pose, that he consulted not the epistle on this particular occasion; and therefore now I desire him that he would do so, and I am persuaded he will not a second time give countenance to any such apprehension of the then state of the church, as though there were any separation made from it by any of the members thereof, doing or suffering the injury there complained of, about which those differences and contentions arose. I shall not need to go over again the severals of that epistle; one word mentioned by myself, namely, μɛrayάyɛre, he insists on, and informs us, that it implies a separation into other assemblies; which he says, I waved to understand. I confess I did so in this place, and so would he also, if he had once consulted it. The speech of the church of Rome is there to the church of Corinth, in reference to the elders whom they had deposed. The whole sentence is, ὁρῶμεν γὰρ ὅτι ἑνίους ὑμεῖς μεταγάγετε καλῶς πολιτευομένους ἐκ τῆς ἀμέμπτως αὐτοῖς τετιμημένης λειτουργιάς and the words immediately going before are, μakápioi oi προοδοιπορήσαντες πρεσβύτεροι οἵτινες ἔγκαρπον καὶ τελείαν ἔχον τὴν ἀνάλυσιν, οὐ γὰρ εὐλαβοῦνται μὴ τίς αὐτοὺς μεταστήσῃ ἀπὸ τοῦ ἱδρομένου αὐτοῖς τόπου : then follows that ὁρῶμεν δὲ. Our author, I suppose, understands Greek, and so I shall spare my pains of transcribing Mr. Young's Latin translation, or adding one in English of mine own; and if he be pleased to read these words, I think we shall have no more of his μεταγάγετε.

If a fair opportunity call me forth to the farther management of this controversy, I shall not doubt but from that epistle, and some other pieces of undoubted antiquity, as the epistle of the church of Vienna and Lyons, of Smyrna, with some public records of those days, as yet preserved, worthy all of them to be written in letters of gold, to evince that state of the churches of Christ in those days, as will give abundant light to the principles I proceed upon in this whole business.

And thus have I briefly vindicated what was proposed as the precise Scripture notion of schism, against which indeed not any one objection hath been raised, that speaks directly to the thing in hand. Our reverend author being full of warm affections against the Independents, and exercised greatly in disputing the common principles which either

purpose.

they hold, or are supposed so to do; measures every thing that is spoken by his apprehension of those differences, wherein as he thinks their concernment doth lie: had it not been for some such prejudice (for I am unwilling to ascribe it to more blameable principles), it would have been almost impossible that he should have once imagined that he had made the least attempt towards the eversion of what I had asserted; much less that he had made good the title of his book, though he scarce forgets it, or any thing concerning it but its proof, in any one whole leaf of his treatise. It remains then that the nature and notion of schism, as revealed and described in the Scripture, was rightly fixed in my former discourse; and I must assure this reverend author, that I am not affrighted from the embracing and maintaining of it, with those scarecrows of new light, singularity, and the like, which he is pleased frequently to set up to that The discourse that ensues in our author concerning a parity of reason, to prove that if that be schism, then much more is separation so, shall afterward, if need be, be considered, when I proceed to shew what yet farther may be granted without the least prejudice of truth, though none can necessitate me to recede from the precise notion of the name and thing delivered in the Scripture. I confess I cannot but marvel, that any man undertaking the examination of that treatise, and expressing so much indignation at the thoughts of my discourse that lieth in this business, should so slightly pass over that, whereon he knew that I laid the great weight of the whole. Hath he so much as endeavoured to prove, that that place to the Corinthians is not the only place wherein there is in the Scripture any mention of schism in an ecclesiastical sense; or that the church of Corinth was not a particular church. Is any thing of importance offered to impair the assertion, that the evil reproved was within the verge of that church, and without separation from it? and do I need any more to make good to the utmost that which I have asserted: but of these things afterward.

In all that follows to the end of this chapter, I meet with nothing of importance that deserves farther notice: that which is spoken is for the most part built upon mistakes; as that when I speak of a member or the members of one par

ticular church, I intend only one single congregation, exclusively to any other acceptation of that expression, in reference to the apprehension of others: that I deny the reformed churches to be true churches, because I deny the church of Rome to be so; and deny the institution of a national church, which yet our author pleads not for. He would have it for granted that because schism consists in a difference among church-members, therefore he that raises such a difference, whether he be a member of that church wherein the difference is raised, or of any other or no (suppose he be a Mahometan or a Jew), is a schismatic: pleads for the old definition of schism, as suitable to the Scripture, after the whole foundation of it is taken away: wrests many of my expressions; as that in particular, in not making the matter of schism to be things relating to the worship of God, to needless discourses about doctrine and discipline, not apprehending what I intended by that expression of the worship of God and I suppose it not advisable to follow him in such extravagancies. The usual aggravations of schism he thought good to reinforce, whether he hoped that I would dispute with him about them I cannot tell. I shall now assure him that I will not, though if I may have his good leave to say so, I lay much more weight on those insisted on by myself, wherein I am encouraged by his approbation of them.

CHAP. V.

THE third chapter of my Treatise consisting in the preventing and removing such objections as the precedent discourse might seem liable and obnoxious unto, is proposed to examination, by our reverend author, in the third chapter of his book; and the objections mentioned undertaken to be managed by him; with what success, some few considerations will evince.

The first objection by me proposed, was taken from the common apprehension of the nature of schism, and the issue of stating it as by me laid down; namely, hence it would

follow that the 'separation of any man or men from a true church, or of one church from others, is not schism.' But now waving for the present the more large consideration of the name and thing, which yet in the process of my discourse I do condescend upon, according to the principle laid down; I say that in the precise signification of the word, and description of the thing as given by the Holy Ghost, this is true: no such separation is in the Scripture so called, or so accounted; whether it may not in a large sense be esteemed as such, I do not dispute, yea, I afterward grant it so far, as to make that concession the bottom and foundation of my whole plea, for the vindication of the reformed churches from that crime. Our reverend author reinforces the objection by sundry instances; as, 1. 'That he hath disproved that sense or precise signification of the word in Scripture;' how well let the reader judge. 2. That supposing that to be the only sense mentioned in that case of the Corinthians, yet may another sense be intimated in Scripture, and deduced by regular and rational consequence.' Perhaps this will not be so easy an undertaking, this being the only place where the name is mentioned, or thing spoken of in an ecclesiastical sense; but when any proof is tendered of what is here affirmed, we shall attend unto it. It is said indeed, that if 'separation in judgment in a church be a schism, much more to separate from a church:' but our 'question is about the precise notion of the word in Scripture, and consequences from thence, not about consequents from the nature of things, concerning which, if our author had been pleased to have staid awhile, he would have found me granting as much as he could well desire. 3. 1 John ii. 19. is sacrificed, ȧuerpiarns ávoλns, and interpreted of schism; where (to make one venture in imitation of our author) all orthodox interpreters, and writers of controversies, expound it of apostacy; neither will the context or arguing of the apostle admit of another exposition. Men's wresting of Scripture to give countenance to inveterate errors is one of their worst concomitants; so then that separation from churches is oftentimes evil is readily granted: of what nature that evil is, with what are the aggravations of it, a judgment is to be made from the pleas and pretences that its circumstances affords: so far as

it proceeds from such dissensions as before were mentioned, so far it proceeds from schism, but in its own nature absolutely considered it is not so.

To render my former assertions the more unquestionably evident, I consider the several accounts given of men's blameable departures from any church or churches mentioned in Scripture, and manifest that none of them come under the head of schism. Apostacy, irregularity of walking, and professed sensuality, are the heads whereunto all blameable departures from the churches in the Scripture are referred.

That there are other accounts of this crime, our author doth not assert; he only says, that 'all or some of the places' I produce, as 'instances of a blameable separation from a church, do mind the nature of schism as precedaneous to the separation.' Whatever the matter is, I do not find him. speaking so faintly and with so much caution through his whole discourse as in this place: all or some do it; they mind the nature of schism; they mind it as precedaneous to the separation so the sum of what he aims at in contesting about the exposition of those places of Scripture is this; some of them do mind (I know not how) the nature of schism, which he never once named as precedaneous to separation; therefore the precise notion of schism in the Scripture doth not denote differences and divisions in a church only; 'quod erat demonstrandum.' That I should spend time in debating a consideration so remote from the state of the controversy in hand, I am sure will not be expected by such as understand it.

Page 77. [p. 149.] of my treatise I affirm, 'that for a man to withdraw or withhold himself from the communion external and visible of any church or churches, on that pretension or plea (be it true or otherwise) that the worship, doctrine, or discipline instituted by Christ is corrupted among them, with which corruption he dares not defile himself, is nowhere in the Scripture called schism; nor is that case particularly exemplified, or expressly supposed, whereby a judgment may be made of the fact at large, but we are left, upon the whole matter, to the guidance of such general rules and principles as are given us for that end and purpose.' Such is my meanness of apprehension, that I could not understand