SEVERAL TREATISES OF Worship & Ceremonies, By the Reverend Mr. WILLIAM BRADSHAW, One of the first Fellows of Sidney College in Cambridge; Afterward Minister of Chattam in Kent, 1601: Known by his learned Treatise De Justificatione. 1. A consideration of certain Positions Archiepiscopal. 2. A Treatise of Divine Worship, tending to prove the Ceremonies, imposed on the Ministers of the Gospel in England, in present Controversy, are in their use unlawful. Printed 1604. 3. A Treatise of the Nature and Use of Things Indifferent. 1605. 4. English Puritanism, containing the main opinions of the ridgedest sort of those called Puritans in the Realm of England. 1604. 5. Twelve General Arguments, proving the Ceremonies unlawful. 1605. 6. A Proposition concerning kneeling in the very Act of Receiving, 1605. 7. A Protestation of the King's Supremacy, made in the name of the afflicted Ministers, and oposed to the shameful Calumniations of the Prelates. 1605. 8. A short Treatise of the Cross in Baptism. 1604. Printed for Cambridge and Oxford, and to be sold in Westminster Hall, and Paul's Churchyard, 1660. A consideration of certain Positions Archiepiscopal. 1. Religion cannot stand without some Ceremonies, as kneeling, etc. REligion is the fear of God, to serve him precisely according to his Word, and therefore it is called Godliness, Isa. 29.13. Acts 2.5. & 10.2. & 26.5. 2 Tim 3.5. Heb. 9.1. Jam. 1.27. As by Superstition his Majesty meaneth, when one restrains himself to any other Rule in the Service of God than is warranted by the Word. Bas. dor. p. 15. Which is therefore called Will-Worship. Col. 2.21, 23. Howsoever it be Religion, out of the fear and love of God, to keep his Commandments as well of the Second as First Table, yet the conscionable observing of the Commandments contained in the first Table is, by an excellency, called Religion; And whereas man cannot judge of such observing the first and third Commandments, therefore is he esteemed Religions, who maketh conscience of the second and fourth Commandments; In sanctifying the Sabbath with such an outward manner of Worship, as is not after man's invention, but according to God's Word. So that by Religion, in this position is meant the outward (especially public) worship of God: Religion being put for Worship, because the fear of God to serve him precisely according to his Word, is, of all the actions of men, especially to be manifest in worshipping God, who will be sanctified in all them that come near him, if they offer strange fire, Leu. 10.3. Religion (then) being put for outward Worship, the Position is granted. For indeed the outward worship of God, doth consist only of Ceremonies, that is, outward demonstrations of inward Worship. But, how doth this follow, The outward Worship of God cannot stand without some Ceremonies, Ergo, It cannot stand without the Ceremonies in question. As though Religion had no better ground than Diocesan Bishops have, according to this Maxim: No Ceremony, no Bishop. But more clearly to perceive the truth, it is to be considered, that some Ceremonies by nature, or general custom demonstrate inward worship, as not only signs thereof, but effects also. Other do the same, as signs only by Institution. By which instituted Ceremony; God is not worshipped except they be by himself prescribed; For as no fire could make any Sacrifice a savour of rest to God, but that which came from God, Leu. 9.24. and 10.1, 2. So no warrant can make outward worship, or any part thereof acceptable to God, but that which cometh from God, Mat. 15.9. Therefore it doth not follow, that because kneeling in Prayer is lawful, therefore the Ceremonies in question (namely the Surplice) be so too. For 1. Nature teacheth us to manifest inward reverence by outward gestures. 2. General custom amongst us maketh kneeling the most solemn sign of the greatest reverence. 3. In true Worshippers of God kneeling is not only a sign of inward Worship, but an effect also. 4. It is warranted by the Word. And 5. It is not appropriated to the outward Worship of God: For men do usually, and may lawfully, demonstrate their inward reverencing of men by kneeling. Whereas the Ceremonies in question (namely i Surplice) do not demonstrate inward Worship by Nature: For then all religious Worshippers would (at least) have a disposition to use the Surplice at all times, and in all places. (2.) None can affirm, that general custom maketh a Surplice a sign of inward Worship. Because the public use of it is mostwhat omitted or enforced, and there is no such matter as the private use thereof, and by private persons. In both which considerations it may be (3) denied to be an effect of inward Worship, and the rather if it cannot be proved to be as effect of the obedience of faith to some commandment of God, prescribing the same. Which (4.) cannot be; Seeing in all the New Testament there is neither Precept, nor Example, nor other matter of necessary conclusion warranting the same. And yet (5.) It is appropriated to the Service of God, and therefore superstitious, and not religious, especially being urged as it is. 2. Ceremonies are lawful, when their doctrine is lawful. If by Doctrine of Ceremonies be meant their signification, than the Thesis is denied: For then other Popish Ceremonies may be restored. As setting up of Candles, to signify that the works of all Christians, Phil. 2.15. especially Ministers, Mat. 5.14, 16. should shine before men; and yet it is pronounced in the third Injunction to be devised by man's Fantasy, besides Scripture, and therefore Superstitious. And unleavened bread in the Lord's Supper may signify Sincerity and truth, 1 Cor. 5.8. And yet by the Communion Book (Rubric after the Communion, Sect. 5.) it is reform, To take away the Superstition, which any person hath, or might have: But many have, and may have Superstition in Ceremonies retained. If the meaning of the Position be this, Ceremonies are lawful, when they are warranted by lawful Doctrine, it is to be granted; but then the Hypothesis must be denied. For it is petitio principii to affirm; that Ceremonies in question are so warranted. 3. The Doctrine of Ceremonies is part of the Gospel. This Position is true, but only according to the distinction of the Doctrine of Ceremonies by institution. Which Doctrine is either affirmative, showing what Ceremonies by institution are to be used, and those be only the two Sacraments, which are indeed Seals, and not only Ceremonies. Or Negative, teaching what Ceremonies are not to be used, viz. Neither Ceremonies of the Jews, nor traditions of Elders, Joh. 4.20, 21, 23. Neither Carnal Rites, Gal. 3.3. Heb. 9.10. Nor commandments of men, Col. 2.22. Which negative Doctrine of Ceremonies is indeed according to the truth of the Gospel, Gal. 2.3, 5, 12, 14. and that is contrary to the Ceremonial Law of Moses. Because that Law stood in carnal Rites, Heb. 9.10, 11. That is, Ceremonies instituted to instruct and direct the outward man unto the inward Service of God, and therefore was that Law called, A carnal Commandment, Heb. 7.16. and those Ceremonies accounted Rudiments of the World, Gal. 4.3. So that after faith (that is, the Gospel) came, that Law, and the Ceremonies thereof gave place, as being less perfect, a childish Pedagogy and beggarly Rudiments, 1 Cor. 13.10, 11. Gal. 3.25. and 4.2, 3, 9 In respect of the more perfect Word of Christ, Col. 3.16. 2 Cor. 3.13.17, 18. Who is that Messiah, who when he came, did tell us all things concerning the outward worship of God. Joh. 4.19, 20, 25, 26. But Christ never told us the Ceremonies in question. Therefore if the Negative Doctrine against Jewish Ceremonies instituted by God to the purposes aforesaid, be part of the Gospel, or Word of Christ, much more is the Negative Doctrine against Ceremonies instituted by man to the same purposes, without warrant of the word, part of the Gospel, Col. 2.20, 22, 23. Galat. 1.6, 7, 8, 10. And the rather, because the Word saith, That they, who burden the Church with Ordinances of the world, which are Traditions after the Commandemen and Doctrines of men, do not hold Christ the he●d, Col. 2.19, 20, 22. and 3.1. and opposing such Traditions to the Commandments of God, and Faith of Jesus, maketh them part of the Beasts Mark, Revel. 14.9, 12. Hereunto accordeth that which is affirmed in the BOOK of Common-Prayer, in the Preface of Ceremonies, viz. Christ his Gospel is not a Ceremonial Law (as much of Moses was) but it is a Religion to serve God, not in bondage of the Figure or shadow, but in the freedom of spirit. 4. Ministers refusing Conformity are Schismatics. This word Schism, according to the now received use thereof in the Church, signifieth A voluntary rending of the Church only for matters of the outward Government thereof. So that, Schismatics are by Dr. Bancroft, in his Notes before his Sermon at Paul's Cross, an. 1588. defined as out of Augustine, to be such, as retaining with us the true Faith, separate themselves, from Orders and Ceremonies. In which sense though Brownists (so called) may be deemed Schismatics, yet cannot Ministers refusing only to conform, be so accounted: Because, their Deprivation or Suspension notwithstansting, they do not separate themselves from the Church, neither do they (indeed) forsake the Ministry of the Gospel, which they desire (before all worldly benefits whatsoever) to execute with a good Conscience, but are thrust from it; and therefore, If men, driven by Excommunication out of the Church be not Schismatics, much less Ministers driven by deprivation or suspension only from the Execution of their Ministry. This word Schism is sometimes taken for any dissension in the Church, whereby the Peace, but not the Unity thereof is broken. 1 Cor. 11.18. In which sense they are to be called, Schismatics, who are specially to be blamed for such Dissension. But if all the Prelates cannot give one Argument sound concluded from the word to prove, That the Ceremonies, in question may be prescribed by authority, and yielded unto by the Ministry, without sin, then are they Schismatics, according to the judgement of the Apostle, who beseecheth the Brethren, To mark them diligently, who cause Division and Offences, besides the Doctrine which they have learned, and to avoid them. For they that are such, serve not the Lord Jesus Christ, but their own bellies, and with fair speech and flattering deceive the hearts of the simple, Rom. 16.17, 18. By which Answer, Protestants do sufficiently justify their Separation from the Papists: Much more may Ministers justify their refusing to Conform, yet without Separation. But when any such Argument shall be given (which hath not yet been heard of) then are Ministers refusing Conformity to be deemed Schismatics. In mean while this Position is to be taken for Petitio Principii. FINIS. A Treatise of Divine Worship, Tending to prove, that the Ceremonies imposed upon the Ministers of the Gospel in England, in present Controversy, are in their use unlawful. CHAP. I. Of Divine Worship in general. DIvine Worship is any action or service that is immediately and directly performed unto God himself, whether the true God or a false, whether commanded by Divine Authority, imposed by humane, or assumed upon our own heads and pleasures. For in this latitude of sense is Divine Worship to be conceived, that it may comprehend under it both true and false Worship. 2. Though all Actions and Services that Man performeth unto Man are not parts of Civil Worship, yet every Action and Service that Man performeth directly to God, is a part of Divine Worship, and ought merely to concern his own glory. It being impossible to imagine how the Creature should perform any service, or do any action to the Creator himself but Worship. For the ground of Worship is the sense of some excellent eminency of goodness in the Party worshipped, and defect and inability to do an answerable good to a good received in the party worshipping, for we need not to worship God if we could be as good to him as he is to us, and therefore (except we should mock him) because receiving all good from him, we are not able to do the least good unto him; all that we can do, is to worship him, that is, to glorify him above all things; and debase ourselves before him as nothing in his presence. 3. All special things therefore done in the Service and Worship of God, is Worship: and a part of that honour that is done unto him. And whatsoever special thing done in Divine Service, is not a special honour and worship unto God, must needs be a dishonour and abuse of his Majesty, who requireth nothing but worship at our hands, and unto whom we cannot possibly do any other good. 4. If therefore a man shall do any special Action in the Service of God, of which there is no use out of the same: and that Action so done, bring no special honour to God; the doing of it is a profanation of the Name of God. For all special Actions done in the Service of God, must either bring special honour to God, or else they must needs dishonour him. 5. Divine Worship is Internal only or External also. Internal worship is merely spiritual, and performed only within the temple of man's heart, of which none are witnesses but God and a man's own conscience. All the inward motions of the heart directed unto God are parts of this Worship, as Faith, Hope, Confidence, Love, Fear and Joy in God, etc. which are all of them divers acts and parts of Inward worship, in every one of which God is honoured. All which spring from the apprehension of our own wants, and Gods infinite excellency and goodness towards us. We need not proceed any further in handling of this Worship, it nothing appertaineth to our present purpose. 6. External Worship is an expressing and setting forth of the Internal by outward signs and rites: By which, as by certain outward bodily shadows and colours, the spiritual and Inward Worship of God is made visible and sensible to others. CHAP. II. Of Ceremonies in general. THese signs and rites are called Ceremonies. A Ceremony is a corporeal adumbration of some hidden thing in the mind, that it desireth to affect others withal, in some effectual manner, for by such means as these, are the secrets of the soul disclosed and painted out or figured to our own and others bodily senses. 2. Such actions properly are ceremonial, that are mere shadows and signs, exhibiting nothing but some similitude and resemblance of such things as man is desirous, but not able to exhibit in substance and in deed. And therefore are called compliments, because in doing them a man laboureth to supply that in a shadow, that he cannot do in substance. And hence it is that the more unable a man is to do that he would, the more he useth to supply his defect with signs and tokens. CHAP. III. Of Natural Ceremonies. CEremonies are either Natural or Instituted. Natural Ceremonies are all such voluntary compositions and gestures of the body, as are with moderate deliberation used to shadow-forth those hidden motions, affections, and habits of the mind, that are begotten in the mind by some goodness in those unto whom they are performed and done; for a man performeth no ceremony unto himself, but unto others, and the ground of that ceremony is in him unto whom it is performed. 2. For example: Authority in another, begetteth reverence in me. This reverence possessing and affecting my soul, it breedeth in me a desire to manifest it unto the party reverenced; but I cannot possibly do it by any other means, but by some bodily shadow and sign, whereupon nature teacheth me to bow the body; the like may be said of lifting up of hands, casting up the eyes, etc. All of which kind are certain natural impressions of the soul, made in and upon the body, endeavouring in and by them to make her hidden motions so visible and effectual, as they may affect ourselves and others. 3. Comeliness and decency doth especially consist in the use of Ceremonies of this kind, and they have been ever carefully observed in the Church of God, as well before Christ as since, both in her public and private ministrations; which wilfully to neglect, were to sin against God, and for any to inhibit only upon their will and pleasure, were impiety. But these Ceremonies in controversy are of another nature as shall afterward appear. 4. This first kind of Ceremonies, the more natural they are, and the more they shall appear to flow from the free and enforced will of him that acteth them, the more decent and of greater grace they are, for they are such shadows as are sent forth from our passions by the light of nature, and are not fit for any other use or signification. 5. And as nature only frameth them well, so if it shall appear that they proceed from her, and are not forced and wrung from men (invita minerva) she putteth into them such a light, that any of ordinary conceit may in the sign see the thing signified. 6. These Ceremonies though Natural, and therefore common to all men, yet are they not in all degrees universally the same, because having their original from the natural motions and conceptions of the mind, especially passion and affection, by which they are animated and form, there being in the stock of mankind such diversity of natures and dispositions; such divers degrees of the same inclination; such a divers composition and mingling of affections, it cannot be but nature must needs vary and be divers in them. 7. And though they are natural, yet are they no● such as nature by violence forceth and wringeth from men (as the actions of panting and breathing) such as men cannot at their pleasure abstain from, or lay down; for laughter in extreme mirth, and weeping in great sorrow, though they be natural impressions and signs of inward and hidden passions, yet are they not Ceremonies; but such signs only are Ceremonies, wherein there is concurrence both of nature and will, in the framing and use of them, as appeareth in the particulars above specified; and therefore are such as may upon some special or particular occasions, be omitted or suppressed. 8. Thus much of natural Ceremonies. Instituted Ceremonies are such outward rites and signs as by reason of some Analogy or similitude, are ordained and appointed to signify and shadow forth any mystical truth, they being not brought forth by nature to any such end or purpose. Of which kind are all the Jewish Ceremonies, Our Sacraments, All Paganish and Popish Rites, and those Ceremonies in present controversy. For none of all those external Rites, do by nature signify any such matter, but their uses and significations are put upon them only by the will of the institutor or user, and are not so much intended for decency and order, as for solemnity and state. 9 Those things that are put to this Ceremonial use, being not made by nature to any such end or purpose, must, if they be not vain and foolish, borrow light from some word of institution, for the more mystical the Ceremonies of this kind are, and of secreter sense, of greater grace they are. 10. Natural Ceremonies, if by institution and appointment they be put to any other use than nature itself hath fitted them unto; do lose their name, and become instituted Ceremonies, as kneeling tied to eating and drinking in the Sacrament, etc. CHAP. IU. Of Civil and Religious Ceremonies in general. THE Use of both these kinds of Ceremonies, that is, natural and instituted, is either in civil service; of man to man, or in religious services of man to God, from whence Ceremonies receive a second Denomination, and are called (whether they be natural or instituted) either Civil or Religious Ceremonies. 2. Civil Ceremonies therefore are such Rites and Ceremonies, as are performed in Civil Offices and Duties between man and man, as they are members of a Civil Body, or Incorporation: The right use whereof is called Civility, and the contempt rudeness; the end of Civil Ceremonies is to signify and shadow those inward affections that one man desireth to show to another: In the due use of these Ceremonies consists humanity, lowliness, courtesy, good manners, civil state, and pomp, etc. Because the Ceremonies of this kind are not controverted, we pass them by. 3. Religious Ceremonies are such outward Rites as are performed in religious Duties and services of man to God: and they are outward shadows of zeal, devotion, faith, holiness, reveren●● of the Majesty of God, etc. 4. In the use of these Ceremonies especially doth external worship consist, whether true or false. 5. Religious Ceremonies are either common or proper: Common Ceremonies are such as are equally used in civil and religious matters: bowing the knee used in prayer, is a religious Ceremony, signifying in that action a Divine Reverence of God. Yet it is not a Ceremony peculiar and proper to Religion, because it is a Ceremony that is and may be used to the Magistrate, to shadow forth also civil Worship due unto him. Of which nature all natural Ceremonies seem to be, and any instituted Ceremony may be, if it have no reference to Religion in the Use. 6. Though matters of Civil Order and Decency be very improperly called Ceremonies, they being rather matters of substance, and it being impiety wilfully and without necessity to neglect them in the Congregation of Saints, or to do any thing contrary unto them: Yet all things tending thereto, may for Doctrine sake be referred to this head. For though God's worship do not consist in them, yet God's worship is profaned in the wilful contempt and neglect of them. Yea as far forth as natural and civil decency and comeliness are outward shadows of inward worship, They may be safely reputed parts of divine worship. 7. Matters therefore of Order and decency in the service of God are all such matters as are drawn from the ordinary civil Customs of men, and which for any to neglect wilfully, would seem to the reason of a natural man a disorderly and unseemly thing. As to come to the Assembly clothed, and that in seemly and usual apparel, according to our civil Callings in the world, to sit there quietly, and in a comely manner, in respect of composition of body, to give as much as may be, upper place to our civil Superiors; that the place of meeting be fair swept; that the Table of the Lord in the time of Communion, be spread after the civil fashion of the Country, with a fair tablecloth; that men pray bareheaded, etc. These Orders used in civil Meetings of men, wherein civil decency is observed and kept, ought not to be neglected in religious Meetings, and therefore they may be called common Ceremonies or Orders. 8. These Ceremonies of civil Order and decency, are of that nature and necessity, that for the Magistrate wilfully to inhibit, were sin in him, and for any particular man not to use and observe as much as conveniently he can, (though Authority had never enjoined them in particular) were impiety. And therefore they are of a far different nature from the Ceremonies in controversy: For let it be supposed to be no sin to use these when the Magistrate enjoineth them: yea suppose them to be holy Ornaments and Rites, yet if no Authority humane or divine had instituted them, it had been no sin for any man to neglect them, nay it were a foul sin to use them. For example: Our Lords spiritual enjoin every Minister in Divine Service, to wear a white linen Ephod or Surplice, they may (if it please them) as lawfully enjoin him to have painted before and behind two fair red crosses: but if a private man upon his own head should use his Surplice so, though it be an honourable sign that he addeth, it would be made a grievous crime. 9 They therefore do but gull the simple of the world, that from humane authority to institute such civil Orders as are above specified, do infer that man hath authority to bring into the service and worship of God such Ceremonies, as are clean of another nature. As though because the Magistrate may ordain such Ceremonies, as without his ordinance, were impiety for a man not to observe, therefore he may ordain such Ceremonies which without his ordinance at least, were impiety and wickedness for any to use. CHAP. V Of Ceremonies peculiar to Religion. THose Ceremonies that are proper to Religion are such as in a peculiar manner are tied to religious persons actions and purposes only, especially such as are in a special manner tied to the solemn worship of God. In these Ceremonies consists the external form of divine worship, and they are the outward badges and cognisances of the same. 2. All Ceremonies used in the service of God, are either civil Ceremonies (to wit, such as are also of the same use out of the service of God) or holy Ceremonies, to wit, such wherein holiness consists in the due use of them; or else they are profane, that is, such as have no use, or a superstitious use. The Ceremonies in controversy are not civil * For then the bare omission of them would argue rudeness and incivility. Ceremonies: again it is granted, there is no holiness in the use of them † Some nigher his M. have given it out that he would (if h● could) hang those that put holiness in them. , Therefore they are profane Ceremonies, and by consequent, not to be mingled with holy things. 3. As there are diversities of Religion and Churches, so there are diversities of Rites and Ceremonies by which they are distinguished, and Ceremonies are the partition walls whereby (fo● the most part) one Church is divided from another. For he that shall with a more narrow eye seek into these things shall see, that for the most part, the diversities and varieties of Ceremonies are the begetters of diversity of Doctrines, and Opinions, whereby one Religion differeth from another. 4. The more one Church differeth from another in Rites and Ceremonies, the more it useth to differ in substance of Doctrine; and the more one Church draweth nearer unto another in Ceremonies, the more it draweth near unto it in substance of Doctrine. The Churches of France and Scotland in substance of Doctrine do so much the more differ from the Synagogue of Rome, by how much the farther they differ from her in Ceremonies, than other Churches; and some in the Church of England that do strive to come to Rome in Ceremonies, come so much the nearer to her in Doctrine, as might appear by divers instances, if the matter were not too too apparent. 5. He that hates the Religion itself, hates all the shadows and shows of the Religion; and he that loves the shadows and Rites of a Religion, he loves the Religion itself; he loves a Pope well that loves the triple Crown; he loves a Friar well, that dotes upon his Cowl, and shaved crown; and out of question he loves a Massepriest with all his heart, that is mad upon his massing attire, or any part thereof. 6. As it is rudeness and want of civility, to neglect or contemn a Civil Ceremony, so it is profaneness and irreligion to neglect or contemn a religious ceremony: and as outward civility consists in the due use of civil Ceremonies, so outward holiness and religion consists in the due use of all Religious Ceremonies: Those Ceremonies therefore are profane and not beseeming the true worship of God, that are so far from any show of holiness in the use of them, that they make the party that refuseth the use of them to seem, and to be reputed pure, holy, and precise; of which nature our Ceremonies in controversy are. 7. As Civil Ceremonies tend to the honour of them unto whom civil worship is due, and is a part thereof: So Religious Ceremonies tend to the honour of him unto whom religious worship is due, and is a part thereof: neither can a man possibly imagine how any thing should be religious, whether a substance or a Ceremony, but it must needs respect him that Religion itself respecteth; ●s therefore we perform civil honour unto those unto whom we perform civil Ceremonies, so we perform Religious and Divine honours unto those that we obey in a Religious Ceremony. They therefore that claim and perform obedience therein, do claim and perform that which is due only to God. 8. Nothing intended or done by man is an honour to God, but that which is an obedience unto God in some Commandment. All Ceremonies therefore of Religion that are an honour unto God, must be commanded by God himself: and to bring in such Ceremonies into his worship as are no honour to him, is to mock God. 9 All Religious Ceremonies or Ceremonies of Religion, are spiritual, that is, are ordained for spiritual uses and ends, and not for civil or temporal, and therefore are outward notes and testimonies of those things that make us spiritual men, and they are parts of spiritual honour due unto spiritual authority and Lordship. 10. All spiritual Lords may claim as their due, spiritual worship, and therefore may institute religious Ceremonies: for look what difference there is between humane and divine, Temporal and Spiritual, the same difference there is between the peculiar worship due to the one, and to the other: if therefore Temporal Lords may require all civil rites and honours, Spiritual Lords may require all Divine and Spiritual Rites and honours. 11. Civil honour and reverence only, cannot nor ought not to please a Spiritual Lord, hence it is that the Spiritual Lords of our Church cannot content themselves with such honour that we give to civil Magistrates and Princes, but we must obey them in peculiar religious duties and services; and surely it is meet that if there be any such besides Christ, that we perform spiritual homage unto them, and they are not worthy that high style that will be content with temporals, when spirituals are due. 12. Those Ceremonies that are enjoined by true spiritual Lords, are truly spiritual and holy, even as spiritual and holy as the Sacraments, though they consist of some things in their own nature indifferent; and those Lords are not spiritual, that are not able by their sole authority and word, to hollow that which before was not holy. 13. Those that can make a Surplice, a Cope, a Cross, etc. to be ornaments of Religion and holy Ceremonies: can, when it pleaseth them, make a shaved Crown, a Monk's habit, spittle in Baptism, holy Water, the triple Crown, and all the Missal Rites as holy. For they are all of the same nature: And those that can find no reason to prove those unholy and unlawful, would find none to prove any other external Rite to be so, if they should in the same manner be imposed. 14. Those that have power upon their own will and pleasure to bring into God's Service some indifferent thing, may bring in any * For all indifferent things are of the same nature. indifferent thing: those that may bring in without special warrant from God, piping into his Service, might as well bring in dancing also; those that have authority to join to the Sacrament of Baptism the sign of the Cross, have authority also (not doubt) to join to the Sacrament of the Supper, Flesh, Broth, Butter or Cheese, and worse matters than those, if they will. Yea, those that have power to make peculiar forms of Religion and Worship, have power to make and invent a Religion and Worship of their own. CHAP. VI Of Divine Worship in special, and first of true Worship. THus much of Divine Worship in general, both Inward and Outward, and of Ceremonies, wherein Outward Worship especially consisteth. Now let us in special consider the same. Divine Worship therefore is either true Worship or false. 2. True Worship is that immediate service that the true God himself requireth to be performed unto himself. In the exercise whereof consisteth true holiness and Religion. 3. True Worship both for matter and manner, aught to be according to the prescript rule of God's Word only: Neither hath any mortal man authority to frame according to his own conceit, any form or fashion of God's Service and Worship; for the manner of Worship also must be holy, and not the matter only; and no man hath power to make any thing holy, that God halloweth not by his Word and Spirit. 4. All civil furtherances and necessary circumstances of Gods solemn Worship, though they be not essential parts of the same, nor by special Nomination commanded: Yet are they to be esteemed Ordinances of God, and not humane inventions. As God having ordained that this Saints dwelling together, both Men, Women and Children, of all sorts and degrees, should ordinarily at appointed times meet together, it must needs be presupposed to be his Ordinance that they meet together in some such ordinary places, as are fittest for to receive most commodiously such Assemblies: So God having ordained that his Ministers should preach or proclaim salvation to a multitude gathered together, and that they should sit at his feet, hath also ordained that the Ministers seat should be higher than the rest of the People's; and the like may be said of all other such Circumstances of Divine Worship, which are matters of so base and low consideration, and so subject to common sense, that it neither beseemeth the majesty of the Word of God in special, or humane authority derived from God, to make any Laws in particular about them; no more than to make Laws that one should not fit in the Congregation upon another's lap, or one spit upon another's , or face: or that men should not make antic faces in the Church. CHAP. VII. Of False Worship. THus much of true Worship. False Worship is such a service of God as hath no warrant from God himself: Worship is false in matter or manner in whole or in part; neither can the true matter of Worship sanctify a corrupt manner, or the true manner sanctify a corrupt matter, or some parts of true Worship, or the whole itself, sanctify any part of false Worship that shall be adjoined to it, or mingled with it. 2. Whatsoever is unholy and superstitious out of God's solemn Service, cannot be made by the sole appointment and will of man holy and good in the solemn Service of God, but must needs be more unholy and superstitious therein, and therefore a part of false Worship. If for a man to sign himself or another in the forehead with the sign of the Cross out of Baptism, be superstitious and unholy, it cannot be good in Baptism, but a profane rite. 3. The more light and to toyish the things seem to be that without warrant from God, are brought into the Worship of God, the more we should abhor conformity unto them, it being a fearful presumption, to serve God in a toyish manner: for who is he that trembles at the Majesty of God, that dares use in his Worship any toy and trifle? They are deceived therefore that think that therefore we should not make scruple to use them because they are toys. 4. That is a corrupt manner of Worship wherein there is confusion and undecency, for all things must be done in the Service of God in decency, order and comeliness, as it is granted; and under the name whereof these Ceremonies are obtruded upon us: But those things that are undecent and disorderly in other matters, and of no necessary use in God's Worship, cannot be matters of order and decency in the Service of God, except God himself should in a special manner command them. 5. It being therefore confusion and disorder in civil matters where a multitude joins together in a common suit and supplication for all to speak at once the same words: And common wisdom and discretion having taught it to be a decent and orderly Ceremony, that some foreman should speak, and the rest hold their peace, giving only some sign and testimony of assent: He must be more than a man, that must make it an orderly thing in our general and ordinary suits and prayers to God, for all the Congregation to open their mouths together in a prayer, especially sigh God hath in special appointed the Minister to be the mouth of the People, and expressly requireth the assent of the People only in the word, Amen. 6. It being a ridiculous disorder in other matters in any solemnity, where any Deed or Record is to be read or rehearsed, for one to read one period, and another read or say another; how can it by man's wit and will, without Ordinance from God, be a matter of order, for the Minister to read one verse of Scripture, and the People another; for the Minister to say one piece of a Prayer, and the People, by way of catch, to say another. 7. If any thing be undecent out of the Worship of God (the same reason of undecency remaining) it is much more undecent in the Worship of God; for the more excellent the thing is, in which ●n undecent thing is used, the more undecent the thing is that is so used. As if it be undecent to go naked in any company, it is much more undecent to go so in the Congregation: If foul apparel be every where else undecent, it cannot be decent in God's Service, though all the Bishops in the world should decree it. 8. An undecent and disorderly thing the more strictly it is urged in the Service of God, the more dangerous it is to yield unto the same, and so much the more effectual cause of false Worship. 9 If there be some apparel that doth in special manner become the Service of God, and deserves to be appropriated unto it, then by the same position there must be some apparel that doth deform and disgrace the Service and Worship of God: for if no apparel can deform it, than no apparel can be an ornament or decent form unto it. 10. If any apparel do deform Gods true Worship, it is that apparel that doth most beautify and grace the false and Idolatrous worship of God: As that apparel must needs most deform a wise man that doth most adorn a fool, and that apparel must needs be most unbeseeming a King, that is seemly and decent for a beggar. 11. If therefore men would set their wits upon the highest strain to invent an apparel to disgrace the Ministers of the Gospel, they could not invent a more odious attire than the consecrated attire of a filthy Mass-Priest, the most abominable Idolater in the earth. 12. Those that abhor Idolatry as much as they do beggary and folly, cannot but hate and abhor the badges of Idolatry as much as the badges of folly and beggary, and therefore cannot but account that Priestly attire that is enjoined unto us by our Prelates, an apparel more unbeseeming the Minister of the Gospel, than a Cloak with a thousand patches, or a coat with four elbows, for beggary and folly being judgements and not sins, the notes of beggary and folly cannot be so odious in a spiritual eye, as the notes of Idolatry. 13. If it be denied, that the apparel enjoined is Popish, because it was before Popery was; this answer may be made. 1. It can never be proved that it was before Popery. For though not all Popery, yet some Popery was in the Apostles times: Most of the Heresies were before the full revealing of Antichrist, which notwithstanding we fasten upon them and count popish, they having entertained them. If therefore an error, maintained before Popery, and retained by Papists, deserve the name of a popish error, why should not unnecessary apparel, though used before, yet entertained now only by them, and those that receive it from them, bear the name of Popish attire? 2. As a coat of divers colours is a fools coat, notwithstanding that Joseph, one of the twelve Patriarches, wore one, so a white linen garment is a popish garment, though some Ministers in the East Churches did wear them, and yet it can never be proved, that either they wore such a one as is prescribed unto us, or that it was a ministerial garment, and not their ordinary civil attire, or proper to the Minister only, or if all this, that it was well done: for there being no one Father that wrote since the Apostles times, but have erred in some matters of Doctrine, why may they not as well err in matters of Ceremony? if all the true Churches of God, beside our own in England, and the greatest part of the sufficientest Pastors of our own Church, are held to err in the general renouncing of these Ceremonies; Why might not some few Ministers in the Old Church as well err in instituting and using them? 14. A corrupt and scandalous Ceremony in the Worship of God is so much the more dangerous and scandalous to others, by how much the more it comes graced and countenanced with lawful authority. A corrupt Ceremony enjoined by a Heathenish Pagan and Tyrant unto the Ministers of the Gospel living under his jurisdiction, cannot do so much spiritual hurt, as when it shall be required by a Christian Magistrate, for the good conceit of the institutor and ordainor of a religious Rite, is it that breeds Superstition. Those therefore whose special calling from God is, to edify the souls of men and not to destroy them, ought so much the more to avoid these Ceremonies they judge and know to be scandalous and hurtful to the souls of men, by how much the greater grace and countenance they receive from the Authority of man, neither can the commandment of the Magistrate be a sufficient plea at the bar of God's Judgement Seat for a man that by virtue or force thereof alone, hath done any action (how indifferent soever in itself) that his conscience tells him will scandalise his brother, and so hurt his soul; gross therefore is the Doctrine of them that teach, That Paul (if the Magistrate had commanded him) should have eaten flesh, though his brother's soul should have been damned for it. 15. The more indifferent an action is in itself, the more odious it ought to be unto us when we shall perceive it to hurt our brother's soul, which ought to be a thousand times dearer unto us than his body, or our own lives, for he shows neither love nor mercy to his brother, that had rather be the instrument of his everlasting damnation, than omit the doing of a mere indifferent thing, though he should incur therefore any bodily punishment whatsoever. That Form therefore of God's Service that consists in the use of such things indifferent, as experience manifesteth, are a scandal (and by consequent a destruction) to the souls of infinite numbers, ought not to be used of any, much less of those who are called by Christ to feed the souls of men, and not to destroy them. How scandalous these Ceremonies are to all, how the omission of them cannot be scandalous to any, but unto such as are worse scandalised already by embracing them, requires a larger Treatise. 16. No Magistrate that is a Christian will challenge authority to destroy the soul of any man, and therefore he cannot upon his own mere will and pleasure, without sin against God, enjoin any thing (not required by God) that evidently tendeth to the destruction of any man's soul; and those subjects that (being ready to perform any duty that God requireth unto the Magistrate) shall refuse to do any such thing so required, and shall patiently and meekly yield themselves to any punishment the Magistrate shall think good to lay upon them without resistance, shall * A patiented suffering, when we cannot in conscience obey, is the best obedience. perform more true and loyal obedience unto his authority therein, than any of those that shall yield obedience to any Laws of that kind enacted by never so good a Magistrate, and (in show) to never so good an end. 17. No subject therefore can take any such authority from the hands of the Magistrate, which may warrant him to do any thing that shall evidently destroy his brother's soul at any time, much less in the Service and Worship of God wherein all things that are to be done, aught to tend to the edification of his soul in a special manner. 18. It is plain in the Word of God, that the Kingdom of God, (that is) the Service and Worship of God, standeth not in meats and drinks, nor any such external Rites having no authority from God. When therefore without any commandment from God, such external things shall be brought into the Service of God, and made the very forms of the same; such Rites must needs be false Worship, and that form of God's Service must needs be adulterate, that is made to consist in such things. For no authority can make that a part of God's Kingdom, that the word of God doth expressly deny to be a part thereof. 19 Those Ceremonies therefore in present controversy being merely by man brought into the Worship of God, are by no means to be yielded unto, for it is in effect to make the Kingdom of God to consist in meats and drinks, or in such like things. For if man hath authority to make the Kingdom of God consist in apparel, etc. he hath also authority, if it please him, to make it consist in eating and drinking, and may make them a part of the liturgy, as well as any of those things that are in controversy. 20. Those peculiar Rites and Ceremonies which are in that manner and form used in the Service of God, that if God himself did but ratify and confirm, that present use of them should then be parts of his true outward worship, must needs, as they are used, (without God's Ordinance) be parts of a false outward worship: But our Surplices, Crosses, Kneeling at the Lords Supper, etc. are such, that if God should but command to use them as we use them, that is, if he should require every Minister in Divine Service to wear a Surplice, to note Joy, Dignity or Sanctity, or in Baptism to cross a child, in sign, etc. N●●, though he should express no use at all, but barely enjoin the things themselves to be used in his Service, yet they should be parts of God's true outward worship; for whatsoever God toeth in a peculiar manner to his worship, is a part thereof. These Ceremonies therefore, in controversy having such a use in the Service of God, unto which they are peculiarly tied, must needs be used as parts of Divine worship, for else the bare ratifying of their present use could not make them true worship; Being therefore (as they are used) parts of Divine Worship, and not parts of true Divine Worship, because not commanded of God; they are parts of false Divine Worship, for that Divine Worship that is not true Worship, is false Worship. FINIS. A TREATISE OF THE NATURE & USE OF Things Indifferent. Tending to prove, That the CEREMONIES in present Controversy amongst the Ministers of the Gospel in the Realm of England, are neither in Nature or Use Indifferent. Joh. 18.23. If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if I have spoken well, why smitest thou me? Mat. 5.11. Blessed are ye when men revile you, and persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you for my sake falsely; Rejoice and be glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the Prophets that were before you. Printed in the Year, 1660. The Printer to the Reader. A Copy of this Treatise by the providence of God coming into my hand, I thought it behooful for my Countrymen, that they should be made acquainted with it, that by means thereof they might receive some light of the truth for which so many suffer. The Author, whosoever he is, hath little cause to be offended with it; The pains he hath taken in it doth persuade me, that he cannot but desire the same in itself, though danger, and want of means, might hinder him from publishing it; But howsoever (good Reader) accept it as a Testimony of my Vows for the good of my Country, the Weal whereof shall ever possess me, though I cannot possess it. Farewell. A Treatise OF Things Indifferent. CHAP. I. Of Things Indifferent in general. A Thing Indifferent (in the largest extent of sense) is any Mean between two Extremes. 2. Extremes (properly) are the uttermost bounds and limits of any thing, being in direct opposition one unto the other. 3. To be a Mean between two Extremes, is so to be seated between them, as that it stand equally affected to either, inclining no more to the one than to the other. 4. Hence the Latins call things indifferent, Res mediae (middle matters) and that by reason of that analogy and proportion that is between them, and those things that in Physical or Mathematical Dimensions possess the middle place in any line, figure or body: For, that is properly called the middle of any thing, that in position being as near as can be to both extremes, inclineth no more to the one than to the other, but is alike equally distant from both. 5. And they are therefore called things indifferent, because in their relation to those Extremes between which they are seated, and unto which they are referred, they stand indifferently disposed, and affected to either; whence of the Greeks they are called Adiaphora, unto which our English term doth precisely answer. For, as that is just the middle of a line, that leaveth on both sides so much to either extreme, that there is in respect of it no difference between the one and the other; but unto it, both are equal and alike: So those things are called Indifferent properly, that without any difference, do equally agree unto, or descent from those Extremes, unto which they have reference and relation. 6. By all this it may appear that things Indifferent, are not such simply in themselves and of themselves considered, but as they are compared and have relation to the said opposite extremes, as the Centre in a circle, considered in itself and by itself, is not the middle of any thing, but only as it hath reference to the opposite extremes in the Circumference: from any of which it is equally distant, and in that respect only, is it called the mean or middle of such a figure. 7. The very essence therefore of a thing indifferent, consists in that equal and indifferent reference and relation that it hath to some two opposite terms or extremes, unto which either in sense or reason it is compared, and by which only it is measured. So that it is in the number of those things that in Schools are called Relatives, all which have only but an accidental being, the Subjects thereof being variable, according to the divers references and respects that they have unto divers things. For as a man simply considered in himself, is neither Husband, Father, nor Master, but only in respect of Wife, Child and Servant. And as the same man in divers respects may be a Father and a Son, a Master and a Servant: So nothing is in and of itself indifferent, but only in relation and reference to some opposite extremes: And those things which in some such respect may be indifferent, in some other respect may be Extremes. CHAP. II. Of things more commonly called indifferent. 1. THough things Indifferent may in that former generality, spread themselves to any mediocrity whatsoever: Yet Custom the Mistress of all speech and language, hath restrained and limited the name to such things only, as are a Mean between good and evil. So that (to omit what in rigorous propriety of speech may be comprehended under the name that is given unto them) In common use of speech, a thing indifferent is only any mediocrity between good and evil. 2. The proper Extremes therefore of things indifferent, being good and evil, they cannot (retaining the nature of their indifference) communicate or partake of either; for whatsoever standeth equally affected to good and evil, cannot in that affection, have in it either good or evil: It being impossible, that either of the extremes should be found in the Mean, without destruction of the nature thereof. 3. Whatsoever then void of all evil, a Such they say are our Ceremonies. For those things are good that are decent, orderly & means of edification. participateth but the least measure of good; or void of all good, partaketh but the b Such we say and have proved the Ceremonies to be. least degree of evil, cannot bear the name of a thing indifferent: for there can be no indifferency in that, which inclineth more to the one extreme, than to the other. 4. A thing indifferent therefore being a mean, between good and evil, it is c So are not these Ceremonies. so seated between them, that it is as far removed from good, as a thing not evil can be; and as far removed from evil as a thing not good can be, and as near unto good and evil, as any thing can be, that is neither good nor evil. So that whatsoever is Indifferent, is neither good nor evil, whatsoever is either good or evil, is not indifferent, whatsoever is not indifferent is either good or evil. 5. Things Indifferent being equally divided from good and evil, are in like manner divided from all the properties of either; For every property being unseparable from that subject, from the nature whereof it springeth, no one can be communicated to any thing, but unto that, unto which the subject itself communicateth itself: If therefore the property of any Extreme be found in a thing Indifferent, the Extreme itself is to be found likewise therein. Which to imagine, is as absurd, as to look to find the Circumference of a Circle in the Centre. 6. No indifferent thing therefore as it is an indifferent thing, d But they say that the Ceremonies in controversy have. For that which is a grace and ornament to good, maketh the better. hath power to make any thing good or evil, better or worse: For it is the property only of good and evil, either to make or increase good or evil in any thing. 7. That e But such are the ceremonies in controversy. which doth more hurt or good, than some things that are good or evil, is not indifferent, but either good or evil: for nothing but good can exceed in goodness that which is good; and nothing but evil, can exceed in hurt, that which is evil. 8. Whatsoever f This do the ceremonies in controversy. worketh upon any affection of man, stirring up in him love, hatred, delight, sorrow, zeal, malice, envy, jealousy, hope, fear, &c. cannot be apprehended as a thing indifferent, by him in whom these passions are wrought. For it is the property only of those things that present themselves as good or evil, to beget and move such passions in the soul of man. For it is impossible that a thing indifferent apprehended as a thing indifferent should beget any thing in the soul of man but Indifferency, and a Stoical apathy or sencelesseness: So that whatsoever a g As our Prelates do the ceremonies. man entirely loveth and delighteth in, admireth, commendeth, pursueth with zeal, commandeth with authority. Whatsoever also a man shall abhor, condemn, forbidden, punish, persecute, he cannot in any sincerity affirm, that he judgeth that thing to be indifferent, but to be in some degree either good or evil. 9 The omission of that is indifferent, the commission whereof is indifferent: and that whose h Such is the omission of our ceremonies said to be, and that in a high degree. omission is evil, is certainly good. 10. All the former Premises considered, this must needs follow, That i To command our ceremonies is to command as they say, a great good, yea a public common good. to command a thing indifferent, is to command no good; to forbid a thing indifferent, is to forbid no evil. k But to use the ceremonies is to do much good, if they edify the soul. To do a thing indifferent, is to do no good: To forbear a thing indifferent l None are more spitefully entreated than those that forbear these ceremonies, and therefore sure therein they do much evil. is to do no evil. And therefore to punish for a thing indifferent, is to punish for no evil. CHAP. III. Of things Indifferent in special. 1. THE Essence of things Indifferent, consisting in a mere and equal privation of Good and Evil, there cannot be given any true kinds or degrees of them: For all privatives considered in themselves, are of the same nature. 2. Though there be no true kinds of them, yet they may be varied according to the diversity of those Extremes with which they are compared: And therefore may be distinguished according to the common distinctions of good and evil. 3. That good that hath not an evil opposite unto it in the same kind, cannot be the Extreme of any thing Indifferent, and therefore cannot vary, distinguish, or denominate a thing indifferent. As, if there be not an opposite colour unto white, than it is impossible to imagine how white should be an extreme to any other colour, or any other colour a mean unto it. 4. That which is properly a mean, must agree with the extremes in all things in which the extremes do agree: for Example, If black and white be both of them colours, that which is properly a mean between black and white must be a colour also; for it were absurd to call any thing but a colour, a mean between black and white: so that the mean follows the common natures and qualities of both the extremes, for as it is said before, That only is a mean that is not only equally distant from two extremes, but withal is as near to both as may be, which cannot be verified of that mean that shall not be found to agree with the extremes in those things wherein the extremes do agree within themselves, and therefore things indifferent follow their extremes. As therefore that cannot be an extreme that hath not in the same kind an opposite, so that can be no medium to any extremes, that doth descent from them in that wherein they shall accord and agree. So that that denomination and predication that belongs to both extremes, belongs also to their mean. The mean between two opposite Qualities is a quality; between two substances, a substance; between two actions an action; between two goods a good; between two evils an evil; between two quantities a quantity, etc. 5. Hence it will follow, that no a All substances therefore are indifferent only by accident, in respect of some use. substance (as it is a substance) can be called a thing indifferent, because that there is no substance that is evil as it is a substance. For an indifferent substance, must needs (if there were any such) be a mean between a good and an evil substance. If then there be no evil substances, it cannot be imagined how there should be any indifferent. 6. The like may be said of all b As also of all artificial which imitate natures. created species and kinds of things, considered not only in their substances, but qualities and dispositions. For the voice of God pronouncing them all to be good, none of them are evil: and if none of them be evil, none are indifferent. For indifferent created things can have no place, either real, or imaginative, but between a created good, and a created evil. There is therefore no Creature of God, nor no created property or quality of any creature, that is by creation a Thing Indifferent. 7. Also upon the said grounds it appears, that there is no a And therefore there cannot be made an absolute and perpetual law concerning any thing, under the name of indifferent; for a law bindeth only to good, and punisheth for evil: and therefore to imagine a law that bindeth to the doing of a thing indifferent, when that thing indifferent turns evil, as the most indifferent thing may, than the force of the law ceaseth. absolute Indifferent thing, because there is nothing in nature either absolutely good, or absolutely evil: In being impossible that any thing should be an absolute Mean, whose extremes are not absolute, for where one extreme is absolute, and the other not absolute, the Mean cannot be absolute; for if it be, it inclineth more to one extreme than the other, which is to destroy the nature of a thing indifferent. CHAP. IU. Of the first Distinction of Things Indifferent. 1. THings Indifferent therefore, being to be distinguished according to those distinctions of Good and Evil that are equally common to them both, we are in the next place distinctly to propound the same, and by them accordingly to distinguish the other. 2. First therefore Good and Evil is such, either in appearance only, or indeed also. Whence ariseth the first distinction of things indifferent, for accordingly some things are indifferent in appearance only, some indeed. 3. A Thing indifferent in appearance only, is that which is a mean between that Good and Evil Consider whether the mystical Rites of an Idolatrous Religion and Worship, be not at least an evil in appearance and show, and therefore cannot be so much as in appearance indifferent. that is in show and appearance only. For that appeareth to be indifferent, that being good or evil indeed, appeareth or seemeth to be neither. 4. A thing indifferent indeed, is that which is a Mean between those things that are in truth and verity Good or Evil. So that such an indifferent is void of all true good, b If our Ceremonies were such, the Devil and Antichrist, and all superstitious and lewd persons would not so much dote upon them, and the hearts of so many learned and godly men would not burn against them as they do. and evil. 5. As that which is good in appearance only, is indeed either evil or indifferent, and that which is evil in appearance only, is indeed either good or indifferent; and that which is indifferent in appearance only, is indeed either good or evil: So that which is indifferent indeed, is in truth, neither good nor evil. 6. As c If Turkism, Judaisme, Paganism, and the grossest Idolatry that ever was amongst the Heathen were established by that law and authority that these Ceremonies are, any point or parcel thereof might be maintained by the same or the like grounds, that Mr. Hooker, Covel, Wilk s, maintain the Indifferency of these Ceremonies: And there is no Article of Faith and Religion, but (by the same method that the Surveyor useth against the Discipline of other Reformed Churches) it may be traduced and oppugned as most odious, gross, and impious. the grossest evil may by means of some counterfeit or shadow cast upon it, be in appearance the greatest good, and the greatest good may be disguised, and in show transformed into the greatest evil: So with much more facility may either of them by the wit of man have cast upon them the forms of things indifferent. So that there must be special heed taken that we admit not of all things as indifferent indeed, that present themselves to us under that name and shape: Florentines can disguise and colour any thing; and it is now adays the common exercise of the greatest wits of the world to transform Good into Evil, Evil into Good, and both into indifferent; so that in these days scant any thing is as it appears, or appears as it is. CHAP. V The second Distinction of Things Indifferent. 1. GOod and Evil is either Internal or External, according to which difference ariseth a second Distinction of Things Indifferent. 2. An External Indifferent is whatsoever hath in it neither outward good nor a Some of our state Divines think all external things indifferent: which shows that they that talk most of them, know lest what they are. evil. 3. An Internal Indifferent, is whatsoever hath in it neither inward good b What inward hurt and evil is in these Ceremonies they best know, that are best acquainted with the state of their flock. nor evil. 4. Something c The Doctors of Oxford ask what hurt can a wise man see in a square Cap, and a Surplice? Indeed there is no outward hurt or evil in it; but it must be considered, whether there be not any inward hurt therein; for if it can be proved, that by them the souls of many are poisoned with superstitious conceits, than it is apparent that they have inward hurt in them. External Indifferent may have in it internal good or evil; and some things internally Indifferent may have in them outward Good or Evil. CHAP VI Of the third distinction of Things Indifferent. 1. THirdly, Good and Evil is either of itself or by accident: which also make the 3d Distinction of things Indifferent. 2. An Indifferent by accident is a mean between those Extremes that a If it can be proved that these Ceremonies are but evil by accident, (they being not good of themselves) it is enough to argue that they are evil, and not indifferent. For, if many things that are good in themselves be to be forborn, when by some accident they do hurt, much more ought a thing indifferent when it hunteth, though but by accident. are Good and Evil by accident, and not of themselves: for, that must needs be only accidentally indifferent, whose Extremes (by which it is limited and defined) are but accidentally Good or Evil: So that whatsoever is Indifferent only in relation of some accidental Good or Evil, is Indifferent not of itself, but by accident. 4. b Ergo, There is nothing absolutely Indifferent (as our Divines of State dream) but by some circumstance of time, place, person, use, it may ●e ●ither very good, or very evil. There is nothing so Good of itself, but it may be made Evil by accident; nothing so evil of itself but it may become good by accident: Nothing so good or evil but it may become indifferent by accident; nothing so indifferent of itself but it may become good or evil by accident. 5. Unto this head may be referred such things as are Indifferent by comparison; for, as there are some things good simply, that are evil in comparison, and some things evil simply, that are good in comparison; so also there is some good and evil, that in comparison with others is indifferent. CHAP. VII. Of a fourth Distinction of things Indifferent. 1. THings are good or evil, either Actively or Potentially: So are also Things Indifferent. 2. A thing Actually Indifferent, is that which hath in it neither actual good nor hurt. 3. A thing Potentially Indifferent, is that which in act doth either hurt or good, though in possibility it may do neither. 4. There is nothing actually Indifferent but is potentially good or a A possibility of evil in a thing indifferent, maketh it evil and worthy to be removed. Nature teacheth to prevent evils, and a man cannot do less in the prevention thereof, than to leave off a thing in itself indifferent, which doth no good, and may do hurt. evil: There is nothing potentially only indifferent, but it is actually either good or evil. Therefore there is nothing absolutely Indifferent. CHAP. VIII. Of the fifth Distinction of Things Indifferent. 1. LAstly, Good and Evil is either Corporall, in respect of the body; or Spiritual, in respect of the mind; In which respect Things Indifferent do always vary. 2. A Thing Indifferent in respect of the body, is any such thing that applied to the body, doth it neither good nor hurt. As that which maketh a man neither rich nor poor, strong nor weak, beautiful nor deformed, hungry nor yet satisfied, sick nor healthy, etc. 3. That may be Good a Circumstances of time and place do also vary the things of this kind exceedingly. For that in some time, and some place, is indifferent to some body, that in another place, and at another time is good or evil. to the body in one respect, that is Evil in another, & contrà; and that may be indifferent unto it in one respect, that is good or evil in another: Also that may be good or evil to one part of the body that is indifferent to another part: And a thing may be indifferent to one, that is good or evil to another. 4. A thing indifferent in respect of the mind or soul, is whatsoever having reference and relation to the soul, b Either indeed or appearance of itself, or accident, actually or potentially. doth it neither good nor hurt. 5. The Goods and Evils of soul, are either dispositions, qualities, or habits in the soul, or such actions as proceed from them, As thoughts, words, deeds; all which are called moral. A Moral good is whatsoever in Man or from man is agreeable and correspondent to the Law of Nature, Reason, or the Divine Law of God revealed supernaturally in his word; unto this head are to be referred, all true wisdom, knowledge, understanding, providence, discretion, and all actions flowing from the same; Also all Moral virtues, as, Justice, Temperance, Holiness, etc. with all the Actions proceeding from them, all which are squared and ruled by some or other of the former Laws. A Moral evil is whatsoever is any ways repugnant (whether in general or particular) to any of those former Laws. As Ignorance, Folly, Injustice, Intemperance, etc. with all Actions proceeding from them. 6. Those things are in a Moral respect indifferent (whether they be Qualities, Inclinations, Habits or Actions) That have in them c See cha. 8. sect 4. marg. neither virtue nor vice. Herein such Actions of man's will are most frequent, that are neither commanded nor forbidden in the Word of God. 7. There is no Action of man's will so indifferent d So that (by Mr. hooker's favour) a man may by taking up a straw or a rush commit a Moral vice. For example, if he should use to do it in the time of prayer. but the doing thereof (by some circumstance) may be repugnant to the Law of God, and by consequent be hurtful to the soul of man. 8. An Action that in some one respect unto someone special Law, is Indifferent, in respect of some other Law may be Good or Evil. As that action may be either Religious or Superstitious, that hath in it neither Temperancy nor Intemperancy. 9 Any action done by man that is not commanded e Such are the Ceremonies in Controversy: They are not where in general or special commanded, no more than the shaved on crown and holy water, and yet they have been and are the special means and occasion of the Schism of many hundred Brownists. Of much superstition in many thousand ignorant Protestants, and of confirmation of many infinites of w●lful Papists in their Idolatry, as is most evident. Also, (if it be a sin to dislike our Lords spiritual) there is no one greater cause that moveth those that the profane call Puritan to do it, than these Ceremonies, which if they might be freed from, as all other reformed Churches are, there is no other Civil obedience or subjection due unto them, that they would refuse to perform, in as low a degree as any other whatsoever. by God, either expressly or by direct consequent, that is a means either of itself or by accident of any hurt either to the body or soul of a man's self, or of his Neighbour, either by bringing evil into them, or nourishing or increasing evil in them, cannot bear the name of an Indifferent action; For there is no indifferency in that▪ which being not required of God (and therefore is not Good) doth hurt (any ways) a man: which must needs be against the Law of God. For the sum of the Law of God being the love of God and our Neighbour, and love aiming only at the good of the loved: That action, that (besides the Law) doth any hurt to any, must either have an exception in the Law, or else be against it, and then it cannot be indifferent. 10. Moral Actions, whether virtues or vices, respect ei●her God immediately, or ourselves or our Neighbour, as is intimated before. So do also all indifferent Actions. 11. That Action is indifferent in respect of God, that doth neither advance nor obscure the glory of God: For this is the only good or Evil we can do unto God. 12. There is no Action f What honour receiveth God by our Ceremonies? It is certain that Antichrist receiveth great honour by them. that a man can do by the power of his will, but either in itself, or by accident, it doth either glorify or dishonour God, and therefore no action, in respect of God, is merely and absolutely indifferent, but thereby God receiveth some honour or dishonour. 13. All Actions of Religion (amongst which g Such are the Ceremonies and Rites that are peculiarly acted in Divine Worship, if they be good and lawful. those are special that are peculiarly done in Divine Service) are (if they be as they ought to be) in a special manner good, tending more directly to the glory of God than any other Actions, therefore no Action of Religion, whether it be Moral or Ceremonial, is indifferent, but either good or evil. 14. No Action of Religion, whether Moral or Ceremonial, h Such are our Ceremonies else they are not indifferent. grounded only upon the will of man, and not upon the Word of God, can bring any special glory to God, and therefore no such Act can be an Act of Religion, but of Superstition, and therefore cannot be indifferent. 15. There being some mystical Ceremonies of Religion Good, and some Evil. If there be any mystical Ceremonies indifferent, they must then in some special and material point differ from the Evil, even as far as from the good. But there is no mystical Rite of Religion i Crossing in Baptism being no more commanded, nor no less forbidden than breathing upon the child, or anointing, which are rejected as evil. It must needs come nearer to these, than it doth to Baptism which is commanded. but doth come many degrees nearer to the evil than to the good. And therefore there can be no mystical Rite of Religion indifferent. 16. An evil Ceremony of Religion being therefore only evil because it is forbidden of God: A good Ceremony of religion is therefore only a good Ceremony because it is commanded of God: and th●t must be an indifferent Ceremony that is neither forbidden nor commanded: But all Ceremonies in Religion that are not good, are evil, and therefore there are no indifferent Ceremonies of Religion. 17. As no man by his sole will can make that Ceremony good in Divine Worship that God forbiddeth to be done therein, or make that evil that God commandeth to be done therein. So can he not make that which is but indifferent to be good: For he cannot make that to be commanded of God that is forbidden of God; Or that which (though it be not forbidden) is not commanded: If therefore what Ceremony of Religion soever is good be commanded of God; and if every Ceremony of Religion ought to be good, and if whatsoever Ceremony is commanded of God is not Indifferent, hence it will follow: That no Ceremony of Religion is indifferent. 18. Thus much of Actions indifferent having reference to God. Those actions of man are indifferent in respect of a man's self, or his neighbour, that being committed, bring neither moral hurt nor good unto himself, or them. For those actions are evil to the doer, and such as hurt his soul, that are a means of bringing either upon himself or upon his neighbour any evil forbidden. And those actions are good to his soul, that are a means of affecting with any good commanded himself or his neighbour. 19 Whatsoever therefore, doing a man no good, is a means either to k But we shall be ready to prove, that such is the Law that requires these Ceremonies. take from a man any good thing that God hath freely granted unto him, as Life, Health, Liberty, Name, honesty, Piety, etc. Or to bring upon a man that evil that God otherwise withholdeth from him, that cannot be indifferent. 20. All such humane Laws therefore, that l Much more those Laws that lay greater penalties upon the omission of some Indifferent than the omission of the greatest good, or commission of the grossest evil, as do the Canons and Laws that require these Ceremonies. upon any penalties, bind men to those things that are confessed indifferent, which are such things as God hath left to the free liberty of man to do, or not to m This hindereth not, but that the Magistrate may, and aught (if it be for the good of the Commonweal) command fish days, and such like the neglect whereof may do much hurt, and the observation much good, for in such cases eating of fish and flesh is not a thing indifferent, but that which men stand bound either to forbear, or to do according to the Civil Laws of Magistrates. do, is a depriving of men of that liberty that God hath granted unto them, and therefore such a Law is neither good nor indifferent, but evil to the soul of him that enacteth it, though not of him that obeyeth it. For it is no indifferency in any man to take that away from a man that God hath freely given unto him. 21. All moral actions of men that are good or evil, are either private, or common and public: The common and public are either Domestical, Political, or Ecclesiastical. Actions also in their Indifferency may vary according to their divers references to these. 22. A private good or evil action, is that which affecteth with good or evil only a man's own person that doth it, and which spreadeth not to the good or hurt of any other (except secondarily and by accident) as he that eateth and drinketh) doth himself only good properly: Though secondarily and by accident, he may, in that strength he receiveth, thereby do his Family or the Commonwealth good. 23. That action is indifferent, in respect of a man's private self, that doth his own private Person any good or hurt. 24. Those Domestical, Political, Ecclesiastical actions are good or evil, that tend to the good or hurt of a Family, Commonwealth, or Church; and those are indifferent, that, being done, do bring neither good nor hurt, or as much good as hurt unto any of the said Societies. 25. That may be good, evil, or indifferent to a private person, as he is a private person, that is not so unto a Family, Commonwealth or Church, or unto him, as he is a member of all or any of them. 26. That may be Indifferent to be done by a Family, or the Commonwealth, as it is such, That is evil and not indifferent to be done by a Church. That may be indifferent to one member of a House, Church, or Commonwealth, that is not indifferent to another; that may be lawful or indifferent for the Church to do in one place, and at some one time, that is unlawful in another place, and at another time. 27. All which premises, or the most of them, being granted, it will easily appear, to any that can rightly apply these principles and general assertions, that the Ceremonies, in present controversy in our Church, are not (as is pretended by the forcers of them) merely indifferent, but either excellent parts of our Religion, or notorious parts of Superstition. FINIS. Summa Summae. The Prelates to the afflicted Ministers in this Realm. Let them prove this assumption but by one Argument, and we will yield. But it is to be noted, That the Prelates still take all things contained therein as granted and without question, whereas we have proved and offer to prove the contrary. ALL those that wilfully refuse to obey the King in things indifferent, and to conform themselves to the Orders of the Church authorized by him, not contrary to the Word of God, are Schismatics, enemies to the King's Supremacy and State, and not to be tolerated in Church or Commonwealth. But you do wilfully refuse to obey the King in things indifferent, and to conform yourselves to the Orders of the Church, authorized by him not contrary to the Word of God. Ergo, You are Schismatics, Enemies to the King's Supremacy and the State, and not to be tolerated in Church or Commonwealth. The afflicted Ministers to the Prelates. ALL those that freely and willingly perform unto the King and State all Obedience not only in things necessary, but Indifferent, commanded by Law; And that have been always ready to conform themselves to every Order of the Church, authorized by him, not contrary to the Word of God, are free from all Schism, Friends to the King's Supremacy, and to the State, and unworthy in this manner to be molested in Church or Commonwealth. But e This Treatise, and other books lately written and exhibited to authority, do prove the Assumption. there is none of us that is deprived or suspended from our Ministry, but hath ever been ready, freely and willingly to perform unto the King and State all obedience, not only in things necessary, but Indifferent, required by Law, and to conform ourselves to every Order of the Church, authorized by him, not contrary to the Word of God. Ergo, We are all free from Schism, Friends, to the King's Supremacy and the State, and most unworthy of such molestation in Church and Commonwealth, as now we sustain. English Puritanism. CONTAINING THE MAIN OPINIONS of the rigidest sort of those that are called PURITANS, in the Realm of ENGLAND. Acts 24.14. But this I confess unto thee, that after the way (which they call heresy) so worship I the God of my Fathers, believing all things which are written in the Law, and the Prophets. Acts 28.22. But we will hear of thee what thou thinkest: for as concerning this sect, we know that every where it is spoken against. Printed in the Year, 1660. To the Indifferent Reader. IT cannot be unknown to them that know any thing, that those Christians in this Realm which are called by the odious and vile name of Puritans, are accused by the Prelates to the King's Majesty and the State, to maintain many absurd, erroneous, Schismatical, and Heretical Opinious, concerning Religion, Church-Government, and the Civil Magistracy. Which hath moved me to collect (as near as I could) the chiefest of them, and to send them naked to the view of all men, that they may see what is the worst that the worst of them hold. It is not my part to prove and justify them: Those that accuse and condemn them must in all reason and equity prove their accusation, or else bear the name of unchristian Slanderers. I am not ignorant that they lay other Opinions (yea some clean contradictory to these) to the charge of these men, the falsehood whereof we shall (it is to be doubted) have more and more occasion to detect. In the mean time all Enemies of Divine Truth shall find, that to obscure the same with Calumniations and untruths, is but to hid● a fire with laying dry straw or tow upon it. But thou mayst herein observe, what a terrible Popedom and Primacy these rigid Presbyterians desire; and with what painted bugbears and Scare-Crows, the Prelates go about to fright the States of this Kingdom withal, who will no doubt one day see, how their wisdoms are abused. Farewell. English Puritanism. CHAP. I. Concerning Religion, or the worship of God in general. IMprimis, They hold and maintain, That the Word of God contained in the writings of the Prophets and Apostles, is of absolute perfection, given by Christ the head of the Church, to be unto the same, th● sole Canon and rule of all matters of Religion, and the worship and service of God whatsoever. And that whatsoever done in the same service and worship cannot be justified by the said word, is unlawful. And therefore that it is a sin, to force any Christian to do any act of Religion or Divine service, that cannot evidently be warranted by the same. 2. They hold that all Ecclesiastical actions invented and devised by man, are utterly to be excluded out of the exercises of Religion; especially such actions as are famous and notorious Mysteries of an Idolatrous Religion: and in doing whereof, the true Religion is conformed (whether in whole or in part) to Idolatry and superstition. 3. They hold that all outward means instituted and set apart to express and set forth the Inward worship of God, are parts of Divine Worship, and that not only all moral actions but all typical rites and figures ordained to shadow forth in the solemn worship and service of God, any spiritual or religious act or habit in the mind of man, are special parts of the same: And therefore that every such act ought evidently to be prescribed by the Word of God, or else ought not to be done: it being a sin to perform any other worship to God, whether External or Internal, Moral or Ceremonial, in whole or in part, then that which God himself requires in his word. 4. They hold it to be gross superstition, for any mortal man to institute and ordain as parts of Divine Worship, any mystical Rite and Ceremony of Religion whatsoever, and to mingle the same with the Divine Rites and Mysteries of God's Ordinance. But they hold it to be high presumption to institute and bring into Divine worship such Rites and Ceremonies of Religion, as are acknowledged to be no parts of Divine Worship at all, but only of Civil Worship and Honour: For they that shall require to have performed unto themselves a Ceremonial Obedience, Service, and worship, consisting in rites of religion to be done at that very instant that God is solemnly served and worshipped, and even in the same worship make both themselves and God also an Idol; so that they judge it a far more fearful sin to add unto, and to use in the worship and service of God, or any part thereof, such mystical Rites and Ceremonies as they esteem to be no parts or parcels of God's worship at all, than such as in a vain and ignorant superstition, they imagine and conceive to be parts thereof. 5. They hold that every act or action appropriated and set apart to divine service and worship, whether moral or ceremonial, real or typical, aught to bring special honour unto God; and therefore that every such act ought to be apparently commanded in the Word of God, either expressly, or by necessary consequent. 6. They hold that all actions, whether Moral or Ceremonial, appropriated to Religious or Spiritual Persons, functions, or actions, either are or aught to be Religious and Spiritual: And therefore either are or aught to be instituted immediately by God, who alone is the Author and Institutor of all Religious and Spiritual actions and things, whether Internal or External, Moral or Ceremonial. CHAP. II. Concerning the Church. 1. THey hold and maintain that every Company, Congregation, or Assembly of men, ordinarily joining together in the true worship of God, is a true visible Church of Christ, and that the same title is improperly attributed to any other Convocations, Synods, Societies, combinations, or Assemblies whatsoever. 2. They hold that all such Churches or Congregations, communicating after that manner together, in divine worship, are in all Ecclesiastical matters equal, and of the same power and authority; and that by the Word and will of God they ought to have the same spiritual Privileges, Prerogatives, Officers, Administrations, Orders, and Forms of Divine worship. 3. They hold that Christ Jesus hath not subjected any Church or Congregation of his, to any other superior Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, than unto that which is within itself: So that if a whole Church or Congregation shall err, in any matters of faith or Religion, no other Churches, or spiritual Church-Officers have (by any warrant from the Word of God) power to censure, punish, or control the same; but are only to counsel and advise the same, and so to leave their souls to the immediate judgement of Christ, and their bodies to the sword and power of the Civil Magistrate, who alone upon earth hath power to punish a whole Church or Congregation. 4. They hold that every established Church or Congregation ought to have her own spiritual officers & ministers, resident with her, & those such as are enjoined by Christ in the New Testament, and no other. 5. They hold that every established Church ought (as a special prerogative by which she is endowed by Christ) to have power and liberty to elect and choose their own spiritual and Ecclesiastical Officers; and that it is a greater wrong to have any such forced upon them against their wills, than if they should force upon men wives, and upon women husbands against their will and liking. 6. They hold that if in this choice any particular Churches shall err, that none upon earth but the Civil Magistrate hath power to control or correct them for it: And that though it be not lawful for him to take away this power from them, yet, when they or any of them shall apparently abuse the same, he stands bound by the Law of God, and by virtue of his Office (grounded upon the same,) to punish them severely for it, and to force them under civil mulcts to make better choice. 7. They hold that the Ecclesiastical Officers and Ministers of one Church ought not to bear any Ecclesiastical Office in another, but aught to be tied unto that Congregation of which they are members, and by which they are elected into office: And they are not, (without just cause, and such as may be approved by the Congregation) to forsake their Callings; wherein if the Congregation shall be perverse, and will not hearken to reason, They are then to crave the assistance and help of the Civil Magistrate, who alone hath power, and who ought by his Civil Sword, and Authority, procure to all Members of the Church, whether their Governors, or others, freedom from all manifest injuries and wrongs. 8. They hold that the Congregation having once made choice of their spiritual Officers, unto whom they commit the Regiment of their Souls, they ought not (without just cause, and that which is apparently warrantable by the Word of God) to discharge, deprive, or depose them; but aught to live in all Canonical obedience and subjection unto them, agreeable to the Word of God: And if by permission of the Civil Magistrate, they shall by other Ecclesiastical Officers, be suspended, or deprived, for any cause in their apprehension good and justifiable by the Word of God, than they hold it the bounden duty of the Congregation to be continual suppliants to God, and humble suitors unto Civil Authority for the restauration of them unto their Administrations, which if it cannot be obtained, yet this much honour they are to give unto them, as to acknowledge them to the death, their spiritual Guides and Governors, though they be rigorously deprived of their Ministry and Service. 9 They hold that though one Church is not to differ from another, in any Spiritual, Ecclesiastical, or Religious matters whatsoever, but are to be equal and alike; yet, that they may differ, and one excel another in outward Civil Circumstances, of place, time, Person, etc. So that although they hold that those Congregations of which Kings and Nobles make themselves members, aught to have the same Ecclesiastical Officers, Ministry, worship, Sacraments, Ceremonies, and Form of Divine Worship, that the basest Congregation in the Country hath, and no other; yet they hold also, That as their Persons in civil respects excel, so in the Exercises of Religion in civil matters they may excel other Assemblies, Their Chapels and Seats may be gorgeously set forth, with rich Arras and Tapestry, their Fonts may be of Silver, their Communion Tables of Ivory, and if they will, covered with gold; the Cup out of which they drink the Sacramental blood of Christ may be of beaten gold set about with Diamonds; their Ministers may be clothed in silk and velvet, so themselves will maintain them in that manner; otherwise, they think it absurd and against common reason, that other base and Inferior Congregations must by Ecclesiastical Tithes and Oblations, maintain the silken and velvet suits, and Lordly retinue of the Ministers, and Ecclesiastical Officers of Princes and Nobles. 10. They hold that the Laws, Orders, and Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction of the visible Churches of Christ, if they be lawful and warrantable by the Word of God, are no ways repugnant to any Civil State whatsoever; whether Monarchical, Aristocratical, or Democratical, but do tend to the further establishing and advancing of the Rights and Prerogatives of all and every of them: And they renounce and abhor from their souls all such Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction or Policy, that is any way repugnant and derogatory to any of them, especially to the Monarchical State, which they acknowledge to be the best kind of Civil Government for this Kingdom. 11. They hold and bel●eve, that the equality in Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction and authority, of Churches and Church-Ministers, is no more derogatory and repugnant to the State and glory of a Monarch, than the Parity or equality of Schoolmasters of several Schools, Captains of several Camps, Shepherds of several flocks of sheep, or Masters of several Families, yea they hold the clean contrary, that inequality of Churches, and Church-Officers in Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction and Authority, was that principally that advanced Antichrist unto his throne, and brought the Kings and Princes of the earth unto such vassalage under him; and that the Civil Authority and glory of Secular Princes and States hath ever decayed, and withered, the more that the Ecclesiastical Officers of the Church have been advanced and lifted up in authority, beyond the limits and confines that Christ in his word hath prescribed unto them. CHAP. III. Concerning the Ministers of the Word. 1. THey hold that the Pastors of particular Congregations are, or aught to be the highest Spiritual Officers in the Church, over whom, (by any Divine Ordinance) there is no superior Pastor but only Jesus Christ: And that they are led by the spirit of Antichrist, that arrogate or take upon themselves to be Pastors of Pastors. 2. They hold that there are not by any Divine Institution in the word, any ordinary, National, Provincial, or Diocesan Pastors or Ministers under which the Pastors of particular Congregations are to be subject, as Inferior Officers. And that if there were any such, that then the Word of God would have set them down more distinctly and precisely than any of the rest: For the higher place that one occupieth in the Church, of the more necessity he is unto the Church; of the more necessity he is to the Church, the more carefully would Christ (the head of the Church) have been in pointing him out, and distinguishing him from other. Hence, in the Old Testament, the High Priest, his Title, Office, Function and special Administration and Jurisdiction is more particularly and precisely set down, than the Office of any of the Inferior Priests and Levites. Also in the New Testament, the Office of a Pastor is more distinctly, and more precisely set down, than of a Doctor, or any other inferior Church-Officer: So that a man may as well call into question the whole New Testament, as doubt whether there ought to be a Pastor in every Congregation, or doubt of his proper Office and Function. And if by God's Ordinance there should be an ordinary Ecclesiastical Officer above the Pastors of particular congregations, than Christ out of all question would with that special care and cost have set it forth, by Titles, prerogatives, peculiar Offices, Functions, and Gifts, that the Churches and people of God should have reason rather ●o doubt of any Office or Jurisdiction, than of the peculiar office or Jurisdiction of the Primates, metropolitans, Arch-Bishops and Prelates of the world. 3. They h●ld that if there were a supreme, National, Ecclesiastical Minister or Pastor, that should be the Prince of many thousand Pastors, that then also Christ (as he did in the Jewish Church) would have appointed a solemn National or Provincial Liturgy or worship, unto which at sometimes of the year, the whole body of the people should ascend, and that unto the Metropolitan City, as unto a Jerusalem; and that he would (as he did in the Jewish Church) more precisely and particularly have set down the manner of solemnisation thereof, than of his parochial worship: Forasmuch therefore as they cannot read in the New Testament of any higher or more solemn worship, than of that which is to be performed in a particular Congregation, they cannot be persuaded, that God hath appointed any higher Ministers of his service and worship under the New Testament, than the elect Ministers of particular Congregations. 4. They hold that the High Priest of the Jews, was typically and in a figure, the supreme head of the whole Catholic Church, which though it were visible only in the Province and Nation of Jury, yet those of other Nations and Countries (as appears by the History of Acts, even though they were Ethiopians,) were under this High Priest, and acknowledged homage unto him. So that he was not a Provincial Metropolitan, but in very deed, an Ecumenical and universal Bishop of the whole world. And therefore they hold, (this being the best ground in the word, for Metropolitan and Provincial Pastors or Bishops,) that the Pope of Rome, who alone maketh claim unto, and is in possession of the like universal Supremacy, hath more warrant in the Word of God, to the same, than any Metropolitan or Diocesan (not dependant upon him) hath or can have. So that they hold, that by the Word of God, either there must be no metropolitans and Diocesans, or else there must be a Pope. 5. They hold That no Pastor ought to exercise or accept of any Civil public Jurisdiction and authority, but aught to be wholly employed in spiritual Offices and Duties to that Congregation over which he is set. And that those Civil Magistrates weaken their own Supremacy, that shall suffer any Ecclesiastical Pastor to exercise any Civil Jurisdiction within their Realms, Dominions, or Signories. 6. They hold, that the highest and supreme Office and authority of the Pastor, is to preach the Gospel solemnly and publicly to the Congregation, by interpreting the written Word of God, and applying the same by exhortation and reproof unto them. They hold, that this was the greatest work that Christ and his Apostles did; and that whosoever is thought worthy and fit to exercise this authority, cannot be thought unfit and unworthy to exercise any other spiritual or Ecclesiastical authority whatsoever. 7. They hold that the Pastor or Minister of the Word, is not to reach any Doctrine unto the Church, grounded upon his own judgement or opinion, or upon the Judgement or opinion of any or all the men in the world; but only that truth that he is able to demonstrate and prove evidently, and apparently, by the Word of God sound interpreted; and that the people are not bound to believe any Doctrine of Religion or Divinity whatsoever, upon any ground whatsoever, except it be apparently justified by the Word, or by necessary consequent deduced from the same. 8. They hold that in interpreting the Scriptures, and opening the sense of them, he ought to follow those Rules only that are followed in finding out the meaning of other writings, to wit, by weighing the propriety of the tongue wherein they are written, by weighing the Circumstance of the place, by comparing one place with another, and by considering what is properly spoken and what tropically or figuratively. And they hold it unlawful for the Pastor to obtrude upon his people a sense of any part of the Divine Word, for which he hath no other ground but the bare testimonies of men; and that it is better for the people to be content to be ignorant of the meaning of such difficult places, than to hang their Faith in any matter in this case upon the bare Testimony of man. 9 They hold that the people of God ought not to acknowledge any such for their Pastors, as are not able by Preaching, to interpret and apply the Word of God unto them in manner and form aforesaid: And therefore that no ignorant, and sole reading Priests are to be reputed the Ministers of Jesus Christ, who sendeth none into his Ministry and service, but such as he adorneth in some measure with spiritual gifts. And they cannot be persuaded that the faculty of reading in one's Mother tongue the Scriptures, etc. which any ordinary Turk or Infidel hath, can be called in any congruity of speech, a Ministerial gift of Christ. 10. They hold that in the Assembly of the Church, the Pastor only is to be the mouth of the Congregation to God in Prayer, and that the people are only to testify their assent by the word Amen. And that it is a Babylonian cofusion, for the Pastor to say one piece of a Prayer, and the people with mingled voices to say another; except in singing, which by the very ordinance and instinct of nature, is more delightful, and effectual, the more voices there are joined and mingled together in harmony and consent. 11. They hold that the Church hath no authority to impose upon her Pastors or any other of her Officers, any other ministerial Duties, Offices, Functions, Actions or Ceremonies, ei●her in Divine worship or out of the same, than what Christ himself in the Scriptures hath imposed upon them, or what they might lawfully impose upon Christ himself, if he were in person upon the earth, and did exercise a Ministerial Office in some Church. 12. They hold that it is as great an injury to force a Congregation or Church to maintain as their Pastor, with Tithes, and such like Donations, that person that either is not able to instruct them, or that refuseth in his own person ordinarily to do it, as to force a man to maintain one for his wife, that either is not a woman, or that refuseth in her own person to do the duties of a wife unto him. 13. They hold that by God's Ordinance there should be also in every Church, a Doctor, whose special office should be to instruct, by way of Catechising, the Ignorant of the Congregation (and that particularly) in the main grounds and Principles of Religion. CHAP. IU. Concerning the Elders. 1. FOrasmuch, as through the malice of Satan, there are and will be in the best Churches many disorders and scandals committed, that redound to the reproach of the Gospel, and are a stumbling block to many, both without and within the Church; and sigh they judge it repugnant to the Word of God, that any Minister should be a sole Ruler, and as it were a Pope, so much as in one Parish, (much more that he should be one over a whole Diocese, Province, or Nation) they hold that by God's Ordinance the Congregation should make choice of other Officers, as Assistants unto the Ministers in the spiritual regiment of the Congregation, who are by office, jointly with the Ministers of the Word, to be as Monitors and Overseers of the manners and conversation of all the Congregation, and one of another; that so every one may be more wary of their ways, and that the Pastors and Doctors may better attend to Prayer and Doctrine, and by their means may be made better acquainted with the estate of the people, when others eyes besides there own shall wake and watch over them. 2. They hold that such only are to be chosen to this Office, as are the gravest, honestest, discreetest, best grounded in Religion, and the ancientest Professors thereof in the Congregation, such as the whole Congregation do approve of, and respect, for their wisdom, holiness, and honesty, and such also (if it be possible) as are of civil note and respect in the world, and able (without any burden to the Church) to maintain themselves, either by their Lands, or any other honest Civil Trade of life: Neither do they think it so much disgrace to the policy of the Church, that Tradesmen and Artificers, (endowed with such qualities as are above specified) should be admitted to be Overseers of the Church, as it is that persons both ignorant of Religion and all good letters, and in all respects for person, quality, and state, as base and vile as the basest in the Congregation, should be admitted to be Pastors and Teachers of a Congregation. And if it be apparent that God (who always blesseth his own Ordinances) doth often, even in the eyes of Kings, and Nobles, make honourable the Ministers and Pastors of his Churches, upon which he hath bestowed spiritual Gifts and Graces, though for birth, education, presence, outward estate and maintenance, they be most base and contemptible; so he will as well in the eyes of all holy men, make this Office which is many degrees inferior to the other, precious, and Honourable, even for the Divine Calling and Ordinance sake. CHAP. V Concerning the Censures of the Church. 1. THey hold that the spiritual keys of the Church are by Christ, committed to the aforesaid spiritual Officers and Governors, and unto none other: which keys they hold that they are not to be put to this use, to lock up the Crowns, Swords, or Sceptres of Princes and Civil States, or the Civil Rights, Prerogatives, and Immunities, of Civil Subjects in the things of this Life, or to use them as picklocks to open withal men's Treasuries and Coffers, or as keys of Prisons, to shut up the bodies of men; for they think that such a Power and Authority Ecclesiastical is fit only for the Antichrist of Rome, and the consecrated Governors of his Synagogues, who having no Word of God, which is the Sword of the Spirit, to defend his and their usurped Jurisdiction over the Christian World, doth unlawfully usurp the lawful Civil Sword and Power of the Monarches and Princes of the Earth, thereby forcing men to subject themselves to his spiritual vassalage and Service, and abusing thereby the spiritual Keys and Jurisdiction of the Church. 2. They hold that by virtue of these Keys, they are not to make any curious Inquisitions into the secret or hidden vices or crimes of men, extorting from them a confession of those faults that are concealed from themselves and others: or to proceed to molest any man upon secret suggestions, private suspicion, or uncertain fame, or for such crimes as are in question whether they be crimes or no; But they are to proceed only against evident and apparent crimes, such as are either granted to be such of all civil honest men: or of all true Christians, or at least such, as they are able, by evidence of the Word of God, to convince to be sins to the conscience of the Offender; As also, such as have been either publicly committed, or having been committed in secret, are by some good means brought to light, and which the delinquent denying, they are able by honest and sufficient testimony to prove against him. 3. They hold, that when he that hath committed a scandalous crime cometh before them, and is convinced of the same, they ought not (after the manner of our Ecclesiastical Courts) scorn, deride, taunt and revile him with odious and contumelious speeches; eye him with big and stern looks, procure Proctors to make Personal Invectives against him, make him dance attendance from Court day to Court day, and from Term to Term, frowning at him in presence, and laughing at him behind his back: but they are (though he be never so obstinate and perverse) to use him brotherly, not giving the least personal reproaches, or threats, (but laying open unto him the nature of his sin by the light of God's Word) are only by donouncing the judgements of God against him, to terrify him, and so to move him to repentance. 4. They hold, that if the party offending be their civil Superior, that then they are to use, even throughout the whole carriage of their Censure, all civil Compliments, Offices and Reverence due unto him; That they are not to presume to convent him before them, but are themselves to go in all civil and humble manner unto him, to stand bare before him, to bow unto him, to give him all civil Titles belonging unto him; and, if he be a King and Supreme Ruler, they are to kneel down before him, and in the humblest manner to censure his faults, so that he may see apparently that they are not carried with the least spice of malice against his Person, but only with zeal of the health and salvation of his soul. 5. They hold, that the Ecclesiastical Officers, laying to the charge of any man any Error, Heresy, or false Opinion whatsoever, do stand bound themselves, first, to prove that he holdeth such an error or heresy; and secondly, to prove directly unto him that it is an error by the Word of God, and that it deserveth such a censure, before they do proceed against him. 6. They hold, that the Governors of the Church ought with all patience and quietness hear what every Offender can possibly say for himself, either for Qualification, Defence, Apology, or Justification of any supposed crime or error whatsoever; and they ought not to proceed to censure the grossest offence that is, until the Offender have said as much for himself in his defence as he possibly is able. And they hold it an evident Character of a corrupt Ecclesiastical Government, where the parties convented may not have full liberty to speak for themselves, considering, that the more liberty is granted to speak in a bad cause, (especially before those that are in Authority, and of judgement,) the more the iniquity of it will appear, and the more the Justice of their Sentence will shine. 7. They hold, that the Oath ex officio, whereby Popish and English Ecclesiastical Governors, either upon some secret informations, or suggestions, or private suspicions, go about to bind men's consciences to accuse themselves and their friends of such crimes or imputations as cannot by any direct course of Law be proved against them, and whereby they are drawn to be instruments of many heavy crosses upon themselves and their friends, and that often for those Actions that they are persuaded in their consciences are good and holy; (I say) that they hold that such an Oath (on the urgers part) is most damnable and tyrannous, against the very Law of Nature, devised by Antichrist, through the inspiration of the devil, that by means thereof, the professors and practizers of the true Religion, might either in their weakness, by per jury, damn their own souls, or be drawn to reveal to the Enemies of Christianity, those secret religious acts and deeds, that being (in the persuasion of their consciences) for the advancement of the Gospel, will be a means of heavy sentences of condemnation against themselves and their dearest friends. 8. They hold, that Ecclesiastical Officers have no power to proceed in Censure against any Crime of any Person, after that he shall freely acknowledge the same, and profess his hearty penitency for it: And that they may not, for any crime whatsoever, lay any bodily or pecuniary mulct upon them, or impose upon them any Ceremonial Mark or Note of shame, such as is the white sheet, or any such like; or take any fees for any cause whatsoever, but are to accept of, as a sufficient satisfaction, a private submission and acknowledgement, if the Crime be private, and a public, if the crime be public and notorious. 9 They hold, that if a Member of the Church be obstinate, and show no signs and tokens of repentance of that crime, that they by evidence of Scripture have convinced to be a crime, that then by their Ecclesiastical Authority they are to deny unto him the Sacrament of the Supper. And if the suspension from it will not humble him, than (though not without humbling themselves in prayer, fasting, and great demonstration of sorrow for him) they are to denounce him to be as ye● no member of the Kingdom of Heaven, and of that Congregation, and so are to leave him to God and the King. And this is all the Ecclesiastical Authority and Jurisdiction that any spiritual Officers of the Church are to use against any man, for the greatest crime that can be committed. 10. They hold, that the Officers of the Church are not to proceed unto the extremest Censure against any man, without the free consent of the whole Congregation itself. 11. They hold, that the Minister, or any other particular Officer, offending, is as subject to these Censures, as any other of the Congregation. 12. They hold, that if any Member of the Congregation, having committed a scandalous sin, shall of himself forsake the Worship of God, and the Spiritual Communion with the Church, that then the Ecclesiastical Officers have no authority or jurisdiction over him, but only the Civil Magistrate, and those unto whom he oweth Civil subjection, as Parents, Masters, Landlords, etc. CHAP. VI Concerning the Civil Magistrate. 1. THey hold, that the Civil Magistrate, as he is a Civil Magistrate hath, and aught to have Supreme power over all the Churches within his Dominions, in all causes whatsoever; and yet they hold, that as he is a Christian, he is a Member of some one particular Congregation, and aught to be as subject to the spiritual Regiment thereof prescribed by Christ in his Word, as the meanest subject in the Kingdom; and they hold, that this Subjection is no more derogatory to his Supremacy, than the Subjection of his body in sickness to Physicians, can be said to be derogatory thereunto. 2. They hold, that those Civil Magistrates are the greatest Enemies to their own Supremacy, that in whole or in part, communicate the virtue and power thereof to any Ecclesiastical Officers. And that there cannot be imagined by the wit of man a more direct means to checkmate the same, than to make them Lords and Princes upon Earth, to invest them with Civil Jurisdiction and Authority, and to conform the state and limits of the Jurisdiction to the State of Kings, and bounds of Kingdoms. 3. They hold, that there should be no Ecclesiastical Officer in the Church so high, but that he ought to be subject unto, and punishable by the meanest Civil Officer in a Kingdom, City, or Town, not only for common crimes, but even for the abuse of their Ecclesiastical Offices; yea, they hold, that they ought to be more punishable than any other Subject whatsoever, if they shall offend against either Civil or Ecclesiastical Laws. 4. They hold, that the Civil Magistrate is to punish with all severity the Ecclesiastical Officers of Churches, if they shall intrude upon the rights and prerogatives of the Civil Authority, and Magistracy, and shall pass those bounds and limits that Christ hath prescribed unto them in his Word. 5. They hold, that the Pope is that Antichrist, and therefore that Antichrist, because being but an Ecclesiastical Officer, he doth in the height of the pride of his heart make claim unto, and usurp the Supremacy of the Kings and Civil Rulers of the Earth. And they hold, that all defenders of the Popish Faith, all endeavours of reconcilement with that Church, all plotters for toleration of the Popish Religion, all countenancers and maintainers of Seminary Priests and professed Catholics, and all deniers that the Pope is that Antichrist, are secret enemies to the King's Supremacy. 6. They hold, that all Arch-Bishops, Bishops, Deans, Officials, etc. have their Offices and Functions only by will and pleasure of the King and Civil States of this Realm; and they hold, that whosoever holdeth that the King may not, without sin, remove these Offices out of the Church, and dispose of their Temporalities and maintenance according to his own pleasure, or that these Offices are Jure Divino, and not only or merely Jure humano: That all such deny a principal part of the King's Supremacy. 7. They hold, that not one of these Opinions can be proved to be contrary to the Word of God, and that if they might have leave, that they are able to answer all that hath been written against any one of them. FINIS. TWELVE General Arguments, Proving that the CEREMONIES Imposed upon the Ministers of the Gospel in England, by our Prelates, are unlawful; And therefore, That the Ministers of the Gospel, for the bare and sole omission of them in Churh-Service, for conscience sake, are most unjustly charged of disloyalty to His MAJESTY. Mat. 18.23. If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if I have spoken well, why smitest thou me? Printed in the Year, 1660. To the Reader. GOod Reader, We come not as voluntaries into this field of Contention, but dragged into it by the very hairs of our head: If our cause be righteous and good, Thou wilt easily grant (in so great Imputations and Extremities inflicted upon us for the same) that we can do no less than give reasons for ourselves and it. All the favour I require of thee, is, That thou wouldst look into our cause (not by the flashing lightings that come out of the mouths of our Adversaries the Prelates) but by the light of our own Reasons, by which, if thou shalt see the goodness of our cause, and innocency of our persons, than embrace it with us, and in pity pray for us, that (without shipwreck of Faith and a good Conscience) we may endure patiently and meekly, whatsoever God shall suffer to be inflicted upon us for the same, in these wicked and licentious times. THE FIRST ARGUMENT. All Will-Worship is sin. To use these Ceremonies in Church-Service, in manner and form prescribed, is a Will-Worship. Ergo, To use them is sin. THE Proposition cannot be denied, for the Apostle Paul plainly condemneth Will-Worship. The Assumption may thus be proved: All parts of Divine Service and Worship, imposed only by the will and pleasure of Man upon the Ministers of Divine Service, and that of necessity to be done, is Will-Worship. But to use these Ceremonies in manner and form prescribed, is to use such Ceremonies as are 1. Parts of Divine Service and Worship. 2. Imposed only by the pleasure and will of Men, upon the Ministers of Divine Service. 3. Of necessity to be done therein. Ergo, To use these Ceremonies in manner and form prescribed, is a Will-Worship. The Proposition is as clear as the Sun at noonday. The Assumption hath three parts: 1. That they are parts of Divine Worship and Service. This is proved evidently by this Argument: All Mystical and Ecclesiastical Rites and forms of Divine Service, instituted by Ecclesiastical authority, to be Ministerial actions in the solemn Worship of God, and performed in that manner, and having that use in Divine Service, that if God should but ratify and confirm the same use, they should then be parts of his true Worship; (I say) all such Ceremonies are used as parts of Divine Worship. But these Ceremonies in controversy, are either all, or the greatest part of them such. Ergo, They are parts of Divine Worship and Service. The Proposition cannot with any modest face be denied; For else how could a sole Divine ratification of the present use of them make them parts of his true Worship? If they were not used as parts of his Worship before. The Assumption is as manifest: For if Christ should by some Revelation from heaven signify, That it is his will that a Minister in Divine Service should wear a white linen garment, in Baptism make the sign of a Cross, to these ends and purposes that are expressed in the Service Book, then certainly they should be essential parts of his Divine Worship, else the Jewish Rites and Ceremonies and our Sacraments are no parts thereof. The second part of the Assumption of the first Syllogism. That they are imposed only upon the pleasure and will of man. This is evident: For those things that God leaves as indifferent to the will and discretion of man to do, or leave undone, being imposed by man upon man, are imposed only upon the will and pleasure of man. The third part of the Assumption is: That they are of necessity to be done in Divine Service. Which is also out of all doubt; For a Minister stands bound to do them upon pain of suspension and deprivation: And God must have no solemn Worship in England, except it be administered in the same. Upon all this it follows: That to use these Ceremonies in manner and form prescribed, is to use such Ceremonies as are parts of Divine Worship, imposed only by the will of Man, etc. The Second Argument. It is a sin against God, for him that is by way of Excellency a servant of Jesus Christ, (without a precise and direct warrant from him) at any time (especially in the Solemn Worship of God) to give special honour to Antichrist and his members. But to use these Ceremonies, is in that manner aforesaid, to give special honour to Antichrist and his members. Ergo, It is a sin against God to use them. THE Proposition is manifest and clear to any that have an eye of Reason and any light of Divinity shining in it: For what is a sin if this be not: That a Servant of Jesus Christ, even then when he is in the Service of Christ, should perform special honour and service to Antichrist, or any of his Limbs. The Assumption is proved (if our Adversaries will grant it, that the Pope is Antichrist, and that all the visible members of his Church, acknowledging him their supreme head, are members of him) by this reason. Such a Conformity to Antichrist and his members in the Ceremonies of Religion and Form of Divine Worship, as is not only besides the Word of God, but in a special manner derogatory to all reformed Churches that have departed from the Synagogue of Rome, is a special honour to Antichrist and his members. But to use these Ceremonies in Divine Worship, is such a Conformity to Antichrist and his members. Ergo. To use these Ceremonies, in that manner aforesaid, is to give special honour to Antichrist and his Members. The Proposition is without exception: For if it should be a special honour to the Bishops of England and their conformed Clergy, for the Churches of Scotland, voluntarily to leave conformity to the Churches of the Low Countries, France, and Germany, and to conform themselves in Ceremonies and Form of Divine Worship to the Prelatical Clergy of England: It must needs be a special honour to Antichrist and his Members, for any to do the like to them. The Assumption is thus proved; For a Minister of Jesus Christ to conform himself in such peculiar Rites, Ceremonies and Forms of Divine Service, to Antichrist and his members, as other reformed Churches have rejected for vain, foolish, and superstitious, is in a special manner derogatory to all other reformed Churches. But to use these Ceremonies in controversy, is in that manner to conform himself. Ergo, It is in a special manner derogatory to all other Reformed Churches. Both parts of the Syllogism are such as may easily be proved, if they be denied. The 3. Argument. All Worship more than Civil, performed to any besides God, is a sin. To use these Ceremonies in manner and form prescribed, is to perform a more than civil honour (even a Religious) only to a humane Power and Authority; Ergo, To use these Ceremonies is to sin. THe Proposition needs no proof: For there is no middle Honour between Civil and Divine; and therefore that which is more than Civil, is Divine. Now Divine Honour is to be given only to God, who will not have his Glory given unto another. The Assumption is thus proved; If these Ceremonies be Religious Ceremonies, and all Religious Ceremonies be a part of Divine worship, performed to that authority that instituteth and commandeth them. If also the authority that instituteth and commandeth them is but merely humane, Then the Assumption is true. But the first is true: Ergo, The latter is true also. The Proposition cannot be denied of any reasonable creature. The Assumption hath three Parts: I. That these Ceremonies are Religious Ceremonies. This needs no proof: For what shall we make to be Religious Ceremonies, if those Ceremonies be not that are prescribed by the Church, to the Church only, tied to Religion only, and Religious Functions, Offices, and Persons; to be acted and performed only in Exercises of Religion and Divine Worship, and are mystical shadows and types of Religious Doctrine? II. That all Religious Ceremonies are parts of Divine Worship. This neither should need any proof: If those that are adversaries unto us in this cause, did not too much presume of the weakness of our Discourse, and the strength of their own wit. For there being an external Divine Worship, which properly consists in the outward Rites and Ceremonies of Religion: What Ceremonies can be called parts thereof, if such Religious Ceremonies as these be not? For if bowing the knee, etc. in Divine Worship, (though it be used also in Civil Worship) be a part of Divine Worship, much more are those Ceremonies that are peculiarly appropriated to Divine Service and Worship, and wherein part of the form thereof is made to consist. But it may (for further satisfying of men) be thus proved: All mere and immediate Actions of Religion are parts of Divine Worship. All Religious Ceremonies are mere and immediate Actions of Religion: Ergo, They are parts of Divine Worship. Further, How can a man imagine that a mere Religious Ecclesiastical Act, done by a Servant of God in the solemn Service and Worship of God, by precise Canon of the Church, should be no part of Divine Worship, sigh all the solemn Rites and Ceremonies that are used in the solemn Services of Civil States, (especially such as are done in their presence) have been ever reputed parts of civil Honour and Worship. Lastly, Considering that God in his Divine Worship doth require the whole heart, and all the powers of the Soul during the act of his Worship, It were great presumption for any mortal Creature to prescribe any Action to man during the same Act that is no part thereof: considering that every Action so prescribed must of necessity pull a part of the heart from Divine Worship. III. That Authority that instituted them is but merely humane. This is most certain, for if they were instituted by Divine authority, they could not be esteemed matters indifferent; and should not be in the power and discretion of the Magistrate to disannul them. The fourth Argument. If it be lawful for a Minister of the Gospel without sin to use these Ceremonies in Divine Worship: it is lawful for him upon the same occasion to use any Jewish, Turkish, Paganish, or Popish Ceremony whatsoever. But it is not lawful for the Minister of the Gospel to use in Divine Worship, upon the same occasion, any Jewish, Popish, Paganish, or Turkish Ceremony. Ergo, He cannot without sin use these. THe Assumption cannot for shame be denied, We prove the consequent of the Proposition. If any Jewish, Turkish, Paganish, or Popish Ceremonies and Rite be a thing in its own nature as indifferent as these Ceremonies are, and either have, or may have by such like institution as good use, than the consequent of the Proposition is true. But the first is true, Ergo, The latter is true also. The Proposition, as I think, cannot be denied, nor the Assumption, but by bringing some contrary instance in some of their Ceremonies: When any such shall be given, this Argument shall be further prosecuted. The fifth Argument. Every schismatical Action done by a Minister of the Gospel is a sin. To use these Ceremonies in controversy are schismatical Actions. Ergo, To use these Ceremonies is sin. THe Proposition will be granted: I must prove the Assumption. All actions of irregularity and nonconformity to the Catholic Church wherein we live, are schismatical Actions. To use these Ceremonies in controversy, are actions of irregularity, and nonconformity to the Catholic Church wherein we live. Ergo, The use of these Ceremonies in controversy are schismatical Actions. The Proposition cannot be denied; for if we be branded with the coal of schism justly, for denying conformity in some Ceremonies, but to some of our own particular Churches wherein we live, though we be content to join with them that use them in Divine Worship: much more Schismatics are they that are not conformable in Rites and Ceremonies, to the Catholic Church wherein they live. I prove the Assumption: If all the Protestants, Pastors, Ministers, and Governors, living this day in Europe, and all the painful resident Pastors of our own Country, (except some nonresident Idol-shepherds, some that depend upon the Prelacy, and some other that are forced and constrained to use them against their will) do not only refuse to use these Ceremonies, but esteem them vain, foolish, and superstitious: Then the use of these Ceremonies are actions of irregularity, and nonconformity to the Catholic Church. But the first will be proved true; Ergo, The latter is true also. The Proposition is evident, by their own Principles: For an irregularity and nonconformity to the Pastors and Governors of Churches, is an irregularity and nonconformity to the Church, for they are reputed the CHURCH-REPRESENTATIVE: and if they be to be anathematised, and excommunicated, that deny the bishops and other ministers assembled in the convocation, to be the Church of England representative, then surely are all the Pastors of the visible Churches in Europe, the Catholic Church representative, and those particular Ministers in this Realm, that shall use not only different Ceremonies, but such as they have renounced and forsaken, are Schismatics and irregular persons. The Assumption is evident in itself. The sixth Argument. All spiritual Communion with those Idolaters amongst whom we live in the mysteries of their Idolatry and Superstition, is sin. To use these Ceremonies in Divine worship, is a spiritual Communion with the Idolatrous Papists (that do not only border round about us, but are tolerated in infinite numbers to live amongst us) in the mysteries of their Idolatry and Superstition. Ergo, To use these Ceremonies is to sin. The Proposition is his M. own, if Master B. have made a true report of the Conference at Hampt. Court; for therein his Ma. confesseth, That if we lived among Idolaters, we ought not then to communicate with them in their Rites and Ceremonies. The Assumpion is thus proved: If Papists be Idolaters, if we be not only in league with whole Kingdoms of Papists bordering upon us, and near unto us, but have many thousand professed ones living amongst us: if these Ceremonies be special mysteries of their Superstition: if to use the same Rites that they do in theirs, in our spiritual and divine Service, be spiritually to communicate with them in the same: then is the Sentence of the Assumption true. But we shall be able to prove, as soon as any shall deny, that the first, and every part and parcel thereof is true. Ergo, The later is true also. The seventh Argument. To Mingle Profane things with Divine, is to sin. To use these Ceremonies in Divine Worship, is to mingle Profane things with Divine: Ergo, To use these Ceremonies in Divine Worship is to sin. THe Proposition shineth in the eyes of the very Heathen, who have esteemed it a dishonour to their Religion and Worship, that any profane persons should be Actors in it, much more that any profane Actions should be mingled with it. The Assumption is thus proved. All peculiar Actions done in Divine Worship, that are neither Civil nor holy, are profane. These Ceremonies are peculiar actions, done in Divine worship, that are neither civil nor holy: Ergo, They are profane. The Proposition cannot with any show of reason be denied, there being no mean between these in such actions as are prescribed to be done in Divine Service, by Canon and Law: For though spitting, coughing, hemming, etc. if they be used for necessity, be neither civil, holy, nor profane actions; yet if there should be an Ecclesiastical Canon that should require the Minister to spit at every full period, or the people to him, and hawk, at every transition in a Sermon, they must needs then be referred to one of these three heads, as shall easily be proved if it be denied. The assumption is as clear: For first, His Ma. (with words of great disgrace and contempt of those that hold the contrary,) hath lately protested that they are not urged as holy and Religious matters; And that they are not civil Actions, hath been proved before; for there being an opposition in Reason between things Civil and Ecclesiastical, though they have some things common to both (as all Opposites have) yet it is ridiculous to affirm, that those things are civil, that are merely Ecclesiastical, and are Actions peculiarly appropriated, and tied to Divine Worship: For civil Actions, are performed in civil Affairs; & though there is a common civility also to be observed even in Divine matters, yet those Actions cannot be called Civil, that are used only in Divine Offices and duties, no more than those can be called Ecclesiastical and Divine that are used only in Civil affairs. For, it may be affirmed by as good reason, that an Ecclesiastical Officer, employed only in Ecclesiastical matters, is a Civil Officer only: Or a Civil Officer employed only in Civil matters, is an Ecclesiastical Officer only; as that a mere Ecclesiastical action, done in and by the Church only, should be a Civil Action. The eighth Argument. If it be lawful to use these Ceremonies in Divine Worship, it is therefore lawful, because they are either lawful in themselves, or being things in their own nature indifferent, are made lawful by the commandment of the Magistrate to be used in Divine Service. But they are neither lawful in themselves to be used, nor therefore lawful because the Magistrate commands them so to be used, though they be Matters in their own Nature indifferent. Ergo, They are unlawful to be used in Divine Worship. THE Proposition I think cannot be denied, when it is, I hope it may be proved. The first part of the Assumption is clear: For if they were in themselves lawful to be used, then might a Minister of the Gospel, being left to his own discretion by the Magistrate, invent, institute, and use the like Ceremonies in the same manner without sin. For any man, left to himself, may lawfully do that which of itself is lawful and indifferent. But a Minister should sin against God, if he should of his own head institute and use the like Ceremonies to these, though permitted by the Magistrate; except we should hold, that it is lawful for a Minister to do any indifferent thing in God's Service, for a man may of any indifferent thing make a Ceremony like unto one of these. The second part of the Assumption is thus proved: If they be therefore lawful, because, being thing in their own nature ifferent, the Magistrate commands them to be done in Divine Service: Then whatsoever thing (being in its own nature indifferent) is, or shall be commanded by the Magistrate, is lawful to be done in Divine Service. But all things that are in themselves matters indifferent, are not lawful to be done in Divine Service, though the Magistrate should command them. Ergo, They are not therefore lawful to be used in Divine S rvice, because the Magistrate commands them, though they be things in their own nature indifferent. The Proposition cannot be denied: For if some things, indifferent in their own nature, being commanded by the Magistrate, are unlawful, it can be no good Argument to say, These things, being indifferent, are commanded by the Magistrate. Ergo, They may lawfully be done. Much less therefore they ought to be done. Or as the Doctors of Oxf. affirm, that they bind the conscience. The Assumption is more clear than the Proposition. If it be considered either what things are indifferent indeed, or go under the name and title of indifferent things. Eating and drinking, the avoiding the superfluities of Nature; due benevolence between Man and Wife; spinning and carding; killing of Oxen and Sheep, etc. which of themselves have in them neither virtue nor vice, are therefore indifferent Actions; and yet I think none, except professed Atheists, but will hold it a foul sin to do some of these Actions in any Assembly, much more in the solemn Worship of God, though the Magistrate should command the same even upon pain of death. But if it be further considered, That Carding and Dicing, Masking and Dancing; for Men to put on women's apparel, and Women men's; Drinking to healths; Ribald, Stage-plays, etc. are things indifferent to be done even upon the Lords own day: May a Minister of the Gospel, upon the Magistrate's commandment, do any of these in Divine Worship? And yet there is none of these but may have applied unto them, by the Wit of Man, a Mystical and Religious sense; and then by this Bishop of Canterbury's Rule, They must needs be good and lawful Ceremonies: for his principal Argument to prove them lawful at his last Convention of London Ministers before him, was this: They are Ceremonies that teach good Doctrine, Ergo, They are good Ceremonies. Whereas the filthiest actions and things that are may teach good Doctrine: The Holy Ghost resembleth the soul polluted with sin to a menstruous cloth: A man fallen again into sin, to a Sow wallowing in the mire: might therefore a filthy Sow, and such unclean Clothes, be brought into the Church, to be visible shadows, and representations of such things? Nay, What may not by this means be brought into God's Worship, and yet by this reason be defended to be a good Ceremony, if the Magistrates and Bishops should decree the same? A fools coat and a beggars, worn in Divine Service, may fitly teach this Doctrine, Not many Wise, Not many Noble: A Minister clothed in such apparel as those that act the Devils part in a play may teach this, That by nature we are limbs of Satan, and firebrands of Hell: Men might wear women's apparel, and Women men's; The one to teach, That the Church is Christ's Wife; The other to teach, that Women in Christ are equal to Men. Bear-baiting may teach us, How Christ was baited before the Tribunals of the Pharisees, or the combat between the flesh and the spirit. But the grosseness of these Assertions will appear in our Special Reasons against the Ceremonies in particular. The Ninth Argument. To administer unto the Church of God Sacraments that are not of Divine Institution, is to sin. To use divers of these Ceremonies, viz. The Cross in Baptism, the Ring in Marriage, the Surplice, etc. is to administer unto the Church of God Sacraments that are not of Divine institution. Ergo, To use these Ceremonies, is to sin. THE Proposition is granted of all, both Papist and Protestant. The Assumption is thus proved: All mystical bodily Rites and Signs of spiritual grace, administered to the Church of God, in his solemn Service, to confirm Grace, and that by him that represents the Person of Christ, are Sacraments. The greatest part of these Ceremonies in controversy are such, and not of any divine Institution. Ergo, To use them, is to administer Sacraments that are not of Divine Institution. The Proposition is most evident, and cannot be denied of any that bears the face of a Divine. The Assumption is as evident, only this one clause may be doubted of: Whether these Ceremonies be administered to confirm Grace, which is thus proved: Those Ceremonies that are administered to edify the soul and consciences, are administered to confirm Grace. These Ceremonies are administered to edify the soul and conscience. Ergo, They are administered to confirm Grace. The Proposition cannot with any colour be excepted against: For to edify the soul, to confirm Grace in the soul, and to feed the soul, are equivalent. The Sacrament of the Supper therefore being, for this only cause a Sacrament, because it is a mystical Rite, whereby the soul spiritually feedeth upon Christ, i. e. is edified in Christ: These being Mystical Rites also, whereby the soul is edified, which it cannot be, but also by feeding upon Christ; It must needs follow, That these Ceremonies are Sacraments. The Assumption is their own, for when they are urged with this, That all things must be done to edification, They all hold with one consent, That they do edify. The tenth Argument. It is a sin against Christ the sole Head of the Church, for any one of his Ministers, (especially in the administration of Divine things) either by Word or Signs, solemnly to profess and acknowledge a spiritual homage to an usurped spiritual authority in the Church. But to use these controverted Ceremonies in manner and Form prescribed, is even in the solemn Service of Christ, by solemn Signs to acknowledge a spiritual homage to the spiritual authority of Lord Archbishops and Bishops, which is usurped. Ergo, It is a sin to use these Ceremonies. THE Proposition may not be gainsaid: For all spiritual power usurped over the Churches of God, is an Antichristian authority; and to profess spiritual homage thereunto, is to profess spritual homage unto Antichrist, which must needs be a sin, The Assumption hath two parts: 1. That these Ceremonies are an acknowledging by solemn signs a spiritual Homage to the spiritual authority of Archbishops and Bishops. Which is most evident; for it having been proved before, that they are mere Ecclesiastical, Religious and spiritual Actions, enjoined by an Ecclesiastical and spiritual authority, They must needs be Signs of spiritual homage to the same authority. For either the doing of a Religious and spiritual Action, in obedience to a spiritual authority, is a Sign of spiritual homage, or no Actions can be a Sign thereof. As therefore a Serving man, being a civil person, upon the Bishop's pleasure, wearing a Tawny Coat, and a Chain of Gold, holding up his Train, going bareheaded before him, holding a Trencher at his Table, lighting him to the house of Office, dressing his meat, rubbing his Horses, etc. doth by these Actions, as it were by solemn Signs, acknowledge Civil homage to him, being a Civil Lord and Master: So a Minister of the Gospel, and a Pastor of a particular Congregation, being by his Office a mere spiritual man; being commanded by the Bishop, as he is a spiritual Lord and Master over the Church of God, to wear a Tipper, a square Cap, a Priest's Gown and Cloak, a Surplice; to make Crosses upon children's faces; to put Rings on Bride's fingers, etc. and all this in their Divine Service: I say, a Minister doth thereby give solemn Signs and Tokens of spiritual homage to their spiritual Lordships; even as by preaching the Word and administration of Sacraments and Prayer, he professeth by solemn Signs a spiritual homage to the spiritual authority of Christ. If they shall peremptorily affirm, That they are only Civil matters (as some in high place have done to myself) than this will follow of it: Whereas the Bishops command now Ministers to wear a Surplice, a Priest's Cloak, etc. he may command them to wear Tawny Coats, and livery Cloaks, and in their courses to wait and at end upon him, as serving Creatures: For there is no more Civil Authority showed in requiring the one than the other, if the one as well as the other be Civil matters. Neither will it help their cause, that the Magistrate requireth these things to be done: For the Magistrate commanding Ecclesiastical matters to be done, his commandment doth no more make them Civil, than his commanding the Sacraments, and other parts of Divine Worship, to be administered duly, doth make them Civil matters. For the ratification by Civil authority the Constitutions of Ecclesiastical authority, doth no more make them Civil matters, than the ratification and confirmation of Civil matters by Ecclesiastical authority doth make them Ecclesiastical or spiritual matters. Though therefore there is none of us that stand our in these matters, but have ever been content to yield unto their Lordships all C●vil honour, such as is given to Barons, Earls, Dukes, and Princes; yet, except they were Gods and Christ's, we have no reason to give spiritual homage unto them; which is it that in very deed they require in these things: And therefore hence it comes to pass, That as they turn out of their Palaces those Servants that refuse their Liveries, and to do their civil Services: So, as though they were Lords and Masters in the Church, they turn the Ministers out of their Offices, and shut them out of the Church, if they refuse to wear their spiritual Liveries, and to do them spiritual and religious Service. But I come to the second part of the Assumption. 2. That the authority of our Lord Archbishops and Bishops, is an usurped authority. This is sufficiently proved of late by Mai. Jacob in his I. Assertion by many reasons, only because the weight of the Argument leaneth upon it, I will use one Reason. Those Officers and Rulers in the Church, that make claim to be of Divine Institution, challenge to themselves Apostolical authority and jurisdiction, as the only Successors of the Apostles, to sit only in Moses Chair; To have sole power of the Keys; To cut from the visible Church, and receive again; To have power of creating and displacing all other Ecclesiastical Officers; To be the Universal Pastors of whole Dukedoms and Kingdoms, under whom all other Pastors are as Curates, etc. And yet for all this, are such as stand and are supported only by humane Traditions and Ceremonies, such as a Civil Magistrate may, without sin, put out of the Church; and such as the true Churches of God may renounce (and yet continue the true Church) as Antichristian Usurpers and spiritual Tyrants. (I say) all such Officers and Rulers exercise a usurped authority in the Church: But our Archbishops and Bishops are such Rulers and Officers as are aforesaid. Ergo, They execute a usurped power over the Church. The Proposition may easily be justified: For if inferior Officers, viz. Pastors of particular Congregations have had, and may have firm continuance in the Church without these humane devises and inventions; If the Magistrate cannot, without sin, put them out of the Church; And if those can be no true Churches that renounce to have particular Pastors and Ministers over them, it must much more hold in such Church-Officers and Rulers as these are, if their authority be lawful and good: For whilst the Apostles lived, they needed not any humane Traditions and devices to support their authority; the Magistrates that sought to put them down sinned with a high hand: And that was no Church that renounced and disclaimed their Office, Authority, and Jurisdiction. The Assumption is as easily justified: For 1. They make claim and title to all those Prerogatives before rehearsed in the first part of the Proposition, and unto more than that, as shall be proved if it be denied. 2. It is an Emblem of their own, NO CEREMONY, NO BISHOP. Ergo, No humane Tradition and Invention, no Bishop. Ergo, The Office of a Bishop is supported by them, either only or specially. 3. Their Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction is derived from the King, else it is a flat denial of his Supremacy. Also, themselves grant in their last Tables of Discipline, That the King hath power to increase or diminish the Circuit of a Bishopric: That he may make two or more Bishoprics of one, and one Bishopric to be two or more: Yea, what should hinder, but that he may divide the Bishopric of London into eight hundred. For, where God hath not defined the number of Parishes that a Bishop is to reign over, it must needs be a thing indifferent: In which, by their own Doctrines, the King hath authority, without sin, to dispose. If therefore the King may as well (notwithstanding any thing in the Law of God) Give the Keys of the Church to every particular Pastor of a Congregation, over his own Congregation, as to a Bishop over a Diocese, which taketh away the very Essence of an English Bishop; He may, without sin, take away the very Office of the Bishop, which consists in having Jurisdiction over many Congregations. Also, it being not defined, by the Word of God, but left free, what attire Bishops shall wear, as also, what maintenance they shall have; The King, having absolute power in things indifferent, according to their own Doctrine, He may turn them out of their Rochets and Parliament Robes; Thrust them out of their Palaces, and put them to their stipends, to live upon voluntary devotions of poor Christian People, and then a man may easily imagine what the Office of a Bishop would be worth: For, he that hath authority to prescribe to a Bishop, and other Ministers, the Forms, Rites, and Ceremonies of their Divine Service, hath also power much more, to prescribe, moderate, and appoint their Apparel, Diet, and manner of maintenance. So that it is clear, That the King may, without sin, disannul the Authorities, Dignities, and Prerogatives of Bishops; Any of which shall be (if it be denied) proved to be matters of greater indifferency, and therefore more appertaining to his Supremacy, than the prescribing of Forms of Divine Service, and mystical Rites of Religion. For let the King take from the Bishop all indifferent things (which he may do by their own Doctrine) and a Bishop will be no Bishop, as shall be proved, if it be denied. 4. There is no true and sober Christians but will say, that the Churches of Scotland, France, the Low-Countries, and other places (that renounce such Archbishops and Bishops (as ours are) as Anticristian and usurping Prelates) are true Churches of God: which they could not be, if the Authority and Prerogatives they claim to themselves, were of Christ, and not usurped. For if it were the Ordinance of Christ Jesus, That in every Kingdom, that receiveth the Gospel, There should be one Archbishop over the whole Kingdom; One Bishop over many hundred Pastors, in a Kingdom, and all they invested with that authority and Jurisdiction Apostolical which they claim jure Divino, to be due unto them, and to reside in them, by the Ordinance of Christ; Certainly that Church that should renounce and disclaim such an Authority, ordained in the Church, cannot be a true Church, but a Synagogue of Satan. For they that should renounce and deny such, must needs therein renounce and deny Christ himself. Thus the Assumption is cleared. The eleventh Argument. All Humane Traditions and Rites enjoined to be performed in God's worship as necessary to Salvation, are unlawful. These Ceremonies in controversy, being but Humane Traditions, are enjoined to be performed in God's worship, as necessary to Salvation: Ergo, These Ceremonies are unlawful. THe Proposition is freely granted of all our Adversaries hitherto. If any hereafter, by reason of some difficulties, the cause may be thrust into by granting the same, shall be so desperate as to deny the same; we shall be ready to make it good, at any time. The assumption is thus proved. Whatsoever Humane Tradition, Ceremony, or Action, that may without sin, or inconvenience to any part of the Worship of God be omitted in the same, and yet notwithstanding are enjoined and urged as more necessary than those Actions that are by the Word of God necessary to Salvation: I say, such humane Ceremonies and Traditions are enjoined as necessary to Salvation. But these Ceremonies are such, as may without any sin, or any inconvenience to any part of the Worship of God, be omitted in the same, and yet notwithstanding are enjoined as more necessary for Christians to do, than those Actions that are necessary to Salvation by the Word of God: Ergo, These Ceremonies in controversy are enjoined, etc. as necessary to Salvation. He hath no blood of shame running in his veins, that will deny the Proposition. The Assumption hath two parts: The first is this, That these Ceremonies are such as may, without sin, or any inconvenience to any part of the worship of God, be omitted. This is evident: For 1. if they could not be omitted without sin in Divine Worship, they were Divine and not Humane Ordinances. For example, Though to go clothed to the Congregation be a Civil action, yet, because it is a sin, for any to go naked to the Congregation, It is a Divine Ordinance, That men should go clothed thither. And in this case (as in any other case of sin) a man ought rather never Worship God publicly, than to go naked to the Congregation. For the omission of a Good Action is no sin, when it cannot be done, but by committing of a sin? 2. Divine Worship consisting in Prayer, the Sacraments, and the Word, no wit of man can show wherein the bare omission of any one of these Ceremonies is inconvenient to any one of these parts: for what inconvenience can a man (that is not drunk with the dregs and lees of Popish Superstition) find it to public Prayer, to be said in the Congregation without a Priest's Surplice? The omission of ordinary pawses and Accents, points and stopps, the suppressing of the voice, or a loud hooping and hallowing out of the words, or an undistinct sounding of them, were such actions as common reason will teach are inconvenient for Prayer, and so inconvenient, that a man ought never to pray publicly in the Congregation, as the voice thereof, that should by Canon be tied thereto: And the Magistrate (though there were no Canon to the contrary) ought to turn such out of the Ministry that should omit such matters in prayer. But for a Minister to pray without a Surplice, can be in reason no more inconvenient, than for him to pray without Book, without a pair of spectacles upon his nose. And there may be as good reason given to prove it convenient for a man that saith a thing without Book, to put on a pair of Spectacles, as there can be to prove it convenient for him that is to pray in the Church, to put upon himself a white linen Garment. The second part of the Assumption is this; That they are enjoined as more necessary for Christians to do, than those Actions that by the Word of God are necessary to Salvation. Which I prove by this collection of Reasons; 1. If the whole Solemn Worship and Mystery of Jesus must stoop and yield to these; And these must not stoop or yield to them. 2. If those that will yield to these are dispensed with, for omission of some duties that God requires of the Minister to be performed as necessary to Salvation, and those that are willing to do all necessary Services tending to the Salvation of Man, cannot be dispensed with for the omission of these, but must be turned out of Christ's Service. 3. If those that refuse only conformity to these are worse than Idolatrous Papists. 4. If the bare omission of these, though upon tenderness of conscience, be Sedition, Schism, Disloyalty, Rebellion, a denial of the King's Supremacy, Anabaptistry, Frenzy, worthy imprisonment, Banishment, loss of Goods and Living. 5. If all that profess these to be unlawful, are to be delivered up to Satan, and anathematised as men holding wicked and damnable Errors. 6. If a man being in that Church, ought not to be of it where these Ceremonies are omitted. 7. If the bare omission of these, wake a Minister by our Law more subject to deprivation and suspension, than the commission of the foulest Crimes, even Drunkenness, Blasphemy, gross Ignorance, uncleanness. 8. If her late Excellent Ma. Religion consisted in these: I say, If all these Assertions be true, then are they enjoined as more necessary to be done, than those Actions that by the Word of God are necessary to Salvation. But all these Eight points are to be justified; Ergo, These Ceremonies are enjoined as more necessary to be done, than some Actions that are necessary to Salvation. The Proposition cannot be gainsayed. It being a Topick Axiom. Cujus privatio est deterior, illud ipsum est melius: to wit, The worse the Privation of a thing is, the better the thing is. For Example, If blindness be worse than deafness; Then is the positive habit of seeing better than that of hearing. So, if Nonconformity be worse than Drunkenness, Blasphemy, Idolatry, Filthiness of Body, etc. It must needs follow, that Conformity is a more excellent thing in itself than Sobriety; the true Worship of God, the glorifying of the name of God, than a chaste and honest life: But all these are urged by the Word of God, as necessary means to Salvation: For the Holy Ghost saith, No Murderer, Adulterer, Unclean person, Idolater, etc. shall enter into the Kingdom of heaven. If therefore Conformity be more urged by our Laws than these, and the Privation more punished: If this be more strictly required of Christians, yea, of principal Christians, even the Ministers of the Word, than the other, they must needs be urged more necessary to Salvation than the other. For, of the more excellency a Christian virtue is, the more necessary to Salvation it is. The Assumption in every part and parcel thereof may be justified by the practice and Assertions of our Adversaries, not only privately, but in public: For the 1. God must not by Canon be Worshipped solemnly in England, except these be mingled with it, though without them he might be never so well worshipped. For the 2. Those that yield to these, need not preach at all in our Church except they will; No, nor to do any other part of Divine Service in their own person, if they will maintain a Curate, that will keep the Ceremonial Law, and fairly re●d or sing the King's Service, as they call it: And yet if Preaching were not necessary to Salvation, Paul that was above an Archbishop, should not have been under a woe, if he had not done it. For no Minister of the Gospel is under a woe, that performeth all services to the Churches of God that are necessary to Salvation. Neither was Paul's Preaching a Reading of Homilies, or of a Service Book. For the 3. Nothing is more notorious then for us that make scruple of these things to be reputed worse than Papists: One that is a great Judge in these causes Ecclesiastical, affirmed it unto myself. Another, openly at Paul's Cross, in mine own hearing, made no doubt but the Papists were in the Church, but he made great doubt whether the Puritans were. And yet we are Puritans for nothing else, but for refusing Conformity to their Ceremonies: For, howsoever they slander us with many other gross imputations, yet they cannot lay any thing to our charge but our conscience in this. For all other matters concerning their own Estates and Dignities, considering how desperate they are, and unreformable, we can be content to leave them to the Judgement of God, who (as it seems) intendeth to glorify himself by some other means, than by their Conversion. For the 4. Read Scottish, Genevat. The Survey, Remonstrance, etc. And ye shall find all this laid to their Charge. Also their practice sufficiently proveth it; for the Ministers that are of late suspended and deprived, only refusing to use these Ceremonies, bear their condemnation under these Names and Titles. The 5. and 6. is proved by their own late Canons; For, if they be to be excommunicated ipso facto, as holding damnable and wicked Errors, that shall Profess any of these Ceremonies to be unlawful, a man ought not to acknowledge himself a member of any such Church, as doth affectedly cast them out of God's worship: For, for what Error a particular person is not to be reputed as a member of the Church, but as a Heathen and Publican; for the same a whole Church is not to be reputed a Church, but a Synagogue of Satan. The 7. may be justified by many Instances of many vile and impious persons of those kinds tolerated in the Ministry. The 8. is proved by him that answers the Plea of the Innocent, who saith, That they that call in question the lawfulness of these Ceremonies, call in question her late Majesty's Religion; which they could not do, except (at the least) part of her Religion consisted in them. Further, If this doth not sufficiently prove the main Assumption, let these Reasons following be weighed. 1. If the Church be necessary to Salvation, and if the Pillars of the Church be necessary to the Church, and if the Lord Bishops be the Pillars of the Church, and these or such like Cermonies be the main Supporters of Lord Bishops: then are these Ceremonies in the judgement of the Prelates necessary to Salvation. For no Church, no Salvation; no Pillar of the Church, no Church: No L. Bishop, no Pillar of the Church: No Ceremony, no Lord Bishop. Ergo, No Ceremony of this kind, no Salvation. 2. All Divine Constitutions binding conscience are necessary to Salvation: But by the late Doctrine of the Prelates and others, these Ceremonies (being not unlawful) when they are commanded by the Church, are said not to be humane but Divine Constitutions, binding conscience; therefore they (as they are urged) are necessary to Salvation. For all divine Constitutions binding conscience, are necessary to Salvation, or else, nothing on our part can be said in any sense to be necessary thereunto. 3. It is necessary to Salvation, that men should not only worship God, but worship him in a comely, decent, and orderly manner, it being a matter of damnation to worship God in a confused, unseemly, and disordered manner, but by the Doctrine of our Prelates, comeliness, decency, and order, consists in the use of these Ceremonies; Ergo, in their Judgement they are necessary to Salvation. Objection: The Church doth not intent to urge these things, as necessary to Salvation. Ergo, They are not urged as necessary to Salvation. Answ. 1. The Church urgeth not these things at all, but only three or four Bishops in the Church, which (if their own Doctrine be true) are Usurpers over our Churches, and not so much as any true members of a Church. What if the Synod should Decree that the King should hold the Arch-Bishops stirrup, and the Prince and Nobles kiss his toe, once or twice a year; and withal they should protest, that they do not require this as a worship, or honour to the Archbishop, but only for comeliness, Order, and Edification, were not this a shameful shift, as bad as the thing itself. The twelfth Argument. All actions, not required by the Word of God, (though commanded by humane authority) that are apparent means of the Damnation of the Souls of infinite numbers of men, are directly against the Law of charity, and therefore sin. But these Ceremonies are such Actions. Ergo, THE Proposition is without question: For if, without commandment from God, I may, upon the sole will and pleasure of the Magistrate, or Governors of the Church, do that by which I shall be a means of the damnation of my brother's soul, which is the greatest breach of the law of charity that can be: Then may I do any sin at their commandment without sin, for what greater sin can there be against the second Table than this, to be a witting Instrument of my Neighbour's damnation. Which though it be but a matter of Jest to our great Doctors, that have many Cures, and no care of souls, yet, to them which know the price of a soul, it is more than if, upon the mere will of the Magistrates, they should be forced to kill their own Children and dearest Beloved's with their own hand. Object. The Magistrate having authority given him by God to command things Indifferent, he commanding, they are to be done, notwithstanding the Scandal of our Neighbour. Answ. 1. Though the Subject aught to obey his Magistrate in all Indifferent actions imposed upon him whatsoever, yet I desire that it may be proved, that God in his Word hath given to any Power or Potentate upon Earth any such absolute authority. The Magistrate is God's Lieutenant, and the glory of the Magistrate consists in this, In that, under God, he beareth a Sword, to punish those that transgress his Laws, but he is by God's Ordinance to be the procurer and protector of the Christian Liberty of his Subjects. That therefore he hath power granted him of God (upon his own pleasure) to take away the same, especially in such a case, requires proof out of the Word of God. 2. If he have such a power, yet those things that God leaves to his will to command, or not to command, he cannot command under a greater penalty than bodily death; for his Sword can cut no deeper, and then in the case of Scandal a Christian Subject ought rather to suffer the Magistrate to take away his life, than to do that which shall procure the Damnation of his Brothers Soul. And in thus doing, he is no contemner of the Magistrates Law, but a fulfiller of the Law of Charity, in not destroying his brother's Soul upon the mere pleasure of a mortal man. Object. But the commandment of the Magistrate takes away the scandal, when the thing is done in obedience to him. Answ. This is another desperate shift. As though the conscience of the weak brother that judgeth a thing indifferent to be a Sin will be ever the more satisfied and relieved in the matter by the authority of the Magistrate, nothing but the authority of God either can or aught to satisfy a doubting conscience. And as for them that put superstition in things indifferent, and are that way scandalised, the authority of the Magistrate or Church commanding them, their scandal is increased, and not removed by the same. Object. But we must more respect Obedience to the Magistrate, than the scandal of inferior persons, the thing commanded being indifferent, and not evil. Answ. 1. The thing commanded is not indifferent, then when it is a scandal and stumbling block to our brother. 2. We must obey the Magistrate only in the Lord, but this is not to obey him in the Lord, only upon his pleasure to destroy a soul for whom Christ died. 3. An obedience to the Magistrate, so far as to the condemnation of our brother's soul, must be a special obedience, in some special good and just commandment, which cannot be verified of a commandment that requireth only a thing indifferent, much less such an indifferent, as is a scandal and means of destruction to men's souls. 4. Such a forbearing of obedience only in love to the salvation of our brother's soul, being without apparent contempt of the Magistrate, and having adjoined with it a meek submission to the mercy of the Magistrate, cannot be called a disobedience, but is indeed a better obedience than theirs, that do contrary, who in their obedience bring the blood of the souls they destroy, both upon their own heads, and the Magistrate, which is a sin in the eyes of God worse than rebellion. Object. But by obedience to these Ceremonies many souls by means of preaching are saved, which shall want the means in the refusal. Answ. 1. We must not destroy the souls of some, that we may save the souls of other, we must do that which is just, though the World go to wrack for it. 2. The greatest good that a man can do, cannot countervail the least evil, much less so great an evil as to be a witting instrument of the damnation of a brother's soul. 3. He that preacheth cannot assure himself of the salvation of one soul by the same, for that is wrought by the work of the Spirit of God. And he hath little cause to hope for a blessing upon that preaching which he purchaseth with the price of blood, yea, of the blood of souls. Object. But the King, the Magistrate and State are scandalised also at the omission of them, and their scandal is more to be respected than the scandal of inferior persons, for the using of them. Answ. 1. For his Majesty, we doubt not but (if the Prelates would) he would easily yield to the removal of them, and therefore he cannot be scandalised at the refusal, when it is of mere conscience, though of conscience deceived. 2. The States and Inferior Magistrates of the Kingdom have in all Parliaments shown themselves willing, and ready to set their hands to the removal of them. 3. If the King and State will be scandalised, because upon their mere will and pleasure, I will not do that which I am persuaded will be a means of the destruction of their souls for whom Christ died: They will be much more scandalized at me if I do it; For such an obedience as this, must needs be a means of begetting or confirming strange sins in their souls: for as it is a kind of deifying of themselves, To require (even in the case of scandal) a thing indifferent to be done; so they that shall in such a case obey, cannot but nourish exceedingly that corruption from which such a commandment shall proceed. 4. The soul of the meanest and poorest in a Kingdom cost as great a price, and is as dear to Christ, as the soul of the Noblest, and in the matter of scandal, as great heed is to be taken to them, as to any other: And it shows of what spirit these men are of, that think they may betray the souls of Christ's little ones, rather than displease a mortal man. Object. What, Must the Magistrates Laws be changed for every humour that will pretend scandal? Answ. Yea, such Laws as command only things indifferent, in cases of general scandal, are to be changed; of particular scandal, are (at the least) to be dispensed withal: For if Laws that command things necessary, are sometimes to be dispensed with, and if of them it is said, Extreme right is extreme wrong. Much more than such Laws as require only such things as are indifferent. 1. Such things that (but for the Commanders pleasure) makes no matter whether they be done or no. Which are indeed unworthy to be commanded of Worthies. 2. A pretended scandal in humour is easily discerned by those that are wise and not malicious, for they that are ready to perform all obedience to the Magistrate in all other heavier and greater things, are ready in his Service to spend their goods and lives, that think nothing too dear for the redeeming of his safety, that are in all other things as obedient, and more obedient than any other of his subjects: It is not to be supposed of any, (that are not possessed with the malicious spirit of Antichrist) that such should refuse to obey the King's pleasure in a toy, and a trifle, (such as are all things indifferent) except that in obeying him they were persuaded that they should sin against their own conscience, which, next unto God, they have cause to please, far above all the Kings of the earth, for it hath greater power to torment them than they have. But I prove the Assumption. All apparent means of confirming men in Schism, Superstition, and Idolatry, by means whereof many have professedly lived and died therein without repentance, are apparent means of the damnation and destruction of many souls amongst us: But These Ceremonies are such. Ergo, The Proposition cannot be denied, for what action of man can be said to be a means of the damnation and destruction of another's soul, if these actions be not, that confirm men in such foul sins? So that either a man can do nothing that shall destroy his brother's soul (which is directly against the express words of S. Paul) Or else such a conformity, in such actions as confirm men in such damnable sins, doth destroy his soul. The Assumption is as evident as any such matter can be. For 1. The Papists, not only amongst us, (which are innumerable) but others also do profess, that by our use of these Ceremonies (which are consecrated mysteries of their own Religion) they are confirmed in the truth of their Religion, and the falsehood of ours. And good reason they have so to judge: For if the broth be good that the Devil is sod in, sure the Devil himself must needs be good also. 2. Those Christians of the Separation, that are called Brownists, being many hundreds, professing the same faith that we do, are by the retaining of Relics, confirmed in their Schism, and Separation from us; And live and die in this opinion, That our Churches are no true Churches, and that a man cannot, without sin, communicate with them. And the main ground of this is, for that we mingle with Divine worship these base and vile inventions of men, Yea, of the accursed Antichrist. What? Is a linen rag, and a Christ's Cross, etc. to be reputed of so great value and price, that the fellowship and spiritual communion of so many Christians, (as sound in religion as any Prelate in the Realm) should be contemned and rejected for them? 3. Common experience teacheth us, that there are infinite numbers in this Realm ignorant and superstitious folk, that place as much, or more holiness in these things, than in the holy Ordinances of God; And how can it be otherwise, when they shall see the Rulers of the Church, mingle Heaven, Earth, and Hell together in this manner about them. Cursing, and anathematising all that shall not embrace them. How can they but imagine, that the sight of a Surplice upon a Priests back shall bring them to heaven, when they shall see those that keep Heaven Keys, send a man, for want of such a wedding garment, ipso facto, to hell? 4. If it be but considered, that all other Protestant Churches have rejected them as menstruous , that more than the greatest number of Pastors in our own Land, that desires the name of faithful and painful Teachers, either count them impious, or at least the burdens or reproaches of our Churches: that the first appointers of them, (after our separation from Rome) intended only a toleration of them, that the most scandalous and lewd persons in our Congregations, are the hottest for them, that every Parliament since her Majesty's reign hath been forward in the removing of them, that the defence of them hath driven men to run into the broaching of many gross and Popish errors. And that so many Ministers, (a catalogue of whose names and states, I could wish were published to all posterity, that it may see the wonderful mild and moderate government of Prelates) have endured and expected daily to endure the gratest extremities for the same: I say, if these things be duly considered, a man shall easily see, that these ceremonies are stumbling blocks, laid by the Devil and his Agents in the ways of all the people of this Realm, to hinder the progress of the Gospel, and to make all men stumble in the ways of salvation. AN ADDITION. NOt only our Conformers unto Rome, but they also that abhor the same; can hardly endure to hear, that these Ceremonies are parts of divine worship, for whose further satisfaction I add this one Argument. Whatsoever being used in divine worship, is directly contrary to the 2d. Commandment, is a part of divine worship. These Ceremonies are used in divine worship, and are directly contrary to the 2d. commandement. Ergo The Proposition is evident, for all outward Idolatry is Divine worship; and nothing but outward Idolatry is directly forbidden in the 2d. Commandment. The second part of the Assumption is thus proved, All inventions and devices of man, grounded orely upon the will of man, and not upon any necessity of nature, or civility, set apart to God's outward worship; are contrary to the second Commandment. These Ceremonies are such, Ergo. The proposition we prove thus. Either all such devices and inventions are contrary unto the 2 d. commandment, or else there is no * A trope or figure of speech, wherein under one kind of Idolatry all sorts are forbidden. Synecdoche therein. But there is a Synecdoche in the 2 d. Commandment. The Assumption or latter part of this Syllogism cannot be denied of any, but such as shall desperately set themselves, against the truth of God. For if there were no figure or Trope in the commandment, then to bow down unto, and to worship the Sun, Moon and Stars, or any other of God's creatures, yea, or any image made by any other, should be no breach of this commandment, much less to offer Jewish Sacrifices of sheep and Oxen, to circumcise, to go a pilgrimage to Saints, to kiss the Pax, to sprinkle with holy water, to baptise Bells, or to use any other Popish rites; in which if a man sin not against the second commandment, he sinneth not against any. Again, It would be demanded, against what commandment, Nadab and Abihu sinned, when they offered strange fire. The Israelites, when they abused gideon's Ephod, Judg. 8.27. The Corinthians in eating meat offered to Idols, in the Idols Temples, 1 Cor. 9 Either they sinned not against this commandment, and by consequent against none, or else there must needs be a wonderful large Trope in the same, which I think never any Divine, Jew or Christian, Protestant or Papist ever denied before now. The proposition is as evident if it be considered, that in the 2 .d commandment, literally and in propriety of speech, nothing is forbidden, but the making of Images for worship, and the bowing down unto them & worshipping of them: Now if there be a Synecdoche in the commandment, there must of necessity be not only other kinds of false outward worship of Idolatry, different in form from making and bowing down unto Images and Idols, but there must be also some common cause or ground, upon which making and bowing unto Images is forbidden, which must be the third Argument, and reason by which all other kinds of false outward worship are brought under bowing unto images, & condemn in that, else it were senseless to make any thing that is not a bowing down unto Images to be condemned under that name and title. For when one thing is condemned under another, it is because that thing doth communicate with it in the same cause for which it is condemned. For example; if under, bowing down unto Images, Jewish Circumcision, Sacrifices, etc. are forbidden, forasmuch as these cannot in any sense be called Bowing down to Images; there must be some cause why bowing down into Images is forbidden, which must stretch itself unto them, and bring them under it, which must be as it were a common genus unto it and them. Now let all the wits in the world lay their heads together, and they shall never be able to devise any such common genus, that shall be the common cause why not only bowing down to Images: but why, under it all other kind of Idolatry and false worship is condemned, but this, for that they were humane devices, & inventions, and therefore under the most usual and general received invention of man, God condemneth all other Inventions used to the same end. If this be not the reason then there are and may be infinite, outward Idolatries and Superstitions that cannot with any reason be referred to this commandment. Therefore it must needs follow that either there is no trope in the commandment, or that all such inventions of man are forbidden in the same. An Advertisement. I had thought (good Reader) to have fortified some other points in the Arguments, which to them that do not consider may seem weak, but I forbear for some special reasons, I am only to admonish thee of one defect amongst others, that hath passed me, viz. The mistaking of the Archbishop's Argument, though I made it better than it was. For thus it is, and hath been I know not how oft (as unanswerable) been propounded. Those Ceremonies whose doctrine is sound and good, are lawful and good ceremonies. The doctrine of these ceremonies is sound and good. Ergo, Which is subject to the very same absurdities that the other, and more also. For 1. the Doctrine of them is unsound & false, for the doctrine of them is this, that they are matters indifferent, of order, decency, and edification, no parts of Divine worship, that they are Schismatics that will not conform unto them, enemies to the Supremacy and State, that it is a wicked error to hold them unlawful and superstitious, that they are to be excommunicated that affirm them to be so, etc. All which is unsound doctrine concerning them. 2. Grant the Doctrine sound, yet it followeth not that the Ceremonies are good; for the thing may be wicked, any yet the doctrine of it sound. For, There is a sound doctrine of all vices. 3. In what respect doth he affirm the doctrine to be sound and good? Is it not from the use and end that is assigned unto them by himself? Because they are appointed for such and such ends? Hence will follow the very same absurdities, that I have observed in the former. For then any ridiculous or base Ceremony, may be instituted, so it be under pretence of a good end. A PROTESTATION OF THE King's Supremacy, Made in the name of the afflicted MINISTERS, and opposed to the shameful Calumniations of the PRELATES. PSAL. 7.3.5. O Lord my God, if I have done this thing, if there be any wickedness in my hands; Then let the Enemy persecute my soul, and take it, let him tread my life down upon the earth, and lay mine honour in the Dust. Selah. JOHN 18.23. If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: But if I have spoken well, why smitest thou me. Printed in the year, 1660. To the civil States of this Kingdom. We beseech your H. and W. that you would by this true light that we shall give unto you, look into our innocency. His Excellent Majesty, yourselves, and your sacred Thrones are exceedingly abused, with Fogs and Mists, which (breathed out of the mouths of the Prelates) are cast between your eyes, and the integrity of our cause: through the darkness whereof you are led to give many heavy Sentences against the most harmless Subjects in the Kingdom, as Enemies to the Supremacy and State. Whereas it shall appear that no Christians in the world give more unto the same then we, and that in very truth, the cause that we maintain is for the King and Civil State, against an Ecclesiastical State, that secretly, and in a Mystery (as we may hereafter have occasion to prove) opposeth itself against the same. If this protestation shall in any measure satisfy you, Than we desire your Honourable Mediations for us to the highest. If not; That then we may know wherein it is defective, and we shall be found ready to give all satisfaction. CHAP. I. A PROTESTATION of the King's Supremacy. WE hold and maintain, the same Authority and Supremacy in all causes and over all persons Civil and Ecclesiastical, granted by Statute to Queen Elizabeth, and expressed and declared in the book of Advertisements and Injunctions, and in Mr. Bilson against the Jesuits, to be due in full and ample manner (without any limitation or qualification) to the King and his Heirs and Successors for ever. Neither is their (to our knowledge, any one of us, but is and ever hath been most willing to subscribe and swear unto the same, according to form of Statute, And we desire that those that shall refuse the same may bear their own iniquity. 2. We are so far from judging the said Supremacy to be unlawful: that we are persuaded that the King should sin highly against God, if he should not assume the same unto himself, and that the Churches within his Dominions should sin damnably, if they should deny to yield the same unto him, yea though the Statutes of the Kingdom should deny it unto him. 3. We hold it plain Antichristianism for any Church, or Church Officers whatsoever, either to arrogate or assume unto themselves any part or parcel thereof, & utterly unlawful for the King to give away or alienate the same from his own Crown and dignity to any spiritual potentates or rulers whatsoever within or without his dominions. 3. We hold that though the Kings of this Realm were no Members of the Church but very Infidels, yea & persecutors of the truth that yet those Churches that shall be gathered together within these Dominions ought to acknowledge and yield the said supremacy unto them. And that the same is not tied to their faith and Christianity but to their very Crown from which no subject or subjects have power to separate or disjoin it. 5. We hold that neither King nor civil estate are bound in matter of Religion to be subject and obedient to any Ecclesiastical person or persons whatsoever, no further than they shall be able to convince their consciences of the truth thereof out of the Word of God. Yea we think they should sin against God, if they should ground their Religion, or any part or parcel thereof upon the bare Testimony or Judgement of any man, or of all the men in the world. 6. We hold that no Churches or Church-Officers have power for any crime whatsoever to deprive the King of the least of his Royal Prerogatives whatsoeer, much less to deprive him of his Supremacy wherein the Height of his Royal Dignity consists. 7. We hold that in all things concerning this life whatsoever, the Civil Jurisdiction of Kings and Civil States excelleth and aught to have pre-eminence over the Ecclesiastical, and that the Ecclesiastical neither hath, nor aught to have any power in the least degree over the bodies, lives, goods, or liberty of any person whatsoever, much less of the Kings and Rulers of the Earth. 8. We hold that Kings by virtue of their supremacy have power: yea also that they stand bound by the Law of God to make Laws Ecclesiastical such as shall tend to the good ordering of the Churches in their Dominions; And that the Churches ought not to be disobedient to any of their Laws, so far as in obedience unto them, they do not that which is contrary to the Word of God. 9 We hold that though the King shall command any thing contrary to the Word unto the Churches, that yet they ought not to resist him therein, but only peaceably to forbear Obedience, and sue unto him for grace and mercy, and where that cannot be obtained, meekly to submit themselves to the punishment. 10. We hold that the King hath power by virtue of his supremacy, to remove out of the Churches, whatsoever he shall discern to be practised therein, not agreeable to the Word of God. And if he shall see any defect either in the Worship of God, or in the Ecclesiastical Discipline, he ought by his royal Authority and power to procure and force the redress thereof, yea, though it be without the consent and against the will of the Ecclesiastical Governors themselves. 11. We hold that the King hath as much Authority over the Body, Goods, and Affairs, of Ecclesiastical Persons, as of any other of his Subjects whatsoever. And that by his Authority, he may force them not only to all civil duties belonging unto them, but also unto Ecclesiastical: afflicting as great punishment upon them for the neglect thereof, as upon any other of his Subjects. 12. We hold that he hath power, to remove out of the Churches, all Scandalous Schismatical and Heretical Teachers, and by all due severity of Laws to repress them. 13. We hold that all Ecclesiastical Laws made by the King (not repugnant to the Word of God) do in some sort bind the consciences of his Subjects: and that no subject aught to refuse obedience to any such Law. 14. We hold that the King only hath power within his Dominions, to convene Synods or general Assemblies of Ministers, and by his Authority Royal, to ratify and give life and strength, to their Canons and Constitutions, without whose ratification, no man can force any subject to yield any Obedience unto the same. 15. We hold that though the King may force the Churches to be subject and obedient unto him: and to be Members of the Commonwealth; yet that the Churches severally or jointly, have no power to force him: or any Subject, against their will to any service unto them, or to any religions duty whatsoever. No, nor to be so much as a Member of any Church. 16. We hold that the King ought not to be subject to the Ecclesiastical Censures of any Churches, Church Officers or Synods whatsoever, but only to that Church and those Officers of his own Court and Household, unto whom (in reverence of their Religion and of the spiritual Graces of God he sees shining in them) he shall of his own free will, subject and commit the Regiment of his Soul, in whom there can be no suspicion nor fear of any partiality, or unjust or rigorous dealing against him. 17. We hold that if any Ecclesiastical Governors (call them by what name you will) shall abuse their Ecclesiastical Authority in the execution of their censures, upon any man whosoever; That the King and Civil States under him, have power to punish them severely for it, much more if they shall abuse it upon the Supreme Majesty himself. 18. If the King subjecting himself to spiritual Guides and Governors, shall afterwards refuse to be guided and governed by them according to the Word of God, and living in notorious sin without Repentance shall wilfully contemn and despise all their holy and religious Censures, that then these Governors are to refuse to administer the holy things of God unto him, and to leave him to himself and to the secret Judgement of God, & wholly to resign and give over that spiritual charge and tuition over him, which by calling from God and the King they did undertake. And more than this they may not do. And after all this, We hold that he yet still retaineth, and aught to retain, entirely and solidly, all that aforesaid supreme power and Authority over the Churches of this Dominion, in as ample a manner, as if he were the most Christian Prince in the World. 19 We acknowledge King JAMES to be our only lawful Sovereign, and unto him to be due all the aforesaid Supremacy, and we renounce and abjure all Opinions, Doctrines, Practices, whatsoever repugnant or contrary to the same, as Anabaptistical and Antichristian, and wish they may be severely punished. 20. We never refused Obedience to any Laws or Commandments of the King, or State whatsoever, but only to such as we have proved or are ready to prove, (if we might be heard with indifferency) to be contrary to the Word of God. And we are ready to take our Solemn Oaths, before the Throne of Justice, that the only cause of our refusal of Obedience to those Canons of the Prelates for which we are at present so extremely afflicted, is mere Conscience, and a fear to sin against God: And that if by due form of reasoning we may be convinced in our Consciences of the contrary, we are as willing as any Subjects in the Realm to Obey and Conform. 21. We refuse Obedience only to such Canons as require the performance of such Acts, and Rites of Religion, as are rejected and abandoned of all other Reformed Churches, as Superstitious Disorders, Such, as are special Mysteries of the Romish Antichristian Idolatry, Such as have been controverted in the Church ever since the last breaking forth of the Light of the Gospel out of the cloud of Popery in Luther's time. Such as all Protestant Writers and Defenders of our Faith beyond the Seas, and most of our own Country men have either in general or particular condemned as vain, idle, and unprofitable, Such as all the Faithful, and Painful Pastors of this Realm, and in a manner all States and degrees of the same, would be content were removed, and swept out of the Church, and for which few or none are zealous but the Prelates, and their Adherents. 22. We deny no Authority to the King, in matters Ecclesiastical, but only that which Christ Jesus the only Head of the Church hath directly, and precisely appropriated unto himself, and hath denied to communicate to any other creature or creatures in the World. For we hold, That Christ alone is the Doctor of the Church in matters of Religion, and that the Word of Christ which he hath given unto his Church, is of absolute perfection, containing in it all parts of the true Religion, both for Substance and Ceremony, and a perfect direction in all Ecclesiastical matters whatsoever. Unto and from which it is not lawful for any Man or Angel, to add or detract. 23. We are so far from making claim of any supremacy unto ourselves (and those Ecclesiastical Officers which we desire) that we exclude from ourselves and them (as that of which we are utterly uncapable) all Princely and Lordly state, pomp and power whatsoever, holding it a sin for any whosoever to exercise (no not by commission from the Magistrate) any Authority over the Body, Goods, Lives, Liberty of any Man whosoever for any crime or offence whatsoever. So that any one of the basest and most inferior civil officers in a Kingdom hath and aught to have (in our Judgement) more Authority and Power over men then any or all the Ecclesiastical Officers in the same Kingdom or in the whole World. Yea we hold that the highest Ecclesiastical Officer in the Church ought to be as subject unto the basest civil officers in the Kingdom, as the meanest Subject in the Kingdom; And that they ought not by virtue of their office, to challenge any freedom or immunity at all from any Civil Subjection whatsoever, belonging to any common Subject. 24. We confine and bond all Ecclesiastical power within the limits only of one particular Congregation, holding that the greatest Ecclesiastical power ought not to stretch beyond the same; And that it is an arrogating of Princely Supremacy, for any Ecclesiastical person, or Persons whosoever, to take upon themselves Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction over many Churches, much more over whole Kingdoms and Provinces of Christians. 25. We hold it utterly unlawful for any one Minister to take upon himself, or accept of a sole Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction over so much as one Congregation. And therefore we hold that some of the sufficientest and most honest and godly men in the Congregation, aught to be chosen by the Heads of Families, to be adjoined in Commission as assistants to the Minister, in the spiritual Regiment of the souls of that Congregation, of which he is the pastor. 26. We hold that these Ecclesiastical Officers being so chosen by the Church or Congregation are to exercise over the said Congregation only a Spiritual jurisdiction and power, consisting in a careful oversight of the outward behaviour of the Members of their Church, That it be not scandalous, offensive, and unbeseeming Christians, And if any Member shall be delinquent they are brotherly to admonish him, showing him the nature of his crime by the word of God, And if after two or three admonitions, he show no tokens of sorrow and penitency, then are they to deny unto him the pledges and seals of the Church, to wit the Sacraments. If this cannot humble him but that he continue obstinate in that sin, than they are by the mouth of the Minister in Congregation (the whole Church consenting freely thereto) denounce him to be no Member of the Kingdom of Heaven, and so forbear to have any further charge over him, until God shall work the grace of Repentance, in him: in this manner they are to proceed against all apparent and Evident crimes only, as Murder, Adultery, Theft, Blasphemy, Ribaldery, Lying, Slandering, Profanation of the Sabothes, contempt of Divine Worship, Disobedience to the Civil Magistrate, etc. Neither ought the extremest of the Ecclesiastical Censures any whit hinder the course of justice that the Civil Magistrate is to exercise against the same crimes; for if a Traitor himself should be penitent, the Church ought to forgive him and lovingly to embrace him as a Son, but the Magistrate ought to execute him, if he should be obstinate in that crime: As the Magistrate ought to cut him off from the Civil Communion of men, so ought the Congregation (of which he is a Member) cut him off from all spiritual Communion with them. If any one of the Ecclesiastical Officers themselves shall sin, he is subject to the censures of the rest as any other member of the congregation. If they shall all sin scandalously either in the execution of their Office or in any other ordinary manner: Then the Congregation that chose them freely, hath as free power to depose them, and to place others in their room. If the Congregation shall err, either in choosing or deposing of her spiritual Officers. Then hath the Civil Magistrate alone power and authority to punish them for their fault, co compel them to make better choice, or to defend against them those Officers that without just causes they shall depose or deprive. 27. We hold that those Ecclesiastical Persons that make claim to greater power and authority than this, Especially they that make claim jure Divino of power and jurisdiction to meddle with other Churches than that one Congregation of which they are or aught to be members, Do usurp upon the Supremacy of the Civil Magistrate, who alone hath and aught to have (as we hold and maintain) a power over the several Congregations in his Dominions, and who alone ought by his authority not only to prescribe common Laws and Canons of uniformity and consent, in Religion and worship of God unto them all; But also to punish the offences of the several Congregations, that they shall commit against the laws of God, the policy of the Realm, and the Ecclesiastical Constitutions enacted by his authority. 28. We hold that the King ought not to give this authority away or to commit it to any Ecclesiastical Person or Persons whatsoever, But ought himself to be as it were, Archbishop and general overseer of all the Churches within his Dominions, and aught to employ under him, his honourable Counsel, his judges, Lieutenants, justices, Constables and such like to oversee the Churches, in the several divisions of their civil Regiments, visiting them and punishing by their civil power whatsoever they shall see amiss in any of them: Especially in the Rulers and Governors. 29. For as much as no people are more hated, persecuted and wronged of the wicked world then the true Churches of Christ; We hold that no people in the Earth stand in more need of the civil Magistrate than they. And that it is the greatest outward blessing they can enjoy in this life, to live under the Protection of their Swords & Sceptres, & the greatest cause of mourning when the same shall be bend against them. And we hold those Churches to be no true Churches of Jesus Christ that living in any Country, shall refuse subjection to the civil Regent's and Governors of the same; be they (in respect of Religion) never such Paganish Infidels. 30. We hold it utterly unlawful, for any Christian Churches whatsoever, by any armed force or power, against the will of the civil magistracy and State under which they live. To erect and set up in public, the true worship and service of God or to beat down or suppress any superstition or Idolatry that shall be countenanced and maintained by the same. Only, Every man is to look to himself, that he communicate not with the evils of the times, enduring what it shall please the State to inflict, and seeking by all honest and peaceable means all reformation of public abuses, only at the hands of civil public persons, and all practices contrary to these, we condemn as seditious and sinful. 31. All that we crave of his Majesty and the State, is, that by his and their permission and under their protection, and approbation, it may be lawful for us, to serve and worship God in all things according to his revealed will, and the manner of all other reformed Protestant Churches, that have made separation from Rome, that we may not be forced against our consciences to slain and pollute the simple and sincere worship of God prescribed in his word, with any humane Traditions and Rites whatsoever, but that in Divine worship we may be actors only of those things that may for matter or manner either ingeneral or special be concluded out of the word of God. Also to this end that it may be lawful for us to exhibit unto them and unto their Censure a true and sincere Confession of our faith, containing the main Grounds of our Religion, unto which all other doctrines are to be consonant: as also a Form of Divine worship and Ecclesiastical Government, in like manner warranted by the word, and to be observed of us all under any civil punishment that it shall please the said Majesty, and state to inflict, under whose authority alone, we desire to exercise the same: and unto whose punishment alone we desire to be subject if we shall offend against any of those Laws and Canons that themselves shall approve in manner aforesaid: and our desire is, Not to worship God in dark corners, but in such public places and at such convenient times as it shall please them to assign, to the intent, that they and their officers may the better take notice of our offences (if any such shall be committed in our Congregations, and assemblies) that they may punish the same accordingly. And we desire we may be subject to no other Spiritual Lords but unto Christ, nor unto any other Temporal Lords but unto themselves, whom alone in this Earth we desire to make our Judges and supreme Governors and Overseers in all causes Ecclesiastical whatsoever, renouncing as Antichristian, all such Ecclesiastical powers as arrogate and assume unto themselves under any pretence of the Law of God or man, the said power which we acknowledge to be due only to the Civil Magistrate. 32. So long as it shall please the King and civil State (though to the great derogation of their own authority as we may have occasion hereafter to prove) to maintain in this Kingdom, the State of the Hierarchy or Prelacy: We can (in Honour to his Majesty and the State, and in desire of peace) be content without envy to suffer them to enjoy their state and dignity, and to live as brethren, amongst those ministers that shall acknowledge spiritual homage unto their spiritual Lordships, paying unto them all temporal duties, of tenths and such like: yea and joining with them in the service and worship of God so far as we may do it without our own particular communicating with them in those humane Traditions and rites, that in our consciences we judge to be unlawful. Only we crave in all dutiful manner that which the very Law of Nature yields unto us, that for as much as they are most malicious enemies unto us and do apparently thirst either after our blood, or shipwreck of our faith and consciences, that they may not hence forth be our judges in these causes, but that we may both of us stand as parties at the bar of the Civil Magistrate to be tried in those differences that are between us, and that when they shall publicly malign or slander us or our cause, it may be lawful for us in a dutiful, sober, peaceable and modest manner without personal reproach or disgrace, in as public manner justify ourselves, and then instead of that silly mockservice to the King of wearing a linen rag upon our backs or making a Christless Cross upon a Babies face, we shall be ready to perform and yield triple homage, service, and tribute unto him, and shall think our lives and all that we have too vile to spend in the service of him and the civil state under him. FINIS. A PROPOSITION CONCERNING KNEELING in the very Act of RECEIVING. Howsoever, Published to satisfy Professors, yet humbly Submitted to the Judgement of PROPHETS. ROM. 14.10, 11, 12. Why dost thou condemn thy Brother, For it is written, I live (saith the Lord) and every Knee shall bow unto me. So then, every one of us shall give accounts of himself unto God. 1 COR. 10, 14, 21. Flee from Idolatry, Ye cannot be partakers of the Lords Table, and of the Table of Devils. Printed in the year, 1660. To my Christian Friend, N. Grace and Peace. HOwsoever it grieveth me to hear of, much more to see the troubles wherewith Satan (knowing his time to be short) doth trouble the Church of God in all places, about unprofitable and Popish Ceremonies, yet (to tell you the whole troth) my Grief is the less, when I consider that both they themselves, who be most troublesome, and do most urge those Relics of Rome, be ambitious, or Dumb Dogs, or Non-Resident, serving their Bellies, Rom. 16.17, 18 Phil. 3.2, 19 Gal. 6.12. and minding Earthly Things, even like their Predecessors, who urged the Ceremonies of MOSES in the Primitive Churches, and their proceed, (like themselves) be so exorbitant that they cannot but prove odious to all men. What a matter is this, that after the Sacramental Bread is ministered, the Cup should be denied because of not Kneeling? If any of these scrupulous Ministers had played such a part, though it were with one openly known to live in sin, notorious without repentance, whom by the 26. Canon no Minister shall in any wise admit to the Receiving of the Holy Communion, how would that Precisian be trounced. But in this Puritan Government of the Church there is no fault but Non Conformity to superstitious vanities; A Bird of their feather may Preach scores of Popish Doctrines, be scandalous in Life, and at his last cast at Dice when he hath lost all, say; In the Spite of God let him do now what he can, and yet hold his own well enough; An other Mans own and ill enough, I might well say if the Law might have due course: well, God amend all, and restrain the remnant of this Rage. In the mean while I rejoice to hear that it is given to any of God's people not only to believe in Christ, but also to suffer for his sake, having the same fight which they see or hear to be in their Ministers, as it becometh the Gospel of Christ, the sincerity whereof belongeth as well to the people as to the Ministers of Christ. Phil. 1.27. For howsoever all are not to wear the Whore of Babylon's Smock, yet all are to make conscience of bowing the Knee to Baal. To confirm your zeal against the superstition of KNEELING, I have long sought (being often solicited so to do by you) and at length found a short but (in my poor judgement at least to me) a sufficient discourse which I have printed, that I may comfort not only you, but many others also who are in doubt, with that comfort wherewith I myself am comforted of God. I say comforted. For when the judgement is satisfied the heart is comforted; This only I require of you that there be no enquiring after or guessing at the Author or Publisher. If that hurtful curiosity were mortified, learned men now fearing that humour would be bolder to write and publish their Godly Judgements, touching points in controversy; among other I hear of a more large and learned Treatise of this point, which no doubt the Author will publish in time, or other for him, if curious Heads, itching Ears, and wanton Tongues, do not hinder. In the mean while let us make as good use of this, as we can, And the Lord give us understanding in all things. Farewell. CHAP. II. KNEELING in the very Act of Taking, Eating and Drinking the Sacramental Bread and Wine, in the holy Communion, cannot be without sin. 1. IT is to be understood, that, howsoever Kneeling may (in itself considered) be esteemed a natural gesture of the body, as standing, sitting, etc. yet in this case, it is by Institution of Man. For neither nature nor custom, doth teach us ordinarily to kneel when we eat and drink, neither doth the Word require Kneeling in this case. 2. If it be by institution, it must be either in respect of a more reverend receiving, or not. But if the most solemn sign of reverence (used in these parts of the World) be without all respect of reverence, and that by Institution of Authority, in so high a part of God's Service, may not such Kneeling be judged, if not a gross mocking of Christ, as was the Soldiers their bowing of knees before him, Matth. 27.29. Mal. 1.6, 7. yet a taking the name of God in vain. Seeing all significations of honour, in God's Service, aught to be to the honour of his Name, Jer. 4.2. and an Oath not religiously intended (as in the nature thereof it ought to be) to the Honour of God, is the taking of God's Name in vain. 2 Kings 5.18. Did Naaman newly brought to the knowledge of God, attribute so much to bowing in the house of Rimmon when his Master leaned on him, so that it was not his voluntary Act? And shall we, who have had the Gospel long, kneeling by Institution and determination, in a principal part of God's Service, make no account whether we Honour GOD, or no, by such kneeling? 3. If Kneeling be instituted for a more reverend receiving, than it must be either in regard of God, or of Bread and Wine; If in regard of God then must we be well persuaded that such kneeling is an acceptable service unto his Majesty. Rom. 12.1. & 14, 15, 23. Isa 29.13. Matth. 15.9. And that this may be, we must consider, whether such kneeling be a Will-worship or a service reasonable, and according to Gods Will. Lest otherwise we find ourselves so far from honouring God, as that we provoke him. As did Nadab and Abihu, who offered incense, Levit. 10.1, 2, 3. but not with the very fire which God appointed, and were therefore devoured with fire. And as did King David, and the Priests, 1 Chron. 13.10. & 15.12, 13. who carried the Ark otherwise than it ought to have been, and therefore Vzza died for it, with a sudden death. For God will be sanctified (if not by, yet) in all them that come near him. 4. But kneeling is contrary to the example of Christ, and his Apostles, who ministered and received sitting, Luke 22.14. or in such a gesture as in those countries' was most used at eating. From which example to differ, without warrant from God's word cannot be without fault. Seeing examples of holy men, much more of Christ, are to be followed, except there be some reasonable cause to the contrary. 1 Cor. 11.1. And the Apostle to reform an abuse which crept (even in their times) into Love-feasts, which were immediately before, or after the Lord's Supper, did banish them thence, and reduced the manner of administering the Lords Supper to the first institution, saying; Shall I praise you in this? 1 Cor. 11.22, 23. I praise you not. For I have received of the Lord that which I have also delivered unto you, etc. Whereby it is apparent, that, that form of Administration, which differeth from the first Institution, is worthy no praise, and therefore no acceptable service to God. For if the Apostle would not tolerate an indifferent thing (as was a Lovefeast till then) to continue so near the Lords Supper, when it was abused, how would they allow the change of sitting into kneeling, especially in these two considerations? First, because the abuse of love feasts, (viz. superfluity) was never so great, and scandalous, in the Apostles time, as the abuse of kneeling (viz. Idolatry) was and is in the synagogue of Rome: And besides, Love-feasts were either before, or after the Lord's Supper, whereas kneeling is in the principal part of the holy Communion. Therefore if the Apostle banished Love-feasts from the Lords Supper, because of the abuse, and brought the Church to the simplicity of the first Institution, is it not a tempting sin to retain the idolatrous kneeling of Papists, and reject the exemplary sitting of our M. Christ? And the rather, because it is in that Sacrament, and in that part of the Sacrament, which especially setteth forth our communion with Christ, and his Church, and is therefore, called The Communion. 1 Cor. 10.16, 17. In due consideration whereof, how can we imagine that Christ hath any honour by our kneeling? Seeing it swerveth, not only from his example, but also from the practice of all reformed Churches, except in England, which the papists themselves call Puritan-Papistical, Concertatio Ecclesiae Cathol. in argu. for retaining this, and other popish corruptions: and, seeing it may be an argument (especially to a Papist not understanding our tongue) that we have communion with Antichrist, and his synagogue, at least in the idolatry of Bread-worship. Which our failing, or carelessness to avow our communion with Christ and his Church, and not abhorring all communion with Antichrist and his synagogue cannot be without grievous sin. Gal. 2.11, 12. Or else Paul sinned, when he rebuked Peter for not holding communion with the Gentiles converted, and wrote without good warrant, where he saith; If any lust to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the Churches of God. And in another place: 1 Cor. 11.16. 2 Cor. 6.15.17 Deut. 12.30, 31. What communion hath Christ with Belial? Come out, and touch no unclean thing. Doth not God straight forbid us to serve him as Idolaters do their gods? These things considered, can kneeling wherewith Papists do honour their breaden God, be honourable to Christ, in his holy Sacrament? 6. Secondly, whereas the end of a Sacrament is to inform the outward man, by sensible demonstrations, it pleased our Mr. Christ, to use such a gesture, as, agreeably with bread and wine, setteth out our communion and spiritual familiarity with him, and rejoicing in him. Revel. 3.20. And therefore as he saith, If any hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and sup with him, and he with me: Matth. 8.11. So he saith, Many shall come from the cast and west, and shall sit with Abraham, etc. By which place it appeareth that as by Supper, so by sitting, familiar rejoicing, or rejoicing familiarity is expressed. In which respects the Communion is called the Lords Supp●● and not a Sacrifice, 1 Cor. 11.2. & 10.21. and we are said to be partakers of the Lords table, and not of an Altar. And therefore not kneeling, and sitting is for receiving. We read not of any gesture of body prescribed, or observed in Circumcision and Baptism as in the Passeover and Lords Supper. Because there needs no material regard to be had of any certain gesture in the two former Sacraments, so the foreskin were cut off, and water be used: But in the other two, a gesture, answerable to the action is requisite. Exod 12.11. And therefore God prescribed to his people: when they were to fly out of Egypt, Num. 9.3.11, 12. Matth. 5.17 & 26.20. the gesture of loins girded, and staves in their hands, because the eating then of the Passeover was in haste. But that gesture being but for that time, as may appear by the omission thereof, when the observation of the Passeover was established, our Mr. Christ, who came not to break but fulfil the Law, and knew what was fittest to be done, did eat the Passeover sitting, a gesture more answerable to eating in peace, than the former used in Egypt. Whereby kneeling is convinced, as being a gesture altogether unanswerable to eating. And the rather, Job 38.2. 1 Cor. 11.25, 26. because it darkneth the counsel of God, and ●eing a sign of the greatest submission obscureth that rejoicing familiarity, which the Lords Supper signifieth and sealeth. Do we not condemn the Papists for ministering the Communion in one kind, because such an administration is against Christ his example, and doth not lively demonstrate the Lords death? Here a caveat is to be given, that none take occasion by this discourse, to justify the childish Pedagogy of signifying ceremonies devised by man, seeing sitting was used by Christ, and the signification thereof is found in Scripture. And therefore that childish Pedagogy is not justified by that worthy servant of Christ, Mr. Cartwright his judgement viz. That sitting doth signify our rest in Christ Jesus. 7. That kneeling may be more sound convinced as a will-worship, objections are to be answered. Therefore where it is supposed that Christ and his Apostles ministered and received fitting but by occasion, and not of purpose: because they were sitting before in eating the Passeover. Whereas if Christ had sitten down of purpose to administer the Communion, than all that is said is granted to be some purpose. The answer is short, yet full: Christ did sit of purpose, when he ministered his last Supper. For after the Passeover he risen, washed his Disciples feet, and sat down again. 8. If it be demanded, why the Church is not bound to the time of evening, as well as to the gesture of sitting, sigh Christ observed the one, as well as the other? It may be answered; John 13.4.12. Time being a common circumstance to every action (for nothing can be done, but in some time) the particular time is not to be observed, except Christ had sanctified it to the communion, as God sanctified the 7 th'. day, on which he rested, Gen. 2.2, 3. or (at least) chosen it of purpose, as he did sitting. But whereas it was upon special, Matth. 26.31.45. Luke 22.53. and necessary occasion, for the Passeover must be eaten before the L. Supper could be instituted in stead thereof: and presently after Supper the hour came, when Christ was to be betrayed. Therefore if the Jews transgressed not the Institution of the Passeover, by changing a gesture, at the first prescribed by God according to that their present occasion, into another fit for a time of rest, much less do Christians transgress the institution of the Lords Supper, by changing the time taken by Christ upon occasion, but not prescribed, into some other fit (in discretion) for the ordinary celebration of the Lords Supper, as probably the Primitive Churches did. For every ●●●st day of the week (viz. the Lords day) the brethren came together to break bread, Acts 2.42. & 20.7. 1 Cor. 16.2: Revel. 1.10 i. e. to minister the Communion. So that either they never met upon the L. day, but in the evening, or else they celebrated the Communion at some other times. But for my alteration of the gestures of sitting, especially into kneeling, there is the least probability. It is further objected; That we may kneel in regard of prayers to be used by prescription of authority, at the delivering of the bread and wine, viz. The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee, preserve thy body and soul into eternal life, and take and eat this, etc. Here unto these answers may be returned; Seeing we reject Christ's example of sitting for kneeling, we must not stand upon what we may do, but humbly consider what we must do. For if there be not a necessary and a justifiable cause both of those prayers, and of kneeling in regard of them, do we not presume upon Christ's patience, in rejecting his example? Now, what necessity is there of those prayers, at that very time? seeing prayers go before, and follow after. Again, must we needs kneel at every bit of a prayer? Is there more necessity to obey a needless direction to kneel at those prayers, than to follow the example ●f Christ, in sitting when we take, eat and drink, things required in the same sentences prescribed? And why must the people kneel, when they hear those prayers, rather than the Minister who pronounceth them? But it is a question, whether those prayers be justifiable or no. For besides that, by reason of them, Kneeling, devised and abused by Antichrist, Mat 6 7 & 26.26. etc. doth cross the practice of Christ and his Apostles, and they may seem a vain repetition: Even the adding of them to the words of Institution is contrary to the mind of Christ. For he did first bless or pray, and after gave the Elements, in a Sacramental form of words, without any addition, saying, take, eat, Mark 14.21. Luke 22.19, etc. etc. Which order of administration, and form of words, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Paul do so constantly, precisely, and sincerely related that any may perceive the meaning of the spirit to be. That the sacramental form of words ought precisely to be observed, without any addition. And the rather, because Paul beginneth his relation thus; 1 Cor. 11.23, 24. I have received of the Lord that which I have also delivered, etc. So that it may seem to be against Religion and Reason, that to a sacramental form of speech, wherein the Minister should only supply the person of Christ, there should be added a prayer, as in the name of the Church. This confusion is fit for Babylon, than for Zion. Lastly, Why is not a short prayer, after other going before as well joined to the sacramental form of Baptism: viz. N. I baptise thee in the Name of the Father, etc. Rom. 14.5.23: If then this addition of Prayer to the sacramental form of words, be not of faith, how then can we, with faith and a good conscience, confirm, or allow the same with our kneeling? 10. Lastly, for justifying of Kneeling, it is affirmed; That it is indifferent whether we sit, stand, or kneel: seeing Christ did sit, when he did eat the Passeover. Whereas God commanded the children of Israel in Egypt to eat the Passeover standing, and some Reformed Churches receive standing, for all that Christ did sit at his last Supper: Therefore the KING may appoint Kneeling, as the most reverend gesture, and best beseeming so holy an action. For answer whereunto, howsoever that which is already said may suffice. Yet it may be further considered, that though it be admitted, that it is indifferent to sit, or to stand, yet it doth not follow, that Kneeling is indifferent. For sitting is the example, and standing is a gesture sometimes used in ordinary eating, and (in the objection) it is said to be prescribed at a Sacramental feast. Again, it doth not follow; That because Christ used a gesture fit for eating in his time, instead of a gesture prescribed upon occasion, it is therefore lawful to use a gesture nothing answerable to eating, 1 Cor. 14.36. and that taken out of the Synagogue of Antichrist (as though the Word of God came out of it, or to it only) instead of a gesture most answerable to eating, and of purpose used by Christ at the Institution of the Sacrament. So that, notwithstanding all that is said for Kneeling, His Majesty (upon whom the burden as of this gesture, so of other Ceremonies, 2 Chro. 29.25. is laid) may remember, That Hezekiah appointed Levites in the house of the Lord, with Cymbals, etc. according to the commandment of David, and Gad the King's Seer, and Nathan the Prophet, for the commandment was by the hand of the Lord, and by the hand of his Prophets. And withal consider, that if Kneeling were the most reverend gesture, and best beseeming the holy Communion, our Lord and Master would not have sitten down of purpose, at his last supper. And that Ahaz was deceived in deeming the Altar at Damascus more honourable for God's service, 2 King. 16.10, 12.14.15. than the Altar of the Lord. 11. Having said that which may be sufficient to a man reasonable, and not contentious, against the institution of kneeling for supposed reverence in regard of God, it remaineth that somewhat be said against the institution of Kneeling, for reverence in regard of bread and wine, which need not to be much. For no sound Protestant of any knowledge, will affirm it, but rather presently consider, That if kneeling be instituted for reverence in regard of bread and wine, it must be either because they represent the body and blood of Christ, though remaining bread and wine touching their substance; And then for like reason, we may worship the Crucifix, and image of God, as the Papists do: Or, because Christ is really, bodily, and locally, though invisibly, present in them, either by Transubstantiation, according to the heresy of the Papists, or by Consubstantiation, according to the heresy of the Lutherans; These things cannot but be considered: And then it must needs follow, that if we abjure these heresies of Papists, and Lutherans, we must also abhor idolatrous, and superstitious kneeling, their daughter and Nurse, which was never heard of before Transubstantiation was hatched in the synagogue of Antichrist. Relics of Rome, fol. 98. & 99 Answ. to Mr. Juels' challenge, fol. 111. So that immediately after Pope Innocent decreed Transubstantiation, Pope Honorius decreed kneeling. Therefore if Harding doth grant that it is not well to kneel, but in regard of a real, and bodily presence; a sound Protestant should infer; But I detest your real presence, therefore I abhor your Idolatrous kneeling. 12. We are to abhor kneeling, not only because we abhor the heresies of worshipping Images, Transubstantiation, and Consubstantiation, but also, because it is the show of the greatest evils that ever were, 1 Thes. 5.22. viz. Idolatry in worshipping a God made of a piece of bread, and of communion with Antichrist, rather than with Christ; and therefore the greatest scandal that ever was, or can be, both in regard of those evils it doth occasionally teach, or confirm, as also in regard of multitudes (indeed the most part of people) either not sufficiently instructed in the right understanding, and use of the Sacrament, and therefore carried with a blind devotion learned by tradition, or corrupted (more or less) with the leaven of Popery. Who all in regard of their weakness, are endangered by this gesture, either grossly to commit the Idolatry of Papists, or to have a superstitious estimation of the outward Elements. And the rather, because by the 21 Canon it is provided: That no bread, and wine newly brought, shall be used, but first the words of Institution shall be rehearsed, when the said bread and wine be present upon the Communion Table. As if the words were Incantations, and the Table like the Altar which sanctifieth the Sacrifice. May not this Proviso seem (at least to the simple) to make way at least to the Popish consecration? How grievous a sin it is to scandalise the weak, may appear by the words of Christ, viz. Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones, it were better for him, that a millstone were hanged about his neck, Matth 18.6. and that he were drowned in the midst of the Sea. And of Paul: 1 Cor. 8.13. If meat offend my brother, I will eat no flesh, while the world standeth, that I may not offend my brother. What an offence or scandal is, the Apostle showeth in the same Chapter, viz. An occasion of falling to the weak. Verse 9 The particular offence he speaketh of is this: Notwithstanding the Gospel was preached a convenient time, and that by the Apostles, yet many wanted knowledge, Verse 7.10. and, even unto that time, did eat as a thing sacrificed to an Idol. Of whom if any should see a man endued with knowledge sit at Table in the Idols Temple, his weak conscience might occasionally be emboldened to eat those things which are sacrificed to Idols. If Paul would never eat flesh rather than he would offend in this case, Verse 12. because in so doing he should sinne against Christ; how dare a Christian, having knowledge, kneel in the presence of any, who, for want of knowledge, receive superstitiously. Of which sort, seeing there be so many even until this hour, and ever likely to be, that we know not when, and where to communicate without some such, either old, or young: It followeth, that as sitting at Table in the Idols Temple, could not be without sin, in the Apostles time, so kneeling cannot be without sin in these days, when the number of faithful Teachers is much decreased, but of Papists much increased, and by our kneeling much confirmed in their Bread-worship. Sum of the confession. p. 74. Therefore if his Majesty's judgement be sound, that the Surplice is not to be worn, if Heathenish men were commorant amongst us, who, thereby, might take occasion to be strengthened in their paganism? Shall we by our corrupt practice of kneeling, strengthen the Papists, who swarm among us in their Idolatry? Rub. after the come. Sect. 5. If the State doth well, in ordaining the Sacrament to be administered in usual bread to take away superstition, whereas Christ did by occasion, minister in unleavened bread, shall not we do ill, in teaching, or confirming superstition by kneeling, whereas Christ did of purpose minister sitting? Hom. against peril of Idol. part 3. Levit. 19.14. setting up of Images in Churches only to be laymen's books, is, by authority condemned, because they are as stumbling blocks in the way of the blind: So that they have been, are still, and will be hereafter worshipped by ignorant persons. Is not kneeling as scandalous? How can it then be justified? But is said, that the King's commandment taketh away scandal, in things indifferent. And it may be averred that this is a begging of the question, except it be proved by the word, that kneeling may be without sin, and that notwithstanding it be an institution of man, contrary to the example of Christ, a sign of communion rather with Antichrist and his synagogue of Rome, than which Christ and his Church, it have no proportion with sacramental eating, and have been, is, and will be bread-worship. But suppose that in itself it were as indifferent as was eating of flesh sacrificed to an Idol, 1 Cor. 10.27, 28. not in the Idols Temple, but at a private table where no weak ones were, in the Apostles time: yet how doth the King's commandment take away scandal from kneeling in public places? Doth it make all so sure, that none can be scandalised? Or, if that cannot be, doth it take away guiltiness from the scandalizer, as if all the blame of scandalising, were in the King's commandment? 1 Cor. 8.11. Numb. 35.37. 2 Sam. 11.15.16, 17. Surely it must be in the former, or else the latter cannot be, for by scandalising a weak brother perisheth. Of whose blood the scandalizer is guilty, as joab was of Vriahs' blood, notwithstanding the King's commandment. Here his Majesty known to be of a gentle disposition, and to have learned, yea professed better things in Scotland, is most humbly prayed, to take this word (King) as spoken in imitation, and understood of Cantor: who known to be of a violent disposition, did carry matters in the Convocation, and published Canons not orderly, and fully concluded, as some of his suffragan prelate's report, But it is impossible, that the King's commandment should make all so sure that none can be scandalised, the general ignorance of the people, the disposition, of the ignorant unto superstition, the old leaven of popery not purged and the multiplying of Papists, all well considered. Nay rather, It is likely, that by the commandementt the scandal will be the greater. Especially in regard of the 27 Canon, where ministers are commanded, under pain of suspension, not wittingly to administer the sacrament to any, but such as kneel. May not simple, and superstitious persons take occasion thus to argue? Why should kneeling be thus urged by authority, if the sacramental signs of the body, and blood of Christ, be no more to be reverenced, than water applied in baptising children? Seeing that is also a sanctified sign of Christ his blood, that washeth away our sins, and iniquities. To conclude, If kneeling in the very act of taking, eating, and drinking the sacramental bread and wine, in the holy communion, be (1) an institution of man. (2) If it be the taking of of God's name in vain, when it is without all respect of reverence (3) If God be not honoured thereby, except it be according to his will. (4) If it swarve from the example of Christ his sitting, and therefore deserveth no praise. (4) If it be a provoking sin to reject the exemplary sitting of Christ, whereby we show ourselves to be in communion with Christ, and the reformed Churches; and to retain kneeling, which for bread-worship, aught to be banished, and whereby we seem to be in communion with Antichrist, and his synagogue. (6) If it obscureth that rejoicing familiarity in and with Christ which the Lords supper signifieth. (7) If the argument from Christ his example be made the stronger, in that he sat of purpose. (8) If the lawfulness of choosing a fit time than the evening cannot justify our rejecting Christ his exemplary sitting. (9) If the bits of prayer joined with the words of institution do make kneeling the more sinful. (10) If kneeling be not as indifferent, as standing, nor best beseeming the holy communion, and the King must appoint nothing but by the hand of the lord (11) If we ought to abhor kneeling, as we abhor the worshipping of Images, Transubstantiation, and Consubstantiation. (12) If to scandalise be grievously to sin, and kneeling be a show of the greatest evils, and withal the greatest scandal. And (13) If it be a begging of the question to affirm, kneeling to be indifferent, and the King's commandment (so called) doth rather increase, than lessen scandal by kneeling, It may be averred, that kneeling in the very act of Taking, eating, and drinking the sacramental bread and wine, in the holy communion, cannot be without sin. A SHORT TREATISE OF THE CROSS in BAPTISM Contracted into this SYLLOGISM. No religious use of a Popish Idol, in God's public service is indifferent, but utterly unlawful: But the use of the Cross in Baptism is a religious use of a Popish Idol in God's public service. Ergo. The use of the Cross in Baptism is not indifferent but utterly unlawful. Printed in the year 1660. Of the Sign of the Cross in Baptism. The use of the Cross in Baptism is not a thing indifferent, but utterly unlawful. For this reason. IT is against the Apostles precept 1. John 5.21. Babes keep yourselves from Idols. Proof of the Major. For the explanation whereof two things are to be scanned, first: what is meant by an Idol. Secondly: how far we are to keep ourselves from the Idol. An Idol is whatsoever besides God is worshipped with divine honour. And though some restrain an Idol to a visible form, because it is derived apo tou eidous yet as a learned writer observeth a Zanch de redemp, lib. 1. cap. 17. Thes. 5. They which will treat of all sorts of Idolatry, must needs take the name of an Idol in a larger signification. By the name therefore of an Idol is understood whatsoever besides the true God a man doth propose or frame to himself to be worshipped, either simply, or in some respect. Neither is this spoken without good reason, for nothing is properly an Idol, as it is a visible form, but as it is religiously worshipped. If therefore it be worshipped it may be an Idol, though it be no visible shape, otherwise the worshipping of Angels and the souls of just men were no Idolatry, seeing these are invisible spirits, and therefore the sign of the Cross If it be religously worshipped, may prove an Idol though it be transiens quiddam a thing vanishing in the Air and no permanent form. For as that learned Zanchy speaketh there is a two fold Idol, the one real the other imaginary, conceived only in the mind. How far we to keep our are selves from an Idol. For answer to the second question. Men may keep themselves from Idols two ways: vix. a cultu, & ab usu Idoli: from the worship, and from the use of the Idol. For the first, b 1 Cor. 10.15 10.13. S. Paul is so strict that he alloweth not the Christians so much as to be present in the Temple at the Idolatrous feasts, though they did it without any internal opinion, or external action of worshipping the Idol. But John in this place doth not speak so much of the worship as the use of the Idol for (as Aug. in psa. 113. well observeth) the Apostle commandeth that they avoid not only the the worship of the Images, but also the Images or Idols themselves. Now the use of an Image, or Idol, may be civil or religious, and both of them public or private. That an Image, even such an Image as is Idolatrously worshipped, may be made and retained for civil respects of ornament, story or such like: we make no question, though the tolerating of them in open and public places, even extra cultum, be offensive and turn into a snare, as gideon's Ephod was to his posterity, when it was abused to Idolatry. And upon this ground we yield, that though the Cross be apparently an Idol, yet in Prince's Banners, Coronations, Coin, Crown, or any other Civil respect it may have a lawful use: But that any thing of man's devising being worshipped as an Idol, should be used religionis, ergo: and in the worship of God, seemeth directly against S. John's precept, for, how do I keep myself from the Idol, or how do I show my zealous detestation of that filthy Idolatry, when I retain it, and use it so honourably, as in the Temple, in the Sanctuary; in the service of God. Which interpretation of this place of S. John, the Church of England c Homil against peril of Idolatry part 2. Exod. 23. & 34 13, Deut. 7, 5, Psa. 16.4. doth on the warrant of Tertullian approve and commend. And this point is further strengthened by the second commandment: which forbiddeth not only to worship, but even to make an Image, or any similitude whatsoever, to wit, ad cultum, or for religious use: as according to the Scripture the best interpreters, d Calvin. insti. lib. 1 cap. 11, Ursin cathe. in exposit secundi▪ precept. Pet. Martyr loc. come. cla. 2. cad. 5. sect. 22 Hooper in 2 precept Zanch. de redempt lib. 1. cap. 15. Bagington on the 2 commandment. Perk. sermon cause cap. 21 Allen on the 2 come. Dod on the 2. come, partly against Images in Churches, partly on the words of the precept, do most naturally expound it. For surely, if Idolatry itself, as a most execrable thing be forbidden, than all occasions and means leading thereunto are likewise prohibited. And what stronger provocation to that spiritual whoredom, then erecting Images in the place of God's worship? For as Augustine well observeth, in Psal. 113. Idols or Images, have greater power to corrupt a silly soul, in that they have a mouth, eyes, ears nose, hands, feet, then to correct it, in that they neither hear, smell, etc. And therefore without doubt, the meaning of the commandment is to bind the Church from all such snares and allurements to sin, and therefore doth Aug. in quest● sup. Levit. q. 68 well conclude from this commandment, that such making of an Idol can never be just or lawful. Now if no similitude at all be tolerable in God's service; then much less any that hath been and is worshipped Idolatrously. Tertullian against the Gnostics accounted them Idolaters, not only which worshipped, but those also which made and retained Images (nempe ad cultum or for holy use) & in his Book de Idololatria, he vehemently reproved the very makers of Images, though they did not themselves worship them, which showeth in what execration the primitive Churches held any religious use of an Idol. The like we may find in Epiphanius ad Johannem Epumm Hicerosal. where he reporteth, that finding an Image of Christ, or some Saint, hanging at a Church door, he rend it in pieces, avouching that to hang a picture in the Church of Christ, was contrary to the authority of the Scriptures and the Christian religion. From hence I conclude, that if the godly fathers were so vehement, against erecting Images of Christ, and of the Saints, even at that time before any worship was given unto them; Much more would they withstand it now, after men have made Idols of them. And if they would not suffer an Idol so much as in the place of God's worship: would they endure themselves to use such an Idol as the Cross in the service and sacraments of God. Their zeal against that spiritual fornication, would never permit them so highly to honour such an execrable thing neither was their zeal herein without ground of knowledge: for the spirit of God in psal. 115.8 speaking of Idols, they (saith he) that make them are like unto them, and so are all they that trust in them Where a plain difference is made between makers and worshippers of Idols and both condemned, as cursed transgressors of the law, shall any then make the Idol of the Cross, and that for religious use: and yet be innocent? Hsa. 16.14. Questionless by David's example we must make no mention, that is to keep no honourable memory of an Idol, and therefore without doubt, Isa. 50.22. not give it so much honour as to use it, or the memorial thereof in the house of God and in his holy worship, but as Isai saith, we must pollute the relics and the very covering, and ornament of the Idol, and cast them away as a menstruous cloth, and say unto it, get thee hence. Proof of the Minor. Now if any doubt, whether the sign of the Cross be adored, and so made an Idol: let them well consider the tract of Bellarmine, de adoratione crucis, where distinguishing the Cross on which Christ was hanged, from the similitude thereof, he saith: other crosses like to this are accounted sacred images. And after he distinguisheth those similitudes of Christ's Cross, into the Image, and sign of the Cross; so that if the Image of the Cross be taken for an Idol (and who knoweth not that it is the universal Idol of popery▪ and to be adored, even cultu latriae (which worship as they themselves hold, is due only unto God): the sign of the Cross must needs be taken for no better. Besides, the said Bellarmine having (as is said) distinguished the Cross into three sorts, the true Cross, De Image lib. 1. 30. the Image of the Cross, and the sign of the Cross: he layeth down this doctrine generally of them all, we adore all crosses, and particularly, of the sign of the Cross he saith The sign of the Cross which is made in the forehead, or in the air, is sacred and venerable. To this agreeth Portiforium Sarish. 4. where it is thus professed, we adore the sign of the Cross, by which we have received the Sacrament of Salvation. And that the Image and sign of the Cross is of one, and the same account with Papists, appeareth evidently as by divers, so particularly by Hart. For Doctor Reynolds (e) showing that the Church of England, hath justly left the sign of the Cross out of the supper for the Idolatry thereof, Confer. with Hart, cap, 8. divis. 4. doth prove that it is worshipped as an Idol, by such testimonies as indeed belong to the Image of the Cross, which Hart no way excepting against, doth imply, that look what estimation they have of the Image, the same they have of the sign, and what honour is due to the one is due to the other. For in very deed, they carefully teach, that it is not in regard of the matter, wherein the Cross is painted, Andra Orthod. expli. lib. 9 Bellarmine de imag. lib. 2. cap. 30. Tho. Aquin. part. 3. quest. 2 art 4. and divers other. ibidem. or the colour whereby it is shadowed, but only and simply for the expressing of the likeness of Christ's cross, and for the representing of Christ crucified (which the sign performeth as well as the Image) that they adore the cross with the same honour, that is due unto Christ himself. And this no doubt was the meaning of Aquinas when he saith, that every effegies or likeness of the cross (whereof the sign is one) is to be adored cultu latriae, and Costerus doth avouch, that the same worship is due to the sign, as belongeth to the very cross of Christ, when he saith (though falsely (f) The Christians from Christ's time hither unto have worshipped with the highest honour, Coster Enchri cap 11. Orthod explice. lib. 9 both the wood of the Lords cross, and the sign of the Cross, with which they daily sense themselves. Mark, that the sign of the cross is worshipped with the highest degree of honour, and as Andradius, (g) in express words saith, in the same manner, that the Image of Christ himself is worshipped, than the which, what can be more clear to prove, that not only the Image, but the sign of the cross is by the Papists most Idolatrously worshipped. If any say: that to the sign of the cross none boweth the knee, or vaileth the bonnet, and therefore it is not adored: I answer first that adoration is intern & extern, and the extern adoration is therefore Idolatry, because it proceedeth from the intern, Zanc. de redemp. lib. 1. cap 17. Thes. 5. Eph. 5.6. Colos. 5. Mark 10.24. 1 Tim. 6.19. Luke 12.15. Phil. 3.19. as Zancheus (h) very learnedly, and largely showeth. If a man invocate to an Angel, or give any honour internal to a creature, shall it not be called Idolatry except he bow outwardly unto it? How then doth Paul say, that covetousness is Idolatry? For a rich man doth not outwardly worship his goods, yet because he giveth unto it intern confidence which is due unto God, it is truly called his Idol, as unto the Sardanapali. (q) their belly is termed their God. Right so the Papists ascribing to the sign of the Cross, that honour and confidence which belongeth to God, do make it an execrable Idol, and so most unfit to stand in the sanctuary, or to be annexed to the holy things of God. Quest. disputat. devenal pecto de effect. Sacrament. lib. 2. 1 Tim. 4. sect. 13 14. Bellar. de effect. sacra. lib. 2. cap. 31. For first they ascribe unto the sign of the cross power and virtue, to merit pardon at least for venial sins as appeareth by (k) Tho. Aquinas, Bellarmine, and Rhemists: Also it is held to partake of power efficient, and immediately (l) operative, and that to convert sinners, Martial de cruse, fol. 114, 115. Yea to gain salvation, Hosius contra Brent. pag. 227. saith unto a rude Clown whole dull understanding cannot reach to higher things, this only (saith he) sufficeth for his salvation; and generally the whole rabble of Romish Doctors do teach to put great affiance in this sign for chase away Devils, and curing diseases, and sanctifying both man and other creatures, to the use of man. Secondly, I say indeed they do give outward, as well as inward worship to the cross. For it is apparent that they invocate it in the same manner, In officio sanct. cruse, printed in English Anno 1599 that they invocate Saints when they say, by this sign of holy cross let evils all fly far from us Again, by the sign of the holy cross, from our enemies deliver us O Lord our God. Also in another place, victorious cross and admirable sign, make us triumph and joy, in heavenly Courts divine. Yea in prayers they join it with Jesus Christ, as in Officio missae is to be seen, where they supplicate: By the mercy of Jesus Christ, by the aid and sign of the cross, by the entercession of the blessed Virgin, Hor. present ad usum Sarum Parisus impres. anno 1498. etc. They couple it also with the blood of Christ in these words; Defend me Jesus, from all evil vices passed, present, and to come, by the sign of holy cross: and by the inestimable price of thy just and precious blood. All which doth most manifestly prove, that among the Papists, it is religiously honoured both with inward confidence, and outward reverence. And therefore if their Idols may in no sort be annexed to the service of our God, the cross in Baptism ought necessarily to be crossed and cursed out of our Liturgy. Neither is it a sufficient answer to say, that the cross amongst us is neither in number nor in use, the same that theirs is, and though their cross be an Idol, yet ours is not. For when God commanded his people to break down the Images of the Heathen, and to extinguish the very name of them; had they performed that charge, if they had burnt all the Idols of Canaan, and afterward made new of the same form, and to another use though not Idolatrous, yet religious? Or how have we discharged our duties and shown our detestation of that filthy Idolatry, if having defaced all the popish Crucifixes and Idols, we erect them new in our Church though not to Worship them, yet to any other holy use whatsoever. It is true that our cross, and theirs is the same both in name, & form, but not in use, for than it were Idolatrous; now I do not say that the Church of England doth commit Idolatry, but that it ought to abstain not only from Idolatry or Worship, but even from all religious use of such humane Ordinances and inventions, which others have and do Idolatrously adore. For if to erect Crucifixes, and other Popish Images for holy use be (contrary to the Commandment) a keeping of an honourable memory of the Idol, Exod. 23 13. Deut. 12.2. Hos. 2 17. how can the religious use of the cross in Baptism being as well an Idol as any of their Images, be retained without breach of the Law, Babes keep yourselves from Idols. Objection. The sign of the cross in the first institution was free from superstition and Idolatry, and if the abuse which grew after be removed, Of this nature are Churches, Pulpits, etc. things of necessary use and warranted by God himself but the retaining of the Brazen Serpent was not where commanded. why should it not recover his ancient use and indifferency, like as the Bread in the Lord's Supper which the Papists do religiously adore? Answer. There is great difference between that which God hath created and commanded, and that which man hath ordained, for the one is necessary, and no abuse can alter the nature of it, the other indifferent, and by abuse may become unlawful, and therefore Hezekiah did worthily break the brazen Serpent, not seeking to redress the abuse of it. Now howsoever Bellarmine would insinuate that the cross is founded on Scripture, yet the weakness of his Arguments do bewray the unsoundness of the matter, Aut enim signum crucis habere vim spiritualem potissimum ex institute Dei. lib. 2. de effect. sacram & lib 2. de Imag. cap. 29 conatur venerationem crucis Scripturae autoritate stabilire de corona mil. and therefore Tertullia's judgement is to be preferred, which plainly saith; that there is no warrant in Scripture for it. His words be, (n) If thou seek any Law for this in Scripture, thou shalt find none. Tradition is avouched to be the Author, Custom the Confirmer, and Faith the Observer. Now it is further to be noted that a double use of the cross is mentioned in antiquity, the one Civil, the other Religious, against the former we do not dispute, yielding all reverence to those Christians, which by that note shown their rejoicing and glory, in that which the Heathens counted their shame, but now, that abuse hath turned both the Image and the sign of the cross into an Idol, it seemeth thereby to be made execrable. For gideon's Ephod being first a Civil monument of victory, when the people went a whoring after it, was it lawful for the Magistrate to erect in the Tabernacle or Synagogue though not the same, yet the like, both in name and form to any religious use? would it have sufficed to say this is not the same Ephod that Israel maketh an Idol of, neither is it set here to be worshipped (for your brethren do grievously sin therein) but only to keep in mind the great victory that God by Gideon gave to Israel. Right so the cross used by the Ancients, to show that they were not ashamed of Christ crucified being merely civil, and yet expressing a most Christian resolution, having been abused, yea, continuing to be worshipped both in Image and in sign, it seemeth that this filth hath made it unfit, on any pretence of restoring it to his ancient use, to be annexed to the holy things of the Sanctuary: especially while there are so many Papists that superstitiously abuse it among us. Now for the religious use of the cross by the Ancients, it was never free from sin and superstition as afterwards is showed, and if it were, yet being an humane Ordinance, and now not only abused to Idolatry, but becoming itself a most abominable Idol, no water can cleanse it, nor any pretext purify it for the holy service of Jehovah. But in very deed, to speak as the truth is, the cross is retained among us with opinion very superstitious and erroneous, for in the late Canons Canon 30. it is said, that the child (c) is thereby dedicated unto the service of him that died on the cross. What is this but to equal Man's Ordinance with Gods, and to ascribe that unto the cross, Tertullian de baptiz. cap, 7, 8, Euseb. lib 6. which is due unto Baptism? a conceit fit for ignorant Papists, then learned Christians to consent unto. Neither do we use it as the Ancients did, for Cyprian, Augustin, Chrysostom and others, (m) it is apparent that those times did consecrate the Elements therewith, and did not cross the child's forehead at all, but referred that unto the Bishop's confirmation, so that our crossing the Infant's forehead and not the Element of Baptism is a mere novelty without any warrant of that antiquity, Cap 24 Innocint. ep st cap. 3 Rab. made inst c eric. cap. 3. Du●and. de ritib. Eccle. lib 1. cap. 20. Our use of the cross. Novelty of some 60 years standing. neither will that place of Tertullian De resurrectione carnis, prove the contrary. The flesh is washed that the soul may be purged, the flesh is anointed that the soul may be consecrated, the flesh is signed that the soul may be guarded, the flesh is shadowed by the Imposition of hands, that the soul may be by the spirit enlightened, the flesh doth feed on the body and blood of Christ, that the soul may be filled and fatted of God. In which words he joining together divers ceremonies of the Christians, doth indeed mention the signing of the faithful, but it may as well be referred to confirmation expressed by imposition of hands as to Baptism, understood by the washing of the body and that one better reason, for it is more than probable that the sign of the cross was not yet used in Baptism, As for Martial his Epistle are justly suspected. seeing Justin Martyr in defence. ad Antoninum & Tertul. de Baptismo & de corona militis, do describe the form of Baptism used in those times, and yet make no mention of the cross therein, which in all likelihood they would not have omitted if it had been used therein, especially Tertullian, who in that place speaketh of the cross, as used out of Baptism in the ordinary blessing of themselves. Objection, But the sign of the cross is not used in Baptism, but when Baptism is ended Answer. ●f you take Baptism only for that dipping and sprinkling of the party it is true, and so none of the popish additions, whereby they defile that holy Sacrament are in Baptism, for those which Bellarmine accompany Baptism are not impious, but if you take Baptism as indeed we do, for the administration of the Sacrament, then both the prayers before & the prayers after, the actions after the dipping; do all indifferently belong to one and the self same thing, yea it is all one continual action of the Administration of the Sacrament. Sure it is that it must be said to be, either in Baptism or out of Baptism, or no where; if it be out of Baptism, how is it by common consent of all, said to be the sign of the cross in Baptism. Object. The sign of the cross is very ancient. Answer. So are many other Popish Traditions: And if on that ground we are to retain it, why do we not give the baptised milk and honey accordingly. Why do we not bring offerings for the dead. For Tertullian the first of the Fathers that ever mentioned the cross, doth establish these, and the sign of the cross, by one and the self same warranty. Besides, if upon the Father's Tradition we use the cross, then must we receive and use it as they have delivered it unto us, that is, with opinion of virtue and efficacy, not only in the act of blessing ourselves, and in the expelling of Devils, but even in the consecration of the blessed Sacrament. For the first, Tertullian is witness, De coron mil. saying, At every passage, at every setting forward, at every coming in and going out, at putting on of our , shoes, etc. We stamp our forehead with the sign of the cross. For chase of Devils, Jerom counseleth Demetrius to use the cross, saying. Epistola ad Demetriam. Lib. 4. cap. 17. And with often crossing guard thy forehead; that the destroyer of Egypt find no place in thee. L●●tantius saith, Christ's followers do by the sign of the cross, shut out the unclean spirit. Chrysostom in Psalm 109. The cross guardeth the mind, it taketh revenge on the Devil, it cureth the diseases of the soul, etc. But these superstitions are small in regard of that efficacy which in the Sacraments, antiquity ascribed unto the cross, for Cyprian (being the ancientest that maketh mention of the cross in Baptism) speaking of it. Whose virtue, perfecteth all Sacraments, without which sign nothing is holy, nor any consecration taketh effect, Cyprian de pasione. and whosoever are the Ministers of the Sacraments, whatsoever hands do dip or anoint the comers to Baptism, out of whatsoever mouth the sacred word do preceded, the Authority of Operation doth by the sign of the cross, make effectual Sacraments. It were superfluous to rehearse the rest. But hereby it is evident that the religious use of the cross, was even at the first sinful and superstitious, neither can it be showed, that ever it was used by the Fathers, religionis ergô sine admixta superstitione, and this invention did no sooner creep into the Sacrament, but it drew unto itself such superstitious conceit of efficacy and necessity, that without it the means which God appointed for the consecration of the Elements seemed over-weak, Lately in Surry a child rebaptised, because the cross was omitted. yea, unavailable, according as some (e) amongst us account not their children lawfully baptised, yea will have them rebaptised, if the cross have been omitted, out of which may be observed, first how dangerous a thing it is to bring any humane invention into the service of God, sigh in the very pure age of the Church, it was punished with such a spiritual curse of horrible superstition. Secondly, though at this time popery was not hatched, yet the mystery of iniquity was then a working, and the beginning as it were of the whorish fornications was found even in the Father's times, so that, as worshipping of Angels in Paul's time, Colosi. 2.18. prayers and oblations for the dead in Tertullia's time, be rightly counted Popish and Antichristian, though as yet that monster was not born: So this and other ceremonies ratified by the popish canons and constitutions, may well be taken for Popish and Antichristian, even in the Father's times, seeing they then made away for the beast, and since have received further impiety and authority from him: Esay. 52.11. wherefore to conclude as Isay exhorteth God's people, to keep themselves from the rites and pollutions of the heathen, saying, depart, depart ye, go out from them and touch no unclean thing: So the spirit in the same manner chargeth the Church not to meddle with the corruptions of Antichristian Babylon, but go out of her my people saith he, that ye may not be partaker of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. Apoca. 18.4. The fear of which curse doth keep us from all the superstitious and Idolatrous ceremonies of that whorish Synagogue.