they forthwith muft needs be the inftruments of this great work. Hereupon they framed unto themfelves an assured hope, that upon their preaching out of a peafe-cart all the multitude would have prefently joined unto them, and in amazement of mind have afked them, "Viri fratres, quid agimus ?". whereunto it is likely they would have returned an answer far unlike to that of St. Peter; "Such and fuch are men unworthy "to govern, pluck them down: fuch and fuch are the dear "children of God, let them be advanced." Of two of thefe men it is meet to speak with all commiferation, yet fo that others by their example may receive inftruction, and withal fome light may appear what ftirring affections the difcipline is likely to infpire, if it light upon apt and prepared minds. Now if any man doubt of what fociety they were, or if the reformers difclaim them, pretending that by them they were condemned, let these points be confidered., 1. Whose associates were they be fore their entering into this frantic passion? Whose sermons did they frequent? Whom did they admire? 2. Even when they were entering into it, Whose advice did they require? and, when they were in, Whose approbation? Whom advertised they of their purpose? Whose assistance by prayers did they request? But we deal injuriously with them to lay this to their charge; for they reproved and condemned it. How? did they difclofe it to the Magiftrate, that it might be fupprefsed? or were they rather content to ftand aloof and fee the end of it, and loath to quench the fpirit? No doubt thefe mad practitioners were of their fociety, with whom before, and in the practice of their madness, they had most affinity. Hereof read Dr. Bancroft's book *.

A third inducement may be to diflike of the difcipline, if we confider not only how far the reformers themselves have proceeded, but what others upon their foundations have built. Here come the Brownifts in the first rank, their lineal descendants, who have feized upon a number of frange opinions; whereof although their ancestors, the reformers, were never actually pofsefsed, yet by right and intereft from them derived, the Brownifts and Barrowifts have taken pofsefsion of

* Entitled "A Survey of the pretended holy Difcipline; to which is prefixed a Sermon preached agamfi the Puritans, at St. Paul's Croft, Feb. 9, 1588-9, from the following Text: Dearly beloved, beliere not every Spirit, but try the Spirits whether they be of God, for many fulse Prophets have gone out into the world. 1 John, iv. 1."

Y ROBERT BROWN, a perfon of a good family in Rutlandthire, edu cated at Corpus Chrifti College in Cambridge, was the founder of a fect of Puritans, who took their name from him. He inveighed with the moft bitter acrimony again the Church of England, condemning her government as Antichriftian, her facraments as fuperftitious, and her whole liturgy as a compound of Paganifm and Popery. His own fyftem of religious infiitution was explained by him in a book entitled **A Treatife of Reformation." He wrote feveral tracts in fupport of his opi

R

nions,

them. For if the pofitions of the reformers be true, I cannot fee how the main and general conclufions of Brownism fhould be falfe. For upon thefe two points, as I conceive, they ftand:

1. That because we have no church, they are to sever themfelves from us.

2. That without civil authority they are to erect a church of their own.

And if the former of these be true, the latter I suppose will follow. For if above all things, men be to regard their falvation; and if out of the church there be no falvation, it followeth, that if we have no church, we have no means of falvation and therefore feparation from us in that refpect is both lawful and necefsary. As alfo, that men, fo feparated from the falle and counterfeit church, are to associate themselves unto fome church; not to ours; to the Popish much lefs; therefore to one of their own making. Now the ground of all thefe inferences being this, that in our church there is no means of falvation, is out of the reformers' principles most clearly to be proved. For wherefoever any matter of faith unto falvation necefsary is denied, there can be no means of falvation; but in the Church of England, the difcipline, by them accounted a

nions, and fuftained various perfecutions, having been committed at different times to thirty-two prifons, in fome of which he could not fee his hand at broad-day. Before his removal with his followers to Middleburg in Zealand, he became difgufted with their divifions and disputes; and though, according to Strype, he had gone a farther diftance than any of the Puritans did, he renounced his principles of feparation, being promoted by his relation, Lord Burghley, to a benefice, that of Achurch in Northamptonfire. He is reprefented to have been unamiable in private life: And it is to be lamented that he always pofsefsed a turbulent and unquiet difpofition. He died in a prifon in 1630, in the 80th year of his age, having been fent thither by a juffice of the peace for af faulting a confiable who was executing a warrant against him.

(Strype's Life of Whitgift, B. IV. C. I. and Appendix, No. 45.

Of the Brownists, see Fuller's Church History, B. IX. p. 168, and Mosheim's Eccles. Hist. Vol. IV. p. 98.)

It appears from a passage in Shakelpear that the Brownifts were treated as objects of fatire: “ Policy 1 hate; I had as lief be a Brownist as a "politician." (Twelfth Night, A. III. Sc. II.)- Why now thou "art a good knave, worth a hundred Brownifis." (The Puritan, A. III. Sc. VI.)

? So denominated from HENRY BARROW, a layman, and noted fectary, who fuffered death for publishing seditious books against the Queen and the State. He derived his doctrine principally from Cartwright; maintaining, among other things, that the church of England was not a true church; that her minifters had no lawful calling; and that the ufe of forms of prayer was blafphemous. (Of this man and his opinions, see Sir G. Paule's Life of Whitgift, p. 58.-Kennet's History of England, Vol. II. p. 571.)

matter of faith; and necefsary to falvation, is not only denied, but impugned, and the profefsors thereof opprefsed. Ergo.

Again (but this reafon perhaps is weak), every true church of Chrift acknowledgeth the whole gospel of Chrift; the dif cipline, in their opinion, is a part of the gofpel, and yet by our church refifted. Ergo.

Again the difcipline is efsentially united to the church by which term essentially, they muft mean either an efsential part, or an essential property. Both which ways it must needs be, that where that efsential difcipline is not, neither is there any church. If, therefore, between them and the Brownifts there fhould be appointed a folemn difputation, whereof with us they have been oftentimes fo earnest challengers; it doth not yet appear what other anfwer they could pofsibly frame to thefe and the like arguments, wherewith they might be prefsed, but fairly to deny the conclufion (for all the premifes are their own), or rather ingeniously to reverse their own principles be-. fore laid, whereon fo foul abfurdities have been fo firmly built. What further proofs you can bring out of their high words, magnifying the difcipline, I leave to your better remembrance: but above all points, I am defirous this one thould be strongly inforced against them, because it wringeth them most of all, and is of all others (for ought I fee) the most unanswerable. You may, notwithstanding, fay, that you would be heartily glad thefe their pofitions might fo be falved, as the Brownists might not appear to have ifsued out of their loins; but untilthat be done, they must give us leave to think that they have. caft the feed whereout thefe tares are grown.

Another fort of men there is, which have been content to run on with the reformers for a time, and to make them poor inftruments of their own defigns. These are a fort of godlefs politics, who, perceiving the plot of difcipline to confift of thefe two parts, the overthrow of Epifcopal, and erection of Preibyterial authority, and that this latter can take no place till the former be removed, are content to join with them in the deftructive part of difcipline, bearing them in hand, that in the other also they fhall find them as ready. But when time shall come, it may be they would be as loath to be yoked with that kind of regiment, as now they are willing to be releafed from this. Thefe men's ends in all their actions is rà dev, their pretence and colour reformation. Thofe things, which under this colour they have effected to their own good, are 1. By maintaining a contrary faction, they have kept the clergy aiways in awe, and thereby made them more pliable and willing to buy their peace. 2. By maintaining an opinion of equality among miniiters, they have made way to their own purpoies

a In the latter editions the fentence is, "Thefe men's ends in all their "actions is distraction; their pretence and colour reformation."

for devouring cathedral churches and Bishops' livings. 3. By exclaiming againft abuses in the church, they have carried their own corrupt dealings in the civil ftate more covertly. For fuch is the nature of the multitude, they are not able to apprehend many things at once, fo as being pofsefsed with diflike or liking of any one thing, many other in the mean time may escape them without being perceived. 4. They have fought to difgrace the clergy in entertaining a conceit in men's minds, and confirming it by continual practice, that men of learning, and efpecially of the clergy, which are employed in the chiefeft kind of learning, are not to be admitted, or fparingly admitted, to matters of flate; contrary to the practice of all well-governed commonwealths, and of our own till thefe late years.

A third fort of men there is, though not defcended from the reformers, yet in part raifed and greatly ftrengthened by them, namely, the curfed crew of Atheists. This alfo is one of thofe points, which I am defirous you fhould handle most effectually, and strain yourself therein to all points of motion and affection; as in that of the Brownifts, to all ftrength and finews of reafon. This is a fort moft damnable, and yet by the general fufpicion of the world at this day moft common. The caufes of it, which are in the parties themfelves, although you handle in the beginning of the fifth book, yet here again they may be touched; but the occafions of help and furtherance, which by the reformers have been yielded unto them, are, as I conceive, two; senseless preaching, and disgracing of the ministry: for how fhould not men dare to impugn that which neither by force of reafon nor by authority of perfons is maintained: But in the parties themselves thefe two caufes I conceive of Atheism: 1. More abundance of wit than judgment, and of witty than judicious learning; whereby they are more inclined to contradict any thing, than willing to be informed of the truth.They are not therefore men of found learning for the most part, but fmatterers; neither is their kind of difpute fo much by force of argument, as by fcoffing. Which humour of fcoffing and turning matters moft serious into merriment is now become fo common, as we are not to marvel what the prophet means by the seat of scorners, nor what the apoftles by fore-telling of scorners to come; our own age hath verified their fpeech unto us. Which also may be an argument against these fcoffers and Atheists themselves, feeing it hath been fo many ages ago foretold, that fuch men the latter days of the world fhould afford; which could not be done by any other fpirit fave that whereunto things future and prefent are alike. And even for the main question of the refurrection, whereat they ftick fo mightily, was it not plainly foretold, that men fhould in the latter times fay, "Where is the promise of his coming?" Against the creation, the ark, and divers other points, exceptions are faid to be taken; the ground whereof is fuperfluity of wit, without ground of learning and judgment. A fecond cause of Atheism is fen

fuality, which maketh men defirous to remove all stops and impediments of their wicked life: among which because religion is the chiefest, so as neither in this life without shame they can perfift therein, nor (if that be true) without torment in the life to come; they whet their wits to annihilate the joys of heaven, wherein they fee (if any fuch be) they can have no part, and likewise the pains of hell, wherein their portion mult needs be very great. They labour, therefore, not that they may not deferve thofe pains, but that, deferving them, there may be no fuch pains to feize upon them. But what conceit can be imagined more bafe than that man fhould ftrive to perfuade himself even against the fecret inftinct (no doubt) of his own mind, that his foul is as the foul of a beaft, mortal, and corruptible with the body. Againft which barbarous opinion their own Atheism is a very strong argument: For were not the foul a nature feparable from the body, how could it enter into difcourfe of things merely fpiritual, and nothing at all pertaining to the body? Surely the foul were not able to conceive any thing of heaven, not fo much as to difpute against heaven, and against God, if there were not in it fomewhat heavenly, and derived from God.

The laft which have received ftrength and encouragement from the reformers are Papifts; against whom, although they are most bitter enemies, yet unwittingly they have given them great advantage. For what can any enemy rather defire than the breach and difsenfion of thofe which are confederates against him? wherein they are to remember, that if our communion with Papifts in fome few ceremonies do fo much ftrengthen them, as is prétended, how much more doth this divifion and rent among ourfelves, especially seeing it is maintained to be, not in light matters only, but even in matters of faith and falvation. Which over-reaching fpeech of their's, because it is fo open to advantage both for the Barrowift and the Papift, we are to wish and hope for, that they will acknowledge it to have been fpoken rather in heat of affection, than with foundness of judgment; and that through their exceeding love to that creature of difcipline which themfelves have bred, nourished and maintained, their mouth in commendation of her did somewhat overflow.

From hence you may proceed (but the means of connexion I leave to yourfelf) to another difcourfe, which I think very meet to be handled either here or elsewhere at large; the parts whereof may be thefe:

1. That in this caufe between them and us, men are to fever the proper and efsential points and controverfy, from those which are accidental. The moft efsential and proper are these two; overthrow of Episcopal; erection of Presbyterial authority. But in these two points whofoever joineth with them is accounted of their number; whofoever in all other points agreeth with them, yet thinketh the authority of Bishops not unlawful, and of Elders not necefsary, may justly Le fevered from their re