The Divine Right of Church Government and Excommunication

QUEST. 1.

1. Conclus. SItting is the most and only lawful gesture, That gesture, that Christ and his Disciples used upon moral and unalterable grounds, which doth not concern the first Supper as first, but as a Supper, and that not upon no occasional and temporary reasons, belonging to that Supper, more then to all the Suppers of that kind, that we are to follow as a pattern, and must be most Lawfull. But the gesture of sitting is such, Ergo:

The Proposition is evident in Scripture, .

I prove the Assumption. 1. Sitting was either: 1. Miraculous. 2. Customable. 3. Occasionall; or 4. Moral. None in reason can say the first; that sitting was a miracle: 2. Nor is it customable. For 1. Customs laudable are grounded upon decency and reason, and so moral, or grounded upon no reason at all.

But Christ did nothing in God's worship, nor did he any human moral actions for the mere fact and will of others going before, for these were not reasonable human actions, and if it be customable only, it is not lawful to put away a customable action out of worship, and to put a moral action of kneeling and Divine signification in the place thereof, for so we might change places, times, persons and all physical circumstances, and make them supernatural. 2. The action could not be occasional: for then the occasion of the Supper as first, and because of such persons, such time at night, such place, an upper chamber, should have moved Christ to sitting, rather then to kneeling, or to any other gesture; but kneeling or any other gesture might have consisted well with that first Supper, with the upper chamber, with the time and persons, as well as sitting, except the Law givers will had been a reason of the contrary.

Ans. Occasionall, properly is that which hath a reason, not from the nature of the thing itself, but from such occasional occurrences of Providence, as God will not alter, and its that which hath no moral nor sacred conveniency with the nature of worship, but hath only a conveniency for such a time and place, as Christ's preaching in a ship, when he is at the sea side, and a multitude are to hear him, the ship hath no agreement with the nature of preaching, more then an house hath, time, place, and persons are clearly such as agreed with that supper, as first, not as a sacred worship, and therefore were merely occasional, and so not imitable, and though Christ might have altered them, yet had they been occasional, and they have no sacred conveniency with this Supper, as this Supper; and if Christ had altered these for mere will, upon no reasons that concerneth all Suppers, they had not been occasional, but positive points of worship, and so had obliged us; yea, the upper chamber, and these twelve persons by no possibility, can concern all Suppers, to the end of the world, but sitting agreeth kindly and natively to all Suppers in general, as kneeling to all praying indefinitely. Christ might have changed bread and wine, in flesh, and milk, or water, will it hence follow, we are not to imitate Christ in bread and wine? And that bread and wine are occasional? Lastly, Paul's practice in passing from an upper chamber, and from twelve men, to a Church full of men and women, 1 Cor. 11. 23, 17, 18, 22. warranteth us to pass from these, we have not the like reason to warrant us to pass from sitting.

2. That gesture which Christ chose, and that refusing all other, even kneeling, having the same Religious reasons, at the first supper as now, that must be most convenient and lawful. But sitting is such; Ergo,

The Proposition is clear: The Assumption is proved from Matth. 26. While they did eat (the Passover) he took bread, Mar. 14▪ 22. As they did eat, Jesus took bread.

But while they did eat the Passover, they sat. Ergo, while they took the Supper they sat: I prove the Assumption, Matth. 26. 20. And, when the evening was come, he sat down with the twelve, Mark 14. 18. And as they sat, and did eat, Jesus said, &c. v. 22. And as they did eat, Jesus took bread▪ eating the Passover, and sitting were co-existent, and taking the Sacramental bread of the Supper, and eating the Passover were co-existent; Ergo, Taking the bread of the Supper, and sitting were co-existent.

Paybodie saith, Paul expoundeth, ( as they did eat ) after they had ended eating, and so after they had ended sitting, and possibly passed to another gesture, 1 Cor. 11. After Supper he took the Cup. Ans. If you wholly remove the Passover, you remove the Table also. 2. Though the Suppers were not mingled, yet the holy Ghost expresseth the co-existence of sitting, and taking the Sacramental bread, as Ezech. 8. 1. As I sat in mine house, the hand of Jehovah fell upon me, 2 Sam. 18 14. Joab thrust three darts in him, while he was yet alive, 1 Sam. 25. 16. The men were a wall to us, all the time that we were with them, Dan. 4. 3. and Matth. 26. 47. And while he yet spake, Lo, Judas came, Act. 10. 19. While Peter thought on the vision, the spirit said to him, Act. 22. 6. Rom. 5. 10. If praying interveened betwixt eating and taking the Supper, and the Passover sitting, to put them to kneeling, this must be true, while they were not eating, Christ took bread, a plain contradicting of Christ. 3. After Supper he took the cup, but they say not after Supper he took the bread, for praying, blessing, breaking, distributing, eating, interveened betwixt the Passover and taking the Communion Cup, and therefore he had reason to say, After Supper he took the Cup, but not that reason, to say, after Supper he took the Bread. It is violent to describe Christ's taking the Bread from the adjunct of time, while as they sat and did eat, if sitting and eating were not at this time, but were gone and past by many intervening actions of kneeling, praying, preaching, this were to describe supper from dinner. 3. By this, the gesture of no Table action can be cleared from Scripture, for when it is said, Luke 9. John 6. He made the multitude sit down and • a •• , a cavillator might say, praying and blessing the meat went before, and possibly they sat on their knees, and Christ sat down and taught the people; it may be he rose and kneeled before Sermon was ended. The Scripture saith, While Christ and his disciples did ••• , and so while they did sit, he took bread. This taking of bread, whether it be an Hysterosis as many think, in respect the Evangelists mention but once taking of bread, or if it was preparatory, and before the act of blessing, it was a sacramental act performed by Christ, while they were sitting, which is much for sitting.

That Christ passed not from passover sitting, to Supper kneeling, I think these considerations move me. 1. Because the changes of all in the Passover, to that in the Lord's Supper, as of flesh in bread and wine, is positively set down. 2. No question the change unto an adoring gesture, had been upon the grounds of conciliating more reverence to that Sacrament, then to the Passover, which must be moral, and tie to the end of the world. 3. Nor would the Holy Ghost have removed an ordinary table gesture into so insolent, and supernaturally significant gesture, as kneeling, without a grave reason expressed, or his own will only, which is only the essential reason, why bread is a Sacrament rather then any other Element, and so would stand of necessary and essential use. 4. Sitting at the Idols table 1 Cor. 8. 10. declareth that in religious feasts, sitting was ordinary, and a sign indicant of honoring the spiritual Lord of the Banquet, and a religious communion with the Lord of the Feast was hence signified.

Ans. 1. Christ▪ his reasoning to prove that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to sit at meat is a greater honor, then to stand: Luke 22. 27. were null, if 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signify prostration, for religious bowing is always an act of inferiority. The same I say if 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signify falling down to the ground. 2. Sitting or pitching about a place, and sitting and lying in sackcloth, may well signify simply to be in a place, but table-sitting and table-inclining on Christ's bosom must be more then simply being at the Table. Nor doth Calvin in that place expound sitting at table, for nothing but simply being at table, though elsewhere he doth.

3. Arg. That which representeth the honor of table-fellowship of fellow-banquetters with Christ, that is of necessary use; But sitting at the Lord's table representeth this; Ergo, Luke 22. 27. The Minor is made good, to teach the Disciples humility, he would stand and have them to sit. Whether is greater he that sitteth, or he that standeth? it is a greater honor to sit at table, then to stand; Ergo it is an honor to sit, for we may well infer the positive from the comparative, Luk. 22. 29. upon the occasion of their striving who should be greatest, and Lord Bishop, he promiseth a sort of fellowship in a Kingdom. 2. In sitting on thrones with him, and the meaning that that fellowship should quench the fire of their appetite for Prelacy. 3. This sitting in Scripture, as table-sitting, is used to express our fellowship with Christ in the Gospel, Mat. 22. 1. 2. Luke 22. 30. Mat. 8. 11, 12. Luke 14. 15, 16, 17. Cant. 1. 12. Cant. 5. 1. Rev. 19. 9. Rev. 3. 20. and our Communion with Christ's body and his blood is sealed up in this Sacrament, 1 Cor. 10. 16. 4. This is confirmed, in that the Sacramental food is not simply given as food, (though that be a special fruit thereof) for then there should be no more required to the essence and integrity of the Supper, but eating and drinking, and on his alone, eating and drinking and using the words of Christ, should receive a Sacrament, and the manner of eating should be accidental, and in the Churches power; but this food is given as food Table-wise, with the solemnities of a banquet, and of spiritual fellowship, which must be represented of purpose here, and that sitting ways, so to eat and drink with Publicans is a sign of fellowship, as Christ's eating and sitting with Publicans and sinners made him be construed to be a friend to them, 1 Cor. 5. 11. To refuse to eat with a fornicator, is to refuse fellowship with him, 1 Cor. 8. 10. 1 Cor. 10. 20, 21. To sit at the Idols and Devils Table, is to partake of the idol and Satan's worship, as having fellowship with them; Ergo, to sit at the Lord▪ table is to have fellowship with him. 5. The Holy Ghost speaketh this fellowship, Luke 22. 14. He sat down and the twelve Apostles, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 with him, see a fellowship, Math. 26. 20. He sat down, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , with the twelve. 18. And as they did eat (together at Table) Mark 14. 15. Luke 22. 15. With desire have I desired to eat with you, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , table-wise, as ver. 14. Mat. 26. 29. I will not drink,—until I drink it new 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 . The words carry a resemblance of drinking with them the well of life, so Augustine, Hilary, Musculus, Ames expoundneth them, so (as I take) he draweth them from 1. This material wine. 2. From Sacramental tabling. 3. From this old fruit of the Wine. 4. From fellowship here in the Kingdom of Grace, to 1. New wine in heaven. 2. To heavenly tabling. 3. To new and everlasting wine. 4. In the Fathers Kingdom. Neither am I much moved with what Paybodie saith, that our Savior led the woman of Samaria, from Jacob's well to thirst for the water of life, yet is not, for that, Jacob's well made a type by divine institution. I answer, this would have some color, if Christ did speak of common wine, as he did speak of Jacob's Well, as of common water. But all the three Evangelists speak of Sacramental wine consecrated by word and prayer, else Christ's calling bread his body should not prove that bread were a sign of his body by divine institution, but only we were to make that spiritual use of bread and wine, that we make of ordinary bread and wine at our houses. Formalists then must say that Christ speaketh of wine here as common, not as Sacramental, which is absurd when Christ is expounding the Elements, in their spiritual signification, Luke 5. 22, 21. But behold the hand of him that betrayeth me is 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 with me, on the table. Mat. 26. 23. Mark 14. 20. If he had been kneeling or standing, (gestures unpossible for them then) he could not have his hand leaning on the table, and if he had not been sitting▪ table-wise, in a table-fellowship with Christ, then could not our Savior have conveniently convinced the ingratitude of Judas, as he doth. Now if Christ aim not to make Judas his fault the greater, because Judas and he sat at one table together, and that as an holy and Sacramental table, he had in this no more argued Judas of ingratitude, then any of the rest of the house who communicated not with Christ, because Christ and they did eat one material and ordinary bread together▪ And in this Achitophel was a type of Judas, as David of Christ, and that not only in this, that Achitophel did eat bread with David, and so had a civil fellowship, but that they went together to God's house, in company together, Psal. 55. 14. So had Christ and Judas fellowship together, at that same Sacramental table: And as tabling together signifieth civil fellowship, so must fellow-tabling at one sacred Feast signify Spiritual fellowship together. 6. Giving and not granting that fellow-sitting together were only a common honor, not a mystical honor by divine Institution, yet since to sit at a table with a Ruler, is an honor, 1 Sam. 20. 5. 2 Sam. 9. 13. Esther 7. 7. Prov. 23. 1. Mat. 8. 11. Luk • 16. 23. Luke 22. 30. And the Lord's Disciples are admitted to sit with him, as is clear in that he sat down with the twelv • , and he sat (Luke 24. 30.) at meat with them, and took bread and blessed it. No power on earth should dare to deprive the people of God of this honor, for this honor was bestowed on the Lord's Apostles, as communicants, not as Apostles, and the want of Christ's bodily presence, diminisheth nothing of the honor, seeing he is really, but in a spiritual manner present, as the Lord of the feast, with us, as he was with them. Paybodie saith, When Christ sat at table in the Passover, even then he schooled them from looking at honor in material or outward sitting, while as Luke 22. 26. he would stand himself as a servant, and wash his Disciples feet. Answ. His non-sitting and washing their feet, being a moral, not a Sacramental teaching them humility, doth no more school them from not looking to sit, then his non-eating, and non-drinking while he stood servant-like, doth school them from not looking to the honor of eating and drinking Sacramentally. Christ teacheth lessons of humility, not to learn us not to seek the spiritual honor of communion with Christ, that were to teach us to be proud, and this man is that bold to insinuate that it was a spece of pride, for the Disciples to sit at table with Christ, and for John to lean on his bosom.

Ans. But in this the disputer and we mean no other thing, then that kneeling which is a note of submission, and never used in banquets, cannot formally express, as an apt sign, the dignity of fellow-table-ship with Christ: 2. Poor Logitian, it followeth not in sitting at table, which is the expressing sign of the honor of tablefellowship, we may not call Christ, Lord. David sitting at Table with his Prince Saul, might well term him ( my Lord the King ) but if▪ David should be put to his knees at Table, and inhibited to eat at the Table, at which his Prince did eat; no wise man will say, that Saul had honored David with fellow-Tabling with him. For the Act of kneeling, and non-eating were no expressing signs of fellow-Tabling, but by the contrary of no fellow-Tabling; the Disputer hath no mind to make us every way equal with Christ, so as there can be a case, wherein it is not Lawfull to esteem or call Christ our Lord; King and Superior, this is Paybodies consequence; but take away Table-sitting, an honor put upon us by Christ in this Sacrament, Luk. 22. 27. and substitute kneeling for it, then you take away God's expressing sign of Table-Fellowship in that gesture: for while the world standeth, kneeling shall never be a sign of Table-fellowship: sitting at Table is a sign, as the Scriptures clear, but sitting taketh never away our inferiority to Christ; you may worship and actuate the person of a co-heir, but not worship in an expressing visible sign of co-heirship, and then kneel. Farther he reasoneth with us, as if Table-sitting inferred an equality betwixt us, and that Lord who is the head of men and Angels; we reason for an honor of fellowship, not equality. David set at King Saul's Table, is not made equal with Saul, but in Table-sitting, he doth partake of Table-honor to feast with his Prince.

If Christ should have sitten and caused his Disciples rise and wash his feet▪ in that he could not have said, ( I have put the honor of Table-fellowship on you, for you stand and wash my feet, and I sit ) this (I say) had been no table-honor, but most contrary to it: It had been indeed servant-honor, Luk 22. 27. and more then sinful men are worthy of. To kneel to Christ is an honor, but to kneel at Tabling with him, as kneeling, is no more an expressing sign of table-honor, nor standing and serving Christ, while he did eat is an honor of table-fellowship. Now if any shall take away eating with Christ, at that table, he taketh away table-honor, as Papists do in taking away drinking with Christ from the people, yet eating with Christ maketh us not equal to Christ, but take away eating, and you take away Table-honor, so take away sitting at Table, and you take away ( eatenus ) in so far the Table-honor.

But by this mean (say they) you make it necessary to sit, and of Divine necessity. I answer, Table sitting is not so necessary, as that the want thereof doth annihilate the Sacrament, and make it to be no Sacrament at all, but it is (as I think) many ways necessary, as first it is morally or Theologically necessary, as being gesture sanctified by the practice of Christ and his Apostles, upon Moral grounds, and so to be imitated by us: 2. It is necessary, by necessity of expediency, as free from hazard of Idolatry, of which crime kneeling in this act, is guilty. 3. It is necessary, sacramentally, for the integrity of the Sacrament, as signifying our honor of Table-fellowship. 4. It is by natures grounds necessary, that as this banquet is material, having bread, wine, taking, breaking, distribution, eating, drinking, so the external solemnity of a banquet, such as is table-sitting, requireth the same. And 5. which is our 4. Argument, it is necessary by necessity of Divine precept ( Do this in remembrance of me ) that this is included in the precept we certainly believe: 1. Because nothing in reason can be excluded, from the precept of the first pattern, but what is merely occasional, such as sitting is not.

2. The practice of Christ and the Apostles cannot be a will-action, and therefore must fall under a precept: sitting cannot be occasional, upon the reason that it was continued through occasion of the passover; for if this be good, then eating and drinking, and the Analogy betwixt the sign and Christ, shall be occasional, and the singing of a Psalm, as was at the Passover, shall be occasional: for Christ retained what did equally belong to the Supper of the Jews, and this Christian Supper, as concerning the common nature of sacred Feasts.

5. What is proper to a table of solemn feasting, should not be denied to this, But sitting was such; Ergo, More of this may be seen in the Nullity of Pearth examination, and the re-examination of the five Articles of Pearth.

QUEST. II.

OUr Argument against Ceremonies is▪ that they fail against the fifth Commandment, and the Authority of Rulers.

What the Civil, or Church-Ruler can command must be good, necessary, apt to edify, and not indifferent, or neither good nor evil; Ceremonies are acknowledged by their Fathers to be indifferent, and neither good nor evil; Ergo, They are such as cannot be lawfully commanded. The Proposition is clear; the Ruler must command for good, Rom. 13. 4. He is the minister of God for thy good, and all for edification, 1 Cor. 10, 23. 1 Cor. 14. 3. v. 12, 17, 26. And therefore all means enjoined for this end, good, and Edification must conduce thereunto of their own nature, and not by the will of men, else they edify not. But that this may be further cleared, it is questioned, if human Laws bind the conscience: for which consider,

1. Dist. An human Law is taken in Concreto, when judges command what God commandeth, as when they make a Law against murder. 2. In abstracto, when the judge forbiddeth what may tend to murder, as carrying Armor in a City in the night.

2. Dist. There is some moral equity in right human Laws.

3. Something positive.

4. Dist. There be four things to be regarded in human Laws: 1. Public peace of the society. 2. The credit, honor and Majesty of the Ruler, even when the Law is unjust. 3. Obedience passive, and subjection, by patient suffering. 4. Obedience active by doing, which is now to be considered.

Dist. 5. An human Law Civil may oblige, Ration generalis praecepti, In regard of the general command to obey our superiors, as the fifth Command saith▪ But the question is, if a human Law, as merely positive oblige in conscience, as if this which the Captain forbiddeth, as, (not to speak the watch-word) be in itself against the sixth Commandment (Thou shalt not murder) if no murder follow upon the not speaking of the watch-word, though it be against the fifth in the general.

Dist. 6. The question is not, whether we be obliged in conscience to obey superiors in things Lawfull, or whether we be obliged in conscience to obey Superiors, when they are sole authoritative relaters and carriers of God's express Law to us, for then they bring nothing of their own, to lay upon us, and in these cases their laws are rather God's Laws delivered by Superiors to us, and bind the conscience. But the question is, if positive laws, in particular matters, negatively only, conform to the word, as in matters of Economy, and policy, as not to eat flesh in Lent, for the growth of cattle; in matters of Art, and in ordering of war and Military Acts, commanded by Captains, if these commandments as such oblige the conscience. Now to oblige the conscience, is, when the not doing of such a thing bringeth an evil conscience; now an evil conscience, as Pareus saith, Is the sense of sin committed against God, and the fear of God's judgment.

Distinct. 7. The conscience i • obliged by doing, or not doing, two ways: 1. Per se, kindly, when the fact of itself obligeth, and for no respect without, as to give alms to the poor at the Commandment of the superior: 2. When the fact obligeth for a reason from public peace, good example, and order.

1. Conclusion. When Rulers command, what God expressly commandeth, their Laws obligeth the conscience, Psal. 34. 11. Come ye children hearken unto me, and I will teach you the fear of the Lord, Prov. 4▪ 1. Hear ye children the instruction of a Father.

2. Conclus. Public peace in all the commandments of Superiors, in so far, as can be without sin, obligeth the conscience, as Heb. 12. 14. Follow peace with all men, and godliness, Psal. 34. 14. Seek peace, and follow after it, Rom. 12. 18.

3. Conclus. Subjection to the censures of Rulers by suffering patiently, is an obligation lying upon all private persons, 1 Pet. 2. 20. But if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable to God, Rom. 13. 2. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God.

4. Conclus. Nothing in non-obeying unwarrantable Commandments must be done that redoundeth to the discredit of the Ruler or the hurting of his Majesty and honor, 1 Pet. 2. 17. Honor the King, Eccles. 10. 20. Curse not the King: For even when we deny subjection or obedience objective, to that which they command, yet owe we obedience official, and all due respect and reverence to the person and eminent place of the Ruler, as Act. 7. 2. Steven calleth them, Men, brethren, and fathers, Act. 7. 51. And yet stiffnecked resisters of the holy Ghost.

5. Conclus. Human Laws, whither civil or Ecclesiastic, in that particular positive matter, which they have of Art, Economy, policy, and in God's matters of mere human coin and stamp, do not binds the conscience at all, per se, kindly and of themselves. 1. Nothing, but what is either God's express word, or his word by consequence doth lay a band on the conscience of itself: But not to eat flesh in L • nt, upon civil reasons, Not to carry Armor in the night, To wear Surplice, and to Cross infants in Baptism, are neither God's word expressly, nor by consequence. The major is sure; because the word is the perfect and adequate object of matters of Faith, and moral practice, which concerneth the conscience, Psal. 19. 7. 8. Psal. 119. 9. John 20. 31. Prov. 8. 9. 2. Because whatever thing layeth a band on the conscience, the not doing of that would be a sin before God, if the Ruler should never command it ( But the carrying Armor in the night (the not wearing Surplice in Divine service ) should be no sin before God, if the ruler should never command them, as reason, Scriptures, and adversaries teach. The Proposition I instruct from the diffinition of an obligation of conscience, for to lay a band on the conscience is defined, to lay a command on the soul, which ye are obliged before God to do, as you would eschew sin, and obtain eternal salvation: So the learned Pareus so Dr. Field; so Gerson, and so teach Gregorius de Valentia, and Suarez. 3. None can lay on a band of not doing, under the hazard of sin, but they that can remit sins, for the power that looseth, the same bindeth: But mortal men cannot bind to sin, nor loose men from sin, but where God goeth before them in binding and loosing, for they cannot bestow the grace of pardoning sin: But he only who hath the keys of David, who openeth, and no man shutteth, and shutteth, and no man openeth. 4. Whoever can lay on bands of Laws, to bring any under the debt of sin, must lay on bands of obligation to eternal punishment, but God only can do this, Mat. 10. 28.

The Proposition is clear, because sin against God, essentially includeth a relative obligation to eternal punishment. 5. In matters of God's worship this is clear. The School-men, as Aquina • , Suarez, Ferrariensis, Conradus teach us, that there is a twofold good. The first is, an objective and primordiall goodness, whereby things are agreeable to God's Law, if rulers find not this in that good which they command, they are not just, and so not to be obeyed. There is another goodness that cometh from the will of authority, & so only divine authority must make things good; the will and authority of Rulers findeth objective goodness in them, and therefore enacteth Laws of things, but because they enact Laws of things, they do not therefore become good and Lawfull, It is the will of the Creator of all beings which is the measure, rule, and cause of the goodness of things, as Adams not eating of the tree of knowledge is good and grateful obedience, from God's forbidding will, and it should have been as grateful obedience to eat of that tree, if God had commanded so. Men cannot make worlds; nor can their will create goodness in acts indifferent, nor can their forbidding will illegittimate or make evil any actions indifferent, and therefore things must be morally good, and so intrinsically good without the creative influence of human Authority, and from God only are they apt to edify, and to oblige the conscience in the terms of goodness moral.

And this is strengthened, by that which in reason cannot be denied, to wit, that it is essential to every human Law that layeth any obligation on the conscience, that it be just, nor is it to be called a Law, except it be just, and justice and equity human Laws have from God, the law of nature, and his word, not from the Authority and will of men; therefore Iurists expound that What pleaseth the Prince, hath the vigor of a Law, of just things. Also the School-men, as Carduba, Thomas▪ Soto, Medina, Adrianus Navar Driedo Castro, as I gather out of their writings, give strong reasons, why Rulers cannot lay an obligation on the conscience, when the matter of the Law is light and naughty, for this were to make a man a trangressor before God, for a word, a straw, a toy, which is unjust: Because the just weight of the matter is the only just ground of the Laws obligation: Ergo, the will of the Lawgiver, except he make a moat a mountain, cannot lay an obligation of necessity on man. 2. It were a foolish law, and so no law to oblige to eternal punishment, and the offending of 2. God for a light thing, for this were to place the way of salvation in that wherein the way consisteth not. 3. Such a law were not for edification, but for destruction of souls. 4. This was the Pharisees fault, Mat. 23. to lay on intolerable burdens on men's souls. 5. The law of God and nature freeth us in positive laws from guilt, in case of necessity, as David did lawfully eat Shew-bread. 6. A Civil law may not take away a man's life for a straw, far less can it bind to God's wrath. 7. Augustine saith, they be unjust balances to esteem things great or small, for our sole will. Out of all which I conclude, that no law as a Law, doth oblige the Conscience, but that which hath from the matter moral equity, and not from the intention of the Law-giver, as Cajetan, Silvester, Angelus, and Corduba teach, which intention must take a rule from the matter of the law, and not give a rule. Gerson, No law (saith he) is a law to be called as necessary to salvation, (as all good laws should be) but that which de jure Divino, is according to God's law, yea, we are not (saith Durand) to obey the Pope if he command a Monk to do something, when he is not moved to command by the necessity, the profit of the Church, but by his own free will, and if this be known. If the Pope (faith he) for his own will, and without necessity and utility should seclude works of supererogation, that command should tend to destruction, and we are to obey Christ, who is above the Pope. And therefore his mind is, that all obligation of Conscience, in human commandments cometh from God's will and law, that is, from the just and necessary matter of the law, not from the will of men.

6. Conclus. All human or Ecclesiastic laws binding the conscience, have necessary, and not probable deduction only, by the warrant of both the M • jor Proposition and Assumption from the Word of God, and Law of Nature. This conclusion is against Suarez, he seeketh only a probable connection betwixt obliging Laws and the Divine law. And Gregorius de valent. is in very deed against Gerson, who teacheth three things of all human laws. 1. That they are in so far just. 2. That they in so far oblige the Conscience, as they have necessary dependence upon natures law, or God's word, and therefore compareth them to these precepts that Physicians give to sick persons, they oblige the conscience of the sick, (as I think) from the sixth Commandment, ( Thou shalt do no murder, ) for if the patient sleep at such a time, or drink wine in such a case, he killeth himself, but they have not obliging power from the fifth Commandment, not as if the King being sick were obliged by the fifth Commandment to obey the Physician, as his superior. 3. He will have all human laws that properly obligeth, to be only declaratory, and to manifest only the Divine law, and to apply it to such and such a matter. The Conclusion is clear from what is said before, because all civil laws as merely positive, in the cafe of non-contempt do not oblige, and in the case of non-scandal, as Medin. Almaine, Gerson teach. And it followeth from a sure ground, that Vasquez layeth down, and he hath it from Driedo, to wit, that the efficacy of obligation in human laws, cometh not from the will of Lawgivers, or their intention, but from the dignity or weightiness of the matter. If then the matter be not from God's law, just, the obligation is none at all; for if the law from man's will, shall lay on an obligation of three degrees, whereas God's law from God's will, before men enacted this in a Law, laid on an obligation of two degrees only, tying the Conscience, then the will of man createth obligation, or the obligative power of conscience in the matter of the Law▪ and by that same reason he createth goodness, which is absurd, for that is proper to God only.

I grant it is hard, because of the variety of singular actions in man's life, to see the connection, betwixt particulars of human laws and God's laws; yet a connection there is, and for this cause the learned worthy Divine, Pareus will have human laws in particulari, & per se, in the particular and of themselves to bind the Conscience. Whereas Calvin, and Beza, Junius, Tilenus, Sibrandus, Whittakerus and others deny this: But the truth is, human civil laws are two ways considered. 1. As they are merely Positive & according to the letter of the Law. 2. As they have a connection with 1. The principles of nature, of right and wrong. 2. With the end of the law, which is the supreme law, The safety of the people, as the Civil law saith, he who entereth to an inheritance and maketh no Inventory of all his goods, shall pay debts above the-whole heritage, this law according to the letter in the Court of conscience is unjust, and so cannot oblige in Conscience; so as he is guilty before God, and deserveth the vengeance of everlasting wrath, who doth not make an inventory of all his goods, and produce it to the Judge; so he that goeth up to the walls of a City, may by the Law be commanded to be put to death, yet is he not guilty of eternal death before God, and therefore if the presumption which is the ground of the law cease, as this; He that maketh not an inventory with a purpose to enjoy the whole inheritance and pay no debts, sinneth before God against conscience, as famous jurists, to wit Jason, Bartolus and others teach: for this Law considered as having connection with a principle of nature, that every man should pay his debts, is a law binding the Conscience, and the truth is, the end of these Laws oblige the Conscience, they being divine expressions of justice and righteousness, but not the Laws themselves; for whatever obligeth the conscience as a divine truth, the ignorance thereof is a sinful ignorance, and maketh a man guilty of eternal wrath, but men are not guilty & liable to the eternal wrath of God, because they are ignorant of all the civil Laws in Iustinians book; then were we obliged to be no less versed in all the civil laws, that bindeth in foro humano, then of the Bible, and law of God.

The adversaries strive to prove that these laws oblige the conscience, we may hear Bellarmine Vasquez, Valentinian, and the Formalist and Arminian, Doctor Jackson say, To resist the Rulers in giving, and making laws, is to resist God, as 1 Sam. 8. They have not refused thee, but they have refused me, that I should not reign over them. Suarez • aith, An human law is the nearest cause of obligation of conscience, as the eternal law is the remote cause. And • ackson as the immediate interposition of divine authority made the killing of Abraham's son, holy, which otherwise would have been cruelty; so the interposition of authority derived from God, make some actions that barely considered would be apparently evil, and desperate, to be honest and lawful; to strike a Prophet would seem sin, but when a Prophet commandeth to strike, not to strike is disobedience, 1▪ Kin. 20. 35, 36. to rob a Spaniard is Piracie, but to do it upon the Kings letter of Mart for wrongs done to the State, is obedience to the King. Answ. To resist the servant in that wherein he is a servant, and as a servant, is to resist God, as 1 Sam. 8. proveth well. But the assumption then is most false, for rulers in making laws, and creating by their sole pleasure, goodness moral, in particular matters without the word of God, are not God's servants, nor is human authority as human, the nearest cause of obligation of conscience, instamped in these laws, nor is it the cause at all, and therefore to resist them, is not to resist God. They be God's instruments and Ministers in 1. Propounding and expounding God's laws. 2. In executing them, and defending them from the violence of men. 3. In making positive and directory civil laws, for civil government, that are laws improperly so called, which bind the conscience as above is said, in so far, as they have dependence upon God's Law: for James saith, There is but one Law-giver. As for Church-canons, all, except Physical circumstances in them, are to be warranted by the word. Therefore it is a vain consequence of Valentia, human laws oblige, dependenter a lege aeternâ, as they depend on the eternal law▪ Ergo, they oblige in Conscience, it followeth not. They oblige in Conscience as their Major and Minor proposition, in that which is moral, can be proved out of God's word, but so, in their morallity they are merely divine, and not human and positive, and so the argument concludeth not against us. They oblige in Conscience as they depend upon the eternal law, that is, as they are deduced from the eternal Law of God, in a Major proposition, without probation of the assumption, that we deny, and it is in question now. The people 1 Sam. 8. in rejecting Samuel from being their judge, rejected God, not because Samuel had a power of making laws, without the warrant of God's word. Neither Moses, nor Jeremiah, nor Ezekiel▪ nor any Prophet were in that servants subordinate to God, for they were only to hear the word at God's mouth. 3. We could have no more at Bellarmine's hand, then Jackson saith. For Bellarmine saith, In a good sense Christ gave to Peter a power, to make that which is sin, to be no sin, and that which is no sin, to be sin. So Jackson, the interposition of derived authority, maketh that which would be murder other ways, to be a good work; that is, men may do what God only can do. If Isaac then at the commandment of Abraham his father, offer his son Jacob to God in a bloody Sacrifice, then Abraham's derived authority maketh that a lawful sacrifice, as to strike a Prophet of it self, is a degree of murder, but when a Prophet commandeth another to strike a Prophet, it is lawful. But can any blasphemer say, that this was human derived authority without warrant of the word of the Lord, such as are human positive laws, and our human ceremonies, see the text, 1 King. 20. 35. And a certain man of the sons of the Prophets, said unto his neighbor in the word of the Lord▪ smite me. This was immediate, divine and Prophetical authority, and not human. Doth the Kings letter of Mart make robbing a Spaniard lawful? Court Parasites speak so, he refuteth himself. The Kings letter of Mart, for wrongs done to the State, maketh that which is Piracy lawful, then the Kings authority doth not here by a nomothetick power, and a law laid upon the Conscience, but the wrongs of Piracy by Spain, done to the State of England, may make the robbing of Spaniards an act of lawful war, and an act of justice flowing from the King as a lawful Magistrate. Now Jackson is speaking of mandates of Rulers in that place, which have no warrant of the word of God. Yea, even Stapleton a Papist saith, as Doctor Field also observeth, That human laws bind for the utility and neoessity of the matter, and not from the will of the Lawgiver. And so saith Gerson, Almain, Decius, Mencha, and our own Junius saith, The plenitude of power of laws is only in the princpall agent, not in the instrument. Doctor Jackson saith, unlimited and absolute faith or submission of conscience we owe not to rulers, that is due to God, but we owe to them conditional assent and cautionary obedience, if they speak from God▪ suppose they fetch not an express commission from Scripture, for if Pastors be then only to be obeyed when they bring evident commission out of Scripture, I were no more bound to believe & obey my governors, then they are bound to believe and obey in Bellarm. contr. 3. lih. 4. cap. 6. not. 89. my Governors, then there are bound to believe and obey me, for equals are obliged to obey equals, when they bring a warrant from God's word▪ and so the power of Rulers were not real, but titular, and the same do th Sutluvius and Bellarmine say.

Answ. We owe to equals, to Mahomet, conditional and cautionary faith and obedience; thus, I believe what Mahomet saith, so he speak God's word, yea so Samaritans who worshipped they knew not what, John 4. 26. gave saith to their Teachers in a blind way, so they speak according to God's word. 2. It followeth in no sort, if Rulers are only to be obeyed when they bring God's Word, that then they are no more to be obeyed then equals & Infetiours, because there is a double obedience, one of conscience, and objective coming from the thing commanded; And in respect of this, the word hath no less authority, and doth no less challenge obedience of Confcience, and objective, when my equal speaketh it in a private way, yea, when I writ it in my muse, then when a Pastor speaketh it by public authority; for we teach against Papists, that the word borroweth • o authority from men, nor is it with certainty of faith to be received as the Word of man, but as indeed the Word of God, as the Scripture saith: 1. There is another obedience official, which is also obedience of Conscience, because the fifth Commandment enjoineth it. Yet not obedience of Conscience coming from the particular, commanded in human Laws, as human, so I owe obedience of subjection, and submission of affection, of fear, love, honor, respect, by virtue of the fifth Commandment to Rulers, when they command according to God's Word, and this I owe not to equals or inferiors; and so it followeth not that the power of Rulers and Synods is titular, because they must warrant their mandates from the Word. But its always this man's hap to be against sound truth. But 3. That I owe no more objective subjection of conscience to this, ( Thou shalt not murder) (Believe in Jesus Christ ) when Rulers and Pastors command them, then when I read them in God's word. I prove 1. If this from a Ruler ( Thou shalt not murder, ) challenge faith and subjection of Conscience of six degrees, but as I read it myself, or as my equal in a private way saith, ( Thou shalt not murder ) it challenge saith and subjection of four degrees only, then is it more obligatory of Conscience, and so of more intrinsical authority, and so more the word of God when the Ruler commandeth it, then when I read it, or my equal speaketh it to me. This were absurd for the speaker, whether public or private person, addeth not any intrinsical authority to the word, for then the word should be more or less God's word, as the bearers were public, or private, more or less worthy. As God's word spoken by Amos a Prophet, should not be a word of such intrinfecall authority, as spoken by Moses both a Prince and a Prophet. 2. My faith of subjection of Conscience, should be resolved, as concerning the two degrees of obedience of faith to the word spoken by the Ruler on the sole authority of the Ruler, and not on the authority of God, the Author of his own word. 4. I answer to Sutluvius, That Christ in the external policy of his own house is a Lawgiver, ordaining such and such officers himself, Ezek. 4. 11. commanding order and decency, and setting down a perfect discipline in the New Testament, in all particulars that have influence, religious, moral, mystically significant in God's worship, and there is reason that Synods and Pastors, should rather promulgate God's Laws, then the people. 1. Because God hath given to them by office, the key of knowledge. 2. Because by office they are watch-men, and so have authority of office to hear the Law at God's mouth, and in Synods to give Directories or Canons according to that word, which people have not, and that their Canons must be according to God's Word, is said in the word, Nehemiah 10. 32. Also we •• ade ordinances for us, 34. as it is written in the law of the Lord.

Answ. Then because faith in Christ is evidently good by the Doctors learning, the Pastor hath no more authority to command the people to believe in Christ, then the people hath to command the same to him. So in preaching all the necessary fundamentals of salvation, the authority of Pastors is merely titular. There be then little necessity of a public Ministry, as Socinians teach us. 2. The ala • rity and manner and measure of believing, and doing things evidently good is as particularly set down in God's Word, as obliging the Conscience, as the Mandates themselves, God who commandeth us to love him, and to believe in his Son, hath not left that power to Prelates, that createth wretched Ceremonies, to command us to love God with all our heart, or not, and to serve God with alacrity or not, or to believe in Christ with all the heart or with half a heart; the sincerity, measure and manner of the loving of God, is no more the subject of obedience to rulers then the loving of God. Rulers do command both alike, Pari authoritate, except the man say that we obey God's Law perfectly, when we give obedience to it, according to the substance of the acts, though we obey not sincerely.

The Doctor giveth us Rules in obeying Rulers.

Ans. Then we cannot venture upon Ceremonies, that bringeth adders to God's word, under all the Plagues written in God's word.

2. God's word, not men's persuasions of conscience (except in this also he be an Arminian) is the rule of men's actions. The servants of Caiaphas may be persuaded there is no good, but much evil in confessing, Christ▪ We are to lay aside the erroneous persuasion, and obey, if the action be good in itself.

Ans. To do anything as apprehended evil, of which sort are human Ceremonies to us, for any respect, is to do with a doubting conscience, and to sin, Rom. 14. 23. 2▪ God's word, not probabilities should lead us in adventuring upon actions.

Ans. This is the Jesuit Suarez his doctrine, and so saith the Jesuit of Corduba Sanches, when the subject is in a doubt, whether the thing commanded by the Superior be lawful or not, he is obliged to obey, and he is to be excused because of the command of the superior: 1. Because (say they) the Commanders condition is better, and for a speculative doubt, he is not to be spoiled of his power of commanding, where reason, saith he, commandeth nothing against reason: 2. Because the inferior hath resigned his will to the superior, Deut. 17. 2. Paral. 19. Ergo, In things doubtsome, God commanded to stand to the determination of the Priest, and it is a truth that the will of the Superior doth not vary and change the nature of a thing in itself; yet it varieth to the inferiors conscience. Now indifference of persuasion is all one to Doctor Jackson with indifferency of the thing, for so he dictates. If one have indifferency of reasons of twelve degrees on both sides, that Arianism, or Arminianism, is truth, if authority determine both to be truth, the weight of authority in indifferency of persuasion should cast the balance, and to believe this, or not to believe it: where Arguments are of twelve grains of light of truth on both sides, it is to the doubting man, as if the thing were indifferent, so is the doubter to give up his soul, conscience, and faith to believe Arianism to be truth, not from light of conscience, (for equally as much light of conscience are in either side, as is supposed) but for the mere will of human authority, without God's word.

Now though the matter here be indifferent in itself, yet not so to the doubter; for Ceremonies in our persuasion are not indifferent. See here Ignatius Loyola say, Give over yourself to your Ruler. Give the Prelate your faith to keep, while ye be in eternity, and at the last judgment he will restore the pawn; And this is ( • aith Gregory de Valent. to give your two eyes to your guide: I had rather they stick in my own head. To these Jesuits I oppose the mind of Vasquez, and Salas, who say in that case the subject should first lay aside his error, and then obey. 2 God requireth a full persuasion by the Lord Jesus, even in things indifferent, Rom. 14. 14, 22, 23. But poor naked human authority cannot ingender persuasion of faith; and here is doubting▪ 3. It is false, That providence favoreth positive actions, more then privations, for Rom. 14. God loveth better abstinence from meats in themselves lawful and clean, as the Apostle proveth, ver. 14. Because nothing is unclean of itself, then that the eater doubt, if he be not transgressing the Law of God in eating, though a great Apostle say, there is no danger in eating.

And Jackson addeth of the same nature these;

Ans. He beggeth the question: The goodness of sincere obedience to authority (saith he) may countervail the evil, that we in our private choice fear to be in the action. But first, obedience to authority in things wanting God's word (whereof he speaketh now) is not obedience, but sinning, because doing without faith. 2. I take the Doctor at his word, refusing obedience to men's will-worship, or to practice even to the ruin of the weak, things indifferent, for fear of the greatest evil, the offending of God, by adding to his worship, Rev. 22. 18, 19. is obedience to God, and not a privation; the purpose (I say) of this obedience to God, may countervail all evil that can be imagined in non-obedience to men, and sure obedience to God, though probably obedience is as good and better, then obedience to men, though probably obedience.

Jesuits and Formalists say, Rulers are in possession to command; Ergo, We cannot thrust them out of possession, where we are not persuaded that they command against reason, saith Sanches: So I say, God is in just possession commanding us to venture upon no indifferent action, where the conscience doubteth, and shall we not no less contend for God's just possession, as time-servers do for mortal Rulers unjust possession in this? 2. I prove that it were Lawfull then to sin against God: A Jew is alike persuaded, that Mary's Son i • the true Messiah, and that he is a deceiver: Opinions about a man, might seem indifferent to the Jews, And it is all one (saith Jackson) as if the thing be indifferent. Now the Pharisees in a Council, determine, that Mary's Son is a deceiver; Then it is lawful for the Jew, upon purpose of sincere obedience to Pharisees, who sit in Moses chair, to believe, that Mary's son is a deceiver; because the conceit of sincere obedience is an essential motive to transubstantiate unbelief into sincere obedience, and the Jew may venture upon the faith, that Mary's Son is a deceiver, and crucify the Lord of glory: being commanded thereunto by his Commanders, because God's providence favoreth more positive actions, then privations. 3. He saith, He that obeyeth for the sole authority of Rulers, doth not evil that good may come of it: 1. Because the goodness of obedience countervaileth the evil of the actions: But 1▪ The question is, if it be obedience; Ergo, If it be no obedience, it cannot countervail the evil. 2. If it be the evil of sin, with a doubting conscience to do what judges commandeth, having no warrant of faith, but the will and lust of men, no purpose of good, though it were to save all the world, can counter-redeem the evil of sin against God. 2. Because (saith he) such a one doth not evil, that good may come of it. Then he that stealeth moneys to give to the poor doth not evil, that good may come of it, by Dr. Jacksons reason, Because the goodness of purposing to help the poor is not a consequent, but a precedent motive of the action, and so maketh it good: We all know, the intention of the end goeth in the intention before the action, but not as an essential cause to make an evil action good, or make an indifferent action necessary and honest: A good intention doth make a good action good and better, but that a good intention (as Idolaters are full of good intentions) can never so season the means, as (this Doctor saith) that it can make evil to be good, Vasquez condemneth the Fathers of ignorance, because they said, Propositum bonum excusat malum opus: so Cassianus said, It was lawful to lie for a good end, and Chrysosto • , and Ambrose said the same, as Vasquez saith: see Aquinas for this. 3. It is the doctrine of the man of sin, That Pope or Rulers, sole and bare authority can make an action indifferent, and so neither good nor evil, to be indifferent and good, as Bellarmine saith; for God only by his institution createth moral goodness in actions; man's will is no creatrix of goodness. 4. Neither resolutions nor skill are to be credited or followed, because private or public, because authority of man as such, is no light nor warrant to the conscience to adventure upon moral actions; and the Lord giveth light to private men to obey, Psal. 25. 8, 9. 1 Cor. 2. 14, 15. John. 7. 17, • 8 John. 7. 27. 2 Cor; 3. 18. 2 Cor. 4. 4. As he doth to Rulers to Command. So Sylvester, Tartaretus, so Rivet, Doctot Field.

I proceed to answer other Arguments: As 1. We must not obey, Not only for wrath, but for conscience, the violation of a special Law, necessarily draweth with it the violation of the general Law of the fifth Commandment; But the violation of the general, (saith Learned Pareus) hurteth the Conscience; and the Magistrate punisheth not for general Violation, but for the Violation of this special Law; Ergo, this special Law obligeth in Conscience. And it seemeth to carry reason. Every just punishment presupposeth essentially a sin, else it is not a just punishment; but the Ruler doth justly punish the particular Transgression of an human Law; Ergo, the Transgression of a particular Law of Rulers is sin. The Proposition is confirmed by grave School-men, Soto, Sylvester, and John, Eselius, Who think that there cannot be a Law obliging to a punishment, and not to a fault; because punishment hath an intrinsical relation to a sin, nor can it be a just punishment that is not proportioned to a sin; for the Law saith, That cometh not under damage, which cometh not under fault.

Ans. Though the Violation of the general Law hurteth the Conscience, it being against the fifth Commandment; it followeth not that the Violation of every particular Law, even that that is merely Positive, hurteth the Conscience before God: For then the carrying of Armor in the Night, Suppose no Ruler on earth make a Law there anent, should be a sin before God, which no wise man can say. 2. The other reason is more important, and draweth with it that School-question agitated by Iurists also and Ganonists, An ulla detur lox pure paenalis; If there be a Law purely Penall, without sin in it: And if the Law of Rulers in things merely Positive, be merely Penall and co-active, and not formally obliging to sin. But I Answer, Rulers do justly punish the Transgression of a Positive Law, not as particularly human and Positive: But as 1. It hath connection with the Moral Reason of the Law. 2. As the particular transgression is scandalous and against order, in which case the formal object of the just punishment inflicted by the Ruler, is in very deed not the simple omission of the positive act of a particular human Law, but the violation of the moral goodness annexed to it, and of the scandal given. Now in this meaning, the transgression of the positive human Law is not kindly, Per se, of itself punishable, but by accident, and so it bindeth the conscience by accident; And in this sense, great Doctors, as Ambrose, Anselm, Theodoret, Chrysostom, Navarra, Felinus, Taraquel say, That human Laws oblige the conscience. But the most learned of the Canonists aver, that not to obey civil Laws, laying aside the evil of scandal, is no mortal sin, and so doth not involve the conscience in guiltiness before God.

2. They object.

Ans. To resist the Laws positive and particular in connection with the moral reason of the Law, is to resist the Ruler, true. But so the question is not concluded against us: for by accident in that sense, human Laws bind the conscience; but to resist the particular Laws, as particular Laws, as particular positive Laws, is not to resist the Ruler: A Ruler as a Ruler, doth never command a thing merely indifferent as such, but as good, edificative, profitable, and except you resist the morality of the positive human Law, you resist not the Ruler; yea, nor yet is the Law resisted.

3. The Jesuit Lod. Meratius objecteth:

Ans. It is denied that Laws civil or Canonical, as merely particularly positive, do oblige as Laws, or that they are Laws, they be only Laws according to the morality in them, that can promove us to our last end, eternal felicity.

It is also false that the Jesuit saith, If thou wilt be saved, keep the Commandments, doth command the keeping of all Civil and Canonic Laws, or that hence is concluded a Law obliging the conscience, that is, human and positive, as if a Lent Fast, a Pilgrimage, and not carrying Armor in the night were commanded by Christ, as necessary to life eternal.

The same Meratius striveth to answer the Argument of Almain and Gerson, which is this; Who ever can oblige to sin mortal before God, he can inflict eternal punishment, but no mortal man can inflict eternal punishment.

Ans. 1. By the Law of nature, sins against the Law of nature deserve eternal punishment, and that essentially, laying aside the positive will of God, to whom I grant it is free to inflict punishment, or not to inflict, and this agreeth to all sin. But to carry Armor in the night, laying aside the case of scandal, and the morality thereof, that no murder follow thereupon, deserveth neither temporal nor eternal punishment. And if this Argument of the Jesuits hold good, no mortal sin shall oblige to eternal punishment, because God's positive will is the nearest cause of actual punishment eternal in all sins. 2. God is not the Author of a propper no • othetick power in man, for that is the question.

Ans. 1. The distinction of the Jesuit is but a begging of the question. He who can oblige to mortal sin by his Law, can also oblige to eternal punishment, if eternal punishment depend wholly on his free will, as the Law doth; What is that, but the inflicting of eternal punishment belongeth to him who maketh a Law obliging to sin mortal, so being the inflicting of eternal punishment belong to him; But our Argument is, he who hath dominion and authority to make a Law, hath dominion and authority to inflict a punishment answerable to the transgression of that Law: for it is one dominion and power to make the Law, and to inflict the penalty of the Law: Man cannot make the penalty of eternal wrath: Ergo, he cannot make a Law obliging to eternal wrath.

2. Excommunication is not done by man's will, but by the power of the keys for a mortal sin deserving excommunication, and so eternal wrath. If any Excommunicate upon his sole will, as wicked Popes have done; in that case the will of a man obligeth neither to punishment, nor to eternal punishment, it is but Brutum Fulmen, and not to be feared. 3. If any Commit an act that hurteth a whole Community, and is forbidden by men in Authority, he sinneth against the Law of God, though men had never forbidden that Act: And we deny not but human Laws agreeing with the Law of Nature, doth oblige the Conscience both to sin and eternal punishment, but then they are not human Laws, but Divine Laws, and in that case two guiltinesses, Duo reatus, are Committed, one against the fifth Commandment, in doing what Superiors according to God's Word forbiddeth, and there is another guiltiness against the matter itself, and a Divine Law, which also should stand as a sin before God, thought the Ruler had never forbidden it: But if any carry Armor in the Night, being forbidden by the Judge, for eschewing of night homicide, if no homicide follow at all, and the matter be not known, and so not scandalous, the carrier of Armor is involved in no guiltiness before God.

QUEST. 1.

COncerning the Christian Magistrate we are to consider two heads, the one negative, what he cannot do in the matters of Christ's Kingdom: 2. Positive, What he ought to do, for the opening of the former: We are to clear whether or no all external scandals Ecclesiastical, as well as civil, are to be punished by the Civil Magistrate; and that as in Civil scandals, that disturbeth the peace of the Common-wealth, the Magistrate hath a twofold power, one to command what is good and just, another to reward and punish; so the Lord Jesus in his Kingdom, hath not only a directive power to teach and forbid, but also a power, by way of Discipline, upon the external man ecclesiastically to reward and punish, to bind and loose, in an external Court on earth. It is granted by the Adversaries, that Christ as King hath a power of binding and loosing, but merely internal, purely spiritual, in regard of the Conscience, by the Preaching of the Word; but for any external power to take in and cast out of the Visible Kingdom of Jesus Christ his Visible Church, This they deny, and so refuse all external Ecclesiastical censures of receiving into the bosom of the Church, and casting out by rebukes, or Excommunication; and therefore that there is no external Court in the Church to punish Ecclesiastical scandals, all scandals and external offenses of the Church, are to be punished by the Christian Magistrate only: In opposition to which error, I say,

1. Conclusion. There is not only a rebuking of an offender in the Church, by private admonition, as between Brother and Brother, common to all Christians, Col. 3. 16. Levite. 19. 17. And of the Pastor only, he applying the Word by way of Preaching to such and such offenders, and closing the Gates of the Kingdom of Heaven upon impenitent sinners, which is acknowledged by the Adversaries: But there is also a Church-rebuking by way of censure, which must presuppose an Ecclesiastical Court, and a rebuking of a Public sin, put forth by many; whereas one only, not a Church or multitude may Preach the Word, and so rebuke by way of Preaching, which I make out from the Word of God, 2 Cor. 2. 6. Sufficient to such a man is this punishment which was inflicted of many: The word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a rebuke or punishment, in the old Translation, it is Objurgatio, in the Newer, Increpatio; Piscator Muleta, is a chastisement, whether this punishment was actual excommunication, as many Learned Interpreters do not improbably gather out of the Text; or if it was a Rebuke of the Church in order thereunto: Certain it included, a rebuking not of one man, but a Church-rebuking inflicted by many, 2 Cor. 2. 6. And by the Representative Church of Corinth, gathered together with Paul's spirit and the power of the the Lord Jesus, 1 Cor. 5. 4, 5. And so presupposeth a Court or Convention of many inflicting this punishment. 2. The Adversaries who deny that there is such a thing as Excommunication, say it was only a rebuke; but if it was Excommunication, it must include a rebuke coming from the many who do excommunicate. 3. It is such a rebuke as must be taken off and pardoned by many, as ver. 7. So that contrariwise, ye ought rather to forgive him, and comfort him, ver. 10. To whom ye forgive anything, I also forgive. So here is a rebuking put upon an offender by many convened in a Court, who did rebuke by way of judicial Authority, and the power of the Lord Jesus; Ergo, it was some higher censure which was inflicted by many, and taken off by many; then that which was inflicted by one by way of Preaching, where there is no necessity that many either rebuke, or comfort the rebuked: for one Pastor is to give out the sentence of Death or Life, rebuking and comforting, toward any one offender, or a person Repenting, whether many be convened to consent and join or not. Yea, I may, being a Pastor of Jesus Christ, dispense rebukes and comforts by way of Preaching, against the will and mind of the whole flock: But a rebuke, and a forgiving by many, cannot be dispensed, except these many convene together in the Name of the Lord Jesus in a Church way and consent. 2. If the convened Church must be heard and obeyed when she rebuketh a Brother, for a fault done between Brother and Brother, and that upon the Testimony of two or three witnesses, then is the Church a Court that is to rebuke an offender, and so to convene him before her: and that is some other censure then by way of Preaching; but the former is true, Matth. 18. 16, 17. 3. If the Churches of Jerusalem and Antioch, convened in a Synod, do give forth an Ecclesiastical rebuke on false Teachers, as those that troubled the Churches, and perverted their Souls with false Doctrine; then is there rebuking of offenders by a Church or Churches, beside a Pastoral rebuking by one single Brother or Pastor: But the former is true, Act. 15. ver. 24, 25. The Proposition is clear, in that a select company of Apostles, Elders and Brethren, doth not only Doctrinally conclude against their error who did hold the necessity of Circumcision, but also against the Persons, and their Schismaticall way, of troubling the Church by a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in making a side and Faction in the Church, ver. 2. 24. And this not any one single man could do in an ordinary way, except we say that it was an idle and unnecessary remedy which the Apostles used to quench the sire, as if any one man might have done all this, or as if they had rebuked these men publicly, not having heard and convinced them by the Word of God; or as if an offense touching conversation and against the second Table, had risen between Church and Church, no less then in the present case of an offense in matter of doctrine, that the Apostles would not have taken the same course, all which are not to be imagined. And in very deed this was not a point of mere doctrine, but also of peace and charity, violated by a Faction, ver. 2. And a scandal in eating things strangled, was raised in the Churches, Acts 15. 24. 1 Cor. 10. 28, 29. Rom. 14. 14, 15, 16, 17. 4. If Timothy be to rebuke publicly, those that sin publicly, and that judicially upon the Testimony of Witnesses. Then is there a public Church-rebuking by way of censure, beside the pastoral rebuking. But the former is expressly said, 1 Tim. 5. 19, 20. This must be a rebuking in a Church-court, except we say Timothy his alone was the Church, and a Monarch of the Church, who hath power to lead witnesses against Elders.

2. Conclusion. There is such a censure as excommunication in the hands of the Church, by which scandalous offenders are to be debarred from the society of the Church, and other holy Ordinances, that they do not profane them, which is proved from Mat. 18. 15, 16, 17, 18. Thus, he who is to be of a brother esteemed as no brother, but as a Heathen and a Publican, and whose offense is bound in Heaven, as the Church bindeth on Earth, and that upon the testimony of Witnesses, he incurreth some other censure of real ejection out of the society of brethren in a Church State, then Pastoral rebuking. But he who trespasseth against his brother, and will neither be gained by private admonition, nor by the Church rebuking him, is in such a case; Ergo, such a one is to be excommunicated, and so Christ must have instituted such a censure.

Divers reasons are alleged against this sense, as not favoring excommunication.

Answ. 1. The same phrase in the same doctrine of scandals is, Luke 17. 3. Take heed to yourselves, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him, and if he repent forgive him. But it cannot be said that if our brother transgress against God, we knowing of that, we are not to forgive him a sin committed against God, though he should come to us, and say that he repenteth, for then might any private brother pardon murders and sorceries, and if this private brother were a Magistrate, by this he is to forgive bloods, and not use the sword against the evil doer, and is to dispence with it seventy seven times, if the offender say, he repenteth. 2. The text saith expressly, If thy brother trespass 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 against thee, not 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 against God. It is true, sins against a brother, are sins against God, but it is evident from the text, that Christ speaks of such sins in a special manner, committed against me, or a particular brother, which are within the verge of my power or his to pardon, as no • being yet publicly scandalous. 3. Cameron saith, to sin against any here, is not to sin against God with the knowledge of a brother, but it is to sin in private against a brother, so as the offended brother is in meekness to labor to gain him, and not bring his fault to public, if he can be cured in private, and therefore with much lenity we are to proceed, whereas before Christ had exhorted not to contemn our brother, here he teacheth with what loving patience and longanimity we are to labor to gain him when he is fallen, else Christ should say but the same thing over again, that he said once.

Answ. 1. This argument is against Christ, as well as against us, for it tendeth to conclude that it is not universally true, that I am to rebuke every offending brother, which I will grant in some sense. For 1. If the fault be small, and possibly a matter of goods, with which I may dispence, without less hurt to my brothers soul, then the evil of scandal may be, if I complain to either the Church or Magistrate, I am rather to suffer wrong, 1 Cor. 6. 7. But because I am not to rebuke my brother imprudently, may I not conclude from Christ's words, I may rebuke him? Or because a mean person may not rebuke a Ruler, or a Prince, or King? Will it follow that a Nathan may not rebuke King David, and because Jonathan may not rebuke King Saul his Father, shall it follow that no other may rebuke King Saul? Or because I may not rebuke a scorner, though a professing brother, or because I may not rebuke my brother before two or three witnesses, who to my knowledge bear the offender ill will, and so I see my rebuking shall be so far from gaining him to repentance, that it shall provoke him to a greater offense, shall it therefore follow I am to suffer sin in my brother and not to rebuke him at all, which the Spirit of God calleth a hating of my brother in my heart, Lev. 19. v. 18. This argument concludeth not that I may not rebuke my brother, but only that I may not rebuke my brother imprudently, or that any brother may not rebuke any brother, whoever he be, King or Ruler, Negatis modi non negat rem ipsam, so we are to pass by offenses and to be willing to forgive them. Ergo, we are not to rebuke an offending brother, it doth not follow, I must be willing to forgive all, friend, or enemy, Ergo, by this reason I am not to rebuke any at all, and Solomon willeth us only not to be swift, too glad and willing, or too quick and sharp eared to hear every ill word, Eccles. 7. 21. Also Heb. Give not thy heart to all words that are spoken, least thou hear thy servant curse thee. So is the same phrase, Eccles. 1. 13. Prov. 23. 26. Eccles. 1. 17. Not unlike this is the phrase Dan. 6. 14. The King set his heart to deliver Daniel, But this will not prove we are not to rebuke an offending brother. 2. That by the Church here, is meant a number of private Christians, is against the Text, for then three witnesses should be a Church, being three private Christians, but sure it is Christ ascendeth in his speech to an higher degree, to the Church who is to hear the Witnesses, the Plaintiffe and the Offender, who hath power to bind, and loose, which is nothing but a Church-court. 2. Thou hast gained thy brother, must be a spiritual gaining of him to repentance, as 1 Pet. 3. 1. That they may be gained by the conversation of the wives, 1 Cor. 9, 20. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 That I may gain those that are under the Law. Ver. 21. That I may gain those that are without Law. ver. 19. That I might gain the more. Ver. 20. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 That I might gain the Jews, so is the Word used for spiritual gaining, Mat. 2. 17, 20, 22. and Christ in his Sermons never speaketh of civil gaining of brethren: And 2. Because he speaketh of the brother, as he is a member of a society, where there be three or more brethren, and a Church of brethren whose help he may seek to gain a brother; it is clear he must speak of a Church-gaining, or of a gaining in order to a Church, and not with reference to any civil Sanhedrin or Court of Magistrates.

Ans. 1. A fault may be light and small in its rise, so long as it is private, which deserveth not excommunication, but if contumacy shall come to the fault, as it is here in its growth and tendency to scandalize many, it is not small. 2. A private fault is not hence concluded to be small; because a brother may pardon it, and conconceale it. For Christ saith to scandalize on of the least of these that believeth in him, is so great an offense, that it were good for the man so offending, to be cast in the Sea, having a millstone hanged about his neck, ver. 6. And yet a brother is to forgive such an offense, Luke 17. 2, 3, 4. 3. In that a brother is obliged to gain his brother, from this fault, it is clear; it is not so small a fault, and 2. Because it is a fault to be brought to the Church; and 3. If the Offender remain obstinate, he is therefore to be esteemed as an Heathen and a Publican, or as no brother, nor any member of the Church; and 4. This sin is bound in earth and heaven. 5. The text will not bear that all weigh y faults, such as Mu • there, that defileth the Land, or solicitation to follow strange God's may be transacted between brother and brother and concealed. Deut. 13. 8. Though Joseph be in this called a just man, (as Beza observeth) in that he would not make Mary his wife a public example, nor reveal her Adultery, which was by the Law to be punished by death, for so Joseph conceived of her.

Answ. In the Word of God, the word Ecclesia, Church, applied to matters of Religion, (as it is evidently here, where it is said that the offended brother, is to labor to gain the soul of his offending brother) doth never signify a civil judicature and therefore the exposition is insolent, and the words 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 can never bear such a sense, we desire one parallel place in the old or New Testament for it.

2. The scope of the place is the removal of scandals in Christ's meek, brotherly and Christian way, ver. 6. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 &c. Who ever shall scandalize, &c. and ver. 7. Woe to the world because of offenses —ver. 8. Wherefore if thy hand or foot 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , cause thee to offend, cut them off, ver. 10. Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones, &c. And then he cometh from active scandals, whereby we offend others, and the way of removal of them, to passive scandals, whereby others offendeth us, and the way of removal of them, ver. 15. Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go tell him the fault between thee and him. Now these sins that are to be punished by the sword of the Civil Magistrate, or not such sins as may be transacted between brother and brother, for homicide, blasphemy, sorcery, extortion are to be taken away by the public sword, and this must have place, Thou shalt not conceal it, thy eye shall not spare him, and the Magistrate is the minister of God, a revenger, to execute wrath on him that doth evil, Rom. 13. 4.

3. Christ hinteth not, in any sort, at any word of blood, wrath, vengeance, the sword, evil doing, fear and terror for the sword, such as are 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , as the office of the civil magistrate is holden forth to us in other places, as Rom. 13. 1 Pet. 2. No man, except he intended violence to the text, can dream of such a latent, foreign and co-acted sense in the words, and if such a sense had been intended by our Savior, he behooved in this place to erect a throne from a divine institution, for the Magistrate, which no impartial interpreter, can with any half side of a shadow perceive in the words.

4. The end of this process is spiritual: If he hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother to repentance, as is confirmed already from Scripture. But whether the offender be gained to repentance or not, the Magistrate is to use the sword, that others may fear; as a Magistrate, he is to regard the peace of the Common-wealth, not the salvation of the offender directly.

5. Christ's way of proceeding to take away scandals between brother and brother, is spiritual, Tell him, admonish the offender, tell the Church, that they may rebuke and admonish, and this is a Moral way all along: But the Magistrates proceeding is not Moral, by requests, orations, admonitions, but by the real use of the sword to compel: for he beareth not the sword in vain, Rom. 13. 4.

6. The proceeding here is with much lenity, patience, and long suffering to gain an offender, but having recourse to the Magistrate to use his club and sword, is rather a way of irritation, to make the gap the wider, and therefore Paul, 1 Cor. 6. condemns this as repugnant to love, that they should go to law one with another, before the heathen Magistrate.

7. Such an expression as this, ( Let him to thee as an heathen man and a Publican ) is never taken for the civil complaining of him before an Heathen judge, nor doth it express the use of the sword by the Magistrate; its so insolent a phrase, that all the Greek Authors that ever wrote, cannot parallel it; for this is a Spiritual and Moral reproach put on the offender, the Magistrates way is a real inflicting of punishment.

8. This remedy is contrary to Paul's, 1 Cor. 6. For there the offended brother, though the offending party be never so contumacious, hath not this remedy of Christ's to implead his brother before an heathen Magistrate, that the Apostle taketh for a sinful scandal, and sin cannot be Christ's remedy: Paul's remedy is, Suffer rather wrong and defraudation; Paul by this interpretation should have commanded them the contrary.

9. Where is ever the supreme Magistrate (who cannot be excluded, if this exposition stand) called by the name of the Church.

10. How incongruous is it, that Christ should direct the Jews, who were to be dispersed through all the earth; to go up to Jerusalem for judgment, seeing Jerusalem was to be laid equal with the ground; and the Jews, their state, Church▪ policy, and the Scepter now removed from Judah, let wise men judge.

11. The complaining to an Heathen Magistrate, or the punishing of an offender by the sword, by no Scripture, is such a binding on earth, by the power of the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, as this is expounded, Matth. 16. 19. And such a binding as is ratified in Heaven, and that by the joint Prayers of two or three on earth, as is here spoken, ver. 18, 19, 20. A Heathen Magistrates Sentence, though never so just, should not be valued, except it were confirmed by the Prayers of the Church, as the Sentence of Excommunication must be.

12. The Jewish Saenedrim was now to take an end, and expire with all the Jewish policy; it is not to be imagined that Jesus Christ would appoint a perishing remedy for a per • etuall and ever-enduring disease; now offenses and scandals between brother and brother were to be in the world to the end, ver. 15. If thy brother offend, &c. And Christ saith, Offences must be, and the remedy here is moral and perpetual: as 1. That Christ shall have a Church visible on earth, against which the gates of Hell shall not prevail: 2. That we first deal to gain our brother in private, ere to his greater shame, he be brought in public, before the Church. 3. The Lord's ratifying in Heaven, what his servants shall bind and loose on earth. 4. The agreeing of two to pray together, the conv • ening of two or three in the name of Christ, with a promise of the presence of Christ, all these are Moral and perpetual: The Lord never did the like of this, before or after.

13. In all the New-Testament we do not read, that Christ, who was the end of the Law, and the body now come in the flesh to abolish all Ceremonials and temporary Laws of the Jewish Church and policy, as Jewish, did institute any old-Testament Law, such as the Sanhedrin was for offending brethren: if it be said that this was but the right expounding of an old divine Law, now almost buried through the corruption of men; then must Erastus show that this was an old Law of divine institution▪ that the Jews were to keep this threefold order in gaining an offending brother, and that this is now abolished, and that the power of the Magistrate in Church-business, by this place is not established to the end of the world; both which are contrary to the Principles of Erastus, not to say that there is not in this whole Chapter, or Luk. 17. where the same purpose is handled, any shadow of reason to assert that Christ is restoring any Ceremonial or Judicial Law to its genuine and sound meaning and sense, but by the contrary Christ speaketh of the Moral and perpetual Doctrine of scandal, and how we are to deal with an offending brother to gain him to repentance, either by ourselves or the Church, and to forgive private injuries, even to seventy seven times: Lastly, since Publicans and Romans converted to the Christian saith from Paganism, even at this time were Brethren, who might both give and take scandals, it shall follow that Christ commandeth Gentiles to submit to the Jewish Magistrates, this was against Christian liberty, and to take from Caesar those things that are Caesars, which is unjust.

Ans. 1. Publicans, that were by Nation Heathens, were excluded from sacrifices and the Temple, jure, by God's Law; but not de facto, because the Jews being under bondage to the Roman Emperor, and spoiled of their Liberties and Laws, might not put their Laws in execution against Heathen and Publicans; it is sufficient to us, saith Beza, that Publicans were execrable and hateful to the Jews, and (say I) that Heathen and Publicans remaining such, are without the Church, and not to be reputed as brethren, but enemies to the true Church of God, and this is that which to us is Excommunication.

I do not doubt but Publicans went to the Temple to pray, but that is but to Argue, A facto ad jus, not the right way, A jure ad factum: Publicans ought not to have done so. 2. Christ the Supreme Lawgiver, who is above the Law, did often dispense with sacrifice and positive Laws, for a work of mercy, and if he touched the dead, and touched the skin of the Leaper, and suffered his disciples to pluck the ears of Corn on the Sabbath day, what marvel then he did eat with Publicans and sinners, contrary to the Letter of a positive Law, Knowing his own, whom the Father had given to him from eternity were to be brought in to himself, by his familiar conversing with them; why should not the Physician converse with the sick; the shepherd with the lost sheep; the Redeemer with his ransomed ones? But this is no warrant, that therefore the cleansed Leaper should not show himself to the Priest, or that an obstinate offender should not be reputed as a Heathen, and not admitted into the Sanctuary. 3. That simple Publicans, or Heathen remaining such, should sacrifice. I never read, sacrifices were offered for Job's friends, who were not within the visible Church: But 1. by God's own special and immediate command: as we read, Job 42. 7, 8. A positive Law for it (which yet was requisite for ordinary worship of that kind) we read not. 2. I think Job's friends cannot in knowledge, Religion, Profession, be esteemed mere Heathens, and therefore as God tied not himself to a positive and standing Law here, so neither was Christ, being the same God equal with the Father, so restrained from not familiar conversing with Heathen, and Publicans, but he might leap over a Ceremony to save a lost soul.

Ans. 1. Christ did well to use these words, Witnesses, Church, Congregation, Heathen, Publican, as well known to his hearers, and these same words in use amongst the Jews are used in the New Testament, as 1 Cor. 16. 22. 1 Tim. 5. 19. Act. 15. 7, 17. Revel. 11. 2, 8. 1 Pet. 4. 3. 2 Pet. 1 19. 20, 21. Anathema Maeranatha, Witnesses, Gentiles, sinners of the Gentiles, imposition of hands, &c. Indeed in ordinary, the Pastor under the New Testament is not called Priest, nor high Priest, nor the Communion Table an Altar: But the words here used are obvious and very significant; and the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or Church is a most obvious word in both the Old and New Testament, and doth signify any Assembly, Religious, civil or profane, according as the nature, person and use or end of the meeting or Assembly was Religious and Profane, as is evident by many places of the Old and New Testament; where the seventy Interpreters use the word for a Church-Assembly; for which see the due right of Presbyters, page 349, 350. and page 473, 474. And since the word Church here is clearly, a company convened to gain an offending brothers soul, by rebukes and censures, and which hath power to bind and loose on earth, so as their fact is ratified in heaven, it cannot be any other, then a New Testament Church-meeting, seeing we find the Church of Corinth commanded to convene and exercise such a power, 1 Cor. 5. 1, 2, 3, 4. And therefore it cannot be expounded of the • ivill judge; not to add, that Erastus, who objecteth this, saith the Syn • dre had both civil and spiritual or Eccl • siasticall power, and therefore he hath no ground to expound the place of the Civil Magistrate. 2. Because he was not yet ascended to heaven, and had not sent down the Holy Spirit, it is no consequence to say he speaketh nothing of the Christian Church of the New Testament, for before his Ascension he appointed the Ministry, the Sacraments, the power of Censures, and the keys given to the Church of the New Testament, Math. 28. 19, 20. Joh. 20. v. 2 • , 22. Math. 26. 20, 21, 22, 23, &c. Now it is as inconvenient, that precepts, such as ( Do this in remembrance of me,) (take ye, eat ye, ) and ( he that heareth you, heareth me, ) should be given to the Christian Church, which yet had no being, as for Christ to hold forth the power of jurisdiction of a Christian church destitute of all being. Yea, this recurreth upon Erastus, who will have Christ here to hold forth the power of the Christian Magistrate, as yet remoter from being, all Magistrates being professed Enemies to Jesus Christ, whereas there was at this time a seed, a bottom of a Christian visible Church: There being eleven Apostles, seventy Disciples, and many others who professed faith in Christ already come. Yea though there be no formed instituted visible Church of the New Testament, yet it became our great Prophet, who taught that Gospel, yea, all that he heard of the Father, John. 15. 15. to his Disciples, which was to be a rule of the Faith of the Christian visible Church not yet instituted, and who erected a Ministry to teach them before his ascension, also to furnish that Ministry with the powerof the keys & censures, as he expressly doth before his death, Mat. 16. 17, 18, 19. Not to add what Cameron saith, that he spake these words when he was now to offer himself on the Cross, and Math. 2. 16. He mentioneth the edifying of the Church of the New Testament, and the Disciples ask who is to be greatest in the Kingdom of God, ver. 1.

Answ. 1. There is no necessity to condemn the office of the Publican, or the birth and condition of the Heathen as unlawful. But a Publican went for a profane man, and for a man who is a stranger to the true church of God, as Mat. 5. 46. If you love them that love you, what reward have you? Do not even the Publicans the same? Ergo, It is Christ's mind to exclude the Publicans from any spiritual or eternal reward, promised to these within the visible Church; and when Christ was slandered by the Jews, because he went in to be a Guest with a Publican, Luke 19. 7. And because he did eat with Publicans, Mat. 9. 12, 13. Christ taketh it as granted that Publicans were profane men and sinners. But he saith they were sick sinners and lost, that is, such as were sensible of their by-past profanity, and desired the Physician Christ to cure them; and Gentiles or Heathen is taken for these who are without the Church, and are void of Religion, 1 Cor. 5. 1. Such fornication as is not so much as named amongst the Gentiles, 1 Pet. 4. 3. Let it suffice you, that ye have wrought the will of the Gentiles, Eph. 2. 11. Ye were in times past Gentiles, what is that, but Ver. 2. Ye walked according to the course of the World; according to the Prince of the power of the air? So a Samaritan, is taken for one that hath a Devil, yet to be a Samaritan by birth and nation is not unlawful, it is then a distinctive term spoken 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to be an Heathen, or counted an Heathen and a Publican, that is, counted a profane wicked person, not a brother, not a member of the church. Theophylact expoundeth this with us, If he hear not the Church, let him be an outcast, least he rub any of his wickedness upon others within the Church.

And these words Let him be to thee, is a word of command, as Mat. 5. 37. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Let your speech be yea, yea, Mat. 20. he that would be greatest, let him be your servant; and, let him be to thee, is not to exclude the Church, but it is set down in a Law-manner in the second person, for far more must the obstinate offender be as an Heathen and a Publican to the Church.

Ver. 18. Verily I say unto you, What ye bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven, and what ye loose on earth, shall be loosed in heaven. These words contain a reason why he who contemneth the Church, is to be holden as a Heathen and a Publican. Why? is it such an offense before God to despise the church? Yea, saith our Savior, with a grave asseveration, Verily I say unto you, they that despise the sentence of you the Ministers of the Gospel, being according to truth given out, they and their sins shall be bound in Heaven.

Answ. 1. Christ doth argue from the less to the more, he proveth what the Church bindeth on earth, shall be bound in Heaven, because if the prayers of two or three gathered together in the name of God, and agreeing together on earth, are not rejected in Heaven, far more shall that be ratified in heaven, which the whole church of Christ decreeth on earth in the name of the head of the Church, Jesus Christ. 2. When in the chapter going before, Christ had ascribed to the Apostles and Pastors, which are the eyes of the Church, a power of the keys, and here he ascribeth to them the power of binding and loosing, there was no cause to dream that he speaketh here of a private forgiving of private sins between Brother and brother, for then he might have said at the first step, Thou hast gained thy brother, that gaining or convincing of thy brother shall be bound or loosed in heaven, no less then the Churches judicial binding and loosing in heaven, which yet is set down as an higher degree of power. But I may here say with Beza in the whole Scripture, the word of binding and loosing is never spoken of any other but of these who are in public places, and by a borrowed speech, here it is spoken in regard of Spiritual power. To bind and to loose, is by a judicial power in subordination to Christ the King, to remit and retain sins. So Josephus saith, the Pharisees ruled all, so that they would banish or recall from banishment, loose and bind whom they pleased, and upon the Authority according to the which Christ sent his Disciples as the Father sent him, so he instructed his Ministers with power to remit and retain sins, John. 20. 23. and Mat. 16. 19. What thou bindest 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , on earth, shall be bound in heaven, what thou loosest on earth, shall be loosed in heaven, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 . So doth Lucian bring in that prisoner speaking to Jupiter, Loose me, O Jupiter, for I have suffered grievous things, Mat. 22. 13. Then the King said to his servants, take him, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , bind him hand and foot; binding here (you see) is done by the command of the great King, Acts 21. 11. So shall the Jews 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 bind Paul, they bound Paul with Law and authority, such as it was, John 18. 12. The Captain and Officers took Jesus, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 and bound him, they bound him not by private authority, Mat. 27. 2. and Act. 24. 27. Felix left Paul 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 bound; if Lictors bind any Malefactors, they do it by authority and Law. So do the Hebrews speak, Psal. 105. 20. The Ruler of the people loosed him, Psal. 102. 20. The Lord looketh down from heaven, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to open or loose the children of death. Psal, 146. 7. The Lord looseth the Prisoners, Job 12. 18.

3. It cannot be denied, but when one private brother pardons another repenting Brother, God ratifieth that in heaven. But it is clear the pardon here holden forth by our Savior, is such a loosing, as hath witnesses going before. 2. Such an one as cometh higher to the knowledge of the Chuuch. Nor doth the particle 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 again, signify anything but pretereà, moreover.

4. And who can say that binding and loosing here, is some other thing then binding and loosing in the Chap. 16. ver. 9. Where the same very phrase in the Greek is one and the same, except that the Lord speaketh, Mat. 16. 19. in the singular number to Peter, as representing the teachers and Governors of the Church, and here Mat. 18. He speaketh in the Plural number, relating to the Church. Now Mat. i6. i8, 19. binding on earth, and loosing, which is ratified in heaven, is evidently the exercise of the power of the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, I will give to thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. What be these keys, he expoundeth in the same very verse, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven, whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed in heaven; then binding and loosing on earth, must be in these to whom Christ hath committed the power of the keys: but 1. Christ hath not committed the keys to all, but to Church-rulers, that are the Stewards of the House, and the dispensers of heavenly Mysteries. Hence the keys in Scripture signify authority and official dignity that is in Rulers, not in private men, as Esa. 22. 22. And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder. So Christ is said to have the key of David, to open and no man shutteth, to shut and no man openeth. By which out of doubt (saith Cameron,) is pointed forth the kingly authority and power of Christ, so saith Vatablus. And our own Calvin, Musculus, Gualther, Piscator, Beza, Pareus agree, that the keys are insigne potestatis, an Ensign of power given to the Steward or Master of a Noblemans house, who is a person in office; The giving of the keys (sai • h worthy Mr. Cotton, ) is a giving power for the preaching of the word, the administering of the seals and censures, by which these invested with power do open and shut the gates. Now we desire any Word of God, by which it can be made good, that the keys and power to bind and loose is given to all that are in the house, even private Christians. But we can show the Keys, and binding and loosing, and opening and shutting to be given to the Officers and Rulers of the house. Hence I argue that interpretation that confoundeth the key-bearers, and the Children, with the Servants of the House; and the Governors that are over the people in the Lord, with the governed, and putteth the Characters proper to the Officers and Stewards, con • usedly upon all that are in the house, is not to be holden; but this interpretation is such; Ergo, &c. also to bind and to loose is expounded by Christ, John. 20. 21. to be a power to retain and remit sins on earth, which are accordingly retained and remitted in Heaven, and that by virtue of a calling, and Ministerial mission, according to which the Father sent Christ Jesus; and Jesus Christ sendeth his Apostles and Pastors to the end of the world, as is clear, if we compare Matth. 18. 18. and Matth. 16. 19. with John. 20. 20, 21, 22. 23. Mar. 16. ver. 15, 20. Matth. 28. 18, 19, 20. Luk. 24. 45, 46, 47, 48.

5. It is against the course of the Text, that we should restrain this to private pardoning of light injuries between brother and brother: 1. Becase Christ labors to decline this, that one shall be both his brothers judge to put him in the condition of an Heathen and Publican, and bind his brothers sins in Heaven and Earth, and also, that he should be his party and accuser: Now Christ will have the private brother do no more personally, but admonish his brother and gain him. 2. If that prevail not, then he is to admonish him before two or three witnesses: See here, the brother is not both party and judge; but witnesses have place. 3. If that prevail not, the business is to ascend higher, even to the Church, which undoubtedly is an Organicall body, 1 Cor. 12. 28. Rom. 8. 6, 7, &c. Act. 20. 28, 29, 30. Whereas two or three private Christians are not a Church, but an homogeneal body: Now who would believe that Christ is to bring down the business which is so high, as before the Church, to the lowest step again, to a private binding and loosing to one brother, who both as judge and party judgeth his brother; yea, and may do this, though there were no Chu • ch on earth? What power hath the Church above the offended brother, or the offender, if the one may bind the other under guiltiness in earth and heaven? 2. Erastus will have light and private offenses only spoken of here: Now Christ speaketh of offenses that God taketh notice of in Heaven and earth. 3. Christ's way is a wise and meek way, that that which one cannot do, and the offense that two, three, four cannot remove, the Church shall remove, but Erastus maketh one private man to remove it, and to Excommunicate and bind in heaven and earth. I might cite, Tertullian, Cyprian, Augustine, Chrysostom, The ophylact, Hyeronimus, and all modern interpreters both Popish and Orthodox for this interpretation, not any of them dreaming of the insolent opinion of Erastus, who misapplieth Augustine and Theophylact for his own way, as Beza cleareth.

Quest. 1.

THE Argument for Excommunication may be thus framed, from 1 Cor. 5. If Paul command that the incestuous man should be delivered to Satan ver. 5. purged out of the Church, least as leaven he should corrupt the Church, ver. 6, 7. That they should judge him, ver. 12. And put him away from amongst them, ver. 13. So as they were not to eat with him, ver. 9. 10. Then is there a divine command for Excommunication; for the Commandments of the Apostles are the Commandments of the Lord, 1 Cor. 14. 37. 2 Pet. 3. 2. But the former is true: Ergo, so is the latter.

There is no ground or shadow of reason to expound this expelling of the incestuous man by the preaching of the word without any Church-censures, for all that is required in Excommunication is here; 1. This putting out was not done by one single Pastor, as putting out by the preaching of the word is done, but by a company and Church, ver. 4. In the name of the Lord Jesus, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit. 2. Paul should have written to any one Pastor to cast him out by preaching; but here he writeth to a Church: 3. He forbiddeth company, or eating with such like men, v. 10. Now this is more then rebuking by preaching. 4. This is a judging of the incestuous man, and a casting of him out of their society, which is another thing then preaching the word.

Erastus and others expound the giving to Satan, of a delivering of the man to Satan, to be miraculously killed, as were Ananias and Sapphira, Act. 5. 5. And because at this time there was no Christian Magistrate to use the sword against the man, therefore he writeth to the Church, that they by their prayers would obtain of God, that Satan might take him out of the midst of them.

Ans. This insolent interpretation wanteth all warrant of the word: For 1. To deliver to Satan, hath no Scripture to make this sense of it, to pray that Satan would destroy the man. 2. It wanteth an example in the old or New Testament, that the whole Church are fellow-Agents and joint causes in the bodily destruction of any, or in working of miracles, such as was the killing of Ananias and Sapphira: The Apostles wrought miracles, and that by their Faith and Prayers, and Christ and the Prophets; but that the Believers, who should have mourned for this scandal, 1. Who were puffed up: 2. Who were in danger to be leavened with the man's sin, and had their consent in Excommunication, should join in a miraculous delivering to Satan, is an unparalleled practice in the word. 3. To deliver to Satan, cannot be expounded here: but as 1 Tim. 1. 20. Where Paul saith he had delivered Hymenaeus and Alexander to Satan, now that was not to kill them, but 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that they might receive instruction and be disciplined, by this medicinal Church-revenge, not to blaspheme: I know of no instructing of these who are dead; if there be two deliverings to Satan, let Erastus and his expound it to us. 4. The Apostle expressly saith, he wrote to them, not to keep company with such men, nor with Fornicators, covetous men, Drunkards, Extortioners, Idolaters: Now Erastus his mind must be, that the Apostles and Churches of Corinth, Philippi, Thessalonica, grievou • lie sinned against God, in that they did not miraculously kill all the Drunkards, the covetous persons, the fornicators, whereas they are commauded to admonish them as brethren, 2 Thess. 3 14, 15. and to pray for them, if they sin not against the holy Ghost, 1 John.. 5. 16. 1 Tim.▪ 2. 3. 5. Paul rebuketh this as a moral fault amongst the Corinthians, such as is not to mourn for this man's fault, and to keep him as leaven in the midst of them, and not to cast him out: Whereas in all the Scripture you find none ever rebuked, because they put not forth in Acts an extraordinary and miraculous power to work miracles; working of miracles came upon persons called thereunto, by extraordinary rapts, and were in men not as habits under the power of free-will, but as immediate Acts of God, even as fire-flaughts are in the Air: So I conceive, while I be better informed. 6. And shall it not follow, that now when the Churches have Christian Magistrates, it is the will of our meek savior, that they kill with the sword all the Drunkards, Fornicators, and all that walketh unorderly; which should make the Church of Christ a Butcher-house, whereas we are to admonish all such as brethren, 2 Thess. 3. 15. And to wait on them with all patience, if God peradventure may give them repentance. 7. The destruction of the flesh must be the destruction of the body. But the bodies of the godly are saved no less then their spirits in the day of the Lord. 8. And for many of the former reasons, by delivering to Satan, cannot be meant a miraculous tormenting of the body by Satan, with the saving of the life; Such as we read was the case of Job; for the delivering to Satan, is to cast out of the Church, and declare such an offender to be of the number of the wicked world, of which Satan is Prince, John. 12. 31. John. 14. 30. and God, 2 Cor. 4. 4. and that which we assert as the essentials of excommunication, are, 1. Here is a member of the Church, one who is within, 1 Cor. 5. 12. one who hath fallen in a foul scandal, and had his fathers wife, ver. 1. who by the Church convened in the name of our Lord Jesus, with that spirit of the Apostle given to them by Christ, v. 4. was delivered to Satan, that his soul may be saved, (for that is the genuine and intrinsical end of Excommunication,) and to be purged out of the Church, lest he should infect the Sheep, ver. 7. and Christians were not to bear company with him, nor to eat with him, ver. 9. 10▪ and he was judged to be cast out as a Heathen and Publican, ver. 12. 13. and that by a convened court, having the name and authority of him who is King of the Church, ver. 4. and more we do not crave. Obj. To deliver any to the power of Satan, is no mean of salvation. Answ. A moral delivering to the efficacy of error, and a reprobate mind, is not a mean of salvation, nor is excommunication such a mean, nor in the power of the Church, but a medicinal depriving of an offender of the comfortable communion of the Saints, and of the prayers of the Church, and means of grace, such is a means, and mighty through God to humble.

Quest. 1.

WE are not to conceive that there was nothing Moral in the Laws that God made to his people of Israel, to debar the unclean, from the society of God's people, and from communion with them in the holy things of God, Numb. 5. 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying: 2. Command the children of Israel that they put out of the Campe every leaper, and everyone that hath an issue, and whosoever is defiled by the dead, Lev. 5. 2. If a soul touch any unclean thing, whither it be a carcase of an unclean beast, or the carcase of unclean cattle, or the carcase of unclean creeping things, and if it be hidden from him, he also shall be unclean and guilty—6. And he shall bring his trespass-offering unto the Lord for his sin, which he hath sinned, Lev. 7. 20. But the soul that eateth of the sacrifice of the peace offerings that pertaineth to the Lord, having his uncleanness upon him, even that soul shall be cut off from the people: 21. Moreover the soul that shall touch any unclean thing, as the uncleanness of man, or any unclean beast, or any abominable unclean thing, and eat of the flesh of the sacrifice of peace-offerings, which pertain unto the Lord, even that soul shall be cut off from his people. In the which observe, that here the soul that shall touch any unclean thing is to be cut off; but Num. 5. 2. He is only to be put out of the Campe; now these were not killed that were put out of the Campe, and therefore to be cut off from the people must be a moral cutting off by Excommunication, not by death; also the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signifieth to make a Covenant, to cut off, either by death or any other way▪ as by banishment, by which a thing leaveth off to be in use, though it be not destroyed, as when a branch is cut off a tree, 1 Sam. 31. 9. Yea, we have Isa. 50. 1. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Where is that Bill of cutting off or divorce: Now this was not a Bill of killing the wife that was divorced, but putting her from her husband, as our Savior saith, It is not Lawfull to marry her that is divorced, Matth. 19. 9. A killed and dead woman is not capable of marriage; yet the word is, Deut. 24 1. Ier. 3. 8. from that same Theame, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : The Hebrews have another more ordinary word to signify death, as Exod. 31. 14. He that doth any work on the Sabbath, in dying he shall die: And it is expounded, he shall be cut off from the midst of the people: 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 but Lev. 7. the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 is four times used without any such expression, ver. 20, 21, 25, 27. To which may be added, that when zealous Hezekiah did find that the people were not prepared, According to the purification of the Sanctuary, though they had celebrated the Passover, the King did not only not kill them, but prayed, God might be merciful to them, and the Lord killed them not (saith the spirit of God) but healed them, Exod. 12. 15. He that eateth unleavened bread, that soul shall be cut off from Israel: but it is expounded, ver. 19. That soul shall be cut off 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 from the Church of Israel: Certainly, he that is killed is cut off from both State and Church, and from the company of all mortal men on earth, Isa. 38. 11. Then to be cut off from Israel is only to be deprived of the comfortable society of the Church of Israel, as the holy Ghost expoundeth it: Also Lev. 4. If any commit any sin but of ignorance, and so if he touch any unclean thing, or eat unleavened bread, forbidden of God, he is excluded from the holy things of God, while the Priest offer for him, according to the Law: Now if he was presently to be killed, either by the Magistrate, or in that act killed by God's own immediate hand, as Aaron's sons were, there was not a journey to be made to the place, the Lord had chosen to sacrifice there, which might have been three days journey from his house, who was unclean; yea, when the man that gathered sticks was stoned, and the false Prophet stoned, Deut. 13. there was no sacrifices offered for any of them before they were killed; and I hope, there were no sacrifices in Moses his Law offered for the dead. Hence learn we: 1. That to cut off from the Congregation, was not to kill, but it was the Jewish Excommunication greater or less: 2. That Moral sins, under the Old Testament debarred men from the holy things of God, while the Priests sacrificed for them▪ and brought them in a capacity to receive the holy things of God.

Leviticus 10. 10. The Priests were not to drink wine, when they went into the Tabernacle: That ye may (saith the Lord) put difference between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean: Now Haggai expressly saith, cap. 2. 11, 12. That it was the Priests part to put this difference, and so to admit to, or exclude from the holy things of God.

Hence for this cause it is said, as 2 Chron. 23. 19. Jehoiada appointed the officers of the Lord's house, so he set porters at the gates of the house of the Lord, that none which are unclean in anything, might enter in; so Ezra 9. 21, 22. None did eat the Passover, but such as were pure, and had separated themselves from the filthiness of the Heathen of the land; for this cause doth the Lord complain of the Priests, Ezech. 22. 26. Her Priests have violated my law, and have polluted my holy things, they have put no difference between the holy and the profane; neither have they shown the difference between the unclean and the clean, Ezech. 44. 6. And thou shalt say to the Rebellious, even to the house of Israel, thus saith the Lord God; O ye house of Israel, let it suffice you of all your abominations: 7. That ye have brought into my sanctuary, strangers uncircumcised in heart, and uncircumcised in flesh, to be in my sanctuary to pollute it, even my house, when ye offered my bread, the fat and the blood, and they have broken my Covenant, because of all your abominations: 8. And ye have not kept the charge of my holy things: But ye have set keepers of my Charge in my Sanctuary for yourselves. 9. Thus saith the Lord God, no stranger uncircumcised in heart, nor uncircumcised in flesh shall enter into my sanctuary, of any stranger that is among the children of Israel: Here is a complaint, that those that have the charge of the holy things, should suffer the holy things to be polluted: I grant it cannot bear this sense, that none should be admitted to be Members of the Visible Church under the New Testament, but such as are conceived to be regenerate; except it can be proved that the Sanctuary was a type of the visible Church: 2. That the Apostles constituted their Churches thus; but we read not in all the New Testament of any admission of Church Members at all: but only of baptizing of those who were willing to be baptized, and from this resulted the capacity of a Church Relation in all Churches visible: Nor, 2. Do we find any shadow in all the word of God, of trial of Church Members, by way of electing and choosing of such and such, as qualified by reason of a conceived regeneration in the persons chosen, or of rejecting and refusing others as conceived to have no inward work of grace in them; this I believe can never be made good out of the word of God. 3. They must prove the Apostles admitted into the Sanctuary of the Visible Church Ananias, Sapphira, Simon Magus, and others uncircumcised in heart, to pollute the holy things of God, and that the Apostles erred, and were deceived in the moulding of the first Apostolic Church in the world, which was to be a rule and pattern to all Churches in the New Testament, to all Ages: I deny not, but they might have erred according to the grounds of these, who urge the comparison for a Church of visible Saints, but that the Apostles De facto did err in their Election and judgment, in that wherein the holy Ghost holdeth them forth and their acts to be our rule and pattern, I utterly deny: I grant Act. 15. In that Synod they did Act as men and Elders, not as Apostles, but that it could fall out, that they should uctually err, and obtrude false Doctrine instead of truth to the Churches in that Synod which is the first rule and pattern of Synods, I shall not believe.

But there is this Moral and perpetual truth in these Scriptures▪ 1. That there are under the New Testament, some over the people of God in the Lord, some that watch for their souls, and govern them; as here there were Priests, Levites that taught and governed the people: 2. That the Rulers of the Churches, always are to have the charge of the holy things; and to see that these holy things, the Seals and Sacraments and word of promise be not polluted, and that therefore they have power given them to debar such and such profane from the Seals, and so are to discern between the clean and the unclean, and this which the Prophet speaketh, ver. 9. is a prophecy never fulfilled after this in the persons of the people of God; therefore it must have its spiritual truth fulfilled under the New Testament, as is clear, ver. 11. Yet the Levites that are gone away far from me, shall be Ministers in my Sanctuary, having charge at the gates of the House, and Ministering to the House—14. And I will make them keepers of the charge of the House, for all the service thereof, and for all that shall be done therein, Ver. 15. And the Priests and the Levites the sons of Zadok, that kept the charge of my Sanctuary, when the children of Israel went astray from me—they shall enter into my Sanctuary, and they shall come near to my Table to minister unto me, and to keep my charge—23. And they shall teach my people the difference between the holy and profane, and cause men to discern between the unclean and the clean. 24. And in controversy they shall stand in judgment, and they shall judge it according to my judgment, and they shall keep my Laws and my Statutes, in all mine assemblies, and they shall hallow my Sabbaths. Now this Temple was another house, then Solomon's Temple, as is evident out of the Text, it having rooms, dimensions, structures, so different that none can imagine them one house, and these chapters contain the division of the Holy Land, which after the captivity was never done, for the ten Tribes never returned, and this Temple is clearly a type of the new Jerusalem, and agreeth to that City spoken of, Revelation, chapters 21. and 22. As may appear especially by the four last chapters of Ezekiel, and in the last words of the last chapter, And the name of the city from that day shall be, The Lord is there. And the Priests after the captivity as well as before brake the covenant of Levi, Mal. 2. And therefore I see it not fulfilled, except in the visible Church of the New Testament, and in the Assemblies of Christian Churches, Mat. 18. Act. 15. and the rest of the Church-assemblies under the New Testament: As for the Lord's personal reign on earth, it is acknowledged there shall be no Church policy in it, no Word, Sacraments, Ordinances, no Temple, as they say from Rev. 21. 22. And with correction and submission, the Priests and Levites, that Ezek. 44. 15. are said to keep the charge of the Lord's House, when others went astray, I take to be a prophecy of these Pastors under the New Testament, to wit, the Apostles of Jesus Christ, and Pastors, and teachers that Christ left in his Church; for the edifying of his body, Ephes. 4. 11. 12. When these Scribes and Pharisees did sit in Moses his chair for a while, Mat. 23. but only as porters and inferior Officers in God's house, yet they were to be heard, while God should cut them off, as he prophesied, Zach. 11. 8.

We cannot say as some do, that persons were deprived amongst the Jews, of Church communion in the holy things of God, because of Ceremonial, not of Moral uncleanness, but now under the New Testament only Moral uncleanness can exclude persons from the holy things of God; and therefore to argue from ceremonial uncleanness in the old, to moral uncleanness in the new, is no good consequence. I answer, the Ceremonial uncleanness in the Old, which did exclude from the holy things of God, doth strongly conclude that moral uncleanness under the New Testament doth exclude from the holy things of God, if that exclusion of the Leaper out of the campe seven days, and the touching of the dead, though imprudently, did typify some other exclusion from the holy things of God, as no question it did, then the consequence must be strong. 2. It is also false that moral uncleanness did not exclude from the holy things of God under the Old Testament, For 1. what was more ordinary, then that sacrifices should be offered for sins of ignorance, for trespass • es, and while this was done, the person was not admitted to partake of the holy things of God. 2. Whence was the Lord's frequent complaints of wearying his soul with sacrifices, solemn assemblies, feast days, and new Moons, when they were morally unclean, and their hands were full of blood, and they had not put away the evil of their doings, did not love judgment and justice, Isaiah 10. 11, 12, 13, 16, 17, 18, 19. And when God complaineth so of them, Ier. 7. 8. Will ye steal, murder and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other God's whom ye know not? 10. And come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my Name? Ergo, Murderers and adulterers were debarred from entering into the Congregation of the Lord, and partaking of the holy things of God, while they repented. Let none say by prophesying, or the keys of knowledge in preaching the Word, they were declared unworthy to enter into the Temple; but that will not conclude that it was the Priests office by power of discipline to exclude them from coming unto the Sanctuary of God. Ans. But if the Porters were set at doors of the Lord's house, to hold out the unclean, and if the Lord charge the Priests with this crime, that they Ezek. 44. 8. set keepers of the charge of the Lord's house for themselves, that is, for their own carnal ends, and not for the honor of the Lord: And that ver. 7. They brought into the Sanctuary of the Lord's house uncircumcised in heart, that is, such as were morally unclean, then had the Priests a power to debar from the Sanctuary such as were morally unclean, and if the Priests are said to bear rule by their means, Ier. 5. 31. Then the Priests did bear rule and govern, though they abused their Power, and the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signifieth to have dominion over any, Psal. 72. 8. Psal. 110. 2. 1 Kin. 4. 24. Levite. 26. 17. And the Scripture gives a power of judging and governing to the Priests. And 2 Chron. 30. 6, 7. The Posts that Hezekiah and the Congregation of Israel sent through the Land, commandeth a moral preparation to those that were to keep the Lord's Passover, to wit, that they should turn again unto the Lord God of Abraham, and should not be like their Fathers, nor like their Brethren, that trespassed against the Lord God of their Fathers. And ver. 11. divers of Ashur, and Manasseh, and Zebulun humblid themselves, and came to Jerusalem to keep the feast of the Passover. This proveth clearly that people under the Old Testament were no less to try and examine themselves, by the King and Priests commandment, carried to them by Postes before they should eat the Passover; then they are to try themselves before they eat and drink at the Lord's Supper: only the adversaries say, the Priests by preaching were to debar from the Passover those who were morally unclean, but not to debar those who were morally unclean, so they were not typically and ceremonially unclean, by any power of Discipline, or by Porters set at the gates to keep them out of the Sanctuary. But I answer, 1. How are the Priests Ezek. 22. 26. reproved for violating the Law of God, and profaning his holy things, in that they put no difference between the holy and profane, the clean and the unclean? Surely the Priests profaned in the highest way, the holy things of God, in admitting into the Sanctuary, those who were not only ceremonially, but morally unclean, as murderers, adulterers, Who cried the temple of the Lord, Ier. 7. And they put no difference between the Holy and Profane, when they admitted to the holy things of God, and into the Sanctuary the uncircumcised in heart, for they do more pollute the holy things of God, who partake of them being morally unclean, and uncircumcised in heart, then those who are only uncircumcised in flesh.

Ans. This Argument is against all Church-censures, but though the Church as the Church cannot hinder scandalous intruders upon the holy things of God, by bodily violence, it doth not follow; Ergo, The Church can keep the holy things pure no way, but morally, that is, by preaching only, for we can give a third way: The rebukes, admonitions and Excommunication, or delivering to Satan are all transacted without any bodily and externnll violence, Christ's Kingdom resigneth all such carnal weapons to the Magistrate, who is the only Governor of the Church of Christ, as the Opponents say, All Church Censures are by way of Declaration, applied to such men by name; and there co-action, though penal, is not by bodily violence, but by acting upon the conscience of men and putting them to shame.

Hence 2. We argue, if beside the preaching of the word, in which Commandments, Promises and threatenings are proposed to all in general; there be rebukes of the Church, the sentencing of such and such persons by name, as Hymenaeus and Philetus, and other Blasphemers; the Authoritative Declaration, that such a brother is to be esteemed as a Heathen and a Publican, and brotherly fellowship of eating and drinking with such an one denied, that he may be ashamed, if these be, then are some debarred from the holy things of God, by Church-Censures, beside the preaching of the word of God.

But the former is true; Ergo, so is the latter.

The Proposition is proved, because all wicked persons and heart-hypocrites are excluded from the holy things of God, by the Preaching of the Word: But only these that are notoriously, and by testimony of witnesses, convinced to be scandalous or contumacious in atrocious sins, after they are by name rebuked, and are declared to be esteemed as Heathen and Publicans; and from whom we are to withdraw brotherly fellowship, are excluded from the holy things of God, by Discipline and Church Censures.

The Assumption I prove: Because the word is preached to all by one in office, and that a Steward and dispenser of the mysteries of God, and he excludeth all unworthy ones known to be such, or invisible only, from the kingdom of God. But the Censure, 1. Is inflicted by many, 2 Cor. 26. by the Church, Matth. 18. 17. convened together, 1 Cor. 54. (2.) It is applied to such persons by name, 1 Cor. 5. 5. He that hath done such a deed, ver. 2. Hymenaeus, Alexander, 1 Tim. 1. 20. Jezebel, Rev. 2. 20. (3) The whole congregation is not to eat or Table with such an one, 1 Cor. 5. 11. We are to note and observe him, and to have no company with him, that he may b ashamed 2 Thes. 3. 14. to esteem him as an Heathen and a Publican, and exclude him from the Seals of the Covenant, so long as he remaineth in that state.

3. Arg. If a person may for not hearing the Church, be judged as an Heathen and a Publican, and his sins bound in heaven by the Church; then by discipline he is excluded from the holy things of God in a peculiar way, in the which contumacious persons, uncircumcised in heart are excluded, in foro interno Dei, in God's secret Court; But the former is true, Matt. 18. 15. 16, 17, 18. Ergo &c. Now if there be two Courts, one before God, Rom. 2. 16. Rom. 14. 4. 1 Cor. 14. 25. 1 John. 3. 21. Another of the Church, Mat. 18. 15. 16, &c. 1 Cor. 5. 4, 5, 6, 11, 12. and two sorts of bindings, two sorts of Witnesses, two sorts of Sentences, then can it not be dedenyed but the Church hath a spiritual Court for censures, as well as for preaching the Word.

4. Arg. Exclusion of an offender from the society of the Saints, and not to eat or drink with him, is some other real visible censure accompanied with shame, then any censure by the preaching of the Word; but there is such a censure inflicted by the Church, Ergo, The Proposition is clear from Rom. 16. 17. Now I beseech you brethren, mark them that cause divisions and offenses, contrary to the doctrine which ye learned 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 and avoid them. Here is a real, visible, and personal note of shame put on Schismatics, a bodily declining and avoiding of their company, which could not possibly be done by preaching of the Word. But (some may say) this was not done by the Church court, but everyone as private Christians were to eschew the society of Schismatics, and by this you cannot conclude any Church censure.

Answ. Not to say that it were unjustice to decline any, and renounce society with him, before he were convinced to be factious according to Christ's order, Mat. 18. which to Erastus is a way of common and natural equity. And so in order to some public censure before the Church. Paul w • i • eth to a constitute Church at Rome, in which he prescribeth Rom. 12. the Officers duty, as what Pastor, Doctor, Elder, Deacon, ought to do in a Church body; We cannot imagine he could command every private Christian to inflict the censure and punishment, (for a punishment it is in order to a public sin) of avoiding any in Church communion, professing they serve the Lord Jesus Christ, as these do, verse 18. upon their own private opinion: Jesus Christ and his Apostles must have left men loose in all order and discipline by this way, howbeit the adversary would deny a church punishment, here is a punishment inflicted by many, 2 Cor. 2. 6. And it is not inflicted by way of preaching, so 2 Thes. 3. 14. If any man obey not our word by this Epistle, note that man, have no company with him, that he may be ashamed, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 by the learned is to put a public church note on him that he may be confounded, make him a 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , a public wonder, that he may be ashamed, as Piscator and P. Baynes observe on the place expounding it of excommunication, and the same word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 that is here, is used toward the incestuous man, who was to be excommunicated, 1 Cor. 5. 9. I wrote unto you in an Epistle, not to keep company with fornicators, the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ver. 1. is ascribed to the incestuous man, and here they are not to be mixed 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 with fornicators, verse. 11. But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother, be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or an extortioner, with such a one, no not to eat. And that we may know that this is a church censure, he addeth ver. 12. For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? Ergo, this no keeping company with such, is a Church judging.

5. Arg. The Church of Pergamos is rebuked for having amongst them, such as hold the doctrine of Balaam, and Revel. 2. 14. and Thyatira, that they suffered Jezebel to preach and seduce the servants of God, ver. 20. as the Church of Ephesus is praised v. 2. that they cannot bear with them that are evil, but had tried such that said they were▪ Apostles, and were not, and had found them liars, Rev. 2. 3. Here is it clearly supposed that these churches were to censure false teachers, if any shall say they were to censure them no other ways, but by preaching against their errors; 1. This would establish a Prelate above the Church contrary to that of Mat. 18. Tell the Church, and 1 Cor. 5. Where the Church gathered together was to excommunicate. 2. The Angel of the Church is taken collectively, for all the Rulers and the whole Church to whom Christ writeth, as is clear, in that he saith so often; He that hath an ear let him hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches, not to the Pastors only. 2. The removing of the Candlestick, is not from the Angel but from the Church; and repentance, and the fighting and overcoming, a reward of the crown of life, and many other things are evidently spoken to the Churches, not to the Angels of the Churches. And therefore the trial of false Apostles must be by a Church, a Court, a college of church rulers, as Paul speaketh unto, Act. 20. 17. Where it is said, Paul called the Elders of the Church of Ephesus, and exhorted them to beware of false teachers, that should not spare the flock, and should teach perverse things, v. 28. 29. 30. and of this sort were these lying and seducing Apostles, now how can one Angel or many Pastors by preaching only try false Apostles, and find them liars? This trying and sentencing of lying seducers, Rev. 2. 2. must be by a court, such as we find to be the practice of the Apostles and Elders at Jerusalem, who in a Synod Act. 15. did find these who taught a necessity of Circumcision, to be perverters of souls and liars, saying, They had the Apostles authority for what they taught, whereas they had no such thing, and Schismatic troublers of the people, Acts 15. See what further I have said for Excommunication before, cap. 2. and sect. 7. which proveth also the same thing. The Church of Thyatira would not be rebuked for suffering Jezebel to teach, if they had no power of Church censures to hinder her; It is not enough to say that the Angel of that Church did sufficiently hinder Jezebel to teach, when in public he declared and preached against her false doctrine, and by the same reason Pastors exoner their conscience, if they preach that such and such scandalous persons are not to eat and drink their own damnation, though they debar them not in a visible court by name from the Lord's table, and though they never excommunicate them, and therefore there is not any censure but Pastoral rebukes by way of preaching, not any other by way of discipline.

Ans. The Angel of Thyatira had not sufficiently hindered Jezebel to seduce the servants of God, by only preaching against her false doctrine, in regard that Paul and Barnabas not only hindered those that teached, that the Gentiles ought to be circumcised, Act. 14. cap. 16. by Preaching; but also had recourse to the power and authority of a Synod, that in a Synod which is a Court essentially consisting of many Pastors and Elders, they might be declared to be perverters of souls, and liars, as indeed they were judicially declared to be such, Act. 15. 24. Hence I argue; if the Apostles could not be said sufficiently to hinder Jezebel's and Seducers, by only Preaching, and Disputing against their errors, except in case of their persisting in their errors, they should tell the Church convened in a Synod, as Christ's order is, Mat. 18. Then the Angel of Thyatira, or any one Pastor do not sufficiently hinder scandals, but may be well said to suffer them by only private rebuking and public Preaching, except they use all these means to hinder Jezebels, false Teachers, and all scandalous persons, that the Apostles used, and therefore the Angel of the Church of Thyatira must be rebuked for not using the Authority and power of the Church against Jezebel. And here by the way, when these false Teachers had sinned against their brethren in perverting their souls, they take not the course that Erastus dreameth to be taken according to Matth. 18. They complain not to the Sanhedrin, or Civil Magistrate, who should use the sword against them, but to the Church Synodically convened at Jerusalem, who used against them the Spiritual power that Christ the head of the Church had given them.

6. Arg. If there be an Ecclesiastical debarring of scandalous persons from the holy things of God, especially from the Supper of the Lord by Censures, and not by the preaching of the word only, then there be Censures and power of jurisdiction in the word beside preaching of the word. But the former I make good by these following Arguments.

1. Arg. If the Stewards and dispensers of the mysteries of God, are to cut the word aright as approved workmen, 2 Tim. 2. 15. And are to give everyone their portion of bread according to their need, and measure, Matth. 24. 45, 46, 47. 1 Cor. 4. 1. 2. 3. and must not s • ay the souls which should not die, by denouncing wrath against the righteous, nor save the souls alive that should not live, by lying words, Ezek. 13. 19. by offering mercy to the wicked and impenitent, then as they should not deny the seals of salvation to Believers, hungering and thirsting for Christ; neither should they give the seals of life to those that are walking openly in the way of destruction.

But the former is true; Ergo; so is the latter. The Proposition is clear: As the word should not be divided aright, if wrath should be Preached to believing Saints, and life and salvation offered to the obdurate and wicked, so neither should the Stewards cut the seals of the word aright, if the Supper were given to wicked men: If they should say, This is the blood of the Covenant, shed for the Remission of your sins, Drink ye all of it: They should save alive those that should die, with lying words; for the seals speak to the Communicant, and apply to him in particular, the very promise that in general is made to him; and this will prove as the Magistrate being no Steward of the word, and not called of God thereunto, as Aaron was Heb. 5. 4. can no more distribute the word and seals to whom he pleaseth, Ex officio, then he can Preach and Administer the Sacraments, nor should another man, who is no Steward, but a Porter or Cook, Teach, and that by his office how, and to whom the Steward should distribute Bread: nor is it sufficient, to say, by this one man, not the Church, is to debar from the Sacraments, for the seals being proper to the Church, as the Church, he must act here, in, and with the power of the Church. 2. It is another question, whether by the Minister, or by the Church any ought to be debarred, and whether there be any such Censure as debarring from the Seals; and its another question, by what power, whether by the power of order, or by the power of jurisdiction, Ministers may debar the scandalous from the seals; I conceive by both powers, they may keep the Ordinances pure; and if it belong to the Magistrate to debar anymore then to preach the word, and by the way of Erastus: The Magistrate by his office, as he is a Magistrate only is deputed of Jesus Christ to Steward the seals to whom he pleaseth: Ergo, (say I) to cut the word aright to whom he pleaseth, must be his due.

2. Arg. As the dispensers of the word must not partake of other men's sins, 1 Tim. 5. 22. so neither should they distribute to wicked and scandalous men, such Ordinances, as they see shall certainly be judgment and damnation to them, and as maketh the Communicants guilty of the body and blood of our Lord: Now that the Stewards Communicate with the sins of these manifestly scandalous, to whom they administrate the Supper: I prove: 1. Because they that sow pillows under the head of the openly wicked, preaching peace to these who should die, do hunt souls, Ezech. 13. 20. and partake of their presumption, and they that heal the wound of the people with smooth words, are false dealers, and concurreth to the wound of the people, Ier. 8. 10, 11. As the Prophet that preacheth lies partaketh of the people's presumption; which believe those lies, Ier. 14. 14, 15, 16. 2. If Eve should but reach the fruit of the forbidden Tree to Adam, and say take and eat, she partakes of Adams sin, if the mother give poison willingly and wittingly to a child, she killeth her child, though it be told the child that it is poison: The Supper to those who knowingly to us, eat unworthily, is forbidden meat, and poison.

3. A third Argument is, from the nature of holy things. It is not lawful to give that which is holy to dogs, nor to cast pearls before swine, least they trample them under their feet, Matth. 7. 6. But the Sacraments are holy things, saith Erastus, and no man can deny it; Ergo, we are not to give the Sacraments to the scandalous and openly profane.

Ans. These holy things, which profane men and openly scandalous can make no use of, but pollute them to their own destruction, and the abusing of the Ordinances, no more then Dogs and Swine can make use of Pearls to feed them, but only trample on them, are not to be given to the profane and openly scandalous: But the Lord's Supper is such a thing, being Ordained only for those that have saving Grace, not for Dogs. Now the Assumption applied to the word, is most false, (as it is applied to the Lord's Supper, it is most true) for the Word is Ordained by special Command to be Preached to Dogs and Lions, that thereby they may be made Isa. 11. 4, 5, 6, 7. Isa. 2. 3. 4. Lambs and Converts; the Supper is not a mean of Conversion; and since Dogs can make no use of it, but trample it underfoot, we are forbidden to give such holy things to them. It is true, They'll trample the Pearl of the word; but we are Commanded to offer the word to all, even while they turn Apostates. 2. If Christ Commanded the word to be Preached to Pharisees and Sadducees; these were such persecutors as sinned against the Holy Ghost, Dogs in the Superlative degree, Matth. 12. 31, 32. Joh. 9. 39, 40, 41. Joh. 7. 28. Joh. 8. 21. Ergo, Christ Commanded some holy things, the word to be given to Dogs; and yet his precept cannot be obeyed, if we give them the Sacrament. 3. By what Doctrine of Scripture will Erastus have these that trampleth on Ordinances, and turn again to tear us, debarred from the Supper? For in his Thes. 26. 27, 28, 29. he holdeth it unlawful to debar any Judas from the Supper; doth he think there be no Dogs in the Visible Church? Peter saith, There be such Dogs as have known the way of truth, and turn to their vomit; and such may promise amendment, confess their sin, and desire the Sacrament.

4. Arg. Those who will not hear the Church, but doth scandalize, not only their Brethren, but also a whole Church, and are to be esteemed as Heathen and Publicans, are not to be admitted to the highest privilege, and to feast with Christ, when the Church knoweth they want their wedding garment: But there may be, and are many in the Church of this sort; Ergo, such should not be admitted: For the Major, I set down the words of Erastus granting it. The Assumption, both Scripture and experience proveth; for there be in the Visible Church, Dogs, Persecutors, Jezebel's, as there be many called, and few chosen.

5. Arg. If the incestuous man must be cast out, lest he leaven the Church, then can he not be admitted to Communicate with the Church, in that which is the highest seal of Christ's love; but the incestuous man must be cast out, lest he leaven the whole Church, 1 Cor. 5. 4, 5, &c. Ergo, The Proposition is clear, because none can be put out of the Church, but they must be separated from the Table of the Children of the Church; the Assumption is 1 Cor. 5 13. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Put him out, ver. 7. Purge him out. Now the Church hath no power by bodily violence to attempt a local separating of him in person from them, as they are men, though they may separate themselves from him; then it must be a declarative casting of him out, as unworthy to Communicate with the Church in such holy Ordinances, as distinguisheth the Church from other Societies, and these be the Seals of the Covenant.

6. We are not to suffer sin in any, Levite. 18. 17. Rev. 2. 20. but to hinder it so far as we can according to our vocation, 1 Sam. 3. 13. As the Priests hindered Uzziah to Sacrafice, 2 Chron. 26. 18, 19, 20. And must pull them out of the fire, Jude ver. 23. As the Law of nature would teach the Mother, not only, not to co-operate with her son attempting to kill himself; but to hinder and stop him by pulling a knife or sword out of his hand, when he is about to destroy himself; if so, then ought not the Church and her Officers to co-operate so far with those who do Eat and drink their own Damnation, as to exhibit and give to such the seals of the Covenant, to pray that these seals may be blessed to scandalons ones, which is to pray directly contrary to the revealed will of God in his word, and against that which the faithful Pastors and Paul Preacheth, That everyone should try and examine themselves, and so eat and drink: Now a real and physical co-operating of the Church, with such manifest impiety, must then be the Churches suffering of sin in a brother, or not hindering him • o eat his own Damnation; if the Lord have committed a power of dispensing the seals to Christians, not to Pagans and Turks: Let Erastus show any precept or practice, why we might not admit Jews, Turks, Indians, though never Baptized, to eat and drink the Lord's body and blood, (we are to Preach the Gospel to them, if they were amongst us) except that such as are to communicate according to the will of Christ, are Christians, members of the Church, who doth try and examine themselves; and Jews and Turks though dwelling and born amongst us are not such, yet Erastus would that such should never be admitted to the Lord's Supper, though they should desire it: Officers also have a command not to dispense some parts of the word to all, as we are not to rebuke open Scorners: Should any of our Church turn Jew and blaspheme Christ, and pertinaciously after conviction persist in his Apostasy; might not Erastus ask by what command of Christ will ye not Preach the Gospel to such an one? Christ made no exception, but said, Preach to all Nations, why do you make Exceptions? might we not answer, Christ hath given a power of dispensing the Gospel to all; yet hath he excepted some, because its against the will of Christ that such can obey the Gospel: We are bidden pray for all, yet are there some that we are not to pray for, because they sin unto death: so is the case here in some kind.

7. It is for our instruction that the Priests were rebuked, for that they admitted into the Sanctuary the uncircumcised in flesh and heart, that they put no difference between the clean and the unclean, and profaned the holy things of God, Ezek. 44. 9. Ezek. 22. 26. Hag. 2. 11, 12, 13. And this was a shadow of things to come, as was observed before, teaching us, that far less should the Pastors of the New Testament suffer the holy things of God to be profaned.

8. We read that John the Baptist and the Apostles baptized none but such as confessed their sins, and professed • aith in Jesus Christ, it would then appear to be the will of Christ, that everyone should not be admitted to the Lord's Supper, though some say, the Apostles baptized single persons not in Church communion, so that Pastors administer the Sacraments by reason of the power of order, as they are Pastors, not by power of jurisdiction, as having warrant from any Church, in regard Churches at the beginning had the Word and Sacraments before they had any Church Government, yet I conceive the Lord's Supper is a Seal of a Churchcommunion, 1 Cor. 10. 16. 17. and the like I say of Baptism typed by Noah's Ark, 1 Pet. 3. 19, 20, &c. and though the Apostles, partly by privilege, partly through necessity, the parts existing before the whole, were necessitated first to baptize, and then to plant Churches, yet the Churches being once constitute, these are▪ Church privileges to be dispensed both by the power of order, and the power of jurisdiction.

Quest. 2.

THomas Erastus a Physician, who meddled not much with Divinity, save in this, in which he was unsound, in his reply to Beza laboreth to make Excommunication a dream, and nothing but a device of Pastors affecting domination.

Ans.▪ The consequence is naught, Christ said only to his Disciples in person, Go teach and Baptize, Is it a good consequence therefore, that none hath power to teach and Baptize, but only the Apostles? Only Paul exhorted the Corinthians, to mourn for the incestuou • man's fall, therefore no Pastors have power to exhort in the like kind. 2. We grant the Apostles did many things out of their Apostolic power, which in a constitute Church, the Church only may do, as Paul his alone disputed against Circumcision of the Gentiles, Act. 15. 2. What? Ergo, Paul in a Synod, and a Synod hath not power to dispute and determine the same, the contrary is evident, Act. 15. 12, 22, 23. 3. It is false that the Authority and rod, with which Paul said he would come to the Coriuthians, 2 Cor. 10. 8. was proper only to Paul an Apostle, the same he giveth to Timothy, and to all the Elders. 3. If Bishops exercised the same power for many ages, Erastus must show us Bishops who could kill miraculously, such as Ananias and Elimas, and work miracles; now beside that, Erastus must with his new opinion, hold up a new creature called a Prelate, unknown to the Apostles or Jerome and the Fathers, he must parallel Bishops for working of miracles to Paul and the Apostles.

Ans. It is very true, the Apostles and Pastors of Christ that now are, denounce eternal wrath, and that authoritatively against those that are invisibly to men heart-hypocrites, who yet before the Church (who know not the heart) go for Saints, and are neither excluded from Sacraments, nor so much as rebuked. But it is a vain collection, that therefore externally scandalous are not to be debarred from the Supper, and Excommunicated: The Prophets, 1 Cor. 14. did preach that Heathens remaining Heathens were excluded out of the Kingdom of God; yet Heathens cannot be Excommunicated; and yet (I hope) Erastus dare not deny, but Christ hath forbidden, that Heathen remaining Heathen be admitted to the Sacraments: Though I dare provoke any Erastian, and attest them by their new Doctrine, to show me a warrant from Christ's Testament, why the Church should refuse the Seals to a Turk; they will say, A Turk is not willing to receive, and therefore the Seals may be denied to him, and yet cannot be denied to a member of the Church though scandalous, if he desire it, and profess repentance.

But I answer, Though a Turk be unwilling to receive the Seals; What if he should be willing, and require to be Baptized, yet remaining ignorant of Christ and the Gospel we should not Baptize him: Now by the Doctrine of Erastus, we have no more re warrant to deny the seals to him, then to deny them to Judas; we desire a Scripture from the adversary, which will not conclude with equal strength of reason against the giving of the seals to any scandalous member of the Church; it is true, a Turk ignorant of Christ, though he should desire the seals is uncapable, and he is unwilling virtually, in regard he as yet refuseth the knowledge of the Gospel, and so is the scandalous professor no less uncapable (though we may grant degrees of incapacity) for he is virtually unwilling to receive Christ in regard he is unwilling to part with his idol-sins: 2. Though a Turk should be unwilling (as its like enough he will be) yet we desire a Scripture, why we cannot make offer of the Sacraments to a Turk, and yet we may Preach the Gospel and make offer of Christ in the word to him, 1 Cor. 14. 23. And this Scripture shall also conclude, we are not to admit scandalous persons to the Sacraments, being both uncapable of them, as also because they can but trample on these pearls,, no less then the Turk should do; the Argument then is just nothing: We exclude many from the Kingdom of Heaven, whom we do not excommunicate on earth; But he should say, we Excommunicate many, whom we do not exclude out of Heaven.

Ans. All this is but with carnal reason to speak against the ways of God; for 1. Not every denouncing of a sinner unworthy of Heaven is Excommunication: So Judas might have Excommunicated himself, and when one Pastor declareth an offender unworthy of Heaven; he is not formally excommunicated out of the visible Church; he is cast out of the invisible Church: But that is not Excommunication, except it be done for a public scandal that offendeth the Church: 2. Except it be done by the visible Church. 3. According to the rule of Christ, Matth. 18. 4. That he may be ashamed, and repent and be saved: God's binding of the offender in Heaven, is a part of Excommunication, but not all, nor the very same with Excommunication. 2. The Churches casting out for Christ's institutions cause, is of more Authority then the Conscionall casting out performed by one Pastor, and yet the Conscional casting out by one, insuo genere is as valid as the other, subordinata non pugnant. 3. We are not to take our compass and rule of God's ways by his outward dispensation, but the revealed will of Christ is our Rule, God thinketh those who walketh inordinately, and causeth divisions, not worthy of the Christian society of the Saints; and must bind them in heaven to that censure, in regard he expressly so commandeth in his Word, Rom. 16, 17. 18. 2 Thes. 3. 14, 15. 1 Cor. 5. 11. Yet he thinketh them worthy of Salvation, and may give repentance and Jesus Christ to many of these; he may deny salvation to the wicked, and upon that feed them to the day of slaughter, dare flesh and blood quarrel this consequence? God hath appointed the wicked for the day of wrath. Ergo, he giveth them more of this life then heart can wish. This consequence dependeth on the mere dispensation of God, nor is this our Consequence. God judgeth such unworthy of heaven; Ergo, they must be cast out of the visible Church, we never made Excōmunication a necessary consequent of the Lord's judging men unworthy of Heaven, for then all these that God judgeth unworthy of life eternal should be excommunicated, and only these, which is false; for God may judge some worthy of life eternal in Christ, and yet they are to be excommunicated, if they refuse to hear the Church, as many regenerate may go that sar in scandalous obstinacy, and many whom God judges unworthy of life eternal, may so belie a Profession, as they deserve not to be excommunicated, and both these may fall out, and do fall out according to the revealed will of Christ.