LITMIR.BIZ

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nation. Thus when K. Henry threw off the popish tyranny, he would not destroy and put an end to the exercise of that unjust power, but only transferred it to himself, and exercised it with great severity. The same unjust dominion over the consciences of men was again exercised in the reign of Elizabeth; who (tho’ otherwise a wise princess) yet being of an high and arbitrary temper, pressed uniformity with violence; and found bishops enough, Parker, Aylmer, Whitgift and others, to cherish that temper, and promote such measures. Silencings, deprivations, imprisonments, fines &c. upon the account of religion, were some of the powerful reasonings of those times. The cries of innocent prisoners, widowed wives, and starving children, made no impression on their hearts: piety and learning with them were void of merit: Refusal of subscriptions, and Non-conformity, were crimes never to be forgiven. At the instigation of that persecuting prelate Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury, the High Commission Court was established; which had a near resemblance to the Court of Inquisition (a fine invention to promote uniformity): Which by the cruelties practiced in it in the two following reigns, was render’d the abhorrence of the nation; so that it was dissolved by parliament, with a clause, that no such court should be erected for the future. A creature framed to promote the wretched designs of such persecutors, was her weak successor James the First, who gave the Puritans to understand that if they did not conform, he would either hurry them out of the kingdom, or else do worse. The bishops supported by such an inspired king, according to Whitgift’s impious and sordid flattery, pursued the maxim to accomplish uniformity by persecution. The grievous severities and numerous violences exercised on Non-conformists in that and the next reign, under that tyrannical prelate Laud (said in parliament by Sir Harbottle Grimstone, to be the great and common enemy of all goodness and good men), are well known by all truly acquainted with the history of those times: As well as the cruel injustice exercised after the Restoration on great numbers of as good subjects as any in the nation; meerly because they could not come up to this uniformity pleaded for, and enquired according to their measure of knowledge after the truth, and desired to worship GOD according to their consciences: until the late great deliverer (William the IIId. of happy memory) of the British nation from popery and slavery, freed those miserable sufferers (noble confessors for the truth) from a yoke of bondage laid upon them, and gave them a law for the security of their Christian liberty; this right of private judgment I have been pleading for. And that this has promoted peace in the state, experience since has proved; as well as former experience made it most evident, that the incroachments upon this right of private judgment, by such legal establishments, have been exceeding prejudicial to the peace of the state: It being impossible but that such methods should cause and perpetuate schisms and divisions of the church, and disturb and disquiet the state; since the wrath of man cannot work the righteousness of GOD; and since civil punishments have no tendency to convince the conscience, but only to inflame the passions against the advisers and inflicters of them. And as history gives us so dreadful an account of the melancholy and tragical effects of this practice, one would think, that no people who have any regard for the peace of the flock of CHRIST, who know the worth of liberty, would be fond of such legal establishments, or any such methods as encroach upon Christian liberty, the most valuable of all our rights.

      Thus I think I have fully answered all your objections against my second corollary. I therefore proceed to a third.

      III. That the civil authority ought to protect all their subjects in the enjoyment of this right of private judgment in matters of religion, and the liberty of worshipping GOD according to their consciences. That being the end of civil government (as we have seen) viz. the greater security of enjoyment of what belongs to every one, and this right of private judgment, and worshipping GOD according to their consciences, being the natural and unalienable right of every man, what men by entering into civil society neither did, nor could give up into the hands of the community; it is but a just consequence, that they are to be protected in the enjoyment of this right as well as any other. A worshipping assembly of Christians have surely as much right to be protected from molestation in their worship, as the inhabitants of a town assembled to consult their civil interests from disturbance &c. This right I am speaking of, is the most valuable right, of which every one ought to be most tender, of universal and equal concernment to all; and security and protection in the enjoyment of it the just expectation of every individual. And the civil magistrate in endeavouring and doing this, most truly comes up to the character of a nursing father to the church of CHRIST. If this had been protected as it ought to have been, what infinite mischief to the Christian church had been prevented? From the want of a due care of this, the clergy through pride and ambition assumed the power of prescribing to, imposing on and domineering over the consciences of men; civil rulers for their own private ends helping it forward; which went on ’till it produced the most detestable monster the earth ever had upon it, the pope, who has deluged the earth with the blood of Christians. This being the true spirit of popery, to impose their determinations on all within their power by any methods which may appear most effectual: and those civil magistrates that suffered and helped that beast to invade this right, did therein commit fornication with her, and give her their strength and power; and so instead of proving fathers to their people, proved the cursed butchers of them. It has been by asserting and using this right, that any of the nations who have been drunk with the Wine of her Fornication, have come out from her Abominations: and would the civil magistrates of those nations, who at this day worship the beast, but protect their subjects in this natural right of every one’s judging for himself in matters of religion, according to that alone rule the Bible; that settled darkness of ignorance, error & idolatry, which now involves them, would vanish as the darkness of the night does by the rising of the sun. How unspeakable would the advantages be, arising from the protection of this right, did they reach no further than to the estates, bodies, and lives of men?

      All reformations are built on this single principle I have been pleading for, from which we should never depart: yet it must be owned and deserves to be lamented, that the reformed have too much departed from this principle upon which they at first set up; whence it has come to pass that reformations in one place and another have not been more perfect. For the Prince of Darkness has always found means this way to make a stand against the most vigorous efforts; and if any advantages have been gained in any point, to secure a safe retreat, by infatuating men with that strange sort of pride, whereby they assume to themselves only, but allow to none else, a power of domineering over the consciences of others. Religion will certainly lie under oppression if this unjust authority be transferred, to decrees of councils, convocations, injunctions of civil magistrates, or from one man or any order of men to another; as it is if we have any other rule of faith and practice in religion, besides the Bible. It were easy to enlarge on the vast advantages and happiness of admitting no other rule or guide but the sacred scriptures only: thence would flow the greatest blessings to mankind, peace and happiness to the world: so that if there be any rights and liberties of men that challenge protection and security therein from the civil magistrate, it is this natural right of private judgment in matters of religion, that the sacred scriptures only may become the rule to all men in all religious matters, as they ought to be. In a word, this is the surest way for the ease and quiet of rulers, as well as peace of the state, the surest way to engage the love and obedience of all the subjects. And if there be divers religious sects in the state, and the one attempts to offend the other, and the magistrate interposes only to keep the peace; it is but a natural consequence to suppose that in such case they all finding themselves equally safe, and protected in their rights by the civil power, they will all be equally obedient. It is the power given to one, to oppress the other, that has occasioned all the disturbances about religion. And should the clergy closely adhere to these principles, instead of their being reproached for pride and ambition, as the sowers of strife and contention and disturbance of the peace of the church of God; they would be honoured for their work’s sake, esteemed for their character, loved as blessings to the world, heard with pleasure, and become successful in their endeavours to recommend the knowledge and practice of Christianity.

      IV. It also follows from the preceeding principles, that every Christian has right to determine for himself what church to join himself to; and every church has right to judge in what manner GOD is to be worshipped by them, and what form of discipline ought to be observed by them, and the right also of electing their own officers.

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