Part 32 (2/2)
Here the brother addeth these words following as mine, which are not mine: ”Therefore he that finds no church government breaks his covenant.” His reply is, ”We must reform it according to the word of G.o.d, if that hold out none, here is no tailing.” He addeth a simile of a jury sworn to inquire into the felony of an accused person, but finds not guilty; and of three men taking an oath to deliver in their opinions of church government (where, by the way, he lets fall that I hold the national synod to be above all courts in the kingdom; which, if he means of ecclesiastical courts, why did he speak so generally? If he mean, above all or any civil courts, it is a gross calumny.) But now, if this be the sense which he gives of that first article in the covenant, then, 1. All that is in the second article might have been put into the first article: for instance, we might, in Mr Coleman's sense, have sworn ”to endeavour the reformation of Prelacy, and even of Popery itself, according to the word of G.o.d, and the example of the best reformed churches;” that is, taking an oath to deliver in our opinions of these things according to the word of G.o.d, and to inquire into the evils of church government by archbishops, bishops, deans, &c., whether guilty or not guilty. I strengthened my argument by the different nature of the first and second article. I said, ”The second article is of things to be extirpated, but this of things to be preserved and reformed.” Why did he not take the strength of my argument and make a reply? 2. By the same principle of his we are not tied by the first article of our covenant to have any, either doctrine or wors.h.i.+p, but only to search the Scriptures whether the word hold out any; for doctrine, wors.h.i.+p, discipline and government, go hand in hand in the covenant. 3.
His own simile hath this much in it against him. If a jury, sworn to inquire into the felony of an accused person, should, after such an oath, not only find the person not guilty, but further take upon them to maintain that there is no such thing as felony, surely this were inconsistent with their oath, so he that swears to endeavour the reformation of religion in doctrine, wors.h.i.+p, discipline, and government, and yet will not only dislike this or that form of government, but also hold that there is no such thing as church government, he holds that which cannot agree with his oath. 4. This answer of Mr Coleman, leaving it free to debate whether there be such as church government, being his only answer to my first argument from the covenant, must needs suppose that the government mentioned in the covenant, the reformation whereof we have sworn to endeavour, is understood even by himself of church officers'
power of corrective government, it being the corrective part only, and not the doctrinal part, which he casts upon an uncertainty whether the world hold out any such thing.
2. ”Church government as mentioned in the covenant is a spiritual, not a civil thing. The matters of religion are put together,-doctrine, wors.h.i.+p, discipline and government. The privileges of Parliament come after in the third article.” The reverend brother replies, ”What if it be? therefore the Parliament is not to meddle with it, and why?” And here he runs out against me, as if I held that the Parliament is not to meddle with religion, an a.s.sertion which I abominate. Princes and magistrates' putting off themselves all care of the matters of religion, was one of the great causes of the church's mischief, and of popish and prelatical tyranny. But is this just and fair, Sir, to give out for my opinion that for which you are not able to show the least colour or shadow of consequence from any thing that ever I said? That which was to be replied unto was, Whether do not the materials of the first article of the covenant differ from the materials of the third article of the covenant? or whether are they the same? Whether doth the privilege of Parliament belong to the first article of the covenant? Whether is that government mentioned in the first article a civil thing or a spiritual? If civil, why is discipline and government ranked with doctrine and wors.h.i.+p, and all these mentioned as parts of the reformation of religion? If spiritual, then why doth the brother make it ”civil or temporal?” p. 11. To all this nothing is answered, but, ”What if it be?” Then is my argument granted.
And to put it yet further out of question, I add other two arguments from that same first article of the covenant. One is this: In the first part of that first article we swear all of us to endeavour ”the preservation of the reformed religion in the church of Scotland, in doctrine, wors.h.i.+p, discipline, and government,” where all know that the words ”discipline”
and ”government” (especially being mentioned as two of the princ.i.p.al things in which the reformed religion in that church doth consist) signify church government and church discipline distinct both from doctrine and wors.h.i.+p (which, by the way, how Mr Coleman endeavoureth to preserve, I will not now say, but leave it to others to judge), therefore, in that which immediately followeth,-our endeavouring ”the reformation of religion in the kingdoms of England and Ireland, in doctrine, wors.h.i.+p, discipline and government,”-the words ”discipline” and ”government” must needs have the same sense thus far, that it is a church discipline and a church government distinct from the civil power of the magistrate, and distinct also from doctrine and wors.h.i.+p in the church; for we cannot make these words, ”discipline” and ”government,” in one and the same article of a solemn oath and covenant, to suffer two senses differing _toto genere_ (especially considering that the civil government is put by itself in another article, which is the third), unless we make it to speak so as none may understand it.
The other argument which I now add is this. In the third part of that first article we swear that we ”shall endeavour to bring the churches of G.o.d in the three kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity in religion, confession of faith, form of church government, directory for wors.h.i.+p and catechising,” where, 1. Church government doth agree generically with a confession of faith, directory of wors.h.i.+p, and catechising. I mean all these are matters of religion, none of them civil matters. 2. It is supposed there is such a thing as church government distinct from civil government, and therefore it is put out of all question, that so far there shall be an uniformity between the churches of G.o.d in the three kingdoms (and otherwise it were an unswearing of what was sworn in the first part of that article), but it tieth us to endeavour the nearest conjunction and uniformity ”in a form of church government;” which were a vain and rash oath, if we were not tied to a church government in general, and that as a matter of religion. 3. The uniformity in a form of church government which we swear to endeavour must needs be meant of corrective government; it being clearly distinguished from the confession of faith and directory of wors.h.i.+p. So that Mr Coleman's distinction of the doctrinal part, and of the dispensing of the word and sacraments, cannot here help him.
From these two arguments (beside all was said before) I conclude that the covenant doth undeniably suppose, and plainly hold forth this thing as most necessary and uncontrovertible, that there ought to be a church government which is both distinct from the civil government, and yet not merely doctrinal. And if so, what Apollo can reconcile Mr Coleman's doctrine with the covenant? And now I go on.
My last reason formerly brought was this: ”Will the brother say that the example of the best reformed churches leadeth his way?” For the covenant tieth us to a reformation of the government of the church both according to the word of G.o.d and the example of the best reformed churches: that as _regula regulans_; this as _regula regulata_.
The reverend brother replieth: 1. ”The best reformed church that ever was went this way; I mean the church of Israel.”
_Ans._ 1. Is the church of Israel one of the reformed churches which the covenant speaks of? 2. Was the church of Israel better reformed than the apostolical churches? Why then calls he it the best reformed church that ever was? 3. That in the Jewish church there was a church government distinct from civil government, and church censures distinct from civil punishments, is the opinion of many who have taken great pains in the searching of the Jewish antiquities; and it may be he shall hear it ere long further proved, both from Scripture and from the very Talmudical writers.
2. ”I desire (saith he) the Commissioner to give an instance in the New Testament of such a distinction (civil and church government) where the state was Christian.”
_Ans._ I desire him to give an instance in the New Testament of these three things, and then he will answer himself. 1. Where was the state Christian? 2. Where had the ministry a doctrinal power in a Christian state? 3. Where doth the New Testament hold out that a church government distinct from civil government may be where the state is not Christian, and yet may not be where the state is Christian? Shall the church's liberties be diminished, or rather increased, where the state is Christian?
In the third and fourth place, the brother tells us of the opinions of Gualther, Bulhager, Erastus, Aretius. The question is of the examples of churches, not of the opinions of men. But what of the men? As for that pestilence that walketh in darkness through London and Westminster, Liastus' book against Beza, let him make of it what he can, it shall have an antidote by and by. In the meanwhile, he may take notice, that, in the close of the sixth book, Erastus casts down that which he hath built, just as Bellarmine did, in the close of his five books of justification. But as for the other three named by the brother, they are ours, not his, in this present controversy. Gualther(1340) expounds 1 Cor. v. all along of excommunication, and of the necessity of church discipline; insomuch that he expounds the very delivering to Satan (the phrase most controverted by Erastus and his followers) of excommunication, and the not eating with the scandalous (ver 9-11) he takes also to import excommunication. He thinks also that ministers shall labour to little purpose except they have a power of government. Bullinger is most plain for excommunication, as a spiritual censure ordained by Christ, and so he understands Matt. xviv.
17.
Aretius holds(1341) that G.o.d was the author of excommunication in the Old Testament, and Christ in the New. And now are these three Mr Coleman's way? Or doth not his doctrine flatly contradict theirs? Peradventure he will say, Yet there is no excommunication in the church of Zurich, where those divines lived, nor any suspension of scandalous sinners from the sacrament. I answer, This cannot infringe what I hold, that the example of the best reformed churches maketh for us and against him; for, 1. The book written by Lavater, another of the Zurich divines, _de Ritibus et Inst.i.tutis Ecclesioe Tigurinoe_, tells us of divers things in that church which will make the brother easily to acknowledge that it is not the best reformed church, such as festival days, cap. 8, that upon the Lord's days, before the third bell, it is published and made known to the people, if there be any houses, fields, or lands, to be sold, cap. 9. They have no fasts indicted, cap. 9, nor psalms sung in the church, cap. 10.
Responsories in their Litany at the sacrament, the deacon upon the right hand saith one thing, the deacon upon the left hand saith another thing, the pastor a third thing, cap. 13. 2. Yet the church of Zurich hath some corrective church government besides that which is civil or temporal, for the same book, cap. 23, tells us, that in their synods, any minister who is found scandalous or profane in his life, is censured with deposition from his office, _ab oficio deponitur_. Then follows, _finita censura, singuli decani, &c._ Here is a synodical censure, which I find also in Wolphius,(1342) a professor of Zurich, and the book before cited, cap.
24,(1343) tells us of some corrective power committed to pastors and elders, which elders are distinguished from the magistrates. 3. The Zurich divines themselves looked upon excommunication as that which was wanting through the injury of the times; the thing having been so horribly abused in Popery, and the present licentiousness abounding among people, did hinder the erecting of that part of the church discipline at that time.
But they still pleaded the thing to be held forth in Scripture, and were but expecting better times for restoring and settling of excommunication, which they did approve in Geneva, and in other reformed churches, who had received it. I give you their own words for the warrant of what I say.(1344)
I have been the longer upon this point as being the chief objection which can be made by Mr Coleman concerning that clause in the covenant, ”The example of the best reformed churches.”
He hath only one thing more, which may well pa.s.s for a paradox. He will take an instance, forsooth, from Geneva itself, though presbyterian in practice. And why? Because in the Geneva Annotations upon Matt. ix. 16, it said, that ”the external discipline is to be fitted to the capacity of the church.” ”This is no Scotland presbytery,” saith the brother. Nay, Sir, nor yet Geneva presbytery; for it doth not at all concern presbytery. It is spoken in reference to the choosing of fit and convenient times for fasting and humiliation,-that as Christ did not, at that time, tie his disciples to fasting, it being unsuitable to that present time; so other like circ.u.mstances of G.o.d's wors.h.i.+p, which are not at all determined to the word, are to be accommodated to emergent occasions, and to the church's condition for the time, which both Scotland and Geneva, and other reformed churches do.
If I have now more fully and convincingly spoken to that point of the covenant, let the brother blame himself that put me to it.
The Lord guide his people in a right way, and rebuke the spirit of error and division, and give us all more of his Spirit, to lead us into all truth, and into all self-denial, and grant that none of his servants be found unwilling to have the Lord Jesus Christ to reign over them in all his ordinances!
THE END.
MALE AUDIS; OR, AN ANSWER TO MR COLEMAN'S MALE DICIS.
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