A Forerunner to a Large Review of the Dispute Concerning Infant Baptism, Treatise · Section 19
SECT. XIX. The six imagined errors charged on me by Mr. B. are cleered from his censure.
MR. B. addes a confutation of six of my pretended errors. The first was onelyonly a speech of mine in conference on occasion of Mr. Bs. words in a Sermon which were taken to be a fling at me, and my meaning was this, that the truth I maintained and such like being about a thing of frequent practise, so that by reason of ignorance sin will be committed, were not to be concealed when if it be it is like to be lost for the peace of the Church, that is to prevent differences in opinion and the breaches in communion that by reason thereof do by accident from the corruption of men fall out. Mr. B. opposeth it, as if I meant a man must not suspend any truth of the Scripture, no not though a total breach bringing bloodshed, ruine, &c. follow; yea by his last argument he would insinuate, as if it would follow on my tenet, that every one that doth but think it is a truth that Christ is not God, that there is no God, &c. that he will think himself bound to reveale it to the world, though it turne all to confusion, and after his satyrical veine saith, He that had rather see the Church in this case then his doctrine of Anabaptistry should be concealed, is good for nothing but to make an Anabaptist of that I know. To which I answer, my meaning in that speech of mine was this, that no truth of God that a person is certain is such, and can demonstrate so to be, which concernes the faith or practise of Christians, through concealing of which they shall erre and sin, is to be concealed when a person may perceive by circumstances, that if he conceale it at such a time the contrary will be established, and so truth be lost in the eye of reason, though much trouble follow thereon. And this I resolved heretofore in my book of scandals chap. 4. sect. 20. not that I know of excepted against by any ground on Pauls words, Gal. 2. 5. avouched by many Divines, and without which the Waldenses, Hussites, Protestants will be condemned for opposing the Monkish profession, halfe communion, &c. though warres followed thereon. And our present and former non-conformists will be deeply guilty of sin in opposing the Prelacy, ceremonies, canons, &c, which hath been one cause of the great troubles of the land, which have proved greater then any raised by the Anabaptists. And so far as many prudent men can discerne, many of the Presbyterian Ministers of the land, do as little regard the peace of this land at this time, through discontent that they want the establishment of discipline after their mind, as any Anabaptist heretofore did. And I presume they that sit at the sterne do find the so called Anabaptists as faithful to the publique cause as their opposites.
As for the two next errors about others then Ministers baptizing and administring the Lords Supper, Mr. B. delivers as much himself as the errors pretended affirm in these words page 221. In a case of necessity (as if people were in the Indies) where no Ministers can be had, if any fay that it is better a private man baptize and adminster the Lords Supper then wholly omit them, I will not deny it; and he gives two reasons. But faith he, Mr. T. speaks it in reference to our ordinary case in England. Concerning which I answer, that for baptizing it is true I speak in reference to the case in England; all or most of the Ministers ordained Tertullian. l. de baptismo Laicis jus est baptizandi.being against baptizing of persons of years sprinkled in infancy, and there lying upon them that see infant-baptisme a corruption a necessity to be baptized upon profession of faith, there is a necessity that they be baptized by persons not ordained by laying on of hands of the Presbytery, though I do conceive laying on of hands an ordinance in force from 1 Tim. 5. 23. and 4. 14. Act. 13. 3. Heb. 6. 2. Nor do I like the argument from Numb. 8. 10. to prove that non-preaching elders may lay on hands conceiving no Mosaical ordinance concerning any positive ceremonial rite belonging to the Jewish service is a rule to us now, and therefore do wish there were either by authority or consent of Churches some way of restoring it; till which I see a necessity that persons not ordained yet preachers of the Gospel do baptize. But for administring the Lords Supper though I acknowledge it most fit in many respects it should be received some Minister ordering it, not so much for the consecrating of the Elements (as they call it) by vertue of office, as for the comely and edifying dispensing of it by prayer and exhortation, the ordinance being holy, and to be performed with much reverence, to which none are so fit as a Minister that is set apart for the word and prayer: yet whereas it is claimed as a part of the Ministers office to be Minister of the Sacraments, or (as they call them) seales, and it is aggravated as if it were the sin of Uzzah or Uzziah for any else to do it, and too much I think is ascribed not onelyonly by Papists, but also by others to the power of order, and many require it as a Ministers duty to give them the Sacrament, and if Mr. Bs. doctrine be good in his treatise of the Saints rest page 651. Their being baptized persons or members of the universal Church, is sufficient evidence of their interest to the Supper, till they by heresie or scandal blot that evidence, Ministers cannot deny it them without instustice, and hereupon many perplexities are in Ministers about giving the Lords Supper, and perplexities in receivers from whom they receive it, it being taught that they do justifie their Ministery, and own them as their Ministers, who receive the Lords Supper from them; and it is taught that Ministers have a power to deny some the seals, and this is made a chief part of their government, I have I confesse said and I think it still true, that a company of believers though they have no Minister ordained in case of want of an ordained Minister may some one or more in holy and seemely manner by giving thanks, praying, and declaring the end and use of that rite, and guiding the action, remember the Lords death in breaking bread, and this may be truly a Sacrament as it is called, and acceptable to God if performed with a holy heart. And my chief ground is, because whereas it is made one of the chief disorders in eating the Lords Supper at Corinth, 1 Cor. 11. 20, 21. that in eating every one took his own Supper before other, this could not have happened if they had been wont to receive it from a Minister that distributed to all; and when the Apostle to rectifie the abuse sets down what he received of the Lord, ver. 23. he speaks not a word of a Ministers duty to regulate them, or of Christs appointing it as a part of his office to distribute it, nor gives any direction to that end: but only ver. 33. that they tarry one for another, and not eat till they came together, whereas if it did then belong to the Minister to distribute, the direction should have been given to him not to distribute till they came together. If it be said (as Saravia against Beza) that there were then Presbyters at Corinth, though I conceive it not likely, but the contrary rather manifest from 1 Cor. 1. 7. & 6. 4. & 12. 28. & 14. 29. Yet it serves the more to confirme my opinion, that then it was not counted the Ministers office to deliver the Lords Supper, and that it might be without a Minister ordained, sith they did receive it then, 1 Cor. 10. 16. yet I acknowledge that it is very antient that the Minister called the President did order the Lords Supper, as I gather from Justin Martyrs Apolog. 2. ad Antoninum where he sets down the order of the Christian service in his time. And I am against the altering it because of the antiquity of the use, and the confusion likely to follow on the alteration. But being urged by Mr. B. and others in the manner abovesaid, it is necessary that the point be examined. Mr. B. argues thus, 1. He that administreth the Lords Supper (in breaking the bread, delivering it to all, bidding them take, eate, &c.) must represent the Lord Jesus, who did all this at the institution. But onelyonly Ministers and no private men are persons who should represent the Lord Jesus in Church-administrations. Therefore onelyonly Ministers and no private men may administer the Lords Supper. To which I answer, 1. [in Church-administrations] in the Minor is added which was not in the Major, and so there are four termes, and the argument faulty. 2. But waving that exception, because it may be quickly rectified, I deny the Minor understanding as Mr. B. doth by a Minister a Presbytery ordained by laying on of hands. For to speak of the Ruling elders Churchadministrations, or the preaching of persons not in office (of which anon) It is certain that Deacons have Church-administration, who are not Presbyters; yea it is manifest out of antiquity, that the Deacons did deliver the Elements in the Lords Supper, and Rogers on Article 23. of the Church of England, prop. 3. saith, at Geneva the elder (a lay-man) ministreth the cup ordinarily at the Communion, and therefore Ministers did and might represent Christ at least in that part of Church-administration. But Mr. B. goes about to prove the Minor thus. Ministers onelyonly are called his Embassadors, Stewards of his mysteries, and beseech in his stead, &c. Answer, 1. I think that those mentioned Act. 8. 4, 5. of whom Philip was then onelyonly a Deacon, as many of the Antients hold, not onelyonly Apollos but also Aquila and Priscilla Acts 18. 26. Frumentius that converted the Indians, and the captive maid that brought the Iberians to the faith, were Embassadours of Christ, and Stewards of his mysteries, and might beseech in his stead. 2. But were it granted that Ministers only are called Christs Embassadours, &c. how is it proved that they onelyonly should represent Christs person in breaking the bread, delivering it to all, bidding them take, eate, &c. Doth the Embassage of Christ, dispensing of his mysteries, beseeching in his stead, &c. consist in breaking bread, delivering it, bidding take, eate, &c? If it do, then a non-preaching Minister who doth these things may yet be an Embassadour of Christ, and Steward of his mysteries, then the breaking bread, &c. is a converting ordinance, as Mr. Pryn held, which Mr. Gillespy and Mr. Rutherford deny. For my part I think to be an Embassadour of Christ, and to beseech in his stead, 2 Cor. 5. 20. to be a Steward of the mysteries of God, 1 Cor. 4. 1. are all one as to preach the Gospel, and that the Assembly did misallege the text 1 Cor. 4. 1. as they have done the other, to prove that neither Sacrament may be dispensed by any but a Minister of the word lawfully ordained, Confession of faith chap. 27. sect. 4. For mysteries of God never signifie Sacraments in Scripture, but the Gospel, Ephes. 6. 19. Rom. 16. 25. Chamier panstrat. Cath. tom. 4. l. 1. c. 4. sect. 9. in Scripturis foreign usurpari pro ipso rei sacrae signo profectò imposturaest. But Mr. B. tells me. It is a silly answer of Mr. T. that Sacraments are not called mysteries of God. For the word preached neither is not the mystery it self, but a revealing and exhibiting that mystery, and so are the Sacraments. The one revealeth them to the eare, and the other to the eye. Answ. Sure if the answer be silly, the refutation is no better. For if the word preached be not the mystery it self, then neither is the Sacrament, much lesse the breaking the bread and delivering it, and so to be Steward of the mysteries of God is not to be breaker and deliverer of the bread and wine in the Lords Supper. But however Mr. B. grants that though the word preached be not the mystery it self, yet it is the revealing and exhibiting of the mystery, and that the sense undoubted of 1 Cor. 4. 1. Stewards of the mysteries of God, is revealers of the mystery of God by preaching the word. But then saith Mr. B. the Sacrament revealeth the mystery of God to the eye. I reply, Mr. B. saith so, but not one text of Scripture saith so: nor is it true. The mystery containes not onelyonly the thing done by Christ, but the end, use, reason of it: but this is perceivable onelyonly by the understanding, and the Sacrament abstractively from the word declares it not, no not so much as a picture: and therefore the Sacramental actions of themselves are not revelations of the mystery of Christ, nor ever so called in Scripture: and therefore I conclude, that the text 1 Cor. 4. 1. doth not prove that it is the peculiar office of an ordained Presbyter to Minister the Lords Supper by breaking bread, delivering it to all, bidding take, eat, &c. And though the title of Minister of the Gospel be used in the New Testament, yet the title of Minister of the Sacraments is a made title. 2. Saith Mr. B. If there be no command or example in Scripture of any but Ministers administring the Lords Supper, then no other may do it; But there is no command or example in Scripture of any other doing it; they that say there is, let them shew it. Answ. I find this command, 1 Cor. 11. 28. Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup, and this example 1 Cor. 10. 16, 17. The cup of blessing which we blesse, is it not the Communion of the blood of Christ? the bread which we break, is it not the Communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one body and one bread: for we are all partakers of that one bread. But for command or example that an ordained Presbyter onelyonly should administer the Lords Supper by breaking bread, &c. let them that say there is, shew it. Mr. B. goes on. But by this time you may see whither Mr. T. would reduce the Ministerial office, 1. Others may baptize. 2. And administer the Lords Supper. 3. And then preaching is all or almost all that is left (for he gives them far lesse in government than I do.) And how well he defended the Ministerial privilege of publique preaching in his disputes with Captain Bray is too well known. And what need the people allow so much of their meanes then to maintain Ministers? is not this next to the utter extirpation of them acoording to the doctrine of their learned Martin-Marpriest. Answ. Pastors and Teachers or Presbyters to teach and govern the Church of God I am assured are a Divine institution, and a very merciful gift of Christ, Ephe. 4. 11, 12, 13. 1 Cor. 12. 28. Acts 14. 23. 1 Tim. 3. 1. Tit. 2. 5. to whom people should yield obedience, Heb. 13. 17. and yield maintenance liberally, 1 Cor. 9. 14. Gal. 6. 6. 1 Tim. 5. 17, 18. If any go about to extirpate them let him be accursed as an enemy to Christ and his Church. The railing bookes of Martin-Marpriest, and such like on the one side; and the slanderous books of Mr. Edwards, Mr. Baillee, &c. on the other side I abhorre. Yet I fear more danger to the Ministry by the pragmaticalnesse of the Ministers, especially their meddling with State matters, then either by Martin-Marpriests libels, or my assertions. Would Ministers keep to their studies and the work of Christ in preaching in season and out of season, it would better establish their maintenance and Ministry, then the asserting such a juridical government and power of dispensing the seales (as they are called) as they do. I ascribe as much to the Ministry as the Scripture gives them. Though the office of preaching whether publique or private be proper to the Minister so as to be his constant imployment, and he ought not to be hindred in it, sith he is to be accountable to God for it: yet publique or private preaching I do not annex to ordained Presbyters as a peculiar priviledge to them, so as none else may be said to be sent or called of God to preach in Scripture sense but they. Notwithstanding what Mr. Thomas Hall in his Pulpit guarded, or my quodam scholar and worthy friend Mr. Giles Workman, in his better temper'd book intitled Private men no pulpit men, have said, I still conceive that not onelyonly for trial of expectants, but also upon other occasions persons not ordained may be permitted, yea desired to preach in the pulpits. I find these words in Bilsons Difference between Christian subjection and Antichristian rebellion, part. 4. Strangers also if they were in place were suffered both to teach and blesse in the Church, as well as others that were tied to their cures, by reason that many were sent by the Apostles and by the Holy Ghost to visite the Churches and comfort the Christians as they travailed, and such were according to their knowledge and gift not onelyonly permitted, but also desired to exhort the people, and to give thanks to God in other mens charges, Grot. annot. in Mat. 4. 23. Mansit is mos aliquandiu in Ecclesia Christiana ut concessu Episcoporum Scriptur as interpretarentur non presbyteri tantum aut diaconi, sed & foreign. Vide Eusebium qui Origenis aliorumque exemplo probat foreign spectant quae leguntur 1 Cor. 24. 19. Neverthelesse I am against the courses of many Souldiers and others, who against the denial of able teachers to whom the teaching of the people is committed, love to get into the pulpits of the ablest men to vent their peculiar conceits, and oft-times their pernicious errors, not reguarding to preach to the ignorant the clear truths of faith and a holy life in places where they have no Preacher, but to new converts to pervert them, and withdraw them from their able Teachers, and to disquiet them and their congregations by frivolous exceptions. And for this reason I was unwilling Captain Bray should preach at Bewdley when I was there, and when he would preach and bent himself to assert a liberty to all that had Gods sanctifying spirit, and could expresse their minds, to take upon them to teach publiquely what's the meaning of the Scripture, and what doctrines are true and what false, without any skill in arts, yea though he taught error, I did oppose him. Which if it were not so skilfully and happily done as Mr. B. better acquainted with such mens way might have done, yet me thinks my good will might have been accepted. But I see very little I do is well taken, and therefore see it necessary to wait patiently on God till my words and actions though intended for the furthering of reformation and good of the Ministry, in my Examen part. 2. sect. 7 in my Apology and elsewhere, be better resented and considered.
The fourth and fifth error Mr. B. chargeth me with as dangerous, and the root of my error about baptism, will more fitly come into the body of the dispute, in which I doubt not but I shall shew that both himself and Mr. Blake (however he esteem his writings) do recede from the Scripture and other approved authors in their making the New Covenant common to elect and reprobates, in making reprobates interest in the Covenant a fruit of Christs death, denying the absolute promise to be most fitly called the Covenant of Grace, hold that a person may not be baptized that is not known to belong to the Covenant of Grace, that God actually seals the Covenant of Grace to reprobates, with sundry other mistakes about Sacraments in general, as if their essence were in being seals of the Covenant of Grace, and deriving thence a right to baptism for believers Infants, though the Covenant be conditional and common to all.
The fith error of mine he confutes is about the Magistrates not being an officer of Christ as Mediator. And he excepts against me for saying in pulpit at Bewdley it was of dangerous consequence which he held, though he named not me at any time, and he wrote to me, and I would not dispute it with him. To which I answer, It is true, preaching on Mat. 28. 18. the argument leading me to it, I did oppose that doctrine, that the Magistrate is an officer of Christ the Mediator, and because Mr. Bs. book was in some of my Auditors hands, did reade the passage in his Aphorismes page 273. and said it was of dangerous consequence. And indeed I think it so still. For I think it will follow, that except a Magistrate can shew his commission from Christ, that he is an usurper, and then none is bound to him but to suppresse him, then no infidel is a lawfull Magistrate who denies Christ, and it will be questionable whether this will not extend to a non-churchmember or an excommunicate person, then a Magistrates doing of right to an infidel against a believer, or to one believer against another, as putting him to death, is an act for Christ as Mediator, and if because all power is given to him in heaven and in earth therefore magistracy, so as that all power must be derived from Christ as Mediator, then a Fathers power over his child, but sure that is in a Father by nature, nor do I think it any part of the curse; then ruling Presbyters should do the acts of civil Magistrates as having plain title to rule under Christ. Nor do I think Mr. B. hath answered these arguments or the rest, but that however he proves Magistracy to be from Christs appointment, and to be subordinate to his laws, and accountable to him, and ought to act for him, yet not that the commission of every lawful Magistrate is from him as Mediator. I think it will follow if Mr. Bs. position be true, that supposing Christ had not been Mediator, there had been no lawfull Magistrate, and that Dominium fundatur in gratia, which was heretofore denied. And sith Christ is heir of all things, and believers onelyonly are Christs, and all theirs, 1 Cor. 3. 22, 23. it would be considered whether by parity of reason the Saints might not intitle themselves to all power, and all mens estates, which was charged on Anabaptists at Munster. But I find I digresse, and therefore stop till more liberty draw me to a fuller handling of it.