The Anarchy of the Ranters, &c. Sect. VI. t. I. t. II. t. III, SECTION VI. How far this Government doth extend in Matters Spiritual and purely Confcientious. T HUS far I have considered the Order and Government of the Church, as it respects outward Things; and its Authority in condemning or removing fuch Things, which in themselves are evil, as being those, which none will readily justify: The Neceffity of which Things is such, that few but will acknowledge the Care and Order in these Cafes to be commendable and expedient. Now I come to confider the Things of another Kind, which either verily are, or are supposed to be Matters of Confcience, or at least, wherein People may lay Claim to Confcience in the acting or forbearing of them. In which the great Question is, How far in such Cases the Church may give positive Orders, or Rules? How far her Authority reacheth, or may be supposed to be binding, and ought to be fubmitted to? For the better clearing and Examination of which, it will be fit to consider, First, Whether the Church of Christ have Power in any Cafes, that are Matters of Conscience, to give a positive Sentence and Decifion, which may be obligatory upon Believers ? Secondly, If fo, in what Cases and Respects she may so do? Thirdly, Wherein consisteth the Freedom and Liberty of Confcience, which may be exercised by م 1 Difference betwixt us and the Papists, and others in this Particular. As to the first, Whether the Church of Chrift Question I. have Power in any Cases, that are Matters of Conscience, to give a positive Sentence and Decifion, which may be obligatory upon Believers. I answer affirmatively, she hath; and shall prove Answer. it from divers Instances, both from Scripture and Reason. For first, all Principles and Articles of Articles of Faith, which are held doctrinally, are in respect to Matarof those that believe them Matters of Confcience. We Conscience Faith 1. Proof from righs know, the Papists do out of Confcience (such as are zealous among them) adore, worship, and pray to Angels, Saints, and Images, yea, and to the Eucharift, as judging it to be really Chrift Jesus; and so do others place Confcience in Things that are abfolutely wrong: Now I say, we being gathered together into the Belief of certain Principles and Reafon. Doctrines, without any Constraint or worldly Respect, but by the meer Force of Truth upon our Understanding, and its Power and Influence upon our Hearts; these Principles and Doctrines, and the Practices necessarily depending upon them, are, as it were, the Terms, that have drawn us together, and the * Bond, by which we became centered into one Body and Fellowship, and diftinguished from others. Now if any one or more so engaged with us should arise to teach any other Doctrine or Doc-trines, contrary to these, which were Ground of our being one; who can deny, but the Body hath Power in such a Cafe to declare, this is not according to the Truth we profess; and therefore we pronounce such and H * Yet this is not so the Bond, but that we have also a more inward and invisible, to wit, the Life of Righteousness, whereby we also have Unity with the upright Seed in all, even in those whose Understandings are not yet so enlightened. But these who are once en. lightened, this is as an outward Bond; and if they suffer themselves to be darkened through Difobedience, which as it does in the outward Bond, so it doth in the inward. liever of and such Doctrines to be wrong, with which we cannot have Unity, nor yet any more spiritual Fellowship with those that hold them? And so such cut themselves off from being Members by dissolving the very Bond, by which they were linked to the Body. Now this cannot be accounted Tyranny and Oppression, no more than in a civil Society, if one of the Society shall contradict one or more of the fundamental Articles, upon which the Society was contracted, it cannot be reckon'd a Breach or Iniquity in the whole Society to declare, that such Contradictors have done wrong, and forfeited their Right in that Society; in cafe by the original Constitution the Nature of the Contradiction implies such a Forfeiture, as usually it is; and will no doubt hold in religious Matters. As The Difbe if a Body be gathered into one Fellowship by the the Princi. Belief of certain Principles, he that comes to beples of a lieve otherways, naturally scattereth himself; for Fellowship that the Cause, that gathered him, is taken away : himself And so those that abide constant, in declaring the therefrom and scat. ters. Thing to be so as it is, and in looking upon him, and witnessing of him to others, if need be, to be fuch, as he has made himself, do him no Injury. I shall make the Supposition in the general, and let every People make the Application to themselves, abstracting from us; and then let Confcience and Reason in every impartial Reader declare, whether or not it doth not hold: Suppose a People really gathered unto the Belief of the true and certain Principles of the Gospel, if any of these People shall arife and contradict any of those fundamental Truths, whether have not such as stand, good Right to cast fuch a one out from among them, and to pronounce positively, this is contrary to the Truth we profess and own; and therefore ought to be rejected, and not received, nor yet he that afferts it, as one of us ? And is not this Obligatory upon all the Members, feeing all are concerned in the like Care, as to themselves, to hold the Right, and shut out the --Wrong? Wrong? I cannot tell, if any Man of Reason can well deny this? However, I shall prove it next from the Testimony of the Scripture. ture. Gal. i. 8. But though we, or an Angel from Hea- 2. Proof ven, preach any other Gospel unto you, than that from Scrip which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any Man preach any other Gospel unto you, than that ye have received, let bim be accursed. 1 Tim. i. 19, 20. Holding Faith and a good ConScience, which fome having put away, concerning Faith, bave made Shipwrack, of whom is Hymæneus and Alexander, whom I have delivered unto Satan that they may learn not to blafpheme. 2 John x. If there come any unto you, and bring not this Doctrine, receive him not into your House, neither bid him rejoice. For to the Greek hath it. These Scriptures are so plain and clear in thèmselves as to this Purpose, that they need no great Exposition to the unbyassed and unprejudicate Reader. Forefeeing it is fo, that in the true Church there may Men arife, and speak perverse Things contrary to the Doctrine and Gospel already received: What is to be the Place of those, that hold the pure and ancient Truth? Must they look upon these perverse Men still, as their Brethren? Must they cherish. them as Fellow-members, or must they judge, condemn, and deny them? We must not think, the Apostle wanted Charity, who will have them accurfed; and that gave Hymæneus and Alexander over to Hymaneus Satan, after that they had departed from the true ander in Faith, that they might learn not to blafpheme. In stanced. short, if we must, as our Opposers, herein acknowledge, preserve and keep those, that are come to own the Truth, by the same Means they were gathered and brought into it, we must not cease to be plain with them, and tell them, when they are wrong; and by found Doctrine, both exhort and H2 con and Alex SAM Tong ity alfe to 2 The Anarchy of the Ranters, &c. Sect. VI. convince Gainsayers. If the Apostles of Christ of Old, and the Preachers of the everlasting Gospel in this Day, had told all People, however wrong they found them in their Faith and Principles, Our Charity and Love is such, we dare not judge you, nor separate from you; but let us all live in Love together, and every one enjoy his own Opinion, and all sh in will be well: How should the Nations have been? is Or what Way can they be brought to Truth and Righteousness? Would not the Devil love this Doctrine well, by which Darkness and Ignorance, Error and Confufion, might still continue in the Earth unreproved, and uncondemned? If it was needful then ✔ for the Apostles of Christ in the Days of Old to reprove, without sparing to tell the High Priests and great Profeffors among the Jews, That they were stubborn and stiff-necked, and always refifted the Holy Ghost, without being guilty of Imposition and Oppression, or Want of true Love and Charity; and alfo for those Messengers the Lord raised up in this Day, to reprove, and cry out against the Hireling Priefts, and to tell the World openly, both Profeffors and Prophane, That they were in Darkness and Ignorance, out of the Truth, Strangers and Aliens from the Common-wealth of Ifrael; if God has gathered a People by this Means into the Belief of one and the same Truth, must not they, if they turn and depart from it, be admonished, reproved, and condemned, yea, rather than those that are not yet come to the Truth, because they crucify afresh unto themselves the Lord of Glory, and put him to open Shame? It seems, the Apostle judged it very needful, they should be so dealt with, Tit. i. 10. Se C 0 m [ C ti C I ( t t a |