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Some Obfervations upon the Original Conftitu tion of the Chriftian Church.

In a letter to the author of the book bearing that title.

[First published in the year 1730.]

Stand ye in the ways, and fee, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find reft for your fouls: but they faid, We will not walk therein, Jer. vi. 16.

Set thee up way-marks, make thee high heaps: fet thine heart toward the high-way, even the way which thou wenteft: turn again, O virgin of Ifrael, turn again to thefe thy cities. Jer. xxxi. 21.

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SIR,

Have feen your performance, wherein I find you take fome notice of the explication of my propofition. And it being now more than a year fince the principles maintained in that explication were fome way impugned in the defence of national churches, and further defended in my anfwer, which ftands to this day without any return, I expected that fome notice would have been taken by you of what I offer in that anfwer; as also of my fpeech before the commiffion, publifhed fome months before your book; especially confidering your objections are monly obviated in thefe papers of mine: but feeing you have not meddled with them, perhaps because you have not seen them, I defire you will do me the juftice to confider them; and when you have offered fomething in the confutation of them, I fhall either receive light, or know how to defend my principles, without being put to the trouble of anfwering objections that stand fufficiently anfwered already, and must be held as answered, till fuch time as you, or fome other, fhew the infufficiency of the answers.

In the mean time I prefume to offer you some obfervations of mine upon your performance. As,

OBSERVATION I

I find you ftill upon the old tract of the contenders for claffical prefbytery against the Independents: and as I always thought, they difcovered another fpirit in this dispute, than in fome other controverfies wherein they have been en. gaged; fo they have caft you a copy in several things, where. in I humbly judge it was not your duty to follow them. As,

1. It was always their way, to fly to human authority when they came to the pinch, in a queftion which is only to be decided by the word of God, and to boaft exceedingly in that authority, and almost anathematise those who take upon them to differ from fo many, fo learned, fo godly men, for pretending to be ftraitened where they were not ftraitened, and to fee what they could not fee. You follow them exact ly in this; and fo do you likewife in having recourfe to com mentators, when you cannot otherwise inftruct your fenfe of a text; as if the fenfe of fcripture were to be found out by plurality of voices among thofe commentators. Yea, I find you sometimes fain to use the authority of Dr Owen. But if his authority be a good argument in fome cafes, why not in others alfo? and if his authority be not a fufficient argument to convince yourself, why do you bring it to convince me?

2. It has been the way of these writers, to tell ftories of the divifions among the Independents, and of the things that befel apoftates from the congregational way, and of the fectaries, and charge them all upon congregational principles as the cause; and herein they also copied after the Papifts. But though this way of doing might pafs near an hundred years ago; yet the stories of thefe vile writers, Edwards and Bastwick, come up again now with vast disadvantage, after they have been confuted, for fo long a tract of time, by the congrega. tional churches in England, ftanding monuments of the falle hood of their charges, and of the vanity of their lying pro. phecies. Their vile ftories and calumnies put me in mind of the methods wherein Chriftianity was oppofed, when it came abroad in the world: and your innuendo about filly women, when you would apply the Apostle's prophecy, that was evidently fulfilled in the Popish church, unto Independents, is very like what the Heathens faid fometimes against Chri

ftians, who, they alledged, " gathered a company of the very dregs and refuse of the people, and filly credulous women, "who, by the weakness of their fex, are easily impofed upon, and combined into a wicked confederacy."

3. There was never a greater application of metaphyfics unto scripture texts, to darken and perplex them, than that which has been made by the writers for claffical prefbytery against the Independents; and you would ape them in this alfo. I muft fay, you do it in a very diverting manner on 1 Cor. xiv, 23. 24. "If therefore the whole church be come " together into one place," &c. when you tell, this must be understood in a diftributive fense; and that their prophefying, and one coming in that believed not, is to be taken for their doing this in their diftinct congregational meetings. Men of a very metaphyfical genius have been engaged in this contro- verly; and, as I fee by your book, that you learned fome school-terms; fo your reafonings upon the words if and all, in that text, upon which you make this exquifite diftinction, do convince me, that, if you had but a little more accefs to converfe in a certain learned place, you might be inrolled among the writers for claffical prefbytery against Independ ents. I must also say this for you, that you know where to ufe your diftinctions; for where you imagine any shadow of fcripture for you, there must be no distinction.

4. You likewife follow the example of these writers, in the intolerable confidence which they exprefs in an argument, they fometimes ufe, when fcripture fails them, viz. That it would be an imputation too injurious on Chrift and his apofiles, to fuppofe, that they ordered otherwise than according to the Prefbyterian scheme. These writers, and you after them, put on an air of infallibility, and thereupon freely use all manner of reflections on the Independents, while, at the fame time, you take the least infinuation of a reflection from an Independent, as a thing altogether intolerable. You injure not an Independent, when you tell him, as confidently as the Pope can tell Proteftants, that he is in a dangerous ertor and a delufion; that he is void of fenfe and candor; that he is a child, or a Jefuite, a fool, or a rogue; But if an Inde pendent fhould be fo bold as to defire more fenfe, or more candor in your arguings, or affirm with confidence, that he is in the right, and you in the wrong; then, as if you were the only men that had right to judge, not only for yourfelves, but for all others, you pronounce the Independent too arro gant, too uncharitable, and what not. You may fay what VOL. I,

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you please, without proof, make conjectures, lay down fuppofitions, and explain fcriptures by them, and make what inferences you will from fcriptures, and the Independent must receive all for undoubted truth; but he muft not open his lips without the ftricteft demonstration.

I know that no difpute of this kind can be carried on by fallible men, and fubject to paffions, without manifold difcoveries of human frailty, which each of the parties in their turn will not fail to fpy out very narrowly, and aggravate to the utmoft, while they overlook what is amifs about themfelves, or put the best conftruction upon it; but feeing we are liable to mistakes, and wrong biaffes, an air of infallibility and contempt of the understandings of them that differ from us, as to the ftrength of our inferences, upon fuch a question as this is, very ill becomes us, at least it ill becomes Proteftants. And if it were given to you and me " to lay "afide all malice, and all guile, and all hypocrifies and en "vies, and all evil fpeakings; and as new born babes to de"fire the fincere milk of the word, not following a multitude "to do evil," nor "leaning to our own understanding, but "trufting in the Lord with all our heart," and giving up ourfelves as weaned children to the conduct of his word, I am perfuaded we would either foon come to be of one mind in this matter, or "forbear one another in love."

Your book has confirmed me in an opinion that I have for fome time entertained. I was of opinion, that it is not meet to manage the caufe of claffical and national prefbytery against the Episcopalians and Independents both in one and the fame book. And when I fay I am confirmed in this by read ing your books, I intend no reflection on your ability for dispute for, I am perfuaded, the ableft defender of prefby. tery on earth would find himself hard put to it in a conflict with both these adversaries at once; even as a Prelatift would be in a wretched condition in an engagement with Papifts and Anti prelatifts at the fame time. It is far the wifer course to have one of these parties for a fecond, when you would fight with the other. And I am not furprised at your apology for your temper, which is owing to your fituation betwixt two fuch mi ferable comforters. The Epifcopalian was able to give you fome comfort against the Independent, by his unity and order and catholic uniformity; for which he is obliged to his friend

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the Papift; and the Independent could afford you fome comfort against the Epifcopalian, by that very thing which you reckon his grand mistake; and when the Epifcopalian vexed you with the antiquity of that saying, "One bishop and one "church," the Independent could have comforted you against him exceedingly, with that ancient word of his, " One "church and one altar." But then it might be inquired, what becomes of claffical prefbytery? and I confefs that is indeed the question. But I am fure the greatest Prefbyterian writers against Epifcopacy have comforted themselves much with this independent cordial: and what Prefbyterian writer is it, that has not taken fome comfort this way against the Epifcopalians, especially on the state of things in the three first centuries? You yourself, that complain of both these comforters, are yet obliged to take fome comfort from them; and while you are warmly engaged with one of them, you are glad to have some respite from the other. If I be mistaken in this, you will correct me; but I will give you fome instances. As,

1. When you write against the Epifcopalians, you fhew a warm zeal for the word of God, and the pattern expressly laid down there, in oppofition to what crept in afterward, with the fairest shew of wisdom. But when you write against the Independents, you are for fome things that your wildom judges moft neceffary unto decency and order, that do not appear in the first formation of churches by the apostles; and these are fuch things as ecclefiaftic courts meeting in the name and authority of Jefus Chrift. And it is your judg⚫ ment, that the rulers of the churches are authorised to determine the number of judicatures in any kingdom where Chriflianity is univerfally profeffed, when they are to be divided or fub-divided, according to the different circumftances of churches and places; and this by virtue of the apoftolical direction, "That all things fhould be done decently and in or"der," or according as they find the exigencies and edification of the whole body may be beft advanced. Thus, while you will not fuffer the Epifcopalians, for decency and order, to fet one church officer over a prefbytery and diocefe, for the edification of the whole, you yourself, for decency and order, eftablifh three church courts, for which you have as little fcripture warrant as he has for his officer, even kirk seffions, provincial and national fynods, p. 213. 258. 259. 260. And the thing you drive at in this, even the adapti g of the government of the church to the conftitutions of the king

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