A. KER.



PROPOSITIONS.

1. As our Lord Jesus Christ doth invisibly teach and govern his church by the Holy Spirit; so in gathering, preserving, instructing, building and saving thereof, he useth ministers as his instruments, and hath appointed an order of some to teach and others to learn in the church, and that some should be the flock and others the pastors.

2. For beside these first founders of the church of Christ, extraordinarily sent, and furnished with the gift of miracles, whereby they might confirm the doctrine of the gospel, he appointed also ordinary pastors and teachers, for the executing of the ministry, even until his coming again unto judgment, Eph. iv. 11-13. Wherefore also, as many as are of the number of God's people, or will be accounted Christians, ought to receive and obey the ordinary ministers of God's word and sacraments (lawfully though mediately called), as the stewards and ambassadors of Christ himself.

3. It is not lawful for any man, how fit soever and how much soever enriched or beautified with excellent gifts, to undertake the administration either of the word or sacraments by the will of private persons, or others who have not power and right to call, much less it is lawful by their own judgment or arbitrement to assume and arrogate the same to themselves. But before it be lawful to undergo that sacred ministry in churches constituted, a special calling, yea beside, a lawful election (which alone is not sufficient), a mission or sending, or (as commonly it is termed) ordination, is necessarily required, and that both for the avoiding of confusion, and to bar out or shut the door (so far as in us lieth) upon impostors; as also by reason of divine institution delivered to us in the Holy Scripture, Rom. x. 15; Heb. v. 4; Tit. i. 5; 1 Tim. ii. 7.

4. The church ought to be governed by no other persons than ministers and stewards preferred and placed by Christ, and after no other manner than according to the laws made by him; and, therefore, there is no power on earth which may challenge to itself authority or dominion over the church: but whosoever they are that would have the things of Christ to be administered not according to the ordinance and will of Christ revealed in his word, but as it liketh them, and according to their own will and prescript, what other thing go they about to do than by horrible sacrilege to throw down Christ from his own throne?

5. For our only lawgiver and interpreter of his Father's will, Jesus Christ hath prescribed and foreappointed the rule according to which he would have his worship and the government of his own house to be ordered. To wrest this rule of Christ, laid open in his holy word, to the counsels, wills, manners, devices, or laws of men, is most high impiety. But contrarily, the law of faith commandeth the counsel and purposes of men to be framed and conformed to this rule, and overturneth all the reasonings of worldly wisdom, and bringeth into captivity the thoughts of the proud swelling mind to the obedience of Christ. Neither ought the voice of any to take place or be rested upon in the church but the voice of Christ alone.

6. The same Lord and our Saviour Jesus Christ, the only Head of the church, hath ordained in the New Testament, not only the preaching of the word and administration of baptism and the Lord's supper, but also ecclesiastical government, distinct and differing from the civil government; and it is his will that there be such a government distinct from the civil in all his churches everywhere, as well those which live under Christian, as those under infidel magistrates, even until the end of the world. Heb. xiii. 7, 17; 1 Tim. v. 17, 19; Rom. xii. 8; 1 Cor. xii. 28; 1 Thess. v. 12; Acts i. 20; Luke xii. 42; 1 Tim. vi. 14; Rev. ii. 25.

7. This ecclesiastical government, distinct from the civil, is from God committed, not to the whole body of the church or congregation of the faithful, or to be exercised both by officers and people, but to the ministers of God's word, together with the elders which are joined with them for the care and government of the church, 1 Tim. v. 17. To those, therefore, who are over the church in the Lord, belongeth the authority and power, and it lieth upon them by their office, according to the rule of God's word, to discern and judge betwixt the holy and profane, to give diligence for amendment of delinquents, and to purge the church (as much as is in them) from scandals, and that not only by inquiring, inspection, warning, reproving, and more sharply expostulating, but also by acting in the further and more severe parts of ecclesiastical discipline, or exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction, even unto the greatest and weightiest censures, where deed is.

8. None that is within the church ought to be without the reach of church law, and exempt from ecclesiastical censures; but discipline is to be exercised on all the members of the church, without respect or consideration of those adhering qualities which use to commend a man to other men, such as power, nobility, illustrious descent, and the like: for the judgment cannot be right where men are led and moved with these considerations. Wherefore, let respect of persons be far from all judges, chiefly the ecclesiastical: and if any in the church do so swell in pride, that he refuse to be under this discipline, and would have himself to be free and exempt from all trial and ecclesiastical judgment, this man's disposition is more like the haughtiness of the Roman Pope, than the meekness and submissiveness of Christ's sheep.

9. Ecclesiastical censure, moreover, is either proper to be inflicted upon the ministers and office-bearers only, or with them common to other members of the church: the former consisteth in suspension or deposition of ministers from their office (which in the ancient canons is called καθαίρεσις); the latter consisteth in the greater and lesser excommunication (as they speak). Whatsoever in another brother deserveth excommunication, the same much more in a minister deserveth excommunication: but justly sometimes a minister is to be put from his office, and deprived of that power which by ordination was given him, against whom, nevertheless, to draw the sword of excommunication, no reason doth compel.

10. Sometime also it happeneth that a minister, having fallen into heresy or apostacy, or other grievous crimes, if he show tokens of true repentance, may be justly received into the communion of the church, whom, notwithstanding, it is no way expedient to restore into his former place or charge; yea, perhaps it will not be found fit to restore such an one to the ministry in another congregation as soon as he is received into the bosom of the church; which surely is most agreeable as well to the word of God (2 Kings xxiii. 9; Ezek. xliv. 10-14,) as to that ecclesiastical discipline, which in some ages after the times of the Apostle was in use.

So true is it that the ministers of the church are liable as well to peculiar as to common censures; or that a minister of the church is censured one way, and one of the people another way.

11. Ecclesiastical censure, which is not proper to ministers, but common to them with other members of the church, is either suspension from the Lord's supper (which by others is called the publican's excommunication), or the cutting off of a member, which is commonly called excommunication. The distinction of this twofold censure (commonly, though not so properly passing under the name of the lesser and greater excommunication) is not only much approved by the church of Scotland, and the synod now assembled at Westminster, but also by the reformed churches of France, the Low Countries, and of Poland, as is to be seen in the Book of the Ecclesiastical Discipline of the Reformed Churches in France, chap. 5, art. 9; in the Harmony of the Belgic Synods, chap. 14, art. 8, 9; in the canons of the general synod of Torn, held in the year 1597.

12. That the distinction of that twofold church censure was allowed also by antiquity, it may be sufficiently clear to him who will consult the sixty-first canon of the sixth general synod, with the annotations of Zonaras and Balsamon; also the thirteenth canon of the eighth synod (which is termed the first and second), with the notes of Zonaras; yea, besides, even the penitents also themselves of the fourth degree, or οἱ ἐν συστασεῖ, that is, which were in the consistency, were suspended from the Lord's supper, though as to other things of the same condition with the faithful; for, to the communion also of prayers, and so to all privileges of ecclesiastical society, the eucharist alone excepted, they were thought to have right: so sacred a thing was the eucharist esteemed. See also, beside others, Cyprian, book 1, epist. 11; that Dionysius, the author of The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, chap. 3, part. 3; Basil., Epist. to Amphilochius, can. 4; Ambrose, De Officiis, lib. 2, chap. 27; Augustine, in his book against the Donatists after the Conference, cap. 4; Chrysostom, hom. 83, in Matt.; Gregor. the Great, Epist., lib. 2, chap. 65, 66; Walafridus Strabo, Of Ecclesiastical Matters, chap. 17.

13. That first and lesser censure by Christ's ordinance is to be inflicted on such as have received baptism, and pretend to be true members of the church, yet are found unfit and unworthy to communicate in the signs of the grace of Christ with the church, whether for their gross ignorance of divine things, the law, namely, and gospel, or by reason of scandal, either of false doctrine or wicked life. For these causes, therefore, or for some one of them, they are to be kept back from the sacrament of the Lord's supper (a lawful judicial trial going before) according to the interdiction of Christ, forbidding that that which is holy be given to dogs, or pearls be cast before swine, Matt. vii. 6; and this censure of suspension is to continue till the offenders bring forth fruits worthy of repentance.

14. For the asserting and defending of this suspension there is no small accession of strength from the nature of the sacrament itself, and the institution and end thereof. The word of God indeed is to be preached, as well to the ungodly and impenitent, that they may be converted, as to the godly and repenting that they may be confirmed; but the sacrament of the Lord's supper is by God instituted, not for beginning the work of grace, but for nourishing and increasing grace, and therefore no one is to be admitted to the Lord's supper who by his life testifieth that he is impenitent, and not as yet converted.

15. Indeed, if the Lord had instituted this sacrament, that not only it should nourish and cherish faith, and seal the promises of the gospel, but also should begin the work of grace in sinners, and give regeneration itself as the instrumental cause thereof, verily even the most wicked, most unclean, and most unworthy, were to be admitted: but the reformed churches do otherwise judge of the nature of this sacrament, which shall be abundantly manifest by the gleaning of these following testimonies.

16. The Scottish Confession, art. 23. "But we confess that the Lord's supper belongs only to those of the household of faith who can try and examine themselves, as well in faith as in the duties of faith towards their neighbours. Whoso abideth without faith, and in variance with their brethren, do at that holy table eat and drink unworthily. Hence it is that the pastors in our church do enter on a public and particular examination, both of the knowledge, conversation and life, of those who are to be admitted to the Lord's table." The Belgic Confession, art. 35:—"We believe also and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ hath ordained the holy sacrament of his supper, that in it he may nourish and uphold them whom he hath already regenerated."

17. The Saxon Confession, art. 15:—"The Lord willeth that every receiver be particularly confirmed by this testimony, so that he may be certified that the benefits of the gospel do appertain to himself, seeing the preaching is common, and by this testimony, by this receiving, he showeth that thou art one of his members, and washed with his blood." And by and by:—"Thus, therefore, we instruct the church, that it behoveth them that come to the supper to bring with them repentance or conversion, and (faith being now kindled in the mediation of the death and resurrection, and the benefits of the Son of God) to seek here the confirmation of this faith." The very same things are set down, and that in the very same words, in the consent of the churches of Poland in the Sendomirian synod, anno 1570, art. "of the Lord's supper."

18. The Bohemian Confession, art. 11:—"Next our divines teach that the sacraments of themselves, or as some say, ex opere operato, do not confer grace to those who are not first endued with good motions, and inwardly quickened by the Holy Spirit, neither do they bestow justifying faith, which maketh the soul of man in all things obsequious, trusting and obedient to God; for faith must go before (we speak of them of ripe years), which quickeneth a man by the work of the Holy Spirit, and putteth good motions into the heart." And after:—"But if any come unworthily to the sacraments, he is not made by them worthy or clean, but doth only bring greater sin and damnation on himself."

19. Seeing, then, in the holy supper, that is, in the receiving the sacramental elements (which is here distinguished from the prayers and exhortations accompanying that action), the benefits of the gospel are not first received, but for them being received are thanks given; neither by partaking thereof doth God bestow the very spiritual life, but doth preserve, cherish and perfect that life; and seeing the word of God is accounted in the manner of letters patent, but sacraments like seals, (as rightly the Helvetian Confession saith, chap. 19), it plainly followeth that those are to be kept back from the Lord's supper, who by their fruits and manners do prove themselves to be ungodly or impenitent, and strangers or aliens from all communion with Christ. Nor are the promises of grace sealed to any other than those to whom these promises do belong, for otherwise the seal annexed should contradict and gainsay the letters patent; and by the visible word those should be loosed and remitted, who by the audible word are bound and condemned: but this is such an absurdity, as that if any would, yet he cannot smooth or heal it with any plaster.

20. But as known, impious, and unregenerate persons, have no right to the holy table, so also ungodly persons, by reason of a grievous scandal, are justly for a time deprived of it; for it is not lawful or allowable that the comforts and promises which belong only to such as believe and repent, should be sealed unto known unclean persons, and those who walk inordinately, whether such as are not yet regenerate, or such as are regenerate, but fallen, and not yet restored or risen from their fall. The same discipline plainly was shadowed forth under the Old Testament, for none of God's people, during their legal pollution, were permitted to enter into the tabernacle, or to have access to the solemn sacrifices and society of the church; and much more were wicked and notorious offenders debarred from the temple, until, by an offering for sin, together with a solemn confession thereof, being cleansed, they were reconciled unto God. Num. v. 6-8; Lev. v. 1-7; vi. 1-8.

21. Yea that those who were polluted with sins and crimes were reckoned among the unclean in the law, Maimonides (in More Nevoch., part. 3, ch. 47,) proveth out of Lev. xx. 3; xviii. 24; Num. xxxv. 33, 34. Therefore seeing the shedding of man's blood was rightly esteemed the greatest pollution of all, hence it was that as the society of the leprous was shunned by the clean, so that the company of murderers by good men was most religiously avoided, Lam. iv. 13-15. The same thing is witnessed by Ananias the high priest, in Josephus, Jewish War, book 4, ch. 5, where he saith that those false zealots of that time, bloody men, ought to have been restrained from access to the temple, by reason of the pollution of murder; yea, as Philo the Jew witnesseth (in his book of the Offerers of Sacrifices), whosoever were found unworthy and wicked, were by edict forbidden to approach the holy threshold.

22. Neither must that be passed by which was noted by Zonaras, book 4, of his annals (whereof see also Scaliger agreeing with him, in Elench. Triheres. Nicserrar., cap. 28), namely, that the Essenes were forbidden the holy place, as being heinous and piacular transgressors, and such as held other opinions, and did otherwise teach concerning sacrifices than according to the law, and observed not the ordinances of Moses, whence it proceeded that they sacrificed privately; yea, and also the Essenes themselves did thrust away from their congregations those that were wicked. Whereof see Drusius, Of the Three Sects of Jews, lib. 4, cap. 22.

23. God verily would not have his temple to be made open to unworthy and unclean worshippers; nor was it free for such men to enter into the temple. See Nazianzen, Orat. 21. The same thing is witnessed and declared by divers late writers, such as have been and are more acquainted with the Jewish antiquities. Consult the Annotations of Vatablus, and of Ainsworth, an English writer, upon Psal. cxviii. 19, 20; also Constantine L'Empereur, Annot. in Cod. Middoth, cap. 2, p. 44, 45; Cornelius Bertramus, Of the Commonwealth of the Hebrews, cap. 7; Henry Vorstius, Animadvers. in Pirk. Rab. Eliezer, p. 169. The same may be proved out of Ezek. xxiii. 30, 38; Jer. vii. 9-12; whence also it was that the solemn and public society in the temple, had the name of the assembly of the righteous, and congregation of saints, Psal. lxxxix. 5, 7; cxi. 1; cxlvii. 1; hence also is that (Psal. cxviii. 19, 20) of the gates of righteousness by which the righteous enter.

24. That which is now driven at, is not that all wicked and unclean persons should be utterly excluded from our ecclesiastical societies, and so from all hearing of God's word; yea there is nothing less intended: for the word of God is the instrument as well of conversion as of confirmation, and therefore is to be preached as well to the unconverted as to the converted, as well to the repenting as the unrepenting: the temple indeed of Jerusalem had special promises, as it were pointing out with the finger a communion with God through Christ, 1 Kings viii. 30, 48; Dan. vi. 10; 2 Chron. vi. 16; vii. 15, 16. But it is far otherwise with our temples, or places of church assemblies, "because our temples contain nothing sacramental in them, such as the tabernacle and temple contained," as the most learned Professors of Leyden said rightly in Synops. Pur. Theologiae, disp. 48, thes. 47.

25. Wherefore the point to be here considered, as that which is now aimed at, is this, that howsoever, even under the New Testament, the uncleanness of those to whom the word of God is preached be tolerated, yet all such, of what estate or condition soever in the church, as are defiled with manifest and grievous scandals, and do thereby witness themselves to be without the inward and spiritual communion with Christ and the faithful, may and are to be altogether discharged from the communion of the Lord's supper until they repent and change their manners.

26. Besides, even those to whom it was permitted to go into the holy courts of Israel, and to ingratiate themselves into ecclesiastical communion, and who did stand between the court of Israel and the outer wall, were not therefore to be kept back from hearing the word; for in Solomon's porch, and so in the intermurale or court of the Gentiles, the gospel was preached, both by Christ, John x. 23, and also by the apostles, Acts iii. 11; v. 12, and that of purpose, because of the reason brought by Pineda, Of the things of Solomon, book v. chap. 19, because a more frequent multitude was there, and somewhat larger opportunity of sowing the gospel: wherefore to any whomsoever, even heathen people meeting there, the Lord would have the word to be preached, who, notwithstanding, purging the temple, did not only overthrow the tables of money-changers, and chairs of those that sold doves, but also cast forth the buyers and sellers themselves, Matt. xxi. 12; for he could not endure either such things or such persons in the temple.

27. Although, then, the gospel is to be preached to every creature, the Lord in express words commanding the same, Mark xvi. 15, yet not to every one is set open an access to the holy supper; it is granted that hypocrites do lurk in the church, who hardly can be convicted and discovered, much less repelled from the Lord's supper; such therefore are to be suffered, till by the fan of judgment the grain be separated from the chaff; but those whose wicked deeds or words are known and made manifest are altogether to be debarred from partaking those symbols of the covenant of the gospel, lest that the name of God be greatly disgraced, whilst sins are permitted to be spread abroad in the church unpunished; or lest the stewards of Christ, by imparting the signs of the grace of God to such as are continuing in the state of impurity and scandal, be partakers of their sins. Hitherto of suspension.

28. Excommunication ought not to be proceeded unto except when extreme necessity constraineth: but whensoever the soul of the sinner cannot otherwise be healed, and that the safety of the church requireth the cutting off of this or that member, it behoveth to use this last remedy. In the church of Rome, indeed, excommunication hath been turned into greatest injustice and tyranny (as the Pharisees abused the casting out of the synagogues, which was their excommunication) to the fulfilling of the lust of their own minds; yet the ordinance of Christ is not therefore by any of the reformed religion to be utterly thrust away and wholly rejected. What Protestant knows not that the vassals of Antichrist have drawn the Lord's supper into the worst and most pernicious abuses, as also the ordination of ministers, and other ordinances of the gospel? Yet who will say that things necessary (whether the necessity be that of command, or that of the means or end) are to be taken away because of the abuse?

29. They, therefore, who with an high hand do persevere in their wickedness, after foregoing admonitions stubbornly despised or carelessly neglected, are justly, by excommunication in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, cut off and cast out from the society of the faithful, and are pronounced to be cast out from the church, until being filled with shame and cast down, they shall return again to a more sound mind, and by confession of their sin and amendment of their lives, shall show tokens of repentance, Matt, xviii. 16-18; 1 Cor. v. 13, which places are also alleged in the Confession of Bohemia, art. 8, to prove that the excommunication of the impenitent and stubborn, whose wickedness is known, is commanded of the Lord: but if stubborn heretics or unclean persons be not removed or cast out from the church, therein do the governors of the church sin, and are found guilty, Rev. ii. 14, 20.

30. But that all abuse and corruption in ecclesiastical government may be either prevented and avoided, or taken away, or lest the power of the church, either by the ignorance or unskilfulness of some ministers here and there, or also by too much heat and fervour of mind, should run out beyond measure or bounds, or contrariwise, being shut up within straiter limits than is fitting, should be made unprofitable, feeble, or of none effect,—Christ, the most wise lawgiver of his church, hath foreseen and made provision to prevent all such evils which he did foresee were to arise, and hath prepared and prescribed for them intrinsical and ecclesiastical remedies, and those also in their kind (if lawfully and rightly applied) both sufficient and effectual: some whereof he hath most expressly propounded in his word, and some he hath left to be drawn from thence by necessary consequence.

31. Therefore, by reason of the danger of that which is called clavis errans, or a wrong key; and that it may not be permitted to particular churches to err or sin licentiously, and lest any man's cause be overthrown and perish, who in a particular church had perhaps the same men both his adversaries and his judges; also that common business, which do belong to many churches, together with the more weighty and difficult controversies (the deciding whereof in the consistories of praticular churches is not safe to be adventured upon) may be handled and determined by a common council of presbyteries; finally, that the governors of particular churches may impart help mutually one to another against the cunning and subtile enemies of the truth, and may join their strength together (such as it is) by an holy combination, and that the church may be as a camp of an army well ordered, lest while every one striveth singly all of them be subdued and overcome, or lest by reason of the scarcity of prudent and godly counsellors (in the multitude of whom is safety) the affairs of the church be undone: for all these considerations particular churches must be subordinate to classical presbyteries and synods.

32. Wherefore it is not lawful to particular churches, or, as commonly they are called, parochial, either to decline the authority of classes or synods, where they are lawfully settled, or may be had (much less to withdraw themselves from that authority, if they have once acknowledged it), or to refuse such lawful ordinances or decrees of the classes or synods as, being agreeable to the word of God, are with authority imposed upon them. Acts xv. 2, 6, 22-24, 28, 29; xvi. 4.

33. Although synods assemble more seldom, classes and consistories of particular churches more frequently, yet that synods, both provincial and national, assemble at set and ordinary times, as well as classes and parochial consistories, is very expedient, and for the due preservation of church policy and discipline, necessary. Sometimes, indeed, it is expedient they be assembled occasionally, that the urgent necessity of the church may be the more speedily provided for, namely, when such a business happeneth, which, without great danger, cannot be put off till the appointed time of the synod.

34. But that, besides occasional synods, ordinary synods be kept at set times, is most profitable, not only that they may discuss and determine the more difficult ecclesiastical causes coming before them, whether by the appeal of some person aggrieved, or by the hesitation or doubting of inferior assemblies (for such businesses very often fall out), but also that the state of the churches whereof they have the care, being more certainly and frequently searched and known, if there be anything wanting or amiss in their doctrine, discipline or manners, or anything worthy of punishment, the slothful labourers in the vineyard of the Lord may be made to shake off the spirit of slumber and slothfulness, and be stirred up to the attending and fulfilling more diligently their calling, and not suffered any longer to sleep and snore in their office; the stragglers and wanderers may be reduced to the way; the untoward and stiff-necked, which scarce, or very hardly, suffer the yoke of discipline, as also unquiet persons, who devise new and hurtful things, may be reduced to order: finally, whatsoever doth hinder the more quick and efficacious course of the gospel may be discovered and removed.

35. It is too, too manifest (alas for it!) that there are those who with unwearied diligence, do most carefully labour that they may oppress the liberties and rights of synods, and may take away from them all liberty of consulting of things and matters ecclesiastical, at least of determining thereof (for they well know how much the union and harmony of churches may make against their designs): but so much the more it concerneth the orthodox churches to know, defend and preserve, this excellent liberty granted to them by divine right, and so to use it, that imminent dangers, approaching evils, urging grievances, scandals growing up, schisms rising, heresies creeping in, errors spreading, and strifes waxing hot, may be corrected and taken away, to the glory of God, and the edification and peace of the church.

36. Beside provincial and national synods, an oecumenical (so called from οἰκουμένη, that is from the habitable world,) or more truly, a general, or, if you will, an universal synod, if so it lie free and rightly constituted, and no other commissioners but orthodox churches be admitted (for what communion is there of light with darkness, of righteousness with unrighteousness, or of the temple of God with idols); such a synod is of special utility, peradventure also such a synod is to be hoped for, surely it is to be wished that, for defending the orthodox faith, both against Popery and other heresies, as also for propagating it to those who are without, especially the Jews, a more strait and more firm consociation may be entered into. For the unanimity of all the churches, as in evil it is of all things most hurtful, so on the contrary side, in good it is most pleasant, most profitable, and most effectual.

37. Unto the universal synod also (when it may be had) is to be referred the judgment of controversies, not of all, but of those which are controversiae juris, controversies of right; neither yet of all these, but of the chief and most weighty controversies of the orthodox faith, or of the most hard and unusual cases of conscience. Of the controversies of fact there is another and different consideration to be had; for besides that it would be a great inconvenience that plaintives, persons accused, and witnesses, be drawn from the most remote churches to the general or universal council, the visible communion itself of all the churches (on which the universal council is built, and whereupon, as on a foundation, it leaneth) is not so much of company, fellowship, or conversation, as of religion and doctrine. All true churches of the world do indeed profess the same true religion and faith, but there is beside this a certain commixture and conjunction of the churches of the same nation, as to a more near fellowship, and some acquaintance, conversing and companying together, which cannot be said of all the churches throughout the habitable world.

38. And for this cause, as in doctrinal controversies, which are handled by theologists and casuists, and in those which belong to the common state of the orthodox churches, the national synod is subordinate and subjected to the universal lawfully-constituted synod, and from the national to the oecumenical synod (when there is a just and weighty cause) an appeal is open: so there is no need that the appeals of those who complain of injury done to them through the exercise of discipline in this or that church, should go beyond the bounds of the national synod; but it is most agreeable to reason that they should rest and acquiesce within those bounds and borders; and that the ultimate judgment of such mutters be in the national synod, unless the thing itself be so hard and of so great moment, that the knot be justly thought worthy of a greater decider; in which case the controversy which is carried to the universal synod is rather of an abstract general theological proposition than of the particular or individual case.

39. Furthermore, the administration of the ecclesiastic power in consistories, classes and synods, doth not at all tend to weaken in anywise, hurt or diminish, the authority of the civil magistrate, much less to take it away or destroy it; yea, rather, by it a most profitable help cometh to the magistrate, forasmuch as by the bond of religion men's consciences are more straitly tied unto him. There has been, indeed, fantastical men, who, under pretence and cloak of Christian liberty, would abolish and cast out laws and judgments, orders also, degrees and honours, out of the commonwealth, and have been bold to reckon the function of the magistrate armed with the sword among evil things and unlawful: but the reformed churches do renounce and detest these dreams, and do most harmoniously and most willingly confess and acknowledge it to be God's will that the world be governed by laws and policy, and that he himself hath appointed the civil magistrate, and hath delivered to him the sword to the protection and praise of good men, but for punishment and revenge on the evil, that by this bridle, men's vices and faults may be restrained, whether these are committed against the first or second table.

40. The reformed churches believe also, and openly confess, the power and authority of emperors over their empires, of kings over their kingdoms, of princes and dukes over their dominions, and of other magistrates or states over their commonwealths and cities, to be the ordinances of God himself appointed as well to the manifestation of his own glory, as to the singular profit of mankind: and withal, that by reason of the will of God himself, revealed in his word, we must not only suffer and be content that those do rule which are set over their own territories, whether by hereditary or by elective right, but also to love them, fear them, and with all reverence and honour embrace them as the ambassadors and ministers of the most high and good God, being in his stead, and preferred for the good of their subjects, to pour out prayers for them, to pay tributes to them, and in all business of the commonwealth which is not against the word of God, to obey their laws and edicts.

41. The orthodox churches believe also, and do willingly acknowledge, that every lawful magistrate, being by God himself constituted the keeper and defender of both tables of the law, may and ought first and chiefly to take care of God's glory, and (according to his place, or in his manner and way) to preserve religion when pure, and to restore it when decayed and corrupted: and also to provide a learned and godly ministry, schools also and synods, as likewise to restrain and punish as well atheists, blasphemers, heretics and schismatics, as the violaters of justice and civil peace.

42. Wherefore the opinion of those sectaries of this age is altogether to be disallowed, who, though otherwise insinuating themselves craftily into the magistrate's favour, do deny unto him the authority and right of restraining heretics and schismatics, and do hold and maintain that such persons, how much soever hurtful and pernicious enemies to true religion and to the church, yet are to be tolerated by the magistrate, if so be he conceive them to be such as no way violate the laws of the commonwealth, and in nowise disturb the civil peace.

43. Yet the civil power and the ecclesiastical ought not by any means to be confounded or mixed together. Both powers are indeed from God, and ordained for his glory, and both to be guided by his word, and both are comprehended under that precept, "Honour thy father and thy mother," so that men ought to obey both civil magistrates and ecclesiastical governors in the Lord; to both powers their proper dignity and authority is to be maintained and preserved in force: to both also is some way intrusted the keeping of both tables of the law, also both the one and the other doth exercise some jurisdiction, and giveth sentence of judgment in an external court or judicatory: but these and other things of like sort, in which they agree notwithstanding, yet by marvellous vast differences are they distinguished the one from the other, and the rights of both remain distinct, and that eight manner of ways, which it shall not be amiss here to add, that unto each of these administrations, its own set bounds may be the better maintained.

44. First, therefore, they are differenced the one from the other, in respect of the very foundation and the institution: for the political or civil power is grounded upon the law of nature itself, and for that cause it is common to infidels with Christians; the power ecclesiastical dependeth immediately upon the positive law of Christ alone: that belongeth to the universal dominion of God the Creator over all nations; but this unto the special and economical kingdom of Christ the Mediator, which he exerciseth in the church alone, and which is not of this world.

45. The second difference is in the object, or matter about which: the power politic or civil is occupied about the outward man, and civil or earthly things,—about war, peace, conservation of justice, and good order in the commonwealth; also about the outward business or external things of the church, which are indeed necessary to the church, or profitable, as touching the outward man, yet not properly and purely spiritual, for they do not reach unto the soul, but only to the external state and condition of the ministers and members of the church.

46. For the better understanding whereof it is to be observed, that so far as the ministers and members of the church are citizens, subjects, or members of the commonwealth, it is in the power of the magistrate to judge, determine, and give sentence, concerning the disposing of their bodies or goods; as also concerning the maintenance of the poor, the sick, the banished, and of others in the church who are afflicted; to regulate (so far as concerneth the civil order) marriages, burials, and other circumstances which are common both to holy, and also to honest civil societies; to afford places fit for holy assemblies, and other external helps by which the sacred matters of the Lord may be more safely, commodiously, and more easily in the church performed, to remove the external impediments of divine worship or of ecclesiastical peace, and to repress those who exalt themselves against the true church and her ministers, and do raise up trouble against them.

47. The matter may further be thus illustrated, there is almost the like respect and consideration of the magistrate as he is occupied about the outward things of the church, and of the ecclesiastic ministry as it is occupied about the inward or spiritual part of civil government, that is, about those things which in the government of the commonwealth belong to the conscience. It is one thing to govern the commonwealth, and to make political and civil laws, another thing to interpret the word of God, and out of it to show the magistrate his duty, to wit, how he ought to govern the commonwealth, and in what manner he ought to use the sword. The former is proper and peculiar to the magistrate (neither doth the ministry intermeddle or entangle itself into such businesses), but the latter is contained within the office of the ministers.

48. For to that end also in the holy Scripture profitable, to show which is the best manner of governing a commonwealth, and that the magistrate, as being God's minister, may by this guiding star be so directed, as that he may execute the parts of his office according to the will of God, and may perfectly be instructed to every good work; yet the minister is not said properly to treat of civil businesses, but of the scandals which arise about them, or in the cases of conscience which occur in the administration of the commonwealth, so also the magistrate is not properly said to be exercised about the spiritual things of the church, but rather about those external things which adhere unto and accompany the spiritual things.

49. And in such external matters of the church, although all magistrates will not, yet all, yea even heathen magistrates, may and ought to aid and help the church: whence it is that by the command of God prayers are to be made also for an heathen magistrate, that the faithful under them may live a quiet life, with all godliness and honesty, 1 Tim. ii. 1, 2.

50. Unto the external things of the church belongeth, not only the correction of heretics and other troublers of the church, but also that civil order and way of convocating and calling together synods which is proper to the magistrate; for the magistrate ought by his authority and power both to establish the rights and liberties of synods assembling together at times appointed by the known and received law, and to indict and gather together synods occasionally, as often as the necessity of the church shall require the same. Not that all or any power to consult or determine of ecclesiastic or spiritual matters doth flow or spring from the magistrate as head of the church under Christ, but because in those things pertaining to the outward man, the church needeth the magistrate's aid and support.

51. So that the magistrate calleth together synods, not as touching those things which are proper to synods, but in respect of the things which are common to synods with other meetings and civil public assemblies, that is, not as they are assemblies in the name of Christ, to treat of matters spiritual, but as they are public assemblies within his territories; for to the end that public conventions may be kept in any territory, the license of the lord of that place ought to be desired. In synods, therefore, a respect of order, as well civil as ecclesiastical, is to be had; and because of this civil order, outward defence, better accommodation, together with safe access and recess, the consent and commandment of him who is appointed to take care of, and defend human order, doth intervene.

52. Moreover, when the church is rent asunder by unhappy and lamentable schisms, while they who have raised the troubles, and given cause for the solemn gathering of a synod (whether by their heresy, or schism, or tyranny, or any other fault of others), use to place the great strength and safeguard of their cause in declining and fleeing the trial and sentence of a free synod as being formidable to them, who seeth not that they cannot be drawn to a public and judicial trial, nor other disobedient persons be compelled to obedience, without the magistrate's public mandate and help.

53. The object of ecclesiastical power is not the same with the object of the civil power, but much differing from it; for the ecclesiastical power doth determine and appoint nothing concerning men's bodies, goods, dignities, civil rights, but is employed only about the inward man or the soul; not that it can search the hearts or judge of the secrets of the conscience, which is in the power of God alone: yet notwithstanding it hath for its proper object those externals which are purely spiritual, and do belong properly and most nearly to the spiritual good of the soul; which also are termed τὰ εἴσα τῆς ἐκκλησίας, the inward things of the church.

54. Those things, then, wherein the ecclesiastical power is exercised, are the preaching of the word, the administration of sacraments, public prayer and thanksgiving, the catechising and instructing of children and ignorant persons, the examination of those who are to come to the holy communion, the ecclesiastical discipline, the ordination of ministers, and the abdication, deposing, and degrading of them (if they become like unsavoury salt), the deciding and determining of controversies of faith and cases of conscience, canonical constitutions concerning the treasury of the church and collections of the faithful, as also concerning ecclesiastical rites or indifferent things which pertain to the keeping of decency and order in the church, according to the general rules of Christian love and prudence contained in the word of God.

55. It is true that about the same things the civil power is occupied, as touching the outward man, or the outward disposing of divine things in this or that dominion, as was said, not as they are spiritual and evangelical ordinances piercing into the conscience itself, but the object of the power ecclesiastical is a thing merely and purely spiritual; and in so far as it is spiritual (for even that jurisdiction ecclesiastical which is exercised in an outward court or judicatory, and which inflicteth public censures, forbiddeth from the use of the holy supper, and excludeth from the society of the church) doth properly concern the inward man, or the repentance and salvation of the soul.

56. Surely the faithful and godly ministers, although they could do it unchallenged and uncontrolled, and were therein allowed by the magistrate (as in the prelatical times it was) yet would not usurp the power of life and death, or judge and determine concerning men's honours, goods, inheritance, division of families, or other civil businesses, seeing they well know these things to be heterogeneous to their office; but as they ought not to entangle themselves with the judging of civil causes, so if they should be negligent and slothful in their own office, they shall in that be no less culpable.

57. To the object also of ecclesiastical power belongeth the assembling of synods, so far as they are spiritual assemblies proper to the church, and assembled in the Holy Ghost; for being so considered, the governors of churches, after the example of the apostles and presbyters, Acts xv., in a manifest danger of the church, ought to use their own right of meeting together and convening, that the churches endangered may be relieved and supported.

58. Thirdly, These powers are differenced in respect of their forms, and that three ways: for, first, the civil power, although in respect of God it be ministerial, yet in respect of the subjects it is lordly and magisterial. Ecclesiastical power is indeed furnished with authority, yet that authority is liker the fatherly than the kingly authority; yea also it is purely ministerial, much less can it be lawful to ministers of the church to bear dominion over the flock.

59. Emperors, kings, and other magistrates are indeed appointed fathers of the country, but they are withal lords of their people and subjects: not as if it were permitted to them to bear rule and command at their own will and as they list (for they are the ministers of God for the good and profit of the subjects), yet it belongs to their power truly and properly to exercise dominion, to hold principality, to proceed imperiously. It is indeed the duty of ministers and rulers of the church to oversee, to feed as shepherds, to correct and rectify, to bear the keys, to be stewards in the house of Christ, but in nowise to be lords over the house, or to govern as lords, or lord-like to rule; yea, in brief, this is the difference between the civil magistrate and the ecclesiastical ministry, in respect of those who are committed to their trust, that the lot of the former is to be served or ministered unto, the lot of the latter to minister or serve.

60. Now we have one only Lord who governs our souls, neither is it competent to man, but to God alone, to have power and authority over consciences. But the Lord hath appointed his own stewards over his own family, that according to his commandment they may give to every one their allowance or portion, and to dispense his mysteries faithfully; and to them he hath delivered the keys, or power of letting into his house, or excluding out of his house those whom he himself will have let in or shut out. Matt. xvi. 19; and xviii. 18; Luke xii. 42; 1 Cor. iv. 1; Tit. i. 7.

61. Next, the civil power is endued with authority of compelling; but it belongs not to the ministry to compel the disobedient. If any compulsion be in or about ecclesiastical matters, it is adventitious from without, to wit, from the help and assistance of the magistrate, not from the nature of ecclesiastical power, from which it is very heterogeneous; and, therefore, if any suspended or excommunicate person should be found who shall be so stiff-necked, and so impudent, that at once he cast off all shame, and make no account at all of those censures, but scorn and contemn the same, or peradventure shall insolently or proudly obtrude himself upon the sacrament, or being also filled with devilish malice do more and more contradict and blaspheme, the ecclesiastical ministry in such cases hath nothing more to do by way of jurisdiction: but the magistrate hath in readiness a compelling jurisdiction and external force, whereby such stubborn, rebellious, and undaunted pride may be externally repressed.

62. Last of all, the power of the magistrate worketh only politically or civilly, according to the nature of the sceptre or sword, maketh and guardeth civil laws, which sometimes also he changeth or repealeth, and other things of that kind he effecteth with a secular power: but the ecclesiastical power dealeth spiritually, and only in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by authority intrusted or received from him alone: neither is exercised without prayer or calling on the name of God; nor, lastly, doth it use any other than spiritual weapons.

63. The same sin, therefore, in the same man may be punished one way by the civil, another way by the ecclesiastical power; by the civil power under the formality of a crime, with corporal or pecuniary punishment, by the ecclesiastical power, under the notion and nature of scandal, with a spiritual censure, even as also the same civil question is one way deliberate upon and handled by the magistrate in the senate or place of judgment, another way by the minister of the church, in the presbytery or synod; by the magistrate, so far as it pertaineth to the government of the commonwealth, by the minister, as far as it respects the conscience; for the ecclesiastical ministry also is exercised about civil things spiritually, in so far as it teacheth and admonisheth the magistrate out of the word of God what is best and most acceptable unto God; or as it reproveth freely unjust judgments, unjust wars, and the like, and out of the Scripture threateneth the wrath of God to be revealed against all unrighteousness of men: so also is the magistrate said to be occupied civilly about spiritual things.

64. Therefore all the actions of the civil magistrate, even when he is employed about ecclesiastical matters, are of their own nature and essentially civil, he punisheth externally idolaters, blasphemers, sacrilegious persons, heretics, profaners of holy things, and according to the nature and measure of the sin he condemneth to death or banishment, forfeiture of goods, or imprisonment; he guardeth and underproppeth ecclesiastical canons with civil authority, giveth a place of habitation to the church in his territory, restraineth or expelleth the insolent and untamed disturbers of the church.

65. He taketh care also for maintaining the ministers and schools, and supplieth the temporal necessities of God's servants; by his command assembleth synods, when there is need of them; and summoneth, calleth out, and draws to trial the unwilling, which without the magistrate's strength and authority cannot be done, as hath been already said; he maketh synods also safe and secure, and in a civil way presideth or moderateth in them (if it seem so good to him) either by himself or by a substitute commissioner: in all which the power of the magistrate, though occupied about spiritual things, is not for all that spiritual, but civil.

66. Fourthly, They differ in the end. The immediate nearest end of civil power is, that the good of the commonwealth may be provided for and procured, whether it be, in time of peace, according to the rules of law and counsel of judges, or in time of war, according to the rules of military prudence, and so the temporal safety of the subjects may be procured, and that external peace and civil liberty may be preserved, and, being lost, may be again restored.

67. But the chiefest and last end of civil government is, the glory of God the Creator, namely, that those who do evil, being by a superior power restrained or punished, and those who do good getting praise of the same, the subjects so much the more may shun impiety and injustice, and that virtue, justice, and the moral law of God (as touching those eternal duties of both tables, unto which all the posterity of Adam are obliged) may remain in strength and flourish.

68. But whereas the Christian magistrate doth wholly devote himself to the promoting of the gospel and kingdom of Christ, and doth direct and bend all the might and strength of his authority to that end: this proceedeth not from the nature of his office or function, which is common to him with an infidel magistrate, but from the influence of his common Christian calling into his particular vocation.

69. For every member of the church (and so also the faithful and godly magistrate) ought to refer and order his particular vocation, faculty, ability, power and honour, to this end, that the kingdom of Christ may be propagated and promoted, and the true religion be cherished and defended: so that the advancement of the gospel, and of all the ordinances of the gospel, is indeed the end of the godly magistrate, not of a magistrate simply: or (if ye will rather) it is not the end of the office itself, but of him who doth execute the same piously.

70. But the end of ecclesiastical power, yea, the end as well of the ministry itself as of the godly minister, is, that the kingdom of Christ may be set forward; that the paths of the Lord be made straight; that his holy mysteries may be kept pure; that stumblingblocks may be removed out of the church, lest a little leaven leaven the whole lump, or lest one sick or scabbed sheep infect the whole flock; that the faithful may so walk as it becometh the gospel of Christ, and that the wandering sheep of Christ may be converted and brought back to the sheepfold.

71. And seeing this power is given of the Lord not to destruction but to edification, therefore this same scope is propounded in excommunication (which is the greatest and last of ecclesiastical censures), namely, that the soul of an offending brother may be gained to Christ, and that, being stricken with fear, and the stubborn sinner filled with shame, may by the grace of God be humbled, and may (as a brand plucked out of the fire) be snatched out of the snare of the devil, and may repent unto salvation; at least the rest may turn away from those which are branded with such a censure, lest the soul-infection do creep and spread further.

72. Fifthly, They are distinguished by the effect. The effect of civil power is either proper, or by way of redundance. The proper effect is the safety temporal of the commonwealth, external tranquillity, the fruition of civil liberty, and of all things which are necessary to the civil society of men: the effect by way of redundance is the good of the church, to wit, in so far as, by execution of justice and good laws, some impediments that usually hinder and disturb the course of the gospel, are avoided or taken away.

73. For by how much the more faithfully the magistrate executeth his office in punishing the wicked, and cherishing and encouraging good men, taking away those things which withstand the gospel, and punishing or driving away the troublers and subverters of the church,—so much the more the orthodox faith and godliness are reverenced and had in estimation,—sins are hated and feared. Finally, All the subjects contained (as much as concerneth the outward man) within the lists of God's law, whence, also, by consequence, it happeneth, by God's blessing, that the church is defiled with fewer scandals, and doth obtain the more freedom and peace.

74. But the proper effect of the ecclesiastical power, or keys of the kingdom of heaven is wholly spiritual; for the act of binding and loosing, of retaining and remitting sins, doth reach to the soul and conscience itself (which cannot be said of the act of the civil power): and as unjust excommunication is void, so ecclesiastical censure, being inflicted by the ministers of Christ and his stewards according to his will, is ratified in heaven (Matt, xviii. 18), and therefore ought to be esteemed and acknowledged in like manner as inflicted by Christ himself.

75. Sixthly, They are also differenced in respect of the subjects. The politic power is committed sometimes to one, sometimes to more, sometime by right of election, sometime by right of succession; but the ecclesiastical power is competent to none under the New Testament by the right of succession, but he who hath it must be called by God and the church to it; neither was it given by Christ to one, either pastor or elder, much less to a prelate, but to the church, that is, to the consistory of presbyters. It is confessed, indeed, and who can be ignorant of it, that the power, as they call it, of order, doth belong to particular ministers, and is by each of them apart lawfully exercised. But that power which is commonly called of jurisdiction is committed not to one, but to the unity, that is, to a consistory; therefore ecclesiastical censure ought not to be inflicted but "by many," 2 Cor. ii. 6.

76. Seventhly, They differ as touching the correlative. God hath commanded, that unto the civil power every soul, or all members of the commonwealth, of what condition and estate soever, be subject; for what have we to do with the Papists, who will have them whom they call the clergy or ecclesiastical persons, to be free from the yoke of the civil magistrate? The ecclesiastical power extends itself to none other subjects than unto those which are called brethren, or members of the church.

77. Eighthly, There remaineth another difference in respect of the distinct and divided exercise of authority, for either power ceasing from its duty, or remitting punishment, that doth not (surely it ought not) prejudice the exercise of the other power, namely, if the magistrate cease to do his duty, or do neglect to punish, with secular punishment, those malefactors who, by profession, are church members nevertheless, it is in the power of the governors of the church, by the bridle of ecclesiastical discipline, to curb such men; yea also, by virtue of their office, they are bound to do it, and on the other part, the magistrate may and ought to punish in life and limb, honours or goods, notwithstanding of the offender's repentance or reconciliation with the church.

78. Therefore, the one sword being put up in the scabbard, it is free, and often necessary, to draw the other. Neither power is bound to cast out or receive him whom the other doth cast forth or receive the reason whereof is, because the ecclesiastical ministry doth chiefly respect the repentance to salvation, and gaining of the sinner's soul, wherefore it also embraceth all kinds of wicked men repenting, and receiveth them into the bosom of the church; the magistrate proposeth to himself another and much differing scope, for even repenting offenders are by him punished, both that justice and the laws may be satisfied, as also to terrify others,—hence it is that absolution from ecclesiastic censure freeth not at all the delinquent from civil judgment and the external sword.

79. Seeing, then, there are so many and so great differences of both offices, and seeing also that the function of ministers and elders of the church is not at all contained in the office of the magistrate, neither, on the other part, is this comprehended within that, magistrates shall no less sin in usurping ecclesiastical power, ministering holy things, ordaining ministers, or exercising discipline ecclesiastical, than ministers should sin in rushing into the borders of the magistrate, and in thrusting themselves into his calling.

80. Neither are those powers more mingled one with another, or less distinguished, where the magistrate is a Christian than where he is an infidel, for as in a believing father, and in an infidel father, the rights of a father are the same, so in a Christian magistrate, and in an infidel magistrate, the rights of magistrates are the same; so that to the magistrate converted to the Christian faith there is no accession of new right, or increase of civil power, although being endued with true faith and piety, he is made more fit and willing to the undergoing of his office and the doing of his duty.

81. So, then, the word of God and the law of Christ, which by so evident difference separateth and distinguisheth ecclesiastical government from the civil, forbiddeth the Christian magistrate to enter upon or usurp the ministry of the word and sacraments, or the judicial dispensing of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, to invade the church government, or to challenge to himself the right of both swords, spiritual and corporal; but if any magistrate (which God forbid) should dare to arrogate to himself so much, and to enlarge his skirts so far, the church shall then straightway be constrained to complain justly, and cry out, that though the Pope is changed, yet popedom remaineth still.

82. It is unlawful, moreover, to a Christian magistrate to withstand the practice and execution of ecclesiastical discipline (whether it be that which belongs to a particular church, or the matter be carried to a class or synod). Now the magistrate withstandeth the ecclesiastic discipline, either by prohibitions and unjust laws, or, by his evil example, stirring up and inciting others to the contempt thereof, or to the trampling it under foot.

83. Surely the Christian magistrate (if at any time he give any grievous scandal to the church), seeing he also is a member of the church, ought nowise disdain to submit himself to the power of the keys; neither is this to be marvelled at, for even as the office of the minister of the church is nowise subordinate and subjected to the civil power, but the person of the minister, as he is a member of the commonwealth, is subject thereto, so the civil power itself, or the magistrate, as a magistrate, is not subjected to ecclesiastical power; yet that man, who is a magistrate, ought (as he is a member of the church) to be under the church's censure of his manners, after the example of the emperor Theodosius, unless he will despise and set at nought ecclesiastical discipline, and indulge the swelling pride of the flesh.

84. If any man should again object that the magistrate is not indeed to resist ecclesiastical government, yet that the abuses thereof are to be corrected and taken away by him, the answer is ready. In the worst and most troublesome times, or in the decayed and troubled estate of things, when the ordinance of God in the church is violently turned into tyranny, to the treading down of true religion, and to the oppressing of the professors thereof, and when nothing almost is sound or whole, divers things are yielded to be lawful to godly magistrates, which are not ordinarily lawful for them, that so to extraordinary diseases extraordinary remedies may be applied. So also the magistrate abusing his power unto tyranny, and making havoc of all, it is lawful to resist him by some extraordinary ways and means, which are not ordinarily to be allowed.

85. Yet ordinarily, and by common or known law and right in settled churches, if any man have recourse to the magistrate to complain, that, through abuse of ecclesiastical discipline, injury is done to him, or if any sentence of the pastors and elders of the church, whether concerning faith or discipline, do displease or seem unjust unto the magistrate himself, it is not for that cause lawful to draw those ecclesiastical causes to a civil tribunal, or to bring in a kind of political or civil popedom.

86. What then? Shall it be lawful ordinarily for ministers and elders to do what they list? Or shall the governors in the churches, glorying in the law, by their transgression dishonour God? God forbid. For first, if they shall trespass in anything against the magistrate or municipal laws, whether by intermeddling in judging of civil causes, or otherwise disturbing the peace and order of the commonwealth, they are liable to civil trial and judgments, and it is in the power of the magistrate to restrain and punish them.

87. Again, it hath been before showed, that to ecclesiastical evils ecclesiastical remedies are appointed and fitted, for the church is, no less than the commonwealth, through the grace of God, sufficient to itself in reference unto her own end, and as in the commonwealth, so in the church, the error of inferior judgments and assemblies, or their evil government, is to be corrected by superior judgments and assemblies, and so still by them of the same order, lest one order be confounded with another, or one government be intermingled with another government. What shall now the adversaries of ecclesiastical power object here, which those who admit not the yoke of the magistrate may not be ready, in like manner, to transfer against the civil judicatories and government of the commonwealth, seeing it happeneth sometimes that the commonwealth is no less ill governed than the church?

88. If any man shall prosecute the argument, and say that yet no remedy is here showed which may be applied to the injustice or error of a national synod, surely he stumbleth against the same stone, seeing he weigheth not the matter with an equal balance, for the same may, in like sort, fall back and be cast upon parliaments, or any supreme senate of a commonwealth, for who seeth not the judgment of the supreme civil senate to be nothing more infallible, yea, also, in matters of faith and ecclesiastical discipline, more apt and prone to error (as being less accustomed to sacred studies) than the judgment of the national synod? What medicines then, or what sovereign plasters shall be had, which may be fit for the curing and healing of the errors and miscarriages of the supreme magistrates and senate? The very like, and beside all this, other and more effectual medicines by which the errors of national synods may be healed, are possible to be had.

89. There wanteth not a divine medicine and sovereign balm in Gilead, for although the popish opinion of the infallibility of counsels be worthily rejected and exploded, yet it is not in vain that Christ hath promised he shall be present with an assembly which indeed and in truth meeteth in his name with such an assembly verily he useth to be present, by a spiritual aid and assistance of his own Spirit, to uphold the falling, or to raise up the fallen. Whence it is that divers times the errors of former synods are discovered and amended by the latter; sometimes, also, the second or afterthoughts of one and the same synod are the wiser and the better.

90. Furthermore, the line of ecclesiastical subordination is longer and further stretched than the line of civil subordination; for a national synod must be subordinate and subject to an universal synod in the manner aforesaid, whereas yet there is no oecumenical parliament or general civil court acknowledged, unto which the supreme civil senate in this or that nation should be subject. Finally, neither is the church altogether destitute of nearer remedies whether an universal council may be had or not.

91. For the national synod ought to declare, and that with greatest reverence, to the magistrate, the grounds of their sentence, and the reasons of their proceedings, when he demandeth or inquireth into the same, and desireth to be satisfied; but if the magistrate nevertheless do dissent, or cannot, by contrary reasons (which may be brought, if he please), move the synod to alter their judgment, yet may he require and procure that the matter be again debated and canvassed in another national synod, and so the reasons of both sides being thoroughly weighed, may be lawfully determined in an ecclesiastical way.

92. But as there is much indeed to be given to the demand of the magistrate, so is there here a twofold caution to be used, for, first, notwithstanding of a future revision, it is necessary that the former sentence of the synod, whether concerning the administration of ecclesiastical discipline, or against any heresy, be forthwith put in execution, lest by lingering, and making of delays, the evil of the church take deeper root, and the gangrene spread and creep further; and lest violence be done to the consciences of ministers, if they be constrained to impart the signs and seals of the covenant of grace to dogs and swine, that is, to unclean persons, wallowing in the mire of ungodliness; and lest subtile men abuse such interims or intervals, so as that ecclesiastical discipline altogether decay, and the very decrees of synods be accounted as cobwebs, which none feareth to break down.

93. Next it may be granted that the matter may be put under a further examination, yet upon condition, that when it is come to the revision of the former sentence, regard may be had of the weaker which are found willing to be taught, though they doubt; but that unto the wicked and contentious tempters, which do mainly strive to oppress our liberty which we have in Christ, and to bring us into bondage, we do not for a moment give place by subjecting ourselves; for what else seek they or wait for, than that, under the pretence of a revising and of new debate, they cast in lets and impediments ever and anon, and that by cunning lyings in wait they may betray the liberty of the church, and in process of time may, by open violence, more forcibly break in upon it, or at least constrain the ministers of the church to weave Penelope's web, which they can never bring to an end.

94. Moreover, the Christian magistrate hath then only discharged his office in reference to ecclesiastical discipline, when not only he withdraweth nothing from it, and maketh no impediment to it, but also affordeth special furtherance and help to it, according to the prophecy, Isa. xlix. 23, "And kings shall be thy nursing-fathers, and their queens thy nursing-mothers."

95. For Christian magistrates and princes, embracing Christ, and sincerely giving their names to him, do not only serve him as men, but also use their office to his glory and the good of the church; they defend, stand for, and take care to propagate the true faith and godliness,—they afford places of habitation to the church, and furnish necessary helps and supports,—turn away injuries done to it,—restrain false religion,—and cherish, underprop, and defend the rights and liberties of the church: so far they are from diminishing, changing or restraining those rights; for so the condition of the church were in that respect worse, and the liberty thereof more cut short, under the Christian magistrate, than under the infidel or heathen.

96. Wherefore seeing these nursing-fathers, favourers, and defenders, can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth, nor have any right against the gospel, but for the gospel; and their power, in respect of the church whereof they bear the care, being not privative or destructive, but cumulative and auxiliary, thereby it is sufficiently clear that they ought to cherish, and by their authority ought to establish the ecclesiastical discipline; but yet not with implicit faith, or blind obedience; for the reformed churches do not deny to any of the faithful, much less to the magistrate, the judgment of Christian prudence and discretion concerning those things which are decreed or determined by the church.

97. Therefore, as to each member of the church respectively, so unto the magistrate belongeth the judgment of such things, both to apprehend and to judge of them; for although the magistrate is not ordained and preferred of God, that he should be a judge of matters and causes spiritual, of which there is controversy in the church, yet is he questionless judge of his own civil act about spiritual things; namely, of defending them in his own dominions, and of approving or tolerating the same; and if, in this business, he judge and determine according to the wisdom of the flesh, and not according to the wisdom which is from above, he is to render an account thereof before the supreme tribunal.

98. However, the ecclesiastical discipline, according as it is ordained by Christ, whether it be established and ratified by civil authority or not, ought to be retained and exercised in the society of the faithful (as long as it is free and safe for them to come together in holy assemblies), for the want of civil authority is unto the church like a ceasing gain, but not like damage or loss ensuing; as it superaddeth nothing more, so it takes nothing away.

99. If it further happen (which God forbid) that the magistrate do so far abuse his authority, that he doth straitly forbid what Christ hath ordained, yet the constant and faithful servants of Christ will resolve and determine with themselves, that any extremities are rather to be undergone than that they should obey such things, and that we ought to obey God rather than men; yea, they will not leave off to perform all the parts of their office, being ready in the meantime to render a reason of their practice to every one that demandeth it, but specially unto the magistrate (as was said before).

100. These things are not to that end and purpose proposed, that these functions should be opposed one against another, in a hostile posture, or in terms of enmity, than which nothing is more hurtful to the church and commonwealth, nothing more execrable to them who are truly and sincerely zealous for the house of God (for they have not so learned Christ); but the aim is, first, and above all, that unto the King of kings and Lord of lords, Jesus Christ, the only monarch of the church, his own prerogative royal (of which also himself in the world was accused, and for his witnessing a good confession thereof before Pontius Pilate, was unjustly condemned to death) may be fully maintained and defended.

101. Next, this debate tendeth also to this end, that the power, as well of ecclesiastical censure as of the civil sword, being in force, the licentiousness of carnal men, who desire that there be too slack ecclesiastical discipline, or none at all, may be bridled, and so men may sin less, and may live more agreeably to the gospel. Another thing here intended is, that errors on both sides being overthrown (as well the error of those who, under a fair pretence of maintaining and defending the rights of magistracy, do leave to the church either no power, or that which is too weak, as the error of others, who, under the veil of a certain suppositious and imaginary Christian liberty, do turn off the yoke of the magistrate) both powers may enjoy their own privileges; add hereto, that both powers being circumscribed with their distinct borders and bounds, and also the one underpropped and strengthened by the help of the other, a holy concord between them may be nourished, and they may mutually and friendly embrace one another.

102. Last of all, seeing there are not wanting some unhappy men, who cease not to pervert the right ways of the Lord, and with all diligence go about to shake off the yoke of the ecclesiastical discipline where now it is about to be introduced, yea, also where it hath been long ago established, and as yet happily remaineth in force, it was necessary to obviate their most wicked purposes; which things being so, let all which hath been said pass, with the good leave and liking of those orthodox churches in which the discipline of excommunication is not as yet in use; neither can any offence easily arise to them from hence, yea (if the best conjecture do not deceive), they cannot but rejoice and congratulate at the defence and vindication of this discipline.

103. For those churches do not deny, but acknowledge and teach, that the discipline of excommunication is most agreeable to the word of God, as also that it ought to be restored and exercised; which also, heretofore, the most learned Zachary Ursine, in the declaration of his judgment concerning excommunication, exhibited to Prince Frederick, the third count elector palatine, the title whereof is, Judicium de Disciplina Ecclesiastica et Excommunicatione, &c.

104. For thus he: "In other churches where either no excommunication is in use, or it is not lawfully administered, and nevertheless, without all controversy, it is confessed and openly taught, that it ought justly to be received and be of force in the church." And a little after: "Lest also your Highness, by this new opinion, do sever yourself and your churches from all other churches, as well those which have not excommunication as those which have it; forasmuch as all of them do unanimously confess, and always confessed, that there is reason why it ought to be in use."

105. To the same purpose it tendeth which the highly esteemed Philip Melancthon, in his Common Places, chap. Of civil magistrates, doth affirm: "Before (saith he) I warned that civil places and powers are to be distinguished from the adhering confusions which arise from other causes, partly from the malice of the devil, partly from the malice of men, partly from the common infirmity of men, as it cometh to pass in other kinds of life and government ordained of God. No man doubteth that ecclesiastical government is ordained of God, and yet how many and great disorders grow in it from other causes." Where he mentioneth a church government distinct from the civil, and that jure divino, as a thing uncontroverted.

106. Neither were the wishes of the chief divines of Zurich and Berne wanting for the recalling and restoring of the discipline of excommunication. So Bullinger, upon 1 Cor. v.: "And hitherto (saith he) of the ecclesiastical chastising of wickedness; but here I would have the brethren diligently warned, that they watch, and with all diligence take care that this wholesome medicine, thrown out of the true church, by occasion of the Pope's avarice, may be reduced; that is, that scandalous sins be punished; for this is the very end of excommunication, that men's manners may be well ordered, and the saints flourish, the profane being restrained, lest wicked men, by their impudence and impiety, increase and undo all. It is our part, O brethren, with greatest diligence, to take care of those things; for we see that Paul, in this place, doth stir up those that were negligent in this business."

107. Aretius agreeth hereunto. Problem. Theolog., loc. 33: "Magistrates do not admit the yoke; they are afraid for their honours; they love licentiousness," &c. "The common people are too dissolute; the greatest part is most corrupt," &c. "In the meanwhile, I willingly confess that we are not to despair, but the age following will peradventure yield more tractable spirits, more mild hearts than our times have." See also Lavater agreeing in this, homil. 52, on Nehemiah: "Because the popes of Rome have abused excommunication, for the establishing of their own tyranny, it cometh to pass that almost no just discipline can be any more settled in the church; but unless the wicked be restrained, all things must of necessity run into the worst condition." See, besides, the opinion of Fabritius upon Psal. cxlix. 6-9, of spiritual corrections, which he groundeth upon that text compared with Matt. xvi. 19; xviii. 18; John xx. 23.

108. It can hardly be doubted or called in question, but besides these, other learned and godly divines of those churches were and are of the same mind herein with those now cited; and, indeed, the very Confession of Faith of the churches of Helvetia, chap. 18, may be an evidence hereof: "But there ought to be, in the meantime, a just discipline amongst ministers, for the doctrine and life of ministers is diligently to be inquired of in synods: those that sin are to be rebuked of the elders, and to be brought again into the way, if they be curable; or to be deposed, and, like wolves, driven away from the flock of the Lord, if they be incurable." That this manner of synodical censure, namely, of deposing ministers from their office for some great scandal, is used in the republic of Zurich, Lavater is witness, in his book of the rites and ordinances of the church of Zurich, chap. 23. Surely they could not be of that mind, that ecclesiastical discipline ought to be exercised upon delinquent ministers only, and not also upon other rotten members of the church.

109. Yea, the Helvetian Confession, in the place now cited, doth so tax the inordinate zeal of the Donatists and Anabaptists (which are so bent upon the rooting out of the tares out of the Lord's field, that they take not heed of the danger of plucking up the wheat) that withal it doth not obscurely commend the ecclesiastical forensical discipline as distinct from the civil power; "And seeing (say they) it is altogether necessary that there be in the church a discipline; and among the ancients, in times past, excommunication hath been usual, and ecclesiastical courts have been among the people of God, among whom this discipline was exercised by prudent and godly men. It belongeth also to ministers, according to the case of the times, the public estate and necessity to moderate this discipline,—where this rule is ever to be held, that all ought to be done to edification, decently, honestly, without tyranny and sedition. The Apostle also witnesseth (2 Cor. xiii.), that to himself was given of God a power unto edification, and not unto destruction."

110. And, now, what resteth but that God be entreated with continual and ardent prayers, both that he would put into the hearts of all magistrates, zeal and care to cherish, defend, and guard the ecclesiastical discipline, together with the rest of Christ's ordinances, and to stop their ears against the importunate suits of whatsoever claw-backs who would stir them up against the church; and that, also, all governors and rulers of churches, being everywhere furnished and helped with the strength of the Holy Spirit, may diligently and faithfully execute this part also of their function, as it becometh the trusty servants of Christ, who study to please their own Lord and Master more than men.

111. Finally, All those who are more averse from ecclesiastical discipline, or ill-affected against it, are to be admonished and entreated, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that they be no longer entangled and inveigled with carnal prejudice, to give place in this thing to human affections, and to measure by their own corrupt reason spiritual discipline, but that they do seriously think with themselves, and consider in their minds, how much better it were that the lusts of the flesh were, as with a bridle, tamed; and that the repentance, amendment, and gaining of vicious men unto salvation may be sought, than that sinners be left to their own disposition, and be permitted to follow their own lusts without controlment, and by their evil example to draw others headlong into ruin with themselves; and seeing either the keys of discipline must take no rust, or the manners of Christians will certainly contract much rust: what is here to be chosen, and what is to be shunned, let the wise and godly, who alone take to heart the safety of the church, judge.

THE END.



A SERMON PREACHED BEFORE THE HONOURABLE HOUSE OF COMMONS AT THEIR LATE SOLEMN FAST

A

SERMON

PREACHED BEFORE

THE HONOURABLE HOUSE OF COMMONS

AT THEIR LATE SOLEMN FAST,

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 27, 1644.

BY GEORGE GILLESPIE,

MINISTER AT EDINBURGH, 1642.

"When the Lord shall build up Zion, he shall appear in his glory"—Psal. cii. 16.

EDINBURGH:

ROBERT OGLE AND OLIVER AND BOYD.

M. OGLE & SON AND WILLIAM COLLINS, GLASGOW. J. DEWAR, PERTH. W. MIDDLETON, DUNDEE

G. & R. KING, ABERDEEN. W. M'COMB, BELFAST.

HAMILTON, ADAMS, & CO., AND JAMES NISBET & CO., LONDON.

REPRINTED BY A. W. MURRAY, MILNE SQUARE, EDINBURGH.

1844.



PREFACE TO THE READER.

Divine providence hath made it my lot, and a calling hath induced me (who am less than the least of all the servants of Christ) to appear among others in this cloud of public witnesses. The scope of the sermon is to endeavour the removal of the obstructions, both of humiliation and reformation; two things which ought to lie very much in our thoughts at this time. Concerning both I shall preface but little. Reformation hath many unfriends, some upon the right hand, and some upon the left; while others cry up that detestable indifferency or neutrality, abjured in our solemn covenant, insomuch that Gamaliel (Acts v. 38, 39) and Gallio (Acts xviii. 14-17), men who regarded alike the Jewish and the Christian religion, are highly commended, as "examples for all Christians,"(1361) and as men walking by the rules not only of policy, but of "reason and religion." Now, let all those that are either against us or not with us do what they can, the right hand of the most High shall perfect the glorious begun reformation. Can all the world keep down "the Sun of Righteousness" from rising? or, being risen, can they spread a vail over it? And though they dig deep to hide their counsels, is not this a time of God's overreaching and befooling all plotting wits? They have conceived iniquity, and they shall bring forth vanity: "They have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind" (Hos. viii. 7). Wherefore we "will wait upon the Lord, that hideth his face from the house of Jacob, and will look for him" (Isa. viii. 17); and "though he slay us, yet will we trust in him" (Job xiii. 15). The Lord hath commanded to proclaim, and to say "to the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy salvation cometh" (Isa. lxii. 11); "Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, all ye that mourn for her" (Isa. lxvi. 10); for "behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (2 Cor. vi. 2). But I have more to say: Mourn, O mourn with Jerusalem, all ye that rejoice for her; "This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth" (Isa. xxxvii. 3): it is an interwoven time, warped with mercies, and woofted with judgments. Say not thou in thine heart, The days of my mourning are at an end: Oh! we are to this day an unhumbled and an unprepared people; and there are among us both many cursed Achans, and many sleeping Jonahs, but few wrestling Jacobs; even the wise virgins are slumbering with the foolish (Matt. xxv. 5): surely, unless we be timely awakened, and more deeply humbled, God will punish us yet "seven times" (Lev. xxvi. 18, 21, 24, 28) more for our sins; and if he hath chastised us with "whips," he will "chastise us with scorpions;" and he will yet give a further charge to the sword to "avenge the quarrel of his covenant" (Lev, xxvi. 25). In such a case, I cannot say, according to the now Oxford divinity, that preces et lachrymae,—prayers and tears,—must be our only one shelter and fortress, and that we must cast away defensive arms, as unlawful, in any case whatsoever, against the supreme magistrate (that is, by interpretation, they would have us do no more than pray, to the end themselves may do no less than prey); wherein they are contradicted not only by Pareus, and by others that are "eager for a presbytery" (as a prelate(1362) of chief note hath lately taken, I should say mistaken, his mark), but even by those that are "eager royalists"(1363) (pardon me that I give them not their right name: I am sure, when all is well reckoned, we are better friends to royal authority than themselves). Yet herein I do agree with them, that "prayers and tears" will prove our strongest weapons, and the only tela divina, the weapons that fight for us from above: O then "fear the Lord, ye his saints" (Psal. xxxiv. 9); O stir up yourselves to lay hold on him (Isa. lxiv. 7); "Keep not silence; and give him no rest, till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth" (Isa. lxii. 6, 7). O that we could all make wells in our dry and desert-like hearts (Psal. lxxxiv. 6), that we may draw out water (1 Sam. vii. 6), even buckets-full, to quench the wrath of a sin-revenging God, the fire which still burneth against the Lord's inheritance. God grant that this sermon be not "as water spilt on the ground" but may "drop as the rain" and "distil as the dew" (Deut. xxxii. 2) of heaven upon thy soul.



SERMON.

EZEK. xliii. 11.

"And if they be ashamed of all that they have done, show them the form of the house, and the fashion thereof, and the goings-out thereof, and the comings-in thereof, and all the forms thereof, and all the ordinances thereof, and all the forms thereof, and all the laws thereof: and write it in their sight, that they may keep the whole form thereof, and all the ordinance thereof, and do them."

It is not long since I did, upon another day of humiliation, lay open England's disease from that text, 2 Chron. xx. 33, "Howbeit the high places were not taken away; for as yet the people had not prepared their hearts unto the God of their fathers." Though the Sun of Righteousness be risen, Mal. iv. 2, "with healing in his wings," yet the land is not healed, no, not of its worst disease, which is corruption in religion, and the iniquity of your holy things. I did then show the symptoms, and the cause of this evil disease. The symptoms are your high places not yet taken away, many of your old superstitious ceremonies to this day remaining, which, though not so evil as the high places of idolatry in which idols were worshipped, yet are parallel to the high places of will-worship, of which we read that the people, thinking it too hard to be tied to go up to Jerusalem with every sacrifice, "did sacrifice still in the high places, yet unto the Lord their God only," 2 Chron. xxxiii, 17; pleading for their so doing, antiquity, custom, and other defences of that kind, which have been alleged for your ceremonies. But albeit these be foul spots in the church's face, which offend the eyes of her glorious Bridegroom, Jesus Christ, yet that which doth less appear is more dangerous, and that is the cause of all this evil in the very bowels and heart of the church; the people of the land, great and small, have not as yet prepared their hearts unto the Lord their God; mercy is prepared for the land, but the land is not prepared for mercy. I shall say no more of the disease at this instant.

But I have now chosen a text which holds forth a remedy for this malady—a cure for this case; that is, that if we will humble our uncircumcised hearts, and accept of the punishment of our iniquity, Lev. xxvi. 41; if we be "ashamed and confounded" (Ezek. xxxvi. 32), before the Lord this day for our evil ways; if we judge ourselves as guilty, and put our mouth in the dust, and clothe ourselves with shame as with a garment; if we repent and abhor ourselves in dust and ashes, then the Lord will not abhor us, but take pleasure in us, to dwell among us, to reveal himself unto us, to set before us the right pattern of his own house, that the tabernacle of God may be with men, Rev. xxi. 3; and pure ordinances, where before they were defiled and mixed; Zech. xiii. 2, He "will cut off the names of the idols out of the land," and cause the false prophet, "and the unclean spirit to pass out of the land," and the glory of the Lord shall dwell in the land, Psal. lxxxv. 9. But, withal, we must take heed that we "turn not again to folly," Psal. lxxxv. 8; that our hearts start not aside, "like a deceitful bow," Psal. lxxviii. 57; that we "keep the ways of the Lord," Psal. xviii. 21, and do not wickedly depart from our God. Thus you have briefly the occasion and the sum of what I am to deliver from this text; the particulars whereof I shall not touch till I have, in the first place, resolved a difficult, yet profitable question.

You may ask, What house or what temple doth the Prophet here speak of, and how can it be made to appear that this scripture is applicable to this time?

I answer, Some(1364) have taken great pains to demonstrate that this temple, which the Prophet saw in this vision, was no other than the temple of Solomon; and that the accomplishment of this vision of the temple, city, and division of the land, was the building of the temple and city again after the captivity, and the restoring of the Levitical worship and Jewish republic, which came to pass in the days of Nehemiah and Zorobabel. This sense is also most obvious to every one that readeth this prophecy; but there are very strong reasons against it, which make other learned expositors not to embrace it.

For, 1. The temple of Solomon was one hundred and twenty cubits high, the temple built by Zorobabel was but sixty cubits high, Ezra vi. 3.

2. The temple of Zorobabel (Ezra iii. 1, 8, vi. 3, 5, 7) was built in the same place where the temple of Solomon was, that is, in Jerusalem, upon mount Moriah, but this temple of Ezekiel was without the city, and a great way distant from it,(1365) chap. xlviii. 10 compared with ver. 15. The whole portion of the Levites, and a part of the portion of the priests, was betwixt the temple and the city.