The English Nonconformity Under King Charles II and James II, Chapter 41 – Chapter 42
Chap XLI. Point XXXVIII. Of Saying Common-Prayer twice a day every day in the Year ordinarily.
L.
IT is but that you shall every day say the Morning and Evening Service, not being lett by Sickness, or other urgent Cause.] And what have you against this?
M.
I think when the Book was made, to help the ignorant Vulgar out of Popery, every day to use the Common-Prayer was a very good help to them. But the Case is much altered, and People now have more suitable Helps; and Ministers have so much other Work to do in their Studies, and with their Neighbours every day, and some Prayers to use more suitable to their Families and Closets, that it must needs be a sinful Impediment against other Duties, to say Common-Prayer twice a day. If they were commanded to Preach twice a day, every day in the year, it would cause a sinful Omission of other Duties, how good soever Preaching be in it self.
L.
But then you have urgent Cause of forbearance.
M.
We are not for abusive dallying with Covenants about Sacred things: It is evident by the instance of Sickness, that the Authors of the Imposition, meant only extraordinary Causes as urgent, and not that we should take our ordinary Work for such an urgent Cause. As if a Man that is bound to spend most of the day in his Shop should Covenant to go Thirty Miles every day, if he be not lett by urgent Cause.
L.
But you see that almost no Conformists do thus: therefore it's certain that they do not so understand it.
M.
That's a warning to take heed of promising that which we see so many that promised it not perform; They are our Monitors to take heed of such a playing with Sacred Covenants, and deceiving the Law, instead of obeying it.
Chap. XLII. Point XXXIX. Of forcing the unwilling Parishioners to the Sacrament, and Accusing and Excommunicating the Refusers.
L.
HOw are you bound to this by Conformity?
M.
1. We must assent and consent to the Rubrick, which commandeth [That every Parishioner shall Communicate three times a year at least. 2. The Oath of Canonical Obedience binds us to obey the 112 Canon, as well as the rest; which saith [The Minister, Churchwardens, Questmen and Assistants of every Parish-Church and Chappel, shall yearly within 40 days after Easter exhibit to the Bishop or his Chancellor, the Names, and Surnames of All the Parishioners as well Men as Women, which being at the Age of 16 years, received not the Communion at Easter before.] And then they are to be Excommunicated if they refuse, and to lie in Jail till they die, when taken by the Writ De Excommunicato Capiendo.
L.
And why should not men be forced to their Duty, and to their own good, if they are backward to it?
M.
The internal part is the first and chief part of their Duty, without which the external is not their Duty, but their great Sin. It is the Duty of Heathens to Believe and be baptized, but not to be baptized till they believe. It is the Duty of Candidates for the Ministry, to get Ability and Ordination and to officiate. But not to officiate before they get Ability and Ordination. It is the Duty of every Man to believe the Truth of the Gospel, and to profess that belief: But to say he believeth, when he doth not, is Hypocrisie and Lying. It is a sloathful Man's Duty to rise and dress him, and go to his Work; but not to work in Bed, or go abroad Naked. Men that need Marriage must Marry, and then liberis operam dare, but not to do this before they Marry. So Persons that are unfit for the Sacrament must be fit, and then receive it, but not before they are fit. Now if you can force them by a Gaol out of Ignorance, unbelief and ungodliness, it will be a very charitable work: Otherwise you force them upon Sacriledge and Profanation to their Damnation. Why else doth the Common-Prayer Book perswade the Blasphemers and hinderers of God's Word, and the uncharitable not to come to that Holy Table, lest the Devil enter into them as he did into Judas, and fill them with all unrighteousness to the destruction of Body and Soul.
L.
But they that are forced to come, will be liker to take preparing Care, than if they be let alone.
M.
Look over the foregoing instances: Will you make a Law among Heathens that all shall be baptized, that this may draw them to believe? Or will you Command all Students to Administer the Sacraments, that this may draw them to Study and be Ordained, &c. We disswade you not from forcing all to Hear and Learn: But do you think that it is so easie and small a Matter to bring a Man to Repent and Believe, and give up his Heart and Life to Christ, and prefer Heaven before Earth, and a holy Life before a fleshly and worldly Life, as that it is but say, Do it, or thou shalt go to Iail. What need a Saviour, a sanctifying Spirit, a teaching Ministry, &c. if it be so easily done at a Command? Will the fear of a Jail make Men believe the Gospel, or Love God? Oh how little doth this way savour of any true Knowledge of the State of Man, or what Faith or Sanctification is?
L.
Wherein lyeth the Sinfulness of such force!
M.
1. It seemeth to make a New Gospel-Condition, or contradict Christ's. Christ saith, That none can be his Disciple, except he forsake all, and follow him: This Course saith, Thou shalt be saved by Christ, if thou hadst rather Communicate than lose all and lie in Jail. The Sacrament is an Investing delivering of Pardon and right to Christ and Salvation; And none but those that desire them above all the World are capable of these. And to give them to the forced and unwilling is contrary to the Gospel.
2. It seems to put a Lie on Christ, as if he had ever made any such gift.
3. It tendeth to deceive poor Souls.
4. It forceth them on Sacriledge, Hypocrisie, Prophanation and Damnation.
5. It may distract those Persons with terror who are conscious of their unfitness, or those Melancholy Christians that under Temptation tremble for fear of taking their own damnation.
6. It polluteth the Church, and confoundeth the Infidels, Catechumens and Fideles.
7. It thereby filleth the Church with such wicked men as prove worse Enemies to the godly than those without.
8. In all Elections the Major part of wicked forced Communicants will carry it, to chuse Ministers like themselves, and carry Church Matters according to their wicked minds.
9. Good men seeing this are ready to be frightned out of the Church to Separation, as men run out of a ruinous House, lest it fall on their Heads, or fly from a noisome place with loathing.
10. And then the Crowd that thus get Church possession will revile them as Schismaticks and Sectaries, and Hypocrites, and persecute and destroy them if they can.
Are not all those sad effects of turning a Church into a Prison, and forcing men to seem to take that which Christ professeth he doth not give them? And of casting holy things to Dogs, and Pearls before Swine; and cramming and drenching those with the Body and Blood of Christ, who have no right till they desire and beg it, and can sell all to buy this precious Pearl? We dare not Assent, Consent or Swear to such a Course as this, nor publish an Excommunication against such men on this account. It's an odd thing to cast men out because they will not come in.
And I pray you how can Ministers in great Cities and Parishes perform this Canonical Obedience, to give in to the Bishop or Chancellor the names of all that Communicated not at Easter, when they know not the hundredth part of the Parishioners in some places? I do believe that in the two Parishes that I last lived in, there are above fourscore thousand Souls: And is it like that the Ministers know twenty thousand of these? I have been at their Communion, even at Easter and Whitsuntide, and I never saw five hundred there. And if they gave in the names of but twenty or forty thousand Non-communicants tho' it's like there are nearer two hundred thousand) in this Diocess, what work would the Bishop and Chancellor have? Cannot you easily imagine what their Discipline would be, and how they would exhort each Person one by one to Repentance, and plead with them for conviction, and resolve their doubts? Doth not this one thing tell you what the English Diocesan Episcopacy is, that giveth one man the Disciplining of many hundred Parishes?
L.
You talk as if you would have a Church of Saints, and seem to make Religion too serious a business: It is well if we could have a Church of Civil Men and Peaceable Subjects, that will use Religion for the Civil Interest, as far as will serve the will of Governors, and the Common Peace.
M.
I am sure St. Paul wrote to no Church but such as he called Saints; and I am sure Christ will save none but Saints: An unsanctified Christian, and a Church not holy, are contradictions in adjecto. Christ came not to set up a meer worldly Kingdom, and to devise a Religion to serve the Will, Ambition or Interest of worldly men, nor meerly to promote Civility, Wealth and Peace. If this be all that you would have, go to Aristotle, Plato, Seneca, Plutarch, Cicero, &c. You need not be Christians for this. But yet we pretend not to know mens Hearts: It is visible Saints that the visible Church consisteth of; and with whom we must have visible Communion. And it is not left to the will of every Pastor whom he will take for a Saint; for then Churches would be of as many sorts or degrees, as Ministers strict or loose Opinions are. But Christ hath himself made the Articles Essential to Christian Faith and Practice, and the Baptismal Covenant, and required us to take those into the Church who seriously profess Belief, and Consent, till they null that Profession by a contrary Profession or Conversation; which must be proved against any man before he is rejected: For the Church is not a Society to be arbitrarily made or unmade, at every Ministers or Bishops will, but hath from Christ the fixed Laws of its Constitution and necessary Administration (better than our 141 Canons.)
But indeed you have toucht our sore: For my part I am past doubt that we should all live in Peace, and Christian Piety, if all (yea all Bishops and Priests) were but agreed at the Heart what it is to be a Christian, and whether the Gospel be certainly true, and whether Christ be the Son of God, or a deceiver, and whether there be a Life after this, and a Judgment of all according to their works: Yea, were they but heartily agreed that there is a God, who is the Rewarder of them that diligently seek him, and a punisher of the wicked. The dispute seems to me to be, whether we shall be Christians indeed, or worldly Hypocrites called Christians; and whether we shall use the Name of God, Christ and Religion for Christ and Holiness, or for the Flesh against Christ.
L.
You are very severe in your Censure.
M.
I doubt some will find Christ more severe, and be less able to endure his Censure than mine, when he shall call some men to account for turning sacred Names, and Offices, and Ordinances against him, to banish Conscience and serious Godliness (to say nothing of Veracity, common Honesty and Humanity) out of the Church, and turn his House of Prayer into a place of Merchandise, and a Den of Thieves; and tempt Turks and Heathens to hate Christians for their wickedness, and to fly from the Christian Church, lest they should lose all Religion, Trustiness and Honesty, or the Reputation of them: But I speak not now of our Governours, whom I leave to God.