The Measures of Christian Obedience, Book 3 · Chapter 6
CHAP. VI. Of the third sort of integrity, viz. that of the Object; or of obedience to all the particular Laws and parts of Duty.
The CONTENTS.
Of the partiality of mens obedience from their love of some particular sins. Three pretences whereby they justifie the allowed practice of some sins, whilst they are obedient in some other instances. The first pretence is the preservation of their Religion and themselves in times of persecution. A particular account of mens disobedience under this pretence. The vanity of it shown from the following considerations. Religion needs not to be rescued from persecution. The freedom of outward means of Religion is restrained by it, but the substance of Religion it self is not. It is extended in some parts, and ennobled in all by sufferings. Where it needs to be defended, disobedience is no fit means to preserve it, because God cannot be honoured, nor Religion served by it. Religion and the love of God is only the colour; but the true and real cause of such disobedience is a want of Religion, and too great a love of mens own selves. Men are liable to be deceived by this pretence from a wrong Notion of Religion for religious opinions and professions. A true Notion of Religion for religious practice upon a religious belief, as it implies both faith and obedience. The danger of disobedience upon this pretence. The practice of all religious men in this case. Of Religion in the narrow acceptation, for religious professions and opinions. The commendable way of mens preserving it. First, By acting within their own sphere. Secondly, By the use only of lawful means. Thirdly, By a zeal in the first place for the practice of religious Laws, and next to that for the free profession of religious opinions.
BUT to render our service perfectly intire and compleatly upright, it is not enough that there be an integrity of the Subject, by our obeying with all our powers; or an integrity of time, by our obeying in all Seasons; of which two I have discoursed hitherto: but it is further necessary that there be an integrity of the Object also; or that what we do thus obey with our whole man, and our whole time, be nothing less than all the particular Laws of Duty and instances of Obedience; nothing under the whole will of God.
We must not aNeque est justa causatio cur praeferantur aliqua, ubi facienda sunt omnia. Sal. de Prov. l. 3. p. 80. Ed. Oxon.pick and chuse in the doing of our Duty, for if we do not obey all, we obey not bSi pro arbitrio suo Servi Dominis obtemperant, ne in iis quidem, in quibus obtemperaverint, obsequuntur. Quando enim Servus ex Domini jussis ea facit tantummodo quae vult facere; jam non Dominicam implet voluntatem, sed suam. Id. p. 79.right in any. Because all the Laws of God are bound upon us by the same power, and enjoyned by the same Authority; so that if we fulfil any one upon this account of his having required it, the same reason holds for our fulfilling all the rest.
This indeed is very hardly believed, because it is so hard to practise. For almost every man has some sin or other, which he can as well dye as part with: It has got his heart, and is become the Master of his affections; and since he loves it so dearly, he hopes that God will bear with it too. He will part with any thing else for Gods sake, he will not stick at any other service, nor repine at any other imposition; all that he craves is only to be tolerated in his Darling Lust, and to be allowed to serve him without cutting off what is as useful as his right hand, or pulling out what is as dear to him as his own right eye, to please him.
And when men are thus desirous of reconciling the service of God with the service of their lusts; when they are resolved to hope, and yet resolved to sin: they have no other way but to perswade themselves that the keeping of some Precepts shall attone for the transgression of others, and to bear up themselves with the delusive hopes and false confidences of a partial and a half obedience. They presently forge new terms of life and pardon which God never made, and which he will never stand to: for finding that they do not perform all his Laws, and yet resolving that what they do perform shall be sufficient for them; they straightway fansie that if they do keep some, for the rest they shall have a Dispensation. It shall be enough for them to part with such lusts for Gods sake as they can best spare; but some they will keep, and them he must allow; and so instead of a perfect and intire, they put him off with a partial and a maimed service.
Now this partiality of obedience is in so many kinds, as men have sins that are endeared to them, which they will not leave for God's sake, but join with him. For every beloved sin can make an interest and Party, and if it reign in us so far as to make us fulfil it, and to disobey in it, our obedience in other things is all that we have to shew besides, and therefore it must be our excuse for it.
And this being an errour of such eternal moment, and a Rock whereupon all the souls, which miscarry under any appearances of piety, are split; I will be particular in recounting and evacuating those colours and pretences wherewith men deceive their own souls, and think that they justifie and defend it.
Now as for those false grounds and pretensions, whereby men seek to shelter themselves under the practice of such bosome-sins as they overlook, because they have no mind to leave them, hoping to be secured, whilst they continue in them, because of their obedience in other parts of Duty, which is a partial obedience: Those pretensions, I say, which are most pleadable in this matter, are these that follow, viz. because their indulgence of themselves in those instances wherein they disobey is either upon one or more of these accounts.
1. For the preservation of their Religion and of themselves in times of danger and persecution.
2. For the supply of their necessities, by sinful arts, compliances and services, in times of want and indigence.
3. For the satisfaction of their Flesh in sins of temper and complexion, age, or way of life.
1. The first pretence whereby men justifie to their own thoughts the indulged transgression of several Laws, whilst they obey in others; is because those transgressions, wherein they allow themselves, are necessary for the preservation of their Religion and of themselves in those times of danger and persecution, wherein Gods Providence has placed them.
Religion is in danger, and like to be undermined by the close and subtle arts, or overborn by the more open and powerful violence of strong and witty Enemies. And this is Gods Cause, and Christ our Lord and Saviours interest; so that whatever is done here, we think is in service of our Maker. If we fight, it is his battles; if we spitefully persecute and devour, it is his enemies; if we rob and spoil, it is to weaken his adversaries; if we lye and dissemble, it is to defeat the designs of such as he will call Rebels; if we transgress in all the instances, and use all the lawless liberties of war, it is because we are engaged in his quarrel. The Cause which we contend for, and have to manage, is sacred; and that we believe will justifie all means, and hallow any services whatsoever. So that our heat and fierceness, wrath and bitterness, envy and malice, revenge and cruelty, endless strife and ungovernable variance, spoils and robberies, seditions and murthers, wars and tumults: in a word, all the transports of passion and peevishness, anger and ill nature, rigour and revenge, are all sacred under this Cover; and pass for holy zeal and pious vehemence, and religious concern for God; whenas, in reality, they are a most impious throwing off, and bursting through all the Tyes of Religion, and Bonds of Duty towards men.
All these enormous effects and horrible instances of an indulged disobedience, are at this Day the consequents of this pretension.
For some on one hand, who call us Hereticks, and enemies to Christ and holy Church, think no means sinful whereby they can weaken and divide, seduce, surprize, or any way destroy us. For they esteem it lawful to dissemble under all shapes to gain a Proselyte, or to disaffect a Party to our Communion and Government. They act a part and play the Hypocrite in all Disguises, and under cover of all Trades, the better to insinuate themselves among all sorts of men; they will affirm falshood, even of their own Church, when it serves their turn; and deny any Doctrines, Precepts, or Parts of it, when they are a scandal to the persons whom they would practise upon, and make against them. They make no conscience of lyes and perjuries in conversation, when thereby they can promote the Churches interest. For they have found out ways to deceive without lying, and to lye without sin, and to forswear without perjury, and to perjure themselves without danger; by their pious frauds, and religious arts of equivocations, mental reservations, dispensations, pardons and indulgences. They can be treacherous and faithless without breach of faith, if it were made to Hereticks; they assassinate and murther Magistrates, embitter and embroil Subjects against their Governours, and against one another; they conspire the death of Kings, the confusion and fall of Kingdoms, the ruine of all that dare oppose them, yea even of all that differ from them. And all this they do for Christ's sake, in a zealous concern for God and Religion, and for the utter extirpation of all heresie and schism. It is this pretence which bears them out through all, and makes them believe that they are serving God, whilst after this extravagant rate they are overturning his whole Gospel.
And others again even of our own selves, who justly abhor these damnable instances of disobedience upon the pretence of preserving or propagating Religion in some furious and fiery spirited sort of Papists, (for God forbid that we should think them all to be of this temper) do yet run into the same extravagance, which upon so great reason they condemn in them.
For if we look into our zeal for the common Religion of Protestants, we shall find that we transgress many, and those most material and weighty Laws of it, whilst we express our affection and concern to defend and preserve it.
For doth not this pretence of preserving our Religion carry us beyond all the bounds of peaceableness, and good subjection? Our great fears about its defence make us daily to distrust our Governours, to think and speak irreverently and reproachfully of their persons, to undervalue all their counsels, to misconstrue all their actions and proceedings, and with much undutifull credulity and unchristian rashness to believe and spread abroad concerning them most odious suspicions and invidious reports; they make us pragmatical and busie-bodies, to go out of our own sphere, and to usurp upon the Magistrates, in projecting means and expediencies, prejudging Criminals, and irreverent censuring, reproaching, yea, and oft-times slandering of our Governours, if they, either in Court or Council, at the Board or on the Bench, determine contrary to our anticipations. They make us to disturb the quiet, and to unsettle the peace of our fellow-subjects, in filling their minds with endless jealousies about their Princes care, and their own safety, and in possessing them with discontents, and undutifull suspicions, words and actions, to the great weakning of Government, and disturbance of the publick peace.
Yea, I add further, these same fears for our endangered Religion transport us into the transgression of sundry weighty Laws, which oblige us towards our very enemies who have contrived to destroy us. For they have made us most partially backward to believe any thing that is good, and forward to catch at every thing that is spoken ill against them. They have made many of us fierce and implacable, malicious and revengefull; they have caused us to thirst after their blood, and to be in pain when they escape; to measure our Religion, and the soundness of our piety, by a reproachfull, spitefull, and implacable usage and behaviour towards them. All which are tempers and practices most contrary to those Laws of forgiving injuries, of loving enemies, of praying for our persecutors, of returning good to all that have evilly entreated us, of meekness and patience, mercy and placableness towards the worst of men, yea, even the worst of enemies, which are so much the soul and spirit of that Religion, which we pretend to be so zealously concerned for.
And if we look into our Zeal for our several parties, how many other Laws shall we find to be daily transgressed, I will not say for the preservation, but even, where that is sufficiently secured, for the higher advancement and encrease of them? For what rude and unmannerly, envious and ill-natured reflections are daily cast upon those persons, especially Ministers, and men of Note and Eminence, who differ from us? How forward are many among us to undervalue and disparage, to contemn and affront them; to heap reproach and infamy upon them, thereby to render their persons ridiculous, and their pains useless? For are not several of us perpetually censuring and speaking evil of them, undervaluing all their real virtues, putting hard and uncandid interpretations upon all their actions, prying diligently and maliciously into all their defects, and aggravating all their faults or follies, raising continually, and spreading to their disparagement uncharitable and envious, yea, oft-times false and slanderous reports? We envy and hate, reproach and censure, revile and slander, bite and devour one another; and all this fierceness and uncharitableness we use for that meek, that charitable, gentle, quiet thing, Religion. For in its service we take our selves to be engaged, and so long we fancy that we have a liberty of saying, or doing any thing.
Thus full of Sin and Disobedience is this sanctified pretence. It is the cover for every offence, and the common shelter for all transgressions; for we boggle not at any Sin so long as it tends to preserve us in the prosperous profession of our endangered or oppressed Religion.
But if men would consider calmly, and have patience to look beyond the surface and bare outsides of things, they would soon discern the vanity of this pretence, and how far it will be from excusing any such sinfull and disobedient practices as they seek to justifie and warrant by it.
For as for true and substantial Religion, for protection on whereof they would be thought to venture upon all these transgressions, it stands in no need of their help to preserve it in persecuting times, although they should use innocent and just means, not such as are sinfull and disobedient. It would live then without their care, and whether they went about by any politick means to preserve it yea, or no. For Religion is not lost when Religious men are persecuted; it doth not suffer, when they do that profess it, seeing it is not one jot impaired when men are buffetted and imprison'd, nay, bleed and dye for it.
Indeed as for the freedom of the outward means of Religion, (viz.) the publickness of preaching, the community of prayers, the unrestrained use of Sacraments, and the like; they are much straitned by persecutions, and we must expect to feel either a great want, or at least a great difficulty in them when Times are troublesome. A persecuting Government can in great measure deprive us of them, when after our utmost use of all such means, as are no wayes undutifull or against any Law of Christ, we are not able longer to preserve them.
But as for the substantial part and main body of Religion it self, which consists in sound faith, and upright obedience, and which those outward means are appointed to beget in us; no state of Times need make them wanting. For they are within our selves, and depend altogether upon Gods Grace, and our own Free Wills; so that all the Powers of Earth and Hell are never able to rob us of them. Could the violence of persecution have oppressed our Religion, it had been stifled in the birth. For it entred in a persecuting age, and yet it was not overborn by the pressure of its sufferings, but bravely overcame them. It begun, grew up, and conquer'd all the world in the very heat of affliction and opposition; the more it was burdened, the more still it spread; and the more men sought to straiten it, the further was it enlarged; the common observation then being this, that the c… exqai…tior quaeque crudelitas …es…ra, ill…cebra est magis Secle.… Plures essi … quoti…s metimu… … v…bis, semen est sanguis Christianorum. Tertul. Apol. c. 50.unparallel'd sufferings of its professors, were the true prolifick, cause of the vast encrease of the Church.
And indeed what should hinder Religion from thriving in evil times? For the same Religious Duties, which are practised with more ease in a prosperous, are exercised also, but with greater honour, in an afflicted state of things. To believe, and do well; to be pious and pure, chast and sober, just and charitable, meek and gentle, quiet and peaceable, with all other instances of a substantial and acceptable Religion, are indifferent and undetermined to any turns of Providence. They may be shewn under fines and imprisonments, axes and halters; as well, and much more honourably, than in times of ease and softness.
Nay, some of its most eminent parts and noble instances are not capable of being exercised at other times. For the duties of patience, and taking up the cross, of forgiving injuries, and doing good to enemies, of praying for them that persecute us, and despitefully use us, which are the most exalted strains, and glorious heights of our Religion, are such, for which a peaceable and prosperous, a favourable and flourishing age affords no famous opportunities. For we must be in a state of suffering evil, and labouring under a load of persecution, before we can sufficiently evidence how readily, how magnanimously, how meekly, how charitably and Christian-like we can undergo it.
So that as for Religion and Sufferings, they are at no such distance but that they may very easily be made to meet; they bear no such mutual opposition, but that they may very well consist together; nay, I add farther, but that they may honour and ennoble, and in many instances, enlarge and improve each other. And therefore Religion needs not to be preserved from sufferings, since it can not only live in them, but is also much extended, heightned, and advanced by them.
But where Religion wants our help, and calls for our assistance; yet is it not possible for us to please God, or to secure it by sinfull means, but only by such as are either virtuous, or at least innocent.
It is not possible for us, I say, to please God by sinfull means, although we intend them for his own service. For what is there in God that should be served by our sins? Is his Love for any thing greater than his hatred is for sin, so as the gratefulness of that should make this, otherwise most offensive, an acceptable service? Is any thing that we can offer to him so pleasing as our obedience? Is he more delighted when we follow our own counsel, than when we follow his; when we do our own, than when we do his pleasure? For all those Laws of the Gospel, and instances of obedience, which under this pretension we transgress, are wayes of Gods own appointment; they are a service of his own choosing, a Religion that is most agreeable to his mind, and fitted in all things according to his liking; a rule that he has thought most absolute to direct our actions, and most fit for us to walk by. If then we would exp…ss our concern for God, our venerable esteem of his wi…dom, our acquiescence in his choice, our submission to his ordering, our acknowledgement of his authority, and our chearfull compliance with his pleasure; let us do it by a religious observance of these Rules which are of his own prescribing. Let us honour him in his own way, by doing our duty, and practising such things as he has made expressions of honour, by making them instances of obedience. For disobedience can serve no interest of God, nothing that we can do being so effectual a reproach to all his Attributes, as to disobey him.
Nor is the use of evil and unlawfull means in any wise a fitter expression of our care for Religion. For what is there in Religion, that can be honoured and advanced by disobedience? Is there any thing in it so sacred as the Divine Laws; and dare any man call that his care of them, when he lays wast, and plainly rejects them? It is gross impudence for any man to pretend Piety in the breach of Duty; and to cry up Religion whilst he is acting irreligiously; he prides himself in the empty name, when it is clear to all that he has lost the thing; for as for Piety it self, and true Religion, by transgressing and trampling upon the Divine Laws, he doth not further and defend, but impiously and irreligiously destroys it.
It is not Religion then, whatever men may vainly pretend, that makes them run into the breach of Laws, and contempt of Duty lest they should suffer in the profession of it. For God and Religion owe them no thanks for such a course, because he is not honoured, nor it strengthned and preserved, but ruined and destroyed by it.
But the true and real cause of such disobedience, whereof God and Religion are only the colour and false pretence, is plainly a great want of Religion, and of the love of God, and too great a love of the world, and of mens own selves. Men are hurried away by an unmortified love of pleasures, honours, and temporal interests; and they have not Religion enough to restrain and overrule them. For these it is, and not Religion, which sufferings and persecuting times take from them: and an ungovernable desire to preserve these, which makes them so violent, as that, at such times, no Laws of Religion can hold them. When men set at nought and disparage Governours, disobey Laws, disturb the Publick Peace, injure their Fellow-subjects, and commit several other sinfull acts and irreligious violations of the Laws of Christ, that they may keep off Persecution for the profession of the Christian Faith: they shew plainly that they will follow Christ only in a thriving, but not in a suffering Religion. They will serve him no longer than he sets them uppermost, and above their Brethren. For rather than suffer any loss, and fall into any dangers for their adherence to him; they will leave him and his Laws to fend for themselves, and flatly disobey him. But when they do so, it is shameless hypocrisie to pretend, that all their transgressions and disobedience is still upon the Principle, and from the Power of Religion; since it is not Religion, but a resolution to be uppermost; not duty, but ambition, covetousness, sensuality, revenge, or a nest of some other unmortified and reigning vices of like nature, which makes them under pretence of a conscientious care for religious profession, to destroy all religious practice.
This, one would think, is plain and evident to any man who can have the patience to consider it; that True Religion can never be the cause of sin, or make men irreligious and disobedient. That must not for shame be called mens Religion, but their Lust which makes them wicked, and carries them on to transgress Gods Laws, that are the chief and sovereign part of his Religion, which, who so keeps, is a religious, as whosoever breaks them, is an ungodly and irreligious man.
This indeed is clear Doctrine, and obvious to any common, if it be withall a free and considerate understanding. And it were scarce possible that any men should think otherwise, had they not either by accicident, hast, or ill design, taken up an odd notion of Religion altogether different from that which the Scriptures give, and which all considerately religious men have of it.
For by Religion they mean only their adherence to the Doctrines and Opinions, but not to the Laws and Precepts of the Gospel. And when they talk of defending and maintaining of Religion; they intend not a defence of Laws, but of Notions; not a maintenance of the practice of Christian Precepts, but only of the profession of Christian Doctrines. They are of the Religion which Christ reveals, but not of that which he commands; they will know and believe what he pleases, but do what they please themselves. They are only for a Religion of Orthodox Tenets, but not of Vpright Practice; and if thereby they can preserve men safe in thinking and professing well; they fancy that God will not be offended with their use of any means, though never so wicked and disobedient.
But this is a most gross mistake, and a most dangerous Notion of Religion, which is quite another thing than what this conceit doth represent it to be. For,
First, The prime part and matter of Religion is the practick part, (viz.) the Laws and Precepts, the Promises and Threatnings of the Gospel. And agreeably thereto the prime business of all Religious men is an obedient practice, and performance of them, or a virtuous discharge of duty and a holy life. This is that Religion whereby all of us must stand or fall, and that great condition, which, as I have shewn, we must for ever live or dye by. When Christ comes to judgement, sayes Saint Paul, he will render to every man according to his deeds, Rom. 2.6. And in that prospect of the last judgment, which St John tells us God vouchsafed him, men were judged every one according to their works, Rev. 20.13. This Religion of Obedience and a good Life, is that which the Gospel is full of, wherein every Chapter, nay almost every verse of it instructs us, and some way or other directs, exhorts, encourages and excites to. And therefore, as ever we would pass for Religious men in the Scripture Notion, we must be carefull to live in all Piety towards God, by complying readily with all his Laws, depending upon his Providence, and resigning our selves up to his pleasure; in all purity and soberness, being free from all lust and intemperance, all sinfull pleasures, and covetous practices; in all justice and charitableness, doing right, and keeping peace, and shewing mercy towards all men. This, sayes St James, will pass for pure and undefiled Religion before God and the Father at the last day, if in such instances as these we have expressed, not our Opinions, but our Obedience; by visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and by keeping our selves unspotted from all filthiness and disobedience of the world. But if any man pretends to be religious, who is destitute of this obedience, that mans religion is vain, Jam. 1.26, 27.
Secondly, Another great part and object of Religion, is the Doctrines of the Gospel. And agreeably another act or instance of Religious Service, is Faith, or Orthodox Belief. And this is intended by God himself as a means to produce the former; Faith being the great instrument in working out our obedience. For this is that victory, sayes St John, which makes us conquerors, and overcometh the world, even our Faith, 1 Joh. 5.4. An obedient practice is all that a righteous faith aims at; it is its end and perfection, that which consummates and compleats it. It being, as St James assures us, by works which faith dforeign.co-operates and concurs to, that faith is made perfect, Jam. 2.22. And this all the points of our Christian Faith are most admirably fitted to effect in us. For in that epitome and compendious account of them, whereinto they were contracted by the Apostles, and which is usually called the Apostles Creed, there is not any one purely speculative Article, or point of idle notion, and meer belief. But every one is influential upon our practice, and helps on our obedience; as any man, of competent skill and abilities, may discern by running over the particulars.
These two then, (viz.) Knowledge and Practice, or Faith and Obedience, take in the compass, and integrate the nature of our Religion. Obedience is the chief thing, and first in Gods design; and Faith or Knowledge is the great means which God has prescribed us, whereby to compass and effect it. So that Religion in that sense wherein the Scriptures use, and God at the last day will reward it; is the same, as obedience to the Gospel proceeding from a belief of it, or, in Saint Paul's phrase, an Obedient Faith, or a Faith which worketh by Love, Gal. 5.6.
And now let any man, who considers this, bethink himself, and tell me whether the transgression of Gods Laws can ever be called Religion in the Scripture-sense; or whether it be possible for men to evidence themselves to be Religious by their disobedience. For the making us obedient to Gods Laws is the great design, and ruling part of all true and acceptable Religion; and the belief and profession of Gods Truth is an exercise and instance of it that avails us only so far, as it concurs to, and effects this Religion of Obedience. So that Religion is not preserved, but lost by breach of Duty; it is never strengthned by disobedient and sinfull means, but is alwayes wasted and destroyed by them.
Let no man therefore ever dare to make Religion a cover for unlawfull Lusts; or dream of protecting it from sufferings and persecutions this way. For God will by no means endure such gross mockery and hypocritical pretensions, as for men to feign piety in the breach of Duty; but if they wickedly transgress his Laws, and continue impenitently to disobey him, let their Forms and Professions of Religion be what they will, he will take severe and endless vengeance on them for their impious and irreligious disobedience. If they are scandalized at the Cross, that is, if they fall off from religious and obedient walking into irreligious transgressions, to prevent those crosses that in persecuting times are annexed to a religious practice and profession; they are scandalized, or eMat. 11.6.offended in him. The Cross is to them a f1 Pet. 2.8. Galat. 5.11.stumbling-block, and a rock of offence, it makes them trip, and turn out of their duty; because they will disown their Lord, and break all his Laws rather than undergo it. And this is a most provoking sin, and subjects men to a most dreadful punishment. For as God will abundantly recompence any losses which befall us through the exercise of an obedient Religion, and a pious conscience; so will he also inflict such torments, as infinitely surpass all those light and present advantages, which we may at any time promise our selves from our politick disobedience. For whosoever, by sinfull means, will seek in perillous and persecuting times, such as those were, to save his life in this world; he shall certainly lose it for ever in the next world: but whosoever shall lay down his life for Christs sake (in taking up that cross which is laid upon a Christian profession, and a Christian practice) that same man shall save and encrease it eternally, Luk. 9.23, 24. So that no dangers in obedience, can ever render it secure for any man to disobey. But that which God indispensably exacts of us in perillous cases is this. Fear not them which kill the body, but, after that is done, have nothing more to fright you with, being utterly unable to kill, or so much as touch the soul; but fear him who exacts obedience of you even at such times as your bodies are like to perish for it, for he, after he hath killed the body, which is all that they can do, is able eternally to destroy both body and soul in hell, Mat. 10.28.
No dangers then can make obedience cease to be our Duty, nor any sufferings make it cease to be our Interest: So that neither Religion, nor Prudence will ever allow of sinfull means; but every Religious, yea, every wise man must take up the Cross, and patiently bear any sufferings that come upon him for Religion, rather than use any breach of duty, or unlawfull wayes, either to prevent, or remove it.
And this the Saints of God and Religious men alwayes did. For no dangers or hazards, no pains or sufferings in obedience could ever draw them to seek for shelter by disobeying. David was tryed with hazards and persecutions of all sorts, but neither sense of present, nor fears of future evils could ever chase him from his duty, or make him seek relief from iniquity and sin. He could not be forced upon it by the most apparent dangers even of the most affecting loss, the loss of life it self. The wicked, saith he, have laid a snare for me, yet I erred not from thy Precepts. My soul is continually in my hand ready to be snatched out of it, yet do I not forget thy Law, Psal. 119.109, 110. He was not grieved, or frighted into it, either by the pressure of his pains, or by the number of his persecutors: They had almost consumed me upon earth, but I forsook not thy Commandments, vers. 87. and many now still are my persecutors and enemies, yet do I not decline from thy testimonies, vers. 157.
The Holy Apostles of our Saviour conflicted with more difficulties and distress, persecutions, and sufferings for the Religion and Obedience of their Lord, than any men, I think, ever did, or it may be ever will do. I think, sayes St Paul, that God hath set forth us Apostles last, as it were men appointed to the bloodiest, which is usually the last, scene of all, even to death it self. For we are exposed to slaughter, as men were, in the tragical sports of that time, upon a publick theatre, being made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men. From the first entrance on our office even to this present hour, we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and are buffetted, and have no certain dwelling place, being made as the very filth of the world, and the off-scouring of all things from the first to this day, 1 Cor. 4.9, 11, 13. If any straits could authorize an evil action, or if any pressures could justifie a disobedient escape, sure these would. But they knew too well the nature of their Religion ever to dream of a liberty to sin that they might avoid persecution; and they were too resolutely addicted to it ever to attempt it. For neither the extremity of their sufferings, nor the desperateness of their danger, could ever make them transgress their duty, or go beyond the Laws of their Religion to lessen or prevent them. But they obeyed bravely and entirely, even in the highest strains, even in the most ungratefull instances, even in those matters, wherein, if any where, the malice and violence of their enemies would provoke, or rather force them to disobey. For in the midst of all these pressures, sayes St Paul, being reviled, we bless, being persecuted, we suffer it; being defamed, we do nothing worse than entreat and pray for our defamers, 1 Cor. 4.12, 13. In patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in popular tumults, in manual labours, in all these things, and in the throng and distraction of all our sorrows, we approve our selves as the true obedient Servants, and faithfull Ministers of God; shewing that, not by any selfish, disobedient, politick shifts, but by pureness of conversation, by long-suffering, by kindness, even to our very enemies; in a word, by the most excellent of all gifts, and the Epitome of all Duty, Charity or love unfeigned, 2 Cor. 6.3, 4, 5.
Religion then can never give protection to any disobedience, nor our concern and zeal for God be pleaded with any shew of modesty or reason in vindication of our transgressions of any of his Laws or Precepts. For Religion needs no defence from times of suffering, it can live in them, it is improved by them, nay some of its most glorious parts and eminent instances are never shown in any lustre, but when we fall under them; and where it ought to be defended, the breach of Laws is in no wise a fit instrument for its advancement and protection. For God cannot be honoured, nor Religion advanced by disobedience. Obedience is so essential and super-eminent a part of its Nature, and so preferable to any idle profession or ineffective belief; that to transgress Christian Laws, for the maintenance of an undisturbed liberty, in professing Christian opinions, were not to strengthen and preserve, but dangerously to wound, if not wholly to destroy it. This disobedience to Christian Laws that we may avoid suffering for the profession of Christian Doctrines, is such as the very temper of the Gospel, which is made up in great part of passive Precepts and a suffering Religion, plainly contradicts; such as its Laws and Precepts strictly forbid; such as Christ our Lord and Judg will certainly and most severely punish; and such as the most persecuted religious men could never be provoked or forced into, either by the greatness of their fears, or by the violence of their pains, although the most exquisite that could be invented by the most searching wits and keenest malice in the world.
So that whensoever men sin to avoid suffering, and disobey the Laws of Religion to preserve the profession of it from persecution; it is not Religion, but their Lusts, not their love of God, but their love of their own selves which makes them disobedient. Religion will upon no accounts justifie their transgressions, but utterly condemns them; and unless their repentance prevents it, God at the last Day will endlesly punish and avenge for them.
But as for Religion in that narrow sense wherein some understand it, i. e. the use of religious Ordinances, and the profession and belief of religious Opinions; if men would shew their care and concern to preserve the free liberty and unpersecuted use of that, so as both God and all good men should honour and commend them; let them shew it in a pious and discreet management. Which they will justly be thought to do, if they keep within their own sphere, and use even there no sinful and disobedient means, and are zealous in the first place for the practice and preservation of religious Laws, and next to that for religious Ordinances and Opinions.
1. In shewing their care to preserve the free liberty and unpersecuted use of religious Ordinances and Professions, they must act within their own sphere. We private Christians must not prescribe methods of preserving it to publick Magistrates, or censure their proceedings, and speak irreverently of their persons and administrations, when they determine otherwise than we had thought fitting. We must not, without consent and approbation of Authority, combine in Bodies, and associate in solemn Leagues, Bonds, and Covenants, to be aiding and assisting to each other with our Persons, Armes, and Purses, to protect it against all Opposers. For these are such things as are no part of our business; but God has hedged them in, and entrusted them in other hands. He has delegated that power to Kings and Governours to take care of the common good, and to judge of publick expedience. He has put the sword into the Magistrates hands, and has authorized him, and him only, to have power of life and death, and to decree and establish peace and war. And if any man, without his order, shall take the Sword, and use it against his Brother; he may read his Sentence which is writ in plain words already, They that take the sword, as every man doth when Authority doth not allow or reach it out to him, shall perish by the sword, Matth. 26.52.
These means then, and any others which God has appropriated to the care, and entrusted in the hands of other men, can be no lawful expressions of our care, but an unlawful intruding into anothers Office; a sinful use of what is put out of ours, and committed to an others management. Our exercise and use of them is a proud usurpation, an unpeaceable encroachment, a busie medling in other mens Offices and Affairs, against the plain Precept of studying to be quiet, and to do our own business, 1 Thess. 4.11.
But the endeavours which we are to use, and the means whereby we must try to secure to our selves an unpersecuted freedom in religious Ordinances and Professions; must be such as are within the sphere of private men. We must be upright and exemplary in the practice of it our selves, and press a like exemplariness in the practice of it upon others. By our humble, modest, quiet, peaceable and submissive carriage, we must convince such as are in Power that it deserves protection; and by our affectionate, fervent and importunate gforeign, says Nazianzen of the putting by Julian's designs against the Christians. Orat. 3. adv. Julian.prayers to Gods we must endeavour to have it put into their hearts to protect and preserve it. We must plead its Cause, and represent that truth and goodness which may recommend it; and try to wipe off the aspersions, and rectifie the mistakes of such as plead against it, or think hardly of it. These, and such like means, are the laudable service in this Case, and the proper business of private Christians. And whilst their care is contained within this compass, and they act thus within their own sphere, it is excellent and praise-worthy: they seek to preserve Religion, and their seeking to do it in this way, is it self very pious and religious.
2. In shewing their care to preserve the free and unpersecuted profession of Religion, they must exercise such only of those actions within their own sphere, as are lawful and innocent, but by no means endeavour to maintain it by such as are sinful and disobedient. They must not defend it by lyes and forgeries, by wrath and bitterness, by fierceness and revenge, by slandering and reviling of their Opposers. They must so defend Religion, as not to disobey it; because that is not defending, but betraying it. A free profession is no further desirable than it tends to an upright practice. So that to disobey for it, is to lose all that wherefore we endeavour after it. Truth must never be bought with the loss of innocence; nor must we ever commit any one sinful action to promote a freedom of orthodox and true professions.
3. In evidencing their care in preserving the free and unpersecuted profession of Religion, they must be zealous in the first place for the practice and preservation of religious Laws, and next to that for religious Ordinances and Opinions. St Paul directs us to the great Object of all religious zeal, when he tells us that Christ came into the world to purchase to himself a peculiar people, zealous of good WORKS, Tit. 2.14. Nothing in the world is so warrantable a matter of a mans zeal, as Gods Laws, and mens obedience. For the Laws of Christ's Gospel are that part which he esteems most; he has made them the measure of life or death, the Rule of our eternal absolution or condemnation. And as he accounts of them, so should we too. Our zeal for them must be more warm, and our care more watchful than for any other thing; because God himself is most especially concerned for them, and all men are most highly concerned in them; they being that whereby all men must live or dye eternally. This I will, says St Paul to Titus, that thou affirm constantly, That they which have believed in God may be CAREFVL to maintain GOOD WORKS; these things are good and profitable unto men, Tit. 3.8. So that the practice of religious Laws must be the great point, wherein we are to be zealous and careful in the first place.
Next to which we must take care of those opinions which have a great influence upon, and are the great productive instruments of all obedient practice; such as are all opinions which are either motives or inducements, helps or encouragements to obedience. In which sort of opinions our Religion abounds, there being, as I said, no idle Article in the Christian Creed, but such Doctrins and Declarations concerning God, and Christ, and our selves, and the other world, as are either absolutely necessary, or very helpful to a holy life. All which, according to their several proportions in promoting piety and obedience to Gods Laws, we are to be zealously concerned for in the next place, as we are for that pious obedience which is wrought by them in the first.
But when we have shown our good affection to substantial piety and Religion by a just zeal for obedience, and plainly practical opinions; then may it be very fit for us to shew our zeal for other true Doctrines and Professions likewise. For it is a great honour to God, and an ornament to Religion, that we have it pure and sincere, free from all things that are liable to just exception, and from all mixture of errour and falshood. And it is also a great happiness to men to have orthodox apprehensions in Religion, and to embrace nothing for Gospel truths, but what God has thereby declared to them. But it is a further happiness still, and such whereof men are the most sensible, to be free from the imperious imposition and tyranny of errour; so as neither to be forced upon the impossible belief of that, which in our own minds we see is false, and therefore cannot believe; nor upon the feigned and hypocritical profession of believing a thing, when really we do not believe it; one of which two is mens unhappiness, when their professed Religion falls under persecution. Now both these are severe and rigorous impositions. For the first is utterly impossible to any, so long as it continues a free and impartial, head; as the latter is to any, whilst it remains an honest and obedient, heart. So that all men have very great reason, so far as they can by all innocent and honest ways, to be zealous against them, and to use all the lawful care and caution that possibly they can, to avoid so powerful a motive, as a sharp persecution is, to tempt them to a thing so unreasonable as is the first, and so wicked and sinful, as is the latter.
So long then as men will moderate their zeal for the unpersecuted use of religious Ordinances, and profession of religious Opinions, with this discretion; let them be zealous and concerned for it in God's Name. For it is their Duty so to be; and God will reward, and all good men commend them for it. If they take care that their zeal transport them not beyond their own sphere, that it carry them not against their Duty, and that it be concerned in the first place for Laws and practical opinions; they may allow it after that to spend it self upon other Points which have more of speculative truth, but less of practice. This zeal now is excellent, 'tis truly pious, 'tis religious.
But if they have a zeal without obedience; if for preventing of persecution in the profession of true opinions, they run upon sinful means and undutiful transgressions; their zeal is ungodly, and all their pretended care of Religion is plainly irreligious. For Religion is not beholding to them, but their own lusts; it condemns their disobedient actions, and unless their timely repentance prevent it, God will most severely punish them. So that as for this first pretence for a partial obedience, viz. our allowing our selves in the transgression of some Laws, whilst we obey in others, because those wherein we indulge our selves are necessary to keep off persecution for the sake of Religion; it is a vain, deceitful ground, and will certainly fail any man who relies upon it.