O how do the Hearts of good Men bleed within them, to fee that Church, which all unprejudiced Obfervers of other Reformed Churches, and their Conftitutions have pronounced to be the pureft, and even the great Bulwark against Popery, most wofully divided by the leveral Sects, Parties and Factions in its bofom, all of them endeavouring all they can to fubvert and undermine it, and let them anfwer it to their own confciences if they can; how they can without blame communicate with thofe Parties that endeavour the ruin of that Church, with which they are in Communion, being unable to fay any thing why they fhould not be fo. Such Men must be Members of one of the Communions; for it is abfurd to perform Acts of Communion, Hearing, Praying, and receiving the Lord's Supper in either of them, without owning a relation to either of the Aflemblies, ours or theirs ; because it is upon the account of Church-membership, that it is any Chriftian's Duty to hold external, actual Communion with a Church in thefe Holy Offices. Now a Man cannot be related as a Member to divided Parties; for then he will be a Member of Bodies feparate from, and oppofite to each other: For the Church Eftablished is one Body, and a Separate Church is another Body, and a fecond Separate Church is another Body, and all Separate Churches are in a state of oppofition to the established Church, being under different Governments and Governors, having different Modes of Divine Worship, driving on different Defigns, fo that whofoever holds Communion in Holy Offices with them both both, no less can be made of it, than that he either really is, or at leaft apparently acts as a Member of oppofite Bodies, and then let it be thought of, how bad and fhametul a confequence there will be of that, which any blind Man may fee, viz. that a Man is, and acts contrary to himfelt, and must be wrong in the one, or in the other, indeed no better than a Schifmatick, or at least a Partaker with them that are Schifmaticks: And there is this plain reafon for it, That (as all agree) either the Church of England is Schifmatical in impofing fome finful term of Communion, or they that divide from the Church of England are Schifmaticks in feparating from it without a caufe. To all which, I add, 7. Such changeable communicating with both these cannot confift with that near and dear Relation that there is, and by all good order ought to be, between a Church Minifter and his People, for their Duties are reciprocal: If it be the Minister's Duty to minifter to a particular People, then ought that People (Mr. Hilder fham faith, by Chrift's Ordinance, as well as by the Laws of the Church and State) to attend and joyn with him in his Miniftration: which relative Duties can never confit with any Perfons heaping up Teachers to gratify itching Ears to himself, no nor with his countenancing any Intruders into their proper Minister's care. In a word, it is contrary to all found Rules and Orders of Church-communion. To conclude this Anfwer, the matter will come to this iffue: If Schifm be fo innocent a thing, that there is no harm nor fin in it; nay, if (as fome of late have fenfelefly affirmed) it fignify a true Catholick Spirit, when a Man is not fo ftrait-laced, but that he can freely communicate with any Communion, that of the Established Church, or that of a Separate Church, oppofite to the Established Church, being a Sound and Orthodox part of the Catholick Church, then let who will go, where they will, to Separate Meetings, no Man blaming them for it. But be it known mean while to all fuch Perfons, That if they be refolved upon it, they must bid adieu to all the numerous Scripture-Precepts of Unity, Unanimity, Brotherly Love, Charity and Peace with all their Fellow-members, and with the Church of God: They muft bid adieu to the Apostle's Doctrine, forbidding and damning all Schifms, Divifions and Separations from that Church, to which they fhall be added, as many as fhall be faved. They must bid adieu to the Doctrine and Difcipline of the Primitive Church; yea, and of the whole Chriftian Church from the Apostle's times to this day, yea, and to the Conftitutions of all the Reformed Churches as well as ours, being all alike obnoxious to the Diffenter's Objections, and being all as fevere Cenfurers of Schifm and Schifmaticks; whether Minifters or private Chriftians, of all caufelefs Separations and obftinate Separatifts as this Church of ours ever was. They muft, instead of their Church-membership, jump into a Faction, and must be felf condemned in it too. They muft break through that near Relation wherein they : * Gal. 5. r9, &c. * they stand to their own proper Paftor or Minifter and thus doing, if Schifin be a damnable Sin (as even the Diffenters themselves have both Preached and Printed) and it it be in St. Pauls Catalogue of the Works of the Flesh, to that it will damn Men as well as Adultery, Fornication, Uncleanness, Idolatry, Witchcraft, &c, for they that live in this as well as them, fhall not int1 Cor. 3.4. herit the Kingdom of God; and finally, if it be carnality, as the fame Apostle makes it †, and to be carnally minded is Death ; Then to fay the leaft of it) certainly it is extreamly dangerous for any to refort to Separate Churches or Meetings, whereby they must become arrant Schifmaticks, or at least be Partakers with them that are fo, if there be any in the Chriftian World. But have fuch as tread these perilous paths nothing to lay for themfelves? Yes, and the fame deferves a fair examination, and them we commonly hear thus pleading for their thus prevaricating with God, and the Church of God. Rom. 8.7. It is true enough, That they for their part have nothing to fay why the Church of England fhould not be accounted a found and orthodox Church, and from thence they have been hitherto fatisfied with her Communion, while they could have no better: But they believe now, the Ordinances of Christ are purer in the Meetings than in the Parish Churches. Now to rectify Men in this, let that be my next Inquiry. Queft. Quest. XVII. May not we go to Separate Meetings in hopes of having Chrift's Ordi nances purer or more purely adminiftred, than we can have them in the Church of England's publick Affemblies? Anf. It is needlefs to multiply Words after fuch ample Satisfaction hath been offered to this Objection by our Learned Divines, and therefore my Answer to this fhall in short be; that it is meer cant to talk of purer Ordinances in our cafe, as any fober Man may judge by a naked reprefentation of the thing: For by Ordi nances here, must be meant the Word, the Sa. craments and Prayer, and to have them pure, (as I have all along fuppofed ) is effential to a true and orthodox Church, that is a found part of the Catholick Church, as ours is acknowledged to be. Now I will ask any Man what purer Ordinances or Adminiftration of Ordinances they would defire than thole of our Saviour's own Institution, rightly adminiftred according to his Order and their firft Inftitution, without any finful, idolatrous, or fuperftitious mixtures of human Invention, which will corrupt them, and make them unacceptable to God, and take away all hopes of his Bleffing to go along with them? Let them tell if they can wherein the purity of the Ordinances confifts, but their conformity to their firft Inftitution, without any effential defects in, without any finful Additions to them: And in this fenfe, we have the con |