Gemitus Plebis: OR A Mournful Complaint AND SUPPLICATION In behalf of the more weak and ignorant of the people of this Nation.  
Drawn up for them by a Friend, whose deep sense of his own ignorance and weakness, hath taught him to be compassionate towards all that labour under the same infirmities.  
By C. RAY.  We roar all like Bears, and mourn sore like Doves, we look for judgement, but there is none, for salvation, but it is far from us, Isa. 59 11. Tolerabilius est Deo quempiam cum ignorantia in humilitate jacere, quam cum elatione alta sapere, Greg. in Mor. Si propter eos solos Christus mortuus est, qui certa intelligentia possunt ista disc●rnere, penè frustra in ecclesia laboramus, August. Epist. 102. 
LONDON, Printed by R. Ibbitsan, for Tho. Newberry, at the Sign of the Three Lions in Cornhill, 1656.   

To the Honourable the Knights and Burgesses, chosen for this present Parliament in the County of Suffolk.  
NOBLE PATRIOTS,  
THis Supplication which now presents itself unto your Honour's view, was drawn up in much grief and anguish of spirit, lamenting to see the sad condition of the people of this Nation, in order to their souls, and everlasting state; whilst after a long expectation of some happy Reformation, they are found partly sinking by degrees into the gulf of Profaneness and Atheism, partly hurried on by the wind of strange doctrines upon the rocks of Heretical opinions, destructive to the very foundations of our holy Religion: Not much unlike the case of that ship wherein St. Paul was driven to Malta, whereof 
Act 27. 7  one part stuck fast in the earth, the other part was broken and driven away by violent waves. The sad apprehensions hereof caused me with a weak and trembling hand to draw up this Petition, imploring the aid of God and men, in this our sinking condition. It was indeed intended to be sent abroad in the world as a desolate orphan, without any discovery whence it came, or to whom in particular to apply itself. But after that divine providence had ordered the convention of this great Assembly, and assigned your Honours to bear a part in that trust, I was easily persuaded to presume so far upon your Christian charity, as to direct it first unto your doors, humbly casting both it, and myself down at your Honour's feet, beseeching you in behalf of the people of this Nation, as the passionate Father mentioned in the Gospel, did our Saviour in behalf of his son; If you can 
Mark. 9●  do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us. A case of higher concernment cannot be presented unto you, than this, wherein the honour of Christ, and salvation of so many thousand souls is engaged. And my hope is, that nothing will be more in your thoughts, than restoring beauty to Zion, and repairing the walls of Jerusalem so ruined every where. They seem to me too unreasonably to debase your honourable station, who would exempt the case of Christ, and the eternal salvation of souls from your care, leaving only the petty businesses of this world unto your cognizance; yea to deal most injuriously with you, persuading you to neglect that, the care whereof is your greatest honour, and security, and the neglect whereof, would certainly blast all your other proceed.  
Now the Lord vouchsafe to yourselves, and the rest of that Honourable Assembly, a large portion of that Spirit which he put upon Christ, the head of all powers, A Spirit of wisdom and understanding, of counsel and might, 
Isa. 11. 2.  of knowledge, and the fear of the Lord, and make you quick of scent, in what concerns the honour of Christ, the free course of his Gospel, and everlasting good of the people, and cause that all the mountains of difficulties that now lie in your way, may be turned into plains before 
Zach. 4. 7.  you, that in the end, the languishing hopes of the faithful in the land may be revived, the vowed Reformation of Religion accomplished, that we, and the following Generations may call you blessed, as being under God the happy instruments of repairing our breaches, and restoring our paths. Which is, and shall be the daily prayer of  
Your Honours, and of all that love the Lord Jesus, a worthless servant, C. RAY. Wast. Sept. 16, 6.   

To all those Faithful Ministers of Christ in the land, whose hearts are mourning under the Present distractions, and breathing after an happy reformation amongst us.  
Reverend Fathers and Brethren;  
THat so weak and worthless a creature hath presumed to speak thus loud in your ears, and by way of petition, to suggest to your wisdom; some things which will scarcely agree with the principles or practice of divers, whose more eminent piety and learning, hath made them, worthily precious and honourable in the Churches of Christ, I can give no better account, than what David mentioneth as forcing words unwillingly from him, My heart was 
Psal. 39 3  hot within me, thenspake I with my tongue.  
The Principal thing which hath stirred these passions, hath been the Consideration of the sad condition wherein the people of this Nation are left, whilst not alone some of their eminent Pilots seem to sit down in despair, as if nothing were to be done in these stormy times, but only to pray and wait for a calm, but even divers of those, whose more industrious spirits provoke them to action, appear to attend nothing more, but to get with the best of their goods unto the boat, leaving the ship to sink in the Sea, contenting themselves with such a reformation, wherein not alone the viler sort, whose open profaneness, and desperate contempt of God and Religion, proclaims them unworthy the name or privilege of Christians, but even the main body and bulk of the people are left, either in the state of absolute heathens, having none to take any pastoral care of their souls, or any other privilege for themselves or their children, then Jews or Turks might enjoy, if they lived amongst us, or else entertained as semi-Christians; neither fully owned nor cashiered, but wearing by halves the colours of Christ.  
Of how exceeding dangerous concernment such a reformation may prove, seems to me not hard to conjecture, especially being attempted in such a juncture of time, wherein the Magistrate hath in great part withdrawn his coercive power, as to things of Religion, leaving men to themselves, and the Devil hath so many agents at work, to seduce men from the very profession of Christ, and to entice them back into the Camp of the enemy.  
Suppose this course were taken with some mutinous or dubious army, that  

1 The more faithful part of the Soldiery were withdrawn from communion with them.  
2. Their voluntary tenders of renewing their engagement to their rightful Prince were rejected.  
3. The most desperate mutineirs, who are always soliciting a total revolt, were permitted and continued amongst them. It were easy to guests what were like soon to become of that Army.   
The deep apprehension of the sad consequents of such a reformation in order to this, and the following generations, considered, and compared with such remarkable signs of divine displeasure, as daily sound in our ears, hath caused me to forget my former resolution of silence, and how weakly so ever, to utter my poor thoughts in this case.  
When holy David in the height of his zeal, was bringing home the Ark of God to Jerusalem, and found by that dreadful 
2 Sam. 6  stroke upon Vzza, that somewhat was amiss, and God was offended, he is found to have laid aside, for the present, his former design, and to have fallen upon a serious enquiry; into the cause of this displeasure of God, which having wisely discovered; and timely amended, the work at the second attempt went on with happy success.  
Many of us have as David laid out our zeal in bringing the Ark of the Lord, I mean the presence of Christ in the power and purity of his worship, and Ordinances, home to our selves and our people, but have been enforced to behold such Stumbling of the Oxen, and so many of those that have driven the Cart, or laid their hands to the Ark, suddenly smitten either with death, or dreadful fits of quaking and giddiness, that nothing appears more necessarily incumbent on us at this time, than to enter a serious scrutiny what we have, done or wherein offended, that God should stop our way and brand our work with such evident signs of displeasure?  
Now, as at that time upon search it was found that the grand miscarriage was, that the Levites had been too favourable to themselves; spared their own shoulders too much, having found out an easier way to carry the Ark than God had appointed, making that the burden of Oxen, which should have 
1 Chron. 1● 12, 13, etc.  been born by themselves. So I cannot but fear that something equivalent may be found amongst us at this time. We have too much indulged ourselves, declined the labour imposed by Christ, and found out easier ways to carry the Ark, than his commands will allow.  
To cull out a few of the best of the people, or whose ways and principles do most suit with our own, these to new dip in water, new name them a Church, or to admit only them to a full communion with us in ordinances, leaving the rest of the people to wander as sheep in the mountains, affording them neither advantage of Sacraments to engage them to Christ, nor censures to awaken them out of their lusts, is a fare easier task, than by vehement endeavours, both public and private to bring back and engage the body of the people to Christ, and strenuously to draw forth the censures by him committed unto us, in revenge of all the stubbornness and disobedience of those, 
2 Cor. 10. 6 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mat. 18. 15  who shall contemn such applications as he hath appointed for their recovery.  
Now the former of these, as being much more facile and easy, hath (though under several and different forms) been attempted by many of us; but the latter, as much more painful and burdensome, We have either totally shunned, or performed by halves.  
Now if upon examination it should be found, that this forementioned way of reformation under what form so ever attempted, is no way approved by Christ, but a mere invention of man, to ease ourselves of the burden which it belongs to the Ministers of God to go under; We shall then see no cause to admire that God hath erected so many monuments of his displeasure, and caused a Perez Uzza to be written in so many places.  
How dangerous the least mistake in things of this nature is, both the case under our hands, and likewise that of Nadab, 
Deu. 10  and Abihu, do sufficiently witness, but when the miscarriage is such as may be rationally thought to endanger the loss of many thousand souls, bought by the blood of the Lord, and engaged in Covenant with him, yea the very undoing this and the following Generations; by dissolving the bonds betwixt Christ and this Nation, it cannot seem strange if God for one at that time, doth now erect many Pillars of Salt, and as any party hath traveled further in these ways, so the notes of his wrath be sound more signal on them.  
Now that the way before mentioned, notwithstanding some show of piety, in making or preserving a purity in Churches, or Ordinances; Yet truly is no way appointed by Christ, but like the new Cart made for the Ark at that time, a mere invention of man to ease ourselves of the burden, I cannot but vehemently suspect upon these following grounds, which I humbly present to your grave and mature consideration.  
1 Because I find not in Scripture, either precept or precedent for any such way of Reformation, though cases not unlike to ours, have often happened of old. Many revolts and backslidings of God's people stand upon record in Scripture with the ways and means of their recovery, but this way of drawing the more eminently pious into new societies, or the withholding the engaging seals of the Covenant from the People, when willing to renew their engagement, I never fixde recorded in Scripture. But on the contrary, those men whose names are precious in the book of God, for the glorious Reformations made in their days, as Asa, Hezekiah, Josia, 
2 Chron. 20. ● 35.  etc. are plainly found to have made it their great design, to bring back and engage the body of the people to God, and for that purpose to have attended nothing more earnestly, than to bind them in sacramental bonds to the Lord. Neither doth the Apostle Paul in order to the Churches of Corinth or Galatia, sadly corrupted, persuade either the sounder part to separate themselves into new Churches, or the Pastors to withhold the Sacraments from them till better reform, but on the 
1 Cor. 1. 10 1 Cor. 10. 21.  contrary earnestly, presseth Love and Union amongst them, and maketh advantage of their Sacramental engagements to Christ, to disengage them from their sinful corruptions.  
2 Neither do I know how to reconcile these proceed with the glorious promises contained in Scripture, of the great enlargement of the Church, or Kingdom of Christ in these Gospel times. Nothing seems more pregnant in the Prophets, than 
Isa. 2. 2  that the times of the Messiah, should be times of great increase to the Church, by flowing in of Nations to it. Now if we well consider how small a part of the World is at this present, or for many ages by past, hath been Christians, and 
Breerw. p. 118  how small a part of the Christian world, is so Orthodox in opinion, or regular in practice, as the body of the people amongst us, we must needs conclude, that if such as these be secluded, and a gathering made according to the mind of some of the stricter sort of our brethren, the Church of Christ would now be brought into much narrower bounds, than before the manifestation of Christ in the flesh; when I consider the Muster roll given in by Joab to David, I am enforced to think the 
1 Chron. 21. 5  Church at that time did not consist of less than five or six millions of Souls, & those (doubtless) much augmented in salomon's days, but should none be owned as Church members, but such as some of our Brethren aforesaid would admit, I question, whether the whole Christian world at this day, would afford a tenth of that number, neither have many ages since the manifestation of Christ in the flesh, been much happier than ours in the number of Orthodox Christians; so as whilst these separating ways seem to aim at the honour of Christ, in leaving none but precious stones in his building, they are found much to detract from his honour in another way, namely in abridging 
Prov. 14. 28  so much the number of his subjects.  
3 Neither do I know how to make these stricter proceed agree with the infinite grace & indulgence of God so much proclaimed in Scripture, and so often proved in his compassionate 
Exod. 34. 6  owning those that were once entered into Covenant with him, even then, when their dreadful revolts and manifold whordomes, 
Jer. 3. 1  did seem to cry aloud for a Bill of divorce. Now the people whose case I am pleading, are certainly entered into Covenant with God, being given up to him in the Sacrament of Baptism, and notwithstanding many miscarriages, are not found to have renounced this Covenant, they truly believe the fundamental Articles of our holy Religion, and even in their greatest extremities, when they are least like to dissemble, make profession thereof; so as they must of necessity be accounted Believers, not Infidels, men within, not without, according to the language of Scripture: Now how the rejecting these men, by hundreds and thousands, as if they were heathen, or debarring them from the Ordinances of Christ, unless upon their contumacious rejecting such applications as he hath appointed, will stand with this infinite grace and indulgence of God, I cannot conceive.  
4 The singular love and goodness of Christ, doth enforce to believe, that in his kingdom, salus populi, is lex suprema. That the Ordinances were made for man, not man for the Ordinances, and consequently that such ways as for preserving the purity of Ordinances, should destroy the souls of the people, can be no ways approved by Christ, now whether these ways of withdrawing the more devout and zealous part, from their communion, leaving them to wander in the wilderness as sheep without Shepherds, staving them off from renewing their engagements to Christ in that heart-melting Sacrament, be not destructive to the souls of the people, creating in them hard and uncharitable thoughts concerning the more eminently pious, leaving them under the guilt of a dreadful sin of omission, and hindering them from one special means of recovering strength against their corruptions, seems not hard to determine. For mine own part, I cannot but strongly conceive in this case, what Jonathan speaks in another, that divers of us have by our unadvised zeal hindered the people, and that a fare greater slaughter might have been made amongst the enemies 
1 Sam. 14. 30  of God, had the people been permitted more freely to taste this heavenly food.  
5 When I consider this way of proceeding, in order to people wherein they are excluded, from communion in Sacraments, and in the mean time, admitted to their wont communion, in prayers, praises, humiliations, etc. I cannot find that clearness of Scripture, evidence for this halving in point of communion, that should warrant our faith to expect the presence or blessing of Christ upon such kind of censures; I have according to my poor ability, considered what hath been published by some reverend Brethren in defence of suspensions, but am enforced still to conceive, that the communion of christians one with another, lieth as truly (though peradventure with some gradual difference) in prayer, as in breaking of Bread; and that the vast difference that now we have 
Act. 2. 42  made, admitting all to communion in one, and so few in the other, was never learned from the rules or examples in scripture, nor yet from the practice of the Primitive Church, whether Jewish or Christian, and consequently that if we will bring up our censures to the rules and patterns aforesaid, we must remove the rail from the communion table, and set it nearer the door of the Church.  
6 Were these suspensions never so clearly proved by Scripture, yet it seems justly questionable, whether Christian prudence guided by Scripture-light, will admit them to be so generally passed. Ecclesiastical censures seem to be enervate, and lose much of their vigour, when they fall upon the major part of the People, yea more to resemble some Popish interdict, than the censures of Christ, the tender Physician; when a finger, an hand, or an arm is dangerously diseased, the wise Chirurgeon sometimes thinks of cutting it off, but he would scarce be approved as a good Chirurgeon, who should deal thus with the major part of the body, though affected in the same manner. The blessed Apostle saw several persons in the Churches of Corinth, and Galatia, whose case he bewails, and peradventure might think them worthy of censure, yet at present singles 
2 Cor. 12. 21 1 Cor. 6. 1 Cor. 5 Gal. 5. 12  out only one not orious offender in the Church of Corinth, and wishes that only the ringleaders of error in the Churches of Galatia, should be cut off. Now had we taken this course to admit more generally the body of the People to a full communion, and laid some stubborn notorious offenders, under more signal remarkable censures, peradventure we might have seen some more happy effects of our proceed, than now we behold.  
I have thus presumed according to the licentiousness of these times, to utter my mournful thoughts in this case, craving from you a candid interpretation of my meaning, though you find my words rude and unpolisht. And if it shall happen that any of you shall me in opinion concerning these things, let this poor Petition have the help of your Prayers, that it may find entertainment in the hearts of those to whom it is directed: if otherwise, let the Author obtain the benefit of them, that God will be pleased graciously to pardon all his errors and sinful miscarriages, who, if he knoweth his own heart, would willingly see and submit to the mind of the Lord, though never so crossing to his former opinion or practice.  
Wast. Septemb. 1656   

To all that love and serve the Lord Jesus Christ in the work of Magistracy, or Ministry. As also to all the more eminent Professors of Religion within this Commonwealth.  
A mournful Complaint, and Supplication, in behalf of many Thousands of the more weak and ignorant people of this Nation; Humbly lamenteth and declareth,  
THat notwithstanding your poor Petitioners have even by your confession, reasonable and immortal Souls, capable of eternal bliss or misery, notwithstanding the same common nature, and the many civil bonds wherein we stand related unto you, notwithstanding you see us weakly owning the same God, the same Christ, the same common principles of Religion with yourselves, notwithstanding you see us dreadfully assaulted by the power and policy of the same enemies with whom you are in combat; notwithstanding you behold our danger from those enemies in regard of our ignorance and weakness to be so great and imminent, that were we not too insensible, we should even fill heaven and earth with our shrieks and cries, yea notwithstanding you profess yourselves Disciples and followers of the Lord Jesus, who not alone descended from heaven, and gave his precious blood a ransom for such poor creatures as we, but whilst he was here upon earth, did with most earnest and unweariable pains, seek up such feeble and wand'ring sheep, and most sweetly communicate himself unto them.  
Yet the depth of our present misery, proclaimeth aloud, that you are extremely straitened in your bowels of compassion towards us, in that we remain under so much ignorance and blindness, under so much deadness and carnality, and you no more forcibly apply yourselves unto our help; you see us groping and tasping as blind men in danger to fall into the pit, and you cry not out unto us, you see us shattered and overpowred by the cruel enemy, and you hasten not unto rescue, you see us fallen amongst Thiefs, and lie wounded in the ways, and you pass by on the other side, nor pouring oil or wine into our wounds yea you see many of us panting, and ready to breathe out the last gasp of our dying Christianity, and you bring no cordials to revive us.  
You have made high professions for promoting the work of Christ in this Generation, you have taken deep engagements upon yourselves to endeavour a glorious reformation, and we hope some others have found some more comfortable fruits from those professions, but also we for our parts are enforced sadly to look back on former times and say, O that it were with us as in the days of old! seeing that little knowledge we had of Christ is now diminished, our small heat of love abated, our weak profession of that our dear Saviour almost quite obliterate, and our children like to be set in a more hopeless condition than ourselves.  
We cannot deny, but as God hath been infinitely gracious in calling us by the preaching of his Gospel to the knowledge of his Son, so with, and under you, we have enjoyed those blessed advantages, by many godly Sermons and exhortations, that if we had not been wanting to ourselves, we might have attained much more understanding of the things of God, and greater victories against those corruptions, that now so overpower us: But as the Patient, who hath contracted diseases by his own folly, or carelessness, yet expecteth that the tenderhearted Physician, should faithfully apply himself unto the cure, so we being miserably wounded and enfeebled by our own sluggishness, yet have hope, that you who behold our doleful condition, and whose place and office binds you to be healers, will have your bowels yerning towards us; and upon this our mournful complaint will lay out yourselves with greater industry and diligence in order to our recovery.  
But because we would willingly move your most tender compassions, we shall humbly cast ourselves down at the feet of each of you in particular, and spread our mournful case before you, wishing that our deep sighs and groans, might fill your ears, but if that do not, that yet your eyes might affect your hearts in beholding our most sad and lamentable state.  
O you the Magistrates! who possess the name and place of Gods amongst us, in whose power, and at whose dispose are all the external means of our present and everlasting welfare, upon whose directions and commands, our eyes wait even in those things which concern our souls, and eternal being.  
You have the command of our persons and estates, to order and dispose them at your pleasure, you have the command of our Schools and Universities to fill or empty them, you have the command of our Pastors and Teachers, to place or remove them, you have the command of our Churches and Chapels to shut or open them, you have the command of our Tithes and other Oblations, to give or dispose them to whom you please: And surely nothing should be dearer to you than the glory of him from whom you have received this power, and the salvation of the souls by Christ committed to your trust.  
Now unto you our mournful condition lamentably complaineth, that divers of our Parishes are left wholly destitute of Ministers, there is none to lead us in the ways of God, none to break the bread of life unto us, no not so much as to read the holy Scriptures in our Congregations, the ways of Zion mourn because none come to her solemn Assemblies; We, and our children faint for thirst, and there is none to draw the living waters for us.  
That divers of our Churches are still possessed by weak, ignorant, or scandalous Ministers, who either through unskilfulness, or unfaithfulness betray our souls into the hands of our enemies, and that you neither have removed them, nor enjoined them to read plainly to us the holy Scriptures, and other godly Prayers, and Sermons composed by abler men, which advantage our Fathers did enjoy in the penury of learned Ministers, and which our experience assures us, would be far more profitable for us than such Prayers and Sermons as are of their composing.  
That you have placed in many of our Churches, and given the Tithes, and other profits belonging to the cure of souls, to men that refuse to take any such charge upon them, and who are so far from having the affections, or performing the duties of faithful Pastors to us, that they do profesledly dis-own any such relation, and consequently all the duties thereunto belonging, thence they neither baptise nor catechise our children, nor do they administer the Lords Supper in our Congregations, our sick and feeble persons they visit not, nor own it as a duty incumbent on them to take care for our souls.  
And though indeed they make Orations in our Pulpits, yet for as much as they profess themselves, no Officers or Messengers of Christ unto us, we cannot hear them as his Ministers, and consequently cannot expect his presence with them, or blessing on their labours.  
That you do not according to the noble example of Asa, Josiah, and other holy Governors, enforce us by your Authority, to worship the only true God, and to attend his sacred Ordinances, you take us indeed off from our wont labour on the Lords days, but do not likewise compel us to attend some public Assemblies to hear the word of God read, or preached to us, we as idle Scholars refuse to go to School, and you our Masters rebuke us not: This indulgence of yours we find indeed pleasing to the flesh, which would rather sleep or play, or drink at home, than go to Church to worship Christ, but we fear that many of us will find cause for ever to curse ourselves for taking, and you for giving us this woeful liberty.  
That you commend not to us by your Authority some public Confession of Faith to be learned and owned by us, which might be as a touchstone to try the Doctrines which we hear, and a preservative against the cursed endeavours of those men, that seek to raze the foundations of our holy Religion; for as the Creed, the Lords Prayer, and ten Commandments, many of us have quite forgotten them, seldom or never hearing any mention of them in our Churches.  
That you do not enjoin a more reverend, and seemly deportment of the body in our public Assemblies we find all helps and advantages, too little to raise our drowsy hearts to true devotion, but when we are enforced to behold the rude and unreverent carriage of others in our Congregations, we find that it mightily hinders and abates the intention and devotion of our spiritis in the worship of God; nor can we think that you would well approve such rudeness and disorder in men's addresses to yourselves.  
That you assign no more Ministers to our greater Congregations, many thousands of us sometimes have but one (if one) to lead us in our spiritual welfare: In your civil wars where the enemies are less dangerous, you have many Officers for every hundred men, And can you think that one man is sufficient to instruct, exercise and conduct many thousands against a more subtle, vigilant, and formidable enemy?  
That you have appointed no means to discover who are listed as our fellow-soldiers under Christ in the Sacrament of Baptism, which we suspect will leave no small scruple upon our children, and others when we are gone, if by the infinite mercies of God, Christian Religion should still be continued in this Nation, you have removed the Diptyches, or books of Record out of the hands of our Ministers, and put them into other hands, but not enjoined them to record the baptism of any, which giveth occasion to adversaries to think that you set but little price upon that sacred Ordinance.  
That you have let lose so many ravening Wolves upon us, who go up and down seeking to devour, venting their poisonous soul-destroying errors, both publicly and privately, whereby we the more ignorant are often shaken in the very fundamentals of our holy Religion, and left in doubt what we should believe, how much better were it for us if you suffered men to poison and infect our bodies to the destruction of this our life natural, than thus to poison our souls to the evident hazard of our everlasting ruin.  
Consider we beseech you, our ignorance, and weakness, and have compassion on our souls, and let it appear by the intention of your care and watchfulness in order to our spiritual good, that our Governors are real Christians, and know the worth of that which Christ hath purchased at so dear a rate, that he may own you as his faithful stewards and we may bless God for you as tender nursing Fathers unto us.  
O you the Ministers of Christ! whom he hath set as watchmen to discover dangers, and give warning as Captains, and Leaders in his Army, as Stewards in his Famisy to give to every one his portion in due season; you are set to be the Lights of the world, the Salt of the earth, yea Clouds to distil the precious dews upon us; from you we expect not alone directions from your heavenly Doctrine, but light from your graceful walking, strength from your servant prayer, and sweet refresh from your fatherly compassions, that you in imitation of the great Shepherd, should carry the Lambs in the bosom of your love, and gently lead the feeble of the flock.  
And blessed bee God amongst you, we have found some truly loving and compassionate Samaritans, who have pitied us in our distress, have bound up our wounds, and laid out yourselves to the utmost of your strength for our eternal comfort; for whose faithfulness in order to our souls, we hope many of us shall celebrate the name of God with everlasting praises.  
But against many of you, our doleful case mournfully declareth, that notwithstanding the holiness of your function, and the great trust by Christ committed to you, yet you seem careless and regardless of our immortal souls; more minding your own temporal advantage in the world, than the eternal condition of the people committed to your charge, encumbering yourselves so much with worldly business, that you cannot give attendance to reading, exhortation, and to doctrine, and whilst you have left your watchtower, and are busy in those lower valleys, the enemy, always vigilant for mischief, surpriseth us to the eternal hazard of souls.  
That divers of you perform the work belonging to your high Calling, with so much coldness and remissness, that you occasion us to question whether you be in good earnest, or do yourselves believe what you deliver unto us, our houses are on fire, and you knock softly at our doors, a dreadful deafness is upon us, and you whisper in our cars, our necessities require that you should cry aloud and lift up your voices like trumpets, to make known to us our sin and danger, and you speak with so low a voice as it you were afraid to wake us.  
That you attend no more to the sure laying the foundations of religion in our hearts, by frequent catechising, and plain Preaching the fundamentals, clearing up to us the grounds upon which these great things of eternity are to be owned by us, through ignorance of these your Sermons, though otherwise excellent, are made in great part unprofitable to us, you are upon the finishing whilst we stick at the foundation, you read in a manner all your lectures to Scholars, of the higher form; whilst we the more ignorant are neglected as not being able to understand the terms in which these great things of God are by you delivered to us.  
That some of you deny unto your children the sacred body of our Christian profession, the Sacrament of Baptism, we would bring our Children in our Arms, and present them unto Christ for his Blessing, but you thrust us back; we would engage our Children unto Christ, to live and die his servants, but you will not permit us, but enforce us to leave them free, to serve the Devil if they please, as if you had conspired with our enemies to thrust our posterity back again to Heathenism.  
That many of you permit us not to celebrate the memorial of our dying Saviour in the Sacrament of his last Supper, and so deprive our souls of that heavenly food, that our dear Lord hath with so much cost provided for us, we would after many sad violations renew our Covenant with Christ, and engage our souls more firmly to him, but you will not permit us; You complain of the looseness of our spirits, whilst you withhold the bonds that should knit us faster unto Christ; you complain of our weakness in resisting corruptions, whilst you withhold the food whereby we should be strengthened; you complain of Schism, strife, and division, whilst by you the sacred Pledge of union is detained from us.  
Some of you have for many years wholly laid aside this Sacred Ordinance, choosing rather to deprive yourselves and others, whom you better approve, of this heavenly banquet, then to afford it unto us; you complain of some of us for living in known sins; and frequently make your proof from some neglect of duty, whilst you yourselves have lived many years in the notorious omission of this great duty, so solemnly enjoined by the Lord Jesus Christ.  
Others of you, though you do administer this Sacrament, you have raised so many stops, and made such lofty rails about the table, that few of us can come unto it, as if you thought it a matter of great piety, to confine the tenders of the body and blood of Christ into a narrow room, and cause those his bitter passions suffered for mankind to be known and remembered only by a few, as if it were an honour to Christ, or advantage to the world, that his name and memorial should perish from the hearts and mouths of so great a part of the people professing his name, and engaged in Covenant to him.  
Hence many of you are so far from inviting us to this heavenly banquet, that you do by your preaching and otherwise, continually hinder and discourage us; as if we were of ourselves too forward to worship Christ, and keep up his memorial; aggravating to the height, if not beyond the truth, the danger if we come unworthily, but not equally acquainting us, with the like or greater danger in the total neglect of this great Command of Christ.  
Others of you, have erected a Court of ruling Elders, and set up them to be Judges over us, and that not in order to any crime or accusation brought against us, but to examine us in order to the Sacrament, without whose approbation, we may not be admitted to the portion of our Master's food, and have not pitied us in our infirmities, when you saw us in our ignorance, jealous of new erected powers, and that we would hardly be convinced, that the business of Sacraments did belong to any other but preaching Elders, yea that we could hardly own them for Elders, upon whom we saw no stamp of God by Ordination to that Office, nor character of humane power by Commission from the Magistrate, or by any legal choice or election from the people.  
Others of you have combined yourselves with some small parties of our neighbours, and those sometimes whose private ways and principles we cannot own, and have called these your Church, and set up those to be Judges over us, according to whose sentence, and that without any legal trial, we may, or may not be admitted to our Master's Table, not showing us which way this power over us should be derived unto them, or giving us cause to believe that you, or they would willingly▪ be so dealt withal by us, or any minor party amongst yourselves.  
By these, and the like means you have discouraged and disheartened us from coming to this heavenly Banquet, and kept us so long fasting, that our stomaches are almost wholly gone, and our spirits much enfeebled, and we fear a dreadful guilt is contracted by our not coming to this sacred feast, remembering how terrible God's threaten were against those that came not to his Passeover of old, 
Numb. 9 13.  and wish it may not be laid to your charge that you have so many ways hindered and discouraged us.  
Consider we beseech you, your deal in this case, and compare your practice with the rules and precedents recorded in holy Scripture for our instruction, and observe whether the servants and officers of Christ, there mentioned, did deal with the people of their times as you have dealt with us.  
We are indeed guilty of much ignorance and carnality, the Lord humble and amend us; But do you indeed think, that there was none in the Camp of Israel under Moses, as ignorant and carnal as we? And did Moses use such means to stave off them from coming to the Passeover, as you have done to hinder us?  
Was there never a one in Israel or Judah in the days 
2 Chron. 30.  of Hezekiah that had as little knowledge, or appearance of real godliness as we, when that holy King sent out his general summons, Come to the house of God at Jerusalem, and keep a Passeover to the Lord God of Israel?  
Was there none in the Church of Corinth, besides that one incestuous person, against whom as just exceptions might have been made, as against us, when St. Paul maketh 
1 Cor. 10. 16.  use of their joint communion at the Lords Table to press their non-communion at the Idols Temple?  
What do you think of the Disciples of our blessed Saviour, were they free from ignorance and carnality, or 
Luke 18. 34. & 22. 24.  was there not a dreadful cloud of ignorance and carnality upon their spirits at that very time, when they were by Christ himself admitted to this sacred Banquet?  
Yea what Officer of Christ did you ever read of in holy Scripture, that secluded any from Passeover, or Supper, unless such desperate and notorious sinners, as were likewise secluded from communion in all other Ordinances of Christ?  
If these things move you not, consider (we beseech you) your own practice, and compare your dealing in this, with your other administrations, and see how you will vindicate yourselves from contradictions.  
We hear you sometimes in your Sermons sweetly tendering Christ to all that be willing to receive him, earnestly inviting us to come to Christ, telling us that Christ expecteth no worthiness on our parts, but only a willingness to accept him tendered to us, but when upon these invitations we come unto you, and profess our willingness to accept the Lord Jesus Christ tendered in that holy Sacrament, having no other way wherein we can so visibly yield obedience to your invitations, you thrust us back, and tell us we must not come, because we are not worthy.  
We find you in your public prayer owning us brethren, Saints▪ and faithful, as appears in that you do not alone in communion with us, but can in our name, as our mouth▪ call God Father, Christ Mediator, and tender up most spiritual confessions, petitions and thanksgivings unto God; but when we would with you approach unto the same God and Mediator in the holy Sacrament, you quite disclaim this brotherhood, in prayer acknowledged, and allege against our coming to it, That you must not give holy things to dogs or swine.  
Yea some of you, when we present our children to Baptism, require from us a profession of our repentance for sin, and faith in the Lord Jesus, and upon such profession by us made, do baptise our children, and justify your practice against those that do oppose you, upon this account that our children are holy, being the offspring of believers, and yet when we would come to present ourselves to the Lord in the other Sacrament, you refu●e and stave us off as unholy and unbelievers.  
In all acts of civil converse where the greatest danger of contagion from polluted persons is, and which the 
1 Cor. 5. 1●  Scripture most expressly forbiddeth with scandalous Christians, you neither warn others, nor do you yourselves decline communion with us; you eat and drink with us, at your own, ours, and other men's tables, and that without scruple, so far as we perceive, and yet when we would upon the command of Christ, come and present ourselves with you at our Master's Table, you seem to fear contagion from us, and allege against us that of the Apostle, With such a one, no not to eat.  
How your greater wisdom will accord these things, we know not, but to us the more ignorant, they appear little less than contradictions, and leave us in a strange amazement, considering what thoughts you have of us, or would have us to have of ourselves, whilst in some things you so sweetly own us as brethren, and good Christians, in others, so strangely cast us off as Dogs or Swine.  
We cannot think you have entertained the Popish doctrine of a real or corporal presence of Christ in this Ordinance, more than in the rest, and yet we cannot but wonder in what School you have learned to make this difference between Christ's Ordinances, that all the residue should be laid in common, and only the Communion table railed in.  
We indeed hear this often alleged, that other Ordinances are converting, this only confirming; other Ordinances are instrumental to beget souls to Christ, this only to nourish those that are begotten: Now though it appeareth to us very hard to affirm that that Ordinance wherein there is a tender of Christ the principle of life unto the soul, may not be a means of conveying life, even the first motions of life supernatural to the soul, yet were this distinction used only to difference the Sacrament from the preaching of the word, we could more easily apprehend it; but when we find it likewise used to distinguish it from Prayer, and other the like Ordinances, it quite surpasseth our shallow understanding to conceive the reason of it, considering we find by the holy Scriptures, 
1▪ Tim. 2. 8▪ Jam. 1. 6 Rom. 10. 17▪  that repentance and faith are necessarily required in order to Prayer, as well as to the Sacrament, and experience assures us, that a child must be born before it cryeth, as well as live before it eateth.  
But what ever difference your wisdom can find out between this and other Ordinances, sure we are, that by this means it is come to pass that your censures, if those your suspensions be accounted such, are made in great part frustrate, and invalid in order to those ends for which our Lord Christ hath appointed censures in his Church, as having little or no power to shame, and consequently reclaim the offender, or to preserve the sounder part from contagion; for how is any man like to be made ashamed who enjoyeth full communion with the best, excepting in one Ordinance, and hath so many and some so honourable companions with him in the want of that? or how is the sounder part like to be preserved, whilst they converse familiarly with contagious persons, excepting in one Ordinance, and that one, wherein of all others, there used to be the least evaporation of corruption?  
If these things yet move you not, let us entreat you to behold the countenances of your poor people, and if you find us more fair and fat in flesh since this restraint of yours than when we did eat our portion of the King's meat, than you may still detain it from us, but if you see apparently, that we are grown leaner and more feeble, yea have more grievous and noisome spots and biles arising upon us, then have pity on us, and restore unto us the portion of food detained from us, yea have pity on yourselves, and think what answer you will make unto the King, when he shall please to look upon us.  
O consider (we beseech you) the sad case of your poor people! and instead of these unprofitable, and as we conceive unscriptural suspensions, make more forcible applications to us, teaching, exhorting, and admonishing with all earnestness, not alone publicly, but from house to house, according to that noble pattern of St. Paul: make 
Act. 20. 20▪  known to us, the true nature of this Ordinance, and how strong an obligation, it layeth upon us of obedience to Christ, whose servants we there profess ourselves, and then with holy Hezekiah call us to engage ourselves to the Lord in this sacred Ordinance, and prove whether this will not be more effectual to recover us from sin, and save our souls, than these your suspensions have been.  
And if you find amongst our number, some whose ignorance is so gross, or scandal so notorious, that you dare not but lay us under censures; yet let those censures be inflicted in the way prescribed by the Lord Jesus Christ, and let all your further proceed with us be according to the Rules of holy Scripture, that both you, and we may expect his blessing in all your deal with us.  
Let those more private and public admonitions enjoined 
Matth. 18. 15.  by our Saviour, go before your censures, and prove whether he will not bless these to our emendation, if after all such Christian applications made to us, we go on boldly, and contumaciously in sin, we then plead nothing for ourselves, if you censure us more deeply than a bare suspension from the Sacrament amounteth unto: but till this be done, and we found obstinate, do not deprive us of the food by our Lord, provided for us, nor us of that precious opportunity of engaging our souls more firmly unto him.  
Make some difference (we beseech you) between us, though many ways faulty, and those that are desperate contemners of God, and all Religion, remembering that there are wand'ring sheep, as well as dogs and swine, carnal Christians, and brethren walking disorderly, as well as sons of Belial mentioned in Scripture: that there were 
Numb. 15. 30.  many in the Church of Israel that did sin through weakness and ignorance, besides those daring presumptuous sinners from whom the Lord would have no sacrifice: Now if you acknowledge such a difference, consider whether it be not more agreeable to the tender mercies of the Lord Jesus Christ, to receive such weaklings in the faith as we, amongst the better sort, by whose godly counsels, and example, we may be edified, than to leave us amongst the desperate contemners of God, and all Religion, by their cursed counsels and examples to be eternally ruined and destroyed.  
O lay to heart the dreadful charge of God against his Pastors of old▪ the diseased you have not strengthened, neither have you healed that which was sick, you have 
Ez●k. 34. 44.  not bound up that which was broken, neither have you brought back that which was driven away, or sought up that which was lost.  
O remember that you are Officers under him, who hath professed he will not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking Flax, and who despiseth not the day of small things▪ O! let your compassions imitate the mercies of him, whose name you bear, and say you concerning 
Isa. 65. 8.  our numerous cluster, though it be not pleasing to the eye destroy it not, there is a blessing in it.  
O you the more eminent professors of Religion! you have by the advantage of more excellent natural endowments, better education, greater diligence, or more abundant grace from above, far surpassed us in knowledge and understanding, in spiritual things, you have made a more glorious profession of Religion, and have clean escaped some of those pollutions in which we are yet miserably entangled, you as Scholars of the highest form, are enabled to afford much help to us, who are of the lowest in the School of Christ, and divine providence hath so dispersed you amongst us in your habitations, and caused such mutual intercourse of worldly business that you have much advantage to discover our infirmities, and afford a seasonable supply of help and support unto us.  
And blessed bee God amongst your number, we have found some humble, charitable, and truly selfdenying Christians, who have cheerfully laid out themselves, and their several abilities for our good and comfort: for whose faithfulness in order to our souls, we are bound always to be thankful, and although sometimes through the prevalency of our corruptions, we too much slight their gracious counsel and advice, yet when our spirits are more serious, we remember feelingly their godly admonitions, and esteem them the most faithful of our friends.  
But against many of you our mournful condition sadly complaineth, that you have shut up the bowels of your compassions from us, that you look aloof upon us, and proclaim us blind and miserable, but do not strongly apply yourselves unto our help, you see us in imminent danger to fall into the pit, but take little care to keep us out, you see us worryed and much overpowered by our lusts, but hasten not to our assistance, you see us chilled with cold, and you rub us not, many of you think it enough to slip away; and shut up yourselves in some separate Congregations, leaving us in danger to perish in our coldness, or be devoured by the cruel Enemy.  
Yea though you proclaim us blind and ignorant, yet you cease not to cast many fearful stumbling blocks before us, whilst we are enforced to see and hear from some of you, scornful censuring and condemning others, greedy panting and grasping at the riches, honours, and preferments of this world, fraudulent circumventing and overreaching others, cruel revenges upon those you judge your enemies, bitter quarrelling and contending one against another.  
And notwithstanding those miscarriages, which might justly cause you with us to lie in the dust, jointly bewailing our dreadful transgressions▪ yet we find you lifted up, boasting of the glorious Times, proudly appropriating to yourselves the honourable names of Christians, Saints, the godly party, not remembering the sentence of our Saviour in the case of the Pharisce and Publican, 
Luk▪ 18. 13  or what he sometimes said to men, whose profession was as high as yours, when he saw them lofty: 
Ma●. 21. 31.  Publicans and Harlots shall go before you into the Kingdom of God.  
That you seem to us to measure the Saintship of yourselves or others, rather by some private opinions, or some small punctilios of worship, then by the great things of Faith, righteousness, and mercy, because we find some men whose profession of the Lord Jesus Christ, is attended with righteousness and mercy, yet accounts us no better than civil by divers of you, whilst others are cried up for Saints and godly, who are much deficient in these.  
That you animate and encourage, yea in some measure necessitate and enforce our Ministers, to their more harsh and uncharitable dealing with us, it is usually from you rather than themselves, that our children are not baptised, nor ourselves admitted to the other Sacrament, whilst they are loath to lose or anger you and if any of them hath more courage in the case of Christ; or more bowels of compassion towards us, you presently brand and asperse them with your tongues, yea often make schisms and separations from them.  
That you carry all things towards us in a lofty magisterial way, not as Scholars of the higher form (which we could willinging admit) but as Lords and Masters over us; though you live in vicinity to us, we seldom hear any words of wholesome counsel or instruction from you, unless you get into our Pulpits; neither can we enjoy any communion with you in our Churches, unless all the power may be in your hands, to admit, exclude, rule and order all things at your pleasure, having forgotten (as we think) that seasonable counsel of St. James, My Brethren 
Jam. 3. ●  be not many Masters.  
Those powers and privileges which you challenge as belonging to the Church of Christ, you share in a manner wholly to yourselves, not affording to us any portion in them, you say it is in the people's power to choose or reject their Ministers, yet make no scruple to obtrude them upon us, you say a Christian ought not to be rejected or dealt with as an heathen, till he be found contumacious after several admonitions, yet observe no such rules in order unto us, as if your very opinion of yourselves were sufficient to make you the only Christians and to entitle you to all the honours or liberties by Christ conferred, and your ill opinion of us were sufficient to degrade us, and seclude us from the meanest privilege belonging to the Church of Christ.  
That you endeavour to bring upon us and our posterity the saddest judgement that can befall a nation, namely to unchurch and unchristian us, and as you for the present seem to account us as Heathens or little better, so your practice tendeth (if infinite mercy prevent not) to make us such indeed, whilst you endeavour, to take from us, and our posterity, all the marks and badges of our Christian profession, and so what lieth in you, wholly to cashier us from the Camp of Christ, as if you grudged to see the promises made by the Father unto Christ, of causing Nations to be gathered to him, performed in this little Corner of the world.  
Consider (we beseech you) the infinite mercies and long-suffering of that God whom you profess, how exceeding flow and loath he is to cast off those which are once entered into Covenant with him; what heart breaking expressions he hath concerning Ephraim and Judah, in the height of their apostasy and rebellion, and how exceeding 
Hos. 11. 8 Jer. 3. 15  backward he was to give a bill of divorce to either of them, and think how acceptable your endeavours are to Christ, who make it so small a matter to cashier so many thousands, yea, whole Nations from his camp.  
Compare, (we entreat you) this your way with the precedents and examples recorded in holy Scripture, and see whether the precious servants of God there mentioned, did ever tread this your way of Separation; did Moses, Joshua, or Samuel? did Jeremiah, Ezra, or Nehemiah? did our blessed Saviour or his Apostles, ever steer your course in order to the corruptions of the Church in their times? did not they lay out their endeavours for the emendation of the whole body? and did not they live in communion with the Church in their times, though many ways corrupted? Yea look upon the Christian Churches recorded in the new Testament, did St. Paul, or any other Apostle, commend to the sounder part of the Churches of Corinth or Galatia, any such separations as you endeavour? yea, what servants of God did you ever read of in holy Scripture, that did withdraw or separate themselves from the body of the people, worshipping the same God with them, upon such pretences as you? or what example do you find in all the holy Scriptures, that looks so like your case, as that of the Pharisees, so branded by our Saviour.  
Consider of the singular talents that God hath bestowed upon you, and the strict account that you must give concerning your improvement of them, and seriously bethink yourselves, whether you might not give a better account continuing in communion with us, and applying yourselves strongly to our emendation, helping us by your godly counsel and example, and cheerfully assisting us in removing desperate contemners of God, and all Religion from communion, than leaving the stations where divine providence had set you, to cloister up yourselves in separate Congregations, and so deprive us your poor brethren, of those helps and assistances which we might justly have expected from your more eminent abilities.  
Ransack (we beseech you) your hearts throughly, to find out the true root and bottom of this spirit of separation, and observe narrowly whether under other specious pretences, or with some pious intentions, there be not a bitter root of pride and haughtiness, causing you to affect singularity, and desire to appear alone to the view of men, thinking it below your worth to be found in communion with those whom in opinion you have laid so much below yourselves.  
Yea think sadly whether those manifold revolts that have been made from your separate Congregations, to monstrous opinions, and unclean conversations, have not been the righteous judgement of God upon you, for your too high valuations of yourselves, and uncharitable separations from others; whereby you have deprived such poor creatures as we, of those brotherly helps, and encouragements, which by your eminent endowments. God had enabled you to yield, and by his providence put opportunities into your hands to afford unto us.  
What construction you make of these passages of providence, we know not, but truly to us the more ignorant, they appear, strange, and formidable, that whereas you fish with so great a mash, that scarce one of an hundred are by you taken and admitted into your Congregations, that out of this hundreth part of yours, more should be found revolting to desperate opinions, than of the ninety nine parts by you deserted, appeareth to us strange and wonderful, and such as we think may rationally put you upon a just suspicion, and serious re-examination of that way, from which there is so easy a transition to many dreadful delusions, and through which so many have already passed into the camp of the enemy.  
Having thus directed our complaints to each of you in particular, we now return unto you all to whom this our mournful supplication is intended, and again prostrate ourselves before you, humbly beseeching you, by all the tender compassions of that God, who styles himself, The God of mercy, by all the precious blood of Christ shed for such poor sinners, by all the bowels of mercy in that Spirit, who (as we hope) ruleth in your hearts, by all the bands both natural and civil, wherein we stand related unto you, by the invaluable price of an immortal soul, and high concernment of an everlasting state.  
Have pity on us in our ignorance and weakness, and apply yourselves more earnestly to rescue us from the rage and malice of our soul-devouring enemies; let your endeavours for our help be somewhat answerable to the greatness, of our danger, to the weight of an eternal state, and to the invaluable price paid by the Lord Jesus Christ for our redemption.  
What if you find us peevish, froward, and sometimes slighting your Christian endeavours for our good, do not presently give over, but remember that the great God of heaven hath waited long both upon us and you, be assured that we shall in the end be convinced of your faithfulness, and that what ever thanks you have from us, the Lord Jesus will certainly remember this work and service of your love.  
O dissolve not that nail that yet we have in Christ's holy place! restore unto us those colours, which you have begun to take from us, let us be entertained as Scholars though of the lowest form, as Soldiers, though in the meanest employment in the Camp of Christ, at least deny us not the favour vouchsased to the Gibeonites, to be as hewers of wood, or drawers of water for the house of our God.  
You tell us you have rescued us from imminent danger of Popery and superstition, but what comfort will this be unto us, if you now leave us, and our posterity to perish in the deeper gulf of profaneness and heathenism?  
Consider what singular advantages you now have upon us for our good, whilst we maintain the principles of Christianity, and wear the colours of the Lord-Jesus Christ, your principal work is now but to bring us to live up to the principles we do believe, and to serve that Master, whose livery we wear.  
But if you leave us till those principles be obliterate, and these colours thrown aside, think seriously how much more hard, and hopeless our condition then will be, especially considering that you are not furnished with the power of miracles or extraordinary gifts, which have been Gods ordinary means for converting heathens unto Christ.  
O then delay not the time! but hasten with all possible diligence unto our rescue, before the Devil circumvent you, and take advantage of your leaving us unto ourselves, as staving us off from the Ordinances of Christ, to harden our hearts, and draw us by degrees to contempt of those things which now we weakly prise, and both you, and we eternally bewail the loss of these present opportunities.  
We are yet willing to engage our children to the Lord in the Sacrament of Baptism, we are yet willing to renew our own engagements unto Christ in that other Sacrament, if you would not dishearten, and discourage us, but we find sin is of an hardening nature, and that long neglect of duty will dissolve the sense of obligation, and we cannot but fear, that if we be now neglected by you, it may come to pass that our hearts may be so hardened, that if God should afterward raise up some Hezekiah who should call, and invite us, or ours, to engage ourselves unto the Lord in these sacred Ordinances, either we or ours should answer such gracious invitations after the same manner as the most of Israel did the summons of that holy King, with scorn and contempt. 
2 Chron. 30. 20   
O let this our imminent danger be weighed in your most advised thoughts, you see how many have already turned their backs on Christ, and all his Ordinances, and are wholly gone after Satan, and how industrious they are to draw others after them, and then think what dangerous temptations you put us the weaker sort upon, to revolt unto the enemy, whilst you refuse to entertain us in the Camp of Christ.  
Mind seriously (we beseech you) that great account that you must give to your, and our Master the Lord Jesus Christ, of your faithfulness in all your administrations, in order to the souls of men, and consider what answer you will make to him if you slight, or neglect so great a part of the purchase of his blood, or what excuse you will find when he shall arise to plead with you.  
Did not I come from heaven, and give my dearest life for the redemption of these poor souls? Did not I with great endeavours, even with the expense of the blood of many my holy Martyrs, bring them under solemn bonds and engagements to myself?  
And when I saw them neglected by their former guides, did not I by wondrous providences rescue them, and deliver them over into your hands that you should feed and teach them?  
And is this your faithfulness to me and mine, to withhold the precious food that I provided for them, to leave them to wander in the wilderness as sheep without a Shepherd? yea, to let lose many ravenous Wolves upon them to devour them, and for an excuse of this your sloathfulness and treachery, to deface my marks and badges which you found upon them, that so you might plead they were none of mine?  
Seemeth it a small thing to you, O Rams and Hee-goats, 
Ezek. 34 21.  you fattest of the flock, that you have taken the best of the pasture for yourselves, but that you have thrust with the shoulder, and the side, and pushed with the horns, the weak and diseased of my flock, till you have scattered them abroad?  
O consider what answer you will make to the Lord Jesus, when he shall arise and plead with you on our behalf, and how sad your case will be, if the blood of so many thousand souls, perishing through your neglect and carelessness, shall plead against you in the day of wrath.  
We have indeed deserved from the Lord Jesus Christ, by our unfruitfulness, and many other sad miscarriages to be by him totally rejected, and that his Gospel-sight should be wholly taken from us; But what have we done to you, that you should deal so hardly with us, that you should be the instruments to bring this dreadful night of darkness on us? Or that you should not rather endeavour our emendation and salvation?  
What evil have you observed in us, from which your joint endeavours might not hope to rescue us? Are we blind and ignorant? Yet surely not so uncapable of instruction, but that your joint endeavours might even enforce the most ignorant of us to learn the fundamentals of Religion, and so much as being practised would save our souls. Are we wrapped and entangled in sinful lusts? Surely your earnest and joint endeavours, might by the blessing of the Lord break these cords of sin, and bring us by an holy violence to the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ, we cannot but think that noble King Josiah had as ignorant and stubborn a people to deal withal as you, and yet he not alone engaged them to the Lord in that his solemn Passeover, but made them serve the Lord all 
2 Chron 34. 33  his days.  
We know the donation of life supernatural lieth not in your power, but it lieth in your power, to acquaint us with the ways of life, to cause us to attend upon the means of grace, to restrain us from the outward acts of sin, yea to set and keep us in such ways of worship and obedience unto Christ, as that you might comfortably hope by God's blessing on your Christian endeavours, to behold us as the Crown of your labour at the great day.  
Now consider, we beseech you in your serious thoughts, whether a general reformation of the body of the people of this Nation, a re-ingaging them in Covenant, and keeping them at the least in an external obedience unto Christ, will not be more for the honour of him to whom the Nations are promised for an inheritance, more agrecable to your own former Vows and Covenants, and a more likely way to make you a blessing to the people, and them to you, than to leave the main bulk of the people to be overgrown with thorns and briers, to degenerate into an howling wilderness, whilst all your care is laid out upon the culture of some few small enclosures.  
What comfort can it be to you, O Magistrates! to have the bonds between Christ Jesus, and this Nation, continued through the revolutions of so many hundred years dissolved in your days?  
Or to you, O Ministers! to have the foundations of Religion, which you found laid in the hearts of the generality of the people of this Nation, quite demolished under your administrations?  
Or to you that call yourselves the godly party, to have the Christian Religion, which formerly did overspread the whole surface of this Nation, now abridged to your few separate Congregations?  
Or what heart, that is not altogether stupid, can behold the great endeavours, and high professions for Religion found in the beginning of these times, and in a sad revolt of so great a part of the Nation back again to heathenism, or the like abominations, and not bewail it with a flood of tears?  
We have thus spread our mournful case before you, hoping that, the God of all grace and mercy, in whose hand are the hearts and ways of all the sons of men, will incline your hearts to pity our sad condition, and more compassionately to apply yourselves unto our help, for which purpose we now make our humble addresses unto him, who gave his precious blood a ransom for us.  

O Glorious Prince, and Saviour Jesus Christ, the faithful, and merciful high Priest of our Profession, who didst for our sakes suffer, and wert tempted, that thou mightest be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, and know experimentally to pity us in our temptations, have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us, O blessed Saviour, and grant that these our mournful complaints and supplications, may pierce the ears and hearts of thy Vicegerents, and Ambassadors, with all the more eminent of thy precious servants amongst us, that our eternal welfare may be more cordially regarded by them, that they may more faithfully and diligently lay out themselves and all their abilities for the salvation of those souls whom thou hast bought with thy precious blood, Let our Magistrates inherit the zeal of Hezekiah, Josiah, and other famous nursing Fathers of thy Church of old; Let our Ministers, as thy dear Apostle Paul, be willing to spend and be spent for our salvation; Let the impressions of thy tender mercies be upon all the more knowing of thy servants, that they may compassionately employ all their abilities for our emendation and salvation. O thou that wept over thy Jerusalem, when they would not own thee; Let us, who (though unworthy) are called by thy Name, and have taken hold of thy Covenant, taste of thy tender compassions. Look down from heaven the habitation of thine holiness, Where is thy zeal, and thy strength, and the sounding of thy bowels towards us; Doubtless thou art our Redeemer, though our Fathers be ignorant of us, and our Elders will not own us, thou art our Redeemer, and thy name from everlasting; O do not suffer us to err from thy ways, do not harden our hearts from thy fear. We cannot expect the like compassions from sinful man, as from thee, O blessed Immanuel, who felt the pains of our redemption, not Paul, but thou, O Christ, wert crucified for us, we cannot repose in any other arms but thine, who carriest the feeble lambs in the bosom of thy love. Though the Priest and Levite pass by on the other side, yet thou the good Samaritan have compassion on us, and pour thine oil and wine into our wounds, and the more we are neglected by men, the more forcible and alluring let the cords of thy love be to us, though the hearts of men melt not over our misery, yet let thy bowels of compassion yern upon us, and let us not lose our hold of thy Covenant, but still be refreshed with thy protection, and rejoice under the shadow of all thine Ordinances. Look down from heaven, and behold this Vineyard, and the Vine which thy right hand hath planted in this Nation, make up the hedge of thy providence about it, and let not the Boar of the Forest continue to waste it, or the wild beast of the field to devour it. Return, O Lord, and let it repent thee concerning thy servants, and let not the evil that is already come upon us appear little before thee.  
Heal thou the dreadful breaches and distractions which the cruel enemy hath caused amongst us, repair the ruined walls of thy Jerusalem. Grant the spirit of unity and charity to thy people of this Nation, that thy family here may be truly a family of love, and on their doors engraven, Here is no strife, for we are brethren. O Lord hear, O Lord forgive, and heal our desolations, remember not against us former iniquities, let thy tender mercies speedily prevent us, we are brought very low. Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of thy name, deliver us, and purge away our sins for thy name's sake; So we thy people, and sheep of thy pasture, shall give thee thanks for ever, and teach our children to celebrate thy praise to all Generations.   
FINIS.