fcience just as they do. And if it was not according to the wifdom of Chrift, who was and is King of Kings, by outward force to constrain others to believe him or receive him, as being a thing inconfiftent with the nature of his miniftry and spiritual government, do not they grofly offend him, who will be needs wifer than he, and think to force men against their perfuafion to conform to their doctrine and worship? The word of the Lordfaid, Not by power and by might, but by the Spirit of the Lord, Zech. iv. 6. But thefe fay, Not by the Spirit of the Lord, but by might and carnal power. The apostle faith plainly, We wrestle not with flesh 2 Cor. :c. and blood; and the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but fpiritual: but thefe men will needs wrestle with flesh and blood, when they cannot prevail with the Spirit and the understanding; and not having spiritual weapons, go about with carnal weapons to establish Chrift's kingdom, which they can never do: and therefore when the matter is well fifted, it is found to be more out of love to felf, and from a principle of pride in man to have all others to bow to him, than from the love of God. Chrift indeed takes another method; for Pfal. 110. he faith, He will make his people a willing people in the day of his power; but thefe men labour against mens wills and confciences, not by Christ's power, but by the outward fword, to make men the people of Chrift, which they never can do, as fhall hereafter be fhewn.

3.

But Thirdly, Chrift fully and plainly declareth to us his fenfe in this matter in the parable of the tares, Mat. xiii. of which we have himself the interpreter, ver. 38, 39, 40, 42. where he expounds them to be the children of the wicked one, and yet he will not have the fervants to meddle with them, left they pull up the wheat therewith. Now it cannot be denied but bereticks are here included; and although these fervants faw the tares,

and

1

and had a certain difcerning of them; yet Chrift would not they fhould meddle, left they fhould hurt the wheat: thereby intimating, that that capacity in man to be mistaken, ought to be a bridle upon him, to make him wary in fuch matters; and therefore, to prevent this hurt, he gives a positive prohibition, But he faid, Nay, ver. 29. So that they who will notwithstanding be pulling up that which they judge is tares, do openly declare, that they make no fcruple to break the commands of Chrift. Miferable is that evafion which fome of our adverfaries use here, in alledging thefe tares are meant of hypocrites, and not of hereticks! But how to evince that, feeing hereticks, as well as hypocrites, are children of the wicked one, they have not any thing but their own bare affirmation, which is therefore justly rejected.

If they fay, Because bypocrites cannot be difcerned, Object. but fo may bereticks;

This is both falfe, and a begging of the quef- Anfw. tion. For those that have a spiritual difcerning, can difcern both hypocrites and bereticks; and those that want it, cannot certainly discern either.. Seeing the question will arife, Whether that is a herefy which the magiftrate faith is fo? and feeing it is both poffible, and confeffed by all to have often fallen out, that fome magiftrates have judged that berefy which was not, punishing men accordingly for truth, instead of error; there can be no argument drawn from the obvioufnefs or evidence of herefy, unless we should conclude herefy could never be mistaken for truth, nor truth for herefy; whereof experience fhews daily the contrary, even among Chriftians. But neither is this fhift applicable to this place; for the fervants did difcern the tares, and yet were liable to hurt the wheat, if they had offered to pull them up.

§. III. But they object against this liberty of con- Object. fcience, Deut. xiii. 5. where falfe prophets are appointed

to

Anfw.

to be put to death; and accordingly they give example thereof.

The cafe no way holds parallel; thofe particular commands to the Jews, and practices following upon them, are not a rule for Chriftians; else we might by the fame rule fay, It were lawful for us to borrow of our neighbours their goods, and fo carry them away, because the Jews did fo by God's command; or that it is lawful for Chriftians to invade their neighbours kingdoms, and cut them all off without mercy, because the Jews did fo to the Canaanites, by the command of God.

Object. If they urge, That these commands ought to ftand, except they be repealed in the gofpel;

Anfw.

I fay, The precepts and practices of Chrift and his apostles mentioned are a fufficient repeal: for if we fhould plead, that every command given to the Jews is binding upon us, except there be a particular repeal; then would it follow, that becaufe it was lawful for the Jews, if any man killed one, for the nearest kindred presently to kill the murderer, without any order of law, it were lawful for us to do fo likewife. And doth not this command of Deut. xiii. 9. openly order him who is enticed by another to forfake the Lord, tho' it were his brother, his fon, his daughter, or his wife, prefently to kill him or her? Thou fshalt furely kill him, thy band fhall be first upon him, to put him to death. If this command were to be followed, there needed neither inquifition nor magiftrate to do the business; and yet there is no reafon why they should shuffle by this part, and not the other; yea, to argue this way from the practice among the Jews, were to overturn the very gofpel, and to fet up again the carnal ordinances among the Jews, to pull down the spiritual ones of the gofpel. Indeed we can far better argue from the analogy betwixt the figurative and carnal state of the Jews, and the real and Spiritual one under the gofpel; that as Mofes delivered

delivered the Jews out of outward Egypt, by an outward force, and established them in an outward kingdom, by deftroying their outward enemies for them; fo Chrift, not by overcoming outwardly, and killing others, but by fuffering and being killed, doth deliver bis chofen ones, the inward Jews, out of mystical Egypt, destroying their Spiritual enemies before them, and establishing among them his fpiritual kingdom, which is not of this world. And as fuch as departed from the fellowship of outward Ifrael were to be cut off by the outward fword, fo thofe that departed from the inward Ifrael are to be cut off by the fword of the Spirit: For it anfwers very well, That as the Jews were to cut off their enemies outwardly, in order to eftablifh their kingdom and outward worship, fo they were to uphold it the fame way: but as the kingdom and gofpel of Chrift was not to be established or propagated by cutting off or destroying the Gentiles, but by perfuading them, fo neither is it to be upheld otherwife.

But Secondly, They urge, Rom. xiii. where the ma- Object. giftrate is faid not to bear the fword in vain, because be is the minister of God, to execute wrath upon fuch as do evil. But berefy, fay they, is evil. Ergo.

But fo is hypocrify alfo; yet they confefs he Answ. ought not to punish that. Therefore this mult be understood of moral evils, relative to affairs betwixt man and man, not of matters of judgment or worship; or elfe what great abfurdities would follow, confidering that Paul wrote here to the church of Rome, which was under the government of Nero, an impious heathen, and perfecutor of the church? Now if a power to punish in point of berefy be here included, it will neceffarily follow, that Nero had this power; yea, and that he had it of God; for because the power was of God, therefore the apoftle urges their obedience. But can there be any thing more abfurd, than to fay that Nero had power to judge in fuch cafes? Surely if Chriftian magistrates be not to punish for hypo

Object.

Anfw.

Object.

crify, because they cannot outwardly difcern it; far lefs could Nero punish any body for herefy, which he was uncapable to difcern. And if Nero had not power to judge or punish in point of berefy, then nothing can be urged from this place; fince all that is faid here, is fpoken as applicable to Nero, with a particular relation to whom it was written. And if Nero had fuch a power, furely he was to exercife it according to his judgment and confcience, and in doing thereof he was not to be blamed; which was enough to justify him in his perfecuting of the apoftles, and murdering the Christians.

Thirdly, They object that faying of the apoftle to the Galatians, v. 12. I would they were even cut off which trouble you.

But how this imports any more than a cutting off from the church, is not, nor can be fhewn. Beza upon the place, faith, We cannot understand that otherwife than of excommunication, fuch as was that of the incestuous Corinthian. And indeed it is madness to fuppofe it otherwife; for Paul would not have these cut off otherwife than he did Hymenæus and Philetus, who were blafphemers; which was by giving them over to Satan, not by cutting off their beads.

The fame way may be answered that other argument, drawn from Rev. ii. 20. where the church of Thyatira is reproved for fuffering the woman Jezebel which can be no other ways understood, than that they did not excommunicate her, or cut her off by a church cenfure. For as to corporal punishment, it is known that at that time the Chritians had not power to punish hereticks so, if they had had a mind to it.

Fourthly, They alledge, that berefies are numbered among the works of the flesh, Gal. v. 20. Ergo, &c.

Anfw. That magiftrates have power to punish all the works of the flesh is denied, and not yet proved.