jewels or gold about him, will venture alone into a place which is a re» ceptacle of thieves and robbers. None that is found in health will thrust himself, boldly without fear or wit, into the company of those who are infected with the plague, or some other noisome disease. Oh then how do they at once betray their religion, and forfeit their reason, who mingle themselves with hereticks, and resort frequently to the company of schismaticks, who are thieves and robbers, for that they steal the truth out of men's hearts*, and rob their high-born souls of the love of God and goodness; whose opinions likewise are worse than the plague in the event and consequence; for, as they incurably infect the soul, so, being embraced and followed, they debar men from ever coming to the kingdom of God. See Gal. v. 19. Witness likewise that of Ignatius, which (did our separatists understand his language) they would read with a trembling in their joints, like that great prince in Daniel, c. v. v. 6. when he read his doom on the wall. The words of Ignatius in English are these: They that join themselves in a faction, and adhere in affection to such who separate and divide their hearts from the truth, such men shall not inherit the kingdom of God. They, who shun not the company of false teachers, shall be condemned to everlasting torments.' For as with David we must hate the congregation of the wicked, I for evil doers, such as are perverse schismaticks; so must we delight in the company of the saints, who are such not only in name, but also in practice; being pure in their opinions, holy in their lives, not carnal, nor sensual; they despise not government, neither speak evil of those who are set in authority § over them by God, but are spiritual, heavenlyminded, meek and obedient; these are, those that excel in virtue, commended by holy David ** for our choice respect and company. Again, in the second place, as reason fetches an argument against them from the danger of such meetings, where the devil may seize upon thee, (as he did once upon that woman in the theatre as Tertullian ++ records) so my reason tells me (thus should every one argue with himself) that it is a shame and disgrace for a Christian, a brother of Christ, to follow such a teacher, to make him his master, who is noλdex, a servant to his own belly, and a slave to his lusts; the subserviency to which hath ever been the original of heresies, as Theophylact notes well upon that place of the apostle ‡‡, They serve not the Lord Jesus, but their own bellies. This is spoken of schismaticks, whose private meetings end commonly in belly-cheer, in luxury and wantonness. This is too well known in these truth-denying times; and this too was confessed of late to me by a taylor here at Whethamstead to be the cause of his revolt from such private meetings, and coming again to our church; it was, (as he ingenuously said) their disorder and unseemly carriage in their conventicles, that moved him, a man of a tender spirit, to forsake their wicked company, and return to God. John x. 8. βασιλείαν θεῖ ἐ • Psal. xvi. 3. ecclesias, &c. Psal. xxvi. 4. + Ignat. Epist. ad Philod, † Εἴ τις χίζονι ἀπὸ τῆς ἀληθείας ἀκολυθεί, κληρονομήσει, &c. Ignat. ibid. Jude, ver 8. Tertul. cap. 26, lib. de spectaculis. These he calls conventicles, diaboli #Rom. xvi. 18. It was on the first of April last, 1651, on which day I bap. tized two of his children in the open congregation, one newly born, the other of the age of twa years and a half. Oh therefore be persuaded in time, before you meet with destruction, to avoid such teachers and their meetings in dark cells and corners. They are nurseries of sin and corruption. Though Israel play the harlot, let not Judah offend: Come ye not to Gilgal, neither go up to Bethaven. Hos. iv. 15. Give not up your names to be those men's disciples, who, for aught ye know, may be the Pope's legates, who broach new opinions contrary to those you have received, and repugnant to the scriptures; such men are not doctores but seductores, not doctors but seducers, not pastors but impostors*. Therefore shun their company, come not into their private assemblies, lest you be defiled with their pollutions, corrupted by their heresies, which ever end in schism; both which break the bones and bruise the flesh of Christ's church, his † spouse. And he that lives and dies in a schism, cannot hope to be saved, being severed from that body whereof Christ Jesus is the head, which body is quickened by that spirit, whereby we shall be raised. If the spirit of him, that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you, he, that raised up Christ from the dead, shall also quicken your mortal bodies,' &c. If then that spirit dwell not in you, you shall not be glorified: As a member that is cut of from the body dies, and by no art can be quickened, or have life put into it, being severed from the influential virtue or activity of that soul which gives life to the body, whereto, whilst it was joined, it lived and moved. I will conclude this third query with that exhortation of the apostle, 'Keep the unity of the spirit, in the bond of peace', that is, in love and charity. If this heavenly fire burns and glows in your Christian breast, you will not, from that which I have delivered, deduce this uncharitable and mistaken inference, as some once did, but are now better informed of my intentions, that I am an enemy to all kinds of meetings of God's saints and servants; I am not, I exhort them often to meet, but when? Not when they should be at church. What to do? Not to take upon them the ministers office to preach, but to repeat what they have heard from the mouths of their orthodox teachers, or to read the scriptures to the unlearned, or to do as David did, i. e. Tell what God hath done for their souls §, the manner of their conversion, the method and means God used to comfort them in their tribulation, or to pray together for the peace of Jerusalem **, for the restoration of the poor distressed church, for a blessing upon the persons and labours of their honest ministers. Let this be the end of your house meetings, and my soul shall meet with you in commendation of your holy practice, and in prayer for a blessing on your pious exercise; but if you do otherwise, i. e. forsake the church, the place where God's people, his servants, do congregate, I fear that it will happen to you, as it doth to the silly sheep that strays from the flock, which becomes a prey to the devouring wolf; or as it did to Dinah, the daughter of Leah, who, leaving her father's house to see the daughters of the land, was met, and ravished by Shechem tt. So they that forsake their ministers, and out of curiosity resign and devote them. selves to be followers of those, who are none, they must expect to be defloured of their faith and manners by such seducers, who are spiritual Bernard. non pastores, sed impostores. + Cant. iv. 9, 10. Psal. cxxii. 6. Rom. viii. 11. ++ Gen. xxiv. 2. adulterers and murtherers, who corrupt men's judgments, and feast it with the souls of their simple disciples, whom they grind with the teeth of error, and poison with that cup which they themselves have drunk of, a gilded cup of heresies, full of † abomination and filthiness. The Lord prevent us with his grace, and preserve us from these corruptions. S. Augustine, in his fourth book de doctriná Christianá, notes, that the word in Latin, which signifies a conventicle or place of private meeting (it is conventiculum et tantùm singulariter dicitur) is only used in the singular number, improperly in the plural; as if by God's spirit (the prime author of words in the hearts and by the tongues of men) this was thereby intended to be implied, that there must not be more places than one, for God's people to meet in, in their several parishes, that is, each particular church, the only place allowed and appointed by God for his publick worship and service. Oh that men would therefore praise the Lord for his goodness, and declare his wonderful works before the sons of men! That they would exalt him in the congregation of the people', leaving their conventicles, wherein God cannot be so highly praised, nor so much honoured, as in a place of publick concourse, a church. I must, for a close of this third query, freely vent my thoughts, which have been ever in my breast. The classical presbyters made way for these abuses and corruptions in our church, by making an unhappy breach in it, when they brought in their motly Directory into the church, by which means, they drove many out of it into conventicles, and, like the sons of Eli ||, by their unjust usurpation made men to abhor the offering of the Lord, and caused the people to trespass, ver. 14. They too by their usurping the power of ordination, contrary to the rule of Christ, and the established order of the church, were the cause that others (in opposition to them) did and do now preach without orders. By this we see, what good friends and servants, how dutiful sons the presbyters have been to their mother, the church. All the hurt that I wish them is this, that they were confined and doomed Scotorum pultibus saginari, § to be fellow-commoners, live, repent, and die amongst their wretched brethren the Scots, the first fomentors of our divisions, and authors of our miseries. Heavenly Father forgive them. They know not what mischief they have done. THE FOURTH QUERY. Whether it be lawful for a Lay-man to preach? I remember a saying of Isocrates, ἐν ἁρμόζει περὶ τῶν φανερῶν πολλὰ λέγειν, It is not proper for an orator, or any one, to spend many words about a business or theme, that is clear and common. Therefore seeing that Δοπανῶσι τὰς τῶν ἁπλεςέων ψυχὰς, τῆς ἀπάτης ἰδῶσιν συτρίβοντες. + Rev. xvii. 4. Psal. cvii. 31, 32. 1 Sam. ii. 17. says of Pelagius, that he was Socotorum pultibus saginatus. Cyril. in Hos. the query is not attended with any great difficulty, and hath been so much discussed by the pens of the learned, I shall not spend many words about it. Only this I shall say, for the benefit and conviction of the unlearned, to whose capacity I desire to fit my discourse, and suit my phrase. If by preaching we understand (as we are to do) the dividing of the word aright, i. e. The applying of it (according to the diversity of persons, times, and places) to the consciences of the hearers in publick; which application of it implies a reproving of sin in a judicial authori tative way, and a denouncing of judgment against sinners; and lastly, a laying forth or unfolding of sweet promises of the gospel, of pardon and forgiveness to the faithful and penitent, who renounce their own, and rely upon Christ's merits: To affirm, that to do this, in a constituted or settled church, is lawful for a lay-man, is as incongruous, and carries with it as great an absurdity, as to say (which is impious) that St. Paul was mistaken, and did not speak from Christ, when he enjoined every one to abide in that calling, to which he is called t. For one to invade the proper duty of a minister, without a special calling from the church, is altogether unlawful; so says Amesius himself, Lib. iv. de Cas. Consc. cap. 25. Secondly, He that can maintain it lawful for a common soldier (because he hath good skill at his weapon and in the feats of war) to challenge the place of a colonel or chief commander, without the consent of the superior officers; he that can prove it that Korah and his two confederates sinned not in rising up against Moses and Aaron ‡, and usurping the priests office. (Moses I am sure checked their boldness thus, Ye take too much upon you, &c. it was so much, and so weighty a burthen, their usurpation so great a sin, that the earth could not bear them, but opened and swallowed up them, and all their proud associates.) Thirdly, He that can convince my judgment, that § Uzzah sinned not in touching the ark; that the men of ** Beth-shemesh did not of fend by looking boldly into it; that ++ Saul and ‡‡ Uzziah did not commit a great trespass in taking upon them the priests office. Thou hast done foolishly, so said Samuel to Saul, 1 Sam. xiii. 13. He lost his kingdom by it, as appears ver. 14. Now the kingdom shall not continue, &c. they are the words of the prophet. Azariah the priest, and with him fourscore priests of the Lord, valiant men; they withstood Uzziah the King, and said unto him, It belongeth not to thee, Uzziah, to burn incense unto the Lord, but to the priests, the sons of Aaron, that are consecrated for to offer incense; go out of the sanctuary, for thou hast transgressed, and thou shalt have no honour of the Lord thy God. You may read, ver. 19. How that he was punished with leprosy, a foul disease, for his foul fact, and that in the forehead, the seat of impudence, he was too bold. His open sin was punished with open shame. Though his zeal seemed to be good, and also his §§ inten • 2 Tim. ii. 15. 1 Cor. vii. 20. 2 Sam. vi. 6. "I Sam. vi. 19. + Art thou then called to be a weaver, a taylor, or a cobler! Desert not thy calling, and thrust not thyself into that which belongs to another. + Num. xvi. 3. Ver. 17. #2 Chr. xxvi. 18. only a good end, but also good means. A good intention, man to heaven. Many with this mistake have gone to hell. 2 Chron. xxvi. 17, 18. ++ 1 Sam. xiii. 11. To a lawful act there is required not if the means be bad, will not bring a Bonum benè is the rule in divinity. tion, yet, because they were not regulated or guided by God's word, he did wickedly, and was therefore both justly resisted [by the priests] and punished [by God.'] This note you shall find in the margin of your English bibles, which I wish were well observed by our too forward zealots, who flatter and deceive themselves with their good intentions, when the means they use are not lawful but unrighteous. Fourthly, He that can prove it by any plausible argument (as I am sure none can, though he were as powerful in invention, and witty in arguing, as * Perronius, once a cardinal of Rome) that it was lawful under the old law for any butcher, because he had skill in killing of a beast, to slay the sacrifice, which was only proper to the † Levites. And he that shall demonstrate to my understanding, that he is not guilty of great presumption, and much pride, who shall first think himself fit for that office, which St. Paul so admired, and trembled at, that he brake forth into a ris inavòs, Who is sufficient for it? He that thinks himself so, is most insufficient; especially when he shall want all those gifts, which are usually seen and required in ministers, as, skill in the languages, fathers, councils, school-men, church-histories, with other modern writers; together with the arts and sciences. Fifthly, He that shall clear this point unto me, that the practice of Christ and his apostles, together with the whole church, for sixteenhundred years, and upwards, is not to be allowed of; especially, when that practice is confirmed and ratified by precept in the Holy Scriptures, where we find | directions to the then bishops for the laying on of hands upon those who were then, and now are to be admitted into holy orders. And, Lastly, He that can evince it, that besides the inward testimony of a man's own conscience §, there is not, upon the former grounds required the outward call or testimony of the church, to whom he is to give trial of his gifts, and then receive the church's blessing, with solemn prayers to God to prosper the work which he is going about, i. e. that he may convert souls, and thereby enlarge the kingdom of Christ. He, that is able (as I am sure none ever was, or will be,) to prove all these particulars, shall subdue my reason, and bring me to a confession, that it is lawful for a lay-man to preach. Till this be proved (as it never can be expected) I shall with the authority of God's word, the consent of all antiquity, and the practice of all reformed churches, conclude and stand firmly to this position: That no man ought to take upon him this sacred function, or office, but he that is called as Aaron was ** i. e. by God. The voice of the church is the voice of God; ergo, lay-men that call themselves by a bold intrusion, we may lawfully call usurpers of the priests office, of the stock of Korah, of the race of Jeroboam's priests. He made of the lowest of the people, priests of the high places, which thing became a sin to the house of Jeroboam, even to cut it off and destroy it from the face of the earth ††. • Persuadebit nobis quicquid volet, ita de Perronio Paulus Sanctus, in vita Perronii opusculis ejus præfixa. + Levit. i. 4. He shall kill the bullock. 2 Cor. ii. 16. # 1 Tim. iv. 14. v. 22. Tit. i. 5. Acts xiv. 23, &c. That he is both willing and able to discharge the office of a minister. • Heb. v. 4. ++ Kings xiii. 33, |
