony, is that Image and superscription of God (in his Governing-wisdom, Holiness and Love) which is unimmitably engraven on the Gospel; as an Image upon a seal, which is thereby made the Instrument to imprint the same on other things. Thus as the Sun, the Gospel shineth, and proveth itself by its proper light. 3. The con • omitant attestation of God is that of [ multitudes of certain uncontrolled miracles; ] done by Christ and his Apostles, which proved the approving hand of God, and oblige all rational creatures to believe a testimony so confirmed to them. Among these Christ's own Resurrection and Ascension, and the Gifts of his Apostles are the chief. 4. The subsequent attestation of God is, the power and efficacy of the Gospel, in calling and sanctifying unto Christ a peculiar people zealous of good works, and directing and confirming them against all temptations and torments to the end: Producing that same Image of God on the souls of his Elect, which is (more perfectly engraven on the word itself:) making such changes, and gathering such a people unto God, as no other doctrine ever did. And all these four attestations are but one, even the Holy Spirit, who is become the great witness of Christ and his Gospel in the World: viz. 1. The spirit of Prophesy is the antecedent attestation: 2. The Holy Image which the spirit hath Printed on the Gospel itself, is the inherent evidence. 3. The miracles of the spirit, is the concomitant attestation or evidence. 4. And the sanctifying work of the spirit is the subsequent attestation, renewed and accompanying it to the end of the World. So that the Argument runs thus [ That doctrine which hath this witness of the Holy Ghost, antecedently in such prophecies, inherently bearing his image so unimitably, accompanied by so many certain uncontrolled miracles, and followed and attended with such matchless success in the sanctification of the body of Christ, is fully attested by God to be his own: But such is the doctrine of the Gospel? ] Therefore, &c. The Major you are not to take upon trust from your Teachers (though your esteem of their judgment may the better dispose you to learn); But you are to discern the evidences of truth which is apparent in it. For he that denieth this must by force of argument be driven to deny, 1. Either that God is the Governor of the World; or that he is the supreme; but say he is controlled by another: 3. Or that he is Good and True; and must affirm that he either Governeth the world by mere deceits, and undiscernable lies, or that he hath given up the power to someone that so governeth it: All which is but to affirm that there is no God (which is supposed to be proved before.)

§. 25. 8. There now remaineth nothing to be taught you, as to prove the truth of the Gospel but only those matters of fact which are contained and supposed in the Minor of the two last arguments: And they are these particulars. 1. That there were such persons as Christ and his Apostles, and such a Gospel Preached by them. 2. That such Miracles were done by them, as are supposed. 3. That both Doctrine and Miracles were committed to writing by them, in the Scriptures, for the certainer preserving them to the Churches use. 4. That Churches were planted, and souls converted and confirmed by them in the first ages, many of whom did seal them with their blood. 5. That there have been a succession of such Churches as have adhered to this Christ and Gospel. 6. That this which we call the Bible is that very Book containing those sacred Writings fore-mentioned. 7. That it hath been still copyed out, and preserved without any such depravation or corruption as might frustrate its ends. 8. That the Copies are such out of which we have them Translated, and which we show. 9. That they are so truly translated as to have no such corruptions or mistakes, as to frustrate their ends, or make them unapt for the work they were appointed to. 10. That these particular words are indeed here written which we read; and these particular Doctrines containing the Essentials of Christianity, together with the rest of the material objects of faith.

§. 26. All these ten particulars are matters of fact that are merely subservient to the constitutingprinciples of our faith; but yet very needful to be known. Now the question is, How these must be known, and received by us, so as not to invalidate our faith? And how far our Teachers must be here believed? And first it is very useful to us to inquire, How so many of these matters of fact as were then existent were known to the first Christians? As How knew they in those days that there were such persons as Christ and his Apostles? that they preached such Doctrines, and spake such Languages, and did such Works, and that they wrote such Books, and sent such Epistles to the Churches, and that Churches were hereby converted and confirmed, and Martyrs sealed this with their blood; &c. Its easy to tell how they were certain of all these: Even by their own eyes, and ears, and sensible observation, as we know that there are Englishmen live in England: And those that were remoter from some of the matters of fact, knew them by such report of those that did see them, as those among us that never saw the King, or Court, or his Restoration, do know that such a thing there was, and such a person there is. Thus they knew it then.

§▪ 27. From whence I note, 1. That in those days it was not necessary to the being of true faith, that any supernatural testimony of the Spirit, or any other sort of proof, than their very senses and reason, should acquaint them with those matters of fact which they were eye-witnesses of. 2. That credible report or history was then the means for any one that saw not a matter of fact to know as much as they that saw it. 3. That therefore this is now the way also of producing faith: Some things we have yet sight and sense for: as that such Bibles, and such Churches are existent; that such holy effects this Doctrine hath upon the soul (which we see in others by the fruits; and after feel in ourselves:) The rest we must know by History, Tradition, or Report.

§. 28. And in the reception of these historical passages note further, 1. That human belief is here a naturally necessary means to acquaint us with the matter of our Divine belief: 2. That there are various degrees of this belief, and some need more of it by far than others, according to the various degrees of their ignorance: As he that cannot read himself, must know by human belief (in great part) that the Preacher readeth truly, or that such words indeed are in the Gospel as he saith are there: But a literate person may know this by his eye▪ sight, and not take it upon trust. So he that understandeth not Hebrew and Greek, must take it upon trust that the Scripture is truly translated: But another that understandeth those Tongues, may see it with his eyes. 3. History being the proper means to know matters of fact that are done in times past, and out of our sight, the same industry that is necessary to a thorough acquaintance with other History, is necessary to the same acquaintance with this: 4. That the common beginning of receiving all such historical truths, is first by Believing our Teachers so far as becometh Learners, and in the mean time going on to Learn till we come to know as much as they, and upon the same historical Evidence as they. 5. That if any man be here necessitated to take more than others upon the trust or belief of their Teachers, it is long of their Ignorance: and therefore if such cry out against their taking things on trust, it is like a mad man's raving against them that would order him: or as if one should reproach a Nurse for feeding Infants, and not letting them feed themselves. Oportet discentem credere: He that will not believe his Teacher will never learn. If a Child will not believe his Master, that tells him which are the Letters, the Vowels and Consonants, and what is their power, and what they spell, and what every word signifieth in the Language which he is teaching him, will he be ever the better for his teaching? 6. That he that knoweth these historical matters no otherwise than by the belief of his particular Teacher, may nevertheless have a Divine and saving faith: For though he believe by a human faith that these things were done, that this is the same Book, &c. yet he believeth the Gospel itself (thus brought to his knowledge) because God is true that hath attested it. Even as it was a saving faith in Mary and Martha that knew by their eyes and ears, and not only by Belief, that Lazarus was raised, and that Christ preached thus and thus to them: but believed his Doctrine to be true, because of God's Veracity who attested it. 7. That it is the great wisdom and mercy of God to his weak and ignorant people, to provide them Teachers to acquaint them with these things, and to • ou chsafe them such a help to their salvation; as to make it a standing Office in his Church to the end of the world, that the Infants and ignorant might not be cast off, but have Fathers, and Nurses, and Teachers to take care of them. 8. But specially mark, that yet these Infants have much disadvantage in comparison of others, that know all these matters of fact by the same convincing evidence as their Teachers: And that he that followeth on to learn it as he ought, may come to prove these subservient matters of fact, by such a concurrence of evidences, as amounteth to an infalibility or moral certainty, beyond mere human faith as such: As e. g. an illiterate person that hath it but from others, may be certain that it is indeed a Bible which is ordinarily read and preached to him; and that it is so truly translated as to be a sufficient Rule of faith and life, having no mistake which must hazard a man's salvation: Because the Bible in the Original tongues is so commonly to be had, and so many among us understand it, and there is among them so great a contrariety of judgments and interests, that it is not possible but many would detect such a public lie, if any should deal falsely in so weighty and evident a case. There is a Moral certainty (equal to a Natural) that some actions will not be done by whole Countries which every individual person hath power and natural liberty to do: As e. g. there is no man in the Kingdom but may possibly kill himself, or may fast tomorrow, or may lie in bed many days together. And yet it is certain, that all the people in England will do none of these: So it is possible that any single person may lie even in a palpable public case, as to pretend that this is a Bible when it is some other Book, or that this is the same Book that was received from the Apostles by the Churches of that age, when it is not it, &c. But for all the Country, and all the world that are competent witnesses, to agree to do this, is a mere impossibility, I mean such a thing as cannot be done without a Miracle, yea, an universal Miracle. And more than so, it is impossible that God should do a Miracle to accomplish such an universal wickedness and deceit; whereas it is possible that natural causes by a Miracle may be turned out of course, where there is nothing in the nature of God against it (as that the Son should stand still, &c. ) We have a certainty that there was a Julius Caesar, a William the Conqueror, an Aristotle, a Cicero, an Augustine, a Chrysostom, and that the Laws and Statures of the Land were really enacted by the Kings and Parliaments whose names they bear; because the Natural and Civil interest • of so many thousands that are able to detect it, could never be reconciled here to a deceit. When Judges and Counselors, Kings and Nobles, and Plaintiffs and Defendants utter enemies are all agreed in it, it is more certain to a single person than if he had seen the passing of them with his eyes. So in our case, when an Office was stablished in the Church, to read and preach this Gospel in the Assemblies; and when all the Congregations took it as the Charter of their salvation, and the Rule of their faith and life, and when these Pastors and Churches were dispersed over all the Christian world, who thus worshipped God from day today; and all Sects and enemies were ready to have detected a falsification or deceit, it is here as impossible for such a Kind of History, or Tradition, or testimony to be false, in such material points of fact, as for one man's senses to deceive him, and much more.

§. 29. Thus I have at once shown you the true order of the Preaching, and proofs, and receiving of the several matters of Religion, and how and into what our Faith must be resolved; and how far your Teachers are to be Believed? And here you must specially observe two things: 1. That there can be no danger in this Resolution of faith, of derogating either from the work of the Holy Ghost, or the Scriptures self-evidence, or any other cause what ever: Because we ascribe nothing to History or Tradition which was ascribed to any of these causes by the first Christians; but only put our Reception by Tradition instead of their Reception immediately by sense: Our receiving by infallible history, is but in the place of their receiving by sight; and not in the place of the self-evidence of Scripture, or any testimony or teaching of the Spirit. The method is exactly laid down, Heb. 2. 3, 4. How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by them that heard him: God also • earing them witness both with signs and wonders and divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own will. Here is the sum of what I have been saying.

§. 30. 2. Observe also the great difference between us and the Papists in this controversy of using Tradition in the resolution of our Faith. 1. They decide the main question in gross by Tradition, viz. Whether the Scripture be the Word of God? But we only decide the questions about history or matters of fact by it, which are subservient to the other. 2. The Tradition which most of them plead is nothing but the Authoritative judgment of the successive Pastors of the Church in a General Council confirmed by the Pope, and as another faction among them saith, The reception of the whole Church both Laity and Clergy; and this Church must be only the Roman faction: But the Tradition which we plead is the concurrent Testimony of friends and foes, Orthodox and Heretics; and of all the Churches throughout the world, both Greek and Latin, Ethiopian, Armenian, Protestants, &c. And this Testimony we plead, not merely as a human testimony (much less as such as is credible chiefly for the mere Power (real or pretended) of the Testifiers: but as such as by a concurrence of testimonies and circumstances hath (besides the Teachers authority) the evidences of infallible moral certainty, in the very History; as we have of the Statutes of the Realm.

§. 31. Direct. 6. Understand what kind and measure of Obedience it is that you owe your lawful Pastors, that you neither prove Schismatical and unruly, nor yet have a hand in setting up Idols and usurpations in the Church. This you may learn from the foregoing description of the Pastors work. The kind of your obedience is commensurate to the kind of his Office and Work. You are not to obey your Pastors, as Civil Magistrates that bear the Sword; nor as Physicians to tell you what you must do for your health, nor as Artificers to command you how to plow, and sow, and trade, &c. (except in the Morality of these): But it is as your Teachers and Guides in the matters of salvation that you must obey them. And that not as Prophets or Law-givers to the Church; but as the stated Officers of Christ to open and apply the Laws that he hath given, and determine of such circumstances as are subservient thereunto. Not as those that have dominion of your faith, or may preach another Gospel, or contradict any truth of God, which by Scripture or Nature he hath revealed, or can dispence with any duty which he hath commanded: But as those that have all their power from God, and for God and your salvation, and the good of other men's souls; to edification only, and not to destruction: Particular cases I here purposely forbear.

§. 32. Direct. 7. Be sure that you look on them as the Officers of Christ in all that they do as such; and see not only their natural, but their Ecclesiastical Persons, that through them you may have to do with God. Especially in Preaching and Administring the Sacraments, and binding the impenitent, and absolving the penitent, and comforting the sad and humbled souls. All the holiness, and life, and power of your spiritual converse with them consisteth in your seeing and conversing with God in them, and using them as his Messengers or Officers, that deliver his message and do his work, and not their own. If you disobey them in his work, it is God that you disobey: And if they Teach you his Word, or deliver you Christ and his benefits in the Sacraments, it is Christ himself that doth it by them as by his instruments, so far as they do it according to his Commission and his Will. This observing Christ in their Teaching will possess you with due reverence and care, and cause you to do it as a holy work: And to see Christ in them, delivering and sealing his Covenant to you, will very much increase your joy: when Man as Man is but a shadow.

§. 33. Direct. 8. Make use of their help in private, and not in public only: As the use of a Physician is not only to read a Lecture of Physic to his Patients, but to be ready to direct every person according to their particular case (there being such variety of temperatures, diseases and accidents, that in dangerous cases the direction of the judicious is needful in the application): So here, it is not the least of the Pastoral work, to oversee the individuals, and to give them personally such particular advice as their case requireth. Never expect that all thy Books, or Sermons, or Prayers, or Meditations should serve thy turn without the counsel of thy Pastors, in greater cases: for that were but to devise how to prove God's Officers needless to his Church. If thou be an ignorant or unconverted sinner, go to the Minister, and ask him, what thou must do to be saved? And resolve to follow his sound advice. If thou be in doubt of any weighty point of faith or godliness, or assaulted perillously by any adversary, or need his advice for thy settled Peace, thy assurance of Pardon and Salvation, and thy preparation for death; go ask counsel of thy Pastors, and receive their help with readiness and thankfulness: Or if thou live where there is none that is able and willing thus to help thee, remove to them that are such, if lawfully thou canst.

§. 34. Direct. 9. Assist your Pastors in the work of God, by the duties of your places which tend thereto: Labor by your holy serious conference, to instruct the ignorant, and convince the unbelieving, and convert the ungodly, and strengthen the weak, with whom you have fit opportunity for such work. Labor by your holy examples, by Love and Concord, and Meekness, and Sobriety, and contempt of the world, and a heavenly life, to shine as lights in the midst of a dark and crooked Generation. Preach all of you, by the examples of your blameless, humble holy lives: O how abundantly would this course promote the success of the public preaching of the Gospel? If you would cause those men to see the glory and power of the Gospel in your holy and heavenly lives, who cannot see it in itself: Then many that would not be won by the Word, might be won without it (to seek after it at least) by your conversations. Thus all must preach and be helpers of the Ministers of Christ.

§. 35. Direct. 10. Forsake not your faithful Pastors to follow deceivers; but adhere to them who spend and are spent for you: Defend their innocence against false accusers; and refuse them not such maintenance as is needful to their entire giving up themselves to that holy work to which they are devoted: Read and study well Ephes. 4. 13, 14, 15. Acts 20. 30. It is for your sakes that your faithful Pastors are singled out in the world to bear the slanders and contradictions of the wicked; and to lead the way in the fiery trial. If they would forsake you, and that sacred truth and duty that is needful to your salvation, and sell you up into the hands of cruel and deceitful men, it were as easy for them to have the applause of men, and the prosperity of the world as others: It is perfidious ingratitude to forsake them in every trial, that must lose their lives and all the world, rather then forsake you or betray your souls: Or to grudge them food and raiment that lay by the gainful employments of the world, that they may attend continually on the service of your souls.

CHAP. VII. Directions for the discovery of the Truth among Contenders, and the escape of Heresy and Deceit.

§. 1. THough Truth be naturally the Object of man's Understanding, to which it hath a certain inclination, and though it be a delightful thing to know the truth: yet that which is saving meeteth with so much opposition in the flesh, and in the world, that while it is applauded in the general, it is resisted and rejected in particulars: And yet while the Use of holy truth is hated and obstinately cast away, the name and the barren profession of it is made the matter of the glorying of hypocrites, and the occasion of reproaching dissenters as Heretics, and the world is filled with bloody persecutions, and inhumane implacable enmities and divisions, by a wonderful zeal for the Name of Truth, even by those men that will rather venture on damnation, than they will obey the Truth which they so contend for: Multitudes of men have tormented or murdered others as Heretics, who themselves must be tormented in Hell, for not being Christians. It concerneth us therefore to deal very wisely, and cautelously in this business.

§. 2. Direct. 1. Take heed lest there be any carnal interest or lust which maketh you unwilling to receive the truth, or inclineth you to error that it may serve that interest or lust. It is no small number of men that are strangers or enemies to the truth, not because they cannot attain the knowledge of it, but because they would not have it to be truth. And men of great learning and natural parts are frequently thus deceived and led into error by a naughty carnal biased heart: Either because that error is the vulgar opinion, and necessary to maintain their popular reputation, and avoid reproach; or because it is the way of men in power, and necessary to their preferment and greatness in the world; or because the Truth is contrary to their fleshly lusts and pleasures, or contrary to their honor and worldly interest; and would hazard their reputations or their lives. How loath is a sensual ungodly man to believe, that without Holiness none shall see God, and that he that is in Christ is a new creature, and that if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, the same is none of his, and that if they live after the flesh they shall die? How loath is the ambitious Minister to believe that the way of Christ's service lieth not in worldly pomp, or ease, or pleasures, but in taking up the Cross, and following Christ in self-denial, and in being as the servant of all, in the unwearied performance of careful oversight, and compassionate exhortations unto all the flock. Let a controversy be raised about any of these points, and the mind of lazy ambitious men doth presently fall in with that part which gratifieth their fleshly lusts, and excuseth them from that toilsome way of duty, which they already hate. The secret lusts and vices of a false hypocritical heart, are the commonest and the powerfullest arguments for error: And such men are glad, that Great men, or Learned men will give so much ease to their consciences, and shelter to their reputations, as to countenance, or make a Controversy at least of that which their lusts desire to be true. Above all, therefore see that you come not to inquire after Truth with an unsanctified heart, and unmortified lusts; which are a bias to your minds, and make you warp from the truth which you inquire after: For if the carnal mind neither is nor can be subject to the Law of God, you may easily perceive that it will be loath to believe it; when in so doing they believe their own condemnation. An honest sanctified heart is fittest to entertain the truth.

§. 3. Direct. 2. Seek after the truth for the love of truth, and love it especially for its special use, as it formeth the heart and life to the Image and Will of God; and not for the fanciful delight of knowing; much less for carnal worldly ends. No means are used at all as means, where the End is not first determined of. And to do the same thing materially to another end, is not indeed to do the same: For thereby its made another thing. Your Physician will come to you if you you seek to him as a Physician; but not if you send to him to mend your Shoos. So if you seek knowledge for the true ends of knowledge, to fill your hearts with the Love of God, and guide your lives in holiness and righteousness, God is engaged to help you in the search: But if you seek it only for to please your pride or fancy, no wonder if you miss of it; and it is no great matter whether you find it or not, for any good its like to do you: Every Truth of God is appointed to be his Instrument, to do some holy work upon your heart: Let the Love of Holiness be it that maketh you search after Truth, and then you may expect that God should be your teacher.

§. 4. Direct. 3. Seek after Truth without too great or too small regard to the judgment of others: neither contemn them, nor be captivated to them: Use the help of the wise; but give not up your Reason absolutely to any. Engage not yourselves in a Party, so as to espouse their errors, or implicitly to believe whatever they say: For this breedeth in you a secret desire to please your party, and interesseth you in their dividing interest, and maketh you betray the Truth to be accounted Orthodox by those you value.

§. 5. Direct. 4. Take heed of Pride, which will make you dote upon your own conceits, and cause you to slight the weightiest reasons that are brought by others, for your conviction. And if once you have espoused an error it will engage all your wit, and zeal, and diligence to maintain it: It will make you uncharitable and furious against all that cross you in your way: and so make you either Persecutors (if you stand on the higher ground) or Sect-leaders, or Church-dividers and turbulent and censorious if you are on the lower ground. There is very great reason in Paul's advice for the choice of a Bishop, 1 Tim. 3. 6. Not a Novice; lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the Devil. It is no more wonder to see a Proud man erroneous, and in the confidence of his own understanding, to rage against all that tell him he is mistaken, than to hear a drunken man boasting of his wit, to the increase of his shame.

§. 6. Direct. 5. Take heed of slothfulness and impatience in searching after Truth, and think not to find it in difficult cases, without both hard and patient studies, and ripeness of understanding to enable you therein: And suspect all opinions which are the offspring of idleness and ease, what ever Divine illumination they may pretend (except as you take them from others upon trust (in a slothful way, who attained them by diligent studies) For God that hath called men to labor, doth use to give his blessing to the laborious: And he that hath said by his Spirit, 1 Tim. 4. 15. Meditate upon these things: give thyself wholly to them, that thy profiting may appear to all doth accordingly cause those men to profit, who seek it in this laborious way of his appointment: And he that hath said, The desire of the slothful killeth him, doth not use to bless the slothful with his teachings. He that will say to him in judgment, Thou wicked and slothful servant, will not encourage the slothfulness which he condemneth. My Son, if thou wilt receive my words, and hide my commandments with thee; so that thou incline thine ear to wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding. Yea, if thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding: If thou seekest her as Silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasures; Then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God: For the Lord giveth Wisdom: Prov. 2. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Mark here to whom God giveth wisdom: All the godly are taught of God: But mark here how it is that he teacheth them. Not while they scorn at Studies and Universities, and look that their knowledge should cost them nothing, or that the Spirit should be instead of serious studies, or that their understandings should discern whats true or false at the first appearance: But while they think no pains or patience too great to learn the truth in the School of Christ.

§. 7. Direct 6. Keep out Passion from your Disputes, and in the management of all your controversies in Religion. For though Passion be useful both antecedently to the the Resolution of the Will, and consequently to the effectual execution of its Resolutions, yet it is commonly a very great seducer of the understanding, and strangely blindeth and perverteth judgment: so that a Passionate man is seldom so far from the truth, as when he is most confident he is defending it. When Passion hath done boiling, and the heart is cooled, and leaveth the judgment to do its work without any clamour and disturbance, its strange to see how things will appear to you, to be quite of another tendency and reason, than in your Passion you esteemed them.

§. 8. Direct. 7. Keep up a sense of the evil and danger of both extremes; and be not so wholly intent upon the avoiding of one extreme, as to be fearless of the other. The narrow minds of inexperienced men are hardly brought to look on both sides them, and to be duly sensible of the danger of both extremes: But while they are taken up only with the hating and opposing one sort of errors, they forget those on the other side: And usually the sin or error which we observe not, is more dangerous to us than that which we do observe (if the wind of temptation sit that way).

§ 9. Direct. 8. When you detect any ancient error or corruption, inquire into its original; and see whether Reformation consist not rather in a restitution of the primitive state, than in an extirpation of the whole. Even in Popery itself there are many errors and ill customs, which are but the corruption of some weighty truth, and the degenerating of some duty of God's appointment: And to reduce all in such cases, to the primitive verity, is the way of wise and true reformation; and not to throw away that which is God's, because it is fallen into the dirt of human depravation. But in cases where all is bad, there all must be rejected.

§. 10. Direct. 9. Pretend not Truth and Orthodoxness against Christian Love and Peace: and so follow Truth, as that you lose not Love and Peace by it; (As much as in you lieth live peaceably with all men). Charity is the End of Truth: And it is a mad use of Means, to use them against the End. Make sure of the sincerity of your Charity, and hold it fast; and then no error that you hold will be destructive to you: But if you know more than others, and use your knowledge to the weakening of your Love, you are but (as our first Parents) deceived and destroyed by a d • sire of fleshly ineffectual knowledge. Such knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth, 1 Cor. 8. 1. To contend for Truth, to the l • ss of Love, in yourselves, and the destruction of it among others, is but to choke yourselves with excellent food, and to imitate that Orthodox Catholic Physician, that gloried that he killed his Patients secundum artem, by the most accurate method, and excellent Rules of Art that men could die by.

§. 11. Direct. 10. Pretend no Truth against the power and practice of Godliness. For this also is its pr • p •• End: I • •• be not Truth that is acc • rding to Godliness, it is no truth worthy our seeking or c • ntending • or. And if it be contrary to Godliness in itself, it is no truth at all: Therefore if it be used agai • st Godliness, it is used contrary to the Ends of Truth. Those men that suppress or hinder t • e 〈◊〉 Knowledge, and Holiness, and Concord, and Edification, under pretence of securing, d •••• nding or prop • gating the Orth • d • x belief, will find one day, that God will give them as little thanks for their bl •• d pr • posterous zeal • o • truth, as a tender Father would do to a Physician, that killed his Children, b • c • us • they distasted or spit out his Medicines. It is usually a pitiful defense of Truth, that is made by the Enemies of Godliness.

More near and particular Directions against Error.

§. 12. Direct. 1. Begin at the Greatest, most Evident, Certain and Necessary Truths, and so proceed orderly to the knowledge of the less, by the help of these. As you climb by the Body of the Tree unto the branches. If you begin at those truths, which spring out of greater common truths, and know not the premises, while yo • plead for the conclusion, you abuse your Reason and lose the Truth and your labor both: For th • re is no way to the branches but by ascending from the stock. The Principles w • ll laid, must b • your help to all your following knowledge.

§. 13. Direct. 2. The two first Things which you are to learn are, what man is, and what God is: the N • ture and Rel • tion of the two Parties is the first thing to be known in order to the knowledge of the C • venant itself, and all following trans • ctions between God and man: One error here will introduce abundance. A thousand other points in Natural Philosophy you may safely be ignorant of; b • t if you know not what Man is, what Reason is, what Natural Free-will is, and what the inferi • ur sensitive faculti • s are, as to their Uses, it will lay you open to innumerable errors. In the Nature of man, you must see the foundation of his relations unto God: And if you know not those Great Rel •• i • ns the duties of which must take up all our lives, you may easily foresee the cons • quents of such ignorance or error. So if you know not what God is, and what his Relations to us are, so far as is necessary to our living in the duties of those Relations, the consequents of your ignorance will b • sad. If learned men be but perverted in their apprehensions of some on • Attribu • e of God (as those that think his Go • dness is nothing but his Benignity, or proneness to do good, or that he is a N •••• s •• ry ag •• t d • ing good ad ultimum posse, &c. ) what abundance of ho • rid and impious consequ • nts will follow?

§. 14. Direct. 3. H • ving s • undly understood both these and other Principles of Religion, try all the subsequent truths • er •• y, and receive nothing as truth that is certainly inconsistent with any of these principles. Even Principles, that are not of sense, may be disputed till they are w • ll r • ceived; and with those that have •• t received them: But afterward they are not to be called i • question; for then you w • uld never proceed • or build higher, if you still stand questioning all your grounds. Indeed no truth is inconsistent with any other truth: But yet when two dark or doub • full points are compared together, it is hard to know which of them to reject. But here it is easy: Nothing that contradicteth the tr • e Nature of G • d or man, or any Principle must be h • ld.

§▪ 15. Direct. 4. B • lieve not • ing which certainly contradicteth the End of all Religion. If it be of a na •• r • l or necessary tendency to ungodliness, against the Love of God, or against a holy and heavenly mind and conversation, it cannot b • truth what ever it pre • end.

§. 16. Direct. 5. Be sure to distinguish well betwixt revealed and unrevealed things: And before you dispute any question, search first whet • er th • •• solution be Revealed o • not: And if it be not, lay it by; and take it as part of your necessary submission, to be ignorant of what God would have you ignorant, as it is part of your obedience to labor to know what God would have you know. And when some things unr • ve • l • d are mixed in the controversy, take out those and lay them by, before you go any further, and see that the resolution of the r • st be not laid upon them, nor twisted with them, to • ntangle the whole in uncertainty or confusion Thus God instructed Job, by convincing him of his ignorance, and sh • wing him how many things were past his knowledge. Thus Christ instructed Nic d • mus about the work of Regeneration, so as to let him know, that though the Necessity of it must be known, y • t the manner of the Spirits acc • sses to the soul cannot be known, John 3. 7, 8. And Paul in his disc • urse of Election, takes notice of the unsearchable depths, and the creatures unfitness to dispute with God, Rom. 9. When you find any dispu • es about Predetermination or Predestination resolved into such points as th • se: Whether God do by physical premoving influx, or by concourse, or by moral operation ut fini • , determine or sp • cifie moral acts of man? Whether a Positive Dec • ee quoad actum be necessary to the N • gation of effects, (as that such a one shall not have grace given him, or be c •• verted or saved; that all the millions of possible persons names and things shall not be future: ) What Understanding, Will or Power ar • formally in God? How he knoweth future contingents? with a hundred such like; Then remember that you make use of this rule, and say with M • ses, D • u • . 29. 29. The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things that are revealed, unto us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of his Law. There are many rare profound discoveries much glory • d of by the Masters of several Sects, of which you may know the sentence of the Holy Ghost, by that instance, Col. 2. 18. Let no man beguile you of your reward, in a v • luntary humility and worshipping of Angels, intruding into th • se things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind. Reverently withdraw from things that are unrevealed, and dispute them not.

§. 17. Direct. 6. Be a careful and accurate (though not a vain) Distinguisher: and suffer not ambiguity and confusion to dec • ive you: Suspect every word in your Question, and anatomize it, and agree upon the sense of all your common terms, before you dispute with any adversary: It is not only in many words, but in one word or syllable that so much ambiguity and confusion may be contained, as may make a long dispute to be but a vain and ridiculous wrangling. Is it not a ridiculous business to hear men dispute many hours about the Cur credis, and Into what faith is to be resolved? and in the end come to understand, that by [ Cur ] one of them, speaks of the Principium or Causa Veritatis, and the other of the Principium pat • factionis, or the Evidentia Veritatis, or some other cause? And when one speaks of the Resolution of his faith as into the formal Object, and another into the subservient testimony or means, or into the proofs of Divine attestation, or many other causes. Or to hear men dispute Whether Christ died for all: when by [ for ] one man meaneth [ for the benefit of all, ] and another means [ in the place or stead of all, or for the sins of all as the procuring cause, &c. ] Yet here is but a syllable to contain this confusion? What a tedious thing it is to read long disputes between many Papists and Protestants, about Justification, while by Justification one meaneth one thing, and another meaneth quite another thing? He that cannot force every word to make a plain confession of its proper signification, that the Thing intended may be truly discerned in the Word, he will but deceive himself and others, with a wordy insignificant dispute.

§. 18. Direct. 7. Therefore be specially suspicious of Metaphors; as being all but ambiguities till an explication hath fixed or determined the sense. It is a noisome thing to hear some dispute upon an unexplained Metaphorical word, when neither of them have enucleated the sense, and when there are proper words enow.

§. 19. Direct. 8. Take special notice of what kind of beings your enquiry or disputation is, and let all your terms be adapted and interpreted according to the kinds of beings you dispute of. As if you be enquiring into the nature of any Grace, as Faith, Repentance, Obedience, &c. remember that it is in genere moris, a moral act: And therefore the terms are not to be understood as if you disputed about mere Physical acts, which are considered but in genere entis. For that Object which must essentiate one Moral act, containeth many Physical particles, which will make up many Physical acts. If you take such a man for your King, your Commander, your Master, your Physician, &c. if you should at the Barr when you are questioned for unfaithfulness, dispute upon the word [ take ] whether it be an act of the fantasy, or sense, or intellect, or will, &c. would you not be justly laughed at? So when you asked, What act Faith or Repentance is? which contain many particular Physical acts. When you dispute of Divinity, Policy, Law, Warr, &c. you must not use the same terms in the same sense, as when you dispute of Physicks or Metaphysics.

§. 20. Direct. 9. Be sure in all your disputes that you still keep distinguished before your eyes, the Order of Being, and the Order of Knowing: that the questions de esse lying undetermined in your way, do not frustrate all your dispute about the question de cognoscere. As in the question, Whether a man should do such or such a thing when he thinketh that it is God's Command? How far Conscience must be obeyed? It must first be determined de esse, whether indeed the thing be commanded, or lawful, or not? Before the case can be determined about the obligation that followeth my apprehension. For, what ever my Conscience or Opinion say of it, the Thing either is Lawful, or it is not: If it be Lawful, or a duty, the case is soon decided: But if it be not Lawful, the error of my Conscience altereth not God's Law, nor will it make it lawful unto me. I am bound first to know and then to do what God revealeth and commandeth: and this I shall be bound to, what ever I imagine to the contrary; and to lay by the error which is against it.

§. 21. Direct. 10. Be sure when you first enter upon an enquiry or dispute, that you well discover how much of the controversy is verbal de nomine, and • ow much is material de re: And that you suffer not your adversary to go on upon a false supposition, that the Controversy is de re, when it is but de nomine. The difference between names and things is so wide, that you would think no reasonable man should confound them: And yet so heedless in this point are ordinary disputers, that it is a usual thing to make a great deal of stir about a controversy before they discern whether it be de nomine or de r • . Many a hot and long dispute I have heard, which was managed as about the very heart of some material cause (as about man's Power to do good, or about the sufficiency of Grace, or about Justification, &c. ) when the whole contest between the Disputers was only or principally de nomine, and neither of them seemed to take notice of it. Be sure as soon as you peruse the terms of your question, to sift this thoroughly, and dispute verbal controversies, but as verbal, and not as real and material. We have real differences enow: we need not make them seem more by such a blind or heedless manner of Disputing.

§. 22. Direct. 11. Suffer not a rambling mind in study, nor a rambling talker in Disputes, to interrupt your orderly procedure, and divert you from your argument before you bring it to the natural issue. Both deceiving Sophisters, and giddy headed praters, will be violent to start another game, and spoil the chase of the point before you: But hold them to it, or take them to be unworthy to be disputed with, and let them go (except it be where the weakness of the Auditors requireth you to follow them in their Wild-goose Chase. ) You do but lose time in such rambling studies or disputes.

§. 23. Direct. 12. Be ca • telous of admitting false suppositions: or at least of admitting any inference that dependeth upon them. In some cases a supposition of that which is false may be made, while it no way tends to infer the truth of it: But nothing must be built upon that falsehood, as intimating it to be a truth. False suppositions cunningly and secretly worked into arguments, are very ordinary instruments of deceit.

§. 24. Direct. 13. Plead not uncertainties against certainties: But make certain points the measure to try the uncertain by. Reduce not things proved and sure to those that are doubtful and justly controverted: But reduce points disputable to those that are past doubt.

§. 25. Direct. 14. Plead not the darker Texts of Scripture against those that are more plain and clear, nor a few texts against many that are as plain: For that which is interpreted against the most plain and frequent expressions of the same Scripture is certainly mis-interpreted.

§▪ 26. Direct. 15. Take not obscure Prophecies for Precepts: The obscurity is enough to make you cautelous how you venture yourself in the Practice of that which you understand not; But if there were no obscurity, yet Prophecies are no warrant to you to fulfill them; no though they be for the Churches good. Predictions tell you but de eventu what will come to pass, but warrant not you to bring it to pass: God's Prophesies are ofttimes fulfilled by the wickedest men, and the wickedest means. As by the Jews in killing Christ, and Pharaoh in refusing to let Israel go, and Jehu in punishing the house of Ahab. Yet many self-conceited persons think that they can fetch that out of the Revelations or the Prophecies of Daniel, that will justify very horrid crimes, while they use wicked means to fulfil God's Prophecies.

§. 27. Direct. 16. Be very cautelous in what cases you take men's practice or example to be instead of precept, in the sacred Scriptures. In one case a Practice or example is obligatory to us as a Precept: and that is when God doth give men a commission to establish the form or orders of his Church and Worship (as he did to Moses and to the Apostles), and promiseth them his Spirit to lead them into all truth in the matters which he employeth them in, here God is engaged to keep them from miscarrying; for if they should, his work would be ill done, his Church would be ill constituted and framed, and his servants unavoidably deceived: The Apostles were authorized to constitute Church officers, and orders for continuance, and the Scripture which is written for a great part, historically, acquaints us what they did (as well as what they said and wrote ) in the building of the Church in obedience to their commission (at least in declaring to the World what Christ had first appointed). And thus if their practice were not obligatory to us, their words also might be avoided by the same pretenses. And on this ground (at least) the Lord's day is easily proved to be of Divine appointment and obligation. Only we must see that we carefully distinguish between both the Words and Practices of the Apostles which were upon a particular and temporary occasion (and obligation) from those that were upon an universal or permanent ground.

§. 28. Direct. 17. Be very cautelous what Conclusions you raise from any mere works of Providence. For the bold and blind exposition of these, hath lead abundance into most heinous sins: No providence is instead of a Law to us: But sometimes and ofttimes providence changeth the Matter of our duty, and so occasioneth the change of our obligations: (As when the husband dieth, the Wise is disobliged, &c. ) But men of worldly dispositions, do so over-value worldly things, that from them they venture to take the measure of God's Love and hatred, and of the causes which he approveth or disapproveth in the World. And the wisdom of God doth seem on purpose, to cause such wonderful unexpected mutations in the affairs of men, as shall shame the principles or spirits of these men, and manifest their giddiness and mutability to their confusion. One year they say, This is sure the cause of God, or else be would never own as he doth: Another year they say, If this had been God's cause he would never have so disowned it: Just as the Barbarians judged of Paul when the Viper seized on his hand. And thus God is judged by them to own or disown by his prospering or afflicting, more than by his Word.

§. 29. Direct. 18. In controversies which much depend on the sincerity or experience of Godly men, take heed that you affect not singularity, and depart not from the common sense of the Godly. For the workings of God's spirit are better judged of, by the ordinary tenor of them, than by some (real or supposed) case that is extraordinary.

§. 30. Direct. 19. In Controversies which most depend on the testimony of Antiquity, depart not from the judgment of the ancients. They that stood within View of the days of the Apostles could better tell what they did, and what a condition they left the Churches in, than we can do. To appeal to the Ancients in every cause, even in those where the later Christians do excel them, is but to be fools in reverence of our forefathers wisdom. But in points of History, or anything in which they had the advantage of their posterity, their testimony is to be preferred.

§. 31. Direct. 20. In Controversies which depend on the Experience of particular Christians or of the Church, regard most the judgment of the most experienced, and prefer the judgment of the later ages of the Church before the judgment of less experienced ages: (except the Apostolical age that had the greater help of the spirit). An ancient experienced Christian or Divine is more to be regarded in many points, which require experience, than many of the younger sort, that are yet more zealous and of quicker understanding and expression than the elder. So those that we call the Fathers or Ancients were indeed in the younger ages of the Church, and we that are fallen into the later and more exprienced age, have all the helps of the wisdom and experience of the Ages that were before us: And therefore God will require at our hands an account of these greater talents which we have received! As it were inexcusable now in a Physician, that hath the help of such Voluminous institutions, observations and experiments of former ages, to know no more than those former times that had no such helps; so would it be as inexcusable for this present age of the Church to be no wiser than those former ages. When Aquinas, Scotus, Ariminensis and other Schoolmen, delivered the Doctrine of Christianity to the Church in a dress so far different from Ignatius, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Cyprian, or any of those former ages, they certainly thought that they had attained to a far greater excellency and accurateness in the Knowledge of Divinity than those their Ancestors had attained: And whatever they swear in the Trent O • th▪ of not expounding any Scripture otherwise than the Fathers do, I doubt not but Suarez, and Vasquez and others of their modern Schoolmen thought so too, and would have been loath to be accounted wise in the measure only of those ancients. The later and elder ages of the Church have had abundant experience, e. g. of the tend • ncy of Ambition and Papal aspirings and usurpations; of the mischiefs of composing and imposing the Popish Missals and numerous ceremonies, and of their implicit faith, and their concealment of the Scriptures from the Vulgar, and many such points; And if we are never the wiser for all this experience, we are the more inexcusable; and may be judged as the negl • cters of our greater helps.

§. 32. Direct. 21. In Controversies which depend most upon skill in the Languages Philosophy or other parts of common learning, prefer the judgment of a few that are the most Learned in those matters, before the judgment of the most ancient, or the most Godly, or of the greatest numbers, even whole Churches, that are unlearned: In this case neither Numbers, nor Antiquity, nor Godliness will serve turn: but as one clear eye will see further then ten thousand that are purblind, so one Jerome or Origen may judge better of a translation, or the Grammatical sense of a Text than a hundred of the other Fathers could. One man that understandeth a Language is fitter to judge of it, than a whole Nation that understand it not. One Philosopher is fitter to judge of a philosophical question, than a thousand illiterate persons. Every man is most to be regarded in the matters which he is best acquainted with.

§. 33. Direct. 22. In Controversies of great difficulty where Divines themselves are disagreed and a clear and piercing wit is necessary, regard more the judgment of a few acute, judicious, well▪studied Divines that are well verst in those Controversies, than of a multitude of dull and common wits that think to carry it by the reputation of their number. It is too certainly attested by experience, that Judicious men are very few, and that the multitude of the injudicious that have not wit enough to underderstand them, nor humility enough to confess it, and to learn of them, have yet pride and arrogoncy enough to contradict them, and often malice enough to vilify them. In such differences it is not only a sign of a wise man to be content with the approbation of a few, but also to have but few approvers: (except where the injudicious do implicitly believe those few that are judicious.) Commonly a very few that are wiser than the multitude, are fain to stand by, and compassionate not only the World but the Church, and see the disease, and the easy remedy, and all in vain; while they are but neglected or despised by the rest, that will not be made wiser by them.

§. 34. Direct. 23. In all contentions hold close to that which all sides are agreed in: There is so much agreed on, even between the Papists and the Protestants, as would certainly save them all, if all of them did sincerely believe, Love and Practice it. For they all confess that the whole Canonical Scripture is true. Therefore be more studious sincerely to hold and improve those common truths which they all profess, than to oppose the particular opinions of any, further than that common truth requireth it. See that the Articles of the common Creed which all profess, be unfeignedly believed by you; and that the Petitions in the Lord's Prayer be sincer • lie and earnestly put up to God; and that the ten Commandments be heartily and entirely obeyed; and then no error or difference will be damning to you.

§. 35. Direct. 24. Take nothing as necessary to salvation in point of faith, nor as universally necessary in point of practice, which the universal Church in every age since Christ did not receive: For if anything be necessary to salvation which the Church received not in every age, then the Church itself of that age could not be saved; and then the Church was indeed no Church: For Christ is the Savior of his body. But certainly Christ had in every age a Church of savedones, who openly professed all that was of common necessity to salvation. An opinion may be true which accuseth the generality in the Church of some error or imperfection: For it is most certain that the Church on Earth is composed, of none (that have the use of reason) but erring and imperfect members: But no opinion can be true that condemneth all the Church to Hell, in any one age: For the Head and Husband of the Church must be her Judge.

§. 36. Direct. 25. Be not born down by the censoriousness of any, to overrun your own understanding and the truth, and to comply with them in their errors and extremes: But hold to the truth and keep your station: Jer. 15. 19. Let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them. It is too usual for the younger and more injudicious sort of Christians to be most zealous about some little Opinions, Ceremonies and Words, and to censure all those that differ from them, with such bitter censures, (as ungodly, flashearted, &c. ) that hereupon some of the more judicious forsake the truth and simplicity of the Gospel, to comply with these censurers merely to escape them; (or as some say, that they may keep an interest in them to do them good:) But such carnal compliances, though with the most zealous men, will bring nothing home at last but repentance and shame: Truth which is the means of the good of souls, must not be betrayed as for the good of souls.

§. 37. Direct. 26. Doubt not of well proved Truths, for every difficulty that appeareth against them: There is scarce any truth in the World so plain, but in your own thoughts, or in the c • v • ls of a wrangling wit, there may such difficulties be raised as as you can hardly answer: And there is scarce anything so evident, that some will not dispute against. You see that even the learnedst Jesuits, and all the Clergy of the Roman Kingdom, will not stick to dispute all the World (if they could) out of the belief of all their senses, while they maintain that Bread is not Bread, and wine is not wine. And yet how many Princes, Lord's and Rulers follow them, and many millions of the people; because they be not able to confute them. If they had said▪ that a man is no man but a warm, Psal. 22. 6. they might in reason have expected as much belief.

§. 38. Direct. 27. Abuse not your own knowledge by subjecting it to your carnal interest or sensuality: He that will sin against his Conscience, and will not obey the Knowledge which he hath, doth deserve to be given over to blindness and deceit, and to lose even that which he hath, and to be forsaken till he believe and defend a lie: that all they might be damned who obeyed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness, 2 Thes. 2. 10, 11, 12. God will not hold him guiltless who debaseth his sacred truth so far, as to make it stoop to his commodity and • ust: where he is a Teacher he will be a King, and sendeth his Truth as the instrument of his Government, and not as a slave or pandor to the flesh: He that will do God's will shall know it, Joh. 7. 17. But the carnal mind that cannot be subject to God's Law, is unfit to receive it, because it is spiritually discerned, Rom. 8. 7. 1 Cor. 2. 14.

CHAP. VIII. Directions for the Union and Communion of Saints, and the avoiding unpeaceableness and Schism.

THE PEACE and CONCORD of Believers is a thing that almost all those plead for, who call themselves Believers; and yet a thing that almost all men hinder and resist while they commend it. The Discord and DIVISIONS of believers, are as commonly spoken against, and by the same men, as commonly fomented. The few that are sincere (both Rulers and private men) desire Concord and hate Divisions in Love to Holiness which is promoted by it, and in Love to the Church, and good of souls, and the honor of Religion and the Gl • ry of God: And the few of those few that are experienced, wise, judicious persons, do choose the means that is fittest to attain these ends, and do prudently and constantly prosecute them accordingly: But these being in the World as a spoonful of fresh water cast into the Sea, or a spoonful of water cast into the flames of a house on fire, no wonder if the brinish Sea be not sweetened by them, nor the consuming raging fire quenched by them. The other Rulers of the world and of the Churches, are for Concord and against Division, because this tendeth to the quieting of the people under them, and the making of men submissive and obedient to their wills, and so to confirm their dignities, dominions and interests: And all men that are not H • lie, being predominantly SELFISH, they would all be themselves the Center of that Union, and bond of that concord which they desire: And they would have it accomplished upon such terms, •• d by such means as are most agreeable to their principles and Ends: In which there are almost a many minds as Men: so that among all the Commenders of UNITY and concord, there are none that take the way to attain it, but those that would center it all in GOD, and seek it upon his terms, and in his way. The rest are all tearing Unity and Peace in pieces, while they commend it; and they fight against it while they seek it: every man seeking it for Himself, and upon his own terms and in his own way: which are so various and inconsistent, that East and West may sooner meet than they.

§. 2. Yet must the sons of God be still the sons of Peace, and continue their prayers and endeavors for UNITY, how small soever be the hopes of their success: If it be possible, as much as in us lieth, we must live peaceably with all men: So far must they be from being guilty of any Schisms or unlawful Divisions of the Church, that they must make it a great part of their care and work to preserve the Unity and peace of Christians. In this therefore I shall next Direct them.

§. 3. Direct. 1. Understand first wherein the Unity of Christians and Churches doth consist: Or else you will neither know how to preserve it, nor when you violate it. Christians are said to be United to Christ, when they are entered into Covenant with him, and are become his Disciples, his Subjects and the members of his (Political) Body: They are united to one another when they are united to Christ their common head, and when they have that spirit, that faith, that Love which is communicated to every living member of the body. This Union is not the making of many to be One Christian; but of many Christians to be one Church: which is considerable either as to its Internal Life, or its external order and profession. In the former respect the bonds of our Union are, 1. The heart-Covenant (or faith ); 2. And the spirit: The Consent of Christ and of ourselves concurring, doth make the match or marriage between us; and the spirit communicated from him to us is as the nerves or ligaments of the body, or rather as the spirits which pass through all. The Union of the Church considered Visibly in its outward Policy, is either that of the whole Church, or of the Particular Churches within themselves, or of divers particular Churches accidentally united. 1. The Union of the wh • le, is Essential, integral or accidental: The essential Union is that Relation of a Head and members, which is between Christ and all the visible members of his Church: The foundation of it is the mutual Covenant between Christ and them, considered on their part as made Externally, whether sincerely or not: This is usually done in Baptism, and is the chiefest act of their Profession of the faith. Thus the Baptismal Covenant doth constitute us members of the visible Church. The Integral and accidental Union I pass by now. 2. Besides this Union of the Universal Church with Christ the Universal Head, there is in all Particular organized Churches a subordinate Union, 1. Between the Pastor and the flock, and 2. Between the People one towards another: which consisteth in these their special Relations to each other. 3. And there is an Accidental Union of many particular Churches: As when they are United under one Civil Government; or Consociated by their Pastors in one Synod or Council. These are the several sorts of Church-Union.

§. 4. Direct. 2. Understand also wherein the Communion of Christians and Churches doth consist: that you may know what it is that you must hold to. In the Universal Church your Internal Communion with Christ consisteth in his communication of his spirit and grace, his word and mercies unto you; and in your returns of Love, and Thanks and Obedience unto him; and in your seeking to him, depending on him, and receivings from him: Your Internal Communion with the Church or Saints, consisteth, in mutual Love, and other consequent affections, and in praying for, and doing good to one another as yourselves, according to your abilities and opportunities. Your external communion with Christ and with most of the Church in Heaven and Earth, is not mutually visible and local: For it is but a small number comparatively that we ever see: But it consisteth in Christ's visible communication of his word, his officers, and his ordinances and mercies unto you, and in your visible learning and reception of them, and obedience to him, and expressions of your Love and Gratitude towards him. Your external communion with the Universal Church, consisteth in the Prayers of the Church for you, and your prayers for the Church: In your holding the same faith, and professing to Love and Worship the same God, and Savior and Sanctifier, in the same holy ordinances, in order to the same eternal end.

§. 5. Your external Communion in the same particular Congregations consisteth in your assembling together to hear the Preaching of God's word, and to receive the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ, and pray and praise God, and to help each other in knowledge and holiness, and walk together in the fear of the Lord.

§. 6. Your Communion with other neighbor Churches, lieth in praying for and counseling each other, and keeping such correspondencies as shall be found necessary to maintain that Love and Peace and Holiness which all are bound to seek, according to your abilities and opportunities.

§. 7. Note here that Communion is one thing, and subjection is another: It is not your subjection to other Churches that is required to your communion with them: The Churches that Paul wrote to at Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, &c. had Communion together according to their capacities in that distance: but they were not subject one to another (any otherwise than as all are commanded to be subject to each other in humility, 1 Pet. 5. 5.) The Church of Rome now accuseth all the Christians in the World of separating from their Communion, unless they will take them for their Rulers, and obey them as the Mistress Church: But Paul speaketh not one syllable to any of the Churches of any such thing, as their obedience to the Church of Rome. To your own Pastors you owe subjection statedly as well as communion; and to other Pastors of the Churches of Christ (fixed or unfixed) you owe a temporary subjection so far as you are called to make use of them (as sick persons do to another Physician, when the Physician of the Hospital is out of the way): But one Church is not the Ruler of another, or any one o • all the rest, by any appointment of the King of the Church.

§. 8. Direct. 3. By the help of what is already said you are next distinctly to understand how far you are bound to Union or Communion with any other, Church or person, and what distance, separation or division is a sin, and what is not: that so you may neither causelessly trouble yourselves with scruples, nor trouble the Church by sinful Schism.

§. 9. I. There must be a Union among all Churches and Christians in these following particulars. 1. They have all but One God. 2. And One Head and Savior, Jesus Christ. 3. And One Sanctifier, the Holy Ghost. 4. And One Ultimate End and Hope, even the frui •• on of God in Heaven. 5. And one Gospel to teach them the Knowledge of Christ, and contain the promise of their salvation. 6. And one kind of faith that is wrought hereby. 7. And one and the same Covenant (of which Baptism is the seal) in which they are engaged to God. 8. And the same Instrumental founders of our faith, under Jesus Christ, even the Prophets and Apostles. 9. And all members of the same Universal Body. 10. And all have the same new nature and Holy disposition, and the same Holy Affections, in Loving God and Holiness, and Hating sin. 11. They all own as to the essential parts, the same Law of God, as the Rule of their faith and life, even the sacred Canonical Scriptures. 12. Every member hath a Love to the whole, and to each other, especially to the more excellent and useful members; and an inclination to holy Communion with each other. 13. They have all a propensity to the same holy means and employment, as Prayer, learning the word of God, and doing good to others. All these things the True living members of the Church have in sincerity, and the rest have in Profession.

§. 10. II. There will be still a diversity among the Churches and particular Christians in these following points, without any dissolution of the fore-described Unity. 1. They will not be of the same Age or standing in Christ; but some babes, some young men and some fathers. 2. They will not have the same degrees of strength, of Knowledge and of Holiness: some will have need to be fed with milk, and be unskillful in the word of Righteousness. 3. They will differ in the kind and measure of their gifts: some will excel in one kind, and some in another, and some in none at all. 4. They will differ in their natural temper, which will make some to be more hot and some more mild, some more quick and some more dull, some of more regulated wits and some more scattered and confused. 5. They will differ in spiritual health and soundn • ss: one will be more Orthodox and another more erroneous: one will have a better appetite to the wholesome word than others that are inclining to novelties and vain janglings: one will walk more blamelessly than another: some are full of Joy and peace, and others full of grief and trouble. 6. They differ much in usefulness and service to the Body: some are Pillars to support the rest, and some are burdensome and troublers of the Church. 7. It is the will of Christ that they differ in Office and employment: some being Pastors and Teachers to the rest. 8. There may be much difference in the manner of their worshipping God; some observing days and difference of meats and drinks, and forms and other Ceremonies, which others observe not: And several Churches may have several modes. 9. These differences may possibly by the temptation of Satan, arise to vehement contentions, and not only to the censuring and despis • ng of each other, but to the rejecting of each other from the Communion of the several Churches and forbidding one another to Preach the Gospel, and the banishing or imprisoning one another, as Constantine himself, did banish Athanasius; and as Chrysostom and many another have felt. 10. Hence it followeth that as in the Visible Church some are the members of Christ, and some are indeed the Children of the Devil, some shall be saved and some be damned, even with the • orest damnation, (the greatest difference in the World to come being betwixt the visible members of the Church), so among the Godly and sincere themselves they are not all alike amiable or happy, but they shall differ in Glory as they do in Grace: All these differences there have been, are, and will be in the Church, notwithstanding its unity in other things.

§. 11. III. The word [ Schism ] cometh from 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , disseco, lacero, and signifieth any sinful Division among Christians: some Papists (as Johnson ) will have nothing called Schism, but a Dividing ones self from the Catholic Church: Others maintain that there is nothing in Scripture called Schism, but making divisions in particular Churches. The truth is, (obvious in the thing itself) that there are several sorts of Schism or Division. 1. There is a causing Divisions in a particular Church, when yet no party divideth from that Church, much less from the Universal. Thus Paul blameth the Divisions that were among the Corinthians, while one said I am of Paul, and another, I am of Ap • llo, &c. 1 Cor. 3. 3. And 1 Cor. 11. 18. I hear that there be divisions among you: not that they separated from each others Communion, but held a disorderly Communion. Such divisions he vehemently dissuadeth them from 1 Cor. 1. 10. And thus he persuadeth the Romans (16. 17.) to mark them which cause Divisions and offenses among them, contrary to the doctrine which they had learned and avoid them; which it seems therefore were not such as had avoided the Church first. He that causeth differences of judgment and practice, and contendings in the Church, doth cause Divisions, though none separate from the Church.

2. And if this be a fault, it must be a greater fault to cause Divisions from, as well as in, a particular Church, which a man may do that separateth not from it himself: As if he persuade others to separate; or if he sow those tares of error which cause it, or if he causelessly excommunicate or cast them out.

3. And then it must be as great a sin, to make a causeless separation from the Church that you are in yourself, which is another sort of Schism: If you may not Divide in the Church, nor Divide others from the Church, then you may not causelessly Divide from it yourselves.

4. And it is yet a greater Schism, when you Divide not only from that one Church, but from many, because they concur in opinion with that one (which is the common way of Dividers.)

5. And it is yet a greater Schism, when whole Churches separate from each other, and renounce due Communion with each other without just cause: as the Greeks, Latins, and Protestants in their present distance, must some of them (whoever it is) be found guilty.

6. And yet it is a greater Schism than this, when Churches do not only separate from each other causelessly, but also unchurch each other, and endeavor to cut off each other from the Church-Universal, by denying each other to be true Churches of Christ. It is a more grievous Schism to withdraw from a true Church as no-Church, than as a corrupt-Church; that is, to cut off a Church from Christ and the Church-Catholic, than to abstain from Communion with it as a scandalous or offending Church.

7. It is yet ( caeteris paribus ) a higher degree of Schism to Divide yourselves (a person or a Church ) from the Universal Church without just cause, though you separate from it but secundum quid, in some accidental respect where unity is needful (For where Unity is not required, there dis-union is no sin: Yet such a person that is separate but secundum quid, from something accidental, or integral, but not essential to the Catholic Church, is still a Catholic Christian, though he sin.

8. But as for the highest degree of all, viz. to separate from the Universal-Church simpliciter, or in some Essential respect, this is done by nothing but by Heresy or Apostasy. However the Papists make men believe that Schismatics that are neither Heretics nor Apostates, do separate themselves wholly or simply from the Catholic Church, this is a mere figment of their brains. For he that separateth not from the Church in anything essential to it, doth not truly and simply separate from the Church, but secundum quid, from something separable from the Church. But whatever is essential to the Church is necessary to salvation: And he that separateth from it upon the account of his denying anything necessary to salvation, is an Heretic or an Apostate: that is, If he do it, as d • nying some one (or more) Essential point of faith or Religion, while he pretendeth to hold all the rest, he is an Heretic: If he deny the whole Christian faith he is a flat Apostate: and these are more than to be Schismatics.

§. 12. The word [ Heresy ] also is variously taken by Ecclesiastic writers: Austin will have Heresy to be an inveterate schism: Jerome maketh it to be some perverse opinion: Some call every Schism which gathereth a separated party from the rest, by the name of Heresy: Some call it a Heresy if there be a perilous error though without any Schism. Some call it a Heresy only when Schism is made, and a party separated upon the account of some perilous error. Some say this error must be damnable, that is, in the essentials of Religion: And some say, it is enough if it be but dangerous. Among all these the commonest sense of [ a Heretic ] is One that obstinately erreth in some essential point, and divideth from the Communion of other Christians upon that account. And so Pareus and many Protestants take Heresy for the Species, and Schism for the Genus: All Schism is not Heresy; but all Heresy, say they, is Schism. Remember that all this is but a Controversy de nomine, and therefore of small moment.

§. 13. By this that I have said you may perceive who they be that are guilty of Church-divisions: As, 1. The sparks of it are kindled when Proud and self-conceited persons, are brainsick in the fond estimation of their own opinions; and heart-sick by a feverish zeal for the propagating of them. Ignorant souls think that every change of their opinions is made by such an accession of heavenly light, that if they should not bestir them to make all of the same mind, they should be betrayers of the truth, and do the world unspeakable wrong. When they measure and censure men as they receive or reject their peculiar discoveries or conceits, schism is in the Egg.

§. 14. 2 The fire is blown up, when men are desirous to have a party follow them and cry them up, and thereupon are busy in persuading others to be of their mind, and do speak perverse things to draw away disciples after them. And when they would be counted the Masters of a party.

§. 15. 3. The flames break forth, when by this means the same Church, or divers Churches do fall into several Parties, burning in zeal against each other, abating charity, censuring and condemning one another; backbiting and reviling each other, through envy and strife: when they look strangely at one another as being on several sides; as if they were not Children of the same Father, nor members of the same body; or as if Christ were divided; one being of Paul, and another of Apollo and another of Cepha • , and everyone of a faction, letting out their thoughts in jealousies and evil surmises of each other: perverting the words and actions of each to an ugly sense: and snatching occasions to represent one another as fools or odious to the hearers, as if you should plainly say, [I pray you hate or despise these people whom I hate and despise.] This is the core of the Plague sore: It is schism in the bud.

§. 16. 4. When people in the same Church do gather into private meetings, not under the guidance of their Pastors, to edify one another in holy exercises in Love and peace, but in opposition to their lawful Pastors, or to one another, to propagate their singular opinions, and increase their parties, and speak against those that are not on their side; schism is then ready to bring forth and multiply, and the swarm is ready to come forth and be gone.

§. 17. 5. When these people actually depart, and renounce or forsake the Communion of the Church, and cast off their faithful Pastors, and draw into a separated body by themselves, and choose them Pastors and call themselves a Church, and all without any just sufficient cause; When thus Churches are gathered out of Churches, before the old ones are dissolved, or they have any warrant to depart; when thus Pastor is set up against Pastor, Church against Church, and Altar against Altar; this is schism ripe and fruitful: The swarm is gone, and hived in another place.

§. 18. 6. If now the neighbor Churches by their Pastors in their Synods, shall in compassion seek to reclaim these stragglers, and they justify their unjust separation, and contemn the counsel of the Churches and Ministers of Christ; this is a confirmed obstinate schism.

§. 19. 7. If they shall also judge that Church to be no Church from which they separated, and so cut off a part of the body of Christ, by an unrighteous censure and condemn the innocent, and usurp authority over their Guides; this is disobedience and uncharitableness with schism.

§. 20. 8. If they shall also condemn and unchurch all the other Churches, that are not of their mind and way, and renounce communion with them all, and so condemn unjustly a great part of the Body of Christ on Earth, this is to add fury and rebellion to an uncharitable schism. And if to cover their sin, they shall unjustly charge these Churches which they reject, with Heresy or wickedness, they do but multiply their crimes by such extenuations.

§. 21. 9. If the opinion that all this ado is made for, be a damning error, against some essential point of the true Religion, then it is Heresy as well as Schism.

§. 22. 10. If this separation from the Church be made in defense of an ungodly life against the Discipline of the Church: If a wicked sort of men shall withdraw from the Church to avoid the disgrace of confession or excommunication; and shall first cast off the Church, lest the Church should proceed to cast out them; and so they separate that they may have none to govern and trouble them but themselves; this is a Profane rebellious schism. This is the common course of schism when it groweth towards the height.

§. 23. 11. Besides all these, there is yet a more pernicious way of Schism, which the Church or Court of Rome is guilty of: They make new articles of faith, and new points of Religion, and a new worship — of God, shall I say, or of Bread as if it were a God? And all these they put into a Law, and impose them on all the other Churches, yea they put them into an Oath, and require men to swear that without any doubting they believe them to be true: They pretend to have authority for all this, as Rome is the Mistress of all other Churches: They set up a new Universal Head, as an Essential part of the Catholic Church, and so found or fain a new kind of Catholic Church: And he that will not obey them in all this, they renounce Communion with him, and to hide this horrid notorious schism, they call all Schismatics that are not thus subjected to them.

§. 24. 12. And to advance their schism to the height, as far as arrogance can aspire, they not only refuse communion with those, from whom they separate but condemn them as no Pastors, no Churches, no Christians, that are not subject to them in this their Usurpation: And they that are but about the third or fourth part (at most) of the Christian world, do condemn the Body of Christ to Hell (even all the rest) because they are not Subjects of the Pope.

§. 25. Besides all this criminal odious Schism, of Imposers or Separaters, there is a degree of Schism or unjust Division, which may be the infirmity of a good and peaceable person. As if a humble tender Christian should mistakingly think it unlawful to do some action that is imposed upon all that will hold communion with that particular Church (such as Paul speaketh of Rom. 14. if they had been imposed): And if he suspecting his own understanding, do use all means to know the truth, and yet still continueth in his mistake: If this Christian do forbear all reviling of his superiors, and censuring those that differ from him, and drawing others to his opinion, but yet dare not join with the Church in that which he taketh to be a sin, this is a sinful sort of withdrawing, because it is upon mistake: But yet it is but a pardonable infirmity, consistent with integrity, and the favor of God.

§. 26. IV. In these cases following Separation is our duty and not a sin. 1. The Churches separation from the Unbelieving world is a necessary duty: For what is a Church, but a society dedicated or sanctified to God, by separation from the rest of the world? 2 Cor. 6. 17, 18. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my Sons and Daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. The Church is a Holy people, and therefore a separated people.

§. 27. 2. If a Church apostatize and forsake the faith, or if they turn notoriously Heretical denying openly any one Essential Article of the faith, and this not only by an undiscerned consequence, but directly in express terms or sense, it is our duty to deny to hold communion with such Apostates or Heretics: For it is their separating from Christ that is the sinful separation, and maketh it necessary to us to separate from them. But this is no excuse to any Church or person, that shall falsely accuse any other Church or person of Heresy (because of some forced or disowned consequences of his Doctrine), and then separate from them when they have thus injured them by their calumnies or censures.

§. 28. We are not bound to own that as a Church which maketh not a visible Profession of faith and holiness: that is, If the Pastors and a sufficient number of the flock make not this Profession. For as the Pastor and flock are the constituent parts of the Church, politically considered, so Profession of faith and holiness is the essential qualification of the members. If either Pastors or people want this profession, it is no Political Church: But if the people profess true Religion, and have no Pastors, it is a community of believers, or a Church unorganized, and as such to be acknowledged.

§. 29. 4. If any shall unlawfully constitute a new Political Church-form, by making new constitutive Officers to be its Visible Head, which Christ never appointed, we are not to hold communion with the Church in its devised form or Polity: though we may hold Communion with the members of it considered as Christians and members of the Universal Church. Mark well, that I do not say that every new devised Officer disobligeth us from such communion, but such as I describe; which I shall sullyer open.

§ 30. Quest. May not men place new Officers in the Church: and new forms of Government which God never instituted? or is there any form and Officers of Divine institution?

Answ. Though I answered this before, I shall here briefly answer it again; 1. There are some sorts of Officers that are essential to the Polity, or Church-form, and some that are only needful to the wellbeing of it, and some that are only Accidental: 2. There is a Church-form of God's own institution, and there is a superadded human Polity, or form: There are two sort of Churches, or Church-forms of God's own institution. The first is the Universal Church considered Politically as Headed by Jesus Christ: This is so of Divine appointment, as that it is an Article of our Creed. Here if any man devise and superinduce another Head of the Universal Church, which God never appointed, though he pretend to hold his Sovereignty from Christ and under him, it is Treason against the sovereignty of Christ, as setting up an Universal Government or Sovereign in his Church without his authority and consent. Thus the Pope is the Usurping Head of a Rebellion against Christ, and in that sense by Protestants called Antichrist: And he is guilty of the Rebellion that subscribeth to, or owneth his Usurpation, or sweareth to him as his Governor, though he promise to obey him but in licitis & honestis: Because it is not lawful or honest to consent to a Usurpers Government. If a Usurper should traitorously without the Kings consent, proclaim himself Vice-King of Ireland or Scotland, and falsely say that he hath the Kings Authority, when the King disclaimeth him, he that should voluntarily swear obedience to him in things lawful and honest, doth voluntarily own his Usurpation and Treason. And its not the lawfulness and honesty of the matter which will warrant us to own the Usurpation of the Commander. And Secondly, There is another subordinate Church-form of Christ's institution: that is, Particular Churches consisting of Pastors and people conjoined for personal Communion in God's Worship. These are to the Universal Church, as particular Corporations are to a Kingdom, even such Parts of it as have a distinct subordinate Polity of their own: It is no City or Corporation, if they have not their Mayors, B • ilists, or other Chief Officers, subject to the King, as Governors of the people under him: And it is no particular Church, in a Political sense, but only a Community, if they have not their Pastors to be under Christ, their spiritual Conductors in the matters of salvation; as there is no School which is not constituted of Teacher and Sch • lars. That particular organized Political Churches are of Christ's institution (by his Spirit in the Apostles:) is undeniable: Acts 14. 23. They ordained them Elders in every Church. Tit. 1. 5. Ordain Elders in every City as I commanded thee: Acts 20. 17. He sent to Ephesus and called the Elders of the Church: 28. Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the Church of God —So 1 Thess. 5. 12, 13. Heb. 13. 7, 17, 24, &c. 1 Cor. 7. 23. If the whole Church be come together into one place, &c. Thus far it is no question but Church-forms and Government is of Divine appointment: And man can no more alter this, or set up such other without God's consent, than a subject can alter or make Corporations without the Kings consent. 2. But besides these two sorts of Divine institution, there are other allowable associations which some call Churches: God hath required these particular Churches to hold such Communion as they are capable of, for promoting the common Ends of Christianity: And Prudence is left to determine of the Times and Places, and manner of their Pastors Assemblies, Councils and Correspondencies according to God's general Rules. If any will call these Councils, or the Associations engaged for special correspondencies, by the name of Churches I will not trouble any with a strife about the Name: In this case so far as men have power to make that Association or Combination which they call a Church, so also if they make Officers suited to its ends, not encroaching upon the Churches or Officers of Christ's own institution, I am none of those that will contend against them: Nor will this allow us to deny Communion with them. 3. And in those Churches which Christ himself hath instituted, there are Officers that make but for the Integrity, and not for the Political Essence of the Church: As Deacons, and all Pastors or Presbyters more than One. For it is not essential to it to have any Deacons, or many Pastors. As to this sort of Officers Christ hath appointed them, and it is not in man's power to alter his institution, nor to set up any such like in co-ordination with these: But yet if they should do so, as long as the true Essentials of the Church remain: I am not to deny communion with that Church, so I own not this corruption. 4. But there are also as circumstantial employments about God's Worship, so Officers to do those employments, which men may lawfully institute: As Clerks, Church-wardens, Door-keepers, Ringers, &c. It is not the adding of these that is any sin. By this time you may see plainly both how far Churches, Officers, and Church-Government is jure Divino, and how far man may or may not add or alter, and what I meant in my Proposition, viz. That if men introduce a new Universal Head to the Church Catholic, or a new Head to particular Churches, instead of that of Christ's institution, this is in sensu Politico, to make new species of Churches, and destroy those that Christ hath instituted; (for the pars gubernans, and pars gubernata are the essential Constituents of a Church.) And with such a Church as such in specie, I must have no communion (which is our case with the Papal Church;) though with the Material parts of that Church, as members of Christ, I may hold communion still.

§. 30. 5. If particular members are guilty of obstinate impenitency in true Heresy, or ungodliness or any scandalous crime, the Church may and must remove such from her communion: For it is the Communion of Saints. And the offender is the Cause of this separation.

§. 31. 6. If a whole Church be guilty of some notorious scandalous sin, and refuse with obstinacy to Repent and Reform, when admonished by neighbor Churches, or if that Church do thus defend such a sin in any of her members, so as openly to own it; other Churches may refuse communion with her, till she Repent and be Reformed. Or if they see cause to hold communion with her in other respects, yet in this they must have none.

§. 32. 7. If any Church will admit none to her personal Communion, but those that will take some false Oath, or subscribe any untruth, or tell a lie, though that Church do think it to be true, (as the Trent Oath which their Priests all swear), it is not lawful to do any such unlawful thing to obtain communion with that Church: And he that refuseth in this case to commit this sin, is no way guilty of the separation, but is commendable for being true to God: And though the case may be sad to be deprived of the liberty of public Worship, and the benefits of public communion with that Church, yet sin is worse; and obedience is better than Sacrifice: God will not be served with sin, nor accept the Sacrifice of a disobedient fool, Eccles. 5. 1, 2. Nor must we lie to glorify him, nor do evil that good may come by it: Just is the damnation of such servers of God, Rom. 1. 7, 8. All public Worship is rather to be omitted, than any one sin committed to enjoy it: (Though neither should be done where it is possible to do better). It is not so unwise to think to feed a man with Poysons, as to think to serve God acceptably by sin.

§. 33. 8. If any one Church would ambitiously Usurp a Governing power over others (as Rome doth over the world) it is no unwarrantable separation to refuse the Government of that Usurping Church. We may hold communion with them as Christians, and yet refuse to be their subjects. And therefore it is a proud and ignorant complaint of the Church of Rome, that the Protestants separate from them as to Communion, because they will not take them for their Governors.

§. 34. 9. If any by violence will banish or cast out the true Bishops or Pastors of the Church, and set up Usurpers in their stead (as in the Arians persecution it was commonly done), it is no culpable separation, but laudable and a duty, for the people to own their Relation to their true Pastors, and deny communion with the Usurpers; as the people of the Eastern Churches did commonly refuse communion with the intruding Bishops, even to the Death, telling the Civil Rulers, that they had Bishops of their own, to whom they would adhere.

§. 35. 10 If a true Church will obstinately deny her members the use of any one Ordinance of God, as Preaching, or Reading Scripture, or Prayer, or Praise, or Discipline, while it retaineth all the rest, though we may not separate from this Church as no Church (which yet in the case of total rejection of Prayer or Praise, is very questionable at least) yet if we have opportunity, we must remove our local communion to a more edifying Church, that useth all the public Ordinances of God: unless the public good forbid, or some great impediment, or contrary duty be our excuse.

§. 36. 11. If a true Church will not cast out any impenitent, notorious scandalous sinner, though I am not to separate from the Church, yet I am bound to avoid private familiarity with such a person, that he may be ashamed, and that I partake not of his sin.

§. 37. 12. As the Church hath diversity of members, some more holy, and some less, and some of whole sincerity we have small hope, some that are more honorable, and some less; some that walk blamelessly, and some that work iniquity: So Ministers and private members, are bound to difference between them accordingly, and to honor and love some far above others, whom yet we may not excommunicate: And this is no sinful separation.

§. 38. 13. If the Church that I live and communicate with, do hold any tolerable error, I may differ therein from the Church, without a culpable separation. Union with the Church may be continued with all the diversities before mentioned D. 3. §. 10.

§. 39. 14. In case of persecution in one Church or City, when the servants of Christ do fly to another (having no special reason to forbid it,) this is no sinful separation, Matth. 10. 23.

§. 40. 15. If the public service of the Church require a Minister or a private Christian to remove to another Church, if it be done deliberately and upon good advice, it is no sinful separation.

§. 41. 16. If a Lawful Prince or Magistrate command us to remove our habitation, or command a Minister from one Church to another, when it is not notoriously to the detriment of the common interest of Religion, it is no sinful separation to obey the Magistrate.

§. 42. 17. If a poor Christian that hath a due and tender care of his salvation, do find that under one Minister his soul declineth and groweth dead, and under another that is more sound, and clear, and lively he is much edified to a holy and heavenly frame and life, and if hereupon, preferring his salvation before all things he remove to that Church and Minister where he is most edified, without unchurching the other by his censures, this is no sinful separation, but a preferring the One thing needful before all.

§. 43. 18. If one part of the Church have leisure, opportunity, cause and earnest desires to meet ofter for the edifying of their souls, and redeeming their time, than the poorer, laboring, or careless and less zealous part will meet, in any fit place, under the oversight and conduct of their Pastors, and not in opposition to the more public full assemblies, as they did, Acts 12. 12. to pray for Peter at the house of Mary, where many were gathered together praying; and Acts 10. 1, &c. this is no sinful separation.

§. 44. 19. If a man's own outward affairs require him to remove his habitation from one City or Country to another, and there be no greater matter to prohibit it, he may lawfully remove his local communion from the Church, that he before lived with to that which resideth in the place he goeth to: For with distant Churches and Christians I can have none but Mental Communion or by distant means (as writing, messengers, &c. ); It is only with present Christians that I can have local personal communion.

§. 45. 20. It is possible in some cases that a man may live long without local personal communion with any Christians or Church at all, and yet not be guilty of sinful separation. As the Kings Ambassador or Agent in a Land of Infidels, or some Traveler, Merchants, Factors, or such as go to convert the Infidels, or those that are banished or imprisoned. In all these twenty cases, some kind of separation may be lawful.

§. 46. 21. One more I may add, which is, when the Temples are so small, and the Congregations so great, that there is no room to hear and join in the public Worship: or when the Church is so excessively great, as to be uncapable of the proper ends of the society; in this case to divide or withdraw, is no sinful separation: When one Hive will not hold the Bees, the swarm must seek themselves another, without the injury of the rest.

By all this you may perceive, that sinful separation is first in a censorious uncharitable mind, condemning Churches, Ministers and Worship causelessly, as unfit for them to have communion with: And Secondly, it is in the personal separation which is made in pursuance of this censure: But not in any local removal that is made on other lawful grounds.

§. 47. Direct. 4. Understand and consider well the Reasons why Christ so frequently and earnestly presseth Concord on his Church, and why he so vehemently forbiddeth Divisions. Observe how much the Scripture speaketh to this purpose, and upon what weighty Reasons. Here are four things distinctly to be represented to your serious consideration. 1. How many, plain and urgent are the Texts that speak for Unity, and condemn Division. 2. The great Benefits of Concord. 3. And the mischiefs of Discord and Divisions in the Church. 4. And the Aggravations of the sin.

§. 48. I. A true Christian that hateth fornication, drunkenness, lying, perjury, because they are forbidden in the Word of God, will hate Divisions also when he well observeth how frequently and vehemently they are forbidden, and Concord highly commended and commanded. John 17. 21, 22, 23. That they all may be One, as thou Father art in me, and I in thee: that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them, that they may be One, even as we are One: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in One; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me. Here you see, that the Unity of the Saints must be a special means to convince the Infidel world of the truth of Christianity, and to prove God's special Love to his Church, and also to accomplish their own perfection. 1 Cor. 1. 10. Now I beseech you brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions (or Schisms ) among you, but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind, and in the same judgment. For it hath been declared to me of you, my brethren,—that there are contentions among you — 1 Cor. 3. 3. For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, (zeal) and strife, and divisions, (or parties, or factions) are ye not carnal, and walk as men? For while one saith, I am of Paul, and another I am of Apollos, are ye not carnal? Phil. 2. 1, 2, 3, 4. If there be any consolation in Christ: if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit; if any bowels and mercies, fulfill ye my joy, that ye be like minded, having the same Love, of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than themselves. Rom. 16, 17, 18. Now I beseech you brethren, mark them which cause divisions (or parties ) and offenses (or scandals ) contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned, and avoid them. Abundance more such Texts may be recited.

§. 49. II. The great Benefits of the Concord of Christians are these following. 1. It is necessary to the very Life of the Church and its several members, that they be all One Body. As their Union with Christ the Head and Principle of their life is principally necessary, so Unity among themselves is secondarily necessary, for the conveyance and reception of that Life which floweth to all from Christ. For though the Head be the Fountain of Life, yet the nerves and other parts must convey that life unto the members: And if any member be cut off or separated from the Body, it is separated also from the Head, and perisheth. Mark well those words of the Apostle, Ephes. 4. 3. to 16. [ Endeavouring to keep the Unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace: There is one Body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one Hope of your calling: One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all: But unto everyone of us is given Grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ.—And be gave some Apostles, and some Prophets, and some Evangeli • ts, and some Pastors and Teachers: For the perfecting of the Saints, for the work of the Ministry, for the Edifying of the Body of Christ, till we all come in the Unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that—speaking the truth in Love, we may grow up into him in all things, which is the Head, even Christ; From whom the whole Body fitly joined together, and compacted by every joint of supply, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the Body to the edifying of itself in Love: ] See here how the Churches Unity, is necessary to its life and increase, and to the due nutrition of all the parts.

§. 50. 2. The Unity of the Church and the Concord of Believers, is necessary to its strength and safety; for Christ also strengtheneth as well as quickeneth them by suitable means. Woe to him that is alone: But in the Army of the Lord of Hosts we may safely march on, when stragglers are catched up or killed by the weakest enemy. A threefold cord is not easily broken. Enemies both spiritual and corporal are deterred from assaulting the Church or any of its members, while they see us walk in our Military Unity and Order. In this posture every man is a blessing and defense unto his neighbor. As every Soldier hath the Benefit of all the conduct, wisdom and valor of the whole Army, while he keepeth in his place; so every weak Christian hath the use and benefit of all the Learning, the Wisdom and Gifts of the Church, while he keepeth his station, and walketh orderly in the Church. The hand, the eye, the ear, the foot, and every member of the Body, is as ready to help or serve the whole, and every other particular member as itself: But if it be cut off, it is neither helpful, nor to be helped. O what a mercy is it for every Christian, that is unable to help himself, to have the help of all the Church of God? their directions, their exhortations, their Love, their prayers, their liberality and compassion, according to their several abilities and opportunities? As infants and sick persons have the help of all the rest of the family that are in health.

§. 51. 3. Unity and Concord as it proceedeth from Love, so it greatly cherisheth and increaseth Love: even as the laying of the Wood or Coals together is necessary to the making of the fire, which the separating of them will put out. Holy Concord cherisheth holy converse and communion: And holy communion powerfully kindleth holy Love. When the servants of Christ do see in each other the luster of his Graces, and hear from each other the heavenly language which floweth from a Divine and heavenly mind, this potently kindleth their affections to each other, and maketh them close with those as the sons of God, in whom they find so much of God, Yea, it causeth them to Love God himself in others, with a reverent, admiring, and transcendent Love, when others at the best, can Love them but as men. Concord is the womb and soil of Love, although it be first its progeny. In quietness and peace the voice of peace is most regarded.

§. 52. 4. Unity and Concord is the Churches Beauty: It maketh us amiable even to the eye of nature, and venerable and terrible even to the eye of malice. A concord in sin is no more honor, than it is for conquered men to go together in multitudes to prison or captivity: or for beasts to go by droves unto the slaughter. But to see the Churches of Christ with one heart and soul acknowledging their Maker and Redeemer, and singing his Praise as with one voice, and living together in Love and Concord, as those that have one Principle, one Rule, one nature, one work, one Interest and Hope, and End, this is the truly beauteous symmetry, and delectable harmony. Psal. 133. Behold how good and how pleasant it is, for brethren to dwell even together in unity? It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the heard, even Aaron's beard, that went down to the skirts of his garment: As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore. The Translators well put this as the Contents of this Psalm [ The benefit of the communion of Saints ].

§ 53. 5. The concord of Believers doth greatly conduce to the successes of the Ministry, and propagation of the Gospel, and the conviction of unbelievers, and the conversion and salvation of ungodly souls. When Christ prayeth for the Unity of his Disciples, he redoubleth this argument from the effect or end, [ that the world may believe that thou hast sent me: ] and [ that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, &c. Joh. 17. 21, 23.] Would this make the world believe that Christ was sent of God? Yes, undoubtedly if all Christians were reduced to a Holy Concord, it would do more to win the Heathen world, than all other means can do without it. It is the Divisions and the wickedness of professed Christians, that maketh Christianity so contemned by the Mahometanes, and other Infidels of the world: And it is the Holy Concord of Christians that would convince and draw them home to Christ. Love and Peace and concord are such virtues, as all the world is forced to applaud, notwithstanding natures enmity to good. When the first Christian Church were all with one accord in one place, and continued daily with one accord in the Temple, and breaking bread from house to house partook of food with gladness and singleness of heart, and when the multitude of believers were of one heart and of one soul, &c. Act. 2. 1, 46. & 4. 32. then did God send upon them the Holy Ghost, and then were three thousand converted at a Sermon; And with great power gave the Apostles witness of the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.

Our Concord in Religion hath all these advantages for the converting of unbelievers and ungodly men. 1. It is a sign that there is a constraining evidence of truth in that Gospel which doth convince so many: A concurrent satisfaction and yielding to the truth, is a powerful testimony for it. 2. They see then that Religion is not a matter of worldly Policy and design, when so many men of contrary interests do embrace it. 3. And they see it is not the fruit of a Melancholy constitutions, when so many men of various temperatures entertain it. 4. They may see that the Gospel hath Power to conquer that self-love and self interest which is the most potent thing in vitiated nature: Otherwise it could never make so many unite in God as their common interest and end. 5. They may see that the Gospel and spirit of Christ, is stronger than the devil and all the allurements of the flesh and world, when it can make so many agree in the renouncing of all earthly vanities, for the hopes of everlasting life. 6. They will see that the Design and doctrine of Christianity is Good and excellent, beseeming God, and desirable to man; when they see that it doth produce so good effects, as the Love and Unity and Concord of manking. 7. And it is an exceeding great and powerful help to the Conversion of the World in this respect, because it is a thing so conspicuous in their sight, and so intelligible to them, and so approved by them. They are little wrought on by the doctrine of Christ alone, because it is visible or audible but to few, and understood by fewer, and containeth many things which nature doth distaste: But the holy Concord of Believers is a thing that they are more able to discern and judge of, and do more generally approve. The HOLY CONCORD of Christians, must be the CONVERSION of the unbelieving world, if God have so great a mercy for the world: which is a consideration that should not only deter us from Divisions, but make us zealously study and labor with all our interest and might, for the healing of the lamentable Divisions among Christians, if we have the hearts of Christians, and any sense of the interest of Christ.

§. 54. 6. The Concord of Christians doth greatly conduce to the ease and peace of particular Believers. The very exercise of Love to one another doth sweeten all our lives and duties: We sail towards Heaven in a pleasant Calm, with wind and tide, when we live in Love and peace together: How easy doth it make the work of Godliness? How light a burden doth Religion seem, when we are all as of one heart and soul?

§. 55. 7. Lastly, Consider whether this be not the likest state to Heaven, and therefore have not in it the most of Christian excellency and perfection? In Heaven there is no discord, but a perfect consort of glorified spirits, harmoniously loving and praising their Creator. And if Heaven be desirable, holy Concord on earth is next desirable.

§. 56. III. On the contrary, consider well of the Mischiefs of Divisions. 1. It is the killing of the Church (as much as lieth in the dividers) or the wounding it at least. Christ's Body is One, and it is sensible; and therefore Dividing it tendeth directly to the destroying it, and at least will cause its smart and pain. To Reform the Church by Dividing it, is no wiser than to cut out the Liver or Spleen or Gall to cleanse them from the filth that doth obstruct them, and hinder them in their office: you may indeed thus cleanse them, but it will be a mortal cure. As he that should Divide the Kingdom into two Kingdoms dissolveth the old Kingdom, or part of it at least, to erect two new ones: so he that would divide the Catholic Church into two, must thereby destroy it, if he could succeed: or destroy that part which divideth itself from the rest. Can a member live that is cut off from the Body, or a branch that is separated from the tree?

§. 57. Quest. O but, say the Romanists, why then do you cut off yourselves from us: The Division is made by you, and we are the Church, and you are dead till you return to us? How will you know which part is the Church, when a Division is once made?

Answ. Are you the Church? Are you the only Christians in the World? The Church is [all Christians united in Christ their Head]. You traitorously set up a new usurping Head; and proclaim yourselves to be the whole Church, and condemn all that are not subjects to your new Head: We keep our station, and disclaim his Usurpation, and deny subjection to you, and tell you that as you are the subjects of the Pope, you are none of the Church of Christ at all: From this treasonable conspiracy we withdraw ourselves: But as you are the subjects of Christ we never divided from you, nor denied you our Communion. Let Reason judge now who are the Dividers. And is it not easy to know which is the Church in the Division? It is all those that are still united unto Christ: If you or we be divided from Christ, and from Christians that are his Body, we are then none of the Church: But if we are not Divided from Christ, we are of the Church still: If part of a Tree, (though the far greater part) be out off or separated from the rest, it is that part (how small soever) that still groweth with the Root that is the living Tree. The Indian Fig-tree, and some other Trees, have branches that take root when they touch the ground: If now you ask me whether the branches springing from the second Root, are members of the first Tree, I answer; 1. The rest that have no new Root are more undoubtedly members of it; 2. If any branches are separated from the first Tree, and grow upon the new root alone, the case is out of doubt. 3. But if yet they are by continuation joined to both, that Root which they receive their nutriment most from, is it which they most belong to. Suppose a Tyrant counterfeit a Commission from the King to be Vice-King in Ireland; and proclaimeth all them to be Traitors that receive him not: The King disclaimeth him: the wisest subjects renounce him; and the rest obey him but so as to profess they do it because they believe him to be commissioned by the King. Let the question be now, who are the Dividers in Ireland? and who are the Kings truest subjects? and what Head it is that denominateth the Kingdom? and who are the Traitors? This is your case.

§. 58. 2. Divisions are the deformities of the Church. Cut off a nose, or pluck out an eye or dismember either a man, or a picture, and see whether you have not deformed it. Ask any compassionate Christian? ask any insulting enemy, whether our Divisions be not our deformity and shame; the lamentation of friends and the scorn of enemies?

§. 59. 3. The Churches Divisions are not our own dishonor alone, but the injurious dishonor of Christ and Religion and the Gospel. The World thinketh that Christ is an impotent King, that cannot keep his Kingdom at unity in itself, when he hath himself told us, that every Kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every City or House divided against itself shall not stand, Mat. 12. 25. They think the Gospel tendeth to Division, and is a doctrine of dissention, when they see divisions and dissensions procured by it; They impute all the faults of the subjects to the King, and think that Christ was confused in his Legislation, and knew not what to teach or command, because men are confounded in their opinions or practices, and know not what to think or do. If men misunderstand the Law of Christ, and one saith, This is the sense and another saith that is the sense, they are ready to think that Christ spake non-sense, or understood not himself, because the ignorant understand him not: Who is there that converseth with the ungodly of the World, that heareth not by their reproach and scorns, how much God and Religion are dishonored by the Divisions of Religious people.

§. 60. 4. And thus also our Divisions do lamentably hinder the progress of the Gospel, and the conversion and salvation of the ungodly World: They think they have small encouragement to be of your Religion, while your Divisions seem to tell them, that you know not what Religion to be of yourselves. Whatever Satan or wicked men would say against Religion to discourage the ungodly from it, the same will exasperated persons in these Divisions say against each others way: And when everyone of you condemneth another, how should the Consciences of the ungodly persuade them to expect salvation in any of those ways, which you thus condemn? Doubtless the Divisions of the Christian world, have done more to hinder the conversion of Infidels, and keep the Heathen and Mahometane World in their damnable ignorance and delusions, than all our power is able to undo? and have produced such desolations of the Church of Christ, and such a plentiful harvest and Kingdom for the Devil, as every tender Christian heart, is bound to lament with tears of bitterness. If it must be that such offense shall come, yet woe to those by whom they come.

§. 67. 5. Divisions lay open the Churches of Christ, not only to the scorn, but to the malice, will and fury of their enemies. A Kingdom or house divided cannot stand, Matth. 12. 25. where hath the Church been destroyed, or Religion rooted out, in any Nation of the Earth, but divisions had a principal hand in the effect? O what desolations have they made among the flocks of Christ! As Seneca and others opened their own veins and bled to death, when Nero or such other Tyrants, did send them their commands to Die; even so have many Churches done by their divisions, to the gratifying of Satan, the enemy of souls.

§. 62. 6. Divisions among Christians do greatly hinder the edification of the members of the Church: while they are possessed with envyings and distaste of one another, they lose all the benefit of each others gifts, and of that holy communion which they should have with one another. And they are possessed with that zeal and wisdom, which James calleth earthly, sensual and devilish, which corrupteth all their affections, and turneth their food to the nourishment of their disease, and maketh their very worshipping of God to become the increase of their sin. Where divisions and contentions are, the members that should grow up in humility, meekness, self-denial, holiness and love, do grow in pride, and perverse disputings, and passionate strivings, and envious wranglings: The Spirit of God departeth from them, and an evil Spirit of malice and vexation taketh place; though in their passion, they know not what Spirit they are of: Whereas if they be of one mind, and live in peace, the God of love and peace will be with them. What lamentable instances of this calamity have we in many of the Sectaries of this present time: Especially in the people called Quakers, that while they pretend to the greatest austerities, do grow up to such a measure of sour pride, and uncharitable contempt of others, and especially of all superiors, and hellish railing against the holiest Ministers and people, as we have scarce known, or ever read of?

§. 63. 7. These Divisions fill the Church with sin: even with sins of a most odious nature. They introduce a swarm of errors, while it becomes the Mode for everyone to have a doctrine of his own, and to have something to say in Religion which may make him notable, Acts 20. 30. Of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away Disciples after them. They cherish pride, and malice, and belying others (the three great sins of the Devil) as naturally as dead flesh breedeth Worms: They destroy impartial Christian Love, as naturally as bleeding doth consume our vital heat and moisture. What wickedness is it that they will not cherish? In a word, the Scripture telleth us that where envying and strife is, there is confusion, and every evil work. (And is not this a lamentable way of Reformation of some imaginary or lesser evils)?

§. 64. 8. These Divisions are the grief of honest spectators, and cause the sorrows of those that are guilty of them. They make all their duties uneasy to them, and turn their Religion into a bitter unpleasant wrangling toil: Like Ox • n in the yoke that strive against each other, when they should draw in order and equality. What a grievous life is it to Husband and Wife, or any in the family, if they live in discord? So is it to the members of the Church. When once men take the Kingdom of God to consist of meats, or drinks, or ceremonies, which consisteth in Righteousness, and Peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost, and turn to strive about unedifying questions, they turn from all the sweetness of Religion.

§. 65. 9. Sects and Divisions lead directly to Apostasy from the faith. Nothing is more in the design of Satan, than to confound men so with variety of Religions, that they may think there is no certainty in any: that so both the ignorant spectators may think all Religion is but fancy and deceit, and the contenders themselves wheel about from Sect to Sect, till they come to the point where they first set out, and to be at last deliberately of no Religion, who at first were of none for want of deliberation. And it is no small success that Satan hath had by this temptatation.

§. 66. 10. The Divisions of Christians do oft proceed to shake States and Kingdoms, having a • amentable influence upon the Civil peace: And this stirreth up Princes jealousies against them, and to the use of those severities, which the suffering party takes for persecution: yea, and Turks and all Princes that are enemies to Reformation and Holiness, do justify themselves in their cruellest persecutions, when they see the Divisions of Christians, and the troubles of States that have followed thereupon. If Christians, and Protestants in special, did live in that Unity, Peace and Order as their Lord and Ruler requireth them to do, the consciences of persecutors would even worry and torment them, and make their lives a Hell on earth, for their cruelty against so excellent a sort of men: But now when they see them all in confusions, and see the troubles that follow hereupon, and hear them reviling one another, they think they may destroy them as the troublers of the earth, and their consciences scarce accuse them for it.

§. 67. IV. It is necessary also for your true understanding the malignity of this sin, that you take notice of the Aggravations of it, especially as to us. 1. It is a sin against so many, and clear, and vehement words of the Holy Ghost, (which I have partly before recited) that it is therefore utterly without excuse: Whoredoms, and Treasons, and Perjury are not oftener forbidden in the Gospel than this.

§. 68. 2. It is contrary to the very design of Christ in our Redemption; which was to Reconcile us all to God, and unite and center us all in him: To gather together in one the Children of God that are scattered abroad, John 11. 52. To gather together in one all things in Christ, Ephes. 1. 10. To make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace, Ephes. 2. 15. And shall we join with Satan the divider and destroyer, against Christ the Reconciler, in the very design of his Redemption?

§. 69. 3. It is contrary to the design of the Spirit of Grace, and contrary to the very nature of Christianity itself. By one Spirit we are all baptized into one body—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit, 1 Cor. 12, 13. As there is one Body and one Spirit, so it is our charge to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, Ephes. 4. 3, 4. The new nature of Christians doth consist in Love, and desireth the Communion of Saints as such: And therefore the command of this special Love, is called the New Commandment, John 17. 21. & 13. 34. & 15. 12, 17. And they are said to be taught of God to love one another, 1 Thess. 4 9. As self-preservation is the chief principle in the Natural body, which causeth it to abhor the wounding, or amputation of its members, and to avoid division as destruction, except when a gangrened member must be cut off, for the saving of the body; so it is also with the mystical body of Christ. He is senseless and graceless that abhorreth not Church-wounds.

§. 70. 4. These Divisions are sins against the nearest bonds of our high Relations to each other: We are Brethren, and should there be any strife among us? Gen. 13. 8. We are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, Gal. 3. 26. We are the fellow-members of the body of Christ; and